Thanks so much to @mrtobenamedlater for the prompt and the idea!
Prompt 46 - “You’re so cute when you’re angry.”
“Naomi, your blood pressure is a little high, you should sit down,” BB said, sounding as if he was both whispering in her ear and speaking to her from the back of her mind, an eerie side effect of him being plugged directly into her brain that she could never quite get used to. She pressed two fingers to the side of her neck and felt for her pulse and as expected, it was racing. Not from exertion, but from rage.
“You’re so cute when you’re angry,” Vasya slurred, looking up at her from where he was laid out on the gurney, elbows deep in the process of being hooked up to various monitors and bags of fluids. Naomi pretended not to notice the sideways glance Dr Halsey shot her at the ODST’s remark, but the slight blush decorating her cheeks gave her away anyway. As unfathomably high on the strongest painkillers she could find as Vasya was, she doubted he even knew what way was up let alone what he was saying. Besides, she was far too angry at him to be mollified by a silly compliment.
“Oh yeah? Well I’m sure I’m downright adorable right now,” she said through gritted teeth, batting away his hand as he reached for her and scowling in the face of his dejected frown. “Do you have any idea what you were doing out there? You could have gotten yourself killed!”
In an act of heroic idiocy, Vasya had thrown himself in the way of enemy fire aimed at her and earned himself a nice plasma injury. Mal, Dev and herself had done what they could to stabilise him with the limited supplies and skillset they had on board their dropship, but had ultimately been forced to make an emergency stop on the Infinity to avail of their med-bay where Dr Halsey had then been given charge of his care.
“You should really lay down, Spartan,” Dr Halsey said, pointing to a bed next to Vasya. “I’m not too happy with the blood pressure readouts I’m getting from your suit.”
“I’m fine,” Naomi said, ignoring the blackness eating into the corners of her vision.
“I was saving your life!” he slurred in protest, jerking out of Dr Halsey’s reach to gesture at Naomi as the beleaguered doctor attempted to hold him down to insert an IV line into his hand. “You should be thanking me!”
“Maybe I would be, if I wasn’t the one wearing a couple of hundred kilos of power armour in the first place!” she hissed, grasping his hand and thrusting it into Dr Halsey’s grip. It frustrated her to no end that he didn’t seem to see his mistake. It was reckless - foolish even - for him to have put himself in harm's way for her. “You know what you’re supposed to do when we get into a firefight - you’re to use me for cover if necessary.”
“Well that’s never going to happen,” he said. “It’s my job to protect you too, y’know.”
Naomi felt some of the anger broiling in her stomach start to dissipate, turning to fluttering butterflies under his dopey but adoring gaze.
“I think… I deserve a kiss as a reward,” he said, breaking the spell by jutting out his cheek in Naomi’s direction. Dr Halsey attempted to muffle an amused snort by disguising it as a cough.
“Don’t push your luck, Rasputin, I should really slap you silly instead!” Naomi replied venomously, feeling her blood start to thunder in her ears again.
“Why? I thought you liked me!” he whined. With a roll of her eyes, she reluctantly let him intertwine his fingers with hers. At least this way, he stayed still enough for Dr Halsey to work on him.
“I do like you,” she grumbled, squeezing his hand in return.
“You really do?” he replied, his eyes becoming big and round with emotion.
“I really do,” she said, choosing to blame the laughter bubbling up in her throat on the light-headedness she was feeling.
God damn, she thought, What the hell did Mal give him? Horse tranquillisers?
“Cos I love you, malishka,” he murmured, his voice turning soft.
His words echoed endlessly in Naomi’s ears, and her head span.
Cos I love you, malishka.
I love you.
No one had ever told Naomi that they loved her before. And now, here was the man she cared for most in the universe professing his love for her (albeit under the influence of enough painkillers to kill a Hinge-Head).
“Oh, Vasya,” she said, her own voice sounding like it was coming from far away. “Vasya, I-“
“Naomi, wait you should lie down you’re gonna-!” she just about heard BB stutter as she blacked out and she fell forward onto her face into a pathetic heap.
Everyone is very OOC and inconsistent here but it made me laugh so I enjoyed writing it. thanks again for the prompt! I still have another one from MrToBeNamedLater as well as 3 from IOnlyMadeThisSoICouldLeaveAnAsk and 1 from HelixStudios that I am working away on✨✨✨
