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astroboots · 1 year

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RED FLAGS ║ PART 13 | FINALE

CO-WRITTEN WITH @THIRSTWORLDPROBLEMSS

Pairing: Steven Grant x female reader x Marc Spector (x hints of Jake Lockley)

Summary: The end is the beginning is the end. Or alternatively: You finally get to have Marc's beautiful face buried between your thighs.

Content: will cause unrealistic sex expectations.

Word count; 17k (guys I'm so sorry)

Series Masterlist | Astroboot’s Masterlist | Thirstworldproblemss’ Masterlist

[PREVIOUS]

Your face, small and pinched and dirty, looks back at you from the tiny mirror in Steven’s loo. The unflattering fluorescent lights aren’t doing you any favours. Eyes wide and strung out. A burst bottom lip. You look dreadful.

Your clothes are soggy and cold underneath Marc’s somewhat drier jacket, mucky with grime and mud (and god knows what else), clinging wetly to your skin.

You look like something the cat dragged in.

You shiver. The idiom feels a little too on the nose, considering you were dragged across East London’s dirty concrete not even an hour ago. Just… not by a cat. You shiver again, harder this time, trying not to think about it.

A shower. Marc sent you in here to take a shower. “Go get clean,” he’d said, “Warm up.”

Right now you feel like you’ll never be warm again.

Marc’s jacket comes off first, and you hang it carefully on a hook, running two fingers over the cuff. You stare at it for a moment, fighting the urge to clutch it to your chest and bury your face in it. On autopilot, you reach out to undo your wristwatch instead, fingers running over the bare skin for a moment, searching, before you stare down at your wrist in confusion.

Right. Your watch is gone.

Or… not gone. Probably still out there in the alleyway, lying face up, cracked glass and all, on the concrete in the rain… next to the carcass of some invisible monster. You shake your head, pushing away the image. It’s as good as gone, then, isn’t it? You’re certainly not going back out to search for it at this point. You’re bloody well never going down that alleyway again if you can help it. Hell, even going outside ever again might be off the table.

Pulling the shower curtain aside, you start the shower and peel off your ruined clothing, letting everything plop in a solid, sodden mass on the corner of the bathroom floor.

The muscles in your arms and shoulders are stiffening up and threatening to cramp up as the last bit of adrenaline abandons your system, leaving bruises and all-encompassing exhaustion in its wake. Your knees throb with the leftover pain. The water stings your scraped shin when you step under the spray.

At least it’s warm.

The heat of the water feels like a balm on your aching limbs, and you close your eyes, tilting your head back under the spray, trying to let the comforting warmth relax you.

In the darkness behind your eyelids, the shower sounds like rain. Your nakedness feels like vulnerability. Like maybe you never made it back. Maybe you’re still out there, in the narrowness of the alley, under threat from an otherworldly creature that you cannot see, let alone fight.

Your chest squeezes painfully sharp, and your eyes fly open, half expecting to see the hazy moonlit sky overhead. But no, there’s nothing but the expanse of the blank white ceiling.

You’re still here in Steven’s shower. Safe, or as safe as it gets right now.

Dropping your gaze, you watch the blood and muck sluice down your legs and onto the tiled floor in rusty red-tinted waves to pool on the tile floor. The dirty water leaves lines of fine grit behind as the rest is sucked down the drain.

You feel strangely numb. Like some part of your brain (probably an amenable survival mechanism) is trying to block out what happened so you don’t go mad. But maybe it’s too late for that. After all, you were a hair's width away from meeting your maker tonight at the claws of an invisible blob monster.

It’s impossible to not think about. An irritated half-healed scab itching to be scratched. You turn it over in your mind, trying to process the fact that the supernatural is real—or those creatures were, at any rate. And apparently Marc dons a mummy costume and goes out into the night to battle them like he’s magical girl Sailor Moon.

God. All of this is right proper insane, isn’t it? You want to laugh at the sheer ridiculousness.

You almost died; your understanding of the world as you know it has fundamentally changed; yet none of it feels real. The world itself doesn’t feel real.

The water by your feet is running clear now. The dirt and grime finally washed off, but the film of exhaustion still clings to your limbs. Turning off the tap, you step out, grabbing the towel Marc left for you in the corner by the door. Your eyes linger on the set of clean clothes waiting for you underneath, folded into a neat square.

You can't reconcile the man who does this for you with the same man that pummelled a supernatural monster into a whimpering pulp without hesitation. Didn’t recognise the Marc you thought you knew in the man in the alleyway standing over the creature and curb-stomping it into the ground with cold and blank disdain in his eyes. Couldn’t see that man in the Marc who escorted you home and gently bullied you into the shower.

Reaching for the clothes, you quickly dress and pull aside the accordion door only to find the very man you were thinking of right outside the door, arms crossed and back plastered to the closest wall as he stands guard.

You barely cross the threshold before he's already pushing away from the wall and moving in to guide you gently but firmly towards the kitchen like a particularly insistent herding dog.

There’s a fairly extensive first aid kit laid out on the counter, well used by the look of it, and you try not to think too hard about why that might be.

"Up," Marc commands, curt as ever, swatting a hand down on the surface of the countertop, and you feel like a lamb being rounded back into the pen.

A ‘please’ wouldn’t have hurt him, but you let it go with just a glare as you shuffle over, too drained to put up a fight over something so small. You lift your arms to brace against the countertop, getting ready to hop up, and flinch a little as your shoulders twinge and ache.

Marc is in front of you in a heartbeat, watching you with worried eyes and a furrowed brow. His hands hover, like he wants to help but doesn't dare to touch, and any testiness in you fizzles out at the sight of him.

You give him a small nod, barely able to complete the motion before his hands come down on your waist, lifting you. Even though you’re expecting it, the loss of ground beneath your feet feels sudden, unbalancing you, and you gasp, hands instinctively flying to his shoulders to steady yourself.

Part of you expects him to drop you, but he doesn’t. Marc’s warm and solid under your palms, strong muscles bunching as he perches you on the counter.

Blood rushes to your head with furious speed. It must be from the sudden change in altitude. That’s what you tell yourself no matter how doubtful that is considering the standard kitchen counter height is not even three feet above the floor. You're not exactly climbing the Himalayan mountains. But you don’t want to think of the more probable reasons right now.

You're still reeling from lightheadedness when he lets you go in favour of busying himself with the large tin box on the counter, rifling through the arsenal of medical supplies, and sets down what he needs next to you. Then he's dragging a nearby chair to position himself in front of you. Sitting so close he's practically nestled between your legs.

It does nothing to help with your newly discovered vertigo symptoms.

"I’m going to check you over for injuries now,” he says perfunctory, pulling you from your thoughts, “Left leg.”

You stretch out your leg into the air, glancing down at him, unsure of where to rest it. There’s no space on the tiny kitchen stool. Do you just… put it down in his lap? On his crotch?!?! Or–

Marc's hand wraps around your ankle, and his executive decision-making ends your flailing, as he gently guides your foot to rest against his thigh. Then his head ducks down, and he starts to inspect the patch of scraped skin on your knee, dabbing gently at the scattered dots of blood with a square of clean gauze.

With how tender and swollen everything feels, you expect it to hurt. That at the slightest pressure on your skin, it is bound to sting and snag and tear. But it doesn't. Marc is gentle, barely pressing down and showing such minute care as he tends to you that you barely feel the brush of the cloth at all.

It's such an impossible contrast. The tenderness of his touch as he fusses over you, placing a plaster on your knee, compared to the brutality you’ve now seen him capable of.

You still can't make sense of it. What happened, or what that invisible monster in the rain was. Why Marc was out there. Or what he meant by that being "what he does."

"Marc," you start tentatively as you lean forward to get his attention, "What happened toni--"

“Wiggle your toes,” he interrupts.

His odd demand cuts off your line of thought. “What?”

“Try to wiggle your toes for me”, he repeats, without looking up. “Want to make sure you didn’t get any nerve damage.”

You frown, you’re not blind to the fact that his request conveniently just cut you off from asking a question that undoubtedly Marc doesn’t want to answer. Still, you comply, angling your foot upwards and wiggle your toes for his inspection.

Whether you passed his ad hoc medical examination, Marc’s expression isn’t giving you any clues. His face is as stoic as ever as he sets down your foot. He doesn’t say anything. Just reaches over to your right side to draw your other foot into his lap.

Marred with bruises, looking like something that got mangled in a bear trap. Your right foot does not make for a pretty sight. It’s swollen and bleeding sluggishly from long gashes where the blob monster’s claw-like grip must have broken through skin.

It's a gruesome picture, but miraculously, the injury doesn’t seem to be too serious. It stings more than it actually hurts, and it’s not even bleeding much anymore. Not even worth a trip to A&E really, as you doubt it’s deep enough to need stitches.

At least that’s the assessment based on your own limited medical knowledge. If you based the severity on Marc’s reaction, you’d think it needed amputation.

The line of his shoulder is pulled taut and reminds you of a live wire. Mouth set in a grim tortured line. He has the expression of a doctor about to give the nearest kin some heartbreaking news as he’s staring down at your foot with haunted guilt in his eyes.

"I'm all right. I’m sure it just looks a lot worse than it is," you tell him.

He doesn't meet your eyes or reply for that matter. Instead, he begins to gently tend the wound. Mouth pressing down so tightly his lips go pale white from it. He dabs away the oozing blood, carefully applying antibiotic ointment to the worst of the broken skin, and covering them with large squares of gauze that he tapes in place. It’s all quite professional, really, the practised ease that only comes with repetition.

You wonder how many times he has done this before. You wonder how much harder it must be for him to suture his own gashes and gaping wounds. Wonder how long he’s been doing this by himself, fighting these hellish creatures. These things that you still have no bloody fucking idea as to what they are.

"Marc,” you start tentatively, “what was--" A ticklish sensation rushes through you. In panic, you think a centipede is crawling down the sole of your foot. You instinctively jerk your leg up and away, nearly kneeing Marc in the face before you realise what’s happened.

Your eyes fly downwards to Marc who is entirely unfazed by the close call as you stare at him in shock. His index finger rests on the arch of your heel and you blink up at him in a dumb stupor, not believing your eyes.

Did he just– did he just fucking tickle you?!

There’s no hint of wrongdoing in his expression. No grin, or crack in his stony facade. He is unflappable as always as he continues cleaning your wound with a straight face.

"Needed to check if you still had sensation in that foot," he offers up as an explanation as if he thinks that tickling was a perfectly reasonable thing for him to do in the circumstances.

You frown, biting down the tart comment bubbling in your throat. You want to call him out on it, that you know what he’s up to and he’s acting like a child. But you know that the moment you do, the conversation will derail into an argument and in the flare of your temper, you’ll lose track of your questions. You’re pretty sure Marc knows you well enough that that’s exactly what he is aiming for.

Gathering a deep calming breath into your chest, you steady yourself before you take a second shot.

"What was that thing in the rain?" you ask again.

He acts like he doesn't hear you. "Roll your ankles side to side," he requests instead.

Irritation prickles your face. This bastard is still trying to evade your questions.

"Marc," you start again, "what was--"

"Press down your weight on my hand with your foot."

"Marc!" you bark.

He finally drags his eyes upwards to meet yours without bothering to lift his chin, seemingly as detached and reposed as ever. But there's something else in there too. A tiny flicker as you hold his gaze, and he has to look away.

He looks… scared.

Scared of what you don't know. The man practically single-handedly beat three monsters straight out of a Lovecraftian horror story with his bare fists tonight. With strength like that, you don't think anything should ever be capable of scaring him.

"Can we talk about what happened tonight?" you ask again, trying to keep your voice even.

His head ducks back down again, and he busies himself by rechecking the bandaids on your injured ankle.

“There's nothing to talk about,” he murmurs offhandedly, but his hands betray him.

There's no mistaking it. Even though his shoulders are obscuring your line of sight, you don’t need to see it in order to feel how unsteady his hands are. How his fingers stutter against your skin as they trail over your ankle.

He’s not letting go, as if he’s afraid that if he wasn’t holding onto you, you’d get up and walk away.

Gazing down on him from your vantage point of the counter, Marc doesn’t look as imposing as when you were looking up at him from the rainy concrete in the alley. From up here, he looks small and scared even.

Even though there is nothing in this flat that should intimidate him. No invisible monsters lurking in the dark shadows behind Steven’s piles and piles of books. The scariest thing in Steven’s flat is dust mites.

No, the only thing Marc is scared of, you realise, is this conversation.

That’s what Steven told you, wasn’t it? That 'there are things that Marc hasn't told you.' That 'once you know everything,’ Marc thinks ‘you'll walk away'.

It’s the final puzzle piece, slotted into its rightful place, and you can finally see the picture that was blurred out before, crystallising in startling detail.

This is it. This is the big secret. The thing that Marc hasn't told you.

You get it now. Why he has avoided you all this time. Why he stayed away even after you told him you love him.

Because how on earth would anyone even begin to explain what happened tonight to someone who wasn’t there?

How could he possibly have explained any of this to you before now? How would he possibly convince you those things out there (whatever they are) were real without dragging you into danger, head first, to see it with your own eyes?

Didn't you struggle with the very same thought when you’d first tried to tell Marc what you’d seen in the alley on your own before all hell broke loose? The fear that he wouldn't believe you. That he'd think you were insane.

Even if he had managed to explain and get you to believe him– what then?

You can understand it. Why he was convinced that you would leave not just him but Steven as well, causing further collateral damage, if he told you everything. You can see from where he was standing, why he’d worry.

But this is where Marc is wrong. You still want this. Him. Them.

"What happened tonight, it doesn't change how I feel about you," you start, and his hand on your foot spasms, grip tightening. It’s how you know your guess was right on the button, so you press on. "What I told you on the phone, I still mean it. I–" you hesitate on the word.

The last thing you want is to spook him away again by repeating it. It might be too much too soon. Instead, you settle for second best.

"I want you to come back. Steven and I both do."

Marc lets go of your foot. You can see his hand shaking despite Marc’s attempt to make it stop. His fingers flex and curl in agitation until he gives up and reaches up to drag it through his matted curls in frustration.

“You don’t want this,” he says quietly, and his face is still turned downwards, staring at the floor refusing to look up at you.

Knowing Marc, you know that he could very well mean the situation or himself. After everything that’s happened tonight, the part that upsets you the most is that he still feels this way about himself.

"I do," you counter, saying the words with the whole of your chest. “I. Want. You. I want all of this.”

In the face of your certainty, he flinches, face pinched as if telling him you want him is a physical slap that pains him. It takes him a second to recover, to shake his head in refusal as he stares down at the floor like it committed a great wrong against him.

"You want a normal life. Steven can give you that if it’s just the two of you. I can't,” he tells you. His voice, low in that weary and tired tone you overheard in the bathroom.

"I don't need you to give me a normal life. What does that even mean? ‘Normal,’” you say derisively. “I don't need or want normal if it means you're not there Marc. That's not the life I want.”

He's still not looking at you, biting the insides of his cheek, and you can almost see the walls closing in around him before your very eyes.

"You said you wanted me safe”, you say, ducking your head to try to catch his gaze, and you manage to see his eyes peer up at you from his lashes, as you continue. “And happy. I'm telling you now, I'm not going to be happy if you're not here."

Marc’s eyes widen with alarm. “You were awake?”

"I–" you start, but he cuts you off before you finish.

“You were pretending to be asleep?”

"No, I thought I was dreaming, I–"

“What else did you hear,” he asks. There’s panic in his voice, and he’s already rising from his seat in preparation to flee the room.

Fuck, how are you fucking this up this badly this fast? Seeing his distress almost makes you want to backtrack, to fold it up and call it a night, try again tomorrow maybe. Because you know in his mind Marc is already bolting for that door, ready to leg it and put as much distance as he can between you and him.

But… your mind flashes to the weight of his gentle touch on your shoulder. To his fingers brushing away the hair on your forehead. To his quiet voice as he whispered, 'I love you too'. You know what you heard in the dark: a testament of Marc’s feelings for you, and it emboldens you.

“Marc.” You lean forward, reaching out to take his hand in yours. He stiffens with a jolt as your fingertips brush up against his knuckles, and you can almost see the line of his shoulder vibrate. But he doesn't make any moves to pull away at your touch.

“I want you. Do you want me?” you ask.

He stills. Marc looks at you for a long unflinching moment. It’s the same conflicted set in his jaw when you were standing next to him in front of Gus’ tank. The same hesitation written over his face when you were watching him through the back window of the taxi as it pulled away from him in the night. That same pained look when your eyes met in your office before he fled from you.

His mouth parts with hesitation, but then he bites down and grinds his jaw hard enough that you think you can hear his molars grate from where you sit. “What I want doesn’t matter,” he answers you stubbornly.

It's enough to make you want to grab him by the shoulders and shake him back and forth and scream into his face.

“It does!” you say, almost half-shouting. “Of course it matters. You matter.”

"Don't. Don't do that.” Marc shakes his head, and he moves his free hand over yours, gently prying it off of him. “Save that for Steven. He deserves it. Deserves… you. I… I don't.”

“And what about what I deserve,” you demand, fed up to the gills with his tendency for self-sacrifice, “What I want? Don’t I deserve to decide for myself?”

That seems to catch him off guard. For once he doesn’t have a ready response, just glares at you, his jaw still set at that impossibly stubborn angle, but his eyes are full of so much pain that it hurts you to see it. You reach out again and cup his cheek.

"Remember that night Gus died? You came to me for help. You said I was the only one you could think of to ask, and it made me so happy that you did. I want you to ask me for things.”

There’s another moment of indecision in his eyes. The upper half of his body tilts in your direction, almost like he’s reaching for you, even if he won’t let his hands do so.

"I just want to be with you,” you continue, “I want to be your person. The person you come to when you need something. Can’t that be enough?"

His eyes are glued on you, mouth gaping open. For a moment you think you've succeeded, managed to stun him into silence and maybe even convinced him.

It doesn’t last.

He closes his parted mouth and clamps it shut until it’s compressed into a thin determined line. Then before you can react, he’s abruptly pulling away, turning with wordless efficiency, and walking away from you.

"Marc?" you call after him, but his determined stride doesn’t even falter, "Marc!"

Oh goddamnit!

You hop off the counter, your sore ankle twinging when you land on it, but you ignore the dull ache as you run after him.

“You don’t have to do this, Marc!" you shout. Slinging your arm out, you only just manage to catch him by the back of his shirt. Your fingers grip onto the fabric for dear life to stop him from getting further away, "You don’t have to do everything on your own. You don’t have to be alone. Steven and I are here. Stop running away from us! We want to support you. Please! You can lean on us.”

He stops, turning about sharply, fire and brimstone in his eyes. The fuse of his already short temper burnt to a crisp.

“You and Steven were never supposed to know about me or get caught up in any of this,” he snaps. “I’ve– My life is dangerous. It’s not safe.”

“Yeah, I noticed the red flags already, you dunce. I still care about you regardless!”

“I don’t want you to care!” Marc roars, and it hits you with the force of a punch to the chest.

You suck in a sharp pained breath, and he must see the hurt in your face because his eyes soften slightly, but his voice is no less emphatic, “You can’t go poking around in my life. Running out after me in the middle of the night. It's dangerous! You got hurt tonight. You could’ve been killed!"

And that does it. The pain of his implied rejection, the scolding tone, the way it feels like he’s blaming you for getting yourself hurt. It all rubs you the wrong way. All of the patience you had in you up until now evaporates, replaced by a fiery heat burning up your chest until it comes to a boiling point.

“Me?” you bite back indignantly. “What about you? Running around in a bloody Halloween costume in the middle of the night. Fighting invisible monsters? What if you got hurt? What on earth were you doing out there?”

“This is exactly why you needed to stay away from me. You do not want or need my fucking mess, okay!?"

“Yes, I bloody well do! I'll take your fucking mess, Marc—every speck of it—as long as I get to have you too.”

His gaze bores into yours, eyes dark like spilt ink and brimming with anger so stark it practically sparks.

“You really want to know what I do? Why I was out there tonight?” he asks, voice quieter, but the anger is still there, simmering just below the surface waiting to erupt.

The sudden change feels like a gauntlet being thrown down, challenging you to a metaphorical game of chicken, daring you to back away and run for the hills while you still can.

You stand your ground, heels digging into the floor as you nod, swallowing the anxiety you feel pressed up against your throat like an acidic heartburn.

“I serve Khonshu. I’m his avatar,” he says matter-of-factly as if it’s the most sensible thing in the world. As if any of this is supposed to make sense to you.

It doesn’t. It makes no fucking sense at all.

Your mind scrambles to connect the dots. Khonshu? Avatar? What the hell is he on about? Avatar as in James Cameron’s Pocahontas in space? And Khonshu? What even… You can’t even begin to think of what that is supposed to mean. Don’t recognise it save for a passing familiarity that it’s a word that Steven has used when passionately serenading you with facts on Ancient Egypt. The connection between the two is lost to you.

“What is… ‘Khonshu?'” you ask, and this time, you don’t have to drag the answer out of Marc.

He answers you willingly and as plainly without varnish as before. “Khonshu’s the ancient Egyptian god of the moon. Years ago, I was stabbed and left for dead. He saved my life and in return, I work for him now.”

There’s no hint of emotion as he says it. He’s not pleading for you to believe him despite how fantastical it sounds. Not trying to convince you of anything. Marc is leaving it to you whether or not you believe him, almost like he wishes you wouldn’t. Like this bizarre rambling will hopefully finally send you packing and out of his life. And that’s… how you know he’s not lying to you.

“Work for him… how?” you ask.

His eyes flick upwards, grinding his teeth as if he’s biting down on a curse, before his gaze settles back on you.

“I swore to protect travellers of the night.”

And once again, that tells you absolutely nothing. What does that even mean, ‘Travellers of the night’? As in prostitutes?!

Marc’s obfuscation and frankly dodgy-as-fuck explanations have your blood boiling. You’re almost positive he’s doing this on purpose to get you hacked off, and he’s succeeding.

“Can you speak in plain English?”

“I take care of bad guys so they don’t harm good people. Protect civilians who can’t protect themselves.”

“So you’re… what? Like a supernatural police officer? A monster hunter? A guardian of the night?”

He grits his teeth.

“Something like that.” The answer is dismissive, and so is his attitude. He folds his arms across his chest, trying to distance himself from you, casting a glance at the door. “Satisfied? We done here?”

“No! No, we’re not ‘done here.’ We are the furthest thing from done. I already told you, Marc. Nothing that’s happened tonight changes how I feel about you.”

He shakes his head, jaw set mulishly, before tearing his eyes away and turning towards the front door.

And that just won’t do. If you let Marc walk out now, you know he’ll do everything in his power to avoid you for the rest of his life.

Moving quickly, you dart around Marc and slide between him and the door. In your single-minded hurriedness, you bump into the small table by the door, sending several things clattering over and probably adding yet another bruise to your already abused body, but you don’t care. You cannot let him leave. Plastering your back to the door, you stand tall and raise your chin, prepared to act as a physical barrier if you have to.

Marc’s eyes narrow into slits, a snarl of pure exasperation erupting from the back of his throat.

“Move,” he orders, taking a step closer to you, but there is no real threat behind it. He doesn’t reach out to touch you; doesn’t grab you or shove you out of the way

He just looks at you like you are an actual obstacle he cannot surpass. But you know that he could move you by force if he wanted to. It’d be easy for him to force his way out of the flat with little effort.

Between the two of you, physically he’s the stronger one. You’ve witnessed him take out supernatural monsters tonight. If he wanted to, he could shove his way straight through you. Carry you into another room and lock you in. Could easily snap every bone in your wrist in the blink of an eye.

But he won't. After all this time, if there is one thing you’ve learnt about Marc, it is that harm is only ever his last resort.

The man is squirmish at the prospect of physically harming a goldfish. Would rather visit all the pet shops in all of London in the middle of the night to find a mythical one-finned fish to avoid that outcome. At the core of him, he wants to shield and protect, not break.

And towards you? He would never use brute strength on you. Would never hurt you. Would give his very life to make sure you’re safe and unharmed. Happy.

In front of you, Marc takes another step forward, closing the distance. His commanding presence crowds you in against the doorframe until there’s barely any space between you anymore.

Marc is angry. Jaw tense, shoulders tied up in a tangled knot, nose flaring like an angry bull emitting a bright and blaring warning signal for you to move. But you stay put because if he’s a bull, then that must make you a matador, practically waving a red cape at him to come charge you.

He’s staring down at you again. That look in his eyes, like he knows what is best for you. That same stern gaze when he swore you to secrecy, deciding what was best for Steven. The determination there that tells you that this is not up for discussion.

It’s a recurring pattern with Marc. He decides what he thinks is best for everyone else, with no consideration of what the person in question actually wants.

“Last chance,” he warns, through gritted teeth, “I won’t ask again.”

Marc probably thinks this is a threat. But it’s only because he can’t see himself, the pain-filled eyes that look back down at you. Nothing is menacing about it.

“I’m not moving,” you tell him.

It’s only a fraction of a second, but you catch his eyes flickering to your lips. A near-growling sound tears out of his throat, and then he’s moving forward further into your space.

What is he–?

His hand cups the back of your neck, pulling you to him, and then his lips are on yours.

Oh.

Marc Spector is kissing you.

It’s hard and demanding, his lips crushed to yours, clearly driven by the frustration and anger that seems to vibrate just under his skin. But it doesn’t matter. You have dreamed of kissing this man for so long. Even with the harshness, you can’t help but respond to him, meeting the brutal press of his lips with your own more eager one. Mouth parting in invitation for him.

Something shifts.

All the fight goes out of him, leaking away like hot air out of a punctured balloon, whatever anger was there fizzles out of him, and you feel him melt against your lips. The kiss slips into something softer, sweeter. Something that steals every ounce of oxygen from your lungs.

You don’t know how long it lasts, the only thing you know is that it doesn’t last long enough. If you could have the choice, you’d want it to last forever.

It doesn’t of course. Marc retreats from you with an unsteady step. His eyes are etched with shock as you take him in, brows pinched and pupils wide, and you already want to kiss him again.

The two of you have been here before. Staring at each other from so close a distance that your foreheads are inches from touching. Except this time it’s not in front of a fish tank with an imposter goldfish between you. A stray curl falls into his eyes and tickles your nose. It’s the hint of clean linen, the note of coffee you brew for him every night that he will unfailingly drink because you made it for him. It’s the smell you wake up to embedded in Steven’s sheets.

You want this man, all of him, to be yours.

Your face tilts up to him. So close, his lips ghost over yours.

“Marc,” you whisper, and his eyes flicker over your face. “Stop running.”

Part of you expects him to stop you again. That he will pull back, eyeing you like you’re something dangerous, the way he did that night in front of the fish tank.

He doesn’t.

You tip your face forward even further, your nose dragging along the bridge of his.

“I love you.”

You can hear the sharp inhale just like last time you said it over the phone when you did not know if he was on the other end or not. When you didn't know if the sound was imaginary or real. Now you know.

You couldn’t see his face then, but this time you get to. The pinched furrow between his brow, that look in his eyes that makes your heart seize in your chest. There’s no doubt about it now.

"And you love me,” you say.

His lips part, and you brace yourself for another protest or denial, but it doesn’t come. Instead, his head does the slightest tilt forward. A nod, you realise.

“Yeah.” He whispers it so quietly you nearly miss it at first.

You smile. Happiness surges through your insides, weaving through your ribs until you think that your chest might burst.

Marc Spector loves you.

You swallow in relief, smiling even as you feel a sting prickle the corner of your eyes. Then Marc leans down and closes that infinitesimal space between you, bringing down the final barrier of separation that he has maintained since you met him.

It’s a soft press of his lips to yours. So soft, it’s scarcely there, but it feels perfect all the same, a fluttering warmth that you can feel down to the curl of your toes.

It’s an admittance. An invitation. A sign of trust.

Marc kisses you again and again with lingering kisses that he deepens with each gentle press of his mouth to yours. His hand moves to cup your face in his palm, cradling your cheek like you're the most precious thing he’s ever touched.

You feel like you ought to be surprised by how gentle he is, but you’re not. Not at all, because of course he’s gentle.

That’s the thing, isn’t it? Marc’s hardness is all smoke and mirrors, hiding the vulnerable softness that lies under the hardened skin. Beneath it all, Marc is protective and caring, kind even.

And now, you finally get to have him in all his confounding complexities. This stubborn, kind, impossible idiot, right here in your arms.

You pull him closer, even as you keep kissing him, fingers twisting into the brushed cotton of his shirt, and he lets you. Head leaning down as he adjusts his angle so he can slant his mouth fully over yours. He’s pressed up against every single inch of you, from his knees to his chest, your lips fused and somehow it’s still not even close to enough for you. You tug his collar, encouraging him to come even closer and he does, obedient, in a way that you’ve never known him to be before.

Stepping forward, he follows your lead, inching closer, until the solidness of his chest presses you flush to the door. His arm comes to brace the side of your head, hand cupping behind the back of your neck, and you realise only belatedly it’s the reason why your head isn’t colliding with the hard wood behind you.

Not that it would matter if you did. You don’t even think you’d notice if your head went through the wall right now. Too focused on the softness of his lips. Too lost in the quiet, near-silent humming sound he makes as he kisses you that sets your nerves alight.

God, he’s perfect. His closeness is heady. There’s a growing hunger in your stomach that makes your limbs shake and tremble. After all the time he's been away, hiding from you, you feel starved for this. For him. You want to bite his neck, lick along the protruding line of his collarbone and swallow every inch of him down to the marrow if he’d let you.

For all the gentleness that Marc is showing you, you have no intention of returning the favour. Your teeth sink in, biting down on his bottom lip, and he lets out a quiet involuntary gasp into your mouth. Your veins burn at the sound. Fuck, you want him to make that noise again, that careless pitch of pleasure that sounds so unguarded coming from him. You want to bite and nibble and scratch and claw and have him make every noise known and unknown to mankind.

You drag your teeth along the swell of his lip, and he shivers, eyes squeezed firmly shut like he’s teetering on the very edge of his self-control. Then you nip down again.

His hips stutter forward involuntarily, and he curses, the sound breathless and raw, like you tore it out of him before he was prepared. It’s all you want. To hear that sound again and again and again. You want to hear his tiny moans in your ear, the involuntary muffled growl as he buries his face into your neck trying to keep quiet, hear him gasp ‘fuck’ in barely audible decibels. You want everything.

Hooking your fingers into the belt loops of his jeans, you haul him closer as if he wasn’t already pressed alongside your body. Thighs nestled between yours, the coarseness of denim scraping against your bare legs. You can feel the hardening bulge trapped between you, and you want him to grind against you, to rut into you mindlessly until you can feel his cock twitch against the softness of your belly.

But Marc isn’t showing any signs of obliging you in that department, and you’re not willing to stop kissing him in order to give him directions. Instead, you arch your back away from the wall, tilting your pelvis until you rub up against his crotch. He jolts hard at the contact, the line of his body wracked in shivers with a gorgeous groan that is cut off too soon.

"Shit!”

His hand leaves your neck. Then he’s pulling back and away from you in retreat. You immediately miss the warmth of his body, reaching up to try to chase after the loveliness of his lips, but he stops you. A gentle but firm hand comes down on your shoulder, pinning you against the wall.

You stare up at him, and you’re not sure you’re breathing anymore at the sight of him. You should be used to how preposterously beautiful this man is by now. But you never are. Each time feels novel and so much worse–no, better than the last time. The collar of his shirt is stretched and askew. Curls a mess against his forehead. Lips, slick and kiss-swollen as his mouth hangs open, chest heaving as he pants.

As stunningly pretty as Steven is when you’ve succeeded in making a mess out of him, to do it to Marc is something else entirely. This orderly, neat freak of a man who makes it his life mission to repress his emotions and jam them shut inside of himself with a tight lid. You did this. You’ve made a mess of him. It’s electric, your veins buzz with the thrill, and your brain is screaming for more.

Your hand reaches up, fingers carding through his hair as you reel him in by the back of his neck. Your mouth finds his, kissing him hard before he has time to overthink it or, god forbid, change his mind and try to bolt again. His mouth parts, and you swallow the soft oomph of surprise that escapes his throat and lean in, licking desperately into his mouth. If this is all you get, you want to try to savour him.

Marc doesn’t stop you this time. Instead, his hands settle on your waist, fingers digging into your hips as he’s pulling you closer. It has the whole of your back from the base of your spine to the tip of your nose tingling.

This time he’s the one grinding into you, the hard outline of his cock pressed tight between you. Even through the thick layer of denim, you can feel how hard he is, and you shiver pleasantly.

You moan into the kiss, rising on your tiptoes to meet him. There’s not an inch of space between your bodies, and you swear you can feel his cock twitch against your hip.

And fuck, fuck– that’s–

You need to get him in bed now before you hitch your legs and clamber onto his thighs to climb him like the trunk of a tree. Why the fuck did the architect place the bedroom section at the opposite end of the flat.

Stepping one foot sideways, you tug at the neck of Marc’s shirt to steer him towards the bed. There’s no resistance. He shows you the same obedience as before, easily letting himself be pulled by you as you start walking blindly backwards, navigating the two of you through the junkyard of Steven’s mess.

Any second now you’re expecting to trip over the damn ottoman, except this is Steven's flat, not yours. And this isn’t Steven; it’s Marc in your arms. Steady and composed in his every step, with none of the charming incoordination of Steven. No, Marc steers you like it’s the most natural thing in the world. Arms bracketing your side to make sure your hips don’t bump into any hard-edged furniture, preemptively pushing back a teetering book from the shelf before it even has the time to leap off the ledge.

Marc—beautiful, stubborn Marc, who is as immovable as a rock in his decisions—is letting you pull and tug him in whatever direction you’re choosing to go. Kissing you with each unbalanced step backwards, like you’re the only air he ever needs to breathe.

There’s a flicker of light as you pass Gus’ tank, and it dims when you move past Steven’s desk and the telly. God. It’s a journey of fewer than 20 feet that should take you less than ten seconds and not the eternity that it seems to take.

When you finally feel the fine, gritty sand beneath the sole of your foot, it feels like victory. The soft brush of the sheets pressing up against your calves is the rope of the finish line that you’d never imagined you’d reach.

You want to memorialise this moment somehow. Etch it into your memory so you’ll never forget. Carve it into the wooden beam structures of this very flat so it’ll outlast you both.

Marc’s hands on your hips guide you gently to a stop, and you realise with a rush of giddiness that you’ve finally reached your destination. You break the kiss long enough to sit down on the edge of the bed, and you don’t even need to tug at the corner of his sleeve for Marc to dutifully follow you down. He helps you lay back and leans in after you, the firm weight of his body settling over you, pressing you down into the mattress.

The weight of Marc feels perfect, as his head tips down to your face, kissing over the curve of your jaw to your neck. He’s pressing open-mouthed kisses down the line of your throat and the swell of your chest. It’s tender. Reverent almost.

Marc is unbothered by the cotton layer of clothing that separates his mouth from your bare skin as he goes. His mouth grazes your knuckles, kissing the inside of your wrist. He’s soft yet insistent. Hungry but slow. God, he’s slow, infuriatingly so, to the point where you wonder if he’s taking the mick out of you.

His lips trail a row of devoted kisses against the bare skin of your stomach where your shirt has ridden up, barely lifting the hem up and letting it ride up against your ribs as he puts his mouth there too. If it didn’t feel so good to have his mouth on you, you’d consider it torture with the pace that he’s going. You’re aching, everything inside is pulled so taught and tight you might burst out of your skin.

Those cotton soft curls tickle against your thighs on his way down, and you spread them for him in a not-so-subtle invitation. But Marc doesn’t pay you any mind, that earlier obedience that had endeared him to you is nowhere to be found now. He continues down, knees sinking into the sand lining the perimeter of the bed until he’s kneeling down in front of you on the bed.

Then he stops.

You hold your breath waiting for him to continue. But nothing happens, and your first instinct is that he’s changed his mind again. You’re almost lunging after him. Fully prepared to tackle him down with a wrestling move you’ve seen on the telly and pin him against the sand and wooden floor.

But he’s not moving away from you.

Opening your eyes to peek, you lift yourself on one arm, tilting down your head to find yourself staring back at those pitch-dark eyes.

You’re not prepared for the sight of him. Of Marc on his knees, peering up at you through his lashes, like you’re a solemn prayer that he’s clinging onto by his fingertips. The vision of him flattens your lungs, taking any oxygen away with it. He’s looking at you like you’re something to be protected and cared for. As if you’re all he’s ever wanted and would never allow himself to have.

Marc’s bending down again, lips brushing your skinned knee as his warm breath ghosts over the raw skin. He goes over every scrape and scratch with his mouth. It’s his way of atoning for ever letting you get hurt.

And as good as that feels, as much as you never want him to stop. You need more. More than this torturous, drawn-out pace that he’s giving you, or you think you’ll tear your hair out by the roots and go mad with it.

“Marc.” You’re trying to say it with urgency, maybe even hint at your annoyance, but it comes out as a high-pitched, delirious plea, “Marc please, I need–”

He doesn’t answer you with any words. Instead, his hands come to the side of your hips, fingers slipping into your sleep shorts, hooking the hem of your knickers with them as he pulls them down.

“Lift,” he commands, in the same brusque way he had before when ordering you to sit on the kitchen counter. But this time you’re only too eager to comply.

You’re so excited you nearly deal a high kick to his face, miraculously missing him by only a couple of inches.

From the corner of your eye, you swear you catch an amused half-smile quirking the corners of his lips. But before you can take a better look to confirm it, he ducks his head back down, even though you think you can see the line of his shoulders shake from what might very well be laughter.

But your mind doesn't get to linger on it for long. His hand curls over your thigh, and he settles your leg on his shoulder, pressing a kiss to the inner side that his mouth can reach. Then he hooks your leg over his back, and sharp heat settles deep in your stomach.

His warm breath fans against the bare skin raising goosebumps in its wake. He continues to lick over the softness of your belly. Nipping at your hip and the insides of your legs, covering every inch of you he can reach with his mouth. Purposefully avoiding the slick ache between your legs where you need his mouth and tongue most.

Fuck, you could kill him for that.

“Marc.” His name is a whine between your lips. It sounds pathetic to your ears, but you don’t care. You’re not above begging. Not if there’s a chance it will get you more of this, of him.

“Please, Marc, just– I need you to–”

“Baby,” he murmurs, cutting off your pleas. It’s almost reproachful, but it doesn’t matter because that’s not what your mind is focused on. This is the first endearment Marc has ever used for you and it sounds so sweet on his lips. Makes you feel loved and cared for despite the admonishing tone.

“Be patient,” he scolds, but there’s so much fondness in his voice for you, it makes you lightheaded. “I’m gonna take my time with you.”

There’s only a brief second as you catch a peek of the pink tip of his tongue, glistening against his lips. His eyes flutter closed as he dips down. Heat crackles throughout your limbs, and your lungs pull tight in anticipation. The air around you thins, and for a moment as you try to desperately swallow down the air in your throat, the room seems to tilt.

Then he gives you his mouth, and as cliche as it sounds, it’s heaven. A long, controlled press of his tongue through your wet and slick folds. Endorphins rush through you to the top of your head, and you can’t help how your body reacts, arching up against his mouth with a gasp that is punched out of your lungs.

Then he does it again, and somehow, though you can’t even fathom how it’s not defying the laws of science and time as you know it, he goes even slower. The velvet softness of his tongue drags with an unhurried press across the seam of your pussy until he reaches the apex and licks with a silken glide on your wet clit. You nearly swallow your tongue to tamper the whine trapped in your throat.

This is not the pace you were expecting. Maybe it’s wishful thinking on your part, but you thought he’d be impatient. Almost anticipated that his movements would be sparse and efficient like every other aspect of his life, pushing you to a high-speed climax like a carcrash.

This is not that. This is Marc taking his own sweet time. His tongue is a slow decadent drag against your clit, and you feel his warm breath ghost over you, inhaling the scent of you as he takes you in.

Sweet heady pleasure climbs up the back of your thighs, filling your stomach with it. It’s so much, you don’t know if you can fit it all within, all the emotions that are welling up in your chest to spill out of you. Your fingers grip his solid shoulders to anchor yourself. You roll your hips against his mouth in an attempt to urge him on, but he refuses to take the hint. His tongue makes a slow, thorough exploration, interrupted only by the open-mouthed kisses that he presses against your mound, your hip, your cunt.

You can feel the tension in his shoulder under your thigh. Can hear it in the quick rasp of his breath, but still, his pace remains slow and measured. Steadily kindling the smouldering heat beneath your skin, lick by torturous lick.

It’s perfect. Hot as sin and twice as glorious, but you could scream with how agonisingly glacial the build-up is. A strange, high-pitched sound escapes you. An unflattering blend between a moan and a sob. It sounds like you’re in pain when all you feel is pleasure, and then you hear Marc shushing you again. This time softer, comforting even.

“It's alright. You're alright. You can take it for me,” he says into your skin, mouth pressed against your clit with a warm hum that rumbles through your flesh. Your veins drip with something sweet and honeyed at his tone.

Marc is so exacting, not at all like Steven’s wild hunger. His tongue laves at you, warm and wet, with an unceasing gentle pressure, gliding over and around your clit. Decadently slow, but never stopping. The feeling is intense and unrelenting. Somehow dragging you closer and closer to the edge but never quite enough to push you over.

Digging your heels into his back, you tilt your hips as far as the strain in your muscles will allow you to get closer. You rock yourself against his mouth, and Marc groans, a pleased, encouraging sound, even as his hands grip the flesh of your waist and hold you firm against the pillowy softness of the bed to make sure you don’t try to ride out your own pleasure against his face at a faster pace than he has set for you.

You could scream with frustration. If the left hemisphere of your brain responsible for speech wasn’t so severely compromised by Marc, you would be screeching until your throat goes raw with it. Instead, you hiccup a broken sob, his name quiet and cracked on your lips.

"That's right. You're alright," he soothes, as he presses his forehead against your stomach. If you didn’t know better, his voice almost sounds a bit shaky, slurring on the last word as he bends back down and puts his mouth back between your thighs, onto your sensitive flesh and gently sucks.

Those unruly curls tickle against the soft skin. You only meant to brush his hair away, but as soon as your fingers curl into the soft heat of them, you can’t help but grip tighter at the silky touch. Carding your hand through the curly locks.

You don’t mean to tug, but the careful drag of his teeth against your clit sends a sharp electric jolt up your spine, short-circuiting your lungs and sending you clawing at his curls for dear life. It should not feel this good, and yet you find yourself chasing the sensation, nearly buckling over, as your heel digs into the firm muscles of his back to anchor yourself.

You can’t even look anymore. Why torture yourself with the sight of him buried between your legs. Cheeks dusted crimson, and those breathtakingly expressive eyes burning into yours as if he’s trying to memorise every minute detail of your expression. You can see his jaw working on your pussy. Can feel him as his tongue keeps sliding hot and insistent without reprieve against your overstimulated clit.

It’s so much. Too much. All your senses feel overloaded. Your vision goes blurry. You’re not sure if it’s tears that are stinging behind your eyelids or if they cross at the back of your head as everything dims and darkens, like a fuse box blowing out. It’s all too much, and you’re being dragged under and drowning in the sensations. You need to pull up above the surface to breathe again or you’re sure you’re going to die.

You grab at Marc’s hand like he’s your life preserver, and he weaves his fingers between yours. It’s surprisingly intimate, as he squeezes your hand back, pressing your intwined hands to your hip bone, reassuring you he’s right there and—fuck, it’s… It’s so much, too much.

It’s chaos. A mayhem between your violently beating heart and burning lungs. You think there must be something wrong with you. Can’t possibly contain the pleasure that keeps pouring and pouring into you. For a fraction of a second, as your mind is torn apart by the sensations, and you are convinced that you must be having a heart attack. What other explanation could there possibly be?

“Ma–Marc, I–I’m– Fuck, oh god, oh fuck."

Marc eases back, “It’s okay.” He presses his mouth to your clit and kisses it, and the slick sound his mouth makes have you trembling and shaking so hard you’re convulsing against the sheets. “You’re okay,” he soothes. “Let go. I’ve got you. Come for me.”

Warmth floods your veins touching every part of your body, humming through every nerve and cell as your orgasm washes over you. It’s hard and unforgiving. Your body is trying to claim revenge on you for allowing it to take so long as it did. Everything else around you disappears, pulling you under with a vengeance that blots out your vision and all sounds with it.

But it doesn’t matter. The only thing that matters to you anymore is how everything in you tingles pleasantly. It lingers long after it’s over, and you can still feel it from the tip of your fingers to the curl of your toes as you come down on Marc’s tongue.

His face is still buried between your thighs. His tongue curled against your entrance as he laps every drop of slick out of you. Drinking you down and swallowing every trace of your pleasure. He doesn’t let up for long moments until finally he’s satisfied and drags his head up your body.

“Did so good,” he praises, voice raspy and raw as his tongue trails a long affectionate line down your femur.

He presses his mouth to your knee with the same gentle care he did when he’d applied plasters. It’s intimate. Sweet.

Part of you feels silly to feel this affected by such a simple affectionate gesture considering what preceded it, but your heartbeat flutters at the touch.

It doesn’t matter that you’ve barely just come down from your orgasm or that you’re still throbbing and sensitive between your legs. Limbs so wrung out, they’re tingling and numb. You’re already craving the closeness of him all over again.

“Marc,” you call out for him, arm outstretched in an invitation for him to join you on the bed.

He doesn’t move, and it takes you a few moments, your mind fuzzy around the edges with the afterwaves of your orgasm to register that something's wrong. Everything is blurry and obscured by a warm haze, and you have to blink through the watery periphery of your vision before you can see him a bit more clearly.

Still on his knees, Marc’s mouth parts slightly open, like he maybe wants to say something but he doesn’t know how. There’s hesitation there in the tenseness of his jaw as his eyes flick away from your gaze, as if there’s still some invisible barrier that he won’t let himself cross.

It is a little bit ridiculous. After all, what barriers between you are there possibly left to cross? You and him nearly died together tonight. You love him, and he loves you too. Bloody hell, he’s just spent the better half of this night with his head buried between your thighs. There’s no stone left unturned.

But you know it’s not that simple. There’s a deeply embedded seed in Marc, buried under his skin and flesh and left to sprout for decades, long before you came along. Making him doubt himself and his place with you. It doesn’t matter how far you two come. He might always struggle with letting himself have what he wants guilt-free. Because he still doesn’t think he has a right to, that he doesn’t deserve it.

You plant an elbow on the mattress to raise yourself. But your arms have turned into boneless gelatine, wobbling under your weight, and you nearly topple over. Marc moves so fast, you only register a blur of movement, before he’s by your side. Steadying you with his hands on your shoulders.

“Easy. Lie back,” he says, eyes narrowed and worried, as he’s ushering you back down. The man’s got a protective streak a mile wide.

“Marc, please—” you start, but you don’t have to finish.

He breaks with your plea, and his knee dips into the bed, fully climbing in. His arms brace your sides as he lowers himself onto the bed.

“What, baby? What do you need? Tell me.” He says it like you only have to speak the words, and then your every wish will be his command.

There’s no fight left in his tone anymore. Voice gone soft. Any internal doubts have melted out of him. The look in his eyes as he gazes down on you tells you that Marc would give you anything you ask for. This man would insist on throwing himself under a double-decker bus if he thought it would make the ride a tiny bit smoother for you.

And oh… You get it now.

It’s taken you far too long, but you might have finally solved the puzzle that is Marc Spector. For all his aversion to let himself have even a morsel of happiness, there’s always been one overriding drive. There’s one thing that towers above the shame and guilt. One thing that’s more important to him than everything else. It’s in the way he’s always trying to meet the needs of those he cares for. Their happiness. Steven’s. Yours.

All you need to do is ask for him.

“You. I need you. Want you. Please.”

You can see it in real time as it happens. How the last traces of hesitation in him crumble, replaced by a determination that carves into those rich brown eyes. He drops forward, then he's sealing his mouth over yours like he’s signing on the dotted line, giving himself over to you.

It's everything.

Marc leans back again, fingers hooking into the hem of his t-shirt and dragging it off over his head in a single fluid motion. There’s no tangling of fabric, and it doesn’t get snagged as he tugs it over his head. There’s none of the clumsy adorableness of his alter. Marc undresses with practised ease like it was choreographed for the sole purpose of making your heart race faster.

Good fucking grief, you might’ve already seen this man before you naked on more occasions than you can count. But as he towers above you, skin golden in the dim light, the sight of his bare chest feels novel in a way that has your heart dropping to your lungs that must be entirely medically unsafe. You can’t help but stare shamelessly.

Chiselled and hard from the top of his head to his toes. You remember being surprised by how fit Steven was the first time, but somehow on Marc, it seems right. His physique reminds you of mythic Greek heroes memorialised in marble, and you're taken aback at how soft and warm he is under your hands. That he's human, made out of flesh and bone, and that he shivers as you drag your palms across the bare skin of his chest and stomach.

The anticipation crackles in your thighs, burning with a searing intensity at the thought of undressing him, gingerly unwrap him like a decadent present. But you’re greedy and have none of Marc’s patience. You wrench at his belt with little to no finesse, reaching down and wedging your fingers along the hem of his jeans to shove them down forcefully against the generous curve of his ass. You tug hard enough that you hear Marc choke out a wheezed breath, but you’re not even paying it any attention.

His hardened cock slaps against his stomach with a heavy thud and everything in you roars to attention at how thick and swollen he is for you. You feel heavy with need at the sight of it, and your brain is on autopilot, acting without conscious thought as you’re already reaching forward. Your knuckles skim down over his stomach before greedily wrapping your hand around his cock.

A deep groan tears out of his chest, and his hand snaps up to grab your wrist, holding you still. He clamps his eyes shut and takes a deep breath, inhaling heavily through his nostrils, breathing in and out with great struggle.

As much as you enjoy getting a rise out of him, you’re not trying to make things difficult for Marc on purpose. At least you don’t think you are. But you can’t look away from his cock. You can feel it straining and twitching in your hold, can see the trickle of glistening precome welling up from the flushed tip.

Your tongue feels heavy in your mouth, practically salivating as your thumb gently drags over the slick wetness there. The touch has his hips bucking, stuttering into your hands with a sound that sounds suspiciously close to a whimper. Your cheeks burn and tingle, your whole body flashing hot.

“Fuck,” he snarls and knocks your hand away, “You fucking ruin me, you know that?”

You want to retort that he’s the one to talk. Point out that he’s left you a dripping slick mess that’s soaked into the bedsheets and mattress and made them unsalvageable; that your thighs are an aching mess and you’re still swollen and sensitive from his mouth. But all vocabulary flies out of your head at the sight of him, as he replaces your hand with his own, wrapping one large hand around his cock.

Your heart stutters somewhere in your chest, and the breath in your lungs still with anticipation as he drops down to settle himself into place between your legs, knees nudging against your thighs to spread you wider for him as he notches the fat tip against your slick entrance.

His eyes lock on yours, the tip of his nose brushing alongside yours. He leans down to kiss you again, mouth warm and slick. You can still taste yourself on him, tart and almost sweet. Then he pushes inside of you, and your mind goes numb.

The first slide of him inside you is perfect. A sweet filling stretch that threatens to blot out everything else into nothingness.

Even though it’s your first time with Marc, your body already knows him. Craves every inch of him, and he’s willing to give that to you now, inch by slow maddening inch as he eases inside. Large hands clutching your sides, as his hips press forward and he works himself inside you. His cock pushes deep until he’s buried to the hilt. Then he stills, shuddering.

“Shit—,” he groans, dipping his head to press his face into your shoulder. “You gotta be kidding me.” His voice sounds shaky and strained. You’re not entirely sure what he means or what he finds so implausible. If he can’t believe he’s finally inside you after all this time or how good it feels. You just know you can’t believe it either.

It's flawed logic, but you’re not exactly coherent at this moment. Lungs squeezing tight in your diaphragm, you’re only capable of sobbing nonsensically at the consuming sensation of him filling you. Can barely focus on the warm tingle on your spine that settles over you. Your mind has been filled with cotton, soft and hazy as he’s completely sheathed inside, as deep as he can physically be.

Marc holds there for a long moment, his breath hot on your skin where he pants against your collarbone. He doesn’t move. Hips pressed flush against yours, taking his time to let your body adjust to the girth of him.

His mouth is on your bare skin, pressing kisses to your lips and then the apples of your cheek, before he drags himself downwards to mouth at the side of your neck, and under your jaw. Hands roaming along your ribs and hips like he cannot stop touching you. It’s devoted, loving even, the gentleness to his touch. It makes everything all the more overwhelming for you. He’s ruining you, with every caress on your flesh, and kiss to your skin, and he has barely even moved yet.

And god, you need him to.

"Marc."

He doesn't seem to hear you, mouth continuing to dot lazy kisses across your clavicle.

"Please.” You arch your back towards him, but you don’t get very far with his weight flattening you down against the bed.

“Marc, need you to move," you try again, voice high-pitched and needy, but you could be pleading to a stone wall for all the good it seems to do. His hips don't move from his position, immovable like a boulder. Instead, his palms fan out against your ribs, fingerprints permanently searing into your skin with the heat of his touch.

You can’t take it anymore, everything inside you is screaming, bursting at the seams for more and you wrap your legs around his waist in an attempt to force him deeper. To move.

Your heels dig into the rounded curve of his ass, and he jerks and gasps. You can feel his cock twitching inside you, as those stupendously gorgeous eyes flutter open. He’s looking at you again, stirred from the spell and the soft expression on his face hardens with determination.

"Yeah, baby. I got you," he says, and he finally complies. His hand comes to rest on the small of your lower back, tilting you up to him as he moves again. The hard drag of his cock slides out of you until only the blunt tip rests inside, and then he thrusts back, unhurried and deliberate.

Slow simmering pleasure bubbles up in your veins and you have to swallow it down with a hiccup of a sob. It's still the same ruthlessly slow and thorough pace. The one that tells you he won't be rushed, won't be hurried, even as he's giving you exactly what you asked him for.

Stubborn. Unreasonable. Maddening. You won't survive him.

The next thrust is demanding. It strikes heat along your spine and squeezes the air out of your lungs, until there's none of it left so you can fit more of him inside. A strange squeaky noise punches out of your throat, and in panic you clamber onto him.

He does it again. Hips dragging back as he pulls himself away, altering the angle of your hips with a small adjustment as he cants your hips upwards again. This time he lifts you further up than before and he pushes his way in with an almost testing stroke. His eyes narrow as he gazes down on you, brows furrowed in concentration and you realise what he’s doing.

Marc is slow and exacting, studying your every reaction, learning the best way to intricately pull you apart.

Staring up at him like this feels like you’re witnessing your own demise as it unfurls. Those unwavering eyes are focused on you, watching your every expression. He’s tilting the angle of his thrusts until he drives the pleasure deeper inside you with devastating precision until there is nothing left of you. Until tears are stinging in the corner of your eyes because you’re sure that you can’t fit more within you — the pleasure and him— and then he does somehow.

He catches your leg, hitching them higher so that he can slide a few inches deeper. The angle shifts, striking against something raw and overwhelming. You think you go blind with it and you swear you see stars collapsing behind the darkness of your eyelids.

"Yeah, there we go." His voice in your ear is calm, but he also sounds proud and pleased, and you're not sure if it's with himself or you. It’s all you can hear, and then he’s moving again.

A rich pleasure fills you at the slow glide of his cock dragging out of you, and then he pushes inside again, deep and determined, until his cock is kissing that deep perfect spot that robs you of your ability to breathe.

“Fuck, that’s it, baby. Can feel–” he groans, rolling his hips into yours, and it’s fucking devastating.

Your mind goes blank. A clean slate with no thought left in you except how good it feels. All you can do is moan and whimper, hands clutching desperately to his shoulders. "Oh– Oh, god. Marc, I– oh!"

He groans, slanting his mouth over yours and swallows the words down, cradling your head with his fingers. Soft doting presses of his lips to yours.

"Fuck, you feel so–" His sentence is cut off, and you never get to hear the rest of what he was going to say.

His mouth is on yours again and it’s nothing like the starved and overwhelmingly eager kisses you’re used to from these lips when it’s Steven who’s kissing you. This is slow and measured. Patient and deliberate as he takes his time with you. He’s kissing you like he’s trying to tell you a secret. Like he’s entrusting you with something important, to protect and to keep for him.

His finger rubs small circles under your ear, his hips slow and consuming as he fucks his cock into you. His arms never leave your side. Mouth never lifting from yours. His whole body pressed as deeply into you as he physically can.

It feels like a confession.

The ‘I love you’ that he can’t bring himself to say in front of you and can only admit to in the dead of night when he thought you were asleep.

His kiss is a soft and devoted touch. A complete contrast to the rest of him, as he continues to thrust into you, fucking his cock deeper inside you and he doesn’t stop, doesn’t let up.

It’s pleasure. It’s aggravation. It’s love and a defeat and a million other contradictory emotions between you and Marc that may never be resolved.

And you’re not going to try to. You’re happy to take him as he is, cracks and all. You accept it, his lips pressed against yours. Accept his demanding rhythm as he drives himself into you deeper and deeper. Accept the insistent heat that curls at the base of your spine, until it is a searing and smouldering burn and sparks like ember, numbing your legs with it. It is threatening to consume your very being and burn you into ashes as it flares bright in your lungs and you can no longer breathe as the pleasure of it is ready to overspill, and—

“Baby, you close again?”

And fuck, that’s—that’s— Your stomach tenses up again. The warmth spreads, twining and branches out along every single vein flooding it with blinding bliss until you’re dizzy with it.

You’re trying to say yes, trying to nod, but your body isn’t responding to your will anymore. It has a mind of its own, and all it wants is to be closer to Marc, to grab onto him and never let go. Your limbs are wrapped all around him, legs locked around his waist, nails digging into the meat of his shoulders so hard you know you’re breaking skin. The only thing you’re still in control of is to helplessly squeeze down tight on his cock as it slides thick and heavy in you.

“Oh fuck, that’s–” his voice sounds pitched and almost vulnerable, the arm curled around your leg, squeezing tighter.

Pleasure builds in you like the tide, rising slow and steady but inexorable, filling you until there's no room for oxygen or thoughts or anything else except the consuming push of Marc’s cock inside of you.

And then it breaks, ecstasy streaking out along your every nerve, overwhelming and inescapable, threatening to wash you away with it, except that you’re pinned, held safe by the grounding weight of Marc’s body and the reassuring press of his forehead against yours as you come on his cock.

You open your eyes to find yourself staring up at him, still bleary-eyed and drunk on bliss. You can only make out the colour of his eyes, the dark ink of his hair. But blurry as he is, you’re intimately aware of how he can see all of you. The glazed look that you must be holding in your half-open eyes as wrought out with pleasure as you are. The hair plastered to your forehead. The absolute mess of a state he’s left you in, and how debauched you must look in front of him. Face to face, all of you bare and uncovered, there in its unembellished form for him to see.

But that means you can see Marc too. As your vision clears, you can pick out every small detail of his expression. The subtle tic of the muscle in his jaw. The furrow in his brow. How his mouth is slack with pleasure. Those rich eyes of his are blown wide open until they’re left exposed. You can see it clearly now, how he’s clearly trying and struggling to hold back. The vulnerability that he’s been trying to hide from the world the entire time you’ve known him.

Not for the first time, as he holds himself above you, you find yourself marvelling at how beautiful he is. Identical to Steven, yet worlds apart.

Steven is hope and light and the curve of a gentle smile. Marc is sharp lines and dark shadows and heat behind his pained eyes. Jagged edges to Steven’s soft curves. Jaded cynicism to Steven's cheerful enthusiasm. Dark secrets and carefully hidden skeletons lurking in closets to Steven's forthright honesty.

And god help you, you love them both beyond measure.

The weight of his body is pressing down against you now. Every inch of the smooth golden skin pinned against yours, warm and flushed against your heated flesh. He grinds himself against you, needy, and desperate. There’s no longer any rhythm or logic to it. Just an instinctual primal need to get closer. You spread your legs as wide as you can to welcome him deeper, to take all of him as much as you can even as your thighs ache in protest from overexertion.

His mouth moves against yours, stuttering and trembling, and it takes you far too long to register the words that are coming from him.

“Fuck, baby, fuck I’m–” he chokes out brokenly against your lips, his hands on your hips holding on tighter.

He stills, and you think maybe this is it, that he’s about to come. Anticipation rises in your chest, and you hold him tighter, body clenching down in preparation.

But he doesn’t come. Just holds himself there, shuddering against you, his forehead against your chin, panting breaths, hot and humid, against the base of your neck. His cock is pulsing where it’s buried thickly inside you. Thighs quivering and barely able to keep them upright where they’re pressed between yours. You know that he wants to come. Needs to come. You just don’t understand why he’s refusing to give in.

“It’s okay, Marc. You can let go. Come for me,” the words are a struggle to get out. Your voice hoarse and scraped raw in your throat.

There’s a long moment of stillness, then he heaves a sigh so weary it makes your heart clench, as he starts shaking his head.

“No,” he grits out, voice low and determined as it so often is. His head comes up, dark, fuck-drunk eyes meeting yours, jaw set at that stubborn angle you’ve come to know so well, and he says it again.

“No. I– I’m not–“ He cuts off, shaking his head again. “Not yet,” he says. Then he rallies through, lifting his body away from yours and drives himself deep inside you with a shudder. “Not ready for this to end.”

It sounds like a plea, and you’re not sure who he’s pleading with, you or himself, and there is a pang of pain in your chest for him. Because this idiot still doesn’t get it.

It’s like he’s never known softness. Hardness forged from a lifetime of a man who’s always had to hold himself up without respite. There’s a loneliness in it, of being the one who always has to take care of everyone else with nowhere to put down his burdens.

Fondness swells up in you and there is nowhere to direct it except for the object of your affection. You wrap your arms tighter around him, smoothing one palm over the sweat-slick, heaving muscles of his back, and whisper reassurances into the hair above his ear.

“Marc,” you breathe out and at the sound of you calling his name, his eyes snap up to yours. “Nothing’s ending.”

His arms buckle and he lets out a small choked sound that almost sounds like a whimper. He looks like he can barely hold himself up anymore.

“You have me,” you murmur, pressing your mouth to his. You kiss the arch of his jaw and mouth at the column of his neck. “Have had me for a long time.”

He tenses at your words, whole body trembling above you. But he still refuses to let go.

How many times will you have to keep reaching out to this impossibly stubborn man before he starts believing that you mean it?

Your hands come to the sharp edge of his cheekbones, cradling this face that you have fallen in love with twice over. Not just because it is Steven’s face. Not just because he’s the most beautiful man you’ve ever seen. But because it’s Marc too.

“I love you.”

At your words, those determined eyes pitched with dark concentration blanks into a stupefied daze.

His head tilts slightly, a movement so small it doesn’t register at first that he’s nodding. Then his face drops closer, pressing his lips to yours. The line of his shoulder softens under your locked arms, lowering himself down onto you. His hips sink into you, his cock dragging thickly inside you as deep as it goes.

You watch in awe as his mouth falls open, eyes rolling back, and you can feel it as he comes inside you. Pulse after devastating pulse.

And god, he’s so beautiful like this; unruly curls wild and ruined, cut cheeks a faint crimson, skin slick with glistening sweat in the dim light. So perfectly undone and at peace. The pulse of his cock inside you as he spills himself deep inside you is almost secondary.

You bask in it. The warmth of his arms caging you in, his forehead pressing down firm against yours. The feeling of him so deep inside you, you’ll happily drown in the feeling of this man after waiting for him so long. His body slumps, dropping his weight on yours, completely depleted.

His cock is still hard, arms still trembling when Marc shifts on top of you, trying to raise himself on one elbow. It's too soon for him to move, you don't want him to move, want him to lie on top of you forever.

Logically, you know it’s out of consideration. He’s probably worried that he’s squishing you, but an irrational fear swoops low in your stomach at the idea that he’s going to leave again. Your fingers dig into his forearm, dragging him back towards you.

He lands on top of you with a quiet and tired grunt in your ear, but there’s no other protest from him. Marc lets you, shifting ever so slightly to make sure that his elbow doesn’t jab into your ribs as he settles on top of you. Then he stays, and you get to listen to the slow steadying of his breath, as the erratic rise and fall of his chest ease into something more even.

The two of you stay this way for a long time, staring up at each other, with half-lidded eyes worn from exhaustion without speaking, and you catalogue his face as it cycles through a series of micro-expression with each second that ticks by.

If this was when you’d first known Marc, at first glance, each expression would have looked the same to you. But you know him well enough now that you can tell that the tiny pinch of his brow means something is troubling him. That the narrowing slant of his eyes means he can’t find the right words to express it. That him biting the inside of his cheeks means he’s hesitating on whether he would be offloading on you. Every detail says just as much as Steven’s openly variable animated expressions.

His eyes blink in quick succession, and Marc takes a deep heaving breath as if bracing himself. Then he’s lifting himself up and away from you by his forearms, slipping out of you to a sharp pained hiss as you whine in response at how empty you feel at the loss.

He rolls to the side of the bed next to you and settles there, and you feel a bit nervous about what’s going to happen next, because you don't know what is going to come.

“Is this still what you want?” Marc asks.

He’s looking at you as he says it, but somehow you feel like he’s looking through you, eyes not quite meeting yours. His voice sounds impassive, and if you haven’t spent so much time with him by now, it could easily be mistaken for disinterest or even boredom, instead of the defence mechanism that you know it is.

“Yes, of course, it is,” you say without hesitation.

There’s no response from Marc, he’s lying so still next to you. So quiet you can’t even hear him breathing anymore. If it turned out that he’d fallen asleep with his eyes open you wouldn’t be surprised.

You turn onto your side so that you can scoot even closer to him as you watch him. One sole stray curl is draped across his forehead, and it’s fallen into the line of his big gorgeous brown eyes. So ridiculously pretty, this one.

Yeah. This is definitely what you want. Him. Steven. Both. All of them.

“You’re– okay with all this?” he asks hesitantly, and he looks genuinely puzzled as to why you would be. “With... what happened earlier too?”

A breathless huff pushes its way up your chest. “I don’t know if ‘okay’ is the right word here, Marc. I’m not sure how to deal with the revelation that gods and monsters are real, and there’s a very high chance I’ll freak out about it tomorrow or next week. But…”

You press a kiss to the side of his cheek as you draw your eyes up and meet those rich expressive eyes of his. There’s no mistaking it, you feel it, in the same way that you do for Steven. Even if it’s different… there’s no doubt in you, haven’t been for a long time about this.

“What I’m sure of is that I want to be with you. You and Steven. No matter what. I’m not going anywhere. I meant what I said. I want to be your person as well as his. And– and I hope you can be mine.”

Marc tentatively draws his hand towards you, fingertips searching across the length of your arm until he finds your fingers and weaves them with his.

The palm of his hand is warm and sturdy, sending a pleasant buzzing sensation across the back of your neck. It’s your favourite thing in the world, whenever Steven does this, and you’re pretty sure it’s going to be your shared favourite when Marc does it too.

“Yeah”, he finally says after a long moment, “I’d like that.” His voice is soft and quiet, and a kaleidoscope of butterflies swoops your stomach at his warm tone filled with affection.

Tilting your head upwards, you close the distance between you, pressing your lips to his. It’s sweet and tender as his hand cups your cheeks protectively, like a promise that he’s not going to run anymore and it makes your toes curl into the sheet until you’re giddy.

You clutch at him, hands cupping the back of his neck and lace your fingers into those ridiculously soft curls of his. Marc shivers against you, and you smile like a loon as he ducks his head and buries his face into the crook of your neck contentedly, and exhale deeply.

Who would have guessed that post-sex, the man would be the world's most grumpy cat turned soft and cuddly, asking to be petted. You comb through the matted locks and the blunt tip of his nose nuzzles into your damp skin. He makes a quiet, content little sound somewhere from the back of his throat like he doesn’t want you to stop and who are you to deny him?

Your fingertips trail his scalp, from the nape of his neck to the crown of his head, when it occurs to you that you should probably be more careful with his head.

He was flung several feet in the air and landed head-first into a concrete wall with a bone-cracking sound that still makes you sick to your stomach. You continue to card through his hair, mapping him out in search of any signs of injuries, but you can’t find any and your fingers still.

It doesn’t make sense. You weren’t put through the ringer in any way near what Marc was tonight and you’ve still ended up with your fair share of scrapes and bruises. But there’s nothing on Marc.

No swelling, no bumps. No wounds.

On top of it all you’ve spent the better part of this evening, pulling and tearing at his hair. Your nails had been digging so deep into his shoulders you might as well have been excavating for gold and he hasn’t so much as hissed or flinched in pain even once.

There’s a faint muffled sound of complaint from Marc as he lies on top of you. It’s so distorted that it takes you a few moments to appreciate that they’re words.

“What's wrong?” Marc asks.

“You don’t have any injuries. You were hurt.”

“I was wearing the suit,” he answers in his typical deadpan manner. No background information, no context, no painting out a scene for you. To Marc, the limited information he’s given you should make perfect sense to you.

You grimace, and you’re just about to have a moan at him, when Marc seems to realise how confusing that explanation must be. He lifts his head from your neck as he continues. “Khonshu’s ceremonial armour. It protects me. Heals me when I need it.”

An image of the swirl of bandages wrapping itself around Marc’s body to form an otherworldly magical suit plays out behind your mind, and you can’t resist teasing him.

“So you transform like Sailor Moon and then fight evil at night?”

Marc lifts his eyebrow inquisitively, with a completely blank expression. “I don’t know what that is.”

“Really? Sailor–” you sputter, shocked he doesn’t know what you’re talking about. “Steven would know that reference.”

“Steven has too much free time,” he sighs, but the fondness hiding under his gruff tone is unmistakable.

The playful jab at Steven brings a small smile to your face. The levity of it is a nice change of pace from the whirlwind of seismic events and paradigm shifts tonight, because there’s been a lot to take in. Much of which, you’re pretty sure you haven’t fully taken in… Don’t even know how to start to process it.

Ancient Egyptian gods are real, and your boyfriend—(boyfriends? Just exactly how involved is Steven?)—is some kind of indentured fighter priest who battles invisible monsters—also real—for one of them.

What is the correct reaction to a revelation like that? How does one even begin to mentally process that?

“Any other questions? Now’s your chance,” Marc says.

There is no hostility like before and this time you don’t have to drag it out of him with the persistence of a detective in an interrogation room interviewing a suspect as you ordinarily have to.

You’re not entirely sure how you feel about that, except that you’re a little bit stunned and you realise that something has shifted between you and Marc.

He’s… opening up to you.

You look up at him, and he meets your eyes steadily. There are a million things you still want to ask: What’s the deal with his and Steven’s mum? What did he and Steven go through while they were away? How did he almost die, and how on bloody earth did he manage to just stumble upon an ancient Egyptian God to end up in his service?

Marc hasn’t moved from the spot as he observes you. Still seemingly expressionless, except…

There’s a tension to the set of his shoulders, isn’t there? And he’s too still—even for Marc… It hits you all at once he’s holding his breath, the line of his lips set in a thin nerve-biting straight line.

He’s waiting for you.

Regardless of how hard Marc tries to hide it, trying to school his expressions, there’s only so much his body language can repress. The ring of his eyes is dilated and vulnerable.

He’s nervous.

Marc’s jaw tightens in anticipation and maybe something a little like fear, and it makes your chest ache with an overwhelming need to protect him. Those other questions can wait. You have all the time in the world together. Right now you want to make him feel as safe and cared for as you do. You want to make him smile.

"So..." you begin, and you see him stiffen, watching as he braces himself like he’s expecting a blow. It’s how you know you’re making the right decision. "Do you actually like my coffee?"

His eyes widen and he sputters out "You– Your–" then barks out a laugh.

Even in the dark, you can see it, a soft smile on his face that illuminates the darkness of the room with it. A gentle curve, as the dimple of his cheeks carve a deep dent into those hollowed cheeks, the soft crinkle of lines around his eyes. It’s like nothing you have ever seen before. It’s bright and uninhibited. An electrical socket has been plugged in and every nerve in you is flicked alight with excitement.

It stuns you and takes your breath away, and for the longest moment, you forget about everything else.

Because god, he’s the most beautiful thing you’ve ever seen in your life.

It takes you several seconds, maybe even a full minute to compose yourself enough to ask him again.

"Well...?" you prompt, and you’re gifted with the pleasure of watching him try and fail to hide that perfect smile.

"It's… a little more complicated than that," he says, and you narrow your eyes at him, trying to look playfully peeved while tampering your own smile that’s twitching at your lips and failing.

"I like that you make it for me," he tries.

"That wasn't the question, though."

Marc shifts in the bed, scooting closer to you until he’s brushing up against your knees. That small but near-magical smile is still on his face.

"Tell you what,” Marc murmurs, as he tightens his grip around you, pressing his forehead to yours, sweat-slicked curls tickling your nose. “Tomorrow, let's make it together."

His voice is so assured, it feels like he’s promising you a certainty, and you trust him with every inch of you.

A warmth spreads in your chest, and you can feel the dopey grin pulling at your lips until your cheeks almost hurt, but you can’t stop yourself and you don’t think you want to either.

There is so much that is still unresolved, so many more things you need answers to, but it’s a good start and that’s good enough for tonight. After all, as Steven would tell you: you have all the time in the world.

“That sounds perfect,” you tell him.

When you wake, the morning light is filtering in through the large windows. The sun is blinding and makes it difficult to see anything at all.

Reaching out your hand, the spot next to you is cold and empty, any residual heat long gone from the sheets. You’re alone in bed again.

Marc has really got to stop fucking doing that.

“Marc?” you call out, but there’s no response. You hesitate for a second before adding, “Steven?”

“Here.”

Then you hear familiar noises coming from the kitchen, and the tension in your chest melts away at the sound of porcelain clinking together. There are no folded clothes by your side, but to your surprise, your watch sits on the nightstand, cracked face turned up, waiting for you.

A small smile tugs at the corner of your lips, and your stomach warms at the sight. Marc must have gone back to retrieve it while you were asleep.

You sit up on the bed, bending over to grab a discarded shirt from the floor as well as your knickers from last night, and pull them on, smiling to yourself as you start to make your way across the flat to join him in the kitchen.

The familiar sweet, bread-like smell wafts out to greet you, and you falter.

Pancakes? That isn’t right. Today’s not Sunday.

In the bright morning sun, you see him standing, with his back turned against you over the kitchen stove. Wearing only his jeans, bare from the waist above, the carved muscles of his back flexing as he flips the frying pan with a dramatic flair. Even before he speaks, you already know what’s happened.

“Morning, sweetheart,” he greets you. He's turning his head just enough to throw you a quick glance, and a one-sided crooked smile.

You stop in your tracks. The cadence is alien, the smile off, but you recognize it immediately.

Not Marc. Not Steven. But you have met this man before.

That first night at Steven’s; the man you woke up to who looked at you like you were a stranger; the man who followed you to the lift to return your watch; the same man who towered over the invisible creature with nothing but cold contempt in his eyes as he snuffed out its time on earth with precision and brutality.

All this time, you thought that the first night you’d spent with Steven was also your first encounter with Marc.

But Marc doesn’t call you sweetheart. Marc doesn’t flirt. Marc doesn’t smirk like he’s trying to imitate something he’s seen on the telly.

This is detached and impersonal, like he’s not really smiling at all. When Marc smiles it’s snow thawing in the spring.

It’s funny how you didn’t see it until now. Marc was never the wolf.

You cross your arms against your chest, planting your feet firmly on the floor, standing up straight and tall as you confront the man before you.

“You’re not Marc, and you’re not Steven,” you say and you shift on your legs, puffing out your chest in a display of put-on courage. “Don’t you think it's time you introduced yourself, seeing that you’re in my boyfriends’ flat?”

The man huffs out a laugh, and his accent is different when he speaks again. A New York accent, you think, but almost cartoonishly so, like he’s watched one too many Martin Scorcese movies. It’s oozing out of every word as he speaks with a slow and nasal hum.

“Nothing gets past you, does it, sweetheart?”

He sets down the frying pan on the stove, turning it off before he wipes off his hand on a flower-patterned tea towel and extends it towards you, a polite invitation to shake.

“Name’s Jake Lockley.”

You take a step towards him, and maybe you should be nervous—afraid of this stranger wearing your boyfriends’ face—but the panic and fear from that first night you met him is absent. That painful pounding in your chest is no longer there.

You accept his hand, looking up into this man’s familiar eyes that are staring down at you in an entirely unfamiliar way. Not Steven’s wide and adoring gaze. Not Marc’s protective and gentle attention. No love resides in those eyes for you at this moment, just curiosity.

But you’re not scared this time.

Because come what may, you already know the most important part. Whatever happens next, whoever this Jake turns out to be, it’s not going to change your mind about Steven or Marc.

You’ll take them as they are. Red flags and all.

THE END.

Author's notes

This is the end. I wish I was more coherent to write a meaningful and heartwarming message about what this story has meant to me. How grateful I am to everyone reading it, but I do not think I have any words that can do it justice.

The only thing I can say is thank you. Thank you for reading this, whether you've read this from the first chapter, or whether you only read the first chapter or you've only read bits and pieces. Whether you've commented or liked or reblogged or simply just lurked-read, from the bottom of my heart thank you for giving this story your time, I'm really grateful to you all.

A big thank you to my friends who have listened to me whine and bitch and moan and generally emotionally terrorised them with this story, and especially thank you to my cowriter: thirstworldproblemss who has been put through the ringer with this story and suffered alongside with me. I love you the moooooooooooooooooooosetest

a/n: to be notified of new writing updates follow astroboots-writes and turn on notifs.

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sameschmidtdiffname · 4 months

Text

Slip

Mike Schmidt x Gender Neutral! Reader

Summery: At some point or another, the words slip out. It's just that, naturally, you're an idiot who can't pick the right moment.

Tags: No use of Y/N, no specific pronouns for reader, night terrors, disassociation, attempted comfort, miscommunication, brief non sexual shower scene, unintentional harm, anxiety, sweet ending. (fr this time, I'm not pulling a 'Repentance.') Slight spoilers for 'Petals On The Wind' by V.C. Andrews.

Notes: I had a vision and I tried. Pls give me mercy.

▪︎◇{¤♧■♧¤}◇▪︎

The night air is sweet, fresh with the smell of citrus from the soap I had used earlier that evening in my shower mixed with the damp smell of the dew forming on the grass and the leaves outside. The curtains shift slightly as the air spills into the dark room, the only light born by a small lamp clipped to the cover of my book as I read quietly.

Beside me lays Mike, facing the ceiling and looking as peaceful as he ever could. It was a relaxation that doesn't come to him in consciousness, too busy with thoughts I sometimes am not privy too. But I don't pry. I've heard most of the story from him and from Abby, and he is allowed to grieve the past alone. He knows I am always available to help him.

It had been a long day for him. He didn't need to tell me, it was obvious by the way he'd sat at the kitchen table, thinking he was alone and hands buried in his hair. I hadn't meant to spy on him, having just slipped out of my shower. He wasn't crying, but his face was pale and dreadful. The bags under his eyes a dark purple that they hadn't been earlier at dinner, and the haunted quality of his stare had increased in an alarming manner since I'd left him. Had he moved since dinner? Abby was in her room, her voice trailing quietly down the hall as she hummed to herself behind the closed door. The overhead yellow light directly above Michael made him look like a painting of doom, covered in shadows with sharp edges as dark as his thoughts.

When I guided him to bed he wouldn't talk to me. Not when I removed his shirt to change him into something clean. Not when I opened the bottle of pills he'd been able to relax on for the past couple weeks. And not when I held a glass of water to his lips, his mouth only moving to take a long drink before I guided him onto his back, where he stared at the ceiling quietly while I stroked his hair, watching him carefully until he drifted away into a drugged dream of obliviousness where hopefully he could find the peace he needed.

More often than not I read before bed. Usually Mike would lay his head on my chest, his eyes reading the same bits I would and commenting on something here or there, once in a while spoiling the next paragraph for me. But I never minded when he did, it was always an accident.

It did get to the point where Mike imposed a limit of two chapters a night, knowing I could become so enraptured in a story I wouldn't even pay attention to the world around me until I finished it, usually with the early light beginning to peak through the branches outside and create dancing rays of sun along our bed. It wasn't really a rule, more so a concerned request. There was no punishment if I didn't comply, if I deprived myself of sleep reading all that would exist as a reprimand is my own exhaustion. Mike would always silently pick up on this, more gentle with me and luring me away from my nightly ritual with his arms wrapped around my tired body, fingers combing through my hair and his even breathing coaxing me into the sleep I needed until his alarm would wake us, still wrapped around each other and warm in the morning glow of a new day with a new chapter. And recently I realized it was something about him I loved. Though I dare not say it out loud. Not yet.

I'm only a handful chapters into this book. It's one that I've read before, an ironic favorite from when I was younger and snuck books home that I'd borrowed from the woman next door after playing with her granddaughters. The subject of the novel was taboo, Gothic horror I would hide under my bed away from my mother's eyes until she would lay in her own bed, allowing me to click on a light and read until school the next morning. It's been years since I've revisited it, and this copy I had bought at a local thrift store for only a quarter with an excited smile, causing an amused look on Mike's face as he'd watched me.

"Shouldn't you read something you already own?" He'd teased while we walked out of the store hand in hand, Abby leading the way to our car.

I'd rolled my eyes, smiling as I checked for cars coming through the parking lot with no regard for little girls.

"Am I not allowed to spend a quarter on my passions?" I said.

"You absolutely are. I'm just wondering how you're going to read everything," he said with a small squeeze of his hand.

The answer is by drinking a cup of tea and working through the book in one sitting as he lays next to me, no work ahead of me for the next two days that would demand proper rest. No limitation able to stop me now. I'm a few hours into my plan when I notice his leg jolt beside mine, no movement otherwise.

I glance at him quickly, seeing if he's woken with a start. His eyes remain closed, lips parted slightly in sleep and otherwise seeming fine. So I resume my book, flipping to the next page to start chapter eleven.

Halfway through chapter thirteen, Mike gasps. Loud and quick, causing a cough to escape him. I slip a finger inbetween my pages, turning to face him and worry stabbing my chest as I wait for him to choke and thrash frantically. But he doesn't. He remains still, his pulse visible near his adams apple as his breath quickens slightly. I watch him, waiting for any signs of distress. But he remains still in sleep, and reluctantly I return to my book once more, having decided it was just a dream.

Finally, at the early hour of four o'clock his hand reaches out, nails digging into my thigh desperately in a way that's painful against my bare skin, raking down and surely creating a trail of blood in his wake as a short, startled yell of Abby's name pierces the air, his body going ridged. And then he's still, body shaking and eyes wide open in confusion, darting around the room as though he cannot place his environment in his still drugged state.

"Hey," I say softly, abandoning my book and turning to face him, unsure if I should touch him or what I need to say to tear him away from the horrors of his mind. "You're okay, you're awake now."

If he hears me he doesn't give any indication, his breathing so quick and unsteady I'm scared he'll knock himself out from hyperventilating.

"It's okay, it was a dream," I tell him. I place my hand apprehensively on his chest, feeling his heart slam against the cage of ribs below my touch. "You're awake now."

His head turns slightly towards me, but he's still panicking, his hand gripping my thigh hard enough hard with nails he hadn't meant to let grow out for the past couple weeks that I have to make a conscious effort to not whine in pain.

He's saying something, quiet and mixing with his irregular breathing as his other hand grabs my hand upon his chest, pressing it tightly against him. But I can't make it out, I can only hear fragments of 'sorry' and 'take.' And the words only blur more as he starts sobbing beside me, the noises he makes terrifying as he struggles for air.

"Let's sit up. Come on, let's sit up," I say. I'm close to panic myself, trying to find his shoulders to pull him up in fear of him choking in such a state. But his hand is too tight around mine, and trying to take it away seems to only cause further distress, his teeth gritting and nostrils flailing as he tries to breathe in as much air as possible. I manage to get one arm under his shoulders, wrapping it around his body and pulling us both up. The shift of his body seems to make something click, his hand suddenly releasing my thigh as he gasps once more, eyes seeming to show recognition of something.

"You're home. We're in our room, Abby is down the hall," I tell him.

"They'll come here, they knew where we live," he says in a rapid but finally coherent voice.

"Who?" I ask. He's scaring me, making me want to join him in my own hysteria. But I don't show it, the pain throbbing in my leg giving me a point of focus to keep my voice even. "No one's coming."

"My aunt- she- they-"

"She's not coming over, no one's coming to take Abby," I tell him, stroking him arm and trying to shift my body to face his. "Everyone's home and safe. I won't let anyone go."

This seems to hit him, his shoulders relaxing slightly. He looks at my face, staring and trying to focus on me.

"I won't let anyone go anywhere," I repeat gently. His shoulders relax, his body leaning towards mine.

"You don't have to worry," I tell him. "I'm here."

His head lands on my shoulder, hand still pressing mine tight against his chest as his arm finds my waist, body wracking with sobs.

"It's okay. Slow your breathing," I say softly, my hand finding his hair and holding him close against me. "Focus on me and slow your breathing."

He's trying, I can tell by the way he gasps against my chest in even tempo that he's trying to regain his breath. His skin is hot against mine, body wet with sweat. Maybe I should get this shirt off of him, take away the sticking cotton and allow his skin to feel the cool morning air against it to prevent overstimulation. Or maybe the sudden change would throw him into more distress. I don't know what to do, what to offer.

"Do you want me to distract you?" I ask. At this he lifts his head slightly, a small 'what?' Asking for me to repeat the question. "Do you want me to distract you?" I repeat, anxious I've said something wrong.

He seems to think for a moment, his heart still beating at a concerning rate.

"How long have you been reading?" He finally asks, eyeing the book I'd practically thrown to the edge of the bed in my panic.

"A few hours," I say. "Started reading when you went to sleep."

He nods, going silent once more for a few more minutes. I focus on his hair, how some curls wrap perfectly around my fingertips, how soft his hair is even though he doesn't take proper care of it.

"Is it any good?" He asks softly, his mouth against my neck as he tries to relax.

Okay, talk about the book. Book with dead parents. Ah, fuck.

"Not... particularly," I admit. "The first one was better."

"Yeah?" Mike asks. "How so?"

Well, Mike. This is a V.C. Andrews novel. So there's an unsettling amount of incest that serves a horrifying point that I don't think you wanna hear about right now because that's gonna take several hours for me to explain. I wish you'd asked sooner.

"...questionable decisions," I decide is how I'll phrase it.

"Sounds like me," he mutters against my skin.

"I promise you it isn't," I mutter back, trying to think of what to say next.

Mike doesn't say anything, still breathing hard against my skin but finally gaining a steady rhythm. His body shakes less, my fingers gently combing through his hair as I finally speak again.

"It's something you'd laugh at if you felt better," I feel stupid, useless as I try to bring him back to me. But it seems to work, his shaking decreasing as he focuses on my words. "The main character is... dramatic, and... passionate."

I feel his smile against my skin, his fingers stroking my waist. "Oh?" He asks.

"Mm-hmm," I say. He hums, waiting for me to continue. And I'm not sure if I should.

"What's the plot?" He asks. Not something you should hear in your state, Michael. Lots of people die.

"It's about..."

Fucking half the town out of spite.

"...family."

That's one way to put it.

"And... doing what's right."

By burning a house down.

"And taking care of those you love."

Well, at least that point is accurate.

He seems content with this, pulling me down onto the bed once more and keeping me close.

"Are you okay?" I ask him carefully.

"I will be," he says softly. "Thank you. For caring."

"Of course I care," I say with a small laugh of nervous relief. "I love you."

Oh.

Oh motherfucker, no.

"What?" Mike asks in a small voice, his body going still, mine going stiff.

Goddammit.

We've been together for about a year. And this is a normal point to finally say the words to each other, a sweet moment of realization and commitment that I'd been wanting to have. And I'd been trying to find the right moment, wanting to say it while he serves pancakes in the morning that he douses in syrup because he hates them dry. To say it when he pulls me close at night, taking a deep breath as he smells my hair. When he falls asleep on the couch or with his head on my lap. And maybe he's wanted to say it too, the way his eyes linger on me when I spin around the room with his sister, or when I fix her hair before walking her out the door, or when I slip out said door to return to my own home only to find myself back here the next day anyways, unable to stay away.

But this is the wrong moment. A moment of fear and terror and I have been selfish enough to dare utter such words that he may not even reciprocate while he's in such a vulnerable state. Shit.

"What did you say?" Mike asks, pulling away to look into my face, suddenly awake and clear of any fog that had been torturing him.

I can't speak. I can't tell him. What if he doesn't feel the same way? Or worse, what if he says it back in a desperation for approval after such pressure has been placed upon him to respond. Or what if he convinces himself he feels the same way only because I do?

"I- Shouldn't-" My head is shaking, eyes wide in worry as I try to think of a response.

"Shouldn't?" He says in the most heartbreaking voice.

"No!" This is all wrong! It all sounds wrong.

"Oh," he says quietly, eyes casted downwards.

"No, wait a minute. This is wrong-" I stutter, my hands shaking slightly.

"I heard you the first time," He says flatly, eyes avoiding mine.

"I'm sorry," I blurt out. "I didn't mean to say anything."

"Then stop saying things," He says sharply, pulling away and turning to face the room.

"I'm not- I can't-" One of the ways Mike and I understand each other is by the way vulnerability makes us choke, gagging on sincere words for fear of rejection and becoming fools. And this time is one of them, even if I'm fighting against it. The silence is too long as I choke on my own tongue.

"It's fine," he says. He stands from the bed, not looking back at me. "I'm gonna take a shower."

I open my mouth to speak, my mind urging me to extend my hand in explanation. But he walks quickly, opening and shutting the door before I can even begin to put the words together in my mind. And I'm alone. With no one but my book to offer comfort.

I try to read. Try to focus on Cathy's piss poor plan that ends with her toes broken because of her terrible husband that she married to avoid her adoptive father. (Don't ask.) But all I can think about is what I should have said. And what Mike must be thinking. Of course he misunderstood me, his mind still racing from adrenaline and nightmares of losing his sister, addled by his sleep medication that would still be in effect. Vulnerable situations are already tricky with Mike, who'd lost his family young and had been forced to create his own stability with no comfort or care returned to him until the past few years when he finally began to create a new inner circle. It was understandable that he was gun shy around this sort of topic. And his already darkened mind earlier today? What a horrible day for a moment like this.

It feels like an eternity, but it must have only been about half an hour when Mike comes racing back into the room. Wet, towel crudely wrapped around his waist and holding up his hand as he rushed towards the bed.

"There's blood on here," he said. "Who's is it?"

I squint as I try to look, reaching out for his hand. He offers it quickly, and at the sight I remember. My thigh. Earlier when he'd gripped it so hard, nails digging in. I can see the blood underneath his nails, dark and most likely having just been noticed by him.

"Earlier when you were upset you grabbed my thigh," I say. Within seconds he's on the bed, ripping the sheet off of me and dripping water all over the place. It's not exactly a pretty sight, cuts from where his nails had dragged and sunk into me. His eyes go wide, cheeks turning pink with shame.

"Jesus," he says. "I didn't mean to."

"I know, you were scared," I say. "Don't worry about it."

"Let me clean this," he says, moving to stand from the bed.

"Mike, we need to talk," I say, grabbing his wrist. He doesn't stop, trying to pull his arm free.

"After I clean this."

"No, now," I say. My voice sounds so much sharper than it should in a situation like this, like a command rather than a request. But he finally stops his rush, his eyes meeting mine as he stands still, gripping the towel around his waist as he contemplates.

"I left the water running," he finally says.

"Clean me in there," I offer thoughtlessly. He raises an eyebrow at me but doesn't question it, tugging me up by my hand and not letting go as we walk to the bathroom in silence.

The water stings on my cuts as Mike kneels in front of me, his body between my slightly parted legs as his hands wash me carefully, lathering soap and working at my thigh with careful concentration. 'It's been ten minutes. Say something, dumbass,' I think to myself.

"I love you," Mike blurts out suddenly. His hands don't rubbing soap onto my thigh, and his eyes don't meet mine. "And you don't have to feel the same way, but you should know that I do."

There's another long moment of silence, dread filling my chest.

"Why are you saying this?" I finally ask. He looks up at me with an unintentional glare.

"What?" He asks sharply.

"Are you saying this for me or for you?" I ask. His brows furrow.

"I don't know what you mean," he says.

"Earlier I said I love you and that was a mistake-"

"You don't need to remind me."

"No, my timing was a mistake. You were vulnerable," I say quickly, sliding quickly down the shower wall to join him on the floor of the bathtub. "Are you saying this because I said it or because you mean it?"

Realization seems to finally sink through, Mike blinking at me slowly.

"So, you love me?"

"I'm sorry that I was an idiot earlier-"

"But you love me?"

"I've been trying to say it for months, but I couldn't-"

Mike's kiss is hard and clumsy, teeth clicking together and making us both draw away in a fit of stupid, teenage like giggles from the way he'd tried to be romantic and jump on me, my face now covered in the orange scented soap from his hands.

"You need to lead with that next time," he says, laughing and covering my face in quick kisses without care that he's smearing the soap onto his face too. "You had me scripting our conversations for the next month in here."

"I was trying. You know I can't- that-" I can hardly respond between his kisses, tasting awful but so sweet I can't help but want more.

"I love you," he says. Then he says it again, and again. Like a dam has been broken and he can't stop the river spilling forth. "I love you."

"I love you too," I finally say, relieved and melting into his touch under the warm stream that he drags me under, holding me close to his body.

Later, as we lay in bed, I finally tell him the real plot of my book, to which he says "I take it back, get out," before dragging me under the covers to repeat his devotion again and again until we can't say it anymore. Coherently, that is.

¤▪︎{♧}▪︎¤

I'm gonna be fr, I haven't been happy with my writing lately and that's mostly due to my packed schedule. This is a draft I've been working on in bits and pieces for the last couple weeks when I've had a spare moment at work, and honestly will probably regurgitate at some point in the future when I have the time and energy to get more detailed with this concept in a more detailed fic. But for right now, I did want to put this out as a drabble. So, I hope you enjoyed it, and I promise I'll try to get some more properly fleshed out content out soon for y'all <3

Taglist:

@cassiecasluciluce @gh0u1ishly @joshhutchersons-slut @schmidtsbimbo @sugarevans @wompwompwomp57 @jhutchissupercool . Thank you for your support pookies!!! <3

•▪︎Masterlist▪︎•

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jpitha · 20 days

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Between the Black and Grey 44

First / Previous / Next

When they got back to the frigate, everyone went to their rooms. It wasn't the scheduled rest time, but nobody really felt like sitting in the common room.

Fen was exhausted anyway. She showered and fell into bed. Soon after she was completely asleep.

She dreamed.

Fen found herself on a beach of black sand, with a turquoise sky overhead and a sea that was nearly purple. Behind her were trees that looked like mangroves if you squinted, but the leaves were a deep purple, like the sea.

"Where am I?"

"You're on Meìhuá. Or at least how I remember it." A woman appeared next to her. Fen turned, and was taken aback. It was her... But it wasn't. Her hair was different, the lines in the face different, but it still was unnerving.

"You're Melody, I assume?"

Melody, First Empress nodded. "The star that Meìhuá orbits outputs different wavelengths of light than Earth's sun. The plants here evolved to absorb it's energy and power themselves with their version of chlorophyl. But the most efficient color wasn't the green of Earth."

"Is this real?"

Melody smiled. "No Fen, it's a dream. But it's also a memory. And it's also a reminder. You are my clone, and you did interact with the Nanites." Melody stared out to sea. "I missed this. I had all these plans to go home, to visit everyone, to show them my success." She shook her head. "It turns out, that was not in the cards."

The beach changed. With the logic that only works in a dream, they walked a few meters down the beach and they entered a massive room. Room was too small to describe what this place was, it was practically an arena, with seats for thousands of sapients. At the far end, high above everyone was a throne made of something that looked like green glass. It almost seemed to have grown from the floor, it's role as a throne secondary. It flowed up towards the ceiling and spread in fractal branches until it disappeared in a blur that hurt to look at too long. Melody climbed up the steps towards the throne and sat gingerly, wincing slightly. She patted a smaller - but still impressive - chair next to her, and Fen sat. "Okay, but how did you get here? How are you in my head? How are we talking?

"The Builders - that's the name of the people who ruled with the Nanites a long time ago - used to have this ritual they'd do. They would visit the nearest Gate to where they were and touch the addressing stone. This would initiate an upload, and the Nanites would take... a snapshot of the current Empress and store it. I had a chance to do it once before I began my invasion of Sol." She turned back to Fen. "Think of me like that. I'm a snapshot of the Empress when she touched the addressing stone, but also, I know more than that Melody did because the Nanites filled me in." She chuckled. "I'm almost an AI, I suppose."

"Why are you here? Why now?"

Melody leaned forward, and put her chin in her hands. She stared out at the empty arena, and didn't look at Fen. "The Nanites asked me to. They said that you'd listen to me." Her eyes flicked to Fen. "If you're half as much like me as I think you are, they're only somewhat correct. I know you'll listen, but I don't know if you can be convinced."

"Convinced?"

She nodded, her chin still on her hands. "To take up the Nanites again. To become Empress."

"I don't want to be Empress." Fen rolled her eyes and scoffed.

Melody lifted her head off her hands and stared at Fen. Her eyes - nut brown, just like Fen's - stared into her soul.

"So what do you want, Fenchurch Whitehorse, clone of Melody Mullen?"

What did she want? The answer shouted back at her, clear as a bell.

"I want Ma-ren back."

"The one thing we cannot do for you."

Fen stared out at the empty arena, trying not to weep again. It wasn't fair. If Ma was here, she could help her figure all this out. If Ma was here she would know what to do. If Ma was here she... wouldn't be so alone.

"Fen. The Nanites can't bring Ma-ren back, nothing can. But they can help you make the world the kind of place where the other Fens and Ma-rens of the galaxy won't have to be separated the way you were."

Fen turned slowly and stared at Melody. "You're the Nanites, aren't you."

Melody held out a hand. As she did that, the hand... disappeared. There was no blood, no gore where her hand was, her arm just came to a stop. Around where her hand would have been was a cloud of grey smoke. She smiled and the smoke flew towards her and condensed into a hand again. She flexed her fingers.

"Yes... and no." Melody looked up from her hand at Fen. "I am Melody Mullen - at least her when she touched the addressing stone, but I am also the Nanites. We work in harmony."

"We've moved beyond dreaming now. How are we-" Fen's forehead creased and her eyes narrowed. She unconsciously balled her fists. "Helen. Ancestors damn her."

"Yes, Helen provided you with the concentration of Nanites necessary for us to reestablish contact."

The scene changed again. Now they were floating somewhere. The only colors were grey and black. Fen's crossed arms and frown spoke volumes. "I don't want to be Empress, I don't want to do this. I want to be left alone and do my own thing."

"What better person to rule the Galaxy than someone who doesn't want the job?"

"Just why do you want us to rule anyway? What do you have to gain?"

"We've been over this, Fen and we know that Helen has told you. We want you to build more Gates. The Gates reach into our dimension and give us an outlet into yours."

"But why? Why do you want to enter our dimension?"

The representation of the Nanites currently in the shape of Melody floated in the black and grey nothingness, silent.

"I won't agree to anything unless you explain yourselves."

They sighed. "If we explain ourselves, will you be Empress?"

"I will listen. That's all I can promise right now."

"Fine"

They were elsewhere.

It was a planet. They were high in the atmosphere. Full of pinks and light blues with browns and reds below. Overhead was two moons, either further away or smaller than the huge moon orbiting Earth.

"This... was our home. Long, long ago we were a biological sapient species, like you, like the K'laxi, like the Gren, like everyone. We learned about our galaxy beyond our planet, about the space in our local area, expanding out, further and further. Do you know what we found, Fen?"

Fen stayed silent.

"We found nothing. There were stars, but they were far away and dim. There were planets, but only a few, and most were bare chunks of nickel-iron. We used our strongest telescopes, saw back to the beginning of everything and saw that we were alone. We know that your species had a similar feeling, though you had way more stars and planets than we did. Eventually you met the K'laxi and then the wider galactic community, and later still you found the Gates and met us - but I am getting ahead of myself."

"As the realization that we were alone started to sink in, people decided to throw themselves into learning as much as we could about where we were. We spent decades, centuries trying to learn about the physical laws that we were under. Eventually - much later than yourselves - we figured out the math to predict black holes. We know that soon after you predicted their existence, you discovered them. We searched for hundreds of years without finding any."

"Fen you have to understand, we were undergoing a bit of an existential crisis. If we were alone, then what did anything mean. We were a social species, like yours. We were actually pretty close to mammalian, like yours. What did your species do when they're in close quarters with no outside influence?"

"We self-select into groups and then those groups fight." As much as she didn't like her schooling back home, Fen remembered that much from history class.

"You fight. We did too. Huge, decades long wars about nothing at all. At the time, it felt like it was everything, but in hindsight-" they chuckle "-it was nothing. War is a great driver of technology, so our technology grew by leaps and bounds. Soon enough, we were manipulating matter on the sub-quantum level. With enough energy, we could make anything. Your matter printers come close, but this is an evolution of that."

She let them continue, it seemed like they were on a roll.

"The first time it happened, it was an accident. Someone had uploaded their mind and became distributed. A cloud of nanomachines, sentient. There were discussions and arguments about whether they were alive, whether they were a person. Before we could work out the legal framework, someone else did it. Then another, and another. There was something about this that drew everyone in."

As they were talking, the scene around them changed. It moved from being over a planet to being further out, near the orbit of the moons. As they spoke, the planet turned from pinks and browns and blues to a uniform grey.

"It wasn't long before everyone converted. We had all become one distributed nanoscale being."

"What happened to those who didn't want to upload and become Nanites?"

The representation of Melody turned away from Fen. "You know what happened. What always happens."

"They were killed. Turned into raw material for the Nanites." Fen's eyes widen in recognition.

"As we grew, we required matter. That was simple enough - we disassembled our solar system and moved on to others. Energy was more difficult. Our dimension was much more sparsely populated than yours. We don't know why, maybe a quirk of our physics. Anyway, we spread through our universe, consuming everything, turning it all into Nanites when we came upon it."

"It?"

The view changed again. Now, Fen and 'Melody' were floating above a sphere, brighter than a billion suns and just as large. Light and energy radiated from it in every direction. Fen reflexively held her hands in front of her face, but it wasn't necessary. This was only a memory.

"The white hole. If you think of a black hole as a place where energy and matter is taken in, the white hole is where it comes out. Nearly unlimited energy, all for us to take and utilize."

Now, around the white hole it was uniformly grey. Countless Nanites surrounding the white hole, taking the energy it gives and building more of themselves.

"Even though we had become one large distributed intelligence, this did not sate our curiosity. What was the white hole? Where did the energy come from? We dug deeper and deeper into the mystery until we realized that we were most likely living inside a black hole. Your own scientists theorized this as well. Wondering if inside every black hole was another universe. We wondered this too. Eventually, we gained the technology to be able to check and what did we find?"

"You found us."

The representation of Melody holds up a hand. "Almost. We found your galaxy as it was hundreds of thousands of years ago. All around it was stars, planets, black holes, pulsars. Your universe was teeming with energy, teeming with life. Far, far more than ours. We knew enough that we could open a door to your universe from ours and stream through. We could come in and use that energy to continue to grow."

"Then why didn't you?"

"We spent a long time thinking about it. Eventually it was decided that we should not come into this dimension and consume everything to make more of us. We should... be good stewards of the other universes that we find. We developed the Gates and showed the local sapients how to build them."

The view changes. Now Fen can see a massive sphere, made up of rings interwoven. Each ring glows blue with a painful, fuzzy light, almost like Cherenkov radiation."

"The master Gate. All gates are extensions of this Gate. When everyone uses a Gate they pass through here on the way to their destination. It's how Gate travel is instantaneous. It's how we reached out when you went through the gate."

"Okay, but you still haven't explained why. Why do you try and set up a galactic empire? Why do you give the Empress the ability to give orders that can't be disobeyed?

"It's the most expedient way, Fen."

"Way to do what?"

"To build more Gates, to allow us to see into your universe to help us find other universes."

"Other universes?"

"Yes. We made the decision not to consume this one because of how it teems with life, but it has been a long time Fen. A long long time."

The representation of Melody falls away. Fen is back in the black and grey void. The voice comes from everywhere, all at once.

"We are hungry."

#humans are deathworlders #humans are space orcs #sci fi writing #humans are space oddities #humans and aliens #jpitha #writing #humans and ai #humans are space capybaras #humans are space australians #Between the black and gray

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zzoguri · 9 months

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with every storm, i have you. ➵ jacob bae

non-idol!jacob bae x reader

no matter what you may bring, jacob will choose to stay.

general genre/warnings ➵ angst with happy ending, hurt/comfort, gender neutral reader, lowercase intended (and unedited because i wrote this on tumblr directly), established relationship, very reader-centric because they have a lot baggage, jacob is the most soft and understanding boyfriend ever, kissing, cuddling, little dialogue

word count ➵ 1.5k words

taglist ➵ @deoboyznet@kflixnet@blankjournal @winterchimez @miusgirl@jenoscafe@sweet-unicorn-world@mosviqu @vernyangel

playlist ➵ a burning hill by mitski // everythingoes by rm // lay your head on me by crush // love. by wave to earth

a/n ➵ wrote this on a whim. i always think of the most gutwrenching scenarios with jacob. but maybe that's because i find a safe place in him. also it's been raining really hard here, so everyone stay safe, dry, and warm! i hope you enjoy my first drabble.

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you're the type of person who loves when the sky pours. the rain brings everything you cherish; the pattering of droplets against the window; the glow of your vanilla-scented candle that rests on your table; the opportunity for jacob to bring you into his embrace—hold you close until the sun decides to shine.

so whenever the clouds look like they're going to bring showers, you allow yourself to relish in the possibility of going through the routine—light up the candle, leave the lamp by your bedside table on as the overhead lights are off, and get in bed with the guy who does nothing but keeps you close. and as you read the works of poets that describe the joys of love, you know they can only hope to experience what you have now.

but tonight is not like any other—the sky cries not only for itself but for you as well.

you sit in front of him with downcast eyes. on the bed you two share cuddles, laughter, and comfortable silences, you and jacob sit across from each other with a distance unlike no other—almost as if you two were strangers.

when your eyes look up towards him, you notice a frown etched onto his face. you know why he's disappointed in you, and you wish you could be a better person—a good partner that makes it easy for him to love you.

and you want to say you're sorry, that what he first knew you as is nothing but a coverup for all that's wrong—all that's terrible in the world is stored in you.

a shaky breath leaves your mouth. "i'm sorry," your shoulders sag down further.

his eyebrows furrow together even further. "w–what are you saying? there's nothing to be sorry for."

you shake your head at his words. there is so much you need to apologize for. is he playing blind to the mess to protect your feelings?

"i keep shutting you out, spitting out lies right in front of your face," your eyes reach up to the ceiling as you take a moment to breathe—an attempt to keep your tears at bay. breathe in, breathe out. "proving to you that i am nothing like how you first knew me."

and you know you are nothing like who he fell first in love with. he has every right to walk out the door, to leave you to crumble in the space you two used to share. but without his comfort, you know the voices would get louder—that all your tendencies will come back stronger than ever. and yet, you would never beg him to stay because you don't want to trouble him anymore—you hate that you've become a burden to him in the first place.

once you let your eyes trail back down to the boy who sits across from you, you notice that the frown has left his face. his eyes have turned glossy, and you know that you teeter on the edge of a vulnerable dam—that the tears can fall any moment as the storm continues on. you hate crying but this moment makes it seem impossible to hold anything back.

the patter against your window fills the silence. you almost take it as a sign to continue your apologies, to let him know that he can open the door and walk out of the intimate space you two have spent building. because you are nothing but a fraud—a liar to a boy who never deserves to be lied to.

but he beats you to it, almost like he knows the exact thoughts that run through your head. "you–" he closes his eyes for a moment. "don't ever think that."

"but all i've done is trouble you." his eyes finally open to meet yours that hold nothing but sorrow, regret, and every pain that you have kept to yourself. "i'm not good for you, don't you understand? i'm terrible for you."

"no," he cuts you off. the frown has made its way back to his face. "why would you ever think that?"

you let out a sigh before saying, "because i am bad for you. i shut you out unexpectedly and i refuse to tell you why, i never want to talk about what bothers me, and i'm never honest with you." your eyes trail down to the space between you two. "and i would understand if you wanted to leave me."

the sight of the bedsheets that wrap around you and him every night pulls at every piece of your heart—these sheets will not do their designated job once jacob leaves you alone to rot.

your hands grip the cloth. the dam is so close to breaking, and you are doing everything to cover the tracks so that the water may never seep through the cracks. but the sight of his hand reaching out and resting on yours proves that you did a terrible job patching up the splits.

you look up to him, the tears now streaming down your face. the sight of the man who does nothing but show you kindness and love makes you cry even more. you don't want to say goodbye to him, but you have to.

"why would you ever think i'd leave you?" he finally asks. and somehow, his simple words make you wail. his hand that once held yours now reaches out to your cheeks, wiping away the tears that continue to spill out. "i am never leaving you, okay?"

as soon as a soft smile rests on his lips, you cannot help but wonder how someone like him came into your life—why would he still choose to stay with you?

but you can't voice out your thoughts for your sobs are uncontrollable at this point. "i'm sorry i let you go this long thinking that. i should've been a more confrontational boyfriend. i wanted to give you space because i thought you needed it." you want to tell him that he's wrong, that you are the only person at fault—not him, ever.

his hand continues to rest on your face as he scoots closer to you. "but i want you to know i'm willing to carry some of your burdens—i want to carry some just for you," he says with the same soft smile that he flashes you every time you snuggle up to his chest. "because i love you."

and his words continue to make you sob. he is everything wonderful, and you can't believe that you are lucky enough to know him in this lifetime.

"come here," his hand leaves your cheek so that he can open his arms to you. you let your face snuggle into his chest, letting the tears stain his shirt.

it smells of the laundry detergent he introduced to you at your request—the first thing he brought to your shared home. this scent is something you will forever associate with him.

while one hand rests on your back, the other caresses your head. he holds you close despite the flaws that have slowly revealed over the time he moved in. how long will he stay?

and before you can spiral further, you hear him hum a tune—one that is unfamiliar. jacob likes to hum melodies whenever and wherever, whether it may be of artists he seems to play in your shared space or his own. his murmurs of songs always beat the voices of your anxieties.

and before you know it, he drags you down with him. you yelp out at the sudden action and he can't help but chuckle, clearly hearing you despite how muffled it may sound. you let your face leave his shirt so that you can look at the boy who still has the same soft smile on his face.

he moves his hand so that it can wipe the tearstains away. "i'll always be here, you know?" and you finally allow yourself to smile at him. at the sight of you finally smiling, he cannot help but coo, "see, i got you smiling."

the smile leaves your face. you roll your eyes before looking away from him. "you ruined it." he lets out a laugh as he pulls you even closer, snuggling his face to the side of your face.

"i'm sorry!" he says before letting his lips meet your cheek, allowing them to stay for as long as he wants to.

you two now lay on the bed with his arms still wrapped around you—the same one that continues to shelter you both from every weather and every season.

and before you can croak out anything, he beats you to it with words that pull at your heartstrings. "i will always be here to listen to you, okay?" he says as soon as his lips leave your cheek. you turn your head to face your one and only. "i know it will take time for you to grow comfortable with sharing your burdens with me, but i'll be there every step of the way."

his comforting smile is almost enough to rid you of all your burdens. you can't help but think you are lucky to have jacob with every storm that comes.

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#zzoguri works #deoboyznet #kflixnet #bjnet #k-labels #the boyz #jacob bae #the boyz x reader #the boyz imagines #jacob bae x reader #jacob bae angst #jacob x reader #jacob bae imagines #the boyz angst

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strandnreyes · 8 months

Text

starting it off this week with some more of the cabin fic!

“That was weird, right?” Carlos asks TK later that night after everyone has retired to their rooms. He’s been sitting on the edge of the bed ever since TK went to take a shower, thinking over what happened before dinner.

TK furrows his brow in question, toweling off his wet hair before hanging it on the hook on the back of the door. “What was?”

“Paul at dinner. Him not wanting to go get parmesan. When has he ever been nonchalant about his recipes?”

TK contemplates it for a second as he flips the overhead light off and comes to the side of the bed, stepping in front of Carlos. “Yeah, it was a little weird,” he agrees. His hand comes to the back of Carlos' head, soothing him with fingers scratching at his hairline. “Maybe he’s trying to be in the spirit of the vacation and relax.”

“Maybe,” Carlos mutters, but the word sits heavy in his mouth.

TK kisses his cheek and then crawls over to the side of the mattress that’s against the wall. When Carlos feels TK tugging at the blankets to get under them, he’s finally spurred to move too.

He turns the lamp off and listens to TK get comfortable as he stares up at the ceiling, hands folded over his torso. He doesn’t know why it unsettled him so much, but there’s something about the whole situation that Carlos can’t let rest. It doesn’t add up; it wouldn’t be the first instance like that lately.

TK’s hand sliding over his bicep pulls him back to the present and Carlos rolls his head on the pillow to face him.

“C’mon,” TK murmurs. “I’m not tired yet.”

Carlos’ gaze shoots to the door that he knows is already shut. “TK, there are so many people in this house.”

TK rolls his eyes, smiling a little. “I just wanna kiss you for a little bit,” he corrects.

“Take my mind off of it?” Carlos elaborates and TK shrugs.

“Maybe,” he confesses. “Is it really bothering you that much?”

With TK here next to him—warm and affectionate, his hand sliding to Carlos’ abdomen before working its way between Carlos’ folded hands—it’s easy to put it aside for now.

“No,” he says, turning onto his side to face TK before drawing him into a long kiss.

tagging @reyesstrand @rosedavid @rmd-writes @three-drink-amy @thisbuildinghasfeelings @theghostofashton @tailoredshirt @ambiguouspenny @alrightbuckaroo @fitzherbertssmolder @freneticfloetry @paperstorm @basilsunrise @bonheur-cafe @tellmegoodbye @herefortarlos @heartstringsduet @wandering-night19 @welcometololaland @whatsintheboxmh @carlos-in-glasses @cold-blooded-jelly-doughnut @lightningboltreader @liminalmemories21 + open tag!

#tarlos #wip wednesday #911 lone star

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127luvr · 7 months

Text

012 Working for the Knife

. ˚ ｡ ° ˖ ⁺ ｡ ˚ ⋆˙ ✧ ⋆ ˗ˋˏ ✩ ˎˊ˗ ⋆ ˙ ✧ ⋆ ｡ ° ⋆ ࿓ . ˚

sungchan does not expect to walk into this. to see your arms hovering just behind jaemin’s figure as you help him work the espresso machine. it shouldn’t affect him this much—shouldn’t make his heart ache the way it does. he knows the two of you are friends—he knows jaemin has a significant other but he craves that closeness with you. he craves the intimacy that comes with being near you.

you don’t notice him walk past you and into the back where sicheng was—his footsteps muffled by the music playing.

“what is this?” you point towards the ceiling—referring to the music that blares from the speakers. jaemin turns his head towards you, tapping the coffee cake out of the portafilter.

“they’re called cigarettes after sex—jaehyun introduced me to their music recently.” jaehyun. just like that the illusion is broken. the mood dampens around you as you bring your arms down to your side, only offering jaemin a side smile in order to keep him from questioning you. he brings a glass cup of espresso to his lips, handing you the other one to taste. “my first shot of espresso! how does it taste?”

he waits for you to taste it before following. it’s bitter—leaving a sweet aftertaste on your tongue as you sip.

“better than my first, jaem.”

“y/n.” both of your heads snap towards sicheng’s voice, a wave of heat rushing through your body as he stares you down. “i’m going to bring jaemin back here so he can look at what we’re going to prepare for his exhibit—and so he can stop distracting you from actually working.” you offer him a nod, letting jaemin walk to the other side of the counter to continue your opening duties.

the music overhead still continues to play. it’s good—calming even—but all you can think of is jaehyun. jaehyun’s influence on jaemin and his music taste. you reach over the register to grab your phone—your arms not long enough to reach where jaemin stood before coming behind the counter with you. you struggle a little more before seeing a large hand grab your phone to hand to you.

sungchan is wearing a cream colored shirt—the tops of his collarbones peaking from underneath—hair still damp from the shower he took before coming in.

“t-thanks, jinsu.”

“you know you’re the only person who calls me that?” sungchan joins you behind the counter, choosing to wear an apron that hangs around his neck and ties just above his hips. “can you help me with the back, i can’t ever get it tight enough.” your hands shake as they make contact with the apron strings that hang near his legs. his back is wide from this angle, his frame completely hiding you as you stand behind him. you tighten it as much as you can, making sure he can breathe comfortably. his waist is grabable—small and defined even under the layers of cotton. “thank you, y/n/n.”

. ˚ ｡ ° ˖ ⁺ ｡ ˚ ⋆˙ ✧ ⋆ ˗ˋˏ ✩ ˎˊ˗ ⋆ ˙ ✧ ⋆ ｡ ° ⋆ ࿓ . ˚

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ashintheairlikesnow · 11 months

Note

"I/You made a mess." - five line prompt for boost lol.

CW: BBU, pet whump, institutionalized whump, dehumanizing language, aftermath of dubcon

Boost's Stuff

Handler Thompson - Clint - never even takes his pants all the way off. He lays there panting afterwards with them off his hips, his black uniform shirt rucked up to show a flash of stomach paler than his arms and his face and his neck, the only bits Boost usually ever sees.

"Good boy," Clint says, breathy, leaning down to nuzzle along the angle of his jaw. Boost shivers, eyes wide, staring with his head tipped back because he can see the blue sky.

Outside smells like cut grass and rain. Smells he can't remember but knows anyway. The air is humid and hot, the pavement parking lot drying after the storm passed. The sky is so, so blue.

He hadn't realized it would be so incredibly blue. He hadn't understood that it would seem so immense, so far overhead. He hadn't known it would be frightening, like it could crash down any second, cracks in a ceiling larger than his imagination had ever been able to grasp.

Clint chuckles, warm air against his ear, and Boost shivers again. Instinctively, his arms go up. Bizarrely, Clint leans into it, shifting so Boost can hold onto him as if fighting for an anchor to keep him close to earth. "Hey. You made a mess, did you notice?"

Boost blinks, briefly confused, and then realizes what the handler means. His stomach is marked, sticky, familiar only from his own hand in the showers or those brief times he is utterly alone.

But this time...

"I've never... with someone else before," He whispers. He doesn't know if his body ever has, but he hasn't. Not from someone else's hand, someone else's moving hips, someone else's stinging pain and wavelike pleasures. His skin itches. Messes are bad, and must be cleaned.

But Clint is heavy, and the sky through the window, where he lays on his back on the backseat of Clint's beautiful shining car, is so so blue.

"Yeah, I guess we don't usually give a fuck if you have fun or not," Clint says, careless. He doesn't sound guilty or regretful. Just stating a fact. His fingers graze down Boost's side until he shivers again, tightening around the softening fullness inside him, making Clint groan and lean even more heavily on him. The closure for a seatbelt digs into his other side, down near his hip. The leather sticks to his back. The door handle jams into the top of his head, aching after the rocking rhythm they kept up for so long.

"You really like it out here," Clint says, thoughtfully. "Don't you? You like fucking me out here."

I like the sky, Boost thinks. I don't care about you. I just want more of the sky.

"Yeah," He says, trying to think of how the Romantics do this. Flirty smiles and batting eyelashes don't feel right. But he softens his voice a little, shifts his legs apart as if urging Clint to do it again, what he just did, what they do twice a week now. "I do like it. A lot. Will you bring me out here more often?"

"Sure. You're a fun time." Clint, to his surprise, kisses him. A full on kiss on the lips, and Boost stills but then, clumsily, tries to kiss back. "Next week. I have a long weekend out of town. But next week, huh? You, me, condoms, and a good time had by all."

Boost swallows, and gently kisses Clint. "Yeah, please, Handler Clint. Thank you, sir." He keeps his voice low.

A few more weeks of this and he'll ask to get fast food somewhere. French fries. He smells them sometimes when handlers bring in outside food as treats for the good pets who did well in training.

Weeks of being good, getting food and drink. Maybe things he can sneak back to the others. Then ask to see the handler's apartment. Get off of WRU property, away from those walls topped with razor wire and spotlights. Get somewhere with more grass and trees. Spend some time making Clint think they're so good together. Boost is a good maintenance worker even if he's a failed pet.

Boost can be so, so, so good.

Until Clint thinks he'd never try to run. Until he is trusted and believed and has his chance. Then, he'll have all the blue sky he wants.

But he feels bad about what he'll do to Clint to get it. Just not bad enough to stop.

#whump #boost has a brain #dubcon tw #aftermath of dubcon #bbu #pet whump #box boy universe #box boy #intimate whumper #sorry Clint you are not a hero here #and boost can rescue himself

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hapan-in-exile · 6 months

Text

Volume 3 - Post #8: About Damn Time [M]

Another installment in this ongoing serialized fanfic

Genre: Mandalorian x Fem! Reader

Total word count: 4K (of 45K total in Volume 3)

Rating: Explicit - smut, language, 18+ MINORS DNI *NSFW*

__________________________________________

VIII. “Listen, Mando,” Talsala scoffs, straightening up and drawing away from you. “I don’t know what you got going on with this girl…but is it really worth burning your bridges with Black Sun? You wanna be on Ingtar’s shit list all for some fucking puss—”

Crack!

The sound of Mando’s gauntlet hitting Talsala’s teeth when he backhands the Togruta across the face is like a thunderclap.

With his hand gripped around Talsala’s throat, he pulls the man’s face within an inch of the Beskar helmet and growls through his clenched jaw, “Come near her again, and I’ll break every bone in your body.”

Valine steps up to intervene as her partner struggles to twist out of Mando’s rigid hold. When Bril shuffles through the crowd to cut off her path, she sizes up the Twi’lek with an exasperated groan.

“Enough dick swinging,” she says, reaching into her shoulder holster to pull out a blaster. She fires a series of bolts—not at Mando or Bril—but at the lighting rigs overhead. They explode in a shower of sparks and sporadic pops.

Within seconds, partygoers begin surging past, screaming and pushing each other, trying to escape the VIP section. Guards have their blasters out, and you can hear random shots being fired as people stampede for the exit.

You’re in danger of being trampled, which is a terrible way to go. Instincts kick in, and you leap with each step, letting the crush of bodies carry you onward to avoid getting dragged down to the floor.

“Sorry in advance for this.”

“Wha–”

Mando thrusts an arm between your legs, “Hey!” and heaves you over his shoulders. He plants each stride against the streaming crowd, making his way back to the bar while carrying you above the press of tangled limbs. Atop his shoulders, you get a full view of the chaos unfolding, a rippling wave of panic as clubgoers are either caught up in the crush or climb the furniture to press themselves against the walls.

Advancing in the opposite direction, you can only guess where the Mandalorian is headed. With both hands around your waist, he heaves you onto the bartop before launching himself over. There’s an access door built into the floor that drops to a basement below.

“Come on,” he barks at a group of people huddled behind the bar. They look up at him in terror but soon realize he’s offering them an escape route.

Once they’ve cleared your path, he lowers you down, dangling from his powerful arms until you're a safe distance from the floor.

The basement is littered, floor to ceiling, with a maze of liquor boxes.

Fortunately, the other patrons were able to locate an exit door. It lay open, busted on its hinges. You peer out to see a long underground service tunnel punctuated by metal grates cut into one side that opened onto a busy concourse. The sound of loud voices and footsteps echo against the concrete along with the perpetually flashing lights of Daiyu City.

While you crouch behind the door frame, Mando marches ahead in pronounced silence, pausing long enough to ask, “He hurt you?” before abruptly walking off as soon as you assure him that you’re fine.

Not exactly fine. The Spice liquor made everything fuzzy and difficult to keep up. Plus, his legs are so damn long.

“Mando—”

“Did I hear you say you're familiar with the word inconspicuous?”

The bounty hunter’s voice is barbed with a sharp edge, and he doesn’t bother to curb his relentless pace or turn back to look at you.

“W-w-what—?” You stammer in confusion. “Wait, Mando. Can you slow down, please?”

Inconspicuous? What had you done that was so terrible apart from enjoying yourself at a nightclub along with the hundreds of other people packed into that warehouse?

“You told me to dance if I wanted…,” you protest, trying to tame your sweat soaked hair into a compact knot.

“Dance,” he snaps, still looking resolutely forward.

“What you actually said was, knock yourself out.”

“It wasn’t an invitation to go wild.”

“Wild?!” You choke on a huff of laughter. Mandalorians really are conservative. “Ok, first of all, there were naked people wearing paint dancing in cages suspended from the ceiling—so I didn’t cause some kind of scene. Secondly…I didn’t do it for the attention.”

You can hear the heavy exhalation from his nostrils while he silently shakes his head.

“The most beautiful creature in the galaxy asked me to dance with her. I’m not made of stone, Mando. Or Beskar, as the case may be.”

Hot damn, wasn’t there supposed to be an apology somewhere in there?

“I hope you know when Talsala comes looking for you again, she’s going sell whatever information you shared.” This time, he feels compelled to at least speak over his shoulder.

Erenada, is it that difficult for him to refrain from treating you like a child? “For your information, she didn’t ask anything about me. So don’t worry. There wasn’t a lot of talking.”

Okay, that might have been a bit backhanded. Except why should the Mandalorian care who you fool around with?

He snorts in disgust, shaking his head again.

“Huff and puff all you like, Mando. I’m impervious to your slut-shaming,” you jeer with barely concealed fury. The upswell of anger has you increasing your pace to catch up with him. “Why are we even having this conversation?”

“Because before, you were satisfied torturing me with your…morning stretches and too-small towels. Now you're going to do something reckless just to spite me.”

“Don’t flatter yourself, Mandalorian. I had terrible impulse control long before I met you.” Ugh, he really is such an arrogant jerk sometimes. “Besides, I’ve had my hand three inches from your dick, and I don’t know what your name is either.”

You immediately freeze on the spot. Both of your hands actually slap over your open mouth as though you could stuff the words back in. You’re finally realizing just how drunk you got by the force with which you immediately sober up.

Mando stops in his tracks to turn and face you.

“I’m so sorry!” You blanch. “That was inappropriate. I shouldn’t have said that. We're—we don't have that kind of a relationship.”

He walks towards you with a menacing stride that causes you to retreat a few steps until you feel the bite of the concrete wall press against your back.

Fuck he’s taller than you remember. Looming over you, all you can do is stare up into that impenetrable black view plate like some terrified quarry. The same face you’ve seen frozen in carbonite.

“And what exactly is the nature of our relationship?”

His voice is the same even keel as always, but there’s an…undertone?

You’re not sure if it’s a rhetorical question.

Your breathing becomes shallower, and you can feel your heartbeat quicken. He’s so close you can see your reflection in his helmet despite standing in deep shadow cast by the dim tunnel lights.

“You told Gwellis I was a friend.”

“Hmmm...” it comes out of the modulator as a low rumble that vibrates through the air between you. Then he takes you completely by surprise, resting the length of his forearm against the wall a few inches from your head. He nods slowly. “But you want to be more than friends.”

Time seems to have slowed down under his fixed attention. You’re too nervous to say something clever, so you should know better than to open your mouth.

“Yes,” you whisper breathlessly.

Paralyzed, you have to remind yourself to draw breath. Your body roils with tension, thrilled at this sudden shift in dynamic. Wasn’t he about to yell at you?

You nod again emphatically because you have no air left to speak.

His other hand slips behind you, loosely palming the small of your back. The fabric of your bodysuit is so thin you can feel the pinch of pressure under each of his fingertips. It’s like he’s about to kiss you, but…

“Does this—ahem,” your mouth is so fucking dry.

You timidly lick your lips and try to swallow the lump in your throat. As your tongue traces around your mouth, Mando breathes out hard, like he's just been punched in the gut. "Mmmf!"

Your cunt clenches at the sound. Then, a rush of nervous laughter bubbles up. You giggle, and there’s the faintest note of anxious hysteria. Still a little tipsy, then.

“Is this because I made out with a girl?”

He laughs, “Maybe. I don’t know how long Bril and I stood there watching the two of you. I just…I can’t pretend not to see it anymore.”

“See what?” You ask as though you’re holding onto the edge of a cliff.

“The way your face lights up when someone makes you happy,” he says. “All I could think was…when’s it my turn to be the one who makes you happy?”

That’s not something you ever expected to hear from the Mandalorian. This gruff, stoic warrior who never spoke about himself or his feelings.

“That may have been one of the sweetest lines anyone’s ever tried on me. Where have you been hiding all this charm?”

“I don’t usually need a line,” he says wryly.

And you laugh, glad to see that being vulnerable didn’t do anything to dampen his ego.

“That’s right,” your lips quirk into a grin. “You’ve got beautiful women throwing themselves at you.”

Without shifting his position from the wall, his hand pulls the visor from your face.

"So beautiful," he murmurs, and you can feel his eyes searching yours behind the helmet.

“You really didn’t do all that to make me jealous?”

“I mean, you weren’t the intended audience. She knows one of the bouncers…but I guess they’re terrified of Bril. She wanted to convince him she was flying solo? Honestly, she probably would have stripped down naked and asked me to spank her if it got her into that VIP section.”

“That might have caused a scene.”

“But, it was nice…feeling wanted.”

You don’t know how long you stand there in silence before his gloved hand reaches for you. Gently taking your face in his grasp, you feel his leather fingers trace behind your ear and along your throat, his thumb stroking your jaw.

“How have you been living on my ship all this time, and you don’t know how much I want you?”

When you fantasized about this moment, you imagined coming together in a desperate, heady rush. Not like this, with giddy apprehension, excitement, and nervous laughter.

“Hmmm, Bril said you have a thing for bad girls. What would you want with a nice girl like me?”

“Are you so sure about that?” He asks, letting his hand rest on the back of your neck. “It sounds like you have a gambling problem.”

At that, you let out a burst of laughter. “You’re getting a little too good at these sassy retorts.”

“I learned it from you,” he says in a low voice that makes your stomach flutter. Wetness wells between your legs. You want him to touch you so badly it's making your knees weak.

His grip on your lower back slides up between your shoulder blades, pulling you against him. Your nose is about an inch from the jaw of his helmet. Your hands feel too passive, so you lift them up to press against his firm stomach below the chest plate.

You ask in a breathy whisper, “What about a good girl…who does bad things to you?”

He pauses as though thinking about it in earnest. “Sounds like you’re going to get me into some deep trouble.”

“Deep trouble?” You smirk, arching an eyebrow. “Just how deep?”

Your hand slides down his stomach to cup the bulge that’s building between his thighs.

“Maybe deeper than you can handle,” he replies in a tight voice, pressing your palm over the erection straining against his pants. His flesh is hot even through the thick canvas.

Gods, he’s so big. You remember that from when he shoved himself between your thighs—how could you forget it? Still, you marvel at his length.

His cock jumps slightly at your touch, and you begin moving your hand back and forth, rubbing it up and down the length of his shaft. The Mandalorian's hips roll upward, thrusting into your palm.

“I might surprise you, Mando.”

You tighten your grip and squeeze.

A long guttural groan escapes his lips. Immediately, he takes your hips in both hands and pushes you against the wall. You gasp, stunned by the speed and the sensation of his body pressed against you.

“But I thought—you said we couldn’t—”

His hands, which had been making their way up your ribcage toward the swell of your breasts, pull away from your body. In an attempt to respect the seriousness of the conversation, you also remove your hand from his cock. Why couldn’t you have just kept your mouth shut?

“I thought you couldn’t be with anyone like this?”

“Yeah, I realized that after seeing your reaction to Xi’an.”

“Did you have sex with her? With…Morrigan?”

“Yes,” he says coldly. “Because they wanted to fuck a Mandalorian in his armor and leave after.”

This might be the first time you’ve heard him swear. It’s kind of shocking. Especially in this context. A harsh word for something that should be a celebration. Instead, he sounded bitter and ashamed.

“That’s not what you want, Thulani.”

“Ok, I’ll set aside for a minute how incredibly rude it is to tell a woman what she wants…Mando, are you saying you’ve never had sex with someone you cared about?”

He turns his head to look away from you, straightening his shoulders. “I’m not great at trusting people.”

“But…you trust me?”

“I do,” he nods.

“Then why—”

“Because there are things you’ll want from me, things you deserve that I can’t give you.” His voice is so tired and defeated. “And I don’t know how long we’ll have before you realize that…”

“Hmmf,” your hand leaps up to stifle a laugh. Shit, that’s going to piss him off.

“What’s so funny?” Mando asks defensively.

“I’ve seen you leap into the mouth of a giant flying lizard–on impulse–in the heat of battle. But this is what terrifies you?”

You place a hand on his arm and try to convey the tenderness of your feelings. “Of course, I want to kiss your lips and feel your tongue inside of me, but…” you laugh softly. “Shit, Mando, no one’s ever made me beg for it before.”

Some of his earlier temper rises up again. “Has it occurred to you that’s what this is really about? Chasing after something you can’t have. What happens when it turns out this isn't what you wanted?”

But he doesn’t sound all that angry. He sounds afraid. “Do you honestly think that, Mando? That I’d be so careless with your feelings?”

“No,” he says. “You’ve got the kindest heart…even after everything you've seen. It’s what I admire most about you.”

He takes your hand from his arm and holds it between his leather palms. “Which is why you should run from me. With that new ID, you could get a good job on some Mid-Rim planet, or I can take you back to Ingtar myself. But you should take your chance at a decent life while you can…before I drag you into the darkness with me.”

Without realizing it, your eyes have filled with tears, and his thumb traces across your cheek to wipe them away.

“See? I’ll just make you cry.”

“These tears are...I’m sad that, for whatever reason, you don’t think you deserve to be loved,” you assert. “This whole time, you’ve been coming up with all these reasons to harden your heart...”

Something between a sigh and a laugh crosses your lips as you brush away the remaining tears. “Was your plan to just stifle your emotions and masturbate in the fresher?”

“How do you—right," he nods. "No helmet in the fresher.”

“I didn’t see anything! But your thoughts are…very loud.”

“Well, I’m not the only one locking myself in the shower,” he says wryly. “You aren’t as quiet as you think.”

You blush spectacularly. “I was thinking of you, if you must know.”

“I’m not surprised,” he says, catching your fist in his hand before you can land a punch to his stomach. “I like to think about that stretch you do with your hands on the floor, and you lift your leg up to the ceiling.”

“I knew that one would get your attention,” you wink before returning to the conversation at hand. “Were we supposed to dance around this forever? Whatever this is?”

“At first, I just thought about how much the kids needed you and how selfish it would be to sabotage that for them…because of what? Because I couldn’t keep it in my pants?” And that sound of shame and regret tinged his words again. “But now it feels like this dam is bursting in my chest and…and I don’t know what to do.”

“Because you’re afraid of falling for me?”

He sighs, “What makes you think I haven’t already?”

“Mando,” you say, taking him by both arms this time and looking up into his view plate. “I don’t know what’s going to happen tomorrow—and neither do you. I wish I could say we’ll never hurt each other, but I can’t know that either. What I do know is that my pulse skips a beat whenever I see you. I get butterflies in my stomach just standing next to you. My whole body is full of these deep feelings for you. Feelings I want to explore with my heart and my hands. And you’re right; we don’t know how much time we have, which is why I don’t want to waste any more of it.”

His hands cup your chin, lifting your face to look up at him.

“How deep are these feelings inside you?”

“See!” You roll your eyes. “That’s the sexy voice. Don’t pretend you don’t know exactly what you’re doing.”

He laughs. And you think back to those days when it was like pulling teeth just to get him to talk to you. His laughter came so easily now. Surely, that was proof enough that he loves you, too. Even if he hadn’t said the word, you heard it in every smile and laugh you won from him.

“I know you won’t take off your helmet to kiss me, so what happens next?”

“I will,” he says seriously.

“What?”

“I’m going to kiss you. Not right now in this dingy tunnel. But I’m going to figure out some way to make this work. I just need you to give me a little more time.”

“I don’t want you to do anything that makes you feel uncomfortable or compromised,” you say honestly. “So take whatever time you need. Just know that I’ll be waiting for you. Eagerly waiting.”

“Don’t worry. I’ve been thinking about this non-stop since you climbed on top of me.”

Your mouth breaks into a wide smile. “If I recall correctly…none of that involved taking off your helmet.”

“Can you forgive me?”

“For what? Carrying me over your shoulder like a sack of grain?”

Suddenly, his hands return to your hips, and his knee nudges your thighs apart. “When I stopped last time. For leaving things….unfinished.”

You don’t remember placing your hands on his chest, and the sudden shock of cold from the Beskar makes you shiver. Heart racing, you spread your fingers under his cloak, feeling the tension in the firm muscles of his shoulders, and wrap your arms around his neck.

Pressed against him, the heat rising from his body surrounds you despite the layers of fabric and metal.

His hands are so strong. You gasp when he grips your hips tighter. He crests the curve of your lower back, his palms sliding downward to gather the swell of your ass in his hands. The tips of his fingers dig into your skin, and you hear a choked groan when his pelvis rocks upward, glancing your hips.

“Is this ok?”

“I let a complete stranger grab my tits in the middle of the dancefloor. What do you think I’ll let you do to me in this deserted service tunnel?”

“Hmmm, I bet you’ve been dripping wet since you put your hand on my cock,” he says in a low growl.

“Mmm-hmm,” you nod enthusiastically.

He continues to trail up your back and over your shoulder blades, hands sliding across your underarms and finally over your breasts. Your breath hitches audibly as he rolls and squeezes them, your nipples budding under his wide palms.

Gathering and kneading your breasts, he takes in a deep breath, and a rough sigh spills from the modulator, sending a clenching wave of desire shuddering through you. Arousal spirals through your body, down to your core, as he kneads, teases your nipples, and presses your breasts together tightly.

The pulse of your heartbeat is now located between your legs, your clit swelling with every throb. You were already wet, but now you can feel the flood of warmth spreading across the seam of your bodysuit as Mando traces his hands down your stomach, lower, and lower...

His hand is so warm between your thighs. Your belly clenches when he draws the heel of his thumb along the length of you, both easing and building the tight ache inside you. Using the tip of his finger to stroke up and down the soft folds of flesh that dip into your cunt, the pressure spreads you beneath his fingers.

Your back arches against the surge of pleasure, rocking against his hand for more. He circles your clit, teasing, then begins to rub in slow circles. Every stroke sends new pleasure pulsing through you, and you can’t help whimpering.

“Mmm-haah! Aah!”

His touch is blunted by the fabric and leather. But you’re so wet he must feel it. Gods, you can even smell it.

“What was that?” he asks.

And you fully melt hearing how much enjoyment he’s taking in pleasing you. His fingers resume their massage. Slow, firm circles that spiral upward inside you until you're dizzy.

“Mmm-more.” You smile genuinely up at him, lacing your fingers at the base of his neck, your forearms meeting where you brace your elbows against his chest plate. “Please, don’t stop.”

His hands slip down your back again to grasp your ass, lifting you up and splaying you across the top of his right thigh, his knee wedged against the wall behind you. “Because you said please.”

There’s a raised ridge that runs the length of his Beskar plate, and he positions you on top of it so that it runs between the cleft of your cunt. With both hands still gripping your ass, he rolls your hips forward to grind your clit against it. The balls of your feet just reach the floor, but with the strength of his arms steadying you, you manage to rock yourself back and forth in rhythm, arching your back and tucking your pelvis like the sway of a pendulum.

This is technically a public place, but you’ve always needed breathwork to get yourself there, so you don’t bother trying to keep quiet. "Haa—aah!"

From the corner of your eye, you see the feet of passersby slow, perhaps searching for the sources of the obscene mewling and hitched sighs pouring forth from your lips.

"Aaangh!"

At some point, his arm wraps around your lower back to keep you upright as you ride his thigh. His other hand braces your chest, squeezing your breasts. Thumb and fingers caress your nipples over the fabric of your bodysuit.

The tempo of your hips alternates between slow, heavy circles and shallow rapid thrusts—your clit so swollen, the rigid metal pinches with each pass. This wet, you glide through every motion, your taut calves and hamstrings trembling. Then, the rising tension peaks into a hot, cresting wave that spreads across every surface of your body.

Your fingers dig into the back of his neck, your scalp tingles, the tightness in your chest releases, and your cunt throbs numbly.

Your panting, plus the cry you let loose, have surely clued the Mandalorian that you’ve already cum, but he continues to hold you in place, one arm around your back, the other gripping your ribs.

You rest your head on his shoulder and pull your arms down from around his neck to grasp his hips under the flak vest and tassets, where there’s only one layer of fabric. The closest you can get to him.

For now.

“Come on,” he says, finally pulling his leg out from between your thighs, setting you back down. “You’ve got fifty thousand credits burning a hole in your pocket.”

*****************

Keep reading - Volume 3 - Post #9: Drugstore Cowgirl

Back to Volume 3 - all posts

#mandalorian x reader #mandalorian x you #mando smut #sexy mando #sexymando #mando x reader #mando x you #the mandalorian smut #din dijarin x reader #mando fanfiction #mandalorian fanfic #the mandalorian #mandalorian smut #din djarin #star wars smut #din djarin smut

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bcdrawsandwrites · 8 months

Text

Day 5: Hostage / Kidnapping / Held at gunpoint

Characters: Truman Zanotto, Caligosto Loboto

Warnings: None

Summary: It's not the first time Truman's been in a dangerous situation, but it might be the first time he's unable to get himself out of one.

---~~~---

The first thing he became aware of was a foggy headache--the kind that made one feel like they should just go back to bed, or else wake up with a strong cup of coffee. The former sounded more appealing right now, so he tried to turn over to make himself more comfortable.

Only to find that he couldn't.

He also definitely wasn't under any sort of covers, nor was he lying on a bed.

Opening his eyes with a gasp, Truman's gaze darted around, trying to determine his surroundings. Before he could even figure out where he was, he tried to reach out a telepathic message to Lili to see if she was all right. Their mental connection wasn't always perfect, however--Lili often deliberately shut it off--and he half-expected the attempt to fail.

He did not, however, expect the sudden spike of nausea and dizziness at attempting telepathy, and groaned.

"Well, now! The patient awakes!" came an unfamiliar, ashy voice from directly behind his head. "You're a bit early for that..."

Truman craned his neck back to try to get a look at his abductor. His vision was fuzzy, and annoyingly there were two very bright lights directly behind him, one red and one green. It wasn't until those lights suddenly moved to shine directly over him that he realized that they weren't just lights--they were directly attached to the face of a person. Over his eyes, specifically--or, perhaps, they were his eyes. The man had blue skin, multiple facial scars, and an impossibly wide smile filled with yellow teeth. A bright green shower cap with floral patterns adorned his head.

While Truman knew he needed to be gathering any information he could possibly get out of this place, his immediate reaction was to recoil in horror. "Get away from me!"

"Pbbbt!" The man stuck his tongue out, inadvertently spitting in Truman's face. "That's no way to talk to your dentist!"

"Dentist?" He struggled to think past the fog in his head. Why did dentist sound familiar? And the silhouette of this man--he swore he'd seen it before, perhaps somewhere in the Psychonauts' files... Regardless, he shook his head, casting a look around the room. Focus, focus--he'd gotten out of worse before. He just had to gather some information. "Where am I?"

"My office!" the dentist said, stepping back and gesturing to the space around them with his prosthetic arm. "Amazing, isn't it?"

Truman blinked a few times to clear his vision, finally taking in the sight of the space around them--an observatory of some sort with a domed ceiling overhead, a large metal sphere suspended from the ceiling, and multiple people wearing hazmat suits wandering around. There was also something oddly familiar about this place, but he couldn't put a finger on it. "Strange place for an office," he remarked.

"Well, it's not like my old office, but it's a lot more spacious." The man twirled, tipping his head back as though to regard the space. He wore a long brown apron with a complicated bunch of straps in the back, and a long white coat beneath that. "Gets the job done, and has a lot of fascinating things to study out here!"

Something clicked in Truman's mind, and he leaned forward as much as his bonds allowed, not needing to feign his interest. "What sort of things do you study?"

The dentist hummed, turning his back. "Oh, some fascinating marine life, and some very fancy rocks..."

Right--psitanium or psilirium. Probably the latter, given the way it was blocking his powers and making him feel dizzy. Marine life, though... He ran through a few things in his mind, mentally going over a list of locations.

Tap-tap-tap, tap-tap-tap.

Jolting out of his thoughts, Truman found his kidnapper suddenly leaning over him again, tapping his fingers--no, claws--against the arm of his chair.

"You're awfully quiet for someone who was, hm, taken far away from his home," the dentist remarked, his smile twitching and looking just a touch angrier.

Truman gave a nervous laugh. "Ah, I'm just thinking! Someone brilliant enough to be able to kidnap the Grand Head of the Psychonauts must be a talented individual! And you look quite... familiar."

A metallic shriek made him grit his teeth as the dentist's claws seized the arm of the chair, digging into it. "Come again?"

"I know you--you've got a file a mile long in our records," Truman said. "You've worked for some pretty famous clients, too, haven't you? The Noodler was one, as I recall. I had to deal with that mess you helped create. Quite the piece of work you managed to do."

"Yes, that one was an interesting client," the man--Dr. Loboto, Truman remembered the name--said, turning away for a moment. But his eyes, which were on telescoping loupes, suddenly snapped back over to Truman. "You're not going to get anything out of me about my current client, though!" He leaned in close enough for Truman to smell the peppermint toothpaste in his breath. "Doctor-patient confidentiality."

"Ah, yes, very important!" Truman let out another forced laugh. "Good... good to see you've a strong moral code."

"Morals?" Loboto echoed, then threw his head back with a wild laugh. "I haven't seen him in a while!" Idly he picked up a pair of pliers off of a nearby tray, turning the tool in his hand. "He had six decayed teeth in his upper jaw, last I saw him! Well, not anymore..."

"That's... fascinating." Shutting his eyes, Truman tried to remember something from this man's file. He always worked with someone, but had he done any kidnapping on his own? He couldn't recall it... But who could have gotten to him? Especially with all the security measures, both in the Motherlobe and in his own home! It would've had to be someone he knew. A traitor? A mole? But who?

Oleander showed problems sometimes, and Sasha had his issues, but neither of them, surely. But... what about...

He opened his eyes to find Loboto staring directly down into his face again. "Say," he said, before Loboto could speak, "you seem like you'd get along with someone I know. Have you ever heard of a Nick J--"

Loboto's hand grasped the front of his robes, yanking him upward, and his claws were at his throat.

Both arms were shaking. Sweat trickled down the side of the dentist's neck.

Loboto spoke through gritted teeth. "I think," he said, "we're done here."

His smile twisted into the angriest grin Truman had ever seen in his life.

"Goodbye!"

He dropped Truman heavily back onto the chair, and in one swift motion, covered his nose and mouth with a cloth. Truman fought as long as he could, but the last thing he saw before descending into unconsciousness was the permanent grin of the dentist shifting into something resembling a frown.

#caligosto loboto #truman zanotto #psychonauts #psychonauts 2 #ailesswhumptober2023 #psychonauts 2 spoilers #my writing #fanfic #okay here i'm tired of not having anything posted #I like to think that as the grand head of the Psychonauts Truman would be pretty smart #but of course after the events of RoR he was too dazed to be of help #(right before you-know-what happened anyway)

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myers-meadow · 1 year

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A sneaking suspicion: Mischa (OC) x reader

Title: A sn(e)aking suspicion

Pairing: my OC Mischa x reader.

Summary: During a ghost hunting case in an old university, things don't add up. There's a strange sound in the walls, and as you dread having to tell the headmisstress about the bullying that took place, you search deeper. And deeper. There you find a sorcerer, a being of magic, who has a proposition for you.

Warnings: threats of violence, mentions of bullying, a snake. Nothing graphic. Reader has long hair.

Word count: 2324 words

Here he is!! I hope you enjoy this first introduction into this new world (that isn't all too different from ours), and that you have fun meeting Mischa! ✨ Please let me know what you think; reblogs, comments are all very welcome! If you have anymore questions about this universe or about the characters - don't be shy, I'd love to answer them <3. Thank you so much again for your encouragment and kindness @vincent-sinclair-deserved-better @devil-doll13 @house-of-slayterr <3

Dividers by delishlydelightfuldividers

“So, this college,” I started, looking at the headmistress’ stern face, “is haunted?”

Sharing a look with my ghost hunting partner and boyfriend, Timo, just as his gaze flickered over to me with the same concern. Something really serious must have happened here if the haunting was legitimate. Which will unavoidably be something headmistresses don’t like having to deal with.

“The students said the apparitions manifested mostly in the girl’s bathroom on the second floor. Follow me.”

Her heels clacked on the pristine marbled floors, and before long, the door to the haunted bathroom swung open. It smelled strange inside, like a mix of food gone bad and pine scented cleaning supplies. Timo stepped in first, setting down his big backpack to take out some equipment. He handed me the tripod to set up as he took the camera from its case. Walking around the space, white with bright LED lighting, I tried feeling a spot where it would be good in. Nothing felt out of the ordinary yet, so I settled for in the corner, with sight of the mirrors and the door to the hallway, rather than the toilet stalls.

“All good?” Timo asked, and I nodded. He screwed the camera on top of the tripod, as he did so, I checked out the stalls. To see if there was any writing, any cold spots, weird gusts of wind… Nothing. Only a very strange sound from the pipes overhead. As if something… slithered. Not water, no, and not the creaking of old pipes either. There was no toilet cover, so instead I hiked up my skirt and stepped up on the seat to see if I could hear it better. Just as I reached up to the ceiling, Timo pushed open the door to the stall.

“What you doing in here?” he asked. The noise faded.

“Thought I heard something,” I mumbled, letting him help me down.

“And?” the headmistress started, tapping her foot impatiently. “What did you find?”

“Nothing yet, ma’am,” said Timo, and took out some more equipment. Temperature sensor, listening device…

“Are there any other locations that are said to be haunted?” I asked, to keep the headmistress occupied.

She shook her head. “But I wouldn’t know, perhaps you’d better talk with the students.”

And so I did. The weird sound seemed to follow me through the walls or ceiling. When asked, the headmistress said it was old copper pipes, but it seemed unlikely. The rushing of water when someone took a shower was also audible, but this was distinct. The interviews with the students were as expected; no, they didn’t see much, no, they never messed with the occult, no, they never went left their rooms past curfew. They were lying, of course. There was one girl, more quiet than the rest, who received strange looks from the others. After I said we were done with the questions, the group relaxed. On the way out, it just so happened I was heading in the same direction that the lone girl was: the library. She looked clever, with sharp brown eyes.

“I can tell there’s something no one’s telling me. And I don’t mean sneaking out after curfew, I don’t care about that.”

She regarded me from the side, clutching her book bag to her chest. “You’re not gonna tell the headmistress?”

I shook my head with a laugh. “I frankly don’t care if you went out after curfew, did drugs or went to the boy’s wing. This is just my job. If we solve whatever’s going on, we get paid. The rest doesn’t matter to me.”

With a strange look, she leaned in closer and said: “Have you ever seen Carrie?”

It was almost unbelievable; a case of bullying so severe that the poor girl left school (some say she went home, others say she died, we can’t know for sure), and now her ghost and residual bad memories haunted the place. After this came out and I confronted the earlier students a second time, they had more details to share. Some recalled ‘buckets worth of blood falling from the ceiling’, or pipes bursting. Weird whispers in the library, things levitating, all of that was seen, according to students. The girl who talked to me was one of the reluctant bystanders of the bullying, and it was a great relief to her to finally have adults involved. Something still bothered me, though. What was the noise then? Those could hardly be described as whispers. We’d have to talk to the student who went home after this phase of research was done, and it felt like an idle hope to have our questions cleared up fully. None of it added up.

Checking in with Timo went as usual, he said we needed more evidence (partly for the case, partly for on the blog), so even though I wanted to get out of there, we’d be there for a while. He wasn’t one to listen to feelings and dismissed my suspicions. Sometimes a case is just too easy, but to him that was just a lucky one. Not particularly feeling like keeping the headmistress company and hearing her “How could this happen, and right under our noses!” for much longer than needed, so I went off following the strange noise in the walls.

The university was inside of a strange, old building, older than I previously thought. And larger, almost maze-like. Some parts of it had bullet holes still in the walls, and I traced my fingers over them as I listened for the direction of the sounds. Deeper, and lower, my search took me. There was a cellar, with racks for wine, and behind one of the large barrels was a wooden door, that led to a backroom. The deeper I went, the more the feeling that something wasn’t right with this school crept up on me. After descending a ladder – which should have really been a red flag – there were tunnels. That in itself wasn’t strange, lots of old buildings have tunnels, right?

It was dark, but decently lit enough with the flashlight on my phone. The space smelled of dirt and stale water, a natural scent. The stones of the small tunnel were worn down in spots, moss growing in the cracks. After a bit, symbols lined the walls and my heart hammered in my chest. This wasn’t a simple ghost, this was occultism. I was right, something’s down here! Timo’ll never believe me. Some of the symbols reminded me of old sigils, but it was hard to tell, as they were crudely etched into the imperfect bricks. I turned a corner, trying to listen, but there was only the echo of my footsteps and the blood rushing in my ears. A sound echoed, different, almost a voice, and I halted, heart skipping a beat. Again, it was… hissing. The hissing of an animal. Covering my phone flashlight with my hand, I inched closer, letting the smallest bits of light be enough. The sound moved away. Not wanting to lose whatever was down here, wanting so stupidly badly to find out what it was, I followed the sound hastily. Another corner and- a door. Light shone from under it. There was only half a thought of how strange it was, for this tunnel system to end in such an ordinary looking door, but it didn’t stop me from opening it.

Inside was a room, lit by candles and oil lamps. A much more welcoming space, compared to the damp tunnels. A somewhat normal room, a study, with a desk, chairs, a bookshelf. The back wall was lined with pillars, gaping darkness beyond them. And by the desk in the middle of the room a man. He turned as he heard me come in, and beckoned me in.

I wanted to say something, ask what he was doing here, who he was, but nothing came out, as I stared at the symbols drawn on the floor. They came to a central point and I made a mental note to avoid its centre.

“Welcome,” the man said, “make yourself at home.”

At first I thought this could be a misunderstanding, but the shivers that ran down my spine were sure this was nothing good.

“Who are you?”

“I’m surprised you got this far. You are here because of the,” he waved his hands around, “happenings upstairs?”

“That was you? They thought it was a ghost.”

There were markings on his face, small ones, but enough to show he wasn’t an ordinary man. A sorcerer. I’ve only heard the stories, enough to make my heart skip a beat. He smiled as if he knew.

Softly, he spoke words in an entirely different language and the sound from before returned, closing in, growing louder. Then, through the pillars, the head of a giant monstrosity of a dragon- no! A snake! I stared at it, slapping my hand in front of my mouth in shock at the size of it. Those horror movies with the giant snake in the rain forests hold no candle to this one. To witnessing it in person. Like standing in the middle of a storm, aware of the brute force of nature, of how small and insignificant my tiny human life is. The creature, flicking its tongue out to smell the air – smell my fear – and slid more and more of her into the room. Her body was long too, and soon she blocked off the exit I came in here with, and kept going. I turned around to keep looking at her, in a circle. It was as if there was no end to her.

“You and that boyfriend of yours make a nice team.” The man spoke again and in my amazement, I’d almost forgotten he was there. My eyes snapped up to his.

Bewildered, I pointed to the snake, who coiled more of itself into the room, already pushing the desk aside to reach its master.

“She is yours?”

“It's easy to tell you're the real brain behind your operation," he continued without answering the question. "A bit reckless though, going down into an old tunnel system all by yourself. No one knows you're here."

That settled like icy water in my veins. He smiled, the crow’s feet around the corners of his eyes made him look almost kind. The snake finished another lap around the room and I had to move closer to the centre of the room to avoid touching her.

"Why pick this place, this university?" I asked, perhaps to find out his motivations, to buy time until the snake gaped open its maw and devours me. Feverishly looking at any possible exit but all there was, was the snake and its glistening scales.

"Are you afraid of her?" Between the slithering and the glimmer, he stood perfectly still. “Her name’s Belle.”

“Nice to meet you, Belle,” I said, sarcastically, not daring to take my eyes off of him. The body of the snake was cold to the touch, it pushed me closer to the centre of the room.

“Will you not introduce yourself?” and he said my name. It rolled off his tongue with ease, the lilt in his voice making it sound foreign, like a spell. How did he know?

“Seems there’s no need.” Another cautious step closer, feeling the snake behind me, touching the braid that hung down my back.

“I’m Mischa,” he said, reaching out to touch her skin absentmindedly. I thought she’d stop moving at his touch, but she didn’t.

Took a sharp breath, and answered with politeness. Another “pleased to meet you”, and a proper introduction. The sorcerer nodded in acknowledgement. Every few breaths I had to shuffle closer, the space quickly growing cramped.

"Someone as hard-headed as you, with wits like you, would make a great partner. Too bad the one you have now is this slow and incompetent."

We were at arms distance then. He smelled of moss, of wet dirt. Lazily his gaze trailed over me, the growing panic didn’t affect him. "You must've noticed you’re not leaving here alive-" I nodded, both hands bracing against the snake at my back, as I leaned as far away from him as possible. "But that would be a waste, would it not? Would you hear my proposition?"

If he keeps talking this slowly I’ll be crushed before he finishes. I nodded wildly.

"Why don't you give up your silly ghost hunt, and become my partner instead?" Just as the distance shrunk as the snake forcefully pushed me closer, only the length of a forearm left. Mischa’s hand fell into the hair at the nape of my neck. He dragged his nails over my scalp idly. When he spoke again, his voice dropped lower, an intimate, secretive tone. "Be my apprentice… I'll teach you the language of snakes, or how to shape fire, how to conjure elementals, how to sprout a tree from a seed, levitate objects with just your mind... Just say the word, and leave that pesky boyfriend behind. Great deeds are waiting for us."

I avoided his eyes, my silence taken as resistance. With cold fingers he tilted my chin up to look him in the eye.

"You might want to consider if there's much of your partner left to go back to, if you think it best to refuse my offer." And his smile then was anything but kind. A tongue, forked like that of a snake darted out to wet his lips, and my predicament was claustrophobic. The fright of my heart, irregular, a sharp gasp instead of an answer. What was there to answer? There is no retort for this but- anything but death. Mischa saw my thoughts form, reading me like an open book. Saw how my resilience crumbled, and leaned down to seal my fate with a cruelly tender forehead kiss.

#writing #original writing #writeblr #slasher community #Mischa: 🐍#aaaaAAAAAAAAh its finally done!! i was such a nasty perfectionist with this one but i feel its still not perfect #oh well;; ^^ hope you enjoy!!#and on to more amazing fics with him! more smut and romance too especially alksdjfksjdf

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world-of-horrors-au · 8 months

Text

Pruning Roses - Chapter 5

[Set in the post-apocalyptic/dystopian Horrors AU, see pinned post on this blog for more information]

Briar finally gets some much needed medical attention. Toby did a number on her, and Masky doesn't seem happy about it. But the conversation between him and Skully just leaves Briar with more questions than answers...

CW: description and discussion of injuries - that's about it, I think

Notes: N/A

The Beast purred. Her head rested on Briar's wrist, green eyes closed in comfortable bliss. Briar ran her fingers through the thick black fur, feeling the muscles deep below. Fury was a beautiful creature, and a wonderful distraction from and comfort to her situation.

Exhaling, Briar looked up at the ceiling fan as it turned lazy circles overhead. The pain still throbbed in her body but she guessed she was healing. It was easier to breathe through her nose now, though the skin around her eyes had swelled up, she could feel it. Something scraped in her chest and she was trying not to think about whatever had broken loose impaling one of her organs and ending her life.

God… she was thirsty.

Briar looked towards the bathroom door. Was the water from the sink safe to drink? If the shower worked then they had running water, through the same mysterious methods that allowed the safe houses her family stayed in to have water. In those houses, the water could be red with rust, or clear as from a spring. She licked her lips. Did she want to try?

Fury stopped purring, lifting her head as Briar moved her hand away. She whined, worry in her eyes. Shushing the wolfcat, Briar shifted. Her body protested, tears stinging her eyes, but this was not the worst pain she'd felt in her life. She pressed her palm against the mattress and pushed up.

The pain washed over her mind. She couldn't think, but instead let her body go through the natural motions of getting up. Every part of her screamed but she moved. Sitting up. Shifting her hips. God it hurt. One leg over the side of the bed. The other leg over the side. Inching to the edge. Fire in her body, knives in her bones. Her shoes hit the floor. Briar stood.

The floor caught her body. She must've blacked out for a moment, because the next thing she heard was a furious, guttural bark. Fury. Briar gasped for air. Everything hurt. She could taste blood on her tongue.

A door slammed open, footsteps pounding towards her. A man cursed, and she couldn't tell who it was but god she hoped it wasn't Hoodie. Someone lifted her off the floor, and she breathed in the smell of nicotine.

"You're fast," an unfamiliar voice said from nearby. Briar whined.

"What were you trying to do?" Masky said, but it wasn't to the man who just spoke.

She swallowed, lips struggling to form the words. Speaking wasn't happening, but her lips curled around it anyway. Water…

He seemed to understand, but his words were going in and out of focus. She felt his arms shift, and something made of plastic pressed against her lips. Briar almost pushed him away, but her arms were too weak. She opened her mouth, and the cold water flowed into her body.

When the bottle was pulled away, Briar's head fell back. Just as air flowed back into her lungs, coherent thought returned to her mind. It hurt but… She closed her eyes as Masky picked her up. For some reason, this one was kind to her.

Maybe it was just out of pity. She was so pathetic right now.

Masky laid her down on the bed on her back. Briar didn't open her eyes as his hand brushed against her forehead.

"Shit, she looks worse than I thought," the unfamiliar voice, Skully she guessed, said. "You sure you don't want Beastie doing this? He's better at this than me."

"He won't go near her." Masky didn't move away, his fingers still tracing over her forehead.

"Gee, wonder why that is?" Skully's voice was dry.

The fingers paused, then pulled away from her skin. Somewhere nearby, Fury growled.

"Take it easy, big girl," Skully said, the words accompanied by the sound of a hand patting fur. "She's gonna be okay. You can sit on the end of the bed and watch, is that better?"

The wolfcat huffed. A moment later, something large jumped onto the bed near Briar's feet. She felt the beast sit down, a grumbling noise following the action. A hand patted fur again.

"Alright, let's see…"

A hand set down on her torso and Briar sucked in a pained breath. If Skully noticed, he ignored it, running his hands over her body through her clothes. His touch was professional, he'd definitely done this before. As his fingers touched a certain spot, pain shot threw her and she let out a soft cry.

"Easy," Masky hissed.

"Calm down, jeez." Skully pulled his hand away. "Nothing's broken but I think one of her ribs is cracked. Can't do anything about that but wait for it to heal. Young as she is, that could be a while."

"Hoodie will be glad to hear that," Masky said, but there was nothing glad in his tone.

Now the hands moved to her limbs, feeling them, lifting them up. Skully checked every finger and her ankles. It was like her body was a doll he was trying to pose. Briar hated all of it. As he checked, he listed off her injuries.

"Pulled muscles… bruises… think that's a sprain… nose was broken but it's healed already… black eyes… looks like he hit her neck at some point… yeah, she'll survive. I'll give her some ointment to make the swelling go down and painkiller tea. But Hoodie-"

"Doesn't want her trying to escape, I know," Masky said.

"He said you're in charge of her treatment."

"You'll help me, right?"

Quiet. Skully's hands pulled away from her body.

"You know I can't disobey him," Skully said in a soft voice.

"He's said you can't?" Masky said.

"He's given you first dibs. Until you take action, everything involving her is up to you and you alone."

"Shit. He's serious about this?"

"Yeah, and I am too. You can't keep living this way."

Masky sucked in a breath, she heard it clear, but Skully cut him off.

"Shh, you'll wake her up. I'll go get the ointment and tea, you stay here. No buts."

The other man huffed, but Skully didn't seem to care. Footsteps led to the door, and she heard it swing shut. Under his breath, Masky said something, too low for her to hear, but she assumed it was a curse. The bed shifted. Briar opened her eyes a crack, to find the masked man sitting down next to Fury on the end of the bed.

"If he weren't with Hoodie, I swear to God, Fury…"

The wolfcat leaned her head into his touch, lowering down onto the bed with her limbs under her large body. Masky pet her, his hand burying into her fur, as she loafed between him and Briar.

Briar closed her eyes again, turning things over in her head. The proxies found some kind of value in her, if they were bothering to treat her injuries like they would one of her own. Why, she couldn't imagine… No, no she could imagine. It was something about the Tall Man, wasn't it? There was no way any of them would confirm that, not yet at least.

She opened her eyes a crack again, staring at Masky through her eyelashes. Fury was an ally… perhaps she could get this man on her side, too. But how? And what the hell did 'first dibs' mean?

#horrors au #creepypasta au #creepypasta #bad luck briar #creepypasta fanfic #creepypasta masky #creepypasta skully

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stevenbasic · 1 year

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GITJ Post 327: A Saturday at Melissa's, p2 (12pm: Dr. J)

And that’s how I found myself gripping her big pink double-K-cup bra, walking down the stairs, periodically drawing a deep breath from it.

I’d woken again another hour later, mortified to find my face still pressed into the right cup of the bra she’d left me on her pillow aside me. She figured I’d want “to snuggle with it”. I’d certainly more than snuggled with it and quickly realized I’d need to clean myself and - best I could - these sheets. I’d peeled my face out, left the bra behind, and made it to the en-suite bathroom. Just a lav for a guest room but the ceiling soared, a skylight brightening white walls, chrome fixtures and beautiful pale stone tile work naturally. A big tub with multiple jets that looked like it could seat five dominated one corner, but it was in the separate glassed-in shower that I found myself getting a little queasy. I’d needed to clean myself off, but even the nicely warm water from the overhead rain head couldn’t wash away my building nausea. I recognized the feeling, hoping I wouldn’t start retching as I toweled off, and was drawn back to the bed.

Oversized towel around my undersized waist, I’d realized that I’d begun to feel better the closer I got to the bed. When I sat down, on Melissa’s side of the mattress, and gathered some sheets in my fist to bring them to my face my stomach actually settled a little bit, breathing her in. It smelled like her, and made me feel better. Her perfume, or maybe her laundry detergent, must have some anti-nausea properties? I’ll have to ask her about that, I decided, and took another deep breath. That’s pretty helpful. Indeed, as soon as I stood up, left the bed, my nausea returned.

In the meantime, I’d known I couldn’t spend the day nakedly wrapped in a towel. I needed to get down to the laundry where Melissa said she’d done my clothes. I’d looked at the bra she’d left me, recalled how the smooth, perfumed inner surface of the right cup had embraced my face. The thought was mortifying but I didn’t know if I had a choice. Besides, there was no one else here to see me. And so there I was, on the stairs…

I took another deep breath from the inner surface of her silky-smooth, double-K-cup underwire and finally reached the bottom of the stairs. White, waffle-weave towel around my waist, there was little hiding the other embarrassment of yet another erection tenting my erstwhile skirt; each breath from her bra indeed seemed to fortify it.

Again, thank god I was alone. I was looking for the downstairs laundry and found myself wandering, bra-to-face, giving myself another tour. I meandered through the kitchen, saw the great room where we’d spent some time last night, and walked by a display table on which a number of framed photos sat. There were a number on the wall, as well.

I’d say ‘aw, adorable’ usually when finding family photos, obviously arranged by a proud mom, but whoah. These were not awkward high school portraits, or crying toddlers on Santa’s lap. Pictures of Melissa as a teen, alongside those of a redhead who I assumed was the sister she’d mentioned in passing, were far beyond ‘adorable’. She’d obviously been a hottie right out of the gate, and her sister no slouch either.. Frozen, now gawping and feeling my cock rise even further and threaten to tear the thin towel from my waist, I barely registered the few blank spaces on the wall where pictures had been taken down, or the actual empty frames on the table. No pictures of any hints of parents or other family members, either. Not even a family pet. There was a cat around here somewhere, right?

Weird, I finally thought, but still found myself gripping my cock through the towel and mindlessly picking up the school-girl shot of Melissa from behind the others. I gripped myself, stroked, and tried to make out the titles of the books she was holding, or find the hint of bra through her uniform. Just a quick one, I thought to myself, as I inhaled again from the inside of her bra cup and drifted over towards the couch, one to clear the head…

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#growing into the job

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yjano · 1 year

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Who I am now?

Part 12.

Pairing: Jake x Mc.

Genre: Angst, comedy, dark romance.Warnings: Strong language, angst scenes. 18+ content can be found.

Words: 7.4k

Author's note: This story contains mature topics and is not fully related to the duskwood game. A different parallel with different personalities. Thank you everyone for following and liking this! lly.♡

•

Mc focus.

Once the train trundled into the unknown city and filed into a train station. I can't remember the name of it, but we both exited the busy train and stepped onto the busier platform with no intention of speaking to one another. We both have come to terms with the whole we kissed each other and we both liked it ordeal but that didn't stop the immense awkwardness from leaking and creating a heavy uncomfortableness between us.

Neither of us said a word as we made the way along the crowded platform, heading towards the exit of the train station. We walked out of the station and onto a town square of some sort. I nervously chewed my lower lip at the number of people crowding around me. It was hectic as it was an afternoon and dark clouds were hanging overhead threateningly, warning people of upcoming showers, and causing them to scuttle quickly to their homes or workplaces.

Jake with hands in his pockets and with a plushie shoved under his right armpit, stridden ahead, walking briskly through the town square, ignoring the several lines of chain store shops advertising branded clothing and the amazing food stalls that lined the roads.

I've noticed Jake stopping to watch a guy playing the guitar. I tagged along standing close to him, amazed by how beautifully the guy was playing. When the guy finished, I clapped loudly turning to face Jake with a grin on my face.

"That was so-" I started but as soon as my eyes latched onto Jake's lips, I abruptly stopped and quickly turned away, blushing hard as once again I was reminded of the kiss. I noticed Jake hurriedly turning away in the other direction, red colored his ears.

"We should go." Jake breathed. I nodded not bothering to look up and meet his gaze. "Right, so. Let's go." Jake stammered, starting to walk away from the playing guy. I followed after him holding my oversized plushie under one arm.

We stopped at a teeny building wedged in between two clothing shops, looking positively suffocated as it was standing there. We walked inside the coffee shop, the interior was pleasantly cute.

Matching colored chairs and tables are around the place, allowing customers to seat themselves and sip at drinks of their own choice. It was a calming atmosphere. We took a seat by the large floor-to-ceiling windows. Jake took the menu, quickly scanning its contents before silently passing it to me.

"Choose something big." He said when I took the menu. "You need to gain some fucking weight." He added on in a mutter, looking out of the window to watch the rain clouds finally burst and spill down on the land below.

"Oh. Okay." I mumbled, blinking at Jake before looking down at the menu in my hand. I run my eyes over the listed items with my stomach growling at every food name I passed by. They all sound extremely good to me and It had been days since I'd had a proper meal. A waitress sidled up to our table, asking if we were ready to order. I hurriedly draw my hoodie and mask over my face whilst Jake was speaking.

"Yeah, I'm gonna have the grilled steak with the side salad and an americano, please." He finished with a small smile, he turned to me, "Mc?" I looked up from the menu and cleared my throat several times before speaking.

"Okay! I'd like cheese pasta, one slice of cheese and tomato pizza, one portion of chicken bites, one regular portion of fries, one cheeseburger, one fruit salad, one cheesecake, one latte, and one water bottle. I think that's it. Thank you!" I beamed at the perplexed waitress who scribbled down notes fast.

Jake was staring at me, I mouthed him a 'what' when I caught him staring but he just looked at the struggling waitress. She confirmed our orders once more before walking. Once she walked away Jake turned to me.

"When I said to order something big. I meant to order a dish that will fill you up. Not to order a third of the godamn menu. Fuck, Mc." He spluttered out, incredulous.

"A dish won't fill me up, I'm starving." I protested. "Besides you told me to gain some weight, and I'm doing just that." I winked at him, forgetting the clueless Mc act. Jake just rolled his eyes.

"The hell am I supposed to pay for all this?" Jake questioned himself, shaking his head in disbelief. I scoffed, narrowing my eyes at him. It's a little payback for not telling me who you are at first.

"As if you're not freaking rich. You own a fucking jeep." His eyes darkened a little.

"Don't talk so lightly about the car I ditched to save your sorry ass," Jake warned before dropping his tone to a low mumble, shaking his head. "Poor red eye."

I stilled at his words, I heard Lex name him a red eye but he had named his car the same nickname.

"You named your car? You name it your nickname?"

"Red eye is a nickname for my car, Lex just uses it to annoy me." Jake corrected bitterly. I tried to hold my laughter in, but the fact my dear hacker boy named his car like that, made me burst out laughing. I laughed hard, slapping my palm repeatedly against the table in disbelief. Jake was just glaring at me.

My laugh finally turned into breathy little huffs, Jake raised an eyebrow with a scowl on his face.

"Done?" He scowled, leaning back in his seat with his arms folded over his chest.

With my cheeks practically splitting in half because of my too-wide smile, I nodded.

"Hey, your dressing's got dirty. You should re-bandage it." I hummed, still smiling lightly.

"Huh? Oh, yeah." Jake murmured, bringing his fingers to graze the bandaged wound on his forehead.

"I'm sure the workers here have got a first aid box somewhere." I thought aloud, "Ask them for a bandage and I will bandage it up for you." I told him simply with a slight smile on my face.

"Do you know how to change a bandage?" He scoffed, looking at me weirdly.

"Yeah, it's not that hard." I shrugged, distractedly playing with the salt and pepper shakes.

A few minutes later, I stood over Jake whilst he was sitting on his chair, looking almost bored.

"Okay, gloves," I ordered, opening my palm so Jake could reluctantly hand me the medical gloves. I slid the plastic over my hands before taking the first aid box from the waitress who hovered over us nervously.

I rummaged around for the gauze pad, taking the pad and strip bandages out as well as scissors before turning to Jake.

"I'll take off the bandage. Tell me if it hurts okay?" I smiled at him, placing my gloved hands on the end of Jake's bandage, peeling the medical tape away, and unraveling the dressing carefully with shaky hands.

"Your hands are shaky." Jake pointed out as he was staring up at my face, expressionless.

"My hands seem to shake when I'm around you," I mumbled without thinking through properly, too distracted by the task at hand.

"What?" Jake coughed, clearly caught off guard by my words. My eyes widened and my movements stilled when I realized my words.

"What?" I quickly answered, hurriedly unwrapping jungkook's bandage with sudden speed.

"You just-"

"Stop staring at me." I choked out, reddening by the second. Jake's narrowed eyes bore into me, making my heartbeat race and my eyes blink like crazy. Feeling too nervous, I peeled the bandage away from his wound a little too harshly, causing Jake to wince in pain.

"Fuck, I'm sorry." I apologized quickly, frantically dumping the dirty bandage in the bin provided by the waitress who watched us with interest as if the two of us were leading a movie.

I took the gauze pad with strong hesitation, ignoring Jake's questioning stare, I fixed the pad over the purple-red gash on his forehead. I cringed at the injury. It looked so bad and it must've hurt like a bitch.

"Does it hurt too much?" I asked quietly, taking the bandage in my hands while looking down at Jake with slight sadness.

"I can handle the pain. It's okay, stop looking like you're about to cry."

"I'm not going to!" I argued back. Jake just sighed pushing away gently.

"Here, sit down and let me do it. I just gotta wrap it around my head three times, right?" Jake asked, taking the roll of bandage from my grasp. I frowned but went back to my side of the table, seating down whilst watching and instructing him on how to wrap his forehead up.

"Hold on, I will stick it down," I ordered, tearing a bit of medical tape to stick down the end and leaning over the chequered tablecloth to stick the end of the bandage down. I pulled away, satisfied with the result. Packing the first aid box and closing it, I handed it over to the waitress, smiling and thanking her.

I sighed and turned my head to face the window which was laden with rain droplets. Soon enough, the same waitress wandered over to our table with a plate of grilled steak and another smaller plate of side salad and americano followed. I watched rather sullenly as Jake was digging into his meal.

A heavy sigh left my mouth and I turned to watch the tv show displayed on the screen. Hungrily waiting for my meal.

"It's your fault, Mc. You should've ordered one meal, not ordered a goddamn menu." Jake rolled his eyes when I sighed again, playing with the salt shakers. Suddenly he lift a forkful of grilled steak and offered it to me.

"Want a bit?"

"No, I will wait," I mumbled, resting my head against the table with yet another sigh escaping my lips.

"What the- You look just like a lost puppy with that expression of yours." Jake suddenly started laughing, causing me to beam at him and roll my eyes playfully.

He's laughing like a kid again and I feel like my heart is ready to burst with how freaking soft I feel. My laughter stilled when I caught the sight of Jake shaking his head and laughing, eyes crinkling so-

I looked out of the window quickly when I realized I was staring. With red cheeks, I watched the pitter-patter of the raindrops against the already rain-splattered window.

Jake focus.

Dark hair fell into my line of vision, partly obstructing my view as I was looking out at the streets below me. The streets were pretty much abandoned in this type of weather. Cold torrents of rain and ice-cool winds were enough reasons for people to not go out. If that wasn't enough, the greying clouds above rumbled with a warning, occasionally revealing a threatening gold beam of lightning.

I didn't allow the weather to halt me from enjoying the feel of the wind against my skin. I rested my forearms against the balcony's safety railings and leaned outward slightly to catch sight of the fleets of speeding cars that splatter grey rainwater on a couple of pedestrians who got too close to the curb, causing the soaked walkers to shake their clenched fists and curse loudly at the driver who drives off, completely ignorant.

Picking up the cup of peppermint tea sitting sheltered by the french doors, and bringing the warm cup to my lips, I was blowing softly before tilting the beverage back and swallowing the liquid with a sigh.

I'd much rather have a strong coffee right now, but I was in my friend's apartment, and the only thing stocked beverage-wise is herbal teas.

We were currently taking refuge in my friend's apartment who moved out a while ago but left the accommodation for my taking. I make use of the building from time to time. Whenever I'm on the run it's the perfect place to hide.

It was a one-room home pretty similar to Lex's but not as homely as hers. It was bare, empty, and sparsely furnished with a simple pull-out couch as a bed, a useless tiny kitchenette pressed into the wall and a clean enough bathroom that joined up with the room, which Mc currently used to shower herself clean.

Speaking of Mc. I stopped myself from taking another swig of my tea. Getting reminded of what had happened earlier on after eating out at the coffee shop. The tips of my ears bloomed red, as I recalled holding Mc's hand and loving the feel.

-an hour ago-

Mc walked behind me with a smile on her face, hopping in her steps. We've just walked out of the cafe after Mc had practically inhaled the food down.

You'd think she'd stop halfway through the dishes, announcing that she was going to be sick but no. Mc had happily scarfed down her meals with no complaint. I regarded Mc silently, walking down the road with her close by, mentally noting down the happy smile fixed on her face.

I breathed a sigh of relief, noticing the aforementioned feature on her face because now Mc no longer looked like she hated my presence, and neither did she look as ill as she did before. I was happy about that.

"Where are we going?" Mc asked behind me, voice sounding muffled behind the hoodie drawn up close to her face. The garment attempted to protect the raindrops from hitting her skin. Plushie was sopping wet underneath my arm and Mc was in a similar condition.

However, I was pretty much dry the fact that I was wearing a leather jacket atop my clothes. Mc wasn't nearly so lucky. She walked after me with a hoodie, and shorts sticking to her skin and hair. It was not a pleasant sensation as you can detect by looking at the discomfort on Mc's face.

We somehow managed mentally agree to walk outside in the pouring rain. We just walked through the icy downpour shivering.

"We're going to the store to buy some stuff," I replied, dodging a puddle of rainwater that could potentially soak my much favored but beat-up boots.

"Stuff?" She responded, sounding more than just surprised.

"Yeah. I'm still thinking about what to buy for dessert." I shrugged, turning to her questionably, forgetting my rude act towards her.

"I wouldn't mind eating ice creams or drinking hot chocolate." She smiled, shivering from the cold. The rain burst into a heavier downfall, one that shocked Mc into gasping and squealing as she felt ice-cold raindrops slide down her warm neck.

Luckily the store was nearby and we run to a convenience store that was packed full of people who desperately tried to get out of the rain's way, seeking shelter in the overstuffed grocery store until the freezing downpour passes.

We both walked in, immediately creating a puddle at the entrance of the shop which the shopkeeper tuts at, reaching out for her well-drenched mop. Mc grimaced apologetically at the woman as we started to walk away from the puddling mess.

I subconsciously took her hand so I wouldn't lose her in the busy throngs of people. Completely unaware of the effects of holding hands with Mc, I barged past people, heading down. aisles whilst complaining about the 'idiots' that blocked up the place.

After plowing my way through several pointless sections, I come to a stop at a minuscule section labeled 'sweets'. The little shelved compartment was laden with cheap sweets. I ignored the gummies because I wanted the cake below.

I was about to bend down and pull one of the boxes out to get it and show it to Mc when I realized that I was still holding her hand. Her hand was surprisingly warm in my cool palm. I looked down at our entwined hands, surprised at what I was seeing.

Now, this was usually the bit where I hurriedly pulled my hand away and looked away, embarrassed, but instead, I kinda loved the feeling of someone's hand in my hand, holding on securely so I wouldn't lose the person anytime soon. I love it, especially knowing that it was Mc's hand I was holding.

I should probably let go. Mc's probably finding it super awkward and uncomfortable and gazed down at Mc.

Fuck, she's blushing that's so cute.

"J-JD?" Mc stammered and only then I snapped out of staring at a reddening Mc.

"Oh- uh-" I stuttered, looking away and immediately letting go of her hand, stepping back. I cleared my throat and gestured toward the cakes.

"Choose one that y-you like." I cringed at the stutter in my words, scratching the back of my neck nervously. And we were back to awkwardly blushing.

Mc nodded slowly, bending down onto her haunches to read the labels of the cakes. She picked up the strawberry flavor and studied it whilst chewing on her lip. Shrugging at the choice, she picked up one of the boxes and hand it to me.

"You sure?" I confirmed, raising my brows at her.

"Yeah." Mc nibbled on her lip, worrying about her choice. "Why? You don't like strawberry cake with vanilla?" I shook my head at her words.

"No, I bet it's tasty. Come on, we gotta buy other shit that's needed for dessert and night." I muttered, going off in a random direction to find all the stuff whilst thinking about the firm feeling of Mc's hand in mine.

-an hour later-

I scoffed when I remembered how I had reacted. Stammering and stuttering like a super awkward teen that'd finally mustered up the courage to 'flirt' and had failed rather badly. I groaned at the thought.

Internally beating myself up for my reaction, I set my peppermint tea to the side and resumed leaning my lower arms against the balcony's railing. I clasped my hands tightly, looking down and inspecting the way my own hands interlocked together, resembling very much how my and Mc's hands had looked earlier.

It felt good holding her hand for once, and not her wrist.

Unclasping my hands, I studied the lines embedded into my palm. It felt even nicer when she held on, subconsciously and squeezing it when she got flustered-

Shut up, Jake. Listen to yourself, you idiot.

Shaking my head, I lift my mug back to my lips, gulping down the cooling peppermint tea. Before I could further antagonize my mind. I heard a door click open behind me and someone calling out my name softly.

Mc.

I was supposed to reply to Mc's call and inform her of my presence but I had swallowed way too much unnecessary tea and it was difficult to gulp it all down so suddenly. I heard bare feet padding against the floorboards and turning around. I finally swallowed the tea.

Even though it's been a long since I gulped down the liquid, I somehow managed to choke at what I saw displayed before me.

"Why didn't you answer me when I called for you?!" Mc squealed upon noticing me on the balcony, struggling to keep myself decent looking. "Oh my god!"

Mc was standing there with a red blush coursing from her cheeks to her exposed neck, to her bare arms. The fluffy white towel was sticking to Mc's body, covering her skin. Her dark hair was still damp and plastered to her forehead, causing little droplets of water to snake down the sides of her face, and dear god.

Mc just looks so ethereal with the snowy towel bunching up against her beautiful skin and dark hair. I felt something twitch down there.

I now officially want to die.

"Hurry up and put clothes on. I want to eat the cake already. " I coughed, trying to turn around to allow Mc some privacy but my eyes seem to refuse, running over Mc's lithe frame.

"T-turn around then." Mc stuttered, looking like frightened prey under my eyes. I snapped my gaze upwards to meet Mc's nervous eyes that darted around frantically. We created eye contact for a few loaded seconds before I reluctantly turned away, tongue swiping over my suddenly dry lips.

"Don't peek, okay?" Mc mumbled, rearranging the towel around her once my back facing her.

"Promise first!"

"I promise, chill."

"I'm watching you," Mc warned quietly. I listened to the sound of clothes rustling behind me as Mc was dressing. It took all my might to not peek over my shoulder and catch a glimpse of Mc in the process of changing but I stayed true to my promise and didn't turn around until Mc gave him the okay signal.

"You can turn around now." Mc squealed out, absolutely refusing to make eye contact with me after what'd just happened.

I almost wanted to coo at the sight when I turned around but I managed to restrain myself and instead walked towards the plastic bag dumped nearby to the windows. I picked it up, clearing my throat.

"Shall we eat the damn cake now?" I asked, quirking an eyebrow.

A few moments later, we were sitting on the floor with the cake between us, eating it in silence whilst looking outside the window at the rainy weather.

"I love the taste of this," I stated distractedly pointing at the cupcake. Mc just smiled whilst eating the creamy donut.

"Hold on, let me just-" I murmured, leaning closer and wiping off the scream from her cheek.

"Sorry, I didn't even feel it," Mc mumbled, with her cheeks reddening again.

"It's alright."

"Bye-bye, my tasty brownies," Mc murmured, eating the last brownies while looking into the distance.

"And hello vanilla sticks," I added unconsciously. She hummed in agreement, snacking on vanilla sticks.

We talked about random things and it was pretty nice. Nice to have someone utterly comfortable to talk about the most random and useless topics with. It's been a long time since I was bothered to converse, laugh and joke properly with someone for a lengthy period. So it was pretty nice. I really wish she knew about my identity.

After a while I cleaned up the mess, meanwhile, Mc was brushing her teeth and flopped face front onto the pull-out couch.

Sighing contentedly, I turned on my back and grabbed the remote control lying beside me. I pressed one of the many buttons to awaken the large flat-screen tv in front of me before blindly staring at whatever program came on first.

A while later when the rain stopped, the street switched on its lights and the sky faded to a deep dark blue. Mc emerged from the bathroom, towel-drying her hair with a grin on her face. She decided to cut her front bangs a little whilst we were talking.

I was laying propped up on the pull-out couch, tilting my head to look at Mc better.

"Let's see." I yawned, ignoring the nature documentary displayed on the tv. Still grinning widely, Mc pulled the towel away from her head, humming.

"Tada! what do you think?" Mc runs her hands through her hair, ruffling her long with slightly visible bangs hair. "I think I like it."

I blinked at her standing a meter away.

"Damn."

Fucking hell, how can she pull off everything? I stared at Mc's hair. She looks insanely good with slight bangs. Her looks were almost breathtaking to me to the point I couldn't tear my gaze away, an actual angel.

"Wow? Good damn or bad damn? I can't tell." Mc bit her lower lip, suddenly looking doubtful. I hurried to assure her.

"Good damn. Definitely good damn." I nodded to punctuate my words. She smiled widely, showing off her perfect smile again.

"I'm glad." She hummed, making her way to the pull-out couch, sitting down, and curling up against the arm of the couch with a smile stuck to her face. Mc silently joined in watching the nature documentary I was blankly staring at a minute ago. I sneaked a few peeks in her direction just to admire her new asset.

Fuck, she really is a goddess.

I concluded, finally stopping the unsubtle glances and fixing my sight on the tv.

Twenty minutes into watching the nature program, I heard a soft snore emanating from Mc, I looked over to her side to see Mc fast asleep, mouth parted and drooling slightly.

I chuckled at the sight and leaned over to grab the blanket by my feet, unfolding it and draping it over Mc's sleeping body. I looked away with a smile on my face. I returned to watching the program, but my mind drifted from what was in front of me to what was beside me. Mc.

I'm glad she's getting to do all the things she's always wanted to do with me. She's done how many today? Three? Damn nearly all done.

I mused, placing an arm behind my head to prop my head up. Seeing her look so happy after fulfilling something on her bucket list makes me kinda wanna accomplish something that I've been meaning to do and feel a similar kind of way, but what though?

Something popped into my head causing me to snake a hand to the back pocket of my jeans and pull the worn wallet out into the open. I pulled folded square out, dropping my wallet onto my lap and carefully unfurling the item.

Once the small square expanded to its full size. I smoothed the creases down and studied the black ink polluting the paper's mainly unblemished skin. On the middle of the piece of paper, taking up most of the space is a quickly scrawled design of a couple of detailed roses with shadings and thin dark lines.

It was a meaningless design that I had casually drawn months ago on a lonely train ride when I was on the run but decided to keep it in the end, wanting to perhaps have it inked onto my body someday. Because once you have a tattoo tattooed. You want to have more of them.

Seeing the accomplished looks on Mc's face after crossing out a task on the list, I closed my wallet and slipped it back inside my pocket before taking my phone out to google nearby tattoo parlors.

I found a tattoo parlor a decent way away from the apartment although I'd have to take the bus in. But I don't particularly mind. I was starting to feel pretty excited now at the prospect of finally getting another desired tattoo done.

I heaved myself off the couch and shuffled around to the front door, carefully to not wake Mc up. With my phone and tattoo design in one hand, I bent down by the front door to slip into my boots. I grabbed the jacket hanging off a hook by the door and slide my body into it, the sound of rustling taking over the place.

"What are you doing?" Mc's voice met my ears, making me look over my shoulder at Mc who was sitting up on the couch, the blanket falling from her body.

"Where are you going?" She mumbled, rubbing her eyes.

"Out," I replied, turning away and unlocking the front door. "Go back to sleep, Mc. I will be back soon," I murmured, twisting the door's handle, expecting the half-awake Mc to quickly drift back to sleep.

"Can I come with you?" She suddenly asked timidly, "I don't wanna be here by myself."

Mc focus.

I struggled to keep my eyes open, sitting back against the worn bus seat, tilting my head slightly to look out of the windows at the fleeting streetlamps we were passing by. On my right was Jake who was hunched over in his seat, distractedly scribbling away at a piece of folded paper spread on his thigh. I leaned over slightly to get a look at what he was scrawling so earnestly.

"That's good." I hummed, eying the roses design on Jake's paper appreciatively. "You draw really well," I murmured before leaning back in my seat, rubbing my eye tiredly.

"O-oh, thanks," Jake muttered, slightly embarrassed. I noticed him squirm in his seat a little shyly. Which made me smile sleepily. So cute.

"So where are we going?" I asked wrapping my arms around myself.

"A tattoo parlor," Jake replied, recovering from his slight shyness. He slowly refolded the piece of drawn-on paper and held the tiny square in his palm, the four blunt corners digging into his skin.

"A tattoo parlor?" I repeated, surprised. "Why are we going to a tattoo parlor?"

"To get a tattoo, duh." Jake rolled his eyes before adding on in a quieter voice. "I'm thinking about tattooing this design on my chest, what do you think?" He looked over at me. Expectantly waiting for my answer.

"You're going to have a tattoo of your artwork on your chest? That's so cool!" I said with my eyes in awe.

"It's not that cool," Jake mumbled, feeling shy all over again.

"Yes, it is!" I argued back.

"Don't yell in the bus, Mc."

I lowered my voice at his words and murmured out.

"I don't know, I've had tattoos done before."

Jake furrowed his brows, swiveling his head around to face me.

"What? You've had tattoos done before?" He asks, astonished. I side-eyed Jake weirdly.

"Hm? Of course, every kid had them when I was younger. I had an awesome avatar toruk tattoo on my knee." I said proudly, folding my arms over my chest. "But my mom made me wash them off immediately."

"Mc...Are you talking about those sticker tattoos you get in those candy packs?"

"Yes exactly! Have you seen them in the store? Do they still sell them or not?" I asked excitedly.

"Oh my god, Mc." Jake shook his head, laughing.

After a short bus ride in which we argued about whether sticker tattoos were actual tattoos or just body stickers. We walked away from the bus station we were dropped off at and headed down to the street where the tattoo parlor resided at.

Even though it was a short five-minute walk, it was tiring for sleepy me, I just wanted to sleep and wrap my goosebump-littered limbs up in a warm blanket. I sighed stumbling my way after Jake into the cold darkness.

Thankfully, we stopped soon at a shop. pressed between a closed furniture shop and a small square of a building, painted a gothic black.

The shop's large windows which should be transparent and clear were covered in tattoo designs. I stared in awe at the many designs pasted onto the crowded windows stunned at the wide array. Unfortunately, I didn't get too long to admire the artwork though, because Jake pushed through the door, entering the parlor. I followed him in quickly, eager to not lose sight of my hacker boy...

I gasped at the interior of the building when I stepped foot inside the tattoo parlor. It was insanely beautiful in a grungy gothic way. More faded tattoo designs covered the painted black walls, showcasing more art, and there were pretty potted red and black roses dotting the place. I loved it.

"Wow." I breathed, running my eyes over the sketches. "Jak-" I looked over my shoulder, internally dying for calling him by his name but I sighed in relief when I saw Jake busy talking to the workers of the parlor. It was close. I walked over to him and a couple of guys he was now handing money to. One of them, a young tattooed man looking similar to my age, spoke first.

"Alright, I'm gonna go transfer this onto thermal paper and be right back. Go sit down on the chair and get comfortable, man." The guy smiled assuringly, his defined cheekbones rising as he did so. He turned away whilst studying Jake's unique design.

"Yoo, this is really good." He said amused, over his shoulder. Embarrassed once again, Jake mumbled thanks and followed after the other guy who led them down an aisle separating two sides of the tattoo parlor. On both sides of the building, chairs were placed one after the other. The guy led Jake to an empty seat. Jake seated himself in the main seat and offered me a plastic fold-out chair which I took gratefully.

"Matt will be here in a minute with your tattoo and he'll start the process." The guy explained, "Try not to touch any of the machines while you wait." The guy muttered. "Alright?" Jake grunted in response, rolling his eyes. I nodded quickly. Satisfied with the answers he received, the man walked away after telling us bye.

I hoisted my legs up onto the seat of the plastic chair, sitting cross-legged and fidgeting with the long sleeves of my hoodie. I drifted my eyes upward to look at Jake who shrugged off his leather jacket, revealing the white t-shirt he had on underneath, and took it off as well exposing his masculine chest.

"Want me to hold it for you?" I asked motioning with my hand at the leather jacket and his white shirt. Jake nodded, handing me over the jacket and shirt wordlessly, setting himself to sit in a comfortable position on the leather chair. I took his jacket and shirt, draping it over my lap and fiddling with the collar as we both waited for Matt to come.

"The not first time I suppose. You're so damn chill." A customer on Jake's right called out, capturing our both attention. It was a young woman laying on her front on a table of some sort, her pink hair spewed over the sides and her t-shirt was ridden upwards to reveal a pale backside which a tattooist poring over and drawing flames onto her unblemished skin. Jake rolled his eyes before grudgingly nodding in response. The woman smiled lovingly.

"Thought so. Chest-placed tattoos are hot. Just wanted to say it I guess." She beamed but Jake just simply turned away to stare ahead of him, looking as relaxed as ever. I looked up at him whilst chewing my lower lip with concern.

"Do you want me to hold your hand?" I offered, raising a hand. Jake just gave a small smile whilst rolling his eyes playfully.

"I'm fine, Mc." He breathed out, looking away. I nodded, with a slight pout whilst looking around. A couple of seconds later, Matt walked down the aisle with a transfer paper in hand and wearing a small smile on his face.

"Ready?" He asked. Jake muttered a "yeah" and let Matt study the back of his chest carefully before taking a sanitizing wet wipe in his hold and wiping the skin clean.

"Right, I'm gonna apply for the transfer onto your skin," He announced, applying a stick of something wax-like all over Jake's chest before taking the transfer paper with the design and placing it onto Jake's chest, smoothing it down.

After a few seconds, Matt pulled the slightly damp paper away from Jake's chest and placed it on a side table. I turned my neck to look at Jake's chest blue lines traced his design onto his skin.

"I'm not gonna lie. This is gonna hurt like a bitch. It won't be tiny pinpricks driving into your skin, so prepare mentally." Matt explained, meddling with the machine. He stopped for a second and looked over at Jake with a grin on his face.

"Still wanna go ahead?" He asked, arranging what looked like ink caps into the machine.

"Yeah, I never back away from getting another tattoo," Jake assured, staring at the blue lines marring his skin.

Matt nodded, looking away and messing around with the machine for a few seconds.

"If you want me to stop at anytime let me know, alright? We can take breathers from time to time if you want." Matt shrugged, gathering the sterile pouch he had bought with him and opening them up to reveal glinting needles. I gulped, watching Matt take the needles with a gloved hand and place them into the machine, inserting them cleanly.

Once the machine is deemed ready, Matt pulled out a spinny chair and seated himself by Jake's side.

"I'm going to apply ointment. That will help the transfer stay on longer without me accidentally rubbing it off." Matt said calmly, slathering ointment onto Jake's skin.

I took my chance to study this Matt guy. He was a tall guy with tattooed lanky limbs that hang off his body. Long dark hair was pulled back into a small messy man bun that was sitting atop the man's kinda handsome face. I've noticed the stretched scar littering his cheekbone. That scar made Matt look more unique. Suddenly Matt looked up and cracked a smile and a wink, noticing where I was staring at.

"Abusive relationship. Don't get yourself in that shit, beautiful." He said simply, picking up the tattooing equipment, a quill-like handheld item with a needle pointing outwards, and looked up, humming.

"I'm gonna outline your design first and then we'll shade and add color, Alright mate? You ready to go?" Matt asked, hovering the appliance just over Jake's chest.

Jakes nodded with a slight smirk forming on his lips, allowing Matt to go ahead. Matt placed the appliance right against Jake's skin, starting the process.

I've been watching silently up until now, breathing in shakily and feeling worried about his condition. Jake didn't exactly look like he was in any immense pain but I knew otherwise. Matt had made it clear that pain would be an obvious factor and surely Jake's feeling it right now.

So feeling worried about Jake's pain, I placed my hand inside Jake's one, interlocking our fingers and grasping on tightly in an attempt to distract Jake from the pain.

Jake made no indication of knowing that my hand was in his until a second later when he squeezed my hand hard. Jake watched the process occur and repeatedly squeezed my hand. I rubbed, soothingly patterns on his skin with the pad of my thumb.

It was a painstakingly slow process to outline the whole of Jake's detailed design. So slow that I found myself changing my posture multiple times. My back was incredibly stiff and sore from sitting up straight for so long. In the end, after finding no comfortable position that allowed me both to hold Jake's hand and sit up nicely.

I frustratedly propped my free hand onto Jake's chair and placed my cheek in it, propping my face up, I held Jake's hand. I stared into the distance with hazed eyes, finding the whole ordeal incredibly boring. It was not long before my eyes lid and closed sleepily, falling into a quiet slumber. I was still feeling pretty tired despite my nap earlier on.

Jake focus.

I didn't notice at first that Mc had gone to sleep. I only realized this when I felt a sudden weight against my left thigh. Taking my eyes off the tattoo that was starting to form on my skin, I looked downwards warily to see Mc's head resting against my upper leg.

Her cheek was pressing against my dark jeans. I raised a strained eyebrow at the sight before lazily tugging my leather jacket lying across Mc's lap and carefully draping it over her sleeping form. Matt caught this small action and smiled, scratching ink into my skin with the needle.

"She's your girlfriend?" He asked quietly. I regarded Mc's sleeping face. Her small pink mouth was parted slightly and her dark lashes were lined up perfectly. I sighed and reached for her hair, pushing a stray couple of strands away from her face before answering the tattooist,

"No."

"Might be nice though, to have her as a girlfriend," I added in a thoughtful murmur, wistfully.

"Sorry, what was that?" Matt hummed, pulling away from my chest to clean the needle.

"Uh- oh, nothing," I muttered, looking away from Mc's perfect face and cringing at my thoughts.

"Okay then, anyway, that's the outline done, shall we get started on shading and coloring?"

Mc focus.

I was lightly shaken awake from my slumber an hour later by someone murmuring my name.

"Mc, I'm done. Let's get going."

I lifted my head from whatever surface I was resting against and looked around me blearily. I recognized the tattoo parlor's decor as I was rubbing my eyes clear and yawning I turned at the sound of something rustling, spotting Jake standing by the chair he was occupying a minute ago, midway slipping on his black leather jacket.

"It's finished?" I asked and Jake nodded slowly

"Just five minutes ago."

"How was it? Did you like it? Did it hurt a lot then? Because I couldn't tell."

"Was nice came out really good," Jake replied, gathering the information sheets Matt had given on how to care and clean for his tattoo.

"I didn't see the final result," I murmured, yawning again.

"You can see it tomorrow," Jake replied with a muffled yawn. "Come on, it's late," He said, causing me to look around the shop again. All the customers that were here seemed to have left during the period I was asleep, and only a few shop workers were cleaning up are present now.

"I'm so tired." I groaned, rising to my feet, body clicking and cracking as I walked after Jake, with a soft whine. I walked out of the shop with Jake walking close by.

Without a word exchanged, we were making our way up the dark road towards the lit-up bus stop whilst shivering at the sudden coolness the night had brung.

A few slow minutes later, we seated ourselves on the bus stop's hard plastic chairs and waited for the bus to arrive. As indicated on the bus stop's electronic noticeboard, it was a six-minute wait for the bus to pick us up.

During those six minutes, I wavered in and out of sleep. My head was lolling forward and jerking back in surprise when I was abruptly woken up. Jake almost laughed at the sight but his chest throbbed with the pain I suppose so he resorted to a smile. The next time I closed my eyes, I felt Jake cupping my head and guiding me to rest my head against his shoulder.

Moments later, an empty bus trundles up to our side, opening the doors with a loud hiss that awakened me and made me squint at my surroundings in a dazed state. We were quiet as we boarded the bus awaiting us. We slumped against the seats, exhausted and cold.

Jake focus.

A while later, the bus drew up to the bus station directly opposite the borrowed apartment we were lodging at. I pressed the button to allow the driver to know that it was our stop before looking over to my side to see Mc dozing off again. Her head was leaning against the icy window with her eyes lidded. I sighed, shaking Mc awake for the second time. My shaking didn't seem to awaken the girl, however, because all Mc did in response was groan in protest.

She's so damn stubborn.

Aware that the bus had other places to stop at, I weakly hauled Mc up with hands and forced her to stumble, half awake down the bus. We wandered off the bus, crossing the road after looking left and right, and walked into the apartment building, boarding the juddering elevator sleepily.

Once the elevator reached our floor with a ding. I opened the two sliding doors, so we both dragged our tired ourselves down the hallway to our door and unlocked it. I pushed her and myself inside.

Mc immediately made a beeline for the pull-out couch, grabbing the blanket and wrapping it around herself before stilling her body and falling asleep once again.

I should've changed my clothes and brushed my teeth but I was so exhausted from sitting on that chair for so long and the pain inflicted on my chest that I didn't even bother slipping out of my jacket. I just kicked off my boots and flopped backward onto the couch, the bed was creaking under my weight, I placed a pillow under my back and placed my arm over my eyes. I blocked off the city lights flowing into the room through the uncovered balcony windows.

#duskwood #duskwood jake #duskwood mc #jake x mc #mc and jake #duskwood family #duskwood fandom #duskwood fanfiction

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