#—꩜ fics

[susanoos-wife]

Commenting on fics is the easiest way to give an author encouragement to keep on writing. If you like a fic, comment on it. Knowing that someone actually read your fics is one of the best feelings in the world.

This week, I read a fic that was around 20 years old, which had originally been posted on the author's personal website and which she added to AO3 a few years ago. She listed her email address with the fic, so after I finished reading, I sent her an email saying how much I enjoyed the story, how much I appreciated the work and effort she obviously put into it, and thanked her for uploading it to AO3. She responded the next day and thanked me for my message, then said she had a few more stories in the same series that she hadn't gotten around to uploading. I checked this morning--she added a 35,000 word novella and thanked me in the summary.

👏 comment 👏 on 👏 old 👏 fics 👏

[kylacxie]

Bringing this back for 2024! Last year the majority was over 400 fics, with that being the largest option, so I figured to increase it to 1000+.

[purenonsens]

Petition to fanfiction writers to write their multiverse/ multiple choices/ non-linear etc stories fics in Twine!! There are some examples on ao3 already and they look fun! The format seems so well tailored to hopping through different realities and times and hhHHHH I just want to read an Arcane one so bad. Please consider trying your hand in this, I bet it's as satisfying for the writer as it's for the reader.

[overtake]

A soft Maxiel Christmas moment | 2k (also on ao3)

CWS: mpreg and the canonical bodily terror of pregnancy

Daniel stares straight ahead at the faux crackling fireplace, his swollen feet propped as close as he can manage without risking them melting off with residual heat. Outside, there’s no majestic snowfall. It’d started briefly yesterday, and for a single minute, with the world a quiet white blanket outside their frosted windows, he felt a moment of peace and sanity.

It’d gone as quickly as it’d come. The temporary relief of fresh snow quickly faded to grey piles and puddles inside pot holes. They’d had to run to the store for last minute items, and Daniel’s mood had quickly soured with every step of his new boots through the slushy squelch. They were brand new for this season, a size up and wider than his old ones because his feet are too fucking big to wear what he already has, and he needed to pad them out because his ankles hurt constantly.

A warm shiver wracks its way through Daniel’s insides, like a hot fan coil has replaced his spine and is boiling his blood from the inside out. He throws off his wool blanket in frustration and tries to heave himself up. Unfortunately, all that brings him is a loud groan before he collapses back into his spot, suddenly sweating and ready to smash every single item in this stupid fucking house to smithereens once he figures out how to stand up again.

He pants for half a second, then uses his hands to shimmy himself along the couch until he’s as far away from the electric fireplace as he can reasonably manage.

Then, all at once, his body’s internal heater shuts off and leaves him shivering again.

“Oh fuck off,” he groans to his round belly. He doesn’t want to grouch at his unborn baby. There are all these studies about when the baby can hear them and how they react to their parent’s mood. It’s why Max says good morning to it before he helps Daniel out of bed. He’ll reverently kiss the bump three times before he leans up to give Daniel four kisses so, “You don’t think I love you less than I love baby.”

That’s what he calls it, baby. They’ve been in gridlock over the name for three months, and Daniel’s argument that he’s the one carrying the back pain and morning sickness falls on deaf ears because Max absolutely fucking hates his name choices. Maybe Daniel didn’t start off great by intentionally antagonizing him with the boy’s name of Dale and waxing poetic about Dale Earnhardt, but Max gave it right back to him by pretending he’d name a child after his father. Safe to say, pregnancy hasn’t brought out the best in them from time to time.

When they’d clasped hands tightly and watched the pregnancy test develop, both pretending they were doing something more dignified than staring at a cup of piss in Max’s plane toilet, Daniel had pictured pregnancy to be full of beautiful moments, some sort of film montage of kitchen dancing and 3d scans and tiny baby shoes.

He hadn’t been totally naive. Michelle had the worst morning sickness through both her pregnancies, and Victoria did not shy away from complaining about all the cruelties her children unleashed on her digestion, hair, and even her nose. Daniel had panic googled that one and immediately regretted it. The last thing he needed on his face was for his nose to get even bigger.

Max had just laughed when he expressed his concerns and kissed the curve of his nose, reassuring Daniel that he’d want him even if it fell right off.

So he knew there’d be hard parts, but he reassured himself that Max being there and the promise of their family together would be enough.

Instead, he’s awake at 4 a.m. on Christmas because he’s gassy and in too much pain to sleep, and the soft snores he used to love from Max made him want to claw off his ears and tear out his hair. He’s constantly overstimulated. Their cunt doctor kept saying things about how geriatric pregnancies are even harder on the body until Daniel refused to keep seeing him if he said the word geriatric one more fucking time.

Worse still, he was banned from flying home. They’d had a whole plan, with Daniel flying out just before it’d be too late term to make such a trip, so he could be around his family until the season ended and Max could join him back in Australia. He’d have a summer Christmas and let their baby be born in his country before he had to take his little family back to Monaco for the new season. It was planned impeccably.

Then the doctors started heming and hawing at his last scan before he left and told him that flying would be a major risk, especially such a long distance. This time, they were wise enough not to add anything about his age.

So now his whole family and Max’s are in a giant ski cabin, taken away from Monaco and the cats so they could all fit in one home, and Daniel had to sit through a 7 hour car ride that turned into 10 with all his toilet stops.

The worst part of all of this is that Max is so patient with him. He massages Daniel’s feet and knows how to tease him about the swelling without hurting Daniel’s feelings. He rubs stretch mark cream on Daniel’s bump, even though he thinks they’re cool and likes to run his fingers up and down the white marks, because he knows Daniel hates them but is too tired to prioritize putting cream on his stomach every day on top of keeping this baby alive. He’s going to be the best dad, and Daniel has to sit grumpy with the knowledge that he’s the pregnant buzzkill ruining Christmas and resenting the child that Max loves more than anything.

He must nod off at some point, because he wakes up vertical on the couch with his head in Max’s lap and a blanket tucked neatly around him to form a Daniel burrito. Max has his feet propped up on the coffee table and is playing classical music, a constant these days because he followed some Instagram parenting accounts that claim it’ll make your baby smart. Daniel’s skeptical, but god knows the baby could use any boost it could get because Daniel’s not handing down much in the way of school smarts.

The house is still silent around them, but light is starting to creep in through the floor-to-ceiling windows. It highlights the silver ring on Max’s finger when Daniel pauses his movements and pulls Max’s hand to his mouth to press a kiss onto the cool metal. His matching one sits around his neck these days, his fingers too constantly varying in size to cover the tan line on his finger. It used to make him bitter to look at Max flaunting the ring Daniel can’t wear, but with some sleep in his system, he feels slightly less like the Grinch.

“Merry Christmas,” Max beams when Daniel lands his kiss and he registers that Daniel’s awake. “I’m going to help your mum make breakfast in a minute, but she’s getting you some cocoa and a moment to ourselves first.”

Max takes one thick finger and carefully thumbs the sleep out of Daniel’s eyes. Daniel’s body is too weighed down by foggy warmth and Max’s love to muster a response. Instead, he turns his face into the meat of Max’s thigh, dutifully clad in the matching pajamas his sister had brought for the whole group, and huffs out a hot breath he hope expresses his gratitude.

Max leans over him to kiss the bump good morning and wish it a, “Merry first Christmas.” Daniel can’t help a spark of warm satisfaction that Max said Merry Christmas to him first, then a flash of guilt and embarrassment that he’s competing with his unborn child on today of all days. Max thinks it’s funny, but Daniel tries to keep most of the thoughts internal.

“I have a gift for you,” Max says. His whole body is curled sideways over Daniel’s so his head can rest on the bump, and he rubs at it absentmindedly.

Daniel raises his eyebrows. “I should hope so. It’s Christmas.”

Max laughs, his crinkly-eyed joyous one that’s lived permanently on his face since they saw the plus sign, but also maybe since the day they both said I do.

“This one is very special,” he says, then dislodges Daniel’s head from his lap for a second so he can fish something out of his pocket and place it into Daniel’s waiting hand.

It’s not wrapped, so Daniel can see it immediately. It’s a picture ornament, small but ornate. The gilded frame showcases Daniel’s bump in the pregnancy photoshoot Victoria had insisted upon. She’d promised Daniel that pregnancy feels like shit for nine months, but you still regret all the moments you didn’t document. Daniel had tolerated about thirty minutes of it and refused to look at the pictures after, but he knows Max loved them. He had them printed and put in a special book, and he’d promised Daniel that he’ll keep it hidden until Daniel’s ready.

“I thought we agreed—“ Daniel says, but the words die out when he reads the little writing at the bottom.

“Joseph/Delilah’s First Christmas,” it reads. Stupidly, Daniel feels himself begin to well up.

“I’m not naming our child Dale,” Max says, wagging a finger in Daniel’s face and giggling when Daniel tearily bites at it. “But Delilah is a close for a girl, I think. And I would probably not name a baby after my dad, but yours.” He shrugs. Daniel’s dad is obsessed with Max. The two of them spent half of winter break fixing up an old motorcycle the first time Daniel had brought him home, and whatever happened in that garage had formed a tight bond between them.

When Daniel doesn’t answer, Max adds, “We can also do Grace, but then it feels like we’re picking a mother, and that’s not nice.”

Daniel clutches the ornament tight to his chest and buries his face tighter into Max’s thigh, blinking into the fabric and letting his tears soak Rudolph’s nose into a damp, dark red.

“Thank you,” he says wetly. He sniffles, then steals Max’s sleeve to wipe his nose with the corner of it. Max doesn’t even reprimand him for it. He’s too busy staring down at Daniel with his gentle, sweet lips tugged into a smile, then pursing them to warn Daniel of an incoming kiss once Daniel’s slightly less snotty.

“I know pregnancy has been really hard,” Max says. His head hovers right over Daniel’s, even though it must be killing his neck to crane it that way. “I love you for not divorcing me for doing this to you.”

Daniel shakes his head. “Hey, there’s a week or two left to go. Don’t count your chickens.”

He pauses, takes in Max’s face. He runs the hand still holding the ornament down the prickle of stubble dotting his soft chin, pokes the freckle decorating his pink lips, admires the morning sun glaring off yesterday’s fallen snow and making Max’s hair glow golden. “Pregnancy has been shit, and I complain a lot, but I’m really excited to be a dad with you. Thank you for this.”

His voice breaks off at the last words, and Max kisses him again. His mouth is cozy like the fireplace heat, and they break into still-kissing giggles when the baby does what feels like a flip of excitement under Max’s resting hand.

Daniel’s mum is probably moments away from interrupting their moment. The kids are all going to be awake any minute now to start tearing into presents, and Daniel will probably be back to being grumpy and overstimulated within the hour.

He pushes what’s to come aside and cuddles into his husband’s loving arms and lets himself feel temporarily alight with gratitude.

(“So it might not even be a boy, but you still get all the credit of having maybe named a child after him?” Michelle hisses later, smacking Daniel’s arm as their dad hugs Max and cries. “Dickhead. Was it not enough to become a millionaire racing driver? You’re not invited for Christmas next year.”)

[violetcoloredskies]

I wrote a dbda oneshot!! Check it out on ao3:

What happened to Orpheus and Eurydice? (3032 words) by violets_are_blue Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Dead Boy Detectives (TV) Rating: Not Rated Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Edwin Paine | Edwin Payne/Charles Rowland, Edwin Paine | Edwin Payne & Charles Rowland Characters: Edwin Paine | Edwin Payne, Charles Rowland (DCU) Additional Tags: Oneshot, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Mutual Pining, Feelings Realization, POV Charles Rowland (DCU), part of a larger work, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Character Study Summary: Charles has been avoiding confronting his feelings for Edwin for a month now, and Edwin has started thinking he’s done something genuinely wrong. Something’s gotta give. … “I just— why does it have to be like that?” “Sometimes you love someone so much that it dooms them.” “I don’t agree,” Charles said. “You can’t not agree with a myth. The ending has been written for millenia,” Edwin retorted. “That’s not how love should work,” Charles protested, forming his argument as he spoke. “If you love someone and do everything in your power to save them, they should be fucking saved. What happened to love conquers all?” “That’s idealism.”

psst @writingandwritten if this is of interest…

[bkgexe]

the defiance of a life spent almost in touch

geto x reader ✾ 15.7k ✾ part one of two ✾ ao3 link

info! (canon au, haibara lives and geto never defects.) Your cursed technique allows you to read people—to see into their minds—when you touch them. It's not pleasant, but to jujutsu society, it's useful. Which means you end up in close proximity to Geto Suguru, who you've been avoiding for nearly a decade since seeing just how frightening it is inside his head. Though it's something you vowed never to repeat, it seems that there are powerful people vested in having you read him once again. ✾ tw! reader is scared of geto, typical jjk gore/violence, geto is. mentally unwell. like he didn't defect but he's Wrong ✾ notes! part two should be out end of january!!!

When the jujutsu higher-ups ask you for help, they always send Kento, because you have a hard time saying no to him. 

To his credit, he always looks sorry. You have the number of every other sorcerer you know blocked. He still comes in person because he knows the blow will be softer if you can complain to him after. He drives you to the appointed location, a small town on the border of Yamanashi Prefecture. The ride is mostly silent. When the car stops in front of a small, traditional house, Kento sighs deep, a sound you got so well acquainted with in high school that you can still conjure it in your mind on command. 

A familiar look: why are you doing this. Another: you can say no.

“You know why I have to,” you say.

The sigh again. “Fair enough.”

You left jujutsu society for a few reasons.

The first: your cursed technique is useless in a fight. You had to rely on strength and agility alone, which got you to Grade B—but you saw what happened to Haibara. The higher-ups send lower grade sorcerers out as a test, a toe in the water. They misjudged the grades of so many curses that at a certain point, you started to suspect that they were making it all up. That they had no way to accurately measure the strength of a curse until it had drawn a sorcerer’s blood. You didn’t want to be a body in a hospital bed, cut so deep through the middle that you had claw marks on the inside of your spine.

Haibara lived, but not without consequences.

The second: three men wait inside the house you’ve been called to. The window that alerted the higher-ups, a non-sorcerer passed out on the ground��and him. Geto smiles warmly when he sees you. You used to like his smiles before you saw the inside of his head. Now all you see is fox teeth hidden behind a stretched mouth.

Though your cursed technique isn’t useful in a fight, it’s still useful. Skin-to-skin contact allows you a look into another person’s mind. Just flashes, and nothing specific, but it’s helpful when the only witnesses you have are comatose or otherwise indisposed. You’re allowed a normal life for these few visitations. The higher-ups don’t bother you anymore. Even Gojo stopped asking you to come back and teach somewhere along the line, distracted by things more (or less, knowing him) important than your existence.

Geto never tried. You can at least respect him for that.

He explains to you that six people have been found in the same state as the man in front of you. It’s not a normal coma—something is smothering their soul, stretching it far from their body. As if they’re standing on the sidewalk across the street from themselves, watching the inside of their head through a lit window in the middle of the night. You’d forgotten what Geto’s voice sounded like, all friendly tones and half-hidden condescension.

When you touch the unconscious man, you don’t see anything at first, which is odd. His wrist is clammy and cold, his whole body covered in sweat. You briefly wonder if his soul is so disconnected that you won’t be able to read him.

And then, memories:            noodles in warm broth,          a pair of leather shoes           with buckles,                    a live wire at the power plant,          what it would feel like          to put your hands on it?,          to feel electricity for the first time in so long?,          to take something into you                                                                  r body that was never supposed to be there?,          hands wrapped around spark-soaked copper—

Outside, you throw up behind a camellia bush. Bile burns your throat, the roof of your mouth. The flowers smell of putrid rot when you know they shouldn’t. Cold air digs needles into your cheeks, so you’re stinging inside and out. Kento hadn’t given you enough notice for you to skip breakfast, but the higher-ups hadn’t given him any notice that they’d need you.

People are predisposed to show you either wants or memories. Never both, for reasons beyond your understanding. Memories are worse than wants. They burrow deeper, which makes them harder to expel.

Instinct tells you the hand is coming before it connects, and you dodge contact—Geto at your shoulder, asking if you’re alright. He doesn’t miss that you flinch away from him. “I’d have brought a bucket inside if I knew,” he tells you. His face says: I’m sorry for overlooking this detail. He’s very good at lying with it.

“It’s at the power plant,” you say. “Whatever’s causing this.”

“Do you want to read any of the others before you go?” The question feels cruel. His face says it isn’t.

You shake your head and leave without a word. 

Kento drops you off at your building and you thank him. You could invite him up easily. The two of you have known each other for so long, have experienced so much together, that being with him feels natural. It’s possible to turn off your brain around him, to touch him and only experience the smallest flashes of memory. 

You thank him and say good night.

It would be selfish. You would give anything to be the kind of person that could be a good partner to him. He’s an easy man to love, which is exactly why you can never love him. You’re difficult, a puzzle that comes with a sizable warning.

When you fall asleep in your cramped apartment, you see soup and silver buckles, live wires and burning flesh.

✾

An unknown number calls when you’re at work. You pick up because it breaks the monotony of clicking around account records and absorbing none of the numbers on the screen.

“Are you busy?” the person on the line asks, and you realize you never blocked Geto’s number because you never had it in the first place.

You tell him you’re not, even though you have a project deadline this week. If you sit in this closet-turned-office for five more minutes you’re going to explode all over the walls. You're not sure why you entertain him—why you didn't just hang up the second you heard his voice. There's something about him that compels you. A terrible, morbid curiosity that sometimes, when you're not looking directly at him, overrides your fear.

He meets you at the same house as last time, but today there’s no window. Just you and him. Kento didn’t drive you. For some odd reason, you thought there’d be someone else here, as if jujutsu society at large should know that you always need a buffer when it comes to Geto. A witness. And you realize that despite the curiosity, despite the compulsion, you should never have entertained this man on the phone for more than ten seconds. You shouldn't be here. You keep your keys spiked between your fingers, as if you’d ever be able to stop one of the most powerful sorcerers alive from doing whatever he wanted with you.

“I didn’t find anything at the power plant,” he says, leading you down a wooded path behind the house. You emerge onto a dirt road on the other side, a near-identical house sitting before you, its sloping, tiled roof dripping with excess morning rain. “Have you had lunch?”

You shake your head. He smiles with his hidden fox teeth.

The man you read this time is just as feverish as the other, but his wrist is hot. This isn’t relevant to reading a person, but you notice these things because you touch people so infrequently. Each time you do it’s a research experience, notes taken inside your head, recorded to compare against other studies you’ve done over the years.

The memories are instant:  rough hands that have hardened from years of manual labor, watching baseball with the other construction workers after projects done in town,                     your daughter           moving to Tokyo for college, radishes that she used to grow in the backyard that she boiled and roasted every day after harvest, and           who          will you eat them with now? and who          will grow them? and who          will you make your hands rough for?  you don’t like baseball.

Pulling away from the man’s mind is like extracting yourself from honey in the process of crystallizing. His consciousness clings to you as you leave, trying its best to suck you back in. You’re the only company it’s had in a while.

“I didn’t get anything,” you say, and your voice is rough. Your throat burns even though you didn’t throw up. 

Geto sits in one of the two plastic folding chairs in the house’s main room. He plays with the piece of his hair that’s loose from his bun, twirling it between slim fingers. You haven’t seen him in a jujutsu tech uniform since high school, though you’re pretty sure Gojo still wears one daily. Geto’s always in crisp white or black button-downs, slacks, expensive oxfords. Maybe playing dress-up makes him feel less like a sorcerer and more like a human.

“I can try again,” you say, and you’re not sure why. It’s for this suffering man, you think, even though your savior complex was left behind with the jujutsu world. 

“You don’t have to,” Geto says, dropping the strand of hair and leaning forward. His language is careful. He’s not telling you no. The way he watches you, elbows on his knees, hands clasped in the middle, makes you feel like you’re being tested.

You try again. This time:  getting your wedding ring engraved,          sitting on the porch in late spring sipping on plum wine,          nearly crying when you see your daughter playing with                     the girls that have caused the town so much misfortune,          the relief when            they ’re finally gone,          the relief when your daughter brings new best friends home and          their eyes          aren’t shadowed and sharp and too old for their sockets—

Retching is your second-least favorite thing, right behind actually vomiting. Your body rejects the images you’ve seen, trying to empty your stomach before the memories can begin to digest.

You tell Geto what you saw. 

His question: “Does he remember what happened to the girls?”

“If he does, I didn’t see it,” you say. When Geto is silent, you tell him, “I can’t do it again. I can’t.”

After a tense, quiet moment, he smiles at you. You still feel nauseous, but you can’t tell if it’s because of your cursed technique or because of the bone-deep malaise that spreads into your skin like a balm when he looks at you—when you’re reminded of what you once saw lurking in the corners of his mind. “Of course,” he says. “Let’s get you home.”

✾

Kento meets you at your usual coffee shop a few weeks later. Your throat no longer feels raw every time you swallow. He has a drink waiting for you when you get there—(describing Kento as punctual would be doing the man a disservice)—and it’s your favorite, with all the little add-ons that you get too nervous to ask for at risk of being a burden to the already overworked baristas. You’re positive he tipped heavy after putting in your order.

He asks you what you think about the murder mystery you’ve both been reading. You tell him about your job, the monotony, the fantasies of exploding. He tells you about jujutsu business, even though he’s not supposed to. This has never stopped him in the past and won’t ever stop him in the future.

“The higher-ups are pleased with your work,” he tells you. He doesn’t sound pleased.

“Kento.” A warning.

He hmms at you as if actually considering your warning before speaking his mind. “Having a foot in either world is difficult. It’s impossible to keep your balance.”

Your drink suddenly disgusts you. You taste bile. The cup is hot between your hands as you roll it back and forth with your palms. “Are you saying I should come back to Jujutsu Tech?”

“I’m saying that if you want to leave entirely, you should.”

You consider this: a normal life, surrounded by normal people, with a normal job and normal friends and a normal partner, maybe, if you’re lucky. The higher-ups would never let this happen. If you wrong them, they make sure to wrong you back. “You know why I can’t.”

“I’d take care of it. You wouldn’t be bothered by anyone.” He speaks with such confidence that you could almost believe him.

You tell him you’ll think about it. The coffee stings your palms. A terrible feeling sits in your throat like a weathered rock.

There’s something other than the threat of retaliation that stops you from pulling the trigger—from fully leaving the world you grew up in, as Kento once did. Maybe you’re not as brave as him. Maybe you can’t reconcile how quickly he ended up going back. Or maybe you just feel so inextricably tied to the world in which you were raised that you need to have it in your life somehow, even if it’s in brief, unpleasant flashes of memory and want.

“You can make your decisions for yourself,” he says. He’s not disappointed with you, you’re sure—just worried. The same way you often worry about him. “They’re pleased. Geto found the curse and exorcised it the same day thanks to you. I can see why the higher-ups don’t want to let you go.”

The stone in your throat grows edges, forgets its weathering. His name always unnerves you, but Kento’s words unnerve you more. “He exorcised it—the same day we drove out there?”

Kento nods, sips his tea. “He can be vicious.”

A tremor begins in your fingers and lodges deep in your elbows, your shoulders, your very soul. “He didn’t need me to read another victim?”

Kento’s a smart man. His eyes narrow. “Not to my knowledge. Or anyone else’s.”

You wave off his concern (suspicion, really, but you love to downplay these things), and your coffee is finished, and you really should be going, anyway. “He didn’t do anything,” you lie, standing and folding your coat over your arm. “He called and asked me to come back out, but I said no.”

It’s easy to see that Kento doesn’t believe you, but he doesn’t press you either. He knows that if you tell him half-truths, once you have all of your feelings together, you’ll tell him everything. He’s done the same, and you’ve given him the grace he’s currently allowing you. He puts up with a lot—but that’s the nature of living the lives into which you both were born.

“Thank you for the coffee,” you say.

“You’ll call me soon?”

“You’re on speed dial,” you tell him—and it’s true. His contact is the only one in your phone that’s favorited.

Kento smiles—something you rarely see. You wish it didn’t call to mind the shine of fox teeth.

✾

How you ended up coming into contact with the wants of Geto Suguru: he showed up at Ieiri’s dorm with his ribs visible through his uniform.

You remember very specific things from that day. The heavy knock, the thud of him collapsing, blood soaking the tatami floors. Shockingly white bone beneath torn skin and muscle, his ink-black hair coming undone, silk-soft and slipping across your fingers as you dragged him inside. Ieiri’s hands were shaking. She smelled like cigarette smoke and metal. Pressure here, she told you, ripping away the remains of Geto’s jacket, and when you touched him everything was skin-muscle-bone-blood and: bodies.  bodies of people that have wronged you. people that haven’t.  their blood thick beneath your fingernails          like orange peel.  how easy it is to snuff out each life. to take from them what they have forgotten to value.                      you could kill more.                      you could kill everyone. 

When you pulled away from Geto, his skin was knitting together beneath Ieiri’s shaking hands—hands you knew well, her black nail polish chipped around the edges because she bit at her nails when she was somewhere she couldn’t smoke. His ribs faded from view, and then muscle, and then his skin was pink and shiny, scar-new, as if whoever had done this to him had simply taken a paint brush to his bare chest and drawn a bold X. 

Blood was underneath your fingernails. Orange peel. It’s all you remember about the aftermath. Getting back to your room and locking yourself in the washroom were voided from your memory. Your head was all bodies. All bone. An undeniable feeling of righteousness, completely sure that they hadn’t deserved what you’d taken from them. And on top of that, the most frightening thing: relief that they were dead. 

You washed your hands so much that the skin was raw, peeling, but you still couldn’t get your fingernails clean.

✾

You ignore his calls.

The frequency with which you receive them makes you uneasy. You don’t have his number saved. The first few digits become a bad omen.

In school, he and Gojo had a reputation for toying with people. Mostly women, mostly in a romantic sense. The difference between the two is that Gojo was easy to understand—a spoiled boy-prince that liked the attention. He wanted girls to fawn after him, to beg for more when he finally graced them with a kiss, to cry when he dropped them.

Geto always seemed worse, somehow. He would date girls and leave them behind like candy wrappers, charming them into giving him a taste and only revealing his true appetite when his prize had reached the inescapable vicinity of his jaws. 

It’s more insidious than simply liking attention. He liked power. Having control over someone.

Whatever he’s doing now is insidious in nature, too. You can feel it. So you ignore his calls and keep working the days away until you can’t ignore him, because he shows up at your office with the confidence of someone supposed to be there, hands in his pockets, leaning against the frame of your door.

You jump so hard that your bones creak, almost louder than the creaking plastic of your poor hand-me-down rolling chair.

“Your instincts are a little dull,” he says. “I thought you would’ve heard me coming.”

Standing up feels necessary. You don’t want to feel smaller than him, even though he towers in your doorway. “I’m not supposed to be bothered by sorcerers without advance notice.” 

He smiles. “I tried calling.”

Your heart is pounding like a rabbit at the foot of a wolf, partly torn to shreds but conscious enough to experience the abject terror of what comes next. “Who let you up here?”

“I was hoping you might be willing to humor me without advance notice.”

“I’m calling security.”

“I need your help,” he says.

“Like you needed my help last time?”

He sits with that for a moment. “Is it a crime to be curious about you? What you’re capable of?”

“You lied to me,” you reiterate. “You didn’t need me to read that man. And, what—it was so you could see more of my technique?”

“Yes,” he says plainly, as if it's a perfectly sane response.

“Why didn’t you just ask?”

He chuckles, the sound rich and deep and calm , as if you’re having a nice conversation between old friends. “Are you saying you’d have responded well if I just asked?”

You remain silent, staring at the sticky notes on your monitor with reminders and deadlines written in blue pen. Tanaka account today. Get stapler back from Yoishi!!!! You both know his question is rhetorical.

He crosses his arms, taps his long fingers against his bicep. Is it impatience, you wonder, or his inability to sit still for too long? His face belies nothing. “Would you read me if I asked?”

Your veins feel too tight, constricting muscle. It must be a leading question—he’s suspicious of your aversion to him, maybe. The exterior he’s built is charming and handsome and kind. That’s probably how he got to your office. You wouldn’t be surprised if the office receptionist saw a handsome face and caved immediately. It’s not his fault you see through it. If you could go back and revoke your touch, remove the bodies from your memory, you would. But you can’t, and the things in his mind scare you. It’s part of what made you leave. The idea of working with a man like that, who held such terrors in his head, was incomprehensible to you. It still is. You would always be thinking about the ease with which you could become one of those bodies.

When you read people who project to you in wants, it’s usually easier. Makes you feel less sick. But not him. He wanted those people dead, whoever they were. He wanted blood on his hands. He was thinking, concretely, that he could have killed them all. That they deserved it.

The relief was the worst part. Seeing all those people dead, and the resounding thought that outshone everything else: finally. 

He steps forward, hand extended slightly. “If I—”

“No. Just—don’t,” you say, and you stumble a little as your legs hit your chair and push it, rattling, against the wall. Your office has never been this small. You never want to be inside his head again. You'd do anything to get him out of your office. “Tell me what you need my help with and we can go.”

He doesn’t look pleased. It seems people in your life are operating on a theme. Still, his hand retreats, and he smiles, slouches a little, as if to make himself smaller. Less intimidating. “Thank you.”

As you leave your office, you give him a wide berth, though you could swear his body goes taut, as if suppressing the urge to touch you.

The Ueno Zoo is closed during operating hours. This hasn’t happened in the entire time you’ve lived in Tokyo. The woman at the gate is a window—the look she gives Geto is one of recognition, respect. He and Gojo are the most well-respected sorcerers currently active, though you believe entirely that Kento is much more deserving of respect than they are. The window lets the both of you inside without a word.

Geto leads you to the vivarium, just to the right of the gate. It’s a beautiful glass building, the windows fogged with humidity to keep its plant and animal residents comfortable. You haven’t been to the zoo in a long time, but when you used to come with family and friends, you always visited the vivarium before you left. The air was heavy and hot, birdsong piped in through speakers, echoing off the glass walls like prism-dispersed light. Every animal inside moved slowly, heavily, and if you listened closely enough, you could hear the soft slide of scales against stone, the heavy thud of a taloned foot into packed dirt. A haven for living in calm and peace.

Inside, it’s chaos.

Display cases are smashed, plants and trees are torn up from the roots, stone walls have been dismantled and crushed. In the center of the rubble, the strewn dirt and bundled roots: jaws. Alligator jaws, crocodile jaws, all long and horrible teeth, and when you look closer—the jaws of snakes, fanged and dripping venom, and others from what you can only assume would be turtles, small and rounded. 

The skin remains perfectly intact on every jaw. Muscle, bone, blood. You see bodies. You see limbs. You remember: finally.

“Don’t look at that,” Geto says from beside you. “Look at me.”

With a deep breath, you do—though looking at him does nothing to dispel the unrest in your stomach, the pit in your chest. 

“Good.” He’s not smiling anymore. You wonder if he’s decided to drop his disguise or if the orphaned jaws are more horrifying than the wants he carries like stones. “Come this way.”

He leads you away from the viscera, into a small office next to the stairs. A man sits in the single chair, staring into the security monitors on the desk in front of him. His gaze is absent, hollow. His hands clasp and unclasp on his lap. Blood is spattered across his face and the front of his cheery yellow jumpsuit.

“He’s been like this since I got here,” Geto tells you. “I need you to read him.”

Ieiri used to tell you that if humans come into contact with curses and live, you have to monitor them closely for cardiogenic shock—stress and fear mounting to such a peak that the heart can’t handle the pressure. It’s not a peaceful death. “He needs to go to a hospital.”

“I’ll take him after.”

“How long has he been in shock?”

“Read him first,” he says, more curt than you’ve ever heard.

This is the thing lurking under the surface. The wolf peeking through the mouth of the sheepskin. It sits in him waiting to be called forth. You’ve seen it already—it’s no surprise to you that it lives in him still. It is, however, a surprise that he let his facade slip so badly.

He smiles, fox teeth a little sharper than usual. “Please.”

You put your hand on the side of the man’s neck, the only skin available to you. Touching people’s faces horrifies you. Such an intimate thing tarnished by the images that flood your brain. 

Memories on a loop:  guttural screeching,          death cries that couldn’t be conjured by a human mind,          and from the ceiling,          from the ceiling          the jaws                     falling, falling,                                          falling,  blood everywhere          and on you and you can taste it          ???          in your mouth          ???           on your tongue          ???            metal and rot,          and there is something discarding these jaws from the bodies of animals          it eats                    while clinging to the vivarium’s rafters something ???        when you met your wife you knew you were going to propose to her in the zoo in the vivarium because of the beautiful glass the beautiful plants she loves plants something           there is something          there is          something you cannot see          some          thing          ???

This time, Geto has a trash can waiting for you. You’ve gotten very good at gathering your hair up with one hand at a moment’s notice. He puts the trash next to the desk when you’re done, and you tell him everything useful that you gathered on the curse. Everything else, you keep to yourself. You’ve gotten very good at that too.

You wipe your mouth with the back of your wrist. The bile tastes more like copper than usual. “Is that everything?”

He holds his hand out to you and you hide your flinch poorly. “Gum?”

The foil-wrapped stick shimmers green, held between his fingers like a cigarette. You stare at it for a beat too long. It’s your favorite brand, spearmint flavored. 

“It won’t bite,” he says. He tilts his head to the side, eyes crinkling with mirth. As if you weren’t tasting blood just a moment ago. When you still don’t take the gum, he laughs softly and it reminds you of high school. His laughter has always been a little mean, as if it gets harder for him to hide his true nature when amused. It reminds you of a housecat playing with a bug. “I won’t either.”

A funny thing for someone with such sharp teeth to claim.

You take the gum from him, careful to grab the very end so there’s no chance of your fingers brushing his. “Thanks.”

He smiles and nods as if he’s done you a favor. You appreciate the gum, but you’d appreciate him ceasing contact with you more. “I’ll see you soon,” he tells you.

“Get him help, Geto.” 

He smiles wide in response.

✾

You lost your virginity to Kento during your graduating year at Jujutsu Tech.

Haibara was recovering, still in the hospital for the third consecutive month. He had to learn how to walk again, the implants in his spine acclimating to him at the same rate that he was acclimating to them. You and Kento were the only two students in your year that made it to graduation. The two of you felt like celebrating but when you began drinking, you realized it was more commiseration than anything celebratory.

“Do you always see things?” Kento asked. He never drank—saw it as beneath him—so when he did, he was a lightweight. “When you touch people?”

“Yeah,” you said. The both of you sat against the headboard of your bed, passing a bottle of gin back and forth—the only thing you could find in Principal Yaga’s campus stash. It stopped tasting like liquor twenty minutes prior. “I can make it quieter. But I really have to focus. Like—I couldn’t make it quiet now, I don’t think.”

Kento turned towards you and said, “Try.”

And always, you would protest when people suggested this. It was like a party trick to people that didn’t have to deal with the fallout. They all wanted to know what you saw in their mind, whether it was wants or memories that jumped to the forefront, what their subconscious decided was important enough to broadcast.

You didn’t believe at all that Kento was asking for those reasons. It’s why you touched him.

Wedging the bottle between Kento’s thigh and yours, you turned towards him and reached for his face. This, for some reason, was your first instinct. His skin was soft, a little dry. His mouth was set in a nervous slant. 

And you got a few things from him: finishing your favorite book for the third time, going to the beach with your mother, finding out how cold the sea was. Memories, unfortunately. The feelings behind them.

But what you felt was mostly your own. 

You pushed his bangs back from his face, and you couldn’t take your eyes from the slant of his lips, and suddenly you were in Kento’s lap, kissing him, and he was kissing you back, hands on your hips, groaning softly into your mouth.

The gin tumbled off the bed and spilled all over your floor. Your dorm would smell like liquor for weeks. 

It was awkward the way a first time should be for teenagers, misplaced limbs and kisses with knocking teeth. You both tried to take care of each other the best you could while shit-faced and entirely inexperienced. You hadn’t kissed anyone before then—you hadn’t touched someone’s face since you were little. 

You’d been scared. He figured out how to make that okay. 

✾

Gojo is in your office when you come into work, reclining in your chair with his feet up on your desk. He peers at you over his glasses, eyes like jeweled robin eggs. “Running kinda late, huh?”

“I don’t have to be here until nine,” you tell him. “It’s eight forty-five.”

“Semantics.”

“You’re in my office.” You don’t even have the good grace to make it sound like a question—just an admonishment.

“Or is it syntax?”

“Can you please get out?”

“Can’t you pretend you’re happy I’m here?” He pouts, taking his feet from your desk. “I won’t even ask you to do anything. I basically just came here to say hey.”

“That would certainly be a first.” You walk behind your desk and shoo him away from your computer, waking it from its slumber. An orange post-it note on the top of your monitor reminds you that tax reports are due TODAY!!!!!!, and you try to prepare yourself for a grueling eight-to-twelve hours of tax filing, depending on how smoothly things go. Gojo Satoru showing up at your office before you is not your definition of smooth. “You said hey. Why are you still here?”

Gojo slowly spins in your chair, pushing himself in circles lazily with one long leg. Avoids looking at you. “You’ve been working with Suguru a lot lately.”

“Twice.” You open up the tiny K-Cup machine you have on your desk and start preparing the world’s smallest cup of coffee. Three times, technically, but you still don’t know what to make of the second time he called you out to Yamanashi Prefecture. When he lied to you. “That hardly constitutes a lot.”

“Enough that it got back to me.” He slows the chair, then starts spinning the other way. “You got any idea why he’s taken an interest?”

Your tiny mug clatters against the K-Cup machine. Geto is probably miles from here, dealing with important jujutsu business, but your heart beats like a prey animal nonetheless, the way it often does under his gaze.“I don’t think he’s taken an interest.”

“As much as I’d love to be flattering you, that’s not what I mean.” He stops the chair entirely, body directed at you. “You’ve been useful.”

There’s nothing you hate more than being talked about like a tool. Your coffee finishes brewing and you take a sip before you really should. It burns your lips. You lean against your desk and look at Gojo, trying to read anything from his face, his body language. As always, you glean nothing. Though you see Geto as the more insidious of the two, you’re keenly aware that Gojo is just as good at pretending. 

“I’ve been useful,” you repeat. “So what?”

“You don’t think you’ve been pretty unnecessary for the missions you’ve been asked to help with?” Though his glasses are on, it's as if you can sense the intensity of his gaze through the darkened lenses. “Suguru could’ve found and exorcised either of those curses easy. I could’ve done it even easier.”

Every meeting with Gojo requires a mandatory ego-stroking period. You decide to get it over with quickly. “Yes, you’re both very strong. What’s your point?”

“Do you know what happened that night?” he asks, taking off his glasses—and this is what really instills a fear in you that something terrible is about to happen. A full view of eyes like glittering sapphires. There’s no question what night he’s talking about. 

You don’t like thinking about that time in general. You don’t like thinking about Geto’s ribs. You don’t like thinking about the bodies. “A non-sorcerer tried to stop the merger. You guys… neutralized him.”

His gaze clouds for a moment. You’re aware that Gojo carries his burdens, despite his unbearable ego. He’s somewhere else, seeing things that you have the good fortune of never having to see. You briefly wonder whether you’d read memories or wants from him. You’re content with not knowing. “Don’t play coy,” he tells you. “You’re smarter than that.”

“You killed him.”

“I killed him.”

Gojo’s account of the day you read Geto: both he and his best friend so narrowly avoided death that they still remember its taste.

A mercenary whittled down Gojo’s endurance and attacked just as they were delivering Amanai Riko to Tengen for their merger. Gojo stayed back to deal with things. Geto escorted Amanai. Gojo was slit from throat to hip with a blade so sharp he didn’t feel the pain until his blood was already varnishing the floor. Geto was carved apart by that same blade, left alive only because of the curses he stored and their indeterminable state upon his death. Amanai, quick on her feet, made it to Tengen. The merger was successful. Things settled down and another Star Plasma Vessel wouldn’t have to be found for a long, long time.

Gojo shows you the scar on his forehead, shiny rib-white, usually hidden by his hair or his blindfold. Being so close to death changed him, he tells you—he fully understood the limits of his cursed energy and what it could do.

It changed Geto too.

“I’m not telling you all this for nothing,” he says, a disarming smile appearing on his face so suddenly after a serious conversation that the speed makes you nauseous. “I just have one tiny favor to ask you.”

It’s long into the day. The details of that day took a while to get through. Your lunch hour is coming up and your appetite is nonexistent and tax forms sit unfiled on your desk. Gojo asking for a favor is always bad news. You can taste vomit and you wish you had a piece of gum or alternatively that you were born an entirely different person. “I don’t want any trouble—”

“No trouble. Promise.” He lifts his right hand, pinkie out, grinning—as if it’s funny that you, specifically, can’t touch him. “I just want you to read him for me.”

Your heart slams into the base of your throat. “That’s… You know that’s not a small ask.”

He drops his hand, shrugs. “C’mon—look, it’ll give you an excuse to get close to him.”

“Why would I want that?” you ask.

“As if I didn’t clock your embarrassing crush on him in high school.”

“Excuse me?”

“Excused. It won’t even be bad,” he says. “I only need you to read him one time, probably.”

“Why?”

“Just curious.”

“Gojo.”

Weighing the cost of telling you a half-truth versus keeping you in the dark seems to take a toll on him, his smile turning brittle at its corners. You think he knows that you won’t do anything for him without more information. Not that you’d read Geto ever, at all—but Gojo hasn’t always been good at believing people when they say never. Hesitantly, he tells you, “Something happened.”

“Like what?”

“I don’t know, something,” he says, finally a little exasperated. “I wouldn’t be asking if I already had answers.”

There are things he’s not telling you, very obviously. He’s minimizing. Jujutsu sorcerers are good at that. And he and Geto are best friends, two people so closely intertwined that they could count as one. “Why can’t you just ask him?”

For the first time in your acquaintance with him, Gojo is silent.

“He doesn’t know you’re asking me to do this,” you say. It would be a question if you weren’t already so sure.

“Oh, no, he’d kill me if he knew I was here.”

“I’ll call him and tell him to come get you.”

“I’d like to see you follow through on that.” He grins, peeks at you over his glasses. “Bet you won’t.”

Geto answers on the first ring, your name spoken in question.

“Your dog’s in my office. Come pick him up.”

He does.

Gojo could easily leave before Geto arrives, but he doesn’t even try. He sits in your chair, still reclined, surely doing immeasurable damage to the hydraulics. Asking him about his motives would be wasted breath—he’ll never tell you something he doesn’t want to, regardless of how much you wheedle him. He’ll enjoy the wheedling, though, and you don’t want to give him the ego boost of being begged. 

Instead, you shoo him out of the way of your desk and start working on submitting the tax forms, leaning awkwardly over your computer. Gojo hums and your back aches, and you refuse to be curious about this entire situation because it’s none of your business. This is what you do now. Taxes and filing.

Geto arrives at your office once again without needing your permission to come up. You wonder who’s working reception.

“Sorry about him,” Geto says, leaning in your doorway. His hair is loose, strands falling softly against his face. You forget how tall he is sometimes. How handsome. It makes your stomach turn. “Badly trained.”

“I think the fault is more the owner’s than the dog’s,” you say.

He shrugs. “If you tried training the dog in question, maybe your opinion would change.”

“Can you guys stop talking about me like I’m not here?” Gojo asks.

Geto grabs him by the back of the collar. “Walk’s over. Time to go home.” He smiles at you over his shoulder as he leaves, his hair so inky black that it almost blends into his dark dress shirt. You remember how it felt sliding through your fingers years ago. Even though you never touched his wound, you think you can remember the texture of his ribs.

You consider Gojo’s proposition long after you’ve submitted the tax forms, after you’ve arrived home late once again, after you stare out your bedroom window into the night sky and see nothing but storm-cloud gray. 

You expect Geto to be the kind of person to keep secrets. It shouldn’t worry you. But keeping secrets from the one person he views as an equal makes you uneasy. The bodies are in your head. You wonder how close you are to finally . When you sleep, it’s fitful, and you wake in the night to the feeling of silk-soft hair running through your fingers, falling so quickly that it’s impossible to grasp.

✾

Kento is antsy when he comes over for dinner. It wouldn’t bother you if he didn’t also happen to be the calmest man you know. He keeps bouncing his leg as he sits at the little two-top table in your kitchen, drumming his fingers incessantly on the tiled surface. He’s not wearing his glasses—and he usually watches your cooking like a hawk, just in case you make a grievous mistake—but instead holds them in his hand, twirling them back and forth. 

The one-sided conversation you have with him is unbearable. Did you have a nice day? Mmmhmm. No crazy assignments? Just the usual. Should I use soy sauce or sesame oil? Oil. My favorite author is doing a book signing next month. Do you want to go with me? Sure. Is something up? Not at all.

Eventually, you’ve had enough. “I’m going to burn the cabbage.”

He glances over at the pan you’re wielding. “It looks fine.”

“I’m going to do it on purpose and I’m going to make you eat it,” you say, pointing your spatula in his direction so he’s positive that it’s him who’ll have to eat the ruined meal. “I’ll spoon-feed it to you.”

Kento is bewildered by this, his eyebrows raised very slightly—shock has always been a micro-expression for him. “I’m sorry. I’ve been a little absent.”

“More than a little.” You stir the cabbage again. “You know I don’t want to pry.”

He nods. The space you offer each other is a give-and-take. If neither of you are ready to speak about something, there’s usually no pressure to do so. 

But this time is different. You’re worried that the strange things happening around you are begging to connect, veins folding over each other to become arteries, blood flowing into your life and staining the foundations. You need to tell him about everything that's happened over the past few weeks. But first, you need to ask. “Does this have something to do with Geto?”

His leg stops bouncing. His fingers quiet against the tabletop. “So you know.”

You tell him everything. Being called out to the village again, going to the vivarium, the jaws. Gojo showing up unannounced, though that's the most usual thing out of everything that's happened. “He asked me to read Geto,” you say. “There are secrets being kept.”

You told Kento about the bodies only once. The two of you had just recently graduated. You shared a studio apartment in Tokyo for three months before your Jujutsu Tech paychecks started coming in. In his arms, you saw memories of a kind-hearted blonde woman, the scent of coffee and pastries, the cool chill of the air in the mountains of Denmark, and you had to pull away from him, trying not to gag and failing.

When you returned from the bathroom, teeth minty-fresh and tongue burning, he apologized so earnestly. As if he had done anything other than hold you close and thread his fingers through yours. 

It was then you began to understand that you could never be his, though the realization didn’t settle in for a while. You told him not to apologize. You told him that nothing was his fault. And then for some reason, you told him about the bodies and the orange peel and the finally and he asked if he could comfort you and you had to say no because you didn’t want to throw up again. From then on, he was wary of Geto. Maybe not as much as you—though that’s understandable.

Knowing what’s going on in his head is one thing. Experiencing it is another.

Kento sighs, familiar. He joins you in the kitchen, in the heat that radiates from the stove. The cabbage is burning slightly even though you never meant to follow through on your threat. Your attention has been elsewhere. “Let me,” he murmurs, and his hand brushes yours as he takes the spatula from you: fresh bread from the bakery at the end of the block,          long nights at the office alone,          a deep hatred of the word ergonomic—  He begins to peel the burning cabbage from the bottom of the pan. “He’s been quiet lately.”

“Isn’t he usually?” You remember Geto being reserved, but then again, maybe that’s only because your memories of him are often in the context of Gojo.

“He can be.” Kento takes the pan to the trash and scrapes off the burnt cabbage, then returns to where you wait for him, leaning against your counter. He opens the top drawer next to the stove and pulls out the menu of the Indian restaurant nearby that you both like. “He’s exorcising Special Grade curses that he shouldn’t even attempt to take on by himself, no matter how strong he is. There are days where he’s cleared missions back-to-back without stopping to sleep.”

“You think he’s focused on work because something’s wrong.”

“Yes,” Kento says, and chews on the thought for a moment. “I don’t like it when he’s focused like this. He gets… obsessive.”

“Him and Gojo were always odd, though,” you say. Minimizing whatever is happening with Geto feels crucial. You’ve never seen Kento this worried.

He hums. “In different ways, perhaps. Gojo’s obsessive nature is more self-centered. But Geto—when he’s consumed by something, it’s like nothing else matters. He’d raze the world to ash if it meant doing what he felt needed doing.”

“Should I be worried?” you ask.

You should. You already know this.

Another sigh. He can’t quite look you in the eyes. You both think: bodies. You both think: finally . “Biryani for you?” he asks. “Or do you want something different this time?”

“Biryani’s fine.”

“Great,” he says, proceeding to order your food. And you don’t talk about it again that night.

✾

You’ve been a regular at the same coffee shop for nearly half a decade. The times you come in vary, depending on work or your weekend plans. You know the regulars and have seen thousands of faces pass through the cozy little building. Not once have you seen Geto here.

Yet he’s at the back of the line when you arrive, smiling pleasantly when he sees you walk through the door. Almost as if his arrival was timed.

If he hadn’t already seen you, you would’ve left. Even as you step into line behind him, you still consider it: bolting out the door and down the street, sprinting your way home as if he’d catch you if you stopped running. He stares at you expectantly while you think about your escape. It puts a shiver deep into your bones, his handsome face and kind eyes and warm smile, all tactics granted by genetics and lifted straight out of a manual on inviting body language. Instead of doing what your instincts tell you is right, you say, “Hi.”

“It's good to see you.” His smile widens, Cheshire in nature despite not showing teeth. “I didn’t know anyone else knew about this place.”

You almost tell him you live close by, but then think better of it. “It’s Kento’s favorite.”

“Of course,” he says. “Haibara took me here a few years ago.”

Yu is kind to a fault. Neither you or Kento have ever talked to him about what you saw in Geto’s head—mostly because you're scared to tell too many people, but also because of the blind respect Yu has for Geto. As if he's a story-book hero that could never do anything wrong. You care about Yu too much to disappoint him with the truth.

“I’ve gotten the same thing here for a long time,” Geto tells you. He gazes up at the menu, such concentration on his face, pulling at the strand of hair loose from his bun for a moment before turning back to you. You remember what Kento said about him not sleeping. His obsessiveness. Nearly imperceptible purple smudges lurk under his eyes. “Would you like to try something new with me?”

You can’t decide if you say yes out of sick curiosity or the fear of what would happen if you said no. Geto pays for both of your drinks—you insist that he shouldn’t, enough times in a row that it’s rude and very obviously makes the cashier uncomfortable, but his insistence wins out.

Waiting at the drink counter with him is torture. You hate when people buy things for you because it makes you feel like you owe them something. For Geto, it’s time. He paid for your presence, at least for however long it takes the baristas to make your drinks. He asks you about your work. You tell him about the books you’ve been balancing, hoping to bore him. Instead he asks more questions about how you like your office, whether your coworkers are nice, if your boss is treating you well.

“Are you looking for a new job?” You fail to keep vitriol from lacing the underside of your words. “We’re not hiring.”

If Geto is bothered by your attitude, he doesn’t let on. He even seems a touch amused. “I enjoy what I’m doing now, but thanks for keeping me in the loop.”

The barista calls out Geto’s name, and he grabs your drink first, hands it to you. You ordered a cappuccino with a syrup that you’ve been curious about but have never tried. The coffee smells amazing even at arm's length, creamy and strong and a little like cinnamon. 

“Thanks.” You slowly turn to leave. “I should be—”

“Wait,” he says, reaching towards you.

You flinch so hard that a slim stream of coffee shoots from the lid’s mouthpiece, burning hot when it lands on your hand. Geto never makes contact, but his arm is still outstretched, as if waiting for you to calm down so he can go through with touching you. You think of Gojo’s request, of the cases where Geto has asked for your help but hasn’t needed it. Yu might have shown him this coffee shop however long ago, but why is he here now? Why have you never seen him here before if he’s a regular?

“Get away from me,” you snap, stern and quiet enough that your words lace themselves underneath the shop’s easy-listening music. 

He does, hands raised and palms open, proclaiming innocence. Slowly, he lowers them. The barista calls his name again, his coffee still waiting on the counter.

“If you ever make me read you against my will,” you tell him, “I will never forgive you.”

Your forgiveness probably means little to him, but it’s the only thing you can threaten. You don’t know him well enough to understand what he holds dear—but you remember respect being important to him when you were at school. Respect and forgiveness.

“I wouldn’t,” he says. “Never.”

You thank him for the coffee again in lieu of a goodbye. The air outside stings against your face, your neck, the spots on your skin where the coffee burned you, steamed milk already drying to film. You’ll wash your hands when you get home. And you’ll wash them again. And again. Eventually they’ll feel clean enough.

✾

Yu calls you at 3:06 in the morning. “They’re dead because of me,” he tells you, and then he’s crying and you’re already walking down the block, heading toward his apartment in your pajamas and large winter coat.

After his injury, Yu wasn’t sent on more dangerous missions for a long time. Even when he was healed fully, despite the nasty scar that twisted and puckered the width of his chest, the higher-ups didn’t think he would be psychologically ready to take on anything too stressful.

They were right. One of the few things you’ve agreed with them about. Yu had always been the most hopeful out of all of you, the most caring. But he was also the most sensitive. Getting so close to death did nothing but make that worse. 

He’s on the couch when you get there, using your key to let yourself in. You and Kento were given copies at the housewarming party, which had consisted of four bottles of peach soju, the three of you, and Ieiri for a few hours before she was called back to the school. His eyes are red and puffy, and he’s curled into himself, laying on his side. It looks like he’s been crying for the entire evening. The worn leather of the seat is darkened beneath his face.

You’re by his side immediately, brushing hair back from his face, wiping stray tears from his cheeks: i wish i’d known i should have !!!          known how did                                         how did i not know how i wish i “Hey, it’s okay. I'm here,” you say, trying a little more pointedly to keep your fingers off his scalp. The thing he wants, simply: to have done better. “Can you tell me what happened?”

“I messed up,” he says, and you’ve never heard him sound so defeated. Even during his recovery he sounded less broken than this. “I don’t—I don’t know how I didn’t see it.” 

At seventeen, you and your classmates began to receive solo assignments. Yu always got the easier ones—still recovering from his injury, both physically and mentally. He tells you about a mission he had almost forgotten: a curse terrorizing a village on the outskirts of Yamanashi Prefecture. The curse was easily exorcized, easily forgotten—what Yu remembered well were the whispers that came after. They called him a devil, named him unnatural, said that he could see things no one else could because he was damned. Just like the two little girls that lived in the village, their late mother’s otherness somewhere in the same vein.

He thought nothing of it. He would get rid of the curse, and the village would go back to normal. Yes, they were skeptical and untrusting of anything that could be perceived as even slightly supernatural, but most non-sorcerers were. Sometimes you had to protect people that would never thank you—that could never comprehend the things you’d given up to offer said protection. Whatever oddities they attributed to other people would fade away once the curse was gone, and the village would go back to normal. Everyone would trust everyone again.

The bodies of the girls had been exhumed during a construction project aiming to bring affordable housing to prefectures outside of Tokyo. The Hasaba twins, Nanako and Mimiko, reported truant by their school over a decade ago. Their mother wasn’t alive to receive the report. Their father hadn’t been there from the beginning. The town didn’t report them missing—they knew exactly where the girls were. From the remains, bones weak and brittle, authorities determined that they died of malnutrition.

“I could’ve helped them.” Yu’s lip trembles and he bites it so hard that you see the skin around his mouth turn bone-white. “They might have been alive then. If I paid more attention, I just—how could they have done that? How can anyone justify that?”

You don’t know. How does anyone justify anything? How many times do you have to tell yourself you’re doing the right thing before you believe it? You wonder if the inhabitants of that village let out a breath when the sisters had finally passed—whether they, too, had a moment of finally.

Yu cries for a little longer and you hold him carefully. It’s all you can do. You’d call Kento if you didn’t know that Yu would be mortified to cry in front of someone he views as his superior at work, despite their friendship. After a while, he pulls his phone out and opens up a message chain. A groupchat for Jujutsu Tech staff. Ieiri’s text, attached to the official posting from the higher-ups: zen’in clan are holding a service for the girls on sunday. gakuganji wants us there to pay respects so everyone better show up. In the report, there are photos of each of the girls, from Picture Day at their school, judging by the uniforms—and you recognize them. 

You’ve seen these girls inside a man’s memories. A man that you read for Suguru. 

Your heart beats so hard that you’re sure Yu can feel it through your shirt, through your skin. When you’ve reassured him as much as possible that he couldn’t possibly be at fault, when he promises you that he’ll be able to sleep without the feeling of guilt crushing him under its heavy heel, you head further into the city instead of back towards home.

The apartment building you come to is sleek, flashy, piercing the night sky like a blade. The doorman lets you in—you’ve been here before. On business only, and never of your own volition. You take the elevator to the top floor and slam your fist against the hallway’s only door, choosing to ignore the shiny golden doorbell and the even shinier knocker. After a few moments of you hitting the wood so hard that it feels like the meat of your palm is going to split, the door opens. 

A terribly annoying grin greets you. “I would’ve invited you up if you called me.”

“Why,” you say, trying your best to be calm, “do you want me to read him?”

Gojo’s expression flickers. A moment, a fleeting instant of concern. He’s without glasses or blindfold—you must have woken him up. It’s probably nearing five in the morning. The first trains will start running soon. “Hello, business,” he says. “I’ve got to admit, I’d hoped I was talking to pleasure.”

“It has to do with the girls, doesn’t it?”

“I don’t ask Suguru about what girls he’s seeing—”

“I saw them, Gojo,” you say.

This shuts him up.

“I read someone who knew them.” You’re not sure why, but it feels necessary to not tell him that you read the man because Geto asked you to. “He didn’t like them playing with his daughter because they were different.”

He stands, silent and contemplating, eyes pearlescent and glowing in the soft shadow that precedes sunrise. 

There’s a terrible phantom that lurks between your ribs, a sticky feeling that slimes along your bones. You think of Geto’s sudden reappearance in your life, you think of Gojo’s intimidating request, you think finally, finally, finally. “Did he kill them?”

His eyes snap to yours, fluorescent, flaring—you had forgotten that the hottest part of a flame is blue. “No.” 

He’s so serious that your heart rate picks up, your body going into fight-or-flight at the coldness of that single word. “Gojo—”

“He wouldn’t.” 

“Okay—it’s okay. I believe you.” You don’t, but you’ll say anything to remove the hardness from his eyes, his tone—the same hardness as when he sat in your office and told you not to sugarcoat things. I killed him. “Then why do you want me to read him?”

“I told you,” he says, and his voice is back to normal but his eyes are nowhere close. “I’m just curious.”

Your hand darts forward on instinct. You want to know what’s inside his head so bad that you can’t control yourself—until you remember exactly who you’re trying to touch and exactly what his power is. Forget being untouchable—he could physically destroy you. He could snap your arm like a matchstick. He could pull at the broken end until the limb splits completely. You step back, but the movement was too obvious to have been anything else.

He grins again. Holds his hand out. “Wanna touch?”

“Good night, Gojo.”

He watches as you get in the elevator, as you press the button for the lobby, as the doors slide shut. All the while, eyes burning.

✾

You’re at a run-down warehouse in Roppongi with a cursed weapon in your hand when you wonder where your life went wrong. Kento called you half an hour ago—cornered, bleeding, his cleaver knocked out of his grip. “I wouldn’t have called you,” he said, “but no one else is picking up.”

It didn’t matter. If he needed you, you would be there. That had been the case for the better part of a decade. 

The warehouse was a storage facility for flour and corn, most likely. The floor is covered in rancid mold. Your knife—Sound Eater, the cursed tool you’d conveniently forgotten to return to the armory when you left Jujutsu Tech—is familiar in your palm. Its handle is worn to the shape of you. 

You feel comfortable like this. More comfortable than at your job filing accounts, at your apartment reading or watching some awful reality TV show. It’s because this is how you grew up, you think. You’re remembering the person you were for twenty years before you became someone else.

At the far end of the warehouse, a stone staircase leads to the basement—where Kento is. Where the curse is. You can sense it, the same feeling as being watched. A specter’s ghostly nails tracing the ridge of your spine. 

The basement smells mustier than the warehouse. A single light blinks ahead, allowing you flashes of the series of hallways that lead deeper into the warehouse’s underground storage. The floor is wet, and the viscous liquid that coats the stone soaks through the soles of your shoes. Your socks stick coldly to your feet. You listen to your weapon to see if you can locate the curse, its energy responding to the curse’s with vibrations and muted shrieks that sing through your bones unpleasantly. The curse seems to be everywhere, spread through the basement like an even layer of butter. 

You find Kento’s cleaver before you find him. It’s deep in the tunnel system—you’ve already been walking for two or three minutes, and there’s been no sign that anyone else is down here with you.

Taking his weapon as a sign that you’re close, you even your breathing, measure your steps—stealth training from long ago functioning like a ghost limb, sending signals through your body despite not having been used for years.

You enter a large antechamber—some sort of production facility—and though it’s quiet, you hear breathing from behind a burnt-out piece of machinery. Slowly, you approach, Sound Eater singing against your skin. This is not the cursed tool’s energy responding to a curse. It can only be Kento. Your heart still beats violently against your ribs, bruising bone.

His shoulder is a mess. Dress shirt torn, blood adorning the fabric and the shiny plastic buttons, face haggard—he’s in pain, and the sight sends you back to your youth as quick as a fist to the face. Group missions, Kento’s injuries, your injuries, the way you started always wearing black because it hid bloodstains most effectively.

You’re at his side quickly, a hand gingerly against his shoulder, checking for damage. He groans. His shoulder is dislocated, but he already knows this. “Help me get it back in,” he tells you. His shirt is still intact enough that you won’t have to touch his skin, which is good. You can’t risk being weakened right now.

Shoulders always relocate with a sickening crack, as if a bone that had been broken is being rebroken and set. A badly healed bone is a liability, Ieiri has told you. Dislocation is easier to fix. You feel a little less sick when the sight of distended skin and incorrectly puzzled bone is straightened out, set right. 

“Details,” you demand.

“A semi-first grade, four-legged,” he says, taking his cleaver from you. “It’s using whatever’s on the floor—sticks you in place. Its left flank is injured.”

The one question that Kento doesn’t seem to be able to answer: where is it?

Sound Eater answers that question for you in the span of seconds, buzzing against your palm, shocks working their way down your fingers. You nod your head towards the north entrance to the production facility, where your weapon is attempting to drag you. Once it gets close enough to a curse, its energy begins to magnetize. The stronger the curse, the stronger the magnetization. You try to ignore the way your hands shake with effort to keep Sound Eater in place.

Kento is up, breathing labored. You hate this for him—that he feels like it’s his duty to deal with this, that his purpose is nothing more than being a jujutsu sorcerer. That knowing what it feels like to exorcise a curse makes it nearly impossible to want to do anything else.

You understand. This is the most alive you’ve felt in years.

In the abridged sign that you and he used to employ during group missions, he tells you, Go right. Distract.

You dart into the clearing, the curse’s eyes immediately finding you from across the large room. They’re yellow, the familiar color of bile, and they shine out from its gray body, the blob-like consistency of a snail on top of four muscled legs, identical to those of a wolf. 

Which means it’s fast.

Your shoulder takes the brunt of the pressure as you roll out of the way of the curse’s first strike. It crosses ground more quickly than you can comprehend. When you right yourself, you can see just how grotesque the creature really is. Its mouth is a wide wound stuffed with teeth. Its eyes are scared, childlike. In its twisted voice, it says hello hello hello? hello who's there hello? and Sound Killer wants to taste its skin.

As it readies its weight on its back legs to strike again, Kento comes down from above, his cleaver hitting the back of the curse’s neck with intense force—almost 7:3. You hear a crack, a hiss, but the curse backs up, head still attached to its body by a thread.

The floor is suddenly very cold. It radiates up through your feet, spiking into your calves, your thighs. You try to move and fail. Sound Eater begs you to let it get closer to its target. 

You’re not sure if the curse can only freeze one person at a time. Kento tries to move forward to strike again and his body jerks and stills, glued to its vulnerable position. The curse readies itself again to strike, its head knitting itself back onto its body. Its wound-mouth opens wide, ready for an offering. 

Sound Eater whistles as you lift it to shoulder-level, as you aim to throw it into the curse’s open mouth before it consumes Kento. 

It’s stupid, Gojo once told you, to lose your weapon on the field if your cursed technique is useless. You got very good at throwing weapons with dead aim, taking out curses with a single slice, Sound Eater a perfect match for you because of its draw to the cores of such curses. Part of you got good at this to spite him. You’ll continue to spite him, even now.

The curse lunges. Sound Eater slices through air. An echoing click fills the chamber as the cursed tool hits tooth, cracking bone but doing no more. The curse halts its attack, scared yellow eyes focused on you now.

And your cursed tool lays beneath its feet, glittering under a layer of pungent slime. You briefly try to appreciate the irony of the situation: if you hadn’t left the jujutsu world, you wouldn’t be as rusty as you are now, and maybe you would have lived. 

Your feet are unlocked so suddenly that you fall to your knees, slime coating your pants, your legs, your hands as you push yourself back up. The curse lies inert in between you and Kento—clearly breathing, but nowhere near conscious. Asleep.

It’s like you can sense him before he speaks, your blood chilling in its well-traveled arteries.

“I’m glad you’re both okay,” he says. Grins without teeth. The same way Gojo grins—confident and so hopelessly self-impressed. There’s a curse beside him, one that he controls, its energy definitely potent but not malicious towards you. It’s familiar, in a way—eyes that crackle with electricity, sparking skin, long claws. You’ve seen it before, but not personally. Geto’s gaze flits between you and Sound Eater on the ground next to the downed curse. “Did Nanami call you out of retirement? Or were you just having a little fun?”

Kento says Geto’s name—a warning. He’s injured, hurting. He doesn’t have patience for games.

“It doesn’t matter why I’m here,” you say, offering Kento help to stand. His body is a heavy weight that pulls at your shoulder, activating muscles you haven’t used since right after high school. “Ieiri still runs the clinic at school, right?”

“Of course,” Geto responds, all fox teeth. He points at the unconscious curse. “First, though.”

You’ve never seen Geto absorb a curse before. You know some details about the process, mostly from Kento and Yu telling you stories about happenings in the field, but you’d never actually witnessed it. It amazes you how the body curls up into such a compact ball of shadow, how it can be contained within the walls of Geto’s cursed energy. The expression he makes while he consumes it is familiar to you. You know that strain, that effort put into controlling every single muscle in your face, veins in the neck straining hard against skin. They must taste awful. You think about the gum he offered you at the vivarium—wonder if he carries it for purposes you hadn’t considered until now. 

He dismisses the other curse with a small movement of his hand, and the energy in the room evens out so quickly that your head feels full of falling sand. Sound Eater goes quiet, and you collect it from beneath a viscous layer of filth. “We should go,” Geto says, gesturing to one of the entrances to the production facility. Knowing him, he probably has the entire compound mapped out in his head. 

“Did you call a car?” you ask.

“I already have one waiting. Figured we might need a quick exit.”

You nod. He still unnerves you, but you’re not entirely without manners. “Thank you.”

He looks at you for a moment longer than you’re comfortable with. Everything seems calculated in his eyes. He never simply sees things—he analyzes them. “My pleasure,” he says. You can't read his tone because he always keeps it even, friendly. But you’re sure that there’s something to read in those words that you can’t quite see right now. “Shall we?”

Despite the way you feel about him, you allow enough tentative trust for him to lead you out of the darkness and back into the sun.

✾

He insists on escorting you home from the school.

There are company cars you could’ve requested rides from—the higher-ups at least owe you a free ride home for everything you’ve done today—but you don’t want to take anything from them that they haven’t already offered. They can be tricky about which of their favors require repayment.

This leaves you and Geto on the last train of the night, alone. He stands despite the long rows of empty seats, leaning back against the Do Not Lean On Doors sign, arms crossed. There’s not even a hint of him trying to hide that he’s watching you intently.

On any other day, you would stand, unwilling to give him any advantage—but you’re exhausted. You need a shower so badly. Layers of slime have dried on you and you feel more disgusting than you ever knew was possible. You sit opposite him, leaning back in the uncomfortable plasticky chair. Meeting his eyes feels foolish. Taking your attention off of him feels even more foolish. Staring at his shoes is a happy medium.

The car rolls steady across its tracks, its wheels whistling slightly when the train reaches top speed between stations. 

“Do you ever see things you don’t want to?” he asks after a three-stop stretch of silence.

All the time. It seems you’ll always be stuck in this cycle of attempting normalcy only to be tasked with experiencing the unpleasant wants and memories of people you don’t know. You’re not going to tell him that, though. Him asking you questions makes you queasy. Your knees feel weak even though you’re sitting down. “Doesn’t everyone?”

“You’re very good at avoiding my questions.”

“You don’t make it hard.”

The train rolls on, and on, and on.

He hooks his arm around the closest stanchion pole, then leans in your direction. The strand of hair that hangs loose against his face sways alongside the train's ebbs and flows. Blinding brightness from the overhead LEDs paint his face in baroque shadows. He could be a devil, or a killer, or simply a man. “Does it scare you?”

Many things about this situation scare you. You ask him to clarify.

“When you read people. I’m sure you’ve seen some… unsavory things.” You think: bodies. You think: blood and muscle and sinew and bone. “It would make sense if those things scared you.”

“They don’t,” you lie. 

He considers you for a long moment, seeming to lean even farther forward, and the idea of him getting closer pierces your stomach like a nail. But the train once again sways on its tracks and his body follows, leaning back on his heels and removing himself from what could have almost been your space. “I always wondered what it was you saw.”

“What do you mean?” you ask. You know what he means.

He smiles, almost condescending—an expression that says come now, are we really going to play this game? The way he says your name in response, so pleasant and even-keeled, makes you feel like a cold stone. Prey trapped in a small space with its most vicious predator. You go so still your blood stops flowing.

Until now, you’d never been sure whether he actually knew that you’d read him. You’re positive he doesn’t want anyone to know what’s inside his head. He paints an image of himself over what he really is, but it’s a faulty veneer. Apply enough pressure and it’ll fracture in all the little places that hold the worst rotted of the flesh beneath.

You know he would do anything to keep this image of himself spotless, whole. You’re sure of it. “Kento will know something’s wrong if I don’t talk to him in the next few days.”

His brows draw low over his dark eyes—first in confusion, and then in a sort of amused incredulity. “You think I’m going to kill you.”

“I think you want to.”

The lights flash in the car as it passes under a tunnel. “What is it that defines a good person?”

“...why are you asking me?”

He grins, and your stomach constricts. “Good and bad are large concepts in a small world. They touch and overlap in more places than any of us could ever anticipate. But we’re supposed to fit neatly into one or the other.”

You don’t respond. You’re too focused on the stretch of his lips.

“So what defines a good person?”

“The things they’ve done,” you say, more to get him to stop asking you questions than anything.

“I don’t remember doing anything particularly harmful to you,” he says—and here it is. What he really wants from you. “It can’t be my actions. So is it my desires that define me as a bad person in your eyes, or my memories?”

Your stomach constricts tighter. Painfully. You’re still four stops away from the one by your apartment. “Geto.”

“It has to be one or the other. Those are the two categories that you can read, right?”

“It was a long time ago.”

“Ten years,” he says. “And you can barely look me in the eye.”

You try, as if you could prove him wrong, but you can’t maintain eye contact with him for more than a moment before you feel a terrible coldness in your gut.

“I’d always wondered if you read me that night, but I was never sure.” He wraps his loose strand of hair around a long finger, then unwraps it. Repeats these movements like a question and answer, like a catechism. “Not until I saw you again.”

“The second time you called me out to the village—you were lying to me.”

“We’ve established that.”

“You put that man in a coma,” you say. "You absorbed the curse that was at the power plant."

He nods, face calm, as if altering someone’s state of being is a normal thing to do. “But I woke him up right after you left and he was unharmed. I paid him for his time.”

“Why?”

“I needed to know what it was that scared you. The situation itself…” he says, holding out one hand flat—and then the other, his hands mimicking the sides of a scale, the second option heavier than the first. “Or me.”

“I’d have told you that if you asked,” you say, and you would have. No point in keeping it from him. “You didn’t have to lie. That was underhanded.”

“I think reading me without my consent counts as underhanded.”

Bone, muscle, blood, sinew. Bone-white beneath his uniform. And the blood, the blood, the blood, orange-peel thick. “I didn’t want to. You don’t understand, you were—I could see your ribs. It was—we didn’t think—”

“I understand,” he says.

“I know you do,” you concede. Because he was there for it all. He experienced it all. He woke up when he was healed and immediately went to search for the body of his best friend, not knowing that Gojo had already woken himself up from the brink of death. “I wish it happened differently.”

“Doesn’t everyone?”

Maybe they do. Maybe things could have gone much differently—worse, even. You could know more than his wants. You could have seen them realized.

“What did you see?” he asks, careful. Quiet. There's a weight to his voice you're unfamiliar with. It sounds like more than passing curiosity.

It’s what makes you answer honestly. “Blood. Bodies.” Finally. “Relief.”

“Which of those scared you the most?”

You look at him, jaw tight, because he knows which one it was.

“And that makes me a bad person?” he asks.

“I never said you were a bad person.”

“You just thought it.”

You have. You’ve thought it every day since seeing his true desires. You’re not sure that you’re a good person either, but your hidden wants will never be as gruesome as his. “It’s not that simple.”

“Of course it’s not.” Again, he smiles—but there’s something brittle to it. Gojo, in your office when you pushed too hard. A mask beginning to crack.

The train stills, doors opening. You're still a few stops away from home. No one gets on, no one gets off. It's just you and Geto on the car, filling its silence with more than words.

“If I asked you to read me now,” he asks, “would you?”

Your head jerks up, and you look past him, at the closing doors, at the windows of the train car. The whistling starts again, the train gaining speed. You’re between stops. There’s no exit. “No.”

“It could be different than last time.”

“You don’t know that,” you say, but what you really want to tell him is that it won’t be.

“What if it is?” he asks. “Maybe you have the wrong idea of me.”

You don’t think that’s the case. You’re not going to tell him this.

“I was angry. Hurt. I thought Satoru had just been murdered.” He says these things like easy facts. His tone takes the emotion out of them entirely, as if those factors didn’t contribute to what you’re sure is massive unresolved trauma. “I thought I was going to die.”

“You didn’t.”

“No,” he says—and here you get a flash of something deeper, again unfamiliar. Because he won’t look at you, even though he’s the kind of person that always makes eye contact. He leans back, distancing himself. “Have you ever experienced that? A moment where you know you’re going to die?”

“I haven’t.”

His lips twist into a muted frown. He looks young, the way he used to in high school. He stares out of the darkened window at nothing. At the walls of the underground tunnels. At blackness, pure and complete. The bags under his eyes are more prominent. Because of the lighting, maybe. “You think a lot of things. You realize a lot of things. And none of it is particularly fair.”

This has to be manipulation. He’s good at that. He always has been. But—something about this moment feels vulnerable, and you’ve never known Geto to be vulnerable. Not with anyone. Even on the brink of death, even just recovered, his chest still terribly scarred—there was nothing. He smiled at you and Ieiri before he left, that fox-teeth smile you hate so much. I’ll be back shortly, he told the two of you, as if his blood wasn’t coating the bottom of your shoes, staining the skin of your knees, clotting underneath your fingernails.

You’ve read people for long enough that you’re sure: this moment is different. “Why do you want me to read you?” you ask, so quiet that your voice is nearly swallowed by the sound of the train wheels scrolling across their metal track.

“Because I want to know,” he says, his voice a little hoarse at its core, “what you see.”

You shouldn’t. You’re too kind. Kento tells you this often. 

You shouldn’t.

When you put your hand out, palm up, Geto places his fingers atop yours so gently—a breeze of a touch. And then: bodies. bodies. bodies.           bodies. bodies. bodies. bodies. bodies. bodies. bodies. bodies. suguru          should we kill these guys ? bodies. bodies.           bodies. bodies. it could’ve been different i could’ve been different bodies. bodies.                     bodies. bodies. bodies. bodies. we could do it together          no. i could do it alone bodies. bodies. bodies— You vomit onto the floor of the train.

Geto is on his knees in front of you, clear of the mess, and your fingers are tangled in his shirt, fists bunching the material at each shoulder. You want to let go so badly but you can’t—you’re heaving, sobbing, your forehead pressed against your fist, tears running hot on to the back of your hand. 

It’s just so bad. It’s so terrible. He wants this to happen. He feels like people deserve this. You never should have let him convince you to read him. You shouldn’t have been drawn in by the vulnerability. Not when—not when it’s that in his head, still, a decade later. 

You can’t stop heaving, nearly retching. You can’t stop pulling in breaths too quickly, not deep enough. Your forehead is flush against his shoulder now, and your tears are staining his shirt, and you can’t let go. You’re paralyzed.

He holds you while you cry. Only touches your back, your arms. Not your hair or face or hands. You couldn’t handle it again. You couldn’t handle it again but you can’t move right now.

As you quiet, as your breaths turn slow, heavier, you realize he’s been speaking to you. Maybe the whole time—you’re not sure. Quiet reassurance. It’s okay, you’re okay. Breathe.

You don’t feel okay. You feel more sick than you ever have. “Why would you want that?” you ask, and your words blend into tears. Into panic. 

He’s quiet, one large hand smoothing down your back over and over, as if reassuring you that you’re safe. Safe in the arms of someone with that many bodies in his head. He sighs, tired, and his breath makes your hair flutter, caresses the curve of your ear.

The shock of fear to your system from realizing just how close he is gives you the strength to pull away—to sit back in the seat again, untwine your fingers from his shirt. It’s creased on each shoulder from your vice grip. There’s vomit on the floor of the train to the right of him. He’s on both knees in front of you, hands in his lap now that you’ve freed yourself from his grasp.

Was it real? The vulnerability? The hoarseness to his voice when he told you that he wanted to know what you would see?

“I’m sorry,” he says.

“Why would you want that?” you repeat.

He sighs again. Sits back on his heels, begins running his hand through his hair before remembering it’s tied up. He just leaves his hand on the top of his head, fingers curling inwards until he’s gripping his hair, and you wonder if it feels the same as it did on the night you read him for the first time. “I don’t know,” he tells you.

The train stops again. The voice says something you don't hear. You can't get up. “That’s not true.”

The doors close and there's the whistling once again, the darkness that surrounds the both of you, the speed you can just hardly feel. “Why did you decide to quit being a sorcerer?” he asks.

You don’t want to tell him. “There were a lot of reasons.”

“How is it fair?” He drops his hand. His hair is disheveled, just like his shirt. He looks so un-put together that he hardly resembles the Geto you’ve always had an image of in your head. “So many of us die. So many of us have injuries that take years to really heal. And it’s their fault. Humans.”

“You’re human.”

“I’m a sorcerer.”

“They’re not mutually exclusive.”

“I’m the one that has to deal with the consequences of their actions,” he says, as if that means something. As if that puts him in a different group from them entirely.

“So you want to kill them?”

“No,” he says, quick—because that’s what he’s supposed to say, you think. Then he quiets for a moment and seems to actually consider your question. “No. But—I do think about it.”

You both sit with the admission. Though the train car is empty, you feel cloistered, walls too tight around you.

“It makes me worry that I’m not a good person anymore,” he tells you.

“Did you want me to read you so you could decide whether you’re good or not?”

“I wanted you to read me because when I heard about those little girls that died, Satoru had to talk me down from going to that village and killing everyone.”

The conductor comes on the speakers, announcing the last few stops. It's both shocking and reassuring to have another person so close. You can't believe this conversation is happening in such close proximity to a person that couldn't even begin to understand the nature of its contents. Strangely enough, the admission quiets some of the fear inside you. Because you can understand it, on some level. Those girls were sorcerers. They were also nine.

“I had to see if there was anything inside me that didn’t want to do it,” he says. “Because—if there’s not—”

“I don’t see everything,” you tell him. There's more you could say, but you've never been comfortable revealing the true extent of what you can do. You've been a tool for long enough that you know being more effective begets more use. “I don’t think you should use me as a metric.”

“It’s obvious that what you saw wasn’t very good.”

“They starved to death,” you say. “I’d be angry too.”

And you're not angry, you realize. Not in the way that he is. Two little girls were starved to death for being somewhat different, and you can't get yourself to feel more than disgust. More than frustration. Parts of you have been quelled over time—being a jujutsu sorcerer necessitates this. You can't get angry over everything because everything is unjust, and everything is unfair, and eventually it'll all build up. Maybe into what Geto is experiencing now. If you hadn't desensitized yourself like this, maybe you would have bodies in your head.

It's unlikely. Not to the extent he does. But it's not like you're a stranger to violence.

“Maybe I’m not a good person because I’m not angry the way that you are,” you say.

“I don't think that's true,” he says, smiling, a little slight and a little sad.

It's the only time since you'd read him at the edge of death that you don't see fox teeth—but the smile is still not entirely kind. His words don't speak of reassurance. Perhaps a sort of envy. You're familiar with want. Uncomfortably so. You recognize it even when you try not to. Maybe he wants to feel the way you do. Less angry. Or maybe he does truly see you as good, in a certain context, and he wants to be there on that level with you.

“The first time I ingested a curse," he tells you, “I was so sick I couldn’t stand. I didn’t realize how awful it would taste. There’s nothing I could compare it to. After it was done, I threw up until my stomach was empty, and then kept going. The stomach acid burned my throat so badly that I had to go to the hospital. I was still young.”

You stay still and quiet. You don't want to relate to him so you try not to.

“And sometimes I wonder—would any non-sorcerer ever understand that? Could they?”

You try not to, and you fail at it. “Will you show me?”

He looks at you in askance. You don't tell people that you can do this. Only Kento knows. It's not something you should allow Geto. Not when he scares you the way he does.

“The first time,” you say, because despite knowing you shouldn't do this, it's that sick curiosity again that pushes you forward. And maybe something else—a want. A need to relate. To be sure that someone else has known what you've felt your entire life. “If you really concentrate on the memory—I want to see it.”

To show you, he touches your face: it’s so dark and i’m scared. and mom said to come home soon. but i saw this thing and i want to see if i can beat it                     no. i’m lying to you. there is a way i want this memory to go. i am a good child and i want to go home to my mother but i am so curious.           i am so curious i am so curious. i want to see what that thing looks like when i kill it. i know i can. i know i am different. i scare my mother and father and they still love me very much because it is so dark and i am so scared and i am just a child.           but i am not scared. i follow the thing into dense trees that shadow the park. i play here with my friends. i kill it.           i don’t know how i know what to do but i do and                     !!! oh                               !!! god                     !!! oh god                                                   please.                                                   please.                                                   please. don’t make me do it again don’t make me do it again don’t make me do it again i want to go home i want to see my mother i do i’m sorry it hurts it hurts oh god           oh  i want to be good. i’m sorry. i want to be good. i’m sorry. i want to be sorry. i’m           god. 

The way you come out of a reading is usually like a free-fall without a parachute. One second you’re tumbling through the air, and the next you’ve been abruptly stopped. Being shown something is different. Kento would show you his childhood when you asked, moments with his family, bad parts of missions that he didn't want to voice but still wanted to share. It’s a little easier to stomach.

Usually. 

His hand lingers near your face, resting on your shoulder. He’s so close to you and he smells like very expensive cologne and you suddenly see how tired he is. His smile hides more than you thought it did. Maybe more than you had been looking for.

“Do you have a final verdict?” he asks. “Or should I decide for myself?”

There’s a predilection in him, you think. He’s predisposed to anger, the self-righteous kind. So is every other sorcerer you’ve ever met. And yet it’s different with him—more complex. Something else is very wrong with him. Deeply.

“I don’t like it when people touch my face.”

“I can keep that in mind.”

“I want you to apologize.”

“Of course,” he says, gentle. Was his voice always this gentle? Or is it because of all he’s shared with you on this train? “I’m sorry.”

The doors of the train open and a tinny voice announces that you’ve reached the last stop of the night. You missed your station a long time ago. You’ll have to pay for a cab. “I don’t think you’re a bad person,” you tell him. “But I'm afraid of you.”

He nods. Sits back on his heels again. “Will you be okay getting home?”

“Yes,” you say. “Thank you.”

You make it home just after one in the morning and lay in your bed with your clothes on and you don’t sleep. You don’t sleep at all.

i will link part two here when it is posted!

[212-apricity]

siren songs and stolen kisses, the runaway

ssask masterlist main masterlist

again guys, im really sorry if this ones a bit shit, i really didnt know what to write for this but i tried my best, hopefully the next ones a bit better💖🙏🗣️‼️

𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔:･𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔:･𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔: 𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔

The humid air hung heavy over the yard of the Chateau as the four of us sat around, waiting for something—anything—to happen. Kiara and Pope were testing the winch to pull up the gold, Kiara carefully being lowered to test its strength, while JJ lounged on the side of the hot tub. I leaned against the Twinkie, arms crossed as I watched them, my mind racing with a thousand thoughts, none of them good.

"What do you think he’s up to?" Kiara called up, her voice breaking the relative silence.

"John B pulling a Houdini," JJ replied, his tone casual as he smirked.

I couldn’t help but roll my eyes at him. "Disappearing without a word and causing us all to stress? Sounds about right."

JJ turned to me, his grin widening. "Well, Princess, you’d know best. Houdini’s probably got nothing on you Cameron kids."

I shot him a mock glare, but my lips twitched in betrayal. JJ always had a way of making me smile, no matter how dire the situation felt. His hair glinted gold in the late afternoon sun, and his confidence was almost contagious. Before I could retort, John B appeared from nowhere, trudging into the Chateau without so much as a glance in our direction.

"What the…?" Kiara said, looking up in confusion as the winch brought her back to ground level.

"John B! Where have you been?" Pope shouted, jogging to follow him. JJ and I exchanged looks before we trailed behind, my stomach sinking at the determined yet furious look in John B’s eyes. Something was seriously wrong.

Inside the Chateau, John B began tearing through the place, smashing things as he searched for something. I winced as a glass shattered under his foot.

"Dude, what are you doing?" JJ asked, his voice tinged with both concern and irritation. His hands rested on his hips as he tried to make sense of the chaos unfolding before us.

John B didn’t answer, ignoring everyone as he stormed into the guest room which had been for years JJ’s (and now my) room at the Chateau. My heart dropped as he reached under JJ’s pillow and pulled out the gun.

"Whoa, whoa, John B, what the hell?" JJ moved forward, his hands raised in a calming gesture, but John B shoved him hard onto the bed. JJ’s hat fell off as he tumbled backward, and I instinctively ran to his side, helping him up.

"Are you okay?" I whispered, gripping his bicep tightly as he shook his head in disbelief. I could see the anger rising in him, his jaw tightening.

"I’m fine, baby," he muttered, brushing himself off. But his eyes stayed locked on John B, who was now storming toward the door. Pope tried to block him, but John B shoved him aside with surprising force, sending him into a table. Kiara rushed to help Pope up, and JJ grabbed my hand as we followed John B outside.

"Where are you going John B? What is going on?" I called out. John B didn’t answer until he reached JJ’s bike, turning to face us all with fire in his eyes.

"Ward knows about the gold," he spat, his voice trembling with rage.

The words hit me like a punch to the stomach, but it was what he said next that left me frozen in place.

"He killed my dad."

Silence fell over the yard. The weight of his words suffocated me, my brain struggling to process. Ward… my dad? JJ’s grip on my hand tightened as John B sped off on the bike, his anger trailing behind him like a storm. The others started running after him, but I couldn’t move, my feet rooted to the ground.

"Y/n, baby," JJ’s voice brought me back, his arms wrapping around me as I trembled. "It’s okay. It’s okay, I’ve got you."

"Dad… he wouldn’t. He couldn’t," I stammered, but my voice betrayed my uncertainty. JJ didn’t say anything, just held me tighter as Pope and Kiara came back, panting and confused.

"What the hell just happened?" Pope asked, running a hand over his face.

"We need to find him," Kiara said, her tone firm despite the chaos.

Inside the Chateau, we gathered around to brainstorm. Every possible location John B might go was thrown out and dismissed until one option stuck—Tannyhill. My family’s estate.

"Y/n…" he started, but I cut him off, shaking my head.

"Let’s just go," I said firmly, ignoring the way my stomach churned.

𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔:･𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔:･𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔: 𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔

We took the HMS Pogue and sailed toward Tannyhill under the cover of night. The moonlit water reflected our shared anxiety. JJ tried to lighten the mood with a sarcastic suggestion about knocking on the front door and asking for John B, but even his humor felt strained.

"Yeah, that’ll work great," I said dryly, earning a smile from him. He reached out to touch my shoulder briefly before turning his attention back to the shoreline.

Pope peered through binoculars, spotting movement at Tannyhill. "Hey, I see Ward," he said, his voice heavy with implications. He passed the binoculars to me, and I froze, my chest tightening as I saw my father alive and well.

"Doesn’t look dead to me," Pope muttered, packing up. "Let’s go home."

"Wait," JJ interjected, his jaw clenched.

"What?" Kiara snapped. Pope looked at her incredulously.

"We can’t just leave John B," I argued, but the tension between Kiara and Pope reached a boiling point.

"Hey, I have the biggest interview of my life in six hours," Pope said, his voice rising.

"And our friend is in trouble," Kiara shot back, her tone cutting.

Pope threw up his hands. "Why is it always about John B?"

"It’s not," Kiara retorted. "It would be any of you in this situation."

"Oh, bullshit!" Pope yelled, frustration clear in his voice.

"This is about friendship!" Kiara shouted, stepping closer.

"Stop with the moral high ground shit, Kiara!" Pope countered, his voice sharp.

"Hey!" JJ yelled, pulling me closer as the shouting got louder. "Guys, not now!"

Kiara turned away, muttering angrily. Pope’s voice softened but stayed firm. "This is my life. Everything I’ve worked for."

Kiara scoffed, her frustration evident. "That’s your priority?"

JJ and I stood together at the back of the boat, the fight between Kiara and Pope escalating before us. His hand never left mine, his thumb tracing soothing circles over my knuckles, but the tension between them was impossible to ignore.

"Yes, Kiara, yes it is! Look, you weren’t there for John B! You weren’t there for any of us!" Pope shouted, his voice cracking with the strain of his emotions. He glared at Kiara, who was visibly holding back tears. “Y/n basically left her family when she found us seven years ago. But remember your kook year, Kiara?”

“Pope, stop,” I interjected softly, but my words barely reached him through his anger.

Kiara looked to the sky, swallowing hard and shoving Pope away “Give me a break.”

“Hey!” Pope shouted back. “You need a break? Move!” He shoved her, frustration boiling over, and Kiara retaliated with equal force, pushing him right back as they both kept shouting at one another.

JJ stepped forward immediately, yanking Pope back with one arm. “Hey, yo, yo, yo! Cut it out, alright?” he snapped, his voice rough and commanding. “This isn’t the time for this shit!”

I caught Kiara’s arm as she stepped forward again, her jaw set in defiance. “Kiara, stop,” I said firmly, my grip tightening. She froze under my touch, looking between me and JJ as if trying to decide whether to keep fighting or let it go.

“Listen,” JJ said, his tone sharper now. “If Y/n and I are the ones mediating, we’ve hit rock bottom.”

Pope glared but bit back whatever retort was on his tongue. JJ jabbed a finger toward the bow of the boat. “Bow. Now. Go.”

Pope finally stepped back, muttering under his breath, and I gently guided Kiara to sit down. My hands were shaking slightly, my nerves frayed, but JJ’s presence at my side kept me grounded.

JJ leaned over to me, his voice low and soft. “You okay, Princess?” His hand brushed my hair back from my face.

I nodded, exhaling slowly. “Yeah… I will be.”

He smiled faintly, his blue eyes searching mine. “You’re stronger than you think, baby.”

I felt a pang of gratitude for him, for always knowing what to say when the world felt like it was falling apart. As the tension on the boat lingered, Pope eventually started the engine, and we sailed toward his house in silence.

𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔:･𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔:･𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔: 𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔

We dropped Pope off first, his parting words curt and strained, then Kiara insisted on walking home. I offered to drop her off instead, but she waved me off, clearly needing space to cool down.

That left just JJ and me on the water, the gentle rocking of the boat and the hum of the engine filling the quiet. The stars above seemed to mock the chaos of the night, shining as though nothing had happened. Wind gusted around us as JJ sailed and I pulled the sleeves of JJ’s my grey sweater that he was wearing earlier.

“What about you, Princess?” JJ asked after a while, his tone teasing but tentative. “Want me to drop you off too?”

I gave him a side-eye glare, though a small smile tugged at my lips. “Not funny, J.”

He raised one hand hand in surrender, the other on the steering wheel, “Too soon?”

“Just a little.” I squinted, holding my thumb and forefinger close together, and he mirrored the gesture, mock-serious.

“Okay, okay, noted,” he said, his grin breaking through. “You’re stuck with me then.”

I sighed dramatically, walking up behind him and wrapping my arms around his torso. “Guess I’ve survived worse.”

JJ chuckled, his laughter low and soothing, and he reached back to pull me closer. “Of course you have. You’re a Cameron, remember? Toughest princess in the game.”

I rolled my eyes, pressing my forehead against his back. “Thanks for earlier… for everything.”

JJ turned to face me, his hands resting on my shoulders. “Always, baby. You don’t have to thank me for taking care of you.” His lips pressed to my forehead, lingering there as if to seal the promise.

I tilted my face up, our eyes locking, and in a moment of unspoken understanding, he kissed me. His lips were soft and warm, and my hand slid under his shirt, feeling the heat of his skin as I tangled my other hand in his hair.

When we broke apart, he rested his forehead against mine, his breathing uneven. “We’ll figure it out, Princess.”

I nodded, my hands still clinging to him.

𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔:･𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔:･𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔: 𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔

The salty breeze carried the faint sound of waves lapping against the dock, a soothing rhythm that contrasted sharply with the restlessness in the air. We were sprawled across the wooden planks of the Chateau’s dock, the sun casting its last golden rays over the marsh. JJ’s arm was slung lazily over his knee, the cigarette dangling between his fingers as he exhaled a puff of smoke.

“Princess,” JJ drawled, his blue eyes sparkling with that mischievous glint I’d come to love. “You’re real good at this,”

I raised a brow, pretending to be unimpressed, though a small smirk tugged at my lips. Taking the cigarette from his hand, I exhaled a plume of smoke that disappeared into the sunset. “Didn’t think the great JJ Maybank could admit someone else is better at something.”

“Better? Who said anything about better?” JJ shot back, leaning in closer until our noses nearly touched. His voice dropped to a teasing murmur. “I’m just saying you’re good, baby. Real good.” I smirked before blowing the puff of smoke I was holding into his face, making him move away in surprise, almost falling off his seat on the wooden plank.

“Ugh get a room, you two,” John B muttered from a few feet away, his tone edged with annoyance as he fiddled with the edge of his cast.

“Or at least let the rest of us enjoy the view without your PDA,” Kiara chimed in, sitting cross-legged with an exasperated look.

I laughed, leaning back against JJ’s shoulder as he pressed a quick kiss to my temple. “You’re just jealous,” I teased, my voice light as I handed the blunt back to JJ.

Kiara groaned, while John B rolled his eyes and continued picking at his cast.

“John B, seriously,” I said, straightening up as my tone turned more serious. “Stop messing with that thing. You’re going to make it worse.”

“It’s fine,” he replied dismissively, the stubborn set of his jaw making it clear he wasn’t going to listen. “It’s just a hairline fracture.”

“It’s a fracture and a cast, dumbass,” Kiara cut in, her voice sharper now. “You’re supposed to keep it on. And you’re supposed to care about your body,”

John B groaned, clearly irritated. “I can’t do anything with it on!” he snapped.

“Maybe if you stopped breaking things—” Kiara shot back, and just like that, the two of them were bickering again, their voices rising in frustration.

Their argument brewed quickly, Kiara’s frustrations bubbling over as John B tried to defend his recklessness. JJ and I exchanged a knowing look, his smirk widening as he shook his head.

"Think they’ll ever stop?" I asked, keeping my voice low.

"Not a chance," JJ replied, handing me the cigarette. "But hey, I’ve got front-row seats, and the company ain’t bad."

I rolled my eyes, my lips twitching with amusement. The comfort between us felt easy, like we were in our own bubble while the world around us spiraled.

The argument (unfortunately) was cut short by the sound of footsteps pounding toward us. We all turned to see Pope charging down the path, his shirt soaked with sweat and his breathing ragged.

“Pope?” I called out, concern lacing my voice as I stood up. “What’s wrong?”

He bent over, hands on his knees, as he struggled to catch his breath. “I—” he gasped, raising a finger to stall us. “I ran… all the way here.”

JJ leaned back on his elbows, his expression calm despite the urgency in Pope’s demeanor. “How was the interview, dude?” he asked casually.

“Don’t… ask,” Pope managed to say, waving JJ off as he straightened up.

JJ grinned, clearly enjoying Pope’s frustration. “Noted.”

Pope’s face shifted into something more serious, and he looked between us with wide, urgent eyes. “Listen, we don’t have much time,” he said, his voice firm now. “Before the interview, my dad told me he had to clear the private airstrip to cut palms for Cameron’s plane. Said it was too heavy and needed a longer runway to take off.”

I froze at the mention of my father’s name, my stomach tightening. “What does that have to do with anything?”

Pope continued, ignoring my question. “While I was sitting there in the interview, I couldn’t stop thinking—hm, why would Ward need a longer airstrip?”

We all fell silent, the weight of his words hanging heavy in the air. Slowly, realization dawned on us.

“Gold,” JJ said, breaking the silence. His voice was calm, but his eyes sparkled with a mix of excitement and determination.

Pope pointed at him, practically shouting. “Yes! Exactly! The gold. This is it—this is our chance to get it back!”

My heart was racing now, a mix of adrenaline and dread coursing through me. Ward had the gold. Of course he did. But if Pope was right, that also meant we had a chance to take it from him.

Kiara shot to her feet, her face set with resolve. “We have to go.”

JJ stood too, pulling me up with him. “Alright, Captain,” he said, turning to John B with a grin. “What’s the plan?”

John B looked around at all of us, his determination shining through his frustration. “We’re gonna steal our shit back.”

The energy shifted instantly. We moved as one, pulling together in a way that only the Pogues could. Kiara grabbed my hand as we started running toward the Chateau to gather supplies, John B, Pope and JJ’s laughter trailing behind us.

𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔:･𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔:･𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔: 𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔

The Twinkie rumbled along the bumpy dirt road as we approached the airstrip. Pope held the binoculars, scanning the scene. "They’re loading up the gold," he said, his voice hushed but urgent.

John B leaned forward, snatching the binoculars from him. "There’s Ward," he muttered, his jaw tightening.

The familiar pang hit me square in the chest at the mention of my father. "Let me see," I said, taking the binoculars.

Through the lenses, I spotted Ward, his commanding presence impossible to miss as he barked orders near the plane. But then my breath caught. "Sarah," I whispered, my voice trembling.

"What?" John B and JJ turned to me, their surprise matching my own.

"She’s with him," I said, my heart sinking as I watched my sister struggle against Ward’s grip. He dragged her toward the plane, his hold rough and unrelenting. Security guards hovered nearby, their stances making it clear she had no escape.

"She’s arguing with him," I said, my voice breaking. My chest tightened as panic threatened to overtake me.

JJ’s hand found mine, his thumb brushing over my knuckles. "Baby," he murmured, his voice soft and steady. He pressed a gentle kiss to my cheek, grounding me in the moment.

"He’s hurting her," John B growled, his anger spilling over. Before anyone could stop him, he was off, sprinting toward the Twinkie.

The air was electric with tension, every one of us frozen as we watched John B and the Twinkie barrel down the dirt path toward the airstrip fence.

“John B! Stop! You’re going to get yourself killed!” Kiara shouted, her voice cracking with desperation.

Pope scrambled forward, waving his arms as if it would somehow make John B see sense. “What the hell is he doing?” Pope’s voice was frantic, and his panic was palpable.

Beside me, JJ cursed under his breath, his grip tightening around my waist as he tried to physically anchor me—and himself—through the chaos. “He’s gonna ram it,” JJ muttered, his tone somewhere between disbelief and reluctant admiration.

“Ram it? He wouldn’t,” I whispered, my voice shaking. But even as I said it, I knew John B well enough to know that he absolutely would.

“John B!” Kiara screamed again as the Twinkie tore through the wired fence, the sound of metal crunching and snapping filling the air.

Pope and Kiara dove out of the way just in time, their bodies hitting the ground hard. I barely had time to process what was happening before JJ yanked me backward, his arm wrapping protectively around me as we stumbled. We fell into the dirt together, JJ shielding me with his body as the Twinkie sped past, kicking up a cloud of dust and debris.

My heart was pounding so hard it felt like it might burst out of my chest. “Oh my God,” I breathed, trying to push myself up.

JJ stayed close, his arm still around my waist. “You okay, baby?” he asked, his voice uncharacteristically serious.

I nodded shakily, looking into his wide, worried eyes. “Yeah. Are you?”

“Fine,” he said quickly, helping me to my feet.

We turned back toward the airstrip, watching as the Twinkie screeched to a halt directly in front of the plane. The plane racing at full speed towards him.

“He’s not actually—” Pope started, but he cut himself off, his mouth agape as he watched John B stationary in the path of the oncoming plane.

Kiara’s breath hitched beside me. “He’s going to get himself killed,” she said, her voice breaking. Her hands flew to her face, tears streaming down her cheeks.

I grabbed her hand instinctively, holding tight as I tried to process what was happening. “Kiara, he’ll be okay. He’ll be okay,” I said, my voice trembling.

But even as I said it, I wasn’t sure I believed it. The sight of John B standing there, a lone figure against the massive plane, was almost too much to bear.

Then, the sound of sirens cut through the night.

The flashing red and blue lights appeared on the horizon, growing closer with every passing second.

“Oh no,” Pope groaned, his hands flying to his head. “No, no, no, no, no, I can’t get arrested. My parents will kill me.”

“Your parents?!” Kiara cried, her voice rising in panic. “What about John B? What about Sarah?”

JJ cursed again, louder this time. “I’m on probation,” he said, his voice sharp and full of dread. “I can’t go to jail, guys.”

I looked up at him, seeing the tension in his jaw, the way his hands curled into fists. I knew what it would mean for JJ if he got caught—for him, jail wasn’t just a slap on the wrist. It was juvie on the mainland. Isolation. Months—maybe years—away from all of us. Away from me.

“J,” I said softly, reaching for his hand. He didn’t flinch away, his grip tightening around mine as if it was the only thing keeping him steady.

“Listen, we have to go,” I said firmly, suppressing the ache in my chest and tears in my eyes for John B and Sarah. “We’re no use to them if we’re in jail.”

Pope nodded quickly, already backing away from the sirens. “She’s right. We have to leave. Now.”

Kiara hesitated, her eyes darting between the approaching cops and the airstrip, where John B was still standing his ground. “But—”

“Kiara,” I said, cutting her off. “We’ll figure out how to help them, but we can’t do it if we’re locked up.”

JJ grabbed his hat and gun off the ground, his movements quick and deliberate. “Let’s go,” he said, his voice low and urgent.

I tugged on Kiara’s arm, and finally, she relented, tears still streaming down her face. We ran together, my heart breaking with every step as the sirens grew louder behind us.

𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔:･𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔:･𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔: 𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔

It was past 4 a.m. when we finally collapsed in bed, JJ’s head resting on my chest as he drifted off to sleep. I ran my fingers through his hair absentmindedly, my mind racing.

My phone buzzed on the nightstand. I reached for it, my heart sinking when I saw it wasn’t from Sarah or John B. Instead, it was a text from Rafe: "I’m sorry."

I frowned, confusion swirling in my chest. I texted back, "Sorry for what? Are you okay?" but no response came.

Careful not to wake JJ, I slipped out of bed and grabbed a bottle of water from the fridge.

I sat on the porch, the weight of my thoughts growing heavier by the minute. The distant hum of crickets and the faint rustling of leaves were the only sounds accompanying me in the darkness. My phone screen glowed faintly as I stared at Rafe’s message, the single line burning into my brain. "I’m sorry."

I felt like I’d been dropped into some alternate reality where my family and friends were drifting further and further out of reach. My fingers hovered over the screen, scrolling through my unanswered texts to Sarah and John B. They were still aired, and I couldn’t shake the dread curling in my stomach.

My mind wandered back to Rafe. He wasn’t perfect—not even close. But he was still my big brother, the one who used to sneak me chocolates when Rose was on one of her strict “no sugar” kicks. He was the one who held my hair back the first time I drank too much at a Kook party and smuggled me into the house without our parents noticing. Despite everything, Rafe had always been there for me, protective and reckless in equal measure.

The distance between us now stung like salt in an open wound. I thought about telling him about JJ—how happy he made me, how he made the world feel lighter even when it was crumbling. But I could already picture Rafe’s reaction: anger, confusion, maybe even outright fury. JJ and Rafe were like gasoline and a lit match—one wrong move, and it would all explode.

Still, I wanted to tell him. To share this part of my life with the brother I used to trust with everything.

The creak of the screen door behind me snapped me out of my thoughts. I glanced over my shoulder to see JJ standing there, his hair mussed from sleep and his t-shirt hanging slightly off one shoulder. He rubbed at his eyes, squinting at me in the dim light.

“Baby,” he said softly, his voice still thick with sleep. “What are you doin’ out here?”

“J,” I whispered, my chest tightening with guilt. “I’m so sorry. Did I wake you up? You should be asleep.”

He padded over to me, barefoot and rumpled, and dropped down to sit on the step beside me. “You didn’t wake me,” he murmured, laying his head on my shoulder and closing his eyes. “But you’re gonna have to tell me what’s goin’ on in that pretty head of yours, or I’m not gonna get any sleep either.”

I sighed, leaning into him and letting his warmth ground me. “It’s Rafe,” I admitted. “He texted me just now—just one message: ‘I’m sorry.’ And I don’t know why, but it’s messing with me.”

JJ was quiet for a moment, his fingers brushing lightly against my arm. “What d’you think he’s sorry for?”

“I don’t know,” I admitted, my voice cracking slightly. “We used to be so close, J. He was the one person in my family who I thought really saw me. And now… I don’t even know who he is anymore.”

JJ tilted his head, his blue eyes searching mine as he encouraged me to carry on.

“I wanna share things in my life with him again, I want to skip school and go to the mainland and shop with Ward’s credit card and piss him off with Rafe and Sarah, I wanna tell him about us, J. I know he’s…different now, and I know what his mentality is towards Pogues” I rolled my eyes at the word as JJ smiled softly, “But he’s still my big brother and I just…I don’t know, J, I just want him back. I mean, he’d probably kill you when he’d find out we were together though.”

JJ chuckled, his grin boyish and crooked. “Small price to pay for you, Princess,” he teased, but there was a softness in his voice that made my chest ache.

I swatted his arm lightly, rolling my eyes despite the knot of emotion in my throat. “I’m serious, JJ. He’s… he’s not in a good place right now. I should be there for him but…I don’t know.”

JJ’s smile faded slightly, and he turned serious, his hand reaching up to tuck a strand of hair behind my ear. “Hey,” he said softly. “We’ll figure it out, okay? Rafe might be a mess, but he’s still your brother. He loves you—even if he’s got a shitty way of showing it sometimes.”

I nodded, blinking back the tears threatening to spill over. “I just… I miss him. I miss Sarah, too. And John B. And I hate that I can’t fix any of it.”

JJ pressed a kiss to my temple, his lips lingering there for a moment. “You don’t have to fix everything, baby. You’re not alone in this.”

The weight on my chest eased slightly as I leaned into him, letting his presence steady me. For a while, we just sat there in the quiet, the night wrapping around us like a cocoon.

Eventually, JJ stood, holding out his hand to me. “Come on, Princess. Let’s get you back to bed. I’m not letting you spiral out here all night.”

I let him pull me to my feet, his grip warm and firm. As we headed back inside, I glanced down at my phone one last time, my unanswered texts glowing faintly in the dark.

Tomorrow, I’d figure out what to do about Rafe, about Sarah, about everything. But tonight, I let myself lean on JJ, his steady presence reminding me that even in the chaos, I wasn’t alone.

And for now, that was enough.

𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔:･𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔:･𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔: 𓆉°❀⋆.ೃ࿔

part eight done!!

im really hungry and i love jj

remember, taglist is open!! feel free to send me a dm or comment on literally anything💞💞

taglist: @harryssideboobz @onelonelybitch @jeyramarie @snowtargaryen @agnxstic

[silversprings-mp3]

oh my god this is so beautiful, i'm having so many thoughts and feelings and emotions

You give him a small smile as you lean against the doorframe to the bedroom. “Oh, it’s not all that bad. I get to fall in love with you all over again.”

oh to fall in love with logan over and over again *dreamy sighs*

“Do you have any fucking idea how sweet you smell?” His mouth is hot against your skin and he laughs as you tilt your hips up towards him. “You want me to fuck you with my tongue? Lap at you until you’re seeing stars?”

YES I DO PLEASE

“Line me up,” he instructs and you obey without hesitation. 

it's such a simple line but imagining it in his voice with that rough guiding tone.....g o d

“You really love me in every universe?” he asks softly, brushing his nose against yours.  “Yes.” “Even this one?” “Especially this one.” 

such a perfect ending <3 ugh i could cry

Til The Sun Turns Black

SYNOPSIS: Your soul is bound to his and you're destined to follow him across the multiverse. When the TVA finds you and sends you to the Void, you feel your chance of finding him has slipped through your fingers. But what you find there is more than you bargained for.

PAIRING: Worst!Wolverine x fem!reader

WC: 13.1 k I apologize for nothing

WARNINGS: smut 18+, mdni, mentions of drinking, angst, peril, some fluff, implied age gap (I guess?), mental trauma, miscommunication, Wade being Wade, dirty talk, oral (m and f receiving), fingering, cowgirl, missionary, cock warming, sex with feelings, unprotected p in v

A/N: Thank you so much for all the love on Soft Edges! I was not expecting that kind of response when I posted that story, so thank you <3. I had the idea for this story in my head since after I first saw the movie. I had no idea my one random runaway thought would turn into this. Also, this story would not have been finished if it weren't for @joelsgoldrush. She let me tease her for WEEKS with this and act as the ultimate sounding board. And she's overall just a delightful human being and I'm so glad I've found her.

The TVA agent sits staring at you, an odd and uncomfortable smile on his face. Like he isn’t quite sure he knows how to smile but had seen it once on TV.  You also don’t think he’s blinked in the past several minutes. It makes your eyes water just thinking about it. 

“I don’t understand why I’m here.”

“Ah, yes, well—“ the agent clears his throat and smoothes a hand down his chest. “You’re a threat to the multiverse.”

You squint your eyes at him and wonder if you’re lucid dreaming. Or trapped in some bizarre fever dream, but you can’t remember being sick. “The…multiverse? As in, more than one universe?”

He nods once. “Precisely.”

It’s your turn to stare as absolutely none of this is making sense. The morning had started off normal—wake up, shower, coffee at your favorite local corner store. You had barely finished your latte when you were apprehended and taken to this bland room by a man who must own insane stock in eyedrops. 

“You see, we’ve been watching you for quite some time,” he continues, oblivious of your growing confusion. “A handful of reincarnations, actually. And we believe we’ve finally pinned it down.”

His words sound insane. 

You were a low level mutant at best. You’ve been able to deeply sense and influence emotions in others since you were six—a standard empath if there ever was one. But reincarnation?

“Reincarnations? I’m sorry but—”

You feel it coming then, that all too familiar prickle of deja vu creeping up your spine and setting deep in your brain. The room begins to soften, the corners blurring and you feel disjointed, separate from the you sitting in the chair.

“Ah, see. We’ve pinned it down.”

The world tilts on its axis and your mind explodes into brilliance, the memories of hundreds of alternate versions of yourself firing down your synapses, leaving you as raw and exposed as a fresh wound. The pain is all consuming as you gasp for air and desperately try to quell the throbbing in your skull. 

Your hands grip the edge of the table, desperate to clutch at something solid to root you in reality as the kaleidoscope of memories swirl before your eyes, colliding and merging with one another. All the timelines converging down to a single point of existence within your mind. It doesn’t matter how many times you’ve experienced this process, the return of your memories—the return of your consciousness—was always accompanied by a torturous sensory overload. 

“You see? You have extensive knowledge of the multiverse. And that kind of knowledge is coveted and dangerous.”

Your vision blurs as the memories keep slamming into you and you can’t help the primal scream that rips from your lungs, the pain in your throat a welcome distraction from the torture in your head. And then, amid the chaos, a single figure emerges in crisp focus, a face you’ve seen thousands of times.

“Logan.” His name comes out in a whisper, your voice trembling.

You know he’s not actually in front of you and instead a mirage, a figment of your overloaded neurons, but his presence calms you. 

“Yes, Logan. You two are quite fond of each other.” The agent stands and you squint up at him, wanting to be anywhere else as you regain your memories. “But never mind him. We can’t have you traipsing around with all that knowledge in your head.”

“No, no, no, please. Please just let me find him,” you beg, hating the desperation laced in your voice. 

The last thing you see before being sent out of existence is his creepy, uncanny smile. 

+++

The Void was bullshit. 

It had been a month since you were unceremoniously dumped here. 

Maybe. 

You weren’t really sure.  

Time had no meaning, each day seeming to stretch on for eons and simultaneously in the blink of an eye. And for every single one of those moments you’d been focused on one of two things: finding a way out and not dying. 

You quickly learned you had a better chance at survival if you stuck to the outskirts and avoided others. So you squirreled yourself away, sheltering in an abandoned cabin and hoping beyond hope you could figure out a way out of the desolate cesspool you found yourself in. 

Figure out a way back to him. 

Back home. 

+++

You don’t venture out unless you have to. 

The Void is full of phantom emotions left behind by its previous inhabitants and the cacophony overwhelms you. Rage, terror and despair so thickly envelope every surface you feel like you’re choking. It’s beginning to wear so harshly on your nerves you wonder if you might actually go insane here.

There was a tension growing in the Void. You’d heard whispers of unrest within the factions, Cassandra hungry for something to sink her teeth into. The undercurrent of rage has increased in the last couple of days and it’s enough to set your teeth on edge.

Stuffing a backpack with a few essentials in case you get stranded, you ready yourself for a supply run. The thought of leaving the perceived safety of your cabin has little appeal, but you’ve been putting it off for far too long. There was a small cache only a few miles from your cabin that other survivors kept stocked with extra provincials. You were hoping for something good, anything other can canned food or cereal. Or Spam. 

Tightening the straps on your backpack, you take one last glance around before stepping out into the forest. It’s eerily quiet, no birds or animals chattering to fill the silence, just the crunch of your shoes against fallen leaves. The Void has always felt oppressive to you, the air just a little too heavy, but there’s something lingering today that makes you feel on edge. Your skin prickles with anticipation and you pat your belt for the knife you’ve stashed there. 

Just in case. 

You’re half a mile away from the cache when you feel it—the inky slick of anger. It catches on the air and wafts towards you in waves. You slow your steps as you approach the road and come to a halt when the battered van comes into view. 

Your breath hitches in your throat. 

You’d recognize those claw marks anywhere. 

Your heart races as your eyes trace the deep, jagged cuts gouged into the metal and the large swathes of blood coating the ground and what you can see of the interior of the van. Instinctively your hand tightens around the hilt of your knife and you crouch down low behind a fallen log. You scan the area for any signs of movement and find none, but you know Logan is stealthier than you and wouldn’t give up his location willingly. 

The van door creaks open on its battered hinges and you inhale sharply as Logan stumbles out of the vehicle covered in dried blood and sweat and more knife wounds and bullet holes than you can count. 

The sight of him ignites a spark of longing that blooms in your chest and makes you physically ache. You can feel him. Your lips remember the hungered warmth of his mouth against yours, the way he’d nip at your bottom lip so you’d open up for him. Your skin remembers the calloused rasp of his hands and not just the greedy grabs when he needed to claim you, but the light brushes of his fingertips against your palm as he held your hand, just to remind himself that you were real. Your nose remembers his scent, woodsy and clean, like the earth after rain. 

Shaking your head, you push down the memories and peer back over the log. A slight breeze wafts through the air and you watch as he sniffs, his head turning in your direction. 

“Fuck,” you curse lowly, trying to crouch further out of eyesight. 

You hear the metallic snikt of his claws and your pulse quickens. There’s no point in hiding—he knows you’re there. You take a slow, steady breath before attempting to focus waves of calm in his direction, hoping to ease some of the anger wound around him. 

His eyes lock onto yours, sharp and predatory and he shakes his head, trying to keep you out. “Who the fuck’re you?” 

You draw back your power and raise your hands in surrender as you slowly rise to your feet. You toss out your name and silently hope for a spark of recognition. But he doesn’t know you. Not yet. 

“It’s not safe out here alone,” you start, moving out of your hiding place. You walk towards him, his eyes following your every move. “There’s a cache just up ahead—” 

The atmosphere shifts without warning, the anger you’d felt previously now melting into thick, cloying fear and desperation. You can taste the ozone and the hairs at the back of your neck stand on end as electricity sizzles across the sky. Glancing up, you see the dark, swirling mass of Alioth just beginning to form. 

You look at Logan, panic racing along your nerves. “I promise I’ll explain everything to you later, but I know you, Logan, and right now I need you to trust me.” 

Alioth’s presence is getting stronger and drawing closer, and every drop of tension and rage swirling within is beginning to weigh down on you, threatening to suffocate you. 

Logan’s eyes narrow, but there’s a slight twitch in his jaw and you know he’s considering your words. His claws retract, but his muscles remain tense, coiled and ready to attack. You grab for his arm, feeling the warmth of his skin and the hard muscle beneath your fingers. “We have to go. Now.”

For a moment, you think he might resist. But then with a low curse, he follows you, his stride matching yours as you lead him towards the cache. The trees blur by, the wind picking up and beginning to toss leaves and loose branches into the air. 

You’re operating on pure adrenaline and your heart pounds in your chest as you run, Alioth gaining speed and distance faster than either of you can move. Each gasp of air burns your lungs and your muscles ache with the effort of your sprint. 

Still a quarter of a mile away from the cache, you know you won’t be able to outrun Alioth. The storm has consumed the sky, the sun diminished to twilight, as the thunder and groans loom ever closer. You turn towards Logan and yell, “It’s too close, we’re not gonna make it!”

Logan’s eyes flash with anger as you stop and turn towards the oncoming destruction. He grabs for your wrist, pulling you almost nose to nose. “What the fuck are you talking about?” he growls, chest heaving with the effort to breathe. “We can’t stop!”

His proximity briefly disarms you, his fierce gaze igniting something deep within you, but you don’t have time to dwell on those emotions. You take a deep breath in an attempt to steady your nerves. “I’m gonna try and calm it down.”

“What are you going to do, think happy thoughts at it?” he asks, his tone biting and sarcastic. 

You know every cell in his body is begging to fight, aching to release his claws and tear Alioth apart with his bare hands. But this isn’t something brute strength can subdue. 

“Just trust me,” you plead, your eyes searching his for some indication that he believes you. “Please.”

His stare is hard, but eventually his eyes soften and he loosens his grip on your wrist. “Fine.”

Tearing your gaze from him, you turn back towards the storm, now a full blown maelstrom of anger and destruction hellbent on consuming you both whole. You exhale slowly, pushing your own emotions of fear and panic as far down as you can. Instead, you turn inward and concentrate on every feeling of peace, calm and stillness you’ve ever experienced and project it outwards. Waves of soothing energy pour from you, an almost ghostly aura emanating from you as your power continues to grow. Alioth continues to surge towards you, the wind now flattening trees to the ground and lifting debris high into the air. 

The fight is excruciating, every cell in your body shaking with effort as you continue to project outwards, the sphere of your influence growing. When the two opposing masses collide, you’re almost knocked off your feet by the force. You’re vaguely aware of Logan beside you, claws unsheathing as he steps closer into your protective shield. 

For a brief moment, you feel the power of the storm ebb before it seems to press into you harder. Your knees begin to buckle and your stance slips. “I…I don’t know if I can hold it!” you gasp. 

Logan doesn’t run but instead moves closer, giving you one solitary nod. You can feel Logan’s eyes on you, feel the doubt swirling behind them and yet he stays besides you, ready to fight. 

His silent encouragement is enough. 

You are not dying in the fucking Void. 

Gritting your teeth, you continue to push. A guttural scream rips from your throat as black spots dot your vision and blood drips from your nose. You dig down, channeling every last drop of your energy into a final wave, extending yourself deep within the core of the storm. 

The black of the storm begins to retreat and the wind begins to calm. As the first few beams of sunlight filter in through the treetops, your vision fades completely and the world goes black. 

The last thing you feel is a pair of strong arms wrapping around you before your mind goes blissfully blank and unconsciousness claims you. 

+++

You wake up in the cache. 

Dust motes dance in the sunlight streaming in through the broken windows. The light is soft, definitely not the early morning glow from before you left the comfort of your cabin and you wonder how long you were out. With a groan, you try to sit up. Your body is stiff, every muscle in your body aching with the effort you took to banish Alioth. Wincing, you swing your legs out of the makeshift bed, the effort taking your breath away and you can feel the sickly creep of nausea climb up your throat. 

A low voice cuts through the haze. “Take it easy.”

Logan. 

You blink, trying to adjust your eyes to the light and find him sitting on the floor, one leg pulled up to his chest as a bottle of whiskey hangs between his fingers. He takes a long pull and wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. 

“How long was I out?” you ask, your voice hoarse. 

Logan doesn’t answer immediately. He reaches over at a box beside him and then rolls a water bottle towards your feet before he finally mutters, “A day.” 

You accept the bottle with a nod of thanks. Taking a slow sip, you close your eyes as the liquid soothes your throat even as your body protests the movement. You’ve never used your powers to that degree before. Fuck, you didn’t even know you could. A perverse sense of pride licks at the edge of your exhaustion. 

Lowering the bottle, you breathe deeply in an attempt to settle the nausea rolling in the pit of your stomach. You glance at Logan and find him watching you, his eyes sharp, calculating. 

“You owe me some answers. You said you knew me.”

You meet his gaze, the weight of his words pressing down on you. After hundreds of encounters with different Logans, it was never easy explaining to him what you were. For a long time, you didn’t even have a name for it. All you knew was that your consciousness, all your memories, everything that you are moves across different universes and inevitably crosses paths with Logan. It always felt like an invisible string, guiding your soul to his. 

“I’m a temporal nomad.”

Logan’s eyes narrow as he glares at you. “A temporal what?” His tone is laced with skepticism. 

You take another sip of water, giving yourself time to gather your thoughts and push away the throbbing at your temples. “A temporal nomad. I don’t die, not in the way you think, anyway.”

Logan doesn’t move, but you see his grip tighten on the bottle in his hand, his knuckles going white. “You tellin’ me you’re immortal?”

“No, not immortal,” you reply, exhaling slowly. “When I die, my consciousness moves. I reincarnate in a different universe. Eventually I regain everything—my experiences, my memories, my feelings. It’s why—” you pause and take a deep, steadying breath. “It’s why I always find you.”

Your words hit their mark and Logan’s eyes flash with something you can’t quite decipher—shock, disbelief, maybe some anger. He sits up straighter, tipping the whiskey bottle to his lips without breaking eye contact. “You always find me?” he asks, his voice a low rumble. “We’ve met before?”

“I’ve lost count of how many time, actually,” you admit softly. “But in every reality, every universe, I find you. And we’re not just friends, Logan.”

Your words linger in the air between you and your heart pounds loudly in your chest. Logan stands suddenly, the now empty whiskey bottle clattering to the ground. He runs a hand through his hair before scrubbing it down his face, his jaw clenched as he paces within the small space. A mirthless chuckle escapes his lips. “This smells like bullshit, sweetheart.”

Your heart aches at his use of the word sweetheart. It’s one he’s always preferred for you, usually spoken with reverence, like a prayer falling from his lips. Except now it’s casual and cold, something with a sharp edge instead of softness. 

“I know how crazy it sounds. Believe me, Logan, it took me several lifetimes to wrap my mind around it.” You stand, your legs wobbly with the effort and you wince against the pull in your spent muscles. “But I know you.”

His expression hardens. “Yeah? Well, I don’t know you. And if you really knew me, you’d know to stay the fuck away from people like me.” Logan’s pacing grows more hurried, his hands clenching into fists. 

“I can’t,” you say softly, taking a tentative step closer towards him. “And I don’t want to. While I might not know the Logan in front of me or the nuances that make you different from the others, I know you.”

His nostrils flare and he lets out a low growl. “Stop.”

“I know the way you fight,” you continue, ignoring his warning. “I know the way you carry your pain as if no one else can possibly shoulder that weight. I know—”

“Stop!”

“—how you push people away to protect them, but that deep down you hope someone will push back. You may carry a lot of self loathing, Logan, but even you know you’re not heartless.” 

Logan’s fist slams into the wall behind him, the sound reverberating in the small room. He stands there, chest heaving, his knuckles bleeding from where they made contact with the rough wooden planks. You watch as the raw skin knits itself back together, his head hanging low. 

His jaw clenches as he wipes the blood from his hands, his breathing still ragged and posture rigid, itching for a fight. He glances over at you, his expression softer but still rough. 

“We’re done here,” he growls, but his voice soft, more broken than angry. 

Logan turns without another word and all you can do is watch him leave.

+++

You spend the rest of the morning dozing in bursts of fitful sleep, your confrontation with Logan taking its emotional toll. Your eyes burn with unshed tears and for the first time in your life, you feel as if you’re destined to wander this universe alone. 

But you can’t think about it. 

Not now. 

Ignoring the ache in your limbs, you pack up what supplies you can and ready yourself for the walk back to your cabin. The sun is a couple of hours from setting, the world bathed in golden light, when you set out. Walking down the steps, you pause at the distant crunch of boots on the gravel. You feel your pulse thrum in your chest as the sound gets closer and then he steps into view, his eyes locking onto yours. 

Logan. 

The sight of him standing there fills you with a rush of conflicting emotions. Relief, angry, anxiety and you’re not sure if you trust yourself to speak first. He looks the same—tired, disheveled, but steady and strong all the same. Neither of you moves, unspoken words hanging between you.

“I shouldn’t’ve left,” he says finally. 

For a moment you say nothing. Because it’s exactly what you want to hear from him. Except, because you’re beyond exhausted, mentally, physically and emotionally, you say, “No, you fucking shouldn’t have.” 

There’s definitely more bite in your tone than you intended, but the release of some of your pent up anger feels so good you can’t bring yourself to care. 

Logan’s eyes narrow as you move past him and keep walking. “Wait, so I come back here to apologize,” he begins, following close behind you, “and now you’re gonna just walk away?”

“You know, you never even thanked me for saving your ass,” you say, side stepping a downed log. “Just started demanding answers and then tucked tail and ran when you didn’t like what I had to say.”

He grabs your wrist and you stumble into his grasp, your breath hitching in your throat as you stand almost chest to chest. “I didn’t fucking ask for any of this!”

His anger bleeds into you, curling around your skin where his fingers press into your pulse point. You feel your nostrils flare and you’re itching for something to hit as you stare up at him, his jaw clenched. Your heart pounds wildly in your chest and you know you need to reign in your emotions or you’ll ignite the fuse between you. 

“You think I did?” you ask, pulling your arm from his grasp. Your voice is calmer, but just as sharp. “You think I want to relive the grief of mourning you over and over while also finding something new to love about you? You think I wanted to be banished to the Void all because my soul just can’t die when I do?”

Logan’s expression softens and he scrubs a hand down his face, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Look. I’ve had a shitty coupla days here. And you’re saying a lot of shit I don’t understand.”

He seems weary, then, and any remaining anger you harbor towards him dies in your veins. You take a deep breath in and blow it out slowly. “You don’t have to understand right now. Just—just trust me. Please?”

You hate how your voice breaks just a little.

Logan nods then, the barest tilt of his head, but it’s enough.

He continues to follow you through the woods back towards the cabin and for a while neither of you speak. It should feel awkward, especially now, but it doesn’t. You’re so used to his brand of stubbornness and reluctance to see what’s right in his face that this is the most at home you’ve felt since you got here. 

“So,” you start after a few minutes of silence, “how did you end up here?”

Logan huffs. “Some asshole in red spandex dragged me here and I said I need to help save his universe.”

“And can you?”

His step falters and you pause to look a him, his gaze fixed somewhere beyond the trees. “I couldn’t save mine.” The weight of his words linger, heavy with a burden only he alone has been shouldering. He doesn’t meet your eyes as he brushes past you and keeps walking. 

“Wanna talk about it?” you ask, catching up with him.

Logan growls. “No.”

“Alright, maybe later then,” you reply and he simply ignores you and keeps on walking. “Where’s this asshole friend of yours?”

“I left him tied up in the van.”

You had long passed the spot where you found Logan by the beat up van and the road was deserted. Based on the subtle smirk on his face, you figure Logan already knows that. Whatever his relationship is with the stranger, he seems somewhat happy to be rid of him and you don’t push him further. Although, you can’t help but wonder what happened to the van and whose hands it fell into. 

Logan’s gait slows as the cabin comes into view through the trees. He follows behind you as you clear the space, checking for any stragglers that may have come along while you were gone. Pushing open the door, you watch as he looks around, taking in the small space. 

“You’ve been living here?”

“I wouldn’t exactly call it living, but sure,” you comment, throwing your backpack on the table as you sit down. You can’t help the groan that escapes your lips as your muscles relax. “You can stay here if you want. I didn’t just let you follow me for your sparkling personality, you know.”

Logan actually laughs at that as he sits down on the small couch. His face lightens up, eyes crinkling just a bit at the corners, and for the first time since you found him, he seems unburdened. A blossom of hope grows in your chest and you grasp onto it, holding tight to the one bit of light you’ve had in this month of darkness. 

“Thank you,” he says softly. 

You know he means for more than the offer to stay and you return his smile with one of your own. “You’re welcome.”

As the sun starts to dip below the horizon, you bring out some extra blankets and a couple of pillows and help Logan turn the couch into a makeshift bed. You turn to leave when you hear him ask, “You really find me in every universe?”

“Yes.”

“That sounds terrible.”

You give him a small smile as you lean against the doorframe to the bedroom. “Oh, it’s not all that bad. I get to fall in love with you all over again.”

+++

You wake in the middle of the night to the sound of low, panicked growls coming from across the room.

You quietly slip from the bed and tiptoe towards the couch. Logan writhes beneath the sheets, pain etched across his face as he wrestles the demons in his sleeping mind. Taking a deep breath, you center yourself and focus every fiber of your power in his direction, hoping the waves of calm can break through whatever battle he’s fighting deep in the recesses of his mind.

Logan growls deep in his throat, the sound guttural and raw, his claws unsheathing and tearing at the sheets beneath him in agitation. A fine sheen of sweat beads along his brow and pieces of hair are plastered against his damp forehead.

“Logan,” you say softly, trying to break through the fog of his nightmare. “You’re safe, Logan.”

Your powers are waning, the stress of fighting off Alioth having left you depleted. You push down the ache, the tug in your brain demanding that you draw back, and instead kneel down in front of him, trailing your fingers across his palm and over the pulse point in his wrist. He jerks at your touch, his claws coming close to your skin, but the contact is enough and you feel his pulse slow beneath your fingertips.

You continue to speak in hushed tones, your voice barely above a whisper. “There you go, Logan. I’m right here. I’ve got you.”

Logan’s breathing is ragged, his eyes squeezed shut. You can feel the tension in his body, his muscles rigid with the need for release. You keep your fingers against his wrist, your touch steady and calming, as you bring up your other hand to smooth the lines along his brow.

“There you go,” you continue to murmur, “Focus on my voice. Focus on my calm.”

Gradually, his growls subside and his breathing begins to even out as the nightmare loses its grip over him. His muscles lose their tension and relax and the frantic movements of his limbs subsides. With one final deep breath, he stills, his claws retracting and he settles back into a peaceful sleep.

You sit and watch him for a minute, taking in all of his features and simply admiring him for the first time since your last life with him. This Logan is different—they all are in their own way—but this one a little more than the others. He seems wearier, more worn down, his usual scowl lines etched deep. There’s an exhaustion in his eyes, too, you haven’t seen before and you wonder if this Logan actually ever rests. 

As you stand, you feel his fingers circle loosely around your wrist and give a small tug. You look down to where he’s touching you, his skin hot against yours, and you glance up to find him staring at you through half lidded eyes. 

“Stay.” It comes out in a low whisper and as you open your mouth to protest, he adds, “Please.”

You could never deny him in any universe.

The couch is barely wider than he is, yet he shifts to make a sliver of space for you to slot yourself into. It should be awkward, the way you press yourself between the couch and the solid warmth of his frame, but it’s not. You hitch your leg over his hip, forcing your legs to tangle, as you rest your head against his chest. His heartbeat is strong and comforting beneath your ear and you find yourself quickly relaxing into his touch.

As you fall asleep, you feel his arm curl around you, tucking protectively against your ribs.

+++

When morning breaks, you’re alone. The warmth of his body is gone and you find yourself shivering. Pushing to sit, you wrap a blanket around yourself before standing up. 

The cabin is empty.

You try and ignore the sliver of panic that threatens to slip its way down your spine. 

Opening the front door, you pause when you find him sitting on the dilapidated porch, staring absently out at the trees. He glances up at you and watches as you sit down beside him. You hug the blanket closer around your shoulders and sit with him in silence.

You don’t mention last night.

“So,” you start, “what’s the plan?”

Logan raises his eyebrow. “You planning on stickin’ with me?”

“If you let me,” you reply with a smile.

You listen as Logan explains the events of the past couple of days, including Wade’s abduction of him from his own universe and how they both became to be bloodied and battered in the van. Your ears perk up when he mentions Paradox and returning to Wade’s universe. 

“You think he can actually get back?” you ask, willing yourself to not hold onto too much hope. 

Logan huffs. “Probably not.” 

“And yet you’re out here trying to think of a way to find him,” you say. “Why?”

A frown tugs at Logan’s mouth and he looks down at his hands. Eventually, he reaches into the pocket of his suit and pulls out a crumpled Polaroid. He tilts it towards you and you look down at the group or smiling people. “He’s got something to go home to,” he says, thumbing the edge of the photo. “I got nothin’.”

There’s something soft in his gaze as he looks down at the photo, some lingering hope he’s too afraid to put words to. 

“I’m sure you have something, Logan,” you say quietly. 

His expression hardens then, jaw tightening, as he slips the photo back in his pocket. “Had. Past tense.” Logan stands then and looks down at you. “Get ready. We’re leaving in five.” 

+++

You get ready quickly, changing your clothes and splashing water on your face before making sure your pack was sufficiently stocked. You were hoping you wouldn’t be needing it for much longer, but you didn’t want to express that thought out loud. Despite Logan wishing to go back to find Wade, you knew he wasn’t convinced this would end well.

Logan’s already started down the path as you jog down the cabin steps, swinging your pack up onto your shoulders. Catching up with him, you hand him the Pop-Tart you pulled out earlier. “Breakfast? They’re unfrosted, because this is the Void, but it’s something.”

He looks down at you, a strange expression on his face, but he accepts your offer. “Thanks,” he says, taking a bite.

“So, where exactly were you headed when you both decided to maul each other silly?” you ask, keeping pace with him as you walk through the woods.

“Johnny had mentioned a resistance out in the Borderlands,” Logan answers, swallowing the bite of Pop-Tart. “Figured we might find some people who could help us get control over Cassandra.” 

You nod. “You’re not far from the Borderlands. Maybe four or so miles from he cache. I haven’t ventured out that far, but I’ve heard there’s a few outposts where others have hunkered down.”

“Then that’s where we go.”

You walk in comfortable silence, leaving Logan to his thoughts as you travel further away from safety and into the unknown. You stop at the cache briefly, pausing only snag a few water bottles before moving on. 

A couple of miles past the cache, Logan suddenly stops, sniffing the air. His posture goes rigid, on alert as he slowly moves forward, beckoning you to follow him. A few yards away, the beat up van comes into view, parked alongside a lodging that looks as if it was built into the very earth itself. 

Logan’s arm darts out, stopping you. “Stay close,” he commands quietly, stepping cautiously closer towards the structure.

You follow behind him, every sense on alert as you step inside. The place is quiet, but then you hear it—the soft rustle of snoring. And then Logan’s soft, “Ah, fuck me.”

Peering over his shoulder, you find a sleeping Wade spread eagle on the bed. Logan side steps the bed, ignoring the sleeping man, and begins rummaging through the place. Finding a bottle of whiskey, he groans in delight, twisting the cap off and taking a long pull. 

“Really Logan?”

He quirks an eyebrow at you, wiping at his mouth with the back of his hand. “What else would you like me to be doing?” he asks, biting. 

“You came all this way to find him and now you’re gonna just drink?” you ask in disbelief. It gnaws at you, his indifference. You can feel little frissons of indignation licking at your skin and you have to tamp down your emotions before they bleed into him. 

Logan shrugs. “He’s asleep. I ain’t draggin’ him anywhere.”

You cross your arms, glaring at Logan in frustration. “I didn’t follow you here to watch you stand around and get drunk. Wake him up.”

He gives you a sidelong glance, his brow furrowing. You don’t relent, your stare pointed as he takes another long pull from the bottle. Muttering to himself, Logan makes his way over to the bed and gives it one swift, forceful kick. 

Wade jolts awake with a loud, exaggerated snort. He looks between you and Logan, his eyes finally settling on you. “Who’re you?” he asks, looking around as if expecting an answer. “When did the script get rewritten?”

You look at him quizzically, your eyebrow raised. “Who are you talking to?”

Wade huffs. “The audience,“ he says, gesturing towards the wall.

“Does he do this often?” you ask Logan in a whisper.

“Hasn’t stopped since he fucking dragged me here,” Logan replies. 

Your attention is diverted as Wade suddenly rolls from he bed, crossing the room and two large strides. He unsheathes one of his katanas, pressing himself against the wall and then he’s pinned on the ground as a woman pulls a blade of her own. After a moment, she lets Wade up and two more people follow into the room behind her. 

Logan eyes each one with suspicion as introductions are made and you can feel the tension growing within him as he continues to drink.

You jump as Gambit uses one of his playing cards to burst the bottle of whiskey in Logan’s hands. Logan ignores your pleading look and Wade’s admonishment as he grabs another bottle with a soft, “Boo boo boo.”

When Laura enters, you feel Logan’s interest pique, something heavy weighing on him. They both look towards one another, taking each other in and you don’t miss the recognition in Laura’s eyes.

“Do you know her?” you ask Logan, sliding closer to him.

Logan shakes his head. “No. But Wade’s Logan does.” He takes another long drink from the bottle, eyes still trained on her.

Wade continues to talk with the group, recapping their time in the Void and how they managed to escape Cassandra’s lair. Logan punctuates the conversation with vitriolic quips of his own, drinking more as Wade tries to get the group to form a team.

You try to send your power Logan’s way, trying to bleed into him some calm, but he shakes his shoulders and brushes you off. “Don’t fucking bother, sweetheart.”

“I can help you, Logan.”

“Yeah, well, I didn’t ask for it.”

As Wade rallies the group into a cohesive unit, gaining their support in taking down Cassandra, Logan huffs a bitter laugh. “You’re all fucking dead.”

“Oh, my god, read the room,” Wade chides. 

+++

Logan storms off, one bottle of whiskey fisted in each hand. You want to follow after him, but Wade stops you. “Let him go, cupcake. Peanut’s in a fragile state and you’re too pretty to become mincemeat.”

You shoot a glare at him and brush his hand away from your shoulder. “No, he only seems to sink his claws into you,” you bite back, but the anger leeches from your voice. 

“Spicy,” Wade comments, “I like you. The script editor worked overtime on you, I can tell.”

“Yeah, well the jury’s still out over here,” you say, but you can’t help the twitch of a smile tugging at your lips. 

You glance over at the door and feel Wade sidle up beside you. “Seriously, cupcake. Chasing after him is like trying to catch a raccoon with rabies. Might be fun, but it’s not worth the bite.”

“Oh yeah?” you ask, peering over at him, “And how long have you known him?”

Wade pretends to look down at his wrist and taps a non-existent watch. “Four days, six hours and thirty-two minutes,” he says with a smirk, “but I don’t really like to put a timestamp on friendship."

With a groan, you plop down on the bed and rub at your temples. “Is everything a joke with you?”

“Mostly,” he chirps with a grin. He leans back against the wall and crosses his arms as he watches you. “But I have been known to press pause occasionally.” Wade regards you for a moment, a slight tilt to his head. “Honey badger does it for you, huh?”

Sighing, you lay back on the bed and stare up at the ceiling. “I have followed Logan through millennia, Wade. I can’t remember a time anymore where I haven’t loved him.”

“His mutant dick that good, huh?”

You half laugh, half snort and shoot him a pointed look. “Not everything is about sex, Wade.”

“Agree to disagree,” he says with a shrug. “We’ve all got emotional baggage, mine is definitely over the free to fly limit, but that guy? Literal mountains. Centuries worth, even.”

“Exactly,” you say, sitting up. “I’ve helped him carry more than you can imagine. Logan may push people away, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t need someone to stay.”

Wade cocks his head, considering your words and his expression softens. “You know running after him isn’t going to fix him.”

“I’m not trying to fix him,” you reply. “He just needs to know someone is there for him.” 

“Well, it’s your funeral, cupcake,” he says with a sigh. “I promise I’ll give a really moving eulogy. But, I do think if anyone is gonna convince tall, dark and brooding out there to join us, it’s you.”

You give him a soft smile as you stand. “Thanks, Wade.”

“And just so you know,” he calls after you, “I’m open and willing to being your mutant dick rebound.”

You roll your eyes and walk out the door.

+++

You step outside and see Logan sitting by himself in front of a fire not too far from the lodging. Walking quietly, you stop when you see Laura approach him and sit along side him. You’re close enough that you can hear their words—hear Logan tell her about the suit, about how he found the X-Men, his friends, dead. 

The anger, the loathing, this Logan carries comes into focus and you can’t help but wonder how long he’s lived with this weight upon his shoulders. Suffering alone with only the bottom of a bottle to quiet the thoughts that scream in his mind.

As Laura eventually leaves, she catches your eye and gives you a small nod.

You feel a strange kinship with her. She too has memories of a Logan who no longer exists and who is radically different from the one she has now. You wonder what she’s thinking and have half a mind to follow after her when you hear Logan call out, “I know you’re there.”

You turn back towards where he remains sitting in front of the fire, the whiskey bottle now more than half gone. Closing the gap between you, you sit down alongside him and watch as he continues to stare down into the fading fire.

“How much did you hear?” he asks, taking a large swig from the bottle. 

“Enough,” you answer simply.

Logan grunts and takes a long pull from the bottle, his lips glistening as his swallows get sloppy. “Well, now you know. I’m the worst Logan,” he almost spits, his tone dark and bitter. “You drew the short straw with me, sweetheart.”

“You know I don’t think that,” you say softly. 

Logan doesn’t respond and instead finishes the rest of the whiskey, tossing the bottle somewhere behind him. Scrubbing a hand down his face, he looks over at you. “You actually gonna join them tomorrow?”

“Are you?”

“It’s a fucking suicide mission,” he answers. “You want to walk up to your death, be my guest.”

“If you’re so convinced this is a suicide mission, why don’t you want to go?” you counter, his ire beginning to bleed into the space between you and creep uncomfortably along your skin. “You afraid you might come face to face with actual death and realize that’s not really what you want?” 

Logan’s gaze flicks up to your face, his eyes dark, dangerous. “You’re fucking pushin’ it.”

“Good! Someone fucking should be!” you exclaim, standing from the fallen log. Maybe Wade was right—maybe this was futile. In every universe Logan could be a stubborn ass, but this one was particularly obstinate. “Do you really believe you’re so unredeemable, Logan? That you’re just a vile mutant who doesn’t deserve sympathy after his friends were brutally murdered?”

You can feel his rage boiling just under the surface of the thin veneer of calm. His eyes pierce into you, pinning you in place as he stands to his full height, his fists clenched tightly. 

“You don’t know shit about me, sweetheart,” he growls. 

Anger simmers in your veins, threatening to burn you from the inside out. “Oh fuck you, Logan.”

He takes a step closer, his eyes narrowing as his lips curl into a cruel smile. “Yeah, you’d like that wouldn’t you? Me sinking into your cunt while you picture whatever version of me you think I am.” His voice is a low rumble, adding to the tension threatening to suffocate you. 

Your breath catches in your throat at his words, and it isn’t desire that courses through you, but rage. Your skin prickles and his vitriol ignites something deep within you, something hotter and brighter than you’ve ever felt before. 

“After all this time and everything I’ve told you, you honestly believe that’s all I want from you? You’re a fucking pathetic asshole,” you snap, your voice sharp and laced with venom. 

Logan’s expression darkens, the smirk slipping from his face as his jaw clenches. “You got some balls sayin’ that shit to me,” he spits. 

A small part of you is terrified of him, afraid that he might actually snap. Might actually unsheathe his claws and send you onto your next life without ever having truly lived this one. But you know him, you know him. His pain and rage isn’t towards you, but himself. 

You risk a step closer to him, narrowing the space between you and you can feel the heat radiating off of him, mingling with your own fury. “Yeah, well at least one of us has a pair.”

Logan doesn’t have time to react before you channel your powers towards him, unleashing an explosive burst of energy that sends him staggering back. And then you smother him, smother him in thousands of years of memories, thousands of years of every single feeling you had ever felt for him in every universe you’ve known him. 

The weight of your emotional onslaught brings him to his knees, but you keep pushing, switching from your feelings for him to his feelings for you. All the affection, all the love, all the comfort the two of you shared in every version of your coupling across space and time floods his mind. 

You watch as his expression melts from anger into one of overwhelming vulnerability and pain. His hands, still clenched into fists, tremble beneath the weight of your power surging through him. He looks up at you then, his eyes pleading and your resolve breaks. Tears burn in your eyes and trail down your cheeks, wetting your lips as a scream rips from your lungs.  

Your hold on Logan dissipates as you reign your emotions back under control. You stagger on your feet as your power diminishes, your chest heaving with ragged breaths and broken sobs. You can’t look at him, not yet. If you do, you might actually break. So you do something that you never thought you would do—you leave.

+++

Night in the Void is cool, almost bordering on uncomfortable like everything else in this godforsaken place, but for once it doesn’t bother you. You gaze up at the sky, the haze of distant stars and planets blurring together the more you try and focus on just one. 

You’ve always loved looking at the stars. There was a comfort in knowing you could look up at the sky and see the same constellations in every universe, that there was always one constant among all the variables. 

You don’t know how long you’ve been sitting before you hear the crunch of his boots on the earth, dried leaves and twigs snapping under his heel. Logan joins you on the ground, sitting with a heavy sigh. The maelstrom of emotions swirling within him bleeds into the space between you and you can feel it, thick and heavy and suffocating. 

You risk a glance at him and he looks…defeated. His eyes are red-rimmed and raw and you see something in those hazel eyes you rarely see—fear. Not fear at you, although your guilt would rather have you believe that, but fear of himself, fear of feeling what you’ve shown him. Logan’s breath is slow, controlled, but you can hear the slight tremor in it. 

“I promised myself I would never use my powers on you” you start, your voice barely above a whisper. “I know what it feels like to experience that onslaught. It feels like drowning.” Your voice cracks and you fight to keep the guilt burning in your chest from consuming you whole. “And that was just a fraction of what we’ve felt across lifetimes, Logan.” 

Logan stays silent but gazes at your face, eyes flicking across your features, drinking you in. The scrutiny makes you shiver. Before you isn’t The Wolverine, the X-Man people in his universe loathe, but a man left raw and vulnerable. 

“You shouldn’t have done that,” he says slowly, his voice rough as the words are pulled from him. “You shouldn’t have shown me that.”

You flinch, the weight of his words are a punch to your gut. “I know,” you whisper, wiping tears from your eyes. “I know and I’m sorry, I—”

Logan cuts you off with a shake of his head, his eyes now locked onto yours. “I already knew, sweetheart,”he murmurs, his voice low. “You feel like—you feel like home.” 

Your heart stutters in your chest and for a moment you can’t breathe. The words hang between you, heavy and raw, the sound of them something you’ve been craving to hear. 

“I am your home,” you reply softly. 

Logan shifts beside you, closing the space between you as he slips his hand behind your neck and pulls you in. His mouth crashes to yours, his kiss urgent, rough and desperate. 

You reach for him, gripping his shoulders as you kiss him back, the Void slipping away. There’s only the heat of his mouth, the rough scrape of his beard against your skin, the way his other hand tugs at your waist in an attempt to pull you closer. 

It’s messy and intense and you don’t want it to end. Logan kisses you like a man starved, like you’re his last breath of air. 

A whimper falls from your lips as he finally breaks the kiss, resting his forehead against yours. You’re both breathless, his nose softly nudging yours. 

“Please come with us tomorrow,” you whisper against his skin. “Let me take you home.”

He nods once and that’s all you need. 

+++

The morning comes quicker than anyone would like. 

Nervous energy bleeds through the group, everyone knowing they’re on the precipice of life or death, that this may be the last day they ever inhale air into their lungs or feel the warmth of the sun on their skin.

Logan’s quiet, already tucking into Gambit’s liquor, as you sit down beside him. He looks down at you briefly, taking a long long pull before offering you the bottle. You take it from him and take a swig of your own, the amber liquid burning a path down your throat. 

“What are you thinking?” you ask, handing him back the bottle.

He stares down at his feet, swirling the liquid around in the glass. “I honestly don’t even fuckin’ know.”

You reach for his hand and give him a comforting squeeze. He stares down at you for a moment and then drags his gaze up to your face. “Whatever happens Logan, I’ll be right there with you.”

Final preparations complete, everyone piles into the van, you tucking alongside Logan in the hatchback. The ride is mostly quiet, punctuated only with the few occasional quips by Wade just to ease the tension. You brace yourself, gripping Logan’s calf as Blade sends a rocket launcher through Cassandra’s front gate and Elektra floors it through the explosion. 

The others leave the van first, forming a line of defense. You look up at Logan and lean forward to press the faintest of kisses against his lips. His fingers curl around your neck and pull you closer, deepening it just enough to taste your mouth. 

“Let’s go,” he murmurs, pulling back. “Stay by me.”

You swallow hard, loathe to let him go, wanting to stay in the perceived safety of the van, but you simply nod and follow him to join the others.

Fighting erupts all around you and you stick as close to Logan’s back as you can. It’s a symphony of chaos—rage, fear and determination all swirling heavily in the air. You feel your power thrum underneath your fingertips as you channel those emotions back towards whoever Logan is fighting, hoping to disarm them—even if temporarily—with their own vitriol in an attempt to give him an advantage. 

The air burns in your lungs as you move through the fight, your mind spinning as you gain distance towards Cassandra’s lair. You can see the others move around you—Elektra and Blade slicing down enemies with their blades; Gambit disarming others with his explosively charged playing cards; Laura fighting in a style all her own, yet so much like Logan’s; and Wade cutting down others like he’s having fun.

A clear path opens up to the ramp leading up to Cassandra and the others swarm behind you, allowing yourself, Wade and Logan to break free from the melee. Logan looks back at you just long enough for you to see the fear in his eyes. You try and remain stoic, even though your mind is racing with all he the ways this could go wrong, and give him a small nod of encouragement. 

You stop short in front of Cassandra as she sits sipping tea, seemingly disinterested in the battle happening just outside her stronghold. “You two escaping I could live with, but coming back willingly…” she trails off, “Boys are so silly.” Her eyes dart towards you. “And you brought a friend!”

“I just need to get home,” Wade says, his tone serious. 

“I’m afraid that’s not an option.”

Cassandra flicks Wade aside effortlessly and Logan’s instantly on alert, claws extended at his side. You attempt to direct your powers at her, trying to defuse the anger simmering below her surface. She rolls her neck and glances at you, intrigue in her eyes. 

“Oh, aren’t you interesting,” she says, effortlessly flicking your powers aside. “I wonder what treats you have hiding in that mind of yours.”

Cassandra steps closer to you, her calculating stare flicking over your face. She lifts one hand up to you and from behind her, Logan growls and moves to attack. You watch, powerless, as she pins Logan to the ground with his own claws. 

She tsks and looks down at him, “That’s enough out of you.”

And then, she’s in your mind, every nerve ending in your body on fire, ready to consume you whole. 

You’re standing in a library, Cassandra at your side. Shelves extend as far as the eye can see, fading into an infinite distance. You walk aimlessly along the shelves, pausing at the entrance of a room simply titled “Logan”. 

“Oh, now this is something,” you hear Cassandra say from beside you. “This is quite the collection you have.”

Your fingers reach out and touch the spines, the briefest flickers of memories emanating from their covers. “I’ve known him for so long,” you murmur. “Been with him through so much.”

You pause in front of one book, the urge to open it nearly overwhelming. Pulling it from the shelf, the pages flutter open and you gasp, the memories of that life flooding your brain. 

You and Logan were married in this life. He worked a simple job, construction. There were no X-men, no missions, no danger. He kept his mutation a secret, showing only you when the memories got too rough, too unmanageable. You were his anchor. You had two kids—girls. And oh, how he loved them. Both of them wrapped effortlessly around his heart from before they were even born.

Tears spring to your eyes as the warmth of those memories flood through you. “I loved that life,” you whisper, putting the book back on the shelf.

“And who wouldn’t?” Cassandra agrees, placing her hand on your shoulder. “So effortless his love for you. So different from now.”

You glance over at her, confusion drawn on your face. False empathy tugs at Cassandra’s sympathetic smile. “Are you even sure he cares for you now? This Logan is so broken, more broken and unloveable than all these other Logans, hm?”

Shaking your head, you try to resist her efforts to batter you, to convince you your soul’s purpose is not worth it. Not worth him. “That’s not true. They’re all worthy. All capable and deserving of love,” you say, your fingers trailing along another spine. “Even this one. Especially this one.”

Cassandra’s face contorts then and…

She’s wrenched from your mind and you fall to your knees, blinking up as you see Wade holding Cassandra from behind, one hand holding Jaggernaut’s helmet to her head. 

Your mind still spins as Logan and Wade confront her, their conversation a jumble in your mind. But you don’t miss her saying either they kill her, or she kills them. Finding the strength to stand, you rise and place your hand on Wade’s arm.

“If I stay,” you start, focusing only on Cassandra and ignoring the press of Logan’s gaze into your skin, “Will you let them go?”

Logan reaches for you and you pull your gaze from Cassandra long enough to press your palm against this chest. You meet his eyes, silently pleading with him to let you continue. 

“Will you?” you repeat, unable to keep the pleading out of your tone.

Cassandra laughs bitterly. “You love him that much? To sacrifice yourself to save him? That Logan, out of all of them?”

You nod, feeling the tears burn in your eyes. “I love him that much,” you reply softly.

Logan grabs your hand then, forcing you to look at him. “Don’t,” he chokes out, voice thick with unspoken emotion, “Don’t do this.”

You smile softly as you reach up and cup his cheek, his beard rough against your palm. You don’t miss the way he briefly nuzzles into your touch, eyes fluttering shut as he sighs. “I love you, Logan. In all my lives, in this one and in the next one, too.” The first tear slips down your cheek as you look up at him. “I promise I’ll find you again, Logan. I always do.”

You press a kiss to his mouth, soft and gentle. It lingers for a moment, a desperate, bittersweet exchange as Logan tries to memorize the feel of you. His hands grip your waist, clutching almost hard enough to bruise, but you relish the pain. 

Wade stands beside you both, uncharacteristically silent, his hands still holding Cassandra in place. His usual banter is gone, the weight of the moment not lost on him. “This is the worst fucking idea anyone has ever had,” he mutters, but his tone is soft. “And I’ve had some pretty terrible ideas.”

Cassandra regards you with a mixture of amusement and curiosity. “If I let them go, you’ll stay here with me in the Void. Be my ally.”

You nod, “Yes.”

Cassandra’s eyes narrow, calculating, weighing her options. Finally she sighs, “Fine. But you know…no one will remember this little sacrifice of yours. The next Logan won’t even know you.”

Logan growls and you squeeze his hand in gentle reassurance. “It’s okay,” you whisper, your voice finally breaking. “I’ll remember enough for the both of us.”

You step away from Logan, your heart shattering with every step. Wade lets go of Cassandra and you feel the weight of your decision settle heavily against your shoulders. 

Cassandra pulls something from her pocket, slipping it onto her fingers. Before you, a portal opens up, just outside the boundaries of the room. Outside, the raging storm that is Alioth grows near and in that moment, you realize Cassandra was playing a game of her own.

“I figure,” she says, straightening the lapels of her jacket, “that they have approximately four seconds before they’re through.”

Your eyes flick to Logan and you memorize every detail, every emotion written across his face. With one final nod, he tears his gaze from you and he runs towards the portal, Wade alongside him.

And then, darkness consumes all.

+++

You’re unsure how long you’ve been out. The last thing you remember was Alioth screaming towards you, giving you barely enough time to cocoon yourself from his rage.

Cassandra is gone.

Wade is gone.

And Logan—Logan is gone.

You open your eyes and find Remy standing above you. He offers you his hand and helps you to stand. “C’mon, chère,” he says, nodding towards the open portal behind him, “Let’s go home.”

You’re not sure where home is any more, not without Logan, but you don’t have the strength to argue. From the moment you wound up here in the Void, you’ve been looking for a way out. Now that you have one, you know you need to take it. 

Accepting Remy’s hand, you join him through the portal.

You stumble into a familiar room and are greeted warmly by a smiling TVA agent. She’s unlike the first TVA agent you met, her presence comforting as she says your name. “We heard you’ve had quite the adventure.” She looks over towards Remy. “Mr. LeBeau, if you’ll follow this agent here.”

Remy leaves with he other agent, turning towards you with a wink. “Enjoy your man for me, yeah?”

Your heart flutters in your chest and you look towards the agent, trying to suppress the hope you feel in your chest. She smiles and rests a comforting hand on your shoulder. From her pocket she pulls out a small device, pressing a few buttons on the pad. Before you a different portal opens and she gestures towards it.

“Welcome home.”

+++

You stand in front of the apartment door and hesitate before knocking. Your nerves flutter uncomfortably in your belly even though it’s been less than two days since you last saw Logan in the Void. But you’re out now—you both are—and the fear nags at you that maybe this isn’t what he wants. That you aren’t what he wants. 

You stuff that thought down with a shake of your head. Raising your hand, you rap against the door three times and let out a shaky breath. When he opens the door, you feel as if the air has left your lungs and you forget to breathe. Your heart aches at the sight of him. 

Logan stops short, his face falling into one of pure disbelief and all he can do is stare at you.

“Is that my stripper?” you hear Wade call from farther into the apartment. Logan continues to stare at you as Wade pops up behind him, his face lighting up in surprise. “Oh, hey cupcake! Didn’t expect to—“

“Get out,” Logan growls, turning his head slightly in Wade’s direction, his eyes never leaving yours. 

From over Logan’s shoulder, Wade wiggles his eyebrows. “Ah, looking for some afternoon delight?” he coos, slinging his arm over Logan’s shoulder and patting his chest. “This guy has been jerkin’ it constan—“

You hear the sknit of Logan’s claws as they unsheathe into Wade’s thighs. “Ah, fuck! Fuck!” Wade curses. “You’re supposed to be penetrating her, not me!”

“Get. Out,” Logan repeats, retracting his claws. 

“Fine.” Wade pushes past Logan’s frame, limping slightly as his wounds heal themselves. “You’re lucky Blind Al’s already out playing Bingo. Or selling herself for blow. I don’t actually know her schedule,” he comments as he walks down the hallway. “Glad you’re home, cupcake.”

Logan barely waits until Wade is out of sight before tugging at the hem of your shirt and pulling you towards him. Your gasp dies on your lips as he drags you inside, shutting the door with his foot and pushing you up against the rough wood. Then his mouth is on yours and it’s warm and wet and wonderful. 

His hands cup your face, fingers moving to tangle in your hair and you feel him everywhere. You whine as he nips lightly at your chin before trailing his lips back up your jaw, licking into your mouth as he kisses you deep. 

Your fingers scramble for purchase, fisting themselves into the fabric of his button-down flannel. 

There’s a desperation and urgency bleeding from him, as if he can’t drink you in fast enough, or hard enough, or long enough to satiate the longing that’s within him. And you’re feeling it too, an ache growing deeper in your belly, a need to be consumed by him fully and you whine into his mouth because he’s not nearly close enough to you.

A thigh slips between your legs as he kisses along your jaw and down the column of your throat, a moan falling from your lips as you greedily seek friction. 

“I can’t believe you’re here,” Logan husks against your shoulder, pulling your hips harder against his clothed thigh. 

Your hands cup the sides of his face, your fingers scratching lightly against his beard. You force him to look at you, his pupils blown wide. “I always come to you,” you say softly. “I always come home.”

He kisses you softly then, his mouth slow over yours and he drops his thigh from between your leg. You whine at the loss and he pulls back. “C’mere,” he says, grabbing your hand and leading you further into he apartment. “I’m not fucking you for the first time against a door.”

You follow him to the bedroom, your chest heaving with ragged breaths and you can feel the prickle of anticipation along your spine as he turns back to look at you. His eyes never leave yours as he shrugs off the flannel and pulls his t-shirt over his head. Your eyes trace the lines of his chest, the strong definition of his muscles, following the line of hair that leads to the top of his jeans. As you bite your lip, you hear his chuckle, “My eyes are up here.”

“Mmm, yeah they are,” you start, tugging your shirt off and shimmying your pants over your hips, “but the view down there is nice, too.”

Logan reaches for you, his large hands skimming over your hips, over the flesh of your ass and under your thighs, lifting you up and forcing your to wrap your legs around his waist. With an easy flick of his fingers, he’s unclasped your bra and you toss it aside with the rest of your clothes. 

Kneeling on the bed, he lays you down, kissing his way down your stomach, his nose nuzzling along the top of your panties. “Do you have any fucking idea how sweet you smell?” His mouth is hot against your skin and he laughs as you tilt your hips up towards him. “You want me to fuck you with my tongue? Lap at you until you’re seeing stars?”

Molten desire shoots down your spine and you can feel the slick between your thighs. God, the mouth on him was going to be the death of you. 

You prop yourself up onto your elbows and look down at him. “Just fucking touch me already,” you whine, and you hate how desperate you sound. “Haven’t we waited long enough?”

He presses a wet, open mouthed kiss to your inner thigh before dragging his nose along the center of your clothed cunt. You inhale sharply as he kisses over your clit before trailing his fingers along your hip bones and pulling the fabric down. His warm hands palm along your thighs and he opens you up, staring down at you with hunger in his eyes. And then his mouth is on you, his tongue licking a hot stripe through your folds before sucking your clit into his mouth. 

“Oh, fuck,” you moan as his mouth continues to lap at you, pleasure tingling low in your belly and spreading through your limbs.

Logan hums. “Sweetest pussy I’ve ever tasted, sweetheart.” His tongue dips down, collecting the arousal at your entrance. “I could die happy between these thighs.”

You trail your hands down over your chest, briefly palming each breast before you continue down and sink your fingers into Logan’s hair. His groan rumbles through you and you don’t miss the way his hips start to rut against the mattress, seeking friction. 

His mouth and tongue continue to move over you, long, slow licks punctuated by gentle sucks and flicks over your clit and you can’t stop the grind of your hips against his face. You feel his smirk against you as one thick finger finally sinks inside your walls, nudging that spot deep inside that makes you squirm.

Another finger slips inside you and a low whine spills from your lips. 

“You’re beautiful like this, you know that,” he says, voice rough, thumb replacing his tongue against your clit as his fingers continue pumping. “All blissed out and needy and desperate to come on my fingers.”

His words zip through you as he fuck you with his hand and you bite your lip. “C’mon,” he purrs, “let me hear all those pretty sounds you make.”

Soft whimpers spill from your throat as he continues to work you, that pull in your lower belly growing stronger and stronger. His hand never stilling, he kisses his way up your body, pulling a nipple into his mouth and then you’re coming, cunt clenching around his fingers. 

Logan licks into your mouth to steal your cries as he continues to work you through your orgasm. Your thighs clamp around his forearm, the pleasure overwhelming. 

He finally stills, pulling his fingers from you and you whimper at the loss. You watch through half lidded eyes as he licks his fingers clean of your slick and you feel that flame reignite in your belly. 

“Take your pants off,” you demand, breathless, pushing at his chest. 

Logan laughs, but allows you to push him onto his back. “You always so bossy after you come?”

You fumble at his belt, undoing his buckle and unzipping his jeans before shoving them down his hips. “Make me do it again and find out,” you taunt as his cock springs free.

He kicks his pants the rest of the way off and you sit back on your heels and admire him for a moment. Your eyes trail from his broad shoulders, down the contours of his chest and follow that line of hair down his stomach to between his thighs, where his cock stands, thick and ready. 

“I will never get tired of looking at you,” you sigh, raking your nails down his thighs, deliberately not touching him where you know he wants it the most. “You’re so beautiful, Logan.”

Whatever response he has, dies in his throat as you finally wrap your hand around his cock, giving him one long, firm stroke. He’s hot and heavy and you’re aching to feel him inside you. But not yet. Leaning down, your eyes meet his and you trace your tongue along the underside of his cock, tasting the salt on his skin.

“Fuckin’ hell,” Logan curses, unable to stop the thrust of his hips, chasing your mouth. 

You wrap your lips around the head, swirling your tongue over the slit and collecting the precum there before taking as much of him in your mouth as you can. Logan hisses through his teeth, fingers winding their way into your hair to help guide your movements. 

“You’re so warm and wet, sweetheart,” he groans. “But I don’t want to come in your mouth.”

You give him one last stroke as you release him from your mouth and climb up to sit on his thighs. Logan pulls you forward by your hips and you gasp as your cunt slides across his cock. 

“Line me up,” he instructs and you obey without hesitation. 

Gripping him in your hand, you guide him to your entrance, notching him inside before slowly sinking down atop him. A sob chokes in your throat at the thick feel of him inside you, stretching you, making you feel complete. Your entire existence boils down to where he’s joined with you and you relish the burn.

His hands are everywhere as you start to move, caressing your thighs, your hips, up to your breasts and back down, tracing a map on your skin only his fingers can read. Praise falls from his lips in an almost nonstop litany, telling you how wet you are, how tight, how warm, how good you’re making him feel.

“Do you want to know how you make me feel?” you ask, breathless. You look down at him through half lidded eyes and find him just as flushed and wanton as you. “How you’ve always made me feel?”

You continue to rock back and forth on his cock, slow, deliberate movements that leave you wanting, needing more. Logan shifts his hips and finds the leverage to fuck up into you, the deep drag of his cock against your walls making you throw your head back and moan. 

“Fuck,” he growls, his fingers sinking deeper into the flesh of your hips, pulling you somehow impossibly closer. “Show me, sweetheart.” 

You brace your hands against his chest, raking your fingers through the damp hair there, feeling his heart beat beneath your palms. Leaning down, you capture his mouth with yours, the kiss sloppy as he continues to thrust up into you. You move your hands up his neck, your fingers collecting the sweat along his jaw and then, “Feel, Logan.”

It starts slow, an almost faint heat spreading from your fingertips as they ghost over his skin, your power beginning to pulse in time with your heartbeat. Logan gasps and his rhythm falters as the first wave of emotion hits him. You slow, too, your hips barely moving as you run your fingers down from his jaw, over the column of his throat and back to his chest. 

Your palms rest against his ribs as you continue to pour into him all the love and passion he’s ever shown you over centuries. Logan stares up at you in reverence, his face soft as he runs his hands up your sides, over your breasts. He tugs you down towards him, his mouth hovering over yours.

“Do you feel, Logan,” you ask, your breath hot against his lips. “Do you feel how much you love you have in you?”

He draws your bottom lip into his mouth, biting softly once, before capturing your mouth fully, kissing you deep. You hum as his tongue swipes against yours and his fingers tangle in your hair. 

A gasp pulls from your throat as Logan wraps his arms around you and flips your position, forcing your legs around his waist as he begins to thrust into you again in earnest. You feel him deep in this position, each thrust of his cock against your walls hitting that perfect spot inside of you. 

“It’s too much,” he groans into your skin. “Never…never felt like this.”

You rake your nails along his back, relishing in the growl that falls from this throat. “It always feels like this,” you gasp, drawing your power back. 

His arms slide under your shoulders, anchoring you in place as his hips continue to thrust into you. It’s lewd almost, the slapping of skin against skin and the wet noises from where you’re joined. His breath is hot and damp against your skin where his mouth hovers over the pulse point in your neck. 

Your fingers snake into the short strands of hair at the back of his neck and your other hand slips in between your bodies, reaching for your clit. 

“That’s it,” he moans, “use those fingers to get yourself off on my cock.”

You can feel where he’s sliding thickly into your cunt, the wiry hairs at the base of his cock damp with your arousal, and you begin to rub in time with his thrusts. Pleasure zips along your spine, every cell in your body afire at his touch. You feel that telltale tug low in your belly and you know you’re not going to last much longer. 

He slides his hands down from your shoulders, following the curve of your spine, forcing you to arch your back. Taking the opportunity before him, he swirls his tongue over one nipple, then the other as he palms the flesh of your hips in his hands, angling your hips further up into his. A keening whine falls from your lips as he somehow thrusts deeper into you, making your legs shake. 

Logan nudges your hand away from your clit, replacing your fingers with his own as he pushes you closer and closer to the edge. His eyes are focused on the sight of his cock thrusting into you and the slick smeared across your thighs. 

“Logan,” you gasp, “I’m so close.”

“I know, sweetheart,” he rasps, dragging his gaze up to your face, “I got you. Takin’ me so well, so tight. Gonna spend the rest of my life tellin’ you how fucking good you are.”

His words tip you over the edge, your orgasm rolling through you as you spasm down on his cock, his name falling from your lips. He fucks you through your orgasm, each thrust of his hips sending aftershocks of pleasure along your limbs as he chases his own release. Logan’s thrusts grow erratic and you reach for him, grasping at his forearms, pulling him down to you. 

“Come for me, Logan,” you murmur in his ear. “I wanna feel you come.”

With one final thrust, he comes with a groan, forehead pressed against yours as he spills himself deep within you. You can feel cock spasm as he lazily thrusts through his orgasm, using your body to wring out the last of his pleasure. You hold him close, pressing open mouthed kisses to his jaw as he finally stills within you. 

Careful not to crush you, Logan pulls you to him as he rolls onto his side. He doesn’t pull out, tugging your leg over his hip to keep you close and full. 

You smile up at him, brushing the damp hair away from his forehead. He sighs at your touch, a content sound that tugs at your heart. 

“You really love me in every universe?” he asks softly, brushing his nose against yours. 

“Yes.”

“Even this one?”

“Especially this one.” 

You don’t know what the rest of this life holds, but you do know one thing—wherever he goes, you’ll be right there with him. 

[sunkitty143]

my christmas gift for @zipsunz!! 🎄🎁

i wrote about makoto and ken visiting their parents in february 2010. it's very sad

[ link ]

[korraofthereef]

Name all the Arcane AU fics your know and love (mainly timebomb based if possible)

Like maybe topics of…

- post-apocalyptic

- modern

- role swapping (like pit-fighter Ekko or smth)

- spiderverse crossover

Etc

[kinky-jk]

🍒🍒🫦

──𐙚 well rounded - big tits!reader x boobie obessed JK

────୨ৎ────

content: cockwarming, nipple play, tit play

note from cherry: sorry this is so short anonie who requested, i had no idea what to write ♡ ily!!

────୨ৎ────

Another skimpy outfit laying on your bed when you finally come home from work

Recently, your boyfriend has shown an increased interest in paying attention to your chest,

Buying you little tank tops in the thinest materials, see through lace bras in pastels,

Much like the one laying on your bed right now

Not that you mind, having felt insecure about your larger chest, it feels good to have your man treasure it

You smile while putting on the white lacy tank top, round, heavy breasts on full display, your hardened nipple already brushing against the fabric

Jungkook jumps to open the door to his office when he hears you knock,

"Hey angel" he greets, wrapping his strong arms around your waist,

"Hi baby" you greet back, savoring his lips in a sweet kiss,

He kisses back, "tired?" he asks, resting his forhead on yours

"Mhm.. this top is cute by the way"

His brown eyes flicker down to your breasts, covered in the thin material, he sucks in a breath, immediately moving his hands to cup your chest

"So fucking pretty" he groans, starting to toy with the fat spilling from beneath his fingers, squeezing it with greedy, firm hands

You moan lowly, tipping his head up slightly so he'd move his gaze to yours,

"Thank you kook" you say, smiling tiredly

He responds by giving you a soft kiss,

"Let's go to bed ma, you're so sleepy" his raspy whisper is enough to make you do whatever he wants, laying down comfortably in the soft sheets,

He wraps around you from the side, kissing sweetly up your neck to your ear, his lips softly grazing the skin, hands already moving up to caress your sides,

"let me spoil you pretty, just relax for me" he whispers, slipping his hands under the flimsy top, large palms taking in as much as he can, rounding them upwards

You hum, closing your eyes and relishing in the feeling of his touch, your own hands running down his back

"feels so nice kook.. but, i think i'm too tired for sex" you admit, almost falling asleep at the relaxing feeling of his hands making you feel good, thumbs now rolling over your stiff nipples, pressing on them, rolling them between his fingers

"Don't worry baby, don't feel pressured. Want me to stop?" he asks, halting his hands momentairly and kissing your cheek softly, his eyes shining with sincerity

You give him a lazy giggle, running your hand through his raven hair,

"Nooo feels so nice.. can you put it in please? Just wanna feel you a little longer"

he moans softly at your suggestion, immediately ridding himself of his pants and boxers, pulling your panties to the side and slipping his thick length into your needy heat,

He fills you up so good, resting comfortably inside of your warmth

"There you go ma, just close your eyes pretty, gonna make you relax" his voice is low and soothing, dancing along the skin of your chest, his lips moving over the material to lick at your nipples, lapping at them before lifting your top entirely

His hands cup your chest again, pushing then upwards and using his tongue to lick soft, slow strokes along your nipples

You're sighing, moaning quietly in pleasure and relaxation

He tugs on them gently, rolling it on his tongue and switching to the other side,

"thank you sweetheart" you tell him, stroking his cheek while he looks up from your chest, one breast still in his sweet mouth, lips wrapped around you

"mhmm 'course pretty.. your tits are so perfect, so pretty.. could suck them forever" he whispers, burrying his face in between your boobs, licking the slit while he presses both to his face,

You giggle when he comes back up, kissing his nose,

"You're so cute",

He smiles, nuzzling his nose to yours,

"Careful baby, you're the cute one" he shifts, his cock throbbing inside of you,

"nhhm.. lets sleep.. or i'll tire myself out" you yawn, he agrees, kissing your lips one last time before dirfting off to sleep,

Still holding on your boob with one hand

[oceansssblue]

Perhaps, tech and cross being twins ,,,, chaos vibes.

Perhaps tbb twins and the domino twins getting into trouble together

Mmm... Fun little idea sparkling! ✨😈

Xx, Blue.

PS. Still acepting xmas clone reqs!

"CHAOS COMES IN PAIRS"

– NO ROMANTIC RELATIONSHIP.

– FEATURING: TECH, CROSSHAIR, FIVES, ECHO. 💖

WARNINGS: CROSSHAIR CURSES A LOT. TINY PHYSICAL (PLAYFULL) FIGHT.

"I've found another set" Fives proudly proclaims, stepping into the empty office his brother had chosen to hide in in order to study his eleventh manual of the month without anyone interrupting him.

Too bad; Fives is a man on a quest.

"A set of what?" Echo asks, glancing up at him over his datapad with a suspicious look on his face.

He knows his brother well enough by now to guess Fives is planning something; and he's looking for a partner in crime. No matter how ridiculous his ideas are, Echo has the strange tendency to tag along. Fives has mastered the art of convincing him.

"Another set of twins, brother of mine" Fives almost sings, an excited grin on his lips. "And right in time for Life Day".

Echo chuckles; eyes shinning in recognition. They have a little tradition, him and Fives; each year, on Life Day, they try to prank another set of clone twins. It had started as a silly joke when they were children; with Echo mumbling twins weren't even a rarity in Kamino anymore and a mischiveous Fives trying to cheer him up and stating that at least they should try to make sure they were the coolest and best known ones. It had moved towards a small plan to mess with other twins from time to time –just innocent playfull games, nothing major– and spiraled from there. Nowadays, Fives and Echo's almost eternal twin rivalry was a known funny story in the GAR.

"What company are they in?" Echo asks with interest, for once abandoning his reading and paying undivided atention to Fives.

The clone grins as if he had been waiting for this specific question all the time.

"They're not even on one" he corrects. "Have you ever heard of the bad batch?"

Echo frowns in confusion; trying to figure out where had he heard that before, why it sounded so familiar. Then an image pops in his head; and Echo's eyes widen in surprise.

"They are twins?" He asks in disbelief. "But they're so different!"

Fives laughs.

"Well, it's not obviously "long hair" and the big guy, but the other two... It's just haircut, tattoos and googles, really".

Echo snorts. Fives continues with his monologue.

"Personality and attitude changes one's physique so much, vod'ika. That's why I'm the handsome twin".

Echo rolls his eyes. He turns on his datapad and slumps down on the chair again.

"Alright, Fives. The smart, realistic twin will come get you when he comes up with a plan of action" he deadpans, sarcasm heavy in his tongue.

Fives has to have the last word. After all, he is the annoying one...

"Ah, Echo, you're gonna' make me blush".

"This is fucking discusting" Crosshair hisses, an angry, irritated expresion perked on his face, dragging his feet inside the Batch's barraks.

"For once I find your words completely accurate" Tech agrees, following him.

They're both covered in some sort of red slime. They had been attempting to give a fresh layer of paint to their armours; but someone had replaced the red paint for a stickier substance, and it had been impossible to get rid of it. It somehow stuck to the skin; a viscous, unpleasant feeling they couldn't wait to take off.

Crosshair was the first to jump on the shower.

"What karking material is even this? And who the fuck waisted their time to pull this on us?"

Tech hums while methodically folding his clothes into a pile.

"I suspect this substance is a mix of Naboo's Faera's flower pollen and the usual starch and glue they often use in children's toys" he explains, hopping in his own shower as well. "As for the later... I have two solid main suspects, but I shall slice into Kamino's security system to confirm it".

Crosshair asks him to elaborate and then just listens. Tech jumps into a long argument based on his proofs, knowledge and deductions; and when he finishes, there's a weird smile perched on his face. Crosshair doesn't think he's ever seen that expresion on him; wasn't even aware his face could do that.

"The fuck are you smiling for?" the gray-haired clone snaps.

Tech ignores his sharp tone and suggests "we could always prank them back".

Cross is shocked into silence, not expecting this need for childish revenge to come from his mature, level-headed brother; but he can see a dangerous glint in Tech's eyes through his yellow googles, and the idea sparks excitement in the snipers heart.

"I think it's time for you to show off your brain game, Tech" Crosshair smirks. "This Echo and Fives won't even know what hit them".

Tech dries his body with a towel and quickly slip into his nightglove.

"I'll have a plan by tomorrow".

Crosshair rests in his bunk that night with a satisfied smile on his face. "Fuck those regs" he thinks, right before falling asleep.

Tech hacks into the 501st barraks and unlocks the door for Crosshair; and the sniper uses his quiet stealth to move through the bunks and cuddle piles without being discovered –and in a room full of soldiers, that's saying something–. He carefully places the small stickers on each of the regs' foreheads with a similar haircut to Fives and Echo; replicating the first's only distintive tattoo on everyone else.

When the troopers wake up the next day and start to interact with each other, inmediately mistaking others for Fives a million times –a confused, lost expresion on their faces– Tech and Crosshair are laughing their asses off watching the scene from the safety of their barraks.

"Oh, that was great".

In the screen of their datapad, the real Fives bursts into laughter. The trooper turns to the other Domino; and grins happily.

"Seems like we've got competition this year, vod'ika. We've got work to do".

As always happens with this kind of things, the pranks escalate. In the few days prior to Life Day, the two set of twins find dozens of ways to mess with each other; from hair dye –Fives thinks Crosshair looks fabulous in pink– , to stealing armour –Echo almost suffers a heart attack at that–, and fashionably decorating each others barraks. A bet starts going around; of which pair would pull the last prank before kaminoans force them to stop the circus.

On Life Day, the bad batch twins arrive to the mess hall covered in multicolor glitter –a half irritated, half resigned expresion on their face–; and the Dominos are estatic to see them. Echo is the one who planned this, and Fives executioned it perfectly. Glitter is one of the most annoying things to try to get rid off; and it quickly spreads everywhere.

"Looks like we've got two new shinies joining us for breakfeast today!" Fives shouts, grinning wildly, further teasing them.

Echo has a smug smile on his face as well. Troopers around them snort and laugh in amusement.

"I'm going to kill him" Crosshair hisses, and to be honest, not even Tech feels the need to stop him.

Crosshair tackles Fives to the floor; the reg making a surprised sound before laughing and blocking his puch, twisting the two of them around. Tech inmediately jumps to help his twin, trying to inmovilize the clone from his back; though Echo is quick to intercept him and join the fight.

A small circle forms inmediately around them; new bets being made while everyone cheer for their favorites. They aim for the other twins to get inmovilized and forced to surrender more than to make each other bleed. This is nothing but common clone traditions; playfull fighting.

It's only when the trainers separate them that they're able to properly see the state the four troopers are in; covered in glitter from head to toes, panting slightly. Upon identifying the Dominos, the trainers roll their eyes, walking away; all but one of them, who shoot the four clones a disaproving, annoyed glance.

"Get rid of this new fashion choice" he snaps, glancing at the glitter on Crosshair's hair. "And make sure this is all cleaned up for when I come back. You're all on cleaning duty for a month".

The silver haired clone shoots him an irritated side eye; but they all take the punishment in stride.

When the trainer leaves, Fives turns towards the Batch twins.

"Good prank war, vods" he offers with a satisfied smile.

Crosshair looks them up and down.

"Not to bad for some regs" he condeeds.

Fives draps an arm over Echo's shoulders. They're both sporting matching grins.

"We're the best of 'em. We'll be ARC's in no time".

For the present being, they would enjoy Life Day.

THE END.

[chodzacaparodia]

It's frustrating that you can come up with the plot of an entire fic in just a few seconds, but writing it all down can take anywhere from never to forever.

[the-coffee-fandom]

Had to make a meme to describe me currently

[silversprings-mp3]

YESSSS this is so good!!!! god what i'd give for this exact scenario lol

this time of year

pairing: friend!steve rogers x female reader

summary: you've kept your feelings for your friend, steve rogers, quiet for years—but when you're at the holiday market with your whole group of friends, some things come to light, and you don't think you can keep pretending you don't desperately want him anymore.

warnings: 18+ content (minors dni!!!), fluff, light angst, smut, oral sex (m and f receiving), piv sex, protection, fingering (f receiving), nipple play, multiple orgasms, kissing, making out, dirty talk, praise kink, pet names (sunshine), aftercare, happily ever after—this is probably the most vanilla sex i've written in a while but it's still porn with feelings.

word count: 11.9k

a/n: my first entry for @the-slumberparty's december daze challenge, and it's technically still december 1 where i live (just barely)!!! i used the prompt "Can I put my cold hands up your sweater for warmth?" and had an idea i really liked and just ran with it! i promise most of my december fics won't be 10k+ words—mainly because i don't think i'd survive it 😅 but i hope y'all enjoy this soft and sweet and smutty start to december!! ♡

december daze challenge masterlist

Teasing tingles of chill danced across your skin as the crisp December wind brushed against your cheeks, making you huddle deeper into the warmth of your winter coat. You pushed your hands deeper into your pockets, but it didn’t do much. You’d forgotten your mittens, and your fingers felt nearly frozen. 

It didn’t help that you and your friends had been meandering through one of the city’s holiday market for more than a few hours, the cold of the evening sinking deep into your bones. Unfortunately, there were only so many cups of hot chocolate one person could consume before they made themselves sick, and you’d reached that limit. 

Still, you were having fun—too much fun to complain about the cold or to try to beg off early. That was why you smiled as you watched your best friend, Yelena Belova, duck into one of the market stalls, her green eyes going wide as they raked over the vendor’s display of knives.

You trailed a little slowly behind the rest of your friends—Natasha Romanoff, Bucky Barnes and Steve Rogers—beneath the pop-up tent, distracted by the chill in your fingers as you rubbed them against your body through the material of your coat, trying to get them warm.

The wintry wind cut through the market again and, despite the trembling of your body, you smiled as you breathed in the scent of it. Beneath the pine smell from the evergreen trees being sold at the big tent near the entrance and the swirling richness of buttery baked goods, there was a fresh scent that made you turn your face upward.

Gray clouds were rolling in overhead, blotting out the deep navy of the evening sky, and you knew, deep in your bones, that it was going to snow. A smile curled the edges of your lips and you let your eyes fall closed as you breathed in that fresh scent of oncoming snow. 

You loved this time of year because you loved the snow. 

Everything about it conjured up memories of sitting by a crackling fire, wrapped in a cozy blanket, watching the beautiful flakes fall from the sky and dust everything in a perfect wintry cloak. You could spend hours sitting by a window, watching the snow come down, and you were suddenly looking forward to doing just that once you got home that evening. 

When you finally opened your eyes and turned away from the sky, you found Steve lingering in the entrance of the tent where your friends were browsing, an intensity in his gaze as he looked at you. He didn’t look away when you caught him staring, simply held your gaze, letting you see the heat swirling in the depths of his bright blue eyes.

That heat had begun appearing in Steve’s eyes more and more when he looked at you, and you knew it had started after a certain night at the bar your friends frequented a few weeks prior. But you’d been determinedly ignoring that look in Steve’s eyes ever since that night—just like you’d been ignoring what exactly had happened between the two of you. 

As fast as the memory of that night sprang to mind, you shoved it aside, reminding yourself that there was no use in dredging it up. What you and Steve had done that night had the potential to ruin all of your relationships, and no matter how much you might’ve wanted reenact the night at the bar, your friend group was too important to you to risk it.

Even after years of knowing them, you still felt like your addition to the group was precarious because you’d joined so much later. Steve, Bucky, Nat and Yelena had all known each other since they were teenagers, and you’d only met them in your early twenties. You’d sat near Yelena at your first job after college, and it had been best friends at first sight—or, at first snarky comment, anyway. 

She’d adopted you as her best friend and introduced you to the others since you were new to the city and didn’t know anyone. You’d liked Steve from the moment you met him, but you’d kept a tight lid on your crush since you were more concerned about fitting into the group as seamlessly as possible, and you figured following your feelings would unnecessarily rock the boat. 

Still, despite your intention of taking your crush on Steve to your grave, you couldn’t ignore the way he’d grown into himself as you all had gotten older. 

Gone was the boy-next-door blond hair and clean-shaven face of the man you’d first met. Steve’s hair had darkened and he’d recently let it grow long enough that it was beginning to curl at the nape of his neck. He’d also grown out his beard, keeping it thick but neatly trimmed.

Steve had also, somewhere along the way, learned how to dress his tall form—and do it well. 

That night at the holiday market, he’d worn light gray slacks, a dark charcoal sweater that you desperately wanted to rub your cheek against to see if it was as soft as it looked, and a black wool overcoat. It was an outfit that had you nearly drooling when you’d met up with your friends, unable to tear your eyes away from how Steve’s broad shoulders and trim waist filled out the clothes.

Despite the chill of the evening, Steve hadn’t seemed the least bit cold, and you’d caught yourself thinking more than once how warm it would feel to be wrapped up in his strong arms. Your fingers would never have gotten so miserably frozen if you’d snuck them beneath Steve’s coat or in his pockets…

With a start, you realized you’d been staring back at Steve for a long, lingering moment, and heat bloomed in your cheeks. You didn’t want him to get the wrong idea—though, at that moment, you were struggling to figure out what exactly the wrong idea was—so you ducked your head and pretended like you were bundling deeper into your coat as you made to move past him into the tent.

“Are you alright, sunshine?” Steve asked as you passed him, his hand landing gently on your arm. Even through your coat, you could feel the warmth of his touch; it made you pause and glance up at him.

You realized your mistake immediately. You were too close to Steve—far too close. So close you could smell the rich, masculine scent of his cologne and feel the heat radiating off his body. It made you want to bury your face in his neck and inhale deeply, to wrap yourself up in his warmth until your bones didn’t even remember what the cold felt like.

“I-I’m ok,” you said in a shaky voice, more rattled by Steve’s closeness than the December wind cutting through the city, and you dropped your gaze to the gold pendant around his neck. 

It glinted in the soft light of the market stall, and you remembered it had been a gift from his Irish Catholic mother. You used the memory of Steve telling you about the pendant to ground yourself and your voice came out stronger. 

“Just cold.”

“D’you want some more hot chocolate?” Steve asked, and there was a hopeful note in his tone, like he was offering to get it for you, but you were quick to shake your head.

“Any more and I think my body will be more hot chocolate than water,” you joked, trying to ignore the emotions swirling in your chest like snowflakes on a wintry gale.

When Steve chuckled, you couldn’t help but look back up at him, finding his blue eyes sparkling as he gazed down at you, affection clear in the lines of his face. 

Slowly, his smile eased into something else—something heavier, an expression that was almost yearning. It made the fluttering flakes in your chest swirl more frenziedly while a warmth bloomed somewhere lower, throbbing more to life the longer Steve looked at you with those darkened blue eyes. His expression spoke of things you’d never dare give voice to.

For another long moment, you and Steve just stared at each other, standing too close just inside the canopy of the vendor at the holiday market. A tension you refused to acknowledge crackled in the air around you.

Of their own volition, your eyes dropped to Steve’s mouth, his lower lip looking so soft and pink amid the dark brown of his beard. For what felt like the millionth time in the last few weeks, ever since that night at the bar, you imagined kissing him—how soft his mouth would be, how warm and inviting, and the feel of his rough beard rasping over your cheeks. 

“Hey Steve, c’mere!”

Natasha’s call finally broke the spell that had fallen over you and Steve, and you jumped back, only in that moment realizing how close you’d been. Close enough that when you ducked your head and turned away from him, making your way over to Yelena and Bucky, that you missed Steve’s warmth almost immediately. 

You let out a shaky breath, trying to ease the tension and whirling emotions in your chest, and slid between your friends, who were still looking at the knives on sale. Looping one arm through Yelena’s, you rested your head against Bucky’s shoulder, taking comfort in your friends’ warmth, even if it wasn’t as soothing as Steve’s had been.

“Both of you already have too many knives,” you said by way of a greeting. Your comment made both of them snort derisively, which made you smirk since it had been your intention to get a reaction out of them. 

“There’s no such thing,” Yelena scoffed, tearing her eyes away from a double-edged dagger with an engraved handle to glance sideways at you. Her gaze met yours and then slid over your shoulder.

You followed it to where Natasha and Steve’s heads were ducked together. They were standing near a display of jewelry and you figured Nat was helping Steve pick out a Christmas present for someone, though you couldn’t think of who. You frowned.

“When are you going to put him out of his misery?”

Bucky’s gruff question drew you out of your thoughts of trying to remember someone in Steve’s life who he might be buying jewelry for, and you looked at your friend. Without even seeing your reflection, you knew confusion was written plainly across your face.

“What?” you asked, a little sharper than you’d intended, but you didn’t appreciate the implication that you were making Steve miserable.

Bucky cut his eyes to you, then slid them to Yelena, giving your best friend a pointed look. You spun your head around to your other side in time to watch Yelena’s mouth flatten into a reproachful frown. 

Suddenly, you got the distinct impression that your friends were having an argument about you, though you couldn’t even begin to wonder what it could be about, except that it had something to do with Steve.

It took a moment of silent arguing before Yelena and Bucky seemed to come to an agreement. Yelena looked at you, a gentle expression on her face that made your stomach drop with anxiety—which only worsened when she put her free hand on your arm that was still looped through hers. 

However, before she could voice whatever bad news she clearly had to tell you, Bucky cut in.

“You know no one would be upset if you and Steve dated, right?” he asked bluntly, his eyes intense and searching when you turned to look at him. “We all know you like each other.”

If you’d been drinking hot chocolate at that moment, you would’ve spit it out all over Bucky and the display of pretty decorative knives. 

Thankfully, you weren’t. But you still managed to sputter and open your mouth repeatedly while you searched for the words to address the preposterousness of Bucky’s statement.

“I do not—”

Whatever weak protest you were going to utter was cut short when Yelena blurted, “We know you kissed.”

Sucking in a sharp breath, the snowflakes that had been fluttering in your chest when you’d been standing with Steve sharpened into icy daggers of unease. You whirled on your best friend. “Pardon?”

“I saw you guys at the bar that night—I went back to get my scarf…” Yelena explained quickly, having the good grace to look apologetic, both for what she’d seen and for bringing it up. “I know you’ve liked Steve for ages, even if you haven’t said anything,” she rushed on, as if she thought if she spoke fast enough, it would make it easier to hear. “I was so excited it was finally happening that I blurted it out to Nat and she told Bucky—we were just so happy for you both.”

You floundered again, your mouth opening and closing as you processed your best friend’s words. It was almost too much to take in. Not only did everyone know what had happened between you and Steve that night at the bar, but it hadn’t changed anything. You’d told yourself for years that nothing could happen between you and Steve because it would throw off the whole balance of the group, but something had happened and it hadn’t done anything. 

“I—”

Again, you were cut off, though it was seemingly Bucky’s turn, and your head swiveled back to him on your other side, feeling a bit like a broken bobblehead. 

“He’s liked you too, for what it’s worth,” Bucky said. Your face must’ve conveyed disbelief because he went on. “He’s been talking about you since Yelena first introduced you to everyone, but he didn’t know how you felt,” he said, cutting his eyes to Yelena with the barest hint of a glare, “and didn’t want to make you uncomfortable.” 

Hearing that Steve liked you was officially too much for you to bear. The dawning realization that you could’ve been with Steve without risking your friendships with Yelena, Bucky and Nat was like a yawning, desolate chasm waiting to swallow you whole. You’d lost so much time because you were so afraid of losing them all, and it hurt—it hurt enough that it took you a moment to realize Yelena was talking again.

“We thought someone had finally made a move, but then you guys were pretending like nothing happened,” she was saying, and you turned back to her, your mind so overwhelmed that you no longer felt cold, only numb. “None of us wanted to bring it up because, y’know, I wasn’t supposed to have seen it.” She shot you an apologetic grimace before plowing on, her expression turning gentle again. “You know we’d never stop being your friends, even if something happened with you and Steve, right?”

Your heart was racing, the fear of change quickly eclipsing the fear of losing any more time with Steve. You’d been friends with Yelena, Bucky, Nat and Steve for so long that you couldn’t even imagine what it would be like if the two of you started dating—let alone what might happen if you broke up. Shaking your head, you refused to acknowledge Yelena’s assurance. Even if they’d still be friends with you, nothing would be the same. 

“Nothing happened,” you said vehemently, even as you choked on the words, the lie tasting like ash on your tongue. But you couldn’t seem to stop. “We were drunk, it meant nothing.” 

But then Bucky—blunt, too-perceptive Bucky—broke into your thoughts and pulled you up short with another simple question.

“Are you sure about that?” he asked, his tone not unkind.

You opened your mouth to snap a quick answer, but the ‘yes’ died in your throat. Because of course something had happened, and of course it meant everything.

For the first time in weeks, you gave yourself permission to remember that night. 

You’d tried to forget it—forget the softness of Steve’s lips on yours, forget the heat of his tongue as it slipped into your mouth, forget the pleasant scrape of his beard against your skin and the gentle way he’d held your face as he deepened the kiss. 

Your first kiss with Steve Rogers had been glorious and messy and too short and too perfect—and it had meant everything to you.

But then you remembered what had happened after, the way you’d pulled away, even though you’d been the one to initiate the kiss in the first place, and panicked as soon as your mind had caught up with what you’d done. 

The rest of the memory was a blur, the anxiety of the moment softening the edges, but you distinctly remembered extricating yourself from Steve—which had felt a little like cutting off a limb—before telling him it was a mistake and it couldn’t happen again.

Back at the market, you buried your face in your hands, and almost sobbed at the memory. “I’ve already ruined things,” you mumbled miserably into your frozen fingers, squeezing your eyes shut to keep the tears at bay.

Bucky made a humming noise, as if he was considering your words. “Whatever happened between you two, it hasn’t changed Steve’s feelings for you,” he said, squeezing your wrist gently until you looked at him. He stared at you for a long moment, making sure you heard him. “So my question stands: When are you going to put him—and yourself—out of this misery?” 

Your friends let you sit with that question for a silent moment, then Yelena selected one of the knives, claiming it was an early Christmas present for herself and made her way over to the checkout. 

Steve was also apparently buying something, accepting a small wrapped package from the cashier that he slipped into his pocket. You were too overwhelmed by your thoughts to be curious about it anymore though.

You stood with Bucky near the entrance to the tent, waiting for your friends to finish their transactions while your mind swirled. You were grateful to your friend for leaving you alone with your thoughts, though you knew it was only because Bucky was confident he’d made his point.

And he had. Oh how he had.

Your mind and heart were a mess. You’d spent so many years telling yourself that you could never let anyone catch on about your feelings for Steve, because if they did, it would lead to the end of the friend group. But they’d all known for weeks, and nothing had changed. 

Well, nothing except apparently Bucky and Yelena had taken it upon themselves to play matchmaker. And you wouldn’t have been surprised if Natasha had been in on the ploy as well, distracting Steve purposefully so Yelena and Bucky could ambush you.

Still, you couldn’t fully silence the tiny voice of fear deep in your heart that insisted that if you and Steve got together, and things ended badly, you’d lose all your friends. 

The rest of the group had known each other for so long and it had been more than a little daunting to figure out where you fit. Adding a romantic relationship into the mix seemed like a recipe for disaster—and if it ended so badly that everyone was forced to choose sides, you couldn’t imagine them choosing yours when they’d known Steve so much longer. 

But as you watched Yelena finish paying for the knife, her words about always being your friend came back to you. She was your best friend—and you were hers. As if proving the point, she caught your eye and smiled impishly as she caught up with you, linking her arm through yours and tugging you back out into the market. 

In that moment, something settled in you. Without fully realizing it, you’d always been a little insecure in your group of friends, always worried they would kick you out at the smallest infraction. But Yelena had said it plainly—they’d always be your friends, and you owed it to them to believe her, to trust her, because that was what friendship was. 

That was what you had to do to have any kind of meaningful relationship.

As your group of friends wandered further down the row of stalls at the holiday market, you couldn’t help the way your eyes kept straying to Steve. Each time, you found him either looking at you already, or glancing your way within seconds, like he could feel your gaze. 

When you looked at him, really looked at him, you noticed a little bit of hurt in his eyes. There was only a hint of it, like he was trying to hide it from you and everyone elese, but you could see it. 

You wondered, briefly, how you’d missed it, but a part of you knew you’d been seeing it since that night at the bar. You’d just been ignoring it along with everything else swirling in his gaze. 

“When are you going to put him out of his misery?” 

You’d known you were making yourself miserable—of course you had. But the realization that you were making Steve miserable, even as he made a valiant effort to hide it, was what finally made your decision for you about what to do with everything Bucky and Yelena had told you.

No matter how scared you were that things might end badly, and you’d end up getting your heart broken and lose all your friends, you had to trust them when they said they’d always be there for you. You had to trust that Steve knew what he wanted—and that what he wanted was you.

The group came to another stop when Bucky spotted a specialty chocolate vendor and he ducked inside. Nat and Yelena followed him in—the latter giving you a meaningful look as you trailed behind before cutting her eyes to Steve. The message was clear and you nodded, giving her a playful shove that made your best friend cackle as she followed Bucky and Nat.

You stepped toward Steve where he hovered just outside the tent, and he shot you a knowing smile when he caught your eye.

“Still feeling like you’ve had enough chocolate?” he asked in a friendly tone, referencing your earlier joke. His beard twitched like he was trying to hold back a smile and it warmed your heart that he not only remembered the joke, but still found it funny.

The side of your mouth curved up in a lopsided grin, and you inched a tiny bit closer, just barely stepping into Steve’s personal space as you looked up at him.

“Yeah, I’ve had my fill,” you said, keeping your tone light. You took on a considering expression, tipping your head to the side and tapping a finger to your chin as if you were thinking. “For tonight, at least.” 

Both of you laughed, but the December wind cut through the holiday market just then, and it reminded you of how cold your fingers were, especially out in the open. You quickly shoved your hand deep into the pocket of your coat, and Steve didn’t miss the movement, drifting even closer to you.

“Do you have any gloves, sunshine?” he asked in a low, rumbly voice that had warm tingles of delight dancing down your spine, all the way to your toes. 

“No,” you said, shaking your head. Steve had moved close enough that you had to tip your head back to keep looking up at him, and you could feel the heat radiating off his larger body.

His blue eyes were sparkling in the warm, golden light of the market, and you could see the swirl of emotion in their depths that was only there when he looked at you. But there was a crease of concern between his brows, too, and you knew he was seconds away from offering to find you some gloves—or something else that would be chivalrous and perfectly friendly. 

You realized, very suddenly, that if anything was going to happen between you and Steve, anything like what had happened at the bar, you needed to make the first move. Bucky had said Steve had been worried about making you uncomfortable before that night, and you were certain it had only worsened after the kiss you’d shared. 

So, before he could say anything, you blurted the first thing that came to mind.

“Can I put my cold hands up your sweater for warmth?”

Steve’s brows lifted in surprise, and you had to bite your lip to keep yourself from trying to take the words back as soon as they’d slipped out of your mouth. And you were glad you did, because as the moment stretched on, and Steve realized you were serious, his brows lowered and his blue eyes darkened with interest.

“Ya sure about that, sunshine?” he asked, his voice low enough that you knew it was meant for only you. He ducked his head slightly, so he was nearly at your eye level, and held your gaze. “I wouldn’t want you doing anything you might regret.”

The words stung a little, but you knew you deserved them, especially after you’d told Steve that kissing him had been a mistake. So you held his gaze and stepped even closer to him, until there was barely any space left between your bodies.

“I’m sure,” you said firmly, letting Steve see the honesty in your open expression. “I know what I’m doing and I—this is what I want.” You were proud of yourself for only stumbling once, and held your breath as you waited for Steve’s response.

The corners of Steve’s mouth flickered in an eager grin, but he wiped the expression away, like he was worried that if he appeared too excited, he’d scare you away. You felt a pang of regret, and it doubled your determination to show Steve that you weren’t going to panic and run away again. 

Pulling your hands from your pockets, you brushed your fingertips against Steve’s stomach in a silent reminder of your question. 

“Can I?” you asked, your voice breathless with anticipation. 

“Yeah,” he rasped, his eyes molten with heat as he stared down at you. “Go ‘head, sunshine.”

You were cold enough that you didn’t waste any more time, slipping your fingers beneath the hem of Steve’s soft sweater and pressing your frigid fingertips to the warm, smooth skin you found. 

“Fuck, your fingers are freezing,” Steve rumbled, the muscles of his abs contracting beneath your touch like they were trying flee. But before you could apologize and pull away, Steve’s hands flattened over yours outside his sweater, pressing your palms against the hard-packed plane of his abs. “Good thing ya got me to keep you warm, sunshine,” he teased, his voice so full of charm that you melted into him. 

“Yeah, good thing,” you echoed in a whisper, the edges of your mouth curling up into a pleased smile. You shimmied closer to Steve, watching the way his blue eyes sparkled with affection as he held your gaze captive.

He wrapped you up against him, holding you in the loose cage of his warms while your fingertips stroked idly against his smooth skin. You wanted to let them wander further beneath his sweater and explore the wonders of Steve’s bare chest, but you managed to keep the urge in check since you were in public—though it was a near thing.

“You know what I like to do most in the winter?” you asked Steve, breaking the comfortable silence that had fallen over the two of you. The sounds of the market all around you were a distant soundtrack.

“What?” he asked indulgently, squeezing you slightly in his arms.

“Curl up in bed and snuggle on a snowy day,” you said with a sly smile. And then, as if a thought had just occurred to you, you tilted your head to the side. “Hey, is your bed comfy? Do you have a lot of nice warm blankets and good pillows?”

A grin pulled across Steve’s face even though he was fighting it, trying to look like he was taking your questions under serious consideration.

“Y’know, I think it’s very comfy,” he said, giving you a knowing look. He’d obviously picked up on the not-so-subtle cue that you might want him to take you back to his place, and you appreciated that he was sticking to the bit. “But it sounds like you’re an expert, so I think you should come over and be the judge of that.”

An answering grin curved your mouth and you murmured, “I’d like that.” 

Then, before you could let your fear get the best of you again, you pushed yourself up onto your tiptoes, your lips brushing against Steve’s beard as you moved to whisper in his ear. 

You shivered at the physical reminder of the coarse hair rasping deliciously against your cheeks when he’d kissed you and it took a moment to remember what you’d been about to say. When you did, you couldn’t hold in your smirk.

“Did I mention I do my best snuggling naked?” 

“Sunshine.”

The nickname was uttered in a gruff, rumbling rasp, like the sound of a plow on snowy streets. It was so deep and delicious, your toes curled in delight and your mouth pulled into a full-blown grin. 

You barely had time to pull away before Steve was wrapping his hand around the back of your neck and towing you in for a kiss.

Steve’s mouth was wonderfully soft and exquisitely warm and achingly familiar against yours. He wasted no time licking along the seam of your lips, seeking entrance that you happily gave him. 

Your fingers curled around Steve’s sides beneath his sweater, digging greedily into the soft skin at his waist while you kissed him back feverishly, trying to close every gap between your bodies.

“Fuck, how does this feel so much better than I remember?” Steve growled against your lips, his hand on the back of your neck tilting your head just the way he wanted so he could lick even deeper into your mouth. 

Your breathy, delirious laugh was swallowed by his all-consuming kiss, the sound turning into a helpless moan. 

God, he was right, it did feel so much better than you remembered to have Steve’s mouth on yours, and you couldn’t fathom how you’d run away from him before because, in that moment, the last thing you wanted to do was stop. You wanted to kiss Steve for the rest of your life.

“I don’t know, but Steve, please, don’t stop,” you murmured when he finally let you up for air. You tried to catch your breath while he was busy pressing insatiable kisses to your cheek, your jaw, the corner of your mouth, anywhere he could reach without straying too far from your lips. 

Pulling your hands from beneath his sweater, your no longer freezing fingers threaded into the hair at the nape of Steve’s neck, pulling him closer while at the same time pushing yourself up onto your tiptoes again. Your bodies slotted together even more perfectly, and you moaned softly into his mouth as you tugged him in for another kiss.

Steve kissed you harder, holding you tight to his chest like he was afraid that if he let go, you’d disappear on the wintry wind. In turn, you held him just as fiercely, your nails raking through the beard on the underside of his jaw and tugging lightly to bring him closer until he was rumbling a pleased sound deep in his chest.

“Get a room!”

The perfect bubble that had formed around and Steve abruptly popped, the sounds of the bustling holiday market rushing in along with the December chill and you pulled away, your first instinct to worry about what your friends would think. But then you caught the look on Steve’s face. 

He was staring at you with such a blissed out expression, his blue eyes dark and hazy, a pleased smile on his kiss-swollen lips, that you couldn’t help but relax and melt back into him. You took your time to press a sweet kiss to his lips before turning to your friends.

Natasha, Yelena and Bucky all wore matching smug grins. Nat was even popping little chocolate candies into her mouth like she was enjoying the show. 

“Oh no, please don’t stop on our account,” she called to you and Steve, gesturing with her hand for you both to continue. The whole group burst into raucous laughter. 

Cracking up and shaking your head, you buried your face in Steve’s rumbling chest, feeling a little shy about being caught making out so heatedly by your friends. But you felt relief, too, that no one was upset—that all your friends were happy for you and Steve.  

When you’d finally gotten ahold of yourself, you tipped your face up and caught Steve’s eye, giving him a sly smile that had his expression instantly darkening with a hunger that made you pulse with desire. 

“So about that comfy bed of yours…” you murmured, just for him to hear. When he nodded once, quickly, to acknowledge he remembered it, you went on. “I’d love to see it if you’re ready to go?”

The implication of your question was clear and Steve clutched you tighter to his chest, capturing your lips for a brief, hot kiss that did more to warm you from the inside out than any of the hot chocolate you’d consumed that evening. 

“Sunshine, I’ve been ready to take you home for years,” he rasped against your mouth, the honesty in his voice making you smile. 

When Steve pulled away, he tugged you over to your group of friends and told them you were heading home—yes, together, he confirmed. All three of them murmured encouraging words in your ear as you hugged them goodbye, and you could tell by the pink tinging Steve’s cheeks that they were doing the same to him.

Once farewells were said, Steve snagged your hand and laced your fingers together. As you walked to the subway, he tucked your clasped hands into the pocket of his overcoat, and then your other into the crook of his elbow, where he covered it with his palm to keep you warm. 

Steve held you tucked into his side the whole way back to his place while he made idle conversation, asking about the latest books you’d read and movies you’d watched. He only let go when it came time to pull out his keys and unlock his door.

There was a giddy, electric energy between the two of you as Steve helped you out of your coat and hung it up. Your gaze kept drifting back to him while you took off your boots and he hung up his overcoat. Once done, he stepped close, toeing out of his shoes next to where you’d dropped your boots.

“Do you want anything to drink?” Steve asked, his voice rough and a little uneven, like he was nervous. It made you smile, settling your own nerves to know he was right there with you.

You stepped further into Steve’s space, your fingers sneaking beneath the hem of his sweater and giggling when he sucked in a sharp breath. He’d made an excellent effort to keep your fingers warm on the way home, but the December cold had still snuck in. 

It was a good thing Steve was there to warm you up again.

“I think I’d just like to see this comfy bed of yours,” you murmured, pushing up onto your tiptoes and kissing Steve. 

The two of you lingered in the entryway of Steve’s apartment for long minutes, kissing and learning what made each other gasp and moan. His teeth nipped at your lower lip, sinking in hard enough to make you whimper before relenting and soothing the sting away with his tongue.

Meanwhile, you let your hands wander further beneath Steve’s sweater, finding a light trail of hair leading down to the waistband of his slacks. You raked  your nails through it, and relished the pleased sound that rumbled in his chest. 

Warm, wet desire was gathering between your thighs, and it wasn’t long before you squirmed impatiently against Steve, needing more.

By the time Steve broke the kiss and spun you around, his heavy hands dropping to your hips to guide you through his apartment, your panties were damp and you were aching for something only Steve could give you. 

Both of you moved quickly as you let Steve lead you to his bedroom, pausing just inside the darkened room while he flicked on a light.

A soft, golden glow emanated from two lamps set on low wooden tables on either side of the massive bed. Curiously, your gaze roved over the room, taking in the earthy colors and tasteful design.

It seemed Steve hadn’t only gotten his wardrobe and appearance together—he’d also made his home a place that was warm and welcoming and entirely him. 

The king-size bed was swathed in a thick, forest green comforter with dark charcoal sheets, a veritable pile of pillows at the head that looked far too enticing. The rest of the room was furnished with a dark wooden bookcase and dresser that matched the bed frame and side tables. There were even some vintage photographs of Brooklyn decorating the wall, along with some framed pictures on dresser.

Wandering over, you picked up one of the photographs. It was from the first autumn after you’d met Yelena and the others. The group had rented a car and gone to a farm upstate to go apple picking and enjoy all the other autumnal delights the state had to offer. 

In the photo, you were tucked into Steve’s side on a bale of hay, ready for the hayride the group had decided to go on, with Yelena on your other side. There was a blanket draped over your laps, and Steve’s arm was wrapped around your shoulders. The three of you were beaming at the camera. 

“Do you remember that trip?” Steve asked, sliding up behind you and wrapping his arms loosely around your waist. His chin rested on your shoulder while he peered at the photograph.

“Yeah,” you said, nodding. Then you winced as you remembered something about the trip. “Wasn’t this the time I fell asleep on your shoulder on the way home and drooled all over your jacket?”

Steve laughed huskily in your ear.

“It is,” he confirmed, brushing a kiss to your cheek before murmuring. “I didn’t wash it for a month.”

It was your turn to laugh, though the sound was more of a surprised exhalation as you twisted your upper body so you could see his face better.

“What?”

Steve grimaced, wrinkling his nose and scuffing a hand against the back of his neck sheepishly, like he regretted admitting that to you.

“It was more because it smelled like you than because of the, y’know, drool,” he explained, his tone a tiny bit defensive. But then he looked at you, finding your face still frozen in surprise and his expression softened. “I’ve liked you since I met you, sunshine.”

It wasn’t anything Bucky hadn’t already told you, but it still felt like an entirely new revelation coming straight from Steve, and all you could think to say was, “Oh.” 

You turned back to the photo, still held in your hand, and all you could think about was the fact that you had the same one tacked up on the corkboard over your desk. You wondered if Steve liked it for the same reason you did—because it made the two of you look like a happy couple, even with Yelena sitting next to you.

“I liked you too,” you confessed in a small voice.

Steve was quiet for a moment, his hold on you loosening slightly as you stepped forward to put the photograph back on his dresser. But when that was done, he towed you back in until your back was pressed to his chest. 

“Liked?” he asked, enunciating the ‘d’ at the end of the word. 

Your mouth flickered in a smile and you turned around in his arms. Your hands smoothed over his broad shoulders while you leaned into him, your soft curves pressing into the hard planes of his body.

“I liked you then, and I like you now, Steve,” you said, holding your breath as you stared up at him. Even knowing he felt the same way about you, it was still scary to lay your heart bare for the first time, and you waited eagerly for his response.

An exhale gusted from Steve and you couldn’t help but note the relief in his expression, even as he grinned wide.

“That’s good to hear, sunshine, because I like you, too.”

“Good,” you said with a grin, dragging Steve down for a too-brief kiss. “Now, will you take me to bed already?”

Steve’s laughter was muffled as he kissed you again, guiding you around and walking you backward until the backs of your legs hit the bed. He didn’t break the kiss as he lowered you to the soft mattress and helped you slide up the bed until your shoulders settled into the pile of pillows at the head.

Your arms wrapped around Steve and you pulled him down on top of you while he braced himself so he didn’t crush you. One of his legs slid between your thighs and he lowered himself down on top of you until his bulge pressed into your stomach. Your belly swooped with excitement and your pulse thrummed with desire.

Hiking one of your legs up around his waist, you writhed beneath Steve, grinding your hot core against his thigh through your jeans. 

You couldn’t seem to stop touching him, your hands sketching the exact measure of his body, and he seemed to be doing the same. Steve’s hands couldn’t stay still, sliding up and down your sides before finally pushing beneath your sweater.

His warm, calloused fingers stroked covetously over your skin, and you felt extra sensitive wherever he touched you, his every caress sending shivers of pleasure racing through your body. 

“Steve,” you whined, wrenching your mouth from his to drag in a much-needed breath. Even still, you craved more and your body rocked up into his, grinding against his thigh while his bulge pressed insistently into your belly. 

“You feel so good, sunshine,” he rasped as he kissed a trail along your jaw and down to your neck. The scratch of his beard against your skin had you shuddering beneath his big body. “Can I…?” he asked, his fingertips teasing along the edge of your bra beneath your sweater.

“Yes—please,” you gasped. Your own fingers curled into the soft fabric of Steve’s sweater between his shoulder blades and you tugged on it, trying to pull it over his head.

Steve chuckled into your neck before he sat up and yanked his sweater off for you, baring the broad expanse of his chest. You caught glimpses of soft brown hair dusted across his pecs and endless swaths of golden skin before he was helping you out of your sweater. 

You grumbled disgruntledly when your view of Steve was cut off as he tugged your sweater over your head, then as he leaned close to unclasp your bra and toss it somewhere in the room. You only dragged your eyes away from Steve’s perfect chest when he made a low, almost anguished sound.

He looked a little dazed, his eyes staring down at your bare breasts. Your chest was heaving slightly, making them bounce gently, and Steve looked almost hypnotized by the sight. 

Snorting to yourself, you curled your fingers around his firm biceps and tugged him back down on top of you, whimpering when your nipples brushed against the hair on his chest. They pebbled as pleasure spiked through your body, settling heavily between your thighs and making even more wetness soak into your panties.

The movement had broken Steve from his trance and he began kissing from your neck down your chest. The rasp of his beard over your clavicle sent a delicious shiver down your spine, making you keen and tremble beneath him.

“Fuck, you’re so soft,” he rumbled gruffly into your skin. He buried his face in the valley between your breasts, groping your supple flesh in his big hands while pressing teasing kisses and gentle bites to your skin. “You’re so perfect, sunshine.”

You whined a needy sound, reacting to his touch as much as his awe-filled words, and threaded your fingers through Steve’s soft hair. You held him tightly to your chest, wordlessly pleading for more, and he enthusiastically indulged the request.

Steve wrapped his lips around your nipple and sucked deeply, drawing so much of you into his hot mouth, it felt like he was doing his damndest to devour you. You were already so sensitive for him that it felt like there was a direct line connecting your sensitive peak to your clit, and you cried out in pleasure, your spine arching up off the bed and pushing your chest further in Steve’s face.

He grinned, doing a poor job of hiding his self-satisfied expression in your soft tits, but you didn’t begrudge him the smugness—not when he nibbled at your hardened nipple so good, it made your hips buck up from the bed. A whine slipped from your lips when you realized you no longer had his thigh to grind against, your legs kicking restlessly at the sheets.

After giving the same torturous treatment to your other nipple, wringing even more whimpering whines and desperate keening sounds from your mouth, Steve began kissing his way further down your body. He nipped playfully at your belly before lifting his head to catch your eye. 

It took you a moment to blink them into focus enough to see him clearly.

“I’ve been dreaming about your taste for years, sunshine,” he rumbled, hooking his fingers in the waistband of your jeans and tugging just enough that you knew he was asking if he could take them off. “Please, can I…?”

You were already nodding, your fingers fumbling over the button of your jeans. Steve seemed just as eager as you, gently pushing your hand aside and taking over as he thumbed it through the hole in the denim and pulled your zipper down. Then he was peeling your jeans down over you hips and thighs, taking your panties off at the same time.

In only a few seconds, you were stripped bare for the first time in front of Steve Rogers, and if it wasn’t for the shuddered exhale that gusted past his lips and the sizable bulge twitching in the front of his slacks, it might’ve occurred to you to feel a little insecure. 

But before those thoughts could even begin to creep in, Steve was dragging his hands up your thighs and spreading your legs with a reverent look on his face, giving an appreciative rumble deep in his chest as he raked his eyes up the naked length of your body. 

“You’re so fucking beautiful, sunshine,” he rasped, pressing his face between your thighs and taking a deep breath. 

Heat bloomed in your cheeks, but you didn’t have time to wonder at how you smelled because Steve was licking his tongue into the seam of your pussy, groaning like he’d eaten something delicious. 

“Fuck, you taste even better than I imagined,” he growled before diving in deeper, burying his face against your cunt and eating you out like he was a dying man and you were his last meal. 

In no time at all, he had you crying out, your hips bucking up off the bed as pleasure swirled through your body. It was all you could do to try to stop yourself from humping against his handsome face.

Steve’s thick biceps banded around your thighs and he held you spread open while he feasted on you, his eyes staring up past your quivering belly and heaving chest to watch your reactions. He sucked and nibbled and flicked his tongue over your sensitive clit, paying attention to what had you writhing and moaning your pleasure beneath him.

He licked into your pussy, fucking you with his tongue until you were squirming and panting on the bed, your thighs tensing and trembling with your building release. 

Needing something to hold on to, you threaded your fingers into Steve’s hair, holding his head against your greedy pussy and rocking your hips into him. You moaned loudly, unabashedly, grinding against his mouth and beard as you neared the edge.

“Oh god, Steve, ‘m so close, please—please, don’t stop, ‘m gonna come,” you babbled, your spine arching up off the bed as you threw your head back into the pile of soft pillows. “Fuck, please, please, please!”

It was clear that Steve was a quick study when it came to your body, and he put what he’d learned to good use, sucking hard on your clit and flicking his tongue over it, steadily driving your pleasure higher until, finally, it crested. And then he pushed you right over the edge.

Your fingers fisted in Steve’s hair and you humped shamelessly against his face as you came with a cry of his name—“Steve!” Your body tightened, and then loosened as wave after wave of pleasure swept through your limbs, making you shiver intensely while Steve’s mouth worked you through your release. 

When the pleasure began to ebb, you melted back into the soft blankets on Steve’s bed, a dazed smile curving your mouth. Steve eased you down with gentle sweeps of his tongue and soft kisses to your inner thighs, murmuring sweet words to you about how good you tasted on his tongue.

It wasn’t until you whimpered from overstimulation that Steve stopped. He pressed one last kiss to the top of your mound before pushing himself up. His happy grin when he saw the sated, content expression on your face made your heart skip a beat in your chest. He was just so damn handsome. 

“Good?” Steve asked, though you knew from the self-satisfied look in his eye that he already knew the answer to his question.

Still, you nodded. “So good,” you purred, stretching and reaching for him. Your fingers curled into coarse hair on the underside of his jaw and you tugged him up your body for a kiss.

You could taste yourself on his lips, and his beard was so drenched in your juices, it made your own cheeks damp. A groan worked its way up your throat at the filthiness of the kiss, and you pulled Steve closer, letting him muffle the sound as his tongue slipped into your mouth. 

Even though Steve had just made you come harder than anyone else in your entire life, renewed desire was beginning to bloom in your core, the heat of your arousal already building again. Distractedly, you recognized that you’d never felt the way you did for anyone but Steve—insatiable, unwilling to let the night end just yet. 

When Steve’s hard bulge knocked against your hip, a devious smirk curled your lips and you wasted no time trailing your fingers down his bare, golden chest to grope his cock through his slacks. He was hard and heavy in your hand, and an excited thrill raced down your spine at the thought of taking him in your mouth. 

Steve groaned against your lips, his big body shuddering when you squeezed and stroked him through the thick material of his pants. So you did it again, rubbing him with your palm until you felt his hard length jump against your fingers, like his body was just as eager for your touch as the rest of him.

“We don’t have to do more,” Steve said, his voice a little breathless. “I-I mean, you don’t have to return the favor or anything. I’m good to just go to sleep if that’s what you want.”

Steve’s words were honorable, but you didn’t want to sleep. 

You pushed at his larger body until he flipped onto his back. Following after him, you kissed down his chest, taking a moment to nuzzle in the soft hair scattered across his pecs before you lifted your head and caught his eye, letting him see the desire in yours. 

“I bet I’ve dreamed about sucking your cock just as much as you dreamed about eating my pussy,” you whispered huskily, holding his gaze determinedly while you shifted down his body until your face was level with his bulge. You mouthed at his hard length through his slacks. “Please, Steve, can I…?” 

“Yeah—yes—fuck, sunshine, you can do whatever you want,” he rasped, helping you undo his button and fly, his fingers trembling. Then he lifted his hips so you could pull his pants down.

You felt like you were unwrapping the most perfect Christmas present as you tugged his slacks and boxer briefs down his thick, toned thighs. You even let out a little gasp of delight when Steve’s cock bounced free, marveling at the sheer masculine beauty of it.

Impatiently, you pulled his clothes the rest of the way off, pausing only to kiss his thighs, enjoying the softness of his leg hair against your lips and cheeks, before returning to his cock. 

Taking him in hand, you circled your fingers around the thick shaft and gave him a loose pump, watching how he bucked his hips into your fist from just that little bit of touching. Steve’s hands were fisted in the blankets on the bed, like he was holding himself back from touching you, and you decided you want to make the man—your man—lose himself in pleasure, just like he’d done to you. 

You ducked down and licked the tip of Steve’s cock, humming in delight as the salty, musky taste of his precum burst on your tongue. The vibrations made Steve groan and you hid a self-satisfied smirk against his cock, before refocusing on your task.

You pressed wet, open-mouthed kisses up and down Steve’s shaft, staring up his hard, firm body while he watched you worship his cock. His cheeks were tinged pink, a light sheen of sweat dotting his brow and his eyes were so dark, his pupils blown so wide, they looked like the navy blue night sky on a winter evening. 

When you ducked down further, taking his balls into your mouth and suckling greedily, Steve’s gaze widened and his cock twitched in your hand. 

“Sunshine,” he rasped, the nickname sounding like a plea for mercy as he groaned loudly. “Ya keep sucking my balls and I’m gonna come way too soon.”

With a smirk, you gave his sensitive sac one last little suckle before letting it fall from your lips, then you licked up the length of his cock.

“Can’t have that,” you quipped, shooting him a smug grin. You pressed a kiss to the tip and wrapped your lips around the head, taking him into your mouth and sucking hard enough to make his hips buck up off the bed. 

Another anguished sound wrenched free from Steve’s lips. 

“Oh fuck,” he moaned as he settled back down, one of his hands coming to rest on the crown of your head—not pushing you down or pulling you away, just holding you like he couldn’t help but touch you. 

For a moment, you focused on Steve’s cock, pulling back before taking him deeper into your mouth, using your tongue to swirl around the head and trace the veins decorating his shaft while your fist stroked him. But when you flicked your gaze up to Steve, you found him watching you with adoration in his eyes.

“You’re amazing, sunshine,” he rumbled when he noticed he had your attention, one side of his mouth pulling up in a lopsided grin. “You’re gorgeous—and you look so fucking hot with my cock in your mouth.” 

The corners of your mouth flickered in a pleased smile as his praise washed over you, and you closed your eyes, soaking it in. When you opened them again, you redoubled your efforts on Steve, bobbing up and down on his length at a steady pace while you pumped him in your fist. 

You lost yourself in the pleasure of sucking Steve’s cock, and before long, you could feel yourself growing wet all over again. Your inner walls clenched pathetically around nothing while your mouth was filled with his big dick, but you didn’t want to stop. 

However, before you could make Steve come down your throat, his hands gently gripped your head and he pulled you up off his cock. With his considerable strength, Steve hauled you back up the bed and rolled you over onto your back beneath him, bracing himself on one hand while the other slide between your thighs. He bit off a curse when he felt how wet you were.

“Christ, sunshine, ya got this wet from sucking my cock?” he asked, a note of teasing in his tone that had heat coursing through your body. Before you could respond, though, his mouth found yours for a kiss. 

You were certain he must’ve been able to taste himself on your tongue, but he didn’t seem to care. He was too determined to devour your lips and swallow your moan while he speared you open with two fingers, capturing your cry of pleasure.

“Oh god, Steve,” you mumbled against his mouth, your hips rocking into his hand and fucking his fingers. “Please, I need you—I need you to fuck me.” Your hand was fisted in Steve’s soft hair and you clung to him, your entire being straining to get closer while still taking all the pleasure his fingers offered.

“Thank fuck—I need you so goddamned bad, sunshine,” he groaned, easing his fingers from your dripping hole and rolling onto his back so he could reach for something. 

A moment later, you heard the sound of a wooden drawer snap closed and he rolled back on top of you, the square foil packet of a condom held in his fingers.

“Ya wanna do the honors?” he asked, his grin so charming and so like the Steve you’d known for so many years that it took your breath away. 

But there was a comfort and an ease to the moment because you were there with Steve—your Steve—and you laughed at his silly offer. You were shaking your head even as you took the packet and tore it open, tossing the foil aside and making quick work of rolling the condom onto his cock. 

When you were done, you gave the base of his shaft an affectionate squeeze and Steve chuckled, capturing your lips in a kiss while he shifted on top of you, pressing his knees between your legs and spreading your thighs to make room for his big, broad body. 

You opened happily for him, kissing him back while your legs hooked around the backs of his thighs. Together, you lined your bodies up until Steve’s cock lay heavily against your mound, kissing lazily all the while.

After a moment, Steve broke the kiss, pushing himself up with one hand while the other fisted his hard length and held himself away from the place where you ached for him to fill. He stared deep into your eyes and gave you a serious look, a little bit of anxiety swirling in his gaze.

“Are you sure about this?” he asked, his eyes roving over your face like he was searching for any hidden remnant of hesitance on your part—any sign that you might run, you realized. “Because I’ve wanted this—I’ve wanted you for so long, that if you tell me tomorrow this was a mistake…” Steve paused, his adam’s apple bobbing in his throat as he swallowed, “it’ll break my fucking heart, sunshine.”

Steve’s voice cracked a little on the pet name and it made your heart split open in your chest. You didn’t know if you’d ever forgive yourself for hurting Steve the way you did, for saying those things you didn’t mean and trying to push him away when all you’d wanted was to pull him closer. 

You decided then and there to make it up to him—and that began with being honest with him. Always. 

So you threaded your fingers into Steve’s beard until you were cupping his face and you stared him directly in the eye as you answered his question. 

“I’m sure, Steve,” you said firmly, certainty resonating in your tone. “I was scared before—I’ve wanted you for so long that the thought of finally having you was terrifying.” You gave him a tremulous, apologetic smile, and his expression softened. “But I’m sure about this,” you said again, your voice stronger. “I’m sure about you, and I’m sure about us.”

When you finished your confession, Steve’s eyes closed and he exhaled a long, relieved breath. You pulled him down for a kiss, and it was a gentle thing—tentative as you both savored the vulnerability you shared, physically and emotionally, thanking one another for the trust that took. 

It was only when the kiss ended and Steve pressed his forehead to yours that he pushed inside you for the first time, his thick cock sinking deep into your pussy with one determined, inexorable thrust. 

Your arms and legs were wrapped around him already and you clung to Steve as you cried out, tears of emotion pricking at the backs of your eyes even as pleasure radiated through your body.

“You ok?” Steve asked softly and the question—so gentle and genuine—had a tear spilling onto your cheek. He brushed it away. 

“This is the happiest I’ve ever been,” you admitted in a thick voice, tugging Steve’s mouth back to yours, kissing him deeply. 

Together, you gave yourselves over to your instincts. Steve pulled his hips back until only half of him remained inside, and your heels dug into the backs of his thighs, urging him to plunge deep into you again. He slid home, and both of you moaned. 

Steve rocked into you with slow, thorough thrusts, but when you moaned for more, he drew back more each time and thrust harder. It wasn’t long before he was fucking you in hard, deep strokes that hit all the most perfect spots inside you, his mouth kissing your cheeks and neck and anywhere he could reach while he held you pinned to his chest, his hips working his cock deep into your cunt. 

With every hard thrust, you clung more tightly to Steve, holding him with your arms wrapped around his shoulders, fingers buried in his hair, thankful he’d grown it long enough that you could grip it tight in your fists. Your body writhed beneath his bigger form, using your legs draped around his thighs to meet his thrusts. 

For what seemed like forever, you and Steve were nothing more than two writhing bodies trying to get closer, deeper, tighter together, like your hearts were straining to become one. And you were so consumed with pleasure that it wasn’t until you were right on the precipice of your release that you realized you were close.

“Steve,” you gasped, trying to tell him you were going to come, and just then he changed the angle of his hips, stealing the words from your lips. 

He was driving his cock so deep into your cunt and grinding against your clit so exquistiely that you saw stars. Your body shook under a deluge of pleasure and the coil of tension twisted tighter in your core.

“Come for me, sunshine,” Steve rumbled, fucking you hard and deep and so perfectly you knew you were forever ruined for any other man. “Be a good girl and come on my cock before I fucking explode.”

His filthy words were your undoing. 

You shattered apart, sharp, sparkling pleasure devastating your body and mind while you screamed Steve’s name as you came. Your whole body clenched tight, clamping down on Steve’s cock hard enough that he grunted into your neck, then you succumbed to the pleasure as it dragged you under its thrall, whimpers and moans spilling from your lips mindlessly.

Steve’s hands gripped your hips tightly, and he rutted into your clenching pussy with wild thrusts as he chased his own release. He found it only a moment after yours, groaning your name against your cheek while his hips stuttered and shunted forward, burying himself balls-deep in your fluttering pussy while he came, his cock throbbing deep in your cunt. 

You held each other close as you came down from your releases. Your fingers stroked through Steve’s soft hair, the strands damp with sweat, and twirled around the gently curling ends. Meanwhile, his hands were petting up and down your sides, his face buried in the pillow beside your head while he rumbled muffled words of praise in your ear. 

Eventually, Steve sat up, pulling his softening cock as gently from your body as he could manage, watching your face closely for any hint of pain. You were a little sore, but when he pulled free, your body mourned the loss of him more than anything else. 

He quickly disposed of the condom and wrapper in his bathroom, then came back with a warm wet washcloth. He cleaned you up with gentle caresses, pressing a kiss to your hip and nipping playfully at your belly until you were giggling and pushing him away, your body too tired and sated and oversensitive for such treatment—but you were grinning all the same.

When he was done, you rose from the bed and went to the bathroom while he padded to his dresser. After you were done, you found Steve relaxing on his bed in only a pair of lounge pants, his chiseled chest deliciously bare and biceps bulging with his hands tucked behind his head. 

You paused, raking your eyes over his gorgeous chest, only catching his gaze when he made a deep, rumbling sound of good-natured warning. 

“You better put on some pajamas, sunshine,” Steve started, his blue eyes heated and a playful smile flickering at the edges of his mouth, almost hidden by his beard. “Unless you want me to fuck you again.” 

The threat in his tone was flirtatious and you almost took him up on the offer. But you knew that if Steve fucked you again, you’d be sore the next day, and you didn’t want that. Huffing a petulant sigh, you moved to the pile of folded clothes Steve had left on the corner of the bed.

The heat in Steve’s eyes didn’t abate as he watched you pull one of his shirts over your head, tugging the hem down until it covered your ass and part of your thigh. You didn’t have any clean panties, so you crawled into bed like that, your eyes finding Steve and watching as the heat of desire softened into the warmth of affection.

The two of you slid beneath the blankets and you curled up at Steve’s side, your head on his chest. You fell asleep quickly and easily to the sound of his gentle breathing, and the steady drumming of his heart beating beneath your cheek. 

The next morning, you woke to snow flurries drifting past the windows of Steve’s bedroom, the flakes having covered his neighborhood in a blanket of white while you slept. You pressed a happy smile against Steve’s sternum, the expression deepening when you felt his heart skip a beat at your closeness.

“So, is my bed comfy enough for you, sunshine?” he asked in the deep rasp of a man who’d just woken up. Using his arms looped around your waist, he pulled you on top of him, his mouth finding yours for a decadent good morning kiss before he let you answer.

“Hmm,” you hummed playfully in thought, smiling against his mouth while you pulled him closer with your fingers curled into the scruffy, coarse hair of his beard. “It could use a few more pillows—and maybe a nice throw blanket.”

“Consider it done,” he murmured, rolling you beneath his broad body and sliding his hips between your thighs. His morning wood brushed against your bare core and you moaned into his mouth. “Anything you want, you just tell me, sunshine,” he rumbled in between slow, drugging kisses, his hips rolling leisurely against you. “I want my girlfriend to feel comfortable here.”

“Girlfriend?” you gasped breathlessly, your heart beating harder with excitement while he pulled away to kiss down your neck. You could feel Steve’s grin against the side of your throat before he pressed a kiss against your thrumming pulse. 

“You wanna be my girlfriend, don’t ya, sunshine?” he asked. 

It was only because you’d known Steve for so long, and were so determined never to hurt him again, that you heard the tiny thread of anxiety in his tone. You squeezed him tightly in your arms and rushed to answer, eager to put his worry to rest.

“Yes!” you cried happily. “Yes, I want to be your girlfriend, Steve.” You twisted your fingers in his soft hair and tugged his mouth up from your neck. “Now kiss me, boyfriend,” you murmured and Steve, obligingly, crushed his mouth to yours in a blissful kiss. 

You and Steve reveled in your new relationship, spending a long time in bed just kissing and exploring each other and making up for lost time before your growling stomachs finally made you get up.

After breakfast, Steve seemed to remember something and he padded to the entryway, coming back with the box he’d acquired at the holiday market the evening before. He handed it to you, saying there was no way he’d be able to wait until Christmas to give it to you.

You opened the present, finding a simple silver chain and a stunningly engraved sun pendant within. You were so overwhelmed with happiness that tears sprang to your eyes and you had to hastily wipe them away.

“A little bit of sunshine for my sunshine,” Steve murmured against your temple before pressing a kiss to your skin. 

At your insistence, he helped you put the necklace on and you thanked him graciously—with words and kisses. Then you towed Steve back to bed, and the two of you gave in to the pleasure of your bodies until you collapsed, sated once again.

All day, you couldn’t stop smiling. You were doing one of your favorite things, snuggling on a snowy day, with one of your favorite people in the world—your boyfriend. And you were making plans for the future, talking about what you were going to get your other friends for Christmas and arguing about how to best decorate Steve’s apartment for the holiday. 

The whole time, you couldn’t help but think about how Christmas would always be extra special for you from that year on. It was a wonderful holiday but, more importantly to you, it was when you and Steve Rogers finally admitted your feelings for one another and took the first step toward a forever together. 

So, this time of year would always be your favorite time of year.

december daze challenge masterlist