Moon Struck

“Steven!”

Steven ignores the shout of his headmate as he hurries through the museum. 

He’s late, and he so hated making you wait for him. He had promised you long ago a personal tour of the museum. One you had insisted for months he eventually give you, when he had time. 

His heels drag, Marc putting on the brakes as he fronts for just a moment. 

Steven nearly drops the travel cup of tea he’s carrying, briefly tripping over his own feet and drawing the attention of several nearby people listening to a museum tour guide. 

“Sorry!” He gives an awkward wave before continuing on. 

“Would you stop that, Marc!” He glances at his reflection in the display case he’s passing. “You’re making us late.”

“I’m making you late. I didn’t agree to this . ” Marc’s shoulders are tense, the line of his brows drawn together. 

Steven wonders if he’s wearing the same expression and briefly passes a hand over his face. He doesn’t want to be scowling when-

He bursts through a doorway, into the Egyptian exhibition, and spots you waiting exactly where you said you would be. 

A shy smile tugs at his mouth, and he tries straightening his shirt collar and running a hand through his unruly curls. He knows it's useless, that his shirts are perpetually wrinkled and his hair nearly always a mess. 

Marc has gone sullenly silent, and he knows he’s watching you too. 

Marc, for reasons Steven cannot begin to parse out, does not like you. 

Or, he pretends not to. 

Again, for reasons unknown. 

Which is entirely bonkers, because you are the most brilliant person Steven has ever met. 

He fidgets with the sleeve of his shirt, which is worried and frayed at the edges from his nervous fingers. 

Despite rushing moments earlier, he’s now anxious about how to actually approach you. 

You were his friend, he should have no problem with walking over and saying hello. 

Steven shifts from foot to foot as people swim around him in the doorway. He’s acutely aware that he’s stood in everyone’s way, the cup of tea in his hand going cold. 

The other thing he’s been promising you for months, a proper cup of tea. 

“Good,” Marc says, reflected in another display case, hands on his hips, chin lifted, “you see how stupid this is. Let’s go home.” 

But it isn’t stupid. 

It’s not stupid to want this. 

It’s not stupid to want you. 

Steven swallows, watching you move to read another plaque. 

As you read, your shoulders droop and then you dig in the bag slung over your shoulder. You glance at your phone when you find it, before tucking it away again. 

Then, you glance at your wristwatch, like it might tell you a different time than your phone had. 

You sigh and move toward the exit. 

Which is Steven’s cue to call your name, loudly. 

So loudly in fact that people turn to look at him. 

Brilliant. Already making a fool of myself. 

“Which is why we should just go home-,” Marc starts, but Steven ignores him. 

Marc, the absolute worry wart, thought you would break his heart. 

You’re smiling at him, a hand lifted in greeting as he approaches you. He would like to think you look relieved, happy to see him. 

But you’re like the sun, and probably look at everyone that way. 

He nearly stumbles into you, hastily handing you the cup of tea, wrapping your fingers around the cooling paper cup, his fingers laced over yours. 

“I was meant to bring you a proper cup and here I am with cold tea.” 

“Hardly very polite of you,” you tease. “Late to meet someone and with a cold cup of tea.” You smile and tsk under your breath. 

Steven fidgets and releases your hand on the cup, fingers nervously tangling together in front of his chest instead. “I’m really so very sorry. I’m always running late. I-I meant to be early today-,”

“Oh, my God,” Marc mutters. 

You lie a hand against Steven’s arm, stilling the nervous fluttering of his hands. “I was teasing you. It’s alright. I do expect an extra long tour though.”

Steven nods, staring at the shape of your eyes, the flutter of your lashes, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. 

You’re quite close to him, his head bent over yours, and he thinks he can see all the shades hidden in your eyes. 

“You look like a love-struck moron,” he catches the reflection of Marc behind your head, arms crossed over his chest, brows still pulled together in that irritated line. “Stop staring at her like that.” 

But he notices that Marc is staring at you too, looking at the back of your head, like he could see to the marrow of you, and your intentions, if he just looked hard enough. 

But there’s a dip in his voice that makes Steven think he might be just a tiny bit jealous. 

Steven shakes his head, trying to ignore Marc’s acid comments. 

“Of course,” he says, glancing down at your hands, the cup held between them. “Would you try it, please?”

Steven had been shocked to find out you were a coffee drinker only, that you had never really tasted tea, at least not a proper cup. 

“I’ve had iced tea,” you had offered weakly, only for Steven to wrinkle his nose. 

“Cold tea? Why would anyone enjoy that?”

Now, he’s brought you a cup of cold tea anyways, and it was tea that wasn’t even meant to be cold. 

You smile at him, lifting the cup as you brightly say, “Cheers!” in your best impression of his accent. 

It’s quite terrible, and makes him laugh.

You take a sip, a considering look pulling over your features. 

“It’s really better when it's hot,” Steven says, awaiting your verdict like it really mattered, like it was incredibly important that you liked the cup of tea he had brought you.

You tilt your head to the side and nod, “It's still warm.” You take another sip, which Steven takes as a good sign. Marc is watching you too, and Steven knows that Marc thinks he isn’t noticing the intense attention he gives you. “I like it. Did you put something else in it?”

Honey. 

He had put honey in despite his better judgment, because he noticed the way you absolutely hammered your coffee with sugar packets. 

“Honey,” he murmurs softly as you look into his eyes with a bemused smile on your face. “Just a bit. Figured you might like it better that way.” 

“Can’t say I’m a convert. Coffee will always have my heart,” you say. “But it is very good.” 

Steven is glad, so glad, you like it. 

Maybe it makes him unreasonably happy. 

“Cheers,” he says, still watching you carefully, smiling, his face very near to yours. He can see the fluttering of your lashes, feel the ghost of your breath. 

You don’t seem to mind the closeness. 

Marc rolls his eyes, and Steven puts a hand on your arm to pull you away from the reflection. 

So he doesn’t have to think about his annoyed alter. 

He tries not to be too upset with Marc, with his brooding protective streak. But he does wish that he’d lighten up just a bit. 

Steven’s heart is soft, it was going to be broken no matter what happened in their life. He was okay with that, especially if it meant spending time with you. 

But that was a hard pill for Marc to swallow.

His habit of shielding Steven was still a hard one to break, even now they were working together. 

“Where would you like to start?” Steven asks you, something like pride filling his veins as he watches you continue to sip at the cup of earl gray. 

“You’re the expert,” you say, looping your arm through his. “You tell me where we should start. Although, I’m very interested in Taweret, after the stories you’ve told me.” 

“Oh, she’s bloody amazin’,” Steven says, watching the quirk of your lips as he takes your duffle bag from you, slinging it over his own shoulder, conscious of Marc’s silence at the back of his mind. “‘Course we can start with her.” 

Steven leads you, the pressure of your fingers against his arm welcome, a warmth spreading up from his belly to land at the back of his mouth. 

It makes his heart ache and his fingers tremble. 

The feeling is strange and welcome. 

He likes you. 

Quite a lot, actually. 

Which was why he hoped today was the day he finally managed to ask you out, the reason Marc tried so desperately to make them late. 

He had met you before he knew about Marc, before their grand Egyptian adventure and Khonshu. 

When he first met you some months ago, you were wandering the halls of the museum, a duffle bag much like the one you have today slung over your shoulder, your head tilted to the side as you examined an exhibit. 

Steven was meant to have been helping Donna move gift shop inventory when he spotted you, brows furrowed as you read a plaque. It was the way you stood that caught his attention, with your toes pointed out and heels together. 

He couldn’t have looked away if he tried, and so he wasn’t surprised when he ran into someone and dropped the box of inventory, stuffed goddesses and cheap replicas of the pyramids spilling across the floor right to the tips of your toes. 

People weren’t exactly nice to Steven. 

He didn’t have any friends, his co-workers overlooked him, forgot him, or were rude to him. He had his mother, of course, but things always seemed to keep them from speaking directly.

He knows the truth now, about his and Marc’s mother, about Marc. 

Still, that day, as the man he bumped into gave him a dirty glare as he turned away, you had stooped down next to him and helped him tuck the merch back into the box. 

You had been kind to him, friendly as no one else was. 

Your hand had touched his and it had been like those moments in all the cheesy rom-coms he didn’t remember watching. He had looked up into your eyes, realizing he was still apologizing repeatedly out loud.

“Hey,” you had said, before tilting your head to the side and glancing down, “It’s okay. Do you need some help?”

No one offered Steven help, not with anything, even when he asked for it. 

And so he swallowed and nodded even though you, as a patron of the museum, should not have helped him. He should have refused your gentle help.  

But you’d helped him until Donna came along and shooed you away. 

He’d thought that he’d never see you again, but you visited the museum all the time, at least once a week. 

He found out that you’d recently moved to London, that you were a staunch coffee only person, that you were a dancer, that your childhood dream had been to be an archeologist before your talent for dance had destroyed that hope. 

You were more interested in Greek and Roman mythology, but quickly became fascinated with Egypt, and Steven had been delighted, weirdly, bizarrely proud that he had put you onto it. 

That you read the books he recommended, that you listened to the music he told you about. That you listened to him without interrupting, or sighing, or checking the time. 

Well, those things were only an incredible bonus. 

You made his throat close up some nights when he lay trying not to fall asleep, because you were the first friend he can remember having besides Gus or his mother. 

Steven was lonely, but you made his world a little less so. 

Now he has Marc, who’s more than enough company some days, a friend that never left him. 

He’d been worried, upon coming back to London, that you wouldn’t be there, that he had dreamed you up and you were never real in the first place. 

He’d been excited to let Marc see you through his own eyes, though Marc claimed with indifference that he remembered you, that he already knew you through Steven and didn’t need to meet you properly. 

Steven had a suspicion that the disinterest was feigned, that he cared too, to know if you were still in London. 

Steven didn’t work at the museum anymore, and so it had taken a week of hanging around the place to finally catch you there one day after a rehearsal. 

To his utter horror, you had been visibly upset with him. Though he had missed you and worried after you, he never imagined that you would do the same for him. “I thought you just - I thought maybe something horrible happened. You just disappeared and they said you were fired? I thought you disappeared and didn’t bother saying goodbye. Steven what happened-,” 

You had demanded his phone number, so you could always reach him. 

It was amazing really, that you had never had it before. 

Steven was just grateful you were still around, still coming by the museum.

Most worryingly though, Marc had not been impressed with you. Or pretended not to be. Though he tried to hide it, Steven always had a keen sense of how Marc really felt, and Marc cared more than he ever let on. 

Now, though, he feels the gentle pressure of your fingers against his arm and thanks whatever god that might be listening, that you were still around, a person that rolled with the punches life dealt. 

Against the advice of his alter, who had almost seemed nervous, Steven had told you everything about what happened in Egypt, about Khonshu and Marc and Layla and Ammit and everything in between. 

“ Don’t do it,” Marc had snarled. “She’s gonna think you’re nuts. She’s going to-. 

Marc hadn’t finished his thought. 

Whatever ridicule and judgement he had anticipated, you hadn’t fallen to his expectations. 

You had listened and somehow understood. 

“So,” you ask now as Steven leads you through the museum, “How is Marc?”

“Being a bit of a knobhead at the moment, to be honest,” Steven says, watching the smile that tugs at your mouth. 

“Oh. Khonshu related or..?”

Steven’s always honest with you, and so he doesn’t lie now. “Wasn’t too keen on my meeting you today, actually.” 

You nod as Steven leads you past an exhibit, into an adjoining room, past a miniature construction of the Pyramids of Giza. “Marc doesn’t exactly like me, does he?”

Steven waits for the snort from Marc, for a derisive comment. But nothing comes. 

The silence is more telling than anything. 

“No, he’s just a bit-,” Steven stops, wiggles his fingers, not really sure how to explain exactly how Marc was. 

You smile weakly at him, “We don’t have to talk about it, Steven. I know he’s very protective. In any case, I’m glad you like me. And I really care for you. I hope Marc knows that, at least.”

Marc remains stubbornly silent. 

Steven gives you the tour of the museum he always dreamed of giving when he worked there. You listen to him attentively, you ask him questions, and for the remainder of the day, Marc is quiet, though Steven knows he’s present, listening in instead of walling himself off. 

Mostly Marc leaves Steven be, when he’s with you. He can’t be mad at the happiness you bring, though he tries to protect the system in his own way. Steven knows it's why he’s so surly though he wishes he’d give you a chance. 

Marc claims that one of them needs to be clear headed, rational, when you inevitably break their heart. 

So, he’s surprised, when you’re leaving the museum near closing and asking Steven about what brand of tea he would recommend so you can start making it at home, Marc’s voice echoes in the back of his head. “Ask her out. You said you were going to today.”

Steven glances down, at the watery refraction of Marc staring up at him from a dirty puddle on the front steps of the museum. 

Marc says, surprisingly gentle, “ You’re happy with her. Ask.” It's only  slightly demanding in tone. Steven suppresses the urge to roll his eyes. 

But his alter is right. 

So, Steven stumbles to a halt nearly knocking you into the puddle. 

And asks. 

“Wondering if maybe you’d come out on a date with me?”

You blink, your hand on his arm where you’d caught your balance, his fingers around your other wrist.

You just stare at him, your lips parting in surprise. 

Fear wells up into the back of his throat when you don’t immediately answer and he starts to stutter out an apology. “Sorry, sorry, don’t know what’s come over me just then. Just a bit taken with you, I suppose.” Steven swallows, feels the words pressing at the inside of his lips, nervous chatter threatening to break free. “You’re quite beautiful and very kind - bit inevitable that I’d have a crush on you, innit?” 

You blink again, stunned, like you can’t believe what you’re hearing. “You have a crush on… me ?” 

“Yes, no - well, yes, I do but -,” It’s not just a crush. Crush seems like a silly little word for the feelings you make flop around inside him. Squiggly, fuzzy feelings. 

“ Shut up, Steven, give her a chance to reply.” Marc snaps at him, like he’s just as afraid that Steven will mess this up.  

He takes a steadying breath, reminding himself that you were truly very kind, and that if you said no, it would not be the end of all he held dear. “Yes, I quite like you. You’re kind and beautiful and smart. What’s not to like?”

“ Nice job .”

And for once, Marc doesn’t sound sarcastic. 

His helpfulness is strange for someone who had been so against the notion mere hours ago. 

Steven bites down the rest of the words swimming in his mouth, telling himself that Marc is right about this thing. He needs to let you reply. 

“I, um, yeah,” you smile, almost like you’re unsure if he really just asked you, “yes. I’d like to go on a date.”

Steven stares at you, not sure he heard right. “Really?”

“Really.” 

“Jesus.”

“Cheers,” Steven chirps quietly, ignoring Marc. He knows he has a goofy smile on his face, he knows that he’s just staring at you. 

But you’re smiling back and Marc is strangely quiet now, a glow of happiness lingers there. Steven has a suspicion that he’s happy too, basking in the fact that you said yes.

Oh. Oh . 

Maybe Marc likes you too.

He was just shit at showing it, saying it.

Maybe that’s why he’s so concerned about the breaking of Steven’s heart, because it might break his too. 

“Oh,” you say, suddenly digging in your bag, still hanging on Steven’s shoulder. He shifts so you can better reach. “I got this for Gus the Second. I forgot to mention it earlier, although now is such a stupid time to be giving it to you,” you say, dipping your fingers into a pocket and bringing out a tiny replica of the Great Sphinx. “Sorry if he already has this one.”

You seem flustered with yourself, like you’re ruining a moment, when all your gift makes him want to do is kiss you. 

He flustered you too, apparently.

You got his fish a gift.  

Steven takes the replica from you gently, sliding his thumb along the surface. “Oh, he’ll absolutely love it.” He pauses, “You said yes, yeah? To a date? With me?”

Something about it doesn’t compute. Maybe you’ve confused him with someone else. 

“Yeah,” you say. “Did you have something in mind, Steven?”

“Er-,” he hadn’t thought that far ahead, but his name on your lips is like a balm. Everything would be okay. 

“ Just dinner, Steven,” Marc says. “Doesn’t have to be elaborate.”  

Steven doesn’t dare look down at the puddle. Doesn’t want to see the smirk on Marc’s face that he can hear in his voice.  

“Dinner?” He hesitates. “Tomorrow sound good, yeah?”

“Yes,” and when he looks at you, you’re smiling. Like this was something good. Something you’ve been waiting for. “7 o’clock?”

“Brilliant.”

He tilts his head toward you, just to be a bit closer to you. 

It’s still a surprise when you lean up and kiss him gingerly, your lips soft and lingering. 

When you pull away, his heart is dancing and you are glowing. 

~

Marc is hesitant to speak to you, though he would never admit it to a soul. 

Steven probably knows, but he would never say so. 

He’s content to watch you through the eyes of his alter. You are Steven’s girl after all. 

Made of sunshine and steeped in warmth. 

You are not his. 

But Marc worries about you almost non-stop. He thinks about you constantly. He tells himself it's because Steven would break if something happened to you. 

But he knows. He knows when you laugh at something Steven says, he knows when you show up at the flat soaked to the bone from a downpour but smiling. He knows when you break in a new pair of ballet shoes against the hardwood floor of the flat. 

“You need to teach her self-defense,” He tells Steven when Marc is the one fronting.

“I’m not going to do that, Marc. She’s been safe before we met her, she’s safe now.” 

Yeah, only now you know about Moon Knight and Khonshu and everything . You know everything. 

Yet you never mention it, never ask. 

Occasionally, you will inexplicably leave a note for Marc, stuck against the glass of Gus the Second and Gus the Second’s Friend’s tank. 

Marc can’t make himself understand it, the way you leave little notes, ask Steven about what kinds of food he likes, ask how he’s doing.

Today’s note said - 

There’s a performance today. I know Steven has come to plenty, but I would love to see you there. 

You sign it with your name and a little heart. 

“She knows you care about her, Marc,” Steven says from the reflection in the tank, Gus and Friend behind his head. “She knows you follow her home when she works late.” 

“Only because you told her,” he snaps. “She didn’t need to know that.” 

Steven only gives a long suffering sigh. 

You know, you know that he follows your route home each night, to make sure you got there safe. And so you had taken up the inexplicable habit of talking to him as you walked. There was no way for you to know if he heard you, when he followed in the ceremonial armor on the buildings above you.

Still, you do it each night without fail. 

Marc, if he’s honest with himself, does not deserve to know you. Does not deserve the notes, the home cooked meals in tupperware left in the fridge with his name written in sharpie on the side of the box, does not deserve your late night chatter and one sided conversations. 

“She’s trying really hard. It hurts her feelings that you won’t even say hello to her. She isn’t expecting you to feel about her the same way I do.” 

Marc doesn’t respond, unsticking your note from the fishtank instead, folding it and tucking it inside his jacket pocket. 

He knows that it hurts your feelings. He sees it in your eyes every time you ask Steven about him, every time he refuses to meet you, even though he knows you, remembers you through Steven’s eyes from before Steven had been aware of him, back when he struggled to maintain Steven’s ignorance of the truth of his situation. 

You don’t know him though, so he’s not sure why it matters to you. 

But he catches Steven’s exasperated expression in the mirror by the door and he knows. 

It matters to you, because it matters to Steven. 

Not because you care about Marc. 

But because he is Steven’s best friend. 

And that is the problem. 

Because he wants you to care about him. 

“So you’ll follow her but you won’t just say hello? Marc, you could just introduce yourself and walk her home, yeah? Instead of stalking after her like a deranged bird?” 

Marc ignores him, ceremonial suit slipping over his skin, mask covering his face.

“Nope. This is much easier.” 

Steven only sighs again. 

~

“I just wonder if I’m any good for you,” you admit to Steven one rainy summer evening. You are propped in the window with a book, Steven on the couch with an open text. 

The air is warm enough that you leave the window open, the sound of rain and traffic drifting through the flat. 

Steven turns to you, taking the glasses perched on the end of his nose off. He frowns at you, brows pulling together over the round brown eyes you’ve come to love. 

He closes the book he had been pouring over. “What d’ya mean, love?”

“Just that,” you pause, trying to gather your thoughts. “I just know Marc is rather protective. And maybe if he doesn’t-,” You swallow, “Maybe I’m not really any good for you.”

Steven holds his arms out to you, and you readily cross the room to fit yourself in his arms, head tucked neatly beneath his chin. “You certainly are good for me. Too good for me.” You feel his chin against your forehead, gently drifting back and forth. “Don’t pay Marc any mind.” 

“Does he hate me?” You pull back to look in his eyes.

“Now, who could hate you?” 

You press a hand to the back of Steven’s neck, fingers trailing up to thread through his hair. He readily leans his forehead against yours, his warm breath ghosting over your lips. 

You feel Steven tilt his head up a bit, and you know he’s watching the mirror, communicating with his alter who wanted nothing to do with you. 

“Could you tell him I don’t want anything from him? That I’d just like to introduce myself? He’s your best friend and I’d just like to say hello.” 

“He hears you,” Steven says. “Just being a bit of a pain in the arse as usual.” 

You suppress a laugh and tilt your head back to meet Steven’s eyes, cradling his jaw between your palms, sweeping your thumb over the thin scar above his brow. “He should know I’m not pressuring him, just that I would very much like to meet him, if he felt inclined.” Steven opens his mouth when you continue, “And that he’s become rather poor at hiding the past few weeks.”

“What?” 

“Just have noticed a certain caped individual on my walks home the last few weeks.” 

Steven’s mouth quirks, his eyes sliding to the mirror again. “He says you have a rather keen eye.” 

“Not so. It’s very hard not to notice sometimes.” As you speak Steven’s brows pull together and he frowns. “What's he saying?”

Steven glances back to you, his nose nearly touching yours. “Nothing you should worry your pretty head about,” he says, reaching up to cradle the back of your head, his lips finding yours, soft as the touch of a feather. “He can tell you himself if he bloody well pleases.” 

You feel slightly reassured as Steven kisses you, tilts you back against the couch cushions and slots himself against you, fingers running shakily up your side against your sweater. You dip your hands under his shirt, laughing quietly when he jumps at the sensation of your fingers against his scarred ribs. 

You feel better, at least, knowing that Steven wants you to meet Marc. 

You wonder what holds him back, what holds him back from even a hello. 

But Steven is kissing you and it becomes rather hard to concentrate. 

~
You talk to Marc on your way home from the theatre each night. 

You know he can hear you, walking on the rooftops above the streets you traverse each night. 

It makes you feel safe, knowing that he’s there, knowing that he cares enough to make sure you got home. 

You tell him about your day, quietly talking to yourself, drawing some curious stares but not too many. If these were the only interactions he would allow then you would make the most of them. 

You think you’ve seen Marc before. That he’d come into the museum once so that Steven wouldn’t miss work. His brows had been knitted tightly together, eyes narrower, mouth a hard frown. 

He hadn’t spoken to you that day, while Steven always made sure to, always. 

It’s raining when you leave the theater this night, your duffle bag slung across your shoulders, hood pulled up over your head as you race down the back steps, eager to get home, to make a cup of the calming tea Steven had gotten you and sleep. 

Your feet and ankles are sore and you felt like a good cry was in order. 

You don’t look up as the rain pounds down, sure that your guarding protector would be there as he always was. You just didn’t have the energy to greet him this night. 

Although you left rehearsal early, Marc always had a way of knowing when you left, of always being there. He was reliable, steady, even if he mostly avoided you. 

Tonight though, you wish you could go home and call Steven, though you know he won’t pick up, not until morning. Steven was who you called when you needed to cry, when you needed comfort. 

Steven was soft, in a way no one else you’ve ever known has been. 

You love dance, but the toll it took on your mental health some days made you wonder if it was at all worth it. 

Your thighs burn and your ankles ache, and you remember the way you were out of step and how the choreographer had sighed. The sound worse than disappointment and closer to condemnation. Maybe you aren't good enough to hack it in this particular dance company, and not for the first time, you think about going home.

The rain continues, drenching you to the bone. It pounds against the pavement beneath your feet, so loudly you don’t hear the footsteps trailing after you. 

You duck down an alleyway, a shortcut you don’t normally take because you’d rather take the longer way around and chatter at Marc. 

But you can’t be bothered tonight. You don’t even look up. 

If you had, you’d have known he wasn’t there, and then maybe you’d have stayed in the safety of the theater for just a bit longer, waited until he showed himself. 

One moment you’re hurrying along, the next a hand is pressed to the back of your neck, shoving you into the brick wall of the alley. 

You open your mouth to scream but a knife presses to the skin of your throat. It digs in just a little as the pressure at the back of your neck disappears and your bag is ripped off your shoulder. 

“Search that for me, yeah?” A male voice says before he leans into you, pressing your body into the wall with the heaviness of his own. 

You hear your things being ripped out of the bag, your dance garments and tights. Extra shoes. Ballet slippers. A bag of toiletries. 

“Search her , then. She ain’t got anything in here.”

Hands dig into you, rough and careless. But you don’t have anything on you, not even your wallet or phone, you know they’ll find nothing and then what?

What will be left for them to take? 

The knife divots into your skin, you feel the warmth of your own blood trail down your neck. 

Surreptitiously, you tilt your head up. Maybe Marc really has hated you all this time, and he’s about to let you be killed in this dirty alley. 

But there’s no one watching you, and you have to wonder for a moment if anyone ever had been there, as the unknown hand gropes through your pockets and then pats down the sides of your thighs. 

You wonder if you should fight. 

Was it better to let whatever was about to happen, happen? Or to try to fight? To at least be able to flee? 

You decide to fight when a figure appears in the corner of your vision. 

One that the two men behind you apparently do not notice. 

The knife disappears from your neck and your head is smashed into the brick instead. 

Your vision dances, Khonshu apparently only visible to you. 

“Do not worry, little bug. My Moon Knight is on his way.”

The skeletal bird you’re staring at can only be Khonshu or a terrible hallucination. 

If he’s a hallucination, does that mean they already stabbed you and you’re bleeding to death? 

“You are not hallucinating,” comes the booming voice of the god of the night sky. “Follow my instruction.” 

Khonshu, who you have no choice but to trust as your assailants argue about whether to kill you, tilts his head.

You are told to drive your right foot directly back, then twist and punch as hard as you can. 

“Then run,” is the last piece of advice before the blasted bird disappears. 

You have no choice but to follow the advice, and hope Marc or Steven really are nearby. 

When you drive your foot back, it connects with a knee. A strangled cry goes up as you twist and blindly punch. Your fist lands on something meaty, sending a shockwave up your arm. Bone cracks. 

You flee the second the hands leave your body, and you think for just a moment that you’ll get away, that you’ll make it to the deserted but well lit street at the other end of the alley. 

But fingers hook into the hood of your jacket which had fallen back off your head. You’re jerked off your feet, clotheslined jacket knocking the breath out of your lungs. 

Still you manage to scream as you fall, palms scraping against the pavement, the knee of your jeans ripping open. 

You roll, acting on pure instinct, driving your leg up into the gut of the man that falls on top of you to square a punch into your ribs. 

“You little bitch -,” 

You whip out a hand and claw his face, his friend stooping to cover your mouth as the knife appears again, shining metal gleaming by the curve of your cheek.

But something - someone - else has appeared. 

Indeed, Khonshu’s Moon Knight is stalking down the alleyway behind them. 

It gives you the determination to shove the man on top of you with all your strength, kneeing him between the legs as you go, the knife slices at your cheek as the man behind you says, “Oy! Stop struggling and-,” 

You never find out what else you should do as the other man’s weight disappears and a fluttering white cape engulfs you. 

You get to your feet shakily and when you look up, it's to meet the blinding white gaze of Marc Spector. His arm is around your waist, the cape like a blanketed cocoon against you. 

“Go to the street. I’ll come to you.” His voice is American and gruff and unexpected. 

“Marc-,” 

But he lets go of you, spins you and pushes you gently in the direction of the street.

You go, rainwater sluicing against your skin. You hear bones snap, the sound of flesh against flesh but you don’t turn or stop until you reach the street. Cars trundle by, a few pedestrians are walking further up the road. No one pays you any mind, the callousness of strangers shocking and not shocking in equal measure. 

The contrast to your fight in the alley is startling, and you feel the burn of tears at the backs of your eyes, the fingers of pressure on your throat as you hold them back.

You don’t hear anything from the alley now, but a few minutes of shivering in the rain later Marc appears, your ruined bag over his shoulder.  

He crowds close to you without a word, lifting your chin with a curled finger beneath your chin. The fabric of the suit is gauzy and warm against your skin, not damp despite the rain. He peers into your eyes, focus shifting to your cheek and then neck, before he takes your hands in both of his, and examines the broken skin of your palms. 

He makes a noise of discontent as he examines you. 

He holds your fingers so tenderly you wonder if he realizes who you are. 

“Marc?” You ask gently. “Are you okay?” 

His head snaps up but he doesn’t answer, just stares at you with that furious white gaze. 

“Could I see your face at least?” 

He hesitates, but only for a moment, before the wispy material covering his face slides away. The humidity and rain make his curls unruly, a lock of hair sticks to the sweaty skin of his forehead.

It’s Steven, and very clearly not Steven. 

You swallow, and touch his cheek. “Are you okay?” You ask again. 

You regret touching him immediately. It’s likely not something he wants from you. 

Steven would have leaned into your palm, but Marc goes still confirming your worry, his brows pulling together, eyes narrower than Steven’s rounded gaze.

You drop your hand, and Marc’s gaze follows your hand. 

Instead of answering, Marc asks, “Do you have a first aid kit at your place or do we need to go to Steven’s?” 

“I have one,” you say softly.

Marc is so very close to you, his head bent over yours. His skin is damp and glowing, eyes such a deep umber that you feel like getting lost in them. His breath falls against your lips.

You inhale sharply at the closeness, breathing in the smoky jasmine and lavender scent that lingers around him, the tang of copper just beneath. Steven smelled like tea and cotton and you wonder briefly if the fragrance is thanks to the suit. 

But then he nods, all business, the rest of the suit sliding away as he pulls away and nudges you in the direction of your flat, not taking the shortcut through the alley, of course. 

“Did you kill them?” 

Marc stiffens, responding gruffly, “No. Just some broken bones.” 

You watch his jaw clench before you carefully reach out and tangle your fingers with his again. He probably thought you thought the worst of him, that he was a cold blooded killer. “I wouldn’t have mourned if you did.” His eyes snap to yours, surprised at the brutality in your shaky voice. “Thank you for coming.” 

“Where’d you learn to fight like that?” 

You smile, the movement making the cut on your cheek weep blood, “I received instructions from a rather strange looking bird.”

“Khonshu,” Marc mutters. “Bastard.” 

You hum, and feel the bizarre sensation of Marc Spector sliding his thumb gently across the back of your hand.

Once in your flat, Marc seats you at one of the two chairs at your tiny kitchen table in your tiny place’s kitchen. 

He kneels in front of you, even though he could take the other chair, and carefully tilts your chin up, dabbing gently at the cut on your neck, then your cheek.

“Did you hear me all those nights? When I spoke to you?” 

Marc nods, turning to grab an antiseptic ointment and a roll of gauze. “Yeah, I heard you.” 

“Why haven’t you-,” you bite your tongue. “Never mind. You don’t have to tell me. Or, talk to me. I’ve been telling myself that ever since Steven told me the truth. You’re just very important to Steven, of course I would like to meet you.” 

Marc goes still for a moment, deep brown eyes meeting yours. “Yeah, makes sense.” He finishes with your cheek and gently brushes his thumb over the column of your throat. 

You tell yourself he’s checking the bandage. 

But your heart beats wildly in your chest. 

“You’ll tell Khonshu thank you? From me? Suppose he did actually give me some helpful advice-,”

“No,” Marc suddenly says, intense in his fierceness, the set of his features grim. “Not when its his fault, my- my fault, our fucking fault you were alone in the first place-,” 

“Hey,” you take his hands and feel them shaking in yours. “It's not. It’s not anyone’s fault. It’s just something that happened. And I’m glad you were around.” You grip his fingers and don’t let him pull away until the tremors subside. “Are you alright?”

He clears his throat, suspiciously glassy eyes not meeting yours, and then goes about cleaning your bruised palms and your cut knuckles. 

Marc sighs abruptly, not answering you, and turns to look into the shining reflection of your floor length mirror. “Steven says he’s proud of you.” He looks away and continues wrapping your hands, “He also won’t let me forget that I haven’t asked you if you’re okay.” 

You open your mouth to reply when Marc bites out brusquely, “Are you okay?” 

You smile, imagining the irritation in Steven’s voice, Bloody hell, Marc! Telling her I’m bothering you about asking her if she’s okay and actually asking her is not the same thing!

“I’ll tell you if I’m alright, if you tell me if you are.” 

Marc snorts, “I can tell by looking at you.” His head twitches toward the mirror again and you know Steven must be annoying him about invisible injuries. You wait for a moment while they seem to have a silent conversation. 

You stop Marc’s hands when he moves to look at your knee instead of answering. “Just a simple yes or no. Nothing more.” 

He looks up at you, brows still tight over his eyes, expression stony, frowning at you so intensely you have to wonder what he sees when he looks at you. “Yes.” 

“Brilliant,” you smile. 

“Yes or no?” He asks you. 

You brace a hand on his shoulder, pushing yourself up, “Yes. I am okay. Does Steven know?”

“He hears you,” his grim gaze drifts back to the mirror. “Sit back down, I’m not done with you.” 

You pat his chest gently when he stands too, close and towering, what should be intimidating. “Yes, you are,” you return firmly. “I’m going to make some tea. Do you drink tea, or is that a Steven thing?”

“Coffee, if you have it.”

You can’t help but smile. 

“We need to wrap your knee though,” he doesn’t let the injury go. “It might get infected.”

You glance down at the scrape, then at the worried frown on Marc’s face. “Shall I change first? That way I don’t just tear the bandage anyways taking these wet jeans off.” 

Marc eyes your wet clothes, the way you shiver, head tilting to the side, like he’s listening. 

He concedes with a nod. 

~

Marc watches you make a cup of tea for yourself and hesitate at the coffeemaker. 

He thinks for a moment that you hesitate because you’re realizing that if you start the pot, you won’t only have to wait for it to brew but for Marc to drink it. 

But when you turn, you only frown at him and ask, “Are you quite sure about the coffee? You won’t sleep. I have more than enough chamomile tea-,” 

“Coffee is fine.” 

You dip your head and turn back to the pot. 

Steven sighs, “You can let her take care of you too, Marc.” 

Marc ignores Steven, refuses to meet his gaze in the shining reflection of your toaster. 

He feels the bone-deep weariness creep up on him, crash over his shoulders, as you set a cup of coffee in front of him a few quiet minutes later. 

“Steven pokes fun at me for my sugar habit. But this is a judgment free zone so don’t be afraid to tell me how you take it.” 

Marc glances into the cup, black coffee staring back up at him. 

“Sugar and milk,” he says and watches you smile, the gauze wrapped around your neck making his skin prickle. 

He should have killed those men for daring to lie a hand on you. He glances at your wet duffle bag, dejectedly lying in a heap in the corner of the kitchen. “Sorry about your stuff.” 

“It’s just things,” you say, wincing as you sit down across from him, setting down a carton of milk and bowl of sugar with a spoon.

He tips his head to the side to glance at your scraped knee under the table, the wince not matching the injury. Had he missed something? Though he supposes you’re probably sore after being thrown to the ground. 

“It’s not that,” you say, tucking your legs beneath you on the chair. “I was sore anyways. I’m always sore from dance. I have a high pain tolerance from all the years of training. Tonight wasn’t actually the worst night of my life.” 

Before he can respond, his heart sinking with your words, you continue. “That’s a neat trick though,” you fling your arms out and then around in an imitation of how he’d circled the cape around you. “Handy.” 

“It’s bulletproof. Most of the time,” he says, spooning sugar into his coffee, then a dash of milk. 

“ Very handy, then.” You watch him for a moment before your fingers tangle anxiously together. “You know, I really am okay. Please don’t feel like you need to stay.”

“Marc,” Steven says, “She thinks you hate her. Open up to her just a bit, yeah?” 

“I don’t hate you,” Marc says, ignoring the exasperated goan from Steven at his blunt response. “I don’t. And I’ll stay, for a while at least. You hit your head,” he reaches out and touches the bruise forming at your temple. He should have cut off their hands for that, broken each finger, twisted the ligaments out. “You might have a concussion,” he keeps his voice as level as he can.  

You nod and swallow, “Is Steven okay? I haven’t worried him too badly, have I?” 

Marc briefly closes his eyes, hearing all over again the screams of his headmate when Khonshu told them you were in danger. The force of his worry had almost forced Marc into the backseat, but he knew he was better suited to handle whatever was happening to you. 

That he could steel himself and deal. With this, he could deal, after all the years Steven had protected Marc from himself, from memories better forgotten. 

If something had happened to you…

“He’s okay,” Marc eventually answers, opening his eyes to find you watching him worriedly. “He was very worried about you.” 

“He knows I’m okay now?”

Marc sees Steven nodding at the back of your head sympathetically. “Yeah.” He licks his lips, takes a sip of the coffee, “I can…I can bring him out if you’d rather be with him.” 

You tilt your head to the side, like you’re considering it. “It’s okay. Not that I don’t want to see Steven, I do. I just…feel very safe at the moment. Maybe something to do with the cape.” You look away and take a sip of your tea. 

Steven is smirking in the toaster’s reflection, smug in a way that grinds at Marc’s nerves. 

The pair of you make no sense to Marc. 

“You into the cape, huh?”

“Oh, only a little. I wonder if your god would give me one.” Your eyes are sparkling, you’re teasing him and it makes his chest hurt in a pleasant way. 

But there was an idea Marc could get behind. Not that Khonshu would ever acquiesce. 

When you finish your tea, Marc shuffles you to the couch, prepared to watch over you for the night. 

You lie down, your legs tucked behind his back when he sits at the end of the sofa, like he’s familiar to you. And he supposes in a way he is, that you spend almost every evening together, despite his silence, and that you know the body he lives in. 

Marc flicks through the various streaming services on your TV, resting his other hand on your knee when you won’t stop squirming. 

“Hey,” he says, thumbing at your knee but not looking at you. “I know you’re okay now. But you might not be in a couple days, when the shock wears off. Takes time sometimes for something like that to catch up to you.” He squeezes your calf. “Let us know if that happens.” 

“Are you - both of you? Either of you?” 

His heart sinks just a little. “Yeah. Either. Both.” 

“Aw, Marc, I knew you liked her! I knew it!” Steven’s hands are folded over his heart, eyes wide and round. “Go on and kiss her!”

He will not be doing that. Knows that you wouldn’t welcome that. 

Instead he massages the flesh of your leg, and says, “Heat can help with muscle soreness. Do you have a heat pack somewhere?”

You turn on your back and put your feet in his lap, “Maybe. I’m okay like this for now.” You pull a blanket off the back of the sofa and drape it over both of you. 

He cups a hand around your socked ankle and says, “Don’t fall asleep.” He traces the delicate knob of bone beneath his touch. 

“Don’t think I could if I tried.” You go quiet for a moment, then say, “For the record, thank you. I’m really glad you’re staying with me.” 

The feeling that wells up in his chest almost chokes him. Marc can only nod, and even Steven stays silent for once at the wave of emotion that crashes through them both.