Chapter 4: First Time
The week that followed was a blur of structured chaos. Hank and Dawn were practically living at the Tower, their presence a constant low hum in the background of Kenny’s life. Meetings about the Quiet Room—some clandestine energy source the Titans were monitoring—dragged on for hours in the conference room, all maps and grim voices. But those weren’t Kenny’s problem yet. His problem, his delicious, nerve-wracking problem, was the spaces between.
Hank found him. Always.
During a lull one afternoon, Hank ambushed him in the gym, challenging him to a hand-to-hand spar. “No screams,” Hank had said, that rough grin already in place. “Just you and me.” It was brutally educational. Hank moved with a controlled, predatory grace that made Kenny’s own trained movements feel academic. Hank pinned him three times in ten minutes, each pin lasting a heartbeat too long, Hank’s breath hot against his neck. “You’re quick, Queen. But you think too much.”
Another day, Hank joined him on the rooftop, the same spot from the debrief. They didn’t talk about the tension. They talked about nothing. Cheap pizza. Terrible movies. The weird echo in the Tower’s plumbing. Hank would lean close to make a point, his arm brushing Kenny’s, and the simple contact would short-circuit Kenny’s train of thought. The flirting was there, but it was subtle. A look held a second too long. A compliment buried in criticism. “Not bad,” Hank said after Kenny used his Canary Cry to shatter a distant, abandoned practice drone. “Loud. Gets the job done. I like things that get the job done.”
The spark wasn’t a question. It was a fact, a live wire strung between them in every quiet moment.
Seven nights after the rooftop, a solid knock shook Kenny’s door near midnight. He knew it was him. The knock was all Hank—no hesitation, all assertion.
Kenny opened it, wearing sweats and a worn t-shirt. Hank stood in the hallway, backlit by the dim sconces. He wasn’t in his Hawk gear, just a tight gray henley and jeans. He looked uncharacteristically uncertain, his jaw working.
“Hey,” Kenny said, his voice softer than he intended.
“Hey.” Hank ran a hand through his hair. “Couldn’t sleep. The talks… they’re grinding my gears. All theory, no action.”
“Yeah, I get that.”
“I was thinking about what you said. About the pigeons.” Hank’s eyes found his, blue and intense in the shadows. “You don’t scare me, Kenny.”
The air left the room. “I wasn’t trying to.”
“I know.” Hank took a step forward, crossing the threshold. The door swung shut behind him with a soft click. The room was dark, only the city’s glow through the window painting them in silver and deep blue. “I’ve been trying to find a way to say this all week. Words aren’t really my thing.”
“Then don’t use them,” Kenny heard himself say, the words a whisper.
Hank closed the final distance. He cradled Kenny’s face in his big, calloused hands, his thumbs brushing over his cheekbones. His gaze searched Kenny’s for half a second, for a veto that wasn’t coming, and then he kissed him.
It wasn’t gentle. It was a confession, pent-up and desperate. Hank’s mouth was hot and demanding, and Kenny met him with equal force, his hands fisting in Hank’s henley. A week of glances, of near-misses, of charged silence, detonated. Hank tasted like cheap coffee and mint, and his body was solid heat against Kenny’s, pushing him back until his legs hit the edge of the bed.
They broke apart, breathing ragged. Hank’s eyes were dark, pupils blown. “Okay?” he rasped.
Kenny answered by pulling him down again. This kiss was deeper, wetter, all tongues and teeth. Hank’s hands slid down, under Kenny’s t-shirt, palms scraping over the plains of his stomach, up his ribs. Kenny gasped into his mouth. He yanked at Hank’s shirt, needing to feel skin. Hank obliged, pulling it off in one swift motion. The city light carved the immense landscape of his chest, the defined abs, the thick arms.
Kenny pushed him onto the bed and followed, straddling him. He let his hands explore, mapping the incredible terrain. When his fingers brushed over Hank’s nipples, Hank jerked underneath him, a sharp, surprised intake of breath.
“Sensitive?” Kenny murmured, leaning down to trace the same path with his tongue.
Hank’s answering groan was a deep, broken sound. “Hell, yeah.” His hands came up to grip Kenny’s hips, holding him in place. “Don’t stop.”
Kenny didn’t. He lavished attention there, swirling his tongue, grazing lightly with his teeth, fascinated by the way the hard nubs pebbled under his touch and how every flick made Hank’s stomach muscles clench and his grip tighten. Hank was vocal, little grunts and sighs falling freely, a raw soundtrack that drove Kenny wild. This powerful, brutal hero, reduced to shudders by this.
Their clothes vanished in a frantic, clumsy push and pull of fabric. Skin met skin. Hank flipped them, his weight a welcome anchor. He kissed a burning trail down Kenny’s throat, his chest, paying careful, agonizing attention to Kenny’s own nipples before moving lower. Kenny arched off the bed, a choked-off cry escaping him as Hank took him in his mouth, hot and expert. His fingers tangled in Hank’s short hair, not guiding, just holding on.
When Hank moved back up, his body slotting against Kenny’s, he was shuddering with restraint. “You sure?” he breathed against Kenny’s lips, the question gravelly and raw.
Kenny reached between them, taking Hank in hand, feeling the heavy, silken heat of him. “I’ve never been more sure of anything.”
Hank fumbled for the lube in the nightstand drawer, his usually precise hands trembling. The first push was a slow, burning stretch that made Kenny see stars. He clung to Hank’s shoulders, his face buried in the sweat-damped hollow of Hank’s neck, breathing him in—soap, sweat, and something uniquely, essentially Hank.
“Okay?” Hank whispered, frozen deep inside him, every muscle in his back corded with the effort of holding still.
Kenny nodded, biting his lip. “Yeah. Don’t stop. Please.”
Hank began to move, and it was like the sparring session—controlled power, a rhythm that was instinctive and overwhelming. Each thrust was a jolt of pure, white-hot pleasure, driving the air from Kenny’s lungs. Hank’s pace was relentless, but his hands were everywhere, gentle in contrast: threading through Kenny’s hair, gripping his thigh hitched over Hank’s hip, thumb stroking his hipbone.
Kenny lost himself in the sensation, in the sheer physical reality of Hank Hall above him, inside him. He raked his nails down Hank’s back, earning a guttural groan. He found Hank’s nipples again, rolling them between his fingers, and Hank’s rhythm stuttered, his hips snapping forward with a broken gasp.
“You’re gonna kill me,” Hank panted, burying his face in Kenny’s neck.
“Then we go together,” Kenny breathed back, and it was true, he felt it building, a coil tightening low in his gut, synced to the pounding of Hank’s heart against his own.
He came first, with a sharp cry he muffled against Hank’s shoulder, his body clenching tight around him. The sensation tipped Hank over the edge. Hank drove into him one last, deep time, his whole body seizing, a raw, unchecked shout torn from his throat as he spilled.
For a long time, there was only the sound of their ragged breathing mingling in the dark. Hank collapsed beside him, but immediately pulled him close, wrapping a heavy arm around him, tangling their legs. Kenny’s head found its place on Hank’s chest, the rapid, slowing thump of his heart a lullaby.
The city glowed outside, indifferent. The Tower hummed around them, full of secrets and missions. The Quiet Room waited. But here, in the tangle of sheets and the heat of spent passion, was a different kind of truth, loud and clear and quiet all at once. Hank pressed a kiss, surprisingly soft, to Kenny’s sweaty temple.
“Been wanting to do that since the rooftop,” Hank muttered, voice thick with sleep and satisfaction.
Kenny smiled into his skin. “Took you long enough.”
“A week’s not that long,” Hank grumbled, but his fingers were tracing idle, comforting circles on Kenny’s bare shoulder. His skin was warm, solid.
“Felt like forever,” Kenny said. He tilted his head back to look at him. The ambient light caught the scar above Hank’s eyebrow, the faint stubble along his jaw. “You’re really bad at subtlety, you know that? All that ‘getting the job done’ talk.”
“It worked, didn’t it?” Hank’s smirk was audible. He shifted, the sheets rustling. “Besides, you’re one to talk. You spent a whole sparring session staring at my ass.”
Kenny laughed, the sound bright in the quiet room. “It’s a tactical asset. Very distracting.” He grew quieter. “This doesn’t… complicate the team thing? With Dawn? The mission?”
Hank was silent for a moment. His hand stilled. “Dawn’s my friend. She wants me happy, even if she’d rather I find it with a nice, quiet librarian who doesn’t fight robots.” He resumed his tracing. “The mission’s the mission. This is… this is separate. This is for me.”
The raw honesty in that last sentence hung between them. Kenny absorbed it, the weight and the gift of it. He let his hand drift up Hank’s side, feeling the ripple of muscle, the texture of skin over bone. He found the familiar territory of a peaked nipple and brushed his thumb over it, a feather-light pass.
Hank’s breath hitched. The circle he was drawing on Kenny’s shoulder stopped.
“Still sensitive?” Kenny whispered, mischievous.
“You’re a menace,” Hank muttered, but he arched his chest into the touch.
Kenny took his time. He leaned in, using his tongue first, a slow, wet circle that made Hank’s whole body tense. Then his teeth, the barest, most careful graze that pulled a shuddering gasp from the man beneath him. He switched to the other side, repeating the deliberate, torturous attention, learning the rhythms of Hank’s reactions—the jump of his abdomen, the tightening of his hands in the sheets, the low, bitten-off sounds he tried to smother.
“Round two, huh?” Hank finally managed, his voice wrecked.
“You offering?” Kenny pulled back, grinning.
In answer, Hank rolled them, pinning Kenny with a look of fierce possession. “My turn.”
The second time was different. Less frantic urgency, more deliberate exploration. Hank mapped every inch of Kenny with his hands and mouth, as if committing him to memory. When he entered him again, it was with a slow, deep certainty that made Kenny’s toes curl. The pace was a relentless, building wave, each thrust landing with precision, Hank’s eyes locked on his, blue and burning.
Kenny wrapped his legs around him, pulling him closer, deeper. He clung to the solid wall of Hank’s back, fingertips pressing into corded muscle. The world narrowed to this: the slap of skin, the creak of the bedframe, the choked-off curses and encouragements traded in the dark.
Afterward, lying in a sweaty, boneless heap, the first pale hints of dawn tinted the skyline. Hank was already snoring softly, an arm thrown heavily across Kenny’s waist.
Kenny stared at the ceiling, a profound exhaustion and a dizzying alertness warring within him. His body hummed. The mission, the Quiet Room, his parents’ legacy—it all still waited outside this door. But here, now, anchored by Hank’s weight, he felt, for the first time, entirely his own.