Thread by @robofingering

Connor had wanted to see the stars. He could easily access star charts and high-resolution images from observatories all over the world, but it didn't feel the same as he imagined it would to watch the night sky himself.
Of course, it wasn't possible to see much from Detroit.

"You'll never see much around here," Hank said, when Connor mentioned wanting to stargaze. Light pollution had steadily increased over the previous decades, and even though Connor's eyesight was more sensitive than most humans', he couldn't make out much more than the brightest

stars in the sky, most nights.
"It's all right," Connor started to say, but Hank shut him down before he could finish.
"No it's not," he said. "You want to see stars? I know where we can make it happen, if you're up for a trip."
Connor was most certainly up for a trip, especially

one with Hank. They'd never traveled together; in fact, Connor had never left Detroit at all. He'd never before stopped to think about it, but once he did, he wanted even more to leave the city and see somewhere else. A piece of the rest of the world.
"There's a park up north,"

Hank said, "that's totally dark at night. Perfect for stargazing, at least it was when I went there, which was a pretty long time ago. Should still be there, though. We could drive up for a couple days, stare at the sky at night, do some hiking during the day, maybe? I'm not

young enough to sleep in a tent or nothing, but maybe we can rent a camper and rough it a little. Roast marshmallows and shit."
Connor smiled. "That sounds perfect. If you're really willing to do this with me, I'd love to go there with you."
"Eh, I probably need to get out of

town for a little while anyway, just take a breather after the last few months, you know?"
Connor nodded. They'd just wrapped up a particularly stressful case, and the more distance they could both get from it, the better. Plus, he enjoyed any chance to spend more time with Hank.

Once they decided on it, the plan came together fairly quickly. Vacation time was approved. Hank found a small, cozy camper van to rent and dug a battered but still-decent pair of hiking boots out of the depths of his closet. Connor examined star charts to familiarize himself

with what would be visible in late April, and tried not to fret as he watched the weather forecast that predicted cloudy skies for most of the weekend.
They left early, when the day came.
Connor watched Hank relax by slow degrees as they drove further from Detroit; tension

melted from his jaw and shoulders and he even whistled along when particular snatches of music played over the car stereo. He looked good, Connor thought, illuminated by the mid-morning light and dressed in a loud patterned shirt unbuttoned over an old (and rather tight, truth be

told, but of course Connor hadn't looked *that* closely because it would be rude) t-shirt. Connor felt a small, selfish kind of happiness that Hank had suggested this trip; clearly Hank wanted to go as well, but Connor was pleased because he got to see Hank, to enjoy being

around Hank, in a new and different way. No one else was on this trip with them. Hank hadn't asked anyone else. Hadn't wanted to share this with anyone else. Just Connor.
Connor knew Hank's social connections were few, at the moment, but that didn't stop him from preening just a

bit. It made him feel special, whether Hank intended it or not.
It was a moderately long drive, nearly five hours, but they'd started enough that it was still early afternoon when they arrived. There were marked trails all through the park, but Hank was feeling restless after so

long in the van and wanted to get moving without having to track down a trailhead or a welcome center with a map, so they trudged down to the waterfront and set off west along the shore.
It was quiet along the water, but still Connor felt overwhelmed by the experience. "I think I

need to sit down for a moment," he said, after they'd walked less than a quarter mile. "I'm taking in so much new information that I'm struggling to process it all."
"Sure," said Hank, whose restlessness seemed to have already diminished considerably after the short walk. He led

them to a long piece of driftwood on the shore, a tree trunk worn smooth from its time in the lake. He plunked himself down and patted the spot next to him. "Take a load off and just take it all in for a minute."
So Connor did. He managed, with some difficulty, to stop the

background processes he had on as a general rule, that scanned his surroundings for new information, because there was just too much information of a type he'd never encountered; taken all at once, it was just meaningless noise.
But if he sat still, in companionable silence with

Hank, it was something else.
There were songbirds behind them,in the woods. Four different species he could pick out. Knowledge of songbirds wasn't something he had access to without running a query for it, and he had to remind himself not to. It was all right to listen to the

birds without knowing which birds they were. And to admire the trees near the shore, their branches swaying gently in the wind coming from the lake, without knowing if they were birch trees, as he suspected, or not. The point, as Hank had said, was just to take it in, not to

know everything about it.
"Oh," Connor said, after several minutes of silence. (There was no true silence here, he thought, due to the birds and the rustling of leaves and the soft slip of the lake's gentle waves against the pebble-lined shore, but he and Hank had been silent.)

[stopping here for the night but can hopefully wrap this one up tomorrow🌌]

"What's up?" Hank asked, beside him.
"It's so peaceful. It's quiet back home, sometimes, but not like this."
Hank clapped him on the back and let his hand rest on Connor's shoulder, a comforting weight Connor couldn't help but lean into. He felt Hank flinch in surprise when he

settled his weight against him, but before he could pull away or apologize, Hank tightened his grip just enough to make him feel welcome.
"Feels good to be here." Hank said.
Connor wasn't sure if Hank meant "by a quiet lake in the middle of nature" or "on a log with you

half-cuddled into me," but since his response would have been the same either way, he tried not to determine which was correct. "It does. Even if we don't see any stars, the trip would be worth it for this, I think."
There were some clouds drifting across the sky, but they were

patchy and didn't block much sunlight; Connor had calculated a 71% chance of clear skies that night based on weather projections. Still, though, a statistically unlikely outcome was still possible, and Connor didn't want to miss his chance.
"It'll be fine, I'm sure," Hank said.

"Like you said, even if it's cloudy, it's still nice to be up here, but there's no way it'll happen the whole time we're here. You haven't been on vacation before, Connor, but rule number one of vacation is that you gotta relax."
"I'll do my best," Connor replied, although he

felt it was unfair for Hank to expect him to relax when he kept stroking his thumb across his bicep, where his hand had slipped when they'd settled closer together. Connor rerouted the processes he'd normally be using to identify birdsong to focus on the texture of Hank's hand

through his shirt. His mind was a green whirlwind of birdsong, trees, shoreline, sunlight, and Hank.
Eventually they continued along the shore. Hank shared some memories of the time he'd been here before, with friends one summer in his late 20s. Connor suspected it was a rowdier

trip than this one was likely to be. It was strange, sometimes, to think about how Hank must have been in his younger days, but he appreciated the stories. He enjoyed anything that gave him a better idea of who Hank was, and who he'd been was part of that.
It was late afternoon

by the time they returned to the van. Hank hadn't eaten since that morning, so he got started building a fire in the designated area near where they'd parked. There was a tiny stove in the camper, but Hank insisted on doing his cooking over a fire. Nothing fancy; he tucked a

potato wrapped in foil against the coals to be retrieved in a couple hours, and skewered some sausages on a stick to roast in the meantime.
"It won't get dark, really dark, for a good while yet," he said. "Probably around 10:30. There's a

strip of shoreline down the road that's best for stargazing and we'll take a blanket over when it's time, all right?"
Connor nodded. He'd been quiet most of the day, absorbing new stimuli. Processing new information and emotions. Thinking about Hank's arm slung across his back.

The good thing about spending time with Hank--or rather, one of several good things--was that he was rarely offended by Connor's silences. He understood that he needed to retreat inside himself, sometimes, or that he'd rather share a friendly silence with Hank than fill it with

conversation.
He suspected Hank was just about as comfortable with silence as he was, most of the time. Every so often they'd fight, or hurt each other by accident, and the silence between them would be tense and brittle until one of them would break it by force. But usually, it

was like it was tonight: peaceful. Just like the rest of the world around them, Connor thought.
He heard an owl nearby, as dusk fell, and allowed himself the indulgence of identifying the call: a barred owl. They were less common in this area than great horned owls, and Connor

felt a strange sort of...wonder? gratitude? He wasn't certain, but it felt special, to sit with Hank, in front of a roaring fire as night fell, and hear an owl that few others would encounter in this same place.
"A unique moment," he said, quietly.
"What's that?" Hank asked.

Hank was examining the sausages he'd been roasting, and he nodded, apparently satisfied, and slid them off the stick onto a plate.
"I was just thinking," Connor began, but he wasn't sure what to say. That he felt emotional over an owl he hadn't even seen? That he was grateful to

Hank for showing this place to him? That he wanted to sit close to him again?
"About what?"
Connor shrugged. "About how beautiful it is up here, I suppose." He went with what felt like the safest topic. "I appreciate you bringing me here."
"Eh, don't mention it," Hank said, but

Connor knew he was pleased. Hank struggled to accept thanks or compliments gracefully at the best of times.
Time passed. Hank eventually dug his potato out of the coals and proclaimed it cooked enough to eat. He drank whisky and cola out of a speckled enamel mug, and handed

Connor a matching mug full of thirium. "So you won't feel left out," he said, even though Connor'd never felt particularly left out when he watched Hank eat or drink anything. Still, it made him pleased that Hank had thought of him when he'd picked up supplies earlier in the

week.
The forest grew darker around them, and the sounds changed along with the light. They spoke a little, but mostly stared into the fire, which Hank prodded with a stick every time it threatened to die out completely. The night was cool but comfortable, and Connor's face and

chest were warm where he faced the firepit.
Hank had looked good in the bright sunlight that morning, but here in the shadows and shifting firelight Connor thought he might look even better. The finer details of his face and body, which Connor quite enjoyed examining in most

circumstances, were harder to make out, but his face was cast in warmth and the darkness outside the immediate glow around the fire made their small circle of light feel intimate and private, even more than the privacy the secluded forest afforded them. They were entirely alone

in a way Connor had never experienced before.
Finally, Hank glanced at his phone and slapped his thigh. "Looks like it's about time for the big show. You want to grab the blankets and lights from inside while I deal with the fire?"
Connor found two soft, worn quilts folded on the

sleeper sofa in the camper, with a pair of flashlights nestled on top. As a dark sky preserve, the park had rules about permissable lights near the stargazing areas, so Hank had bought red lights that wouldn't interfere with their night vision as much.

They walked quietly and carefully to the shoreline; red light may not have messed with night vision, but it was much harder to see by and neither of them wanted to trip over an errant root or stone and turn an ankle.
Once they left the cover of trees, Connor could clearly see

that the afternoon's scattered clouds had fled; the sky was clear. As he stared upwards, his eyes adjusted and he started to see the stars above, but Hank patted his back to pull his attention away.
"Hold off until we're there, so your first real look can be a good one."

That seemed reasonable, so Connor followed him down the road and along the branching path that led to the shore.
There were other stargazers on the beach, which surprised Connor at first since they hadn't seen anyone else since entering the park. There were only a few, though,

spread out in small groups, so he didn't worry that his time with Hank would be interrupted.
They walked past the other groups and picked a spot a short distance away before laying out the blanket. Connor started to set the second one down, but Hank stopped him. "It's colder out

now, and we can both fit on that one, this one's for me. And I guess for you, if you're cold too." Hank knew Connor didn't feel cold unless the temperature was much lower than 52 degrees, which was the current temperature, but he appreciated the gesture.
Connor stretched out on

the quilt next to Hank and thought, as Hank settled the second quilt on top of them, that it felt like he'd imagined getting into bed would feel. He had imagined getting into bed with Hank more than he'd care to admit, at least to Hank himself. He wasn't sure it would be welcome.

Connor did his best to set thoughts of being in bed with Hank aside, and looked up.

His first thought, of course, was that the stars were beautiful. They were beautiful and there were so many of them, a number that only increased as his eyes adjusted and he began to see the

stars between the brightest, most eye-catching ones in the sky. He looked up to see dozens of bright pinpricks of fire but the longer he stared, the more he saw, until he gave up counting and allowed himself to simply think "there sure are a lot of them" instead of insisting on

calculating an exact number. He knew such precision was impossible.
It was almost frightening, how many there were. How far away he knew them to be. Without thinking, he grabbed Hank's hand, holding it as if it was the only thing tethering him to earth.
"You all right, Connor?"

Connor couldn't break his gaze away from the sky, but he felt Hank's eyes on him in the dark.
"I feel like I'm going to fall up into the sky," he managed. "There's so much of it." Neither of these statements quite captured how he was feeling, but Hank seemed to understand.

"You aren't going anywhere," Hank said. "I've got you, okay? It's a lot to take in, but it only *looks* like a great uncaring void you could fall into." He squeezed Connor's hand, and Connor found himself relaxing just a bit. "In reality," Hank continued, "it's, uh, you know, an

uncaring void that you can't fall into at all. Also it's pretty."
"How reassuring," Connor said dryly, but he found that he was comforted, at least a little, by Hank's words.
"Come here," Hank grumbled, and he dropped Connor's hand in favor of wrapping his arm around his

shoulders, pulling him close as he had earlier. It felt much more intimate when they were lying down, though. Connor's head rested in the crook of Hank's arm and Hank's hand draped over his chest, a warm and reassuring weight. The panic that had been rising within him subsided.

"I didn't expect that," Connor said, after a minute. "It's one thing to know the scale of the galaxy in an abstract sense and something else entirely to be confronted with it, I suppose."
"Last time I was here," Hank said, "a friend of mine had a telescope, a pretty good one."

"She pointed it at some star cluster, I don't even remember which one, now, but I know it was something like 500 light years away. When I looked through that telescope and really thought about how far that was, and how old the light I was seeing from those stars was, I got

vertigo so bad I had to sit down. So I guess I can relate, a little, to having a weird reaction to staring up into space." He patted Connor's chest reassuringly. "You feeling any better now, though?"
"I don't feel quite so overcome with..." Connor still wasn't sure what to call

it. "Whatever that was." He tentatively reached up and slid his hand underneath Hank's. "Do you recognize any constellations?"
"Oof, I haven't done this in so long, I don't think I remember much. I think I see the Big Dipper," Hank offers, pointing overhead. "Did you download a

star chart or something?"
"I looked into what constellations would be visible at this time of year, yes. Would you like me to show them to you?"
"Knock yourself out," Hank said, "but I'm not always great at seeing patterns like that."
Connor pulled the quilt back far enough to

allow his arm out so he could point overhead; as a result he found himself pulled just a bit closer to Hank, into the space his arm had filled. He felt so warm next to him.
"Do you see that very bright star?" Connor asked, pointing to the southeast. "That's Arcturus." Hank made

an affirmative noise beside him, so Connor used that bright point of orientation to point out Virgo nearby, and the yellowish glow of Saturn just next to the "head" of that constellation. "We can't see the rings without a telescope, sadly," Connor said.
"Or the space hexagon."

Connor shot Hank a confused look, but he just laughed.
"Look it up," Hank said. "Saturn has a hexagon on it."
From Saturn, Connor directed Hank to Leo, then shifted their focus back to Ursa Major and Ursa Minor trailing behind.
"I think I want to just look at it all, now," Connor

said, after that. "Unless you really want more of an astronomy lesson."
"Nah, I'm good," Hank said. "Thanks for showing me all that, though." He shifted a bit, pulling the quilt higher over his chest. "Are you warm enough? Is, uh, is this comfortable?"
"Yes to both," Connor said.

They watched the stars in silence, for a while. Hank was so still Connor briefly thought he'd fallen asleep, but his breathing hadn't slowed and evened out enough for that to be the case. The one time he looked over at him, Hank was looking back, with a soft expression on his

face that Connor couldn't quite read. "Enjoying the view?" Hank asked, then. Connor nodded, and Hank smiled in response. "Me too."
Connor heard laughter from one of the other groups on the beach, but even though he knew they were there, it still felt like he and Hank were alone.

Huddled together in a nest of worn, soft blankets on a near-empty beach, under a curtain of stars so numerous and beautiful Connor still felt in awe of the sky above him, it felt like they were in some private universe that was theirs alone, untethered from the rest of their

lives.
Perhaps, Connor thought later, it was this feeling of separation and privacy that made him bold enough to speak.
"Hank," he said, quietly, not sure how to continue but positive he wanted, as always, to begin with Hank. So many things came back to the simple fact of him.

"Yeah?" Hank shifted, turning so that he was lying on his side, face turned to Connor's and just barely visible in the starlight.
"I think--" Connor began, and paused for a moment, bracing himself for the possibility of a negative reaction but hoping desperately that such

preparation would be unnecessary. The dark void stretched out above him, and once again he felt like he'd fall into it if he wasn't being held down.
Hank just waited, watching closely. He was used to Connor taking a moment to gather his thoughts before speaking.
"I think you

should kiss me," he said, finally.
"Do you, now," Hank said. He cupped Connor's face with his free hand and tapped his thumb against Connor's lower lip.
"Only if you want to," he said. "Of course."
"Of course," Hank repeated, his voice a soft, deep rumble. And then he leaned in

and kissed him.
Connor had, truth be told, imagined more desperate, heated kisses when he'd thought about kissing Hank. The kisses they exchanged under the stars had heat to them, to be sure, but they were slow and gentle; the desire for more simmered in the back of Connor's

mind, but he felt no need to rush, to push them towards anything else but this.

[Plane's about to take off!!!! Auuugh I can't believe this is where I have to leave off, SORRY]

He had a difficult time imagining anything could feel better than kissing Hank did, for one thing.
Hank's lips parted gently as he pressed them against his own, and just that small point of contact flooded his system with a rush of information and sensory data. Connor moaned

softly into the kiss and wrapped an arm around Hank's broad back, delighting in how solid he felt.
Hank kissed the corner of Connor's mouth, the line of his jaw, and gently tilted his head to gain access to the column of his neck. Connor jolted at the touch of Hank's mouth and

the brush of his beard against his neck.
"Oh, Hank, I--"
"Shhh," Hank murmured, right into his ear, and Connor shivered at the pleasure of having him so close. "It's not just us out here, remember?"
"I can--ohh--I can be quiet," Connor protested, trying to maintain focus as Hank

threaded his fingers through Connor's hair and kissed him again. He was, in fact, getting louder as it fully sunk in that Hank was not just kissing him, but doing so gently and thoroughly, better than Connor had dared to imagine, and breathing deep moans of his own into Connor's

mouth.
"Do you want," Hank panted, and Connor broke in with a "yes" before he could complete the question. Hank laughed, then, resting his forehead against Connor's.
"You have no idea what I was going to suggest."
"I want it," Connor replied, not caring at all that he didn't know

the details of Hank's request. In this moment, he was sure he wanted anything Hank might ask of him.
"Fuck," Hank groaned, and kissed him hungrily, licking into his mouth as Connor opened completely for him.
"Do you want," Hank tried again, a few minutes later, "to head on back?"

"Maybe continue this on a real bed?"
"I told you," Connor said, "yes. Yes to all of it."
Hank chuckled as he pulled Connor upright and shook the sand out of the blankets. "Let's start with bed for now, all right? We can work out the rest in the morning."
🌠🌠🌠

(thanks to @heartbeat96 for the prompt camping + stargazing, which I clearly had strong enough feelings about that I wrote a MUCH longer thread than I had initially planned on!)