They were treating it slowly. That was the only way to treat it at this point, according to Rebecca, and Leon, despite the biting need to fix this, trusted her judgment.

He hadn’t been convinced to hand him into the BSAA, or god forbid, the military’s hands, though. No. This was between them. He was keeping him in his apartment, despite the risks.

Leon knew the risks, and he was the one who would take responsibility for it if the worst should happen.

He didn’t think it would though. He hoped it wouldn’t.

Luis had already been verbal–if barely– when Leon had dragged him home from that shithole in Europe, and he’d been in treatment a month without incident. He’d improved a lot. You’d almost think that there was nothing wrong– though there were moments. There was always the possibility of a relapse.

Rebecca had brought more of the serum that day. Leon was used to administering it. He’d been used to it before he brought Luis home, even. He didn’t need her there to help.

Luis didn’t go out much…for reasons obvious to the both of them, but he was making progress. Progress enough that he had mostly regained his ability to speak. Progress enough that he’d started reading again.

Which was where Leon found him, holed up in the corner of the dark room, balanced in a chair with a copy of Don Quixote in his hand, well worn and weathered.

Leon didn’t turn the light up as he entered the room. It bothered his own eyes too sometimes, and Luis certainly didn’t need it. The book– Leon wasn’t quite sure where it had come from. Had Luis had it on him when he’d pulled him out? Or had Leon bought a used copy in some fugue state years ago and stashed it away, only for Luis to find it?

“Medicine time,” Leon announced in a low voice, letting Luis know that he was there.

Luis dog-eared the book, closing it with a low chuckle. “Already? Feels like it comes earlier every day, Sancho.”

He looked up at Leon…red eyes just a little too reflective and bright in the low light…teeth just a little too sharp in his mouth. These days, it was rare that Luis looked completely human.

“Hey if you’re too busy for a dose of human juice lemme know,” Leon drawled. He dropped his body onto the couch next to Luis’ chair. “But my guess is you’re starting to experience normal time again.”

He looked Luis over again, studying his features for the thousandth time. At least he didn’t look so damned haggard and drawn now. The color was back in his skin. Leon couldn’t help feeling guilty every time he thought about what Luis had been through. Leon had thought he had been dead. He’d left him. Damn it, he should have made sure.

For all intents and purposes, it seemed he had been dead. His heart skewered, his body cooling. And when he was found wandering Europe as a half-crazed mess…a feral half-insect…it was clear just how close he’d come.

But somehow, maybe due to the plagas that had been reduced to slumber in his chest…here he was now.

“I DO have a pretty stacked schedule lately, Mr. Kennedy,” he purred with a roguish grin. “but I think I can manage to pencil time to play doctor.”

“You sure have a way with words there,” Leon snarked back. “You make it sound like I should have asked Rebecca to borrow her stethoscope.”

The banter was already becoming routine. Just like that day years ago. Had it really only been a day? Somehow it had made much more of a mark on Leon.

And it sure as hell had made a mark on Luis.

Maybe it was the same mark on both of them.

LIterally, and physically. Both men bore the ragged burn scar of their attempt to sever their connection to the Los Illuminado on their chests,

“Should I start hamming it up?” Luis offered with amusement. “maybe faint like a princess?”

“Hey get your role straight, are you Don Quixote or Snow White here? Take off your shirt.”

Leon flipped the medical case open and pulled out the syringe and the bottle of serum.

Luis sighed, tutting his tongue as he held his hands up. “I’m a man of multitudes, señor kennedy”

Still, he worked to unbutton his old shirt with a cocky little smile “but if you insist, who am I to refuse, ey cowboy?”

“Man of multitudes and that contains ‘fainting priciness,” Leon snorted, shaking his head. “I’ll remember that. You know, I don’t think Ashely faints.”

He jabbed the needle into the serum, drawing it in with practiced ease, and glanced at Luis as he took his shirt off. Luis’ movements were smoother now, his hands less shaky. The first few times they’d done this, Leon had had to unbutton the shirt for him.

But he’d come a long way since those first few weeks.

Luis was thinner, weaker than when they’d first met, his chest scared hideously with an electrical burn that only served to quell the plagas rather than destroy it utterly…further compounded by the nasty puncture scar that had all but healed in the years he was wandering. The last memento of what was nearly his death.

He stretched, and leaned back on the chair with an arm slung over its back. “The Baby Eagle’s all grown up. Strong girl like her, I’m not surprised.” He chuckled low. “Though she’s missing out. You faint, you get a handsome man worried about you.”

Leon felt himself flush a little at the joke, and mumbled back a lame quip in reply. “You don’t have to faint to make me worry over you, cowboy. Just opening your mouth is enough.”

He stood up, and leaned down over Luis’ bare chest. The electrical scar there was much like the one across his own body, and for good reason. Matching marks indeed.

“Awww.” Luis grinned, his chest rising and falling with the motion. He struck a little pose, lounging back with a flirty wink. “Dangerously close to affection there, Kennedy.”

“Me? Show affection?” Leon smirks, and puts his hand on Luis’ chest– to find the right stop for the needle. “Not sure that’s something I can manage, between all the quips and the getting myself almost killed.”

“Not getting yourself killed now, are you?” he teased, his chest warm under Leon’s hand. “Unless you think I’m going to unhinge my jaw and take your head off– but even praying mantises wait till after a little fun and games for that kind of thing.”

“Keep up the flirting like that, one day I’m gonna start thinking you’re serious, cowboy.” Leon felt the heat in his face, and he used the moment to stab Luis with the needle, the serum making its way into his veins.

“Geh…” Luis grimaced as the serum flowed through him, moving towards his heart with every beat. “I can be serious sometimes, Kennedy.”

Leon felt a nervous thrill like he’d been the one getting the dose of medicine. He put the needle away carefully and clicked the case closed.

“Is that so?” He wasn’t looking at him when he asked.

“Every now and again.” Sera chuckled under his breath, his free hand idly rubbing the injection site as if it’d shake off the odd feeling of the serum working through his body. “About some things.”

Leon smothered the flutter in his stomach as he turned back to look at him, watching him rub that spot.

Leon knew how the stuff felt when it went through you.

“Are you still delirious?” Even he wasn’t sure if he was asking seriously or not.

“Eh. I’ve had worse, Sancho.” Luis said with a slightly dizzy bent to his smile. He did shift around, though…enough to make room on the chair. “Not worse than any hangover I’ve ever had.”

Leon can’t help but notice the extra room in the chair. What would Luis actually do if he sat down there, he wondered.

Why not find out?

He hesitated a moment and started to ease down beside him, carefully not to put too much of his weight right on the other man’s body for… a variety of reasons.

“Something tells me you’ve had almost as many truly legendary hangovers as I have at this point.”

Luis made a pleased sound as Leon eased into the chair. It wasn’t long before his arm dropped down around Leon’s shoulders, as he shifted to get them both comfortable.

“I’m a man who loves his vices, eh? A little thing we have in common.”

“Looking back, maybe I picked up the vices from you.” Leon felt the little hairs on the back of his neck stand up as Luis put his arm around him. “I used to be such a boyscout.”

Luis draped against him with the sort of dizzy laziness that came with such an intense serum calming the parasites writhing in the body.

His hand rested on Leon’s shoulder as he teased, “You? A boyscout. Won’t believe it until I see it.”

“Too late now,” Leon mumbled, feeling the heat of Luis’ body on his own. He swallowed thickly. “Still interested, even though you missed it?”

“Hmmm.” Luis grinned over at him, his smile lopsided as ever. “You know. I might be.”

That smile had been etched on the back of Leon’s eyes for ages.

“I don’t get you at all, you know.” He barely noticed that he was leaning in toward him.

“No?” Luis’ voice was rich and warm as his arm draped lower down Leon’s arm, drawing him closer, “after all that bonding, Sancho?”

Leon let himself be pulled closer, knowing exactly what a bad idea it was. Luis smelled nice. He was warm.

Leon felt like if he let things keep going he was going to find himself waking up to a screaming nightmare, and no Luis.

He didn’t pull away.

“Maybe I just expect everybody to be as fake as I am. Can’t believe it when I meet a real knight in shining armor.”

Luis’ scruffy face found its way against his shoulder. It was all too evident he was still shirtless…especially as he shifted to lean closer.

“Just like the townsfolk in Don Quixote, eh? But sometimes things turn out to be truer than cynicism believes, eh?” He put one hand on his chest with that wolflike grin, “to dream the impossible dream and all that.”

“You’re making it seem more possible by the second, I have to say.” Leon’s hand found its way to Luis’ bare chest again, brushing the other man’s hand. Their faces were close.

“Told you I contain multitudes.From fainting princess to knight.”He leaned just a little closer “You’re a damn handsome man, Agent Kennedy.”

Leon could feel the blood rushing in his ears, and something twisting inside his chest. He chose not to question it.

He’d waited too long the first time.

A shiver rolling through him, he leaned the rest of the way in and pressed his lips to Luis’.

Luis didn’t shy or pull away. Maybe it was the same twisting feeling in his own chest. Maybe he’d been waiting just as long.

Either way, he pressed his lips to Leon’s with a pleased huff of breath, kissing him with his slightly chapped lips.

Leon wrapped his free arm around Luis, gathering their bodies together, his other trapped pinned between them as they kissed. He could feel the heart beating in his chest. Luis alive and in his arms. They had known each other for a day– why did this feel so important?

He let himself be carried away by the rush of it for a long time before he even considered pulling back.

Luis kissed him with a passion that proved it…proved that the single day they spent together made a lasting impact on him too, even feral and crazed as he was in the aftermath. Luis leaned in as far as Leon would let him, and kissed him with an almost desperate passion.

Leon kept him pressed close, and leaned his forehead against Luis’, hair falling in both their faces.

“Welcome back, snow white.”