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It was late at Boxmore-now affectionally called Voxmore from time to time, at least when Lord Boxman and Professor Venomous collaborated on their attacks to the plaza, which was seeming to become more and more often-the time of night where the bodega was beginning to close for the day, however as Boxman says, Boxmore doesn't sleep!
The two owners of Boxmore were working together, sitting far closer together than they needed to at their shared work desk. Right now, they were just plotting ideas, so they didn't need to separate. Exploding robots and unpredictable elements just weren't so compatible together in the testing phases.
Their thighs and elbows were touching, one occasionally moving their arm so that the other could continue writing, only to move it right back when the other started writing a new line. The only way the two could excuse the unneeded closeness was that since the professor was (probably) coldblooded, and it was night, he was probably cold and needed to steal some of the others body heat.
Boxman was humming some tune to himself, and Venomous found himself writing his ideas down in sync with it. He smiled fondly, glancing over at the other, who was hard at work drawing some ambitious doodles to upgrade his robotic children with. Venomous refocused his attention back to his own sheet, rereading his notes and ideas. They looked so much more neat and organized, compared to Boxman's impulsive scratching of his pencil whenever an idea popped into his head. He couldn't tell which one he liked more.
Venomous scribbled some equation down, gesturing an arrow to relate it to one of his other ideas. He paused, reading it over before expanding some more on that single equation. So many what if questions were crossed out in the process.
He wondered about how to combine his efforts into Boxman's own, and doodled one of the others robotic children, jotting down notes from one of his previous inventions that could possibly be compatible with the robot if engineered correctly.
The professor skimmed through his sheet again, before looking at it with a smile. Seemed good enough for now. He looked over at Boxman, who looked to be at the same stage, offering his paper over to Venomous, who did the same.
The paper Boxman passed him was full of scribbled out concepts--doodles with large circles surrounding them--words that were written on top of each other, underlined multiple times, and even arrows pointing to it. He noted a few stray Jethro doodles and smiled fondly at them.
Boxman's handwriting was, true to his adjacent half, chicken scratch. Venomous had to squint to read it. He followed a trail of promising ideas, only for it to lead into a scribbled out mess. The professor picked up his pencil and made some of his own marks, having the trail follow into a different path, pitching his own ideas that could potentially help put Boxman's mind at ease.
The paper contained drastically different ideas, all from Boxman. That man was an enigma. It was a wonder how he thought up so many different things in a single session with no guidance. He marked in simple questions next to some of Boxman's notes, hoping to expand the other's idea even more. The professor added tips to some weapon ideas to give them a better punch, more durability, and lighter to make them easier to swing around.
That gave Venomous a thought, and he doodled up a sketch of Ernesto, writing notes about improving his durability during team battles. He linked one of Boxman's ideas to his own, a small suggestion following it.
They passed papers again, and he smirked at the thoughtful notes Boxman provided. They were still chicken scratch, but a lot of them had a smiley face at the end. He noticed an arrow pointing at one of his equations, Boxman rewriting it and saying that he got the math wrong. The professor wrote a quick thank you, checking Boxman's math before scribbling out his own and making adjustments to the following ideas.
It was a quiet dance, both pencils flowing, or streaking, across the papers with purpose. Neither verbally said much to each other, communication generally kept to written messages. However, sometimes while they were passing the papers, they got distracted with off topic matters. Both of them were culprits of this in the past.
This time, however, it was Venomous. He wrote How did attacking the bodega go? Sorry I couldn't watch. The professor still remembered seeing the wreckage of the aftermath, after he was finished with a conference. He passed the paper, Boxman following.
Venomous saw Boxman give quite an evil smile as he found his question, writing back a fairly lengthy response. He looked back to Boxman's sheet, offering more ideas. Reading over some of Boxman's answers to his previous questions left him with a smile. They had such an obvious tint of excitement and passion, the professor couldn't help but smile. Smile far too warmly for someone such as himself.
The professor knew exactly what was happening, and he didn't know how to deal with it. He knew this feeling, as he felt it before. Vaguely. Not at this amount. Professor Venomous, a calm and overall indifferent villain, was very rarely known to show affection to those he cared for. And the few people who did know were the very people he showed that affection to.
So when Fink made it obvious to him about how close he and Lord Boxman were getting, he realized it: he had a crush on Lord Boxman. The professor simply didn't know what to do about it. And so instead of plotting up a method to confess, he mentally reprimanded himself whenever he found he was doing some action towards Boxman that was just a bit too friendly. Too fuzzy and fluffy for someone like Professor Venomous.
They passed papers. The professor read over Boxman's response, detailing just how badly the robots got tore apart. He wrote an apologetic response, swerving his pencil as he finished off a sympathetic smiley face. Venomous tapped the tip of his pencil along with whatever nonsense Boxman was humming, adding a new block of text of how to prevent the same mistakes from the latest bodega attack.
Venomous tried to not tense up when he felt Boxman shift his leg a tad bit. Cob, he didn't want to lose the other's body heat. The professor noticed that the 'nonsense' that Boxman was humming was actually that one song he sang on the night the two went to the villain party. Venomous nearly snapped his pencil in half at the warmness that followed his brief blast to the past.
He scribbled down nonsense to try to rid himself of the thoughts, doodling just a bit too roughly on the paper. He found himself doodling a heart and almost ripped the paper in half. Pull yourself together Venomous mentally shouted at himself, breathing through his nose as he very hardly scribbled the offending shape out.
Venomous slouched his shoulders, trying to adapt a more relaxed demeanor, before continuing to write words he himself didn't comprehend. They passed papers. The professor strained to not smile at the other's handwriting. He subconsciously leaned into Boxman's touch, trying to not tense up when he realized what he'd done. Don't be weird. Venomous hissed at himself.
He continued writing, scrabbling down anything that came to his head that didn't involve Lord Boxman, huffing in agitation. Venomous felt the other's knee tense up, before Boxman gently rubbed his shoulder against his, in a odd, reassuring gesture. Professor Venomous tried to not let it show how much he appreciated it.
He leaned some more onto the other, seeing as Boxman didn't seem to mind it, before finally calming down enough to write in his usual handwriting. The professor underlined a sentence and connected it to one of his own ideas, repeating his previous process.
They passed papers. He spotted a small 'you ok?' and tried to not let his heart melt. He quickly went to responding with the classic 'I'm fine. Thank you.' Venomous even added a small smiley face. Boxman started humming again, thankfully a different song than before, one Venomous didn't recognize.
The professor began to tune out everything that didn't involve writing down ideas, switching papers with Boxman as though he were programmed to. The only thing that slipped through his blocked out hearing was the faint sound of Boxman's humming, the papers rustling between them, and the scratching of their pencils.
Boxman tensed up, Venomous realized, before they passed papers again. He skimmed over the paper and read over a note Boxman left. Professor Venomous tensed up and froze.
Above Boxman's tiny note, which was scribbled out and rewritten multiple times, sat a painfully blunt sentence written in the professor's handwriting, 'i love you'. It was written so small he was surprised Boxman noticed it when he himself hadn't. Venomous looked at Boxman out of the corner of his eye, ultimately failing to keep the blush off his face. The other seemed to try to bury himself in reading his paper.
'Well, this partnership is over' His mind commented helpfully as he stared at the stupid, stupid sentence. It was almost like it was taunting him. He wanted to rip it to shreds and throw it into the handy incinerator Boxman kept around.
'Boxman!' Venomous remembered, slowly drifting his attention to Boxman's note that laid underneath the professor's confession. There were scribbled out ones that were beside it, and Professor Venomous tried to not see what was originally written underneath them. He focused back on the message, 'are you serious? like 100% serious about that' Venomous tried to not groan, as he wrote 'I am, actually. I wasn't really planning to do that exactly, though.'
He didn't bother looking at the rest of the paper, instead lightly nudging Boxman's shoulder and offering him the paper. Boxman slid the other one out of the way and blankly stared at the offered paper, a faint blush coating his cheeks. He seemed to be rereading it multiple times, a certain gleam in his eyes.
The professor laid his head in his arms, trying to not hiss. He heard Boxman writing something down, and he shuffled a little bit. Boxman passed the paper, and Venomous gingerly grabbed it, looking at the written conversation. ´well. i wasn't expecting that. but. i would be willing to, well, progress whatever we have going on to something... more?' Venomous' face heated up far more than normal, as he picked the sheet up to take a closer look at it and reread the sentence over and over again.
Venomous silently took a deep breath, placing the paper back down on the table, shifting his weight a little more against Boxman. He felt Boxman lean back against him, and the professor's heart soared. Venomous picked the pencil up and wrote 'ok.' Trying very hardly to not spill out his feelings more than his subconscious already had. He nudged the paper over to Boxman.
Boxman had a sly smirk on his face, and Venomous huffed, resting his chin on his left hand, forcing himself to look at anything but that damned engineer. Venomous felt Boxman slowly wrap his own arms around Venomous' right arm, as he melted into it. Boxman even nuzzled against the other's shoulder, for Cob's sake.
The professor lowered his hand and shifted to properly hug Boxman, resting his chin on the other's head, a soft hiss purring from him. Boxman cooed, nudging his way into the other's neck, Venomous feeling his smile against it.
"Dad?"
"Boss?!"
Two voices called out into the room. Venomous and Boxman quickly fled from each other's embraces, faces ablaze, as their chairs scratched against the floor unpleasantly.
"What are you two doing!?" Darrell and Fink yelled in unison, before growling at each other.
"It was... Cold." The professor tried to save his and Boxman's dignity, with a cross of his arms. It did nothing to stop the noteworthy flush on his face. In fact, it only made it worse.
Boxman glanced at him with a sheepish grin, red faced. It looked painful. The two looked back to their kid's, to see them bickering on why each other's guardian was cuddling with the other's.
"Cob, help us," Venomous grumbled under his breath, as he shyly took Boxman's hand with a small smile. Boxman returned it eagerly, running his thumb along the others in a comforting manner. Maybe this won't be too bad. The professor hummed to himself, shuffling himself closer to the other.