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deripmaver · 6 years ago

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💉 drugged (for the whumpy prompts)

~3000 words, Victuuri

Additional tags/warnings: Omegaverse, brief Victor/Other, Victorian era, neither yuuri nor victor do the drugging lol, mentions of prostitution

See if you can guess what kind of AU this is ;D

Fog rolls in overthe streets of the East End, over the cold, empty shipyards andpockmarked pavement. The dirty gas lamps shine eerily upon it, fadedrings of light that keep the dark cloaked figures in shadow.

It’s the kindof fog that chills down to the bones, the kind that demands a cozynight in, a book read by warm lamplight – which is the kind ofevening Victor Nikiforov had intended to enjoy, but then-

He shakes hishead, long, silver hair falling in ghostly cascades down his back. Hehasn’t put in the normal effort, dressed himself up to the normaldegree of perfection, for his job tonight, but that hardly mattersnow. His job is what’s put him in this situation in thefirst place.

The conversationstill echoes in his head, painful like the clanging church bells thatwake him up in the morning, like a subtle punishment from on high.

Anger flashesthough him, sharp as the surgeon’s scalpel, and he grips his chestas though that’ll stop the pain of it.

How dare Yuuri,when he was the only one who had bothered to help him – a pooryoung immigrant, lost and alone in a dangerous part of town as thesun began to sink below the horizon. A newcomer from Japan, one ofperhaps three omegas admitted to medical school in London, and Victorhad taken him in for the night, given him comfort and a bed and a hotmeal-!

When he hadhelped Yuuri, remembering how hard to was when he had arrived allthose years ago, barely speaking the language, taken in by a plumpomega woman who expected him to work for his room and board.

The anger is goneas quickly as it came, though, and in its stead all Victor feels isexhaustion, a dull ache. He slumps back against the dank wall,resting upon a stack of boxes.

“Ah, Yuuri!” Victor cooes,“You are making friends! I am so happy for you.”

Yuuri fidgets, bright red, staringback at the retreating forms of his classmates – at thedisapproving curl of their lips. The only other omegas in theprogram, Victor knows, and not nearly as remarkable as Yuuri. They’rehigh born, their Alpha sire’s pulling strings to get them intomedical school – though Victor figures he can’t complain toomuch, not if they’ll have even a little more empathy when handlingomega anatomy.

“I, ah, actually… Wanted totalk to you about that?” Yuuri mumbles, not meeting Victor’sgaze.

Victor frowns. The others aregone, now, and though he can still feel their disapproval, it’sbeen a long time since he worried what other people thought of him.

“Yes?”

Yuuri swallows. He’s very red,his hands are shaking in the way they do when he’s too afraid tosay something directly.

“They, um,” Yuuri begins,“It’s been – it’s been hard for me. I never really fit in,here, it took everyone so long to realize I even spoke English –I,” he pauses, “There are only a few other foreign students, andthey’re all alphas, and they want nothing to do with me. Now, theother omegas will sometimes allow me their companionship, but theystill see me as so different from them.”

“Yuuri,” Victor says, slowly,“What are you trying to say?”

Yuuri swallows. When he speaks, itsounds as though he’s carefully considered every single word. “Howdo you feel about me coming to visit you, only? And in the east end?”

Victor feels like Yuuri haspunched him in the gut. Still, his voice is steady as he responds,“You don’t want to be seen with me.”

“It’s not that,” Yuurimumbles. Lies. “They just don’t understand you – like theydon’t understand me, and I don’t want them to think-”

“Think what?” Victor hisses,cutting him off, “Think that you might actually like me? That youwould willingly spend time with a-”

“Victor, don’t,” Yuuripleads, putting his fingers over Victor’s trembling lips. A few ofthe pedestrians’ eyes flit to them as they walk past, a fewscholars look up from their books, outside the university library.

Victor laughs, angry,hurt, cruel. “Why not? I’d wager I’ve had half these alphas inmy bed, or their fathers, at least. They know who I am. I know who Iam, and I’m not ashamed of it. I didn’t become the most soughtafter whore in all of the east end, all of bloody Londonby being a coward. Not like you.”

Yuuri steps back.He’s trembling all over, his eyes fill with frustrated tears, andfor a moment Victor regrets everything he’s said – he wants totake it all back, to take Yuuri into his arms, to say it’s alright,whatever he wants, so long as they can stay friends.

He can’t, though.He won’t. Yuuri is the first person who has looked past what he didat night, who wasn’t a sneering high-born omega or a lustful alphafull of superficial flattery and a wife at home, who saw dog-loving,literate, sensitive Victor.

And now. Anotherdisappointment.

Yuuri whispers, “Thenail that sticks up gets hammered down. That’s what they said to meat home, when I didn’t just want to bond and breed for a richfamily. It’s what I’ve been fighting my entire life, and I’m sotired. I’m not saying this to push you away from me-”

“And yet,” Victorsnaps, “You’ve succeeded.”

Yuuri’s mouth snapsshut. He looks down, picking at the threadbare sleeves of his dress,lips trembling like he was terrified that this might have been theoutcome. Yuuri still can’t wear English fashion comfortably, it’sclear in the way he stands, awkwardly, how he pulls at the starchedcollar of his dress.

“They’ll throwyou away, Yuuri,” Victor says, knowing the cruelty of his words.“When you’re not poised enough, when your accent isn’t rightenough, when they pick away the veneer and see something inside youthey don’t like.”

Yuuri doesn’tspeak. He stares at the ground, worrying his lower lip, tinted pinkwith the lipstick his new friends likely insisted he wear.

“Don’t do that,”Victor whispers, before he can stop himself. “You’ll just makeyourself bleed.”

Yuuri stares at him,eyes impossibly wide, watery with unshed tears. “I don’t thinkyou’re a whore.”

Victor steps back. Hesighs, hating how he understands why Yuuri doesn’t want to be seenwith him, hating how much it still hurtsto be rejected like this. “But,” he says, softly, “I am. Andeveryone knows it. And you don’t want to be seen with… Withsomeone like me.”

Yuuri still doesn’tsay anything. Victor knows him, knows he’s upset, knows that thegears of his mind are turning faster than his tongue can catch up –but Victor’s afraid, too, afraid to hear Yuuri say that he’sdisapproved of him this whole time, but was simply too polite to sayso.

He turns, so Yuurican’t see the tears that well up in his own eyes, and says curtly,“Perhaps you shouldn’t come by this Friday evening. I wish youthe best, Yuuri.”

“Vitya!Surprised to see you out tonight – it’s been a while since you’veworked a Friday.”

Victorsighs, looking to the side. “Needed the extra money,” he says,clipped. He really doesn’t want to talk to Chris, not tonight.Chris knows about Yuuri, and he’ll be damned if anyone is going toget any information about Yuuri’s absence from him. “I’m goingto take a walk.”

Chrisfrowns. “Are you sure? Me and some of the others are in a groupover by the pub. Just to be safe, we don’t know if he’s out theretonight.”

“I’llbe fine,” Victor mumbles, waving him away. He doesn’t have theenergy to think about him tonight.

Chrislooks like he might object, so Victor turns on his heel and wandersalong the docks, past rowdy pubs and shivering omegas with theirskirts rucked up. They huddle together for warmth and safety, staringat the alphas intently as one of them gets picked off, taken to aback alley or their rooms for a quick fuck.

Someone’sbehind him. Victor whirls around, staring at him hard, unable to stophis body from tensing – but it’s just an alpha, with dark browneyes and a tweed suit, weighted down with a heavy bag of something.

“VictorNikiforov,” the alpha breathes, “The loveliest whore in all ofLondon. What luck that I happened to run into you tonight.”

Victordoesn’t respond to that. He certainly doesn’t feel likethe loveliest whore in all of London – he feels like a washed-outrag, fraying with overuse, a stone’s through from being tossed outwith the day’s rubbish.

Rejected.

“Imust say,” the alpha continues, “You look even lovelier inperson. The way your hair reflects the moonlight, the soft white ofyour skin.”

Hereaches out, softly, hesitantly. Victor feels himself lean in alittle closer, letting the praise wash over him. The alpha toucheshis cheek tenderly, like he’s made of porcelain, his thumb pressingjust a bit harder as he caresses down to the pouting pink of hislips.

“Youtruly could be a porcelain doll,” the alpha whispers. “The jewelof anyone’s collection.”

Anyone but Yuuri’s,Victor thinks, bitterly.

“Thejewel of yours, perhaps?” Victor says, coquettish, batting hispainted lashes prettily.

Thealpha grins, wide and toothy, smelling of mint and tobacco andsomething sharp. “Oh, youhave no idea how much I desire you.”

Victorfights the urge to roll his eyes. He’s heard that dozens of times,each one as superficial as the last.

“Shallwe?” The alpha purrs, releasing his scent into the air. It doesnothing for Victor, not like Yuuri’s, so sweet, like the scent ofpure sunshine – but it always makes the alphas feel better to dothis. Victor releases some of his in return, lazily, and is surprisedwhen the alpha’s pants don’t tent immediately.

Apparentlyhis flattery was just that. Victor normally wouldn’t even entertainthis man – his suit is cheap, the leather of his back peeling andcrackling with age. He has such high standards for his clients, now,requires luxury and money upfront, requires sweet wine and tender kisses.

Hestill stings from Yuuri’s rejection, though. He’s ashamed howmuch he appreciated the tender touches, the sweet words, how hisspirits rose just that little bit from the compliments. It might bevanity, but Victor has always been sensitive. He had little choicebut to become a prostitute, and it’s only now that he gets anypleasure from it, since the shower of praise from his clientsoutweighs the condemnation from the rest of the world.

Victortakes the alpha’s gloved hand and leads him back to his apartment.

Thealpha is quiet as he touches him, peeling the layers and layers offhis body with surgical precision. Victor bats his eyes and bites hislip, letting his silver hair cascade down his body tantalizingly.Each warm kiss against hiscollarbone and throat sends pangs of sensation down his body.

“What’syour name?”

Thealpha doesn’t answer, lipswet and sloppy all over Victor’s chin and cheeks.This time Victor actually does roll his eyes. Fine, that’s fine. Heprobably has an omega and pups at home and doesn’t want Victor torat him out.

Histeeth graze the smooth expanse of Victor’s neck, hesitating justover his scent gland, his tongue going out to lick lazily at thesensitive spot.

“Don’tyou dare bite,” Victor gasps, feeling a twinge of arousal despitehimself.

Thealpha pulls back, his expression unreadable. Hishands go to Victor’s thighs, slipping just barely beneath his thinshift. Victor smiles, softly, bashfully, hands clasping over thealpha’s.

“Doyou want to take this off of me?” he whispers, breathy.

Thealpha nods, eyes alight with intensity, with fire. Victor pushes upto allow the alpha to pull the shift over his head – then lies backonto his bed, body splayed out and legs spread. He stared, the alpha– he stares, and stares, and Victor feels as though he can barelybreathe,suddenly struck with how the alphais looking at him.

“Whatis your pleasure, sir?” Victor murmurs, running his thin fingersover his bare chest, resting them teasingly on his pink nipple.

“Iwant,” the alpha says, choked, “Let’s play doctor, tonight.”

Yuuri’sface pops into Victor’s head again and he flinches, visibly.

“Ah,”Victor laughs nervously, belaying the pangs in his chest again,“Perhaps – something else? I can be whatever you like –schoolgirl, maidservant-”

“I’mafraid,” the alpha booms, suddenly looming over Victor, thighsclenching around Victor’s hips and holding him still beneath hisbody, “I really must insist.”

Victordoesn’t bother to hide his scowl as the alpha goes to reach intohis bag. In the back of his mind, though, he feels a twinge of fear –play doctor could mean anything from the innocuous digitalpelvic examination to somesadist who wants to use cruel instrumentation to probe inside of him.

He’sbeen in this situation before, though, and despite his slight frame,he is not weak – and in any case, carries a blade just beneath hispillows.

“Turnaround, darling,” the alpha murmurs, kissing the nape of his neck.

Victorrolls onto his stomach, lifting his hips up and wiggling them backand forth. He peers at the alpha, probing into his leather bag.

“Nopeeking,” the alpha teases, touching Victor’s lips.

“I’mafraid,” Victor parrots back at him, trying and failing to hide thebiting note of sarcasm, “I really must insist.”

There’ssilence, stillness. Tension builds, and Victor’s fingers creepcloser to the knife beneath his pillows, a sudden fear pooling in hisgut. He remembers, then Chris’ warning, why it wasn’t wise to beout alone tonight, but surely the brute butchering whores wouldn’tlook so slight-

Thealpha grabs Victor’s long, silver hair, slamming his face down intothe mattress. Victor yelps, fingers shooting out to reach beneath thepillows, and suddenly there is a stabbing, burning pain in the scentgland on his neck.

Victorscreams, hand clenching desperately on the handle of the knife, andhe rips it out and lunges forward-

But.

But,suddenly, the knife is so very heavy in his hands. It’s like lead,dropping heavily, harmlessly onto the mattress, slipping like sandfrom his trembling fingers.

Victorwhimpers, scream cut off, and the sound swims through the air asthough he’s underwater. His hands, so heavy, so weak, come up tohis neck, grasping uselessly around the syringe pumping somethinginto him.

Hetries to push himself off the bed, away from the alpha, watching inamusement as he struggles. His feet his the hard floor, but they’releaden weights, and he tumbles to the ground as the room collapsesaround him.

Tearswell up in Victor’s eyes as he whimpers, pitifully, still trying toremove the syringe from his neck even as his body twitches, naked andvulnerable on the floor.

“I,”he stammers, tongue as heavy as the rest of him, “Wha-”

“Hush,”the alpha soothes, running his fingers through Victor’s hairtenderly, softly, “Hush now, my darling.”

Hethumbs away the tears falling from Victor’s eyes, and his facemorphs and blurs as Victor’s vision goes black.

The killer clearlyhas some kind of medical background, some knowledge of omega anatomy,both male and female.

Yuurihad said that. He was trying to find out who this monster was, tryingto keep Victor safe, and now-

Victor’seyes flutter shut, body limp, useless, save for the frantic,terrified, rabbit pulse of his heart.

Hewasn’t even supposed to be out tonight.

#victuuri #victuuri fanfic #victor nikiforov #yuuri katsuki #yuri on ice #yoi fanfic #yoi fic #whumpy prompts #my fic #Anonymous

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vibesaresimplyatrocious · 2 years ago

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I've noticed that prostitution law seems to be a pretty inconvenient thing in jumble sale chic; you mentioned it a lot in chewing coffee but never went into detail. You think you could do that here?? Love your world building btw. Abo has so much potential and it feels like ur the only one who's noticed!!

Let’s talk about prostitution law and how it has influenced the decisions of Matt, Peter, and the Fantastic Four.

So, prostitution law is one of those things from our world that I think would be even more stringent in the omegaverse, and would exist in a way that would be a huge direct concern for Peter specifically with his actions sharing ruts with his friends.

Prostitution is a crime that is determined on a state rather than federal level. In our world, there is some kind of anti-prostitution law in 49 out of 50 states (Nevada is the exception, and only in like. certain counties.). While the exact provisions vary by state, most states have some kind of law criminalizing 1) the sale of sex, 2) the purchase of sex, 3) promoting the prostitution of other people, 4) selling obscene acts that fall below the scale of actual sex, 5) promoting the sexual or obscene acts of unwilling participants, etc. etc. And these laws usually have some kind of aggravating statutes that state that the penalty is worse if there are the presence of certain factors--if you've been caught doing this before, if a minor is involved, if you're soliciting within a certain area of a school, etc. With the ABO world, we can expect all of these laws to be present and then some.

When you're talking about law, you have to look at 1) the policy that's going to craft the law and 2) the actual laws that they're going to prosecuted under.

Policy in our world:

So, in our world, there are several policy rationales underlying anti-prostitution laws. Once again, we are going to set aside whether or not these policy rationales are correct. It's just the explicit rationale that most legislatures give--whether these laws actually serve these policy rationales is entirely independent from justifying these laws with these policies.

The number one policy rationale you're going to find for anti-prostitution laws is "public welfare." And this can be executed in a lot of different ways. Sex work is linked heavily to human trafficking. Now, whether or not criminalizing sex work actually decreases human trafficking is another debate. There's a very good argument that anti-prostitution laws make it more difficult for trafficked individuals to get help. But one valid argument is that by criminalizing these actions, you're able to interfere with more sex trafficking operations.

There's other arguments about health concerns. Sexual contact risks the spread of disease. Moreover, it's hard to track or regulate this spread--it's illegal in 37 states to knowingly spread HIV, and it can bring civil liability as well. But if a prostitute has HIV, then engages in sexual contact with customers who they do not keep any record of, then that's a big spread of disease in a criminalized manner. Each of those customers now have the risk of HIV, and they may spread it to others, and it spawns from there. now, you can prosecute the original spread of HIV. Person 1-->2. But says Person 2 didn’t realize they got HIV, and spread it to Persons 3, 4, 5, and, 6, and say Persons 4 and 6 didn’t realize they got HIV and spread it to Persons 7, 8, and 9. Now, you’ve got behavior that we’ve previously decided deserves some kind of criminal penalty (knowingly spreading HIV), and only one person you can get justice for, because only Person 2 had it spread knowingly to them. Persons 3-9 all had it spread unknowingly to them, and they may be spreading it unknowingly to other people. So there is a public policy concern in the spread of disease through commercialized sexual contact.

Another argument is public morality concerns. Whether the legislature can moderate or dictate the morality of its citizens is an idea that waxes and wanes in popularity depending on how conservative american society is at the time. But sexual acts and sexual contact outside of marriage (and inside of marriage, depending on what the acts are), particularly for pecuniary gain, is something that is, in many circles, perceived as a morally corrupt act that some state legislatures want to prevent. so they get in the business of their citizens to prevent it. This is the exact policy rationale that went into laws against gay sex, by the way, and it’s deeply fucked but it is something that happens. in the ABO world, this is going to be an even stronger sense because it’s inarguably more conservative than our world.

There's other arguments. Prostitution in a certain area may decrease its property values. It may be connected to other criminal activities. Honestly, people can bend over backwards to make any logic they want fit. But these are, generally, why a lot of sex work is prohibited in some degree in pretty much all of America.

Once again, that's not an endorsement of any of these policies or a statement as to whether they successfully achieve what they're claiming to want to do. It's just how they're justified, and it's important to understand how laws are justified to understand 1) how they're going to be actually enforced, and 2) to understand other likely ways that laws will be crafted in fictionalized societies.

Policy in the ABO world:

The thing about the ABO world is that it's even fucking weirder about sex and commitment than even the weirdest of fanatics in our world. I've mentioned this in other posts, but my rule for writing in the ABO world is that i had to take everything that is part of generally accepted ABO "lore," but how exactly it exists within the world would be up to my own discretion.

For example, a lot of ABO fics center on alphas being naturally possessive and domineering, and omegas being naturally submissive caretakers. I don't like the idea that anyone's gender determines their personality, so I decided to only have it exist during the most extreme moments, aka heat and rut, when you're already so out of your goddamn mind that you're down to have sex with anything with a pulse. that's also why Ned was an alpha and MJ was an omega. I was assigning shit when it came up in a sentence, and I know that traditional ABO classifications probably wouldn't have clocked their personalities as what i made them. So i was like, cool, let's have proof of concept, it's not dispositive of your personality, and did it on that whim.

so, i grew up around very conservative circles that were super into "rad trad" relationship dynamics. it. is weird. there is a lot of weird shit about the wife being the property of the husband, has to serve and honor and care for the husband, husband being the "protector" and leader of the family, for some goddamn reason this affects who has to pick up their fucking socks off the floor, i don't know. and I'm surprised to say that the ABO world is even fucking weirder about gender roles than anything i ever encountered in the weirdest of rad trad mindsets! Ideas about gender roles and relationship dynamics are just So, since the commonly accepted community mindsets are more extreme than like, our most extreme equivalents in our world, that means the laws are even more extreme.

With the ABO dynamics in mind specifically, I can think of a few theoretical policy implications that would really make the prostitution laws stricter, and, specifically, would probably result in an absolute prohibition against selling ruts and heats specifically.

On its face, selling ruts and heats are probably very lucrative. So, say there’s a prostitute. There’s two different actions that we’d be talking about 1) selling their own mating cycle or 2) selling themselves as a participant in someone else’s mating cycle.

For the first, there’s absolutely a demand to get to spend a cycle with someone in heat or rut. You’d be buying an extended period of time with a partner willing to do basically anything. That being said, it would have a lot of severe dangers that would make this behavior absolutely prohibited in the ABO world. The person in cycle would be totally vulnerable. Their partner could film things without their consent; invite other people without their consent; perform acts they didn’t consent to; hurt them without their partner being able to defend themselves; abandon the heat or rut before it ends and leave them with major health complications. So there would be a huge public welfare concern prohibiting the sale or purchase of a mating cycle.

“But the person selling decided to take on that risk” we don’t care. There’s certain risks in the law we never allow people to assume. For example, you’re never able to enter into a lease for something below the required housing standards, even if you know that this is an unlivable space and you’re willing to take on the problems because you’re broke as fuck and this is the only place cheap enough that you can live in. you can decide to take on the risk all you want, but the law won’t recognize that fact. selling heats and ruts would have such extreme dangers involved that i can see zero chance of it ever being allowed in this kind of society.

It would be further exacerbated by the health effects by post-rut or heat. Granted, I think I made up drop for this? I don’t remember ever seeing it before; it just didn’t make sense to me for there to be like, zero potential health effects of something that would be an inherently violent biological process. that being said, there would be a similar public health concern about the fact that any sale would likely not sale to post-cycle, and it would cause health ramifications for the participants.

Likewise, there’d be substantial market for the sale of a participant in heats and ruts. Heats and ruts are difficult and sometimes dangerous alone--to the point where I could easily see there being official, licensed centers to gain a partner for one. the problem is in the unlicensed sale of a participation. A lot of the same concerns arise--the participant could do things without their consent, they could leave before it finishes, they could invite people that you didn’t consent to be there, they could film you, they could just straight up kill you in your vulnerable state and rob your corpse.

And, I want to be clear, just becuase that’s what the legislature justifies it with, that doesn’t mean what it actually does or that is what its main intent is. The real spirit behind the laws is attempts to keep people from sharing cycles with each other without it being a long term commitment. They want to maintain traditional relationship dynamics, specifically in the cases of mating cycles.

That being said, Peter’s actions dances along the line of something that could very much get him in trouble. He’s violated no letter of the law, but his behavior? Scandalous. People are going to be hostile to it. They’ll try to make the letter fit.

The actual laws:

So, not to get too deep in the weeds, but when you’re getting prosecuted under a law, it’s usually a matter of how far the prosecution can stretch the facts to wriggle it under a specific law. they have to match the elements of the crime, and you have to evaluate conduct by whether or not the policy will let it stretch far enough to fit facts.

Let’s make a hypothetical ABO anti-prostitution law.

“A person is guilty of cycle-adjacent prostitution if this person knowingly:

(a) engages, or agrees to, or offers to engage in sexual conduct with another person during his or her heat or rut in exchange for compensation; or

(b) engages, or agrees to, or offers to engage in sexual conduct with another during such third party’s heat or rut in exchange for compensation, unless he or she has maintained proper licensing under all relevant state and federal authorities and all such sexual contact occurs in a properly licensed and maintained facility.”

So, now that you have the law, how do you figure out if you’ve violated it? It’s going to depend on how far these hypothetical prosecutors have been able to define the terms underneath it.

Take, for instance, “during his or her heat or rut.” How do you determine when a heat or rut starts? What if someone only sells the period of time in pre-heat or post-heat, but not the heat itself? One policy implication says that the true health concerns are raised in heat or rut itself; another policy implication says that selling pre or post cycle will ultimately affect your health during the cycle, and therefore should still be moderated. based on how hostile this world would likely be to any intimate contact between individuals not planning to mate indefinitely, I’d probably expect a broad interpretation.

I think the most important definition in this would be “for compensation.” How do you determine when someone was compensated for a heat or rut? In cases where someone writes their sexual partner a $10k check after the cycle, then never talks to them again, that’s an easy case for compensation. But if we stretch the definition, we risk getting a lot more people under the statute. Let’s look at a hypothetical:

Say an abusive ex demands that someone spend their upcoming cycle with them. Now, when they were in a relationship, the ex had a dog that the abused partner loved more than anything. The ex mistreats the dog, but the abused partner had no way of getting rights to the dog when they left, and they had to get out. If the abused partner agrees to spend the cycle together, the ex will give them full rights and ownership to the dog. If they don’t, the abusive ex will have the dog put down. Out of fear for their beloved pet, the abused partner agrees, they spend the cycle together, and in return, ownership of the dog transfers fully to the abused partner.

After, the abused partner goes to a clinic to get medication for drop. The clinic demands to know, first, why their mate is not there to soothe them through it instead. The abused partner has little to no knowledge of their rights or the law, and they opt for honesty and explain that they had an abusive ex who promised to give them their beloved dog back if and only if they spent a cycle together. The clinic calls the police and reports them for prostitution. Are they going to get successfully prosecuted?

In that case, you have someone agreeing to engage in and actually engaging in sexual contact during a heat or rut, all of which would be very easy to confirm. You got the records of the clinic from when they got medication to prove the existence of a heat or rut, you have their own statements and admissions about what happened, you have the fact that they weren’t continuing this relationship after the cycle, all of the physical evidence like bond marks, bodily fluids, etc. The case is going to turn on whether getting the dog back counts as “for compensation.” And there’d be a very good chance that it would, because policy says that we don’t want people just changing the means of transferring compensation from money into other assets of value just to skirt prostitution laws.

You can keep changing the scenario. Say you have a professor who heavily implies that spending a cycle with them would get you an A in the class, and you need it to keep your scholarship. It happens, professor doesn’t give you shit. But the actual illegal action is the act of agreeing to it in anticipation of compensation, not the compensation itself. Your professor, meanwhile, can argue that he never tried to solicit sex from anyone, he would never abuse his position like that, he has no idea if that delusional omega misunderstood their relationship. He can claim knowingly solicit the sharing of this rut for compensation, but you’ve revealed that you knowingly agreed to do this in anticipation of compensation. So you may still end up caught under these laws, and the fuckwad who coerced you into sex gets off scot-free. That’s the thing about the law. it catches way, way more than what you think of as the “classic” case for the law, and sometimes it misses the cases you actually want to catch.

And Peter knows this. He’s educated about these laws. He’s lived in fears about these laws. He’s been working in crime since he was fourteen. Which is why he’s been so careful about how he handles this post-rut.

Keep in mind, proving the crime is the prosecutor’s problem. It doesn’t have to be proven yet to be arrested. They just have to have probable cause to arrest you. Peter knows that if he walks into a clinic looking for drop supplements so soon after he just spent a different rut with a different alpha, it’s the sort of high-risk behavior that will get him flagged as a probable prostitute. It is not illegal to sleep around and spend a bunch of ruts with a bunch of different alphas. It is illegal to get compensation for it. So he knows that if he gets flagged, it’s enough for the police to arrest him and go looking for compensation, and since these laws are probably broadly defined, there’s a lot they could try to wiggle in under that. He also knows that if he gets tagged as Daredevil’s omega, it doesn’t matter whether they actually think he’s a prostitute. They’re going to try to hit him with absolutely any charge they can, because once you get him on an actual legal violation, then the DA waltzes in and offers a plea deal in exchange for Daredevil’s identity.

As it is, Peter cannot go to jail just for having sex with Daredevil. he’d sit in a cell for 48 hours, and once they failed to drag up charges on him, he’d walk. but if he got caught selling sex to Daredevil? then those are actual legal grounds to hold him under.

Peter’s actions would potentially fall under subsection b. He doesn’t have a license, there was a hell of a lot of sexual contact, and none of it happened in a proper facility. His entire case is going to turn on whether he got compensation in return. For the most part, it looks like his actions were wholly gratuitous. However, Matt did give him money afterwards to cover his expenses.

now, good news! Matt knows the law too, better than Peter even. So he knows how to make sure that no prosecutor would be able to prove compensation for Peter sharing his rut with him. For one thing, it’d be nearly impossible to prove the actual transfer of money. Matt gave him cash, and every potential eye witness would never, ever testify against Peter. But even if they could somehow prove that someone gave Peter money after the rut, there’s a very good argument that what Matt did could never be considered compensation.

When you’re thinking about policy, and whether people are going to be willing to stretch it to cover a specific fact pattern, always think “is this the kind of behavior that society wants to encourage?” In Matt’s case, he was being a good alpha! He took care of his omega in the aftermath of a rut. He made sure to make up for lost income, paid for pregnancy tests, paid for the birth control. And then he didn’t go a cent over. Granted, a big part of why Matt demanded receipts is because he knew Peter would try to fudge the numbers and low ball him and he is not having his mess cost his friend a fucking penny, but another big bit of it was that he knew how important it was to be exact on this. If he pays more than Peter’s expenses, then that’s giving him something for the rut. It’s compensation. But if he’s just paying Peter’s expenses, aka providing for his omega, he’s very solidly existing in the exact space that society actively wants him to occupy. It’s the exact behavior that they would never want to criminalize, and that’s important, because that ties judge’s hands. You can’t make exceptions in cases like this without risking fucking with precedent, especially if matt appeals any decision against peter, which he would. So, in the specific case of Matt and Peter, both of them are smart enough and legally savvy enough to know what shit the DA may pull and cover their asses ahead of time.

Now Johnny’s case is an entirely different beast. Because all we just talked about? those are poor people rules. now we have to talk about rich people rules.

the legal system does not work the same way for rich people and poor people. And, I want to be clear, it’s not like a mystic thing? you don’t walk into court and say, “hello, i’m very rich and famous, the laws do not apply to me,” and the judge says “you’re so right i am so sorry mr. storm” and then you go home. the problem is that the legal system is very difficult to navigate, and there’s a lot of points where you can win a case before you actually end up in trial that are extremely heavily weighted towards people who know how to navigate those steps.

Let’s go back to the abused partner trying to get their dog back. Three scenarios: 1) public defender 2) matt and foggy 3) rich.

Abused partner has now gotten dragged in for prostitution. They can’t afford representation, so they eventually get a public defender appointed to them. in the time before they invoked their rights, they’ve had a fully body search conducted, biological evidence taken, and they’ve rambled out a lot of probable confessions. The public defender they get is overworked, underpaid, and just out of law school. DA offers a plea bargain that still lands with the abused partner in prison. Abused partner decides not to take it. Public defender tries their best, decides that the evidence is sufficient to establish it happened, and decides their best chance is to fight on the grounds of whether the dog constitutes compensation.

It’s their first voir dire. They don’t know how to do jury selection. Several people end up on the jury who think that cycles should be shared between mates and only mates, and that you have to marry whoever you spend a cycle with no matter the circumstances, and there are no other excuses. Maybe the abused partner is a person of color, and there are a few racists who got on the jury too. The public defender also has never had to argue a motion in limine before, and isn’t the best on objections, so the prosecutor spends the entire time referring to the abused partner as a sex worker, prejudicing the jury. The public defender misses a few key evidence objections, and some very damaging evidence comes in that otherwise could have been kept out.

Abused partner gets convicted. They get fines they can’t afford, jail time, a record, and they have to spend ten years on the sex offender’s list. Even when they get out, they can’t get a job, because they have a record and are on the sex offender’s list. I don’t think anyone actually thinks this person is someone deserving of punishment, but they still ended up completely fucked. a huge injustice happened because they didn’t understand the legal system and couldn’t afford someone who did. a half decent prosecutor would have dismissed all charges the second they heard the details of the case, but a lot of the time, the prosecutor is a shithead, so they go through the system instead and get spat out with their life ruined.

Scenario Two. Abused partner gets dragged in for prostitution. They’re terrified. They don’t ask for a lawyer, because they do not fully understand their rights or how to properly ask for a lawyer. They still think that maybe, if they just explain the situation, they’ll understand and let them go. Matt Murdock, however, happens to be around the corner buying a bagel from a bagel connoisseur. he hears everything, decides “fuck that,” parkours over three rooftops, and dramatically bursts into the interrogation room and rips into the presiding officer for not calling them the moment his client was brought in. Give them the room and get away from his client.

now, the story is a bit different. Foggy and Matt are the gods of law. the police weep when they swan into their precinct. they tell the DA to get the fuck out of here with that insulting plea bargain and go to trial. They, however, know how to argue in the alternative. So they plead not guilty on all charges, hold the ADA to the burden of proof, and also argue that there’s no real proof that this alleged sexual contact even occurred, but, alternatively, even if it did occur, they have an affirmative defense of coercion, but, alternatively, even if it did occur and you aren’t convinced it was coerced, the dog is not compensation. arguing in the alternative basically allows people to run mutually exclusive defenses without admitting to any single one of them. So, if you argue she was coerced, that implicitly admits that it happened, right? Wrong. she can still claim that they haven’t proven it even happened without weakening either defense. in scenario number #2, the prosecutor has to overcome a lot of other facts than in scenario #1, because it was assumed in scenario #1 that it did, indeed, happen. scenario #1, you argue your best grounds. scenario #2, you argue every ground.

Foggy runs voir dire. He’s shaped like a friend. He’s the most sexy and charming man alive. He actually convinces the racist jurors to tell the judge, in private, that they’re biased and they’re struck for cause (which people weirdly cop to more often than you think in voir dire? like. they just walk up and have teh self-awareness to confess that they’re racist and shouldn’t be on this jury. it’s beyond me.). Karen finds the publicly available social media posts of the jurors biased against anyone who shares cycles outside of marriage, now they’re struck for cause. Foggy spends the entire voir dire starting to get the jury on his side and steadily convincing them of his theory of the case. already, the client has much better odds than scenario #1.

now it’s motions in limine and motions to exclude. matt’s special talent is acting like the most offended man alive. he learned it from nuns. he’s un fucking beatable. is my client a sex worker? wow, that really sounds like the jury’s fucking job to decide, the prosecution shouldn’t be allowed to say those words ever. and? oh? there’s physical evidence against my client? evidence that they had hormones in her system consistent with a cycle? the police ran a full body cavity search and blood draw against them, actually? yeah, the prosecutor seems to have forgotten to file the fucking warrant that says that they could do any of that. Oh there wasn’t a warrant? my client consented to the search? are we sure they consented, or did your officers make them think that you were collecting evidence to prosecute their rapist? wow, it seems all they got was a fuckton of entirely inadmissible evidence, your honor. yeah, it should be kept out. the defendant isn’t getting on the stand at all, pleading the fifth, so you can’t ask them jack shit as to what happened.

now, prosecutor starts sweating, because now, it’ll be a fight to prove that a cycle even happened, because all their evidence got thrown out. but wait, they have the person that the defendant talked to at the clinic, who they told the entire story to. that person can testify about everything that the defendant told them.

And they do, and foggy gets up, and he might be able to laboriously question them about every single off-color social media post they ever made about their views about people who have sex outside of marriage or who use birth control. The kind of posts that reflect the fact that this is the kind of person who would call the cops on a rape victim and call them a prostitute. oh, you didn’t prescribe them drop medication because you called the cops instead? how do we even know they were at this clinic for drop? could they have come for something like, say, birth control instead, and you may be someone who has some very strong views about that sort of behavior? hey, jury, does this sound like someone who would have the motive to lie? it does? shock and awe.

now let’s talk about the dog. oh, they got the dog in exchange for the cycle? yeah, did the ex actually tender any transfer of ownership? they just dumped the dog on their doorstep? do you have any actual evidence to show that this was an exchange of ownership and not an abandonment? gee, this sure just sounds like you’re persecuting someone who took in an abandoned dog. moreover, dogs cost money to take care of, don’t they? it costs more over their lifetime to feed them and pay their medical bills than their own sale value would ever be, right? Jesus, this doesn’t sound like compensation, does it? if anything, this is an expense.

Now, there’s a lot of trouble proving that there was sexual contact, that it happened during a cycle, that they got compensation, or that this wasn’t coerced behavior. cut and dry case gets destroyed.

the thing about law is that there’s a million little points to cram your fingers into and destroy a case. the good lawyers aren’t the ones who succeed on the main point; the good lawyers are the ones that succeed on a million little points. it’s about gaining ground. it takes a lot of fucking skill, and usually, people with that skill charge out the ass for it.

Now let’s talk about rich people.

This never happens to a rich person. a rich person has them arrested the first time they’re abused. the rich person calls their lawyer the second their shitbag ex tries to pressure them into sex and has them arrested for attempted solicitation. throw in charges about animal abuse while we’re at it. they sue for damages, custody of the dog, whatever. it never gets to the point that it happened if you’re poor.

But let’s try to keep it as close a scenario as possible. Abused partner is an 18 year old kid. they were scared and humiliated. it was their first relationship. they hid it from their parents, then hid the abuse, then the cycle, and kept hiding it until they end up in a police precinct with a prostitution charge hanging over their head.

well, their parent’s lawyer charges in at 3 in the fucking morning in an immaculate designer suit and they start threatening everyone in the building. You searched my client how? Without a warrant? give me your badge number and i’ll give you directions to the nearest unemployment office.

quickly, the framing of the narrative is going to change. if you’re poor, and you get dragged in for prostitution, you spend the entire fucking time battling the presumption that you’re trash and did it for the whatever. if you’re rich? this is an upstanding member of society. they were very obviously assaulted. why are you wasting fucking taxpayer dollars harassing assault victims instead of arresting their rapist?

It never goes to trial, because any DA stupid enough to green light it for trial is going to be facing reelection under the banner that they harass upstanding members of society who were victims of rape. even if it does go to trial, everything that matt and foggy did applies, because these are people with skill who get paid for their skill.

Same facts, same system, but rich people always come out better because they can hire people who know how to work the system, and they look like such upstanding members of society that the system usually has zero interest in prosecuting them.

Which is why the Fantastic Four can take a very different approach to Johnny’s rut than would ever be plausible for Matt’s.

First off, no one is going to prosecute them for it. If any one tries to investigate them, the lead attorney is going to get called into a shiny high rise run by whatever biglaw firm the F4 employs, and everyone has a nice chat about what evidence the DA doesn’t have and what upstanding citizens and heroes the F4 is, and maybe taxpayer dollars would go a little bit better towards catching actual criminals instead of people with a contract with the citizen to catch criminals. any escort they hire is going to have vested interest in not going to prison for being a fucking prostitute, so chances of them testifying without some kind of deal is low. and compensation? you mean very necessary medical expenses for a highly dangerous rut? surely, you joke. there’d have to be something seriously political going on for anyone to even try, and all of those public policies we’ve been talking about? have been in reference to normal heats and ruts. there’s a very serious public welfare interest in the amazing flaming boy not burning down the city from an unmanaged rut. they may be willing to make a carve out for this one incredibly exceptional circumstance that’s unlikely to change how the law is implemented against wider society. it would not be worth the time, money, or effort to prosecute this case.

so no one in the F4 is going to jail for hiring a prostitute. at best, they pay a fine and have to deal with a few embarrassing headlines about the hooker who spent a rut with the human torch. as a result, it very rapidly can be considered a plausible option when potential alternatives include johnny dying in a rut-related accident. with Peter and Matt spending the rut together, both have to bend over backwards to make sure nothing they do can be construed as prostitution. They get away cleanly because they’re well-versed in the system and know how to not get caught in it. With Johnny, they have the leverage to ask around for references for discrete prostitutes willing to do shit with hazard pay.

So we see, implicitly, how privilege very seriously affects the execution of laws. Peter and the F4 are all liable under and subject to the same laws. But Peter has to live in fear of them. The F4 can make the risk calculation, and decide that while it’s distasteful, it may be the necessary and rationale response to a very serious danger to Johnny. And I want to be clear, i don’t think it would have been wrong to hire someone to help Johnny through it. It’s, specifically, the double standard that’s the issue.

the only time anti-prostitution laws would ever conceivably work would be in the case of any non-disclosure agreements.

Say you’re the Fantastic Four. You just had your youngest member’s extremely private and sensitive business leaked from someone you, personally, vetted and hired. SNL has already made a skit about it, which is currently one of the top ten trending videos on YouTube. the information is trending. the media is having a field day. it’s already looking to be a bloodbath. you want to protect your youngest member as best you can. So you go to your very high powered and expensive attorney and say “hey, how do we make sure that whoever does this can never speak about it publicly ever for as long as they live.

the thing about contracts is that there seems to be this idea in the public that they’re these absolute forces? they’re not. there’s about a million ways to get around contracts. first off, for contracts to be valid, there has to be this thing called consideration. it means "this for that.” you have to have an actual exchange of value. this is where anti-prostitution laws become a problem.

because the “this” that the F4 are getting is silence, and you have to ask what the “that” the sexual partner gets in return is. Now, if it’s just “the chance to be johnny storm’s sexual partner,” that ain’t gonna fly. for one, courts are going to be highly suspicious that this is an actual thing of value you’re getting in exchange. secondly, that means that you’ve classified sex as compensation for something else of value, which, you know. has prostitution problems.

say the F4 says, “well, we get your silence, and you get a comically large bag of money with a dollar sign written on the side.” once again, we run into prostitution laws. because underlying the transaction is, still, sex. having sex in the first place may be contingent on this deal being signed. So, you’re potentially getting the deal in consideration for the sex, and getting money in consideration for the deal, so a court may look at the underlying facts and say “yeah no this is inextricably intertwined with sex, this is prostitution.” now, it’s one thing to have a chat with a DA about whether or not they can prove that the F4 hired any prostitute. It is an entirely different thing to walk into a court of law and try to enforce an NDA and have the judge rule that this is an agreement for a prostitute. Any DA is going to have a much better case, because the F4 filed their fucking evidence on the public record.

Let’s pretend their highly paid attorneys heroically navigate all these hurdles. They get consideration somehow, it’s not a prostitution agreement, etc. etc. Can they now enforce an NDA about Johnny’s rut?

Probably not.

NDAs are, for the most part, very touch and go as to how to enforce them. courts are naturally hostile to them, so you have to be extremely careful about how you craft them.

first off, scope. NDAs have to be very narrowly defined. So say you want to make sure they can’t say anything about the rut. Well, how do you define the rut? They’re going to need a pre and post rut period--is that included, or is it just the week he spent in actual rut? let’s say that you want the entire thing to be kept quiet. Well, that’s more than a month of time--that’s broader than just the rut itself, so courts are now looking at this through a more hostile lens. What information do they have to keep quiet about? can they talk about moments that didn’t involve sexual contact? what if they want to talk about Johnny tripping over a doorstep three weeks before the rut begins? No sexual contact is involved, they’re not in the cycle itself--can they talk about that? you have to outline exactly what they’re not allowed to talk about, and there’s a lot you may miss, and there’s a lot the court may tell you that you’re being too overly burdensome with.

the other problem is time. depending on the state, NDAs usually have a duration that they’re limited to and it can’t be overly burdensome (unless like, trade secrets or something is involved, which this wouldn’t invoke at all). So maybe you can keep them quiet for a two year period after, and then this person starts a book tour. still doesn’t do what you want it to do.

you also have to ask--hey, what happens if they break the NDA? You take them to court and say “hey, that was a shitty thing to do, pay us money in damages.” And the opposing counsel says “What damages?”

Because the information? It’s already out. It’s public narrative. Every fucking one on the planet already knew Johnny Storm was going into rut. It’ll be a fight to actually prove that this caused any real damage to his reputation or caused any emotional distress that hadn’t already been caused by the original leak.

Let’s say they hired a prostitute, then. No escort wants to risk going to prison just to go on a talk show circuit as the person hired by Johnny Storm for his rut, right?

they’re not going to prison. there’s no deterrent.

For one thing, in order to prove that this person is a prostitute, they would have to implicitly admit to hiring a prostitute. which means they just exposed themselves to legal liability because, instead of the DA having to fight for scraps of information in a losing case, they went and put it onto the public record. say they’re willing to do that. Does the escort go to prison? No. no, they don’t. They are at the happy center of one of the most highly publicized cases of modern times. If they go to prison and the F4 doesn’t, that puts on shining display the legal system’s hypocrisy, which judges tend to not like. they can also afford a high powered attorney who can wriggle in all the difficult bits of the case and make it a nightmare to get a conviction. they get a fine, at best, and live off of their book tour money in luxury.

There’s also always public policy concerns underlying teh enforcement of NDAs. we don’t want people to be able to legally make sure that no one can ever talk about their sexual contacts ever again. that is highly susceptible to abuse and makes it difficult for people to consult friends and family about their own relationships. So courts are going to be even more hostile to enforcing this agreement.

Great lawyers can do a lot of things. but lawyers also have to be honest to their clients about their odds. So they got to their highly paid attorneys and probably get Like We’ll Try But Sorry Champ It’s Probably Coming Out. and then they devote their energy to trying to figure out if they can legally get whoever the fuck this is gonna be to waive liability regarding dick fires.

The only way to keep it out was the off chance that Johnny, who was not in a relationship and had never once been in a relationship that didn’t involve his nudes getting leaked, finding someone who, out of the sheer kindness of their heart, would be willing to risk the dick fire while getting absolutely nothing in return and keeping it quiet from every living soul afterwards. which seemed extremely unlikely considering it was the biggest news story around when Johnny walked in, beaming, and announced that he found such partner. you’ve met him. he’s that reporter with the number one newspaper for all superhero news. oh, and all those forms you’ve been laboriously drafting with legal? he has a blanket refusal for any and all forms. he says he’s allergic. oh, no, no, he won't talk to medical either. he says that if there is a single person other than the two of them who know about or conceptualize any and all sexual acts involving him he’ll kill himself and then Johnny, actually, so like. no. no, there won’t be any medical monitoring. ambulance on standby? Get this, he’d much rather risk any dick fire damages. He sort of made me swear up and down that in the case of any dick fires, i’d shut the fuck up about it and call his buddy danny for some kind of alternative eastern medicinal cure involving fisting. Oh, birth control? he super promises he’s taking them, but, haha, he says that he still fucking hates reed after that one dinner and if anyone insults him again by asking to watch, he’ll graffiti the front door of the baxter building with an unflattering portrait of them all.

so that’s basically a broad overview of jumble sale chic’s prostitution law and the influence it has on the actors in this fic.

#daredevil #spiderman #fantastic four #johnny storm #matt murdock #peter parker #jumble sale chic #chewing coffee #omegaverse #abo dynamics #god am i a fucking omegaverse scholar now

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