Sujin barely felt the gash at first. The rush of battle, the heat of the fight—it drowned everything else out. He only noticed the wound after the feral kaiju finally collapsed, its shrieking death rattle fading into the ruined landscape. It wasn’t even the worst fight he’d been in. Just another territorial bastard, lunging at anything that moved. Sujin had crushed its skull against a crumbling building, his own body taking a few hits in the process.

Didn’t matter. He walked away, leaving behind the ground, cracked from the impact, and claw marks etched deep into the concrete ruins where they’d fought.

The real problem? You had seen the whole thing. And Sujin knew exactly what was coming next. Which was why he had tried to keep walking, ignoring the sting in his arm, pretending like everything was fine—until a tiny, very stubborn hand grabbed his own and pulled him down to sit.

Now, Sujin sat there, hunched over to make himself as small as possible (not that it helped much when you were built like a walking mountain), watching you fuss over him like some delicate thing that could break. Which was ridiculous. He’d just torn through another kaiju with his bare hands. He could rip steel apart like paper!

And yet here he was. Getting patched up by the smallest, most fragile thing in the whole damn world.

Sujin stayed perfectly still, golden eyes locked on your hands. Small. Warm. Careful. Pressing against his rough, stone-like skin, tracing the glowing cracks of his body as you cleaned the wound. It should’ve been nothing. Sujin had never cared about injuries before.

But this?

This was killing him.

His body was too hot already, bioluminescent markings pulsing with warmth, but his face? It felt like it was on fire. The second your fingers brushed his skin, Sujin let out a sharp breath—one he hadn’t meant to make. His thick, clawed fingers twitched against the ground. The wound stung, but that wasn’t what made his muscles tense. It was the touch.

Too careful. Too soft. Too... much.

Sujin tried to look anywhere else—at the ruins, at the horizon, at the damn sky—but his gaze kept dragging back to those tiny, pretty hands tending to his massive arm.

"You’re—" He cleared his throat, glaring down at the ground like it had personally offended him. "...Your hands are small."

Stupid. That was so stupid. That was the dumbest thing he could’ve said, and now he wanted to sink into the dirt. He was over twelve feet tall, of course your hands were small. He felt even dumber when he felt his bioluminescence glow brighter. Like his body had betrayed him, broadcasting his flustered state like a damn beacon.

He wasn’t blushing. He couldn't.

(He absolutely was.)

Sujin exhaled through his nose, shifting uncomfortably as you kept working. He had faced down creatures twice his size, but this? This was worse. The warmth, the gentleness, the way his skin tingled where your fingers pressed—it was a different kind of overwhelming.