War of Hearts

(05) A Compliment

~

It was early morning when the sun had appeared in the sky, the rain no longer sharing its despair.

Technoblade and Badboyhalo had reached the river bank. All that's left to do was cross the running current of waves and reach the swampy side of the forest. Bad stepped forward, quite eager in achieving their task, in fact, he was so excited he did not even notice the way the land crumbled at the weight of his foot, causing him to slip; If it had not been for Techno grabbing his bag from behind, the fast current would've taken him instead. 

"Careful—!"

The pink-haired man chastised, stepping back and letting his teammate breathe.

"Oh my goodness... thank you." Darryl gave a nervous smile, his heart loudly pounding in his chest. That was close.

David's look softened for the shorter male, the memory of last night coming back to him. 

~

When the silence had become unbearable in the cave, David took a quick peek at the brunette to his left. The latter was still freezing, shivering against the cold despite stuffing his arms inside the t-shirt. His own hand fiddled with the edge of his coat, the fabric was soft and despite it being wet from the outside, the inside was rather dry. The water did little damage so he was able to keep warm. Biting his bottom lip, David ran a hand through his now-dry pink locks, sighing before standing up and slowly walking the rest of the meter distance to the brunette. 

The latter seemed to notice his nearing presence and looked at him from behind his glasses. Emerald green eyes locked with oak brown ones causing David to hitch a breath. They're beautiful. Shaking the thought, he untangled the ribbon on his front and began taking the coat off his arms before flipping it over and placing it around Darryl's shoulders. Upon finding out what he was doing, the latter's eyes widened.

"Oh, no, you don't have to you muffin!" 

He tried to take the red coat off but David insisted. Offering him a warm smile causing heat to run up on Darryl's cheeks leaving a tint of nice pink across.

"Thank you..." it was small, gentle yet sincere. This caused a brighter mood for the former.

After tying the ribbon on the front, David sat right next to the empty space beside the once-freezing male. He was left with his white, long-sleeved button-up shirt; it had gotten a tiny bit cold for him but that was okay. It was most probably because he wasn't that used to being outdoors without his coat. 

Pressing his fingertips against each other, David started thinking of a conversation starter to pass the time when Darryl spoke up.

"I'm sorry I wasn't the one you were expecting..." The former glanced at him, seeing a distant expression on Darryl's features, "I know you were expecting to get paired up with Skeppy.." He grimaced yet kept the forced smile on his face to try and hide it. 

Techno grunted with a shrug, he put his gaze forward where the source of light was placed. "Meh, you're pretty cool." 

It was a simple response yet it was enough to spark something inside of Darryl's chest. He clearly wasn't expecting that. Much less from Technoblade himself. 

David saw the amazement in his eyes and suddenly shied away from the attention. Normally he would've absorbed it, enlarging his ego furthermore. Yet for some reason, he felt really self-conscious around the blonde-brown-haired boy.

"I mean, you're good with the bow." He stated as a distraction, "Now I wonder, why don't you use it often during the mini-games in the village?"

It was Darryl's turn to shy away, covering his face with Techno's coat's sleeves, muttering some incoherent words as he looks away. 

Techno moved closer, "what was that?" Bad continued to mutter in low volume, 

"Sorry, still can't hear you." 

"... I said I don't think I'll be good..." He finally spilt with a hearable volume. 

With that statement, Techno raised a brow, "Are you kidding? You were amazing. Have you seen the way you headshot those three skeletons? That's called skill right there."

With his monotoned voice, he still sounded very persuasive and hyped up, it was something that Bad quickly thought was a 10/10.

He giggled, "Thanks, a friend taught me how to properly aim."

Now that did not sit well in the young Technoblade's mind. The thought of someone standing behind Bad, getting away with touching his hand to teach "how to properly learn" was outrageous. With that thought in mind, he did not even notice that the brunette had gone off, rambling about his experience in learning, too distracted to notice Techno staring once again. 

Bad's voice was pretty nice to listen to. Probably because of how soft and gentle it was along with the occasional voice cracks. This voice was all he listened to until what felt like hours had passed by when all he heard were gentle snores to his left. Glancing over, he saw the brunette was leaning his head against the wall, eyes already shut and glasses a little bit off. Finding peace even when sleeping. 

This brought a small smile to David as he very carefully took the silver glasses off, setting it aside to where it won't get crushed then slowly let his hand push Darryl's head so it could lean on his shoulders. Having content with this, David let his own headrest on top of Darryl's, evening out his breath until sleep takes him. 

A loud wailing brought Technoblade out from his flashback. He and Bad had successfully crossed the river, now ready with just a couple of steps to take until they reach the wailing OctoQuid of the Western lake.

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