#i welcome u to reblog this with other moments too

[carelessflower]

you have to be a whole other level of gay and religiously traumatized to recognize this location

[mooishbeam]

『♡』 Servant’s Secret 

♡ featuring: ayato kamisato x f!reader

♡ summary: the commissioner catches you during some alone time, and decides that punishment is in order. wc: 2.1k+

♡ cw/tw: afab, unprotected sex, breeding, edging, overstimulation, spanking, humiliation, slightly sadist?, cunnilingus, mild degradation, pet names (bunny)

notes: hello! I read a lot of smut but never write it and it's been years since I've written anything so I figured I'd give it a try! sorry if I'm a bit rusty. let me know if u like it <3 comments and reblogs are appreciated!

The commissioner was a busy man. When he occasionally visited the town, his honeyed words left a lasting pleasant impression on the public. However, Ayato would be gone many nights, returning haggard from cumbersome affairs. He flashes a gentle smile, reluctant to reveal the vitriol he harbored for these repetitive duties. He was a man to be feared, stopping at nothing to achieve his goals. Stern and prideful and clement. Only the most loyal companions could see him in this vulnerable state. Therefore, it came as a surprise to Ayato when he took a liking to you.

Maybe it was the way you accidentally beamed whenever he returned to you, awaiting his arrival like a loyal pet. “Welcome back, my lord.” You’d say in a monotone cadence. Though you were anything but when he wasn’t around. When you and Thoma had your weekly water fights in the kitchen during food prep he pretended not to notice. When your soft giggle echoed against the confines of his heart, he pretended not to notice.  

Simply because the thought of you smiling for everyone but him was frustrating.  

You were a lowly servant. You were careful not to disturb his tedious work. You felt he was much more important than you; a man this compassionate and protective over his people should be considered in the highest regard. Still, you couldn’t help but feel your cheeks glow hot whenever he called your name, saccharine vibrations that sent shivers down your spine. Sometimes his gloved hand would graze against your shoulder or neck, leading you to wonder how it would feel in other places. He never caught you dozing off—or so you thought—but daydreaming about his lips decorating your neck was a daily occurrence.  

Tonight, was a night like any other after finishing your tasks. As you wandered through the garden, the stars casted an orchestra across the welkin. You tell yourself repeatedly to repress the improper thoughts you had of him. But turning to the sky to cleanse your mind doesn’t always help, and so you return to your quarters for a more direct approach.  

Sliding your hands between your legs, the only thing you can think about is Ayato’s delicate fingers working their way inside you, kissing the shell of your ear with light praises. Usually, you were more careful to lock the door and control your voice, but your senses were clouded with the stimulation of chasing your high. “Ayato...” you whimpered into the bed sheets continuously. Just as you were about to cum, a familiar voice approached the door. “(Y/N)? In the morning I need you to- “. Cracking the door open, Ayato caught a glimpse of your flustered, trembling figure.  

It happened so fast you couldn’t register it. He immediately shut the door, followed by a quick “My apologies”. Your orgasm was immediately ruined, and you were mortified. You never prayed to an archon before now, but you called on all of them to save you in this moment.  

Your plan was to avoid him at all costs. The only thing you could hope for was that he didn’t catch the moaning. Your tasks for the next two days were done quickly and quietly, too stricken by horror to bear seeing his face. Ayato immediately caught on, but the thought of chasing you was slightly amusing to him.  

On the third day, your cleaning was just wrapping up.  

“Excellent job today, (Y/N).” His presence this close to your ear was shocking and you almost dropped the duster in your hand. “Thank you, my lord. I’ll be going now.”  

“Mm, no. I would like to speak with you privately.” He said, his lips slightly curling. You wanted anything but that right now.  

“Have I… have I done something wrong my lord?”  

“Have you?” He retorts, his eyes peering into yours. You felt all the air leave your chest. “I don’t think so, no.”  

“Okay, come then.” His tone was almost commanding more than playful, and you knew not to protest.  

In his quarters, you both sat quietly for some time. He leaned forward with his hands under his chin, staring at you from across the desk. You try your best to avert his gaze, but his eyes never leave you. The room feels so much smaller now, like a predator surrounding its prey.

“You’ve been avoiding me. Have I done something to offend you?”  

“No, my lord” you reassure him, “I was just feeling a bit ill.”  

“Ah, I see.” He lazily covered his mouth with one hand, attempting to stifle the sly smirk that creeped onto his face.  

“I can’t allow my subordinate to fall under the weather. May I check?” You allowed him to get closer. He removed one glove and grazed his hand against your face, then the back of your neck, then your ears. You were burning up just from the contact of his bare hand.  

“You feel hot. Looks like a bad fever.” You nod along, fueling the lie.  

“Do liars commonly come down with the flu?” 

“…What?”  

“You were shaking and sweating when I caught you a few days ago, perhaps that’s a symptom.” You immediately knew what he was talking about and went into panic mode looking for a proper explanation. Instead of padding for more lies, you drop to your knees and bow your head.  

“I’m so sorry, my lord. My actions were disrespectful and crude and this will never happen again.”  

A soft ‘tsk’ came from Ayato. “Why are you using ‘my lord’ when my first name was commonplace on your lips not too long ago?” Nothing could make your life worse right now. You couldn’t find any other words and bowed your head again.  

“I’m deeply sorry.”  

“…So, what should I do? I can’t just allow this to go unpunished.”  

“I’ll accept any punishment, my lord.”  

His eyes darkened at this statement.  

“Anything?”  

“Your lying is more indecent than everything else. What did you say again?”  

You were completely stripped naked and bent over his desk, your hands tied behind your back. It was an hour since you accepted your punishment, and you came three times already. A clit sucker is attached to your pussy, while Ayato sits back and curls his fingers into your dripping heat. Any rational thought you had sunk a while ago. “So- ’m so sorry my lord.” Your words teeter on babbling; mind foggy from his skillful digits. A sharp slap makes contact with your ass a few times, forcing your back to arch and send spikes of pleasure through your legs.  

“I’d appreciate it if my pet was more honest. But it’s okay, I have no problem reteaching obedience.”  

He sped up his fingers, matching the movement of your body writhing in pleasure. Your cum dripping down his gloved fingers made his cock twitch and grow in his tightening slacks. “Poor thing, your pussy is so puffy and sensitive. You’re not going to give up on me, right?” He detached the sucker from your clit and admired how swollen you were. The feeling of being empty made you whine, before he sent a stinging slap to your clit.  

“Ah. No, my l- “Before you could finish, Ayato shoved his fingers covered in your essence in your mouth. You sucked on his fingers, and he tugged your hair roughly, forcing you to look up at him. “You are not to call me ‘my lord’ anymore. Only Ayato. Do you understand?” You nod through half-lidded eyes.  

“Good girl.” He spread your backside to get a perfect view of the sticky mess coating your inner thighs and ass and licked a long stripe into you. The feeling of his wet muscle invaded your senses and turned your brain to mush. He ate you out like a starving man, grunting from the squelching noises that erupted from your core whenever he sucked on your folds. He stopped occasionally to catch his breath and went back in to lap up your juices.  

“Please Ayato, ‘M gonna cum.” He was greedy and unforgiving, feeling his smile soaked in your arousal whenever you pulled away because it was too much. The raw sensation made your knees buckle, but your legs subconsciously opened wider for him. You just wanted to be good for him. Then he suddenly stopped. 

“Are you sure you deserve it?” He cooed. You turn to meet his dark sadistic gaze. 

“Please.” Your words are broken and fall to a whisper, tears spilling from heightened sensitivity. His smile is soft sunlight despite the look in his eyes, and he takes your chin within the caress of his palm. “When you misbehave, these things happen. I don’t think you deserve it just yet.”  

Ayato cut the restraints binding your wrists and carries you bridal style to the plush bedding further in his chambers. He set you down like a delicate flower and began to strip. You try your best to cover yourself, but the numbness in your limbs protested. “Exposing yourself so shamefully in front of the commissioner, how errant.” He teases. Ayato finally springs his cock free, sticky with precum and desire. His veins meet the underside of his shaft and angry red tip, begging to be buried inside you. He steadies over you, placing a breathtaking kiss to trailing soft pecks and bites along your ear. It was stirring you up all over again, and you wrap your arms around his neck to deepen the kisses. “Wan’ you.” You mumble between breaths.  

“Do you? Beg for it.” You suddenly get shy, unable to find the words. “Tell me exactly what you want, my little bunny.” 

“I want... I want you to ruin me. I need it bad Ayato please.” For some reason, verbalizing what you wanted was much more embarrassing, and he felt your reluctance. “This shouldn’t be too hard for you, right? What did you think about when you touched yourself to me?” His directness makes you cower. “Did I face-fuck you to tears or was I more passionate. Tell me everything.” Your breath hitched. “I want your cock deep inside me and I want you to breed me. I don’t want you to hold back, do whatever you want to me please.” This answer seems to satisfy him. 

“Good girl.” 

Ayato positions you into a mating press and in one motion shoves himself balls deep in your sex. His breath is ragged, and the feeling of your walls sucking and clenching around him perfectly drove him over the edge. He begins driving himself in and out of you from base to tip, squelching and slapping from his balls against your ass echoed throughout the room. His veins dragging along your most sensitive spots combined with the tuft of hair that made contact with your clit after each thrust make you dizzy. You're drowning in his scent and your heart is drumming in your chest. “Do you know how long I’ve wanted this?” His words come out shaky. “My little bunny. You’re mine. Say it.” His thrusts get needier and rougher, and his whimpers turn to breathy whining. The coil tightening in your stomach threatened to snap at any minute, but you held on for permission. 

“I'm yours, Ayato. Please-”  

“Go ahead, cum for me bunny. Cum on my cock.” Stern, almost like a command, he speeds up and begins to rub circles on your abused clit. Your legs shake and you throw your head back along with your eyes. You came on him with a scream, violently clenching and pulsing around his girth. He doesn’t stop and fucks you through your high as he is approaching his. “Where do you want my cum?” Everything in you clung to him tightly, and so you begged for him to do it inside. 

“Fuck- you’re such a good slut. All for me.” He finally reaches his climax, stuffing you to the hilt and spurting into you. Thick, hot cum fills you from the inside as he whimpers throughout it, feeling his cock twitch at times. He stays there for a while, making sure you were properly full. Making sure he owned you. You were so exhausted you ended up dozing off with him still inside. 

You wake up to a sleeping Ayato, eyes lingering on the scratches littering his back. You were cleaned up, minus the dark bite marks dotted around your torso. The early morning sun reflected on him like an angel, and you wanted nothing more than to stay with him. Recollecting the hot daze on his face from the previous night, surely there wouldn’t be any harm in continuing this arrangement. 

[hoseoksluna]

THE BALL OF LIGHT, i. | myg, jjk

pairing: friend!jeongguk x fem!oc (ft. brother!yoongi)

genre: fluff

word count: 2.9k

summary: life of other people never mirrored yours and jeon jeongguk will never be yours, either.

pin: ball of light / taglist: join / discord: join / masterlist: run

cp: ao3 / wp

warnings: smoking, suggestive but not described thoughts of nudity, pessimism, orphancy / the members in this series are fictional.

note: everybody, welcome the new series. it is a multiple member-centered fanfic, so the names you see in the title don't necessarily mean the pairing is endgame or anything like that. who the main love interest is will be a surprise that the fic will slowly reveal. trust the process with the first chapter. it's short on purpose and i will reveal the information and quicken the plot along the way. let me know what you think. reblogs and esp comments are mandatory unfortunately in the hoseoksluna house:/ ...... sfjsldfjsldfj ENJOY. i love u guys! should i crosspost it on wattpad? (im scared of wattpad)

… Or was his destiny from the start To be just one moment  Near your heart? 

(Ivan Turgenev)

�� an epigraph from the book White Nights by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Your brother Yoongi was always the pair of hands that would tug your legs down whenever you would fly in your books for too long. He did it out of tender care and fatherly kindness, calling your name in order for you to come join him in the kitchen for a meal. To be some semblance of a family after the tragedy had sunk its teeth into your bloodline. And what you had never imagined was that one day, you’d have to leave him behind to step inside a dream of this very reality. 

Throughout the trajectory of your girlhood, you had lived inside the worlds of your books. Classical literature that carried more depth, more leniency, despite its hardships that the characters went through, than this world. The idea of love clung to you like a second skin, one you wouldn’t really receive from the two important roles in your life because you weren’t made out of love, but would find within flowery and difficult words of another time. Digging deep and understanding made you fall in love with it, seek it in school, in the streets and inside your own home, only to look and walk past those people still empty-handed. 

In spite of it all, your palms were, somehow, still heavy. As if they carried something invisible for worldly eyes. 

You would see it come to life whenever you would close yourself up in your room, with your folded legs, your short hair wild and with a book on your lap. Dostoyevsky taught you that love could be found upon a fateful coincidence and it marred you in a beautiful way that was pitifully disastrous. It forced your eyes to look for it everywhere, even through the reappearing pain of disappointment, and it especially forced you to look for it at home. 

The hope remained even after both of your parents went to the other side of this love, beyond this world. They passed away due to an unfair illness. And because they went at the same time, you often found yourself thinking if they loved each other in the realm of eternity, when they very seldom loved each other in this temporary realm. 

Your firm, ingrained dreaminess helped you cope with the sudden silence, the aftermath of your state of orphancy. You no longer had to reread a sentence in your book a thousand times, the once screeching voices beyond the door of your bedroom shunned out, dead, but still pulsing. The walls carried the ghosts of those parental fights and Yoongi… he, in his secret sensitivity to the paranormal, braided for you a bracelet of black thread. To keep you safe from those spirits, to help you heal. 

He didn’t have one of his own, and that fact faultlessly described the new role he clothed himself in within this abrupt change. He would stare at the walls with a cold gaze, threatening them with power if they ever made a sound. He sat more at the kitchen table now than he did at his music station in his room, spine hunched over a myriad of bills that would make him pull on his hair until a bald spot formed. On the left side of his head, just above his ear, where his amygdala bloomed with black flowers. 

You would come home from school, glide your eyes over his bare wrist pressed to his cheek,  and touch the tense muscles over his protruded shoulder blades. You saw, vividly, the way his new role tore him apart and you wanted to help him. Physically and emotionally. But Yoongi rejected your help, rejected the emotions you were so willing to smooth out and caress with the lines of your palm that knew love from the way you caressed the pages of your books. He would get up from the table, tell you to shower, and he would walk to the kitchen to prepare you a meal, a meatless one because meat was expensive. He would wash his hands in the sink, let the cold water hide the strands of hair he plucked out of stress. 

He would pretend that everything was fine when in reality, nothing was fine. 

Your parents didn’t leave you a dime, but they let you keep the house you and Yoongi grew up in. Left an unpaid mortgage in your hands instead of happy memories, instead of love. 

But Yoongi, he showed you love. He would show it to you by the way he would boil the water for you in the beginning of yours and his orphancy because he had no money to pay for the water bill and because all the money he had saved in his boyhood was used for funeral expenses. He would show it to you by the way your plate would have meat and his wouldn’t. And he showed it to you by the way he wouldn’t allow you to find a job and financially help him, but instead told you to focus on your degree. To focus on your dream. No matter how many times you pestered him that you could find a part-time job. 

No, your dreams require your full attention, he had said once, that Yoongi-coded frown shadowing his features. Go study. 

And so you bowed your head and silently left, retreating into your room while contemplating in your heart that Yoongi never knew what your dreams looked like. And neither did you. Not until they showed up right in front of you. 

It is a time perfumed by the upcoming winter, the November time of the present. Frost has been kissing each corner of glass one would stumble across in the city of Seoul, decorating it with its affection using its snowflakes. It’s what you’re looking at, perched with your shivering form on the bus stop with the only friend you ever had in your lifetime. 

Or a so-called friend. You don’t think you would use the term friendship with a guy like Jeongguk. 

He represented the unattainable aspect in the books you’ve read. The goal that hasn’t yet been reached. The agonized yearning that hangs by a thread around the character’s life. He embodied the aspect of pain itself—because if life had been a little kinder to you, he would be yours. 

Life, however, isn’t kind. 

Life is realistic.

You met the boy at a wrong time in his life. Passing by him on the stairway of your high school, you caught him in a tense, yet volatile situation of an emotional kind. Spring, still reminiscent of winter, had wrapped itself around your nineteen years of age, and you, dreaming a strange dream that you couldn’t wake up from, ran late for your class. You hadn’t spoken to him prior this fateful day, though you knew of his existence. He was just a background character that you didn’t pay any attention to until he blazed up with life and the sparks of sensitivity on that empty staircase. And you couldn’t take the other way; you couldn’t turn around and miss the class. You had to walk by him and his girlfriend at the time while they were in the middle of an argument that shook through the echo of the space. 

You walked by them, but the encounter changed your life. It changed your life because Jeongguk’s cheeks were tearstained, glistening in the uncanny white of the staircase. His eyes were fixed on yours, his eyelashes wet and long—prettily, so terribly prettily. You quietly apologized, running up the stairs as rapidly as you could, and his eyes did not leave yours until you were out of his view. And then you heard the shuffling of feet and where there was an absolute turmoil, silence replaced it. 

Jeongguk found you that very day. 

Alarm was eclipsed over those puffy eyes, his eyelashes no longer wet, but still long, so terribly pretty. You were on your way out, exiting the building, when he grabbed a hold of your backpack, stopping you from disappearing. And when you gazed back with absolute horror, your short bob swishing around you, Jeongguk smiled a soft half-smile, which thinned out that negative emotion—as if he did it on purpose, not wanting to scare you. 

What’s your name? he started with a question, his shoulders slouched and drooping, an evident tiredness misting him in a drowsy aura. His voice was strained, bubbling in his throat as if he either screamed his vocal cords raw or didn’t speak for a while, choosing silence. Both options turned your heart upside down, painfully. You felt a greater pity for him than you ever have for someone in your lifetime—and that was the beginning of all your firsts with him. 

When you said your name, Jeongguk averted his gaze and nodded his head. You expected him to ask you which year you were born, but he kept his eyes low as he uttered the words, which made your pity for him grow into a bare tree  with just one twig, a seemingly singular wing, within you. 

I don’t know how much you heard, but Ka-eun didn’t do anything wrong. It was a misunderstanding and I would appreciate it if you kept it to yourself. 

You had heard a female screaming, seething voice, but due to your sleepy state, you hadn’t made out what those words actually were. But remembering the tears dripping off of his lashes, you realized how hurtful those words thrown at his must had been. And while you thought about this all, Jeongguk took your hand, pried open your fingers and fished out of his pocket a small banana milk. 

Ka-eun, the it-girl of the high school. Jeongguk protected her reputation, in spite of the fact that she didn’t deserve it at all. 

That was the kind of person Jeongguk was. 

It wasn’t the only encounter you had with him. He would smile at you and greet you while passing you in the halls. Would put banana milks sometimes on your desk early in the morning. Would sit beside you at lunch when he wasn’t on speaking terms with her. And he would confide in you while knowing nothing about you. 

That’s the reason why you can’t call your intertwinement with Jeongguk a friendship. Certainly not, after the person he became when uni life spread its roots in yours and his and he chose the one opposite of yours. 

The faculty of medicine stood facing your faculty of philosophy and literature, and Jeongguk, wearing his green scrubs and his oversized hoodie, would meet you during lunch breaks, insisting that you spend it together because he didn’t know anyone else and he was too anxious to meet new people because of what Ka-eun put him through. 

But Jeongguk didn’t eat. Not so much like he used to. 

The trauma and the difficulty of his field forced him to turn to cigarettes. And him blowing out the smoke the other way so you don’t inhale it while eating your lunch made another twig, another wing begin to grow on your tree within your chest for him. 

You didn’t love him, but he was kind to you and he meant something to you. You never loved a man, besides Yoongi and Dostoyevsky. And Jungkook puffing out the smoke like that, he reflected Yoongi and his brotherly love for you in a way that made you dream. Dream about a romantic love that everyone else seems to have so easily, except for you. About that romantic love you read about in your favorite Dostoyevsky book White Nights. 

But perhaps the affinity you had for Jeongguk was some kind of love that the books haven’t written about, at least later on. A kind of non-romantic love that you, yourself, came up with. A love that meant nothing in this world, but everything to you. A love that blazed up like the tip of Jeongguk’s cigarette that he lit up for you at the beginning of autumn of this year, letting you try it out just because he felt like it. 

Another first that has become a habit. 

You didn’t have money of your own to spend it on packs of cigarettes, but Jeongguk did. And he’s never been the kind of person who was stingy. He would give himself if he could, and it completes him—the act of giving and the other person’s response of receiving. 

His eyes burst with light at this very moment, a few months later, just like they did the first time when he lit up a cigarette for you. Though this time, you don’t need his help. You feel their heat, in the middle of this frosty bus stop, as he watches you place the cigarette he pulled up from his pack for you, his own hanging from his lips, unlit. He always waits for you to light up your own first like the gentleman he is, but something about his gaze is different. You sense their intensity, their foreign, foreign intensity that you don’t think is meant for you. And when you take that first puff, you expect it to leave you—like you’ve learned that it always does—but for some reason it doesn’t. 

There’s depth to the eye contact once you reciprocate it. Murkiness descends upon the pair of you, the sun parting ways with the day in a much quicker way that you still haven’t gotten used to. And along with it, a light layer of snow begins to fall. 

Something is meaningful about it—like it should be written down. Jeongguk’s eyes of lingering seriousness, pensive. The snowflakes that settle upon his ebony hair. How silky they must be to the touch. Always so poofy and voluminous. 

Your hands itch to write and Jeongguk doesn’t ask for his pink lighter back. He merely keeps staring, and you start to think that maybe something is weighing his heart heavily. Something personal that he will soon pour out. Like he always does. 

You’re the listener, never the talker, but something inside you urges you, strangely, to make the first move. Get him talking, get him smoking, so he can go home, go to bed and awake with a fresh consciousness, ready to be filled with anatomy, sicknesses and all the other stuff he needs to cram. 

The hand that longs to write lifts, and it feels natural. It feels natural to flick your thumb on the lighter and call fire to life. It feels natural when Jeongguk purses his lips, lifting the cigarette in the process, and holds it up for you while his hands remain warm in the pockets of his oversized black jacket. It feels natural to watch him suck in, the cheeks that carry too many memories of his tears hollowing out. 

And for a second that is too brief, you let your soul imagine what it would be like… to have Jeongguk as your boyfriend. 

To have the full, ceaseless measure of his love. The one that is meant for the better people, but not for you. 

To have his hands touch your skin in a way that would convey what he feels for you— 

“Have you told your brother yet?” 

Too, too brief, that second. Internally, you take your imagination and sew it shut with a pink thread. Pastel pink, like his lighter. 

The question aches as if you pricked your heart with the needle. You haven’t told Yoongi that you smoke one cigarette a day with a boy after school. You haven’t even told your journal. All in fear that the only life you ever managed to experience out of the realm of your books would simply disperse, never to be found again. 

In fear that Yoongi would be mad and you’d add another layer of stress on top of his already high pile. In fear that he would yell at you like your father did over meaningless things. 

“No,” you respond, softly, dropping your gaze to the ashy tip of your cigarette, flicking it off. The prickling sensation deepens as the iciness of the weather grows. You shiver, sighing. The tree in you does as well. “I’ll never tell him. Never—”

“Never in a million years,” he finishes for you, and your mouth parts in the overwhelming realization that you were wrong. 

Jeongguk does know something about you. He remembers that this is a sentence that repeats in your vocabulary multiple times a day. And there’s such intimacy to it, him knowing this, him finishing the sentence for you, him being educated in the matter that bears your name. 

Or perhaps not. Perhaps you’re too starved of any male attention, love and touch. 

Your imagination in you fights against the seam. 

“What happens if he sees you?” Jeongguk asks, and you pause before replying. Take a puff of your cigarette, watch as a miniscule star of mischief begins to live within the macadamia chocolate of his eyes—as if the principle of him secretly corrupting you utterly enthralls him. You picture that’s what he smells like underneath all those clothes of his, your imagination poking a finger through the seam. And you let it—you let it grasp you because it’s stronger than you. 

Macadamia, musk, cedarwood. 

The kind of lustful smell that is dark to the sight, but innocent in its core. 

Behind him, the blue murkiness fully evens out, no hint of the sun’s coloring painting its corners with positivity. Pessimism abides, and you feel it burying itself into your literature-woven bones. 

You’ve been waiting twenty minutes for the bus, Jeongguk even longer for his. The roads are long and empty, darkening the longer you stand here. The snow forms a firm layer on the ground, and you already anticipate Yoongi’s anger-infused worry, crawling all over you. 

You turn to look at Jeongguk, your blood flow at full halt. 

“War happens, Jeongguk,” you say, swallowing thickly. “If Yoongi and I see each other outside of the walls of our house.”

𓂃 ౨ৎ LOVE-KISSED BABIES: @jjk7k , @tkslovechild , @euphoricmyth , @cinmmongirl , @ririkookiemonster , @perfectiondazesworld , @https-mei , @bangtansonyeondanue , @jungkoock , @cinmmongirl , @hoseokkie-caeks , @kam9404 , @fr0ggieth1nk , @parkinglot-nights

© 2024 hoseoksluna, all rights reserved

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[lucrativesoul]

Welcome Home

summary: you finally graduated college and are home free for the summer, planning to spend as much time as possible with your best friend. what you weren't planning for, however, was the incredible sight of her older brother, Leon, who had drastically changed after all those years. you had never thought you would fall for your best friend's brother.

pairing: leon kennedy (re2) x fem! reader

word count: 9.3k

warnings: smut, bathroom sex, public sex, fingering, dom(ish) leon

a/n: guys, thank you endlessly for 300+ followers, 250+ reblogs and all those likes! i'd like you all to take a moment to read this, apologies... i absolutely love writing. I've been writing for ten years! crazy. i do it for fun, and because i want to put out the content that i want to consume and i want to be that outlet for people who don't write but want to consume, that is just as fair! a while ago, while writing this, my laptop gave me a scare. i'm realizing now that its a 5 year old macbook, which, in apple timeline, means it might be on the way out at the blink of an eye. if you are feeling generous at all, i have created a ko-fi. it is absolutely not necessary, because i'm not doing this blog for money, but if you really love my work and want other ways to support me, it's there. i will never be upset at no donations, but i made it in hopes that i'm on this blog for a long time. so sorry for the rambling, i really hope you guys enjoy this one, and i will be back soon for a fifth fic. love u!

No matter how many young adult fiction books you read, how many love story tropes you think you have seen, there was just one that seemed so unreasonable, it was almost laughable. Because, after all, you spent way too much time with this person to ever even see him as attractive, it had never even crossed your mind. Come on, your best friend’s brother? The boy who was so ungracious, messy, impolite, and had a crude, childish sense of humor? It was just unrealistic.

Until… It was realistic.

For all your life, you looked at Leon Kennedy as the young, bumbling boy who tripped over his own two feet at any given opportunity, ready to make jokes at inappropriate times and constantly worked overtime to barge in when you and your best friend were hanging out. He was only two years older than you, but his personality read the same age, if not, younger. Boys will be boys…

You always knew that college would change a person, and you can’t deny that about yourself, but it was so hard to look at the people you were closest to and imagine that they, too, changed with college. Your best friend was still the same person you knew since middle school, and all those years that you knew Leon, he had never changed, until he left for college himself. You were confident in knowing that when he came back, he would be the same exact person, just… older.

You could not have been more wrong.

“These days could not go by any faster.” Your best friend whined to you over the phone, a daily routine between the two of you. “I need you home ASAP, Leon is driving me crazy. He’s being so loud.”

Yep, that sounded pretty in character for him. “I know, just five more days, and I’m home free, forever. I wish commencement wasn’t even happening at this rate, I’m wasting away here.”

You were finishing up your last days as a college senior at a school that was a thousand miles away from home. The scholarship opportunity was incredible, and you could not say no to this offer. Your best friend chose to stay local, which you inwardly criticized, but would never say to her. You knew her parents could have afforded to send her here, who needs that big of a house for a family of four anyway?!

Commencement was set to happen on Thursday, and it was currently Sunday. Your own parents had flown in to watch you walk the stage, and while you knew your best friend would have dropped everything to come as well, her school chose to hold theirs on the same exact day. Figures.

“I miss you guys. The summers I came home just weren't enough. I have to say, I’m so glad this internship bullshit is over. It feels like I haven’t ever even lived with you.”

You heard her groan on the other line. “I know! It’s so stupid. Why would a program even make it so you could only intern in the summer? Don't they know you are only in your twenties once?!”

You laughed at her remark, gazing off as you continued the conversation. Classes were over and exams were concluded, at least you had a healthy pile of books to go through to pass the time. You decided to worry about the logistics of taking them home at a later date.

There’s something so innocent about getting lost in the world of young adult romance. Some would say it makes their own lives dreary, coming to the conclusion that they could never live out these fantasies in the real world, but to you, it felt real anyways. It only made you happier. It puts some optimism in your life.

The comfy plane read you chose was about a high school girl, absolutely smitten over the five-years-older brother of her best friend. This type of thing, you thought, just seemed too… fairytale, to be real. In no world where you knew someone as a child could you grow up and think they were an object of fantasy. You tried picturing you and Leon in this situation. Never!

Admittedly, you haven’t seen Leon in like 4 years. The last time you saw him, it was right before you left for college, and your major requires summer internships which leave a very small window for home visits. You never crossed paths during those times. From what your friend tells you, he’s rarely home now, he must have migrated to a new group of friends in college and found other passions. Good for him, you thought, you wish you could say the same, but you needed the income from whatever job you landed from your internship.

He was never really a tiny boy in high school, he was of a pretty average build and rivaled some of the football players, but he was not an athletic kid. You can’t imagine him changing that much more, your best friend never talked about him like that, obviously, so, you only had to imagine after the last time you saw him.

From your own personal standpoint, it was just impossible to believe in this best friend’s brother trope. You shut the book and closed your eyes, willing the plane to start moving faster.

As soon as your plane touched down, you whipped your phone out to send a text: As soon as all this shit is put away, I’m coming straight over.

Predictably, less than three minutes later: YES!! All nighter, we’re 14 again. I have drinks in the fridge.

Willing yourself through all the pleasantries of coming home, promising other relatives you would be by in a few days when you are settled, you merely threw your suitcase down into your room before dashing out to your car, knowing the route to your best friend’s house even with your eyes closed. 

A tight, running start hug was the intro you both needed as a fresh start to the summer.

“Please tell me you are home for good now, they aren't making you do any more summer internships?”

You laughed as you followed her into the house. It felt like it’s been forever since you’ve been in this large house’s lived-in walls. “No, thank god. I’m officially done. Except for job hunting, but I’m putting that off for as long as I can get away with it.”

“Agreed.”

As you followed her up the steps to her room, snacks and drinks spilling over your arms, a loud cacophony rang out through the house, coming from the garage. “What the hell is that?” You stopped short, listening to it through the closed door.

“Wow, that’s how I really know it’s been forever since you’ve been here. I’m so used to it now. It’s a band that Leon is a part of. The ‘rents loaned out a car space in the garage.”

Wow, you thought, multiple things to dissect here. One: this has been going on for some time now, and you never knew. You didn’t blame your friend for not bringing it up, it wasn’t weird to not mention a new hobby of her brother’s. Two: Leon apparently knew how to play an instrument. You couldn’t recall anytime seeing him play anything, and he had never expressed an interest in singing, so that was difficult to digest. Three: their parents would give up a car space just for them to do this. They still had two car spaces left in there.

“God, it’s really been that long, huh? I’ll have to get him to spill all about this whenever he comes out.”

You heard a groan from in front of you on the stairs, and you hopped up to be beside her, headed to her bedroom. “If you can even catch him. He’s like a slippery snake. Plus, he’s so private, I don't know what happened to him. Anyway, you should come over tomorrow night and pregame with me and the girls, cause…” 

She droned on, and while you still had half of your brain paying attention to her, you couldn’t help but think about that sentence she just said. Leon’s different now? The slippery snake part didn’t make many waves, you weren’t surprised that a man in his mid twenties didn’t want to be bothered, but you didn’t expect a whole new personality to come out of him. What happened while he was gone? Or, what kind of epiphany did he have?

“Oh, my god, look at this, too. I totally forgot to send you this. I’m so mad you missed it!”

Your best friend shoved a phone in your face, and you took it, grateful for the mental topic switch. It was a group of four girls and five boys, your old friends, standing along a cliffside in bathing suits. You assumed this was the cliff jumping extravaganza you heard about over the phone a couple weeks ago. And, yes, you were also mad you missed it.

“This looked like so much fun, I haven't seen all of them in forever. Maybe we can convince everyone to do it again soon.” You looked up and smiled as your friend laughed. You looked back down to the photo. “Who is this?”

She leaned over you as you zoomed in on a man in the top right, his lower half covered by a girl bending forward for a photo, but you could tell he was incredibly toned. His hair was pushed back with water from the lake below, and a broad smile graced his features. You sensed familiarity, but you had never met this person before.

Your friend scoffs. “Girl, what? That’s Leon.”

“What?!” Has it really been that long since you’ve seen Leon in person? Now that you look at it again, yep, that’s definitely him, but why does he look so different? Thinking back, it wasn’t often you spent time with him around after he graduated high school and went to college. You saw him probably even less than you visited home during your college career, and honestly, it has probably been years since you’ve seen him at all. “He looks so… different.”

“Like I said, I don’t know what happened. Maybe he won’t recognize you either.” You handed her phone back to her. Maybe, you wondered, but you doubted it. Nothing about you changed at all. You woke up every day waiting for a magical overnight nose job and five month glute progress from the gym that you didn’t go to, but it never happened. 

The night carried on, the strange questions about Leon’s college whereabouts pushed to the back of your mind. It felt so good to be back home. The summer was only just getting started, and with the buzz running through your system, you couldn't feel anything except excitement.

“I’m out of water, fuckkk,” You moaned. Your friend giggled at you. 

“Go get some. And don’t fall.” If you were any more sober you would have glared at her for this, reminding you of the time you drunkenly took a tumble down her stairs, but right now, it was only a funny memory as you totally didn’t have an iron grip on the railing as you walked down.

The rest of the house was dark and quiet now. You remembered her saying her parents were somewhere else, so you hadn’t seen them at all tonight, and there was no longer heavy music coming from the garage. You instinctively turned your head that way, like it would magically start up again.

You stumbled over to the refrigerator, yanking it open and hearing all the bottles clink around on the door. It took you a second to collect your bearings, but after a few more seconds, water was located, and you let your eyes readjust to the darkness as you shut the door. A figure in the darkness made you yelp.

“Goddamnit, you scared me!” You placed a hand over your beating heart.

A deep laugh floated through the air at this, but you were still partially blinded. “Hey, you. I’m sorry, I thought you were my sister.”

Leon. 

You blinked hard a few times, willing the night vision to return, and a little bit of your drunkenness away. You took a hard look at the man in front of you, as good of a look as you could. You only saw a silhouette, a dark shirt, hair over his forehead, and he was taller than you, wider, stronger. This was not the Leon you remember from high school.

“Leon. It’s so nice to see you.” You tried your hardest to sound normal, but surely he already knew what the two of you were up to.

“Yeah, it’s been a while.” Slowly, your vision was returning, and his facial features were becoming prominent. Eyes. Mouth. Smile. “Congratulations on graduating, back home for good now?” 

“Yeah, yes. Thank god. Thank you.” You could now tell you were fumbling over your words, and suddenly wanting nothing more than to go back upstairs. “I’ll be here a lot more often now, so get used to me.” You walked around him back to the stairs, listening to that low chuckle that you got out of him. God, you really needed another drink.

The night and next day bore on with nothing too important left to remember about it, as long as you were in the confort of your home town again getting fucked up with nowhere to be, it was a great time as far as you were concerned. 

Though, despite continuing to drink that night and waking up a little unsteady the next morning, you couldn’t shake that brief encounter you had with Leon. You could barely see him in the dark, but you could already tell he looked different. His build was wider than the last time you saw it, he even looked a little taller. He had only ever been maybe an inch above you, but since he disappeared to college, it looked like he went up at least five. Or maybe you were shrinking. 

You were mad it was so dark and you were on the edge of tipsy and drunk to be able to clearly see him. You saw him in the photo of the outing at the cliffside, but you really didn't want to believe that was him. He was almost… sexy.

Which was crazy. You had never thought of Leon like that. Yes, there was some sort of novelty to having a crush on the only consistent older man in your life whom you weren’t related to, but whenever you came face to face with him, it was just normal. You felt nothing, he was just there. 

But this… this could change everything. Was he actually attractive now? God knows you weren’t the best at being normal around people who you thought were attractive, and that could make things infinitely awkward with being around your best friend so often. And your best friend, what would she even think? You can’t confide in her to tell her you might think her older brother is hot. This was all messed up. This is not how you wanted summer to start.

–

A few days had passed with no rift, and your momentary crisis left with no memory. You discovered, though, as much as you couldn’t wait for summer to roll around so you could be free of your duties, your days were much more boring than you had anticipated. With your past summer internships, you were always busy, and had one or two days a week to rest at most. But now, with the summer sun high in the sky and no requirements of you anymore, you were at a loss of anything to do other than sit by your best friend’s pool, baking in the heat.

“They’re having some start-of-summer party going on in one of the campus houses tonight, are we down?”

You didn’t move your head nor open your eyes as your friend spoke to you. “Yeah, sure. It will be more of a time than drinking with just us.”

She sighed. “You can say that again.”

You pushed yourself up off the chair. “I’ll be back, don’t drown.”

You listened to her sarcastic response as you went inside the house, needing a moment to cool down, and to refill your drink. As you slid the glass door shut, you were greeted with the sound of loud instruments, reminding you of the first night you came here once returning from school. Leon must have had his bandmates come over some time while the both of you were outside, as you don’t remember hearing this, or seeing anyone else. You ignored it, and stalked past the door, headed upstairs to the kitchen.

The music stopped, a door opened, and chatter became clearer without the barrier. You didn’t know who else Leon could have here, you didn’t know his friends, and you were suddenly too aware of the bikini you had on. Whatever, you soothed your anxiety, I look good.

“Oh, hey.” You turned around at the strange voice, not recognizing the person standing at the stairway, headed towards the kitchen. “Now it’s a party.”

“Dude, gross.” A more familiar voice followed quickly behind the quip, and Leon’s head became visible as he climbed the stairs. “Sorry.” He spoke now to you, visibly doing his best to keep eye contact with you. Now you could really feel your half-nakedness. 

“Doesn’t sound like you guys are making much progress out there.” You joked, turning your head back to where you were filling your water bottle. You heard Leon’s friend laugh, making a remark along the lines of blaming other people in the band, but you unintentionally tuned him out.

“We’re trying.” Leon was closer to you now, and when you turned, his friend had disappeared, probably into the bathroom. Leon was grabbing drinks from the fridge, and the two of you were separated by the kitchen island, sunlight illuminating both of you.

His hair was a shade darker than you remembered it being, still blonde, but almost brown. It came down to touch his ears, and the pieces of bangs on his forehead were clumped together with sweat. He had on a gray tank, the ones with the arm holes that go down to your ribcage. His arms, god, those arms–

“Doing anything fun out there?” He walked around the island, even closer to you now, getting cups from the cabinets. 

You shook your head. “Just trying to become a leather couch while I’m still young.” You fixed the top of your water bottle back on, but didn’t move from your spot, taking the chance to talk to Leon.

“That’s the spirit.” He placed the cups down on the counter and leaned on it, clearly standing around to talk to you, too. You noticed a bandage wrapped around his right hand as he crossed his arms.

“What happened there? Start scrapping with the wrong people?” 

He lifted it and looked at it, like he just realized it was there. He laughed softly. “This might sound gross, but it's just a callus that burst open the other day. Right when I was used to holding drumsticks all the time.”

You sighed a gentle laugh. “Doesn’t that hurt, still using it?”

He shook his head. “Nah, I just didn’t want to start touching shit and get it all gross again.” He set his hand back down. You took the silence to ask another question. 

“When did the drums start? That was never a thing as far as I can remember.” He looked down, slowly nodding his head, as if trying to piece together memories of what his life was like the last time he saw you.

He sighed. “I kind of picked it up during college. I thought it was a lot of fun. I knew a lot of guys at the time who were in a bunch of different bands, so they had access to all these instruments, and I tried a bunch, but the only one that stuck was drums. I guess it’s easy and I like it only because I still can’t read sheet music for the life of me.”

You smiled softly at his explanation. Looking at him in the daylight, now, you can see the old him in his features. He grew into his face, his cheekbones slightly more pronounced, and his dimpled chin fitting perfectly into his jawline. His eyes were soft, yet tired. Still the bright blue you remember them being.

“Are you any good?”

He smiled fully at this, looking back up to you. “Of course. I know it sounds like ass right now, but we’re trying out some new stuff. But, and maybe I’m just biased, I think we have some really solid potential.”

You shrugged, a grin still present on your face. “I’ll have to see it to believe it.”

Leon stood up now, grabbing the cups and the still tied together 6-pack. “I agree. We’re doing a local show next Wednesday night. I’m always inviting my sister, but she doesn’t like going alone, and the rest of your friends don’t like that bar.” You smiled at this. Sounds typical of your friends. “Maybe she will come if you will. And, uh, if you’re still with that guy, he can come, too.”

Your brow furrowed at this. “Guy?”

Leon shrugged. “Oh, well, she told me in passing that you were with some guy last summer. From around here.”

You paused to think about this, nearly forgetting your whole past trying to rake your brain for a memory. It then hit you. “Oh, shit, yeah, that was definitely just a summer thing. He was…” A douche, conceited, horrible at sex. “Not the best. I’m not seeing anybody. And definitely not while school was in. I was way too busy for that.” 

He nodded, standing up a little straighter. “Well, that’s good. And fuck that guy.” You giggled at his support. “I think you should come. I’d be happy to see you there.”

And, oddly, for the first time ever speaking with Leon, your stomach did a flip that only ever happened when you were talking to someone whom you liked. It caught you off guard, and your words caught on your throat.

You nodded quickly, using the opportunity to take a deep breath in. “Yeah, I’ll be there. I’ve got the time to, now.”

“Cool. I won’t disappoint, I promise.” With that, Leon bounded back across the room and down the stairs, opening and shutting the door to the garage. You sighed deeply. You didn’t like the feeling that was creeping up inside of you.

Putting your newfound conundrum aside for the night, you resolved to let loose and get back to enjoying the summer the way you had intended to. You were almost tempted to stick around and listen once his band got started with the music again as you were on your way outside, but decided against it, as your friend would surely be asking what took so long. 

Part of you wished Leon had gone to this little party tonight, considering he knew all of your mutual friends, but he was never the party type before this, and it seemed that college did not change that much either. It would make sense if he had a gig coming up, they must be preparing, but you didn’t picture him to be much of a perfectionist. Maybe that changed as well.

–

“Why are we going to this again?” Your friend asked as she followed you out of her house, locking the door behind her. She seemed awfully quick to keep up with you for complaining about doing something she doesn't want to.

“I don’t know, it gives us something to do. Leon asked me to come. Now you’re coming with me.”

“What? Why did Leon ask you to come? He doesn't ask me.” The two of you slid into her sleek black coupe. 

You shrugged as you fastened the belt. “I saw him the other day when I was here, I came in while we were out by the pool. We were just talking. And he said he does invite you, by the way, but you never go.”

She was the one to shrug this time. “Maybe he does. You think there will be hot men here?”

“We’re both hoping.” You half-assed the response, but you already knew the answer was yes. You could never tell her you think Leon is attractive now. You had been mulling it over the past few days, ever since you spoke to him, and you had no choice but to confirm it. He really, really grew into his body. You could even push the curiosity aside to wonder what it was about college that changed him like that, you were just thankful it happened.

Your local bar looked just as you remembered, dark and looming from the outside, people filing in and out simultaneously. It was much busier than you had ever seen it, but the show was most likely the reason for the sudden influx in customers.

The crowd was a thick mass, and you had trouble even spotting the stage when you walked in, but once you and your friend had found a nice little corner, vacant of bodies, and conveniently found a third mutual friend to stand by, the room seemed a little less stuffy.

You absentmindedly scanned the crowd, people hoarding in front of the stage, waiting to be the first to break open the mosh pit, presumably, people in the back drinking idly and chatting, almost like they don't even know a show is happening this night. You found yourself looking for Leon. He was in the building somewhere. You wished you could have told him you were there, but what good would that have done? He wouldn’t have come out to say hello, there were preparations to be had back there.

God, shut up already, you willed at yourself, annoyed at the mere fact that you couldn’t stop thinking of Leon.

Admittedly, you thought of that first scene more often than not recently. The muscle shirt, ribcage exposed, thick arms, sweet smile and bouncy cheeks with a strong jawline, the vision came to you during the day, at breakfast, while you were scrolling your phone, late at night, when the moon was your only company. 

You wondered what he would look like tonight. You were so anxious for him to step out on stage. Would he see you?

Your friend stumbled sideways into you, knocking you out of your monetary stupor. People were now starting to crowd in, hence the bump, and you were assuming the start of the set was about to happen.

On cue, the lights went darker, the roar of the crowd exploded, and people rushed on stage and took their places. Your eyes were instantly drawn to Leon, who, from what you could only see from the backlight so far, had on another muscle shirt. It made your legs feel like jelly.

The lights went on, and after a brief introduction from the front man who was holding a guitar, they started. Leon was right, they were pretty good when they weren’t rehearsing new material. You knew this wasn’t the type of music your best friend was into, but to your surprise, she was bopping away with your other mutual friend, both of them holding drinks. That’s probably why.

Turning back, you could see Leon clearly under the lights now, which were strobing in and out, flashing different colors and patterns. His hair was pushed back this time, exposing his forehead, and looking brand new. You liked the way it looked on him, it made him almost look older. Everytime a strong beam of light would shine down on him, you could see the glistening sweat on his skin, his face. He was so focused on hitting the beats, and succeeded everytime, and you were so enticed by it.

This was a side of Leon you never thought you would see. It was so clear, standing in the crowd watching, how much he belonged up there. He looked so confident, every move was made with ease, no hesitation, and you could feel yourself melting.

It was like a headrush, you didn’t think you would enjoy it this much, but clearly, every moment took your breath away. Yes, you were looking at Leon the whole time, but who could really tell?

Soon enough, the show ended, and the crowd was applauding for what felt like ten minutes as the individual members left the stage, thanked everyone, hopped down to talk to others. You were interrupted with your people-watching when your friend grabbed you by the elbow to let you know she was headed back to the bar for more drinks, and you absentmindedly nodded while you turned back.

You caught the back of Leon, dipping behind the stage into the back of the bar. The tips of your fingers tingled with… something, some emotion you couldn’t read… and you let your body take over as you weaved through the crowd, headed to the back.

People bumped you and yelled in your ears as you squeezed in between them, paying them no mind, on a mission of your own.

After a few seconds, you reached a hallway, a few people lingering by the bathrooms, and you spotted someone, you recognized him as the frontman, dipping behind another doorway, chattering loudly to people behind the wall. Times like this, you wished you had decided to down some liquid courage.

You stalked slowly over to the doorway, seeing flashes of shadow as people walked by, unsure if you should hang out or go in. Most likely, you weren’t welcome, it was probably for performers only, but you couldn’t help it, you continued inching closer, drawn in by an unseen force.

As you took another step inward, a figure rushed out and crashed right into you. 

“Oh shit, I’m sorry, bathrooms are that way if you’re looking for them, this is restricted access.” You looked up at the man you walked into, you didn’t know who it was. 

“Oh, um…” You backed up a step, and though he was making moves to walk around you, he was waiting for a response. “I was actually waiting for Leon… the drummer.” You added in the title, just in case this was a man who worked at the bar with no affiliation to the band. But, to your relief, he nodded.

“I’ll get him, just chill over there, ‘kay?”

You dumbly nodded and backed up again. The hallway was lit with fluorescents, the bright white kind, but it was still dark, with the walls and floors looking slick with condensation. You opted not to lean up against them.

“Hey, you’re still here?” A voice snapped your head back over to your left, and you saw Leon walking towards you. “You didn’t leave with the rest of them?” He must have seen your other friend there as well.

You shook your head. “They’re still here, I think. Just getting drinks.” He nodded. “I told you I would come.” You held your arms out in a here I am gesture. He laughed.

“I’m so glad. I didn’t see you while I was up there, but… I do tend to just tune everything else out when I play.”

“You did great. You were really good.” You spoke, almost breathless for no apparent reason. 

He smiled softly, his eyes holding contact with yours. “Thank you.” His hair was now starting to fall back into place on his forehead, his face was still red with exerted energy. Your eyes wandered, without your permission, his arms were shining under the hallway lights, still sweaty. You looked away, but he saw. “You look great tonight.” His voice was low, and a twist went straight down your abdomen.

You smiled back. You briefly looked down at your outfit, simply a short skirt and loose band tee. “Thank you. It’s nothing.” 

“I like it.” He looked back into your eyes, and you found yourself lost for words. He broke eye contact for a second, turned around and looked into the back room where, presumably, the rest of his bandmates were. He turned back to you. “You know,” He looked down, and took a step forward towards you, slowly, as if to test the waters. You stayed put. “It’s been so long since I saw you last. I almost didn’t recognize you the first night you were at the house.” You grinned at the memory. You were also equally stunned to not know Leon had changed so much. “Not that you weren’t before but… You’re beautiful, now.” 

Your stomach sank at his words, and with his new proximity to you, it caused you to have to look up at him. You felt a strong shiver course up your body.

“I really… I didn’t recognize you. You look so different, too.” You whispered, knowing he was close enough to hear you. “I didn’t even think it was you at first.”

He simply stared at you for a few more moments, taking in your words, and the way you looked in front of him right now. You were suddenly self conscious, but his gaze seemed to tell you that he liked whatever he saw.

“I… don’t want to back you into any corners here…” He looked down, still not meeting your eyes. “But you’re giving me a… vibe. And I’d rather fuck around and find out than never know if I don’t try.”

You stood up straighter, coming closer to meet his face, his eyes finally touching back onto yours. “What kind of vibe?” You had to say something, anything, because you could barely comprehend this situation right now. Leon was catching a vibe from you? Could he tell that you were looking at his body? Could he tell that you thought he became very sexy?

He tilted his head a little further, and his brow bone cast a shadow over his eyes, darkening them. Another shiver down your body. He shrugged. “I think I just… think you are incredibly attractive, now.” His eyes darted down your body for a quick second before resuming their previous place. “And I want to know if you want to just try it out. Just once.”

You took a quick, silent breath in. He must have been picking up your messages, even though you said nothing and only spoke to him once. Was that one conversation that powerful? Was it the hint you dropped about not being with that guy anymore? Was this something he just knew he was going to attempt as soon as he saw you? You didn’t know, and you really didn’t have the time to think it over.

You reached up and placed a hand on his chest, slowly taking the shirt on his body in your hands, pulling him closer, but with no force. His eyes darted up behind you, and he turned his head quickly one more time. He saved you the trouble, and dipped his head down and kissed you hard.

You sighed instantly, fully gripping his shirt and dragging him in closer to you, pushing your body against his as you could feel him move towards you at the same time. You were exploding, you didn’t know what to do with the rest of your body, and could only bring your other hand up to his bicep, where he then palmed your waist. He pulled back after a few seconds.

“Follow me,” His face was flushed, and when he turned around, you were very quick to follow. He maneuvered the two of you through the back room, where people still were congregating, but none of them paid much attention to the two of you. You passed by his other bandmates, and when he turned the corner, he pushed open a door, and ushered you inside. It was a bathroom. “This is the best I can do right now.”

Instead of replying, you simply grabbed his face in both hands and pulled him in. The room was dark, you could tell from under your eyelids as you felt the heat of his face on yours again, and you were at least happy for that, you weren’t too sure you wanted to see the state of the bar’s bathroom at this moment.

His hands found solace again on your waist, thumbs rubbing circles, and fingers teasing along the waistband of your skirt. Leon pressed himself further into you, sandwiching you in between him and the wall, and the stark difference in temperature between the two caused another series of shivers to run up your body.

Leon’s mouth left your lips, now wet and slick with his saliva and yours, and traced them down the length of your jaw, along your neck, nipping at the tender skin, making you sigh and arch your back, increasing the contact of your bodies. Your hands dragged along his sturdy shoulders, reaching around and locking your arms behind his neck, holding him in as he worked your neck, and as his hands started to move. You kept breathily gasping as he bit underneath your jawline, fingertips caressing your jutting hip bone, dipping lower, causing ripples to erupt in your core.

He had positioned his hands now to take purchase on the hem of your skirt, full intentions of pulling it up, when he released his lips from your neck and his face was back in front of yours. 

“Sorry that this is all we have.” His voice was low, and you almost didn't hear it over the static of the bar music softly coming in through the speakers. “We can wait if you want.”

His hand was still positioned on your clothing, and you didn’t let go of him even a little bit. You could only look up, your head already touching the wall behind you. “Where’s the thrill in that?”

Under his shadow, you saw his lips quirk up slightly, he breathed a laugh, and dove back in to kiss you. You threaded your fingers through his hair, slightly tugging, hearing him groan at the sensation. The hand that was ready to hike your skirt up did just that, and his other was gripping your thigh, lifting it higher so he could slide himself right in between. 

He made himself comfortable pressed against you, and you could feel his erection growing through his jeans, giving himself some sort of friction, and you pushed back, earning another groan through your still connected lips. You dropped one of your hands from his hair and traced down his bicep, and into the large hole of his shirt, relishing in every ridge that his ribcage and abdomen had to offer. His skin was so smooth, you knew you would never be able to get enough.

He backed away from the kiss briefly for another moment. “If I never saw you that day you came inside, half naked… in my house looking like that…” He continued to grind himself into you as he spoke, earning noises from the both of you. “Who knows how long I would have to wait?” The hand on your thigh crept upward, leaving a wake of shivers in its path. His palm was flush to your bare skin, reaching the joint of your thigh and hip, and he squeezed the flesh of your hip, digging his thumb into the sweet spot, making you squirm. You clawed at his back, you didn’t even care if it hurt him. You were sure it didn’t.

Leon hovered his mouth over yours, not connecting, but enticing you, and you could only look up at him through a foggy gaze. His hair had now fallen back over his forehead, streaked with sweat, but you hardly minded the way it was touching yours, you wanted him closer. It was impossible how, through the shadow he cast from the light behind him, you could see his blue eyes so clearly, pupils blown, the way he was looking at you made you want to drop dead.

You couldn’t wait any longer, you didn’t even have words to say back to him, you just needed to show him what you thought, how you felt, you just needed him. Your hands came around the front of his body again, not losing contact the entire way, and grasped desperately at his belt, needing to pull out his girth, needing to have his cock in your hands, mouth, in you.

You gasped, trying to form words, but his presence was so dominating, you almost couldn’t. “Leon…” You breathed, and your fingers couldn’t work the clasp fast enough. “Let me…” Finally, it slid open, you pulled the two ends of the belt apart, and made quick work to free his dick from its constraints. Your knees buckled, and you started sliding down the wall.

As you were about to hit the ground, his hands hoisted you back up from under your arms, and you could have whined, the frustration growing, the time only growing in between you getting to have him in your mouth.

“No, I’m sorry,” He grunted as he pulled you up. He put both hands under your thighs, and you gasped as he suddenly picked you up, you wrapped your arms around his neck for balance. “You’re not getting on this floor for me, we’ll save that for another time.”

Another time. Fuck, just those words alone had you melting in his grasp, his strong hands and arms holding you up, walking you around the corner of the bathroom and shutting the two of you in a stall.

“But, you already started this for me, so,” He had you pressed in between himself and the wall once again, one of his arms was still holding you up in the air, legs wrapped around his torso. He tried to separate himself as much as he could to pull his cock out, you reached down in between the two of you to help him, pulling the waistband forward so he could pull them down.

Your breath caught as he pulled it out, a solid, thick length, rock hard, and you were suddenly so mad he wouldn’t let you suck it, because, fuck you would have sucked the life out of him at just the sight of his dick. 

Once he was free, he stroked himself a couple of times, causing himself to moan, and shit, you almost did, too, and he went back to the hem of your skirt, pushing it up over your hips, exposing your small underwear. He eyed them for a moment, humming in acceptance, before sliding them sideways and exposing your aching pussy to the cool air. You, in contrast, were overheating in this bathroom, but now that you were free, it felt so nice, and it felt even better when he ran his fingers along the length, in between your folds, pressing into your clit to watch you squirm again under him.

You sighed loudly, moans slipping out with your breathing as his contact with your heat felt like heaven, your head leaned back and hit the wall, but you didn’t care, you couldn’t feel it, you felt nothing but Leon’s fingers right now.

“Fuck, you’re so wet already,” He was breathing heavily, and you choked out a whimper when he slid one of his fingers in, and it wasn’t stopped with any friction. You also couldn’t believe how wet you were, but then again, you would jump hurdles to be able to suck his dick right here and now, so it must have gotten you worked up. “You feel so good around me.” He mumbled, practically groaned out, sliding in a second finger with ease, the slick sounds becoming louder as he worked you open, and while it felt so good, you just needed him to fuck you already.

“Leon…” You kept whining, unable to say anything else, mind fading, only wrapped around the feeling of him pleasuring you, fingering you, loosening you up for him. “Please, Leon…” You moved your hips, trying to signal to him to pull his fingers out, but he resisted, his hand following the movements of your hips, only going deeper, causing you to squeal when he went as far in as he could.

“Stay still, take it…” Now he pushed himself back against you, finding your lips again and kissing passionately, trapping his fingers inside you, and when you felt them move inside of you, you couldn’t help but squirm against him. His tongue caressed your lips, the inside of your mouth, and your tongue as he was so entwined in kissing you and in fingering you to the edge, his other hand gripping relentlessly at your ass.

After what felt like forever, he backed away, strings of saliva connecting your mouths, his eyes darker than ever, and you, breathing heavily, working to regain composure. He slid his fingers out, a small hiss escaping your lips with the emptiness.

“Fuck,” He sighed, and he looked back down in between you two. He adjusted his grip on your thigh and ass as he used his now free hand to line the tip of his cock up with your entrance, you felt a throb hit the core of your pussy at the mere sight, and you instinctively tightened when he teasingly dragged the tip along your lips, not giving you what he knew you wanted.

You sighed frustratingly, and couldn’t help it but to reach down and wrap your own hand around his dick. The sudden contact made him gasp, but he caught your hand and prevented you from piloting the moment.

“Just relax…” You didn’t need to look up to hear the smile painting his face, and as much as you wanted to protest, you knew he had the upper hand. This time. “You’ll get it, just be patient.” He drew a couple more lines into you, with your hand still trapped under his on his cock, which you could feel it throb every few seconds, and he finally pushed the tip into you.

You whimpered, whole body going slack, and you drew your hand back from his dick to find closure on his shoulder, steadying yourself as he slowly pushed himself all the way in. He had to stop every other second to collect himself as well, jaw tightened, hands gripping bruises into your hips and legs, a long, deep sigh once he was bottomed out.

He brought himself closer to you, relishing in the feeling of you being wrapped around him, unmoving, and he had his face in the crook of your neck, as if to ground himself from the feeling. Your body was shaking slightly, and you could barely breathe with his weight on top of you, but it all felt so good. His skin was slick, sweat coating anywhere that wasn’t exposed to the air, and your hands drawing deep scratches into his shoulder blades.

“Fuck, fuck…” You felt Leon’s lips moving against your throat, and his breath was hot, you could tell he was desperate to move inside of you, but he was still. “You’re so tight, god…” His lips moved up to place gentle kisses along your jawline, and your head rolled to the side to give him more access. He stayed there for a second, teeth grazing your skin, and after a while you were ready for him to start moving.

You picked your head up and turned sideways, forcing him to look directly at you, wasting no time in reconnecting your lips, and, while continuing to kiss you, he slowly slid out, and pushed himself back in.

The both of you were glued to each other as he continued to thrust in and out, your hands gripping impossibly hard on his shoulders, thighs shaking, breaths choppy. His eyes never left your face, he was watching your expressions so closely, you had no control over whatever was happening to you, you could barely breathe, you were so focused on the feeling that Leon was delivering, you simply ceased to acknowledge the setting you both were in.

“God, Leon…” You choked out in between gasps, head hitting the wall over and over, trying to helplessly grind your hips into his when he thrust up, but you had no energy to move against him. He took the initiative, and every time he would plunge into you, he would stay there for a beat longer, and make sure your previously ignored clit was getting the friction it needed, which made you whine even louder.

His breaths were so heavy, spitting out ‘Fuck’, and ‘Oh, shit’, and ‘So good’ every few seconds, letting his train of thought loose as he let himself go, and lost control of the pace.

One of his hands let go of your thigh, and it landed along your chin, forcing your head down to look into his eyes. “How does that feel, hm? So hard to move in you, so tight.” His voice was a broken mess, just breaths, essentially, but it was all you needed to spur you on. 

You simply nodded, knowing the words were nowhere close to coming out right now. Even if you tried, it would be a mess of moans and gasps. You could feel him so deep inside of you, hitting that point to split you open, your pussy was endlessly wet, enough to fuel a whole round or two, and he let you know.

On another thrust, he pushed himself in and sat there for a moment, your moans spilling out without reserve, you both tensed as the unmistakable sound of the creaking door was heard.

Leon took his right hand, free from holding you up, and laced it over your mouth, silencing any sounds of pleasure that you had left in you. 

You were both stiff, eyes wide, and he had his head swung in the direction of the noise. The footsteps approached the counter and turned the sink on. If they were to walk around the corner, they would see Leon’s legs under the door, and could have easily walked in, considering he didn’t shut it all the way, it was just stopped by his body behind it.

He slowly turned his head back to face you, you couldn’t move due to the weight of his hand, and you wanted to writhe under him so bad, feeling his cock throb still deep inside of you while you both were still. Tears were practically forming in your eyes.

He locked eyes with you, and without a sound, mouthed the words Be quiet.

He kept his hand clamped over your mouth, but he slowly adjusted your position so he could slide out of you at a snail’s pace. Your eyes widened in surprise, not expecting him to move, and you used all of your remaining energy to hold yourself together, being overcome by the pleasure while also staying conscious of the person who was still at the bathroom sink. You were glad there was still music playing outside in the bar, and the sink was still running, because if it were dead silent, they definitely would have been able to hear the wet sound of Leon pulling out, and fucking back in. 

He held eye contact with you while he continued to do this, holding you so tightly to make sure nothing made any noise,and a devilish grin broke out onto his face. He was enjoying every second of this. 

He was basically getting off on the idea of pushing you to your limit, forcing you to obey what he asked you to, even if it would benefit the both of you rather than just one. If Leon were shameless enough, he could have told them to fuck off, but instead, he held you here, silenced you, yet drove you to the fucking brink just to watch you fall apart. It made you want to cum right then and there.

After what felt like ten, twenty, thirty minutes (fifteen seconds), the sink shut off, a moment of silence, and the door creaked open again. Leon took his hand off your mouth and you both sighed deeply. While holding you still, Leon leaned back to look through the door to confirm you were alone once again.

“You were barely holding it together, I thought we were going to get caught.” He said on another thrust into you, bringing your faces closer once again. You swallowed hard, instinctively choking back moans now.

“Y-you… you were making it hard…” Gasps, again, as Leon was determined to make everything he asked of you difficult.

He brought himself closer into you, and spoke lowly. “Good,” With swift moves, his free hand was around your throat, holding your head back, and he was relentlessly bouncing you up and down on his cock.

The pressure around your throat and the pressure building in your core at his movements was all overwhelming, your hands were cutting crescents into his bicep from your nails, but he hardly took notice, he was so busy moving the both of you as well as keeping an eye on your face to watch how you were responding to his movements, he was too preoccupied.

The slick sounds coming from your pussy were evidence that the situation was much more of a stimulant than you ever expected, and the sound alone brought you so close to the edge.

“I bet you loved almost getting caught.” He groaned out, his movements stuttering, and you knew he must be close as well. “I bet it was driving you crazy, having to shut up while I gave it to you. You took it so well.” Your eyes nearly rolled to the back of your head, mouth open, you wouldn’t even be surprised if you were drooling at this point, Leon had all the power now.

“Leon,” You whispered, no energy for your full voice anymore. He understood.

“Take it, baby.” He thrust harder and harder, pressing you flat against the wall, the tip of his cock hitting all the deepest points. “I’m almost there, you feel so good.”

“Fuck, Leon,” If you could grasp any harder against his arms, you just did. “Fuck, I’m so close.”

“You got it, come on, cum for me.” He pressed his forehead into yours, grinding into you on the inward thrusts, making you fall apart in his arms. A few more thrusts, grinding a few more times, and a squeeze to your throat had you gasping in a silent scream around him, panting wildly letting your orgasm loose. 

He fucked you all the way through it. “Shit, that felt so good, fuck, I’m gonna cum,” You watched him as he chased his own, sweat beads dripping down his face, his hair coated in it. His hips stuttered one more time, and as he released his seed into you, he buried his face into your neck, whimpering and biting again. 

He pulled out of you, and it wasn’t missed by either of you the way his cum dripped out of you and onto the floor. You cracked a small smile when you heard him breathe a laugh.

“I’m sure that’s not the first time this bathroom has seen that.” He looked back up at you, breathing heavily, arms shaking from holding you up. You tapped his arms, hoping your legs were strong enough to stand on your own. He lowered you slowly, making sure you were stable before letting you go.

“I hope that’s what you wanted. I might have gotten ahead of myself.” He was still standing in front of you, neither of you made moves to leave the stall. You leaned against the wall for support.

“I would have stopped you a long time ago if it wasn’t, Leon.” He smiled down at you, breaths steadying out. He nodded his head.

“Coming to the house any time soon?”

You laughed out loud this time. “I’m sleeping over this weekend.” 

He smiled wider at the sound of your laugh. He leaned in and kissed you again. “Can’t wait.”

[roseglazedlens]

⦑ a kiss away ⦒✶.*

pairing(s): leon kennedy x afab!reader synopsis: you and leon were supposed to be just friends. until one night, an impromptu kiss changed the trajectory of your relationship. content: smut 18+ only mdni, fluff, angst, friends to lovers, mutual pining, oral (m receiving), p in v, degration, hair pulling READ THE PREQUEL HERE « words: 2.1k┇masterlist┇ao3┇reblogs appreicated! »

You can’t stop thinking about the kiss.

You can’t stop thinking about Leon’s calloused fingers grazing over the plump of your cheek, scorching your skin with hands so cold it reminded you of the rifles you handled during those gruelling winter missions. You can’t stop thinking about how his pupils flared, and you basked in the glazed cerulean of his irises, so clear you could see yourself through them.

Worst of it all, you can’t stop thinking about him.

You shouldn’t. You know you shouldn’t. Leon Kennedy is your friend, your best friend. Your first meeting was five years ago on the field, clicked instantly from sharing the same corny sense of humour, and since then, your dynamic with him has been strictly platonic. You told him about all your exes, your sex life in detail, who you dated and when you had your one night stands. Hell, you even told him about your revolting bad habits that you kept secret from your exes. There was no chance this man could fall in love with someone like you, right?

…Right?

Truth is, you valued your relationship with Leon so much that you’re unwilling to risk it. You two connected beyond the small stuff, sometimes you find your conversations take a philosophical turn. You two discussed about life, family, dreams for a better world – it’s not the kind of connection you can find again.

And now you two have shared a kiss.

You were startled by the sound of your ringtone chanting through the Bluetooth speakers of your car, piercing through your train of thought. Your brain assigned autopilot, navigating you home after a laborious mission in the middle of Texas for the past two weeks. Darting your eyes at the screen, you recognised the familiar name on your contact list.

Leon. Speak of the devil.

You clicked a button on the side of your wheel. The ringing stopped, and the line connected. Immediately, you were embraced by a glee in Leon’s voice, but only ever so subtly.

“Hey. Welcome back.”

“How’d you know I’m back?” You gripped the steering wheel, a tiny concern brewed in you, worried he would catch your unusual behaviour.

“Chris told me. He’s surprised you didn’t say anything.”

A deep sigh left your throat from your core. You couldn’t exactly tell Leon that you needed time, time to catch a breath, time to process your yearn for this man. No matter how understanding he could have been.

There was no use hiding – Chris would have told him about your whereabouts if you didn’t. Chris and Leon are close friends after all.

“Can’t get a moment of peace with you two around.”

“Next time, call me. I can pick you up.” Your pulse took a leap. In another time or situation, those words would not meant anything to you. It was just how Leon was, his instincts to help others extended into his personal life too.

“So you don’t fall asleep on the wheel, stupid. Your death will not be on my conscience.”

That earned a giggle in your books. You could tell Leon’s light teasing was an attempt to comfort you, to make you laugh, to hear the snorty chuckle between your lips.

“Don’t worry. If I pass, I’ll make sure to haunt you for the rest of your life. Regardless whose fault it is.” You quipped.

“That sounds wonderful.”

Despite his sarcasm, Leon’s voice warmed at the sound of your laugh. You couldn’t help but appreciate these moments like this with him, and you prayed what you had together would never go away.

“Anyway, get some rest. I’ll bring you some food to your place at eight.”

You appreciated how he remembered that you prefer to stay home directly after a mission. After difficult missions, the presence of people could be daunting and uneasy.

Leon’s the exception.

He always brought a peace offering – a chicken sandwich from your favourite deli, a viral dessert you saw in a store once, your usual frappuccino order with ten customisations… If you want it, he got it for you.

“See you soon.” He hung up and you drove home.

You’re thankful for internalised heating and electric blankets. They’ve became necessities for post mission self-care routine like this one. You scrubbed yourself down, cleansing the scent of blood, grease and dirt that clings deeply to your body. So when you finished, you feel rejuvenated. You napped, checked for new mail, checked for bad food in the fridge and took care of any errands you missed when you had to leave swiftly for the mission.

You waited and waited. It was almost eighty-fourty, with nothing but a brief text that penned “Running late” from Leon. You texted back, no follow-ups, no ‘seen’, no double checkmark. You wondered what was taking him so long, before the bell buzz at your door.

You opened the door, prepared to give him a lecture, just to find Leon with a familiar takeaway bag in his hands.

“No way… Is that…?”

“Yes. It’s from your favourite place.”

“Wait, the one that’s always has a long line…?”

Leon helped himself into your apartment. His hair soaked, it shimmered under the ceiling light of your apartment. He must have waited a whole hour in the rain.

“I don’t know what to say.”

“Thank you would be nice.”

You hurried to your cupboard, picked up a fresh towel and handed it to Leon for him to dry off.

“Thank you. I mean it.”

Leon nodded, a gentle grin at the corner of his lips knowing that you’re grateful of his gesture. And you genuinely did. No man, no ex, no friend you knew would do things for you to this extent. With your help, Leon removed his wet jacket and revealed his top also drenched underneath, clinging to every bump, every muscle on his torso. You swallowed deeply, slotting your eyes anywhere but his chest.

“I’ve got spare clothes in the car.”

You insisted on grabbing Leon’s clothes for him, thankful for the opportunity to take yourself away from the situation. You took the keys, and took in some fresh air. Anything to distract yourself from imagining your best friend naked on the top half. You opened the truck, retrieved his spare clothes in his gym bag and returned to your home.

When the door opened, you found Leon with his shirt already removed, revealing those sculpted muscles from the results of his vigorous training.

“Sorry. It gets uncomfortable when it’s sticky.”

You gawked, your eyes planted on the slopes of Leon’s tauted arms, pelvis line drawing a deep v into his crotch. He’s showing off. You know it. You struggled through the desire of staring knowing it will just rub his ego even further, but your eyes betrayed you. Leon observed you, a smug grin that made you hold back a punch.

“Like what you see?”

Leon strided towards you, taking his time. You had plenty of chances to walk away now, but your feet are planted to the floor, his dry clothes still in your hand. With a hand over your head, Leon closed the entrance door, and shifted close enough for you to catch his scent – the musky woodiness mixed with rain and his odour enveloped your nose – his signature cologne.

A hand reached to your waist, pulled you in his embrace.

“Do you want to see the rest?”

His breath tickled your ears as he whispered.

You forgot how attractive Leon could be. How others flock to his attention. Begged me to give them his number. With full confidence, you believed those charms didn’t work on you. Blissfully unaware that Leon chose to withdraw his charms in front of you, contrasting to the unadulterated need his body radiated right now.

Breath tightened, pulse sped, unable to keep up with your thoughts. You felt a sensation shot down your spinal cord, knees trembled slightly, a look of mischief clung to Leon’s face. Your body betrayed you, nodding incessantly.

“So honest.”

Leon feet guided you to the couch, sat you till your eyes level to the bulge in his jeans. The blond undid his first button, and your gaze followed the zipper downwards. Leon grabbed underneath his boxers, and his dick sprung free onto his abdomen. With a curled fist, Leon hovered it at the bridge of your nose and pumped it a few times in your direct line of sight.

“Wet it for me, baby.”

He teased, inching his cock closer to the pucker of your lips.

Saliva gathered at the back of your throat, your tongue desperate to feast on him. A droplet of precome leaked from his tip. You grazed your tongue on the tiny slit, circulating the drop all over your mouth until it blended in your saliva. The light hint of saltiness was there, and it was gone again.

Leon hitched a breath, his hands crawling down your head to pull your hair back loosely for easier moment. You hollowed your cheeks, and slide his girth between your lips. Light gasp turned to needy grunts, the hands groping your hair tightened, pushing you further inside.

You curled your tongue all over the head, coating it with your slick, indulging in the smell of sweat intertwined with his sex. Corner of your lips dribbled down your neck, eyes forced shut from the ache of the shape of his cock head engraved in the back of your throat. But you couldn’t get enough. You let a hand go from Leon’s thigh, and reached for your underwear instead.

“Look at you. Can’t even wait five minutes.”

Leon’s blue eyes glistened with cunningness. His hand tugged harshly at your hair, eliciting a pained groan that pulled you off his cock out with a pop. With one swift motion, Leon removed your top and pants, until you are bare in nothing but your underwear. He slid his hand underneath you, pushed your underwear aside, and felt the stickiness as a finger went inside you.

“God, you want this so much, huh?”

“S-Shut up and fuck me, Leon.”

Leon’s expression changed when you told him that. It triggered something carnal within, and shoved your back onto the couch, underwear pushed aside, cock teased your entrance. With one deep breath, Leon thrusted himself in you, ignoring your needy pleas. You shrieked in pleasure, your jaw drowned in the juncture between his neck and shoulders, nails clawing his back.

“You’re sucking me in, baby…”

Leon’s skin flushed red, his sculpted shoulders strained in delight at the impact.

Without further ado, Leon slammed into your swollen, needy cunt. Squelches and the slap of skin to skin hovered the air, and a stir developed in your body, threatened to release. Your eyes tried to brace shut, but Leon’s hand stroked your face when you did, demanding you to look at him. Until your thoughts were filled with him as you finished together. Leon followed, removed you quickly and landed the streams of come on your lower belly.

It was supposed to be a moment of euphoria, but Leon’s expression turned grim, parting from your embrace after his fingers dwelled lightly on your shoulder blades.

“You should have run when you had the chance.”

Leon sighed, regret forming at his tongue.

“You could have had a normal life, be with someone who doesn’t chase death like me. But now that I have you, it’s impossible to let you go. I can’t ignore wanting you anymore.”

You sensed years of agony and sorrow behind his cerulean eyes – you never noticed these emotions he kept so secretively in his heart. How much did he had to suffer when you told him of all your relationships in the past, and Leon supported you each and every time. No matter how terrible your exes treated you.

“That’s not the life I want.” You affirmed, two fingers brushed his lips and reached his jaw. “I don’t want an easy life, Leon. I don’t care how hard it is. I want to be by your side.”

Leon pulled you in tighter into his familiar embrace. He laid his lips against yours, and you are reminded of that intimate kiss you shared two weeks ago. The passion, minty sweetness of gum is so distinctly Leon.

It was his plea, begged you to notice how much Leon loved you. How far he will go to make you happy. It took you so long, but you could finally accept him. You returned the kiss, just as gentle, loving – a silent vow to Leon that you will make him happy as he lived.

“Come on, baby. Let’s eat. The pizza’s already cold.”

EDIT: I wrote a prequel to this! thanks for reading! come check out my other works. ––yours truly, rose.

[catcze]

No but ehat if like wriothesley had an s/o or maybe someone hes romantically interested in who he sees mostly in the fortress and then they go outside together one day and he's like "i never realized how beatiful you are in the sun" and hes all cute and blushin and shit OUGGH OUGH OUGH I'VE BEEN SHOT THROUGH THE HEART WRAAAAAGHHSHDH

OUGHHASDAS YOU AND ME BOTH U AND ME BOTH

Reblogs are greatly appreciated !!

When you set out on your day off, you weren't expecting to run into your boss— certainly not in a cafe, of all places.

"Your grace?" you ask hesitantly, approaching the table that Wriothesley and Sigewinne occupy. There's a litany of small desserts before them, as well as a teapot and two tea cups filled with rather aromatic tea. You run a hand over your top, trying to smooth any wrinkles that there may be. You certainly hadn't been expecting to run into him here! Oh, if you knew you would have dressed a little bit better. As it is, you were just here to hunt down an afternoon snack, and you certainly looked it.

But Wriothesley lights up at the sight of you, a small smile curling the edge of his lips. Sigewinne grins too, waving in welcome.

"Hello there!" She says pleasantly. "We weren't expecting to see you here!"

You chuckle. "Same here."

"But it seems like you've come at quite the opportune moment," Wriothesley says, beckoning you into one of the empty chairs of the table. He straightens a bit, slouching less in his seat, and leans forward on his elbows. That smile is still on his lips, and his gaze hasn't left you for a second. "I'm afraid we may have gone a bit overboard with our order. You'd be doing us a favor by having some." Sigewinne nods in agreement. You feel the blood rush to your face though, turning it warm.

"Oh, I couldn't impose like that, your grace—"

"Sure you can," Wriothesley's smile broadens then, and you get a hint of his canines in his smile. A slight hint of a dimple on his cheek. "I already said that you'd be doing us a favor, didn't I? Besides, you can drop the 'your grace' while we're here. Treat this like... a serendipitous meeting between friendly parties, rather than between coworkers."

And oh, if you thought that your face was warm before, it had practically doubled in temperature now. Not wanting him to hurry you any further, you plop in the seat. Sigewinne giggles, pouring you a cup of tea and handing it to you which you take with a word of thanks.

"Here," says Wriothesley. He gestures for you to hand him your plate, and as you do so, your fingers brush. It sends tingles up your arm, and you damn near drop the plate out of reflex. Wriothesley, judging by how he clears his throat, his ears turning several shades redder, is not unaffected either.

He fills the plate with lots of confectionaries, desserts, finger foods, and sandwiches, and all sorts of other things. Sigewinne points out some things for him to give you on occasion, and he happily takes her suggestion and gives you some. Well. You've certainly got your afternoon snack and thensome.

As Wriothesley hands the plate back to you, he pauses just as you've taken hold of the other side.

"You know... I think this is the first time I've seen you in broad daylight," he muses. His cheeks redden a bit, and he chuckles at himself under his breath. "The sunlight makes you look even more stunning than usual."

And you make an embarrassed noise, because archons, you might just be in need of medical assistance by the end of this, because there is no way the flipping of your heart is normal. You take the plate, looking down and away so he doesn't see your flustered expression, but he has anyway, if his small laugh is any indication.

"If you ever want to come back here, feel free to say so. My treat." Wriothesley offers, gazing at you with his chin resting on his palm. He looks at you like he never wants to look away. "I'd be happy to see you in this sunshine again, if you'd let me."

[aquaquadrant]

from eden, part IX (act II)

Word count: 15,401 Warnings: Self-deprecating thoughts (not really, Jimmy’s just a listener and doesn’t know it), strong language, internalized racism, past abuse/experimentation, dehumanization, self-hatred, kissing, mature implications (fade to black), voluntary decapitation Summary: The Double Lifers have successfully thwarted the invasion by Hels Tek, but not unscathed. Now that Tango’s been outed as Bravo’s doppelgänger, the remaining threads are starting to unravel, and Jimmy suddenly finds himself fighting to save Tango from his own inner demons. Can their love survive the fallout?

A/N: This chapter had to get split into two parts bc Tumblr sucks, here's a link to the first half if u missed it. Hope y'all enjoy, please reblog/comment if you do!

Also please don’t think too hard abt the technical portal/redstone junk. I’m throwin a lotta random terms and conditions out there in the hopes of creating a feasible explanation for how portal travel works, and how Hels differs from other worlds in that regard. It’s possible there are contradictions or other things that I didn’t fully think through, but these details aren’t really important. Just try to suspend ur disbelief. - Aqua

~*~

from eden, part IX (act II) - no tired sighs, no rolling eyes, no irony

~*~

“Right then. Uh, thank you all for coming on short notice.”

Grian’s tentative welcome is met with a chorus of rather subdued greetings from the Double Lifers. Everyone is gathered in a loose semicircle around spawn, standing in their respective soulbound pairs and groups. Jimmy would’ve preferred to have this conversation sitting down, inside somewhere, but Tango had insisted on spawn.

Only now does Jimmy realize that the open nature of the forest clearing at spawn is less enclosed than a room filled with fourteen people would feel, and he understands.

Tango hadn’t been very talkative on the way over. But every time he said something, it was with that same forced ‘Everything’s fine!’ kind of attitude. It’s really starting to frustrate Jimmy, making him want to grab Tango by the shoulders and shout, ‘No, actually, everything’s not fine, and that’s okay!’

But he doesn’t think that’d be well received at the moment.

Tango, standing beside Jimmy, is still maintaining his fake nonchalance. To an untrained observer, he’d actually look quite casual. Simply standing with his hands in his pockets, listening intently to Grian with a plain, but not unpleasant, expression. The only indication Jimmy has that he’s at all uncomfortable is the complete lack of movement.

He doesn’t fidget, doesn’t pace, doesn’t shift his weight- all things that might otherwise be taken as signs of anxiety, but are usually normal for Tango. The stillness, though subtle, is concerning. It means he’s tense and on-guard. As if expecting an attack at any second. Which, to be fair, Jimmy doesn’t blame him for. 

But more concerning is the fact that Tango can so easily and convincingly pretend that everything’s fine. He must’ve had a lot of practice.

(Ten years, remember?)

(Of course he’s a good liar.)

(Surprise, surprise.)

Grian clears his throat. “So, as we all know… there was an attack yesterday by some strange fellas who came in through a hacked portal of some sort. I’ve locked the world down for the moment, but until we know all the who’s, why’s, and how’s, I’m afraid that’s only a temporary solution… since I’m sure you all don’t wanna be stuck here forever.” 

He says it matter-of-factly, not a hint of any frustration, annoyance, or other ill-feeling in his voice. But Jimmy sees Tango’s face twitch anyway. Unsurprisingly, the guilt is getting to him.

“But that’s why we’re here,” Grian continues, taking a more upbeat tone. “Tango has kindly agreed to explain a little better what’s goin’ on, so hopefully, we can get to the bottom of this and uh… come up with a plan for moving forward.” He gestures invitingly towards Tango. “Tango?”

(Here we go…)

Tango clears his throat. “Right, yeah, thanks.” He takes a small step forward, casting a quick glance around the clearing. “Okay, so here’s the deal. I spawned in a world called Hels, where every player is sort of an evil counterpart to an overworld player elsewhere in the universe. At least, that’s what I’ve gathered from the Helsknight fiasco.”

Jimmy can actually see the sudden realization that settles over all the present Hermits- minus Pearl, who seems as out of the loop as the others.

Grian’s eyes widen. “Oh my gosh, that makes so much sense…”

“Oh, dudes,” Ren breathes, running a clawed hand through his hair. “Not gonna lie, I completely forgot about that…”

“Same here,” Impulse says, looking stunned. “I mean, it was over and done with so fast, and Wels didn’t seem worried, so I guess none of us really thought to look into it? Man…”

Scott puts a hand up. “Um, what’s tha’ Helsknight fiasco?” he asks, frowning.

“Oh, right.” Tango scratches the back of his head. “So, you guys know of Welsknight, right? One of our fellow hermits?” At the group’s hesitant nods, he continues, “On Hermitcraft’s seventh world, there was this player who randomly joined and attacked Wels. None of us ever saw him, but when Wels explained the situation later… he said Helsknight was some kinda evil clone, and that he came from a place called Hels.”

Murmurs of surprise and confusion ripple through the group. Jimmy longs to put a hand on Tango’s shoulder as a reassurance, but based on how tense he is, that’d probably set him off.

“Wait, really?” Pearl asks, her antennae curling in surprise. “What’re the chances of that?”

“I know,” Cleo agrees, “it was really strange, in hindsight…”

“So this Helsknight guy,” Joel says, knitting his brows together. “He’s what Bravo was talkin’ about, one of those Hels players? Like all the other people that came through the portal?”

“Yeah,” Martyn chimes in, “I- I noticed a lot of uh, ‘Hels’ in the names in chat. Or like, ones with ‘bad’ or ‘evil’ kinda vibes.”

“Yep.” Tango nods stiffly. “Now, don’t get me wrong, I don’t know Helsknight or- or how he joined Hermitcraft, but it was obvious he was Wels’s counterpart. I mean, he said he was ‘all the darkest parts’ of Wels, right?” He folds his arms. “Well, I’m that for Bravo. A sort of uh- a personification of his badness, I guess.”

“Wait, wait, wait,” Bigb cuts in, holding his hands up. “So- so you’re sayin’ that we all have these… Hels versions of ourselves?”

“Evil doppelgängers, yeah,” Tango amends. “I mean, I don’t know why it’d only be for some players and not others, and Hels is plenty big enough for every player in the universe to have a counterpart. You go to any of the major cities around spawn, and it’ll definitely feel that way.”

“What’s this… Hels world like?” Pearl asks, her red eyes wide with a sort of morbid fascination.

Tango’s expression darkens. “It’s an ancient world, infinite and deadly. The overworld and nether are fused into one crazy, messed-up realm full of these weird hybrid kinda biomes, and- and you can’t access the end. The bedrock ceiling makes it so hostile mobs spawn basically everywhere, but you can’t find naturally spawning passive mobs for like, hundreds of thousands of blocks around spawn, ‘cause the early players murdered them all. And no portal travel in or out- at least, that’s what we thought.”

Jimmy’s starting to see why Bravo described Hels as ‘an inescapable prison of horrific violence and suffering.’ 

Grian raises his eyebrows. “No end?”

“No portals?” Bdubs echoes disbelievingly.

Etho, who’s been listening with rapt attention, tilts his head. “That Bravo guy, he mentioned something about my, uh… my doppelgänger?”

Tango shrugs. “He must’ve met them at some point in the last ten years, yeah. I- I dunno, I never did.” He pauses, creasing his brows as he glances around the circle again. “Actually, I don’t think I ever met any of your guys’s Hels. Or, if I did, I don’t remember.”

That makes Jimmy frown. “What do you mean?”

Tango gives Jimmy a sidelong look. “I uh, I wasn’t really that social for most of my time there, I spent my childhood being a general menace- most kids do, actually. There’s no infrastructure to look after kids, we- they’re basically on their own. So you can imagine it’s- it’s an interesting world to grow up in.” Idly, he kicks at a clump of grass. “Bunch’a little monsters runnin’ around unsupervised, causing chaos, trying not to get brutally killed by hostile mobs and players, it was great.”

Horror seizes Jimmy. “That’s awful.”

“That’s just how it was,” Tango says bluntly. “I mean, try setting something like that up without an admin, right? See how that goes.”

“Wait, Hels doesn’t have an admin?” Grian repeats.

“Nope. At least, not when I was there.” Tango shrugs. “They hadn’t for a long time before I even spawned, so- so the whole place was basically anarchy, every player for themself.”

Aghast, Scar shakes his head. “What in the world…”

“How long did you spend living like that?” Impulse asks softly, his eyes sad.

Tango’s avoiding everyone’s eyes now, staring off somewhere into the middle distance. “Oh, probably ‘til I was like… fifteen or sixteen? Somewhere in the teen stage? That’s when I met Atlas.” A bitter smile splits across his face. “He told me he was recruiting for his redstone company, Hels Tek, and- and of course he threw in lots of cheap flattery, blah blah blah, and in my young, naive stupidity, I fell hook, line, and sinker. Turns out all he wanted me for was a blaze farm.”

There’s a brief silence.

“What?” Jimmy asks, confused. Is that what Atlas had meant about a farm design? Did they just want to force Tango to make farms for them? He knows Tango’s a bit of an innovator in that regard, but that’s an awful lot of trouble to go through for something that could easily be done by someone else.

“He… wanted you to build a blaze farm?” Impulse asks slowly, brows knitting together.

Tango laughs; a sharp, dry exhale. “No, no. Not to build one. To be one.” He reaches a hand up to tap one of the blaze rods hovering around his head. “I uh, I dunno if you guys have noticed, but these things here aren’t just for show. They’re real, functional blaze rods, and they just so happen to be respawnable.”

Jimmy’s stomach drops.

Oh.

(There we go, now they’ve got it.)

(Makes sense, right?)

(Honestly, it’s so obvious…)

The clearing is deathly silent now. All Jimmy can hear is his own heartbeat pounding in his ears. Everything is clicking into place, all the strange things he’s seen and heard suddenly making perfect, horrible sense.

They used Tango as a blaze farm. An actual sentient player, reduced to nothing more than a simple mob. A player with complex thoughts and feelings, with creative ideas and passions, with hopes and fears and dreams. They locked him up like an animal to use for profit- and even now, ten years later, he still can’t fully escape from it.

Jimmy has a sinking feeling he knows what Tango’s nightmares are about.

Tango keeps talking. “They didn’t start with that, of course.” There’s a bored sort of quality to his voice, like he’s merely commentating on the weather. “There was this uhh awkward phase where I thought I was helping with redstone experiments, when actually I was the test subject.”

It’s kind of surreal, actually. To be standing here and talking about this so casually. It’s like Jimmy’s having a nightmare he can’t wake up from.

“And once I caught on, well, they uh- they didn’t exactly have to play nice anymore,” Tango laughs. “That’s where I got these fabulous accessories.” He waves a hand, cuff jangling around his wrist.

Jimmy feels sick. They put the cuffs on Tango to lock him in a farm. To think he’s still had those on him, all this time-

“After that,” Tango continues briskly, “it still took, like, another year of testing for them to develop the most optimized farm.” He delivers the information almost disinterestedly, studying his claws. “It was a pretty smart design, nice and compact.”

Jimmy glances around the clearing. Amidst the shocked, horrified faces, he finds Impulse- who seems to be focused on taking slow, deep breaths, his hands curled into fists at his sides.

(Uh oh, no Impulse to the rescue…)

“Wither roses dealt constant damage,” Tango rattles off, “triggering my blaze rods to respawn as quickly as they could be skadoodled away by hoppers, and they had regen on an automatic clock to keep me alive- though there was a backup respawn anchor for any accidents.”

Wither roses. Of course. Jimmy can picture it, in his mind’s eye; Tango chained up among the ashen flowers. What must it have felt like, to be withering all the time? His health constantly wavering between the icy blackness and the regeneration, every minute of every day. How absolutely miserable.

Jimmy somehow finds his voice again. “How… how long did you spend like that?” he asks hoarsely, stepping next to Tango.

Tango won’t look at him- though he’s carefully watching out of the corner of his eye. “Oh, I dunno… four or five months, maybe?” 

Months. Jimmy’s heart aches. He can’t even begin to imagine what that existence was like. To spend all day trapped in a farm that’s constantly hurting him- and by wither effect, no less. Not to mention how dehumanizing the entire concept is on its own.

“How’d you get out?” Jimmy asks tentatively. “If- if you don’t mind.”

Tango snorts. “Yeah, so, one day, the charge on my anchor ran out when no one was around, so I was able to kill myself to get back to world spawn. And that’s when the portal to Hermitcraft appeared.”

Etho steps forward. “I thought Hels didn’t allow portals?” he asks, his voice as cool and unreadable as his partially-concealed expression.

Jimmy’s taken aback, his feathers puffing up unwittingly. He doesn’t understand how Etho can grill Tango about technical details in such an upsetting situation. In fact, he’d almost think that Etho doesn’t care at all- except the question makes Tango pause. In his expression, Jimmy can see his mind working, and realizes what Etho has done.

By circling back to a scientific topic, he’s provided Tango a distraction. Something less personal for his mind to focus on, and take everyone else’s focus off of him. Already, Jimmy can see that Tango’s less tense as he starts to explain.

“We didn’t have portals in Hels, but we knew the concept from data-mining.” Tango spreads his hands. “Locked comm commands, hidden recipes. But portals to Hermitcraft are made by the universe, right? So- so whatever is preventing Hels players from making portals, it- the universe can circumvent it. ‘Course, at the time, I didn’t know how it appeared or where it was gonna take me, but I went through. And apparently, somehow, a portal appeared in front of Bravo that took him to Hels at the same time. The universe must’ve tried to send Bravo to Hermitcraft, glitched ‘cause of Hels’s wonky portal technology, and swapped us by mistake.”

Etho hums noncommittally. “So it was an accident.”

(Oh, sure.)

(That’s what they think…)

(Yeah, he ‘accidentally’ didn’t tell anyone the truth for ten years.)

Jimmy angrily pushes the thoughts away. So long as Tango didn’t intend to strand Bravo in Hels, that’s all that matters to him.

Tango gives Etho a funny look. “I mean, that’s not the point? Bravo’s been trapped in Hels ever since, ‘cause of me. This whole invasion thing was my fault, they were tryin’ to get me back for the farm and help Bravo escape Hels, and... I dunno, get back to his life? Or, the life I stole from him ten years ago.” He shrugs. “So yeah. Secret’s out, sorry I’ve been lying to some of you for a decade, now, and- and sorry you all got dragged into my mess. I didn’t mean t- well, anyway, that’s- that’s what happened.”

“God, Tango,” Jimmy breathes, reaching a hand out, “I- I’m so sorry.”

“Sorry?” Tango asks incredulously, jerking away from Jimmy. “Wh- for what? That’s just what Hels is like, okay, if it wasn’t the farm it’d have been some other terrible thing, so y’know, it’s- it’s whatever.” He lets out another harsh laugh, raking his claws through his hair. “If anything, I’m the one who should be sorry, I mean, I- I’ve been lyin’ for ten years and-”

“They put you in a farm?!”

Everyone jumps. Impulse’s voice is suddenly several octaves lower, quite a bit louder, and warped with distortion into something truly demonic. His pupils have eaten up the rest of his eyes, turning them solid black. The teeth bared in a scowl look bigger and sharper than they used to, and the hands at his sides have sprouted claws. His horns and tail have grown longer, too, and Jimmy can see what looks like dark, leathery wings sprouting up behind him. His entire body is outlined by a bright golden glow, like his skin has abruptly become as hot as lava, and the absolute fury in his expression burns even fiercer.

Ah. This must be ‘full demon’ mode.

Bdubs quickly jumps in front of Impulse, grabbing him by the shoulders to ground him. Jimmy instinctively steps in front of Tango, wings snapping out to shield him from view.

But the damage is already done. Jimmy hears footsteps, and by the time he looks over his shoulder, Tango is gone.

“Tango, wait!” Jimmy turns to follow him, but a hand suddenly grabs his arm.

Martyn is there. “Don’t chase him,” he says lowly, “he’ll only panic more.”

Jimmy wants to argue, but the severity in Martyn’s solitary eye sobers him. “Alright,” he relents, folding his wings. “I… guess I’ll give him a few minutes to calm down…”

“Right, then.” Martyn gives a short nod, putting his hands on his hips. “Wasn’t expecting that.”

“Tell me about it,” Jimmy mutters, gazing back over the clearing.

Impulse is starting to settle back down, Bdubs in front speaking to him in low tones while Etho and Joel each hang onto an arm. It looks like his extra demon-y features are reverting back to his usual state, though he still looks furious.

Grian is sitting against a tree, wings splayed out around him. He’s massaging his temples like he’s warding off a headache, his eyes squeezed shut, groaning, “How did I not see this coming?” while Scar, crouched beside him, rubs his back soothingly.

Ren is pacing back and forth across the clearing. “I should’a killed more of those guys,” he growls, tail lashing, ears pinned flat against his skull.

“Hey, you did all you could,” Bigb says comfortingly. “I was the one that got us killed. If I’d kept my shield up, he wouldn’t have gotten that shot on me.”

“I wish we’d realized that Atlas guy was in charge,” Martyn laments, crossing over to them. “If we’d stopped him from leaving, we could’a gotten a lot more information.”

“I wish we’d known Tango was dealing with all this,” Cleo says bitterly, her crossed arms resting on her knees, Scott leaned against their side. “I mean, honestly… ten years and we never knew? That’s- that’s- that’s rubbish. We’re rubbish friends.”

“Hey, hey now,” Jimmy says, lifting his voice to address the group, “this wasn’t anyone’s fault, okay? You guys have been great friends to Tango- otherwise, he wouldn’t have stuck around for so long, right? It’s- it’s just his way, to try and deal with things on his own without askin’ for help. You know that.”

Cleo exhales slowly. “Yeah, I know. Still sucks.”

“Yeah.” Jimmy glances over at Impulse, who seems to have recovered himself back to normal, sitting cross-legged next to Bdubs. “You alright, Impulse?”

Impulse gives a slight nod, expression guilty. “I’m sorry. I- I almost never lose control like that, I just got so angry… not at Tango!” he quickly clarifies. “Never at him. I- I just… thinking about what they did to him, everything he went through…”

“It’s okay, it’s okay,” Bdubs murmurs, squeezing Impulse’s hand. “That’s- it’s freaking crazy, right? With th- hyaugh, evil Hels world, puttin’ people in uh, in farms… sheesh.”

“Yeah, it’s alright,” Jimmy assures him. “I know you didn’t mean anythin’ by it. I’m sure Tango does, too, he was just so on-guard the whole time… he just got spooked, that’s all.”

“Jimmy,” Pearl says urgently, fluttering over to him while tailed by her small pack of wolves, “d’you know- uh, is- is everythin’ Tango said true?” she asks, concerned.

Jimmy swallows. “It’s true. I mean, I- I didn’t know about the farm specifically, but based on what I overheard Atlas say- it makes sense.” He rubs the back of his neck. “And gosh, I didn’t know how awful Hels was, but the way Bravo talked about it…”

“But, um…” Bdubs pipes up hesitantly. “Just- just ‘cause Tango is Bravo’s… uh, Hels… doppelgänger, whatever… doesn’t mean he’s evil, right?”

“I know!” Jimmy cries, throwing his hands up. “That’s what I’ve been tryin’ to tell him! He doesn’t believe it. He thinks he’s a monster for what he did, killin’ those guys and burnin’ down the ranch.”

“That’s ridiculous,” Martyn scoffs. He’s coaxed a still-seething Ren to lay down now, absentmindedly stroking Ren’s ears as his head rests in Martyn’s lap while Bigb starts to braid his hair. “It was self-defense, yeah? A bunch of strangers invaded your home, and he defended it. There’s nothin’ wrong with that.”

Jimmy has a feeling it’s more to do with how Tango killed them and how the fire got started, plus the fact that Jimmy got hurt in the process. But Tango didn’t share those particular details, so Jimmy’s not about to now. Besides, in his opinion, that doesn’t change anything.

“Yeah, yeah, I know,” he says ruefully. “But he still blames himself for what happened. For all of it.”

“Well, that’s stupid,” Cleo deadpans. Then she pauses. “Or- sorry, his feelings aren’t stupid, but I- I hope he knows that none of us feel that way.”

There are exclamations of agreement and similar sentiments from the rest of the group, which helps ease some of the tightness in Jimmy’s chest. He knows his friends, and knows they’re all good people who wouldn’t judge Tango like that, but it’s been hard not to let Bravo’s words get to him.

“I’ll tell him,” Jimmy promises them. “I’ll try to make him understand, he just- I think he’s always been afraid this day would come, that he’s just been tickin’ down borrowed time.”

“What d’you mean?” Grian asks, rising to his feet. “It’s not like he knew they were coming, right?”

Jimmy shakes his head. “No, I don’t think so. It’s more like… he’s always had that possibility hanging over him.”

“Yeah, I think you’re right,” Impulse says quietly. “The first time he saw a communicator portal open, you would’ve thought he was being sent to his death. It… makes sense, looking back now.” He puts his head in his hands, sighing. “Man, there were so many signs…”

Grian walks over, pulling his communicator out. “So hang on, the world itself is called Hels, yeah?”

“Yeah, why?” Jimmy asks.

Grian doesn’t respond, silently scanning his comm with his brows knit in concentration. And then something very strange happens. For a moment, it almost seems as if Grian’s eyes flash purple, and Jimmy hears his voice in his head.

(There it is. Hm, firewalled. Gonna be tricky.)

Then Grian pushes his glasses back up, and it passes.

“Right,” he says briskly, putting his comm away. “I can’t find the world, so the portal thing checks out. But since Tango’s cut this meeting a bit short, do you have any other information? Anything the Hels guys might’ve said or done that we should know about?”

Jimmy blinks. Grian’s just looking at him expectantly, giving no indication that there’s anything out of sorts. Jeeze, he’s used to having random thoughts, but the stress of everything must really be getting to him if he’s imagining his friend’s voices, now.

“Um, actually,” Jimmy says, “the collar they put on Tango… he said it’s using some sort of… modified wither rose to dampen his fire? It’s uh, also dampening our soulbond.” He clears his throat, glancing away. “As a- as a fun little side effect.”

“Have you tried removing it yet?” Etho asks, stepping around Impulse with his hands in his pockets.

“I did, earlier,” Impulse chimes in from the ground. “Just with my hands, but uh, he acted like it was hurting him.”

Jimmy nods. “Yeah, Atlas locked it on him with a key, and I’m pretty sure he still had it when he left. So I think that might be the way to get it off.”

“Well,” Joel cuts in, straightening up from where he’d been leaning over Impulse’s shoulder, “surely not the only way, right? I mean, you could always…” He makes a noncommittal noise, and draws a finger across his neck.

Jimmy bristles, wings flaring out. “What, decapitate my soulmate?!”

Joel holds up his hands. “Hey, hey, we don’t know if that thing’ll respawn on him!”

“His cuffs do!” Jimmy points out.

“Yeah, but isn’t it worth a shot?” Joel counters.

“I… I guess,” Jimmy relents, letting his feathers smooth back down. “But I’d rather look into a few other options before jumpin’ straight to decapitation, if you don’t mind. Tango’s been through enough as it is.”

Joel backs off. “Alright, fair enough.” 

“Okay…” Grian turns to address the rest of the group. “Well, um… this has been an interesting revelation, to say the least. I think we’re gonna have to do a bit more research to figure out how they got here before we just… open the world back up. So that means we’ll all be stuck here a bit longer, is that- is that okay with everyone?”

“Yes, yes of course,” Bdubs says vehemently.

“Yeah,” Impulse agrees, “whatever it takes.”

Further murmurs of assent ring out from among the group. Everywhere Jimmy looks, he sees faces full of sympathy and understanding, not a single trace of resentment or annoyance to be found. God, he loves his friends.

“Thanks, guys, I appreciate it,” he says gratefully. “I’m gonna go check on Tango, but we’ll keep you updated if anythin’ changes.”

“Right, okay then.” Grian claps his hands together. “Uh- I guess that’s all for now?”

Nodding, Jimmy turns and takes to the sky, leaving spawn behind him.

His mind is still reeling from all the heavy revelations, his stomach twisted up into knots, but he’s at least comforted by knowing that his friends are behind them. Seems that the fears Bravo tried to instill were completely unfounded, nothing more than vicious, desperate attempts to sow division between Tango and the others. Jimmy really shouldn’t have doubted them.

(That went… surprisingly well.)

(Give it time.)

‘Oh, shove off,’ Jimmy thinks.

~*~

He finds Tango back at the spare room in Impulse and Bdubs’s house.

Thank goodness for that. He hadn’t exactly been sure if Tango would consider this a safe place to go. But with the ranch destroyed and the world on lockdown, it’s not like he has a lot of options.

Tango’s sitting on the bed with his back to Jimmy. At a glance, he seems relaxed, but his legs are curled under him in a way that’d allow him to spring up in an instant. And the way his pointed ears swivel back toward Jimmy tells him Tango is quite alert.

(So deceiving…)

“Hey, Tango,” Jimmy says softly. “You alright?”

“Oh, hey.” Tango doesn’t turn around just yet, shrugging a shoulder. “Sure, yeah.”

Jimmy lingers by the bed for a moment, uncertain. “Um, Impulse didn’t mean to lose his temper like that,” he offers. “He wasn’t mad at you, he was mad at the situation, that’s all.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know. Just, in the moment- I- I- thought…” Tango sighs. “Anyway. So- so I guess I should head out, huh?”

Jimmy’s stomach drops. “What? What’re you sayin’?”

“It’s over, right?” Tango asks, his voice tight, shoulders hunched by his ears. “They don’t want me around, and I don’t blame ‘em. I mean, once Grian opens the world again, it’s only a matter of time before another portal from Hels opens up. And- and who’d want to go through all that again, right? So don’t worry, I get it, it was my fault, so-”

“No, Tango, I promise- none of them blame you, alright?” Jimmy sits down on the bed- not too close. “None of them believe what Bravo was sayin’ about you. None of them think you’re some… some evil monster that deserves to be locked up in Hels.”

Tango finally turns around. His body is coiled with all the tension of a drawn arrow. “That’s ‘cause they didn’t see me- what I did- back at the ranch,” he says sharply. “They don’t know the whole story.”

Jimmy rubs the back of his neck, exhaling slowly. He knew Tango would hold that against himself. “Well, I do, and I-”

“No, you don’t.”

Jimmy blinks. “Wh- oh, you mean the Helsknight thing?” he asks, furrowing his brows. “Look, honestly, based on what you told Bravo, I don’t blame you for doing that. You were just scared you’d get sent back, that doesn’t make you evil. I know you-”

“No, you don’t,” Tango says again, more intently. “You don’t know everything about me, Jimmy.”

Jimmy’s stomach drops. “Wha’d’you mean?”

Tango smiles without humor, a hard look in his eye. “You wanna know why I like making those- those crazy mob farms? Why I try to kill them in creative, fun ways?” He tilts his head. “Because I like it. I like to make their deaths entertaining. I’ll even sacrifice efficiency for it, I’ll go out of my way to do it. And I- it doesn’t stop there, I’ll kill passive mobs for no reason. Cats, frogs, things that don’t even have drops, for absolutely no reason. That’s not normal.”

Despite himself, Jimmy feels a chill run down his spine. “That’s not… those are just mobs, it’s- it’s not evil…”

(Are you sure about that?)

Tango exhales sharply- a short, bitter laugh. “Okay. You know why practically all my mini games end in death? Huh? You wanna guess?”

Distress shoots through Jimmy. “Tango-”

“I like to watch players die, too,” Tango says. “And I like it to be entertaining. I enjoy it, that’s- that’s just plain sadistic.” He rakes his claws through his hair. “That’s what I am, I’m a- a sadistic monster, okay, I always have been.”

“Stop it, don’t say that!” Jimmy protests, his heart twisting. “You’re not- people actually sign up for those games, you know. And it’s not like death is permanent, it doesn’t matter-”

“So?” Tango interrupts harshly. He jumps off the bed and starts pacing. “What- does that make any difference? Doesn’t matter if people enjoy them, okay, my- my reason for making them is wrong. Designing games is fun, sure, but I- that’s never what it’s been about. I like to make players struggle, and suffer, and die in the end. I like to watch them experience pain and fear in a trap of my own creation. I like the feeling of control it gives me. No matter how you look at it, that’s- I- I’m messed up.”

Jimmy can’t take this anymore. He rises to his feet. “Tango, stop, that’s enough,” he says, his voice stern. “I know I haven’t known you very long, but-”

“Yeah,” Tango snaps, rounding on Jimmy, “you haven’t! That’s the whole problem! I’ve kept a huge chunk of my life secret from you, my own soulmate. I’ve kept it from the Hermits, too- my friends of nearly a decade. I’ve deceived and lied to everyone I ever cared about. I’ve pretended to be this- this benevolent game maker who just wants everyone to have a good time, I’ve kept so much of who I really am hidden ‘cause I knew that if you guys ever saw the real me, you’d hate me.”

Jimmy’s mind is reeling. Tango’s clever eye for game design is something Jimmy’s always loved about him, the way he could create fun challenges even amidst the throes of a death game. After all, the first time they really interacted was when Jimmy died to his ‘Dare to Flare’ challenge back on the Third Life world. And that had been a laughably simple game compared to some of the things he’s done on Hermitcraft.

Even though it ended up costing Jimmy a life, the rush of adrenaline had been thrilling. And even though in hindsight, he knew it was a deliberate ploy by Tango to thin out his competitor’s lives, Jimmy’s never resented him for it.

So to suddenly realize there might’ve been more to it… that Tango might’ve actually enjoyed watching him burn to death- beyond the simple satisfaction of having outsmarted his competition, of course- is… unsettling, to say the least.

(What a start to a relationship!)

(The red flags have been there from day one.)

(A sadist and a liar, lucky you.)

But nevertheless, Jimmy holds his ground. “I don’t hate you.”

Tango tenses. “You should.”

“No, I wouldn’t,” Jimmy insists. “I love you, Tango.”

“No, you don’t!” Tango snarls, and the hurt in his voice is raw and ragged and bleeding. His eyes are burning with rage, and Jimmy’s almost certain that if it weren’t for the collar, he’d be on fire right now. “Alright? Just shut up! You love this- this version of me that I’ve presented, okay, this lie I’ve been living. You love Tango the friendly redstoner, who makes ridiculous high-pitched noises when he’s flustered and who’s funny when he’s mad and who can’t fight his way out of a one-block hole. You don’t love the sadistic blaze hybrid that sets things on fire and- and rips people’s throats out with his fucking teeth, don’t be stupid!”

The silence that follows is deafening.

(And there it is!)

(Finally showing his true colors.)

(He did try to tell you…)

For a moment, Jimmy is too stunned to speak. Tango’s never yelled at him before, not seriously, and the sting of his words is almost a physical thing.

Tango seems just as shocked at his outburst as Jimmy is, his face paling as his anger quickly extinguishes. The next words out of Tango’s mouth are almost guaranteed to be an apology, but Jimmy isn’t letting him off that easily.

“Now hang on just a second,” Jimmy says lowly. “You don’t get to tell me how I feel about you. I’m a grown player. I’m not some poor, innocent idiot that you’ve manipulated into loving you, alright? And it hurts that you’d think so little of me, that I’d stand here and just lie about my feelings to you.”

(Ooh, someone finally grew a backbone-)

Jimmy silences the thought, violently forcing it out of his mind. He’s got no patience for that sort of thing right now.

“I’m sorry,” Tango whispers, “I didn’t-”

“And what’s more,” Jimmy continues, gaining steam, “do you really think I’m the type of person to judge someone so harshly for things outta their control? You honestly think I’m some- some shallow, heartless jerk who’d turn on you, just like that? Or- for that matter, you think the Hermits would? After ten years of friendship, you have that little faith in them?”

Tango’s eyes widen. “No, no it’s- it’s not like that,” he says quickly. “I didn’t mean-”

“I don’t care that you’re from Hels,” Jimmy presses, taking a step forward. “I don’t care what you did in the past, or that you kept it from me. I don’t care if some random guy thinks you’re just the manifestation of all his evil- frankly, I think that says more about him than it does about you.” He comes to a stop in front of Tango. “I love you. The teeth, the claws, the death fascination or- or whatever you wanna call it- I love all of it. All of you. And I wish more than anythin’ they hadn’t got that damn collar on you, so you could feel that love through our soulbond. But you’ve felt it before, right? Before I knew? Well um, it hasn’t changed, I promise you that.”

Tango stares back up at him. Now that the anger’s gone, he just looks scared. “You don’t-” His voice breaks. “You can’t.”

“Yes, I do,” Jimmy answers, unwavering. As difficult as this conversation has been, this part’s easy. “I promise, cross my heart.”

Tango shudders, squeezing his eyes shut for a moment. “Please,” he whispers, “don’t… I can’t- if I let myself think that but you don’t mean it, I- I can’t handle that. Please. Just tell me now, okay, get it over with…”

Understanding settles over Jimmy. Creasing his brows, he takes a slow, deliberate step forward. “I mean it,” he says, lifting a hand to cup Tango’s cheek.

Tango trembles, but he doesn’t move away. He swallows, licks his lips. “Say it again?” he asks, almost a plea, his eyes darting to take in every inch of Jimmy’s face- like he’s unsure whether he can truly believe what he’s seeing, almost searching for any hint, any trace of doubt in Jimmy’s expression.

There isn’t any. Jimmy leans in. “I love you.”

Something glimmers in Tango’s eyes; a warm light Jimmy hasn’t seen since before the ranch burned. 

Something like hope.

Love rises inside Jimmy like a wave- love and the sorrow of shared grief, the fierce determination to withstand it, and the agony of all the past suffering he can’t take away. It’s overwhelming and exhilarating, this sudden rush of emotion. A whirling maelstrom that makes his head spin. But his love burns brightly through it all, a sole lantern against the storm.

Maybe he can’t make Tango believe he’s worthy of love. But he can give it anyway.

Jimmy moves slowly, tilting his face down towards Tango’s. He keeps his eyes open until the very last second, giving Tango plenty of time to move away or say something to stop him, to give any sign at all that he isn’t feeling the same.

There isn’t any. Their lips meet gently, like a familiar greeting. Like the way sunlight falls through the window every morning.

And just like that, the dam breaks. Suddenly Tango’s kissing him back, fervently, pushing against him. Jimmy’s legs hit the bed and buckle, sending him backwards, Tango falling on top of him. His hands cling to Jimmy’s shirt, twisting in the fabric, and his tears wet Jimmy’s face, salt on his tongue. Above the pounding of his heart in his ears, he can just make out the words Tango’s murmuring between kisses, breathless and desperate.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I love you.”

Jimmy pulls him impossibly closer, whispering, “I never doubted.”

They don’t need words after that.

~*~

“Jeeze, they weren’t kidding,” Tango mutters, taking in the ranch with wide eyes.

The ranch looks even worse than Jimmy had been imagining. Nearly the entire first floor is gone, just a wide-open plot and their lonely front door sitting ajar. Aside from the odd block here and there, it’s just empty. A couple trapdoors from the furniture in the living room. The smooth stone slabs that made up their kitchen countertops. An occasional unbroken glass pane floating where there used to be windows.

It’s not a home anymore, not by any stretch of the imagination.

Up the intact cobblestone staircase, the second floor has only fared slightly better. Some of the walls are still standing, charred and moth-eaten as they are. He thinks most of the bathroom’s interior was spared, as it was primarily made of different stone materials. Polished andesite and the like. The chests in their storage room made it, of course, even though the room itself didn’t. And their bedroom seems to have gotten the worst of it. From down here, he thinks it might just be the bed itself that’s left.

The roof is gone, leaving their cobblestone chimney awkwardly sticking up from the ground to nowhere. The path up to the house and the surrounding fields have been torn up to make a ditch. Necessary as it was, it’s quite the eyesore. And to top it all off, one of the custom trees that Scar helped build has been hastily chopped down, due to its proximity to the nearby forest. There’s just a couple of logs and solitary leaves left floating in the air.

It hurts. Everywhere Jimmy looks, there’s another source of heartache. Another precious memory that’s been turned to ash. It’s almost enough to bring tears to his eyes.

But he’s also aware of Tango standing beside him. He knows how much Tango is already beating himself up for the fire, and the last thing he wants to do is add to that guilt.

Jimmy turns to give Tango a rueful grin. “Talk about your fixer-uppers, ey?”

Tango exhales slowly. “Man, it’s so…” He glances at Jimmy, expression pinched. “I’m sorry, you worked so hard-”

“It’s fine,” Jimmy says, shrugging. “It’s just a building.”

Tango hesitates. “It’s… alright to be upset. This was our home, and I- I got all ‘rahhhrr angry-burny rage mode’ on it and-”

“Not your fault,” Jimmy says, voice gentle but firm. He puts a hand on Tango’s shoulder. “If anyone’s to blame, it’s the Hels fellas for attackin’ us in the first place.”

Tango makes a noncommittal noise, scuffing the upturned dirt with his boot. “Sure.”

It’s clear he’s not convinced, but Jimmy leaves it there for now. Their conversation from yesterday is going to take some time to fully sink in. He crosses over to a haphazardly-placed double chest near the front of the ranch and crouches beside it, lifting the lid with a creak.

“Martyn said everything they were able to save is in this chest here, let’s see…” He rummages through the chest’s inventory. A lot of it is random junk; miscellaneous blocks, half-stacks of wheat, dropped weapons and armor from the fight. But there are a few good finds, like some of the clothes from their closet, a couple of flower pots, one of his framed embroidery pieces...

“Oh, hey, look at this!” Jimmy calls excitedly. “My gloves!”

He pulls the gloves out, looking up from the chest to see Tango standing over him. His eyes widen when he sees them- happily surprised at first, and then the familiar dawning of guilt and regret.

“You uh… maybe I should take those back, for now,” Tango says quietly, his ears lowered. “Or- or maybe just forever, yeah.”

“Ey, stop it, no take-backs,” Jimmy chastises him, slipping the gloves on. “Gloves couldn’t have prevented that fire, anyways. And I like wearin’ ‘em, because that way it’s sorta like I’m holdin’ your hand all the time.”

A grin tugs at Tango’s mouth. “Aw, that’s real cheesy, honey,” he teases, even as a faint blush colors his cheeks.

“Yeah, but I mean it,” Jimmy says loftily. “I’m keepin’ them.”

Tango holds his hands up, chuckling. “Alright, alright…” His gaze travels back towards the ranch, up towards the storage room with its rows of chests. “Guess we should still have plenty of materials to rebuild, huh?”

“Should do, yeah,” Jimmy says, straightening up. Having the gloves back is an immediate comfort, despite the fact he’d only gone two days without them. He foldings his arms, gaze sweeping critically over the remains of the ranch. “I guess for now, we’ll just focus on the structure? Y’know, get the place liveable again and worry ‘bout the decor and landscapin’ later…”

“Oh, that’s what you think!”

The loud voice makes them both jump. Jimmy whirls around to see Bdubs- of course, because there’s absolutely no mistaking that voice.

“Bdubs!” Jimmy laughs, clutching his heart. “What- what’re you doin’ here?”

Bdubs puts his hands on his hips. “I- I can’t believe what I’m- ‘no interior decor’, yeah right! You’re not gonna get outta that very- so easy! I tell you!”

Tango snickers. Luckily Bdubs’s sudden appearance hasn’t seemed to cause more than a brief startle. “Oh, yeah? You gonna help out, then, shorty?” 

“Hey!” Bdubs barks incredulously- though it’s clear from his expression he’s not really upset. “I’m tryin’ t- augh, n’you- you stu- yes. Yes, yes, I’m here to help, of course. For goodness sakes. I- how kind, are I! Sweet, kind Bdubs…”

“And handsome, too,” Jimmy adds cheekily.

That makes Bdubs beam, puffing his chest out. “Yeahhh, c’mon baby!”

“Don’t encourage him,” Tango groans.

“Oh, stop it!” Bdubs huffs. “Anyway, Impulse would’ve come, of course, but he and Etho- the redstone guys, you know, uh, they’re havin’ a- a- little chat, little brainy-thing… brainstormin’ ‘bout the portal stuff with Grian. But never thy fear! I saw you guys head out and, in my eternal wiseness, have already called in the forcements!”

Jimmy exchanges an amused look with Tango. “Well, any help is appreciated,” he amends.

“Sure about that, Timmy?” calls Joel’s voice, as the man himself appears over the hill.

And he’s not alone. Cleo’s taller figure looms over him, Scott and Pearl walking on either side of her as a small pack of wolves weave between their legs. The trio is followed by Martyn, Bigb, and Ren- the latter seeming to have recovered his friendly disposition and wagging tail. Finally, Scar emerges from behind a tree to round out the group, calling out a cheerful, “Hello there!”

Joel comes to a stop next to Bdubs and claps him on the shoulder. “We figured you two could use the help, what with you not bein’ builders and all.” Cheeky man.

Jimmy snorts. “Gee, thanks,” he says sarcastically. But slights at their building skills aside, he’s actually quite touched.

Tango blinks. “You guys… all came to help out?” he asks, sounding amazed. 

“Of course!” Bdubs declares. “We ha- we help!”

Cleo shrugs, giving a hapless grin. “You know, I- I- I really don’t know… why Bdubs invited me? I’m not that great a builder. But I can supervise, I guess? And- and heckle. Always heckle.”

“And reach tha’ tall bits,” Scott offers, lightly elbowing her hip.

“And reach the tall bits,” Cleo laughs. “Right. Yes.”

“It’s the least we can do,” Martyn chimes in, slinging an arm around Bigb’s shoulders, “since that portal stuff is way over my head.”

Bdubs pulls a face. “Uh…” He speaks to Jimmy and Tango behind his hand, despite making no effort to lower his voice at all- for comedic effect. “Normally, I would’ve offered my perfect redstone prowess to uh, to help the other guys out with their little portal thing, you know, but eugh- I knew someone would have ta’ keep all these jokers in line.”

“Ah, of course,” Tango replies sagely.

“Well?” Bdubs turns expectantly to the others, throwing his arms up. “Get movin’ then! Sheesh! Stand around, waitin’ for- for no raisin…”

“Yes, my liege,” Cleo drawls, rolling their eyes.

Ren claps his big paws together. “Yeah, we’re burnin’ daylight, my dudes!”

Pearl’s fuzzy wings unfurl from beneath her red cloak. “Let’s see what we’re workin’ with!” she says excitedly, fluttering up to the storage room.

Just like that, the other Double Lifers descend on the husk of the ranch. Placing down temporary chests and crafting benches, sorting through the remaining resources, filling in the ditch with dirt. Multiple conversations start up immediately as everyone sets to a task, and the atmosphere is comfortable- even if a bit strange.

Jimmy can’t recall a time when this many of them have worked on a project together. Not on Third Life, not on Last Life, not here. Something like this just wouldn’t be possible during a death game. Large gatherings between different groups are always fraught with tension and uncertainty, by the fear of a trap or a backstab or a fight breaking out.

But it’s nice. Pearl is hovering above the second floor, working with Cleo to build the walls back up while Scott prepares some stairs and slabs for detailing. Scar and Bdubs are already bickering about how to do the landscaping while Joel grumbles at them, waist-deep in the ditch with Bigb and Martyn placing dirt. Ren’s started tearing down the damaged trees, clearing room for replanting, and Pearl’s wolves mill about, filling the air with curious sniffs and yips.

Tango’s watching the scene unfold with wide eyes, and it suddenly occurs to Jimmy that this is the most people Tango’s been around since the difficult conversation at spawn. Impulse was checking on them throughout the rest of the day, of course, and a few of the other players stopped by now and again, but not in big groups or anything.

Jimmy steps closer to Tango. “Is this okay?” he asks softly.

Tango looks at him in surprise. A smile spreads across his face, and he takes Jimmy’s hand. “Yeah,” he murmurs. “Yeah, it is.”

Jimmy smiles back. “Then let’s get in there.”

~*~

Jimmy lets out a low whistle. “Dang, this looks even better than before!” he says, craning his head to look around the room.

After a full day of building and the gradual dispersal of the other Double Lifers, Jimmy and Tango are now seeing their new bedroom for the first time. They were around for the bulk of the structure building, but once it came time for the interior, Bdubs and Scar had insisted it be a surprise. Everything about it is perfect, from the custom furniture to the quilted wool rug to the fancy frame Scar built around their double-wide bed.

Tango clears his throat. “Maybe, uh- maybe we can just…” He kicks one of the beds with the toe of his boot. “... scooch this over a little…”

“Nope,” Jimmy declares, sweeping Tango off the floor and onto the bed. “Nice try, mate, but you’re stayin’ right here next to me.”

“Okay, okay, fine! I ju- don’t say I didn’t warn you!” Tango huffs, but he’s grinning as he says it.

~*~

“Alright, fellas,” Grian says, clapping his hands together, “here’s what we’ve got so far…”

Jimmy leans forward, resting his elbows on his knees. Tango is a little tense beside him- probably just nerves. But it could be worse. They’re gathered in the living room of Impulse and Bdubs’s house; Grian perched on the arm of the sectional across from Jimmy and Tango, Impulse and Etho sitting adjacent to them. The familiar setting and fairly limited company seems to have helped put Tango more at ease for what might end up being a tricky conversation.

“We’re... pretty sure we know how the Hels peeps got here,” Grian continues, “but there are a few things we need to clarify, first.” He glances at Etho, inclining his head. “Etho, you wanna explain?”

“Oh yeah, yeah.” Etho stands up. “Tango, may I see your comm, please? I uh, just need to look at it for a minute.”

Tango blinks. Anxiety flashes across his face for just a brief second before disappearing. “Oh. Uh, sure?” He pulls the item from his inventory, holding it out.

Etho takes the communicator. “So,” he begins, sitting back down, “you said that in Hels, players can’t make portals with their communicators, right?”

Tango gives a short nod. “That’s right. That comm isn’t the one I spawned with, they took that from me at Hels Tek. X made me a new one, after I got to Hermitcraft.” He gives a dry laugh. “I told him- I told him I lost it. Which, I mean, that’s- it’s technically not a lie, just... not the whole truth.”

Jimmy gives him a sympathetic look. He might no longer be worried that the others will reject him, but this still can’t be easy to talk about.

Etho studies the communicator, his mismatched eyes narrowed in concentration. “So after you got a new comm, you were able to use it to make portals?”

“Yeah,” Tango says, “it uh, it’s taken me to each Hermitcraft world and everything in between, no problem. Hubs, solo worlds, creative- you name it.”

Etho hums. “Can you use your comm to travel to Hels?”

“No.” Tango glances away. “I’ve looked for it, a few times. Never shows up.”

That brings a couple more questions to mind, but Jimmy files them away for later.

“Interesting.” Etho seems to be delving deep into the communicator’s hardware, typing rapidly. “So uh, the portal issue isn’t centered on players that spawn in Hels, just their communicators. And since overworld communicators can’t find Hels, there must be something about the world itself preventing it.”

Tango knits his brows together. “I suppose…?”

It’s at this point that Grian leans forward. “Have either of you heard about firewalls?” he asks.

Tango shakes his head, but Jimmy’s heart jolts. He has heard that word before; just the other day, when he thought he heard Grian’s voice in his head. But that’s not exactly something Jimmy wants to bring up right now. Or ever, maybe. His weird, random, intrusive thoughts don’t need to be anyone else’s problem.

“Um…” Jimmy pretends to think about it for a moment. “I think I’ve heard the term somewhere before, but I- I dunno what that actually means.”

“Right.” Grian spreads his hands. “So firewalls are a sort of added security measure that admins can use when making a new world. It’s like, an impenetrable barrier ‘round the world that makes it basically impossible for anyone unauthorized to join via portal.”

“Wait, really?” Tango asks, eyes widening. “What- why haven’t I heard about this? Do all worlds have these?”

Grian makes a noncommittal noise. “Well, firewalls are kinda outdated. Developments in server security and comm travel have basically rendered them obsolete. I mean, when’s the last time you heard of a private world being raided, besides ours?” He shrugs. “Plus, it’s a real tedious process to set one up, so they aren’t used often. Mostly for multiplayer worlds that are invite-only, if an admin is particularly concerned about hackers.”

Jimmy holds out a hand. “So wait, hang on, this- what’s this got to do with our situation?”

Impulse catches his eye. “If you try to join a firewalled world without permission, it doesn’t show up on your comm.”

“Oh,” Tango says, realization dawning in his expression. “You think Hels has a firewall?”

“It’s the only thing I can think of,” Grian says, nodding. “However, it’s a bit odd, ‘cause firewalls are usually just one-way… meaning that they keep players out, but they don’t stop players from leaving. So if that’s what’s goin’ on with Hels, it’s a firewall unlike any I’ve ever heard of- where it’s meant to keep players in, too. I’m not exactly sure if that’s why comms made in Hels can’t make portals, or if that’s due to something else entirely, but uh, that’s my best guess.”

Tango runs a hand through his hair. “That’s… I mean, this is the first I’ve heard of firewalls, but that doesn’t sound impossible…”

“So,” Jimmy speaks up hesitantly, “so how did the Hels Tek guys open a portal here?”

“How, indeed?” Etho repeats, finally looking up from Tango’s communicator. “Well, we know the portal was red, not purple. That’s like a comm portal, the way their light syncs up with the world they lead to. But uh, you know, the players coming through had items and armor on them, and they didn’t show up at world spawn. Their spawns didn’t reset, either, they uh- they kept spawning back on the other side. That makes me think this was actually a hacked nether portal, not a comm portal.”

Tango frowns. “Hang on, we- we didn’t have nether portals in Hels, either. I mean, how- there was no point, the nether and the overworld were combined into one realm.”

“Right.” Etho’s got that look in his eye- the glint of an idea about to take off. Jimmy’s seen it in Tango countless times. “You know how nether portals work?”

Tango coughs into his fist. “Oh, right, of course I know all the uh, super technical skadoodle bits, but- but maybe you should go over it.” He jerks his head towards Jimmy and Grian. “You know, for these uh, non-redstone people here.”

“Please do,” Jimmy chuckles.

Etho’s eyes crinkle upwards, like he’s smiling behind his mask. “Basically, they grab the coordinates they’re made on and translate it to nether coords, and vice versa. From what you’ve told me about Hels, being a fusion of the nether and overworld realms, a nether portal couldn’t work ‘cause it’d be like… giving it coords to a place it already is? It’d just crash and never ignite. But if you gave a nether portal frame coordinates to a different place… like, say, a different world…”

Even with Jimmy’s scarce knowledge of portals, it’s easy enough to catch Etho’s meaning.

“That’s crazy,” Tango protests. “How’d they- how could they possibly have gotten coordinates to Double Life?”

“I don’t think they did. I think they got coords to you.” Etho leans forward. “Think about it. The portal didn’t open at spawn, it opened down the hill from the ranch- where you were. I think that was intentional, considering you’re the whole reason they came.”

Jimmy’s mind is spinning. “But... how? And how’d you figure all this out?”

Etho shrugs a shoulder. “Uh, educated guess? Like, just kinda based on the things Bravo said, and what Tango’s told us about Hels and the players it spawns. But um, looking at his comm just now basically confirms it for me.”

“Wait, really?” Tango asks, surprised. “How?”

Etho tilts his head. “Communicators are pretty special items. They’re unique to the player they spawn with- even a replacement communicator like this one. It might not have the hard locks on it that prevent it from summoning portals, but it’s still unique to you. And based on its data, I can tell your player data is a little different. I think it has to do with you being from Hels.”

Tango hesitates. “Okay, and…?”

“If you and Bravo are really counterparts,” Etho says, “then I’d expect your data to be similar. Like, the same word in different languages, in a metaphorical sense. So if Bravo’s data was fed into a nether portal, it’d translate it to your data, and open a portal at your coords. Plus or minus a few blocks, probably.”

Jimmy knits his brows together. “So… you’re sayin’ they used Bravo to open a portal to Tango?” he surmises.

Etho nods. “I’d need Bravo’s comm or a look at his player data to confirm, but that’s my best guess, yeah.” He holds the communicator back out to Tango.

Tango stashes the communicator in his inventory. “So wait, what about- how does the firewall thing factor in, here?” he asks. “If it stops comm portals, wouldn’t it stop a nether portal, too?”

“Yes and no,” Grian answers. “A firewall works by constantly scanning for portals. If it finds one trying to form, it’ll crash it. If a nether portal was used to travel between different worlds, rather than two realms on the same world, a firewall would recognize it all the same.”

“But,” Etho continues, “if they somehow figured out how to stabilize the portal… like, by sending a constant stream of updates… it’d constantly reset the scanner of the firewall. Sort of like an update suppressor. That way, the uh, the firewall can never actually register the portal as a problem and shut it down. So that’d be one way they could keep a hacked nether portal open, even in the face of a firewall.”

Tango exhales slowly. “Okay…” he says, “and how do we stop them from doing that ever again?”

Impulse winces. “That, we’re not sure about. I mean, if Bravo wasn’t there for them to grab a signal from, I guess that’d stop them. However they built a portal, it probably needs his data to function.”

“Oh, well, great.” Tango throws his hands up. “No way he won’t help them again, he hates my guts. Only reason they haven’t come back yet is ‘cause Grian locked the world down, I- I guarantee it. But we can’t just all stay locked in here forever, you’ve all got lives and other worlds to get back to.”

Jimmy frowns, putting a hand on Tango’s shoulder. “Tango, anyone who’s got a problem with you has a problem with all of us.”

“For sure,” Grian agrees.

“Besides,” Impulse says, shrugging, “not to toot our own horns or anything, but I think we handled ourselves just fine against them.”

“You mean Pearl’s wolves handled them,” Tango says flatly. “And you guys had the element of surprise. I guarantee the only reason they went down so easy is ’cause they weren’t expecting much resistance. They show up again, now knowing what they’re up against, and that’s- that’s gonna turn out a whole lot differently.” He crossed his arms. “I need to leave, before Grian opens the world back up.”

“And what, just wait for them to come after you?” Jimmy demands, his wings puffing up. “Absolutely not.”

Tango makes an unhappy noise in the back of his throat. “It’s- you understand it’s only a matter of time, right?” he stresses. “Maybe it won’t be right after Grian lifts the lockdown, okay, maybe it’ll be days, or weeks, or months. Either way, it’ll happen eventually, and when it does… whether it’s- if that happens here, or back on Hermitcraft, or the next Life world... the result will be the same. People I care about will get caught in the crossfire, I- I’m not lettin’ that happen again.”

Jimmy pauses, wings drooping. The distress in Tango’s voice is sobering. There’s no question that Tango cares fiercely about his friends, and the guilt for putting them in harm’s way must be staggering. But still, he insists, “We don’t mind stayin’ put-”

“For how long, though?” Tango asks pointedly. “I can’t ask you guys to stay here forever. Like, I- I can’t stress enough how obsessive Atlas is. He came for me after ten years, okay, he’s not gonna just give up or lose interest. There will always be the risk of them opening another portal to me, so long as Bravo is in Hels.”

“So what if Bravo wasn’t in Hels?” Impulse cuts in.

Tango gives him a confused look. “What do you mean?”

Impulse’s eyes are alight with excitement as he gains steam with his idea. “What if we went to Hels and got him out? That way, he’s not mad at you for being stuck there anymore, right, and Hels Tek can’t use him to make another portal.”

“What, you mean we open a portal to Hels?” Tango asks, raising his eyebrows. “I- I thought we already established that our comms can’t take us there, what- how are we supposed to get there?”

“The same way they got here,” Etho says. “We use your data to open a hacked nether portal to Bravo. Ahah.”

As intimidating as the prospect of encountering Hels Tek again is, Jimmy has to admit it’s probably the only solution. They can’t just ignore the problem and hope it goes away, not if it means Tango could get randomly attacked at any moment. And with all of the Double Lifers together, they stand a much better chance of succeeding.

“That’s a great idea!” Jimmy exclaims. “We grab him, shake Atlas down for the key to the collar while we’re at it, and get out. Problem solved.”

Tango doesn’t seem nearly as enthused. “No way. Absolutely no way. That’s- that’s way too dangerous, if you guys get stranded there- and Atlas is already looking for more hybrids to make farms with, he was about to take Jimmy for a feather farm!”

A brief silence follows this revelation.

Grian grimaces, ruffling his wings. “Oh, woof.”

“What?” Impulse asks, taken aback. “That’s why he had Jimmy chained up, too?”

Jimmy blinks. “Oh, is that what he meant?”

“What’d you th- you didn’t know?” Tango asks incredulously.

Jimmy holds his hands up. “Hey, hey, I didn’t spend much time thinkin’ about what he said to me!” he says sheepishly. “I was more concerned about you.”

Tango pinches the bridge of his nose. “Oh. Oh, great. Well yeah, that’s what he wanted you for, to stick you in a feather farm skadoodler for all eternity.”

Jimmy swallows. No wonder Tango’s been so against the idea of them going against Hels Tek again. Death is no big deal- they’d simply respawn. Few injuries cause lasting damage. But being trapped in a farm like that, with no means to escape…

“Well,” he says, “that still doesn’t change my mind. You’re his number one target, okay, you can’t go without backup.”

“No,” Tango huffs. “Let me do it. I- I know Bravo shouldn’t just be left there forever, but that’s not your guys’ faults! It’s my life, my mistake, you guys shouldn’t be putting yourselves at risk like that-”

“Tango,” Jimmy interrupts, “we’re not gonna make a portal to Hels and just send you through alone-”

“Well, I’m not letting you guys come with me!” Tango shoots back. “Most of you guys are hybrids or monsters, too, and I’m not gonna risk Atlas turning you into farms.”

Grian clicks his tongue. “Ey, we wouldn’t let that happen.”

“Yeah,” Jimmy says, “and what’s the alternative? You just take off to some solo world until Hels Tek comes a’knockin’?”

Tango shrugs. “I mean, I’d be fine with that-”

“No,” Jimmy says firmly. “I’m not lettin’ that happen. This is our only option, to put this problem to bed forever, and we stand the best chance if we do it together. We have to take it.” He grabs Tango’s hand. “Please, Tango.”

Tango hesitates, staring at their intertwined hands.

Now more than ever, Jimmy desperately wishes that he had some sense of what Tango’s thinking- even just the slightest insight to his thoughts, the faintest impression of an emotion through their soulbond. Especially since he’s had his confidence in reading Tango so thoroughly shaken over the last week. It’s scary to consider that he might not know Tango nearly half as well as he should, that Tango can so effectively mask his true feelings even from him.

“... fine,” Tango says, after a small eternity. “Fine, okay, we- let’s plan an invasion to Hels, sure.”

Jimmy gasps. “Really?”

“But,” Tango says warningly, “we gotta go about this extremely carefully, alright? No willy-nilly ‘rushing in blindly without a plan’ nonsense. And- and once we’re there, if at any point I tell you guys to flee, you- you best be fleein’, got it? With extra flee. No stupid heroics of noble stupidness.”

It’s a chance. That’s better than nothing. “Yes, alright!” Jimmy cheers. “Thank you!”

(Yay, we’re going to Hels- said no one ever.)

(Do they know what they’re getting into?)

(Oh boy, here we go.)

Etho shrugs. “Whatever you say, Tango, you’re the uh, you’re the Hels expert, here.”

Impulse folds his arms. “That’s a dirty condition you kinda tacked on the end, there,” he mutters, “but I’ll accept it.”

“Alright then.” Tango gives a tired sigh, but the corners of his mouth are curling into a smile. “I- I guess we’re doin’ this. We’ve got some room in the basement at the ranch, we can build it there.”

“Excellent.” Grian grins. “Let’s build a portal to Hels, fellas.”

~*~

Jimmy’s startled awake by a shout.

Heart pounding, he squints into the dark room. As his eyes struggle to adjust in the scarce light, he can just barely make out Tango sitting upright in bed. His rapid, shallow breaths wheeze through clenched teeth, faint sparks emitting from his dim blaze rods as they try to ignite.

“Tango,” Jimmy whispers, sitting up, “you okay?”

Tango’s breathing hitches. Then he turns to collapse against Jimmy’s chest, clinging fiercely to his shirt. His entire body is trembling. “Nightmare,” he manages to get out.

Jimmy’s heart twists. He knew it was only a matter of time, but that doesn’t make it any easier to see. Gently, he wraps his arms around Tango, then his wings for good measure. “I got ya,” he murmurs. “I’m here.”

Tango tucks his face against Jimmy’s shoulder and falls silent. Maybe he’ll want to talk about it in the morning, maybe he won’t. But for now, Jimmy just holds him, and hopes that’s enough.

~*~

Jimmy stares at the redstone circuitry laid out before him. “I understand none of this.”

Though it’s only been a few days since they started work on the portal, they’ve already made a lot of progress. Impulse and Etho have been over basically around the clock, with Bdubs and Joel tagging along more often than not. They’ll watch the redstoners work until they get bored, and inevitably wander upstairs to bug Jimmy. Grian checks in on them every now and then, and the other Double Lifers have popped by for little visits, so it’s been a lot of activity at the ranch. Lots of people coming and going.

It’s strange, but not necessarily in a bad way. Almost like an actual pleasant community feeling. Neighbors helping neighbors and all that.

A dedicated digging session has left them with a bit more space in the basement, allowing them to section off a separate room from Tango’s sugar cane farm. They finished it with a stone floor and simple wooden walls at Bdubs’s insistence (he considered it unacceptable to just leave it all as freshly-dug dirt). An obsidian portal frame (complete with corners at Etho’s insistence) stands empty against the back wall, leaving abundant floor space for the redstone- of which there is plenty.

Redstone dust wires criss-cross through rows of repeaters and hopper lines. It’s all far beyond Jimmy’s capacity to understand, of course, but even Tango seems a bit baffled. He’s claimed many times that his understanding of redstone is surface-level at best, and that his real skill comes in applying the various components and systems in creative ways. But he’s at least been able to help with the construction, the actual placing of redstone components.

“Right,” Tango laughs, running a hand through his hair. “Let’s- lemme see if I’ve got this right…” He points at a long line of redstone dust. “Main circuit to the portal.”

Impulse nods. “Yep.” 

Tango steps gingerly around the redstone, gesturing towards a rather complex looking amalgamation of observers and comparators. “This nonsense over here will turn my skadoodle bits into a fireable signal.”

Etho, leaned against the wall with his hands in his pockets, chuckles. “Pretty much.”

“And this,” Tango waves at the hoppers, “will count out the final coords before they hop on the main bus line to the portal.”

Jimmy nods hesitantly. “Okay… okay, cool, so- so is it done, then?”

“Not quite,” Impulse says. “We need a player detector.”

Tango creases his brows together. “What, like a- like a pufferfish? A skulk sensor?”

“No, more like a- a whole separate system,” Etho explains. “It’s more than just registering your presence. We need something that can read your data, pick out your coordinates, and send them to the portal for translation to Bravo.”

Tango exhales slowly. “That… sounds pretty complicated.”

“Oh, it will be,” Impulse says, folding his arms. “I mean, just think about how much data each player contains, right, all the codes that dictate our behavior and biology… we don’t wanna overload this thing, so it’ll require some heavy-duty filtering.”

“Not only that,” Etho continues, “but uh, if that firewall thing turns out to be a problem, we’re gonna have to figure out a way to stabilize the portal, too. That’ll take some tinkering with different power sources til we find the exact right input to override the firewall’s checker.”

Jimmy winces; he’d been hoping for a quicker solution. It’s already been over a week since the invasion, and he knows Tango hates being stalled. The sooner they get this problem taken care of, the sooner they can stop worrying and get back to their normal lives. Jimmy himself doesn’t have anywhere else to be, but the other Double Lifers do. And even if they don’t mind the unexpected stay-cation, it definitely bothers Tango that their lives have been disrupted for his sake. Goodness knows he’s already got enough of a guilt complex.

But Tango simply gives a bemused smile. “Well, let’s get started, then.”

~*~

“Are we really sure we wanna do this?”

Jimmy winces at Tango’s tone. “I know, I know,” he says regretfully, “it wasn’t my favorite idea either. But if it can get that collar off’a you, we gotta try, right?”

Trying to remove the collar manually had resulted in a sharp, shooting pain through Tango’s neck at the slightest movement. Trying to remove it with redstone had proven unsuccessful- clearly, it was designed to be insulated against any outside signals. Trying to pick the lock had resulted in nothing but a lot of frustration. So that left them with their last resort.

They’ve moved outside, round the back of the ranch, to avoid getting blood stains all over their newly refurbished house. A random bed has been placed down to provide them with a quick and easy respawn, their items temporarily stowed in a chest. Impulse holds a Sharpness V sword, tail flicking as he watches them apprehensively.

“I’m only gonna do this if you’re okay with it,” he tells Tango seriously. “We can go back to the drawing board, come up with some other things to try…”

“No, no,” Tango shakes his head, “I don’t- you shouldn’t be wasting time on this, you’re already working pretty much nonstop on the portal.”

The frustration in his voice is evident. Impulse frowns. “I don’t mind…”

“Well, I do!” Tango says, crossing his arms and glancing away.

Jimmy exchanges a look with Impulse before putting a gentle hand on Tango’s shoulder. “I know there’s a chance it won’t work,” he starts quietly, “and we’ll have killed ourselves for nothin’. No one likes gettin’ their head cut off. But it’ll be over quick, we’ll respawn straight back here, and then at least we’ll know we tried everything.”

Tango makes a noncommittal noise. “Hey, I- I’m not afraid of a little decapitation, alright, I just… I feel kinda bad putting you through this, you know?” Guilt creeps into his expression. “It’s not your neck that the stupid thing is stuck on. You shouldn’t have to-”

“We’re in this together,” Jimmy tells him steadily. “So if you’re willin’ to try it, I’m happy to die along with ya.”

Tango manages a faint laugh. “Jeeze, honey, you- you don’t have to make it sound so dramatic. We aren’t on a three-life system anymore.”

Jimmy shrugs. “Well, that’s how I feel! Honestly, if there’s even a chance this’ll get that thing off’a you, I’m down.”

“Alright.” Tango takes a quick, steadying breath. “Okay, I wanna try.” He glances at Impulse. “Uh- commence the chop-ificating, then, I guess.”

Impulse nods; he’s keeping his expression and general demeanor calm, reassuring. “Okay, then. So here’s what I’m gonna do…” He carefully sets the edge of his blade along the rim of Tango’s collar, so that the metal is just barely touching skin, and then pinches the collar between the fingers of his other hand. “I’ll give it one quick, clean slice, and try to pull the collar off your body, okay?”

Tango tilts his chin up. “Okay,” he whispers. He’s nervous, now; every muscle in his body is rigid.

Jimmy reaches for his hand. “I’ll be right there with ya.”

Impulse tightens his grip on the sword. “Tango, gimme a countdown whenever you’re ready.”

“Alright.” Tango exhales shakily, closing his eyes. “Five... four... three... two...”

Jimmy closes his eyes and squeezes Tango’s hand.

“One.”

Pain slices across Jimmy’s neck- an intense, searing burn, like he’s swallowed a bucket of lava. There’s a rush of vertigo, the world spinning off-kilter around him. He’s instantly thrust into darkness, that all-consuming void with which he’s rather familiar.

And then it’s over. He’s back, sitting on the bed with Tango in a piled heap of limbs. 

Jimmy sucks in a breath. Now that everything’s stopped spinning, he can see that the collar is still around Tango’s neck.

“Oh, babe,” he murmurs, sweeping Tango into a hug. “I’m sorry.”

Tango’s laugh is muffled against his shoulder. “Worth a shot, right?”

Impulse, standing a few feet away and holding a bloody sword, looks dismayed. “No good,” he says as he walks over, putting the sword away. “Your body respawned before I could pull the collar off. But uh, that’s… not the only issue.”

That makes Tango look over. “What is it?”

“I caught a look at the inner face of it,” Impulse says, frowning, “the part that’s actually touching your skin? And, um… it looks like there’s a bunch of little… spikes on the inside of the collar?”

“Spikes?” Jimmy repeats, raising his eyebrows.

“Yeah, I don’t know how else to describe them?” Impulse rubs the back of his neck. “Um, they’re black in color, not super big... probably thinner than my pinky finger but not like, needles or anything…”

“Oh.” Tango blinks. “It’s the thorns. They’re wither rose thorns. That’s how it works.”

Jimmy’s heart jolts. “What?”

Tango spreads his hands. “When Atlas locked the collar, it must’ve caused a- a bunch of thorns to pop out and dig into my neck. But they aren’t- they don’t have the full strength of wither rose, so that’s why I’m not getting the full wither effect, and after a while, you know, they sorta- they numb the area, so I don’t feel them. But when we start yanking on the collar, it forces them deeper into my skin, so it hurts.”

“Oh... my gosh,” Jimmy breathes, aghast. “That’s- that’s horrible!”

The whole concept of the collar is already inhumane- to treat a fellow sentient player like a simple animal. But this? This is just plain evil. 

Impulse seems to be trying very hard not to get upset again. “Well, then,” he says, voice tight. “That rules out my next suggestion, which was to just go at it with a few sharp axes. I don’t wanna like, hammer those thorns deeper into your neck...” His expression turns thoughtful. “What if we try and get something sharp between your neck and the collar, slice off the thorns all the way around? Then we could-”

“No,” Tango interrupts. “Look, I- I appreciate the help, but if we tweak this thing the wrong way, it could probably jab an artery, or puncture my trachea, and then I’d respawn and be right back at square one again! No, I- I think we’re done.”

Impulse looks like he wants to argue, but Jimmy catches his gaze, giving him an imploring look. 

“Alright,” Impulse relents. “I’m sorry it didn’t work out.”

“Yeah,” Jimmy says, “we’ll get that collar off, I promise.”

“It’s fine.” Tango’s avoiding Jimmy’s eyes. “It... might not be the worst thing, you know, to have my fire locked down. Considering our fancy new house and all.”

Oh, they can’t have that. Jimmy puts a hand on his shoulder. “Tango,” he says seriously, “your fire is a part of you, and I’m not gonna rest til we’ve got it back.”

Tango sighs, but when he looks up, his eyes are fond. “I know.”

Impulse exhales slowly. “Do you... wanna try and get the cuffs off, then?” he offers.

“What?” Tango jolts. “Why? They aren’t hurtin’ anything.”

Impulse holds up his hands. “Hey, it’s okay, I just thought... if they’re from that terrible place, maybe you’d wanna get rid of ‘em?”

“And y’know,” Jimmy chimes in, “it’d be a lot easier for someone else to crack them off ya, couple good swings with an axe, maybe…”

“That won’t work,” Tango says stiffly. “They’ve been on me for so long now, been through so many respawns that if I’m not the one to remove them, it- they’ll just keep coming back.” 

Impulse inhales through his teeth, understanding dawning in his eyes. “Oh, man.”

“Are you sure?” Jimmy asks, his heart sinking. He isn’t overly familiar with the universal rules that determine what does and doesn’t respawn along with a player, but Tango seems pretty certain.

“Yeah. They’re basically part of my data now.”

“Oh.”

The unspoken question is glaringly obvious: ‘why haven’t you removed them yet, then?’ The cuffs seem just as well-made as the collar, but surely there’s a way to cut through them. At least, he should’ve been able to find a way sometime during the last ten years- even if he wasn’t comfortable asking any of the Hermits to help him.

But Jimmy can tell Tango’s already hit his limit for today. It’s a subject he’s always avoided discussing in the past, so they’ll just have to wait until he’s ready.

(Oh, gonna make that mistake again?)

‘Shut up,’ Jimmy thinks.

~*~

“Need some help, hun?”

“Ack!” Jimmy gives a start, accidentally yanking out the feather he’d been teasing. He whirls around. “Tango!”

Tango holds his hands up. “Sorry, sorry!”

“Jeeze,” Jimmy laughs, catching his breath, “I- I thought you guys were still working on the portal!”

“Well, yeah,” Tango says, closing the door behind him, “but Etho thinks we need a redstone ore block and we didn’t have any layin’ around, so he and Impulse went mining.” He crosses over to sit on the bed, curiously studying the feathers strewn about. “Doin’ some preening?”

“Um...” Jimmy ducks his head sheepishly. “Yeah, just- just the uh, burned ones... they’re startin’ to itch.”

Tango gives him a sad smile. “Hey, it’s alright. You don’t have to hide it from me, I- I won’t get all weird mega guilt-trippy about it.”

Jimmy softens. “I just... I know you’ve been beating yourself up about it, that’s all.” He gazes at the burned feather in his hand. “It was an accident. I don’t blame you.”

“I know.” Tango runs a gentle hand over one of Jimmy’s wings. “Can… can I help?”

Jimmy smiles. “Sure.”

~*~ 

“Wait, are you serious?” Tango asks, eyes wide. “You think the portal’s ready to go? Right now?”

Grain nods. “Yeah, I do.”

Jimmy glances between them with raised eyebrows. They’d called Grian over for a little update on the current state of the portal project- now complete with the fancy player detector system that the redstoners have been painstakingly building over the past week. But once Etho explained that the final step was stabilization, Grian had dropped a bomb on them.

“I’ve uh… been doin’ some research,” Grian continues, “and I’m pretty sure that Hels has a firewall that’s just been sorta… inverted? It’s still a one-way barrier, it just stops players from making portals out rather than in. ‘Course, it’s still inaccessible by comm portal, but our little set-up here should circumvent that. Once we’ve gotten the portal to lock onto Bravo’s coords, there shouldn’t be anythin’ stopping it from forming.”

Etho scratches the side of his mask. “Well, if we don’t have to stabilize the portal, that’ll definitely simplify things,” he says. “We might actually have everything we need already.”

“Couldn’t hurt to fire it up,” Impulse agrees, glancing at Tango. “Just to give it a little test drive? If we do get a portal open, we can easily shut it down right after. We don’t have to actually go through it.”

Tango hesitates. “But wouldn’t Grian have to lift the lockdown?”

“Yeah, I will,” Grian amends. “But I’ve actually just finished settin’ up a firewall, so when I lift the lockdown, we’ll still be protected. We’ll be able to leave through any portal we want, but no one else can get in without bein’ on the whitelist.”

“Wait, really?” Tango looks surprised. “Why- did you let the others know? I- I’m sure they’ll wanna get back to their other worlds.”

“Ey, I only just finished it!” Grian defends. “I wanted to let you lot know first, so there wouldn’t be any panic or confusion if people started randomly leavin’ through portals. I’ll inform the others, but uh, I’m pretty sure they’ll wanna just stick around til we get this done. Especially if the portal’s ready to go. All that’ll be left to do is come up with our plan of attack, and we’ll need all hands on deck for the actual mission.”

“Yeah,” Impulse says easily, “Hermitcraft can wait.”

Tango chews his lip. “I… I guess we can try it,” he relents.

“Great!” Grian pulls his communicator out. “Gimme a second to lift the lockdown, okay…”

Jimmy turns to Tango, taking him by the hands. “Hey, is this alright?” he asks softly. “We don’t have to try it today if you don’t wanna.”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m alright,” Tango assures him, squeezing his hands. “It’s just- it’s a bit sooner than I was expecting, you know? But this is good. I mean, if this works, then this whole business will finally be over.”

Jimmy’s eyes trace the collar around Tango’s neck. “Yeah. And not a moment too soon.”

Obviously they’ve still got a pretty significant task ahead of them. It’ll be no easy feat to storm Hels Tek, not if they’ve got as much muscle backing them up as they did for the invasion. Atlas is one slippery fella, and it might be hard to get Bravo to listen to them long enough to cooperate. But getting the portal in working order is another hurdle down, so they can shift gears towards the impending mission. And once that’s done, there’ll no longer be a threat hanging over them.

Suffice to say, Jimmy’s looking forward to getting back to his domestic bliss.

“Okay,” Grian says, glancing up, “lockdown is officially lifted. Go ahead.”

“Alright, Tango.” Etho pushes away from the wall. “Uh, just hop onto the redstone ore block whenever you’re ready, I guess? Everything should be in place.”

Tango exhales shakily, looking nervous, but he manages to give Jimmy a smile. “Here goes nothin’...”

Turning away, he steps onto the redstone ore block, which immediately lights up. It starts a sort of ripple effect along the dust that connects it to the rest of the redstone, triggering all kinds of ticking and flashing. It’s all Jimmy can do to follow the signal as it travels towards the portal frame-

Static fills the air, and the portal ignites. Swirling red light fills the frame.

“Oh, nice,” Grian breathes.

“Yes!” Impulse cheers. “We did it!”

“Okay, uh, Tango?” Etho nods at him. “Go ahead and step off the block, now.”

Tango doesn’t respond. He’s staring at the portal with an unreadable expression clouding his gaze, almost as if in a trance.

Jimmy quickly hurries to his side. “Tango,” he murmurs, gently shaking his arm, “come on.”

“Huh?” Tango jolts. “Oh, oh right, sorry!” 

He steps aside, and the portal remains lit. Impulse grins. “Alright, looks like we’re good,” he says, stooping over to hit a button next to the portal. A piston extends across the redstone line, and the portal extinguishes.

Jimmy lets out a breath of relief. An irrational part of him had been worried that Hels players would immediately start pouring through. “You okay?” he asks Tango quietly.

Tango nods. “Yeah, sorry,” he says with an apologetic smile. “I’m fine, it just… kinda hit me all at once.”

“Yeah,” Impulse says, “I definitely wasn’t expecting to have a working portal today, either. But hey, good job guys!”

“Yeah, nicely done, fellas,” Grian says, sounding pleased. He starts typing on his communicator. “I’m gonna let the others know we’ve got the portal workin’, and tomorrow… we’ll all meet to start planning our invasion of Hels. I’m sure if we put our heads together, we can come up with a solid plan to get Bravo, get that key from Atlas, and get out.”

Tango snorts. “Oh, sure. Easy peasy.”

“Don’t worry,” Jimmy says, putting a hand on Tango’s shoulder. “We won’t go through til we’re all good and ready, yeah?”

Tango’s expression softens. “Yeah.”

“Right.” Grian puts his communicator away. “Get some rest, everyone, and we’ll see you tomorrow. Details in chat.”

~*~

<Grian> portal done. meet @ impulse and bdubs tomorrow at noon for hels invasion plotting. all ideas welcome

<PearlescentMoon> Ooh :0 

<InTheLittleWood> wait seriously? already??

<Renthedog> YO amazing job on the portal guys! :D 

<BdoubleO100> oh THANKS A LOT for volunteering us to host GRIAN!!

<Grian> :P 

~*~

Later that night, in the dark quiet of their room, Tango rolls over to nestle his head beneath Jimmy’s chin, claws bunching up the fabric of his shirt.

“Thanks,” he murmurs.

Jimmy hums. “For what?”

“For… not givin’ up on me.”

“What’d’you mean?”

“I mean… you know, I- after everything I did, and- and everything I said…”

“I already told you, that doesn’t matter to me.”

“Yeah, I know. But when I realized the secret was out… that things were- that we couldn’t just go back to normal… I mean, I was convinced it was over. Everything, my- my new life, my freedom, my friends. Us. But you never gave up hope.”

“Of course. It’s been a long road here, alright, I- I’m not givin’ that up without a fight.”

Tango tilts his chin up to look at Jimmy, red eyes glowing in the dark, and leans in to meet his lips. They kiss slow and sweet. Warmth hums in Jimmy’s chest.

This hasn’t been an easy journey, and he knows there’s plenty more challenges still ahead. Even if the mission to Hels goes well and they achieve all that they want to, the experiences Tango’s been through won’t magically go away. It’ll take time. Healing isn’t linear. But with everything out in the open now and the support of their friends, Jimmy’s hopeful that Tango can start to unlearn his self-hatred. Jimmy will be there every step of the way.

All too soon, Tango pulls away. “We should get some rest,” he whispers, settling against Jimmy again.

“Yeah,” Jimmy sighs ruefully, draping a wing across Tango. “Gonna need all two of my brain cells at full strength.”

Tango huffs a soft laugh. “Love you, honey.”

Jimmy closes his eyes, smiling. “Love you, too.

~*~

Jimmy wakes up to a cold bed.

That immediately sets off alarm bells in his head, because since when has Tango gotten out of bed before him? Then he opens his eyes and realizes it’s still night; a faint crescent moon hangs in the starry sky visible through their window. Their room is dark and empty. Tango is nowhere to be seen.

The alarm bells become a siren.

No, no, no, no, no.

Jimmy springs out of bed, sparing a second only to grab his shoes off the floor before throwing the door open. His heart is in his throat as he flies down the stairs to the main level- all dark and empty- and hooks the corner to wrench open the basement door. 

Already he can see the chilling red glow from the portal cast across the wall, a shadow of bleeding light, and a million curses scream through his mind. His stomach feels like it’s knotted in on itself and his lungs are burning for air, he’s moving faster than what seems physically possible and yet not nearly fast enough as he crashes down the stairs and bursts into the portal room, mouth opening to cry out-

Just in time to watch Tango vanish into the red light.

~*~

Somewhere in Hels, a player walks through a portal.

Tango’s heartbeat pounds in his ears. He’s already started shaking- if it weren’t for the wither effect flowing from his collar, he’s certain his blaze rods would be igniting right now. It’s a bizarre mix of emotions. The scent of ash and the sight of netherrack are comforting, in a way. Familiar. But it’s also terrifying, because there’s no mistaking where he is.

(There’s a reason he doesn’t like hanging out in the nether.)

Fear threatens to swallow him. He pushes it down; he’s got a job to do.

Forcing a steadying breath through his clenched teeth, he takes in his surroundings, ears pricked cautiously. He’s definitely not at spawn- he’s at the border of a basalt delta, actually, fine gray particles fluttering through the air. Aside from the portal behind him, there’s not a structure in sight. No sounds save for the distant bubbling of lava and the distinctive slap of magma cubes.

Tango frowns, chewing his lip. The portal was supposed to take him to Bravo, so he must be around here somewhere. Why he’s not at Hels Tek, Tango isn’t sure. Maybe they’re out on an errand run? Either way, he ought to start looking around.

But first, he’s got to break the portal so no one can follow him. Everything he’d packed made it through with him, thankfully, so he equips his pickaxe and turns back to the portal-

Just in time for Jimmy to emerge, running straight into him.

The collision knocks Tango to the ground, pickaxe flying from his hand, his forehead stinging where it smacked against Jimmy’s chin. Blinking spots from his eyes, he pushes himself up on his elbows with a groan. Once his vision stops spinning, he locks eyes with Jimmy, who seems just as shocked as he is.

Both of them shout at exactly the same moment.

“What are you doing here?!”

~*~

[charliehoennam]

just need you.

a/n : I blame @joshlmbrt for this. u asked for it and it got me horny so here you go 🧡

prompt: men who knead your thighs and hip as you sit on their lap with their big hands as you slick their hair back and tell them about your day. who get so hard when you kiss their forehead and tell them you have to go shower. who don’t let you go and fuck you on the couch — deep, thoroughly, filled with love

pairing: david loki x f!reader

warnings: 18+ only, no minors please. language, smut, creampie, cockwarming, david gets horny from feeling loved.

SHARING IS CARING, REBLOG IF YOU LIKE IT

Parking your car in the driveway just behind David’s Crown Vic, you switch the alarm on as you make your way over the grassy pathway paved from David’s walking over time.

Despite the dull day you had, you smile at the butterflies that still flutter every time you’re about to see him. Using the spare key he had gifted you, you unlock the front door and step inside.

You take the liberty of making yourself at home by kicking your shoes off and walking further inside towards the kitchen, you set your bag on a chair and drape your coat over its’ back.

“Baby, that you?” he asks from the living room.

“Yeah, it’s me, honey” you reply walking over with a smile.

He leans back and manspreads against the couch after crouching over the files and documents all fanned out over his coffee table along with his gun holster and badge. You take in the sight of him, hair slicked back from his shower, dressed in a tight white tank that accentuates his muscles. He usually wears them under his button-ups, but you love it when he wears them in the house, paired with a pair of gray sweatpants.

“You look so tired, baby.”

“I am tired” he smiles reaching for your thighs to guide you closer and unspokenly invites you to sit on his welcoming lap.

You accept and lean against his broad solid figure, lazily draping one arm around his neck while your other hand rests against his chest.

“Too tired for me?” You smirk watching his eyes trail down your body to your crossed thighs.

“Never too tired for you, honey” he replies taking your knee and pulling it towards him to let you drape your leg over his as his other hands sits at your waist.

“I hope not” you chuckle and press your lips against his to properly say hello. “I missed you” you whisper.

“I missed you too, honey… Didn’t get to see you this morning.”

His eyes close as he nuzzles his nose into your neck, taking in the lingering scent of your sweet perfume as his palm glides up and down your thigh.

“I know. You spent the whole night on duty, so I figured we wouldn’t anyways. But we’re together now hm?”

“Yeah, honey. You’re right. How was your day, hm?” he questions lifting his head to admire the gentle details of your face.

He listens to you vent about your day, kneading your thigh as his other hand slowly rubs your back up and down. He listens thoroughly, making a comment here and there, asking questions as you go on, but the glimpses he takes down your shirt and at your thighs don’t go unnoticed by you.

They make you feel loved and desired although you decide not to call them out because you’re drinking him in just the same; eye roaming up and down his chest, fingers gently twirling the hairs that peek out from the top of his tank or delicately squeezing at his biceps as you mindlessly rub his strong arm.

“How about your day, baby?”

“I don’t wanna talk about my day, honey. Just…” he sighs closing his eyes.

You know how his job takes a toll on him. Being a detective means having to see and witness things that are generally hard to stomach, let alone forget. And, although he can never forget certain things he wishes he could, he’d rather treasure the moments you get to spend together because, not only are they too few, they help him shut the rest of the world out. These moments with you melt away all worries he carries as a detective and allows him to just be David, a loving and caring boyfriend.

“It’s ok, babe. You don’t have to,” you answer with a tender kiss to his forehead.

You let your kiss linger there for a moment as he groans contently, wrapping his arms around your waist to hold you closer. You’re almost certain you could feel his dick hardening as your fingers comb through his damp hair.

You chuckle imagining how good and relaxed he must when you take care of him.

“Why don’t you put this stuff away then and order us a pizza? Or whatever you’re in the mood for? I’m gonna go shower.”

You move to try to stand up, but he shakes his head. His arms tighten around you and hold you in place.

“No, baby. Stay here with me. Wanna be with you” he pleads wrinkling his forehead as his brows pinch together. His hand rises from your waist and his palm rests against your cheek when his lips meet yours. “Missed you so much, honey. Feel so good when you’re with me.”

You smirk noting how his breathing hitches and his cock twitches when you kiss his forehead again.

Gently peppering his forehead with kisses, he exhales sharply clenching his jaw as he pulls your legs to fully straddle his lap. His hands greedily grope at your thighs, at your hips and at your ass, enjoying your body’s fullness through your stretchy leggings.

You pull your head back a bit, letting your fingers meet at the back of his head to continue their therapeutic scratching on his scalp.

“I haven’t even showered yet, babe” you whisper shyly concerned, fearing your natural scent might be slightly more noticeable.

“No, honey, no. You smell so good for me” he frowns with eyes closed and shakes his head. “Just wanna be with you right now.”

“Yeah?” you whisper letting him kiss on your neck as he grinds his hardened dick against your sex.

“Yeah, baby. Feel so good on me like this. Can you feel it?”

“Y-yeah” you answer breathlessly as you give in and grind your dampening pussy against his crotch. “I feel your cock, baby. Feels so nice and hard.”

“Yeah? You like how it feels like this?”

You nod licking your dry lips as you continue dry humping his clothed cock, whispering how you love his dick so much as it throbs in his sweatpants when his hands pull your leggings up to make your ass and mound more noticeable.

He groans gently biting at your collarbone as he relishes the friction your body provides. Panting softly, you move your hips faster as his hard dick rubs against your sensitive nub.

“Fuck, Dave. Right there… That feels so good.”

“Ride me, baby. Just like that. It’s ok, I got you.”

Lost in the intoxicating pleasure that is washing over you, he rests his forehead against yours watching your face contort as you chase your orgasm.

“Cum for me, baby girl. You can do it. Feels so good, right? You like it, don’t you?”

“Fucking love it” you whimper feeling it build in your core. “So close, Dave. F-Fuck!” you pant as his hands grip your hips to pull them closer. “Gonna-gonna cum!”

“That’s my baby girl. Cum for me, sweetheart.”

The pleasure snaps in your core as you moan and slowly still your hip to soothe yourself with slow thrusts against his dick.

Running his fingers up and down your obvious camel toe, he clenches his jaw realizing how wet your leggings are from the dry humping and your orgasm.

“Honey, can I rip these? Please? Please? I need to feel you.”

“But they’re new, babe. I just got them.”

“I’ll get you new ones, I promise. Promise you” he quietly begs with the softest voice. “I’ll get you a hundred if you let me rip these right now. I’m so fucking hard, it’s hurting.”

He might as well; you’re almost sure they’re ruined now from the slick that’s gushing out. 

The second you nod and approve, all eyes go straight to your crotch. You hold onto his knees as you angle your hips forward for him. David quickly gropes at the fabric, pulling it carefully away from your skin. Digging his finger into a small tear, he rips a hole into the middle of your leggings to expose your wet panties. 

"Hold them for me, honey" he asks, fumbling with his sweatpants to push them down enough to free his dick. 

You eagerly obey and pull your panties to the side to reveal your soaking cunt. With one hand on your hip, he pscoots you close as his other hand holds his cock to guide it against your folds. 

"Fucking..." he sighs closing his eyes as his head lulls back at the pleasure of your warmth against his cock. 

Taking advantage of the moment, you dip your head to kiss his neck but David's quick to capture your lips with his. He stills his kiss for a moment as he stares hungrily at you, letting his hands do the work of guiding his dick into your entrance. 

You smirk as you ease down slowly on his cock, watching how his mouth slowly opens into an O. The pained expression is purely based on the pleasure and self control he's got over himself to not cum right away. 

"Easy, baby. Easy." You remind him by pressing kisses to his forehead as you start to slowly move your hips. 

His hands squeeze at your hips and ass, so desperate to sink his fingers into your soft flesh. 

"Fuck, you're wet on my cock, honey. Can't hold back too long" he begs. 

"I got you, baby. It's ok" you pant riding his cock. 

You gently grip at his hair while his mouth mauls at your neck. The moans he elicits out of you are aphrodisiacal music that weave through his veins and make straight for his dick. 

He replaces your hand  with his, holding your panties to the side from behind with his hand resting against your ass. 

"Tell me you love me" he pleads, shutting his eyes hard as he feels his orgasm building. 

"I love you, baby. I love you so fucking much. Love every single bit of you" you pant heavily rocking your hips roughly against his. 

"God, don't stop, honey. Don't stop!"

I love you's spill from your mouth as you chase his release until you feel his broad  body tense under your arms that hug him, filling you with hot white cum. Noting the way he stills your hip from the sensitivity, you pause long enough to let him calm down and slowly regain your movements to help soothe him. 

Lifting his head, he kisses you, letting his tongue invade your mouth hungrily as his arms lock around your waist like a belt to hold your pussy on his bottoming out dick. 

"God, I fucking love you too."

[bruisedboys]

your Peeta fic was EVERYTHING!! So soft and lovely.

Could I request established Peeta x reader where maybe reader somehow gets a concussion and Peeta takes care of her? Obviously only if that sounds interesting to you.

I’ll read whatever you write for him 🫶🏼

thank you my love !! I was really proud of it so I’m very happy you enjoyed it. thank you for your request too! here’s a little something 4 u <3

peeta mellark x fem!reader vaguely in universe but no specifics, can be read as an au or just post-mockingjay

Peeta’s exceedingly gentle as he asses the damage to your head. One hand at your jaw tilting you up towards the light, the other pressed to the side of your head that you didn’t whack on the lip of the bathtub. He angles you this way and that, careful fingers pressing down around the spot you’d bumped.

He presses down on a particularly aching spot and you can’t bite back the whimper it entails. Peeta cringes.

“Sorry, I’m sorry, baby,” he hushes you softly. “That’s where it hurts the most, yeah?”

You nod. You feel a bit like you might cry. You’re embarrassed at your fall, dizzy and sore, too. “Yeah. S’there a bump?”

“Not a big one.” Peeta finishes his examining and moves down to sit with you on the bathroom floor. He presses a warm, soothing hand to your neck. “Are you still feeling dizzy?”

“A little bit.”

Peeta hums. When you’d first bumped your head you were so dizzy you couldn’t stand. Peeta had called Katniss’ mother on the phone in the living room and she’d diagnosed you with a mild concussion. Normally you’d be worried about it, but Peeta’s been so lovely and patient you’ve got no room for worry, just love. Plus, you’re pretty sure his hands have magic healing powers. You feel better already and it’s only been ten minutes.

“Okay,” he’s saying. “That’s okay, honey. How about I help you get up and we’ll move you to the bed?”

Bed sounds nice. You do your best to smile at your lovely, caring boyfriend. “Yeah, please.”

Peeta slides his hands under your armpits to help you up. You’re already in your pyjamas, which is just pure luck — you’d been getting ready for bed when the accident happened. Peeta had come running the moment he’d heard the thump as you slipped. He’s been worriedly doting on you ever since.

He sits you on the bed and lets you press your heavy head to his abdomen for a few moments. He holds you steady, one hand stroking the hair at the back of your head, steering clear of your bump. You breathe him in, his sweet, woody scent, the soft cotton of his t-shirt.

“Sweetheart,” Peeta pulls back, but rather than let you hold your head up on your own, he takes your face in his hands, holding you up himself. “I’m gonna get some ice for your bump, okay? Want to lie down?”

You nod around his warm hands. Peeta helps you lie down on two pillows and then straightens up.

“Do you need anything else, sweet girl?”

You know it’s pathetic, but you’re feeling miserable and needy. You tilt your chin up. “A kiss would be nice.”

Peeta grins. It’s pretty on him, especially when he’s been so worried for you he hasn’t properly smiled since your fall. “One kiss, coming right up.”

He kisses you sweetly, his mouth pressed to yours in a kiss that almost crosses the border of chaste but not quite. You hope he’ll give you more later. If you ask for them, he definitely will. He’s not one to deny you anything you want.

“Thanks,” you say as he pulls away. “For the kiss and for everything else.”

Peeta smiles at you and you know you’re in good hands. The best hands. “You’re welcome, lovely.” He moves away and you miss him already. He must know, because he adds, “I’ll be back really soon, don’t go anywhere, okay?”

You weren’t planning on it.

-

thank you for reading! please consider reblogging if u enjoyed 🤍

[noellefan101]

Your First Date-Genshin pt 3

Characters: Lyney, Freminet, Wriothesley, Neuvillette, Alhaitham x gn reader

Summary: Your first date with them,

Warnings: lyney flirting, tea

Note: omg im finally done, i really liked writing these tho, ye thats all i have to say school literally destroyed my brain, love you

Lyney

he would definitely preform a TON of magic tricks during your first date, both romantic, some are just pretty to look at and then there´s the brother-you're-just-embarrassing-yourself magic tricks

: said ever so kindly by Lynette

wouldn't make your date as public as his shows, since he wants to share the moments and magic tricks with you only

(+ Lynette, Fremi and "father" if she asked him so, but yk, they're only made for you)

after he had given you more rainbow roses than you could ever count to, he set out some homemade goods, like cookies, a cake, cupcakes(whatever you lik)

(in which he definitely didn´t spend a few days learning to make)

overall 10/10 (if you dont ask lynette, she had to leave bc of the amount of secondhand embarrassment(she was there at the start)) and it was enjoyable for u.

Freminet

yes, you would be underwater for your first date, but if you really don´t like it(yet)he can just take you some other time

^^but he would prefer to show take you on your first

[and yes, Lyney and Lynette (+his other siblings at home)did bet on when he would finally confesses and take you on a date]

he would let you wear his diving helmet if you really wanted to, but he would also just wear it if he felt embarrassed, or wanted to tell you a story (most likely abt pers)

he aslo ended up showing you a few of his mechanics(robots?)

and showed you some works in progresses other people haven´t seen, other than him and pers ofc

Wriothesley

he would drink tea with you in his office

^^maybe Sigewinne baked you something too,

but you mainly drank tea and just talked the whole time

(bro likes tea so much, someone pls make him shut up abt it)

well other than showing you and talking about his (absolutely massive) tea collection (and cake/bakery(sry))

if he´ll ever let you talk, ofc he will(its a very unfunny joke), he´ll listen to you for as long as you´d want to talk

you also laughed a little when he told about how melusines and stickers dont work well

and he liked seeing and hearing your laugh, so he might go for a date number two

Neuvillette

he would take you out to a fancy restaurant or he would just sit and talk with you somewhere more private

but maybe include a Melusine passing by here and there, checking on you both or for some work-related reasons (that they then put off, just a little, when seeing you both together)

i imagine that you would try some different types of water with him, by his request, and tried your dam best to find a difference.

but he would also get you any kind of drink, dessert or food you´d like

all in all its pretty easy bonding with him, and he just likes being beside you and spending time with you

Alhaitham

he would take you to a quiet cafe where you could sit in peace, since he doesn´t like loud places and want you two to be alone for the most part

he would pay 100% he doesn't even give you a chance to try and pay for anything (he´s nice when he wants to be)

he definitely brought a book with him to read(+ one for you) and would either let you talk while he reads a "little", or he would just read out loud so you know what kind of books he likes

he´s not good at doing any kind of romantic things, but he did try and do something

that including:

taking you out on the date later in the evening so he later could show you the stars, and point out some constellations

asking your friends (and maybe family) what you like food-wise, so he knows what kind of place he should have in mind when picking the place of your date

thank you for reading i don´t think i´ll make any more of these, but if you want it i´ll do it, luv ya-Masterlist

You are welcome to reblog and like any of my posts, but you CAN NOT translate, copy or hate on anybody for liking my posts

[ask-lab-rats]

A little explanation-

Lab Rats is a human au where Cobs has created 14 specimen as test subjects. Basically a "created in a lab" au. Some have powers relating to their objects, while some of them don't. Unlike Cobs and his family, the subjects have object names such as OJ, Taco, etc.

[Summary for newbies]

TW overall for: swearing, torture, abuse, experiments, and general hospital stuff (Ex: needles)

You can ask these characters at the moment:

OJ - 001

Taco - 002

Paper - 003

Pickle - 004

Bow - 005

Marshmallow - 007

Bomb - 008

Paintbrush - 009

Salt - 010

Lightbulb - 011

Pepper - 012

Balloon - 013

Nickel - 014

Knife - 015

Baseball - 016

More will be added as the story progresses. [Powers]

You can ask them anything! Just no inappropriate asks because most the characters are around 11 years old :)

And for funsies, I'll tell you Cobs family aka his bio children.

His oldest and only daughter, Apple Cobs - 20 yrs. Shes in college.

Middle child and oldest son, Gabe Cobs (3Gs) - 18 yrs. Just joined the military.

And the youngest, twins Michael and Shawn Cobs (mephone4 + 4s) - 11 yrs.

You can ask them stuff too if you want

You can also ask the doctors/staff (and others)

Dr. Parker (Cabby)

Dr. Spoon (Silver Spoon)

Dr. Berry (Blueberry)

Tessa Thomas (Testtube)

Finley Harrison (Fan)

Carmen Spoon (Candle)

On Christmas Break!

For the askers

You guys are just normal people on the internet reading about these unfortunate children. You don't really have any special powers. You can still try if u want but it probably won't end how u want.

Be nice and be patient plz I promise I will get to everything

Fanart is always welcome!

Now about me, the creator!

I go by she/her go check out my main acc @dicediceking

@dicedice69 , @babygirls-alt-acc and @ask-ii-bfdi-shipkiddos are also me. I don't post on the 1st one, the 2nds my reblog acc, and the last is my other ask blog

There will only be ships with the older characters that I plan on adding later.

I apologize if some are out of character. I'm only human. I will also add in a few headcanons.

You can ask me any question u want too (but nothing inappropriate, I'm a minor ok)

CreatorNotes are when I'm ooc. Any post without tags will also be ooc

Inspirations

[minnielvr]

DIE FOR YOU ; a hwang hyunjin smau

synopsis : jyp uni's resident "bad boy" hwang hyunjin decides to swoon y/n l/n, not too popular but also well known, as a dare from his friends. what happens when he actually falls for her? genre : college smau!! with written parts. lots of drama but there will also be plenty of fluffy moments! enemies to lovers woohoo!!! pairing : hwang hyunjin x fem! reader featuring : stray kids, yunjin from le sserafim, minji (faceclaim), hanni, & haerin from newjeans, keeho and intak from p1harmony, wonyoung from ive. others may be added as the story continues. warnings : cursing, kys jokes, bullying as a joke, alcohol usage, suggestive jokes, lots of angst tbh. status + updates : this smau is ongoing and updates will be slow af bc im in college and busy! TAGLIST : the taglist is OPEN!! pls comment on this post or send an ask if u wld like to be added!!! playlist : music that reminds me of this series & its characters!! its a mix of like almost every genre so it wont be everyones cup of tea🤷‍♀️ also play it on shuffle!! notes : guys i cant stop LOLLLL😛 like i said updates will be hella slow but like this idea has been in my head for saurrr long and i need to get it out NEOW. also guys PLEASE do NOT spam like. you can js comment or reblog instead thank you!!! ────────────────────────────── profiles gangy😜 | FBGM💰 ────────── chapters 1. super shy🙈 2. right guy 3. no y/n stop comeback🥺🥺 4. shes crazy frfr 5. fym EYE happened 6. next time 7. welcome home cheater 8. party 9. plot twist 10. #pussypower 11. y/n asf 12. hehe�� 13. school girl 14. miserable & pretty 15. ilyt ig 16. oh. 17. old ass 18. thinking caps! 19. dont call my girl sweet 20. y/n pls cum 21. iykykykyk

[targaryenrealnessdarling]

A Perfect Score - Chapter 5 - Ice Princess | FigureSkating!AU

Summary: Moving on to the North, before the match with Cregan and Sara, everything comes to a head | Word Count: 7.2k~ | Warnings under the cut~

Series Masterlist | Links to my Taglists: General Taglist | Aemond Targaryen Taglist

Warnings: *deep breath* jealous!aemond, swearing, degradation, heaps of sexual tension, one room in the hotel trope, aemond being a sexual menace, a lot of dirty talk, p in v unprotected sex, oral sex (f receiving), fingering, creampie, mild angst

A/N: *me barking writing all the warnings* I ain't got nothing else to say I-

Comments, reblogs & likes are always appreciated in this household. I love u 😚

“What the fuck was that?!” El shouts over the video call, making you cradle your face in your hands. 

She’s showing you her front camera, tapping on the TV in front of her as she rewinds the footage of your routine at Casterly Rock. She must have replayed that specific part about ten times now.

She taps the screen harshly, “Look at that! You’re fucking blushing, you whore!”

“El, please” you reply, exasperated.

“Is that a fucking bruise on your leg”

"El!" You shout over the phone, making her press her lips together in a mischievous grin.

"Did you get a bit too cozy?" She teases,

"Fuck off"

"You both look completely different. Also that triple spin, that was fucking perfect"

"Thank you" you say flatly, rolling your eyes, remembering doing it in the routine.

You don't remember the time between the dressing room and getting on the ice. Just the steady hum of the crowd's applause as the announcer welcomed the representatives of the Crownlands.

"Performing second is Aemond Targaryen with his not-so-new skating partner, who proved herself significantly in the deciding match for the Championship tour"

"They were both very icy in that performance. Let's see if anything has improved"

You run over all the jumps and spins, in case your mind is so preoccupied that you've somehow forgotten. Smoothing down your hair and your skirt, desperately trying to hide any proof of his fingerprints, you take your spot in the middle of the ice.

For this routine, it begins with Aemond facing you, and when he pauses to a halt before you, you meet his gaze briefly, feeling the warmth creeping up to your cheeks.

Before he left the dressing room, he looked nervous. But that facade is gone. He looks deadly serious, and you hate to admit that the look he's giving you, performance or not, is so piercing and purposeful that it's almost exciting. Arousing? No, focus.

At the other match, his touch had been calculated, firm and almost rigid. His movements were largely the same, as you had pointed out only the day before. But now, his touch is so whisper soft it's almost undetectable. His fingers dance across your bare skin, a path of goosebumps left in their wake. Except this time, his eyes barely ever leave yours, fully aware of the effect of his touch and a ghost of a smile lob-sided on his face.

Every single touch of his hands on your waist to lift you, every hold to lunge into a jump together and every shared gaze never fails to have your stomach roll pleasantly inside you, settling between your thighs where Aemond had touched you not a moment before.

You come together, skating backwards for the triple spin. His hands brace your waist, and you swallow anxiously.

"Remember to tuck your arms in" he whispers, you nod, running over what you need to do, "you've got this"

"I'm seeing a stark difference in attitude in this performance. Perhaps our icy couple are starting to warm up"

Taking a steadying breath, Aemond does as he needs and flings you in the air, ready to catch you once you've done one, two, three spins, before taking your hand once you land.

Right leg, push…

You can't help but smile when you land it. That's the best feeling in the world, when the crowd applauds.

"She's done it! Another graceful landing!"

You release the breath you'd been tightly holding, gliding through the rest of the routine with Aemond to the view of the stands, some of them stood and some seated in applause.

It's only when you are stopped, with Aemond's arms around your middle and feeling his hurried breath against your back, that you can finally form a thought. Your heart beats furiously in your chest, lungs dry.

"Well done" he breathes, hot against the shell of your ear. The praise goes straight to your core.

"Oop, I saw that look. Perhaps the Ice Prince has an Ice Princess in his sights"

"Oh come on, look at the way he's looking at you!" El beams over the video call, tearing you from your thoughts, "I swear to all the gods, if y'all don't smash-"

"Can I have one conversation with you that isn't about fucking please?"

El pulls a face, "What can I say. Hoes United. Are you kidding me? Ice Princess? He better be calling you princess between the sheet-"

"Goodbye, El"

You hang up, heaving a large sigh, staring forwards at the bed with your packed duffle bag, ready to depart once again in the car with Arryk. 

It was clear as day, the difference between you and Aemond. The attitude.

The commentators dubbed you his 'Ice Princess', a nickname which you hate immensely. Several reporters had flocked to the hotel you were both staying in, all hanging around Arryk's car waiting for a chance to speak to the famed 'couple'.

The match was a success at least, no doubt because of the 'warming up' to one another, as the commentators graciously put it. You received good scores, marginally better technically than Johanna and Jason but ultimately winning most on performance, the former of which wiggled her eyebrow at you as she hugged you in congratulations during scoring.

She didn't dare say anything. The cameras would pick it up, no doubt.

A seasoned pro in that respect.

As per usual, you and Aemond were hauled into the back of Arryk's car provided by Hightower Management, sat together on opposite ends. 

Also as usual, Aemond had his airpods shoved inside his ears, turned away towards the window. Usually, you'd be able to hear the music blasting through his earphones. But you couldn't hear a thing. 

Perhaps he just wanted to be left alone.

His hands were clasped tight in his lap, his left leg bouncing. And you had to turn away towards your own window to stop staring at him in his sweatpants, feeling your face and neck get hot just thinking about what happened between you two.

The journey to Winterfell was several hours. You couldn't possibly be faster getting out the car and grabbing your stuff, walking straight past Aemond to go into the foyer of 'The Lone Wolf', a humble yet large hotel in the heart of Winterfell. Owned by none other than the Stark Family, so the idea of seeing Cregan before the match sent anxious flutters in your stomach.

"Good morning, Miss" the receptionist says with a polite customer service brimmed smile.

"Hello, uh, should be some rooms booked under Hightower?"

She nods, her fingernails clicking against the keyboard, "Just let me check for you…"

You ignore the white-haired male in your periphery, leaning against the desk by one of his forearms, one airpod now safely tucked away. When you spare a brief glance, he's not looking at you, but at the woman as she types quickly, flexing his fingers on the desk. You swallow thick at the closeness, sidestepping an inch.

The lady pulls a face.

"I'm afraid there seems to have been an administrative issue with the booking…"

Your skin starts to erupt in worry, "what issue?.."

The receptionist meets your eyes, her lips drawn flat in apology, "There is only one room on the Hightower booking…"

You go cold all over, staring back for a long moment without saying anything.

"A twin?" you ask,

She shakes her head, "a double.."

Your hand braces your forehead, leaning against the desk, "Fuck"

An awkward silence passes before you ask, "there aren't any other rooms?"

"I'm afraid not. We're full because of the skating match in a few days"

Aemond bites the inside of his cheek, his face stoic, "Is there a sofa? In the room?"

She reluctantly nods, "Yes but only a 2 seater-"

"That's fine" Aemond says immediately, holding his hand out and clapping the keycard in his grasp. He sighs and turns to you, smirking slightly at the horrified look on your face, "Let's go then, business partner"

You feel like you stand stock still, frozen into place, your heart hammering in your chest at the thought of sharing such intimate space with Aemond.

I've got to be the most fucking unlucky person in Westeros.

By the time you catch your breath, having checked to see if Arryk had already left (which unfortunately he had), you're walking hurriedly to the room, standing before the numbered door for a moment as if to psych yourself up for the next day and a bit that will be inevitably be spent in extremely close proximity with Aemond.

The hotel room is luckily wide, with an en-suite situated in the corner as well as a wide curved window that looks out over the roof of another building. Aemond shucks his bag onto the sofa, his well muscled back moves as he unzips it and pulls his belongings out.

He barely moves his head, "You gonna unpack or just stand there?"

Hot embarrassment combined with subtle anger nips at your insides. You pull your lips into a flat line to hold you back from retorting and huff your bag onto the bed, pulling off your jacket. 

Aemond won't stop you from getting comfortable.

"Will you fit on that 2-seater?"

Aemond shrugs, still busied with unpacking, "I've slept on worse"

Usually, unpacking is a time for relaxation, making a home of the hotel room. But here, with Aemond, it feels like you're on guard the entire time, methodically grabbing the more intimate items of clothing and putting them away as quickly as you can.

Suddenly, the shorts you're wearing feels just a bit too revealing, the hem lapping at your thighs barely. Every now and then, you feel his gaze on them, setting every hair on edge. But when you look back at him, he just does that little lob-sided smug smile, pretending to be busy with something else.

You push your palms over the skirt of your dress anxiously, feeling a nervous sweat coat them "Okay well…" you murmur awkwardly, "I'm gonna…to go downstairs for a bit"

You're barely turned, hand on the door when Aemond chuckles, low, in his chest, "Desperate to get away from me, hm?"

You freeze, not daring to turn back. All you can hear is the soft press of his trainers on the carpet as he turns away, and you just know he's looking at you. 

The inside of your mouth is so dry.

"I know what you're thinking, I can see it on your face" he muses quietly, his voice edging closer to your back as you're frozen on the spot, "I know you've been thinking about what we did, in the dressing room"

No I haven't.

Yes I have.

Fuck.

As much as the thoughts whizz around your head, they don't make the connection to your mouth. You can feel how close Aemond must be to your back, and your fingers tighten over the handle of the door.

"You have, haven't you?" He grins darkly, his voice an octave lower, quieter, more calculated, "I haven't been able to stop thinking about it"

Your breath is stuck in your ribs, arousal pooling slowly in your belly, like the calm tide of the ocean sweeping in to wet the sand. 

You feel his breath against your neck and ear, blowing the hair at the side of your face. His mere presence behind you. 

"See you tonight"

Almost as soon as he says it, you're out the door, pushing it shut behind you forcefully. Shutting out the feeling that you desperately want to disappear. The mere memory of his hands on your bare thighs that day sets urgency in your core, hands clenched tight at your sides. 

But more than anything, the way he kissed you, was the feeling you remembered the most. You recall moments after he'd rushed out, touching your kiss-swollen lips, willing the feeling of them back, realising just what line had been crossed.

Aemond Targaryen was an infuriatingly good kisser. Just like the way he moves on the ice, he's smooth and deliberate, taking his time. And it translated in the passion of that moment, the way his hand had grasped the back of your neck, and the other had spread your legs to accommodate him standing between them…

…How his hardness had pressed against your clothed core.

Aemond had been aroused.

Everything you thought about him, about how he felt about you, could very well be misplaced. 

You don't know how to feel about that.

It goes against everything you thought. Everything you believed.

And he still hasn't apologised. He'd said pretty words, all but those two you really needed.

Nothing would happen until he did. You'd make sure of that.

Torture him right back. It's the least he deserves.

Prick.

The hotel bar is better than anticipated, with several tables and chairs, even stools that line the front of the large oak counter on one side of the room. You don't usually partake in drinking, or at least much. But every now and then you feel you deserve it.

And right now for example, it's taking the edge off.

The large glass windows show you just how dark outside it already is, with the streetlights beaming through the single glazing. The North is different, obviously, but you didn't quite consider the weather.

Your muscles ache from doing your cardio, choosing to train on the ice tomorrow instead, the day before the match with Cregan and Sara. The hotel gym was nice, and each time you went into the hotel room to change, you worried about running into Aemond.

But luckily he was nowhere to be found.

Where he'd gone?

Not your problem, you surmise.

You were dressed once again in black, but nowhere near as flashy as the after-party from weeks before, but still a nice enough dress that it completely didn't work with the use of a bra. Hightower Management had organised a small get-together of the skaters currently in the North, as a way of showing support, despite all of you being quite literally competitors.

This includes the Singles skaters.

With that, they insisted you and Aemond look presentable.

You were there early, as a means of…avoiding Aemond in the hotel room. With so far, success.

A few figures begin to leak into the bar area, a few you don't recognise, but then a sea of silver-hair you actually would like to see.

Baela and Rhaena, clad in equally stunning blue dresses, bound up to you with gleaming teethy smiles. You stand excitedly meeting them in the middle, a shared female squeal of excitement is the only sound emitted.

"There she is!" Baela shouts, and both the twins envelop you in an equally tight hug.

"Jesus, guys there's only one of me, bit looser please" you joke, pretending to be out of breath.

They pull back, their silver curls sitting loose with silver accessories, "Our Ice Princess!" Rhaena jabs with a mischievous smile.

You can't help but roll your eyes, "Don't you fucking start, I've had enough of that"

Baela laughs, "had enough of your Ice Prince as well?" 

You give her a warning look and the twins hold back their smile, dropping the subject as per your glare. Knowing how you can get.

"How is Pairs?" Rhaena asks,

You sigh, "Different" is all you respond, "How's Singles? Rhaenys giving you a hard time?"

They both groan comically at the same time, "is she? When is she not giving us a hard time? She's our grandmother"

You laugh, sipping your drink, "Ah yeah, forgive me, I do forget sometimes she's a gilf"

"She's not a gilf!" Baela retorts, making you snort a laugh. Almost dropping the glass in your hand.

"Who's not a gilf?" 

You all turn and beam, "Jace! When did you get here!" Baela throws herself at him, as does Rhaena as soon as her sister lets go. Sometimes you forget they're cousins, they look so different.

"Hi Jace" you smile, "How have you been?" You ask giving him a hug, which he returns with one hand politely on your back.

"Alright, competitions kicking my ass though"

"Oh dear" you pout, faking a sad face and patting his shoulder, "You'll get over it"

"Thanks, you're so kind" Jace grins.

Over his shoulder you spot him, lurking in a corner with a phone pressed to his ear. 

Aemond.

He's dressed all in black again, hair in a loose bun, with a button down and dress pants, the sleeves rolled up to his elbows, and a chain that glints beneath the collar. You swallow at his expression.

He doesn't look pleased in the slightest.

But annoyingly, he does look good.

His eye flits from you and Jace, before realising that you're watching him, to which his attention falls entirely to you. You wonder if he's actually on the phone since he doesn't say anything.

"There she is. The Ice Princess" Cregan Stark obstructs your view for a moment and you smile politely.

"Hi, Cregan-umf"

Your outstretched hand in greeting is completely ignored as Cregan pulls you into a hug, his massive form completely swallowing yours.

"You're in the North, we hug here" he laughs, the vibrations rumbling through your chest, his hand politely in the middle of your back to gently squeeze the hug for longer than you'd think.

Your eyes immediately go to Aemond, over his shoulder. He hasn't moved an inch. But he's hung up his phone, slapping it on his thigh to shove into his pocket. You can't pin down what that look is, but the muscle in his jaw tenses when he looks at Cregan, softening into a smirk when the Northerner pulls away.

Your throat feels tight.

"I know you've been thinking about what we did, in the dressing room"

He doesn't look away, eyes trained on your body. Unabashedly raking over it.

"I haven't been able to stop thinking about it"

"Drinks!" Baela announces, dragging you luckily to the bar, breaking your staring competition with Aemond.

As the night progresses, you get to know Cregan and Sara. They couldn't be more different from one another, despite being half siblings. Sara has a fire in her belly, and a competitive eye, whereas Cregan is like a big, muscly Northern golden retriever. He looks like the kind of guy who lifts at the gym in one breath and in another would be having afternoon tea with his grandmother.

The duality takes you off guard multiple times during the night.

Jace and Cregan at least seem very close, having trained together multiple times. They're like long lost brothers, the way Cregan has him in a soft headlock as they wobble back to the bar, is proof enough.

Sara leans close to you, "Is he always like that?"

"Who?" You ask, sipping the drink you've been nursing for hours. Not wanting to get drunk in the slightest.

She nods to the corner, "Your Ice Prince. Aptly named by the way he stares at you"

You follow her line of sight, your core instantly clenching at the sight of him. Perhaps you hadn't really realised it before but several of his top buttons are undone, showing more of his skin at a formal event than he had previously.

You swallow, "Oh, uh, yeah he is. Ignore him"

Sara smirks, "Girl, he wants to fuck you. Can you not see that?"

You turn urgently to her, cheeks ablaze, "That's not true"

Sara hums smugly, "Denial is a river in Egypt. He looked like he wanted to tear Jace's head off when you hugged him"

"Jace is just a friend"

"Oh good, so he's available?" Sara raises her eyebrows.

Now it's your turn to smirk, "Are you after him?"

She shrugs, "he's not bad looking. Guy like him might look harmless but I bet he's freaky between the sheets. With a massive c-"

"Sara!" Cregan interrupts, seeing your screwed up face, clearly having heard everything, "Can we have a moment alone?"

She doesn't even need a second, before she prances off in Jace's direction, giving him the big eyes. Cregan leads you to the bar by the small of your back, and you can't tell if he's oblivious to how intimate that is, or if it's intentional, but when he does it you can't help but look in Aemond's direction, who's being hounded by Baela, but clearly not listening.

Cregan smirks in Sara's direction, "Poor guy. Being in Sara's sights is never good"

You laugh, "She'll eat him alive"

"Quite literally I think" Cregan chuckles in return.

There's a pause as you lean against the bar.

"How's life with the Targs?" He asks, one large hand encircling a pint glass effortlessly.

You shrug, "Has it's trials and tribulations, but otherwise they've treated me well enough"

Cregan looks around before leaning forward, murmuring in a hushed manner, "All I would say is, be weary of the big guy"

You cock your head, "You mean Otto?"

He points his finger like you've hit the nail on the head, "Yeah, him. I heard he's a right fucking stickler"

You nod, "He's very particular" you smile, reassuringly, "I manage though"

Cregan is about to open his mouth when Aemomd steps forward, his tall stature rivaling Cregans as he makes himself known. The Northern man fakes a smile, nodding in greeting, but neither says anything.

Before you can inquire, Aemond's hand encircles your forearm, "We're leaving"

"What?" You ask wide-eyed, wondering from where this rudeness has come from. 

Aemond tugs you away, and you wave goodbye to Cregan as well as Baela and Rhaena, whose eyes you catch across the room. Sara wiggles her eyebrows.

Aemond doesn't reply, so you fight against his grip, to no avail, "Aemond let go of me. Now"

It's clear Aemond is not listening, and if he is, he doesn't show it on his face. He even stops by the lift, pressing the buttons hurriedly, but once he sees which floor it's coming from, he grumbled and drags you instead up the stairs.

"Aemond, what the fuck is wrong with you!"

"Not having that northern cunt cosying up to you" he murmurs low, dragging you up the four flights of stairs to your floor. Luckily there's nobody there to see you both, it's so late at night.

His face is stoic, lips flat in a line, seething underneath.

"Are you fucking for real? Let go of me!"

It's only when you're in the hallway, stood before the hotel room door that you manage to pull your arm free of him.

"Are you fucking deaf?" You quip angrily, "what the hell was that Aemond?" You push against his chest as hard as you can, but he's built like a fucking brick wall and doesn't move an inch. Doesn't even lose his balance a little.

He doesn't say anything for a moment.

"Do I have to repeat myself? I'm not your fucking girlfriend Aemond! Stop treating me like one"

"You'd rather me let you have the likes of Cregan fucking Stark trying to get into your-"

"So what? What right do you fucking have to boss me around like you own me?" You retort, "besides he was just being nice!"

Aemond chuckles, "Oh yeah, just being nice. He only had one thing on his mind" he smirks, his gaze raking over your dress, "dressed like that, who knows what he was thinking"

"Excuse m-"

Down the hall, a room clicks open, the shadow of it moving barely before Aemond tugs you inside the hotel room out of view. He shuts the door and locks it quickly, his fingers once again curled around your forearm.

"I swear to god, if you grab me more time-"

Aemond scoffs, releasing and facing you, dwarfing you with his form as he approaches, "Or what, princess?" 

You swallow, backing up somewhat when he takes his calculated small steps towards you. His chest level with your eyes, you see the chain poking out beneath the undone buttons, the slightest bit of skin…

"Don't call me that"

"Who can blame Cregan fucking Stark anyway? With you dressed like that" Aemond responds, invading your space even further.

Your throat goes dry, "What?.."

"The second I saw you in that flimsy little thing, all I've been able to think about, is how I'm going to take it off"

Through your fierce blush, you clench your hands, your core doing the same involuntarily, "you're delusional"

He hums a laugh, "You're cute when you're trying to be angry, princess"

You feel how short your breathing is, how your chest goes all tight. It feels like being hunted, when he looks at you like that. That mischievous glint in his good eye.

"What is your fucking deal, hm?" You retort, feeling a last rush of courage, "Does it give you some sick satisfaction making my life hell? First you hate me, then you're indifferent, then you're hating me all over again and now you're acting like th-"

His hand claps around your waist, squeezing painfully, tugging you towards him in a deep, near-desperate and dizzying kiss. Much like the first one in the dressing room, it's urgent, his lips prying yours apart to slip his tongue into your mouth, humming deeply at the contact with yours. His other hand quickly finds the back of your head, anchoring you with him and chests touching only barely.

Everything dissipates, he's a good fucking kisser annoyingly, and he sucks briefly on your lips, making the blood rush to them so that they're swollen from his attention.

Your brain, lost in the brief act of passion, kicks in finally and your hands push him away. Your lips part from each other with a wet click, your face noticeably flush. Aemond too, looks slightly flushed, but wears a smug expression.

"What the hell was that"

"You reciprocated" he answers matter-of-factly,

"In your dreams"

He hums, "So stubborn. Are you always like this?"

"Fuck you"

"In the dressing room, you were so intent to continue" he replies, stepping forward slightly from when you'd pushed him, "If we weren't due to perform, nothing would have stopped me from fucking you right on that table in your sparkly little get-up"

You can't deny how the air gets sucked out your chest when he says that. Hate and lust are head to head inside you, battling for dominance.

"You'd like that wouldn't you…"

It's the way he says the words, so low and calculated, with that lazy smirk. His lips just as kiss bruised as yours, the few strands of hair that fell from his bun, disheveled.

All of your pent up hormones from not having slept with anyone for ages, the memory of what he did in the dressing room, as well as the sight of him right here, giving you that fucking look…

Every fucking look he's given you the past few weeks.

The memory of his hand on your thigh, squeezing.

Every hand against the small of your back…

…something snaps.

"Fuck it" you whisper, advancing on him again, both hands cupping the sides of his face and kissing him fiercely again, putting all those bottled up emotions, good and bad, behind the intensity of it.

You feel him smile smugly against you, his hands rested on your hips, fingers digging into the fabric of your dress, "Fucking knew it" he murmurs between the breaks of both your hateful kisses.

One hand sliding round to the back of his head, you card your fingers into his hair, inevitably ruining whatever style he had it in, to pull him closer to you, intensifying the neediness of his lips against yours. You swear he moans at the tugging of his hair, but you don't even hear it, too concentrated on his teeth as they nip at your bottom lip, nursing the area with his tongue afterwards.

A full body shudder erupts through you, sending a gush of arousal straight between your legs. It makes you feel weightless.

As if that weren't enough, Aemond's hands drop, cupping and kneading the flesh of your ass, squeezing near-painfully. The unexpectedness of it makes you gasp into his mouth as he pulls your core that bit closer to his hips, where you can feel the evidence of his arousal hard in his dress pants.

Your hands can't help but explore him as well as he is for you, running across the planes of his well-muscled chest, feeling them strain under your touch like he's holding back. Your fingers run over his chain, dipping to undo the buttons with dizzying speed.

"Eager, are we?" He whispers cockily between kisses.

You shoot him a scathing look, punctuating your words with the rough undoing of more buttons.

"Do you ever shut up"

He doesn't reply, too entranced by the softness of your touch on his bare pale skin as it's revealed button by button. His own hands trace up your middle, over your ribs and straight past your breasts to the straps of your dress, tangling his fingers into one and them and pulling it over your shoulder. Not quite enough to expose any intimate part of you.

Fuck, he's teasing you.

His lips migrate past yours, his nose ghosting over your cheek to your neck, where his lips tease the sensitive skin with open-mouthed kisses, teeth nipping at the space where it meets your shoulder. It's rougher than anticipated, and a soft breathy moan slips out, only serving to spur him on.

His one hand on our waist pushes you back, your knees hitting the mattress sending your body against it. He follows you, cushioning the fall and looming over you, using one of his knees to edge your legs apart for him.

In the heat of it all you've managed at least to get his shirt entirely open, shifting the fabric from his shoulders, shamelessly appreciating the shape of him. Your fingers trail that little bit of hair leading beneath his belt, feeling how the muscles of his abdomen flex with the contact, hearing the whisper of a low moan in his throat.

It's only when your hand begins to massage the very obvious and, you hate to say it, impressive bulge of his erection, that Aemond lets out a shuddered quiet moan, his breath fluttering against your neck.

You smirk, "Eager, are we?" You tease, echoing his previous words.

It's like a switch flipped and Aemond rights himself slightly, one hand taking both of yours and pinning them above your head in a very sudden act of dominance. He revels in the shocked look on your face, his black shirt now forgotten on the floor.

"Keep them there. You won't like it if I have to ask twice, Princess"

His voice send a bolt of pleasure to your core, and you visibly swallow nervously, watching his hands dip to your thighs and pushing the fabric of your dress up to your hips.

You jump in your place as Aemond's hands brace your thighs roughly, parting them and bringing his lips to the sensitive skin on the inside, trailing them up slowly, teasingly, to place an open-mouthed kiss to your clothed core.

"You have no idea what you do to me" he murmurs against you, wrapping the hem of your underwear around his fingers and tugging them off your legs. The motion, as quick as he does it, leaves your lungs breathless for a moment as he descends and kisses the now bare skin on the crease where your hip meets your thigh.

"Aemon-" 

Aemond's tongue swipes through your slick folds and he groans low at the taste which sends a deep thrum of want through your core, making everything seem just too much to bear. Too much and yet too little all at the same time.

"Fuck, baby…"

You can feel your thighs shaking against his grip as he keeps them parted for him. It halts every thought in your mind, back arching off the bed as he delves deeper, his tongue parting your folds to fuck you with the wet muscle repeatedly. It feels like he's trying to discover places inside you, as deep as they may be, to make you fall apart.

The angle has your lips parted with hurried breaths, head thrown back against the bed, struggling to keep quiet with the way his nose moves side to side against your aching bundle of nerves.

"Fuck…Aemond…" 

It feels like as soon as the pressure begins to build in your belly, he comes away, his lips glistening with your slick, causing your face to heat up in embarrassment. His eyes gleam with mischief.

"What happened to that smart mouth, hm?"

Before anger even has a chance to reach you, he plunges two fingers knuckle-deep inside you, instantly curled up trying to find that sweet spot inside. Your thighs shut around his hand, effectively trapping him there, a slew of desperate moans filling the silence in the room, as well as the wet smack of his hand as he fucks you with his fingers.

" - ah, fuck, Aemond - "

He grins, "Fuck you're soaked for me…" he muses, increasing the intensity, pistoning them inside you, "...come on, baby…"

He finds that spot with infuriating accuracy, aided by the thickness and length of his fingers, stretching your pussy as he watches them disappear, covered in your arousal.

Your back arches impossibly, thighs squeezed tight. And he smirks in victory.

"There it is…"

Logic, reality, everything is just absolutely gone. Mind blank, and all you're able to think is just him. The pleasure he is giving you. His words. It's all just too much.

The coil in your belly threatens to snap at any moment, the pads of his fingers bullying your g-spot mercilessly. So much you can feel your slick soak his hand and the insides of your thighs.

And just like that.

It's gone.

Your crane your head to him, looking up as he kneels between your legs, outright moaning as he swipes his digits through his lips into his mouth. Tasting you.

Your clit throbs at the lewd action, as well as the fact he's enjoying it so much. Feeling your face flushed and heat bathing your skin.

His hands drop to his belt, "You look so fucking perfect like this" he says, the sound of the leather slipping from his dress pants sending a bolt of arousal back to the place you need him most.

"Don't look at me like that" he smirks, his fists closing around the buttons, "the first time I make you cum, it's going to be on my cock"

You would think of some kind of quip, but Aemond tugs his underwear down, his cock springing free, and his hand coming to stroke himself to full hardness. The motion has you captivated, and inadvertently makes your thighs press together.

Aemond is big. Perhaps bigger than anyone you've had before. He is slightly curved, leaning slightly to the right, and as he strokes himself, his thumb swipes whatever precum comes out his weeping pink tip all over his cockhead, sighing softly at the relief of it. Your breath is momentarily stolen once you realise how his large hand encircles it, making it clear how thick he is on top of all that.

Annoyingly, he has the prettiest cock you've ever seen.

As a last ditch attempt to keep up appearances, your eyes meet his.

"What makes you think I'd let you?" You challenge, "you've not apologised to me yet"

Quite unexpectedly, he smirks, laughing lowly.

"Oh, Princess" he whispers, one hand pulling the rucked up fabric of the dress at your waist and removing it, tearing the fabric over your head and leaving you entirely naked and exposed. The sensation of the fabric and cool air has your nipped harden to attention, and Aemond sighs appreciatively as he kneads one breast in his palm.

He leans down, his tongue darting out to tease the skin around your nipple, "I am sorry" he muses condescendingly, before closing one nipple around his lips, tongue swirling against it. You're unable to do anything but press your lips together to stifle a moan.

Aemond pays special attention, lapping at it like a man starved, humming and pleased at the reaction he gets when he grazes his teeth over it. He pulls off with a gentle pop, kissing the valley of your breasts, his cock hanging heavily against your thigh. So close, and yet still feels so far away.

He reaches away for a second to go for his wallet on the bedside table, but your hand moves quickly to capture his wrist. His piercing gaze looks down at you questioningly.

"I'm clean…" you say, face hot with embarrassment, "...and I'm on birth control"

Aemond grins wolfishly at the admission, leaning down to kiss and nip at your neck, "Someone's prepared"

You gasp when he drags the head of his cock up your folds, parting them only slightly.

"You just want it raw, don't you?"

From this action alone you can feel how wet you are, and when he taps his cockhead against your clit a few times sending sparks of pleasure up your spine, it's obvious when it smacks wetly against your skin.

"Now baby, it's just you and me. I want to hear you when I fuck you. Understood?"

You nod, dizzy from just how much he's teasing you. 

"Just fuck me" you plead, annoyance colouring your tone.

He laughs through his nose and your mouth drops open when he pushes into you, splitting you open on his thick cock, slowly working his way inside.

"I'm going to fuck that little attitude right out of you"

Fuck.

Aemond bottoms out inside you, stilling for a moment for you to adjust but also for him to catch his bearings. He breathes in shuddered bursts against your neck, his stomach flexing and fists tightened either side of your head.

"Fuck, baby, you're so tight…can feel you squeezing me…" he moans softly against your ear, pushing himself as far inside you as he can possibly go. It has your eyes fluttering shut as his length tucks against that sweet spot, filling you aggravatingly perfectly, the walls of your pussy stretching deliciously to take him.

"Shit-Aemond…" you mewl as he shallowly fucks himself into you a few times, craving friction, craving what glimpse you saw of him earlier, "...please…"

Resting on his forearms, one hand ventures to your thigh to spread you further apart as he pulls almost all the way out.

"Seeing as you asked so nicely"

All air seems to be stolen out of your lungs and replaced with warming bliss as Aemond's slams back inside, his hips immediately pressing with a loud smack against you as he thrusts ceaselessly, holding both of your thighs in his palms.

With every harsh push inside, a soft, moan-like breath slips from your lips. Gods, when was the last time someone fucked you, as in properly fucked you, like this? Probably longer than you'd like to admit. That Highgarden guy left you high and dry, and even the guys before that, they probably thought girls had one hole, so knew little about how to pleasure you.

It's clear Aemond doesn't share this trait, and your thought process is immediately zipped from your past sexual encounters to right now as Aemonds thumb begins to deftly gather your arousal on it to circle around your clit, setting every nerve alight.

"Stubborn and a brat?" He muses, applying a delicious amount of pressure to that needy bundle of nerves, "I thought I made myself very clear, Princess. I want to hear you"

He punctuates his demand with two particularly harsh thrusts, your arousal sounding almost pornographic in nature.

Whether you want to or not, your lips part more to let your sounds of pleasure fill the room, the ceaseless sounds of your fucking alongside it. Your hands fist the bedsheets and Aemond hums appreciatively watching your breasts and body move with every motion.

He rewards you by increasing the speed of his motions, practically fucking you into the mattress. It's here that is the first time you see Aemond let his face show what he's feeling. That smug, cocksure smirk he has worn since arriving back at the hotel room drops, and his jaw slackens, his eye hooded to look down at you with reverence.

"Fuck-baby, I can feel you, you're going to cum for me aren't you-" he moans, his hips never letting up their pace, "shit-feels so good. Been dreaming of this for fucking weeks"

"Aemond-" you moan softly, turning your head, closing your eyes, feeling all exposed to him when he looks at you like that. The pressure in your gut is absolutely set to explode, and you feel that coil tighten impossibly.

Your throat tightens as Aemond leans down, his hips hitting the flesh of your thighs as he continues to piston his cock inside you, the chain around his neck dangling arousingly above you. 

You feel him grab your face, turning you to face him, your eyes slightly hooded with pleasure but looking right at him. It's so intimate, it makes your skin feel like it's on fire. 

His expression is serious.

"I want you to look at me when I make you cum"

Your hand joins his wrist, guiding him to your neck, and his jaw slackens again when he realises what you want. His fingers wrap around your neck, palm against your windpipe, and he just holds you there, feeling your pulse fluttering against his touch.

All you're able to utter before falling off the edge of your pleasure is, "fuck-"

Blinding white pleasure courses through your veins, your heart hammering in your chest, feeling every single thing Aemond is doing but ten times more sensitive. Being edged twice before certainly didn't help. Every thrust inside, brushing against your sweet spot, the way his thumb continues to press circles against your bud, has your orgasm extended in a long drawn-out shattered moan.

Aemond buries his head into your neck, his arms enveloped around you, letting your bud finally have a reprieve. Your thighs begin to shake as Aemond fucks you through it, overstimulation rocking through your entire body with the incessant bullying of his length against your sweet spot.

"It's alright, baby, I've got you" he whispers, his own tone strained. You can't help but sigh fondly at his words.

"Fuck-where-"

"Inside me…please"

Aemond feels you tighten impossibly around him one last time before he stills, hot ropes of his cum painting your walls and leaving an unmistakable warmth at the deepest parts of your core. Aemond says nothing, but moans helplessly against your neck and you feel his all-body shudder through your hold on his shoulders.

He fucks you shallowly, aching for the last moments of friction just as your orgasm subsides, replaced with a manageable dull thrum, practically able to fell your own heartbeat, and his with his presence inside you. The drag of his cock through your sensitive walls has breathless pants spilling from your mouth.

The silence stretches as Aemond stills, his cock softening within you. 

You don't have time to consider what at all he's thinking, as he presses a chaste kiss to your jaw, significantly softer than anything you've both done since arriving back to the hotel room. It shocks you, the intimacy of it.

What had you expected him to do? Get up, pull on his clothes and leave?

Maybe.

You had no expectations with Aemond. So for him to do this, had your chest constrain almost painfully. 

What did this mean?

Did he just want a quick fuck?

Had he done this with Floris?

What did it mean for your partnership?

You're almost disappointed in yourself that these are the first thoughts on your mind. 

And yet despite the pleasure running hot through your veins even still, as Aemond props himself up to look down at you, his chest heaving with hurried breaths, there's something on his face, in his expression, that you just cannot read.

There's an uncertainty in not being able to read him.

And underneath that hum of pleasure, through your rapid heartbeat, there lies something that hurtles you deep away from it all.

Doubt.

Taglist 1 (Bold means I could not tag!)

General Taglist: @blairfox04 |��@hb8301 | @jamespotterismydaddy | @nenelysian | @natty2017 | @randomdragonfires | @risefallrise | @theoneeyedprince | @thelittleswanao3 | @tsujifreya | @urmomsgirlfriend1 | @valeskafics 

Aemond Taglist (1): @asp3nxx | @avidreader73 | @bellaisasleep ​ | @boofy1998 | @cathy1514 | @dahlias-and-marigolds | @fan-goddess | @gaeela-6

[mooishbeam]

『♡』 The Remarkable Machine Who Learned How to Love

♡ featuring: toji x f!reader

♡ cw/tw: none, a little angst but a whole lot of fluff! wc: 1.6k+

notes: i was thinking about this all day and decided to whip up somethin in a couple hours. hope u like :P art by manuel_juju on twitter! comments and reblogs are appreciated!

In a kill-or-be-killed world, Toji reached the top of the food chain—unfortunately, staying at the top is a thousand times harder than the climb. And when he looked down, there was no one to catch his fall.  

Before Toji met you, he was as aimless as a speck of dust, carried endlessly by an unpredictable tide of winds. He followed the cracked and crumbled path bespoken for lost souls like himself. Destined to be nothing but a vessel, a hollow man of sturdy muscle who worked himself to the bone, filthy jobs common men wouldn’t dare consider, because who was there to stop him anyway? Was there anything left for men birthed from hopeless circumstances, raised by broken homes to turn to lives of criminality? He couldn’t find an answer. He wasn’t equipped with the empathy to understand why guilt gnawed at his conscious; why whenever he ate takeout in his dimly lit apartment, it spilled out the chasm in his chest.  

It was much easier to complete the task, to trudge to a check cashing facility to retrieve money he couldn’t care less about. Perhaps he’d walk this earth alone forever, constantly watching over his back from a fear of daggers shooting from every direction, waiting to strike at his most vulnerable. It was only a matter of time.  

Or maybe he’d allow his sins to surpass him. Accept the peaceful release of death and pay the price of a vacant funeral service.  

It was all but irreparable, until he walked into his usual convenience store and encountered the new clerk at the register. It was past midnight, and Toji placed the quick meal on the counter. When his tired eyes panned up from those frozen noodles, his heart reset, a part he thought died amidst the torment. It skipped across his ribcage, stopped until a fleeting breath pulled him back to reality, to the intense fluorescent lights and your warm welcoming smile. There wasn’t a single altercation that stole the air from his lungs the way you did.  

Life hadn’t torn you apart yet.  

Your eyes didn’t break away, unexpected, as Toji was used to people hanging their heads near him. He’s aware of his threatening stare and intimidating stature; it’s what keeps him alive. And you were unbothered. You scanned his item, and flashed those pearly whites that sent a nosedive straight to his stomach, “I’m a big fan of this brand!”  

Toji remained tight lipped, unwilling to sift through difficult emotions and experience a feeling he believed himself to be undeserving of. He nodded, and somehow you continued, “Shouldn’t eat so late, though. Messes with your stomach.” A puff of wind pushed from his nose before he could stifle it. “Are you a doctor in the daytime?” You chuckled and bagged, “Sorry, slow day.”  

He arrives the same week, searching for a couple of beers to bring back to his apartment. You were in an obviously dangerous position, with one foot off the step ladder as you attempted to push a bottle of cleaner onto the highest shelf. It was a fight between gravity, and the opponent nearly won before his hand grabbed the handle. “Oh! Thank you” you smiled. It was sunnier than the last and reopened the stitches he’d been struggling to sew since that moment.  

Toji suddenly had countless excuses to go to the convenience store. Sometimes he’d enter for a snack, and you’d discuss your favorite chips, other times he pretended to need items just to hear your voice ramble about a niche topic you knew too much about. When his heart thrummed off kilter, and his mind became consumed with thoughts of the pretty night-shift cashier, a piece of him demeaned. How embarrassing it was, to be attracted to the scripted kindness of a service worker. Toji barely recognized he had favorites, let alone desires. So why did he have such an unwavering desire to see you?  

He’d snatch a pack of noodles one day, a subconscious grin at the joining of your eyes. It didn’t matter if the twinkle in your gaze wasn’t exclusive to him; for a second, it felt like someone cared, and it was fulfillment he couldn’t shake.  

You leaned over the counter on your elbows, “Did you know there’s over 35,000 ramen noodles restaurants in Japan?”  

“I didn’t, but that sounds like a lot of options.”  

“Mhm, you should try one. The real thing is way better.”  

“I’m sure. I don’t really go out to restaurants often, so…”  

“Me neither”, there’s a lengthy pause, and you finally blurted, “maybe we could go together!”  

He was stunned. Lost for words, really. It wasn’t possible, a girl as beautiful as you who wants to be seen with a stone-cold machine in public. It had to be a prank, a fabrication by fate to taunt him. You grew an anxious smile, “Hah, sorry, I overstep-“  

“I want to.” You stiffened, and he found solace in your shared nervousness. “O-oh! Great!” 

Toji’s first date with you had been a disaster, though. He’s heavy handed by design, and it’s no different in his daily life. His strength leads to instances of clumsy behavior. He expected you to be appalled, disgusted, or at least judgmental.  

You never shunned him. When he held your hand too tight, you slightly unclasped it. He wanted to retreat, to stuff them in his pockets and remain at a safe distance. But you interlocked hands and spoke soft, “It's okay, just try not to hold so tight.”  

He swung the door open for your entry and almost shattered the glass door on the opposite wall. “I appreciate your enthusiasm” you giggled.  

He was afraid to even hug you—he might underestimate his strength and crush your sternum. Toji walked you back to your place and turned to leave. “I’ll see ya around.” Despite that, you guided his calloused hands around your waist, slinked into his broad body, and embraced him.  Every aspect of you, foreign but comforting—little breaths fanning his shirt, fingers brushing along his back, sugary perfume wafting in his nose.  

It was heaven on Earth.  

Now years have gone by, and instead of bleached walls and silence greeting him as his eyes crack open in the morning, he smells the familiar scent of pancakes, pans clattering on the stove. He waltzes into the kitchen in a hazy state and admires the aching back of his very pregnant wife. You have a hand assisting your lower back and another on the wooden spatula scrambling eggs. 

Toji dropped his past for you after the engagement.  He cashed his last check and disappeared from the underground circle without a trace. He was aware if he continued the path he was heading, the result awaiting him was six feet under. The outcome was unimportant, however, you—the image of tears streaming down your face at his poor volition, your figure keeled over his gravesite under dewy grass and wailing for his return to no avail. He couldn’t stomach it. He had to protect you and commit to the next stage of his life. He’d never tell you about his previous work. It was for the best. He’d be selfish, just this once. 

One sock is different from the other, wearing loose shorts and a random shirt sitting above your massive belly. It’s his preferred version of you. Your stomach and thighs adorned in stretch marks, shaped like tiger stripes that declare your strength through each dip and curve; It's his greatest honor. You’d take on the complications, unending exhaustion, and hormone imbalances to bless him with a child. Toji hasn’t let you lift a finger since you got pregnant, opting to handle all the household tasks, borderline subservient to the mother of his child. So, his mouth twists when he sees you up so early.  

He stands behind you, hands trailing from your upper thighs to your stomach, then the small of your back. You lean into him while he massages circles and whisper a tiny “Good morning.” 

“Ya could’ve woke me up” Toji mumbles, kissing your temple. He wraps around to the underside of your belly, mindful of his muscle, and lifts it carefully. His respect for you increases tenfold with the heavy weight on his palms. You hum a pleased noise, sudden relief from your back. He carries it and smooths his thumbs over the taut skin. 

“You’re a late sleeper, and I haven’t made breakfast in a long time.” 

“Ya don’t have to do a thing, y’know.” 

“I know. But I wanna do this for you”, and he grins. It’s quiet, standing in the warmth of your bodies, sunshine glowing through the window to cast an angelic gleam on your face.  

Then he feels an imbalance of pressure along his fingers and mild wriggling within your tummy. Toji traces the movements, seeking to play a game with his unborn child. Sometimes it scares him, to bring new life into a world that almost smothered his light.  He worries that he’ll end up on the same road as him or he won’t be a good enough father. The journey of parenthood is a long, laborious one. You’re always learning, and Toji’s still processing the basics. It’s complicated, he trips and falters; yet you’re there to support him, through thick and thin, sickness and in health.  

What was he if not for you—his pillar, his source of happiness and comfort. You’d given him everything to wish for and infinite reasons to stick around. An iron criminal, bested by no mortal, chipped away by compassion and gentle hands. 

“You can let go if it’s too heavy.” 

I can stay here forever. 

[darkficsyouneveraskedfor]

Dirty Work 33

Warnings: this fic will include dark content such as bullying, familial discord/abuse, and possible untagged elements. My warnings are not exhaustive, enter at your own risk.

This is a dark!fic and explicit. 18+ only. Your media consumption is your own responsibility. Warnings have been given. DO NOT PROCEED if these matters upset you.

Summary: You start a new gig and find one of your clients to be hard to please.

Characters: Loki

Note: The man has no chill.

As per usual, I humbly request your thoughts! Reblogs are always appreciated and welcomed, not only do I see them easier but it lets other people see my work. I will do my best to answer all I can. I’m trying to get better at keeping up so thanks everyone for staying with me.

Your feedback will help in this and future works (and WiPs, I haven’t forgotten those!) Please do not just put ‘more’. I will block you.

I love you all immensely. Take care. 💖

You hover before the door, each step sending a searing ripple through your bottom. You wring your hands as you walk in circles. You're not even sure Mr. Laufeyson is still within but you don't dare open to check.

Time slogs by in your cowardice. You retreat to the sofa and pull your feet up, hugging your knees as you hang your head. You just want him to forgive you and tell you you're good.

You close your eyes as your head begins to thrum. You're mind wanders ahead of you and the list of everything you'll need to pack. You don't even have a bag of your own, what will you put your stuff in? How long will you be gone? You'll have to rescheduled Ronan's next visit, and forward the gate codes to the gardeners...

You slip into a doze as your mind skews with the endless rote of tasks. You slump down until the world goes black, your body sinking into itself. You only stir again as you feel a shift around you.

You grunt and lift your hand as you're lifted from the sofa. You look up at Mr. Laufeyson's chin as he carries you across the room. You wiggle and brace his chest as you float precariously in his arms.

"Come to bed," he coaxes as he takes you into the hall.

You don't move. You don't dare. Fearful that he might suddenly hate you again. He brings you to the bedroom and lays you on the bed. You stay curled up as he shuts the door.

He moves around quietly and approaches with a swish of fabric. He holds a satin nightgown by its straps. You pout up at him as he tilts his head.

"Sleep, we have much to do tomorrow," he girds.

You nod and sit up. You sidle to the edge of the bed and he places the nightie beside you. He unbuttons your blouse before you can. You sit there and let him. He swiftly pulls the sleeves down your arms and disposes your bra in quick succession. He grabs your arms and makes you stand, unzipping your skirt before he shimmies it down to your ankles. You step out of it, then your panties as he tugs them down too.

You raise your arms as he opens the nightgown above you and he sweeps it down your figure. The cool fabric makes you shiver. Still groggy, you teeter on your feet and turn to stare at the bed, waiting for his order.

"A moment," he extends a single finger before striding away.

You stay as you are, folding your arms as you face the wall. The satin makes your bum sting each time you move. You hear him behind you.

"Get on the bed," he orders, "on your stomach."

You obey, so quickly you nearly flop onto your face. You move your head onto the pillow, bending your arms beneath. He nears and pinches the fabric just along the curve of your thigh. He peels it up and reveals your tortured flesh.

"It might hurt," he warns and touches a cool swab to your skin. You hiss between your teeth and swallow down a whimper. He works diligently, almost dotingly at cleaning the lashes, bruises tender at his touch. "We can't have an infection, can we?"

"No, Mr. Laufeyson," you agree as he covers your bottom with the nightie.

"Mmm," he hums and leaves you again.

You wait, unmoving, for his return. When he comes back, he undresses near the closet and pulls on only a pair of twill pajama pants to sleep in. He climbs onto the bed from the other side and grabs your shoulder, rolling you onto your back. Your face contorts in pain as your weight rests on your rear.

"Better," he says. You frown. "You are doing better," he specifies, "pet, if you are to accompany me to my mother's celebration, you must be on your best behaviour."

"Yes, Mr. Laufeyson," you utter.

He traces the strap of your nightie with his fingertips and you shudder. As much as you fear his touch, you long for it. It means he's not upset. His hand wanders as he trails over the swell of your chest, your nipples going pert beneath the fabric.

"And you are excited to come?" He asks.

"Yes, Mr. Laufeyson," you answer.

"Truly?" 

"Yes, I... I've never gone anywhere before."

"Not anywhere?" He prompts doubtfully.

"No," you lower your eyes shamefully, "we couldn't afford--"

"Not to worry," he lifts his hand and taps the tip of your nose, "let me worry for the expense. I only need you on your best and to have everything ready. Can you do that?"

"Yes, Mr. Laufeyson," you gulp, "I promises--"

"Shhhh," he presses his finger to your lips, "it is late."

You nod as he drags his fingertip over your lips and circles your mouth. He fixates on the move, his eyes glittering. He lets out a sigh.

"One more thing," he adds as he frames your chin, "you will avoid my brother."

You swallow and whisper, "yes, Mr. Laufeyson."

"Very good, pet," he bends to kiss your forehead, "rest, you will surely need it."

✨

Exhaustion shrouds the night. You wake little by little, sore and weak as your fatigue weighs you down. You languish in the bed next to Mr. Laufeyson, his breath rising and falling softly in his chest. You’re uncertain what to do.

Should you wait for him to rouse before you set about the day?

You don’t dare wake him up. The very thought sends a flow of terror through you. Whenever you disturbed your father’s sleep, he was never happy. Those days were the worst. Men are safer when they’re asleep.

Restless, you relent to the morning and sit up carefully. You glance over at Mr. Laufeyson. Gone is the anger that creased his forehead and curled his lip. He is peaceful and placid, all tension drained from his features. Conscious, his cheeks are always drawn taut with disapproval and brow set in an imperious line. He looks almost harmless.

As the night tugs against your bottom, you’re reminded that he is not. You turn your back to him and slip off the side of the bed. You peek at him again, slowly tiptoeing to the door. He doesn’t stir.

You ease the door just enough to pass into the hall and scurry onward. You take the stairs quickly and charge into the kitchen. He can’t be mad if you bring him tea. If you’re just doing your job, there’s no reason for disappointment.

You boil the kettle and pluck out cups and the tea pot. You do the task without thinking, arranging the tray just so before lifting it up. You are careful not to rattle the contents as you climb the staircase. 

You shoulder through the bedroom door and find Mr. Laufeyson as you left him. You try not to notice what you didn’t before. The twitching movement over his pelvis, just beneath the blanket. You gulp and set down the tray on foot of the bed. The smell of tea wafts from the spout of the pot.

It’s good he’s asleep, the tea still needs time to steep. You step back and pull on your finger, watching him, waiting. Would he be even more upset if you let him sleep too late? He said today would be busy.

“Pet,” he frightens you as he speaks without moving, “do you plot against me?”

You wince and shake your head, pressing your hands to either side of your neck, “no, Mr. Laufeyson, I wouldn’t–”

“Be calm,” he opens his eyes and his head lolls to face you, “I am being facetious.”

You stare at him and blink.

“Sarcasm,” he declares and bends his arms around his head, stretching his long back with an arch. His arms bulge as the muscles in his chest strain against his skin. “What has you awake so early?”

“Tea,” you bounce on your feet, “I wanted to surprise you–”

“Mmm,” he rumbles and scratches his chest, “you can be so precious.”

You nearly wiggle at the praise. He doesn’t hate you anymore. You’re being good.

“Have you made your list?” He asks, groaning as he sits up.

“My list?” You echo in confusion.

“For our journey,” he leans against the headboard and smooth his hair, though a curl stubborn stands at an angle.

“I will,” you step forward and pour a cup of tea. You bring it around to him and place it on the night table, “no milk.”

“Ah, good,” he hooks a finger through the handle. His lifts his other hand flicks his index towards you, “take this off,”

“Mr. Laufeuson?” You flinch.

He arches a brow, overriding further argument. You bunch up the satin in your hands and pull the nightgown above your waist. You shimmy it up over your head and slip the straps down your arms. You put it in a heap on the side of the bed, just by his legs.

“Turn,” he twirls his finger.

You obey and put your back to him. The bed creaks as the cool morning air pricks your skin. You jump as he touches the hot flesh along your ass. You hiss and ball your fists up as the bruises thrum.

“Mmm, it should heal,” he retracts his hand, the headboard knocking against the wall again. You hang your head and let out a shaky breath. “Well, pet, you may sit and have your tea before we begin the day.”

“Mr. Laufeyson,” you reach for the nightie and he tisks.

“Ah, leave it,” he demands, “I prefer you like this.”

“Yes, Mr. Laufeyson,” you acquiesce and stiffly march forward, curling around to the other side of the bed. You pour yourself a cup as you feel him watching you.

“And you are still excited?” He prompts.

You bat your lashes at him as you cradle your cup.

“About the trip?”

“Oh, yes,” you nod and blow over the steaming tea.

“But you are nervous,” he states, his gaze boring down on you.

“Yes,” you lower your cup over your lap. “Trying not to be.”

“No, it is good, you are well to be cautious,” he girds, “you’ve met most of my family, being confined with them is another task.”

You nod and stare down into the amber breakfast tea. He sips and lets out a deep breath, a rumble rising from his chest. You glance over as he traces his finger along the rim.

“Stay close to me and all should be fine,” he sighs, a strand of anxiety in his timbre, “yes, I do think it is our best plan.”

You bring the cup to your lips and taste the stringent tea. It’s too strong for you but you drink anyway. Your mind isn’t on the tea, it’s on that word he keeps using. ‘Our’? No, it’s his and yours; what he has and what he allows you. One moment, you are adversaries, the next, he speaks as if you’re allies.

You don’t understand him and his moods, you just know you must appease them.

✨

Mr. Laufeyson picks your outfit. A black miniskirt and a white camisole, along with a pair of sheer stockings. You note that it’s rather similar to the maid costume he’d liked so much before. You don’t linger on the thought long before you begin the day.

You have your list of to do’s; the first being, make your own list. You don’t know the first thing about packing. Before, Mr. Laufeyson gave you a carefully curated inventory, but now you have to figure out what you need. That’s a question you rarely consider.

You type out two things before you feel lost; clothes and soap. Well, that’s not very helpful. Which clothes? How do you dress for Wimplesnatch or whatever that thing is? You still don’t know what exactly this celebration is. Is it like Christmas? Or Halloween? Do you need a costume?

You type into the search bar and find a website that generates packing lists. You’re slightly amazed by its existence. It reassures you that you’re not the most clueless person on the planet. You don’t know how many days you’re going to be away so you put in a week and hope for the best.

That looks better. You copy down the list by hand and set it aside. You start a second, one you don’t need help with.

‘Electric, rent, Leslie, groceries…’

You tally up the new deposit in your account into your debts. You login in to your online account and click around. You usually just go to the bank but when you went to get your direct deposit information for the agency, the bank offered a virtual sign in. You’re confused by all the different numbers and buttons.

You go to the FAQ and scroll. You finally figure out how to pay a bill and search in your email for the digital bills you let stack up unread. You add the payees one by one before you attempt payment. You check and recheck each amount before sending it off. When you’re done, your heart lurches at the amount leftover. It’s almost all gone.

You exhale in relief. You can’t go off not knowing your dad’s taken care of. You didn’t part on good terms but he’s still your dad and he’s still very sick. Maybe you should go say goodbye…

“Pet,” Mr. Laufeyson startles you as he struts in through the open door, “ah, I’ve found you.”

You turn in the seat and watch him roll in a large suitcase behind him. He drags it towards the desk and wheels it to face you. It is the colour of lilacs with rose gold zippers. It’s so pretty.

“There you are. It should suffice,” he slaps the top before letting it go.

Your eyes round as you admire the bag. It’s yours? You reach tentatively to touch it before recoiling.

“Thank you, it’s so nice,” you smile. “Erm, I was thinking…” you reach back and grab the first list, an asterisk next to one of the items, “gas money? Do you–”

He interrupts you with a laugh, “pet, don’t bother with all that. You only need to bring yourself. Besides, you should save your money. My mother does love to spend and she will surely have some special plans.”

“Oh,” you seal your lips and twist in the seat. You reach to exit out of the window but before you can, the screen is spun away from you.

Mr. Laufeyson angles the laptop towards him and bends to scan the screen. His eyebrow furrows and he looks at you in alarm.

“Did your stipend not go through? I will call the bank–”

You gulp, “it did, I just–”

He clicks and you grip the edge of the desk to keep from grabbing him. What is he doing? His eyes flit down the screen.

“You… you’re still paying for the fetid old beast?” He snarls.

“Mr. Laufeyson, he’s my dad–”

“A father who never once took you on a holiday? Or a simple road trip? Yes, he is a prize. If I knew my money would be siphoned into his ungrateful hands–”

“I’m sorry, Mr. Laufeyson,” you pout and rock in the chair, “I wasn’t trying to be bad.”

He huffs and stands, his hands going to his hips. He looks down at you and you wilt. He rolls his shoulders and drops his arms.

“I know you meant well,” he sighs and feels around his back, sliding his wallet from his pants pocket, “you will take the gold card for the trip.”

“Mr. Laufeyson, I can’t–”

“You will,” he picks out the gold plastic and places it on the open laptop, “I cannot have my family thinking I pay you pennies."

[mazeinthemiroh]

hihi! can i request an ateez reaction to their s/o waking them up with kisses pls? thank u sm <3

ateez reactions waking up to kisses

genre: fluff, crack in some

warnings: none

pls like and reblog if you enjoy <3

hongjoong

a perfect way to start the day. feeling you pepper little tiny kisses makes him automatically smile. he will let out a little "g'morning", not opening his eyes because a few more blissful moments with you is more important to him than embracing a new day for this moment. so he'll pull you closer and cuddle you lazily. 5 more minutes… that all he needs…

seonghwa

his favourite way to wake up. infact, if you don't wake him up. like this, he will get all pouty. because your lips feel like heaven on the warm skin of his face. even half asleep theres an unconscious smile that blooms in his face when he feels your affection. then he'll blink his eyes open and look at you softly.

yunho

yunho does not like mornings. so waking him up with kisses softens the experience of waking up, for sure. the first time he felt your lips pressing little kisses on his cheeks, he will roll over, not fully awake, and get closer to you. then he would slowly opening his eyes. even being welcome by your face in the morning puts the day off to a good start. now, he looks forward to mornings.

yeosang

he won't appreciate you waking him up i can't lie. "leave me aloneeee" he'll think you're trying to be annoying on purpose because you both like to tease each other. but when you explain to him you wanted to be romantic he's like "oh 💀 there are better ways to do that" but whatever. just do it anyway, it's more fun that way. he has to deal with a little bit of affection, come on. not the worst thing to happen.

san

it's something you both reciprocate. if he wakes up before you, he wakes you up with sweet kisses, his plump lips molding beautifully in your morning skin. and if you wake up before he does, you do the same. his skin and morning scent is addictive, it's hard not to kiss him all over. and he loves the indulging feeling of your lips all over him. pure bliss.

mingi

these kisses would tickle like hell for him so you would hear the cutest little sounds come out of him. his giggles are so endearing i will literally cry if i talk about them for too long. he will wake up with a grin on his face and be like "what are you doing?" before kisses you tenderly back, because he's romantic and soppy like that, especially in the mornings, my gosh.

wooyoung

he'll complain about it because he thinks he's so hilarious hahaha very funny we're all laughing 😐 no but even when he's half-conscious he's ready to tease you. it's automatic. "can't get enough of me, can you?" he would say. "what, i can't even sleep without you attacking me?" honestly this man... at this point you might as well start flicking his face instead. then he'll actually have something to complain about <3333

jongho

he would wake up with one eye open to check if he was still sleeping or not. chances are he was just dreaming about you and now here you are, kissing his face gently, your warmth making him sink back into the pillow and provide a distinct sense of inner peace. he will let out a "good morning, baby" and drift back to sleep in your arms im crying over here