When Worlds Collide (MxM)?

The construction of the railroad continued over the next few weeks. They laid miles of tracks at a record pace, thanks to the Terran's natural strength, and were now building the final design for the locomotive.

Aino often returned to the lab looking exhausted. Whenever Kade showed concern, the inventor would try to shoo him off, but the human would then point out his hypocrisy.

Eira observed the two whenever they were together, and remained convinced that Aino would be going into season any day now.

Kade ignored him, finding the insinuation ridiculous when Aino was too exhausted to think about such things.

One day when they were almost finished with the train's construction, Aino stumbled into the lab. He lazily tossed some papers onto the floor as he dug around, his eyes drooping from exhaustion and mumbling to himself.

This was the worst that Kade had ever seen the man, and he got up from his desk to help.

"What are you looking for?" He scanned the documents to make sure nothing important was getting tossed.

"The brake schematics." Aino drawled, rubbing his eyes. It was early in the morning, so the man must have been working straight through the night. With the project almost ready for presentation, he was on a time crunch. "I lost the copy I had earlier and need to verify that it was built as designed."

"I can look for them." Kade tugged on the man's arm, trying to pull him away from his search. But the Terran was too strong for him, even in his tired state, and stubbornly remained where he was.

"You don't have to."

"You're too tired to even read any of these," Kade tugged harder.

Aino knocked over a pile of papers and didn't hear a word he said. Kade felt irritated and glanced at Tiner to see if she had any ideas. But the girl shrugged, equally as lost about how to get the man to rest.

Not knowing what else to do, Kade boldly grabbed Aino's face, cupping his cheeks and forcing him to pay attention. "You need to rest. Surely an hour or two won't cause the project to implode on itself?"

Aino's half-lidded eyes struggled to focus. He wobbled on his feet, then slowly raised his arms until his hands were over Kade's. The human blushed at the interaction.

Then the inventor closed his eyes, letting his ears droop as he sighed. "Why are you so soft...?"

Tiner took this opportunity to once again examine the wall. Before he could answer, Aino's head dipped down until their faces were inches apart.

Kade's lips tingled in anticipation, and he froze, waiting for the Terran to close the gap. But he never did. He just felt the man's breath as he sighed again.

Feeling stupid for expecting anything, the human pushed Aino back until he was sitting in a chair. His hands slid off of Kade's as his head sagged to the side, allowing the human to release him.

"I need to..." Aino was fighting his exhaustion, and his head bobbed back up.

"Oh no you don't." Kade went right back to cupping his face. "You need sleep. Okay? Relax. Like this."

He stroked the man's cheeks with his thumbs, lulling him asleep as he murmured words of encouragement until Aino's head drooped back down.

The position looked uncomfortable, so Kade balled up his coat and tucked it around Aino's neck. Then he dug around the desk and found the brake schematics.

Cleaning up the mess of papers from the floor, he summoned Eira and ordered him to bring a plate of food so that Aino would have something to eat.

Kade remained in the lab, working through whatever he could to lessen the burden on the inventor, and found himself so engrossed in his papers that he didn't notice when Aino woke up.