#This looks like it was made by three different artists

[iamquiantrelle]

GOLDEN BOY (chapter 2)────── iamquaintrelle

⌗ pairing : trent alexander arnold x black oc

⌗ summary : trent is having a quarter life crisis but will a smart-mouthed girl whip him into shape?

⌗ warnings : 18+ only!! (☁️☔️💕)

⌗taglist: @foreverisntenough, @trentswrld, @trentswhore @cinnaleaf @v6quewrlds @football-and-fanfics @eriks-girl @preetykookie @4ngryssgf @endlessmuse @noturbabe22 @bbgkoo

Tyler was still talking, going on about lighting concepts, but Trent's mind was spinning like he'd just done dizzy penalties.

April fucking Goodplenty.

The girl who'd rinsed him about his accent was apparently some hotshot photographer to the stars. No wonder she wasn't gassed about him being TAA - she probably shot Mbappé in his boxers last week.

"…could really elevate your brand," Tyler was saying. "Show a different side of you, you know? More artistic–"

"I fucked her last night."

Tyler's fork clattered against his plate. "What?"

"Well, almost fucked her." Trent grimaced, remembering. "Got proper mortal on tequila."

"You're taking the piss."

"Swear down." Trent tugged his collar down, revealing the art gallery of hickeys April had left behind. "She's got this mental cat named Pussy–"

"Bruv." Tyler put his head in his hands. "You're telling me you pulled the photographer I've been trying to book for three months? The one who told Nike to fuck off because their concept wasn't 'authentic' enough?"

"…yeah?"

"And you got liquor dick?"

"Oi!" The elderly couple at the next table turned to stare, and Trent lowered his voice. "It weren't just me, she was proper steaming too."

Tyler started laughing, proper belly laughs that had heads turning all over the restaurant. "This is peak. Absolutely peak. The one time your dick decides to go on strike–"

"Listen yeah," Trent cut in, "we can't book her. It'd be weird now."

"Are you mad? This is perfect! She already knows you, innit? Might even give us a better rate–"

"Ty." Trent's voice was serious now. "She proper mugged me off this morning. Slammed the door in my face and everything. Think she'd just take the piss if we tried booking her."

"Or maybe…" Tyler had that look he got when he was plotting something. "Maybe she'd want to finish what you started."

Trent's mind flashed to this morning - April in that silk robe, the way it had gaped open just enough to drive him mental. The absolute violation that would be, her directing him all professional-like while knowing exactly what he looked like in just his boxers.

"Nah." He shook his head. "Find someone else."

"Too late." Tyler's grin was pure evil as he held up his phone. "Already sent the inquiry last week. Got a meeting with her tomorrow."

"You're taking the fucking piss."

"Meeting's at two. Her studio in Shoreditch." Tyler stood up, dropping some notes on the table. "Don't be late."

"I'm not going."

"Yes you are." Tyler's voice had that tone that meant business. "This is exactly what we need for your image right now. Bit of edge, bit of artistry. Show everyone you're more than just the scouse wonderkid."

Trent watched his brother leave, then slumped back in his chair. Fucking hell. Tomorrow was going to be madness.

His phone buzzed - Tyler sending through the studio address. Under it was a message that made his stomach flip:

'She already confirmed btw. Said she's "very interested" in working with you.'

Christ. What had he gotten himself into?

Trent's Range Rover crawled through Shoreditch's narrow streets, his GPS having trouble trying to navigate the one-way system. Warehouse conversions and street art blurred past as his mind wandered to the night before last - to tequila shots and spiced vanilla and yellow-eyed cats named after Bond girls.

"Just round here," Tyler pointed, and Trent pulled up outside a converted factory building. Red brick, massive windows, proper East London trendy.

"Still think this is dead weird," he muttered, killing the engine.

"Stop being a pussy and come on."

The receptionist buzzed them through to a freight lift that looked like something out of a horror film, all exposed metal and dodgy grinding noises. When it finally wheezed to a stop, they stepped out into what had to be April's studio.

And there she was.

Fuck me.

The high-waisted jeans should've been illegal, honestly. Hugging every curve like they were painted on, leading down to these mental heels that had Trent's brain short-circuiting. The cropped jumper showed just enough skin to be professional but still have him thinking very unprofessional thoughts. Her hair was pulled back today, showing off cheekbones that could probably cut glass.

"Tyler," she smiled, all business now. "And… Trent. Nice to see you both."

The way she said his name had him remembering exactly how it sounded when she'd been leaving those marks on his neck. Speaking of which…

"Still sporting those love bites, I see," she smirked, gesturing for them to follow her into what looked like a meeting room. "Rough weekend?"

"Something like that," he managed, trying not to stare at her ass as she walked ahead of them. But fucking hell, those jeans were criminal.

The meeting room was all exposed brick and vintage furniture, mood boards covering one wall. April perched on the edge of the table, crossing those legs like she knew exactly what she was doing to his mental state.

"So," she began, pulling up some images on her laptop. "I've got some concepts I think could work really well. Break away from the usual footballer shoot - no watches, no posing with cars. Something more… raw."

Tyler leaned forward, interested. "Go on."

"I'm thinking black and white, minimal styling. Really strip everything back." She turned her laptop around, showing similar shoots she'd done. "Some torso shots, maybe even full nude–"

"What?" Trent choked out.

"Nothing gratuitous," she continued like he hadn't spoken. "All very tasteful. Think Greek sculpture vibes. Show the athletic form, the power, the vulnerability…"

"Nah," Trent shook his head. "No chance."

"Why not?" Those eyes fixed on him, challenging. "Scared?"

"I'm not scared," he bristled. "Just don't fancy getting my kit off for your camera, do I?"

"Wouldn't be the first time you've stripped for me though, would it?"

Tyler's eyebrows shot up as Trent felt his face heat. "That was different–"

"Was it?" She tilted her head, that infuriating smirk playing at her lips. "Because I seem to remember you being quite… willing."

"We'll think about it," Tyler cut in smoothly, ever the professional. "Maybe start with something less… exposed? Build up to it?"

April shrugged, standing up. "Your call. But I think you're missing an opportunity here. Could be something special."

As they headed for the lift, she called out: "Oh, and Trent? Might want to invest in some turtlenecks. Those marks look proper savage. Almost like you ran into a vampire or something."

"That what you are then? A vampire?"

Her laugh echoed through the studio - an unfiltered belly laugh that had him staring. Head thrown back, eyes crinkled, nothing like her professional photographer persona. Something in his chest did a weird flip.

"You're mental, you know that?" he said, but he was grinning despite himself.

"So I've been told." She winked - actually winked - and disappeared back into her office.

Outside, Tyler was already on his phone, probably lining up their next meeting. "That went well."

"Well?" Trent spluttered. "She wants me naked!"

"Not straight away though. We can build up to it–"

"I'm not getting my dick out for art, Ty!"

"No one said anything about your dick," Tyler grinned. "Unless… you thinking about showing her that too?"

"Shut up."

"Nah but seriously," Tyler pocketed his phone, turning to face him. "Did you see those other shots she showed us? Proper sick. Could really change how people see you."

Trent leaned against his car, thinking about it. The photos had been amazing - athletes looking powerful but vulnerable at the same time. Nothing sleazy about it. But still…

"She's just going to take the piss the whole time."

"Maybe that's what you need though?" Tyler raised an eyebrow. "Someone who doesn't treat you like TAA, Liverpool's golden boy. When was the last time someone actually challenged you properly?"

Never, if he was being honest. Even Sophie had just tried to mold him into what she thought he should be. But April… she seemed dead set on doing the opposite.

"Plus," Tyler added with a smirk, "think you might be into it a bit."

"What?"

"The way she mugs you off. Saw your face when she was giving it the big one about being scared. You proper love it."

"Fuck off," Trent laughed, but his neck felt hot. Was he actually into being challenged like that? The way she'd rinsed him about everything, how she kept him on his toes…

Christ. Maybe he did have a thing for it.

"Just think about it," Tyler said, already walking to the passenger side. "Meeting's in the diary for next week. Wear something nice."

Trent watched his brother disappear inside the car, then looked back up at the studio windows. Through the massive panes of glass, he could just make out April's silhouette, bent over her desk reviewing something.

Those fucking jeans though.

Maybe one more meeting wouldn't hurt.

Liverpool's training ground was freezing, typical January weather making everyone's breath visible in the air. Trent tugged at his high-neck base layer, grateful for the excuse of the cold to cover up April's artwork. Two days later and the marks were still there, like she'd been trying to brand him or something.

"Again!" Slot's voice carried across the pitch. "Press higher, Trent! Control that space!"

He pushed forward, finding that pocket between the defensive line in the practice match. The ball came to his feet like it was on a string - muscle memory from thousands of repetitions. One touch, two touch, whipped cross to Nuñez who buried it in the top corner.

"Better! Take five, lads!"

Trent grabbed his water bottle and phone from his bag, dropping onto one of the benches. His thumb opened Raya automatically - sad behavior really, but he couldn't help himself. Been glued to it since New Year's, swiping through posh girls and influencers without really seeing them.

Until.

"You're fucking joking," he muttered, nearly dropping his phone.

There she was. April Goodplenty, 27, verified profile with that little blue tick. Her first photo was something artistic - all shadows and angles, showing off those cheekbones that could probably slice bread. The next one had her on some beach in Bali, wearing this tiny white bikini that had his throat going dry. Then one of her working, camera in hand, tongue caught between her teeth in concentration.

The bio though: "If your profile's got you in a watch and suit, save us both the time and swipe left xx"

Trent snorted. Course she'd have that energy on here too.

His thumb hovered over her profile. Would she even swipe right on him? Probably saw him as just another job now. Plus there was that whole… liquor dick situation. Total violation that was.

Fuck it.

He swiped right just as Slot's whistle pierced the air.

"Let's go! Set piece drills!"

Back to work then. He jogged back onto the pitch, trying to focus on football instead of wondering if she'd match with him. They ran through corner routines, free kick patterns, all the stuff that should've had his full attention. But his mind kept drifting to spiced vanilla and burgundy nails and that laugh that made his chest do weird things.

"Trent!" Slot's voice snapped him back. "You're dropping too deep again!"

Get it together, lad.

By the time training finished, he was tired. The shower felt biblical, hot water washing away the January chill. He wrapped a towel around his waist and another around his neck to hide the love bites, heading for his locker when his phone lit up with a notification.

New match on Raya.

His heart actually skipped. What was he, twelve?

But there she was - April Goodplenty had swiped right. And she'd already sent a message:

"You get one second chance. Don't fuck it up."

His first thought was "Yes ma'am" but that felt a bit… eager. Instead, he sent back a salute emoji, trying to play it cool while his brain was doing cartwheels.

Right then. Where the fuck do you take a girl who thinks fancy restaurants are dead and probably knows every hipster spot in London?

He opened Google, typing "unique date ideas Liverpool" before deleting it immediately. Nah, that was basic. She'd see right through that.

What about… he thought back to her flat. All those vinyls, the art everywhere. The way her eyes lit up when she was taking the piss out of his accent.

Maybe he did have an idea. Something properly scouse, but make it interesting. Show her his Liverpool, not the sanitized version he usually showed girls like Sophie.

His fingers hovered over the keyboard, a grin spreading across his face. Oh yeah. This could work.

Now he just had to not fuck it up.

**********************************************

Two-all against Man United felt like a kick in the teeth. Trent's yellow card was still burning him up - such a soft call from the ref after Rashford went down like he'd been shot. The crowd had lost it, Anfield turning into a cauldron of noise as Man United's number ten rolled around like he was auditioning for the Olympics.

The gaffer had given them the "point's a point" speech in the dressing room, but it didn't help the taste of ash in his mouth. Should've had that game wrapped up in the first half - hit the post twice, had a penalty shout waved away. Then Bruno's equalizer in the 89th minute... violation that.

And now he had to somehow get his head right for this date.

He'd picked Baltic Market - bit different from his usual spots, proper Liverpool but with an edge. Street food stalls, local artists, that indie record shop in the corner that reminded him of April's flat. No fancy tablecloths or sommeliers giving it the big one about wine pairings. Just real Liverpool culture, the kind tourists never got to see.

His phone buzzed - probably Tyler asking about the match. But nah, just his mum sending another article about his yellow card. Christ, did everyone have an opinion these days?

"This better work," he muttered, checking the time again. Seven minutes late. Maybe she'd ghosted. Wouldn't be surprised after that meeting, him acting all precious about getting his kit off–

"Didn't expect you to actually pick somewhere decent."

That voice. He turned and… fuck me.

The Balenciaga jumpsuit was doing criminal things to her figure, and those heels had her almost at his height. Her coat was probably worth more than his entire outfit, but she wore it like it was nothing. Those curls though - bouncing with every movement, making his fingers itch to touch them.

"Rough match?" she asked, and he could've kissed her for not going straight into analysis mode like everyone else after a draw.

"Something like that."

"Good thing I know just the cure." She nodded toward the entrance. "Shall we?"

Inside was buzzing - fairy lights strung across the ceiling, music from some local band floating through the air, the smell of about twelve different cuisines mixing together. April's eyes lit up like a kid at Christmas, taking it all in.

"Now this," she said, "is more like it."

They ended up at this Korean street food stall, April going in on some bulgogi fries while telling him about this shoot she did with some rugby player who kept flexing his abs between takes.

"Real tragic," she laughed, licking sauce off her fingers in a way that had his mind going places it shouldn't. "Like mate, I can see them, you don't need to keep pushing them out. Looked like he was having a fit."

"That what you want me to do then? Get my abs out?"

"Please," she rolled her eyes, but he caught the way her gaze flickered to his torso. "Your ego's big enough already. Plus, after that meeting... seems like you're scared of the camera."

"I'm not scared," he bristled. "Just don't fancy having my arse all over magazines."

"Shame," she smirked. "It's quite a nice arse."

Before he could process that, she was already moving on to the next stall, leaving him standing there like an idiot.

They wandered through the market, April stopping to chat with every artist about their work. She knew her stuff too - passionate about it all. Made him think about those art prints in her flat, how everything there had felt intentional. Not like his place with its designer furniture picked out by some interior decorator.

The record shop owner recognized him, but instead of the usual selfie request, he and April got into this massive debate about vinyl pressings that Trent couldn't follow for shit. But watching her get excited about it, those curls bouncing as she gestured, the way her eyes lit up when she found some rare pressing... it was doing something to his chest, making it feel tight in a way that had nothing to do with the match earlier.

"Trent?"

He blinked, realizing he'd been staring. "What?"

"I said, should we get out of here?"

Outside, the Liverpool air was bitter now. April pulled her coat tighter, those curls whipping in the wind, and Trent had to stuff his hands in his pockets to stop himself from reaching out to touch them.

"Listen," she said suddenly, turning to face him. "Let's cut the chase. I'm a busy woman, you're a busy man... so are we trying to fuck each other or are you pussy?"

Trent nearly choked on air. "I- what?"

"You heard me."

"You slammed a door in my face!" he spluttered. "Like, what are you talking about?"

"Sorry," she shrugged, not looking sorry at all. Those eyes were dancing with mischief again. "I saw you giving me the eyes at our meeting. And you swiped right on Raya, so..."

His brain was short-circuiting. This girl was actually mental. Completely off her head. Saying whatever came to mind like she didn't give a fuck about the consequences. And fuck him if it wasn't the most attractive thing he'd ever seen.

"You're actually mad," he said, but he was grinning.

"Maybe." She stepped closer, close enough that he could smell that spiced vanilla again. Close enough to see the flecks of gold in her eyes, the way her lips curved into that smile that spelled trouble. "But I don't see you running."

No, he definitely wasn't running. Not when she was looking at him like that, like she was deciding exactly how she wanted to ruin him. Not when those curls were right there, begging to be touched. Not when everything about her was a challenge he desperately wanted to accept.

"So?" She raised an eyebrow, and he could see the marks she'd left on his neck reflected in her eyes. "What's it going to be?"

The wind whipped around them, carrying the distant sounds of the city - cars honking, music from the market, someone laughing. But all Trent could focus on was the way April was looking at him, those eyes challenging him like always. Making him feel like more than just TAA, Liverpool's golden boy. Making him feel... real.

Fuck it.

"Your place or mine?"

Her smile turned wicked. "Bold of you to assume I'm that easy."

"You literally just asked if-"

"I know what I asked." She took a step back, and he immediately missed her warmth. "But maybe I just wanted to see what you'd say."

Christ. This girl was going to be the death of him.

"See you at the studio next week, Trent," she called over her shoulder, already walking away. "Try not to think about me too much."

He watched her disappear into the night, those curls bouncing with each step, that jumpsuit doing ungodly things to his mind.

Too late for that, wasn't it? He was already in too deep, and they both knew it.

The worst part? He was starting to think he didn't mind at all.

…………tbd

[wellwornworldwalker]

I have an obsession with assigning theme songs to characters I like. Since Linked Universe is my current hyperfixation I realized I have a golden opportunity. Sleeping at Last is one of my favorite artists and he has an album called Enneagram. 9 songs for 9 personality types for 9 Links so without further adieu here is my totally flawed assignment of songs.

One - Warriors.

The list goes on forever Of all the ways I could be better, in my mind As if I could earn God's favor given time Or at least congratulations Now, I have learned my lesson The price of this so called perfection is everything I've spent my whole life searching desperately To find out that grace requires nothing of me

In the Swords comic Warriors admits that wielding the Master sword made him feel invincible and that nearly cost him his life.

Now Warriors has learned that his true strength is his ability to work with others, a strength he brings to the chain. I see Warriors as someone that likes rules, he needs the world and people to follow a predictable pattern. That puts him at odds with the chaotic members of the chain (That’s everyone, including Warriors.) He’s a perfectionist, specifically the type of perfectionist that believes if you want something done right you’ve got to do it yourself. He’s learned to work with others, and has overcome his initial instincts as The Hero.

Two - initially I thought Hyrule was the best match for Two but as I was writing this analysis I changed my mind to Twilight.

Sweetheart, you look a little tired When did you last eat? Come in and make yourself right at home Stay as long as you need Tell me, is something wrong? If something's wrong, you can count on me

You know I'll take my heart clean apart if it helps yours beat

Twilight is running himself ragged. He was pulling double duty as Wolfie and Twilight. He’s trying to make Time proud, then turns around and tries to mentor Wild. A thankless task because Wild is not interested in his mother Cuccoing. He's more used to the mature blue eyed wolf that pushed him to his limits and never coddled him.

And in Twilight Princess he became The Hero to save his village. Mayhaps Twilight is a bit of a people pleaser but…

I know exactly how the rule goes Put my mask on first No, I don't want to talk about myself Tell me where it hurts I just want to build you up, build you up Till you're good as new And maybe one day I will get around to fixing myself too

Twilight recently had his heart broken when Midna left and shattered the mirror. Maybe he’s trying to avoid those feelings by concentrating on everyone else?

Three - Time and Legend were fighting back and forth with songs Three and Eight. Those two are very similar . Both young hero’s that had their childhood stolen in a single defining moment. Legend watched his uncle die and went on the run. Time drew the sword and woke up seven years later having slept through his childhood. And they’ve become pessimistic and cynical because of that.

And a nice little detail that shows how similar Time and Legend are is when Legend and Warriors were betting on who Time’s wife was. War’s thought it would be the princess. But Legend correctly guessed it was someone different because he knew that wasn’t Time’s style.

But back to Time, because these two are different and maybe that just because Time has the advantage of years and age on his side but he settled in a way Legend hasn’t

Maybe I've done enough And your golden child grew up Maybe this trophy isn't real love And with or without it, I'm good enough

Time is who he is because he has Malon and the ranch. Malon loves the very normal man Time is not The Hero he had to be. The others immediately notice how different Time is when they get to the ranch.

He laughs, smiles, and jokes around. While on the road he’s tense and serious. He sees this quest as a duty and a responsibility, but he wants to be home. Makes you wonder why he’ll leave home and die to become the hero’s shade?

Four - Is FOUR

Jk jk it's Sky. The song Four is about ordinary touching divine. And if that doesn't sum up Sky I don't know what does.

Bodies fashioned out of dirt and dust For a moment, we get to be glorious

When Sky first encountered Demise the Demon King spends a lot of time pointing out that Link is human, brave for a human but still human.

Then there are these lines

But I've fallen in love with a ghost I lost my balance when I needed it most

He loves Zelda, a mortal incarnation of a goddess and in his quest to save her he is so often just a little too slow. He's there in the end and gets the job done but it's a close thing that haunts him.

Five - For real this time. This is Fours song.

The opening lines are

I want to watch the universe expand I want to break it into pieces small enough to understand And put it all back together again In the quiet of my private collection

He's a curios little guy and a smith. Always looking into the mysteries of the world, take them apart and remake them. Maybe that curiosity got him into a little trouble. He's got the four sword and one magic sword is more than enough for him.

The last lines of the song are

I finally feel the universe expand It's hidden in heartbeats Exhales and in the hope of open hands

Four has got the four sword but he is also the hero of Minish cap. He see's the large universe and the small important things that are closer to home. He's recognized this after the events of sunset and dawn. If this quest is to succeed he needs to let his brother's in. Wild knows his secret but that was more of a spur of the moment angry reaction. I'll be interested to see if he purposefully reveals his secret to anyone else.

Six - Six was originally my pick for twilight but I switched him and Hyrule. Fanon characterizes Hyrule as the healer but so far we've only seen him healing once. So I'm basing this off of his games, Linked universe canon and my hopes for his character arc.

We laugh about this line because Hyrule has what is considered the hardest game. Oh you sweet summer child. You complicated, pixilated little hero. Do you know what you've done? That's why I associate these lyric's with Hyrule's character

I want to take shelter, but I'm ready, ready to fight Somewhere in the middle, I feel a little paralysed Maybe I'm stronger Than I realize

Like Legend Hyrule lives in the fallen hero timeline. That's caused some serious problems for his kingdom. But unlike Legend, Hyrule seems to be open and friendly.

Is it courage or faith To show up every day? To trust that there will be light Always waiting behind Even the darkest of nights

It takes real courage to live in a dying world and still love it and it's people.

Seven - There was never any doubt in my mind that Seven was Wild's song. Some of these were difficult to nail down but not Seven and Wild. This song is about being restless and wanting to explore. Perfect for our Hero of the Wild

Then the song hits you with this sucker punch

But I want to be here Truly be here To watch the ones that I love bloom And I want to make room To love them through, and through, and through, and through The slow and barren seasons, too

Twilight has pointed out the Wild should talk to his Zelda about who he used to be and who he is now. But that means looking to the past and he's can't bring himself to do that yet. Instead seeing his life as two different people. The before and after.

Eight - I mentioned that I flipped flopped on choosing Time or Legend for this song but I finally decided that this is more Legend's song. Truth be told Eight could have been just about any Link's song. It's such a protagonist song. It's my favorite :)

Jojo has draw a picture of Legend with Marin and he looks so happy and playful. Something we don't see with the group.

But I can't let you see all that I have to lose All I've lost in the fight to protect it I can't let you in, I swore never again I can't afford to let myself be blindsided

He was open and loved once before but then he lost it. Not only lost it but had to be the one to destroy it himself, confront that maybe this happiness was never real to begin with. Now he's withdrawn and cynical. Legend is still all in on being a hero. (Unlike Time he's not looking to settle down.) But he wont be opening his heart anytime soon.

Can we talk about this panel from the bet

Are you talking about Time or yourself?

I'm standing guard, I'm falling apart And all I want is to trust you Show me how to lay my sword down For long enough to let you through

I can't wait to see his brother's break through that hard exterior and see the kind and empathetic person underneath. We see flashes of it.

(Memories is a gold mine for everyone's characterization, just saying.) He's emotional mature enough to know where to really lay the blame. I hope he can help Wild see that. But I think to really get through to Wild he'll need to be emotional vulnerable and he's not prepared for that yet.

But in the end Legend is a hero through and through. Since he was 11 he's been The Hero and he shows no sign of stopping.

I'ma shake the ground with all my might And I will pull my whole heart up to the surface For the innocent, for the vulnerable And I'll show up on the front lines with a purpose

He's grumpy and cynical but still a hero.

Nine - By process of elimination Wind is number Nine. I'm not really happy with this one but none of the songs really fit Wind . So I decided to speculate about Wind's future. Wind and Tetra are supposed to reestablish the Kingdom of Hyrule, a daunting task for a 13/14 year old. No wonder he admires the kings of Hyrule so much

Wake up Fall in love again Wage war on gravity There's so much Worth fighting for You'll see Another domino falls Either way

Quite the opposite of Wild , Wind is always looking to the past to build the future.

This ended up being longer than I thought it would be but I also didn't even talk about half my feeling when it comes to this album and Linked Universe. IDK how that possible. But I've said enough and I just needed to share my thought. And you guys should totally listen to the album.

[mask131]

I know that this is a band-aid over an open wound, but in case it might cheer up someone out there, remember that "Sandman" isn't all Neil Gaiman.

Now of course, yes he did create the Sandman comic, yes he was the writer and leader of the main series and various little complementary stories, and yes everything with the "Sandman" title on it probably has him gain some money in his pockets (I don't know exactly the legal ramifications of the Sandman franchise).

But you can remember that "Sandman" became a franchise part of the DC Universe and a property of the DC Comic. As a result, there is a LOT, a LOT of spin-off series where Gaiman was not involved or barely. Series he did not write, he did not chose the artists for, and where his involvement usually goes either "I was proposed X author to do a spin-off series and gave my blessing", or "I gave advices to the creators of the series from time to time but they kept ignoring me so I left" or even "I just checked the basic premise and then walked out to let them do their thing", with even some where it was "I never had anything to do with it".

In fact, it was why these spin-offs series had such a hard time getting popular and couldn't fly of their own wings easily ; why so many people did not bother looking at them (If the original creator isn't there, it's no good, it's just "glorified fanfiction") and why a lot of people dislike them ("Only Gaiman does it right"). Mind you, on the later point I have to admit the quality of those spin-offs is very varying, especally since they expand in a lot of different ways and retcon a lot of different things, resulting in conflicting timelines.

But if you are curious about checking them out one day, here are the Gaiman-free parts of the Sandman franchise:

1/ The Dreaming (1996-2001)

An anthology about minor inhabitants of the Dreaming and the adventures of various dreamers, created by various guest-artists. Neil Gaiman was merely a creative consultant on this series, but he was apparently dissatisfied or un-seduced enough by the worldbuilding elements introduced in "The Dreaming" to complete counter-it with the release of "Endless Nights", making Dreaming "not-canon" (and the series also did poorly because of how it was constantly compared to Gaiman's Sandman in unflattering terms).

2/ Sandman Presents

Originally, "The Dreaming" (90s run) was an anthology series but then shifted into a continuous storyline. However, to keep the idea of bringing guest creators and one-time artists each adding their fragment to the Sandman universe, the line of "Sandman Presents" was created, a set of mini-series and one shots. "Thessaly: Witch for Hire" ; "Bast: Eternity Game"; "Love Street", "Merv Pumpkinhead, Agent of DREAM", "Petrefax", "The Furies", "The Corinthian: Death in Venice" and far more yet...

Several of these mini-series proved popular enough that they spawned their own series. Such as...

3/ Lucifer

Created by Mike Carey in 2000, this series was a follow-up of the very successful "Sandman Presents: Lucifer - The Morningstar Option". It is currently one of the most famous Sandman spin-offs thanks to the TV series adaptation "Lucifer", despite... the TV show being VERY very different from the comics.

4/ Dead Boy Detectives

The other most famous spin-off of the Sandman, thanks to the recent series adaptation, and just like "Lucifer" it was originally a "Sandman Presents" line (also called "The Dead Boys Detective"). However beware, if you want to have the full continuity between "Sandman" and "Sandman Presents: The Dead Boys Detetive" you'll have to go through a Gaiman-written story, in "The Children's Crusade".

5/ WitchCraft

A mini-series exploring the characters of the Three Witches. Had a sequel, "WitchCraft: La Terreur".

6/ Destiny: A Chronicle of Deaths Foretold

A mini-series about Destiny by Alisa Kwitney.

7/ God Save the Queen

A 2007 series also made by Mike Carey and about a big crossover of Sandman, The Dreaming (90s edition) and The Books of Magic.

8/ The Sandman Universe

The biggest and most recent spin-off project of the Sandman comics. Created to celebrate the 30th anniversary of Sandman in 2018, it started with a series of comics overseen by Neil Gaiman though written by different artists (Gaiman wrote nothing in these series). It started with the introductive one-shot "The Sandman Universe", opening four different reboot/continuity series: The Dreaming reboot (by Simon Spurrier), House of Whispers (by Nalo Hopkinson and Dan Watters), a Lucifer reboot (by Dan Watters) and a Books of Magic reboot (by Kat Howard and David Barnette). [I have not talked about the Books of Magic franchise despite it being closely linked to the Sandman one, but that's because this post is already getting way too big].

After these four initial series, tons of other mini-series and reboots were launched, again written by many different people outside of Gaiman, several of them still going on to this day. The Dreaming reboot got a sequel (The Dreaming: Waking Hours), Hellblazer series, a Locke and Key crossover, and the "Nightmare Country" series by James Tynion IV (which got a sequel, "Nightmare Country: The Glass House").

All of that to say... Sandman hopefully isn't just Neil Gaiman. Its branches spawn into many different universes of the DC world, and there were many other authors who poured their ideas and concepts into the Sandman world.

(And I have not even covered ALL of the Gaiman-free spin-offs. The Sandman franchise is REALLY big)

[omo321]

I got Soh @arsquare's Kaishin bundle I won in a lottery last month 🤠

(on the second try that is, he was kind enough to send another copy bc the post office declined to give the first one to me bc I the parcel didn't specify my legal name :// whatever)

Whatever paper was used for the postcard, I love it (shiny in a nice subtle way) also Kaito is so cute here, I only now realized

I wonder if there's any practical sense to having business cards nowadays? anyways it's very pretty and now I DO wish more people had them. I'd be collecting....

I don't have any immediate use for the memo pad so I'm keeping it sealed but looks very good!

the art on the bookmark is amazing as I already have known, it is also more flexible than I thought, and the transparent effect is very nice! when i think about it, I probably prefer paper bookmarks, but it physically pains me whenever they get permanent creases, so plastic is safer that way... (also tassels give me a bit of an anxiety ever since since I used one I got as a gift from Urumqi students as a keychain and it fell apart lol...)

postcard and the book got a bit bent, nothing too serious but enough for me to side-eye our post service (for that, and stealing two of my zines now :/)

Soh was kind enough to add a drawing of fem Tsurumi for me too! (I went a bit insane for her for a month or two, here :DD) incredible <33

the quality of printing in the comic itself is really good, slightly glossy somehow? I haven't read manga in a while but I remember the paper being more plain/rough

can't even imagine the amount of effort that went into this comic, the kaishin santa origin story and three-month production period is wild. mad respect. I have so much respect for sequential artists in general.

I dont remember 1st edition well enough to spot differences but the art looks amazing… what's the word… crisp! crisp.

assorted story notes:

I remember reading it the first edition like "kaito in teitan? where's aoko :/" @ "AOKO!! :DD". she's merged with Ran here technically but it did feel like she played a role and wasn't only "Kaito's version of Ran", which I appreciated. ALSO I LOVE HOW SHE'S DRAWN SPECIFICALLY

progression of shinichi's faces after time reset is so funny :DD

SHIN BEING GHOSTED BY RAN AFTER CONFESSING… then choosing to be honest with her despite it…. Fire...

when I read the 1st edition, I found it not particularly shippy (I didn't know Soh doesn't ship it as that point, put it made sense in retrospect). Re-reading it, I see the romantic notes more clearly, but the sense of distance between them is also more obvious. that's kind of related to why the ship is loved, isn't it? It's easier for these two to be honest with each other who they barely know, rather than their lifetime friends, as far as canon goes. lol Aoko wasn't able to fix Kaito before and she won't fix him now...

[furkrum]

my take on the sadie hawkmans dance

[fisheito]

hey. hey you. yeah, yoU!! the one who actually looks at clothing!!! i request help. i need images of wedding dresses that you think would fit the starter trio [yaku, ed, oli]. pls send images........ of any ideas you have🙏

[moe-broey]

LIKE........ @ the prev post about armor flexibility.... Is That Why They Look Like That??????? 👁️👁️

Something else fascinating I found actually when I was comparing the Askr trio (knowing Alfonse and Sharena largely match, just a few differences here and there), wanting to get a better look at Anna...

SHE HAS BIG ASS BOOTS?!????? I. COMPLETELY FORGOR ....... it gives her a real sturdy look though. Hm.... (Thinking about what this means for characterization/how I'd draw her, esp w my initial impressions kind of. Being the opposite of this LMFAOOO oops 😥)

[todayisafridaynight]

reminiscing on the period where i didnt know sawashiro was modeled after ttm and the second i learned and embraced that it 1000% altered the way i drew him These Are Not The Same Bitch

[kerosene-saint]

I am a serial bandom fan made merch collector

[mv1simp]

for the bully!Max, Leclerc!Reader and chubby!reader simps in my requests…I heard you and I’m here to deliver 😼😼 enjoy!!

You Belong To Me ♥️

Bully!Max Verstappen x Chubby!Leclerc!Reader

say it louder, say it louder, who’s gonna love you like me (who’s gonna fuck you like me?)

Growing up as the youngest daughter in the Leclerc family, you’d had a childhood crush on your brother’s rival and friend, Max. But when you grew older he turned into your worst nightmare, always bullying you. You’ve been able to avoid him for the last 5 years - but now with your new engineer job on the paddock, you can’t hide from Max any longer…and can’t stop the feelings you still have for him.

Content includes: 18+ MDNI, smut, size kink, dom/sub, dark! Max who bullies innocent virgin!reader, dub con, brainwashing, bimbofication, somno, yk all the good shit, WC 9k 😨

You shiver as you walk into your family’s childhood vacation home along the Cote de Azure, despite the summer heat. It’s been a long time since you’d visited this house. Even though your Mama and three older brothers came by often, looking for a weekend break from their busy lives or a romantic getaway with gorgeous girlfriends, you’d always turn down their offers to join once you were in college. They'd always be confused at your hesitance - but then again, they don't know just how many bittersweet memories this home holds for you. You’d grown up here in the summers, the youngest daughter of the famous Monegasque Leclerc family. Racing was in your bloodline, and your beloved Papa had instilled his passion into all of his children before he’d passed away.

Your older brothers, who were all handsome, tall and athletic, made natural drivers right from childhood and easily progressed through the karting competitions. Meanwhile, you were the youngest and the only daughter, and were raised in a far gentler manner as the apple of your family’s eye, their cute bunny as they’d nicknamed you, after your favourite childhood pet. In comparison to your brothers who ran around outdoors, you were more shy, preferring to be left with your books and colouring pencils in the safety of the patio.

Of course, with all your differences, there had been the healthy sibling rivalry of brothers vs sister growing up. They hated being forced to play house or pose for your scribbly drawings (not Arthur though - even at age 5 you were convinced he secretly loved when you made him join the Barbie tea party.) And in turn, you'd alway complain when you’d be dragged to cheer on Charles from the sidelines as he won his karting competitions. You would sulk, childishly annoyed at your parent’s attention shifting from you to their middle son’s rapidly growing racing career.

But it all changed when Charles raced against Max Verstappen for the first time at age 11. The blonde Dutchman aggravated your competitive older brother immediately with his aggressive driving tactics. You’d heard Cha, as you’d been calling him since you were little, furiously ranting about the illegal moves Max had been pulling and your 7 year old brain tuned it all out. But when you first saw the mysterious blonde in question, your heart fluttered with a feeling you’d never felt before and a bright blush overtook your chubby cheeks.

You immediately became infatuated with the older boy, who was far nicer to you than Charles had been back then. Your middle brother's idea of “sibling time” involving hiding beetles in your bed and laughing when you screamed. So it became a common sight to see you wandering after Max instead of being by your family’s side, tugging on his shirt sleeve and showing him the racecar drawings you’d made. Max always entertained you, ruffing your hair and smiling back toothily, telling you that you were a much better artist than his little sis Victoria.

You’d beam from the praise, only leaving Max’s side when his scary father Jos would approach and eye you with disdain. You scampered back to your family, to your older brothers who accused you of the worst crime imaginable to the loyal Leclerc blood - exchanging racing strategies with the enemy Dutch. Your mother had hit all three sons on the back of the head and told them they could learn a thing or two about treating Bunny with respect like that cute boy Max did.

As you grew older, your pigtails were replaced with cute pins and headbands in an effort to look pretty whenever Max would come around to your summer home. By now, his rivalry with Charles had turned into a reluctant "frenemies who also spent summers together to discuss racing". You'd get to be with Max all day, swimming in the turquoise ocean and eating sweet stroopwafel that he always brought. An in the evenings, the two car-obsessed 14 year olds would be arguing about overtaking strategies at your family’s dining table. You’d pout, childishly wanting attention at age 11, interrupting whatever stupid point you're sure Charles was making to bat your eyelashes at your guest. Holding up your now detailed drawings of a black kart, you asked Maxie - as you’d taken to calling him - if he liked your recreation of his.

He’d grinned at you, still boyishly handsome and in the lanky phase of growing up as he told you he loved it, should he sign his autograph on it? with that Dutch accent you adored. Charles watched your shenanigans with a roll of his eyes, snidely muttering (in French, thank god) that the annoying little bunny wasn’t doing a very good job of hiding her crush on the enemy Dutch. You flushed, frantically checking to make sure Max hadn’t been able to understand, and had run off with a red face to tearfully rat him out to your Mama. Unlike Charles, she found your crush on Max rather cute, and always encouraged you to give your favourite ribbons and bows to Max for a good luck charm the way you did with your brothers pre-race (Traitor, teen Arthur and Charles mouthed at you).

She eyed you knowingly when you do your best to avoid blushing as you grew older still, this time seeing Max when you were 14 and him 17 with an impressive winning streak in the Junior Redbull team. He’d started to develop into his tall 6 foot frame now, towering over your tiny 5”2 frame like your brothers did. What, no drawing of a racecar for me to sign Bunny? he gently teased, leaning down so you could shyly kiss both of his cheeks - a Monegasque tradition Max had become accustomed to from your family. You stuttered out your no, of course not, you were too old for that now! making him laugh at how cute you looked before walking off. Arthur watches the exchange with a smirk, elbowing Cha when he emerges from the changing rooms. Your middle brother’s frenemy status with Max was more of a friendship these days, and his earlier accusations of you being a traitor had turned into something much more annoying. Max and Bunny, sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G-

But by the time you turned 16, your Maxie changed from the sweet, laughing boy you’d always trusted into someone darker, someone who you felt scared of at times. You were at the age where you now wanted Max as your boyfriend, naively thinking that the 19 year old driver would return your affections when he’d attended your Sweet 16th. You’d spent hours getting ready, styling your long curly hair and wearing a cute dress all your friends had insisted you would be irresistible in (but had almost given your older brothers an aneurysm). It was tight and short, and although you'd always been a chubby kid, you feel a self conscious of the new plush curves around your hips and chest, in comparison to your older brothers who now looked very handsome and muscular.

You’d lit up when you saw Max across the fancy yacht club, flooded with all your schoolmates and family friends who’d come to celebrate the baby Leclerc’s birthday. He'd looked so handsome, his muscular frame now filled out and catching the eye of many girls. There was a devilishness in his smile that came with the confidence of being the youngest F1 driver in history. Lately, your innocent crush had started to drift towards naughtier, dirtier fantasies about what Max’s large hands and lips would feel like on you, if he snuck into your bedroom in the middle of the night and told you he loved you as you willingly gave him your first kiss.

But all your naive hopes come crashing down when you see a slim, sexy blonde approach Max where he’s talking to Charles intently, drinking a beer. His hand squeezes her ass in a familiar motion as she wraps her arms around him, leaning up to give him a kiss. You quickly turn around in the crowd before you can be seen, heartbroken, and drown yourself in blurred conversations and slices of birthday cake. Max doesn’t even come to wish you happy birthday like he normally did, always with a special gift in hand. At some point in the night you’re talking to Charles and try to subtly ask who that blonde girl with Max had been. Your older brother gives you an amused look, asking if you still had your silly little childhood crush on Max? You adamantly deny it, and he smirks and tells you that was Giana, Max’s girlfriend and an Italian model. You’re upset, of course, but thankfully he changes the topic to tell you how Max had recommended his old F2 seat go to Charles, wasn’t that amazing Bunny? You nod mutedly, having become used to Cha being less and less aware of anything that went on outside his racing career these days.

After a sneaky shot of tequila your friend gave you, you have the courage to go approach Max. His girlfriend is still at his side and raises an eyebrow, pointedly glancing down at your figure to make it clear what she thought of your curvier body. What shocks you, though, is seeing an annoyed look on Max’s face as well, as he demands to know why you’re interrupting, couldn’t you see he was busy? You’ve never heard him speak like that and are confused, asking him why he’s being so mean, did I do something wrong, Max-

He cuts you off, smirking as he asks why you weren’t calling him Maxie anymore. The girl laughs at that, saying no way, she’s such a kid, she calls you that? A few of your older schoolmates have wandered over, curious to see what was going on and you flush from the embarrassment of having Max treat you like this in front of your friends.

From then on, Max just became crueler and crueler to you. It’s like he enjoyed seeing how you'd react, your cute chubby cheeks darkening with embarrassment as you avoided his gaze. Once he'd officially moved to Monaco, you ran into him everywhere as him and Charles formed a close friendship and would often hang out. Max would always time his harsh remarks just when your brother wasn't in earshot. He'd mock you about everything, from your childish appearance, to your innocently conservative outfits, your nerdy perfect grades, your animated Italian gestures and accent which he'd always seemed to adore growing up. Your popularity in school plummeted as your friends watched the talented F1 driver roll his eyes and mutter how pathethic you were when he heard you were reading romantic novels on Friday night instead of partying, saying the only reason you had any friends was because of your talented brother’s fame. Your family had no idea what was going on - as Max’s bullying started the same time your Papa becomes unwell and landed in hospital. Your brothers thought the change in your sweet demeanour was because of your sadness for your father.

If only they knew the real culprit was right under their noses.

It seemed there was nothing teen Max enjoyed more than seeing your big brown doe eyes welling up with tears. He’d use everything you told him growing up against you, making gossip and rumours fly around your school constantly. Any guy who tried to talk to you was assumed to be doing it as a dare. The first few years of high school had been like hell - the only thing making it bearable being your perfect grades and promising future. Unlike your older brothers who were natural sportsmen, you were the opposite and excelled at academics, and you’d used it to get a full ride scholarship at a prestigious engineering course in the UK.

That’s what you reminded yourself to get you through a graduation party at the end of high school. You'd been reluctantly dragged by the small group of friends you’d thankfully kept despite all the bullying and rumours. In true Monaco trust fund kid fashion, the party was hosted on one of your schoolmates' yacht, with many juniors and older siblings tagging along as well. Towards the end of high school, Max’s bullying was less common as he became busier with his racing - something Charles had become fully invested in with his new F1 Alfa Romeo seat. And you’d grown up, too, maturing into your curves and pretty dark Italian features, catching the eye of a few boys in your year.

It seemed you’d been briefly relieved of your duties of being a social pariah when you're yanked into a circle of already wasted partygoers playing 7 minutes in heaven. But when your friend pulled out your name with a drunken flush, you could only widen your eyes in horror when the next name she announces was one you'd never expected - Max.

And then you see him, on the other side of the deck, leaning against the railing and ignoring the girls trying to speak to him as his ice blue eyes intently watch you. You squeaked out your protests, begging your friend to try again, but it's hopeless when the circle begins chanting your name and Max’s. Giving up, you turned around and ran through the crowd, trying to reach the ramp and get off the boat -

-when a large, warm hand wrapped around your waist and easily pulled you into a broad chest. Before you knew it, you're in a tiny, dark storage room, with Max Verstappen blocking the door and smirking down at you. Your naive heart still ached with conflicting feelings for Max, who was your childhood knight in shining armour, who always stood up for you when your older brothers ganged up on you, always knew how to make you laugh when you were crying from their teasing. But this was also the same Max who made your high school life hell, had teased you mercilessly behind your brother’s back, and used all the secrets you'd trusted him with against you. He'd make you look like a childish little girl in front of your effortlessly cool, rich peers. This reminder brought you back to your senses and you quietly but firmly ask him to let me out.

He hadn’t let you leave, of course, instead leaning down until he was whispering in your ear with his deep voice that still send shivers down your spine, mockingly asking if you’d had your first kiss yet or if you're still the same stuck up Leclerc who thinks she's too good to be fucked by anyone here?

Heart racing furiously from nervousness, you mumble out that you hadn’t had your first kiss, avoiding his ice cold eyes as he chuckled. You know his game well enough by now to understand he wouldn’t let you go until he gets his answer. You hated the boy you once hoped to give your first kiss to. He’d ruined your reputation beyond repair, had made it so no guy at school would touch you even if they found you pretty.

Well, apparently except for one boy.

Turns out Max himself had no issues laying his hands on you, hidden in the darkness of the storeroom. His hands had pushed you up against the wall, your face cutely scrunched up in confusion, and then your jaw almost dropped in shock when he pressed his lips to your ear. He huskily whispered how pretty you looked, how he’d hated the way boys had been checking you out all night. They didn’t know you’d already promised to marry Max when you were little, yeah Bunny?

And then he’d captured the surprised gasp you let out, shocked that he’d remembered your childhood wish to be his vrouw, his wife, when he leans down to press a surprisingly gentle kiss against your soft lips. When he pulled back, his face remaining close to yours, your brown doe eyes looked into his with whirling confusion and hurt - but also desire flickering in them. And then you’d both gotten lost in another kiss, then another, and then Max being Max had starting running his hands all over your body. Squeezing his hand into your juicy ass to make you shyly moan, and then greedily slipping his tongue inside.

That’s how everyone had found you when they yanked the door open, with Max having you moaning his name, one hand sliding up your skirt and the other running over your tits. The darkness in his gaze returns as he pulled back and left you leaning against the wall with wobbly legs. He laughed as he strode off the party, saying it’d been so easy to get you to beg for him like a little slut, who would’ve guessed with your innocent appearance?

You couldn’t wait to graduate high school and go to university after that. And it had been amazing, moving far away from Monte Carlo. No one knew who you were or how deep your history with world famous athletes like Charles or Max went. You reinvented yourself, becoming confident after months of therapy and your intelligence becoming something you were admired for instead of teased. You’d though that was the end of it, that you’d never have to be humiliated or have your heart broken by Max Verstappen again. Until 5 years later when you got a call from Lorenzo asking you to come home.

With the intimate engagement party of your oldest brother being held at your family’s scenic vacation home, you’d been unable to refuse. You knew Max was going to be there, but you’d taken a deep breath and reminded yourself that things were different now. You were 22, a qualified engineer and had used your own hard work to get a job within the Alpine garage - even using your mother’s maiden name as your last name because you wanted to prove it was because of your skill, not connections. Charles had been bewildered, begging you to please come work at Ferrari, bebe but you’d been adamant about needing to prove your own worth. You loved your family, and were so happy for Cha’s success as your relationship with your brothers blossomed into a close, loyal one as adults. It had always been your father’s dream to see him in the red suit. It was unbelievable to have millions of Tifosi literally worship your older brother - and their adoration extended to you, his sweet younger sister Bunny. You make rare appearances on the paddock but were hailed as a good luck charm when you did, Tifosi cheering when you affectionally kiss your brother on both cheeks and tie a hair ribbon to his suit. You always made sure to stay well away from the Redbull garage.

And you’d become radiant in your beauty, too, in pretty, flattering dresses and fitted miniskirts that showed off your soft stomach and thighs, your generous cleavage and juicy ass. Full, lush lips and long dark curls framed your sweetheart face and you’d been finally been able to put makeup on without fear of being mocked. A few guys had tried to ask you out in college, but you hadn’t been quite there yet in your confidence to say yes. Max had seemed to put you off all men, for now at least….and your protective Italian brothers seemed to make it their personal mission to protect your honour and integrity. Very dramatic, you’d said to them with a fond roll of your eyes, secretly enjoying how they cared for you despite their luxurious celebrity lifestyles. So you’d ended up still being a virgin at your college graduation, wanting to save it for the man you fell in love with.

You reminded yourself of all that you had to offer, of how you weren’t the same nerdy little girl who was going to be bullied, when you heard Max would be joining your family prior to the engagement party. The night before he was meant to arrive, you’d been overthinking and anxiously wringing your fingers so hard that your whole family had started demanding to know what was troubling you. After giving them some weak excuse about being worried about your new job, you'd gone to read one of your romance novels by the pool after dinner to destress. You had ended up falling asleep under the stars, your tired mind eager to rest.

You didn’t know the man you were desperately hoping to avoid had landed a night earlier with his private jet. When he’d greeted your middle brother late in the night, saying he would crash for now and greet everyone properly in the morning when they were awake, Charles had gone to bed and the last remaining light of the house switched off. Only the silver moonlight illuminated your pretty face and unsuspecting figure when Max Verstappen stepped outside his bedroom's French doors, hoping to cool off - but instead felt his blood pumping heatedly at the sight of you.

Honestly, he hadn't expected to see you for years as you'd understandably fled to the other side of the continent the second you had the change to escape. You’d turned from a nervous, cute schoolgirl into a gorgeous woman, and his intense gaze hungrily roams over your peaceful sleeping body. He was going to ruin you, he thinks wickedly, gently stroking your still chubby cheeks that subconsciously leaned into his touch.

He decided to give you one last night of quiet as he left you in deep sleep, walking back inside with dark desire brewing. The childish bully he’d been as an angry teen, desperate to prove himself, was gone. He was now a thrice proven world champion, a millionaire, a man who’d been with dozens of women but found only one he still wanted through it all. And it was none other than his racing rival's sweet younger sister, the one who'd stayed loyal to him since she was little. He was ready to make you his, whether you still wanted him or not.

When you finally saw him at breakfast the next morning you had been suspicious at his pleasant behaviour, greeting you like he would any family friend and asking how college had treated you. Your whole body had gone stiff, eyes distrustfully following his every move. You’d been forced to respond back politely as your family watched you, your mum still grinning as she rooted for her daughter to become romantically involved with her childhood crush. If only your family knew how much Max tormented you, they’d never let him get within 10km of you again. But to your surprise, Max kept up his kind manner even when your family would be out of the room, laughing and smiling easily at you and somehow bringing confusing butterflies back to swirl in your stomach. After the week he'd spent at your vacation home, you'd naively started to think maybe he had changed. Maybe the five years away had made him mature into the charming, funny driver you'd seen in numerous interviews and ads, being unable to avoid his far reaching fame.

But it turned out his respectful behaviour, all through the engagement celebrations and the after party, only served as a ploy to get you to foolishly lower your guard. Max had greedily collected up all the information he’d missed over the years, about what your likes and dislikes were now, about how you’d gotten a job with your own means at the F1 paddock. And then he casually informed you over dinner that he’d spoken to Horner who was coincidentally looking for a mechanical engineer - and had wanted to interview you after seeing your resume. Your family had been ecstatic at a job for you in a prestigious garage, despite their blood thirsty Ferrari loyalty. Even Cha had caught you after dinner, telling you that it was thoughtful of Max to look out for you, that as your big brother he’d feel so much better if you were working in a winning team’s garage and being protected by Max, instead of alone in a poorly performing team.

You were so confused, couldn’t understand why Max was trying to get involved - and you told him so that night, hushed angry whispers in the hallway after everyone had gone to bed. He’d smirked, leaning down to press you into the wall, saying Wasn’t it obvious Bunny? I want you.

Your eyes widened in shock, and you stammered out your confusions, asking him why he would say such a thing, only to feel his lips brushing your ear. His deep voice murmured his explanation of how his father didn't think Max had been focused enough when he was younger, had wanted him to throw all distractions to the side...including you. I'm a three time world champion now, Max said with a cocky grin. It doesn't matter what he says anymore, I do what I want.

Although his initial words about how the change in his behaviour being due to his controlling father sent a pang of empathy through you, you hadn't come this far to just give in. You pushed him off you with all your might, only being able to get a couple of inches as you glared and said you're delusional, Max, if you think I'd ever forgive you. Much less want you back after the hell you put me through. Storming off, you naively thought that was the end of it, that Max would back off once he saw you weren't the same lovesick girl he could toy with anymore. Not gonna call me Maxie anymore? he teases at your retreating back.

You should have known Max always got what he wanted, because he finds his way into your bedroom later that night. It was stupid to not lock your room because you think he wouldn't lay a hand on you when under the same roof as your brothers. Softly closing the door behind him, Max's dark gaze took in your curvy, sleeping figure in your childhood room. It was still decorated with your younger self's belongings as your Mama had always wanted you to feel welcome - but you had never come back after graduating. So you slept against a large plushie Bunny, cutely dressed in a pink matching shorts and camisole set. The twisted desire to corrupt the sleeping beauty in front of him rushes to Max's head - and his hardening cock- and he doesn't hesitate to slowly run his large palms over your body. He teasingly slides one hand up your sheer camisole to graze your large tits and the other down your shorts, to lightly toy with your pussy through cotton panties. The sweet dream you'd been having started to turn into a dirty one from the stimulation, and you instinctively grind back against the warm, hard body pressed into your back as you moan sleepily.Your dream is getting more and more heated as Max plays with your sensitive body, and only when you’re starting to drench your panties with slick do your eyes hazily blink open. Your adorably confused expression turns him on even more as he captures your gasp in his mouth, using his tongue to explore the inside of your mouth. Soon he has your panties pulled to one side and his thick finger sliding into your dripping folds. Your muffled protests have started slipping into confused moans, and he doesn't need to keep you silent any longer as start kissing him back when your body's frustrated needs take over your mind's denials. Max looks down on your face, memorising how pretty your wide brown eyes looked as you teared up, and he whispers filthy things in your ear to send you off the edge and spiralling into your first orgasm. You're so sensitive, bunny, you’re still a virgin aren’t you? Saved yourself just for me like a good girl, hmm?

You’d silently cried into your plush toy as you buried your flushed face into it, feeling lost in the overwhelming pleasure that you knew you shouldn't be feeling, that was wrong but felt so right. Drool stained your poor bunny plush as you bit down on it to muffle your scream of Maxie as waves of satisfaction rolled over you. You'd fallen back into a deep sleep after the overwhelming stimulation, distantly feeling Max's lips press a goodnight kiss to your tear stained cheeks. And when you awoke in the morning, you almost thought you'd imagined up the whole thing, a particularly naughty wet dream, but when you found that your panties were missing underneath your cute pajama shorts you knew there was only one person who would have taken them with him.

You didn’t even get a chance to confront him because you find out the very same day that Max had gotten his lawyer to cancel your Alpine contract and have Redbull send you a new one, complete with a generous signing bonus that anyone would be a fool to refuse. With your family watching you expectantly, you knew it would be too hard to explain your way out of this. So you reluctantly signed the 1 year contract, telling yourself it was only a temporary problem, that you would surely be hiding out the back of the garage and in the workshops, well away from your childhood bully.

That’s all Max needed to get you alone, to start his corruption of you, his favourite Leclerc sibling. Right from your first day, he’d welcomed you with a firm hug, his swollen biceps pressing you against his broad chest, squeezing your plump ass and making you squeal - but striding off before you could say anything. Or coming up behind you when you were bent over, tinkering on something, and making sure you could feel his impressive semi against your covered slit. You'd always desperately try to move away, anxious someone would see - but you stood no chance against the adult Max's strength when he tightened his grip around your thick hips and grinded himself on your jiggling ass.

He still teased you, sure, but now it came off as harmless flirting, steeped into your childhood friendship. And conflicting feelings swirled in your chest when you saw the lucky ribbon you’d gifting him as a kid somehow still tied to his seat, an ever present good luck charm. Everyone else would smile at you two encouragingly, saying you looked so sweet together, where you secretly a couple? No one seemed to share your nervousness around Redbull's champion driver, or pick up on the undertone of darkness in his intense gaze when he looked at you.

Soon he has you travelling exclusively with him, staying in all the same hotels, under the guise of being his personal mechanic for any last minute corrections. Charles loved it, saying this way Max could always keep a close eye on you when you were away from home. If only your overprotective brother knew he was sending his little sister right into the den of the lion. And the so called Dutch Lion was no longer holding himself back from taking your sweet innocence all for himself.

You'd always belonged to him, after all.

It first started when he’d gotten absolutely furious seeing you at a race afterparty in Miami, giggling cutely in a pretty minidress with an engineer you’d started to flirt with at work. Max had all but dragged you to his private booth, tossing you over his strong shoulder when you tried to stand your ground and stand firmly in your strappy high heels. He kicked all the models and B list celebrities trying to leech out of the dimly lit room, pushing your head down till you were staring up at him, your pretty face bathed in the red neon lights as you anxiously bite your glossed lip.

If you wanted to get fucked so bad, he growled deeply, unbuckling his belt and making your eyes go wide with fear as the biggest cock you’d ever seen emerges, you can just beg for it nicely like the good little slut you are, hmm? You’re sniffling, tears emerging in your wide doe eyes as you beg him please Maxie, please don't do this, I promise I’ll stop-

But he doesn’t listen to one pleading word, his twisted mind obsessed with one thing and one thing only - making the pure Leclerc sweetheart gag and choke on his mean cock. You knew better than to get in the way of what Max wanted, because he always ended up getting it. Instead you let your mind go blank, letting the guilty pleasure cloud your senses to ignore the reality of how mean Max was being, your pliant mouth dropping open as you let him ruin your throat. There isn’t a glimmer of his childhood sweetness in his dark, icy blue eyes as he memorizes the hypnotising sight of your chubby cheeks slurping at raging erection, the tears falling down your face at performing your first blowjob on your knees at a nightclub just making him impossibly harder. He groans as your sweet mouth slurps on his warm length, continuing to whisper his filthy promises to punish you and slipping into dutch as he climaxed. Fuck, fuck, erg lekker, so fucking good- He made sure your crying cheeks was pressed right into his tense abs when he finally emptied his load inside you, panting heavily from how good your heavenly tongue felt. He didn’t move until you followed his instructions and tried to swallow every drop. Your inexperienced mouth struggled, half of his sticky cum leaking out the corners of your mouth. He tutted mockingly, smearing his release all over your swollen lips with his thumb and saying he’d have to give your throat so much more training so it knew how to suck a cock, hmm?

Your cheeks burned with humiliation at failing to please him properly, even though he was practically forcing you to deepthroat him. The next day, when you woke up with no voice, you’d had to pretend you had a cold when seeing Cha for brunch the next morning.

And when he’d have a bad qualifying, he’d easily swipe his way into your hotel room two doors down from his. He often finds you in a cute silky babydoll, getting ready to sleep after a long day in the garage but making sure to dress prettily because you never know when Max is in a bad mood and wants to take it out on you. You had one more job to do, and that’s to make up for whatever mistake you must have made with the car and fucked up his hot lap, Max would argue. An angry Max always scared you so you would sweetly beg for his forgiveness, even for a mistake you would never have made on the car, letting him abuse your petite frame to vent his frustrations.

Tonight, he wanted to play with your breasts, sliding the silky straps off your nightie off your shoulders to hungrily eye your curves, tanned nipples quickly tightening from the chill. Can’t get enough of these pretty fucking tits, he said as he sloppily fucked them while you obediently kneeled in between his spread legs. You’re squeezing your plush chest together to cushion his raging erection, his angry red tip making you squeal when he growls and splatters cum all over your deliciously tanned skin. Knowing he’d get mad if you don’t let him mark his territory, you rub the sticky cream all over your hardened nipples and large breasts before you clean up his drooling cockhead with your mouth. He cooes his praises at you, telling you see, you’re perfect at this, maybe he’ll have you promoted from engineer to his personal cocksleeve to relieve his stress, hmm?

You feel so dirty at the wetness gushing between your legs at his filthy words, biting your lip at the thought of Max fucking you in his driver’s room while your brothers stood just a garage over in Ferrari. But despite his constant teasing, he knew to never cross the line fully and actually fuck you. That would scare you away, make you too anxious, and although he played rough and mean when he'd been younger, he now had the patience to wait and leave you wanting more, so that you'd be the one to come to him. So he edged you constantly, working you up only to pull away just as you almost climaxed, his name on your tongue like a prayer. Or pulling you into sleep against his bare muscled chest, so that you'd feel his morning wood against your soaked panties but be unable to do anything except dry hump him.

And his plan worked because after only a few months, your once pure and innocent mind has become utterly ruined for Max’s attention. The Dutch Lion has convinced you that you’re meant to be his plaything, and you can’t find it within you to try and deny him any longer. Would it truly be so wrong to give in to the naughty desires you’d been having about your childhood sweetheart, your school bully, your brother’s rival on track but friend that had been trusted to keep his little sister safe? When you’d grown too desperate to satisfy yourself by grinding on your pillow or your tiny fingers, you’d decided to entice Max even more in the hopes that he’d properly take your innocence.

You’d certainly caught the Dutchman’s eye, as well as many other hungry gazes, when you started arriving on the paddock in cute heels and floral minidresses. And of course, your generous cleavage was out on full display in sweetheart necklines, instead of conservatively hidden in an oversized Redbull shirt. You’d made sure to have your lanyard tucked right in between your bouncing tits too, the label of Max Verstappen’s Enineering Team dangling and drawing attention with each bounce of your tits when you walked. Because you knew your Maxie just as well as he knew you, after all - and he was a intensely competitive and jealous man. You hadn’t even had to wait till the debrief as he’d hightailed it right out of the meeting room, taking you to his motor home through a back passage.

You still play the clueless little virgin, adamant on trying to resist him even though you're secretly finding it just as dirty and hot as Max does when he shoves you against the door, locking it firmly. Fuck, your body drives me wild, it’s all your fault that I’m getting distracted like this. How can you be such a naive virgin but walk around with the body of a slut just begging to get fucked, huh?

You frantically shake your head, trying to plead your innocence but he doesn’t hear your words, instead grabbing a hold of your miniskirt and asking if you understood girls with thick asses like you shouldn’t be showing them off unless you wanted attention, yeah? You started crying easily, already finding your thoughts going fuzzy as you slipped into submission, craving the way he’d degrade you for his own pleasure.

He’d have to punish you for distracting him, he said, even though he’d won P1 it had been torture seeing your fat ass bending over when you dropped your phone in front of him. You were lucky no one else had seen your cotton panties or he’d have to fucking kill them.

His possessive words make you shiver, doe brown eyes staring up at him expectantly and waiting for his orders. He swears at your obedient expression and guides your hand to his sizeable bulge, making you squeal, hoping it sounds like fright and not eagerness. He rubs your tiny palm across his pants, demanding to know just how the hell he was meant to focus with a hard on the whole race?

When you can’t answer him properly he smirks and tells you that you’ll just have to take your punishment like a good girl, then. Within seconds he has you lying across his lap, your miniskirt up around your hips and white cotton panties pulled down to snugly trap your thick thighs together. And then he’s spanking you with his large hands, telling you to count and meanly restarting each time you lost track when he hits extra hard to watch your ass bounce. By the time he’s finally content your cheeks are red and burning, and you’ve left drool all over his sofa from your desperate efforts to muffle your wails.

You like that, don’t you bunny? He asks meanly. You start sniffling again at his mean words, cheeks burning with humiliation because it had felt soooo good but you felt so naughty for enjoying it. You'd die if he found out. So instead you tell him he was being so mean, Maxie, couldn’t he just be nice to you like when he’d been younger?

Your eyes widen as you blurt the words out instinctively, making Max’s expression grow stormy at your bratty reply. Ripping your panties off entirely, he stuffs them into his pocket and tells you to explain why you’re fucking dripping all over me then, hmm? - running his thick fingers along your dripping cunny and smirking at the long strands of sticky wetness that connect to his fingers when he pulls away. When you don’t respond, too embarrassed by how your body has given you away, he slides the fingers into your closed mouth despite your attempts to turn your head. He makes you lick him clean, tasting yourself on him, murmuring if you were a good slut and spread your legs for him he might consider eating you out.

The ache between your thighs is almost as painful as your tender ass now, and your virgin cunny tingles from the idea of Max kissing you down there. Even though he’s being so mean, you can’t help but sit down willingly against the sofa arm and slowly part your thick thighs, blushing all the while as he examines you intently. You whine when his hungry gaze continues to linger, but he doesn’t stop, even taking out his phone to snap photos of your pussy after holding your thighs open to stop you frantically closing them when you see what he’s doing. It’s so cute and wet he murmurs distractedly, looking entranced as he slowly sinks a single thick finger in and finds it completely sucked in by your tight, drooling pussy. Really, you’ve never let any boy except for me touch you here, not even with his fingers? At the shake of your head and shy murmur of no, just my own, I promise, Maxie he breaks into an evil, satisfied grin. So this little hole is really all mine to claim, huh?

It turns out going down on you was really more of a punishment than a pleasure because he makes you cum multiple times with his skilled tongue. You’re begging him to stop, feeling overstimulated and completely wrecked, mascara stained tears running over your chubby cheeks. When he finally eases his sadistic torture after teasing flicks of his broad tongue have you squirting a third time, you’re too fucked out to protest him separating your puffy cunny lips and spitting onto it, as if it belonged to him. Bunny, if your brothers knew the kind of things I was doing to their precious baby sister, Max says, chuckling darkly. They’d want to slam me straight into the nearest barricade and have my head on a spike.

But your brothers remain as oblivious to your corruption as ever, with an endless supply of work excuses easily being used by Max and now you, as you started to fully give in and enjoy the intense pleasure being his personal fucktoy brought you. He’d taken your sweet virginity on a hot night in Singapore after beating Charles to P1, telling you that the best reward wasn’t the trophy but knowing he got to cum raw inside your untouched cunny. After plying you with champagne at the yacht afterparty, he'd taken you back and fucked you on the French chaise, not even making it to the bed. He’d been gentle the first time, huskily whispering praises in your ears as you desperately tried to adjust to the size, his cock so much larger than his fingers. He licked away the tears at the corner of your eyes as you bite his shoulder, lost in the waves of pleasure as you ride out your orgasm.

When he finally carries you over to the bed, climbing over your satisfied figure, you’re fooled into thinking he’s going to cuddle you. He’s turning you onto your front and you’re expecting to feel him behind you, bringing you into him as his little spoon like he does ever night. But your sleepy eyes go wide open when your thick hips are suddenly pulled up into the air, and your flushed face pressed down firmly into the sheets. And then he huskily whispers it’s time to fuck you properly, be a good bunny for me and take it, okay?

You wailed into the cushions, your open mouth leaving drool all over the pillowcases, as his cock bullies your tight cunny over and over. He reaches around to toy with your sensitive clit, smirking when your crying turned into confused moans of pleasure as the pressure in your pussy starts to feel so good. Soon he’s slamming his hard length into your twitching figure, slapping your red plump ass repeatedly and telling you how funny it’d be if Charlie found out his rival had claimed your virginity, hmm? Should he tell him next time the Ferrari driver tried to one up him on the track? You sob, begging him not to tell your protective brother, shaking your ass onto him and telling him he could even cum inside if he wanted instead of telling your brother. Max groans at your gullibility. Silly girl, he croons as he bends down to whisper in your ear, his muscled abs pressing down on you. I was always going to do that anyways, hmm? This ass belongs to me.

And then he’s moaning into your drooling mouth as his hips still above yours, draining his heavy balls into your pussy that had already been stuffed full of his thick, creamy load from the first round. Rivulets of your mixed juices run down the inside of your thighs, overflowing from the sheer amount of cum he’s pumped you full of. You know better than to ask him to wear a condom, instead praying that it was the wrong time of the month to get knocked up. Especially when he doesn’t let you get up and try to pee it out, instead murmuring he’s just going to stuff a couple of fingers inside and make sure you don’t waste anymore, okay? You try to resist, crawling away and wanting to save your poor, overstimulated clit but once again Max easily holds you still. Hmm, guess I’ll just have to teach you a lesson and use my cock to plug you up, he threatens meanly, making tears fall down your face again and his dick twitches with interest. Every man had his pleasures, and world champion Max Verstappen’s was to see the Leclerc baby sister crying and begging for him. Sick bastard, you think distantly through a pleasurable haze as he sinks back inside your gummy walls and makes you keep his cock warm.

Your secret affair with the Dutch Lion continues easily throughout the year. And at the end of your contract, at the yearly FIA prizegiving, you attend with Charles instead of with the Redbull team, dutifully doing your part as the Leclerc sister now that your term at a rival garage was done. At one point you get up from dinner, saying you had to find the bathroom, but end up gone for 20 minutes, missing Cha being awarded overtake of the year for when his Ferrari had divebombed the leading Redbull. Later, when everyone is mingling, Charles walks over to Max’s table, shaking his hand and taking a seat to reminisce about the season. They’d come so far together from their childhood karting days, wasn’t it heartwarming now that they stood together on the F1 stage?

The two men laugh, catching up on missed updates during the busy end of season. Soon they’re talking about their love lives, Max congratulating Cha on his relationship he’s recently made public. The Ferrari driver warmly returns the compliment, saying whoever the Redbull driver was seeing recently must be treating him well because he’s never seen Max so relaxed before. He’s seen the gossip magazines speculate who the silhouette of a mystery girl seen making out on Max’s lap in a paparrazi shot through his car window. Max slyly commented that it was good the camera hadn’t been able to go lower, because then they’d have seen that she’d actually been bouncing on my dick underneath her skirt. Charles laughs at Max’s deviousness, patting him on the back for being such a shameless fucker.

Charles had forgotten to go find the youngest Leclerc, which was just as well because he would never have been able to guess where you had been hiding. You’re diligently on your knees, drooling on Max’s cock underneath the tablecloth, safely tucked in close between his spread legs. Your brother is completely unaware that the girl he and Max are joking about is his innocent baby sister, who’s currently worshipping his rival’s thick length eagerly. Paying the price for her brother’s overtake on the track with her glossy pink lips, just as Max had ordered you too when he found out what award his rival was getting tonight.

As the night continues, all formality lost as the party goers make use of the open bar, it was all to easy for the blonde Dutchman to make you follow him to the private bathroom. It’s so degrading, so mean of Max to do this, to have you on the dirty bathroom floor with your pretty curls unpinned from the classy updo you’d spend ages styling. Your expensive red silk dress hangs off your hips and exposes your bare, bouncing tits to his hungry gaze. So slutty, no bra and all, hmm? You wanted me to fuck you tonight, didn’t you? Answer me! He slaps his hard length repeatedly against your chubby cheeks, spraying precum everywhere and making your perfect makeup run.

Soon mascara stained tears are dripping down your face as Max makes you finish sloppily sucking him off, his phone camera on you and recording every single filthy sound that fills the air. It’s obscene, the way his huge cock stretches your small plush lips open all the way and your eyes roll to the back of your head every time his tip grazes the back of your throat. Hmm, so eager to drink my cum, aren’t you? He coos, and you nod dazedly, your doe eyes glassy. Fuck, you’re such a good little slut, letting me do whatever I want you to your body. My own personal fucktoy. Bet you’d even let me piss down your throat if I wanted, huh?

You gag at this, trying to shake your head but finding it impossible with the strong grip he has on your hair. Max chuckles at your panicked expression, reassuring you not to worry, he wasn’t that mean. You don’t believe him, because later he bends you over the bathroom counter and makes you look in the mirror to see where his leaking cock repeatedly sinks in to the hilt, stretching your cunny out yet again, filling it with his thick seed. You text Cha some excuse about feeling unwell and leaving early as Max buckles you into his passenger seat, knowing there was no way you could explain your absolutely wrecked appearance to your brother afterwards.

You’ve realized that the legal end of your Redbull contract really had no say on anything. Because at the end of the day the only thing that mattered was what Max wanted - and he wanted you to stay by his side, forever. So you let him take your hand in his a few months later at Lorenzo’s wedding, revealing the secret relationship to your family. Your mother is overjoyed, telling you both that you always had her blessing, ever since you’d been kids. Your brothers take a lot more convincing, of course, as well as Max swearing privately to Cha that you certainly hadn’t been the girl from the paparazzi car incident, he’d never treat the Leclerc princess like that of course! He was a playboy before, sure, but for you he was willing to stop all that and commit.

Charles gives you two his begrudging yes, seeing how attentive Max was with you, always intently watching you whenever you entered the same room as him and always knowing where you were if you walked away. And the way you’d look up adoringly at the blonde, desire and love clear in your doe eyes. Soon you’ve accepted Max’s offer to move into his penthouse, unpacking all the lingerie and diamond necklace sets he’s been buying you for months. And when he comes home at the end of a tiring day, sighing and settling on the living room couch, you now know to anticipate Max’s needs before he has to tell you. You crawl over to him, wearing skimpy lingerie in his favourite colour, nuzzling your face into his clothed thigh and asking please Maxie, could you please suck him off, your mouth felt empty without him?

He places a loving kiss to your forehead and unbuckles his belt for you, cooing praises at what a good little pet you were being for him. This time, when he cums, you have no issue greedily swallowing every single drop of his hot, sticky cum, licking your well trained lips. So yummy, Maxie…Would you like my pussy or my ass next?

He smirks down at your slutty words, a dazed expression on your face, dumbly ready to please him however he liked, whenever he was in the mood, wherever he wants it. Nothing quite beats having his own personal toy, even if it’s taken some time to break you in. Doesn’t matter now, though, because it has been worth it. Because you’ll never leave his side again, completely devoted to him, the concept of being with any other man ruined for you.

Time for him to make good on his childhood promise, Max thinks. Make you his vrouw, his wife, once and for all.

[amalasdraws]

https://www.tumblr.com/bigmammallama5/732632789726478336?source=share do you have any tips on how to detect ai and deepfakes?

Good question and I'm gonna be honest, it's not always easy and it will only get harder and harder. I'm just an artist who has spent their personal time to dive into this topic and study images. I'm still learning and there is a lot I don't know. But let me show what I know. This will be long, but I will make a summary at the end! So far, even with ai having become better and better there are still almost always some things wrong with an image, and they all have a very specific look to them. So let me try to show you some and point out some of them.

As we all know, a biggest struggle ai had were hands. And even though here and there we still see messed up hands, I say "had", because the hands is actual a good example on how ai is improving and will only get better. Still, looking at pictures that show more hands is always worth it, because somewhere in the back there will be most likely at least one messed up hand.

Another issue a lot of ai still has is hair though!

It's very obvious still in many ai "drawings" and in those otherwise well rendered portraits. Hair starts to blend with the ears a lot, or with the clothes.

There is also often this very odd look between something too sharp and way too blurry

There is often a very specific texture to the hair. I actually do not know the artistic or specific name for it. I can only describe it as this weird sharp feeling that makes it look oddly pixely, and then you have areas where it's very blurry. And the kind of loops and almost flame like looking hair we see in the last pic out of the three here is also something very common with ai.

As an artist I know we make mistakes too! The way I draw hair is flawed too! But it's not only that it's flawed here, but it's following always the same pattern and falls into the same issues over and over again, no matter who is "creating" the image. Those flame like loops are a common one, next to the odd blends and weird sharp and blurry textures.

But ai is getting better, and we not only have "art" and something that tries to be a drawing/painting, but photos too.

A lot of those "photos" have a very specific texture and look to them! Again, it's not always the mistakes, but the very specific optic too. A lot of the images are oddly smooth, too rendered, with always blurry backgrounds. And when you look closer at the background you will see the mistakes! The crowd behind Jesus is a hot mess once you look closer. Bob Marley's hair has the same issue than I described before. Lincoln is surrounded by people with messed up hands and don't even get me started on the faces behind Caesar.

So a lot of ai images look alright on a first and quick glance, but as more time you spend with them, as more mistakes you will notice. The wehre is Waldo of ai horror.

And those "photos" shared here are still very obvious. Not just the mistakes and messed up details but the very specific aesthetic too.

Those images get better and better and as less details you have, as less mistakes you have!

With photos like this it becomes harder and harder. There are not many details and no hands. Not many mistakes can be made. Also the very obvious plastic looking smoothness isn't so much here anymore. It kinda still is...but differently. And always the blurry background!! Sometimes the hair is still a giveaway. Collars and clothe straps are also often still a giveaway upon close look. As is jewelry. Earrings will be different and necklaces often don't go all the way around, just end, or blend with the hair or clothes.

Often details on jewelry is also blurry and not shown properly. This is a trick with many details. With jewelry, batches, hair, ears, text. So it's often blurred out and not shown properly because ai doesn't know what to really show here.

It's often really just the small details and when we scroll down quickly we will miss them. Like the wedding ring on the middle finger, the pens on top of a closed pocket, the batches that are always blurry, messed up faces that blend with a blurry background.

And sometimes it's so subtle that I could only really tell that right is the ai image in comparison to the real photo on the left. The real photo shows hands clearly and even when things are blurred out it doesn't feel that it's done to hide things. The ai image on the right hides the hands. There is also a very dead look in the eyes :D

And here I could only tell because the text in the back doesn't make sense. Even blurred out we should be able to make out something here

And after seeing a lot of ai images I recognize the kind of blurred out bg in combination with a very smooth and well rendered foreground/characters.

And here the only giveaway is a closer look at the backgrounds as well

To summarize it:

Ai and fake news rely on a fast living world. We are being bombarded with tons of information and messages daily and we scroll past quickly. But the best tool, for now, in detecting ai is taking our time! Those images get better and better but so far there are still always some things off!! Especially in the background!

Hair. Often weirdly smoothed out and oddly sharp at the same time

Hair often blends with the ears or the clothes

Details are blurred out.

Jewelry doesn't match (example earrings). Details on metal often blurred out and never shown. Necklaces blend with hair or the clothes, and don't go around the neck.

Background is always blurred out.

In this blurred mess there are often hidden very messed up faces and/or hands.

A very specific smooth and yet too sharp/too rendered aesthetic combines with an always blurry bg.

Text, especialyl in the background, is not legible and doesn't make sense.

Backgrounds are often (so far) the dead giveaway. Somewhere in the back things become muddled and messed up. This shows also very well in ai decor/architecture. There will be odd lines that don't align or align too well. Curtain poles that end in the furniture, a plant that is behind a lamp suddenly having leaves in front of the lamp. As longer you look as more you will notice.

Conclusion:

Take your time with images! Sit with them! Especially when it's framed as important and political news. Is it ai and propaganda, or did it really happen? Don't fall for the quick buzz and outrage! Some things are obvious right away but with others you have to take your time. And it's time you have! If you are still unsure if a pic is real or not, do some research on top. Image reverse search. Can you find it anywhere else? Are other news outlets sharing it? Does the image/message make sense? For example there is now a deepfake of Bella Hadid voicing support for Israel. Ask yourself, does this make sense? If it feels out of line compared to previous behavior, do some research! Media literacy is not just as being able to recognize a fake or real right away, but being able to do research. To question things! Don't just take every post online for face value. Even when shared by a mutual you trust. They might have been tricked!

There are so many information online and it's great to have access to so information, but it's also difficult to wade through all of it. Media and truth are a weapon and it's being twisted and bend used to manipulate. Always has! But ai and so many people being able to post and share things, it becomes bigger and bigger and more dangerous. So don't just take everything that is handed to you and share it further no questions asked. Media literacy and being able to think for ourselves and do the research is important!! And as research becomes harder and harder, as sources are being messed up with ai and other fake news, it's even more important to sit with the images and study them. See the flaws, the mistakes. Compare it to other news and images.

This got long, and I started to ramble at the end. Sorry But I hope this helped

[mandalhoerian]

Fish in a Birdcage ৎ୭

ৎ୭ ⸻ rafayel has quite the storm raging in his mind during his artistic expedition to aridum. which, the root of his crisis he was trying to wean himself off of wasn't supposed to tag along to make him spiral further. funny thing is, you just think he's sick. he is. just infected by something far worse than you can imagine: crippling dependency.

ৎ୭ ⸻ SO MUCH BUILD-UP, momentary sickfic, anxious attachment issues, rafayel being hot and cold with the reader, angst, exhibitionism for like 0.01 seconds bc of bond shenanigans, switch4switch and constantly changing dynamics that comes with it, handjob, slight obedience kink, impromptu bondage play with rafayel's neck piece praise kink, obedience kink blink and you miss it, p in v, CLOTHED SEX ITS SO HOT 2 ME, unprotected sex, multiple rounds.

ৎ୭ ⸻ hello lads fandom, FIRST WORK HERE (it sucked my soul out i've been working on this for like tHREE weeks)!!! this is my adaptation of rafayel's nightly rendezvous card intertidal zone. a lot of it is based on my reading and understanding of the card, i'm so sorry for releasing this when caleb just released but, i hope you enjoy, much love <3 ( lil tag: @comatosebunny09 )

ৎ୭ ⸻ 26K, read on ao3

In retrospect, finding out Aridum was a city in the middle of a desert should have made you stop and think more about how the climate would actually affect Rafayel before diving straight into travel plans.

You know, a Lemurian.

Who, logically, wouldn’t fare well in the dry heat.

Rafayel flicking off your genuine concern like it was a bug on the surface tension of his fish tank was the first red flag you should have paid more attention to. In your defense, since he’d been there before and was confident enough to initiate banter, it was easy to give in and trust he knew what he was doing as he batted his lashes at you with those pretty dual-colored, sparkly wide eyes that left you starstruck in the face and said, “As long as I’m with you, I’ll be fine.”

Well. He was with you now and he wasn’t fine.

Because for once in his life, Rafayel didn’t have enough energy to run laps around you. Just a few minutes outside the hotel, lingering near the grand fountain square framed by towering palm trees that offered scant shade, and he began to deflate pitifully like a garish balloon leaking its vigor into the sweltering air. His usual dynamism, the kind that pulled attention to him as effortlessly as a river carved its path, had dimmed to a sluggish ebb, so much so you found yourself glancing over your shoulder every ten seconds, vigilance heightened by the unsettling absence of his ever-present current. The languid pace like he was moving through molasses made him look like an entirely different person than the one tugging you through the airport with even the luggage excitedly rolling behind him.

And it had been just a single day since you’d set foot in Aridum.

That wasn’t to say the trip had been a disaster or he was in terrible shape — you two were still on day one. Back in Linkon, he was, on paper, enthusiastic about pointing out local landmarks for you to go together like he knew the city personally, but he had quickly lost that energy when it actually came to the execution. You chalked it up to him not being able to get any sleep the previous night because of a mix of jetlag and the discomfort of a new bed, but regardless, it was still concerning to watch him only interested in stopping by street stands where he could buy himself cold water bottles and stand in a shaded corner in order to drink them slowly under shelter, while also dragging you with him, so there wouldn't be even a split-second distance between you two.

You were thankful you didn't have many plans in mind. Rafayel always packed enough enthusiasm for the both of you, but now, as you watched with wide-eyed worry how his spark had suddenly wilted, the drastic shift in his personality left him finding everything he suggested doing utterly unnecessary for the day. On top of that, after only managing to sit still for five minutes or so, it'd become obvious to see that the environment of this city, complete with a sun beating down hot enough to cook you alive, had taken a toll on Rafayel's temperament far more drastically than expected — rendering his eagerness completely sour.

But still, you wanted to cheer him up, you did. It broke your heart seeing someone who brought so much life into every room shrivel down to such a defeated shell. Maybe that's why you couldn't help yourself when you caught him pouting at something on the phone screen as if it'd done him a great offense.

So, you began teasing. “Rafayel, we haven’t even been out for thirty minutes, you're sweating already?"

“No, I’m not.”

“Yes, you are,” you countered, only to squint at his face more closely. “Wait. You’re not?”

He threw his arms out like he was expecting a grander reaction. “Do you know what that means?”

“That you’re a human raisin in the making?”

He groaned, a sound that was more theatrical than pained, but you still caught the edge of frustration in it. “It means I’m seconds away from crumbling into sand. You’ll have to gather me up and carry me home in a jar.”

You started walking towards one of the fountains near some empty seats where shade was available, while he dragged himself behind you like a zombie. "Let's sit you down before you begin to form cracks."

The fountain’s spray misted faintly in the air, enough to make the stone bench beneath feel less like a skillet. Rafayel took extra care positioning himself on one of the seats before collapsing backward, draping one arm over his flushed face.

He took the bottle of yet another ice cold water you fished out from your bag without protest, but his free hand found your wrist and lingered there — light at first, then tighter, like he needed to anchor himself. The unexpected heat radiating from his skin sent a little jolt up your arm. You were about to comment on it, but then he tipped the bottle back and drank, and you swore you could feel the tension in his throat as if it was your own.

When he finished, he let out a breath — not a sigh, just an exhale that sounded heavy, deliberate, sprawling beside you, one leg stretched out, the other bouncing restlessly as he tilted his head back and squinted at the cloudless sky.

“I think I’m dying,” he announced, as if that wasn’t thr fourth time he’d said it today.

After your attention was made aware that he indeed wasn’t sweating by the dry hairline of his, though, the mood to banter had dissipated like a mirage. You began fussing. Was it normal that he didn’t sweat? If a normal person was like this, they needed to be taken to the hospital. However, Rafayel had done nothing but up the ante in complaining, that had to indicate nothing was seriously wrong, right? He’d know his body the best. Right?

“I told you to put on sunscreen this morning. Did you?”

He scoffed, “I don’t need it,” — and you heard the imaginary Lemurian in his tone rolling his eyes at your human expectations.

“Not with that attitude,” you shut him down, already skimming through your bag at an increasingly faster pace. “Now, keep still.”

Finding what you were looking for, you uncapped the bottle, reaching out with one hand to tilt Rafayel’s head left and right to gauge where to start. His skin under the pads of your fingertips felt almost brittle and paper-thin — unnatural on Rafayel, making you unconsciously rub like it was a stain you could get rid of. Without meaning to, you frowned, and he made a soft, lukewarm grumble, nudging your leg with his foot, reminding you what you were doing. Which was fussing over a grown man who should have been responsible from the start and able to take care of himself.

“Show me your forehead,” you said, wanting to get it out the way first.

He obediently carded his bangs back, silent, half-hooded eyes flicking everywhere on your face going ignored as you rubbed sunscreen in and felt what alarmingly was similar to a fever. It was a relief to hear him humming at the feeling, you hoped it would help as you quickly moved to spread the white lotion over his cheeks and smeared a stripe right across the bridge of his nose as he fixed his hair, squinting at your ministrations.

Though, somehow, he looked contented enough that you had to stop him from nuzzling into your hand. “Rafayel, I’m working here.”

All you got was a breathy, “Mmm,” as if he was speaking through the pleasant haze of sleep.

How contradictory of him, as always. For someone constantly grumbling about the unbearable heat, he leaned into every touch with a docility that defied reason — and worse, he initiated them, either molding against you like water taking the shape of the container it was poured into, or his fingers ghosting over your skin as though drawn by instinct. You couldn’t make sense of it. The mere thought of physical contact when the air was this heavy and oppressive made your skin crawl, but he seemed to revel in it. No, thrived on it.

It wasn’t just the way he didn’t flinch — he leaned in harder, his breaths hitching faintly, brow furrowed like he was wrestling with a need he barely understood. You’d swear the heat radiating from your skin would only make it worse, yet he tilted his face into your touch as though your thumbs brushing his cheekbones offered a balm, a strange, cooling relief.

Maybe, he perceived your skin to be indeed cooler than his.

It had to be something unique to his Lemurian physiology. His reactions didn’t make sense otherwise. What human would ever enjoy the sensation of warmth pressed against warmth in such sweltering conditions? And yet here he was, biting back what suspiciously sounded like a placid sigh, while you struggled to reconcile the peculiar contradiction.

“C’mon, don’t let me do all the work,” you muttered, quieter than you intended, the heat and the moment distracting you entirely.

You must have sounded a tad bit worried, because Rafayel didn’t react with his usual playful defiance or the melodramatic sulking he resorted to when things didn’t go his way. Instead, he fell silent, sinking more fully against your side as though he belonged there, and successfully narrowed the angle you were working with. His head tilted slightly, guiding your hand to the sharp line of his jaw with an unspoken invitation, eyelashes fluttering as he blinked, the haze of his voice turning soft and almost vulnerable. You couldn’t even see his face properly from looking at the top of the purple mop of hair blocking you.

"Do my neck too?"

Before you could decide, his hand encircled your wrist. Not tightly — not forcefully — but with a loose, guiding pressure that was maddeningly deliberate. He led your lotion-slicked hand to curve around his throat, the smooth, simmering heat of his skin pressing against your palm.

You hesitated, the instinct to pull away warring with the strange tension settling between you both, but his thumb found the delicate underside of your wrist and began tracing slow, thoughtful patterns that seemed designed to leave you paralyzed. You knew damn well how tenderly and skillfully he handled paintbrushes, and it was evident by the practiced precision of each touch that he was using the same sensibility on you, whether he was fully aware of it or not, which sent a warm burst of blood rising to your cheeks.

Seeming restless, Rafayel sat up straight and finally allowed you a clear view of him. His head tipped further back, exposing more of his neck to your hand, eyes darkened into to a shade of purple that seemed otherworldly in the harsh light of day. They glittered like faceted amethysts film-burned blue around the edges, soaking in every sunlit fleck of your features with a focus that made your chest tighten, like you were being studied with the assessment of the artist Rafayel before another’s painting, his focus unbroken save for the low hum he let slip, soft and unguarded.

You swallowed hard, aware of how exposed you were. The bustling world of Aridum hadn’t stopped turning just because the two of you had stumbled into whatever this was. A bead of sweat rolled down the back of your neck, but it wasn’t just the desert heat making you feel like you were suffocating.

This shouldn’t have been happening. Not here, not now.

Your breath shuddered as you finally regained enough sense to break the silence. "Do it yourself," you murmured, voice uneven as you pressed the bottle of sunscreen into his chest. You looked away, clumsily rubbing your hands on your arms to mask the way they trembled, pretending to rid yourself of excess lotion while wishing desperately to erase the heat radiating off your skin.

Rafayel sighed, a low sound of reluctant acceptance, as he pulled himself upright. His fingers glided over his neck, spreading the sunscreen where you hadn’t, his movements smooth and unaffected as he worked the lotion over his collarbones and along the nape of his neck. The sight was annoyingly graceful, as though he wasn’t feeling the same unbearable tension you were. If you’d have thought of bringing a small electric fan along today, it would have been inches from your face already.

"Maybe we should’ve gone out at night," you said abruptly, grasping for any lifeline to shift the moment’s focus. Your gaze darted to him as he worked, your cheeks burning hotter than the sunlight that baked the streets. "Now I feel bad."

"What for?"

"Making you come along. This must not be very inspiring.”

Rafayel let out an honest-to-goodness laugh. It rolled from his throat so easily and naturally that it seemed even he wasn’t aware of it until the sound tapered off into a quiet chuckle. Shaking his head, he leaned toward you until his temple rested lightly on your shoulder, his gaze unfocused as he stared absently at the fountain ahead. "I’m not giving up time with you just because the sun here wants me dead."

He completely bypassed the part about inspiration, but the sincerity in his words hit you like a splash of cool water on overheated skin. Your shoulders relaxed as you melted into a sigh, letting your head fall atop his, but the sticky warmth made the closeness unbearable almost instantly.

You promptly peeled yourself away with an, "Ugh.” He had already filled his making-you-feel-hot quota for the day, in every sense of the word.

Rafayel straightened just enough to meet your gaze, "That’s how you answer my heroic declaration?" he asked dryly, one brow arched in faux offense.

He didn’t budge, though, even though the heat seemed to bother him more than it did you. The stubborn set of his jaw spoke volumes, and it took a gentle nudge of your elbow to get him to finally sit upright. Even then, he let out a dramatic whine from deep in his chest as if being forced to separate was a personal betrayal.

"You’re lucky I’m rewarding it with mercy," you shot back, brushing a hand through your hair to vent your own rising frustration with the heat. "Come on, let’s head back. I need to get my fishie in the water before he dries up completely."

"But you wanted to see—"

"There’ll be plenty of opportunities in the future," you interrupted with a wave of your hand. "If anything, this was a good lesson about choosing the time we go out more carefully."

To your relief, Rafayel didn’t push back. He rose to his feet with you, though his sluggish movements and the slight downward pull of his lips suggested reluctance. As much as his leaning on you had been irritating in the heat, the sight of his faint frown made your chest tighten, and without thinking, you looped your arm through his and pulled him closer, even though the contact made your already overheated skin feel unbearable. His shoulders straightened slightly at the gesture, but the small crease between his brows didn’t disappear.

"I hear it’s seafood night at the hotel restaurant," you offered, attempting to lift his mood. He was obviously bummed out, but his stubbornness refused to show why outright. It was cute to a degree — childish almost, so endearing you couldn't find it in yourself to grow impatient with him. But you hated seeing him down. "If we head back now, we might snag a rooftop table.”

"Snag? Puh-lease. Worst case scenario, one glimpse of me and I could get us prime seating any time, anywhere," Rafayel scoffed. Still, the corner of his lip twitched upward as if tempted to smile, and you found yourself mirroring the reaction immediately. “And that whole thing would still be less bothersome than you assuming I haven’t secured us a reservation already.”

Later that evening, after dinner on the rooftop, the mix-up with the room service attendant delivering Rafayel’s envelope to your room turned out to be a convenient excuse to check on him. It had been hours since you insisted he take time to rest, and while he promised to settle in and let you know how he felt after freshening up, you hadn’t heard from him since.

You were greeted by the humidity hitting you in the face like a solid wall of rain when the door got opened though, instead of your boyfriend. Thick as fog like it had its own gravity.

Rafayel stood in the doorway, his hair dripping and clinging to his flushed skin in lazy dark purple rivulets, robe loose, the soft fabric blotched dark with water where droplets had slid from his neck and shoulders.

The room behind him radiated a different kind of heat — not the oppressive dryness of the desert, but the heavy, steamy warmth of someone trying to crawl their way back to comfort in the only way they knew how.

He looked better, at least.

The brittle edge that had been clinging to him seemed softened, as if he’d soaked away some of the tension in the beath he’d clearly stepped out of upon you knocking on his door.

Still, the sight of him — damp like a wet cat instead of a fish in his natural environment, robe-clad, the faint sheen of exhaustion still lingering in the way he leaned against the door frame left an odd twist in your chest.

He didn't look any worse for wear than he had earlier in the day when he’d claimed he wanted to spend the rest of his night marinating in ice cold water, and while seeing him not suffering was a relief, you clearly weren't expecting for him to actually mean what he said, even though the water obviously wasn’t ice cold.

The envelope, as it turned out, held a ticket to the memorial hall and an invitation to an art salon gathering hosted by one of his friends. Neither looked to be sparking any interest in Rafayel, however, despite him having come here for as much stimulation as possible for his inspiration.

You understood. It just wasn’t possible when he wasn’t feeling well.

The room itself was telling the entire story, in fact, chaotic in its stillness against the beauty of the floor-to ceiling windows framing the desert skyline in soft, shimmering lights of the city crowned by the full moon hanging proudly above. Papers were scattered across the floor in uneven piles, some curling slightly at the edges where they’d caught the artificial moisture in the air, blank and untouched, and some haphazardly sketched in a way you couldn't even begin to guess what they would become later. A few uncapped pens sat nearby, ink untouched, next to a can of soda that had long since gone warm. It wasn’t hard to guess what he’d been doing — or trying to do — in the hours since you’d left him.

So, you told him to stop forcing himself. Come enjoy the scenery with you.

It was your first instinct, but the words didn’t feel enough. You weren’t an artist, you didn’t know what would be good for the block he was going through. Even though your concern was genuine, you were clumsy at best at consolation.

But, he did lower himself onto the floor beside you anyway, his hands brushing against the scattered papers as he sat and leaned back on his palms. Like this, it was easy to imagine him search for his vision to come to him among the mess as he was attempting to draw, and end up with his gaze drifting out the window instead.

And then, as if he were a tide and the moonlight was pulling him inexorably to shore, he began to open up. Pushed by your mention of watching the view together, he spoke of sceneries. Of what traveling to discover secret corners of nature meant to him before everything changed — before he started creating. About how he used to just look at the world and feel it. Admire it. He didn’t need to do anything with it back then. A sunset was just a sunset, the sea was simply the sea, and neither asked anything of him but to exist alongside them.

Once he began to create, however...

Those discoveries done from a place of pure enjoyment became material, their beauty and pain turned into fuel. The act of looking became an act of taking. Of extracting. He started to see the world not as it was, but as something that could be stripped bare and transformed. A beautiful, bleeding wound. Every sunrise painted became a slice taken from the sun. Every ocean wave he put down on canvas was a handful of ocean lost. He couldn't experience sceneries for themselves anymore without having to to capture and translate them into a demand.

He didn’t look at you while he spoke, but the portrait of his honesty could be interpreted by even the most art-blind.

It was then that he dropped the bomb on you: “If one day, I become someone who only takes from you… If I were like that, would you leave me?”

That question dropped into the space between you like a stone in still water, sending ripples through everything you thought you understood about this moment.

But Rafayel was watching you in a way that made your pulse trip over itself, dissecting every flicker of your expression, like you were sitting in the middle of a high-stakes exam you hadn’t studied for. His fingers splayed on the ground besides yours were mere inches away, but even in that minimal distance, you sensed him drawing further back — a subconscious, reflexive reaction to fear, as if he needed to protect himself by retreating into some remote part of his mind, distant and closed off from the rest of him.

"Oh you silly fishie..." was your immediate response despite the whiplash he'd inflicted upon you, fondness rolling off your tongue easily, folding over itself into a dull ache for the struggle he was going through. "I won't leave you."

Your hand slid towards him, pinky finger crossing over until it brushed against his — gently, giving him ample chance to pull away before you covered his entire hand with your palm.

He was feverish again, despite all attempts made to soothe him, and the urge to smooth the pads of your fingers over his flushed skin, mapping each ridge and freckle that dotted his knuckles, surged forward within you. And you gave in, trying to make up for what you knew words would never be able to express, as you lightly rubbed lines onto the back of his hand.

It seemed to melt something in him, and he eased into your touch. It was an involuntary response to you reaching out for him — he tilted into you like he always did. It only lasted a second or two, however, before you felt him falter; like he noticed the instinctual motion midway, then consciously pushed down the reaction by gripping his thighs in an effort to sit back and avoid leaning in. Your heart dropped a little, confused, and you stole a peek at his face through the corner of your lashes to try to guess what he was thinking about.

What you saw only amplified how wrong everything felt. His features, which normally softened whenever you reached out for him, tightened, pensive. He frowned, holding back — hesitant about something, unreadable except for a subtle unease creeping in around the edges.

Even before he broke the silence, you had the awful premonition that his next words weren't going to be what you hoped to hear.

"Are you sure?" he asked, measured and quiet, and you knew you were right. This was trouble.

You squeezed his hand lightly despite wanting to do the very opposite, reassuringly, "Do you really think I’d stay even a second longer with someone I know is bad for me?"

He remained unresponsive.

“Rafayel?”

You made it about yourself, idiot, you realized.

Instead of acknowledging him and his cue for more reassurance and affirmation, you'd shifted the attention from him to trust in your decision making. You hadn't meant to, you hadn't done it deliberately — but...

Gosh, you were absolutely terrible at this.

So much so that Rafayel being the more emotionally in-tune of the two of you even in his vulnerable state was setting a humiliating new standard for how low you could go.

It was pathetic, really, how utterly you failed to pick up on what should have been an obvious cue. There wasn’t a shred of doubt in your mind that he’d taken your clumsy words as a glaring sign you found his struggles trivial, insignificant compared to your own convenience. All you’d managed to do was shove him deeper into the spiral of insecurities he was already battling.

This was supposed to help him clear his head. All it had achieved so far was adding onto his concerns.

Despite your determination to pour everything you had into assuaging the gnarled knot of his self-doubt, you were woefully unqualified for the task. Unmoored, you floundered blindly through half-finished thoughts, grasping for ways to communicate your feelings — gracelessly, imprecisely — all in hopes of soothing whatever ugly thoughts tangled around your boyfriend's brain like weeds choking the life from fertile soil.

Your stammering words stuck to the roof of your mouth like taffy, thick, unwilling to yield, and suddenly useless, coming out slow as you spoke. “What I mean by that is… My life has been consumed by you. In the best way possible. You made it ito a beautiful, chaotic mess bursting with life. I couldn’t possibly leave you.”

And he heard it — you felt it in the faint shuddering breath he drew as a silent response.

His thumb swiped over your pinky in absent response, stroking soothingly over the thin bones as he stared at your joined hands. His shoulders hadn't relaxed even marginally, but there was still an immeasurable kindness in the gesture.

“Besides, you’re not someone who takes. That’s not true at all. You’re just…”

He looked up then, turning his head to you, a doe-eyed, half-dazed blink breaking past the glassy stare he'd fixed on the empty space in front of him. His hand twitched underneath yours, flexing as he made a questioning noise, wordlessly urging you to elaborate as he invited comfort from your explanation. The way he tilted his head, the corners of his furrowed brows slightly angled upwards — the effect was childlike, innocent almost.

Receptive.

Breaking through your hesitation to touch him lest he shrink away again, you lifted both hands to cradle his cheeks gently, smoothing your thumbs across the high sweep of his cheekbones until his eyelids slid shut.

A soft sigh fell from his parted lips, his body pliant in your grasp as he melted under your fingertips, as if the gesture were more potent than any reassurance you might offer. The climbing tension within your ribcage dissolved with a single exhalation at the sight — helplessly endeared by his sheer willingless to submit to your awkward, inexpressive attempt at consoling. Subtle adoration burned quietly beneath each featherlight caress you placed along the slope of his nose or the soft patches underneath his eyes.

"You're just feeling a little anxious," you continued carefully, brushing a stray piece of damp hair away from his temple. It stuck stubbornly, refusing to let itself be tucked behind his ear before you tried again, gentler this time, hoping to soothe any lingering reservations you hadn't managed to wash away. “That’s probably why you’re overthinking things.”

In the brief silence that followed, anxiety bubbled low in your stomach once more, especially when he seemed to be focusing somewhere on your neck and ignoring looking you in the eye directly. It came as yet another whiplash and a sinking feeling simultaneously when he covered one of your hands with his, tilting his chin to plant a kiss into the centre of your palm as if making up for the withdrawal from earlier.

"What, were you playing tricks on me?" you murmured.

Shaking his head, "A token of my gratitude," he clarified. A gentle huff of laughter slipped past his lips, so faintly that you would've missed it had you not been staring at him with rapt attention in your bewilderment. "For you. Who accepted someone like me."

You frowned, eyebrows immediately drawing close. “Rafayel—”

He leaned in all of a sudden, one of his arms slid behind your back, while the other stretched across in front of you, caging you in with an unnerving ease. Both his hands rested flat against the floor now, framing you on either side like a living barricade. Your own left arm shot down to slap a palm down so you wouldn't topple over on your side. The droplets falling from his damp hair onto your neck was a sharp, sudden cold in comparison to the alarming heat radiating from his body, making you jolt in place as he loomed close enough for his breath to fan across your face.

"You're burning up again," you said weakly, trying and failing spectacularly to disguise your nervousness with indignance as his lips brushed softly against the apple of your cheek before ghosting lower, pausing just beneath your ear, testing for a reaction.

Meanwhile, him taking your hand that was balled up in a fist on the ground to slowly bring it towards his mouth left you frozen and dizzy from the contradictory sensations prickling under your skin.

Rafayel hummed against your wrist in response, dropping light kisses along the ridge of bone connecting your thumb to the rest of your fingers in the interim. It was impossible to ignore how every one of his touches ignited something different within you — the sensation of him painting the length of each finger with tender brushes of his lips and heated exhales sent pulses of liquid warmth flowing through your bloodstream.

The abrupt shift had left you uncertain about many things, chief among which being whether your previous efforts actually sank in at all or not.

Apparently they had.

The combined assault was distracting, but even amidst the whirlwind of thoughts vying for attention, you struggled to fully comprehend just how drastically the moment had veered off course — how your own worry-stricken attempt at appeasing him ended here instead, with your pulse hammering in your ears as he pressed even closer, draping his arm around your waist to turn you sideways until you were nearly sitting on his lap, faces inches apart.

A glimpse hope of maintaining control over the situation arrived in the form of a can toppling over during his handling of you, clattering on the hardwood flooring and startling you enough to snap free of the strange trance Rafayel had ensnared you in during his momentary lapse in focus.

Being so close gave you a good look at the change in him that manifested suddenly; his features visibly hardened as he turned his head at the disturbance, seemingly irritated to have been interrupted midway — a dark glint shone through his lashes before shifting over to you, misty, hazy, indescribable in its raw complexity.

His bathrobe hung loose, the neckline slouched further down one shoulder from having moved so much earlier, displaying more skin than was appropriate, and you weren’t sure if you were imagining the faintest hint of familiar coloration mottling his chest.

Which was dry.

Not only had his skin absorbed all the moisture that clung to it like a sponge after stepping out of the bathroom, there was no hint of perspiration whatsoever — not a bead of sweat lining the ridges of his collarbone or dampening the strands of hair stuck to his forehead.

As if responding to your inner thoughts, he lamented, "As you said, I'm anxious... Well, more like... Restless," before leaning in further to bury his face in the crook of your shoulder. "Ever since I arrived here, I feel..."

His arms encircled your waist, pulling you flush against the expanse of his chest and filling your nose with the scent of bodywash. It was no less than holding a solid block of heat capable of radiating more than enough warmth to replace an actual human furnace. The sheer amount of radiated temperature seemed ridiculous in such conditions, but the way he tried the loosen the already disheveled robe covering his other shoulder despite coiling around you, which had to be the source of the biggest discomfort concerning heat, was even more ridiculous. Shouldn’t he have let go of you before complaining?

"The air feels like it's burning, like there's not enough moisture anywhere. My heart's racing and I feel so miserable," he admitted quietly, muffled in the material of your shirt.

Yeah, you were taking him to a hospital.

This wasn't normal by any means, especially since you were now a hundred percent sure Rafayel couldn't sweat in order to regulate his internal body heat.

How could you let this go on for so long? He had been suffering these symptoms for a whole day now, hiding it all under layers of petulant frustration and overdramatic complaining to escape having to ask for help.

He was always like this. So secretive and reserved about his struggles underneath all the goofiness, especially those directly related to him being a Lemurian.

You put a hand on his burning chest and pushed yourself away to put some distance between the two of you and this moment, ignoring his quiet gasp and the way he clutched your waist. "I'm taking you to a—”

Suddenly, the world spun off its axis, a dizzying blur of motion that ended with your back colliding against the floorboards.

The impact sent a ripple through the room — drawing pens clattering and rolling away, half-sketched papers crumpling beneath you, while others scattered into the air like startled birds, carried by the gust of displaced air.

As you blinked up, trying to shake the daze from your mind, the world sharpened into focus.

The light cascaded over Rafayel like liquid mercury, accentuating every sharp edge and soft curve of his form. His bare legs straddled your hips, knees pressed firmly into the ground on either side of you, pinning you in place with an effortless authority. His hands had found yours in the chaos, and now your wrists were restrained above your head, his long fingers encircling them with a grip that was firm yet somehow shaky.

The bathrobe he wore hung precariously, one shoulder already exposed to the moonlight’s caress while the other threatened to follow suit, the fabric dipping low to reveal a tantalizing V that stretched from his clavicle down to his navel. Tendrils of lilac hair curled lightly downwards with gravity, catching the light from outside, glittering like morning dew against a canvas of violet satin and plopping down onto your face, each impact making you blink. And his face, suffused with a flush so intense that it seemed to glow under the pale lighting, as if all the blood in his body had rushed to stain his fair skin with an undeniable rosy bloom.

The cool floorboards beneath your skin were contrasting harshly with the heat of his touch, and the helpless position left your pulse racing in a way you couldn’t entirely blame on adrenaline.

Rafayel lowered himself until his nose brushed lightly against yours, his breaths shallow and uneven, eyes caught halfway between hazy drowsiness and burning intensity — a vivid shade of sunless plum made darker not by the shadows cast across his features, but a deeply buried and masterfully concealed emotion on the verge of making itself known to you.

To call it desire wouldn't do it justice.

It was something far stronger than fleeting arousal or casual infatuation — you hadn’t been looked at this way before. Weren’t even sure if a man could look at someone like this. There was nothing superficial or mundane about this particular weight. It sought to consume you. To burn you alive, leaving you to crumble into ashes like incense offered up to a deity. And the worst part? You had no idea what exactly you were being consumed by, or why.

All of this, because you had merely wanted to—

“No. I’m not going anywhere,” he hissed as if sensing your plan, breath dragging along the edge of your ear. "I'm just... restless.”

But—

“In every sense of the word.”

Oh?

Your mind reeled, dizzy from the intoxicating cocktail flooding your senses — from his breaths washing over the side of your neck, to the overwhelming sensation of Rafayel on the verge of draping over you like a living brand, hot and firm, trapping you in place.

"Especially when you're by my side," he purred.

Oh.

He pulled back to stare you down, heavy-lidded and glinting like knives honed razor sharp, yet somehow tender in his approach. If anything, it served only to accentuate the danger of whatever it was simmering below the surface. This was different than his Ebb Day state, but similar enough in its intent to be instantly recognizable — especially since it bore all the marks of the manic rush he fell victim to when succumbing to the lure of his instincts.

It was something primal in you that scattered your thought process into oblivion and made you look away instinctively, averting your attention toward the window off to your left — but the sparkling view of night time in Aridum was soon curtained by a flash of Rafayel's hand as he cupped the side of your face in one smooth motion.

The slight roughness of the pad of his thumb brushed along your cheekbone until his fingers sank into your hair, fanned along the outer edge of your ear, and turned you back to face him. The gesture felt proprietary, like he wanted to make certain he'd captured every last scrap of your undivided attention, like it physically hurt to allow even the smallest opportunity for you to withdraw and escape his grasp.

“Rafayel,” you forced your common sense to come out of its hiding place. “I don’t think—”

"But even so, I can't let you go. I don't want to," he breathed against your lips, punctuating his command with an achingly slow drag of his nose tracing yours. The contact made something molten unfurl in your belly, warm and sticky-slick and pooling in the hollow space below your navel, curling its tendrils through your veins like sweet, syrupy nectar. "What should I do?"

It would be easier than breathing to surrender and give him whatever he was asking for, but... but...

It felt wrong when he was so distressingly hot to the touch, not to mention you couldn't shake off the feeling he was doing his best to distract you from your worry by acting more brazenly suggestive than you'd ever seen him be before.

"You should rest, I don't think you'll enjoy getting worked up in your current condition—"

Your efforts were derailed with the subtle scrape of chapped lips running up the slope of your neck and a bite into the fleshy part below your ear as punishment for daring to answer his plea with platitude.

A shudder shook your frame, nerves firing off confused messages in quick succession throughout your brain, half demanding the sudden pressure recede and half urging more from the tingling heat. Your hand flew to grip his bare shoulder, fingers digging in until the tight bunch of muscle strained beneath his fevered skin — not enough to stop his ministrations, but enough to serve as a weak deterrent.

"Such lovely lips, spinning such pretty excuses," Rafayel huffed, drawing back and sweeping his thumb across your chin with gentle disapproval. "When we both know you don't want me to let you go either."

The words trailed off into something softer, tender, almost wistful, and were followed by the pad of his finger slipping past your parted lips, stroking along the underside of your tongue before drawing back and skimming across the wet patch he'd left glistening upon your bottom lip. As if magnetized, his smoldering stare followed, entranced by the minute trembling of your mouth, darting occasionally upward to capture your own hooded eyes at the sudden boldness of his gesture. He licked his own lips slowly as if thirsty, mirroring the same lazy stroke he'd used against your mouth, allowing you to take your fill of the sight.

No.

Before you could fall into his enticing trap again, your palm pressed firmly against Rafayel's chest until he eased back obediently, giving you space to rise, every single sensation previously pink at the edges quickly melting into clarity about taking care of him properly.

"This isn't the right time," you insisted breathlessly once you managed to catch your breath and speak, steadfast with the strain of iron will alone — pushing forward when your mind threatened to wander where his moistened lips had been just seconds before.

The mood was quickly dispelling, much to Rafayel's clear irritation, judging by the petulant slouch of his shoulders. You emphasized your point by putting your hands on his forehead, cheeks, neck, every patch of skin you could reach, the clear intent of medical examination being communicated silently until he relented with a dramatic sigh, turning his face upwards to expose more of his throat as if giving permission.

"It's fine," he groused reluctantly, although his grumbling somewhat relenting in volume under your gentle inspection. "I'm not dying."

"That's the opposite of what you said earlier today. Are you sure you don't want—"

His hands closed firmly around your wrists, tugging you off gently before you could finish speaking. "It's really not that bad.”

You’d be more convinced if he'd just told you about how miserable he was feeling.

"Is it a Lemurian condition?" You frowned up at him, taking note of how carefully he cradled your hands in his palms, stroking the insides of your wrists. "If it's making you feel awful, shouldn't we see someone about it?"

Rafayel tilted his head at you with a peculiar sort of fondness written across his features. It was difficult to identify what precisely made his smile curve upward into something distinctly knowing, yet warm — something infinitely affectionate yet impossible to quantify.

"Already doing that," he answered cryptically, tilting forward until he met your forehead with his own, nuzzling into the creased spot directly between your brows, eyelashes fluttering shut.

Ugh, this man.

"Do you know for a fact if you'll be okay?" you asked as delicately as possible without sounding too overbearing. That would definitely push Rafayel closer to defensive territory again and have him brush off any attempt at assistance, or even conversation, so you needed to walk the tightrope of concern while still keeping it mild enough for him not to clam up. "This trip still has a few more days left. What if you don't get better?"

The corner of his mouth twitched faintly with a ghost of a smile, perhaps pleased by your attentiveness —— "I enjoy this kind of concern."

—— which was starting to irritate you a little. "Well, I don't. Seeing you suffer and not doing anything isn't enjoyable."

He had the audacity to grin at that, broad enough to crinkle the corners of his eyes as he ducked his head coyly before turning it sharply to brush the tip of his nose against the shell of your ear and murmuring, "Not enjoying seeing me suffering does imply some enjoyment in seeing me otherwise."

"Rafayel!" You snapped finally, jerking out of his embrace with exasperated incredulity, only to meet an unrepentant smile waiting for you beyond your escape. He wasn't deterred whatsoever, which was a little unnerving.

Or rather, the rapid shift to your own pent-up restlessness was about to become in the next two days.

The limbo between then and the memorial hall day unfolded in a whirlwind of contradictions, each more puzzling than the last — starting from the abrupt ending to your interlude in front of the window, where he suddenly pulled back without any warning at all, leaving you cold and stunned with the excuse that he wanted to go to sleep, subsequently kicking you out of his hotel room as if possessed by a demonic force capable of inducing selective amnesia.

Like he wasn’t asking to fold you in half like a laptop mere moments ago.

The result was you forcing mandatory house rest until the day of the memorial hall visit came, settling awkwardly between coddling and hovering — a weird blend of fussing over his health like a mother hen and trying desperately not to make him feel infantilized as a result of said fussing.

All of that only ended with him either clinging close or deliberately distancing himself in confusing waves that seemed to occur at random intervals with little rhyme or reason.

It was simultaneously bewildering and heartbreaking. You had no idea how to react when he gave you zero insight into his thoughts and behaviors unless coaxed open, and even then, his answers were cryptic.

(So much for enjoying your concern.)

Really, this was your fault.

Maybe you shouldn't have pushed. But you worried.

Especially when he was dismissive like that despite being openly going through something other than a fever and a creative block, made worse by his inability to leave the hotel due to the hostile environment. Both of which you could do nothing to help with.

He would sit at the edge of the bed, his sketchbook propped open but untouched, pencil hovering above the page as though waiting for some divine spark that refused to come. At times, he’d stand by the window, reminding you of a cat sitting by its food dish for its owner to fill it with dinner, paw swiping irritatingly at its empty confines. Then, just as abruptly, he’d abandon his spot to sprawl across your lap instead while you were busy with paperwork online, one arm draped loosely over his stomach as he stared blankly at the ceiling in defeat, and demanding you play with his hair.

Then, some time later, it was back to deciding being near you was unbearable, pulling away entirely whenever you reached out for reassurance, no matter how casual or friendly your intentions, retreating back into his personal bubble to focus on attempting to get something on paper mindlessly, pages fluttering with restless action, crumpling here and there under the rough treatment before being smoothed out hastily.

The cycle continued nonstop. Restlessness, fatigue, clinginess, building you up while you didn't let it show because time and place, solitude, then back again — you never knew what Rafayel's whimsies were going to bring, and the uncertainty of it wore you thin, fraying your already wan nerves.

The humidifier was a desperate, last-ditch effort, the kind born out of sheer frustration and the kind of exhaustion that makes rationality optional.

You’d bought it from a small local shop at the crack of dawn, spurred on by the memory of walking into Rafayel’s suite only hours before, where he’d bullied the hotel staff into delivering two oversized sacks of ice — each roughly the size of a small child — and ordered them to be dumped unceremoniously into his bathtub.

At 3 AM. In the dead of night.

By the time you returned and set it up, the machine had barely begun spitting out its first gentle stream of cool mist before Rafayel sat down beside it, legs folded beneath him like a solemn monk meditating in front of some sacred relic. His quiet intensity as he stared at the thing made you wonder if he was grateful, resentful, or some combination of both — because with Rafayel, it was never as simple as one emotion at a time.

Still, the day turned out to be noticeably easier on him, and for the first time in what felt like forever, you allowed yourself to believe that maybe, just maybe, the worst had passed.

He still looked like death warmed over, often pink on the face and worn, but at least he wasn’t on the brink of staging another late-night ice-bag heist.

He even tolerated your awkward attempts to distract him, accepting your offerings of snacks, endless glasses of ice water, iced tea, whatever cold beverages you could scrounge up, and a marathon of that one TV show the two of you had been meaning to watch together.

And, of course, there was the doting.

So much doting.

Which was rare for you.

You were not, by any stretch of the imagination, the kind of person who showered people with attention. You weren’t the mom friend. You didn’t hover. But something about Rafayel in this state, rightfully whiny, subdued, far too fragile for your liking, made you want to roll him over in bubble wrap and shove him in your pocket to keep him safe from everything.

In some ways, you were more anxious than he was.

The helplessness swung at you like you were a tree and it was an axe, the inability to snap your fingers and fix him, to just make it better was torture. Worrying felt inevitable, but useless. And the not knowing what to do with yourself in between bouts of fretting? That was worse. Still, he wasn’t showing any signs of further deterioration, which felt like a victory you didn’t want to jinx.

You were so relieved you briefly considered leaving all your savings to the shop clerk who’d sold you the overpriced humidifier. She had probably thought you’d lost your mind, judging by the way you thanked her like she’d just handed you a ticket to salvation, practically singing her praises as she rang up your purchase. And honestly, if you could go back in time, you would’ve thanked her even more profusely.

Because it worked. Rafayel was better — well, better-ish. Better enough that you decided it was safe to move forward with the plan to visit the memorial hall.

Which, eventually, became a visit to the ocean.

An ocean.

In the middle of a desert.

The sheer impossibility of it left you breathless, like you were standing at the edge of a fever dream made real. The water stretched out endlessly, shimmering beneath the brutal sun, and you couldn’t stop marveling at the sheer absurdity of it — a body of water so vast, so alive, nestled in a place it had no right to be. It felt like a miracle.

It was a miracle.

And just when you thought the desert couldn’t surprise you further, the skies proved you wrong soon enough later, crowning the experience with snowfall at the end of the trip. Snow, delicate and silent, drifting from the sky like a benediction.

You couldn’t help but marvel at it all — at how the world had managed to gift you two impossibilities in the span of a single day. It felt like the desert itself was defying logic, bending over backward to offer something beautiful, something extraordinary, as though it wanted to prove it wasn’t all hardship and sunburnt misery.

But Rafayel stood by the edge of the ocean with a look that made your chest ache — a look that spoke not of wonder, but of mourning. To you, it was a miracle, but to him, it was a tragedy: a dying ocean trapped in a place it could no longer thrive, its very existence a reminder of something slipping away. An everlasting eulogy engraved into reality.

He didn’t look away from the canvas of pain he had set up and started painting for himself until you voiced all of what you thought out loud for him to see.

And this time, you truly felt like you had broken through — like you’d reached him in a way that mattered.

It was there, in that rare, fragile moment, that Rafayel dove straight through your hesitation, sidestepping the awkward pauses you were fumbling with, and pulled you into an embrace before you even had the courage to ask if you could. It was as though he had heard the unspoken thought aloud, plucking it out of the air with startling precision.

And then he’d confessed — softly, almost too softly — that at the time, he had wanted to come here before, with the most important person in his life.

Those words lodged themselves in your chest, a bittersweet ache blooming alongside the unmistakable joy bubbling up within you. You hugged him back as tightly as you could, pouring all the gratitude you didn’t know how to put into words into that one simple gesture. Gratitude for trusting you enough to share that. Gratitude for showing you yet another new side of himself, something unguarded and rare. A treat, indeed, one you hadn’t expected but cherished all the same.

Relief flooded through you, so potent it felt like a physical weight lifting from your shoulders. You hadn’t even realized how tense you’d been until that moment. Your body relaxed, and with that relaxation came fatigue, the kind that crept up on you and left no room for resistance. Before you knew it, you had fallen asleep during the entire way back, lulled into a rare sense of peace you hadn’t felt in days.

And yet.

Like clockwork, he withdrew the instant you arrived back at the hotel.

Rafayel never thought he’d truly understand what it meant to drown.

As a creature of the sea, he wasn't meant to in the first place.

Not until you.

The realization had hit him like a storm breaking over still waters — not all at once, but in slow, rumbling waves that built. He didn’t even feel himself breaking; it was more like a slow erosion, the kind that wears stone into sand. Quiet, but irreversible. Your optimism. Your touches. Your encouragement. Inching in and in and in one step at a time.

(It was snowing in the desert.)

He had been holding himself together in the driver's seat, hands knotted around the steering wheel and knuckles bloodless with how tightly he gripped. Every inch of him vibrated with anxiety, away from where you lay fast asleep beside him, breathing shallow and uneven like he was afraid of exhaling too loudly. But there you were, oblivious, asleep, your head leaning softly against the window as if his world hadn’t collapsed in on itself.

(It was snowing in the desert.)

It wasn’t the desert heat that was killing him, though it might as well have been. (Everything about this place grated against him — the air, the dry scrape of his skin, the silence of the fading ocean that was too vast to be comforting. Too big. Too empty. Fading. Fading. A warning from cities away that this land was no place for a creature like him.) He wasn’t meant for this — for the cracked earth and the relentless sun and the suffocating absence of water. His body ached for moisture, for the cool, familiar embrace of the sea, but it ached even more for you. (He didn’t even realize how long he had been watching you from the corner of his peripheral vision — how long he had been unraveling, thread by thread.)

You’d tilted his world off its axis, turned everything he thought he knew into something unrecognizable. Once, pain had been his anchor. It was always there—constant, unyielding, something he could hold on to when nothing else made sense. It had driven him, fueled him, given him purpose when nothing else could. He had sought it out like a man dying of thirst seeks a mirage, and it had never failed him. Pain was constant. Pain was reliable. Pain was everything. Inside. Outside. It was all he had ever known, and it had kept him alive — fed the anger that gnashed his insides with teeth and claws, soothed the beast that prowled just under his skin, tempered the instinct that drove him relentlessly onward. Toward destruction. Towards home.

He had used it as a shield, as armor, as the whip he wielded against those who dared to clip the tails of his people. A weapon. A tool. A brush.

And then there was you (who he'd willingly sought out, angry and grieving and resentful and hurt.)

You, who didn’t fit into his carefully crafted world of suffering and art and revenge. You, who had made him forget (as easily as you forgot him) what it felt like to hurt, to ache, to yearn for something greater than himself. To hate. To see others bleed while his fingers flew across canvas after canvas, leaving only beauty in their wake — only soaring wings, only gleaming scales, only flowing water, only living fire, only reaching skies, only rushing wind, only rising floods...

Only you.

(It was snowing in the desert.)

Except now, he did yearn. He yearned in a way that was foreign and unbearable, in a way that felt like drowning — not in water, but in light, in warmth, in the overwhelming weight of wanting something too much. It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t fair that he wanted you this much — needed you this much — when he didn’t even know who he was without all the hurt and hatred inside. It wasn’t fair that he felt something hot and ugly churning under his skin whenever you smiled up at him in admiration, filling his stomach with lead until he thought he might collapse beneath its heaviness. It wasn't fair that there were times when he thought it might actually be better not to have met you again at all.

(That thought filled him with dread so immense it threatened to crush the breath from his lungs; the possibility of having spent his entire life stumbling aimlessly through darkness towards a destination he was no longer sure even existed — )

He watched you sleep, the rhythm of your breathing steady and unbothered.

His gaze lingered on your hands, resting loosely in your lap, fingers twitching faintly as if even in sleep, you were reaching for something. (Reaching for him?) He wanted to take them in his own, to press them to his lips, to hold on so tightly he’d never have to let go. But he couldn’t. (He wouldn’t.)

Because the moment he did, he knew he’d lose whatever fragile standing he had left.

(“Isn’t it a surprise that there’s an ocean in the desert?”)

His thoughts spiraled, looping back on themselves in a tangle of contradictions that refused to resolve; questions without answers, fears without resolutions. What had he become, to need you like this? To depend on you like this? To depend on you so completely that even the idea of your absence felt like the loss of something vital — something essential — an emptiness he wasn't prepared to face.

(What must you think of him? Did you even know what you did to him? What would you think of him?)

He had told himself he could manage it, that he could stay close enough to feel your warmth but far enough not to burn. But that was a lie, wasn’t it? He was already burning. He had been burning since the moment he met you. An addictive pain — the kind that made him ache for more even as it seared him from the inside out.

And before he knew it, the car was parked beside the hotel entrance around the far corner of the garden, and Rafayel didn’t remember driving there at all.

He blinked, confused for a moment as to how exactly he had managed to pilot the vehicle, when you stirred quietly in the passenger seat, drawing his attention like a moth to flame.

You groaned softly, eyelids fluttering, but remained firmly locked within slumber's grip as he unbuckled your seatbelt for you, as gently as if he were handling fine china. Your head leaned sideways against the headrest and faced him, slack and soft with sleep. His fingers twitched around the plastic buckle, curling into a fist until he thought they might cramp under the strain.

He leaned forward, forehead coming to contact with the cool leather surface of the steering wheel, squeezing his eyes shut tight enough to blot out your presence entirely.

There was too much to process — too many feelings, thoughts, sensations threatening to overwhelm him if he looked directly at them, instead swirling through his head like debris caught in a vortex, invisible yet disorienting nonetheless.

But they all blipped out of existence the moment he turned his head around, following the impulse to look.

(“Isn’t it a surprise that there’s an ocean in the desert?”)

The urge struck Rafayel with all the force of a lightning bolt — bright, sudden, unavoidable — and suddenly the knuckles of his fingers were sliding across your cheek, feather-light in gentle arcs along the arch of your cheek, savoring every inch of satin flesh as it shifted beneath his caress.

The sensation of touch buzzed pleasantly underneath his skin previously starved, reveling in the sweetness of contact after so many days of withdrawal.

The artificial light coming from outside bathed your sleeping form in a glow that cascaded like a gentle waterfall, chiaroscuro shadows casting angles upon your features, emphasizing every line and curve, and for a long time, all he could do was stare. He could feel your breath against the tips of his nails, warm puffs of moist exhales against his calloused flesh, and found himself fixating on the gentle undulation of your chest as you breathed — unconsciously, mindlessly unaware of what such a simple act did to him.

The memory of your voice echoed in his mind, soft and certain, cutting through the chaos like a beam of light.

"Isn’t it a surprise that there’s an ocean in the desert?"

You had a way of reframing everything, of taking the pieces of his broken world and rearranging them into something that almost looked like hope. (He hated it. He loved it. He hated that he loved it.) It wasn’t fair. None of it was fair.

You hadn’t asked to become such an integral part of his existence — so intrinsic and fundamental and irreplaceable. Yet somehow, here you were. Here he was. The absence of water, the grief of it. The grief of what it meant to lose something so essential, so intrinsic, that one didn’t know how to live without it. And that grief had found a new home in you. You, who had become his ocean, his escape, the source of every ache in his chest and joy in his heart.

(Isn't it a surprise that there's an ocean in the desert? Isn't it a surprise you're the muse calling to him and not the muffled, fading cries of the dying ocean in pain, not the skeletal remains of an era he'd never get back?)

He gazed, and gazed, and gazed, drinking you in like a thirsty man lost in a sea of golden sands, watching the subtle play of lights over the curves of your face — the delicate angle of your chin, the arch of your nose, the graceful slope of your neck as it curved into collarbone and shoulder — memorizing every detail he could, without the pressure of having to wrench himself back before he drowned in your wake, without the need to pretend to your face he was anything less than desperate to be with you all day, every day, in every way possible. And that the sound of your voice in his ears was enough to get the paintbrush running across paper from the sheer momentum of his imagination.

But he couldn't keep going like this.

Somehow, somewhen, between the start of your journey and now, this thing had begun shifting irrevocably past his ability to contain it any longer. Had grown exponentially until it seemed to dwarf his capacity to handle it. All it would take was being away from you for a mere few hours to bring him to a level of misery that was honestly embarrassing.

And you had no idea.

No idea that orbiting around him in these past few days like a second moon had only served to exacerbate the foul joy of watching you fawn over him.

It made him sick to his stomach to admit it, but soaking in the knowledge (in his soul, through the bond) that you cared so deeply for him went straight to his head like some drug he hadn't realized he needed.

It felt so despairingly good that he would wrap himself around you like a vine climbing towards sunlight if he could for the rest of his days, absorbing your rays of affection like photosynthesis... or a parasite.

(Was he being punished by the sea that this love was eclipsing his fury and vengeance? Or rewarded that he held both equally in his grasp despite how terribly wrong it felt at times? Regardless, his inspiration was the punchline, once only capable of singing into the canvas elegies of lament and sorrow, now composed ballads and odes that poured out effortlessly.)

You would hate him if you ever found out just how perversely his emotions swung in every direction; so high one moment that the ecstasy of relief nearly shattered his reserve of control, and so low the next that he feared he'd choke to death from the guilt that clawed up the back of his throat like a strangled animal's cry for mercy.

This entire ordeal had flipped the script completely — instead of keeping you at arm's length as he normally did (regarding… everything), Rafayel now clung onto you desperately like Tantalus to a branch of fruit he’d finally gotten a grasp of, and what if he was exposed? The question rose like bile in his mouth whenever he began slipping.

“I won't leave you.”

Liar, his grudge wanted to answer.

It remembered. It never forgot. It told him you'd flee and never look back if he let a sliver of this dependency that bound him tighter to you with each passing day slip out from his fingertips — if he allowed you even the tiniest insight into the strange workings of his head and his heart.

Because you didn’t understand. You couldn’t. You had no idea what you were talking about when you told him you wouldn’t leave. How could you, when you didn’t know the depths of what you were promising to stay for? You didn’t know the true nature of Lemurian love, its ferocity, its weight, its cost. The all-consuming, all-encompassing reality of it — how they loved as if it was the only thing tethering them to existence itself. How they lived for it, how they died for it. How he had been dying for it.

If you saw it — if you saw him — you would run. He knew you would. Because if he laid bare just how much he depended on you, how much of his breath, his will, his very being hinged on you, you’d be overwhelmed. You’d leave.

Why else would he be tearing himself apart like this? Miserably trying to wean himself off you, forcing himself to let go only to grasp harder each time he felt you’d finally come to hate him and slip away?

He didn't know how long he sat there in silence.

Just a bit longer, he would keep watching you with these feelings out in the open. Just a little bit longer. He couldn’t bear to wake you up.

By the time you stirred, groggy and disoriented but blissfully unsuspecting, it felt as though several eternities had passed in the span of minutes, and he had to struggle with all the strength of a raging current to force himself back into this skin of his that felt too tight and suffocating around him.

But, still resting his temple against the steering wheel with an arm slung on top of it and another hanging lazily at his side, feigning ease, nothing betrayed his inner turmoil.

He watched quietly as you slowly regained your bearings, resisting the temptation to reach out and brush aside that one piece of hair out of place on your head, letting you find the words first.

(So adorable. So endearing.)

(It was not only snowing in his desert. There was also an ocean in there.)

"Rafayel..?"

"Yeah?"

"How long was I asleep?" You blinked at him blearily, one hand lifting to rub the lingering tiredness from your eyelids as you peer into the darkness of night beyond his silhouette. "Why didn't you wake me up?"

Everything he'd been thinking about vaporized and left behind nothing but softness, so tender it scared him; it seeped into the spaces in his heart left vacant and curled inside them, filling every corner, until it made the next smile he offered you come free of burden. "You were sleeping so well, cutie. I didn't want to disturb you."

The unconscious put of your lips and the way that strand of hair bounced around when you slid down your seat a little had him leaning in before he knew what he was doing, smoothing the unruly thing, fingertips betraying him by skating across the outer edge of your ear while he watched you tilt your cheek instinctively.

His body warmed immediately, gravitating towards you in a half-hug that kept you cradled close to the side of his frame as he nuzzled into your hair above your temple with a hum, dipping his nose deeper into the crown of your head near where your neck curved gracefully upwards before inhaling deep — greedy, thirsty, like he’d die if he couldn’t seep up all the scent of you.

Your breathing hitched a bit, and that’s what halted him right at the corner of your mouth with a sharp exhale — he couldn’t be doing this, he was just thinking about how he needed to pull back and —

Art salon.

Yeah, the art salon gathering.

He was supposed to be on his way to there like yesterday.

If only his body didn’t move like a most willing pupped tethered by strings to yours and refused to walk away whenever he tried.

“…Rafayel?”

It suddenly hotter in this car like a tide pool at noon. So stiflingly hot he was breathing fire even with the snowy weather outside. So unbearable the deepest V-cut known to mankind that had his whole chest out for the world to ogle did nothing to help.

He could… He could skip.

Yeah, he needed this. It had been literal days of non-stop withdrawal and a push-and-pull of his frustration that you wouldn’t touch him (because oh noo, he was sick — which, he wasn’t!) and stubbornness to not let you touch him. He’d gotten to a point that he was drunk off your scent alone and he couldn’t keep doing this forever, and why should he? Why did it matter about this event at all? Who cared — who cared about some stupid gathering? He wasn’t functioning anyways until he—

Stop. He had to stop. He was already so late.

He imagined catching himself by the scruff of his neck and yanking himself back to the driver's seat, within safe borders. Far away from your mesmerizing lips and wandering eyes and cute squirming in your seat under the thin cover of innocence.

And pulling away and practically fusing with the car door was exactly what he did.

He needed to prove to himself, just this once, that he could function without the constant reassurance of your presence — that he wasn’t helplessly anchored to you, no matter how much the pull of your moon whispered otherwise.

He had to dilute himself. This — and his inspiration problem, involving you or not, was his to figure out. And he had to figure it out if he wanted you to stay by his side.

"...Do you wanna go back to your room first?" he heard himself ask you quietly.

"You're not coming with me?" The tiny furrow of worry between your brows spoke volumes about your confusion, and despite wanting to reach out and smooth it away, to wipe every ounce of uncertainty from your face with a tender kiss, Rafayel clenched his fingers around the door handle of the vehicle until they cramped, his heart aching strangely inside his chest as you stared quizzically at him.

He brought out the invitation that came with the memorial hall ticket, waving it a little with little to no enthusiasm, "I still have to attend my friend's art salon thing."

The way your shoulders deflated and face dropped at the mention made him waver in — not enough to follow through with ditching the whole thing, but certainly making his resolve weak enough to crack like glass under pressure. "But you don't look well. You need to rest."

How could someone manage to resist getting spoiled like this, he thought miserably as he closed his eyes while you continued fussing, peering worriedly up into his face with the cutest scrunch to your forehead, palms searching along his cheeks heat before trailing down the length of his arms, and he wanted nothing more than to give in to that impulse of being coddled to bits by your hands alone.

He was a weak man.

You nearly lifted off the passenger seat and fell into his lap the way he embraced you, his arms coiling around you like kelp around a rock, holding fast as though you might slip away with the wind. His face buried into the crook of your neck, breath warm and uneven against your skin, his grip snug yet teetering on the edge of too much — like he didn’t trust himself to let go. There was a desperation in the way his hands trembled slightly, his fingers pressing into your sides, not hard enough to hurt but enough to leave the faintest impression of how badly he needed this. When your pained whine broke through, it was like snapping a thread, he instantly loosened his hold, guilt washing over his features as he pulled back just enough to make room for you to breathe. But he stayed close, his forehead dipping to rest against your shoulder as a heavy sigh rumbled deep from his chest, raw and apologetic. You leaned heavily into him, your fingers threading into his hair in a gesture that should have comforted him, but instead left him drowning deeper in the tangled sea of his emotions.

"See? You're burning up again," you mumbled as your cool lips grazed his temple in a comforting kiss. He was no better than a child. He knew it. And he hated how much he basked in your coddling, reveled in the unspoken message behind your words: Don't hide it. Tell me when you hurt. I care. "Maybe we can go together? Will you feel okay if I'm there?"

He would. He would feel more than okay, because that's what made him function.

But he couldn't keep being like this.

"Do you wanna turn me into a sea creature beached on the sand after the ocean recedes," he whispered, mostly kidding except not really, hiding in the dip of your neck just below your ear, hand tracing absent shapes into the small of your back above your tailbone. "Unable to breathe on my own, waiting helplessly for your tide's return?"

Your fingers stroking through his hair slowed, then stilled entirely at the edge of his nape. You pulled back only far enough to meet his lowered stare, confusion dancing within your own, bright and clear and genuine. You had no inkling of what was going on with him, and he didn’t want you to find out either. He would be fine. He was going to handle it.

"Don't you trust me?" Rafayel said. "How about we make a promise? I promise... I'll be okay without you tonight."

It hurt to lie to you so directly, but seeing your doubt dissolve to appease him helped soothe that sting considerably. (Even if it felt a little too convenient to rely on such flimsy methods.) You nodded, seeming convinced in spite of yourself, and his stance firmed — strengthened with your faith and affirmation alike, like he'd just taken a double shot of espresso. He would be okay. He wasn't going to keep imposing his feelings upon you even if a part of him desperately yearned to, no matter how difficult the prospect seemed.

(Say no, a small part of him whispered traitorously, selfishly, insistently. Ask me to stay. You know I can't say no to you, he wanted to plead. Needed to be affirmed once more, reassured that he was welcome to indulge, to remain, to lean into the comfort you offered freely.)

"Okay..." you echoed uncertainly, but gave him another soft smile — tentative yet warm, gentle encouragement. He watched quietly as your expressions shifted in quick succession, cycling through shades of hesitation and worry before settling on resignation. You nodded again, firmer this time, seemingly steeling yourself against whatever doubts you harbored. He wanted to kiss it all away.

But instead, he gently pushed you back, sinking further into his seat, looking out the view beyond the windshield to gather his wits against the force that was your presence beside him.

"You can head back," he repeated, not turning to meet your searching stare. "I can handle it."

The art salon had an air of cultivated elegance, grandiosity reflecting into soaring ceilings and walls adorned with curated artworks, with conversations floating in fragmented pieces, the occasional laughter punctuating the steady hum of "cultured" discourse — all the while Rafayel stood at the periphery, his posture consciously maintained with the kind of deliberate nonchalance that masked a profound discomfort, one hand buried in his pant pockets and the other holding a flute glass of champagne, ghosting the suffocating room with an expression of aloof disdain, attention drifting from painting to painting without ever settling. Humans circled him like murmuring specters, their faces a study in muted curiosity and empty civility. He loathed their presence. (Yet, here he was.)

The room's overwhelming sensory overload grated against his composure — cloying mingling of varnish and wine, sharply polished sheen of curated lighting, artifice of smiles that never reached their eyes...

He should leave. (No, he had to stay.)

The dichotomy was a pendulum swinging between contempt and an unspoken compulsion to endure. He’d insisted he didn’t need you here, insisted on proving — to himself as much as to you — that he could function without your constant presence. But the more he replayed his own words in his mind, the more it was obvious the joke was on him.

He rolled his eyes as an overly enthusiastic laugh erupted nearby, a sound sharp enough to pinprick through his already thinning out patience. His hand twitched in his pocket, the movement a reflexive manifestation of his barely-contained frustration.

(Focus.)

The art, exquisite as it was, did little to distract him as the chatter blurred into a meaningless drone, the edges of the room constricting him under the weight of pretense.

And then. The tug.

At first, it was delicate — an unsuspecting tremor sifting through his awareness, like the faintest ripple across an otherwise still surface that he thought he was imagining and hoping this was you. But it swelled rapidly, a deluge of sensations sweeping him off his feet towards your pull with a force that left his breath stuttering and the floor wavering beneath, erupting into vivid, agonizing clarity.

His lips tingled, a ghostly imprint of a kiss not yet given.

Heat bloomed under his skin, first at the base of his throat, spreading like a slow, insidious current. The faintest pressure, then, at his collarbone, radiating outward, like silk dragging over sensitive skin, a tingling warmth that prickled and spread, until it seemed to rewrite the very contours of his form, leaving him trembling with phantom caresses that lingered far too long to ignore.

He could feel the press of your palms against his chest, the drag of your nails over the planes of his stomach, each sensation so precise it made his breath catch, and the ache in his hands mirrored the way you gripped at yourself. Every brush of your hand — every hurried, seeking stroke — burned through him like smoldering embers, and he swore he could hear the faintest hitch of your breath, feel the tremor in your thighs.

A siren song of need that echoed his own, calling him under, drowning him in you.

Come to me, come to me, stay with me.

His breath hitched with the oxygen turning into lava-hot needle prickling in his lungs, his legs going limp as noodles and giving way. He collapsed into the nearest chair with a jarring lack of control, the motion abrupt, almost violent.

One hand clamped onto the edge of the table as he hastily discarded the champagne glass to cover where the bond was glowing, fingers digging into the wood as if it were the only thing keeping him from being swept away.

A single candle at the table’s center responded instead of Rafayel, its once languid, uninterested flame quivering violently, and then erupting into an erratic flare, a burst of light so sharp and sudden it cut through the room like a gasp. The activity drew murmurs from those nearby, heads turning, eyes widening as the flame seemed to writhe with a life of its own as wax spilled over the edges of its holder, dripping down in frantic rivulets, glistening like molten gold beneath the trembling glow.

"Hey, Rafayel, man, you good?"

A hand on his shoulder made him flinch violently and slap it away, the contact snapping him partway out of his spiraling thoughts. "Don't."

He was already rising, the chair scraping noisily against the floor as he pushed himself upright with a force that bordered on frenetic. The friend stood as well, confusion clear, but Rafayel didn’t wait to explain — with a curt shake of his head, he turned on his heel and strode toward the exit, leaving the other man standing there with his hand half-raised, a bewildered, "Hey, where are you going, come back!" hanging unanswered in the air.

The murmurs of those left behind — curious stares, the faint scrape of chairs and clothes ruffling — faded into irrelevance, they barely even registered. The bond burned like a tether, yanking him back to you, and he had neither the strength nor the desire to disobey.

By the time he reached the cool air of the night outside, he was seething. He had heard you loud and clear.

You merciless, cruel, horrible witch of a woman, punishing him with your sweet truth in an act so loving yet selfish, selfless yet entirely possessive, driving him completely to his wit's end until the only remaining thought was yours — to worship you wholly, thoroughly, obsessively, as deeply as he wanted.

He was in love.

You were in Rafayel’s room.

Because for his sanity to be tested like you intended it would be, of course you had to be in there of all places.

He was able to crash in the way he wanted like a dam bursting without knocking holding him back. In fact, he didn’t even bother calling out at all.

And honestly, he wasn’t even lucid enough for coherent thoughts such as those the moment his vision tunneled on your frame in the middle of his space, your back turned to him, an unaware and unintentional siren in a fluffy white robe loosely tied at your hips.

His robe.

Rafayel was moving before he registered the full picture — prowling the distance between you within seconds, hand snatching up yours and spinning you around. Just being this close and touching you uninhibited got the synapses firing faster than bullets in his head. He pushed forward into your space with no preamble, crowding you against the floor-to-ceiling window. He spared another two or three precious seconds taking in your startled expression with vindication (“Rafayel, what are you doing here?” before putting a stop to all the unnecessary talking with a kiss.

How could he expected himself to stay away from this?

One knee pushed between your thighs, a subtle but undeniable acknowledgment of what he’d felt, and you faltered, clutching the sides of his shirt so abruptly the lily decorations peppered through out clinked. A quiet noise escaped past your lips, muffled by his own and intensifying the building pressure simmering in his gut as he played with the collar of your robe — his robe — and drank greedily from you.

He felt a push at his chest.

The separation between you that couldn’t be more than a tight space to breathe each other’s air brought the world rushing back into focus — Aridum’s quiet, serene snowfall materialized behind your head like a mockery of their frenzied tangle of limbs, the ambient sounds of the city bustling in the distance dampened.

Your eyes searched his, glazed and hazy with steadily-building arousal, yet waiting nonetheless for an answer, shiny lips parted in wordless wonder.

Rafayel could say nothing. The words were there, soda fizz under the surface threatening to erupt into something incomprehensible at best if he opened his mouth.

His palm engulfed your cheek and drew you right back in, continuing the kiss with more urgency to prevent you from tumbling out from his grasp again — let the action speak for him.

The need that thrummed deep beneath rendered him mute, save for strained sighs and grunts of effort louder than the rustle of fabric and the thuds of feet shuffling around on the floor as he plundered your mouth, tongue chasing yours. It tasted like toothpaste and chapstick, like fresh mint leaves, like nurturing warmth cooling his into something calmer.

Rafayel’s hand left your face and slid down your back to seize your waist, dragging you closer, flushing your hips against his firmer and pushing his thigh more brashly. Not even a second later, his other hand bracing your wrist against the window pulled your arm into him to spin you around like in a dance, switching positions without breaking away.

And you bit him.

He recoiled with an “Ah,” that was more surprised than pained, drawing away just enough to swipe his thumb over the curve of his bottom lip where your teeth had punctured him.

“Why are you here?”

Something rotten and vicious was about to bare his fangs at you through a smile he barely stopped from telling on himself by holding back, ‘You called,’ from slipping.

The other, more acceptable answer came in a quick and effortless sweep of your legs off the floor, draping them over either side of his waist, one palm supporting you underneath like the cradle of a hammock as he pivoted towards the bed. “This is my room,” he said — low, simple, keeping eye contact to witness your frustration. “You’re the one who walked in here.”

He saw in the curl of your mouth that you would’ve continued arguing semantics if not for Rafayel bending to deposit you gently atop the bed for you to settle safely beneath him. The mattress creaked under his shifting as he eased further and started descending to resume getting lost in your kisses until a finger landed upon his lips.

“What I meant was,” you started, and Rafayel exhaled against your touch and nuzzled into it like an obedient pet coming to heel with a lowered tail before his master. “Shouldn’t you be at that art salon?”

He stared, blood about to keel over the boiling point.

His beloved was pouting. So adorable that he wanted to bite down.

You’d been so patient with him, hadn’t you? The little divot between your brows called out to Rafayel, begging to be kissed.

“I regret going in the first place,” he said, getting closer to breathe those words directly against the curve of your ear, savoring its delicate shell and the heat emanating from it against his lower lip — basking in the short tremble he could pull out of you that told him all he needed to know. “Stay here with me—”

His arm dipped around your waist and tugged you insistently closer, shakily eager, while your hands scrambled at his biceps, the side of your neck stretching upward to meet his halfway and melting further into him like candle wax molding against Rafayel and pooling liquid sweetness inside him like a basin filled.

Ring — ring — ring — ring — ring — ring — ring!

What the hell? Now?

A surge of irrational anger flared inside Rafayel, sharp and sudden, as if the hotel room phone had personally wronged him so bone-deep that his ancestors themselves had been insulted by its shrill, untimely ring. He clicked his tongue sharply against the roof of his mouth, a frustrated noise brimming with disdain as he reached out with the intention of silencing the nuisance immediately.

But before his hand could reach the red button, your fingers curled gently around his wrist, halting him mid-motion. The touch was soft, warm, and unassuming, yet it cut through his irritation more effectively than words ever could. His breath hitched as he glanced down at your hand, stilling under the quiet weight of what you were going to say next.

“Wait,” your dulcet murmur came. “What if it’s something important?”

More than this?

The irritation got you a side eye for that — but he quickly caught onto where this was heading from the way you gave him a pointed, sultry glance under your lashes and the faintest devilish curl at the corners at your lips. The grip around his wrist turned into your fingers interlacing with his as you guided him to accept the call, holding his gaze so intensely throughout that the beginning of the reception’s announcement went unheard in his ears.

“The guest of this room is unable to answer. Please leave a message."

Rafayel hadn’t even found a chance to breathe, let alone process what was even happening when you pushed him off and knocked him flat onto his back, straddling his hips with surprising speed which elicited an involuntary jolt from him.

He froze, breath caught somewhere between his lungs and the thick, burning, moistureless air that was overheating him. A thousand words tumbled in a rush into his mouth at once, all died under his breath in a sigh as his senses swam and short-circuited in response to your boldness, the sheer power radiating off your figure captivating him. For a single, stretched heartbeat, all he could do was look up — look at you.

The light from the ceiling framed your form in a way that bordered on divine, spilling past the loose strands of hair that fell around your face and catching on the curves of your silhouette like a lover's caress. Shadows slithered around you, dipping into the soft folds and valleys of the bathrobe that clung to you in all the places his gaze couldn’t help but follow.

And then the vision struck, slicing through his mind like a blade dragged cleanly through water.

No, you brought it to him, conjuring it as surely as though you had whispered it directly into his mind.

The blues wouldn’t just be blues — shadowy cobalt would bleed into the depths below, heavy and still, fading into fractured glacier blue as the water grew lighter near the surface, where the sun struggled to break through. The greens would soften into glassy jade, shimmering faintly, caught in the shifting light as if the water itself pulsed with life. Shadows would stretch in drenched charcoal, not oppressive but endless, framing the brightness above almost like curtains opening.

And there, close to the surface, you would hover like the sun underwater, light spilling from you in ripples and shards. Your form would glow with submerged gold, warm and radiant, a halo of sunlit pearl surrounding you where the sunlight hit the water and scattered around your silhouette. You wouldn’t simply stand still — you would drift, your movements impossibly fluid, arms outstretched in a gesture that could be comfort or inevitability, a quiet invitation to a homecoming. Shadows would gather around your curves in bruised honey, soft and subtle, fading into the glow that surrounded you, the kind of light that looked almost too warm to belong in the cold ocean.

The person who the painting was drawn from the perspective of would see you not as a person, but as something greater. His arms would float above him, slack and surrendered, the only movement from his fingers angled upwards, glowing faintly with washed ash gold, the last vestiges of warmth clinging to his skin, while the rest of his form darkened in the embrace of storm-drift gray. Faraway air bubbles would be glacier silver-blue catching the warm light as they ascended toward the unreachable surface, reflections flickering like distant stars against the background of salt-shadow teal.

This was a homecoming.

The bursting of colors landing on his imaginary canvas came to a head when the branding heat of your mouth found his ear, screeching into stuttered motion and scattering like seagulls afterwards. His head lolled sideways under the zapping pressure, inviting more of the world-halting caress that left him all limp.

Then it was gone — only a cool tingling remained where yout moist breaths once ghosted him —

"Hey bro, why'dya leave? Get back here—"

Shocked as if he had short time memory about it being a voice message, he squirmed for a beat, eyes flitting in panic between the call display and you with the mortification of every single drop of blood in his body rushing southwards.

His friend’s voice fractured into static buzzing under the pounding of his ears when you bowed forward once more, towards the red mark on top of his mark that was practically vibrating under his skin, trailing kisses across its glow. Every skin contact point with you burned even with the layers of clothing in-between, melting into an acute throb as you reached the base of his throat and dipped into the hollow between his collarbones — fingers dancing along the strip of his neckpiece before delving underneath, dragging down and delicately, deliciously tugging.

That was all it took for Rafayel to flip your positing and roll you beneath his body, propping himself up with one forarm and holding your wrist to just — stop you for a minute, expression tight as he asked, “Are you sure?”

Your intentions were crystal clear, but it was necessary to check in before continuing any further even though he needed this like air right now, and the prospect of hearing it straight from your lips that he was wanted —

Looking somewhere off to the side, you replied, “Otherwise you’ll actually go back,” thoughtfully, but there was something resentful in there, the statement almost bitter sounding in its delivery.

The overjoyed press of his lips to hide the smile he just knew would annoy you betrayed what he was thinking on the spot.

“So cute,” breached containment however, full of affection as he moved aside your hair behind your ear tenderly, fore and middle fingers taking your love’s sensitive edge between them and caressing, causing you to turn your face further away from him. “You must have missed me quite a lot.”

That sentence was accompanied by the press of his knee into the junction between your inner thighs, innocent enough unless you factored in that one certain revelation of earlier that entirely changed the context in intent. Especially when your pupils dilated visibly before him as you choked out a tiny gasp of surprise, revealing your guilt in glaring clarity.

“What, not pleased you got caught?”

A wicked impulse seized him — one daring him to keep playing this card to unlock so many possibilities as to how he could have you tonight.

He could have you show him what you’d done while he watched until you begged to be touched — on your back with legs wide open for his viewing pleasure, or hovering right above his face in 4K Ultra HD quality that he could just lay down and enjoy and perhaps contribute with his breath if he felt generous enough. You were having fun all on your own, yeah? He just wanted in on it. Not knowing wasn’t a sin, but not learning was.

If you didn’t think you were ready to bear the consequences of this decision of yours, you should have rethought before choosing the room he frequented, shouldn’t have turned him into a fish out of water in public by calling out to him like that, should have known better that Rafayel could be the vilest when he was provoked.

“Or, are you?”

His words were a double-edged knife. Pick the surface-level meaning and you ended up with him teasing you about missing him quite literally, nothing more, nothing less. Take him for what lay beneath, however...

Unfortunately, or, fortunately, you were one slippery fish.

"Why should I be ashamed?" The confidence that dripped from your reply rang genuine. You were so unbothered by his instigation that he realized this was going to be harder than expected, perhaps more rewarding as well. A delightful prospect. "Do you wish I wouldn't miss you?"

Oh, your pride, your grudge was truly an impressive sight —

gleaming razor-sharp even under scrutiny, glittering steel reflecting his image in fragments, and yet tempered by enough warmth to invite him closer instead of warding him off.

"Not at all." His heart sang. "But it couldn't compare to how much I missed you."

"And you still left," came a mumble, sounding more dejected than anything, carrying the weight of his deeds for the past two days.

It was that easy to change his mood.

Rafayel cooed instinctively, rubbing soothing circles into the skin above your knuckles as he pressed a string of quick kisses into the curve of your wrist — lips brushing tender apologies along its path until he reached the palm of your hand cupping his face, where he lingered to feel you stroke delicately over his lower lashes.

"I'm here now," was his gentle promise, one spoken nuzzled against the backs of your fingers. "I'm not going anywhere."

"What are you going to say to your friend? You didn't even pick up his call," you admonished softly, drawing his attention towards where the voicemail was still being displayed on the hologram screen hovering from the nightstand, accepting a prompt about how to proceed.

Rafayel made a show of leaning back to sit back on his heels, staring down at you as he slipped his fingers underneath the tightly-belted thick, sash-like band to pop the clasp to the side apart, the metal closure disengaging with a small clack as the ends slid free and exposed the zipper underneath.

He drank in your every reaction — every detail of you sprawled out before him: your robe coming undone ever so gradually, tantalizing glimpses of skin peeking between its parted folds, a little bit of collarbone here, the curve of your breast there, teasingly hinting at the shape of a nipple underneath the white fabric, then another flash of thigh, an exposed inch of inner leg from your feet shifting restlessly alongside his shins.

He pulled the whole belt free in one smooth yank — the sudden momentum making it snap with a harsh crack. It curled like a ribbon in his palm as he surveyed you, gauging your reaction; watching your widened stare catch onto cloth held loosely in his fist as he flung it haphazardly to the side.

Then, he started tugging at your ankle to raise it higher — dragging his knuckles along your heel, the sole of your foot, caressing into the arch of your instep, traveling along the softness of your calf all the way down to your knee, a single fingertip trailing underneath, slinking gradually but surely toward the inner side, tracing hypnotic spirals into the silky flesh that made your breathing hitch unevenly.

The ends of your robe were riding further up past your thigh along with the slow march, your naked skin revealed in gradual increments the higher his palm slid — revealing more and more until his hand stopped at the underside of your thigh, entirely disappeared from view because of the bunched up cloth, and pulled your leg up gently to drape it over the curve of waist.

Falling right back in on instinct, he leaned down, propped above your splayed form on his forearm beside your shoulder and bent to drag his nose upwards along the line of your cheekbone, saying, "I'm busy."

Your answering snicker was endearing and familiar, drawing forth a swell of warmth inside him like the sun rising over a tranquil ocean's horizon. "Still trying to run away?"

“Just returning to the original plan.”

There would be no running away now — not anymore, not ever, at least not from you and what you made him feel. He'd tried; failed, obviously, as evident in his return here, where the answer awaited him with open arms.

"Who says I'm going to agree? I still haven't forgiven you.”

Rafayel adored that one pout of yours, the one that curved at its edges like the swoop of a bird's wing, delicate and lovingly rounded in its downturned shape. It drew his mouth upward to meet its match, slotting perfectly against its twin seamlessly in the union of a kiss, lingering as if they belonged together like puzzle pieces. You melted sweetly under the fondness contained within the gesture, sighing quietly in surrender; every angle of his mouth was drawn to yours inexorably, it was gravity pulling falling stars back to their courses.

"Not yet," he amended dutifully once he could manage words again, and felt your smile widen before sealing his mouth over it. "Let me."

"If you beg," you shot right back, the curve of your mouth pronounced against his chin, smug satisfaction dripped from every word and its delivery as you pulled away again just enough to meet his half-hooded stare evenly — daring him to refuse you. "Properly."

You kissed the little groan that was about to spill past his lips, but it wasn’t enough to satisfy him. Neither was it intended to.

"How would you like me to repent?" He dragged the question into an offer, a honey trap ripe for plundering. "On my knees? On my back?"

He let his arousal to show on his fact at those mental images, conjured by practiced ease, crafted to seduce. The soft puff of your exhale danced across his chin, sending his nerves tingling. A sign he was on the right track? Or did it merely betray surprise at whatyou had in mind? Either possibility stirred his blood.

"You know what someone in your position shouldn’t do?" you whispered, low and hushed, conspiratorial yet laced with a dangerous authority that quickened his pulse. His brows rose involuntarily, the shift in your tone sending anticipation skittering down his spine. Your lashes swept low, casting faint shadows on your cheeks as your pointed stare locked onto him, sharp enough to pierce. "Ask me what to do when you’re supposed to be coming up with ideas on your own. That’s weaponized incompetence."

His head snapped back so fast that something audibly clicked in his neck.

Mouth wide open.

"Weaponized in—" The sensual, submissive haze he’d been wrapped in evaporated like morning dew under the brutal heat of the desert sun, vanishing so quickly it left him sputtering. The words faltered on his tongue as insult overtook every carefully cultivated mood, his composure fracturing into clumsy indignation. Propped up on his elbows above you, his face twisted into a comically muddied mix of offense and disbelief, his tone taking on an incredulous sharpness as he glared down at you.

"Say that again and I’ll spit bubbles at you!" he snapped, his threat hanging in the air like a gauntlet thrown by a petulant prince.

"Pffft!"

The insolent brat you were being in that moment, daring to laugh straight in his face, was both impossibly cute and maddeningly infuriating. He stared down at you, eyes narrowing with mock offense, the knowledge that your laughter was entirely at his expense gnawing at his frayed patience. He was torn between kissing you senseless or flipping you over and finding some other way to wipe that smug, adorable smirk off your face.

"What do you mean weaponized incompetence?" Rafayel shot back, the words almost trembling with disbelief. "You think I can't please you properly without you guiding me through it step-by-step? Is that what you're saying?!" His irritation swelled, a balloon of indignation puffing up and threatening to burst as he fought, tooth and nail, to keep the whine rising in his throat from escaping. "I like you telling me what to do because I enjoy indulging in your desires! Not because I’m incapable of being creative in bed!"

A frustrated huff crowned his ranting, "Stop laughing!" he barked, though his rising pitch only seemed to add fuel to your uncontrollable amusement.

You shook your head firmly, slapping your hands over your face to muffle the sounds of your laughter, but it was no use. Your entire body curled inward instinctively, knees drawing up as you rolled to your side, burying yourself deeper into the cocoon of your mirth. It only made it worse for his pride — your stifled giggles shaking through you like tremors, every failed attempt to contain yourself sending them bubbling up again.

Rafayel let out a growl of frustration, throwing his body off yours with an exaggerated thud, landing face-first into the pillow beside you in utter defeat. The mattress jolted slightly from the force, but the muffled yell he buried into the pillow caused a chain reaction that only made your laughter harder to suppress. The giggles came fast and bright, and he swore they sounded far too gratifying for his current temperament, his scowl deepening with every shake of your shoulders and every wheezing gasp for air that he felt in the bed, he didn’t even need to look.

The fact that you were utterly immune to his wrath, impervious to every “Stop,” he threw your way, made it all the more maddening. How was he supposed to maintain the upper hand, to reestablish even a shred of dignity, when he couldn’t even intimidate you?

"I'm sorry," you gasped finally, though the apology was weakened by the cracks of laughter still slipping through. You managed to sit upright, though it took visible effort, your hands brushing away tears from the corners of your crinkled, joy-stricken eyes. A few lingering giggles escaped as you cleared your throat, attempting to sound sincere but failing miserably. "I didn’t think you’d have such strong feelings about this topic."

Rafayel lifted his head from the pillow, his hair disheveled, his glare shooting daggers your way, though the deep flush blooming across his cheeks betrayed his struggle to keep his composure. He opened his mouth to retort, to say something, but instead all that escaped was a muffled, irritated groan as he flopped back down into the pillow.

“Rafayel.”

He rolled onto his back with dramatic flair, hands folded primly over his stomach and ankles crossed, the picture of theatrical innocence. The pout he wore, however, was pure spite, lips pushed forward just enough to make his point. “If you think I’m sooo weaponizing my incompetence, maybe I should actually start doing that. Let you handle everything yourself. Clearly, you’ve got it all figured out.”

“Rafayel…”

“No, no, go ahead,” he cut in, stubbornly resolute, almost belligerent in its exaggerated persistence. “I’m useless, right? I don’t know what I’m doing. Teach me. I won’t even lay a single finger on you.” He puffed his cheeks, a childish act of defiance paired with the way he turned his head away, sulking with the finesse of spoiled royalty.

The exaggerated display drew a sigh from you, long and exasperated, but tinged with a quiet amusement that he didn’t miss. He wasn’t fooling you — not for a second—but he relished the moment all the same.

“Well,” you began, feigning hesitation, with false reluctance. “Since you’re already laid out, I guess…” You trailed off as you shifted to straddle him, slow enough to test the limits of his so-called resolution, the soft white robe you wore parting ever so slightly as you moved, revealing tantalizing glimpses of skin before your knees closed firmly around his hips, framing him like twin prison bars.

His eyes darkened as he watched you, taking in the sight hungrily, every detail sinking into him like a drug he couldn’t resist. His hands betrayed him almost immediately, fingertips skimming the hem of the robe where it hung loosely, their touch feather-light as they ghosted over the tops of your thighs. It was instinctive, reflexive — completely unrepentant.

“I thought you weren’t touching me,” you teased with a playful lilt that interrupted the heat thickening the air between you like an unwanted knock on the door.

His hum was deliberately innocent, his head tilting as though to feign ignorance. But the dark gleam in his eyes and the smirk curling at the corners of his lips told a different story entirely. “I really like this robe,” he murmured with a calculated drawl. “What, I can’t touch my own clothes now?”

The claim was absurd — blatantly so — but it made you pause, his fingers grazing the fabric in question as though testing its texture, when in reality, it was clear he was savoring the warmth of your skin beneath it.

(Truthfully, it was also you who looked lovely draped in what was his — but that went without saying.)

Your mouth opened, the gleam of a retort on the tip of your tongue, but the words dissolved into nothingness as his hands shifted, palms hot against your sides, skirting along your ribs in an intentional, testing motion. He knew the heat of his touch stole the breath from your lungs, burning through the fabric like a spark setting fire to paper.

“You go on,” he said, infuriatingly smug as he leaned back into the pillows, his hands never straying far from your sides. “Help yourself. Take as long as you need. I’ll just… be appreciating this fabric in the meantime.”

His fingers traced the lines of your ribs, the motion slow, languid, before sliding downward to hover just above the curve of your stomach. They lingered there, resting near the knot of the belt holding your robe together. The edge of his thumb dipped just slightly beneath the fabric, brushing over its folded loops, a movement so subtle it was barely there, as though he wanted to test how much he could push you. He toyed with the fabric, rolling it between his fingers like he was unraveling a puzzle.

The pause in his pent-up desire — the break that had proven to be a blessing — was wearing thin. The front he was putting on, all casual indifference and smug bravado, was crumbling, betrayed by the way his gaze kept flickering back to you, and, of course, the growing press of his impatience beneath you, hard and neglected, made it abundantly clear that he was more than ready to pick up where you’d last left off.

You broke first.

With nary a warning, your hand shot out, snatching the ends of the thin, ribbon-like scarf draped loosely around his neck. You wound the fabric around your fist once, twice, tightening it just enough to make your intentions clear…

Then you yanked.

The pull wasn’t violent — no, it was far too calculated for that. Enough pressure to catch him off guard, to tip him forward slightly, but not enough to hurt. It was a demand, plain and simple, one he found himself surrendering to before he even had the chance to consider resistance. His wide-eyed surprise melted almost instantly like cotton candy in water into something darker, something sharper, as his lips curled into a grin that spoke volumes about just how much he was enjoying this game.

"First, you ask to beg for my forgiveness," you continued, pulling him a little closer, and his chest tightened as though the leash around his neck extended all the way to his lungs.

Your gaze pinned him down like a blade, your lips curving into something that wasn’t quite a smirk, wasn’t quite a smile — something far more addictive.

"And then," you murmured, sweet but laced with unmistakable bite, "you start ordering me around like a brat."

A jolt of concentrated heat shot through him, not from embarrassment but from the sharp edge of thrill that ran through his veins. He let the tension in his body slacken just slightly, a calculated move that allowed him to lift from the bed a little, meeting your challenge with his own. The faint tug of the scarf against his neck only heightened the electric energy between you, and he found himself biting back a grin.

“Well," he said at last, letting his weight sink into the bed with a noncommittal shrug, the barest shift of his shoulders enough to convey his defiance. "I’m just playing my part." He tilted his head just enough to make the scarf strain, wanted to see what you’d do with the provocation. “The sleazy husband.”

“You want a reward for that?”

“Acknowledgment of how committed to the role I am would be nice.”

“Oh yes, the most infuriating actor—”

“Aaand you goofed it—”

“—impossibly—”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah—”

“—handsome," you went on, and his smirk faltered ever so slightly. “Disarmingly clever, annoyingly witty," you added, the sharp edge softening with each word, though the grip you kept on the scarf didn’t loosen. If anything, you pulled him closer, closing the space between you inch by inch. "—and worst of all," you finished, dropping into something softer, something so intimate, "Completely, devastatingly, undeniably competent."

“Well, aren’t you good at apologizing…” he said into himself, embarrassingly beet-red at having fallen for your trick.

“I’m still waiting for yours, you know,” you pointed out distractedly, playing with the crystal flame lilies scattered on his wine berry shirt, tracing the petals of a bloom while seemingly entranced, following the silvery droplets dangling in a chain. “But I’ll be graceful this time and keep going with mine...”

Before he had a chance to blink or register the motion — your free palm slipped underneath the thin fabric covering his heart, caressing right alongside the pulsing red mark — and squeezed with a vengeance (such a fierce boob grab!), applying enough pressure that the pads of your fingers sunk into flesh, then widened the buttonless V-cut of his shirt by yanking, no, downright ripping it open by the lapels with both hands, and Rafayel damn near felt like a virgin at how scandalous that single action was that he almost covered himself up.

But then again, he could hardly claim innocence right now, could he? He was practically a champagne bottle about to pop down there. Just from that. Who was he, the main female character getting her corset ripped in a bodice-ripper novel?

“Ohmyg—hi? What happened to hello? How are y—”

“Shut up or no head.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Kisses were rained along his collarbone, the length of his neck, and nipping gently at the spot behind his ear that got the hairs on his nape rise to attention. It would’ve been funny what a child’s play it was to tease him until his ears matched the scarlet blossoms on his shirt, except nothing about this particular situation bore humor — least of all, his response to it.

Which was practically none at all. Because he simply lay there, stiff as a plank from how turned on he was, and you worked him diligently as if he was an instrument and you were the virtuoso.

It was also because he was zeroed in on the cleavage peeking out from the gap in your robe as you made your way further downwards, tongue flickering along the dips and bumps of his upper abdomen — surely able to feel more than hear each inhale and exhale getting closer to moaning territory the longer you kept teasing. He even caught a nip slip here and there, getting impossibly harder in response, culminating in him twitching and tightening beneath you whenever you — purposefully! — brushed against his erection.

“Rafayel,” you sighed dreamily, and he moaned for real this time at how his name fell softly past your parted lips, pouring into a pleased hum against his navel where a trail of wetness gleamed — followed by fingertips curling gently around the hem of his pants’ band. “You’re so quiet. Not leaving it up to chance, huh?”

And the only response he gave was an impatient roll of his hips toward your head, granting you permission — eager acquiescence, even — while a loud, unabashed gasp slipped into his lungs as your hands found the zipper of his pants. With a practiced tug, you freed it from its track, and his pants slid low on his hips, just enough to reveal the waistband of his underwear. Your fingers followed immediately, hooking under both fabric barriers to ease them down until they rested tautly just below his hips. The motion tugged on his shirt as well, once secured by the overlap tucked into his waistband, and with nothing anchoring it anymore, the luxurious fabric parted effortlessly, exposing the sculpted expanse of his chest and abs in one sweeping reveal. His stiffening length, freed from its confines, ached visibly — leaping subtly toward contact, as though craving the touch it had been denied for far too long.

"See? You're being so good... why do you keep wanting to provoke me?" came your lilting reproach, spoken against the soft skin of his pelvis, lips fluttering teasingly across its planes in playful grazes of their silky plush. "

“Permission to talk?”

A sharp, in-drawn breath escaped him the moment a single finger traced along the underside of his shaft, lingering over a wildly pulsing vein — evidence of the frenetic race of his heart currently pumping pure liquid lightning straight through his veins — but he recovered quickly, allowing it to dissolve into an exhale long and drawn-out instead.

“Go ahead, handsome.”

His hips lurched instinctively in search of something tangible, of a sensation besides the torturous tickle of warm breaths dancing lightly along his arousal, "Give me my reward, then. I've waited so long for this, it's been torture."

“Doesn’t sound like you minded the wait. You left me, didn’t you?”

Ah, yes. The grudge. You were becoming like Rafayel the longer you stayed by his side.

"You know I hate waiting. Let alone like this," he said, all whiny and punctuated with a shudder — one that was met with an accompanying jolt that surged straight from the base of his erection when your lips brushed teasingly alongside it. "I didn't think you'd be this cruel..."

"Are you really asking?"

"Can you give it to me instead of wasting time talking?" came his blunt retort, brows drawn together in an impatient furrow that radiated ‘I’m being wronged,’ energy.

"Not wasting time at all, just wanted to spend more time with you. Feels nice, right? You deserve this,” you murmured comfortingly against the swell of his abs rising and falling with each heavy breath — and oh, he almost melted into a puddle at that, visibly deflating with his chest cavity just filling up all warm and fuzzy with love.

It did feel nice but — just — just — fuck — he needed to be touched or he actually was going to disintegrate into sea foam. Not joking.

A brief kiss landed on on the left side of his Apollo belt in consolation before a drag of your tongue along its path followed, transitioning into you breathing more warmth directly into his base, then placing a loving peck to his tip — eyes twinking at the tremble that surged through him. “I really love seeing you so reactive. Does it feel that good? Just breathing on you like this?”

His hips pushed upward in tiny nudges, bumping insistently against your cheek, practically begging to be held properly inside your mouth. "It doesn't feel good at all — just, come on, hurry... I keep my lube in the top drawer on the left... It's edible, you know..."

Thankfully, you didn't smirk at him. Didn't stop to tease him about his eagerness, either, wordlessly going about reaching over to rummage for a bottle in his nightstand — an act that forced you to draw away from his straining member completely, your warmth vanishing suddenly in one agonizing instant, causing him to nearly whine from the loss.

You popped open the lid to squirt some lubrication into your palm and recapped it while staring down at him with a curious gleam. "You had something like this with you the whole time—"

Your words got cut off upon him grabbing your dripping hand and directing it straight where his impatience stood angry at the delay, shuddering out a moan at how incredibly silky the glide was.

"Finally... yesss," he hissed, thrusting upwards to feel more friction — the delicious slickness spreading across your enclosed grip driving him absolutely wild. "Ahh—kkhfff... Keep going, you have to keep going, don't let go... Please. Please?”

Something in your face twisted weirdly at his breathy begging, making his heart flip at the unflinching lust in your widened gaze trained firmly onto his jerking hips.

He had your fist trapped around his swollen cock, urging you into pumping it once you settled into a steady rhythm stroking its turgid crown, twisting and curling into each new swipe upwards along his pulsing flesh; encouraging you by squeezing tighter every few strokes until you took over completely. Then, he threw his arm over his forehead haphazardly, basking in the blissful waves flowing through his veins at long last, watching you watch yourself pleasure him through fluttering lashes, breathing hard through half-parted lips.

"That's it," he sighed huskily, rocking his body into the hand rubbing and grinding against his dick's ridge with expert motions; thumb circling its glistening head and caressing alongside its slit where precome beaded out generously, smoothing over the entirety of its surface and working into the underside, swirling tantalizingly over the bulging vein there until all his thoughts melted into a haze of pure sensation, mind wiped clean of everything except the singular, simple fact that he desperately needed to come. "Like that — nnhhh, yes! That feels amazing — feels perfect — love those sweet little fingers... So close already, I can't, I can't—"

At his muttered groans, your pace stuttered noticeably before resuming its previous speed, which wasn't fast enough according to the stretching throb inside his core, his blood rushing loudly through his ears like boiling rapids. "No, faster..." he urged you, rutting into your palm even harder in a frantic effort to increase the pressure and bring him to the precipice quicker. "I can't hold on much longer — need more, I need more. Tighter. Tighter."

The corners of his vision pulsed white and Rafayel whimpered as he jumped inside your curled fist when the unexpected sensation of having your forefinger slide through his sticky fluids gathered at its tip, swirling clockwise before ascending back up in an unhurried stroke that carried a slippery coating alongside it to smooth out the glide to put pressure right into the slit — a sensation that lingered for seconds afterward with ghostly echoes, drawing a sudden choked gasp from his lips at how intensely good that single touch felt.

“Thaaaaat’s it, yeah, I love that, you have such a beautiful voice.” Your free palm swept up alongside his ribs to rub gently against their curve as though to soothe the ragged sounds ripping past his throat; traveling upward to cradle his head against yours where your cheek brushed alongside his temple, holding him still with tender care and easing some of the tremble wracking through him. "Can you feel how much I'm enjoying us being together like this — how badly I've missed you? Please let me hear those pretty sounds, I wanna hear them loud and clear. Will you be generous for me and share it all?"

His reply died in his throat in favor of a low keening sound — something raw and broken — when you squeezed tighter.

The way your nails dug ever so delicately into the sides of his cock, applying pressure just shy of pain was truly exquisite torture, making his head swim and rise up from the bed so he could crush his lips against yours, biting hungrily into your plush mouth and delving deep into its depths until oxygen became nothing but an afterthought. Every neuron of him burned alive in chain reaction as your tongue wound and slid alongside his, curling along the underside before retreating for him to suckle on your lower lip eagerly until it swelled red.

"Mmnghhfuck! Hhhaaa—keep—" Words spilled past his slackened lips like ribbons unfurling, senseless as he struggled to convey how excruciating it was to contain his euphoria within, desperate for any sort of outlet to relieve the pressure rising inside him rapidly —

— and then broke off suddenly on a low moan when he caught a flash of your unoccupied hand that was just cradling his neck having found its way between your thighs, the view out of sight because of the robe —

Then, Rafayel saw the pearly gates.

His orgasm slammed straight into him, so unexpected and yet wholly expected all the same that he gasped around it like he was in a headlock, utterly disoriented by the sudden assault on his senses, soaring impossibly higher with each jerk of his hips into your fingers' grasp and shooting thick white streaks across his stomach; leaving behind faint smears wherever it hit its mark — warm, sticky ropes landing atop his defined abs and even reaching as far as his sternum.

He knew something was wrong when it didn't stop.

Far from it, really: each pulsing contraction seemed to force more of its fluid past his cock's narrow slit, painting your pumping digits liberally with his release — even staining the lapels of your robe in messy spots. It lasted so long that Rafayel started seeing stars sparkling around the edges of his blurring vision; making everything appear fuzzy like static. "Nggh—too much—ah! Aaa—hhh! Nnhhfff... Khhffffcking hell... Can't believe—still going—"

"Don't hold back now, just ride it out, nothing wrong with it," you murmured fervently, brushing some hair back from his sweat-soaked temple and — then — kisses, so many kisses. "I know you wanted this so badly, it's okay... You deserve this. Let go for me, yeah? Can't you let go for me? All this stress will go away. Isn't that nice?"

What came out instead was an embarrassingly high moan, hoarse with overuse, entirely at odds with the self-assuredness he'd wanted to project with each thrust of his hips, spurred onwards by instinct alone in a mad dash for euphoria.

Just how pent-up was he?

He couldn't recall the last time he'd felt pleasure this acute, sharp as shrapnel beneath the layers of desire, making him so out of it that he wasn't even aware of the embarrassing mess he made like he’d just wet himself being cleaned up with a tissue by you.

And it still wasn't nearly enough.

He surged forward, wound his arm around your waist and tossed you to the side gently so your back lay flush against the sheets before following suit in a tangle of limbs that ended with you under him — where he belonged: cradled between your thighs, seated fully inside their heated clasp as he hovered above you — one elbow propped beside your shoulder while the other wandered aimlessly downwards and undid the trusty knot holding your robe together in one go.

"Rafa—"

“Sorry, I'm sorry, I can't, I'm so thirsty," he said, as he raised the lube-and-come-sodden hand of yours up to his mouth to lap at the trails trickling over your wrist; sucking on your fingertips in apology — no trace of shame coloring his cheeks as he did, far too focused on the task of cleaning them thoroughly to be distracted by something as trivial as embarrassment. He didn’t even taste himself. Just the blueberry.

So engrossed in it that he didn’t even notice you burning holes with your gaze at his lips sealing around your thumb while he ran his tongue underneath it in short, quick flicks until it was glistening once more, except this time with spit instead of lubricant.

All the while, he traced the clean strip of skin revealed by the parted folds of your robe with a searing hand, starting from the valley of your cleavage between your breasts all the way down the slight convex curve of your torso leading towards the V that marked the point where your thighs began, drawing delicate circles into your navel, slipping downward inch by tantalizing inch in search for hidden oasis.

Taking notice of how wrecked you looked through the curtains of your fingers splayed over his eyes and forehead, Rafayel rewarded you an equally debauched looked as his lips curled into a smirk against your palm.

A loud, viscous pop of your wetness echoed in the room when his fingers tenderly made contact — positively dripping for him. Your mouth flew open upon feeling him draw his forefinger's pad gently against your entrance, lingering teasingly at the seams in an excruciating crawl, tracing lightly around it as you pulsed hungrily against his fingertip.

"So thirsty," he mumbled absentmindedly to himself — mouth watering.

Rafayel pushed open your legs by the backs of your thighs to allow his head better access. If he was on a normal day, he would plant feverish kisses on the insides of your quaking knees and thighs and mark you everywhere, made it more sensual, more teasing, but he was borderline parched — not to mention more impatient than a driver stuck behind a cyclist in a one -lane road.

You yelped at his mouth diving between your legs in reckless abandon. His tongue lapped up your slick in deep, obscene flicks, then plunged inside into the warm haven awaiting him inside, devouring your sweet nectar in loud slurps, uncaring of how sloppy and unrestrained he was currently acting; far too hungry to concern himself over anything save for indulging greedily in your flavor.

"Rafayel, shit, that feels—oh my god..." He had to push your hips down by splaying his hand along the plane of your stomach as you arched helplessly, otherwise you would have simply lifted right off from his greed ravaging you without mercy or restraint. "That's so—you're so—fuck! What—what’s gotten into you? Ahh...!"

Any hope of responding to that died the second your hand tangled itself tightly into his hair and tugged to bring him impossibly closer against you, his head blanking. It felt so good when your heel planted itself onto his shoulder blade and pressed insistently there in a silent plea for more, sending ripples of heat fanning out across his nerve endings in their wake.

Without hesitation, he latched his lips around the swollen bud peaking proudly from beneath a layer of velveteen flesh and flicked upwards, suckling hard before closing around it fully — then rolled his tongue in circles around its rim with the intent to render your world spinning madly with each passing stroke. The fingers locked around your trembling thighs kneaded deeply into their skin, coaxing the delicious, involuntary spasms coursing throughout you until the only thing you knew was the blissful torment his hot mouth wrought.

"You're so delectable on my tongue, did you know? The prettiest moans come pouring out from your lovely lips when I'm between your legs like this," he said, the sentences pieced together like beads on a pearl necklace fragment by fragment between licks and sucks, sounding just short of reverence. "Your taste drives me wild, I swear it's addictive... Am I making it up to you yet? Please say yes. Tell me it's working."

"Yesyesyesyesss—" A sharp inhale cut off anything else you tried to babble further as Rafayel rewarded you with another generous helping of his enthusiasm by diving back in and running his tongue in earnest up through your center. "You feel amazing, you — feel — so — g-good—"

"—don't think that's enough, though. Didn't you call me incompetent earlier?"

"What," you choked out angrily when a puff of warm breaths skated dangerously close to where you were most sensitive. "Oh my god—"

"I hold grudges, cutie. You taught me that," he said in a sing-song reply, lighthearted in tone, nearly drowned out by the thready groans bleeding through.

"I apologized already — what more do you want? Stop teasing, Rafayel!"

A pregnant pause followed as he stared up at you from between your legs, and saw your eyes widen with realization at just what you'd requested.

"As you wish," he relented, a dark edge to his mischievous grin when he rose back up and braced his knees against the mattress better, pulling your hips tight into the cradle of his thighs until one of your legs was thrown over his shoulder. "Have it your way — and don't forget you asked for this."

The slow sink inside your wet heat was traitorously misleading: a gentle, sweet meeting at first that masked what was brewing underneath.

A dragged out whine fanned his flames as you threw your head back. “You asshole—”

"I could have made you come once, twice..." he said, in a smooth purr that dripped sinfully past his lips.

Your mouth fell open on a silent gasp; the first wave of pleasure rolling through you upon being filled suddenly in one deep plunge. Your torso twisted to allow you to hide your face into the curve of his forearm draped next to your shoulder.

"You know I love taking my time with you," he continued, pausing to bury his face into your hair to breathe you in deeply, adjusting your leg to fall from his shoulder straight onto his hip. You took advantage of Rafayel getting close, grabbing onto his back so quickly that you missed the first time and yanked his shirt down to bunch halfway down his midsection and get stuck at his elbows. "And you just had to take that from me. I don't know which one of us is greedier... "

An apology was voiced, muffled by the crook of his elbow, almost incoherent by your gasps.

He cupped your chin and made you look at him. “Are you comfortable? Not hurting you, am I?”

Your throat clicked audibly. Then you shook your head rapidly in answer to both inquiries: yes — no — everything was okay — and Rafayel breathed a quiet sigh of relief.

And then, out of nowhere your fingers started moving around the expanse of his upper back, and before he could question the non-sexual way it came across when he was literally inside you, you said, "You're sweating."

"Yeah...?" Confusion muddled his hazy mind clouded with dull pleasure begging for him to start moving again, but you looked at him with wide, eager expectation dancing behind your expectant eyes — as if you couldn't quite believe what you'd seen.

"No — your temperature. It's still high but you're sweating now," you told him excitedly. "Rafayel — that's huge! This means your body is cooling itself down!"

He huffed.

"Of course it is, I've got the hottest woman in the world under me," he said with a roll of his hips, earning an enthusiastic moan from you in the process. Your arms snaked themselves around the back of his neck tighter until both forearms crossed at their crease, palms moving upwards in an intoxicating drag through the back of his skull. "You the cure to all of this..."

His forehead dropped unceremoniously yours where it stayed, and he sucked in an uneven, shaky groan that tapered into something resembling a whine as he started rutting steadily against you, driving into that spot where you liked it the best with growing desperation with the occasional staccato grunt at the fluttering squeeze and murmured encouragement.

At some point, his mouth wandered towards your pulse, scraped his teeth against it gingerly before latching on it in an open-mouthed kiss that was hard enough to bruise.

You tilted your chin skywards with a sigh to give him better access and tangled your fingers encouragingly deeper into his hair, and something inside him sparked awake in response, a fiery need demanding him to paint every inch of your skin violet, rose and mauve so that it may glow evermore brightly for everyone to see —

"Way too beautiful for your own good... Driving me crazy... Every single day... Couldn't keep my hands off you the moment I got in here..." he hissed furiously as though he were possessed, snapping his hips harder upon finding the angle he desired, searching relentlessly for something within you both to satisfy the frenzied race to the peak taking control of him completely; searing kisses littering everywhere he could reach along the underside of your chin and neck whilst spewing senseless litanies into your skin in between them. "Can't believe I could have this forever... Right? Say I can have this forever. It'll drive me insane if you don't, I swear—"

"Forever," you echoed hoarsely, your nails digging tightly into his scalp as his pace increased once more. "Y-you can have me forever—anytime, wherever—"

Your assurances came with a startled cry of ecstasy as he sank his teeth into the juncture connecting your shoulder and collarbone in a bite that bordered on a savage instinct to ensure he was there, he'd been there, and would always be there. "You're not leaving, are you? Aren't gonna leave me anytime soon, right?

Every syllable was marked with a measured grind into you as if determined to force every word inside your head by burying it deep in your core — imprint it permanently into your brain; until the only thing filling your thoughts was him and him alone. "Not letting you — I'm not letting you. I can’t let you go, it’s too late — too late. Say it. Say it.”

"As — many times as I ne-ed to," you panted underneath him, arching upwards so beautifully for him as his grip loosened marginally to let you find that perfect angle that caused your back to bow like a perfectly tuned instrument in his hands; singing nothing but divine music. "'S not changing, ever. Won't change... Agh!"

His hips bucked in answer to your nails sinking deep into the skin of his shoulders as though clawing for dear life. "Yeah? Yeah? Promise—?"

All you could do was sob into his mouth hungrily swallowing yours — a mess of moans falling endlessly past your lips swallowed whole, accompanied with plaps and slaps of wet thrusting. There'd never be a time when he wasn't craving the taste of your flesh burning scorching white hot against his own, craving more and more until everything blurred into a haze of delirium.

"Tell me... Tell me—hah, tell me, princess. Let me hear it..." His chest rumbled deep within where yours rubbed deliciously against his bare flesh with each fervent roll of his body. Even then, it wasn't nearly enough; couldn't possibly be, not with how ravenously thirsty he was for anything and everything having to do with you: your sounds, your expressions, those intoxicating stares filled with nothing but need for him and only him. Not while his stomach twisted itself in knots tight enough to tie sails and yet remained impossibly empty at the same time, yearning for the sweet relief of gratification flowing freely and quenching his deepest thirst. "Wanna hear you, gotta hear you say it—"

"I'm right here, m'here, not going anywhere, not leaving... I'myours, just don't let go, don't let go of me—"

He heard it as though you were underwater; faint, muffled underneath the thick fog clouding his senses, so indistinct yet simultaneously loud enough to drown out anything else within reach.

Every coherent thought vanished from his mind, melting into thin ribbons streaming across an ocean of red flames, then bursting forth anew into embers scattering throughout his vision in a dizzying display, igniting behind his eyelids with blinding light every time he blinked them closed. When he opened them, new constellations blossomed instantaneously; bright orange ones with maroon tinges shining bright among the black canvas.

"M'not gonna—! Can't let go—couldn't even if I tried. They wouldn't even be able to pry you away from my cold, dead hands."

More vivid blotches appeared before him at random intervals, painting his desert landscape in abstract patterns shifting so erratically they threatened to form fractals at any moment, jagged shapes overlapping and warping themselves until they resembled colorful stains splattered across walls in chaotic messes; or perhaps simply the shadows of clouds skirting the edges of his sight drifting past without a care — all blending together and merging seamlessly as though water droplets bleeding into fine lines until none could tell where one ended and the others began.

"Gonna be... gonna be stuck with me for life," Rafayel said, sounding entirely half out of his mind with the way he was babbling endearments (something about a bride) in-between little laps that trailed upwards along your quivering sternum toward your heaving chest; kissing you so fervently as though possessed, driven wholly by base instincts demanding he give in to whatever compulsion overtook him. "Always been mine. Always. Always—can't ever leave, yeah? I won't forgive you—won't forgive you this time—"

"Rafayel, I'm gonna come, please..." you whispered hoarsely against the crown of his head nestled between your breasts, your hands grasping onto his shoulders helplessly in an attempt at anchoring yourself. "I can't keep going, I'll fall apart. Please, don’t stop, don’t stop—"

One of his fingers slid down to repeatedly flick through your swollen folds, teasing and circling around your clit while his tongue swirled around a nipple; pulling and sucking hungrily with fervent desire, giving a pointed twist once he'd latched on.

"Come for me, then, do it, c'mon, cream all around me, let me have it, let me have this — you can do it, I’ll help you along.” His lower body lifted suddenly, pulling back until only his cockhead remained caught inside; followed by a quiet pop indicating his lips breaking contact from where they were buried in your chest. "I need you so bad I can hardly stand it anymore... Wanna feel you — feel all of you — need all of you..."

All it took was one sudden shift after a steady build-up of rhythm of shallow, quick thrusts: the smallest rotation of his pelvis and thrust straightwards, hips knocking against yours in a violent shove of flesh meeting slick flesh for you to fly apart spectacularly when he buried himself into that specific area right below your cervix.

With a shuddering breath that dissolved instantly into a shrill cry tearing through your throat, your thighs locked tight around his waist — holding him prisoner while your nails sank fiercely into his scratched back as your entire body trembled uncontrollably through the aftermath.

“Yeah, there you go, cutie.” A comforting, grounding caress landed on your forehead, tracing the arc of its curve towards the back of your ear; then repeating itself multiple times in slow, unhurried strokes — to remind you he wasn't going anywhere, anytime soon. “There you are, that was beautiful. You got me seeing stars.”

"It's... It's snowing outside... In the desert," you said faintly, eyelids slow in their blinking, and Rafayel thought how utterly gorgeous you looked, all worn down and exhausted and so drunk in your post-orgasmic euphoria to talk nonsensically about what was happening outside.

"Yeah," he agreed, equally hushed as he peppered a trail of soft kisses across the bridge of your nose. You closed your teary lashes instinctively against the ticklish sensation. "It's so soft... and beautiful..."

You were the snow in his desert. Though, too blissed out to pick up on what he was implying.

Too busy stiffening up when you felt his cock jump inside you.

"You... you're still hard?"

“I didn’t come in the first place, whoops. Busy being too competent, I guess,” he said breezily, tilting his hips so that he pressed deep inside, directly into the tender spot inside you where pleasure flared to life unbidden.

"Let me... Let me rest, fuck, give me a minute..." Your hands scrambled for purchase against his scarred back; anchoring yourself by clawing surface level trenches down along its expanse and dragging red tracks as he continued his grinding in torturously slow and shallow rolls. "Need — I need to catch my breath, you're gonna make me pass out, shit, hold on — !"

Rafayel had you for three more times after that.

The first was the short prologue to what was coming, picked up from where he’d left off in the same position — head buried in your neck, making you tightly embrace him like he’d fly off the earth if he wasn’t held. No sooner did his hips start bucking roughly against yours before he spent himself inside in long pulses that coated you inside in heated spurts, sending sparks rippling out into your limbs from where you clenched weakly around him through your own release that hadn’t yet run its full course.

The prettiest sounds in the whole entire world spilled from him as he pulled out with a schlick, dripping his neglect-thickened seed onto the sheets, and you were naive as to think this was it. You both had indulged yourselves enough for the night, fucked through the absence-abstaining makes the heart fonder phenomenon, it had been fantastic to witness him get so serious. Surely now would be a good time to cool off and step into the bath together now that you’d been able to make him sweat and the sex-heavy humidity clinging thickly to your body was getting more comfortable the more you became aware of it. The room was absolutely boiling, stuffier than a sauna like he’d projected all the heat trapped inside his body everywhere. Perhaps opening up a window wouldn’t hurt…

“That was one,” he said then, staring down at his flushed erection straining proudly between his legs like a compass needle pointed north — the faint strand of semen connecting his tip and stomach swaying and snapping apart. “This isn’t anywhere near enough.”

To your shock, Rafayel got off the bed, hauled you in by your legs until your bottom half was dangling from the bed, and folded you completely in half with no warning. Your legs were pushed against your chest and were hooked over his shoulders, and the speed of with which all of it happened punched out a wheeze from you.

"Can I? Are you okay?" he asked urgently, patting your thigh rapidly twice, pausing — then adding another firm slap there before you nodded hurriedly in confirmation rather than a verbal response, because fuck, his weight holding you down felt absolutely incredible like this.

Your ankles started bobbing in sync with his hip thrusts as he drove deep inside your heat, the sink easy, smooth and soft and the mess you both made between your legs pouring out and splattering everywhere as he kept mumbling, “I can’t stop, I’m sorry, I can’t stop, can’t stop—”

This round lasted longer, though it was the worst frenzy you’d seen Rafayel in. Nothing was slow about it, he was mercilessly pistoning himself into you and unpredictably switching between shallow and deep that had your clit being scraped against and A-spot drilled into. You couldn’t even keep your eyes open from how intense pleasure was kneading you violently like a dough. If it wasn’t for his mouth gluing itself onto yours, the entire floor and the poor downstairs guests probably would have heard what was happening with how loud his moaning became — because he was downright voluntarily overstimulating himself.

With one particularly desperate sob, Rafayel finally buried himself to the hilt within you — throbbing — in harsh jets of liquid fire with jerking, abrupt twitches of his hips, milking himself into your body as he found yet another release that was as intense and concentrated as the previous. You cried brokenly, shuddering as that final thrust abused your clit over the edge of orgasm number two, involuntarily flinching and trying to get away when he pushed all the accumulated, positively flowing stringy mess right back into your puffy cunt with a strange, entranced look on his face. You had to slap his hand away and kick his weight off you, powerless and exhausted and fully feeling like your vagina was gaping and would never close back up.

A soft kiss on your cheek brought you back to earth.

“Still alive?” he croaked, gently maneuvering you higher up the bed and laying you back comfortably. You had to avoid the giant, wet and shining spot that had to be dripping down on the floor at the edge of the bed, face burning as Rafayel’s sweat-drenched forehead leaned against yours. “I’m not going easy on you… I have to say I’m impressed how good you’re taking it.”

You realized, once more with feeling, that he was rock-hard against your hip despite having already come three separate times — two of which had filled you to the point of pouring out of you — and had no sign of calming down any time soon.

He was beyond insatiable.

Though the third and final time was far sweeter, the pace much slower and drawn out as though he’d suddenly regained some sense and clarity. By that time, you were growing deliriously tired, the earlier carnal fucking accommodated itself to you by morphing into tender lovemaking. Rafayel had you on your side, comfortably able to hug pillows and anchor yourself, while straddling your thigh and hooking your other calf over his waist and held it there firmly, out from your space to let you breathe with his back straight. Just looking down at you with obvious, sensual longing to lean down for kisses the entire time and looking so fucked out had been enough to rekindle your desire.

He was driving himself languidly into you, either eyes closed and head thrown back, or focused dead-on at the spot between where he was slipping in and out of you — watching your cunt eagerly swallow his white-coated cock and attempt to suck him right back in each time he pulled out until only his tip remained buried. Over and over.

And eventually, his shaky breaths and sweet sighs started turning into fast-paced, restrained moans. You saw him hanging on the precipice of wanting to go fast again, the tension his body pulled taut like a bowstring about to snap.

At one point, your robe and his shirt had found themselves slingshotted into the far, opposite corners of the room at some point but he still had his pants and was positively drenched in sweat like he’d just taken a bath and shining under the dim lighting.

"Drained all of my stamina, I'm empty, completely dry... I’m gonna need an IV drip. I can’t believe it. This is crazy, you know... I could die happy like this... But I wanna come. I wan—nnah come inside you so bad again, wanna fill you up—make you full with me—"

He went completely motionless and stayed burrowed in you when your palms cupped his face gently, forcing him to look down at you with his shiny eyes. "You've got to calm down first."

“I don’t think I can,” he murmured, panting, “I really can’t. You feel so—”

Your thumbs stroked the outer corners of his eyes with aching tenderness. “We’ll stop and try to calm you down a bit continuing then, okay? Try for me. No need to rush when we have time to ourselves. No one’s going anywhere.”

He stumbled and nearly fell to his elbows on top of you. “Tell me to,” he said, in a begging voice. “You can just tell me to calm down. Anything you want, anything. You know I’ll listen.”

All these months of living with the revelation about the bond and it still came as a shock to you, but you figured if it was for his own good...

So you ordered him: "Calm down and relax, Rafayel. Everything’s fine, you’re okay."

And god, did he listen well.

You were shocked, as you always were each time, to see just how willingly compliant he was. Seeing his body literally change its chemistry to conform itself to your desires and let go of all tension was unbelievable. You immediately felt bad that you’d forced it on him somehow like some admitted, invasive tranquilizer, because you could have made him relax naturally, with your own labor, a glass of water and massage, maybe, gradually work him through it—

“There’s nothing to worry about. Don’t think about it too much. Just focus on me, yeah?” A quiet command that lacked any real intent to order accompanied an equally soft kiss planted softly against the corner of your mouth, and all thoughts went flying out of the window when you saw how mellowly at peace he was, gazing dreamily at you without the slightest care in the world.

After that, everything became a blur once again. But a pleasant one. Slow, like molasses trickling lazily throughout your bloodstream at room temperature — soothing all aches into pleasure-flavored coziness at being joined, no rampant race towards a climax involved. There was no concept of time whatsoever: just the two of you together.

After your pillow talk about what he believed inspired him — what he wanted would, you internally filled in the blanks — and how he was running out of reserves exclusively saved up for the purposes of his art, you had to make it clear to him that there would be no pain involved in your relationship.

You didn’t know if he expected to be hurt by you in the future or implied he had no problem with that happening, but you couldn’t even tolerate him saying those things for the sake of love, or whatever it was. Him being intimately familiar and nonchalant with the concept bothered you down to the bones.

Not only were you trying to work around the huge rock he’d just dropped on top of your heart with the revelation that Aridum had to represent pure suffering to him as a Lemurian, you were also slightly upset he’d wanted to subject himself to it because he was lost more beautiful things in life had made their way into his life to inspire him as well. His paintings, all of them, had taken a new context and an additional layer of tragedy with that revelation, despite the fact that he’d basically said you made him draw from a different fountain and clogged up the other one.

It was a bittersweet happiness to hear Rafayel wanting to explore brighter, happier sides of life together when the sketch he showed you he was working on while you were sleeping depicted a man drowning in the sea and a figure beckoning him from above, close to the surface. Something still very painful.

“That’s one bleak drawing.”

“Depends on what you see.”

“I see a dying man hallucinating. Maybe that’s someone close to him and his brain is comforting him with a vision. I don’t know.”

“Interesting take. Maybe it’s not just a man at all. Maybe it’s a reunion. It looks peaceful, doesn’t it?”

Now you looked again, it did look peaceful. Just like Rafayel was right now, next to you on the bed with his forehead almost touching yours.

"I'd like to think he isn't drowning, then."

Rafayel just smiled.

[chrollohearttags]

makeup artist!armin…that is all 🫠

📝: black fem hairstylist!reader, friends to lovers, fluff to smut, praise, he’s also bi, alcohol use, switch!armin, choking, finger sucking, oral (a eating) missionary, cumshot, calls reader babe and my love

🎙️: I’m trying out something a lil’ different and trying to actually make my drabbles short so I hope y’all like it. Also I know like 3 of you might actually see this tonight but posting anyways bc I’m bored

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you never thought you’d see makeup artist!armin ever again..in the flesh at least. It’d been three years since you, him and twenty other attendees of one of the country’s most elite cosmetology schools had graduated as licensed beauticians. A majority of you had gone on to do extraordinary things with your newfound certifications…some working for prestigious salons, others starting their own businesses and continuing ones they were running illegally. But you and Armin? Leagues all on your own! Of course, the same could have been said when you were in school together. Seemingly attached at the hip and matching in both skills and wit. makeup artist!armin was naturally the talk among the class. The only male in a room full of gorgeous girls…chatting and keeping up with the conversations as if he were one of you. Offering advice on boyfriends and husbands, reciting the lyrics to every female rap song that played from the salon floor’s speakers as you all practiced balayage and full sets whilst the instructor watched. makeup artist!armin was a natural..able to analyze a face and turn anyone into the most beautiful version of themselves. Of course, it left much speculation on his orientation but when the question arose, his response was: “I like what I like, that’s all.”

with his fluffy blonde locks, warm blue eyes, scattered tattoos, including the pieces on his neck and hands…fingernails always donned with nail polish and sporting jewelry of some form, he was a dream. But it was him who was enamored with (y/n)..his girl to anyone who asked. Something you always figured to be a lighthearted inside joke, considering the number of empty, flirtatious passes you made at one another. Pretending to kiss, even allowing him to grasp your throat in the process because he’d only follow it up with some effeminate remark before you both broke into a laugh. “Armin moveee, you play too much.” “Babeee, c’mere. You didn’t have a problem last night. Why are you being mean to me?” But makeup artist!armin wasn’t interested in playing games anymore..especially when he saw you all over Instagram, going viral for your amazing work. Laying wigs, coloring, finger waves, silk presses..the works. You were the best of the best and people were dying to get a seat in your chair. Including an influencer with tons of followers and the money to burn, looking to get done up by the city’s finest for a club appearance. What you didn’t expect was the person traipsing behind her to be makeup artist!armin..looking even better than he had before!

“It’s been a while, my love. How are you? I see you look sexy as always.”

Hugging instantly as the excitement over took the both of you. makeup artist!armin couldn’t keep his eyes off of you as you styled the influencer’s hair, watching you two laugh and chop it up..joining in on the fun occasionally. Turns out he had been working with some notorious clientele, using his talents to earn quite a pretty penny and make a name for himself in the beauty sector. But the real conversation wasn’t done until after hours…when he’d finish up with your guest and you were closing up shop. The two of you would down some of the leftover shots you had with the client as part of her pregame whilst he decided to give you a complementary beat for old times sake…

talking about life and what it had been like since you left the academy. Divulging in juicy gossip about friends and old peers alike, work and what it was like having your entire catalogue on display for social media. Of course, what makeup artist!armin and yourself truly wanted to know was if there was a special someone around..

“Me? Nah, me and my ex been done. I don’t have time for dating..the money is my only love nowadays.”

“I feel that. All I do is work and go home.”

but he was hoping to change that last sentiment. Dressed in his black button down and slit jeans with silver bands on his fingers..he’d turn your face towards him as the guise of brushing on your highlight

“Y’know I really missed this, (y/n). I’ve been watching you and I’m so proud of what you’ve done. You’ve worked hard.” “Thank you, Armin..you’re always so sweet.” “Well duh, I’ve already told you, you’re my girl..”

makeup artist!armin couldn’t hold back any longer…bridging the gap of space between you two as the bright lights hung overhead. He'd confess that he’d thought about you everyday and wished that the two of you had kept contact. It was as if all of the sexual tension and feelings that the two of you had been harboring were just seconds from spilling over. Which only in turn led to you moving to the back of your salon, lips crashing together and tongues shoved into each other’s mouth as he mounted you onto a nearby countertop. Completely forgetting his masterpiece he’d painted on your face.

“Arminnn..”

“Shhh..it’s okay, babe. I know..you don’t have to tell me. I know you better than anyone.”

a statement that rang true when he’d pull you into a kiss yet again and clutch your throat as he’d done in a joking manner many times before. A movement they elicited a smile from you both.

“You still like that, huh? So nasty..”

“You said it..you know me better than anyone, baby.”

from your lips to your neck, he’d mark you with pecks, licking and nibbling at your ear as he whispered lecherous things; from how good you looked in the bodycon dress you were wearing to how he needed to hold it up while pounding you from the back..

“Mmmm..see, there you go playing wit’ me.”

“Spread your legs for me, baby and you’ll see how much I’m joking..”

leaving you with a heavy pat to the ass as he scooped you into his grasp and parted your thick thighs. Obviously much more fit than he was when you’d last saw him. makeup artist!armin tugged down the top of your dress, exposing your breasts as he planted a hand into your tummy..peeling your panties back with his teeth before diving into that dripping center. Wasting no time in lapping on your clit, gliding a finger or two in and sucking on your folds as if it were his first meal in months. He certainly was no stranger to eating pussy..regardless of everyone’s opinions on his sexuality!

“F-fuckkkk..Arminnn..” Pushing his head and shoulders back whilst still grinding on his mouth.

“I’m sorry, babe. What is it that you want? Because you’re realllly confusing me..do you want me to stop..or should I keep eating this little pussy until you come all over my face?” Laughing as he spat into your entrance and continued lapping. (Y/N)’s legs began to quiver, breath shallow and chest heaving as your eyes rolled back..you’d never felt anything remotely euphoric as this. He knew each of your spots, what made you tick and how to pleasure you. He navigated your body as well as an eyeshadow palette and like always, he wasn’t done until he was satisfied..

“Awww, babyy—don’t cry. I know it feels good but you’re gonna ruin your pretty makeup. Here..suck on my fingers.” That soft yet dominant taking over as he shoved two digits in your mouth. What followed was a trail of saliva and his tongue breaching your puckering lower entrance. Which nearly caused you to shoot through the roof.

“Look at that..now I’m in all your pretty holes, babe..I’ve waited so long to do this. Fuck..you taste amazing.”

you’d whimper and writhe around, grasping at the marble counters as that orgasm neared..he’d push those fingers in and out until splatters of warm juices hit his chin. “Sorry, my love..I hate to stop you but—” unbeknownst, he had been stroking himself through his boxers and was ready to let you get the real thing.

“If you want to come anymore, it’ll be on this dick. I really need to fuck you.” His voice was much deeper than before and you didn’t hesitate to let him inside. Pinning your legs back to the vanity, makeup artist!armin tapped that head and shaft against your folds before gently gliding in, keeping your eyes fixated on each other with his hand still around your neck. That fat cock splitting open your wet folds.

“Shit…your pussy’s so warm, babe. God, why’d you keep this from me?” But you were too in awe to answer..completely stuck on how big he was and how well he wielded it. Slowly stroking and rubbing your clit with the opposite hand. You were fixated on his gaze and sweet words, listening to him to praise you whilst he resided balls deep inside of you.

“Oh my gosh….’s so fucking big. Fucking me so good..” whimpering and barely able to fork coherent sentences. makeup artist!armin would chuckle softly as he watched it slide in and out, the bulge appearing when he sped up. “Damn, babe. I love this look on you…but I love even more how I look inside of you.” Pounding you into the vanity with his lips melded to yours.

“Ahhhh…yes, baby! Right there..’m gonna come.”

“I told you, if you want to, it’s gotta be on me.” makeup artist!armin would continue thrusting until he drew more splashes out of that cunt, making you squirt all over his torso and the countertop. It wasn’t long until he too was reaching his own climatic peak, burrowed over you with his face buried into the crook of your neck as he called out your name..whining about how badly he missed you.

“Oh God I missed you..I missed you so bad. Can I come for you, my love? Please? I’ve been so good..I waited all this time just for you..”

and it was no question that you’d welcome it..waiting patiently as he pulled out of you reluctantly. He’d spray those thick ropes of cum all over your tummy and even catch your face..

makeup artist!armin reveled in his latest and most prized creation yet. Laughing as those fluffy lashes swatted off remnants of his seed..droplets staining the glossy nude lip he’d just finished.

“I need a kiss after that. C’mere..” “Yeah, I agree.”

makeup artist!armin had long since dreamed of what he’d say and do once you guys reconnected. He was nervous, afraid that you’d reject his feelings but it was no longer a secret. That mounting love that had been festering inside of you both had exploded into a blaze of passion that couldn’t be extinguished any time soon. And now that he was back in your life, you’d never be apart again.

[homunculus-argument]

Okay so the one and only time I've seen the Wicked musical was live on stage, and that's the only context I have for the whole entire show. So if that particular stage show made any artistic lisence changes to the story that other productions have done differently, I would not have known nor noticed.

Anyway that particular production had Fiyero played by a dark-skinned black guy with shoulder-length dreadlocks, and that guy was definitely loving this role, and absolutely selling it too, doing bitchy little hair flips and all. Did not leave any room for question that this is absolutely the pretty boy prince that all the girls fight over. All things are as they should be - I am enjoying the show and every single gut punch plot twist that I 100% did not see coming because I've never seen or heard this one before.

And then like two or three years later I'm seeing the first gifsets of the movie version on my tumblr dash, and had to take a minute to actually process that this is supposed to be the same character. Like that's not the prettyboy prince. That is not how he looks. Put him back.

[llamagoddessofficial]

Nightmare being so restrained AND a closeted romantic immediately gave me the image of him journaling about you. The journal would be somewhat of a legend/myth among the murder time trio (Killer vehemently insists that he caught a glimpse of Nightmare writing by the fire. Dust thinks he's full of shit) but if someone were to look in it they'd find some very detailed writings of your features, behaviors, thoughts about you... maybe some very literal prose. And if he found that person looking in it there would be no evidence that they (or the journal) ever existed

My Nightmare is, deep down, quite artistic. Whilst Dream has an eye for poetry and the written word, Nightmare has always been fond of form and colour. In another life, unburdened by powers and hatred, I imagine he would've lived a quiet and contented life as a locally successful painter.

Alas... this is not that life. He keeps his passions hidden, even from you. So his journal remains locked away in his room.

His journal is a little black leather-bound book, with uneven pages, so thick it needs a ribbon to remain closed.

It's messy. 90% sketches, most unfinished. Some are lit up with watercolours and some aren't. He sketches everything - landscapes, the interior of his castle, his henchmen, his enemies, memories from his childhood. There's one attempted drawing of what he used to look like before being corrupted, but he's covered that one in so much ink it's impossible to even tell what was underneath.

He's good at drawing. I mean really good. Hundreds of years of practise shows. He writes around the drawings, filling pretty much any gap on the paper, and he has excellent handwriting.

It's the only place where he's utterly honest with himself. He talks about his real feelings, his frustrations and desires... his biggest regrets. He bears his Soul, in that little book, because there's nowhere else he can. Not yet.

Just by reading it, you can tell when he meets you. And when he falls for you. It starts out small - just a profile sketch, a 3/4 view of your head from memory, the usual. But then it just continues. Another 3/4 view, more detailed this time. A closeup of your face. There's more you than words on the page. A day when he was clearly fixated on your neck and shoulders because there's three studies in a row. A whole double spread dedicated to a watercolour of you napping by an evening window.

He reminisces for pages about the lives he would've had with you if things had gone differently. A home? A garden? Children? Would he ever have made a good father?

He also talks in great detail about the strength of his feelings for you, and how he isn't even sure what to do with himself anymore.

No one knows about the journal.

... Except Killer.

Killer saw Nightmare writing in it, once, and decided to go snooping through Nightmare's room while he was out. He found the locked box, and the journal.

He took one look at what was inside - and then closed it again and got the fuck out of there. He still acts like he's searching for it because he knows the severity of what he came across. He will never EVER admit he saw it.

[captain-joongz]

i'm back with another delicious little scenario, this time for our boy Hwa~~ hope you enjoy yourself!

hard hours are open, inbox is ready for you darlings!!! <3

HARD HOURS THOUGHTS

warnings: voyeurism, photographing sex, fingering, squirting, exhibitionism, nudity and nude photography

now, let's talk about photography major Seonghwa who uses his bestie for his final project - displays of tasteful nudity

when his professor told Seonghwa their final project in the summer semester would be tasteful nude photography, he immediately thought of you - even though it took some effort to persuade you to help him

as his bff of course you'd do anything for him, but this seemed a little far - you've never been naked in front of him, but in the end you agreed after he promised to buy you those shoes you'd been pining after - none of you could have anticipated how this would end up

Hwa chose his bed as the place and after some hesitation you stripped down to panties. it started innocent enough, with you lying on the bed and Seonghwa kneeling over you with his camera, hands barely touching you to move you to his liking. but after a while he'd get frustrated that his vision just wasn't coming through

his touches would get firmer, more demanding, grabbing roughly onto your flesh and pulling you into different positions, the artist's focus fully consuming him - and shamefully you'd start to get wet. especially when the lines started to blur and he asked for more sensuality, more eroticism and you bowed and bent under his camera, felt yourself up for the lense and grew breathless when his dark eyes took you in and appraised you

after that it didn't take long for his fingers to wander - to make it more authentic, to draw your expressions out better - just to help you out to sell it, that's what he whispered when he slipped them between your thighs and caressed your slick cunt. before you knew it your panties were off and he was three fingers in deep, wild strokes making you thrash about the bed

somehow he still managed to keep taking photos - the shutter sound and occasional flash interrupting your pleasure muddled mind as you writhed under him. and what a vision you made - body twisted beautifully, hands tied and twisted into the bedding as you sought to ground yourself, face an amalgamation of lust, pleasure and gratification.

and he'd be damned if he didn't capture the look of your climax, if he missed the clear shot of your sweet ecstasy

your orgasm somehow creeped up on you - the pleasure was so intense that you didn't even notice when it started boiling over until you were clenching on his long slender fingers and crying out, the waves of pleasure robbing you of your breath

and Hwa did take a photo of it, and weeks later after he went through heaps of shaky blurred photos depicting your little romp and salvaged a few of them, it was the centre piece of his exhibition

divider by @cafekitsune