#cadbane | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

sinisterexaggerator · 1 year ago

Note

Maybe one where reader - due to some recent unsuccessful business or other hardships - lost considerable amount of self confidence, hiding in her own bubble, and space cowboy tries to drag her out of the stagnating in his own bastard way? Reader could be friend or romantic interest, it'd be up to you. What do you say?

An Unlikely Muse

Cad Bane x Gen! Reader

Summary: You are an artist whose mind’s been blocked until Cad Bane comes to call.

Warnings: Nudity, implied smut, kissing, lust filled thoughts, and fluff/comfort (in Bane’s own way).

Word count: 3.5k+

Notes: @deepbluespace4 , sorry this took so long to get to. I was inspired to write this based on your ask. ;) I had you and others in mind when writing it, a sort of shoutout to Bane artists, I guess.

“What are ye down in de mouth about?” the Duros asked, his lean build held up by the doorframe of your paltry studio.

The tools of your trade were littered about the room, everything having its place in the wake of organized chaos. You sat with your back against him, toiling over a blank canvas, your mind obstructed from accessing the breadth of your normally overactive imagination. You found your creativity to be lacking, and your mood had taken a turn for the worse.

This was becoming a repeat scenario, you with your brushes and paints laid out before you, yet nothing to show for it. You jumped, startled by your lover’s voice, not bothering to wonder how it was he had found his way inside your home.

“Stop creeping up on me like that,” you warned, though you lacked conviction. The bounty hunter smirked, one corner of his mouth twitching upward as he stepped further inside the room.

“Ain’t creepin’. Was in de neighborhood.”

Cad Bane was not a man to be told what to do, yet he tolerated you for some strange reason. Oddly enough, he had commissioned you for a portrait that now hung in Maz’s castle on Takodana, or so you had heard, as you had never stepped foot on the remote planet to see for yourself.

The gungslinger had received your name based on someone’s recommendation, yet he had not bothered to elaborate. You were left guessing who had dispatched Cad Bane to your doorstep.

Regardless, the Duros had provided you with a distinguished holo of a Weequay pirate, mentioning something about his hatching day, and he had been quite satisfied with the result. Afterward, you bargained with him. Instead of credits, you solicited him for something a bit irregular, having caught him perusing your body with those stark red eyes.

What was the worst that could happen? You were sure he held an attraction for you.

At first he made it clear that he thought you were “pulling his leg,” as the saying goes, yet you were dead set on bedding the Duros if he allowed – not only was he excruciatingly attractive, but his reputation proceeded him. You wanted bragging rights, as childish as that may have seemed at the time, and it was evident the thought had already crossed his mind.

Honestly, you were shocked by your own gall, blaming it on those hypnotizing, gleaming jewels that permeated you down to your core with every glance.

“Let me get dhis straight—” he had begun, “—ye wanna fuck me in exchange fer paintin’ dhat dhere portrait.”

“Yes,” you had answered plainly, remembering the merc had cocked his brow at you.

“Fine, saves me money in de long run,” had been his only reply, though it was enough to leave you satisfied.

It was an evening you would not soon forget, etched into your memory as if your mind was composed of black-bark wood, and Bane was the chisel used to shape and mold you to his liking.

Apparently, the bounty hunter was particular with whom he spent his time with. At some point, he had decided he rather favored you (for reasons unknown), and to your surprise he often came to call. You had grown fond of his intermittent visits, and never dared turn him away, even when you were feeling disheartened and depressed; you were currently a victim of the dreaded Artist’s block.

“I’m sorry, I’m just a bit out of sorts,” you admitted, turning on your stool to face him. He was a sight to behold, not once growing tired of admiring his slender physique.

“Cahn tell dhat by lookin’,” he commented offhand, Bane not one to sugarcoat things, even at the detriment of your feelings. He strode forward, the sound of his aged leather boots echoing across the floor with every footfall.

You watched, enthralled, eyes traveling upward in increments. Your gaze started at his feet only to end up at his face after you had taken in every nuance of his gruff demeanor; the Duros was capable of instantaneously stealing your breath away without so much as lifting one of his blue fingers.

You had it bad; you pondered on how obvious it might be.

“Agreeing with me isn’t helping matters,” you managed, having long since stopped being intimidated by him. Though he was a lethal weapon in his own right, your name was not among those on his shitlist; you thanked your lucky stars.

“What seems te be de problem,” he questioned, one tightly gloved hand casually placing itself on the outside of his jutting hip. The hunter’s weight shifted to his right side as he peered at you indifferently; you wondered if he truly cared, or if he was attempting to be cordial.

You were silent for a moment, studying his pose, soaking up the grandeur of this formidable being that was no doubt pretending to be concerned. Still, even if it was all for show, it warmed your heart and prompted you to confide in him; your plight was not life or death, but it felt that way to you.

“I’m not inspired to create anything, and have not been for quite some time,” you confessed, twirling your dry flat brush between two fingers. The quizzical look he gave you compelled you to set it down, feeling silently judged by his never-ending scrutiny.

“Dhat all?” he asked with nonchalance. Perhaps you were the one judging him, never knowing beyond a shadow of a doubt what was going on inside that oversized noggin of his; you could only guess.

Bane circled around you, strolling unhurriedly toward a viewport that would give him a decent vantage of the world outside, this one full of airspeeders and street merchants. You swiveled in your chair to watch him, the Duros adjusting his hat between two knobby digits, relocating it to a more favorable position. Then, he drew your curtain shut, finally turning, and now sporting an expression of a more serious variety. “Reckon Ah could help ye out."

Suddenly, the gloves came off, one at a time; Bane’s motions were slow and methodical, his movements comprised of simplistic actions that demanded you swallow down an inordinate amount of spit. He tossed the pair of them arbitrarily onto your cluttered desk, followed by his wide-brimmed bolero.

“You-you can?” you asked, heart aflutter behind a wall of flesh and bone; it was the only thing preventing its escape.

“’Member dhat time ye said ye wanted me te model fer ye?” His inquiry stopped there, knowing you would not need anything more in the way of an explanation, Bane’s now bare, indigo-colored hands rising to dislocate his breathing tubes. The sound of pressure being released behind a locked tight valve lasted but for a moment, the Duros shucking off the cap that covered the full expanse of his bald head; you were left gawking at his sharp and angular features, fighting to keep your excitement at bay.

“I do,” you whispered, setting your hands in your lap. They itched to not only reach out and touch the man, but to take up your instruments. He had barely started to undress and already you were dying to record every minutia of his form in excessive detail.

“Maybe now’s de time,” he proffered, his tone lackadaisical, as if this weren’t the single most exhilarating thing to have happened to you in all your days. Then, the coat was gone, thrown over an armchair you had picked up secondhand from an estate sale, observing dutifully as he began to unfasten the no-fight holsters buckled about his waist.

It felt as if your veins were conduits for electricity instead of blood. You sucked in a breath and held it, trying to force yourself into a latent state of calm before responding; you did not want to make him second guess himself by being too overtly enthusiastic. “I would love to, Cad.”

“Good,” he responded flatly, carefully arranging his LL-30s atop his discarded duster, depthless, bloodred eyes locking you in place. He moved to thumb the top of his dense leather tunic; you heard the telltale sound of a zipper crawling slowly down the length of its tread, revealing to you not a bare chest but more armor underneath.

You finally exhaled, realizing you were practically being offered a striptease by none other than one of the most deadly bounty hunters in all the galaxy. You could no longer contain yourself, fumbling to take up a pencil, then scurrying to locate your drawing pad as Bane further disrobed.

Once peeling himself from skintight Nashtah-hide, the Duros kicked his boots off, one heel at a time, letting the top half of his ensemble join the coat and blasters off to the side. Left dressed in only dusky denim, worn leather chaps, and a body glove, you spent this time sharpening graphite against a knife’s edge, catching a glance of the decidedly erotic display only here and there as you tried your best not to cut yourself.

“Shit!” you exclaimed, failing at your endeavor, a bead of crimson forming along a small cut against your thumb. Still, you would not let that stop you; you wiped it off on your already paint-stained jeans.

Bane had just finished husking off his trousers when he sauntered forward; you met his unnerving stare. He took up your hand, then suckled the tip of your thumb like a babe nursing, feeding off another trickle of bright red blood that had wetted your skin, never breaking eye contact.

You felt like you might faint, mouth parting to watch in awe as he drank from you as if he were a vampire; his elongated canines were slightly daunting up close, waiting for the moment when he might bite down.

That moment never came; he released you before your imagination could truly take hold and devour you, much like you wanted him to do.

“Careful, darhlin’, ye need dhat,” he lightly scolded, his own thumb grazing the slit of his thermoguard suit, prying apart the flaps before he tore it into two halves; its fasteners behaved like magnets. Not surprisingly, you found yourself caught somewhere between wanting to act professional and desiring to be the victim of a merciless rutting against your disheveled desk.

Finally, scarred and bruised flesh was revealed to you, dappled in varying hues of blue and green; his job was a dangerous one, Bane subjected to its many risks. Without thinking, you bit your lip, drawing up your pad of rare and expensive flimsiplast to set it in your lap; it was a type specifically manufactured for those who specialized in the visual arts such as yourself, and you could not think of a better time to use it.

“Wait a tick,” the gunslinger exacted, whisking off the remainder of his bodysuit. He stepped out of its legs and kicked it across the floor. Then, he returned his outsized accessory to his head with a haphazard plop, rifling through his own belongings in order to find his smokes.

“Got a light?” he asked.

For several moments you did not move, too enwrapped in the lithe figure of the Duros before you, his sinewy body occupying hardly any space at all. Despite his build, you knew he was powerful, cunning, and adept. And now, he was naked, except for his ostentatious hat.

“Ye-yes,” you stuttered, shuffling paper and its much more resilient cousin, flimsi, all over your workspace in order to find your book of matches. Once acquired, you quickly sparked one against the striking board, holding the flame outstretched as you left your drawing supplies resting atop your legs.

“Much obliged,” Bane volunteered in thanks, bending low to place his cigarra against the tiny fire that had sprung to life. You found yourself unapologetically staring, nearly burning your already injured thumb. You squeaked as you blew it out, the Duros again rising to his full stature. He inhaled a deep drag of hand rolled herbs, relaxing on the exhale, only to tsk and shake his head.

“Suppose yer slow aht learnin’ things,” he dared.

Instead of taking his insult to heart, you found yourself studying the curves of his small rump; they alternated back and forth as he walked away from you, Bane catching you in the act of ogling by the time he had spun around to reface the room.

“Ah’d ask if ye seen somethin’ ye liked, but figur’ Ah already know de answer,” he savagely teased; you watched as his lungs expanded behind his ribs, the bare-assed gunslinger taking another puff off the end of his smoke.

“C'mon—” he urged, finding the most comfortable seat in the house, a highbacked chaise lounge which he now reclined in, the point of one elbow supporting the weight of his head as the hand holding the cigarra wafted dismissively toward nothing in particular, “—draw me like one'na dhose dancin’ Twi’leks.”

With your mouth now fully agape, it took some effort to close. If his genitals were not hidden away, sheathed inside him until such a time they had been coaxed to rouse, you would most assuredly be staring at those, too.

Shamelessly. Predictably.

“Not with you lying down like that,” you said, somehow regaining your power of speech.

In spite of everything, the Duros laughed; it was dry and insipid. He sat up, reconfigured his gangly limbs, then sprawled out on his back. While one leg remained level, the knee of the other protruded upward. He placed one arm behind his neck to sustain this position, still fully aware of his joint in the other as he tilted his head, those hellfire eyes fixating on your ceiling.

“Take it or leave it,” he said.

You took that as your cue.

Not wanting to waste one second, you snatched up your sloppily sharpened pencil. You took a deep breath before you pressed the graphite to the page, clearing your mind of anything and everything that was not Cad Bane.

You started with a basic outline, light lines unfurling across once empty space as your hand moved at a rapacious pace; your art was something that was second nature to you if your mind decided to cooperate. Elementary shapes formed the Duros’ extremities, granting yourself this time to warm-up with a sketch to get back into the swing of things, back bent and eyes shifting to and fro from paper to model who was so eerily quiet now, allowing you to concentrate.

Bane continued to laggardly toke his herbs, a plume of white smoke billowing out of his thin-lipped mouth to fill the area just above his head. He began to tap his foot along the plush cushion of your couch, as if listening to some song only he could hear. Drinking him in - every plane and hollow - filled you with joy, more so as his likeness divulged itself to your eyes alone by aid of your polished skills.

You roughly filled in the fine intricacies of his face, those you had stored in your memory, as his hat was lower than you wished for it to be, hiding dry, cracked scales and the exact placement of numerous scars; he was none less beautiful in your opinion, and you felt that these little imperfections made him appear all the more rugged and handsome.

The pencil you had chosen was versatile, permitting you to shade the tiny appendages now come to life, so close to the real thing sitting there and breathing as if he had not a care in the universe.

The Duros began to hum; it threw you off guard, so soft and melodic was his voice. Normally acerbic in tone, it was remarkably pleasant; you lowered your implements and set them down, now only bothering to listen.

A few precious moments went by before the man noticed you had stopped your scribbling, Bane turning his head in your direction. When he saw you only gawping at him, the flat space between his eyes stitched. He reached an arm out and put out his cigarra on the end of your caf table; it was transparisteel and would not leave a mark, but ash.

“Finished already, are ye?” he asked, sitting up. You scrabbled to regather your supplies, stuttering as you nearly dropped your pad.

“N-no, I- I was just-”

“Well, let’s see it, dhen.” The man stood, towering, naked, and mildly irritated.

“I was just listening to your-” There was a swagger to his step as he approached, so perfect a specimen to draw as you had ever seen. “-humming,” you surrendered, gazing up at him with a pout written across your visage as plain as the lines now scrawled into the paper he held, having retrieved it from your lap; you waited with bated breath, anticipating some kind of rebuke or snide remark.

Instead, he examined it, no words or sounds passing his tongue to grace your ears. There was only a long stretch of silence, too long, perhaps. You decided to ask him a question if he would be so kind as to answer you.

“What was that song, Cad?”

Without missing a beat, he humored you; his reply wound up being more personal than you had thought, only imagining it to be something he had heard in passing, or a little melody he fancied.

“Don’t remember-” he started off, gaze never wavering from the subject of his interest –- himself. “Life-giver used te sing it te me back when Ah was a grub.”

The idea that Cad Bane had ever been a baby, much less a child, suddenly dawned on you, and what a strange revelation it was. You instantly had the urge to research what a Duros “grub” looked like, but held off to compliment him.

“You have a lovely voice,” you told him, meant to be more than empty flattery. The bounty hunter shifted his gaze, those alluring red eyes once more capturing you in their snare.

He said nothing, pondering your praise, as if deciding whether or not you were being serious or if you had taken to mocking him. Regardless, he returned the drawing to you, boring holes into your head with his unrelenting stare.

“Looks good-” he started, causing a wave of relief to wash over you unexpectedly; you had no idea his approval would mean so much to you, “-fergot te mention Ah charge a thousand creds’ an hour.”

You almost choked on your own saliva, eyes wide as saucers as you could not read him, wondering if this was some kind of cruel joke.

“But, Cad, I don’t have that kind of money!” you vocalized in mild panic. Bane snickered, already having an answer prepared.

“It’s ‘cause instead of takin’ payment, ye ask fer sex,” he stated matter-of-factly, though in your defense you had only done that once.

“No, I don’t! Your case was special,” you whined, wondering what kind of person he must think you to be.

“How special?” he queried, leaning forward to shadow you with his imposing figure and the brim of his large hat.

“I don’t lie with anyone but you,” you meekly explained.

The reptilian creature canted his head. “Lie as in lie-” he made a motion with one hand, flattening his palm to spread out across the open air, pantomiming the surface of a bed, “-or lie as in lie,” he asked, voice deepening to express annoyance.

“Lie as in lie! I haven’t slept with anyone since you’ve been gone,” you conceded, finding yourself to only have eyes for the man before you, perhaps somewhat problematic as you knew he was a free agent and that you possibly meant nothing to him.

“Dhere it is,” he quipped, lifting the corner of your chin up so you were coerced to face him; he had noted your distress. “Mind’s blocked ‘cause ye ain’t been laid in fifty rotations.”

You scoffed, trying to put your thoughts together. You felt it absurd for him to even suggest such a thing, though it was possible what you were truly feeling was embarrassment, or denial. “That’s not- I don’t think- There’s more to it than- Really? – How da-!”

You were cut off with a kiss, a featherlight brush of Bane’s lips to yours. Immediately silenced, you could only muster a tiny moan as your shoulders drooped and your body settled completely in your chair. You relished every second, never wanting it to end. Just as soon as that notion crossed your mind, he broke away, leaving you twitterpated and with an awestruck expression plastered on your face.

“I still want to paint you-” you blurted out, though you had felt a stirring in your loins; truth be told, you wanted both – to commit his likeness to canvas, and to take him to your bed “-that was just a warm-up, I-”

He kissed you again as a means to silence you, cutting off your complaints midsentence. Once you were quiet, he pulled back to address you with a shrug of his shoulder. “Dhen ye best pay up.”

“But I can’t afford t-”

He was already wandering off, having disappeared around the corner toward your bedroom. You made out his voice calling to you from down the hall, sounding distant, but you could hear him loud and clear.

“Might be persuaded te give ye a discount.”

With this gentle prodding, you would be spurred to action; your spark was back, as was your motivation. You would paint a thousand pieces if gifted the chance to paint Bane only once in your whole lifetime.

Presently, he was your unlikely muse, and you were content with that.

—-

Masterlist

Likes, comments, reblogs appreciated.