THE LANGUAGE OF LOVE

By

Ashleigh Anpilova

Steel begins to notice Silver's ties.

A first time story.

Written: September 2012. Word count: 758.

It was during an assignment which for once did not involve Sapphire that Steel noticed something different about Silver, or rather about Silver's tie. It was pink and not a reddish pink, but a rather startling bright pink; a colour Steel had never seen Silver wear before; a colour he knew he would never wear.

He hadn't been deliberately looking at Silver or at his tie, it was just that as he'd turned around Silver had been right behind him, so close in fact that Steel had had to adjust his centre of balance to prevent himself from falling over. He'd noticed the tie then, even he, who was not renowned for noticing things, for paying attention to what his fellow elements wore or even said outside of an actual assignment, could not have failed to notice it.

For some reason noticing Silver's tie irritated him even more than Silver himself usually irritated him and he felt the control he had over his natural body temperature slip for a moment, something that never happened to him. He was so used to controlling his body temperature at a normal for humans and his fellow elements in order to prevent anyone from knowing his normal body temperature was a few degrees lower than what was considered normal. It was second nature to him to do so, thus for his control to slip like it did over something so unimportant discomforted Steel for a moment.

Thus he felt his control slip for a second, he took a step back from Silver, forgetting he was standing on a step and he staggered. Instantly Silver caught his hand and steadied him; just for a second Steel saw Silver's eyes open a little wider as he noticed the coolness of Steel's skin, but then the look of surprise fled and Silver let go of his hand.

A week later Silver was sent to help Sapphire and Steel and this time Steel noticed his tie was a paler pink. It was another colour Steel would never wear, but he preferred it to the bright pink tie Silver had worn.

A fortnight later Silver was once again sent to help Steel and once again his tie was pink. Steel was beginning to wonder if there was some significance in Silver's choice of colour for his tie, especially as he had noticed that when Silver had been sent to help Jet and Copper his tie had been a dark blue.

To Steel's bemusement and faint irritation he found himself paying attention to Silver's ties every time he saw him. And he noticed there was a definite pattern: if Silver was helping Steel in any way, be it Steel by himself or with Sapphire, he wore a pink tie; the pink varied in hue, but it was always pink. However, if he was assigned to any other element his tie was never pink.

And then the day came when Steel noticed Silver had changed his tie during the day. He had seen Silver go off on assignment with Jet in the morning and in the afternoon Silver appeared by Steel's side to assist him. When he'd seen Silver go off with Jet, Silver's tie had been a silvery-blue, but when he joined Steel it was pink.

Steel had had enough. Once the assignment was over, he caught Silver's arm, ensuring he didn't use anywhere near his full strength to hold him. "Why?" he demanded. "Why have you changed your tie since this morning? In fact why do you always wear a pink tie when you are with me but never when you are with any other element?"

"You noticed." To Steel's confusion Silver looked pleased.

"Of course I noticed." Steel's tone was clipped.

To his further surprise and confusion Silver smiled broadly. "Good. I wanted you to notice."

"Why?" Steel demanded, suddenly feeling a little discomforted by the way Silver was looking at him. "Well?" He added when Silver didn't answer him instantly.

Silver shrugged. "I'm just trying to decide how to answer you. You're not really a man of words, are you, Steel?"

Steel didn't get a chance to answer, not that he knew what he'd say, as the next moment Silver had extracted his arm from Steel's grip and instead put his arms around Steel and was kissing him.

Steel could have stopped the kiss quite easily; could have knocked Silver unconscious with a single blow; could have done anything he chose to do. And he did; he chose to kiss Silver back.

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