#wattane

Chapter Ten
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SUMMARY:The legends are in Psamathe for three weeks for press week. It’s week two and Wattson and Octane haven’t seen each other since we last saw them.
RATING:K-T
SHIPS: Wattson and Octane
TAGS:alcohol, food mention, anxiety, fluff, angst, slow burn
around 12.5k words

Natalie sat in the restaurant downstairs slumped over a bit, her elbow on the table and resting her head in one of her hands. She was shoving the food around on her plate, looking uninterested and lost in thought. Her feet tapped under the table, a sigh leaving her as she took a small bite. 

It was slightly packed this afternoon, each table having someone sitting at it, the crowd moving in and out at a quick pace and tables rotating faster than normal. Natalie was grateful for her reserved seating right now, otherwise eating here for lunch seemed to be a stressful event she wouldn’t want to be a part of. She was growing annoyed at the sound of laughter, though, not being able to summon the feeling in herself authentically all day.

She just felt down in her spirits lately, and maybe that was her own fault.

Across the table from her sat Ajay who was finishing her plate, eyeing her friend as she took the last bite of her own food.

Ajay clicked her phone screen on, checking the time and her notifications to see if Octavio had replied yet with no luck.  

She grabbed a napkin to wipe her face, clearing her throat as she looked at Natalie.

She knew that Octavio could be anywhere in the hotel – or literally anywhere on Psamathe, really – but Ajay wasn’t going to go tracking him down. She knew he was probably doing something that took his attention away and not to waste her time trying to get it from said activity. He would come back after the fact. He always did, it was annoyingly reliable and also unreliable at the same time. Example alone he even followed her to the games; he just showed up and she had to accept it.  

Luckily, they had a better relationship since the incident with his legs but they still rocked back and forth from time to time. No matter what though, she wanted the best for him and Natalie seemed to bring it out of him. She wasn’t so sure about the reverse just yet, but knew at least that Natalie wanted him to care about her too. It was enough for her to feel like she had room to prod at the topic.    

“Yuh good? You’ve barely touched your lunch today. I thought you liked what you got.” Ajay asked, trying to hide her concern for the blonde who had been somewhat quiet all morning through interviews and now during lunch.  

All Ajay had heard all day in passing was small mentions of Octavio scattered throughout each conversation with one another; and she had seen her a lot with having to be in most interviews and press conferences alongside each other since 6 this morning. Ajay had tried to find Octavio for Natalie unbeknownst to her knowledge, just wanting to push the two of them together at this point. She was growing tired of watching them spin around, it was normal for him to never make up his mind but painful to watch from the sidelines when she could see an easier route; which there was.

Natalie looked up from her plate of half untouched food, sitting up slowly and shrugging tiredly. “Je vais bien.”

“Uh huh, but is that a lie?” she persisted, poking Natalie again with another question.

All it did was result in another heavy sigh, Natalie slumping backwards into the booth and looking down at her feet under the table. She anxiously ruffled her bangs, and avoided eye contact with Ajay. Her mind was racing around ways her week could have gone better but she was sat regretting the choices she didn’t take.

It had been over a week since she had the time or opportunity to see Octavio, and she ran from it the second the option appeared at her doorstep. Even though all she had wanted was to see him, she couldn’t get herself to let it happen.

He had shown up to see her late last night and she hid in her suite, pretending to be asleep although she heard him outside the door. He knocked a few times and she was certain he stayed for a minute before leaving, the mechanic whir of his legs giving him away.

Her mind was becoming more and more consumed with negative outcomes and because of that she had ended up keeping him at arm’s length. She knew she missed him but also knew she couldn’t help herself from wanting him when he was around. It was an issue for clear thinking. She just couldn’t think straight around him and she wasn’t sure if she loved it or was just fearful of a devastating end too much to try any further. She knew heartache and the searing pain it could cause. That couldn’t be the story for the two of them.

It was easier to sort through her feelings on her own; but being on her own meant a gnawing settling in her as she thought about seeing him. She hated missing him like this, undetermined factors at play. She just wanted to see him, hearing his laughter and thick accent wrap around her, but it felt too dangerous of a desire.

No matter what way her thoughts swayed, the last time they spoke was a broken record in her head.

She was wishing she hadn’t ever made the error of dipping her toes in instead of jumping. She didn’t do what she should have done, and she knew of it already.

It was too cold, too new, and she pulled back too fast because of it. She was scared of freezing – leaving something left unnoticed, losing him, losing the happiness he brought her. All while panicking about whether she was causing just that by trying to stop what felt inevitable at its core. Heartache. She did desperately want him, but at what cost?  She told him she would see him, and now it was obvious this wasn’t as easy of a task to complete as she thought it could be. It entailed so much more than just being around him.

Self-sabotage at its finest; she was letting it all slip away.

“Nat?” Ajay asked again, trying to get her attention while trying to not show her concern.  

“Hm?” Natalie replied, looking over at her and tilting her head in confusion. She felt too scattered to think properly about anything at all and she hated it, a weight in her chest throughout the day. If she couldn’t think properly, how could she make the right decision? She couldn’t ever forgive herself if she made a mistake with this, there would be no repairing it.

It was odd knowing that seeing him would most likely solve some of her worries, but only for as long as she was with him. His presence made her anxieties fade into the background, making them barely noticeable and hidden from her mind. Once she was alone again, she had too much time to think and then think again and again. It was becoming draining to never escape her own worries and she had minimal ideas for getting out of it; one of them being just caving and seeing him no matter the repercussions. She was mentally prepping herself all day for the task, even if she wasn’t sure of completing it.

Natalie grabbed her water, gulping down the last remaining bit and set the glass back down with a clunk on the table that she wasn’t expecting.  

She looked at Ajay, who was giving her a look back that said everything.

Ajay clearly knew what was going on and wanted Natalie to speak the truth first but it didn’t seem plausible to pull the words out and say them. She was actually quite scared of the reality outside her daydream; the two were combining and she didn’t know what to do if both collapsed around her. It seemed simpler to keep them separate out loud, even though it didn’t stop them from intertwining in her mind.

She didn’t even wantto think about it, but it was all that was on her mind. It still seemed like he could vanish at her fingertips, like it wasn’t really happening and she was quite scared of when it could become real. Months ago it wasn’t even on her radar, what was to say it would stay for either of them in a few more?

“Nevermind.” Ajay shook her head, realizing that this wasn’t going to be a conversation to be had right now or maybe at all.

She stood up from her seat and looked back at Natalie to see if she would be coming along with her or sticking around to finish her food.

It took a moment with Natalie looking at her plate and deciding to leave the remaining scraps behind, she just didn’t have an appetite right now, before she stood and followed to leave.

“Have you-” Natalie started, but trailed off almost instantly as they stepped through the doors of the restaurant and into the hallway. She had been trying to slyly mention him throughout the day, but now that it was growing later so was her patience. She had minimal confidence to move forward despite her worry, but still was attempting the question again. “Uhm, are you planning on seeing Octavio later today?”

“Not tonight. I have a gig booked that I was planning on breaking curfew for.” she smiled patting her back with her sticks attached, nudging Natalie with an even bigger grin now. If she couldn’t track down Silva, then she could invite her friend to a distraction. “Yuh want to come?”

“To your gig?”

“Yeah! It might be fun! It’s a bit loud, we can get you some headphones if you’re interested in coming.” Ajay offered, checking her phone one more time before giving her full attention back to Natalie. “I know you wanna see O, but why don’t you try to just do something to take your mind off whatevers going on. He might come by it later tonight, he sometimes does.”

Natalie pursed her lips together, shaking her head ‘no’ nervously. As much as the idea of trying to forget about him for a little while to clear her mind seemed like a smart choice, she wasn’t sure if another party of kinds was the way to go. “I appreciate the sentiment, mon ami. I just don’t think so, though, not today! I may go back to my suite and take a nap before dinner. Maybe some other time, if that’s alright?”

“For sure, just say when you ever wanna come by – you know we’ll always make room for you at our shows!”  

She smiled slightly, reaching her arms out for a goodbye hug and the two embraced tightly for a second. It was comforting being with someone she considered her family. At least a small portion of her felt better.

“Merci, I appreciate that greatly. Have an amazing show tonight! They always are.” Natalie grinned, waving goodbye.

Ajay laughed, walking off down the hall with a wave over her head. “See ya, Nat!”

Natalie took a deep breath once she was alone in the hall, stepping out of the way of the door to lean against the wall. She rubbed her cheek anxiously, resisting the urge to pull out her phone and try to find Octavio on her own right now.

Maybe she should have gone with Ajay despite not wanting to be around crowds right now, she just was tired of being alone with her thoughts.

A small group of three people left the restaurant, the door opening at her side and causing her to go stiff. She let the group pass by with her undetected against the wall, thanks to her silence right now, and watched the three people laughing and talking as they disappeared around the corner. She felt exposed even though all of her thoughts were tucked away in her head.  

She took it as a sign to get walking to her room, as she didn’t want to run into anyone else seeming to be having a better day than her. It shoved her mood even further down to see smiles on strangers faces, sending her wondering if they would be better at this than her. Would they make the right choices, would they stumble?

She didn’t get people, at least she never assumed she did. It was her biggest fault that she eventually realized was a strength later in life. No one is perfect at everything and she had her intelligence in science.

No, she did not get people, but she understood everything else she did and better than most. It was a price to pay for her own self and willingly she came to terms with that at a young age. She didn’t need to understand how people functioned to befriend them, to have them around or in her life. She did enough research to hold over the bare minimum, and learned as much as she could from books and experience. Until Octavio she hadn’t thought that much into what to say or do, she just tried her best. Now, she was overthinking trying to analyze something that could never be - by anyone.

She felt like she would break the two of them in her fingers, crumbling it to pieces because she would make the wrong move. Was there a wrong move? Maybe stalling was the wrong move.

Natalie swallowed the lump in her throat, hurrying while she was alone in the hall towards the elevator. She pressed the button repeatedly, impatient for it to arrive. Once it was cracked open, she slid inside of it as fast as she could to seal herself off from the rest of the hotel.

She clicked the force close button, leaning back against the wall and trying to space out the rickety sound of the ride up. It was a risk taking the elevator right now with people everywhere but she assumed it was faster than trying to run up a few flights of stairs. It paid off too, because she was alone on the way.

It would be a lie if she said she wasn’t hoping Octavio would be outside her suite when she arrived. She loved that he kept magically appearing out of nowhere, something he had always done prior but now it was bringing her a different kind of happiness.

He was the first thing she looked for the second the doors slid open to her floor, and a wave of disappointment came over her the second she realized he wasn’t anywhere to be seen.  

Well-deserved in her mind considering she let him walk away last night. It didn’t stop the disappointment at all, though.

She accepted the truth and pushed herself off the wall of the elevator to start walking forward to her suite, trudging along.

Her hand was in her pocket trying to fish out her room key when she slowed down, stopping her search and stepped forward to place her forehead against the door to her room instead of unlocking it.  

She closed her eyes tightly as she tried to push past the uneasiness she felt, but it wasn’t working.  

She needed to just see him; she needed to stop running from this like distance would answer her questions magically.  

She yanked her phone out of her pocket instead of her key, opening her eyes once she steadied her breath somewhat. Her fingers were typing too fast for her, having to go back multiple times to fix a letter and eventually just scrapping the whole long paragraph she was attempting to write. It was too wordy, too long, too honest. She retyped the new message, just five words and simpler than a half-baked admiration confession over the phone.

TXT TO OCTAVIO – UNSENT 2:56 PM

Can I see you again?

Natalie looked down at her phone, hovering her finger over the send button but just shut the screen down entirely after she couldn’t decide what to do.  

Was it too needy to ask for him to see her this way?  Especially after she let herself miss an opportunity already, she wasn’t sure if this was rude to do – although he had no idea she let him walk away that night. Maybe this was just another excuse to stop it all before it got too far.  

She exchanged her phone for the key and unlocked her door, pushing it open and shuffling inside.  

The door swung closed behind her with a flick of her hand, it clicking shut and letting the darkness of the suite consume her. The curtains drawn closed and all the lights off, she felt safe and hidden within it from the crowds and it instantly brought on a sense of tiredness she had been ignoring.

She kicked off her sneakers and collapsed onto the bed on top of the covers, laid up on her side.  

Nikola hopped up beside her, curling up in front of her stomach an began to purr. After that she didn’t recall dozing off, it happening rather quickly from the day and her stressors. 

               -       -       -

Natalie awoke groggy, and now alone on the bed with the imprint of where Nikola once was under her fingers on the comforter. She yawned, propping herself up with her arm slowly and looked around the dark room to gain her bearings. She was a bit disoriented, but that was most likely just the nap and would fade in time.  

Rubbing her eyes, she got up from the bed and stretched her arms out. Her vision was slowly adjusting to the darkness, but she clicked on the lamp beside her bed to lighten the room a little to speed up the process.  

She let out another yawn as she stood and tried to wake herself enough to change clothes for the night. She should’ve just put on something to sleep in earlier. The shirt and jeans she was in were now slightly wrinkled and spotty with cat hair from the nap.

She walked across the suite as she wiped as much of the fur off as possible, clicking on the light in the bathroom as she entered it.

Natalie leaned on the counter to look at herself closely in the mirror, staring herself down and trying to mentally convince herself to do something. Anything with the Octavio situation. 

Her unsent message sat taunting her in her phone and she couldn’t ignore its’ nonstop begging to be thrown into the world. She wasn’t one to just let things go, to just leave things behind, and it felt a lot like she was doing that on accident out of fear.  

She sighed heavily, hanging her head in her palm and pulling away from the mirror. She couldn’t even look at herself because all she saw was someone who was running from her problems, and she hated how controlling her worries were to the situation when she didn’t want to be sitting on the sidelines forever. She didn’t want to be sitting on an unsent message, not when nothing is guaranteed.

It was never who she was to just watch opportunities of something new pass her by, the chance to learn or grow was something she strove to find. Simply put, she went after things in its entirely and devoured it until she understood it from top to bottom. If she cared, she cared with her whole being. So, the fact she was avoiding the option to feel something she never felt before with him sat unwell within her and couldn’t be explained past an impasse.

She patted at her pockets, taking her phone out and sliding open the unsent message to Octavio. It was hours later from when she originally wrote it, originally wanted it.

She wasn’t sure why she was left to sleep through the last set of interviews for the night but considered it a blessing: the extra sleep and a few less events. No one had come to get her like she assumed they would’ve, just letting her take the absence, she supposed. Either way, she was glad no one had shown up to wake her because she wasn’t going to be willing to go anyway with how she felt. At least she wouldn’t have been going in the best mood or spirits.  

Now that it was late enough in the day she hoped that Octavio would be back at the hotel. He was out doing who-knows-what all day and she was hoping that it would mean he was back by now.

The screen light burned into her eyes making her look away, and after a second of doubt she closed the message again and left it unsent.  

Instead, she left the bathroom to find a fresh pair of clothes and changed into them. She opted for a knee length skirt and sweatshirt with an apex logo on the back, switching into them quickly and looking for her shoes as she changed. She had been wrangled into one of the merchandise booths earlier today and ended up walking away with items for most of the legends – which is where the branded clothing was appearing from and her light-ish wardrobe she packed for the trip was grateful.

Natalie spotted her shoes laying on the floor and snagged them on her way out her door, pulling them on as she hopped out the door and down the hall alternating to each foot as she slid them on.  

She hurried downstairs to the main lobby using the stairs, but once she arrived there, she realized it was the last place she actually wanted to be.

She slunk into the corner of the lobby to escape the bulk of the crowd, finding the doors to the banquet hall that weren’t locked off for once by a rope barrier.

The entire first week she was curiously popping her head around workers to try to see what it looked like inside the room. She wanted to see where they would be broadcasting from this year, a theme always taking place and the legends all dressed up in fancy clothing to accept awards and dancing around the floor together.

She tried to open the door but it barely budged, the hinge catching on the lock and stopping short. She groaned under her breath in defeat, turning to sit on the bench beside the doors and pulled out her phone. She ignored the unsent message and instead opened her socials, scrolling quickly and not really looking at anything on the feed in front of her.

It was just a distraction at first, but she scrolled back up at the sight of blue on her screen as she went.

She found the post she previously went past, the red LIVE button in the corner of the video and Octavio in the screen with a skyline background behind him. The sound was muted for her while she stared at the video waiting to be opened, him throwing his head back and readjusting his mask in the video.

She hesitated but brought up his livestream, the audio starting to play back at her as she watched the comments fly on the side. He was laughing, answering questions for fans and hanging precariously on the edge of what looked like a roof in the video but she couldn’t make out much besides the skyline.

Seeing him made her regrets grow larger, wishing she was wherever he was right now.      

She swiped the live closed, switching to her unsent message to him and stared at it intently. The idea of just shoving herself towards the idea of no return was bouncing in her head and she knew she had to try to do something.  

She had given it a rule book in her head to what made it real, and it meant just that the next time she saw him because seeing him twice solidified all of it into reality. Once was to give it a try, but twice would be her willingly wanting it again.

She was really hoping he was at the hotel, the stream seeming to say that he could be. She finally had a smidgen of confidence to push forward, taking it and running, fighting the fear within her and doing what felt right though terrifying. 

TXT TO OCTAVIO – 10:03 PM

Can I see you again?

Natalie pressed send in a panicked motion, closing her phone instantly once it sent through and leaning her back on the bench as she waited. She let out a shaky breath, tapping her foot nervously. It didn’t take long for him to reply to her, which she was surprised yet happy about. She didn’t think he would get back to her that fast while he was on a stream; she was fully expecting to be left unanswered, so it was relieving to hear back so suddenly.

-TXT FROM OCTAVIO – 10:07 PM

Been waitin for u to say that chica

-TXT FROM OCTAVIO – 10:07 PM

Meet me up on the roof????

She bit her cheek, regretting taking this long to reach out to him now with his reply being so quick – so she began heading straight there the second she finished reading his words.  

She took the elevator to the highest floor she could, having to take the stairs the last two floors and emerging on the roof in the cooler night air after her trek. It was refreshing to be in the fresh air after the walk up, her pausing at the door to take in the coolness of the night.

There was a slight wind being this high up and it was carrying the smoke from the far side of the roof in her direction. She followed the smoke like a trail of breadcrumbs, spotting Octavio sitting on the edge of the building with his legs hanging over the side. He had a cigarette in his one hand and an energy drink sitting beside him on the edge. In the other hand he held his phone, streaming himself for his fans. The glow of the city beneath him looked like stars from this height, and he was relaxed as ever inches from slipping. He flicked the ash over the edge, watching it fall and turned to look over at the sound of Natalie’s footsteps beside him.

“Aye, you made it.” he grinned at her before turning to his phone to bid his fans goodbye with a cheeky chuckle. His fans pleas echoing from the phone to stay longer or show who had arrived on the roof with him, unable to see who it was, failed as he disconnected the feed suddenly after his farewell.  

He threw one leg over to stand up on the roof, rubbing at the back of his neck at the sight of her. He forgot how much he missed her until he was looking right at her, and the parts of him that missed her screamed for him to wrap her up but he shoved it down. He hadn’t seen her in a week, and wasn’t sure if it was the busy parts of work that got in the way or if she had been avoiding him. He didn’t want to push her too far, or too fast.

He knew she was the source of his inability to find a rush with his normal stim, it just didn’thit the same right now and it was because something felt missing. He felt the surge flow through him but it wasn’t the same, aggravatingly so. He got the biggest rush from pushing his boundaries with her lately, it had somehow become better than what he was used to. The novelty of the relationship made it richer, and in time he knew it would fade back to normal and level out but she was new and enchanting.

He knew better than to just push forward but he couldn’t help wanting to ask for more every time he saw her. She was taking her time, not wanting to ruin anything between the two of them, but it was digging into him like a painful thorn every time she walked away without him. He was trying to respect her space and patience but it was growing harder as the days passed.  

“Is this where you’re always hiding, Tavi?” she asked him, a faint smile starting in the corners of her lips as she stood beside him.

He was slipping his hand under his mask to take the occasional puff, but now that he was off of the stream with his fans’ he could take his goggles and mask off entirely. He stuffed both of them into his pocket, looking at her as she walked over to him.

“Ah, don’t rat me out now.” he winked, taking another puff of his cigarette to distract his hands from wanting to pull her in instantly.

Natalie stepped closer, sitting down on the edge where he sat previously and looked down over the side towards the ground. The people were barely visible from here and she knew one wrong movement and she could tumble but tried to shove that feeling off, scooting closer to the inside of the roof than the outer edge.  

Octavio sat back down beside her, hanging his feet back over the side and finished off his cigarette as he did.  

“I won’t. As long as I can borrow your hiding spot sometimes.” she replied, looking at him beside her and turned fully to hang her feet over the side too.  

“Anytime, hermosa.” he bit back the grin on his face, not hesitating to snake an arm around her waist once she was sitting alongside him.

She scooted closer to him, looking out at the skyline and tried to think of something else to say but could only conjure the mundane of typical questions. “So, how has your week been?”

“If I’m honest, without seeing you it was kinda… boring. I cut out of here few times though. It just was a bit ‘bleh’.” he shrugged slightly, swinging his feet under him. “What about you? Any cool new fans who realized you kick ass? I know you had interviews all day.”

“I did meet one person today who was quite friendly! She seemed to like a lot of the legends, mentioned you a few times! We talked for a bit.”

“Well everybody digs the Octrain, so I’m not surprised. She’s got great taste for wanting to meet you.”

“Are you just trying to find ways to compliment me?” Natalie asked, holding back a laugh.  

“Si,” he winked back in reply.

She shook her head with a full-blown laugh now, it fading slowly with her racing thoughts and him noticing as it did.  

“Hey, qué ocurre?”

“I’m fine!” she said, lying though it felt wrong to do so.  

He gritted his teeth, the feeling of wanting to put forth the effort for someone else this much was a new sensation for him. He wasn’t sure how, but the inflection in her voice gave her away despite sounding as peppy as always. The look on her face was what initially gave said lie away to him, but her tone confirmed it. He forced the weariness in him aside, looking down at the ground and rubbing his thumb in circles on her hip. “Please don’t lie to me…”

She sighed, leaning her head on his shoulder in defeat as she was caught in her lie. “Are you sure this is worth risking our friendship?”

“You’re still on that?” he half joked, squeezing her side gently to reassure her before lowering his tone to something more serious that was harder to get out. The more honest he was with her the harder it was to be serious, to be vulnerable without running. He used his free hand to turn her chin towards him, looking into her eyes with a cheeky grin. He wanted to bring her smile back to her face but knew it probably wouldn’t be as easy as he hoped. “You’re worth the risk.”

Natalie caught her breath in her throat, looking back into his eyes as she tried to find her voice. Her cheeks warmed, and she felt like he had all the right answers and her heart couldn’t keep up. It felt too good to be true, a whirlwind she surely would have to crash from. She pursed her lips together, looking down away from him and towards the ground below.  

“Watts?” He mumbled softly after she didn’t reply, losing his humor completely as she stayed silent.  

“What if you become someone you are not because of me? What if you-”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa. Where’s that coming from?” He stammered, stopping her from saying anything further.  

Natalie took a deep breath, sitting up to look at him with concern in her eyes. “You were so kind, so attentive… it was so out of character for you when I was taken out of the match and brought to the med bay. You won alone, and you spent your day with me instead of flaunting that rightful win. I was going to be fine and we all knew that, but you stayed in my room that whole night. I woke a few times and every time I did you were there. I never forgot about that.”

“You saw me?”

“I didn’t think anything of it at the time, truthfully. I just don’t want you to resent me later because of this, I don’t want you to just be trying to be someone you think I would want. I want you, Octavio, but not like that. I do not want to be a negative impact on your life.”

“You? Negative?” he laughed, trying to move past her words but it didn’t work. He sighed heavily as she stayed silent, leaning his head into her shoulder and closing his eyes tightly. “Natalie, por favor, I’m begging you to realize that’s not the case.”

“Even Ajay noticed you were acting different that day. I noticed you all in the hall whispering amongst yourselves and even she seemed pressed about something at the time. You cannot tell me in full honesty you aren’t becoming someone you are not.”

“Is it so bad that I’d at least wanna do that for you?” he began, lifting his head to look at her and using his free hand to turn her chin to look into his eyes again when she broke away. “I care about you, alright?”

She was slightly taken aback and nodded in reply, but sat and listened as he spoke. His hands leaving her face left her breathless and she couldn’t have replied if she tried. He shook his head with an impatient sigh, reconnecting his gaze with hers.

He had a nervous adrenaline building in him that only propelled him forward towards admitting more of himself to her, more of how he felt about her. He had thought they were past this part, past her worry but apparently he had thought wrong.  

“It wasn’t about winning that match after you were gone, I can win whenever I want.” he started, running one of his hands through his hair anxiously. “I was wrecking on myself all match for letting you down, I had to see you after. I thought you’d, I dunno, hate me or something. I thought I ruined my chances. I made a lot of… mistakes in that game and I never stopped to realize where I fucked up in the arena before you. I go in full force each time without thinking and maybe that’s holding me back in some ways. I can spare a secondor two to plan a route, you know? I could’ve helped, probably done a lot more but I didn’t. You made me realize that I could do more… at least sometimes.”

“Tavi, how could I possibly ever hate you?” she frowned, looking down towards the ground below them to watch the lights passing below whenever she couldn’t bare looking into his eyes. She pinched the bridge of her nose, and took a breath.

She forced herself to look at him while she spoke again. “You may run in spontaneously most of the time, but you always do damage and change the course of the game doing so. You are so certain of yourself; it is one of the things I admire about you… I do not want to be the one who changes that somehow. You don’t believe it’s bad for you and who you are as a person?”  

“I’m certain I want you and everything that brings with it.”

“Octavio.” Natalie sighed heavily, pulling her sleeves down into her palms and placing a hand beside her to balance herself. “That doesn’t-”

“Que? I’ll keep doing this for as long as it takes. I’ll keep going in this circle for you until you’re ready, but you gotta give me an actual chance sometime.” he replied quickly, leaning in closer to her as she looked away. He sighed, brushing her hair away from her cheek to expose her scar more before wrapping his arm back around her waist.  “At first, I didn’t know if I liked how it felt to feel like… thatafter I let you down, chica, but I kinda get it now. You may be making me different, but it’s not a bad thing to me. I’m better. A better champion, stunt-man, and uh well, I guess person. Don’t tell Ajay I said that.”

She giggled under her breath, looking up at him with a nod as her nerves settled around her worries slightly. “You really think I make you better?”

He huffed, embarrassed as she pointed the words back at him. He tried to detour the conversation almost instantly while still answering her, rushing through his words. “You reminded me there’s always something more beyond what we have. I hadn’t forgot about it or stopped wanting it, nah, I just lost focus once I joined the games.”  

“Non terrae plus ultra.” she remarked back.

A small smile broke at the corners of his lips hearing her recite his motto back to him, nodding along. “So, you get it, then?”

“As much as I can understand in my own way. I do believe you may make me better too, though.” she whispered back to him, not able to bring her voice above that decibel. She slunk into his arm around her, reaching her hand over to take his free hand in hers.  

He took it willingly, letting their fingers intertwine with a smile and a flirtatious taunt. “You do, huh?”

“Oh, shush.” she giggled quietly, looking at him with a smile on her lips that only made his grow bigger.  

He paused to gaze at her face, his eyes trailing to her lips with a desperate want to pull her in closer. He couldn’t as much as he wanted too – not yet. He felt like she was just convinced they wouldn’t damage one another, and he feared pushing her away again so he held himself back. He glanced up as a drop of rain hit his head and cheek, chuckling slightly as he looked up at the sky. It had blown over with dark clouds covering the once present moon and he knew it would start to pour soon by the looks of it. “Come on, unless you wanna get soaked we should head in.”

She placed her other hand out, catching a few drops of rain in her palm and watched it pool in the center before nodding in agreement. “Oui, alright, lead the way, Octy.”

He stood up from the ledge, the two keeping their hands connected, and he helped her to her feet as well.

She skipped through a few steps along the way, him smiling to himself as she disconnected from his grasp to spin once in a circle as the rain started to come down a bit quicker. He caught up to her pace, reaching around her body to grab the door handle and pressing his chest against her back as he did.

Natalie leaned back into him as he pulled the stairwell door open, and the two hurried inside just in time as a crack of thunder caused a sudden downpour.

Once they were standing together in the stairwell the door shut slowly on its hinge, closing them off from the rain and growing cold air. She brushed her hair out of her face, it starting to stick together from getting slightly wet and let out a lighthearted laugh. She glanced up at him, subsiding her laughter as she looked into his eyes. For once, she didn’t feel nervous that something terrible would happen between them and it spurred new feelings she had been shoving away. His face was glistening from the rain and she wiped a few drops of rain from his forehead with her thumb, unable to hide her staring eyes at his features.

She cleared her throat, looking down and shaking her hair out a bit more even though it was fixed now.

Octavio held back his smile, catching her staring and choosing to leave it unnoticed to her. Instead, he hopped over the railing beside them, dropping down a floor and landing with a thud hidden underneath his cackling laugh. “Vamos!”  

She shook her head with a bubbly laugh, leaning over the railing on her forearms to look below at him for a minute before choosing to just take the actual stairs to catch up.

“This isn’t a race!” she giggled, bounding down the stairs with him.

“Everything is a race, Princesa.” he laughed in reply, but never straying too far from her on the way down.

They made the way down the rest of the floors to his suite together, hurrying through the hall and he unlocked his door with a swipe of a card.

He opened it up, letting her walk inside first and following behind shutting the door behind him with his steps in.

Natalie looked around at the messy suite, it an exact replica of hers but replaced with stim and energy drinks scattered on the floor instead of her notebooks and clothes. She looked around the room, spotting his gaming system hooked up disorganized under the television and a headset sitting atop of it and curiosity piqued her.

He tossed his mask and goggles onto the counter from his pocket, watching her walk into the living area out of the corner of his eye and trying not to stare like they continually kept doing to one another. Always catching moments when the other wasn’t looking.

He looked away from her, opening up the fridge and grabbing himself an energy drink.

She took a seat on the couch, sitting upright and crossing one leg over the other. She picked up one of the games sitting on the table, flipping it over to look at the back of it.

“You want somethin’?” he inquired, his head half sticking in the fridge.

“Non, I’m alright! Merci, though.” she replied, half listening as she read the description of the game in her hands.

He shook his head once, taking his drink and shutting the door to the fridge. He looked over at her again, spotting the game this time and squinted his eyes in confusion. “What’cha got?”  

“It was on the table. One of your games, I think?” she replied, gesturing the game up to show him the cover.  

He nodded as he realized what she had. “Wanna play?”

“Oh, I don’t know how.” she shook her head, setting the game down and crossing an arm over her lap nervously.

“I could show you.” he offered, stepping around the counter and coming over to sit beside her. He set his drink down on the table, sliding the clutter aside with the can as he placed it.  

“Or you could play and I could work on my-” she started before he cut her off with a laugh.

“Did you just say ‘work’? You’re killing me.” he chuckled, rolling his eyes at her suggestion and booting up his gaming system. “No work tonight, come on. Thought this was supposed to be fun, Watts.”

“Fine, fine. You’re right.” she admitted, kicking her shoes off so they sat below her in front of the couch. She tucked her feet up underneath her, leaning towards him and grasping for the controller in his hands. “Show me?”

He gave it to her willingly, having loaded into a game for her to try. A few notifications popped up in the corner of people wondering if he would go live anytime soon, but he ignored them and hoped she would do the same. He didn’t care about doing anything with fans right now, he had spent most of his day streaming to distract from not seeing Natalie. Now, he was finally with her for once and this was his new priority for the time being. He could blend the two together later – right now he just wanted to spend time with her to take in how much his heart raced every time she brushed against his skin.

Octavio put his arm around her, scooting closer as she fumbled with a few buttons to see what they all did. He pointed out a few things, trying to explain it at a pace she would be comfortable with and watched her eagerly as she attempted to play one of his games. It was admirable to see her trying to enjoy something new, even if she did seem frustrated with it at times.

“What do you do for fun?” he asked. “It’s obviously not this.”

“I work on my inventions. Electricity isfun to me.” she replied, her tone serious as she looked over at him and took her attention away from the game. She shrugged, knowing her answer bored most but she didn’t care.  “I also have some other hobbies that I’ve been picking up. Hound was teaching me how to take care of a garden, so I have that set up back home. I have an old vinyl collection, listening to it is magical, like another world when you play anything off of it. Papa found the player for me one year for my birthday. It was stuffed away in my mother’s things that we thought had went missing. I also found a Nessie that year I thought I lost!”

She paused to think, tapping her finger on the controller with a ‘hm’.  

“I enjoy morning runs! We may have that in common, since well, I know you adore running everywhere.” she exclaimed, looking to him to find an amused look on his face causing her to stop and shake her head in confusion. “What?”

“Has anyone ever told you when you get talking about stuff you care about your whole face lights up?” he grinned, captivated by her as she was speaking. He ran his thumb over her shoulder and it only made her flush a deep red in the cheeks.  

“You asked!” she laughed, trying to brush away the look on her face and steady her breath though it wasn’t working.  

“Keep talking about it.” he urged, scooting in closer on the couch. “What are you working on right now?”

“W-what do you mean?”  

“You said electricity is fun, chica! What are you working on?”

She widened her eyes slightly, her mouth forming an ‘o’ shape as she realized he was truly interested in her words. She was so used to people not understanding or taking the time to care that it was a breath of fresh air to hear him ask her about it.  

“Oh! I’ve been working my own abilities lately. I’ve found a way to channel my electric charge through my suit and into my shield. It took a while, considering if it malfunctions I could fry myself from the inside.” she giggled softly before continuing, “It’s still very low powered. Mainly because I was planning on easing into a higher voltage after preliminary testing. I’m hoping to boost it a little so it does more of a difference in the arena later. I just want to test it first before I go tweaking anything, that way I know what the problems are before I go back to alter anything. It’ll save time so I don’t have to pry the whole thing open each time I find a problem.”

“Whoa, okay so, you figured out how to cheat your shield?” he replied, asking for clarification. He liked the concept of it, it was similar to his own abilities but he was already hopeful to see if he could borrow the tech in game to try himself.  

“It is not cheating! You regain your own health back, it’s just as fair as that.” she said defensively.  

“I didn’t mean it in a bad way,” he said trying to reassure her, “it’s actually pretty sick you can do that. It’s like a running current through your suit then? You’re literally carrying around electricity all the time – why hadn’t I realized that sooner?”

“It’s pretty flash-y.“ she sputtered out, a giggle following her pun.  

He shot her a look with a laugh, shaking his head. “That was decent, I’ll give you that.”

“Merci!” she replied with another laugh, looking back at the screen that glowed back with a pause screen. She clicked it back into the actual game and attempted to play again.  

She fumbled with the controller for a little while but started to understand the mechanic after sometime, becoming more fluid with it as he helped where needed. He had moved behind her on the couch overtime, reaching around her whenever she accidentally came too close to death to swoop her out of the bad situation. She got through a few of the levels with minimal assistance from him, but was growing tired as her eyes were wearing down from staring at the screen. Octavio hadn’t seemed to be bothered by it but she was becoming sensitive to the light after a few hours. She had leaned backwards, sitting in between his legs and resting against his chest as he played the game with his arms wrapped around her.

She glanced over at the clock on the wall, shocked to see the time had ticked far past what she thought it was. She must have been distracted from the night, getting too involved with the game and her company with Octavio to even notice the passing of the hours. It was too late into the night now to salvage her sleep. It would be 4 in morning soon, and following quickly after that at six was going to be when she had to get up for the day. She was accepting the lack of sleep part already when she tapped his arms to let her out of his grasp.  

He did as he was asked, though bummed about it, and watched as she stood up to gather her shoes.

“I should go…” she said, quietly.  

“No…” he grumbled, setting the controller down immediately at her words and grabbing for her hands. “Come with me, instead. We can go get breakfast before everyone is in the restaurant.”

“You haven’t slept, Tavi.” she replied, shifting on her heel as she looked down at him on the couch.  

“And?”  

“…Neither have I?” she said with a small laugh, unsure of why this was a conversation when they had to be up soon for work.

“But they serve coffee,” he paused, “and tea.”

She groaned softly, smiling at him despite her annoyance with his battle for her to say yes. It was endearing to see him try so hard to get her to stay, and she did really want to stay.  

“Can I swing by my suite first so I can take care of Nikola for the morning and change?” she asked, looking down at her clothes and then back at him.

“Duh.” he nodded with a smile, hopping to his feet to pull her in by the waist. “Anything, Watts.”

She smiled at him, holding back the flutter of butterflies in her stomach at his words. She hesitated, moving away from him and towards the door putting her shoes on one at a time. “I’ll meet you downstairs?”

“You bet.”

He sidestepped ahead of her, beating her to the door and opening it up for her with a cheeky grin. He leaned on the door frame as she walked into the hallway past him.

She turned on her heel, partially waving at him as she hurried down the hall to the elevator and tried not to think about how she wished she had done something to say goodbye besides wave. It felt so formal when she was daydreaming about the taste of his lips, wondering if he would wrap her up in his arms or they would share a quick peck before parting.  

She was floating on air the entire time she was running around for the morning, her head in the clouds and incapable of thinking about anything but Octavio. She regretted missing those few days with him, wishing that she hadn’t of wasted them in her own worry but was at least happy to know it was in a better place now with the two of them. She swapped into a pair of jeans and a v-neck shirt, grabbing a jacket on her run out the door.

Octavio and Natalie weren’t apart for long, only about twenty-five minutes, mainly because the both of them hurried through everything to get back to one another as fast as possible.  

Octavio was already downstairs waiting outside of the elevator door, his foot against the wall and typing away on his phone. The clicking under his fingers going speedily and sending away a few messages in a row.  

The elevator dinging open brought his attention up, looking over to see if it was who he was hoping it would be; and when he caught sight of her blonde hair, he knew it was Natalie.  

He quickly adjusted his mask and goggles so he looked alright, running a hand through his hair as she approached him. Every time he saw her it was like the first time now, hitting a brick wall and falling to pieces repeatedly. The thrill of knowing she felt the same for him made it that much more fulfilling.  

He instantly hooked an arm around her waist, pulling her in and over to the side of the elevator he was tucked up on. She shrieked slightly from him popping out of seemingly nowhere, but it settled into a laugh once she realized it was him. He pulled his mask down to his chin, giving her a quick peck on the cheek along her scar before putting it back on.  

Natalie blushed furiously instantly and looked around to see if they were alone, making him chuckle to himself at her instant concern. It was adorably easy to rile her up.

“No one’s awake yet, we’re fine.”  

“I just don’t want to ruin this just yet by including fans, and they happen to be everywhere here.” she said, smiling slightly at him as she looked him up and down. He had partially changed into one of his normal outfits in the arena minus the battle gear; his shorts sitting at his hips, and his abs peeking out from underneath his t-shirt slightly. She hated staring at him because she didn’t want to get caught, but she never really stopped to let herself do it prior and she was finally letting herself admit the attraction she had for him to herself.  

He shrugged, understanding her concern but not wanting to stop with his affectionate displays. He enjoyed watching her face blush up too much; it being the opposite color of her eyes shining back at him. He tapped her gently on the chin once before pulling out his phone to check on his messages. “So, hermosa, change of plans from breakfast. We really won’t be running into anybody because Che needs a ride back into town, her van broke down. Plus, says she’s unfit to drive anyway. Don’tknow what that means but I imagine we’ll find out.” he shook the keys to one of the cars sitting out back in his hand, smiling widely under his mask. “Care for another joyride, instead?”

“Oh, I was going to get some-”

“Tea?” he replied, scooping a cup off of the bench beside him and handing it to her.  

She took the drink partially flustered but thanked him quietly. It was a kind gesture that didn’t serve him in anyway and it made it that much more thoughtful, especially when she never thought he had stopped to notice these sorts of things before. “Merci. You didn’t have to do that.”

“I felt bad the plans changed so suddenly, figured you’d want it for the road.” he shrugged, trying not to linger too much on the sentiment. He stopped, back tracking and rubbing at the back of his neck. He hadn’t stopped to ask her if she wanted to even come along, he’d just assumed.  

“Unless you don’t wanna come, that’s fine too.” he added on swiftly.

“Do not feel bad, I understand! Ajay needs assistance, that’s more important. I don’t want her getting busted being off property, not all of us can sneak around like you in the daytime.” Natalie smiled, zipping up her jacket since they would be going outside and pulling up her hood. “I’ll gladly tag along!”

He snickered at her words, offering his arm for her so they could walk out together. He was half expecting her to turn him down because of her worry of being caught but she glanced around once and must have decided it was alright to do, and he was happy for it. “The trick is to act like you belong and no one stops you until you break something; at least in my experience.”

She took a sip of her drink, giggling into the cup as she hooked her arm into his to start the walk to the back lot. “You are basically a professional at this point, I suppose, then! How many places are you banned from again?”  

“A handful.”  

“How vague.” she teased, disconnecting their arms and pushing open the back door with her hip. She turned on her heel, looking back at him as the door rested against her side and held it while he caught up. He wasn’t lingering behind for any reason other than he couldn’t stop watching her move, and he felt badly for it every time it happened but couldn’t stop wondering about what stopped him from noticing her before. Each time he saw her he spotted something new and added it to his list of things that drew him to her. She had her own air about her – down to the way she bounced on her feet to walk around, her resonating laughter, the way her hips swayed, the sparkling excitement in her eyes whenever they came across something fun.  

He placed his hand on the door above her head, propping it open for her.

They walked outside together, slightly in a hurry to pick up Ajay on the outskirts of town. The pavement was still wet from the rain through the night, but the clouds above finally started to dissipate and fall apart. Natalie took a deep breath, stalling partially, the smell of wet soil prominent in the air and the quiet chirping morning starting to appear though it wasn’t light out yet.  

The two hurried to the car, Octavio snagging her door and opening it for her before sliding over the hood to hop into the driver side; simultaneously sliding open his messages to Ajay as he started the engine up.

She huffed at him, laughing under her breath as she got into the car. She didn’t even have enough time to react, him moving too fast for her to stop it.  

She dropped back into her seat, stretching out and watching him typing away on his phone.  

He replied quickly to Ajay, telling her he was on the way and tossed his phone on the dashboard before pulling out of the spot to drive off.  

Natalie took another drink of her tea as she leaned forward, turning on the radio and leaving it on a lower setting. The hum of the morning news came from the speakers and she skipped around the channels until she found something that was playing music. The base beat of the song reminded her of the fact that Ajay had thrown the event last night, wondering if Octavio had given up going or was never planning to go at all.

“I was kind of surprised you did not go to her gig last night.” she started, looking over at him in the driver seat as she rolled her window down slightly to let fresh air through the car. “I thought that’s where you would be, anyway.”

“I’d be anywhere you are.” he cleared his throat nervously after his words, gripping the steering wheel under his fingers. That was a bittoo honest. “It’d be great going to one of her shows with you, though. Would you wanna do that sometime?”

“Of course!” she eagerly agreed, reaching out to wrap her hand around his arm. “Just tell me when and where.”

“I thought I’d have to convince you.” he chuckled, easing his nerves and letting out a shaky breath though riding the high it was giving him to feel that way.  

“Non, I promised you I would try new things, didn’t I?”

He tilted his head to the side, pursing his lips together with a nod. He wasn’t going to fight that logic, especially when it benefited him.  

Natalie rested back in the passenger seat, taking a sip of her tea as she looked out the window and mindlessly drew shapes on his arm with her fingertips. She was watching out the window as the buildings passed by, them driving through the downtown area again but this time passing right by the road to where they got shakes and continuing further out of the city instead of turning.  

Her touch sent chills down his spine, him sitting up more as they got closer to where they were headed to get Ajay but unable to shake the feeling in his chest that pounded and swirled. It felt false to know she was beside him, wanting to be here with him just the same as he wanted to be with her. Yet, the touch of her fingertips and his pulse racing in his chest told him it was all very real.

He pulled into a dirt parking lot, slowing the car down as he circled the lot to find the van. In the middle of the lot stood a warehouse with a few cars and the van parked out around it. Ajay was propped on the side of her van and sitting in an oversized hoodie and yawning slightly as the car pulled up. She had a can in her hand, crumpling it up and tossing it into the back of the van as she finished off the last gulp.  

Octavio parked, rolling down his window as soon as it halted in place. He hopped out of the window, standing on the driver seat to look over the vehicle and yelling over the top of the car. “Che!”

Natalie giggled to herself at the scene, rolling her window all the way down to watch as Ajay caught wind of his yells.

Ajay closed the van door it sliding shut with a click, taking her bag with her and strolled over to the car with a confused look on her face. She squinted, looking into the passenger side to see who was there but couldn’t make them out of the shadow from the lights overhead in the parking lot.

“Hey, how’s it?” she asked, leaning down slowly and into the window to see who was in the passenger seat as Octavio dropped back down into the car.  

He bounced once, leaning onto the passenger seats back to look out the window at Ajay who was letting her eyes adjust to the interior of the car.

“Who didjya- oh, hey Nat.” Ajay said, smirking to herself before moving to get into the backseat of the car.

“Been alright, we’ve been up all night.” he said, looking into the backseat as the door opened but let his hand trail along Natalie’s leg for a minute.

Ajay faked a retching noise, sliding in as she did and dropped her bag at her feet. “I do not need to know anything else. Bit soon, huh?”

“Get your head out of the gutter,” he laughed, looking over at Natalie to make sure she wasn’t uncomfortable with the conversation.  

She must have caught his glance of worry, because she squeezed his hand gently and turned to look behind her at Ajay. He readjusted how he was sat in the driver seat, gripping the steering wheel to leave.

He tapped his foot impatiently, partially from waiting until the door was closed so he could drive off again; but he would be lying if he wasn’t anxious to hear what Natalie had to say.  

He focused on his driving but occasionally peeked at Natalie out of the corner of his eye as she spoke.

“We played video games! He showed me the controls and I got to level nine basically all by myself. So, I would say that I obtained a new skill, kind of! It’s been a productive night. We were going to get breakfast, but you needed a ride so I decided to come with. I hope that’s alright.”

“Yuh were gonna go get breakfast after spending all night together?” she declared back with a wide smile, eyeing Octavio in the rearview mirror. It was some kind of progress and she couldn’t deny how happy it made her to see, especially when she was worried that he wouldn’t be able to commit to the idea in the first place. It was a start and she was hoping there was more to it than just a night spent together.  

“What about it?” Octavio asked, speeding up the vehicle to get back to hotel before anybody would be back at the front desk. He also wanted to get away from this conversation with Ajay, he was weary of the ground underneath Natalie and himself and wasn’t sure if anything could break it just yet. He wasn’t ready to let go of Natalie; and a slightly intoxicated Ajay, as he was beginning to realize he was dealing with, was knowledgeable enough to say just the wrong things.  

“What do you mean‘what about it’, seriously you two?” Ajay groaned, raising an eyebrow in confusion. She leaned back in her seat and crossed her arms over her chest. Her head dropped back against the headrest, her eyes closing momentarily.  

She sighed, shaking her head at them and opened her eyes with a squint. “I’ve had quite a few tonight and am still sort of runnin’ on a buzz, and while I appreciate yuh both coming to get me and all I gotta ask… are you two dating now or what? It’s been clear for a minute now that yuh both have some kind of feeling for-”

“We’re just seeing how things go, hermana. Mira, do you want me to stop for some food or something?” he interrupted to ask her; a bit worried at the state of her but more at her words, glancing back in the rearview mirror as he drove. He darted a glance at Natalie, worried about her reaction too. He could tell he couldn’t stop anything Ajay would say, her filter uncapped, but he hoped Natalie wouldn’t take it too strongly.  

“M’ sorry, I just can’t stand that you both keep talking to me about each other and it’s like – just kiss already, you know? I got one of yuh in this ear and the other over there. Stop tellin’ me yuh wanna but can’t.” she exhaled heavily, hiccuping. Her arm stretched out over the backseat, and Ajay slid down onto her stomach in a slow motion. She rested her cheek against the cool fabric of the seat, yawning once and closing her eyes again.

Natalie hid her smile as she glanced back at Ajay, biting down on her bottom lip to hide her amusement and leaning over to Octavio with a stifled giggle. “Is she going to be alright for interviews today?”

“Probably not.” he chuckled in reply.

“Don’t talk about me

Chapter Nine
(previous chapter)(next chapter)|(start over)
SUMMARY:The legends head to Psamathe for three weeks. [CONT.]
RATING:K-T
SHIPS: Wattson and Octane
TAGS:alcohol, food mention, fluff, angst, slow burn
around 16.2k words

An alarm blaring at his side and knocking coming from the door awoke Octavio from his slumber. He had a headache pounding profusely as he came to his senses. It was morning, that much he knew from the light pouring through his curtains, but he wished for more time to sleep away the hangover.

He grumbled out, pulling the pillow over his head to block out the noise and light. He had no desire to leave his bed, knowing that the first event was awaiting him downstairs. He was going to have to face cameras and questions when all he had was questions of his own.

The alarm continued to beep insistently and it only made his headache worse but he was stuck laying in the bed, forcing his eyes shut to try to block it out.  

The flashbacks of everything that happened last night came back like a stifling nightmare.

He wanted to waste away and just disappear into the bed, though he knew whoever was behind his door seemed too persistent to leave.  

He wished he could rewind time and redo the entire day over. He would’ve spent it differently and appreciated another kind of day with Natalie, one he could actually remember. Instead, he was dreading seeing her after he vaguely remembered showing up at her door. He couldn’t really remember anything from the party besides Natalie; she was all that he could summon in his foggy brain shrouded by the alcohol he drank that night. He knew because of this the majority of the day would be rocky at best trying to piece his memory together.  

Octavio peeked over the pillow as the door opened, the sound of footsteps approaching the edge of his bed. They must have gotten a key from the front desk, he thought. He spotted the shoes at the floor, knowing they were now standing above his bed and groaned quietly.  

“No.” he grumbled as the barrier between him and the world was torn from his hands, the pillow flying across the room.

Above him, Elliott stood with an impatient look on his face. His arms crossed over his chest and his foot tapping sarcastically, shaking his head with a ‘tsk’.

“You don’t get a say so here, man. I’d say I’m sorry but it’s not my fault you’re this wrecked. I’ve never seen you drink that much.” he said, pulling the blankets back from Octavio and onto the floor. “You are so late it’s not even funny and I don’t have time to stick around to make sure you get up. I told Ajay I’d come do this because she’s already in an interview and mine starts in fifteen. So, if you follow the problem here… maybe get out of bed.”

Octavio glared at Elliott as he spoke, throwing one of the other pillows on the bed at his head. It missed and flew past, landing on the ground near the other one. Octavio groaned faintly, watching Elliott walk around the room and shot him a pained look. “Compadre, begging you to keep it down.”

Elliott shook his head, wandering to open each of the curtains for extra measure. “Yeah, well, get over that because it is loud and it is busy downstairs. Oh, and guess what you have to go. It’s nine and you have no time to get ready. Good luck.”

The light shone in and Octavio put his hand to his eyes, wincing from the piercing headache. He let out a frustrated sigh, reattaching his legs and standing with a lazy stretch.

Elliott gave him a thumbs up, leaving out the door he never should’ve been able to open if Octavio had a say.

Once the door latched closed, he was left alone with his headache and regrets from last night again. Now, torn too far from sleep to be able to lay back down to hide from the day.  

He’d rather be late to his interview, which wasn’t something he’d ever think he would say.

Normally, he would sprint at the chance to be in front of a camera, he was consistently in front of one by choice anyway with his livestreams, but he had no mindset to answer questions today. He didn’t want to even try. He could try to dodge most of the event if he tried and hope he could talk himself out of it later, though knew it was inevitable for him to have to go. He just had to hope that he could find Natalie amongst the chaos of the day, he needed to see her after last night. He needed to make sure he didn’t do something unmanageable.  

The idea of damage control was never in his knowledge. He wasn’t the type to follow up a mistake with an apology, not unless it benefited him in some way. He never did anything wrong, just things other people found discouraging. He scraped by to keep people from being mad at him, and it was normally enough with his grin and excuses. He just didn’t feel alright with leaving last night alone, even if he wasn’t sure what exactly happened. It involved Natalie, it felt off, and that alone propelled him to change trajectories.  

A new plan; focus on Natalie and hope maybe he could find a quiet moment to tell her how he felt.

If he could just tell her how he felt things would change, they would be different, he was sure of it.

Even though the thought of telling her how he felt meant being vulnerable, and that was almost enough to send him running the other direction like it always did. Natalie had become a guiding force, though, and even if he was terrified, he wasn’t turning back. He decided that a while ago and it only cemented itself now.

He would find her and talk to her and sort out everything – though it seemed all too familiar in hindsight. Did he do this last night? He wasn’t sure. He just felt like something had happened and didn’t know what. The looming disaster sat in the back of his head but he wasn’t sure why. He could muster the memory of dancing and Natalie, that burning of the alcohol going down, and the thumping of his heartrate all night; besides that, he was running on empty for ideas of what had went down entirely.

He only knew so much from what was real last night and it all felt like sorrows of things he did wrong.

It put a weight on him not being able to figure out what happened while feeling so terribly. He had to find someone to set the story straight. He knew one of the best choices, though most likely uncomfortable, would be Natalie. She was the one thing striking through his memory of the night, so it was the best place to start to put it all back together in his head.

The option to talk to anyone who was at the party was there but he actually wanted to see Natalie, and this was an easy way to do both at the same time. Even though he was going in unaware of if he may had done something terribly wrong last night. He had no idea if he told her how he felt and it made him slightly apprehensive. He wanted to tell her, truthfully, but what if he had but forgotten it?

What if he told her and she shunned him?

He tore through his luggage on the floor, tossing a few things to the side and tried to find something presentable to wear. What exactly was determined presentable to them he wasn’t sure, but he knew it wasn’t going to be his normal wardrobe. He was also struck with the new question of Natalie and her opinions on what he would wear – since when did that matter? He never cared about anyone’s opinion but his own, but now he was subconsciously double checking for pieces in his bag that he thought would catch her attention.  

He rummaged through the suitcase, tossing through some of his clothes and tried to find the most suitable thing he could use.  

He found a pair of looser fitted black pants that were tailored a bit higher on his leg, retching slightly as he realized this was going to be his life for the next three weeks before continuing to search for a top.  

The room was too quiet compared to how much he was thinking right now, and it didn’t help soothe his nerves at all. Now that he had decided to just try to tell her how he felt, he couldn’t relax. He paced into the bathroom as he adjusted his goggles and mask onto his face with the shirt he chose tucked in his hand.

He thought he’d assembled a decent outfit, pulling the sheer white button up on and tucking it into his pants. He looked at himself in the mirror as he got ready, looking himself from side to side with a sigh. Given the fact he hated having to wear it, at least he looked decently good. He rushed through applying some hair product, and decided it was as good as it came right now with the time limit he had.

He was late but he didn’t need to make it worse. He already knew he wasn’t headed directly to his interview.

He cracked his neck from side to side, shaking his fingers through his hair one last time and checked his appearance in the mirror. Satisfied, he turned the light off, hurrying around and making sure he had everything for the day.

He bolted out the door, letting the door slam behind him as he took off down the hall. A small line of fans waiting at the elevators detoured him to the staircase instead, pulling open the doors to start his descent to the main floor. He didn’t need the quality time with his own mind, but he had it, and all that he could think about was Natalie.  

The thought of her morphing with his desire for adrenaline – as it felt the same in his heart, beating wildly in his chest.

The sound of his feet on the concrete stairs made his headache worse, and he was trying to get the walk over with as fast as possible for more than one reason. The distant sound of chatter that grew louder the closer he got made him realize just how busy the event was this year and hoped it would make sneaking around that much easier.

Octavio slammed through the doors at the lowest level, using his elbow to push the door open and slowed his pace once he entered into the crowded lobby. A few people spotted him, taking some photos and gaping at him as he passed them by but the majority of the crowd didn’t notice his entrance. He glanced around the room, scanning the faces.

What was filled with workers yesterday was now filled with fans and executives of the games today. Vendors and people with lanyard passes around their necks walking from room to room. It was flooded with people and he knew Natalie would hate it, so the chance to find her would be slim since she wouldn’t stay long in the lobby. He didn’t know when her interview started or where to look, but he was determined to track her down before he did anything else today.

A piece of himself was telling him he had to see her, and he couldn’t argue with that.

He was on the edge of the lobby near a few of the boardrooms sectioned off for interviews. Some of the doors were closed tightly during interviews, and some doors open to welcome people to sit before one was about to start.  

He walked casually through the crowd, the loud chatter shattering his headache to oblivion as he went. He rounded a corner from the stairs, peering through a few of the doors to see who was inside as he went.  

He aimlessly walked past three rooms before he found what he was looking for: Natalie.

The door was almost menacing, staring through the glass circle in the door to see her on the other side. All he had to do was go inside and get her attention, he would figure out what to do from there. That was his plan, at least so far. He just needed to talk to her, he reminded himself, it was only words. If she was anything like him during these events, there was a chance she would be grateful for the excuse to leave.  

He checked his surroundings to see if anyone had noticed him at the door, slinking into the room as quietly as he could, but the whirring mechanics of his legs didn’t help his stealth too much in a quiet boardroom.  

A few people sitting in the back row turned to spot him. He put a finger up to his mask and then pointed back at Natalie who was speaking at the front of the room, signifying them to stay quiet and turn their attention back to Natalie as he made his way to the back wall. He didn’t want to take attention away from her by any means while she was speaking, he just needed to steal her away for a minute – or hopefully more.  

He waited there silently undetected by Natalie while she answered a few questions, but she spotted him after about five minutes.

She looked over at him with a confused gaze, trailing off her sentence as she looked back at the crowd. She stalled her words, letting out an ‘um’ and a small sigh. Her eyes looked back and forth between Octavio and the rest of the crowd, unable to figure out where to go from here.

She couldn’t tell his expression because of the mask and wished they were somewhere private so they could talk one on one. The legends never normally had time to be an audience member at another interview – so why was he here? Her instant thought was worry that something had happened but knew he may just interject if it was that urgent. So, perhaps, it was because of last night.

He gestured his head towards the door, tilting it to the side when she locked eyes with him.

He wanted her to follow him. If she didn’t want to walk away from her interview she didn’t have too, but he had to try to pull her away from it. It was worth giving it a chance to see if she would come talk to him now, he couldn’t wait. Natalie had a better work ethic than most of the legends on the roster, he actually admired her for it, sometimes. It was a low percentage he would get her to come talk, but he was optimistic; as always.

Natalie tried to turn her attention back to the questions being thrown at her, most of them revolving around her pylon and some of her memorable matches that occurred over the year. She couldn’t answer them properly though, not right now. She had distracted herself all morning over her thoughts of Octavio, finally getting them to subside shortly ago. Now, that was impossible with him standing at the back of the room and beckoning her to follow.  

She had wasted most of her morning lying in bed, unable to get up because her heart hurt. A feeling she hadn’t felt in a long while, and it took its toll that morning as she dragged herself around. She felt heavy as she went about the day and got ready, and even now she wasn’t feeling her normal self. Even though she and Octavio left off on a decent note it still sat sour on her tongue. Perhaps because she didn’t get what she wanted in the end and someone else could have so quickly. She felt foolish to assume she could get that attention from him, to assume anything would happen.

She felt as if she was leading herself on. It wasn’t a thought she wanted to give any more time, but it always crept back in.  

She felt badly for thinking of him so often when she had no idea how much she ran across his mind, or if at all. Was it selfish to wish she was on his thoughts as much as she thought of him? She wasn’t sure, but couldn’t break the new habit.

Now, he was showing up places trying to whisk her away and she couldn’t help but want to follow the lure.  

She smiled politely, folding her hands in her lap and scrunched her fingers at the yellow fabric wrapping her skin. A sundress for the day seemed ironic, when nothing about this felt bright. If anything, she was worried he had come to apologize for being so forward and put distance between the two of them. Her mind searched for the worst outcomes, trying to prepare herself for the upcoming shatter if it was around the corner.  

She stood up slowly, biting at the inside of her cheek nervously while flashing a fake smile to the cameras and reporters. “Excusez-moi! It seems I may have something to attend.”

Natalie descended the few stairs from the small stage, waving at the crowd with a smile and hoped they wouldn’t mind her departure. She couldn’t turn down Octavio though, the sight of him pulling her in. She wondered if this is how it felt for him with his stim; the want and need to be around him becoming more addicting and sending her on a rush whenever he was near her.  

Octavio waited as she walked towards the back of the room, taking her hand to guide her to a hiding spot and tugging her along out the door.  

She followed willingly, leaving the interview she didn’t want to be at behind and tucked up around the corner with him behind a large overflowing plant. Once they were out of sight from the majority of the crowd, he rubbed his hands together and looked at her with an unnecessary chuckle because of his nerves. He felt clammy now that he was looking right at her, trying to figure out where to start now that they were face to face. Was this the wrong place to tell her this or was he making an excuse for himself?

She pulled the sleeves of her cardigan to her palms, wrapping herself up and hiding the sundress she wore under the knitted pattern. She could tell that he seemed anxious about something, and when his constant state was jittering around without pause it was harder to tell the difference. Yet, something seemed off.

“Is everything okay?” she asked, concern in her voice though quiet. She had a lot of things she wanted to say last night but knew they weren’t going to be heard so she kept them to herself. She wanted to ask him how he felt towards her after the compliments from last night, though knew it would scare him off and were most likely nothing coming from him so intoxicated. “You were really drunk last night, then you were late this morning to your interview. I was worried about you…”

He laughed, rubbing at his temple slightly and tossed an arm up in a shrug at her though it felt impersonal. He didn’t know how to defend his actions, the sound of her concern making him regret his choices even more. He was so caught up on her words of worry towards him, it always coming with such integrity that he couldn’t help but believe she actually meant it. It made him letting her down in any way that much harder to swallow. “I’m decent enough. Don’t stress about me, Watts, just overdid it. How’d you know I was running late?”

“I saw Ajay this morning.” she shifted uncomfortably in her flats, looking at him with a pain her eyes that he worried was because of him and something he had forgotten.  

“Que? Did I do something?” he asked, trying to search the fuzzy memories of last night but failing to find anything reasonable. It didn’t help he had no recollection of the night besides fragments of moments that all added up to a messy timeline that made no sense to him, now he was starting to believe Natalie was the reason he felt weary towards everything.

He hated not knowing what was reality and what was his mind creating false narratives.  

“Do you not remember last night?”  

“Bits and pieces… care to fill me in?”  

She looked around the hall they stood in, watching a few groups of people walk back and forth. She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, looking to the ground away from him and slid her foot from side to side across the smooth marble surface trying to gather her words. “I did not see you for most of the night, let’s say that. You were with some other… people, some people I don’t know. This being said, I’m not sure who to guide you to. I can only fill you in on what I know and, again, it isn’t much. What can you recall from last night?”

He squinted his eyes, leaning against the wall with one foot up behind him. He couldn’t understand how he wasn’t with her most of the night when all he could remember was her, but distortion to the night was evident he may not know what actually happened. He just had to ask, though he worried that asking the wrong thing would make it harder to salvage.  “I remember you.”

“You remember me what?”

He hesitated to try to grasp at any little memory in his head, faltering as he spoke. “I remember visiting you.”

“You came to see me, yes. That is correct. After I left the party, you came to my suite and I saw you again. You said some things, you left. We barely spoke though aside from when I had first arrived.” she mumbled out the last few words, not wanting to relive the fan swooping in and tearing him away – and him willingly leaving her. She let him, too, which made it all the more worse. He had made amends while he was drunk but it still stung like a paper cut, minimal but existent. Now, she wasn’t even sure if he remembered what was permanently burned into her brain and it stung even worse. She wished she had his hazy film over her own memory, but she could remember him dancing against a petite blonde vividly and it filled her with such an uncomfortable ache to watch. It had sat with her all night, past him visiting her, into the morning, and now looking at him and picturing it again.  

She looked away from him again, not able to keep eye contact as she just saw his goggles staring back. It felt naked to her to be showing her emotions plain as day but he had a buffer between them. She didn’t want to seem exasperated with him, but she couldn’t continue this conversation if it kept going in the direction she thought it was headed. She was dreading him asking her to track down the fan, and wanted to escape that before it started. She wouldn’t be able to return to her interview if he asked her that, she knew it would be impossible to hide her sadness. This just couldn’t be something they spoke about right now, not if she didn’t know what was coming. “Is this dire or can it wait until after the interviews?”

“Oh, come on!” he proclaimed, stepping closer to her and lowering his voice from the passerby’s. He brushed his hand along her arm, trying to get her to look at him but it didn’t work. He didn’t know what to do but he could see her closing off from him and he hated it. He tried to play off the topic, trying to draw her back into talking to him. “You know you don’t care that I took you from that. You don’t really wanna go back, right?”

She pursed her lips, looking back down the hall from where they came for a minute to see if anyone would return for her. She finally looked back at him with an uncertain look, not able to decide what was best right now. She didn’t enjoy the interviews he was right, especially today when she couldn’t think straight and just wished the questions would stop but they wouldn’t. They kept asking her the same things and it was becoming draining to try to act like she cared at all.  

All she could think about was the fact she wished Octavio cared for her the same way as she did for him, but she also couldn’t fathom being able to trust the chance that one day he wouldn’t rip out of her life. He wasn’t one to provide stability, he never stayed in one place that long. So, why would he change for her? It would most likely send him leaving sooner if they tried to be together, if he even thought of her that way. At least, she worried for the absolute worse and the worst was him leaving her life.  

It wasn’t an easy choice for her to decide what to do right now, if anything she felt like running out the front doors and avoiding everything. She knew it was her job to sit through these events, though, and the interviews were a part of it. It was only the start of a very long three weeks and she didn’t think that starting to sway from being punctual now was a good idea, though tempting.  

A heavy sigh came from her lips and Octavio knew he lost her back to the interview. She frowned at him apologetically, taking a few steps away backwards from him before he was able to pull her in with a touch that would make her swoon. She had to think clearly right now and knew her weaknesses with him. “We could talk tonight if it’s that important. Swing by my suite before dinner?”

He nodded along, knowing he had no room to argue with her on the topic. He wasn’t going to push his luck when he didn’t even know what happened entirely last night and she seemed bent up about it. He would just have to go through the day with his worry and hope that seeing her came sooner than later.

“No problemo. I’ll be there.”

“You better.” she teased, a more playful smile briefly coming from her before it faded back to a weaker one. She couldn’t muster her normally peppy demeanor, her weariness tearing her down quickly.

She left the spot they found, hurrying back around the corner and into the room for her interview giving everyone an apology for the delay as she entered.

Octavio stood in the hall, trying to figure out what she could’ve meant by those words and knew it had to be the result of himself last night. Too many pieces were missing from the timeline and he was worried something would fall through the cracks and ruin his chances with Natalie. It was even harder to deal with the fact he knew he caused most of it by his overdrinking and poor choices, which he wouldn’t admit to anyone but himself.

He shuffled off to his own interview, feeling lowly about the entire conversation with Natalie. He had high hopes going in to it and he left it with a heaviness resting on his shoulders he wasn’t anticipating.

He put on a fake happy demeanor, slinking into the room that was already filled with people awaiting his arrival and took a seat on the stage. He readjusted his mask, zoning out slightly as the doors were pulled closed to lock him in this premade hell. He did his best to answer questions as best as he could as they fired them at him, but he didn’t have the same focus he normally did and a few people noticed. Typing on phones and whispers among the crowd. He was hopeful no fans would poke at him on his social, not wanting to deal with them calling him out for acting just slightly different than expected. He was already shoved into clothes he hated, even though he did tweak the dress code for his own comfort and style. He had to deal with the devastated feeling in him with no escape from it right now.

He let the time pass him by without paying close attention to much that was happening in the room, despite being the main focus of the crowd. His mind was on what to say to Natalie later. How to ask her out of the blue to give him a shot on the romantic venture seemed like a fever dream he just concocted. He had spent so long trying to avoid letting her know, trying to find the best possible moment to tell her and plan to win her over then and there. Telling her meant giving her the chance to say no and it was being subconsciously avoided by always finding an excuse to wait. Yet, he was sick and tired of waiting; it wasn’t in his blood to sit around and wait. If he we wanted something he took it, he conquered. In his head, it went like clockwork, but he knew it most likely couldn’t ever get anywhere substantial the way he had originally planned.

He was being too careful about it and lost his courage somewhere along the way, but he had somewhat found it after this morning when he woke to the lack of memory and the fear of losing her.  

He’d never been scared like that before, feeling helpless to something you can’t watch break. He needed to put himself back down firmly on the ground in order to shove himself off the metaphorical cliff that was telling Natalie how he felt about her. He felt ready enough to do that, ready enough to stop caring about his worries and just drive forward.  

After an hour of questions that felt like longer, he finally was released into the main lobby from his interview. He was given a break for a few hours until his next event, which would sadly be more questions that mimicked the first round but with new people who thought it was fresh news. This time was normally to be spent getting a snack or taking a break, the break in the day for them to use wisely. They didn’t get much time to themselves normally during the day.

The second he was freed from the interview he was looking around for Natalie, and wandered the main floor for his entire break trying to track her down. He popped a few stims to hurry his search, getting a few people to notice him walking around as he passed in a breeze and had to stop for some autographs.

He ran into a few fans, Ajay, and Fuse; but, to his dislike, no Natalie.

He knew he would see her later. It was guaranteed that he would, but he still wanted to see her again – now. The reason was only partially because she looked appealing in a sundress that wrapped her up in all the right places to expose her curves, peeking out from behind the cardigan when she walked. It was hard to avoid now that he was taking notice of her, things he never saw before were becoming apparent to him. He also couldn’t wait much longer because he was desperate to move things into something more and soon. He felt like he was losing his mind from all the waiting, a sickness inside of him that nestled in his heart and wouldn’t leave him alone. He kept it all to himself, bottled within him and made a long day longer.  

Ajay brought him up to speed on what had happened, including the conversation he’d forgotten in the bathroom with Loba and Anita. That wasn’t a pleasant conversation by any means hearing her tell the tale, which he was putting up there as one of the worst nights he’d had overdrinking. He didn’t like hearing any of it but had to sit through it, unable to control the outcome.

Now that he was caught up on the events of the night, he was desperate to see Natalie but incapable of tracking her down or having the time to talk.

He gave up his search for her during the off time as his break came to an end, going into his second interview for the day though he didn’t want too and just wishing it passed faster than the first. He reluctantly did as he was expected this time, though he wasn’t as engaged as people hoped today.

                                                       -     -

The screaming of fans as Natalie passed by them at the end of the day was enough to hurry her pace back to her suite. Though she loved them dearly for all they gave her she was wearing thin on the noise and commotion.  

All day she had been daydreaming of the camping trip, the clearing and the melodic chatter of birds – Octavio at her side as the two had floated around and played in the water together as the night passed them by. It was the saving grace during the interviews for her, thinking about that day and everything it was. Even if she was split with how she felt towards Octavio, it kept her sane through the day reminiscing. If she hadn’t of been daydreaming of it, she assumed she would’ve snapped and started crying five minutes through the second interview from mental exhaustion alone.  

She wanted to get out of the hotel and away from the ruckus of the high-scale event, but knew it wasn’t possible with curfew for the legends. It was becoming later in the night, the clock going to strike a new hour for dinner soon. To make matters worse, it seemed no matter where she turned she found a group of people awaiting someone eager to talk with. A majority of the legends, like herself, most often than not were too polite to turn away a fan. Most of them did care about the people who supported them in the arena, wanting to give that back during these kinds of events. It leading to constant streams of people wanting a minute of her time, which turned into an hour or three because she couldn’t say no.

It was nice until she remembered that she had meet and greets to attend to this week. So, most of these fans were just fate in passing her in the hall and she was offering more of her time than needed; but as always, did it kindly even when it drained her.

Right now, she didn’t have any spare seconds for anyone knowing that she had to meet Octavio soon. So, she did her best to avoid groups where possible.

She had the entire day to cope with the chances of him wanting her to help him track down the fan from last night, and was feeling lighter on that being what could come from him. She had gotten herself back into a better mindset revolving around their friendship, using her desire to be around him as an excuse to push past everything else. She was hopeful his company alone would be enough. Longing for a friend to be something more had become so painful, but unable to avoid. This was her only solution, one she kept having to shove back into her head as what she should be doing. She couldn’t lose him if they were friends, they couldn’t hurt one another in that way if they werejustfriends.

She was walking tiredly down the hallway of her floor, her arms wrapped around her cardigan that she took off on the walk upstairs. She would’ve taken the elevator but it was swarmed with people and the walk gave her a bit of peace.

She was running low on caring to be social with people and blamed the never-ending interviews she had to sit through today for causing it to be so. The only person she even wanted to see was Octavio, knowing that his presence always brought a sense of happiness or calmness to her.  

A familiar metal tapping from down the hall made her quicken her pace to her suite, finding Octavio already standing outside her door.

He was leaning against the wall, one hand shoved in a pocket of his shorts. He had apparently wasted no time changing out of his formal wear, and Natalie wasn’t surprised.

He had on his normal tanktop and short combo, but added a larger fit jacket that ran long on him over it all. He’d redone his hair, doubled up on his piercings, and found a few rings to wear in his bag he’d thought he lost. He had on his mask, but no goggles.  

She giggled faintly to herself, surprised to see him here so soon and already prepared to leave, and skipping to a stop in front of him.  

“Tavi! You’re here already!” she said, smiling softly at him with a tiny wave.  

He looked up from his phone once he heard her voice, shoving it into his jacket pocket. He took a large breath to prepare himself and let it go after a few seconds. “I talked to Ajay. She told me what happened.”

Natalie’s smile faded a bit, nodding at him as she walked past him to open her door, unlocking it. She wasn’t sure what that meant exactly, and it rocked her confidence knowing what she knew. “Oh. And?”

“I don’t even know who I was with all night, they weren’t important.” he expressed quickly, following behind her into the suite. He closed the door with his foot and lingered there trying to think of how to explain himself correctly and concisely.  

“Is that all?” she asked, not stopping to talk face to face. Instead, Natalie walked into her kitchen, placing her cardigan on the lounge as she passed it. She opened the cabinet to retrieve two glasses, putting them on the counter and grabbed a pitcher for some water. She opened the fridge to her side, grabbing an energy drink out of the door and cracking the can open to pour it over ice for him.  

He held back a smile as he watched her slide the glass towards him. She hadn’t even bothered to ask or wonder about the gesture. She just knew him in a way that he didn’t think other people cared too, she did things to be kind not for benefit. This wasn’t just shield cells in the arena, this was her taking the time to memorize him as a person even though he barricaded most of his past and personality from everyone. He never mentioned his favorite drink, but it sat in the door of her fridge clearly placed there for if he visited her suite. She chose to pay attention to him and learn things when he wouldn’t tell people them, and he couldn’t help but notice the small things adding up with the two of them. His heart swelled as he realized all of this at once and then he began to belittle himself for feeling so weak in the knees from a drink. He was off in his own world realizing how much she cared for him, and because of that trying to know what to say became much more difficult.  

“Gracias.” he took the glass in his hand, tugging his mask down momentarily to take a sip as he eyed her walking around the kitchen getting food together for Nikola.  

“Mira, I’ve been trying to figure out how to say this but I don’t think I’ll ever get the right words-” he trailed off, looking down into his glass and watching the ice move around. He tugged at the corner of his mask, trying to readjust it slightly even though it sat perfectly fine on his face.

Natalie turned her gaze to him as his voice got more serious, setting down the dish of food on the floor and walking over to him on the other side of the bar to give him her full attention.

“Did I do something?” she asked, a bit worried now that it seemed to be a long running topic coming to light with how he phrased it.

“No! No, nothing like that.” he reassured, having to backtrack to another phrase. He paused, taking off his mask and set it on the counter next to his drink. He exhaled a shaky breath, the feeling resembling adrenaline but more so labeled as fear as he tried to find a way to preface his questions. “Can I ask you something?”

She looked at him intently, trying to read his face for any sign of how he was feeling and nodded in reply. “Toujours, what is it?”

He reached his hand up, running his fingers through his hair and down to the back of his neck. He looked at Natalie who was leaning against the counter to look up at him with worry in her eyes and knew he wasn’t going about this in a very suave manner. He was embarrassed with himself that he was acting such a fool around her, unable to spit out flirtatious one-liners because his thoughts vanished the second he looked into her eyes. Would she turn him down? Was this a bad idea?

Was it too late to stop now?

He felt like backing down in that second, so naturally, it only made him jump head first instead. One step backward, five forward.

“If I asked you out to dinner, not like for just… fuck. This is so lame, isn’t it?” he laughed nervously, looking up towards the ceiling to find his bearings to speak. He was terrified now that she was standing right in front of him despite preparing himself for this question all day – really for weeks now he had been thinking about how to ask her this. He just didn’t know what she would say back, and it could be what he didn’t want to hear. He didn’t want her to say no.  “Natalie, I know we’ve been… you know I’ve considered you just an… my amiga… for a while now, yeah? If I asked you out sometime, would that be… okay with you?”

Natalie froze as he spoke to her, taking in each word as they came and tried to process each as quickly as possible while he looked to her for a reply. She had felt like this had been an emotional rollercoaster she was stuck on with him in the forefront, and it had just reached a new height she didn’t see coming where he apparently liked her too. She had her theories, but they were just theory not fact. It wasn’t at all what she anticipated him to say, if anything she was blindsided but slowly adding up past interactions in her head to find that maybe this wasn’t all that out of the blue; the problem might have just been her missing signs that stood so brightly in front of her it blocked out reality. All the comments she passed off as friendly, maybe weren’t only just.

She knew how she felt about him lately, knowing that the questions of whether he would be interested in her could be true were all she thought about; but the fact he was asking her out to dinner felt like a fantasy. She could’ve pinched herself, it felt so unreal considering not even twenty-four hours ago she was questioning whether he even noticed her existence that way and if she would ever get that option. She was spending the entire day trying to remind herself of the exact opposite of his proposal now. Even with the backlogged compliments she seemingly forgot about until now, she couldn’t believe he was standing in her suite asking her to go out on a date. Was that what was happening? Had she dreamt it up? She was quite tired from the day.  

Natalie crinkled her nose, taking a breath but no words came out. She wanted to blurt out yes, wanted to put caution to the wind and take the chance, but it was hard not to avoid the whole reason it worried her to begin with.

The idea of losing him still stayed even though he was asking her to give them a try, that she knew. Just because you want it doesn’t mean you can have it, and it surely never means you’ll be able to keep it forever. In her world, nothing lasted forever. Everything would always drift itself away from you somehow, unable for you to grasp it back into your life no matter how hard you tried. She feared the flow of life, though she tried to ignore it through science based fact. Change was not her strong suit.

She didn’t want Octavio to have the fate of leaving her life forever. She couldn’t bear the thought of losing him, even if it meant hurting herself in the process but she couldn’t hurt him either. It was a twisted mess that rattled both of them, and she stood silent far too long for Octavio to keep quiet any longer.

“I’m begging you to say something.” he said, his voice breaking as he shifted nervously where he stood. He was panicked that she was trying to find a way to turn him down politely, not sure if he was ready for the answer that he dreaded if it did come.

She pursed her lips together, smiling slightly at him though the worry was stricken through her. She tried to focus more on the positive aspect of all of this: the fact he may feel the same towards her.  It was a small part of the whole picture, but it fulfilled one part of her that wished for more. “Are you… asking me out on a date, Octavio? ”

“Do you want me to be?” he replied, quietly. He looked into her eyes, trying to find the answer to the question that was eating him from the inside out but could only see hesitation coming from her. He didn’t know why she was holding back, but only assumed it was because of his actions from last night.

“Are you sure this would be a good idea for the two of us?” she asked him instead of answering his question. She just couldn’t stop worrying about losing him and it crept in to warn her of the downfalls, one problem causes another. Her stress outweighed the drive to step forward into trying.

He sighed heavily, reaching in to take her hand into his.

She looked down as they intertwined their fingers together with a buzz of a feeling in her heart, him pulling her closer and resting their hands in-between the two of them.

“If we get to the end of press week and you don’t think it’s a good idea, we can just… pretend we never tried.” he offered, trying to give her some sort of reassurance that it would be okay for the two, no matter what, but her face read that it didn’t change her thoughts. She still seemed just as closed off as she did before. “Come on, pleasegive me a chance.”

“You know that’s not it.” she whined, refusing to look at anything but their hands. “What if you can’t look at me one day because of something that happens and we never speak again? I really do cherish you in my life and I don’t want to risk-”

“Youcherish me?” he teased, tilting her head up by her chin gently and grinning at her.  

“Oh, stop it. I mean that your friendship is important and risking that seems to be fruitless in nature.” Natalie blushed a deep red, shoving his hand away and looking down away from him. She tore away from the embrace, creating a few steps of space between them and looked out towards the balcony instead. “How will we know it’ll work out after press week? What if it fails down the line and we grow to resent one another? I’m not certain that one day something won’t just change with us. People grow, become new beings, want new things. That is a process of life, sadly, le changement est inévitable.”

“I don’t really know how people stay in long-term happy relationships, it’s not my forte to understand. I just know that I really like being with you and I think that can be enough to try.” he said, closing the space she created between them and placing his hand on her shoulder to turn her to face him.  

She turned on her heel, looking up at him. He seemed sincere and she didn’t normally see this sort of tone coming from him.  

“I don’t know…”

He brushed her hair behind her ear, swallowing his worry that she wouldn’t even give them a chance. He was putting his entire heart on the chopping block for her, giving her the ability to smash it into pieces. It was something he never entrusted anyone to hold, out of fear they would drop it.  

He never got attached to people he had dated before; they were always distractions in-between the mundane. He never gave them that part of himself, it stayed closed off. Natalie was so far on a different scale he never even went before. He never thought he would ever even allow someone this close to him to be able to even hurt him at all. He was actually asking for love for one of the first times in his life but his vulnerability was showing for the first time as well by doing so. He felt raw and he hated it, but also sent him on a spiral that made it impossible to think or breathe. How he could hate feeling so open but also want to split himself apart more because the rush of her knowing him was a drug within itself, he had no idea.  

He just couldn’t keep walking away from her, he didn’t care if the world moved around him even though he wanted time to stand still. He didn’t care if he had no idea what could happen. He didn’t care there was no certain chance things would be okay. He would do whatever he could control to keep her around, to make it work. He couldn’t get her out of his head, there was no other option.  

He couldn’t let her walk away before it started.

He paused to catch his breath, adrenaline racing as he sputtered out his statement. “I wanna try for you, which I’ve never been… willing to do for anyone before. I mean, fuck, I’ve been trying to find a way to ask you for- just, mira, I’ve been thinking about you a lot. I know I’ll never be able to dislike you, so can we start there? Just give me these three weeks to take you on a few dates. We can test out… us. I feel like you wanna do this too, stop me if I’m wrong and I’ll go. I just know you wanna say yes. Please say yes.”            

“Where would we go first?” she asked quietly after a beat. She knew nothing had changed in her worries, but she couldn’t say no when he was so adamant about it. His drive wore on him adorably to her and it wasn’t possible to turn it down. She had seen him determined with stunts plenty of times, the ambition the same as he would refuse to back down.  

She couldn’t argue with him when she hadn’t even given it a shot. Her fear rested in trying at all, but she wouldn’t be able to know if it would work if they didn’t give it a try. She was torn in between the two in her mind, moving forward with the outing anyway knowing she would at least be with him was the more appealing option. That was all she ever wanted if she was truly honest with herself – to just be around him.  

He grinned at her widely, not wasting any time now that it was becoming a reality in front of his eyes. “Care to have our first date be right now?”

She shook her head at him with a smile, looking down and with a blushed face. She shouldn’t have been so surprised he was so quick to suggest it to be so soon. “Now?”

He squeezed her hands tenderly, separating from where they stood together to get his glass of the counter. He took a few gulps of his drink which was now watered down and gaining condensation from sitting untouched, but pushed passed the lack of flavor to down the rest.

He grabbed his mask from the table, pulling them on to go back out into public. He turned to her once it was on, jittering from foot to foot. “Everyone is going to be at dinner, it’s the best time to sneak out. No one will notice us if we slip out the back and we’ll be back before morning. I’ll tell Ajay to come check on Nikola. Let me take you somewhere besides this boring stuffy place.”

“We’re leaving the hotel? Is that allowed? I am quite positive we have a curfew.” she cautioned him.

“Bummer, you really think I’d bother to ask for permission? Nothing about this idea screams legal or allowed.” he chuckled, pulling the hood to his jacket up over his head and revealed a graffiti version of his name on the back. He gave her a playful look but offered his hand to take, changing his tone to be a bit more serious. “Is that cool?”

She laughed quietly, stifling it under a breath. She truly had no clue what he would have planned for them considering she just agreed, but she felt confident enough in him to know it would be worth it despite the downsides of her fears. Though she could only hear Ajay and Renee in her head telling her that Octavio wasn’t one to put all of your cards down for, seemingly unreliable at times, but she was willing to be the one person to doubt that.  

In her opinion, he had proven himself to be reliable and honest. Even if he did fumble at times trying to do what he wanted with resistance from others. He was still kind to her. He was always kind to her. It showed in him asking her permission for something he would have ran into full speed otherwise.

“I trust you.” she said, a soft smile on her face as she tried to relax more into the idea of the two of them. She so badly wanted to sink into the idea of them without a care in the world, but it wasn’t possible. She had worries lingering like dark shadows but was trying to put those aside for the sake of desire. She did want him, she wanted it to work but the opportunity for failure refused to let her stay optimistic long. “Just give me a second.”

She quickly switched her flats to her sneakers before they left. She didn’t have enough time to change out of her dress from the day, but it wasn’t uncomfortable by any means. So, she chose to just change the shoes, since it was the only part of the outfit that bothered her.  

He was glad for his mask to hide the smile on his face, the joy overflowing him once he realized she was authentic in her trust. Not many people told him that an also meant it earnestly, and he was planning on keeping that trust with her. This new found bond being more fulfilling than he’d thought it’d be. He didn’t know how, but he assumed that being open with her was a decent start. He moved towards the door, lingering a few paces from it as she changed shoes.

Natalie skipped a few steps to meet up with him at the door, grasping the door knob and pulling it open for the two to leave the suite together then closed it.

The halls weren’t that busy anymore as dinner service had begun for the hotel, and the main lobby would be the most crowded despite the day dwindling to an end.

“Where are we going?” she asked, still following despite being unaware of the destination.  

“You know, hermosa, I grew up here. I thought I could show somewhere I used to go, take a trip there and revisit an old past time of mine.”

Her eyes widened slightly as the knowledge came crashing back to her, tapping her hand to her head from her forgetfulness. “Bien sûr! I cannot believe I almost forgot you’re from here originally. You’re really showing me all of your hiding spots, aren’t you?”

He laughed nervously and nodded along, feeling caught in the romantic gestures he didn’t realize he kept doing. First the camping trip, and now he was planning on taking her to another reminiscent location. Was he overdoing it? He wasn’t sure, he didn’t normally get this close to people on a personal level.  “A few of them, maybe.”

“I’m quite honored. I know how secretive you can be.”

Octavio tried to ignore her statement of his secrecy but it stuck to the back of his mind, slipping away for him to fester on it. He knew it was something he needed to work on if he wanted her to trust him, he was already worried about it. Now, she was reiterating that he was what he already feared; that maybe he wasn’t capable of being completely sincere when it came down to it.  

He guided the two of them down the elevator and through the main lobby towards the front desks. He turned to her, placing a hand on her shoulder and stopped her near the fountain in the center of the room. She gave him a confused look but he immediately tried to reassure her, giving her a gentle squeeze on the shoulder.  

“Just stay here for a second.” he said, already gone before she had time to protest. She sighed, crossing an arm over her side and dipping a finger into the fountain while she waited. An odd start to the night but she was patient in whatever he was planning.

He snuck along slowly, crouched down slightly as he went into the front desk room. He began scanning the wall for the keys to the cars he knew they kept here for dropship pickup. There were about ten cars, and each were custom to make for a comfortable ride to and from the hotel. He had been in them more than a few times as a kid when his father didn’t show up to get him and instead a driver did, or a maid, or a worker – anyone but his father.

As a teen he was no stranger to snagging one of them for a joy ride if he got stuck here some nights, eventually falling into the racing scene in Psamathe because of the amusement and rush he got from a speeding car. While he wasn’t about to bring Natalie to a race, he did know the best roads to push the cars to its limits and wanted to show her a piece of him no one knew about.

He plucked a set of keys off the wall, retreating back and out of the main office without being seen. He’d bring them back later when he was finished using them, besides, he knew no one would be staying here due to the event.  

No one would notice a missing car if it wasn’t needed to be used.    

He rushed back to the center of the room, tapping her on the arm as he passed and gestured for her to follow him. “Come on.”

“Did you just steal-”

“Ah, no.” he stopped her sentence, shaking his head as she caught up to his pace. “Borrow.”

She rolled her eyes, giggling playfully and following behind him down the hallway towards a back exit.  

They were lucky to get by without being caught by anyone, especially any of the photographers. Natalie wasn’t sure if she wanted the world to know anything about them just yet, the fragility of something new that was already on unsteady ground she assumed it would need to be cradled from a harsher lens. That harsher lens was everywhere at this event and in his life with a heapful of a following in his fans, so she hopped they could manage everything without stumbling into problems.

Octavio propped open the door, waiting for her as they stepped outside into the night air.  

She was instantly relieved, the quiet surroundings being a contrast from the loud crowds she was within all day long. She no longer was worried about being caught leaving the hotel this late, not when it was this peaceful outside the walls. She half walked and half skipped through the parking lot alongside him, taking in a deep breath of the air and letting out a happy sigh.  

He clicked the key, unlocking the car and making the lights flash on. He grinned at her, dramatically showcasing the car for her to step up to and opened the door to the passenger seat.

Natalie hesitated, looking around the parking lot once over for any people before submitting to his suggestion. It was only borrowing, after all. It was only partially nerve wracking, her heart racing as she stepped forward to slid into the car. Octavio’s hand guiding her lower back momentarily as she sat. He closed the door on her side, sliding over the hood of the car and hopped into the driver side in a fluid motion.

The interior of the car was sleek and clean, a black matte finish over the entire thing. Natalie had her hands balled up in the center of her lap, looking at him as he turned the car on and pulled out of the spot casually. She relaxed into the seat, rolling her window down to let fresh air through the car and to be able to look up at the sky above.  

He drove slowly out of the parking lot, taking a turn and driving further away from the hotel and gaining speed as the space grew from being noticed leaving.  

He tossed his hoodie back from his head and took his mask off to shove in his pocket, glancing over at her out of the corner of his eye. He caught glimpses of her in the dim lights passing by the top of the car. He briefly smiled when he noticed her leaning back in the seat. His fingers tapped on the steering wheel, clearing his throat.  

“You really think I’m secretive?” he asked, breaking the silence between the two as they drove to bring up the topic from earlier. It had been stuck in his head since she mentioned it, and found it to be a decent start to show her he wanted to get closer to her. If he opened up in ways that he couldn’t with anyone else maybe she would trust him enough to keep seeing him. It was a shot in the dark but it was worth it. He was sure this was a good idea to prove himself to her, even though it was a task he gave to himself. He wish he knew more about what he was doing, there had to be a handbook or something… right?

It was almost aggravating how he was willing to do anything to keep her around, but at the same time he was desperate for her company these days – she was addicting. The push and pull of his feelings, though dreadful, were a high he never felt before her. A new kind of rush, all the same adrenaline he craved. He’d give whatever he needed to keep feeling it. He wanted more. More of her and more of how this felt.                      

She stopped looking out the window, leaning on the middle armrest instead and shrugged slightly at the question. She was certain of his secretive nature; always having questions for him that he merely gave her jokes to cover the lack of an actual answer. She could be honest, straightforward, just tell him how there had been multiple times where he detoured a conversation when it got too personal. She learned to avoid certain topics, knowing they’d be avoided the second you even tried to ask. He was a master at the game of chess he made his private life. You’d never be able to breach the walls he hid some of his memories behind, and Natalie didn’t want to try in fear of causing him harm. She had no idea why he was so closed off and trying to break into someone’s past without thinking of the repercussions is selfish.  

She knew sometimes it’s harder to talk about things that break you up on the inside, letting them out can only make it worse in some cases. It was best not to delve too far into topics he didn’t want to speak about, so she left them alone though curious. She was hopeful he would speak to her about those things if he ever became ready. Til then, she took the small bits of details she could overhear.

“I don’t know many details about you besides what I know from the games, or vague things in passing. Like your bunny, Navi, whom you’ve mentioned, for instance.”

“You paid attention to that crap?”

“Of course, I did.” she replied, almost shocked he was surprised she remembered. “It’s about you, why wouldn’t I listen?”

He held back a smile, gripping the wheel tightly to lessen his nerves. He had become so attached to the rush of his stim, using it in and out of the games for fun and the sensation but he never thought when he first met her that he would feel that same rush just from being around one another. Just talking to her and realizing she wasn’t what he thought made him re-look at the whole relationship they had prior.  

She had more to her than what was on the surface and he couldn’t help but admire the fact she cared enough to get to know him, even when he was doing his best to put up a façade to keep others out. She had found a way to get to know him over the last few years as friends, somehow getting him to open up little by little until he realized what had even happened. It was one of the reasons he was so adamant now about wanting to try with her. She had been the only person able to crack his exterior that no one even thought existed. Everyone but her thought his spontaneous ‘junkie’ nature was the whole of him, or at least it was the only portion of him they acknowledged in the light of day.

She looked back at the labels and the stereotypes people had given him throughout the years, and after he entered the games, and chose to make her own decision. All the while he chose to harbor as much personal information from her as possible while she did so. Now, he regretted being so closed off to her and wondered where they would be now if he realized the comfort they had within each other at the time. How much of her life would he know by now if that was the case? If he had stayed behind just one time, during one match or one afternoon training, to be alone with her instead of taking off to do who knows what… would he had noticed her sooner? Or was it inevitable that he had to be stopped for the first time to even notice a thing? 

Either way, he felt at fault for not having even attempted to become closer with her sooner. She saw through him almost instantly, always being the one to double check and ask if he was okay or needed to talk about something when he was hiding his bad mood. Always opening her door to him whether he deserved it when he needed help, and he never took the offer to come to her. Maybe it was why he kept a partial distance from growing closer to her at first. He wasn’t used to someone caring about him, and he chose to ignore it was even happening.

Why he never thought she cared before, he didn’t know – maybe he couldn’t believe it when they first met and she was bringing him baked goods and birthday cards without a reminder, maybe he still couldn’t.  

He was asking her for a shot but he had to open up to her too, or else he would reap what he sowed and the entire hypothetical of them being together would combust at the seams. He knew this despite the fear that settled in thinking about being vulnerable with someone. He’d opened up to D.O.C plenty of times, but it was not even remotely the same being another person.  

He shook off his thoughts, looking over at her beside him briefly with a new cheeky smile. He didn’t want to ruin his first night out with her with him locked up wishing he’d done something sooner.

She was here now.  

She was leaning on the window of the car, having rolled the glass all the way down now and letting the wind hit herself in the face, sending her hair flying. Always staring up at the stars he considered to be just dust, proving that beauty in life was perspective and opening his eyes to a new way of thinking by doing so. He couldn’t dwell long there, but she got him to notice it to be what it could be besides only wasting away. It was like her electric pulse, glistening back down at him and reminding him to stop time an again to notice how brightly they could shine.  

He tapped his fingers rhythmically on the wheel

Riddle Me This | oneshot

SUMMARY:Wattson finally finds out what Octane looks like underneath his mask.
RATING:M
SHIPS:Wattson and Octane
TAGS:alcohol, smoking, mature themes
around 15k

Metal creaked below Natalie’s feet as she entered the dropship, steadily walking up the ramp and into the ship cabin to take a seat for the ride back into town. Behind her and trudging off of World’s Edge with satisfaction in the air alongside them was Ramya and Octavio, both trailing one after the other onto the ship with a leisure stride as the cameras watched them go.

Ramya dropped to the seat beside Natalie with a thud, her feet stretching out in front of her as she leaned forward on the bench. A happy sigh came from the mechanic as she swung her wrench between her legs with one hand to settle on the floor, popping a bubble with her gum and smacking it in-between her teeth with a chomp.

The sound echoed in the quiet, smaller ship, to transport them around– the ride back was always so peaceful compared to first arrival; well, depending on who the winning squad was.

The last to board was Octavio, who was bouncing around with excitement for the win and getting distracted because of it. He was enthralled with himself and with his team for standing alongside him at the end of the match.

He never normally stayed to bask in the feeling of the win, the high of it all was enough as it happened, but today the cameras were glued to him and he felt unstoppable after the rush that was the last seven or so minutes. The cameras soaked up every second of his giddy nature as he walked, following every step as he looked around for his team to celebrate with them. After a quick scan, he found them already seated and awaiting him on the ship to leave already. He must’ve missed them headed there. His attention was oblivious to the cameras as he made his way to the ship – only now starting to come down from the adrenaline that had rushed through him.

Natalie was thrilled to walk away with another win; alongside her friends as well was just the cherry on top of the sweetest day. She had brought Octavio back to his feet multiple times in the match today and felt like her assistive nature is one of the only reasons he was able to showcase his abilities at all. It was the only reason they were still a squad to be reckoned with. It was the only reason he was on his feet to land the finishing shot, having revived him moments prior to keep him in the fight instead of pushing to be flashy herself alone.

The ship’s door glowed red from the light above it in a pulse, the door rising and closing with a clasp behind Octavio as he sauntered into the ship at the last second before take-off. He grabbed onto a pipe above his head for support, resting his foot on the bench and looking around the cabin as he bounced on his heel. He looked towards the two with a grin underneath his mask that wouldn’t break. “That was amazing, amigas. Rampart! When you brought out Sheila and started shoving them back into the ring, I almost got caught in the crossfire! It was wild! Watts, you saved my ass from literally everything. You revived me and then immediately downed someone after. You’ll have to show me how you did that! I wish we could do that again! Is anybody else still racing inside? Just me? Probably just me?”

Natalie giggled faintly at his excitement, unable to hold back her amusement as she pulled her hood from her head and stretched the fabric away from her scalp. She shook her fingers through her hair, freeing the matted down appearance her suit caused to her blonde locks but it didn’t do much to help. She soothed her laughter into a muffled giggle and formed a faint smile at him, curiosity piquing her. “Do you want to have the same fight again or are you just wishing there was another match today?”

“Si! All of it!” he chimed out, steadying himself as the ship moved through the sky. He wiped at his forehead with his bicep, raising his arm to his head and huffed once at the warmth he gathered through the match; and now in the stuffy cabin of the ship he was only growing warmer.

Octavio nodded with a laugh, moving his hand to the side of his face and freed himself from his goggles and mask. He exhaled in comfort as he felt the air hit his skin that was once hidden, the stinging around his eyes from the goggle’s rims settling against him for hours and leaving imprints behind finally free to breathe. He had the mask balled up in his hand with the strap to his goggles looped to his finger, swinging it around.

He didn’t think anything of it – he always took his mask off to let his face breathe from time to time, and a particularly warm day in the dropship was one of those opportunities. It wasn’t that he was hiding what he looked like underneath his gear, because he wasn’t secretive about it at all, he just chose to wear those things so constantly that it was uncommon to see him without it or know anything but.

Natalie, however, was frozen on the bench across from where he stood unable to process the sight she was given without warning. She didn’t think she could speak if she tried right now, her eyes working overtime to take in everything she had ever wondered about in seconds.

She had known Octavio for over six months now, and the fact she never thought to ask to see his face was one thing – but seeing it for the first time was another.  

She had built up an idea in her head of what she thought was underneath everything he wore but the imagination always gets something wrong. It was a mystery she thought of relentlessly that had been solved with a single glance and it shouldn’t have felt as monumental as it was acting up to be… but it was just that.

She knew Ramya was speaking beside her, the rumbles of sound circling her, but she didn’t hear a single thing as she stared at Octavio’s face and took in his features.  

His hair was in a messy disarray from the fight, having ripped most of his headgear off for the ship ride back. Strands of green hair poked around and sent her looking in all directions, but within an instant her gaze snapped to his eyes that glimmered back at her with a hazel-colored enthusiasm and confusion.

He had a cracked tooth, scars aplenty on his face, and stubble under his bottom lip and on his chin. The suggestion of a mustache forming but it clearly was shaven off that morning and the five o’clock shadow had set in once again. 

She bit the inside of her cheek as she tried to scan his face as fast as possible but knew she was lingering too long. It would be a lie to deny how attractive he was but she wasn’t about to voice that out loud. She couldn’t stop thinking about how this had been hidden underneath the mask the whole time. She just never knew such a ruggedly handsome man resided there, and now there was no going back to not knowing such information.

She wasn’t expecting any of this but, somehow, she was immediately taken aback by him and loved feeling this thrown for once. She already knew who he was; the humor and the fun, the spontaneity in life and the whimsical care. Among anything, he was her friend an she appreciated him as that and for all of the traits she had come to love of his. If anything, she did like him already a little bit. Maybe… but they were friends and good ones at that.

It was just now she was also having a problem moving past her new found crush on his features. Layering with the history between the two already, there was a heavy box of feelings on her back to keep her swirling. It was a lot of thoughts to have while silently staring at a person – and she had no idea what to say now that the only thought in her head was how hothe was. It felt shallow and wrong to suddenly form these feelings once she saw his appearance, but then again, she had always felt a bit drawn towards him in her heart when he was around. She had chalked it out to friendship and that he was just different.

Maybe this was the tipping point that broke her out of the lie she had trapped herself in with Octavio, and maybe she did feel something for him more than friendship but worried for the consequences of her own design to do anything about it. Either way, she was frozen in her seat with her eyes locked to his.

His eyebrows cocked up on one side, a bigger smile overtaking his lips as he looked back at her in confusion. Had he lost a tooth in the match? Did he have a new bruise on his face? He was a tad lost to what the answer to her staring directly at his face could be, bringing a hand to his cheek momentarily.

“Watts?” he asked, his voice softer and confused.

Natalie cleared her throat, finally breaking her stare and looking away in embarrassment as a flush came to her cheeks. She couldn’t look at the ground for too long or risk seeming even stranger, but she couldn’t erase the reaction on her face no matter how badly she wanted to pretend it wasn’t there.  

It was only Octavio.

So,whydid she feel so taken aback by all of this? She was whirl winded by her newly formed attraction towards him and was desperately trying to solve something that had no solution. Instead, she chose to fight it and refuse to admit what was right in front of her.

Surely, this was just chemical and it would pass in time. Surely, she was mistaken and they were just friends. They could return to the friends they were in her head prior to this revelation and she wouldn’t feel her breath hitch in her throat whenever he smiled in her direction – flashing that cheeky grin of his that enticed her to stick around time and time again. She knew deep down there was no going back, but she hoped nonetheless for the saving of a friendship.

The more she tried to rid of these feelings the more she realized how much there was to all of this than just appearance like she first assumed.

She thought of all of the moments she enjoyed his company more than any others, the endless joy she felt when he was on her squad for matches, how she felt in the clouds when he spent time with her at all and he tended to whisk away her concerns with waves of energetic opportunity.  

She had been lost in thought for what seemed like ages to herself, but in reality, it was only a few passing moments.

She looked up at him after she gained some of her composure. She tucked her hair behind her ear, trying to act as nonchalantly as possible but her heart was racing more now speaking to him than it was at the end of the match today.  

“Hmm?” she said, her voice cracking gently as she tried to speak.  

“Everything all good?” he asked her, eyeing the soft shade of pink overtaking her cheeks more as he spoke to her.  

She pursed her lips together with a few quick nods, finding herself staring again as she tried to find a way to answer him and detour from the conversation at hand. “Just… tired.”

He tilted his head to the side in confusion, not willingly wanting to take her answer as the truth but nodded along anyway. Something about all of this felt out of the ordinary for the two of them. Normally, Natalie wasn’t one to stare, let alone at him, so he was finding it difficult to understand what had changed so suddenly. Nothing had changed for him, had it?

It took a pause of thought until the realization came barreling at him full force.

He hadn’t ever taken his mask off around her before and this was her initial reaction to seeing him without it – and the fact that it had produced such a stunned quiet reaction was a definitive ego boost.

He was glad to know she might find him attractive, considering he had found her to be the very first moment he saw her. It was reassuring it might be reciprocated. Even more than that, it provided a small opportunity to pull a rise out of her that he now knew he could cause – and he would be lying if he said he didn’t enjoy watching her get flustered at his expense.  

In all actuality, this seemed like it could be more adrenaline pumping than any match he had endured lately.

Outrunning death in the arena was the same old game he won at time and time again and he was tiring of the amusement he got from it. He tried his best to soak up as much of it as possible but it was never enough lately to keep his spirits up once the excitement was gone away.

This, however, seemed fresh and impossible. It was Natalie and she wasn’t one to fall for his antics but always the one to laugh along with his jokes. If anyone would turn down an offer to go home with him, it would be her and he knew that. She had too much respect for herself to be something of unimportance. He had wondered for quite some time how they would be together and chose to ignore his growing admiration more and more. So, it seemed like a hefty thing to accomplish to even manage winning her over.

In the back of his mind, he could hear the voice of Ajay the first day he ever met Natalie. A stark reminder for why he shouldn’t be making these decisions. Ajay was berating him for even thinking it would be okay to date another legend when he brought up the idea; let alone that legend being Natalie, who was joining the games along-side him. She was just on the cusp of a tragic loss, but he couldn’t help his immediate attraction to her at the time.

He had wanted to try to ask her out on a date but even he knew it wasn’t okay to make advances on her when they first met; even before Ajay yelling his head in. He never forgot that argument the two had. It escalated from asking out the pretty blonde girl into Ajay ripping into him about using people for his own amusement and prosperity, to which he asked if this was about him or the operation for his legs. They didn’t speak about it again, but she never did answer that question.

So, he sat on his surface value feelings and became friends with Natalie instead. After that, he wasn’t sure if he really wanted to attempt the two together anyway or if he just thought it was a new conquest to try and it was hollow of care. His flirtatious nature towards her bled through the friendship slightly, but he did his best to keep his attraction to himself while he admired her personality more and more.  

The more he got to know her, the more he began to see them as opposite sides of the same coin. They had some similarities; but to him she was patience while he was eagerness and he hardly saw it meshing into anything more than a friendship nowadays anyway.

After a while he had found a way to ignore how he felt towards her almost completely and pretend it didn’t exist, though it still sat festering in his heart and mind from being left alone to wonder at all about what could have become of them. What could have become if he had added her name to the list of one-night stands that first night he met her, if he had tried to flirt with her that first week, if he had told her the truth that when she saved his life in the tower crash that he wanted to be with her then and there, if he had let himself want her without pause… well, where would they be? Where would they be if he hadn’t hidden every last piece of his romantic admiration towards her?

He had forgotten those questions to the back of his mind over the months he stayed away from asking them.  

Yet, that didn’t change the way she was staring at him right now. Nor did it change how often he thought about her at the peak of his quietest night. He felt like everything with them could end in burning flames that would ruin the two completely or by the twist of fate he could walk away tonight finally knowing what the taste of her lips was like.

This time he didn’t feel like pretending his feelings didn’t exist.

He wasn’t quite positive why he was so determined to do this, though the memory of the long nights he spent watching her in recaps of matches only reminded him slightly of his theories. He was becoming more impatient to give himself this challenge to win her over, and he was never the kind to back down from something – even if it was self-inflicted.  

All he knew for sure was that he couldn’t walk away from the opportunity that he had let out of his grasp once before. Nothing ventured meant there was nothing gained and he knew the better option was to always try.

Octavio balanced precariously between confident and nervous. While filled with the adrenaline laced courage, he felt as if the best things could come from the least likely places, hurtling himself towards the idea headfirst.

With nothing to hold him back any longer he had no desire to wait another second. Even if he had decided they would be best as friends, it couldn’t hurt to give it a chance… right? Better to try and know how it would end than live with regret. With her seeming to be in a healthier place since the loss of her father, it seemed like a better time than any to finally answer the question that lingered in his mind.

He needed that answer to what she thought of him so he could finally stop thinking about her and endlessly questioning the possibilities of what could have happened all those months back. He wasn’t one to wonder – he just did things.

He relentlessly went over ideas for stunts, sure, that he was very familiar with. He just never waited too long to try out his ideas, though. Not going after Natalie that first day was the first time he resisted his own temptation and it remains the longest and only time he ever held out attempting something he thought about consistently.

So many theories he had conjured up as to how it could all end between them but he just wanted to stop wondering about hypothetical for once with her. This was his chance. Now that the divider keeping him from trying his luck with her had been moved, he refused to stand in his own way any longer. He just wanted to find out if he could even win over the smartest person he knew.

“Oh! Don’t say that, chica. Does that mean you aren’t coming to Elliott’s?” he puffed his lip out in a pout, rolling his eyes slightly. “We’re the winningsquad! You gotta come for a sec’. We can get you something with a kick of caffeine.”

“I was not planning on coming tonight, but I suppose I can manage an hour or so.” she replied, unable to turn him down as his face lit up with enthusiasm and annoyance at the same time. She only found it endearing of him to be asking her this way.  

“Ramya,” he began, looking over at her with a greedy grin on his lips. “You buying first round?”

“Only if Nat does a shot with us.” she smirked, peering over at the blonde beside her and nudging her in the side playfully with her elbow.

“Oh, uhm, I don’t know if that is a very-” Natalie replied with hesitation in her voice, crossing her arms over her lap and looking over to Octavio to see his expression towards the request but didn’t find an escape there to use. “I just don’t drink often or at all.”

“We’ll do something lighter for ya’.” Ramya suggested, shrugging. “And if in the moment you really don’t want to drink it… well, then two shots for me.”

The settling of the ship on the ground broke the conversation apart. The door to the ship unclasping and dropping down to the floor with a whooshing bang, creating a ramp to the ground below and letting the air sweep into the ship to shove a breeze at the legends.

“I’m headed to the bar. See you both there?” Ramya asked, popping another bubble with her gum as she meandered her way off of the ship and onto the loading dock. She turned on her heel, pointing her fingertips at both of them. “Yeah?”

“Si! Just got to swing up to my suite realfast. I’m feeling like changing out of my gear for the night for once.” he grinned, looking over to Natalie with a wink as he offered her his hand to help her stand. “I’ll be quick, don’t worry. Am I gonna see you there or are you planning on ditching me?”

Natalie slid her hand into his, his calloused hands clasping onto hers tenderly, him pulling her upwards and helping her to her feet with ease. She blushed faintly again, mentally cursing herself for not being able to hide any of her butterflies underneath the surface.

She felt like an open book right now and worried he would think less of her for something so mundane as a crush – she didn’t think he cared about love like that. There was no reason to daydream about something that couldn’t ever become more, but she still did think of him and wondered what he was thinking now as he looked back into her eyes silently.

She nodded at him, a smile forming on her lips as she sighed out the only words she could manage. “Yes. I’ll be there.”

The grasp between them fell as he parted away from her, bounding down the ramp of the ship and each step moving him further away from her. She wanted to stop him and say something – though she hadn’t a clue of what she would even say to him at all if she had.

When Octavio finally vanished around the corner from her view, a breath finally left her body in an oversized exhale of nerves. She tried her best to shake off the feeling as best she could for now, but it was almost impossible not to think about everything on a record loop. Gathering her things to leave for the bar while lost in thought, she hurried off of the ship indecisively towards the front lobby.

Octavio hadn’t enough time to pause on any uncertainty he may have if he wanted to pull off impressing her tonight. He could bat his chances in his gear from today, but the scorching heat from earlier made that seem even unappealing to him when he caught sight of himself in window reflection. Alongside the challenge he set up for himself with Natalie, he did, after all, want to make it to the bar on time to spend the night celebrating his win with the rest of the legends – but the change of clothes seemed necessary, though annoyingly out of the way.

His pace quickened to a sprint as he took off across the courtyard towards his suite, which was nestled away a few floors up within the apex building next door to the loading dock. Past the fountains outside, through the lobby, slip by unnoticed past fans because he didn’t have the time, up the stairs, go one flight too high and have to run back down. Still, It didn’t take him too long to arrive at his destination. He shook the doorknob as he unlocked it, shoving open the door and stumbled into his suite from putting too much weight behind the motion.

He tugged off his clothes over his head, pulling off his gear and it landing on the floor around him. He kicked the clothing pile he made out of his pathway to walk as he made his way over to the dresser and suitcase to dig around for something else to wear. Most of the items gathered in a new pile beside him as he discarded what wasn’t good enough for tonight. His thought process was simple: to show her who he was without the mask. It just seemed he was overthinking it now that he was staring down his wardrobe. Everything was of his own choosing but he wasn’t sure what would be a flashy show or what was authentic. A groan left him as he looked around at the pile of clothes that he had deemed incorrect for the night and tried to solve his self-made problem as he looked around.  

He peered down at his nails, the chipped blue paint hidden away underneath dirt and blood from the match that caused him to roll his eyes in annoyance.

He would just grab whatever seemed comfortable and go from there – he never cared much about matching anyway, only cared if he could sprint in it.

Hopping to his feet, he swiftly moved to the sink in the bathroom to scrub himself down and freshen up a bit. He left behind the few remaining pieces of clothes he had picked out to wear, scattered on top of the dresser away from the pile he made on the floor.

The water continued to rush over his hands after he finished cleaning up, his gaze looking up to meet his own in the mirror. He brought his fingertips up to his cheek, brushing along the scars and imperfections softly. It left behind trails of water on his face, causing him to lean down and splash his entire face instead. He tossed his wet hands through his hair, matting down the top. It was cold, shocking his system and he cleared his throat while shaking his head to rid of some of the water. His elbows leaned on the counter of the bathroom sink, staring at the drain as the nerves settled into his bones over the idea of finally trying to win over Natalie. He didn’t mind feeling this way, not at all, but for the first time he wondered what was a good idea — and he hated that.

What started as a playful game to him was turning more serious the longer he was alone with his thoughts, but it couldn’t deter him from trying no matter what his brain mocked up as negative. He thrived on this kind of pressure and he was hoping it would be enough to pull him through to finish what he had started.  

Octavio dried himself off with a hand towel and reapplied the coat of dark eyeliner to his bottom lid that had smudged away from the game today and the water he splashed to his face. The pencil rolled away as he let it fall onto the counter, picking up an opaque slender bottle and spinning it in his hand until he found the nozzle.

He sprayed his bare skin once with his spiced flower-scented cologne, setting it back onto the counter besides the rest of his things and hurried back into the bedroom to grab his clothes.  

He changed quickly, pulling on the self-made sleeveless cropped shirt and flattened it on his chest. He yanked on a pair of loose fitted jeans over his metal legs, buttoning them with his one hand. The knees were exposed by large gashes cut into the jeans, the knee exposed to the shin and the frayed material outlining the hole. He picked up a random long-sleeve flannel off the floor to brace himself from the colder wind tonight, shaking it out once before slipping it on.

The last thing he grabbed was a leather belt off the floor, unraveling it from itself as he walked around.

His pace stalled at the dresser again, adjusting his belt around his waist as he looked around for his jewelry.

He never wore any of it in the games, at least not nearly anything. It was too much of a hassle to replace the things he lost in the arena and he knew from firsthand experience getting a nose ring ripped out hurts, well, a lot.

He scooped up a few rings for his hand, four stud earrings, his mask, along with his phone and wallet and took off out the door. He started pushing earrings in and sliding on rings as he walked to the stairwell door.

Octavio patted at his pockets, fishing his phone out but as he was typing in the number to call for a car, he changed his mind.

A scrunched-up expression met his face as he put his phone into his pocket, bounding the stairs and hopping over the railings on the way down to reach the main floor quicker.

It wasn’t too far to the Paradise Lounge from here and with stim at the ready he was certain he could get there just as quickly as a car would be able to. Besides, he could go for the kick of stim right now to keep him going on the rush from the match and get him there even faster. This gave him an excuse to use his stim in a way that he deemed to be anything but recreational.  

As he exited the building, he took the back route through the alley instead. He brought his mask up to his face, slipping it on and stretching out his limbs in the process. A faint humming caught his attention, looking up at the street lamp above his head momentarily as it flickered.

His phone buzzed, bringing his attention back to reality and he pulled it out to quickly check the notification. A smile popped onto his face at the message – it coming from Natalie. The message was a long blurb of her wondering if he was coming or not because Ramya bought the first round already and she wouldn’t be drinking anything if he wasn’t there.

A chuckle left him as he swiped his phone open, quickly typing in reply to her that he was on his way. The message swished off and he put his phone away again, looking up at the night sky as the clouds moved overhead in silence and started off on his trek to the bar on foot as he was pulling a stim out of his flannel shirt pocket.

                                       —     —    —

The sound of the door rattling open caught Natalie’s attention every single time it happened. She had been checking her phone every so often too, a bit on edge about him coming and questioning her presence here tonight the longer it took for him to arrive. She felt silly thinking he would even consider her a romantic interest, per say– she couldn’t see him viewing her that way no matter how long she thought about it. He would surely bore of her if they ever tried to be together that way. Maybe she was just being pessimistic, or maybe it was realistic.

Sitting alongside Ramya and Anita at the bar, they were chatting back and forth about the match today and how well the squad had done but Natalie was lost in her own mind wondering if Octavio was really going to show up at all. She had plenty of friends here tonight to fill that void if he didn’t, but it wasn’t enough it seemed.

She couldn’t get the image of his face out of her mind, not that she even felt as if she wanted to do so. She was taking this far more seriously than she cared to admit.

Earlier, Natalie had rushed off to change seconds out the front doors, running up to her suite with Renee with her nerves tucked up neatly alongside. She had opted to freshen herself up for the night, hoping it would make him see her as someone other than the electrician’s daughter for once. A quick swap out of her gear into something more lightweight and breathable – and if you were asking Renee why Natalie just had to change, well then, it would be to impress Octavio, but that would only be met with denial from Natalie.  

Now, it seemed pointless for trying so hard when he wasn’t even here yet and no signs of arrival even though he said he was on his way. She hoped he was alright… had he taken a cab or walked?  

Natalie let out a huff as she leaned on her arm, using the tabletop for leverage as she watched Ramya lose patience in Octavio and down a shot of brown colored liquid with a tossing motion.

Instead of sticking around as Ramya grabbed the other two shots, Natalie stood from the table and fixed her clothes once she was on her feet. She slid her fingers under the waistband and adjusted her long-sleeved baggy sweater underneath the high-waisted skirt that clung to her curves. It was snug and cozy, and it only took her two minutes to change into. She swayed on her feet, her sneakers making a small squeak on the wooden floors, and shook her fingers through her hair. The fabric of her sleeves found her palms, balling up and holding onto the ends as she looked around the bar to find somewhere else to go.

The door opened again with a bell ring, making her turn on her heel to look over her shoulder with a weaker hopefulness.  

This time, she wasn’t met with disappointment and a smile perked up on her lips instantly.

“’Bout time!” Ramya yelled towards the door, throwing her hands up in the air as she stood. “Are we gonna do that round now to celebrate?”

Octavio pulled his mask from his face, slipping his hand under one side to pop it off and shoved it into his jeans pocket. He walked into the bar, making a b-line for the table where Ramya and Natalie stood. Stepping around a few small groups of people, he nodded his head up in a greeting to his teammates. His gaze took in Natalie up and down, trailing on her features for a moment as he approached and he had to hold back his tongue from saying anything too soon.

He had seen her out of gear before, but it was more along the lines of pajamas while wandering the lounge at 3 in the morning; and yes, she looked adorable shuffling around in slippers with her nessie under arm, but this was different. He could see the scar from her accident peeking out of the bottom of her skirt, drawing his eyes down and causing him to clear his throat out of embarrassment from his staring for once. He felt his cheeks warm slightly, instantly trying to make it go away by focusing on the table instead – hoping for a drink.

He looked to the table, noting the empty shot glasses strewn about and chuckled slightly but wished he had an excuse for his reddened cheeks. “Did you drink them already?”

“Ah, who cares. I’ll get Witt to pour us another round.” she tapped her knuckles to the table a few times, disappearing off into the crowd and leaving behind the two.

Natalie shuffled on her feet, looking over at Octavio and let her eyes fall to the floor to keep from staring again. He must have noticed her glance at him a few times though, because he closed the space between them to toss his arm over her shoulder and pull her in slightly to give her a squeeze of a half hug.  

Anita let out a soft laugh into her beer bottle, leaning back in her seat at the table alongside them and pointed at the empty shot glasses with a lazy gesture. “You sure Nat? P ordered something that has a bit of a kick to it. Dunno if you’ll like it.”

Natalie swooned under his touch, the aroma of his freshly applied cologne wafting her way. She pursed her lips together, her cheeks heating as she tried to keep her composure, and shrugged. “First time for everything, I suppose.“

Anita tilted her bottle back, emptying the glass and wiping her bottom lip. She kept the empty bottle in her hand, standing and stretching from the seat. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you. I gotta head out, got an early start. Night, guys.”

“Goodnight, Anita!” Natalie chimed back, waving politely once before tucking her arms back up in a crossed fashion over her stomach.

“See ya.” Octavio replied, plopping down in the seat across from Anita and leaning backwards on the plush cushions. He kept his one leg out, sitting sideways in the booth and looked towards the bar to see if Ramya was on her way back yet. When he spotted her at the counter still unserved, he gave his attention to Natalie with a cheeky smile. “You changed. Guess we both got too warm after the match.”

“I just popped up to my suite once you mentioned the idea, it sounded nice to get out of my gear after today. It wasquite warm. You looked hot, unbelievably so.” she said quickly, looking away from him and then up at him again as she cleared her throat with eyes wide. A blush formed at her cheeks as she misspoke, having her attraction towards him accidentally slipping through from feeling so flustered around him for the first time. “I-I meant it was really hot today. Not- not that you aren’t attractive I just meant-”

“Who’s ready for some shots?” Ramya asked, interrupting the conversation but with welcome arms from Natalie. Underneath her words, a faint chuckle was coming from Octavio who couldn’t take his eyes off Natalie now with a permanent smile drawn to his face.

Natalie was willing to take any distraction from her own rambling at the moment, unable to back pedal out of her own doing. She took one of the shots off the small platter that Ramya was holding, bringing the glass up to her eyes to look at it closer for a second.

Once each of them held a glass and formed a circle, Ramya brought hers to the center for them all to clink together and the three placed their hands and glasses alike together.

The glasses tapped together once, pulling them apart to each take the shot. Octavio and Ramya both took the shot without hesitation, while Natalie let the shot glass linger near her lips and inhaled the scent that smelled like something that could clean a floor. She was weary of it but watched the other two already swallowing it as she hadn’t even sipped hers. As Ramya was popping her lips together in satisfaction from the taste, Natalie was finally tilting the shot glass into her mouth and slowly letting the liquid flow over her tongue.

A grimace met her face instantly, letting the liquid sit too long in her mouth before finding the confidence to swallow and promptly regretting that decision. She placed her hand over her mouth, her eyes watering only slightly as she shook her head rapidly. “Non. No, I don’t like that.”

Octavio watched her expression with humor building inside of him, bursting out into laughter at her statement with a nod. “I didn’t think you would.”

“Why did you let me try it then?” she exclaimed back at him, stifling her own laughter now that he was laughing. It didn’t help that Ramya was chuckling under her breath as well, the humor feeling infectious amongst the three.

“Mira, I just wanted to see your reaction and I could say it was priceless.” he laughed again, setting his shot glass down on the table and gesturing behind him at the bar. “Come on, chica, I can get you something you might actually like.”

Natalie hesitated but began to follow him in agreement. She turned over her shoulder to wave goodbye to Ramya, the mechanic already wandering away and into the crowd to find another legend to talk with. She walked along with him towards the counter of the bar, the two lingering behind a small line of people waiting to be served.

On the other side of the counter was Elliott, who was rushing around trying to serve everyone and falling behind but doing his best. He was finishing up an order at the cash register, sliding the receipt at the patron and spinning on his heel to check the crowd again.  

Octane tossed his hand up in the air for a second, catching the attention of Elliott and dropped his hand to Natalie’s back once he did. He moved his hand to guide Natalie gently towards the bar with it resting at the square of her back.

Elliott met them at the other end of the bar, grinning at the two of them together so closely in confusion but decided to roll with it. He would ask questions later when he had more time. “Need something, guys?”

“Can I get two shots of tequila and a vodka lemonade?”

“Totally! Two seconds, take a seat and I’ll whip it up.” he smacked the bar top, turning around again and began by grabbing the glasses he would need in a rush.

Octavio spun one of the bar stools around for Natalie to take a seat, the metal creaking under the motion. “You wanna sit?”

She eyed the stool for a moment before hopping up onto it. She crossed her one leg over the other and absentmindedly watched Elliott move around behind the counter with liquids pouring.

Octavio stepped closer to her, placing his hand on the back of her stool and the other on the bar counter in front of her. He watched her intently for a second, the effortless nature of her pulling him in and gaining his curiosity. Once she caught him staring this close to her, he broke his silence instantly and twisted her bar stool to face more towards him. “Chica, you did amazing today. I really appreciate you helping me out so many times.”

“Maybe you shouldn’t run ahead as often and I wouldn’t have had to save you.” she laughed with a scrunch of her nose, looking up at him with a shrug and a smile on her face as she poked fun at him.

“Ouch.” he joked, placing a hand to his chest as if he was pained and shot a cheeky grin at her. “Call me out why don’t ya?”

“Oh! You know that I am only kidding, right? It’s truly my pleasure to help you in the arena – I’m here for you no matter what. Even if you do make impulsive decisions sometimes that scare me half to death.”

“I don’t mean to scare you, hermosa. I can handle myself in the arena, you shouldn’t worry about me too much. It’s nice to know I’m on your mind, though. As for being impulsive-” he began, as his lips eased into a gentler smile, refusing to move his eyes off of hers as he trailed a hand along her cheek to tuck up a strand of her hair behind her ear. “-tell me how that’s a bad thing?”

“I suppose it isn’t sometimes.” she whispered, the touch of his hand on her cheek sending her voice into a quiet response.

He didn’t feel like stopping his plans but he had to wonder if she thought the same as him: that it felt wrong to want one another at all on the surface but he was barreling towards trying anyway. He had only one concern wrapped around wanting her, truthfully, and it was that he didn’t want to hurt someone he had grown fond of as a person. He wasn’t sure if he was so bent out of shape over trying to have her because he thought he should be trying to have her or because he really did want to be with her. Maybe he just chased the impossible because it interested him and he never stuck around because he wasn’t the type, or maybe he wasn’t sure how to stick around.

His confidence and ambition had gotten him this far.  

Octavio took a deep breath, looking down at the ground as he tried to find his wording, a more a serious tone to his voice that caught her attention. “Nat. Can I ask you something?”

“Is that not already a question?” she said, trying to lighten the heaviness of the topic before smiling at him and placing a hand on his arm. “Of course. You can ask me anything, mon ami.”

He chuckled faintly, standing upright more and letting go of the bar counter as he did. Her touch sent sparks through his veins and it made asking her anything a little less nerve wracking. His head tilted slightly to look at her, the sound within the bar dwindling to a quiet white noise in his mind as he focused on her and cracked a weak smile. “Riddle me this. Do you think we do things in life because we find comfort in them or because it’s who we think we are?”

She squinted her eyes at him in surprise, her mouthing dropping open slightly and then pursing together in a dumbfounded huff. Her lips scrunched to the side of her face for a moment, shaking her head in confusion. “What exactly is this about?”

“I’m just wondering if there’s something out there that we are destined to be doing but we don’t out of some force that keeps us away from it; ourselves or other people. We just sit around in our comfort and think it makes us whole. We think the life we have made up for ourselves is everything already but what if it’s barely a pebble in the water? What if there is so much more that we miss out on by holding back with fear or are we just choosing to be selfish when we do the things that don’t fit into our comfort zone? Do you think we chose to stay in that bubble because it’s safe or because we want to be there willingly?”

“I think we stay there because it’s all we know. We don’t truly know ourselves, do we? We know who we are today, but not tomorrow, and by that knowledge I’d say that we stick around where we feel we understand.” she replied, trying to slowly think about each thing she said before it left her lips. His question was twistedly confusing but she could piece together this wasn’t about just one thing, about one topic. She chose to think carefully – but most of her thoughts were voiced allowed. “That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try to push our boundaries of what we know, though. There could always be something more that brings you that feeling but you wouldn’t know unless you searched for it. Comfort can be found in more places than familiarity, don’t you think? Change can be terrifying but there is something special about the chances of finding something that makes you feel whole again and brings you that comfort. It’s always worth looking.”

“Si, I agree completely.” he smiled slightly at her, biting the inside of his cheek at her words. Perhaps he was wrong about Natalie when they first met, he didn’t think she would be one to willingly embrace change but somehow, she had managed to master the art of faking it and actually doing it at the same time. And somehow it was exactly the reply he needed to hear, his own concerns with himself fading away slowly as she spoke.

“Where is this coming from? Is everything alright?” she asked him, a growing worrisome tone in her voice, as she swiveled back and forth slightly on her stool.

“Everything’sfine, Watts, prometo. Just been on my mind lately about trying new things and whether it’s a good idea or if I just think it would be because it’s familiar for me to do crazy shit. You know? Mira, it’s a bit backwards but my comfort is being uncomfortable and in new situations. Sometimes I wonder if that means I’m missing out somewhere along the way by constantly moving… if I’m hurting people along the way.” he explained, shrugging slightly and eyeing her up and down again quickly. He had more to his thought but kept it to himself, not willingly wanting to share that developing a relationship with her in the first place started this entire inner debate months prior. He never questioned himself as a person until Natalie stepped into his life, and while he liked the majority of himself… maybe he was a tad selfish.

He wondered this thought over and over again late at night – but he never thought he would be able to ask her the very same question that haunted him when he couldn’t sleep. Did he just find comfort in being her friend or did he actually enjoy being only that to her? Was there something missing, because he couldn’t see where it was supposed to go if it was. He wanted to try to ask her out, to take her home… but was that just his ambition to check off the impossible or did he truly want her? On top of that, why did he even care to solve the mystery of wanting her when he never wondered this before for any other conquest he came across for as long. Handfuls of people came and went but they never echoed through his thoughts like Natalie did.  

“I guess I wonder past our own comfort, what is there that we will never see? Am I just the adrenaline junkie without a heart that the media paints me as and nothing more?” he told her, noticing Elliott approaching the counter and cleared his throat nervously. Maybe this was a bad place to have this conversation.

Natalie held back her breath and words as Elliott came over to return the drink order to the two of them. She kept her eyes on Octavio as Elliott placed three glasses in front of them and hurried off to serve more people.

Octavio picked up his two shots in either hand, swallowing one after the other without hesitation and letting out an exhale of the alcohol hitting his throat. Out of the corner of his eye, he watched Natalie take the smallest sip of her drink and cradle it in her hand.  

“Tavi?” she started, placing her hand on his shoulder to get his attention and waited until he was slightly looking towards her to keep speaking. “I think we will always know what we want deep down, but we can also think we know what we want until we realize it is not. I didn’t think I could ever be so happy here at the games but I’ve grown quite fond of this place and everyone here. You are so much more than one choice or one tiny detail. What makes up the mosaic of Octavio Silva is a multitude of pieces. I think we do things because we find comfort in them and because it’s who we are to seek comfort. So, I suppose the answer to your riddle is both are true. We do things for comfort but also because it is who we are, because everyone finds comfort in different places. Am I speaking nonsense?”

He smiled faintly, looking at her as she took another sip of her drink more eagerly than the last one. He shook his head towards her, sliding the empty shot glasses further into the counter for Elliott to grab. “No, you aren’t. Never thought both before.”

“Is that the answer?” she questioned, sipping on her drink slowly and swaying on her stool as she smiled at him. He looked towards her with a gleam in his eyes, causing her to smile even wider and set her drink within her lap. “Or am I mistaken?”

A chuckle left him, nodding in reply as he ran his hand through his hair and leaned against the counter. He dropped his hand to his side and slid his fingertips along her knee beside him, trailing it along her thigh absentmindedly. “Didn’t really have an answer before tonight, hermosa, but I like yours.”

She glanced down at the sensation of his touch, watching him look around the bar while his fingers painted pictures on her skin. Something had changed with him since the match earlier and it wasn’t her knowledge of his face. A new ambition which she didn’t think she’d seen from him before and now she hadn’t a clue of what to think or feel but hope he continued this new pace so she could figure it out.

“Do you want to play some darts or-”

“Wanna get out of here?” he interrupted her, popping his lips together as he brought himself to his feet fully from leaning on the counter and turned to look at her. The room was filled with people but he didn’t care for anything anyone had to say, though multiple fans had tried to grab his attention to which he ignored them tonight. He was growing more bored of the bar, it only drowning out his focus of the shimmering figure at his fingertips.

He noticed her hesitation to his request, moving towards her and placing a hand on either side of her seat with a wide smile. He got a few inches from her face and paused. Glancing down at her lips, he bypassed her face and leaned closer to her ear to remove the space between them almost completely.

She caught her breath in her throat as she heard his voice start up as a whisper in her ear, the warmth of his breath hitting her skin, his voice gravely and low as it cut through the chatter of the crowd.

“Just me and you… care to come along?” he muttered to her, the vibration of his voice sending shivers down her spine in ways she never felt before – and she had been electrocuted before.

“Are you feeling alright?” she whispered back, placing her drink on the counter and letting her hand find his chest to rest on. Her thumb grazed over his chest, looking down into the small space left between them and did her best to hold in her butterflies. She was certain it was the alcohol in his system that made him act like this ontop of the win today, but couldn’t help but wonder where it was coming from in the first place. Was this about his riddle? She had witnessed him leave the bar with plenty of people before but she was never one of those people, and she truly never saw herself on the receiving end though she imagined it. He never even looked at her that way – had he? “You’ve never been so forward with me before.”

“Never better. There’s a first time for everything, right?” he retorted, stepping away from her and offering his hand for her to take with a wiggle of his fingers.

Natalie scooted off of her stool, letting her feet drop to the floor with a thud and slipped her hand into his willingly. She was glad to have the support there, her footing becoming slightly wobbly when she first hit the ground again for her first few steps from her intoxication. “I suppose you make a good point, but shouldn’t we close our tab first?”

He tugged at her hand gently, placing a finger to his lips to shush her playfully. He shook his head no, pulling her along to the door and she giggled faintly as she followed along. He smiled at the sound of her laughter, slipping out the doorway and guiding her ahead of him with his hand – to let her walk freely ahead to set the pace and to let himself view her from behind unseen. After a few steps through the doors, they dropped a hold on one another and Octavio grabbed the door to help her outside.

The night air hit both of them in the face as they stepped out onto the sidewalk together, but it did nothing to sober either of them or bring them out of the daze they were both in. The only light was coming from the night sky twinkling overhead and the neon sign hanging above the bar door that flickered on and off, it shining atop both of them. The door closed with a soft bang, closing off the two from the patrons inside and silencing the street to the sounds of a rare car passing. They were nowhere near a major road right now but the hotel was only a few blocks from here.

“Where to?” she asked, pulling open her phone to call for a car when suddenly he placed his hand over her screen to push her phone away from her sight. She glanced up at him, confusion in her eyes. “What?”

“Let’s just walk around for a bit before we head back to the hotel.” he urged, already taking a few steps away from her down the sidewalk but pacing himself in hopes she would follow.

She pursed her lips together, nodding in agreement and put her phone back into her pocket. While she didn’t mind the suggestion, she assumed he would want to return wherever he was headed right away not linger around. Who was she to argue with something so simple? “A walk sounds nice, actually.”

He waited for her in his place, using the free moment to snag a cigarette from his pocket and placing it between his lips. He fumbled with the lighter and the wind, sighing to himself as Natalie approached him with a faint laugh watching him struggle. She cupped one of her hands around his cigarette end, allowing him a place to light it hidden away from the wind.

He took a long inhale as it finally formed an ember at the end, exhaling out the smoke and it floating away with the wind. He tapped the ash off the end of his cigarette, winking at her appreciatively with a click of his tongue behind his teeth. “Gracias.”

“You really shouldn’t smoke, you know. It’s bad for you.” she mentioned as they walked, her hands tucked up behind her back and strolling alongside him as he sauntered with a hand stuffed in his pocket and the other holding his cigarette between his fingers.

“A lot of things are bad for you! Doesn’t mean people don’t utilize them for beneficial reasons.”

“You don’t have to explain yourself to me, mon ami. I didn’t mean to pry. I’d just like you to live a long healthy li-”

“Now you sound just like Ajay.” he teased as he cut her off, taking another long drag and chuckling towards her while trying to retain his smoke in for a second. He exhaled towards the sky, looking over at her as they walked down the sidewalk and farther away from where they began at the bar. “You’re cute, Nat. You know that? You care a lot about other people, almost too much.”

“I would not say that. I say I care with everything I have until given a reason to take it away. Is that so wrong?” she frowned, pausing in place as she spoke.  

He skidded to a stop after a second once he realized she wasn’t alongside him anymore, turning to see her frowning behind him. “Nah, I didn’t mean it like that. That wasn’t the right way to say it… I guess I meant you care more than anyone I’ve ever met. Even Ajay gets fed up with me and won’t listen to reason – but you always do.”

She softened her stature but her arms stayed crossed over her chest, and she watched him take a few steps back to meet her where she stood.  

Octavio took a step closer to her, hooking his free hand to her side and gently tugged her towards him. She freely took a few more steps in, closing more space between the two. He bit his bottom lip momentarily, sighing at her with a smile. “Do you remember our first match?”

“Oui. How could I forget the tower collapse? We almost died… you got seriously injured that day but kept laughing like it was the biggest thrill. You were so lifeless after having that much excitement as we ran… I was so panicked to see you like that. You hopped back to your feet, one of your goggles had shattered and I could see you glowing with this happiness underneath your gear. I didn’t understand you but I wanted to know everything after that I was so intrigued by you. I-” she paused, looking down at her feet and back towards him with a shrug as she tried to ignore the obvious truth. “I mayhave had a silly little crush on you when we first met after that. It was nothing. I swear, it was just a little thing that I thought… but I got over it. You’re an amazing friend and I am certain it was just because we had just met and it was so stressful.”

“You saved my life with those hands all charged up, they shocked my system in more than one way and I never stopped thinking about you or wondering. I need you to know that.” he admitted, the liquid courage letting the honesty flow off of his tongue as he stood with her on the sidewalk staring back and forth at one another. The knowing of the fact she had wanted him before only made it feel that much more stable to admit; but he loved the knowledge that they had both been thinking the same things on opposite sides. He lowered his head towards hers, inches from her face as he let a hand graze her chin. “I need you to know I felt the same about you.”

She unraveled her arms from her chest, her mouth ajar and unable to form anything but a muttered noise from her body. She shook her head in denial, stepping back from him and started her walk slowly back towards the hotel – knowing he would follow – and gave herself a moment to regain her composure. This was too much to learn in one day; his full appearance and now thisbeing revealed? She couldn’t catch her breath, so she was surprised when she felt herself start speaking. “So, how do you feel now?”

Octavio dropped his cigarette onto the ground as it neared its end from his relentless puffing on it, stomping out the red embers with his heel before hurrying after her. He couldn’t deny how much he loved the fact she had felt something towards him just like he had her; he couldn’t hold back the truth and now she seemed to grow quiet on him. At first, he wasn’t sure if he had done something wrong but he heard her muttering as she walked away and unable to make out her words. “Hold on, hold on, hold on.” He rushed ahead of her, trailing backwards as they continued the walk to the hotel together but he was trying to slow her down. “Stop and talk to me. What did you say?”

“How do you feel about me now, then?” she repeated herself, though nervous of the answer he may give her and slowly stopping her pace to listen. She looked around at the street, finding the sign for the road only just out of sight to read clearly. She hadn’t a clue where they were, all she knew was the storefronts all sat closed and the hotel was a shape in the skyline in her view. She looked back at him when she was met by silence in reply, crossing her arms over her chest and looking to the ground. “You don’t have to answer me if-”

He shook his head, bringing his hand to her chin to tilt her gaze towards his. He let his other hand drop to the square of her back as he pulled her in. “Just tell me to stop.” he whispered, the hand at her chin slipping into her hair to grasp at the strands gently.  

Natalie hitched her breath in her throat, the touch of his hands on her body drawing her weak in the knees as she leaned in to his advances and met him in the middle. Their lips crashed together with a tender desire as her hands trailed his chest underneath his flannel.

He slid his hands down her side, pulling her closer to him to press themselves together. The warmth flowed between the two, standing on the sidewalk and pressed together. She snaked her hands around his neck to hold him even closer, the wind whipping up more around them as the cooler night air crept in. He gripped at her side, desperate to keep her near and letting one of his hands roam her body to take in whatever he could as they stood together.

He had no idea how long this would last, but he knew he wasn’t pulling away just yet.  

Octavio bit down on her bottom lip, causing a muffled giggle to arise from her and he smiled to himself at the sound. He guided her backwards slowly, her back pressing up against a building wall as his one hand caught hold of the wall to hold himself up. He kept his other hand at her side, which had snuck its way into her shirt to rub his thumb against her bare skin, and slid his tongue into her mouth to deepen the kiss into more and more by the second.

She let her hands wander his chest, arms, hair – anywhere she could put her hands on as he transcended her to a place of no thoughts and only static running through her. The feel of him underneath her felt false, like a movie she saw and wondered how true, a question she didn’t think would ever be answered. She couldn’t pull herself away from the intoxicating man at her fingertips, his lips locked to hers and tasting faintly of alcohol and nicotine. It wasn’t anything she expected when she daydreamt about kissing him, but it all added up perfectly in her mind and she didn’t dare forget it now.

He pulled their lips apart, catching his own breath with a grin on the corner of his lips forming. He brought a hand to her chin, running his thumb over her bottom lip and staring at them with a longing want again. He bit his own cheek, looking up into her eyes with a glimmer in his own. As much as he wanted to have sex with her right here and now; he couldn’t justify sleeping together in an alley somewhere. He would and has done it – but he didn’t want that for her when he had no idea of her history in dating. He did respect her quite a bit to know she deserved more than a dirty alley besides a garbage can, but he also couldn’t picture himself stopping.

“Care to catch a cab back?” he mumbled to her, leaning down to press his lips to her neck to give her a gentle kiss and trailed down her collarbone.

She barely managed a moan from the sensation of his lips to her skin, her voice cracking and weak from being silent so long. She nodded in embarrassment to the sound that escaped her, instead leaning her head back against the building as she watched him pull back away from her to fumble with his phone to call for someone to pick them up; though he kept a hold of her side the entire time.  

Once he was done booking the cab, he shoved his phone into his pocket and turned his full attention back to her. He couldn’t help but smile the second he saw her; still leaned against the building with the streetlight above shining onto her face and illuminating her beauty to him even more. To which his only thought was that the cab could not come faster. He chose the closest driver but it didn’t matter, it would never arrive as fast as he needed it right now.

He leaned closer to her again, brushing his fingers along her cheek and cupping her face to place a few pecks on her lips again. “You looked so… hot today in the arena. I was thinking about putting my hands all over you the whole time you were slaughtering people left and right with your 45 and fences. You never even flinched – and you even threw a punch.”

“You were watching me that much?” she asked, flattered at his words and eagerly awaiting each peck to her lips from his. The word felt foreign to her; she had heard plenty of cute, adorable, and pretty compliments in her day. They were lovely things to hear but it was something more this way coming from him. “You think I’m hot?”

“I wasn’t joking when I said I’ve been thinking about you, Natalie.” he mumbled, chuckling under his breath as he placed his forehead against hers to look her in the eyes. “Smoking hot. No contest, chica.”

“Do you just say that to all your dates?” she joked, the question only mildly laced with truth, trailing her hand along his chest with a smile.

“Only when I mean it.” he replied stoutly, leaning down to give her a longer tender kiss; and pulling away on

Just Take Me Home | oneshot

SUMMARY:Wattson finally decides to break up with Crypto, and it doesn’t go as planned when Octane gets involved.
RATING:18+
SHIPS: Wattson and Octane
TAGS:alcohol, violence, blood, mature themes, tbh if you like crypto don’t read this
around 8.6k

A chatter was taking over the paradise lounge; it was covering the sounds of music coming from the jukebox and smudging all of the conversations into one incoherent blabbering. There was a crowd of people mingling throughout the room and Octavio was uninterested in each of them – unable to find a care to pay attention to the happening around him as he simmered in his alcoholic buzz to distract from his own wandering mind.

Octavio sat with his foot rhythmically tapping the floor, barely in the seat properly as he swished around the liquid in his almost empty glass. With an elbow on the bar to hold his glass and his other hand at his chin, he began fiddling with a loose strand on the bottom of his mask.

“You need a refill?” Elliott asked him, lingering in front of him on the other side of the counter as he wiped down the bar surface as he waited for a reply.

Octavio glanced over his shoulder, eyeing Natalie on the other side of the bar cozied into a booth with Tae Joon and talking in hushed voices. Octavio hadn’t been able to muster a reason for her to give him the time of day – after all, he missed his shot with her and someone else got there first. He tried hard not to think of that reality but it was hard to miss when it was right in front of his face. He grimaced to himself, turning back to Elliott and shoved the glass in his direction. “Rápidamente.”

“Something up?” Elliott pried as he took the glass to fill it again, sliding it under the tap and pulling the lever as he eyed the speedster.

“Nah.” he replied, half listening as he looked back over his shoulder one more time to see Tae Joon pressing a kiss to Natalie’s neck. Octavio felt his stomach fall at the sight, snapping back around and trying to mentally erase the image he wished he never saw. It felt wrong to him to want her so badly when she had no idea, when it was all he daydreamed about. He just couldn’t help wanting her – and when he couldn’t have her, he still tried his best to respect her decisions though it ate him alive to watch her be with someone else. He just waited, patiently, for the day she was open to the idea of someone new. “Hurry up with that drink, amigo.”

“You say ‘no’ but the tone says ‘yes.’ Care to try again?”  

“Don’t.” Octavio rolled his eyes, leaning up and over the counter to snatch the glass from him and tugging his mask down to take a few gulps.

“I was just-” Elliott trailed off, his gaze looking past Octavio and towards the other side of the room with a furrow forming on his brow.  

Octavio cocked an eyebrow up, chuckling lightly in unaware amusement as he scanned Elliott’s face. “Mira, now you seem like somethings up.”

“I think there… is?”

“Qué?”

Elliott gestured with his head, nodding in the direction of his concerns and Octavio turned on his stool to look with a swivel.

On the other side of the room, too far for him to hear, sat Natalie twiddling her fingers. She was looking down at the table while Tae Joon was leaning and talking into her ear, but she was curling away from him slightly.

She opened her mouth to seemingly speak against whatever was said, but instantly closed it again and pressed her lips into a forced smile instead.  

Octavio hadn’t a clue what was even being discussed but the look on her face was enough to make him want to involve himself. He’d seen too many of these encounters and sat idly by as Natalie would drift further from her friends and compromise parts of herself to please Tae Joon for the sake of face.

Across the table from her sat Renee, who was visibly pissed off and holding her tongue and the complexity of it all intrigued Octavio more. With everything Elliott had said, was it true maybe the relationship was finally headed for its final hour? He couldn’t help but be hopeful for that, after all, he was determined to prove to her he was the better option like he wanted to months earlier.

He had watched the two on the cusp of an argument more than once, and now he had saw Tae Joon treating her with disdain and turning around to pretend he had not moments prior once again. To say the least, without listing the world of mistakes, Octavio just didn’t like the guy and it was getting harder to hide that fact for the sake of the games.

Tae Joon stood from the booth, brushing his coat down and flipping out his wallet to drop some cash onto the table for the bill. He seemed to be in a hurry but Natalie still sat in the booth, looking across the table at Renee with an apologetic look.  

Octavio scrunched his nose, tapping his foot against the metal of the chair and a repetitive clanging came with it. He wondered if she would stay behind – would he be able to finally find a free moment to speak to her without Tae Joon around to talk over him?

He looked back at Elliott, who was now buffing a spot into the bar counter from constant wiping and eyed him in partial confusion. “What do you know that you aren’t saying?”

“Ugh, fine, I promised I wouldn’t tell but… Renee said they’ve been fighting, er, well he’s been stern with her lately.” Elliott whispered under his breath, leaning over the counter to keep his words from finding any other ears besides Octavio. “I guess Nat stayed over at her place last night and he was notcool with it. She wouldn’t tell me anything else though, I tried.”

“Why didn’t anybody fucking tell me?” Octavio spat back, a rage under his breath as he turned back to look at Natalie, and he couldn’t take his eyes off of her at the table now. He hated how closed off and quiet she had become lately; he knew it was the pressure of trying to hold the world on her shoulders for the grown men in her life when she never should’ve been subjected to it in the first place. He hated having to watch her like that and now this was proof he was right when he assumed she deserved far better.  

“I…just…did? Why am I in trouble?” Elliott replied, confused with the sudden anger being directed at him.

Octavio rolled his eyes, his hand clenching his shorts fabric as he sat watching whatever this was unfold before him. Did he have a cause to put himself into the conversation or was he out of line? He didn’t want to offend or upset Natalie, that was the only concern, but he still couldn’t stand being silent towards it when she seemed so out of sorts. He had all of the reasons to step in, to say something… but he couldn’t, not when he respected her and didn’t want to make a scene surrounding it in public for her sake.

He took his drink, pulling his mask back up onto his face and tried to be as casual as possible while moving across the bar floor. He slunk into the booth beside where Natalie sat, sitting himself down with Anita and Ramya to listen in on the conversation to determine just how rocky the entire thing seemed.

If he could help in anyway, he would find it.

Tae Joon ran his hand through his hair, shoving his wallet back into his pocket and offered his hand to Natalie; which wasn’t reciprocated. He dropped his hand to the table and formed a fist to lean on, lowering towards her with a shake of his head. “Come on, let’s go home.” he said with a pout, yet somewhat sternly.

“I am not finished with my drink yet, though, and Renee and I were going to-”  

“Nat, I said let’s go. I have stuff to do.” Tae Joon grumbled back as he cut her off, pulling open his phone and sighing heavily. “I’m going to miss my deadline for this coding job. Haven’t we hung here long enough?”

“Why can’t I just meet you back at your apartment?”  

“Would you just come on; don’t you think it’s late enough when we’ve both got work tomorrow? Besides, you know I don’t like staying in one place for too long.”  

Natalie sighed, picking up her cup to take another sip and Tae Joon aggravatingly sighed again. They made eye contact with one another and he gave her a look of impatience. She cleared her throat as she set her cup down instead of taking another drink. “Right. My apologies, I must’ve mistaken the time…”

Renee huffed out, sitting up more in her seat and threw an arm up in desperation at her friend as she stood to leave.

She didn’t want to go but she couldn’t ever figure out how to end something she never wished she started without hurting someone’s feelings. Perhaps she was only hurting herself by trying to stay.

Looking to her friend and around the room, she spotted Octavio and held her breath.

Her brain was moving at high speeds, it racing in circles around all of the choices she could take and what one was the best decision. Natalie closed her eyes tightly, swallowing her fear in her throat and tapped her finger against the table as she stood beside it. In her mind, she pictured a happier version of herself and at her side was not Tae Joon. It hadn’t been him for a long time. Perhaps there was a time where she convinced herself everything would work out in the long run, but she didn’t want to wait for that someday for her life to improve; not when she knew of someone who treated her far better simply because he wanted too.  

When she opened her eyes again, letting out a shaky breath, she locked eyes with Octavio. He was so close to her that she could reach out and grab him but somehow, he felt acres away. She felt so secluded nowadays though everyone thought she was happy with her ‘closeknit’ boyfriend. She didn’t want to fall back into another sad night of falling asleep in bed alongside someone she was beginning to detest. She would rather love someone who didn’t want her than be with Tae Joon any longer; though she was hopeful Octavio wanted her too.

Natalie hummed lightly under her breath, trying to search for her words to save herself from falling back into the routine and life she came here with and looked from Octavio to Tae Joon. She straightened her posture before speaking, shaking her head.

“I- actually, I do not want to go home with you.” she said, slowly but adamantly.

Tae Joon, paused but then laughed and smacked his own chest lightly. “Is this another one of your jokes?”

She looked around and darted her gaze to Renee for support, finding her friend waving her on in encouragement. If Natalie was certain about anybody disliking her relationship with Tae Joon, right after herself, it was Renee; whom had been one of her biggest pushers to end this once and for all. The courage was only found when all of the moving parts fell into place tonight and she couldn’t harbor a fix, or wanted one. “I do not want to be with you anymore…”

Tae Joon’s laughter faded into nothing, looking over at Renee and then at Natalie with a more frustrated look.  “Let’s go talk somewhere private about this.”

“Non. Non, I don’t want to go anywhere with you, Crypto.” she stammered out, trying to be forceful in her words but it only angered him more as she became more distant.  

“You can’t be serious.” he scoffed, moving towards her and wrapping her up in his arms to try to bring her back towards his affections.

She squirmed in his grasp, trying to pry his arms off of her body to free herself. “Let go.”

“Nat, just talk to-” he began, gripping tighter and pressing his lips to her shoulder blade rather than releasing his hold on her when she requested.  

Octavio wanted to intervene now for his own peace of mind, but he knew Natalie was far more than capable of handling herself. He just hated seeing her being treated with such a disrespect that a bubbling rage had already settled within him because of it.

“I said let me go!” she demanded, pushing Tae Joon more forcefully this time and causing him to stumble a few steps back. She harbored her breath, pulling her arms in and crossing them over her chest in a defensive manner. She took a step away from him as he took one towards her, causing him to groan in frustration again.

“Stop acting like a child. Everyone is watching right now.”  

She turned to ignore him, but the look on her face was proof she was crumbling, her eyes welling up as she grabbed her purse from the booth and put the strap over her shoulder.  

If this was a watered-down version of her daily life, Octavio was furious with himself he hadn’t done something sooner. Ramya, whom was beside him, elbowed him roughly in the side, nodding at the situation unfolding and mouthed for him to ‘do something already.’

“I’m leaving.” Natalie said plainly towards Renee, trying to inform her friend before she took off, but she hadn’t a plan of how to get home from here without her original ride. She would have to walk to the bus stop and make do, either way she had to leave before he became any worse than he was already being. Her concerns were correct in that he would find a way to weasel back in and make her feel guilty to let him stay, no matter what she did right or wrong, he always did find a way. It was why she couldn’t muster the courage to break it off until today; perhaps knowing she was surrounded by friends who cared was the one final piece that helped her take that leap away from him finally. Perhaps it was the fact that she hadn’t even been able to lie to herself anymore that she loved him at all – or had ever.

If she did love him, it was lust for something he could never provide and it was a brief happenstance she viewed as a mistake now. She hadn’t been happy with him in months. If she was truthful with herself, she wished she had been able to walk away sooner but even now she feared she wasn’t free to be with who her heart had been craving.

“Finally.” Tae Joon sighed, moving to grab for her hand again which only caused her to back up more to make space between them.  

“No. Without you!”

Octavio stood from his booth, unable to keep quiet and out of the conversation any longer as he noticed every little thing happening.

He placed himself in between Natalie and Tae Joon, looking directly into her watery blue eyes with a growing concern. He wanted to let out his anger on the person causing her to feel this way – but chose to prioritize her over anything else.

Though he kept his fondness for her to himself. After all, they were still good friends, and he chose to stand by her side even though she was giving a less than worthy person her heart. He had tried to sway her at first but when she first spoke of how happy she had been he couldn’t take it away; though if he had known it was a lie, things would’ve been different for the two far sooner.

He hated waiting around but he would always be willing to wait for her.  

He always knew when something was wrong lately. He would always show up and wonder if she needed any type of help. She always smiled at him and said no thank you but secretly wished each time that she had begged for him to whisk her away to anywhere but here.

“Need a ride, Watts?” Octavio asked, patting his pocket for his keys and trying to search her eyes for an answer. He was hopeful this time she would say yes, her eyes always did but she never spoke it out loud.

“She doesn’t need a ride.” Tae Joon replied for her, aggravated to find someone else trying to pop into the conversation that he was trying to derail – let along Octavio being that person.

“Hah, that’s funny. I don’t think I asked you, compadre.” Octavio snapped back over his shoulder before turning his focus back to Natalie, who seemed to be more of a shell of a person now that everything was spiraling apart but seeming grateful to see him stepping in for her lack of gumption.

She smiled weakly at Octavio, an ease of relaxation coming over her once she realized she wasn’t as alone as it seemed. She saw the annoyed expression on Tae Joon’s face behind him, but she didn’t care. She wanted to go – she wanted to leave with Octavio if he was willing to take her.

Tae Joon placed a hand on the speedster’s shoulder, pulling him backwards and out of the way to get closer to Natalie again.

A small stumble along with an astonished chuckle came from Octavio in reply, regaining his footing and stretching his neck from side to side.  

“Don’t get involved, this doesn’t concern you, anyway.” Tae Joon glared him down as he walked over, hissing his words through his teeth. He was taken aback, however, to find Natalie sliding her footing away from him to stand behind Octavio instead.

“S'il vous plaît, Tavi.” Natalie whispered, placing her hand on his back and finally confirming his hopes. That was all he needed.

Tae Joon reached forward around Octavio to take ahold of Natalie’s arm again, desperate to get her away from the crowd in the bar and talk to her privately in order to reign this all back in so it went back to normal. He could feel her slipping for a while now and this seemed like the final snapping point, he couldn’t talk his way out of this one. The tips of his fingers barely grazed her skin when Octavio’s grasp clamped down on his arm, stopping him from reaching forward any further.  

“I could do this all day.” he sneered at the hacker, shoving his arm away and back to the man’s side. He felt the gentle palm of Natalie behind him on his back, his stiff posture loosening slightly under her touch though his anger resided within him.  

“Natalie, are you just going to hide behind him and refuse to talk this out with me like adults? Don’t do this, please. I love you.” Tae Joon begged; his tone was now more sorrowful rather than frustrated as he put on a pitiful face for Natalie’s sake – but she wasn’t buying the façade anymore that he was trying to mask over the problems.

She had a rage that had sat within her unsaid for weeks once she uncovered the truth of what she meant to Tae Joon. A few concerns from a friend with voices from the void – you’d think those trying to utilize her rather than respect her would take that into account. It took far too long to find this strength when it always resided within her, but she wasn’t losing steam now.

“No. You don’t. You loved the database connections you found with me and my position in the Syndicate. You put me in the middle of everything without my knowledge, you put me in danger, but I’m smarter than I look and I found out, Crypto.” she snapped back, letting out a shaking exhale as tears fell onto her cheeks from pent up fears and anger. “You used me! I have been trying to do this for weeks and while this is not quite what I intended for how this is playing out… I’m done.”

“You are such a fucking bitc-” Tae Joon barely finished his sentence; his words cut short by a leather glove covered fist meeting the center of his face followed by a loud crack which sent him backwards in a disoriented state.  

Octavio followed him though as the man stumbled, grabbing him by the collar of the shirt and pulling his arm back to ready another punch if needed. He rocked on his heels, his arm jittering with pent up energy and glared down at him.  

A growl left his lips as he had shoved him against one of the booths, pining his forearm against Tae Joon’s neck. “Say it again, I dare you.”  

Tae Joon coughed out from lack of oxygen, a newly bloody nose formed on his face, and narrowed his eyes at Octavio before shoving him backwards and attempting to throw a punch.  

It didn’t get very far, however, with the fist only getting about halfway before Octavio stopped it in his palm and chuckled menacingly at the man. “Oi, hijo de puta, is that all you got? You gotta be quicker than that.”

“Isn’t this predictable, you trying to play hero for her again.” Tae Joon said, ripping his arm from the grasp of the speedster and looking past him at Natalie who wasn’t getting involved – instead she was standing beside a booth with Renee’s arm wrapped around her and Ajay was rubbing her back to console her. It only pissed him off more to it occurring, it just meant his loss was imminent.

“Me? Predictable? That’s as likely as you being a decent human being.” he retorted, “You don’t deserve her kindness, pinche pendejo.”

Tae Joon lurched forward, tackling Octavio backwards into a table and sending liquor glasses off the table and shattering around the floor. “You say that like you believe you deserve it! What? Has she been sleeping with you or something, is that why she’s got this crazy idea she could replace me?”

“Stop it!” Natalie cried out in reply, the group of three girls jumping back as the glass flew and the table collapsed from the weight of the two men tossing punches back and forth. A few members of the bar crowd shouted, leaping away from the crash as well and an eruption of yelling came from the few people beginning to circle around them. “Someone is going to get hurt!”

“It doesn’t matter what she’s been doing, she could replace you with anybody. She could have anybody she fucking wanted; she’s gorgeous and kind, unlike you.” Octavio yelled in the tussle, unable to keep himself from holding back all of his unsaid words now, slamming his knee into the other man’s stomach and wrestling around to pin him to the ground again. “Where’s that give you the right to treat her like property and get her to stop talking to all her friends? Huh? I barely see her anymore because you never let her out of your sight. Easier to convince her to stay if you get her alone, no?”

“You don’t know me; you don’t know anything.” Tae Joon argued back, trying to hurry to cover his tracks but a thick crowd had already formed around them in a circle to chant on the fight – which Octavio was clearly winning. He wasn’t even able to stand as Octavio refused to let him up from the floor, but he kicked up and shoved the weight off of him long enough get a pocketknife from his pants.

In a scrambled movement, he lunged at Octavio with a knife holstered in his hand.

“Hey! No Weapons!” Elliott yelled, hopping over the counter in one fluid movement and rushing to try and break through the crowd to separate the two of them as it escalated too far and he spotted the shining metal through the crowd.

Natalie spotted the knife too, her eyes widening in a panic and ducking down lower to snake her way through the circled crowd and break into the center in a rushed worry. She darted in, falling to her palms and hurrying to her feet to try and stop the altercation from going any further. She couldn’t just stand by like Renee and Ajay were trying to get her to do, she had to stop this before Octavio got hurt.

Tae Joon was above Octavio now, having caught him with a smidge of luck, and had the knife pressed to his neck to keep him from getting away – but his efforts were soon stalled as he spotted Natalie in the center of the crowd with them. At first, he thought she had rushed to hisaid, that she had come to her senses. It didn’t take long to notice her intense concern was being directed at Octavio, though. It only reiterated he had lost far long ago before tonight, and he pressed down harder with the knife in a shaky agitation.  

She was stood alongside the edge, a few strangers holding her back from getting any closer out of concern, but she wanted to stop this and stop the panic it was causing. She tried yanking her arms from the people around her, unable to break free for the time being, but she didn’t even have to call out for him. When she spotted Octavio, he was already looking at her.

His mask had been torn from his face and his goggles shattered like the first time she saved his life in the arena, and he had a smile on his face. He seemed to be on the odd end of the fight right now – but his smile said that he knew he had won more than one thing. He winced in pain from the knife, its imprint forming in his skin, and a small trail of blood leaving one side.  

He grabbed at the handle and pushed it away from himself with force. It didn’t give him enough distance though, if anything it gave Tae Joon a better leverage to come back with a strike to the side with the knife again.  

A burning sensation coming from Octavio’s skin pulled him back to his senses, it kicking him into a higher gear and making him able to regain his strength over the other man.

With a jump in order to stand and find his balance, Octavio shoved Tae Joon onto his back and kicked him twice in the head with his metal foot and a laugh resonating after in success. He wasn’tdone with taking his anger out for all the things Tae Joon did to hurt her, but he intended on ending it now.

The other man groaned in pain, his hands reaching for his head as he rolled onto his side and a stranger from the crowd leaned down to check if he was alright.

On the other side of the circle, Octavio reached for his own skin to press onto the slit wound at his side, the warm blood seeping into his pants. He used his other hand to wipe at his face, finding his goggles and mask both missing but didn’t have the time to find them now. He stumbled back slightly but shook it off, scanning the crowd for where he last saw Natalie. She came into his current fuzzy vision, her wispy blonde hair standing out and the sound of her voice yelling his name lingered like sweet perfume in the air to him.

He didn’t even care about himself right now, not when he was looking directly at Natalie and she seemed so concerned.  

Had he stepped out of line?  

Natalie finally broke free of the crowd’s grasp, rushing to Octavio and cupped his face in her hands instantly. He had cuts along his lip and it was only the surface of what seemed wrong. He cracked his signature cheeky grin at her, smitten with her worry in his health and her immediate care for him, though he was still riding high from the fight’s rush.  

“Why did you- you really didn’t- mon amour, please tell me you’re okay.” she rambled out quickly, dropping her hands to his shoulders from his cheeks.

“Still need that lift home?” he asked with a chuckle, followed by a wince of pain as he glanced down at his side and removed his hand once to see the damage.

She followed his eyes to his side, a faint yelp leaving her lips once she became aware of the wound on his body. Her eyes widened, her hand immediately moving to press on his side for him for pressure and whimpered softly. “No, no, no, no. That’s a lot of blood, Tavi.”

“Nah, I’m fine. Don’t be so worried…” he replied, reaching his hand out to rub her arm gently. “Are youokay?”

“Elliott!” Natalie screamed out over the loudness of the crowd, never taking her eyes off of Octavio who was swaying on his feet and she was worried he would pass out on her in his state. “Ajay!”

She took a deep breath, trying to shake off her fears as she looked to him.  

“I think you’re in shock. Maybe sit down?” she insisted, taking her jacket off in a panic and tying it around his side to add more pressure to the wound.

She felt like her life had flashed before her eyes when she saw the sharp blade, she often spotted Tae Joon sharpening it, but to think it had pierced his skin was unthinkable to her. She couldn’t picture her life without the amusement and loving care that came from her relationship with Octavio, and now he was hurt from defending her. It all seemed so twisted when none of it would have occurred in the first place if she listened to her heart to begin with and chose him. She couldn’t handle a world without Octavio… and she couldn’t fathom one without herself loving him. How had she been so oblivious to what was right there, and how had she stayed with someone so cruel so for long?

She looked over at Tae Joon on the ground momentarily, but didn’t feel sorrow like she assumed she would, if anything she pitied him for the ruthless person he was and would never stop being. She felt a twinge of sadness for herself for putting up with it for so long. She looked back to Octavio as she kept a hand on his arm, steadying him. “I cannot believe I dated that. I trusted… and he could’ve killed you tonight if he tried. I don’t even want to think about losing you.”

“You think I would’ve lost? I was just getting started, hermosa.” Octavio muttered, brushing a strand of hair from her cheek.

Natalie paused to purse her lips into a half smile, looking up at him and sighing. “No, of course not. We just haven’t been able to talk in a few days, for reasons I’m sure I don’t have to explain, and I’ve been meaning to tell you-”

“What is it?” Elliott yelled out, finally breaking through the crowd an into the center and spotting Natalie and Octavio first before he saw Tae Joon on the ground. He wasn’t sure who was in worse shape – but it seemed that while Octavio was bleeding all over his bar floor he was still walking and talking coherently, unlike Tae Joon.

Elliott hurried over to Octavio, placing a hand on Natalies back to rub it once in apology as he looked to Octavio. “First things first, are you alright?”

“It’s not that bad, I’ve had worse.” Octavio said, looking back and forth from his wound to the two standing with him.  

“You need to lay down, man, just go upstairs. I’ll handle… the old man.” he replied, gesturing behind him to Tae Joon who was still wallowing in pain on the ground.

“Let’s get you to Ajay, she’s got D.O.C.” Natalie said, nodding in agreement and wiping the blood onto her pants from her hands and moved to guide him to the edge of the crowd.

From the other side, a whine and a yell came out. Tae Joon propped himself up on one elbow, his head still in his hands as he glared at the two of them together already. “Nat! Are you really that heartless you’d leave me here like this?”  

She ignored him, ushering Octavio out of the crowd and towards the booths where she had stood with Ajay and Renee, as Tae Joon was left still yelling for her to return.

Elliott stayed in the bars main room to designate people in certain directions; he was just trying to clear out the bar in order to handle the broken pieces of his establishment.

Natalie, Renee, and Ajay all took Octavio into the back of the bar to an unlocked door, trailing up a dark and musty stairwell to the apartment that was a wreck from Elliott and Ramya’s living conditions.

It was clean and private enoughto get away from any more of the fight progressing, which it seemed like both were far from done trying to rip the other apart even though one was severely injured.

The three women quickly took over the kitchen counters for medical supplies and forced Octavio to lay up on the couch to relax as D.O.C was hooked up to him. They pried his shirt from him, him unwillingly, wrapping his torso in a bandage and left him to rest after Ajay patched him up; though she was sure he would be gone in ten minutes once he was healed up enough to move.

                -     -

It had only been about twenty minutes since they came upstairs, and he was laying on the couch spinning his butterfly knife in his hands as he watched Natalie walking around the apartment. Ajay had come over to poke at him a few times, but he swatted her off like a gnat and tried not to get impatient just sitting around. He only stayed because he knew Natalie would be a wreck if he took off after all of this, he didn’t want to do that to her despite hating laying around.

Elliott came upstairs to confirm that Tae Joon had left, saying he had taken off for medical attention and giving up when Natalie wouldn’t come back downstairs.

He dropped off the broken goggles and mask he found downstairs, and he an Renee left to finish cleaning up from the fight, mainly because he begged her for the assistance with all the glass.

Ajay was shuffling around in the kitchen, cleaning up slightly as she was becoming annoyed with the mess. She eventually took off downstairs to find something more durable to scrub the counters down with and grab something to drink to dull her senses from the events of the night.

Once the door snapped shut, Natalie grabbed another icepack from the freezer and shuffled over to Octavio on the couch to take her turn watching over him.

He scooted over, making room for her on the cushion beside him, and she sat down with a small smile.

“You’re forming a black eye.” she said, dabbing the ice packet to the side of his brow and looking down at him. “Thank you.”

“Worth it.” he muttered under his breath, gently tapping underneath his eye to feel for the pain of the bruise, to which received a giggle from Natalie. He smiled faintly at her laughter, shaking his head at her. “Ahh, Watts. Don’t thank me, alright? It’s enough for me he finally got what was coming for him for treating you like shit.”

She shook her head again and looked down sheepishly, pulling the ice back and resting her hands in her lap. “You noticed?”

“Noticed? It drove me crazy, chica. Surprised youdidn’t notice how pissed I always was. You deserve so much better than thatguy.”

“You’ve said that a lot. It was a lot more complicated than that, though.”

“Si. Si. I know.” he nodded, pausing before reaching for her arm cautiously. “Are you okay, Natalie?”

She shrugged her shoulders, patting the ice against his brow again and brushing her other hand along his neck where the imprint of the knife resided. “I believe I should be asking you that question, shouldn’t I?”

“Earlier, you said you had something to tell me?” he asked her, watching her intently as shivers sent down his spine from her touch. He felt weak for the first time tonight, lifting his hand to meet hers and offering it to hold.  

She hesitated, but wrapped her hand with his and let out a sigh. “You talk so much about worth, happiness, striving for the end goal… and I believe I know what I deserve finally. I just do not know how appropriate this is off of what just happened.”

“Define appropriate?”

“You may be one of the reasons I couldn’t stay with him any longer.” she admitted quietly, trailing her fingers up his arm and finding cuts and bruises from the fight blending with his tattoo. She dropped her gaze to his side, happy to see a pure white bandage still wrapped around him.  

It was impossible to look away from her as she inspected his body and tried to care for him, her words lingering in the air tempting him forward. She dabbed the ice on his brow again before placing it back in her lap, looking into his eyes with a concern. She took his hand in hers again, running a thumb over his bloody knuckles gently. She sucked in air, pursing her lips together. “Why did you do this to yourself? For me?”

“He couldn’t just call you that.” he replied, looking at her while she fiddled with his hand. He took his free hand, pushing her bangs out of her eyes and tilted her chin to look at him instead of the wounds on his hands. His held his breath slightly, her gaze meeting his and locking there. “How am I a reason?”

“I think I may want you quite terribly, Octavio.” she spoke quietly, her gaze lost in his hazel eyes.

“You’re just saying that because I beat up your ex less than an hour ago.”

“Non. I’m not.” she began, breaking away and looking away from him with a furrowed brow. “I wanted to leave him for a long while now. Renee has been trying to convince me to just pack up and go, I just… I felt like I could help him be a better person. I felt obligated to stay… to try. I don’t think he ever wanted to try for me like I did him, though. I realized how little I cared for him like that… realized that I missed you… when he told me I couldn’t see you, I was furious.”

“He did what?” he grumbled, but it received no reply as she continued speaking.  

“I could not wrap my head around why it made me so mad for him to try to keep me from you, and then tonight seeing you defend me and put yourself in harms’ way. You said so many kind things… I think everything makes a lot more sense. I know I have been avoiding what was right there out of fear of losing everything.”

“Chica, what are you-” he stammered, unsure of if he was truthfully hearing everything correctly. Did he have a concussion or was she reciprocating his feelings?

“I want to be with you, Octavio. Is that okay?” she asked him hesitantly.  

Octavio sat up in his spot on the couch, not having to hear another word once the phrase left her lips. He reached forward to wrap his arms around her waist and lifted her onto his lap in a swift movement. He slipped a hand up to her hair, drawing the two of them together and crashed his lips onto hers.

She melted into his grasp, her hands drifting over his bare chest and placing slow lingering kisses back onto his lips. It felt so much more in sync than it ever had before, a fever she couldn’t control and wouldn’t want to.  

He moved slowly with her, his hands roaming her body from her hair to her waist, and tried to take in every inch of the exquisite blonde before him. If this was a dream, he didn’t want to wake – he couldn’t contain his growing need for her when he had subdued it so long.  

She maneuvered around on his lap, perching herself straddled on top of him instead, and placed both of her hands on his cheeks to deepen the kiss between the two. His tongue was exploring hers as his fingertips trailed underneath her shirt and pulled on the hem at the bottom.  

She obliged to his inaudible request, helping him lift her shirt off over her head as she pulled back from the kiss with a heaving breath. He tossed the shirt behind his head, his hands instantly finding her bare skin and leaning up to place trailing kisses along her chest and stomach.  

She brought her hands to his chin, bringing his face back to meet hers and grazing her lips over his with a giggle escaping her.

Octavio looked up into her eyes, sliding his hand up her side and caressing her bare skin. “This isn’t too quick for you, Princesa?”

She shook her head, placing a small kiss onto his lips and then proceeded to trail more down his neck as she mumbled her words into his skin. “I’ve been thinking about this more than you would think. It is more so longoverdue.”

He bit down on his cheek as her lips touched his skin, closing his eyes as the shudders floated over his body because of it. Her touch alone would be able to turn him on to her, but her words of admiration were all it took to shove it over the edge of no return. He slid his hand to her back as he crashed his lips into hers again, unhooking her bra with his thumb and index finger and let the clasp come undone.  

She glanced down at him longingly as she sat up on her knees, carefully prying her bra from her body and letting it fall off of her in order to toss it off to the side. She was far more nervous than she was letting herself off to seem to be, unwilling to slow her momentum now that she was barreling headfirst towards something she thought would only be a fantasy.  

He couldn’t take his eyes off of her, admiring every piece of her that she was revealing to him. Her scar wrapped along her cheek and down her face to her shoulder blade, drawing him down to the base of the marks and beckoning him to leave more. He hesitantly reached for her, cupping one of her breasts in his hand and the other hand keeping at the small of her back to hold her closely. He placed a kiss along the top of her breast, biting down gently and looking up at her to see if she was okay with any of this as he did so.

He was met with relief as she let out a small moan, wrapping her hands back up in his hair and pulling him closer to her to kiss again – desperate to keep him near her. Her tongue slid over his bottom lip and over the puffed portion that had a cut on it from one of the punches, before slipping back into his mouth and begging for more from him.

Octavio couldn’t keep his hands off of her soft skin, and neither could Natalie to his. She moved her fingers to his toned waistline as they kissed, fumbling with the button and zipper on his pants and slowly got him out of his shorts to expose his boxers and toned thighs.

Her hands traced the muscles on his chest and arms, softly moving over the wound on his side, and taking in each part of him as she went. Each scar and bruise, new and old, and tried to savor the taste of him while it lasted like she had been lost in a drought and this was her first rainstorm in years.

He watched her carefully as she placed small pecks onto his skin, her moving to his lower abdomen and him hitching a breath in his throat from it. He couldn’t lay idle while she patiently adorned his body in faint lipstick stains, though he could watch her like this in awe all day.

Instead, he sat upright more in the couch and took more dominance over her. They toppled to be opposites on the couch with him now mounting her partially and slid his hand underneath the fabric of her pants.  

He groaned to himself, pleased and more aroused at the wet sensation that greeted him and he collided his lips to her neck to leave behind his own type of love mark. “You’re so fucking sexy…” he mumbled into her skin, biting down gently and sucking to leave marks along her bare skin, leaving traces of himself behind.

“Je te veux, Octy.” she moaned in reply, tilting her head back slightly. She looked back down at him as he teased her over her underwear and peered up at her with a playful, yet yearning, grin.  

Natalie gently pushed him back again, taking her place on top of him and cupped his face to passionately kiss him again. He reached forward, grabbing at her waist and unzipped her jeans impatiently, pulling them off of her body with a growing desire while they tried to keep themselves connected like their lives depended on it.

The two were ripping at what little remaining clothes they had left on, surrounded by the partial darkness of the room and the two pressed together until everything but themselves faded away into nonexistence; despite having people just downstairs. Neither cared, neither would be able to stop now if anyone tried – both had waited so long for this moment to come to a pinnacle that it was impossible to walk away.

She leaned down to place a kiss onto his shoulder blade, his hand settling on the inner of her thigh and stroking side to side.  

He tugged her closer with his one hand, moving his other along her thigh and teasingly starting to play with her beneath the thin fabric. His first touch caused her to gasp quietly, her nails digging into his skin instinctively and rushing to press her lips to his again.  

He drove his tongue into her mouth, both of them refusing to pull away as he toyed with her in-between the thighs and caused faint moans to rumble against his lips.

A raspier noise in an exhale came out in reply from him, unable to hold it back as her sounds only drove him further over the edge.  

Natalie grasped at his risen erection and stroked it gently a few times. He clutched his hand to her ass as she mounted him and lowered herself onto him, his eyes locked to her face as she moaned out loudly once she fully took him into herself.

He couldn’t help but smile selfishly, bringing his one hand to cup her cheek and the other at her hip to guide her movements while she found a rhythm as she eased herself in riding him. He was watching her in amazement, though he was always thinking that of her, but now something about her was so effortlessly stunning he felt honored to be bestowed this part of her at all. Her figure fit into his hands like a perfect match; his calloused and bruised hands gently caressing her soft skin, and he tossed his head back with a pleased groan.

She slowed slightly, which only drove him up the wall when he was starved for this to continue. She grazed her fingertips over his partially healed wound, thanks to D.O.C, and pressed a gentle kiss to his neck. “Are you alright, mon amour?”

He chuckled faintly, closing his eyes as her lips moved over his skin and sent electric tingles through him. A quiet moan left him, nodding his head partially. “Dios, how could I not be? You feel so good, hermosa. Por favor, no te detengas.”  

She coiled her arms around him, sighing in pleasure as she continued the rise and fall of her movements, slipping closer to him and burying her face in the crook of his neck to keep quiet as he became impatient with her cautious demeanor towards him.

The speed got quicker as he took more control, sitting up more and pressing his chest against hers to thrust himself deeper into her and sending out louder sounds of pleasure from Natalie. She bit down into his shoulder to quiet herself, her fingernails digging into his back and grinded her hips against his.

He slid his hand over her milky skin, cupping her breast in his hand and continuing to bounce her on his length with a rapid succession. It felt false that this was all happening and he was devouring every second of it, pushing harder the longer they were going; bodies sweaty in the heat of the badly insulated apartment and pressed together so tightly without room for air.  

Her hair was beginning to stick to her face, never losing her rhythm as she found his lips to kiss again. “Tavi, I’m…” she began, her voicing trailing off in higher pitched moan as her legs began to quiver. He took ahold of her by the ass and hip to keep her upright, her finding his gaze and cupping his face in her hand.

She pulled him in by the chin, placing a passionate kiss to his lips with a moan escaping him too as he felt himself coming to his climax. He gripped down on her skin to pull her in closer as he finished inside of her, a heavy exhale leaving his body alongside a melodic unison of both of their sounds of pleasure as they both reached that point together. He pulled himself out of her, running his fingers up her sides as they took labored breaths and she nestled herself into his embrace still straddled above him.

Octavio was stroking her bare skin softly and chuckled in his momentary exhaustion, glancing down at her as she looked to him with a tired smile. The twinkling of her eyes had returned from the last time he saw her, a real smile now on her face and the once shattered version of her he had come accustomed to had vanished to bring back the glowing person he had fallen for months prior. He was addicted and he wanted more, he craved her in every sense of the form. He wanted to keep this version of her around – he wanted to keep her around. “Care to go again, conejita?”

She blushed feverishly, dropping her head into the crook of his neck and he tightly wrapped his arms around her to pull her closer into a loving embrace. His touch was a healing sensation, one that brought her to a home within another person – she never felt this connected with anyone before, and if she thought she loved him before this she was surely lost in him now.  

She trailed her lips to his ear, whispering under her breath for him with a demand that even she wasn’t prepared to take no as an answer to. “Absolument. Take me home, mon amour.”  

Chapter Eleven
(previous chapter)(next chapter under hiatus)|(start over)
SUMMARY:A group of the Legends attend a Flyer Liars show together, Octavio and Natalie included.
RATING:T
SHIPS: Wattson and Octane
TAGS:alcohol, smoking, food mention, anxiety, fluff, angst, slow burn
around 14.9k words

A quiet lull was sitting over Natalie’s suite, the television on pause with a recap match playing and the sound of rain hitting against the window. Always a welcome pleasure by Natalie to see a calming rain, but it deterred some of the crowd from the event that day and made for a more relaxed schedule.

It hadn’t been longer than three days since they rescued Ajay from the parking lot, with her being drunk and forgetful the next morning. She offered an apology for the state they found her in and extended a new invite to her last show her group was having while they were still on the planet.  

It seemed the Flyer Liars drew in a fairly large crowd on the underground circuit; they sold out twice and decided to offer a third show, which sold out just as fast as the first two. It was only a few hours until doors opened for the event, Ajay already having vanished from the hotel to prep the venue along-side the technicians.  

It was late into the evening and curfew had set in for the night. All of the legends had returned to a suite for the night, safety precautions set in place for the event, though Octavio rarely followed that rule. Tonight, more than he would be breaking rules and skipping out for once. He had returned from a run earlier and was in the shower in Natalie’s suite to change for the show, only one among the many in the group preparing for tonight right now.

It was a bit of a complicated task to get a group of legends from the hotel to the event unnoticed, but Tae Joon offered his services to monitor the grounds and keep the entire thing under wraps. He had to stay back at the hotel to do so, but figured it was a better alternative than no one getting to go alongside Ajay. He would see another show some other time.  

Only a handful of people agreed right away to sneaking out of the hotel this late, and a few more came to an agreement after some convincing. Truly, it only took a bit of explaining just how coveted and well the event had done for everyone to want to tag along. Everyone was eager to see Ajay in her element on stage, they all got brief tastes in matches when she would drum in downtime with her shock sticks.

Last Octavio knew, there was around ten people planning on attending. He was just glad that Natalie had said yes and was a part of that group, even more so that she seemed enthused about going in the first place.

He felt eager to redo what he should have done during Elliott’s party. How he should have been at her side all night and showing her who he was, getting to know her. Plus, he hadn’t been to a show in ages. In fact, he couldn’t remember the last time he went to one it seemed it had been that long.

Needless to say, he was filled with eager anticipation waiting for the time to roll around to go. An escape from mundane tasks with Natalie; what more could he want out of something?  

He propped the bathroom door open, one towel wrapped around his waist and the other draped around his neck. Sticking out of his mouth was a toothbrush, which hung further down as he opened his mouth to speak. He grabbed the toothbrush at the last second, scanning the room to find her laying on the bed with her notebook and pen.

He grinned to himself, leaning onto the doorframe more to get a better look at her. He took in her frame, delicately curled up on the bed and her curves begging him to wrap her up.

She hadn’t even looked up as she was too focused on her work. She was laying around in a t-shirt and shorts, with his hoodie on and the hood itself thrown over her head. She had a pen stuck behind her ear and another in her hand, but he wasn’t sure what was being used or not.

“Aye, Princesa, will you hand me my bag?” he asked, gesturing towards the black backpack laying on the floor beside her dresser.  

She hesitated in looking up, her hand still scribbling as she tried to listen to him. Once she finished writing, she looked upwards and compressed her lips together in apology. “Hmm? Oh! Of course.”

He chuckled as she got up from the bed, sliding her notes aside before standing and scurried to the bag to grab it. She picked it up from the straps, holding both evenly so nothing would fall out because the zipper was open and handed it to him at the door.

Her eyes trailed over his wet skin; the towel draped at his defined hips that fell into a V and beckoned her to wonder what was underneath. She snapped her gaze back towards the ground away from him when she caught herself staring too long, her cheeks flushing a deep red despite it being a secretive thought for only herself to hear.

“Gracias.” he took the bag, unaware of her wandering eyes, disappearing back into the bathroom to finish changing and brushing his teeth; leaving the door slightly cracked open as he did.  

“How was your shower?” she asked him, clearing her throat, crawling back onto the bed and falling back onto her side with her things in front of her. She propped herself up on her shoulder, tapping her pen on the paper and watched the door for him. She heard the sink run and then stop, and a bag zip and hit the floor before he answered her.

“Oh, not bad. Took too long.” he laughed faintly. He pushed the door open all the way with his foot and exited the bathroom while drying his hair, a towel in one hand rubbing at his head. He dropped the towel onto the floor by the bathroom door, fixing his cropped tank top that was clinging to his still slightly damped chest as he walked over to her. He looked down at the notebook, seeing some sketches and getting a bit lost. “What you workin’ on?”

“A few alters for some mechanics in the game!” she answered quickly, flipping the book closed and sliding her work towards the end of the bed. “Nothing special. Just nonsense that can wait, besides it’s no rush on the deadlines.”

“Work can wait?” he teased.

“Oui! Work canwait until another day. Besides, we have to get going soon for Ajay’s show.” she reminded, peering down at her phone to check the time. “Speaking of, I should get dressed.”

He sat down on the edge of the bed as she stood up. She shuffled over to her clothing and crouched down beside her things. She began digging through her luggage trying to find a pair of distressed jeans, somewhere hidden in the bags she brought.

He ran his hands through his still damp hair, shaking some water from it as he watched her searching.  

She pulled out the jeans and her sneakers, carrying them on her arm in a stack. She hurried into the bathroom and closed the door behind her, leaving him alone to sit idly by waiting for her to return.

Octavio patted at the pockets of his shorts, finding them empty. He huffed, looking around the room for his missing cigarettes and wallet and tried to spot them from where he sat. When he couldn’t find them right away, he stood and began wandering around.

He started to search the room, looking underneath some books and clothes and eventually found his things on the kitchen counter. The last place he expected to find it was where it was. Neatly stacked side by side, they were clearly placed there by Natalie when she found them somewhere less accessible.

He took the pack and wallet and shoved it into his front pocket, grinning to himself as he checked the door for Natalie. When the door didn’t open yet he turned his attention to his phone, quickly scrolling through his unread text messages to see if any seemed important to reply to but he barely read anything as he tapped through. Some seemed like they were professional in nature but he didn’t care, he couldn’t focus on that right now though when the only thoughts he could muster involved Natalie and himself with her.

A door creaked open as he was scrolling, immediately taking his focus back to Natalie who appeared looking anxious. She brushed a few strands of hair from her eyes before readjusting the jacket that rested on her shoulders.  

“Aye, chica, what’s up?” he asked her, putting his phone into his other front pocket and closing the space between them in the same beat.

“I’m just second guessing if this is a good idea. I love Ajay and all, but I just don’t know how loud or busy it’ll be. What if we get spotted by press and they expose us in the next magazine? Are we even allowed to be in relationships with other Legends? I hadn’t considered that. Even worse, what if we get caught leaving? Do you think they’ll suspend us from the games?” she explained in a ramble, sorrowful as she crossed her arms over her chest. It was a lot to have running through her head at once and he was regretful she was so full of stress towards what was supposed to be a fun outing. He wondered what it was like inside of her head with how quickly and often she found reasons to alter course because of concerns laid in theory. Was it her past that made her hardened and easy to scare, or did she adapt to keep those around her happier by keeping herself in a bubble? Was she even scared or just overly aware of what could come to live in bliss?

“Mira, hey, look at me.” he started, placing his finger under her chin and raising her face to look into his eyes. “I will notlet anything happen to you. If shit gets to you, we can leave pronto. Photo and video, or whatever, is prohibited at Flyer shows unless it’s the photographer they hired. Ajay promised there would be a decent pair of headphones waiting for you if you needed ‘em to dull out the noise a little.”

Natalie shifted on her feet, letting out her nervous breath and nodded slightly. She unfolded her arms, opening them up to him and slunk in for a hug. She found a comfort with him that she hadn’t had anywhere else, someone who was patient to listen to her concerns and dismantle each one in order to help her move forward. This truly was feeling more and more like a storybook romance she remembered hearing in her childhood. The princess gets the prince and they live happily ever after… was this hers? Was that life?

He sighed slightly, a weak smile on his face as he brought her in for an embrace. He wrapped his arms around her waist tightly, giving her a small squeeze and placed a kiss on her cheek.  

“You still wanna go?” he asked her, quietly.

“I do. Youlove these kinds of things; I have to at least try. Besides, I want to support Ajay. She’s so happy with how well these shows did. She hasn’t performed in years before coming back here. The response has been so thrilling to see and it’s not even my band. I’m very proud of her! I have to try.” she said, pulling back from the hug and giving him a reassuring smile. “Besides you’ll be with me, how can I say no?”

He grinned, bouncing in place on his feet slightly as he pulled away from her to check his phone again. “Glad you said that cause our ride’s gonna be outside in ten. We gotta go.”

Octavio clicked his phone off, rushing towards his bag and squatted beside it. He fished out his mask and goggles, putting them on and then going back into the bag for more items. He hurriedly got a few rings and some earrings, kicking the bag back against the wall as he hopped to his feet.  

He readjusted his mask as he approached the door to leave, fiddling with it under his fingers as he walked though he wasn’t paying much attention to the placement.

Natalie giggled faintly from the door, watching him rush around the suite and gathering his things. She stood with a small bag at her side, a few tassels hanging off the side, the long strap resting on her shoulder.

He looked at her and cocked his head to the side, slowing to a stop at the door where she stood. “Why’d you stop?”

She brought her hands to his mask and readjusted it again for him, tucking the straps up as she fixed the crooked slant that he had given himself.  

“Oh. Gracias.” he mumbled; lucky his mask hid the red tint on his cheeks. He peered down at her lips, biting down on his own. “Ready?”

“Lead the way!” she said, fixing her hood to cover her head and tightening the strings, preparing for the stealthy exit to leave the hotel.

He offered his hand to her and she took it with a wide smile, interlocking their fingers as she swiped the lights to her suite off.

The two hurried out of the room together, taking the stairs down to the main lobby to avoid being spotted leaving the elevators. They had become good at traveling in stealth, what with detouring and avoiding fans to keep them from finding out about the blooming relationship between the two.

It was quiet in the halls this late, most hotel recipients sound asleep in bed or resting in the room they were paying for, and the sound of feet travelled farther and faster. Plus, with cameras on every corner and less people to crowd the spaces it was easier to spot someone out of place. Luckily, they had Tae Joon intercepting camera signals to guide the way with ease. It benefitted having everyone work as unit to pull off something of the sort, surely moving the operation a lot faster being able to slip under the radar of watching security guards.

The trek down to the main lobby caused the two’s duo to grow in size; as Ramya, Elliott, Loba, and Anita all tacked on to the group slipping out of the hotel together. At the base of the stairs already waiting for the others was Fitzroy, Pathfinder, Bloodhound, and Renee.  

Natalie giddily greeted Renee with a hug, trying to keep her ‘hello’s’ down to a whisper as they all gathered in the bottom corridor to headcount before leaving. Octavio lingered behind her, his hand in his back pocket and looking around at the group.

“Is everybody here?” Octavio asked, quietly.

“I believe so. Mary and Makoa are watching movies and babysitting Nikola for me tonight. Dr. Caustic said no.” Natalie replied.

“Did he say no, or did he cuss you out with words bigger than Elliotts brain?” Ramya cackled under her breath, pulling her flask from her pocket to take a sip.

“Uhm, rude, right here.” Elliott frowned.

“Sorry, mate.”

“I believe he called us ‘imbeciles wasting away’ or something when I asked, amongst other things I won’t repeat.” Natalie said with a shrug.

“Well, jokes on him cause tonight’s gonna be dope.” Elliott grinned, winking at Renee.

“Don’t say that.” Loba groaned, rolling her eyes and checking her watch as she tightened her sleek black trench coat around her waist. “The van should be rolling up now. A bit lacking in style, but I’ll let it pass for the night. It was short notice.”

The group collectively left the corridor, hurrying out of the back door and all piling into the van awaiting them out in the parking lot to get out of the rain that was still continuing to drizzle over Psamathe.  

Two doors slid open at the hands of Octavio and Fuse and plush bench seating awaiting them was revealed in three rows. In the front seat, behind the wheel, sat Jamie who waved a quick hello.

“Thank you for showing up last minute.” Loba cooed, sliding into the passenger seat and typing into the navigation once she sat down. “Take a seat and get comfy. We have a bit of a drive awaiting us, according to Ajay this location is further out than the first two shows. It’s a bigger venue, I suppose.”

“I love roadtrips! How much farther?” Pathfinder asked, a question mark appearing on his chest as he looked at the group. He sat in the front row alongside Anita and Elliott, behind them was Bloodhound, Fitzroy, and Renee. In the last row sat Octavio, Natalie, and Ramya.

The van slowly rolled into a start, bumping everyone around slightly as they left the parking lot and turned down the street.

“Mate, we justleft.” Fitzroy laughed, leaning over to look at Pathfinder with a grin.

“Mmm,” Loba looked down at the map, clicking through the details and turned to look into the back of the van. “A half hour?”

“I should’ve brought more booze.” Ramya mumbled, pausing as she was tilting her flask back to take another drink.  

“Perhaps pace yourself?” Bloodhound implied, tilting their head up and turning behind them to watch Ramya down the rest of her flask with a head shaking confusion.

“Valid point. Maybe next time.” Ramya pointed back, hiccupping once and patting Bloodhound on the shoulder.

Octavio leaned back in his seat, stretching his one arm around Natalie and draping it over her shoulder. He tapped his foot impatiently, looking out the window at the passing buildings and tried to catch street signs to see where they were.  

Natalie folded her hands in her lap and held her bag there, crossing one leg over the other and leaning into the crook of his arm for comfort. She looked over at him, nudging him slightly with a grin on her face. “Are you excited?”

“Duh. I should be asking youthat.” he said, leaning down to talk quieter with a breathy laugh. “You still nervous?”

She shook her head partially, her fingers fiddling with the button on her bag. “Only a little bit.”

“I’m real glad you’re here, Watts.” he said, reaching his free hand to intertwine his with hers. “Things are gonna be kickass tonight. Swear.”

“I’m glad I’m here, too.”” she nodded along, taking his hand and smiling widely.

A quickening pace of the van meant they had met the interstate, and Octavio sighed in relief that the trip was going to be moving much faster now. He looked forward to the rest of the group, kicking his legs up on the seat in front of him.

Fitzroy glanced over to see the metal feet sticking out beside his head and turned on his side in the seat to look behind him.  

“Oh. Sorry, amigo.” he replied quickly, sliding his feet over so they weren’t as close to his head.  

“Nah, no worries. You been to many of her shows? You kiddos go way back, yeah?”

“I’ve seen a majority of em’. I’ve always gone alone or went with Ajay to set up shit at the venue though, you know? So, this is pretty sick to go with everybody. Now you’ll all get why I say she’s the best drummer around.” Octavio shrugged nonchalantly, unaware of the growing intrigue of Natalie who couldn’t help but wonder if he was really ready to share this part of him with her.

“You’ve never brought anybody to her shows before?” Natalie asked, slightly curious.

Octavio tilted his head down to look at her, shaking his head with a squeeze of her hand. “Not just anybodydeserves to see the Flyer Liars with me. Come on, I’m basically a V.I.P there.”

She laughed softly, squeezing his hand back and let a smile settle permanently on her lips. It was another glimpse into the life of Octavio Silva for her, and she was grateful he was willingly opening up to her now. Maybe long gone were the days of scraping for pieces of him – maybe he wanted to know her just as deeply as she did him. She had tried for a few years now, ever since they met really, to get to know him better and more than just the Octaneshe saw in the arena. It was a comforting feeling to know that things between them were falling into a more relaxed space, one where he was showing himself to her. It felt breakable and vulnerable to be so open with another person, wanting to memorize them down to the last detail so you could have them with you when they went away.

She felt as if the two could last the trial of time for the first time in the last few weeks. At least, she was now determined to make that a reality. The truth was that she couldn’t see herself without him and she knew that now completely as they sat side by side in the back of the van together. Their hands clasped together and him distractedly looking out the window every fifteen seconds to see how far they had gone. She was quite happy; happy with him and where things were for the two and intended on keeping it that way. Things were supposed to be simple right now, but they were anything but with how complex her feeling for him were.

He was just eager to arrive at the venue right now, unable to keep still in his seat in the van the rest of the drive there.  

The second they arrived, he threw the door open and hopped out onto the wet pavement. He turned on his heel to help Natalie out of the van, offering his hand to her which she took instantly.  

She stepped out alongside him and pushed her hood from her head, looking up at the sky for a moment. “At least it stopped raining!”

“Si, I bet the line outside reallyappreciated it.” he motioned towards them all with umbrellas and damp clothes, taking his cigarettes from his pocket as a few members of the group walked slowly together towards the venue. He yanked his mask down slightly, looking towards the doors and scanned the line for anyone that looked familiar but didn’t spot anyone and was glad for it.

He swiped one of his cigarettes from the pack and placed it between his lips, stopping to light it.  

“The line’s really long, whoa. I wasn’t expecting that many people.” Elliott said, baffled and ruffling his hand through his hair to fix it. “I didn’t realize how popular they were.”

“Che said she had to pull some strings to get us in – but I mean, like they’ll tell her no?” he laughed, puffing on his cigarette and exhaling it into the wind while he was still stood outside before the show.

Loba was the last the join the group of legends standing in a circle in the parking lot outside the venue, having just bid Jamie goodbye and set a time for him to swing back to retrieve them all. She stepped up to everyone, pulling open her phone and checking in with Tae Joon quickly. After a few taps on the screen, she seemed confident. “I think everything is settled. We’re good to go for the night. So, I guess have fun and meet back here in four hours. If you’re late, we’re not going to be waiting for you.”

“Onthatnote, I’m heading inside.” Ramya stated, walking ahead of the group and paused to lean on Octavio’s shoulder. She pursed her lip, looking at him. “Where am I headed?”

Octavio chuckled, pointing towards the front door and a bouncer. “Go talk to them, then.”

“Ah, let’s go get us some cold ones for the night. Get on this one’s level here.” Fitzroy replied, referencing to Ramya as he followed her to the front doors with Bloodhound, Pathfinder, Anita, and Loba following behind.

Renee side stepped from where she was standing in the crowd as some of them dispersed. She beamed at Natalie, approaching her as she spotted the two of them still side by side. She was glad to see they had become such a unit – she told him to keep an eye on her, and it seemed they took it to another level she couldn’t help but appreciate for her friend. It was fulfilling to see her have someone who visibly cared so much for her in her life. “You not heading in yet?”

Natalie looked over at Octavio, who was speed smoking through his cigarette to rush inside, and then back at Renee with a shake of her head and a grin. “Not yet, no.”

“It’s gross you even smoke those. Do they even have filters?” Renee asked him, retching slightly as she thought about it. “Ugh, how do you stomach that?”

“Qué? I like the taste and it’s easier to roll my own without a filter, so I just don’t use them.” he shrugged, looking at the cigarette in his hand and then back at her.

“Whatever works for you, I guess.” she shrugged in reply, but was still weary of accepting it, looking back at Natalie. “I’ll see you both inside then maybe?”

“Absolutely!” Natalie waved her off, shifting on her foot and stuffing her hands in her pockets. She turned to look at Octavio with a smile on her face, bouncing on her heels as she stood next to him. She made sure to stand on the opposite side of the blowing smoke, keeping herself from the down draft but being able to stay here with him.  

He put his cigarette out on the ground, stepping on it with his foot to extinguish it. He looked around them as the group all vanished inside the door, leaving them alone standing in the parking lot together. He grinned, pulling his mask down further on his neck as he closed the space between them with a few steps. He was happy she was still standing out here with him rather than following the group inside, she could’ve easily gone with Renee instead but she chose him, she keptchoosing him, and it filled him with joy to be that first pick. “You want to go in the back way and see Ajay before she goes on?”

Her eyes lit up, nodding at him quickly. “Oui, I would!”

He placed a quick peck on her cheek, pulling his mask up onto his face and looked at her with a gesture to his mask. “Do I look good?”

“Always handsome and put together just enough.” she smiled, brushing a strand of hair on his head into a better spot and poked him in the nose.

He froze, a faint blush forming on his cheeks that he was happy to be hidden from her. He was a taken aback by her compliment, having heard it from fans before but always brushing it off and ignoring it. He didn‘t care about his appearance, it wasn’t important when you pull stunts. However, hearing her spin sweet words around him and how he looked to her and mean it made his heart swell. He stuttered on the thought. “I meant my mas-, you think I’m handsome?”

“Very, actually. Haven’t I told you that before?” she asked him, noticing his pause and thinking back on each time he spoke highly of her. Had she returned the favor? Had she even told him how highly she thought of him? She couldn’t recall telling him how she thought of him in that moment, but she remembered each time she bit her tongue and kept a lingered gaze to herself. Every time she admired him from afar and wondered maybe but kept it to herself. Perhaps she was so busy hiding how she felt she wasn’t embracing it fully enough before, after all it didn’t seem right to keep her appreciation to herself when nothing is granted to last.  

She shouldn’t be sitting on unsaid words, at least she didn’t want to be that person anymore who kept things to herself. She had so many things she had wished to say and had lost the chance – maybe this was one of those times to speak up.

He cleared his throat, looking from her to the ground and tried to ignore the question due to his inability to accept the compliment coming from her. He scrunched his nose up, trying to laugh it off and shrugged it off trying to detour the conversation elsewhere. “Me? You’re quite the stunner yourself, you know.”

She rolled her eyes, blushing absentmindedly and laughing him off just as he did her originally. “Don’t change the subject! Have I not ever told you that? Everyone should hear it, especially you, and you need to know it’s true!”

“Let’s just head-”

She took his hand into hers again, brushing her other hand over his cheek with a bright smile and looked into his goggles to reach his eyes behind them. “You’re a mass of potential, energy, and to top it off you are very beautiful; inside and out.”

He paused, lingering on the feeling of her hand on his cheek and her sweet words circling him. He hadn’t heard any of those things projected at him in sincerity before, and it was a feeling to savor. No follow up of asking him to do better, no condescending tone that said he did anything but. It was hard to swallow when he was so used to being dismissed.

“You are extraordinary, Octavio. I knew that from the second I saw your gauntlet run footage. I probably would have known it a lot sooner if we knew each other personally before.”

“Where’s this coming from exactly?” he asked her, though devouring every word that she laid out for him.

“I’m not sure, it has just been these last few weeks getting to know you better. I realize we have not really spoken like thisbefore, I never told you that, I don’t believe. I felt like you needed to know that. Is it too forward? I-” she stumbled over her words, suddenly worried she stepped over an invisible boundary. She was just caught up in how good everything felt between them right now, she forgot it was all still in a delicate beginning phase when they had been together night after night now. He was becoming a part of her life and she wanted to make sure he knew how much she cared, though still they hadn’t confirmed even what they were to each other. She wasn’t sure if she was even ready to determine where they went next when everything they were right now was working so wonderfully these last few days.

“Gracias, Natalie. It means a lot.” he admitted, his heart fluttering in his chest with each word.

She patted his cheek and smiled widely at him, his words calming her nerves that her statement was out of line.

“Now, shall we go see Ajay?” she asked him, peeking at her phone to check the time and then back at him.

“For sure. Let’s go, hermosa. We aren’t done talking about this though. I didn’t get to repay the same to you.” he grinned, darting off ahead of her to a door on the side of the building without giving her time to reply and her following in step with a quiet laughter.

He led the two of them around the corner, following a concrete path as they went and traced the edge of the parking lot. Natalie slid her hand along the building, walking in pace with him as she trailed the exterior.

She huffed, shaking her head as she went but a smile still formed at her lips and was unable to argue as they were running behind compared to the rest of the group and he had already taken off to avoid her reply.

As they approached the door, a bouncer who was less attentive and sitting alone on the side of the building, looked up from a magazine at them. She cocked her head to the side, eyeing them and tossing her magazine onto the chair as she stood. She replaced the magazine with a tablet, turning on the screen and looking up impatiently at them. “Names?”

“Silva.”

After a few taps, she found him on the list and scratched her head. She looked down at the tablet once more for clarification before turning to a locked box beside her chair. She clicked it open with a key around her wrist, pulling out two passes for either of them. “Er, okay so two lanyards, then. Please recycle them at the end of the night. Do not remove or lose this during the event or while on the premise, they are your pass and ticket around the venue. Valid for tonight only, do nottry to use it again. Have a great show.”  

The bouncer unlocked the backdoor, pulling it open to reveal a dim hallway with faint booming music coming from inside. She handed them a lanyard each, both of them slipping them on around their necks.

Octavio offered his arm and Natalie wrapped her hand around it, grasping onto his bicep. She took a deep breath and followed closely beside him as they stepped through the doorway and down a few steps into the hall. He seemed to know his way around already, and she stuck closely to him as to not get lost or separated.  

People were passing back and forth at quick speeds, some with headsets and equipment and others with instruments. Octavio didn’t get distracted by each person passing like Natalie had been, guiding them down the hall further into the back of the building and stopped at a pair of double doors only briefly. He used both of his hands to yank the metal doors open and motioned for Natalie to go ahead of him, waving his pass at a guard to get past the security at the doors.

She slid through the double doors and felt him press up behind her as they both entered the room together, the door closing tightly behind them once they were inside. He rubbed her arm gently, stepping around her and walking into the room that was quieter than the hall and only filled with four people.  

One person sat at a table on the phone and writing in a notebook simultaneously, while the other three were scattered around the room relaxing before the show on plush seating or couches.

What once was a warehouse overflow storage, now was the venue’s green room. The room was concrete floors with rugs draped over to makeshift a floor. Overhead lighting that was dimmed and mirrors along one wall that lit up brighter with cosmetics strew about the tables. There were a few places to sit and a coffee table sitting in the middle of them all. The smell of liquor and a stench of a smoky skunk residue wafted around the room.  

“It’s Silva!” one of the members chimed out, raising a beer up in a greeted hello. “and a smokin’ hot blonde. Hello, there. Aren’t you a legend like these two? They let somebody as gorgeous as you compete?”

“She’s one of the best, actually. Wattson.” Octavio replied defensively, passing his hand behind her to take ahold of Natalie. He slipped his arm around her waist, trying to bring her to the back of the room towards Ajay sitting at the mirrors but was met with slight resistance.

He felt flustered and annoyed, wanting to personally take it into his own hands, but was silent as Natalie straightened her posture. He didn’t feel like he had a right to speak for her, though he wanted to do so desperately. He just hated hearing someone else trying to compliment her. It sat uneasily in the pit of his stomach, but he was grateful she wasn’t seeming to care – or reciprocate it. He always forgot how stern she was in the arena. She wasn’t one to be walked over without having something to say about it, she wasn’t one to be under estimated; he learned that the hard way, but was grateful in the long run for all her blows to his inflated ego at the time to bring him back to his core. He had began forgetting who he was to start it all when he first showed up, running endlessly until he accomplished a goal and then looking for the next.

He was just glad to not be on the receiving end of her wrath anymore.

“I’m more than appearances. I am assuming that was intendedto be kind, however. Considering you are friends with Ajay, merci, I think.” she cracked a weak smile pursing her lips together to hide her aggravation, waving hello to the other band members with her free hand.  

Octavio gently nudged Natalie along, mainly to get her away from the flirtatious band member, walking towards the mirrors to stand behind Ajay as she was finishing putting on her makeup.  

They slowed to a stop, appearing in the mirror behind her and Ajay smiled widely. She had applied a thick layer of liner to her lid, placing the pen down and turning quickly once she noticed them in the reflection alongside her.

She rose from her raised chair, stepping down onto the floor and pulled Natalie into a tight hug.

“Yuh made it!” she exclaimed, rocking her friend slightly during the hug and pulling back to get a better look at both Octavio and Natalie. She grinned, shoving Octavio in the shoulder playfully and jittered on her feet before pointing towards her band member. “Sorry 'bout him. He’s working on being lessof an ass.”

“Sorry.” he replied, muttered and echoed through an almost empty beer glass before raising to his feet.

“I gotcha somethin’!” Ajay said, shaking her head as she spoke focusing back on Natalie.

“Oh?” Natalie replied, curious.

Ajay turned to unzip her bag sitting on the table beside her mirror, pulling out a pair of thin headphones that sat over your head. They were yellow and still wrapped in the plastic. She turned, handing it to Natalie with excited anticipation. “We searched everywhere for dat thang. Not too bulky, but it’s great at diluting sound. It’ll help, for sure. If it don’t though, yuh can come hang in here to chill out.”

Natalie collected her gratefulness, taking the headphones out of the plastic and slipping them on to rest around her neck. “This is so sweet of you, Ajay. I know you have offered before; I just didn’t want to put you through all that trouble of accommodating me. Wait, we?”

“O was the one running around for me after a while. I got busy wit’ interviews and gettin’ muh kick drum fixed. Ain’t nobody or nothing would stop me from gettin’ you here! I think O would say the same, yuh know?”

“Are you kidding me? It’s not a trouble if it helps you, Watts, I’d run anywhere to find you what you need.” Octavio agreed, tapping the headphones around her neck with a thick laugh.  

“Eugh. Enough, please.” Ajay joked, sticking her tongue out at the two and turning back to grab her sticks off the table. “You both best find a good spot here soon. Curtain is in ten.”

“As they say in the theater, break a leg!” Natalie chimed at her.

“Don’t take that literally, Silva.” Ajay laughed.

She walked both of them back to the double doors that lead to the hallway, checking the time once to see how quickly they all should be hurrying. She hugged them both goodbye for the time being, waving them off down the hall.

It was a quick walk for Octavio and Natalie back to the main room of the venue, having been able to bypass lines using the backstage corridors. They ended up slipping out of a side door beside the bar, him leading her into the condensed crowd.  

It was quieter now though still filled with a lull of voices in the main room, the stage empty, but the colored lights brightly filling the dark room and a faint thumping of a random track being played to pass the time for the crowd. The bartender was working at lightspeed, tossing out drinks for customers rushing to get a refill during the downtime between acts.

Natalie exhaled nervously the second the door behind them clasped shut and closed off the hall light. She had no clue why she felt so anxious, perhaps it was just anticipation for the show and knowing she was here with him. She felt Octavio step behind her, his arm slinking around her waist as they stood at the side of the crowd and he placed his lips near her ear.

“Want anything, Princesa?” he asked, glancing at the bar beside them and then back at her.

She shook her head ‘no’, taking ahold of his hand at her side and crossing her arms over her stomach. She looked into his goggles, smiling once she reminded herself how nice this moment would be for the two of them if she only let herself relax. Her concerns were within his fans, mainly, but she didn’t notice anyone running up to demand his attention right now. No one would see them in the darkness of the room, nothing would happen after tonight that would ruin things, everything would be okay if she just let herself enjoy this.

Instead, she let herself focus on Octavio and the energized bounce to him as they stood together. It brought a smile to her face, squeezing his hand in hers.

As for Octavio, he was feeling unstoppable right now soaking in the anticipation from the crowd, the feeling of a concert or show could never be replicated and he always appreciated the sensation. It flashed by in an instant but you talked about it for years. He could only strive for that kind of longevity with his stunts.  

Just like a reckless drive late into the night this was one of his most beloved past times and sharing it with Natalie was thrilling, though he knew she was still wary with how much she would enjoy it. She was an overthinker at heart, but it was her scientific nature to find solutions. He admired her for it – but did wish she would just move past things sometimes and do without thinking. He couldn’t help but remember the laughter and racing filled night she tried what most likely was the impossible before – and it seemed he enjoyed showing her new things far more than he realized. He wanted to be the person to help her branch out and try new things. She had done that for him plenty so far and he felt he wanted to return that favor like many others.

He was just glad to bring his past and himself into what they had started together. He never did that with anyone before, never shared a piece of himself with them and asked them to stay.  

He nudged her gently, looking around for a route through the crowd. “Let’s get a better view of the stage. Sound good?”

She nodded, unfolding her arms with him spinning her slightly so he didn’t have to drop his hold on her hand. She laughed slightly, her nervous settling more from the spin as she drifted in the careless world that Octavio brought her into.

The two held tightly to one another’s hands as they trudged through the crowd, finding a spot to stand that was situated near the back of the room but center to the stage. As they slunk through, Natalie bumped into someone and quickly turned to apologize.  

Turning around with a laugh was Renee, grasping hold of Natalie’s shoulders before the two stumbled more. “Didn’t think I’d see you! Where were you guys?” she asked them, slightly drunk and yelling to contrast the crowd more than she needed to be. A few people around them glanced over but returned to talking amongst themselves rather quickly after.

“We went back to see Ajay.” Octavio replied, his hand still connected to Natalie’s and his thumb grazing over her palm. He gestured towards her empty glass. “What’d you get?”

“Just some limited time drink for the night. The bartender said Ajay came up with the cocktail, so I wanted to try it. It’s not bad.”

“Ah, shit. I forgot allabout those specialty drinks. Can’t believe they still sell them.”  

The lights clicked down, the sound of the crowd yelling erupting for the show and ending the conversation between the three. Natalie winced at the screaming coming from directly beside her, grasping for her headphones and pulling them up onto her ears. Maybe it was best to use them before it got any worse.

Everything muffled out and she sighed in relief, a heavy breath leaving her body and relaxing with it. Octavio stepped closer to her, placing a hand at her waist and tapping the headphones now on her ears. He gave her a thumbs up, and she returned him with one back.  

He bounced happily at her reply, turning her to face the stage by the waist and pulled her back against his chest. His arms draped around her from behind, twiddling his fingers as they stood together through the entrance of the band. She could feel his heart thumping in her back, it pressed against his chest. It was beating rapidly, feeling the quickness of what he strove to feel all the time, and held a hand to her own heart to compare as she watched the show starting.

The lights flashed on a pulse, multiple colors lighting up the scenery and then back to pitch black. After a moment, they heard the bang of a drum ring out through the darkness and Natalie jumped excitedly on her feet to cheer for what she knew was Ajay.

Once the lights came up fully, it showcased the Flyer Liars together up on the stage, side by side with instruments and smirks on their faces ready to put on a show for the screaming fans that managed to swing tickets to the show at all. Standing behind the two upfront on a stand raised higher, and on her drums, was Ajay with her hands banging on the tom drum in between her legs. She stood up on her bench seat, raising her arms up higher.

“We are the Flyer Liars!” she yelled; a smile plastered over her face as she met a pleased yell from the crowd. The faint strumming of a guitar was under her words, and she waved at the crowd with one of her sticks. “Hope ya liked the opener we booked for ya guys. Tonight is pretty special and not just ‘cause this is our third show that you all sold out, again.”  

Ajay paused, looking at the crowd and smirked again letting herself soak in the cheers. “Not only is this our last show, but we have plenty of Apex Legends scattered throughout the crowd tonight.”

A few gasps and cheers escaped the crowd, one bellowing yell from Fitzroy coming from the bar and another from Elliott near the front of the stage.  

“We givin’ you all a kickass show tonight, and I’m glad my friends are here to see it! Don’t forget in a week we add a new one to the family at the banquet, tune in! You may just hear a new single from a certain group you all claim to like.” she laughed, pointing to the back of the crowd towards Natalie and Octavio with her stick and smiled. She dropped down to her feet, landing on the bench and yelling out again counting her band in together.

Octavio felt the rush of the music wash over him, but his attention focused on Natalie at first, looking to her in front of him to see if she was okay with it now that the show was started fully. He smiled to himself as he watched her bopping along to the music, hesitantly dancing to it but seeming to enjoy herself. He took it as affirmation he could lose himself slightly in the music too.  

He closed his eyes, letting the thumping of the bassline pound in his body and he started dancing along to the music with his hand at her waist at first. She was standing so closely, her body against his and his heart raced faster because of it.  

After a minute, he strayed from her partially and was jumping around with the crowd along to the music and the chants of others screaming the words along with the band. Natalie laughed at the sight of him, no limit to his intensity and felt her heart grow with happiness. How she happened to find another portion of him she liked more than the last, she wasn’t sure, but she adored him. She reached for his arm, not wanting to lose him in the dense group of people they were dancing in.  

Octavio took her hand, spinning her in a few circles on the ball of her foot and pulled her in closer with a breathy chuckle that her own laughter mixed with. They maneuvered around in circles, dancing together and vanishing into a world where it was only the two alone in the room despite having a few hundred people around them. They could’ve been plucked right out of a living room with the lack of care they had to the wandering eye being together.  

It was a carefree opposite right now to how Natalie felt during press week. She always feared being caught by the wrong person and losing the serenity that came with barely anyone knowing about the two of them. There were so many factors at play, so many unreliable variables that could ruin what she was holding so closely. It was refreshing to have a space so public and yet so private for the two, at least for tonight she felt as if it was okay to let her guard down to be with him fully finally. It only took the feeling of the drums hitting her chest to make her forget, the gift she found within him dancing away and looking to her to be the partner.  

She felt free right now, feeling the sensation of the music within her and losing herself as she danced around with Octavio running his hands along her skin. She was feeling a complex list of emotions right now, but it all summarized down to never wanting this moment to end with him.

He had grasped at her hips, moving the two in motion to together, and her arms were draped around his neck.

After a set of songs gone and passed, Octavio was still wired but Natalie began winding down though she wished she wasn’t.

He turned in time to notice her force a fake smile and lowered his level of energy as he got even closer to her, pointing a thumb over his shoulder towards the doors to question if she was ready to take a break. He leaned towards her ear to ask her if she was alright as her hand grasped his arm.

She didn’t even wait for him to say anything, him about to speak as she nodded her head quickly to him; not thinking she could even hear him right now over the music anyway. She was just growing tired, and thirsty, and had tried to hide that fact from the speedster with endless battery with nosuccess.

Apparently.

Octavio didn’t hesitate once he saw her nod at him pleadingly for a break, wiping his arm over his forehead to remove the sweat from dancing. He pulled the hood of the jacket onto her head, cupping her cheek gently and nodded back at her in understanding.

He cut through the crowd with her holding his hand tightly. The two sliding through the masses and finding the side door next to the bar again, Octavio opening it up for her and Natalie scurried through it into the hall. She placed her hands at her sides, taking deep breaths as she giggled from the excitement of the night.  

He shut the door behind him, turning to look at her as he pulled it closed and grinned widely to himself as her laugh echoed around him. The sound of the show still blared on at a fainter sound behind him as he moved forward down the hall. “You’re a good dancer.”

“So are you!” she said, tugging the headphones from her ears, and grinning at him widely as she relaxed her back and raised her foot to press against the wall. She patted at her forehead to find it sweaty, a softer laugh leaving her lips as she looked over at him with another deep breath.

“You alright?” he questioned, moving closer and placing his hand beside her head on the wall and leaning towards her.

Natalie brushed her hand over his chest, sliding her hand over his shoulder and rested her arm there as she nodded with a wide smile. “I’m amazing! I would love something to drink, though.”

“Come on.” he grinned back at her, eyeing her lips and trailing his gaze to her eyes that were glimmering with energy from the night. He was so attracted to her right now while she was clearly running on an adrenaline high - it wore so well on her, to him at least. He darted off down the hall, which was now partially deserted during the show, and ran towards the green room again.

“Tavi, ugh, no fair! My feet hurt!” she barely groaned, unable to keep a stifled giggle down as she shoved herself off the wall to catch up with him.

“Aye, what’s that like again?” he asked, jokingly as he looked down at his metal feet and then back at her as he waited for her at the doors.

He shoved the double doors open to the empty green room and held one of them for her as she walked in before him.

She slowed her jog to a walk as she went through the doorway, collapsing on to the couch with a sigh, her feet throbbing from the dancing and walking.  

Octavio followed behind and searched the cooler at the side of the couch, pulling out a water bottle and handed it to her.

It was dripping from sitting in ice that had slightly melted, but she didn’t care as she sat up and took a few drinks. She wiped her hand dry on her jeans and looked around the room, crossing one leg over the other.

He took a seat beside her, resting back on the couch and tossed an arm around her while kicking his legs up onto the table. She took another drink of her water and leaned her head to the side, resting it onto his shoulder.

“Answer me this, it’s been bugging me all night. When did you see my gauntlet run?” he asked her, taking his goggles off and running his fingers through his hair.

She sat up to look at him, having to wrack her brain for the memory. She finished drinking her water for now, closing the bottle and shrugged. She took a tired breath and squinted her eyes in thought. “I think it was the day I was invited to the games, if I remember correctly. I had gone to see Blisk to discuss the ring and I believe you had just come from an interview with him, so it was playing on his screen. I asked him to show me what it was; I was curious.”

“Oh,” Octavio rolled his eyes, remembering on that day and the anger he left the interview with. Maybe he shouldn’t have pried. “he told me I wasn’t Apex material that day, whatever that meant. I never got why he changed his tune, though. I didn’t ask. Didn’t wanna.”

“He wasn’t sure how stable you would be for the games as a whole. He thought you were too reckless.”  

He scoffed, “Tooreckless! Is that even possible? and let me guess, you believed him after watching me blow off my own legs?”

“Non, actually quite the contrary.” she stated, looking over at him to see a puzzled look permanently stuck to his face from her words. “I’ve told you before, but I will say it again, Tavi. You are full of potential that no one else seems to ever see. I told Blisk that too that day. We all need a wild card to keep things fresh and spontaneous, to bring the unknown to the public to see. The innovative take on how you tried to quicken your time at the Gauntlet, while terrifyingas someone who cares for you, it cannot be ignored how original you are. That cannot be bought or replicated.”

“So, it’s sounding like you got them to accept me into the games? Should I be thanking you or something?” he asked, a bit puzzled, but now feeling slightly indebted more so to her. She was making him a better person… and was the tipping reason he even was invited to the games in the first place?  

“Absolutely not. I simply got them to see what was already there, they just weren’t noticing it.”

He huffed quietly, looking at her and clenching his teeth together from nerves. He dropped his gaze to the floor, and she took his hand in hers. He had so many things he wanted to say in reply, but his words were caught in his throat and were muffled by finally feeling accepted. He hadn’t a clue of how to repay her for being so considerate and accepting.  

He wanted to shower her in the feelings she gave him, he wanted to replicate it ten-fold but no words would ever be enough in his eyes. “You’re one of the smartest people I know, Nat. You’re stunning, you’re funny, you’re… you’re you. Beyond what anyone could ever try to be.”

She blushed, nudging him in the side thankfully and looked down at her water as her heart fluttered in her chest.

He ran his fingers along her shoulder and tapped her again to gain her attention.  

“Let’s get out of here.” he suggested after a moment of silence.

“What about the van and Ajay?” she protested at first, slightly confused but growing intrigued.

“Who cares. Let’s just go. The bus route isn’t far from here and we can be back by morning.”

“Did this idea just come to you or did you always plan on doing this?” she asked, her answer already starting to fall within a yes because of her admiration of his never-ending ideas. She never knew where they would end up when they were together and part of that terrified her while it thrilled her.  

He was a mix of things she couldn’t stop wanting or thinking about. A complicated bottled mess of perfection she wanted every last part of.

“…Yes.”

She rolled her eyes at him playfully, tossing her hands up in acceptance. “Okay! Let’s go, but I want to stop for food at Connie’s.”

“Deal.” he agreed, smiling widely and pulling his goggles back on. He rose from the couch, bounding off towards the doors and looked back as he waited for Natalie who went in the opposite direction as him. He looked back an forth from  her to the door. “Wait, where are you going?”

“Just a moment!” she replied over her shoulder, scribbling on a scrap paper with a pen. She tucked up the paper on the mirror, it faced with the label looking out towards the room. A big font that said AJAY on the front. “I’m leaving Ajay a note for when the show is over since we’re not going to be here.”

“Oh, right. Good idea.” he shrugged, though he hadn’t even thought of that. He tapped his foot and waited as Natalie hurried over to him in the doorway, the two of them rushing out into the hall and directly to the side door they entered in.

Natalie pushed the door open for the two of them, stepping outside into the fresh night air and catching the attention of the bouncer as they left who barely looked up momentarily from her magazine.  

He followed out with her, looking around the empty parking lot and then back at her. She caught up with him, walking alongside as he directed the two down the street.  

It was deserted outside this late than compared to the venue, but you could still just barely hear the sound of music coming from the warehouse as they walked further and further away.  

The moon and streetlights were the only lights to guide the way, and Octavio was lingering at a slower pace tonight to admire Natalie. It felt familiar to when he first started even thinking about the chance of them – that night he stayed at her house seemed all so far away in the past now but ever present in his mind.

He slowed to a stop as they approached a bench, a bus sign hanging above that was lit vibrantly in blue. Natalie instantly took the excuse to sit down, resting on the bench from the few blocks walk here as he scanned the schedule. He checked his phone and then the schedule again, turning to her with a thumbs up. “Kickass, bus should be here in five.”

“Are you sure we are going to make it back for morning check in?” she asked him, not wanting to bring it up again but her concern for too many strikes always worried her. No one wanted a record as a Legend, and she was no exception. No one wanted to seem unreliable in the eyes of the show runners.

“Positive, chica. I won’t let yoube late.” he told her, swaying next to her at the bench and checking around them. “I just want more time with you.”

“Why can’t we be together at the hotel?”

“We can, but not really. You don’t want anybody to catch us and I get it, people are like vultures sometimes but… Nat, it’s really hard hiding how much I wanna be near you at the hotel. I’ve already had fans get at me on social about not showing up at my suite ‘cause I’ve been staying with you so much. They don’t know where I’m going but they def’ are getting suspicious of somethin’.”

“I did not know they noticed…” she trailed off.

“I guess I streamed so much before we started seeing each other that when I slowed down the hours it made them question what was up.”  

She felt embarrassed to be taking up so much of his time and bit down on her cheek. Would he be streaming if it weren’t for her? “Am I hindering your schedule or something?”

He chuckled quietly, dropping down to sit beside her on the bench. “No, of course not. It’s not a set thing or anything, anyway, when I do stuff online for fans. I can just let people know about us and then we can just move on. I’m sure they’ll get it.”

Natalie placed her hand over his arm, squeezing gently. She didn’t want to keep bringing them back to square one per say, but she felt as if it was the best choice to keep them together for now. “I know it’s hard but I’m not ready to let everyone in on this. I do not want to share this, not yet. We will work around it… you always say live in the moment, so let’s just keep doing that together. We can worry about telling fans and the media later. Please?”

He looked into her eyes and tried to find space to argue but couldn’t muster it when she seemed so determined with her opinion. Hearing her tell him she wanted to live in the moment with him, he couldn’t turn it down. It just didn’t feel right despite wanting to shout from rooftops about the two of them. It made things so much easier to merge his two worlds, but knew that wasn’t what she wanted right now. He would accept it to please her, anything to keep her around. He sighed, nodding along. “Alright, alright, alright. Later.”

He rose to his feet again as the bus pulled to a stop beside them, helping her to her feet. It hissed out as the breaks settled in, the doors swinging open with a thud of metal.

The two got onto the bus and Octavio paid for two tickets with a swipe of a card, scurrying towards the back together, tucked up alone.  

Natalie took a seat first, him plopping down beside her as the bus lurched forward to move on the next stop.  

It only took about twenty minutes for them to reach the destination they needed, him tugging her along and her skipping in follow out the doors and back onto the pavement outside once they reached it.    

They were around the block from Connie’s diner and you could see it shining through the trees from where they stood at the bus stop.

“Thank goodness, I’m so hungry.” she exclaimed, walking towards the diner the second she saw the signs light through the leaves.

He chuckled under his breath, following behind her and jogging to catch up as they walked to the diner around the corner.  

It was basically empty in the parking lot again, only a car was sitting parked outside this time. The upsides of always going to a diner in the middle of the night, never a soul in sight but others that don’t care to be seen.  

“I’m glad you liked the show.”

“Ilovedit! You will have to take me again sometime.” she replied him enthusiastically, turning on her heel to look at him as she walked backwards to the door.  

He opened it for her, reaching around her to do so, and guided her inside as the bell above the door dinged twice.

“For sure, I’d do that again any day with you.”

Behind the counter, sitting on a stool and doing a crossword with the radio on low in the background, was Connie. She peeked up from the paper, looking over at the door with a growing grin.  

“Well, look who came back. You kids look wrung out. Where ya’ been?” Connie questioned, getting up from her stool and setting her paper down. She walked over to the register to ring the two of them up, looking over the counter at them.

“Che had a gig tonight, underground scene. Nat went for the first time and we took off for some food. She insisted on here.” Octavio replied, glancing over at Natalie as she was reading the menu.

“Girl’s got good taste, that’s why. I appreciate it, sweetie. Whatcha wanting tonight?” she said, turning to talk to Natalie personally.

Natalie smiled in reply, pushing the hood off of her head as she hummed her lips together before speaking. “Could I get a large cheesy fry and I would like to try the ‘overloaded chocolate’‘ shake this time, I think?  

“That sound’s good. I’ll have the same but make the fries spicy?”

“You got it. It’ll be a minute, if ya wanna take a seat. I’ll get your shakes here first.”

“Merci, Connie!” Natalie replied, wandering the few tables and picking a booth to sit in.  

Octavio slid in the seat beside her, prying his goggles and mask from his face and setting them on the table with a clatter that filled the empty diner. Lines imprinted on his face from the wear all night, and he rubbed the sides of his eyes momentarily before leaning on his arm on the table.  

The blaring of the blender cut through the diner, and Natalie tapped her nails on the table with a sigh. She looked over at him leaning on the table and smiled weakly. “Do you think it will be hard for us after Press Week?”

He turned his gaze to meet hers, not able to find a truthful answer when he wasn’t sure what was in store for them. He didn’t want to ta

Lifeline: Are you sure you aren’t dating Natalie?

Octane: If I am, I certainly wasn’t informed of it.

Lifeline: To be fair, if any of us were dating someone without realizing it, it would be you.

[while hugging]

Wattson: Why do you have an erection?

Octane: I’m happy.

Octane, about Wattson: I just love her so much.

Lifeline: How much do you love her?

Octane: I’d bend over forward for her.

Lifeline: You mean you’d bend over back- oh… OH!

Snuggling up!

Twitter commission from izafrogi!!
It’s always a pleasure getting to draw these two together <3

Wattane beach episode

pastel gf purble bf