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In Robert's defense, he feels like anyone would get a false sense of security after parading around in a robot with more armor than a tank for as long as he has.
He has to remind himself, sometimes, that without the suit, he's just another guy, all vulnerable human flesh and blood. That he can't take on armies, that he's not big and strong. He's just... what had Punch-Up called him? A robot guy without his robot?
He'd also been under the apparently false impression that he still had some sense of anonymity going for him. Sure, he was more defenseless walking home at night without the suit, but he also had less of a target on his back. Visi had commented before that, out of office, he actually looked homeless, which should deter even the most desperate of criminals.
So why is he here, seeing double of his shaking fingers, and why are they red?
Stupid question. The red is blood. His blood. Because he's been fucking stabbed.
He vaguely registers his attacker looming over him, saying something about finally having Mecha Man at his feet, but he's honestly not listening. Robert doesn't care who this guy is or why he's here or- okay, no, he does care a little about how he found him.
But most of all, in the heat of the moment, he just cares about not dying.
He tries to turn onto his stomach in an effort to crawl away, and he gets there, but not much farther. A sharp pain jolts up the side of his torso, and he can feel wetness pooling under his hoodie. Fuck.
"Oh no you don't, Mecha Man."
Robert makes a mad scramble for his pockets, feeling them up for something, anything, as fingers tangle into his hair and tug sharply, dragging his whole upper body off of the ground.
His scalp burns, his side feels like it's tearing open, and his hand closes around a small can.
It takes all of two seconds to aim it over his shoulder and punch down on the trigger. He hears more than he sees the impact as the solution hits his attacker's face and eyes, because he drops him at the same time. Robert can't catch himself, so he collapses on one shoulder while the man screams and screams about "my eyes! Fuck, my eyes!"
Forcing himself up onto his elbows, Robert watches the guy, much less cocky now, claw at his face and trip over himself as he stumbles out of the alley. He hears his pounding footsteps as his attacker runs off, having lost interest, and glances down at the can in his hand.
A hot pink, slightly glittery container of pepper spray with a taped on sticky-note reading 'for after yoga ;)'.
"Thank you Invisigal," he breathes out to no one in particular and slowly, carefully, gets his legs up underneath him again.
Everything feels... mildly off kilter, but the pain has mostly dulled.
Adrenaline's kicking in, his hardwired mind supplies.
It doesn't feel like he's been stabbed so much as he feels vaguely... numb and wrong. One of his hands instinctively clasps to his side where all the tingles of wrongness are coming from and clamps down.
You have to keep pressure or you'll bleed out. He doesn't know if it's his own voice he's hearing in his head or his dad's.
Great. He's hearing voices. That's a good sign.
Get your bearings. Get help.
But that's the thing: he doesn't have any fucking idea where he is.
Which doesn't make sense, he was walking down this very road of his own volition not five minutes ago. He knows where he is and where he's going, where the nearest hospital is, how to call for a cab. All of that information is still in him somewhere, but it's not rising to the surface.
All that's driving him as he stumbles out of the alley, oddly calm despite it all, is muscle memory. The faint feeling that he's been here before, seen that convenient store's neon chilli pepper sign before, that he's supposed to take a left here.
And so he follows it, feeling blood that seems more like someone else's than his own start to soak through his hoodie, and really hopes he doesn't fucking die out here.
It was a quiet night, post-coma, and Robert had been drowning the sorrows of his failed career, life, and legacy in more alcohol than he was probably post-coma-cleared enough to.
Not that any of it was really doing anything. He couldn't afford any of the good shit, so it was all watered down, dollar beer and whatever he had left in his flask. And he knew he looked like shit, so there wasn't a chance in hell anyone was buying him something stronger.
The whole thing was a bust. He was barely buzzed by the time he closed and paid up his tab and shuffled out of the bar, somehow feeling worse than when he'd gotten there. Wasn't alcohol supposed to make you feel better? Or at least less bad?
Why the fuck did he even come out tonight?
He should've been at home with his fucked up robot and the one thing that was keeping him from finishing the job Shroud started: his stubby, rotund chihuahua that couldn't reach his own food bag and would starve without Robert there to take care of him.
Hadn't he already abandoned the poor thing enough when he went and got himself stuck in a coma for months?
Deciding he'd make it up to Beef with his favorite thing in the world - food - he found himself in the nearest convenient store, prodding his way through the bare-bones pet section.
The bell on the door jingled as other late night patrons came in and out, and he draped one of the least chemically altered looking bags of kibble over one arm. That would get him through the door, but he'd need more to appease the tiny dog, and these biscuit treats were the kind Beef didn't like.
Well, no. He liked them well enough, it was them that didn't like him. Or Robert's floor, where they always got thrown up.
So he grabbed the next best thing: a package of pre sliced pepperoni. And when he was in the aisle with the other meat and jerky products, he realized he should probably eat something too. You know, since he'd forgotten to have dinner. And lunch.
A Slim Jim and a packet of Twinkies was a somewhat nutritious meal, right?
He tossed it all into the counter and dug out his wallet, watching the numbers go up on the register out of the corner of his eye.
Fifteen for Beef's food, four for the pepperoni. Two bucks each for his dinner.
He glanced down at the twenty in his otherwise empty wallet and tried not to die inside any more than he already had.
"Actually, scratch those last two. Sorry," he sighed, passing over the crumpled bill when another hand suddenly shot out and pressed a five onto the counter beside him.
"Keep it, it's on me," the man it belonged to spoke, and when Robert turned to face him he swore he felt the temperature in the room go up a few degrees.
He was tall, with a long mane of dark hair and a cocky grin. His flaming Thrasher tank top plunged low down his chest, drawing a line of interest from where his leather jacket was struggling over his broad shoulders to where his tight pants hugged his hips.
Facing him felt like standing too close to a fire, and, appropriately, the man was haloed by a flickering, red chilli pepper sign in the window behind him.
"Uh... thanks," Robert managed to say after probably staring for, well... too long.
The man's deepening, smug smirk seemed to confirm as much.
"Chad," he supplied, shifting the six pack of beer he was holding from one hand to the other so he could hold it out.
Robert had enough presence of mind to shake it. His hand was warm to the touch.
"Robert," he replied, and watched as Chad smiled at him.
"Want a drink, Robert?"
Chad had enough money to buy the good stuff. He cracked the caps off two bottles with grip strength alone and handed one over as the two of them leaned on the graffiti tagged brick wall outside the store. Robert's plastic bag with his dinner and Beef's apology goodies lay momentarily forgotten on the ground next to him as he and Chad stood side by side, sipping good beer - as good as beer could get, anyway.
Even outside, there was still heat radiating between them, and Robert didn't know if he should start to worry about this guy being a super with, like, radiator powers or something, or if those post-coma meds stomping out his sex drive were finally wearing off, conveniently in time with the entrance of one of the most attractive men he'd ever seen. Or maybe he was just more tipsy than he thought and imagining things.
He took a long sip, feeling the carbonation tingle on his tongue as he watched one of Chad's curls blow lightly in the breeze.
"So, I gotta ask," he broke the silence eventually. "Do you give beer to all the broke guys you meet in convenient stores, or am I special?"
A small smile twisted its way onto Chad's mouth as he turned to look at him, amusement dancing in his amber eyes.
"You're my first," he answered, licking non-existent beer residue off of his lips and dragging his eyes over Robert in about the least subtle way possible. The attention made him feel warm all over. "Maybe I only do it for the cute ones."
Ah.
So he's fucking with him.
"Right. And sad, borderline homeless," Robert gestured to himself with a self-deprecating smile, "is your type?"
Chad barked a laugh, twisting his body to face him fully with one broad shoulder propped up on the wall. "You do look pretty fucking pathetic, yeah," he didn't lie, giving Robert's jacket a poke. "Brown is definitely not your color."
But before he could get offended, if Robert was even going to bother wasting the energy on it, Chad leaned in a little closer, bringing an involuntary flush to Robert's cheeks with him.
"But maybe I like getting to swoop in and save you," he smiled, and it was teasing, but there was genuine warmth there too.
Robert felt himself smiling too. "My hero."
Chad just winked and went back to leaning back on the wall with a long swig.
Okay. So maybe he really was flirting with him.
"Your sad, nearly homeless ass need saving from anything else while you have me, Robbo?" Chad asked.
And Robert was probably meant to say something enticing like 'my empty bed' except that actually didn't make a lot of sense, and also he was a little too buzzed and fucking miserable to be quite that clever.
Though slightly less so on the miserable part since this guy walked in.
"Myself?" Robert offered, and it was meant to be a joke, but when it came out it didn't sound like one.
Chad raised an eyebrow, intrigued. "How so?"
It took a little while for him to come up with the words, but, eventually, he answered, "Do you ever wish you could just... go back to the way things used to be?"
Before you blew up your grandad's robot and your dad's legacy and your family's whole fortune, lost probably the one thing you could never lose, busted your back, disappointed your dog, disappointed your city, and basically everything just went to shit.
Yeah, no, he doubted Chad knew what that felt like.
But the guy just scoffed a quiet laugh, gently sloshing the beer around in his bottle with two fingers. "Sure. I mean, doesn't everyone?"
He pushed off of the wall, and Robert watched as the taller man came up to stand in front of him, gaze somewhere off towards the ground, deep in thought.
"I guess, for me, I just realized that the way things used to be kind of... sucked? No point going back even if I could." His blazing eyes met Robert's, and it was intense. Earnest. "Gotta look forward, y’know?"
Robert tilted his head. "What if I don't have anything to look forward to?"
Chad's weight shifted, one of his hands pressing into the wall next to Robert's head and boxing him in with dizzying heat. His grin was back and so much closer than before.
"I'm standing right in front of you, and you're telling me you don't have anything to look forward to?"
Blame it on the alcohol. Blame it on the meds. Blame it on whatever made him feel better, but when Robert looked up at Chad, curled around him and fending off the evening low by simply fucking existing - and he didn't even mean just the temperature - something in him finally snapped.
He wanted. And fuck everything else.
Before he even fully realized what he was doing, he had a hand on Chad's jaw, curling around his neck and pulling him in. He was kissing him the next second, and it felt positively molten.
Chad went willingly. He kissed him back with a hot, demanding tongue that swiped into Robert's mouth possessively. A hand gripped his waist, a warm, solid body pressing him further into the wall, and he swore he was burning.
Every touch, every taste, it fogged up the dark parts of Robert's mind like a mirror after a hot shower, and he wanted more.
It was Chad who pulled away first, panting with swollen, red lips curving upwards. "My place isn't far," he jabbed a thumb over his shoulder, invitation clear.
"Okay." Robert didn't hesitate, didn't think. "You should know, though, I don't... do this a lot."
Chad paused but made no effort to put any space between them, and the heat was eating Robert up in the best way.
"Like, with men?" he asked.
"Like with anyone," Robert corrected.
And even though that was the arguably sadder answer, it seemed like it was the right one, because Chad was smiling again. He bent down to snag the plastic handles of Robert's bag with two fingers and took a few steps back.
"And I get to be the one to break you in?" he teased, walking backwards. "I'll be gentle, I promise."
A laugh bubbled up out of Robert's chest, and some magnetic pull had him pushing off of the wall and following after him. "Somehow I doubt that very much."
He didn't remember a single thing from the walk back to Chad's place. All he could think about was warm lips and strong hands.
And then he was being pushed up against Chad's door and kissed hard as keys jingled in the lock, and he stopped thinking altogether.
He props himself on one shoulder on the door and knocks with his free hand, trying not to get blood on the carpet.
There's a light shuffling that tells him the person on the other side is on their way, so, with effort, he forces his weight onto his own two feet again. Otherwise he'd probably collapse when the door opened.
It swings inward a moment later to reveal Flambae, hair down, in civvies. Though the orange t-shirt with the low cut v-neck and black sweats with flame decals don't feel that far off from his usual suit. He looks softer, more relaxed. Good. He looks good.
"Robert?" he asks, eyebrows furrowed in confusion.
And Robert tries to answer, to explain I've been stabbed, but the words don't come and the world feels like it's tilting - and that's because it is, because he's falling.
Flambae's reflexes are faster, though, and strong arms catch him before he concusses himself on the doorknob. All encompassing warmth wraps around him.
"What the fuck is wrong with you, man?" Flambae asks, holding him up as best as he can while Robert clings to his arms for dear life.
"Got jumped," he manages to answer, and sounds way too calm and cool about the whole thing, even to his own ears.
Flambae sits with that for a moment, and probably would have spent longer deliberating if he didn't have all of Robert's weight hanging off of him. "Alright, fuck," he sighs after about two seconds of what Robert imagines were a very real weighing of the pros and cons of leaving him in the hallway, and hauls him inside.
He gets deposited on the couch, and a lamp snaps on to his right, flooding the living room with warm light instead of just the blue glow of the paused episode of Real Housewives on the tv. Flambae is on him in a second, holding him up with a warm hand on his shoulder and running blazing, concerned eyes over his frame, no doubt looking for injuries.
It reminds Robert of the last time they were in this apartment. Not the injuries part, but the heat, the closeness, the burning intensity of Chad's gaze as he backed him into the nearest surface, caged him in with his body...
"Hey!"
Two fingers snap aggressively in front of Robert's nose.
"Don't you fucking pass out on me, bitch," Flambae barks at him. "You need to tell me where it hurts."
Right. Yeah, no, he's right.
So Robert pulls back his jacket to reveal the sizable bloodstain seeping through his clothes, and watches as Flambae's eyes widen in recognition. Then his hoodie and shirt are being gingerly peeled back, and warm hands are on his bare skin.
He averts his gaze, staring at the popcorn of the ceiling, but Flambae's whispered "fuck" does about the same damage as looking down and seeing his own torso torn open would anyway.
"That bad, huh?" he tries to joke.
Flambae meets his eyes. Initially, Robert isn't sure what to make of the look he sees there. Concern, worry... something more. It's a look he's never seen on the hero before, and certainly never directed at him.
But then he relaxes into a much more familiar eye roll.
"Just a paper cut, you normie. Stay," he orders and climbs off of the floor.
As if Robert could go anywhere.
He hears more than he sees Flambae pad off into what is probably the bathroom, bare feet sticking to the tile as he rummages around under the sink and in the cabinets. He drifts in and out of consciousness waiting for him to find what he's looking for...
It's an insistent heat between his knees that brings him to again. Flambae is kneeling before him, which he's going to pretend to be normal about, pressing two capsules into Robert's clammy palm and holding up a glass of water.
"Take both, you're going to need them."
"What is it?" Robert asks, more out of habit than anything, and is already placing the pills on his tongue. He swallows with them a gulp of water that makes him realize just how dry his throat had gotten.
"Pain killers," Flambae answers, pawing through a first-aid kit in his lap. "Strong shit, even works on me."
"Thought the good heroes didn't get hurt?"
"Talking hangovers here, Robbo." He plucks the glass from his hand, leaving it somewhere on the coffee table, and gestures for him to lift his arms. "Up."
And it isn't like Robert hadn't caught onto the fact that Flambae had been lying out of his ass to try and make him feel better when he called it a paper cut. He's been in this game too long to not know the difference between run-of-the-mill blood loss and you-might-die blood loss. But still the pain manages to surprise him when he lifts his arms, tugging at the wound and making even more of his insides ooze out.
"I know, I know," Flambae's gentle voice is in his ear, making quick work of each layer of Robert's clothing. "Come on, stop whining like a little bitch. You're fucking Mecha Man," he reminds him and presses a towel to his wound for pressure.
Robert's dizzy with the physical and emotional whiplash.
The next thing he knows, something cold and wet is getting splashed down his abdomen, making his muscles tense and a hiss slip passed his teeth.
"What is-"
"Hydrogen peroxide," Flambae sighs impatiently before he can even get the question out, shaking the brown bottle in Robert's field of view as proof. "Look, my sister is a nurse and I gave an old lady CRP in a Whole Foods one time, I know what I'm fucking doing."
Robert huffs a laugh, which hurts. "What an inspiring list of credentials."
"Point is," the hero ignores him, adding even more peroxide for good measure - fucking stings - and then starting to dab it up with the towel, "I really don't need you backseat first-aiding, okay?"
Robert almost wants to defensively list off, from memory, all of the key points of wound care from each volume of First-Aid Essentials his father made him study with religious intensity - if anyone's more qualified here it's him. But that would mean reconciling with the fact that, if he were really following those manuals, he wouldn't be too afraid to look at his own fucking wound.
"Okay," he's agreeing instead, and clutching onto the sides of the couch cushion with a grimace as Flambae starts to, surprisingly gently, apply a ring of Vaseline around the affected area.
It's a slash, not a full-on stab, Robert can tell now, even without looking. He can feel the difference. Meaning the blade sliced through a good few layers of flesh but didn't go straight in and pierce anything important. That's good.
He can also tell, watching Flambae douse his own hand in peroxide, that this is not the first time he's done this.
Which is, at least, mildly comforting.
"You're gonna want to bite down on this," he all but shoves the towel into Robert's mouth, thankfully rolled up so the blood soaked parts are on the inside.
"Why-" he tries to ask, but Flambae only uses the opportunity to press the towel in further.
Effectively silenced, Robert can only watch as Flambae momentarily lights his hand on fire before pressing those burning fingers to his open fucking wound.
His rapid attempts at protesting are muffled, and so are his screams as white hot pain engulfs him.
When he woke up, he wasn't alone.
He could tell, first of all, because he was warm all over, and that's not something you get from sleeping alone, curled up inside the cold corpse of the Mecha Man suit.
His second clue was the source of the warmth: a long, hard body pressed up against his back and an arm slung casually around his middle. Hot breaths puffing softly against the back of his neck.
It was like being spooned by a human furnace.
And Robert had the momentary, borderline crazed thought of never moving from this spot for the rest of his life.
What did he really have to get up for anyway?
He was unemployed, his robot was broken, he had no friends or family he wanted or bothered to keep in touch with. Though really he could have ended that at 'he had no friends or family' period. His stomach suggested he might need to get up for breakfast at some point, but Robert had worked around that urge before. The same could be said about his bladder.
Sure, if he stayed long enough his apartment might start to accumulate even more dust than it had during his coma. The frozen meals in his freezer might get freezer burnt. His hypothetical, non-existent produce might hypothetically rot. But other than that he didn't have anything-
Oh fuck.
Beef.
He forced his tired eyes open beyond the cursory blinks he took to get his bearings, craning his neck for a view of Chad's alarm clock.
He'd been gone for over ten hours. Fuck.
Sure, Robert fed him and took him out before he left last night, but Beef would have woken him up for breakfast hours ago. He must be hungry and alone and scared, not knowing if his owner up and abandoned him for the second time.
Alright, that was enough of a reason to get up. And just like that, realty slammed back into him.
There was actually never a world where he could stay swaddled in a virtual stranger's warm arms and comfortable sheets for too long. Chad wouldn't want him, and Robert didn't think he'd actually want it outside of a fantasy anyway. In fact, the heat was starting to make him sweat.
As gently as he could, he lifted Chad's arm from where it was hugging his torso and turned onto his back to make it easier to slide out of the bed. The blankets were made out of some kind of slippery fabric that helped, and Robert actually had the presence of mind to slide a pillow into the space he'd been so Chad wouldn't notice his absence right away.
But turning back to do that put him face to face with the man, and that was... maybe a mistake.
It wasn't like Robert hadn't gotten plenty of a good look at the guy last night, but this was different.
Chad was naked, for one, with only one thin, barely-there black sheet standing between him and a full frontal. His hair was fanned out over the red and orange pillows, and his whole body was lax with sleep, chest rising and falling steadily with deep breaths. The sunlight creeping in between the blinds and landing on his frame was unfairly beautiful.
And now Robert was just standing there staring at him, equally as naked, save for his morning stubble, probably looking like a complete idiot.
Having to physically tear himself away, he tried to be so quiet as he picked through the haphazardly discarded clothes on the floor, trying to accurately discern what was his and what wasn't. The last thing he needed was to get caught stealing this guy's clothes.
Once acceptably dressed, wallet, keys, and (dead) phone acquired, he slipped out of the room as silently as the creaky door would allow and forced himself not to look at Chad again.
If he did, he couldn't promise he wouldn't crawl right back into that god damn comfortable bed and stay there.
He found the plastic bag from last night's convenient store run on the kitchen counter by the front door as he was tying on his boots and made sure to grab that too. Now it felt like the pepperoni was less of a treat and more of a beg for forgiveness, but he doubted Beef would know the difference.
Robert only hesitated when his hand was hovering just above the doorknob.
Should he... leave a note or something? A phone number? A simple thanks for a great night?
No, come on. Who left a note after a one night stand?
That's what this was, after all, and that meant both parties had a great time, and neither particularly wanted to see the other ever again. Right?
He chanced a glance over his shoulder at the cracked door to Chad's bedroom, half expecting the naked man to be propped up in the doorway, framed by the sunlight, asking him if he wanted coffee.
Robert closed the door behind him when he left and never looked back.
When he wakes up, he's alone.
It takes Robert longer than he'd like to admit to get his bearings.
He's still in Flambae's apartment, still on the couch, only now he's horizontal with a pillow tucked under his head and a blanket thoughtfully placed over him. The tv has gone dark, apparently given up on the hope that it was still being watched, but the lamp is still on, and Flambae is nowhere to be found.
Maybe he went to bed or something? What time even is it?
Robert tries to sit up and immediately regrets it, as even the slightest use of his abdominals sends a spike of pain straight up his side. He crumples back against the cushions with a pained groan and glances down at where the blanket had fallen away in his efforts.
He's still shirtless, but instead of a gaping wound in the middle of his already scarred to shit torso, there's a neatly dressed bandage, held on by four smooth strips of medical tape. He can even see gauze.
Okay, so maybe Flambae wasn't just talking himself up when he said he knew what he was doing.
Underneath all the layers, with some ginger and gentle prodding, Robert can feel that he cauterized the wound in its entirety too. Closed it up with an even more demanding burn scar that doesn't hurt any less but is at least not actively bleeding, keeping his insides inside.
All things considered it's... fine work.
Especially for an ex-criminal with no professional training who hadn't been expecting his boss to come barging in to his evening off to bleed all over his couch.
Fuck, maybe it's good Flambae isn't here, because what the fuck is Robert supposed to say to him?
Hey, thanks for closing me up?
Sorry about all this, I don't know why I came to you instead of a real hospital? Except actually I do know, my adrenaline drunk mind remembered the last time you brought me here to fuck until we passed out - you know, the night we never talk about - and decided to retrace it's steps?
Hope it wasn't too much of an inconvenience?
Fuck.
Maybe it would have been better to just bleed out after all.
But, like it or not, he's still kicking, and his body is demanding attention. Especially his throat, which has gone dry, raw from a vague memory he has of screaming. It's a complicated maneuver he has to pull to reach the cup on the coffee table, relying mostly on his arms, but he manages a few sips before succumbing to his fate of being glued to the couch.
With literally nothing better to do, he has the opportunity to actually look around, which he had been either too distracted or too rushed to do last time.
The apartment's not unlike his own, actually. A kitchen and living space separated by a bar counter - and Robert is already intimately familiar with the bedroom. That's creative LA architects for you. But Flambae's, of course, looks much less like a prison/abandoned building hybrid. Actually, it kind of looks like the 80s exploded in here.
It's still the angsty, black and orange bachelor pad Robert had been expecting, but he can also spot thrifted or gifted tables and chairs that don't match but also somehow do. There's records stacked in the shelves of the TV stand and a turn table. Those are beaded curtains over the balcony door, and that is an orange lava lamp.
The walls aren't cluttered by any means, but he recognizes a framed Abba cover, one of Prism's tour posters, what look like family photos but are too far away for Robert to make out. If he squints, he's pretty sure that's the SDN logo on the bottom of a lightly-scorched but mostly-intact page stuck to the fridge with a fire magnet - Flambae's acceptance letter into the Phoenix Program?
Even the couch he's on is a hard, rustic black leather, but it's piled with so many blankets and patterned pillows he can't say it's not made soft and cozy by proximity.
It's a space trying very hard to look cool, but, at the same time, is so firmly nestled in warmth and comfort and silly little personal interests that it doesn't quite succeed. In other words, it's a perfect reflection of the guy who owns it.
He's so lost in that particular, unnecessarily poetic thought that when keys jingle in the front door he's startled into trying to sit up again, to his instant regret. So when Flambae pushes inside, momentarily letting in the hallway light with him, he finds Robert, loathe as he is to admit it, withering in pain on his couch.
"Ah, you're awake," is how he greets him. "Good, so you'll appreciate this kind gesture, then."
"If you're idea of a kind gesture is-" Robert starts to say, but he doesn't even get the snarky reply out before a small (but not insignificant) weight is dropped on his legs. He risks another wave of pain and nausea to see what it belongs to and- "Beef!"
The pup's ears perk, and he wastes no time running up the length of Robert's body, of course managing to land not one but two paws directly on his wound in the process, to start licking at his face. And it hurts like hell but Robert doesn't even care, he's too busy laughing at the tickling kisses and wrapping his arms around his dog so tight.
"Yeah. I knew you wouldn't be able to relax without your tiny cow underfoot, so," Flambae shrugs casually and tosses - yeah, those are Roberts keys - onto the table. "Let myself in. I know you don't mind."
Key thievery and mild trespassing aside, Robert is genuinely touched.
He sounds it too, when he looks up at him and says, without a hint of sarcasm, "Thank you, Flambae."
For a split moment, it looks like the hero doesn't know what to do with that either. Then he shrugs again. "Yeah, well. If he shits on my carpet, I'm reopening your wound."
That actually earns a chuckle, but Robert will blame it on the pain killers.
"Shift it," Flambae orders, gesturing vaguely at Robert's feet, which he notices for the first time have had the shoes removed. It's oddly intimate.
He does his best to pull them in without tenderizing the wound too much so that Flambae has space to sit on his own furniture.
And then, for a moment, they just kind of... sit there. Robert had made no progress in figuring out what to say to the guy, and it didn't look like Flambae came prepared either. Beef, who is completely immune to social awkwardness, noses under Robert's blanket so just his butt and wagging tail remain.
Oh, to be that blissfully oblivious.
"So..." It sounds like Flambae is forcefully dragging the words out of himself, pulling teeth. "How are you feeling?"
Robert stares at the ceiling for the second time, realizing he doesn't know how to navigate a conversation like this with the man either. He opts to stick to their usual guns.
"Like I got stabbed?" he offers, unhelpful but not dishonest. "But... less like I'm on death's doorstep. So."
"Come on, man, it was never that bad. Fucking dramatic."
He can actually hear Flambae's eye roll.
Then, quietly and much more serious, "you know the fucker who did it to you?"
Robert tilts his head to find Flambae pointedly glaring at the rug instead of at him, with Beef popping out of the other end of the blanket and huddling against his undoubtedly warm thigh - traitor. If he didn't know any better, he'd think the guy was angry. Not normally unusual, but on Robert's behalf? That's new.
"Didn't really get a good look at him," he admits. "But, if I had to guess, sounded like another villain I busted up, looking for some revenge."
He sees Flambae's crippled hand twitch a little at the familiar story but doesn't mention it.
"Now that people are starting to connect the dots between Robert Robertson and Mecha Man, it's apparently getting risky to walk home alone."
"Yeah, no shit. You don't have powers. You can't be putting yourself in dangerous situations like that."
"Believe it or not, I didn't go out tonight looking to get mugged," Robert shoots him a look. "And I can take care of myself."
"Yeah." A scoff. "And that's why you're here, right?"
"Careful Flambae, it's starting to sound like you actually give a shit."
"Of course I give a shit, fuck you."
In fairness, someone that didn't give a shit wouldn't have let him into their home and given him first aid. They also wouldn't have taken off his shoes and tucked him into the couch, or kidnapped his dog just to make him feel better.
It was obvious Flambae cared. Robert didn't know why he said that...
"Whatever."
Flambae shakes his head and is already starting to get up, much to Beef's evident and vocal dismay. Something seizes in Robert's chest and the words are tumbling out before he can stop them.
"Are we ever going to talk about it?"
Flambae momentarily stalls, slowly like he knows exactly what it he's referring to. Still, he asks, "Talk about what?"
Playing dumb.
Maybe it's a sign that no, he does not want to talk about it, so fucking drop it, but Robert pushes anyway.
"The fact that I've been here before?" he puts it plainly. "Somehow in less clothes than I'm in now, in case you forgot-"
"I didn't fucking forget," Flambae cuts him off sharply. Not looking at him again, one fist clenched as the damn seems to break. "I'm not the one who fucking left and never brought it up again. That was all you."
That takes a moment for Robert's drug addled brain a moment to unpack that.
"You're... mad that I left?"
Flambae scoffs, like it was a completely absurd thing to suggest, and crosses his arms. "Yeah, no, I don't give a fuck what you do. It's just not good one-night-stand etiquette, you know," he shrugs defensively. "But I guess a tiny, flat-assed bitch like you doesn't get enough action to actually know the etiquette, huh?"
"First of all, you know that's not true. Second," a small, smug smile creeps onto Robert's face, despite everything, "you're mad I left."
It's not a question this time.
"What are you, fucking deaf? I literally just said-"
"I'll stay for breakfast this time," Robert offers, giving his head a tilt that some might call flirty. He would call it, more accurately, drugged and making questionable decisions. "We can even cuddle."
Flambae's glare is nearly enough to set him on fire on the spot, but it's slightly undermined by the blush spreading on his cheeks.
"I could throw your ass out right now."
"You could," Robert agrees.
But he's not going to.
And he doesn't. Because, as Robert is starting to realize, he's actually kind of a good person? Which makes Flambae growl with irritation and push off of the couch.
"Just- go to sleep and don't fucking die or whatever," he sputters angrily, clicking off the lamp and already on his way to his bedroom. Clearly done with whatever this conversation turned into. "If you're not better in the morning, I'm taking you to a hospital."
Robert can still just make him out in the dark, and, even though he isn't far, calls out, "Flambae?"
He stops in the doorway. "What the fuck to you want?"
"Thank you. For saving me. Again."
Robert's half sure it's the most earnest thing he's ever said to the man, definitely top five at least. And he can't see Flambae's reaction. His voice doesn't give much away either.
"Get some sleep," he orders, and then shuts the bedroom door behind him.