Light Pouring In [Lio/Galo]

[roesslyng]

Title: Light Pouring In
Fandom: Promare
Characters/Pairing: Lio/Galo
Rating: 0+
Length: 2k
Summary: Sometimes Lio likes to look at the stars.
Other: Written for Hawberries for Chocolate Box.



Light Pouring In

Night. Quiet.

It wasn't hard to get up to the roof of Galo's apartment building. One stairwell, one easily-picked lock. Lio slipped his way up and through and out, then went to the edge that ran along the roof. Sat down. Looked up.

Promepolis was bright, even late at night, its thousands of tiny lights sharp against the darkness. The light pollution obscured most of the sky, and the moon was absent. But from his high perch, if he looked very carefully, Lio could see a few stars.

He slipped a lighter out of his jacket pocket. Flicked it open, watched the spark and tiny flame. Let it go out. Did it again. Then he closed his eyes tight, the afterimage of the flame bright against the darkness of his eyelids.

It had been a year since the Promare left. A year since Galo had dragged Lio to his place, insisting that he clean himself up and then get some sleep. That they could figure everything out tomorrow, or the day after that. At the time, they'd both thought the arrangement would be temporary.

Lio couldn't imagine leaving.

A sound came from the doorway. Lio looked, reaching inside himself for flames that were no longer there.

He let out a long breath when he saw Galo's familiar bulk framed against the bright light of the stairwell.

"I don't think you're supposed to be up here," Galo said cheerfully as he walked over with the confidence of someone who knew they weren't supposed to be up there either but could explain his way out of it if he had to.

"Then the door needs a better lock," Lio said. He looked away, staring out at the city. It wasn't any of his concern.

"Hah! Good one."

Lio said nothing. Waited. Just as he expected, after a moment of watching him, Galo sank down heavily beside him on the rooftop's edge.

"Wow, it's sure cool up here! All those lights... And look, you can see people down there! Hey, d'you think if we called out, they'd hear us?"

"No," Lio said. He looked over at him, watched Galo peering down at the street below, waving at passers by who wouldn't have seen him even if they had looked up. "If you tried, you'd be loud enough to piss off all your neighbours."

"Yeah, probably." Galo pulled himself back, then looked toward him, smiling. "Hey. They're your neighbours too, you know."

Lio stared at him for a long moment, taking in that bright smile, bright as the lights below them. "How did you know where I was going? All I said was that I was going out," he asked, not caring how blatant the topic change was.

"I heard your footsteps heading toward the stairwell up to the roof. It wasn't hard to figure it out from there."

Well. That explained it.

Lio said nothing else. Not until Galo edged closer, sliding an arm around him, warm and familiar and comfortable.

"So... Why'd you decide to come up here?"

Nestling closer, Lio looked upward, staring at the few tiny pricks of light that he could pick out in the sky. "It's been a year," he said after a moment.

"A year?" Incomprehension in Galo's voice.

"A year since the Promare left."

"...Oh. Oh." Galo tightened his hold, giving Lio a little squeeze, as if he knew that he couldn't possibly understand how he felt, but wished he could. "So, uh. Did you want to be alone? I could go back inside -"

"It's fine." And it was, Lio realized. "I just wanted to look at the stars for a while."

Following his gaze, Galo looked up. "It's pretty hard to see anything," he said.

"Yeah." Lio paused for a moment, considering carefully. "There's a lot I don't miss about... you know. Before. But there were nights when I was outside the city, and everything was quiet, and the sky was clear." He decided not to mention that he didn't just miss the look of the starry sky, but the way it felt to be out in the middle of nowhere, with heat burning deep inside and the void up above him.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

For a moment, they were both quiet. Down below, the city rushed, the sound of vehicles sharp against the night. Lio stared up at the sky and tried to ignore it, tried to lose himself in the stars and endless black.

"Hey Lio," Galo said, ducking his head to whisper by his ear. "I have an idea."

Galo's ideas tended to be either very good or very bad, and sometimes they sounded like one but were actually the other. "Really," Lio said, and turned his head to catch Galo's cheek in a quick kiss. "Like what?" Even if he had his reservations, he was still curious.

Galo grinned. "I know where we can go."

---

The night air was cold. Aside from the two of them, the road was empty. They flew down the highway on their motorcycles, side by side, leaving Promepolis and its noise and lights behind.

Galo hadn't wanted to say where they were going. Lio asked him when they stopped by the apartment to get their keys and some warmer clothing, but in response, Galo shook his head. "You'll see," he said, grinning widely. "I bet you'll figure out where we're going pretty quickly."

"Is there any reason you can't tell me now?" Lio asked as he pulled on his gloves, unable to contain his curiosity. Ordinarily, such evasiveness would be annoying, but there was something about that grin that made Lio soften.

Galo was bouncing up and down on the balls of his feet, ready to go. "I could tell you," he said. "But it'll be better if it's a surprise!"

As they drove up the highway, Lio kept wondering, but not for long. The further they got from the city, the more familiar the landscape looked, until he knew exactly where they were headed.

The mountains and forest rose up around them.

Here, the air was even colder, and lacked the sharp scent of population and pollution. Lio followed as Galo picked his way along the lightless road, until finally Galo came to a stop. Killed the engine. Slid off his bike.

Lio did the same.

For a brief moment, they were both quiet. Lio looked toward Galo, deciding to leave the next move to him, since this had been his idea in the first place. In the moonless dark, he could make out the shape of his body, but little else, until Galo slipped his phone from his pocket and turned on the flashlight.

"Come on," he said, his features washed pale by the faint blue light and his voice no less enthusiastic than it had been before. "Let's go!"

Without a word, Lio slipped out his own phone and followed him.

The path was thin and difficult in the dark. Even with the eerie electronic glow, Lio had to take care with where he put his feet.

They only needed a moment to ease themselves through the trees until finally the path opened up, leaving nothing but a familiar deep crater yawning wide and black. Sharp earth rimmed the edge of it, lighter than the forest floor, enough to make it easy to see where the ground ended and the crater began. When they both pocketed their phones, they were plunged into the living dark again.

Lio stayed still, and kept back from the edge, unsure what to think. He'd been here before, but under much different circumstances, and at the time he'd had other things on his mind. Though he couldn't see the facility at the bottom of that huge black hole, he knew it was there. Why had Galo brought him here?

"It's too bad we can't go out onto the lake that used to be here," Galo said, oblivious to Lio's train of thought. "I used to like coming up here, and it was ice all the way down. We would've had a better view that way. But hey, look! What'd I tell you? Stars!"

He pointed up, and Lio lifted his head, gaze following until he saw.

Away from the city, with no lights to outshine them, stars scattered across the moonless sky in sharp relief of white against the deep endlessness of the night. When before he could only pick out a few stars against the lightened sky, here the wide expanse of them was endless and bright. The effect was like glitter spilled on black velvet. Lio took in a sharp breath, and stood there staring as the night settled around them and the air pinched his cheeks.

It wasn't anything like the rooftop.

More than once, Lio had spent the night under those stars, on his own or with the other Burnish. He remembered looking up at the brightness, staring up at the vastness of it while listening to the flames inside of him, and planning his next move in a desperate attempt to bury his uncertainty about the future.

This was different.

He suddenly shivered, wrapping his arms tightly around himself. The jacket he'd chosen had been fine for a short drive, but he hadn't expected the chill of the mountain air. Without the flame inside of him, the cold seeped in under every layer of his clothes.

A second later, Galo's arm coiled around his shoulder.

Lio leaned into him, nestling against the warmth of his body. A year ago, he never would have thought he'd ever find himself cuddling up to a firefighter. But things had changed, and now, he wasn't going to object to it at all. The heat rolling off Galo wasn't the same as the heat that had burned inside Lio for years, but for the moment, it would do.

He hazarded a glance at him. Galo was looking up, watching the sky, far more quiet now than he usually would be. It was difficult to read his expression with only the stars to give light, but he looked both content and lost in his thoughts, just as Lio had been a moment ago.

"Hey," Lio said, giving Galo a nudge. "Thanks."

Though it was hard to see his expression, there was no mistaking the smile in Galo's voice. "I figured you'd like it out here! Nice and clear, you can see everything..."

Lio shook his head. Prodded him again. "I didn't mean just that."

"Oh?"

"For..." For letting me stay at your place, Lio thought. For saving the world with me. For believing we could make things right. The words were on the tip of his tongue, but refused to tumble out. "For everything."

"Hey, that's what I should be telling you!" A laugh, warm and familiar, and Galo drew Lio closer. "Nothing's been the same since you came into my life, but you know what?"

"...What?"

"I wouldn't want it any other way."

Something tight twisted in Lio's chest. It wasn't the first time he'd heard Galo talk like that, but most of the time, he said it so lightly. Now, here, under the stars, it sounded bigger, more serious.

When Galo moved, dipping his head, Lio knew what he meant to do. Automatically, his hand came up, touching Galo's cheek and guiding him in the dark until they met for a kiss.

Galo's mouth was warm against his own, the kiss impossibly soft. One broad hand sank into Lio's hair, and the other slid down to rest at his waist. Lio shivered, and this time it wasn't from the cold.

He wound his arms around Galo. Pulled him closer, kissed him more deeply, and clung tight to keep him where he was. Swept his tongue against his lower lip, making him gasp. Lio could feel the warmth in Galo's cheeks, and a slight tightening in his grip. As if they could possibly get any closer than they already were.

Lio smiled against Galo's mouth, and pressed flush against him. Stayed close, letting the kiss linger, drawing it out because he wanted to. Because he could.

This wasn't how he had ever thought his life would go.

But now, he thought as he kissed Galo under the stars, there wasn't anywhere else he would rather be.