#breaking news: owen carvour wins “world's most reluctant caretaker” more at 8

[starpirateee]

curtwen prompt!! you brought it up in the last curtwen fever prompt so now I’d actually love to see reluctant post-banana sick fic care (going either way, but owen having to take care of the man he thinks he hates lives a little rent free in my head) if you’d want to write that :)

Funny you should mention that, actually 👀 because I literally got asked this not half an hour later:

Same brain, huh? At this point, it's too much of a coincidence not to write, so the two of you can have your way with this reluctant caretaking

"Come on, Curt, we don't have the time to stay here!" Tatiana made sure to keep her tone a mix of insistent and well meaning. It was her fault that Curt had ended up in this mess. Since finding out that he was arriving in Monte Carlo, the Deadliest Man had requested that they make things a little interesting, that they should manage to get agent Mega alone for even a moment.

Now, Curt was at a level rather closer to death than she would've hoped, and she was glad that she'd arrived now instead of a minute later, otherwise she was sure that she'd have found him in a much worse state.

Curt stumbled to his feet, shooting a glare over his shoulder that spoke of all the betrayal he felt. Near enough all the energy he had left was being used on trying to keep himself upright, but he could always spare a little on making sure she knew how offended he was that she'd essentially left him to die.

"What, you expect me to trust you, after that?" He snapped, glancing back towards the Deadliest Man, who was still trying to recover from that blow to the head he'd been dealt.

"I don't care if you do or not, we have to go!"

She reached out. Instinct took over, and Curt reached out too. When her hand clasped around his forearm, his breath caught in his throat. There was a light set of footsteps across the room that he was absolutely sure that nobody else would hear. Every instinct within was telling him not to look, this wasn't the time for-

"Owen..?"

Despite everything, he looked up anyway, across the room, straight into the colourless, blank stare of Owen, who was leaning against the wall by the door. The bastard even had the audacity to lift a hand and wave, like he was fully aware that Curt couldn't take his eyes off him. This was the Owen that resided in his head. He had been at once familiar and entirely unwelcome, like finding out that a stowaway on board a vessel was actually your closest friend, and having to choose between selling them out or leaving them to a potentially worse fate by not saying a word. Part of him really didn't want to see Owen there at all, he was nothing more than a reminder of his fate, and what he could've done better.

The other part of him knew that his mind was just making up an image of Owen that was so unfailingly unscathed, because he simply couldn't handle the idea of him being marred in any way. It hurt to try and imagine what kind of injuries he must have accrued during the fall. During the explosion. During the moments before he took his final breath…

He was so caught up in the moment that he barely registered Tatiana drop her arm and start running out of the door, under the impression that he was hot on her heels. The more space they put between themselves and the likes of the Deadliest Man, the less likely they were to be traced, she knew that. So when she'd told Curt to get going, she'd really meant it.

But that did mean that she missed the Deadliest Man— missed Agent Owen Carvour— take a gun from the holster at his side and offload, striking Curt just above the hip. She missed Curt bite down a cry of pain, whirling around just in time to see the assassin rising to his feet. And the way that Curt looked down on himself to examine the wound. And the fact that his fingertips came back bloody, the way his eyes went wide, and the way he hit the floor within moments of registering the dark red substance that coated his hand.

Tatiana may have missed that, but Owen didn't.

Curt collapsed, and it took a long moment before he worked out the reason why. Of course. That bastard was terrified of the sight of his own blood. Of all the things for a man to be afraid of…

Of course, that wasn't the only injury he'd managed to sustain. The last few minutes had been a rather interesting ride, and Tatiana had come dangerously close to not finding Curt Mega alive at all. If he had his own way, he would've made sure he kept that arrogant son of a bitch alive for months, right on the delicate cusp between being alive and being dead. To watch him suffer, to see him experience something even close to the level of pain he himself had endured over those few painful months… Those months he had spent stupidly wishing Curt would come back for him, where he would hold himself strong, forcing himself to remember there was something on the other side worth surviving for… It hurt like hell, and he wasn't going to pretend to ignore any of the scars it had given him. He would never be the same, so why should Curt be?

All the same, whether he was able to get his own way or not, the truth of the matter lay in the here and now. Curt— supposedly the best spy this side of the Atlantic— had just passed out on first sight of his own blood. And Tatiana was gone. Of course, it was only a matter of time before she realised Curt wasn't actually behind her— even in the bustle of the casino hotel. Then, she'd make her return, no doubt. Until then, though, Owen had a bleeding Curt on the ground, and a certain idea in his head that he would rather not see him dead, actually. Maybe some other time he could get into the making him beg for death part… He deserved as much.

He sighed deeply. "God, Mega, you really need to work on that fuckin' issue of yours…" He muttered stiffly as he crouched and began rifling through the bag under the bed for his own supplies. Those kind of things were always needed in an emergency, sure, but he didn't expect this emergency to involve the patching up of the man he hated with such a fiery passion…

That was a matter for another moment. Curt couldn't work on his issues, because he wasn't conscious. He couldn't call him out for caring even slightly, because he wasn't conscious. He couldn't even figure out that the man behind the mask— the one that had been promptly removed and discarded on the bed— was the man he'd been searching for, because he wasn't conscious.

And that was the issue that needed dealing with right now.

Owen reminded himself that he couldn't care less what happened to Curt, so long as it happened by his hand. And by his hand, this had happened, so there was always that. As he pulled Curt's tuxedo jacket from his shoulders enough to be able to lift his shirt and start working on the bullet wound now causing blossoms of red against the fabric, he wondered to himself just what was making him do this. He didn't care. Especially not about Curt. He'd been told one too many times that he was cold, and callous, and all of those things they wanted a perfect operative-slash-weapon to be. If all of that was true, then there was no way that he could possibly have any room left for caring about Curt.

But, on the other hand, four years was a long time to be missing what was essentially a piece of himself.

And now here he was. Right there, at his disposal. Missing a tooth, clearly missing some brain matter, and missing a fair bit of blood that just… Would not stop coming.

The bullet hadn't even lodged in, it was a surface wound at best. And yet, Curt bled and bled and bled. Something wasn't entirely right here…

Owen decided not to think about that. He applied the first layer of gauze, and started to wrap the bandage around Curt's midriff. Periodically, he kept looking up at the door, to make sure he wasn't going to be spotted or caught in this position. He imagined it looked rather strange— a man with a knife at one side of his belt and a machete at the other, kneeling by the side of another and applying layers of bandages to a bullet wound. By all accounts, it didn't make sense, and thinking about it brought the slightest of smiles to his face.

"Look at you…" He hummed. Filling the silence was the best bet here, otherwise he'd start thinking about the few times he could remember doing this before… The moments he'd spent in the dead of night on the floor of some shitty motel room, making sure Curt stayed alive. And he really didn't want to think about that. The tenderly spoken words, the way their hands brushed against one another, the meaningless teasing about how he should've been more careful…

God, he missed the old times.

"… You're an absolute mess, Curt. It's absolutely fine for you to play the damsel in distress, though, isn't it? When you need saving, look at how there's always someone there to pick up your slack, and look how often it has to be me… Where the hell were you when I needed you, though?" He asked quietly, shaking his head. He wasn't so deterred by the sight of blood at his fingertips, but ironically, it had disturbed some inner part of him for exactly the same reason that it had disturbed Curt.

Because… Well, because it was Curt's.

And there was some inner part of him— that same man he'd spent the last four years trying to push down within himself— that was concerned. Concerned about the fact that the blood wouldn't stop. Concerned about what would've happened if he wasn't stopped. He didn't care about the aching in his own head left over from the blunt end of the pistol… That didn't really matter in the grand scheme of things. Apparently, what really mattered was this stupid, selfish— loving, grounding, gorgeous— American agent spreading blood all over the hardwood floors.

What would've happened if he wasn't stopped? Would he have actually dared to go so far as to kill Mega? Would he have gone that far, here in this hotel room, only to pack his bag and leave immediately after like he didn't just leave the body of his partner in the room?

Curt is not your partner. Not anymore.

He sighed to himself. "Where were you when I was calling your name with all the energy I had left?" His hand pressed down against the wound, just above the primary source of pain. He reached for another layer of bandages.

"Where were you when I was bleeding out on the floor of a cell, sparing a thought to the last hope I had that you might come back?" He watched the blossom of red seep in through the bandages and bit his lip, letting his apprehension show for a fraction of a second. He had no right to be nervous right now. He had every right to be pissed.

"Where were you when your shadow sat at the other side of the room, huh? All the time I spent wishing that was really you, even if you'd come to do nothing but observe while I made sure I lived to see tomorrow… You weren't there. You never were. This…" This life he had been given. This life he knew he should be grateful for, because at the end of the day, it wasn't his to have and never was…This had all come from that fall, the last time he trusted Curt to have his back. "This is your fault."

And yet, he kept winding bandages around his waist, administering all of the care that he knew he could muster, especially towards Curt. On one hand, this was his fault. He had walked away when Owen needed him the most, and yet… He didn't really have a choice, did he? There was a good chance that he would've died as well…

But he'd never come back. He'd never bothered to check whether Owen was alive. Because he would've found nothing, and he would've known something was wrong, because nobody's body just disappeared…

The only time Owen stopped working was the brief moment he reached up to scrub a furious tear from his eye, as if Curt deserved the satisfaction of knowing that he was close to breaking over just the thought of him. He left in his wake a smear of red that he didn't think twice about. Like he hadn't felt the chill of blood against his face before… As if he'd never had to wonder if a particularly bad round would leave a stain to his cheeks.

He'd been lucky so far, but it was only a matter of time, he supposed.

"Y'know, this isn't so fun when you're not around to listen…" He whispered, leaning in close. Another check of the door. Another show that nobody was there waiting for him. Another sigh. "I never wanted to kill you, Curt, you should know that. And I know, that's absolutely nothing when it comes down to it, but I digress…"

He made a final check to ensure that the bandage was tight enough, that it would hold if and when Curt got on his feet again, then stood up, towering over the unconscious form of the man who used to hold the title of partner… Of lover.

"I guess you'll never know what really happened here tonight. And I know you can hear me, but I know you're just like me. You always have been. You've been hearing me for the last four years…" A dry, humourless chuckle left him, the only barrier against the floodgates opening. "And that's someone else's song, I'm afraid… This? This is one of those. Think of it as someone else's song, it'll make things a lot easier when I do what I have to do… For both of us, I think."

When Tatiana found Curt, he was barely conscious, trying to button up the shirt that someone had left wide open, and trying to make himself look in the least bit presentable. He had pretty much stopped bleeding, but it didn't take a genius to notice that someone had bothered to patch him up with a few layers of fresh bandage. He could feel it against his skin, taut and securing. A professional's job— or at least, someone who really knew what they were doing.

His memory held onto the ghost of a voice. Chiding him. Telling him that it was all his fault. Telling him that he wasn't there. That voice had a name, and that name belonged to a ghost. He knew it. The ghost knew it too, it seemed.

But there was no trace of him.