Could you ask for a little story where Billy tries to impress a female reader with his new design?
Something adorable like a date where Billy brags about the greatness of his new design (avoiding saying that he likes the reader) It would be very pleasant and satisfactory for me if I could fulfill this đ
anon your request was so cute i had to deliver!! billy would absolutely do this. he is not subtle. he is so not subtle.
Just a Starlight Knight Passing Through (Your Heart)
(domestic, fluff, f!reader)
The cafĂŠ table wobbles slightly when Billy sets his elbow on it, leaning forward with the kind of barely-contained energy that suggests he has been waiting, well, very, very impatiently, to say something important.
He doesn't say it right away, though. He picks up his drink. Takes a sip. Sets it down. Glances away at the street like something out there is suddenly very interesting.
You wait.
"So" he starts.
"So..." you echo.
"You noticed anything... different?"
You look at him. Really look. The new silhouette is hard to miss. The Starlight Knight aesthetic that used to live mostly in his head now lives on him, woven into every polished detail: the upgraded armor, the clean geometric lines, the red scarf draped over his shoulder like it was designed specifically to catch the afternoon light. Which, honestly, it might have been.
"Hm" you say. "Your scarf's new."
Billy makes a sound caught somewhere between indignant and pleased. "My scarf? That's what you're leading with? The scarf?"
"It's very red."
"It'sâ okay yes, the scarf is great, the scarf is a key element of the whole look, butâ" He gestures at himself broadly, an expansive sweep that encompasses the full picture. "I mean. Come on."
"You look nice~" you say, which is both the truth and a deliberate understatement, because watching Billy try to fish for a compliment without asking for one is one of your favorite things in this world.
He makes a face. "Nice. Nice. You know what the Starlight Knights say about 'nice'? Nothing. They don't say anything about 'nice' because 'nice' is not in the vocabulary."
"What is in the vocabulary?"
"Incredible!" he says immediately. "Legendary! Cool beyond measure! Stuff like that!" A pause. "I'm just saying, objectively, the new design has a lot going for it. This isn't even opinion. This is? this is data."
You rest your chin in your hand. "Give me the data, then."
Billy was clearly waiting for this. He sits up straighter.
"Okay, firstâ" He taps the pauldron on his shoulder, and there is unmistakable pride in the gesture, something almost shy behind the bravado if you know where to look. "The upgrade isn't just cosmetic. The whole loadout got a serious overhaul. The girlsâ" He pats his hip, where his revolvers sit. "âare running better than ever. Better range, better output. Not that they were ever bad, obviously."
"Obviously."
"Secondâ" He touches the scarf, just briefly, just with his fingertips. Something quieter moves across whatever expression Billy's faceplate is capable of carrying. "The red scarf. That's....it means something, actually. It's not just a scarf."
You don't push. You just let the silence hold open like a door.
"It's from back when I was with the Sons of Calydon," he continues, a little more slowly. "I gave mine to someone before I left. Didn't think I'd get another one. But." He clears his throat, which shouldn't be possible for a machine, but Billy has always been impressively human in the ways that count. "Anyway. Point is..... it's a good scarf. Symbolically. Aesthetically. All of it."
"It suits you." you say, and this time you mean it plainly, without the tease.
Billy goes quiet for a moment. You catch the slight adjustment in the way he's sitting, shoulders just barely less square, some small defense dropping.
"Yeah." he says. "Yeah, I think it does."
The afternoon light shifts through the cafĂŠ window and catches him perfectly â the scarf, the clean lines, the boy underneath all that polished armor who wanted nothing more his whole life than to be something worthy of the heroes he loved. And here he is. Finally.
"Third point," he says, rallying. "The motorcycle."
"There's a motorcycle?!"
"There is a motorcycle." And the pride in his voice then is enormous and entirely genuine, every trace of affected cool evaporated. "Brand new, fully integrated into the combat system. I know, I know â already cooler than everything you were imagining."
"I wasn't imagining anythingâ"
"You were imagining something. It's okay. The motorcycle earns it." He leans in again, conspiratorial now, that particular Billy energy that makes everything feel like a shared secret. "Between you and me? When Nicole saw the invoice she made a noise I've never heard come out of a human being. But she approved it. Which means she also knows it was worth it."
"She definitely approved it for the sake of the team."
"She approved it because it looks amazing and you know it! He points at you. "You agree. Don't pretend you don't agree."
"I didn't say anything."
"You smiled."
You school your expression back to neutral. He is entirely too perceptive for someone who spends half his time quoting a children's superhero show.
"My face does whatever it wants." you tell him.
"Yeah, well." Billy leans back, arms crossed, one corner of his posture settling into something loose and content that you have learned to recognize as him at his happiest. "Your face was agreeing with me. The data is conclusive."
The afternoon stretches warm and easy between you, and Billy goes on about the Starlight Knights, about the upgrade, about some episode he re-watched four times this week. And you listen, and watch the red scarf move when he gestures, and think that he never once says I wanted you to see this or I thought about you when I got it or anything so direct as that.
He doesn't have to.
You already know.
