Description:

“What?” Billy sits up, blearily rubbing his eyes with the fingers of one hand.

“Downstairs.” Steve grips Billy’s bicep. “I heard something.”

Sure enough, the sound of glass smashing on the hardwood floors downstairs makes them both freeze.

Billy waits a moment before reacting. “Where’s your baseball bat?”

“Under the bed.”

Billy scrambles out of bed and pulls on his underwear. “Stay here, ok?” He fumbles under the bed and retrieves the bat with the nails, giving it a practise swing.

“I’m not letting you go alone,” Steve snorts, pulling a t-shirt over his head (Billy’s t-shirt, he realises as he smells the cigarette smoke). He’s fought monsters more terrifying than any intruder they could come across and there’s no way in hell he’s letting Billy go without backup.

“Stay behind me, Princess,” is all Billy says in reply; a whispered compromise.