#and then all hell breaks loose... or perhaps even more frightening: it *doesn't*

[butchfalin]

realizing that a p5r false reality bad ending fic could be nearly indistinguishable from an ooc "akechi never did anything wrong" no metaverse high school au and amusing myself about it

[electricbluebutterflies]

i have a kabby prompt if you so choose.... in polis after ALIE, abby doesn't want to talk or cry.. she just wants sex. she begs marcus to make her feel something else, make her forget. marcus can't do it, not now, knows it's not what she needs and abby breaks down in the process. they end up sleeping.

Aka let’s play fast and loose with the s3 finale and shortly thereafter. PG13-ish, content warning for implications of dubcon (neither involved person was consciously aware of their actions), and also on ao3.

She has become a monster.

In the immediate aftermath of regaining consciousness, as she processes the weapon in her hands and the blood that might not be hers on her clothes, Abby is in shock. She knows there is that cute little word for it, and she knows recent events are far more complex than she is currently able to deal with. Neither of those background-noise details calm her as she searches the room for her…

Not lover, not yet at least, god no. They got one good kiss before everything went to absolute shit, and from there she… actually does not know what may or may not have happened between them. Her body is sore in certain places, yes, but her body is also sore everywhere else so that’s unhelpful. Will she wake up in a few days or weeks and know what she did while she had the chip? Until this fear passes, she hopes not. She hopes…

She finds him from across the room, and there is no one else in the world, and she runs and she falls and she crashes.

Everything she is still sure of is tangled up in this broken man, in his bloodshot eyes and shaking hands. She envelops him and she never wants to let go, and she-

“I’m here,” she murmurs over and over. “I’m here.”

What she did while controlled is a mystery; what he did even more so. She does not care, as she forces herself to be strong. This is a new dimension, perhaps even more frightening than the hell that surrounds them. Marcus has been a constant presence almost her entire life, stubborn and stoic and perfectly composed… except around her. Every time she has seen him break has been because of her.

She’ll be the death of him. She knows it now, feels it in the shifting of his body against hers, the deeper breaking he refuses to do in front of other people but won’t be able to fight off much longer. If he can die, it will be because of her, and it will be an unworthy sacrifice, and-

“Come with me,” she murmurs. “We should… we should…”

Chaos as it is, they slip away. They will return to the epicenter later, face the fallout of circumstances far beyond their control, but for now there is nothing to be done and Abby feels no guilt in departure. Until the dust settles she is unimportant - she felt the gun in her hands, the impeccable programming in her veins, and there will be no partial survivors for her to patch up. If she is wrong, she won’t be far, but she needs to breathe and she needs to get out of her skin and she wants and she wants and-

She pushes herself up on tiptoe in a hallway and kisses him hard enough to bruise because she can, because she wants to go numb and what other purpose is there in collision. Because she screwed up again, got herself attached to something else with a beating heart, and she has a certain feeling that his badly bandaged wrists are somehow her fault. She runs her tongue over his lower lip, desperate for something, anything. This will do nicely, once they’re somewhere behind a decent door. Not how she planned this step in whatever they are, but it will do.

But here is not the right place, and she breaks apart and leads on. She can’t remember them ever being this quiet with each other. There were those good months of shared workspace - can she miss something that only ended a few weeks ago? - and they were civilized to each other then, but not quiet. Trying to run things was a collaborative effort, countless little conversations about every little thing because they had no faith in themselves and absolute faith in each other. This, this is…

She doesn’t know where she is anymore in this rabbit warren of a palace, but if she had to guess, she’d assume they’ve wandered into the visiting diplomats’ wing or something. She does not know, does not care beyond there is an empty room with a door that locks from the inside. Somewhere out of the way enough for what she wants, for making each other numb, for-

She kisses him again, and this time he does not allow her to deepen it. This time he backs away, and the pain in his eyes breaks what’s left of her heart.

“This won’t help,” he murmurs.

“Then tell me what will.” Hands on her hips, glaring at him, reminded of a long history of sparring. If he wants a fight, she can easily give that too. “I was not me, Marcus. There are missing days of my life. I am terrified, and I don’t… I want to forget. Let me forget with you.”

“I can’t.”

Well that’s annoyingly vague, she thinks, and his overall presence isn’t making her feel any better. “Why? Give me one good goddamn reason why you won’t lay me down on that bed behind us and fuck me until I can’t focus on anything that isn’t you.”

He takes a step back and several deep breaths, visibly bracing himself. “There are… for one, this is hardly the right time.”

“We just survived the impossible. And given the fantastic array of shit that seems to happen to you in particular, I don’t think there will be a right time.”

“You’re visibly exhausted.”

“How much energy do you even think sex requires? I’m not asking you to show off, I just-”

“I don’t know what happened during… during that. What my body did while my mind wasn’t in it.”

“I don’t either. That’s the point. I want to go numb and I want to feel present again and I want-”

“That might help you. It might make things worse for me.”

Shit. So she probably did do something. She knows he didn’t exactly take the chip right after she did, but-

“What did I do? How did I hurt you?”

“You kissed me. It felt like you. I wanted it to be you. But you were… aggressive. Your timing seemed odd. And that’s how I figured it out.”

Abby turns away, curling into herself. She can’t look at him right now. All the scenarios she’s considered in the past twenty minutes, but not that, not the unforgivable, not…

“What happened after that?” She has to know. She doesn’t want to, but she has no choice.

“They… they tried to use you against me in another way. They were going to kill you. They restrained me, painfully, and they meant to make me watch you die. And that’s when I broke. After that… I don’t know what happened when we were both gone.”

“But you survived me. And you’re still willing to be alone with me.”

“Yes, because that wasn’t you. I know you, Abby. I’d like to think I have some idea how you love. And when the time comes, I know you will be different.”

“How can you let me kiss you when I-”

“Not. You.” He’s drifted closer somehow, and he puts a hand on her shoulder. “I can see the difference.”

“But you won’t…”

“Not because of that. It might… I do want you. I do trust you. Someday soon, I want to find out.”

“But not now,” she hisses, still feeling like she’s missing something.

“Not now. But only because we’re both tired and have seen too much. Not because of you, Abby.”

She turns to face him and oh, it is easy to fall and let herself be held. This, apparently, is within his limits. He is solid and he is hers, still racing manic energy but less so than the last time they touched, and she still wants so many things, and-

“Will you at least stay with me?” she asks, because even that feels like too much. “If I decide this is where I’m staying until the next disaster, or at least for tonight?”

“Yes.”

“And if I want you next to me on that bed? If I want…”

“Of course.”

There is a gentleness in this man, she thinks as she breaks the embrace and walks over to sit on the edge of the bed and take off her boots. Still a new blossom of a thing, this softness in an unlikely place, but undeniably present. Marcus, standing just out of reach and waiting for her to finish her process before he replicates it, has become everything he is capable of these past few months. And he chooses her, chooses to lie with her in her wreckage, and she cannot find words for any of it.

She shifts her body to the far part of the mattress and watches as she can. He has a jacket to shed as well, made harder by the layered bandages on his wrists. She ought to replace them with something clean, she thinks, but she will worry over that come morning or when he asks for her her help, whichever comes first and not a moment sooner. When those wounds heal, she will see them - she’d like to think she’ll see his details every day for a long time yet - and be reminded of his sacrificial heart. She will...

“You could move closer if you want,” he suggests.

She does. She fits well on his side, resting her head on his shoulder. She could get very used to this part, if he lets her.

“If I kiss your cheek, will you freak out on me again?”

“Depends on what else you do in that moment.”

So, innocent is alright. She feathers a few kisses across his face, because she can, and a heartbeat one on his lips before she retreats. Not pushing, not going anywhere, just a little playful affection.

“Not-me didn’t do that,” she murmurs.

“Not-you didn’t understand boundaries,” he replies. “Thank you, for...”

“Don’t. You know when to stop me, Marcus. That’s part of why I love you.”

He makes some kind of contented noise as she closes her eyes and crashes, and for now they are enough.