Me again! I just love your writing and idk if I can request two if not it’s ok just ignore this, but can you write one for either Kix or Rex where there’s a lot I mean A LOT of tension between them x reader. They lowkey like each other but won’t even think about doing anything about it bc of regulations/rules. All other clones know and they always tease them. Maybe they do something to get them to confess both their feelings to one another? Maybe some angst and fluff and slow burn? Thank you sooo much
First, I’m sorry it’s taken me so long to get to this!! I adore this prompt and it was so fun to write!! (Also, I hope you won’t mind, but I picked Kix! ;) )
warnings: description of injuries, blood mention, angst, some language, a little, tiny bit of steam
word count: ~1.5k
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You suppose it starts out as little touches. Lingering glances and glancing brushes that feel like heavy blows in their aftermath.
It’s the way you swear Kix has a speck of dirt on his shoulder, right below the lurid red medic symbol. The way your hand lingers there for just half a beat too long, cupping the plastoid armor.
Or the way he moves around you, with his hand coming up to rest on your hip just long enough to move past, in a way that would annoy you to hell if it were anyone but him.
Perhaps it’s the way you high five him one day, after he regales you with the story of finally getting the infamous Captain Rex to get some rest. You intend the gesture to be be funny, but then you make contact with his hand and then the two of you just sort of… pause there, fingers splayed out against each other.
Totally normal way of high fiving someone.
It might even be in the way he sits just slightly too close, so that his hand accidentally grazes your thigh when he moves it from his lap to the table.
Once is an accident, twice is suspicious, but five times?
That can’t be a coincidence.
It graduates from there, as all things do. Little touches become longer, excused as necessary even though you both know everyone sees through your shit.
Maybe it’s when Fives walks in on you two sleeping, your head on Kix’s shoulder and his head resting on yours.
He teases Kix so hard, you want to cringe into the floor, even as Kix explains you both just “fell asleep.” Fives rolls his eyes as he leaves.
“Yeah, and I’m blind,” he mutters giving you in particular a knowing look.
Or maybe it’s when you fall and hit your head, not hard enough to cause permanent damage, but hard enough that Kix insists you let him check it out.
You sit in the medbay and watch him move around. If there’s just a bit more urgency in his step, neither of you comment on it. He clicks on a little light.
“Follow this with only your eyes,” he says. Maybe you hit your head a little harder than you thought, because you move your head after the light two different times.
Frustrated, he takes hold of your chin, keeping your head in place with one hand and moving the light with the other.
“Your eyes,” he says slowly, enunciating each word in a way that leaves you focusing on his lips.
“Eyes,” you hear yourself echo faintly.
He leans in while he studies your pupils, titling your face up just slightly. Makes sense, you reason, seeing as you’re sitting down and he’s standing over you.
“Gross, Kix, not in the medbay!” It’s his brother Jesse, making fake gagging noises. Kix jumps and lets go of you like he’s been burned.
“We’re not together.” He says it easily enough, but you don’t miss the glance back over his shoulder.
The longing that’s getting harder and harder to deny.
Were it not for rules, you two would be together in a heartbeat, the tiny part of your heart, the one you spend day after day arguing with, says.
The two of you are more subtle after that. Never alone together, always keeping busy so you don’t have to think about what you can’t have.
And it’s fine, really.
Except when you brush imaginary dirt off his shoulder, or when he brushes past you, or when you high five him, or when he sits just slightly too close, you feel like you’re being burned alive.
As it happens, you two finally reach a breaking point when you, well, quite literally, butt heads.
He’s on his back in the medbay, trying to fix one of the droids. You’re sitting on one of the exam tables above him, talking about senseless things to pass the time, when Kix goes rigid.
“Shit,” he mutters.
“You okay down there?” He’s silent and you slide off the table, squinting into the shadows cast by the droid.
“‘M fine,” he says, voice sharp. It’s a sure sign he’s in pain. You peer closer, noting the way he’s clutching his hand to his chest. Blood is oozing out slowly, over his fingers.
“Kix!” you say with an undignified yelp of fear. You try and tug him out, and he shrugs you off.
“It’s fine.” Stubborn man.
“Liar,” you say, kneeling over him at the same time he goes to get up.
It’s like watching a disaster happen in slow motion. Your brain knows what’s happening and tries to tell you to move, and you do. But it’s towards Kix’s rising big skull instead of away.
He stand up into you, and you feel more than hear the crunch in your nose.
The taste and smell of blood is instantaneous. You fall to the floor beside him with a groan, hands coming up to cup your poor nose. Kix is on you in a flash, trying to do damage control, but his hand is still bleeding, and it’s making even more of a big mess.
So there you two are, on the floor, moaning in pain, covered in blood. Not your finest moment.
Someone clears their throat, and you two pause in your fumbling attempts to stem the bleeding.
“Kix, I don’t care what you do in your own time. But this is not the place to explore your weirder tastes.” It’s the Captain himself, perhaps the worst person to catch you two like this.
“No, that’s not-”
“He’s not-”
The two of you are talking over each other, and Captain Rex just laughs, leaving you two to suffer in a bloody heap on the floor. Kix extricates himself first, finding bandages with his good hand.
He wraps them around his injured hand, then ties it off with his teeth, a move that almost distracts you from the blinding pain in your face.
Almost.
“Shit, Kix, I think you broke my nose,” you say with another moan. He’s back beside you in an instant, gently prying your hands off.
“Let me look, and I’ll tell you,” he says, after you slam your hand back onto your nose, only to cry out in pain. Not very smart of you.
Kix takes your hands again, placing them to the side and wiping away some of the blood. Your nose is tender to the touch. Carefully, he probes the sides of your nose and you wince.
“Sorry,” he says. There’s a lingering softness in his tone, the same kind of softness you’ve noted in his touches.
“It’s okay,” you say quietly. He looks down at you, and you don’t even think about the way he’s still holding your nose.
Instead, you’re caught on his eyes.
He has kind eyes, you decide, the kind that invite you in and make you feel important. Safe. Cared for.
“I, uh, I don’t think it’s broken,” he says. “Just bruised.” Even as he speaks, his hands drift away from your nose, and his eyes move down to your lips.
“Kix,” you say, intending it to come out as a warning. Instead, it’s breathy and needy, and you find yourself arching up to meet him even as he leans down.
Your first kiss is not euphoric, like you would hope. Instead, it’s an experimental peck against your lips and then an accidental knock against your nose, which has you cringing backwards.
But. You have come to expect something like this from you two. So when Kix pulls back in horror at the thought of hurting you further, you’re prepared.
You wind your arms around his neck, tugging him back to you. He comes willingly, caressing your face as he slants his lips across yours.
This time, you would put your kiss safely in the “euphoric” category. It’s like you can finally breath after all this time spent holding your breath. You play with the hair at the nape of his neck while you kiss him, and he hums softly, cradling you to his chest. You sigh into him. No more stealing glances and barely-there touches.
“No, we can’t,” Kix says, voice hoarse as he pulls away abruptly, shattering your dream. You want to cry. Everyone already thinks you’re together, so why can’t it be the truth?
“I know,” you say instead, for him, even as the two of you lean in for another kiss. Kix cups your face this time, thumb stroking your skin as you kiss, and you realize it’s because you actually are crying.
“Cyar’ika,” he murmurs against your lips. You wrap your arms around his chest, tugging him down on top of you.
“I know,” you say again. “Just for a little bit.”
And for just a little bit, he lets you dream. You don’t care that the two of you are a mess, or that anyone could walk in. For now, you have more than lingering touches and glances. You have a promise that down the line, after all is said and done, he’ll pick you.
You have Kix, and that’s enough.
