Archive of Our Own ^beta

Robert’s stomach dropped, the old familiar swoop and plummet that was part and parcel for piloting a big fucking mech with rockets attached to its back and feet. A sensation that nevertheless took some getting used to after all that time spent behind a desk, but one he wasn’t about to let slow him down.

Not now. Not after the screech and scream of feedback over his comms, coming a little too close on the heels of that last set of orders from Dispatch, fading down to panicked murmurs as the team tried to piece together the problem.

“Who’s available?” Robert barked over the line, quieting the chatter further. “Deacon? Who do we have?”

Deacon, one of the replacement dispatchers hired on after the destruction wrought by Red Ring the month prior, stammered, his voice dropping before abruptly coming back. Dropped headset? Dropped headset. Robert clenched his jaw against another snap and gave a little more juice to the thrusters.

“U-um, we should have… I mean, Phenomaman should be on his way back with —“

“No time for that,” Robert cut in. “Tell him to rendezvous at Flambae’s last known location.”

“I’m coming too! Fuck this shit.” Prism, with a chorus of agreeing murmurs.

“Negative,” Robert replied. “Stay on assignment.”

“This dipshit sent my boy to fight a rock monster!”

“It was covered in ice! I thought —“

“Well you thought fucking wrong, didn’t you!”

“Enough. Alice, stay on assignment. Deacon, I’m borrowing Phenomaman —“

“—Almost there!”

“—and…fuck, Golem, you available?”

“I am now. En route.”

“Good. Help Phenomaman the second you’re on scene. Phenomaman? Distract that fucking thing while I get Flambae out of there.”

“Affirmative, Robert Robertson.”

A flash of light cut across Robert’s field of vision and he felt some of the tension bleed out of his muscles. Thank fuck for fast response times. Golem would still be a while, but at least Phenomaman could hold his own until then.

“Alright, you ugly sack of shit,” he muttered, altering his trajectory as the monster in question came looming into view. “What did you do to him?”

A quick scan of the immediate area didn’t show him any obvious signs of Flambae. Portions of the bay were iced over, the air churning into a maelstrom of mist outlining the creature’s hulking form, eddies gusting fast and with enough force to bend trees as it swung at the newly arrived hero flying about its head like a particularly determined gnat.

Robert slowed, easing the mech down as gently as he could. Metal strained as the suit fought gravity in an effort to hover, and Robert knew it was only a matter of time before he had to touch down. Astral pulse or no, physics would win out in the end.

“Where…Fuck!” A gout of flame shot out from between two thick plates of ice, cut off as abruptly as it appeared as the floes moved to close the gap. Robert was already angling for it, heart hammering in his chest, muttering “come on, come on, come on.”

No further flame, no indication of any heat whatsoever beneath the surface of the ice, and Robert didn’t even hesitate the moment he reached the point he’d marked before the fire vanished: he landed with a heavy thud and began wailing on the ice, weakening the surface as best he could.

No air, surrounded by water… even if Flambae could generate enough immediate heat to start melting the ice there wasn’t anything to let his flame burn on, nothing to feed it. And with how thick the ice was, he’d run out of air for his fucking lungs long before he breached the surface.

“COME ON!”

Ice cracked, fissures splitting through the plate, and Robert guided the mech’s hands down deeper, applying focused concussive force.

“Scan for life signs,” he barked to his suit’s computer.

“Scanning… Locked.”

“Fuck.”

He’d punched a sizable hole, but Flambae’s body was sinking deeper. There wasn’t enough time to try and force a bigger opening for the suit.

“Well. This is gonna suck.” 

“What’s gonna suck?” Galen.

“Tell Royd I’m about to stress test his fancy insulation.” His fingers moved over the controls, priming the suit to anchor itself in case the ice gave way before he was back.

“Good luck.”

The hatch opened as Robert unbuckled himself, and the first gust of undoubtedly cold air barely penetrated past the suit he wore like a second skin. Good sign, he thought, balancing for a moment at the opening of the mech. Let’s see how it does with freezing water.

“Be right back,” he informed the general chat and, without waiting for a response, plunged into the icy depths.

Clawing his way back to consciousness was a grasping, stuttering process, gained in starts and stops as his senses were assaulted by the unfamiliar feeling of…cold.

Cold.

Had he ever experienced cold before? Never in a true sense, and certainly not so completely. He hadn’t known how all-encompassing the sensation could be, how numbing, how it could rob him of control over the most basic of motor functions. Shuddering, shivering, muscles spasming, and it burned, it fucking burned in his lungs, down his throat, not the comforting sear of alcohol savored on the tongue, not the wildfire heat of true flames. This was a burn sharper, crueler, agonizing with every inhale…

Until it wasn’t.

Until, impossibly…warmth.

A slow ember catching and coaxed, and it hurt, it fucking hurt as it built in his chest and spread to his extremities, but this, at least, was a familiar pain. A welcome pain, chasing away his numbness bit by bit. If he could just kindle it into something more…

“Easy there, Chad.” A voice so close he could feel its rumble in his chest, as familiar as the fire seeking an outlet beneath his skin. “Try not to fry me, huh?”

Flambae forced his eyes open with great effort and blinked, once, twice, three times, trying to make sense of where he was.

Metal, screens, flashing lights and buttons. Another source of warmth, external, pressed so close to his body. The scent of spicy aftershave and sweat, and the flash of a face looking down at him briefly, warm brown eyes and a delicate spread of freckles…

“What the fuck?”

“Gave us a bit of a scare there,” Robert informed him. There was a smile teasing at the corners of his lips for the barest of seconds before they pulled down into a frown. “Hey, what do you remember? Any pain? Confusion?”

Pain? Sure. Confusion? Definitely. But as for what he remembered…

“I’m going to kick Deacon’s ass when I get back.”

Another rumble against his chest, for all he couldn’t hear Robert’s laugh over the whir of the engines. He was gaining awareness in stages: he was in Robert’s mech, Robert was piloting it, and he was pressed against the other man’s own body. Close, very close, his ass planted against the seat between Robert’s legs while his own legs rested with his knees drawn up, his upper body turned toward Robert’s chest. An arm was around him to keep him in place, his head lying against Robert’s shoulder.

He was warming me up.

“He’s been kicking his own ass about it, trust me.” Robert’s voice interrupted his thoughts.

“Not the same.”

“No,” Robert agreed softly. “It isn’t. But his supervisor will handle it.”

Flambae scoffed, then bit back a yawn.

“Try not to fall back asleep, alright? We still need to get you checked out.”

“Check you out,” Flambae muttered, petulant, as he buried his face in Robert’s neck. He felt the other man shiver and felt a brief surge of satisfaction.

“Don’t make promises you can’t keep, Mr. Fire and Flame.”

“What?”

Flambae forced his eyes back open even as every inch of him cried out to fall back asleep.

“Nothing,” Robert replied, and the smile tugging at his lips was definitely more of a smirk. He looked down, right into Flambae’s eyes. “Just be a good boy and do as you’re told for once.”

A different sort of heat seemed to suffuse him then, even as he bit out the first response he could think of.

“Fuck you, Bobby. I can stay awake if I want!”

“Can you?”

“Of course I fucking can!”

“Okay,” Robert replied, nodding. “Sure.”

Flambae narrowed his eyes at him. “I know what you’re doing.”

“Flying you back to base?”

“Being a smart ass.”

“And keeping you warm?”

Flambae scoffed again, pressing his nose against Robert’s neck and smiling as the man shivered again.

“…thank you,” Flambae murmured after a moment. “For finding me.”

“You’re welcome,” Robert replied, his arm tightening around Flambae for a moment.

“Still gonna kick Deacon’s ass, though.”

“Isn’t Prism being angry with him punishment enough?”

“…you make a good point.” He bit back a yawn, shaking his head in an effort not to drift off again.

“Almost back,” Robert assured him. “Let the medics do their thing and then you can sleep for as long as you like.”

“That a promise?”

“It’s a promise.”

“Fucking better be,” Flambae muttered, snuggling closer. “Or yours will be the ass I’m kicking later.” Another rumble, another laugh, and Flambae refused to think of things like comforting and cozy.

“Deal.”