Archive of Our Own ^beta

“Have you two moved from there at all today?”

Wash cracked open an eye just enough to see Tucker standing in the doorway, condensation coated can in hand. He tracked it as Tucker raised it to take a sip and questioned briefly whether he was more enticed by Tucker’s lips or the cool refreshment that the drink would give. An answer that came easily when the large body that laid over him shifted and sweaty skin rubbed awkwardly.

“Not really?” he said, smoothing out the strand of Caboose’s hair that he’d been idly stimming with. “He let me get up to go the bathroom once, that’s… about it. Otherwise it’s been all cuddles all the time, even if its, well…”

Tucker raised a brow. “As hot and humid as Satan’s armpit in here?”

“That about sums it up.”

“Gross.” Taking another big swig of his drink, he stepped inside and crouched beside the bed. “How much do you think he’d jump if I touched this to his arm?” he said, shaking the can slightly.

“Don’t,” Wash warned. Tucker snickered, rolling his eyes.

“I won’t, I won’t, geez. I thought this place was finally loosening that stick from your ass,” he said, only snickering more when Wash narrowed his eyes at him. “Love you babe.”

“I’ll get back to you on that,” Wash said, which didn’t help the laughter any. “Mostly I’m worried that if you startle him awake, I’m going to get a full force Caboose headbutt to the chin. I’ve had enough concussions to last a lifetime, thank you very much.”

“Okay, okay, point taken.” Dropping to sit on his ass, he offered the drink to Wash. He took the can and several gulps of refreshing soda, exhaling heavily before handing it back. “Sooo… is it a good day, or a bad day?”

“A little bit of both, I think?” Brushing a curl from Caboose’s face, he pressed a kiss to his forehead. It wrinkled slightly, Caboose’s brow furrowing. “He did mention Church, but it was in passing; that didn’t stop him from looking sad, but… I think he mostly just wanted to spend some time together. And maybe reorient after travelling to another dimension.”

Tucker snorted. “Right, that. What the hell even was that?”

“You know what, I’ve decided I’m not even going to try and figure it out.”

“Probably for the best.”

Freeing his arm from Caboose’s tight hold, he let his hand lay open, palm-up, and readily squeezed back when Tucker’s took it. Fingertips brushed past the callouses on the inside of his middle fingers, pulling back to trace circles around the dry skin; the sword had always sat in a strange place, for human hands.

“What have you been up to? I didn’t hear any music, so I’m guessing not the band,” Wash said.

“Nah. Caboose on drums is half the fun. That and Grif had Carolina taking another lesson on being lazy; aka Lina looked like she hadn’t slept in a week and Grif’s the only one who can get her to nap—” (“He is getting strangely good at that.”) “—so I kinda just chilled outside, did some drills.”

Wash chuckled, shaking his hand lightly. “How did you not overheat?”

Tucker stared at him with a deadpan that could rival the blank stare of Lopez’s helmet. “Babe, you used to have me doing drills in the middle of a jungle canyon. This shit is nothing compared to that.”

“Fair point.”

Quiet grumbling interrupted them. Caboose shifted in his sleep, burying his face against Wash’s shoulder and wrapping thick arms tighter around his torso. Wash’s face contorted in the weirdest mixture of discomfort and contentment that Tucker had ever seen.

Barely holding back laughter, he asked, “You okay there, Wash?”

“I don’t know if I’m enjoying this or not. On one hand, this is fantastic pressure stimulation, on the other, he’s so sweaty and that is horrible.”

“The offer of waking him up is still open,” Tucker said, fingernail tapping aluminium. Wash cringed at the sound and Tucker stopped with a mouthed ‘sorry’.

“You can wake him up, but not like that.”

Huffing exaggeratedly, Tucker shifted up onto his knees. “You buzzkill.”

“I don’t want a concussion!”

“You wouldn’t get a concussion, you dumbass,” he said with all affection, ruffling Wash’s hair. “You really need to cut this soon if you’re not gonna bleach it again, or you’re going to end up with frosted tips.”

“As you’ve told me a thousand times.”

Ignoring him, Tucker took a strand of Caboose’s long, curly hair and tickled his nose with it. Wrinkles pulled at the edges of his nose, the tip scrunching up and away from the offending sensation. It chased after, until they almost expected Caboose’s entire face to retract back into his skull from how intensely his nose crinkled.

Tucker muffled laughter in a bitten lip.

“I don’t think that’s even working, Tuck—”

ACHOO.

Caboose sneezed so hard that his head rocketed forwards, missing Wash’s chin by a literal hair and shot into a sitting position. Thankfully he let go just as quickly, saving Wash’s spine from being jerked with no warning, but didn’t avoid winding him when his full weight dropped on his abdomen.

“—er,” Wash wheezed. “Jesus christ.”

Caboose blinked, processing his sudden consciousness until his eyes focused on Tucker. Face splitting in a grin, he threw up his arms. “Tucker! Hello!” A beat. “I would like to kiss you.”

“Really now?” Tucker said, folding his arms and raising a brow. He grinned right back. “You forgot to say the magic word, Boose.”

“Abracadabra.”

“There it is.”

Tall as Caboose was, even sitting on the bed, Tucker had to stand up for Caboose to reach him without crushing Wash more than he already was. Thick arms wrapped around his waist in much the same was as he’d previously been holding their other boyfriend, pulling him into a kiss and nearly off his feet.

Tucker chuckled into the kiss and pulled a face when he got to feel first hand how sweaty Caboose was. “Oh god, Boose, you feel like you’ve been drowned in Donut’s lube.”

“That is… certainly a sentence,” Wash said, still wheezing slightly from Caboose’s weight. Rolling his eyes, Tucker tapped Caboose on the butt.

“Stop crushing our boyfriend, dumbass.”

Quickly looking down, Caboose jumped as if noticing Wash was there for the first time and scrambled to sit on the mattress, instead. “Oh! Oops! I forgot that I was squishing you.”

“You sure did. Don’t worry about it, just… let me catch my breath.” He chuckled breathlessly, laying his hand over Caboose’s and giving it a squeeze. “You sleep well enough, Boose?”

“Yes, you are very comfortable,” Caboose said, nodding. “And it is fun to squish you.”

“You’re real good at it, when we’re not both melting into a giant puddle,” Wash said. He sat up, stretching out the stiffness from laying in one position for so long. “How does a swim sound? Maybe cool ourselves off a bit.”

“Oh yes! I would like to go stimming.” Pause. “That is not a word malfunction. That is deliberate. Water is the best for stimming and I would like to go and jump in right now.”

“Not in your damn boxers, Caboose. C’mon,” Tucker offered his hand and Caboose took it eagerly, hopping up from the bed, “swim trunks time. Hope you’re ready to get splashed to shit, I still haven’t forgotten your assault from last time.”

Caboose puffed his chest out. “I will reign supreme and you can never stop me. I have more splashing power than you will ever know.”

“Which only makes defeating you all the more satisfying.” Tapping him on the nose, Tucker tugged Caboose towards their makeshift footlockers of clothes.

Wash chuckled under his breath, watching them with an amused glint in his eye and a fond smile on his face. It was nice to get away from it all, to finally have an extended period of time where there wasn’t something life-threatening to deal with—well, besides the usual chaos that pervaded the group to its very core. But he’d much rather deal with that kind of nonsense than anything real and he knew the sentiment was shared, even by those who struggled to adapt to the calm.

Hell, this was the first time since the three of them had even become a triad that they weren’t in the middle of a warzone. That alone had changed things dramatically, mostly in the case of just how much time they got to spend together.

It was… it was good. Strange, but good.

“Hey, Tucker?”

Tucker looked up, already pulling on his shorts. “Yeah?”

“Love you too,” Wash said, kicking off and tossing his standard shorts over at them. Caboose paused mid-leg insertion to look at him expectantly. Wash smiled. “And you too, Caboose. I love you both.”

“Yeah we get it, you’re a big sap,” Tucker said, though his grin betrayed his half-hearted façade of nonchalance. “C’mere and get your trunks on, asshole.”