Chapter Text
Doc sighs as he stands in front of the door of his laboratory and room. The lights were off, which was something that Doc never had ever done, not until Grian asked if he could stay in his room whenever he stays over.
Doc at first, didn't like the idea of turning off the lights in his laboratory, it's a laboratory for heavens sake, there are specimen that need to always be under the light and observed. And Grian had said so as well.
"You don't have to change the way you're doing things, I'll just pick a corner and stay there." Grian said, looking down at his feet.
Even with how dim lighting was at that moment, Doc had seen the red rim around Grian's eyes. He'd been crying, he'd been crying a lot it seems, and Doc couldn't understand the feelings that came over him that night. The emotions that made him pull the winged man into his arms and try his best to comfort him.
He had asked Grian what hurt him, who hurt him but all that the blonde did was shake his head and push his face against Doc's chest.
Doc shakes his head, ridding the thoughts of a few days ago and twists the doorknob. He carefully pushes the door open but it seems like his carefulness wasn't needed as the man he was worried about waking, sat on the corner where piles of pillows and blankets were all neatly organized in a nest like shape and was very much awake.
He meets the gaze of honey brown eyes. Doc closes the door behind him in a slow manner, careful not to make noise.
"You're still awake." He comments.
"'Couldn't sleep, I felt a little guilty for taking your coat." Grian replies, his voice soft and... Fragile? Vulnerable?
He let's his gaze wonder and found Grian holding his folded white coat against his chest.
Doc swallows. He wants to reach out, to touch, to hold and–"I see, so that's where it went." He chuckles.
Ever since the crystal incident happened, there had been faint whispers that coaxed his mind in certain situations. Sometimes it was warnings for danger, sometimes it was tellings of fortune. It was his instincts, or so he'd like to think. His instincts that had always been there but always laid deep, dormant and inaccessible until that moment that the nuclei had brought them out along with his powers and other animalistic features.
"Sorry," Grian murmurs yet he hugs the cloth closer to him.
Something instinctive, something animalistic, something that's part of him yet Doc still can't fully understand nor comprehend likes it. Likes the way that Grian seem to find comfort in his room, seem to find comfort in his things. It unnerves him–how he's feeling this way–yet he feels... Safe...?
"I'll give it back to you after I wash–" "It's fine." Doc cuts in.
He didn't know what pushed him to say it, why he seemed so desperate and yet–"It's okay, if it gives you comfort then you can keep it for a while." He says.
The meaning of his words only dawn on him seconds after it left his mouth, he school his expression into a calm one, not wanting Grian to feel anymore guilty than he alre–Doc bites his tongue and looks away.
There it is again, the concern and the way that his instincts drive his body to do things, things that's he's only allowed to watch and replay like he was nothing but an observer stuck in his own body. He doesn't know where his instincts stem from, he knows that he's been more wary around Xisuma and other of the people in the base but he doesn't know what the reasoning behind it was. And for someone like him who had studied a tid bit of psychology and prided himself to be self-aware, it frustrated him to no end.
Grian shifts in his seat and Doc realizes that he's staring, he's about to apologize when Grian lowers his gaze down to the white coat in his arms.
"Thanks..." Grian murmurs and yet Doc can see how his feathers are puffed out and–
"Your...nest looks bigger." He says absentmindedly, tearing his eyes away from the blonde man.
He forces himself not to think about the feathers, how soft and brilliant they look. Oh, but they are soft, Doc knew how soft to the touch they are even–
"... My instincts were on edge, nesting smooths–no... Erm–" Doc couldn't help but look back at the man.
"Nesting is soothing, it calms my instincts...and me, I suppose." Grian murmurs.
"I take it as you added a few more blankets?" Doc asks, somehow wanting this dumb conversation to continue.
"And a few pillows," Grian tacks in before saying, "I didn't take any of yours though, so don't worry."
His hair bristles and the growing horns on top of his head feel funny in a way that Doc wants to scratch them raw until he no longer feels it. It wasn't a bad thing, Doc thinks. It isn't a bad thing but at the same time it feels so unusual.
"Oh?" Doc finds himself speaking before he can think better of it. "I find that quite hard to believe seeing that you have my coat."
Grian's obsidian black wings behind his back twitch along as he huffs and rolls his eyes.
"As tempting as it sounds to add more pillows into my pile, your pillows are incredibly hard. I'm surprised you can even consider them as such." And before Doc can retort–"No Offense," Grian tacks in.
"I don't doubt the quality of my pillows," Doc says a little bit too absentminded as he finds himself staring at the way Grian's wings twitch and move.
"Doc, those are rocks." Grian deadpans.
Doc huffs, amused, "Perhaps you sleep on clouds which is why you look down on my bedding that reach mortal standards."
There was silence and Doc's lips twitch upward as he thinks of what the lack of sound should imply.
"This can mean two things," he says.
"Either you're immortal or you actually do sleep on clouds."
More silence.
"I will not agree or disagree with your ideas." And Doc blinks.
"You sleep on clouds?" He asks.
Grian scoffs, "You're more interested in the fact I sleep in clouds rather than immortality?"
"Are you immortal?" Doc asks.
There was a few beats of silence and Grian laughs, tension clear on his shoulders and if the twitch of his wings were any indication–"I don't know," he says but Doc knew otherwise.
Doc knew Grian's fighting style well, it's the type that forsakes safety in exchange for speed and efficiency. He's been friends with Etho long enough to know how well it works on the field and yet for how careless Etho could get at times, Grian takes that up several more levels. Grian's the type of reckless that either means he doesn't care for his own safety or he knows that there's nothing that those undead can do to hurt him–"I guess that answers your question." And Doc plays along.
He stares as Grian's honey brown eyes examine him. He could tell that Grian knew the words that go unsaid between the two of them.
"Yeah... I sleep on clouds." Grian murmurs as he looks away from Doc.
There was a few more seconds of silence, neither of them knowing what to do now that they've entered uncharted territory.
"But I stand my ground, you sleep on rocks." Grian says.
Doc knew that Grian was trying to make it sound snappy, teasing or something humorous but it ends up as a soft murmur with a sigh of disappointment following it after.
In a desperate attempt to try to keep the conversation going, Doc asks, "What does it feel like?"
Doc didn't need light to know that Grian was raising an eyebrow at his shenanigans. He coughs, "The–the clouds I mean." He tries to save some face.
He hears Grian hide a laugh in the guise of a cough.
"Feel it for yourself." Grian says.
There was a moment of silence, Doc blinks thinking that perhaps he had heard him wrong.
"... Can... Can I?" He asks, licking his lips yet he can feel his mouth going dry. "Isn't that an intimate thing for you avians?"
Grian shrugs, Doc can see him clearly even when there's only a dim light of a nearby lamp.
"Isn't it an intimate thing for a doctor to share his lab?" Grian shot back.
There was a moment of silence, Doc is frozen–holding himself back from stepping into the nest because of the consequences that might run after him.
"Us avians..." Grian murmurs and it leaves Doc twitching, wanting to reach out and–
Grian looks away, "Nevermind..." He murmurs and it frustrates Doc more than it should.
He grits his teeth and starts taking off his boots and placing them in their normal spot on the corner, he could deal with that tomorrow, he's going to head to bed.
Grian seems to catch on, he sighs dejectedly and sinks into his nest of pillows and blankets.
"Goodnight, Doc." Grian says.
And Doc longs to take that frown off his face and hold him.
"G'night," he replies as he turns his back on the avian and settles into his own bed and covers.
Although it was painful to admit, it took Doc an hour and a half of staring at the wall and ceiling with a few occasional tossing and turning before he finally realizes that he wasn't getting anything close to drowsy.
"Feel it for yourself." It was an offer.
Doc takes in a deep breath and holds it in his lungs for a few seconds before breathing out.
"Feel it for yourself." It repeats in his head as soft whispers–it wasn't Grian's voice, no, not even close. But it's coaxing him–almost as if it was making him regret that he had turned down the offer.
"Feel it for yourself." Doc shuts his eyes tightly, wanting to fight off the whispers of his damned instincts, wanting to get rid of them.
Grian starts humming.
Doc's eyes snap open and he was tempted to turn around and question the avian but then he feels as if his limbs we're melting–heavy and relaxed. His eyes start to droop and he tries to fight it but then Grian croons.
It was like a spell, a heavenly lullaby that makes the tension bleed out of Doc's body and coaxes him into a feeling of security.
Doc was weak to it, was the last thing he thought of before his eyes slip shut and he was out cold.