His heart was burning.

No, that wasn't right. His entire body was burning, the pain cutting through him in waves.

Mr. Heartland opened his eyes, and immediately regretted it. The pain forced its way in, the burning enveloped his senses and seeped into him; one eye went blind immediately, he squinted both shut in a desperate bid to save his sight.

He didn't realize it until later, but the aptly named Sea of Ill Intent was a sea of acid.

Heartland struggled upward, gasping for breath as he broke the sea's calm surface. The small amount of protection his clothes offered was rapidly disintegrating, the feathery blue collar he loved so much breaking apart in clumps and dissolving amidst the waves. His skin would follow soon.

After falling into the portal to Astral World, the one named Eliphas had judged him as anathema and cast him out – Heartland didn't exactly understand what it had meant at the time, but the exile to Barian World had inadvertently dumped him off into one of the world's acid seas. Or perhaps it was intentional, he had no time to speculate on his fate. The acid had worked its way through his clothing and hair, and had started to work on his skin. His blood stained the violet water and Heartland started to scream.

Vector had saved him before, hadn't he? The Barian offered him life in exchange for fealty and trapped him in the body of a fly, happening upon him by chance. Or maybe it was fate. This time he was nowhere to be seen.

"Vector-sama?!" he shrieked out, as loudly as his raw and burning throat could manage. The pain was becoming overwhelming; the acid was working its way to his muscles, compromising them. He was having trouble staying afloat now as his left arm refused to work, vital tendons and muscles severed. The fourth time he screamed for the Barian he lost the battle with his failing muscles, sinking back below the surface, thrashing and flailing. The last thing he saw before he went blind was his cane, the heart at its tip half-dissolved and separated from the shaft. Involuntarily Heartland tried to suck in a breath of air and instead filled his lungs with acid.

It tore his body apart. Vector never came.

Mr. Heartland bolted upright in bed with a gasp, sweat rolling off him in waves.

The dreams were vivid because he had lived them, in a sense. Perhaps little details were changed – his own personal nightmares – but they were never just dreams, they were memories. He touched his arms as if to verify he was intact, his breath still catching in his throat despite himself.

The man lying in bed next to him stirred slightly, laying a hand over Heartland's leg, withdrawing when the owner found the skin clammy. It took Dr. Faker a moment to rise, blinking sleep from his eyes before he propped himself up on his arms.

"Which one was it this time?" Faker asked quietly, concern inundating his voice.

He had died twice, he had two such nightmares that plagued him. There was the aforementioned death in the Sea of Ill Intent, and the second where he burned alive in Don Thousand's flames, engulfed by the Fake Numbers which had consumed him in his duel with Kaito and subsequently Yuma and Astral.

"Acid," Heartland answered simply, and was shocked to hear the way his own voice wavered unsteadily in his throat. He was a man who was always confident, sure of himself and his actions. Only here in Faker's bed, torn from his nightmares did he break down a little. Faker was the only one who ever saw past his façade.

Suddenly he found Faker's arms around him, pulling their bodies together. "It won't happen again, Heartland. I won't let it," he whispered after a beat, pressing his face into Heartland's neck and kissing the exposed skin.

Here in his arms, Heartland had to believe him.

His hands rose to bury themselves in the shocks of blonde hair before him, guiding Faker's face to his until their lips met. Without his glasses the form before him was blurry, slightly indistinct, but he knew every part of him by heart. "I trust you," Heartland breathed between kisses, his arms encircling the doctor until he'd fallen back into bed and Faker was on top of him.

They built this city together, perhaps driven together only by necessity at first, but it had developed into something more faster than either had expected. And perhaps at first the Numbers had clouded their thoughts, made their first encounters little more than quick fucks bent over the desk in his office in Heartland Tower, but at some point it became personal to both of them.

The thought caused Heartland to stir involuntarily; Faker felt him and responded, pushing the mayor's legs apart with one knee as they deepened their kisses, hungry for the feel of one against the other. He ground his leg between Heartland's until he was moaning and writhing, desperate. The nightmare had long been pushed from his thoughts.

The only barrier between the two was the thin fabric of underwear; Faker hesitated only enough to rid them of it as fingers scratched lightly down his back. Their eyes met briefly, Heartland's face was flushed but he managed a light smirk, a trace of that flamboyant, "heart burning" personality of his behind it and Faker couldn't help but smile back at him. Then he held them together, stroking lightly at first to watch the way Heartland writhed under him, biting his lip to stifle his moans.

Then Faker started to thrust and the friction between them became almost unbearable. Heartland met his rhythm with his own thrusts and stifled the moans building in his throat with more kisses, half-desperate for the comfort the body poised over him provided. His cock thrust up against Heartland's and he practically melted, Faker's fingers trapped them tightly together and he had to pump harder.

They rocked together and thrust until Faker had whispered words of his love into his ear and Heartland broke down, whining the doctor's name into his neck and cumming onto his cock and stomach, thrusting weakly a few more times until Faker had done the same. The mess between them went forgotten for a time until he felt Faker move further down his body. The chill of the night air against his skin was replaced by the warm, wet embrace of Faker's mouth, sucking him clean and then some.

He came again, this time in Faker's mouth.

Whispered words always followed, their bodies entwined together until Mr. Heartland could find sleep again. The nightmares were coming less and less these days – he wasn't sure they would ever disappear entirely, but he could hope. Faker was helping, anyways. Too many nights he spent alone with his thoughts. Maybe all Heartland had ever needed was someone to share them with.

He fell asleep again in Faker's arms, and this time there were no dreams of acid or fire, only the two of them together.