Prompt 033: "Kiss me" from a writing meme.

Snow flurries down and coats the landscape in a glistening gleam of white. It's Wheatley's second snowfall, and Chell has been doing a great job at helping him celebrate by chucking snowballs at him from across the woodland clearing.

"Oi, that's really not fair." He bats the powdery white from his glasses with a black glove. It's far too cold, crushed against between the frames and his nose, and he has to lift them up to brush the rest away. "You know, I'm pretty sure we agreed on no faces. And you can't say that was an accident, because in case you haven't noticed, I am a little on the tall side of things, so you'd really have to aim quite a lot higher if you wanted to hit my face—which, if I'm honest, it's starting to look a lot like you did. Aim. For my face. Again: not fair. At all. I never did that to you!"

Chell isn't having any of it. Grinning behind the snow-flecked bark of a gnarled pine, she whisks another snowball his way, only for it to disintegrate harmlessly against his shoulder with a soft skiff. Wheatley backpedals, scooping up a handful and molding it between his gloved fingers. Another whirls his way, but he manages to duck out of its arcing trajectory before it sails past.

"Ah-ha, that was much too high," he says, "almost like you were aiming for something!"

Coiling his body back, Wheatley plants his boots in the drift and flings his snowball toward her with purpose. Its path turns crooked and it cracks against the tree in a glittering puff of white. Chell responds in kind; her aim proves true, and she strikes him smack in the belly.

"Hey, come on, get out from behind there," says Wheatley, pawing up another fistful of snow. "You've got all the advantage now, haven't you? I don't have a tree or anything to take my hits for me. Well, I've got a coat. Got that. But that doesn't really count, does it? Not much of a shield, if I'm honest. Not like that thing. I'll have you know I would've got you if it wasn't there. C'mon, stop hiding!"

Chell pokes out from behind the body of the pine and tosses another snowball. This time, it hits his knee with a cold crunch before bursting into a glittering powder. It wounds his pride to admit, but she but she does exhibit uncanny aim; clearly a product of her time spent Back There where portals in opportune places were how she survived. Mashing his own weapon into a compact chunk, he chucks it over in her direction for cover fire, but it does little to help his situation.

"Exactly how many of those bloody things do you have over there?" he asks, dodging another flying snowball. The twist nearly knocks him on his butt, but he manages to realign his equilibrium and straighten his backbone with flailing arms before the fall. "You can't possibly be making them that fast, this is ridiculous!"

After being pelted with a few more snowballs, he catches the violet of her coat as she flees from the safety of the tree and heads for another copse toward the outer edge of the clearing. Well, it's less fleeing and more aggressively hopping, if he's honest. The ground is layered with a good foot of the fluffy stuff, and she seems to struggle with traversing it. Not that he's much better.

"Running away, are we?" Wheatley starts after her with awkward steps, his breath a column of wispy grey. She's rather far ahead, her footprints plowing a contorted path through the snow, but that doesn't deter him. "Oh, I don't think so, love," he calls after her. "You're not getting away like that. You've got a face-snowball to answer for!"

Wheatley's boots mash through as soft flakes stick to his chilled cheeks and melt into liquid crystal on his glasses. While Chell is lithe and quick, she is out of her element and his strides cover a much greater distance, and he soon finds himself just beyond arm's length. He reaches out for the ends of her trailing scarf, but she's keeping pace enough to prevent him from catching it. Desperate to close the gap, Wheatley does the only thing he can think of: he leaps forward and tackles her. Under his weight, they both plunge unceremoniously into a snowdrift.

"Ha," he gloats—but it doesn't last for long.

Hair askew and her knit hat haloed by white, Chell stares at him with gentle pale eyes and a smirk pinching the corner of her mouth. She's situated beneath him quite snugly, her knees hugging at his hips, and there is a brief moment where it feels like his brain has been scoured perfectly blank; he can't process things, he can't think; all he knows is that his heart has somehow found its way into the back of his throat with a spurred rhythm and his blood is running hot.

Chell's mitten touches his cheek. The cold sparks a jaunting tremble down the length of his spine. There's fondness in her countenance, he knows—they've been friends for a while now, there's no denying that—but the hammering palpitations inside of him sing something entirely different.

"Ah, well," he mumbles, the sensation of warmth pooling under his skin, "I think a tumble through the snow's probably good enough, yeah? I mean, you got it all over you now. Being… well, submerged. Mostly submerged. In the drift here. Um, I think we're even now. You know, one face-snowball in exchange for a whole body barrage. Pretty even, I think. Probably."

Chell doesn't seem to be interested. She's silent and focused, snowflakes drifting down to soak in the strands of her dark hair and through the knit fabric of her hat, and he's beginning to notice the space between the two of them has narrowed considerably.

"I, uh—look, I'm—I really am…" He can't latch onto a coherent train of thought. "Ah, are… are you… are we…"

She presses her lips to the tip of his chin in reply. Wheatley's pulse skips one too many times in his neck and he nearly collapses in surprise; he has to channel every ounce of will he has to keep the muscles in his arms from giving out. Her mitten still cups his cheek, and when he tries to look away out of sheer nervousness, she turns him back.

"You're… trying to tell me something, aren't you," he breathes. The slate of her eyes pins him in place and it's difficult to string his words together because the meanings of her actions are piecing together quite well in his head, but he tries his best to craft an intelligible sentence. "I—I don't want to—no, I mean, I want to, I do—I just don't want to, well, um… mis… misinterpret. Your meaning. Ah, as it were. That would be… very bad, to say the least. And I'd rather avoid it. If at all possible."

Chell says nothing. The snow flutters against her lashes and melts in droplets on her cheeks, and her smirk only grows.

Without another thought, Wheatley kisses her. It's clumsy and slow, he knows, but he doesn't care; with her breath hot against his mouth, he can barely feel the chilling bite of the snow entrenched around them or anything else. Her mittens cradle the back of his head, coaxing him closer. He has no idea what he's doing, but he's kissing her and it's amazing. She makes a soft noise beneath him, and he finds his arms have let him lower so he can be as flush with her as their winter garb will allow.

Pulling back, Wheatley sucks in a heavy breath between his teeth. "Right," he says. The cold air prickles down his throat and an exhale swirls up in a misty column of vapor. "Well then. Did I… ah, well, was that—was that your meaning?"

Chell bites at her lower lip, but her smile persists as she playfully bats his ear with the palm of her mitten.

In a whirl of elation, Wheatley scrambles to his feet and (albeit with some trouble) pulls her up into his arms. Snow is caked down her back and all along her legs, but he crushes her close and kisses her again and savors the frost and the chill and just the feeling of her being against him. After a short while, the soreness in his muscles forces him to lower her back to the ground, and he reluctantly lets her down.

"Ha, sorry," he manages. He helps brush off some of the snow from her shoulders with a gloved hand as she tends to her legs and arms. "You know, about the whole… tackling thing. Got you pretty well covered, I think. Didn't mean really to. Sorry. Again. You're probably bloody cold by now. I know I am. We have been out here quite a while, haven't we? Been an hour or so. Maybe two. Sort of… lost track, if I'm honest. Why don't we go someplace a bit warmer?"

Wheatley doesn't expect her to tug him down and nuzzle his nose before kissing him again, but she does. The warmth of her mouth and the pressure of her hands along his jaws tug his heart in odd directions, and a pleasant heat punches down his vertebrae only to tuck itself below his belly. When he feels her nip at his lower lip and gently suck, his knees start to buckle and his voice has somehow wrangled out of his throat in a thick moan.

"Hah," he breathes, so incredibly close, "I really do think—ah—somewhere warm would… would be far more ideal. And preferred. I mean, don't get me wrong, I really—I do love this, I'd rather not stop—but I really do think maybe indoors might be… better suited for… for this."

With a sly smile, Chell presses her lips to his cheek and takes him by the hand. He follows without question as she leads him out of the clearing and onto the woodland path. Snow continues to fall, speckling her coat, and the frosty air gusts through her loose hair.

Feeling far too hot under his winter layers, Wheatley grins and tries his best to ignore the sway of her hips on the way home.