#for bone structure reason and shit

[suckinitup]

actually i dont think he'd look at void like that but its too late so picture emizel instead . meow and everything

[moodiestcow]

•

[lisired]

i thought you were dead

pairing: yuta x (f) reader

genre/warnings: murder, angst, violence, smut, unprotected sex, oral (f receiving), choking

summary: after investigating the activity of a local gang, your boss abruptly disappears, and it's up to you to find out what happened to him. you almost immediately suspect the reapers, one of the most infamous gangs in seoul. and yuta is willing to lend a hand in your operation, but only at a cost; forget him in the end.

word count: 20k

a/n: part 2/3 of my wanted: dead or alive series. as always, feedback is appreciated!

“I want him dead, woman.”

Every bone in your body was itching with the overwhelmingly extreme urge to roll your eyes. Though rather than lose your job, or potentially your life, you held back and replied, “Got it, boss.” 

You knew this conversation had been long overdue, but that didn’t mean you were any more eager to have it with him. Your boss could be a pain in the ass sometimes. He never cut anyone any slack and he took retribution way too seriously. 

That said, you supposed he had his reasons. As an inner circle member of one the most infamous gangs in the country, he had as much to lose as he had to gain. It made perfect sense, you knew, that he wanted his marks completely dead. Not barely on the cusp of consciousness. 

As if you gave a damn what he wanted.

“Jaehyun giving you a hard time?”

Coming out the door of the arms building, directly beneath the entire two floors of the narcotics trade happenings, you turned when you heard a familiar voice behind you. “When is he not?”

Jeno snickered and shoved his hands in his pockets. “He can be a pain in the ass. And he’s even harder on the noobs. I think you’ll get used to it though.”

You snorted. “You have that much confidence in me?”

Jeno nodded. That notorious grin was still on his face to express his amusement, but he seemed authentic as he replied, “Yes, because you’re stronger than the other recruits I see come in and out.”

Your brows furrowed together. In your three months under this gang, barely anybody had spared you genuine kindness. “What makes you say that?”

“You haven’t tried to slap the shit out of him yet.”

That was the last answer you were expecting to hear, so it made you burst into laughter. 

Pleased by having made you laugh, Jeno smiled a little wider. “May I tag along?”

“Please do,” you told him, the tone in your voice dangerously close to desperate. “When I was told I was being assigned to the arms unit, no one told me the head motherfucker of it all is also the one playing God.”

That was a lie, of course. You knew early on that Jaehyun juggled both the arms trafficking operation and the responsibility of getting rid of anybody who slighted the syndicate. Your real boss’ leftover notes were thorough and neat.

But that was nothing Jeno needed to know. As far as he knew, you were merely another newcomer anticipating to make dirty money by illegal means. And you had every last intention of keeping that dirty little image in his head. You had a role to play. 

Pulling a pair of keys from the pockets his hands had been buried in, Jeno chirped, “I’ll do the driving.”

You made no argument, following him to his car and climbing into the passenger seat. 

After giving him the coordinates of whatever location Jaehyun had sent you off to, Jeno drove you halfway across the city to an abandoned warehouse. The whole structure looked a whole breath away from giving in on itself. 

Jeno grimaced. “I’d hate to die here.”

You laughed at that, heading for the door. 

Jaemin blew out an exasperated breath when he saw you entering the warehouse and stood up from a crate he had been sitting on. “Fucking finally. Jaehyun never mentioned that you’d be bringing company.”

You rolled your eyes, but you couldn’t blame him for being vexed. The drive here had taken a good minute and if he had been here since you were informed of your assignment, he had been waiting even longer. 

“Nice to see you too, Jaemin,” Jeno replied sarcastically. 

Surprise flickered onto your face for a split second. You had no idea how they knew each other, but it was far from impossible. They both worked for the same bastard whose bidding you were doing right now. 

Jaemin was annoyed. “I would be happier to see you if you both were on time.”

“Yeah, whatever.” Jeno pointed at the back of Jaemin’s pants with a sly expression. “You’ve got a little something there.”

With another irritated breath, Jaemin dusted off his pants. Most of his current frustrations seemed aimed at the fact that this warehouse was barely holding itself together. “This place is old as fuck. I think something crawled and died in that crate. Like seven years ago.”

Even though you wanted to giggle, the urge was overcome by the one to get this over with so that you could do something meaningful. “Where’s Kang Hangyeol? I���m trusting you didn’t leave him alone.”

“Do I look like an amateur to you?” Jaemin asked, waving you off. “He’s in the back. There’s no way he’s moving out of that position, dead or alive. Follow me.”

You trailed closely behind as Jaemin led you through the old warehouse. There was a clutter of dust-laden boxes and a slew of spider webs in every available corner. Graffiti that looked maybe a few years old was the only proof of recent human activity. 

“What’s this guy dying for anyway?” you asked, disguising your concern as innocent curiosity. You didn’t want to make it obvious that you were trying to justify your inevitable actions. 

Jaemin, on the other hand, didn’t seem as worried. This was a life he had led for years and no one would expect anything other than him to be committed. “Apparently, he’s a brother. He was caught sneaking on our turf.”

Your brows furrowed, imagining what a brother was doing on Reaper playgrounds. They had no business being even remotely near this gang and any of its less than luxurious locations. “You’re sure he’s a brother?”

“Yeah, they found him in one of those ugly masks.”

Jeno snorted.

Nearing the forthcoming doorway, you reached for the switchblade you had tucked away, unsure what you were going to do with it in the first place. At times, it was less like a weapon and more like a comfort tool. And you needed comfort right now. Your involvement as an undercover cop didn’t legally or emotionally justify taking someone’s life. 

No doubt, it was the worst part of being undercover. You advanced your way through the ranks most times, meaning you gained enough authority to convince your new peers to spare innocent lives, but this syndicate was something bigger than you had ever experienced. It would take years to infiltrate their innermost hierarchy. And you didn’t have years. 

Jaemin reached for the door knob and pulled it open, expecting to see a half-conscious man bound with his arms behind his back. Imagine your collective shock when you saw nothing but an empty wooden chair next to a pile of rope. 

“Where’s Hangyeol?” Jaemin stammered. 

“I was expecting you to know,” you mumbled, inspecting what all was leftover. There were a few drops of blood on the chair at best. You clutched your switchblade tighter.

At least Jaehyun wouldn’t be pissed at you this time. You could already imagine the verbal backlash Jaemin was going to get for this. Not even you had messed up this badly before. 

Jeno leaned on the wall, entertained by everything as always. “Nah, you don’t seem like an amateur, man. Total pro.”

Jaemin groaned, “This is serious!”

Not a second later, you heard a gunshot echoing out in the main entrance of the warehouse. This felt like a setup somehow. You clutched your switchblade tighter, hissing, “You had one fucking job, Jaemin!”

He opened his mouth to say something about how this wouldn’t have happened if he didn’t have to babysit you to make sure you went through with the kill, but you all froze when you heard a second gunshot. 

Jaemin grabbed the bag slung over his shoulders and set it down on the chair where your mark should have been instead. He handed Jeno a gun and took one for himself, then pivoted towards you. “You sure you don’t want one?”

You shook your head. The knife in your hands would suffice. They always had. “I’m good.”

“You know what they say,” Jeno chimed in. “Don’t bring a knife to a gunfight.”

That was true for someone maybe. But even though you had gone through your annual firearm training with the academy, you were stubborn and preferred your blades. “She’s my baby.”

“That’s even worse. Who brings a baby to a gunfight?”

You were tempted to laugh, but you could hear the chaos unfolding practically right outside the door and it unnerved you. “I do. Let’s go.”

The dark hallway outside the old storage closet led you back to the main entrance of the warehouse through a little opening. You could see brothers rummaging the place and took a wild guess that they were here to take back their own. 

A little headcount went on in your head as you noted the number of armed, masked men you saw lurking expectantly around every inch of the unloading site. The three of you were definitely outnumbered, that was for certain. 

“I counted fourteen,” you whispered quietly. “Are we good?”

Jeno nodded, gun close to his chest. He looked more serious right now than ever. “I’ve got your six. Let’s move.”

That was all you needed to hear as you dove headfirst into the bloody sea of chaos. While Jaemin and Jeno immediately started to fire their weapons, stealing all the attention, you hid close on anything you could find and ambushed, coming up behind and dragging your blade against the cold necks of your enemies. 

Your ears went deaf to the cacophony of masculine shouts as men dropped like flies around you. The sound bled into choked noises with every throat you impaled. 

They were strong men, but you were swifter. Both were lethal and dangerous, but they couldn’t touch you if you didn’t let them. You were too nimble for them to keep up with, too quick.

But the one time you didn’t move quick enough, you rolled onto the filthy floor and looked down the barrel of a gun. You groaned, raising your head a little higher to meet the bloody eyes of your mark. 

He was right there in the flesh, hovering over you with a sly grin as if he was proud of what he had done. You were insulted to even be held at gunpoint. Every desire to spare him immediately fled your body and you raised your switchblade, penetrating his throat without hesitation. 

Not stopping to watch him bleed, you turned your head just quickly enough to see Jeno’s gun be kicked out of his hands. You wiped the blood from your knife and furtively approached his aggressor, briefly catching him off guard and kicking the gun back. 

Jeno scrambled towards the gun and quickly opened fire, the sound making your ears ring obnoxiously. 

“Goddamn,” you said, shaking your head in disapproval. 

Jaemin came over panting for breath, glancing around to make sure the entire room had been cleared. “I think I should be getting paid extra for this.”

Jeno snorted and came to a stand, directing his attention back to your face. “Remind me to never again invite myself on one of your assignments.”

Your shoulders shook with a laugh. That was fair enough. But there was definitely bigger fish to fry right now. How in the hell did the Brotherhood know where Kang Hangyeol was being held?

The three of your phones beeped collectively. With all the fighting and being thrown you each had done, it was a miracle they were still functioning. You glanced down to read a message Jaehyun had sent. 

Several bases have been attacked. Going incognito. More details later. Lay low until further notice. 

Your brows furrowed. “What the hell?”

“Vague as fuck,” Jeno replied, as if he had read your mind. “He must be in a meeting.”

Jaemin scoffed. “So what do we do then? Just wait around to die?”

You closed your blade and shook your head, reminding, “You’re already going to die. You let Kang Hangyeol get away. Remember?”

“That’s not the version of the story I plan on telling Jaehyun.”

You rolled your eyes. “If you start being nice to me, I’ll leave that part out of my report.”

Jaemin hummed, as if he was mulling it over. “Deal.”

You nodded with a tiny sigh. Nothing good was going to come out of rival gangs taking turns exacting revenge on each other. You knew that like you knew the law. 

Jeno safely returned you to the headquarters with a little farewell and warning to be safe before you went your separate ways. Normally, you would meet Jaehyun in person to briefly discuss the happenings of your task, but he wasn’t in his office. He would have to settle for the paragraph you sent to his phone. 

Upon entering the tiny apartment you had surprisingly been offered by the Reapers, you almost immediately collapsed on the bed, worn down by exhaustion. 

You had nearly dozed off completely when the sound of your phone ringing made you jolt awake. “Hello?” you answered weakly. 

“Is someone sleepy?” Ten teased. 

You groaned. If not for the fact that you had recognized your co-worker’s number, you would be sleeping right now. “I had a very, very long day.”

That piqued Ten’s interest. “You did? Tell me everything.”

You sat up, trying to wipe the sleep from your eyes. Stifling a yawn, you replied nonchalantly, “Oh, you know. The usual running around the city, trying to look like a loyal employee, and nearly getting shot to death.”

“Nearly getting shot to death?” Ten’s voice was loud as hell, repeating your words with shock. 

Well, if you weren’t awake before, you definitely were now. “I’m fine. No more bullets for me. It wasn’t the first time and it probably won’t be the last either.”

You couldn’t recall the first time someone had attempted to shoot you, but the memory of the first and last time they successfully did so was something you would always remember. Across the world in the United States, on a mission to track and detain a gang leader moving in and out of the country to evade arrest. 

Surprisingly enough, with it being an open case, that wasn’t even the mission that made you quit being a spy. Until now. 

“You got lucky the last time you got shot,” Ten replied, hating how casual you were about it but almost somewhat impressed. “Don’t let it happen again.”

“I’ll try,” you replied quietly, fully awake but still mindful of the fact that these walls were thin and you had no intention of exposing yourself. You switched the topic. “How’s the birthday boy?”

Ten wanted to talk more about the hectic day you had, but he supposed he could let it slide this once. “He’s twenty-five and drunk as all hell.”

You shook your head in amusement. You had expected nothing less. “I remember when I turned twenty-five.”

“I don’t,” Ten retorted. “I was blackout drunk too. He’s not going to remember either.”

You snickered. As long as Mark was having fun, that was all that mattered. “He should go wild. At that age, life becomes more about experiencing and less about surviving.”

“I assume that’s why you think barely dodging a bullet is no big deal?”

You resisted a roll of your eyes. Leave it to Ten to be utterly dramatic when it came to all things big and small. “No, actually. I call that focusing on the things I can control and not dwelling on what’s behind me.”

Ten sighed. You were insufferably stubborn, and even when you had gotten shot your first priority was still your work. They had to more or less chain you down to make you rest. “Whatever,” he replied, tone laced with disapproval. “Do you want me to put him on?”

“Yes, please.”

There was a moment of shuffling as Ten went to find Mark, not that it took very long. In a matter of seconds, you heard Mark enthusiastically greeting you by your name. 

“Hey, birthday boy,” you said happily, content to hear your co-workers’ voices. It brought them peace too. Knowing you were still alive and breathing somewhere. “How much did you drink?”

Mark chuckled. You could imagine he was rubbing his nape right now. “Not gonna lie, I have no idea. But I’m feeling good.”

“As to be expected,” you replied, leaning back a little against the headboard of the bed. “How have you been?”

“I’m honestly bummed that you’re not here. But hey, I did finish this case I was working on. I kept asking myself what you would do.”

You snorted. “And that’s how you solved the case?”

“Well, Ten and Jisung helped too,” Mark confessed. 

You laughed. 

“What about you?” Mark asked. “How’s the case going? I heard Ten screeching something about you almost getting shot. You good?”

Your mind brought you back to that moment for a second, being knocked underneath the mark and coming face to face with the barrel of a gun, but you banished the thought away. “I’m good. Not a nick or bruise.”

Mark hummed. He chose to believe you had everything under control. It wasn’t that he didn’t worry about you sometimes, but he knew what you were capable of and admired your strength. “And the case. How do you feel about finding Kun?”

Something about the mention of your boss made you frown. After retiring from being an undercover spy three years ago, you decided to make yourself useful in other ways, and had been transferred directly under his unit. You had mainly adjusted to handling organized crime without being on the field yourself. 

A few months ago, Kun had been investigating a gang called the Reapers. He’d been playing it close to the chest and you only found out because he had been acting suspiciously lately. He made you swear to secrecy, which you did. Until he disappeared into thin air. 

The worst part was that he had been missing for literal months and you didn’t feel like you had made any significant progress. You knew deep down that his chances of being alive were slimmer than ever, but you wanted to have faith in the odds. Kun had dedicated his entire life to the force, but he wanted to settle down someday. He wanted a wife and maybe a couple of kids. 

The thought that he would never get to do those things chilled you to the core every time it crossed your mind. You sighed and replied honestly, “I feel like it’ll be a while, but I’m doing everything I can.”

Mark would have to be content with that answer for now. He knew you would find Kun, whether it be dead or alive. He just hoped it would be the latter. “I have faith in you,” he told you sincerely. 

“Thank you,” you replied, somewhat comforted by those words. “I’ll hear from you again soon. Happy birthday.”

Mark smiled as he held Ten’s phone to his ear. “Thanks. Talk to you later.”

The very next day, you woke up to another message from Jaehyun that had less to do with details about the attacks from yesterday and more to do with something about a weird buddy system. According to him, you would new a partner from now on. 

You didn’t exactly have many friends here, so your first instinct was to call Jeno. 

“What do you mean you already have a partner?” you asked, flabbergasted. Something told you that he had chosen Jaemin over you. 

Jeno was trying his best to let you down gently. “I mean, I already have a partner. You called a little too late. It’s a shame we can only choose one. The three of us would’ve made a good team.” 

You sighed exasperatedly. You were on a to-and-from lockdown, no detours. And you needed a partner for whatever fucking reason. This gang was impossible. “Do you have some kind of humiliation kink? That fool almost got us killed yesterday.”

Jeno tried to stifle a chortle and failed miserably. “He might be a fool, but he’s my friend. I’m sorry, babe.”

“Don’t ‘babe’ me when you’re in cahoots with Na Jaemin of all the people in the world.”

You could hear Jeno sighing from the other line, contemplating the situation carefully. He didn’t want to leave you hanging. “Hear me out,” he started. 

Although you were glancing down at the phone in the palm of your hand with a blend of disdain and disappointment, you answered reluctantly, “I’m hearing you.”

“I heard around that some of the high-ranks are taking in their best soldiers.”

“Oh,” you replied quietly, not sure if you liked where this was going or not. But you chose to think about it pragmatically. If you were closer to the high-ranks, you had more access to hidden intel.

“I know a guy who knows a guy, who knows a guy. He’s the gang’s tracker. The one who can find anyone and everyone. If there’s anyone who can keep you safe, it’s him,” he continued. 

So he was a dangerous man. Not that you were any afraid. You had met many lethal men and yet you were still breathing. “Okay. When can I meet him?”

“Right now.”

Your head snapped behind you. That voice didn’t belong to the one on your phone. It belonged to someone merely a couple feet away from you. If you thought you were stealthy, this man gave you a run for every dime you owned. 

You stumbled back. Your eyes went wide. The blood drained from your face as if you had seen a ghost. And to be fair, that was exactly what was happening. 

“Don’t look so surprised,” Yuta told you indifferently. The sound of his voice did nothing to put your nerves at ease. Your shoulders were cold. Your heart was thudding. 

You had been located by the tracker. You swallowed sharply. It took every bit of your strength not to collapse in front of him. “You’re the third-in-command.”

“That’s me,” Yuta replied calmly. He took your phone and hung up the call. You hadn’t even registered Jeno’s bemused voice calling out to you worriedly. 

To be frank, it felt like you were dreaming. Or hallucinating. This was the last man you were expecting to see. Ever. “I can find another partner.”

Yuta chuckled. “You will find another partner in a group of people who hate talking to strangers whose intentions they don’t know?”

“You don’t know my intentions either.”

That seemed to amuse Yuta more than the last response you gave him. “Kim Yeongsu. Ahn Dongil. Cho Geonhan. You still want to play dumb?”

That had your attention. Your work always came first. You would follow the trail of breadcrumbs if it meant there was a chance they would lead you to success, even if it was a trap. 

Yuta didn’t wait for your answer. Apparently the look on your face said more than enough. You were game. “Go to housing. Pack your shit. I know you didn’t bring a ton anyways.”

That was a little too true, but a thought crossed your mind. He was helping you, and you couldn’t imagine why. “What do you want in return?” you asked skeptically. 

The little grin on Yuta’s lips fell. You felt something gloomy inside you stirring, but ignored it the best you could. There was no time for old emotions. After a small pause, he replied darkly, “Forget we ever happened.”

“Consider it already done,” you said, cold as ice, and paid the throbbing emptiness in your chest no mind. 

After you gathered what few things you had from the apartment you’d been given, you went straight to Yuta’s place. He was none too happy to see you, at least from the less than warm look on his face, but he opened his doors for you and let you inside. 

Leading you down the hall to an extra bedroom, Yuta skipped the greetings and niceties. “I don’t care what you do as long as you don’t bother me and don’t leave on your own. I don’t feel like getting shit from Taeyong.”

You nodded. Yuta turned and headed out, and the second he was out of earshot you grumbled something under your breath. Did he really have to be so rude?

Maybe you deserved it. Not that you would ever admit it to him or yourself. The way you saw it, you had only done everything you knew to do best. You had made no commitments. The only thing you ever promised was absolute and unwavering loyalty to your work. 

Fuck’s sake, you were still in shock. You had spent the past three years of your life believing something that couldn’t have been more false. Three years of your life you would never get back. Didn’t you deserve to be angry too?

Aggravated, you started to unpack your things and put them away somewhere safe. Yuta was right about you not having many belongings. You never did when you were on missions, or even in the very rare event that you were on vacation. They would only weigh you down. 

You grabbed your phone from the nightstand when you were done, knowing Jeno would most likely be demanding some kind of explanation for your abrupt hang-up, and sent a text his way. Yuta is taking me in or whatever. Take care of yourself. And tell Jaemin to be safe too. 

Jeno sent a message back after a few moments. Well, you thought it was Jeno, but considering the content of the message, someone else had gotten ahold of his phone. I’m always safe, princess. Don’t worry, I’ll take perfect care of Jeno. 

You immediately typed a response, After what happened yesterday? Doubtful. 

Will you ever let me live that down?

Unlikely. 

Jaemin was probably somewhere rolling his eyes at your message. In a few seconds, he answered, Are you a human or a magic eight ball?

You laughed a little at that. Some of the stress elevated from your chest, though not by much. You were still fighting in a close battle with your feelings - shock, anger, bitterness. All of the above. 

They were becoming almost uncontrollably strong and the last thing you wanted was to be unable to put a rein on your emotions. You stood up and headed out what was your room for the next who knew how long, checking out the apartment to distract yourself. 

You had been here before. Once. You had gotten hurt and since it was the closest option, Yuta opted to bring you back to his home for the first time to take care of you. The other times you only met in hotels. 

He had taken you to his living room and prompted your legs up on the coffee table, gingerly tending to your injuries. You remembered the guilt in his eyes every time he heard you hiss and saw you grimace. You remembered the way he tried to kiss it better. 

Even now, that same coffee table was still here three years later. The apartment was more or less as you remembered, but Yuta wasn’t. He was so much colder than he was before, but maybe you had done that to him. 

None of it helped. You were still emotional. Remembering the way things used to be only strengthened the tremor in your heart. The only reasonable thing you could do now was focus on your work. At the end of the day, you had a job to do, after all. 

You spotted Yuta with a cup of coffee in the kitchen and mustered the courage to approach him, announcing, “I have a question.”

Yuta winced his eyes closed. “What about ‘don’t bother me’ was confusing to you?”

You took his annoyance in stride. “This group and the Brotherhood are basically at war with each other. Why?”

Yuta shrugged, sipping from his coffee. “We’re their only competition. Do the math.”

You hummed. You had learned that the Reapers dominated the drug market and it was their most lucrative branch of business. Even though you worked beneath its entire two floor levels, you were never allowed to become too privy to the operation itself. It was forbidden knowledge if you were too new. “Have you ever run into one?” you asked curiously. 

“Nope,” Yuta replied nonchalantly. “They’re all mousy about showing their faces and they wear weird masks and stuff.”

That you had learned from your encounter with them the other day, which you wondered if was worth mentioning to Yuta. You decided against it for now. “Do you know why I’m here?”

“You want to know who killed your beloved department chief,” Yuta sang knowingly, setting his mug of coffee down on the counter. 

Those words made you shudder, wondering if he had been keeping tabs on you, but you kept pressing. “Was it the gang?”

Yuta initially shook his head, but then he seemed to genuinely think about it for a second. The silence only served to make you anxious. There was a small pause before he answered, “Well, if someone did, neither of us signed off on the decision. We don’t kill cops. It’s too messy. I don’t like messy.”

You believed him. Though the decision to meddle with cops not being greenlit by the inner circle didn’t mean that any low-ranks weren’t involved. You had to keep digging. “I’m assuming all the names you gave me were low-ranks then,” you replied, piecing things together. “I haven’t ran them through the system yet.”

“They’re low-ranks who had pretty bad prior run-ins with cops,” Yuta explained. 

You were surprised they would knowingly even take in anyone like that, considering how much they seemed against it. “One of them probably did it, then.”

“When you find out, let me know so I can hang them on a billboard in town square,” Yuta said coolly, to no one’s surprise. 

“Or you can let me bring them back to the station and we’ll persecute them to the highest extent of the law,” you suggested instead.

Yuta shook his head, none too enthusiastic to let you do things the legal and proper way. If someone in his gang had done this, they had violated a highly important rule that was more like a law of his own. “My way’s quicker.”

You rolled your eyes while he wasn’t paying attention. There was never any use arguing with Yuta Nakamoto when he wanted something. You learned that early on. He was unshakable in his ways and couldn’t be bent and manipulated into shape like the other pawns you’d hunted. 

But that was what you had liked about him. At least, one of many things on his abundantly long list of attractive traits. The others had only been deliberately chosen expendable tools to leech new intel off and dispose of when you got what you wanted. 

When you met Yuta, however, you knew he could never just be another pawn in your twisted game of survival. He was too intuitive, too perceptive for his own good and yours. You never had the upper hand for long with him. You both had something to lose in mingling with each other, and strangely enough, that made things more exciting. 

Yuta dismissed himself first as if he sensed more questions approaching and knew to disappear before you could conjure them in your head. “Sleep well. I’ve got an early meeting with the boys tomorrow morning, which means you have to come too.”

You watched his back sadly as he left. It was impressive you had gotten him to speak so much, considering he seemed to want nothing to do with you. Though if that was the case, why did he go out of his way to be partners with you?

That was the one thing giving you hope - the single most dangerous thing for someone like you to have. 

Tomorrow rolled around, and like he said you would, you accompanied Yuta to an inner circle meeting. More accurately, you waited outside for him to finish while they discussed the gang’s next steps and back-up plan if their biggest rival challenged them again. 

Nothing you were interested in. You only cared to know who was responsible for the fact that your boss was presumably dead. So far, there was no body, which gave you even more ammunition to keep searching rather than readily move on. 

In your thoughts as you stood outside the door of the conference room, you jolted out of them when you noticed someone coming. And to your surprise, it was Jeno’s footsteps you were hearing. 

Jeno had been looking at his phone, but acknowledged your presence with a baffled look when he glanced up at you. “Oh, hey. I didn’t know you were here too.”

The shock was mutual. You waved at him. “I wasn’t expecting to see you either.”

“Yeah, Jaemin’s here too,” Jeno replied, slipping his phone into his back pocket and giving you his undivided attention. “He’s downstairs looking for coffee. He really wanted an Iced Americano.”

You shook your head, pretending to be disappointed. “Fish found in the ocean. Who’s surprised?”

Jeno was shaking with laughter. “No one, I guess. I’m also not surprised that they’re kicking us outside instead of letting us listen in on the meeting.”

There was no surprise there. Reapers were painfully stingy with important information, as you had come to know. “I know,” you groaned in annoyance. “Like we don’t deserve to know what the fuck is going on.”

Jeno nodded along, bobbing his head in agreement. He leaned in, mindful of the fact there were a number of dangerous men right behind the door, and whispered, “That’s what I’m saying. Jaehyun ended up more or less adopting Jaemin and I. If you think you hate the guy right now, imagine living in his house.”

You winced, feeling sympathetic. Between his housing situation and yours, you didn’t know which was worse. “Damn.”

He looked behind him to the conference room, hidden behind a glass wall. You could see in all you wanted, but couldn’t hear a word of the conversation. “This buddy system is weird as all fuck. Meeting like this is even stupider,” Jeno said, blunt as ever. “Everybody knows the best time to strike is when they’re all together.”

You hadn’t thought about something like that. In all truth, you had been thinking about Yuta. Nothing he was doing made sense right now and you sensed an ulterior motive behind his seemingly kind actions. He had never helped you for free, after all. There always came a price. 

The price didn’t seem so bad back then. You could have signed your life away to him and wouldn’t have even noticed. He helped you, feeding you intel on an underground fighting gang in Japan, and in return you helped him, giving him special access to cop affairs. 

It cost more now. Or at least it felt that way. The tension was unbearable and the memories leapt at every opportunity to weigh on your mind as well as your heart. Once upon a time, you only felt Yuta’s weight on your body. Things were so much easier before. 

“I guess so,” you told Jeno, forcibly grounding yourself back in the moment. “But I think that all depends on the Brotherhood’s motivations for attacking and what they plan on getting out of this.” 

“A few people are gonna have to die before that gets figured out,” Jeno replied darkly. 

That was very true. Naturally, you had already come to that conclusion too. At this rate, you were expecting a hefty number of casualties on both ends. 

The meeting droned on for what seemed like an eternity before Yuta finally stepped out of the conference room with most of his fellow members in tow. A few had stayed back for whatever reason, but the ones that headed out barely paid you a lick of attention as they made a beeline for the elevator. 

Not that you were complaining, of course. The fact that you were a mere blip on their radar was a good sign, all things considered. But it made you realize that Yuta had never told them what you were. 

You couldn’t wrap your head around why he was helping you. Every time you tried not to worry about the intent behind his deeds, it backfired immediately. And so when you were alone in his car, you asked, “Why are you helping me if you hate me so badly?”

“I’m not helping you,” Yuta told you, buckling his seat belt around his waist. His eyes were nowhere on you. Like you didn’t concern him at all. “I’m helping myself. The sooner you find the bastard that killed your boss, the sooner I can tie up loose ends, and the sooner we can both move on with our lives.”

He didn’t deny hating you. Something about that made your stomach churn. “Well, at least you’re honest,” you mumbled. “And we don’t know if he was killed or not.”

You knew better than to think that he was alive, but you wouldn’t accept it until you saw his corpse for yourself. The people in your unit had come to mean a lot to you over the years. 

Yuta scoffed. If you looked closely enough, you could almost see something bitter in his expression. “Your boss has been missing for what? Two or three months now? You know the statistics better than I do, baby. He’s dead.”

“Statistics aren’t foolproof,” you reminded. 

“I thought they would be to you. Glad to know I was wrong.”

You caught it this time, mainly because he wasn’t cloaking it. The resentment covering his words from head to toe. He wanted you to know he hated you. You swallowed sharply. Message fucking received. 

The ride back was silent. You had everything to say to him, but even more pride. It would do you no good with someone as stubborn as Yuta Nakamoto himself. What would it fix if you admitted you’d done him dirty? Not a goddamn thing. 

You raced into his apartment without another word when you both arrived. There were bigger problems than whatever was going on between the two of you. No issue, big or small, would be allowed to come between you and work and anyone who dared try ultimately faced your wrath. 

Once in your room, you opened your laptop and entered the names Yuta had given you along with additional information you had stumbled across and cross-referenced them against the unit’s current findings. And you came up empty. There was nothing that lent any support to either of those three men being the perpetrators, other than their history of assault on cops which Yuta had already informed you of. 

To say nothing of the fact that the crimes seemed very spontaneous, according to the incident reports available. Like they were simply doing whatever they had to do to remove themselves from the corner they’d been backed into. They were apprehended immediately. No repeats and nothing that screamed violent disdain of cops. 

It was unlikely that their behavior would escalate from second-degree murder to a deliberately executed abduction of a police chief. You shut your laptop, groaning. Yet again, I have fucking nothing.

Nightfall came and a lot of time sped by doing even more research, but to no avail. You weren’t any closer to solving the disappearance of your boss and it was making your skin crawl. Three years away was starting to make you think that you’d lost your touch as a covert. 

Uncontrollably, your mind started to wander to the past. The case that earned you your rep as a prolific undercover agent and simultaneously the last one you ever worked. A memory held you hostage, one of many. 

The room was so hot you couldn’t breathe. It didn’t help that Yuta’s naked body was tangled with yours, refusing to let go after a few long rounds of love-making. At the very least, the luxurious hotel room on the top floor had comfortable bedding and a beautiful window outlook of Yokohama. 

Though your breath was more taken by the view of the gorgeous man in your grip. And the intimate moment you had shared together. “Yuta, I’m scared,” you told him quietly. 

Not more than a few words had been exchanged since you two finished, so Yuta was surprised to hear you speak. “What are you scared of, darling?”

Your heart raced by a thousand miles per hour as you sucked in a breath, willing yourself to remain calm and level. It was not often you were made nervous by something, so Yuta had assumed whatever was troubling you was more or less life-threatening. In a way, he was spot-on. 

His eyes were squarely on you, giving you his undivided attention. Which only made your heart flutter quicker. “I’m scared because I like you,” you confessed in a whisper. “More than I’ve ever liked anyone before.”

Yuta’s eyes flickered in surprise. Not by what you had said, but the fact that you’d said it aloud. The two of you had been dancing around the subject of romance for a couple of months now, focusing on the main task instead of the love inadvertently developing between you more quickly than you’d hoped. He hummed. “That scares you?”

“It’s not just that,” you replied, knowing how it sounded. “We’re on two separate sides of the law. After this operation inevitably ends, I won’t have an excuse to see you anymore. I will go back to my way of life and you will go back to yours.”

That had always been the plan. Once you ultimately exhausted your purposes for each other, this little alliance would break. Though Yuta’d had a change of heart. “It doesn’t have to be that way,” he said, cradling your face. “We don’t have to live completely separate lives forever. You’re obviously good at keeping secrets. No one has to know.”

“But it’s wrong.”

“Playing with my dick when you’re supposed to be looking for a serial killer is okay, but secretly being in a relationship with me behind your handler’s back is where you draw the big red line? That cuts deep, babe,” he joked. 

“It’s a thin gray line,” you corrected, matching his humor. “And I think I found the serial killer.”

Yuta playfully rolled his eyes. He’d told you just enough about his job that you didn’t paralyze with fear whenever he touched you, in spite of knowing he had taken lives and would do it again in a heartbeat. He was a protector, a defender. “Yeah, wrong one, baby.”

You giggled. The noise made Yuta’s heart swell in his chest like never before. He wanted to defend you with everything he had, destroy anybody who dreamed of laying even the tip of their fingers on you. He would crush entire worlds in his palm for you.

“I like you too,” Yuta admitted, as if it hadn’t already been obvious. The man fucked you like he wanted to consume you right after. “More than I ever thought I would. Five months ago, I would’ve never imagined I’d be holding you in my arms like this right now, but I wouldn’t have you anywhere else. So tell me what I gotta do to keep you here.”

His words nearly had your head spinning. Your eyes were brimming with affection. “Just hold me like this forever,” you replied softly. 

Yuta smirked. “I think that can be arranged.”

The memory seemed so close, yet so far away. Sometimes you wished you were still somewhere in a hotel in Yokohama or in the alps of Hakone with him pressed into your side. You pictured cherry blossoms and scenic lakes with a view of mountain peaks touching the clouds. You pictured Yuta enthusiastically showing you to all his favorite stops, hand in yours. 

You couldn’t remember the last time he had genuinely smiled at you now. The promise to take you to his hometown was one of the last things he’d told you. You remembered how excited he had been. And now he wouldn’t even look at you. 

That hurt like a bitch. 

Something else was bothering you. You more or less always knew Yuta was a powerful gang member, but you never realized he was one of the most influential members of the Reapers. The two of you had been too focused on what was ahead of you to look behind. 

It made you wonder what you really knew about each other. You had seen him as an oasis away from dreadful work, someone who was passionate and intuitive. Someone who got more and more interesting every time he spoke. Someone who kept his heart under lock and key, but loved you with all of it.

Yuta had taken months to get to know. Intentionally. He preferred to take his time when it came to sizing people up and understanding them before they could do the same to him. And he was very, very good at doing so. He guarded his heart and only allowed you to see what he wanted you to see. But you knew how to disarm him.

Like you, he was also obstinate as all hell. It was immovable object meets unstoppable force meeting him. Things were still that way now. You would have to fight like hell and then some if you wanted to prove that you still deserved to be in his life, because he would fight even harder against it. 

You knew he was not one to forgive or forget and he could take a grudge to the grave if he so pleased. Scorpion was his name and stinging was his game. Viper and venom. No wonder his job was to hunt and kill anybody who slighted the gang enough. He was revenge personified. 

Tossing and turning in bed, unable to fall asleep even after a steaming hot shower, you swallowed your pride and paraded straight to Yuta’s bedroom. The door was unlocked. You poked your head inside, the movement not unnoticed by Yuta. He was still awake. 

“The day is already over,” Yuta said dismissively, glancing away from you. “You can bother me with questions tomorrow.”

“I’m not here to ask questions.”

Yuta raised a brow, turning to you again. “Then why are you here?”

You swallowed the lump in your throat. This was going to make things awkward. “I don’t want to sleep alone,” you whispered.

“You don’t want to sleep alone,” Yuta repeated, as if he had misheard you.

You nodded slowly. When he echoed your words back to you like that, it only made you feel stupid for thinking he would let you share a room with him, let alone a bed. 

Yuta contemplated your words for a while, mulling a decision over. After a moment, he sighed, relenting. “Come here.”

That surprised you thoroughly. You were half expecting him to tell you that he didn’t give a damn and ask you what you wanted him to do about it. You took a few tentative steps over to him. 

Yuta quirked his brow, patting the spot beside him. His skin looked like honey in the golden-yellow hue of his lamplight. “What are you waiting for? Get in the bed.”

You hesitantly crawled into the bed, underneath his sheets. You were scared of something. You didn’t want to make any more mistakes when it came to him. 

Yuta could practically smell your fear like the musk of an animal. He couldn’t help it. He had seen all of your emotions, especially the ones you pretended not to have in front of others. And he knew them intimately.

He suppressed a smirk. Was it wrong to bask in it a little? “What are you scared of?” he asked. 

Those five words made you freeze, remembering where you had heard them before. That night you confessed your feelings to Yuta in a Yokohama hotel. “I’m not scared of anything,” you lied through your teeth. 

Yuta knew you were lying. He always did, after all. “Tell me the truth.”

You swallowed. He was always so good at reading you. The words were at the tip of your tongue, but you couldn’t say them. “I… didn’t want to make you uncomfortable.”

“I’ve had women in my bed before, you know,” Yuta replied with a snicker. “I think I’ll be okay.”

You almost rolled your eyes, but then you started thinking about how many women had slept beside him since you weren’t in his life. Your mind was picturing Yuta with some faceless girl, giggling naked underneath the sheets as you had done three years too long ago. 

“Yeah, I know,” you grumbled, turning around with your back to him. “Goodnight.”

Yuta called out your name sternly. “Look at me.”

You slowly faced him. It was hard to look him in the eyes, but you did it anyway. You wanted to seize the control back. 

Never in a million years would you have assumed that of all things, Yuta would kiss you restlessly. You reciprocated without hesitation, falling into the kiss as if you were picking up where you’d left off. 

Yuta tangled his fingers through your hair, lips moving against yours with something that was dangerously close to pining. Your heart raced at the thought, wondering if he missed you the way you missed him. Three years was too long to be without the only man you’d ever loved. 

Full of surprises, Yuta pressed his mouth to your neck, sucking and nibbling and marking you as his possessively. He would never admit it to your face, but that was his intent. You couldn’t resist a moan. Yuta knew exactly what to do to get you falling apart in his arms and begging for more like you just couldn’t get enough. 

Your entire body burned with fever. Your eyes winced closed when Yuta sank his teeth into your flesh, the sensation teetering somewhere on that thin line between pain and pleasure. You knew he would leave behind a number of bruises by the time he was finished with you, and you weren’t complaining. 

Yuta had gotten a taste of you and now he couldn’t will himself to stop, against his better judgment. The part of him that wanted to loathe you with every fiber of his being would have to be put on hold for now. He wanted you too badly. His ever-growing resentment for you be damned. 

You missed kissing Yuta to the last breath. Your body remembered what it was like, tasting and sucking on each other’s tongues, and it started to shudder with excitement at the memory. Amongst other things. 

Yuta recognized the telltale signs of you becoming aroused and decided to take things a step further, testing the waters to see if they would slam him against rocks. He brought a hand to your thigh where he knew you were weak and defenseless, tenderly kneading the skin. 

Like clockwork, you were tensing underneath his hands, needily pressing your thighs together. Goddammit it, he still remembered what your weak spots were and how to use them to his advantage. There was something about his warm hand on your skin clashing with the cold nudge of his rings that made you shudder. 

“Yuta,” you called out, reaching your breaking point. 

He didn’t say anything, having too much fun teasing you and watching you get worked over something so simple. “Hm?”

You stifled an irritated groan. He knew exactly what you were going to say, and you knew he only wanted to hear it from your own mouth. “I want you,” you confessed, as if it wasn’t obvious. 

Yuta watched your face, recognizing the look of absolute dwindling patience, and chuckled. “You want me how?”

“However you want.”

Yuta’s eyes flickered in astonishment for all of two seconds. Given the circumstances, he hadn’t expected to hear you say you would let him have you however he wanted, but it damn sure did wonders to turn him on. More than he was already, that is. 

You were less surprised when Yuta stole another steamy and borderline erotic kiss, his hands settling firmly on your jaw instead of combing through your hair this time. His tongue in your mouth had your heart fluttering and your body scalding with relentless desire. 

Yuta withdrew from the kiss to toss his shirt above his head. You mirrored him, and in the few seconds it concealed his face from your view, you were oblivious to where his darkening gaze had sunk. It wasn’t until your shirt was cast into oblivion that you realized he was staring at your belly. 

You glanced down, having forgotten about the long red gunshot scar. You opened your mouth to speak, but Yuta beat you to a word. 

“Who did this to you?” he asked almost threateningly, switching on a dime. 

You shook your head, reaching out to soothe him. “Yuta, it was two years ago.”

“I’m not going to ask again.”

You sighed through your nose. The man responsible was already rotting in prison, for life most likely. You were satisfied. “Some guy named Levi Clark,” you told him. “He’s an American. It happened when I got invited to the States on a classified that went open.”

Yuta hummed. The response was nonchalant itself, but you could see the little gears turning in his head the way they always did when he was up to no good. 

“He’s in prison,” you continued, sensing it would be worth including. 

Yuta nodded. “Okay.”

Your brow raised with suspicion. “You’re not going to kill him, are you?”

Much, much worse, Yuta thought grimly to himself. But rather than have you worry your pretty little head off, he kissed the corner of your lips and lied, “Of course not.”

You didn’t believe him at all, not even for a half second, but you weren’t going to say anything. Especially not when he started to kiss his way down your body from your supple breasts to your inner thighs, making sure to be extra tender when his lips brushed against your scar. 

His lips sank even lower, fingers raveling in your underwear and yanking them below your ankles. They were right between your legs yet still not where you needed them, pressing sweet and slow kisses on your thighs, which was nothing like how you remembered him. Yuta was hard and fast. 

You let him have his way, kissing and biting at your sensitive thighs while knowing the sensation drove you wild, your body visibly exuding arousal. It was enough for him to effortlessly slip his fingers inside, but he didn’t dare, thumbing your nub with his hand solely to watch you writhe and squirm. 

“Yuta,” you called out, voice teetering toward a whimper. “Don’t tease.”

Yuta raised a brow, pretending to be confused. Like he wasn’t deliberately trying to get a rise out of you. “You said I could do whatever I want with you. And I want to watch you get worked up over me.”

“I know, but…,” you trailed. “Please?”

Yuta knew how much you hated begging, so for you to say please meant you didn’t just want him - you needed him like you needed blood in your veins. And it turned him on even crazier. 

He made a spur of the moment decision to get a hold of your hips and pull you onto him, making you sit on his face. You released a shaky noise when he began to suck and lick at your neglected bundle of nerves without warning, his hands gripping your thighs for purchase. 

Yuta ate you out skillfully, pressing all the right buttons. Literally. His tongue was giving your clit ample attention, expertly doing everything he knew to have you moaning loudly and riding his face for more. Your arms were on either side of his head, gripping the sheets for dear life. 

You could hardly breathe. You moaned a breathless, “Fuck,” as he continued to go to town, obviously keen on eating you out until you went limp and couldn’t keep yourself upright. 

Yuta gripped your thighs roughly, scraping them with his nails. He didn’t mind how they were suffocating him at the moment, the sides of your knees pressing into his head every time you tensed and shuddered. Yuta kept going, nose brushing against your clit every now and then. 

“Holy fuck. Shit. Fuck,” you swore, all other previously existing vocabulary exiting on the right. 

Yuta was satisfied by that reaction. You tended to do that when you felt too good - forget everything except him and his uncanny talent for making you unravel. Something about knowing he was more or less the only thing on your mind made his already stiff cock even harder. 

You needed this more right now than ever. You could physically feel the tension escaping your mind and body, unshackling your bones and letting you breathe. Even Yuta could tell you were in dire need of relief and he took it upon himself to make sure you got enough to make your toes curl. 

“Yuta…,” you whimpered, grinding into his mouth like nothing would ever satisfy you. 

Fuck’s sake, you were going to be the death of him. The way you called out Yuta’s name made him want to shove you onto his mattress to fuck the breath of you and then some. He resisted for now. Knowing how rough he could get, he wanted to be certain you were ready to take him. 

Your eyes were rolling to the back of your head. This was the first time in three years you had experienced sexual contact from another human being and it was safe to say you were touch-starved. Your entire body tremored with the excitement not only of being touched again, but of being flush against Yuta once more. 

Yuta couldn’t lie. Well, he could and he most definitely would try, but he’d missed you too. The romantic aspect of his longing aside, you were a goddess in his eyes and he always worshiped your body the way it deserved. Which, after long hours of being hard at work, you had never not appreciated. 

After having been with Yuta, you knew no one else would ever satisfy you or get you off how he did. You each had been with your fair share of sexual partners, but Yuta was the only one who ever made you see stars and the whole damn moon. When work got especially stressful, you always had urges, but you took care of yourself just fine. 

This was a far cry from just fine. This was mind-numbing pleasure that had you clinging onto his hair and whimpering his name over and over as if it was the only word you knew. As if he was the only thing you knew. 

“Yuta, I’m close,” you told him shakily. 

Yuta could tell, but hearing you say it made him push you off his mouth none too gently and onto the bed as he had wanted. When you whimpered in disapproval, Yuta playfully chided, “Don’t complain.”

Your core throbbed with need, but your eyes flitted between his handsome face and his beautiful v-line, wondering if you should’ve focused on how he licked your arousal from his lips or how hard he had gotten from getting you off as he shuffled out of his pants. 

Both. Both is good, you thought to yourself, licking your own lips. 

Once his clothes were off, Yuta knocked your thighs apart and gripped your jaw with one hand as he steered himself to your entrance with the other, growling, “Look at me.”

You did as told. You would steal a soul in a heartbeat for him if he so bade you. His dark eyes were staring into yours, watching your contorting face as he began to take you. And you watched him, tightening at the way his mouth hung open. 

Yuta noticed your eyes wincing closed as he filled you inch by inch and when he was fully seated inside you, he slackened his grip on your jaw in favor of your hair. “Keep your eyes open,” he told you assertively. “I don’t want you to miss a fucking second.”

You whimpered, but obliged him. Your eyes were tempted to water at the sensation of being stuffed full of his cock again and it didn’t take long for him to stretch you out. 

“Good girl,” Yuta said, smashing his lips against yours. It was the only time you were allowed to close your eyes and you did so immediately, kissing him like it was the last time. 

Yuta started to move, pressing himself in and out of your slick pussy with ease. You were so fucking wet and it was making him lose his mind. Your body took him back with every deep thrust, accepting him, little wet squelches echoing off the bedroom walls as his hips smacked into yours at a quick yet steady pace. 

You were in a different world. With Yuta’s weight dangling on top of you, you couldn’t help but fondly remember all the times you had been here before, all the times you had surrendered your body to him for him to do as he pleased. You were another person with Yuta. Someone free and wild and reckless. 

For a long time, you thought that version of you was dead and buried. But here she was, eating her heart out for him, ready to kill for him if he so asked.

“Oh my fuck,” you moaned almost at the top of your lungs, grabbing Yuta’s shoulders to anchor yourself, as if you were afraid of sinking too far without him. 

Yuta lowered his head to your chest and began to cover every inch of your naked breasts with love marks that eventually would fade a dark color. They stung vaguely, but Yuta knew you were a sucker for pain and he was more than happy to give it to you. 

You didn’t feel human anymore. Rather, you felt like two feral and ravenous animals in a back and forth game of trying to intimidate and tame one another, clinging onto your survival instincts like they were all you had left. You would never back down, but you would never give chase either. You just kept taking turns circling each other in the wild. 

Yuta wanted to deny the hold you still had on him, but the second he felt the way you throbbed and tightened around his cock, he knew he would forever be a slave to his feelings for you. He continued fucking you at this pace, nice and hard, deep and fast. “Fuck,” he groaned. 

You yanked his hair and pulled him onto you, stringing your legs around his hips to keep him close as you kissed him endlessly, never wanting to cease your hold on his body that burned with sweat and insatiable hunger. Kissing it better again. You wanted to be sore when he was done with you, to feel the leftover ache of him in your very bones. 

“You’re so damn beautiful,” Yuta grumbled when your lips separated, almost as if he was upset about it. You had enticed him like a siren, lured him to a death he would die a million times for another night with you. 

You weakly shook your head, but grinned at the compliment. “That’s all you,” you whispered, slowly trailing your fingers down his back. 

Yuta could see it in your eyes that you were right there, on the edge he’d dragged you almost over, but not close enough to let you slip. This time he would give it to you. He wanted to make you come on his cock, pulsing with climax. Sex was power to him. He loved being in control of your pleasure, knowing that it was entirely dependent upon him. 

You didn’t even have to tell him you were close. Yuta got a hold of your throat and limited your air flow, craning his head to whisper in your ear, “Come, baby. Come all over my cock.”

It was almost instantaneous. In a matter of seconds you were crash-landing from the atmosphere and slowly grounding yourself back into the hard rough dirt. You suddenly shuddered with orgasm, clasping his hair in your hands and sharply crying out his name. 

Yuta chuckled, knowing that would happen. In a weird way, it was comforting to know that all his old tricks still worked on you, that he still knew your body as if it was his own. “That’s my girl,” he sang with satisfaction. 

You had barely recovered from your climax when Yuta pulled out and flipped you over, then buried himself some inches deep inside you again all within a blink. “Oh my god,” you stammered, tangling your hands in the silk sheets and thick blankets. 

His hips moved quicker than ever, roughly fucking you into the mattress while he chased relief, and you loved every second of it. There would never be a time where you wouldn’t be happy in allowing Yuta to use your body as a means of getting off. 

Yuta smacked your ass and the sound of your soft whimpers made his dick twitch with excitement. He willed himself to pull out of you and finished himself with his hand, a stripe of his cum landing on your back as he groaned deliciously in climax. 

“Stay still,” Yuta said after taking a pause to catch his breath, pulling his pants back up to his hips and meandering towards the bathroom. 

Not that you had any intention of moving as much as an inch. He had literally fucked the will to do anything out of you. You were going to lay right there on his bed where you had fallen limp until further notice. 

Yuta returned with a damp cloth to wipe his release off your back. His shirt was still on the floor and he didn’t seem like he was eager to put it back on. You staggered to the bathroom to clean yourself and the moment you came back you collapsed on the mattress. 

“Goodnight,” you whispered, getting comfortable on the opposite side of the bed. 

Yuta switched off the lamp on his nightstand and did the same, heart still trembling with the afterhighs of what you had done together. Or maybe it was out of affection. “Goodnight.”

It didn’t take long for you to drift off. You were sated, and it was all the relaxation needed to put you to sleep. 

When you woke up in the morning, admittedly somewhat later than normal, Yuta was no longer perched on your side. Your heart throbbed a little with ache, but you ignored it. This was Yuta Nakamoto, for fuck’s sake. You should have expected less.

You found your shorts and slipped them back on, more or less limping out of his bedroom to the kitchen where you figured Yuta would be hiding. And you were right. There he was with his morning coffee. He looked right at you for half a second, but said nothing.

Fine, asshole. If you won’t, then I will, you huffed to yourself, tenacious. “Good morning,” you said to him, leaning onto the counter. 

“Morning,” Yuta replied quietly. 

“Is something wrong?” you asked. You had trouble believing that was all he had to give after the night you’d shared together. 

“Hm?”

You shrugged your shoulders, feigning nonchalance, but you both knew what you were getting at and you were trying to play your cards accordingly. “I just feel like you’re keeping yourself from me.”

Yuta played dumb. For now. “What makes you say that?” 

You stifled a groan of frustration. His passive aggressive behavior was starting to get on your nerves. You would take direct confrontation over this if it meant he would stop hiding his heart from you. You knew he had something to say to you, which only made this all the more unbearable. 

“You know why,” you replied, snappier. “You’re acting like nothing has happened.”

Yuta sipped from his coffee, barely a single thing off in his composure. “Am I?”

You studied him, looking for a defect in his perfectly crafted demeanor, some hint or clue as to his genuine emotions. You didn’t buy his indifference. “Yes, you are. Is there something you want to say?”

“What do you want me to say?” Yuta retorted, continuing this back and forth game. The game of survival. “It meant nothing. You looked like you needed it. I was just lending a helping hand.”

You didn’t want to believe him, because that would mean you were alone in the memories, in the thoughts of what you had together once upon a time, so close to a happy ever after. “You seem to be really into helping me, for whatever reason,” you mumbled, suspicious. 

The doubtful undertones in your voice weren't lost on Yuta. He knew you were trying to figure him out and check him for ulterior motives. “Is that a crime, miss undercover?”

You groaned exasperatedly. “God’s sake, Yuta. Just spit it out. What do you want from me?”

“Nothing,” Yuta lied, rinsing his cup out in the sink and placing it gently into the cabinets before stepping out. 

You exhaled loudly. He had no reason to be this goddamn difficult when he was perfectly capable of speaking about his feelings like a normal human. Like hell you were going to put up with his insufferable bullshit. Did he expect you to be some kind of fucking mind reader? 

Five minutes later, almost the very second you had set your mind on following and confronting him, Yuta whirled back into the kitchen, hissing, “Why didn’t you look for me?”

Your eyes flickered with shock. “What?”

Yuta was too fed up to tolerate you playing dumb. He didn’t raise his voice, but he was firm as ever. “Don’t play dumb. You let me fade away. You never looked. Why?”

The anger disappeared from your body for a second, and guilt swept over in its place. “I thought you were dead.”

Yuta shook his head, unaccepting. “That’s not good enough. Your boss is more than likely dead, but you’re still risking your life to find him.”

You stayed quiet, unsure of yourself. Why didn’t you look? Were you leaping at the opportunity to undo the damage you’d caused by eating the forbidden fruit?

“Did I ever mean anything to you? Anything at all, dear?” Yuta pressed, approaching you like he was trying to intimidate you. To make you fear him. “Or was I a pawn in your perpetual pursuit of justice?”

In any other circumstances, you would have been amused by how poetic he sounded, in spite of how sharp his voice was. But you couldn’t bring yourself to laugh. “Yuta, you were never a pawn. You were so much more.”

Yuta grabbed your hair, but he didn’t yank. He simply held it firmly in his hands and tilted your head up to look at him. “Did you use me?”

“We used each other,” you whispered. 

“No, no, no, dear,” Yuta sang almost sweetly. “You did all the using. You got what you wanted from me and left me for dead. That’s the cold hard truth, isn’t it?”

“You know it’s not,” you said, reaching out to grasp his shoulder. 

Yuta snapped, “Then, what is?”

You were rooted in memory, traveling back in time three years. The last dance. The underground fighting gang in Japan you’d hunted like prey and chance met Yuta. The same gang had killed one of his own and he planned on exacting his revenge. In his own way, he had also been undercover.

The case was essentially over and it wouldn’t have been possible without Yuta’s help. After a typical long night of your bodies meeting, you had woken up one day to him gingerly prying himself out of your arms, whispering apologies for waking you and something about how he was going to head over to the fight club. 

You didn’t think it would be the last time you ever saw him. The opposite. You smiled in his burly arms as he veered down and gave you one final kiss of affection, daydreaming of how you would keep your illicit affair a secret from the law and betray your oath. 

The next thing you knew, you were receiving a call about how the entire fight club had burned to a crisp. With a handsome number of people in it. Your heart thundered in your chest and you waited all day for Yuta to return, but when morning came and he still didn’t show, you assumed he never would. 

But duty still called. You successfully carried out an operation that culminated in an ungodly number of convictions. You got your glory and fame. And only after mourning him for months did you slap on a brave face and pretend Yuta never meant anything to you. 

“You want to know the truth?” you asked, fighting tears as your temper rose. You had things to get off your chest too. “The truth is that I mourned a loss that never happened and when I saw you standing there, perfectly fucking fine, I thought I saw a ghost. Now you’re punishing me for grieving you and I can’t take that shit.”

Yuta rolled his eyes. “Don’t play the victim. We both know that if you wanted to look for me, you would have. You didn’t. Your work is all that ever mattered. It still is.”

That cut deep. Is that really what he thought of you, after all this time? That you only cared about money and power?

You stepped away from him, recoiling. “That hurts, you know.”

“The truth tends to do that sometimes.”

You shook your head in disbelief and laughed hollowly. “Is this seriously all you can bring yourself to say? After I thought you were dead for three years?”

Yuta shot back, “And I thought you didn’t care about me for three years. Who has it worse?”

Running your hand through your hair, you sighed exasperatedly and asked him, “Does it have to be a fucking competition?”

“Yes.”

This was more complicated than any case you had ever solved. It was impossible to wrap your head around in spite of how desperately you longed to make sense of this. “Why are you faulting me for this?” you asked, paralyzing. “You could have come to me, you know.”

“I didn’t want to get in the way of your work,” Yuta said, a hint of something rueful in his voice, but it was gone in a flicker. 

Now it was your turn to roll your eyes. “Stop doing this. Stop making it seem like everything you do is for my sake. Like you never had bad intentions.”

Yuta simmered with frustration. Was it genuinely so hard to believe that he cared about you? You were everything he ever wanted and everything he never had.

“Oh, I had intentions,” Yuta replied with a chuckle. “I had intentions of whisking you away and taking you across the world with me. Intentions of showing you off to my friends and doing everything I could to see you smile. But you had me fooled, baby. You manipulated me.”

You shook your head vigorously. “I did not!” 

“You did,” Yuta hissed. “I have to commend you, sweetheart. It’s not often someone tricks me the way you did. You really were something else.”

The tension in the room was becoming too much even for someone as strong as yourself and you crumbled underneath the surface, loudly confessing, “I couldn’t do it!”

Yuta paused, caught off guard. He had been slowly pushing you to the edge, but he wasn’t expecting you to break. “You couldn’t do what?” he asked. 

You inhaled a few deep breaths, knowing you were on the verge of tears and not wanting to sob in front of him. “I couldn’t move into your world and out of mine, over and over. I wanted to, but I knew the guilt would eat me alive. It had to be one or the other. And when you died, or when I thought you did, I mean, I thought the universe had made the choice for me.”

That only made things worse. You had essentially just admitted you were never going to allow yourself to be with him, dead or alive. “Is that why you never looked?”

“I’m sorry,” you whispered, outstretching your hand to grab his, but he wouldn’t let you.

Yuta bristled. He loved you more than anything, but right now, he hated your guts. “You’re not sorry. You made your choice.”

And you were regretting it more and more by the second, wondering how you could account for lost time. “A choice I don’t resonate with anymore.”

Yuta had no sympathy. “That’s too bad. The damage has already been done. So just double down and bleed me dry like you always have, and we can both move the fuck on.”

The gears were starting to turn in your head, quicker and quicker. “That’s what this is about?” you asked, everything finally starting to click. “You want to see if I’ll take advantage of you?”

Yuta crept closer, running his fingers over your cheek almost with affection. Your body caved instantaneously, but your mind couldn’t fall for it. “I want to see exactly how far you’re willing to go to help your boss. The things you’ll do, the lies you’ll tell. The truths you’ll bury. I want to see you for what you really are.”

You were sick and tired of him acting as if he knew everything and snapped, “What am I then? Please enlighten me.”

“The death of me,” Yuta replied, seconds before closing the tiny gap between your bodies and kissing you. No matter how greatly he despised you, the weight of his desire would always overpower. 

Your lips moved in fearless sync as you kissed each other breathless, as if you were in a competition to see who would suck the life out of the other first. But until one of you died, you traced your hands along any bare skin you could set your fingers on and held onto each other’s bodies, keeping yourselves close.  

At least when you were like this, the odds evened out. You made Yuta insane with your body and he made you arch into his hot touches. You breathed a little less when he touched you and he died a little more when you pushed him to his high’s end. Then you brought him back to life and took his soul all over again. There was no losing or winning here. Only life or death. 

Without warning, Yuta gripped your hips and hoisted you onto the counter. You gasped, clasping his shoulders. He stole your shorts from underneath you and yanked them down your ankles, tossing them into the deep end, and stuck a hand between your legs to feel your arousal growing around his fingers, a deep, guttural sound springing from the back of his throat when he felt how wet you were from his kisses.

“Yuta,” you called out, running your hands down his chest from his shoulders. “Fuck me.”

“No.” 

You gawked. The next thing you knew, he had one hand around your throat and the other pressing a knife against it. “You don’t get to be the boss of me anymore. You lost that privilege. You don’t get to control me,” he said, cold as stone. “You don’t get to act like I’m yours.”

The knife flush against your neck did nothing to unnerve you. None of your survival instincts were on edge. Your muscles weren’t tense. Your breath was mostly level. You asked coyly, “Aren’t you?”

Yuta clenched his jaw. You were right and he knew it. He was completely and thoroughly owned by you - mind, body, and soul. And heart. No matter what lengths he went to deny it, you were his salvation. In beautiful life and in sweet death. 

“No. You have to earn it,” he told you, quiet but fierce. 

For the time being, you played submissive. You already knew he was eating from the palm of your hand, all yours. There was nothing left to secure, but you wanted to appease him. “How can I earn it?”

Yuta stamped the knife harder against your throat, not enough to draw blood, but enough to keep you still and pliant. “When you said you loved me, did you mean it?”

You thought back to all those little memories, swimming around in the deep end of your mind. There weren’t many times you’d whispered the three word confession into his ears, but that made it all the more special. You remembered all of them. Walking through those secluded streets of your dropsite, hand in hand. Shielding your face in his chest as he fucked you within an inch of your life. Waking up in his arms the morning after. 

When you had sex last night, it took everything in you not to say you loved him. Your heart broke itself with the effort. “Yes. I would draw blood for you.” 

That still wasn’t enough. Yuta knew you could be ruthless if pushed. He wanted to know where your love for him started and ended. And truth be told, he didn’t want it to end. He wanted it to overflow. “Would you die for me?” he pressed.

You exhaled, “In a heartbeat.”

That was the right answer. Yuta briefly forewent the knife and slackened his grip on your throat, unfastening his pants just enough to take out his stiffening cock. You gripped it in your hands and pumped him fully hard in no time at all. With a painfully hard cock, needy and aching for you, Yuta gently brushed your hands away and slowly coaxed himself inside. 

You gripped the bottom edge of the counter when he was finally rooted inside to the hilt. Yuta began to move and when he found a comfortable, hard pace, his hand leapt for his knife again, dragging it against your skin. 

Yuta had ample opportunity to hurt you, time after countless time. Yet he never had any more than you’d asked for. You could be staring death squarely in the eye and not an inch of you would paralyze with fear as long as Yuta was there to hold you tight.

You liked to pretend you were fearless, but Yuta made you feel like you really were. I can do anything as long as I have him. He’s my strength and my empire. The whole world doesn’t stand a chance against us. And we’ll burn it to ashes for trying. 

“I…,” Yuta started, his breath distant and faint. “Would die a million deaths for you.”

These kinds of confessions stopped startling you a long time ago. Yuta was intense and deep, and passionate. When he loved, he loved till the last minute. “I would bring you back every time,” you told him, shuddering. 

“What if you couldn’t?”

“Then I’ll follow you to hell close behind,” you whispered, clasping onto his forearms. You wanted to hold him until kingdom come, and you had every intention of doing so. 

Yuta was conflicted. The result of you tearing his heart in more than two pieces. Part of him wanted to resent you forever, to tell you to fuck off and stop toying with his imperfect feelings. Another was ready to stain the walls in blood, not yours, if it came to keeping you close. And the other accepted that you were the only woman in the world who could manipulate him, but chose not to. 

It wasn’t just the sex that made him weak, but it sure did help. You were tightening around him like a noose, taking his cock like a champ as you had done countless times in the past, and Yuta wanted to reward you for it in any way you wished. If you asked for the universe, he could pull a few strings. 

“You’re mine,” Yuta said possessively, teasing the knife down every available inch of your bare flesh. He was wholeheartedly obsessed with you and he would continue to be for as long as he breathed. “Tell me you’re mine.”

“You’re mine,” you taunted in between soft moans, attempting to hide the flutter of your heart. “And I’m yours.”

Yuta was burning alive with his own passion, scalding from the inside out. “Fuck,” he grunted, tossing the knife into the sink. “You drive me crazy, you know that?”

“I know,” you whispered. 

“You own me.”

“I know that too.”

“You wanna know what you don’t know?” Yuta asked through pants, but he wasn’t stopping. Not until you were both surely sated. “Not a second went by where I didn’t think of you. Of what you were doing and who you belonged to.”

Well, I know now, you thought to yourself, but the admission drove you mad. You couldn’t help but wonder what thoughts kept him up at night in your wake. Did he picture your face whenever he got hard? Did he pretend he was inside you when he fucked his fist until he came?

“I’ve always belonged to you,” you told him sincerely. You wanted to kiss him again, but you held back for now. 

Another groan sprung from the pit of his throat and he put a tightening grip on your throat. “Say it again.”

Your legs wrapped around him, wanting him more in spite of the lack of blood flow. Wanting him deeper. “I belong to you. And only you, Yuta,” you rasped. 

The way you said his name had him reeling. With how you reacted to every graze of his fingers, light or rough, Yuta knew there was a throbbing void in you being filled at last now that he was in your possession once more. It was the same dark and empty void in him. “I hate you,” he hissed, slapping his hips into you harder. “For making me love you when you never cared about me.”

You had been taken aback by his words, but eased a little with relief when he finished his statement. Only a little. “That’s a lie.”

“Admit it. Admit you never cared,” Yuta barked. His grip on your throat was harsher and he had another calloused hand winding your hair around his fingers.  

You couldn’t say that. It wasn’t true. “I was wrong,” you choked out instead, face tensing in a heavenly blend of pain and pleasure. “And I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Yuta.”

Yuta all but stilled when he heard you say those words. Finally a fucking apology. And now he was going to make you beg. Or better yet, he was going to see if you meant it. 

You gasped loudly when Yuta abruptly pulled out of you and hauled you off the counter into his burly arms, carrying you to the living room. You clung to him tightly the entire time, although you knew Yuta would never let you fall. He sat you on the couch, sitting beside you to your right, and pulled you onto him. “Prove it.”

Yuta watched you grip his cock and steer him to your entrance without hesitation. Like it was routine. You made a high-pitched noise when he penetrated you again and clawed at his chest and shoulders for purchase, prepared to give him every ounce of your strength and vigor. 

You watched his face contorting with ecstasy, not minding the way your nails dug into him. Yuta had always been the bigger pain freak. Your legs still ached with the passion of him and they would even more when you were finished with him, but you didn’t care. You rode him to hell and back. 

“Fuck. Holy fuck,” Yuta swore, watching you bounce on top of him with a vengeance. He should have known that when he told you to prove it, you would take that as a challenge. He cursed your name between expletives. “Slow down.”

You smiled contentedly, proud of yourself for ruining him to the bare bone. This was a man that prided himself on power and control, so snatching it from underneath him surely gave you an ego boost. “You wimping out on me, babe?”

Yuta mumbled something under his breath. More dirty words, certainly. He wanted to fight it, yet he couldn’t help but surrender. “No.”

“Then, take it,” you hissed, grabbing his jaw gently and stealing his lips in a hot kiss. Yuta’s fingers bruised your hips as your lips met with a reverberating wet sound.  

Yuta looked dizzy from lust and pleasure, and passion when you pulled away from his lips in favor of his neck, sucking and nipping at the raw empty flesh. His breath went faint as you left your mark. He was moaning like a bitch underneath you, overwhelmed by your mouth on his skin and his cock in your warmth. 

It was taking a toll on him, making him shake and bite his swollen, bleeding lip. “Stop. I’m gonna come, baby,” he said breathlessly. 

“Come inside me,” you told him softly, riding him even harder. You wanted to finish him. 

Yuta’s throat went dry at your words and he couldn’t stop the indescribably erotic noise that escaped him. He had fucked you raw more than once, but he had never been allowed to fuck you full of his cum. Now you were handing him the privilege on a silver platter and he was about to come on the spot like a virgin.

Your hips smacked down against him, brutal and quick. Yuta couldn’t help but thrust up into you, matching your movements with the intention of finishing you and himself. You were bruising and breaking beneath his rough hands, but it didn’t matter. He would seam you back together. 

It quickly became more than he could handle and Yuta came with a groan of your name plus an additional slew of curses, his body writhing from the hot sensations. His eyes went wide when you kept riding him at this rough and hard pace, chasing your own climax. 

You hummed, satisfied. That’s it, baby. You might not want to say it to my face, but your body has never lied. You are just as owned by me as I am by you. You are bound to me by a ball and chain. 

Not far behind him, you shuddered with orgasm from the constant pounding of his cock against your sweet spot driving you over the edge. Yuta could feel you throbbing and pulsing around him and it drew him another deep noise from him. You went slack, draping your arms over his shoulders, and felt his cum leak from your cunt. 

You weren’t in any hurry to move. Yuta was as close as humanly possible, every inch of himself buried inside your pussy, and you wanted to keep him there indefinitely. You tilted his jaw, watching his cute face. “Are you tired?” you asked softly. 

Yuta scoffed, as if he couldn’t believe you were asking him that. Though you knew he always had more to give you. “We just fucked for an hour.”

“What are you talking about? We spent most of the past hour arguing.”

“That was foreplay.”

You burst into laughter. That was a very Yuta-esque answer. “For you, maybe,” you murmured. 

Yuta arched his brow. “Oh, really now? Then please explain why you were so wet by the time I’d only kissed you. Riddle me that, beautiful.”

“There’s a simple explanation,” you said, in spite of knowing you had none. None too inclined to admit it to him, you opted to kiss him again instead, still holding onto his jaw the entire time. 

Yuta let you get away with it just this once, hands roaming your back underneath your shirt. It was still damp with sweat and the thought of licking away every last drop with his tongue made Yuta stifle a groan. Most likely for the best. The sound would have made you clamp around him if you heard it. 

And you would’ve fucked him all day long if you could, but duty called and though the state of your relationship with Yuta was mending, you still had other problems to solve. 

After a makeout session that lasted way longer than intended, you both begrudgingly retreated to your separate rooms. You had work to do, and Yuta needed time to think about what you meant to him. 

You were surprised to receive a call from the station a few hours later, recognizing the number though it was unsaved. Figuring it was probably about the names Yuta had given you, you answered the phone. “Hello?”

“I’ve got news,” came Ten’s voice. You knew from his grim tone that it was nothing good. 

You sighed. “The bad kind, I’m assuming.”

“We identified a body today on the side of the highway. It’s Kun.”

You were silent for a long moment. No words would come. You weren’t surprised he was dead, but the fact that you couldn’t deny it anymore stung. 

Ten knew you were hurting, but he continued, “He was mostly bones. He’s been dead for months. And before you ask how we know it’s him, he died in uniform. His badge says his name.”

“Any idea what the cause of death is?” you forced yourself to ask. 

“Forensics are running tests right now, but we’re pretty confident it was a gunshot wound,” Ten told you softly. “He had a single one to the head. He didn’t suffer.”

“How nice of them,” you replied, but your voice was armed with pained sarcasm. It didn’t make sense. Why kill a man and release his body three months after the fact? 

“I know that’s not what you wanted to hear, but I have something else to tell you,” Ten said, quiet as a mouse. 

You swallowed your darkness and listened. No matter what, it was paramount that you found the bastard who did this. And, if given the chance, ripped their head off. “Yes?”

Ten’s voice was soft, as if he was telling you a secret of some foul nature. “There was a witness description that matched one of the guys I saw you ran through the database last night. But he’s been locked up for a couple of days. There’s no way it’s him.”

You hummed in confusion. “That’s suspicious as hell. Who gave the witness description?”

“Some random truck driver,” Ten replied, obviously none too convinced. “We’ve tried interviewing him about it, but he insists that’s who he saw and that he’s not being bought or coerced in any way into giving false statements.”

You didn’t buy it. Not even for one second. It was literally impossible for someone who was currently in custody to have dropped off a body on the side of the highway. And if he had a solid alibi, there was clearly someplace else you needed to look. “He’s lying like hell. And he’s likely being intimidated. The question is, who has that kind of power?”

Ten took a wild guess. “A gang.”

You glanced in the direction of Yuta’s bedroom, as if you were trying to signal him through the wall. You had believed him when he said that the Reapers didn’t kill cops, but a situation like this required the influence akin to the kind a gang would have. “That’s true, but I think we can rule out the Reapers.”

“You have an informant?” You could hear the confusion in Ten’s voice. 

I have something much better, you said solely to yourself. “Something like that, yes. I think we’re looking in the wrong place. Or maybe there’s a part of the picture we’re missing.”

Ten hummed, clearly deep in thought. “What about the Brotherhood?”

“What about them?”

“I know these two gangs have conflicts about their drug territories and the like. Kun was investigating the Reapers’ involvement in a few drug deals gone south, but we know now that it was the Brotherhood’s mark.”

That was a valid point. The instance was one of many crimes Kun had been looking into, but it could have been his unlucky ticket to death. He had investigated crimes involving the Reapers and promptly went missing, which turned you to the same gang. Though as it turned out, it was the Brotherhood’s responsibility. 

What if this whole time, you had been looking into the wrong criminal empire?

“That… changes a lot of things,” you replied, connecting the dots in your head. 

“I have to go, but remember it’s just a hunch. Don’t get unmotivated. Keep looking,” Ten said encouragingly. “Someone will check in with you tomorrow as usual.”

“I’ll be looking forward to it,” you murmured. 

Before you could hang up, Ten called out your name one last time and added, “Be careful, okay?”

“I will,” you reassured him, not wanting him to worry too hard. You knew the loss of one prominent member of your team put additional stress upon the safety of the others. And with that, you bid each other goodbye. 

Yuta had a few errands to run the next day and as protocol decreed, you had to tag along with him. Nothing too dramatic. You imagined that with the gang’s current focus being on determining the next course of action to take against their rival, Yuta was more useful here rather than going from country to country eliminating threats.

His job was much like yours in that regard. Your former one, at least. You bounced from place to place, no one location being too safe, taking on new identities in foreign cities. In the middle of almost losing sense of who you were, all in exchange for recognition and praise, Yuta had been the one to sweep you off your feet and help you remember. 

That was why it hurt so much when he was gone. You lost him, and you lost yourself. He had reminded you how beautiful love was, how liberating it was to not think of the aftermath of missions. With every heartless criminal you locked away, another piece of your soul chipped away too. 

Yuta had made you realize that you weren’t broken. You were still whole and you still had a soul. And you knew, because you had bore it to him. 

You snapped out of your memories when you heard the car door click open and quickly close beside you. Yuta handed you a dark sheath, made of leather. “This is for you,” he said quietly. “If you still use them, that is.”

“I still use them,” you told him with a nod, unsuccessfully ignoring the way your chest flooded with warmth. He remembered. 

“Good,” Yuta said, fastening his seat belt around his waist. “And by the way, we’re not going home like I thought we were. I just got a call. We’re having an impromptu meeting.”

You stifled a groan, none too eager to sit around outside while the higher-ups had private discussions behind a glass door. But you said nothing as Yuta pulled out of the parking lot. 

Though as you followed him through the building to the designated door on the far end of the hallway, you complained, “I just don’t understand what you guys are talking about that you didn’t get done in the past two meetings this week.”

“This is important. And besides, I don’t make the rules, baby,” Yuta replied, totally amused but hiding it with a poker face. “He does.”

The man in question was already patiently sitting at the head of the table with a poker face that could kill if he tried hard enough. Lee Taeyong, you recognized. The leader. 

His second-in-command was right beside him and with Yuta being third, he didn’t hesitate to snag a seat directly across from Johnny. The only thing that surprised you was Yuta dragging you inside, seating you squarely beside him in a chair of your own. 

It wasn’t long until the room filled with enough high-ranks to make anyone nervous and after doing a mental headcount, you quickly realized all eight of them had come.

Taeyong seemed to be doing the same count and once he counted an adequate number of heads, excluding yours, he spoke up loudly. “Yuta, was it necessary to bring her?”

“Yes,” Yuta chirped without explanation. 

“Alright, then,” Taeyong said swiftly, commanding total attention with the tone of his voice alone. “Now that we’re all here, firstly I wanted to apologize for calling last minute. I realize you are all busy with your respective responsibilities. But in light of recent events, I want to extend our incognito another week.”

Haechan nodded in approval. He was the head of their prostitution business. “Good idea. The ladies are scared shitless. They don’t wanna work and I’ll raise hell if anything happens to them.”

“This is slowing down our income,” Doyoung chimed in, disgruntled. Likely thing for the guy in charge of money laundering to say. “We can’t make money if we’re all hiding. We need to fight fire with fire.”

“We've been trading hits back and forth. What more do you want?” Johnny asked. 

Doyoung shrugged. “We need to do something that will make them realize we’re not to be fucked with. Right now, they think they have the upper hand.”

Yuta shook his head. “No, they don’t. This all started because of drugs. It’s common knowledge that we own the market around here. If they weren’t intimidated, they wouldn’t have made any moves.”

“Then what do you suggest, Nakamoto?”

“I agree that we need to blow all their heads clean off,” Yuta replied like it was the most normal response ever. “But for the right reasons.”

Jaemin was the hacker and he didn’t exactly understand why he was here. Or why they were arguing. “I don’t really think it matters what the reason is. We need to stop them willingly or by force.”

Yangyang groaned. He was the one directly over the gang’s entire drug trafficking operation and you could imagine he was none too pleased. “Our drug operation is our most lucrative branch and they’re not touching that. We’re fine.”

Haechan insisted, “My ladies still need to work. And I’m not letting them until it’s safe for them to do so.”

Doyoung half-agreed, “The ladies need to work so we can make as much money as possible. This incognito is only hindering us.”

“My guys are dying,” Jaehyun announced. “If we lift the incognito, imagine how many more of us will be dead.”

Taeyong exhaled a sigh, rubbing his temple. You resisted a laugh. They were stressing each other out when every last one of their problems could be solved if the Brotherhood was removed from the picture. 

Noticing his boss’ exhaustion, Johnny changed the topic. “The incognito aside, we’re still not fine. I’ve been hearing that the police chief who was investigating us and disappeared before we could pay him off was found dead. Now it looks like we’ve got cop blood on our hands.”

Yuta deadpanned, “Exactly what we needed.”

You tried not to stiffen as Johnny mentioned your boss. Then you thought deeply about his words and reflected on the phone call you had with your co-worker last night, and your blood went cold. You mentally chastised yourself for not thinking of it before. 

Yuta raised his brow at you when he felt you attempting to subtly capture his attention. You mouthed, “Outside.”

You stood up abruptly and he excused himself, following behind you.

 When you were both on the opposite side of the door, you asked, “What exactly happens when you collectively sign off on decisions?”

Yuta was taken aback by your question, but gave an honest response. “The eight of us gather around, much like right now, and try to make a unanimous vote.”

“I’m assuming that doesn’t happen often?”

“No, it doesn’t,” Yuta replied, tempted to chuckle. “What’s this all about, baby?”

Now completely certain they had nothing to do with it, you took a deep breath, revealing, “I don’t know why it’s just now hitting me, but I think you’re being framed.”

Yuta didn’t seem surprised. “Are you sure?”

You slowly wound a hand through your hair. “I don’t know, but all the evidence points to this gang. Not just the fact that you were the last thing my boss investigated before he died. As it turns out, one of the cases he was looking into was the Brotherhood’s work. When he was found dead yesterday, we got a witness description identical to one of the guys you gave me.”

Yuta furrowed his brow. “You’ve lost me.”

“Yuta, that guy has been in jail for three days now.”

You watched the shock color his face in real time. “Who in the hell gave the witness description?”

“It was a truck driver,” you told him, remembering the conversation you had over the phone. “He was obviously lying and my co-worker and I think he’s either being paid or pressured. But we thought about who would have that kind of sway over someone.”

“A fucking gang,” Yuta finished for you, bristling with frustration. His hand was on his head, attempting to think this over. 

You felt guilty somehow. Like you should have known this was coming. 

The second Yuta turned to the door, prepared to come armed with news that would surely anger his co-workers to no end, you both heard gunshots echo out from downstairs. Instinctively, Yuta pulled you into his arms without a care, glancing around. “What the hell?”

You shuddered, words suddenly resounding in your memory, and chided yourself for being too stupid to not comprehend them until it was too late. Everybody knows the best time to strike is when they’re all together.

They were all together. 

“They’re coming,” you whispered.

“Do you have the knife I gave you?” Yuta asked, borderline frantic. You had never seen him so worried. 

You nodded wordlessly. 

“Thank god. We gotta go,” Yuta replied swiftly, not wasting a breath to get a hold of your arm and lead you down the hallway. You heard his co-workers barreling out the conference room from behind. 

You let Yuta steer you away, trusting him wholeheartedly. He knew this building better than you did, and better than his opponents did. That was his advantage. 

Moving door through door with you in his arms, Yuta clasped onto your body like the thought of letting you go would send a shiver down his spine, gentle enough to cause you no pain yet firm enough to keep you exactly where he wanted. You both remembered what happened the last time you were separated. 

The thought made you shudder. Second turning into minutes, minutes turning into hours as you’d waited for him to come back. For a goddamn phone call. Something. Anything that would indicate he was still alive. 

Like he could sense your prevailing thoughts, Yuta stopped you, glancing both ways like a child crossing the street, and whispered, “Listen to me, baby. I’m right here. Okay?”

“I know,” you replied, quiet as a mouse. Your natural instincts were flaring up and your whole body was tempted to paralyze with fear, but none for you. Only for him. 

“We’re going to make it out of here. I know we will.”

You believed him, but for safe measure, you grabbed his face in your palms and pressed your lips against his feverishly. Yuta kissed you back without restraint, his hold on your smaller frame tightening more with every passing moment. It felt like seconds until it was over and though you wanted more, you knew you had to settle. 

When he heard a noise emerging from a none too distant hall, Yuta reached for your hand and continued to drag you towards the closest exit he knew. You did your best to keep up with his hurried steps, almost tripping over your own legs every step of the way. 

Even more gunshots echoed against the walls, too close for comfort, and rather than potentially rush into something dangerous, Yuta caged you behind him as you hid on the opposite side of the closest available corner. You were able to cock your head just long enough to see a figure dressed in all black, their head cloaked in a beastlike mask. 

Brothers. 

There were masculine wails and screams everywhere. You recognized the sound of death and chaos when it touched your ears, and it made you cling to Yuta harder. The only thing you didn’t know was whether or not it was the blood of his gang members or his rivals staining the walls. 

“They’ve got this bitch surrounded,” Yuta murmured irritably under his breath.

That wasn’t reassuring at all. “Then what’s the plan? If we can’t leave, then what are we gonna do?”

You could see a flicker of something dark flicker in Yuta’s eyes, followed by something like resignation, and you knew what it meant instantly. “We have to fight.”

Fight didn’t startle you. Your hand immediately went for its weapon. Flight was officially off the table. 

This was a full-blown war. 

Yuta poked his head around the corner. When the coast was clear, he took you down another corridor, a touch darker than the others. You recognized the hallway and knew you were close to the rear side of the building. 

You didn’t see it. Not until it was too late. And by the time you heard it, there was already a brawny pair of arms wound viciously around Yuta’s neck, yanking him back with force. He dropped his weapon, reaching up behind him out of instinct, and endeavored to pry his attacker’s bloody, calloused hands off. 

“Yuta!” you called out. You didn’t hesitate to go after him, but another person snuck up behind you and put your wrists in a vice-like grip behind your back, dragging you off into another room as you desperately tried to writhe out their arms. 

The last thing you heard was Yuta shouting for you before the door slammed closed in your face. 

Your body tensed with the anger of a heartbroken woman at being separated once more from your lover, who you knew would move mountains to see you again - or die trying. And you would never, ever let that happen. 

In the split second of freedom you had while the faceless enemy locked the door, you snatched the blade Yuta had given you from its sheath and sprung into action, landing an unexpected attack in the back of his head. Over and over.

You were just about to drag the man’s fallen body out of the way enough that you could sidestep towards the door when you heard another one open from behind you. You jolted for your weapon, spinning on your heels. 

A person came out. This one had a face. And you recognized him. 

Jeno raised his hands in innocence. “It’s just me.”

“Get. The fuck. Back,” you hissed, holding your blade to announce that you were armed and very much dangerous. 

Realizing you didn’t trust him, Jeno switched on a dime. “You finally figured it out, huh? How clever of you.”

You knew Jeno wasn’t who you thought he was the second you finally pieced together the true meaning of his words. “Who are you?” you forced yourself to ask. 

Jeno shrugged, smirking to himself as if something was funny. “Isn’t it obvious? I’m a brother.”

“I know that, but where do you fall in their hierarchy? Who do you take orders from?”

Jeno scoffed, his evil little smirk widening in unwavering amusement. “Take orders?” he repeated, incredulous. “Babe, I’m the one who calls the shoots.”

You stilled for all but a second. You were staring into the eyes of a gang leader who was conniving enough to infiltrate the ranks of his rival. There was no way in hell he was easily backing down from a challenge. 

The glaringly obvious shock on your face made him laugh out loud. “That’s right. I’m the leader. You look surprised.” 

You sneered, “You son of a bitch.”

If not anything else, Jeno looked proud of himself. He was so damn smug. “Don’t play innocent, beautiful. You’re not exactly a saint either. I doubt Taeyong knows there’s a cop mingling in his affairs, and his trusted third-in-command is just allowing it to happen under his nose.”

How in the hell did he know you were undercover? You had to assume everything he knew about you right now was equally as dangerous and lethal as his potential. 

Your eyes narrowed. Your body was twitching with unadulterated anger and twitching to do something deadly. “Did you kill Kun?”

“Nah. Well, I wasn’t the one who pulled the trigger, I mean.”

That didn’t make it any better. He was the one calling the shots, after all. He said so himself. “But you consented to his abduction and murder. Why?”

Jeno played with the edge of a blade of his own. He sounded thoroughly bored as explained, “He was getting too close for comfort. Looking for the Reapers was inadvertently bringing him closer to us, and we couldn’t just give him a two for one combo. It was nothing personal, you know.”

You shook your head. Then you slammed on brakes. “How do you know about Yuta and I?”

His mocking tone wasn’t lost on you as he teased, “I think you’ve lost your touch, spy. My guys wanted to take you out, you know. They were certain you were a threat and you would figure us out.”

So he not only knew that you were affiliated with the police force, but the covert agency too. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Jeno snorted. “Surely you remember Yokohama. I’m realizing it’s very easy to pin things on other gangs. You swept in to investigate their activities and lover boy came along to figure out who was killing off his buyers.”

This was unforgivable. The entire time Jeno had this much dirt on you and your personal life and discreetly used you to expand his illegal crime syndicate at the expense of another, and another. And you had no idea. 

“You recycle all of the same shit,” you pointed out, seething inside out. 

“Maybe,” Jeno replied carelessly. “But you know what they say. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”

You shook your head. “So that day the three of us were together. It was all fake. You killed your own men?”

“They served their purpose,” Jeno said darkly, lifting his blade. “And you’ve served yours.” 

Your entire body stiffened with alarm when you heard someone attempt to push open the door closest to you. Stepping inside after kicking away the corpse of the man you’d fatally stabbed, Jaemin came in armed with a gun. And you were to assume it was fully loaded. 

This shocked you less than Jeno’s betrayal did, if you could even call it that. He wasn’t some guy you’d trusted. He was some guy you’d underestimated. “Of course you’re involved too,” you murmured, positioning the sharp blade in front of yourself. 

“Of course,” Jaemin repeated with a sly little laugh. “Who do you think cleans up his mess?”

Jeno didn’t bother to roll his eyes as you would usually expect from him, going with it. “And I’ve made a big one.”

You knew what that meant. They wanted to exterminate you like some troublesome little pest in their happy home. 

As if to confirm your suspicions, Jaemin smiled menacingly and crooned, “You have to go, sweetheart. You know too much now.”

Your heart was racing. Even you seemed to accept that you were overwhelmed and outnumbered. You knew that with one wrong move Jaemin wouldn’t hesitate to empty his chamber into your head, but for once, you had no idea how to get out of this. You just knew that you wouldn’t go down without a fight. 

Yuta entered your mind again and wouldn’t leave. You couldn’t hear his voice anymore, but you hadn’t heard any more gunshots either. Rather than resign yourself to defeat, you were going to assume he was still alive until proven otherwise. 

“Wait!” you shouted when you saw Jaemin cock his gun, obviously ready to paint the walls with your brains. “Where’s Yuta?”

Jaemin shrugged his shoulders. His smile was ominous. “Your little boy toy? No clue. He’s probably bleeding out somewhere, princess. I think he might be dead.”

“Not yet.” 

The three of your heads snapped in the same direction when you heard that familiar voice. Relief flooded your veins when you saw Yuta standing in the entrance of the door, having snuck up unheard. 

Before Jaemin could even get the opportunity to fire his weapon, Yuta raised and cocked his own, and a loud clap rang out in the air just before you watched Jaemin fly backwards from the impact of the piercing hole in his gut. 

And to your surprise, Yuta didn’t immediately kill him. He had his reasons. Rather than stick around to give a message, Yuta hurriedly reached for your arm and tugged you out the door. You could see in Jeno’s dark eyes when you took one final glance at him that he wanted to give chase, but saving a life was more important. 

You used all your strength and speed to keep up with Yuta’s steps, his fingers intertwined with yours as you paced wordlessly through the seemingly endless corridor. The two of you ran and ran until you had descended at least two more floors, wanting to ensure there was a safe gap between you and your enemies. 

Like hell Yuta was going to let you get shot a second time. 

“I’m so happy you’re okay,” Yuta said frantically when you were in the clear, running his hands over your cheeks. “Are you hurt? Did they touch you?”

You shook your head. “No, they didn’t lay a finger on me. Are you okay?”

“I’m fine as long as you are,” Yuta told you, relief washing over his face. You had lost each other once and neither of you were keen on suffering that hell ever again. 

“I’m fine,” you whispered, your heart speeding quicker than you knew it ever could. This was nothing like that first time you thought you lost him. Fear struck you tenfold. “I told you I would die for you.”

“If you ever risk your life for me, I’ll die right after you,” Yuta told you, more grave and serious than you’d ever seen him. “You’re not leaving me. Ever.”

And you didn’t leave him. As soon as two weeks later, you were in a hotel in Osaka after dark, tangled in silk sheets after a long night of making love to each other. Yuta made it abundantly clear that he wanted to make up for lost time, and you both mutually agreed there was no better way than doing all of the things you’d always wanted to do together. 

He wanted to whisk you away on romantic trips and show you to all his favorite places in his hometown, and you were slowly making your way down the lengthy list. You wanted an oasis away from the dark reality of the world, to lose yourself in a world that only consisted of you and the man you loved. 

You missed nights in Japan. The country never slept. Neither did your heart and your feelings for Yuta.

Ironically, he was fast asleep when you received a call from a familiar number. 

“I know I’m not supposed to contact you anymore,” Mark started without greeting. 

You snickered, wondering where this was going. You were still under the sheets right beside Yuta, knowing he would immediately stir if you even attempted to sneak out of the comfortable bed. “And yet you’re calling me anyways.”

“I have a good reason,” Mark replied reassuringly. “So you know how you got shot?”

“I think I may remember getting shot in the stomach, yes. I'm not too sure.”

Although you couldn’t see him, you imagined Mark was playfully rolling his eyes. “Yeah, well, that guy who shot you - Levi Clark - he disappeared from prison.”

You gawked, but tried to keep your voice to a murmur. “What?”

“Yeah. And he was found dead two hours later. Like, really dead. I saw the photos. It’s ugly.”

You glanced at the man sleeping beside you with extreme suspicion, but told Mark levelly, “Thanks for informing me.”

Mark sounded chipper. “No problem. And if you ever need anything, I’ve got you.”

You broke into a wide smile at those words. Though you knew it would only do everyone involved no good to continue contacting your former co-workers. “Take care of yourself, Mark,” you whispered softly. 

“You too,” were Mark’s last words before he hung up, letting you resume your new life. 

You placed your phone down and crossed your arms, knowing something was very off in this picture. “Yuta?” you called out. 

“Hm?”

So he wasn’t asleep. You crossed your arms tighter. You suspected as much. “I know what you did.”

Yuta’s voice was groggy. “Which thing did I do?”

“You know the one.”

A small sliver of a smile tugged at his lips. “You would die for me. I would kill for you. We’re even, dear.”

You wrapped your arms around him and pressed a few kisses to Yuta’s devilishly handsome face, not mad about it. His hands snaked around your waist and you sighed contentedly. “I guess we are.”

[meanbossart]

Oh boy, VaM is kind of a trial and error experience LOL I couldn't really show you how to use the interface and stuff without a whole video or something, but it's not THAT difficult to get a hang of if you just give yourself a day or two to play around, not to mention the number of tutorials you find out there. Luckily, if you only want to use it as a reference software that makes the process far easier (to this day I have no idea how to animate on that thing, since that's not what I use it for)

As for how I use it, it's pretty self explanatory - if there's a complicated pose I want to draw but I'm either having trouble with it, or just want to double-check angles/anatomy, I will use it as a resource! I use for most of my "proper" pieces (y'know, the nicer looking ones) and every once in a while for my silly comics if I'm having trouble with a pose.

Lets use this drawing for example (the character on top of DU drow belongs to @namespara )

I don't draw a lot of mud-wrestling (shocking, I know) but I had an idea of the kind of pose I wanted them to be in. So the very first thing I did was make a rough sketch of what I was envisioning:

I often do a rough sketch first, even If I know I'm going to be pulling the program up because A) It's less tedious than adjusting the models over and over again until I pick a pose and B) because sometimes I'll decide I don't need the reference, after all, and so that's 30 minutes I'll have spared myself of playing around on the software.

Now, this is a pretty complicated pose! It's in a weird angle and the bodies are making contact in ways I'm not used to depicting, so I did choose to whip out VaM for this one. I went into the program and after some messing around, I flopped my little dolls together like this:

Now something really cool about VaM is that you can completely customize your models, and if you have the patience, I would definitely encourage you to do so! Obviously, you don't have to make picture perfect replicas of every single character you have, but as you can see here I have made a DU drow "decoy" to help me better understand some of his features when I draw him: he has a strong brow, a short nose, a square jawline - these are all going to look a very specific way from certain angles, and I might not always be sure of how to draw it right! So it's useful to have models that bear SOME semblance to the character so you can better understand how different viewpoints will affect their bone structure and mass.

Also thank fucking god for the elf-ear slider. Figuring out how to draw those shits from certain angles was a huge pain in the ass when I started drawing DnD races.

So, with the reference in hand, I go over the sketch again:

Now you may notice that I don't stick to the reference 100%. There's three reasons for this:

posing on VaM is tedious as hell. You can get something incredibly natural looking and picture-perfect to reference from if you wish, but it's going to take you hours to do. So, for the most part I just slap guys together until the results are "close enough" and use that.

In my opinion, you should always aim to ENHANCE your reference material, not replicate it exactly!

While VaM is a PRETTY DANG GOOD source of anatomical reference, it isn't perfect, I often supplement it with further reference from real life resources or make tweaks based on my own knowledge where I catch it falling short (and, antithetical to what I just said, I sometimes fuck the anatomy up further on purpose if I think it looks better that way LOL it's all jazz baby).

Then lines, color, yada yada. I don't have a tutorial on that and I don't think I could make one, because my process is chaotic as hell, but I do at times use Virt-a-mate as loose reference for lighting too when coloring - waaaaayyyy less so however, because that process is even more tedious and I feel like I often get better results by just winging it. It is a feature of the program though, and I'm sure it would be helpful for someone who has a difficult time visualizing lights and shadows. I only started using this program a few months ago, so I happened to already have a pretty good understanding of that kind of thing and just don't personally feel like I get much out of that particular mechanic.

Here's a few other examples of pieces that I made reference for (WARNING: Suggestive)

Now, for the question many of you may want to ask:

"Can I trace this junk?"

And to that, I say: Buddy, you can do whatever the hell you want with the reference material you created.

However,

If your goal is to learn and improve your art, and to recreate realistic proportions and anatomy from memory, tracing won't help you.

Developing your own style, your muscle memory, and personal technique will all be hindered by choosing to trace instead of drawing from observation, so I would encourage against it. Hell - even when tracing is employed as a technique, it's usually by high-skill realism & concept artists who are looking to either cut some corners, save time, or just double-check their own proportions in order to improve further - if you try tracing as a beginner, you will most definitely find the result to still look stiff and "off".

So trust me, there is so much more to be gained from drawing from observation. Make note of tangents, compare proportions, use all the elements of the picture to dictate where and how things should go - it will be a far more rewarding experience.

Hopefully this has been helpful! VaM is a really cheap program (you get it on the guys' patreon for I think 8 dollars, just google it!) and it's definitely been worth my money as an artist since I found it. Learning to use it can be a little intimidating at first glance, but as I said above you only really need a day plus one or two tutorials to get a hang of the interface.

A fair warning though, IT IS A SOFTWARE MADE FOR VIRTUAL SEX/ADULT ANIMATION So when looking it up expect to see a some spicy content.

[the-gnomish-bastard]

Every species has a different way of engineering and craftsmanship. To show this, we’ll use a bike as an example.

A Gnome-made bike will be quick, efficient, and have several hidden features like inspector gadget. It will probably also have several bells, none of which make a bell-like sound.

A goblin bike will probably be made of wood, bones, and scrap. It’ll work, but not very well after the first few times. It probably has a compartment to keep cool rocks and bugs you find.

A Kobold bike is a stolen goblin’s bike, just lit on fire and somehow shittier.

An orc bike will be the most metal thing you have ever seen, figuratively and literally. The wheels are made of metal. Shit has spiked wheels. This thing will be passed down as an heirloom. Lot of spikes.

An elvish bike should not work. By no means is it structurally sound. It looks like it should collapse. They think the look is all that matters, and the only reason they get away with it is because they enchant the shit out of it. Likely made of glass and given a long and weird name.

A Dwarvish bike will have wheels of stone, a bell that somehow plays the sound of a giant war horn, and they put a molten engine in it. They made a motorcycle. It will be covered in the most intricate runes you will ever see.

A halfling bike is probably made from tied tree branches. Still works though.

Giff? It has a gun.

Mindflayer? You know that shit is covered in tentacles and it fucking teleports.

The gith don’t have bikes. They’re just riding dragons and killing the mindflayers.

Goliaths just use boulders for the wheels.

The fey are just being dicks. They don’t have bikes either, but they use the people they tricked as bikes.

Demons can’t make bikes. They just buy them.

Devils sell the bikes to the demons.

Celestials have replaced the wheels with wings.

The beholders are disintegrating everyone’s bikes because they’re angry that they don’t have legs.

The Tarrasque just really wants a tricycle.

[seat-safety-switch]

"Ribfest is back," shouts The Mayor, immediately before he descends into the turret of the tank and seals the door behind him. He is not wrong: Ribfest is indeed scheduled for this weekend, but the amount of cowardice shown in this one interaction makes me question his moral authority to preside over it.

This event is special in my town, but not for the reason that it used to be. Every year lately, folks get tooled-up on their homemade barbecue sauces and start to lay siege to the town around them. Nobody is really sure why this started so recently, but the active theory from the FEMA scientists is that AliExpress "has a lot of great shit for sale" and you'd be stupid not to experiment with putting some of it on some fall-off-the-bone braised pork.

Now, most folks would tell you that if you're going to end up fighting off your neighbour with an ice pick every year, simply don't go. This is a dismissive argument made in poor faith. And, worse than that, it's disrespectful to the meats, a concept that would make my dear mother faint in horror. The threat of imminent death that hangs over every moment of the proceedings simply adds a new dimension to the flavour.

Here's how I do it: I get in and I get out, fast. You don't want to be caught unaware while you're busy tucking into some "C"-tier stuff slopped out by the kindergarten teacher, Ms. Shotwell. No, the real strategist figures out from last year's ordeal who has the best barbecue in town. And this time, it's Barley Mowat, a young gun who used to be a television journalist before the Bad Times began. He got replaced by a machine sentience, has no job. Lives for the ribs, as do most of us now. Sometimes he starts to tell you a fact about how sewer pipes are made, or how many football fields long a structure is. It's best to just let him talk, even outside of the shrieking rage fest of a Ribfest-induced hallucination. We hang out at the bar, sometimes. He drinks a lot.

Barley's ribs are once again top-tier: he's got some kind of green chile sauce this year. Lends a real taste of the Southwest to every bite, which is tender and rich in equal measure. Plus, he clobbered a dude from the backpack store with a golf club when he tried to steal the up-armoured NASCAR that I used to drive to the event. Don't park in the designated spots, folks: like I said, get in and get out.

[towards-toramunda]

Thinking about more iconic lines from the show over the years instead of going to bed and created a list that is far too long:

- What’s my mother’s name?

- My best. Finally.

- I have so many flowers to bring to her.

- You were not born with venom in your veins. You learned it. You learned it.

- Don’t get on my ass about it! All I heard is that its pretty easy to do here thats all I took from what you said. (Bonus: its for the god of arts and crafts)

- At dawn, we plan.

- Doo doot doo doo doot doooo donuts!

- What matters more, the dream or the dreamer?

- Sleep well with your bad decisions.

- Nothing happens for a reason. It’s absolute fucking chaos.

- Patience is fine, but it can curdle into apathy.

- I’ve met the devil, thats not him.

- You never take copper. That's just kicking someone while they're down. You take silver if they're an asshole, and you take gold regardless.

- Time is one of my specialties.

- It’s entirely off-putting how disarmingly charming you are.

- How lucky I am to have had all of you. How lucky indeed.

- I smell like a crayon.

- I could tell by the bone structure and the contempt.

- I think I can punch ghosts now.

- Big moon, little moon.

- Pop, pop!

- I need chaos. I have faith in chaos.

- Molly said not to steal from happy people.

- I am going to tell you the story of how I murdered my mother and father.

- Smiley day to ya!

- I killed my family, I’ll throw you under a bridge.

- We’re on the moon bitch.

- She throws it. I shoot it. It explodes! NO STRUCTURAL DAMAGE! (FLUFFERNUTTER)

- I am all for faith, and I'm not going to pick a god. They can pick me. It'll be the first one that actually praises me and then maybe I'll fucking answer. I'll wait. They can fucking beg. And I will listen, which is more than they ever fucking did.

- I would like to RAGE!

- The worst thing that has happened to me has already happened.

- We're running; it's bad.

- You can reply to this message.

- Dagger, dagger, dagger.

- Opinions are like opera. Sure, you can listen to them, but why would you, really?

- There is no god that strides this world that I worship more than I worship your heart.

- I would like to live long enough to be someone else.

- Help, its again.

- Whoever it was, just put it back. I think they've earned it. Put it back.

- I’m fun scary.

- Sorry, babe. Gotta handle these ninjas.

- I’m the cleric? I’ve never traveled with a bunch of people I thought would die in front of me.

- He thinks I’m gonna go into the water for some fucking buttons.

- You are, at the moment, the luckiest person in Whitestone. Do you know why? Because you’re at the bottom of my list.

- You need me more than I need you.

- I protect him. He’s my boy. And I keep him safe.

- I made the earth remember him.

- Come correct or get corrected.

- Do not go far from me.

- Are you worth saving?

- How do I want to do this?

- Heaven to some, and hell to others.

- Fix him!

- Why do we tell stories?

- Do you spice?

- Listen you fucking jungle! I'm a paladin of the Wildmother. You're going to move or we're going to bust you wide open! We'll wreck this place. Don't make me fucking tell you twice!

- I am your god, long may I rein, eat of my fruits.

- Anybody can make lights. Anybody could send a message through a wire. I want to bend reality to my will.

- Would you like to talk before or after?

- What the fuck is up with that?

- To reach a hand down to somebody, they need to be beneath you! And I'm beneath nobody.

- The one eyed monster slayed my pussy.

- Time is a weird soup.

- I’m killing someone. Hold, please.

- Gold is a resource by which mortaldom climbs.

- Why are you so mean to me?

- Yours is the face I saw when murder entered my heart.

- This one time I saw a bug carrying a piece of bread that was like five times its size and he was carrying upstairs, like up and then he would turn, and then up, and then he would turn.

- I live as long as Whitestone lives.

- Vox Machina! Fuck shit up!

- I’m not disappointed, I’m just angry.

- Someone prayed for a miracle and there you were.

- We don't leave people behind. That's just the rule. You do not leave people the fuck behind.

- Call me child one more goddamned time!

- Finish it, Champion.

- I am of the Empire. But I am no friend to the Empire.

- I think it has been a long time since anyone has pointed out to you that you're a fool. Pain doesn't make people, it's love that makes people. The pain is inconsequential. It's love that saves them. And you would know that but you have none around you. You said so yourself, you surround yourself with lies and deceptions. And I wish for you, in the future, to find someone to mourn you when you are gone.

[ofmonstersandlovers]

👽Alien Boyfriend Headcanons👽

I was inspired while watching Ancient Aliens after so many years

TW: Might be suggestive??? Idk lol but watch out for that ig, reader is ambiguous

There's gonna be a huge language barrier at first.

Pretty alien boyfriend has an alphabet that's way different from any from Earth.

It's probably like dolphin clicks

But! He's a quick learner after being given cute little picture books.

Which flows into this trait - man's is curious, curious.

Wants to learn anything and everything.

And when it comes to you? Oh, he eats that knowledge up!

Memorized every detail about you down to the smallest detail.

How you like to sleep, what temperature of the house is the most comfortable for you, what signs you give that you're about to soon fall sick.

Everything.

Some might find that attention creepy but oddly endearing?

He remembers the dates of importance.

For some reason, the day he tried to cook for you and failed which led to you two cooking together is important to him.

Very sweet boyfriend 10/10.

Malewife.

Finds the vast differences between you fascinating!

From skin color, to bone structure, even your hair.

Which means he's always touchy, always tracing every inch of you.

😏

He always has a hand on you, usually hips our your stomach.

Sure, the stomach is a... choice, but it's his favorite spot! All your little organs being there making sounds when he lays his head there!

The way you jolt for a moment when he places kisses there!

It's his favorite spot!

When he can't touch said favorite spot oh he fucking riots.

By that I mean he pouts and makes offended clicks sounds.

Sulking as he makes grabby hands.

"Why?" He'll whine a lot.

When you finally let him, he jumps you. All the nuzzling as he wriggles into his favorite spot and absolutely melts.

Times he goes back to his home world, he brings back gifts!

Little things he'll think you'll like and trinkets that he decorates your home with.

Makes it quite a conversation when guests come over and see nothing but sci-fi shit.

Sweet, curious and very thoughtful, it comes out of left field that he's possessive.

Not in like a "your can't leave the house" way!

But he's sure to make everyone know that you're with him.

Arm around the shoulder, hands playing with your own as he nuzzles into you, sometimes even leaves nips on your neck as a display.

There have been times someone tried to approach you with none platonic intentions while he's next to you and he nearly pulled out the mousekatool.

Now he just curses at them in his language or stares them down with daggers for eyes.

Which does work since, like man's is big.

Like big.

Not like the trope of aliens being knee height little guys.

Overall, the alien boyfriend is an otherworldly experience.

Pun intended

[letteredlettered]

@popqorn asked me what I know about dinosaurs.

Scientists no longer debate that birds evolved from a dinosaur. Almost all of them agree on this; they just debate about which dinosaur. (Most scientists agree that birds only have one common ancestor, so it's not the case that different dinosaurs evolved into birds. It's just one.)

Almost all scientists agree that birds evolved from a therapod. They just debate about which therapod. Therapods stand on two feet, have shortened forearms, and are carnivorous. T. Rex, Deinonychus, and Velociraptor are all therapods. Scientists don't think any of those evolved into birds.

If you don't know Deinonychus--you probably do, actually. The "Velociraptors" in Jurassic Park are actually Deinonychus. Velociraptors were about the size of chickens.

Do not tell children that the Velociraptors in Jurassic Park are not Velociraptors. They will think you don't know your shit and lose all trust in you as a dino expert. And if you convince them they have been fooled for their entire tiny lives, you will break their hearts and their trust in the world. Some people do not think this is a dinosaur fact, but it is perhaps the most important one of all.

Archaeopteryx is important for two reasons: 1) it has sometimes been classified as a bird, sometimes a dinosaur. Now most scientists agree it is a dinosaur. 2) For a while, it was considered the ancestor of all birds, but now many scientists think that Archaeopteryx is only a cousin to the ancestor of birds (sort of like Lucy [the australopithecus afarensis, the fossil that was once the oldest, most complete, biped hominid] is considered the cousin to the "missing link" in human evolution)

A big reason that scientists think birds evolved from dinosaurs is that fossil evidence shows that many dinosaurs had feathers.

Feathers are very similar to scales, and fossil evidence shows scales that are more feather-like and feathers that are more scale-like. Dinosaurs had scales, but birds have them too! Bird legs/feet have scales.

Speaking of bird feet, therapods and birds have similar feet--three toes in front and one big toe in back for balance. If you've seen Jurassic Park, the big "Velociraptor" claw that Dr. Alan Grant draws across the young boy's chest at the very beginning of the movie is the back claw of a Deinonychus.

Birds have hollow bones. Some dinosaurs have hollow bones.

Some birds swallow rocks to help them digest. Fossil evidence suggests some therapods swallowed rocks. These fossils are aptly called gastroliths. Disappointingly, they just look like rocks.

For a long time, scientists had no idea what color dinosaurs were, but in the last decade or so, they have been able to find fossil evidence of pigment. Pigment (such as melanin) is a molecular structure, which is why this took scientists so long to find--you need a pretty powerful microscope to find this data. That said, even when they have found evidence of a certain pigment, it's not clear that they've found all the pigment for a given dinosaur, meaning they still don't know what color the whole dinosaur was. But the first pigment they found evidence for was a reddish brown.

Scientists also don't know what shape dinosaurs were. We know what the skeleton looks like, but some animals can look extremely different than the shape their skeleton suggests. A great example is a whale. A lot of the shape of whales is actually due to their blubber; looking at a whale skeleton, you would probably never guess what some whales look like.

Dinosaurs lived during the Mesozoic Era, which is comprised of three periods: Triassic, Jurassic, and Cretaceous.

There are a lot of different ideas about how and why the dinosaurs disappeared. A famous idea is the asteroid that hit Earth at the end of the Cretaceous Period. Evidence for this impact include a huge crater in the Yucatan Peninsula and a layer in the strata of the Earth. Almost anywhere you dig on Earth, you will come to a very thin layer that contains a bunch of iridium. Iridium, you may have learned from movies, is rare on Earth but common in meteorites. If a huge asteroid containing iridium were to hit Earth, the asteroid would vaporize on contact, and eventually the iridium would settle back onto the ground all around the globe. This layer in the Earth's soil is known as the K-T boundary, aka the Cretaceous-Paleogene boundary. The time of this boundary in the Earth's strata marks a huge extinction event.

That's about all I remember about dinosaurs.

[wazzappp]

WERE DOING SPECBIO STUFF AGAIN BABY. Feels fucking good to get back to my roots (i get to close 50 tabs worth of research now. Delightful)

Terminators are made of a Titanium Alloy (Im going with ferrotitanium which is a mix of iron and titanium. They never specify in the movie what the titanium is mixed with so fuck it we ball baby)) skeleton contains limited amounts of Mimetic Polyalloy (fake material used for the terminator in terminator two). Mimetic polyalloy can be hard or flexible and will be used to create new structures that the iron collected from food will later fully establish. This will allow his metal endoskeleton to mimic standard growth that a regular skeleton would have growing up.

When first introduced to the foster system (medical checkups are required once entering the foster system. The police probably do some checkups on Robbie also just to make sure hes okay when they find him), medical tests show that he has anemia, so it’s  recommended he be put on iron supplements. My reasoning is any iron in his blood is almost instantly sent to work on growing his endoskeleton. That means the actual amount of iron left in his blood is pretty low (the opposite of this is hemochromatosis which is when there's too much iron in your blood). I could see him probably trying to stop iron supplements but I think there would be some side effects to convince him to start taking them again. His joints might ache or I could see child terminator Robbie saying some mildly concerning shit like ‘my bones feel hungry’. I also think he might crave foods that are high in iron. Like beef/chicken liver, canned tuna, and seafood. Idk how frequently he could AFFORD these things but yk. The endoskeleton hungers eternal  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Nanobots are used to repair wiring for his nervous system, synthetic muscular system, acts as his immune system and sometimes accelerates healing for his organic systems (organic parts of his muscular system, skin, and nerves). For the most part his organic systems heal on their own at about the same pace as a normal human person. Nanomachines/nanoparticles are fueled by glucose (if Robbie needs work done by the nanobots he might need to eat or crave sugar both before and afterwards). 

He probably has a fairly (?) normal digestive system and circulatory system. The spread of his circulatory system is just more limited because some parts of him don't really need blood. . The primary job of the nanomachines when they aren't busy healing or growing his body is to harvest as much heme iron from the food/supplements he consumes as possible so that it can be repurposed later. His immune system is taken care of by the nanobots so all he has to worry about is red blood cell and plasma production. Similar to adults, most of this takes place in his spine, ribs, skull and breastbone. The red bone marrow is stored inside these metal parts and the red blood cells are then released into his bloodstream. Plasma is created in the liver and also in bone marrow so most of that stays the same

Another fun bit about the endoskeleton:

Bones close to his skin that are in danger of being exposed (knuckles, kneecaps, cheekbones) have a very thin enamel coating to preserve the illusion that they are bones. But underneath it’s all just the same Ferrotitanium.

onto the muscular system

Muscles are laced with a Shape Memory Alloy called Nitinol. A flexible (SURPRISINGLY durable godamn) metal material made of nickel and titanium that reacts to electrical and thermal impulses. It’s already used in the medical field (I can not fucking BELIVE that this is real thats so so so SO fucking cool). Superficial muscles are more organic (80% muscle 20% nitinol) but as the muscles go deeper they become more and more synthetic (20% muscle 40% nitinol 40% titanium wiring for durability). Superficial muscles are more muscle for stealth purposes. If injuries go deeper than anticipated he will still be able to fly mostly under the radar, assuming no wires have been significantly dislodged. If he’s been injured into the deeper layers then there’s no use in trying to lay low anymore. He’s clearly in a combat situation and stealth protocols no longer matter.

ALSO I did some math to try and figure out how heavy Robbie would be with all this metal in his system. Heres the logic for my equation:

CONTENT WARNING. MATH.

About 12 - 15% of your body mass is bone. A person weighing 155 lbs will have about 22lbs of bones. One Cubic centimeter of bones will weigh about 1.85 grams.

Ferrotitanium alloy is 4.5 grams per cubic centimeter. 

The equation 1.85/4.5 = 22/x in which x is his new bodyweight. Multiply 1.85 by 2.43 to get 4.5. Because the equation must be symmetrical you then multiply 22 by 2.43 to get 53.5 lbs.

With all of the extra metal in his system, I think it would be reasonable to assume that he LOOKS like he should be about 155 lbs but his actual weight is around 250 lbs. I have. NO idea how doctors are going to deal with this.

Had some VERY FUN hypotheticals from @moosemonstrous (thank you for proofreading my insanity once again <3) about his body shedding as much water as possible and like. shriveling his organs to drop as much weight as possible before doctors appointments. But given that he is a cyborg and not an android I do think that might kill him so Im thinking??? Maybe people just assume the scale is broken.... every single time he's in.

IDK man if they have access to his wack ass file then his breaking the conservation of mass is the least weird thing in there.

OKAY YAYYYYY NOW THAT I HAVE HIS INTERWORKINGS LAID OUT I CAN DO FUN CYBORG GORE!!!!! <33

[ladyshinga]

One of the biggest reasons I loathe "AI" things like its "art" and chat bots and shit? Because humans don't understand computers and y'all start thinking they're all-knowing GODS who can DO NO WRONG

Imagine a law bot is fed lots of past cases in order to determine punishments for a prisoner. I know we're not there yet, just bear with me for an example.

Thing is, all the past human judges were RACIST, and their punishments were disproportionate - white prisoners get lighter sentences, everyone else (especially black people) get worse.

An AI isn't gonna have morals or ethics. ALL IT CAN DO... because again, it's a COMPUTER PROGRAM and not an ACTUAL Artificial Intelligence... is read back over all the example cases it's been given to come up with something similar. It sees a very "white" name? It'll give out those same judgements because that's what it's sampling from.

Humans are programming this shit, and HUMANS have biases. Computers aren't smarter than us, they aren't wiser than us, they will make some one's bias so much worse BECAUSE other humans shrug and go "well a computer said it so it must be true" - it becomes much harder to argue a point when you're arguing against an algorithm and not a person with discernment and a real thought process.

Consider the TERF woman-only app called "giggle" that determined who was "allowed" on the app based on a selfie and an AI that could "read" some one's bone structure and "tell" if they were biologically female. Guess what! All the history of "bone structure" arguments for biological sex, racist science! Amazingly, it's WHITE cis women who had the easiest time getting on this app because the AI is ONLY basing it off of a CERTAIN subset of white women to determine WHAT femininity IS. And that's the whole history of male vs female "science", it's HEAVILY filled with white-focused traits that ultimately end up punishing, say, black women whose facial traits might not look like what the AI thinks is "feminine"

Stop trusting computer programs that were made by flawed humans. Stop thinking we're in this amazing future where this is real actual AI and we can trust these programs to be logical and non-biased. It's a fantasy

[heartfullofleeches]

yes please dear god smile reader is baby

[Very baby. Here's how Yan Scientist and their slime formally met]

"Subject 43? Payment for yesterday's efforts."

"An apple....but you said I could go home."

Feeding day - as if their headache couldn't get any worse. Like common livestock, their possessions squealed and whined about the most senseless things. Pleading for testing to cease; begging to be returned to their families when it was their love ones who sold them to begin with. The scientist would sooner snip out their tongues if it meant a moment of peace, but they were not a tyrant - plus verbal records of their subjects experiences was easier to stomach at night than written. The audio logs had lulled them to sleep better than any pill or liquid could.

"I said it was a possibility - if you did what I asked properly. You may have killed your cellmate, but you did not bring me their eyes. A shame really. I took the time out of my day to prepare your meal by hand. Ah - well, there's someone who will appreciate my efforts more. Tell me, tuna or ham?"

A wet gurgle sounds from the scientist's pocket."

"Both? You greedy devil. I suppose you do deserve something special for putting up with the same pains that I do."

The scientist picks up two sandwiches and smushes them together as the mass in their pocket becomes denser; gooey tendrils slithering up the length of their coat and crawling onto their shoulder as they lift their hand. The blob sucks up the sandwiches into its gelatinous body, wiggling with delight as they're broken down and absorbed into its structure. The scientist pats the gel with one finger causing it to vibrate more violently resulting in a breathy laugh from its owner.

"Alright, we have more subjects to feed. Come on, You - you too."

The scientist snaps their fingers at the Henchman wheeling the cart who closes the cell door as they both exit. The slime creeps down their shirt and through their sleeve as they walk, resting in the scientist's palm. A marvel their little companion was. They wished they had the honor of creating it, but it's origins were a mystery even to them. The scientist found the creature munching away on the undissolved bones of a past test subject. From numerous experiments, the scientist discovered their new lab partner could not only breakdown organic compounds, but most non living object too and had a choice on what it consumed. It made for the perfect little helper to get rid of all the dead bodies and those who oppose them. The best part about the slime was that it had no mouth and therefore the most tolerable member of the team.

The scientist's smile melts as they enter the next cell. The stress that had fled them by the usage of their slime as a stress toy skyrocketed seeing the act of utter betrayal pointed at them. A lackey, standing over a motionless subject - gun raised at their employer. The scientist sighs.

"Please remove your mask."

The Henchman does as told. Figures - there was only one other person the scientist trusted with the codes. They supposed trying to make this a family business was a poor decision.

"Emery - this has got to stop."

A chuckle. "Does it really?"

"You won, just let him go. I know you didn't have the best upbringing, but he still your -"

Emery grits their teeth, squirming the slime so hard it slithers out of their grip. "You don't know shit. If it makes you feel any better, I haven't actually done anything to him - yet. Just locked him down here, with all the others nobody would care to miss. There is no persuading me on this. If you have nothing else to say - do it."

Their Henchman reaches for his gun, Emery rests their hand over his. Through clouded view and reasoning, the figure steadies their gun. They look away, unable to look as they pull the trigger on the once innocent child they knew. Emery doesn't flinch as it fires - a teal web covering the entirety of their chest and dissolving the bullet as soon as it hits. Their attacker looks on in horror, but before they can do anything Emery takes their henchman's gun as their own and fires back, bullet piercing their heart. Emery's head falls, expressionless eyes gazing out at the person left alive - mouthing two words.

"Your fault."

Emery exhales, placing a hand over their chest and gathering the slime into one ball. "One thing after another. Now I have to fire a new head. Eat your meal and return to me when you're done."

They lower the slime to the ground who plops out on the smooth surface - spitting an apple out that rolls at the scientist feet. They pick it up as they walk off, wiping away tears.

-

A picture frame shatters.

"Why would you choose him and not me. Why!?"

The picture holds a smiling, bucktooth child in the arms of their butler as they show off their award for the camera and all to see. The person who taught them everything, the only one there when they had no one. Emery throws an empty bottle at the image, sinking down at the foot of their bed - cradling their arms to their chest.

"why....."

The sound of wet suction weaves into their cries as the slime wrigglies itself beneath the crack in their bedroom door. It inches towards them, shaking violently before spitting up as locket on the floor. Emery goes to grab it, but as they do the smile shoots up their arm and spreads out, and puffs up over their shoulder like a makeshift pillow. Emery cards their fingers their hair, climbing to their feet and pocketing the trinket.

"I guess I do need some rest. Thank you, You. You seem to be the only one I can't trust."

More gurgles.

"I guess I should give you an actual name eventually." They sight - broken body collapsible on their bed and crawling under their blankets with the help of their aid. The slime hops up on their pillow as they raise their head - solidifying as they rest. "Goodnight, You."

That night - Emery had the worse night's rest they ever had in their twenty-seven years of living.

"You are my sunshine. My only sunshine. You make me happy, when skies are gray~"

Is someone ... singing?

"You'll never know, dear. How much I love you-"

The voice sounds so familiar....no... There's more than one. It's hard to remember something so sweet - when all those voices ever did was beg you to stop.

"Please don't take - my sunshine away."

Emery shoots up like a lightning bolt. Their hands search the bed for their glasses which had fallen - finding a squishy, but very real feeling hand beneath their grasp. Emery locates their glasses as the body's see through eyelids peel back.

"Goodnight, You!"

Emery screams - rolling out of the bed in a tanglement of their blankets and obscenities. The interior in the bed sits up, puzzled; bubbles floating through their translucent body as their anxiety peaks.

"Emery.....this you?" The figure points, noting the odd number of fingers on its hand as it looks at theirs. "Mmm wrong...."

Emery's eyes widen as the slime's sixth finger merges into the fifth. "Y-you?...."

The slime chirps. "Emery!"

Emery looks strength in their knees. "What? How?..."

"Ahhh.... You - eat meal... gr...ow better at shape. Too much at one time - hard to understand. Able to single out things Emery say - Emery is... the only one I can trust."

Emery clutches their head. "Ngh..."

"Help?" The slime lunges foward, reverting to its natural state as it crashes into the floor and forming back into its humanoid shell as it catches them before they stumble. It was hard to notice with half of them hanging off the bed, but the slime was massive - size their size if they had to estimate. They bury their face into their hands. "This can't be happy.

The smlie's droppy smile falters. "Wrong? Wanted to make you happy. I..will go back if it makes you happy. Sad Emery...makes me sad too."

Emery looks up at the slime. They raise out their hand, stroking the slime's cold cheek. It hums with a full body shutter - leaning into their palm until their fingers poke through the membrane. Emery retracts their hand, sliding it into their now empty pocket.

"It's fine. I guess we really need to pick a name for you now."

"Mm I pick?"

"Do you have something in mind?"

"Y/n!"

"Where'd you pick up that one?"

The slime points to their head. "Memories. I... like it the most out of them."

"I see... Y/n, it's cute. Alright, Y/n - let's go get some breakfast."

The slime spits a small bag from its stomach contents onto its hand, giving the trail mix too them. That's much more alarming when it's coming out a real mouth and tongue.

"Breakfast!"

Emery takes it with two fingers, holding the dripping bag away from their face. "Thank you, Y/n......at least I have you by my side."

[beach-hermit]

(alot of) Elliott headcanons

Some are random, some are unnecessary detailed

-Has a hair and skin care routine (that's why he needs that long to leave his house in the morning)

-Has a drivers licence, but he doesn't like to drive (mainly because he doesn't own a car, since he is in Pelican Town)

-Wears glasses when he reads or writes (I imagine when his kid shows him something on the phone, that he has to first pull out his glasses)

-Twirls his hair when he is concentrating or nervous

-Combs his hair when he's bored, even if it's already perfectly combed

-Can't cook very well, but is always trying his best

-Can sing and likes to sing

-If Elliott didn't became a writer, he would be a musician

-Likes to dance

-Randomly uses other language(s)

-He is confident, especially when it comes to his looks. He likes his appearance, but doesn't brag about it

-Coffee addicted

-Elliott picked up drawing, because he thought it looked easy when he saw Leah doing it without problem

-Likes all the flowers, but the rose especially

-Is a foodie (ofc)

-Doesn't swear. He thinks it's unprofessional and will ruin his vocabulary

-When he's mad or irritated, he'll accidentally say fuck or shit, but will instantly, dramatic cover his mouth in shock

-He doesn't get angry easily, but gets fustrated alot

-Elliott would never resort to violence, if there isn't a reason too (only if he gets attacked or his partner gets attacked)

-Probably had a little drinking problem before he got married, but doesn't like to admit it

-He's lightweight (gets drunk easily)

-Always wears a hair tie on his wrist. Just in case

-Actually doesn't like getting his hands dirty

-He talkes alot and most of the time, people don't really understand him, but they just let him talk

-Elliott uses large words that the average Pelican townie hasn't heard before

-Loves telling bad jokes

-Has no idea how to use a computer

-Carries a small notebook with him, in case a idea pops up for his novel

-Stole from Pierre once because he didn't had enough money, Elliott felt extremely guilty but also didn't wanted to tell Pierre, so he didn't shop there for a few weeks

-He doesn't shave constantly, but when he does, he shave his whole body as soon as he can't see his skin anymore

-He only shaves his beard to make his face look more youthful and to show off his bone structure

-He's always warm

-Elliott sometimes walks around naked in his cabin, mostly in the morning or at night (also in the farmhouse)

-Will occasionally takes morning laps (single and married)

-Has tried smoking once and almost threw up

-If Elliott has a problem with a townie, he just won't speak with them, if the issues wasn't his fault. (He basically waits until they apologize)

-His voice gets higher when he's nervous or scared

-He snores, not extremely loud but you can hear him outside of the room

-Sweats easily

-Elliott is soft spoken, if he's mad tho, his voice ton gets "dark" and even a bit louder

-Elliott's a fast thinker, he always has the "right" thing to say and knows good comebacks

-Elliott knows alot of useless stuff about alot of things

-Remembers the names from people he just met

-Pays attention to small details (people or in books)

-Gets offended when someone uses foul language, in front of him or to him

-He has problems to fall asleep sometimes

-His handwriting is small and in cursive, that almost no one can read, everytime he writes something down for someone, he writes in block letters

-He is expressional, you can tell if he's sad, mad or happy

-Doesn't really celebrate his birthday, for him it means that he'll get older and that makes him depressed

-Elliott is strong

-But he got no combat knowledge

-Falls in love FAST

-Is good at guessing

-Gets spooked easily

-He collects useless stuff like: shells, rocks, leaves and blossoms

-Elliott is resentful, he'll never forgive you for divorcing or cheating, but he'll cry about it for a looooooong time

-Writes love letters and poems, that he wishes to someday he can share with his future spouse

marriage

-When it's a slow, lazy day on the farm, Elliott would just wear a tshirt and sweatpants, when he knows he won't go outside today

-Elliott only shows that side of comfort to his spouse. He'll never walk outside not wearing his signature formal wear, because he likes people to believe that he always dresses that good.

-Doesn't want to stay in a dirty place for too long, that's why he likes to clean the farm house

-Is always paranoid when his spouse comes home too late (even if it's only 5 minutes)

-Preferres gardening work over farming work

-Elliott jobs will be: planting plants, takes care of the greenhouse, laws the lawn, waters everything and remove weed

-Actually took his piano with in the farm house. (would be cool if the piano would be in his farm room or at least a furniture item that you get when marrying Elliot)

-When his spouse is home and tense, he'll give them a massage, draw them a bath or just be there for them

-Elliott will "force" his spouse to take a day off, to just relax and spend some time together

-Will agree on being a house husband

-Now that Elliott has access to a kitchen, he'll try some dish combinations

-Elliott only cooks when his spouse isn't home, so that they can't see the mess Elliott is going to make in the kitchen

-If his spouse is pregnant, he'll take over the farm and other activities for them, so that they have no stress

-Will speand his own money on giving gifts to his spouse or child(ren)

-His spouse may wake up with Elliott's hair on their face

-Elliott needed to get used to sleep in bed with someone, so in the early states, he would take over the whole bed on accident

-Usually calls his spouse: love, dear, honey, sweetheart, sweetie and darling. If the name allowds it, he also gives them a nickname

-If he finds his spouse passed out (and isn't hurt), he carries them all the way home

-If his spouse has long hair, he likes to play with it

-Secretly watches his spouse from afar if they work on the farm

-Puts his relationship experiences into his novel

-He keeps a picture of his spouse (and children) in his wallet

-Elliott always wears the mermaid pendant, it doesn't matter when or where

-Give's his spouse a good night kiss, if they fall asleep before him

-Man loves to cuddle

-Likes to rest his head on his spouse's chest

-When he's in the town, he wears the mermaid pendant and a wedding ring, to show off and let everyone know that he belongs to a wonderful person

NSFW version

[bravevulnerability]

3x22 au with castle and beckett in the pool together pleeease

Castle wades in the shallow end, the pool mostly empty save for a man swimming laps and a woman, whom he just watched dive into the deep end. Her gaze snags on him the second she comes up for air. 

She swims over to him with irritation in her eyes flaring like the sun overhead. 

“I told you to stay on the deck,” Beckett growls.

“Beckett, people have seen us here together,” he reasons, trying so very hard to stop his eyes from wandering past her face, down to the exposed skin of her chest, sun-kissed and decorated with rivulets of water that race to converge at the v of her swimsuit. “Don’t you think it might look suspicious if I sit by and sip piña coladas while you seduce Royce’s killer?”

She doesn’t buy his reasoning. Not at all.

“Okay, okay, I also wanted to swim in the pool. It’s a nice pool, Beckett-”

Kate curses under her breath and flicks her eyes over his shoulder, her gaze landing on something that has her straightening in the water. Russell Ganz, he’s certain, and she confirms it when her gaze snaps back to meet his.

“Okay, since you ruined my original plan, we’re going to have to improvise.”

“I’m game. So how-” He chokes on his question as Kate places her hands to his bare shoulders. Her fingers dig into his skin ever so lightly as she uses him for purchase to reel herself in close. Her body glides through the distance between them, drifting through the water until her arms are lacing snugly around his neck.

"Castle."

He can't breathe.

"Castle," she snaps, but her lips are curled in a tight smile. "You're making me look bad. Touch me back."

"Say less," he mutters, reaching for her thighs.

She gasps in surprise when he hefts her up, her legs instinctively curling around his waist.

"I said touch not - grab," she huffs, but her arms remain folded around his neck.

"I didn't grab," he murmurs, slipping his palms up her thighs, past her hips, and splaying them wide at her spine. Her lips purse. "I'm just playing the part of a very interested male companion."

Beckett smirks, leans forward to tilt her mouth towards his ear. "So your normal role?"

"Funny," he mutters, but he's trailing his fingers up the line of her vertebrae, savoring the hitch in her breath, the stutter of it in his ear. "But you're not wrong. Though, I'd call this a more hands-on approach."

"Castle, I am trying to get Ganz's attention, stop-"

"Distracting you?" he grins, one of his hands lifting to curve along her shoulder.

He loves the structure of her bones, the strength he can see carved into her shoulders. He traces the bone of her clavicle with care, hooks his thumb under the strap of her suit.

Her head turns, nose bumping into his cheek. "He's on his phone. Not looking yet. Stop."

"I'm just touching. You said to touch-"

"I'm going to hit you," she mutters, unfurling her arms to cup her hands at his nape, lean back in his grasp. And oh, her eyes are... dark. "When he looks this way, I'm going to shove you away and get out of the pool. He'll follow."

"How can you be so sure?" he asks, lowering the hand at her shoulder back to her outer thigh. Which is pressing snugly into his hip. Holy shit he can't believe he has Kate Beckett wrapped around him.

"Because I have a plan," she shrugs, her own eyes tripping down his face, over his mouth, down to his chest.

The elegant line of her throat ripples.

Her thumb is moving in a maddening circle just below his ear, her palm draped at his pulse point. She's so close, her lips just inches away from his, the heat of her body flush with his, ruining the reprieve of the water.

He's going to kiss her. Again.

"Beckett?"

Her eyes flutter and she shakes her head.

"I'm sorry."

"What-"

And then she dunks his head under the water.

-

He's dripping wet and waiting for her when she meets him behind the bushes. But before he can say a word, she's poking him.

"Ow!" he hisses, protecting his chest before she can stab him again while she whisper yells at him.

"He called me green, Castle! What the hell were you doing?"

"I saw his phone in the cabana after you tried to drown me," he scowls. "I thought it was worth the risk."

"You took his phone?"

"No, I took a picture of his recent calls list while you were busy flirting it up."

"What?" The smile spreads wide across her face. "Where is it?"

"Don't poke me," he warns as he digs for the phone in his pocket.

"Poke you? I wanna kiss you," she grins, taking the phone from his proffered hand.

He tightens his grip on the thick towel around his waist. His life can be so unfair.

"I'd like that," he risks. "Least you could do after you dunked me."

"Oh please," she sighs, glancing up at him with mischief in her eyes.

"Beckett, water went up my nose. Do you know how unpleasant-"

She lifts on her toes, lips at his cheek and dangerously close to his mouth.

She presses a kiss to his skin.

"Better?" she husks, and he curls his fingers at her hipbone, fisting the slinky, wet fabric of her wrap, her swimsuit, in his hand.

He exhales slowly. This new game they're playing, teasing the fire between them... he's not sure he can survive it.

"For now."

[orbitariums]

YALL always putting yn in some dark ass noncon traumatizing ahh situation where she's powerless and a fockin dummy and sometimes it actually is just sad with not even a taboo appeal to it. so i'm proposing brat!reader who is worse than patrick, art and tashi combined and FUCKS SHIT UP. like she's genuinely just a bad person. but you wanna be her friend even though you know she sucks. inspired of course by none other than brat by charli xcx.

tw: mention of drugs and addiction and the ramblings of a madman....

she's a rich black girl from the suburbs who actually grew up with tashi and they never liked each other, always had a bone to pick with one another for reasons they couldn't even explain. she ends up at stanford in the creative writing program because of course, she's a quiet poet with no bones to pick with this beautiful world. right? WRONG?

she's a massive cuntress with a borderline coke addiction and when she's not writing she's throwing huge parties in her off-campus apartment which is more like a penthouse. she's a certified 365 party girl with a penchant for getting people to do horrible, nasty things. her favorite quote is from the book sharp objects: "sometimes if you get people to do things to you, you're really doing it to them."

and so, even when she does fuck all three of them, and lets them feel like they've got one up on her and each other, it quickly becomes clear that this is not the case. if there was turmoil in their friendship bubble before, she's just turned it to a train wreck.

she's the definition of a brat: coming into class with her oversized louis v bag and sunglasses pushed up the bridge of her nose to hide that she's coming down from molly. turns to art, smiling sweetly and smacking her gum, asking him for notes. using that same paper to do a line with patrick that same night, at the same party tashi demanded him not to go to because he has a match the next day — he fucks up terribly the next day and you decide the only way to make him feel better is by pumping him full of more drugs and alc of course. you're comforting him and patting his back while he snorts a line, cooing that "it's okay" "you'll feel better" "you'll get 'em next time."

maybe she even turns him into a full-railed addict, and despite art and tashi's begging him to stay away from you he still comes back because the sex is too good and the coke is far too strong. and all the while, as much as they want to shut you out because you're ruining patrick's life, you're ruining their life, you have such a way with words that you're reeling them back in again and again. they become addicts too, not to a substance, but to you. the way you fuck their lives up so much that it actually gives their life some sort of structure, some semblance of meaning outside of tennis and classes.

she finds a way to worm her way into all of their lives, turning them against each other in ways they didn't even know possible. what a fucking brat!!!

[scribblewrites]

Random MHA headcanons that live in my brain

list of some stupid headcanons that just feel right

Characters: Bakugou, Kirishima, Kaminari, Uraraka

Bakugou

Texts with full proper sentence structure and punctuation. He focuses too much on his studies to not be a nerd when texting. I’m talking corporate email style texts.

He is an ugly sleeper. tossing, kicking, snores with his mouth open, you name it. he also looks like shit in the mornings but will deny it and tell everyone that he just rolls out of bed and is good to go.

Has hyperhydrosis and has only worn black/dark clothes since middle school to avoid people commenting on his sweating.

He is asexual. He doesn’t realize he is until his early twenties, he always thought he was just better than other teens for not being distracted by relationships and horny things.

Kirishima

Refuses to wear gloves when dying his hair. His hands and ears are constantly stained red from the messy application.

Wears a retainer at night to help stop teeth grinding or accidentally biting his tongue.

Dry scoops pre workout/creatine like a MENACE when in a rush. He says he’s fine doing it but has had multiple coughing fits after accidentally inhaling.

Kaminari

Struggles in math and English (dyslexia & dyscalculia) but thrives in science. He adores physical science especially, but since people expect him to not be a good student he stopped applying himself.

Has accidentally eaten a candle

Got his wisdom teeth removed in his second year, Sero proceeded to video him crying because his doctor “stole his bones” while recovering from laughing gas.

Knows and uses the most chronically online slang terms to confuse and upset Iida and Bakugou

Uraraka

Will float things around her room while multitasking. She often forgets when she does this and will walk into waterbottles and notebooks she left floating

She often doodles in class and started keeping small notebooks full of cute animal drawings. She’s not especially talented or anything but will always leave doodles for her teachers on tests.

Is a huge fan of mug cakes. She is the reason the dorms never have clean mugs but always offers to make them for her friends as a quick treat.

Loves anything with strawberries. Order at a small coffee shop? Strawberry matcha. Favorite treat at the bakery? Strawberry fruit sandwich. Her favorite snack when her family is tight on money is strawberries dipped in sugar.

Hope y’all liked these stupid hc’s lol. Let me know of y’all’s favorite random highly specific headcanons