#I did not expect Cait to be the one to initiate the kiss… What am I supposed to do with this information

[lovelooksgudonu]

Everyone in my life has changed. Promise me you won't change. I won't.

[fallout-drabbles-n-stuff]

Romanced Companions reacting to Sole sitting on their lap while they're sitting on a couch or chair? 👀

Cait:

"Well look at you, Youre more than welcome to sit on me anytime lad/lass."

Cait takes this as invitation of "be as dirty as possible". Have no fear, she will back off if you don't indulge the first time. Honestly? It's more of an automatic response for her, however you reputable showing her genuine affection that doesn't lead straight to sex will break down this subconscious wall and soon you'll find her being the one that wants to be held.

Curie:

"Oh..oh wow. Excusez-moi, Curie didn't expect you to do this. Please, stay..this is quite enjoyable."

She had no idea how nice it felt to be so close to someone. Sure, she had kissed you and such- but there was something so sweet yet light hearted about this that made her little synthetic heart sing. As such, she'd simply wrap her slender arms around your shoulders and settle into the contact.

Danse:

"It's a good thing I don't have my power armour on. Come here.."

Believe it or not, Paladin Flustered wouldn't actually get too..well..flustered when you do this. I think it's fair to say that Danse is touch starved, so having you be so straightforward with your actions pleases him. He probably wouldn't admit it, but Danse often times craves your affection. So, to properly savoir the moment, Danse would wrap his muscular arms around your waist and give a gentle squeeze. He'd then lean into to press a kiss to your cheek before resting his head in the crook of your neck, his stubble rasping against your skin as he did. Be careful, he might go to sleep if you don't watch him close.

Deacon:

"I think I can get used to this.."

I think we all know that Deacon isn't entirely fond of physical contact. Thankfully, you seem to be an exception to his intolerance. At least..Youre getting there. As silly and light hearted as Deacon is, affection is serious- as such, he'd hold you in a gentle grasp and just sit there.

Gage:

"I think I can think of something a bit better for you to sit on, but hey, suit yourself."

Sitting on Gage's lap is almost a sure fire way of initiating sex. Nevertheless, he'd torture you for a while. Keeping you flush to his chest as his whispers sinful things to you, all the while his hands begin to wander. Just slap him if you're not in the mood. He'll laugh it off.

Hancock:

"Whatcha think Sunshine, am I a comfy seat?"

Oh boy. What have you just done? Hancock eats this up with devilish delight. Provided the two of you secluded, he may just push his luck and start pressing little kisses to your shoulder, which then lead up and..well you get the gist.

Macready:

"Fine, but you're not going anywhere anytime soon."

He's so chill with it, it's almost unlike Mac. He'd just roll his pretty crystal like eyes and lay back on whatever he was sitting upon. Alas this means you don't really get to sit on his lap..however you do get to cuddle him.

Maxson:

"Well, you've definitely succeeded in distracting me of my duties. Well done. Unfortunately for you, this is a welcome interruption- so I win."

The very second you try this, Arthur will stop you. Don't worry, you won't get pushed away. Instead he'll causally guide you to turn around so rather than sit on his lap per se, you end up more or less straddling him and facing him. Once he succeeded in this, he'd grace you with a self satisfied little smirk of his..but most noticeably, his eyes held no hint of mischief. His eyes granted a peek of what he was- just a young boy in love with something other than military prowess.

Nick:

"I've missed you too. Now, would you be interested in helping me out with this file?"

The sheer amusement Nick got out of your antics made his robotic heart feel as though it was skipping a beat. Alas, he was as composed as always. He'd simply place his head over your shoulder, completely enveloping you in his arms before pointing to specific lines in the mentioned manilla folder containing the "file".

Old Longfellow:

"Now that's what I'm talking about.."

You kidding? You just made that old drunk's day. His ocean blue eyes would ignite in an obviously pleased mischief, a smirk forming at his lips as he purposefully maneuvered you flush against him.

Piper:

"Sheesh, I know, I'm irresistible."

Piper would be taken so off guard by you doing this. However, she is nothing if not capable of "going with the flow." Even if she wanted to do a little happy dance on the inside. Instead she'd settle for kissing your nose and calling it a dub.

Preston:

"Oh..*chuckles*."

Being "smooth" ordinarily came quite easy for the charismatic man, however in your presence that seemed to all but take a flying leap out the metaphorical window. Bewildered by his own nerves, Preston would just sort of grin with a silly laugh- a blush ever so slightly creeping up his face all the while.

Sturges:

"Hey baby.."

By the time the two of you have time to relax like this, it's probably well into the evening whenever Sturges has finished up his daily repairs. This may mean that he is sweaty, a little smelly..but honestly? Who isn't nowadays? Regardless, he'd languidly wrap his arms around you and give a gentle grin- maybe even close his eyes and bask in the moment as his sore muscles began to gain some reprieve.

X6-88:

"What..what am I supposed to do with my hands..?"

Don't take his words to heart. He truly doesn't know what to do. His heads spinning, his mouth running dry..it's unlike anything he has  ever felt. In hindsight, he probably could've been smoother but oh well. You make him weak, isn't that good enough?

[eccacia]

These Games We Play

Notes: Um, so, the muse has been kind to me lately, so here’s another Savitar/Killer Frost speculation fic, partly based on the 3x22 promo. I wanted to explore their dynamic more, and Savitar’s motivation for turning evil and all. @blackirontyrant asked me if I was going to and I didn’t initially plan on it, but the characters ran away with the story, so here it is.

Warnings: This is a lot darker than what I usually write, even compared to my other Savifrost fic. They’re crueler to each other here, I guess. There’s also cursing, violence (although nothing that we’re not used to on the show), and smut (like, in the first scene, so if that’s not your thing, avert your eyes. If it is… er, read on. I’m not used to writing smut, but I hope it doesn’t disappoint). If any of these is triggering, please be kind to yourself and don’t read this.

Soundtracks: Largely inspired by “Gasoline” by Halsey, “Love Is a Losing Game” by Amy Winehouse, and “Circles” by Greta Svabo Bech. Give them a listen if you haven’t already, they’re wonderful.

Rating: NC-17

Word Count: ~ 4,450

i.

Are you deranged like me? Are you strange like me? Lighting matches just to swallow up the flame like me? Do you call yourself a fucking hurricane like me? Pointing fingers ‘cause you’ll never take the blame like me?

— Halsey, “Gasoline”

Her back’s chafing up against the rough concrete wall behind her, and his painful grip on her thighs are already leaving bruises, but she can’t bring herself to care about those right now.

“Tell me how much you want it.” His breath is hot in her ear. She can feel his smirk against her skin, his hand inching up the inside of her thigh. ���Or do I have to make you beg?”

She makes a strangled noise when he brushes a thumb over the fabric covering her slit, already soaked with her arousal. They haven’t even undressed yet—her coat and his jacket are on the floor, but her skirt’s still bunched around her waist, and his pants are still on, unzipped—and already she is so close. She grits her teeth and digs her nails into his shoulders, wishing she could rip his shirt off and tear her nails down his well-muscled back. “You’ll never—ah—you’ll never make me beg,” she snaps back.

“Never?” he says, amused. His thumb traces lazy circles around her clit, and she arches into him, trying to grind into his hand, but he keeps to that agonizingly slow pace. She nearly whimpers in frustration. “Is that a challenge?” he continues, his lips now ghosting the smooth expanse of her neck.

“You’re not”—she gasps when he slides a finger into her, and he bites down hard to leave a bruise on her neck, before soothing it with his burning tongue—“you’re not up to the challenge.”

“We’ll see about that,” he says with a dark smile. He slides another finger into her. Her entrance is so slick that it meets no resistance, and he begins pumping into her at a steady pace.

She shuts her eyes and digs her heels into his waist. “Faster,” she says. “For fuck’s sake—”

“Beg for it,” he growls against her skin. He withdraws his fingers, but he thrusts his cock inside her with such force that her head slams back against the wall. He flicks her swollen clit with his thumb and it takes all her willpower not to come then and there. “Fuck, Princess. Beg for it.”

“No. Just—God, move,” she demands, grinding her hips against his until he lets out a groan. She smirks, knowing that he won’t last much longer, either.

“Not until you beg,” he grits out. And then, with a glint in his eyes, he grasps her chin and he kisses her roughly. His mouth collides with hers; he thrusts his tongue in to plunder her mouth, he bites on her bottom lip until it’s swollen and close to bleeding. The onslaught of heat from him, and the sheer force of the kiss, is blinding and intoxicating; she feels like she’s been set on fire; his desire is raw, consuming, corrosive, and it proves too much for her to bear.

“Fuck me,” she gasps into his mouth, yanking on his hair to break the kiss before she loses her mind. She gulps in greedy breaths of air and licks her lips, tasting the remnants of him in her mouth. “Come on. Fuck me.”

He gives her a feral grin. “The magic word, Princess.”

She digs her nails into his back. “Please fuck me, you sick bastard—”

She hasn’t even finished her sentence when he slams into her, increasing his rhythm until her toes curl and she throws her head back in a silent cry of ecstasy.

He comes not long after she does, his groans muffled in the side of her neck, his hot seed trickling down the inside of her thighs.

She slides down to the floor afterwards, trying to catch her breath, and he folds into a sitting position beside her, leaning back on his hands.

His flashes her a triumphant smirk. “I win, Princess.”

She smoothens her skirt and flicks her hair back into place, gathering the sweaty strands away from her neck. “I told you not to call me that.”

He snorts. “I have nothing else to call you.”

“I don’t either, but I don’t give you a pet name.”

He shrugs and zips up. “Call me God.”

She scoffs. “Don’t delude yourself.”

“You’re one to talk,” he returns. “You call yourself Killer Frost, but you haven’t killed anyone yet. Maybe I should test your limits again.”

Her gaze darkens. “You almost killed me the last time you did.”

“I almost killed you?” he laughs. “I stranded you in the middle of a feast. You were the one intent on killing yourself.”

She doesn’t respond. She remembers that incident well. It had happened a day after she’d failed to kill Tracy, when she’d almost depleted her energy reserves from fighting Flash and his team. He’d been disappointed, but he said he knew exactly what she needed. He’d brought her to a small factory in the outskirts of the city. It was an all-male factory. At least fifty warm bodies, he’d said. For your target practice. Or your next meal, whichever strikes your fancy, he’d said. And then he’d left her to herself.

She’d already been weak then, nearly unable to stand from her battle with Vibe—she’d been unable to conjure a single icicle—so she’d decided that she would feed first.

But when she’d held the first man around the throat, smirking at the terror in his green eyes, she’d suddenly seen Barry Allen’s face superimposed on his. This isn’t you, Cait, he’d said. Don’t do this. Underneath all that cold, you’re still you. She’d abruptly let go of the man, and as he’d scrambled away from her she’d tried to silence the voices in her head, but she’d started seeing more of her friends in the faces of the remaining men—Cisco, in the young man with the shoulder-length hair; HR, in the middle-aged man with blue eyes; Julian, in the man with blond hair; Wally, in the quiet young man with serious eyes. And their voices, ricocheting around the inside of her head—Cait, please, you’re my best friend. You can always come back. It’s never too late. Please. Please. Please. We love you. Come home.

It had been Caitlin Snow’s memories, she knew, from the last time she’d overcome Killer Frost. She’d been trying to fight her. She might have been weak with hunger, but Caitlin Snow was not; and for the brief moment that she’d been able to control over the body they shared, she’d handcuffed her wrist to a steel pipe.

I’d rather die, she had found herself thinking through the haze of delirium. It’d felt like it had come from her as much as it had come from Caitlin Snow. Better me than them.

That was how Savitar had found her, wrist bleeding from the steel of the handcuff, half-deranged from hunger, paralyzed by the voices in her head.

“Pathetic,” he says now, lips curling into a cruel smile. “Perhaps the name Caitlin suits you better than you realize.”

She gives him a venomous glare. “Don’t you ever speak that name.”

“How did it feel like, Princess?” he continues, leaning forward. “We’ve never talked about it, have we? How did it feel like to be at the mercy of a mere slip of a girl? To be completely, utterly powerless?”

Her hands are balling into fists. “We’ve agreed to never mention the past.”

“What did Caitlin Snow tell you? That they’re going to take you back with open arms?” He smirks. “That they love you?”

“Stop it,” she hisses. Cold steam rises from the ground she’s sitting on.

“Let me tell you something, Princess.” His eyes are glittering with malice. “I know the past and I know the future, and I know that they only ever came to you when they needed you. I know that you contented yourself with whatever scraps of attention they gave you. They gave you a prison, and you thanked them like they’d given you a gift.” He sneers. “Pathe—”

She slams her hand onto the ground, and an icicle spears him from behind.

He gasps and chokes. When she retracts the icicle, he coughs out blood.

It will take an hour for the flesh wound to close, and four or more for the collapsed lung to mend. In the meantime, he will feel like he is suffocating to death.

“You’re forgetting that I am not her,” she says coolly, although in the back of her mind, she can acknowledge that Caitlin Snow’s medical knowledge has been useful to her yet again. “Now, Barry. What was it you told me when I first joined you? Wasn’t it ‘Never speak of the past’?”

He’s glaring at her now, his breath ragged and stuttering, but he’s unable to make a sound.

“I’ve abided by your rules,” she continues. “I expect you to abide by them, too. I’ve never asked about your scar or your little vendetta, so from this point onward you’ll never speak of Caitlin Snow again, either. Understood?”

She takes her coat from the floor. She brushes the dust from it and flares it around her shoulders in a flourish. “I’m going around the city,” she tells him. “You are not to hunt me down, or I’ll destroy both your lungs.”

When his wounds close, he doesn’t hunt her down. She regards him coolly when she returns, challenging him to hurt her, but he merely turns his back to her and leaves.

ii.

He did not wear his scarlet coat, For blood and wine are red, And blood and wine were on his hands When they found him with the dead, The poor dead woman whom he loved, And murdered in her bed. [ . . . ]

For each man kills the thing he loves, Yet each man does not die.

— Oscar Wilde, from “The Ballad of Reading Gaol”

They find him.

He’s made a slight miscalculation. He’d underestimated just how wily the team becomes under tremendous pressure, and now, they’ve managed to track him down.

But it doesn’t matter. They’re letting Iris walk to her grave, after all.

He watches the expression on their faces now. It’s only Joe and Iris facing him, although he knows that Barry Allen lurking in the vicinity. He can almost imagine the conversation that took place. Let us talk to him, Bar, they would have said. Maybe we can reach him.

Fools, they all are. The future has been set in stone.

He smiles at their expressions. They’re thinking they can save him. Ridiculous. Gods have no need for salvation. “Joe. Iris.” Her name is like poison on his tongue. “I see Barry has told you about me.”

“We want to talk to you,” Joe begins, putting his hands up in surrender, as if to calm him down. “Whatever you’re planning, please don’t do it. You were my son once. Please, Barry—”

The name sets him on edge. “That’s not my name!” he growls, his shoulders tensing, his hands turning into fists in his pockets.

“I am not Barry Allen,” he adds more evenly. “My name is Savitar.”

But Joe is undeterred, and he takes another step forward. “Please. Tell us what happened to you. Let us help you, son.”

That word is acid to him, and against his will it corrodes the walls around his memories—Barry’s memories, memories of Joe taking him in very gently when his mother died, of Joe bringing him to ball games and watching every one of his quiz bees, of Joe bringing him back to his senses every time he’d doubted himself as The Flash. Memories of a time when he’d been cared for, cherished, loved.

And on the coattails of those memories are the uglier ones, memories from the future—Joe seeing him for the first time as a time remnant. Joe saying, “You’re not the real Barry. What have you done to him?” Joe loading his gun, pointing it straight at him. Joe firing. The bite of the bullet on his shoulder. The smoke from the barrel of the gun.

“You’re not my father,” he grits out. “You’ve never been a father to me.”

Joe’s gaze falters. Iris puts a hand on the crook of his arm and turns to face him. “This isn’t you, Bar. Please don’t do this.”

“Oh, but this is me,” he says. “This is me after you broke me.” He gives her a twisted smile. He remembers the sting of her rejection across all the timelines he’s been to, but the memory is but a phantom pain. He is immune to pain now. “Even now you refuse to see me as I am. Tell me, Iris, do you love people only if they’re what you imagine them to be? You loved Barry Allen when he was human. You loved Barry Allen when he was a hero, even if he was a hero burdened by the world. But me, a broken Barry Allen, you’re incapable of loving.”

“That’s not true,” she says, her gaze fierce and unwavering. “I love all of you. All versions of you. That’s why we’re here now, because we want to bring you back—”

He laughs. “Bring me back,” he repeats. “Bring me back to what? To the light?” He takes a step towards her, and like the Iris he remembers, she does not shy away from him. She stands her ground. She looks him in the eye. She knows she will die by his hand, but even so she looks at him with the deluded certainty that he will yield before her.

“You know what I realized, Iris, over the centuries that I’ve been God?” he says, his voice dropping an octave. “God creates man in his image, and like God, man fashions other men in his own image. We only see what we want to see in the people we love. We are blind to what will hurt us. And you, Iris, fall prey to that human fault.”

“I never said I wanted bring you to the light,” she says softly. “I only want to bring you home.” She takes a step closer to him. “I want you to come home to us as you are now.”

His gaze darkens. “Never.”

She searches his face. He remembers those eyes. He remembers the ghost of Barry Allen in him looking into them and thinking, I’m in love with her. I will always love her. She’s the light and love of my life. She is my world. But when she will look at him in the future, she will say, “You’re not the Barry Allen I know and love,” and she will turn away from him, like all the others will; but it is her rejection that cuts the deepest. He had made her his light and love and life, and when she leaves, light and love and life leave with her, too. She will leave him a blind man in a labyrinth, she will leave him to descend into hell, and when he emerges from it he is never the same again.

She touches the scar on his face. “I see you as you are now, Savitar,” she murmurs. “I’m sorry for whatever I’ve said to you, or whatever I will say to you. But time doesn’t matter now. Only this moment does. And in this moment, I’m telling you that I love you. Barry or Bart or Savitar, past or present or future...” Her voice breaks. “In whatever form, I love you. In whatever timeline, I love you. In whatever life, I love you.”

He knows those last three lines. He almost whispers them with her as she says them, because these are the lines she will tell him right before he kills her. Right before he watches the light leave her eyes. Right before she takes her last breath. He’s seen himself kill her a thousand times. He’s relieved it a thousand times.

He doesn’t know why, in this moment, imagining her die by his hand makes him feel something akin to remorse.

But it lasts only a second, and in the next the steel returns to his eyes, the walls around his heart.

Iris must die, or he will never be born. It’s the pinnacle of greed, but he isn’t Barry Allen anymore; he thinks of no one but himself now, and he makes no apologies for it.

“Very touching.” He grasps her hand in his and pulls it away from his face. “But love is just a memory to me now, Iris,” he says, flashing her a cruel smile. “And soon you will be, too.”

iii.

For you I was a flame, love is a losing game Five story fire as you came, love is a losing game One I wished I never played, oh what a mess we made And now the final frame, love is a losing game

— Amy Winehouse, “Love Is a Losing Game”

She’s leaning against the entrance when he returns. Her gaze is accusing.

“You still love Iris,” she says.

He sweeps past her and ignores her.

She follows him. “I saw the look on your face when she touched you. You wavered. You said you don’t feel pain, but you’re lying—”

He slams her into a wall, his arm to her throat. The cold metal digs into the skin of her neck. “Never speak of the past,” he growls.

She narrows her eyes at him and tightens her hands around his arm. Frost crawls into the fissures in his armor, biting into his skin; and when she twists her hands hairline cracks appear on the metal surface.

He snarls in fury and loosens his hold around her throat. When he does, she swings her legs up and kicks him on the chest, so hard that he loses his balance. He catches himself in time, but she falls into a heap on the floor, gasping for breath.

And then suddenly, she’s laughing, a low, raspy sound. “This isn’t the past anymore,” she says. “This is the present—”

“This is all past to me!” he fumes. “There is nothing that I haven’t already experienced—”

“Don’t lie to me!” she hisses. “Don’t fucking lie to me. You were surprised when they cornered us. You were surprised when Iris touched your face. When she said she loved you, your face changed.” Her gaze is heavy with accusation. “You can’t bring yourself to kill her, can you?”

“You weren’t even supposed to be there,” he spits out. He emerges from his armor. “You were supposed to be fighting Vibe, and then you were supposed to kill the girl.”

“I did fight him, but he sent her away before I could knock him unconscious.” She got to her feet. “You haven’t answered me. Do you still love Iris?”

“What does it matter to you? Are you jealous, Princess?”

Now she throws her head back and laughs. “You’re hilarious,” she says, clutching her stomach. “You come face to face with Iris once and instantly you go soft. You can’t even summon enough malice for your insults.”

He glares at her. “This is none of your fucking business.”

“Of course it’s my fucking business,” she snaps. “Because if you’ve had centuries to forget and you still haven’t gotten rid of Barry Allen, what hope do I have of ever getting rid of Caitlin?”

“They’re not real,” he bites out. “Those memories and feelings aren’t real. They’re phantoms.”

“Phantoms,” she scoffs. “Phantoms that still haunt you, you mean?”

“Don’t test me, Princess.”

“And don’t patronize me,” she says. “You know what I heard back there, in your exchange with Iris? I wasn’t hearing a God who’d transcended pain. I was hearing a man who’s scared of being broken by the woman he loves.” She gives him an icy look. “You don’t fool me, Savitar. You’re no God.”

“Leave me,” he says evenly, turning his back to her. “Leave this place now.”

“You’re a coward,” she says with venom. “You can’t even face the truth about yourself like a man—”

He lunges at her before she finishes speaking, and she falls face-down to the floor from the force of his blow.

He crouches beside her. “You want to know the truth, Princess?” he rasps in her ear, holding her face to the ground. His anger sparks electricity down his limbs, and his voice drips with acid. “The truth is that I am not a man. I am a phantom. I am a relic of Barry Allen’s mistakes.” He can see her digging her fingers into the ground. “I am not real, but the pain they inflict on me is.”

Suddenly, sharp tendrils of ice burst out around him, and he’s barely able to flash away before they pierce the place where his body was, but several nick his clothes and draw blood from his skin.

She props herself up and spits out the blood in her mouth. The scrapes on her face are already healing.

“So that’s it,” she says, smiling grimly. “You don’t know how to deal with pain. The reason you want Iris dead is because she’s the one who can hurt you the most. She holds the most power over you. If you kill her, you’ll be free of any weakness.”

He leans against a table. It seems that her persistence and their fight has worn him down. She can see from the slump of his shoulders that the adrenaline has fled his system, and he suddenly looks smaller in the dim light. “The reason I want Iris dead,” he says, enunciating the words, “is because her death is the beginning of my ascension. Once I kill Iris, Barry Allen will kill me, and then he’ll become me.”

She raises her eyebrows. “Kill you?”

“One of the possible futures,” he says. “Perhaps the most probable one, from what I’ve seen. After I kill Iris, and after Barry Allen kills me, the only thing that will stop him from becoming me is if he can save Caitlin Snow.”

She strides towards him. “I won’t become Caitlin Snow,” she says, her voice hard and determined. “And you will not die. You will not die. I won’t let it happen.”

And then, for a brief moment, her eyes flash brown.

His gaze softens. His fingers curl around her chin. “Princess,” he says, and the way it rolls off his tongue now sounds nearly affectionate. “We both know that there’s more Caitlin Snow in you than we first thought.”

“Nonsense.”

“Tell me,” he says, “did Caitlin Snow ever love Barry Allen?”

She looks away.

“I never loved any of them.”

“That’s not what I asked.”

“I gave them everything,” she continues, her eyes flashing brown again. “I stitched them back together each time. I listened patiently when they told me how hard it was to see me like this. I kept quiet when they didn’t ask me about my pain. I didn’t even nag so much anymore, even though I worried myself to shreds when they were out.” Her breath hitches. “I gave them everything.”

“And in return, they gave you a cage,” he murmurs.

“A pretty cage, but still a cage.” She leans in to his touch and her hand ghosts around her neck, where her necklace had been. “They said they loved me, but their love was a cage, too. Why did they do that?”

“Men want to contain what they fear,” he says. “Especially if what they fear is a woman.”

She huffs and rolls her eyes. “You men have fragile egos.”

He lets out a gruff laugh, and she gives him a tentative smile.

She hasn’t answered his question, he notices, but he knows it’s one of those questions that he can never ask again if he wants to keep her by his side.

He tilts her face to the dim light of the room, and he notices that she is paler than usual. From her fight with Vibe, no doubt.

He runs a hand along her jaw, and rests it on the back of her neck.

“Hungry, Killer Frost?”

Her smile widens. “Mmm,” she says, and he pulls her to him and dips his head to give her a kiss. It’s entirely unlike their previous kisses—this kiss is tentative, leisurely, probing. He runs his fingers along her curls, licks the seam of her lips, savors the taste of her in his mouth.

When he pulls back, he subtly vibrates to restore heat to himself. He puts his hands around her waist and settles her on the table behind him, and then he gets down to his knees. 

She gives him a bewildered look, but doesn’t protest when he tears her underwear away and flashes her a wicked smile.

“For what I said about the factory incident,” he says, and before she can understand what he means, his mouth is already on her clit and he’s eating her out like a man starved. He’s unbelievably skilled with his tongue. All she can do under his ministrations is to scrape her nails down his scalp and dig her heels into his muscled back and whimper incoherently as he takes her to the height of pleasure.

When he’s through with her and she’s able to see straight again, she shoves him into a wall and palms the front of his pants. He’s already hard, and his pupils are dilated in arousal.

She smiles. She gets down to her knees, and then runs her mouth over the tented fabric. “For the icicle to your lung,” she says. “And to even the score.”

She unzips his pants and takes him into her hot little mouth, and as she had been, he finds himself helpless and incoherent and completely surrendered to her.

———

The next day, they carry on as if nothing had changed between them. After all, they never speak of the past—to them, there is only the present, and the agonizing, all-consuming hope for a future where they will no longer be shackled to their pasts.

But in their heart of hearts, they both know that that future is unlikely to happen. He knows enough of her to see that she is still Caitlin Snow, and she knows enough of him to see that he isn’t trying to transcend pain—he’s only running from it. And yet they hurl themselves towards that future as men and women hurl themselves at their burning houses, greedy to salvage whatever they can before the fire turns everything to ash.

[pregnantcornbread]

Mass Effect: Andromeda - Choices, romance, further questions.

So, I preordered Mass Effect: Andromeda to be delivered to me via courier on release day. Why? I absolutely loved Dragon Age: Inquisition, and loved BioWare’s style. The hard choices you have to make actually make a difference in the story, as do your personality and influence (not like TellTale’s Walking Dead series, who promote that your choices matter, when actually, they really don’t, the story continues regardless). In DA: I, I was a female hunter Lavellan, with not-so pointy ears (which made a difference how the other elves interacted with me), and a Ghilan'nain vallaslin (which endeared me to the halla herders). I originally romanced Blackwall, but when he left, I went full Cullen, a satisfying relationship filled with awkward coughs, innuendo, and drug withdrawal – and frequent visits to the ramparts for ‘alone time.’ I spent over 300 hours completing every side quest, relishing in new environments, killing everything bad in sight, trying not to whine when all the important choices somehow fell to me (including what is to be done with a man who is flinging goats at my stronghold) and taking down all the dragons. I never felt tired playing that game, the ‘fetch’ quests were fun due to the party banter (hint: if you have your romantic interest in your party, things get hilarious!), and the lovability of your party, well developed characters who don’t just rehash the same lines all the time (except in fight mode: “Solas needs help” is still ringing in my ears, after all this time). The DLC was quite well crafted as well (although The Descent is possibly my least favourite – why am I collecting mugs in the deep roads again? Trespasser had a great ending, and gave you another change to mix it up with your crew). So my expectations were quite high with ME: Andromeda.

After spending a quick five minutes deciding on a male or female Ryder, I chose the obvious. After having to play countless RPG’s as a man (Far Cry, Shadow of Mordor, Sleeping Dogs, GTA:V, Witcher), I chose a woman, because yeah, I am one. I spent an hour fixing my Sara to look like a human rather than whatever the preset was. My Sara, in the design part, sort of looked like a young Mary Steenburgen. Satisfied with my choice, I got on my merry way with the game. Upon waking up out of cryo, I saw everything that was wrong with my Sara’s face, the shading was shitty, the skin was terrible, her nose was way bigger, her eyes looked purple in some lights (instead of deep blue) and what was up with her goddamn eyebrows? But in some scenes, she actually looked like the Sara I had designed. Rather than spend another hour redesigning her face, I decided to roll with it and keep her. It was a good choice, because she looked like present day Mary Steenburgen with worse skin and a neck tattoo, and looked like she had seen some shit and could handle her shit, rather than some prim and proper pathfinder’s daughter who was only on the ark because her dad said so.

End game spoilers ensue, so please read at your own peril:

The following is split up into three parts: My choices in the game, romance, and post-game questions.

My game is at 111 hours and 98% completion. There were two quests that I did not finish before completing the game (excluding the medicine quest after Herbal Entrepeneurs, because it was bugged) – ‘Path of Hero’ and ‘Aid Apex’ (because I killed all the architects before I got the mission, and so had no option to scan them). Post game, these quests are no longer available to me.

My Choices:

Sometimes I would leave the game running for hours while deliberating on a choice. My first choice was whether or not to have a scientific outpost or a military outpost on the first world, Eos. As your advisors tell you, what you choose will reflect on how the initiative is seen in the eyes of possible intelligent life in the system, and will set the standard of what you intend to do in the system. I chose a scientific outpost – less “we’re coming to invade you”, more “we’re just here to live and learn.”

First murderer: I chose to release Nilken, because intent is not a crime, but I also didn’t speak to his wife outside the jail, so his secret was not exposed.

Vehn Terev: I gave him to the resistance, because interfering with Angaran justice wasn’t the right play.

Path of a Hero: I spoke to Kerri, but declined her offer, as I was just new to this pathfinding business, and didn’t feel that I could offer any nuggets of wisdom. Then I forgot about it and it failed the quest. Meh.

Reyes Vs Kelly: Both are terrible choices for leaders, but at the time, I wanted to see where a romance with Vidal would go, I played it out, and was disappointed, but in my do-over, I still let Kelly die, because she was quite evil. Even though Reyes was a tosser for cheating, he still seemed the better hand.

Angaran AI: I gave the Angaran the AI, because I didn’t feel right about keeping it for myself – and potentially angering the Angara.

Secret Water reservoir: I let the Angara merchant keep the water in reparations for the outcasts killing her brother, and to prevent the Nexus from becoming a thoroughly colonising body in Elaaden.

Drive Core: This one was a bit fuzzy for me, because I was also doing the quest with the AI saboteurs, and they were talking about Overload (I think), a program about a weaponised AI, and Drack was sending me emails about Overload Morda, so I thought that Morda was a weaponised AI. I ended up scanning Knight’s hideout a little too thoroughly, which made her people hostile to me, and she ended up being sniped on the Nexus. Alain vows revenge, which is unfortunate, because SAM made him walk again. After finishing a few more quests, I came back to Elaaden and I ended up trusting Morda with the drive core, because pissing off all the Krogan was not my idea of ‘peace among worlds.’ Also, after all the shit the Krogan have been through, the Krogan need a voice at the table – they didn’t even get their own pathfinder!

Avitus Rex: Rex became a pathfinder, because he was out finding Turians when the Turians weren’t.

Sarissa’s Fate: I couldn’t let Sarissa keep her position after all that dickery that got her Pathfinder killed. It may not have been the smart move, but although she was the best person for the job, a huntress without her squad’s support will not go far. Also, I don’t think I could have looked at Cora if I agreed to lie to everyone about it. If Tann (number eight in line) can be the director, why can’t Valderia?

Salarian doctor: Ehh, what a moral dropkick. He got jail.

Exaltation facility: I let it stand, for further help in the final mission.

Salarian Pathfinder: This one was heartbreaking. A female Salarian who is an actual trained pathfinder (would have been the only one in my crew), who is captured trying to rescue her people despite my commands to get the f out of there vs Drack’s dime a dozen Krogan scouts. I had planned on saving the Krogan scouts beforehand, and had Drack in my party, but while I was doing this mission, I was really torn. If I choose the Salarian, the Krogan won’t trust or respect me, but if I chose the scouts, I would get further support from the Krogan, with no real consequences on the Salarian side. Whatever I chose, I would be taking a side, with consequences down the line. I went with ‘Krogan lives matter,’ despite sacrificing the most badass Salarian, ever. I mean, every Salarian would want to mate with her just for the prestige!

Kill code: While it may come to bite me in DLC or sequels, I used it, just to get it out of the way. I don’t trust Primus to honour his deal in the future.

Ambassador: I loved Morda for the choice (just to spite Tann), and Bradley would have been a good second, but I ended up conceding power to the Moshae, I believe she was the smart choice. Although I had enough of a presence to unite the Angara and the Initiative, the Moshae would not be swayed by outside or inside influence. If I chose Hayjer, the Krogan would hate me, as much as “Krogan lives matter,” Morda would only act in favour of the Krogan and Clan Nackmor, and possibly make a heated attack against the Salarians/Turians in retaliation for the genophage, and Bradley, well, I could be accused of being specist.    

  Romance:

This is where I think the game could use improvements. It is pretty disappointing if you are FemRyder or a MaleRyder who doesn’t romance Cora (the extreme effort put in this relationship compared to the minimal effort of the others is quite disappointing – they actually kiss properly and there’s thrusting!).

Look at those two humanoids realistically kissing!

The lack of dialogue choices means that relationships become boring and quickly. While in DA:I, the cut away sex scenes did hold a little to imagination, that fact that you could go and talk to your interest during long, arduous missions and sneak away for a little kiss cut scene helped keep your interest in them, and having them in your party was always a hilarious time (“Keep your eyes off the Inquistor’s behind!”). While playing the game, you get a sense of your SO and your squadmates, their endearing and not-so endearing traits, it almost felt like they’re almost real people. DA:I is a well-fleshed out, well-written RPG, and the relationships are defining trait of this game – I’m sure that if all there was to do was going around killing things, I probably wouldn’t care. Instead, you help Cullen get off his lyrium addiction, let Iron Bull teach you your umm… limits, hunt around trying to find the perfect gift for Sera (much to the utter dismay of your compatriots), read terrible poetry to Cassandra, strong-arm a fop for Dorian’s pendant, save a spirit with Solas, challenge Josephine’s fiancée to a duel, save Leliana from spy assassins, and want to give Blackwall the coward another chance.  

The last major RPG I played that had multiple romance options was Fallout 4, and I romanced MacCready, Cait, Piper (just to shut her up – every time I’d talk to her, she’d want something more - ehhhhgghh), Danse and Curie (to also shut her up). Having one romance option in FO4 became too tedious, the only thing that changes is their scripted dialogue when they wake up next to you, so I romanced others to see what they said – because I honestly didn’t care about romance in that game because it was so flat.

Here’s who I romanced in ME:A (usually by flirting with everyone and then seeing what happens):

Liam – I started off flirting with Liam because he seemed interesting, until he quickly didn’t. His dialogue doesn’t change. You can’t really flirt with him in between missions after you’ve had a one night stand, and he’s so boring, I’d rather eject myself out of an escape pod than deal with him. If you go the whole game with Liam, he makes you a jump pack, but is it really worth it for being bored to death?

Vidal – I quite liked having someone off the ship to avoid a HR nightmare, but it turns out that after you become exclusive and dance with Reyes, that’s it – that’s your big romantic scene. Reyes becomes a chatterbox of nothing after that.

Jaal – Jaal is interesting, and unknown, and kind of reminds you of a perfect, dreamy boyfriend who is too in touch with their feelings, and you stay with them because you don’t want to deal with the fallout if you break up with them, because they’ll probably kill themself. Rocking a sexy, deep voice, I was almost convinced to be in a relationship with him, if not for Jaal’s confusing switch between Vulcan logic and hopeless romantic during the course of a conversation. Jaal is a warm space Mufasa, and will tell you what you want to hear, but his sex scene kinda sucked. Although the post coitus (?) debrief with Lexi is quite hilarious.

Vetra – I’m not sure if I didn’t flirt enough with Vetra, or if she didn’t want to be with me because I told Sid off – a lot, but perhaps it was never meant to be. My codex reads that Vetra hopes that we can be friends, so perhaps admonishing Sid worked against me.

Suvi – I didn’t flirt with her at the beginning, and I decided against a relationship with Suvi because her sex scene was awkward/awful.

Which leads to my commitment for the game:

Peebee is the one with the purple jacket… not young Sarah Paulson rocking the undercut…

Peebee – Peebee is a thorn in your arse from the moment she joins your crew. Rem-tech this, remnant structures that. Tight-lipped, evasive, and a motor-mouth, she’s a bit like Sera from DA:I, but a bit more grown up. She has limited long-range fighting skills, so bringing her to anything bigger than a small raider camp firefight is pointless. She insults Vetra, Liam, and Cora, but has some quite funny conversations with Jaal (interspecies breeding) and Drack (about their age). Liam and Cora, even during the final stages of the game, relentlessly question her loyalty. I chose Peebee because her storyline was the most interesting, as opposed to other potentials (Liam – “Hey, I’m a boring human too.” Jaal – “I’m an alien, meet my mothers, I moisturise my neck flaps.” Vidal – bad boy Han Solo). I turned down Peebee’s offer of casual sex, because at the time I didn’t want anything to do with her, so I told her that I’d want more to get her to leave me alone, and I didn’t want a Liam thing – where you have a one night stand once and then all of a sudden they want you to commit. But I kept flirting with her, regardless, recycling the “I like it when you flirt” dialogue whenever I got on the ship. I couldn’t do that with Liam, Jaal, or Reyes. Turns out, the more I learned about Peebee, through doing her loyalty missions, the more endeared I became towards her. From being tight-lipped and evasive to slowly trickling out interesting snippets – like her relationship with Kalinda, and her rem-tech project, she started to grow on me as I realised that she was not like the others, who give you all the information up front and you spend the rest of the game cycling through dialogue that you first heard 70 hours ago, with minor changes mirroring your progression in the story. You have to prove to her that you’re trustworthy. If you do commit to a relationship with her, and reciprocate her trust - it leads to a pretty explicit sex scene – complete with Asari melding. While the mechanics of the scene are quite awkward with FemRyder’s weird facial features – she looks like she’s super confused and not enjoying it all – trusting Peebee enough not to leave you brain dead during the first time she has melded with someone, and having Peebee trust you enough to meld with you makes the relationship all that more worthwhile. While I’m all for space boinking, Peebee’s relationship was less about the physicality of the act of boinking, and more about the trust and emotional connection inherent in the relationship, which I felt was satisfying. Post-meld Peebee has some killer dialogue aboard the Nomad, inviting Cora over for a pyjama sleepover, faking extreme horniness to get Jaal to admit that he was faking being asleep, and at the end, when you ask her ‘what am I going to do with you?’ she offers to make you a list. But the relationship and closeness doesn’t really go anywhere near the level of a relationship that DA:I does, due to the stunted dialogue choices. Although, I hope I didn’t get Peebee pregnant.

Post-Game Mysteries:

The ending scenes kind of set up the unfinished issues for the DLC/sequels – Primus wanting to kettify everyone, exploring Meridian, understanding the Jaardan, finding all the other lost arks, how many more useless solar systems are around, etc. Some questions remain, though. Say if I find a way to fix Ellen Ryder, what could she add to the story, other than my mother being there? She may be able to assist with new gadgets for players who chose a biotic route, or will she just serve as a ‘bringing your romantic attachment home to mum’ trope? Should we care about Jian Garson’s death and the mysterious benefactor? You learn during the game that the Milky Way has been fucked over by the Reapers, but we can’t save them, should we care?

After finding out why Alec Ryder made Sara the Pathfinder, all I wanted to do was talk to Cora about it – she wasn’t “looked over” and the promotion was to protect Alec’s secrets (i.e. Ellen on board, Milky Way gone to shit). I felt like my number two deserved an explanation, rather than sullenly assisting the other untrained Pathfinders on the Nexus (who did nothing, by the way – go out and bloody Pathfind – it’s not that hard!). I noticed that after ‘Journey to Meridian,’ Cora seemed cold, and would barely speak to me. Perhaps she was disappointed in me choosing Peebee, or perhaps SAM leaked what I found out to Cora. Will I ever get the chance to tell Cora about it?  

During the pre-prologue descision making process, you get to choose if you want a Male Shepard, or a FemShep (your ME:3 save has no bearing over this game). I went with a FemShep, like my ME:3 counterpart. Did I hear Jennifer Hale during the game? No. Does it even make a difference? Unknown.

After leaving Meridan and coming back to talk to everyone, some questions remain. During the epilogue, you meet the new crew responsible for Meridian. After you come back, the Australian implores you to go and find the sprog (a baby). Every time I see Addison, I ask about the baby that was born on a spaceship flying away from the Kett, who I suggested the family settle on Eos (no way was I going to get that lady on the Nexus – she’d have hated it!), but when I’m in Prodromos, I can’t find the baby. If that baby has been stolen by the Kett, I swear – I will hurt Bradley!

Further questions: Will Lexi and Drack ever get together? Will Vetra find love? Will Peebee take Jaal’s offer to try Asari-Angaran reproduction? Will the Nomad ever get some tunes? Will Drack live to see great-grandfatherhood? Will Cora hook up with Scott? If I agreed to sign up for Jill’s insemination program, and Peebee was carrying my child, could I raise them as siblings? How would my FemRyder deal with being a father?

What would happen if the Jaardan came back to Meridian to check on their experiments? What happens if the scourge takes over Meridian? Have I screwed over all of humanity by settling them there?