Coldwave + gen Legends team prompt - x number of times someone from the team thought they were together plus 1 time they actually were but no one believed them? (And thanks for opening up prompts again!)
1. Rip
Rip gave them separate roomson the ship.
Len exchanged a curious lookwith Mick, but shrugged. It didn’t matter much to him. Two rooms just meantmore space to put their stuff as they went on their shopping trip across time.Plus, it’d be nice to have separate corners to go back to when they needed thespace. They may have gotten back to their version of normal for the most part,but that also included periods where they needed a few days apart.
Honestly, he thought mostmarried couples could benefit from that.
“Beds are a little small,Rip,” he drawled while Mick snorted behind him.
“This is a time ship, Mr.Snart,” the captain said with disdain, “not a Motel 6.”
“You mean the beds don’tvibrate when you put a quarter in?” Len’s eyes widened dramatically. “Mick, weneed to go back to Central.”
“I thought you liked the onesin Keystone,” Mick said with a barely contained grin.
“I do,” Len admitted. Theyran too loud, but combine it with a heating pad and it was great when his backwas bothering him. Plus, it made Mick laugh. “Change of plans. We need to go toKeystone.”
“You’re some of the oldermembers of the crew,” Rip reminded them, irritated and long-suffering. “Pleaseact like it.”
“We’re thieves,” Len remindedhim. “We don’t exactly follow societal norms.”
“Ship seems smart,” Mickpiped in. “Bet it could make the beds vibrate.”
“Beds,” Rip repeated, as ifmaking two beds vibrate instead of one was ludicrous.
“We need options,” Lenagreed. “Ambiance. I like decorating with art. Mick likes memorabilia.”
“Just wait until I getZepplin’s guitar.”
Rip frowned at them, perplexed.“Partners?” he questioned.
“In sickness and in health,”Len deadpanned. “If it’s legal. Mick, was it legal?”
“For us or the aliases?” Mickasked innocently just before Rip walked away from them entirely. He met Len’seyes with a grin. “Think he knows?”
“We’re legends,” Len saidwith the worst English accent he could muster. The snort Mick gave was completelyundignified. “I’d bet it’s in the history books. CCPD were starting to figureit out before we left.”
“Finally.”
Len hummed in agreement. “Youreally think the ship can make the beds vibrate?”
2.Sara
Flirting with Sara was agame. She met him comment for comment while Mick rolled his eyes and it was fun. It was meaningless if they wantedit to be and if they didn’t… It wasn’t as if he and Mick were strictly monogamous. If the wind blewright and they felt like only being with each other, they’d speak up. Monogamymeant putting those rings back on significant fingers and the old school ideaof forsaking all others.
They weren’t wearing theirrings when they joined the Waverider. They were back together, but running ontheir old rhythms and it was fine. It was how they worked.
Mick had been amused by Sarafrom day one. Pegged her and the look Len was definitely giving her ass andtold him good luck, because Mickthought Len wouldn’t have a chance. Len would have been insulted if his idea offlirting with women didn’t usually end up being snarky comments that were only kind of flirting and being overlyforward in the same breath.
There was a reason he’dmostly only been with men.
But Sara was fun. Theircomments became steps to an odd little dance that would go as far as theywanted it to. Maybe a bed. Maybe nowhere at all. It was enough to keep him onhis toes and he saw the answering grin from her that said she was having justas good a time.
Which…didn’t quite explainthe vaguely guilty look that took over her face when she’d asked for a sparringpartner and saw a lingering hickey low on his neck.
“Where’d that come from?” sheasked, sounding a little amused, but there was a sudden tension that hadn’tbeen there before.
He frowned at her, confused. “Mick,”he replied, because who else would it be from? They all knew they weretogether.
Guilt and hurt and anger andhe really did not understand girls, because all of a sudden, she was mutteringabout men being infuriating.
Maybe he should just stopflirting with women.
3.Amaya
They couldn’t see himanymore, not since Stein had taken the receiver out of Mick’s head. The thinghadn’t been functional in months, not properly, but it had been enough for Len.It had given him something to latch onto, something that solidified theconnection between him and Mick, but with it gone…
Maybe it was for the best, hethought. Every time he’d appeared to Mick, he’d been frustrated and bitter andit wasn’t helping anything. It wasn’t as if telling Mick it was him would helpanything, because they were right. He was blown through the time stream inmillions of pieces, floating through time and space until it was all happeningat once and… Fuck, just trying to stay centered on a single version of Micktook everything he had. There was no point in telling Mick the truth when itcouldn’t save him. It would just hurt them both.
He still watched, forced hiscells together as much as he could and to stay in one fucking place so he couldwatch. Watched the team knock Mick down until they had to build themselves backup as one.
Amaya was…good. Flawed asanyone and uneducated in some things, but she listened when Mick explainedpyromania and anxiety to her and when he told her that her view of mentalhealth was outdated. Len could respect her and the way she was a little morecareful with Mick on the bad days.
She let Mick talk about Lenon those days, attentive while he went on about whatever story came to mind.Old jobs. The safe house in Gotham Len had loved and Mick had outright banned,because it was Gotham.
“You miss him,” she said,understanding and kind as one story tapered off with a sad chuckle.
“Built my fuckin’ life aroundhim,” Mick agreed. He took another long drink from his beer like it’d numb thehurt.
Her eyes widened a little atthe words, surprised, and Len wondered if anyone had bothered to tell her they’dbeen together. Maybe not, he considered. The others didn’t tend to talk abouthim much and Mick wasn’t a big talker in general, especially not when he had totalk about feelings. “You two…”
Mick grunted and took anothersip of his beer. “Bastard loved starting shit. You shoulda seen the game of catand mouse him and Sara had going,” he told her. “Kept telling him they neededto find a bed and get it over with.”
Bright side, alternate himwasn’t some kind of hypocritical Nazi.
Downside, the alternate himhad puppets.
Len didn’t even know wherethe man found puppet versions of the team. He didn’t think he wanted to know.
The humor of his existencewas dampened by Stein’s death, though. He’d been ambivalent about the professorwith his attitude and tendency to look down on the less moral of them, but heliked Jax. The kid was broken up about it, lost without his other half, andwhile Len hovered behind Mick unseen, he watched Jax get halfway to Mick justto change his mind and turn around. Searching for help and too scared to askfor it, Len thought. Poor kid.
If he’d had any effect on theworld around him, he might have made something crash, cause some kind of noisethat would make Mick look in Jax’s direction before the kid could turn tail andrun.
He didn’t need to.
Somewhere near the fourteenthtime, Mick cracked open a second beer and slid it to the empty spot next tohim. “Take a seat, kid,” he said without turning around, because of course Mickhad known Jax was there. He’d probably always known, but he was letting the kid do what he needed to.Hide when he needed to hide.
Jax hesitated before he satdown, beer bottle clutched between two hands for a long time before he finallytook a drink. “It’s my fault,” Jax said finally.
“He made his choice,” Mickcountered. “Loved you enough that he wanted you to make it out if only one ofyou could.”
“He had a family!”
“And you’ve got a whole lifeahead of you,” Mick reminded him, blunt but not without kindness. There was atenderness with Jax. He was the youngest of the team and old enough to takecare of himself, but Mick would always be a big brother. “Doesn’t make it anyeasier when you’re the one left behind, but it’s what you’ve got.”
“That what you do?”
Len wasn’t sure he actually needed to breathe, but his breath stillcut off suddenly. This wasn’t a conversation he wanted to be a part of, muchless be a spectator to, but he didn’t know how to leave. Thought it might have been his own fucking masochism thatkept him there.
“Ain’t the same, kid,” Micktold him with a kind of tiredness that made Len’s throat feel tight. The handthat wasn’t holding the beer bottle reached up reflexively to brush against thechain around his neck he usually kept under his shirt. He’d been playing withthe twin bands absently before Jax joined him, but they were still in the openand Len watched Jax’s eyes focus in on them. Watched them go wide for a minute,surprised, and quickly turn into a grief that was new and old.
“Mick…”
“Just keep going, kid,” Micktold him. “That’s what he wanted. Just live your damn life.”
Jax nodded, eyes wet, andthey lapsed back into silence. The rings didn’t disappear back under Mick’sshirt while they nursed their beers and Len found himself staring at them. Theway the platinum glinted off the lights and the way they laid against eachother on the chain.
Jax kept looking too. Lenwondered if it was guilt or the kid questioning his own future.
5.The Team
The time stream spit him outin a whirl of colors and pain.Non-corporeal becoming corporeal again and Len hadn’t felt in three years. But his knees collapsed under him and hecrashed to uneven ground with a rock digging into his hip and… Wild eyessearched around, wide and watery because the daylight was too fucking bright.Blurry figures, gasps, and shouts.
Big hands on his shoulders.
He cried out, startled.
The hands moved up to holdhis face and tilt it upwards. Get a good look, his mind supplied, but he had topress his eyes shut because of the way the light burned.
“You’re okay,” a voice said. Mick’s voice, rough and gravelly andbrittle in ways that Len knew meant Mick was about to lose his shit. “You’reokay, Lenny. You’re… Fuck.”
He wanted to say something,to tell Mick he was alright, but it might have been as much lie as it wastruth. He was shaking and if anyone accused him of crying, he’d blame it on theway the light hurt his eyes, but he was alive? Back? He didn’t know what tocall it.
Didn’t bother trying tofigure it out as Mick hugged him hard, lips brushing over his cheek beforeMick’s face was buried in his neck. Len held him back just as hard, likeholding onto Mick would keep him from disappearing again and put him backtogether all at once.
“Must be happy to have yourpartner back, huh?” Ray asked Mick with a watery smile later, after they’d managedto pick themselves off the ground and acknowledged the others.
Mick’s arm tightened aroundLen’s waist, supporting and needing support all at once. “Yeah,” he said as Lenleaned into him, body feeling weak. “Yeah, Haircut.”
Nate stared at them foranother second before realization dawned. “Ohhh. Partners.”
Sara’s palm met her forehead.
Mick shook his head andshuffled Len on board.
+1Time They Didn’t Believe Them
Mick was hurt. Mick was hurt. It was more fire and burns andthis wasn’t supposed to happen again. It wasn’t supposed to…
They’d been too far away fromthe Waverider and Gideon’s med bay. Too far away from the futuristic saves andthey’d had to settle for a hospital. It was 2012 and Len was back in another ERin another shitty city and losing his mind. Maybe losing Mick. He couldn’tfucking do this again. He couldn’t…
He’d put his wedding ringback on in the mad rush to get to the hospital. Paramedics bent over Mick inthe ambulance and blood on his hands, Len had swallowed back bile and unhookedthe ring from the chain around his neck. It didn’t fit him right anymore,knuckles just barely big enough that he had to force it down. Thanked a god hedidn’t believe in and had to rightthen that he’d been just this side of too skinny since the time stream hadgiven him back to Mick. It felt too tight and he’d have a hell of a timegetting it off later, but he needed it. Needed the connection. Needed the proof.
“I’m his husband,” he toldthe doctor when the man didn’t want to release any information. Dark eyesflickered down to the ring.
“Mr. Snart-”
“Rory,” he corrected, becausewhen it came to hospitals and real names, he was always Leonard Rory. A cityhall wedding. A name change somewhere down the road that might not have been atall legal. He’d never wanted to keep Lewis’ name, had downright laughed whenMick had made a joke about hyphenating.
“Mr. Rory,” the doctorcorrected sympathetically, “the burns were extensive…”
He listened to theexplanation and the promises that they’d do everything they could for him, andno one seemed to judge him for the way he sank into a chair and put his head inhis hands.
“I wanna transfer him toBoston when he’s stable,” he said, because they could get Mick off-course intransport and get him back to the Waverider. Let Gideon heal him back up theway he’d been. Mick didn’t need more burns. He might look at the scars likesome kind of religious communion with the fire, but not with the way the doctorwas saying it had crippled him this time.
God, his face…
“It was a good idea,” Zarisaid to him after the doctor had left and they’d visited and Len had thrown upuntil his head spun. “Telling them you were married. They only would havetalked to family.”
“You did it for the legalprotections, right?” Nate guessed. “Since spouses can’t testify against eachother.”
“And medical,” Ray added. Asif he’d needed to.
“You want help getting thering off?” Sara offered. “Pinky rings aren’t really meant for the otherfingers. It looks like it’s starting to cut off circulation.”
“It wasn’t…” He wanted to sayit wasn’t a pinky ring, that he’d been a scrawny shit when they’d gottenmarried and that, back then, it had fit on the proper finger. The wordswouldn’t come, though, and he shook his head, pulling his hand in towards hischest. He could have Gideon resize it when they got back to the ship. Let hergrow his finger back if she had to.
Coldwave, a Len from an Earth where Mick died at the Oculus runs into our Mick
The thing was, he’d alwaysknown Mick would die in a blaze of glory. It would be big and impressive andthe fire would burn bright the way Mick loved.
But Mick would be dead and Lenwould be alone.
He’d nearly gotten himselfkilled when he tried to run back in after him, already prepared to take Mick’splace, because Mick couldn’t die. Nothere. Not like this. Not on a mission Mick hadn’t wanted to be on in the firstplace. Not ever. Len knew they were a mess, complicated and dysfunctional, butMick had been his whole damn life since he was fourteen and he didn’t know howto face a world where they wouldn’t come back together eventually.
He’d always told himself he’dbe the first to die, selfish as it was.
But the explosion went off whenhe’d barely gotten back inside, shockwaves coming before the flames. Sarascreamed his name and might have threatened to drag him back herself, but…
It was too late.
The realization hit him and heknew. An explosion with Mick in the center… He was gone. There was no pullinghim back and getting him out. It wasn’t a matter of Gideon healing some burnsand regrowing a limb. He knew what explosions did to bodies when they were theones with their hand on the trigger. He knew…
The world went quiet aroundhim, muffled and numb and it was like everything had just…stopped. Broken. Tinyhands on his arms that should have made him flinch. Fingers pressed to hispulse point like they were trying to see if he was okay. There was a thrum ofblood pulsing under their fingers, he was sure, but he felt dead.
It was his fault.
Someone—he was never sure who—gothim back onto the ship and he stared dazedly out the window as the VanishingPoint came apart in a series of explosions.
It was beautiful, he thought ashis knees went out from under him.
Mick would have loved it.
He left them to kill Savagewithout him. He should have gone with them, taken revenge out on the man theTime Masters had been helping. Savage had just as much a hand in killing Mickas they had.
He didn’t go. He couldn’t pullhimself out of the fog that was half grief and what he only sort of heard Lisacalling dissociation. Someone must have called her. Maybe the Flash. Barry.Cisco. Someone. Not Mick. Mick wasn’t calling her. He wasn’t calling anyone.
He ate when people made him,but mostly, he slept. Sometimes, he cried. Others, he screamed.
“It’ll be okay, Lenny,” Lisapromised him, voice tear-clogged and weak.
He squeezed his eyes shut andwished she wasn’t lying.
He got back on his feeteventually, but he wasn’t okay. He’dnever done well without Mick. Jobs were too risky. He was a little too brutal,skirting too close to the kind of callousness Lewis used to have.
All trace of the Legendsdisappeared six months after Mick died.
Len didn’t look for them.
Three years, four months, oneweek, and six days after Mick died, he walked into Jitters.
Mick walked into Jitters.
Len’s fingers curled around thecardboard cup of hot chocolate with cayenne and marshmallows—a Heatwave—so tightthat he thought he’d crush it in his grip. He stared, sure he was starting tohallucinate again and that he was going to have to call the shrink Lisa hadforced him to start seeing, but-
Mick looked as shocked as him.As wide-eyed. As pale.
He looked like he’d seen aghost when he was the ghost.
They ended up at a table in thecorner, backs straight and hands holding onto cups like lifelines. Neither ofthem spoke for a while. Len’s drink went cold.
“Which Earth is this?” Mickasked finally, his voice all gravel and stressed in the way that said wordswere hard right then.
“Nine,” Len said, because he’dknown. He’d fucking known it wasn’t the same Mick. He’d seen too many doubleswalk around Central to think he could be that lucky. “You’re-”
“-one,” Mick finished. “Youdied at this place. The Oculus-”
“You died at the Oculus,” Len corrected. Maybe stated. He couldn’tmake his brain think. “I wasn’t fast enough-”
“You took my place,” Mick saidand there it was. It was the answer of what would have happened had he beenthat much faster. He would have died for Mick. He should have died for Mick, who had spent his whole life saving Len.
“I tried-”
“I hate you for it,” Mick snapped. Len went still. Mick’s eyes were litup, angry and hurting and… Len understood. Mick hated his Len for dying on him,for taking his place and leaving him alone. He still loved him, but he alsohated him a little bit.
“I hate you too,” Len admitted,because he doesn’t think that angry part of him will ever go away. He lovesMick more than he hates him, but it’s there.
Mick gave a sharp nod andturned his eyes down to his drink. “Are you okay?” he asked.
“Are you?” he returned. It wasas much of an answer as it wasn’t. They both had the dark look lurking in theireyes, a tiredness that went too deep to fix. Some things, you just don’t get over.
Mick snorted and that was that.They didn’t talk. Len didn’t ask why Mick was on Earth-9. They stared into mugsof cooled drinks until Mick’s comm went off and he replied with a gruffaffirmative. Sad eyes met sad eyes and they knew it was goodbye. It was for thebest. This Mick wasn’t Len’s Mick anymore than Len was Mick’s Len.
It didn’t stop them from asingle kiss in the dark corner of Jitters. Mick’s gloved hand cupping the sideof his face as Len curled his fingers into the front of Mick’s shirt. Lipspressed against lips, closed and hurting, because it was like they were sayinggoodbye to different people more than to each other.
“Be careful,” Len whispered,because his Mick or not, he needed to know there was a Mick alive on anotherearth. It might help him sleep better.
“You too,” Mick mumbled back.He swiped his thumb across Len’s cheekbone once and, then, he was gone.
It wasn’t closure, but it wasthe closest he’d ever get.
If no one else has said it... Prompt: Coldwave, Earth-9 Len decides that any Earth with Mick is better than the one he's on.
I also had an anon prompt from the same universe, so they both kind of bled together??? So yes. This is a sequel to a different earths AU that can be found here.
Anonymous prompt: E-9 Len and E-1 Mick meet up again and travel together? (Inspired by your latest post/response.).
Earth 9 burned.
He’d gotten used to Barryshowing up at his apartment, awkward and reluctant whenever he asked for help.A bad guy here. A too-wild Rogue there. Len turned him down every time. He didn’tcare, hadn’t cared about much ofanything since the Oculus and Mick and dully promising Lisa that he wouldn’toff himself. He wasn’t quite sure that he believed him and he was pretty sureTeam Flash had bugged his place, but whatever. The most they’d ever hear washim gasping awake in the middle of the night because he was dreaming ofShreveport or the Oculus.
Sometimes, he wondered if thatwas why Cisco had trouble looking him in the eye and not because he and hisgirlfriend seemed to be courting Lisa.
Then, the world shifted. It waslike everything had shifted three inches to the left and, suddenly, people werein power that hadn’t been. People were dying. A new world order, their rulerswould say in the way that made Len’s skin crawl.
Cisco died first. Then,Caitlin. Cynthia. Barry. Body after body kept falling, bodies strung up likewarnings that death would follow if you thought to put on a mask.
Lisa died in his arms while shechoked on her own blood.
For the first month after, he’dexpected the Legends to come and fix things, but Sara’s and Ray’s bodies gothung like twisted piñatas and Len couldn’t find it in him to be surprised whenthe others followed. Jax. Stein. Rip. Kendra. Battered bodies of people he didn’tknow, but their rulers did and they boasted.
People died until everyone wastoo scared to fight back and, eventually, the rulers turned on each other. Warand blood and Len barely slept for weeks as the echoes of bombs going off kepthim awake.
His home became a wasteland inthe span of a year.
When a breach opened, he didn’tthink twice about stepping through it. Anywhere was better than a world ruledby the Legion.
He stepped out into a fieldwhere guns were going off, but a flash of flame and a bark of his name made himduck just in time.
Mick was staring at him when helooked up, but it was the other one. Earth 1, he remembered. The coat was thesame and the gloves were black instead of the dark red his Mick used to wear.
“Nine,” Len told him before hecould ask. “A breach opened-”
“We’ll get you back,” the otherRay told him, cheerful and helpful, as if he thought Len would want to go back.
“Nothanks,” he said shortly and held his hand out to Mick, expecting a backupweapon. The gun that got pressed into his grip shot bullets instead of ice, butit was good enough. He shot an advancing werewolf—what the fuck—between the eyes and gave Mick a disturbed look. “Youget those a lot?”
“Don’task,” Mick advised with a long-suffering look.
Lenjust shot another werewolf that… Yes, that werewolf had vampire fangs. Okay, then.
Hetold Mick about his earth later, hands curled around a mug that held more bourbonthan hot chocolate. Mick listened, knuckles white around his own beer bottle,and skin gray when he told him about Lisa’s death.
They’dboth needed a minute after that.
Butthe story came and the tears didn’t, but Mick’s knee was pressed against hisown by the end.
“I’msorry,” Mick murmured, like speaking any louder would break them both topieces.
Lenonly hesitated a few seconds before he put his hand over Mick’s. “It happens,”he replied, but didn’t think Mick would appreciate him pointing out that thewhole thing proved Len should have been the one that died. Far as they couldtell, their worlds had been near-mirror images, splitting at their alternateselves dying at the Oculus.
Lendied and Earth 1 lived on.
Mickdied and nothing of Earth 9 was left standing.
“Whatare you gonna do?” Mick asked him.
Lendidn’t have an answer for a long time.
Inthe end, he stayed, if only because he had nowhere else to go. The Lisa on thisearth had hugged tight once, but he wasn’t her brother and she wasn’t hissister. It wasn’t the same. He couldn’t replace her Len any more than she couldreplace his Lisa.
“Don’tdie, alright?” she told him as they parted. He hadn’t been able to resist theneed to pull her in and kiss her forehead.
“Youtoo,” he murmured into her hair before he let her go.
“He’snot him, you know,” she said when he was halfway to the door. He turned back toher, frowning, and she continued on. “Mick. He’s not the one you lost.”
“I’mnot his Snart either,” he agreed, because he wasn’t going to try and make thisMick fit in the mold of his. Their old wedding ring sat on a chain around hisneck in the same way it would until he was rotting in the ground. As horribleas they’d always been with words, it was something that couldn’t be replacedwith a body double.
Shenodded like he’d said the right thing. “Don’t die.”
Hegave her a ghost of a grin. “You too.”
TheseLegends were different with their strange combination of family and strangers.They tried, but they moved around each other like they were still trying tofigure out how to let people in. The ones he recognized looked at him with thesame kind of sad look Lisa had given him when she first saw him, because he waswearing a dead man’s face just as much as he wasn’t.
Mickcalled him Lenny and resolutely didn’t call him Len, like if he did, he’d beskirting the line of losing himself between the one he had and the one he’dlost.
Lenstill called him Mick, if only because he could never say Mickey with astraight face, but it seemed to work out. They fell into a rhythm that was asfamiliar as it wasn’t. Mick kept the old cold gun stored away and Len let Rayhelp him build a new gun that fit closer to the specs of the one he’d had onhis own earth.
Hetook a kind of malicious glee in killing Damien Dhark when the opportunitycame. Demons and daughters and Dhark drowned in his own blood the way Lisa had.
“Closure?”Mick asked him later when he caught Len scrubbing blood from under his nails.
“Closeas it’s gonna get,” Len replied, because that was his reply to most thingsthese days. Questions about Mick. About Lisa. About the things and the peoplehe’d lost. Everything would always be a little different than how it had been,good enough to settle something in him, but not quite enough to let him forget.
Hethought he liked it that way.
Theirfirst kiss was a mess.
Theroom was dark. Mick’s lips tasted like beer. Len’s tasted like salt and tears.
Technically,it wasn’t even their first kiss, butthat kiss outside Jitters was long past and hadn’t even been about them. It hadbeen them kissing their real partners goodbye as much as they’d ever be ableto. A sad attempt to lay some feelings to rest and move on.
Lenwasn’t sure they’d ever really manage it, but they both kept living.
Theybarely looked at each other for days after, confused and ashamed, because howcould they? Falling in love again was going to happen—and, God, that was tooheavy for a first kiss, but his gut knew what his heart didn’t want to admit—butit felt like a betrayal to his Mick if he moved on with a different version ofhim.
“I’mnot him,” Len told him when a mission got them trapped in a basement for hours.
“Idon’t want you to be,” Mick replied plainly, but there was amusement lightingup his eyes. “Turns out, I’ve got a fucking type.”
Lensnorted out a laugh. “What? Leonard Snarts?”
“Painsin the ass,” Mick corrected. “Apparently, I find it cute.”
“Itworks,” Len said, lips quirking. “I think I’ve got a thing for gruff assholes.”
Itwasn’t the same. Their histories were almost identical up until a certainpoint, but it was the things that happened after that changed them. Lensecluded himself a little more and held onto the ones he cared about a littletoo tightly. Mick spoke up in ways his anxiety used to never allow.
Theywere different people, he realized one day when he was staring out into thetime stream and searching for another him in the swirls. The ones they’d lost andthe ones they’d found, because Len had never been Len without Mick in the sameways Mick wasn’t quite Mick without Len. The combination was different, but itwas a home they were building from the ashes of broken lives.
“Yougood?”
Lenglanced at Mick’s reflection in the glass, fingers falling from the ring aroundhis neck. “Yeah,” he said and knew he was telling the truth. “I’m good.”
Coldwave fic where it takes Mick flirting with someone as part of a heist for Len to realize he has feelings for him?
Leonard Snart was a petty, possessiveasshole. He knew that. He accepted that. Lisa might have shaken her head at himand Mick might roll his eyes halfway out of his head about it, but facts werefacts. He cared about very few people and the ones he let in? If they were in,they were in. He protected his own and maybe he was – definitely – a bastardabout it, but he made his stance clear.
The fact was, though, that Mickhad known what he was signing up for when he agreed to being partners. Hesigned up for the headaches and every last one of Len’s quirks.
Which…fine. Maybe Mick hadn’tquite expected Len to be so judgmental about the people Mick took home. Orabout that guy in Saints & Sinners that kept asking Mick to play pool so hecould watch Len’s partner bend overthe table.
Mick fucking knew what theasshole was doing too. That amused grin of his said everything.
Len was used to it. He didn’t like it, but he was used to it.
He was less used to Mick beingthe one on the grift for jobs. Most times, it was Len playing the con whileMick played muscle. Others, they’d pull Lisa in if the job needed a woman’stouch. But they didn’t usually have Mick in a three-piece suit – loose tie andtop buttons undone, because Mick was wholly incapable of buttoning a shirtfully – and conning some woman in a form-fitting gown.
Len should have been the one onthe grift, but no. Lewis’ last surprise visit meant Len was laid up with abusted leg and even more busted ribs. Mick had had to take over rather thanrisk the opening to get in with the woman that curated the art museum in OpalCity.
Who, as it happened, seemed tolike Mick.
He watched the feed from Mick’sbutton cam, scowling, as she laughed and ran her hand down Mick’s arm. Stupidand typical, but Mick was giving it rightback. He kept bending his head down to hers and the angle of the cameragave just enough space for Len to see his hand on a narrow hip.
“Her key card is in her purse,”Len reminded him, irritated. “Not on her ass.”
Mick snorted into his scotchand had to cover it up with a flimsy excuse she still fell for. Idiot. Down thewrong pipe. Lisa wouldn’t have fallen for that when she was four.
“I already got it,” Mickgrumbled into his comm when he stepped away to get them both a new drink.
“Making a night of it, then?”
“You’re the one that said toplay it natural. It ain’t like I could pick it and run. Security would be on myass in a minute.” Damn it, he had a point. “So shut up and take your meds. You’rebitchier than normal when your ribs are broken.”
Then, he turned off the buttoncam.
He fucking turned it off.
“I can still hear you,” he reminded Mick,peeved. “There are rules-”
“Onepoint of contact at all times when split up on a job. I know, Len. Jesus.”
Hesat there the rest of the night, blind and listening to Mick flirt with thecurator, all high-pitched giggling from her and low, rumbling chuckles fromMick. The ones that said he was truly amused and, excuse you, those chuckleswere usually reserved for Len. Notthat he could tell Mick that, because pointing out specific laughs and claimingownership to them was a level of crazy that Len wasn’t even sure he wanted to touch.
Evenif they were his.
Mickknew Len didn’t like sharing.
It wasn’t like he’d go homewith her, though. He’d already played a risky game by staying with her for solong after taking the card. If she’d realized…
It was a relief when Mick toldher goodnight and walked her to the valet station to get her car.
So Len was not still poutingwhen Mick got back to the safe house with the once-loose tie completely undoneand his shirt hanging open by a few more buttons. He wasn’t. The pouting wasover.
“Are you still pouting?”
Fine. Maybe he was stillpouting a little bit. “No.”
Mick rolled his eyes at him thesame way he always did when Len was being especially insane. “Uh-huh. I’m gonnaget out of this.”
“Surprised you didn’t have herhelp with that.”
“Maybe I wanted you to,” Mickshot back with the same benign flirting he’d always done. It drove Lisa crazy.She called them ridiculous.
“Not tonight, honey. I have aheadache,” Len drawled.
Mick disappeared into thebedroom with a bark of laughter and Len almost asked if he’d wanted to go back with the woman. Almost.Not that it would have mattered, because Mick didn’t usually go home withpeople Len didn’t approve of. That Len knewof, he corrected suddenly as something in his stomach twisted. It wasn’t likehe was glued to Mick or that Mick really neededLen’s approval for a hookup. Mick was no monk. He met people and went home withpeople, but he came back to Len. Which mattered. Somehow.
Even when they were pissed,they went home to each other eventually, he thought as he stared at the closeddoor. Home. Because safe houses were safe houses, but with Lisa off at college,Len’s idea of home had become pretty damn centered on Mick and-
Huh. He…might be a little inlove with Mick.
No wonder Lisa said he wasridiculous.
Or…they. She said they were ridiculous.
“Len? You alright?” Mick’s voice came and Len blinkedhimself free of the questions that had started popping up in his head to see…Yeah. Sweat pants and a wife-beater that answered the question do you find Mick attractive with aresounding hell yes. That suit hadlooked really good too, if out of character for him, but this… This was Mick.
Fuck, he was screwed.
“Are you in love with me?”
Mick went still. And a little pale.Maybe a little panicked. “What?”
“You flirt-”
“-so do you-”
“-and Lisa says we’reridiculous-”
“-it’s Lisa-”
“-and I think I’m in love withyou, so two plus two equals ridiculous. I think.”
Mick’s mouth snapped shut soquickly that Len heard his teeth clack. It sounded like it hurt. “You’re inlove with me?”
“Signs point to yes,” Lenreplied, a little curious. “It’s a new feeling. I’m not used to it.”
“Because you hate most people.”Mick knew him so well.
“You didn’t answer my question.”
Mick’s Adams apple bobbed as heswallowed, but he came and sat on the coffee table next to the couch Len wasextended on. Fingers interlaced. Bent forward to put his elbows on his knees. “Idon’t flirt with you for your witty combacks.”
“I thought you liked mycomebacks,” Len said, maybe a little wounded. “They’re clever.”
“They’re really not.”
“I thought they were.”
“You also love puns. You’re nota good judge.”
“You love me,” Len accused. “Youwouldn’t put up with me if you didn’t.”
“No,” Mick admitted and quirkedhis lips up into a tiny smile. “I wouldn’t.”
♀ how long does your muse usually need for a shower/bath?
It depends. If it’s a normal shower, he’s in and out in ten minutes. If it’s because he’s hurting and his back or his joints are bothering him, he’ll lie in a too-hot tub until Mick starts in on him about heat stroke. Which Len is pretty damn sure you can’t get from sitting in a bath, but Mick can be a mother hen sometimes.
If Mick’s showering with him, the showers last as long as the water tank does.
♤ does your muse have any scars? where? what do they look like? how did get them?
Len has way too many scars. Injuries are a hazard of being Lewis’ son and of being a criminal. If it wasn’t his dad with fists and broken beer bottles, it was jobs with guns or inmates with shivs. There are some burn scars from Mick’s fires that they don’t talk about. Ever.
People crack jokes about the way he keeps himself covered up, but the fact of the matter is that he’s got scars all over, but they’re mostly centered on his upper body. When Gideon reconstructed his hand and part of his wrist, it was the first time he’d seen that skin scar-free in decades. Old cigarette burns--another of Lewis’ favorites--were gone, but more are still littered up the inside of both forearms. He’s got an old stab wound on his right side. There are burns on his back from when he dragged Mick out of the fire in Shreveport. A bullet wound in his left shoulder from one bastard that got too close. His right knee has a mess of surgical scars from when a job went bad and Mick had downright carried him to a hospital. There are more scars he doesn’t even remember the stories behind, whether by time or by choice. Lisa still gets choked up whenever she sees what’s left of old scars on his back. He thinks they might be from a belt, but he’s not sure and it’s better to just not let her see them.
♦ any tattoos? where? what’s the story behind them?
No tattoos. There have been points where he wanted them and where he told himself “if I ever got a tattoo, this is what I’d get”, but tattoos mean identifying marks and having to expose scarred skin to a tattoo artist.
Let it be clear, Len has zero interest in prison tats. He knows how they’re done and knows with his luck, he’d end up with an infection. He’ll pass.
⦂ what clothes do they sleep in?
Long-sleeved shirts and sweatpants. Yes, he is the person that will get redressed after sex, even if his partner is looking at him like he’s crazy. No, he does not want to sleep naked. Most of his beds have been in sketchy motel rooms or half-assed safe-houses. You’re lucky he put his naked ass on that bed long enough to do anything.
Plus, he’s always cold as shit at night. Poor circulation.
For years, it was hisgrandfather that had done the upkeep on the house. The walls ate the meagerincome the ice cream truck gave him, but he tried. It was the house he’d boughtwith his wife. The house they’d raised their son in. The house their son hadbrought his new wife to. The house his grandson was born in.
But then, Lewis left, shuffledaway to prison and the house wasn’t the same. Leonard walked the halls of it,trailing after his grandfather and watching the world pass. He watched from thekitchen’s doorway when little Lisa was brought home from the hospital, wrappedin pink. He watched her grow, guiding her as she toddled around. He whisperedto her when she rubbed sore ears and pretended that her new gold studs didn’thurt.
He watched from the front porchwhen she left, a car full of boxes and her ice skates. “Bye, Lis,” he murmuredafter her and gave a short wave as she gave one last look towards her home.
The house grew quiet afterthat, emptied out after Lisa and her mother moved back east. It left Len alone,staring at the bare bones of a house that had been his family’s for so long.The one that had seen his first breath.
“The history,” a woman saidcautiously as her fingers traced the painted-over grooves of his old growthchart on the kitchen door’s frame, “I read the stories…”
“It was nearly twenty yearsago, Sarah.” The man pulled her against his chest. “It’s fine. It’s Central.You know how much they like their old stories. Besides, Mick and Becca alreadyclaimed their bedrooms.”
She sighed. “I know,” she said,but she opened her mouth to say something else. Another argument, maybe, oranother regret about the farm they’d left behind in Keystone.
“Mom, where’s the box with my-”
The boy—Len’s age, he thought,no older than seventeen—stopped mid-sentence, frozen where he stood. Wide eyesstared as Len moved around his parents.
“Mick, what is it?” his motherasked. “What’s wrong?”
“Hi,” Len said, more a testthan anything. Just to verify. Alwaysverify, his father had told him once upon a time. Ironic, he thought,because the man had never planned ahead. “I’m Len.”
The boy kept staring at him.“Uh… Mom, those stories the realtor had mentioned?”
His father sighed,long-suffering. “Not you too. Mick, you used to sleep out in that old barn.Don’t tell me you’re scared of an old ghost story.”
“But I…” Mick trailed off,pausing before he gave a long breath. “I just…thought I saw something.”
“You did,” Len told him with agrin. “You know, you picked my room.”
“Shit,” Mick breathed. Hisparents scolded him, but he didn’t seem to notice.
Because the stories were right;the old stories the neighbors told about Lewis Snart and how he’d killed hiswife and son in ’72. Len’s mom had passed on, finally free of the man she’dstopped loving and grown to fear, but Len… Len had always been too scared. He’dstuck around, giving his grandfather company until he died and, then, trailingafter Lisa when the next owners brought her home.
He’d been in love with Micksince he was sixteen. It wasn’t like the movies with one big, significantmoment that made the lightbulb go off. It was…quiet. Slow. Years of comfort andfriendship until he’d realized that, oh, that was what being in love wassupposed to feel like; like friendship, but more.
It was the least dramatic thinghe’d ever done.
He never told Mick. Heswallowed it down over the years, burying it under snark, one-night-stands, andpeople he could have grown to love if his heart was big enough for more thanMick and Lisa. He didn’t need it, didn’t need the drama and the inevitablerejection and the loss of the one person that had come into his life and heldon.
When Mick burned, it was likesomething inside Leonard had died. Shaking hands and panic attacks that tookhim so far out of himself, he thought he might never come back. Running. He ranand kept running, because he couldn’t face that he’d gotten Mick hurt. Hisplans had been flawed. They’d put Mick somewhere he knew his partner wouldn’twillingly walk away from.
“I’ll let the world burn,” Mickhad told him once, voice far away as he stared into his lighter’s flame.
“What about you?” he’d asked.
“I’ll burn with it,” Mick hadreplied with a smile. “Right down to ashes.”
He ran for two years, but in theend, he always went back to Mick. He went back with a present that promisedMick’s destruction as much as his own. He went back with words that were toocool but covered up the hammering in his chest.
Mick never let him see hisscars. Len knew where they were, had poured over medical records Lisa hadstolen from the hospital after he’d fled Shreveport. His shoulders. His arms.His chest. And Mick, the guy that used to walk around their safe houses withjeans and nothing else, suddenly kept himself covered in ways that were morelike Len than himself. Layers. Long sleeves. Gloves.
They didn’t talk about it.
They pretended it wasn’t there,the same way they’d always pretended Leonard wasn’t hiding a patchwork of scarsunder his own clothes. Pretending was easier.
When Chronos happened, Lenwished they’d never left Central.
He went to Mick’s quartersafter they’d dropped their younger selves at the Refuge, ready to tell Mickthat, never mind, they should just go home. Fuck everyone else. He couldn’t dothis anymore, felt like his anxiety was going to kill him before the TimeMasters could. Alexa, he wanted totell Mick, abort.
Mick was shirtless when he camein, halfway to reaching for a new Henley, but he froze. They both froze as thedoor slid shut behind him. Len sucked in a breath. Mick clenched his jaw.Neither of them flushed, but Len almost wished he could so Mick wouldunderstand that he wasn’t disgusted. That he didn’t care about the scars. Theytore something in him to pieces, but it wasn’t disgust.
He should have said it, shouldhave reminded Mick that he wasn’t the only one with scars. That he wasn’t theonly one ashamed of them. His voicewouldn’t work, but his eyes did, moving carefully over the burns and the otherscars etched into skin. Didn’t ask about the ones that still looked fresh andcould only be from his time as Chronos.
He didn’t talk.
He swallowed thickly and lockedhis eyes on Mick’s as he shrugged out of his jacket. Shoved his sleeves up tohis elbows. Scars. Cigarette burns.
Mick starred back at him, newshirt clenched in his fist as he walked over. He dropped it halfway there, bothhands free as he took Len’s arms and looked. Thirty years of friendship and he’dnever let Mick see, had wrapped himself up in clothes that were more likearmor, because he hadn’t wanted Mick to see the weakness.
He hadn’t cared what hisone-night-stands felt in the dark. They hadn’t mattered. Mick mattered. His opinion mattered.
He forced himself to stay stillas rough fingers brushed over an old cigarette burn he couldn’t remembergetting, but he almost jumped back when Mick turned his arm over. Almost ran,because he didn’t want Mick to ask about the long scar that ran from his wristto his elbow.
Mick’s breath shook, but hedidn’t ask. His hand curled around Len’s wrist tighter in response, like it wasthe only thing he could manage. Len carefully didn’t think that Mick’s hold wasthe only thing keeping him from running like a coward.
He reached up with his freehand as the silence stretched, touching at the scars across Mick’s shoulder. Theywere rougher than he thought they’d be, extended down over his back and up hisneck into the space his collars usually hid. His fingers curled around them,holding on in something that was too intimate for them and the thing Leonardnever talked about.
Mick’s eyes moved up to hisface, staring, and Leonard spared a second to think how ridiculous it was thathe couldn’t speak. Words had never failed him so completely before, but evenwith only his forearms exposed, he felt stripped bare. He thought Mick mighthave seen it, might have understood, because something in his partner’s faceshifted. Gentler. A question Len couldn’t understand.
He understood it when Mickkissed him, that the glance towards his mouth had been him asking permission. Thathe’d taken the chance anyway.
His hands drifted to Mick’sbelt as they stumbled back towards the bed.
Hands roamed. Eyes took inevery mark.
Afterwards, Mick traced thebelt marks etched into Len’s back with the kind of attention Len usuallyreserves for memorizing blueprints.
“You’re leaving me with them?”Len sputtered. It was disrespectful, like he was just begging for his father toknock him on his ass.
Lewis almost did, a fist curledand an arm raised, but he lowered it. He didn’t look like he wanted to. Helooked like lowering it just made him want to hit Len more.
Len very carefully did notskitter back.
“Their brat saved yourworthless ass,” Lewis reminded him, glaring at him like he’d gone somethingwrong. Granted, he had. He’d mouthed off to a few Santini sons so spectacularlyon his first day at juvie that they’d tried to kill him. So it was his ownfault. Len was failing to see the point…
Oh.
“The life debt,” he realized.“That doesn’t mean you have to leave me with them!” He had a life in Central.He had Lisa. If he was left inKeystone, how the hell was he going to protect her?
This time, Lewis did hit him, ahard hit across his jaw that sent him careening into the wall behind him.
He knew. He knew the laws.Until he turned eighteen, it was his dad’s choice how to handle his debts.There was no way Lewis would have let Mick hang around his heists long enough togive Len time to save Mick in turn. A life for a life; through saving it orthrough marriage. A life saved or a life together.
He was fourteen.
He opened his mouth to argue,but Lewis caught him by the throat. “Lisa,” he croaked out. A question. A plea.
His father snorted and droppedhim back to the floor. “Hope she’s smarter than you.”
Mick was standing on the frontporch when his dad’s old Pontiac pulled up to the farm. Even from the passengerseat, he could see the apology Mick wanted to say. I’m sorry for taking you from her. I didn’t mean for this to happen.
It wasn’t his fault. Mostpeople didn’t follow the old laws anymore. They’d faded out of everyday usewhen blood magic and the fae fell out of favor, but Lewis had held on. TheSnarts had always been more archaic than Len’s mom had been comfortable with,but that was how she’d ended up married to his dad in the first place. An oldspell. A binding. Not even a divorce could have saved her.
Mick’s parents shooed him backas they met him and Lewis at the base of the stairs. They looked shell shocked,like they hadn’t expected this. Hadn’t wanted this. He respected them for it,seeing the horror on their faces at the idea of a man handing his son over likethis. At the proof that Lewis still followed the way of the fae.
Lewis shoved him forward hardenough to make him stumble. Mick’s mother caught him with thin hands, holdingonto him so tightly that he could feel the terrified tremble. His father wasthrowing him away, but he was forcing them into a magical contract he didn’tthink they wanted any part in.
“The debt is paid,” Lewis said,final. Len could feel the magic crackle through the air.
Mick’s father paled, mouthhanging open, and fuck, he didn’t know what to do. He inched towards him, voicelow as he whispered the proper words. “Paid with life,” the man repeated. “Whatwas yours is ours.”
Lewis hummed, cast Len a lastlook of disdain, and left.
Mick rushed off the porch thesecond the car had disappeared, frantic eyes on Len. “What now?”
Len swallowed. “Now,” he saidas he looked at Mick’s parents. At his in-laws. “You marry me off beforemidnight.”
There weren’t many choices.Mick was the oldest with a sister, Becca, a year behind him. Their siblings—thethree boys and baby girl—were too young, bodies too weak to handle the kind ofmagic necessary to satisfy a blood debt.
Becca refused before he evencame through the door. “I’m sorry,” she told him, genuine and terrified. “Ican’t.”
“He brought in the fae, Becca,”her mother tried. “You’re the only option. If we anger them-”
“I’ll do it.”
They all turned to Mick. Him,with wide eyes. His sister with surprised gratitude. His parents withconfusion.
“Mick, that’s not legal-”
“It’s magic,” Len said, cuttingoff Mrs. Rory’s argument. “Human law doesn’t matter. All they care is that Iget soul-bound to someone and that the debt gets paid.”
“You’re both children,” Mick’sfather said, angry.
“Becca’s thirteen,” Mickreminded him. “I’m older. And I’m the one that saved Lenny, anyway.” He lookedat Len, surer than Len had ever seen him in the few months they’d known eachother. “It should be me.”
Mick’s mother let out a noiselike something in her hurt. Len understood. He felt the same thing. And likeher, he knew Mick’s mind was made up. He was sentencing himself to Len, to their souls being bound socompletely that they’d follow each other through life and straight into death.
This wasn’t what Len had had inmind when he said they’d be partners on the outside.
It’s what was happening.
They completed the ceremonythat night, dressed in white and bathed in the moonlight as Len talked themthrough the ritual. As they cut their hands and bled together.
Len felt when it happened, likehis soul had been half torn from his body just to be replaced with somethingelse. A warmth he hadn’t had before. A presence.
They fell into each other,knees in the mud and shaking down to their bones.
“Lenny,” Mick gasped into hisneck. “I feel-”
“I know.”
He wanted a lighter. Thoughtthat might have been Mick’s own want echoing through them both.
He laced his fingers with Mick,their palms still bleeding, and squeezed. Muttered a phrase in Latin as Mickrepeated after him.
I’msorry, hewanted to say. You deserve better thanthis.
“It is done,” he said insteadand felt his end lock into place. “Where you go, I will go. And as you die, soshall I.”
Mick’s eyes met his, scared andserious in the same moment. “It is done,” he echoed and gasped as his own sideclicked. “Where you go, I will go. And as you die, so shall I.”
A chorus of giggles camethrough the trees, loud enough that it covered the sounds of Mick’s mother’ssobs and his father’s sniffs.
Becca clamped her hands overher ears to try and block out the fae’s laughter.
