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autisticblueteamLength: 860 words
Notes: Written shortly after episode 5 aired, basic plot spoilers up until that point.
(AO3) (Tumblr)
When he opened his past self’s eyes, he was greeted by darkness.
Low thrumming of an ever-running engine that used to be little more than white noise seemed much more blatant, after years of absence. Deep, rumbling snores from across the room were the only thing that broke the silence otherwise, loud enough to wake anyone that wasn’t used to it. To wake anybody but him.
Wash’s heart skipped a beat at the sound.
Maybe this was a bad idea.
It skipped again when he saw them, the shadow of their gargantuan form laying atop the bed that they barely fit in, rising and falling with every breath. Squinting as his eyes adapted to the dark, there was no sign of the deep, angry scarring that once wrapped around their throat and extended claw-like up the side of their face. This was before the Sarcophagus mission took place.
Before Sigma.
Slowly, he got up. Bare feet on cold metal floor, the covers slipping away and taking their warmth with them. He crossed the room as quietly as he could, but it came as no surprise when a warm, brown eye flickered open with a quiet grunt. His breath caught in his throat.
Maine raised a hand and signed a simple, ‘Okay?’ and nodded towards him. Wash’s hands raised instinctively in return.
“I’m okay,” he said, words echoing the motion of his hands. “Couldn’t get back to sleep, that’s all. Could I—” his teeth caught the inside of his cheek, his heart beat a little faster. He had a job to do, he was supposed to be finding Carolina, but with every jump to another time in the Project, he saw Maine. The real them, alive. Not the shell of a person he’d last seen, that his actions had sent over the edge of a cliff. “Could I lay with you tonight?”
It only took a second for Maine to grunt and shuffle backwards, giving him space, but it was a second long enough for his mind to race, wondering if somehow he’d come too early or if in whatever timeline he’d landed in, he and Maine had never been that close, if this really was a bad idea, a waste of time—
But no. That soft grunt cut through the doubt and, weakened, it fell away.
Wash settled into his spot beside them like he’d never left. Warm, secure arms wrapped around him and he latched on, in turn, his fingers curling into the material of their shirt. Low, rhythmic thuds of a beating heart echoed where his ear pressed to their chest. Indescribable and muddled torrents of emotion swelled in his chest—memories he hadn’t dared to dwell on came flooding back and for a moment he thought he might cry.
For a moment, he understood a little of why it had been so hard—impossible, even—for the others to resist taking a chance on changing the past.
“…I missed you, big guy.”
Maine grumbled, half-asleep and confused. The ‘missed me?’ was layered in the sound, communicated in that way only he had ever fully understood.
“Yeah. I missed you. I know that doesn’t make a lot of sense right now, but you’re probably not going to remember this conversation in the morning and, well, I definitely won’t, so…” Inhaling deeply, buried his face in their chest. There was an amused little huff and a hand on his head, fingers scratching gently at his scalp.
For a moment, Wash forgot it all. Forgot the time travel, forgot the chaos that had been the undercurrent of his life for years, forgot the fate of his friends, forgot the frustration and anger that bubbled under the surface of his focus. He simply… melted, a pleasant buzz running through his nerves. Maine had always been the best for stimming.
He hadn’t known, the last time that they lay like this, that it would be the last time.
But he did this time. This time he could savour it. Remember it.
Every second was a second longer than he could ever have hoped to have before and when Maine’s breathing became rhythmic and even beside him, when they drifted back into a peaceful sleep, Wash knew he’d claimed enough of them.
Carefully, he raised his head to look at them one more time. To memorise their face, to overwrite the haggard, lost face that he’d seen the Meta wear. Replace that final memory of them with something truly them.
“…love you, big guy,” he mumbled, pressing a single kiss to their scarred cheek.
And then he left.
Coming back to his senses in another younger body, he allowed himself a second to gather his senses. There was a few more things he could try. He still had a job to do, his current friends to save, a friendship to mend.
But, for a moment, he dwelled on the warmth that settled in him like a phantom. For a moment, he remembered their face and he remembered his own words.
The past is done.
But goddamn, even he couldn’t deny that sometimes, you wished it wasn’t. Even if only for a moment.
