It settles again after that. Not awkward. Just quiet. The sort of easy quiet that starts to feel companionable once you stop fighting it. Steve can feel the warmth of the kid tucked against his ribs, the slight weight of him, the safe smallness of him. He hasn’t let himself hold anything, anyone, this gently in a long goddamn time.

That thought brushes against something in him and he tries not to look at it too directly.

Because that’s the thing.

Steve used to be easy with touch. Easy with all of it. Hands in hands, arms slung over shoulders, fingers in hair, quick hugs, long hugs, casual shoves, roughhousing… the whole stupid bright human mess of it. Then the world did what it did. Then monsters in human skin took what they took. Then his own body stopped feeling like somewhere he could live comfortably — let alone offer to anybody else.

Except…

Well, except for kids.

Somehow kids are different.

Somehow? When it’s a trembling little boy pressed into his side in the middle of a tree with the whole godforsaken arena crouched below them, the static in his head goes quiet. The VHS tape on a constant loop stops playing. Not because it’s gone, but because it’s gone silent. Cut to black. Like whatever part of him flinches from everything else doesn’t know how to flinch from this. There’s nothing ugly here. No threat in it. No shame. No abuse.

Just warmth. Protection. The simple, brutal instinct to keep innocence alive… even if it kills him.

Which, honestly, it still might.

Ro shifts, peeking up again. “So Texas Hold’em’s like poker too?”

“Yeah.”

“Why’s it called that?”

Steve exhales contentedly. “Couldn’t tell you.”

“You don’t know?”

“Man, I barely know why anything is called anything.”

Ro makes a small sound of acceptance at that, then pauses. “Did your dad teach you all of them?”

Steve’s smile doesn’t disappear.

It just changes.

The easy shape of it falters into something quieter, more worn at the edges. He reaches up automatically and plucks a little twig out of Ro’s closecropped hair, thumb brushing the soft fuzz of his head after. Ro waits, patient as ever, in no hurry to rush an answer out of his hero.

Down below, something rustles once far off. 

Steve listens, but nothing follows.

Then he looks back down at Ro and says, softly, “Yeah. He did.”

Ro softly studies his face.

“Used to let me sit in when he had people over,” Steve goes on, keeping his tone even. “Gave me chips. Told me not to tell my mom when he let me stay up past midnight.”

Ro’s eyes go round. “You stayed up past midnight?”

Steve smirks. “Yeah, I did.”

“Did you get in trouble?”

“Nah, not really. But…” Steve’s smirk turns playful. “Before you ask? There’s absolutely nothing cooler that happens after midnight. It’s just dark. And late. And you wake up exhaaaaausted the next day.”

Ro’s express turns impish. “Okay, but—you have to say that. Because you’re older.”

Steve gives him a sidelong look. “You say that like I’m eighty.”

“You act like you’re eighty sometimes.”

That one’s so unexpected Steve actually chokes on a laugh. But he clamps it down quickly, glancing automatically through the branches, then looks back at Ro with betrayed amusement written all over his face.

“Wow.”

Ro shrugs inside the bag, shameless. “You do.”

“Unbelievable.”

“You make old man noises.”

“I do not make old man noises.”

“You kinda do.”

Steve narrows his eyes. “Name one.”

Ro opens his mouth, then immediately demonstrates this dead-on grumbly little sigh through his nose that sounds horrifyingly like Steve after a long day of being inconvenienced by life.

Steve freezes.

Ro beams.

And for one horrified second Steve just stares at him, then tips his head back against the bark and silently laughs so hard his chest shakes.

“Okay,” he whispers finally, wiping at one eye. “Okay, that one was fair.”

Ro settles again, smug as hell.

The laugh fades. The branch beneath them creaks softly in the breeze.

Then Ro asks, much more quietly, “Do you still play with him?”

There it is.

The question lands lightly, but the ache under it doesn’t.

Steve goes still for a second. Not in a way that Ro would notice as wrong, maybe. Just… careful. His eyes stay on the canopy above them where the moonlight moves in chopped little pieces over the leaves.

Then he shakes his head.

“No,” he says.

Ro waits.

Steve keeps the smile on his face because Ro’s looking at him and because there are cameras somewhere inside these trees and because he has gotten very good at holding his face steady while worse things happen behind it.

“My parents aren’t around anymore,” he murmurs, voice low and plain.

Ro’s brows pull together sadly.

Steve can practically see the thought forming in real time. He’s young, but he isn’t naïve enough to not understand. If anything? The kid’s still too young to have already learned how to read absence that quickly. Or at least… Steve hopes he is.

He swallows once and says, “They passed a little over a year ago.”

Ro stares up at him with that solemn, open little face of his. “I’m sorry.”

Steve nods once. “S’alright.”

A beat passes.

Then, cautious as a fawn stepping toward an open hand, Ro asks, “Did… the monsters take them?”

And for one whole second, the whole world narrows to that.

To the simple innocence of the question.

To the ugly, split-open truth of it.

Because yes.

Yes, they did.

Just not the kind with claws.

Not the kind with teeth.

The monsters that took his parents wore human faces and expensive clothes and envy like it was birthright. They broke into his home and murdered what was his, then turned their hunger on him… because cruelty loves a witness. Because power loves a body it can ruin.

Steve doesn’t tell any of that to a nine-year-old boy in a tree.

He just looks at Ro for a long beat and nods. “Yeah,” he says quietly. “Yeah. The monsters got ‘em.”

Ro’s mouth presses into a sad little line. Then, with all the shy certainty of a child still brave enough to believe in gentler things, he says, “I’ll bet they’re watching over you, though.”

…and Christ.

That one almost undoes him.

Steve’s soft gaze flicks warily away. He tucks the sleeping bag a little higher around Ro’s shoulders just to have something to do with his hands while he subtly collects himself.

“Yeah,” he murmurs, forcing a crooked smile back into place. “I hope so.”

He lets that sit for exactly two seconds before deciding absolutely not.

Nope.

Not doing this.

Not tonight.

So he shifts up onto an elbow, cocking his head at Ro with that exaggerated change-of-subject expression that older boys get when they’re about to steer hard away from their own feelings, and asks, “You got any siblings?”

It works immediately.

Ro’s whole face lights up.

“Yeah.” He nods fast. “Two sisters.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Uh-huh. Maribel’s twelve. June is eleven.”

Steve smiles. “So they boss you around.”

Ro makes a face. “All the time.”

“Thought so.”

“But June only does it because Maribel does it first.”

“That’s how they get you.”

Ro leans in like this is sacred knowledge. “You know sisters?”

“I know people,” Steve says mock-solemnly, Erica and Lucas already on his mind. “Same difference.”

That earns him a little snort. Then Ro’s eyes brighten even more. “Oh!—and my mama’s gonna have another baby.”

That pulls a genuine grin out of Steve. “No way?”

Ro nods hard, smiling so widely it makes him look younger and older all at once. “Yeah. She says if it’s a boy? Then maybe Emmanuel. Or Thomas. But if it’s a girl, maybe Eden. Or Naomi. Or Lilac.”

Steve repeats the names back softly, letting them all settle in between them. “Those are good names.”

“I know.”

“You got a favorite?”

Ro thinks hard. “Eden.”

“Yeah? Why.”

“Just sounds nice.” He shrugs. “Like a place with fruit.”

That one makes Steve smile brightly again. “Fair enough.”

Ro wiggles more comfortably into the shared sleeping bag and adds, “Daddy likes Naomi best.”

Steve’s smile softens. “Yeah?”

“Mm-hmm. He says it sounds strong.”

The word daddy hangs there a beat too long.

Steve keeps his face neutral. “Your dad around?”

Ro’s expression flickers. Not dark, exactly. Just a little sad around the edges. But he smiles anyway, because he’s a kid and because kids will keep smiling through heartbreak if you let them.

“He’s been off working the mines,” he says. “Few months now.”

Steve’s jaw tightens.

The coal mines.

Of course.

But Ro keeps talking in that simple, wholesome way that makes it all worse. “We get to call him sometimes. Not every day, but—sometimes.” He looks up at his ally hopefully. “I think he’ll be home by the time Mama has the baby.”

Steve just looks at him for a moment…

At the hope still sitting so openly on that little face.

…and he feels something twist hard in his chest.

So he doesn’t let Ro say anything else that might veer toward doubt. He just nods like this is the most certain thing in the world.

“‘Course he will,” Steve says. “Wouldn’t miss that.”

Ro studies him somberly.

Steve keeps going before the kid can hesitate. “And when he gets back, you get to act all important and explain everything… like you’re the only one who knows how babies work.”

Ro’s mouth opens in offended delight. “I do know how babies work.”

“Oh, you do?”

“Yes.”

“Alright then. My bad.”

Ro gives him a suspicious look. “You’re making fun of me.”

“Little bit.”

Ro kicks him lightly through the sleeping bag.

Steve acts wounded. “Violence? In my own tree?”

That earns a tiny laugh.

Good.

So he keeps it going, keeps the whole thing light and easy and pointed firmly toward a future that might not exist. Because the alternative is unbearable and because he can’t — he just can’t — let this little boy start talking like he’s already half-dead.

They talk about the baby more. About whether boys or girls cry louder. About how June apparently once tried to eat dirt when she was three and swore it tasted “green.” About Maribel being bossy because “somebody has to be,” according to Maribel. Ro imitates both sisters with alarming accuracy. Steve almost loses it twice.

By the time the conversation drifts again, the air has turned far sharper with night. The breeze whispers through the leaves above them… and Steve now absently rubs warmth into Ro’s shoulder without even thinking about it.

His eyes go to the darkness beyond the tree line.

To wherever you are.

And he wonders to himself…

If you’re warm.

If you found high ground.

If you’re tucked away somewhere safely or shivering your ass off in the dark with that stubborn, sweet jaw of yours now set and your whole body wrecked from any sort of pain. He still doesn’t know if you’re injured or not. He doesn’t know about the hammock. Doesn’t know that you’re higher than the ground. Doesn’t know shit, except that you’re out there and you’re still alive. At least as of the last mockingjay call… and somehow… that makes the distance feel worse instead of better.

Ro catches him looking into space for too long.

But he doesn’t say anything for a few seconds.

Then his smile starts forming, slow and secretive.

By the time that Steve notices, the kid is outright grinning. “What,” he asks, already suspicious.

Ro wriggles his eyebrows. “You thinkin’ about Wendy Bird?”

Steve glances down at him fully now and just blinks… Then a crooked smile drags at his mouth despite himself. “What makes you ask that.”

Ro beams like he’s about to win the lottery. “Because you got that face.”

“What face.”

“That face.”

Steve gives him a look. “Excellent description. Super helpful.”

Ro giggles softly and settles more comfortably on his side so he can stare up at Steve with full investigative intensity. “So is it true?”

Steve sighs through his nose. “Oh my lord...”

“Is it?”

“Ro.”

“Is it really really true?”

He says it like he’s asking whether Santa is armed and waiting somewhere with a reindeer cavalry. Like the answer matters on a cosmic level.

Steve rubs a hand over his face, already grinning. He should shut this down. He knows he should. There are cameras. There’s press. There’s everything this could mean and not mean and get twisted into.

But the kid’s looking at him like that.

And worse (far worse), Steve still can’t quite make himself say no.

So he stares up through the branches and takes his time. “Well,” he begins slowly, “I didn’t exactly know she felt that way.”

Ro gasps like this is scandal of the century.

Steve snorts. “Yeah, no shit. That was kinda my reaction too.”

“You didn’t know?”

“Nope.”

“Not even a little?”

“Not even a little.”

Ro is horrified and fascinated. “How?”

Steve laughs quietly. “I don’t know, man. I was busy.”

“With what.”

Steve deadpans, “Existing.”

Ro squints at him.

Steve’s mouth twitches, then shrugs one shoulder. “We grew up in the same town. Same orbit, I guess. I knew who she was. Just… didn’t really realize how much until later.”

Ro listens like it’s gospel.

And Steve, maybe because the night is dark and the branches are close and the kid’s looking up at him with all that unfiltered trust… hears himself keep talking.

“My best friend used to bring me these amazing chocolate chip cookies from Ren’s bakery all the time,” he says. “Like, for years.”

Ro perks up immediately. “Wendy Bird’s cookies?”

Steve points at him. “Exactly. Wendy Bird’s cookies.”

“Were they good?”

Steve turns to stare at him. “Kid. They were insane.”

Ro giggles.

“I’m serious,” Steve whispers fiercely. “Like—dangerously good. Like I would open the box and next thing I knew half of them were gone and Robin was yelling at me—because apparently other people existed and I was supposed to share.”

Ro’s eyes shine. “Did you?”

“Not enough.”

“That’s selfish.”

“Yeah, well. They were really good.”

Ro covers his mouth to muffle a laugh.

Steve smiles despite the ache Robin’s memory brings with it. He lets it ache. Just for a second. Then he keeps going. “And everything Ren baked at the Capitol? Back at the suite?” He shakes his head softly. “Crazy.”

Ro blinks sweetly. “Like what?”

“You name it. Chicken. Bread. Lamb chops once, soup. Pancakes…” Steve’s voice turns thoughtful without him meaning it to. “Didn’t taste all fancy, either. Not in that gross, overly rich Capitol way. Just… home.” He pauses, thinking of the luncheon version of “Hawkins on a Plate" you put to shame that night, after making dinner. “Tastes like home.”

The word sits there.

Home.

Ro hears it. 

Steve hears it too, but he presses on anyway. “And she knows all the words to ‘Be Our Guest.’”

Ro’s whole face lights up. “What?”

Steve chuckles quietly, smiling. “Yeah. Every word.”

“How do you know?”

“Because she performed it for me.”

“No way.”

“Way.”

“You swear?”

“Swear to God—I dared her to do it, and she just…” He gestures helplessly with one hand. “Committed. Fully. No shame. None.”

Ro is openly delighted now, laughing into the sleeping bag. “She did all of it?”

“All of it.”

“The dishes part too?”

“Especially the dishes part.”

Ro loses his mind at that in silent little kid snickers.

And Steve — Christ, he can’t help it. He’s laughing too. Not loud. They can’t afford to be loud. But open enough that it feels… strange in his chest. Good strange. Rusty strange.

Familiar strange…

Ro wipes at one eye. “What else.”

“What else what.”

“What else do you like about her.”

Steve freezes.

Because that’s the damn question, isn’t it.

Ro waits with relentless patience.

Steve shifts, then lets himself flop back flat against the bark instead, one arm tucked under his head. He covers his eyes briefly with his other hand like he can shield himself from the answer by making the whole world darker.

“Bro, why you doin’ this to me,” he teasingly grumbles into his forearm.

Ro, thrilled by this obvious embarrassment, wiggles closer and props himself up on an elbow. “C’monnnn.”

Steve peeks at him through his fingers. “You’re a menace.”

“You’re stalling.”

“I’m thinking.”

“Well you’re thinking at a snail’s pace.”

“Okay, wow. Ouch.”

Ro grins like a cat with a bird.

Steve exhales deeply, then drops his hand from his face, staring up through the leaves. Then, because lying would feel more wrong than telling the truth at this point, he says, “For starters? Yeah. The cooking thing.”

Ro nods eagerly.

“And she has the best taste in books,” Steve adds with a wistful little twitch at the corner of his mouth, thinking back to the train... “Even the ones without pictures.”

That gets another eager nod.

“And…” Steve squints up at the sky, thinking as he talks. “She’s got like, no shame. In a good way. Like if you dare her to do something ridiculous, she’ll usually just do it. Which is either charming… or terrifying, depending on the situation.”

Ro giggles sweetly.

“And she…” Steve pauses, surprised by his own next thought. “She notices stuff.”

That earns a little head title from Ro. “Like what.”

Steve shrugs slightly against the branch. “Everything, I guess… Stuff people need. Stuff they won’t ask for. Stuff they’re pretending not to feel.” His mouth twists. “Annoying, honestly.”

Ro smiles knowingly.

“And when she talks to kids,” Steve adds more quietly, “she never talks down to them. Which is rare.”

That one makes Ro visibly glow as he listens.

He wants to say like you, but refrains from interrupting.

Steve notices, his expression softening. “She makes people feel… I dunno.” He frowns, searching. “Safer, maybe.”

The second he says it, he knows it’s true.

Not just for Ro. Not just for Hannah and Jack.

But for him, too.

And that realization moves through him slow and heavy as water.

Ro is now staring at him with such naked fascination… that Steve almost has to laugh again, just to keep from outright blushing beneath the kid’s gaze.

“You done psychoanalyzing me,” he mutters.

“Nope.”

“Great.”

Ro shifts even closer, nearly vibrating with delight now. “What’s your favorite-favorite.”

Steve groans and drags a hand over his face. “Bro...”

Ro waits him out like a cheeky little devil.

Steve lets the silence stretch. Hears a far-off night bird caw once. Hears the breeze move. Hears his own pulse in his ears and the quiet steady breath of the kid tucked against him and the truth gathering… whether he wants it to or not.

Then he props up on an elbow again, looking back down at Ro before softly answering with, “She means it.”

Ro blinks.

“When she cares,” Steve explains, voice rougher now, quieter, “she means it. Doesn’t half-ass anything. Doesn’t fake it, or... do stuff halfway, or… hold back anything because she’s afraid.”

Ro’s face goes tender with understanding. Like he knows exactly what Steve means because of course he does. He’s seen you do it himself. He’s literally survived because of it.

After a moment he agrees, almost reverently. “Yeah…”

And that’s somehow enough.

They go quiet after that. Not empty quiet. Settling quiet. The kind that drapes itself over the branches and lets the dark come back in around the edges.

Ro gradually relaxes against his ally again… although, the little troublemaker doesn’t stay quiet for long. After about thirty seconds he blurts, “That Tommy guy actually fell for it, though. Like… he totally believed her whole act. About tricking you into being nice to her.”

Steve turns his head and looks down at him curiously.

Ro looks completely earnest. Completely serious.

“…she said that?”

“Yeah, but—only to trick him,” Ro clarifies instantly. “She just pretended. That way, he’d think she was on their side. And they’d forget all about us kids—so they’d only focus on taking out the main threat. Which is you.” His expression brightens again. “But then they found you, and I found them too—because of the trail she left for me—”

“The breadcrumbs trail?”

Ro nods. “Yeah. Exactly. So I hopped tree to tree. Then followed their sound, ‘cause they’re loud. And then I spotted the nest. So it all worked out.”

That makes Steve go reversely quiet for a long stretch of seconds.

For a moment, all he can do is process this information in real time. But then, because he’s been skirting around dread and grief and memory all night, he feels something unexpectedly bright split through it.

“How the hell did that nest even get there…?” Steve wonders aloud, realizing in real time just how divinely placed that wicked thing was in the end.

Ro grins sheepishly, shrugging one shoulder. “Angels.”

Steve huffs a laugh. “Oh yeah? Angels planted those devil hornets?”

“How else would they be there?”

“Mmm,” Steve pretends to think. “I was gonna say the Gamemakers, but eh. Let’s not give those guys any credit. We’re goin’ with angels.”

Ro beams — then goes quiet while pursing his lips, deep in thought. “Do you think that… Tommy is actually that angry all the time?”

Steve puffs his lips, letting them vibrate with it. “Buddy, I think that guy stays angry just to prove himself.”

“Like—if he stays angry, then it’ll scare people into doing what he says?”

“Exactly.”

“Even though he’s really just a big ole meathead?”

Steve grins wickedly at that, already chuckling. “He’s a total meathead.”

Ro makes a strangled little sound trying not to laugh with him.

Steve keeps going, lower now, conspiratorial. “Dude’s got the vibe of a guy who flexes in the mirror and gets impressed by himself.”

Ro full-on snickers into the sleeping bag. “He’s got a whole lotta freckles,” he whispers. “Probably one for each time he bullies someone.”

Steve points at him. “I like that observation.”

Ro nods eagerly. “Like…anytime he picks on someone? He gets zapped with another freckle. Because God wants people to see he’s a meanie.”

That makes Steve pull back slightly, expression curious and intrigued. “Wait, then what’s that say about my freckles?”

Ro blinks at that.

Once, then twice.

He opens his mouth, shuts it.

Steve waits, brows raising in amusement.

“Yours are different,” Ro hurriedly blurts.

That earns a sputtered laugh out of Steve, who scrunches his nose fondly at the kid. “Oh mine are different, huh?”

“They are,” Ro swears. “You don’t have that many. Just like—that one there, and that one there.” He points at the little moles on the apple of Steve’s left cheek. “And one on your neck. But they’re nice ones.”

“Oh they’re nice ones.”

“Tommy’s look like speckles of poop.”

Steve loses it.

Not loud. God, he can't be loud. But he has to slap a hand over his own mouth as he laughs, shoulders shaking hard enough to jostle the cord around them. Ro is wheezing too, face buried in Steve’s chest, both of them trying not to make a sound and failing in the quietest, most ridiculous way possible.

Steve hasn’t felt anything this close to boyhood in so long it nearly hurts.

Not joy exactly.

Not the easy careless version.

But something adjacent. Something alive and stupid and precious.

Eventually they settle back down from it, both still smiling in the dark.

A howl sounds somewhere very far off.

Not a wolf.

They both know it.

Ro goes still first, then tucks in closer again without a word while Steve’s arm wraps around him automatically — pulling him closer, his protective instincts taking over. Then he pulls the sleeping bag higher, until it brushes both their chins.

For a while neither of them talks.

Steve listens to the night. Listens to the distant wrongness moving through it. Feels Ro’s heartbeat where the kid is pressed close. Stares up at the stars between the leaves and tries not to imagine you alone somewhere out there in the cold.

But he fails.

He thinks of the Games. Of the Careers. Of you beside them. Of what it must have cost you to play that role. Of the possibility that something worse than death could have happened in the time he wasn’t there to stop it.

His throat tightens.

And before he can stop himself, before he can decide whether it’s fair to ask or fair to know, he hears his own voice in the dark.

“Was she scared?”

Ro knows exactly who he means.

He lifts his head just enough to answer, little brows pinching. Then he shakes his head against Steve’s chest.

“Not really,” he whispers. “At least… not when she talked to me. She wasn’t.”

Steve nods once, staring up into the canopy.

No fucking way.

No way you weren’t scared.

He knows better. He knows what fear smells like, looks like, tastes like in a person’s mouth. He knows you had to have been be scared. Knows it with all the awful certainty of somebody who has spent too long learning what terror does to a human when it’s cornered.

He swallows thickly.

Then, unable to leave it alone, he asks quieter still, “Did they ever… y’know.” His brow furrows with genuine ache. “Did they hurt her?”

Ro thinks.

“Not around me,” he says. “But… she didn’t let me stay near them much.” He thought for a moment. “After she took off—y’know, after we found each other and got settled in the cave… she didn’t want me to follow her until later. Like, the next day. After I followed the breadcrumbs.”

Steve’s jaw flexes.

“…and stayed hidden,” Ro says softly, “looking for you.”

At that, Steve feels something lodge inside his throat.

“I think they believed her, though,” Ro adds quickly. “Her game.”

Steve looks down.

Ro nods now, like he’s trying to reassure him. “I think they really did. She got that one guy to sort of…” His face screws up while he searches for the word. “…like her.”

Steve raises an eyebrow. “Marvel?”

Ro points. “Yeah. Him.” Then, very urgently, because this apparently matters on an ethical level, he blurts out, “But she doesn’t actually like him. That part was fake.”

That does it.

Steve’s whole expression breaks open into relieved amusement so suddenly that he can’t even hide it. He scrunches his eyes shut and laughs once under his breath, shaking his head.

“Good,” he murmurs. “That’s good. I mean—yeah. Obviously. I knew that.”

Ro nods hard. “Good.”

“Yeah.”

“Because that guy’s stupid.”

Steve covers his face with one hand and starts laughing again.

Ro dissolves with him.

And in the middle of a tree in a death arena with monsters somewhere in the woods and everything poised to get worse at any second — the two of them wind up low-key roasting Marvel like a pair of little assholes at a sleepover.

“He’s got the face of a guy who goes, ‘bruh, watch this—’ right before doing something dumb,” Steve whispers gleefully.

Ro is gasping with his own silent laughter now. “He probably thinks that he's, like—really handsome.”

“He definitely thinks he’s really handsome.”

“He’s not, though.”

Steve looks down at him, playfully scandalized. “Harsh.”

Ro shrugs. “He’s like a six, on a good day. But only after push-up’s.”

“Okay, that’s fair.”

“And if Wendy Bird says jump, he’d probably ask how high but then faceplant onto the concrete like—” Ro goes limp, acting it out, pretending to reach for the heavens as he twitches an eye. “Ugh…helllllp…my face is uglierrrrr…and I don’t believe in fairiesssss…because my mama doesn’t love meeee…”

Steve tips his head back against the bark and has to smother another brutal wave of heartfelt laughter into his own shoulder.

“Jesus Christ,” he whisper-snorts. “Where were you hiding all that?”

Ro just giggles like a little kid because he is one.

Eventually, inevitably, the laughter burns off into mutual tiredness. It comes gradually — a yawn from Ro, a slower blink from Steve. The cold outside of their sleeping bag presses a little closer each minute while the heat trapped inside grows softer and more drowsy.

Steve rubs at one eye. “Alright,” he murmurs after a while. “We should get us some sleep. Big day tomorrow.”

Ro nods immediately — sleepier now, all sharp little edges of curiosity finally going fuzzy. “Gonna draw up Operation: Smooth Criminal, right?”

“Exactly,” Steve winks.

His little shadow nods again, shrugging around another little yawn before he burrows in without argument, head tucking under Steve’s chin this time, one little arm folded between them.

Steve gathers him close with zero hesitation. 

He pulls the sleeping bag up and over them until the darkness goes warmer, smaller, more private. Just the two of them breathing together in that cocoon of trapped heat, rope, bark and hush…

Outside, the night stays uncertain.

But together, for one impossible moment, it doesn’t feel that way.

Ro’s voice comes a minute later — hushed, already half asleep.

“G’night, Peter Pan...”

Steve closes his eyes, feels his heart twist with something involuntary and so warm and so painful all at once.

Then he squeezes the kid closer and whispers back into the dark…

“Night, lost boy.”

END OF CHAPTER 

<- previous part here

⚕️

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