topcoat (whitewulf)

14 July 2024

Still, after the debriefing White Knight stopped him and reached out to tap against the marks with the back of a knuckle. The place where the exosuit touched Biowulf's chest rang with a quiet metallic sound.

"Unsightly," White Knight said, eyeing the scars, something unreadable in his expression - Biowulf could never quite read him, some barrier he couldn't cross, the faint yellow light of the visor holding him at arm's length. He stepped back to look Biowulf over in full, like he was only just seeing him as a whole, all the long-standing scratches and scuffs that had spread out across Biowulf's body over half a decade in this shape. His scrutiny was a heavy wash of static. It hazed fuzzily over him, then went sharp and clear when White Knight tipped his head and smirked.

"You trust me," he said, not a question, a certainty - "I just had an idea."

--

It was already fifteen minutes in, twenty, he couldn't keep track of the time like this when White Knight hummed behind him and asked, "Can you feel this?" like an afterthought. Already twenty or twenty-five minutes of keeping frozen still as White Knight prepared the surface of him - held him by the back of the neck to keep him steady while he used finer and finer grit sandpaper to smooth out all the scratches Biowulf couldn't see on his back. Biowulf had promised himself he would stay present during this, to remember the pass of White Knight's hands on him, but White Knight had circled him and clicked his tongue and muttered "this would be easier if I could take you apart" and his attention had scattered. The suggestion had been a heady gift to begin with - the suggestion or maybe the clear-cut no-questions order, White Knight telling him rather than asking. Can he feel it: of course. Every tight circle of the sandpaper cutting across living metal, a cleansing burn of pain, feeling raw and new when the cool air shifted across his roughed-out skin.

"Yes," Biowulf answered, stutteringly late. "It isn't bad."

White Knight had brought: an airbrush, industrial, apparently well used; sandpaper, dry and wet, to such a fine grit that it looked almost smooth; tape meant to block out sections of color; paint, in cool glossy white, and a smaller tin of a yellow gold. Careful, practiced hands. White Knight had tied his fur up first, perfunctory, to keep it out of the way of his work, all the ease of someone who was setting about a favored chore. Biowulf felt himself a canvas. He felt the way a well-used weapon must, how a favored gun must feel when its master broke it down to pieces to clean it and polish it.

White Knight scrubbed the rust from him. He wiped away metal dust and left a clean, even surface. The first fine spray of primer nearly made Biowulf shiver, cold and baptismal.

It must have taken hours; time slid away from him to skip too quickly and drag years-long. White Knight was quiet with focus except to tell Biowulf to raise his arms or turn his head, and when he had made Biowulf bend low to tape protective plastic across the glass of his eyes and said, off hand, "A shame there's nothing to be done about these," and Biowulf had almost drowned under the tide of disappointing his master until he'd noticed White Knight's wry smile. The hardest portion had been when White Knight had finished, set the airbrush down, and then told Biowulf not to move while it dried, and then began cleaning up while Biowulf could only watch him, only catching hints of White Knight's satisfied smile when he turned.

"It dries fast," White Knight said finally, turning to face Biowulf with his arms crossed. "Proprietary formula - had to 'borrow' it from Providence. You should be set."

There was still the plastic sheeting over his eyes - he had to pull it away, carefully, afraid to touch his claws to fresh paint - gold glimmered at the corner of his vision. He glanced down and the clean expanse of white startled him. He looked, in an oblique sort of way, though still dangerous and alien, he looked like --

"It'll be good to have a soldier represent me again," White Knight said, glancing over his work. He was smirking pleased, a certain proud tone to him that Biowulf had never seen before. "I'd like to see the look on Black Knight's face when she sees this."

Something about the idea of Black Knight seeing him this way - wrapped in White Knight's colors, by his hand - something about the idea of stepping into the Providence base where she waited with all her pawns, with her collected handful of scientists, with van Kleiss -

He flinched away from himself, claws drifted too close to his perfectly painted chest, and White Knight scoffed. "What, afraid to scratch it up? I'm not keeping you on base just because you're freshly painted." He looked over their matching whites. "If you get it dirty, I'll fix you up again."

The promise thrilled down Biowulf's spine. "Thank you, master."

White Knight's smile finally broke, but only for him to roll his eyes, not cruel. "Enough of that. It's getting late and I'm sending you back into the field tomorrow. I expect you to make me proud out there."

He was the weapon put back together again, signed with White Knight's name. Some part of him felt tight and warm and delicate, precious with the care shown to it, but Biowulf straightened carefully and nodded. "I won't fail you, master."

White Knight grinned at him, wide and sharp, and Biowulf had to tear his gaze away first, overwhelmed by the sheer number of undeserved gifts he had received.