#and be like these guys must think I look so stupid

[prlssprfctn]

AU, where Bruce accidentally gets de-aged (physically and mentally), and the first person he bumps in is... Red Hood.

To Jason's defence, he didn't connect the dots at first. He was just patrolling around his usual turf, thinking of nothing in particular, when he saw a small child in a ridiculously serious suit, sulking around Crime Alley. He looks distraught, and considering that he looks rich, it is no surprise - that is not a place for him. So, he is either lost or something happened, right?

He takes the helmet off, as he usually does when he is dealing with kids (they got scared easily) and carefully approaches a brooding baby.

'Hey, shrimp. Where are your parents at?'

That said shrimp turns around, his big blue eyes looking confused and lost, and Jason thinks he looks awfully familiar.

'I am not shrimp,' he protests instantly, pouting at him. 'And they are somewhere... here. We just left the movie theatre together!'

Jason glances at the abandoned movie theatre, back at the little rich boy with a familiar frown, and it clicks. This is his fucking dad. Suddenly, a kid - but it is fucking Bruce Wayne, for sure.

'Was watching Zorro by any chance?' Jason still asks, just to be sure that he is not going insane.

Bruce - and it must be him - beams at him.

'Yes! This is a great movie, by the way.'

Oh, hell. At least, he didn't witness his parents' death just yet. Jason wasn't sure he would be able to deal with his father being so small, and mourning his mom and dad. He would probably cry himself at some point.

'Hey,' Jason calls out for him slowly, squatting down; God, who would've thought that this little shrimp would become so tall and big in the future. 'Aren't you... You must be Thomas's kid, right?'

Okay, yeah, Jason is going to lie to this kid. Because there is no way he manages just to steal Bruce as a stranger to bring him back home; it is still a kid, even if it is his father. Right?

'You know my dad?' Bruce tilts his head, little fingers tugging on the hem of his jacket; suspicious.

'You could say that,' Jason nods. 'Alfie... I mean, Alfred called me. Asked me to pick up a kid, since Thomas and Martha got an urgent call.'

Fuck his life and stupid life choices. What the hell he was even doing? He looked like a mugger; or like a psycho. But Alfred was his best bet - he could call him, after all; ask, well, support his idiotic made-up story.

'No one calls Alfred Alfie but my dad,' Bruce pouts in a very, very spoiled manner.

'Well... I do. We served together in the army,' he blurts out.

His armour, apparently, is enough a proof for the kid to nod slowly.

'Okay. But you gotta take off your strange mask first,' Bruce folds arms on his chest.

...???

Did this kid just agree for an unknown man to take him home? Like this? Who could've thought that this pouty child would become the most paranoid man alive in the future?

'Uh, why?'

'So I can remember your face and do an identikit, if you turn out to be a bad guy,' Bruce smirks stupidly. 'Duh.'

Jason is going to cry. This kid is so cute.

'Yeah, duh,' Jason huffs, but despite his better judgment takes the domino mask off as well. 'Go on, take your time. My identikit should be the prettiest, shrimp.'

Bruce... gawks at him. His eyes are comically wide now, mouth open, and then, he jumps a little closer to him - oh, God, he is jumping when excited? - putting his hellishly cold hands on Jason's cheeks.

'Woah. You look like dad.'

'Uh,' Jason nods awkwardly, and because he is an idiot, adds a joke: 'We are brothers, actually. Just don't talk much.'

...Apparently, little Bruce can't take jokes. Because he lets out an adorable gasp, and throws himself on Jason as if they knew each other for ages now.

'Uncle? That's so cool. You look like Zorro!'

Damn this little kid, and this stupid family. Damn Joe Chill and the night he killed this kid's parents. Damn it all. Bruce might be an asshole sometimes, but he was so... cute and innocent.

'Thanks, shrimp,' Jason slides a domino mask back on, picks up little Bruce with one arm, and grips a helmet with another. 'Come on, let's go home. Alfred will make your favourite tiramisu.'

'You know my favourites?!'

Jason sniffles.

'Yeah. Yeah, I do, kid.'

If he gets so emotional over this kid, he has no idea how worse Dick is going to be once he finds out.

Oh, this is going to be one hell of a night.

[matchpointfaist]

a love like religion ˚₊‧꒰ა♡໒꒱ ‧₊˚

sheltered! art x flirty reader pt iii

the third time he saw you, art couldn’t decide between happy and horrified. he’d been doing his best to stay focused on his studies, his faith, and his training; on anything but you. his thoughts drifted, sure, but for the most part he thought he was doing pretty well. an entire week passed, and he managed to avoid you on campus, ignoring his fleeting thoughts of wishing to see you, even for just a moment.

he knew, in the back of his mind, that attending his teammates birthday party was a mistake. he knew you were in the same social circle, that you’d probably be there, all gorgeous and flirty and drunk and- it was just best if he didn’t see you.

he told himself he wasn’t taking extra care in his appearance for you; he just wanted to look good, that’s all. a birthday party is a big deal. so he got dressed in a button up and jeans, made sure his hair was perfect and his cologne wasn’t too strong, and tried to keep his head high as he entered the already too loud party.

almost immediately, his eyes fell to you. everyone’s did, though, he couldn’t blame himself. you were a vision of pink and silver shimmer, your hair falling down the dangerously low back of your dress. his breath quickened, his mind racing with excuses on how to get out of here before you noticed- and then, your sharp eyes were on his, a dangerous little smile on your glossy lips.

“donaldson!” your voice carried over the music like a melody, like some sort of siren call crafted just for him, rendering him helpless, “cmere!” and he practically floated to your side, a nervous smile on his lip, “uh, hi, hey. i didn’t know you’d be here,” he managed, biting the inside of his cheek and hoping he didn’t think too stupid.

“course id be here,” you grinned, “what’re you drinkin? i can get you a refill,” he shook his head, “no, i don’t drink, i can just get a water,” “you don’t drink?” you laughed, like it was the most insane thing in the world, “cmon, artie. come with me,”

so he followed you to the kitchen, let you pour him a cup of stale beer even though he knew it was wrong, it was stupid, it was a sin. “it’s cheap shit, but it’s fine,” you sounded almost apologetic as he sniffed it, trying to keep his nose from scrunching, taking a shy sip. “you look pretty,” he said after a moment, choking down the beer with what he hoped was only a slight grimace.

“you too,” you smiled, and for just a brief second, it seemed real. not like that fake, mocking smile you gave everyone else. in a flash, though, it was gone, replaced by the coyness you showed the rest of the world, “nice shirt. green looks good on you,” you trailed your fingers over the collar of his shirt, and he almost lost it right there in the crowded kitchen, his head swimming. “my grandma got it for me,” his cheeks flushed, acutely aware that was not the right thing to say, but you didn’t seem to mind.

“cute,” you just smiled, “here, finish that and i’ll make you another, kay?” he shook his head, already regretting the first round, “no, i really can’t, i’m sorry,” he rambled, “i have class tomorrow and i don’t drink anyway and-“ “don’t worry about it,” you rested a hand on his shoulder, “it’s fine, artie. we’ll have fun anyway, yeah? you can just watch me drink,” you teased. and oh, he did watch you. all night, you practically dragged him around the party, inches from you at all times.

he watched you laugh, watched you dance, watched you drink and smoke and all the things he’d always be too afraid to do. he watched you in rare moments of your true form as you interacted with your girl friends, watched you shut down the guys that tried to dance too close to you. he watched so intently he felt like he had learned who you really were in just a few short hours, like he’d cracked some sort of code he must have missed before.

at 11, he debated leaving without even saying goodbye, just leaving you to your dancing and talking. but as he turned to leave, you were calling his name, a little pout on your lips that sent him reeling. “i’ll walk you home,” you offered, and he took note of your heels in your hand, your bare feet on the floor. “no, that’s alright,” he smiled slightly, “thank you, though. that’s kind of you,”

“let me,” you pressed, “at least let me walk you out, art,” so he did, of course, like he did everything else you asked of him. you walked with him to his dorm, and when you asked to come in, he let you do that, too. even when his head was screaming at him to stop, that this wouldn’t end well, that temptation was the gateway to sin.

you just looked so fucking pretty, sitting there on his bed, your heels tossed in the floor and the skirt of your dress on his comforter. he wished he could memorize the moment, bottle it up and save it for when this night ended. surely you’d never be back there, he told himself, this was just one time. a lapse in judgment, on both your parts.

but then he was sitting beside you, and your perfume was so sweet, and your words were even sweeter when you asked him about his hometown and his family and the pictures on his bookcase. you sounded like you really cared, like you thought he was interesting. you, of all people.

“you can relax,” you told him, and his heart nearly stopped as you pressed your leg to his, scooting closer on his bed, “jesus, you’re so tense. i’m not gonna bite you, yknow. not unless you like that,” you winked again, and his cheeks were flushed, his mind working overtime to form words that just wouldn’t come.

“you shouldn’t be in here,” he finally blurted out, his eyes wide with fear of the way it sounded, like he didn’t want you there when that could not be further from the truth, “sorry- that came out wrong. i just- i can’t be with anyone, and you’re in my room and it’s late-“

“you can’t be with anyone?” you repeated, a laugh on your lips, “why not, hm? is the devil gonna getcha if you slip up?” and then your hand was back on his necklace like all those days before, touching it, burning into his skin, “live a little, art,”

and then you were kissing him, and oh god, oh god, oh god. it was heaven and hell and a mistake and bliss and burning and soothing and everything he’d been too afraid to admit he’d ever wanted. you tasted like vodka and cotton candy and sacrilege and he couldn’t get enough, couldn’t hold back the sounds leaving him from the simple act of your kiss, couldn’t stop his hands from wandering and fuck, you were so warm and so soft and he could’ve died right there when you climbed into his lap, kissing him dizzy, tipping his jaw open with your fingers and dipping your tongue into his mouth.

he would’ve let you do anything in that moment, would’ve let you ruin the path he’d been on for so many years, would’ve let you dismantle all his plans and his faith and anything you wanted if you just kept grinding against him, kept kissing him so sweetly, so dangerously.

and then you sank to your knees off the bed, your hands pulling at his belt and your eyes shining as you blinked up at him, a sultry little smile on your swollen lips. “you’re so hard,” you hummed, sounding content as you pulled down his jeans, “has a girl ever touched you like this, hm?”

“no,” it came out like a whine, his hips bucking into your hand as you ghosted your fingers over his cock, “jesus- no, no one has,” you made a little noise, like you were pleased, and your eyes widened as you pulled down his boxers, taking him into your hand. “this is so- oh, this is so bad,” he hissed in half-pleasure, half-anguish as you pumped him slowly, your lips parting. “why’s it bad?” you asked, so innocently, so sweet, “just making you feel good, art. that’s all,”

“a sin,” he panted, eyes screwed shut, knowing full well if he looked at you he’d finish right there, just from your hand, “this is- sex before marriage is a sin and,” he trailed off, fucking into your hand despite himself, a little whine leaving his throat.

“oh, no,” you tsked, and when he dared to open his eyes, you were pouting up at him, “it’s okay, art. i’ll be good, yeah? i’ll make up for it,” he didn’t have time to question how before your tongue was on him, licking at the tip like a lollipop, and his eyes rolled back, his hands fisted in his sheets.

“forgive me father, for i have sinned,” you murmured, and he choked out a moan as you took him into your mouth fully, so warm and wet and close- fuck, he was so close. you pulled away with a pop!, “holy mary, mother of god, pray for us sinners,” and then his cock was down your throat, and you were humming around him and he was so fucking close- his hands were in your hair before he could think to stop himself, his hips bucking into your mouth, your name leaving his lips between moans and pleas.

he didn’t know what he was asking for, exactly. forgiveness, release, for you to slow down so this never stopped, but for you to make him cum down your throat like he’d imagined so many times before. one hand was in your hair, the other clutching his sheets as he came, panting and moaning and whining he opened his eyes in just enough time to see you licking your lips clean, wiping your chin with a grin, sucking your thumb into your mouth.

you leaned down, kissing him until all he could taste was salt and sweat and you, god, you, and then you were gone, his lips still hot. “amen,” you whispered against his ear, gathering your heels and pausing at the door, “see you around, art,”

and then, for the second time, you were gone. he looked down, and nearly fainted when he saw what was left in his floor. your pink lacy panties, complete with a little wet patch, bundled up just for him.

“forgive me father,” he mumbled to himself, picking up the lace and tucking it into his nightstand, not even bothering to clean himself up before curling up and drifting off, his mind busy with thoughts of you.

[scary-grace]

sips drink. I am going to need. [ ring ] for shigraki

Thank you for the prompt! As usual, I went a little berserk with it, and there is. so much smut in this. If you're not a fan/this is not the vibe, let me know and I'll write you a different one, or do a better job with your other prompts! 9k, AU with demons, succubus!reader, tons of smut. If you're a big fan of super dominant Tomura, this is not the fic for that. MDNI + thanks to @dogblessyoutascha for beta-reading on short notice and putting up with tons of yapping and fic about this guy.

wanted (if you want me)

a Shigaraki x f!Reader fic

You're a down-on-your-luck succubus who just got rejected by the guy who summoned you, and you can't go back to Hell until you find somebody else's soul to steal. Shigaraki Tomura, reeling from a Valentine's Day rejection of his own, is the perfect victim. Or so you think. (cross-posted to Ao3)

“Sorry,” the guy who just summoned you says, sitting back from the pentagram he’s drawn on the floor with a frown. “You’re not my type.”

“I’m – what?” You feel stupid, which isn’t how you’re supposed to feel. You’re a demon, and a mortal’s just summoned you. You should feel powerful and lawless, not embarrassed. Not rejected. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, you’re not my type,” the guy says again. He gestures awkwardly at you. “I was hoping for somebody – more.”

“Did you want a guy or something?” you ask. You cross your arms over your chest. Your clothes are barely worthy of the title, and you don’t want this guy seeing your nipples if he’s not even into them. “If you wanted a guy, you should have summoned an incubus. It’s not my fault you can’t read.”

“I like girls,” the guy snaps at you, rather than addressing the fact that you just called him a moron. “You were supposed to look like this.”

He picks up the grimoire he was reading the incantation out of and holds it up to you. It must be a new edition of the same old grimoire, because the last version of it you saw didn’t include illustrations. The illustration in question is a demon, identifiable as such by her horns and tail, but she looks about as much like you as you do like an angel straight from Heaven’s hideous art-deco gates. She’s got the kind of proportions that don’t work on Earth or in Hell – tiny waist, enormous breasts, ass that needs its own zip code, and her outfit is so tiny that you can see her nipples and her clit through it. And then there’s the face she’s making, straight out of some seedy erotic magazine, with blown-out pupils and open mouth and a delicate flush across her cheeks, all ready to be ruined.

Your outfit is skimpy, sure, but not that skimpy. You have the parts you need, but they aren’t that exaggerated, and if you tried that stupid expression, you’re pretty sure your face would melt off. If this is what this mortal expected, of course he’s disappointed to have gotten you.

His disappointment isn’t your problem, and now you’re in a mood. “Let me get this straight. You summoned a succubus – a sex demon from the depths of Hell – to fulfill your fantasies, and you’ve decided that now’s the time to get picky.”

“I’m not being picky,” he says. “Girls like you don’t do it for me. Can’t you send somebody else?”

“Sorry. All my sisters are seducing hotter mortals than you.” You feel a surge of pleasure at the way the man flinches. Guys like these – when they summon a succubus, they’re always thinking about the sex part, not the part where you’re a demon. “They took one look at you and decided I was all you deserved, and you know what? I don’t think you deserve me, either.”

“Well, I don’t want you, so –”

“In fact,” you continue, rising to your feet and internally cursing the fact that you decided to materialize in fuck-me heels, “I don’t think you deserve to get laid ever again.”

The mortal blanches. “What?” he demands, taking a step back as you step forward out of the pentagram. “You can’t leave the circle unless I say.”

“You really should look into those reading lessons. You’ll have a lot of time on your hands.” You were just going to lay the curse, but you decide that’s not enough. You nail him in the balls with a sharp kick, and as he doubles over, you speak, your voice crackling with the fires of Hell. “May your erections always wither, no matter how much porn you watch or how many drugs you take. May you disappoint every lover you take to your bed, and may that bed lie as cold and empty as the grave where they’ll bury your impotent corpse.”

It's a pretty good curse, if you say so yourself. “You bitch,” the mortal spits, but you snap your fingers and seal his fate. You know the moment the curse settles over him. You see the despair in his eyes. “Take it back!”

“No,” you say. You grasp his chin in one hand and lean in close, so close that your breath huffs out against his lips. You scraped your tongue for this guy. He deserves all this and more. “I’ll see you in Hell.”

His eyes roll up in his head and he collapses to the floor. You step over his unconscious form and survey the apartment you’ve found yourself in, dingy and filthy and smelling unpleasantly of human body odor. This is the kind of mortal who thought it was wise to reject you, just because you didn’t exactly resemble the absurd sketch in his grimoire. This is the kind of mortal who thought you weren’t good enough for him. Your lower lip begins to tremble, no matter how hard you sink your sharp teeth into it, and sulfuric tears begin to leak from your eyes. You were so excited to be summoned, so hopeful that you could do a good job for once. Now you just want to go home.

But you can’t. When you try to dematerialize and let Hell call you back, you can’t, and you realize why not in the same second as you realize that you didn’t curse that human nearly hard enough. You were summoned to this world to serve a purpose – to fuck some mortal so hard that they’ll sell you their soul – and until you serve that purpose, you’re trapped here. You need to find a mortal to sleep with, immediately. And you can’t go out looking like this.

You ransack the mortal’s apartment. None of his street clothes are anything you’d be caught exorcised wearing, but he has a long coat that he probably thinks makes him look mysterious and cool. You shrug it on, noting that it covers your skimpy outfit while still providing easy access to your body when it’s time to take it off, and keep searching, in case there’s anything else you can use. Money, as it happens – this human has a bank account and credit cards, and even unconscious, it’s all too easy to read his mind for the PIN. You pocket all of it, hide your demon form with a glamour, then leave the apartment door wide open on your way out.

As soon as you hit the street, though, you realize that you have an even bigger problem than you thought. You assumed it was some featureless winter evening, the kind where a bored, lonely mortal has nothing better to do than flip through a grimoire and get himself into trouble, but every storefront you look at is decorated with hearts. Every mortal you pass on the street is on someone else’s arm, or carrying flowers, or making out in the glow of a streetlight. It’s Valentine’s Day. You’re fucked.

Contrary to what humans like the idiot who summoned you think, Valentine’s Day isn’t actually about sex. Sex is a side effect of what Valentine’s Day is really about, which is romance. It’s about love and soulmates and tenderness and affection and forever, which is exactly nothing you know anything about. Succubi and incubi exist on the dark side of all of that, in its nasty, sleazy, prurient shadow. You don’t court, you seduce. You don’t make love, you fuck. You don’t show people the face of God, or whatever that dumb-ass musical says; you show them the gates of Hell and walk them through. Seducing a random mortal is a tall order for you on a given day. Seducing one on Valentine’s Day is going to be damn near impossible.

You feel tears welling up again and blink them back. Crying over rejection from a filthy, useless mortal was bad enough. Demons shouldn’t feel that kind of pain, and if they do, they shouldn’t wallow in it. Demons get the job done. And it’s not totally hopeless, when you force yourself to be honest about it. For all the mortals who are happily coupled, there are plenty who aren’t, and if the mortal who summoned you is anything to judge by, some of them aren’t averse to a little salacious, damnation-worthy fun.

As far as places to find single humans go, you’re spoiled for choice; while all the restaurants have Valentine’s Day specials for mortals out on a date with their special someone, it seems as though every club or bar is advertising an event for singles. You peer into a few bars, but none of them strike you as having the right mood. Most of them carry a pathetic air of hopefulness, as if the humans within believe they really might find someone to love tonight of all nights. You don’t need hopefulness. You need desperation. You need a human so lonely and desperate that they won’t question why a stranger wants to fuck them. If you were attractive in your human guise, you’d have a better shot, but apparently you aren’t. Only a human who’s truly desperate would go for you.

Finally you come across a bar where the mood seems a little more appropriate. Some sort of singles event is winding down as you come in, and you sense the despair beginning to set in. Most of the humans here could easily pair up with one of the others if they were willing to alter their standards, but humans have gotten entitled these days, and they all think they deserve a partner who matches their ideals. They cling to that fiction even as the mood in the bar worsens. They don’t need to settle. They’re holding out for true love.

Pathetic. You square your shoulders and wade into the mix.

The gender of your target doesn’t matter to you. It doesn’t even matter if they’re willing to sell their soul tonight – once you’ve fucked them, you can come back as many times as it takes for them to give it over. But even with your criteria broadened, you’re having trouble. As you search through the humans, tasting the flavor of their emotions every time you brush against one, you don’t find a single one who feels the way you need them to.

You taste sadness. Loneliness. Despair. Resignation or acceptance – sometimes they’re hard to tell apart. A few strange humans have even found refuge in faith, some idiosyncratic hope that they’ll find what they’re meant to find when the time is right, as if God has time to ordain such stupid things. On another night, you’d take pleasure in crushing their hopes, but your own hopes of getting out of here are sinking by the second. You need a human. Any human will do.

But just as you’re resigning yourself to seduce a woman, one whose loneliness carries just the faintest tinge of despair, you’re hit with a wave of exactly what you’ve been looking for. Not just despair, but disappointment. Not just loneliness, but hurt. Not just resignation, but frustration and embarrassment, at feeling hurt and disappointed and finding themselves here at all. You turn away from the woman without ever drawing her attention to you and follow the thread of rejection through the bar to a booth in the corner, where a mortal sits alone.

Along with the relief of finding a target at last, the first feeling that crosses your mind is surprise.  This isn’t the sort of mortal you’d expect to find alone on Valentine’s Day, just based on his looks alone – almost-delicate facial features, long white hair, a frame that’s broad-shouldered yet lithe, observable even when he’s seated. As you get closer, you see a birthmark below the corner of his mouth, scars over his mouth and eye, and long lashes framing his crimson eyes. This mortal is pretty. Some of your sisters don’t care what their targets look like, but you like your mortal men pretty.

The mortal looks up as you come to the edge of his table. He seems as surprised to see you as you are to see him. “You’re late to the party.”

“Apparently not, since you’re here. Do you mind if I sit down? My feet are hurting in these shoes.”

He looks down at your shoes, and just like you were hoping, his eyes trace upwards, over your bare ankle to your calf to your knee before it disappears beneath your stolen coat. “Go ahead,” he says. “There’s room.”

There’s plenty of room, but you sit down next to him anyway, your leg pressed against his. You feel him startle, feel him go tense, and decide it’s worth drawing attention to. “Did I scare you?”

“No,” he says, but you can hear his heart beginning to race. “Just wondering if this is a setup or something. People like you don’t usually want anything to do with people like me.”

“People like me?” you say. You turn towards him, elbow propped on the table, chin propped in your hand. “What do you mean?”

“Don’t play dumb,” your mortal says. “Looks like yours, there’s no way you’re single.”

You can’t imagine this mortal’s self-deprecating angle working on anyone, but the compliment makes you glow ever so slightly. “Strange. I was thinking the same about you.”

Your mortal doesn’t glow. He blushes. “Don’t lie.”

“Would I lie?” Yes, frequently and gleefully – but not right now. “You’re gorgeous.”

He scoffs, averts his eyes, but his heart’s beating faster. It’s cute, and since he’s opened this door, you might as well walk through. Time for a little touching. You start with the scar above his eye. “I like this, and this –” you trace the scar, then tuck a few strands of white hair behind his ear, letting your fingers graze across his cheek and down to his jaw before reaching the scar over his mouth. “And this –”

He speaks while your fingers are still against his lips. “Careful.”

“I’m being really careful,” you promise. You run your fingers over his mouth again, slow and teasing, then turn your attention to the birthmark. “And I like this. It really completes the picture. Whoever rejected you tonight, they were out of their mind.”

“I could say the same about whoever rejected you.” Your mortal’s hand brushes against your knee, then drifts away, and you shiver ever so slightly. You like this mortal. It’s always easier when you like them. “I saw you watching the rest of them. Why did you pick me?”

“Like I said, you’re gorgeous,” you say, and shrug. The shrug presses you a little closer against him, and you don’t pull back. “And you looked like you were having the same kind of night as I am. I thought we could make each other feel better.”

He gives you a skeptical look, but the flush in his cheeks gives him away. Oh, you like this one. Even if he gives you his soul tonight, you’ll come back to visit him at least a few more times. “How do you think we can do that?”

“By giving each other what we want,” you say. “Don’t you get tired of having to play a part, to be what someone else expects you to be, and never have your desires fulfilled? I could give you that.”

He scoffs. “You think you know what my desires are?”

“You’d tell me,” you murmur. “That’s the point.”

Your mortal’s skepticism doesn’t fade, but neither does his blush. “What about what you want? I don’t buy for a second that it’s just to sleep with me.”

The question gives you pause. It’s not one you’ve thought of before. Succubi don’t have sexual desires, really – your goal is always to seduce your target, which means it’s all about what your target wants. You aren’t very good at your job, but you’ve put up with all sorts of things, doing them or having them done to you, if it means the mortal you’re fucking will hand over their soul. What you want, personally, doesn’t factor in even slightly. What do you want from this mortal? You don’t know.

“You don’t know,” your mortal says, as though you’ve spoken aloud. His hand brushes against your leg again, settles there. “I’ll help you find out.”

“Only if you tell me what you want,” you insist, as he brushes your coat aside and finds your leg bare. His fingertips are dry and rough as they trail over your skin, brushing the inside of your thigh. “Oh –”

“Too much?” he asks. There’s an almost wicked glint in his eye.

You feel your own heart pick up the pace. This will be a challenge. You like a challenge. “Answer my question first. Every time you answer, you can move your hand.”

“I want you.”

“Wrong answer.” You close your legs, not that they were that far apart in the first place. You’re not easy. “I asked about your unfulfilled desires, and you just met me today. I can’t be the only thing you want.”

“Mm.” Your mortal makes a dissatisfied noise. Even as he leaves his hand in place, you see an awkwardness settle over him – nerves, or something like it. For such a gorgeous mortal, he’s an interesting contradiction. “I want – to be out of control.”

“Out of control?” You won’t open your legs just yet. “Tell me more.”

“You were right about me. I’m always doing what others want. I always have to be in control. I want to be outside my own control,” your mortal says. He can’t meet your eyes, and the flush in his cheeks looks almost uncomfortable. When you lean in to kiss it, his skin is hot beneath your lips. “I want someone else to –”

“Praise you? Worship you? Pleasure you until you can barely think?” You know you’ve got him by the sharp intake of breath, by the way he startles. “That would be my pleasure, too.”

You part your legs enough to free his hand, and his fingers, shaking slightly, work their way up the inside of your thigh. “What else?” you ask. “Be specific.”

“I want whatever you can give me.” He turns his head, looking away, which is an error on his part; it leaves his neck exposed, and you lean in to kiss it, feeling his pulse jump and race. “If I tell you it’s too much, I want you to give me more.”

“That was a good answer.” You part your legs a little further, and he takes it as the invitation it is. “Anything else?”

“I want to do the same to you,” your mortal says, and your face flushes. “It’s only fair. If you get to ruin me, I get to ruin you.”

Ruining him calls to mind all sorts of things, acts you’ve performed for other mortals by rote, acts you want nothing more than to perform for him, and the thought overwhelms you enough that you miss what he’s doing with his hand between your legs until he’s touching you, tracing your clit through the thin fabric. You realize with some degree of horror that you’re wet, and worse, that even his delicate touch has you spreading your legs wider. While you weren’t paying attention, your mortal made a bid for the upper hand, and he almost got it.

Not quite, though. You renew your efforts on his neck, feeling him shudder. You’ll do as he asks, as he desires – but not until he begs you, out loud, to give him what he needs. He shifts, squirms, in response to your attentions to his neck, much as you’re doing with his hand between your legs. “Mutual ruination,” you muse. “That sounds like a plan to me.”

Your hand’s been trapped at your side. You work it free and slip it behind his head, tangling your fingers in his hair. Then you turn him back to face you, drinking in the sight of him for a moment before you lean in to kiss him. The only way your mortal’s never had his desires fulfilled is if he’s never voiced them. You can’t imagine anyone looking at him, seeing him like this, and denying him what he wants.

Most mortals you’ve seduced lose patience with kissing quickly. The kind of mortals who summon a succubus only have one thing on their mind, but your mortal doesn’t know what you are. He kisses you eagerly, if inexpertly, and it’s only right for you to reward his enthusiasm. Besides, there’s something about kissing him that feels right, too right for the unholiness of what you are. If being with a mortal feels this good, you’re probably doing it wrong.

What does it matter? As long as you sleep with him, you’ll be free to return home. You’re a demon. Wrongness and rightness don’t factor in. You kiss your mortal carefully, paying some mind to the sharpness of your teeth and the delicateness of his skin. He’s less careful with his teeth. They nick your lip and blood wells out, and he licks it away without a moment’s hesitation. That flick of his tongue makes you consider other places it might belong, and you catch your breath. Or maybe it’s because he’s tugged your underwear aside to touch you directly, and you can no longer ignore the way he makes you feel.

You lean back, struggling to clear your head. A thought crosses your mind. “What’s your name?”

“Tomura.” Your mortal’s crimson eyes are dilated with want, the desperation you were so drawn to evident across his face. “Please –”

You kiss him again, and as he begins to finger you in earnest, stroking your clit and dipping his fingers shallowly inside you, you untangle your fingers from his hair and trace the inside of his thigh. Tomura startles at your touch, but spreads his legs at once, and your head spins with want. “How long have you wanted this?” you murmur against his lips. “Tell me.”

“Eternity.” Tomura twitches as you brush your hand over his groin before returning to toy with his thigh again. “But it’s not what they want me for. Nobody asked what I wanted until you.”

“Then they were missing out.” You bite back a gasp as Tomura sinks two fingers inside you, curling them just so, but his touch is only half the reason – the other half is the thought that you’re the first to see him this way, the only one to see him this way. “If they could see how pretty you are like this –”

“Do you want them to?”

“No,” you decide at once. You brush your hand over his groin again, noting how tightly his pants are stretched over his hardening cock. “I want you all to myself.”

His body jerks, craning upwards into your touch. “Now,” he says, almost demands. “I need it now.”

“People could see,” you warn. “If they walk by, they’ll know we’re up to something. Do you care about that?”

“Yes,” Tomura says, and you run your thumb over the tip of his cock through his pants. His body jerks, and you do it again. Again. “Fuck –”

“We can leave whenever you want,” you say, even as your body tenses around his fingers. You feel wound tight, your legs shaking from the strain, your lungs feeling as though they can’t hold on to even a single whisper of air. Mortals have choked you before while you’re seducing them and it’s never been like this. “Tell me to stop and we’ll go.”

Tomura doesn’t tell you to stop. You undo his belt, unzip his pants, and the instant your hand closes around his cock, he moans, loud enough to attract attention if anyone from the failed singles event is still around. He’s embarrassed by it – you can tell – but he doesn’t tell you to stop, and you keep stroking his cock. “So pretty,” you say, your voice catching as the heel of his hand presses against your clit. “Does that feel good? Let me make you feel even better.”

You grasp his wrist and pull his hand from between your legs, thankful for the reprieve. Tomura tastes his fingers, savoring them in a way that makes you feel almost awkward. “I wasn’t done.”

“No, but you’re about to make a mess.” You give a pointed glance down at his cock, which is oozing enough precum to stain his underwear. “I’ll be right back.”

There’s plenty of space for you under the table, and better yet, you’re out of sight, which means Tomura can’t see your reaction to the way he spreads his legs for you. And you haven’t vanished a moment too soon. You can hear footsteps approaching, and you sit forward and take his cock in your mouth just as the newcomers arrive.

“You sure you need this whole booth when you’re by yourself?” whoever it is asks. You hear Tomura start to answer, but you suck lightly on the tip of his cock, forcing him to bite back a curse. “What is your problem?”

“No problem,” Tomura grunts. You put your tongue to use, tracing it over his tip as you wrap your hand around the rest of his length. “Fuck – fuck off. There are other places to sit.”

The newcomer might say something else, but you can’t hear it around your own heartbeat thudding in your ears. Tomura wants you. He wants you so badly that he’s letting you blow him in public, that he won’t tell you to stop even when the two of you might be caught. The instant the other mortal leaves, you’re cradling his balls in your free hand, then sliding your hand a little further to press against his taint. Tomura’s entire body jerks and trembles. “Careful,” he forces out between gasps of air. “I’m going to – come –”

You wish you weren’t under the table, even if being under the table is necessary to contain the mess. You wish you could see Tomura’s face as his composure shatters, as he tries and fails to thrust upwards into your mouth and spills a ridiculous amount of cum down your throat. But he’s not quite out of control, not yet, and if you’re going to steal his soul, you really should give him what he wants first. You keep stroking his cock even as the shaking subsides, your tongue still dragging over his tip. He hasn’t gone soft just yet. You’re kind of impressed.

You’re impressed, too, with how he holds out. You know you’re overstimulating him, but he hasn’t told you to stop yet. And he asked you to keep going even if he told you it was too much. Still, you don’t like the idea of hurting your mortal. You renew your efforts, employing all the tricks you’ve learned to keep mortal men hanging on your every move, and to your shock, Tomura comes again. This time he’s almost sobbing, and you draw back at once, climbing out from under the table to check on your handiwork.

There are scratches in the couch cushions and on the tabletop, and both the napkins that were on the table have been crumpled out of existence. Tomura looks wrecked. He’s been yanking at the collar of his shirt, running his hands through his hair, and his face is flushed and sweaty. His eyes are blurred, and he’s still breathing hard, but when you lean in to kiss him, he obliges instantly. He’s unsteady, and yet there’s a strange hunger in the way he kisses you, a hunger that takes yours and amplifies it in a way you can’t quantify, let alone guard against. You find yourself melting into his touch, needing closeness, needing contact. And he gives it to you.

You’ve only just settled into a languid pace, your hands in his hair and his arms wrapped firmly around your waist, when someone smacks a server’s tray down on the table and startles you out of it. It’s the bartender. “Do you mind?” she demands, her face red. “This isn’t that kind of place! Take it outside.”

That’s fine with you. A little PDA is one thing, but whatever happens next between you and Tomura, you want privacy for it. You start to slide out of the booth, but Tomura won’t let you. He kisses you again, and you realize he’s giving himself cover to button his pants. But as long as you’re here – “What did I just say?” the bartender explodes. “Get out!”

You and Tomura stumble out onto the street, and the instant the door shuts behind you, Tomura pins you against it to kiss you again. “Does that feel good?” he asks, the same question you asked him earlier. You didn’t give him a chance to answer, and he doesn’t give you one, either. “Let’s go somewhere. You’re not the only one who doesn’t like to share.”

“Where should we go?” you ask. “I’d rather not go to a love hotel. Your place?”

He hesitates for a moment. “My place. Come on.”

You kiss on the train platform, mostly to keep out the cold, but on the train, you find yourself simply looking at Tomura, talking to him. You find out that he got rejected tonight, too, and came to the bar to mope about it. “They’re nothing. Their opinions don’t matter,” he says. Even his disdain sounds like yours. “That doesn’t change how it feels.”

“I know,” you say. You lean against him, your head on his shoulder, your left hand intertwined with his right. “My – date – said I wasn’t his type, then showed me this ridiculous drawing –”

“May his dick shrivel up and fall off,” Tomura says matter-of-factly, and you find yourself giggling. “If you aren’t enough for him, he doesn’t deserve to have any at all. Still –”

He trails off. “His loss, my gain.”

“You’re just saying that because I blew you.”

Tomura snorts. “Don’t be stupid. You asked what I wanted. Nobody’s ever asked me that. That’s not what I’m for.”

“What do you mean?” you ask. He doesn’t strike you as a sex worker – he’s too earnest, too vulnerable, in how he responds to you for it to be his day job. He shrugs, shakes his head. “I think you’re for whatever you want to be for. That’s how you are to me.”

His grip on your hand tightens for a moment, then loosens again, fingers tangling with yours. A strange spark, like an electric shock, ripples across your hand, and you look down to see an odd shadow around your ring finger. That wasn’t there before, but then again, you’ve never spent this long in the mortal world without fulfilling your purpose. “What about you?” Tomura asks. “Why don’t you know what you want?”

“I never thought about it before.” Some of your sisters enjoy their jobs, but it’s always felt like a job to you. Something to get through, so you can go home. “It hasn’t really mattered.”

“It matters now,” Tomura says. “When we get back to my place, I’ll show you.”

Tomura’s place is in a downtown high-rise, the third floor from the top of the building, and he gives you long enough to finally step out of your awful shoes before he peels you out of your jacket. For a single moment you’re convinced you’re about to see the same reaction as the mortal who summoned you, but instead Tomura’s eyes travel slowly over your form, lingering in every place you’d expect and a few places you didn’t. “This picture he showed you,” he says. “The one he thought was better than you. What did it look like?”

“Uh –” Where do you start, really? “The proportions were totally off. Its waist was tiny, and its breasts were huge –”

“Huh.” Tomura’s hands are at your waist, running over the curve from torso to hip and back with a firm, steady touch. One stays there, but the other migrates upwards, cupping your breast through your scant clothing. “What else?”

“It had this stupid outfit on. Like, way smaller than mine. You could see everything,” you say. Tomura’s thumb brushes over your nipple, then comes back to circle it, and heat begins to pool in your lower abdomen. “It barely covered her nipples – or her clit. It just looked kind of – I mean, I can hang in there with the best of them, but –”

Your voice catches. Tomura’s hand slides from your waist down between your legs, stroking your clit with his middle finger. His touch is featherlight, compared to the way he’s playing with your nipple, pinching and tugging it, making you squirm. “What else?” he prompts.

“The stupid face she was making. It was straight out of a porno – like, one of the really cheap ones. What some guy who’s never seen a woman come before would –” You startle as Tomura’s fingers slip further between your legs, then sink easily into you. “Tomura –”

“This drawing sounds like a fucking mess,” Tomura says. He reaches down and grasps your thigh, hiking your leg up around his waist and leaving you even more exposed for him. “I want to see the real thing.”

He wants you to come for him. You know how to fake a convincing orgasm – or an unconvincing one, depending on the target – but you don’t want to fake for Tomura. You promised him he can have what he wants, and he wants this, you. Your chest goes tight. “I don’t know if I can, like this.”

“I’ve got lots of ideas.” Tomura kisses you, and that need to melt into him resurfaces, even as your body responds to his onslaught. “Show me.”

You try to keep kissing him, but you can’t. Your legs are shaking again, and it’s hard to breathe, and you have to draw back to gasp for air. Somewhere in the back of your mind is the thought that this isn’t how it’s supposed to happen, that something went wrong in your seduction of this mortal if he’s the one trying to please you, but it’s stifled by other, more pressing matters. The heat flooding through you, the awful and yet indescribable exposure of your legs spread this way, Tomura’s hand anchoring you so you can’t pull back off his fingers until he’s done with you.

Or until you’re done with him. You come hard enough to blur your vision, hard enough that your legs almost give out, and Tomura keeps his fingers inside you until your twitching and squirming subsides. When he draws them back, you can see that his hand is soaked. He brings them to his mouth to taste them again, and you spot a shadow around his fourth finger. It can’t hold your attention for long. “That was good,” he decides. “But I want to see more.”

“More?” Your voice is shaky, and you’re hanging onto Tomura for dear life. “What do you mean?”

“You said I could have what I wanted,” Tomura reminds you. “This way.”

You follow him down the hall on shaky legs, into a bedroom with an enormous bed. Finally. You’re not getting into bed with Tomura still wearing your horrible outfit, so you peel it off, then turn to help him with his clothes. You undress him slowly, kissing every inch of skin you uncover, trying to regain some of your lost composure. But it’s hard to compose yourself when there’s so much of him to explore, to praise. So pretty, so noisy, so needy even when there’s no need for it – because you want him to have what he wants, and you want to be the one who gives it to him. The only one who gives it to him.

And that’s what you find yourself murmuring, as you guide him down to the bed to lie on his stomach, as you brush his long hair aside to kiss his back and his shoulders. I have what you need. Everything you need. You’re mine.

Tomura’s breathing turned quick and shallow a while ago, worse as you kiss the small of his back, the arch of his hip. He stirs beneath you. “I want to see more,” he says. “On your back.”

He’ll fuck you now, and he’ll come, and then you can finally go home. You spread your legs, leaving room for him to settle between them, and he does – much further down than you expected. He anchors your hips to the bed before you can stop him, holding you down with strong hands as he lowers his head between your thighs. The way his hair brushes against them tickles. The marks he leaves on them are oversensitive, making your legs twinge long before his tongue drags over your clit, and you wonder how you’ll explain the marks when you get back to Hell. How you’ll explain the fact that this mortal seduced you almost as skillfully as you seduced him.

Tomura eats you out messily, enthusiastically, until you’re arching your back and thrashing in his grip. The heat of his mouth against you, the pressure of his tongue against your clit or the way it feels when he licks inside of you – it all feels almost sinful. Too good for you to have, too good to want more of, too good not to beg him to keep going. You can barely manage to praise him for it, but when you do, his grip on your hips tightens and he grinds against the mattress. It’s wrong. There’s something wrong, and you want it so badly, and for the first time, you understand a little bit of why humans are so quick to sell their souls.

Tomura makes you come once, then a second time while you’re still trying to recover, and you barely manage to scramble away before he can slide his fingers inside you and try for a third. “What happened to not being in control?” you ask, and he shrugs, half a smirk on his face. “Lie down. It’s my turn.”

You crawl over him as he lies back, tasting yourself on his lips when you lean down for a kiss. Tomura relaxes so easily for you now, so much that he lets you grasp his hands one by one, raising them above his head. For the first time since you cloaked your true form, you engage in a little bit of demon magic. Enough to conjure restraints, and tie Tomura’s hands to the headboard before he can so much as open his eyes.

You’ve shocked him. You can see it, and better yet, you can feel it, in the way his skin heats up and his heart races. “You said you didn’t want control,” you remind him. “And I said I’d pleasure you until you couldn’t think.”

“Are you?” Tomura’s voice goes raspy. He watches you with wide eyes as you shift further down on the bed. “What are you going to do?”

“Everything.”

You learned all sorts of magic in the course of stepping into your role as a succubus, but this is the first time in a while that you’ve used any of it. And it’s for small things – the restraints on Tomura’s hands, the feather you conjure to trace all over his body until he squirms, the lube you coat your fingers with before you start working them inside him. Tomura doesn’t stop you, but he has a request. “Don’t fuck me like that. Not tonight.”

“Just my fingers,” you promise, and he nods, his eyes dark with need. “Whatever you want.”

You haven’t had the chance to watch Tomura come yet, and you get a chance as you finger him to an orgasm. He takes your breath away, your mortal – so pretty, so vulnerable, so loud and expressive and lost in it that you can’t help but stroke his cock with your free hand while you work him up a second time. In an ordinary seduction, with an ordinary target, now is when you’d stop. Now, when all he can do is beg for you, now when he’d give you anything to keep going; right now is when you’d ask for his soul in exchange. You know how to phrase it so that the mortals never guess what they’re truly giving up. It would be easy.

And it’s not what you want. There aren’t words for how much you don’t want that. Not when you’ve earned your mortal’s trust, not when he’s certain enough that you’ll give him what he wants that he doesn’t feel shame in begging for it. You know Tomura’s close when he starts squirming away from your fingers rather than clenching down on them. “Ride me,” he pants. “Ride my cock.”

Demon magic cleans your hands, and you slip down onto his cock with only a little strain. “You’re perfect,” you tell him as he stares helplessly up at you. “We fit so well –”

Tomura’s hips jerk upwards beneath you, making you gasp. “If we fit so well, come on my cock,” he pants. He’s been yanking at the restraints. You made them soft, but his wrists are chafed. “I need you to. I can’t – fuck, I need you –”

You’ve never needed a mortal before. You’ve never needed anyone before, but you need him, enough that doing what he asks doesn’t feel far-fetched at all. You ride him slowly, finding an angle that suits you, realizing how sore you are in the same moment. It’s been a hard night’s work. Usually mortals can’t keep up with you, and usually it feels like work. Tomura’s fingers curl and uncurl uselessly as he fights the restraints, and you reach up to grasp them, to hold them steady. And that’s when you notice it – the same shadow marking around his fourth finger as around yours.

Where did that come from? What is that? The restraints you conjured vanish in the space of a single heartbeat, and Tomura’s hands clamp down on your hips, guiding you as he thrusts upwards. His hair is glued to his forehead with sweat, to his chest and his shoulders and the sides of his neck, and the same heat writhes beneath your own skin as Tomura takes control over your pace. His thrusts are unsteady, but every time, he finds the angle you need him to.

You can’t breathe. You can barely think. Everything narrows down to heat and pressure and friction and pleasure and agony, because your body’s wrung out and still needs more, because Tomura’s falling apart beneath you and pressing his thumb over your clit to take you down with him. Pleasure explodes through you, collapsing you on top of Tomura. His grip on you barely loosens, even as your efforts to hold onto anything fall away. Anything includes your human guise.

Damn it. You untangle yourself from Tomura as quickly as possible, only to tuck yourself in against his side, uncomfortably relieved when he holds you tight. If you keep your tail under control and he doesn’t get a good look at you, he’ll never know what you really were. He’ll know something’s up, though. When he wakes up and finds that you’ve vanished out of this world, leaving evidence only in the chafe-marks around his wrists and the taste of you still on his tongue, he’ll know there was something strange about you. And he’ll have a lot of questions when you come back.

And you will come back. That’s the only thing that makes the knowledge that you’re mere moments from being drawn back to Hell bearable. Most of the time you can’t wait to leave your targets, whether you’ve collected their souls or not. This time, though – “I don’t want to leave yet.”

But you weren’t the only one speaking. Tomura said the same thing, on the off-beats as you spoke. “You’re leaving?” you ask. “This is your house. Where are you going?”

“Where are you going?” Tomura retorts. His grip on you tightens further – tight enough to bruise, if you were human or mortal. “What –”

He sits up suddenly, pulling you with him. Hell is pulling you back, but not quickly enough. Tomura looks at you, sees you – sees your horns, sees your tail, which is lashing anxiously in spite of your efforts to calm yourself. But you see him, too. You see the ram’s horns curling from beneath his white hair, the sharpness of his teeth. He’s not trying to control his tail at all. It wraps around your leg tightly. “You’re a demon.”

“So are you.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Why didn’t you know?” You try to separate yourself from him. Tomura should be letting go of you, should be shoving you away, but he’s still holding on, tighter every time you try to pull away. “Let go. If they find out –”

The world tears open around the two of you, well before you can pull away, and Hell pulls you back in at warp speed.

You don’t end up back in the spot you dematerialized from, and you doubt Tomura does, either. The two of you crash down on a rocky plateau, just on the outskirts of one of the cities, a desolate place no one comes to unless they’ve been cast out to wander amongst the souls of the dead. Why are you here? Is it because you came back together? Maybe that’s why – it couldn’t return you to your separate summoning locations when you’re so close together, so it split the difference and dropped you off here. Maybe there’s still time for you to hide this.

“Wow,” a familiar voice announces from somewhere behind you, and your heart sinks, “have the two of you fucked up.”

Tomura swears under his breath. “Is that your boss?”

Your boss, or your mother – nobody’s clear on which. Nemuri is picking her way through the jagged stones towards you, a vicious smirk on her face. “I can explain,” you start. “It��s not –”

“I tricked her,” Tomura interrupts. You stare at him in horror. “It was me. Not her.”

“No,” you snap. “I seduced him. I’m the one who –”

“I’m sure you believe that.” Nemuri’s smirk broadens, showing her fangs. “You’re so pathetically incompetent that –”

“Now, now, Nem. Let’s not let my guy off the hook here.” The new voice, loud and rich and full of almost-insane laughter, can only belong to another elder demon. Like Nemuri, he’s wearing a vicious smirk. “Remember, my guy’s the one who got rejected by his summoner and packed it in for the evening. At least yours gave it a second shot.”

“That’s my boss,” Tomura mumbles. “Fuck.”

“In fact,” Tomura’s boss continues, “one could argue that your girl’s off the hook. She did her job. It’s not her fault that my guy’s aura of misery was so strong that it made him actually look human. Or that he was so desperate to be wanted by somebody that he forgot to check whether she was actually a demon trying to steal his soul.”

Tomura’s shoulders hunch, and a surge of anger runs through you. “When you put it that way, Hizashi, it does sound like my nymphet is off the hook,” Nemuri says. “But when your pathetic little imp tried to take the fall for her, she wouldn’t let him. It seems they’re terrible at everything demonic, lying included. They’re telling the truth.”

“They really did seduce each other,” Hizashi muses. “That’s cringe.”

“More importantly, it’s against the rules.” Nemuri’s standing over you. Hizashi joins her, and the two of them leer down at you and Tomura, practically licking their lips. “Whatever shall we do with them?”

There aren’t many punishments that can affect demons – you’re basically gluttons for it. Then again, there aren’t many rules for demons to break. “I’m not sure,” Hizashi says. “Offer them up to Heaven for punishment? Banish them to the mortal world until the trumpets sound? Throw them out to wander with the restless dead forevermore?”

You might not love your job, but you have your sisters. If you’re cast out, you’ll never see them again. The only thing worse would be getting thrown to Heaven as an offering, one of Hell’s not-infrequent tithes to keep the peace. Tomura’s tail wraps around your waist, and you cover his left hand with your right as you wait for your fates to be decided. The thought crosses your mind, pointlessly, that you won’t spend an eternity of exile entirely alone. You’ve dragged someone else down with you, which might be the most demonic thing you’ve ever done in your life.

“Now that I think about it,” Nemuri says, her smirk broadening still further, “I don’t think we need to punish them – not when they’ve punished themselves so effectively.”

“What does that mean?” Tomura snaps. Hizashi is guffawing, his voice echoing off the jagged rocks. “Don’t laugh. What does that mean?”

“What does it mean, you gloomy brat?” Hizashi wipes at his eyes, still chuckling. “Take a look at your hands, both of you.”

You let go of Tomura’s and lift your own. Your right hand is clear, but your left – you remember noticing the shadow around your fourth finger, feeling the faint spark as it darkened a little further. It’s not a shadow anymore. Instead it’s a thin golden shackle, encircling your finger below your knuckle. No, not a shackle. A ring.

It won’t come off. You yank on it, try to dig your nails beneath it, but it won’t come off. Next to you, Tomura’s doing the same, cursing fluently, and Hizashi and Nemuri are laughing at you both, leaning on each other to stay upright. “It’s the first rule we teach you all when you’re spawned. No fucking your own kind, and this is why!” Hizashi is laughing almost too hard to speak, while you try to chew your ring off and Tomura breaks his own finger trying to remove his. “Thanks to your little tryst, the two of you are bound forever in unholy matrimony!”

“My congratulations to the happy couple,” Nemuri says. “The two of you are never going to live this down. You’ll be the laughingstocks of Hell. You’re going to beg us to banish you!”

“And we won’t,” Hizashi says. “I can’t think of a better object lesson than the two of you. We send you to the mortal realm to collect souls, and not only did you end up fucking each other, you didn’t commit a single demonic act!”

“I cursed somebody,” you protest.

“Me too,” Tomura says. “The mortal who –”

You remember what Tomura said about the mortal who rejected you: May his dick shrivel up and fall off. “You cursed the same mortal,” Nemuri says. She pauses a moment. “I will admit, it’s a fairly creative curse. The imp’s little add-on will make a nice insult to the injury.”

You’re better at cursing mortals than you are at seducing them, but you can’t imagine Tomura’s bad at it. Not with the way he worked you over. You duck your head to hide the heat coming up in your face. “Well, we’ll leave the two of you to enjoy your honeymoon,” Hizashi says. He shrugs off the ornate robe he’s wearing and drops it on the ground in front of you, revealing body chains, nipple piercings, and nothing else. “Wear this on your way back into the city. Maintain a little dignity.”

“Here, imp. Just for you.” Nemuri drops her robe over Tomura’s head, and he shoves it off into the dust. “Everyone’s going to know about your little bout of lovemaking, but I imagine you’d prefer if they didn’t know exactly how you’ve been chewing on each other.”

The two of them stroll back towards the city, arm in arm, still laughing. It’s a long time before their laughter fades, and then you and Tomura are alone on the outskirts. The wind, blowing hot a moment before, changes direction, growing cold and carrying sharp shards of ice. You put on Hizashi’s robe, then turn towards Tomura. He’s already shivering, arms crossed and shoulders hunched, Nemuri’s robe discarded in front of him. You pick it up and settle it back around his shoulders, shifting his hair aside so it won’t get caught beneath the collar – and then you realize what you’re doing. You freeze. “Sorry.”

Tomura shrugs, but the robe stays on. “You’re better at this than your boss says you are,” he says without looking at you. “I believed you.”

“I’m worse than she says I am,” you say. “I wasn’t lying.”

Tomura looks up at that, and you look away, your eyes stinging in the freezing wind. You never lied to Tomura, not from the moment you approached him. This would be so much less embarrassing if you had. If you’d listened to any of the moments where you sensed that it was going a little too well, that it felt a little too good. If you’d kept your distance instead of falling under his spell as quickly and easily as he fell under yours. “Your boss was talking out of his ass. Your whole thing worked really well on me.”

“Yeah. Except it wasn’t a thing.” Tomura’s tail wraps loosely around your wrist. “Mutual ruination. You were right.”

He’s got your right wrist. You study your left hand with its ring, and Tomura lifts his alongside yours. His ring looks the same as yours, although he’s dislocated his fourth finger in addition to having broken it. “Want me to fix that?”

“Demon magic doesn’t fix things.”

“It’s not supposed to marry people, either.” You’re not expecting that argument to work, but Tomura lets you capture his hand anyway. You relocate it manually, then try to work some magic over it. All your magic serves to make a seduction easier, so it shouldn’t be hard to twist it into something you can use for the sake of your – “I think it worked. How do you feel?”

“Like I fucked up,” Tomura says. Fair enough. “And I’m not sorry.”

“What?”

“You heard me.” Tomura’s hands slip inside your stolen robe, settling into the same place he was holding on as you rode him. “This isn’t that weird. Mortals do it all the time.”

“Except mortals who get married in Vegas can get divorced,” you point out. Somebody has to play angel’s advocate here, even if you’re already unfolding yourself from seated so you can get into his lap. “We didn’t even make any vows.”

“You did,” Tomura says. “I heard you say it.”

You’re mine. Is that really all it took? It makes a certain kind of sense, when you force yourself to look at it honestly. Mortals almost never doom themselves consciously. It’s always a moment of weakness, a split-second lapse, an instant where desire rules over reason. “Then you can break us up. Since I’m the only one who vowed anything.”

“No way.” Tomura’s lips brush the side of your neck, making your nerves twinge. “I agreed.”

You set your hands on his shoulders and push him backwards, and he goes willingly. The way he’s looking up at you counts as a sin all on its own – crimson eyes half-lidded, pupils already dilating, his cheekbones already dusted with pink. “Did you figure out what you want yet?”

“I have some ideas,” you say. You collect his hands from your waist and pin them on either side of his head, leaning down for a long, slow kiss. “But I’ll start with you.”

[4lexnilsen]

“that’s what it was,  yeah…”   alex absently agrees,  nodding his head and sucking on his still bleeding lip.   a fresh wave of guilt fills his heart and he hears himself saying,   “i think most people are just jealous of you.   you have everything,  helena.”   and it’s no excuse for bullying,  but in a way it is an explanation.   “i can only speak for myself and although i don’t see you as a rich,  entitled brat,  i am very much jealous of what you have.   and i’m not even talking about the money,  that doesn’t mean much to me.”   even though,  it must be nice to never worry about getting a job or wondering how you’re going to pay the rent.   “you were right about me.   i wish i had a dad like yours.   yours wants to give you the world while mine doesn’t even know when my birthday is.”   shoulders shrugging faintly underneath the puffer jacket like it’s no big deal,  eyes flickering back onto the road when they begin to sting.   “and so people attack your family or your upbringing because they’re jealous,  but believe me,  if given the opportunity,  they’d swap lives with you in a heartbeat.   you’re not a horrible person.”   he glances down at her hand lingering on his skin,  butterflies fluttering in the pit of his belly,  making him simultaneously nauseous and infatuated.      

“is that a hammer?   what were you planning to use it for?”   he laughs dryly,  somewhat amused by the contents of his friend’s pockets but still very much disgusted with himself.   but the mere memory of their very first meeting has his features softening,  a gentle smile tugging at the corners of his lips,  causing the wound to reopen.   not that it bothers him.   he feels so warm and tingly,  confused feelings brewing deep inside.   “you saved my life that day,  i’m not even kidding.”   maybe in a way he’s managed to pay his debt tonight by disarming harry.   “oh,  then i’ll get mine virgin,  too.   i’m not much of a drinker.   i’m actually pretty famous for always bringing a book to the bar.   that’s my thing.”   it’s very kind of her to offer him a ride back home,  but the bar that he has in mind is only a few blocks away from his apartment so there will be no need for that.   “yeah,  of course,”   he agrees,  focusing on driving and turning the radio on so that it can fill the silence between them.   katy perry’s old song is playing,  the one that got away,  and alex finds himself sinking his teeth into his busted lip to keep from getting emotional.   stupid song.   

they circle the block a few times before alex finds an open spot,  right outside the small corner bar that he’s been telling helena about.   its neon sign flickering half-heartedly,  but there are quite a few people inside.   this place is the opposite of that fancy lounge,  its patrons stink of vodka and cigarettes and don’t drive rolls royce,  but maybe that’s exactly what they need.   a change of scenery.   the black mustang pulls in,  barely fitting between two beat-up sedans.   “alright,  here we are,”   he mutters,  cutting the engine and unbuckling his belt before climbing out into the cool night.   he circles the car and opens helena’s door for her,  offering her a hand,  but doubting she’ll be willing to take it.   the air around them smells like wet concrete and distant food trucks,  but at least the hum of traffic has all but faded away.   inside the bar,  it’s warm and dim,  which alex figures works in their favor —   at least no one will ask questions about their faces.   does it look like they were in a domestic brawl?   probably.   he leads his friend over to the wooden bar,  helping her slide into a high stool.   shoulders brushing as he takes a seat beside her.   he orders them a round of some fruity beverages,  virgin.   and when the bartender places two glasses in front of them,  with sugar-dusted rims,  he doesn’t even realize the guy didn’t hear the last part.   there’s rum in their strawberry daiquiris,  but as he takes a sip,  he can’t really tell a difference.   “so…   what a night,  right?”

"i've took a lot of self defense classes and such, but i don't think that was it. i think that was just anger talking, i just had enough of being called a rich entitled bitch. like i'm some horrible person for things out of my control, i can't help who i was born to." another curse word she'll repent for. but remnants of anger are still left soaring through her, when you have been judged for it your entire life you finally realize you're not going to take it so lightly anymore. "no." she answers, she doesn't know who she is. but she's guessing she's someone who frequents the lounge looking for what she got tonight... or was. since she's sure she and alex have ruined their mood.

dumping her pockets of all the tools she had them filled with... screw driver, taser, mini hammer, phone. head turns towards him when his fingers touch her cheek, setting off an unwanted spark to burn beneath her chest. "i do have one." a first-aid kit, that's always a number one thing to have. "ever since you needed a walgreens trip, i've been inspired to keep one." helena would laugh, almost there with the start of a smile at the fond memory, until the said memory fades along with the smile that was just beginning to bloom across her face with ache because that was before everything he said to her tonight that's made her view him as a different person. words are not quickly forgotten, unfortunately. and now everything's tainted. even her favorite memories of him.

"let's go there, then. i'll get mine virgin though." not telling him it's because she's never drunk before, he'll make fun of her for it. "you'll need someone sober to drive you afterwards." she claims, pretending the tears stinging her eyes isn't because of the memories being tainted. blaming it on the cut across her jaw. "watch the road, i'll be okay." fingers gently wrap around his hand, slowly removing it from her face even her touch lingers a little extra longer against his skin before letting go completely.

[eff-plays]

"Lmao EA thinks Veilguard failed because it wasn't a live service. Are they fucking stupid?"

This is a charitable take ^^^^ This is an EXTREMELY charitable take, and let me explain why.

EA wants a live service game. They want it BAD. They know nobody else wants it, but that doesn't matter. They want it, because to them, it's infinite money. If they just keep throwing devs at it, no matter the devs' actual passion or areas of expertise, they believe they'll hit the jackpot. When you have almost-infinite money to throw at a problem until it spits out the final infinite-money glitch? That's what you do.

When Destiny dropped and did big fat numbers back in the day, EA got so hard they couldn't think, looked over what devs they had locked in their basement, and picked out BioWare as their lab rat. BioWare just finished Mass Effect, right? That was some sci-fi bullshit, just like Destiny! Make them make another Destiny. But by the time it came out, it was too late. People were tired of the genre, and Anthem was so nothing and made by devs who couldn't care less, so it fizzled out like a wet fart. Alright, that was a big fail, but hey!! Inquisition made big money, so get BioWare on another live service, this time maybe fantasy-flavored? Except oops, looks like we used up all the goodwill with Anthem and people are really pissed about us making Dragon Age, an exclusively single-player game, multiplayer. Ugh. Okay. Fine. Scrap that, I guess. Gotta save face, for now. Let's um. Yes, let's just axe some devs from this, ya know, we gotta make money too right? Can't spend TOO MUCH on a singleplayer game. Oh no!!! It came out and it sucked?? Well, obviously it's not OUR fault. The game is as good as it could have been under the circumstances ... you know, not being a live service game. We wanted it to be live service, gamers, but YOU said it should've been singleplayer! And now it failed to meet expectations! See? We told you! Alas, if only it'd been a multiplayer live service instead ...

Look. They know. They're fully aware and they can very much hear and see all the criticisms thrown at Veilguard, and at live service games in general. The problem isn't that they don't get what gamers want, it's that they don't CARE. They want infinite money, and to them, having one good live service is so much more valuable than having a bunch of little one-off sale games. Do you understand?

"But BG3 and Elden Ring and etc etc made so much money and it was singleplayer!!" Yeah, but did they make Fortnite money? Did they make INFINITE money? No. They didn't. EA. Wants. Infinite. Money.

And they want to keep trying to get that one infinite money glitch, so that little comment about "oughough if only it'd been a live service game" isn't a misunderstanding of what players want or a poorly-thought-out argument: it's propaganda. They're trying to twist Veilguard failing into a justification for why their next game will once again be an attempt at a live service game. "See? You guys wanted singleplayer but then it failed 😔 We simply CAN'T justify making another singleplayer game, not when it SELLS SO POORLY. It's okay though, WE know what people ACTUALLY want, and we'll do it next time :)"

It doesn't matter to them how many single-player games must fail and how many devs must be sacrificed, how many players must be upset and alienated, because if they hit that infinite money glitch ONCE, if they get ONE Fortnite ... Then none of it will matter.

So yeah. This isn't stupidity. It's plain and simple greed.

[swagspren]

Okay I’ve been thinking about Adolin fashion and something that is so funny to me is that nobody (that I can remember (probably Shallan is at some point)) is like “wow, Adolins outfit looks so good.” They’re like “you look stupid” and he’s like “it’s fashionable.” I know he’s not exactly surrounded by fashion appreciators, but I think it is so much more awesome that he is dressing fashionably and receiving little to none of the positive feedback. Like he’s really doing it just for him and that’s how fashion should be <3

[harryzroze]

HES HERE HES HERE AAAA

[beef-brisket]

Adam: Wow... that's a great goal, Lu. I think you can do it.

Lucifer: Y-You do?

Adam smiled at him: I do! I... didn't even know there was a pond over there- stupid weeds are looking shit... but yeah. You can do it. You're a strong guy, Lu.

Lucifer bluhed: I don't know... if I'm strong...

Adam: Lucifer. I couldn't imagine dealing with what you deal with. Especially every day. You're truly amazing. And strong. And you deserve to get to that pond. I really think you can do it... Charlie told me how big of a deal it was that you came to my door to drop that container off, and that must have been so hard for you. But you did it! So, fuck yeah, I think you're strong as fuck.

Lucifer chuckled when Adam shoved a piece of chicken in his mouth.

Adam: Fuck, this is good.

Lucifer: I'm glad you like it!

Adam: Of course!

They sat and talked for a few hours before Adam went home.

Lucifer watched him leave and noticed a buzzing feeling inside him. He was so excited that he had someone over- he couldn't wait to tell Charlie, she's going to be so proud of him.

Looking through his window, he quickly ducked down when he saw Alastor walk out of his home.

Alastor: Ah! Adam! Good evening!

Adam: Hey Al, what's up?

Alastor: Oh, you know... nothing much. I see you're all dressed up!

Adam: Yeah, I had dinner with Lu.

Alastor: ...Really? Are you sure...?

Adam: Uh... yeah? I didn't hallucinate the last few hours, Al.

Alastor: Oh, I'm sure my deer! Speaking of, I was wondering if you'd like to join me for dinner some night. Maybe... next weekend?

Adam: Oh, sure. Can't say know to a free meal!

Alastor: Wonderful! I'll let you know the details later on.

Adam: Yeah, okay. See ya, Al!

Alastor: Have a good night, my deer~.

Trapped Heart

@beef-brisket

⚠️This deals with Agoraphobia, anxiety, depression, and mentions of domestic abuse ⚠️

-

Adam: Well that's the last of them.

He looked around his new home and smiled, this place was so much better than his last home and a third of the price too.

They were practically giving it away.

There was his lawn mower that was on the truck still.

Adam went out to put it in the garage when he noticed his neighbor, a short blonde man getting his mail from his box. He was better looking than his last neighbor.

Adam waved: Hey!

Lucifer jumped as he grasped his mail, he looked over and saw a handsome brunette standing in the driveway across the road smiling and waving.

Lucifer: O-Oh, hi!

Adam: Names Adam, I just moved in.

Lucifer: N-nice to meet you! I'm Lucifer, I hope you like it here.

He wanted to be polite and welcome his new neighbor right, but he could already feel the cold tendrils of anxiety start to slowly crawl through his skin trying to wrap around him like a vice grip.

How long has he been outside? His heart started to beat a little hard with each moment he's not back in his home. He could die! He's not safe he needs to get back!

Adam: Yeah me too.

By the looks of it he already likes what he sees.

Lucifer nodded, he could feel the tremors starting in his hands the palms getting sweaty.

He needs to go.

Lucifer: I-It was nice to meet you Adam! B-But I need to get going.

Adam: Oh okay, maybe we can hang out sometime?

Lucifer gave a tight smile: Y-yeah.

He waved again to be polite and tried not to run back to his house, his therapist said it was good for him to be out as long as he could stand it.

Pushing himself a little each day. Today him reached his limit.

Once his front door was closed and locked behind relief washed over him, he's safe now nothing can hurt him. He hugged his mail to his chest, he needed to sit down.

Lucifer went over and placed everything on the coffee table. He tried to remember his breathing exercises.

Adam seemed very nice, maybe he'll send Charlie over when she comes to give him a proper greeting.

-

Adam tilted his head as he watched his new neighbor go into his home, if he didn't know any better he would say the man was panicked. Did he do something? He knows his personality can be a little brash at times but he thought he was being polite.

A man that lived beside him came out for his mail as well.

Adam: Hi! Umm, I'm new here.

Alastor: Oh hello! I'm Alastor, I guess that makes us neighbors.

Adam chuckled: Guess so. Umm, if I may ask, is the man that lives there okay? I didn't intend to upset him.

Alastor looked over at Lucifer's home and rolled his eyes.

Alastor: Getting the mail was he? Don't worry about it that man's afraid of his own shadow. I wouldn't waste my time, he never leaves his house.

Well that sounded a little dramatic.

Adam: What?

Alastor leaned on the fence: Oh yeah, Mr. Morgenstern over there never leaves his house. Rumor has it that his wife used to beat the fuck out of him in the home but it was worse when they were in public. Apparently she'd just humiliate him and others would join in making things worse. He was never free of her but at least in the home he could be alone.

Adam was horrified to hear that: Dude, the fuck, is that true?

Alastor shrugged: Not sure. All I know that is true is she left him nearly 8 years ago and he's become some kind of hermit that never leaves the damn house. His daughter Charlie, sweet girl you'll likely meet her, comes over from time to time.

Adam looked over at Lucifer's house, that couldn't all be true right? Maybe some was and the rest is telephone gossip extras?

Him and Alastor parted ways, he had to put everything away in his house. All the while his mind kept going back to the handsome neighbor across the way.

[uncanny-tranny]

Whenever people who are entrenched in diet culture talk about how terrible chemicals are, I just want to whip out this:

[telesodalite]

Never getting over Fulcrum being a project manager...

Idk why, but something about that is so funny to me. Not just because the title of "project manager" is inherently kinda funny for a Decepticon, but also because-

1. It's vague sounding and hard to explain irl because it technically exists in multiple fields, like healthcare or manufacturing, which surely translates into canon in some way.

2. In canon, it's simultaneously a really mundane, innocuous sounding job, yet it's also a super morally awful position to reside over depending on the context. (*cough* forced colonization and cyberforming *cough*)

And 3. It solidifies the fact that behind all the surface level militaristic work we get with both the Decepticons and Autobots, there's also Cons and Bots with "normal" jobs in both factions.

Like, sure yeah we get scientists and doctors, engineers and programmers, but usually in big important or warfront positions. (For plot reasons, understandably.) But it's also really funny and interesting to think of those that worked background positions, or minor jobs.

Like an Autobot working in their equivalent of an HR department, or a Decepticon who runs one of their outpost's or starship's kitchens.

Just all the pre-war jobs that didn't just disappear with the war, but instead evolved to exist within the factions.

It's particularly funny with the Decepticons though, because it could be a super mundane job or situation, but because it's them, it has to have an air of ~e v i l~ to it, either legitimately and/or merely for the vibes, like Tarn's "performance reviews".

[hanzajesthanza]

a book with geralt 😃

a book with geralt without ciri 😐

a book with geralt without yennefer 😔

a book with geralt without dandelion 💀

[moregraceful]

it was once observed by a dear friend that the hours in which i am most alert are like 7pm to 2am which probably explains a lot about how my posts get worse throughout the evening. but also sometimes i look at today where i was just sort of gnawing the couch all day until about 5pm when i wrote an entire fic in two hours and then another entire post about kaapo which to be clear took another two hours bc i had to chase links and explain my passions in a kind way and this was in addition to a church meeting. i would excel as the person who lights and then extinguishes lamps in the night

[greenerteacups]

How do you feel about the fact that Bellatrix was Voldemort’s concubine/lover?

This ask prompted a real coleslaw of emotions.

Top level, I can't take the Cursed Child seriously as canon. I'm a purist about text to begin with — no word of God or adaptation can change what you put in the original books, and if the author wanted the text to be different, they had their shot — but, even if not, the Cursed Child is bad. Like, it's My Immortal type bad. It's the kind of bad that makes you glad it didn't come out closer to the original books + movies, or it could have had a Game of Thrones-type cratering effect on discussion and fandom. The Albus/Scorpius dynamic is cute — everything else about it sucks. It is a no-fly zone for good ideas. The Golden Trio are all twisted into funhouse mirrors, Voldemort has a daughter, and most perversely, the absolutely horrific mutilation of Cedric Diggory's character (in no world did that boy become a Death Eater! he was KIND AND DECENT! and he DIED ANYWAY! that was THE FUCKING POINT!!!!!!!).

Second layer: let's say that Bellatrix/Voldemort is canon and explored beyond the writers going "whoops gotta find a working womb for Voldemort's kid." That's a really interesting dynamic. It's a horrible dynamic! It's a motherfucker of an age gap to begin with, and it would have started when she was in her late teens to early twenties! Plus, she was married. To another man. So that would have to be explained? Because she obviously wasn't always so mindlessly devoted to Voldemort that she couldn't entertain connections with others? But that's not to say that I'm against it as a narrative decision. Tom Riddle is (captain obvious moment incoming) a Bad, Bad Man, and the idea of him seducing a younger woman is actually an understandable extension of his connection with his followers that's not explored in the books. Because, like: the Death Eaters are a cult! Riddle runs a death cult. Cults use sex to manipulate members. One of the oldest tricks in the book.

Third layer: this could be a kind of interesting move for Riddle, who as a villain is never developed all that much, and doesn't have much in the way of humanizing qualities. Because Riddle is anti-love as such. He doesn't believe in it, and if you believe Dumbledore, he's not capable of it. (I don't really love this take on the character, but I think that Riddle thinks this is the case, and Dumbledore is so grizzled and jaded by the years that he believes him. Dumbledore's great failure with Tom was never seeing past the person Tom wanted him to see — or, rather, looking at Tom and seeing Grindlewald when he should have seen Harry.) So for him to harbor enough affection for Bellatrix to take her as his (only?) lover, when he doesn't seem to need it to convince her to join him (and he doesn't really need her support, anyway) creates a wrinkle in the Story of Voldemort as we're told. It suggests that either Tom or Dumbledore (or both) is lying about his capacity for love— or at least his capacity for human attachment. And that Tom isn't so unique as either of them would like to believe.

Also, it adds a wrinkle to Bellatrix's character, too: even if they met when she was an adult, there's manipulation happening there that's clearly one-sided and unequal. or at least, there probably is. and if it's consensual, or if she aggressively pursued him— that's interesting, too. my point being: this isn't a bad idea, necessarily. it's a bad idea because i don't think the writers of the Cursed Child thought about any of that when they were trying to find a womb for the Voldebaby.

[leatherbookmark]

"I know why you want to return to our world, Meggie! You just miss your boyfriend! But we haven't seen everything of this beautiful world yet!" Mr Mortimer sir your wife was enslaved for working as a scribe disguised as a man. In this world women are punished for learning their fathers' craft and your thirteen years old daughter would be already married if she was born in this world. I know the books are very pretty but Mo your wife is pregnant. I don't think they have c-sections here :(

[liverpool-enjoyer]

venting / advice seeking (dw its not depressing this time lmao)

[front-facing-pokemon]