millefolium | ( open smut post )

[ The young man has been serving some of the best martinis anyone has ever tasted. He's polite and quietly interested.

One might realize, eventually, that he does not work here. Maybe sometime after the third drink. ]

[ stephen strange might have lost the watches, the lambo, the excess, but his appreciation for good craftsmanship is a lifelong tendency: he’s been drinking the martinis with subdued relish. when he pushed down at the bar earlier his mind was somewhere far away; now it closes in on the present slowly, aided by the taste of vermouth and the sight—increasingly compelling—of a young man who seems to be keeping stephen’s glass full before he can think to magically top himself up.

when armand drifts by again stephen, terribly at ease, finally can’t help himself. ]

You know, if you’re tired of being on your feet ...

[ a vague flick of his fingertips towards the seat beside him. offhandedly: ]

I doubt you need to ask for a smoke break. [ having successfully clocked that armand isn’t an employee. whatever else stephen is capable of observing, though, has always had its upper limits. ]

[ armand is... out of practice might be an understatement. but experience makes up for it. he's uncertain of which hat he should be wearing for this, it changes from person to person, and this man is hard to read. he'd hoped the drinks would make it easier, but so far there is nothing.

he takes the seat, meeting the man's eyes briefly as he does. shy, almost. ]

I had hoped you'd offer a different seat.

[ his voice is soft, younger-sounding than he looks. he has an european accent, british to the untrained ear, but there are hints there that suggest it's not his first language. ]

[ Izuku gets out of the hospital after Katsuki does. That's often been the way. Even with the stress on Katsuki's heart, Izuku was under watch for longer. Or maybe he's better at listening to doctors' orders (just kidding! he isn't). Either way, he's one of the last of the students released. There are others still injured, pulled back from the brink of death.

He's not allowed to see them, to fret after them, even if he wants to. Kacchan is alive, he knows, and no longer in the hospital. He was also chased out rather than allow him to worry (loudly) all over the place.

Izuku should go home, talk to his mom, something.

Instead, he goes to Katsuki's house. His parents aren't home, which is probably best. Katsuki has barely let Izuku in the door before Izuku's hands are on him, tangled in his shirt as much as his still-numb fingers will allow. ]

You're really here. You're...

[ Alive, he doesn't say. Alive, alive, alive. Izuku been so sure at one point. He doesn't even remember what happened immediately after, but it doesn't matter now. They made it. They couldn't save everyone, but they made it.

He thumps one fist lightly against Katsuki's chest. ]

You scared me, you know!

[ katsuki’s dad has a work dinner tonight, and had only stepped out with his mother because katsuki insisted they didn’t need to jump up his ass every time he winced or coughed. so he’d been cooking when the doorbell rang. thankfully it’s the kind of meal he can simply leave with the stovetop off before making his way to the door.

opening the door should be mundane, a nothing affair, but izuku hasn’t darkened the doorway of the bakugo house in a decade or more. and katsuki doesn’t have time to feel what he’d normally feel at the sight of izuku, so unexpected—the million diffuse and varied emotions izuku always subjects him to are themselves subject to time, urgency, immediacy. his arms come up unthinkingly when izuku staggers against him, one folding immediately around his waist and the other higher so he can dig his fingertips roughly into the shorn moss-soft hair at the nape of izuku’s neck. izuku’s mere presence makes anywhere a battlefield laying in wait, even the dim light of the bakugo doorway, and katsuki’s reflexes act accordingly. my body just moved on its own. ]

Stupid—Izuku. [ not stupid deku. the hero deku was never a fool. ] Where the hell else would I be?

[ his voice, too, operating on its own: every nerve and capillary in his body immediately pulses into adrenaline highs at izuku’s closeness. izuku, out of the hospital; the two of them having won together. objectively these were all inevitable. but izuku in his arms was always the farthest thing from an inevitability. if anything it should be impossible.

he coughs when izuku thumps him and grouses, ] Watch it.

[ but he isn’t letting him go, his face burrowing against the unscarred side of izuku’s head, nuzzling him like a blind dog. his body, again, moving on its own. ]

[ Izuku hears his name — his actual name — from Katsuki's mouth and he swears his heart beats faster. It's so rare to hear it like that, but he thinks he'll never grow tired of it. He was only Deku for years. Sure, he took that name, originally an insult, and made it something else. He doesn't mind being called that now, especially from Katsuki, but hearing his actual given name is something precious.

He wouldn't be able to articulate that just yet. ]

S-sorry!

[ He puts his hand there against Katsuki's chest, gently, palm open. He doesn't have time to contemplate that, though, with Katsuki's arms around him, tight and strong and sure.

They'd made it, somehow.

There is still the world and the aftermath and Izuku's loss of power, but none of it matters right now because they made it. All the things that had come before, all the scars littering their skin just a roadmap to the only place Izuku wants to be: wrapped in Bakugou Katsuki's arms. ]

I don't want to let you go again.

[ He means it literally. He means a million different things. ]

The sun has set, and S.T.A.R Labs has fallen silent. It had been a busy day, and more stressful than she’d like. Harrison is away, and she’s left to hold down to fort in the meantime. A necessary part of the job, and their relationship. But god, could things have waited until he got back? But she’s put out the fires, fixed the math, and made sure that everything’s still running smoothly.

It’s all been taken care of. FINALLY. She’s seated at Harrison’s desk, finishing up a few loose ends. A few too many loose ends. And she’s lost track of time, honestly. Immersed in the work as she is. Nothing but the sound of pen on paper, and whatever song is playing over the speakers. (She’d picked a playlist at random for background noise as she worked.)

( open smut post )

for Strange, probably. The kinks will come.

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you know what i'm here for, we'll find a kink after they angst about it idk

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They have a perfectly good desk. Whatever shall they do with it? (IDK what I'm doing but LET'S GOOO)