Work Text:
He doesn’t linger.
It’s a soft kiss. A touch of his lips to Stolas’s warm cheek. Kissing his heart shaped face after such a long time, a flutter of emotions erupt in his chest. Gratitude, adoration, admiration, and the fourth thing he is still too weak to voice, but his heart knows well. Feelings that he hopes can be felt even through Stolas’s sleeping form.
It’s a kiss he has stolen several times in the night. A farewell to his sleeping prince. A moment of weakness—now a moment of strength. The strength of his feelings, the strength of their bond, the strength of his promise.
He moves away and a smile comes to him. The corners of his mouth lift with ease. He takes one last look at…
…Stolas’s open eyes.
Blitzø’s face falls.
“Wha?” His voice rasps with tiredness.
Shit. Maybe he didn’t notice?
Stolas stares at him, his white pupils large through his half lidded eyes.
“What…what was that for?” He says through a breath.
Son of a bitch!
A spear to his heart. Panic, shame, and fear… dissolving as quickly as they came. Acceptance comes to him and overpowers them easily. A smile threatens the corners of his mouth once more. A familiar warmth makes itself known once more but instead of burying it down, he lets it be. He’s wasted too much time denying and hiding.
“Just because I wanted to.”
Stolas stares, his eyes quickly searchers through his own with clear disbelief and vulnerability on his face.
And Blitzø feels almost overwhelmed by Stolas’s open beauty. His emotions are loud and clear, making him oh so easy to read. He thinks Stolas deserves the same clarity, the same vulnerability. If no one else, Stolas deserves this.
With the hand still pressed to Stolas’s face, he swipes his thumb across his cheek in a gentle caress. Stolas again doesn’t react, but the tiniest bit of red dusts his cheeks. Blitzø repeats the motion. Again. And again, until he realizes no amount of touches will ever satisfy him.
“You’re beautiful.” He says honestly. Caressing small circles into his cheek, tickling those short feathers that curl on his face.
That gets a reaction.
Annoyance in those red eyes. He still can’t believe how easy it is to see everything now.
“You don’t need to do that.” But he doesn’t move away.
“Do what?”
A spark of hardened emotion settles in his eyes before he gently leans into the hand. Closing his eyes tightly for a brief moment.
“This.”
Blitzø furrows his brows. “I know that.”
He thought he made it clear that he doesn’t need to do anything. He was never obligated to care for Stolas.
He has always wanted to and now…
Now he realizes maybe…just maybe he’s allowed to.
Stolas…laughs.
He laughs. It’s a weak thing but he can still tell it’s supposed to be sarcastic.
“What?” Blitzø barks.
Confusion. More disbelief…anger…wait anger?
“Stolas?”
“Do not do this to me now.” He snaps suddenly. Finally pulling away from his touch.
He tries to sit up but his elbows shake as they try to hold his weight. Despite the renewed fire in his eyes, his body has expended the last of his energy.
Blitzø pushes on Stolas’s chest to lie back down.
“Stolas, please lay the fuck down.”
He is ignored. Stolas leans forward, anger and pain mixing together making the feathers on his head stick out even more.
“No! You please!” There is a hint of something deep and broken in the way his voice shakes when he says the word ‘please.’
“Do you think you can comfort me…pacify me by pretending? Do you think this is funny?!”
Panic swells within him. He searches the last two minutes to see what he could have possibly done wrong. He lifts his arms and waves them in surrender.
“No! I’m not joking?”
Tears.
Blitzø feels like he’s been punched.
Tears swell in those eyes but none fall.
“Stop lying! Just stop! I don’t need your…your pity. Or your…gratitude. Stop pretending!”
“Pretending to do what?!”
“Love me!”
…
Ouch.
He feels his heart break a little at that. That familiar pain and betrayal coming close to making him slip back into old habits. To pull away, to shut him out.
An argument lies on the tip of his tongue. A fire in his throat. A flush rises to face, he breathes in ready to tell him off.
But then he meets his eyes again. He sees it again. That vulnerability, that sorrow deep within and thinks it…familiar.
Flashes of his memories pass by like rain clouds threatening to drown him. Verosika, Fizz, Barbie, Moxxie, Loona…Stolas.
Oh.
Stolas has been open and honest with him…And he doesn’t believe Blitzø to be doing the same. Can do the same.
And why would he?
“It doesn’t mean anything.”
“I’m not letting you!”
Ah…
He deflates completely.
That’s right.
…But even so.
Maybe…even if it’s too late…
He’ll do better.
“Well…I’ll just have to prove to you that I’m serious then.”
Stolas’s eyes widen. Nothing but shock in them now.
Blitzø smiles at him.
Stolas looks like he wants to say something more, to argue, call it bullshit, call him bullshit. But as quick as the fight comes, it leaves just as fast. Maybe it’s the look on Blitzø’s face or that he is actually too tired to argue but…he relaxes. And finally sinks back into the couch.
“And when I do, maybe you can stop being angry at me?” It’s a joke…mostly a joke…okay, half of one.
“I was never angry at you.”
“Could have fooled me.”
“…Anger is not the right word.”
Oh? Oh.
But that conversation is too much for now. It is definitely too much for him.
And Stolas?
He looks at his messy hair, his slightly sunken eyes, and the ever present sorrow.
They’ve been through enough.
“Sorry.”
Stolas lifts his chin at that. His face scrunches and his expressions turn to more annoyance.
He blurts out, “For bringing it up. Everything is crazy as is.”
The expression turns to surprise. Genuine surprise. Stolas nods but doesn’t say anything else.
BOOM!
Blitzø turns his head to look out the window. Some of the fireworks outside get incredibly close. He knows they’re for him and he revels in that for a bit but he swears to Satan if they set his roof on fire... He will throw some very colorful words out his window. Along with maybe some grenades.
He turns himself fully and sits on the floor by the couch, watching the fireworks through the window. Marveling at the colors. Basking in wonderment and joy.
“You did that.”
“They’re for you.”
He snorts. “No, I mean you made that happen.”
Threw it all away to make that happen.
He stomps the guilt that he knows sooner or later will devour him.
Not now.
Stolas still needs him.
Stolas sighs and without missing another beat, “They wouldn’t celebrate if they hadn’t already believed in you.”
Blitzø bites his lip from arguing, instead reveling in the swell of pride he feels from that.
“You always believed in me.”
He is met with silence, an uncomfortably strong urge to turn around almost breaks him but he decides Stolas needs some peace.
They sit in mutual silence. Listening to the loud explosions and watching the flashes of color.
After a while, he does turn around and sees a hand very close to his head lying on the couch. He obsesses over whether or not it was reaching for him before deciding to do something about it…just in case.
He takes Stolas’s hand in his.
Stolas looks down at their joined hands. His eyes are filled with overwhelming sadness but there is something…oh, it’s fondness.
And by Lucifer he is stunning. Put the moon…their moon to shame.
Fuck, his stupid heart skipping a stupid beat.
While he could live in that moment forever, he needs to ask.
“What happens now?”
Despair.
Stolas turns his head to the side as if finally catching on just how much he is spilling himself to Blitzø but keeps his hand in his.
“I need to see my daughter.”
The colors from the fireworks flash on his face—purple, blue, red. Blitzø remembers the last time he saw them, watching the fireworks together. The joy they shared, immense.
A small broken sob.
“I want my owlet back.”
That guilt threatens to drown him tenfold. Blitzø looks off to Loona’s door briefly. He looks back to Stolas, determined.
“How are we going to get to her?
Grief.
A single tear runs down his cheek. He shakes his head.
“I don’t know.” It’s barely a whisper.
Well…fuck that.
“You’ll see her…she’ll be okay.”
Stolas looks at him with such wounded eyes. Fear and sorrow mixing together to make something so broken. And he would set the world on fire if it meant taking this pain away.
“And…You can stay here as long as you need. A-and we’ll figure it out together, I promise. You’ll see her again.”
He doesn’t expect a response. Or even a sign of hope. But to his surprise, Stolas nods.
“Together.”
Fuck if his heart doesn’t swell.
Blitzø squeezes his hand one more time to stop him from doing something stupid or saying something stupid and gets up. Heading towards his beanbag in the corner.
“What are you doing?”
“Uhh…” He points at the chair. “Going to bed?”
Stolas looks down and scrunches up his beak in disgust and it takes everything in him not to close the space and kiss the furrowed lines at his mouth.
“You need something?”
“Would…Will you be comfortable?”
Blitzø snorts. He is not about to explain how sleeping on the floor or a chair isn’t a first for him. “Yeah, I’ll be fine.”
Disappointment. The look on his face is disappointment, but before he can ask again—
“Okay.”
Stolas looks at the chair one more time, before turning on his side, settling with his back facing Blitzø.
Blitzø wants to say something more but lets it be, acknowledging that they’re both in need of rest more than anything.
He takes a blanket off the floor and wraps himself in it, flopping onto the chair. He takes one last look at the fireworks before closing his eyes.
“Goodnight, Stols.”
“…Night Blitzø.”
“Blitzø!”
Blitzø’s eyes shoot open, and he becomes the first person to fall off a bean bag chair.
“What, what? Huh? Where’s the fire? Is the landlord here? Who died?!”
Blitzø blinks a few times in the dark room. Letting his eyes readjust. He sees the time on the microwave clock saying it is a bit past two in the morning.
Stolas is sitting up on the couch wide eyed. His feathers clinging to his face.
Panic settles in Blitzø’s bones.
“Stolas, Stols? Are you alright.”
Those eyes snap to him. Wider and more desperate.
“Come here…please come here?” The fear and sorrow break off in a whimper.
That gets him moving instantly.
He runs and half trips to the couch. Falling to his knees before Stolas.
When they get close enough to touch, Stolas does just that. He wraps his arms around him and pulls him close. An inhuman whine rips from his throat.
“Stolas, please talk to me!”
A broken breath, “B-bad dream.”
Ah. That makes sense.
Even so, Blitzø doesn’t feel that much more relieved. Stolas shakes as he holds him. A distressing amount of what must be tears land on his horns. Damp sweat clings to his skin. From where Blitzø is pressed against, he can hear Stolas’s heart pound fast in his chest.
Blitzø wraps his arms tightly back. Squeezing his eyes and digging his fingers into the feathers of his head. Smoothing down the feathers before repeating the process.
Sobs wreak through Stolas in response.
Blitzø coos and rocks them back and forth on the couch. He says gentle affirmations and reassurances. Anything he could think of to try to soothe him back down from his panic. He even hums at one point. A nothing tune that his mother used to sing from a forgotten memory.
After a long while, Stolas finally settles down. He doesn’t stop his cooing or his touches until a good while after that.
When they break apart, Stolas looks at him with raw vulnerability, biting his lip before he lifts the blanket.
Blitzø stares at the vacant space with worry.
There is nothing he aches for more…But still, he needs to be considerate…or at least some semblance of it.
“Stols, are you sure?”
Stolas nods, eyes puffy from crying.
“Do you want to talk about it?”
“N-no.”
“You want to eat something instead? Or we can watch TV—”
“Shut the fuck up and get in.”
Well, when he asks so nicely.
Blitzø crawls into the sheets, stretching his legs straight to take up the least amount of room.
Stolas puts an arm over him and hugs him close anyway. Not unlike the position they had just been in. His hand right over Blitzø’s pounding heart. His soft chest fluff and warm sweater burn at his back.
He puts his hand over Stolas’s and intertwines their fingers.
“Goodnight, Stols.”
Snores are his response.
He tries not to think too hard about the fact that Stolas easily fell asleep when he had Blitzø in his arms…tries and fails.
“Hey? Stols?”
No response. The only sounds are gentle breathing.
He closes his eyes.
“I’ll take care of you, I swear.”
His thumb caresses the back of Stolas’s hands.
“So you better take good care of my heart alright?”
The last thing he says before joining Stolas in the land of dreams is—
“Because it’s yours now.”