#dp x fallen london

[astroboots]

RED FLAGS ║ PART 7

CO-WRITTEN WITH @THIRSTWORLDPROBLEMSS

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

Summary: Your subconscious is trying to tell you something important about the choices you have to make. Or alternatively: is it still a threesome if the two men are alters?

Content: Stefon voice: This chapter has everything: angst, vaginal sex, anal sex, threesomes, DP sex.

Word Count: 8,165

Series Masterlist | Astroboot’s Masterlist | Thirstworldproblemss’ Masterlist

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You stare up at the shadows on the ceiling above your bed, willing yourself to fall asleep. 

But it’s simply not happening. 

Every time you close your eyes to the darkness, your brain takes it as an invitation to play a slideshow of this evening’s highlights. 

Marc showing up at your door, Marc holding you on the DLR, Marc's face inches from your own in front of the fish tank, Marc tucking you into the taxi. The images play behind your eyelids over and over and over again like a broken merry-go-round until you’re dizzy with it and dart up from your bed to pace the distance of your flat for a good twenty minutes, calming your jittery nerves enough that you can lay still long enough, close your eyes– only for the reel to start again.  

Get up–walk around–lie down–replay–and so it goes. Again and again and again. 

You don’t get much sleep that night.

Friday morning comes early. 

You must’ve fallen asleep at some point because you wake to your alarm blaring, but your sore back and the heavy dull ache behind your eyes tell you it was not nearly enough rest. 

One look at the clock informs you that you have 15 minutes to get yourself together and out the door or you’ll be late for work. It’s a mad scramble, and you earn yourself a bruised shin courtesy of the bloody ottoman, but you make it out the door and to the tube just in time, dashing down the stairs and squeezing yourself through the already-closing doors as the morning commuters around you grumble.

Pressed up between a grumpy construction worker and an even grumpier 20-something office worker, you’re holding onto your belongings for dear life as the train sways, trying to make sure you’ve got everything you’re meant to, when you realise the jacket in your hand is not one of your own. 

It’s Marc’s. 

There’s no need for another layer in the overpacked warmth of the train, and it’d be too hard to manoeuvre yourself into it in the minimally-available free space anyhow. You drape it over your arm instead, the way you might if you were just… holding it for a friend. There it stays for the entirety of your commute until you exit the station into the damp chill of late Autumn London fog so heavy it’s nearly drizzling. 

You glance at the jacket. The sensible thing to do here would be to just put the bloody thing on, but for some reason you can’t quite bring yourself to do it. Instead, you shiver your way through the two block walk to your office, arriving cold and clammy and feeling all together out of sorts.

On top of that, your sleepless night and slapdash makeup application are apparently not doing you any favours, because once you arrive at work, no less than three of your coworkers ask if you’re ill. With as polite of a smile you can muster, you push off their concern and get to work.  Busying yourself with small, mindless tasks, you manage to get through most of the morning without thinking overly much about anything. 

That lasts right up until 11:47am when your phone pings out, rattling against the surface of your desk. 

Steven Hiya love! 🥰 What did the sushi 🍣 say to the bee 🐝?

Steven’s silly random texts usually bring a smile to your face, and this one still does, but today it’s accompanied by a sickening swoop of your stomach and a heavy feeling that weighs you down, slowing your fingers so that it takes you twice as long as usual to type a response.

You I don’t know… What did it say?

Steve Waaaasa-bee!!!!! 🤪🤪🤪

You Oh my god! 

Steven Speaking of which, how do you feel about sushi for dinner tonight? Shall I get us some from that Eat Tokyo place on my way to your office? 🍣🍱😊

You glance at Marc’s jacket where it’s sitting, innocently folded atop your purse by the side of your desk, and tear your eyes away. Guilt over your actions yesterday comes crashing down on you all over again like a ton of bricks. You can’t imagine sitting with Steven in his flat eating dinner under the watchful eyes of Gus 2.0, The Imposter while lying to his face about what you did last night. The very idea makes your already unhappy stomach turn. 

You Sorry. I have Friday social drinks with the team tonight and I’m getting the side eye for having missed too many. Raincheck? xx

Drinks with your team is predictably awful. 

It’s a longstanding social obligation at the end of each week that you’ve never enjoyed. Too much boozing and Graham from two cubicles down tends to get handsy and start hovering too close once he’s on his sixth pint. You’ve happily foregone it most weeks since you started dating Steven. 

Tonight though, it’s the lesser of two evils and the perfect excuse.

Since it’s Friday, the pub closest to your office is an overpacked mess. The floors are sticky from spilt beer, and the rancid smell of what must either be old cider or piss has permanently seeped into the cracks of the wooden beams. You’ve entirely lost count of the number of elbows jammed into your back, and your voice has gone hoarse from shouting to be heard over the unnecessarily loud music and cluttered conversation taking place all around you.  

The evening drags on. Sleep-deprived and exhausted, you find yourself zoning out, eyes drawn to the large fish tank in the corner of the pub. It’s a standard collection, a few guppies, a fat Gourami fish that shimmers red and a handful of goldfish swimming about. 

One is almost orange in its goldenness, nothing like Gus’ more stark golden hue. Another one has the same colouring as Gus but is too skinny to pass, the third one… hmmm. That one is a bit more promising. It isn’t one finned, but it’s the right size and colour, and one fin is even a bit smaller than the other, so maybe– 

Oh god, what are you doing?

Are you seriously scoping for another replacement fish right now? You need to stop.

Shaking your head to snap yourself out of it, you turn your attention back to the conversation at your table. 

“My son’s gotten into a phase where he won’t stop watching Finding Nemo on rerun,” Poppy from accounting is saying next to you. “He loves that movie. Wants me to make him a Nemo costume for Halloween this year. Must’ve told me twenty times to ‘make sure it’s only got one fin.’”

A shiver works its way down your spine. The words feel accusatory somehow, even though you know that she couldn’t possibly have known what you were up to yesterday. You’re also pretty sure Nemo technically had two fins, one was just smaller than the other, but you’re not about to correct her when it’s all you can do to push down the image of Gus that’s trying to swim up to the surface of your mind. 

From across the table one of the other accountants chimes in, saying how their kids love the movie as well, and then it’s a pile on of enthusiasm, everyone blathering on about their kids watching Nemo on rerun. 

Nodding vaguely, you pretend to be following along in the conversation, but you keep having flashes throughout of the Imposter Fish and his two whole fins swimming around in Gus’ tank like he owns the place. Your skin prickles like you’re about to break out in hives. 

You stand abruptly, nearly knocking your chair over in the process, earning yourself concerned and questioning stares from around the table. 

Shit. 

“I’ll… um… I’ll just grab another round for the table, shall I?” you blurt out, trying to salvage your dignity or at least the situation, then escape to the bar. 

Ordinarily it would take an eternity to get the bartender’s attention on a busy night like this—a good twenty minutes to be spotted in the crowd, if you’re lucky. But tonight, on the one night when the wait would have been a welcome reprieve, the bartender spots you almost instantly and prepares your order with similarly unwelcome speed. That’s how you find yourself stacking pint after pint in your arms, cradling them as best as you can as you reluctantly start back towards your table not five minutes after you left. 

You’re struggling to balance the drinks and evade the throng of people as you make your way through the crowded room when you spot him, and it feels like your heart stops. 

There’s a man by the fish tank, his back leaning against a wooden beam. You only see him out of the corner of your eye at first, but the stiff, almost militant posture and rich black curls, slicked back but starting to unfurl from the heat and humidity of the pub, are unmistakable. 

Why is he here!?

Time slows to a crawl, and you forget to breathe as the longest second you’ve ever experienced in your life stretches out and out and out until the lack of oxygen in your brain has you convinced that it’s Marc you’re staring up at. You walk forward, even as the firmness of the floor beneath you gives. All you can see is his wide back covered by the brown canvas jacket, identical to the one Marc had lent you last night. But that can’t be right, because you still have it. It’s on your chair, isn’t it?

Time has never unfolded so slowly as you watch the man turn his shoulder, presenting a full view of his face only for you to see that his eyes aren’t gorgeously brown. Nose, nothing at all remarkable or unique. His jaw is round instead of the ridiculously cut sharpness you’re so used to seeing. 

There’s not a single feature in the man’s face that is as sharp or striking as Marc and Steven and with that realisation time slams forward then resumes its normal pace. Your stomach drops, landing on the sticky flooring near your feet. 

You don’t want to be here. 

Turning back to your table, you drop off the ordered drinks, as you murmur an apology about needing the loo.

Mumbling ‘excuse me’s and ‘sorry’s as you dash through the throng of crowds, you push your way to the ladies room at the far end of the pub where you find your salvation through the door marked with a silhouette of a woman. 

There’s a row of stalls, but you don’t bother checking each for cleanliness the way you usually do. Just make a beeline for the furthest one, thankful that it turns out to be unoccupied. You flip the lock and sit down on the rim of the toilet, eyes flitting over the bits of used gum that’ve been rolled up and tacked onto the cracked tiles. There’s soggy bog roll pooling around your shoes courtesy of a previous visitor, but you scarcely care, too relieved to have some space for yourself to just breathe for the first time this evening, without interruptions or anything to remind you of Gus or Marc or Steven. 

That reprieve barely lasts for two seconds. 

As if on cue, the main door to the ladies slams open. A group of women pours in, all shouting zealously, and there’s no sound isolation to protect you from hearing every bit of the conversation from where you sit.

“Pet, listen to me. If he loved you, he wouldn’t be lying to you now would he?” comes a shrill, concerned voice.

“It’s not like that. You don’t understand, he was just worried about how I’d take–” Before she even finishes her sentence, another voice cuts in, even shriller than the first.  

“No! I don’t care what his excuse is. No partner worth a damn would lie to someone they’re in a relationship with. You need to dump that liar!” 

The words plunge into your chest with a painful twist that tears through your insides, making your cheeks and eyes both burn. The universe certainly seems set on hammering some point home tonight, but this is really just a bit unfairly on the nose now, isn’t it? 

Hunching over in the cramped space of the stall, you dig your elbows into your knees and hide your face in your hands. You don’t want to be listening to this. Can’t handle it right now. Just can’t.

Quickly, before they have time to say more, you stand and smooth a hand over your clothes and hair, as though making yourself a smidge more presentable might somehow smooth out some of your inner turmoil.

Taking a deep steadying breath, you exit the stall. You hesitate for a moment before approaching the sink and hurriedly washing your hands, not quite willing to sacrifice personal hygiene or the appearance, at least, of normalcy. By now, the group of women have converged on their unlucky friend, cornering her against the far wall as they continue to rant on about lying liars who lie and exactly what liars deserve. (The worst, apparently, as far as these ladies are concerned.)

Oh god. You have to get out of here. 

You do, hastily fleeing the loo and fighting your way back to the table. You must look as rough as you feel, because you don’t even have a chance to open your mouth before Poppy shoots you a concerned look. 

“Are you alright?  You look as if you've seen a ghost.” 

“Um… No, actually.” Grabbing the lifeline that’s been offered, you make a dramatic showing of feeling ill, “I’ve been feeling a bit under the weather all day, and it’s really caught up with me now. I’m going to head off early tonight.”

You nod your way through the condolences and well wishes, picking up your handbag and gingerly retrieving Marc’s jacket from the back of the chair as you make your polite goodbyes by rote, and then exit the pub as quickly as possible given the crowd.

Outside, the rain is bucketing down. It’s standard weather for London this time of year, but tonight it feels like one more bit of pointed commentary by the universe, and you huddle miserably under the pub awning.

You just want to go home. 

Steven’s place is only two stops away by tube—if you leave now, you can be there in less than eight minutes. But even as you think it, you realise you can’t go to his. As much as you want Steven, want to burrow into the comfort of his embrace and never come out again, that wouldn’t be fair to him.

Instead you unlock your phone and pull up the Uber app. 

It’s Friday, in the centre of Soho, and the only Uber that accepted your request is 30 minutes away (having to make a drop that is nowhere nearby, despite what the app is telling you) not to mention the surge in pricing. You confirm anyway, unable to bear the thought of braving the crowded trains for the long commute back to your flat.

Then you wait.

The awning isn’t nearly wide enough to protect you from the rain, and frigid water rebounds off the concrete, splashing onto your feet and legs and soaking through your shoes until your toes are swimming in the cold dampness of your socks. 

Marc’s jacket is folded neatly over your arm, still dry. You think about how warm it was in the cab last night, how it smelled of him, but even with the chill seeping through your jumper, you still can’t bring yourself to put it on. For a brief second, you consider going back into the pub where it’s warm and dry, but being cold and wet seems like the preferred option at the moment. It feels like what you deserve.

This is a right proper bloody fucking mess, and it’s all your fault.

You and Marc almost kissed. Might have done if he hadn’t pulled back. You might have betrayed Steven—the man you love. And for what? 

You’re attracted to Marc. You can admit that much to yourself. 

You try to tell yourself it’s just because you’re attracted to the body he shares with Steven, but you know it’s more than that. 

You’ve grown to care about Marc independently of his connection to Steven. You look forward to the quiet mornings you spend with him. Enjoy watching his micro-expressions while you prattle on about your days during breakfast. The small quirk on one side of his lip, when you tell him something he finds amusing. The way he grunts like a displeased pug when he spots another mess that Steven has left in the kitchen.  

Impossible though it had seemed to begin, he’s become your friend. There’s no denying that after your ridiculous caper with the fish last night—you’d only go that far for a good friend, a trusted one. 

Someone you really care about. 

Someone you almost kissed.

You huff out a choked laugh and bury your face in your hands, disgusted with yourself all over again.  

But it’s not really even about the almost-kiss, is it? Though that’s certainly bad enough.

It’s about the fact that you’re lying to your boyfriend—mostly by omission, but sometimes also… not. That you’ve been lying to him for so long that it’s somehow become a “normal” part of your everyday life. So routine you’d almost forgotten you were doing it.

It’s about the fact that Marc—your friend Marc—came to you for help, and you were so eager to help him that you didn’t stop to consider the consequences. That now you’ve gone from lying to Steven—your boyfriend Steven—to actively helping to deceive him.

Somewhere along the way, you stopped seeing Marc as the antagonist in the story of your lives together. And now you've allowed yourself to become his co-conspirator against Steven, which is exactly the opposite of what you wanted. 

You’re deceiving Steven for Marc. Going along with him because he says it’s better for Steven that way. But is it? Is it really better? You don’t think so, but… you don’t know.  

You believe that Marc wants what’s best for Steven.

You believe Steven deserves to know the truth about himself. 

Two truths, but incompatible ones. And you’re the one stuck in the middle. It’s an impossible choice. No matter what you do now, you’re going to be betraying someone. Choosing one of them over the other. 

And you don’t know how to live with that.

Bile rises in your throat, and you have to close your eyes and swallow hard. You dig your fingers into the material of Marc’s jacket, twisting it in your hands as you curl into yourself.

You’re so caught up in your misery that you barely register the slosh of tires against the rain, looking up just in time to see your Uber pull up to the curb. Hunching your shoulders, you hug the jacket and your bag to your chest, shielding them from the flood of frigid water that drenches you as soon as you leave the protection of the awning, and quickly make your way across the sidewalk.

Climbing hurriedly inside the vehicle, you close the door behind you and set everything on the seat beside you, guiltily smoothing out the wrinkles in Marc’s jacket caused by your rough handling.

“Bloody hell, sweetheart, you’re soaked. That’s London weather for you innit?” the driver remarks, and you look up to see him watching you in the rearview mirror.

He’s not wrong. You feel like a drowned rat, as you catch sight of your reflection in the darkness of the passenger window. 

“Same as always, isn’t it?” you manage, hoping that will be the end of the forced pleasantries, and you’re grateful when he hums in agreement and turns his attention to the road.

The air in the car is warm and stuffy after the wet chill of the outside, the leather seat hot and sticky against your back even through your wet jumper. Your face feels overheated, and you lean your forehead against the coolness of the windowpane, staring blindly out through the rain-fogged glass as the car pulls away from the curb.

The evening traffic outside seems endless. The road is chockablock, and you’re stuck in a sea of red and amber tail lights blinking blurrily behind the rain-streaked darkness of the window. Your head rolls against the glass with the rocking motion of the vehicle as it starts and stops with the flow of cars outside, and the old motor rumbles on, making you drowsy.

Worn out from the lack of sleep last night and a day of emotional turmoil, you don’t even notice when your eyes slip close and you drift quietly off to sleep. 

The car comes to a halt in the middle of a roundabout. In the rearview mirror, the driver pulls his cap down, covering his eyes and muttering under his breath that “this is as far as we go.” 

Looking out the window, you’re confused. There’s nothing you recognize as being anywhere near your flat, but somehow you’re already turning the door handle and stepping out of the car. 

You’re in the middle of the road, traffic on all sides of you. Before you have a chance to turn around and protest to the driver, the car is already pulling away, exhaust fumes your only goodbye. 

At least it’s stopped raining.

Across the wide street, the St. Martin’s Theatre is lit up in gold. The marquee banner spelling out ‘M.O.U.S.E.T.R.A.P.’ in bright glowing red neon. You start to walk ahead, but nothing is quite as it is or where it should be. Tottenham Court road, which is always busy and buzzing with life, is entirely abandoned. Empty of people. 

Next to you, you spot a pastel-coloured bubble tea shop. They’re a dime in a dozen in London, and it does nothing to help you make sense of where you are. It’s not until you reach around the corner and arrive at the familiar teal-coloured facade of Cafe Babka (one of your regular date spots with Steven) that you start to place yourself. 

If you turn right up ahead, you’ll reach the British Museum. It is an hour away by tube from your flat. Still, as you make the turn, your building stands there in its square concrete familiarity. You can even see your small balconette on the fifth floor.

There’s a sensation like skipping a track on a record—you don’t remember entering the building or taking the lift up to the fifth floor, but suddenly you’re walking down the hallway to your flat. 

Steven is there outside of your door, and the hallway lights up when he greets you with a bright smile and a small wave of his hand. His eyes are as sweet as always when he moves to kiss you. 

Then you’re inside your flat, Steven moving with you towards your bed, mouth never leaving yours. Did you unlock the door? You can’t remember, but does it matter? How can you care about details like that when Steven’s lips are on yours like this, soft but hungry.

Somehow, you don’t stumble or run into any of your furniture as he walks you backwards with his kiss, the ottoman and its usual threat to your shins and balance are suspiciously absent. In fact… nothing is where it should be.

You’re disoriented. 

Maybe it’s a testament to how good of a kisser Steven is that you’re losing all spatial awareness, but that can’t be the whole explanation. Something is off, but you can’t stop long enough to consider it, too distracted by the way Steven keeps pressing kiss after sweet lingering kiss to your lips, by the heat building low in your belly for him. Can’t stop to think until you find yourself pressed down against the mattress.  

Linen sheets stretch endlessly out underneath you, wider than your own double mattress and lower to the ground. There’s sand underneath your foot where it’s hanging off the edge of the bed, and when you look up, you’re met not with your drab white ceiling, but with a large square of wooden planks overhead surrounded by wide open eaves and wooden beams. 

This isn’t your flat, it’s Steven’s. 

But still… Something's strange. Not quite right. The room seems to swim, lines and contours of the timber overhead blurring together. You drag your eyes to the walls, trying to clear your vision, but no matter how hard you concentrate on the many many books Steven has adorning his dusty shelves, none of them have titles on their thick spines. 

That’s not right either. 

In fact, everything in Steven’s flat is reversed, like you’re Alice, gone through the looking glass. Shelves that are meant to be on the left are on the right. The kitchen is by the exit instead of the far end. The fish tank looms large over the living room, expanding to eat up half the space of the flat. Gus doesn’t seem to mind though. He’s swimming in happy circles around his new, two-finned tank mate as if he’d never known anything different. Every so often one of them swims close to the corner, and the flash of a reflected fin tricks your eyes into thinking there’s a third fish.

There’s a part of you that wants to pause, take a moment and attempt to make sense of things. But Steven is there, anchoring you to the bed, not giving you a moment to consider your observations or try to connect the dots as he continues to kiss the breath out of you. 

His hands are roaming your hips and thighs now, caressing every inch of your flesh that he can reach. One comes up to cup your breast lovingly, your nipple drawing up tight under his palm. Another hand lingers delicately on your throat, and he continues to stroke your hips all at the same time. 

It’s good, so good. So much. Overwhelming to the point where you don't even fully register that there are three hands caressing you when, biologically speaking, Steven should only have just the two. 

Greedy and determined, those nimble fingers grip into your hips then drift down between your thighs, sliding along the seam of your cunt. Steven groans low and needy against your lips at the wetness he finds there, and he parts your slick folds, gently pressing two fingers into you. 

Moaning into his mouth at the pleasurable intrusion, you arch your back in open invitation, encouraging Steven's curled fingers to find that perfect place inside. Aching heat rolls over you in waves, streaming out along your limbs until you’re nearly numb with it. You bend further back, not sure if you're trying to chase the sensation or escape from it. As you do, a warm, firmly-muscled chest presses against your back, and you hear a rasped groan in your ear. 

“Fuck, you’re eager for us.” 

The tone is brusque and even, rough and warm like sandpaper made of velvet, and nothing like Steven’s. Electric heat shivers up your entire spine because you recognize the owner of the voice. 

With a turn of your head, you meet his eyes. It’s all narrowed darkness as Marc holds your gaze for a long moment. His thumb catches under your jaw, tilting you up to him, and then he closes the distance between you, leaning in to press his lips to yours. 

Finally.

The brush of lips is soft and measured. Completely unlike Steven’s hungry and eager kisses. Marc has far too much restraint for that. Instead his kiss is slow and controlled, his hand cradling your jaw, thumb caressing your cheeks like he’s savouring the moment. Savouring you. 

Somewhere in the back of your mind, an alert pings. A tiny, niggling doubt that makes you wonder what Marc’s doing here, how this can be happening. But you ignore the thought. Don’t question it, because god, you fucking want it. Want him. 

Want to be exactly where you are.

You're caught, sandwiched tight between the two of them with little space to spare. Regardless of which way you move, to the front or the back, you only end up closer to them both. 

When you push yourself forward, Steven’s fingers slide deeper inside you, his cock twitching against the softness of your stomach. When you push back, Marc’s hardened length meets you, pressing insistently against your lower back as he lazily thrusts against you. 

There's nowhere for you to go, and that's fine. Better than fine. It's bloody perfect, because there's nowhere else you'd rather be than trapped between these two men.

Steven licks and nips his way down your breast and stomach in a long line of open-mouthed kisses. White heat tingles and simmers under your skin where his lips have touched, burning you up from the inside out until you’ve all but melted into the mattress from his attentions. 

The sharp bump of his nose nudges at the inside of your thighs, and he looks up at you with pleading eyes, begging you to spread your legs for him. Before you even have the chance to comply, Marc’s calloused hands are already there, sliding down and in along the inside of your thighs, spreading them apart until you’re wide open for Steven. The two men moving in perfect simpatico.

Then Steven’s mouth is on you, hot and eager and perfect. 

His tongue dips into your pussy without hesitation, licking a wide strip up around your clit and then back down again, and you cant your hips up and onto his tongue. He doesn’t resist. Steven’s always so generous, so trusting and giving in bed. He lets you—encourages you to try and fuck yourself on his beautiful, persistent mouth. Gorgeous, pleasurable heat flickers along your spine, searing into your limbs until you feel it everywhere. 

“He’s good with his mouth, huh?” Marc murmurs into your ear, sounding almost admiring. 

Opening your mouth, you try to say yes, but your throat is dry with the blinding heat, and nothing comes out, not even a moan. Electricity sparks, shimmering through you with every soft and long lick of Steven’s tongue on you.

You twist your fingers into the bedding beneath you, and the eaves in the ceiling crack and pull around the edges with the motion. The harder you grip the sheets, the deeper the shadowed lines carve into the wood, until they’re giant crevasses, wide enough that you can see the night sky through the gaps. 

The pale moon peers down at you, surrounded by bright stars scattered against the blackness. You don’t think you’ve ever seen the stars shine so clear in the light-polluted London sky in all your life, and you dig your fingers in further into the bedding, unwilling to relinquish the view.

“It’s okay. I got you.” Marc’s voice is cajoling and sweet, the same soft tone he used when he held you in his arms to keep you steady on the overground. A part of you wishes he would always speak to you this way. “Think you can come for us?”

You close your eyes, nodding in reply because you think you’d do anything he wanted as long as he asked you so sweetly. Pleasure is already building steadily under the press of Steven’s talented mouth, your orgasm already looming on the horizon.

“That’s it, baby. You’re doing so good,” Marc murmurs.

Everything is ratcheting higher and tighter inside of you, building and building until it’s almost too much. Too good. The feeling rocketing through you is so overwhelming that you can't think, can't move, can’t speak. Would scream or sob or shriek if you could still fucking breathe. 

But somehow you still haven’t fucking come. Your orgasm caught somehow, suspended in limbo. It’s like you waited too long, flew too high, and now you're trapped right on the fucking edge, teetering torturously without ever falling over.  Sparks dance at the edge of your vision, and you feel lightheaded like you’re going to pass out. 

“Come for us.” 

Marc’s voice cuts through the cacophony of competing sensations with that single simple order, and everything else disappears. 

Your world narrows. There's only the firm weight of Marc’s body anchoring you to the bed. His low, encouraging voice in your ear, whispering praises. Steven’s mouth working hot and eager against you, and the soft warmth in his eyes as he stares up at you with rapt attention, pupils blown wide.

Static fills your ears, and then you come hard on Steven’s tongue. 

The pleasure floods your system, blotting out the rest, until your vision darkens and everything sounds like it’s buried underground. 

There’s nothing here. Just emptiness. Darkness a mile wide, like the insides of a music box snapped shut. 

Are your eyes still closed?

Slowly, your vision repopulates again. Your surroundings filled in like a child playing with a paint-by-numbers app. The bed. The bookshelves. The fishtank. Steven. Marc. 

Marc whose gentle hand cups your cheek, drawing you up to meet his eyes. “How do you want it?” he asks. “You want Steven to fuck you?” 

Steven who is still draped between your thighs. His tongue drags over his lush bottom lip, savouring your taste, eyes dark and ravenous as he leans back in to lap gently at you again. He’s nowhere near done with you yet. 

You huff out a noise, some strange merger of a moan and a hum, meant to be an affirmative, because of course you want Steven.

But your gaze is fixed on Marc’s face, watching the corner of his lips curve. Not snide, or mocking, never that. It’s the same unfeigned, half-smile you’d seen in front of the fishtank the other night, and your head buzzes with lightheadedness at the sight of it. 

“Or you want me?” he asks. 

You whine at his question, because you do. Of course you do!  

But Steven is right there too, resurfacing from between your legs just barely long enough to press an indulgent kiss to the inside of one of your thighs and ask, "which is it, love? Me?"

He turns his head, nose brushing up against your clit as his mouth parts, licking into you, with a ravenous moan. His words are muffled by your body as he continues to speak, “Or do you want Marc's cock filling you up?"

You don’t answer him. Can’t answer him. It’s an impossible choice. 

How can you choose one of them over the other?

Next to you, Marc leans closer, pressing a kiss to your temple, nose dragging along the back of your neck, as he speaks.

“Or maybe our pretty girl doesn’t want to choose, hmm?” His arms are against your sides, bracketed you in as he presses you down with his body. “That’s it isn’t it? You just want everything.”

And god help you, he's right. He's so right. You want them both. 

You try to take a deep breath, try to inhale because you want to tell them so, but there’s no air in the room. That should be a problem, you think, but it’s not. Even though you’re not breathing, haven’t breathed for fuck knows how long, you feel fine. 

So much better than fine. 

You’re weightless, practically floating. Could easily drift away if Marc wasn’t pinning you down. Your orgasm is still pulsing between your legs, warm and insistent, but you can’t feel the pulse in your veins or your heart, even though it should be there beating its way out of your chest. 

Marc is still watching you softly. Steven too. You nod at them, have to let them know.

“Greedy girl,” Marc says, voice soft and indulgent in a way that makes the words feel like the highest praise. 

Wrapping his fingers around your arm, Marc rolls you onto your side facing him. Strong arms wrap around you, caging you against him, as those dark eyes bore into yours. You can barely imagine that there was ever a time that you used to be intimidated by this man, scared of him even, because all you want now is to be closer to him. 

Lucky for you, that’s just what he gives you. 

Like he can read your mind, Marc’s hand settles on your hip and slides down, down, down the length of your thigh until his palm reaches the bend of your knee. Warm fingers wrap around the joint and pull, hiking your leg up over his waist, opening you to him. He drops his face down to press a soft kiss to your shoulder, then urges you closer still, slotting one thick thigh into place between yours, watching you all the while. 

There was a time when you would have quailed under that direct stare, but when you see that ferocious intensity there now, it sends a skitter of elation down your spine. 

Relishing his attention, you preen for him as his hand skims up the back of your raised leg and over your hip. Your eyes follow its path, watching as he takes himself in hand and aligns his cock with your slick wet entrance. 

You’re a mess for him, dripping and swollen cunt providing no resistance as the blunt tip of his cock pushes in, slow and measured. Marc is unhurried, barely rocking his hips into you, and it’s maddeningly good. It’s all shivery heat and unbearable pressure as he eases his way inside, not stopping until he’s buried to the hilt. 

You can’t remember where you are anymore. Your surroundings blur together, and all you know is the perfect weight of Marc inside you, the warmth of his thighs pressed against yours. It’s just you and him in this place, and you could easily get lost in this, forget everything else, but… Something’s not right. 

Something important is missing. 

“Wait, wait,” you gasp, turning your head to look behind you, but there’s nothing there. No furniture, no room… nothing. You turn back to Marc, “Where’s Steven? I–I want–”

The question doesn’t have time to settle before everything fades back into existence, the bookshelves, the fishtank, the bed seemingly appear from nowhere. There’s a weight shifting behind you on the mattress, and when you turn to peer over your shoulder again, Steven is there, an adoring smile on his face.

“I’m here, love, right here. Not going anywhere,” he tells you when you clutch at him.  

Steven’s chest is pressing up against your back, all solid and firm-cut muscles that you never get to see during the day when he’s half-drowning in his oversized clothes. 

He has one hand resting on the curve of your hip, gently pulling you back as he presses in closer behind you. You can feel the fat head of his cock nudging hot and slick along the cleft of your ass. 

“Can I? Is that alright, love? Want to be inside you.” His voice is desperate, filled with need, and fuck, who are you to deny the man you love?

You nod, and feel Steven repositioning himself behind you. His hand disappears from your hip, and his cock slides against you with more purpose, spreading precome across your skin as he lines himself up. His mouth skims your shoulder, and the shuddering breath he takes burns pleasantly across your skin before he grips your hip and presses in. 

His cock slips into you more easily than you expected, barely easing inside before he retreats, then presses in again, a bit farther this time. His mouth lays hot kisses and tender words across the skin of your shoulder as he works himself inside you slowly, inch by thick inch, stretching you open and filling you to the brim. 

If there was any space left inside of you, you’re sure that you would be breathing, but you can’t. Can’t even fit air inside your lungs. And oh fuck, Steven isn’t even all the way inside of you yet. Fuckfuck. You don’t know if you can–

A warm hand comes to your cheek, cupping it with a tenderness that makes your heart ache in your chest. 

“It’s alright, you’re alright. You’re doing so good, baby. You can take it for us can’t you?” Marc coos. 

You nod with a whine, trying to distract yourself with the softness of Steven’s touch. How he’s palming every inch of your skin he can reach, the slope of your ribs, the curve of your breast. His worshipful mouth on your neck. The softly murmured “I love you”s that he sears into your burning skin with his lips. 

And that’s a bit easier. 

Between Steven’s profuse adoration and Marc’s encouragement, it’s almost too easy to surrender the last bit of your doubt and give into them both. 

“There we go. Good girl,” Marc murmurs. He presses an indulgent kiss to your cheek as a reward, and Steven takes over praising you, “that’s it. I knew you could do it. Knew you could take us both, love.” 

Then they begin to move.

It’s a gentle rocking rhythm, barely shifting you back and forth between them, but even that is still so fucking much. 

You’re overwrought. 

Overfull. 

All of you feel overexposed like a tender nerve. 

But there’s nothing else for you to do but take it, shaking and shuddering between them as you take everything they have to give you. All you can think about is how full you are of both of them, stretched so thin to your limits to the point that you swear Marc and Steven must be able to feel each other through you with every slow, deep, maddening thrust. 

Somewhere in the distance a bell rings. You turn your head and crane your neck, chasing the sound. The motion presses you back against Steven, who is right there, nuzzling into the side of your neck, nose pressed tight against the pulse. 

His mouth glides over the side of your throat, hot and slick, and you lose yourself to it. The touch is consuming. The edges of his teeth flirt with your sensitive flesh, and then slowly sink in, biting into your neck. The pleasure is sharp and stinging. It’s almost enough to make you forget. 

But the melody of bells ringing from afar grows increasingly louder. You try to ignore it but you are about to rip your hair out at the incessant clang. 

“Ignore it,” Marc says. He cradles your face, lips tracing the contours of your jaw. “Focus on us.” 

It isn’t hard to follow Marc’s commands. Not when his hips cant up and thrust back into you, a deep and mind-numbing slide. For once, you find yourself only happy to obey his words. 

But the sound comes again, and you were wrong before. It's not bells, it's the doorbell buzzing. Someone's at the door. 

There’s the sound of metal scraping against wood and then the metallic thump-thump of the lock sliding open. You try to squeeze down on Marc’s shoulder for his attention, but it only seems to spur on Steven who lifts his hips, thrusting himself inside you as deep as he goes. 

“Wait,” you gasp, because no matter how good Steven feels inside, you’re still distracted by the stranger trying to get into the flat. “There’s someone at the door.”

“There’s no one at the door,” Marc says, pulling back slightly. 

The words have a sharp impatient bite, scolding you in that tone that’s so customary from him. You want to frown, make a snarky retort, but he drives himself deep inside you, and pleasure streaks through your limbs until you nearly scream from it. 

There are footsteps approaching.

A shadow stretches out in the corner of your eye. 

Soon it looms over you, blocking out the muted light in the room, and the air around you shifts. There’s someone else standing at the end of your bed, observing you. You open your eyes and look up. Raven curls and thick brows that frame those familiar gorgeous brown eyes. 

The ringing persists, blaring out. It’s not bells or the door buzzer. It’s a siren, flashing and waving red, warning you of danger. 

The man looks like Steven. But you know it’s not him—the warmth and adoration reserved for you in those beautiful brown eyes is entirely absent. 

It’s not Marc either. Marc doesn’t look at you like you’re some distant curiosity. You’ve seen annoyance, irritation, even anger reflected back at you in his eyes. But he’s never looked at you like you’re nothing to him.  

You realise that now. 

Panic grabs hold of you, and you sit up quickly, pulling at fistfuls of the sheets that you desperately cover yourself with. You scoot backwards in the bed, clambering up along the mattress, hands fumbling uselessly behind you, reaching for something to grab onto. You’re expecting the firmness of Marc’s chest, the warm touch of Steven’s hand, but there’s nothing. 

When you turn to look, the bed is empty. Marc and Steven are no longer with you. 

It’s just you and him now. 

The man moves towards you, mouth twisted into a predatory smile. The alarm calls out to you again, but it’s too late to warn you now. You’re already trapped—can’t look away from him. 

“Hear that?” His tone is flat, voice is devoid of emotion. It sounds neither like Steven's nor Marc’s voice. “It’s time to wake up.”

He comes to the side of the bed, looming over you as he reaches down.

You flinch back, but he’s too big. Too close. 

You can’t escape. 

Gripping the covers tight, you hunch into yourself, cowering, trying to brace yourself for whatever he’s going to do to you.

But then he reaches right past you. 

Doesn’t touch you at all as he retrieves something from the bookcase at the head of the bed, and lays it gently across your lap.

You look down to see a bundle of brown canvas fabric, all soaked from rain and wrinkly from your rough handling. 

It's Marc's jacket.

“Don’t forget this, sweetheart.”

With his words, darkness swamps you and everything disappears. There's no light, no warmth, no space—only a blank void slowly being filled with the soft hum of a motor running and the sounds of traffic honking nearby. 

Your eyes are still closed as your consciousness is dragged back to an awareness of the sore stiffness lodged in your neck. 

You open your eyes with a startled gasp, and then you have to inhale great lungfuls of air into your heaving chest, possibly the first time you’ve actually taken a breath since– oh.  Since you fell asleep. You were dreaming.

Slowly but surely, you become aware of your surroundings. The cracked and dry leather seats, the grey felt of the low ceiling, the complete lack of any naked men in this space with you. You’re in a car—not in Steven’s flat or his bed. You’re still in the Uber. 

It was just a dream. 

Your skin tingles with the memory of being pressed against warm, firm muscles, and the space between your legs still pulses a phantom ache. The echo of Steven’s mouth on you, Marc’s thick length pressing into you, the overwhelming fullness of having them both inside you at once makes you throb. Your face is burning. 

You glance at the front seat where the driver seems oblivious. Absent-mindedly you notice that he isn’t wearing a cap as you pray to the universe that you didn’t make any embarrassing sounds during your semi-public sex dream about being manhandled into a threesome by your boyfriend and his alter. 

Dear god, what the fuck is wrong with you!? 

The sound of bells fills the air just like before, and for a moment you wonder if you’re still trapped in the dream. 

“Hey, sweetheart, your phone is ringing.” 

The words jolt you from your thoughts. You’re an idiot. It’s not alarm bells, it’s your bloody ringtone. 

Grabbing for your handbag, you plunge your hand inside, fumbling blindly until you finally manage to locate your phone. You quickly fish it out, swiping a thumb across the screen to answer.

“Hello?”

“Hi, love. It’s– uhm, it’s Steven.” His voice comes through the phone, nervous and rambling, and it instantly sends your anxiety skyrocketing. “I’m sorry, I know it’s late, and you’re out with colleagues, and I’m sorry, I didn’t want to disturb, but I didn’t know who else to call–” 

“Steven!” you interrupt when he shows no signs of getting to the point. It comes out louder and harsher than you intend, and you then force yourself to soften your voice as you encourage him to gather his thoughts, “It’s okay, Steven. Just– What did you need?”

“Could you… um… Could you come over tonight, please? I need to talk to you.” 

~ CONTINUE ~

Dedication: to my one and only, the ewe to my ram, my beloved who stays up with me until 4am (her time) to discuss the significant differences between precum and precome (and how the latter clearly denotes sophistication and class 😂😂😂) to our crazy asses that extended this from a three parter to a five parter then an eight and ten parter and now we're looking at twelve parts and if there is more to come then god help us all. I love you always @thirstworldproblemss. xx

[five-rivers]

What Lies Between

Popping on for just a moment to drop this. :P

This is a Danny Phantom x Fallen London crossover.

Spoilers for Fallen London.

.

The kernel of the story, as it so often was, was love.  

Love, that vast and unpredictable force that destroyed kingdoms and raised them up all at once.  The mountain-mover.  The subtle chain and anchor.  The intemperate fire.  That madness that caused the otherwise sane to take up fists against spears and play chess against death itself.  The love that tamed the worst of monsters and the most terrible of angels.  The many-faced love, that may lie between lovers, between brothers, between worshiper and god, between parent and child, between artist and work, between soldier and country, between friends, between enemies, between sinners, between sky and sea and stone, between imagination and memory, between, even, strangers unlikely to ever meet.  

That love.  

This love was between executioner and condemned, between the axe and the neck it was told to fall upon.  The neck it only scraped.    

Listen.  Carefully, now.  One love can grow to another, like a seed sprouting, like rust weakening chain, like ice creeping up the side of a ship.  

The axe was set to watch, because it was also clockwork, because it was also mirrors, because it was also a bell that rang to warn of danger and the passing hours, and in watching, it learned this: love is watered by knowledge.  Love is like war - secrets bring it close, and those who prove exceptions are monstrous indeed.  

And so, because the axe was not monstrous, when a hand was put to it again, and it was raised for a second strike, it twisted.  

But love transforms.  The axe did not flee with its victim.  The watcher did not flee with the observed.  It was a parent that fled with their child.    

.

There are risks that come with running.

The ones who had owned the axe and passed down their condemnations were sharp of eye and long of arm, keeping their hands clean through use of convenient tools.  They did not like their fingers being caught in clockwork gears.  They did not smile at the mark of love.  

There was nowhere in this world they could not see, no place in this world they could not touch.  The parent was strong, and old, and had earned fortitude from many wounds.  The child was swift, and bright, and held a sharpness whetted by hope.  What parent would not take a blow for their child?  What child would not take one for their parent?  That was the bloody truth of love, and love bled.

The wound bled.  

But time ran on, and time was like a river split, like a mirror shattered, like a path with a thousand crossroads.  There was nowhere in this world they could be safe.

There were other worlds, lit by other stars.  Step through a mirror, step through a door, a turn in the path…  They would be there.  

But there were risks in running.  

Those who sought the parent and their child were cruel, but the stars were kind and generous.  They gave freely of life, and freely of death, and knew of the places where stardust fell into souls.  Those stars that burnt out burned green in contemplation, in sanctuaries of passion and purpose.

In other places, glimpsed down other paths they might have tried, starlight fell like knives and things greater than the ones who ordered the child’s destruction were of the same mind.  The child had transgressed.  The child would be struck down.  What difference was there, between the axe and the fires of the Law, except that the axe would be kinder?

Why not return once more to the hands that had wielded it?  Why not become, again, the executioner?

.

And yet…

Love is the breaker and maker of chains.  Love is the hope when hope is lost.  Love is the final stroke of the knife.  

They came to a place green with the dreams of dead stars, and from the mirror spilled a country drenched in an impossible rainbow.  Beyond the rainbow was a city at a crossroads shaded by tall trees, beyond that, a city of sand and grand monuments, another of water and wells and things hungry for blood, a fourth city, with a silver tree growing through its heart, and a fifth, with a leaning clockwork tower, and beyond that fifth, two others, indistinct like mist.  The cities were drowned and fell and rose and fell and rose again.  

And they were dark.  Untouched by sun or star.  And with them–  Within them–

“She loves the stars,” said the child, drinking in the impossible colors, the last kind starlight lambent on him like a blessing, like an apology.  His eyes were half closed in dreaming.  

It was true enough, though not as it was for the child.  Love wore a different face, and the stars there were cruel.  

But there–

The cities–

Dark.  Deep.  Marvelous.  

The parent took their child in their arms and stepped through the mirror into a forest the color of sleep.  The moon slunk across the sky like a cat carved of ivory.  The starlight was shaded in hues of memory.  Blood dripped like necessity onto grass that did not remember.  

They had stepped from one country of impossibility into another.  From death into dream, for there is love between those siblings as well.  

Necessity dripped like grief, and the parent walked through the colors of the Is Not to bargain with a lover of stars for the sake of their child.  

.

All things that love must also dream.

Love is a lie that is also a truth, as are all things with value, and such things must be found in dreams.  So too are truths that are also lies, and things that could have been and things that never were.  

But as the child dreamed within dream, and the parent followed the path of blood that even now drained from their child, so too did dream a messenger of delivering a message.  

The sky– Black.  A star– fallen.  Light– gone forever.  

A lesson: even the cruel can be loved.  

The inky fall of a final night drifted on the air of dreams.  Tears drifted up.  Snowfall in reverse.  It was always known that grief could not be delayed forever, a reckoning could not be postponed indefinitely.  Seven cities, seven stories told in the dark, never reaching sunlight.  Seven stories, their pages wet for weeping, a letter, useless, useless, there was never enough time.  

"I offer you a betrayal," said the parent, for although it was the axe, it was also clockwork, and the treachery of clocks is no small thing.  "I offer you service."

The messenger's twelve attendants drew near, and one was a mirror, in that it was mirrors, and another was a mirror in that it was the parent, and they recognized themselves and nodded across the vast distance.  

"It has been done," said the creature swathed in cloaks and wings.  "The bargain has been struck and it will be struck again."

"Sanctuary and healing.  Protection and life."

"Until the message must be delivered."

It would have to be time enough.

.

The parent went away twice, transformed.  First, to the city at the crossroads, where a priest-king bargained for the life of his lover, and the others go with it.  Second, with its child to a garden lit with the light of Stone.  The others went with it, here, too.  They went with an apple as red as a heart, with knives held in both hands, with a cup of pearls, with a mirror shining green, with a honeycomb dipped in allspice, with a bottle of poisoned wine, with a skein of spider-silk, with a burning coal - no, a cinder - held between long tongs, with a book with pages of lead, with a gem of immeasurable value, with a light that is not named, with the sound of bells.  And this made possible by what the parent had given.  

The garden was bright.  The garden was glorious.  The garden was paradise.  In the garden was vitality.  In the garden was life.  In the garden was a truth that should not be spoken.  

It is the domain of children to speak such truths.  

"The daughter of–"

"Quiet," snapped the stone-bearer.  

"It is a nonameliorant discussionary topic," said the book-carrier, significantly more gently. 

"Even here?"

"In omnilocatory.  Perfidicious elements require that we practice discretionics.”

The one armed with knives made a rather violent hushing gesture.  They were silent, the child laying upon the grass as his parent stroked his hair with hands that were twisting into claws.  

The book-bearer opened its tome and began to read to the child in a language that burned.  Symbols hung upon the air as it spoke, and it was understood: these were prayers, these were instructions, these were old and secret laws that had long been held broken and were being reforged by those who listened - or, perhaps, laws once thought unassailable being riven to pieces be the same.   

The child was offered first the unnamed light that is sleep, borne by the one whose name would be forgotten.  He refused it, and that one nodded, and watched hungrily.  By this, it had seen what was to come, and what had been, and it knew that with the contract being consummated, that which he would be could not be destroyed in entirety.  It was not enough.  It would never be enough.  

The wine was poured into the cup of pearls, and brought to his lips.  For poison was of death, and so was the child, and here, where death was impossible, he must die.  

Then, the mirror was held over him, and his lips anointed with honey, and the gem-bearer raised up its charge to cast captured sunlight over all.  Thus, death and dream the siblings were brought together.

The knives cut away the child's clothes and the makeshift bandages the parent had managed to give him.  The wound was exposed.  Glistening and gaping, it lay in the spirit as much as the flesh, and dreams as well as the waking world.  It was a disease and a curse as much as an injury.

The knives fell again, this time on the apple, cleaving out a hollow place inside it where the cinder might sit.  Then, slowly, slowly, it was lowered, down, into the wound.  

The silk-bearer unwound its skein, and with it threaded a needle fine enough that the silver glint of it was lost in the light.  It looked at the mirror and began to sew, stitches dipping in and out of possibility.  The wound closed, inch by inch.  With the last stitch, the reader closed its book.  

There was silence.  

Then, Mr Chimes raised its bell and–

.

You try to visit the House of Chimes regularly.  Not because it is terribly exciting - for a place frequented by the most interesting of Londoners, it is, in fact, rather dull, once a person is accustomed to it - but because being seen there tends to attract other opportunities.

(And you’re certainly paying for the privilege, aren’t you?)

As often as you remember, you forget, of course.  A person of such importance as yourself is always dreadfully busy, even when you don’t mean to be.  There was, for example, the matter of that peculiar plant, and the murder at the university, and getting that contract reversed - really, you should have known better than to keep that sort of acquaintance - and, oh, there’s really too much to list, now, isn’t there?

Today, you come with your dog.  She’s a very good girl, altogether, huge and black and smelling strongly of honey, though you know she puts many people off.  That’s just what you want today.  Too many people, aware of your reputation, expect you to be constantly sociable.  It simply isn’t sustainable.

You scratch her head between her ears.  Good girl.  Very good girl.  She could, you think, take on the Eater-of-Chains at its prime.  Too bad you hadn’t met her, yet.

The Personable Doorkeeper gives you a friendly nod as you approach the door of the House, and you return it.  He reaches for the handle, and…

You pause at the threshold, one foot still raised.  It is… uncommonly busy.  Beneficial or not, some of the more regular Friends of Mr Chimes, such as the Silk-Clad Expert and the Regretful Soldier, had a tendency to… discourage others.  There is, after all, a limit to how much one can bear to hear of Spider Councils or Hell.  

Well.  Not for you quite so much.  You are, after all, the sort of person who would let someone tear your heart out just to satisfy your curiosity.  

(To be quite honest, donating one’s body to science did become dull after the first few times.  You never would have guessed.)

You put your foot down, and continue your confident stride towards your favorite table.  How and why are so many exceptional people here tonight?  And behaving so strangely, too.  The Sulfur-Perfumed Dandy isn’t even trying to corrupt the Unlikely Innocent.  The Acclaimed Beauty, the Often-Censored Poet, and Mr. Huffam are in a corner together, so drunk they lean into one another.  The Staunch Patriot and the Suspected Traitor, who rarely leave the House of Chimes for reasons of identical and yet somehow opposite issues with the law, are within plain view of one another and haven’t gotten into a fight… and, more concerningly, are fidgeting so intently with their respective badges that they are falling apart.  As you watch, another red feather drifts into the air above the Suspected Traitor’s table.  

Something, you conclude, is wrong.  

Very wrong, indeed, you amend yourself, as a woman who looks just a little too much like a certain widow stands up and leaves.  

You sit.  Your table mate looks up from her book.  Her fingertips are colored in violant.  You think there might be just a touch of the shade on her lips as well.  She always did have a bad habit of licking her pens.  

“I was wondering when you’d show up,” she says.  She takes a brass bookmark from the back of the book - the edge sharp enough to cut - and places it on her current page before shutting the book and pushing it to one side.  The author is a noted poet of the Celestial school.  

You nod at the book and wonder if she was going back to her roots.  She had been a poet once herself.  

“I never left them,” she says.  

You have known the Flame-Touched Fabulist for years now.  You despair of ever understanding her.  But there are more important things at the moment.  Social requirements fulfilled, you need to know…

What is going on?

“You really don’t know?  This is one of your random visits after all?”

You bristle in annoyance.  Your visits aren’t random.  They are precisely calculated and planned, carried out in…

You deflate.  

You have only just gotten back.  

“Past the mirror again?” asks the Fabulist.  

Your lips twitch, which is, apparently, all the answer the Flame-Touched Fabulist needs.  Yes, you were in Parabola.  Blasted snakes.  Blasted cats.  Blasted whoever is riling them up, too.  Likely that new researcher.  The one the Dean of Supernumerary Fellows was so fond of.  Git.  

“Any luck looking for–”  

She broke off, looking over your shoulder.  The whole club quiets to muttering.  You twist, looking over your shoulder.  You can’t see what’s arrested everyone’s attention.  

“Well.  Even my words won’t equal the real thing.  Go look.”

You give her an inquiring look.  

“I’ve already seen,” she says.  “I…”  Her hands flutter, uncharacteristically.  “I have not decided how I feel about it, yet.  It isn’t a bad thing, but it is… unsettling.”

In the Neath, there are many things that could fall under that label.  Some of them, you get used to.  Others, you never really do.  Even when they move in next door.  And, sometimes, it’s the most innocuous things that do the most damage…

Still.  It was curiosity that brought you and the Fabulist together.  You get up and weave through the crowd.  Your dog helps with the parting.  As desperate as people seem to be to catch a glimpse of whatever this is, no one wants to get that close to her.  You give her an absent-minded pat.  Good girl.  

The crowd is gathered around a little-used table in the back of the club.  The one that always gets a draft.  You shift sideways around the Disobedient Clay Man and freeze.  

Because what you are seeing doesn’t make sense.  

There is a child at the table.  That sentence, stripped of context, doesn’t seem so impossible, doesn’t seem so extraordinary.  But this was the House of Chimes, not some random cafe or cheap restaurant.  What you have to pay for your membership doesn’t bear mentioning.  

Who would pay that for a child?

A more disturbing thought crosses your mind:  Did the child pay for himself?  Somehow?

You banish the thought for the moment, to instead observe the child.  Pale skin, ink black hair - it must have been a while since he’d seen the sun, if he ever had.  He is dressed expensively, which fits with his location, at least.  You cannot, quite, see the color of his eyes, as he’s looking down.  Reading a book.

There is a plate of cut apples on the table in front of him.  Surface fruit.  And is that honey?  Who in the world is giving a child prisoner’s honey?  On apples?

Or, maybe, like the apples, it’s from the surface.  The expense of that beggars your belief almost as much as it would beggar your wallet.

The boy absent-mindedly reaches across the table and pops an apple slice into his mouth.  He does not vanish.  So it is surface hon–

You barely have the thought when the Sticky-Fingered Epicurean darts to the table and snags one of the slices.  He disappears as soon as he shoves it in his mouth.  

That is.  Ah.  Disturbing.  The implications are–

You turn back to the table to see that the boy has looked up, frowning just a little at the theft.  You see his eyes.  

Once upon a time and years ago, you lived on the surface.  Once upon a time, you knew the sky, the stars.  Once upon a time it wasn’t enough.  

You remember the last, clear, winter day before you came down.  You remember standing on the deck of the ship and craning your head back to see the clear, cold-burning blue of the sky, framed by delicate, lacy clouds.  You remember, although until this moment you had forgotten, because the color is looking right at you.

Those eyes.  

You have seen people with blue eyes before, of course, despite the way blue tends to fade to storm-gray down here.  You have spent time in the Forgotten Quarter, cataloging the blue-glazed pagodas denizens of the Fourth City worshiped in.  You have never seen this blue down here, in the dark, twin shards of the sky implanted in someone’s face.  

Those eyes crinkle.  Smile.  It’s a smile.  

“Are you looking for a place to sit down?”  asks the Sky-Eyed Boy.  “It is awfully busy in here, isn’t it?”

You take his offer and begin to introduce yourself.  

“No, no, don’t tell me.  I like to guess.”  The boy laces his fingers together and props his chin up on them.  “Hmmmm…   A Parabolan Polymath?”

That… is far closer than you would have expected.  Close enough to one of your more common appellations to chill you.  You do not particularly like being known as the Mirror-Marching Mathematician, but it is accurate.  However, you prefer being a Fastidious Geometer.  

“Huh,” says the boy, eating another slice of honey-drizzled apple.  “Really?  What’s your favorite shape, then?”

You’ve always been partial to hyperbolas.  But that’s really neither here nor there.  This child…  He reminds you, a little, of the princesses.  That presence, that draw on attention, on sanity, the pure and overwhelming color of their eyes…  

What is the boy?

More diplomatically, who is he?

“I haven’t really been here long enough to pick up a title.  I haven’t done anything significant.”

You disagree, but you keep that quiet as the Sky-Eyed Boy thinks.  

“I was told that some people just use their parents’ titles.”

You allow that it’s true.  The Watchmaker’s Daughter comes to mind.

The boy nods.  “Then I should be called Mr Chimes’ Son…  Or do you think the Son of Mr Chimes is easier to say?”

You stare at this latest impossibility.  Attention is never drawn to the fact, but…  The Masters are distinctly…  They aren’t human.  At all.  You’ve met Mr Chimes.  It doesn’t look anything like this boy.  

“I’m adopted, of course,” says… Mr Chimes’ Son.  As if that’s any easier to swallow.  

“Why?” you manage, voice hoarse from shock.  

The boy tilts his head, as if assessing your intelligence and finding it lacking.  “Because he loves me.”

Well.  That just has all sorts of unsettling implications.  At the same time… of course that is the answer.  Here in the shadow of the Bazaar, what else could it be?

Love.  Always love.  

.

.

And, uhhhhhhhh if anyone wants to say hi to me on Fallen London my character name is Marsali.

[natural--trash]

Tag thing, wanted to do it for some time but now im at my comp and stuff so uh yeah anyways

Rules: once you’ve been tagged you’re supposed to write a post with eighty-two truths and then tag twenty-five people

I was tagged by @fluffyliontae

Name: tsu (just call me that, or susu or smth yknow)

Blood type: A-

Nickname(s): susu, mym

R/s: single

Zodiac Sign: libra

Pronouns: eh whatever, on some days its he > she > they but it can also be a diff order so yeah seriously whatever floats your boat

Favorite TV Shows: W - Two Worlds (same), a Persona 5 anime could be one of them but there’s none

Long or short hair: long

Height: 162cm or so

Do you have a crush on someone: romantic none, aesthetic ones? squishes? hoo boy

What do you like about yourself: my eyes, that cute scar on my hand

Right or left handed: right

List of three favorite colors: too many, i mostly like colour combos, but light blue, black and #540003 i guess

RIGHT NOW

Eating: nothing, i had brownie ritter sport a bit earlier tho

Drinking: water

I’m about to: draw

Listening to: Believer - Imagine Dragons

Kids: 0

Get married: nah

Career: I want money

MOST RECENT

Drink: water

Phone call: i think my uncle??

Song you listened to: before Believer there’s Bonfire on my spotify playlist but rn its Queen by History

HAVE YOU EVER

Dated someone twice: nah

Been cheated on: thats a long story

Kissed someone and regretted it: dont think so

Lost someone special: hmm

Been depressed: yeah

Been drunk and thrown up: never drunk alcohol

Kissed a stranger: nope

Had glasses or contacts: yeah

Had sex on the first date: nope

Broken someone’s heart: not that im aware of it

Turned someone down: kinda??

Cried when someone died: yeah

Fallen for a friend: im aro, that doesnt work

IN THE LAST YEAR HAVE YOU

Made a new friend: yes

Fallen out of love: no

Laughed until you cried: yes

Met someone who changed you: mhhh dont think so?

Found out who your true friends were: kinda (I’m sorry that I’m always answering like this omg)

Found out someone was talking about you: cant remember

Kissed someone on your fb list: i dont use fb

WHICH IS BETTER

Lips or eyes: eyes

Hugs or kisses: hugs

Shorter or taller: taller

Romantic or spontaneous: platonic

Sensitive or loud: sensitive

Hookup or relationship: friendship

Troublemaker or hesitant: hesitant

FIRST

Best friend: have conatct with both or them but we’re not as close? although I still don’t mind lying/rolling around on his floor

Surgery: does removing my wisdom teeth count? (does it?)

Sport: swimming (I wish I hadn’t stopped)

Vacation: Turkey

DO YOU BELIEVE IN

Yourself: depends on the day (same)

Miracles: yeah

Love at first sight: i dont rly believe in romantic love, but other than that yeah has flashbacks to when x impulse bought a ps vita

Heaven: i want to

EXTRAS

How many people from your fb list do you know irl: i still dont use fb

Do you have any pets: i used to have a duck

Do you want to change your name: yeah kinda i’d prefer something gender neutral

What did you do for your last birthday: i played video games at home bc i have no friends

What time did you wake up today: idk, fell asleep again

What were you doing last night at midnight: internet

Something you can’t wait for: when i move out

Last time you saw your mom: some minutes ago

What is one thing you wish you could change about your life: how my brain is sometimes

Have you ever talked to a person named tom: yeah, had a classmate with that name

What’s getting on your nerves: loud noises in the morning, often ppl i dont consider as friends

instructions: You can tell a lot about a person by the type of music they listen to. Put your music on shuffle and list the first 10 songs, then tag 10 people. No skipping.

(should i do the whole thing?? ok lemme get my phone pls note that i havent gotten the p5 ost yet)

Obtained a Berry! - DP OST

actually there comes some more Nintendo OST

Awake -BTS

Young Forever (unplugged ver) - BTS

crow tit (jpn) - bts

Mein Block - Sido

We don’t talk anymore - Jungkook

a song i do not remember what it was

Faint - Linkin Park

La la La - naughty boy

i think its time to make a new playlist bc i dont listen to some pop songs anymore

so uh yeah the whole thing it is

5 things you’d find in my bag:

tissues, a shit ton

wallet

probably some paper

charger

phone

5 things you’d find in my bedroom:

desk

clothes

stuffed animals

bed

my computer

5 things i always wanted to do in life:

Travelmore

Get a job i love

Own a cat

Get a life I like

Have ppl I’m close with that are not far away

5 things i’m currently into:

video games

persona 5, fire emblem heroes (they deserve their own point)

kpop

art

ummm edgesthetic?

5 things on my to do list:

go to a BTS concert

get a part time job

learn Japanese and perhaps Korean and get better at French

visit all the countries I still want to go to

get better at drawing

5 things people may not know about me:

I would love to study video game development but I’m too scared of what’s after that plus there’s no way I’ll get accepted hahaha

i love min yoongi and his mixtape bc he idk he helped me think that maybe not everything in my life will be shitty later and that maybe I’ll be able to be happy one day

I’m currently in a more down phase

i have problems with my sense of reality

i have a cute scar on my hand

Top 10 BTS Songs Tag:

  House Of Cards (Full Length Edition)

  House Of Cards [OUTRO]

  Good Day

No order from here on

4. I NEED U (Japanese Ver.) 5. FOR YOU 6. 쩔어 (Dope) 7. 등골브레이커 (Spine breaker) 8. 24/7 = Heaven 9. Blood Sweat & Tears 10. Not Today

I have time

10 groups/artists you like besides Kpop/liked before Kpop:

nqrse ❤︎ ❤︎ ❤︎ ❤︎

Fall Out Boy

Panic! at the Disco

DAOKO ❤︎ ❤︎ ❤︎ ❤︎

Casper

Die Ärzte

I think that’s it

DAT ADAM

uhh I liked Abingdon Boys School at some point

idk the old Sido songs aint bad?

10 favorite non-kpop songs:

ダイスキ - DAOKO

BANG! - DAOKO

Das Grizzly Lied - Casper

パラサイト(Parasite) - nqrse feat.まふまふ,luz  

ECHO - まふまふ (mafumafu) feat.nqrse

p much any song sung by nqrse im sorry im trash hmu and ill link you some good stuff

Believer - Imagine Dragons

Bonfire - Felix Jaehn, ALMA

Die Vergessenen 1/2 - Casper

omg i totally forgot about OSTs Toberu Mono from The Last Stiry, too much from Persona 5 liek Beneath the Mask, Last Surprise etc

10 favorite movies:

i don’t watch enough :c

10 favorite tv shows, including anime & cartoons:

W - Two Worlds

Acchi Kocchi

Psycho Pass

I’m giving up

10 things you enjoyed before kpop/enjoy besides kpop, that won’t fit in the lists above:

music

art

video games

esp atlus n nintendo games!!

cute soft stuffed animals

flight rising

sarma

collecting cute key charms

collecting cute things in general

dancing

ten tag last movie you watched: i dont know

last song you listened to:  that one song mentioned above by Daoko

last show you watched: I Hear Your Voice

last book you read: Der Vorleser by Bernhard Schlink, don’t read it

last thing you ate: chocolate

if you could be anywhere in the world right now where would you be: Tokyo

when would you time travel to: itll be spontaneous

first thing you would do with lottery money: buy a loft

character you would hang out with for a day: P5 Protagonist

time right now: 23:52

the ‘or’ tag

build a snowman with v OR have a snowball fight with j-hope

get coffee with suga OR get ice cream with suga

go to the cinema with jimin OR the amusement park with jungkook

do a dance cover with j-hope OR sing a duet with jin

kiss rap monster OR cuddle suga

babysit with jimin OR dogsit with v

meet j-hope’s family OR have v meet your family

film a commercial with j-hope OR film a sketch with v

hug jimin OR hold hands with jungkook

go to paris with jin OR go to london with suga (sorry been to paris already)

film a drama with jin OR do a photo shoot with rap monster

attend an award show with rap monster OR wear couple t-shirts at the airport with jungkook

spend a lazy day with suga OR explore a city with j-hope

fall asleep next to jimin OR wake up next to jungkook

make up a silly rap with v OR a silly choreography with jin

have a fun picnic with j-hope OR a fancy date with jin

have jungkook serenade you OR have v sing you to sleep

have a dance party with j-hope OR sing karaoke with suga

go camping with jimin and v OR go to the beach with rap monster and suga

cook with jin AND bake a cake with jimin

have a sleepover with the hyung line OR a birthday party with the maknae line

celebrate halloween with jungkook, suga, v and j-hope OR christmas with rap monster, jimin and j-hope

rules: answer the questions with the first letter of your name, then tag 10 people. If the person who tagged you has the same initial, you must use different answers. you cannot use the same word twice.

What is your name? - Tsu

A four letter word? - text

A boy’s name? - Tom

An occupation? - tailor

Something you wear? - t-shirt

A color? - turquoise

A food? - tomato

Something you find in the bathroom? - toilet

A place? - Tokyo

A reason for being late? - traffic

Something you shout? - yells

A movie title? - something that starts with “the”

Something you drink? - tea

An animal? - turtle

A type of car? - tesla

Title of a song? - Tage wie diese - die toten hosen

I’m,,, maybe later @mama-kisu @metroid-fr (you can do the non kpop stuff) eh whoever wants i guess

[five-rivers]

Does anyone here in the Phandom play Fallen London?

There is a part of me that thinks it would be cool to do a DP X FL crossover.