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Galo’s heart is on fire. Which doesn’t mean much on its own. Not when that is the normal resting state for him. An equilibrium hot enough to forge red hot steel. But there’s fire like a furnace and then there’s the one like the molten hot core that powers the world. A singular experience and nothing else like it exists in the universe. Nothing else like Lio Fotia either or how it makes him feel when they’re together like this.
“Is that all you’ve got?” Lio says and Galo will never know how he manages to sounds so smooth and breathless at the same time. Nor how he manages to maneuver around him so well after all this time.
“You know it’s not.” Skin slick, with sweat beading down his brow, Galo huffs a laugh in response.
“Don’t know why you still ask.” Yes. He does.
“The problem is I have to ask.”
That does it. Galo thrusts forward and Lio is there to meet him and if he strains to catch it he can just make out a gasp. There. He finds the spot that offers Lio no respite.
Galo settles his weight over his him and his heart beats faster with each degree the temperature soars. The only sound is the beat of his heart, not just in his chest but the way it washes through his head. The sound of it like a tidal wave, a wild fire let loose and it’s far too late for either of them to try and contain it. Not that they want anything of the sort.
As;dfkjs;dfsd God I hate this part it’s so hard. Idk mention the ground rumbling in here sort of. I fucking hate this.
“Not so high and mighty now, huh Big Boss.”
This is the part where Lio is supposed to yield.
One look at the smirk that doesn’t quite reach his mouth but has completely flooded those violet eyes Galo realizes too little too late compared to his flame, Lio is a smoldering inferno. (Talk about the color of fire) Not that he could ever forget but then he goes and gets wrapped up in the challenge, the pleasure, the thrill. And then, the powder keg blows.
For a moment all he sees it sky, the bright blue of it shot through by the pinks and aquamarine…. Like it’s sunset instead of high noon
Thrown onto his back in what takes only seconds, he hears the hissing pop of the Matoi Tech seals failing before he registers the full weight of black fire forged armor settling on top of him. Shoving forward on the controls only causes the poor mech to jerk pathetically in place. Two of Lio’s blades poke from the shoulders and dug deep into the ground, spitting sparks and flames.
Galo feels the blunt folds of a frown crease his brow before he gives any consideration to hiding them.
One clawed hands gropes at the lip of Matoi’s reinforced visor, five fingers scrapping at the surface that send sparks flying like he were striking steel and flint. It makes Galo shivers as if it they were dancing across his bare skin. Well, he’s not far from that either. Lio has enough power in those armored limbs that he could fold the mech back together like origami. Through the mask that looks like it’s grinning in triumph, that self-assured sense of ability, Galo catches a wisp of the matching expression inside, a perfect contrast to his own. Before the sun’s white hot glare blots it out again.
By now the heat radiating off of him is oppressive. It’s a small window to the outside world and all Galo can make out around them is the burned red rocks of some kind of crater. It gives the impression, the very mirror image of the very caldera lake where they first met, only they’ve traded the frost covered ground for the steam swirling around them. In place of palatial evergreens, barren sulfur coated monoliths reach for the sky. And most importantly of all, an audience of none, an open air cathedral filled with the low vibrato of the earth that continues to tremble beneath them.
He doesn’t it feel it so much as hear it now. It’s far too subtle to compete with everything hammering away inside of him.
The sound of tempered alumino-silcate glass creaks against the joints where it meets ablative armor and Galo’s attention snaps back to the present.
“Hey. Hey. Hey! You promised you wouldn’t break it this time!”
Lio only pauses, the visor still warped out of position, taking the time not to consider his response but only because he can.
“I believe my exact words were it won’t break. If you don’t lose.” Get good Galo it's saying, colored in those haughty, hollow tones.
Galo jerks again at the controls only to stumble pathetically in place. Right. He’s still pinned beneath the burnish in more ways than one but at least his efforts have relieved some of the strain on the mech and Lio doesn’t seem like he’s in any hurry to resume them just yet. Just tap, tap, taps against the glass expectantly and this it’s not just spark but flames that float down into the cab where Galo narrow avoids the minor burns but he can’t save the upholstery from getting singed.
“Liooooo!” He groans and the earth joins him in chorus.
You break it you bought it and bought it meant his time. He doesn’t begin to question why Lucia even allows these little off the record excursions, not that he isn’t grateful. Something something valuable data he suspects and the rest of it goes right over his head before just tuning out completely.
Somehow she manages to log all of it off the books without raising one of Ignis’ nonexistent eyebrows. Cataloguing the damaging in ways that are wholly reasonable at least where the scientist is involved. The inevitable burn marks he brings home pass easily enough for routine maintenance and testing. That deep crack in the structure will be chalked up to performance and stress diagnostics compared against her latest models. Or in layman’s terms, publicly funded mech battles.
Which would be great if that’s all she needed him for. Pretty much the best consolation prize you could ask for. More often than not it was days upon days of playing guinea pig to one of her latest gadgets and even that was kind of cool when it was munitions and aviation support. Unfortunately the things that were the most useful were very likely the least interesting. Like Biotech. At Heat mapping. What amounted to a whole lot of sitting there and looking sexy for the cameras. Her words.
Which was to say nothing of the biggest problem that came from wrecking the Matoi in the first place. With Lio bracing his hands against orange safety bars, the hard alloy begins to bow outward against the pressure.
“Remember how long it took to fix the last time!”
Galo swats at Lio, armor and all. From his helmet crowned with horns, he cocks his head to the side, like a stallion disregarding the barely perceptible nuisance of a fly. “I wasn’t the one insisting it could fly on the updraft.”
Undeterred, Galo persists, somehow quick enough not to end up with any burns of his own. “Five. Weeks. Lio.”
A pause. The liquid pool of black reflecting his own displeasure back at him. The groan his Matoi exhales as the pressure relieves and finally. Finally, the walls come down, first losing their rigid edges, then the hard polish, melting off him until Lio is left unarmored but never unarmed in the leather that sticks to him like a second skin, so black that it hurts to take his eyes away to where the sun filters through the haze.
Reduced to five foot nothing and still straddling Galo’s Matoi, Lio swings a foot up and digs it into Galo's shoulder as the whole mech sags an inch lower to the ground, like he's just delivered a punishing blow. Distantly, Galo registers that the swords holding it in place have dissolved into their component flames. More immediately, from where he’s poised Lio is still the single more formidable thing he’s ever encountered.
Crouched over, still gripping the lip of the glass visor, the fire in his eyes burns brighter, the look on his his face matches that a predator ready to crawl inside after his prey, no matter how hard it would be to accomplish anything in the cramped space. Like this were just a normal date and they were just going out to the movies. Those old timey drive ins that are just an excuse to make out in the car. Except instead of a movie it's an open air brawl and instead of a car they've got the Matoi.
Galo grins, not quite giving over to triumph. “Has anyone ever told you you’re so hot that...”
“Finish that sentence and I go back on my word.”
Galo knows that look too. Disappointment. And expectation.
“Well?”
It hasn’t always been about playing fair, but with Lio it’s long since become about having fun. Something that’s no longer possible within the Matoi. There isn’t much to take in across his periphery, just red rock and a hazy sky, not a damn clue what awaits below and an adversary with the high ground advantage.
Sounds like fun.
With a sudden lunge out of the cockpit, Galo makes a grab for Lio’s leg that’s within reach, hoping to unbalance him. His other had closes around his pistol??? He take aim, ducks a Burnish flare that bursts on the visor above his head and catches his foot on the safety bar. His hold on Lio never failing as the sky turns somersaults with the ground once more and they both tumble down.
The earth is on fire where Galo lands on his back. Rough stone digging into bare skin. The body that settles atop him another cover of that intimidating warmth. Gloved hands knead into sculpted muscle. Neither compares to the mouth that closes over his own, breathing fire down his throat, igniting the furnace in his gut.
Something something this should maybe get fleshed out more
His own hands are anything but idle as well as they clamber their way up into the silken fall of the seafoam hair possessing those rare curves of Lio’s that are so inviting to touch. There’s his hair and the shell of his ear and that perfect dip he’s memorized where neck meets clavicle. By the time Lio has braced himself around Galo’s waist, Galo has traced his way well past that, to the curve of his ass, dragging him down, grinding up.
Lio doesn’t gasp but his breath hitches and it’s enough that Galo feels he deserves the shit eating grin he shoots out in response. Totally worth the ensuing glare too. He thrusts up once more for good measure and Lio catches it this time but not fast enough before Galo captures it, between his lips once again. His breath is on fire, skin pebbling like molten rock though somehow it doesn't burn him in a way he's long since stopped questioning. Something about Burnish magic and by this point he's pretty sure Lio's a witch.
That's not a surprise so much as the heat that's not just coming from body above him. He's far too wrapped up in the other, far too wrapped up in one another to question it until his stomach drops out from under him. Not just his stomach but the whole ground that definitely sinks a few feet lower.
There's smoke in the air. It's not just some leftover refuse from their fight, it's smoke that's rising skyward on a superheated updraft to mingle with the feather dusting of clouds overhead. And there's sparks. Flecks of debris flickering between black and red and orange and yellow. That's new. For the first time, Galo peers over the ledge to be met with the sight of a caldera crater to rival their lake on the distant outskirts of Promepolis only this one one swirling, angry red and alive and hot enough to punch him in the face hard enough that he ducks back behind cover with a yelp.
"Hey babe. Where are we?" Galo chances another tentative peek down into the pit of the volcano.
Lio sighs from beneath him. His hair splayed out in the dirt and dust of the ground where Galo had apparently flipped him in his fire fighter's response to a threat. His armed are crossed tight over his chest. That's not the only thing. Yeah. That's look is a familiar one too but for once it's not the most dangerous thing staring him down. "Mt. Elbrus."
The name is not unfamiliar to him as one of the volcanos--obviously--within a day's range of the city. The better question is which direction and exactly how far and which one of the various mythologies they'd all seemed to have drawn their names from. Galo tries tries wracking his brain to sort out the answer to each of them simultaneously but it's the view below that keeps stealing his attention idk head empty. Like it's angry. Looks like that video where someone threw there trash into a volcano it just keeps getting bigger***
"Uh huh," he answers without really hearing X in Lio's voice or the impatience. "And I suppose you just know all the volcanos in a hundred mile radius?"
"Yes."
"Okay. Okay, firebug. No one likes a show off." Except Galo. Galo likes a show off. Especially this show off.
No question about it that they've crash landed near smack dab in the middle of the caldera with the pool of spitting mad lava bubbling higher by the minute. It's reminiscent of a viral video not long back back of a man who made the economical decision to dispose of his trash in a location not dissimilar to this exact place. The initial impact landed without much fanfare but the ensuing sections had bubbled up and boiled over like the volcano itself had taken offense to being reduced to a mere trash receptacle.
Galo had texted it round to everyone at BR and lamented to Varys--who had only been sympathetic out of the boredom that accompanies the midnight shift--that he always wanted to know what it would be like to touch lava. Did he think it was more of a milkshake consistency or wet cement? And that had devolved into looking up what happens when you mix too much cornstarch with water and definitely not their own personal experiments that earned them extra overnights for the state of the kitchen that Aina had discovered the following morning.
Before he can regale Lio with the whole episode, five gloved fingers have latched onto his face. Jerking him back onto their narrow ledge. "Eyes up here."
Instead of a story, Galo has the sense to keep it short for once. He blurts out, "Hey Lio, Have you ever touched lava?"
Lio's grip only tighten a moment, only briefly painful before it's relieved with a huff. Those fingers feel strangely cool as they rake through his hair, the mop of a fringe at the front and scraping sumptuously at the short scruff that follows all the way back a long his nap. "Why?"
Galo shivers and he's not sure if it's Lio's fingers, or his lips that have found his throat or the way he can command so much authority with one word that deserves the blame. It isn't often that Lio isn't the hottest thing in the room but then who would expect him to be competing with the room itself.
"I've just always wanted to try. There was this one time... at the station... with corn starch..."
You’d burn up.
Okay but that’d doesn’t tell me if YOU have
Galo impressed. Lio grabbing him. Eyes up here.
Is this safe?
You’ll be fine. Haven’t you learned by now. (You’re in the safest place you could be.)
If he was safe that meant one of two things. Either Lio could protect him or…
Lio’s doing this!!!
Which is really cool but also kind of concerning but also really cool and also Lio is really distracting so maybe they’ll just make out except Galo is also the worst and keeps getting distracted.
.
Idk Lio is very horny and Galo being very ADHD keeps getting in the way but somehow he prevails
Not a burnish but he could feel the pressure building, couldn’t lio tell
It’s gonna blow, it’s gonna pop. It’s close.
Very pointedly dancing around Galo getting off I guess because a volcano is erupting instead.
Also very pointedly ignoring that Galo would literally be dead idk Burnish magic Lio is still a witch
---- SCENE CHANGE!
Mt. Elbrus rapidly receding behind them no longer remains as mountain peak so much as a faint outline in the encroaching darkness, still limned in the fulminant fury of her eruption that Lio assures him will endure for days. There's a terrible joke in there somewhere that Galo chews over as he steers the Matoi back toward the city, an ever encroaching source of glimmering lights that only grows stronger against the backdrop of the sunset horizon splashed through in gradients of reds and orange fading to purple and finally that inky shadow of black that will be their cover of return.
Lio looks as a sated as a cat with a bowl of cream from his perch in one of the mech's oversized arms, braced easily against the safety bar and shoulder joint for balance at their leisurely pace. He keeps his face fixed forward which gives Galo the distraction of his elegant profile. Broken only periodically by a backward glance and a rare smile filled with such affection that Galo might stumble over the words he's not even speaking.
That does it. "Three days huh? That's gotta break a Guinness world record for longest orgasm for sure."
The reaction is, better than expected. Rolling through a series of emotions that range from the furrowed brows of confusion, the wide eyes of surprise and pursed lips of something that almost borders on embarrassment. Cute. Certainly worth whatever retaliation he was weighing his odds again. Maybe even worth pushing his luck.
"I'm thinking we should submit you to the proper authorities, babe."
"I believe they need a record of the event. You wouldn't survive the attempt."
Lio licks his lips. The fire has returned, burying all traces of affection. Not that anything could really smother it and Galo only beams brighter, like he's reflecting every bit of the light that Lio emits, the only source for miles.
IDK SOME SHIT
"Besides. It's a terrible analogy. Lava's thicker than that. More like wet cement." Relaxing back into his massive seat of ablative armor, unabashedly digging a heel into one of Galo's ribs, he might as well be claiming a seat on his throne.
Unfazed, Galo grabs his foot, tugging him lower, tugging him closer, till Lio is practically inside the cockpit and they're face face to face. "Ah. So you have touched it!"
"You could have too." A smirk. A shrug. A gesture that says, not my problem.
"But you said-!" he whines.
"You missed your chance."
"Lio we gotta go back!"
Somewhere between this argument and the next--a far more mundane debate about where to grab takeout for dinner from the meager list of options that will remain by the time they get back--and Galo has the sense to switch on the auto-pilot to carry them home. For the rest of the way, he gives himself over to the lingering embers in his chest still smoldering from the day they've spent together, in the embrace of the volcano, protected from the prying eyes of the outside world. Just them. Still them. Hearts full.
Red hot like steel being forged.
Lio is beautiful like a blade, all sharp edges, he's a work of art
“Is that all you’ve got?” Lio says and Galo will never know how he manages to sounds so smooth and breathless at the same time. Nor how he manages to maneuver around him so well after all this time.
“You know it’s not.” Skin slick, with sweat beading down his brow, Galo huffs a laugh in response.
“Don’t know why you still ask.” Yes. He does.
“The problem is I have to ask.”
That does it. Galo thrusts forward and Lio is there to meet him and if he strains to catch it he can just make out a gasp. There. He finds the spot that offers Lio no respite.
Galo settles his weight over his him and his heart beats faster with each degree the temperature soars. The only sound is the beat of his heart, not just in his chest but the way it washes through his head. The sound of it like a tidal wave, a wild fire let loose and it’s far too late for either of them to try and contain it. Not that they want anything of the sort.
As;dfkjs;dfsd God I hate this part it’s so hard. Idk mention the ground rumbling in here sort of. I fucking hate this.
“Not so high and mighty now, huh Big Boss.”
This is the part where Lio is supposed to yield.
One look at the smirk that doesn’t quite reach his mouth but has completely flooded those violet eyes Galo realizes too little too late compared to his flame, Lio is a smoldering inferno. (Talk about the color of fire) Not that he could ever forget but then he goes and gets wrapped up in the challenge, the pleasure, the thrill. And then, the powder keg blows.
For a moment all he sees it sky, the bright blue of it shot through by the pinks and aquamarine…. Like it’s sunset instead of high noon
Thrown onto his back in what takes only seconds, he hears the hissing pop of the Matoi Tech seals failing before he registers the full weight of black fire forged armor settling on top of him. Shoving forward on the controls only causes the poor mech to jerk pathetically in place. Two of Lio’s blades poke from the shoulders and dug deep into the ground, spitting sparks and flames.
Galo feels the blunt folds of a frown crease his brow before he gives any consideration to hiding them.
One clawed hands gropes at the lip of Matoi’s reinforced visor, five fingers scrapping at the surface that send sparks flying like he were striking steel and flint. It makes Galo shivers as if it they were dancing across his bare skin. Well, he’s not far from that either. Lio has enough power in those armored limbs that he could fold the mech back together like origami. Through the mask that looks like it’s grinning in triumph, that self-assured sense of ability, Galo catches a wisp of the matching expression inside, a perfect contrast to his own. Before the sun’s white hot glare blots it out again.
By now the heat radiating off of him is oppressive. It’s a small window to the outside world and all Galo can make out around them is the burned red rocks of some kind of crater. It gives the impression, the very mirror image of the very caldera lake where they first met, only they’ve traded the frost covered ground for the steam swirling around them. In place of palatial evergreens, barren sulfur coated monoliths reach for the sky. And most importantly of all, an audience of none, an open air cathedral filled with the low vibrato of the earth that continues to tremble beneath them.
He doesn’t it feel it so much as hear it now. It’s far too subtle to compete with everything hammering away inside of him.
The sound of tempered alumino-silcate glass creaks against the joints where it meets ablative armor and Galo’s attention snaps back to the present.
“Hey. Hey. Hey! You promised you wouldn’t break it this time!”
Lio only pauses, the visor still warped out of position, taking the time not to consider his response but only because he can.
“I believe my exact words were it won’t break. If you don’t lose.” Get good Galo it's saying, colored in those haughty, hollow tones.
Galo jerks again at the controls only to stumble pathetically in place. Right. He’s still pinned beneath the burnish in more ways than one but at least his efforts have relieved some of the strain on the mech and Lio doesn’t seem like he’s in any hurry to resume them just yet. Just tap, tap, taps against the glass expectantly and this it’s not just spark but flames that float down into the cab where Galo narrow avoids the minor burns but he can’t save the upholstery from getting singed.
“Liooooo!” He groans and the earth joins him in chorus.
You break it you bought it and bought it meant his time. He doesn’t begin to question why Lucia even allows these little off the record excursions, not that he isn’t grateful. Something something valuable data he suspects and the rest of it goes right over his head before just tuning out completely.
Somehow she manages to log all of it off the books without raising one of Ignis’ nonexistent eyebrows. Cataloguing the damaging in ways that are wholly reasonable at least where the scientist is involved. The inevitable burn marks he brings home pass easily enough for routine maintenance and testing. That deep crack in the structure will be chalked up to performance and stress diagnostics compared against her latest models. Or in layman’s terms, publicly funded mech battles.
Which would be great if that’s all she needed him for. Pretty much the best consolation prize you could ask for. More often than not it was days upon days of playing guinea pig to one of her latest gadgets and even that was kind of cool when it was munitions and aviation support. Unfortunately the things that were the most useful were very likely the least interesting. Like Biotech. At Heat mapping. What amounted to a whole lot of sitting there and looking sexy for the cameras. Her words.
Which was to say nothing of the biggest problem that came from wrecking the Matoi in the first place. With Lio bracing his hands against orange safety bars, the hard alloy begins to bow outward against the pressure.
“Remember how long it took to fix the last time!”
Galo swats at Lio, armor and all. From his helmet crowned with horns, he cocks his head to the side, like a stallion disregarding the barely perceptible nuisance of a fly. “I wasn’t the one insisting it could fly on the updraft.”
Undeterred, Galo persists, somehow quick enough not to end up with any burns of his own. “Five. Weeks. Lio.”
A pause. The liquid pool of black reflecting his own displeasure back at him. The groan his Matoi exhales as the pressure relieves and finally. Finally, the walls come down, first losing their rigid edges, then the hard polish, melting off him until Lio is left unarmored but never unarmed in the leather that sticks to him like a second skin, so black that it hurts to take his eyes away to where the sun filters through the haze.
Reduced to five foot nothing and still straddling Galo’s Matoi, Lio swings a foot up and digs it into Galo's shoulder as the whole mech sags an inch lower to the ground, like he's just delivered a punishing blow. Distantly, Galo registers that the swords holding it in place have dissolved into their component flames. More immediately, from where he’s poised Lio is still the single more formidable thing he’s ever encountered.
Crouched over, still gripping the lip of the glass visor, the fire in his eyes burns brighter, the look on his his face matches that a predator ready to crawl inside after his prey, no matter how hard it would be to accomplish anything in the cramped space. Like this were just a normal date and they were just going out to the movies. Those old timey drive ins that are just an excuse to make out in the car. Except instead of a movie it's an open air brawl and instead of a car they've got the Matoi.
Galo grins, not quite giving over to triumph. “Has anyone ever told you you’re so hot that...”
“Finish that sentence and I go back on my word.”
Galo knows that look too. Disappointment. And expectation.
“Well?”
It hasn’t always been about playing fair, but with Lio it’s long since become about having fun. Something that’s no longer possible within the Matoi. There isn’t much to take in across his periphery, just red rock and a hazy sky, not a damn clue what awaits below and an adversary with the high ground advantage.
Sounds like fun.
With a sudden lunge out of the cockpit, Galo makes a grab for Lio’s leg that’s within reach, hoping to unbalance him. His other had closes around his pistol??? He take aim, ducks a Burnish flare that bursts on the visor above his head and catches his foot on the safety bar. His hold on Lio never failing as the sky turns somersaults with the ground once more and they both tumble down.
The earth is on fire where Galo lands on his back. Rough stone digging into bare skin. The body that settles atop him another cover of that intimidating warmth. Gloved hands knead into sculpted muscle. Neither compares to the mouth that closes over his own, breathing fire down his throat, igniting the furnace in his gut.
Something something this should maybe get fleshed out more
His own hands are anything but idle as well as they clamber their way up into the silken fall of the seafoam hair possessing those rare curves of Lio’s that are so inviting to touch. There’s his hair and the shell of his ear and that perfect dip he’s memorized where neck meets clavicle. By the time Lio has braced himself around Galo’s waist, Galo has traced his way well past that, to the curve of his ass, dragging him down, grinding up.
Lio doesn’t gasp but his breath hitches and it’s enough that Galo feels he deserves the shit eating grin he shoots out in response. Totally worth the ensuing glare too. He thrusts up once more for good measure and Lio catches it this time but not fast enough before Galo captures it, between his lips once again. His breath is on fire, skin pebbling like molten rock though somehow it doesn't burn him in a way he's long since stopped questioning. Something about Burnish magic and by this point he's pretty sure Lio's a witch.
That's not a surprise so much as the heat that's not just coming from body above him. He's far too wrapped up in the other, far too wrapped up in one another to question it until his stomach drops out from under him. Not just his stomach but the whole ground that definitely sinks a few feet lower.
There's smoke in the air. It's not just some leftover refuse from their fight, it's smoke that's rising skyward on a superheated updraft to mingle with the feather dusting of clouds overhead. And there's sparks. Flecks of debris flickering between black and red and orange and yellow. That's new. For the first time, Galo peers over the ledge to be met with the sight of a caldera crater to rival their lake on the distant outskirts of Promepolis only this one one swirling, angry red and alive and hot enough to punch him in the face hard enough that he ducks back behind cover with a yelp.
"Hey babe. Where are we?" Galo chances another tentative peek down into the pit of the volcano.
Lio sighs from beneath him. His hair splayed out in the dirt and dust of the ground where Galo had apparently flipped him in his fire fighter's response to a threat. His armed are crossed tight over his chest. That's not the only thing. Yeah. That's look is a familiar one too but for once it's not the most dangerous thing staring him down. "Mt. Elbrus."
The name is not unfamiliar to him as one of the volcanos--obviously--within a day's range of the city. The better question is which direction and exactly how far and which one of the various mythologies they'd all seemed to have drawn their names from. Galo tries tries wracking his brain to sort out the answer to each of them simultaneously but it's the view below that keeps stealing his attention idk head empty. Like it's angry. Looks like that video where someone threw there trash into a volcano it just keeps getting bigger***
"Uh huh," he answers without really hearing X in Lio's voice or the impatience. "And I suppose you just know all the volcanos in a hundred mile radius?"
"Yes."
"Okay. Okay, firebug. No one likes a show off." Except Galo. Galo likes a show off. Especially this show off.
No question about it that they've crash landed near smack dab in the middle of the caldera with the pool of spitting mad lava bubbling higher by the minute. It's reminiscent of a viral video not long back back of a man who made the economical decision to dispose of his trash in a location not dissimilar to this exact place. The initial impact landed without much fanfare but the ensuing sections had bubbled up and boiled over like the volcano itself had taken offense to being reduced to a mere trash receptacle.
Galo had texted it round to everyone at BR and lamented to Varys--who had only been sympathetic out of the boredom that accompanies the midnight shift--that he always wanted to know what it would be like to touch lava. Did he think it was more of a milkshake consistency or wet cement? And that had devolved into looking up what happens when you mix too much cornstarch with water and definitely not their own personal experiments that earned them extra overnights for the state of the kitchen that Aina had discovered the following morning.
Before he can regale Lio with the whole episode, five gloved fingers have latched onto his face. Jerking him back onto their narrow ledge. "Eyes up here."
Instead of a story, Galo has the sense to keep it short for once. He blurts out, "Hey Lio, Have you ever touched lava?"
Lio's grip only tighten a moment, only briefly painful before it's relieved with a huff. Those fingers feel strangely cool as they rake through his hair, the mop of a fringe at the front and scraping sumptuously at the short scruff that follows all the way back a long his nap. "Why?"
Galo shivers and he's not sure if it's Lio's fingers, or his lips that have found his throat or the way he can command so much authority with one word that deserves the blame. It isn't often that Lio isn't the hottest thing in the room but then who would expect him to be competing with the room itself.
"I've just always wanted to try. There was this one time... at the station... with corn starch..."
You’d burn up.
Okay but that’d doesn’t tell me if YOU have
Galo impressed. Lio grabbing him. Eyes up here.
Is this safe?
You’ll be fine. Haven’t you learned by now. (You’re in the safest place you could be.)
If he was safe that meant one of two things. Either Lio could protect him or…
Lio’s doing this!!!
Which is really cool but also kind of concerning but also really cool and also Lio is really distracting so maybe they’ll just make out except Galo is also the worst and keeps getting distracted.
.
Idk Lio is very horny and Galo being very ADHD keeps getting in the way but somehow he prevails
Not a burnish but he could feel the pressure building, couldn’t lio tell
It’s gonna blow, it’s gonna pop. It’s close.
Very pointedly dancing around Galo getting off I guess because a volcano is erupting instead.
Also very pointedly ignoring that Galo would literally be dead idk Burnish magic Lio is still a witch
---- SCENE CHANGE!
Mt. Elbrus rapidly receding behind them no longer remains as mountain peak so much as a faint outline in the encroaching darkness, still limned in the fulminant fury of her eruption that Lio assures him will endure for days. There's a terrible joke in there somewhere that Galo chews over as he steers the Matoi back toward the city, an ever encroaching source of glimmering lights that only grows stronger against the backdrop of the sunset horizon splashed through in gradients of reds and orange fading to purple and finally that inky shadow of black that will be their cover of return.
Lio looks as a sated as a cat with a bowl of cream from his perch in one of the mech's oversized arms, braced easily against the safety bar and shoulder joint for balance at their leisurely pace. He keeps his face fixed forward which gives Galo the distraction of his elegant profile. Broken only periodically by a backward glance and a rare smile filled with such affection that Galo might stumble over the words he's not even speaking.
That does it. "Three days huh? That's gotta break a Guinness world record for longest orgasm for sure."
The reaction is, better than expected. Rolling through a series of emotions that range from the furrowed brows of confusion, the wide eyes of surprise and pursed lips of something that almost borders on embarrassment. Cute. Certainly worth whatever retaliation he was weighing his odds again. Maybe even worth pushing his luck.
"I'm thinking we should submit you to the proper authorities, babe."
"I believe they need a record of the event. You wouldn't survive the attempt."
Lio licks his lips. The fire has returned, burying all traces of affection. Not that anything could really smother it and Galo only beams brighter, like he's reflecting every bit of the light that Lio emits, the only source for miles.
IDK SOME SHIT
"Besides. It's a terrible analogy. Lava's thicker than that. More like wet cement." Relaxing back into his massive seat of ablative armor, unabashedly digging a heel into one of Galo's ribs, he might as well be claiming a seat on his throne.
Unfazed, Galo grabs his foot, tugging him lower, tugging him closer, till Lio is practically inside the cockpit and they're face face to face. "Ah. So you have touched it!"
"You could have too." A smirk. A shrug. A gesture that says, not my problem.
"But you said-!" he whines.
"You missed your chance."
"Lio we gotta go back!"
Somewhere between this argument and the next--a far more mundane debate about where to grab takeout for dinner from the meager list of options that will remain by the time they get back--and Galo has the sense to switch on the auto-pilot to carry them home. For the rest of the way, he gives himself over to the lingering embers in his chest still smoldering from the day they've spent together, in the embrace of the volcano, protected from the prying eyes of the outside world. Just them. Still them. Hearts full.
Red hot like steel being forged.
Lio is beautiful like a blade, all sharp edges, he's a work of art