And Louis looks taken aback. Something like dread digging claws into his chest, tightening as Louis looks back at Daniel, register his expression.

They're laying down, but Louis feels unsteady anyway, hearing Daniel—

Did Daniel pluck this from his head? Unlikely. Uncharacteristic. If he'd been prodding around Louis' mind already, he'd hardly have needed to coax Louis into saying anything aloud.

And Louis has all this dread. This disorienting sense of retreading, recognition attached to nothing, no structure to hang this thought upon.

"Yes," Louis says slowly, thumb coming to rest in the hollow of Daniel's throat. "Are you listening to me?"

Listening as shorthand. As in: are you touching my mind?

A question that Louis knows has a single answer.

A question that leads them to a different question, harder to map out.