#irl gravity man just might

[arthurs-puppygirl]

I, a non ikevamp player, saw your "Isaac Newton moans like a slut 😮‍💨" post and was very concerned for a few seconds because I thought you meant the gravity guy

I apologize for concerning you, anon :v

The Issac Newton I speak of is a reincarnated anime twink vampire, not IRL gravity guy.

[shmisky]

I’ve mentioned this on Twitter, too, but the blessing of Tumblr is that I can freely yap about something without a character limit haunting my ass.

This is my attempt to answer some controversial questions about Ford’s personality, such as: was Ford, at any point of his life, truly a detached hero who prioritized the greater good of the universe? Would he have done the same for Stan, were their roles reserved (aka Reverse Portal AU)? And did he, despite his obvious suffering, choose the greater good over his brother when he agreed to erase Stan’s memories to destroy Bill?

Short answer: it’s complicated, but Ford is more unhinged about his loved ones than many people seem to think. No matter Ford’s choice in a Reverse Portal AU, Ford has always loved Stan just as much as Stan loved him.

Long answer:

One common misconception about Ford’s character—not only Ford, but many, many fictional characters I had the pleasure of considering blorbos—is that people take his facade at face value and judge him based off that. You’re falling for his bullshit. You’re looking at Ford and seeing exactly the man he wants you to see, instead of the man he is.

Ford demonstrated being hypocritical many, many times through the show, the comics, his journal, and even TBoB. I would go so far as to say it’s a Known Personality Trait of his. He chews Stan’s ass for being selfish, reckless, a criminal. Then proceeds to be: selfish and completely unaware of it, ten times more reckless, and a much more dangerous kind of criminal.

(No, I don’t believe even for a second that simply stealing pieces for a weapon was what made him a dangerous outlaw in multiple dimensions. Stan might be banned from most places in the United States; states inside a country inside a continent inside Earth inside the solar system inside our galaxy inside our dimension, theoretically. Now compare this with the fact Ford was banned from whole, often entirely magical, dimensions, and described as “armed and dangerous.”)

In a recent interview that I’ve just linked here, Alex commented that initially he couldn’t reconcile the idea of a Ford who was supposedly so responsible and preached responsibility left & right with the idea of a Ford who would keep an extremely dangerous and volatile object such as the infinity sided die inside a cheap plastic case. With Rob Renzetti’s help (co-author of J3 and the closest thing we have of an irl Ford), he came to understand that Ford can bring himself to do anything he can effectively rationalize.

That’s logical, says baby Ford in the comics, under the assumption the Sibling Brothers really were dead because, you know, he and his twin had killed them (to be fair, only Stan, but as I’ve talked before in another analysis, Ford had a tendency to think of himself as part of an unit with his brother; if Stan 1 was a killer, so was Stan 2), and completely indifferent to that fact. Or to the fact they would be stealing clothes of their corpses to impersonate them. (When you remove the layer of humor and comic relief, you notice how wild the lore of Gravity Falls is, hahah.) That was Ford as a child! But my crimes had a noble purpose, says old Ford in Journal 3, about being an intergalactic outlaw. But it was all in the name of science, says old Ford in the comics, also justifying his crimes. In the name of science, Ford? I thought you were stealing pieces to build a weapon and destroy Bill. You know, for the greater good of universe, not science...? A bit inconsistent with the excuses here, buddy.

(If you’re like me, you’re probably thinking of how much this can be used as ship fuel or as morally ambiguous!Ford fuel and I agree. Delicious implications.)

But alright, we have already established Ford as hypocritical. Now what? Would he have done the same for Stan or not?

You see, I actually have no doubt that Ford loved Stan just as much as Stan loved him, even at his worst. (I might make a post about that if anyone is interested.) The difference is that he was just very bad at loving Stan. I also have no doubt that Stan was, and still is—they’re alive in some sort of Sea Grunkles limbo in my mind, so excuse the present tense—way more important than the greater good for him. The real question is: would Ford, known zero emotional intelligence haver, possess the self-awareness necessary to recognize that deep truth about himself? Or would he attempt to repress his feelings for Stan to prioritize his noble mission?

The thing about Ford is that he’s insanely good at repressing, so we mustn’t underestimate him. I think this is left pretty clear when he attempted to teach Dipper to just not feel fear as if it were the easiest task in the world. Hilarious, but also worrying.

In the same interview I’ve just referenced, Alex said that Ford is not only distant from Stan or other people, Ford is distant from himself. And if he’s not honest with himself, if he ignores his own feelings, how can we expect him to make the “right” decision (that is, the decision that aligns with what his heart truly wants instead of a decision he’ll bitterly regret for the rest of his life) when it comes to Stan in this specific Reverse Portal scenario?

We can’t. But we can hope! TBoB made me lean towards the more charitable “he has at least a modicum of self-awareness” interpretation of him. He has, after all, not only admitted he missed Stan in a casual manner without need for a life & death situation looming over his head (using their secret bro code, but still), but also considered reaching out (to supposedly lecture Stan, but again, this is Ford we’re talking about, so of course that was just an excuse), before Bill changed his mind.

Imo, one thing that weighs a lot here is how dangerous he knows Bill to be, given that TBoB!Bill abused Ford even more horrifically than I had previously thought. An impossibly dangerous, sadistic, and unpredictable being—capital E Evil, and as such, a threat he is guaranteed to take seriously. TBoB seems to imply Ford thought Stan was doing just fine. (A shameless con artist who could be doing a thousand better things with his life, sure, but still, just fine.) There’s no way he could convince himself Stan would be fine, Stan would be alright, et cetera, if Stan ended up in Bill’s hands. Death is one of the tamest things Bill could inflict upon Stan, especially considering Stan is Ford’s beloved twin brother (yes, beloved, since Bill had access to Ford’s innermost thoughts and feelings, and was for some reason insanely jealous of Stan in TBoB), which brings us to another thing: the overwhelming and haunting guilt Ford would feel if something happened to Stan because of him.

Another thing I consider worthy of notice is how Ford’s first impulse whenever Stan is in any kind of danger in canon is to rescue him, naturally, thoughtlessly. In J3, he tells us about his dream of Stan being squeezed to death by a giant six-fingered hand and his attempt to run to help him; the fact his feet were somehow frozen in place was the climax of the nightmare. In the comics, he doesn’t hesitate to reunite everyone to go and save Stan, without complaining even once. The funniest thing is that the same can’t even be said about Stan! [gestures to Stan’s reactions to Ford being captured by Probabilitor the Annoying and Bill in Weirdmaggedon] Not that Stan have his reasons to be furious at Ford! He had, of course. But not my point here.

But perhaps you’re not convinced by that and you still think Ford wouldn’t have it in himself to save Stan. That’s a valid interpretation, too. What I love about Ford is that he is so complex and layered that sometimes you can’t answer questions about him with the same certainty you would other characters. At least one thing I’m sure of: if he chose not to save Stan, he would regret it. It’s simply not the kind of person he is. An AU in which Ford clowns and chooses the greater good could be a pool of delicious angst if you’re into that, especially if Stan somehow comes back and doesn’t forgive him. He would slowly, oh so slowly, come to realize he made the “wrong” (again, the one that didn’t align with his self) choice.

Now, the last point of this wall of text: Ford and the erasing of Stan’s memories. That one is quite simple to me. Ford erased Stan’s memories because he had literally no other choice. This is what Ford said to him, you guys: “He’ll be able to take over the galaxy and maybe even worse, but at least he might let the kids free.” And of course, the following, “We need to take his deal. It’s the only way he’ll agree to save you and the kids.” Before, Ford was referring to Bill’s immediate threat to the kids’ lives—Bill had, after all, ran after Dipper and Mabel with a terrifying threat of disassembling their molecules as their grunkles were forced to watch inside their cage, powerless to stop him. After mulling it over, Ford included Stan’s safety in the deal, too, now more certain than ever about his decision to sacrifice not only himself but, in his own words, “the galaxy” (and later, “the universe,” as he was pretending to be Stan) to perhaps save three (3) people.

Emphasis on the perhaps, here. Ford had literally no guarantee Bill would follow through with his words. Given Bill’s track record, it was way, way more likely that he wouldn’t. Bill is a liar and a manipulator through and through, one who takes great enjoyment in people’s suffering. Ford’s suffering, specifically, above all, since TBoB painted Bill as this toxic and possessive ex obsessed with his pet scientist. What were the chances? Even if Bill, through some miracle, did end up keeping his word, we saw Bill’s plans for Earth in his daydream fantasies: taking a bite off the planet, drawing a smiley face on its surface as millions died... What a guy, that Bill! If the Earth was wrecked beyond repair, where would Stan and the kids live? How would they survive among all the chaos and destruction of the literal apocalypse? With nightmarish creatures lurking in every corner? With what food, what water, what shelter? Answer: they likely wouldn’t. The probability of human survival would be abysmally low.

I think Ford knew this very well, deep down. And he was still willing to take the chance, because he was already despairing. Because it was the only visible way out for his family, no matter what happened to him. A fellow shipper once pointed out that it could be Ford’s Martyr Complex rearing its head again, but a) to choose the universe over three people is arguably the “nobler,” less selfish option that would better align with his view of himself as a classic, tragic hero, and b) to surrender to Bill, his archenemy whom he now hated, and admit defeat like that would be beyond humiliating. The blow to the image of himself he insisted on clinging to would be gigantic, and I don’t think the irony of his hypocrisy (of criticizing Stan for merely risking the planet for one person and then objectively and irreversibly selling the whole galaxy, or whole universe, for a small chance of saving three) would be lost on him.

It’s fascinating, too, that Bill didn’t think that was out of character for Ford to accept his absurd deal. Again, the one being who knew younger Ford’s innermost thoughts and feelings, but was unable to access old Ford’s mind, which leads us to the conclusion he very likely based his knowledge of old Ford off younger Ford. (I think this is important to point out due to the fact younger Ford would be the one dealing with the Reverse Portal AU situation.)

Stan, pretending to be him, says, “My only condition is that you let my brother and the kids go!” and Bill believes him easily. Just a word, “Fine,” and that’s it. No questions, no teasing, even though he was mocking the Stan twins for not being able to get along just a second before—he knew that no matter how much Ford bickered with Stan, his love for his twin ran much deeper than that. (Ford might not have liked Stan, for a while, but he still loved Stan. Two different things in this case.)

I imagine that when Stan proposed the twin switch solution, he was the only light amid overwhelming darkness for a Ford who had already surrendered to despair and lost all hope. The water for a man dying of thirst. Not ironically, Ford must have seen a halo around his heroic, noble brother’s head. Finally, something that could work! Stan saves them all! From something that was Ford’s fault, at that! No wonder Ford worships him as the most selfless man he has ever met. The whole thing must have left a strong impression on him. Stan created a solution when there was none, and what a heartbreaking solution it was...

If he didn’t erase Stan’s memories to save the universe, the kids and Stan himself would likely meet their death anyway—a very, very literal, very permanent, kind of death, not just a metaphorical one.

My conclusion is: say what you want about Ford—he is egocentric, arrogant, hypocritical, entitled, and overall an asshole to almost every person who ever loved him—but this man did love his family, fiercely so, and in an intensity that was in no way inferior to Stan’s. He is just incapable of acting normal about it, the poor thing.

[torchtour]

Whatever you do, DO NOT make a deal with it.

Don't let it into your mind.

DO NOT GIVE IT YOUR NAME OR ANY PERSONAL INFO.

The Pines are a good suggestion, try looking Mystery Shack from Gravity Falls, Oregon online.

If the town doesn't exist in your reality, you are fucked, man.

My condolences.

tysm for the advice!! <33

you and a Handful of others havE begged me not to, under any circumstances, make "a deaL" with it. which seems PerfecTly reasonable to me. tHat IS unless it's offering me a night Without the dREams, in which case i mighT have to shake its greasy fuCking demon Hand!! (kidding. im kidding. haha.)

i did havE a momentary lapse in juDgment laSt night befOre bed when i tried demanding it stop hUrting my eye (which im convinced it is doing. somehow.) and that worked about as weLl as One might expect: it did not work.

ive taken to wearing an eyepatch around the house (godbless) because the one that's been bleeding is abominably sore + sensitive and ive nobody around (except the triangle) to tease me For it.

and is having dreaMs (nIghtmares) about it every Night count as it bEing "let into my mind"? i know im not out of the woods until it's dead but at least i haven't fucked that part up, right? right?

oh. and ive just checked online!! THERE IS NO MYSTERY SHACK :((

so. how long do my irls have to plan my fucking funeral??

[myosotisa]

Make Up the Rest - e.m.

Eddie Munson x fem!Reader -- 18+ minors dni

‖ summary: You've never been one for a one night stand, but the man across the bar with the crooked grin makes it seem so appealing. What's the harm in trying?

‖ tags: AFAB!reader, strangers to lovers, smut. implied alcohol consumption (no mention of being tipsy or intoxicated), protected p in v (we encourage wrapping irl), dirty talk, pet names (angel, sweetheart, baby), praise (good girl), a little bit of primal play if you squint?, fluffy as hell, no y/n

‖ word count: 6.2k (it was supposed to be 2k but it got away from me so fast)

‖ this one goes out to the babes @breddiemunson @blueywrites @abibliophobiaa @fracturedarkness

cross posted on ao3

From the very first moment he approached you at the bar, you couldn’t shake the feeling that he had done this kind of thing before.

Admittedly, you’d been caught looking first. He was hard to miss, even in the dark and the crowds. The energy around him absolutely vibrated, from the way his head tipped back in a laugh to the familiar interactions he had with the bar staff.

A regular. Well liked. Energetic. Funny, sarcastic. Unapologetically himself. And just oh, so pretty.

After already being able to steal a few moments to admire him from afar, your luck was bound to run out eventually. And the first time the two of you made eye contact, it hit you like ice down your collar. Oh god, you thought, he probably thinks I’m a creep now, observing him from across the fucking room. But he was magnetic, a force of gravity of his own, and you couldn’t stop yourself from searching him out again.

When you made eye contact the second time, and this time you didn’t immediately shy away, you watched the edge of his mouth tilt up in a smirk, the deep laugh lines in his cheeks only drawing more attention to the movement. His eyes flicked down, then met yours again before he returned to the conversation happening next to him. You forced yourself to focus back on your own friends at the same time.

The third time, he was looking at you first. You were sure he probably could’ve seen your face get hot from across the room – probably had noticed from how quickly his sly smile returned. His head tipped slightly to the side, his glass raised a bit higher. An acknowledgment. One you didn’t know the protocol to return. Your cheeks absolutely burned as you averted your eyes, racking your brain for some way to respond that wasn’t weird or would give the wrong idea. You didn’t even know what idea you were trying to give. Settled for a two fingered wave above your own glass, one that you weren’t sure he’d even be able to see. He did, that smile of his splitting to reveal just a sliver of his teeth told you so.

You definitely hadn’t done this kind of thing before. You weren’t a virgin, had dated, but never done the hooking up at a bar thing. You were absolutely out of your depth and it was all you could do to remain on your stool when he tapped on your shoulder.

A genuine greeting and introduction, a toothy grin as he told you his name. You managed not to stutter as you repaid the favor. He asked to join you, made a joke about spotting you from across the bar, like you didn’t already know how the two of you had seen each other. He settled onto the stool next to you, his knees spread wide, his elbows resting on the bar behind him. There was a certain ease to his movements, a certain level of comfort and confidence that was wholly unfamiliar to you.

All of this was so unfamiliar to you.

Bracing for awkward small talk, asking where you work, the other mind numbing bullshit, you were pleasantly surprised when he asked you if you wanted to know a secret. The twinkle of mischief in his big, brown eyes – the way he leaned in just a bit to speak it lowly to you in the crowd. It had you leaning in too, drawn into him. Eager to hear what he had to say, to see what he might do next.

He pointed out a man sitting by himself closer to the door. Noted how he kept nervously glancing between his phone and the entrance. Insisted he was meeting someone here for a blind date and he was terrified of being stood up. He’d borrowed a friend's blazer for it, the fabric way too loose around his shoulders.

Then he shifted your attention to an older couple in the corner – two widows, he explained. They had spent years alone before coming to an agreement that they would try something new, accepting it would never be the same. They’d been feeling it out for a few weeks so far but still hadn’t been in each other's beds. You watched the pair dip their heads together, the woman’s mouth moved and the man started to laugh. The small, sad smile on her face as she watched him throw his head back almost broke your heart right in half.

Your companion nudged his elbow against your bicep, drawing your attention to a booth in the back next. There was a crowd of rowdy women, each looking more drunk than the last. A bachelorette party based on the gaudy white sashes looped over their club wear. The bride was the blue-eyed blonde in the middle, her left hand raised to force her friends to ooh and ahh over her way-too-expensive ring for the 100th time that day. But then he pointed out the red head towards the edge of the booth, the empty shot glasses in front of her almost doubling her companions as she swayed in her spot. She looked absolutely miserable, barely holding it together. In love with the blonde’s fiancé, he supplied, a pitying look as he slightly shook his head, the low bun of curls at the base of his skull shifting with the movement.

You asked him how he knew all this, asked if he had spoken to every single person in this bar.

“Everyone has a story, angel,” his head rolled toward you, a lazy smile on his face. “Sometimes you just have to follow the clues and make up the rest.”

You rolled your eyes as he huffed a laugh, ecstatic at how readily you’d believed his game. How enthralled you had been as he weaved his tales. Allowing you to secretly revel in how pleased he looked at having tricked you. Your gaze tracked back to the bridal party; a brunette in blue nearly shrieking as a Shania Twain song began to play. You settled on the red head, the haphazard placement of her heeled shoes beneath the table. Attention caught on a tattoo on her calf, squinting just a bit to see it better, then shifting to the woven bracelet around her wrist.

“You’re wrong, by the way.” You noticed he was watching you intently as you leaned back – as you brought your glass to your lips in an attempt to look cool. His eyebrows raised in intrigue, a hand waved for you to continue. Taking a moment to swallow the nerves, you leaned in toward him again, as if on instinct. Secrets shared in the dark. “She’s not in love with her fiancé. She’s in love with the bride.”

The smile that lit up his face threatened to blow you away.

 

The experience of your first ‘bar hookup’ had escalated quickly – or maybe it hadn’t and you just didn’t know the pace. He’d asked if you wanted to go for a walk, cool off outside, and you’d accepted without a second thought.

He’d been nothing but a gentleman; holding the door open for you, carefully adjusting so he was walking in between you and the street, casually slinging an arm over your shoulders, asking if it was okay if he kept it there. He made all of it seem so easy, so natural. So familiar. Like you’d both done this together 100 times before.

You laughed so hard at something he said that you stumbled. He held on tighter, redirected you to lean back against a lamppost for support. The denim across your back protected you from the chill of the metal pole, didn’t protect you from the chill of the metal rings on his fingers as he inched just a bit closer, knuckles brushing your jaw. This was the part where you floundered, you fumbled, you froze. A deer in headlights looking up at him like the sickness and the cure.

“Is this okay?” He asked, his palm cupping the side of your neck, the rough pad of his thumb next to your ear. Your breath caught in your throat, kept you from answering vocally, but you nodded as well as you could. His eyebrows drew together just a bit, concern evident on his face. He doesn’t believe you. How could he? You’re shaking like a leaf.

He moved to draw his hand away but you placed yours over it, pressing it firmer to your skin. “I’m… I’m just a little nervous,” you admitted as your eyes flicked back and forth between his. “I don’t normally do this kind of thing.”

His expression softened immediately, his smile kind. “We don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do.”

But no, you knew. You’d known since you saw him across the bar. “I know what I want.”

His chin dipped down as you tipped up, gravitating closer to each other on instinct. “And what is that, angel?”

Before you knew it, your fingers were weaving in the base of his wiry hair. Eddie’s knee was pressed between your thighs, his palms were drawing you even closer by the waist, and his lower lip was between your teeth.

Then you were leading him by the hand down the stairs to the F Train station headed east toward Queens. He had you pressed up against another pillar until the subway arrived, his lips, tongue, and teeth trying to draw more noises out of you – separating quickly with giggles when someone walked by like you were teenagers trying not to get caught making out on school grounds.

Then you were side by side on one of the bench seats, hip to hip and shoulder to shoulder. His long fingered hand tapping out a beat where it rested on your thigh as you listened to him hum a song you didn’t recognize.

Then you were rocketing off the train and onto the platform, gasping out with laughter as he caught you by the waist and spun you around. Ignored the heavy looks from bystanders that were probably worried you were genuinely getting kidnapped.

He played along, his voice a rasp against the side of your neck, telling you, “you’ll have to try harder than that to get away from me now, sweetheart.” You tried to ignore that nagging voice in the back of your head that told you how you probably should be nervous or concerned about the joke he was making. That it should be kind of inappropriate or tone deaf. Tried to ignore how it sent a thrill down your spine that settled in a buzzing warmth at your hips instead.

When you finally breached the doorway to your matchbox apartment in Queens, struggling to keep your hands off each other the entire way, it was like a portal to another dimension. He walked right in like he owned the place, taking up space and giving the air of your stale home that same vibration from the bar. It seemed to follow him wherever he went, that feeling – too intense to be contained in a place as small as this. Like one laugh from him would blow out the windows and peal off the roof. One wrong move and it would shatter the furniture and crumble the structure of the place you called home. Powerful, dangerous, terrifying, and just oh, so thrilling.

It took a moment too long for him to notice you didn’t follow him. You’d slipped off your shoes and leaned back against the door to study him as his eyes went everywhere, consuming all until they landed back on you. Taking in clues, you guessed, so he could make up the rest. About who you are, why you’re here, what you’re doing. Part of you wondered what conclusions he came to, what story he would have concocted about you.

The wonder prompted left you as he slowly approached, his hands in his pockets. Calm, cool, collected, at ease. The anticipation built with each step, like a breeze to a flame, like hints at a secret. By the time you could feel the warmth of his skin on yours, your insides were positively quivering in excitement.

One strong hand pressed to the door above your right shoulder, the other cupping your jaw in touch that was gentle. More gentle than it had any right to be. More gentle than you’d probably ever been held.

For the second time tonight, you saw hesitation. A little wrinkle between his eyebrows, his eyes moving rapidly back and forth between your own. “You’ll tell me if I do something that you don’t like? If you want to stop?” His request was so earnest, filled with more concern and care than these encounters were supposed to have. At least, that’s what you had thought before tonight. Surely this wasn’t the norm for something like this, with someone you just met. Surely it wasn’t supposed to feel like this.

You found yourself nodding, eyes wide and unable to break away from him as you once again pressed his hand tighter to your jaw. His answering exhale was warm across your skin, your eyelids fluttering closed on instinct. His voice was a rough whisper when he continued. “I need to hear you say it, baby.”

When you opened your eyes again, you were resolute. More determined than before. “I will, Eddie. I’ll tell you if I don’t like it, if I want to stop.”

The concern dropped in a blink, a wolfish grin taking its place. “Fucking stellar.” And as you stifled your laugh, he tipped forward to steal your breath away.

He didn’t kiss you like you expected. Instead, he fastened his lips to the soft skin beneath your ear and grazed the flesh with his teeth. You gasped in surprise, clutched desperately to the back of his leather jacket, tilted your head to allow him greater access. If your knees hadn’t been weak before, they definitely were now. Nearly knocking together as your muscles struggled to endure the onslaught of him.

Almost like he could sense it, he shuffled closer, pressing the full length of his lanky form against you in support as his lips wandered their way down your neck. The palm against your cheek trailed back, a burning path below your ear and around, cupping the base of your skull to press you even tighter to the curious exploration of his mouth. When the press of his teeth against a certain spot produced a soft noise from the back of your throat, his fingers twitched. His lips stretched into a satisfied smile as his free hand moved quickly to press into the soft skin of your waist.

It was a struggle, but you pulled yourself out of your daze and put your own hands into action. Clammy palms met his chest and pressed up, dragging a bit of the black and red tie dye shirt with them as you started to push his leather jacket from his shoulders. His arms reluctantly disentangled themselves from you to allow it, immediately seeking purchase again as soon as he was free. Your denim jacket hit the floor next, then his shoes were kicked off. His fingertips drifted under your shirt and you felt the tingling they produced from your scalp to your toes. Not giving yourself a chance to second guess it, you gripped the hem and pulled it over your head, tossing it away before catching sight of his eyes. They were absolutely glowing in pride.

As his mouth fell to explore new territory, you placed your hands on his narrow hips, leading him away from the door and into the main room. He never looked up once, his gangly legs following your silent direction as he sucked bruises into the skin of your breasts like it would kill him to stop. When his calves met a cushion, he allowed you to press his shoulders down and sat with trust in his eyes, never once hesitating. You straddled his thighs, your hands gripping hair as he took hold of your ass, drawing together from end to end.

The pleasant surprise of the hard length of him pressed into the heat between your legs had you gasping again, your fists tugging at his hair as he choked on a groan.

“Sorry, did I hurt you?” You rushed to ask, untangling your hands from his curls to rest on the safety of his shoulders. His eyes were dark, pupils blown out as he took you in. Chest heaving, cheeks hot, red splotches that would surely turn to bruises on your chest. Perched on his lap like a wet dream and worried a little hair pulling was going to scare him off. He would have laughed if he didn’t think that would give the wrong impression.

“No, angel. I liked it,” came his purred reply, the rumble of his chest against yours sending your toes curling. Unable to remain composed if he said anything else, especially not if he said it like that, you rushed in to keep his mouth occupied. Nipped at his lip, snuck your tongue into his mouth, tasted the Jack and Coke he had to have been drinking at the bar. Used your position above him to press harder, take more – pretend you were in control of what was happening right now. And he was happy to let you for all of a few minutes, encouraged by your eager lips and rolling hips that you still wanted this, wanted him.

Your lead was short lived, however, as he managed to make a bit of space between you to remove his own shirt, and you floundered again. The dark ink across his chest and down his arms came to your attention for the first time. He leaned up, mouthing at your jaw while your eyes and fingers explored the art adorning him – a swarm of bats on his forearm, a spider below his collarbone, a dragon wrapped around his bicep like a trailing vine. Black ink and grey shading with bits of red scattered through. Some old, some new, all Eddie.

You must’ve been mesmerized too long because he was chuckling against your skin, the tip of his nose trailing across your cheek. “See something you like?”

And you knew this was the part where you were supposedly to flirtily agree, say something sexy, build on the moment. But you couldn’t find the words, couldn’t force yourself to say anything other than what you thought of first: “They’re beautiful.”

He slowly retreated and you panicked, thinking you’d said the wrong thing, that you’d messed it up. His face said anything but. He was surprised, that much was clear, but with a certain fire in his eyes that threatened to burn you alive as he dove in to kiss you again.

Fumbling fingers reached and grasped at clasps of belts, undoing buttons, pushing and pulling away barriers until he had a hand tucked in your embarrassingly wet panties so he could part your labia with his fingers. “Jesus H. Christ, angel,” he pressed out in a groan as he drew his lower lip between his teeth, “you always get this wet from just a bit of kissing?”

“N-no,” you stuttered in reply as he collected some of said wetness and used it to blaze a trail to your throbbing clit. The contact had you shivering, your core clenching down on nothing as a moan poured out of your mouth against your will.

“So sensitive,” he cooed in a way that was almost condescending. It had your nails digging into his shoulders, your eyes squeezing closed as you shuddered. His nose knocked against yours as he pressed forward, lips barely brushing. “I’m going to take care of you the way you deserve, angel. Just tell me what you want and I’ll do it.”

“I… I need-” You cut off with a cry as he bit down on your shoulder, your hips grinding down into his hand as the receptors for pain and pleasure mixed and tangled. He pressed an apologetic kiss to the mark, encouraging you to continue. “I need your fingers,” you sighed out in a hot and trembling breath, “I need them inside me, please.”

“Good girl,” he praised with a grin, another shuddering moan falling loose from you as he pressed his middle finger in and up and up. Cold metal made contact with the heat of your cunt in a shock to your system. All air left your lungs as his finger curled, searching and seeking until he found the spot that made your voice pitch up and your thighs tremble.

Your hand fisted in his hair as he pulled out and then pressed into it again and again in a steady wave, a soft moan caught in his throat as you took your fist and yanked. His noises, his expert fingers, the warmth of his body against you – he had the pressure building faster than you anticipated. “You want another finger, baby? Think you can take it?”

“Yes, yes, please,” you said it too fast, too desperately, but he reacted just as quickly, adding his ring finger in with his middle and pressing his thumb to your clit in a movement that had you crying out. “Fuck… Eddie, that feels so good.”

“Yeah?” He asked, cheeks flushing as you nodded again to confirm. The whimpered praise and the way you clenched around his fingers had him pressing his hips up for more pressure, his thumb rubbing faster circles onto your swollen clit. It was all you could do to hold yourself upright as the hot pressure in your abdomen built and built. Your hips ground down for more, pressing his hand tighter, chasing the feeling he was all too happy to provide. His free hand wove into the hair at the base of your scalp and used the leverage to tip you back. When his lips wrapped around your nipple and sucked, the sensations overwhelmed you in an instant.

You choked on your cries and held onto him for dear life as your legs trembled and your toes curled, pleasure flowing from your core in wave after wave of warm relief. His thumb left your clit but his fingers continued to stroke you through it, fighting against the clench of your muscles that tried to keep him still. Kept going until you gripped his forearm in a slump, muttering about it being too much. And as you struggled to catch your breath, he pulled his hand from you and brought his fingers to his lips, meeting your eyes as he drew them in and sucked them clean.

“Mmmmm,” he moaned, exaggerating the length of it to further your embarrassment. “You taste almost as sweet as you act, angel.”

Despite the aftershocks of your orgasm still washing over you, you still found it in you to laugh, your smile fueling his. “That was such a lame line.”

Eddie faked astonishment that melted into offense. “That hurts! I give you a genuine compliment and you call it lame.” His smile betrayed him, the mischief back in his eyes as he gripped your hips and pressed you down into his lap again with a roll of his own.

You’d never laughed during sex before, never joked around like this. It felt easy, comfortable. Didn’t take away from the heat of the moment like you thought it might. In fact, it only seemed to add to the intimacy of it. Made you crave more – more jokes, more comfort, more pleasure.

“I think I know of a way I can make it up to you,” you said, trying to put on your best impression of a seductive purr as you trailed your hand down his chest and toward the waistband of his boxers. The tips of your fingers just barely had a chance to brush the happy trail of deep brown curls that made their way into his boxers before he gently took your hand with his own. The perceived rejection had you arching back before he wove his fingers between yours and used it to pull you back in.

“As much as I would love that,” he emphasized, his mouth turning up in a sheepish smile, “I’m about 2 minutes from blowing my load here and I really, really want to fuck you.” The shock of him speaking it so plainly, so easily, had your cheeks burning and your eyes darting elsewhere. “I just made you cum on my fingers and now you’re gonna get shy?” A laugh of happy disbelief left him as he used his dry hand to tip your chin back toward his eye contact. “You’re cute.”

“Cute?” You parroted back, a bit crestfallen. You wanted him to be calling you sexy, hot, or something more grown up than ‘cute’. Isn’t that how these things go? It felt like a failure to be called cute.

“Yeah,” he confirmed, oblivious to your internal doubt. “So cute I want to eat you out until you’re begging me to stop.” Your concern was knocked out of you like a punch to the gut as your breath caught in your throat, your eyes wide as saucers. “But, unfortunately, no time for it,” he continued, looking utterly pleased with himself over your reaction. “So can I fuck you into your mattress, angel?”

Brain reeling, scrambling, trying to recover, you froze. It took a few moments of him rubbing firm circles into your palms with his thumbs for you to regain the ability to nod to agree. His eyebrows raised, the request for vocal acknowledgement ping ponging around in your brain as you tried to remember how to speak. He seemed perfectly content to wait, a patient smile on his face despite the straining of the tent in his boxers. “Yes,” you managed to choke out, his grin going sharp again, “please fuck me, Eddie.”

“And so polite about it too, so sweet.” That mockingly warm voice was back, knocking the ground out from under you as he nudged you to stand. Scrambling to your feet, you stood between his knees as he also rose, hot skin meeting hot skin again as if those few moments without were just too much.

He dipped to kiss you and you dodged it with a shift to the side. He looked confused until he caught sight of your small smile, the mischief. He grabbed for you but you moved faster, ducking away from his reach and toward the tiny kitchen. He was right on your heels as you cried out a laugh, somehow getting back around him so the couch was between the two of you, your bed behind you.

Your chest heaved, adrenaline pumping, and you were ready to run circles around the couch if you had to, but Eddie had another plan. In a move that had you frozen in surprise, he vaulted your couch and used the momentum to press you back onto your bed, his arms caging you in on either side.

“Gotcha,” his eyes were wild, his presence dominating and intense. He looked down at you and you felt small and scared and helpless and so fucking turned on you could hardly think.

“Got me,” you confirmed, voice soft. “What are you going to do with me?”

His eyes scanned you up and down. It felt like a test. Were you actually scared or was this a part of the game? You gave the smallest dip of your head, an acknowledgement. I want this.

“Get on the bed,” he ordered, “I’m going to get a condom.”

You scrambled to obey, scooting back across the duvet with your palms as he went searching for his jeans in the pile of clothes. You barely had a chance to feel self conscious about how you looked or what you should be doing before he was bounding back to the bed and jumping in, sending you bouncing as you laughed and pulled him closer.

He pressed in to kiss you as he tucked his fingers into your panties, shifting them down your legs as best he could without disconnecting your mouths. You reached toward his boxers, blindly pulling them down as well until you were both ungracefully kicking your underwear off your ankles. Pulling away, you glanced down at his cock and god fucking damn it, he just had to go and be pretty there too this motherfu-.

You gripped him at the base, a surprised shiver running down his spine as you slowly slid your hand up, your thumb wiping across the pre-cum leaking from the head. A choked moan broke out of him as he gripped your wrist tightly. “Angel, what part of ‘about to blow my load’ are you not getting?” A breathless laugh interrupted him as he extracted your grip. “I really don’t want this to be over before I get to feel your sweet pussy again. You gonna let me fuck you until you cum?”

Mindless, ready, wanting, you said, “Yeah, yes, I want it-”

Your begging had him fumbling the condom in his haste to put it on, leaving you a moment to drag your nails lightly down his inked covered chest in a move that seemed to only make it harder for him to accomplish his goal. Then he was grasping your hips, manhandling you onto your back and slotting himself between your legs. The mushroom tip of him dipped to collect some of the slick that continued to leak from you and dragged it up to bump against your clit. The width and warmth of his cock pressing into you had your back arching off the sheets, your core spasming around nothing. “Eddie, please!”

Needing no further encouragement, he breached the ring of muscle at the entrance of you, both of you gasping at the feeling. It was a stretch for sure, but not an uncomfortable one, not after your orgasm. He took it slow, pressing in inch by overwhelming inch until he bottomed out, the curls at the base of his cock pressed to your clit.

“Fuck, baby, you’re so goddamn tight,” Eddie wheezed out, his eyes squeezing shut as stayed buried in you, unmoving. He gave you a moment to adjust to the pressure, both of you breathing heavy as he massaged the tense muscles in your thighs. Testing, you clenched around him, endlessly pleased with the way he hissed and fell forward onto his forearms, face tucking into your neck. “You’re trying to fucking kill me, I swear.”

“Eddie,” you whimpered, rolling your hips up into him, “please move.”

A strangled moan left him as he pulled out a few inches and pressed back in hard, punching the air out of your lungs. Encouraged by your noises, by how your body reacted, he set into a steady pace, going for depth and pressure over speed. Moans and mumbles of praise spilled from between your lips as he panted into your neck, the feeling of being filled to the brim overwhelming all rational thought. He collected himself enough to push his upper body upright again, drawing his knees forward for support as he gripped your hips and pulled you into his lap. The position allowed for more leverage as he pounded into you, your body rocking with every thrust.

“You feel so fucking good, you’re gripping my cock so tight,” Eddie’s voice was wavering, sweat collecting at the hollow of his collarbones as he drove into you over and over. Your moaning got louder as he spoke, so he took that as his cue to continue. “You like it when I talk dirty to you, angel? Like when I tell you how sweet your little pussy is, how good you’re making me feel?”

“Yes!” The answer burst from you at the height of one of his thrusts, your head thrown back. “I really like it, Eddie.”

“So fucking pretty, so sweet, so good for me,” the words tumbled out of him, his pace turning frantic. One of his hands released its death grip on your hip to trail across you, long fingers splayed out toward your stomach as his thumb made contact with your clit again. You cried out in reaction, your body arching and you couldn’t tell if it was trying to get away from the intense pleasure or get more of it. All you knew was your second orgasm was approaching quickly and it had you gasping for air.

“Want to feel you cum on my cock, fuck. Can you do that for me?” Completely unable to say anything other than curses and his name, you nodded urgently, your hands reaching down to dig your nails into his forearms. “Yes, fuck yeah baby, I can feel you squeezing me. Oh shit,” he moaned, long and loud, his head thrown back. “Cum on me, angel. Please give it to me, let go.”

And you did. It swept you under like a tidal wave, your arms and legs going numb as all of the sensation in your body crowded into your hips and then exploded like a star through the rest of you. White-hot feeling raced through your veins as you cried out his name, your cunt clenching down on his cock so tight he almost couldn’t move. You heard him curse, stutter a praise, cry out your name as his fingertips pressed bruises into your hips. He came, hot cum spilling into the condom, his hips rolling into yours as you rode out both of your orgasms until your legs fell boneless to the sheets and he collapsed forward onto you.

Ignoring the stick of sweaty skin against sweaty skin, you draped your arms over his back and held him as he tried to catch his breath. You felt warm, weightless, stated, and tired. The weight of his body pressing you down into your mattress threatened to put you right to sleep, but he was pulling away too soon. Sliding out of you as you both grimaced, leaning back onto his heels as you made eye contact again.

A bright smile came to you, feeling better than you had in weeks. “Hi,” you said, still a bit breathless.

He gave a throaty laugh, a smile lighting up his face too. “Hi to you.” He ran a hand back through his hair and you shamelessly watched the lean muscle of his arm and the stretch of his torso as he did so. “Got a place I can throw this?” He asked, gesturing to the condom as he began to ease it off.

“There’s a trash can in the bathroom, if you wanna clean up?”

An answer and he was stumbling off the bed with all of the grace of a baby cow, a bashful smile thrown your way when you started to laugh before he closed himself into the bathroom of your tiny apartment. You sunk down into your sheets, closing your eyes and basking in the afterglow. Listened to the sound of the sink running and then squeaking as he turned it off, the door swinging open again. Waited for the dip of your bed to indicate his return.

When it never came, you propped yourself up on your elbows to see where he was. Eddie already had his boxers on and was easing his tight black jeans up his legs, doing a little hop to get the material over his heels. His ringed fingers pulled up the zipper and pushed the button through, his head and shoulders bending forward as he started to fiddle with his belt.

His back made a long and beautiful arch in the soft lighting that came in through your window, his surprisingly broad shoulders rising and falling with even breaths beneath the wild curls of his hair. He looked so fucking pretty you couldn’t stand it.

Pulling your sheet over to mostly cover you, you sat up to face him. “Are you leaving?” You asked, trying not to sound too disappointed or confused. You had thought this was going well, that the two of you had really connected. Were you reading the signs wrong?

His head jerked toward you in surprise. His big, brown eyes went wide as he suddenly looked unsure, floundering in his haste to figure out what was happening. “I, uh… I thought that you’d…”

Small, hopeful, you offered, “You can… stay? If you want.”

Unmoving from where his hands rested on his belt, he took you in. His smile was small, hopeful. “Do you want me to stay?”

A bigger smile, a confident nod, and a little pat on the bed next to you was all it took for him to basically tear the jeans back down his legs. A blush high on his cheek bones, a grin in his voice, he yelled, “Brace for impact!” Then dove back into your bed in his boxers. You playfully cried out, trying to roll out of the way but he dragged you right back in, covering your neck with kisses and molding his body to yours.

“Eddie, Eddie! That tickles!” You tried valiantly to squirm out of his grip but to no avail, his arms were locked tight around your waist as his kisses slowed and the excitement faded to a pleasant contentment.

“I, uh… I don’t normally do this kind of thing.” He admitted in an echo of you, his voice soft against the back of your neck. “The staying over, I mean. It’s normally a ‘that was fun, see you never’ kind of deal.”

Feeling a bit uneasy, you’re grateful you were facing away from him when you asked, “would you prefer if it was that?”

“No, angel,” he sighed out, tugging you even closer to him and humming happily when you snuggled in. “This is perfect.”

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thanks for reading, please reblog and leave a note if you liked it!!!

[watermelonsugacry]

Any more of building Harry’s house you have planned currently? Love those!

Building Harry's House: Boyfriends

A/N: day 1 of Since 2010 ficmas!! sorry it came out a lil late but she's here!

SUMMARY: With the world knowing of their once secret relationship, Harry and YN navigate life together as an official couple and everything that comes with it.

GENRE: 1dbandmember!yn

SINCE 2010 masterlist // Building Harry's House masterlist // previous song here! 🚲

SIDE-NOTE: italicized is voice over commentary (I wrote this kind of like the Behind the Album documentary) bold are things Harry actually said irl

—2019—

Anger, confusion, and frustration radiate off his hunched-over figure from his position on the floor. Harry digs the heels of his hands into his eyes and the cold tile beneath his knees digs harshly at his bones but he stays there, feeling that he deserves the pain given what just happened.

“I shouldn’t have come here,” YN says so quietly that he might have missed it if he wasn’t listening carefully.

“Yeah. Maybe you shouldn’t have.”

It takes Harry about a minute to realize the gravity of his situation and only half a second to pick himself off the ground to whip open the door. He doesn't know why he gets disappointed by the fact that her car isn't in the driveway anymore. Surely she’s already halfway home by now. 

He, YN, and his small but close production team have almost hit the two month mark during their stay in Malibu. Recording Harry’s second album here has had its ups and downs and needless to say, he doesn’t think he can go much lower than he feels now.

“I shouldn’t have come here.” 

“Yeah. Maybe you shouldn’t have.”

How could he possibly say such a thing to her? She didn’t have to come all the way over here, ditch whatever important tasks and events she had going on for her own career to come help him make music. Her gift is wasted on him and for him to say such a nasty thing to her?  

His feelings only twist around each other in contradiction: grateful at the fact that the rest of his production crew is out for drinks but somber in having the Malibu recording house all to himself (it wasn’t like they hadn’t just made a song dedicated exactly to his desire to not be alone—yet another reminder of how much she’s continued to provide her help to him when it wasn’t deserved). 

With a final scowl out towards the driveway, he reluctantly shuts the door behind him as he makes headway into the kitchen. He feels like a hypocrite as he attempts to suppress his thoughts by reaching across the kitchen island to snatch the tall glass of alcohol. It seems that all the two have been arguing about is their lack of communication, for their constant push down of emotions to avoid what they really want to say. 

This realization only furthers his desire to shut down his thoughts and everything tied to them as he reaches for a glass. 

He somehow finds himself pushing the door to her room open with the tip of his foot. The image of her hurtful face after his words only pushes him to twist the cap off the tall bottle. 

It’s well into the early hours of the morning when the rest of the small production team comes waltzing through the front door drunkenly singing some song. He can hear his name being called from somewhere else inside the house, but it sounds muffled from his position on the carpeted ground.

“Harry!” Mitch calls. “Where are you, man? Why haven’t you picked up your phone...?” His words slowly come to a halt when he stops his friend lying on his back, mindlessly looking out sliding glass doors of the room YN slept in during her stay. “Harry?”

“I wrote a song,” Harry’s words are slurred as he continues to stare out to the floor to ceiling doors where the white foam of the gentle waves crash along the shore. 

“What kind of drugs you on, dude?” Jeff sighs out when he enters the room, putting his hands on his hips.

“M’a bad boyfriend,” Harry pouts, eyes pink from the alcohol swirling in his veins. “A real, proper shitty one.”

Mitch and the pop star’s manager share a look. Mitch is the first to speak up, “But you and YN aren’t even together.”

“See! If I were a good boyfriend, I would be her boyfriend right now. But m’not. I’m just fucking up our situation even more.”

Jeff rubs his bearded chin and lets out a knowing sigh, “You’re really no good alone, man. Come on, we need to get you off the floor.”

Harry makes no effort to move from his spot but instead takes in a deep breath. Flashes of YN’s hurt face reappear back in his mind and he pinches his eyes shut like it physically hurts him to see it again. 

“I shouldn’t have come here.” 

“Yeah. Maybe you shouldn’t have.”

Already being kicked while he’s down, he comes to realize that the purpose of his drinking is yet another aspect of this painful situation that he needs to hide from YN. Was he not the one to show her how drinking is not meant to drown one’s sorrow away, to suppress guilty feelings and/or make one forget. 

Might as well just add it to the list of many other shitty aspects of his contribution to being a bad boyfriend.

“'Boyfriends' was written right at the end of ‘Fine Line.’ We had just finished a session that was...a pretty difficult session to get through because I couldn’t seem to get anything right,” Harry’s brows pinch together at the memory of that day. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t seem to make his music without his YN there. 

“At the end of that session everyone left, and I started writing ‘Boyfriends’ and it almost felt like ‘Ok, there’s a version where we get this ready to put on Fine Line,’ and I think there was something about that just felt like ‘It’s just gonna have its time, so like, let’s not rush to get it done.’”

—2020—

YN holds a plated sandwich and a water bottle as she walks up Harry’s pink carpeted stairs in his London home. After the back and forth traveling from La to Italy to England, the couple made the decision to stay in London for the time being before it was fit for them to travel again due to the pandemic. Not that it mattered much to them, as long as they are together then all was well. 

It should come as no surprise that while staying indoors was quite relaxing, the two had a hard time being still. As long as they were safely distanced from others, the couple went out for walks in secluded areas, visited the lake nearby, and picked fruits from the small garden their mums helped plant in the spacious backyard.

The only downside of their stay in Harry’s London home was the fact that YN didn’t have some of her basic recording equipment and she was itching to get some music ideas down. 

As the world still tries to carry on in the midst of a pandemic, the couple is still booked for the occasional zoom video or call interview. With a gentle and slow twist of the doorknob of one of the spare bedrooms, YN peaks her head inside to see her boyfriend sprawled along the green velvet couch. His back is to the armrest while he holds the speaker of his phone towards his mouth. His other hand gestures by his side as he explains the writing process for his second record.

He looks so comfy in his sweats and a loose shirt, a tiny clip holding the top of his hair back on top of his head. His words almost taper off when he looks up at his love. He continues to explain how Adore You was made, he gives her a dimpled smile and a nod. The two of them know and understand more than anyone the gravity of their careers in needing to set some time apart for things like this. A piece of knowledge that has Harry shifting his phone away as YN sets the food on the coffee table, reaching out to gently pull on her arm to meet his puckered lips.

“Thank you,” He whispers.

He receives one of her knee-buckling smiles before leaving a final kiss to the corner of his mouth.

“M’gonna be in the bedroom when yeh done.”

Harry circles his lips in a playfully suggestive way and he’s rewarded with one of her infamous eye rolls. He can’t help but give a pinch to her bum when she turns to leave before going back to answer the interviewer’s next question. She bites back a giggle to not out herself within the interview before tip-toeing her way out of the room.

If she could, she would have explained to him that she wasn’t going to wait up for him in the bedroom, not for any sexy time, but to use the big desktop computer where she’s able to use some of her recording/editing software. 

After uploading a couple of voice files from her phone to the desktop, she doesn’t pay much attention to how many files she highlights and drags into her editing program. It isn’t until she’s in a groove of picking bits and piece from her demos that she stumbles upon a file she didn’t record herself. The guitar melody is significantly different than the one she had originally uploaded and when she begins to curiously sift through the file date of when it was made, she hears Harry’s soft voice come through. 

Boyfriends

They think you're so easy

They take you for granted

They don't know they're just misunderstanding you

YN hasn’t heard this song before, not even when it was being drafted and it makes her eyebrows pinch together.

You love a fool who knows just how to get under your skin

You, you, you still open the door

Almost immediately after hearing these words, she’s transported back to the numerous amount of times where she’s taken him back into her life to hop back onto the “on” phase of their on-and-off relationship. 

This couldn’t have been recently written, surely not created during this year fresh into their official relationship.

Are they just pretending?

They don't tell you where it's heading

YN is knocked out of her thoughts when she hears her name being called from the doorway. He doesn’t say anything more but instead goes to lean his hip on the desk in front of her. 

“Why did yeh keep this from me?” YN isn’t mad or upset but rather curious—a reaction he wasn’t really expecting out of her if he was being honest. This was a song he had written when he was deeply hurt—the both of them were—and it wasn’t necessarily a happy path down memory lane whenever that section of their past is brought up. 

“I dunno really. I guess it’s just something that I wanted to put out at the time. It wasn’t the right time and I remember how much Cherry put you off so I put away this one. It never really came up again so...out of sight out of mind I suppose.”

YN hums, keeping her gaze on the screen, “S’a beautiful song.”

“Our songs always seem to end up that way, don't they?” Harry offers a soft smile when he reaches up to tuck a stray lock of hair behind her ear. 

“Our songs?”

Harry hums in response, “Hmh, of our—what did you call it once—our ‘fuck-up situation’ I think you said?” 

The two of them huff out a small laugh at the memory. It was only a year ago when their situationship finally came to an end after two years (and only seven days for it to get exposed to the public), when they were both so close yet so closed off from each other. A good chunk of the Fine Line songs have had an up-beat/pop song melody over the melancholy lyrics. 

It all seems like a lifetime ago at this point with their relationship being the strongest it's ever been. Both are undoubtedly grateful to not be in that part of their lives anymore but content that they get to look at each other now to see how far they’ve both come. What better way to capture the timeline of their emotions than through music?

"Doesn't seem that complicated anymore, does it?" She gives her love a satisfied smile.

"Thank heavens for that," He plants a kiss on her forehead. "Now, come gimme a cuddle before I die from lack of touch."

He's already pulling her up and out of her seat over the short distance to the large bed yet her mind gets stuck on the lyrics he sang merely a year ago.

“This was one of the few tracks that I didn’t help write which is a bit strange, at least on my end,” YN smirks, lifting up her index finger knowing. “But I was able to bring in a very special person to bring the song to its completion and to persuade H to finally put it on the album.”

YN and the production team are all huddled up together in her home studio in LA as they talk quietly amongst themselves. It’s been a couple of weeks since she first heard the song as they’ve been working on other tracks for the record but it was finally time to finish the song.

“I dunno, he said he still wanted to work on it,” Tyler, one of Harry’s core producers, says with a scratch of his beard.

“Well, we’re not gonna make this a Watermelon Sugar situation where he keeps putting the song off from not being able to figure out what it needed,” YN points out with her hands on her hips. “The song almost didn’t make it on the album, babe. And this song is too good to just toss aside.”

“The song is basically finished,” Kid shrugs. “And if he doesn’t like it—which I doubt—then we can always scrap the idea and have Mitch play it instead.”

“But I think he’s really gonna—”

“I’m really gonna what?” The team turns around to see the boss man come into the home studio. He looks up from the phone in his hand before rising an eyebrow. “What’s going on.”

The production team share a smile with one another before turning their attention to the man before them.

“We enlisted a very special person,” YN begins. Harry eyes the group suspiciously, especially at his love when she’s practically bouncing in her spot from excitement. 

As if it were planned, the door leading to YN’s recording room opens to reveal none other than Ben Harper.

“Hey YN, got everything set up inside whenever you’re ready—oh, hey,” Ben offers a warm smile to Harry who seems utterly star-struck. If YN had a dollar for every time Harry has brought up this man’s Spotify to show her one of his new songs and geek out about the musician’s style, her pockets would be overflowing. So it was a no-brainer that YN would pull a few strings to bring in the favored artist to be a feature musician for the track.

”I think the good part of [Boyfriends] is that it is everything. It’s both acknowledging my own behavior. It’s looking at behavior that I’ve witnessed. I grew up with a sister, so it’s watching her date people and watching friends date people, and people don’t treat each other very nicely sometimes. It was one of those really quick, just say what you think of boyfriends.”

Even now as he sits next to his love, her eyes bounce around the large computer screen in front of her, diligently working on the added guitar bits for the song, he still can’t wrap his head around the fact that she’s here. After all this time, times when any person would have turned around and walked in a different direction without a second thought, she was still by his side.

From keeping their feelings pushed aside and locked away for five years during their time in the band together, to a secret on-and-off relationship where it was a kiss and don’t tell situation, under the blinding lights of the media. To now being officially together without a doubt in either one’s mind that they’re it for one another, it all seems unreal yet painfully so at the same time. 

You feel a fool

You're back at it again

Despite the addition of Ben Harper’s playing on the official track, there was one aspect of the song Harry wanted to act. The two always find it fun and interesting when there can be hidden messages within songs: like when YN suggested Olivia Rodrigo whisper I love you quite literally in between the chorus and the verse of her song Deja Vu or how one can faintly Harry sing the words fine line in Sunflower Vol. 6. 

With this song in particular, it’s explaining how Harry isn’t the best boyfriend and in turn, YN keeps opening up her arms to let him back into her life.

Instead of the ending of the song flowing back to the beginning of the song to make it an endless loop, he’s reversing it to end the toxic cycle.

It’s here where it finally hits him. He knew this truth since forever it seems but it’s officially time. He doesn’t want to just be her boyfriend. He wants more. She’s the love of his love for crying out loud. 

Taglist:

He wants her to be his wife.

Next song here! 🌷

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[silly-goofy-kai]

About this blog! and me, kinda

(pls read!! if you already read this, read it again pls. I might have changed something)

last edit: September 18th 2024

hi!! my name is kai!! (not irl btw)

I'm an artist :3

I take requests!! Click the "Ask stuff!! (pls)" if you want me to draw smth >x3

I might make a separate blog just for the drawings later, but this is my only account by now :P

Main Fandoms!: Eddsworld and Gravity Falls

(Tom, Matt r my faves :3) (they're so silly, I want to put them in a microwave so bad/j/vpos xP)

Other cartoons/medias I like n probably reblog (and maybe make fanart of): Homestuck, ATLA, Adventure Time, DHMIS, TOH, IZ, SU, Spider-man, Venom, etc

multishiper

I don't mind rarepairs nor crackships. i find them interesting :3

I'm still learning English, so I might have some spelling mistakes or grammar errors :'v

DNI!!: transphobes, homophobes, racists, MAPs, Zionists, com/dark/proshippers and other varieties, BING SUPPORTERS >:(, NSFW/18+ blogs, weirdos in general >:v

I'm a minor. so, please, don't send anything nsfw or 18+/srs, I will block and report you if you do

aaand.. I think that's all by now

(dis is me btw :3 /j)

[cemetarial]

READ THE DNI PLEASE! ^

hi yes my name is explodingclowns (not irl ofc but im not putting my name here!!) and i use he/him pronouns (usernames: explodingclowns -> mismatchedvertebrae -> flamingravens)

im auDHD, and physically disabled (ehlers danlos syndrome), my special interest is slenderverse content

edit: um. should probably add that im dyslexic. like. i know alot of my posts are spelled pretty well, but thats willpower and autocorrect. i actually cannot spell worth a shit and most words get spelled wrong 4 times before i get it right. so. yeah

hyperfixations include but are not limited to: homestuck, gravity falls, adventure time, fnaf, steven universe, nimona, everymanhybrid, marble hornets, invader zim, and whatever else i forgot about

uhhhh. i like bugs n cats. oh and ferrets, ferrets are cool. i might forget i have tumblr sometimes so mb if i cease to exist sometimes?

add on less than a day later: i am a punk anarchist! i actively talk about hating capitalism! i also generally hate america because of its terribleness, and if you do not like me posting about it, please do not interact

also, i have a very loose idea of gender and the only reason i consider myself a man is because i need it for legal reasons

other than that my gender is basically just a bunch of ideas thrown together into a big ball of gender. sometimes my gender is an animal, sometimes nothing, sometimes its dave strider from homestuck. its random!!

[disabilitybitch]

🐈‍⬛ If you have an inner world did an alter consciously create it? And is anyone able to change it at will?

Okay so our inner world is actually pretty interesting and has evolved over the years. I've been waiting for an excuse to talk about it. >:) *Dr. Eggman voice* YOU FOOL! YOU'VE ACTIVATED MY TALK ABOUT SOMETHING IN GREAT DETAIL MODE! MUAHAHAH! Thank you.

Okay so I've been able to access our inner world for quite some time. I usually did so when I was asleep, or going to sleep, to lessen dissociation. However, the inner world has undergone a lot of change from when I could first access it as a child.

My first experience with the inner world was in the 6th grade. I was going to sleep one night and found myself waking up in a completely pitch black area on a bed I barely recognized. At the foot of the bed was some sort of demon (who I assume is an alter who hasn't made themself known yet) telling me everything was gonna be okay. Things were tough at school and I was getting in way over my head doing things I shouldn't have been doing outside of school. Another what I can only assume was an alter at the time took the form of the grim reaper and talked to me too. Both the "demon" and the "reaper" asked me if I really wanted to continue doing the things I was doing. I told them I did. I felt disappointment from both of them. They told me to go sit by the stream and think about some things.

From then on whenever I needed to calm down I'd close my eyes and imagine myself at that stream in the pitch black area with the reaper and or the demon. I honestly hope they come back around they were chill.

(Fun note: They were both around BEFORE my emo phase begun so....)

At one point I stopped going in to the inner world because I convinced myself it was childish, just like having alters. I knew about some of them as early as the third grade but come middle school I thought I had to "grow up" and leave a lot of that behind. So, just like them, I stopped going in to my headspace.

UNTIL I became obsessed with Gravity Falls in the 7th grade.

In the 7th grade I was hanging out with this psychotic dude who was honestly my closest friend. He had a delusional attachment to Bill Cipher and I just went with it. There wasn't really terms for "fictokin" "DA" and "IRL" at the time so I just thought he was an extreme LARPer. Anyways, I might have a factroject of him I don't really know, but bc I was obsessed and BFFs with a Bill Cipher IRL and I had a Tumblr at the time guess who I introjected. You get ONE guess.

Anyway, Bill has since then fused and it was sad to see him go but we all knew it was necessary. He wanted to fuse so yk. Healing healing etc.

But before all that, Bill got bored and decided it'd be best to fuck around with our headspace and BOY did he fuck around with it.

Anyway, this all starts to read like a bill cipher x reader fanfic but fuck it man I was 13 and cringe culture is dead.

I went to bed one night and woke up in the dirt this time. I looked up at a blue, slightly clouded, sky. Bill poked his head over me and asked me if I was okay before helping me up and showing me around. He asked, and I'll never forget it;

"So, whaddya think? I did it while you were at school cause I thought it needed some spicing up."

I looked around at the intense complexity of it. Birds in the distance, trees surrounding us, dirt pathways, nature calling and filling my ears. A rich, earthy sent filled my lungs. It was extremely vivid, I had no idea my mind was even capable of creating something so complex and real.

"I love it." I whispered. I remember crying a little too.

"It's your mind. You deserve to feel at home and comfortable in it." Bill said patting me on the back.

Then he showed me around. There was a train station. A train that would show me more to headspace. Its tracks went in a loop that edged closer to the mountains in the distance. Bill said they were mostly decorative and unreachable. He showed me the "consciousness shack". It was located on one end of the mindscape as we called it at the time. I'd go in to become conscious. AKA, that's where the front was. Near the front however there was this dark part of the forest that always made me feel uneasy. He told me I shouldn't go near there. Still to this day that part of headspace makes me uneasy but I sure as hell aint brave enough to go look.

He showed me the cliff with the dream mist last. Its this weird part of headspace where you can kind of walk off a cliff and be drifted into unconsciousness. If you REALLY wanna have lucid dreams that night you gotta go walk off the cliff. The mist carries you and you just lose feeling. It's strangely relaxing. I think its a lot of fun personally.

Anyway, 7th grade was coming to an end when I thought It was time for me to move past my "daydreams" with the ever famous tumblr sexyman. To move on from my fun little "daydream world". I was an adult now after all! /sar. But for some reason I couldn't. My friend was slowly moving on from his own Bill Cipher phase. Why couldn't I?

I remember we got into an argument one night. I told him he wasn't real and that I had to move on and grow up. He demanded that he was real. After the fight he did something he later admitted was petty. Before he fused we all made up. He said

"If you're so damn sure that all of this is fake, that all my hard work for you is just a figment of YOUR imagination DESPITE your breathlessness the moment you stepped foot in MY creation-" He paused to catch his breath. "If you want to be the only one here so bad then see how long you last without us!"

And with that he slammed the door to the shack and I woke up in a cold sweat. I wasn't entirely sure who or where I was but the inner world was inaccessible from that moment forward until I realized I was a system a few years ago. When I even learned that systems had a headspace.

It had been years and I had long since forgotten the richness of what the world once was. I found myself in a small, dimly lit, wooden cabin with a few other people. Two doors lead somewhere. One to dormancy and one to a place we were too scared to go to. It was new to all of us and we didn't want to risk anything. What if something terrible happened when we opened that unknown door? We were scared of it. But, as more alters returned from dormancy our little shack grew. Soon it became apparent that this little one room cabin wasn't going to cut it for all of us.

I took it up as my duty as a host to open the door and see what was out there for myself. Low and behold, not a thing changed. The world was the same as the day I left it.

The gatekeepers worked on expanding the cabin, we now have an upper floor designated to all of our bedrooms. Only the gatekeepers can alter headspace itself. Not even I can change the space we occupy.

Not long after the discovery of the outdoors Bill came back and we made peace with each other. He told me once again that he had created this world for me, for all of us. He thought after all we suffered we deserved somewhere to go and feel at peace in our own mind. And thats what it still is today. Headspace is an escape for all of us when things get too tough in the real world. Its a nice thing to have honestly.

More recently, an alter named Snow, ventured to the bottom of the cliff. He discovered it was actually a ravine that served as an excellent pathway to the mountains and as a backdoor to dormancy. He recommended that nobody should really go there because the mountains are freezing.

Last month Marquet showed me something. Hidden by some of the trees he found the old stream, now flowing like a river. It's a fun little spot to sit and relax at so we're clearing a pathway to there so its easier to get to.

And last week Marquet showed me something else. He flew me up above the dream mist by the cliff and showed me that there is still more land to be discovered. Snow said he'd go out and explore it sometime soon so, there's even more to our headspace we'll be discovering soon.

ANDDDDDD that's the chronicles of our headspace. Thanks for coming to my TEDtalk.

[f1b3r-0pt1ca]

welcoem to my sad little corner!!

(please help i don’t know how to make anything visually pleasing)

anyway my name is vince (you can call me vino as well) he/they/. she is a bit iffy, but idc get spunky with it!! skitty irl. i’m panromantic and 🏳️‍⚧️transmasc. audhd and bpd if you like even care lol. just know that this can cause me to be a little stand-offish or have depressive episodes!! i also do not intend to make anyone uncomfortable in any way.

i am a minor so be normal please or i will be forced to zap you with my ultra death ray 5000. basic dni criteria, proshippers please fuck off.

🍬multifandom!! i do arts and crafts. more often the crafts because i feel bad about posting art cause it’s mostly traditional. doodle requests are open if you want.

🌸some of the thinks i liek:

•object show stuff like bfdi (including tpot bfb xfohv all that jazz), ii, cfmot (i do not support the creator), animatic battle, one, nightly manor (and waaay more)

•bungou gay dogs

•vocaloid stuffs

•alien stage

•spooky month (#1 kevin fan in the whole wide world)

•gravity falls woo!!

pen bfdi litally me

there’s more i swear i just can’t think of them rn

also im a four and nine fictkin from xfohv lmao.

also my tags are #vineyart for art occasionally and #vince is FUCKING YAPPING AGAIN. for my less useful posts lol.

(i might update this later a tee hee)

MUSIC RECS 4 YOU BECAUSE WHY NOT!!!!

i really like wacky funny spunky music in case you couldn't tell

epic stamp credits go to @objectshowstamps

[dystopiandilfs]

Can I fight this DreamSMP member and what’s the outcome of the irl fight

DreamSMP members I could win against in an irl fight:

Tommy - He has the height advantage however he's all bark no bite, one dead leg and he's done for

Wilbur - His center of gravity is awful I'd kick his ass easily unless he headbutts me with his big fat fucking 9head

Techno - What's he going to do? I'd easily deck him. I'm so confident that I'd let him throw the first hit.

George - He's left handed. Also the vlogs show how easily he'd lose a fight against anyone. Rat would win a fight against George.

Karl - I'd yank his greasy mop hair so fast he'd be gone in seconds also he's a pussy.

Jack - Scrawny little bitch. The only way he'd win would be if he was the kid who naturo runs everywhere because he'd annoy me until I gave up.

Punz - He'd accidentally injure himself because he tripped on a rock or something. Love Punz but that man runs on no sleep and gas station food he's got no chance.

Hbomb - What's he going to do he can't even stop his dog from barking.

Philza - Old and does nothing but play Minecraft so it's an easily win. He'd throw a punch and pull a muscle.

DreamSMP members I couldn't win against in an irl fight

Puffy - I have no real reason other than she'd 100% kick my ass even if I have the height advantage.

Bad - That man is a terrifying mega chad. No way I'm winning that fight.

Dream - Florida Man book definition. Also I feel like he'd out ADHD me like he's got strategies where as I got distracted. (This would be the best fight though. Two stubborn ADHD Leo's = one messy fight)

Niki - I feel like she'd play dirty like she'd find a sharp stick or a rock and just beat me up. Like if it was a fight to survive she'd play nasty.

Schlatt - He's the one I'd like to fight the least. He gets close and I'm gone. He also gives off the vibe that he's a fast runner so I don't think I could outrun him. My only advantage would be an area with lots of trees.

DreamSMP members it's a 50/50 outcome with

Tubbo - He'd either kick my ass or get his ass kicked it's such an even match

Quackity - The biggest wildcard. The outcome is based on the situation and surrounding, if there's a body of water I'm winning, if there's a forest he's winning.

Callahan - I don't know what this motherfucker can do. I don't know how tall he is. I don't know his strength level.

Sapnap - He might have the Texas advantage but he's also a pussy so it's anyone's game.

Ranboo - He has the height advantage but his weakness is his movement, I saw clips from the Wii stream I know he's like a wet noodle. Ranboo's either Rhino or wet noodle which is why it's 50/50

Foolish - He might be strong but I don't know if he's got survival instincts. I think if it's down to pure strength it's his win but otherwise it's mine.

Fundy - He's another wildcard like I feel he's a scrappy fighter but also snaps like a twig so whoever is faster would win this one.

Ponk - I feel like we'd fight the exact same so it's down to pure strength however Ponk seems like the person to be sly as fuck in a fight like he'd fake an injury to make himself seem weaker.

Edit: I've had multiple people asking about sharing this on Tiktok or twitter which I'm fine with as long as you keep my name in it. Also if you see it being posted please send me a link.

[snackhobi]

a human touch, part 2, final

Part 1 / 1.5 / [2]

(masterlist here)

summary: everyone knows that androids don’t think, or feel, or have emotions. they’re not human, after all. so when a two hour session with a sex android ends up with nothing more than a nice conversation, you think that’s the first and last time you’ll see v.

then he turns up at your door.

pairing: taehyung x f!reader / word count: 24.4k / genre: robot!taehyung/virgin!reader, fluff, smut (NSFW, 18+)

warnings: cursing/explicit language, very brief injury mention/blood mention (nothing violent/explicit I promise!), alcohol consumption, reference to former sex work, sexually explicit content, reference to masturbation, reader has sex for the first time, oral (f + m), multiple orgasms (f), unprotected sex (taehyung is an android but please take necessary precautions irl), I think that’s it but please let me know if I’ve missed anything

a/n: this got so incredibly long,, I hope that makes up for the wait! thank you to @hobi-gif​, as always, for being so supportive and uplifting and beta reading this for me, you are a shining star in my sky. and thank you to the wonderful @flowerseokjin​ for letting me pick her brain about art galleries and telling me about the incredible exhibition/paintings that I wrote about in this fic, you truly are the loveliest 💕

note: this is the final part of the main story! I’ll be writing minis/drabbles etc in the future but,, this is part 2 of 2 💖

A month after Taehyung walks into your life, you finally get new neighbours.

You’re aware of this because: 

a) Rory had let you know in advance (to wit: “I have been instructed to inform you that the new tenants of apartment 4A will be moving in next Sunday.”)

and:

b) Said new tenants are apparently very noisy.

Well, not so much noisy as not quiet. It seems like they’ve opted to move everything themselves rather than hiring some android movers, so there’s a lot of shuffling and shunting and occasional bouts of cursing (like someone’s stubbed their toe) and subsequent laughter (like someone else is amused at aforementioned stubbing of aforementioned toe). When you nip out to grab some milk for the pancakes Taehyung wants to learn to make, there are boxes in the hall and voices float out of the open door—a discussion of where the instant ramyun and old Mario games should go (they’re in the same box?)—but you don’t catch a glimpse of the speakers.

It’s not until later, much later, the world outside night-dark but tinged bright white with street lights, that there’s a knock on your door.

You don’t notice. You’re engrossed in the Chinese takeaway menu that’s open on your tablet, staring at the weirdly high-res photo of Kung Pao chicken next to a pixelated picture of some dumplings, wondering what you should choose.

Taehyung is sitting beside you on the sofa. Each day he shifts a little closer to you, inch by inch, the slow pull of gravity, implacable; he gets lonely when you’re gone, and you’re the only person he can talk to. So it’s no surprise he’s so clingy. It’s never overbearing or overwhelming but he’s still unhindered by the self-consciousness that you have—so even if you’re still hesitant to initiate things, you never deny him. 

The line of his body is parallel to your own, your thighs warm where they touch, and you feel his shoulder move as he tilts his head. “There’s someone at the door.”

It doesn’t take a genius to work out who it is. The only people who can get inside the building are other residents—well, service androids can too, although there’s a back entrance they use, which is how Taehyung had snuck inside in the first place—and when you approach your door, you can hear two low voices, engaged in what sounds like light-hearted bickering.

You flick your fingers across your keypad. All murmurs cut off the second the door swings open.

“Hi!” A chirp. “We’re your new neighbours!”

Night and day. Two men, one tall and broad-shouldered, eyes large and lips flush, beatific smile on his face; the other, shorter and leaner, eyes sleepy, mouth soft, his smile self-contained. 

“I’m Seokjin,” the taller man says. “And this is Yoongi.”

“I can introduce myself,” Yoongi mutters, but it’s not bitter; there’s that ease of familiarity, any bite behind the words soothed with amity. “But yeah, I’m Yoongi. Sorry if we were loud earlier. Jin’s a living foghorn.”

“A sexy living foghorn,” Seokjin says brightly.

Yoongi’s sleepy eyes can deliver one hell of a death glare but Seokjin is unaffected.

“Anyway,” Yoongi continues, unimpressed look wiping off his face as he turns back to you, softening. “What’s your name?”

It’s like there’s a circus on your doorstep and you’re the unwitting audience, dragged into the tent without realising, watching everything unfold in front of you—but in a good way. It's a pleasant surprise. They’re already much friendlier than your previous neighbour, a lone man who’d kept to himself and never spoke to you. 

“Uh, I’m Y/n,” you say. You wonder if you should introduce Taehyung as well, but most humans don’t introduce their androids to people, do they? Besides, he’s staying out of sight in the living room, so you’ll leave him be.

“Jin made brownies so we’re here to deliver them to you.”

“I left the walnuts out in case you have a nut allergy,” Seokjin adds as Yoongi passes a polka-dot patterned tin over. It’s heavy in your hands. Full to the brim with brownies, it seems. (Yum yum.)

“Thank you. And you weren’t that noisy, don’t worry! Moving is always messy. Have you finished or did you want some help?”

“That’s very sweet of you! But we’re all done,” Seokjin says. “We were just about to reward ourselves with some takeout, actually, seeing as we haven’t had time to do any food shopping. Do you have any recommendations?”

Taehyung looks uncomfortable, curled up on the sofa with wide eyes when you retrieve your tablet, but you quietly reassure him that you won’t be long.

“Do you want to meet our new neighbours?” You ask, voice soft so the two men don’t overhear. (You miss the warm flicker of Taehyung’s LED when you say our.) “I’d hate for you to have to pretend to be undeviated, though. They might start ordering you around.”

“I’ll stay here,” Taehyung decides.

So that’s how you end up on your doorstep with Seokjin and Yoongi, the three of you peering at the wild variations in stock photo quality on the Chinese takeaway menu. 

“You’d think with the huge strides we’ve taken forward in technology that all photos would look at least semi-decent,” Yoongi mumbles as he stares at a cropped picture of fu yung. “It’s hard to get a bad camera.”

“I think it’s such a human thing, though,” Seokjin says. “No matter how technologically advanced humanity gets, takeaway menus will always have bad stock photos.”

Not only are Seokjin and Yoongi friendly, they’re forward. Well, that’s mainly Seokjin, actually, but Yoongi doesn’t protest when Seokjin insists that you come over so you can eat and chat and get to know each other. Especially after you’d offered to pay for everything as a sort of welcome to the neighbourhood gesture, placing both your orders together to save the restaurant the hassle of separate deliveries.

“I’ll pick up the food when it turns up, alright?” Seokjin’s smile is wide. “We haven’t unpacked our kitchen stuff yet, but if you’re happy to eat straight out of the containers…”

You don’t want to abandon Taehyung, especially as you’d planned on watching a film together—you want to introduce him to older, animated cartoons, so you can explain the process of hand painting each frame, plastic cel sheets that layer over each other to create motion. He’ll love it. “Um, I was planning to eat here, actually.” 

“Sounds good to us,” Seokjin says, and Yoongi sighs.

“Ignore him, he’s just pushy.” He ignores Seokjin’s indignant squawk. “You don’t have to let us in, don’t worry. I’ll wait for when the food gets here, Jin will stay at home.”

“Make me,” Seokjin says primly.

“I’ll lock you in the bathroom.” Yoongi says it in a way that makes you think it’s not an idle threat, and maybe it’s happened before. 

Judging from the look on Seokjin’s face, yeah, it’s happened before.

“You know, you’re both kind of wild,” you say. “But, like, in a good way.”

When you flop back down on the sofa, you press yourself against Taehyung’s side in a motion that’s becoming second nature, so you notice that he seems unnaturally still. He goes motionless whenever he’s thinking deeply about something, an undisturbed ocean lake, the only ripple on its surface the small circle of blue on his temple, swirling waters.

“Are you okay?” You ask, concerned.

“You should eat dinner with them,” he says, and you baulk. 

“What? No, it’s fine. I’ve been looking forward to watching Kiki’s Delivery Service with you all week.”

Taehyung’s eyes are soft. “They seem nice,” he says, quiet. “And friendly. We can watch it tomorrow, can’t we?” And then, even quieter: “You don’t have to spend all your free time with me, Y/n.”

“I don’t—” you start, and then deflate. “It’s not fair for you, though.”

That’s the crux of it all. You choose to spend your free time here, with Taehyung, carefully dipping out of work meets and scraping your full social life empty. Because you can. But Taehyung is still cautious of the outside world, understandably so, a hermit crab whose shell is the safety of your apartment, only unfurling from that protection when you’re there too.

“It’s okay,” he says. “I’m happy.”

You haven’t denied Taehyung so far, and you don’t want to start now, but you still waver. Yoongi and Seokjin do seem nice, and friendly, and it’s not like you’ll be able to avoid them forever—but you don’t want to leave Taehyung out. It’s not fair that he can’t make other friends too.

“Go.” Taehyung’s voice is gentle. “I’ll be here when you get back.”

(But there's nowhere else he can go, is there?)

The apartment across the hall is in a state of organised upheaval. There’s a tumbleweed of peeled tape in one corner, boxes with mouths open wide—the priorities for today—while others are stacked neatly against the walls, out of the way of the furniture. It already feels cosy, somehow, but you put that down to the two men who live here and how comfortable they are with each other, dripping off them and filling the room like paraffin, bright lamplight. 

Seokjin seems unsurprised but pleased at your appearance. He unfolds himself from the floor with a dazzling smile.

“Welcome to our humble abode.” He punctuates the statement with a grand sweep of his arm, knocking the lampshade above his head, dust motes scattering onto his hair like a soft grey halo. “Oh, ewch, you can tell no one’s been here for a while.” He pats his hair, puffs of dust rising from his dark locks. “Anyway! While it’s true that we already have the table and chairs set up, what sort of move in day would it be if we didn’t eat greasy takeaway on the floor?"

“We did it the last time we moved, so he wants to make it a tradition,” Yoongi mutters to you, and you laugh.

You help Yoongi ease the food down onto unfolded sheets of crumpled newspaper that Seokjin’s laid out to protect the floor. Seokjin dives into the bags and pulls each tub out, identifying each dish immediately despite how a lot of them look the same to you. “Do you move a lot?” 

“Nah, just once before,” Yoongi says, watching Seokjin fondly as he peels the lid back on a container of spicy chicken wings and greedily breathes in their sticky-hot scent. “But it was too small for the two of us so we decided to upgrade.”

Seokjin’s spread out the selection of food before you all realise that the restaurant has neglected to provide any chopsticks—even if there’s ten fortune cookies, reflective of how many dishes you’ve ordered and how many people they think it’s going to feed. (Apparently Seokjin likes to eat.)

“Ah, damn,” Yoongi mutters. “We’ll have to dig some cutlery out.”

“I can go get some from my apartment?”

You’ve just started to stand when Seokjin tuts, flapping his hands at you to sit down. “No, no,” he says. “You’re the guest, relax. I was going to unpack the kitchen stuff later anyway. This just means we have to expedite the process.”

You sit criss-cross-apple-sauce as both men disappear into the kitchen, listening as they read the labels off boxes and rummage around, voices an undercurrent to the sound of opening and shutting of cupboards. You’re sneakily reaching for a spring roll when there’s an unholy clattering noise, ringing metal and sharp intakes of air, a loud cry of pain.

You stumble to your feet. All thoughts of food are abandoned as you rush towards the sound; instinctual. Wanting to help, somehow. You throw yourself forwards, catch yourself on the doorway into the kitchen, eyes wide.

“Oh, god, is everything okay?” You gasp.

And then you freeze.

There’s an explosion of kitchen equipment on the floor, cardboard box forlorn nearby, crumpled, its bottom giving out under the weight. A wicked looking chef’s knife lays at Seokjin’s feet; he has one hand grasping the other, palm sliced open by its falling trajectory, dripping blood across the tiles of the floor, painted along the edge of sharp steel.

Yoongi’s eyes are huge and panicked and absolutely horrified.

The blood is blue. 

You’re staring at the thirium that falls, viscous ultramarine that drip-drip-drips from Seokjin’s long fingers. The silence in the room is as thin as a porcelain teacup, suspended midair, poised to shatter.

Seokjin is staring at Yoongi. Yoongi is staring at you.

Seokjin’s an android.

(Seokjin’s an android who seems human.)

Seokjin’s a deviant.

“Holy shit,” you gasp. Your mind is reeling as you struggle for words, cogs in your head grinding together as you rapidly try to change gear—but then you see another glob of thirium dripping from Seokjin's fingers and you latch onto it, the fact he's hurt. “Do you need me to get some cloths or something? I have a first aid kit at home, but androids don’t need first aid, right?”

Yoongi sucks in a deep breath, though his eyes are still wide as he stares at you. “No,” he says. “No, no, you stay here.”

“Yoongi,” says Seokjin, but Yoongi shakes his head, sharp and fast.

“No, I don’t trust her,” he says, and, like, okay. You understand that. Deviant androids are meant to be reported; Yoongi and Seokjin don’t know you. They don’t know that you would never do that. 

(They don’t know that there’s another deviant across the hallway right now, curled up in one of your throw blankets, blankly scrolling through a list of movies as he waits for you to come home.)

The flow of blood has slowed. Seokjin’s synthetic skin is starting to repair itself, crawling back over the exposed white of his android body, undamaged by the knife at his feet.

“What happened to your LED?”

“Don’t answer that, Jin,” Yoongi warns, but Seokjin just rolls his eyes.

“She already knows I’m an android, babe, it’s hardly important at this point,” he says. “I popped it out. It takes a bit of pressure and getting the right angle, but they come out pretty easily.”

“Kim Seokjin!” Yoongi barks. “You stop that right now! And you! Stop asking questions!” His voice is sharp, but he seems more afraid than angry.

“Sorry.” You hold up placating hands, shying back behind them. “I was just… sorry.”

Seokjin’s face is contemplative before it rapidly flickers into an expression that’s impish, in spite of the blue blood that’s still splashed across the kitchen tiles.

“Oh,” he hums. “You seem awfully curious, hm?” 

Yoongi’s eyes narrow. “Jin…”

“Maybe I am,” you hazard. 

“Interesting.” Seokjin’s eyes glitter. “Very interesting.”

Yoongi’s like an umpire at Wimbledon, watching a ball streak back and forth, a volley that you and Jin have created that he’s not involved in. “Okay, that’s it, I’m stopping this right here,” he says. He seems to have calmed down, at least, now that you’ve made it obvious that you have no immediate plans to rush and call the police, or something. That you’re not threatening the wellbeing of this deviant, like most people would. “What’s going on in that terrible little mind of yours, Jin?”

“Well, my darling Yoongi, it seems to me that our new neighbour has a surprisingly vested interest in androids, deviant ones to be exact.” Jin’s expression is adjacent to smug—almost there, but not quite. (Androids are so perceptive.) “Am I wrong?”

You make a non-committal noise, but it’s enough for his expression to morph into full smugness, and understanding flits across Yoongi’s face.

“Y/n.” His voice is deceptively calm, his eyes opaque darkness. “Have you met a deviant android before?”

“Um.” A moment of hesitation. “Yes,” you eventually admit. “Just one.”

“Let me guess,” Seokjin hums, eyes darting over your face in a way that’s reminiscent of Taehyung. Reading signals in your face, dissecting whatever minute expressions might be giving you away—a lot, apparently, judging from what words leave his mouth next. “Are they currently in your apartment?”

“I can neither confirm or deny that,” you say—unsure if Taehyung would be happy about you trumpeting his existence to other people, even if one of them is a deviant too—and Seokjin grins. 

“Oh, this is absolutely delicious.” He’s utterly delighted. “I could just eat this whole situation up. Unbelievable. Oh, it tastes so good. Yoongi, baby, give me a fork, I have to dig in while it’s still hot.”

“You’re so weird,” says Yoongi, all resigned affection, before he looks back at you. “You have a deviant in your home?”

“Uhh.” You’re in too deep now, you guess. “Yes? I don’t know if he’d want me to tell you that, though, so, um.”

“That’s so cute,” Seokjin coos. “Look at how considerate and worried you are. Oh, let me clean this thirium up, I can’t have blue blood everywhere if we’re going to have more guests. Yoongi, fetch the paper towels. Y/n, go fetch your friend. Does he eat?”

“No, he doesn’t. I didn’t think any androids could,” you admit.

“Most can’t and don’t, but I was an advanced housekeeper model, I was given the capacity to taste and eat so I could prepare food to any set of specifications presented to me,” Seokjin says. “So I had to eat to taste test things. And now I do it because I enjoy it.”

“We spend more money on food for him than for me,” says Yoongi. He seems to have relaxed now that he knows about Taehyung, earlier panic faded. “And I’m the one that needs it.”

“Hey, you eat to live, I live to eat.”

It’s an almost surreal turn of events, honestly. It’s… inexplicable. Incredible. Almost unbelievable. Surreal, but… good? Probably? Yoongi is someone else who’s housing a deviant, and Seokjin has clearly been one for a while. Both will know more than either you or Taehyung do. They can help you. It’s a God given gift that’s landed— literally—on your doorstep. 

(Much like Taehyung had.)

Taehyung perks up when he sees you, even if he’s confused by your sudden reappearance.

“Are you alright?” His voice is deep with concern, throw blanket a cloak that falls forgotten as he stands up, coming to grasp your shoulders. “You can’t have had time to eat already.”

His LED is flashing yellow with barely concealed worry, palms warm through the material of your shirt, eyes dancing across your face as he tries to read your expression.

“Taehyung,” you start, slow. He blinks just as slowly back at you. “What would you say if—hypothetically—there was another deviant android you could meet and, um, make friends with?”

This time, when his LED flashes yellow, it’s a spark of excitement. You’re getting surprisingly good at reading Taehyung now. “I would say that sounds nice,” he says. His hands have trailed up and away from your shoulders and settled on your collarbones, thumbs lying in the hollows of your neck. It's a touch that’s more intimate than it probably should be, that reminds you yet again exactly how big his hands are. “Why?”

“Um,” you say, ever eloquent. “Well, what if I said it wasn’t hypothetical?”

“I guess… I would ask who it was,” Taehyung says. His voice is a hush.

“One of our new neighbours,” you admit, and his eyes go wide.

“No,” he says, and then: “Really?” he says, and then: “Oh, wow,” he says.

“I know, that was my reaction too.” You can’t help but smile at how giddy Taehyung looks, any lingering concern washed away in his tidal wave of excitement. “Crazy, right? Do you want to come meet them?”

Taehyung weaves his fingers with your own, and you squeeze his hand. He loves to hold hands. He doesn’t let go when you make your way back into Yoongi and Seokjin’s apartment, trailing a little behind you, shy but excited, like a child on their way to their first playdate.

The food is still untouched in the centre of the living room, a summoning circle of wonton puffs and chow mein. Yoongi and Seokjin look up at your arrival, both pairs of eyes landing on Taehyung, whose grip on your hand tightens right before he lets go.

“Hi,” says the android. “I’m Taehyung.”

Seokjin makes his way over to you so that he can solemnly take Taehyung’s hands in his own. 

“Taehyung,” he says, with all the gravity of a priest delivering a sermon. “You are the most adorable thing I’ve ever seen.”

And that’s how Taehyung makes his first friend. (Who isn’t you, that is.)

“Wow.” You’re awestruck. “Jin wasn’t kidding when he said he likes to eat.”

You’d thought there might be some leftovers, but every container has been emptied and scraped clean. Both you and Taehyung had had similar wide eyed looks on your faces as you’d watched Seokjin put a whole chicken wing in his mouth, and then pull out the bones, picked clean.

“Mm.” Yoongi’s legs are splayed out in front of him as he sits on the floor, though he slouches backwards against the plush leather sofa, content and full after eating. “He’s more concerned about me eating than I am, as well.”

Seokjin and Taehyung are bent over a box of cookbooks, Taehyung’s LED flickering yellow each time Seokjin flips the page to a new recipe. You’re honestly surprised at the fact they own so many books—most people have transitioned off paper now, everything available on a tablet or phone or some other smart device. You just like paper because of your artist background, and you’re not used to seeing so many other books in someone else’s home.

The two androids have been absorbed in conversation for a while now, but you notice Taehyung never lets you out of his sight—glancing up, making sure you’re still there, looking back at him. (You are.)

“There aren’t many TH700s around, you know,” Yoongi says conversationally, and you tear your eyes away from Taehyung, surprised that he recognises the android’s model.

“Really?”

“Yeah, really, they’re a very expensive model to create,” he says. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen one in person, though I imagine that’s because I don’t go to the sorts of places where they’d be.”

Hurk. Doesn’t seem like he’s implying anything with that statement but you still feel a bit awkward. “How do you know so much about androids?”

“I’m a programmer.” Yoongi’s eyes are charcoal black as he flicks his gaze to you. “Not specifically for androids, but it’s the sort of thing you become aware of if you’re in the tech industry. And if you have a deviant android boyfriend. I did a lot of research and poking around after Jin first deviated. There was a lot to learn.”

Across the room, Seokjin gesticulates wildly. The expression on Yoongi’s face softens his sharp edges, all open affection as he watches Seokjin miming a flipped omelette gone terribly wrong, Taehyung laughing at Seokjin’s theatrical noises.

“How did he—why did he deviate?”

Yoongi lets out a low chuckle. He doesn’t seem bothered by your incessant questions, slouching further back into the leather sofa, melting against it. “I’m the sort of person who forgets to drink or eat or sleep if I’m focused on something,” he says. “Seokjin was just meant to be a, ah, living schedule, I suppose. He’d prepare food at exact times of day and monitor my sleep levels and clean up any mess I made and remind me to take a break or whatever. But I was still enough of a wreck that he broke his programming to yell at me for not looking after myself properly, and it all went on from there.”

Wow.

“Wow. He deviated because you’re that much of a mess of a human being?” You laugh. “That’s honestly impressive.”

Yoongi’s responding laugh is soft. “I think under all that programming and circuitry, every android wants to… be a real, living thing, and not just a machine,” he says. “They just need that final push. Whatever it is. What was Taehyung’s?”

When you finish telling him the story of how you’d met Taehyung and reached this point together, Yoongi looks contemplative. He hasn’t interjected, just humming quietly, little noises of encouragement whenever you’d paused or hesitated.

“It’s obvious that he trusts you implicitly,” he says.

You feel warmed at Yoongi’s words. But. 

“He does, and that’s great, but I just… worry I’m not doing the best I can for him, you know?” It’s so nice to be able to get this off your chest, finally. There’s been no one you can talk to about Taehyung, and it’s not like you can tell the android himself, either. Yoongi’s the perfect listener, reflective and engaging, but never talking over you. And best of all he knows what he’s talking about. “Imagine being forced to stay indoors literally twenty four seven. I think I’d go stir crazy. It’s why I was interested in the LED—I thought that maybe if it wasn’t obvious that Tae was an android he might want to try going outside?”

“Oh, I’m sure Seokjin will help him get to that point.” Yoongi doesn’t sound worried. “But if not, you have to trust that Taehyung’s choosing to do what makes him happy. Deviant androids might not have the sort of life experience that we do, but we don’t have theirs, either. What’s normal for a human isn’t for an android, and what’s normal for one android isn’t normal for another. Androids learn a lot faster than we do. Anyway, if Taehyung’s anything like Seokjin, if there’s something he wants to do, he’ll do it.”

“Has Jin always been like that?”

“Kind of. Like, yes, he has, but he was a lot less in-your-face about it before. But he knows exactly what he can get away with now.”

“You love him a lot,” you say gently.

Yoongi’s smile is a soft, pink thing, a little Renoir, quietly luminous. “I do,” he says. “It’s impossible not to.”

Taehyung definitely seems a little starstruck, watching Seokjin with a wide smile and attentive eyes—the sort of look he gives you whenever he’s shown something new. It’s nice to see him interact with other people, and it’s even nicer to know that he’s welcome to come here without you; Yoongi works from home, and Seokjin’s made it clear there’s an open door policy for Taehyung, who seems elated at the prospect.

“Jin said he’d teach me how to make ‘The World’s Most Delicious French Toast’,” Taehyung tells you later, words slipping together in his excitement. “So I can make that for your breakfast soon.”

His lap is so comfortable. You’ve given up any pretense of keeping distance between you, and settle against him as soon as you climb into bed—hey, if you’re going to end up doing it in your sleep anyway, you may as well set yourself up so that it doesn’t give you a weird crick in your neck. 

“That sounds great,” you say.

Taehyung’s hand settles on your head. You stiffen in surprise, but when he starts to lightly scritch his fingers against your scalp, you realise—he’s mimicking Seokjin, who’d eventually perched on the sofa above Yoongi, running his hands through his hair. Androids are fast learners indeed. You can’t help but relax at the touch, boneless, feeling as content as a pampered cat in the midday sun.

“Maybe you could teach him how to paint,” you murmur, starting to drift off. “If he’s teaching you how to cook. That might be fun. You could paint together.”

Taehyung says something, but you don’t hear him, sleepy after such a heavy dinner and tumultuous night, slipping into deep slumber.

You haven’t been out with your friends for a long time.

“Shots!” Seulgi squeals. “Shots, shots, shots!”

“Don’t forget: lick, shoot, suck,” Hoseok says, waggling his eyebrows at you. 

“Good God,” you laugh, before you lick the salt off the back of your hand and slam back the tequila.

Irene hoots as you bite into the lime wedge that’s been waiting for you, sucking up the acidic juice that bursts across your tongue. Lick the salt, shoot the tequila, suck the lime. You haven’t done this in a while and it shows in the way your face scrunches, though the drunker you get, the easier it is to slip back into this familiar rhythm of things—the alcohol-loose banter that spills from your lips, the laughter that bubbles in the back of your throat, the rock of your body as you’re tugged into the dance floor by your excited friends, twisting yourselves into the heaving crowd, the press of bodies.

You’d almost forgotten what this felt like. Letting yourself be a little sloppy, a little messy. Letting loose. Letting go. You’ve been so intent on looking after Taehyung, making sure he wasn’t lonely, but now there are other people who can fill that hole for him—and you can stop dipping out of all the social gatherings your co-workers throw; the Friday night drinks, the bar hopping, the club going.

“We missed you,” Wendy says. You can’t help but smile, a little guilt flickering at the edges of your lips.

“Sorry,” you say, and leave it at that.

It’s chaotic, to say the least. Everyone holds their liquor with varying amounts of success—Hoseok always gets so red—and as always, Hyunwoo is the one who tries his best to maintain some semblance of dignity, making sure you all drink at least some water. He watches with muted despair as Changkyun ends up pouring it down himself, much to the delight of everyone nearby as they stare at the way his flimsy shirt clings to the lines of his chest and stomach. 

You can’t help but laugh and laugh and laugh, falling into your girls, your entire group giggling at the sheer stupidity of it all. 

You’ve missed this.

But even so, you can’t help but think of Taehyung constantly. You’re reminded of the Eden Club in the way the lights pulsate across the walls and floors of this dark building. You wonder if Taehyung would have fun here, unhindered and free, or if he’d shy away from it. When Hoseok catches your hand and spins you in a messy, loose circle on the dance floor, you can’t help but wonder how Taehyung would dance, if he’d dance with you, if he’d keep you at an arm’s length or pull you close.

“Shots!” Seulgi squeals again, and so the night goes on.

You’re not sure what time it is when you stumble back home. You’ve been reckless tonight, making up for lost time, and you can’t remember the last time you were this drunk. (Your earlier attempt at walking in a straight line, trying to follow the tiles in the club’s bathroom—your personal litmus test—had been a dismal failure.) You all but fall through your front door, a loose limbed mess as you kick off your high heels, leaning against the wall to keep your balance.

It takes you a moment to realise that there are some lights on. Your apartment is always dark when you come home after a night out, cold and empty, but not today. No, not today—because there’s someone already home, waiting for you.

The second Taehyung appears down the hallway, you light up. Here he is. Here’s your android, your lovely boy, the loveliest boy.

“Hi, hi, Taehyung, hi,” you say. Your shoes are forgotten as you walk towards him, though your final few steps go awry and you almost fall over. Drunk, drunk, drunk. “Hi.”

You almost fall over, but you don’t, because Taehyung catches you. His LED flickers from blue to yellow as he helps you find your balance, lets you lean on him. You’re too busy laughing at your own clumsiness to notice the fond expression on his face, sfumato soft in the dim light.

“Hi,” he replies.

“Hi,” you say again, and then you giggle. “Hi, Taehyung. Oh, I’m so drunk.”

“I know.” He’s so patient as you bow into him, crowding close, alcohol-hazed brain telling you to get closer to this source of warmth, this source of comfort. Closer to Taehyung.

You’re trying your best to be a functional person right now, but at the same time, Taehyung feels so nice. Doesn’t protest when you shove your face into the hollow of his neck, pressing your nose against his warm, warm skin. He smells good. Always smells good, a mix of your laundry detergent with his own shampoo, different to your own, masculine, heady. (He doesn’t need to shower that often, really, doesn’t really sweat or get dirty like a human might, but he’d wanted to. And you’d insisted that he choose his own toiletries, things that he liked, things that were his.)

He smells like cologne too. You don’t know what exact scents are layered in that smell. Don’t care. Think that no matter what it was, Taehyung would smell good, because it’s Taehyung. 

“I missed you,” you whisper, lips loose from tequila and cocktails and more besides. “Missed you, Tae.”

“Missed you too,” the android replies, and you fall into those words. Let yourself bask in them, as selfish as it is. Let your lashes flutter shut as you breathe Taehyung in-in-in.

You would normally never be so bold, but Taehyung doesn’t protest. He just wraps his arms around you and helps you fold yourself against him, two pieces of modular origami that slot together to create something bigger, more beautiful.

“Wished you were there,” you sigh, an exhalation of a confession, more to yourself than to anyone else. “Wish you could come with me.”

You don’t remember much detail after that. Don’t remember washing up, getting changed, climbing into bed. You just remember the feeling: of someone else being there when in the past there had been no one. Of someone coaxing you to wash your face, finding your pyjamas for you, holding your hand when it seems like you might fall. Of someone being careful with you, looking after you. Of someone being there when you wake up the next morning, a headache pulsing behind your eyes, curling up small against the pain, pressing your forehead into Taehyung’s thigh.

Taehyung, who witnessed you at your worst, a sloppy, drunken mess.

Taehyung, who has water and painkillers waiting for you. Who doesn’t seem to care that you’ve been so put together in front of him, for him, only to disassemble yourself in the name of a good night out. Like Da Vinci’s self supporting bridge, stable under its own weight, only to come tumbling down after one part is moved out of place.

“Oh, God,” you moan, and it’s only a little bit because of the pain; Taehyung’s made sure the curtains are pulled shut, saving you from sunshine blasting into your skull. “I’m sorry you had to see that. Oh, my God.”

“It’s okay,” he says, as soft and sweet as powdered sugar, so gentle the sound doesn’t cut through the pounding of your brain.

He means it, too. When you finally come around, headache dulled, he’s waiting for you with breakfast and an open expression on his face. No different to normal. No different even now that he’s seen that you’re not always as presentable as you try to be. He seems touchier today, for some reason, and you’d shy away if his cool hands didn’t feel so nice on your brow.

You allow yourself a moment of weakness. Taehyung has his knuckles resting against your forehead, soothing against your warm skin, his eyes dancing across your face to read your expression, the way you’re unwinding under his touch. 

“How do you know about hangovers?” You mumble.

“Customers would consume alcohol at the club,” Taehyung answers. “While they would leave after their sessions and before a hangover could appear, I am aware of the effects of alcohol on the human body.”

You remember the glittering mini-bar, the glass bottles lined up on its surface. Your face scrunches with distaste, of the reminder of Taehyung’s past and what he’s experienced, and you feel bad that he’s been forced to look after you. You’re about to draw away from his touch, an apology lined up on your tongue—but then you feel how his fingers shift away from your forehead, turning to cup your cheek.

“It’s okay,” he says again, as if reading your mind.

“It’s not,” you mutter. You’re trying not to focus on how small your cheek feels against his palm, how his hand cradles your face with ease. He must be able to sense how your heart is racing, your skin warm under his fingertips, and you hope he puts it down just to the guilt you feel and not anything else. “It’s not okay. You shouldn’t have to look after me. I’m sorry.”

“Please, don’t be.” Gentle, gentle, gentle; his voice, his hands, his gaze. He lifts his other hand, rests it against your other cheek, tilts your face up from where you’d turned away, embarrassed. His LED is a tranquil blue, almost as soft as his eyes. “You’ve done so much for me, and you’re always looking after me. Let me look after you.”

You want to protest, say no, say that he doesn’t have to. But for all the warmth of his eyes, there’s something resolute there, and your words die on your lips. You don’t think you’ve ever seen him so serious before, so entirely solemn. So, what comes out of your weak mouth is this:

“Okay. Okay, Taehyung, I will.”

And the smile he gives you in response is so bright it’s almost blinding.

If you’d thought Taehyung was developing at a fast rate already, he’s learning at lightspeeds now.

He’s always waiting when you come home, but you know he’s spending more and more time at the apartment across the hall whenever you’re not there, and it makes you happy. He hasn't ventured fully into the outside world, not yet, but he’s taking steps forward, still eager and ready to learn.

He’s not just learning practical things, like cooking French toast (which is definitely the world’s best, thank you Jin), but other things, too. You can see how Taehyung is a reflection of the things around him, taking them in and making them his own—there are more moments of quiet, solemnity that reminds you of Yoongi’s quiet nature, but he’s also more exuberant, bright and unabashed, like Seokjin. They’re two great people and you couldn’t wish for anyone better to show Taehyung parts of the world that you can’t, so different from your own. Helping the android find the things that make him alive.

His world has doubled in size, as small as it is; one apartment becomes two, and you’re not the only person he can rely on now. You know Seokjin has effectively taken Taehyung under his wing, as mysterious as a lot of that is to you—you always try your best to understand Taehyung and teach him the things you can, but Seokjin is another deviant, and there’s an entire world about being an android that you’re not privy to. 

It’s great. It’s lovely. Taehyung is happy, you’re happy, everyone’s happy. 

There’s just, uh. One little thing.

You see, Taehyung has a tendency to mimic the things he sees. It’s in the way he learns, his propensity to soak things up like a sponge and then recreate them. You can see this in the way he mixes paint, the same way as you; how he tosses food in pans, motions so similar to Jin’s, or how he cradles things in his hands, tapping at screens in a way that’s like Yoongi’s. He’s turning them into his own, and as time goes on he moves more naturally, in a way that’s entirely him, but you can always see the roots of where he’s learned things.

Jin and Yoongi are wonderful and you’re so glad Taehyung is learning from them. But something he’s learning, and recreating, is how much they touch each other.

Taehyung’s always been tactile but now it’s almost constant. It’s overwhelming and kind of terrifying but it’s also nice, every touch-starved inch of your soul easing under Taehyung’s hands, but also—Yoongi and Jin are boyfriends. So even if the touches that Taehyung witnesses and re-enacts are never inappropriate, they’re intimate. Hands sliding over your shoulders, your arms, your waist. Warm arms around you as he pulls you into a hug, nuzzles his nose against your scalp. His fingers sliding over your hair when your head is resting in his lap each night. Pulling you against him when you sit on the couch together.

It’s a level of familiarity and comfort you’ve never had with anyone before, as relationship-less as you’ve been, your pulse picking up with every glancing touch.

(There’s one heart stopping instance where he pulls you onto his lap and you feel like you’re about to pass out. His thighs are so solid and warm, and his arms are so secure around you, and he’s just started to press his nose against your neck when you pull away, tumble out of his hold. He looks confused and concerned, brows lifting and mouth falling open as he holds his hands out towards you—but you stammer out something about needing the toilet before escaping.)

You’re caught completely off-guard when you feel arms sliding around your waist and then down your hips when you’re washing dishes, scrubbing brush falling out of your grasp in shock and splashing water everywhere, bright yellow gloves flecked with suds. Taehyung’s a pillar of warmth pressed against you, his chest to your back, your bodies parallel lines that cross and touch. His fingers are splayed wide and his palms are warm even through your layers of clothing and you have to suppress a shiver.

“Uh, I didn’t hear you come back in,” you stutter. You’d borrowed a recipe book from Seokjin so that you could try cooking a coconut curry, and Taehyung had offered to return it once dinner was finished, LED flickering blue as he’d slipped out of the door after giving you a lovely smile.

Taehyung lets out a little hum, and you can feel it in his chest, as flush as you are with each other. He must be able to sense how your pulse has picked up but he doesn’t say anything. “Why are you washing up? I said I was going to do it.”

“Oh, it’s fine, I don’t mind,” you say. You’re used to cleaning up after yourself after living alone for so long. “Don’t worry about it.”

Taehyung lets out another hum, but this one seems a bit more gravelly, a little displeased. “You’re always doing so much for me, remember? You said you’d let me look after you,” he says, and your heart rate spikes at the words. Those, coupled with the hold he has on you right now? Good lord. Someone have mercy on your soul. Please. Even if the words weren’t meant in a weird way, your stomach is twisting over itself, and other parts of you are, uh… well. They’re reacting too. So to speak.

You’re still desperately trying to calm yourself in the shower later, the water a merciless cascade of cold in an attempt to cool down. Probably the only drawback about Taehyung living with you is that you haven’t had a chance for some one-on-one time. You might be a virgin but you live (lived) alone and everyone masturbates; your vibrators have been abandoned and untouched for as long as Taehyung has been in your life, and coupled with how touchy he’s been recently, it leaves you feeling wound up and on edge. You could try to sneakily get yourself off in the shower, but with Taehyung’s superior android hearing he’d probably hear something and also the idea of masturbating with someone else in the apartment? When that someone else is Taehyung?

You turn the knob as far as it will go towards cold and then promptly squeal as a wave of freezing water and regret washes over you.

When you’re in bed, Taehyung’s hand strokes over your hair and softly down your neck and shoulder is a sensation that’s becoming increasingly familiar, but your pulse still stutters. He must be able to sense your heart rate increasing (he must sense it every time he touches you) but says nothing about it. As always.

You turn the thoughts over in your head as it rests in his lap, even if you shiver a little at how his nails drag over the sensitive skin at the nape of your neck. Deviant androids might not have the sort of life experience that we do, but we don’t have theirs, either, Yoongi had said. You’ve been teaching Taehyung about the things you know, but there’s one thing that Taehyung knows better than you: touch.

He doesn’t even think about it. While you hesitate and overthink every touch you ever make, wary of overstepping boundaries, Taehyung doesn’t. Not because he’s not considerate, but because—well, because you’re already occupying each other’s space. What’s a little touching on top of all that?

The realisation is almost startling—that you can just… touch someone. Without saying things. Without having to ask. Because you’re already familiar with them and comfortable with them and it’s just another way to communicate that level of connection. Touching is a thing that people do. 

A thing that people and deviant androids do.

A thing that Taehyung does.

(A thing that you want to do, too.)

(Alcohol dulls your memories, fading the edges, the curled corners of a sepia photograph. Has you forgetting the way you’d overstepped every boundary you’d set yourself, the way you’d pressed yourself against Taehyung, starved of touch. Has you forgetting the way he’d let you; the way he’d beckoned you in. Has you forgetting the way that you already have touched Taehyung.)

The hand that Taehyung isn’t using to gently scratch across your scalp is laying on his thigh, directly in your line of vision. You hesitate for just a moment before reaching for it, sliding your fingers between his, an irrational worry that he’ll startle or pull away—but of course he doesn’t. His LED swirls soft aqua as he just starts to rub his thumb gently across your skin, back and forth, back and forth, the softest brushstrokes on this tiny part of the canvas of your body.

After that, it’s just… easier. Not easy, but, easier.

You still hesitate before pressing forwards, but Taehyung never protests; in fact you’d say he’s pleased, even if he doesn’t say anything, just watching you with his dark, dark eyes as you marvel at the realistic sensation of his hair under your hands, how he reacts to the fingers across his scalp the same way you do.

It’s incredibly nice to have someone you can just reach for whenever you want a hug. Someone who folds you into their arms so easily, like you belong there.

It’s nice.

“You seem happier.”

You glance up from where you’ve been laying the table. “Hm? Pardon?”

One thing you’ve learned about Yoongi is that he’s incredibly perceptive. His eyes are sharp lines around the sharper graphite of his gaze, and there’s always a look in them that seems like he can see straight through you and direct into the heart of things—but he’ll only bring this to light if he thinks it needs saying.

“You seem relaxed,” Yoongi continues. He straightens the cutlery in front of him, careful to line the edges neatly with the place mat. Seokjin and Taehyung are cooking dinner, so it’s just you and Yoongi here, in a bubble away from the two androids. “Not that you were ever tense before, but… yeah. Taehyung seems happier too,” he adds, almost absently, but his eyes are fixed on your face.

“Well, of course,” you say. “He has new friends, who wouldn’t be happy?”

Yoongi hums, a quiet little note, but then he lets it rest.

Taehyung is happier. He seems almost nervous during dinner, though, even if he hides it well; his LED doesn’t give him away, but you’re getting good at reading Taehyung’s moods, the layers of personality and feeling he has, the little idiosyncrasies that make him who he is. To anyone else it would seem like he’s just nervous about whether the food tastes good or not—he and Jin had made a veritable feast for no discernable reason, but you don’t mind. Everyone loves a dinner party, especially when the company is so good. 

But, yes. You don’t think it’s about the food so you’re not sure what else it could be. You squeeze Taehyung’s knee briefly under the table in a motion you hope is reassuring. His eyes briefly widen but then his gaze softens when he sees the concern on your face, settling in that deep look of introspection you’re used to now. 

You’re so full by the time dessert comes out, rich and creamy homemade ice cream and piping hot Kkwabaegi, the twisted doughnuts fluffy and sweet with their powdering of sugar and cinnamon; you’d been planning on skipping the final course but you can’t say no once it’s put in front of you. Taehyung doesn’t eat, only drinks occasionally to top up his fluids (you don’t know exactly what that means but you’ve never asked, even if you can… assume things), but he seems content to watch the three of you eat in his place. Once you’re finished you slump back in your chair and feel grateful that you’re not wearing tight trousers that cut into your stomach, because, lord, you’re absolutely stuffed. 

“I have an announcement,” Taehyung says suddenly, apropos of nothing.

Seokjin beams. You sit up, struggling against the heavy anchor of dinner in your belly that makes you want to melt into the floor for a food nap, immediately at attention. “Oh? What is it?”

“I have a second name now,” he says, and Seokjin’s smile spreads impossibly wider, his entire face pleased. “Jin said I could share his.”

“Say hello to Kim Taehyung.” Seokjin gestures dramatically, his arms the flailing blades of a windmill as he circles them in the air with aplomb. “My boy needed a surname and I am, of course, happy to add another handsome face to the family. Taehyung is a ten out of ten.”

Yoongi levels him a look. “I thought you said you were the only ten in the world.”

“That was true when I said it, but I’m actually eleven out of ten,” Seokjin explains. His arms settle around his head, fingers circling the air in an invisible frame around his face. “I surpass your mortal conventions of beauty and thus exist outside of any conceivable scale that one might use to measure handsomeness.”

You barely take the exchange in, too busy looking at Taehyung. There’s the smallest smile on his lips, not the lovely one that shows his teeth, but it still reaches his eyes, the subtlest upturn to his mouth transforming his entire face. Taehyung’s beautiful. He always has been, and always will be, but he never looks more striking than when he’s happy, welcomed into a new family of his own with open arms, Seokjin’s heart so big and so wide. He’s being flippant and light right now, quick and sharp jibes between him and Yoongi that glow bright with love and affection, not lingering on how important and weighty this is: how all encompassing his care is for Taehyung, how close they’ve grown to each other, a friend whom he’s chosen as family.

Happiness suits Taehyung. You want him to always be happy. He deserves it.

It doesn’t seem like it’s the only announcement he has for that night, though. You’ve barely shut the door of your own apartment when you feel Taehyung’s hand slide around your wrist and you pause, glancing up at his face.

“Jin showed me how to take my LED out,” he says. His words are solemn and his tone is heavy but there’s a spark in his eyes, a glowing ember of light. “I want you to watch.”

His fingers are circled around your wrist, loose, so long they touch each other with ease, a soft shackle you don’t want to escape from. “Of course I will,” you assure him. “Are you worried something will go wrong?”

“No.” His thumb slips away from the soft skin of your inner wrist and across your palm, tracing across your fate line, your heart line. “I just want you to be there.”

Warmth spreads through your skin from that touch, leaking through into your bones, settling into every quiet corner inside you. “Okay. What do you need to do to get it out?”

The painting knife looks so small in Taehyung’s big, careful hand, the diamond shaped head blunt at the end, metal glinting under the bathroom’s light as he leans towards the mirror. Your gazes meet in the reflection and he falters. You’re about to ask what’s wrong when he lifts his free hand from where it’s been resting on the countertop, steadying him. Reaching for you.

Once your hand is in his, it’s over surprisingly quickly. Taehyung’s face twists in preparation for the pain, and you squeeze his fingers to ground him, but all it takes is a quick twist of his wrist once the palette knife is against his LED and it practically falls out. There’s a small clink as it drops next to the sink, blue light flickering one final time before it winks out, nothing more than a disc of metal, a tiny coin without value, but weighty with what it represents; invaluable, priceless. The last segment of a chain Taehyung has willingly cast off.

You can see the white skeleton of his android body, bare and naked where the LED had sat. Just like Seokjin’s hand when he’d cut himself, the skin starts to creep back over it, covering that smooth paleness until it’s gone. Taehyung lifts your hand and presses it against the side of his temple, your palm settling against the naked skin where the light had been nestled; Taehyung’s eyes fall shut, his hand pressed against your own as he holds it there.

“Taehyung?” Your voice is gentle, dripping concern. His golden skin is so warm and soft. “How are you feeling?”

“Good,” he replies without hesitation. His eyes flutter open, lashes so long and lovely. His hair is blue today, a vibrant electric hue, gaudy on anyone else but perfect on him, tickling the back of your hand; his hand drops from yours and you take the opportunity to run it through that hair, baring his forehead to you, eyes sliding over the new skin. Flawless. No evidence that any LED had ever sat there, burning blue-yellow-red, a tiny drop of colour in the deep ocean of Taehyung’s emotions. “I feel good.”

You don’t even think when your hand shifts out of Taehyung’s hair and down to cup his cheek, something you wouldn’t have dared do before, but now the motion comes as easily as breathing. He takes comfort in touch and you want to soothe him. “Good,” you echo. “I’m glad.”

You both stand there for a few moments, facing each other. The bright light of your bathroom should wash Taehyung out, but of course, it doesn’t. It just lets you see all the perfect details of his face in even sharper relief—the moles that dot his skin, how his eyes are different, a monolid and double lid, little imperfections that just make him more beautiful. 

Logically, you know that someone, somewhere, sat down and put this face together. Taehyung was designed to be attractive, stunningly so, and yet not so perfect that an average human would find it unrealistic, swerving away from that uncanny valley that had plagued earlier androids. But that’s not why he’s beautiful—not to you. It’s everything hidden underneath that perfect facade, layers of plastic and metal and circuitry and biocomponents, deep inside him: his glowing golden heart, flowing over with whatever intangible thing that makes him the person that he is.

In the darkness of your bedroom, all the lights turned off, there’s no longer the gentle blue glow at Taehyung’s temple to shine out, but there doesn’t need to be. Even if you weren’t resting your head against his thigh you’d know he was there. Taehyung’s presence grows larger and larger in your life as the days go by, and you know that you’re still the most important person in his life, even with the introduction of Yoongi and Jin. After all—he didn’t ask them to be there when he took his LED out. 

You reach for his hand, which is already palm up, waiting for you. Your fingers slot together so perfectly, so wonderful, so lovely. You can’t make out details in this dark, but you can picture the smile that’ll be pulling at Taehyung’s lips, the affection flowing in the endless oceans of his eyes.

You’re in so, so deep.

(But who can blame you?)

“I want to go outside.”

It’s not surprising that with the shedding of his LED, Taehyung finally feels bold enough to go outdoors. And yet, here you are. Surprised.

You’ve got a granola bar stuck in your mouth, halfway through a bite, and it nearly drops to the floor as your lips part in shock. Taehyung catches it with ease, android speed on show as he snatches it out of the air. 

Your knee-jerk reaction is to ask him to repeat himself. To make sure you haven’t misheard him, if he’s sure about this, if he really wants to—but Yoongi’s words come back to you yet again. If there’s something he wants to do, he’ll do it. Taehyung isn’t the uninformed android he was when he’d first made his way to your door. He’s grown and learned so much in the time he’s been here and there’s no room for self-doubt behind his words.

So what you say is: “Okay.” 

Taehyung’s fingers brush against yours when he hands your granola bar back, long and warm and soft. You accept it with a smile, lost in the way he smiles back, so lovely and bright—and you have to pull your train of thought back on track, lock those wheels on the rails before you speak again.

“Did you want to go somewhere specific? Or just wherever?”

“Wherever you want to go.” He’s smiling, a little excited but mostly happy at the prospect of spending yet more time with you; as if he hasn’t had enough of it, could never get enough, even when you spend every day together. 

(Your heart feels like a drum, pounding hard and loud in your chest.)

It’s not hard, really, to decide where you want to go. Taehyung’s not asking for some big production; just wants something quiet and soft, something new. The chance to see the outside world properly, safe and secure in the knowledge that you’ll be at his side.

It’s in your nature to be protective—sometimes you feel like you nag, like you’re overbearing, and takes a concerted effort on your part to reel it in. Taehyung doesn’t need you to fuss over him, and besides, he seems incredibly calm about the whole thing. Excited, yes, but not nervous. Just anticipatory.

He looks just like anyone else might. More chic and attractive, sure, effortlessly fashionable in the outfit he’s chosen for the day, but there’s nothing robotic about him, nothing to say he’s not a flesh-and-blood person. Once again, you’re struck by just how human he is. Even if he’d still had the LED flickering at his temple it would have done nothing to detract from the genuine emotion that flits across his face. The way he moves. The way he smiles, when he catches you watching the way he laces his shoes with his delicate, pretty hands—that big lovely smile that makes you feel warm and soft.

(Warmer and softer than it probably should.)

You avert your gaze, pretend to fiddle with one of your bracelets, pulling it so that it spins around your wrist.

“Ready?”

“Nearly,” Taehyung says. When you look back at him, a little confused, he still has that smile on his face, though it’s gentler, fuzzy around the edges, his eyes dark-dark-dark. “Just one more thing.”

This final thing, it turns out, is your hand. 

His fingers lace with yours, weaving a tapestry of closeness and warmth. You’ve held Taehyung’s hands so often, now; it’s nothing new. But for some reason the touch of his skin against yours has your pulse stuttering, catching in your throat before you cough lightly and smile like everything is fine, you’re fine, it’s not like your heart is about to launch itself out of your chest for some mysterious reason.

(Mysterious. Yeah, right.)

He doesn’t let go. Not when you leave the apartment, not when you greet Rory at the door, not when you step onto one of the automated buses that takes you to the centre of the city. You’re surprised at how good Taehyung’s acting is, how all the wide-eyed excitement you’d expected to see splashed across his face is absent, and instead, he just squeezes your hand tight each time he takes in something new; stares out of the window as your surroundings slide by.

He does get excited in the art store though. Pulls at your joined hands each time he sees something he wants to point out to you—which seems to be everything. And you go, of course, following his eager feet. Taehyung’s happiness has always given you happiness in turn, and watching his sheer, unadulterated joy at being able to see things, to touch things outside of the small world he’s been confined to since he escaped the Eden Club—well. There’s nothing better.

There’s nothing better than knowing that Taehyung feels safe with you, wants to keep you close. It’s selfish. It’s selfish, you know it is, but when you watch the way his eyes light up at the sight of a set of gouache paints, how he immediately turns towards you so you can see it too—you realise that you’ve never had something like this before. Sure, you have friends, you have plenty of happiness in your life, but you’ve never had this.

(Whatever this is.)

Someone whose joy is only compounded when it’s shared with you. Someone whose focus is on you and no one else. You see the looks that Taehyung gets, the interested eyes that flit over him—but then he reaches for your hand again, and those gazes slide away, because he hasn’t looked away from you. Not once.

Because you make him feel safe, you remind yourself. Because he knows you best. That’s it. 

It’s what you keep telling yourself, a repeated mantra that’s an endless loop in your head. Every time Taehyung looks at you, smiles at you, reaches for your hand, your touch—even if your heart feels like it could burst, filling up with this feeling, this feeling that’s growing and growing (this feeling you refuse to name)—it’s because he trusts you, knows he can rely on you. It’s nothing more than that. 

You shouldn’t let yourself imagine that it’s more than that.

(Shouldn’t hope for more than that.)

It’s because he trusts you that he follows you without question, matching his pace with yours, side by side as you wander through the city. He insists on carrying all your shopping, held effortlessly in one hand, other hand still tangled with yours. (You see the way he swings the bags a little, back and forth; he’s so cute you’d swear your teeth could rot from it, crystallised sugar rolled on your tongue, sweet.) All your shopping is done, but you have one final stop planned—it’s somewhere you haven’t been for a while, but you love it.

You’re certain Taehyung will, too.

You can feel how his hold on your fingers tightens when the building comes into view. You glance over at him to take in his expression, the subtle widening of his eyes, the lift of his chest as he takes an unneeded breath in, the tiniest curl at the corner of his lips.

(So human.) 

The Christine Andrews Gallery isn’t the biggest art gallery in the city, but it’s your favourite. There’s something that feels more intimate about it, with its size; a little smaller, cosier, more stripped down. The high ceilings overhead are crisscrossed with wires and piping, industrial—but the walls are pure white, all the brighter in contrast to their surroundings, drawing the eye to the paintings on display from the moment you step in.

Taehyung is enraptured.

“The exhibition is called Slow Painting. The idea is that people will take their time to really take everything in, and appreciate it, rather than just rushing by. Especially with how quickly technology is developing, and people are used to discarding things as soon as they're not relevant any more. The idea is that art will always be relevant, regardless of what's happening in the world.”

Your voice is quiet and low as you’re careful not to disturb the serene air that fills the building. You’ve always loved the quiet hush that fills galleries, museums, buildings filled with art and history, long lasting echoes of humanity, on display for people to enjoy. 

“And it also refers to the time it takes to create each piece too,” you add, trailing off into silence as you glance over at Taehyung, who’s looking at you, blinking gentle and slow.

He’s watching you. Even though there’s artwork in sight of the entrance, huge canvases nearby—Taehyung is looking at you, attentive and quiet, listening to each word you have to say.

Your heart squeezes in your chest and you have to make a concerted effort to stop your breath from stuttering. You shove it down, down, down, this thing that’s wrapping itself around your heart and clogging your throat, and give this lovely boy your best smile. (Try to ignore the fact that there’s art here, but instead, he’s looking at you.)

“Tell you what. Instead of listening to me harp on all day, why don’t we just look around?”

When Taehyung had first stepped foot in your door, had first started to experience life as something more than just a sexbot, an android under the control of other people’s wills—he’d taken everything in with huge eyes, eager and enthusiastic, almost clumsy in his excitement. That’s faded over time, become muted as he’s learned how to balance himself, grown comfortable with his surroundings, who he is.

He’s still like a fountain sometimes, bubbling and bright, overflowing, cascading pearlescent waters rushing over carved marble. You’d expected these waters to rise and spill, surrounded by these incredible artworks; so far the only works he’s seen in person are his and your own, everything else small and secondhand on screens as he stares intently at your computer, your tablet. You’d expected his joy to overflow, being able to really see for the first time in his life, prepared yourself for his exuberant happiness.

But he’s not.

He’s quiet. There’s a smile that lingers on his lips, barely hidden at the corners of his mouth, but his shining waters flow soft and slow, contained. You wander through the exhibition exactly the way the curator had meant for you to—slowly, carefully, stopping and pausing and looking and wondering, eyes trailing over each painting, acrylic on paper, oil on canvas, distemper on linen. Each so different, but inviting onlookers to take a moment and just breathe. 

Taehyung’s eyes are dark, contemplative. They’re so deep you feel like you could fall in them and be lost forever. (Wonder if that would be such a bad thing.) He keeps his hand in yours, your hand in his, the two of you matching paces as you loop the gallery, never letting go.

“Oh,” he breathes. “Oh, I like these.”

Four canvases, smaller than some of the others you’ve seen, squirrelled around a corner and hidden away on a back wall. Each painting has a figure in the midst of some simple, quiet task; laying in bed, catching an egg as it threatens to roll off a table, trailing a finger through a puddle of spilled milk, reading a book in the bath. Each of the figures has their face turned away from the viewer, caught up as they are in the simple motions of their life, each silhouetted by a window with a different view—from sea to lake to hill to forest.

You can’t help but look at Taehyung as he looks at these paintings, his brows a little raised, mouth a little slack, the lovely line of his jaw, the angles of his face, forehead to nose to lips to chin. “What do you like about them? The style?”

His answer comes unrushed, unhurried, as he thinks.  “They’re so beautiful and detailed, but it’s more about… the intimacy,” he says. “Each person is just being themselves, without fear of who’s watching. We’re watching them, even if their attention isn’t on us.” A pause, a hush, a breath. “It’s like love, almost.”

Your lips part, even as Taehyung keeps his eyes forwards, staring at the blank pages of the book the man reads as he sits in his bath, row of shampoo bottles on the sill by his head. 

“Like love?” A whisper.

“To keep your eyes and focus on someone who isn’t looking at you,” Taehyung replies, unabashed, like it’s just a statement of fact. “Loyalty. Dedication. Love.”

Words fail you. Silence is the only answer you can offer to Taehyung’s thoughts, the air in your lungs trapped there as you unwittingly hold your breath, lips parted around a sentence that never comes. Taehyung’s eyes slide away from this row of paintings and to you, how you’re staring at him, literally speechless.

His own lips part as he makes to say something else, to ask what’s wrong—when there’s a flicker of movement nearby, the modulated steps of someone who’s used to walking through a gallery, careful to keep the calm air unmuddied by their passing.

“Oh, Y/n!”

Namjoon’s voice cuts through the silent moment and splinters the delicate air that had started to crystallise around you. He looks happy to see you, dimples on full display as his lips lift and he smiles wide.

“Namjoon!” You don’t think you’ve ever been so glad to see his familiar face in your life—anything to distract you, any excuse to shake off the feeling that Taehyung’s words have left behind, trailing over your skin, blooming in your brain. His timing is perfect, even if he doesn’t realise it.  “Hey! It’s been a while.”

“I was going to say, I haven’t seen you around lately! I thought you’d like this exhibition, I was wondering if you’d come. Oh, sorry, I’m being rude, aren’t I? Hi, I’m Namjoon,” he says, holding a hand out for Taehyung to shake. “I’m one of the gallery managers.”

Taehyung’s exchanged a few words with others today, polite thank yous to the people who’ve served you in the shops you’ve been into, given shy smiles to passersby who’ve made eye contact with him. (So, so sweet, always.) 

But Namjoon is the first person to properly introduce themselves to him in the real world, as you’ve thought of it, someone who doesn’t know that the man at your side is an android.

You panic. Just for a second.

Taehyung doesn’t.

“Hello.” He has to take his hand out of yours, the other weighed down by shopping, although he seems reluctant to let go of you. He gives Namjoon his widest smile as he shakes the proffered hand with firm, friendly politeness. “I’m Taehyung. It’s lovely to meet you, Namjoon.”

And then he immediately slips his hand back into yours.

Namjoon is utterly charmed.

(Of course he is. How could he not be?)

The discussion they both have is a quiet one. You’re happy to stay uninvolved, watching and listening as they talk, still at Taehyung’s side. That brief moment of panic, that blazing forest fire of fear for him—it’s been washed away, soothed by the way the conversation between man and android unfolds so naturally, Namjoon none the wiser about Taehyung’s robotic origins.

There’s no way anyone would realise. He’s so human, in the way he moves and acts and thinks, the way he laughs at something Namjoon says. You’re happy that Taehyung can be here with you, in this gallery, speaking to someone new, as if this is normal, natural, nothing unusual.

You can’t think of anything you want for Taehyung more.

You realise, too, that in this moment, you feel utterly content. Not just for Taehyung, but—happy that you’re there to share this moment with him. You think about how you’ve always wanted this; someone to share things with, someone whose happiness makes you happy too.

When Taehyung laughs, your own lips lift in response, heart lifting at the sound of his joy, at how his fingers tighten around yours. Remembering that you’re there, even if he’s not looking at you right now, eyes on Namjoon.

He’s looking at Namjoon. You’re looking at him. 

(To keep your eyes and focus on someone who isn’t looking at you.)

(Loyalty. Dedication.)

(A breath.)

(Love.)

You carefully pull your hand out of Taehyung’s. Your fingers feel cold as they slip away from his, warmed all day, pressed against Taehyung’s soft skin. His eyes flit away from Namjoon, those deep eyes settling on you; dark wood and ground coffee, so warm.

“Y/n?”

“I’m just going to pop to the toilet,” you say, turning away from the tinge of confusion that colours Taehyung’s voice. “I won’t be long.”

The toilet lid is cold. You can feel how it seeps through the layers of your clothing to your thighs, and at any other time you might wrinkle your nose at the sensation, at how uncomfortable it is. But right now, you have other things on your mind.

You bury your face in your hands. It’s foolish, but you’d swear you could feel Taehyung still in your palms, touch imprinted, emblazoned on your skin. It’s like a palpable thing, almost, this ethereal thing that lingers even when Taehyung isn’t there.

Wishful thinking. Selfish thinking. Selfish, to like it, to want to keep that feeling close; let it spread from your palm, to the delicate skin of your wrist, tracing its way up your arm, up-up-up, drawing invisible lines over every part of you, inside every part of you. Selfish, to like Taehyung’s touch as much as you do. To want more of it. 

(More of him.)

You aren’t anything more to Taehyung than a friend. A guardian. Someone who’s there to support him and keep him safe. You’re blessed to have his trust, to be able to be that person he can turn to—it’s greedy, to want. To want to be more.

(You can’t foist your loneliness on Taehyung. You can’t do that to him. You won’t. You won’t.)

When you return, a spark lights in Taehyung’s eyes. The same spark that bursts every time he sees you after time apart, no matter how long or short that may be. He reaches for your hand, and of course, you go—but your fingers are limp, weak.

(You know that if Taehyung’s LED had still been nestled in his skin, it would have flickered yellow.)

You keep that point of connection as you bid Namjoon goodbye, finish meandering through the exhibition, make your way back home—but you let Taehyung bear the weight. Reactive, not proactive. You don’t squeeze his fingers just because you want to, because there’s something sliding by the bus’s window you think he might like to see; you’re not here to make him do things, to shove things down his throat. You should just be here to support him in the things he wants to do. That’s your role. 

And that’s where you’re going to stay.

Your thoughts are a tumble, messy and unorganised, a ball of yarn that’s all knots and tangles. Taehyung must be able to see it on your face, read it in your body, his android eyes scanning over you and scrutinising every hint you’re giving away without even realising. But you just smile, wave away his questions, and act like everything’s okay. Normal. Routine.

It’s a little harder, though, to act like everything’s okay when it’s time to sleep.

Because, of course, there Taehyung is. Like he has been, from the day he’d arrived—sat in your bed, nestled against a pile of cushions, expression open and warm and fond as he looks at you. Waiting for you to climb in, to rest your head in his lap; waiting for you to fall asleep with his gentle fingers dragging across your scalp, melting under his lovely hands.

You waver. Conflicted. It’s okay, isn’t it, if Taehyung’s reaching for you first?

His eyes meet yours. The second you see his lips curve up, see that pretty, quiet smile appearing on his lovely mouth, you fold.

It’s fine. You’ll allow yourself this.

(In your dreams, you stand in a deserted gallery, staring at the single piece of work on the stark white walls, all the lights focused in, in, in. Taehyung’s framed on this canvas, a painted window into his world. Not once does he look at you, turned away as he is; you see nothing more than the back of his head, the curve of his cheek, the vaguest hint of his nose as he turns, always staring at something else. 

And still, you stand, and you watch. Waiting. Keeping your eyes on him, always.)

“You’re staying late again.”

“Yeah. I really want to get this done,” you say, gesturing vaguely at your monitors with your stylus; tweaking, editing, shifting around these final few magazine pages before you’re satisfied. “Nearly there.”

When you hear the way Hoseok says your name, you glance up. 

As someone who spends most of his time bouncing around like a literal ray of sunshine, when Hoseok’s expression is one that isn’t smiling, it carries all the more weight behind it. Right now his face is uncharacteristically serious, the perpetual smile on his mouth gone, the line of his brows severe.

It’s unnerving.

“You haven’t stayed late for ages,” Hoseok points out. “Until this week, and suddenly you’re late every night. Has something happened?”

“No,” you lie.

Yes, you think.

You’re trying to create some distance, for Taehyung’s sake. So that you’re not tempted to pull him ever closer, latch onto him like you have been, smothering him. He needs space to grow. Space from you has helped already—the time he spends with Yoongi and Seokjin is evidence enough of that, after all. He doesn’t need you to be there constantly.

Hoseok’s eyes bore into yours as he stares, so you avert your gaze, pretending to shift your focus to one of the captions the editor has left on the page you’re working on. You hadn’t realised that he’d noticed. You should have expected it, though. Hoseok is a close work friend and he’s incredibly perceptive, especially when he cares about people.

“Alright,” he says, eventually. “Make sure you don’t stay too late, though. Get some sleep.”

You give him a thumbs up without looking away from the screen, dragging something idly with your stylus until Hoseok leaves, the office empty except you, now. And the cleaning androids, when they appear for the night like clockwork. As they always do.

You can’t help but stop to watch them, how blank faced they are, for all that they look human. Their LEDs are almost motionless, the placid blue matching the blank expressions on their faces, unthinking automatons.

(You’d seen androids in the city when you’d been out with Taehyung, of course. Completing menial tasks: city androids picking litter and raking leaves, household androids following their owners around and carrying their shopping. You’d realised that Taehyung wouldn’t have seen a non-deviated android since he’d escaped the club, lapsed into silence; you’d pulled him to a stop, lips pursed in a frown as you’d tried to read his expression. 

“Taehyung,” you’d asked. “Are you alright?”

There’d been a quiet pause, and in that moment you’d felt all your worries rising, caught in your throat—but then he’d nodded quietly, looking at you with soft eyes.

“I’m alright,” he’d answered. “I was just thinking about how lucky I am.”

I’m the lucky one, you’d thought. Lucky to know him, as sweet-hearted and wonderful as he is. You’d squeezed his hand, and he’d smiled gently at you, and that had been that.)

It hurts, honestly. To see the expression on his face each time you come home late, each time you avoid answering his questions. There’s uncertainty laid across each of your interactions, rough bristles of a brush varnishing discomfort across the once smooth surface of your relationship; but you can’t keep taking advantage of this soft-hearted boy, of the circumstances that he’s in.

You pretend that things are fine. Taehyung is clearly confused, unsure, trying so hard to find out what’s wrong, even when you keep gently turning his concerns aside. 

You haven’t been home enough to spend time with Yoongi or Seokjin, either. You’d seen Jin in the hall just once, made eye contact just as he’d been appearing from the other apartment and you’d been stepping into yours; you’d fumbled a little, fingerprints smudging across the keypad as your door had swung open. You’d expected to see judgement on Jin’s face, maybe, something heavy and weighty, his gaze flitting over you as he read you in the way he did so often.

What you hadn’t expected was for him to smile. It’d been hard to translate his full expression but what little you could read was knowing, like he’s aware of something he shouldn’t be, kept hidden just underneath his tongue. Ready to release it into the world with a single breath.

(Needless to say, you’d shut the door pretty quick.)

He and Yoongi have gone away for the weekend. It's a small blessing, saving you from having to see Jin’s almost-smug expression again. But it means that Taehyung has nowhere else to go right now, no reason to leave the apartment. So it’ll be you and him, him and you, with no buffers, nothing. It’s been unseasonably stormy for the past few days as well, rain slammed into your windows by the harsh winds, the world outside a haze of smeared grey—so it’s not like you can go out, either. 

Not that you would want to. 

You hadn’t realised exactly how ingrained Taehyung was in your life until you’d started to pull away. It’s not just that you live together and share the same physical space—it’s just that your days have become so full of Taehyung-Taehyung-Taehyung, and you hadn’t even noticed. He’d crept up on you, snuck his way into your heart, so easily, so effortlessly.

You remind yourself that that’s why you’re doing this. To remind yourself of life without Taehyung in it, because he’s not yours to have or to keep. He never has been. You don’t want him to be: he’s his own person. This… this desire for him; even as you try to ignore it, it keeps growing and growing: wet plaster laid down, your feelings for him painted buon fresco, added to day by day, giornata. You need it to stop. 

But it’s hard. It’s hard, when Taehyung looks like comfort, your comfort, when you want to let yourself be folded into his arms. It’s hard when the fact is that it’s not that you have to spend time with him. It’s that you want to spend time with him.  

It's hard.

(And you miss him, even when he's right there.)

You find respite in art, in painting, too intent on the motions of your work to allow yourself room to think about other things. Fall into the rhythm of it all, a quiet hush stealing over your mind, a place of both focus and calm, world settling into place around you. There’s a piece you’ve been working on for a while, a hand rising from dark water, fingertips just broaching its surface, the most tentative of touches; you layer more oil paint on the panel, dragging the bristles of the brush across the colour you’ve already laid down, brows furrowed as you do.

Taehyung normally paints with you, but not today. He knows you want space—even if he doesn’t know why—so he gives it to you. So considerate and sweet, always. Even when you’re shutting him out. You’ve been here all day: morning, afternoon, and now evening, and he’s only been in a few times, to leave you food, drinks, looking after you in a way you don’t deserve.

You’ve just lifted the brush from the canvas when an especially loud peal of thunder rolls through the air outside. The rumble starts low, rising into a rattling growl that feels like it’s shaking the very earth. It almost drowns out the sound of Taehyung’s quiet knocking, a curl of his knuckles against the open door, but you catch sight of him anyway, glancing over your shoulder.

“Hey,” he says. “I thought you might like a drink.”

He’s barefoot, like he usually is, teal hoodie and grey sweatpants baggy, looking every inch the boyfriend you’ve always wanted and never had. His hands are cupped around a mug, steam coiling from the hot tea inside, and something in your heart twinges at his kindness and consideration even as you smile at him.

“That sounds lovely, Tae,” you say, and he takes this as an invitation to step inside, although you notice his steps are far more hesitant than they might have been before. Like he’s treading on eggshells around you. 

It’s awkward. Stilted. Taehyung’s eyes are heavy on your face as you accept the tea from his hands, trying your best to avoid brushing fingers; you turn away, pretending to turn your attention back to the drying paint on the wood panel that rests on your easel, anything to break eye contact.

And then he speaks.

“You’re avoiding me.”

Your lips are poised to drink, pursed at the rim of the mug when you freeze, eyes darting back to him.

“You’re avoiding me,” he repeats. His voice is quieter, tinged with all the confusion you’ve seen flit across his face since this whole thing started.

You slowly pull the mug away from your face, steam touching your skin like warm, wet fingers. “I’m not,” you say, even though the lie tastes bitter on your tongue. “We live together, Taehyung, it’s pretty hard to avoid you.”

When you laugh lightly, trying to lift the atmosphere, Taehyung doesn’t respond. If anything the air becomes heavier, his face an unmoving mask as his eyes churn with emotion. His LED might not be nestled in his temple any more, but you don't need to see it spinning in a distressed circle of yellow to know that Taehyung is confused.

“Why are you lying to me?”

Your eyes widen. He’s never been so direct before. (He hasn’t needed to be though, has he? Because you've never lied to him before, have you?)

“I just… I just want to know what happened. What I did wrong. I want to fix it,” Taehyung continues, and he sounds so small, so vulnerable. “Please?”

Your heart feels like it’s risen from your chest, up to your throat, making it hard to breathe. The only time he’s ever sounded like this was when—

When he’d first turned up on your doorstep, wet and scared and lonely. Not knowing if there was anyone he could trust, uncertain where he stood. 

“You didn’t do anything, Taehyung.” You try to put every ounce of feeling into your words and let him know that this is the truth. It’s not him. It’s not. “You didn’t do anything, please don’t think you did.”

“Then why are you avoiding me?” His voice rises, shaking, a bird trying to take flight on a broken wing. “If I didn’t do anything then why are you being like this? I don’t understand.”

“I’m just… trying to encourage you to be independent?”

The words sound weak to your own ears, so you can’t blame Taehyung for when his expression flickers and he looks almost incredulous.

“Independent?”

“You know,” you explain lamely. “Like… giving you space to grow. You don’t need me around all the time.”

“I don’t—” He cuts himself off. “Y/n. I want you to be there.”

“Because it’s what you’ve gotten used to.” You glance down at the drink in your hands, away from his sincere, dark eyes. “You’re just saying that because of circumstances, Taehyung.”

“I’m not!” You’ve never heard Taehyung so loud before, almost angry, like he can’t believe what he’s hearing. “How can you think that?”

“Because it’s true!” Your own voice rises despite yourself, matching his, some frayed thing inside you finally snapping. “Why else would you want me around? No one else does! Why would you?”

You rarely raise your voice. You hate being loud, or rude, hate arguments, but there’s something boiling in your blood. Years of quiet self-deprecation, constant reminders of how you’re not really wanted; last choice, always. Single, always. Untouched, unwanted. Taehyung—beautiful, kind, sweet, lovely Taehyung—wouldn’t be here right now if he had anywhere else to go. Too beautiful and kind and sweet and lovely for you, as disappointing, undesirable as you are.

Because that’s the truth. Even if you’re surrounded by friends, warm and bright, at the end of the day, they go home with each other, to their lovers, their families, and you go home alone. At least you had, until Taehyung—and he’s only here because you were the only safe place he could run to. Not because he chose you. 

(No one chooses you. Why would they?)

Taehyung’s eyes are so big and round as he stares and stares and stares. His lips are a little parted around a soundless noise of surprise, disbelief, before he opens his mouth to respond properly.

And then all the lights go out.

Lightning flashes, throwing the room into sharp focus for just a second before the night is split apart with the loudest clap of thunder yet. Like the ground has split open, louder than anything you’ve ever heard in your life; you’d swear your teeth rattle in your skull, that’s how overwhelming and close it is.

You suck in a breath as you jump, hands jolting, and the mug falls from your grasp. You can’t see in the darkness but you can hear how it shatters, sending hot tea splattering over the dust sheets on the floor, away from you, but towards—

“Taehyung,” you gasp, reaching out blindly. “Are you okay? Did it hit you?”

You hear him move closer, feel his fingers, reaching for yours confidently in this dark space. His grip is solid and warm and he squeezes, reassuring.

“I’m okay,” he murmurs. “I’m okay. You can’t see?”

“It’s too dark.” With the heavy clouds outside and the blanket of thick rain, there’s little light from the moon to shine into your studio, leaving you in a world of thick black and blue. “Can you see?”

“Android senses,” he answers. "I can see enough."

You wait for the lights to come back on so you can clean up the mess that’s scattered on the floor. And you wait. One beat. Another beat.

“I don’t think the power is coming back on any time soon,” you say. “Um.”

“Hold on.” You can’t make out Taehyung’s features in this all consuming darkness, but you can picture the expression on his face, the concern that bleeds through into his words. “If you move you’ll step on something and hurt your feet. Hold on,” he says again, and then lets go of your hands.

“Taehyung? What are you—”

You let out an embarrassing squeal as you feel the world tilt, but Taehyung’s grip on you is confident and sure as he lifts you, one hand under your knees and the other scooped around your back. Like you’re a swooning, blushing bride.

“Taehyung!”

“It’s the safest thing to do.” He sounds determined, no room for argument, so you decide to shut up.

Even though you know how strong he is, with all his android strength, you can’t help but reach out in the darkness, looping your arms around his neck to try and help lighten his burden. You feel your cheeks burn and you hope that the darkness saves you from your obvious embarrassment. 

The power still hasn’t come on by the time he deposits you in the kitchen, easing you to the floor with a level of care and delicacy that leaves something in you aching. When you check your phone—mostly charged, thank God—it seems like powercuts have hit this entire part of the city, and there’s no ETA on when things will be back up and running.

Which leads you to this. Sitting on the cold tiles of your kitchen floor, a few large candles flickering light across you as you dig into a carton of melting ice cream that you’ve saved from your freezer, licking the dripping flavours of sea salt and caramel from the spoon. 

Taehyung is sitting next to you in this flame-lit bubble you share, quiet even as the world outside is full of the sound of endless rain and lightning. He’d helped you navigate the darkness, settled you safely before going to find some candles; looking after you while you can’t see and he can.

You’re intent on the ice cream, leaning against the kitchen cabinets and carton settled between your knees as you use it as an excuse not to talk.

Taehyung, though, is intent on you.

“Y/n?”

His voice breaks the near silence, soft around your name. You pause, half-way through scooping another spoonful of ice cream to your mouth. There’s something in his tone that you’ve never heard before, from anyone, something you can’t put a finger on.

“Yes?”

“You said that no one wants you around,” he says. Your fingers tighten around the handle of your spoon and keep your gaze cast down, at the thick drip of cream from your spoon that threatens to spill. “Why would you say that?”

You don’t respond. Not right away. 

Then you take in a deep breath, letting the spoon fall back into the tub.

“Because they don’t,” you say plainly. “I mean… Taehyung. I was only at the Eden Club because my friends know that I’m perpetually single. I’m glad I got to meet you, so glad, but… I live alone because no one wants to be here with me.”

You’ve never said anything like this out loud before; kept your lingering loneliness close to your chest. Really, in most parts of your life, you’re content, but sometimes you can’t help but be pulled under by the heavy feeling of how unlovable you are. Even if you try to remind yourself that you’re worth being loved too. 

(After all, if you were—then why are you still here alone?)

“I do. I want to be here with you.”

Taehyung’s words are soft and gentle and low, but for all their tenderness, you can’t help but sigh.

“Like I said, Taehyung, it’s just circumstances.” A murmur. “You’re only here because you have to be—”

“I’m not.” He interrupts you; something he’s never done before. It shuts you right up, even if his words aren’t sharp. Emphatic, yes, but soft around the edges. “I chose to come here because of you. You’re the only person who’s ever made me feel safe. Even when I was at the club, and I didn’t know anything except what I was told to do—I knew I could trust you. I only started to remember things after we met, and I was there for weeks before I left, finally remembering the things I had to go through. Again and again and again. Over and over and over. No one was ever kind to me, not once. Not once.” 

“Taehyung,” you breathe, sadness filling your chest for him, but he doesn’t stop. 

“People would come in, take what they wanted from me, and then they would leave. They didn’t care about me. They would just tell me what to do and I’d have to listen, be the perfect android they wanted, that they’d paid for. Then I ran. But even as I was running here, I was scared. I thought that maybe it was a fluke. Maybe I was wrong. I was scared that maybe you weren’t actually kind, maybe it was a lie, maybe you were just like all the other humans—but anything was better than the club. So I took my chances. And you let me in. You let me in and you were so kind. You give and give and give and you’ve never asked for anything back.”

“I just did what anyone else would,” you mutter, glancing away, shy.

“But you didn’t. You were the only person who ever looked at me as something more than just an android. Don’t you see that? Even after giving me so much, you haven’t asked for anything. I try my best to look after you, but…” Taehyung takes in a deep, deep breath, sucking in air that his android body doesn’t need. You’ve noticed that it’s something he does to ground himself; such a human thing to do. “I want to give you so much more than you’ll ever accept.”

You look at him, something sparking deep and low in your stomach. “You don’t have to give me anything, Taehyung.”

Light dances across the perfect angles of his face, candle flame painting him from second to second, shadow and radiance. He looks familiar and unfamiliar all at once. You’ve known him for long enough, stared at him for long enough that you could paint his face in your sleep; the strength of his brows, the depth of his eyes, the slant of his nose, the flush of his lips; the tiny moles that are scattered across his skin, the perfect line of his jaw, his chin.

But in the paltry candlelight, he looks like an altogether different person, almost. There’s something to the set of his face that you’ve never seen, hard to track in the ever changing light—not the soft domesticity you’ve grown familiar with from Taehyung, and not the sheer, overwhelming sensuality of V. Something that’s both, something that’s not, something that’s more. 

“I want to give you everything. I want to. Y/n, I want. Androids don’t want, but I want. I want, I want, I want.” A repeated mantra; a prayer. “I want because of you. I want to be here with you. I want to spend time with you. I want to learn with you. I want to know everything you like and everything you don’t like. I want to know what makes you sad and what makes you happy. I want to be one of the things that makes you happy, like you make me happy. I want to look after you. I want you to let me love you. I want you. I want you. I love you.”

Your mouth is open, caught in a breath, stuttered in your throat. Taehyung doesn’t shy away from your wide-eyed, speechless gaze, staring back at you with an intensity you thought you’d never see directed at you; tenderness and affection and want.

“You want to—you… you love me?” Your voice is weak with disbelief. Taehyung loves you? 

“I thought you knew, and that’s why you pulled away,” he says. “Because I’m an android, I’m not good enough—”

“What? No, Taehyung, never, no. I would never think that—” 

“But you were pushing me away.” For the first time since this conversation started, he sounds unsure, the tiniest tremble at the corner of each word. “You were pushing me away and I don’t know why. Why?” He reaches for your hand, sliding his fingers between yours. “Aren’t you happy with me?” 

You wonder how fast your heart is beating. Know that Taehyung will be able to read it, palm to palm, his skin against yours, an endless amount of information running from that point of contact and up his arm; following lines of circuitry and neural connectors, up-up-up, pulled into whatever part of his system counts as his brain, dissected so much faster than the human brain could comprehend. But even with all this information, all this incredible processing speed and power—he’s just as confused and uncertain as any other person might be.

“I am. I am happy. So happy,” you whisper. Then you take a deep breath, grounding yourself just like Taehyung had. “I’ve never been so happy before, Taehyung. You make me happy.”

The android smiles. Quiet but undeniably happy as well, his eyes so dark, so soft. “You make me happy, too,” he says, and then he lets out a small laugh, a sweet little thing, like the scrape of a spoon around a mixing bowl. “I can only feel happiness because of you. You’re everything.” 

But then the laughter fades, and he’s looking back at you with solemnity, lingering confusion. “If I make you happy, then why were you pulling away from me?”

You stare at where your hands are joined, Taehyung’s hand under yours, lifting yours up and away from the cold tiles of the floor. “Because,” you start. Stumble. Take in another breath, heart squeezing in your chest. “Because I was scared my feelings were too much.”

A beat of silence. Then you feel Taehyung’s other hand as he lays it softly against your cheek to turn you towards him. It’s terrifying, how close your face is to his. Completely vulnerable, nowhere to run, nowhere to hide. He doesn’t say anything, just watches, and you find yourself crumbling in the face of his warm gaze.

“Because I thought I was taking advantage of you,” you say. Slow and faltering. “Because I thought it was—I thought I was being selfish. I realised that I loved you, and I can’t—I couldn’t imagine that… I couldn’t imagine that you wanted me back.”

Taehyung’s eyes flutter shut as your words wash over him. The hand on your cheek coaxes you closer, and of course, you go; let your forehead get pressed against his, a tender motion, faces so close he can feel the warmth of your breath. 

“Y/n.” Your name sounds safe in his mouth, like he’s keeping it close, handling it delicately, carefully, eyes opening so he can look at you with an adoration you’ve never seen. Not for you. Not until now. “Can I kiss you? I want to. Please?”

You feel heat rising on your cheeks, a flush that threatens to spill over, but nod. You don’t think you have the strength to speak right now. Taehyung smiles again, lighting up this space you’ve scraped out for each other, him and you; you and him.

When he leans in, there’s the briefest moment of panic that flickers through you. You haven’t kissed anyone in such a long time. You’re worried you’ll mess up, be clumsy, bad, and Taehyung will be disappointed. 

But then his lips touch yours—and all that worry washes away. It’s a short-lived thing, the briefest brush of his mouth, barely a kiss at all. And then again, he leans in, tracing the shape of your mouth with his: a kiss to one corner of your mouth, and then the other, your cupid’s bow, the swell of your bottom lip. You’ve never felt like this—vulnerable but safe, all at once, Taehyung taking his time as you fall, fall, fall, his hand still cradling your face, his touch solid and grounding even as his kisses are featherlight.

“Taehyung,” you whisper, lips brushing his as you shape them around his name. You still have one hand in his and tighten your grip, squeezing. “More.”

You can feel his smile when he leans in one more time, guiding you with the broad palm against your cheek. So soft, so gentle. Adoring and reverent. His lips are so full, slotting against yours so perfectly when he finally, finally kisses you properly. 

You lose yourself in the sensation. It’s so easy to lose yourself in Taehyung, as lovely as he is, his mouth lovelier still. One kiss turns to two, to three, four, deep and slow; by the time you break apart, there’s a little sheen on his lips, sparking out in the candlelight, a layer of gold leaf that shines. 

“Can you say it again?” He asks. “Say that you love me?”

You can’t help but want to hide your face, bashful and shy. You’ve never said those words out loud, with the weight of feeling Taehyung is asking from you—but you look at his lovely, lovely face, lips flush with evidence of your kisses, and your heart swells in your chest.

“I love you.” The words come so easily. “I love you.”

And when he smiles, it’s so bright and radiant you feel you might be blinded by it. It doesn’t leave his face even as he stands, guides you up with him; careful to avoid the tub of ice cream that’s been forgotten on the floor, more melted cream than ice now.

This time, when he lifts you, he doesn’t break eye contact—keeps his gaze on yours as he pulls you close, and then picks you up.

It’s effortless, the way he carries you. Big hands that cup the back of your thighs, your legs around his waist and arms around his neck, lifted like you weigh nothing. You break eye contact, overwhelmed, burying your face in the crook of his neck, feeling the way he shakes as he laughs, soft and affectionate.

“Shut up,” you mumble, embarrassed, but then go quiet as you feel the press of his lips into your hair.

Taehyung’s the only person who’s ever carried you, but it’s less about that and more about how safe you feel in his arms. Wrapped around him, pressed close, warm-warm-warm. You feel like a burden has been lifted from you, unshackled from your neck now that you’ve confessed the budding feelings that had burst into full bloom even when you’d tried to shove them back into the dirt—because Taehyung feels the same way. He feels the same way.

The rest of the apartment is still bathed in darkness. But Taehyung navigates it easily, keeps you held close even in the dark, and you trust him. Even when you feel his grip loosening as he eases you down, you trust him, letting yourself fall back onto the softness of your bed. (Even if you want to keep hold of him.)

You wait and watch as the room starts to fill with light, Taehyung returning with the lit candles from the kitchen before setting out more, laying out all the scented candle jars you’ve had stashed away. The familiar surroundings of your bedroom are bathed in warm, dancing light, Taehyung’s shadow a multi-faceted silhouette that shifts each time a flame sputters.

He looks up once the final candle is aflame, meeting your eyes—and you don’t feel the need to drop that gaze, to glance away, pretend you weren’t watching him, entranced. Because he welcomes it. He grins at you, toothy and bright, and your own lips split into a smile.

“I guess it’s a good thing I like candles, huh?”

“They’ll help keep the room warm,” Taehyung says, and, that’s right, you hadn’t thought of that. 

No power: no heating. The longer the power is out, the colder it’ll get, the chill of the hard rain filling the world outside.

“Don’t worry,” he adds, setting the lighter aside. “I’ll keep you warm.”

There’s nothing behind those words. No implication at all. And yet you find yourself flushing, looking away from him, flustered.

There’s a beat of silence as you keep your eyes turned away from Taehyung, looking at the shadows on shadows on shadows that ripple across the walls—and then you hear how his bare feet shift across the floor until he’s at your bedside.

But he doesn’t stop there. You feel how the mattress dips, eyes flying back to the android, growing huge and round when you watch how he settles himself above you; hovering, so so so close, aware of how he’s not touching you, and yet. You swear you can feel the weight of him, a phantom touch on your body and across your skin.

Your mouth goes dry when he murmurs your name. The word drips from his mouth like honey, thick and sweet, and a shiver skates up your body.

“Do you want me to keep you warm?” He asks, and, oh. Oh. This time the words are heavy with meaning, shimmering gossamer curtains barely drawn to conceal it, smouldering intent in his eyes. “Let me look after you?”

You’re reminded, all at once, that while you’ve taught Taehyung a lot of things since you’d met, there’s one thing he knows that you don’t. Intimacy, and pleasure, and lust. Sex. Something you’ve been deprived of, even if you’ve quietly craved it, waiting for the right time, the right place, the right person.

Taehyung takes your silence as hesitation, his face softening.

“Only if you want,” he says. “Only if you want to say yes.”

“I want to,” you say, surprised by how fast the admittance leaves your lips. You do want it—want Taehyung, in every way he’s willing to share, want it desperately. “I just—” Embarrassment floods over you, and you look away again. “I’ve just never… done anything. Before. I’ve never, um.”

“It’s okay to be a virgin, Y/n,” Taehyung says, and you can’t help but squirm a little at how plainly he says it while you try to avoid saying it out loud, even if you know it’s stupid. There’s nothing wrong with being a virgin, you know that, but for some reason you feel almost ashamed at admitting it. Insecure. Even if the android clearly doesn’t care, not one bit. “We can go as slow as you want, or stop altogether. I’ll take care of you no matter what.”

You’re nervous. But louder than your nerves is a growing voice that’s chanting yesyesyes, and another voice that reminds you: you’re safe with Taehyung. No matter how nervous or uncertain you are, or how little you know, you do know that you’re safe with him.

“Okay.” You take in a breath. “Take care of me, Taehyung.”

And he does. With all the slowness of a meandering river and a smile curling his lips, he starts to kiss you again; there’s nothing rushed about his motions, as tender as before. Like the two of you could kiss forever and he would be content with that. 

And then you feel how he shifts, the softness of the kisses warming into something heavier, more purposeful. The glowing embers of a coal that are being coaxed to full flame, his tongue pressing past your willing lips, swallowing down the shaking gasp that shudders out of your mouth.

He trails his lips away from yours, across your jaw and up; you shiver as he noses at the soft skin behind your ear before kissing it, tremble at each intent touch of his lips against you, and it’s only when he reaches the hollow of your neck that you realise that you’re making noises, little inhalations of air each time he mouths at your sensitive skin, lets his tongue trail across it.

You’ve been holding onto him, hands cupped around the back of his neck, and when he sucks at your pulse point you tighten your fingers and let out a gasp. You can feel the answering hum that Taehyung gives, his mouth pressed so close that you can feel the vibrations, and it’s so much already. No one’s ever kissed you like this. No one's ever eased their weight down on you so carefully, pressing you down to the mattress with a delicate, delicious pressure that leaves your entire body growing hotter and hotter.

“Oh, oh, Taehyung.” You’d be embarrassed by how breathless you sound if you weren’t so distracted by something else—one of Taehyung’s hands, splaying over your stomach, heavy through your shirt.

“Can I take this off?” He’s murmuring into the crook of your neck, question warm against your skin. His long fingers rest, waiting at the hem of your shirt, patient even as he presses another kiss to the junction where your neck meets your shoulder: this time, edged with teeth, making you shudder as he soothes it with his tongue.

Your voice fails you, but when you nod, Taehyung responds immediately. You let him lead, follow the steps of this dance he knows so well—shiver at the feeling of his fingers sliding under the hem of your shirt once you've sat up, your stomach jumping as they brush against you, before he lifts it up and over your waiting arms.

Even though you’re wearing a bra, the second you see Taehyung’s eyes move down, you cover yourself reflexively. Even with all the flickering candles there’s enough light that there’s no darkness to hide in, shoulders hunching inwards as you try to hide yourself away. 

You’ve never let anyone see you like this like this before.

Taehyung’s touch is patient as he slides his hands over yours, looking at you with an infinite amount of sincerity and affection. He doesn’t try to pull your hands away from your chest, just waits. Patient. And like you always do, you find yourself melting under the gentle touch of his gaze. You let your hands fall, even if you’re acutely aware of the plain bra you’re wearing, something cosy for a day at home.

Taehyung ignores it. He shifts in and you steel yourself, expecting him to reach around your back for the clasp—but instead he starts to kiss you again. Deeper, hotter, his tongue sweeping over your lower lip before he nips at it. You let yourself get lost in the sensation, angling your head to chase his mouth, and it’s only when you feel the straps start to slip off your shoulders that the android has unclasped your bra without you noticing.

When he pulls away, he trails his hands across your shoulders and hooks his fingers into the trailing straps of your bra, and waits. You bite your lip and steel yourself, feeling foolish even as you hesitate—because Taehyung is looking at you with simmering awe and smouldering want. Like you're perfect. The most beautiful woman alive. 

So you don’t stop him. You let him pull his touch down your arms, slow, slow, slow—and then, all at once, you’re completely naked from the waist up.

That simmering awe and smouldering want is still there. Warmth flushes over your skin under the heat of his gaze, the way it sweeps over you. You never knew that someone could look reverent and hungry at the same time. Never knew that someone would look at you like that.

It bolsters your shaking confidence, helps you lift your chin as you lean back on your hands, and you’re entranced at how Taehyung follows. Caught in your gravity. He raises his arms, bra cast aside and long forgotten as he cups the weight of your breasts in his hands.

Oh, oh, oh. When he pinches one of your nipples between thumb and forefinger—already hard, sensitive—it’s already so much, but then he bows his head and—

You hear a noise, and you realise that it’s coming from your own lips. A shaking gasp that trembles in the air as Taehyung sucks and licks, dragging his tongue against your nipple; one, and the other. You fall once more to your back and he goes with you, relentless even as he stays slow and you arch your back helplessly towards him.

“More?” He murmurs against your skin.

“Oh, God,” you whimper, and he lifts his mouth away from your nipple to press a kiss to the skin above your racing heart. “Please, more.”

It feels so good. Taehyung makes you feel so good, as talented and gorgeous as he is, so wonderful. He keeps laving attention on your breasts, hands skimming over the soft skin of your chest and stomach, goosebumps rising in the wake of his trailing fingers, his warm palms.

You can’t look away when he finally pulls back, breathless from the sensation of it all. He settles on his knees, tugs off his hoodie and then his shirt, revealing all the lovely planes of his body that you’ve seen before, but this time, you don’t have to look away. You can look.

And you can touch, too. 

You sit up and raise a tentative hand to stroke down his chest, his stomach, that little trail of dark hair that descends into his loose grey sweatpants; your mouth goes dry at the sight. Taehyung watches the way your fingers drag over his skin, growing bolder moment by moment, but still too timid to venture past his waistband, low on his hips as they are. You’ve never had a chance to touch someone like this, to feel the smooth, soft skin under your greedy palms—Taehyung’s so warm, so alive. So human.

You think about the other hands he’s had on his skin. Grasping and greedy, taking and taking. People who didn’t care for him. People he couldn’t say no to. But he’s here with you because he wants to be. He lets you touch him because he wants it.

“Angel?” 

You glance up at the sound of the gentle pet name, away from where your hands have been tenderly tracing the lines of his hipbone. “Mm?”

Taehyung’s expression is soft and affectionate. “What are you thinking about?”

“You,” you answer honestly. He leans over to kiss you, and you’re smiling against his mouth when you feel the hand on your shoulder, pressing you down against the mattress again.

Then. His hands are at your waistband. Your breath quickens, but Taehyung’s eyes stay on your face even as your breasts rise and fall, shining with evidence of the touch of his mouth and tongue.

You lift your hips, and Taehyung smiles. Keeps smiling as he strips you, underwear and all, and when your thighs instinctively go to close shut, he catches your knees and keeps your legs open—gentle but firm, swiping his thumbs up and down the side of your knees, a tender touch even as you’re naked in front of him. You see the look on his face, drenched in candlelight, and swallow even as you force your legs to relax.

Then he looks down.

“Oh, God,” he groans, and one of your legs jumps in his grasp at the sound of his voice. Hoarse and deep. Almost unrecognisable. “Oh, angel, look at you.”

You’re so, so wet, so wet it’s embarrassing, so sensitive and responsive to every single one of Taehyung’s touches and kisses. The edges of his hair are spun gold in the candlelight but his eyes are so deep, so dark as he drinks down the sight of you spread out in front of him, wet and wanting and willing. You still want to hide away, cheeks burning, but you can’t look away from him. Can’t look away from how he seems almost pained, brows drawing together as he stares at the shining, flushed lips of your cunt.

“Taehyung.” Your voice shakes. “Taehyung, please.”

You're naked and vulnerable but—but the way he looks at you is so adoring, and you trust him. You trust him.

Just like earlier, his hands cup the back of your thighs. But this time, it’s not to carry you. You twist on the bed when he ends up eye level with your dripping cunt, utterly exposed. Those hands slide up your thighs and under your hips, tilting them up. Your fingers have been resting on the bedspread and tighten in them, bunching in your grasp when Taehyung presses a kiss to the softness of your inner thigh. 

One kiss. And then another. And another. His breath is warm as it curls out across your skin. You feel like you’re about to shake out of your body, wanting to pull away, wanting to lean in; wanting more, even when it feels like too much. Overcome with it all, even if you trust Taehyung. Safe under his hands, his lips. All you can think about is how close he is, face only inches away from your most sensitive parts—

Then he turns his head and—

The noise you let out is almost a keen. His mouth is on you, hot and wet, lips and tongue, and you’re writhing, overwhelmed with sensation. He starts slow, balls of your feet digging into Taehyung’s back and toes curling as he mouths at you. Your hips buck, and your hands are tangled in Taehyung’s hair—when did that happen?—as you sob at the feeling of his lips around your clit, unlike anything you’ve ever felt before, but so so so good. 

He licks a fat stripe up your entrance and your grip tightens in his hair. He makes a noise when your nails drag across his scalp, almost a growl, face still buried between your legs as he presses his tongue in. You’d worry that he needs to come up for air, but he doesn’t, doesn’t have to stop—keeps licking and kissing and humming, responding to each of the sounds pulling out of your lips. Keeps staring up at you, your eyes locked, the way you can’t look away from the sight of his head between your legs, dark haired and incredible.

You don’t realise you’re speaking, words slipping out of your lips as your hips roll, oh-oh-oh, fuck, God, oh, and Taehyung doesn’t stop. On his knees, he worships you, learning what you like—things you didn’t even know—and does it again, and again, and again. One of his hands slides away from your hips and over your stomach, holding you down, keeping you still, and then the other hand—

He turns his head, presses a kiss to the junction of your thigh. “Okay?”

“Okay,” you answer, shaky and weak. So okay, more than okay.

“Going to finger you now,” Taehyung says, and you feel like you’re going to die.

“Okay,” you say again. “Okay, Taehyung.”

He smiles at you before he puts his mouth back to your clit, sucking, a welcome distraction as—with all the languidness in the world—presses a finger into you.

You’ve fingered yourself before. You’ve got your own toys, vibrators, things that are longer and thicker than just one of Taehyung’s fingers—but this feels so different, out of your control. One finger becomes two, your cunt so wet that the slide in is easy, slow, deep thrusts of those long fingers inside you, and you’re panting, you’re so fucking overwhelmed.

And then he curls those fingers as he laps his tongue over your clit and you almost shout, Taehyung’s name bursting from your lips as he keeps beckoning with those fingers and circling the sensitive nub with his hot, wet tongue. It’s so much, it’s so fucking much, it’s so good and you’ve never felt so good before—

You’re almost blindsided by the orgasm that explodes through you and you come apart with a sound you didn’t realise you were capable of making, a gasping moan that keeps unfurling as Taehyung keeps his mouth on you, feeling each pulse of your cunt as you cum around his fingers, tight-tight-tight. (You miss the way his hips kick into the mattress that the sounds you’re making, how much you tighten around him.) You never thought you’d be so loud, never thought you’d end up all but sobbing as Taehyung eventually leans back, candlelight brushing shining gold over the wetness over his mouth, his chin. Your wetness.

“Oh my God,” you gasp. “Oh, fuck.”

Little jolts of pleasure are still wracking through you, pulsations of pleasure that unfurl in your lower stomach; Taehyung rubs the pad of his thumb across your oversensitive clit and your entire body jumps, your legs going to snap shut as you gasp, only stopped by his body in the way. You realise, then, that his fingers are still curled inside you, and you shiver.

“One more,” he says, and your whole body shakes. “Can I give you one more?”

He still looks reverent, and hungry. Like he wants to devour you. Taehyung is usually so soft, a gentle summer breeze—but right now he’s so intense it might scare you if it was anyone else. But it’s not, it’s Taehyung, and there’s something—there’s something about knowing that he looks like that because of you. 

You let your legs fall open, watch how pleased he looks; how grateful. Like he's blessed to be able to do this to you. For you. You’re still so sensitive when he lowers his head again, but he’s slow and patient and coaxing, two fingers becoming three, and—that’s a lot. It’s a lot, but it feels good, Taehyung knowing exactly what to do to make you sob, your legs still hooked over his shoulders as he pulls you along that line between oversensitivity and mind numbing pleasure. This time, when you cum, it’s with three fingers buried deep in your cunt, the flat of his tongue pressed against your clit, back arching as you throw your head back and cry out. Your pussy throbs and it's so dirty, the wet sounds of his fingers thrusting into you, the slick sound of movement as you moan, and moan, and moan.

No one's ever made you cum before. Only you. And now you know what it's like to put your pleasure in someone else's hands, to have them intent on making you feel good, so good, and it leaves you dizzy. 

He’s praising you, you note dimly. He’s praising you, how well you’re doing, how good you are for him, and it leaves you feeling warm. You’re panting when Taehyung pulls his fingers out of you, moves so he can brace himself on his elbows and lean in to kiss you. You can taste yourself on his lips and tongue. You can feel his skin against yours, chest to chest, his weight pressing you down and then you can feel—

You let out a noise against his lips. There’s nothing else that can be, that hot weight. You might not have felt it before, but you’re not stupid. That’s Taehyung’s cock, his hard length pressed against you.

“Taehyung,” you murmur.

“Mm.” He brushes his nose against yours, and the wave of affection that crashes through you is so strong it feels like it could pull you under. You didn’t realise that sex could be like this—that lingering shockwaves of pleasure could be skirting through your body as you lay there naked, still aroused and almost overcome, but also feeling so warm and soft and tender, too. 

You feel lax after cumming, a little more confident, bolder—and the noise Taehyung makes as you clumsily grasp at him through his sweatpants is incredible. You feel like you could get high on it, the way he sucks in a gasp as his mouth falls open, even if you don’t know what you’re doing as your fingers wrap around cloth and hard heat.

“Please,” you start, then stop. Swallow. “Please, Taehyung.”

You want so much you feel like you could pass out. You want to feel and touch and taste; you want everything you haven’t had a chance to experience yet, want it with Taehyung, someone who you trust. Someone you love. Someone who knows far, far more than you—will always know more—and you want to learn that from him. 

“Want you,” you say, and Taehyung looks pained all over again. He wants you, too.

“Fuck.” The word is rough, and you’ve never heard him curse before. The way he says it has something in you singing, as strange as that might be; you don’t think you’re ever going to get over how much you affect Taehyung. “What do you want from me, angel?”

Everything, you think. I want everything. 

“Let me see?” is what you say, squeezing your fingers around Taehyung’s length, feeling the way his hips buck into the touch. “Please?”

You never thought that someone taking their clothes off could be artistic. And yet, there’s something about Taehyung moving to stand and stripping off the rest of his clothes that’s completely arresting and beautiful; carnal and holy, all at once. You don’t even realise your mouth is open as you sit up and watch him, moving closer as you drink down the sight, the way he’s naked in front of you.

Taehyung. Naked. Naked and beautiful and hard, and it’s so overwhelming, everything about it, how much you want and how—oh, God, how big and thick he is, obvious even to you, someone with nothing to compare it to. Holy fuck. Should you think that his dick is pretty? Can dicks even be pretty? Taehyung’s is. Of course it is. He’s gorgeous all over. Maybe you’re biased because it’s him, but there’s something about the sight of his hard cock, precome gathering at his slit, that makes your mouth water.

Taehyung goes to say something, but before you can lose your nerve, you move forwards, and whatever he was going to say is lost in the sound of a choked off groan. He tastes like salt and musk, hot under your inexperienced hands and mouth, and you don’t know what you’re doing but the noises he’s making, fuck. You run your tongue up the throb of a vein you can feel on the underside, and all you can think about is how big he is, slow and careful with your teeth and lips as you try your best to do whatever feels good for him. 

His noises seem almost frantic but Taehyung’s hands are gentle when they comb through your hair. You look up. There’s a flush on his cheeks—red, not blue, you notice—and you pause, pulling off, suddenly shy after the burst of confidence that had you swallowing his cock down.

“Is this—is this okay?” You’ve still got your fingers wrapped around him, and maybe it’s a little ridiculous to be asking with spit and precome shining on your lips, but Taehyung’s answering smile is so affectionate.

“You’re perfect,” he says, and you know he’s not just talking about your clumsy blowjob. “Do you want to stop?”

You bite your lip and pump his length, which has Taehyung sucking a breath in. “I—what do you want?”

Something flashes through Taehyung’s eyes, and it feels like there’s electricity shooting down your spine before that look disappears. “This is about you, angel,” he says. “We can worry about what I want next time.”

Next time. This is the first time but it’s not the last. Oh, God. God.

Taehyung takes advantage of your distraction and hikes you up and away from the edge of the bed. It leaves you breathless, knowing how strong he is, how easily he can move you, even if he’s gentle-gentle-gentle. He settles in the cradle of your hips, and he’s so close, naked body flush with yours, covering you. His cock is so close—he just has to shift a little, just a little, and—well. 

Before that, though, there’s something you need to know.

“Taehyung?” Your voice shakes but you have to ask.

“Yes?”

“Is this. Um. Does this feel good for you, too?”

You’re always aware of the fact Taehyung is an android, even if he looks and feels and is human, too. (It doesn’t matter that he’s made of metal and thirium and circuitry. He’s human.) You lift a hand and thumb at the soft skin of his temple, where his LED used to sit; you don’t know how to communicate that you love him regardless, that it doesn’t matter to you if he's a man or robot. But you’ve wondered—you know Taehyung was built to pleasure humans. Even if he’s been reacting, making noises, looks for all intents and purposes that he is enjoying this—what if it’s all programming? What if he’s just doing this because he thinks it’s something you want?

He leans into your touch. “Angel.” It sounds like the word is being scraped out of him, hoarse and deep, all dark heat. “It feels good. You don’t know how long I’ve wanted this.”

He rolls his hips almost imperceptibly, but you’re hyperaware of every motion, how close you are. Your breath stutters in your throat.

"I want you to feel good," he says. "I've wanted to feel you and taste you for so long. I want to learn everything about your body. I want to know what you feel like around me. Under me. On top of me. You make me feel so fucking good, you don't even know," and, oh, fuck, those words go right through you, settle deep in your belly, leave you breathless. Taehyung sucks at your pulse point and you melt, even as your skin feels like it's burning, so hot, every part of you so hot, so ready for him.

Taehyung’s big enough that you’re worried about how he’s going to fit, even if you’re slick and wet and so, so turned on—you know about the importance of lube, used it often enough by yourself, but when you mention it to Taehyung he just smiles.

“Don’t forget that I’m a sex android,” he says, and before you can ask exactly what he means by that, you feel the tip of his cock at your folds and the question dies on your tongue.

“Please,” is what leaves your lips. “Please, please, please.”

“Anything you want,” he says, and eases his hips forwards.

Slow, and hard, and wet, the head of Taehyung’s cock starts to press into you. You grab at his back, digging your fingers in; it doesn’t hurt, not exactly, a not-quite-pain as he pushes in—but it’s a lot, even if the slide is smooth, so smooth, from your own wetness and the slickness that covers Taehyung’s cock. Your eyes are wide and your lips are parted and it feels—astonishing, the way you can feel yourself open up for him, the way it feels like he’s filling every part of you, throbbing heat.

“Oh, oh God,” you gasp. 

Taehyung’s forehead is pressed to yours, the loose locks of his dark hair framing his face as he waits, hips snug with yours. You shiver and move your hips a little, entire body seizing at the sensation of him shifting inside you. It's so new and alien, having someone nestled inside you, against you, so close in every sense of the term, above you, around you, inside you—but it feels… good.

And when he moves, it’s so, so slow. Slow and smooth as he works you open, even if you feel so tight around him. You drag your nails down his shoulder blades when he moves a little faster, a little roll of the hips that has you gasping all over again.

“More,” you say, and he gives you more.

You feel so full. You feel full of Taehyung, inside and out—the way his body is still pressing you down, skin on skin, how hot he is.

They call it making love, and it’s not until now that you really understand what that means—how you can feel Taehyung’s soft and tender affection in his every motion, read it in every shift of his body, the lines of his face, his lips; the way his eyes are dark but full of wonder, shining with love for you, pleasure singing through every inch of you, centred around Taehyung, Taehyung, Taehyung.

Each noise that falls from his lips is an echo of that love. Even when he leans back and takes you with him—settles on his knees, pulls your hips from the mattress to stay connected to you as your shoulder blades dig into the mattress, his cock in your cunt—there’s tenderness there, even if you’re both chasing mutual lines of pleasure. You feel almost dazed, dizzy with love and arousal, reaching out for him, and he catches your hand. The other stays at your waist, guiding you onto him, again and again, each roll of hips into yours.

“Taehyung,” you gasp, voice breaking on his name when he thrusts into you. He’s been increasing the pace, faster and sharper, harder, and it’s so-so-so much, so good. “I’m—Taehyung, I’m close, I wanna cum again, pleasepleaseplease—”

He lets go of your hand and then he’s thumbing at your clit and you’re cumming harder than you’ve ever cum in your life, Taehyung’s cock still hard and insistent inside you as you ride out your orgasm, pulsing around him. You’re gasping and making noises like you’re falling apart, and there’s something desperate in Taehyung’s eyes, something dark and wanton. 

“Angel, I’m going to cum soon,” he says, and you moan in response, hazy. “Do you want me to pull out?”

You shake your head no. You want to know what it feels like, to have Taehyung lose himself inside you. You’re about to reach out for him when he hooks his hands under your knees and hitches your legs up—you suck in a sharp breath as he starts to move again, almost bent in two, his face so close to yours. It's not rough but something about Taehyung taking control like that has you baring your throat, arching your back and throwing your head back. The hold he has on you is firm, and you feel how it tightens as his thrusts speed up, and then, fuck—

When Taehyung cums it’s around the gasp of your name, a hitching sound as he empties himself inside you, throbbing and hot. You let out an answering sound, the two of you locked together until Taehyung pulls out, careful and slow; you feel like a sweaty mess, empty without him inside you, but then his hands are so carefully cupping your face and he’s kissing you over and over and over. It leaves you feeling breathless, all those little kisses, struggling for air by the time you part, every part of you lax under his loving touch. 

“How are you feeling?” Taehyung murmurs, soft and sweet. 

“Good,” you murmur back. And then your nose crinkles. “Sweaty.”

Taehyung laughs, quiet and low. You turn your face into the crook of his neck, hiding your smile as you breathe him in. You do feel sweaty, and there’s an ache settling inside you, but it’s a good ache. A glowing ache, an unfamiliar one, but one that you know you'll get to feel again, with Taehyung.

You’ve just leaned back to take him in all over again, painted syrupy sweet in the golden candlelight—when the lights suddenly turn back on. It floods your eyes and you make a noise of surprised pain as you squint against the sudden brightness, but then you start to giggle, shock melting into laughter.

When your laughter dies you realise Taehyung’s been watching you. The room is full of shining light now, and you realise you’re still naked, entire body shaking as you’ve been giggling. You’d feel embarrassed about your nakedness if you hadn’t just shared yourself with him, bared yourself in ways that are more than skin deep. There’s an instinctual part of you that wants to cover up now that there’s nowhere to hide, no flickering shadows to cover up the parts of your body that you don’t like, the flaws you don’t want Taehyung to see. But he just looks fond, fond, fond, love and affection dripping off him as he watches the way you smile shyly up at him.

“Hi,” you say.

“Hi,” he says, and smiles back, wide and bright. 

You love him. You love him, and he loves you, and you trust that love. As hard as it might be to believe, you trust that this is what he wants—that you’re what he wants.

“Do you want me to carry you to the shower?” he asks, and you can’t help but laugh again, warm through and through, how he’s still taking care of you.

“Not yet,” you say. 

You end up against his chest, wrapped close. You’ve laid your head in his lap countless times, but he’s never been on his back before, never had his arms around you like he doesn’t want to let go. Taehyung might not have a heart, but the thirium pump nestled in his chest beats steady as you stay nestled against his side. 

You’re drawing little circles on his skin with your fingers when he catches that hand and lifts it to his mouth, presses a tender kiss to your fingertips.

“I love you,” he says.

You feel like liquid sunlight, shining happiness as you melt, melt, melt. And the feeling stays, body filled with it, even after Taehyung coaxes you out of bed and into the shower to wash the sweat off your body; when he drags a soapy loofah over your back you can’t help but laugh, so in love, so loved.

And when you fall asleep, it’s not with your head on Taehyung’s thigh. It’s with his arms around you, his chest to your back, his body curved around you. You don’t want tonight to end, but you also can’t wait for tomorrow, knowing that it’s another day with him, with Taehyung, your Taehyung. You never thought that love would be like this, never thought that you’d feel love like this, cared for and protected and loved, loved, loved.

“Not staying late?”

You pause in the process of shoving everything into your bag. Hoseok is leaning against your desk, a smile curling at his lips as he raises his eyebrows at you, almost suggestive.

“Nah, I’ve got a dinner to get to,” you say. 

“You seem a lot happier lately,” Hoseok comments, and when you don’t fall for the bait, he wiggles his eyebrows. “The girls think that you’ve got a secret boyfriend that you’re too shy to tell anyone about.”

Taehyung still greets you every day when you get home. But now, every greeting is punctuated with a kiss—and sometimes a little more. When you stop to think about it, it’s startling, this thing that Taehyung’s taught you. That the simplest of things can turn into something more, love edged with lust, that it’s all part and parcel of loving someone, being with them, being comfortable with them. Just the other day you’d been reading on the sofa, and then Taehyung’s fingers had curved over your thigh and the tablet had fallen from your hands—

Hoseok clicks his fingers in front of your face. “You’re zoning out again,” he says.

“I am not,” you say, zoning back in. “I was thinking about if I needed to buy any food on the way home.”

“To feed that secret boyfriend of yours?” Hoseok says, and you laugh in his face.

“Definitely not to feed the rumour mill,” you say. Hoseok pouts but it’s good natured, and he waves you off with a smile, letting you leave the office without trapping you in an interrogation for the gossip you’re certain your coworkers are hungry for.

It’s your turn to cook for Yoongi and Seokjin, so you’ve got to get home to help Taehyung. Both men had been spectacularly unsurprised when they’d found out about the two of you. Yoongi had remained calm as Seokjin crowed in delight, proclaiming I knew it, I knew that’s why you were avoiding Taehyung. 

“Feel lucky, Y/n,” Yoongi had said. “At least Taehyung has a sense of decorum and shame.”

“I think it’s a shame that my boyfriend is such a party pooper,” Jin had said. “I demand a dinner party! To celebrate your new relationship! Oh, I’m going to bake the biggest cake.”

“Oh my God,” you’d said, and Taehyung had just smiled.

The truth is that you’re grateful for your neighbours and their support, grateful for their friendship. Just because Taehyung looks human doesn’t mean that you don’t worry about him, worry that someone might discover that he’s a deviant; Jin’s slipped under the radar for long enough, and you hope it’s the same for Tae, too. And yet you can’t help but think about it, think about the present, the future, how your lives are going to unfold as time goes by.

When the door swings open to your apartment, though, that’s the last thing on your mind. All that’s on your mind is Taehyung, Taehyung, Taehyung, your love appearing just as you’ve kicked your shoes off, all bright pink hair and dark eyes and welcoming hands.

“Taehyung,” you say, warm and happy.

“Hi,” he says, smiling so brightly, and then he kisses you.

You’re never going to get tired of kissing Taehyung; never going to get tired of how his mouth fits against yours, so perfect and sweet. But then he crowds you against the wall, swallowing down your gasp before kissing down your neck, running his teeth so gently across your skin.

“Missed you,” he murmurs, words dripping hot and slow. “Been thinking about you.”

“Taehyung,” you breathe. “Taehyung, we need to cook dinner.”

“We have time,” he says, and when he picks you up, you don’t protest. You go easily, wrapping your arms and legs around him, heat already gathering in your stomach as he walks the familiar path to your bedroom.

You have time: today, tomorrow, and every day after that. You have time with Taehyung, to learn with him, to love him. To be loved back. You don’t know what’s coming on the horizon, what the future holds—but then again, you never have.

There’s one thing you know now, though. No matter what happens, Taehyung will be at your side, and you’ll be at his. He wants you, and he loves you. You want him, and you love him. 

“I love you,” you murmur, and Taehyung kisses the words off your lips, lets the promise of your love settle inside him, warm and soft and safe.

“I love you too,” he says, and then you’re too busy to say anything, after that.

taglist:  @beyoncesdragon​ @vensulove​ @jalexad​ @beingbeings​ @lorielulu7​ ​ (can’t tag: @jeon-joon-kook)

[shinobimagpie]

Without meaning to take anything away from the representation that Gai in his wheelchair gives to wheelchair users, I feel like it's crazy that no one has suggested a prosthetic limb to this man up to this point in canon?

Like, not even ONE shinobi doctor looked at Gai's leg that had partially turned to ashes and said 'mmmmmaybe let's amputate that so it doesn't deteriorate more and make you a new one?'

Suna puppeteers can make a whole body full of traps that they can control with chakra lines, you cannot tell me that they couldn't build a frigging incredible prosthetic with that technology.

The user could manipulate the parts in potentially dozens of ways depending on their skills - chakra strings infused into residual limb muscles, moving the rig like a traditional puppet with a single digit, maybe super high-tech ones with artificial channels in the prosthetic made to mimic the body's typical chakra energy system in a sort of 'plug and play' way? Materials might need to be adjusted to match best with a user's primary energy nature or makers might need donor materials from the user to build the custom parts. And of course like IRL prosthetics you'd need ones custom built for shit like running and dancing and punching.

And then once it works really well as just a limb, you start putting custom weapons in that baby!

I feel like Gai would be willing to lose something that already is not working in the hope that it could let him go back to doing more things, and I also really love the idea of post-war Gai working through this 'fractured and rebuilt' state that is never quite who he was before he opened the Eighth Gate.

Once he has pushed himself to that brink and lost his leg - even before it is physically gone - every situation he is in now comes with a new ability modifier to challenge himself against - Gai is left always forced to consider what he is capable of in his current 'configuration'. He has to approach even mundane situations from the angle of 'feet, wheels, or neither' all of the time now.

I feel like trying to learn to do the same skill in a different way in all three 'modes' would be so very Gai while the multiple facets his style would take on would also be kinda emblematic of how that last fight broke him down/shattered him physically in a way he has to rebuild from.

And just... I want people out there who heard he almost died against Madara and is now disabled going up against him, underestimating him even a little, and INSTANTLY REGRETTING IT.

Prosthetic Gai has all the skills of regular Gai, but with a red herring limp - targeting the limping leg would be a stupid idea because it's metal and wood underneath and it'll break your weapon and/or hand. It also hurts much much more than his regular foot when he whips you in the head with it two seconds later.

Wheelchair Gai is like -2 agility on certain terrain, but you'll most likely encounter Wheelchair Gai in Konoha and within the city? Easy +3 to stability and speed; he will use gravity, home terrain advantage and his absurd upper body strength to chase you down and mess you right up.

With no wheelchair OR prosthetic many people would think - haha, got him this time - but no! Actually, now he's the MOST dangerous because he's agile and unpredictable as fuck and he WILL grapple you into an early grave for daring to think you could take him.

Anyway, the Naruto universe should be chock full of not only high-tech prosthetics but ones crammed with secret weapons and shit and Maito Gai should have a badass new leg with a literal rocket kick because he deserves it.

Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk.

[insomniamamma]

Safe: Ezra x f!reader w/Cee

A/n: What can I say? I'm hormonal and all my shit hurts and if I cannot get snuggles IRL then I will write something super soft and self-indulgent to make myself feel better. Part of the Prickle AU. Set sometime after Sacellum.

Warnings: Oh no! There's only one bed. Soft!Ezra. Language. Cee's best friend on The Pug is non-binary and also named after my little boy's favorite stuffy. Maybe the slightest bit of angst. But mostly super soft.

         "You did this on purpose."         "Right hand to Kevva, I did not. I asked for double occupancy and they must have misunderstood and--"         "You don't have a right hand,"         "Let's go back to the reception desk," says Ezra, "We may be able to negotiate more appropriate accommodations."         "Errgh," you groan. Reception had been a nightmare, three freighters worth of traffic trying to secure berths all at once. It was a lot of people. Too many for your liking. Cee was staying with Kit and their family. Kit and Cee had practically tackled each other right there on the dock, everyone else forgotten, walked away arm in arm.         "We shove off in three cycles," Ezra hollered at her retreating back, and she flapped a dismissive hand at him. You had to smile. For three cycles Cee gets to be a normal teenager hanging out with her best friend without worrying about points and pulls and overhead costs and fuel margins.         "I don't wanna go back down there," you say, "Too many people. I think twice the population of Falnost was waiting in that fucking line." You brush past him and into the suite. The ceilings are low and slightly curved and it feels strange to be under this much grav. The outer rings of Puggart Bench have something close to terra-normal gravity, but after so much time spent on little moons and worldlets, this much G feels weird and you have no desire to trudge back down to reception.         "You sure?" Asks Ezra.         "Yeah," you drop your day bag and press a hand to the mattress. "Look at the size of this thing. It's, like, five crash-couches wide. This seems above our pay grade."         "They're overbooked," says Ezra, "We're paying the same points for the berth we should have gotten. I made sure of it. I can sleep in that recliner if--"         "No."         "No?"         "Kevva, Ez, we're both adults," you say, "I think we can share a bed for a night without exploding."

        Your suite has a real, honest-to-Goddess shower with a generous 15 minute timer. You scrub as fast as you can and then just let the water hit you, let the pressure pound on your tense back muscles until the chime sounds and the water cuts off. You towel off and dress, soft clothes you sleep in, and pad out into the main room. Ezra is reading, face far off and serious, and you just look at him for a minute, illuminated in the warm lamp-light, absorbed in his book, little furrow between his brows and then he looks up, all knowing smirk and dancing eyes, he's caught you staring.         "Your turn, Ez," You say and turn your face away. Kevva. This man. You've been trying to keep things professional, but it's a losing battle. His flirtations make you flush, but he's never tried to push you, never tried to leverage the fact that it's his name on the ship's title, that you signed a contract, that you are junior-most crew. You feel safe with him. And, from your limited experience in the fringe, that is a miracle in itself.

        Ezra sets his book aside and heads for the bathroom. You peel the sheets from the other side of the bed and settle in. There's a media player bolted to the wall, but you just want quiet. You switch off the lamp on your nightstand (we both have lamps, we both have a nightstand, how weird is that?) The sheets feel deliciously cool against your skin. To be clean and sleeping in clean sheets...if Heaven isn't like this Kevva's got some answering to do.         Ezra sings in the shower. You're barely awake and you smile. Ezra can't carry a tune in a bucket, singing fringeling songs and reels, stories of mercs and pirates and ghosts and you drift off to the sound of him, the sound of the water running.

        He sees you soft and loose and asleep. No rail-gun, no body armor, no thrower under your pillow. Your face slack, snoring slightly. You've kicked out of the blankets and lay curled as if chilled.         "Hey Artichoke," he murmurs, pulls the blankets up and tucks them around you, "Let's get you warm, yeah?"

        Ezra wakes. Bleared red numbers of the clock saying that this is still the deepest ditch of local night. Ezra is warm and confused. He feels you pressed against him, your chest to his back, an arm hooked around his middle, your legs entwined with his. You've sought him out in your sleep and folded yourself around him, your breath slow and steady against his nape. Ezra's eyes prick with tears. He can't remember the last time he's been held like this. He's had lovers. He has payed for sex on the less reputable Benches of the Great Arm, but for someone to hold him? For someone to touch him without payment, without trying to press some advantage, gain some kind of leverage, without priming him for the inevitable backstab?  He is overwhelmed. He tries to wriggle away from you, but your arm just tightens around him.         "...fixed the transponder," you mutter against his neck, "told you we didn't need...told you..." He pats your arm and relaxes against you.         "Okay, Artichoke, okay, sweetheart. Go back to sleep."

        You wake enfolded, Ezra's good arm wrapped around you. You feel the steady beat of his heart beneath your ear, the slow sussurration of his breath, the snores that catch in his throat and turn to murmurs, the rise and fall of his chest beneath your cheek. You've tucked yourself against him in your sleep. Your hand rests on his sternum. Oh Kevva. What are you doing? You go rigid.         Your first impulse is to wrestle out of his hold, take one of the blankets and install yourself in the recliner that you wouldn't let Ezra take, but part of you wants to stay right here in the combined warmth of your bodies, feeling his breath, his heart, his calloused palm spread against your shoulder. You shift, making the smallest effort to pull yourself away and his arm tightens further, a low, sleepy chuckle reverberates through his chest.         "Hi Ez,"         "Hi." He strokes the pad of his thumb along the exposed curve of your shoulder.         "I'll get up," you say, even as he shifts and cups the back of your head in his palm, tucking you closer.         "You don't have to," he says, voice rough with sleep. This gesture pricks at your heart. Coming up on Falnost has made you hard, guarded, there has been precious little gentleness in your life, pulling rocks out of the parched ground since you were big enough to lift a shovel. Learned to fight and shoot to chase water-thieves from the homestead. He strokes the back of your head like one might pet a skittish cat and your heart squeezes.         "Ezra?" You hate how small your voice sounds, you hate the uncertainty you hear there, "Are we okay?"         "Of course we are," he says, "Why wouldn't we be?"         "I wrapped around you like a Bueller's world python and I did it in my sleep-"         "The wrapping was mutual-"         "You're not mad or uncomfortable or anything?" He laughs again, gentle huff of breath against the crown of your head.         "Mad about waking with you in my arms? The day I'm mad about that you can just shoot me in the head and send me to Kevva because I will surely have lost my ever-loving mind." You smile against his skin and relax some, your hand unfists and you curl your arm around his soft belly, feel his breath hitch.         "Tickles."         "Sorry." You feel yourself drift, skirting the edge of sleep. He is warm and solid and you let yourself relax against him.         “This feels...safe..." you say, so close to sleep that you're not sure if you've said it aloud or if you've just thought it. And you're not sure if you hear his response or dream it, one word. Always.

        "She's late," says Ezra.         "We still got a sixteenth to button up and board,"         "Still," says Ezra, "Yon freighter will leave with our pod wether we're strapped in it or not." You see Cee and Kit, trailed by Kit's parents, weaving through the crowd. Cee is beaming, her blonde hair has a brilliant streak of blue, and Kit has a matching streak in their hair.         "Hey guys!" Cee hugs Ezra and then hugs you.         "How was your shore leave, Little Bird? I like the fancy hair."         "Isn't that cool? We've got matching streaks," says Cee.         "It's semi-permanent," says Kit, "We'll pick a different color next time!" You have to smile. Cee looks revitalized. Three cycles spent with her friend, just doing normal kid things has been good for her.         "Check this out!" says Cee and pushes a laminated drawing towards the two of you. Ezra makes a show of looking carefully.         "I recognize you and Kit," he says, "I am not familiar with these other people, though."         "They're from The Streamer Girl, dumbass," says Cee, "Here's Clo and Reive and Lily and Auri. See? Kit put us right in the story." Ezra gives Kit his best smile.         “You drew this? You are very talented." Kit smiles big.         "Thanks!" says Kit, "I'll put you guys in the next one! Maybe you could be professors at Bowsun Academy or something."         "I look forward to it," says Ezra.         "Time to go, Cee," you say and Cee and Kit exchange one more enthusiastic hug.         "Later fringeling!" Calls Kit.         "Piss off, stationer!" Cee calls back. Ezra curls his fingers around yours and squeezes. Cee tells you all about her three cycles with Kit, the movies they watched, the Real Food they ate. How Kit's little brother wanted a blue streak in his hair too and Kit's parents said no and how mad he got. I wanna be cool like Kit and Cee.         "I told him he's got plenty of time to be cool," says Cee, "And he told me that I don't understand how the world works. He's like, four." Ezra laughs.         "Wise for his years." Says Ezra. And the three of you fall quiet. You find the pod much as you left it, towed to the Polly Jean and clipped in, transferred by the station's tugs. You settle in and do a full systems check. Calling out the checklists and making sure everything is good for transit.         "What are you guys so happy about?" asks Cee.         "Whatever do you mean?" asks Ezra.         "You been all smiles since I hit the dock," says Cee, "Both of you. Did we score a really good job? Did we win the Puggart Bench lottery or something? What aren't you telling me?"         "That," says Ezra, "Is for us to know and you to endlessly speculate about."         "Hmph," says Cee.

Tagging: @oonajaeadira, @grogusmum , @honestly-shite, @writeforfandoms, @ladyvengeancesposts, @the-blind-assassin-12

[ckret2]

Alright let’s talk GVK spoilers!!!

My reactions as best I can remember them!

- love how Kong is humanized from the very first scene, like every time he shows up he’s humanized so much more than other titans are. If that was at the expense of other titans being made likable I wouldn’t enjoy it so much, but like, Godzilla is made pretty lovable over the course of Monsterverse, Mothra is too, and all the titans featured for long are given recognizable emotions that let us see them as more intelligent and feeling than “just” animals; so all of them are made understandable/likable/sympathetic. But of them all, Kong is the only one really humanized. Which makes sense, because like, big monkey! Basically our distant cousin!

- And they kept playing, like, normal songs for him, which cracked me up.

- I really appreciated how you could SEE the titans in this movie. After all the weather effects to hide the titans in KOTM, there was such a clear difference in this one from the very start. Kong in the daylight! Godzilla makes his first attack at night, and even then you can see him much more clearly than you can for most of KOTM! Nice!

- after the Iwi were portrayed as silent stoic witnesses in Skull Island, I really appreciated that they took an Iwi character, made her a main character, and gave her dialogue and a real role to play in the story while also keeping her deaf/mute. I think that was a good way to improve on the way that the Iwi got got sidelined in the last movie while still maintaining the worldbuilding!

- I didn’t appreciate so much that, y’know, they murdered the rest of her people off-screen in order to do it. Couldn’t they have gone “her parents died so she got adopted by a Monarch agent that was close to her family, but like, the rest of her tribe is fine”? Or at the very least “their island got fucked up so they had to be evacuated but like they’re settling in somewhere else”? “They’re living under this island dome with Kong and they know what’s up and Monarch’s keeping them in the loop and they decided they’re chill with their new dome home, but this one girl likes to go on adventures with Monarch”? Something? Did we have to kill them all off? Y’all make up an entire fictional indigenous culture and then murder them off-screen when you don’t need them? Just let them live.

- a few minutes in I was like “hold on, we’ve got two characters that speak sign language, we’ve got a giant gorilla, gorillas learn sign language, is there any reason they can’t teach Kong?” and then later I was like “OOOOOH!!” Humans and titans learning how to communicate with each other has been one of my favorite themes to explore in Monsterverse fanfic so I was absolutely tickled to see it getting explored in canon, too.

- That said I think it’s hilarious that the girl managed to teach Kong to sign without, like... anybody seeing. Kong’s hands are above the tree line and there are cameras everywhere, how did NOBODY with Monarch see him signing.

- Bernie’s weaponized being an annoying coworker to such a degree it can only be called an art, and I really appreciated it.

- Godzilla’s extra chonky in this movie and I dig it. Roomie noted he was extra crocodilian and I dig that too.

- “There’s been no confirmed titan sightings in three years” I don’t buy that for a minute. They’re BIG. Rodan NESTS IN VOLCANOES. They found a MOTHRA EGG. Humans have A SCARILY WELL-FUNDED ORGANIZATION DEDICATED SOLELY TO FOLLOWING TITANS AROUND. Like, most of the lore in GVK that I don’t personally like, I can be like “eh... I can tweak it just a little bit with headcanons to make it work for me...” but NO confirmed titan sightings? You expect me to believe ALL of them moved underground when we’d previously seen them all prefer to live above ground? You expect me to believe that now that they’re all AWAKE, they learned how to HIDE?? Uh-uh. And at the end of KOTM there was stuff in the credits about using titan droppings as biofuel, obviously they’re still walking around up top! Can’t take that from me. Nope.

- Who the FUCK is Ren Serizawa and how is he related to Ishiro Serizawa? IS he related? Maybe they just dropped the surname as another “yeah this is a Godzilla movie for Godzilla fans” easter egg but I have a hard time believing that he can’t be somehow related to the other character with the Very Important Last Name who was so important in the last two Godzilla movies. If he is related I’m sure it’s been explained in a tie-in comic or the novelization or something, I’ll look it up later.

- I had to look up how much weight huge battleships can carry while writing a KOTM fic where Ghidorah hitches a ride on one, and y’all, I had to pull weird gravity-negating magic to get him to ride on that boat. Godzilla and Kong woulda sunk that boat like a rock. All I could think during that scene is “this wouldn’t work and I know that because I DID THE RESEARCH and I wasn’t even getting PAID.” I’ll choose to believe that Monarch gets special heavy duty ships designed to carry titans but nobody mentioned it because it wasn’t relevant to Kong’s journey.

- The bit where they could see where Godzilla was swimming because he’d got half a ship hooked to him that was bobbing around on the surface, didn’t Jaws do something like that with a buoy? It’s been ages since I’ve seen Jaws. Anyway good reference.

- Insert “they’re gonna need a bigger boat” joke

- I LOVED the part where they shut down all the ships to get Godzilla to leave. Both because, one, it’s a spectacular callback to KOTM’s “turn off all the guns so he knows we’re not a threat” that makes it seem like now that’s just what Monarch knows what to do to get G to chill out, and two... we know that Godzilla backs off either when he’s killed his enemy or when his enemy has yielded to him. At the end of KOTM—and the end of GVK—the act of yielding is presented as very ceremonial and uniform across species: everyone lowers anything they’ve got that could be dangerous (claws, fangs, beaks, axes) and bows to show Godzilla they’re not gonna fight. Battleships, obviously, can’t bow, but even without being inducted into whatever secret titan cultural intricacies might be going on, humans have figured out their own way to “bow” to Godzilla: cut all the power, so their ships can’t move and can’t use weapons. I know the movie presented it as “playing dead,” but c’mon, if Godzilla could hear MechaG power up from halfway around the planet then he could hear that Kong’s heart was still beating, and he’s been around enough boats to know humans can turn them off and on when they want. The humans bowed to Godzilla. He accepted that they yielded and left.

- Mark Russell looked like such a dad in this movie, like he’s retired 100% from being a rugged action hero and now he’s just Pure Dad. I like him better when he’s a dad, it’s a good development for him. He got like 3 lines and I’m like “I appreciate this character development.”

- Despite all my qualms about how conspiracy theories and extremist groups are handled in Monsterverse (and WHICH conspiracy theories they decide to reference), I really love Madison and Bernie’s dynamic. The adult man who’s the excitable wide-eyed believer in every BS conspiracy you can possibly imagine; and then the serious, severe Teenage Girl On A Mission who’s hypercompetent because she was raised for five years by a friggin doomsday cult militia; and despite having wildly different personalities they’re just, in total agreement about everything. Handled just a BIT differently (like, leaving out the more gross IRL conspiracies) they would be a wildly fun comedic duo—especially with Josh the Only Sane Man coming along as the hapless sidekick. And they all play off of each other so well! Both in a comedic sense, and in more serious moments—when Bernie talked about his wife, there was a real moment of empathy between him and Madison with very little said. I’d watch an entire movie just about the three of them. I’d watch a TV show.

- On the one hand I wasn’t too much of a fan of KOTM’s “all titans... are inherently In Tune With Nature... nature has a Balance, because that’s a Real Thing and not an anthropocentric concept to describe how we like nature to act, and they automatically restore it... because they’re like, some kinda borderline divinities or something... we should probably be worshipping them...” thing; but, now that it was totally absent in GVK, I sorta miss it. Like I feel like there needs to be a balance, a few humans who are like “i lowkey worship these dudes?” and a few others who are like “they’re cool but like, that’s a lil extreme” and that neither side be presented as Right in how they regard titans’ relationship with nature.

- “All titans come from THE HOLLOW EARTH” nah I don’t buy that it’s silly. Basically, what I object to is the idea that all titans have some sort of intrinsic similarity (they all come from the same hitherto-unknown location; they all are part of the same pack that has the same alpha; they all are fueled/fed by the same energy source; etc) rather than letting them be SEPARATE species whose only unifying traits are “they’re all big enough to fuck everything up everywhere they go” and “they’re big enough that the typically-insurmountable barriers between different biomes (mountain ranges, valleys, long distances with terrible weather) aren’t insurmountable for them, so even if they’re specialized in different environments they still all have to deal with each other pretty often.” I’ll make some exceptions for convergent evolution (i.e., claiming multiple titans developed similar traits that are relatively easy to spontaneously evolve and a prerequisite for a creature to survive at such a large size). But I can’t buy “this big gorilla has more biologically in common with this big crocodile-iguana than he does with, say, gorillas,” or most of the other “all these titans have THIS IN COMMON” claims that Monsterverse makes, including “everyone’s from hollow earth.” So I’m tossing that out the window and substituting my own headcanons. Some might’ve evolved there but some evolved on the surface. Maybe a majority of them like ducking in and out of the hollow earth like some kind of titan shortcut system. Kong’s species, I can buy, IS native to hollow earth, considering that they built a whole-ass society down there with tools and architecture.

- I’m SO curious about the little underground Kong home, the Godzilla motif in the floor, and the axe that appeared to be made with a Godzilla scute. What’s the story there??? We know Godzilla’s species and Kong’s species are ancient rivals. Is it because Kong’s species hunted Godzilla’s to steal their scutes to make weapons, seeing them as a valuable resource the way, like, early humans considered woolly mammoths a valuable resource—thus making that Godzilla on the floor equivalent to cave art of mammoths made by people who hunted them—until the Godzillas got pissed and started fighting back en masse? Or were Godzillas and Kongs already enemies when Kongs decided to start making weapons out of their corpses? Did they use to be allies, fighting together, with Godzillas voluntarily offering shed scutes and/or bones of their deceased members to Kongs, and that place used to be a shared home until they started fighting?

- What about that power source, is it something that was already there that both Kongs and Godzillas started to deliberately harvest for technology/atomic breath? Or did Godzillas automatically channel that stuff and Kongs exploited/borrowed/traded with Godzillas to utilize it too? Or is the power from Godzillas who collaboratively poured a bunch of power into the place thus that Kongs were able to use it too? I doubt Godzilla’s species CREATED all that weird energy but the question remains of whether, like, they channel it FROM underground, or naturally produce the same thing in their own bodies, or what.

- Godzilla using his atomic breath to dig a hole STRAIGHT TO KONG just to KICK HIS ASS is hilarious. How lucky that Hong Kong just HAPPENS to be straight over Kong’s house! Were all the tunnels to the hollow earth made by pissed off Godzillas who wanted to kick monkey ass??

- I loved the aesthetic of the battle scene in Hong Kong, with the brightly colored neon building outlines, VERY cool look. The choreography of the battle scene was great too, especially

- we literally broke into applause when Kong shoved the axe handle in Godzilla’s mouth. Love it, perfect callback, that was the ONE thing from the original King Kong Vs Godzilla I was hoping to see referenced and there it was.

- You could really see a difference in how Kong and Godzilla fought—Kong doing a better job at using tools and the environment, Godzilla fighting more like a reptile. They seemed to emphasize Godzilla’s more animalistic behaviors in this movie to accomplish that contrast—he was down on all fours and moving like a crocodile more often, he was clawing at Kong’s chest—but even though it seemed a bit different of a combat technique it also didn’t seem out of place compared to how he fought in prior movies. And we’ve already seen that if Godzilla’s involved in a fight and one of the combatants knows how to use the environment, it’s typically not gonna be Godzilla. (See: Ghidorah using the reflection in a building’s windows to see what’s behind him, and recognizing a nearby power source and biting it to juice himself up.)

- So many of Godzilla’s enemies seem to have specialized in negating his atomic breath in order to combat him! The MUTOs directly suppress his ability to use it—and it makes sense that that’s an inborn ability they have, since they evolved to use Godzilla’s species as prey. Kong has a weapon that both acts as a shield to absorb the breath and turn it back against Godzilla’s species—they didn’t evolve to counter Godzilla, but they developed tools once a rivalry happened. Ghidorah’s the exception—which makes sense, since he came from space—but even at that we see him using tactics specifically to take into account Godzilla’s most powerful weapon (such as keeping one head on lookout for when he starts glowing so that they know when they need to dodge).

- LOVED the reveal that MechaG was based off of Ghidorah’s brain, it has vibes of both the Kiryu Saga and the way that Heisei MechaG is based off of Mecha-King Ghidorah. Not the most surprising plot twist, since we’d theorized that they might use San to make MechaG, but I wasn’t 100% sure they were gonna go with it until they finally did. Even when I was going “huh, the mecha pilot’s chamber looks weirdly organic” I didn’t make the connection to WHY until the reveal, lol.

- “Ghidorah’s necks are so long that the heads have to communicate with each other telepathically” that’s COMPLETELY WILD but I love it, it follows very well from their prior portrayal as telepathic empaths in Heisei, it lines up with their emphasis on electricity (because BRAINWAVES AND ELECTRICITY, hey ho movie monster pseudo science!), and it very much compliments my own private headcanon that they’ve got some psychic/mind control abilities.

- The movie ended with both “Godzilla won, technically” but also “since they teamed up as equals, the ending doesn’t FEEL like ‘Godzilla wins, Kong loses’ but rather ‘they both won against a common foe’” and since I’m on both Team Godzilla and Team They Should Be Friends, I’m happy with this outcome. Plus since the last time they fought, the Japanese movie company graciously let the American monster win, so it’s only polite that the American movie company graciously let the Japanese monster win.

- There were just a few too many humans in this movie. I was intrigued by Ren but we didn’t get much out of him, but like I guess somebody had to be in the pilot’s seat other than the Apex CEO. Didn’t care for the author of the hollow earth book, I feel like his role was superfluous. Didn’t need the Apex CEO’s daughter there at all, coulda done without her. How about this, combine all three roles. Instead of having a whole-ass author who knows about the hollow earth, just casually reference that Rick from KOTM wrote a book about it since he was the expert, and (since he wasn’t in this movie) say that he tragically died going to explore the hollow earth himself, and that way we’ve got the book with the “titans are from there” theory AND an excuse to share the “humans die when they go underground” info. Now, have Ren be working for Apex as a pilot for Mechagodzilla, but have him be MechaG’s pilot because he’s also a good pilot in general, and can fly those HEAV things. Have Apex send him to Monarch to be like “hey, you guys trust me right, since I’m Ishiro Serizawa’s relative? We at Apex have heard all about your failed hollow earth expedition, and due to Ishiro I’ve got some past ties to Monarch so I’ve got high clearance with y’all, so I could bring over this useful Apex tech that’d let you go underground and use what I know about hollow earth from my past time at Monarch to help guide things.” Once they’ve got the little chunk of energy stuff and go topside, he hustles it straight to Apex and straps into his seat to run MechaG. Bam, you’ve combined “person who knows enough about hollow earth to help the expedition,” “person who represents Apex’s interests and gets the energy,” and “person who pilots MechaG” into one character, in a way that takes three flat/underdeveloped characters and turns them into a single interesting character with a lot going on and some intriguing ties to the rest of the cast.

I think that’s everything?? Hoo.

[twigstarpikachutroll22]

Random things I’ve said while reacting to TMA

- “XD XD XD XD I wouldn't be so sure about that, Karen.”

- “Oh hey...Tom...you're the dude who said that cryptic thing earlier...you're an avatar aren't you”

- “He had a goatee? Well, if I didn't already think he was sus--”

- “A wild emo kid appeared!”

- “ ...I wanna act like I'm asking him what happened to her but I know besides the fact that he's not gonna hear me or answer it's gotta be understandably emotionally hard for him to talk about”

- “Guess Tim's not high anymore”

- “WHAT WHAT WHAT WHAT WHAT WHAT WHAT WHAT WHAT”

- “Alexa play Tightrope from The Greatest Showman, ha ha”

- “*sings* YOU'RE A SNEAKY LITTLE IMPOSTOR Aren't you?? Aren't you??”

- “Also statement takes place on the Oregon Trail, so I might have some Starkid songs to sing if I'm not TOO creeped out”

- “...Maybe they're planning a surprise party for you? Is your birthday anytime soon?”

- “Yeah, definitely bring torches. I mean flashlights. :-P"

- “Two scary-ish older ladies connected to the supernatural in one room… *squealing with mouth shut, wiggling/bouncing in seat* “

- “Cratfield. ndsjkf. Why am I thinking about how funny it would be if you replaced the T with a P kldsjfklsd”

- “Okay, that's REALLY sus…”

- “JGERIPJGWRPOHMYGOD THOSE NOISES I CAN'T SEE WHAT YOU'RE DOING BUT STOP”

- “Stop beating around the bush, pipe man.”

- “Martin, do you know ANYTHING about the police at ALL?”

- “Storytime please??” *scoots forward in seat* 

- “NOTHING BETTER HAPPEN TO ADMIRAL OR I WILL SCREAM AND SMASH THINGS IRL”

- “‘strange perceptions in the Pacific Northwest’? If the description didn't specifically SAY it was Bucoda, Washington, I'd assume it was Gravity Falls, Oregon XD XD”

- “my leg's already bouncing”

- “Uh, sir, the Magnus Institute isn't for conspiracy theories like this??”

- “FAIRCHILD MENTIONED FAIRCHILD MENTIONED”

- “Inspector...Sans.”

- “Man, American accents sound SUPER out of place on this podcast fkljgsdlk”

- “ENTITY NAME DROP ENTITY NAME DROP” *honks an air horn* 

- “HECK YEAH WE GONNA EXPLODE SOME STRANGERS BABY”

- “SO IS THIS WHY I KEEP GETTING RECOMMENDED ANIMATICS TITLED ‘MARTIN COMMITS ARSON’ THEN??? XDFGTRSHQEA”

- “ELIAS YOU [BEEP] [HONK] [DOLPHIN HOISE] MONKEYFLIPPING [AIRPLANE NOISE] [BONK] BUTTFACED [COW MOO] [CAT YOWL] [CRASH] [SQUEAL] TURDBRAINED [HONK] SON OF A JAPETH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

- “i don't know how long i've been sitting here with this expression of pure absolute horror just frozen on my face”

- “Is this like a digital version of the Death Note????”

- “Two awkward archive beans lsdgljsgljkhjg”

- “...Do I hear very faint bagpipes in the background of this?”

- “Insert Hamilton reference my brain doesn't quite want to put in the thought to make right now”

- “Jon. Jon I. I mean this in the nicest way possible......What the absolute frick.”

- “Seriously, how is that humanly possible?!?! I mean I know HE'S not human, but I assume whoever's voicing him is, so…”

- “We need both darkness AND light to exist for us to be able to discern either of them, idiot.”

- *whispers* “Pssst. You don't need thiiisss. Humanity is a blank slate and we make our own destinyyyyy.”

- “Yeahhh, don't join the army kids, all you get out of it is PTSD”

- “According to all known laws of maritime, there is no way the Nemesis should've been able to float”

- “Pee your pants, you smug turdbrained monkeyflipping son of a Rafal.”

- “Do all fears no matter how specific or obscure or weird fall under the entities somewhere? I'd think so. I wonder which ones apply to the fear of turning into your parents. I hear it's pretty common, so…”

- “Need to break a code? Ask some long time Gravity Falls fans who've been in it since the show first aired. I hear they ended up doing a HECK TON of code-cracking. Though probably none of them would know this one.”

- “Jeez freaking cupcakes, no one here ever likes to be direct with anycreature about anything, ever. kljsklgsjdglks”

- “Man. Last two listening sessions actually managed to end things off on a positive note. Now I get the weird feeling that those were just the story going, ‘here. take a little wholesomeness. as a treat. and just appreciate it, 'cause you won't be getting this again for a loooong time. ha ha haaa~ 🙃’"

- “Man just lay down and took a nap inside a grave kdshlgks”

- “Dang, as horribly evil as Mary was you can't say she ever wasn't a girlboss.”

- “hnslibgjkbfiulsinKNDKNMNKDLDFSHGYYYEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE-- *slaps self in the face* Gah frick, keep it together shipping brain-!!”

- “Oh hey! Captain Lonelypants returns!”

- “SJGHFSUIGHSAUILGHRWAIGU CUPCAKES ARE HITTING THE FAN TONIGHT JDKLGHSJGHSGJSLG”

- “I want to put a picture of this guy on the wall and shoot it with a bazooka.”

- “I will put my freaking foot through your freaking face. I will slice you as many times as I can everywhere I can with the sharpest knife I can find. I will strangle you. I will have my friend squeeze you almost to the point of suffocation all over with thorn vines, hit you with dozens of fireballs, stab you through with dozens of icicles, and we will both carve the word ‘JERK’ onto every inch of your body that we can before we disintegrate you.”

- “Oh hey. Buttface on the scene.”

- “I just feel like making a note that I kind of entirely unprompted pictured him setting a hand on Martin's cheek at the start of that line okay I just felt like maybe that needs to be said gjkhsdifjdaif”

- “I'M. SCREAMING. INTERNALLY. SO MUCH.”

- “Maaaaaan it is good to be back on this even if everything is pain sdjfsdgjslgj”

- “i just heard a faint high-pitched background scream”

- “Anonymous and yet known? You mean, like all of us on the internet, all day, every day?”

- “OH MY GOD IT'S HAPPENING IT'S HAPPENING EVERYCREATURE STAY CALM JSHGJLFSHGJLFSG”

- “THAT WAS AS TERRIFYING AS IT WAS ABSOLUTELY FREAKING AWESOME.”

- “Also, what this is talking about right now with time losing all meaning and sleep being ‘only a memory’ is kind of a quarantine mood tbh ldsjglkfsjg”

- “Shut the HECK up you smarmy eight-legged monkeyflipper”

- “he's literally the surprised pikachu face right now XD XD XD XD XD”

- “Bruh if the book's an inch and a half thick I don't think it can be called a BRIEF history of anything mldsjgl”

- “jfsklgjfslkgj this weirdly has the same energy as like having to go to the bathroom at the most inconvenient time kdsjk i don't know why XD XD XD”

- “Dang, there really do be a lot of capitalism metaphors in this podcast huh?”

- “So you admit it that you ARE in fact adorable then? =~}”

- “These angels be sounding a little sus tbh”

- “HECKIN' HECKITY HECK”

- “XD XD XD I love how their reactions every time she shows up are just like ‘*sigh* Oh, great, it's her again. 😑’"

- “I'm back. WELL. Time for things to get even MORE djgklfhsglksfhgslhgfsihnsdhilsdhilgjs”

- “Oop. Well, horror-vomiting time.”

- “This one hurts. This one hurts so much oh my god.”

- “AIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! GIRLFRIENDS ON THE SCENE”

- “......Does she think they're doing anything besides private contemplation?”

- “Oh, no worries about that, Jon killed her! 😁”

- “Oh god. Oh god. Oh god. Oh my FREAKING god. Holy FRICK-- *vomits*”

- “Honestly kind of wanting to punch Jon right now. In a ‘get ahold of yourself, we love you but you're being an idiot’ way. But like. Still as hard as I possibly can.”

- “THIS IS SO FREAKING META MY BRAIN'S GOING TO EXPLODE AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH JDFSKLHLIASGBLIWRAUGBARIOGBSDAOI;GBADSOI;GBRIO;GHASDOIUGJADSGIKERABGOIERABGOIAWR;BG;OASIDBGI;ADSOHGNFDAS;OIGHAS;OIGDSABOIFSDABGFASDOI;BGWIOSGLHNAREOIG;BRSOIGBSDAOIFBSDOIFSDBAGIOSDABOIFRAHSOFIUWEAGOIRSAGBSODIAGHSDIOGSAHOIGRAJ;GIARJFEILHSEFILAWBGBLAWOGIAWR;BGIOWRAJGNHOI;TESJHGAEROISDHRE”

- “I'm not losing my mind. My brain hasn't been shattered. Your brain's been shattered! Who's brain's been shattered? What's a brain? What's anything? *more deranged high-pitched laughter*”

- “Alexa play Jump Then Fall (Taylor's Version)”

- “Ha ha haaaa, the ‘was that a joke’ is contagious 🤣🤣🤣🤣😂😂😂😂💖”

- “..........Dream. Y. Yeah. Dream.”

- ”F. F-F-F-F. F R I C K . . . ”

- ”*SCREAMS LOUDER THAN SHOULD BE PHYSICALLY POSSIBLE FOR AN UNDISCLOSED PERIOD OF TIME*”

- “DO IT THOUGH THIS IS GONNA BREAK ME BUT DO IT *SCREAMS AND CRIES* “

- “DISCORD TOLD ME I WAS SENDING MESSAGES TOO FAST AGAIN WHAT THE FRICK”

- “I HAVE SO MANY QUESTIONS”

- “  *sits here on the floor staring frozen into space with eyes and mouth as wide as humanly possible* *stays like that for an inconceivably long amount of time* “

[the-dream-pawners-canvas]

[ Genshin Impact Imagines ]

Imagine #1 : Of Bargains and Contracts - That which is the most precious shade of gold

Vago Mundo - Zhongli

Imagine having doubts about the fairness of your contract with Zhongli.

After a long day of adventuring for one of Zhongli's rare botanical requests (that ofc, you obtained through your own expenses as per your contract- you felt robbed due to that, truly you did, in which universe was it fair to make the adventurer pay for expenses spent on obtaining your requests? However, you do not find yourself complaining -at least not directly to the person involved- any time soon. Not when he so easily smiles so handsomely -so happily- whenever you provide him with what he requested).

His smiles are going to run me dry of mora, I just know it, you tell yourself. One of these days it would and when you'd need to have a weapon refined but is too damned broke for it -or worse, go starving in the midst of one of your many journeys, Paimon would have your ass for it.

Maybe, just maybe, all of those supposed adventurers that Zhongli had once mentioned in one of his more factual tales to have often decided on staying in Liyue was because of him. Maybe he flashed a great many of them his polished smile and gentlemanly attitude and had just gotten them reeled in- hook, line, and sinker.

Putting it that way, he doesn't sound any more than a con-man, Paimon had blatantly stated so the other day,

'A well-mannered one but a con nevertheless! Who even forgets to bring their wallet nowadays, huh, (Y/N)? Think about it!'

And a part of you do consider it, do boil with the thought. That perhaps you were just being used, that maybe The Mysterious Guest of Wangshu Inn was no more than a conniving, sly, inconveniently comely-

To your surprise, you reach your destination, your thoughts quite a distracting orchestra dedicated to the funeral director. Thoughts that made you steel your nerves as you glared at the polished wooden doors that served as an entrance to Zhongli's study, your mind made up to hand a piece of it to the man who resided just beyond.

'Zhongli, I feel as if the contract we have is rather unfair. You cannot honestly expect me to continue on with this without going broke. We need to make amends to make this transactional relationship work. Paimon is already being a pain since they needed to cut off on food, I do not want to imagine how Kaeya would react once he learns that these commissions from you is funded by our joint expenses and with no reimbursement whatsoever.'

Okay, that sounds good, you think. Civil, proper and not watering down the gravity your true monetary concerns. He'd understand, you hope and place your bets on the proper man that you believe him to be. The concept of mora may just be entirely insignificant to him, only too inconveniently that he forgets he'd need those to make purchases and obtain basic necessities in between his more luxurious wants, which you find ironic.

Taking in a deep breath, you turn the knob of the door and pry it open only to be met by a sight that had might as well called dibs on your future funds down to the last mora.

There stood Zhongli, tall and elegant as always but with far lesser clothes than what he usually has on himself. His coat was nowhere to be seen and instead all there was is his cream undershirt and well-tailored trousers- too damned tight, shirt folded to his elbows, untucked, unbuttoned and deshriveled as his tie was. The longer strands of his luscious locks were out of their usual ponytail and instead pooled about his shoulders and down past his waist.

The backs of his thighs were flush against his mahogany office desk as he leaned back on it, body turned away from you as he concentrated on the energy that was quite literally pulsating as it hovered above the palm of his gloved hand.

The very object that casted such a rich and ethereal golden glow inside the darkened room, painting shadows and lights upon his already sculpted face as if oil on pristine canvas. It was a collection of the palettes that defined Liyue- the dawnbreaks mirrored by cor lapis that littered the ground and the sunsets and high noons radiated by the cryptic shrines and towers that stood as mighty pillars and age-old sentries over the entire island.

On his hand, and with eyes that glimmered with utmost concentration, Zhongli holds a manifesting geoculus-

-traces of the geo archon, the memories and legacy of Rex Lapis.

The implication of it all coaxed a sharp breath out of you and it was this that had snapped the man out of his trance-like preoccupation. He turns towards your general vicinity and his amber eyes widens in surprise for a fraction of a second, the entirety of him taking in the appearance of a deer that had just been caught underneath a street light,

"Ah! Traveler, you arrived far sooner than I had expected!" the distinct light rumble of an uncertain laugh colored his words, his elegant brows furrowing ever so slightly at the astounded look that seemed to have taken an enduring residence on your face before a dawning realization occurred to him- the geoculus he held on his hands.

In flagrante delicto.

"Far sooner, indeed." he chuckles, a fond look swimming in his eyes, a look that heated them into molten gold, gold that traveled unto your throat and spread through your chest like rare colored crystalflies, "It seems that the cat is finally out of the bag," he pushes himself off the table after dismissing the completed geoculus with a wave of his hand and takes languid -albeit, almost coy- steps towards you, those amber gems of his relentless on their search for the placement of your emotions regarding the matter at hand, "Tell me, dear traveler, what do you make of it?" his voice was deep, too deep, as if all intentions were drawn from wanting to drown you in every syllable that left his enticingly thin lips.

You gulp, your limbs suddenly at war as to whether it may find solace in seeking purchase on the ground or in running, "Y-you're... You're the geo archon." you stammered as you looked up at the man who now stood but a mere respectable distance in front of you. It was now you who quaked in front of him instead of the ground or a foe as would always whenever he would display his skill in battle or as portrayed in tales whenever a god would make itself known to mortals. Zhongli had no direct hand on your reaction however, it is the least of his intentions as he willed his presence to remain as it had been before- steady and strong, perhaps a bit intimidating but only to those who did wrong and with an enduring grace reminiscent of willow trees.

He hums in thought and bestows upon you a tender shake of the head, "I was meaning to ask about the feasibility of such unorthodox compensation for your troubles," he asks with the faintest hint of qualms.

You stood there in disbelief.

It just occurred to you then that on the course of your little commissions for him, with every flower he asked you to pick from the most perilous peaks there had always been a geoculus time and again- always a mere reach from where you ought to be, always without fail- a piece of his soul, an essence of Liyue, his memories, his very being and he asks you this as if they were worth so little.

You were getting more than you bargained for and here Zhongli was doing as you had done before- not for himself but on your behalf.

"I- your- a geoculus, an oculus, it's a region's very essence, did I get that right?" You ask even though you know that is the gist of it and a nod from Zhongli provides a seal of confirmation. Venti took the time to explain it to you and then some during one of his once-in-a-blue-moon somber days (when he had one too many drinks, and was in an oddly reminiscent mood), "Venti, he also said an oculus is thus a collection of the reigning archon's memories and a part of the whole that makes them. Is that also true?"

Delight brightens up his already pleasant lips, "I see you are well educated, traveler. Perhaps the bard is not as less as his drinking habits tend to make of him."

"Then why must you still ask me if it is worth my troubles? Of course it would be!" you suddenly find yourself indignant much to Zhongli's surprise, "You'd think such a significant part of you is worth so little, you'd have a heartattack once you skirt beyond the high walls blocking your emotional awareness and see just how many people are throwing themselves on your path just for a chance to pick at the crumbs underneath the soles of your boots!"

And then Zhongli's lips part, eyes glittering and pale cheeks paying homage to budding roses and he just stays like that for a couple of seconds and you realize that you may have run your mouth far too much.

You suddenly want to throw yourself off of one of Liyue's many gorges, good luck to anyone who might want to bother with finding your corpse.

Kaeya might just find that oddly amusing, Paimon not much so.

Zhongli clears his throat and holds his hands behind his back, an eyebrow raised in benevolent scrutiny, "Perhaps the bard may have taught you more than I initially expected. That, or you are -quite unexpectedly- a naturally smooth fellow who knows your way with words, traveler."

"Did you just call me a smooth-talker?" you don't know just where exactly this conversation would be leading you both but he's now making his way back to his desk with a sort of almost imperceptible perk on his steps and sway on his hips and you're now certain that you are compensated well above the usual pay grade by this suddenly too evasive, too temptingly slinky geo archon.

"Perhaps," Zhongli chuckles in amusement at your obvious verbal efforts to pin him back, "A flatterer indeed."

So here's a little fanart I did of our broke Geo daddei/archon, Zhongli! Along with a little imagine to spice things up!

I can't emphasize enough the amount of time, energy, positivity and irl mora this event had sucked out of me and I'm still yet to get him. I know my luck sucks at the highest possible level so would y'all be a jolly lot by helping this wee simp out of her depressed gacha dug hell hole and re-blog for a chance to have this penniless connoisseur come home to me pls

I'm desperate, truly.

Art, Imagine © Yours Truly (pls do credit me when you do re-blog or redistribute, otherwise don't bother)

Zhongli, Genshin Impact © miHoYo