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It somehow started with Cypher approaching him, but in reality, it had been mostly an accident, a miscommunication, a joke that hadn't been interpreted as such that somehow led them to their current situation.
Cypher had a lot of self control, more than what people assumed given his tendency to just steal and break into stuff that didn't belong to him. He did all of the stuff they accused him of, but it didn't mean it was just an impulse that couldn't be controlled and not the fact he had made a choice. Still, for all he claimed to be the master of his decisions, there was one impulse that he had a hard time controlling most of the time: The urge to bother the living shit out of Sova.
How could you blame him? Sova was a funny target to shoot at, to tease, because he was an unmoving force of self control that not even him could rival, a man who wouldn't let anything get to him or pull any reaction he didn't want. Cypher just couldn't help himself, he had to try once, twice, and again and again to make Sova snap, let it be a positive reaction like a laugh (very unlikely ) or a curse (his favorite kind) or just make him squirm or groan tiredly, the sentinel being the Achilles heel of his self control.
So when he strutted into the common room for the mandatory 'movie night' of the month and saw every single seat that wasn't the floor itself - which was already being used by some agents - and his eyes landed on the hunter sitting alone on the back of the room, using an armchair all by himself, his natural instinct was to walk up to the man and stop in front of him with a cocked hip and smiley eyes.
"Is this seat taken?" he asked, pointing to the man's lower regions.
Sova blinked twice, confused "That's my lap"
"I know what I asked"
Rivalry , that was the word most would use to describe the situation between the two of them, and it may not be perfect to cluster what their real dynamic was, but it was close enough. Sadly, both having accepted that rivalry was the word to explain their current relationship, it meant they had to accept some thing that came with the word, like the fact that competitiveness was something expected of them.
And if you were Sova and Cypher, you'd find that daring the other was one of the most entertaining forms of competition that existed.
Cypher, with this seemingly innocent question was daring Sova, daring him to say yes, it was taken, or tell him to fuck off, because from a single look, both knew what Cypher was going to do if the answer was "No".
Cypher smirked.
Sova rolled his eyes, and much to Cypher's embarrassment, instead of answering and telling him off, Sova extended his hand, took him by the side of the coat, and made him stumble forward, manhandling him until he had Cypher sitting on his lap in a way that didn't obstruct his sight of the movie, and finally relaxed, like he didn't have a flushed and indignant sentinel sitting on him.
It was only the start of their situation.
Cypher was mad that the man hadn't complicated himself with having him sitting on his lap for the 2 hours the movie lasted, that didn't make any fuzz after, who WON that fucking dare just like that.
He needed to embarrass him again.
He did it again, twice, just to see, one when the hunter was sitting on a table having lunch and another on their way to a mission in the Vulture, just to try to make him lose when there were more people observing them.
But the hunter didn't back up, even daring to seat himself better and opening his legs wider before he pulled Cypher down, going back to his conversation with Breach as if his nemesis wasn't sitting on his legs.
Then, he tried the opposite, waiting until that perfect opportunity when they were alone and Sova, with a book under his arm, walked into the direction of a couch only to stop when Cypher, sitting by himself, patted his own leg invitingly.
It was a clear dare. Come sit on my lap. When they were alone and there was no one to distract Sova from him. He saw Sova physically tense on his spot, not sure whether to do it or not.
It was torture when Sova accepted. The man was heavy, but not impossibly so that Cypher couldn't bear to have him sitting on his lap, and his body was like a furnace with all those layers and natural warm body. Sova hadn't even blinked, just sat down and reclined against his chest like it wasn't a big deal as he read his book, his hair falling on Cypher's face. They were so cozy together that he wanted to scream at his own stupidity for making him put himself in that position.
After that, Cypher officially gave up. Clearly, sitting in each other's lap was not something that made Sova uncomfortable or embarrassed, so he just gave up, and tried very hard to forget how it felt to have the hunter pressed so close.
But it didn't stop happening.
It wasn't common, per say, but it did happen, in some many ways and circumstances that it seemed the world was keen on putting them in each other’s laps.
There were some normal, even funny situations, like that incognito mission that required the whole team to travel in a too small van that didn't have enough seats for them and space for their weapons. The logical choice was to share a seat, with Cypher on top of Sova, both pretending they weren’t feeling tingles on the points of contact where Sova's arm acted like a belt around Cypher's waist.
There was also another movie night, but instead of sitting on the floor, Sova walked up to him telling him to scoop aside in the narrow armchair to sit next to - completely on top of - him.
Then, there were more tragic ones.
Like the mission on Ascent, where Sova got shot right on the stomach and Sage was still too far on the Vulture to heal him, so Cypher had no choice but to sit behind the man, use his own belt to tie his stomach, keeping the hunter together as he quite literally held his guts inside with his hand. That had been traumatic enough, but he'd do it again and again if it meant to keep the hunter alive.
There was also the incident with the dossiers.
They knew it was coming, after the previous ones that had appeared around the globe, but if Sova was being honest with himself, even if he hated how secretive Cypher was, he had been praying Cypher's dossier didn't exist. He knew the man's past, whatever it was, was important and probably tragic, but knowing it and seeing it was a different story.
Cypher was broken . They had to be one man down for the mission, because as soon as they landed in Morocco, they found one of the damned tablets thrown into the ground, like the words under it weren't about to break the man that rushed to get it, like he knew whose intended target was from the moment he stepped from the aircraft.
He had wanted to stay with him, everyone had wanted to, as they saw how he fell to his knees, like his body had suddenly given up on him, sobs wrecking through him as he read the dossier, and read it again, and again.
They couldn't stay, their mirror selves were still on the other side trying to steal radianite and destroy their world, but Viper was not heartless even if a little too cold, quickly giving him the order to stay, give his wires to her, before she made everyone rush to their sites before they attack begun.
It was hard, hard to work with one man less, hard to focus when you could only think about said man as you killed your own mirror self and secured the spike.
It was so easy to leave the spike secured in the hands of Kay-O and literally run to the back of the ship, out of view where Cypher still rested, unmoving, the slow blink of his blue eyes the only sign he was awake.
It was even easier to fall in front of him, take the dossier still clutched in his hand and throw it aside, and finally pull the man he's been worrying about for the last hour in his arms. It was like a plug had been pulled from Cypher since he escaped into the aircraft, the stiff man finally crying out and holding onto him as he wept.
They found comfort in each other's lap, after that. When one had a stressful day, when their infiltrator played with them as they searched for them over the globe.
Later, when they finally found her and trapped her, not wasting any second before they shut themselves in one of their bedrooms, Cypher pulled Sova down on top of him, and promptly fell asleep in each other's arms, bone-deep exhaustion finally winning over them and making them pass out for 12 hours at least until someone sent Skye to check on them, somehow the two of them moving as they slept and completely switching their position, with Cypher tucked under Sova's chin with the hunter snoring loudly.
Honestly, it was only time until everything led them where they were now, with Cypher sitting on Sova's lap, dressed comfortably, pulling his mask off with a tremble of his hand as Sova drank in the sight of him for the first time. The obvious conclusion, he accepted, as the hunter smiled at him like the sun had come out outside after days of darkness, and finally let what the world had been pleading them to do, leaning forward until his soft lips touched Cypher's chapped ones for the first time.
How could you blame him if his actions finally led him to have this? Cypher thought as he crossed his arms around Sova's shoulder, deepening the kiss.
Yes, he did well by daring to sit on Sova's lap.