Work Text:
That night, after all five having walked away from Merrick Enterprise, Andy finds them a small hotel on the outskirts of the city to lay low. She, of course, insists that she’s fine, but Nicky eventually manages to convince her to let him look at the bulletwound. Booker stands in the corner looking like a sad puppy the entire time, but Joe refuses to let him help. Nile looks uncertain where to place herself in the room.
Andy got them all separate rooms, and as soon as Nicky finishes patching her back up she firmly tells them to leave hers and get some rest. Usually, this is the kind of night when they wouldn’t want to split up, and Joe tries to argue with her. Nicky wouldn’t mind them all sleeping in the same room either, they’re used to it after all, and with their leader being more vulnerable than ever before, it seems like the right thing to do. But Andy doesn’t budge.
“She won’t sleep,” Booker says in the hallway outside. His voice is solemn and still reeking with guilt. “Doesn’t want to keep us up.”
Nicky and Joe don’t bother answering him, because they know he’s right. They’ve been here before.
Nile looks sad, and Nicky reaches out to squeeze her shoulder. She offers him a small, thankful smile before disappearing into her room. Booker wordlessly salutes them before heading down the hall to his own, and Nicky gives him a curt nod in response. He can see Joe’s glare in the corner of his eye while he unlocks their door, but leaves it alone. Joe loves and hates with a burning passion, and Nicky adores that about him, but it also makes it extremely difficult to earn Joe’s forgiveness once you’ve betrayed his trust.
They take a long, hot shower, scrubbing the caked blood from each other’s skin, and Joe helps Nicky wash his hair. He gently massages Nicky’s scalp with his fingertips, touching the spot right where his head had been blown open just a couple hours ago.
It’s an ancient ritual, the two of them touching each other where mortal beings would’ve been left with a scar, but it never fails to make Nicky shiver. Even after 900 years, the attention Joe shows every time he’s tracing Nicky’s unmarked skin, like he’s memorized where the bullet or knife cut into him, even in the heat of battle, still makes Nicky’s heart swell.
The bed is queen sized, which is plenty more space than they’re used to, but they still curl up together the same way they’ve done every night for the best part of a millennia, with Joe plastered along Nicky’s back and holding him close against his chest. The gun is on the bedside table, well within Nicky’s reach.
Nicky can immediately tell that something’s wrong, that something’s changed , even if the change is minimal. He can feel it in the way Joe is holding him, arm wrapped tightly around his waist. He can hear it in the way Joe is breathing into the back of his neck, hot air curling over his skin.
When they fight, their awareness of each other is a constant, powerful thing. Nicky blindly hands Joe weapons without even looking to see if he's there, because he knows he is. They’re so attuned to each other that they move through the battlefield like they’re one and the same.
In a way, Nicky supposes they are. After so many lifetimes together, Joe feels like an extension to his own self. They know each other’s bodies and minds as well as they know their own. Sometimes they can look into each other’s eyes and hold entire conversations without even uttering a word. They are part of each other now. A two-headed creature walking through centuries.
This is no different. Nicky can sense the weight of Joe’s thoughts as they lie there in the dark, and he reaches down to rest his hand on top of Joe’s arm.
“Yusuf,” he says softly, easily slipping into Italian. “My love. Talk to me.”
In the beginning, Joe had picked up Nicky’s language quicker than Nicky did his, and so Italian became the language they used to communicate. And even though Nicky has been fluent in Arabic for hundreds of years by now, they still fall back to Italian most of the time when it’s just the two of them.
Joe lets out a shaky breath, and it takes another moment before he speaks.
“When he shot you,” he whispers eventually, voice breaking. “I was scared you wouldn’t come back. For a moment, I was certain you wouldn’t.”
Nicky makes a sad noise, and turns in Joe’s embrace. All lights in the room are off, but he can still make out Joe’s face in the dimness. He knows Joe’s face better than he knows his own, because he’s spent his whole life looking at it. He cups the side of Joe’s neck with one hand, watching Joe’s eyelids flutter from his touch. There’s a pained furrow to his brow, and it makes Nicky’s chest ache.
“I’m here,” he whispers back, wanting desperately to comfort him. “I’m here.”
He wants to say ‘I’ll always come back to you’ but knows those words would ring hollow tonight.
“Every time,” Joe whispers, hand on Nicky’s hip now. “Every single time, Nicolo. And now— ”
“I know,” Nicky promises, pushing himself closer. “I know, I know.”
The two of them have never taken their immortality for granted. They still rush to each other’s rescue, still desperately try to shield the other from harm. They still seek out each other’s gaze every time they come back to life, wordlessly making sure they’re both still there. And when only one of them has fallen, every second they have to wait for the other to come back feels like a decade. 900 years of cheating death, and they still worry about each other, and while Nile is willing to shoot herself in the foot to prove a point, knowing she’ll survive despite the pain, Nicky and Joe don’t want the other to be put through any kind of pain, whether it’s lethal or not.
Nicky and Joe have never taken their immortality for granted, but it’s even worse now, because of what’s happening to Andy. Because while they always believed her story about Lykon whose wounds one day refused to heal, it’s different to see it with their own four eyes. The fact that it’s happening to Andy is terrifying enough, but Nicky knows it’s filled them all with doubt about their own immortality. Nile is far too young, but what about the rest of them? Are they still too new, or are they getting old enough to meet their final death? What are the rules? Nicky can only imagine how terrified Joe must have been after he got shot and had his brains splattered all over the floor. Can only imagine the agonizing horror of thinking Nicky’s immortality was gone now, too.
“It’s not my time yet,” Nicky whispers, pressing their noses together against the pillow. “It’s not my time yet, Yusuf. But when it is, it’ll be your time as well. We’ll go together, I know we will.”
He hasn’t believed in God for many centuries, because it’s hard to worship an immortal being when being one yourself, and knowing people would worship you if they could. He believes in Joe. He believes in Andy. He believes in the good force their team is to the world. And he believes in destiny . He believes he and Joe were meant to enter their immortal life together, and he refuses to believe that whatever higher forces there are, gods or otherwise, would be so cruel to not let them leave it the same way.
Joe makes a broken noise, and lets go of Nicky’s hip to hold the back of his head instead. They press their foreheads together, breathing hotly against each other’s faces. Nicky’s heartbeat is fast and erratic, his entire body burning with an urgency to be as close to Joe as possible.
“What if we won’t,” Joe whispers. “What if we won’t, and one of us ends up like Booker?”
“No.” Nicky shakes his head against Joe’s. “No, love.”
“I can’t be alone, Nicolo,” Joe pleads, and a small sob is torn from his throat. “Booker is right. I have no idea what it’s like to be without you, and I don’t ever want to know. I’d be lost. I’d be lost .”
Nicky lets out a sad noise and swiftly gets on top of him, making Joe roll onto his back so Nicky can straddle his thighs. He takes Joe’s hands, intertwining their fingers, and pushes them down against the mattress on each side of Joe’s head. Joe goes easily, looking up at Nicky on top of him with hooded eyes that are shining in the moonlight.
“I’m here,” Nicky reassures him again, using the weight of his own body to push Joe down on the bed as he leans down over him. Grounding him . His voice is barely more than a whisper, breath curling over Joe’s face as he speaks. “I’m right here with you. For tonight. For as long as I’m still breathing. And when I draw my last breath, I won’t leave you behind.”
Joe visibly shivers, tilting his chin up, and Nicky is already leaning down to crash their lips together. Nicky lets go of Joe’s hands to hold his face between his hands as they kiss, and Joe immediately grabs Nicky’s hip and cups the back of his head. Joe whines right into his mouth, holding him firmly in place, and the heat building between them makes Nicky’s heart race. The sound of their lips disconnecting and connecting again and again is loud in the room, panting hotly against each other’s mouths in between kisses.
“My love,” Nicky breathes out. “My heart.”
Joe’s breath hitches against Nicky’s lips. He buries his fingers inside Nicky’s hair.
“My life,” he whispers back.
“My life,” Nicky echoes.
He can’t promise Joe another millennia, or even a century, but he can promise him tonight.