Bob felt like he was dreaming.
The pessimistic part of him was shouting about how he was going to wake up soon.
But everyone around assured him that Helmut really was in front of him, both body and brain, whole again.
After such a painfully long delay due to ridiculous paperwork and proving that he was fit to go on the rescue mission, it didn't seem real for the moment to finally be here.
"You're getting lost in your head there, Bobby." Helmut's gentle voice broke Bob out of his thoughts.
"What? Oh, sorry." Bob said, sitting up straighter from where he was hunched over Helmut's bed.
Because things could never be simple, Helmut was currently confined to a hospital bed as his body recovered from its long stint in hyper ice, or at least recovered enough to be transported back to the Motherlobe.
"Penny for your thoughts?" Helmut asked his husband.
"It's just…you're here. I mean…you're here." Bob struggled to convey how he was feeling, everything too mixed up inside to properly voice.
"I know." Helmut smiled, understanding what Bob felt. "I waited so long to hold you again, and now I can."
With weak arms, Helmut moved his hands to eclipse Bob's, rubbing the back of them with his thumbs.
Bob smiled and leaned in closer for a hug, waiting patiently for Helmut to navigate his arms around him. They stayed like that for a while before parting with a kiss.
"It's funny." Helmut said as he flexed his fingers. "You're the old man yet I'm the one who moves like I'm older."
Bob laughed, though he didn't find the comment funny.
"You'll get better." He promised.
Unlike Bob, who really was old and had all the issues that came with age.
"I hope so." Helmut said. "There are some activities that I'm eager to get back to."
The larger man wiggled his eyebrows at his husband.
This evoked a genuine and loud laugh from Bob.
"Helmut, this is a hospital. Show some dignity." Bob laughed and coughed at the same time.
"What? I was just talking about going on our road trips again." Helmut said unconvincingly. "You're the one with your mind in the gutter."
"Agent Fullbear, Agent Zanotto, I'm back." Razputin suddenly appeared in the room with a plastic bag in his hands.
"Raz." Helmut reminded as he looked at the young agent.
"Right, off duty." Raz said to himself. "Helmut and Bob."
The young boy was very endearing with how he tried to present himself as a professional agent, but Helmut still saw him for the child he was and so wouldn't stand for Raz for being serious all the time. So, he managed to get Raz to agree to use first names without 'agent' attached when not doing mission work, to help the boy relax.
The entire point of bringing Raz along on the mission to recover Helmut's body was to help him relax after all that he'd been through, giving him some distance from his family, Ford and the Motherlobe, without the pressure of his peers.
And Helmut also knew that Raz was the type of boy who needed to be active and doing something, so a recovery mission was ideal for allowing Raz to feel like he was doing something while also giving him something easy to destress with.
"Did you bring the goods?" Helmut asked.
"Uh huh." Raz pulled out some food from the bag and handed it to Helmut. "The counter lady said that I got them fresh out the oven too."
"Ah, actual food. With taste!" Helmut celebrated.
He clumsily fumbled with the package, Bob's hands hovering to help if needed, before successfully opening and taking a large bite.
"Careful, you'll choke." Bob worried.
"I'll take choking over the hospital food here." Helmut said through a mouthful of food.
"Is it really that bad?" Raz asked.
"Yes." Helmut said.
Suddenly, a nurse walked in.
"So, Mr Fullbear…" She trailed off as she saw what the man was eating.
Helmut froze like a deer in the headlights, looking from the nurse to the food as if contemplating whether he'd be able to hide it as if the nurse never saw it to begin with.
"Mr Fullbear, you should not be eating that in here." The nurse scolded.
"Why? I wasn't put on any special diet." Helmut said defensively.
"You're getting crumbs all over your bed." The nurse pointed out.
Looking down, Helmut saw that his food had indeed caused a mess all over his blankets.
"Oops." Helmut said as more crumbs dropped onto the bed.
The nurse sighed. "I'll need to get some help so that we can clean your bed." She said. "In the future, can you please refrain your…nephew from eating messy foods in bed." She then directed at Bob.
"We're husbands." Both Helmut and Bob corrected.
"Oh." The nurse said in surprise.
She looked between the two men, who were able to psychically pick up on her judging them heavily. Specifically on their age, since Bob was an old man and Helmut wasn't even greying yet.
"I'll go get the help." The nurse said stiffly, leaving.
"What was that about?" Raz questioned.
"Nothing to worry yourself over." Helmut assured the boy.
Bob sighed. "I'm going to go get some air." He said, standing up to leave.
"Bobby." Helmut said out of concern.
"I'm fine." Bob insisted before his husband could worry. "Razputin, look after Helmut for me."
"Yes, sir." Raz eagerly accepted the 'mission'. "He'll be fine under my watch."
"And I feel all the safer for it." Helmut laughed.
Bob smiled at his husband's laugh before leaving.
Bob sighed heavily as he sat outside of the hospital
The nurse's comment and judgement bothered him more than they should have.
But Bob supposed that he would have to get used to thoughts like that. Because even though he and Helmut had been close in age when they married, twenty years in hyper ice had caused a very noticeable age gap between them.
It was something that Bob hadn't even thought about until now.
Of course, he had always been aware that he had aged while Helmut wouldn't have, but the idea only really sank in after finally finding Helmut's body and seeing the lack of aging for himself.
But somehow, how others would see it hadn't crossed Bob's mind.
"I look old enough to be his dad, don't I?" Bob mumbled to himself.
On instinct, Bob reached into his jacket only to grasp at nothing, as he'd thrown away all his alcohol.
Staring down at his empty hand, Bob sniffed and tried to not think about how badly he wanted a drink.
But that just let his thoughts go to darker places.
Realistically, Bob knew that Helmut still loved him despite the extra twenty years and alcoholism, proven by the first act Helmut performed after waking up from being re-brained being to kiss Bob so hard they both nearly passed out from lack of oxygen.
But intrusive thoughts still wormed their way in, making bad connections and creating possibilities in his mind that Bob couldn't help thinking about even though he knew they weren't true.
With Helmut being so much younger, he could lose attraction to the old man that Bob was, leaving him for a younger man. And Bob wouldn't even blame him, twenty years older meant twenty years closer to the grave, and it also meant that Bob would eventually leave Helmut in the same situation he had originally been in, decades of having to go on without his loving husband.
And Bob hadn't done his body any favours with his alcoholism, his liver was probably pickled at this point, which meant that his life expectancy was even lower.
It would be better for Helmut if he did find someone younger, so that he had a healthy partner who he wouldn't have to suffer though living past for years and years.
It would be selfish of Bob to keep him from that.
"Bob?"
Bob blinked and looked up, startled to see Raz suddenly in front of him.
"Oh, hey." Bob said quietly. "Aren't you supposed to be guarding Helmut?"
"He asked me to come get you." Raz reported. "Said that you needed to be pulled out of your bad place again."
Bob said nothing, embarrassed that the child knew so much about his issues.
"And he said that you needed this." Raz added.
Then, to Bob's surprise, Raz hugged him.
It took a few seconds for Bob to fully register the display of affection, but then he found the tension melting out of his shoulders, just a bit.
In the presence of something given so innocently and in such earnest, Bob's dark thoughts receded enough for him to think more clearly again.
Hesitantly, Bob hugged back for a brief moment before pulling away.
"Thanks, kid." He said.
Raz smiled up at him.
"Come on, Helmut's waiting." He said.
Bob let Raz lead the way back to Helmut's room.
Though Bob found that the boy could be a bit pushy, he liked the kid. He sort of had to considering that Raz had helped snap him out of his drunken depression enough to get his act together and reunite him with his husband.
But outside of the sense of gratitude, Raz was such a well-meaning and helpful young boy, who definitely needed more opportunities to just be a child, which both Bob and Helmut wanted to give him.
Raz was the sort of boy that Helmut and Bob would have loved to adopt into their family.
They had never seriously considered adopting all those years ago, their current living situation not exactly ideal for raising a child, but the subject had come up a few times.
Then the Grulovia incident happened and all thoughts of having a child of his own were catapulted from Bob's mind.
Maybe they could restart the topic now.
Though, would adoption be a viable option. Bob's age would have to be a mark against the couple before they even began.
Though, if Helmut had someone else-
Before Bob's thoughts could lead him back to a dark place again, he and Raz entered back into Helmut's room.
"Bobby!" Helmut reached his arms out to his husband.
Like a magnet, Bob went straight to Helmut, who then pulled him down into a kiss.
"Talk to me, Bobby." Helmut said when they finished.
After so long together, even after much longer apart, Bob could still never hide anything from Helmut.
"Bad thoughts." Bob admitted. "I'm old, and you're still so young."
"Bobby," Helmut stroked Bob's cheek. "You could be forty, you could be a hundred; age means nothing to me. I love you, now and forever."
Bob smiled. He always did with Helmut's dramatic declarations.
"I know." He said. "But these thoughts still appear anyway. About how I'll eventually leave you, and how much it'll hurt you just like it hurt me. And that it'd be better for you if we-"
Helmut put a finger to Bob's lips.
"I know what's coming." Helmut said sadly. "But I'll live through it, because I'm never abandoning you."
Bob couldn't help it, he began to cry.
"I love you." He sobbed.
"And I love you too." Helmut assured, his own eyes shining.
The two embraced again.
"Hey." Helmut said after a minute of silence. "Marry me."
Bob choked out a laugh. "We're already married." He reminded.
"So?" Helmut asked like it wasn't a big deal. "Let's get married again."
"I don't think that's how it works." Bob laughed. "I think you mean renewing vows."
"Alright, we can do that." Helmut said. "We can have a renewing vows ceremony."
Bob shook his head. "Sounds like a good idea." He relented easily.
"Ooh, a renewing vows ceremony." Raz reminded the two adults that he was there. "What's that like, is it like a wedding? Can I be invited? Can I be the ring bearer? Can I be the best man? Wait, do you have those at a renewing ceremony? Will there be cake, like the one I saw in Bob's mind?"
Helmut and Bob looked to each other, sharing a smile as they let the boy ramble on.
"He already has a family, you know?" Bob telepathically reminded his husband.
Helmut didn't respond, but Bob could feel him internally pouting over not being able to claim the junior agent as his own kid.
Author's note: Please comment.
Enemy concept: Intrusive Thought:
It makes bad connections in your mind.
Design: Body of an insect, drill nose that it uses to burrow into the ground, and a thought cloud for a backend.
Mechanics: Burrows under the ground to attack the player from underneath and/or uses the same connection move that Raz does to grapple onto the player for a quick hit.