#Epiphany 11
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skeletons-in-ur-closet · 19 days ago
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hnnnngmmmmmm kermit scrunch face...i cant think abt my childhood for too long if i dont wanna be angry
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answrs · 10 months ago
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fr though I didn't know who was coming back besides Donna so when the card game happened - aces high, "I am the king" - I SWORE there was gonna be a last-minute Ace cameo along the lines of "You are a king, but I have an Ace. I win."
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walkswithmyfather · 11 months ago
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Revelation 5:11-13 (NASB). “Then I looked, and I heard the voice of many angels around the throne and the living creatures and the elders; and the number of them was myriads of myriads, and thousands of thousands, saying with a loud voice, “Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power and riches and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing.” And every created thing which is in heaven and on the earth and under the earth and on the sea, and all things in them, I heard saying, “To Him who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb, be blessing and honor and glory and dominion forever and ever.”
“The Songs of Longing” By In Touch Ministries:
“The baby born in a manger will return in all His glory as King of Kings.”
“Throughout history, the church has seen Advent—the weeks leading up to Christmas—as a time to focus on a weary world’s wait for a Savior. We reflect on Christ’s first coming, when He arrived as a baby miraculously born to a virgin in Bethlehem. And we look toward His someday return as a conquering King, which is described vividly throughout the book of Revelation.
When we think of that final book of the Bible, we tend to focus on the descriptions of heaven and celestial beings, spiritual warfare, and pronouncements of God’s judgement. But laced throughout the book are songs of worship, which anchor us to the eternal reality that God reigns over all.
Meditating on these songs offers a powerful harmony to the carols we sing at this time of year. In Revelation 5, John writes, “To Him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb be the blessing, the honor, the glory, and the dominion forever and ever” (v. 13). These hymns of praise help us cultivate holy longing for the second coming of our King Jesus. And they give us a glimpse of His glory—glory of the One we are longing for.
Later this month, as the Bible in One Year reading plan takes you through the book of Revelation, consider taking some time to pray the words of these songs. Join the chorus of eternity as you lean into the wait that characterizes this season.”
[You can find the Bible in One Year reading plan at Intouchuk.org.
Photo by Walter Chávez at Unsplash]
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whenthegoldrays · 1 year ago
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I have a whole playlist dedicated to Im and Yeon Kyung with lovely songs like "State of Grace" and "Be More" and "Breath" and I'd like to make an edit of them to any of these songs
But tell me why the one I want to make most of all is "epiphany" by Taylor Swift-
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Guess I have to finish reading Dead Poet’s Society now
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listen-to-the-inner-walrus · 11 months ago
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While we're here, I just want to add an example of a good response to Harris' video.
In the first half of the video, Harris briefly mentions a creator called Lukeypoo (who now goes by Luke Stephens) who had plagiarised Harris' Bloodborne review, and his response at the time was to deny it, signal to his alt right buddies and insult Harris.
After the video came out, Luke Stephens made a post on his community page regarding it:
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For those, who can't see the screenshots, it reads:
A video went up on YouTube last night that showed something I did 6 years ago in early 2017, of which I'm very ashamed. I've talked about it on stream plenty since then and try to be very open about it, but I know a lot of people haven't been watching me since 2017 or have not heard me discuss this before. I don't want to hide from my mistakes or deflect, so very plainly here's what happened:
I was just starting on YouTube and I ripped off a phenomenal video on Bloodborne. It was a fantastic video by hbomberguy and after finding it through a Reddit post I tried to take his 1.5 hour masterpiece and make my own suckier version at around 7 minutes. I copied the premise, jokes, structure, and then pretended like it was all just a coincidence that they were so similar. I was a 19 year old idiot who thought it didn't matter because "he's a bigger creator so it's fine" and "it's just the internet." When I was rightly called out for copying his video I dodged, lied, and even attacked and insulted the appearance of those holding me to account, including hbomberguy himself. I copied someone's video, in parts word-for-word, and I pretended like *I* was the victim and *they* were being unreasonable. Unbelievable. There is no question at all: I was in the wrong, fully.
Let me be very clear: I whole heartedly disown who I was back then and what I did. Politically, religiously, and even morally/ethically I was a person that I hate today. I was an extremist, a bully, a religious zealot, and above all, a prick. This event sparked a spiral in my personal life that I didn't document online, but that has led me to who I am today. Someone who tries very hard to respect my fellow creators, audience, and to uphold a high ethical standard for myself. I strive every day to be a better man for myself, my family and kids, and for the community around me. And that's why I'm writing this, because I don't think we should hide from our mistakes or pretend they didn't happen. I screwed up, big time, and I stole the hard work of an incredibly talented creator and for that I'm incredibly sorry. I was 19, hard headed, and above all arrogant and unwilling to acknowledge I had screwed up. It took a couple years after that before I could openly admit what I had actually done, and that it took that long is all the more shameful.
I don't expect a response or certainly forgiveness, but for what it's worth, I am truly sorry for everything, @hbomberguy
For the last 6 years I've been working my butt off to be someone I can be proud of being and I hope you all can see that the man I am today is not the shameful excuse of a person I was back then.
I've never watched a video or stream by Luke Stephens so I can't attest as to his content, but this is one of the best responses I've seen to any kind of accusation, and so I lean towards believing him to be a better man than he was six years.
I thinks it's important to highlight the good response/s to Harris' video, to remind ourselves that plagiarism is not such an immoral action that from which you can't redeem yourself (though in Somerton's case, I'm less sure of that) if you take accountability for your actions, and to remember that in most cases, we should give people space to grow and become better.
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The swiftness and brutality of Hbomberguy’s complete evisceration of James Somerton’s career cannot be overstated.
#i saw this a few days ago and its stayed on my mind#and i havent seen many other people talk about it so i thought i would#also this is unrelated by im not gonna ever put this in an actual post so im going to use these tags to get it off my chest#i rewatched the video yesterday and it aas during harris' speech about how art is difficult and a skill#that i kinda had an epiphany i guess#(have not used that word in a while huh)#because thrice within the last few years#ive come across fics on ao3 where while i wouldnt call it plagiarism the authors did very much steal a considerable amount from my fics#some less than others#one of them used some of the exact same sentences as mine so i guess that one was plagiarism#but they all took a nontrivial amount of ideas or plotbeats or phrasings from my fics#and each time i was in three minds: 1) i found it kinda funny honestly though i cant articulate why; 2) i was flattered because i dont#really think my fics are worth stealing from; and 3) holy shit i baked one of the holy shit two cakes#i wasnt really upset by it especially because i know my work has been inspired by fics i love at times#but after rewatching harris' video#i realised it wasnt that i wasnt upset but that i wasnt allowing myself to be#because i didnt consider my work as something you could steal from? i didnt consider it worthy of that#like not as in ''oh i didnt know my art was that good'' but as in ''oh i didnt know my work was art''#so ive been allowing myself to be upset about it since then#and all those emotions are probably tangled up in the roots of the treehouse luke stephens' response is squatting in#because like#im not going to do anything about it like im not going to accuse the authors of plagiarism#even the one who stole exact sentences mostly because their writing is indicative of a 13 year old and mate im 23#ive been writing since i was 11. i know what its like to be starting out as a newbie writer it just feels mean for me to call them out#and if theyve stolen lines from me theyre going to have done it to other people and im sure theres someone else who feels more comfortable#in approaching them about it#but anyway back to my point#im not going after any of these people in anyway but if i did id want their response to be like this
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phillipfancypants · 10 months ago
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Whats your favorit flower?
Daisies!! It’s actually crazy how fitting it is for me—
I’ll explain:
I never liked the smell of flower bouquets and I always found like, “full sized” flowers to be kinda too much.
But my mum and grandmother taught me how to make daisy chains when I was a little kid, and when my sister used to do Track (and field) I’d pick daisy wildflowers and make tiny bouquets for her or my mum in between her events.
At some point during high school I decided I liked daisies and started buying Daisy-print stuff.
Then I got a boyfriend in college and I guess if you are a girlfriend you’re expected to have a favorite flower so I was like “yeah sure I’ll pick daisies”
Over the course of the next few years of college I collected more Daisy themed clothes, bags, jewelry, mugs etc
THEN I decided to study abroad in Denmark. And fun fact, the most recent queen (the one who just stepped down) is named Marguerite. Which is Danish for Daisy. And they’re her favorite flower. So basically the entire country has subtle daisy accents because of her.
Then my bf got a pet rabbit. He’s not good at names so he let me name her. And she’s this adorable little doe-eyed critter and the name Daisy just *fits*
And anyway I’m talking with my mum about the rabbit being named Daisy
And she says
“Oh I’ve always thought Daisy was an adorable name.
I wanted to name you Daisy
But Dad wouldn’t let me….”
So yeah it seemed like the universe came together to make sure that me, a girl who allegedly doesn’t like flowers, was objectively assigned a favorite flower.
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dwuerch-blog · 10 months ago
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On the 12th Day of Christmas....Epiphany
“On the 12th day of Christmas my true love gave to me…….” Let’s talk about those 12 days of Christmas. The true Christmas season starts on Christmas Day, the 25th. And it marks the official start of the 12 days of Christmas, and that relentlessly stick-in-your-head Christmas carol. But there’s so much more than the song. The 12 days of Christmas is the period that marks the span between the…
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thefabelmans2022 · 1 year ago
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no tonys this year this might be my last straw
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suhkusa · 2 months ago
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BOTH AIN’T SH!T - A HAIKYUU SMAU
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PAIRING. Osamu Miya x f!Reader, Atsumu Miya x f!Reader
CW. college au!, angst, fluff, OOC, suggestive/mature humor, the twins aren’t very good people, lowkey y/n isn’t either, language, some written content, a lot of fighting and arguments, childhood friends-to-lovers, love triangle in a sense
STATUS. COMPLETE
SUMMARY. The Miya twins had an infamous reputation around campus— one being known for sleeping around while the other plays hard to get. But what happens when they both decide they want to settle down with none other than you, their childhood friend.
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INTRO.
1. BESTEST FRIEND
2. WHORE ENDEAVORS
3. PRESUMED DEAD
4. PEACE AND LOVE
5. LOOK AT ME
6. STICK TOGETHER
7. SLUTTY OOMFS
8. DROWN TO DISTRACT [📝]
9. CAUGHT A STRAY
10. A CERTAIN MIYA
11. GO TWINS!!!!
12. END OF SUBJECT
13. PASSION PROJECT
14. FRAGILE
15. THE TRUCE
16. STUDIOUS AHH
17. U WANT HIM SO BAD
18. WHAT NOW
19. NERVES [📝]
20. MAYBE IT WAS
21. ALL OFFENSE [📝]
22. ONE CHANCE
23. FOR THE PLOT
24. YOU’RE DEAD
25. EPIPHANY [📝]
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OSAMU’S ROUTE.
1. REACH OUT
2. TIME [📝]
3. NOSTALGIC
4. HOME SWEET HOME [📝]
5. MY LOVE
END.
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ATSUMU’S ROUTE.
1. JUMPED THE GUN
2. SPEAKS VOLUMES [📝]
3. THEULTIMATEFREAK
4.BEUTIFIL
END.
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• both routes continue after ch. 25
• will be updated everyday at 2-5 PM PST
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© all writings belongs to suhkusa 2024. do not repost or change.
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moonstruckme · 19 days ago
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hiiiiiiiii mae <3 i have an idea for thawing out series. what about if reader has a 'moment' w one of them and the other boy gets slightly cranky bc of it but then is also confused bc he doesn't know if he wants r or the other boy.........and then EPIPHANY 😈
Thanks for your request! The mood of it got altered some but I hope you like it :)
collab with @ellecdc
part 1 | part 2 | part 3 | part 4 | part 5 | part 6 | part 7 | part 8 | part 9 | part 10 | part 11 | part 12
cw: modern au, chronic pain, some hurt w/o comfort but dw we'll fix it down the line
poly!wolfstar x fem!reader ♡ 2.6k words
“Pads!” Remus shouts across the ice. “Focus!”
Sirius’ cheeks pinken slightly as he tears his stare away from the Russian soloist practicing her quads. You laugh and say something to him that makes him pinch your waist meanly, as if you’ve been acting any better. 
You and Sirius are completely starstruck. Remus wants to be irritated at your distractibility, but it’s sort of adorable. You nearly fall on your bum watching the Austrian team run drills, Sirius is too busy eye-flirting with a Swedish skater to remember he’s supposed to be going into a turn, and you both stop your routine entirely when the Canadian duo steps out onto the ice. 
You and Sirius draw plenty of stares yourselves, though naturally only Sirius appears to notice. He shoots a wink at a skater admiring him and a glare at another looking too closely at you, his hand possessively on your lower back anytime you’re not running your routine. 
Altogether it means you have to spend a couple of extra hours learning to work through this specific brand of stage fright and running your drills again after you all get your heads turned multiple times, but Remus lets it slide. He remembers being just as dazzled during his first Olympics, seventeen years old and feeling like he’d somehow snuck into the hall of fame, an imposter among legends. 
Part of him hopes that the embarrassment of having to do a half-ass death spiral in front of so many professionals will make Sirius finally go all the way, but no such luck. He keeps you firmly above where you ought to be, expression impassive even as Remus can see you pleading with him with your eyes. Still, the rest of the routine goes well, and Remus tries not to let it get under his skin. He hopes you’re right and Sirius really will pull through in the final hour; your faith in your partner is absolute, and Remus finds it easy to put his faith in you. 
He lets you loose to spend the afternoon as you’d like, but it comes as no surprise when he sees you both on the ice again. Remus knows you’ve likely got plenty of nerves to work off. It’s one thing to compete in your home country, another entirely to represent your home country while competing amongst the best figure skaters in the world. He calls you off the ice before one of you can overexert yourselves and pull something. Sirius swears up and down that his ankle hasn’t bothered him since the day after he hurt it, and Remus hasn’t seen anything to make him suspect differently, but he knows better than to take risks with a healing injury. You spend the rest of the afternoon playing cards and gambling for candies in Sirius’ room. 
Eventually you disperse to go to bed. Remus’ hip has been bothering him since the flight the previous day, so he goes on a walk to stretch it out. It’s odd, he thinks, how easy things have come to feel between the three of you. When he first arrived, Remus had every intention of setting up strict professional boundaries, of knowing you only as your coach and seeing you only during practice times. And then you started practicing together, and it seemed like his boundaries wouldn’t even be necessary. Sirius hated him, and besides that the two of you existed in a bubble no one could penetrate, intimate and trusting only each other. Now, after learning about what your former coach did to you, Remus understands why that was necessary. You were protecting each other, safeguarding your partnership and your careers. It would have made sense for you to keep Remus at more than an arm’s length, taking his coaching with grains of salt and keeping him well away from your private lives. 
But then there have been days like today. Still bickering with Sirius, still watching the two of you interact with a familiarity only years of history can grant, but feeling warm and welcome despite it all. It feels easy, to tease Sirius and let him snipe back. To let you lean your shoulder into his and not move away. It feels good. 
Remus’ hip is feeling fairly good too by the time he gets back, sore from the exercise but not so stiff. As he makes his way to his room, passing Sirius’ and then yours on the way, he sees light sneaking through the crack underneath your door. 
He frowns. It’s late, and you’re meant to practice again early tomorrow morning, your last day of practice before you compete. You should be well rested. As he approaches your door, he hears sound coming from inside. Low, crackling voices, and a song that tugs at the fringes of his memory. Then a sound he knows too well, the shushing of skates on ice.
Remus knocks. The door is thin enough that he hears your little gasp and a quiet snap, and when you say “come in,” it sounds like a question. 
He suppresses a smile, opening your door cautiously in case you didn’t really mean it. 
You’re sitting on your bed, one hand atop your shut laptop. “Hi.” 
“Hi,” he says, leaning against the doorway. “It’s late.” 
“I know.” You look almost shy. Between that and the pajamas you have on, plaid little shorts and a bulky sweatshirt, Remus has the urge to pinch your chin between his fingers. “Sorry, I was just watching some, um…”
“Figure skating videos.” Your lips part, and he says, “I could hear them from outside.” 
“Oh.” You laugh. It’s a nice sound, one Remus can happily say he’s come to know well, but this one is woven through with nerves. “That’s embarrassing.” 
“Why is it embarrassing?” he asks honestly. “It’s normal to want to study your competition. And they’re fun, I still watch them all of the time.” 
“It’s not…” You give him a tentative look, then scoot over on your bed. “Do you want to see?” 
Remus can’t imagine you’re watching anything he hasn’t seen a million times, but he is curious which are your favorites. He’s careful to sit on top of your covers, a few inches between your leg and his. The bed doesn’t allow for anything more. 
“Fuck, did they really have to go back to making them out of cardboard?” 
That gets another nervous laugh out of you as you open your laptop screen, playing the video. And Remus knows then where he’s heard the music before. It’s his music. You’re watching his old routine, a niche one from a small competition back in Wales. Remus was fourteen when this was filmed. 
He glances at you, and you’re watching the video with your bottom lip trapped between your teeth, the colors of the screen dancing across your eyes. 
“I’ve always admired how tight your form was,” you say. “You were so young, but it was obvious you were putting the work in.” 
“I practiced a lot,” Remus agrees. “Too much, really.” 
The nostalgia he feels for figure skating is bittersweet when he watches videos like this. He remembers spending all his time in the rink, every hour he wasn’t in school or at home, nothing spared for friends or hobbies. He did love it, but in loving it he forgot to build a life outside of it. Life was constant motion, training and competitions and awards whirling around him like the rink during a spin; by the time he had his accident anyone that might have been his friend had their own friends, and Remus realized he may have been lonely for years. 
“I’m really glad you agreed to coach us.” You’re still watching the video, young Remus doing a camel spin. “You’ve made us a lot better, both of us. I know Sirius is going to end up fixing the spiral, and I’m going to try my best, and…I really hope we can make you proud.” 
“You will,” Remus says, instead of you already do. It feels wrong to take any credit for how incredible you are, either one of you, but that is what he feels when he sees you out on the ice. Proud. He looks at you carefully. “You’ve seemed wound pretty tightly lately.” 
Your eyes drop, no longer looking at young Remus but not at the older one either. 
“It’s alright to be nervous,” he says gently, “so long as you know that you deserve to be here. You’re going to do great.” 
You rub your lips together. “Were you nervous during your Olympics? Is it okay for you to talk about?” 
“Yeah,” Remus says, a bit surprised, “it’s fine. I was nervous. I was…” he chuckles “I was freaking out, honestly. But when I got out there, it was really just like any rink. The music and the routine were the same, so I just let myself get lost in it. I almost forgot where I was until it was over, and people were waving flags at me and all that from the stands.” He feels his lips curve with the memory. Bumps your shoulder lightly with his. “It’s not so bad. Anyway, I think it’s got to be better to go through it with someone else. I was on my own, but you’ll have Sirius with you.” 
You give him a little sideways smile. “And you, right?” 
A fond warmth blooms in Remus’ chest. “And me.” 
“Has it been difficult for you to coach us?” you ask him tentatively. “I mean, to come back?” 
Remus takes a deep breath. “Yeah,” he says after a minute. “At first, it really was. I’m not proud of it, and I don’t think I really knew it at the time, but I was jealous of both of you. Anytime you did something differently than I would have, I got so frustrated that you were throwing away these opportunities I would kill to have again. It was easy to look at either one of you and wish I was in your place.” 
You’re nodding, not a trace of hurt or offense in your expression. You look at him like you understand. 
“But that stopped a long time ago,” he says. “After I worked with you for longer, it became clear you’re both very different skaters than I was.” You huff a laugh, and Remus nudges your shoulder admonishingly. “That’s not necessarily a bad thing. I think early on I wasn’t a very good coach to you because I couldn’t see your individual strengths. But now I think I can, and it’s really a privilege to watch you skate together. It’s lovely. And I’ve loved getting to know you and Sirius, too. So, yeah, it was difficult at first, but I’m really glad I came on. And I’m glad you were patient enough to let me stay.” 
That got a bit more earnest than he intended. Remus feels heat rise to his face, but you’re still nodding, thoughtful, like you’re trying to wrap your head around it. He sees you rub your lips together again. 
“I really want to do well,” you say softly, “but I’m not the skater Sirius is. I don’t have his natural talent, and I don’t flourish under pressure the way he does. I—that’s usually when I mess up.” Remus’ chest aches at the vulnerability in your voice, his hand moving unconsciously to cover yours on the bed. Some of the tension goes out of you at the touch. “I’ve tried my whole life to keep up with him, but I’m never quite there, and you guys, you’ve both been these incredible, talented skaters…” Your eyes meet his, timid and ashamed. “I’m afraid I’m going to let you both down.” 
“Are you kidding?” You drop your gaze, and a surprised little laugh trips off Remus’ tongue as he ducks his head to follow, holding your hand more securely. “I’m sorry, that was rash, but really. How can you think that? You’re one of the most talented skaters I’ve ever seen.” 
You’re still avoiding his gaze. He takes your chin in his hand, gentle, an encouragement more than anything, but you let him turn you towards him. 
“I don’t care how much of it comes from natural aptitude,” he says firmly. “You’re an incredible skater. Even when I didn’t know you at all, it was obvious that you care about this more than Sirius or I likely ever have. That’s important. You can see it in how hard you train, and in how you move on the ice.” Remus shakes his head, expelling a breath. “It’s mesmerizing. You’re beautiful to watch.” 
You’re not shying away from him now, but Remus doesn’t let go of you. Your expression is wide open, diffident but curious. He goes on.
“The way you skate, it’s not just about the motions or the art of it, it’s joyous. Anyone can see how happy you are out there. That’s what makes you so good. You really love it.” 
“You did, too,” you murmur. 
His voice softens in kind. “I did. But not the way you do.” 
Your eyes lower, but this time he allows you it. Remus is suddenly acutely aware of your leg where it's pressed up against his, of his own heartbeat. He’s still holding your hand. 
You wet your lips. “Do you really mean all that?” 
“Why would I give you a whole speech I didn’t believe?” 
You crack a smile. “Some coaches call it a pep talk.” 
“You’re beautiful to watch,” he says again, voice dropping to a murmur as he realizes you’re staring at his lips. He breathes in, and the distance between you lessens. “You’re beautiful.” 
Remus knows he’s judged you rightly when your hand comes around his waist, pressing into the softness of his jumper to glean an impression of the skin underneath. You kiss like you skate, with a sweet eagerness, ready to explore and wanting to learn. Your lips part, inspiring a similar parting in Remus, and you let out a breath with a soft humming sound. 
Remus' nerves are alight underneath your hand on his side. He angles his torso to get you closer, free hand coasting up your thigh. Your fingers bunch in his jumper, kisses picking up heat as he lets his hand settle at the small of your back, an echo of how Sirius touched you this morning when—
Sirius. 
Remus draws away from you so suddenly he hears you gasp. He still has your face in his hand, can feel the flustered warmth of it before he removes that too, putting distance between you. 
“Sorry.” His voice is hoarse. Guilt burns in the back of his throat. “Sorry, it’s not you. I just, I—”
Sirius. Sirius. Sirius. 
“I didn’t think that through.” He can feel his heartbeat in his mouth. Sirius is in love with you. Remus is only just starting to feel like a part of your team, but this could send you all back in time. Kissing one of his skaters, who the other is in love with? His stomach hurts. “I’m your coach, and you—we have a big competition coming up. I shouldn’t have done that.” 
He edges off your bed, looking at you while he does. Your lips are still parted, eyes wide. 
“It was a really shit idea,” he says, “and I’m so sorry. It’s my fault.” 
You rub your lips together. Remus feels it like you’re still moving them against his own. “It’s fine,” you say on a breath. “We can forget it.” 
“I’m so sorry,” he says again. 
“It’s okay.” You’re shaking your head, and he’s backing away, both of you like deer caught in headlights. “You’re right, it was silly. We’re professionals, we can get past it.” 
Remus feels himself nodding, feels the handle of your door in his hand. 
“Practice in the morning?” you ask weakly. 
He pushes out a breath as he opens the door. “Yeah. Six thirty.”
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lockefanfic · 1 month ago
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Polaroid
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The following is Chapter 11 in the Toy series, but it can (mostly) be read on its own. 🙂
12,713 words.
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Exhibit 1: Central is a young woman’s (Subject A) open mouth. Subject A’s lips are glossy, slick - with cherry red lipstick and a thick, semi-transparent pale white liquid. Given the contextual clues in the photo, this liquid is likely semen. More of the substance stains the lower part of her face, running down her chin in thick streams. Her exposed tongue reveals more of it coating her mouth. A thick rivulet of semen drips onto her palette from the top of the picture, where another woman’s (Subject B) lips are barely seen. The rope of semen joins the mouths of Subjects A and B.
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It’s in the middle of it all that come to a realization: what was playing out in front of you was no longer surprising.
There was a time when seeing something so lewd, so utterly ridiculous in its depravity, would shock you. And for the first few months of your new job, when you found yourself in similar circumstances, that feeling would come without fail. Each and every day seemed to bring more and more ludicrous experiences. How could anyone not be shocked by what you saw, heard, and felt since Chaeyoung and Momo picked you out of the crowd at the concert all those months ago? 
But it was in that moment, some time past midnight, as you sat on what was probably a ludicrously expensive couch in the corner of the penthouse suite of one of the highest-end hotels in Singapore, that you realized the absence of that once-familiar feeling.
That was not to say that you weren’t aroused by the whole thing - of course not, quite the opposite in fact, if the erection you were sporting were any indication. You didn’t think you’d ever tire of seeing what you saw, hearing what you heard, feeling what you felt. Rather, you just weren’t surprised by it in the same way you used to be. It was just another day in a string of days that felt like your wildest dreams come true.
But when every day was so wild, then really, no days were wild, were they?
A sharp moan stirs you from the intense personal epiphany you were having in the corner of the hotel room. On the bed, not twenty feet from you, the third man in the room slips his cock inside Myoui Mina’s slick, dripping pussy from behind.
Mina lets her mouth slip from the stiff cock that filled it a moment before. There is a brief moment of pleasant surprise on her delicate features as she is filled, stretched, her body quickly accepting and accommodating the thick shaft that had just entered her. The moment is short, fleeting. The look of serious determination that she sported moments before returns, as does her mouth to the slick, glistening cock in front of her face.
Myoui Mina was often shy, reserved, introverted. Her public and private personas were much the same; this was a young woman who enjoyed quiet weekends at home building lego or grinding away at an MMORPG. She attended fashion weeks and other appearances like the other girls, of course, but you knew she only did so because it was in her contract, and it paid her - she had little actual interest for the clothes she was shilling or the scripted comedy she and the girls were playing out.
But during sex - and especially during sex when multiple males were involved - she was another person entirely: forceful, dominant, assertive. In control, of herself and those lucky enough to share a bed with her.
The two men who currently had that honor - you had no idea who they were and the girls had insisted that you didn’t need to worry about them - begin to fuck Mina from both ends. Her body - that slim, delicate, almost fragile body of hers, covered as it was in sweat and spit - is rocked back and forth, back and forth atop the high-end bed and the expensive-looking but already soiled sheets that covered it. Soon she settles into a rhythm, timing the movements of her body so the cock in her mouth hits the back of her throat just as the one in her cunt fills her to the hilt.
She moans around the cock between her lips. The two men grunt and sigh. Slick flesh slaps against slick flesh. Sex fills the room, pervades every moment that passes.
There was a time in your life when seeing such a sight play out in front of you was the stuff of dreams, of lonely nights with a picture, video, or smutty story from the darker parts of the internet. And here it was - playing out in real life, right in front of you. Just another sight, another memory being made to sit amongst the many hundreds that had filled the most memorable time of your life.
“Jesus, fuck,” Chaeyoung hisses. She is lying next to you on the couch, as naked as you are, watching, as she often did. She loved to watch. She loved being fucked, of course, but she loved watching others get fucked just as much, if not more - if nothing else because of what she got to do with them afterwards.
You have one arm wrapped around her shoulders. It slides down her upper chest to cup a small, round breast. She sighs as you capture her nipple, moans as you twist the piercing atop it, softly but firmly. Enough to make sure she felt it, but not enough to really hurt her. You knew well by now just how much she could take before the delicious spikes of pain became unbearable. You quickly found that she loved the pain, excited her almost as much as a kiss or touch.
You can’t exactly tear your eyes from the spectacle playing out on the bed in front of you, but out of the corner of your eye you watch the young woman in your arms begin to finger the needy flesh between her own legs. She makes no attempt to hide it, even swinging a leg out to rest over the couch’s arm, spreading herself open for her slim fingers. She moans as she finds her clit and teases the tender flesh around it with two fingertips. 
You continue teasing her nipple, your free hand finding your own cock, painfully stiff, and giving it a few strokes. She watches you do it. She hisses as she watches you touch yourself, wordless sounds of lust escaping gritted teeth. Her eyes flick back and forth between your cock and her friend being roughly spitroasted mere feet away. Her eyes are glazed, half-lidded. Hungry.
For a few long minutes the two of you sit there, touching yourselves, pleasuring yourselves to the sights and sounds playing out in front of you.
On the bed, Mina orgasms - she lets the cock in her mouth leave her lips to let a shriek of pleasure escape from between them. The man fucking her behind shudders, slowing his thrusts momentarily to relish the pulsating of her orgasming cunt around his cock. The man in front of her seems upset by the sudden loss of the woman’s mouth around him - he reaches down, grasps a handful of her dark hair, and twists her head up to look at him.
She fixates him with an intense, lustful stare - even as her orgasm makes its way through her quivering, trembling body. He grips his cock with his other hand and slaps its thick, hard meat against her soft, delicate features.
Mina smiles. Wild, playful. She even giggles a little, an innocent, pleasant sound against the obscene, perverse context. You wonder for a moment how a woman born with such a classically elegant, delicate face could appear so utterly lustful, act so wanton.
Then she slips the cock back into her mouth and the three are fucking again, the two men having their way with her, taking their pleasure, using her - even as she used them.
The entire exchange stirs something in you, makes you want more than to just sit there with your cock in your own hand - especially when there was a naked, willing, needy little thing in your arms happy to take your hand’s place.
You tear your eyes from Mina for a moment. The hand on your cock leaves it, quickly slides into Chaeyoung’s hair. The thought of pulling her onto your lap and having her ride you comes to mind, but the thought of her mouth on your cock was too strong to resist; and besides, it would ensure your view of Mina’s show would remain unobstructed. Your fingers close around a knot of the unruly blonde strands, and with little softness or consideration, you pull Chaeyoung’s face onto your cock.
Her lips part, taking you into her slick, hot mouth quickly and easily, as though she were waiting for you to do so the whole time. Within seconds she is sucking your cock, head bobbing up and down, tongue pressed against the side of your cock or swirling around your head, spit dripping freely down your length and onto your balls. Chaeyoung moans around your shaft - she is sloppy, more focused on pleasure rather than your comfort - but you weren’t one to argue with the results. You shiver with pleasure as you use her mouth, pulling her head up and down along your length as though it were a sex toy and not the mouth of one of the biggest idols in Asia. 
She has squirmed onto her side to suck your cock better, but the hand between her legs doesn’t cease in its movements, her small wrist working faster between her flushed thighs. Soon she is moaning around your cock, the vibrations of her throat feeling wonderful within the warm wetness of her mouth.
The show in front of you goes on. The man behind Mina begins to spank her as he pounds away at her juicy little cunt. The one at her head unwittingly follows your example, grasping her head with both hands as he fucks in and out of her mouth. They both up their pace, although it was difficult to tell whether it was their own choice to do so or whether Mina, despite her rather compromising position, was doing something with her body to entice them to do so. Whatever it was, the pace of the show quickens as it reaches its climax.
The hand in her hair transitions to grasping the back of Chaeyoung’s scalp, guiding her up and down, using her mouth like the needy little fucktoy it was - the perfect little fucktoy for such a show. It was so utterly unreal, so ridiculous, using her mouth the way you were, using it to get off at the sight of her best friend being spitroasted so roughly in front of you.
But it was just another day, these days. Not that the surreal regularity of it made the slick, hot little mouth wrapped around your cock feel any less amazing.
“Fuck, fuck, Mina--” the man fucking her cunt gasps. “Fuck, I’m gonna-”
“Shit, me too-” the man at her head hisses.
“On me!” the young woman shrieks, tearing the cock in her mouth free from between her lips to shout the command. “Don’t fucking cum in me.”
“Mina, fuck,” the man hammering away at her cunt gasps, his brow tightening, the grip on her ass tightening, leaving furrows in the pale, pliant flesh. “We always used to, fuck, we always used to cum in you-”
“-fill you up,” the other man spits between gritted teeth. “Wanna cum down your throat-”
“No,” Mina snaps, adamant. “You know the rules.”
She fixates the man at her face with a look - and while you can only see her side profile even you are struck by the intensity in those usually elegant, dainty features. She turns over her shoulder and gives the man behind her the same glare.
Even when there were multiple men involved, even when she was engaged in some of the filthiest acts imaginable, Myoui Mina never seemed rattled by any of it. She had a control, a grip over her own emotions and her own body; even as she exerted that control and grip over the men that she shared a bed with. The hold was ironclad, unshakable. It made men weak, made them unable to resist her demands.
“Fuck, alright,” the man behind her hisses, defeated.
“Wanna cum on your front,” the man at her head snaps. He is desperate now, being so close to his orgasm. They both are. And they both know neither of them are really in any position to be asking for more, given how blessed they already both were.
Mina relents. For a moment the intensity in her eyes is interrupted by a soft moan of pleasure as the man fucking her cunt reaches a particularly sensitive part of her. “Fine then,” she says, the words half-moan. “Fucking cum on me.”
The two men leave her body. Spit tumbles from her mouth, pre-cum and her juices drip from the splayed lips of her cunt. She turns around on the bed until she is lying on it.
“Paint me.”
The two men waste no time. Their hands find their needy cocks, and soon they are stroking themselves off to the sight of the beautiful young woman on the bed between them - naked, sweaty, dripping spit and sweat and cunt juices onto the soft cotton sheets beneath her. She squirms and writhes on the bed as she awaits their cum. 
Her hands wander her own body, tracing paths up her tight, toned midsection and squeezing a small, firm breast, or wandering between her splayed thighs, index and ring finger spreading apart the slick lips of her own pussy, middle finger finding and teasing her needy little clit. She is moaning throughout it all, little wordless sighs of pleasure as she touches herself.
The two men cum - they paint with the most lewd materials known to man, on one of the most beautiful canvases in existence. They leave their thick, warm semen on her body in long, heavy streaks, on her toned abs, her small breasts, the elegant features of her face, twisted in perverse joy at being debased the way she was.
She sighs and moans as they cum on her, each rope of semen seeming to incite a new spike of pleasure in her body until she too is cumming again, orgasming at the feel and sight and sound of two men stroking themselves, pleasuring themselves to her, leaving their cum on her. Staining her. Sullying her perfect image, turning the perfect lady into a dirty little cum-stained thing.
You cum too. How could you not? The sight of what had just happened in front of you was enough, never mind the feel of Chaeyoung’s slick tongue, hot mouth, and full lips wrapped around your cock.
Your hands pull the young Korean woman’s face down to the base of your shaft. You feel her gag around the hard, spasming shaft filling her mouth with semen. She manages not to rip her mouth from you, even if she could somehow fight the fingers woven through her hair, holding her skull fast against your crotch. 
The fear of hurting her that you once had from earlier in your time as her toy didn’t come up this time. She knew how to suck a cock - you knew that well. She knew how to take a load down that skilled throat of hers.
Eventually, some indeterminate amount of time later when your hands finally release their grip on her scalp, she manages to slip off your shaft. She raises her head, and her features are flushed, her hair frazzled, eyes half-lidded and still heavy with pleasure - a mess, but a satisfied one. From the corner of her mouth, a rivulet of glistening cum drips from her lips, but they remain sealed, keeping most of your warm load within. Her cheeks are fuller, and the thought of what she held within them drives you crazy.
She picks something up from the end table flanking the couch and presses it into your hand, something large and plastic. It takes you a moment to rip your eyes from the utterly erotic sight of your cum dripping down Chaeyoung’s chin, but when you do, you realize the object in your hands is a Polaroid camera.
Without further word she leaves the couch and approaches the filthy, cum-stained form of her best friend sprawled atop the bed. Mina welcomes her with open arms in a gesture that seems oddly intimate, oddly loving. There is a warm smile on her slick lips. The younger woman crawls atop the bed on all fours until she is perched atop it, face inches from that of her friend.
Mina opens her mouth. Chaeyoung opens hers. 
By some miracle, the camera viewfinder finds its way to your eye. You frame the shot. Your finger finds the shutter button as your thick, white semen drips from Chaeyoung’s mouth onto Mina’s waiting tongue.
Snap.
---
Exhibit 2: A woman’s (Subject B) pelvis dominates the frame. She is wearing a one-piece swimsuit, the crotch of which is pulled to the side. She is on her back, her legs spread apart, and a male’s erect penis (Subject C) is embedded to the base within her. Subjects are mid-coitus. 
Exhibit 3: In the lower third of the picture are two women (Subjects A and B), seated on what appears to be a poolside deck chair, facing the camera. The background is blurry and unrecognizable but appears to be natural or decorative foliage. The two women are wearing swimsuits and sunglasses. Subject A is presumably wearing a two-piece bikini, although only the top is visible, her lower half concealed by a white beach towel. Subject B is wearing a one-piece swimsuit.
--- 
“They’re old toys from our last tour,” Mina says. She had a way of reading your thoughts and answering unasked questions - something you were thankful for in that moment, because you weren’t quite sure how to broach the topic of the two random men who’d shown up the night before, engaged in a threesome with one of the girls you were responsible for, and left without so much as a word. 
“It was my turn to pick the toys last time we were here - me and Jihyo’s turn, anyway,” she continues. “But she wasn’t in the mood - or so she says - so she let me have her pick. I picked those two.”
“Oh, okay,” you answer. “And they’re not… toys any more?”
“I still call them up whenever I’m in town and want to have some fun,” she answers, nonchalantly, as though she were referring to old work or school acquaintances and not casual sex partners that she’d just had a rather wild threesome the night before. “One of them is pretty high up at this hotel, which is how we got this fancy suite. And no, they’re not officially the group’s toys anymore.”
“And they never… y’know, got hired by the company, like we did?”
“Nope. I guess you and the others are the lucky ones. Usually toys stay in the city we picked them in, and they usually only last a couple of nights. I guess you really impressed the girls, because one or more of us must have gone directly to the boss and asked that you and the others be hired on permanently.”
“I see. And you’re not afraid that they’ll do something? That they’ll go to the media or public?”
“No,” she answers, confidently. “Because they know if they try something they won’t be getting any more of this.”
She didn’t need to specify what this was, especially when this was laid out on the deck chair of the suite’s private deck, spending the warm Singaporean afternoon sunbathing. Even in what was a relatively modest bikini and simple designer sunglasses, Myoui Mina was breathtaking.
From your sitting position on the deck chair next to her, you let your gaze linger on her slim, tight body for a moment. She adjusts herself on her chair, knowing without a doubt that you were watching every movement she made. She playfully slides one leg up on the chair, revealing a full, pale thigh before placing a hand on her knee and striking a model’s pose. Her head turns slightly to face you, and the corner of a soft pink lip curls upwards into a sly smile.
You return it, and the two of you share a small laugh. Despite being typecast as the shy, introverted ice princess she was early in her career, you were glad to see her come out of her shell a little bit in recent years, both on and off the stage.
Your phone buzzes in your pocket, and despite the cute moment you were sharing with Mina, you pull it out of your shorts.
“I wish you’d relax,” she says, turning away from you again with an exaggerated sigh. “This is supposed to be a vacation, remember?”
She was right - the company placed higher importance than others on making sure its artists received sufficient vacation time, and this week was one of those company-mandated weeks when no official work was to be done. Many of the girls took it upon themselves to leave Seoul for a few days; Chaeyoung had already booked the flights and had had Mina make arrangements for the hotel before you’d even had a chance to ask her what she was up to. Before you knew it she’d shown up at your door and told you you had twenty minutes to pack for a five day trip to Singapore with the two of them.
The nature of your job meant that you were never truly off work, though, and there were still the odd emails to catch up on regarding appointments and other duties for the weeks after this one. Amidst the emails are a few notifications from the group chat you shared with Buzz and Woody - Woody apparently wanted to get the three of you together for beers sometime, but with you out of the country and Buzz busy with his actual career that night out would have to wait at least until you got back.
“Sorry, Mina,” you say, sheepishly placing your phone on Do Not Disturb and placing it on the side table beside your own deck chair. “There’ve been some changes to Nayeon’s schedules next week, and the higher ups thought I should know since I’m on duty with her starting Monday.”
Mina lets a barely audible huff of air escape her nostrils at the mention of Nayeon. The friction in the group had become more apparent over the past few weeks, and the girls were surprisingly willing to let their places in the battle lines be known to everyone, including their managers.
“Sorry,” you apologize. “Didn’t mean to bring her up on purpose. Wasn’t aware that you didn’t like her.”
“No need,” Mina answers, “you’re just doing your job. Doesn’t mean I can’t hate the bitch.”
You supposed that you shouldn’t have been surprised regarding where Mina stood in the entire Nayeon versus Chaeyoung split that had fractured the girls into two opposing parties, given her close relationship to the latter. But her openness on the topic still struck you, given her usually aloof and introverted nature, particularly when it came to matters that didn’t involve plastic building blocks or fictional, virtual worlds.
“Mina, I… listen, you don’t have to answer if you don’t want to, but I’ve been wondering, like-”
“-what happened between Nayeon and Chaeyoung?” Mina finishes, again reading your mind, throwing the topic you’d been tiptoeing around out into the open. 
“Well, yeah.”
Mina crosses her arms. A frown appears on her lips. It doesn’t seem to be one of anger, but one of genuine frustration.
“I wish I knew,” she admits. “All I and the rest of the girls know is that those two have hated each other for as long as we’ve been a group - even before the Sixteen days. Whatever happened between them, it happened long before we ever took to a stage together.”
You nod along, not quite knowing how to move the topic forward. Thankfully, Mina does it for you. She’d made a habit of it lately.
“Every group of girls has its secrets, I suppose, but most of them are open ones: Tzuyu’s a virgin, but won’t be one for much longer, I think; Dahyun only sleeps with guys she has feelings for; Sana only sleeps with guys she doesn’t have feelings for; Jihyo isn’t over Da- I mean, Buzz; Momo’s carrying a torch for someone, although we haven’t quite figured out who yet; ​​Jeongyeon is in love with Nayeon; Nayeon’s an evil, cold-hearted, manipulative bitch. That last one may or may not be a secret.”
You had gotten to know the girls relatively well over the past few months, but much of what Mina had just revealed was still news to you. The girl clearly wasn’t one to keep secrets or didn’t care enough to face the consequences of spilling them - it was likely the latter. You want to press further on a few of them, but Mina continues her train of thought before you can do so.
“But the whole thing with Nayeon and Chaeyoung… I know Chaeyoung like the back of my hand, but yeah, it’s a strict no-go zone with her. I never pushed it. Not even when we were together.”
“Wait, what? Together? You and… Chaeyoung?”
“Yeah,” Mina answers, nonchalantly, as though she weren’t just dropping a heavy truth grenade at your feet and had tossed the pin away. “For a year or so.”
“Damn. I mean, the clues were there, but…”
Mina smiles to herself. “Yeah, we kind of slipped up here and there, didn’t we? The higher ups didn’t think it was real, and they passed it off as fanservice, but we… yeah, we were a thing. Serious, too. Or rather, I was ready to make it serious, but Chaeyoung…”
“...Chaeyoung?” you prod, your curiosity temporarily overcoming any hesitation you may have had at prying into the girls’ personal lives.
“She wasn’t ready to take that next step,” Mina finishes. “When we both decided it wasn’t going anywhere, we decided to break up.”
“Damn.”
“Yeah. She wasn’t ready for anything serious, I guess. I felt like there was something holding her back from taking the next step. Trauma? Fear? Who knows. I sure as hell didn’t.”
The two of you sit there in silence for a while. Mina reaches for the drink at her side table and takes a sip. She sits there for a minute or two, stirring the liquor with her straw, trying to make sense of her thoughts. You want to say something, anything, to fill the silence.
“She’s still my best friend,” Mina says, eventually, breaking the silence for you. “Not to mention a pretty hot fuck buddy. I suppose that’s not a bad consolation prize, all things considered.”
She turns to smile at you, and you return it, although you sense a little bit of sadness behind the curl of her lips. After a while she returns to stirring her drink and taking small sips out of it, while you turn your attention back to your phone, unable to find the words to continue the conversation and unwilling to pry further into what was clearly a touchy subject.
“You two look awkward as fuck,” comes a voice from the suite’s glass doors. Chaeyoung emerges from the room, a black plastic bag in one hand. She’s wearing a black one-piece strapless swimsuit beneath a skimpy pair of denim shorts - shorts she makes sure to rid herself of before joining you and Mina by the pool, leaving her long, slim legs and cute little butt bare.
“We’re just enjoying the peace and quiet without you around making all the noise,” Mina says, returning her drink to the side table before motioning with her head towards Chaeyoung’s plastic bag. “Whatcha got there?”
“More drinks,” Chaeyoung answers, taking a seat at the foot of your deck chair and pulling three green glass bottles from the bag, along with a few novelty shot glasses she must have picked up from a souvenir stand. “Oh, and some sunscreen. Don’t want the higher ups getting pissed at our precious manager here for letting us get sunburnt out on vacation.”
She tosses the tiny bottle of sunscreen in your lap. You don’t miss the suggestive look she shares with Mina.
“You go first,” Mina says, suggestively, as she opens one of the soju bottles and pours a shot into one of the glasses. “It’s my turn to watch the show.”
Chaeyoung draws close to you on your deck chair, bringing her face to within inches of yours as if to kiss you, that cute little tongue of hers darting out to flash over her lips - before, with a wicked grin, she nudges you aside with her torso and lies down on her stomach on your deck chair.
You resign yourself to your fate, shooting Mina a smirk as you take up position behind Chaeyoung, opening up the bottle of sunscreen. You straddle the back of Chaeyoung’s thighs, squirt a small amount on her upper back, and begin to spread it over her soft, creamy skin.
She purrs, not unlike a satisfied cat, as you massage the thick lotion onto her upper back and shoulders. In the deck chair next to you, Mina takes her shot of soju - but doesn’t swallow it. 
Turning onto her side, she reaches up to Chaeyoung’s cheek before kissing her deeply, passing the soju between their mouths. Chaeyoung swallows most of the alcohol, but Mina’s lips don’t leave hers - leaving a lot of the clear liquid to escape their lips and drip down their chins. 
What begins as a soft, tender kiss quickly becomes a passionate makeout session. You bite your lip at the sight. You feel yourself stiffening beneath your pool shorts, even as you continue to massage what was left of the sunscreen onto Chaeyoung’s shoulders and back.
Mina breaks the kiss momentarily, shooting you a look - and the mischievousness in her eyes is impossible to miss even behind her sunglasses. She kisses Chaeyoung again, capturing the younger girl’s lower lip between her teeth, while reaching down with a hand to her friend’s ass - and pulling the crotch of her swimsuit aside and stretching it around a perky ass cheek, revealing her naked pussy.
Chaeyoung catches on quickly to her best friend’s intention, arching her back to allow you a better look at her upraised ass and the newly revealed flesh between her thighs. She wiggles beneath you, and you take your weight off her thighs to allow her to bring her knees beneath her body, raising her ass up off the deck chair.
Without breaking their kiss, Mina undoes the ties to the lower half of her bikini before pulling it off her body, tossing it away with an exaggerated flourish. Naked from the waist down, she gives Chaeyoung a last peck on the lips before she too turns onto her stomach and brings her knees beneath her, raising her ass, bringing it next to Chaeyoung’s until they are touching at the hip.
They spend a moment there, their upraised, naked asses swaying back and forth as they smile slyly at each other and at you before sharing soft, teasing kisses with each other. You cannot help but reach forward, needing to touch, needing to feel, as though by touching them you could receive some measure of reassurance that this was all really happening and not part of some ridiculous dream. 
You squeeze Mina’s ass with your right hand and Chaeyoung’s with your left, relishing the warm softness of their skin beneath your fingers. Mina’s ass was round and full, Chaeyoung’s cute and perky - both were utterly mouthwatering in their own way, to say nothing of the warm, slick flesh that waited just beneath each pair of cheeks. You sigh to yourself, your brain a little overwhelmed with the sensations suddenly flooding it.
“Fuck me,” Chaeyoung hisses over her shoulder, finding and holding your gaze with an intense, sultry look. “Fuck her. Fuck us both.”
You’d learned by now not to question such an order or hesitate when presented with such an opportunity. You were long past the point of questioning these things as they happened to you, having transitioned fully into simply enjoying them as they came. 
To that end, your left hand leaves her ass, grasping your painfully stiff cock and bringing it to Chaeyoung’s slick, hot cunt. Your tip buries itself between the lips of her pussy, causing a soft sigh to slip from her lips at that first contact. At the same time, you bring your right hand between Mina’s thighs, slipping the tip of your middle finger between her lips. Finding her hot lips dripping, your ring finger joins your middle, your fingertips playing with the moist, slick flesh there, but not penetrating any deeper, not yet.
The girls sigh and quiver and moan beneath you, waiting, wanting. You take it all in, relish the moment - every movement of their young, tight bodies, every lustful gasp and sigh that leaves their perfect lips. 
But your self-control only lasts so long. Your hips slide forward, filling Chaeyoung to the hilt with your cock - and Mina with your fingers.
Every single time felt special, felt new. This time was no different, even if the circumstances - sex with women you’d long believed were so far beyond your reach so as to be impossible - had become routine over the past few months. 
But you never tired of it. Not when the high was so high.
Chaeyoung is tight, slick, hot. She clenches tight as you fill her for the first time, that juicy cunt of hers stretching around your shaft, making you quiver involuntarily at the feel of her body wrapping around you. Mina is similarly vice-like; despite the relative slimness of your fingers, you can still feel how much she clenches around your digits. 
You start fucking Chaeyoung, your cock pistoning in and out of her cunt at a slow but steady pace, your fingers doing the same with Mina. There was certainly a time for teasing and foreplay with the girls, but you’d learned by now when such patience and buildup was necessary, and when it wasn’t. This was one of the latter times - a time for a hard, fast fuck, for getting to the pleasure without the preamble or teasing.
Chaeyoung moans, softly, as she’s filled again and again with your cock. Mina is biting her lip, and even though her eyes are still hidden behind her sunglasses you can tell her gaze is fixed solely on her best friend’s face, watching intently as her small, cute features are twisted by the pleasure building throughout her small, tight little body.
“Fuck,” Chaeyoung gasps. “Fuck, fuck me just like that.”
Mina lets a sound slip from her lips, and even though it is wordless it sounds like agreement. Her tooth bites deeper into her lip, and you fear for a moment whether she would soon draw blood.
But the concern for Mina is fleeting; Chaeyoung’s pussy wrapped around your cock is your main focus. Your free hand clutches a small butt cheek, or her tiny waist, pulling her back toward you as your hips slam forward - the forcefulness with which you thrust into her body increasing steadily, even as your tempo and pace remained the same.
“Such a good toy,” Chaeyoung sighs. She’d always been one of the more vocal girls during sex, finding release through words the way the others found release in breathless gasps and moans. “Such a good toy for us. For me.”
“Mmmm,” Mina hums, another wordless sound of agreement. Her pussy clenches around your fingers. You find it more and more difficult to plunge your fingers in and out of her body, but you ensure your fingers are fucking her with the same pace that your cock is fucking her best friend.
You glance over at her - at that slim, pale body of hers. There was a lot to love about her - the long, graceful legs, the round, full ass, the well-toned midriff and cute pair of breasts. But it was the way it all combined with that graceful, elegant face that put her on another level; seeing it twisted and contorted with lewd desire, seeing that face become slave to her base needs - it gave you a perverse pleasure, a lewd satisfaction in corrupting something so seemingly prim and proper.
By contrast, Chaeyoung seemed built for the physical pleasures - small, tight, slim, easy to throw around and bend over and play around with. There was something about her that invited sex, something that asked to be used, to be held down and fucked - even though you knew that she equally liked being the one using, the one pouncing atop a man and using his body for her own pleasure. Something about her screamed sex, made her irresistible. Every time you had her, you felt yourself giving into it more and more completely.
Your fingers slip from Mina’s body as you feel yourself give in to your need to fuck Chaeyoung, to take her, make her yours. You up your pace, your cock pounding her now, giving her tight little cunt hard, fast thrusts.
She yelps at first at your new pace, but yelps become sighs, and then moans. Your hands pull her hips back toward you as you thrust forward, ripping more delicious sounds from the young woman’s throat, making her cute butt cheeks ripple and bounce with each impact of your hips against them. Despite the roughness with which you’re fucking her, she still finds the words to put words to her pleasure.
“Oh fuck,” she gasps. “Fuck, Mina, fuck, he’s fucking me so good. So good. So hard! So good. Stretching me out. Gonna… gonna fucking cum soon, all over his cock.”
“Chaeyoung, mmmm,” Mina replies, unable, like her friend, to find the words that could give voice to her pleasure. She settles for reaching over and capturing Chaeyoung’s face with her hand, pulling her towards herself for a kiss.
The sight of the two making out - even as you fuck Chaeyoung’s cunt with long, hard strokes - is intoxicating. It felt amazing for you, but it must have been sublime for Chaeyoung, if the pulsating of her pussy around your cock was any indication.
Her orgasm hits her from out of nowhere, and she moans her pleasure into Mina’s mouth. The older woman breathes her moan in, inhales it, her lips curling up into a smile even as Chaeyoung turns into a quivering, trembling mess beneath her lips.
Eventually Chaeyoung’s strength gives out, and she breaks the kiss, falling forward and letting her head drop to the deck chair. You slow your thrusts, relishing the embrace of her pussy rippling around your cock as her orgasm runs its course.
“Me now, me,” Mina gasps, almost pleading, barely able to come up with the words she needed to describe the need coursing through her body. “Fuck me now. Me.”
You slide from Chaeyoung’s trembling pussy, delighting in the sight of her cunt lips wrapped around your shaft as it leaves her body. Your cock is slick and wet and dripping with her juices, some of it dripping onto the deck chair in heavy drops. You leave her face down, ass up on the deck chair, a blissful smile on her face as she relishes every second of the post-orgasm haze that had taken a hold of her senses.
You take up position behind Mina, swapping over to her deck chair, planting one foot on the floor for better leverage. You bring your glistening cock to her needy little cunt, and you slip into her body with one strong thrust, hilting yourself inside the mewling young woman’s slick little pussy.
Mina’s cunt is tight and dripping, given she’d just spent the past few minutes watching her best friend have her brains fucked out right next to her. From the very first thrust she is clenching, pulsating, quivering around your shaft. It was obvious that she was in no mood for a slow build up, slow ramping up of pace and forcefulness.
So you fuck her - hard, fast, merciless. And from the moment you slide out of her cunt, only to hilt yourself inside her again, her entire body tells you that that was exactly what she wanted.
She sighs, moans, cries her pleasure. Without words, like Chaeyoung. It was odd, you realized, given how relatively composed she was the night before when she was with the two old toys, and even earlier than that, when you had her with Buzz and Woody a few weeks prior. Both of those times she seemed to have complete control over the situation and her own body, vocalizing her needs, ordering her partners to do what she wished. This was a woman whom you’d witnessed taking three loads in each of her holes, all in the same night, without so much as a sly smile of contentment afterwards.
And now here she was, a mewling, quivering thing, unable to form words, her only way of expressing her pleasure being the breathless sighs and moans that spilled from her lips in an endless tumble. What was different?
You realize, even as you fuck the young woman into the deck chair, that it was Chaeyoung’s presence. The younger woman had been a mere observer with both of the other encounters, but now, having been fucked by the same man mere moments before, she was a full participant. 
Was it Chaeyoung’s proximity that drove Mina mad? The knowledge that she was being fucked with the same cock that had been inside her best friend and ex-lover just moments before?
Whatever it was, the Mina you were slamming in and out of was a different one from the one you’d had before. She reaches behind her, her nails pressing deep into your hip. She turns towards Chaeyoung, her sunglasses falling from her eyes as she does so, revealing eyes drunk with some heady mixture of pleasure and need.
“Mmmm,” she sighs, “Oh! Ummmh. Chaeyoung-”
Chaeyoung shakes the last of her post-orgasm stupor to reach up with a hand, cradling Mina’s face just as Mina did to her minutes before, when she herself was on the verge of cumming. 
“Do you like that, baby girl?” she asks, breathlessly. “Do you like being fucked hard like this?”
“Hhhmmmm,” Mina sighs, even as her body is rocked back and forth with the relentless pace of your cock thrusting in and out of her tight little cunt. The wet slap slap slap of your hips into her slick, sticky crotch makes it almost difficult to hear her.
“Mmm, I bet you do,” the younger girl answers, understanding the meaning beneath every sound that left her friend’s mouth, even if those sounds ceased to resemble human language, and instead took the form of lustful moans and wordless sighs. “I know you love being fucked like this. Being fucked hard, having your cunt pounded.”
Chaeyoung forces a kiss onto Mina’s lips before bringing her mouth to the moaning woman’s ear.
“I know you love it, taking cocks like this,” she continues. “Being used. Normal fucking isn’t good enough for you, is it? You need men to use you, don’t you? Being fucked like this - you love it. Do you know why, Mina? Do you know why you love being fucked hard? Because you’re so prim and proper all the time, aren’t you, baby girl? Because you’re Myoui Mina, elegant and ladylike, the perfect princess - being fucked like a whore.”
Mina cums in response - as though some secret keyword had been spoken, some trigger she had buried deep within her pulled by a merciless finger. Her orgasm is rough, violent, her entire body becoming a trembling mess as the pleasure overcomes her senses. She tightens almost painfully around your cock, the silken embrace of her cunt becoming almost unbearable in its tightness.
She falls forward, off your cock and onto the deck chair, breathing heavily, eyes shut, body still quivering. You gasp involuntarily as you leave her body, the slick wetness of her cunt sliding off your cock sending shivers of pleasure up your spine. You’d seen Mina cum before, of course, including on your own cock more than once - but never like this. You’d never seen her have an orgasm so strong, so raw.
You feel a need to comfort her, make sure she was okay. You bend over her body, placing kisses on her sweaty back and neck.
Chaeyoung joins you, leaning on her side on Mina’s deck chair, kissing her friend’s forehead and flushed cheeks even as the older woman quivers and trembles with the aftershocks of her orgasm.
“He hasn’t cum yet,” she whispers into Mina’s ear as she pulls a strand of hair behind it. “We can’t leave him like this, can we, baby girl?”
“Mmnnnn,” Mina manages, though her breaths are short as she struggles to feed tired lungs. 
“Neither of the other toys came in you last night, did they? They followed your rules. Do you want a load now, baby girl? Do you want a load in this tight little pussy? In your tight little ass?”
Chaeyoung runs a finger along Mina’s lips before planting a soft, tender kiss upon them.
“…Or would you rather swallow it?”
Mina’s bottom lip curls under her tooth before she answers.
“You… you, take it. Take his cum. I know… I know you want it. I want you.. I want you to have it.”
A wicked smile pulls at the corners of Chaeyoung’s lips.
“Okay, baby girl,” she whispers, loud enough for you to hear. “I’m sure he’s got a lot of cum saved up for us. It’s already the second day of the trip, and he hasn’t cum in a pussy yet. Don’t worry, baby girl. I’ll take his load for the both of us.”
Chaeyoung reaches into the black plastic bag that she’d left on the deck floor, retrieving her Polaroid camera. She places it in Mina’s hands.
“Make sure you get a good shot,” she says.
Chaeyoung lies on her back on her deck chair and spreads her legs. She reaches down, pulls the crotch of her swimsuit aside further than it already was, revealing her slick, dripping opening. For a moment, you are surprised with how quickly she turned your attention away from Mina’s wellbeing and back to her own pleasure. It was almost greedy, how quickly she claimed your load. Almost selfish.
But the thought is fleeting, because there she was - beautiful, tight, needy, waiting for your cock, craving your load. Any hesitation you might have had about how quickly she’d forgotten about Mina vanishes at the sight of her and the needy cunt between her flushed, spread thighs.
You come back to her deck chair, taking up position between her legs, bringing your cock - slick, glistening, aching - to her needy little cunt. You swipe your tip up and down her lips for a moment before sliding inside her, filling her in one smooth, long stroke.
“Fuck,” she hisses through her teeth. “Fuck, that’s it. That’s it, baby - I know you're close. Come on. Fuck me, cum in my pussy.”
You fuck Son Chaeyoung into the deck chair with firm, solid strokes of your cock, making sure she felt every entry and exit, filling her until you’re hilt deep before slipping out and doing it again and again and again. She spreads her legs wider, lets you get as deep inside her as you could. She hooks her ankles around your waist, wraps her hands around the back of your neck and lets her fingers intertwine. The cock hammering in and out of her body feels wonderful, but she cares less about her own pleasure and more about making sure her needy little pussy was filled up with cum.
“Come on, baby. Fuck me. Fuck my pussy up, give me that mess. Cum in me. Fill me up, fill me deep! I want to feel it in my guts.”
“Fuck, Chaeyoung,” you grunt. She was so tight, so slick, so hot - the silken grasp of her cunt wore away more and more of your sanity with each thrust. “Gonna make me cum.”
Mina whimpers next to you both, and you spare her a glance to see that she’s recovered somewhat from her orgasm. She’s grasping the camera with both hands now, holding it beneath her eye, waiting for the perfect shot. Her hands are quivering slightly. Her lower lip is curled under a tooth as she bites down hard on it.
Chaeyoung sees her readying for the shot and feels you nearing your peak. She places her hands on your upper chest before giving you a slight push backward, forcing you to straighten your arms as you support your weight with your hands on either side of her head. It creates space between your bodies - and gives Mina the perfect angle for a shot of your cock sliding in and out of her creamy little pussy.
“Oh god,” Mina gasps, breathless at the sight before her.
“Chaeyoung, gonna fucking-”
“-cum in me!” she hisses, eyes locked on yours with a wild intensity, wanting nothing more in that moment than to feel your cock spasming inside her as it fills her with semen. “Cum in me, cum in my cunt - fill me up with your cum.”
Mina’s tooth breaks the tender skin of her lip. She tastes the blood in her mouth.
She frames the shot. Her finger finds the shutter button just as you orgasm, filling Chaeyoung’s cunt with the first of several ropes of thick, warm semen.
Snap.
---
“Signal was the worst song. I have no idea how it got released, much less became our title track.”
“And the music video!” Mina adds. “With that dumb alien, and the dumb superpowers. What were the marketing team on when they came up with that stuff?”
“I dunno,” Chaeyoung says, filling your shot glass with the last drops of the three bottles of soju. “But hey, it won Song of the Year for some reason, so I guess it wasn’t a total failure.”
“I kinda liked Signal,” you admit, sheepishly. “I thought it was a bop.”
“Of course you did,” Chaeyoung says with a teasing sneer. “God, you’re such a fanboy.”
“Can’t complain about where it got me,” you counter, shooting the young woman a wink before downing your shot. You relish the sweet but strong flavor of the alcohol as it slides down your throat. The three of you had started drinking not long after your little session, lounging about on the deck chairs as the afternoon turned into early evening. Alcohol mixed well with the post-sex haze, lending the warm Singaporean sunset a warm, comfortable feeling.
“We’re all out,” Mina observes, motioning with her head towards the empty green bottles. “I suppose I can head out and get some more.” She raises her upper body off her deck chair and looks around for the bikini bottoms she’d rid herself of a while ago, but before she can find them, Chaeyoung stops her with a hand on her forearm.
“Now, now,” the younger girl says, “I don’t think you or I should be going out given our current state of dress. You can’t even find the other half of your bikini, can you?”
“I mean, either of you can just toss some shorts on and be just fine-” you begin, only for Chaeyoung to pull the top of her swimsuit down, letting her small, perky little tits slip out. Mina playfully follows suit, slipping her own round tits out of the cups of her bikini top.
“So you think I should go back out to the convenience store with my tits out and a load of cum dripping down my thighs? Man, the company would kill us if we went out like this, wouldn’t they?” Chaeyoung asks Mina, playfully.
“They sure would,” she replies. She had seemed eager to make the liquor run herself - but her desire to please Chaeyoung outweighed her desire for more alcohol, apparently.
“I really do want some more drinks though, and maybe some snacks,” Chaeyoung continues. “If only there were a strong and responsible but also handsome and well-endowed manager here to solve this little predicament of ours.”
The girls smile slyly at you, and you give them a snort through your nose before standing up off the chair and putting your shorts back on. You make a show of giving both of their pairs of tits a nice long look before turning around and starting towards the open glass doors of the hotel suite.
“Wait!” Chaeyoung says, reaching for the Polaroid. “Take a shot of us before you go. While the sun’s still up.”
You take the camera, expecting her to direct you to take another lewd shot - they did both have their tits out and Mina’s bikini bottom was essentially MIA - but Chaeyoung surprises you by tucking her tits back into her swimsuit and grabbing a white towel from a nearby deck chair that she tosses over Mina’s naked lower half.
“Take a clean one for the fanboys,” she says, mischievously, as she puts on her sunglasses and cuddles up next to Mina, who has pulled her bikini top back over her breasts. “I’m sure they’ll love the Michaeng tease!”
Mina sits up and gets ready for the picture, but the smile on her lips is forced. There is a quiver in her lip, as though Chaeyoung had just reopened an old wound.
You frame the shot. Your finger finds the shutter just as Mina slides her sunglasses back on, as though she wanted to hide the sadness in her eyes.
Snap.
--- 
Singapore had many things - some of the best cuisine in Asia, world-class shopping, gorgeous people - but the past eight hours you’d spent hopping in and out of various art exhibits had convinced you that it also had a thriving art scene.
You weren’t much for art, truth be told. You could appreciate the talent behind a paintbrush or a pencil, of course, but you weren’t exactly one to spend more than a few minutes admiring a piece. 
Chaeyoung was quite the opposite. There were several times over the past few hours that you’d found her absolutely engrossed in a particular piece, to the point where she appeared almost motionless in front of it, her breathing being the only indicator that she was a living being and not herself some sort of statue.
“Art can express what letters and numbers can’t,” she said, out of the blue, while you both stood there admiring a piece from a local modern artist. “It isn’t constrained by the rules of language or math or science. It’s expression in its purest form. That’s why I love it.”
Spending time alone with her was always something you looked forward to - you didn’t need her to justify the hours you’d both spent in small, quiet local galleries and exhibits over most of the day. That she felt the need to do so led you to believe that she was unsure of how you felt about her obsession with canvases and spray paint and acrylics.
“We can take as much time here as you want, Chaeyoung,” you say, quietly. Her attention leaves the piece in front of her for a moment to shoot you a smile for a moment before she returns her eyes to it.
“Yeah? You wouldn’t rather be with a sweet, wholesome girl in a classy sundress and heels? One that doesn’t drag you into shady galleries filled with weird abstract art?”
“Naw. And I think I get this piece, honestly. It’s, uh, about the colors and stuff.”
Chaeyoung smiles, returning her attention to the art piece.
You spend the next ten minutes in silence. You do your best to make sense of the colors and shapes in front of you until Chaeyoung slowly slips her hand in your arm and drags you toward the next exhibit.
---
Exhibit 4: Two subjects (Subjects A and C) are immediately post-coitus. The male, Subject C, is on his back. Subject A is atop him. Subject C’s penis is still fully embedded inside Subject A. Semen and other bodily fluids drip from the meeting of their bodies to drip down Subject C’s penis and testicles.
---
The first time it happens you aren’t quite sure what exactly it was - but the intense, sharp pleasure it incited within you was intoxicating. 
The second time, you think you know what it is - Chaeyoung’s tongue. 
Mina rides you roughly, fiercely, every muscle in her toned hips and thighs working hard to slide her juicy little cunt up and down your length. Her small, round tits sway atop you and the wordless, breathy moans that leave her mouth are music to your ears. 
But it’s the little pauses she makes every few seconds, at the apex of each exit of your cock from her body - the pauses that allow Chaeyoung to drag her tongue up the underside of your shaft, gathering up the slick juices that coat your length - that drive you crazy. 
With your tip inside one woman and another’s tongue lapping up the wetness on your shaft, the concept of sanity was quickly becoming an abstract, unknown thing.
Chaeyoung returns to playing with your balls, caressing them with careful fingertips. Mina returns to bouncing that tight little pussy of hers up and down your cock. You return to relishing every moment, doing your best to hold on to what remained of your sanity even as more and more of it was lost to you with each bounce, each lick.
What you would have given to be in Chaeyoung’s position for even a moment, to see what she saw, watching Mina’s round, firm ass bounce up and down, watching your cock as it speared in and out of her leaking, dripping cunt. The sight of it alone might have been enough to make you cum right there, on the spot. It’s only by some miracle that you hadn’t already.
Your fingers dig deep into the soft, yielding flesh of Mina’s thighs as she continues to ride you. You had to ground yourself, find something to anchor yourself with amidst the waves of pleasure battering you. Each one was more delicious than the last - and each one brought you closer and closer to a climax you weren’t sure you wanted so soon.
It was too good. The slick, silken embrace of Mina’s cunt, the sighs and moans filling your ears, the feel of Chaeyoung’s tongue darting out and licking the underside of your shaft - it was too good. You wanted it to last, fought hard to control yourself even as you knew the fight would be in vain.
“He’s gonna cum soon, baby girl,” Chaeyoung announces. She knew you well enough by now, knew by the quiver in your thighs and the tremble in your balls that you were close. “Where do you want it? You want it in this juicy little cunt of yours, don’t you? I know you only let our current toys cum in you. I know you haven’t had a load in this pussy in weeks. Is this where you want it, baby girl? Is this where you want him to cum? Tell him where, baby girl. He needs to hear it.”
“Inside,” Mina hisses, the single word leaving her mouth with an intense amount of conviction, as though she couldn’t even fathom the idea of you cumming anywhere else. 
“You heard her,” Chaeyoung relays. Even amidst Mina’s moans and the wet slap of her thighs against your hips her words are crystal clear. “Fill that pussy up with cum.”
“Fuck, Mina,” you gasp, fingers turning into claws as they dig into her pale thighs before reaching around and filling your palms with the soft flesh of her bouncing ass, slamming her down onto your cock. Mina bends, sucks the breath from your mouth with a passionate kiss.
She breaks it, watches you with passionate, wild eyes. Her hips are relentless, her cunt pulsating, tightening  - too good, too fucking good. Her lips open, and she whispers.
“Cum inside me.”
Your hands slam her ass down onto your crotch, and your cock spasms as it fills Myoui Mina with thick, hot ropes of cum. She sighs and moans with every spurt that paints her walls, but the wordless sounds that leave her mouth sound far away, dull, because you’re too far gone, too far lost in pleasure to even parse the sensation of sound.
For a few long, beautiful seconds, you feel like you’re floating. The pleasure flowing through your veins is overwhelming, is all that exists. 
Mina, breathing heavily, lifts her hips up and off you. Your cock, still stiff, glistening and slick and wet, slips from her body. Heavy drops of your semen drip from the splayed lips of her fucked cunt, dropping onto your cock and balls.
Chaeyoung licks her lips at the sight. She frames the shot. Her finger finds the shutter.
Snap.
Even before the resulting photo has begun to leave the camera, she has already tossed it onto the bed. You look over Mina’s shoulder and watch as Chaeyoung, eyes hungry, presses her face against the Japanese girl’s cunt.
The look on Mina’s face tells you all you need to know about what is happening just beyond your line of sight. The pleasure wracks her fine, delicate features as Chaeyoung eats out her freshly fucked pussy, licks up the warm semen and cunt juices leaking freely from it. Mina moans, arching her back, giving Chaeyoung a better angle from which to devour her sticky, dripping pussy.
Your hands are still gripping Mina’s ass, a full cheek in each palm. You spread the cheeks apart, allowing Chaeyoung even easier access to the Japanese girl’s body.
The sounds that fill the room are unholy. Chaeyoung is slurping and sucking and licking and Mina is moaning and sighing beneath her tongue, back arching sharply, her limbs trembling.
You watch over Mina’s shoulder as Chaeyoung finally raises her head from her friend’s cunt. She is a mess - semen and cunt juices flow freely from her chin and the corners of her lips.
She opens her mouth - and her tongue is wet, white, glistening. Her hands find yours, still spreading Mina’s cheeks apart. Her fingers play with Mina’s ass, teasing the tight bud until it opens slightly.
She lets the juices in her mouth drip onto Mina’s asshole.
You watch it - the glistening, slick, sinful drip of juices as it falls from the tip of Chaeyoung’s tongue and between Mina’s cheeks.
When her mouth is empty, Chaeyoung returns her face to Mina’s body, this time swirling her tongue around Mina’s pursed asshole, teasing the tight opening with her tongue, letting the slick wetness she’d spit on it inside her body.
You watch it all, enraptured, from over Mina’s quivering shoulder. You lock eyes with Chaeyoung, her eyes finding yours even as she is nose-deep between her best friend’s ass cheeks, her tongue working inside her ass. The look she gives you is nothing short of wicked.
Eventually she raises her face from Mina’s trembling body.
“I think her ass is ready now,” she states. “Come fuck it.”
You slide out from under Mina’s boneless, trembling body. You take up position behind her, bringing your cock, still rock-hard - because who wouldn’t be, after seeing what you’d just seen - to the slick, wet mess of her asshole. She, like you, is powerless, unable to do anything except whatever Chaeyoung desired. Two puppets, two pawns, slave to her will.
Her hole beckons, slick and ready, waiting to be fucked and taken and used.
Chaeyoung watches over your shoulder, a devil in disguise. She presses her chest against your back, arms wrapping themselves around your torso, just as she had wrapped herself around your very soul. You feel yourself surrender to her, bound to fulfilling her every desire - even if in this moment her desire was to watch you use her best friend’s body.
For a moment, she considers grabbing the camera, capturing this moment too, allowing you both to re-live it over and over again in the future - but as you slide inside Mina’s ass and the air is soon filled with lust and sex and fucking, the thought of doing much else quickly flees her mind.
She had a hold over the other two occupants in the room, and the need to sate her desires overcame any desire to capture it on film.
---
Exhibit 5: Photo is predominantly dark and indiscernible. Lens was likely obscured by a close object while taking the photo.
----
The air is stale, heavy and hot. When you open up the blinds and pull open the sliding door that led to the balcony, the rush of cool air that floods the room does much to chase away the last cobwebs of sleep from your groggy head.
Chaeyoung stirs on the bed, lets out a groan of protest over the merciless sunlight and the chill of fresh air. She turns onto her side away from you.
You let your gaze wander over her small, tight little body, naked as the day she was born. Sitting next to her on the bed, you reach out and let your finger graze her soft curves, over the creamy skin and ink occasionally embedded beneath it. She loved art so much she wanted it inked into her own body, not knowing that she herself was a form of it.
When your fingertips reach her shoulder she captures your fingers with her own and they intertwine.
“Ten more minutes,” she manages to mumble.
“We have thirty minutes to get out of here,” you answer. Mina had awoken some hours before and was already downstairs checking out at the front desk and settling the bill. 
She grumbles and protests, but eventually she rises to a seated position.
“I can think of a couple of things we can do in thirty minutes,” she says, suggestively. You find your gaze drifting to her small, round breasts and the piercings atop them, and your hand follows suit, gently cradling one in your palm. She purrs, and a naughty smile perks up the corners of her lips as she brings her face to yours and gives you a kiss.
“I’ll take a raincheck,” you say, softly. “C’mon. Mina’s probably already called us a ride to the airport.”
“Okay, okay,” she relents. You place the loose sweater and sweatpants you’d prepared for her in her lap.
It was a bit of a challenge, dragging her out of the hotel room and downstairs, where Mina was waiting with your luggage on the curb next to a newly arrived black SUV. Unlike Chaeyoung, she is impeccably dressed in a grey pencil skirt and matching white button-up, looking for all intents and purposes as though she was on her way home from a business trip and hadn’t spent most of the last five days having some of the filthiest sex imaginable.
“Finally,” she says under her breath as you and Chaeyoung approach. You wheel your two carriers to the rear of the waiting vehicle and assist the driver with loading them into the trunk.
Chaeyoung produces the Polaroid camera. “One last photo!” she announces. “Good thing, too, ‘cause it’s the last shot left.”
Mina brushes her hair from her face, preparing herself for the photo - until Chaeyoung shoves the camera into her hands.
“Take a pic of me and my man slave,” Chaeyoung says, playfully. She shuffles over to where you are loading the last of the luggage into the trunk and hooks her arm in yours. You glance at her as she approaches, and find a wide, cheery smile on her lips as she poses with you.
You both miss the quiver of pain in Mina’s lip.
She frames the shot. Her finger finds the shutter button.
She covers the lens.
Snap.
“Oh, shit,” she says, flatly, as the camera cranks out the photo. It takes a few moments to confirm as it develops, but eventually it appears most of the photo is obscured by the finger Mina had left over the lens.
“Damn,” Chaeyoung says, disappointed. “That sucks. Oh well, we have plenty of other photos from this trip.”
“Sorry,” Mina says under her breath as she passes the camera back to Chaeyoung and climbs into the vehicle.
---
Mina barely manages a smile when Momo enters the green room; truth be told, she was so exhausted, physically and emotionally, that the older woman was lucky to even get that.
“Hey,” Momo greets as she tosses her bag onto a nearby table before slouching into a stylist’s chair. She, too, looked and sounded a little ragged. “How was Singapore?”
“Great,” Mina answers beneath her breath, telling Momo all she needed to know about how the younger woman really felt. “How was Paris?”
“Great,” Momo repeats, with an equal amount of sad sarcasm. It had been two weeks since she’d returned from the French capital, but she wasn’t sure she’d recovered from the toll it had enacted on her body or heart.
The two sit there in silence for a while, silence heavy in the air. After a few minutes, Momo takes her phone out of her bag.
“I saw that pic she posted,” she begins. “The Polaroid of the two of you.”
Mina sighs under her breath, looking away slightly, unable to bear the thought of eye contact with anyone at the moment. This was the last conversation she wanted to have. “What about it?” she manages.
“It was shitty of her to do,” Momo says. “I’m sorry, Mina.”
“Sorry for what?”
“I don’t know,” the older woman admits, not quite knowing how to broach the topic. “I just… I know about you two, how you were together. It’s shitty of her to use your history to get likes from thirsty fanboys on fucking insta.”
Mina’s eyes shut involuntarily, as though her body were protecting itself from the world. She didn’t want to deal with this, wanted to run away from it all, would rather be anywhere else than in this green room preparing for a performance she had little enthusiasm for. She appreciated Momo taking her side, but to hear Chaeyoung’s intentions out loud hurt her more than she was expecting.
“It’s fine,” Mina says, although she isn’t sure whether she believes it herself. “She doesn’t know how I feel. She didn’t mean anything by it. It’s just…”
“...it’s just?”
“It’s just… fanservice.”
Her voice cracks as the word leaves her lips. It hurt her, to have what was an important part of her life reduced to something so fake, so inherently pretend. She feels a spike of emotion well up in her throat, and she turns further away from Momo in an attempt to hide it.
It doesn’t work - Momo leaves her chair and takes the one next to Mina. She wraps an arm around the younger girl. After a few moments’ hesitation Mina relents and turns her body to Momo, and the two embrace.
A few minutes pass - the two young women sharing a moment of comfort amidst the hustle and bustle of a music show. Outside, they can still hear Sana laughing with her juniors over the dull beat of whatever shrill, overproduced song they were filming a dance challenge to. They do their best to shut out the world in each others’ arms.
“I want to be with her,” Mina says, softly, voice barely above a whisper.
“I want to be with him,” Momo answers.
At that moment the door opens and Sana lets herself into the room - thankfully, with her back facing them. She spends a few moments lingering by the door, waving goodbye to the small crowd of junior idol worshippers she’d gathered. She bathes in their attention, wears it like a dress, relishes every overexaggerated wave and promise to stay in contact. Inside the green room, her two group members cringe - the very sound of her voice annoyed and irritated them, as did the empty promises and fake compliments that left her lips.
Momo and Mina part before she can fully enter the room. Before they do, they share one last look.
In each others’ eyes, they come to an understanding.
---
The photos were terrible, by modern standards.
Some were poorly composed, some over or under exposed, blurry or unfocused. But therein lay their charm - their imperfection gave them character that modern photography lacked. Modern photos could be edited, touched up until they were perfect. Not so with physical photos. They were fleeting moments in time captured on film, photographer flaws and all.
The more scandalous, lewd ones she put aside - they’d go in a special album, one she kept for lonelier nights - but most of them she put in her normal album with the others. They would take their place alongside photos with friends, photos of important places or things, foreign landscapes and macro images of blades of grass or drops of rain. Many of the photos are of art, or are framed in such a way as to be art themselves. 
She saw art everywhere. She wanted to capture it all, hang them all up in galleries where they could live forever; even if said gallery consisted only of the small album she kept in a corner of her room.
There are a few of the new additions that she likes more than the others - the ones of him. Not the cheesy, staged photos of them in front of touristy landmarks or landscapes; no, she liked the candid ones the most. The ones of him laughing, only half in-frame, at a dad joke Mina dropped over lunch; the one of him in a vintage store they found tucked away in an alleyway, pointing up at an off-frame t-shirt that had caught his interest; the one of him she took when they got lost walking back to the hotel and he’s trying to make sense of the map on his phone, confused.
But the one she took on their last day there, the one of him asleep, head only half on his pillow, the sunlight making his skin glow - that was the one she liked the most. Her fingers trace the photo for a moment, and a soft smile finds its way on her lips.
After a moment she puts the photo in the album and closes it, placing it back on her shelf. 
As she does, her eye catches something - the small, rainbow-patterned album behind the one she held in her hands.
She knows she shouldn’t - she knows what’s in there, and what emotions it would bring up - but something possesses her to pick it out from her shelf. So much had happened, so much had changed over the past few months. Perhaps a part of her needed a reminder of a different time, when she was a different person - when they were different people.
She opens the album, and her fingers quickly find the last page. It is well-worn, familiar. Her fingers trace the pink-framed outline of the only Polaroid there. 
Her smile remains, but now it is a sad one.
---
Exhibit 0: Two young women (Subject B and Subject D) are embracing. The photo is a close up of their faces. Subject D is placing a kiss upon the cheek of Subject B, who is presumably holding the camera to take the selfie. Both Subject B and Subject D appear happy. In the lower half of their frame are their left hands, fingers intertwined - simple matching rings adorn their ring fingers.
On the bottom of the Polaroid frame, written with a black Sharpie in simple handwriting:
“Love you always - Nayeon”
---
Author’s Note: Toy is dirty PWP but also feels? *shrug* ;)
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kaylasficrecs · 11 months ago
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spencer reid recs - part 2
heartbeat | one shot, flangst | @theonewiththefanfics
red lipstick kisses | imagine, fluff | @ddejavvu
a real headscratcher | one shot, fluff | @bippot
fail an altercation | imagine, angsty flangst | @railingsofsorrow
11:34 pm | imagine, fluff | @morehotch
wingteam | imagine, fluff | @sailortongue
all you want to do is smooch | imagine, fluff | @tinyluvs
calls you a pet name | drabble, fluff | @moonstruckme
falling for you | imagine, fluff | @sofiareidings
we'll be alright | one shot, flangst (lots of angst) | @unseededtoast
you're on your own kid | imagine, flangst | deactivated blog
buried alive | series | @pathologicalreid
wrapped around your finger | imagine, angry fluff | @dr-spencer-reids-queen
incessant insomnia | imagine, flangst | @reiding-writing
things we bury | series | @parkerslatte
love potion | imagine, fluff | @foxy-eva
girlfriend interrupted | imagine, flangst, comfort | @actually-safer-to-kiss
dedicated to new lovers | series | @sweatervest-obsessed
a very strange night | series | @reidreaders
stick season | two shot, angst | @sweatervest-obsessed
different kinds of nerds | imagine, fluff | @moonstruckme
sleeping on the jet | drabble, fluff | @golden1u5t
through a withdrawal | imagine, flangst, comfort | @reiderwriter
a secret from morgan | imagine, fluff | @tweedlydumbtweedlydoo
flustered with nicknames | imagine, fluff | @tweedlydumbtweedlydoo
sparks fly | series | @avis-writeshq
bookworms | drabble, fluff | @little-miss-dilf-lover
carriage six | two shot, fluff | @avis-writeshq
secretly mine | imagine, fluff (some angst) | @actually-safer-to-kiss
the archer | one shot, angst | @pathologicalreid (tw)
that day in the café | imagine, flangst | @the-au-thor (tw)
coping mechanism | imagine, fluff | @veryberryjelly
secret's out | one shot, flangst | @the-bau-quinjet
broke my heart | one shot, flangst (more angst) | @darnittumbleweed
heart's desire | one shot, flangst | @waywardxrhea
roommate remembering his birthday | imagine, fluff | @luveline
shouldn't i want you? | imagine, flangst | @weird-is-life
rather ardently | one shot, angsty flangst | @reidscanehand
because i love you | imagine, flangst (more fluff) | @atlabeth
a shared heart | imagine, fluff | @benedictscanvas
epiphany | imagine, angst | @pathologicalreid (tw)
can you come get me? | one shot, angst | @pathologicalreid
galileo | series | @write-orflight
on your own | two shot, angst | @g0dlyunsub
be my angel | imagine, flangst | @nereidprinc3ss
beach day | two shot, fluff | @benevolentbones
in every other life | one shot, flangst (more fluff) | @irndad
forgiven | one shot, flangst | @reiding-writing
be so stupid | imagine, flangst | @mariasont
warm you | imagine, flangst | @g0dlyunsub
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zara-renata · 1 month ago
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Even the rocks on the roadside in the N109 Zone could tell | ao3 | part 11 the Sylus series
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Summary:
"How could you tell I was nervous?" -mc, phone call with Sylus "Remote Support" Sylus makes one final miscalculation. You wake up from a nightmare in a place you weren't ready to revisit. Sylus has to reckon with the inevitable consequences of how he treated you when you first met him, but you're paying the higher price.
Notes:
Sylus x gn reader, Sylus x mc, second person POV, some Kieran and Luke POV Slow burn, enemies-to-friends-to-lovers This story contains: grief, angst, a panic attack, self-destructive behavior, threatened violence (both real [against other characters] and imagined [against mc]), reference to in-game violence on Sylus's part, mc with PTSD, mc with self-esteem issues and negative self-talk, hurt/comfort, a shampoo epiphany This is probably the lowest point in their relationship, and has the least amount of comedy of the series. But Sylus's bullshit from their beginning needs to be addressed before true love can really take off.
You’re here again. You think you’ve always been here, and any other memory is the dream. You have always been here, in this echoing house, the worn floorboards under your feet, still polished, still perfect for sliding along on socked feet, competing to see who can careen down the hall and hit the door at the end first. You have gotten so many bruises from slamming into the door at the wrong angle, but every one was worth it, to collapse with Caleb into a fit of laughter at the end. Even when he lost, and hit you instead of the door, slamming your body back into the door a second time—doubling your chances of concussion, as your grandmother would scold afterwards. But you’re not wearing socks now, and no matter how far you walk, the door at the end never comes closer. The closed doors lining the hall approach and pass with your steady booted stride, landmarks that offer no guidance at all.
You look back on the fever dreams of what you thought was your real life until you found yourself here, in this place again. The first time you reached out and clasped Xavier’s hand in yours, pulling him to his feet, trying to help him brush off the dirt from his beautiful white battle gear. Being held in his arms as the shimmering starlight of his evol lifted you both into the air to safety. Offering him a bite of your snack, watching his normally placid face light up with pleasure at the taste.
The first time you startled Rafayel off of his stupid, unsafe ladder. Walking barefoot with him along a deserted beach, the warm water sweeping over your ankles. Picking up seashells, and asking him if this one would fit in with his jumbled collection of knick knacks contained in his chaotic studio? Coming upon an eel trapped in the sand at low tide, the only sign of life an occasional gasp for oxygen—watching him carefully dig it out of the sand and release it back into the water. It swam away energetically. He said it was a dumb little eel, and would just get stuck again with the next low tide. You told him that you’d both just have to come back often to ensure that wouldn’t happen. 
The first time you saw Zayne again as an adult, crisp white lab coat over the broad shoulders of a man, so incongruous to your memory of the narrow shoulders of a little boy. His achingly gentle touch, when he listened to your heartbeat through the stethoscope, how he inexplicably held your wrist in his soft fingers to count your pulse instead of using the fingertip monitor. How he kept the flowers you gave him on the windowsill in his office and shook his head every time he had to stitch your wounds.
And … Sylus. 
The first time he held you bound before him, the glow in his eye blinding as he ransacked your soul with all the care of a corrupt cop. How his rough palm wrapped around your throat, and the paralyzing strength with which he tightened his hold. The suffocation, and the hate, and the fear, crushing your breath. The first time he called you a disappointment. All of those things, and everything after—the soft caress of his hand in your hair, his warm body wrapped around yours. Those achingly gentle faux memories, not even dreams, probably. Just daydreams, fantasies born from the pathetic need to be held gently again, in the way you hope someone held you as a child before you lost your memories.
Because you’re here again. And it feels so timeless, and so real, compared to these other faded memories. You must have always been here. You hear someone cutting an apple, the dull thunk of the knife hitting the butcher block, the juices misting with each snick. You press your ear against every door you pass. He’s so close. You’re sure of it. You lift your steel-toed boot and slam the flat of your foot into the next door in this endless hallway. It doesn’t even rattle. You kick it, again, and again. You’re sweating. Your head is pounding. You’re losing your breath and you can’t feel your legs anymore. You kick again. And again. And again. With what little breath you have left, you start to scream, the tears and the snot running down your face. He’s right there. If you’re strong enough. If you’re persistent enough. You can get to him. You can break yourself out of this nightmare, if you’re just enough. 
You scream, and you scream, and you kick, and you kick, until your throat gives out.
You wake up, and the scream from your dream is just a whimper in your throat. Your legs are asleep from how your body is folded in on itself, lying in what seems to be a bed.
You wake up in the dark.
You have no idea where you are.
Your heart is pounding in your chest, a jackhammer in the cracked cement of your body.
Your hair, your face, the pillow, the sheets on the bed you’re lying, what you’re wearing—wet. Sweat. Tears slipping from the corner of your eyes into the hair at your temples.
Where the fuck are you?
You sit up, wince at the tingling returning to your legs. Feel along the bed. Nothing. Your hand finally hits something smooth and hard. You pat around, find the base of what you hope is a lamp, let your hand drift up. You switch on the light.
Impossibly, your heart begins to beat even harder. No. No. You don’t want to be here. You aren’t ready to be here. As long as you see Sylus anywhere else—on the street, in a crowded club, in your apartment, even in your bed, you can keep the memories squashed deep, deep down with all the other things that frighten you, that cause you pain, and you can handle being near him. But you can’t reconcile your memories from this place with the memories of being swayed gently in his arms in a crowd, the tender touches on your couch, your bed, a glass of water held to soft lips, your head pillowed against a strong chest with a steadily beating heart as you fall asleep.
You can’t be here.
You crawl to the edge of the bed, land on bare feet on a plush rug over a cold marble floor. The room is empty. The bookshelves, the imposing desk in the corner, the chaise lounge at the foot of the bed, the black leather armchairs and marble topped coffee table. The dark walls, the record player. You recognize each and every object, although you have refused to return here in your mind since you were allowed to leave. You could walk through here blindfolded. You wish you were blindfolded.
The thin sweater you find yourself wearing is soaked through with sweat. You shiver in the air of Sylus’s silent bedroom. You swivel your head, searching for your own clothes. For your boots. Nothing. You don’t want to go deeper into his room, away from the door, an exit, toward the bathroom and his huge walk-in closet for your clothes, or even to borrow more of his. You want out. You can live without shoes. You can’t live if your heart explodes from the panic clawing its way up your throat.
You silently slip out of his bedroom into one of the echoing corridors of his base, with its deep maroon paneled walls and marble floors, the dense gloom of the N109 zone filtering through the huge windows lining this hallway. You remember every single detail. You hear nothing. Just the thundering of your heart. You stride through the labyrinthine halls, the high ceilings soaring above you along with the elaborate, savage designs of the chandeliers. You avoid going near the dining hall or the kitchen or the den or living room, sticking to the outer edges of the wing you know will lead you to the front door. To the way out of this place filling you with so much dread you could collapse under the weight if you falter for even a stuttered heartbeat.
Miraculously, you make it without seeing a single soul. You turn the gothic monstrosity of one of the double front door handles, fully expecting it to be locked from the inside, but it shifts easily in your hand. You open it only as far as necessary to squeeze your shivering body between the doors and let it close softly behind you.
The night is cold. It’s autumn now, after all. Since there are no natural trees in the N109 zone, the wind gusts unchecked against your already cold body. Sylus’s base sits on a cliff overlooking the valley of the N109 zone with its towering skyscrapers thrusting into the perpetual night like crystalline stalagmites in a vast cave. His house is accessible only by a long and winding road up the hillside. A proper villain’s lair. It’s going to be a long walk through the cold and dark if you don’t figure something else out.
You hate yourself, for your tendency to make assumptions. For not asking enough questions. For refusing to think about all the things that you should keep in the forefront of your mind every single second of every single day. Why had you assumed that Sylus was taking you to a hotel to wait for the evol linkage to dissipate? Why didn’t it occur to your stupid ass that he’d take you to his fortified base, where he is the safest, where it doesn’t cost him any money, where it is his home, since you were already in the N109 zone at Amnesia?
You just fell asleep in his big fucking tank like an idiot, without asking a damn thing.
You will deserve the walk ahead of you. Hopefully it will be what you need to never forget again that this man is using you for his own purposes, and probably every single thing he has done up to this point has been to further his goals involving his need for your resonance. After all, the shopkeeper made it plain from the very beginning: you can’t resonate with someone who frightens you. Someone you dislike. Someone who disgusts you. Sylus has never disgusted you. Quite the opposite, unfortunately. But fear and hate, individually, are probably sufficient to block whatever it is in you that allows you to connect to another in such an intimate way.
And what’s the best way to get someone to stop hating you? To stop being afraid of you? Determine what they need the most, and then give it to them.
Your insomnia. Your desperate loneliness, always there, under your skin, for as long as you can remember, but amplified in the aftermath of losing your family. Your craving for human touch and connection, the kind of touch and connection you can’t bring yourself to ask of your friends. That you can’t stand to seek in strangers anymore, after so many failures.
And of course, Sylus has known what you so desperately want, since the very first night you met him. Your mind drifts to your hand, wrapped securely in his. To him pulling you against him, and reading you bedtime stories about indemnification and allocation of risk and remedies in case of breach. To his soft kisses along your shoulder. How many times did he drop in at your place after he released you from his base? Three? It’s only taken three evenings to accomplish his plan that probably began with the deal about the brooch. Lull you into complacency, acquire your affection instead of your hate, and your willing help instead of your fear. Three evenings, to replace him choking you until you blacked out. To replace … everything that came after.
You look down at your bare feet and bare legs. You can survive this. You can survive anything.
You make an inventory of your current situation. You’re barefoot. Unarmed. Soaked in sweat, and the wind is gusting. You don’t have your phone. But you do have your Hunter’s watch. That’s enough. You’ll get far enough away from the base to avoid Sylus or his minions alerting to your absence and finding you outside, call for help, find some shelter, and wait for someone to come pick you up. You recall that the landscape along the winding road leading up to Sylus’s base is fairly isolated. You gamble that there won’t be anyone coming all the way up here at this time of night.
Once you’re home, you will be able to think straight. When your heart isn’t jackrabbiting in your chest. When this jittery feeling, like you can run a marathon without breaking a sweat, isn’t coursing through your pounding veins. When the lingering despair from the nightmare about your grandmother’s house has faded to the tolerable thrum of grief you’re used to these days. And you will uphold your end of the deal with Sylus. You meant it, when you let the coin decide. You can be as resolute in your decisions as he is. You will be his friend. Why, when you know that most of his behavior toward you is calculated, manufactured—a talented forgery? Because Sylus is very good at getting what he wants. He wanted your affection, and your willing help. And he has been successful in acquiring it, despite your best efforts to resist his charm. You’re honest enough to admit that to yourself. And what even is friendship, if you expect something in return? He may only be able to think of friendship in transactional, cost-benefit, return-on-investment terms, but you don’t want to live that way. Despite your best efforts, you like him so terribly much, and that’s the beginning and end of it. 
You will help him with his love, for whatever your help is worth, and you’ll finally wipe the slate clean. You just need… you just need your heart to stop for a minute. That’s all. And that can’t happen here, in the place where Sylus treated you more honestly than he has ever treated you since you were allowed to leave.
You take a deep breath and begin to jog. You can survive this. You can survive anything.
***
After being thoroughly entertained at Amnesia by Sylus’s Hunter, Luke and Kieran finally managed to dump Noah with Linda after settling the terms of their bet regarding how long they think it will take their boss to successfully woo the object of his unhinged obsession.
The one rule: no interference that could tip the odds one way or the other. Luke, Kieran and Noah must act as neutral observers of the hilarious conundrum their boss finds himself in regarding the highly skilled, highly oblivious Hunter not being able to see what is obvious to anyone who has the unfortunate opportunity of being within a five kilometer radius of the two of them: that Sylus is head over heels, and so is the Hunter.
Each concerned party committed to upholding this sacred rule of non-intervention. Each of them lied through their teeth while making such a commitment. But Luke and Kieran can tell that countering whatever Noah will likely come up with to drag out this complicated courtship will require all of their combined talents to ensure the odds remain in their favor, and that Sylus will convince the Hunter to accept him sooner rather than later.
Luckily for them, this shitshow is a win-win situation. As long as Sylus is happy, Luke and Kieran are happy. And they can tell, the Hunter is already making Sylus happy. They can see it in how drastically his mood has improved ever since the protocore auction. He no longer vacillates between the few emotions he has shown in the years they’ve known him—rage, utter boredom, and the worst: an unsettling blankness. A cavalier attitude regarding whether he lives or dies, whether he wakes up in the morning or not, whether his heart is beating or at a standstill. He’ll sometimes make off-hand comments about the banality of just… surviving, of waking up to find that he’s still alive and being utterly indifferent to that fact. Every time he says shit like that, shivers run down Luke and Kieran’s spines. They’d much rather he punch holes in walls in a fit of rage or blow up buildings out of boredom than encounter him when he’s at his most… empty.
But ever since the auction, the twins have seen a veritable rainbow of emotions clear as a Linkon City’s sunny afternoon on their boss’s otherwise impassive face. Amusement. Worry. Fascination. Yearning. Pining. Longing. Craving. 
“Luke, I’m truly proud of you for actually reading the thesaurus,” Kieran says from behind the steering wheel of their sleek, powerful muscle car. It was a present from Sylus. He claimed it was a bonus for their help in a particularly ugly business feud that ended up in more corpses than anticipated, but they both thought it was hilarious that the “bonus” arrived on the exact date of their latest birthday. Their boss really is the best.
“Thanks, man. It was like, really mind-blowing to learn how many words there are for Boss’s thirst for his pet.” Luke leans back in the sexy black leather bucket seat and enjoys the seat heating. Tonight is the coldest it’s been this fall. He fiddles with the sound system.
Kieran swats his hand away. “Driver’s choice. You know the rules.”
Luke pouts. “I’m not in the mood for Bach. Boring. I want Rachmaninov.”
“You don’t need to get wound up this close to home. It’ll take forever for you to settle down if you listen to Rachmaninov right now, and we really need to get some sleep. I have a feeling we’re about to get really busy with how distracted Boss is going to be with the Hunter.” He drums his fingers along the steering wheel. “He’s going to need all the help he can get.” 
“Ugh, fiiine.” Luke hunches further into the comfy seat and stares out the windshield, watching as the bright headlamps slice through the dark gloom, lighting up a swath of the deserted road leading up to their home. Suddenly, he jolts in the seat.
“What the fuck—”
“Is that—?”
“The Hunter, yeah—”
“And, what the fuck—”
“Yeah, no shoes—”
“Call—”
“Boss. On it.”
Luke already has his phone clutched in his hand, and the ringing fills the car through the sophisticated sound system Sylus ensured the car had, along with the fastest, strongest engine for this model on the market.
Kieran watches the Hunter disappear in the rearview mirror, while simultaneously slowing the car as quickly as possible without making excessive noise that could spook the Hunter.
Sylus’s deep voice suddenly fills the car. “Speak.”
“Uh, Boss?”
“Who else, Luke?” Sylus says dryly. “Speak.” 
“Do you know where your Hunter is?”
The line is silent for a beat. “I left Kitten in my bed, asleep, while I went to take care of some paperwork in the study.” He pauses. “Is there a reason you’re asking me this?” Anyone who didn’t know their boss like they do would think his tone of voice was indifferent. But all Luke and Kieran hear is a spike of worry.
“Uh, I’m pretty sure we just passed someone on the hillside road to base who looks, like, a scary amount like your Hunter. With no shoes on. Or coat.” Luke winces in anticipation of their boss’s response.
The line goes dead.
Kieran has slowed the car sufficiently to be able to pull a u-turn without tires screeching, and expertly swings the car around. He cuts the headlights, counting on the light from the blood-red moon to provide sufficient visibility. He then accelerates until he has the Hunter in view, and slowly follows the lonely figure, ready to provide protection until their boss can arrive and take the situation in hand. Luke and Kieran can tell that whatever you’re experiencing, this is not a situation that they are equipped to handle, and if they come up too quickly behind you, they’re worried you will bolt off-road and be even more difficult to collect again. They really, really hope you don’t notice their presence behind you until Sylus arrives.
***
Fuck. You’re being followed. And you haven’t found one damned area along the roadside that looks like it could serve as good cover since leaving Sylus’s long, convoluted driveway, because this region is a lifeless wasteland of bare dirt and rock and only small outcroppings of earth along the hill’s descent.
You didn’t remember it being so desolate. Probably because you were just so relieved to be escaping with your life, you were looking at the world through rose-colored glasses and failed to notice that the area leading up to Sylus’s base is as hospitable as the N109 zone’s red, red moon.
You had stiffened, almost pausing in your steady jog along the roadside as a sleek, sexy car that looked like it was built for racing came careening around a bend in the road, the two figures in it just silhouettes behind the blinding headlights as they roared past in a huge gust of wind and gravel. You had hoped, with all of your wildly out-of-control heart, that they were just business associates heading to the base for a meeting or something, and that whoever was in that vehicle wouldn’t recognize you or care about a lone nutcase going for a middle-of-the-night run in the middle of nowhere.
But you’re a highly trained Hunter, and you’ve gotten more sleep lately. Without turning around, you can tell that the same car is following behind you, which would be alarming enough, without the fact that whoever’s driving it is trying to be a sneaky shit with the headlights off. As if you can’t hear the purring of that sweet engine even over the strong wind. Idiots.
Your mind races. You have no weapon. You don’t even have shoes. Surprise is the only means of gaining an advantage. You half-turn, wrap your arms around your stomach and drop into a crouch, as if your stomach hurts and you can’t keep jogging because of the pain. Head down, you watch out of your peripheral as the car keeps slowly approaching in the dark. You let one arm drop from your waist on your side not in view from the car, and feel around on the ground until you find what you’re looking for. Then you wait.
When the car is only just a couple meters from you, you launch yourself from your crouched position and sprint directly at it. Its brakes screech as the driver is taken by surprise, but it’s too late. You’ve already vaulted from the hood onto the roof, and you’ve brought the heavy, dense rock clutched in your hand as hard as you can against the driver’s window. As it shatters, you reach through the now open space with your other hand and grab the driver by the throat, half pulling him out of the tinkling window frame. You hold the rock high above your head.
“Why the fuck are you following me,” you bite out through clenched teeth.
You hear the other car door open, but remain focused on the person you have by the throat.
“Don’t come any closer or I will make your friend unrecognizable for identification at the autopsy,” you snarl. You see the other person freeze in your peripheral vision.
You return your focus to the driver. Staring into his grimacing face, you see a young man, one you don’t recognize. He has a riot of floppy dark curls, shaved to a sharp fade on the sides and back of his head. His big dark eyes reflect the light of the red moon as they dart all over your face. He takes a deep breath.
“If I told you that you do not have anything to fear from me, or my brother, would you kindly put me down?” he asks in a voice that sounds alarmingly familiar. Your stomach cramps almost as painfully as your heart has been for the past hour. Without letting go of the driver’s throat, you turn and look at the man standing at the open passenger door, looking back at you with the same face as the man you have in your grip.
You let go, and Kieran sinks back into the car with a grunt. You scramble off the car roof and back away from it.
Just as you’re about to apologize, you see headlights cutting through the dark. You’re suddenly overcome with the wish that Sylus had killed you when you first met, because you can’t imagine how he’s going to react now, when he sees that you assaulted his employee and damaged his property with the rock that is now falling out of your nerveless hand.
You want to turn and run. You want to put this fucking night behind you. You hate that you’ve been thinking that so often lately. Every single time, you just want the night to be over. You’re so tired. Your heart won’t fucking stop doing that horrible thing in your chest, and you still feel like you need to run until you collapse to make it stop. But you’ve learned by now that there is no running from Sylus. Not in any way that matters. So you just stand there, waiting for the hammer to fall.
Thankfully, he doesn’t appear to enjoy toying with his prey tonight, because he quickly comes to a stop and parks the tank behind the twins’ car. He gracefully climbs down from the driver’s seat, slams the car door, and strides up to Kieran’s side, his black biker boots with the chains crunching on the broken glass. You wince with each footfall. He leans down and looks at Kieran. “You good?”
You can’t hear Kieran’s response, but you see Sylus nod and straighten. He gestures for Luke to get in the car, who obeys without comment. He then taps the roof firmly, twice, and strides toward you as Kieran pulls the car into the road, hangs an efficient u-turn, and disappears into the night.
You close your eyes and wait for Sylus to… you’re not sure? Hit you? Slam you with his evol? You brace yourself. Just because he’s been affectionate up until now, even through you throwing the duffel at him in front of an audience, doesn’t mean he’ll suffer you hurting his employees for no good reason. It doesn’t matter that this is the first time you've ever seen them without their masks on, and that it felt incredibly threatening as they followed you, for some unfathomable reason, with their damn headlights off.
Sure, you could fight back. Try to block his blow. But at this point, you feel like you fucking deserve it. You want to punch yourself in the face for hurting Kieran. You don’t know him, but he’s never been mean to you. The worst he’s ever done is give you a flare gun and pretend a pair of handcuffs could magically restrict Sylus’s evol. He didn’t deserve to be scared half to death and choked through a broken window because of his earlier prank. It occurs to you now that maybe stalking you with the headlights off was the twins’ idea of another prank? And you broke their car window and choked one of them. For fuck’s sake, at this point, you’ll welcome Sylus’s fist.
But instead of the hit you’re still bracing for, you jerk a little when you feel the heavy weight of a warm coat being draped around your shivering body.
You open your eyes. Sylus stands in front of you, wearing a thick cable knit sweater.
“If you wanted to go for a run, sweetheart, you could have just told me. We have a perfectly functional home gym, equipped with treadmills with big screens that make you feel like you’re running on a serene mountain path or along the beach. There’s no need to endure the desolation of the N109 zone’s ‘scenery’ when you’re here with me but want to work out.”
You just stare at him. 
“What’s wrong? Crow’s got your tongue?” One corner of his mouth lifts as he taps the corner of your mouth gently with his index finger.
What the hell is happening? “Are you not mad at me?” you ask, completely at a loss.
“Why would I be mad at you?”
You gesture a little helplessly. “I hurt Kieran. I damaged your property. I interrupted whatever you were doing since you’re now out here instead of back at your home.”
“You didn’t damage my property. The car belongs to Luke and Kieran. Can I touch you?”
“What?” Your heart is a bloody, clenched fist, punching your body from the inside out. Sylus’s apparent calm in the face of all the mess that is you is making you feel like you’re insane.
“I said, can I touch you?” he repeats, as if he has all the patience in the world to repeat questions you clearly heard the first time.
“Like, can you hit me? Or strangle me? You want my permission to give me what I deserve?”
Sylus’ face changes. If you hadn’t been spending so much time recently watching videos on micro expressions and bluffing and acting, you might have missed it. He looks furious for a microsecond, and you want to take a step back. But you deserve whatever it is he’s feeling right now. You force yourself to stay still. You look up into his now neutral, lovely face.
He breathes in through his nostrils. “I will repeat this as many times as you need to hear it,” he says calmly, as the wind sweeps his silver hair across his forehead. Your heart is going to kill you, as you live through the eternity of the pause in this sentence. “I will never, ever hit you. And I will never think that you deserve to be hurt, for anything that you do, or don’t do.”
Okay. Okay, weird. He’ll strangle you, but he won’t hit you? He thought you deserved to be held captive for three days, denied food and water, forced to resonate, but he expects you to believe that he doesn’t want to punish you for fucking up as big as you did tonight? Where is the thin red line here? How can he say that he will never think you deserve to be hurt, when he hurt you so terribly during those first three days?
“Ask your question,” he says, but it’s not a command. It sounds more like a gentle invitation. What alternate reality have you stepped in tonight?
“I don’t understand how your mind works,” you say instead of obeying him.
“If you don’t ask, then you’ll continue not knowing how it works.” He still sounds infinitely patient. “As much as I’d like to, I can’t read your mind. Unless you ask, I won’t always know what you need from me.”
You shiver, even under the warmth of his heavy coat, but can’t bring yourself to answer. You close your eyes against the memory of his calloused hand around your throat. Of him tossing you in front of a huge mecha battlebot, sneering “You can handle it.” Of him telling you to survive the night, or else enjoy your last meal at his table. You open your eyes.
Sylus is watching your face, thumbs hooked in both trouser pockets. He shakes his head a little. “All right. I propose that we go back to the base, and you can pose all your questions there, no strings attached, without you standing out here freezing to death on your bare feet.”
This time you do take a step back, shaking your head. “No. No, nope, no thank you. If you could just dump me somewhere closer to the city, I can just get someone from the Association to pick me up. We can talk another time.”
He watches you closely, and you feel naked, with your heart a sledgehammer against the brittle framework of your ribs, and the sweat still soaking your hair. “Is there a particular reason you’re reluctant to go back home with me?” he finally asks.
You choke a little on a laugh. “You could say that,” you say dryly, with all the calm you can muster through the chaos in your chest.
“Care to share?” 
You’re so tired. You’re so, so tired. None of it seems to matter anymore—whether he hits you, leaves you on the side of the road, or splatters you onto the gravel with his evol. “Do you really not know, Sylus? With all of your insight, do you really need your aether core to figure out why I wouldn’t want to go back to your criminal headquarters?”
“I thought you were getting used to the idea of the criminal aspect of my life,” he says slowly, as if that’s the important part.
“You’re right. I care less and less, every day, that you’re a wanted outlaw. But I really have no interest in reliving the days you spent choking me out and trying to brute force your way into resonating with me,” you murmur, because it’s so hard to say out loud, let alone think about it. You’re shaking. You’re shaking so hard, your bones hurt. Your teeth are chattering. None of these things have anything to do with how cold you are.
Sylus becomes very still, with the red, red moon above him, the wind still gusting through his hair, pulling at his sweater, and the dead earth stretching behind his tall figure.
“Can I touch you?” he asks again. 
Can he touch you? Of course he can. All he has to do is what he has always done. He can just reach out and take what he thinks he deserves from you. As he has done since the first moment you met. But you don’t want to have to give him permission for it. You know you deserve it, but you still have enough of a sliver of self-preservation, or pride, or backbone—something in you refuses to give him this last bit of yourself by being complicit in whatever he wants to inflict on  you right now.
“Can I touch you? Not to hit you. Not to choke you. Not to cause you any pain, in any way, whatsoever.”
You’re so confused. “Then why are you asking for permission, when you’ve never done that before?”
“Because I can see that bringing you to the base tonight, without talking to you about it, when you haven’t been back since our first few days together, was a mistake on my part. I may be many things, but stupid isn’t one of them. I do not intend to make the same mistake more than once.” 
“I was stupid for not asking you where we were going,” you try to protest, although you don’t know why, through your clicking teeth.
“No, you weren’t. You trusted me to take you somewhere you would be comfortable. It was my fault for not considering that you would not feel safe in my home because of the way we began.” His voice sounds so resolute.
You just look down at your toes.
“Can I, please, touch you?” he asks, yet again, but this time he sounds a little strained.
Now that you know he’s not going to try to hurt you, you can finally nod. As soon as you start to bob your head, you feel yourself swept into the air, his strong arm under your knees, the other under your shoulders, and he holds you tightly, so that your face is tucked into his throat.
He carries you to the tank and manages to get the door open without letting you go, but instead of putting you on the passenger seat, he sets you on one of the bench seats further back in the vehicle, pulls the door shut behind himself, and sits next to you. He pauses, taking you in from head to toe, and then leans forward next to the driver’s seat and fiddles with something on the dash screen. He then sits back and pulls you onto his lap. Apparently, he hadn’t turned off the vehicle when he first arrived, because it’s so warm in here. He rests his hand, somehow still warm after standing out in the cold, against your heart.
“I know you want to go home right now. But it’s over an hour away. You need to get warmed up sooner rather than later. Do you trust me enough to allow me to take you back to base until you’re no longer shaking so hard it’s vibrating the whole armored vehicle?” he speaks, lips against your wet hair.
“It’s a tank, Sylus,” you protest, because even now you can't help yourself.
“Do you trust me enough to allow me to take you back to base until you’re no longer shaking so hard it’s vibrating the whole tank?” Sylus murmurs into your hair.
You don’t want to go back there. You just want to close your eyes, and be anywhere else but inside your body right now. Your mind drifts back to how thirsty you were in that house, the house he wants take you now. How thirsty you were, and no water was given. And when the terror would recede and exhaustion seeped into its place, the awareness of your hunger, and no food was given. How did you ever trust him to come near you again? How can he possibly ask you if you trust him enough to take you back there?
But being in his arms like this, despite everything he has done to you, his hand against your broken heart, is calming you in a way that makes trust and choice seem meaningless. You want to just stay right here, in this moment, where the past and the future are just fever dreams, and the only reality is Sylus’s hand, his lips, his chest against your shoulder and side. You want to carve your way into him, force him to carry you inside his skin so you’ll never be cold again. Even though he's the reason you're cold to begin with. You're so tired of this tangled, terrible bond with this terrible man.
And yet. Like always with him, when he's right here, holding you with such fierce tenderness, you find yourself surrendering to the temptation, to the seductive illusion that you’re safe with him, and you let him have whatever he wants.
You just nod, your cheek rubbing against the soft sweater over his clavicle. You feel his chest expand in what might be a relieved sigh, or just exasperation, and the vehicle begins to move. You startle, but he shushes you. “It’s in self-drive mode, we’ll be back in a few minutes.”
You relax again, and the way back is a blur. You don’t want to look, as he lifts you from the car and carries you through the underground garage beneath the base, into the elevator that lifts you to the floor on which his bedroom is located. The same expansive windows, soaring ceilings, subtle light in wall sconces stream by as he strides forward.
“I can walk,” you try to protest, but again, he softly shushes you. 
“No, you can’t.”
“I’m cold, not paralyzed,” you counter, exhausted, amazed you still have the capacity to argue with him.
“Yes, yes, but you haven’t seen your feet. And I have.”
“What?” you lift your head, but he presses your face back into his chest.
“You ran five kilometers without shoes on a semi-paved road, kitten. I’m pretty sure you’re not accustomed to barefoot running, based on the state of your feet.”
You shudder even harder. You hadn’t even noticed the pain.
And then, you’re back in his bedroom. You feel him shift, toeing off his shoes at the threshold. He passes the lounge area, his hulking desk, the bookshelves and the bed, and takes you into the black marble cave of a bathroom you recall from your hunt for the brooch. He sets you on the padded bench thingy that probably has a fancy name that you imagine every rich person has even in their bathrooms and then goes to the walk-in shower and turns on the water. Almost immediately, steam begins to fill the expansive space. He returns and kneels at your feet. 
“Your clothes need to come off,” he says softly, but loud enough that you can still hear him over the spray.
Since you’re back here, the place where you spent so long helpless and trapped, it’s easy to slide right back into that space, but this time you don’t have the energy to even try to help yourself—you just nod again, but don’t move.
Sylus pauses, but then slowly reaches out and slides his coat from your shoulders. Then, so, so gently, he lifts the lower hem of the sweater you’re wearing, knuckles drifting along the sensitive skin of your stomach, and gathers the material under your armpits. With his other hand, he lifts one of your arms and pulls it through and out of the sleeve, and gently rests it back at your side again. He repeats the movement on your other side, and lifts the sweater over your head. Then, with one arm, he scoops you from the bench, gently but efficiently peeling the sleep shorts from your hips and over your legs. You’re left in just your underwear.
He carries you to the shower, the steam warm on your skin, and lowers you on one of the marble benches built into the wall. The water streaming from the shower hits him full on, and his own clothes are soaked through almost immediately. He reaches behind himself and pulls the sweater and undershirt over his head and tosses them back into the bathroom. He then grabs his belt, unbuckling it in practiced moves. Unzips his trousers, slips out of them, tossing them behind him as well. Clad in only a black pair of boxer-briefs, wet hair tarnished silver, he sits next to you on the bench and pulls you onto his lap again, your back to his chest. 
And then… the two of you just sit like that, floating together in a timeless space composed of water, skin, and the steady shush of the shower water. His arms around you are as tight as a straitjacket, securing you against him as if he thinks you’ll dissipate like the steam and drift away if he doesn’t anchor you to his own body. He doesn’t say anything at all. He doesn’t ask anything at all. He just holds you, his cheek resting in your hair, and doesn’t let go.
Slowly, so slowly, your heart slows in your chest. Your body-wracking shivering ebbs in violence, until, finally, you are completely still. Now that your muscles aren’t locked into defending against the convulsions from the cold, and… everything else, you melt into Sylus, head lolling on his chest, the spray of the water soothing everything that hurts, and his steady heartbeat at your back soothing everything else.
But of course, because you’re you, and this life is your life, this peaceful emptiness doesn’t last long. You slowly become aware of the most terrifying need welling up inside you, one you’ve managed to resist since… now that you think about it, since the last time you were in Sylus’s home. You need to fucking cry. 
All of your efforts to avoid this feeling—the terrifying loss of control, the exposure of the weakest part of yourself to yourself, or to another—refusing to speak about the terror and the pain inside you, the terror and pain you carry through every minute of every day, to your friends, to your doctor—all in a desperate bid to keep the floodgates of your tears bolted shut, are crashing onto the shore of this ocean of need. The need to cry. You’ve tried so desperately to avoid it, because once you start, you’re afraid that you will never, ever stop.
But now, being held by this man, who is so deeply threaded into the source of this feeling, somehow triggers the switch in your brain that says safe, safe, you can release the flood behind the gates, and you will not drown, because he’ll hold your head above water, no matter the cost .
You have no idea why your brain thinks this. You can guess why your brain considers a gunshot the same as a bomb, or why your first instinct when approached from behind is threat threat threat, neutralize first, ask questions later . But you cannot fathom for the fucking life of you why your brain sees Sylus and whispers, Shelter. Sustenance. Safety.
You can’t help it. The first tears begin to gather at the edges of your eyes. Your breath quickens, your chest begins to heave with the effort of holding it in. Your face is hot. But despite all of your will focused on not. fucking. crying... the tears begin to fall. At first, silently, but then from deep inside your chest, the sobs clawing their way out of your lungs through your throat, and suddenly you’re howling.
It hurts. It hurts so much. You hate it. You hate that Sylus is here as silent witness to all the weakest parts of yourself. You twist in his arms, straddle his lap. You wrap your arms around his neck and bury your face in his throat, and then you weep. You wail, snot and spit and tears sliding down his chest, because you’re blocking the shower’s spray.
And Sylus? He keeps his arms wrapped around you, his cheek still in your hair, and doesn’t say a thing. After a while, you realize that he has started to shift on the bench, gently rocking you as you fall apart in his arms. One big hand, pressed flat on your back, runs firmly from the top of your spine to your lower back, and then back again. Still anchoring you to him. You feel a low vibration in your chest, under all the other sounds of the loud shower, and realize he’s humming very quietly. You have no idea if he’s humming something in particular. But the feeling in your chest is so soothing, eventually you realize that your sobs, and your tears, have slowed, just as the shivering of your body did while wrapped in his arms.
And then you’re done. You don’t have anything left—just the hollow relief of not being afraid, not shivering, not crying—the relief of not feeling much of anything at all. You try to hold on to it, grasp it in your fists. But like everything else, it slips through your fingers all the same, and you feel the shame come.
Miraculously, the shower water is still hot. It’s beating down on your back, your lowered head, still tucked under Sylus’s chin. You try to sit up, move away, but he just tightens his hold.
“Where do you think you’re going, sweetheart?” he asks, sounding like he has sounded since the end of the auction. Slightly amused. Curious. Infinitely tolerant. 
You can’t say anything. You’re so embarrassed that he just witnessed all of… that. You just want to escape now.
“Hmm?” he murmurs into your hair, to emphasize his question in the face of your refusal to respond. And then, “Why are you always trying to leave me?”
You’re so surprised by the raw vulnerability in his question that you pull back to look into his face. He’s still holding you so tightly, your noses brush. His eyes are wet from the shower spray, droplets clinging in his dark lashes.
“What do you mean?”
“You leaving the base without saying a word is the second time in just one night that you were considering leaving me, without even telling me,” he says evenly, big hand still spread across your back. “Why?”
Suddenly, you’ve had enough. You are so tired of not understanding him, of trying to decipher clues from his inexplicable behavior, the incongruous way he touches you, treats you when you’re at your lowest, compared to how he treated you when you first met. “Why do you even care, Sylus? No amount of utility that I may have for you is worth you putting up with… this,” you gesture to yourself, face twisted in disgust.
“Utility?” he repeats, tilting his head. The hand on your back drifts upward until he has his big palm wrapped around the back of your neck, thumb along the side of your throat, fingers plunging into your hair.
“The dating advice… the resonance,” you remind him, though you don’t know why. You assume he knows exactly what you were referring to, that he’s just buying time to think of an answer that will make you stop asking inconvenient questions.
“You think I’m… ‘putting up’ with you, as you so charmingly phrase it, because I want your help with convincing my beloved that I’m sincere, and because I want you to resonate with me again? Is that what you’re saying?” he summarizes your thoughts.
“Why else would you go to all this trouble to spend so much time on me, when at every turn I end up doing something ridiculous? First, almost having a panic attack at the auction. Then, the very next time we’re out in public together, I make a scene during one of your business meetings. Then, the same night, because I’m just that awesome, I have another panic attack and almost kill one of your employees because I thought they were some human trafficker thinking he had an easy target tonight.”
“Why did you think they were human traffickers?” Sylus asks.
“He was following me with his fucking headlights off in the middle of the night on a deserted road in the N109 zone! What would you have assumed?” you demand, forgetting the whole point of this conversation.
He tilts his head, makes a little moue with his mouth. “Fair enough,” he acknowledges. “And that’s exactly why I’m not mad at you. I didn’t believe for a second that you would attack him for no reason. And, neither did he, by the way. Which is why you’re still in one piece.”
You eye him. “What do you mean?”
Sylus considers you for a moment, and then sighs. “Do you think you’re up to getting washed up before we unpack what you just said? I’ll make us something to eat and we can talk about everything once you’re clean and dry.”
You look down at your fingers, and see that their tips resemble raisins. You’ve made Sylus sit in this shower for at least an hour while you lost your shit. Despite the rich bastard being able to afford never-ending warm water, apparently, you can’t imagine this is how he wanted to spend his version of his evening. You nod.
“Finally, some sense from you,” he smiles slightly, lifting you in his arms. He sets you gently on the shower floor, and grabs a bottle from the built-in shelving containing a bunch of shower products. He kneels in front of you, his broad back blocking the spray from hitting your face. Despite the heat in the room, you shiver as he reaches toward you, as you feel his fingers slide from your calf to your ankle. Your brain stalls out and you can’t bring yourself to protest as he lifts your leg and gently foams some fragrance-free soap, and as delicately as possible washes the now-stinging sole of your foot. He gently lowers it back to the shower’s marble floor, and does the same with your other foot. When he’s done, he simply holds your foot in his palm, looking at it contemplatively, thumb running along the skin near your ankle. 
After a few moments, he eyes your face, and then his gaze drifts to your hair.
“I probably suck at washing someone else’s hair. Can you teach me how to do yours?”
You start shaking your head. “I may have hurt my feet, but I’m still capable of washing my own hair. You really don’t have to do this for me,” you begin, but he shakes his head.
“Just indulge me. Please.” He looks steadily at you. Something about the way he says please, and the fact that it’s the second time tonight he’s asked you so earnestly for your permission to touch you, has you nodding, again. 
He gently squeezes your foot, and then moves to get a few more bottles from the veritable drugstore he has stashed in the shower shelves. He then kneels back at your side and shows you, to your amazement, the same products that are sitting in your own shower back home. “Show me how you use these,” he says.
You stare at the bottles. Then you stare at his face. His eyes seem to gleam through the shower steam.
“Why—?” you ask, but he just shrugs.
“I was hoping you’d visit me,” he says nonchalantly, like it’s the most normal thing in the world for him to stock all of his friends’ personal hygiene products in his bedroom’s en suite bathroom.
Your mind drifts over all of the assumptions you’ve held about this man since you met him. All of the assumptions that have been utterly incorrect. You think about your assumption that he was dreaming about someone else, as he was biting your neck. You think about your assumption that the person he was describing in the Lethe lounge was someone else—anyone else, either one of your friends, a fellow Hunter, or someone you don’t even know. You think about the deal he made with you tonight—the help he says he needs in convincing someone that his feelings are sincere. Someone who refuses to consider that he doesn’t have an ulterior motive in treating them with kindness. In spending time with them. In devoting his precious free time to caring for them. Your gaze drifts between the bottles of the mid-range shampoo and conditioner he’s holding in his strong hands, because you can’t afford the really fancy shit you would really like to splurge on but you have too much pride to just buy the stuff from the grocery store. 
You understand the nature of tools. You work with tools every day in your job. Your knives, your swords, your guns. You maintain your tools with a diligence that others may consider fanatical, but which you know will help you survive, in the end. A whet stone, to sharpen your blades. Gun brush and oil, to clean and ensure the weapon doesn’t jam when you need it the most. These things are essential in caring for your most useful possessions. 
If you are a tool, the only things Sylus needs to maintain your utility are an absence of fear, your willingness to help him, the strength of your body in being well rested and well fed. Everything he has done up till now could be interpreted as serving the purpose of maintaining a tool he intends to use in the future. But a tool doesn’t have to be attractive. A tool doesn’t need clean, well-moisturized hair to function. The cosmetics of the thing are irrelevant, as long as it can efficiently serve its purpose. But you also know that Sylus likes shiny things. He likes the best, finest things. But if he wanted you to be as attractive as possible for aesthetic purposes, he could have bought the expensive, top-of-the shelf products that you’re sure he buys for himself if he was hoping you’d visit and inexplicably be showering in his bathroom. But no. He bought the products that you use. That you’re used to. That he knows you like because you had bought them for yourself. You cannot understand how the presence of your own shampoo and conditioner in his shower could serve any of the purposes of an owner maintaining the utility of a tool. 
You look back up into his face, and he’s looking at you patiently, but also with an eagerness to get started on helping you with your hair. Aside from everything else—how you started, how he treated you in this house—you don’t dare believe that the assumptions you’ve been making up until now are wrong. You aren’t ready to handle the emotional devastation if you begin to hope that the person Sylus wants in his life is… not someone else, only to find out that such an assumption is also wrong. You can’t. You can’t, not yet.
So you just gesture at the shampoo. “I start with this.” 
He sets the conditioner down. You proceed to tell him how you take care of your hair, and he follows your instructions silently, with a clumsy obedience that is incredibly endearing. His fingers along your scalp are so soothing, you melt into him as he washes your hair, your back to his chest. When he’s done, he takes the same care with the conditioner, touching you like you’re made of the most delicate blown glass instead of the scratched and scuffed stainless steel you imagine yourself to be.
When he’s done, he withdraws his hands from your hair and says next to your ear, “I’ll leave you to finish washing up. Towels and clothes will be on the bench. Call for me, and I’ll bandage your feet.”
And then you’re alone, with the water still beating down on your chest and shoulders. You peel off your underwear, and just sit there, knees drawn to your chest, letting the soothing heat stream down your back.
Your mind drifts. Again, you think of his calloused hand around your throat. You think of him sneering that you’re such a disappointment. You think of the thirst, and the hunger. You think about him dragging you across the floor with his evol, every time you tried to claw your way of the room where he forced you to resonate, over and over again.
You think about his embrace as you danced at the auction, your clasped hands as he let you decide when to detonate the bombs before you slipped into a panic attack. You think about the first time you fell asleep with him, on the back of his motorcycle. You think of a pot of poisonous flowers, wine the color of his eyes in a glass held to your mouth, his hands in your hair tonight.
You know that you can’t continue like this. Something has to give. You can’t be his friend, while being terrified of your memories of him. You need to do what he has asked and ask him questions, so that you can finally reconcile the man who just washed your feet so tenderly with the man who suggested cutting off your hand to break the linkage between you the first time the energy shackles bound you two together. The man who brings you wine, and more food than you could eat in a week, with the man who starved you for days.
You slowly get to your feet, wincing at the pain in your soles. You must have cut your feet up pretty bad, but you don’t want to look. You hobble to the shelves and let your hand drift over the array of neatly organized bottles. Your hair products are the only familiar products. Everything looks fancy as hell, with minimal branding, dark and masculine. You find body wash, and squeeze some onto your palm. The scent of citrus rises to your nose—you’ve finally found the source of oranges you sometimes detect on Sylus’s skin. You eagerly lather the soap between your hands and quickly cover your body with it.
When you’re done rinsing, you hobble out of the shower and find the towel and clothes stacked neatly just as Sylus had described. You even find the same type of towel you use specifically on your hair. You wrap it around your head, slip into the silky tank top, shorts and robe, and sit for a moment, elbows on your knees. You see yourself in one of the huge mirrors above the large sink and counter. You look so fucking tired. It’s time. You can’t keep shoving everything down, down deep. You need answers.
“Sylus,” you call. You wait. He appears in the doorway, leans his long body against door frame, shirtless with black silken pants hung low on his waist, warm looking slippers on his big feet.
"Yes, my dearest treasure?"
You laugh a little at the absurd endearment. Somehow, even when you're feeling at your worst, he always manages to make you laugh. It would be so easy, to close your eyes. To pretend that the way you began with him was the dream, that his gentle touch and silly endearments are the real Sylus. The only Sylus. But you're tired of lying to yourself. If you try to shove it all down, down deep, what happened tonight will only repeat itself, in possibly worse ways. You need to find a way forward, a way to realign the conflicting images of Sylus, to sift through them like mirages in the desert. You'd rather see him clearly, from his most malignant to his most tender selves, than continue to be lost between your horrific memories from those first three days and how he's looking at you right now. As if you're somehow precious to him. You take a deep breath.
 “Can we talk?”
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hiraethwa · 11 months ago
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the collection - one summer day
pairing: ushijima x reader summary: where you did not expect to fall for shiratorizawa's future ace warnings: slice of life, strangers to friends, friends to lovers, fluff, angst, childhood trauma, swearing, set in 2010 (2 years before the pre-timeskip events), maybe some smut, best friend!semi, (did i mention angst??) a/n: rewatching haikyuu which has inspired me to write again after 5 years of break... this is going to be a long ride so buckle in folks! thank you for your support! tags: send me an ask to be tagged!
return to the library
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/.volumes
࿐ 00 guidepost. ࿐ 01 clear skies. ࿐ 02 fly high. ࿐ 03 shining light. ࿐ 04 new dawn. ࿐ 05 saturn i. ࿐ 06 saturn ii. ࿐ 07 sun and moon. ࿐ 08 to be human. ࿐ 09 disconnect. ࿐ 10 epiphany. ࿐ 11 star-crossed. ࿐ 12 shoot for the stars. ࿐ 13 hello, tokyo. ࿐ 14 crescendo. ࿐ 15 wake-up call. ࿐ 16 chasm. ࿐ 17 light.
coming soon ࿐ 18 hiraeth ࿐ 19 homecoming ࿐ 20 moon and back
fin./
status: ongoing
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starry-bi-sky · 11 months ago
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Snippets for my Clone^2 Au that I thought was funny...
in incorrect quotes style format (Clone^2 = Both my Clone Damian Au and Clone Bruce Danny aus combined)
Snippet 1: Danny and Damian meeting for the first time
Danny, avoiding Damian's katana: I don't wanna know who made you I don't wanna know who made you I don't wanna know who made you Danny: pleASE STOP TRYING TO STAB ME
------- Snippet 2: Danny and Damian meeting (Alternative)
Bby Damian: gets dropped off in the ONE city where his dad's clone is Danny, internally: damn I don't wanna know who made you
Danny: alright little buddy, lets -- *blocks Damian's sword* please don't stab me -- let's get you something to -- *blocks Damian's sword* please don't stab me -- something to EAT
------------- Snippet 3: Danny checking out books in the library Librarian: oh, are you trying to learn arabic, Mister Fenton?
Danny: oh- uh, yeah :) my parents recently,,, took in a foster kid from overseas,,,, but we found out he doesn't know english and he's having a hard time adjusting Danny, lying (only partially) through his teeth: so I,,, thought,,, maybe it would help him acclimate to his new environment if I learned some arabic :) Librarian: oh how sweet! let me know if you need any help, i can find you more books Danny: thank you
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Snippet 4: Damian wants to patrol Damian: let me come with you on patrol Danny, 16 year old idiot who fights without powers: uh. no. you are Itty Bitty Child Damian: comes with anyways
----------- Snippet 5: Damian, trying to fight a ghost without a ghost-proof sword: Danny, catching him and holding him against his chest: *radiating exhaustion* no,,,, no,,,,, not yet,,,,
-------- Snippet 6: danny has an epiphany Danny, realizing that he needs to set an example now that Damian is coming with him on patrol: fUCK Danny: I NEED AN ACTUAL SUIT ---------- Snippet 7; dynamic duo Danny: what is it with you and batman and robin???? Damian, silently sweating: ,,,,,,,because they are exemplary partners and i would like to think that us two are the same Danny, doesnt know identities: ...aww??? thats kinda sweet??? okay :)
---------- Snippet 8: hypocrite Damian: dijaal (affectionate) Danny, on day ?? of solving a cold case after a ghost asked him to: hrbhk - Damian, what are you doing up? it's late, you have school in the morning Damian, staring at him deadpan: you have school too. you should go to bed Danny: five min..utes buddy. then i'll go to bed Damian, grabbing the back of his rolling chair and pushing him to bed: no. now. danny, with eyebags the size of the marianna trench: ...fine. now.
--------- Snippet 9: ...the line Danny, doing homework with Sam and Tucker: Danny: *has an epiphany* wait. shit Tucker and Sam: ...? Danny, his head in his hands: am I Damian's dad or his brother?? Danny: wh- what do we define this??? Tucker: ... you're brothers until its funny? and then you're his dad?
----------- Snippet 10: learning Danny: reading a book about learning arabic Damian, slamming his hand down on the book to get his attention: dijaal, *points to book* kitab Danny, frowning: what? Damian, tapping book: kitab Danny: ..ki..kitab? Kitab? Book? Damian: Boog...book. *points to table* tawila --------- Snippet 11: clone reveal Damian, later after he knows enough english and months of chilling out: i am a clone.... meant to kill my original Danny, internally: wow you don't say? Danny, out loud:..huh. okay. thanks for telling me, uh, same here. except that last part
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Dijaal = imposter Damian is affectionately calling Danny an imposter because danny is a clone of bruce :)
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