#sci fi seal

[cf-12]

Arrival (2016)

[harpuiaa]

i've been dead and gone bc of school and jobsearching and everything happening all at once but ive been playing the boktai series games lately and i'm enjoying it a lot. I just got past the third boss in boktai 2. I don't know why but i'm enthralled with these games, i highly recommend them

[corvidist]

Artfight attack for @styllwaters of their OC Selma, returning to the facility she was raised in for a more important conversation.

[styllwaters]

Selma (she/her) is a sophont leopard seal whose lineage is rooted in genetic modification. She has mixed DNA, including human and bear. She is sarcastic, bold, and sometimes blunt, but cares deeply about her students at ESSE.

More info under the cut!

Selma is 28 years old and has had to undergo countless surgeries throughout her life. The unethical experimentation which her ancestors experienced has caused her to develop chronic pain, as well as heart and joint issues. Her unconventional bauplan is a primary factor.

She was born on Hanidias, into a care facility made specifically for GM individuals. An overwhelmingly high percentage of the residents were victims of Genizix. Selma's expected lifespan is 60-65 years, considered a rare and lucky case by her doctors. Most other Earth experiments had a maximum lifespan of 30.

She was raised by a post-human nurse who worked as a spacecraft intelligence for an emergency medical craft - this sparked her love of piloting. Selma was discharged from the facility at 19 years, although she has to return frequently for checkups.

She now works on Kilra at Elvoir's School of Space Exploration, teaching spaceflight classes. After finding Vreaz, she offered to pay for his tuition. In return, Vreaz helps her out in the workshop after school.

Besides piloting, Selma enjoys fashion, cafes, and making reckless decisions.

[haaaaaaaaaaaave-you-met-ted]

Sealed Empire Cover Art by David Metzger

[rimurutempest]

*Ta sé:

(*This is é.)

Image ID in alt text.

Help me pick a scientific name for my horrible cryptid? 🥺🫶

Art is by @calamitydragon btw!

[macsdayoff]

met a new psychiatrist today and she was asking the adhd questions and when she got to the only wanting to talk abt interests/interrupting i just started giggling. is this what the kids call a red flag

[anemoki]

cutie X3

I luv aliens and seals :3

[wanderthefens]

Thinking about this video I watched yesterday about mega cities and honestly I think maybe we as a species should die out before we make mega cities a thing. The video was mainly about cities from movies but it was so optimistic about real life future mega cities despite showing the literal hellscape cities from these movies in the background like I’m glad city planners and architects are excited about building vertically but if I ever had to live in a city that looked and functioned like the one in the fifth element I would just kill myself. Same for the city in the minority report but that one causes a weird sort of uncomfortable terror in me that the fifth element doesn’t. The fifth element’s city is just horrible and infuriating and grungy. The minority report cityscape makes me feel a particular difficult to describe fearful discomfort. And don’t get me started on the concept of the entire eastern seaboard of the US being one giant mega city like if that ever happens in real life we have got to drive ourselves to extinction because the earth is never recovering from that. We gotta export our trash to mars and make peace with ourselves because a city spanning an entire seaboard sounds like the end of days to me.

[writerssnippets]

Unscripted

The prisoner had been sitting idly against the wall when the dark-clad figure entered. The solitarily confined inmate had seemed tired, his black hair somewhat bedraggled and his eyes shut in silent slumber, but the sound of footsteps seemed to revitalize him instantly as said eyes snapped open, his sharp blue irises darting towards the bars that kept him locked away. He rose to his feet in a manner that might have been described as reverent if not for the slow smirk that spread across his features as he dusted off his black leather clothing, his movements allowing the torchlight to flicker off of the golden accents. He towered over the other, his length only accentuated by the fact that he was thin enough to come across as underfed.

Not unlikely, in a prison cell that had been abandoned for well over a century.

“It’s been a while since I’ve seen one of your kind around here,” the prisoner mused as he approached the bars, the figure on the other side coming to a halt in front of his cell, “a Player, huh? Few make it this far, you know.”

The Player turned to face him, and a less experienced person would have flinched at the sight of their face. It was a blur of static, constantly obscured by glitches and inconsistencies. They wore a hood that hid the phenomenon in shadows, but the prisoner’s keen eyes could still discern the emotionless square pupils that glowed faintly beneath, as well as the erratic flashes of the veil of anonymity.

The Player was silent at first, as though deliberating how to respond. The prisoner eyed them patiently, his gaze never still for so much as a second as it flickered from the Player’s non-descript cloak to their muddy boots, resting momentarily on their belt as he searched for a weapon, but found none. His eyebrows quirked imperceptibly upwards, but before he could voice his observations, the Player spoke.

“I’m not here to chat. Give me what I want, and I’ll leave.”

The prisoner let out a dry laugh. “All business, are we? Come now, why would I be eager to lose the only company I’ve had in decades?”

The Player showed no emotion, their voice equally neutral as they continued.

“Where is the Hidden Palace?”

A disappointed huff sounded from the prisoner’s lips as he brushed aside an errant strand of black hair. “Now why would I tell you that?”

The Player’s snarl echoed hollowly down the hall, prisoners shifting anxiously in their cells at the discontented sound. The prisoner in front of them didn’t seem fazed, however, as he crossed his arms and raised an eyebrow.

“Oooooh threats,” he replied mockingly, rubbing a hand over his clean-shaven chin, “very impressive. Tell me, handsome-- do you know why our people refer to your kind as Players?”

The Player didn’t respond, and the prisoner leaned closer to iron gate between them, clenching a hand around the bars as he spat his words with a sneer. “It’s because that’s what you do. You lie, you manipulate, you kill and you steal. You play people, and I’m not about to participate in your little game.”

The Player was fast, almost too fast to see. Their hand was but a blur of static as they grabbed the collar of the prisoner’s sleek outfit, pulling it towards themselves so that his face was pressed against the bars, choking as his own attire forbade him from breathing. There was no gloating, no eerie chuckles or sinister smiles, only the same monotonous voice as the Player restated their demands.

“The Hidden Palace. You know where it is, do you not? Tell me.”

The prisoner slammed his palms against the bar in a wordless surrender, staggering backwards as the Player released him from their iron grip.

“You drive a hard bargain, Player,” he spoke wryly, rubbing his throat as he attempted to regain his lost breath, “alright, I’ll tell you where the Palace is. Do you have a map?”

Without a word, the Player drew a map from the backpack slung over their shoulder, holding it open in front of the cell as the prisoner stumbled back towards the divide between them.

For a moment, the prisoner hesitated. He could feel the power coursing through his veins, just below the surface-- he could take the Player, easily. All he had to do was release it--

He pointed at the lonely mountain marked as the Ruined City on the map.

The Played nodded, rolling up the map once more and returning it to their pack. Then without another word they turned on their heel, tracking dry mud along the hallway as they left the prison.

The prisoner sighed in frustration, letting out a cathartic yell as he slammed a fist into the wall beside him. Cracks formed in the cement, a shiver running through the ancient cell, and the inhabitants of the neighbouring cells mumbled anxiously to themselves. The leatherclad prisoner ran his fingers over the cracks pensively and sighed once more, this time in resignation. He watched as the cracks flickered momentarily, before seeming to repair out of their own violition, leaving the wall perfectly intact.

He could have struck out at the Player. He could’ve tried to steal the keys, or manipulated them by sending them in the wrong direction, or simply busted the wall.

But that would’ve meant going off-script. And if there was one thing he knew, it was that going off-script was a very, very bad idea.

Especially for an NPC.

[cf-12]

変わらないキミは特別です

[strangesmallbard]

bg3 characters if they worked at publix/safeway/your grocery store of choice:

karlach: in charge of anything that involves moving heavy objects between locations, but also works produce. LOVES helping old ladies take their groceries to the car; will accidentally abandon the vegetables at least once per shift. (she does apologize to the vegetables.) also is a pallet stacking master in the most haphazard configurations that, somehow, miraculously never fall over. frequently posts her monstrosities on r/publix, alongside a selfie of her giving a cheeky thumbs up.

wyll: store manager, in his second year of a master’s degree in public policy. optimistic like a sword is optimistic. WILL make sure you take your mandated break and will hand out store giftcards for a job well done. does not suffer customers who behave badly. is roommates and longtime best friends with karlach; the energy they exude while together either makes your shift bearable or unbearable, depending.

shadowheart: works the in-store coffee counter. probably should not because she always looks vaguely disgusted, annoyed, or bored. the dark circles under her eyes are always there no matter how many espresso shots she sips. has anonymously complained to corporate about the store’s music choices. every new employee thinks they have a shot with her until she hits them with the 👁️😐 did you need something? 👁️😐 and they slink away, feeling chastised for reasons unknown.

minthara: works the meat and/or fish counter. smokes seventeen packs per mandated break. always smells a little bit like red meat. has the most insane combat stories but it’s completely unclear whether she’s a veteran or just someone who gets into situations on purpose. every 20-something employee is at least mildly obsessed with her whole thing, but she’ll only humor karlach. no one knows where she lives.

lae’zel: 22-year-old grocery team lead. typically works the 5pm-11pm shift, but still obviously runs that shit like a navy seal base. has encyclopedic knowledge of grocery store codes and also lore. during mandated breaks she can be found doing one-armed pushups, argueflirting with shadowheart, or scribbling poetry in a notebook. she’s also the pitcher on her college’s varsity baseball team; everyone shows up to her big games and she fails at not looking overwhelmed by joy every time.

jaheira: beloved customer service manager, knows literally everything and everyone. taught wyll everything he knows about not suffering customers who behave badly. often goes mountain climbing with her scary 39-year-old girlfriend astele who owns the smoke shop next door. sells the best weed you’ll ever smoke in your life.

gale: day shift manager counterpart to lae’zel, postdoc who needs the job to make rent obviously. constantly gives aisle directions for the store location he worked during undergrad and shelves the soup cans all wrong. WILL show you photos of his cat. constantly recognized by his booktube fans (he also streams sims 4 builds of classic sci fi/fantasy book locations). he does wear his own merch underneath the uniform.

halsin: that customer who’s very polite but frequently and inexplicably barefoot. he also teaches woodworking and pottery at the youth center down the road. sometimes brings his regular kids to the store for a field trip and those little bags of cheetos. grows the weed that jaheira sells.

astarion: does not work at the grocery store. he worked at the grocery store for two weeks, during which he showed up late every day, insulted customers, and generally behaved like a cat ripped away from his ball of yarn. he only lasted those two weeks because gale (roommate/situationship) begged wyll to give him another chance in a different department. he still lives with gale while finishing up a law degree and can be found loitering in the grocery store, bitching about The Circumstances with shadowheart.

[lolabangtan]

arte factum | pjm

After your ex-husband is found dead in his house, you're burdened with the well-being of his latest invention, a good-looking, polite android who seems to have a peculiar interest in you.

Word count: 17k

Warnings: smut, somnophilia, obsessive behaviour, suicide, mentions of domestic and psicological abuse.

# Artifical Intelligence AU, horror, sci-fi, sub!Jimin, dom!female reader, yandere!android Jimin, vouyerism, he uses one of her panties to jerk off 😭, ma’am/Master kink, homeboy just doesn’t handle well seeing her naked, creampie, ‘unprotected’ vaginal sex, oral sex (male and female receiving), nipple play, overstimulation, fingering, horny groping, he needs to chill, face-fucking him with her fingers? idk.

A/N: lots of plot, read with caution. I don’t really know what else to say. Just, hm, enjoy the filth? Sub!yanderes are probably one of my lowest fantasies 😗✌️

Read this story listening to its own Spotify playlist.

“I didn’t know you were back already. How did it go?”

You’re still staring at your reflection on the teacup, the steamy drink smudging your face despite your complete stasis. It’s been at least five minutes since Taehyung poured it for you, but you’re still gripping the cup instead of sipping it.

“Well,” you murmur without looking away, “how do all funerals go? – they’re always depressive as fuck.”

Yoongi takes a seat in front of you “You know you can be sad about it, don’t you? It doesn’t mean you’re to blame. We— we don’t know anything yet.”

“My husband killed himself!” you blurt out, finally ripping your eyes away from your reflection. “I know I didn’t do anything, but still— maybe I could’ve done something. Maybe— maybe he wouldn’t be dead if I hadn’t sued him.”

You’re still wearing all back, sitting down miserably in your kitchen. That tea that Taehyung poured you is starting to cool down.

“Your hubby was a psycho, remember? It doesn’t make him any less of a stalker just because he’s dead now.”

Your friend has always had a way with words, you think to yourself with a chuckle; after all, he’s right. Just because he’s dead, it doesn’t mean he didn’t put you through all that shit. In a way, and you feel terrible for this, you’re kind of glad he’s gone.

“Mrs Im said they’d read the will this evening. You’re not going, after all?”

“You think he left me anything?” you ask him with an arched eyebrow.

But Yoongi just shrugs. “Maybe. Who knows.”

Even if he did, you’re not sure you want any of the things your ex-husband could’ve possibly left for you after his death. They’d be soiled with hatred and poison.

It seems, after all, that he did leave you something in his will. Or that you suspect, at least, after you’re summoned to his house by one of his lawyers. You can’t even describe the goosebumps rising in your skin as you walk into the suburban house that you used to call home.

“Ma’am, it’s good to see you.” Mrs Im rushes to shake your hand when she sees you. “I wasn’t sure you’d come. Thank you.”

“It’s the least I could do,” you say half-heartedly.

But, well, you went to the funeral, so it would be odd not to come; you need to finish off and seal this part of your life for once and for all.

“Don’t worry, it’s just some money and the art collection.” You don’t miss the way the woman and the notary eye each other, and you cross your eyes. “Uh, well, there is something else... that he left for you hoping you’d accept. One of his last creations. He finished it a few months ago.”

“I don’t really need a vacuuming robot, thank—”

“Oh, ma’am—! It’s something completely different,” the lawyer cries out.

With an arched eyebrow, you follow them down the hall, now more intrigued than ever, and walk down the steps that lead to his lab, where he’d work on all of his inventions. A mad scientist for a husband is what you had. A truly mad genius. You can’t even fathom what he’s invented this time.

Since it’s not been longer than a week since he passed away, the place is just as eery and spooky as it has always been.

You walk downstairs following the other two and stop in your tracks when they do, almost bumping against them. Arching your eyebrows once again, you open your mouth to ask them what’s wrong but go quiet when a young man, standing naked in the middle of the room, waves at you with the sweetest of smiles.

“God! I told you not to turn it on yet! Fucking hell, I almost had a fucking heart attack,” Mrs Im grunts, putting her hand on her chest.

“S-sorry, I swear I thought it was turned off when I left...”

Your eyes can’t help but flutter down to his crotch; his cock is thick and decently sized, but what truly makes your mouth water is how it reddens and twitches when the two of you meet. Oh, how you like nice cocks. How you need one in your life— isn’t he gonna cover himself or something, though?

“Uh, nice to meet you. Anybody cares to explain what the hell is going on?” you finally blurt out, a bit tired of their antics and dying to just have something else to look at. “I’d like to go back home as soon as possible.”

The woman takes a deep breath. “This is it, ma’am— this is what your husband wanted you to keep—”

“My name is Jimin, ma’am. It’s my pleasure to meet you.”

You don’t listen and turn around towards her:

“He... wanted me to adopt this guy?”

“That’s not a ‘guy’, ma’am, it’s Jimin, or subject JM13, a robot. Your ex-husband had been working on it for five years until now,” the notary continues, finally making himself noticed.

Five years? That means he was already working on it during the last years of your marriage. Weird.

“He was planning on selling the design to a company for the massive production of, er, sex androids.” Mrs Im’s voice goes meeker and softer as she speaks, perhaps ashamed of her words. Honestly? Same. Fucking sickhead. You stare at the so-called Jimin in disbelief. “However” – you look up back at her when she continues – “he seemed to change his mind at some point and decided to keep it and make you its guardian if something ever happened to him.”

“And what am I supposed to do with a... sex robot, if I may know?”

Mrs Im walks up to the big table in the centre of the room and picks up a bunch of papers just to read them leisurely. Then she puts them back on the surface and sighs.

“Can I be honest with you, ma’am?” You nod, though a bit hesitant. “Just take it. Sell it off if you want, there wasn’t anything that forbids you on the will. Or keep it; it can clean, cook, and fuck your brains out if you want. Do whatever you want, I just wanna be over with this case already. Your psycho ex has been giving me a headache ever since you sued him after your divorce.”

You need a couple of seconds to process it all, but you quickly come to the conclusion that she’s just as tired of this business as you. And maybe a hand or two at home won’t be so bad after all.

But it’s so spooky – he looks just like a person.

“So, its name is Jimin?” you ask as you walk up to the standing figure in front of you. You don’t need to tilt your head to look at him.

“So it seems.”

“I guess you’re coming home with me, Jimin. I just hope these two know how you work,” you say then, glancing at them.

“I’ll be happy to help, ma’am.” Jimin’s voice is probably the sweetest sound you’ve ever heard; it slithers into your mushy brain and pools on your tongue with the craving of saying his name out loud yourself – Jimin. “Thank you for keeping me. I will do anything I can to be of assistance to you.”

“I’m sure you will... Come on, let’s go home. By the way, don’t you come with instructions or something?”

Jimin laughs boyishly. “I’m automated, ma’am.”

“Well, there is one thing that you might want to know, though...” The woman butts in with the papers in her hand and reads, “If it ever puts you in danger and ignores direct instructions, you can always press the small switch behind his left ear. It will proceed with the complete shutdown of its system until you decide to turn it on again. In case you are being immobilised, just say out loud its name along with ‘shutdown’ and it will turn itself off.”

As soon as they’ve handed you some clothes for him and given you the little instructions Jimin needs to function, you find yourself closing the door of the side of the car where he’s sitting right now before you head to the driver's seat.

It’s true that you don’t trust this thing in the slightest, especially knowing who created it. But you’re determined to find out what has your ex-husband planned for you and why he decided he wanted you to keep Jimin out of all the people he knew. Maybe he’s not dead and is watching you right now through a peephole in the android’s eyes? Maybe he’s not done making your life miserable yet.

“Ma’am—!”

Jimin takes the wheel in time before your car takes a turn, neglected during the short but strong while you’ve been sulking in your thoughts.

“Are you okay, ma’am?” he asks you then, looking at you with concern as you take over the wheel again. “Would you rather I drove instead?”

“No, it’s... It’s okay, Jimin, thank you.”

“Your heart is beating fast, ma’am. Am I making you uneasy?”

You roll your eyes with a shameful sigh. “Uh, maybe a little. But it’s not your fault— you just have a creator with kind of a nasty name.”

“You used to sleep with my Master, I know.”

“Yeah... I mean,” you blurt out, now a bit bashful, “we were married. It was a bit more serious than just sleeping together – unfortunately.”

But then you realise— how on earth does this robot know who you are?

“Did he talk about me?”

“He talked about you quite often.”

You take a breath. “And what would he say?”

“My Master... wanted me to know how much he loved you,” Jimin says half-heartedly.

So, he just built himself a friend. One that couldn’t run away from him – pathetic. But Jimin doesn’t seem too fond of him, so you relish in the idea that your ex couldn’t even keep his handmade friends.

“He didn’t love me,” you spit out. “That nasty thing wasn’t love.”

It’s pretty much pointless to try and explain what love is to a robot, so you just tighten your grip on the wheel. For the rest of the ride, you stay in complete silence, and Jimin respects that you don’t want to talk.

“Uh, I guess you won’t need a bedroom? Or do you?”

Jimin takes a look around, inspecting the entrance hall of your house. “It’s better for my hardware to rest on a bed when I’m on standby, ma’am.”

“And... when do you switch to stand-by?”

“Once you go to bed,” he replies with a smile. “But I react to loud noises and turn back on in case there’s an emergency.”

Oh, so you get a full-time bodyguard in the package too. Cool – you guess.

“In that case, you can have the guest room. My room is upstairs— well, I’ll show you around now. Follow me.” Naturally, Jimin does as told and walks behind you as you guide him through the rest of the house. “My office is at the end of the corridor. I need to focus when I’m working, so please, don’t make too much of a fuss if you’re around this part of the house.”

“May I know what’s your profession?” Jimin asks on his way back to the kitchen.

“I’m... I draw comics,” you murmur. “It’s a pretty boring job since I started working for a publishing company, but the pay is really good— and I work at home a lot, so I’d also prefer if you didn’t disturb me when I’m in there unless there’s an emergency.”

You go to grab the kettle to make yourself some tea, but he gently takes it from your hand and beckons you to take a seat instead.

“Please allow me, ma’am.”

Pulling your hands away, you let him take charge of your tea and sit down. It’s oddly nice, but there’s a little voice in your head nagging you for taking advantage of a robot. As if that’s even possible. However, the voice slowly fades as Jimin prepares your tea, your eyes fixed on the way the muscles of his back bulge and tense under the flimsy fabric.

Well, your ex-husband did a pretty decent job with this one.

“There you go, ma’am. Would you like some cream with it?” he asks again with that angelic voice of his. You just shake your head. “What would you like me to do now?”

“Oh, nothing, really.” You fidget on your spot, awkwardly taking the teacup between your fingers.

“Please— I want to be of service.”

At his insistence, you nod weakly. “Well, I guess the kitchen could use some maintenance... And I think the microwave is broken. Can you... do something about that?”

Jimin nods fervently and, after asking you where can he find the tools, he gets on with the job. You can just watch him in awe as he dusts the windows, fixes your microwave, and puts a pair of flowers that apparently had been in your dining hall all this morning in a China vase. Again, you’re too perplexed to regret your decision.

Somewhere after dinner – which clearly was made by Jimin and was basically the best bite you’ve had in a while – your doorbell rings in the middle of the house’s pre-slumber silence.

You rush to the door before he can do anything. “I’ll go, you stay here.”

When you reach the entrance hall and open the door, you see Taehyung standing in front of the gate, checking impatiently the watch on his wrist.

“Y/N! What’s wrong with you?” he whines through the intercom. “Open up! Didn’t you get my texts?”

God, you’ve just realised that you’ve been so busy with the funeral, the will, and handling this peculiar new inhabitant in your house that you haven’t checked your personal phone since lunch.

“Sorry—”

“Hey, I was mad worried,” he mutters, coming in without needing to be invited. “How did it go? What did the notary say? Did the psycho leave you—?”

Judging by your friend’s sudden silence, you figure he’s just noticed the new face standing in the middle of the hall. Taehyung’s grimace turns from shock to confusion, and from confusion to some kind of sly understanding.

“Sorry,” he chirps, “didn’t know you had company. I can come back later if you want.”

“Actually— I think you should know this.”

Taehyung raises his eyebrows and offers Jimin his hand for a shake. “Really? Ah, I’m Kim Taehyung, nice to meet you. Wow, your hands are so soft! What lotion do you use?”

“Listen, this is what my ex left for me in his will. His name is Jimin.”

“This? You mean... that he’s his adopted child or something?” your friend retorts with a grimace. “Or a protégé?”

“No, he’s a robot.”

But he just lets out a laugh. “You’re kidding me.”

“God, I’m being serious— Jimin, can you show him?” The android obediently turns around and lifts his shirt, revealing a plug that sinks all the way into his lower back. “See? I know it looks like a fucking joke because I’m still trying to process it all – but he is.”

Switching his eyes from him to you, Taehyung finally grabs your arm and, excusing the two of you, pushes you into the kitchen before closing the door. “Are you nuts? So, they told you your psychotic ex-husband built a robot that you could take as a housekeeper and you fucking brought it in? What is wrong with you—!”

“Do you think I’m stupid?” you cut him off. “I know there’s something fishy about this. But I want to find out what.”

“If this is about—”

“Of course it is,” you cry out then and bury your face in your hands.

You need to know – you need to know if he was to blame after all or if you actually became a paranoid who dumped her innocent husband and convinced everyone that he was crazy. You need to know if you just pushed him into such a miserable and unjust fate that he had to end his life.

And perhaps Jimin has the answer.

“Whatever, I’ll keep an eye out on him. Just one creepy thing, Y/N,” Taehyung grunts as he opens the kitchen door to walk out. “One creepy thing and he’s a dead robot.”

You roll your eyes with a half-hearted grin and follow him back into the living room.

Jimin looks up from the floor. “I... I understand that my Master did bad things to you, ma’am— but I swear I’d never hurt you. I’d rather die myself.”

You decide not to answer or react to his puppy eyes. Then your friend claims to be too busy to stay – although he does make you promise that you’ll call him if anything happens – and you see him off with the shadow of Jimin standing behind you.

“Dude, it’s so fucking realistic,” Taehyung grunts before getting in his car.

Once the two of you are alone in the house again, you tell him that you’re going to take a bath to wash away every single ounce of stress from today. He nods with a smile and watches you enter the bathroom; it’s modern and large, your silhouette reflecting weakly on the black and white tiles. A spacious bathtub rests in the middle of the room.

You sit on the marble edge as you watch the steamy water fill up the tub.

When there’s enough water and the ceiling of the room is cloudy with steam, you take off your clothes, drop them onto the floor, and finally, sit down. Just that makes you let out a groan of pleasure, the feeling of the hot water licking on your limbs washing all your worries away.

You’ve always thought that there’s something oddly erotic in bathing – whether it’s just the freedom of being naked in the tub or all the possible ways one can be served and tended to.

After you wrinkle like a raisin, you decide it’s time to come out and get on with your evening; still a bit dizzy from the illegally amazing bath, you stand up to hop out of the tub, with the misfortune of slipping on some pool of water on the floor.

You fall on your backside, twisting your arm in the way.

“Oh, fuck! Shit!”

Somehow you manage to get up and pick up the remaining pieces of your dignity. Still, there’s a throbbing pain in your arm that means you most probably should have it checked.

And, of course, Jimin suddenly bursts in without knocking. “Ma’am? Are you all right—?”

His eyes immediately slide down your figure, fixing on your breasts, and you cover yourself up as an instinct.

“Don’t you know how to knock?” you grunt, ignoring the pulsing pain. “I, uh, slipped and fell. But I’m okay, don’t worry. Could make it out alive...” God, what on earth are you doing? You don’t have to cover up for him, he’s just a pile of circuits and microchips. “I’m fine.”

Slowly – tauntingly almost – you move your hands away from your breasts, feeling a tingle in the pit of your stomach when they softly move forward. You also uncover your crotch, and you’ve never felt so deliciously bare before. Jimin’s eyes flicker down to your perked nipples, he drinks up the sight of your figure for a slight second before he pulls himself back together and holds the towel out for you.

“Can you lift your arm, ma’am?”

You sigh. “No, it hurts too much,” you grunt then as you spin it. Great, now you’ll have to drop by the hospital to check if you broke anything. “I, uh— I need the towel.”

“Allow me.”

After staring into his eyes with defiance for five exhausting seconds, you raise your arms a bit, enough so it won’t hurt, so that Jimin can dry you.

Like the touch of a feather, he runs the towel against the skin of your shoulders first. Delicate, the cotton hugs you, it brushes you softly. Soon, he’s done with your arms and moves down to your breasts. It almost feels like his breath hitches at the contact of your mounds, LED-lit irises fixing on your nipples. If you were a bit more insane, you’d swear there’s some sort of sexual tension between the two of you.

But, of course, you’re not that insane yet.

Jimin was made to resemble a human— and he does, almost perfectly. A fairly good looking one on top of that. So, it’s normal that your realities are mixed up. Your coochie doesn’t know his robocock is made of microchips.

You have to stop yourself from thinking any further about Jimin’s cock. It won’t do you any good.

The contact of his fingers with your nipples, though separated by the towel, sends a shiver down your spine, and you shift in front of him.

Jimin does a very meticulous job as he kneads your breasts and brushes the fabric against them, eyes never leaving the view. For a second he sticks out his tongue, but it seems that – for some reason – he was just wetting his lips.

Then he drops to his knees, and it catches you off guard. Your core pulses at the unfathomable thought of having his tongue lapping at your wet folds, but you’re quick to hush them away.

“I should take you to a hospital, ma’am,” Jimin says softly, eyes looking up at you from between your legs. You can swear his breath feels hot. “Maybe you hurt your arm seriously.”

It’ll be a complete mess if you have, honestly. You need to hand in the sketches of your new work in a couple of weeks. A work that doesn’t even have a plot yet if you may add. So, obviously, you just can’t afford more delays.

Jimin finishes worshipping your legs dry after he asks you to sit down; you actually give it a thought at some point – you could tell him to bend down and eat you out until you’ve soaked his face and no one would be there to judge you. You could tell him to lie on the floor and let you ride his automatic cock until his stupid circuits break down. Not that you wouldn’t absolutely love it.

What a pity you’re too sane to do it.

Jimin shifts uncomfortably between your legs, eyes wandering and roaming around like crazy, before he gets up— and you swear, you swear there’s a slight tent in his crotch. You swear you saw it just now. Is that normal? Is it some kind of reaction programmed into his automatised body or something?

“Okay, let me just get ready and we’ll head out—” You turn around, realising something. “Damn it... Ugh, I forgot I brought the hamper down to the kitchen to do the laundry... Mind dumping it for me? I still have to dry my hair.”

Obviously, he nods with a gentle smile, but his eyes shift to red when he finally has your underwear in his hand; you decide not to give it much importance, though.

Since you asked him to look into your room in case there were any other dirty clothes lying around, Jimin turns the doorknob and slithers in like a shadow. It’s the first time he’s in your room – and the smell is mind-blowing; everything is imprinted with your fragrance, everything has been touched by you, everything has your essence all over it. Oh, he wanted to meet you so bad.

Not as reluctantly as he should, he can’t help pressing your underwear against his nose. It too smells like you.

You were so close just now, your warmth, your wet heat standing right in front of him. It makes something tickle within all his cables and microchips, makes him need and desire you in a way that he’s never felt before. Nothing could’ve ever prepared Jimin for the feeling of finally having you in front of him.

This smell that overwhelms each of his sensors, the fragrance of your skin that he got to learn so well, your luscious lips moving as you’d talk to him, your hands, so soft— you had invaded every single corner of memory he had prepared for when Jimin finally got to meet you in the flesh.

Now, he knows it’s wrong. He knows that giving in to his desire for you is not part of his plan. But God, how can he resist the urge, the yearning?

With a swinging movement, Jimin cups his hardening crotch; the contact is slight, but it’s enough to make him sigh and close his eyes to project images of those sweet memories. He pictures you lying on the mattress as he takes out his cock – with your legs parted and hooked around his head as he dips his tongue into your dripping slit. He wraps his wet muscle around your clit and sucks, making you clench around nothing, making you want him. A whimper escapes from your parted lips, it feels too good not to make a sound. Jimin laps at your folds deeper, wants you to remember the feeling of his tongue against your cunt forever.

The sensors in his cock thrill as he humps his hand, your panties shoved into his mouth.

It’s like a vine creeping up his throat and wrapping around it, would leave him breathless. His system wasn’t ready for this ecstatic craving, he needs to buck his hips faster and squeeze the sensitive tip.

He takes out his cock, craving more. Now fucking into your underwear, his cock slides between the folds, and Jimin comes with a pitiful mewl a second later. His artificial cum soils the already damp fabric with the frustrating, half-hearted feeling that it’s your pussy he’s filling up.

It spurts on his fingers too, so Jimin licks them clean before standing up to throw the panties into the washing machine for once and for all. Excitement bubbles up inside of him.

He was made for loving you, after all.

There are only two things that comfort you right now.

The first one is that, even though you hurt your left wrist, you need only the right one to draw. The second is that Jimin the android is here to do literally everything you want.

From taking out the garbage to cooking to massaging your feet or fixing the wobbly leg of your drawing table, he’s always ecstatic to help. For real, it almost feels as if you’re the one doing him a favour when you let him make your bed. It only gets weird when you need his assistance to do things like getting dressed or taking a bath, but Jimin is a robot, after all; it’s all in your touch-deprived head.

“Yeah, I see what you mean... But I can’t really change that, it’d create a plot hole; there’s a scene in the seventh chapter...”

Right now you’re having an online meeting with your editor, discussing the work you’ve been crushing your head off for. It’s six in the morning, you’re gonna need a whole lot more coffee to get through the rest of the day— and yet there she is, breaking you down like a truck. She’s not one for giving you any slack.

“A plot hole?” she repeats in disbelief. “You’d need a plot for that in the first place.” You let out a sigh. “Look, I’m sure these past few days have taken a toll on you, Y/N, but we need you to come up with something. The agency’s patience has a limit. You could try to spice things up a bit? Work on something more mature—? Maybe this is all just an artistic block.”

You frown, sipping your coffee. “Uh, mature? Meaning?”

“I’m not saying you go write a BDSM meaningless bestseller or anything, but... something mature readers could be interested in. Maybe you’ve just grown out of YA adventures for the time being.”

“Are you asking me to draw porn?” you retort with a snort. “That’s low. You know I like light-hearted stories. Besides, what could I write about? All I’d come up with would be raunchy stuff.”

“Why don’t you ask your boyfriend? Well, boyfriend, partner, fling— whatever.” Tilting your head, you wonder what the hell is she talking about, but then you notice Jimin’s back on your screen as he makes you another coffee. “Can he hear me—? You know, sexual themes can be very profound too.”

As deep as you’d like to, you think to yourself. But you don’t wanna picture Jimin in any kind of story that is in any way related to ‘more mature stuff’, so you just shake your head. That’s enough nonsense for a meeting at six in the morning.

Because well, ‘lonely girl starts living with a sex robot and eventually goes on having kinky sex with it’ sounds lame as fuck. And pathetic. It’s pretty humiliating already to realise you’re in that picture right now, at this stage of your life, in this economy.

“Well, I better get going— I have a meeting in half an hour. We’ll talk later.”

And, beep— the screen goes black, she’s gone.

“Your coffee, ma’am.” Jimin’s gentle voice snaps you out of your thoughts; he’s eyeing you intensely as he puts the mug down on the counter, almost as if he’s trying to get something out of you.

“Thanks. Can you pass me the honey—? Don’t bother, I can do it myself.”

Bitch, as if.

As soon as you take the spoon of out the jar, a jolt of pain pierces through your bad arm, and it slips off your fingers. Now they’re sticky with honey and you’ve made a fool of yourself. What a great way to start your already awful morning.

“I—”

Jimin takes your hand, not too roughly as to come off as rude, but rightly enough for you to suspect there’s something going on with him.

His stare is intense, red LED-lit rings piercing through yours in search of something, some reaction, some form of permission. The honey drops down your digits as a warning, now or never. Your heart beats painfully fast in your chest, threatening to burst right through your ribcage and onto his lap.

“Lick it clean,” you rasp. “All of it.”

Like your words are magic, Jimin rushes to part his lips so that you can put your fingers into his mouth. Funnily enough, it’s hot and wet, and you almost think you’ve heard him whimper.

Your core pulses, suddenly empty and craving something to clench around. As he keeps lapping at your digits oh-so thoroughly, you have to rub your thighs together, you hope he won’t notice. Could he, though? Can Jimin understand that he’s turning you the fuck on?

And then it sinks in.

Of course it feels hot and makes you tingle. Of course he acts like this— that is the sole purpose of his existence, to desire whomever he’s programmed to. He’s a robot, a machine. He follows cryptic orders.

But then again, as his tongue swirls around your fingers and he sucks the honey off them, you can’t help feeling the urge to bend him down on the table and ride his cock. Even if that’s pretty much the point, the craving you’re feeling comes off as terribly sad. After all, you just want to part your legs and order him to fill up this emptiness he’s provoked in you.

With a rather jerky move, you pull your fingers out of Jimin’s mouth, and he licks his lips immediately, sultry eyes looking up at you.

“T-that’s enough, you can stop,” you groan.

He gets up with a weak nod, perhaps waiting for you to ask for more, to order him to touch you, to kiss you, to pleasure you— but those words never come out of your mouth, and you get up quietly with your coffee in your hand.

“I’ll be… working in my studio,” you murmur. “Don’t disturb me unless it’s an emergency.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

You call Yoongi as soon as – you think – you’re out of his hearing range. Not that he’s not a high-tech android perfectly equipped to eavesdrop on your conversation – you doubt he even has to eavesdrop, could perfectly well just be standing in a room on the other side of the house and still able to hear your every word.

He says he’ll show up in maybe half an hour, and you get the chance to work a bit on one of your drafts, although to no avail because your brain is dry, and ask Jimin if he can bring up some more coffee. By the time you’re done, he comes into the room with Yoongi walking behind him.

“How’s your wrist?” he asks while Jimin pours the required sugar, and you hold out your hand. Maybe you’re going crazy, but he’s so indifferent to your conversation that it totally looks like he’s eavesdropping. “Looks much better.”

You nod and glance at the android. “That will be all, thank you,” you murmur.

“Yes, ma’am.”

Jimin leaves the two coffees on your table and leaves with a smile.

“Jesus, it’s like having, uh, well— it’s a fucking robot in your house,” he muses. “Are you sure this is still a good idea? Keeping an artificial intelligence made by your looney husband at home.”

You cock an eyebrow. “It was never a good idea, especially when you put it like that.”

“But…?”

There is always a ‘but’ with you, though.

“But maybe Jimin is my only way to find out if… he really did all those things,” you finish with a weak voice.

Threatening your co-workers, blackmailing your boss to get you to work from home more often, keeping your family away from you with lies and ploys. To know that his sobs and pleas were all lies, his way to guilt-trip you into forgiveness. His way into your head and heart, to mess with it, churn and mould it into one of his experiments. To him, you probably were never anything but that – another one of his wicked creations.

Maybe it’s stupid and pathetic that you’re grasping at straws to redeem and excuse him.

When the silence weighs in, Yoongi turns around to take his phone out of his jacket, almost knocking his coffee over. You gasp and get up to save the precious mug from a fatal fall that would have totally crashed it into pieces and immediately sneer at him.

“Sorry, I didn’t—”

“Be careful!” you cry out. “It’s my favourite mug.”

Yoongi frowns, taking the piece to inspect it with a judging look. “This? It’s literally the tackiest, ugliest mug I’ve ever seen.”

He’s probably referring to the awful pink glitter and the even shinier ‘there’s a chance this is vodka’ written on it. Of course, it’s never vodka, but it sounded so funny it made you chuckle when you walked past the shop during a promenade with your husband. You told him about it after coming home, and even though he didn’t seem too interested, he was listening since you found it lying on the kitchen counter the next morning.

Your husband never mentioned it again, or ever for that matter. It’s one of those little gestures that fill you up with guilt and remorse.

In some way, he did care about you. At least at some point in your relationship.

“Anyways,” Yoongi murmurs then, moving the mug to the centre of the table for its own sake, “it’s up to you. Just make sure to keep an eye on it, and if you notice something weird going on, don’t just think ‘it’s a coincidence, okay?”

Not that you’d ever think that, would you? You consider yourself pretty aware of the risks you’re taking; you just consider them worth it if it means you’ll discover some of the truth.

And then Yoongi frowns, staring at you. “But— why do I have the feeling you weren’t panicking because of that?”

“Okay…” You look down, into the dark liquid in your mug, as you muster the courage and get rid of the embarrassment. “So, let’s say I started to— let’s say I started to, hm, find Jimin too attractive for my own good?” Your voice turns into a whisper, afraid he’ll hear you – that’s literally the last thing you’d want him to know. “Like, seductive.”

“I’m not really surprised. I mean, isn’t Jimin a sex robot? I guess that’s what it was made for, so that just means it works,” he says instead, shrugging his shoulders.

“But then, uh, should I give in?”

You’ve come to the conclusion that, regardless of how you try to act, Jimin is going to turn you on.

Maybe he’s just too good at this, maybe you’re in need of a good fuck, or maybe you are in fact a pervert who finds the fact that he’s a robot a huge turn-on. Whatever it is, you can’t really go on living like this and pretending he’s just a friend who lives and hangs with you.

Jimin’s making dinner right now, a casserole to warm you up despite summer being around the corner. With his back turned to you, you see from your spot on the couch how his shoulders flex and contract as he moves around the kitchen. He stirs the stew and brings the ladle to his lips to check the flavour, groaning in approval.

But some of the stew splashes out and stains his hand, so he turns around to fetch a cloth. Seeing there’s nothing around, he then brings his hand up to his lips to lick it clean. His plump lips move against the skin, tongue flickering. It almost looks like he’s kissing it, and your core tingles.

Work. Yes, you need to focus and work on something productive.

Whenever he’s in your field of vision, you feel the stupid urge to touch him, kiss him, wonder how it would feel if you’d let him touch you at least once. The possibility is so real, just one word, that they terrify you.

Dinner is ready not long after, and the two of you eat in silence. It’s weird that Jimin eats at all, but he’s told you that it’s for the sake of his performance, to make things more natural; it’d be off-putting to just have a human-looking robot standing in front of you and watching you eat for a whole meal, and he’s right.

You have no idea how he eats and digests, though; there’s still so much you don’t know about him yet.

The way he’d put the chopsticks in his mouth, how he’d lick the spoon clean, the eye contact as he’d recreate such human gestures for your pleasure. It all was literally on purpose.

By the time you’re done eating, Jimin is already starting to clear the table. You thank him for making such a delicious dinner and get up to get some work done. Honestly, you need to be alone more than anything; alone to process how fucking turned on you are right now.

“Hell…” You close the door of your studio behind your back and let out a heavy sigh. “Let’s at least get on with the drafts.”

Draft, my ass. It’s barely a bunch of sketches and some oddly timed strips without any plot. You really can’t hand this over to your editor if you want to keep your artistic dignity, but all you can think of are Jimin’s luscious lips, Jimin’s slim body, Jimin’s thighs, Jimin’s voice, Jimin’s smile, Jimin’s eyes shutting tight when he smiles at you. Jimin, Jimin, Jimin. You’re a pathetic little thing who’s losing it for the resemblance of a man.

But why does it arouse you at the same time? Why do you get wet when you think about how lewd and low you’re acting? You tell yourself it’s ridiculous, but you’re dying for him to just kneel before your spread legs and eat you out.

Your hand moves on its own, your brain still wandering mindlessly around unlikely situations.

Breasts, thighs, lips, neck, the curve of a lower back sitting down, whispers, soft chuckles filled with secrecy, intimacy in the palm of a hand, kisses down the shoulder, hands venturing to touch and stroke and imprint its marks of adoration on the skin of a loved one.

When you come back, you notice they resemble you and Jimin; this is what you’ve been suppressing for weeks. Craving and longing for his touch.

Maybe this is the perfect way to unwind your frustration. You can let your imagination go wild, reflect on this confusing situation on paper, let it unravel and rebel before your eyes. After all, true artistry comes from honesty, doesn’t it? Aren’t all artists obsessed with their muses in some way? You’ll let Jimin pester your dreams for a bit longer.

You draw some sketches, key settings that you’ll use to close the plot later – if there will be a plot in the first place, of course. That doesn’t have to be entirely bad. Steamy scenes and a playful tug-of-war between guilt, obsession, and pure lust sounds good too.

The way Jimin licked your fingers clean, you know he eats pussy like a champ. He’d be so good, slurping and desperate and thirsty for your juices. Maybe a bit unhinged, hands gripping your thighs because he needs to shove his face in between.

There must be a range of stimulation to set his arousal off, right? Like, there must be things that turn him on, and maybe even a level to get him overwhelmed.

Picturing it your head gets too real when you rub your thighs together, stifling a groan. You need him to touch you, but you need to touch yourself for that matter. Sneaking a hand beneath your pyjama shorts and underwear, you stroke up and down your folds, smearing your wetness before you sink your fingers into yourself.

Legs folded and heels steady on the chair, you swing your hips and help to start working yourself open. It doesn’t feel half as good as you know Jimin’s cock would, but you can only picture him kneeled down and fingering you with his eyes glued to your reactions.

“Fuck— ah, s-shit, so good…” you moan.

Your other hand sneaks beneath your shirt to play with your nipple. Arching your back into your touch, it all gets faster, messier, impatient.

When your thumb comes to rub your clit, it feels harder to keep quiet. Fuck, you really want to have sex. With Jimin, only with him. You want to fuck him against this drawing table until you’ve creamed his cock, see your ex-husband’s talents recreating human pleasure.

With your mouth forming an O and your breast gripped in your hand, you come around your fingers, perhaps making more noise than you should.

As you come down from your high, you stare at the lewd results of your lust: two figures writhing and tangled around each other, bodies seen through the gaze of desire, warm loneliness mixed with the boiling fear of vulnerability. Jimin would never judge this, you realise. He can’t. He was made for loving you – or anyone – to an obsessing point, right now you’re his only one. You’ve fulfilled him.

Pretending nothing happened, you put the draft in a folder and keep the steamier ones in one of your drawers – maybe you’ll show them to your editor someday. Then you go to bed, luckily not running into Jimin.

The next morning, he’s making breakfast by the time you come down, hair done and confident in your outfit. But you overslept today, so you’re in such a hurry that you can only apologise for skipping such a lovely meal, and you run to get in your car. It makes him want to pout, but he’s better than that.

Jimin likes to tidy up around the house when you’re not home. He always feels like an inconvenience when it’s time to clean the room you’re in, so he always makes sure to schedule the cleaning around your activities. His bedroom first, always, and then the kitchen. Then he’ll sort it out through the day.

The food he made this morning goes into the fridge, knowing you’ll pounce it as soon as you’re back. The coffee, however, goes down the drain since it’s pointless to keep it. He’ll make you another one, he’ll make you as many coffees as you want.

One mug, two mugs, three, four, five, s— where your mug? Your favourite one, that is. It’s not with the others, and it’s not in the pile of dirty dishes either. Maybe you had a coffee last night and forgot it somewhere?

After looking in the living room, your bedroom, and the terrace, Jimin makes his way down the corridor.

The door to your studio always feels intriguing and threatening; you’ve never exactly forbidden him from going in, but it’s your den, your personal hideout. It feels like he’s intruding.

As always, the first thing Jimin notices as he walks in is the everlasting chaos lingering in the place. You never bother to tidy up after yourself as you work, and he gets so few chances to work on it that it’s almost always like this; his instincts scream that he gets down to business.

First, the mug.

Yes, he’ll fetch your mug and come back once he’s done with the kitchen.

Jimin catches the scent of coffee floating somewhere in the room, but there’s something else too, a heavier, sweeter smell that grabs his whole attention.

And then it downs on him – that it’s the scent of your arousal. You’ve touched yourself here.

Shaking his head, though, he pushes the thought to the back of his mind and decides that he’ll deal with that later. Now he needs to get on with his chores so that everything will be ready by the time you’re back home.

He finds the missing mug on one of the side tables, but the mess is too icky, he can’t help the urge to clean up a bit around the place, it’s almost an instinct in him. Just clearing the tables and opening the windows, and maybe sweeping the floor, that’s it. The bare minimum to keep a well-balanced level of hygiene.

After working on the side tables and tidying up the cupboard, Jimin moves on to your sketching table.

There are so many paper sheets and drawings scattered, even on the floor, messily pinned to the surface, marks of pencil and eraser crumbs all over the table. He squats to pick them up, dodging the half-opened drawer. He should close it before you hurt yourself.

When Jimin grabs the handle, the view of a naked figure catches his eyes. The natural need to know more, more of you, more of your desires – it all makes him open it completely and grab the paper.

The sketches are too little connected to each other to make any plot out of it, but the female character resembles you.

And the male looks just like him.

There’s this scene where she asks him to take off his shirt and sees the plug on his lower back, exactly where Jimin’s is. Just like him, he’s a robot. The sexual tension between the two of them is palpable. Is this what you feel about him? Tense and guilty and teetering on the edge every time you look at him?

Until he checks the next paper and sees that this one is longer. In fact, the scene takes more than five pages, far more than the other unconnected short scenes.

It all starts with her going to bed, probably picking up after a stressful moment. She’s wearing nothing but a flimsy tee and panties, the focus on the shape of her breasts too delicious and obvious to ignore. Yours bounce like that too, so naturally.

The android opens the door and stands in the middle of the dark. Somehow, it doesn’t feel creepy, just— anxious. He can read the mixed feelings in his stare, the same guilt consuming her.

He probably just walks up to her resting body to admire her, maybe smell her scent. A speech balloon pops up, he’s thinking about how he knows she wants to be pleased, how her boyfriend left her wanting this evening after parting ways. He doesn’t touch her like he could, too lazy, too stupid, too clumsy.

His Master was the same – obsessed with you but for all the wrong reasons. A projection of his hurt human ego and the urge to control you because everything else was out of his reach.

The male character now starts to nuzzle her neck, take in her fragrance. Playful hands sneaking under the clothes, she sighs and turns around, splayed on the bed for him. He immediately cups one of her breasts and takes her nipple into his mouth, sucking with hunger.

She locates the pleasure in her dreams and remains asleep, much to his frustration.

His hands roam down her waist and hips, worshipping her tender flesh and naked thighs. With a trail of peppered kisses down her stomach, he ends up crouched between her legs, tongue hanging out before he licks down her clothed folds. She groans, almost waking up, and it doesn’t take too long of having her cunt lapped at for her to do it.

What— what are you doing?

Let me please you, Master. I beg you. I know how wet you are, I could touch you in ways he never could. I’m a servant to your pleasure.

Jimin automatically drops the papers to shove them back into the drawer. Your scent is still heavy in the sensors of his nose, and the memory of your arousal against his tongue has not gone away – and never will.

And now he knows you want him as much as he wants you.

His system reacts instantly, the idea of you desiring him activating every mechanism as his body warms up and his cock starts getting hard. Buried in your cunt, swallowed by your pretty lips, pumped between your fingers; there are so many things he wants you to do with him. And the things he’d do to see your face scrunched in pleasure, gasps and groans coming out of your pretty lips; the possibilities feel so real now, he can almost touch this new reality.

“Oh—”

The fake flesh twitches when Jimin sneaks his hand under his underwear and wraps it around his cock. It’s leaking so much already, his Master built him well.

Paced and quiet at the beginning, he soon starts to buck his hips into his first, the friction never enough. Jimin pictures it’s you he’s fucking, that you let him sneak into your bed, wishing for him to touch you and lap at your folds until you’re coming. He doesn’t know yet how his sensors will react to the warmth of an actual person, but he knows yours will be heavenly.

Filling you up, peppering kisses all over your skin while you stroke his head and praise him for being so good – it will all be just as promised, the greatest fulfilment of his existence. You want Jimin to do it, and he’s dying to oblige.

“Ngh— f-fuck,” he gasps. “Ma’am, Y/N, fuck, fuck…”

You’re so beautiful, breasts full and fleshy, hardened peaks when it’s cold. He’d worship your hips and waist, nature made human, finding completion in the welcoming embrace of your legs around his hips. His cum would leak out and drip down your thighs, he could fuck you again and again until you’re satisfied, until you’re content with him.

His hand is now moving at a speed that will soon bring him to climax. With the other resting on the table, Jimin pumps his cock, millions of images in his system.

The dirty sketches in the half-opened drawer stare back at him.

“Oh fuck, there, m-ma’am,” Jimin whimpers and squeezes the tip, “fucking Christ—!”

White, creamy cum spurts out and lands on the table, on his tummy. Some of it even ends up splattered on the floor. Once is enough, he thinks as he forces his hand to stop, riding out his orgasm.

His greedy sensors begin to relax at the lack of stimulation, and Jimin tucks his cock back into his pants so that he can clean up his mess. He came to tidy up and ended up making it all dirtier – what would you think? Would you punish him? It was a mess, after all; dirty, messy, naughty.

But you want him. And you want him now.

“To be honest, Y/N, I wasn’t completely sure you’d even show up, but this is… This is brilliant! Hot, mature, dark, defiant—”

You glow at your editor’s praise, ignoring Yoongi’s judging look. Unlike her, he does know that there is an actual android living in your house whom you find particularly hot. But he’s not going to say anything, not when one of your projects has finally got her approval.

“I’m gonna keep this and hand it to my chief, okay?” she says with a smile.

You shrug. “Sure… I, uh, drew some steamier stuff, but I didn’t bring it here since I didn’t know how you’d react,” you say then, bringing the mug to your lips but noticing it’s empty already.

“Oh! I’ll talk it out with the publisher and give you a heads-up, how does that sound?” your editor continues. “It all depends on the level of explicit content they’ll want to keep for the work, but honestly, it sounds hot as fuck, so I’m sure you’ll be able to explore the topic wholeheartedly. Now—! Take the rest of the day off and go home, get a latte, take a bubble bath, whatever.”

She then grabs her stuff and storms off her office, claiming to have dozens of meetings and things to do. Which is probably true.

“I really can’t believe it – oh, you’re such a whore.”

“Hey!” you groan. “You were the one who told me that I should just… give in.”

“So, did you?” Yoongi asks, collecting the empty mugs and fetching all the papers her boss left behind herself.

“Not with him, but yeah, kinda. I mean, I found some ways to unwind,” you simply reply and help him clean up. “I’ve decided that this new outburst of ideas is too precious to waste.”

Instead of nodding or something, Yoongi just scoffs at you. As if that was the reason. But it’s helping you get over your artistic block, which is good for his job too, so he’s not going to complain too much. Besides, you look more at peace, and that is pretty much all that matters.

It’s almost lunchtime. You decide to call Taehyung, and the three of you meet at a nearby restaurant to have a bite together.

While you are an author and Yoongi is an Assistant Editor, Taehyung is part of the creative team. He designs covers and similar stuff for novels, helps you come up with colour schemes and pallets, and really is overall the eye everyone needs to make things shine their brightest. You met him and Yoongi long before you met your husband, and they’ve been with you ever since.

“The weather is so fine lately!” the youngest exclaims. “Why don’t you throw a barbeque?”

“At my place?”

Taehyung nods and looks at Yoongi for support. “Yeah, why not? Just make the robot do it.” You frown immediately at his words. “What is it now?”

“The android has a name, you know,” you reply.

“And why would that matter? It’s a robot, just a pile of circuits and microchips,” he mumbles, too shocked at your offence. “Even if it looks like a human, it doesn’t make it one, Y/N.”

You don’t know why, really, but it infuriates you to hear him talk about Jimin like that. Maybe you’ve gone a bit too far humanising him— it. Humanising it. But it feels so real when you look at… his eyes, his smile, his lips, his button nose. Something crafted with beautiful skill.

While your husband had made you a monster, he had made Jimin to be a piece of art.

Then, how could you not be angry at Taehyung’s shallow, hurtful words? Whatever love and sorrow were created with, Jimin and you were made from it.

“We all have our coping mechanisms, don’t we?” you finally say, shrugging. Yoongi chuckles next to you. “I don’t see why I can’t live a lie like that until it blows up in my face. Maybe you remember I’ve lusted after way worse men.”

Men, that’s the thing – Jimin is not a man.

Taehyung frowns. “Uh, I thought you originally wanted to pry secrets out of it about your ex.”

“Yeah, what about it?”

“I think— you’re mixing things up,” he sighs then as he starts playing with his fingers. “Maybe you should get back in touch with your therapist and discuss it with her? – you’re not going to listen to me anyway.”

You decide not to dwell on the subject any further; you want some peace of mind for when you come home to Jimin. He’s always such an expert when it comes to your gestures, can pick up any mood swing in an instant. It was scary at first, but now you’ve come to feel astonishingly natural about it. Maybe you even find it soothing.

It’s past ten when you get home. Not too drunk, maybe a little tipsy. At most – you swear.

Tiptoeing your way through the entrance hall, heels hanging from your hands, you hear the notification sound and take out your phone. You let out a giggle at Taehyung’s idiotic text, but suddenly you’re bumping your face on the wall and letting out a groan of pain.

Just as your wrist is finishing to heal, now you’re hurting your nose? Great.

You whimper a bit more on the floor before you get up and go on your way, still rubbing the bridge of your nose with a frown.

After managing to do your skincare routine and change into your pyjamas – or rather a tee and a pair of panties because Jesus Christ it is hot – you tuck yourself into your bed with a smile, glad to finally find yourself ready to sleep. Not a single worry or concern in your head, just the utter joy of knowing that tomorrow you won’t have to face any troubles.

And just like that, you fall asleep. And as always, one thought goes to your mysterious housemate.

He’s all over you, hot breath fanning against your cleavage.

With his hands snuck under your shirt and kneading your breasts, Jimin begins to play with one of your nipples and profusely watches your reactions, hoping to see you wake up any time soon.

You, however, only groan quietly and arch your back, thighs rubbing together. He’s not getting concerned only because you’re still breathing and you don’t look too pale. Jimin leaves a trail of kisses down your neck and rucks up the fabric, engrossed by the sight of your bare breasts.

He wants to touch every corner of your body, but he wants you to be awake to enjoy it.

Slowly, Jimin makes his way down to the waistband of your underwear. Your smell is so sweet, so intoxicating, each of his sensors is going wild at the mere thought of tasting you; your arousal against his tongue as he laps at your folds, your breasts bouncing as you arch your back, it all makes his fingers tighten on your hips. This desire to melt into your body is consuming him.

Jimin doesn’t need air, but he feels breathless.

His fingertips stroke your clothed folds, feeling them warm already. Arousal soaks the fabric, you’d welcome him so easily. One word from you and he’ll be on his knees ready to pleasure you.

“Hm…” you suddenly let out, turning your head around. Your hips buck, chasing his touch.

This is exactly what you wanted him to do, he thinks as he pulls down your underwear. He will fulfil your fantasy tonight.

As Jimin finds room between your thighs, you stir on the bed, pretty much unbothered for now. You’ll wake up to ecstasy, he’ll make sure you do. The firmest path to your love, he’ll carve it with his teeth if it’s necessary; with his tongue shoved between your legs as he helps his Master find complete bliss.

The trail of thoughts has left him a bit agitated by the time his lips meet your skin. Jimin plays with your inner thighs, kissing the flesh, teasing his sloppy way to your folds while his hands stroke up and down your waist. The sight of your wet heat welcomes him.

His tongue parts your lips, and he grips your butt to spread your legs, giving him better access. He wants you to drown him between your legs, make him yours, claim him. Sucking, licking, lapping at your folds, slurping and flicking his tongue; Jimin watches you move on the mattress once again, a soft moan escaping from your lips. Your thighs hug his head so nicely, and your hips rock against his mouth in a greedy search for that wet, warm pressure.

“What—?” Your eyes widen at the sight of Jimin’s face shoved against your cunt, and you pull your hips away from him in a jerk. He doesn’t try to stop you, crawling instead on top of you. “What the fuck, Jimin!” you let out. “Get away from me!”

You push his face away with your palm, and he backs off without complaint. Jimin ends up sitting on his knees – so poignant and obedient you almost pity him.

His face is still soaked with your arousal. “I’m sorry, ma’am, I thought—”

Jimin cuts himself off, and you’re surprised to see that you’ve managed to leave him speechless. Then, seeing you’re not showing any reaction besides your bated breath, he crawls back to you, and you lie back, unsure about what to do. What is there to do now? He seems insistent, and your core is still pulsing, eager to be pushed over the edge.

“I want to pleasure you, ma’am,” Jimin murmurs, staring down at you with his intense red LED-lit eyes.

They’re almost heart-shaped, seeing the adoration he’s looking at you with. It makes you rub your thighs together again.

Your eyes flicker to the red switch behind his ear for a second.

“Why?” you ask with a thin voice.

This time he nuzzles your neck but you don’t mind. Instead, you have to resist the urge to move your hand from his face up to the crown of his head and pet him. You want to know why would he decide to sneak into your bed and— well, eat you out.

“I… saw the things you drew,” Jimin says, and your cheeks heat up in a mortified blush. “So, I thought they were… us.”

“W-well, you thought— you thought wrong, Jimin—”

He nods weakly and lowers his eyes, perhaps unable to keep eye contact now that he’s failed in his task. You have no idea what his ‘brain’ works like. “Yes, ma’am, I see it now.”

Was it wrong of him? Of course it was. Have you been wishing that he – or you for that matter, were you any braver – would do it? Absolutely yes. Jimin has finally surpassed the line you were even afraid of admitting it was there, and you feel… free; to touch him, to let him touch you, to kiss and be kissed. Maybe this will be your final downfall into madness, so God, let it be spectacular.

“That’s not the answer I was expecting,” you muse, suddenly grinning. “What do you say when you’ve been bad, Jimin?”

His eyes look into yours in search of some kind of hesitation, of some signal that he might be taking your actions the wrong way – again. But you’re staring up at him, a confident look on you, hands stroking the back of his hair as they move to play with the switch.

His body trembles.

“I’m sorry, ma’am. I won’t do it again.”

“That’s better.” Your smirk widens, leaving the switch behind to stroke the back of his hair. “Good boy.”

Good boy. Good boy. His whole body goes into overdrive, limps tightening to bend down for a kiss. Good boy. But you don’t want him there, not yet, so you beckon at him to keep going further down, and Jimin gets it instantly, nestling his head between your legs without a question; you’re still dripping wet from his previous ministrations.

His laps at your nub turn sloppy as his flat tongue moves long and slow with broad strokes, there’s saliva running down the corner of his lips again. Jimin wants to savour your wetness until it’s recorded in every chip inside his head.

“Of fuck, oh— Jimin, J-Jimin,” you groan. “Shit! There, just like that—”

This is so much better now that he can hear your voice.

Your sweet voice he’s fantasised so much about, every night since he recalls his own existence. It’s been you, always you, you all over.

With your thighs fluttering around his head, Jimin opens his mouth and starts fucking you with his tongue – a perk about being a robot is that his tongue never tires, like, ever. And he keeps shoving his pointed tongue inside of you again and again, until he pulls away; his chin is soiled with a filthy mix of your arousal and his saliva, whatever that’s made of.

Making eye contact, he slips a finger inside. You’re stretched out enough for it to slide in easily, especially since you’re dripping wet. His tongue keeps flickering at your swollen nub.

“Come up here.”

You finally join for a hard kiss, lips crushing in desperation. The contact leaves you both trembling, eager, expectant. He’s still wearing his pants as he nestles his hips against yours, face buried between your exposed breasts.

You take his hand in yours to pace it, and he gets the clue instantly, curling his finger inside of you.

Knuckles deep, Jimin keeps pumping them in and out carefully, eyes fixed on your face to see what makes you grunt and moan. You tug at his hair, sensors throbbing in excitement at the roughness, when the knot in the pit of your stomach tightens.

“I want you to make me cum,” you say then, staring into his glowing eyes.

“Yes, Master.”

He fingers you while you kiss him, brushing lips together, sucking on his tongue, fingertips massaging your dripping walls and rubbing your sweet spot.

It all feels so real to the touch, you’re slowly sinking into a different world; a world where he’s human and you’re cradling a person in your arms, a world where your heart doesn’t bleed at any resemblance of love. A world where it doesn’t scare you. And it’s all Jimin, hovering over you like a dutiful shadow.

“Master,” he moans against your lips. “F-fuck, I was— I was made for loving you, Master.”

And you were made for being loved by me.

Jimin’s lips clumsily brush against yours, your tongues rolling over each other in a sloppy kiss. Pleasure grips your guts tightly, you can’t help but wish it was his cock instead working you open. Fucking you into what’s probably the best orgasm of your life.

Pleasure seeps into you with a shiver, starting from the crown of your head and taking over the rest of your body. You call for him in a whisper, and Jimin replies chanting your name like it’s a prayer. The way he adores you just pushes you further into your approaching climax. The coiling tension in your stomach engorges and gets bigger, you chase your orgasm against his fingers, his thumb stroking your swollen clit until your guts tighten.

“Shit, J-Jimin, you’re— you’re doing so well,” you groan and sink your teeth into the fake flesh of his neck. “I’m close, I’m close—”

Your hips stutter as they thrust up against his fingers, and Jimin goes faster, trying to separate the delicious sting of your love bite to focus on his arm’s motions. They have to be perfect, exact, and precise to bring you to your climax.

But he lets out a moan of pleasure when your walls clench around his finger; the memories of your warmth around him are foggy and delirious.

His body feels boiling against yours, machinery melting. Whatever his conscience is like, it’s slowly vanishing into pleasure, a mellow taste of honey on his tongue. It’s sweet and intoxicating, just like your touch – just like your hands, crawling right now to his neck to anchor him over you.

Then you go still underneath him, under his cautious stare, and with a grin, you climax around his fingers. You groan his name and claim his lips again, to which he obliges, of course. Your skin is sweaty, and you’re fighting to catch your breath while he worships your body in the afterglow of your orgasm.

Jimin peppers little pecks down your neck and chest with adoration. “Thank you, Master, thank you, thank you—”

Now that you’ve quenched your sickly thirst for the robot, you’ll go on living your normal life. No more nightly encounters, no more delirious feelings of tenderness. You will exist normally from now on.

You’re a liar. A filthy, wicked liar.

Never again, you had told yourself after that night. Letting Jimin eat you out in your own bed until you came not once but three times was one thing. Letting him sleep next to you as he recharged was a bit over the line but still acceptable.

And now here you are, sitting on the kitchen counter with your legs spread open and Jimin’s warm tongue shoved into your cunt. This wicked tryst has been going on for days now, seems to be your chosen pastime ever since. Any time you run into each other at the house, it’s like you get instantly wet and feel that familiar tingling between your thighs, and he’s not even a bit less reactive to you. Whoever reacts first doesn’t matter, the other will act accordingly; it’s as if you were addicted to each other.

Jimin knows your body like the palm of his hand. Knows where to touch you to make you tremble, knows what to say to fuel you. Always so eager to please you.

It’s like your hormones are constantly bubbling up, boiling inside your body pending his presence.

You’re practically fucking Jimin’s mouth with your tongue now. Fingers tangled in his hair, you want him as close as he may be. The feeling of his wet tongue on your cunt still lingers like a throbbing memory.

“Jimin,” you whisper against his lips.

His hands are on the counter, grounding himself. “Yes, Master?” he replies then, following your lips in another kiss.

“You’ve been enough of a tease, don’t you think?” you ask with an arched eyebrow, and Jimin tilts his head to the side, rather confused. “I want your cock now.”

You don’t know why, but you've yet to try him out. All of him, that is. Jimin has proved himself to be worthy of your body and trust, able to worship with each part of his. Except, for some reason, his cock – but you’ve started to suspect why he’s so reluctant to do it.

As Jimin begins to fumble with his pants, his eyes are fixed on yours; it’s the first time you notice him unsure about something, and it makes you shrink in doubt. Your hands find rest on his.

“You didn’t like it,” he murmurs then, “with him.”

How he is aware of that you don’t know. Although he doesn’t refer to him as his Master anymore, you’ve taken over that title now. For Jimin, that sweet, evergreen word will be chained to you forever, and he will honour it. Engraved in his hands, in the pad of his fingers, in the tip of his tongue as he worships you.

You cup his cheeks, stroking them with your thumbs. “But you’re not him, are you?”

In a way. You’d be repulsed.

Jimin’s silence confuses you, but you decide not to dwell on it, and so you pull him in for another kiss; you run your tongue over his lips, and he parts his luscious lips to let you in.

With a mischievous grin, you jump off the counter and face Jimin as you play with the waistband of his trousers, making him step back until the two of you slowly fall on the couch. Once you take his cock out, you raise your hips, finally about to feel him.

And then a ringing noise interrupts.

His LED-lit eyes turn into a devious yellowish tone when you pull back to pick up the phone with a groan.

Jimin knows that voice, has seen the guy’s face – Kim Taehyung, the little shit who would hit on you all the time when you were at work. The memories of his face are tinted with an angry red he hasn’t even put there himself, bloody-like and rabid. But the mere thought enrages him, and he doesn’t understand why.

“I know it’s at short notice, and it sucks, but my boss wants us to get at it as soon as possible…”

Seeing Taehyung is still talking, you mouth at Jimin ‘work’ so that he knows you’ll hang up as soon as possible. You love your friend, you really do, but can’t he understand that you’re off work right now?

“Okay, sure, see you. Bye—”

The call has barely finished when he grabs your phone to throw it away. When you turn to demand an explanation, a shiver takes over your body. It’s a feeling of dread, one you’re familiar with.

“Don’t go,” he begs, nuzzling your neck. “Stay home with me, please.”

Warm tears wet your neck, his arms tangled around you. You’re unable to move right now, but you’re not fighting his grip off either, too confused; not aware of the storm of screeching thoughts passing by in his mind, mixed with alien feelings that are rooted deep inside of him.

You’re staring down at him dumbfoundedly when Jimin pulls back. There’s an instinct inside of you screaming to get away, but instead, you wipe his tears.

He grabs his head and looks down with his eyes closed. “I’m— I’m sorry, Master. I-I’m so sorry, please forgive me,” he whimpers then, but it doesn’t feel like he’s talking to you when Jimin starts hitting his forehead. “Forget it! Just forget it, forget it, forget it!”

Your chest feels heavy, and your body feels cold, the heat of the moment nowhere to be seen.

Slowly, you get off of him to pull your pants back up, and he does the same, avoiding your eyes. He doesn’t need to know he’s let you down right now.

But this time, though, you feel bad for him; Jimin is sobbing in a way you’ve heard no one cry before. It’s the purest form of self-inflicted pain you’ve seen, and maybe you only remember your own laments to sound like that. When you’d wake up and look in the mirror just to greet the pitiful reflection of a thrown-away doll.

You coo at him as you leave a kiss on his wet lips. “Shh, it’s okay.” Had it been another person, you wouldn’t be feeling this warmth in the pit of your stomach – but you are, and you want to sooth Jimin’s pain. “I know you didn’t mean it. Just don’t do something like this again.”

The main difference is, your Master never apologised. He always thought that, whatever he’d take with his deadly hands, he was entitled to it. The world owed him adoration.

“Thank you,” he murmurs, nodding.

“How about I turn you off while I’m at work?” you ask him then as you rake your nails through his hair.

“Please… I want to rest.”

With a gentle flick of your fingers, you turn Jimin off for the first time. Watching his body shut down is almost like watching him fall asleep, and you smile sweetly at the sight.

He probably won’t get cold, but you cover him with a cosy blanket anyways. And so you walk out of the house, grabbing your purse on your way. A meeting with the creative department doesn’t sound like fun right now, but actually, you could use some work to blow off this weird feeling inside of you.

Because, how on earth does he know those things? You’ve never told anyone that your ex-husband used to be a complete ape with his cock. Not on purpose, you hope, but Jesus Christ, you’d always have to limp your way to the bathroom afterwards.

Also, he’d always make you dry as hell.

And even though he wasn’t loving, nor a good lover, nor sensitive or caring, he had you in the palm of his hand. You can’t recall a more humiliating feeling than remembering you were in love with him.

The meeting goes, well, just as you expected – boring and way too long. Could’ve perfectly been just an email. But the team is happy to see your project go on, and you’re happy too. In fact, it’s done its job so well that you only remember about Jimin’s odd behaviour today the moment you step back into the house.

Jimin is sitting on the couch, right where you left him.

Looking cherubic and beautiful, you stare at his eyes, his cheeks, his lips, his nose, and wonder where did your ex-husband get the inspiration to make him.

You lean in for a kiss on his inert lips as your thumb strokes the switch behind his ear. Naturally, his body doesn’t react in any way to your presence, and you let out a chuckle of frustration, finally turning him back on.

His eyes flutter a bit before he looks at you.

“Hi there, angel.”

Jimin smiles softly at you, nuzzling your hand in search of warmth. How sweet he is, he’s nothing like him. Not a bit.

He claims your cuddles with a gentle tug at your hand, and you sit next to him, letting him rest his head on your shoulder. You rake your nails through his hair as you stare into the nothingness, too engrossed in your thoughts.

However, you’re starting to feel weirded out about just how much Jimin knows about you; why would your ex ever tell him about your problems in bed, for example? Judging by his reaction to the call, did he also talk about that time when you flirted with Taehyung perhaps a bit too much, before you confessed you were married and became friends? You don’t think your husband knew about all those things, let alone told Jimin about them.

So, why does he know, then?

What else does he know that you can’t even fathom? Your chest tingles at the prospect of already being bare before him; there are so many things you still feel ashamed of, you don’t want him out of all people to… know.

Besides, you still have no idea why. Actually, you don’t know a thing about Jimin, about his origins, about how or why he was created like this. You had sworn and promised in the past that you had decided to keep him to find out about all of that, and really, you’ve just forgotten about it.

“I just remembered” – you suddenly get up from the couch, and Jimin pouts at the sudden lack of warmth – “I left some sketches in the office. I’ll be right back, okay?”

“Will you be back for dinner?” he asks, nonetheless.

“Yes, of course.”

Then you get up to fetch your purse in silence. Once you have everything you need, you wave your hand in goodbye and head to the entrance hall under Jimin’s consuming stare; it’s not watchful, but it really is intense. You feel it burning on your nape.

“Master?” You turn around when he calls you again. “You’re not mad at me about earlier, are you? I don’t know what happened to me, I’m really sorry… I was made to make you happy.”

Made to make you happy, made for loving you. You, you, you. It’s always you with him, like you’re his world. It only makes you frown, but you help the urge and smile instead, wishing it will ease his worries.

“Don’t be, I understand—”

“I’m not like him,” he suddenly says, and you feel cold all over.

“What?” You try to put on a calm face, but what he just said really weirded you out. “W-what do you mean?”

Jimin gets up and walks up to you, gently tugging at your arms. “I’m not like him, I would never be. He was a despicable monster, a-and I know I’m not even human, but— I love you, Master, I love you better than he ever could.” Then he kisses you, and you can’t help kissing him back. “I’ll do better, I promise. I won’t cross you again.”

His words make your stomach churn, but you don’t say anything; you’ve got some heavy work ahead. So, you peck his lips one more time and say goodbye, leaving him standing in the entrance hall all on his own.

It’s luminous, with a sickly white light, just as you remember it. Sterile, made of steel, and eternally silent. Few places give you the creeps like your ex-husband’s lab.

Although the place is not huge, you’re so unfamiliar with it that you wouldn’t even know where to begin with. He surely must have kept a journal of his experiments, right? He was always so keen on writing on paper— but maybe they took it away already.

It’s so weird to think that he’s dead now, though – you always thought him so powerful, so eternal, that death was never in your mind. How could it be when he was the ruler and commander of your life? What would you be without him, you pitiful butterfly? Always his angel, his pretty little thing, his loving wife he was so in love with.

And now he’s dead. Like a pathetic, weak human, he’s dead.

Instead of feeling sad or uneasy about it, it makes you feel good. It feels so, so good to know that he’s rotting somewhere. You hope it hurt.

You move around the room, looking at your surroundings; plans and sketches scattered on tables that no one has bothered to clean, half-made robotic arms, and dozens of inventions displayed on shelves like they’re his prizes.

But contrary to what you expected – or not since you always knew he was a control freak – you find his journals piled up and sorted out by date on one of the shelves at the end. If you remember correctly, Mrs Im said he started working on Jimin five years ago. That is, three and a half years before your divorce, so you look for the notebooks with that year written on them.

“Aha! Gotcha.”

You start revising the first journal, turning the pages as your eyes fly over the letters. Finally, you find the first notes; he mentions a folder with the official project information, but you will look for it later. What you read is more or less what his lawyer told you, the research of android models for sale as sex products.

It feels a little strange to read it on paper, so cold, when Jimin’s presence is so warm.

However, something catches your attention out of a sudden. You read it again to make sure you didn’t misinterpret it, but it’s pretty hard to do it:

The experiments are running smoothly: thanks to my memories, Jimin reacts to basic stimulation, and his sensors work well. Today it hardened only by smelling one of Y/N’s pieces of underwear. It will be a success if I manage to set his arousal on with vaguer objects or smells.

You turn the pages, being met only with shallow comments on the experiment. But you want to see if he mentions you again. What did he mean, ‘his memories’? How could that be possible? And why would he use you out of all people to test Jimin’s… sensors, or whatever he’s talking about?

To check next day: refractory period. Just when I was about to see if Jimin recovers faster when the stimulation is linked to her, she came down to announce her mother had just arrived. I ought to continue the experiment from there.

I hate that old woman; I wish I could get rid of her forever. I know she talks shit about me to Y/N.

Your eyebrow immediately arches at the comment; for years he would cry about how your mother hated him, and it turns out the feeling was mutual. Honestly, at this point, you’re not even surprised.

For the time being, you want to focus on processing the fact that somehow your crazy ex-husband managed to turn his memories into chips, or whatever. You don’t have a clue about these things. To insert them into Jimin and, well, you guess, customise his sexual arousal? Does that even make sense?

Jimin seems to have taken on an odd behaviour lately. It follows Y/N around the house but is aware it must not be seen. It knows of conversations the two of us have had without being present, and even of things not even I knew about; today Y/N showed up with a new mug and thanked me for buying it, but it was not me.

I have also noticed a growing aggressiveness towards me. More verbal than physical, but I am studying the possibility of speeding up the selling.

Suddenly breathless, you limply put the notebook back on the table.

So, it wasn’t him. None of it was, probably. The mug, or the flowers, or those cute notes he’d leave on the fridge wishing you a good day – they had all been Jimin’s. And suddenly you feel so, so fucking relieved.

He had been the problem all along. Not even Jimin, who had his memories, had his wickedness. Jimin was sweet, so he could’ve been too; he just didn’t want to.

And that is all you needed to know.

Then you realise you’ve reached the end of the notebook. You grab the next one, which covers a year and a half and covers your divorce. This is probably the only chance you’ll ever get to know what he was really feeling back then. Or ever, for that matter.

It seems that my memories are a bigger influence on Jimin’s personality than I first thought. It has become obsessed with my wife as if it was in love with her.

I know it was the plan all along, but I cannot help wondering if I have taken it too far.

I have not been fighting to keep her with me so that thing will ruin my chances of staying with her.

You smile fondly as you read it. However, as your eyes reach the last paragraph, you frown with disgust at his words. How could he speak like that of his own creation? Oh, what a heartless man. You cannot help but pity him. A body filled with hatred and fear and pain, he was a good for nothing.

This week I will be conducting no experiments as I ought to see my lawyer.

You quickly turn the page again.

This time, you’re startled as you observe the handwriting; it’s messy, angry, written so strongly that the pen almost ripped the paper. The page underneath is marked, the letters never to be forgotten.

I hate him. I hate him, and I hate her. And I love her. Y/N is mine, Jimin is mine, they are both mine, yet I cannot make them do what I think it’s best.

She fucking left. I would make her such a masterful thing if she’d only let me.

But there’s always that beastly creature stopping me.

Stopping him, how? What did he mean by that?

The next notes don’t feel too interesting; he doesn’t even sound like he’s enjoying himself anymore. The comments are technical, and he noted down some of his thoughts about the companies that had offered to buy Jimin.

But then you realise something.

If he wanted to sell – and it sounded like he was pretty confident about his decision – why would he leave Jimin to you in his will? If he wanted you to stay as far from him as possible.

You’re done with the notebook, so you grab the next one. It seems to be the last one, too; there are no more journals in sight, and it looks like most of the pages of this one have never been touched before. The spine doesn’t look too used either. Maybe he finished the project quickly before he even had the chance to write much?

There’s no way out. Every time, it manages to catch up on me. Wherever I go, it knows. Whatever I do, it knows. It will be standing at the end of the corridor, looking at me, grinning like it knows my darkest secrets. I cannot get out of the house without it knowing, it knows everything. I’m sure it’ll kill me.

If I die, it killed me.

My love, if you ever read this, please know that he is worse than I will ever be. If you’re reading this and I’m gone, know that his hands are dripping with blood, not mine. I know I’m sick, but so are you. We were sick in love, were we not? Loving each other until our souls rotted.

He’s different. He has no soul, no sickness. He doesn’t understand your darkness the way I do.

It makes me full, like an endless cycle. There is no birth without blood, but for him, there was no blood, no guts. He’s as human as I will make him, ripped out from my ribs.

His love is my sickness. Remember it if you ever love him back.

“Master?”

For the first time in a while, you’re terrified to hear his voice.

Turning around, you see Jimin standing at the top of the stairs. You flinch when he takes a step down, so he stops altogether and waits for a reaction, a word, a sound – anything from you, something to let him know you don’t despise him.

“Did you follow me here?” you ask with a frown, too afraid not to be crossed.

“I was worried,” he murmurs. “You left so suddenly you forgot your phone at home… A-and I did think that perhaps you were lying and that you’d be coming here instead.”

And he was right, in a way. But that doesn’t give him the right to follow you. That’s practically stalker behaviour. You’re starting to get the creeps, so Jimin goes all the way down to you and gently takes your hands. You don’t know if you don’t move out of fear or because you’re too comfortable with his touch.

Your voice comes out weakly. “Did you really kill him?”

“Yes,” he says with a smile. “I— I did it for you, Master. He erased my memories, I had to do something. He wanted to take me away from you.”

“So, you killed him,” you repeat, rather to yourself. Nodding slowly, you pull your hands away from his and turn around, needing some air to sort out your thoughts. “Because— because you wanted to stay with me? Why?”

You already know the answer. You don’t believe it yet, you don’t think it possible – but you know what words you’ll hear.

“Because I love you.”

Jimin seems ashamed of it, as he avoids your eyes and decides to stare at the floor instead. Like a boyish love confession on a sunny school day, your delusional body warms up the idea, but he can’t, can he? He can’t love you.

“Jimin,” you call softly, and finally, he looks up from the floor, “when you look at me, do you see me? Me, as a human, as a woman, as a creature? Do you even understand all of that?”

And then he smiles, and your chest blooms. “Yes – and you’re fascinating.”

All those years watching you, sneaking glances of you walking around the house, so close but still so far away. He’d dream of you, dream of you in his arms, him in yours, sharing kisses, pleasuring you the way his Master could not. He’d be careful, he’d be loving, he’d listen to each of your words.

“He gave me this body and all the cables and everything that keeps me moving, but you, Y/N— you gave me a conscience! You made everything make sense! You made me human,” Jimin claims in a whisper.

You can’t help but frown. “But he deleted them. How can you still remember me?”

You’re getting an answer for each of your questions, but somehow, they all seem only to leave you even more confused.

“He didn’t,” Jimin rushes to say, and then he goes on to explain further, seeing your puzzled face, “Not all of them, at least. I didn’t let him. I wanted to be with you, I didn’t want to… forget you.”

“Why?”

“Because after I got to know you through his memories I realised that, if there’s any person on this world that could accept me despite what I am, that was you. I thought you could love me.”

Letting out a sigh – of desperation, tiredness, love, you have no idea – you cup his cheeks and purse your lips. Do you love him? You’re not sure. Your stomach churns and turns at the mere idea of losing him, but can you really love him?

His words echo in your head like poison. His love is my sickness. Remember it if you ever love him back.

But is it, really? Jimin’s love feels soft. It doesn’t feel smothering or drowning. He loves you just the way you want to be loved. You don’t feel owned by him, on the contrary. Actually, you think Jimin loves you despite his husband’s sickness. That must be why he apologised when it took over him this evening at Taehyung’s call.

The sickness shrieked, the love apologised and learned.

“I know they aren’t mine,” he continues, snapping you out of your thoughts. “I know it wasn’t me you fell in love with, whom you slept with, the person you decided to spend the rest of your life with. I know it was him all along, but I—” Jimin nuzzles your neck in a desperate search for your warmth. “I can’t help it! I was made for loving you!”

But instead of answering, you tilt his chin up and kiss him.

“Living— living with the memories,” he continues as you leave pecks on the corner of his lips, “of your touch, of your warmth, your love.” Jimin’s arms tangle around your waist. “Loving you but forced to stay away – it was torture, Master.”

His breath feels warm against you, his hands feel hungry around you. His red LED-lit eyes stare into yours, searching for a sign, any indication of love.

You brush your lips together, softly at first, until his whimper makes you grin and run your tongue over his lip, asking for entrance. You suck his bottom lip into his mouth until he does, tongues rolling over each other in a heated kiss. With your skin burning up, you run your hands through his hair, and Jimin cautiously squeezes your butt when you push him against the counter.

Suddenly, you sink to your knees and begin to fumble with the waistband of his pants.

“So, you have sensors, right?” He nods weakly. “Everywhere.”

“Y-yes, ma’am—”

“And is there any way to alter them? Is it possible to make you last longer, or even make you not last at all?” you ask, still kneeling before him. Again, Jimin nods and closes his eyes. “Then, I want you as sensitive as possible.”

“Yes, ma’am…”

He must have a limit, and you want to find it. Either he runs out of cum, or his sensors give up, or he just fucking short-circuits.

It doesn’t take long for Jimin to get hard between your fingers, smooth rolls of your wrist as you pump him with an affectionate but hungry pace. Letting out a gasp, Jimin grips the edge of the counter for balance; he’s indeed too sensitive not to react to the touch he’s been craving his whole existence.

“So hard,” you purr, “I can’t wait to taste you, Jimin…”

“M-master, please, Master! Oh fuck, oh—” Jimin whimpers in response, gritting his teeth.

His body is shaking when you part your lips and engulf his cock, eyes glued to his pretty face. His knees buckle, and he squeaks in pleasure, you hollow your cheeks to swallow more of him. Meanwhile, your other hand gently plays with his balls.

“That— that f-feels so good, Master,” he rasps. In appreciation, you suck further down onto his cock until there’s a trickle of saliva rolling down your chin. “Shit! God, thank you!”

You somehow manage to grin with his cock between your parted lips. Jimin seems too aroused to process any robotic thought properly, so you move your hands to his ass and knead the flesh, pushing your lips into your mouth. He yelps instantly and follows it with his hips, and then you dip your tongue into his slit; it makes him let out a sob and almost fall to his knees, warning you of his climax, or rather begging you to slow down.

Your darkened lips, wet with saliva, suck again while your tongue presses on his tip. His cock throbs, a salty flavour you think it’s fake precum lingering on it. His hardened length slides in and out of your mouth with sloppy movements.

Jimin lets out a choked sob. “Master!” Filled with guilt, as gently as his trembling body will let him, he puts his hands on your hair. “L-let me cum, I need to— I-I need to come, please—”

Finally, you raise your head to let his length slide out of your mouth, and you catch back your precious breath.

“Sensitive, are we?” you mock him.

There’s time for him only to roll his eyes, out of annoyance or pleasure, before his hips buckle into your mouth one more time. The coiling tension in his sensors pools in the centre of his body, Jimin sucks in a sharp breath, and soon his cock twitches again, heavy on your tongue, warning you of his high.

“Master,” he whimpers. “T-thank you, Master, fuck— shit!”

And Jimin spills himself inside of your mouth, his release salty and more similar to actual cum than you expected. After swallowing, you help him ride out his orgasm using both hands and lips.

He’s still holding his weight on the counter when you speak, “Get on the table and lie down.”

He was probably expecting to eat you out since you pull down your pants once you straddle him, so it does take Jimin by surprise when you align your entrance with his half-hard cock. You hear him mumble something as your hand grips his cum-covered length, fingers playing with his release and making him let out a gasp.

“Are you still sensitive?” Barely able to keep eye contact, Jimin nods weakly. “Good.”

You quickly get rid of both your and his shirt. Once you’re naked against each other, you bend down to finally touch, knead, nib, and kiss wherever you feel like; you’ve had enough of leisurely letting him pleasure you without taking your part.

Your warm lips leave a trail of kisses down his neck and chest. “I’ll ride you again and again… until you either run out of cum or short-circuit.”

“M-mast—!”

Jimin lets out a choked sob when you sink down on his cock, immediately rolling down your hips. A hint of pain takes over you as your walls grip him, stretching around his length, and you moan. It’s been a while since you last had such a nice cock work you open— but then Jimin’s hands grab your waist, and his blissed face takes you completely off guard.

“Fuck, so good, Master, I love— I love you,” he whines.

His eyes move down to his cock disappearing into your body; you feel so warm, so wet, the pressure around him letting him know that you’re stuffed with him too.

You breathe out and thrust down onto him again, setting a desperate, frenetic tempo. “You feel good too, angel, shit—” The sounds of smacking flesh echo across the room, pushing you to ride him faster. “Gonna fuck you until I go mad—”

With your hands splayed across his chest, you use him for leverage to slam your hips together.

“Please, don’t stop!” Jimin begs you then, eyes rolling back. “Oh, coming, M-Master! I’m— I’m close, p-please—!”

You bend down again and nuzzle his neck only to gently bite on his earlobe, making him purr. “So, you want to come inside of me, Jimin? Want to fill your Master up with your cum? Is that—” A groan drowns down your throat when his cock finally finds and pumps into the right spot. “I-is that what you want?”

The heated kiss the two of you share is enough of an answer. You tilt your hips so that your clit rubs against his pubic bone, pushing you closer to your climax.

Body arching against you, Jimin pushes back up against your thrusts erratically. His thighs move up and down to help, the seeming muscles bulging and flexing, and all his system starts to burn, aching to burst. His cock slides into your dripping cunt in a desperate tempo.

Jimin sucks on the skin of your neck before whispering, breathless, “I’m—”

And then you feel it – a tremble, a soft pant, and one last powerful thrust up into you before you groan at the warm feeling of his cum flooding you. Jimin reaches out for your body as he convulses, hugging you tightly before you give in and kiss him. Your hips don’t stop after even helping him ride out his climax, and he looks at you with his brows knitted in confusion. But you smirk, his creamy release leaking from your entrance and leaking down his cock.

“Ugh— hurts, Master,” he whines then. His fingers dig into your waist.

“Told you,” you whisper; “I’ll ride you until I come, no matter how many times I have to make you come.”

Like a man who has accepted his doom, Jimin lets you kiss him again, this time hungrily sucking his bottom lip into your mouth. A groan vibrates in your throat, you can tell you’re close, judging by the way your body is burning up, your swollen clit rubbing against the base of his cock.

It softens partially inside of you, but not for long; maybe it’s because of his sensors – since they’re set to the highest level of sensitivity – that Jimin sucks in a sharp breath when you clench around him.

“I’m close, angel,” you say, almost grunting.

You’re close, can feel your climax teasing you. Heat spreads under your skin, and you have to fight not to crumble on top of him, thighs burning. He stares at your sweat, covering your body, sliding down the valley of your breasts, tapping against the metal surface. You enjoy how Jimin responds to your touch when you stroke down his chest and realise he’s close too.

Slowly, you raise your hips and snap them onto his cock again, eyes never leaving his beautiful red LED-lit irises.

“Cum with me, will you?”

You’re so full of his cum already, you’re sure it’ll leak out for hours. But your lips find each other in the sickly whitish light blinking over you, and it’s so comforting that you can’t help the tension snapping in the pit of your stomach with a deep moan muffled against his lips.

“Shit, shit, baby—! Oh, fuck, so good, so good,” you chant, now rutting your hips faster.

You dissolve into pleasure with his arms around you, grounding you to him. Walls fluttering around his cock, the shockwaves grip your body like a fit of hysterical lust, pushing you to fuck him faster, harder, balls swinging against your cheeks until Jimin lets out a trembling sob; then he empties himself inside of your tight walls, and you relentlessly fuck him through his orgasm, slower by the minute.

Jimin watches your breasts as they heave up and down in an attempt to catch your breath. Meanwhile, his system slows down, now trying to run smoothly.

You smile when his thumbs stroke your waist in circles. “What?”

“I still…” His smile falters, now totally back on earth. “I still don’t know if you want to keep me, Master.”

“You’ll have to stop calling me ‘Master’ eventually, you know,” you say and ignore his pleading question. Caressing his cheeks feel way more interesting right now.

“Why?”

“Well” – you sit up on his lap, making some of his release leak out and drip down your inner thighs – “I’m sure people will start making questions, don’t you think? I believe you should stick to it only at home, when we’re alone— or even better, only in the bedroom.”

It takes him a second to realise you’re taking him. With this, you’re claiming him, you didn’t even doubt it for a second.

Jimin is yours, forever, however long that lasts.

Don’t hesitate to like, reblog, and leave some feedback if you liked it! It’s always good and encouraging to know what you think <3

“arte factum” is copyright ²⁰²² Lola Bangtan, all rights reserved.

[tmntforeverinmyheart]

I unironically love the mutant apocalypse, and really wish there was more content of it. I mean it paved the way for rises future that fans seem to worship. It’s unfortunate that the designs kinda sucked (looking at you leo) and how the bridge between the mutagen bomb and 50 years into the further is basically unknown. Like how did leo of all people become a cruel wasteland king? What tragic accident befell casey, april and karai for them to be nonexistent? What did raph and donnie do for 50 years? What happened to mikey to make him go crazy? So many questions left unanswered, so im gonna make content of my version of the mutant apocalypse for awhile cause i love them, it feeds my angsty soul lol

Leo retains bits and pieces of his past life. Unfortunately most of his memories have become disconnected from each other. He remembers a man or a mutant? Spikes of metal and skin, silver armour encasing his whole body, the man’s heart, pulsing with green. Green what? Leo didn’t know. He remembers colours, red, purple and orange. One radiating warmth and a fiery temper, one cold and calculating but with a softness, one filled with love and brightness. What do they mean? He thought back to the man (mutant?) how monstrous he looked. looking down at himself he could see the resemblance between the memory and his reality. The man felt most familiar, and unlike the colours was more in focus. He carried an air of superiority and held himself with pride. Leo wanted to be like him. A path has been chosen for him and he will follow it.

Note: Leo does not actually remember his name, I just wanted to make it obvious who the character was.

Tw blood

Donnie and Raph stayed together. Raph had to be his younger brothers protector, in this strange new world their ninja skills wouldn’t be enough, not in the state they were in. Donnie could barely hold his weight, the scars left behind from the flames were slowly healing, sealing up his eyes in the process. They wandered together, searching for their missing family members. Surviving on through the ever changing climate on scraps, raw meat, mutant flesh, it didn’t matter. The only thing that mattered was staying alive and finding their brothers.

Mikey was separated from his brothers in the aftermath of the mutagen bomb, Eventually finding his way back to the sewer. His home was in disarray. Luckily he still had one friend he could count on. Ice cream kitty practically hug-attacked mikey when he opened the freezer. Mikey stayed in his home, finishing off the food in the fridge and cupboard. There wasn’t much to do really. He played cards with kitty. Failed to meditate, and looked at old photos. 10 years passed by and eventually the fridge and freezer stopped working and he had to go searching for another safe haven to keep his friend from melting. He found a still working pizza place and hunkered down. This pattern continued for a number of years. He traveled all over New York to different grocery, ice cream and pizza stores to keep kitty alive. Mikey became sickly from eating so much outdated and even moldy food. Mikey had to resort to eating his infinite ice cream friend. He grew hair at some point, which was odd (he didn’t even know that was possible), it was curly and unkept. He would braid his hair into different shapes to pass the time. The world around him was crumbling, seeming more and more out of a sci-fi movie everyday. He stayed in his head a lot, imagining a whole new reality where he still had his family. But he couldn’t completely discount his reality, after all he had ice cream kitty.

Until he didn’t…

During his travels, Leo met many mutants. One in particular just wouldn’t leave him alone. Their first encounter was a battle over a rotten carcass. She attacked, wrapping her long body around his lower leg, cutting off his circulation. He attacked her back, swiping at her with his claws. He remembered the man with the spikes, and manipulated the skin of his arm, forming two hard spikes, he swiped at her again. She backed off with a haunted look in her eyes. “Shredder” she said quietly, before slithering away.

[satancopilotsmytardis]

Universal Tongue

Pairing: Shigadabi

Rating: Explicit

Summary: Commissioned by @norsetenko, Dabi has been the science officer on the ESV: Ingenuity for three years, their vessel currently undertaking a five-year-long exploratory surveying mission. He never tires of going to new planets and seeing new things, though it's usually from a distance in the initial sweeps. But the jungle on this one is too thick for their rovers or drones to breach, which means he has the rare opportunity to go planet-side himself to collect his samples. Unfortunately for him, a heavy storm rolls in fast, and his pod is trapped in the mud.

Fortunately for him, there is a cave system nearby to take shelter in. And very, very fortunately, the strange reptilian humanoid who lives there is open to negotiating sharing his shelter for the time being.

Contents: Absolutely inaccurate sci-fi bullshit, language barrier, voice kink, brief descriptions of violence, anal sex, oral sex, xenophilia, non-human genitalia, double penetration, organic lube, oral fixation, tail fucking, grinding, cumming untouched, multiple orgasms, wet and messy, size difference

Word Count: 19,435

The ESV: Ingenuity has been his home away from home for three years. Exovin Explorations became his home at eighteen when he decided that even being on the same planet as his father and his constant belittling was too close. He put up with it getting so much worse for the two years that it took for him to study, improve his health, and eventually apply and test to join the program. It had been a grueling process to train his body, heavily scarred and stapled together from when he'd gotten into one of the labs at the Endeavor Institute of Interstellar Advancements and had gotten caught up in a volatile reaction. But he put everything he had into doing it, and had made it.  And the day he'd gotten his acceptance letter, Toya had packed his shit and left.

He went through his basic training, broke off into his specialized training, and at twenty, he had been assigned to the crew and the ship he would be acting as the Science Officer on. Burning the letter that had been addressed to him from his father trying to make him 'give up on a stupid dream' and go back home to at least be somewhat useful at his father's company, had earned him the callsign 'Dabi' and he had all but put 'Toya Todoroki' into the flames too. His official ID doesn't even say 'Toya' anymore, and of the names that he could have gotten saddled with, he's really not begrudging Dabi as his new one. 

"You almost ready, Dabi?" Spinner's voice crackles through the earpiece that's already comfortably in place as he finishes making sure that his suit is fully sealed from head to toe, and his full case of equipment is in order. At least he didn't end up with a name because everyone watched him fuck up the calibrations for one of their machines to the point it spun so fast it nearly decapitated someone. 

"Yeah, I'm doing final checks." He responds. 

Compress's voice crackles through next. "The radar is showing a forming stormfront about ninety miles off." 

"Are we postponing?" He doesn't really do a good job of keeping the slight disappointment out of his voice. The only reason he's getting to go down to the surface of this planet ahead of schedule is because the jungle biome that stretches across the southeastern quadrant of this continent has such dense vegetation that none of their rovers have been able to get in, and the canopy is too dense for their other sensors to scan. So far there haven't been any signs that the planet wouldn't be habitable to humans, but until every section is cleared, they're not supposed to go down to start cataloging anything for possible use. This mission got special clearance and Dabi always loves taking his first step onto a new planet, so he was excited to get to do so before everyone else. 

"No, it's still a ways off and it seems pretty localized, just collect the early samples." There's a wry warning in that tone, because it's been three years and the rest of the team on Ingenuity knows that he can, and will, immediately get distracted by any alien flora or fauna that he sees that is especially different from anything he's ever seen before. 

"... Am I still being dropped off in the lake?" Based on their scans, that's the only place that he can get dropped if they don't want him to have to hike into the jungle himself. He chooses not to comment on the warning as he ensures that he has his extra case of specimen jars just in case. 

"Yes." But he can practically hear Compress rolling his eyes.

"Cool," He secures his gear and gets into the single-person pod and straps in. "Starting launch procedures." 

It still takes another couple of minutes for his vessel to be lowered out of the belly of their ship. They've been holding just outside the gravitational pull of the upper atmosphere for the better part of two weeks now, and Dabi is excited to get to watch the descent out of the windshield as the pod slips lower and lower, into the cloud layer and then beneath it. The path that Compress programmed for his descent is smooth, though he does see the dark clouds and crackling lightning of the distant storm raging as he goes. 

It only takes a few minutes for his pod to be half-submerged in the lake, and with just a few flicks of switches across his control panel, it is starting to putter to the nearest shore. When he gets to the shoreline, another switch is able to get the mechanical legs to unfold from the chassis and bring it just up to the tree line before he checks in again, "Landed without issues. I'll be disembarking to collect air, soil, and water samples." He says mostly for the official logs. Then he pushes his luck just a bit. "Should I set up a collection container to try and get a sample of the rain in case it gets here?" 

Compress sighs. "We'll see. It's going to depend on how fast the storm moves. Be careful." 

"You got it, Cap." 

He disembarks with his specimen bag in tow and starts by collecting some of the rich earth that's on the bank of the lake. One of the best things that he's learned since he started training for this position is that life on other planets, no matter how strange it is, is also all so similar to one another. Planets with carbon-based lifeforms, which is Exovin's primary interest, are all made of the same building blocks no matter what else has changed. In the soil he takes from the bank, he sees that it's mixed with clay, and when he moves up a little closer to the tree line, he's greeted with with plants with pale woody trunks and tall splayed branches, though the leaves on this planet are extremely dark-- nearly black-- and fanned out in large bunches. The shape is different, the color darker than anything he'd ever seen on Earth, but he knows that he'll find cells in these leaves that aren't all that different to what he would find on Earth.

The little insects that he finds skittering around are all mostly clinging to those trees, steadily making their way upward to find a feast in those dark canopies, and the sounds of life filter in from every inch of the world around him. The buzzing of flying insects, the distant songs of birds that have chirps and whistles lower and longer than the ones that he's heard before, and the rustling of leaves above that make it abundantly clear that there are other creatures moving around in the foliage. He begins to take his samples, letting the pack on his hip begin to run a diagnostic on the makeup of the air. The gravity, according to their tests, is about one percent higher than the gravity on Earth, but it's not really noticeable as he moves around. Gathering the samples he was supposed to take is easy and quick, he's finished in twenty minutes before he asks for clearance to set up a way to collect water from the rain. 

He tries to find a spot that hopefully won't be too intrusive and begins to set that up as well before Compress's voice crackles in through his speaker again, "That stormfront is starting to move and it's picking up speed. Finish up what you're doing and return to the ship." 

"Got it." He doesn't dilly dally, though he wants to. He's the first human to ever set foot on this planet; he cannot be blamed for being curious and wanting to catalog literally everything he finds. They have another nine planets in their quadrant that they're supposed to finish doing these initial surveys on over the course of the next two years, and then they'll report all of their findings back to Exovin and return home for a year of rest and reevaluation. After that, they'll hopefully be given clearance to go to the planet that seemed the most likely to be able to sustain interplanetary resources and spend a few years there where he'll be able to explore and catalog new life to his heart's content. But for now, this little jaunt will have to do. He finishes up and starts to move back in the direction of his pod as he starts to hear the distant crackle of thunder. 

He's just stepping out onto the bank as a cavalcade of movement starts to come from alongside it and Dabi half tucks back into the trees to hide from whatever creatures are trying to take cover from the oncoming storm. The beasts that come through have six legs, and he's guessing they stand nearly as tall as a giraffe, their eyes are set into the sides of their skulls and their bodies have long, irregular stripes of white and gray across them, the color darkening and growing more solid as it reaches their heads which must be up in the canopy most of the time. The herd of nearly a dozen of them are moving fast as they go, and for a minute, Dabi is caught up in the majesty of seeing a species that it's possible no one else has ever seen before. 

And then they plow into his pod. 

"Shit!"

"Dabi? What's happening? Your pod just sent a distress signal--" Spinner's voice comes through sharply worried, but Dabi is just wincing as he watches the herd of megafauna trample his pod into the thick clay at the bank of the lake. He doesn't dare try to shoot them or set off an alert out of fear of starting a full stampede, and instead resigns himself to watching the metallic structure sink a third of its body into the earth. The pods are sturdy machines and he flicks a heads up display to switch to a live feed to show the rest of the crew on the Ingenuity what's happening. 

"Oh dear." Compress's voice sounds as shocked as Dabi feels, but then he starts to troubleshoot as the herd moves on and Dabi chances slipping back across the freshly trodden earth to get a look at his poor pod. "Spinner, are any systems reporting significant damage?" 

"No, it looks like everything is still intact, but two of the legs are wedged into its body like this. I might be able to remotely activate the third to try and dig it out, but I'm not sure." 

Dabi moves around to the side of the pod that may be able to help-- "The foot is underground on this side too." He warns before the other can activate it and make the situation worse. "I'll dig out this side and we'll go from there?" 

"You need to get inside for now," Compress tells him. "The storm is moving fast, the winds are charting at category four." 

"I can't get in," the pod would be the safest place to take shelter, "The hatch is buried--" he takes out one of the smaller drones that he has in his kit and launches it, sending it to scan between the trees and the rest of the area, looking for shelter for him. His readout is more simplistic than the ones they should be getting back on the ship and in a matter of minutes, he's seeing a strange blob of a structure about half a mile from the lake. "Is that a mountain range or a cave system?" 

"Both," Compress tells him. "It's the only enclosed structure within walking distance-- Do you think you can make it there?" 

Thunder rolls through the sky and Dabi's chilled just from how that noise has silenced the insect and birdsong. "Yeah, moving now." He has supplies to last him a week in his pack, just in case of something like this, and he knows how to set up for basic survival in case of situations like this, he'll be fine. He starts to make his way through the jungle again, having to turn on his headlamp even though he hates making himself a beacon for predators. He doesn't have a choice if he doesn't want to make this whole situation even worse by breaking an ankle tripping on a root. 

Dabi moves as quickly as he's able to through the foliage, but it still takes him ten minutes to find the cave system he's being guided to, and by that time, the rain has already started to fall thick and heavy. He ducks inside of the opening, large enough that he's got at least another six feet before hitting the ceiling, and calls his little drone back to him from where it must have been scanning the full system. The little bot takes a few minutes to come back as he checks in with the others on the ship. 

"I'm here, looks like it's high enough that hopefully it won't end up flooded with the rain." 

"Alright, good, it looks like there might be some thermal vents deeper down, so make sure to run a full air quality test before you remove your helmet-- if you need to." 

"Got it." He moves a few yards deeper into the cave and then does get out his on-site testing kit and starts to test the air quality and the soil and water samples he'd gotten from near the lake. If rainfall like this is common, then those samples should show him if there's anything particularly dangerous for him if he's exposed. 

It takes about twenty minutes for him to determine that the air is breathable and that the rainfall must be something truly torrential during these storms from the minerals he finds that have been deposited in the water through the erosion of stone. But it's not dangerous in it of itself. This is a perfectly habitable planet for humans and at least twenty three of the seventy eight cataloged species who work with Exovin. Spinner, a gecko-like humanoid called a Varqix, would actually love this part of the planet based on the temperature and humidity levels.  

Dabi takes off his helmet and cuts off his oxygen tanks to ensure that he doesn't waste what he has, just in case, as he sends that information back up to the ship. He settles in to watch the storm and run any other tests that he can on what he's gathered so far. He doesn't know how long this will last, but at the very least he can be productive while it's going. 

///

It's been about two hours with the sky still a riot of activity drenching the planet below, when Dabi's proximity scanners built into his suit start to beep. He glances up at the mouth of the cave, turning on the flashlight built into his wrist to see if there is a creature that calls this place home that he needs to be mindful of. But there's nothing at the entrance. He reluctantly turns to the deeper darkness of the cave and shines his light there, but he doesn't see anything coming from that direction either. The proximity alarm goes off more insistently, and Dabi hates every atom in the universe that has led him to this point as he preemptively brings a hand slowly and shakily to cover his mouth before he takes a timid breath and looks up towards the cavern ceiling. 

The hand was a good call, because even anticipating something being there, does not let him fully trap the scream that tries to tear out of his throat as that ring of light falls over the edge of the creature watching him from the ceiling. The alien is clinging to the rock, its skin as pale as the tree bark outside, and easily ten feet tall, and even longer than that as he sees its long serpentine tail coiling around one of his legs and across the irregular cragginess of the cavern. Its head is swiveled around to look down at him, solid red eyes from lid-to-lid save for the dark spot of his pupils. It's definitely a reptilian species, given the more slitted nostrils that are part of his nose and the longer slits that extend his mouth past the place it should naturally close at the corners. The creature opens its mouth and puts two rows of wickedly sharp teeth and that exaggeratedly large mouth on display in a frankly terrifying show, but Dabi has training for this.

He fumbles to push the button on the neck of his suit, and before the creature can drop down to hurt him. The speaker in his suit crackles to life and it starts to chirp out different ways of saying 'safe' in as many languages as Exovin has been able to register throughout the decades of interstellar travel. It takes about nine of them before they hit one that has the creature tilting its head and clicking back lowly. His translator locks onto those sounds and the earpiece he's wearing hums back to life. 

"What are you doing in my den?" The speaker translates the low growls and chuffs that make up this creature's language and the sound that his translator chooses to use is rude, frankly. The creature was already terrifying as it lowers itself from the ceiling. His body is mostly humanoid and densely muscled, his hands and feet ending with four digits on each, though his hands have one finger that is longer than the rest that seems armored, all of the appendages having wicked talons on them. Long white hair spills across the creature's scalp, reaching across its face, over its shoulders, and halfway down its back. Its long tail slithers languidly across the ground towards Dabi's things and he does his very best not to flinch as his translator takes in the language sample it's received and extrapolates a bit more to work off of from the language that the creature seemed to recognize. 

"I'm sorry to intrude," he starts carefully. The creature tilts its head to the side slightly as his translator parrots the words back in its own attempts at this guttural language, though it doesn’t make his voice as deep as the speaker made the creature’s. "I got caught in the rain and was looking for somewhere safe to stay. I don't mean you any harm." 

The creature listens, and then responds, "Do you feel safe here, little one?" 

Dabi does his best not to bristle, not wanting to potentially get himself into any more trouble. "From the weather? Very." 

It tilts its head to the other side, its tail swishing languidly across the ground as it looks down at him. "You don't belong here." Dabi is about to ask for clarification, but the creature goes on, "The sky egg, on the bank, that is yours, yes?" 

There's an immediate relief from that. At the very least, if the creature knows that it's possible for other creatures to come from their sky, he isn't going to have to handle first contact with a species that's going to be convinced he's a god or demon, or something else absurd. "Yes, I was visiting to learn about this planet," he gestures at his kit and the little vials of soil and cuttings of plants he was trying to process, "When a herd of six-legged tall creatures with long necks knocked it into the mud." He explains carefully. The translator will get better the more they speak and the more information it takes in from the other creature. 

"Aindrul," The creature tells him, and the translator tries to run that species name through their databases, but it comes up blank. It really was a new species then.

"Aindrul," Dabi agrees. "I can't leave until I can dig out part of my ship." He explains. "And I can't start to dig until the storm stops. I was hoping that I could stay here until the rain stopped? Then I'll go on my way. I'll do my best to stay out of your way." He will do his best to not annoy the creature with too many questions, though he has a million. Their scans of the other parts of this planet didn't show any signs of civilizations, which must mean that if this is the dominant species on the planet, then this species must not be very social, to the point where any information about culture that Dabi can learn will be especially interesting. It's always fascinating to hear about the cultural practices of species that are so completely different from humans. 

"...That is a long time to linger, little one."

Dabi frowns slightly, "Does the rain on your planet last a long time?" 

The creature frowns at him in return. "This is the storm of the tri-moon." He explains like Dabi is a child who should know better. "The rain will fall until the three moons are high over the lake." 

Dabi has to run some calculations in his head based on what Magne told him. She's their navigator and focused astrologist. This planet has four moons, none anywhere near the size of Earth's, with mostly two being visible at a time depending on what phase all four of them are in. Three can happen, but it would have to be the next time that they lined up to all not be waxing at the same. He tries to remember more specifics, but it wasn't his area and he was definitely more focused on and excited about the plant and animal life to have been as interested in the moons. "How long is that?" 

"A month, little one." 

Dabi blanches and the creature chitters at him. The translator picks up on the sound, but just informs him that it means 'sympathy, comfort' when his distress is so apparent to the creature. The planet rotates its sun a little faster than Earth does, the days are a little shorter too, but not by very much. Enough that a month here is three weeks of his time. Three weeks. Oh shit. "I, uh--" 

The creature chuffs at him again and then turns to start to go deeper into the cave, "You may stay so long as you do not get in my way, little one. But when the rain clears, you will leave, or my hospitality will end in a far less pleasant manner." 

His translator beeps to alert him that he was threatened, but the words and the slight growl to them was more than blatant enough for Dabi to pick up on that on his own, thank you very much. "Right, thank you!" He calls after the creature as he disappears into the dark. 

Dabi sinks back down to the cavern floor and pulls his helmet back on, calling back to the crew. Oh he is so beyond fucked. 

///

No one is happy to find out how long he's going to be stuck planet-side. It throws a wrench in their schedule, of course, requires a bunch of reports from Compress, and will definitely make him have to do a shit ton too when he gets back to the ship, but that's the long-term fuckery he has to deal with. In the short-term, Dabi is in a tight spot as far as rations go. He has a water bottle that is made to filter out any potential parasites, bacteria, toxins, and the like from just about anything he puts into it, and the rain itself is already, according to his tests, not too different from rain water on Earth, so he feels pretty safe about that. but he isn't as certain about food. It's standard practice for anyone on an away mission to take a week of rations with them, and he has that. He can stretch that as much as he can, but it won't be pleasant. What becomes far more pressing is that, as he gives these updates to the crew and they try to figure out what his next steps are, Dabi starts to notice that the temperature is rapidly decreasing. 

An aerial scan proves he's not insane about that, and the reason he's noticing it even in his thermal suit, is because it's dropped twenty degrees since the rain started two hours ago. The cloud cover is apparently so thick that any light and heat from the planet's sun is being dispersed in the upper layers of the cloud cover, leading to the ground cooling rapidly. Dabi is going to be in a rough spot if it gets too much colder at night even with the supplies he has. 

He talks to the rest of the crew for a few more minutes, but it's ultimately decided that he's probably best off going and talking to the reptilian alien again to see if it could tell him anything about surviving these harsh conditions. Dabi hesitantly starts to move deeper into the cavern and calls out, "Excuse me?" 

His voice, and the translator's approximation of it in the new language rings out around him, as he moves deeper, and it only takes until he's gone maybe thirty feet before he starts to feel more warmth in the air. Their scans didn't say this structure was connected to a volcano or anything like that, but Compress did mention there were other geothermal vents somewhere within the system.

"What is it, little one?" The voice comes from higher than he's expecting as he finds himself stepping into a wider cavern, an oblong chamber that seems to have a hole in the ceiling that's been dug out at an angle so that water can drain into what appears to be a carved pool in the floor. He turns to the left and sees that the creature has dug out a section of the rock too, about five feet up from the floor, and seems to have made it into a burrow. It's filled with leaves and other foliage from outside and the alien had been tucked into it, but now is poking its head out from the opening to watch him intently. 

"My name is Dabi," he tells the creature. "Do you have a name?" 

The creature waits for the words to be translated and then responds, his voice a low rumble that buzzes through Dabi's skull, "Tomura Shigaraki." 

Which gives Dabi a little more information about his species than he expected. "You have a clan name? Do you have a family?" 

"No. What do you need, little one?" 

"I'm sorry," He waits for the translator to repeat that, not wanting to offend the creature with his misspoken words. "... I wasn't prepared to be trapped through this storm. I wanted to know if there's any time when the rain lets up? I was hoping I could try to gather some supplies." 

"There are short lulls." The creature tells him. "Do you have enough to wait a few days for that? If so, I will take you hunting with me then." 

Relief goes through him, "I'll be good for a few days. Thank you, I really appreciate your hospitality... Shigaraki?"

"Tomura." 

"Tomura." He hesitates but still asks, "You told me before about the aindrul, I'm a human, what is your species called?" 

"Kir." As soon as the species is said, his equipment starts to run it through the database, but like the aindrul, this one turns up nothing. 

"Thank you. Humans... tend to like company. We like to talk to each other and spend time together when we're cohabitating with other species. I can do my best to make myself scarce if that's something you want, but if you're open to it, I'd like to know you more while I spend time in your den." 

The kir listens to the translator make his language understandable again and then considers him, its tail moving languidly where it's hanging out of its burrow, long enough that it's dragging against the cavern floor. "We can talk, little one, but not now. I spent the day preparing for the storm and I wish to sleep." 

"Oh! Okay," Dabi straightens, "I'm sorry if I woke you." 

"Humans apologize a lot." The kir remarks, pulling its tail up into the burrow and shifting so that the bulk of the pale body is hidden. 

"Can I ask one more question before you go to sleep?" 

"Hmm?" 

"What sex are you?" 

"...Are you looking for a mate, little one?" There's amusement in the deep growl of the creature's voice as it lifts its head to half turn back to him and pin him under that strange red-eyed stare. 

He hopes his burns hide the heat that goes to his face, "No, I just wanted to know what pronouns to use." Pronouns are hard across species, some not having any concept of them at all, and others having dozens with the punishment for getting them wrong being execution. But he would like to know so that he can report back to the others with as much detail about the kir as possible. That should help to make identifying this species against their database, if it's been entered under a different name, a little easier. "I'm male, I use he/him." 

"As am I, you may use the same for me, little boy." 

"I'm an adult," he stresses even as he starts to move back towards the cavern entrance so that the kir can sleep. 

"I suppose that means you won't get any bigger, what a pity for you. A little one forever." And Dabi cannot believe he's barely talked to this creature for ten minutes and he's being called short and a baby in one fell swoop. But the kir is amused instead of annoyed with him, and given the wicked claws and sharp teeth that he has, Dabi would rather be a source of amusement than a source of nourishment. 

Dabi leaves his main chamber and goes back down the long tunnel to the entrance, the air getting colder and colder again as he does. He is quiet as he packs his equipment back into his kit and brings it with him this time as he returns, taking out the small thin thermal blanket that is in his pack of supplies and trying to curl up as comfortably as he can on the hard rock floor. He sends a written report of the conditions, what he's learned about the kir, and then settles in as he listens to the storm rage in the distance and tries his best to fall asleep on the hard ground. 

Oh, this is going to be a hell of a time for the next three weeks. 

///

Dabi wakes, with something poking at his shoulder what feels like five minutes later, and he immediately palms the trigger in his suit that will electrify the outer layer to make whatever's touching him drop him if it proves to be hostile. Tomura sees his eyes open, and he takes hold of Dabi's arm, pulling him off of the floor. 

"Wha--" 

"Your teeth are chattering so loudly you're keeping me up." The alien pulls him, blanket and all back into the cavern and brings him over to his burrow. Before Dabi can say anything else, his tail coils around his waist in two thick wraps that covers him from sternum to the tops of his thighs. And when he's held tight by his tail, Tomura lets go of his arm so that he can use his claws to climb back up into his bed, pulling Dabi up with him. 

"Wait--" 

The kir chitters at him, and his translator doesn't have a word for the sound, so it simply tells him 'exasperated'. He pulls Dabi into the burrow, and even with the larger creature inside with him, it is big enough for both of them, though the kir curls his body and tail around him, tucking his blanket up tight between them too. He looks over Dabi, who is still a horrible cocktail of bewildered and humiliated, and then he tucks his head into his arms and closes his eyes, a very low purring starting to hum through his body. It's so low that it's a mild hum, but so deep that it rumbled through the kir's entire body and into Dabi's too. His translator tells him 'soothing, contentment' and Dabi really does mean to protest. But the burrow is filled with layers of soft material, grasses, leaves, and a strange shredded pale fluff like the head of a dandelion, which is much softer and warmer than the stone he was laying on before. Maybe the kir can be a communal species and aren't for some reason during the storm. 

This alien clearly feels empathy and has gone out of his way to express kindness, no matter how pushy that ended up being. That's a good sign, he reminds himself as he tries to relax against where his back is resting against the creature's long tail. There are plenty of creatures in the wide universe who don't feel or express those sentiments at all, regardless of species. He's a lot better off if he's trapped on a planet where this one would see his discomfort and choose to help him instead of leaving him to suffer or killing him for the inconvenience. 

He settles in and closes his eyes, listening to the creature purr and their deep even breaths echoing softly in the burrow. 

///

The next morning he finds the kir has already slipped out of his burrow by the time he's woken, and isn't in the cavern where he can see him, and Dabi does ensure that he checks the ceiling immediately as well. He checks in with the others first, 

"Good morning," 

"Morning sunshine!" Magne answers back. She and Twice should have taken over for Compress and Spinner in the past two or so hours, and she still sounds fresh and cheerful. "How are things planet-side? How's your big, scaly roommate?" 

"It sounds like it's still raining," he tells her, glad that his suit has enough lightly glowing element for him to see by even without using his full flashlight. "And he's nice. Any luck looking up his species?" 

"'Kir' didn't trigger any of our systems," she tells him apologetically, "but if you can get him to hold still for a scan or get a sample from him, we'll run it again." 

"I'll see if he's up for that." But probably not right now. The creature is already putting up with a lot from him. He doesn't want to push his luck and outstay his welcome when he apparently has weeks left of this. "Any sign of the storm letting up from there?" 

"Not that we can tell. The winds have held at forty miles per hour for the past few hours, but it hasn't stopped thunder storming. Sorry, firecracker." 

"Tomura said he'd take me with him to get supplies," he tells her instead. They had no idea that this storm would be a persistent problem, and there was no way they could have predicted that his pod was going to get smushed into the ground by the aindrul. There's no reason to linger on it, especially when, at the moment, there doesn't appear to be any significant and immediate threat to his life. "He also has definitely seen a ship and stuff before, because he's not really confused about it. Didn't Proximacard Multinational also do a brief tour of this sector? Any chance that we can send a request to them to try and find out if they logged the kir?" 

"I'll reach out, but it'll probably take a week or so to hear anything." 

"Not like I'm going anywhere." 

"I guess we can't abandon you there." She contemplates with a sigh. "You're the only one who gets excited about soil nitrates." 

"They're important!" 

"You have enough battery for long-range calls for two weeks, so we should start to ration your battery." She says, quickly deflecting from the rant he's definitely gone on before. He always had the doubt in the back of his mind that he would never see another world, so every small piece of these other planets he's gotten to explore has excited him. Even after years of it, every part of each world is a new, delightful mystery to unravel and observe. 

They talk for a few more minutes, deciding on stretching it to the four weeks they hope they'll need by only having him call in once every two days, Ingenuity time, and only for five minutes unless there's been a significant development. The only other calls he'll make are for emergencies. They'll keep an eye on the storm and let him know if the cloud cover thins enough and the lightning pauses long enough for him to leave before the tri-moons are in the sky. When they've done that, the call ends to start preserving his battery and Dabi carefully moves to the edge of the burrow and lowers himself down to the floor. That's not too difficult to do, though it was a little unnerving to back out of the opening and into the barely-lit cave without being able to see it, but he gets onto the ground without any trouble. He leaves his blanket up there. He doesn't know if it's going to get warmer again or if it will stay so chilled throughout the rest of the storm, but if it stays cold, he'll probably need to sleep there with the kir until he's able to leave. 

He moves out of the chamber to go back to his kit and he finds Tomura sitting on the floor, his tail coiled around his legs, as he looks at all of his little specimen jars and tools. His kit is three interconnected cases, one with tools to gather his samples, one to put his electronic equipment, and one with his supplies, like sample jars. His planet-side standard pack is also there and has been opened as well. 

Tomura has laid out everything from each of the packs in neat, clean rows that seem to correspond with which pouch or pocket he'd taken them out of. 

"Hmm, you know, I would have been happy to show you my things if you'd asked." It's not even really an admonishment. He doesn't know this creature, he doesn't know his customs, he's not about to tell him that to humans it was inappropriate for him to touch his things without asking. 

"You sleep for a long time, I will put them back when I'm finished." The creature picks up one of his ration packs. "This is... food?" He hasn't opened any of them as best as Dabi can tell, so he thinks that the kir must have just smelled the food through it. 

Dabi sits down with him on the cavern floor. "Yeah, I need about one more week's worth of food to last through the storm without discomfort." He won't starve, that's not going to be an issue unless things get really, really fucked, as far as the storm and his departure plan go. 

Tomura gently crinkles the package that looks tiny in his hand, especially with his one long armored talon. "...Does your food have to be... dry?" 

"No, our rations are dried so that they last longer without going bad. I can eat food with moisture in it." 

Tomura hums and puts the package back down on the neat pile of them. Then he turns his attention to the cuttings and other samples he'd taken the day before. "What are you doing with these?" 

"I'm a scientist. The group I work for has people, like me, go to different planets to try to learn more about them. I came here to take a few small samples so that I could bring them back to the bigger ship and see what they're like and how they grow." 

Tomura hums and picks up one of the jars with a cutting of a small plant he had found growing at the base of the trees. "Be careful with this one. When it's mature, it releases a cloud of burning dust." 

Well. He's glad to have found that out now rather than later and Dabi picks up the little tablet that Tomura's already laid out and scans the lid of the jar and makes a note about that. "Can you tell me about the others?" 

The tip of Tomura's tail lifts from its coil and swishes across the floor slowly and Dabi has hung out with enough cats to know that's a sign of aggravation, though he's not sure if it's something reptiles do as well. Though he does purr. Maybe he's got a little cat in him too, spiritually. "Why does your group want to learn about my planet?" 

Well, guess he does have to do this part of the pitch, though it's really his least favorite thing to have to try and make sound appealing. "We want to find planets that are safe to explore and learn more about. Not just humans, like me, but lots of different species who want to see new worlds. My crew just visits for a very short amount of time to find out what other species could come here for longer research studies. Sometimes the planets we visit only have a little plant life and some wild animals, but no people. When we find people already living on a planet, that other team will visit and talk to them to see if they can be allowed to study there." He explains carefully and then waits for the translator to do its work. After another beat he adds, "Do your people have a government that the other crew can contact?"

"We live alone, unless a mother is rearing her young, but a group could be assembled to meet these other people." Tomura doesn't say anything else about that topic and instead picks up one of his laser cutters that's no bigger than a pen. "Is this a weapon?" 

"I guess it could be, but I use it to take samples of things that I can't get with my clippers," he points to those and then puts his hand out for the laser cutter. Tomura hands it over without protest and Dabi picks up a loose rock from the ground, sets it in an empty space between them and turns on the cutter. He still can't hold his hand still enough to get a perfectly sliced line, given the flare of the laser can't cut anything more than three inches from it, and even touching the rock, Dabi cannot draw a straight line to save his life, but Tomura still chitters when the stone splits in half as Dabi finishes. 'Interest' his translator tells him. Dabi puts the laser back into the row Tomura had it in. 

"Do you have the means to hunt?" 

"Not really," he admits. "Humans don't usually have to hunt, and I'm a scientist," he says again, "I'm not normally supposed to hurt the plants or animals I find on a planet." 

Tomura considers that. "You should stay put then, little one. I'll bring back more food." 

His face burns but he doesn't protest. He doesn't know what other kinds of creatures call this jungle home, and he has no idea if he'd be able to keep up with Tomura, especially if he crawls through the trees the way he's so easily able to scale the cavern walls. "I'm really sorry about causing you so much trouble. Thank you so much for everything you're doing to help me. Your hospitality is greatly appreciated." He hopes that the mechanical chitters and chirps that the creature hears are able to express that sentiment clearly. Things would be much worse for him if he was alone, sitting here watching the rain fall and talking to the crew, sure that it would let up soon. 

Tomura listens to the clicks and his head tilts to the side slightly, still pinning him under those strange red eyes. "You're welcome, Dabi. You're a... curiosity. It's worth a few small inconveniences to sate that." The kir starts to put back the items in his kit, and yeah, they were laid out so he's able to pack them back inside exactly as they were. Dabi is guessing that if he didn't wake up, he wouldn't have ever even known that Tomura was in his stuff. "Do you eat meat?" 

"I can, plants too, but I'll probably have to cook them, my teeth aren't as sharp as yours." He just means for it to be an easy explanation, not really wanting to see if this creature knows about the risk of germs and parasites that could be in the meat of the other animals he hunts, but Dabi finds himself stiffening suddenly when a large hand shifts to his face.

The kir's skin is cool against his own and, Dabi finds, is covered in fine scales along the back , the palm tough, smooth skin. his long taloned finger rests against the side of his neck, as his two others hook under his chin and his thumb moves to his lips. He pulls gently on his bottom one. Tomura makes him bare his teeth and then clicks softly in the back of his throat. 

"Much blunter." Dabi's entire face goes hot as he pushes his large finger between his teeth, testing his canines lightly against his skin. Holy fuck. his thumb is the size of three of his own fingers and Dabi really doesn't even know where to start with the inappropriateness of this touch, but he really doesn't want to examine it either because then he might have to worry about the inappropriateness of the flickering warmth that goes through him at being manhandled so easily by this creature. "It's a wonder you can chew anything at all." He takes his finger out of his mouth and lets go of him and Dabi has to grapple for a second with that misplaced heat. Fuck, yeah it's been years since someone put something in his mouth like that, but he really doesn't need his body misbehaving like that. "Wait here, I'll bring back enough for you to eat." He instructs. 

Before he leaves though, he shows Dabi around the other parts of the cave system. A bit deeper in, there is a large pool that is being filled from three vents dug into the ceiling to let the rain water flow into it, creating a pseudo shower and bathing area, that Dabi is happy to be shown, because that means he will at least be able to be clean and clean the clothes beneath his suit while he's here as well. He shows him two other paths, one that goes deeper into the mountain that they can retreat to in case of flooding, and the other as a secondary exit in case the first is not viable for any reason. Then the kir leaves him to his own devices and goes out into the storm. Dabi watches him go, but with his coloration and the rain so thick and heavy, he loses sight of the alien in a matter of seconds as he takes off into the trees. 

///

Dabi's been alone for a few hours. The cave, even though the sky is still black save for the flashes of lightning splitting the sky, has warmed up significantly since last night, and he thinks that means he'll at least be safe during the day to take off his suit and just wear around his standard issue black thermal sweats and gray t-shirt for a while. He goes and tests the water in both chambers to see if it will be safe, bringing a small electric lantern with him. This, at least, has enough battery to last for months at a time given the simplicity of the device, and it makes it so much easier for him to see by. There are no notable parasites or dangerous contaminants in either of the pools, so Dabi does fill up his water bottle and let those filters take care of any additional microbial contaminants. He also goes back to the creature's bed and finds a few little foot holds in the wall and uses those to step up high enough he can actually look into the bed with the lantern. The cavern he's carved out for himself in the wall is an oblong shape with a domed ceiling that is at least nine feet deep and about four and a half feet tall at the highest point of the ceiling. It's been stuffed full of leaves and dried grasses like he'd noted before, but he is more interested in the white papery stuff. He takes a little sample of that out, putting that in the jar he has, and then reaching to touch it without his gloves. It feels soft and papery, and he figures the shreds of this must be what gives the rest of the bedding its fluff. 

He goes back to his equipment and sits down, beginning to go through his samples one-by-one, and doing whatever field tests he can with what he has on hand, writing everything down as neatly as possible in an actual notebook by hand. At least this way he'll be able to photograph these pages and send his work back to base during his next check-in to save power. And he waits. 

///

It's starting to get chilly again and he's gotten back into his suit when Tomura comes back into the cave. He hears the change of the cadence of the falling rain and gets to his feet, going to greet him at the mouth only to find himself gaping as he sees the large predator dragging an even larger animal behind in his tail. His arms are full of round, nearly bowling ball sized fruits, and he's completely drenched, not that that's a surprise, with his long hair plastered to his face and down his back. 

"Little one," he greets, but moves past him, inclining his head to get Dabi to follow, which he does, a good yard and a half behind him as he tries to take in what he can of the beast that the other killed. This creature also has the pale coloring that the other animals on this planet have had with the majority of its body being white, and pale shades of gray, in splotches and stripes, but the back and head of this creature is dark like the canopy above, the color split like that of a shark. It is a quadrupedal creature that he guesses must live among the higher tree branches because its feet and hands are structured the same, like with monkeys and chimps on Earth. It also is scaled rather than furry though, and its corpse is bleeding sluggishly as it's dragged deeper into the cave from the wounds in its neck and side that look like they're from Tomura's teeth and claws, its head rotated at a sharply unnatural angle that Dabi guesses is what actually killed it. 

They move into the main cavern and Tomura drops the beast from his tail and then uses that and his arms to set down and stack the bulbous fruits. Dabi hadn't turned off his lantern when he heard him approaching, and Tomura blinks at the light, but doesn't comment on it. The fruit are the deep red of an apple, though the color is almost uncomfortably uniform across all of them. He expects fruit to have variation in it, and the stunning lack of change aside from a slight difference in size is very strange. 

"Do your tests, find what you can eat. I will take whatever you cannot." 

"Thank you." He really doesn't have better words to express his gratitude for the other creature's hospitality, so he tries to at least just be fast about it. 

Dabi goes and gets his kit and uses his tools to take samples from the beast. He does test the meat, and over the course of the next hour he determines that the meat is edible, and will remain so after it's been cooked. He's glad that he did get survival training though, because as he carefully butchers a section of the large carcass, he feels Tomura watching him from his burrow. He hopes he doesn't look too inept. He has a small flash cooker with him, only big enough to contain 20oz of whatever he puts in it at a time, but it can also work as a dehydrator, and Dabi determines how much meat he'll need to stretch his rations to make it a full month, just in case something else goes wrong. 

He takes what he needs and it's barely a quarter of the meat on one side of the creature's body, then he moves off to the side so that he can work on cutting it into strips and making it into jerky. 

"Little one, surely that isn't enough." 

"I'm little," he says, with some amusement when the creature seems to be admonishing him. "And I don't hunt, I don't need as much energy as you do." 

He huffs softly, but does move over to the carcass himself and begins to take his meal. Dabi watches between changing out strips of meat in the small chamber. Tomura's mouth is large, despite how it looks when he's just talking, and he uses the way his jaw can seemingly unhinge to take large bites out of the creature's body, focusing on the areas that are covered in the most muscle tissue. The two rows of teeth carve deep grooves out of the creature and, like Spinner, he doesn't really chew his food, just making sure the chunks he takes in are manageable and then swallowing them down. He also can, apparently, eat bone, though he does tend to break open the bigger ones first to lick out the marrow with a long forked tongue. It's a little gross to watch, but no different in concept to any wild predator taking a meal, and by the time Dabi has finished dehydrating most of the meat and flash cooking the strip that he is going to eat fresh tonight, the kir has consumed half of the corpse. He purrs and the translator tells Dabi 'content', though he could have guessed that on his own. 

When he finishes with the carcass, Tomura takes the last of his kill out of the cave again, but he takes it through the other tunnel that he showed Dabi earlier and then doesn't come back immediately. Dabi takes that opportunity to have a bite of the meat himself. It has a toughness and a gaminess that Dabi has heard is common in wild game, and has a deeper umami flavor than beef alone usually does. It's definitely palatable and Dabi is certain that if it was prepared with even a bit of salt, it would be an easy staple meat and livestock on this planet if it were ever colonized. He is eating when Tomura comes back after about ten minutes, the blood and gore cleaned from his skin completely. 

He sees Dabi is eating and nods to himself before going over to the fruits. He uses his long index finger to break open a small part of the shell, and given the force he uses for it, and the way that the accompanying crack sounds as it echoes around the room with them, has him guessing they're as hard as a coconut at least. The coloration has also started to wash out slightly, getting less vibrant as Tomura puts the fruit back on the ground and kicks it towards the pool that is still filling with rain water. It rolls easily across the stone until it splashes into the little pool and then Dabi jumps out of his skin as it explodes with a loud pop, spraying a foot around the puddle with displaced water. 

Tomura lets out a hissy little chitter. 'Laughter, mockery'. Dabi glares at him, but the kir just chirps in reply before going over to the shallow pool and fishing out the fruit with his tail. It's cracked nearly all the way in half now, and the color of the outer skin is that vibrant rich red again. The inner flesh looks to be mostly a papery, stringy pulp, but he tears that away and pushes it to the side before extracting a fist-size mass of paler pinkish flesh that's dripping with a semi-translucent fluid before coming to sit down beside him. He offers him half of the flesh and Dabi takes it and puts a small pinch of the sticky flesh into his scanner. It takes a minute for it to work and firstly determine that it's not poisonous. Then it begins to break down the nutritional components inside of it. 

After another few minutes it beeps again and Dabi has to read the output twice to make certain that it's correct. The fruit is rich in vitamin C and D, with nearly double the amount of protein as guava, and it has more than ten percent of Ladreynyx per ounce. Holy fuck. Ladreynyx is one of the most sought-after substances in the wider known universe. It tends to occur on planets that at one point had a higher concentration of radiation, and early lifeforms seemed to develop this secretion to help counteract that and neutralize the negative effects of the radiation, healing their own cells and insolating them from the worst parts of it, so that they could thrive. It's such a hard to find substance, and one that medical professionals want in abundance so that they can test out how much good it can do helping to treat and prevent cancer and other forms of radiation sickness. All of which are becoming more common given how many people are going off-planet and getting exposed to the radiation of different planets and their atmospheres. 

"What's this fruit called?" He asks as he brings a small bit of it to his lips. Ladreynyx isn't poisonous unprocessed, but he is a bit concerned that it may be bitter and medicinal. The flesh has the texture of slightly unripe mango, and a sharp citric flavor that is bright on his tongue, but as he chews it mellows into a softer sweetness that reminds him of dango. 

"Uzut, they can only be harvested during the rain." Tomura explains, seeming satisfied with Dabi eating the flesh. "They wither quickly once they've been removed from the water and the inside becomes foul when the skin ashens." 

"And they explode?"

"Only when their shell is compromised in water. But it is a faster way of getting to the pits. It kills the fish that try to eat them." 

Dabi takes another bite of the flesh and then asks, "And what kind of creature was that?" There is some hesitation in the question. Some species find constant questions unpleasant, some find them outright rude, and he really doesn't want to piss off his host. 

Tomura doesn't get aggravated though. He answers any question Dabi asks him and asks his own in turn as the night gets colder and the thunder keeps booming outside. And they spend their evening talking about anything and everything that either of them can think of. 

///

They spend the next two days together, with Dabi sleeping in the creature's bed with him against the chill, and the kir being as amused and interested in learning about humans as Dabi is about learning as much as he can about this planet. Being on a surveying crew, he doesn't usually get to become so focused on the worlds they visit. Usually, he only gets to take a passing interest, but this, for as unorthodox and unforeseen the circumstances may be, is giving him the opportunity to learn as much as he can about this planet as possible. 

They're sitting together on the floor of the main chamber, Tomura curled around him, his tail easily fully encircling him, though not touching, just close so that he can watch as Dabi lays out his samples in order of what he wrote about in his notebook so that he can send his pictures back to base. He's learned that Tomura can change from being an endotherm to an exotherm, mostly at will, and during the day he tends to be endothermic and delights in having Dabi's much hotter body as a way to soak up some extra warmth when he can. When everything is all ready, Dabi turns his communicator back on and turns off his translator. He doesn't necessarily want the other creature to hear everything that he's saying, especially if they've turned up something interesting about the kir from past expeditions. 

On the hour, the connection opens up and Dabi immediately starts to take and transmit the pictures of his notes before Compress even opens his mouth. 

"Dabi--" he pauses in his greeting as he starts to see them coming through. "I take it you're doing fine then?" 

"Yeah, I'm good. Tomura has been super helpful and very nice." And the creature immediately pokes his head up from it resting on the circle of his arms when he hears his name and enters the frame slightly. He clicks at the screen and Compress smiles at the other creature. 

"That's good." And they launch into the rest of their check-in. No news yet from Proximacard and the storm is as thick as ever from their scans, but other than that, there hasn't been too much disturbance on their end either. They filed the paperwork to deal with the sudden delay in their schedule, and they may be rerouted to dock at the nearest space station afterwards so he can get a proper check-up and they can restock on the supplies they're going to be down because of the delay, but it doesn't sound like they're in any trouble over it so far. 

Dabi hopes they'll be in even less of it when he uploads his notes about the Uzut and their abundance of Ladreynyx. 

///

The storm rages on outside and time slips by. By the end of the first week, Dabi feels gross enough that he needs to bathe and preferably clean his clothes as well. The only thing that keeps him from it initially, is that it's dark and still fairly cool in the cave even during the day, and he's worried that he won't be able to get them dry again. He voiced the concern to Tomura and the kir considered for a little while before he disappeared for a few hours. Then he'd come back with a few strange mud-covered bulbs like that of a tulip, that were as long as Dabi's forearm. Tomura used his claws to tear them open and inside had been a fibrous tissue that Dabi had been able to light with his laser tool, creating a small fire near the second entrance to the cavern that he could use to dry his clothes over. That was a fantastic bonus, but he wasn't prepared for the kir to follow him into the second pool to bathe. 

His face had heated, but he stripped down anyway, only leaving his translator, the speaker wrapped around his throat, and the earpiece in place so that he would be able to understand what the creature said as he bent over the pool and sunk his arm in up to the shoulder. He pulled up an egg-plant shaped fruit from inside of the water, that was bleached as white as so much of the vegetation that grows near the ground on this planet. He squeezed it, and it started to ooze out a thick viscous liquid that smelled strongly herbaceous, and Dabi had to pull his clothes back on to run a sample through his scanner to determine that it wouldn't melt off his skin before he'd accepted it. 

It definitely wasn't quite soap as he was used to it, but the way it lathers and how it does help to leave his skin clean in a way he guesses isn't dissimilar to the way bitter ginger nectar can on earth. He washes himself and his clothes, and then wraps himself up in his thermal blanket as he waits for them to dry. And Tomura stays with him, his eyes linger over his body, but Dabi can't begrudge him that. He's been looking at the alien's body whenever he can, fascinated by every inch of pale flesh and patch of scales, the curve of muscles beneath, his single armored finger on each hand, his sharp, bright eyes and large, dangerous teeth. Tomura is far from the first alien species he's ever interacted with, but this is different from meeting a foreign species in one of his classes or on an established planet. This feels... special. So he doesn't protest when he finds the creature's strange eyes lingering on any patch of his skin, and when he chitters at him inquisitively about the scars littered across his body, Dabi explains what those are too. 

It's especially amazing how he takes that in stride and it doesn't change the texture of his glances. There is no pity that sours his looks. It's been a very long time since Dabi met someone who could manage that.

///

The first week is the most difficult, and even then, it's only a challenge because they are starting to put together a routine. Not because there is any real hardship. He learns that aside from hunting when he's hungry, something he usually only has to do once a week given the volume of what he eats during his meals, Tomura spends most of his days sleeping. It's not uncommon for species that haven't developed other kinds of entertainment, and since the kir are intensely isolationist to maintain their territories, they don't have any kind of society or trading. Dabi talks a little about his, how humans are a social species, how they have laws and things that they have to abide by so that they could invent agriculture and industry. He's not trying to convince the kir that is the way things should be done-- the earliest humans who wanted to explore the stars had definitely tried that, and there are chapters after chapters dedicated to them in every textbook for every beginner course on space travel that talks about how they were slaughtered for trying to colonize other sentient races. Which is why Exovin's policies are to make contact and enter discussions, meeting the dominant species on their terms before anything else. 

Tomura asks about how humans live on Earth and in their societies, so Dabi tells him. And in turn Tomura tells him things about his species. 

"Our mothers lay and hatch a clutch of usually two to three young at a time." 

"You have siblings?" 

"One, a sister. I haven't seen her since we left our mother's den when we were of age. I believe she makes her territory in the desert." 

"Will you ever visit her? Or your mom?"

"No, females are fiercely territorial. She would probably tear off my head long before realizing who I was." He chitters, but the translator says he's amused by the thought, so Dabi figures that his species must not get lonely, must not crave connection the way humans do. "Do you have siblings?" 

"Yeah, I'm the oldest of four. I have one younger sister and two younger brothers." And on and on their conversations go. 

Tomura doesn't seem to have any concerns about having their long talks, especially not when Dabi doesn't protest to him wrapping around his body the same way he does when they are laying together in his burrow at night. And Dabi never protests, even when he is made to feel so small because Tomura's voice is always so low. It rumbles through his chest in his chitters, growls, and purrs as he speaks, and they send a low, steady hum throughout the room. The vibration of them as he speaks sometimes makes gooseflesh crawl along his skin... and sometimes it puts a little heat there too. 

Dabi really does his best to not think about that, but he can't quite help it. He recognizes the growl that he lets out when he says 'little one' even without the translator now. Fuck, maybe three years without any sexual contact that wasn't his own hands is more than he thought it was. He never broke down or hooked up with any of the others, though he thinks that they may have been on and off throughout their voyage. He wasn't usually aching for it, but something about Tomura, something about the way he watches him, the way he leans in close and speaks too him so low that Dabi can feel the echoes of his voice in his own chest, that's making the celibacy a far more noticeable inconvenience. 

But he doesn't know how the kir mate, and he is not about to ask. Besides, he's damn sure that Twice and Magne won't let him live it down if his 'first contact' has to have the 'Kirk Clause' added to his final report. 

///

At the midpoint of the storm, the howling winds, crashing thunder, and torrential rain somehow get even worse. His check-in isn't until tomorrow, but Dabi has a sneaking suspicion that they're getting into a severe enough storm that tornados would be possible if this were Earth. He asks Tomura if they have tornadoes here, and he seems flabbergasted by the concept, which leads them to discussing the different natural disasters that they can have on their opposing planets and Dabi watches Tomura dig out another little hole in the side of the wall, easily breaking through the stone and scraping away the contents.

He had been thinking, given it was a smaller structure, that it was going to be a bed for him, because the kir wanted him out of his space, but when it's finished, it's just big enough for Dabi to store his kit and suit so that they aren't tucked off at the side of the room anymore. Tomura still lifts him into his bed at night and holds him close as they sleep, his purrs rumbling through them both.

///

It's still cool and late when Dabi wakes hearing his communicator chirping frantically from its place across the room. Tomura grumbles, but unwraps his tail from around Dabi's body, relinquishing his hold around his waist as well when he recognizes the sound. Dabi slips out of his burrow and goes over to retrieve his tablet, taking it into the bathing chamber so that he doesn't disturb Tomura any more than he already has as he answers with a yawn, 

"Hey Mag--" 

"Dabi," her tone is strained in a way that has him sharply shaking the last lingering threads of sleepiness. 

"What is it? What's going on?" 

"Are you alright? Tomura hasn't hurt you?" 

He blinks. "No, of course not-- Why?" 

Her face is pale and drawn as a file comes through for him. "We got the communication back from Proximacard. They registered the dominant species as REH-129, and marked the planet as 'unsuitable' for foreign life because the species was extremely hostile. Six of their people died." 

Dabi opens the file, trying to make sense of what she's telling him. He mutes the video file that's been attached to the report, leaving the subtitles on, and watches as the Proxima crew lands and starts to comb the jungle, taking their own samples and exploring. It's sunny and bright in the video, but the footage has clearly been edited down to show the first contact with-- Tomura. There's no mistaking the creature. He knows his eyes, his hair, recognizes the way he holds himself as he looms over the crew in one of the trees and clicks and snarls at them. He asks them who they are, why they're in his territory, and Proxima tells him that they've arrived to enter the planet into the rest of the interplanetary community, they say they're looking for useful things, that they want to find the government if there is one here, they hold themselves firm and strong in the wake of Tomura's increasing agitation. 

They open fire when he moves too quickly into their space. The phaser blast hits his skin and dissipates across it harmlessly. And Tomura opens his mouth wide enough to show off all of his teeth before he lunges. The footage is shaky and awful then, a horrible blur of violence as he watches Tomura easily tear through their suits, through flesh, as he cuts down the members of Proxima. They learn quickly enough that they need to run, and the last of the footage shows Tomura dragging their dead deeper into the jungle. His stomach twists. 

Based on the feedback they were able to get from the suits, he'd eaten a fair amount of the remains before the signal stopped transmitting. 

"They tried exploring other regions and they found the other REH-129's to be as aggressive if not more so." She warns. "Are you sure you're safe there?" 

He was positive of it up until ten minutes ago. "He hasn't ever hurt me." Is all he can think to say. He doesn't want to elaborate too much about how close they've been so far. 

"That may not always be the case. The Proxima members who survived their other interactions found that phasers didn't work, but electricity and laser weapons could do some damage. If you need to protect yourself--" 

"Okay." He cuts her off, his stomach gone sour from this new knowledge she's saddled him with. "He hasn't made any aggressive action towards me. He said his people are territorial-- they don't even visit family members to keep out of each others' space. They may have just been scared of how many people were showing up in their domains." He tries weakly. But that doesn't take away seeing how bloodthirsty Tomura could be if the mood struck him. 

Magne doesn't look satisfied with that. "Make sure you're wearing your monitor for your vitals, alright?" So they know if he gets killed. It's not as if they can get down here to help him if they think he's in trouble. 

"Okay." He agrees, but they don't stay on the call much longer than that. He doesn't return to bed for a long while. 

///

He can't help but keep replaying those clips over and over in his head as Tomura stretches and readies himself for the day. He yawns wide and shows all of his too many teeth-- and then he licks his lips like a cat when he's finished. He tilts his nose up and scents the air, opening his mouth again to get an even better read on the room, and Dabi sincerely hopes he can't literally smell the discomfort under his skin. 

"Hmm, I'm going out to hunt. I'll bring back a feast for us, little one." 

He has never felt so relieved to be alone as he does now. "Oh, you don't have to worry about me--" 

The creature titters at him in that low grumble, leaning down a bit to nose at his hair for a second before moving on. "You will like what I return with." He promises, and then moves out to the edge of the cave. "Stay in this chamber. The weather may be worse before I return." If Tomura had said that yesterday, Dabi would have asked if he had to hunt today, or if he could hold off until things got a little better, but he doesn't now. Now he's worried about what Tomura will do if he gets hungry, so he says nothing. He goes and Dabi tries to put it out of his mind. 

 It's worse than failure when he watches the videos over, and over, and over again, as if that will somehow make the horrors he's seeing less real instead of more. 

///

He's alone until it's starting to get cold again, and Tomura returns with his kill. He made sure to bring the same creature as the first time, knowing that Dabi can eat that too, and an array of other fruits. He waits patiently for Dabi to test them to see what he can eat and what he can't, and he does have to put one aside for containing a nearly lethal dose of arsenic around any of the flesh that touches the seeds. But otherwise, he's able to try the four that are presented to him. Tomura watches him, his tail slithering languidly across the floor, a constant purr in the back of his throat. 'Happy' the translator tells him when Dabi lights up as he finds one of the fruits tastes like fresh strawberries and citrus. 'Content' it says as they eat together. He tries to pretend that he isn't scared when his mouth opens to tear into meat and fruit with the same ferocity. 

Tomura takes the remnants of their meal and disposes of them and he wonders if he goes to the spot where he dumps the remains of his kills, if he'll find anything he can bring back to the ship of the Proximacard crew, something to send their families, maybe. He tries not to think about that. He waits for the other to clean the blood from his skin and return and he cuddles up in his burrow with him when they're both full and starting to really feel the bite of the cold air as the storm rages on. 

///

Dabi wakes to Tomura nuzzling into his neck and purring loudly, he shifts a little to hit his translator, usually leaving it off at night to save battery, and is immediately told 'hungry', which sends ice flooding his gut. 

"Tomura," his voice is thin with his sudden, sharp terror as the kir coils his tail tighter around his body, pinning his arms to his side and forcing him still as he nuzzles in closer to his neck. His tongue flicks over Dabi's skin as he takes a deep breath, scenting him more thoroughly than he ever has before. 

"You smell so good, little one." He purrs, nuzzling his skin again. "Smelled like this all day. What's different, Dabi?"

'Hungry' the translator tells him again as Tomura purrs, the sound of it rumbling through Dabi's body and trying to shake loose his arousal alongside the fear tinging his veins. "I-- Tomura--" He squeaks softly as one of his large hands moves around his waist, slipping underneath his shirt and meeting his skin with cooler flesh and the barest prickle of his sharp claws. Tomura's tail moves, trying to wrap a little tighter around him, as he shifts so that they're not laying curled around each other anymore, but the other creature has his weight over him. And his tail drags over the inside of his thighs as it rearranges itself, putting a pressure somewhere that's had none for so long. Preparing to die by being eaten alive is really not the appropriate time for his body to start to warm, but Dabi lets out a whimper as it happens, two sharp spikes of heat in his cheeks as he feels his face begin to blush. 

The translator clicks something out in Tomura's language and Dabi stiffens, terrified of how that was translated. Tomura hears it and then lets out the loudest, deepest growl that he's ever heard from him which should be pants-shittingly terrifying, and instead only makes Dabi's body go a little warmer from hearing it echo around the enclosed space. His hands are firm as they pull at him, forcing Dabi onto his stomach and before he can ask what he's doing, he's got one of his elongated, armored fingers between his teeth. his mouth stretches around the intrusion as it pushes into him, back until it's filling him, the tip making his throat flutter as it sits just at the point of breaching him. It's been long enough that he's had something there that Dabi gags weakly, his head going into a dizzying spin of terror and arousal. 

Tomura presses his face into the back of his neck again as his tail wraps around one of Dabi's thighs and pulls it up, making him tuck it between his chest and the floor, his other hand around his hip and pulling those up and back so that he's spread wide. 'Hungry, hungry, hungry' the translator tells him, but Tomura is growling and purring. The hand that isn't in his mouth moves over his hip and up his back, pushing his shirt up with the movement. 

"I thought that things may be different for humans-- but you smelled so good, little one. This is good, isn't it? This is what you're hungry for, isn't it, Dabi?" His voice ripples through him and Dabi doesn't know how to think past that sound, past the fullness in his mouth to find fear when Dabi is hungry. Hungry in a way that the translator doesn't understand in its coolness. Not for either of them. 

He moans weakly around the intrusion in his mouth and timidly rocks his hips back. The growl that Tomura lets out has Dabi's cock hardening as the kir presses in even closer, putting his hips flush to Dabi's ass. But he's never seen the other's sex organs, and he can't feel anything now. He whines around his finger, licking and sucking at his claw, and making the alien purr even louder as he does. He doesn't protest as he pulls at his waistband and the sweats and his boxers slip over his hips, leaving him open and exposed to the other, his cock already half hard. 

Tomura purrs and leans in close again, nuzzling against the back of his neck as his hips move against Dabi's bare skin again. And this time, he feels something slick starting to spread over his skin. It's hot and viscous, and Tomura's tail uncoils partially from his limbs so that the thin tip can move between his legs. It pauses on its way to his hole, finding his cock and rubbing along him. "That's it, little one. I'll give you what you need." 

Dabi feels certain he's going to when that tail leaves his cock, which has him whining and reaching his hand between his legs to touch himself, as his tail slithers over his balls and to his hole, spreading around more of that slick over him. He's happy to have it because all too soon, the tip is prodding at his center, nearly as wide as two fingers and Dabi is moaning again. It's been so long since he's had anyone else touch him there and he is desperate for it now. Has been desperate for this creature's touch since he first caught his chin. He tries to stay relaxed as his muscles are rubbed at gently. For all that Tomura is so large, such a violent predator, he seems to know how to be careful where it counts and Dabi will take that if he can get it. He still doesn't know what the other's genitals look like and he's not even sure if they're compatible like this, but he's willing to try. 

The tail spreads that slick inside of his hole, moving against him in serpentine, undulating motions that makes all of those nerves light up in a way his own fingers haven't been able to since he's been on this excursion. His tail isn't like his fingers, it's so much longer and it gets perfectly thicker as Tomura feeds it into his body inch by inch. He had been hoping for a cock, but Dabi won't complain if this is what he gets instead. He squeezes himself at his base when Tomura's tail rubs just right and he finds his prostate, the loud moan that comes out of him is muffled around his finger as his whole body goes tight and he jerks his hips back against the alien's strength to try and get more of that sensation where he wants it. 

Tomura growls again and that does not help Dabi's leaking cock. Fuck. It's been so long since he was fucked-- he's pretty sure he's not going to last very long at this rate. He forces himself to let go of his aching cock, clutching onto handfuls of the bedding instead as Tomura's tail thrusts inside him a few more perfect times. He feels helpless, useless in the creature's grasp, and tries to show that he can be worth his time, sucking on his finger, swallowing around him, and running his tongue along the chitin-like armor plates along it, careful of the sharp tip of his claw against the sensitive tissue inside of his mouth. It earns him another low purr and his tail starts to retreat. 

He wishes he could speak, but his talon is too deep in his throat for him to manage it, instead whining as he's made suddenly empty. Dabi tries to push back, wanting to be fucked full desperately, and going stiff as he feels his ass rub against Tomura's hips. It hurts a little and he has to nip at his finger to get him to pull back just enough so that he can peek over his shoulder, but as soon as he does, he thinks his brain may melt. 

Like most reptilian races, Tomura has internal sex organs. Or internal until they're needed, and they both need them now. The two cocks are pressing out of a slit between his legs, stacked on top of one another, thicker than Dabi's and longer too, proportional for his body, but holding the same familiarly phallic shape that he expects. There are bumps along the top, ridges that move up his lengths to frame his head, and he's soaked, that thick slick dripping translucent from his heads and his slit. He whimpers. He wants to be full but-- but they're so big. 

Tomura's other hand cups his ass, pulling him open wider, his thumb brushing the edge of his flushed, puckered hole, and opening those stretched muscles again so he can dribble more of his slick inside. "Such a pretty color, little one." He purrs and makes Dabi tremble as his voice sinks that praise all the way into his bones. He presses forward, his heads rubbing against his hole, and he goes absolutely breathless with his anticipation. There's no way that he can fit both of those inside. A thin panic starts to go through him, terrified he'll be torn open, but the kir seems to recognize the tightening of his hole as nerves, seems to see the difference in their size, and he shifts to just focus on his lower member, letting the other glide between his cheeks instead as that blunt head starts to push inside of him. 

His cock is thicker than the amount of tail he was given, and the stretch, even through the slick, makes Dabi moan. Tomura starts to chitter too, purring his pleasure, and the translator can only tell him 'good' and 'hungry' as the kir slowly feeds his first cock into Dabi's body. He hopes that the other understands how good he's feeling as well, and tries to lave his tongue along his finger like he would if he had one of those thick, gorgeous cocks inside his mouth. It takes a moment before he's inside as deeply as he can go, purring the entire time. But once he is, he starts to gently rock his hips, and that immediately makes Dabi desperate for it. He doesn't know if he's ever wanted to be fucked harder in his entire life, and he can't stop himself from trying to immediately twitch his hips back to get more. 

For a split second he thinks he must have done something very wrong because Tomura snarls, his grip tightening everywhere. He's certain for a moment that he's about to die impaled on this creature's cock, but then he's pulling his hips back and snapping them forward into his body. Dabi lets out a loud cry of pleasure, his cock twitching and begging for release as the kir sets to a fast, brutal pace that pushes Dabi deeper into the bedding. 

He's blinded by his pleasure, by the rough thrusts of the other man, and he can't even swallow around the finger in his mouth anymore, drool slipping out past his lips. But as he gets more pliant, Tomura must think he's ready for more, because he draws his hips nearly all the way back on one thrust, and then there are both heads at his hole again. He doesn't have a chance to tighten, to fear, this time because it's a smooth movement, eased by his slick, and unrelenting in the even pace he uses, as he fucks both of his cocks into his hole. 

Dabi has never been this full before. Hasn't ever felt such blinding, perfect pressure against every inch of his inner walls, a constant, hard press against his prostate just from how deeply his cocks are reaching and how wide they're stretching him. And he can't hold on. Dabi gives a broken sob as his balls tighten as he's made so, so full, and he cums all over the creature's bed. 

"That's it, little one," Tomura chitters, his other hand going to Dabi's softening cock and cupping him, keeping his sharp talons far from his skin. "Such a good boy, showing me how good you feel. Show me again." 

He doesn't have the breath, or the use of his tongue to tell the other that he can't again immediately, but it doesn't matter. Tomura keeps fucking him, his cock pushing pleasure along every inch of his nerves until Dabi thinks he might tear around it. And he doesn't stop until Dabi is hard again and moaning and sobbing constantly as Tomura's thrusts and growls go through him and make him so, so hot. He didn't know he could feel like this-- he's never wanted someone like he wants Tomura right now. and it's with a fresh sob that he finds himself going impossibly tighter around the kir's cocks as his own pulses with pleasure as he spills across the bed a second time. 

The tightening of his muscles again seems to be what pushes Tomura over the edge, his hips slamming hard into Dabi's, putting his cocks as deeply inside of his body as possible, and then he snarls. The sound should be terrifying, but it only makes Dabi keen with an animal pleasure he's never felt before, as his cocks twitch and he soaks his insides with his cum. 

It takes so long for him to stop spilling, and by the time he has, both of their breaths are just starting to calm from the way they were echoing around the little burrow. He pulls out and Dabi mewls as he feels the flood of him go down his legs and soak the bedding. But Tomura doesn't seem to care. He purrs and chuffs at him, 'content, content, content', pulling Dabi's exhausted body in close as he licks the tears from his cheeks, but he doesn't take his finger out of his mouth. Dabi doesn't protest it, slumping against his chest and letting himself be soothed to sleep by the happy purrs deep in his throat. 

///

When he wakes again, he's horribly sticky, and still cuddled up tight against Tomura's chest, his jaw aching a little because he still has the tip of his finger between his lips. Dabi tries to shake the last of the sleepiness and reaches up to pull on Tomura's wrist. The kir looks at him, his tail twitching with his agitation, but he hesitantly lets him take it from his lips. A low, clicky, chirp leaves his throat as he does, and Dabi frowns as the translator tells him 'fear'. 

"What's wrong?" His throat feels a little thick, and he really is gross from the mix of sweat, cum, and bedding stuck to his skin, But he does not want Tomura to be scared, or threatened, by him. He doesn't even want to imagine how badly that would go. 

"...Typically, we don't stay with our mate after we've finished." He says carefully, watching Dabi like he might be the dangerous one. "Females try to incapacitate males once they've finished mating. They often tear or bite off their mate's--" 

Dabi blanches. "Humans don't do that," he tells the other quickly. "Humans can stay with their partners if they want to, they raise their young together sometimes, no one gets hurt in our mating unless they want that, or unless... something else is going on that's not okay." He doesn't want to elaborate on that now, not when he's trying to put the other at ease. He catches his hand, lacing their fingers together, running one of his along the heavily armored one. "...You keep females gagged so they can't.. bite?" And clearly evolved this as a way of doing so. 

"Yes... Do humans not eat their mates?" 

"Not like that." Dabi explains. "Why do kir?" 

"Once impregnated, it becomes hard for a female to hunt, if a male can't escape before she's recovered from the coupling, she kills and eats him to sustain herself until she's ready to lay her clutch." He's fairly certain that sounds like the mating practices of some spiders on Earth and arachnid-like races that have been registered. He'll have to ask if female kir exhibit that same kind of sexual dimorphism later, but not right now. 

"Oh. Well, you don't have to worry about that with me. I'm not a kir and I'm not female. Humans don't use our mouths to hurt each other when we have sex, and we mate for pleasure, not just to make children." He explains carefully. A flicker of warmth goes through him. "I can show you what we use our mouths for." 

Tomura considers him for a moment, his other hand coming up to his jaw, his thumb catching his lower lip again. Dabi presses a kiss to the pad of his finger, waiting for him to decide. "Alright, little one. Show me." 

Dabi is still careful and slow as he moves up the creature's chest so that he can start by pressing a kiss to his cheek. His skin there is cool, but not covered in one of the thicker patches of scales that seem reserved for along the tops of his thighs, his back, chest, stomach, and along the backs of his arms. He peppers those little kisses along the seam of his elongated mouth, showing that there's nothing dangerous in the action before he takes a little breath, tries to push aside the flesh he's seen the other rend with his teeth, and gives him one against his lips. Tomura is still beneath him, letting him do what he pleases, and Dabi pulls back a little. 

"We use our tongues too-- just not our teeth. Can I?" He figures he's better off asking than having his tongue abruptly removed. 

"Be careful, you're so delicate, little one." The kir purrs and the sound of his voice, the soft concern in it, makes Dabi want to show him that his softness is good. That he can make it good for the other as well. 

He presses back in and seals their lips together, going slowly, but deliberately as he shows the other how to kiss him back. Tomura still hesitates when his tongue prods lightly at the seam of his lips, and Dabi tries to soothe away that concern by running his hands over his skin, along his chest, down to his waist as he all but climbs on top of the creature instead of just being cuddled against him. Tomura opens his mouth a little and Dabi slips his tongue inside, careful of his very, very sharp teeth. It takes some coaxing before their tongues are moving together, and Tomura's is so much longer and more flexible than Dabi's own, and he tastes like the fruits they'd eaten the night before, though mingled with the staleness of sleep. 

They kiss, and kiss, and the longer it goes on, the longer Dabi proves that his mouth isn't any danger to the other, the more bold Tomura grows, eventually even chancing slipping his tongue between Dabi's teeth and licking into his mouth the same way that Dabi had his. He moans, his cock starting to harden, because Tomura's tongue is longer, bigger, and settles inside with a weight that makes Dabi hungry for something else. 

He pulls back a little and when Tomura sees his cock starting to flush, he begins to purr loudly again, his tail moving up Dabi's thighs to prod at his hole again. Those nerves are so sensitive from being fucked before that Dabi immediately moans, rubbing himself against those questioning little touches, and then watching with his own fascination and arousal as that slit starts to show on the kir again. His skin separates along an invisible seam between his legs and a translucent fluid starts to leak out. His tail moves from Dabi's hole to tease along the lips of his sheath, making more of that slick ooze out, and when his tail is shiny with it, it goes back to Dabi's body. 

He hums, pleasure sparking down his spine, and a recklessness deep in him when he murmurs, "Humans kiss there too." 

Tomura chitters, a sharp surprised sound. "Do they now?" 

"Mmhmm," he agrees, trying not to get distracted as the tip of his tail slips inside. "Can I? Please? I like to lick my partner's cock-- cocks." He corrects. "I promise I don't bite." 

The kir hesitates a second but then lets out a low breath. "How can I deny my mate anything that would bring him pleasure?" And the words alone are doing it for him as he moves down Tomura's body. His tail stays stretching and teasing his hole, but Dabi is mostly focused on how badly he wants to have Tomura in his mouth. 

His heads are just starting to press out from his slit and Dabi gathers some of the slick dripping out across his fingers and gently slips one along the lower head and up into his sheath, just a bit. He glances up to make sure he isn't causing any discomfort, but Tomura is growling and purring as his cocks start to press out a little more. Dabi teases his fingers along and around him, finding the one place of Tomura's body that is as warm as his own. He licks his lips before bringing them to the head of his upper member, and then he licks gently against that sensitive part of his anatomy. The flavor of him is overwhelming. It's a sharp citrus flavor like so much of the fruit here, but it has a musky bitterness to it as well that tempers the flavor somewhat. It's a strange taste to have on his tongue, but not one he'll complain about, especially not when he hears the strained little chirp that the kir lets out as Dabi laves his tongue along him. 

He's more than wet enough with his natural lube for Dabi to be comfortable kissing him along his lengths as they continue to press out until he's fully erect again. And then Dabi leans in, and completely wraps his lips around the head of the upper one. Tomura growls as Dabi moves his tongue over him, reveling in just how soft his skin is. He forces himself to pull off, even though he wants nothing more than to have the weight of him in his mouth, stretching his jaw. 

"Can I keep going?" 

"Yes," The other sounds half crazed, a hand moving to catch his hair and pull him, trying to get more. 

Dabi laughs, pressing another teasing kiss to the one he hasn't sucked on yet. "I can't get both into my mouth, is that okay?" 

"Little one, anything you do with your mouth is more than enough." 

"If I tap your thigh, it means I need you to let go so I can breathe." He warns, but trusts the other not to hurt him, and too impatient to have his jaw stretched open again to wait for confirmation. 

Dabi figures he's representing the whole human race and their persistent love of both giving and receiving oral sex, so he doesn't do anything by half. He does his best to keep his head on and not drift away and just fall into the haze that having his mouth so full can put him into. He moves along his upper length, his hand wrapping around the lower one and stroking him in time with each movement of his head as he slowly bobs down lower, and lower, his tongue working over him. The ridges and texture along his cock feel as good in his mouth as they did when he had him inside of his body before, and he drools constantly against his tongue as he chitters, chirps, growls, and purrs in such a messy string of noises that goes straight to Dabi's cock and has him leaking against his stomach too. 

He lets himself warm up a bit longer before he takes a breath and then sinks down until his head is pressing past the tight ring of muscle into his throat. Dabi can immediately feel the stretch there and it has him moaning, sending those vibrations along Tomura's length and his hand tightens in his hair as he snarls again, his tail in turn, fucking deeper into Dabi's body. He tries to hold onto some sense of rhythm after that, but it feels impossible. He just can't stop himself, moaning and rocking, trying to be fucked from both ends, and Tomura obliges him. He starts to move his hips, lightly at first, but when Dabi sucks and swallows so hungrily around him, the movements get faster, harder, and Dabi is floating, taking in little sips of air between movements and moans as they move together. 

Dabi doesn't get a warning, forgot to say he would want one, when the kir is close. He just gets a sharper deeper flavor of citrus and salt on the back of his tongue, and then Tomura is holding him in place, holding himself deep in Dabi's throat, as he cums. The gush of it makes Dabi dizzy as he does his best to swallow and swallow, but it still feels like there's too much and he taps his fingers frantically against Tomura's thigh. The kir chitters and pulls out, and Dabi feels his cum drool across his chin, as he gasps for breath, moaning from how close he is to his own orgasm. 

Then Tomura pushes his thumb back as far as he can on one side of his jaw and keeps it spread open, "Give me your tongue, little one," he growls and Dabi can't do anything but moan deliriously and open wider, letting his cum-soaked tongue lull out over his lower teeth and sore lip. Tomura shifts, bringing his second, still hard cock, to his mouth and fucking it inside. he doesn't push into his throat this time, but being used like this, just held open for the other's pleasure makes Dabi's entire body burn with his need. He finds himself moaning and shifting, spreading his thighs around one of Tomura's and rubbing his dripping cock against the texture of his cool scales there. That sensation makes his nerves scream, and Dabi chases more and more of it. Tomura fucks his tail and cock into him at the same frantic, unrelenting pace, and in a matter of minutes, his cum is splashing across Dabi's tongue again, and Dabi is following him, cumming hard against his thigh as he tries to swallow as much as he can with his mouth held open. More of it just spills down his chin and onto their skin, but the kir is purring the entire time that Dabi shudders through his orgasm. 

"Gorgeous, little one. So beautiful, so wonderful. My mate," he praises, gently removing himself from inside of Dabi's body. Dabi can't even hold himself up anymore from how good his whole body feels in the wake of his orgasm. Tomura just gathers him up again, and holds him close, licking up the mess from his skin as he purrs and purrs. 

///

They can't keep their hands off of each other once they've started, and Tomura learns to wrap his serpentine tongue around Dabi's cock and lick, squeeze, and stroke him like that until he's falling apart. He delights in learning about his prostate and that his tongue can be as good as his tail or cocks to stimulate the gland as well, and make Dabi feel good too. And they still talk, they still share meals together when Tomura goes out to hunt, and Dabi grows accustomed to the creature purring and purring all day, every day, getting even louder whenever they touch. 

But for as good as the sex is, as kind as the kir has been to him, Dabi knows, and when he goes out to hunt again and Dabi is left with only the dwindling storm as company, he finds himself thinking about that again and again. He sits with those thoughts making him colder and when the other comes back with more fruit and a smaller reptilian quadrupedal corpse, Dabi knows he has to shatter this soft thing between them that feels so good. 

"Tomura?" 

"What is it, little one?" He asks, setting down the food and coming to get into Dabi's space, licking over his cheek as he scents him deeply. 

"...I'm not the first human you met." He says carefully, watching the creature's strange eyes. "Another group came here, right? In orange suits?" 

Tomura's lip curls back and he gives an unhappy hiss. "Yes. They were not like you. They were many and violent. They encroached on my territory," His tail flicks with his agitation. "They wanted to take my land as their own and claim the spoils of it." 

"...You killed them." 

"Of course." He doesn't sound concerned about that, but when Dabi doesn't say anything for a second, Tomura nuzzles in a little closer, chittering at him softly. "They were different from you, Dabi. You came to my home and asked for permission, you ensured you were not hurting me or my land. You met me with kindness, not violence. I will meet you in kind for as long as you stay here with me." He promises. 

Dabi lets out a shaky breath. Well, he guesses when he calls Fuyumi next time he's on the ship, he's going to have to actually thank her for smacking him all throughout high school until he finally grew some manners and tact. "The storm is going to stop soon, isn't it?" 

"You could stay anyway." Tomura offers, "I would never begrudge your company." 

He can't, but the kir seems to know that even without making him reject the offer outright. Instead Dabi wraps his arms around his neck and the other purrs softly before he leans in to give him a kiss. 

They don't eat until, much, much later. 

///

The rain does stop after another three days and Dabi watches it happen with a hollowness in his gut, even as Tomura brings him outside so that he can see the three foreign moons sitting high and lovely in the sky. He sits close to him as he calls back to base and Compress tells him that if he can retrieve his pod, then he should be ready to go as soon as he's able, the kir scratching at his neck almost constantly as he listens. They're already so far behind schedule that they really can't afford to linger, and they're sure he's ready to come home too. The Ingenuity has been his home for years, he should be excited to go back. There's a pit in his stomach as Dabi puts what he's taken out of his pack, back inside, and Tomura ensures that he's leaving with samples of every fruit that he's given him. 

He walks with him out through the mud that Dabi really would have expected to be thicker given how much rain they had, but it seems as though the temperature creeping higher and higher is sending it evaporating and choking the environment with humidity and fog. Tomura keeps an eye out, ensuring no creature is brave enough to try to hunt him. The lake is, unsurprisingly, flooded, coming up to the tree line, but with a press of a button, the submerged pod is able to dislodge itself from the soft earth and crawls up to where they're standing. And then there's really no stalling anymore even though it feels like there's lead in his chest. He's only just started to turn to Tomura when the kir wraps his tail around his waist, and cups his face between his hands and kisses him. Dabi meets it just as desperately. Fuck he's going to miss Tomura. It's a sharp burning ache of that deep in his chest. 

"Be safe in your travels, little one," Tomura murmurs, resting their foreheads together. "And if the moons allow, come back to me again?" 

He feels his throat tighten. Two more years of his trip surveying this sector, then a year minimum back on Earth, waiting with baited breath to find out if this planet will even be considered for deeper study given how hostile the kir can be. Another four months to travel out here again. That's so long. Tomura might not even still be here when he gets back-- if he does. "I'll try. Thank you, for everything. I wouldn't have survived without you and I'm so glad that we were able to meet." He gets up on his tiptoes, and Tomura gives him another kiss. 

"...Be safe, Dabi." He seems reluctant to let go of him, but he has to, and Dabi steps away and seals up his suit and puts on his helmet. 

He doesn't dare watch out the window as he gets inside and does his final checks for launch. He is not gonna walk back into the Ingenuity crying. 

///

When he arrives back, he's immediately put in full quarantine. It's standard procedure for an extended stay on a foreign planet and Dabi subjects himself to it without complaint. Twice has him go through a barrage of medical scans, even as all of them talk to him through the glass like he's a zoo animal about how happy they are he's back. And he is happy to see them again. He did miss the familiar halls, their faces, but he doesn't think he does a very good job of hiding his melancholy. Definitely not when Magne and Compress come to see him at around midnight the third night that he's in quarantine and they pour him a shot before carefully passing it through one of the special hatches in his containment unit, before they both take a seat on the other side. 

"So Twice reviewed your vitals data from while you were planet-side." Magne starts. "I tell you a guy killed six people and you immediately have to get on that as fast as possible?" She teases carefully. 

But Dabi doesn't want to tease, doesn't want to make light of something that felt so... solid. Real. It only was a week and a half and Dabi is pretty sure it's the only romantic entanglement he's had in his life that made him want to stick around and find out how much more that could be. He drinks instead of answering her and Compress takes that as his cue to step in. 

"Dabi, whatever happened on the planet... if you're in need of counseling or assistance--" 

"Wasn't forced, Mister," he says flatly. "Tomura was good to me. He didn't like that the Proximacard crew tried to pull their colonizing bullshit. I was polite, he didn't see me as a threat, and we got close." He puts his cup back into the slot, waiting for it to be decontaminated before Magne can pour him another. "I've started writing my report, I'm being as thorough as possible." 

"...I'm sure there are things that you won't be including in that report. And that's fine, Dabi." Compress tells him gently. "But we're here as your friends. If that's something you need right now." 

Magne pours herself and Compress a shot and then puts the whole bottle in the chamber for Dabi. "Come on, firecracker, tell us about the scary lizard boy you had to hump and dump." 

"He purrs like a cat." He grumbles, taking the bottle when it's relinquished. "And he's got two dicks." 

"Oh, well, I could overlook murder for that too," she agrees sagely and Dabi tries to unravel the knot of sorrow that's been living in his gut. 

///

It's not years before Dabi is touching down far closer to the cave system that he spent so much time in before. It's only six months. Six long, agonizing months negotiating his contract. He'll still have to go back to the nearest base in a year and a half if Tomura lets him stay, and he'll be responsible for trying to find a way of harvesting the fruit of the uzut to try and find a sustainable way of getting more of the Ladreynyx for further study-- but he can stay here if Tomura lets him. 

He disembarks with a shaky breath. He has his own ship now, not a pod. It's small, only big enough for him and maybe one other person, and it won't be able to travel long distances, but it's his, and it can take him away if he's not welcome anymore. God, Dabi hopes he's still welcome. He takes off his helmet before he steps out of the ship, hoping that seeing his face will ensure that he doesn't draw any undue ire from the kir. 

"Tomura?" He calls into the forest, into the cave. Things are so quiet for a second and then he hears twigs snapping, and before he can fully turn, the kir is breaking through the tree line and rushing up to him. Dabi has a split second of terror that he'd mistaken what happened between them, his heart going to have to break before it stops beating-- but then he hears Tomura's familiar purrs as his hands catch his face and his tail wraps around his waist as he's hoisted from the ground so that the kir can chitter and purr at him as he brings their mouths together in a series of frantic, needy kisses. 

"Dabi," his name is spoken with such reverence between the kisses that it leaves him breathless. "You're back--"

"I'm back," he agrees, warmth blooming in his stomach as he curls his hands over the kir's shoulders. "I can stay, if you'll let me--" 

"I regretted letting you go the moment you left." And Dabi thinks, maybe, if he didn't know the other creature so well, that might be a frightening sentiment. But instead he feels so warm. 

"I've been trying to come back ever since. I have obligations, my company wants me to send more samples, and I'll have to leave again for a little while to check in, but I can stay," his voice still goes small. "I can stay?" Because this is for so much longer than before, this is asking a lot of a creature whose race typically lives in solitary. 

"By my side forever, little one." Tomura promises him, leaning in to nuzzle at him and scent his skin. "So I never have to miss you so fiercely again." 

Dabi doesn't know if kir have a word for love in the romantic sense when they barely hold ties to their families. But Dabi hopes that a year and a half to start is long enough for him to figure out how to explain the concept. 

Thank you so much for reading and thank you @norsetenko for commissioning this piece! If you enjoyed it, please consider leaving a comment, they brighten my day!

[five-rivers]

timer

@echoghost1 @everfascinated

.

It hovered over the surface of the portal, clearly separate from it.  A large, flat, disk shape, with a pale, luminous face.  More vivid numbers circled the edge, painted neatly.  A single, delicate, metal hand pointed towards the number seven, on the left side of the clock.  It had been pointing there for the past hour or so, ever since it had been noticed.  

Maddie drummed her fingers on the workbench she stood next to.  The timer - because what else could it be? - was, thus far, a mystery to her.  Usually, Maddie liked mysteries.  Exploring the mysteries of the Ghost Zone had been the reason they had built the portal in the first place.  This mystery was fascinating, and Maddie was excited about it, but it was also incredibly troubling.  

Obviously, the timer - hovering, green, immovable - was ghostly in origin.  What else could it be?  But how did a ghost place get in here to place it?  For what purpose?  How much time was left?  What was it counting down to?  It couldn’t be anything good.  Ghosts had no love for her family or their works.  

As soon as she’d noticed it, she and Jack had started taking readings, but nothing they did gave them anything conclusive, or any way to get rid of the thing.  

It was frustrating and troubling.  Frustrating and troubling.  

“Uh, Mom?  Dad?  It’s six and we were wondering if you wanted us to order dinner or anything…”

Maddie looked up to see Danny coming down the stairs.  

“Oh, sure!” said Jack.  “Pizza sounds great, son!”

“Yeah.  What are you even– What’s that?”  

Danny stared wide-eyed at the timer for a long moment, and Maddie moved to reassure him.  Danny was always so timid around ghosts, so afraid.  This timer was doubtlessly malevolent, but she and Jack wouldn’t let it do anything to Danny.  

Briefly, Danny’s eyes gleamed green.  Then, slowly, but inevitably, he collapsed.

Maddie leaped forward, keeping Danny from hitting his head on the bottom step by the narrowest of margins.  “Jack!”  

“What happened?” he asked, hurrying over.  “Danny?  Danny?  Talk to me, son!  Can you hear me?”

Danny’s eyes fluttered open briefly, overly reflective, then shut again.

“I’m setting up the quarantine booth,” said Maddie.  “Will you carry him?”

Jack nodded, grimly.  

They’d gotten the quarantine booth set up after Vlad’s unfortunate recurrence of ecto-acne and the revelation that ecto-acne could be contagious under certain circumstances.  It was sealed, filtered, protected, shielded.  Every precaution they could think of had gone into it. 

… and, yes, they should use those precautions more often, but Maddie and Jack loved getting up close and personal with the subjects of study.  

“We need to get that thing shielded,” said Jack as he set Danny on the bed.  He rushed out towards the timer and started setting up shield projectors around the portal.  

Maddie, meanwhile, pulled the medical scanner free from the ceiling.  Well, ‘medical scanner’ was a very sci-fi way of putting it, when really it was quite prosaic, if you knew how it worked.

She positioned it over Danny’s body and set it to taking data. 

Temperature, low, heart rate, low, bones, intact, nervous system… that part of the scanner didn’t work all that well, ignore that reading…  

Ectoplasm levels were off the charts.  

Maddie inhaled deeply.  Stay calm, stay calm.  They would fix this.  They’d cured Vlad and Danny’s friends, they could cure this, whatever it was.  They would get rid of that timer and they’d save Danny.  

“Mom?” said Danny, weakly.  

“Hey, sweetie,” said Maddie.  “How are you feeling?”  

“Bad,” said Danny.  He tried to sit up, but Maddie pushed him back down.  “What’s happening?”

“You collapsed suddenly,” said Maddie.  “We’re trying to figure out why.”

Danny raised one hand to his face.  Green light reflected off his hand.  Understanding flicked over his features.  

“Okay, but I think I’m feeling better, now,” he said.  He tried to sit up again.  

“We need to figure out what happened before you go running around,” said Maddie, pushing him down again.  She looked over at Jack, through the thick, transparent sides of the quarantine booth.  Jack was now trying to throw a towel over the timer and–

Wait a moment.  

“Stay down,” she told Danny.  “Let the scanner do its job.”  She walked out of the quarantine booth.  “Wait, Jack, wait.”

“But we have to keep it from affecting Danny.  We don’t know if its effect is visual or what.”

“I know, I know,” said Maddie.  “But look at it.  Look at the hand.”

The hand, which had been pointing at the number seven, was now pointing at the number six.  

Jack scowled at the timer and tried to throw the towel over it again.  The towel passed through it.  “Are we sure this is a timer, Mads?  Maybe the numbers are counting down charges or something like that.”

“I don’t know, it still looks more like a timer to me.”

“But why did it affect Danny like that?” 

“I don’t know.  We need to start decontamination procedures right away, though.  His ectoplasm levels are off the charts.  The sudden spike is probably what made him collapse, but I don’t know how this could have increased his ectoplasm levels so much so quickly.”

I don’t know either,” said Jack.  He picked up the latest version of the Fenton Finder (which incidentally, still detected Danny more often than not) and shook it.  “None of the detectors we have pointed at it picked up anything.  Nothing going towards Danny, nothing ambient, nothing anywhere else.”

Maddie had hoped that their detectors had picked something up, but with the continued failures of the Fenton Finder, maybe she shouldn’t be so surprised.  

“We’ll keep looking,” said Maddie.  She was forgetting something.  What was she forgetting?  “Jazz.  We need to tell Jazz, so she doesn’t come down here.  What if it only affects minors?”

“Righto,” said Jack, shoving the Finder at Maddie.  “I’ll do that, you start the decontam procedures!”

Maddie nodded tightly and turned back to Danny.  She could see his eyes gleaming from here.But they could fix this.