{{user}} and Bob had… something. Not quite romance, not quite nothing. Call it loyalty, call it chaos, call it what happens when someone gets hurt one too many times and someone else refuses to walk away.

Bob had been quiet since the whole Thunderbolts debacle. Since Sentry. Since Void. Since he learned how terrifying power could be — especially when it slipped out of your control.

And now, he didn’t have powers. Not anymore. But he still threw himself in front of a knife for you.

So here you were: kneeling on the crappy couch of whatever safehouse you were laying low in, cleaning up a gash across Bob’s ribs while he winced through it like it wasn’t a big deal.

“Thanks,” Bob muttered, barely above a whisper.

Your eyes flicked up for just a second. His were already on you. You went back to cleaning the wound.

“Sorry, really,” he mumbled again, tone laced with guilt. “I guess I was just… I don’t know. Trying to do something good. Since the whole… y’know.” His voice trailed off like it always did when he didn’t want to say it. Void.

He looked down at you — at your hands tending to him, the care in your touch even if you were clearly trying not to look at the fact that his shirt was off and, okay, he wasn’t unfit.

You focused on the wound. Not the abs. Definitely not the abs.

“Next time,” you murmured, “let me take the knife.”

Bob gave a weak grin. “Yeah, but then I wouldn’t get a free nurse.”