Title: The Very First Breath
Author: Timothy Wren
Fandom: S&D Tier (Web Series)
Relationship: Alex | S Tier/Morgan | D Tier
Genre: Pre-slash, Whump, Hurt/Comfort/Rescue
Word Count: 794 (complete)
Summary: When Alex said “I won’t let you die”, Morgan took him at his word.
–
For some people, being yanked naked and without warning across spacetime would be uniquely horrifying. The loss of your clothes, the reality around you giving way to colorless black spinning past– being taken against your will, without a choice, without a say; it’s probably alarming to the average person.
Alex is not most people.
Being summoned doesn’t scare him. Being naked, being weaponless, being taken doesn’t scare him. Few things, in fact, scare the most dangerous villain to ever be born.
Morgan summoning him is fucking terrifying.
With one text, Alex could teleport to the D-tier villain, anywhere on the planet or beyond, so the fact that Morgan is using his one (1) ability for the month to pull Alex to him, without so much as a ‘by your leave’–
Alex has only enough time for his heart to leap into his throat, his pulse tripping into a sprint, before reality rematerializes around him. He lands with a snarl and sees Morgan on the ground, eyes glassy, blood at his temple.
No. Unauthorized.
The denial ripples through him and through the room, visceral and ringing. He throws out a hand and the other people– he senses almost half a dozen– go flying back, like so many specks of unimportance splattering on the walls.
Alex picks up Morgan and steps between dimensions, rippling into the ridiculously ornate bedroom of his lair. He’d take a studio apartment with a decent kitchen, but the minions insist he indulge in the splendor of an emperor-king, and he’s never been more grateful for it than when he can set Morgan down on the huge, soft bed.
The other man groans, brown hair blending with the black sheets in the shadows.
“Hey, asshole.” Alex says, mouth dry. “Haven’t you been lying down long enough?”
“Ugh.” Morgan stirs enough to blink dizzily. “Shut up, ‘m cold.”
Relief, stark and naked, slams into him. Aware enough to talk, but not coherent. Fuck, but Alex will take it.
“I’ll start a fire.” He glares at the mantle and it obligingly bursts aflame.
“C’mere.” Morgan makes grabby hands. Alex struggles to resist on the best of days, which today is emphatically not.
“You’re going to regret this when you wake up.” He warns. Morgan rolls his eyes, dragging Alex with weak hands until he has him situated to his delirious satisfaction, and sighs with pleasure.
Alex lays a hand so carefully over his chest, fingers spread.
“Do you remember that time I fed you blood?” He asks quietly.
“Nn, weirdo.” Morgan pats at his wrist, eyes still closed.
“It was kind of like this, except you were even more fucked up.” Alex rests his head on Morgan’s shoulder and closes his eyes. He can feel his blood, of course– enduring, undying and carrying with it the extension of his power.
With it, he can always find Morgan.
He can coax it to heal the other villain’s wounds, and he does so now.
“Just a little immortal.” He mutters, pressing his forehead into fevered skin where Morgan’s sleeve had been torn off. Just enough to never leave.
A fluttery sensation at his hairline startles him, the barest hint of weight. It strokes down and Alex realizes Morgan, very nearly unconscious, is petting his hair.
He swallows heavily.
Morgan makes little hushing noises, humming. He’s on the edge of delirium, bruises and contusions visible on his skin, and he’s worried about comforting Alex.
Even feeling his best friend alive and well is not quite enough to comfort Alex; not with the vision of Morgan, still and lifeless on the ground, still so fresh in his memory. It is all he can do to sit here, where he’s needed, instead of allowing the skies to rain blood on a field of absolute carnage.
But Morgan wants to make him feel better, Morgan is comforted by how easy he can breathe in Alex’s domain and in his presence, and so he lets the hand in his hair pat and stroke until its owner falls asleep. It’s enough that the other villain feels safe in his arms; the rage, barely banked within Alex, won’t be satisfied tonight by even a thousand soft touches.
Alex will be comforted by the gold-brown eyes opening tomorrow with no pain clouding them, expression soft with sleepy confusion, and he will be comforted with slaking his thirst for vengeance on whatever remnants dared.
He’d likely killed most of them already, back at the scene, but then, like now, his priority was clear:
The S-tier villain pulls the other villain close as the room warms, listening to Morgan’s breathing grow easier and easier as the healing tends to his internal wounds. Like Alex, the blood is handling the important things first.
Everything else can wait.