#it's not like i don't know what it's like to grow from old behaviors that were shitty

[threshrshark]

"i'm mentally ill and nd so i can't change my toxic traits" is such a fucking joke man. what the fuck is wrong with people. it translates to "i don't want to hold myself accountable for my actions or bear responsibility for hurting others" in like....every scenario.

you'd think these ppl would be like "damn this keeps happening maybe i should reexamine how i treat others" but instead it's "well i have [x] so you HAVE to be EXTRA PATIENT with me" which always actually means "do not hold me accountable i will get upset/mad at you"

[why-animals-do-the-thing]

I promised you some lions! Let's talk about manes, males, and management.

This is Tandie, the current male lion at the Woodland Park Zoo.

Notice anything odd about him? He's got one of those hilarious awkward teenager manes. Except... this cat is nine years old.

I was, of course, immediately curious.

Manes serve a lot of purposes for male lions, including being an indicator of health and fitness - it's actually a sexually selected trait and a social signal. Mane texture / hair quality / length is dependent on nutrition and the body having energy to grow (and carry around!) that much hair! The color is also a signal: males with darker manes have been found to have higher testosterone levels.

In one research report, wild males were much more likely to avoid a lion decoy when it had a longer or darker mane - but the girls really loved a dark mane. It's thought this is because a long, dark mane is an indicator of mate quality. Males with longer, darker manes have higher testosterone and were pretty healthy: meaning they had more energy for fighting, had a better chance of recovering if they got injured, and generally had a higher rate of offspring survival. Manes matter!

So, back to Tandie. He was actually born at the Woodland Park Zoo in 2014 alongside two brothers, to dad Xerxes and mother Adia.

This was Xerxes (rip).

Obviously, a very large, dark, lush mane on Xerxes here. So where did these blond muttonchops come from on his son?

I asked the zoo docents and got an answer that didn't make a lot of sense. They told me that after the three cubs grew into adolescents, they were moved to the Oakland Zoo together. But living together suppressed his testosterone, and he never grew a mane.

Hmmmm.

Here's a photo from 2016, when the brothers debuted at Oakland. They're a year and a half old in this photo.

(Photo Credit: Oakland Zoo)

And here's from an announcement for their third birthday.

(Photo credit: Oakland Zoo)

Okay, so these dudes obviously all were growing manes as of 2017. I think Tandie is the one on the left in the first photo, and laying down in the middle on the second. What happened?

I was just in the Bay Area for a zoo road trip, of course I went to Oakland and tracked down a docent to ask some questions.

It turns out that shortly after the brothers turned three, they started acting like adult male lions: they started scuffling regularly. It's a normal social thing for male lions to live in groups, called coalitions, but according to my lion experts there's generally a baseline level of some social jostling within them. It wasn't quite clear from what the docent said if they couldn't manage the boys together, or if they just wanted to avoid the scratches and small wounds that result from normal lion behavior. Regardless, they put all three of the boys on testosterone blockers in order to be able to keep them together as a social group.

Now, I don't know a lot about the use of hormone alteration as a form of captive animal management, except in the case of birth control. I don't think it's something that's unethical - there was just a webinar on it that I saw go by - but I don't think it's commonly done with big cats. Lions have kind of complicated reproductive cycles, and for instance, we've been learning that female lions can take much longer to come into estrus again than expected after coming off hormonal birth control.

In males, testosterone blockers (or being neutered) means they lose their manes. This is why a lot of rescues will do a vasectomy on their males instead of a neuter - it allows them to keep their mane and the social signals that accompany it.

Tandie returned home to Woodland Park Zoo after Xerxes passed in early 2022, and the docent told me all of the lions had been off their blockers "for while." I'd guess those things happened around the same time, since bringing the trio down to a duo at Oakland would reduce some of the social tensions.

Hormones are such interesting things, though. One of Tandie's brothers has a full mane again, and the other is still totally mane-less.

As for Tandie, his mane is growing back in, and it looks like he might rival his dad for length and coloration.

He started here, in February:

Yesterday:

What a difference four months (and maybe proximity to a girl) makes!

[kanansdume]

I like living in a middle ground where Anakin gets consequences that are a little more meaningful than "he has to live with the knowledge that he done fucked up" but don't go against the concept of the Jedi not going for harsh punishments. Because in the examples with Anakin and Ahsoka, their punishments match their crimes generally. Anakin's a little late to a meeting, it's not that big of a deal. Is it frustrating and irresponsible of him? Yes, but nobody's dead because of it, so the Jedi mostly just ignore it. Ahsoka disobeyed orders out of stubbornness and arrogance, which is a bigger deal and so she does actually have to do something as a result of that, but because she's still learning it's better to let her re-orient herself than to punish her. Ahsoka loses a lightsaber, the best thing to do is to help her find it.

But when you get to the point of Anakin committing whole ass genocides against the Jedi, desecrating their home, helping bring down the Republic, that's not something you can just overlook because at some point he decided that maybe those things weren't such nice things to do. Even if he does end up turning on Palpatine and helping bring down the Empire, it doesn't bring back the Jedi dead. It doesn't take the stench of death and darkness out of their home. It doesn't undo the fact that the Jedi are probably still not safe to just live their lives in the Republic. It doesn't undo the enslavement of the clones (and the crimes THEY have to live with that they aren't even responsible for but that they'll always have to remember as their own choice now ANYWAY). It doesn't undo the pain and misery inflicted upon the other citizens of the Empire. It doesn't undo the torture of the Inquisitors.

That's not something he can fix by spending a day in an Archives re-orienting himself. Nor do I think any of the Jedi would respond that way.

So the middle ground is that Anakin never gets to be a Jedi again because who the FUCK would trust him after that? Even if they forgive him, who would trust him around Jedi younglings again? Who would trust him with any knowledge of where they LIVED if they even have a central place where the Jedi can come together? The middle ground is that Anakin can work to rebuild his relationships with the people willing to give him those chances, but has to accept the relationships he has irrevocably LOST. The middle ground is people like Ahsoka and Obi-Wan being willing to help him find his way again and then walking away afterwards because they can't look at him the same way while they're still alive and their duty isn't TO HIM, it's to the Jedi who are still recovering from his atrocities and to the people of the galaxy who are ALSO still recovering from his atrocities. The middle ground is that Anakin doesn't get to get everything back, even if he is forgiven for the things he's done by the people most important to him.

Anakin gets to have a happy ending of sorts, he can probably get Padme and the twins back because, well, Padme is who she is, but he doesn't get EVERYTHING back. And it's not a punishment, it's just that he broke a shit load of trust and the Jedi are unwilling to make themselves that vulnerable to someone who's proven themselves so willing to hurt them a second time. They're in a place post Order 66 where they don't have the luxury of just letting Anakin back in and assuming they'll be safe. They don't have the luxury of being able to focus on rehabilitating Anakin into a Jedi lifestyle. They HAVE to prioritize themselves because there's so few of them left in a galaxy so extremely dangerous to them now. Anakin's a liability.

And Anakin should have to accept that. Accept that forgiveness doesn't mean everything goes back to the way it was, that his actions will have serious consequences that change things for him. That he's caused a lot of loss and people aren't going to be able to trust him EVER AGAIN. That even if they love him still, he's still going to represent pain and betrayal to the people he cares about more than anything else and it's too difficult to be near him anymore. Anakin should have to figure out how to LET THEM GO for their sake, even if it means he loses them forever.

The whole point of Ahsoka going to the Archives was to learn patience, to re-center herself so that she can understand how she fucked up and not do it again. She's learning a lesson in there, same as she is with Tera Sinube. Anakin's consequences should ALSO force him to learn better, should force him to re-evaluate things to the point that he finally, FINALLY, learns the lessons he should've learned years earlier. Let those consequences force him to learn how to LET THE FUCK GO for once in his entire life.

The choices don't have to exclusively be "he burns in lava" or "he gets back basically every relationship he had before this and gets to be a Jedi AND be married to Padme with kids as if nothing ever happened because living with his choices is painful enough." There's other options in the middle with serious consequences that would be very difficult for him to have to live with as befitting the seriousness of the choices he makes that still allow for a modicum of sympathy towards Anakin and an understanding of the Jedi's willingness to forgive and offer second chances. The options for what Anakin might have to suffer as a result of the awful choices he makes and the realistic reactions people may have to him for the rest of his life even if he changes his mind at some point are limitless.

Even though I love Star Wars and the whole main theme of hope and stuff, whenever I hear about how those close to Anakin would've accepted him back, even after everything he has done, rubs me the wrong way. Maybe I'm not getting the point of it, but to me it feels like when they offer Anakin to come back, to turn away, that there plan is to forget everything Anakin has done and just move on as if nothing ever happened. Like no consequences or anything. Like I said, I'm probably missing the point. But for some reason it feels wrong for him to run away with Padmé or Obi Wan and not face any consequences.

If that's the way you feel, then that's the way you feel! I'm not being sarcastic or throwing any shade about it, genuinely that your feelings on it are valid for you, because that's how stories and art works, that we each have our own reactions and I’m not about to try to talk you out of yours.�� Everyone works differently and no person is obligated to feel one way or another. But when it comes to the greater themes of Star Wars, there’s a Howard Kazanjian quote that touches on it: “I said to George, ‘Why? This guy [Vader]—he’s like Hitler. He’s killed. He’s done all of these terrible things and now we’re saying he’s equal with Yoda and Obi-Wan, as if he’s gone to heaven or whatever?’ George pointed to me, he was real close, and he says, 'Isn’t that what your religion is all about?' And, boy, that was like being slapped in the side of the face, because, yes, it is what my religion is all about, and obviously his, but I hadn’t thought it through.—Howard Kazanjian, producer of Return of the Jedi. It’s not specifically about any one religion (especially as the Jedi are Buddhists) but it’s a common theme in many religions (for memory, Buddhism teaches that forgiveness is an end to suffering, which is an important theme with Anakin imo) and it’s not about letting someone get away with something or that there are no consequences, but it’s about not clinging to the past, it’s about not holding onto the anger and hurt because they make you suffer just as much, it’s about how the Jedi don’t strive to punish people, but instead to help them onto better paths. An important distinction to keep in mind here is that consequences and punishment are not the same thing.  Consequences can be “Anakin has to live with the knowledge of what he’s done.”  Consequences can be “Obi-Wan/Padme/Ahsoka can never again look at him and not see the trust he broke, even if he earns it back, even if they will love him through it.”  Consequences can be “They can never have the life they once had ever again.” Punishment is making Anakin suffer for what he’s done, punishment can be a form of consequences, there’s a lot of overlap, but that it’s important to note the two aren’t mutually exclusive and the Jedi have always leaned hard away from punishment that makes people suffer.  (Look at TCW, Anakin does stupid shit all the time and they never punish him, look at Ahsoka messing up and her punishment is working in the Archives, something that’s not meant to make her suffer, just to help her re-orient herself.) In death, Anakin’s last moments were ones of genuine selflessness, that (as Lucas explicitly says) he didn’t care about what happened to himself, he just wanted to save his son, regardless of what that meant for himself, whether he would live or die, whether he would force Luke into what Anakin wanted for him.  That moment isn’t about saying, “Well, then all the other stuff he did no longer matters.”, it’s not about saying that they’re equal, but instead saying that forgiveness is about letting go (one of the core themes of Star Wars), that the Jedi would rather help someone back to the light than to punish them in the dark. When the Force Ghosts offer Anakin the way to preserve himself in the Force, that’s what it’s about, that Anakin turned back to the light and they wanted to help that, they’ve always been about forgiveness and second chances.  To turn Anakin away after a sincere moment of selflessness and desire to turn back to a better path, that’s just not who they are. Now, when I talk about how Obi-Wan or Padme or Ahsoka would have accepted him back while they were alive, that can take on different shades of motivation, to my mind.  The above all still holds true, the Jedi repeatedly offered second chances when they could, but I think it’s also that those characters specifically loved Anakin so much that they would have taken him back even when it was maybe unfair.  Jedi aren’t perfect people, they have their own biases, they have the people they’re closest to, the ones that they would do more for, would pour more of themselves into than others, because that’s how people everywhere work.  And they loved Anakin Skywalker so much that they would forgive the terrible things he did because he’s burrowed his way into their hearts. We never really see what that taking back looks like, whether they were alive or dead when it was offered.  Anakin refuses to turn back for Padme, for Obi-Wan, for Ahsoka.  We don’t know what kind of consequences he would have faced afterwards, but I have a hard time believing that there would have been no consequences.  But the two aren’t mutually exclusive--being willing to accept someone again doesn’t mean you have to sweep everything to the side and pretend it never happened.  (Though, I think it’s fun to play in messy areas of how much would each of them be willing to look past, because they personally don’t want to lose him again, even if it’s not a moral or ethical thing to do?  If Anakin ran away with any of them and avoided punishment, I personally would see that as kind of a deliciously fucked up scenario that’s about how attached they are to him, how they’re willing to let others’ suffering stand because they can’t bear to live without him.  That’s one vein in which I write meta about Obi-Wan or Padme or Ahsoka accepting him back.)(Primarily, though, I’m of the opinion that there would be consequences, just that they wouldn’t be punishment-focused consequences.) When Anakin becomes a Force Ghost, we don’t see what that process is like or if there are consequences of it, we don’t know what his journey is like after that, only that Obi-Wan and Yoda were willing to accept him again and help him preserve himself in the Force. For me, I’m willing to roll with no consequences for Anakin if it means I’m getting other things I like, like I want my baby to be happy, I want shippy fic, I want Jedi reunion fic, etc.  But I do prefer consequences for him--not punishment, but consequences, like what he did is probably never going to be forgotten, they’re forever going to look at him and remember what he did, that he murdered children, that he helped enact genocide on the galaxy, that he helped enslave and torture billions of people.  Forgiveness =/= forgetting. But ultimately I think the Jedi are focused on healing and harm reduction, rather than heaping more punishment onto someone.  Punishing Anakin further wouldn’t gain them anything, they get nothing out of holding onto that anger at him, instead it actively hurts them just as much as it hurts Anakin, because that’s the whole way the Force works, that holding onto anger and hurt = the dark side. They don’t forget, but they do forgive, because that’s the way to end everyone’s suffering.  You don’t necessarily have to agree with that worldview, it’s perfectly fine not to!  Lots of people don’t, it’s normal.  But it’s how these characters view the world in general and Anakin Skywalker in particular, it’s the theme that Lucas wanted for Star Wars.

[pin-k-ink]

UNDER ONE ROOF ⋆✦⋆ kuroo tetsurou

synopsis ➸ kuroo didn’t know what he was agreeing to when he said yes to watching over you for two weeks. now, with you constantly coming onto him, he’s quickly realizing how hard it is to say no—and how much he doesn’t want to.

tags ➸ dílf!kuroo, huge age gap (20s + 40s), unhèalthy relationship dynamics, manipùlation, reader is a huge brat and she will get on your nerves, brat tamer!kuroo, mastúrbation (m & f), jealousy, possèssive behavior, dírty talking, gròping, heavy pétting, manhándling, mention of an injúry, degradàtion, slút-shàming, dry hùmping, unprotected séx, marathon séx, face fućking, bloŵjob, squírting, beggíng

wc ➸ 20.6k (i’m so sorry 💀)

"Dad, I'll be fine. You're overreacting as usual." You struggled to keep the exasperation out of your tone as Kenma pulled up to Kuroo's apartment complex.

Kenma killed the engine but kept a white-knuckled grip on the steering wheel. "I'm not overreacting. I'm being realistic based on your...track record." His jaw clenched minutely before continuing. "Just promise me you'll exercise some semblance of self-control this time?"

You pursed your lips, refraining from an outright eye roll. "It wasn't that big of a deal, okay? A few too many people at my place, that's all."

The flat, unamused look Kenma leveled your way made you shrink back slightly. "Neighbors had to call the police to break up your 'few too many people,' and I had to bail you out after they found you...indecently exposed with two random guys. Again."

Heat crept up the back of your neck at the reminder. In your defense, you'd been severely intoxicated and those two strangers had been very persuasive...and enthusiastic. Not that your father wanted to hear any of the details, based on the muscle ticking in his jaw.

"Look, that's why I'm leaving you with Kuroo this time," he pressed on, voice taking on that no-nonsense edge. "He'll keep you in line until I get back from this business trip. No promiscuous behavior, no binge drinking, nothing that could jeopardize your future."

Your fists clenched at the insinuation you were just some reckless, irresponsible child who needed constant supervision. Yes, maybe you enjoyed letting loose a bit more than most well-behaved college students. But you were an adult, damn it! Perfectly capable of looking after yourself without strict babysitting.

Before you could unleash the sharp retort burning on your tongue, there was a rap on the window. Kuroo's laidback grin appeared in the glass as he waggled his fingers in greeting.

"Ah, right on time! Was starting to worry you two had bailed on me," he chuckled, eyes crinkling in that easygoing way you'd always adored.

You seized the opportunity to exit the car before further lecturing could commence. Kuroo pulled you into one of his trademark bear hugs once you were vertical, squeezing with affectionate zeal.

"Took you long enough to get here, troublemaker," he murmured fondly into your hair. "Was starting to think I'd have to stay bored and lonely without my best girl around."

A pleasant shiver danced along your nape at the husky timbre of his voice so close to your ear. Kuroo had always been an indulgent, affectionate presence in your life - a welcome counterbalance to Kenma's frequently stern parenting. Growing up, you'd often admired the easy charisma and confidence your father’s best friend exuded. Part of you wondered, in a distant, abstract way, what it might be like to bask in that roguish charm aimed at you directly...

You quickly banished the stray thought, burying your face into Kuroo's solid chest instead as his arms tightened further. "Don't be so clingy, old man. I'll only be here for a couple weeks."

Behind you, the driver's side door creaked open, signaling Kenma's arrival. Kuroo tossed your father a grin over your head, not loosening his hold on you in the slightest.

"Ah, there's the doting dad now! C'mon, we can continue the lecture inside over some beers." His eyes danced with undisguised amusement as Kenma bristled slightly at the jab.

"Very funny, Kuroo," Kenma muttered, mouth set in a flat line. "But I do need to lay down some ground rules if she's staying with you for a while."

You extricated yourself from Kuroo's snug embrace, stepping back and crossing your arms over your chest defiantly as Kenma stepped closer. The tension between the two best friends thrummed familiarly - Kuroo radiating easy humor while Kenma maintained stern disapproval.

Your dad took a steadying breath before fixing you with a level stare. "I'm serious about this. You are not to throw any parties, end up in compromising positions with strangers, or make any unilateral decisions that could derail your education-"

"Oh my god, Dad!" The whine escaped before you could stop it. "I'm an adult, not a misbehaving toddler! When are you going to start treating me that way?"

Kenma opened his mouth, eyes flashing dangerously, but Kuroo quickly moved to insert himself between you both. His hands landed on your shoulders, calm yet firm, pulling your heated focus to him.

"Now now, you two, let's not jump straight into argument mode so soon. We'll have plenty of time to bicker later." He shot you a wink before shifting his gaze to Kenma. "I've got this under control. I know exactly how to keep our little hellraiser in line without killing her spirit."

Kenma stared at his friend, a thousand unspoken retorts flickering behind his eyes. You could practically see his inner monologue debating whether he could truly trust the two of you alone together for an extended period. At last, a weary sigh slipped past his lips.

"Fine, I'm putting my faith in you, Kuroo. For now." He leveled you with one final, intense stare that made you want to squirm. "But any misbehavior at all and I'm sending in reinforcements, understood?"

Whether he meant to hire an actual bodyguard or simply sick your mother on you, the threat was painfully clear. You nodded tersely, holding Kenma's gaze and refusing to be the first to look away. A battle of wills you were determined not to lose, if only to prove how much of an "adult" you were.

At last, Kuroo chuckled and slung a companionable arm around your shoulders, breaking the weighted tension between you and your father. "See? All settled! Now how about you head out and let me get my quality niece-uncle bonding time in before she gets sick of me?"

Though the sarcastic jibe brought a faint smirk to Kenma's lips, you could tell his dubious hesitation lingered. Nevertheless, your father stepped forward to enfold you in a tight hug, one you returned fiercely despite your earlier exasperation.

Kenma pulled away first, squeezing your shoulder and studying your features carefully. "Stay out of trouble. Please? For me?"

You mustered up your most reassuring smile, leaning in to peck his cheek lightly. "I'll be a perfect angel, Daddy. I promise."

The obvious lie should have rankled more than it did. But Kenma simply sighed and shook his head in resignation, adjusting his grasp on his travel bag as he prepared to depart.

"I'll hold you to that. Behave for Kuroo and...and I'll see what souvenir I can find for you in Italy..."

His muttered bribe brought an inadvertent grin to your lips as Kuroo ushered you back toward the apartment with a theatrical bow and exaggerated flourish of his free arm.

"And so the bonding festivities commence! C'mon troublemaker, prepare for the best girls' staycation your hot single uncle can provide!"

Kuroo's playful declaration had you rolling your eyes so hard they threatened to relocate. "Hot single uncle? Seriously? That's just creepy on so many levels."

He shrugged unapologetically, steering you through the lobby with his arm still slung around your shoulders. "What? I'm hot, I'm single, and while not technically related by blood, I'm about as close to an uncle as you've got."

You pulled a face of exaggerated disgust. "Please don't ever call yourself my uncle again. That's like...an instant boner-killer."

Kuroo's barking laughter echoed through the small space, and you grinned despite yourself. There was something innately infectious about his easy charm and rapscallion energy. "Wow, damn! Way to just completely obliterate any sense of family-friendly bonding, kiddo."

"Don't call me kiddo either," you retorted as the elevator doors slid open with a chime. "I'll be twenty-two next month, remember? Not exactly a child anymore."

You could feel the heat of Kuroo's assessing stare sliding over you, just on the periphery of your vision. The casual rake of it made you sit up fractionally straighter, all too aware of how your low-cut shirt gapped to reveal hints of cleavage from this angle.

"Oh trust me, I'm well aware you're not a kid anymore," he murmured, the undercurrent to his tone giving you pause.

But when you glanced over at him, Kuroo's expression was as impassively playful as ever. Not a single lascivious hitch to indicate he might have been venturing into more suggestive waters...which, of course, was precisely where your own thoughts had begun meandering unbidden.

The elevator dinged your arrival at Kuroo's floor, and he ushered you out ahead of him with a hand pressing warmth to the small of your back. The hallway blurred past in a vague tableau of drab carpeting and nondescript doors until he was guiding you into the first one off the small entry corridor.

You turned in a slow circle as Kuroo flipped on the lights, taking in the surprisingly spacious guest suite. Abstract art prints lined the walls, lending a vibrant splash of color amidst the black furniture and modern fixtures.

"Not too shabby," you remarked, lifting an impressed brow Kuroo's way. "Not what I pictured at all for a washed-up old man with no wife or life."

Kuroo scoffed in faux-offense, tossing the small duffel of clothes Kenma had packed for you onto the plush queen bed. "First off, I'm only fourty-six, brat. Second, I'll have you know this place is basically an Adonis' palace where all the finest honeys flock."

You quirked a dubious eyebrow, gaze deliberately sweeping over the space with exaggerated appraisal. "Right, 'cause I can totally see you whipping out those cheesy lines while trying to seduce some poor girl back here."

Before you could evade, Kuroo closed the distance and yanked you flush against his chest in a grip far more sensual than the earlier hug. You inhaled sharply at the sudden intimate proximity, meeting his intense stare from beneath your lashes. Kuroo smelled of sandalwood and peppery musk, a scent that was bafflingly more intoxicating than you'd ever noticed.

"Who says I'd need lines other than the truth?" He murmured, voice pitched low enough to ghost tingles down your nape. "Why go for cheesy when 'I want you' works just as well in the right tone?"

Your mouth felt abruptly parched, throat clicking in a tight swallow you couldn't quite stifle. The steady thrum of Kuroo's heart against your own fluttering pulse made you hyperconsciously aware of the lack of space between your bodies. The hard wall of his chest, the sinuous strength of his arms bracketing you against him, the faint tickle of his breath against your brow...

You rallied yourself with visible effort, putting on a show of extracting yourself from his arms and rolling your eyes in dismissal. "Wow, Kuroo, can't take you anywhere without the bachelor desperation vibes taking over," you chided with an airy laugh. "Good thing any girl with half a brain knows your bark is way worse than that impotent bite of yours."

Kuroo snorted, clearly unfazed by the brush-off. "Ouch, that hurts coming from my favorite companion." He hooked a thumb over his shoulder toward the hallway. "C'mon, I'll give you the full penthouse tour while the slander is fresh."

As you followed him out, you couldn't resist one final flustered jab. "Please, do not refer to me as your 'companion' ever again. I don't need those gross old-man vibes getting all over me."

But even as the teasing counters continued flowing freely between you, brimming with practiced ease and playful brio, a newfound undercurrent seemed to lace each exchange. There was a thrilling energy now, veins of irresistible temptation and tension brimming just beneath the surface.

You found your gaze continually straying to trace the lines of Kuroo's body in ways it never had before. Mapping the shift of firm muscle and masculine definition barely concealed beneath his fitted t-shirt. Fixating on the sharp hollow of his throat each time he tilted his head back in unrestrained laughter. Drinking in the ruggedly handsome contours of his face as if seeing them for the very first time through the lens of burgeoning desire rather than familial fondness.

And from the heated glances you continually intercepted raking over your own frame, Kuroo seemed equally as preoccupied with thoroughly appreciating the woman you'd matured into, absently licking his lips whenever you turned away. Almost as if he too were acutely, viscerally aware of the new precedents being set between you.

Still, when you wandered back to flop gracelessly onto your temporary bed with a contented sigh, Kuroo knew better than to allow things to escalate too precipitously. One broad palm landed atop your head, smoothing your tumbled hair back from your forehead with an endearment more akin to an indulgent older brother than anything else.

You shot him a sly look from beneath your lashes, immediately recognizing this for what it was - Kuroo's subtle attempt to steer you both back into familiar, innocuous territory before the simmering undercurrents got away from you.

Well, two could play at that game.

With a put-upon huff, you rolled onto your back, deliberately arching your spine in an indolent stretch that made your shirt ride up to bare a sliver of toned midriff. You caught the telltale stutter in Kuroo's breathing, the way his heated stare latched onto the newly exposed stretch of skin like a magnet.

Slowly, methodically, you trailed your fingertips along the taut vee of muscles just visible beneath the hem of your top. Your tongue darted out to wet your lips in a show of exaggerated absentmindedness as you continued trailing indolent circles around your navel.

"Mmm, you know..." you murmured, letting your voice drop into a lower, sultrily purring register that had Kuroo's undivided attention snapping back to your face. "I could use a little...stress relief after Dad's interrogation out there."

You punctuated the blatant invitation with another tantalizing arch of your spine, pushing your breasts higher and straining against the thin fabric. A calculated glance slanted his way revealed Kuroo swallowing hard, looking distinctly like a man warring with his baser instincts.

"I'm sure we could find a fun way for us both to unwind after he put me through the wringer," you pressed, tracing patterns lower, dangerously closer to the button of your too-tight shorts. "Work off all that...heated tension before you call me out for dinner?"

Kuroo's nostrils flared as his jaw went rigid, and for a breathless heartbeat, you were certain he would finally succumb. That the carnal need simmering behind those sharp hazel eyes would win out over restraint and detonate between your tangled forms here and now. Your blood thrummed with peaky arousal, entire body liquid heat and tightly-coiled anticipation.

But then Kuroo expelled a low, rueful chuckle and the spell was broken. He raked one broad palm through the artful disarray of his hair, regarding you with an undeniable glint of dark amusement that only fuelled your petulance.

"Nice try, kiddo," he husked, the low timbre sending unwanted tingles rocketing through you. "But you're gonna have to work harder to unravel me with those moves. Not my first time fending off your wiles, remember?"

Your lips twisted in a pout you knew full well drew his gaze inexorably. "Maybe I don't want to just fend you off," you retorted, hoping the petulant whine in your tone conveyed precisely how turned on you were feeling. "Maybe this time, getting you riled up is the entire point."

Kuroo's brows winged higher as his gaze openly raked over your splayed form once more. This time, his yearning appraisal brought tingles of wicked satisfaction rather than self-consciousness.

"Trust me, gorgeous," he managed at last, voice gone tellingly husky. "Part of me would love nothing more than showing you just how riled you've gotten me. But we both know how that story has to end – with your dad hunting me down and gelding me within an inch of my life."

Your mouth opened to formulate a retort - a scathing denial of your tame, saintly reputation that had Kenma forever playing over-protective warden. But Kuroo didn't give you the chance to voice it.

One broad, calloused palm cupped your cheek with surprising tenderness, the rough pads of his fingers trailing sparks against your suddenly oversensitized skin. You felt the air leave your lungs in a harsh exhalation, held paralyzed beneath the searing, unguarded intensity of Kuroo's molten stare.

"So as tempting as you look," he rasped in that low, wrecked timbre that shot liquid heat arrowing through your core, "I'm not about to jeopardize what we've got over one round of pent-up games, yeah?"

Something inside you clenched at the implicit reminder – no matter what sinfully delicious tension existed between you, Kuroo still saw himself as almost family at the end of the day. He would never actually cross that forbidden line, no matter how persistently you tempted and goaded.

The realization flooded you with an odd blend of yearning, frustration, and reluctant respect for his restraint. You opened your mouth to spit out whatever caustic retort might help preserve your carefully cultivated blasé front-

"Tell you what," Kuroo pressed on before you could marshal the words, his thumb tracing a searing path along the plump bow of your lower lip in a blatantly intimate caress. "You promise to stow that wicked mouth and insatiable appetites of yours for the rest of the evening? And I'll take you shopping tomorrow night, just the two of us."

Your breath hitched audibly as he leaned closer still, heated exhalation gusting against the sensitized whorls of your ear to send delicious tingles arrowing straight to your core.

"Show me you can be an honest-to-god good girl for once, and I'll give you a grand adventure worth staying out of trouble for..."

With that sinful promise dangling tantalizingly in the air, Kuroo pulled back, lips curved in that same roguish smirk yet now laced with the undisguised promise of rewards still to come. He regarded you through heavy-lidded bedroom eyes, blatantly awaiting your breathless capitulation or further, fruitless temptation.

Your chest heaved with sharp, ragged pants you couldn't quite stifle. With tremendous effort of will, you kept your rebuttals and wanton offers leashed, refusing to give him any further cause to refuse your attempts at seduction outright. Not when the carrot of some unknown indulgence dangled so enticingly above you.

Eventually, Kuroo seemed satisfied by your mute surrender. He dipped his chin, lips brushing your fevered brow in a shockingly tender brand of possession and benediction.

"Good girl," he murmured in a hoarse growl that had your core musculature fluttering anew. "Put this behind us for now, and I promise you'll get everything you've been craving later..."

With one final searing caress that felt burned into the curve of your flushed cheek long after he retreated, Kuroo turned and made his way out of the guest suite. Leaving you a hot, shaky mess of thwarted need and simmering what ifs that felt poised to burst into searing reality sooner rather than later – even if he wouldn't be so easily taken before then.

As Kuroo moved about the kitchen preparing dinner, his thoughts were utterly consumed by the simmering tension now charging the air between you and him. He couldn't tear his mind away from replaying your bold attempts at seduction earlier, or how painfully tempting you'd looked splayed out so wantonly on the guest bed.

His hands stilled on the cutting board, knife poised over half-chopped vegetables as Kuroo's gaze went hazy with recollection. The way your shirt had ridden up to tease at soft midriff and the teasing vee of your hips. The subtle roll of your spine as you arched into an indolent stretch - so calculated yet seemingly artless in its invitation. And that come-hither rasp of your voice dropping into unrepentant sin, offering searing delights Kuroo shouldn't even entertain indulging.

A harsh exhalation gusted past his lips as desire, so cruelly reawakened yet stubbornly restrained, gave a sullen throb low in his groin. Kuroo couldn't deny being utterly transfixed when you turned your wiles on him like that. Some deep, primal part of him yearned to surrender - to take you up on that scorching proposal and show you exactly how "riled" you'd gotten him all these years with the slow burn of your teasing.

In his mind's eye, Kuroo easily pictured stalking back over to crouch above your reclined form, pinning your wrists to the mattress on either side of your head. He'd drink in every molten inch of you spread wantonly before him, from the sheen of exertion and arousal glazing your skin to the impudent quirk of your lips as you challenged him to make good on unvoiced threats.

Kuroo could practically taste the erotic potential crackling between your barely parted forms. All it would take was one decisive roll of his hips to grind his cock against your cloth-dampened heat. You'd stifle a strangled sound of yearning, back arching greedily to chase that first forbidden frisson—

"Tetsurou?"

The sound of his given name on your lips jolted Kuroo violently from his spiraling fantasy. The knife slipped in his suddenly vice-like grip, knicking open his palm with a bright blossom of crimson. He hissed out a sharp curse, both at the stinging pain and the fact he'd been so utterly consumed by his hunger for you he hadn't registered your approach.

You tsked sympathetically from somewhere behind him now, sending tingles of visceral awareness skating down his nape. "Need me to kiss it better and make the owie go away?" You crooned in that soft, saccharine tone Kuroo knew damn well was more velvet sheath for venom than genuine innocence.

He whirled to face you, pulse jackrabbiting beneath his ribs when he found you perched on the counter directly beside the scene of his lapse in focus. One leg was folded up against your chest, the other swinging lazily off the edge - all purposefully indolent insouciance and inescapable awareness of the effect you had on him.

"How generous," Kuroo forced out in a roughened rumble, trying for glib detachment even as his gaze raked hungrily over the strip of thigh exposed beneath your tiny sleep shorts. "Pretty sure I've got some bandaids around here somewhere that'll work just as well, but thanks."

Rather than retreating, you merely smirked wider and leaned forward a fraction, putting your breasts on indecently tantalizing display in that threadbare tanktop. "Suit yourself. But I was hoping for an excuse to get on my knees and lavish some personal attention for once..."

The blatant invitation hung suspended between you in a haze of static charge and spiraling heat. Kuroo could feel his self-restraint fast eroding, each labored breath stoking the banked embers of temptation simmering hotter by the second. His mind raced frantically, scrambling for some witty deflection or hasty retreat—

Before he could succeed, your tongue slipped out to trace a maddeningly slow path over the plump swell of your lower lip. "You know I've been told I have exceptional mouth-to-mouth skills for this sort of...situation," you murmured, voice pitched low and rough enough to feel like a physical caress along his thundering pulse. "Seems a shame to let that talent go to waste any longer than necessary, hmm?"

Kuroo couldn't stop the low, graveled growl of undisguised yearning that tore free from somewhere primal and smoldering at your teasing insinuation. Nor could he tear his gaze away from the wanton paths your fingertips traced over the bare expanses of skin you'd so meticulously put on display. Stomach clenching with mingled arousal and heated frustration, he took a single step forward, fully intending to—

He cut himself off sharply, turning on his heel and stalking away from the temptation of your poised, feline sprawl with every ounce of restraint he could muster. You watched him flee with heavy-lidded awareness, lips curved in a victorious smirk that only stoked Kuroo's smoldering urgency further.

"I need a cold fucking shower," he tossed over his shoulder in a guttural rasp. "Don't wait up, gorgeous. I'll come collect you when I've regained some goddamn rationale around that mouth of yours..."

The last, damning word seemed to resonate in the weighted silence he left hanging in his wake. Kuroo tried desperately to focus on the promise of frigid spray rather than the tortuous vision of your plump lips wrapped so prettily around that very phrase - and what other searing delights they might bring to blissful fruition between your tangled forms.

Somehow, he had to regain control before the next few weeks of close proximity eroded the last of his resolve entirely. You deserved far better than falling to his weaknesses in such a desperate moment. And he deserved far sterner retribution than even Kenma could deliver should he ever give in to the temptation of tainting you so profanely...

Dinner passed in a tense spiral of heated glances and loaded silence. Despite your outward veneer of angelic politeness, Kuroo could see the glint of challenge smoldering behind every coy flutter of lashes directed his way.

You seemed utterly focused on dismantling his restraint inch by excruciating inch. From the way you lapped up every stray crumb or droplet of sauce from your full lips with maddening leisure, to the insistent press of your stocking-clad foot tracing sinuous paths along his calf beneath the table's cover. Each tiny gauntlet thrown down made Kuroo's blood rush hotter, stoking his arousal to increasingly painful intensity with every passing moment.

By the time you'd retired for the evening with a sultry murmur of "Sweet dreams, Tetsu," Kuroo could barely see straight past the relentless fog of yearning clouding his thoughts. His skin felt seared from your seemingly innocuous caresses and teasing touches, every nerve ending overwrought to the point of maddening hypersensitivity.

The second Kuroo's bedroom door thudded closed behind him, he was already shucking his clothes in a fevered whirlwind - buttons popping and fabric tearing as he frantically shed the barriers separating him from the relief he so desperately craved. Within moments he collapsed back onto his bed in only his boxers, hand shoved unceremoniously beneath the tented cotton to fist around his painfully hard cock.

A guttural groan of pure ecstasy gusted from Kuroo as he started shamelessly pumping himself with rough, frantic strokes. Visceral scenarios of bending your body over the dinner table and rucking up that little skirt you'd worn instantly unfurled behind his clenched eyelids. He could practically feel the tight, slick heat of your cunt gripping him to the hilt as he surged forward to stake his claim.

"Fuck...gonna feel so goddamn good wrapped around me," He hissed through gritted teeth, thrusts becoming more erratic as the sinful image of your head thrown back in rapture crystallized hotly. "Been driving me crazy...teasing little bitch...need to teach you a fucking lesson..."

Kuroo's free hand flew up to claw at the rigid plane of his abdomen, leaving behind bright ribbons of crimson as his pleasure barreled relentlessly onward. He imagined capturing those wicked lips between his teeth as punishment for every taunt and flagrant provocation you'd issued so seamlessly all evening. Driving himself to brutal, punishing depths over and over until you sobbed and keened and swore to stay good - at least for a little while.

Even picturing your pleas for mercy in that breathless, wrecked timbre you'd used earlier was enough to have Kuroo teetering wildly on the razor's edge. His balls drew up tighter as electric jolts of blinding bliss raced along his synapses with each twist of his calloused grip. Already he could taste the coppery tang of his own strained groans filling the bedroom, breath sawing harshly and release imminent—

A metallic jangle from the front entranceway had Kuroo's orgasm aborting before it could quite crest. His eyes flew open in the same instant he stilled, body strung taut as a bowstring as a cold tendril of realization slithered down his spine.

The midnight quiet echoed with hollow, careful pacing as if someone were sneaking tiptoeing movements. Then, the unmistakable vibration of the front door's locks being disengaged from the other side pulsed through the apartment in a searing staccato.

Kenma's parting warnings slammed back into Kuroo's lust-fogged brain with all the force of a sledgehammer: "Watch her closely. I wouldn't put it past her to slip out looking for trouble the second you blink..."

You. Sneaking out alone into the night to find some godforsaken revelry, no doubt. And despite his current state of painfully swollen and unsated dick, Kuroo felt the switch within him flip from hungered deviant back to protective guardian in a heartbeat.

With a growl of exertion half frenzied lust and half recalcitrant duty, he wrenched himself off the bed and stumbled to locate the first shred of clothing in reach as stealthy footsteps crept ever closer.

Kuroo's footsteps slowed to a prowling gait as he neared the living room, every muscle in his body tensing like a predator catching the scent of prey. There you stood at the front door, hand curved around the knob as if seconds from twisting it open and slipping outside.

But it was your appearance that stole Kuroo's breath and ignited molten need pulsing through his veins anew.

The scrap of crimson fabric you wore could barely even be considered a dress - more like a lingerie bodice sculpted to your lithe curves with indecent intimacy. It cupped the swell of your breasts, forcing them into a tantalizing plunge of cleavage before tapering off into a loose, flowing skirt portion that revealed teasing flashes of thigh and the lace garter adorning your upper leg each time you shifted.

Kuroo drank in the delectable tableau you presented with undisguised starvation, any lingering notion of rebuke or chastisement withering before the scorching promise of your provocatively clad form. You seemed to sense his hungry regard boring into you, shoulders going taut as you tilted your head slightly in acknowledgment.

"Going somewhere?" Kuroo finally grated out, throat parched and pulse jackrabbiting beneath his skin.

You didn't startle or try to fabricate some trite excuse. Instead, you pivoted to face him fully - the motion causing the wispy material to flutter around your body like scarlet flame, offering a split-second's teasing glimpse at the bare curve of your hip and abdomen beneath.

Kuroo barely suppressed a low, ravenous sound at the visceral temptation.

"Not going anywhere, Tetsu," you murmured in a voice like dark, velvety honey dripping straight into Kuroo's veins. "Just thought I'd slip into something more...comfortable while you were gone."

Your tongue darted out to trace a slow, meandering path over that full pout of your lower lip and Kuroo felt the final tethers of his restraint starting to splinter like overheated metal.

"Is that so?" He breathed out a fractured exhale, unconsciously prowling closer now despite his rapidly unraveling discipline. "And just who were you hoping might appreciate the view should they happen by?"

Rather than blanching or feigning innocence, your lips curved into a slow, eminently satisfied smirk that would have put the most depraved temptress to shame. With maddening deliberation, you allowed the bodice's sheer skirt portions to slip open even further - shamelessly revealing the absence of any panties and giving Kuroo an unobscured view of your bare pussy glistening with arousal beneath.

"Oh Tetsu, don't be coy," you crooned in a voice that liquified Kuroo's bones and made his shaft strain against its confines. "We both know precisely who this little show was meant for..." You punctuated the brazen insinuation by trailing one hand up the dip of your waist and over the slight swell of your hip before palming one of your tits shamelessly.

Something inside Kuroo seemed to splinter with a visceral, protracted ache at the image you painted. Some primal, proprietary need he could no longer wrestle down or contain reared up with a vengeance. In two strides, he crossed the remaining distance separating you, muscles tensed for violence.

Before you could so much as flinch, his fist lashed out, slamming into the door's frame beside your head hard enough to rattle its hinges. You went rigid, every shallow breath gusting between your parted lips in teasing wisps and ghosting over Kuroo's own straining chest.

"Don't you fucking dare," he snarled, bracing his other palm against the door to cage you in fully and blanketing your slighter frame in his looming heat. His voice dripped with seething menace, hazel eyes boring into yours with unflinching demand. "You want to play your wicked games, little girl? Then you can stay right here and sate them properly for once instead of traipsing around and dangling your charms for any passing degenerate to see..."

As his words hung in the electrically charged space between your bodies, Kuroo allowed the tip of his thumb to graze the over-sensitized swell of your lower lip with a maddening brush of friction, heart hammering an erratic staccato beneath his ribs.

"That's what you've been gagging for all night, isn't it? For me to finally break and give you exactly the kind of thorough, unrestrained claiming you've been begging for with those eyes?"

His hoarse murmur reverberated straight through you, hips canting subtly forward to grind the hard outline of his cock into your lower belly and banishing any distance between your bodies. You gasped softly at the delicious contact, pupils blowing wide with naked hunger.

Kuroo snaked his other hand with slow, almost torturous care around your back, fingertips skating over heated skin to palm your ass with unabashed greed. He squeezed firmly enough to lift you and force you up onto your tiptoes, your gazes locked in an endless battle of wills and unleashed, unstoppable need.

"Well?" His breath ghosted over your parted lips in counterpoint to his rumbling challenge and the rhythmic grind he established against your core. "If you've finally had enough of playing coy and pretending you don't want this as badly as I do, now's your last chance to walk away before I cave to the beast you keep trying to unleash..."

The molten whisper hung between you, thrumming with electric inevitability. Kuroo could feel the ragged flutter of your pulse against his palm cupping your feverish skin, the delicate shudder coursing through your frame as you swayed instinctively closer.

Your lips parted further as if to give voice to either undeniable surrender or a breathless plea for Kuroo to finally claim you with the ferocity you'd been stoking all night. He tensed in anticipation, every over-sensitized nerve ending screaming for your explicit permission to shed the last threads of restraint still holding him paralyzed on that razor-thin edge.

For a dizzying moment, he could almost taste the searing potential of finally unleashing himself, ravaging your pliant body as roughly and thoroughly as the beast prowling his veins demanded. Kuroo could picture hoisting you bodily into the searing cradle of his hips, pinning you helplessly against the door as he ground your molten centers together with punishing friction...

That's when Kenma's words sliced through the desire-soaked haze enveloping Kuroo's thoughts like a bucket of ice water:

"If I ever find out you so much as looked at my daughter the wrong way, I'll neuter you myself. And that's after my wife gets through kicking your ass first..."

The haunting vow rang with merciless clarity in Kuroo's mind - a bucket of sobering reality to counter the lush temptation of violating the most sacred of boundaries with the woman openly offering her wanton surrender mere breaths away. He froze utterly, gut clenching with a queasy lurch of shame. How could he even consider jeopardizing his friendship with Kenma over some fleeting, heated indiscretion?

You seemed to sense the shift in Kuroo's demeanor, that he'd regained some tenuous grasp on restraint despite the fever still thrumming between your bodies. A tiny, frustrated noise slipped free as your features contorted in a glare of disbelieving outrage.

"Don't you dare fucking pull away from me again, Tetsurou," you growled in a cadence dripping with such naked challenge and need that Kuroo nearly faltered anew. "I swear to god, if you think shutting me down now is going to make me stop craving your cock, you're delusional!"

Kuroo shuddered fully despite himself, arousal jackhammering nearly to the point of pain at the visceral promise of your guttural words. But he dug deep, clinging resolutely to the kernel of conscience beating like a metronome through his lust-fogged thoughts. He couldn't - wouldn't - be that level of betrayal to Kenma, no matter how sweetly the temptation painted itself.

With a fortifying inhale that felt like drawing in shards of glass, Kuroo untangled himself from your sinuous clutches, ignoring your outraged hiss of protest as he forcibly restrained the urge to lay claim so savagely.

"It's late," he managed in a tone gone desert-dry and rough enough to scour his raw throat. "And clearly my better judgment is waning enough for the night. We'll discuss this further after you've had a chance to...cool down."

You watched him with those mercurial eyes gone molten with frustrated fury, chest heaving with ragged pants that did nothing to detract from your brazen state of undress. For a prolonged heartbeat, Kuroo expected an explosive outburst or further attempts at seduction from you. But then, miraculously, some spark of compliance or defeated resignation seemed to bleed the raging inferno from your gaze.

With a toss of your head that made soft tresses spill artfully around your bare shoulders, you sneered. "Whatever. Don't come crying to me when the strain of denying yourself gets to be too much to handle alone at night anymore..."

Kuroo drew himself ramrod straight, pouring every ounce of willpower into keeping his gaze locked forward rather than allowing it to track the provocative bounce of your ass as you spun on your heel and stalked away down the hall. He waited until the muffled thud of your bedroom door slamming echoed like a death knell through the apartment before slumping back against the wall and dragging in a harsh, shuddering breath.

How the hell was he going to survive the remaining weeks of your tempestuous presence while keeping both your ravenous desire and his own treacherous impulses properly leashed?

The following morning found an undercurrent of smoldering resentment still permeating the air. You seemed determined to punish Kuroo for his rejection with frosty glares and curt one-word responses to any attempt at conversation or banter. Your simmering fury was nearly palpable enough to scorch any time he entered the vicinity - deliciously thrilling and unnerving in equal measure.

Finally, unable to endure the bristling awkwardness any longer, Kuroo cleared his throat over the remains of his breakfast. "Look, we both know moping around sulking isn't going to make this go away," he drawled, careful to keep any hint of condescension from creeping into his tone. "Maybe we need to get out and do something a little more fun together? Give you a chance to blow off some of that pent-up steam more...productively?"

Your gaze was skeptical as it flickered up to meet his, clearly wary of any potential olive branch representing ulterior motives or opportunities for seduction. But Kuroo held steady under your scrutiny, offering his most disarming grin.

"C'mon, we can make a little day trip out of it if you'd like? Grab some lunch, do a little shopping, maybe hit up a few sights if the weather cooperates..."

Resentment warred visibly with intrigued temptation across your features before the latter finally won out with a resigned huff. "Fine. Not like I have anything better to do until Dad gets back anyway." You paused, worrying your plump lower lip between your teeth in a way that made Kuroo have to swallow thickly. "Just promise to keep your hands to yourself and maybe I'll consider not holding last night's debacle entirely against you..."

A spark of challenge lit in Kuroo's chest even as he gave a genial shrug of acquiescence. "Whatever you say, princess. Although that begs the question of whether you'll be able to control your own wandering paws around little old me for once..."

You scoffed in a pantomime of offense even as the barest hints of a wry smirk curved your lips. "Oh, I think I've proven my restraint is far superior to your own when push comes to shove, Tetsurou."

The familiar note of salacious teasing had Kuroo's blood heating despite himself. But he held your gaze levelly, determined not to let you regain advantage - at least not so swiftly in the wake of his hard-fought self-denial.

"We'll just have to see about that, won't we?" He countered at last, allowing his eyes to rake over you with unguarded appreciation. "After all, there's only so long either of us can hold our breaths before one of us is bound to...come up gasping..."

The blatant undercurrent of wager and innuendo made your own stare spark in undisguised awareness, the air between you shivering in a deliciously renewed charge. Kuroo rose, movements lazy and confident as a predator scenting fresh prey.

"Better go get ready, sweetheart," he drawled as he moved towards the hallway, uncaring you tracked his every step like a starving woman admiring an exquisitely prepared feast. "It'll be my pleasure making things...interesting for us both today."

With one final, searing glance over his shoulder that promised indulgences still to come, Kuroo sauntered off to prepare himself for the delectable temptations and torments ahead. He only hoped the day's distractions would be enough to purchase him another reprieve from your mutually cataclysmic desires...at least for a few blissful hours more.

The tension that had lingered from the previous night's heated confrontation seemed to dissipate as you and Kuroo ventured out together into the crisp morning air. He tried to remain hyper-aware of the simmering undercurrents still crackling between you, but genuinely found himself getting swept up in simply enjoying your company as the day unfolded.

Over a laidback brunch at a cozy café, you fell back into your usual effortless rapport of teasing banter and roguish quips. Kuroo realized with a strange sort of fondness how easy it was to forget the obscenely tempting woman you'd matured into when you were grinning up at him with syrup smeared at the corner of your mouth, looking for all the world like the same mischievous brat he'd watched grow up.

Still, there were moments that would jar him back into visceral awareness of the barely-restrained desire pulsing between you both – like when you stretched lazily and your shirt rode up to expose a tantalizing strip of toned midriff, or when you casually licked a glob of whipped cream from your fingertip with slow, indolent focus. In those heated instances, Kuroo had to actively tear his stare away from drinking in the lurid tableaus you unconsciously presented.

After brunch, you wandered through a nearby outdoor market – pointing out quirky items that caught your fancy and sharing stories of your latest college misadventures as Kuroo listened with poorly restrained fondness. He couldn't resist the occasional playful nudge or tug on your hair, relishing in your indignant squeals.

Small, innocuous gestures that nevertheless filled Kuroo with a strange sense of nostalgia for cherished days long since passed when your relationship held no murkier underpinnings. Back when things had been simpler...easier.

But then your hand would brush his with purported innocence, or you'd lean in fractionally too close as you tugged the sleeve of his shirt to get his attention, and the nostalgia would instantly combust into that now-familiar scorching heat low in his core.

By the time evening rolled around, that same tantalizing friction was back in full force – only heightened by the casual intimacy you'd both lapsed into over the course of the day. Almost as if all the emotional groundwork of boundaries and uncertainty had already been blazed through, leaving only the heady longing and pent-up tension still smoldering beneath polite veneers. ik

Kuroo felt like he was walking on a tightrope, trying to balance enjoying your company without giving in to the overwhelming desire simmering between you two. As you strolled together down the lively shopping promenade, he was hyperaware of every accidental brush of your arm, every sly glance you shot his way. The sexual tension hung thick in the air, stoking the fire raging within him.

You reminded him of his promise to take you shopping, that coy smile playing on your lips. Kuroo wanted to refuse, to steer you both back to safer territory. But the gleam in your eyes made his resolve falter. He knew you wouldn't let this go, not when you could sense his weakening restraint.

"Sure, one store," he agreed reluctantly. "But we're keeping things PG, got it? No funny business."

Your grin only widened at his futile attempt to set boundaries. "I'll be on my very best behavior," you promised, though the suggestive lilt in your tone said otherwise.

True to form, the moment you stepped into the trendy clothing boutique, you barreled straight towards temptation. Kuroo watched, jaw clenched, as you selected increasingly revealing outfits to try on – tight dresses that clung to your curves, low-cut tops that exposed a tantalizing swell of cleavage. Each time you emerged from the dressing room in a new ensemble, his eyes were helplessly drawn to your body like a magnet, drinking in every inch of skin on display.

You preened under his heated stare, arching your back or bending over just a bit more than necessary as you posed and asked his opinion. Kuroo tried to keep his responses clipped and neutral, but his voice emerged as a strained rasp each time.

Finally, you slipped behind the door again, and Kuroo forced himself to turn away before you reemerged in something even more sinful. He paced the small waiting area, hands fisted at his sides as he wrestled with the escalating ache between his legs. Get it together, Tetsurou, he scolded himself. You can't let her temptations break you.

The soft creak of the changing room door made his head snap up, breath catching at the sight of you. This time, the delicate black dress you wore could barely be called clothing – the flimsy material was practically see-through, clinging to your body like a second skin and leaving absolutely nothing to the imagination. As you sauntered closer, each swaying step made the dress ride up tantalizing higher on your thighs.

"Well?" You locked eyes with him, open challenge burning in your gaze. "What do you think about this one, Tetsu? Think it would look better..." You trailed off, slowly dragging your hands up your sides to emphasize your breasts straining against the sheer fabric. "On the bedroom floor?"

Kuroo's throat went dry as you closed the distance between you, plush lips parting invitingly as you pressed yourself flush against his body. He could feel the pebbled peaks of your nipples grazing his chest, smell the intoxicating floral scent of your skin and hair. The blood was pounding so fiercely in his ears, he barely registered your next words.

"Come on, old man," you purred, tilting your hips in a slow grind against his growing hardness. "You can finally give in, just this once. No one has to know how badly you want me..."

With a guttural groan torn from his very core, Kuroo captured your lips in a searing, desperate kiss. All of his flimsy resistance and halfhearted objections crumbled entirely as he pulled you harder against him, one hand burying itself in your hair while the other shamelessly groped your ass.

You eagerly reciprocated his hunger, mouth opening to allow his probing tongue to delve deeper as your nails raked over his shoulders. The kiss was all heat and wet friction and the slick tangling of tongues, devolving rapidly into messy desperation.

When you finally broke apart, lips swollen and breath sawing harshly, Kuroo's gaze was molten with naked need. "Fuck it," he rasped out, guiding you backwards toward the dressing room. "You want this so bad, princess? You got it..."

With a low growl, he yanked the flimsy dress clear over your head, leaving you beautifully bare before his ravenous stare. As he crowded you against the wall, hands greedily roaming your body, all thoughts of resistance fled entirely. You'd baited him expertly, and now there was nothing left but surrender to the raging inferno of lust you'd both fanned for far too long.

Kuroo pinned you against the dressing room wall, the flimsy door shuddering on its hinges as he ground his clothed cock against your naked heat. Your head lolled back, mouth falling open in a silent moan as his lips and teeth blazed a scorching path down the column of your throat.

One of his powerful thighs shoved between your legs, forcing them obscenely apart to make room for the delicious friction he established. You clung to his broad shoulders, nails raking over taut muscle and bunched fabric as you rocked wantonly into the exquisite pressure.

"Yes...oh fuck, Tetsu, please..." The entreaty slipped free in a shredded whimper as molten licks of rapture sparked outwards from your rapidly liquifying core with each punishing grind of Kuroo's hips.

He swallowed your cries with another deep, bruising kiss - all teeth and slick tangling of tongues as he laid utterly merciless claim. One large palm clamped over the generous curve of your breast, kneading and tweaking the peaked nipple with expert command until you arched into his brand with a ragged plea.

Just as the two of you threatened to shred through the last vestige of control, a shrill ringing cut through the haze of panting breaths and slick glides of skin. You startled against Kuroo's unrelenting attention, scrambling to locate the source of the interruption.

"Fuck, ignore it baby," Kuroo growled against the swollen swell of your lips as he tried to recapture your mouth. But you placed a palm to his heaving chest, stilling his insistent motions just long enough to locate your buzzing phone abandoned beside the discard pile of outfits you'd tried on.

The name "DADDY" glared up from the screen, undeniable and utterly disruptive in its timing. You froze, equal parts mortification and a sudden rush of clarity dousing the raging inferno like a bucket of ice water.

Kuroo seemed to experience a similar sobering, judging by the way he abruptly wrenched himself from your tangled clutches with a guttural curse. He pressed the heels of his palms into his eye sockets, harsh breaths sawing raggedly through the quiet changing alcove.

"Answer it," he bit out in a grating tone when you continued staring numbly at the vibrating device. "It's probably Kenma checking in finally..."

Obediently, you connected the call, fingers trembling as you lifted the phone to your ear while Kuroo dragged himself back from the precipice of utterly losing control.

"H-hey Daddy..." you stammered out, unable to fully erase the undercurrent of breathy desire still permeating your voice. "Did you make it to the hotel okay?"

You kept your eyes trained resolutely on the wall opposite as Kuroo raked his tortured stare over your flushed, gloriously debauched state. His jaw ticked visibly with the strain of warring compulsions before he seemed to reach some grim inner resolve.

Without ceremony, he snatched up the discarded pile of clothing and strode for the exit, steps tight and precise as he headed for the register. You watched his exit helplessly with one hand clapped over the mic, entirely uncertain how to process the harrowing swing between total debauchery and cold sobriety.

Finally, you shook yourself from your daze. "Yeah, I'm just...just out getting a few things with...with Tetsu," you mumbled hoarsely into the receiver, unable to mask the warring torrent of disappointment and relief thrashing beneath your skin. "No, no everything is totally fine and...and normal here..."

You trailed off staring blankly at the dressing room's mirrored wall – the debauchery reflected back at you a bitter mockery of your platitudes. Hickeys darkened over the swell of your breasts, hair a riot of tangles from Kuroo's merciless grip, the proof of your arousal stark and glistening between your thighs and smeared incriminatingly over your inner thighs.

Far from fine or normal.

With a trembling sigh and a desperate prayer Kuroo would maintain his reforged nobility for just a while longer, you slunk into the bathroom to quickly restore some semblance of dignity and untangled poise before braving whatever storm awaited on the other side.

The drive back to Kuroo's apartment was cloaked in a heavy silence, the air thick with unresolved tension. You kept stealing sidelong glances at him, eyes tracing the taut set of his jaw and the way the tendons in his neck corded with strain. His knuckles were practically white from gripping the steering wheel, biceps flexing beneath the material of his shirt. You found your gaze lingering on those sculpted forearms, remembering the scorching imprints his large palms had branded into your bare skin not long ago.

A heated flush crept up your chest as you recalled the urgency of his touch, the blazing intensity in his smoldering stare as he'd pinned you against that dressing room wall. Just thinking about how utterly you had unraveled him, how close you'd both teetered to the edge of no return, made a spiral of arousal rekindle low in your belly.

Finally, you couldn't take the charged quiet any longer. As if giving voice to the roiling torrent might somehow lance the turbulent undercurrents between you. "Are we going to talk about what happened back there?" you ventured, keeping your tone carefully neutral despite the way your pulse thrummed with reawakened yearning.

Kuroo's Adam's apple bobbed convulsively as he swallowed hard, sharpened jawline tensing further. "What's there to talk about?" His gravelly response held an undercurrent of forced nonchalance that did nothing to mask the storm clearly raging behind his eyes. "Just a lapse in judgment that won't be happening again."

The curt dismissal ignited a fresh flare of indignant frustration deep in your core. As if he could so easily disregard the raging inferno he'd stoked and indulge in willful blindness. You bristled, the flames of desire now sparking into defiance as you bristled. "So that's it? You're just going to pretend like you didn't want me just as badly?"

Shifting in your seat, you arched your back slightly to thrust your breasts forward and let your hand trail up the inseam of your skirt in a slow, sinuous caress. You parted your thighs a few tantalizing inches, holding Kuroo's burning stare in silent challenge. The rapid dilation of his pupils and the way his throat worked around a convulsive swallow did not escape your notice.

"I felt how hard you were, Tetsu," you murmured in a voice gone low and syrupy with provocation. You bit your lower lip slowly, letting it plump up and glisten with the brief sweep of your tongue. "How turned on you were, having me pressed up against you. Don't tell me you’re just gonna ignore that."

A muscle ticked in his chiseled jaw, the corded sinews of his neck snapping taut. But Kuroo kept his glass-cutting stare locked resolutely on the empty road ahead, seemingly laboring to maintain his rapidly crumbling veneer of forced restraint. His chest rose and fell in harsh drafts, utterly at odds with his white-knuckled grip on the steering wheel.

With a sharp swerve that jostled you both, Kuroo abruptly pulled over on a quiet side street. For a split second, you expected – hoped – that he would finally surrender. That the smoldering heat in his hooded stare would arc forward and consume you both in the searing release of passion too long stoked and denied. You even leaned subtly into his space, lips parting in breathless expectation.

But instead of seizing you in the punishing kiss you craved, Kuroo squeezed his eyes shut and pinched the bridge of his nose in a gesture of clear self-restraint. The sharp ridges and hollows of his profile were limned in stark relief by the ambient glow of the streetlamp, casting his features in an almost pained mask of stoicism.

"You don't understand, [Y/N]," he grated out in that deliciously rough timbre that made your pussy flutter traitorously. "It's not just about age or consent. You're Kenma's daughter, for fuck's sake."

The reminder lanced through the gauzy cocoon of longing clouding your thoughts – a sudden dousing that left you recoiling slightly. But even the fleeting pang of guilt was not enough to extinguish the ember of desire still burning molten and insistent in your core. You worried your plump lower lip with your teeth again, noting the way Kuroo's gaze tracked the unconscious gesture with naked yearning.

"So what? The two of you aren’t related by blood."

Even to your own ears, the attempted rationalization rang thin and hollow – a transparent grasp at justification for indulging in this increasingly inescapable compulsion arcing between your charged forms.

Kuroo's jaw clenched hard enough to throw his chiseled features into harsh relief, full lips peeling back from gritted teeth in a rictus of frustration. "That doesn't matter!" he exploded, the blaze finally detonating behind those piercing emerald eyes. "Kenma is my oldest friend, my brother in every way that counts. And betraying his trust like this by lusting after his little girl?"

His words emerged guttural and fraught, the muscle jumping sporadically along his tensed jawline as his chest heaved with the force of containing the twin maelstroms of lust and self-loathing clearly at war within his formidable frame.

"It's unforgivable..." he finished in a voice gone hoarse with effort that seemed to resonate through you in a full-body tremor of apprehension and answering hunger.

The car idled around you, the low thrum of its engine seeming to give voice to the pulse of hunger you refused to quiet so easily. You absorbed Kuroo's weighted condemnation and rationality through the molasses-thick silence, tasting the bitter truths on your tongue...and dismissing them with a willful defiance that roiled and snapped through your veins like liquid fire.

"What if," you hedged at last, carefully modulating your tone to a lower, syrupy warmth. "What if he didn't have to know? Just this once to get it out of our systems."

The insinuation hung wreathed in ephemeral promise – one you punctuated by allowing your hand to slowly creep higher along Kuroo's taut thigh until your questing fingertips brushed against the outline of his cock swiftly taking shape beneath the coarse denim. You relished the punched-out groan that gusted free of him despite his visible efforts to contain it, his powerful thighs parting incrementally in a reflexive, unbidden welcome to your temptation.

"[Y/N], baby...don't..." Kuroo's graveled entreaty was unmistakable even as his willpower hemorrhaged. You refused to grant him quarter or pause now, shuffling gracelessly across the console until your lips ghosted searing friction against the sandpaper rasp of his own in a tantalizing brush of silk over steel.

"Don't act like you don't crave this just as much as I do," you breathed against his parted mouth, your damp exhalation seeming to scorch its heated path along every molecule. "I can feel how much you want me..."

A visible tremor wracked Kuroo's powerful frame then, his control stretched gossamer-thin and shredding. With a ragged curse torn from somewhere deep in his chest, he crushed his mouth down over yours in a searing, desperate kiss that threatened to steal the very air from your lungs. His large palms slid over every lush curve and swell in a heated brand of possession – bunching the fabric of your skirt up over your hips without preamble as he hauled you bodily into the cradle of his lap.

The action pinned you flush to the hard-on you'd been so purposefully teasing, eliciting a shamelessly wanton moan that Kuroo swallowed greedily. A dizzying spiral of tongues and teeth and lush, bruising friction commenced between you – frantic and ferocious and lit by the feverish promise of total surrender. Kuroo's every ragged exhalation scorched over your flushed skin with the guttural relish of starvation, his powerful body undulating beneath you in open invitation.

It was finally happening – the dam breaking to unleash the turbulent waters you'd strained against for far too long...

Then, with an animalistic growl torn from the depths of his core, Kuroo abruptly tore his mouth from yours. You both panted harshly in the aftermath, chests heaving and bodies glistening with the visceral efforts of that brief conflagration. Kuroo's eyes bored into you from beneath hooded lids, burning with an intensity that nearly made you moan at the visceral, proprietary promise you found there.

"We can't..." he rasped out, even as his hands roved hungrily over every exquisite swell and hollow of your wanton curves. He kneaded the lush flesh of your ass shamelessly, grinding your molten pussy against his aching cock. "Fuck, you have no idea how badly I want to just fuck you right here..."

You arched against him with a keening sound of entreaty, nipping sharply at the corded tendon straining along the column of his throat with your kiss-swollen lips. "Then why are you fighting it? I'm right here, Tetsu...all yours for the taking if you just give in..."

A shudder wracked Kuroo's broad shoulders and he momentarily buried his face in the fragrant hollow beneath your ear, seeming to inhale the humid fusion of your desire and dizzying feminine musk. You felt the rasp of his tongue caressing the feverish jump of your pulse point before he leaned back, jaw visibly ticking with the strain of containing the beast howling for release within.

"Kenma..." he ground out through gritted teeth, chest sawing with exertion as he visibly warred to regain the tattered shreds of his composure. "I can't do that to Kenma...fuck, I can't betray him like this no matter how tempting you make it!"

You issued a wordless growl of sheer frustration and smashed your mouth back against Kuroo's in a punishing kiss of pure, wanton possession. Your hips surged erratically against his, grinding and circling in search of any exquisite friction to soothe the mounting ache. His hands – those peerless instruments of dominance and barely-restrained power – squeezed your hips with bruising force, meeting your agonized roll for ravenous roll as you both teetered ever nearer to the abyss.

"Don't think about him or anyone else," you rasped out between the wickedly slick tangling of tongues and fevered sips of lush, parted flesh. "Just think about me and what you're going to do to me once we get back..."

A full-body shudder wracked Kuroo's powerful, delineated musculature then, making you momentarily dizzy as your senses swirled with the intoxicating scents of your feverish exertions and his spiced, earthy virility. For a suspended, panting heartbeat, you thought he might actually give in right there and now – shed his shredded composure and take you right atop the creaking console in an animalistic frenzy of unleashed hungers.

But then Kuroo's expression slid into grim determination, emerald eyes glinting with a resolve too steely to ignore. "Get off me, princess," he grated out in a voice thick and molten from your arduous joining. With gentle yet unmistakable force, he untangled your limbs from around him, depositing you into the passenger seat with surprisingly finessed care.

You opened your mouth to protest or cajole further, but Kuroo fixed you with a look that brooked no additional discussion. Shaken by the authority blazing from his banked stare, you simply slumped back in sullen, heated frustration as he started the car and pulled back onto the empty road with sharp, jerky motions.

The drive passed in a thick, tension-laden silence once more – your own frustration and simmering yearning mounting with every block traversed and minute ticking past. From the passenger seat, your gaze traced over Kuroo's stern profile and lingered on the prominent set of his kiss-swollen lips before flickering towards the backseat...

Where easily a dozen glossy shopping bags lay scattered and overflowing with the entire selection of risque garments you'd sampled earlier during your flagrant attempts at seduction. The sheer volume of them, crammed haphazardly across the plush leather, suggested Kuroo had spared no expense in purchasing every single indecent offering you'd modeled so shamelessly for him across the evening.

You absorbed this visceral evidence of just how deeply your provocations had affected him – no matter how firmly he tried distancing himself from the primal, lust-choked demands you'd elicited. The sight of all those dresses and scandalously revealing tops, the ghost of their heated exchange permeated the fine material in a way you doubted would ever be expunged now.

Silently, you turned your gaze back out the window, chest constricting with equal parts yearning and a newfound flush of humbled apprehension. If even an evening as blatantly purposed to incite Kuroo's basest longings had pushed you both to such explosive limits, how on earth would either of you survive the smoldering compulsions newly awakened between you going forward?

Man and woman – both undeniably enraptured, yet torn between morality and forbidden lust...what choice did either of you truly have but to succumb entirely to the raging inferno now threatening to consume you both utterly?

The remainder of the evening passed in a blur of simmering tension and loaded silence. As soon as you entered Kuroo's apartment, you stormed down the hall without a backwards glance – the sharp staccato of your footsteps and the punctuating slam of the guest bedroom door ricocheting through the quiet like auditory shockwaves.

Kuroo stood frozen in the living area, shoulders rising and falling with deep, calming breaths as he struggled to regain equilibrium. Every inch of his body still thrummed with unspent arousal and the ghost of your lush, wanton curves pressed so urgently against his own aching hardness. The dusky floral scent of your desire seemed to permeate the very air, making his head swim dizzily.

He sank onto the sofa, scrubbing his palms over his face as warring tides of lust and self-loathing churned within. How close had he teetered to that razor's edge of indulging his most depraved impulses? Minutes from dragging your willing body back against his and consummating the forbidden, treacherous cravings coiled like a serpent around his resolve?

The thought sickened him as much as it made his cock throb insistently. With a muffled groan, Kuroo shoved himself upright to stumble towards the safe refuge of his room. Perhaps distance and unconsciousness would dull the overwhelming tempest now lashing against his shores.

He intended to seek you out later, when coherent sentences and rational discussions became possible again. An effort to assuage your understandable ire and work towards diffusing this entire disaster before it fractured something irreparable between you.

But for now, Kuroo needed to retreat and regroup – escape the torturous haunting of your essence clinging to every space if he had any hope of eventually confronting the minefield you had both set dancing across.

Sleep, however, proved equally elusive in light of his spiraling thoughts. Each time Kuroo closed his eyes, visceral flashes assaulted him – the slick swell of your parted lips, the blissed out arch of your spine as you ground down against his aching cock, the primal mewls of desire spilling wantonly past the swollen pout needing nothing more than his tongue to swallow them once more.

At some point in the restless fever dream, he found himself wandering down the dimly lit hallway, a silent wraith pulled towards the forbidden as surely as helpless debris caught in a riptide. He paused outside the guest suite, gaze riveted to the sliver of spilled illumination glowing from beneath. He could picture you stretched out on those rumpled sheets so achingly vivid it made his fingers ache with the urge to trail worshipful paths over every exposed expanse...

A ragged exhalation gusted from Kuroo's parched lips. He sagged back against the opposite wall, fighting off the insidious temptation to breach that final barrier. Clearly your alluring presence had completely unraveled his normally steadfast self-control and rationale. For both your sakes, he would have to keep a healthy gulf between you...at least for now.

With monumental effort, Kuroo retreated back to his room and the refuge of cool, clean sheets blessedly void of the temptress' haunting essence. He lasted a grand total of an hour sprawled out in solitary torment before surrendering what little composure remained and indulging himself in a rough, curse-laden fantasy that would have made even your wanton desires seem quaint by comparison.

By the time the first pale ribbons of dawn streaked across the horizon, a raw-throated and shuddering Kuroo finally succumbed to fitful slumber with the sticky residue of his cum cooling in streaks across his tensed abdomen. And through the shredding vestiges of restless unconsciousness, he swore he could taste the phantom heat of your tongue laving scorching paths along the insides of his thighs in leisurely benediction...

Sunlight filtering through the bedroom's gauzy curtains roused Kuroo from his lurid fever-dreams at last. With monumental effort, he tugged leaden eyelids open to blearily assess his surroundings – half expecting to find you a tousled, inviting vision spread out beside him after the feverish imaginings plaguing his slumber.

But the rumpled sheets beside him remained untouched, unsullied of any presence save his own. A sudden, petulant hollowness seemed to yawn through Kuroo's core at the realization, far more visceral than he cared to analyze.

Huffing out a frustrated exhalation, he finally levered himself upright and scrubbed his hands through the sweaty disarray of his bedhead. The motions caused his shoulders to crack in relief, reminding him of just how restlessly he must have tossed and turned throughout the night. Each minute of failed slumber scored into his senses by the molten brands of fantasies too lurid for conscious recollection.

With jerky, still sleep-clumsy movements, Kuroo tugged on a pair of sweatpants before making his way towards the kitchen and the steadying ritual of brewing a strong pot of coffee. He needed fuel and sustenance if he harbored any hope of somehow diffusing the powder keg now smoldering so perilously on his doorstep.

Kuroo fully intended to seek you out, clear the air, and work towards patching the cracks already webbing between you with remorseless speed. Before more irrevocable sins and unspeakable hungers could leach through and fracture everything apart.

But the moment Kuroo shuffled into the front living area and spotted your silhouette perched on the sofa, all intentions scattered like ashes in a downdraught. You sat utterly motionless, hands folded demurely between your knees and shoulders hunched beneath a thick sweater that seemed to swallow your slender frame.

For several weighted heartbeats, Kuroo simply stared – part of him frantically scrambling to piece together what apologies or arguments or tempering explanations might be fitting for the storm no doubt still churning your stare.

But when you lifted your chin and met his gaze full-on, he knew in an instant that the tumultuous anger and hurt smoldering behind your depths had dimmed to low embers overnight. All of the thorns and hissing defensiveness he'd steeled himself for seemed...muted, dampened to a bemused sort of weariness.

"Morning," you murmured, offering an uncertain smile that halted Kuroo in his tracks. "There's coffee made already if you want some."

And just like that, it was as if some unspoken truce had been negotiated over the empty hours of sleeplessness plaguing you both. No blazing recriminations or bitter wrath, simply a thin veneer of civility draped between your respective wounds like gauze still awaiting a more permanent salve.

Part of Kuroo wanted to tear through the falsely calming atmosphere with demands and impassioned pleas to finally hash out the forbidden hungers simmering between you openly and without restraint. A larger, more guarded piece of him reveled in the reprieve – no matter how brittle its origins or longevity.

For now, there would be no knock-down-drag-out confrontations about culpabilities or unspeakable transgressions. Just the steady, comforting motions of two friends clinging to the shreds of propriety still distinguishable through the smoky haze of sin.

"Thanks," Kuroo rasped out at last, gesturing vaguely towards the hallway. "I should hit the shower, but I'll grab a mug after."

You merely nodded without lifting your chin, as if any sudden movements or excess attentions might shatter the delicately-reforged peace between you. Kuroo allowed the hazy beat of silence to stretch and congeal around him for a few more endless seconds before retreating with a self-conscious clearing of his throat.

Hot water scouring his fatigued muscles did nothing to cleanse the heavier burdens now bearing down upon him. Each droplet scissoring down his well-muscled frame seemed to whisper your name in a haunting sussurus laced with equal parts damnation and devotion. Over and over until his skull echoed with the weight of it all, the agonizing decisions and tempests of lust still holding court behind his eyes as he fought for purchase on elusive clarity.

By the time Kuroo finally emerged, towel slung low around his hips and bare feet damp against the living room floor, he found you exactly where you'd been. Your eyes flickered over the exposed expanse of defined musculature, trailing down the dewy hollow of his throat to the thick, coarse hair trailing down his navel before hastening away.

A flush stained your cheeks despite your otherwise placid expression and Kuroo felt the bottom drop out of his stomach in sympathy. It would seem neither of you was quite immune to the molten brands of temptation searing between your shared spaces after all.

Some desperate instinct prodded him to break the ice, to raise a jest or levity to at least mask the simmering current tugging them both down into murky depths once more...until he saw the two mugs already awaiting on the coffee table.

And beside them the cheerfully plain cardboard box containing the six-pack of fancy cookies he favored but rarely indulged. His stomach clenched, suddenly painfully unsure whether the gesture stemmed from simple thoughtfulness and consideration...or carried infinitely murkier underpinnings of appeasement or delayed capitulation.

"[Y/N]..." Kuroo murmured, the name dripping from his tongue like fragrant benediction and damnation all at once. "What...?"

But your only response was to lift one shoulder in a tiny shrug before inclining your head towards the prepared dishes silently. The weight behind your compliant silence made Kuroo's gut churn for reasons he could barely fathom.

He crossed the space more out of instinctive compulsion than true desire, sinking onto the couch cushions careful inches away from where you huddled beneath the oversized sweater. For one teetering heartbeat, he was frozen - every fiber of his being screaming at him to reach out and map the enigmatic hollows and slopes of your features with desperate reverence. To try and see past whatever crossroads you had navigated in the cold depths of morning while he wallowed in his own disgraced indecision.

But in the end, he simply reached for the prepared mug of steaming brew, cradling the heat and steadying ceramic between his palms as a penitent before an altar he longed to glimpse...yet dared not risk profaning further with any more selfish, craven demands.

The silence stretched between them, thick and weighted as Kuroo sipped his coffee. He stole furtive glances at you over the rim of the mug, brow furrowed slightly as he tried to decipher the strange shift in your demeanor. Gone was the defiant fire that had blazed so brightly the previous day, the blatant challenge and provocation that had nearly unraveled him completely.

Instead, you seemed...subdued, almost chastened. Your eyes remained downcast, fingers worrying at a loose thread on the sweater you were huddled in. Kuroo recognized it as one of his own - the sight of you engulfed in the worn fabric sparked an unexpected flicker of tenderness amidst the swirling uncertainty.

Just as he opened his mouth, prepared to finally broach the smoldering tension crackling between them, you spoke up in a soft murmur.

"I'm sorry about yesterday." Your gaze flickered up to meet his, equal parts contrition and a guarded wariness he couldn't quite decipher. "I acted like a brat, and I crossed so many lines I shouldn't have."

Kuroo's brows hiked up, the apology catching him completely off guard. A thousand potential responses flickered through his mind, but he remained silent, letting you continue uninterrupted.

"You were right to shut me down," you pressed on, worrying your lower lip between your teeth. "What I was trying to push you into...it would have been a huge mistake. A betrayal of my dad's trust in the worst way."

He watched, utterly transfixed, as you visibly gathered your composure with a deep, steadying breath. When you met his gaze again, there was a newfound determination glinting in your eyes that made his chest constrict painfully.

"I need to be better than that," you stated, more to yourself than him. "I can't keep letting my...impulses and selfishness rule me, not when it risks hurting the people I care about most." A wry, self-deprecating smile curved your lips. "Especially over something as stupid as a cheap thrill that would have ruined everything in the end."

Kuroo's mouth had gone dry, his coffee suddenly tasting ashen on his tongue. This measured, earnest side of you was so at odds with the wanton temptress who had pushed him to the boundaries of control mere hours ago. He couldn't decide if he was relieved at your apparent change of heart, or if a deeper part of him mourned the loss of that smoldering, unchecked passion.

"From now on, I'm going to be focusing on my studies," you continued, voice strengthening with conviction. "No more distractions, no more chasing selfish whims that could jeopardize my future and hurt the people I love."

Despite himself, Kuroo couldn't contain the incredulous huff of laughter that slipped past his lips. You cut him a mildly reproachful look, but he simply shook his head and lifted one shoulder in an unapologetic shrug.

"Sorry, I just..." He searched for the right words, sarcasm warring with sincere consideration. "After everything that happened yesterday, you'll forgive me for being a little skeptical about your sudden resolve to become a model student again."

To his surprise, you didn't bristle or retort defensively. Instead, you simply held his gaze steadily, mouth set in a solemn line.

"I mean it, Tetsurou," you stated, each word laced with sober emphasis. "Things went way too far yesterday, and we both know it. I refuse to let my lack of self-control ruin things any further between us or with my dad."

He searched your expression, looking for any hints of deception or lingering temptation simmering beneath the surface. But all he found was earnest determination and...an undercurrent of what could only be described as regret. Regret for the lines you had crossed, for the dangerous territory you had led him towards so brazenly.

Kuroo felt something within him loosen at your sincerity, the constant knot of wariness and residual arousal slowly unspooling. Perhaps you had both needed this reckoning, this moment of clarity amidst the maelstrom of lust and indecision.

With a slow nod, he set his half-finished coffee aside and leaned back against the sofa cushions. "Alright, if that's really what you want..." He let the implication hang in the air - giving you one final chance to contradict or deflect.

But you simply met his gaze evenly and offered a small, resolute smile. "It is. I promise."

He found himself returning the smile, some of the heaviness that had weighed on him since yesterday finally dissipating. "Then I'm with you. Whatever you need to get through this..." He waved a hand vaguely. "...whatever this chapter is, I've got your back."

A shimmer of gratitude flickered across your features, and you nodded silently. The air between you seemed to clear, the tension bleeding away to be replaced by a newfound sense of solidarity and understanding.

As you rose to retreat back to your room, likely to tackle some studying, Kuroo couldn't help but marvel at the shift. Just yesterday, the mere sight of you had set his blood boiling and restraint hanging by a gossamer thread. Now, you were calm waters, your determination sending ripples of pride through him rather than turbulent desire.

Part of him wanted to bask in this newfound sense of solidarity, to trust in the sincerity he had glimpsed burning in your eyes. You seemed so resolute, so committed to reining in the chaotic impulses that had nearly led you both down an irreversibly dark path. For a fleeting moment, Kuroo allowed himself to truly hope that the worst had passed - that you had both exorcised the ravenous temptations and granted each other the space needed to heal.

But another, more cynical part of him couldn't shake a lingering wariness - a nagging suspicion that this abrupt shift in comportment was simply a new gambit in whatever twisted game of seduction still simmered beneath the surface. He knew you too well, had witnessed firsthand just how adept you were at manipulation and preying on his weaknesses when the mood struck.

Was this whole 'good girl' act merely a calculated move to lull him back into a false sense of security? To bait him into dropping his guard entirely before the next onslaught of provocation? Kuroo clenched his jaw, resisting the urge to rake his palm through his disheveled bedhead. He couldn't afford blind trust anymore, not until his senses managed to fully disentangle themselves from the drugging aura of your temptation.

The rest of the day passed in that same strange, uneasy truce. You remained tucked away in the guest room, a silent sentinel devoted to your apparent studies. Kuroo tried to busy himself with mundane chores and mindless distractions, desperate to avoid falling back into the same spiral of fevered ruminations that had plagued him the previous evening.

When at last the knock at his door dragged him back to the present, the dimly lit hallway revealed your silhouette hovering uncertainly just past the threshold to his bedroom suite. A woven blanket was wrapped securely around your lithe form, soft locks tousled by evident restlessness.

"Hey," you greeted in a low, rough murmur that somehow still managed to caress over his nerves with unbearable gentleness. "I didn't mean to disturb you, I just..."

You trailed off, gaze flickering away as one slender hand worried at the blanket's edge. Kuroo inhaled a steadying breath, forcing himself to remain impassive rather than closing the distance to offer...well, whatever fragile intimacy his body instinctively longed to provide.

"Everything okay?" He prompted when you remained locked in uncertain silence.

Finally, you nodded and met his probing stare fully once more. "Yeah, it's just...I don't know, never mind. Sorry, I shouldn't have disturbed your evening."

As you turned to retreat back down the hallway, something deep inside Kuroo clenched at the thought of you withdrawing further into solitude and shadow. Before his rational mind could override the impulse, he found himself calling out to your departing figure.

"Wait!" It emerged more gruffly than intended, making you freeze in your tracks and glance back over one shoulder. Kuroo groped for an appropriate excuse, something benign enough not to raise defenses all while affording your company a while longer.

"Ah, I was actually planning to head into the office for a bit later," he fibbed. "Get a head start on some paperwork since I'll be out for the next couple weeks." Kenma's extended business trip suddenly provided convenient cover for maintaining a credible pretense.

"If you wanted," he pressed on, feigning nonchalance. "You could come along? Maybe grab a bite or something afterwards? No pressure or anything, just a chance to get out of the apartment for a bit."

Silence stretched between you as you seemed to mull over his proposal. Kuroo waited with studied patience, refusing to allow his desperation to bleed through the carefully measured tone of his offer. If you sensed how imperative it suddenly felt to draw you back out of your isolated solitude, there was no telling what fresh deceptions or exploitations might be unleashed...

"That's very kind of you," you said at last, rewarding Kuroo's lungs with oxygen once more. "But I think I'll pass tonight. I'm actually making really good headway on this literature review for my Criminal Justice class."

The unexpected excuse shouldn't have landed with such a hollow pang in Kuroo's core. He forced a tight smile and a nod as if your wholesome refusal was precisely what he had expected all along.

"Well hey, can't argue with putting education first. That's my girl." The endearment slipped past his lips before he could rein it back, making something almost pained flicker across your features.

"Thanks for understanding," you murmured, hugging the blanket tighter around yourself as you began retreating once more. "Really, Tetsu, this is exactly what I need right now, so just...don't worry about me for a little while, okay?"

The words sliced through Kuroo like a physical blow, leaving him unmoored and reeling in their wake. Before rational thought could intervene, his body propelled itself forward of its own volition - powerful strides devouring the distance until you were engulfed in the circle of his arms.

You went rigid at the sudden embrace, shoulder blades tensing beneath Kuroo's palms as he crushed you against the solid plane of his chest. For a breathless heartbeat, you remained frozen - two tautly strung bowstrings lashed together and thrumming with twinned uncertainty.

Then you seemed to melt fractionally, slender form softening into the cradle of Kuroo's insistent hold as you allowed your cheek to pillowed against the reassuring thrum of his heartbeat.

Kuroo drank in every visceral detail greedily - the fragrant whisper of your shampoo, the pliant silk of your hair brushing his jawline, the delicate points of your body pressing into his with undeniable substance and fever.

Without conscious thought, he angled his face downward, allowing the rough rasp of his stubble to score delicate friction against the downy slope of your temple. He inhaled deeply, pulling your combined scents into his lungs like a man starving for sustenance.

Your breaths hitched in response, mingling with his own in tremulous susurrances that sounded dangerously akin to shared whimpers of need. Before Kuroo's tenuous grasp on control could splinter entirely, he tilted your face up towards his with two blunt fingertips beneath your chin.

Your features were suffused with ethereal shadows, making your eyes glimmer with haunted liquid fire. Kuroo stared into those molten depths, every muscle in his body locked taut as he waged a silent war with the compulsions howling through his bloodstream.

To claim your lips in the searing, profane manner they had taunted and tempted with such maddening ardor? Or to retreat from the brink of that scorching precipice once more before he immolated the last tattered remnants of restraint still just barely tethering his hungers in place?

Kuroo could feel the answer being etched into the twin brands of your shared exhales, the tantalizing give of your body cradled against his hardening form. Every atom and synapse screamed for capitulation to the searing potential hanging like a livewire between your mouths.

With what felt like monumental effort, he dragged his lips across your searing cheekbone instead - angling his mouth to brand a searing path towards your brow. You shuddered fully beneath his roving caress, fingers clenching in the thick material of Kuroo's sweatshirt as if to tether yourself in place.

Finally, Kuroo pressed his lips against the warm silk of your forehead in what felt like a ghosting benediction – an aching promise to soothe and protect the most fragile innocence blooming within the banked furnace of your temptations. He lingered in that tenuous stasis, coaxing the stinging behind his eyes to relent long enough to steady his voice.

"Sleep well, little one," he rasped out at last in a tone gone rough with too many competing compulsions. "I'll be back before you know it, so try not to study too hard for once while I'm gone."

Reluctantly, he allowed his arms to fall away from you – slowly enough to avoid any abrupt separation that might shatter the fragile symbiosis you'd achieved. Then he turned to retreat, unable to risk glimpsing whatever swirling riptides of emotion still churned behind your mercurial depths.

Kuroo made it as far as the corridor leading towards the stairwell before his breaths began sawing erratically again, lungs burning with the effort of containing the turbulent hungers still prowling his inner battlefields.

The rest of the short trip towards the office building passed in a blur. In an effort to quiet his riotous thoughts, Kuroo found himself spontaneously re-routing his steps towards one of the neighborhood's more upscale bakeries instead. Perhaps a sugary indulgence and the simple, unassuming ambiance of the place could buoy his spirits and purchase some semblance of peace once more...

He had just collected a small box of artisanal marzipan fruits and some chocolates from the smiling confectioner when his phone began trilling. Kuroo felt his gut plummet straight through the floor as Kenma's name flashed on the screen.

Nearly dropping his purchase in the scramble to accept the incoming call, he pressed the device to his ear and tried to ignore the way his voice cracked upon answering.

"Hey, everything okay? You're still in Italy, right?"

There was a pregnant pause from the other line, followed by a low clearing of his best friend's throat. "Ah, yeah...yeah, I'm still in Milan until the weekend at least."

Another terse silence stretched between them - leaving Kuroo plenty of phantom shadows to populate with increasingly paranoid visions of half-articulated transgressions exposed. He was just about to blurt out some frantic platitude or innocuous excuse when Kenma's mild baritone interjected again.

"Sorry, I don't mean to call unannounced like this," he began in his usual reserved candor. "It's just...well, I've tried reaching [Y/N] herself but she hasn't picked up all day, and I wanted to check-"

"Oh, no, she's totally fine!" The words burst out in a panic-soaked rush before Kuroo could help himself. He forced himself to take a steadying inhale before continuing in a more modulated tone. "Yeah, we've just been...keeping busy and all while you're away. You know how she gets sometimes."

He winced at his own flustered rambling, but pressed on, desperate to steer the conversation away from dangerous territory. "Actually, it's kind of impressive. [Y/N] has really doubled down on her studies this week."

There was a pregnant pause on the other end before Kenma's responding laughter filtered through, dry and mildly disbelieving. "My [Y/N]? Studying voluntarily without being threatened bodily harm? Now I know you're kidding me, Kuroo."

Kuroo smiled thinly, well aware of how unlikely his claims sounded given your typical scholarly apathy. Still, he persisted, an idea sparking with sudden conviction. "I'm being totally serious, man. She's been holed up in her room almost nonstop, burying her nose in books and typing away at assignments. It's like she got body-snatched by a model honors student or something."

The laughter faded into skeptical quiet as Kenma seemed to realize his best friend wasn't joking around. "Wow...I, uh...I don't really know what to say," he admitted, sounding mildly bewildered. "I mean, don't get me wrong, I'm thrilled if she's taking her coursework seriously for once. But you have to admit it's a pretty drastic turnaround for my little hellraiser."

Kuroo couldn't help but grin ruefully at the apt description, old memories of teenage hellraising antics replaying in his mind's eye. "Tell me about it. I'm still waiting for the other shoe to drop and some massive rager or scandal to emerge."

"Hey now, don't give her ideas!" Kenma's feigned scolding was tinged with paternal fondness that made Kuroo's chest clench unexpectedly. "I'm putting my faith in you to keep her on this suddenly motivated path."

"You got it, don't worry," Kuroo assured him, tamping down the reflexive urge to confess the twisted detours you'd nearly led him down already. He sighed, shifting the bakery box to his opposite hand as he stepped out into the dusky evening air. "I'll keep a close-"

His words trailed off abruptly as his gaze landed on a darkened alleyway across the street. There, illuminated by a security lamp's harsh glow, a couple was intertwined in a heated embrace against someone's parked car. More specifically, the unmistakable figure of a young woman in a criminally short dress was straddling her companion's lap, hands fisted in his hair as she devoured his mouth with wild abandon.

Despite the poor lighting, something about the tumble of hair and feminine curves sparked a flicker of disquieting familiarity in Kuroo's chest. He squinted, trying to make out more details before forcing out an awkward chuckle.

"Damn Kenma, you're never gonna believe what I'm looking at right now," he muttered, unable to tear his gaze from the brazen public display even as he cringed. "Some chick literally grinding on some poor bastard's car like she's filming the intro to a bad porno. And get this - she looks dead-on like [Y/N]!"

The crass attempt at humorous deflection died on his lips as the security lamp flared brighter, casting the woman's face into sharp relief. Because there was no mistaking the upturned nose, the sensuous curve of those lips currently trailing hot, open-mouthed kisses along her partner's stubbly jawline...

It was you.

His daughter. His precious, frustratingly impulsive little girl straddling a stranger in the filthiest backstreet grope Kuroo had ever witnessed...right under his nose while he regaled Kenma with laughable tales of your studious reformation.

Something seemed to splinter behind Kuroo's ribcage as numbness descended like a burial shroud. He barely registered Kenma's concerned voice buzzing against his ear until the words "...llo? Kuroo? You still there?" pierced through the fog.

"Uh...y-yeah, sorry," he stammered weakly, unable to tear his gaze away even as you gyrated against your would-be lover with shameless abandon. "No, you're...you're absolutely right. Just another unfounded worry on my part."

He forced out a hollow chuckle, bile stinging the back of his throat as his stare stubbornly remained transfixed. "Don't worry about a thing over here. Everything is...is totally under control as per usual..."

The lie dripped like acid from his numb lips, curdling what little remained of his composure into smoldering embers. Before Kenma could probe or contradict further, Kuroo managed to force out some pithy excuse about paperwork needing attention and quickly terminated the call.

He stood rooted in place, chest heaving with ragged breaths as he absorbed the full, damning picture before him. You - tender, smart, mature you who mere hours ago had sworn up and down to reform your rebellious ways - rutting against a stranger in the most brazen, obscene manner imaginable.

The girl Kuroo had admonished himself to protect above all else, even his own pitiful weaknesses, was practically unraveled beyond recognition before his eyes. And all he could do was stand helpless witness while the sordid tableau unfolded around him like the punchline to a particularly cruel, cosmic joke.

Kuroo's entire being detonated into an inferno of fury as he watched you grind shamelessly against the stranger, uncaring of the sordid public spectacle. Every muscle went taut, tendons straining beneath his skin as a crimson haze of rage descended.

Part of him raged at the brazen deception - the fresh wounds of your earnest vows to reform and focus on your studies still burning raw. He'd actually begun to entertain cautious hope that this tempestuous chapter between you might reach some semblance of equilibrium once more. But here you were, spitting on that fragile detente without a shred of remorse.

But an even larger part seethed with something darker, more visceral. A primal, proprietary need to rip you away from that defiling embrace and reclaim what was his by...what? Right? Possession? The twisted tangle of sinful cravings you'd awakened anew these past few days that now clamored to be sated at any cost?

Kuroo's jaw clenched hard enough to grind enamel as you threw back your head in apparent bliss, lips parting in a punched-out moan of shameless rapture. His vision whited out momentarily, entire body going rigid as that same bestial impulse to claim and conquer you flared with blinding intensity.

Before conscious thought could fully intervene, his legs propelled him across the street in long, devouring strides. You didn't even register his thunderous approach until he was upon you, one large hand fisting in the hair at your nape to wrench you backwards.

"What the everloving fuck do you think you're doing?" Kuroo's voice lashed out in a guttural snarl so unrecognizable, even he barely identified it.

You yelped at the violent snapping of your heads, features contorting in a wince of discomfort as you were forcibly separated from your would-be conquest. Your erstwhile partner blinked in shock before bristling indignantly.

"Hey man, what the hell is your pro-"

Kuroo whirled on the hapless stranger with a look of such barely leashed violence, the other man actually flinched back. You seized the momentary distraction to scramble off the car's hood, chest heaving and confusion written large across your delicate features.

"Tetsurou, what are you-"

But Kuroo cut off your protest by reaching out and fisting an iron grip in your upper arm. You gasped at the punishing force, squirming futilely as his fingers dug in without mercy.

"We're leaving," Kuroo spat out through grinding molars, hauling you bodily against his side. "Now."

The unfortunate bystander who'd had his lurid plans so rudely interrupted seemed to rally his machismo at last. Squaring his shoulders, he took an inadvisable step forward - fists clenched and chest puffed out in a transparent display of misguided intimidation.

"Hey pal, I don't know who the hell you are," he sneered in a tone that was almost laughably unthreatening to Kuroo. "But you need to back the fuck off before I make you. The lady and I were in the middle of something private."

You opened your mouth to protest or deflect - undoubtedly either an innocuous excuse or an outright attempt at sneaking away if Kuroo had to guess. But any chance of mitigating this catastrophic situation through words or hollow placation had already burned to ashes in his blistering fury.

"Shut your goddamn mouth before I shut it for you," Kuroo growled, voice descending to a register of pure hellfire and devouring intent.

He didn't wait for the confused fratboy to rally another feeble retort. With insulting ease, Kuroo dragged you around and slammed the smaller man against the hood of the same car that had been the backdrop to such sordid debauchery only moments ago.

"This woman is my girlfriend," he snarled directly into the man's ashen face, not even registering the lie as it spilled from his bile-stained tongue. "And if you so much as look at her the wrong way again, I'll bury you out here in a shallow fucking grave. Nod if you understand."

The other man nodded with frantic obedience, every trace of posturing now wiped away by the tangible promise of violence rolling off Kuroo in searing waves. He barely registered you trying to twist out of his bruising grip, frantically motioning towards the terrified bystander.

"T-Tetsurou, stop! You're scaring him!" You hissed through plump, swollen lips. "Just let me handle this, you're only making it worse!"

With a wordless rumble of unadulterated venom, Kuroo tightened his fist in your hair and wrenched your head aside until your full attention focused solely on him.

"Don't you dare try and control the narrative now, little girl," he spat in a tone laced with sulfur and sin. Noting your flicker of apprehension at the potent authority in his commanding rumble seemed to kickstart some sadistic amalgam of satisfaction and self-loathing in his gut. "You lost all privileges to dictate anything when you decided to spread your legs and make a whore of yourself five minutes ago in public like a desperate fucking slut."

Your eyes widened into saucers at the vulgar insult, color searing your cheeks to match the angry flush staining your chest. But you wisely remained silent, apparently sensing the knife's edge Kuroo now teetered upon.

Not sparing the traumatized third wheel so much as a glance, Kuroo finally released his grip only to seize your arm once more. He dragged you away from the sordid scene in a wake of your stumbling footfalls, beelines towards where his car idled with ruthless intent.

"I swear to every higher power listening," he growled through clenched teeth as he hauled you implacably forward. "If you so much as look at another man between here and home, I'll toss you in the trunk like a misbehaving pet."

You couldn't entirely muffle the wounded sound that wrenched free, even as the furious compliance in your strides never faltered. Kuroo relished the heady swirl of shame and debauched satisfaction with equal relish - an intoxicating amalgam of brutality and corruption that threatened to rip the very seams of his tattered control wide asunder.

The drive back to Kuroo's apartment passed in thick, seething silence. You huddled against the passenger door, arms wrapped defensively around your midsection as you steadfastly avoided Kuroo's burning glare. The air was choked with unspoken recriminations and simmering fury.

Kuroo's knuckles were bone-white where they gripped the steering wheel, tendons standing out in harsh relief against his forearms. His jaw muscles ticked and flexed as he ground his teeth, struggling to contain the torrent of anger and disappointment roiling just beneath the surface.

When they finally arrived, Kuroo threw the car into park with more force than necessary, the tires chirping in protest. Without a word, he flung open his door and stormed towards the building's entrance, expecting you to follow. The fact that you immediately fell into step behind him only stoked his ire further.

It wasn't until you were both inside, the apartment door slamming shut with an ominous thud, that the dam finally burst.

"What the hell were you thinking?" Kuroo's voice lashed out like a whip crack in the tense quiet. He turned on you, eyes blazing with a mix of fury and something darker, more visceral. "Going off half-cocked like some reckless teenager chasing the next cheap thrill?"

You lifted your chin defiantly, refusing to be cowed. "I don't need to explain myself to you, Kuroo. You're not my father."

"You're damn right I'm not," he growled, advancing until you were forced to tip your head back to maintain eye contact. "Because if I was, I'd have spanked your disobedient little ass into next week a long time ago."

Your nostrils flared, clearly affronted by his harsh words. "That's real rich coming from the guy who nearly mauled a complete stranger just because he was getting a little action."

A muscle in Kuroo's cheek twitched at your mocking insinuation. "Don't play dumb, [Y/N]. We both know that shameless display had nothing to do with a casual hookup. You were out there practically begging to be treated like a glorified street walker."

His voice was low, dangerous, but you didn't back down an inch. If anything, your eyes glinted with fresh belligerence.

"And what if I was?" You challenged, jutting your chin out stubbornly. "My body, my choice who I decide to allow all over it. What's it to you, really?"

Kuroo closed the remaining distance between you in two strides, his larger frame suddenly looming over yours in clear intimidation. But rather than shrink away, you simply tilted your head back further, almost goading him with your refusal to yield.

"You want to act like a selfish, rebellious brat who doesn't comprehend consequences?" His voice was a rough growl now. "Fine, we can do this the hard way."

Your eyes widened a fraction at the tacit threat, but you disguised any trace of unease with a derisive snort. "Oh yeah? You gonna put me over your knee too while you're playing stern disciplinarian? Because we both know how well that worked out last time."

There it was - the flash of unmistakable hunger flickering to lurid life behind Kuroo's stare. You saw it, knew exactly which button you'd just pressed to fan the flames of his smoldering temper into something...else entirely.

"Keep pushing me," he rumbled, so close now that his words puffed hot over your parted lips. "I'm begging you, princess. Give me one more bratty remark, one more button to justify bending you over and showing you exactly what dealing with a selfish little brat like you really entails."

There was a beat of loaded silence, the undercurrent between you becoming a live wire of yearning and reproach in equal measure. Your tongue darted out to wet your lower lip, and Kuroo's gaze tracked the motion with laser focus, a muscle feathering in his clenched jaw.

"Is that a promise?" The words were little more than a throaty rasp, both challenge and outright invitation wrapped in velvet sin.

Kuroo's harsh exhale ruffled your hair, the sound more akin to a predator's growl than anything remotely human. Then, without warning, his hands landed on your hips in an unforgiving grip as he wrenched you flush against his rigid frame.

The breath stalled in your lungs as they finally breached that last fraying tether of resistance. One of you moaned - you couldn't tell who - before your mouths collided in a bruising, frantic clash of lips and teeth and shuddering need.

Kuroo's fingers dug into the soft flesh of your hips hard enough to leave lurid blossoms of mottled imprints as he wrenched you against the searing brand of his cock. A ragged growl tore from deep in his chest - part exaltation, part feral conquest - as your bodies collided with heated friction.

"You want this so fucking bad, don't you?" The words emerged in a gravel-roughened rasp that seemed to reverberate straight through to your molten core. "All those pouty little teases and wanton displays, just baiting me to give you exactly what your greedy body has been begging for."

He didn't give you a chance to respond before crushing his mouth over yours in a bruising, devouring kiss that rapidly turned slick and filthy. His tongue swept past your gasping lips to lash against yours in blatant possession, searing paths of possession that seared straight down to your quivering center as surely as any physical brand.

You whimpered against the onslaught, hands scrabbling up Kuroo's broad back to clench in the taut musculature knotted there. His hips rolled against you with a carnal grind of dominance that made you instinctively part your thighs wider in helpless invitation.

Kuroo noted your wanton display instantly, growling his viciously smug approval against the vulnerable curve of your throat where his scorching path led next.

"Fuck, look at you..." he rasped in a tone transmuted to pure gravel-laced decadence. "So goddamn desperate to take everything I've got already, and I've barely even begun claiming what's mine."

His fingers squeezed even tighter into the giving flesh of your ass, hauling you up until you were forced to lock your legs around his narrow hips to avoid tumbling fully into his punishing momentum. Kuroo took advantage instantly, rutting against your cloth-dampened heat with searing undulations that made your head fall back on a breathless moan.

"That's it, beautiful," he growled against the rapid flutter of your pulse point before lathing a heated path along the bared slope with his tongue. "Let me feel every one of those pretty little whimpers you've been dying to release..."

One large palm slid higher to palm the generous swell of your breast with merciless ownership. Your back arched as if electrified, nipples pebbling to diamond-sharp points that were promptly soothed by the calloused friction of Kuroo's palm kneading the swollen curves.

"A single night of you taunting me with that heavenly body was almost my undoing," Kuroo confessed in a fractured rasp that set your nerves afire. His lush lips branded a molten path up the vulnerable column of your throat until you trembled against him fully.

"Fuck...I can only imagine how quickly I would've self-destructed if I'd had you spread out and waiting for me with those big eyes begging for my cock night after night..."

Your entire body seized at the guttural benediction, walls fluttering against the scorching outline of Kuroo's cock still rutting against you with blistering intent. He swallowed your keening whimper with another punishing kiss that left you dizzy - tasting coppery crimson and utterly overwhelmed in the wake of his ruthless dominion.

By the time he tore his mouth from yours at last, you were quaking against him like a leaf in a storm - overwrought and delirious with a forbidden inferno now raging unchecked.

"Stay with me..." Kuroo entreated in a cadence that felt scored straight into your flayed nerves. The calloused rasp of his fingertips trailed rioting spirals of shattered restraint as he petted your sweat-dampened tresses back from your flushed features.

"Stay right here while I finally put that dirty little mouth of yours to use..." He ground out the barely-cloaked threat through gritted teeth. Those piercing hazel eyes you'd admired for so long now sparked with more lust and menace and proprietary challenge blazing behind them than you'd ever glimpsed before.

And the most terrifying part was how it didn't make you quail or retreat but rather molten thrills of eagerness knot in your quivering belly as Kuroo slowly lowered you back to your shaky feet. Heat sang straight through your veins at whatever reckoning had finally been unleashed between you...and how utterly powerless you felt to halt its all-consuming torrents even if you'd wanted to.

Kuroo stepped back at last, allowing you space enough to sway in dizzy abandon at the sudden deprivation of his scorching embrace. He watched you with the heated focus of a starving man beholding the most decadent delicacy - eyes burning over every trembling inch as his chest heaved with ragged drafts.

Then he lifted one hand towards you in a cruelly languid beckoning that made your entire body ignite with fevered possibility. That same hand you'd felt cradle your cheek was now extended imperiously, awaiting the benediction of total capitulation from your wrecked, overblown form.

"Come here..." Kuroo husked out with quiet promise that brooked no refusal. "And let me feel that greedy little cunt stretched around me while I teach it some manners for once."

With a strangled gasp, you stumbled forward on leaden legs. You didn't dare tear your gaze away from the predator's eyes that pinned you with such carnal hunger. Didn't risk shattering this fever-dream of temptation and utter ruination that seemed poised to engulf you completely.

When you were within arm's reach, Kuroo wasted no time, wrenching you flush against him with a bruising grip on your hip. Your lips parted in a startled gasp at the searing contact of his rigid cock grinding against the soaked gusset of your panties, but before any sound could escape, Kuroo had already seized the back of your neck with his other hand.

Your eyes flew wide in shock at the sheer possessive weight of his grip pinning you in place. But even as you tried to wrench away, a sharp slap across your ass stilled you immediately.

"That's right, beautiful," Kuroo purred, low and deadly. He rocked his hips in a punishing roll against the soaked seam of your underwear that made you shudder in helpless bliss. "You've got no say anymore. Not when you decided to behave like a reckless, attention-starved little brat and beg for someone else's cock like a cheap whore. No..."

He gave a rough, rumbling growl that vibrated all the way down your spine. Your toes curled against the floor, thighs quivering with the effort to remain upright under the onslaught. His words were like a physical brand, scorching their way through the remnants of your tattered resistance.

"From now on, I own every inch of you, including that perfect pussy," he crooned, the filthy promise making your cunt clench. "Every single delectable inch is mine to do with as I please. And if that means teaching you a lesson in the process..."

You could feel his smirk against your ear, the sharp, dangerous edge of it making you whimper. His palm slid from your neck, fingers wrapping around your throat with a firm pressure. Your eyes fluttered closed at the deliciously heady sensation, pulse fluttering under his touch.

"Then so be it."

You squealed as Kuroo suddenly lifted you off your feet, his hands gripping the back of your thighs to hoist them up and around his waist. Without a word, he started carrying you toward his bedroom, a small, distant corner of your brain marveling at his effortless strength.

Your back collided with his mattress a moment later, the abrupt impact forcing the air from your lungs in a startled gasp. Kuroo stood over you, hands working furiously at the buckle of his belt and the button of his slacks. The sight made something dark and twisted unravel deep in your belly, a need so overwhelming it threatened to drown you entirely.

The belt came free first, followed shortly by his pants. He made no move to remove them, simply lowering his boxers just enough to free the engorged length of his cock. The sight stole your breath all over again, your eyes greedily drinking in the sight of the thick, veiny shaft, already dripping with an ungodly amount of precum.

You didn't get long to stare, though, because a second later, Kuroo was grabbing your ankle and dragging you towards the edge of the bed. You yelped at the unexpected jolt, hands scrabbling for purchase in the soft sheets beneath you as he flipped your body around with ruthless ease.

His cock was now directly above your face, the tip dripping with need. With a low groan, Kuroo wrapped his fist around his throbbing shaft, pumping it slowly as his free hand grabbed the back of your head. Your scalp prickled at the sudden tug on your hair, a low, wounded sound escaping the back of your throat.

"You wanted this so bad, remember?" he grunted. His hand continued to pump his length, the head inches from your lips. You could see the way his cock twitched, hear the obscene sounds his hand made as he stroked himself, and your tongue darted out to swipe across your lower lip.

"Beg for it."

The command was simple and straightforward. Yet it struck at the deepest, most secret part of you, the part that was so desperate to be claimed, used, and ravaged, no matter the consequences. The part that had been aching for him since the day you'd first stayed with him.

"Please..." The word came out as a whine, pathetic and pitiful and needy. "Kuroo, please. Please fuck my mouth. Use me, however you want. I'm yours."

"Yes, you are," he rumbled. His hand tightened in your hair, pulling your face up to meet his cock. It slapped against your cheek, sticky pre-cum smearing along your skin, and a moan spilled from your lips. "Mine."

The tip of his cock dragged along your cheek, up towards your parted lips. It brushed across them, leaving a trail of his essence that you eagerly licked up, the bitter-salt taste flooding your mouth.

Kuroo groaned above you, eyes dark and dangerous and so fucking hungry. He thrust forward, cock sliding into your waiting mouth, and the world narrowed to that point of contact, the sensation of his length pressing against your tongue.

You moaned around his girth, and Kuroo's eyes fluttered closed, a hiss escaping him. He held your head in place as he began to fuck your mouth in slow, shallow thrusts, cock gliding along your tongue.

Your body felt alight with need, skin burning and prickling and electrified. Everything was too much and not enough, the air charged with anticipation and desire and an undercurrent of desperation. Your thighs pressed together, trying to alleviate some of the building pressure, and a muffled cry escaped you at the friction.

Kuroo opened his eyes at the sound, gaze darting down to where you squirmed on the bed. A low chuckle rumbled from him, and he withdrew his cock, letting it hover in front of your face. A thin trail of spit and pre-cum connected the tip to your lips, and the sight sent a shiver through you, made you clench around nothing.

"Is someone feeling left out?" Kuroo murmured, voice dripping with wicked promise. You nodded, unable to speak, and his cock twitched, another bead of pre-cum leaking from the slit.

"Then be a good girl and get yourself off for me. I want to watch while I fuck your mouth."

He waited until you'd shifted onto your knees, hand sliding down your belly, before plunging back inside your mouth. You moaned, the vibrations making his cock twitch, and slid your fingers underneath the band of your panties.

Your arousal was coating the insides of your thighs, had likely left a damp spot on the sheets beneath you, and you bit back a whine at the slick, gliding sensation as you ran two fingers along your folds. They slipped inside effortlessly, your walls already pulsing and hot and so, so needy.

Kuroo watched it all with an intensity that was both thrilling and terrifying, the hand not holding your head steady flexing into a fist as he fought for control. His hips rocked into you with more purpose, and your own fingers found the spot that had you seeing stars.

The room filled with the wet, squelching sounds of your fingers pumping into your pussy, the slap of Kuroo's balls hitting your chin, and his deep, guttural moans. Your free hand came up to cup his balls, and he growled, thrusting deeper into your mouth.

"Fuck," he rasped. His eyes were hooded, and you could feel him swelling in your mouth. "Take your panties off. I want to see you cum with my cock down your throat."

You shuddered at the crude words, pulling your soaked fingers from your dripping pussy and hooking them around the fabric to pull it down your legs. It fell to the floor, and you spread your thighs wider, fingers diving back to the apex of your legs.

A strangled noise tore from Kuroo's throat, and he thrust harder, the head of his cock hitting the back of your throat with each snap of his hips. His pace was growing erratic, and you could tell he was close, could feel his balls tightening in your palm.

You pumped your fingers faster, the pressure in your belly building, coiling tighter and tighter. You were so fucking close, and the knowledge that Kuroo was seconds away from blowing his load down your throat was almost enough to send you over the edge.

"Look at me."

You obeyed instantly, eyes locking onto his. The intensity of his gaze nearly shattered you, the raw desire, the possessive hunger, the sheer need written on his face. Your walls clenched around your fingers, and the dam broke, a gush of liquid heat spilling from your core as you came.

Kuroo swore, his eyes fixed on the puddle of cum soaking into the sheets, and then his hips stuttered, cock jerking violently as he came. Hot, sticky ropes of cum coated your throat, and you swallowed around his length, milking him for every last drop.

His chest was heaving when he finally pulled out, his fist releasing its hold on your hair to lazily squeeze the remnants of his orgasm onto your lips. You opened without thinking, licking his cum from your lips as it fell, and Kuroo groaned.

"Fucking hell, you're perfect," he breathed, tucking his cock back into his boxers. He bent to scoop you up in his arms, cradling you to his chest like a precious treasure. "Kenma raised a fucking goddess. I don't know how the hell I'm supposed to ever let you leave this bed now."

The rest of your stay was a haze of sweat-slicked skin, tangled sheets, and broken cries. Kuroo spent the remainder of the week fucking you every way he could, on every available surface, until you could no longer think straight, until your legs were trembling from exertion and you were covered in a multitude of love bites and hickeys.

But the one thing that stuck with you most, the image that had been burned into your mind from the moment you'd arrived, was the look of pure, undiluted worship in Kuroo's eyes.

And it was that look that made you realize you would never be able to leave him, not for good. Because somewhere between the late-night talks and the teasing banter and the way he looked at you, Tetsurou had taken root in your heart.

The day of Kenma's return dawned with an electric undercurrent thrumming through the apartment. You stirred against Kuroo's furnace-hot skin, roused by the featherlight caresses he was trailing down the dips of your spine.

"He'll be here soon," Kuroo murmured, the graveled timbre of his morning voice making you shiver. There was an unspoken weight behind the words, an acknowledgment that your insular haven was nearing its inevitable end.

Rather than being cowed by the looming presence of reality, you felt a defiant spark flare to life in your core. Pushing up to your knees, you allowed the tangled sheet to slip sinuously from your body in a gauzy susurration until you knelt gloriously bare before Kuroo's riveted stare.

"Then we'd better make the most of our time left," you breathed, bracing your palms on his powerful chest as you straddled his hips purposefully.

Kuroo's hands flexed against your waist, fingers digging in with delicious possession. "You're insatiable, baby girl." His voice dropped an octave, dripping with undisguised sin. "Thought I'd have worked some of that greedy energy out of you by now."

"You'll just have to try harder then, won't you?" You leaned down to slant your lips over his in a messy, eager clash.

Kuroo surged upright with a growl, rolling you both until he caged you beneath the solid brand of his weight. His broad palms mapped scorching paths down your body until he was gripping the underside of your knees. Then he shoved your pliant legs apart to make room for his cock to grind forward in one slick, insistent thrust.

You cried out at the searing friction, back bowing as he bottomed out within your velvet depths. Kuroo swallowed the ragged sound with a searing kiss, setting a punishing pace that knocked the breath from your lungs.

"That's it, babygirl," he growled against the swell of your gasping lips. "Open up and take every thick inch of me while you still can..."

He drove into you then with undisguised relish, the bed frame creaking ominously beneath you. You locked your ankles at the small of Kuroo's back to brace yourself, fingertips scoring delicious crimson streaks along the corded ridges until your shared grunts and rough gasps filled the room.

You lost track of how many times he brought you to that shattering precipice, your cries reaching a fevered peak before Kuroo dragged you inexorably back over the edge with each new brutal joining. Only the muffled buzzing of Kenma's text chime finally caused Kuroo to slow his insistent rhythm.

"Looks like daddy's on his way up," he rumbled, sweat-slick hair hanging in wild disarray around his beautifully wrecked features.

Pinning you with a smoldering look of pure sin, Kuroo rose onto his knees, thick forearms flexing as he gripped your hips and heaved them upward to allow even deeper penetration.

"Time for one more ride, beautiful. Make it loud so he knows exactly who his little girl belongs to now..."

[aphroditelovesu]

can you please write 🦄 for either yan!steve or yan!bucky?

❝🦄❞ - ‘’I... I really can't let you go.’’

❝tw: kidnapping and slight angst.

When Steve found you at home, well, at least he considers it your home, you were lying on the couch, reading a book of your favorite genre. The mere sight of your presence made him smile and he unconsciously moved closer to you.

"Hey, honey." He murmured as he sat down next to you on the couch, close to your feet stretched out and bare beneath the soft fabric. Steve frowned slightly when you didn't respond to him. "Honey? I'm home." He tried again, his voice firmer.

But he got no response.

Steve sighed irritably when he realized what you were doing. The punishment of silence.

Steve ran a hand through his hair, feeling his frustration growing. He knew the punishment of silence was your way of showing that something was wrong, but he couldn't understand what he could have done to deserve it.

Everything he did was for you. Always for you and would always be for you.

He leaned forward, placing his hand gently on your knee. "Honey, please tell me what's going on." He pleaded, concern evident in his voice. "I can't fix what's wrong if you don't tell me."

The book in your hands continued to be your only answer. Steve sighed again, deeper this time, and decided to try a different approach. He got up and went to the kitchen, preparing your favorite drink. Maybe, with a little patience and a gesture of affection, he could break the silence and find out what was going on.

Steve quickly returned to the living room, bringing with him a silver tray with your favorite drink and snacks. He placed it in front of him, on the coffee table. However, you refused to talk to him, or even look at him.

Had he done something wrong?

Steve tried to search his mind for anything he could have done that triggered such a reaction from him, this coldness that hurt him more than anything. He sighed when he finally realized that it may have been the sudden change in your life that caused you to become so cold towards him.

You still hadn't completely gotten used to his presence, to living with him. It had been something sudden when he brought you here, but Steve couldn't leave you alone, not when the world was becoming more and more dangerous. He couldn't even imagine what he would do if something happened to you.

Steve sat next to him again, this time closer. He gently touched your shoulder, trying to get your attention. "I know things changed too quickly." He began, his voice low and full of regret, "I brought you here thinking it would be for the best, but perhaps I didn't consider how much it would affect you."

He took a deep breath, trying to find the right words, "I just wanted to protect you, make sure you were safe. But I understand if you're feeling like you've lost your freedom, your old life. I'm sorry if I was selfish in not realizing it sooner."

Silence still hung between you, but Steve continued, determined to get through to you. "I want you to feel at home here, not like a prisoner. And if there's anything I can do to make this easier for you, please tell me. I'm here to listen."

You finally looked at him and placed the book down in your lap. Your gaze met his and you spoke, your voice loud and clear. "I want to go home. To my real home."

His gaze suddenly hardened and the grip on your shoulders tightened, becoming painful. His voice was low but you could feel the anger, the pain, in them. "No."

Your heart skipped a beat at the sudden change in his behavior. Steve had always been protective, but he had never been so authoritarian. You tried to pull your shoulders away from his grip, but he wouldn’t budge.

"Steve, you're hurting me." You mumbled, trying to keep your voice calm even as fear rose within you.

He took a deep breath, eyes softening a little, but his grip still firm. "Sorry." He murmured, slowly releasing you. "I just... I can't let you go. It's dangerous out there, and I can't risk losing you."

You rubbed your shoulders, feeling relief mixed with growing discomfort. "But I can't live like this, Steve. I need my freedom, my space. I can't be a prisoner. I can't."

He shook his head, visibly struggling with his own emotions. "It's not a prison. It's to protect you. You have to understand that."

Steve grabbed your hands and squeezed them gently, touching you as if you were made of glass, and with any wrong touch, you could fall apart. He rubbed your fingers and replied, "I... I really can't let you go."

His words were painful to hear because you knew he was telling the truth. He would never let you go.

[en-gelic]

THE BOY IS MINE — !

syn. when you get jealous gn. fluff 1.1k cw. skinship, jealousy, short reader 엔하이픈 형선 ୨୧ the boy is mine LiA'S NOTE my bday is on monday 🤭 COLLECTION 엔하이픈 막내선

LEE HEESEUNG — You had been watching him interact with the engenes for the past 20 minutes, watching as he made flirtatious jokes and held their hands. Pushing back the uncontrollable pout on your lips, you huffed and dodged his kiss when you arrived home. Bewildered by your indifference, he pestered you about it, trying to bribe you to tell him. "Why are you mad? Just tell me." He pressed, burying his head between your neck, pressing ticklish kisses on your collarbone. "Go talk to your fans." You pouted, shrugging him off and stalking into the kitchen. An amused smile grew on his lips as he bit back laughter at your childish behavior.

"Are the engenes really the cause of why you're mad." He questioned, catching your arm before you could escape his grasp. Feeling embarrassed, you refused to answer. He leaned down and pressed kisses on your lips, each one getting longer than first. Pulling away, he trailed kisses down your neck. "Engenes should be jealous of you," He began between kisses. "Because you have me, and I love you." "More than you love the engenes?" You huffed, feeling your anger deplete. He let out a breathy chuckle, scooping you up in his arms and moving to the bedroom. "Of course."

PARK JONGSEONG — Staring daggers at the waitress, you watched Jay charmingly smile at her and engage in what he called polite conversation, but to you was just straight up flirting. You could see that the waitress had a clear crush on him by the way she batted her eyelashes at him repeatedly and the way she hovered around your table like a lost fly. "Baby, where do you want to go after this?" He asked, finishing the wine in his glass. You muttered a half-hearted reply which he was behavior he was not used to seeing from you. Moving to place a hand on yours, he tried to read your face.

"What's wrong?" He questions, worried about your silence. "I don't know. Ask the waitress, she seems to be bored and waiting for a conversation with you." You complained, picking at your food like a 5-year-old. He smiled his charming smile at you, and you huffed even more, turning to look at him. "Just stop doing that smile to everyone." You complained, pushing down the corners of his mouth. "Now she's probably going to fall in love with you and you'll leave me for her ass and personality." You pouted. Leaning over, he pressed a kiss on your pouty lips. That single action caused your lips to twitch upwards as you tried to bite back a smile. He gave you a few more, leaving his lips stained with your red lip product. Getting out your wet wipes, you moved to wipe his lips but was stopped by him dodging your hand. "I have to show the waitress I have a girlfriend, so my pretty girl doesn't get jealous." He said, teasing you with a grin. "I hate you." You replied, feigning indifference, but actually pleased at his stained lips. "I love you too." He answered. ✶ more under the cut !

SIM JAEYUN — Jake had been laying on the floor, playing with Layla for the past hour, leaving you to relish in your growing hatred to a dog you used to love before. "Should we take Layla out for a walk?" He asked, sitting on the bed beside you. Without replying, you turned away from him, playing games on your phone. He shook your leg, immediately noticing something was wrong. "Babe?" He asked. "Go take her by yourself, since you love her more than me." You mumbled, sinking into your blanket barrier. He stilled for a moment, until he slid into the bed with you. "Are you jealous?" His hot breath swirled at your neck as amusement lined his voice.

"Why would I be jealous of a dog?" You retorted, even though you were indeed jealous of a dog. Knowing how much your pride meant to you, he stifled his giggles, which resulted in you huffing even more and moving out of his grasp. You felt him get out of the bed and heard the door open and close after. Thinking he left, you scoffed and buried yourself in the blanket, thinking about ways to get Layla out of the room. An arm startled you out of your thinking as you were moved to your back. Removing the blanket from your head, you found his eyes gazing down at you. "I was reading something," He started, caging you between his arms. "The art of fixing things with your girlfriend, I think it was called." Clearly, you knew that wasn't a thing, but you listened anyway. Leaning down, he caught your ear with his mouth, moving down to your neck. "Step one, was give her a kiss." Before you could reply, his lips collided with yours messily. Pushing him away, you struggled to catch your breath. "Where's Layla?" You questioned, knowing very well that she would come in between what you were about to do. He grinned his signature boyish grin. "She's on her walk."

PARK SUNGHOON — "Does he have to be so pretty?" You complained silently as your date was continuously interrupted by fans and onlookers stopping him to take a photo with him or get his autograph. "We should go to Tifanny and Co next," He started, excited after meeting his fans. "They just said that a new collection was coming out." Without replying, you excused yourself to the bathroom, muttering pouty complaints to yourself, Sunghoon smiling to himself at your irritation, finding it cute that you were jealous.

To make you even more jealous, he chatted about the fans on the drive home fighting back a smile at your pouty replies. You had been so immersed in your phone that you didn't even notice when he pulled up in an empty driveway. He picked up the phone in your hands and put it in one of his pockets, patting his lap afterwards. Pulling a face, you reluctantly moved to his lap, avoiding his gaze. "What's wrong, love? Feeling jealous?" He teased, moving you to face him. "No." You mumbled through evidently pouting lips. His hand traced the fabric on your jeans, moving his hand from your hips to your waist. Pulling you closer to his body, he pressed a peck on your neck, holding it there before moving to your collarbone. "What do you want?" You complained, pushing away from him. Your action was short-lived as he pulled you back, peppering more kisses on your neck. "You." Dancing around the border of temptation, he kissed everywhere but your lips. After he pulled away, your pout increased. "Why did you stop?" He displayed his perfect teeth through a grin. "I see you've forgiven me. Say please and I'll consider." He teased. "Kiss me and I'll forgive you." In an instant, his lips were on yours; the action of forgiveness becoming messier. Pulling away, you slid off his lap. "I'll forgive you now."

© EN-GELIC, 2024

[wilted-society]

playing with fire

pairings: mattheo riddle x reader

genre: fluff + angst

warnings: suggestive ending, cussing

— mattheo's flirtiness couldn't be held back. You decided you were fed up with it.

Hogwarts hummed with its typical vibrancy, the old stone corridors filled with the noise of students' chatter and sporadic laughter. Despite the lively surroundings, you were preoccupied with a recent confrontation with Mattheo. Your relationship, marked by a fiery mix of passion and intensity, had taken a toll on you, leaving you especially shaken and uneasy after this latest disagreement.

With a heavy heart, you strolled your way through the great hall. Stopping to sit down beside Pansy, who took notice of your unusual behavior.

"What's the matter? You usually sit next to Riddle?" Pansy questioned, seemingly oblivious but quickly realized as she noticed the tension between you two. "Oh.. Is it bad?" She whispered, to which you only replied with a weak nod.

On the other hand, Mattheo, who was sitted beside Theodore, looked your way for a moment and then went back to his food. Playing with, barely even eating any of it.

"What's happened? She usually sits right next to you." Theo furrowed his eyebrows, looking between you and Mattheo. Immediately noticing the tension. "I fucked up." was all Mattheo said, before turning back to his plate and played with his food. Theodore urged him to tell what was the reason, kept pestering him until he finally told Theo.

The fight had stemmed from a misunderstanding that quickly spiraled out of control. Mattheo had been spending more time with his Slytherin friends, particularly a girl named Cassandra, who had a reputation for being overly flirtatious.

Y/N had confronted Mattheo about it, her insecurities bubbling to the surface.

"Why do you keep spending so much time with Cassandra?" Y/N had demanded, her voice tight with jealousy. "She's all over you, and you don't seem to mind."

Mattheo had frowned, clearly taken aback by her accusation. "Cassandra's just a friend, Y/N. You're overreacting."

"Am I?" Y/N had shot back, her frustration growing. "It feels like you're pushing me away. Like you don't care about how I feel."

Mattheo's eyes had darkened with anger. "That's ridiculous. You're being paranoid. I can't have friends without you thinking the worst?"

The argument had escalated, each of them saying things they didn't truly mean. Mattheo had stormed off, leaving Y/N feeling a mix of anger, hurt, and regret. The wounds from their fight still stung, and she couldn't shake the feeling that their relationship was on shaky ground.

"Yeah you fucked up," Theodore patted Mattheo on the back, "better make it up to her then." Theo said before turning back to group, to which Mattheo sighed.

.

"I swear, Luna. That guy will be the death of me. He was basically eye-fucking that Cassandra, flirting with her like he doesn't have a girlfriend!" You ranted to Luna Lovegood, who was intently listening to you rambling.

Luna, perched on a windowsill with her legs crossed, watched you with her usual calm demeanor. Her big, silvery eyes were filled with empathy and a hint of concern. "That sounds incredibly frustrating, Y/N. Have you tried telling Mattheo how you feel?"

You stopped pacing and turned to face her, your frustration palpable. "I did, Luna. But he just brushed me off, saying I'm overreacting. It's like he doesn't even care how much it hurts."

Luna tilted her head, considering your words carefully. "Sometimes people act out in strange ways when they're dealing with their own insecurities. Mattheo might not realize how much his actions are affecting you."

You threw your hands up in exasperation. "Well, he needs to realize it, Luna! It's like he's purposely trying to get a reaction out of me. And it's working. I don't know how much more I can take."

Luna slipped off the windowsill and walked over to you, her movements graceful and serene. She placed a gentle hand on your shoulder. "Maybe he's trying to provoke you because he's unsure about his own feelings. Or maybe he's testing the boundaries of your relationship. Either way, you deserve honesty and respect."

You felt a lump forming in your throat, and tears threatened to spill over. "I just... I love him, Luna. But this is tearing me apart. Seeing him with her, laughing and flirting like I'm invisible... it hurts so much."

Luna's expression softened even more, and she pulled you into a comforting hug. "Love can be very complicated, Y/N. But you are strong, and you deserve someone who makes you feel valued and secure."

You hugged her back, feeling some of your tension ease in her calming presence. "What should I do, Luna? I don't want to lose him, but I can't keep feeling like this."

Luna stepped back and looked into your eyes, her gaze steady and wise. "You need to have a serious conversation with Mattheo. Tell him exactly how his actions are making you feel. If he truly cares for you, he'll listen and make an effort to change. If he doesn't, then you need to consider what's best for your own well-being."

You nodded, wiping away a tear. "You're right. I need to be honest with him and with myself."

Luna smiled, a soft and reassuring expression that made you feel a little lighter. "And remember, you always have friends who care about you. You're never alone in this."

"Thank you, Luna. I really needed to hear that," you said, your voice steadier now.

"Anytime, Y/N. Let's go for a walk by the lake. The fresh air might help clear your mind and give you the courage you need to face Mattheo," Luna suggested, her hand still gently resting on your arm.

You nodded, grateful for her support. "That sounds like a good idea."

.

"Goodnight, Luna!" You bade your goodbyes to Luna, parting ways as you strolled through the winding corridors on your way to the Slytherin dungeons.

The dim torchlight illuminated the path ahead, and the castle seemed almost alive with its shadows and quiet reverberations.As you quietly strolled, you heard a voice call out your name.

"Y/N!" It was him—Mattheo Riddle. The same voice that always had the power to make your heart race, the one that whispered sweet nothings to your ear. But tonight, his voice only stirred up more anger and heartbreak.

You chose to ignore him and kept walking, determined not to give in. "Y/N! Please, can we talk through this?" he begged, his footsteps echoing against the stone walls as he hurried to catch up.

You paused and turned to face him, a cold glint in your eye. "You better be." You narrowed your eyes at him, still furious and heartbroken.

Mattheo ran a hand through his hair, his dark eyes filled with a mix of desperation and regret. "I know I messed up, Y/N. I didn’t realize how much it would hurt you.”

Your heart wavered slightly at the sincerity in his voice, but you quickly regained your resolve. “Actions speak louder than words, Mattheo. You flirt with other girls and brush me off. How am I supposed to believe anything you say?”

He took a step closer, his presence encroaching on your space. “I’ve been an idiot, Y/N. I swear, I didn’t mean to hurt you. I just—I’ve been dealing with my own insecurities, and I wasn’t thinking straight.”

You felt a surge of frustration and sadness, but deep down, you still cared for him. “You have a funny way of showing it, Mattheo.”

He reached out, his hand gently cupping your cheek. “I’m sorry. I never want to lose you. I just need you to understand.”

The touch of his skin against yours sent shivers down your spine. It was a soft caress, a brief moment of tenderness amidst the chaos. You felt torn between wanting to push him away and craving the intimacy that only he could provide.

His dark eyes bore into yours, his voice low and intense. “Let me make it up to you, Y/N. Let me show you how much I care.”

Your breath hitched at the suggestion, and you felt a twinge of desire creeping into your thoughts. “Show me?” you murmured, your voice betraying a hint of vulnerability.

Mattheo’s hand slid from your cheek to the small of your back, pulling you closer. “Yes. Let me prove to you that I’m worth it.”

He leaned in, capturing your lips in a slow, heated kiss. You could feel the tension in his body as he deepened the kiss, his hands moving to caress your waist. A shiver ran through you as his touch lingered on your skin.Your resistance melted away as you responded to his kiss, feeling the need to be close to him. It was a soft, heated moment that made you forget the pain of the past few days.

Breaking the kiss, Mattheo rested his forehead against yours, his breath warm against your lips. You smirked, an idea—rather suggestive, came up in your head. "Lead the way, then."

And with that, Mattheo wasted no time dragging you both into his room. His smile was visible as he sprinted immediately to prove himself.

[animeyanderelover]

Anon: May I request Platonic Mukamis with a little sister?

Tw: Yandere themes, toxic relationship, possessive behavior, obsession, overprotective behavior, clinginess, delusional mindset, isolation, manipulation, threats, self-harming tendencies

Little sister

None of the Mukami brothers are related by blood yet their bond surpasses that of even siblings who are related. They have been sticking together ever since they found each other and fought for their survival in the unforgiving world. They find you when you are but a mere baby, a few months old at best, left behind in a side street as if you are disposable trash. Whilst Yuma and Ruki show some hesitation as they don't know how capable they will be to provide for you, especially since you are so young and dependent, Kou and Azusa are immediately enraptured when you look at them with innocent doe eyes. Azusa even starts crying as he begs his older brothers to take you in and ultimately Ruki gives in to his pleas. It is always difficult but they try their best to cater to your needs as good as they can and even give you a name after a lot of small arguments about what name fits you best. Your wellbeing is prioritised over even their own as your presence is like rays of sunlight, warm and welcoming. When Karlheinz offers to transform them, all of them immediately take the offer as they realise that this is their chance to give you the treatment that you deserve.

Ruki Mukami

📘​Even if Ruki has expressed his doubts when the four brothers found you back when they were still humans, he has grown into the role of your oldest brother. Perhaps even a little bit too well. The fact that he didn't immediately want to take you under their care when you were still a baby is something he hides from your knowledge even so many years later and he has urged his brothers to do the same. He fears that if you were to ever find out about his initial hesitance, you would turn your back on him and favor his younger brothers over him. He takes immense pride in the fact that he is your oldest brother as he likes to treat it as if it would give him some special rights in comparison to his younger brothers. Those special rights include making most of the decisions for you as he claims that as the oldest he naturally has the most experience and knows what would be best for you in every situation of your life. If you have anything that worries you, Ruki encourages you to seek him out. He is the one who oversees your homeschooling as his brother and him have all agreed that attending school with humans is far too dangerous for you. He can teach you all you need to know.

📘​From all of your brothers, Ruki is the one who places the most restrictions on you, even as you grow older. His motivations lie largely within his paranoia and his overprotective tendencies because even if you are a half-vampire just like them, he can't stop himself from still seeing that little, toothless baby in you that smiled whenever she saw his face. It is only natural for you to grow older and more independent yet Ruki finds himself despising that process as he worries that one day you may intend to leave the mansion and go on your own adventures. You are his little light and you have always been and he has always been your big brother and intends for you to continue thinking that way. He is quite adamant on family events where all Mukami siblings participate and his brothers have never once rejected that idea because it means spending precious time with their adored, little sister. The happiness you five share is not an illusion and he really wants you to realise that whenever such a family event happens. You could never get the same amount of happiness with anyone else besides them. Do you understand him? It is best and safest for you to always stay with your beloved brothers.

Kou Mukami

​🎤​From the very first moment your bleary eyes met his own, Kou has known that he would do everything for you and turn into anyone if it meant to keep you and protect you. You are a little princess that deserves the world yet surviving on the streets always meant that he couldn't treat you the way he wanted to. When Karlheinz transformed them and gave them capabilities and riches they could have never dreamt about before, Kou finally could do what he hadn't been able to do before. From the very first day since they started their new life to the current day, your second-oldest brother has never stopped spoiling you absolutely rotten. Whatever you have wanted throughout your life, you have always gotten from him as prices nor rarity of the object you wanted have never mattered to him. Kou is quite playful and he proudly claims that title as your favorite playmate. Whether you want him to play with your puppets with you or want to play hide and seek with him, he has always entertained you. Ruki has reprimanded him already due to the risk he sees in some of the games he plays with you but Kou has always reassured him that he would never allow you to get hurt.

​🎤​From the first night they took you in though, Kou has always sung for you. It always made his heart swell when you would start crying during the day or night but would slowly calm down the moment he started singing a lullaby for you. It is one memory he greatly bemoans the older you grow and lullabies start being less important to you yet he still sings for you quite often. He composes a lot of songs and many of them he has written for you during his life, soothing melodies and kind words to calm your frightened young mind as you grew up. You still love his voice and his music though and that knowledge fills him with pride and with warmth and he gladly allows you to try to write a song of your own or teaches you how to play an instrument. He finds himself playfully pouting whenever he notices that you prefer spending time with another one of his brothers, he can't help the tinge of jealous he feels whenever he witnesses that sight. He tolerates it though as he knows that Ruki, Yuma and Azusa are mindful of the time they spend with you. Such jealousy always evaporates the moment you compliment him though or tell him how much you love your big brother.

Yuma Mukami

​🌱​Yuma has his doubts when they initially pick you up because he knows how harsh the environment is that they live in. He has always been tall and physically very strong which allows him to protect those who are important to him. You are still a tiny and fragile baby though. How are you supposed to survive on the streets? Even when Ruki agreed to take you under their care, he still has his doubts. It is the moment he holds you for the first time and you wrap your tiny fingers around one of his that he gathers the determination to defend you till his last breath. After he has been turned into a half-vampire and gained even more physical strength, he has only strengthened that vow in his mind. His tall physical build has always led him to be exceptionally gentle with you, especially when you are still only a small child. A part of him has always been worried that you may be scared of him because of his strength and tall build yet you have never expressed once any anxiety as you always come running to him and stretch your arms out, your large eyes begging him to lift you up and twirl you around. He has never been able to deny those cute eyes of yours, even though he has always been careful.

​🌱​Whether lifting you up, letting you sit on his shoulders or giving you a piggyback, Yuma has always been the equivalent of a human amusement park for you and this is something he takes pride in. He has been taking you to his garden from a very young age too and you are the only person who has ever gotten away with jumping through his patch without getting chased down angrily by him. He enjoys teaching you how to cater to the needs of a plant and how to tell if the fruits and vegetables are ripe or not. Whatever of the harvest you prefer the most is what he ends up sowing and growing the most in his garden just to watch the excited glimmer in your eyes whenever he informs you that it's time to harvest your favorite fruits and vegetables. You are in general quite isolated from other people yet the few times you are taken out, Yuma is terrifyingly efficient to scare away anyone who looks like they consider to approach you. Very few have the guts to chat with you if he is always right behind you after all. All that frightening strength that could easily crush someone's skull is never shown to you though as Yuma has always been only gentle and careful with you.

Azusa Mukami

​🗡️​Azusa has been attached to you from the very start, his heart nearly bursting when he found your little form in a basket all alone as your mother has left you behind. He begs Ruki to let them keep you as he fears that no one else would take you in and that you would end up dying lonely and afraid without having ever experienced love and he even bursts out in tears as he pleads to his older brothers. He even volunteers to take care of you all by himself if no one from that would agree to keep you. He has stayed the most attached to you even up until now, although he has been forced to limit the time he spends with you as you grow older and require a bit more privacy. When you were a baby he would always be right next to you or hold you even himself as you fell asleep, his fingers playing with your small ones and he would read bedtime stories to you, always happy when you came running to him with a book clutched in your hands that you wanted him to read to you. The youngest brother of yours often finds himself bemoaning the time when you were so cute and tiny, even if you will forever be his baby sister for him. Sometimes he still asks you if he can read a book to you.

​🗡️​Whilst his older brothers care for him, Azusa has some self-harming tendencies and they have always been worried that he might set a bad example for you. They care for him and want him to stop because it saddens them to see him like that but they are also afraid that you might pick up on it or would get scared once you are old enough to realise what Azusa is doing. To all of their relief helping to raise you seems to rid Azusa of that unhealthy behavior of his for the most part as he instead dedicates much more time to protect and raise you lovingly. Yet he has some relapses at times, mostly when you have an accident or fall ill. He cares deeply for you so seeing you in any kind of pain induces him with such anxiety that he feels his throat tightening and his vision blurring. In a very twisted sense of wanting to suffer with you, he resorts to grabbing a knife and cutting himself over and over again to show solitude with you. Azusa never tells you the truth behind all the bandages and the band-aids he wears the next time you see him though as all of his brothers have warned him that he might make you feel guilty. Being the reason for your sadness is the last thing Azusa would want.

[byunpum]

Tsa·zìskrrmipaw | part 2

Pair: Neytiri x Y/N human baby x Sully family

Warning: soft moments, mother rage, violence, sadness

Note: I had this job done a long time ago, but I changed a few things. Finally I am publishing it. I hope you like it a lot, and enjoy it. Remember to read part 1 <3

AVATAR MASTERLIST | Part 1 | Part 2

If there was one thing Neytiri was sure of when she decided to accept little Y/N into her family, it was the offensive comments. The discriminating looks they would give her and her baby. She could receive all kinds of insults and mistreatment. But her little Y/N? oh no, not her. Her little bean shouldn't be treated like that. So she became much more protective of her baby. Neytiri knew she couldn't have you locked up all your life in the hut. That she and Jake wouldn't be around you all the time, even your siblings. Neytiri knew she had to let you grow up, but she was very afraid.

The day was pretty quiet, lo'ak and kiri were taking their midday nap, while little Y/N was playing with her father. Jake was lying on the floor, while Y/N was combing his hair and cuddling him. Meanwhile neytiri was finishing weaving a foot bracelet for her children. Neytiri was giggling at the scene ahead of her. Jake was almost asleep, while y/n's little hands were trying to climb up and move his father's head to the other side. Jake said it was "spa day for daddy," but he was taking it very seriously. "daddy you have a big head" says y/n, now using his feet to move jake's head. He laughs, and stands stiller. "You're the big head" jake jokes, moving his hands up from his head to hold the little girl. Pulling her up into the air, hearing her laugh. Now laying her on his chest, cuddling her and giving her lots of kisses. Neytiri feels so in love, at times like this she is glad and thankful that jake is her partner and father of her children. He is such a great father.

"Y/N!!!" Neteyam's voice is heard from afar, running into the hut. The boy had gone out to play with some friends. He ran as fast as he could to his little sister. "You have to come with me, I found the perfect place to play" says neteyam, wrapping his arms around y/n's chest. Lifting her into the air. "Hey easy warrior…remember your sister is smaller" says jake, taking y/n in his hands to put her on the ground. Little y/n didn't care about any of these actions, for her it was all a game.

"Neteyam what's wrong?" asks neytiri, watching as her eldest son runs to her. "Mom…I found a really nice place to play and practice with y/n. She can go with me, right?" asks the boy, excited. Neytiri is silent, giving jake a quick glance. He lifts his shoulders, waiting for his partner's decision. Y/n was 6 years old, and barely out of the hut. But what worried her most was the behavior of some of the clan members. Many accepted the human as part of the clan. But many rejected her presence. "Mom please!!!" the little girl is at her brother's side. Jumping up and down with excitement, while neytiri thought of what to say. "My love…why don't you play here near the hut, where you always play?" speaks neytiri, neteyam pouts.

After several minutes of begging, Neytiri agreed to let the two children go out to play. Neytiri felt as if her heart wanted to go out, she was getting nervous. Watching as both children ran out of the hut, "teyam…take care of your sister!!!" shouts neytiri. Jake walks up to her, sitting behind her. Hugging her from behind, wrapping his arms around her waist. "My love… she'll be fine, she's just going to play. It's okay" jake speaks, wrapping his arms around neytiri more. He knew what neytiri was like with y/n. Jake was still surprised… when neytiri brought a human baby to care for him, then wanted to adopt her. And now she cared for y/n more than she cared for herself. He didn't know what y/n had done in neytiri, but it had to be something magical. "Yes…I know she'll be fine, after all neteyam is with her" neytiri tries to calm down.

Meanwhile neteyam and y/n had arrived at the place. It was right next to the village, a nice jungle area. Where there were low trees, perfect for y/n to play with. The grass was soft, and the creatures that went to drink water from the small lake in the middle of the place were very safe. There were even more na-vi children playing in the area. Neteyam took her sister by the hand, but not before taking the oxygen mask and placing it on her younger sister's nose. "Breathe," said Neteyam excitedly. When they were ready, they ran to a branch. Neteyam helped his sister up, running along the wide trunk. They played like this for more than an hour. Practicing jumping, making bows out of the wood they found. Even collecting rare objects to place in their father's hair. Neteyam took great care of y/n, carrying her in places where she could fall. Cleaning her face, and always making sure her oxygen was good.

Both children were very entertained playing, they were watching some giant snails moving on the trunk of the tree. Until they felt that someone was behind them. The giggling of some children caught neteyam's attention. He quickly turned around and got up from the ground. While y/n tried to imitate him. "My mom says you should be with your own kind," said one of the children. Looking at the little girl, who was already feeling intimidated. "Mine says you should have died when your real mom did" says another child, this one was taller. "Hey, what's the matter with you guys? Stop bothering us…GET OUT!!!" shouts neteyam annoyed by the comments. Meanwhile y/n was holding neteyam's hand tightly. She didn't understand why those kids were saying that to her, to Y/N her mother was neytiri. They were the same…or so she thought. Neteyam was arguing with the children, who were much older than neteyam. One of the boys grabbed y/n's arm and lifted her into the air. While another one pushed and held neteyam on the ground.

He had the little y/n in the air, she was crying and screaming. "teyam!!!" she screams as loud as she can. Neteyam helplessly on the ground. The na-vi child had him restrained. "And what's this for?" the annoying bully grabs the oxygen box that y/n used to have around her waist. In a jerk he rips it off, and now he's observing it. "Stop that!!!! That's a big thing…she could die, PLEASE LEAVE HER ALONE!!!" yells neteyam. The little boy was crying in helplessness, as he saw how desperate his little sister is. The boy threw y/n on the ground, the fall was hard. He threw her with much force, then to kick her in the ribs. The little human girl writhed in pain. As she curled into a ball on the ground, while still crying. "Oh, so without this…you won't bother the clan anymore?" says the boy…giving neteyam one last look. When he burst the oxygen machine on the floor. "Nooooo" shouts neteyam, knowing that this was one of the most important tools for y/n.

Note: Y/n can breathe pandora's air, but she needs human air every few moments. That's why she had the oxygen mask.

The device shattered into a thousand pieces, while the other children stepped on what they could. With a few scoffs, the boy holding Neteyam let go. Neteyam ran to his little sister… picking her up in his arm. To hug and comfort her. Neteyam wanted to fight for his sister, but that would make things worse. "I'll tell your mothers," Neteyam says. The little boy was holding his sister in his arms, trying to calm her down. The children scoff at him starting to walk away. "yeah…right" the laughter trails off, as they disappear into the jungle. Neteyam looks down to see his little sister.

Y/n had some scrapes on her shoulders and the blow she had taken to her ribs was already getting swollen and purple. "teyam…it hurts so m-much" y/n cries. Hugging his brother. " Don't worry…come on let's go home, mom and dad will know what to do" says neteyam. He was little too, this was all a bit confusing for him. But he had to be the big brother, carrying his sister carefully.

Neytiri suspected that something had happened, you two had taken so long to return. "neytiri calm…calm" neytiri speaks to herself. But all calmness was gone when she saw her mother enter. Mo'at had a worried look on her face. Neytiri stood up quickly. "What happened?" the woman asks. Mo'at approaches. "Some children hurt y/n and neteyam took her to me," Mo'at says, not wanting to upset her daughter. But she had to tell her the truth. Jake was nearby listening in. He, too, quickly approached the women. "What? Mom!!! Y/N IS SHE OK?" neytiri is hysterical. "Daughter, come…she is crying and calling for both of you" says mo'at she was also a little confused by this situation. Neytiri told jake to stay with lo'ak and kiri, while she saw what had happened.

Neytiri arrives at mo'at's hut. Entering as quickly as she could, she saw norm at y/n's side, he was taking her vitals. Neytiri observed how several parts of her little girl's body were bandaged. And the big bruise on her ribs. What the hell had happened? Her heart wanted to burst. "Mama!" neteyam whimpers, he was right next to his sister. "Mama!!!" y/n cries. Neytiri runs to her daughter. Stroking her hair, giving her a kiss on her forehead. "my baby..what happened?" neytiri starts to examine her daughter's whole body. "The blow to the rib was serious" says norm, he was talking seriously. Neytiri looks at him with concern. Y/n starts coughing, as she always did when she lacked oxygen. Norm approached him, placing the large oxygen mask on him. "What about her oxygen machine?" asks Neytiri.

"mom they broke it!!!" neteyam was so worried, sitting on his mother's lap. "by eywa…what happened?" Tears of fury began to comulate in neytiri's eyes. Whoever had done this was going to suffer the consequences…neytiri had to find out what had happened. After a while, Norm handed her the oxygen machine. Telling her that he was going to make another one for Y/n that would be appropriate for her size. Mo'at told him that it was best for Y/n to get plenty of rest. The blows were very strong. Neytiri held her little daughter to her chest, as her baby cuddled her neck. She was asleep. While neteyam was holding her free hand. "Hey neytiri…you need to figure this out…with that blow to the ribs. Y/n could have died…this is serious" says norm. Before neytiri nods with her face and begins the walk home.

On the way neteyam told her everything, how that children had insulted her sister. How he had beaten her and treated her. Apologizing for not protecting his sister. "Love…this is not your fault. You're little too, and those kids are much bigger than you two. They are wrong for doing this, but don't worry I will take care of it" says neytiri.After quite a long walk, they arrived at the hut. Jake ran up to neytiri when he saw the state of Y/n. "What the hell happened?" jake is shaken. Neytiri explained everything to Jake, the more Neytiri told him the more upset Jake became. Who did they think they are, hurting one of Toruk Makto's sons?

Neytiri carefully placed the girl in her hammock, she was very sleepy. Placing her oxygen mask on her, at a gentle rhythm. Just so she could breathe both airs. Neytiri followed the same routine as every night, but she was very upset. "Mama…y/n will she be alright?" asks lo'ak looking at his sister from afar. Neytiri walks over to her son, stroking his face. Lo'ak and y/n were practically twins, with several months of differences. They were raised at the same time. Lo'ak used to sleep with y/n, and jake had told him he should sleep alone today. "Yes honey… she's fine. She just needs to rest" neytiri carries the child, taking her to kiri's hammock. After putting all the children to rest, neytiri quickly left the hut.

Jake was just outside, at the edge of the hut, which was at the height of a large tree, Jake was cleaning the pots that had been used for the meal when he saw how neytiri stormed out, her gaze was focused on a target. Grabbing her hand to make her stop for a moment. "baby where are you going?" asks jake. Neytiri waved her hand for jake to let go, and continued on her way. Jake stayed there watching neytiri walk away, but several minutes after neytiri disappeared into the brightly lit jungle he decided it was best to chase after her. Verifying that all the children were okay, he climbed down from the tree and followed his partner.

On the other hand, neytiri knew what she was going to do. Where she was going to go. She knew that group of mothers, the mothers of those troubled children. They used to eat together, they used to stay late in the common area of the village. With their hands closed, and their anger at a high level. Neytiri reached the group of women. The na'vi women were finishing their meals, others were laughing about some topic of conversation. Until one of them felt someone grab her head, revealing her neck. Feeling a sharp knife in her throat.

"I think I was very clear…when I said to stay away from my daughter" says neytiri. Her tone of voice was low and threatening. Showing her fangs, and with dilated pupils. The women around stood up for themselves, shouting and asking neytiri to release their friend. "Your son almost took my daughter's life," said neytiri. Listening as the woman in her arms, lets out a mocking laugh. "You're talking about the devil," says the woman, feeling a cut on her arm as neytiri slams her hard to the ground. She hit her head, seeing how neytiri was now on top of her. Fury was all over her entire body. "The only demon here is your damn child" speaks neytiri. Hearing as the woman's partner approaches, the man rushes over. Neytiri stands up, she could take this man. If she had to defend her daughter's honor she would do it, no matter what.

Just as the man approached to attack Neytiri and defend his partner. Jake appears in front of him, with a quick punch to the chest. Leaving him on the ground, right next to his partner. Jake began to growl, pulling out his knife. Positioning himself in front of neytiri, to create a barrier. "If I ever see your son again…or any of your children near my children. I swear I'll rip his head off myself!" shouts Neytiri. Jake is backing her up, ears perked up, fangs out. None of them were brave enough to reveal themselves in front of Toruk Makto and Neytiri. They were great warriors.

The couple and the group of women walk away. With difficulty because of the blow and cut that neytiri had given to the woman. Leaving Jake and Neytiri alone surrounding the bonfire. Jake didn't look away until he saw the group disappear. Turning to see neytiri collapsed on the ground, covering her face with her hands. Tears began to flow, and whimpering shrieks began to sound. Jake kneels down to hug neytiri. "She could have died…and I wasn't there to take care of her. I promised mom I would take care of her…I promised to be her mother and take care of her. And today I almost lost her jake, ma jake today one of our daughters almost died" neytiri looks at jake, she was collapsed. She was in pain and furious.

"I know…I was really scared too," says jake, watching neytiri's eyes widen. That's what she was afraid of…afraid of losing her. It took neytiri so long to accept that she loved a human. It took her so much to give all her love to a creature who needed her. And now that she had promised her that she would always take care of her, these things happen to her little girl. "Ma neytiri… Y/n will have to live with all these comments and situations. But we will always be here to take care of her…like now." Jake laughs a little, trying to cheer his partner up. Neytiri just hugs him tighter. + + The days passed and little Y/N got much better, she still had that bruise on her ribs. And it still hurt, but he was already playing as if nothing happened. Even lo'ak went back to sleep with her sister. Neytiri was barely leaving the hut, she didn't want to meet those women. Much less leave Y/N alone, she would rather stay with her children at home. By coincidence, that morning, while everyone was eating breakfast, "Mom, could we go to the river? I want to go play with lo'ak" says y/n sitting on her father's lap. "mmm I don't think so" says neytiri, shaking her head quickly. "ahhh mama!!!" says lo'ak, whining. They hadn't been out to play for a long time, the only one who had been out was neteyam and that was because he had to go to practice.

Jake gives neytiri's hand a squeeze, laughing a little. The woman takes a calming breath before replying. "It's okay…besides I think you guys need a bath" says neytiri tickling kiri. She was still half asleep. Later, jake takes neteyam with him, while neyitir takes kiri, lo'ak and Y/N to the river. Watching as the children run when they see them approach the water source. Screaming and laughing. They looked so happy. Neytiri settles down on a rock, beginning to settle everything to clean up for her children. She regretted that neteyam was not there today, he smelled bad too. First it was kiri, while lo'ak and Y/N continued playing in the water. Then it was lo'ak's turn and finally Y/N.

"Ok, come here little one" neytiri says as she removes the little one's loincloth, preparing the oils she was going to use. For Y/N everything was different and unique. "Hello ney" says ninat, she had recently given birth. She was a new mother, and she was the only woman in the clan that neytiri trusted. Besides her mother. "Nina!!!!" says Y/N happily, jumping in the water. "Hi baby" ninat comes over to give the little girl a kiss on the hair.

"Hi…how's everything?" asks neytiri starting to clean Y/N, while ninat began to arrange to do the same with her baby. "Everything is perfect…hey I heard what happened" says ninat, seeing how neytiri's face changed. They both looked at the bruise that was still on the little girl's skin, and how she had other scratches on other parts of her body. "I don't want to talk about it…I" neytiri felt ninat place her hand on her shoulder. "Next time…come and look for me. I will always help you take care of your family" ninat says, neytiri smiles a little. She is glad to know that there are people who support her and know that this event and behavior they have had with Y/N is wrong.

After cleaning Y/N, Neytiri put a new loincloth on her and told her that she could go play with her brother and sister. Just as the little girl was on her way among the rocks, she saw the group of children who had once hurt her. They were approaching with their mothers. The women were going to another corner, but immediately noticed the presence of the sullys. Y/N ran as fast as she could to her mother. Burying her head in her mother's chest. The little girl was trembling, and you could hear how she was about to start crying.

Neytiri looked up and saw the women. Giving her a defiant look, noticing how the woman's arm was bandaged. Neytiri looked at her little daughter, taking her head in her hands making her look her in the eyes. "Y/N…they already know their place, as long as I am alive, no one will hurt you…I promise you" Neytiri speaks, hugging her daughter.

[bunni-v1]

Aommgg

Could I request the nrc staff + grim finding out you‘re a girl (plantonic)?

Or do they all know straight from the start?

TW: None

Info: Crowley, Grim, Sam, Cruel, Trien x Reader (Platonic)

🍓Hello lovely! I didn't want to make a whole long post about this, but I do want to talk about it. I'm so glad you asked! So the staff is... made aware of the situation, obviously. But, I think I'll go a little into depth on how each member deals with this information.

Crowley knows because... well... he sees you out of the ceremonial robes before anyone else does. He handles it as well as he does every other issue he comes across. "Just cover it up!" Famously said by Crowley. He's not unkind though, he does ensure that you get the help you need and he makes sure you keep what you need hidden, well, hidden. But... he won't do more than the bare minimum unless his hand is forced. Like... with Scarabia, he pretty much threatened the whole dorm with expulsion if they so much as uttered a word to anyone but amongst themselves. He is, unsurprisingly, not a father figure to you. He's more like... you're weird quirky uncle that you like, but only in small doses.

Grim, our little guy, finds out at the same time as Crowley... and he's a little harder to convince to keep his mouth shut to start. He doesn't like you, okay, you stole his position at NRC (like he had a chance at all). With a few well-placed cans of tuna from both you and Crowley, he keeps his little rat mouth shut. However, when you're actually granted studentship as NRC? His tune changes. It changes because Crowley holds his position as a student over his head, but it changes. Not a SINGLE person will ever hear you're a woman from Grim. He can't lose this position, not after so much work to get where he's gotten to. Besides, he grows to really love you! You're family to him, and no one out family. Seriously, he's so protective of it, once Ace and Deuce figure it out they're too scared to talk because of Grim's looming presence.

Sam is the first member of Staff to find out, other than Crowley. How? Crowley's sudden interest in pads, tampons, birth control, and all the fun stuff that comes with being a woman. Sam usually would just shrug his shoulders and excuse Crowley's quirky behavior, but then you come in looking like a lost deer and he gets it. He is genuinely so nice to you though! If you ever feel unsafe on campus, you talk to Sam and he'll handle it for you, okay? Sure, he jacks up the prices on your feminine products, but it's considerably less than his normal prices. Hell, if you're short, he'll "suddenly" remember he's got a discount on those items. He's like a cool older brother, honestly. He lets you hang out in the back of the shop and do homework when you ask, and he gives you snacks at a discount when you're there!

Crewel doesn't really treat you any differently than anyone else. Admittedly though, he's fond of you, even if you're a troublemaker. When you come into his class on your first day in a uniform six times too big for you, he feels pity for you. You didn't ask to be here, and now you have to wear that atrocious old uniform? You poor little pup. He's not exactly easy on you, but he's more understanding of your mistakes. Eventually, after you get to know him better, he offers to get you a nicer uniform and also privately tutor you. This is his excuse for keeping you busy so that you don't have as many chances to get found out, and it's also because you are horrifically failing his class and it looks bad on him.

Trien treats you the most differently out of everyone on staff. The SECOND he found out you were a girl and were being forced to hide that fact for Crowley's sake? Oh my god, grandpa was PISSED. Crowley got an EARFUL after that meeting. This man makes it his mission to make your stay as comfortable as he possibly can make it because sevens know Crowley won't be doing SHIT. After he meets you? Oh my god, you remind him of his own girls when they were little. He absolutely adores you, and everyone can tell. It's so odd to the other students because he clearly favors you, and when they ask you about it you've got no clue. He is your dad here at NRC, as out of character as that might be. You are a young woman lost in a world that is not kind to you going through so much more than you need to. He doesn't want to add more to your plate. You can come to him for anything and he will provide as best as he can.

Vargas (I'm sorry for forgetting about him lol) is a lot like Crewel in the fact that he doesn't treat you too differently from his other students. You're still made to push yourself to your upper limits for gym, still expected to keep up with your peers, and still expected to meet his general expectations. However, if it's way too much for you to do, out of fear of Crowley and Trien breathing down his neck, he'll lessen your load. Otherwise, he doesn't really have much chance to be around you outside of class. He finds you amusing and knows you've got a good head on your shoulders, but that's about it from him.

[yumeka-sxf]

I'm finally home from my vacation and able to discuss the latest SxF chapter...all I can say is, I have a lot to say! I'll start with funny stuff first before I move on to analyzing...

Anya was especially hilarious in this chapter - where do I even start with her gremlin-ness? 😂 First off, there's her calling the butlers "henchlings' henchlings" (in the Japanese version, I believe she's using some mispronunciation of 弟子, which means "follower")

Then she calls out Twilight for being, well, Twilight, even giving his behavior its own acronym 🤣

She feels bad for George because his family isn't important enough for Twilight's aforementioned Twilighting 😅

And this doozy of a nickname for Bill!

In the Japanese version, she calls him something like "old man bully who hits people with balls" 😆

But joking aside, we get these profound words from Jeeves that seem to resonate with Twilight.

His words remind Twilight of the hypocrisy of his position: on the one hand, he agrees with Jeeves and wants the children to be able to grow up as they wish, without being burdened by the expectations of their parents. But that's exactly what he's been corralling Anya towards this whole time...doing whatever's best for Operation Strix, regardless of what may be best for her.

This scene reminded me of his musings when they first took Bond to the dog park; another case where he's aware that the morals he believes in are the opposite of his actions and yet...he continues with the mission.

I also think it's great that the other parents thank Anya for her bravery during the bus hijacking. Even if their kids don't act grateful, the parents should be on their behalf. Perhaps seeing this praise for Anya right before his eyes is what made Twilight feel even more guilt upon hearing Jeeves' words - he's seeing more and more what an exceptional girl she is despite not having the perfect traits for his mission, and yet he's still manipulating her (not realizing she's aware of the mission and wants to help).

But on that note, it's nice to see that George's dad and Becky's mom somewhat agree with Jeeves. As of now, I'd say out of all the Eden kids we've gotten to know, George and Becky seem to have the most decent families. I especially like how Becky's dad is adorably doting, to the point where he gets crushed when Becky asks Yor for help instead of him 😅 Also Martha having to reel him in, lol.

But despite being an overbearing dad, at least he isn't quick to jump on Loid supposedly "seducing" Becky 😂 He seems to not take it seriously, which is good since Becky is the one making the moves with her silly little girl crush.

Also Emile thinking Yor is pretty~ I'm surprised he had something nice to say about anyone connected to Anya, lol. I really want a chapter where Yor takes all the Eden kids on a playdate and they start thinking she's awesome like Becky does, even Damian.

Speaking of Yor, just when I thought she would be demoted to "background character" for whatever arc is coming, the last few panels give the impression that she'll have her next moment in the spotlight soon! Is she just destined to always catch Melinda when she falls? 😅

Not only are we getting more Yor/Melinda interactions next time, but also (hopefully) more of Anya reading Melinda's mind. I know there's theories floating around of how Donovan may be able to read minds and is possibly the one behind the experiments done on Anya, and that Melinda may have some psychic abilities too. Also some relation to that Arnold Crowley character introduced several chapters ago. I'm not good at theorizing, so I'll leave it to fans who are better with that kind of stuff 😅 But I think they're all good theories and I'm keeping my fingers crossed we'll get more insight into Desmond secrets very soon!

...but unfortunately the next new chapter won't be until November 25th, so we'll have to be satisfied with theories for now!

[sillysiluriforme]

If you’re up for it, could you talk a bit more about Felix in the la terreur au? I saw that comic of Colt shooting him in the head (and not dying bc senti shenanigans), and that makes me want to know more about how he grew up and what else Colt did with him (and what Amelie’s role has been in all of that). Love what you do, thanks! 💙🦚

Oh boy !! I think Felix is one of my favorite characters from canon.

He's extremely competent, right ? He has all these grand plans that he does go through with, unfortunately the plans all have stupid goals. Not only that, but he can't seem to think long term. (confronting Gabe during the same episode he learns he's keeping his aunt's body in the basement, the diamond ball episode, his whole relationship with Kagami...) He has this childish recklessness I find really endearing.

We're pushing all those things a little further in LT !

Felix grows up isolated in a big, big house, he learns quickly that no one that can will help him. Amelie's in the same boat. His grandparents are fully aware of Colt's behavior and refuse to step in. Emilie's oblivious. Gabriel is Gabriel.

So he learns to rely on himself.

Colt is not a good person. He's selfish, and he's jealous, and he's set in his ways, and he's a war profiteer. And now he has a magic baby of dubious origins.

He can't get past the fact Felix is not a normal baby. The first few years go smoothly enough. The baby is fussy but manageable. Something for Amelie to do. Then Colts starts gets sick. It's like a cold initially, but he never gets better.

He tries to raise a real man. Drills and old fashion discipline. His mom whines about it, but it's what he needs. He's "beating the devil out of him." Colt keeps getting worse. Amelie's head is everywhere but here. She's calmer. She's stealing his Codamol, but he doesn't bring it up. Anything to get her to shut up.

He's dying ! He's dying, and he's scared, and he's a profoundly religious man, he's sure this fucking thing he created is siphoning his life forces. That's what he gets for messing with the devil. He blames everyone but himself. He mostly takes it out on Felix. From that point on, it's constant orders. Do this, don't do that, do it this way or that way. He's using that ring like his life depends on it. Does it ?

This thing cannot die. He tries to get rid of it 3 times and no matter what it gets back up.

He's dying, and his mind is going with it. This thing is a monster. His brother-in-law is a monster. His wife is a monster. Everyone is a monster. He's dying and it's their fault.

[wholoveseggs]

Kinktober - {Day Twenty-Two}

{<- kinktober masterlist}

18+ ---- {Masterlist} {Tag-List} {Kinktober}

{Elijah Mikaelson x Plussized!Reader} Request {Anon}: I have a request for kinktober and elijah, (you think you can make it a lare reader x elijah? There is not nearly enough of those floating around) with kinks 18, 21, and 22 (I hope that's not to many!)

♡♡♡ Because I am dumb it took me so long to figure out your typo 'lare'... I even googled 'lare kink'.... only to realize you meant large... sighhhhh I'm growing less and less sharp in my old age... Anywhooo me & my fellow plus!sized girles deserve a man like him ~xoxo ♡♡♡

1.5k words - Kinks: dom!Elijah, sex toys, standing sex, insecure!reader, plus!reader, Elijah having none of your self-loathing & being a bit angry about it, mildest of mild dubcon...

Elijah watched you from the doorway of your bedroom.

You were staring into your full-length mirror, dressed in your underwear. The look of sadness on your face pulled at his heartstrings.

He was about to make his presence known when your hands moved to grab the plump flesh of your stomach and sides. You turned from side to side, and Elijah could see that you were frowning, and looking critically at your figure.

Elijah felt anger at your behavior, the way you looked down on the body he so enjoyed. You were soft, and curvy, with breasts and ass and hips he adored, and you could not appreciate it.

It wasn't the first time he'd seen you doing this, but it was the first time he decided to act. No longer would he let you fester in your own self-deprecation.

You didn't hear him, too engrossed in the thoughts running through your head, so you jumped when you saw his reflection standing behind you in the mirror.

"Eli-" You began to speak, but the words died in your throat as Elijah wrapped an arm around your waist.

"Why do you look at yourself with such disdain?" He asked, his voice quiet in your ear.

You squirmed under his intense gaze, and you tried to remove his hands from your hips.

"I don't know what you're talking about," You said, avoiding eye contact.

He tutted, and you pulled away, only to have him drag you back towards him. His lips found the juncture between your neck and shoulder, and you sighed as he sucked and kissed at the skin.

"You are perfect," Elijah growled, his hands roaming up and down your sides.

You scoffed, struggling in his grip. You didn't want him touching you right now, you didn't feel desirable, and you didn't want his pity. All you wanted to do was hide, but his hold was unbreakable.

He let out a frustrated sigh, before grabbing you and tossing you on the bed. You landed with a surprised gasp, and before you could sit up, Elijah was over you, pinning you to the mattress.

You pushed on his chest, trying to get him off, but he didn't budge. His eyes were dark, his hair falling messily around his face.

"Do you think I'm a liar?" He asked, and the question threw you off. You shook your head, avoiding his gaze.

"Look at me."

You forced yourself to meet his eyes.

"What do you see?"

"An asshole?" You replied sarcastically, and his face tightened, displeased with your attitude.

"I see a strong, stubborn woman, who is the most gorgeous thing I've ever laid my eyes on."

Your heart fluttered at his words, but you pushed them away.

"You have to say that," You mumbled, looking away. "You're my boyfriend."

He leaned down and kissed you, his hands caressing the soft skin of your stomach. You kissed him back, but there was still tension in your shoulders, and he pulled away, sitting back.

"You still don't believe me."

You didn't respond, and he shook his head. He got off the bed, and you sat up, expecting him to leave. Instead, he grabbed your legs, pulling you so your ass was just at the edge of the bed.

He knelt on the floor, spreading your legs and pressing kisses to the inside of your thighs. His hand caressed your legs, moving higher and higher, until he reached the hem of your underwear.

"May I?" He asked, his fingers brushing the elastic. You hesitated, but eventually nodded, and he pulled them off.

Elijah kissed your mound, then used his hands to spread your lower lips. You squirmed as his tongue ran up your slit, and when he focused on your clit, you couldn't help but moan.

His tongue moved expertly, and your mind blanked as the pleasure built. His hands were firm on your thighs, keeping you open and preventing you from clamping them shut.

"Eli!" You gasped, and you could feel the smirk against your sensitive flesh. Your orgasm hit hard, and you were a gasping, quivering mess when Elijah sat up, his face glistening with your arousal.

He licked his lips, then stood, shrugging off his suit jacket and unbuttoning his shirt. You stared at him, eyes hazy with the aftershocks of your orgasm.

Elijah opened the drawer of your nightstand, rummaging around before pulling out a small vibrator. Your eyes widened, and you closed your legs, your self doubt creeping back.

He noticed your reaction, and sighed. He climbed onto the bed, grabbing your thighs and pulling them apart, before leaning over you and kissing you deeply.

"Let me show you how beautiful you are."

He pressed the toy to your clit, and turned it on, the sudden stimulation making you jump. He rubbed it slowly, and the vibrations had you moaning.

"Elijah," You whined, and he smirked.

"Do you like that, darling?" He asked, and you nodded. "Tell me."

"I love it," You breathed, and he hummed, kissing you again.

"Good girl," He said, and you felt your walls clench around nothing. You heard the sound of his zipper, and you looked down to see him pulling his cock free.

Your legs trembled at the sight, and he chuckled, pressing the tip to your dripping pussy.

"So eager," He murmured, and you whimpered as he rubbed his length up and down your slit. He pushed in suddenly, bottoming out.

"Repeat after me," Elijah commanded. "My body is beautiful."

"M-my body is beautiful," You echoed, and he thrust into you, a choked gasp escaping your lips.

"My curves are irresistible," He said, and you swallowed the lump in your throat, repeating his words.

"My ass is delectable."

"My ass is de-ah!" You broke off as he increased the intensity of the vibrations, and his hips snapped into yours.

He chuckled darkly, taking your hand and making you hold the toy. "Keep it pressed against yourself, and don't come."

You obeyed, the constant stimulation making you desperate. His hands were now free to grab your hips, holding you tightly as he pounded into you.

The headboard banged against the wall, and his grip was sure to leave bruises, but all you could focus on was the delicious drag of his cock, the way his body covered yours, his hot breath on your ear as he panted.

"My breasts are magnificent."

"M-My breasts are magnificent," You gasped, and the hand on your hip moved up, his fingers pinching your nipple.

You yelped as his thrusts became impossibly fast, tapping into his supernatural speed. He fucked into you, and the sound of his thighs slapping against yours was obscene.

He kissed the corner of your mouth. "You're so fucking perfect, and I can't believe you can't see it."

His words were like a punch to the gut, and you moaned as the coil in your belly wound tighter.

"Are you going to come for me, angel?"

You nodded, and he took the toy from your hand, switching it up to an even higher setting. "Not yet."

You were a babbling mess, your pussy dripping wet as Elijah's cock slammed into you. His warm hands held your ass, lifting your hips up and moving you to meet his thrusts.

"Please, Elijah," You begged, and his hips stuttered. "Please, I need to come."

"Not until I tell you to," He growled, and you whined. He smirked, and pressed the vibrator to your clit.

"Oh god, oh my god- Elijah- please, please, please-" You chanted, and he slowed his movements.

Your legs were shaking, and the feeling was becoming overwhelming, his lips on your skin and his body covering yours.

"There we go," He coaxed, his eyes glazed over with pleasure. “You can let go now, my perfect angel."

His command was enough, and the coil inside you snapped. He kept the vibrator on, prolonging your orgasm, and it was almost painful as the aftershocks wracked through you.

Elijah groaned at the sight of you coming, and he cast the vibrator aside, grabbing your hips and picking you up. He stood, lifting you up and down on his cock, grunting at the feeling of your pulsating pussy.

You could barely think, holding onto his shoulders tightly, you were only aware enough to kiss him, the sensation of being held up and fucked almost too much.

"Where should I come, my sweet?" He asked, his breathing labored.

"In me," You replied, and his eyes darkened.

"What was that, baby? Say it again."

"Come inside me," You repeated, and he smiled, his hips thrusting one last time as he emptied himself inside you.

"God, your pussy is perfect," He groaned, his grip tight. "You feel so good, baby."

You moaned, your overstimulated clit rubbing against his pelvis, and you clenched around his cock, the feeling of him spilling inside you sending a rush through you.

You collapsed against him, and he wrapped his arms around you, his cock still inside you as he laid on the bed. He pulled the comforter over the two of you, and kissed your forehead, his chest rising and falling as he caught his breath.

"Now do you believe me?"

You smiled. "No, but I'd love another demonstration."

Elijah growled, his arms tightening around you.

"Oh, don't worry. I plan on showing you exactly how beautiful I find you for a long, long time."

{<- kinktober masterlist}

[zentraex]

Summary: Amorica is a virus that makes people turn yandere. Never would you have thought, that your boyfriend Izuku would be one of the infected.

Pairings: Yandere! Izuku x Reader Warnings: Yandere behavior, violence Remember: English differs a lot from German, so I apologize for possible mistakes:

Love-Virus: Amorica

"Deku! Here, here! HELP!" shouts a young girl, whose legs are mercilessly smashed in a pile of rubble. She is small and petite, has her whole life ahead of her. She can't give up yet, not if she has to see someone else. 

Her boyfriend, her darling, her everything. 

She MUST see him again, she still MUST spend time with him like she planned it and she MUST marry him, start a family with him and grow old together. 

She just has to!

"HELP!!!! DEKU! I'M HERE!" she screams with full force and thankfully her cry for help is finally heard. In front of her appears a muscular green-haired man, number one among all heroes, one who goes by the hero's name Deku. He has saved thousands, no, even millions of people. Today he is there for her, for the poor little girl who whimpers and shivers in pain. 

"Don't worry, I'm here now," he says and puts on his broad and wide smile that everyone in Japan, no, even the whole world, knows.  He lifts the debris aside and pulls her out so gently, even though his hands look like they could crush someone.

She breathes a sigh of relief as the pressure on her body subsides. It was really hard to bear. She sweats all over her body, the stress brought her into high gear. 

"Thank you, Deku!"

The hero only nods in response, but his smile hasn't even left his face. Not even when the girl's sweat mixes with his and causes a tingling sensation in the affected areas.

_

"Izuku, you're scorching hot!" you realize when your hand almost burns on his forehead. 

It's been a day since the earthquake. Your boyfriend was on duty and once again saved countless lives. 

Your boyfriend is a good person, maybe even the best.

You're incredibly happy to have him and when you look at his reddened face, you can see that he feels the same way.

He always forgets to think about himself.

You just smile as you put a cool rag on his forehead and give him a tender kiss on the cheek. 

"I'll make you chicken broth, okay? Rest until then, you will certainly feel better."

Izuku just nods and closes his eyes. Just a few seconds later, you hear slight snoring from the living room. 

You smile. 

Even if you don't like it when he's sick, you still like to nurse him back to health.  

_

"Izuku, your fever won't go down! You've been on 39 degrees for three days! You have to go to the doctor!" you shout through the house.

Your boyfriend just shakes his head.

"It'll be okay. I'm sure I'll feel better tomorrow."

"Don't kid yourself, Izuku. That's what you said two days ago."

You're worried, no, scared, because you don't know what to do about it. 

Izuku just lifts the blanket and opens his arms. 

"Just come here, please. Then I’ll feel better."

You frown, but you still comply with his wish. Usually, your boyfriend doesn't want you to get too close to him when he's sick. He is always afraid that he could infect you.

That's why you're surprised when he hugs you and gives you a kiss on the forehead. 

More worry spreads through you. 

Maybe it's really something so serious....

_

"Do you really have to go to work?" your sick boyfriend asks you as he makes his way to you. Today is the fifth day that Izuku has his fever. You had the days off, but now you have to go to work today. 

"I'd rather take care of you, but I have to."

Izuku hugs you, his strong muscles holding you firmly in place.

"Why don't you take the day off?"

Laughing, you shake your head and give him a kiss on the cheek. Reluctantly, Izuku lets go of you, a pout on his lips. 

_

"Darling!", Izuku greets you as you get home. He has already torn the door open before you have even arrived at your house. 

With your eyebrows drawn together, you walk towards him. Usually, you both always call each other by name.

Izuku was never the type for pet names.

Is it his illness?

Izuku has never waited so eagerly for you.

Is it his illness? 

Izuku has also never hugged you as tightly as he does now.

Is it his illness?

Today is the sixth day. Will he get well soon? Hopefully he will get well soon. It makes you nervous, worries you and gives you a little anxiety.

"How are you feeling today?"

"Better, but I missed you so much."

You put your hand on his forehead: it really seems to be cooler now.

_

"36.5 degrees. Congratulations, you're officially healthy today," you smile. Izuku returns your smile and gives you a kiss on the forehead. "Are you going on patrol right away?"

"Yes, of course. I've rested far too long, haven't I?"

You just nod and laugh. You can't wait to get back to your usual everyday life. 

_

"The virus, Amorica, spreads through bodily fluids among people. The exact number of people affected is still unknown, as it is not noticeable to the infected and the people around them. Symptoms include exaggerated longing for one's partner, unhealthy jealousy or immoral behavior. Those affected explain that they have begun to no longer perceive their actions as bad.  How contagious the virus is, is still unknown at the moment. However, scientists suspect that some are immune to it. 

Today we tell the story of Molly. She is a 20-year-old lawyer who is infected with the virus. Molly doesn't know how long she has been ill, but her boyfriend pointed out that her controlling behavior began a month ago. At first, the signs were only vague, there were only frequent questions about her boyfriend’s well-being. After a few weeks, Molly started following her boyfriend everywhere. Days later, Molly committed her first murder out of jealousy. Although her boyfriend was in constant contact with her, he has no symptoms.

How-"

You change the channel in shock. For some time now, the news have been reporting on such cases. Izuku also tells you that there are frequent cases. The infected act out of unhealthy love: they stalk, kidnap, even kill. The victims are usually distraught afterwards and have to seek therapeutic help. 

Society is afraid, people are becoming suspicious, you also have concerns.

What if you annoy someone infected? 

A shiver runs down your spine. 

Hopefully not...

_ _

Meanwhile, Izuku watches you from the door frame. 

For some time now, his desire for you has become bigger. He can't really explain it, but somehow, he wants your attention especially often, want to hug you especially often and wants to kiss you especially often – from head to toe.

What's wrong with him?

Of course, he loved you before, otherwise you wouldn't be in a relationship. For some reason, however, he can't let you out of his sight, as soon as he averts his gaze, his heart aches. 

It hurts, cramps and contracts. 

It's like he needs you to survive, because without you, his heart doesn't beat anymore. 

It's worse when he's at work. He can't think of anything but you! 

All the injured people he saves suddenly have your face!

Then his breathing becomes more and more heavy until at some point he can't breathe at all, suffocates almost at nothing. 

He always comes home immediately afterwards, so, he can calm down when you greet him at the door, with your sweet loving smile. Every tension, every worry and every fear that ran through his whole body until now dissolves and is replaced by a feeling of warmth and security. 

Even now, as he watches you from a distance, it feels like everything is in harmony. 

He breathes in and out in a relaxed manner as he lets the situation sink in and then sits down next to you. However, when he looks at your face, he notices the deep wrinkles of your forehead and the look of worry in your eyes. He copies your facial expression and puts an arm around you, pushing you close to him. 

Your scent rises to his nose and despite the situation, he has to suppress a moan as his eyes roll back. 

Had your smell always such an intoxicating effect on him?

"What's the matter, darling? Is something bothering you?" he murmurs as he rests his chin on your head. 

"No... well, yes, sort of," you say and return his hug. Izuku's heart seems to jump happily as your tender arms wrap around him. 

"Well then, go on! What's going through your pretty head?"

"Well, there's this infection going around right now and I'm afraid of what people are capable now. What if someone is after me because I'm only talking to her lover?"

Then don't talk to anyone, you only need me. Just stay here, then nothing happens. I protect you, with me you are safest. 

Izuku would like to say that, but before he can say the words, the penny drops. His eyes widen when realization hits him: he is infected. 

"Don't worry, nothing will happen," he says, gives you a kiss on the forehead and goes into his study room, locks himself in.

That explains everything! That's why he's no longer himself!

Oh no.

Oh no.

Oh no.

What is he doing now!? Is there a cure? Not yet, right?

He grabs his green curls tightly as he drops into the chair. 

What if he endangers you because of this virus! You would leave him!

No, you would never leave me, I wouldn't let that happen.

No, no, no, away with these thoughts. That's not him! These are not his thoughts; this is the virus! 

His heart beats like crazy and his breath becomes heavy as panic runs through his veins. 

He already had to deal with a few cases involving the virus. Some infected people locked their loved ones in the basement so that they could not leave them, some broke their legs for the same reason. As a sign of love, some carved their name into their partners skin with a knife. 

What if Izuku will do something like that to you?

At the thought, he quickly rushes to his trash can as he vomits. 

These are horrifying ideas! He doesn't want that, he's afraid, so incredibly afraid. 

The only thing he can do now, is to get out of your way and hope that he will heal for some reason, or you will leave him and go somewhere, where you are safe of him.

Leave? No, you can’t abandon me! I'm nothing without you!

The thought makes him vomit again.

_

It's been a week since Izuku started to avoid you like the pest. You're worried, something is bothering him and he refuses to talk to you about it. He locks himself in his room, sleeps there and doesn't even come out to eat. 

Today, you made ramen the way he likes it best. You knock gently at his door, but there is no answer.

"Izuku? I made ramen. Would you like to come out and eat with me?" you finally ask after a while.

He doesn't even open the door when he answers you, his voice only sounds distant and quiet from the other room. 

"No, I'm not hungry, but thanks for preparing."

Tears form in the corners of your eyes as you are rejected yet again. He always says that, but even if you leave him a bowl, it's still left untouched the next day.

"Izuku, what's wrong with you? Please talk to me!"

There is no answer and then you sob loudly as the tears flow. 

"Izuku, did I do something wrong? If so, I'm sorry, but please stop avoiding me!"

Again, no answer and then you leave, crying and heartbroken. 

_ _

Behind the door, Izuku's world collapses when he hears your crying. His heart splits into thousands of shards with every sob. 

He tied himself up at the other end of the room so he can’t go to you. 

He had a hard time getting through the first two days, but at the third he couldn't stand it anymore and stood next to your bed at night and watched you. For this moment, all his thoughts were in harmony and he had been able to relax again after two days of suffering.

That was the last time he saw you, because he realized how sick his behavior was. 

Then he tied himself up so he would not be tempted to get too close to you again. Deep down, he knows that these shackles are of no use at all and that he could break them with ease, but he tells himself that they are indestructible. 

For the sake of both of you. 

_

Three days later, he hears a man's voice from the living room. 

Who is this?

He doesn't know this voice. Has the time finally come? Are you leaving him now?

No, no, no! You wouldn't do that to him, would you? You wouldn't replace him just because he doesn't show up for a few days, would you? 

Who is this?

Who dares to get too close to you? 

"Make yourself comfortable on the sofa," you say. 

"Thank you, I'm glad that we're doing something together again. How long ago was the last time? Three years?"

"Yes, maybe. It definitely feels like an eternity. What a coincidence that I saw you on the street today."

So, you know each other from the past? Why doesn't he know about him? Why didn't you tell him about this guy? Why is he in your apartment?

Why are you doing this to him?

He is trying so hard for you, and you!? You're cheating on him!

No, no, no. You wouldn’t, you would never do something like that. He has to calm down, otherwise he will do something he might regret. 

Izuku doesn't know how long they guy stayed already, but every second feels like torture. He doesn't want to keep himself restrained anymore. He misses you so much. 

So so so much. 

He will certainly never hurt you, right? 

The victims of infected people are usually distraught afterwards and have to seek therapeutic help. 

But with him, it will never come to that. He will treat you like a princess as you deserve. He will carry you on his hands and make sure that you lack nothing, that you are always well. 

So, he can stop, right? He can go out, right?

"By the way, are you single? You know, I've always had that huge crush on you and always hoped to see you again. Maybe you can give me a chance, hm?" says your visitor. 

_ _

Before you can answer, the door of the study suddenly breaks and dust and smoke is blocking your view. 

What the…?

You only hear breaking bones.

Your heart pounds rapidly against your chest as it begs you to run away. But you can't help but be glued to the ground as panic flows through you. 

Only when the view clears, you recognize Izuku, who is holding the smashed skull of your childhood friend and looks at him deranged, breathing heavily. Then his eyes suddenly wander to yours and a big smile pulls onto his lips.

"Darling!" he says and throws the skull away like it’s garbage. When he takes a step towards you, you take one back, shivering. Izuku's smile falls and he looks at you anxiously.

"Don't be afraid, I would never do something like that to you!"

You can only cry as you stretch out your arms in front of you, hoping it will keep him away and protect you. 

"Don't cry, darling, please. Everything’s okay!"

"No, stay away."

You know that if Izuku really wanted to do something to you, he would so already. He has the power to do so. 

Who would have thought that your beloved boyfriend would ever kill someone? Number one hero? The best person out there? The hero, who saved thousands, no, millions of lives?

That you'd ever be afraid of him?

Who would have thought that a virus could change a person in such a way that you finally decide to rush to the exit. 

But you don't get far when two muscular arms wrap around your stomach and capture you. Izuku pushes you close to him as he buries his nose in your hair. You hear him inhale loudly and exhale contentedly as he squeezes you even harder.

"Finally," he says. "Finally, I have you in my arms again, darling. I promise that I will never avoid you again. I have no idea why I did this in the first place. How did I come up with this idea? Am I stupid? This feels like heaven!"

More tears flow down your cheek as he drags you further and further away from the door. 

"We have so much to catch up on for the long time we haven't seen each other."

[hollyhomburg]

Before I Leave You (pt.68)

(Omegaverse au, Mafia au, Bts x Reader)

Summary: Your time is running out. minute by minute, breath by breath, kiss by kiss.

Tags: Angst, Hurt (no comfort yet), illusions to past mental health issues and past domestic abuse, mentions of low-self-esteem, internalized shame and self-shaming behaviors, themes of abandonment, speeding, guns, violence,

W/c: 13.4k

A/N: ahhhhh so here we are! i've been dreaming of this chapter since the very beginning of the series! this is like...the ultimate chapter...thank you for giving me a little bit of extra time to sit with it! we've still got a bit to go! there is a little section near the end where the chapter will prompt you to click on a link to play kate bush 😂 if you feel like you'll be distracted by music in the background you don't need to push it- thats just the song that i always heard playing in my head whenever i heard that part playing.

Previous part - Masterlist - First part

Hobi is sitting on the edge of the nest sipping at his ice water when you come back into the nest room. Someone has drawn all of the heavy curtains over the windows and they pool on the floor at the rim of the room. The plastic pulled up too. The evidence folded and put away for later burning. Like a bad memory or a piece of clothing that doesn't fit right. Shoved in the back of the closet.

The rage and fear and panic are harder to put away. The conviction is not so easy to hide. You can’t put it down the same way that people file their taxes or their children's old scribbles.

You- like a child, have not been able to color between the lines. You- like a child, are messy.

You can’t stop yourself from walking over to him. Drawn to him where he sits nursing his injuries like a moth to a flame. You feel every heartbeat spent in his presence; every breath shared sticky like smoke in your lungs. Every second is savored and every second burns.

You want to ask him if he’s alright, but questions like that seem very pointless now.

Hobi’s not alright- but he will be. He will be okay forever if you do what you have to do. Now that you’ve decided it’s all you can think about. You rarely ever get to know that your last day with someone will be your last day, and now because you know- you look at him a little harder. A little longer.

You wonder what he’ll look like in 10 years and in 20. If he’ll get crow’s feet from smiling so much. If the salt water he loves so much will eventually grow into his features and make him look like something ancient.

You wonder if one day he'll get so many freckles that the tops of his shoulders will be permanently a shade deeper than the rest of his skin- Or if Seokjin’s sunscreen will spare him from the simple pleasure of looking like your favorite thing. Hoseok has always been one part sunshine one part everything else.

He looks pale right now. It hasn't been summer in months and you won't get to see him get all freckly and sun-kissed again.

Growing old is a privilege (you don’t want to grow old) and you’re reminded of that every time you look at his throat and see the bruises there (you wish you and Hobi could stay as you are- like this, in this house- both alive and healing- forever) but you can’t.

You can’t.

You touch his shoulder softly and his head jerks up, body going tense and then slack when he sees it's just you.

It’s quiet up here. The others are just downstairs and they’re making a lot of noise. Hoseok turns, setting his glass of water down on the floor, leaning into your hand in the same movement. It would be cute if he didn’t have black bruises crisscrossing his throat and blood in the whites of his eyes. In truth, every blink only convinces you that this is what you have to do. This is what you need to do.

You know that at any moment the pack is going to come looking for you. That they’ll all come and fill the room with their soothing noises and sweet concern. You're not too worried about finding the right time to slip away. Moonbyul’s given you 24 hours after all.

We didn’t get enough time, did we? I’d have liked more.

Hobi tries to speak and you shush him, he makes a frustrated hum of a noise. You sit down next to him when he tugs you, hand vicelike on your wrist. Your heart is beating really fast. You wonder if he can hear it or at least smell your distress. The whole house is a tangle of distressed scents; your rain, Yoongi’s ocean, Hoseok’s burnt caramel. burning burning burning. It disguises your scent. Hoseok can’t smell how you’re panicking.

You smile at him, and Hobi tries to speak again. unsuccessfully.

“Here your phone-” but Hoseok doesn’t reach for it, he doesn’t reach for anything but you. Pulling you closer to him. His thumb pressed to the pulse point of your wrist, where your skin becomes thin and sensitive. Pulling you until your thigh lines up against his.

The nest up here is the only place in the house that smells somewhat normal, still soaked with your sleepy muted scents from a few days ago (How long will it be until your scent fades from the house?) You take a deep shaky breath, trying to savor it. Hoseok bites his lower lip.

Hoseok starts on your thigh. His hand squeezes it once and then he starts to write. It’s slow going. He can only write one letter at a time but-

“D-O-N-T”

His eyes are positively boring into yours as your breath hitches and you start. “Hobi I-” he repeats it again, writing it out faster. You grab his hand squeezing it. But he pulls it out of your grasp.

“N-O”

You huff, frustrated and close to tears but stealing yourself not to show him your true feelings. How hard this is. You duck in low, kissing over one of the bruises on his neck. He jerks back, furrowing his eyebrows at you. And part of you is just begging him to let it go. You’re half sitting in his lap now all so that he can write out his distress on both your thighs.

“Alright- just stop.” You can hear the rest of the pack on the stairs. It’s getting late, they’ve done all of the cleaning they can manage for today. You can hear Yoongi on the stairway talking to Jin:

“Maybe we should just burn the railing, there’s definitely a bullet or two in it still.”

Jin’s reply is near hissed, utterly scandalized in the way that only Jin can sound. “It is mahogany Yoongi.”

Hobi writes on your thigh, a single tear trailing down his nose. He’s usually a little bit better at keeping himself together but the stress of the day wore him through. Polished all of his usually stubborn edges like the ocean polishes sea glass. He’s too tired to properly argue. Letter by letter as he goes.

“P-R-O-M-I-S-E M-E,” he writes across your thigh.

You have maybe a second before they’re upon you. You have to be convincing. Have to, or else Hobi might tell. You don’t think he’ll get in your way. You don’t want to think about what you’ll have to do if he does.

You dart forward, pressing your lips to his in a way that you don’t really feel, in a way that has him pushing you a little off of him. Trying to reassure him in the only way you know how.

You bite the inside of your cheek to keep from crying and he tucks a lock of your hair behind your ear. His fingertips skimming soft across your jaw and your lips. Pressing at the corner of your sad smile like he can peel the fake expression away from your face and have you tell the truth for once.

“I promise, okay? I promise.”

Hoseok is not convinced. He doesn’t believe you all the way. But the pack is up here before he has a chance to write out anything more. Yoongi appears in the doorway, smelling of soap and bleach, a bit of it turning the corner of his shirt yellow where it should be black. His eyes cautious but so loving it takes your breath away a little. He treads softly over to the two of you; like he's worried about spooking you.

The moment between you and Hobi passes when Yoongi's hand curls over the back of your neck and you tilt your face up at him. And he interprets the glassiness there as something else. something more sensitive and more like omegaspace than what it is. you falling through space and time, you dying and drowning infront of him.

He probably thinks Hoseok was just comforting you.

Yoongi’s hand settles softly on the ball of Hoseok’s shoulder too. an equally as tender touch. Long fingers splaying against his collar bones, cradling a bruise there forming. Asking softly, eyes all dark with the anguish and apology of it-

“Do you think either of you can stomach dinner?”

As always, you say you can hot because you want to, but because you know it will make him happy to see you eat. You might not get many more opportunities to make Yoongi happy- you should take this one and savor it.

Yoongi loses that vaguely wounded look in his eyes with every bite you lift to your mouth. His scent sublimating into something sweeter as the night darkens and quiets.

You can tell Hoseok is not convinced of your promises when he stays glued to your side through the whole of dinner. Almost stubborn with how he resists Yoongi’s prodding and Namjoon's. Changing out the cool dressings on his throat and shaking his head at Namjoon’s suggestion that he sleep propped up against the back wall of the nest, where it’s safest. Eyes tracking your movements as you get up and brush your teeth.

His focus remains solely on you, even when Jungkook carries Tae out of the bathroom and places her among the softest things in the nest. When Noodle squirms his way out from under the bed and tries to worm himself in between his legs. Nudging under his elbow with his pink nose.

He wraps himself around you as you get ready for bed. An arm slung protectively around your waist to pull you flush against his front where you couldn’t squirm away without him feeling it and waking up.

It feels like buying time even though you're too distracted to properly enjoy it- the way they try to cheer you up. Everything that they do to try and make things better feels far away like a photograph- a memory just out of reach- the colors a little off.

Jungkook needily wraps himself around Tae and croons soft reassurance into her ear about how pretty her hair looks, how soft her pajamas make her. And would she like some of her skincare routine? Jungkook will do it for her, will pat it across her cheeks, and won't drag it under her eyes to preserve the state of her wrinkles.

Tae answers all his requests with a simple shake of her head. Eyes still frighteningly blank, that 1000-yard stare that you've all seen on your faces at one point or another, that you see in the reflective surface of Namjoon's phone in the nest, discarded and not charged.

Tae's scent is something awful- none of her usual roses and all cinnamon. Does Tae smell more like her old self because that version of her was always afraid? Or was being a boy the first thing she hated and that's why she smells like boy tae now?

You hate it. You can tell the others hate it too. Yoongi drags her close to scent her silly. cheek and neck going all pink from how hard he scents her, and then scents you, and then goes back again.

Jungkook can do little more than cuddle Tae with Jimin, his big hands smooth down her thighs, while Jimin brushes her hair gently- careful not to let the bristles brush her scalp. He's learned how to take care of her over the last few months and he's the gentlest when it comes to detangling. Not like you- who's so used to ripping through your hair without thought.

Up and down their hands go as Jin fluffs the nest around you all. Making the edges of it higher, and more protective of the fragile pups at the center (like fluffy duvets could ever block bullets. In his dreams- Jin’s love is enough to keep you all safe).

Yoongi and Namjoon are only too happy to oblige him with the nest-making and the general fussing. But in between Jin’s request for a hairdryer and another cold cloth for your hands. You catch them watching the door like they half expect some new threat to appear.

Certain things are harder to ignore; like Yoongi sitting on the edge of the nest with a gun balanced across his thigh. Or the heavy thud of a fresh box of bullets, rattling in their acrylic case when Jimin sets them down on the floor. The red shotgun casings lined up in pretty lines- just like Tae’s lipsticks downstairs.

You ask for one of Hobi's sweatshirts and Yoongi puts the gun away to go and give it to you. Hoseok fingers the edge of your shirt stroking over the meat of your hip idly. But every inch of him is taught like he’s going to have to grab you and hold you down. You lace your hand with his and turn to give him a look.

Yoongi’s back with a sweatshirt but it’s Jin who demands to dress you- to guide your fragile and freshly wrapped hands through the holes. Jin pulls it down around your hips with a soft huff before he gets distracted looking at the bruises on your back and side. From getting thrown back into the wall and from an errant elbow. Every time you twist even a little bit- they ache.

A tub of soothing cream that the pack usually uses for the more wanted kind of bruises sits open on the edge of the nest.

The pack moves about in pairs, here and there. Going down to the ground floor in sets of two. Unwilling to let anyone out of sight. There are guns everywhere, Jimin must have let loose his hidden stash of them. A shotgun leans up against the bathroom door. A handgun with an extended stock is always close at hand. There's a larger plan lingering here. You hear it in Jin's soft reassurances. Said hushed over your heads.

"Witness protection isn't as bad as you think it is Yoongi-"

"It won't work- don't you think we know how it works? That won't be safe enough."

"We have at least a few hours, we don't need to make any decisions now."

Jungkook’s scared voice, “Are we really going to have the leave? The house and everything?” A pause. A look is shared between Jin, Namjoon, and Yoongi. Jimin's eyes remain focused on Tae.

“Maybe bunny, we have to wait and see.”

“Do we have a carrying case for Noodle?”

“I think it’s in…” Yoongi trails off, but Namjoon answers for him.

“Yeah, it’s in the basement.”

They set about keeping watch for the night. those of you that aren't nursing wounds that is- mainly Jimin, Yoongi, and Namjoon- Guns remain at the ready and loaded. Jimin will go first, Yoongi second, and Namjoon last.

Jin tries but Namjoon nudges at his chest and growls in a way that has all of your ears perking up. The pack alpha’s commands can’t easily be ignored. Jungkook tries too to convince them too but even Hoseok shakes his head at him. No one is under any illusions of how fragile this peace is.

No one asks Namjoon to leave the Christmas lights on- but he doesn’t shut them off all the way- leaving just one string lit as a bit of a nightlight. None of you are quite brave enough to risk the darkness.

Hoseok stays close by, his hand clutching your wrist more often than not. Even when the pack settles in for sleep. He wraps his arm around your waist and settles in behind you, caging you in.

(Hoseok’s arms are not the prettiest cage you’ve ever been in but they are the cage you’ve liked the most. You think you’ll miss his arms and his hands. They’re so pretty and long, you lean down and kiss one where it’s gripping the nest and he makes a small noise in surprise that quickly gets swallowed by the hungry quiet.)

The quiet is very hungry, every brush of fabric against skin, every slight movement of the pack sets you a bit on edge. You think it will be hard to sleep- wound up as you are.

You don’t think you're even tired until your head hits the pillow and you have to struggle to stay awake. You want to stay up and listen to the sound of your pack, their soft and measured breathing, the sound of kisses shared above your head, the feel and safety of being in the nest. You want to commit the rhythm of them to memory.

Hoseok’s soft rasping breath on the nape of your neck evens out the more that his swelling goes down. It goes from hissing to more of a squeak as the night settles. Tae shakes through her aforementioned panic attack with all of you piled around her. You get your hand on her ankle at least.

Yoongi and Jimin’s shushing is the only punctuating sound in the half-light. Because what can you say besides sweet nothings when you know she has a perfectly valid reason to fear falling asleep?

You savor every little twitch of their trauma-worn bodies as you flit in and out of an uneasy sleep. Every slight sigh and hand on you rousing you. Jungkook, brushing his fingers through your hair. Hobi, pressed along your back like a second skin shifting and trying to tilt his neck to a more comfortable angle.

You get too hot with Hobi wrapped around you like that, eventually tugging at his sweatshirt that you wear and almost purring when kind gentle hands help detangle you from it with a soothing little shush sound so that you hardly have to wake. Yoongi, around midnight.

Yoongi’s thin but strong fingers rub a soothing touch along your jaw. Soothing away a small sad noise you make that has him curling around your front. The sound of Namjoon's low voice as he says something to your mate and then takes his place at the helm of the nest to stand guard.

“It’s okay pup, I’m here- I’m not going to let anything happen to you- not now- not ever.”

It’s unfortunate, but Namjoon can’t let Tae sleep for more than half an hour before checking her pupillary responses, making sure that her brain isn’t swelling. Concussions are no joke and Namjoon does not take chances with his prettiest alpha. He sends her back off to dreamland with a comforting scent mark and a soothing grumble. After the 5th hour when the risks turn nominal, he decides to just let her sleep.

But Hoseok doesn’t sleep, he can’t really. The pain keeps him awake and what with the way that his neck is injured he can’t find a comfortable position. He shifts and settles the whole night. Keeping you close with that arm around your waist every time you squirm so much as an inch away.

He’s restless until Namjoon gets up to get one of Jimin’s painkillers.

He’s resistant even then, half asleep still fighting. Trying to move away and shaking his head at Namjoon. Namjoon mistakes his unwillingness for simple fussiness and not for fear. If Hobi falls asleep it will be substantially easier to slip away- you watch from below as Namjoon props hobi up and pinches his jaw to make him open his mouth, encouraging the alpha to show his tongue with a prod of those gentle hands. His eyes are barely open, exhausted as he is.

“I know it hurts to swallow Hobi but you’ve got too.” Regardless of his shaken head, Namjoon insistently nudges his mouth with it. Soothing his gag with a stroke of his thumb down Hoseok’s Addams apple. A kiss to his lips for being good.

“This will help the swelling go down, you’ll be okay by morning.”

It’s minutes before they take effect. Slowly- Hoseok’s arm melts away from your stomach. His grip on you slackens from the drugs and his breath evens out. You say a quiet goodbye to him in your head and turn around to face him and kiss his forehead.

At least the last time you touch, it’s soft like that. At least the last time you touch him- it’s gentle.

Yoongi, Jimin, and Namjoon trade-off. A gun shared between the two of them. Perched on the edge of the nest. Eyes on the vacant stairway Infront of them. Listening for every creek and whisper met with a held breath and hand tightening around the gun. Waiting for the violence that you can all feel coming.

You won’t let it hit them; you won’t let it into this house again. Not while you’re still breathing.

When you're sure that Hobi is asleep you roll onto your back and stare up at the Christmas lights twinkling in the dark. You remember watching Jungkook hang them for you. You remember. You'll always try to remember; you promise yourself right then and there that you'll never let the memory slip away. No matter what happens.

You look over at Kookie, face so peaceful in sleep, a pillow hugged to his chest belly down in the nest, cheek squished close to the top of Yoongi's head on your other side. His back rising and falling.

Jungkook has always been a pretty omega. You reach over to him to stroke down the stiff bridge of his nose, to commit his face to memory. When you turn back to Hobi, you do the same, touching across the heart shape of his mouth, the subtle roundness in his cheeks everything. You look around at all of them- your pack, sleeping softly- sleeping safely. Namjoon's wide back, his shoulders that could hold the world up. Unaware that you're watching him.

You’ll remember all of it, every car ride, every trip to the beach. Every joke and jab. You’ll store each of the memories like a found thing in your pocket. A piece of seashell or sea glass.

You’ll take Jungkook’s laughter and store it- a memory to use when you need to remember that it’s okay to be young for a minute more. When you need to look after yourself you’ll remember how Jin did it and follow his example. And when you need to rest and be soft you'll remember yoongi. You’ll remember Tae like a tube of lipstick and see her every day in the color pink. And Jimin-

Jimin has a hard time sleeping. Even when Namjoon takes the last shift. He sleeps with one hand on a gun, spaced protectively in front of Tae. His bad arm unfolded from his sling. Putting his body between her and the staircase. Namjoon’s heart pulses dully with the knowledge of that when he glances back, just to check and make sure that Tae and Hobi are still breathing. You hide your open eyes from him when he turns, going extra still and feigning sleep.

Namjoon tamps down on his instincts; the last thing he wants is for his scent to go sour and possibly rouse them. But in the quiet, Namjoon's mind has too much room to fan out and overanalyze. Panic is a particularly alluring drug, his mind festers in it. Rolling around in bad ideas the way that Noodle would roll around in a puddle of catnip.

If he got the pack together, put you all in cars, and drove you far far away from here would that be enough to keep you all safe from harm? Or would that only be temporary? Is temporary safety worse when you know what you have to come back to? Or should he just try to talk to these people, barter with them something. Would money be enough? How much wouldn't Namjoon give? 

You are dreadfully similar to him. Only his planning stays in its infancy stage. 

It isn’t all silent. Noises punctuate the night here and there. Namjoon is so on edge that he all but snaps his teeth at the shadows. An alpha on alert.

Namjoon’s ears perk up at every car that dares to drive by your narrow street, the neighbor two houses to the left who leaves for work in the city at 4:05 every morning, right on time. Noodle and the sound of his scrabbly little paws on the stairs, zooming up and down them until Namjoon gets up to scruff him too. 

Your freaking cat does not like Namjoon on a normal day, he's only ever loved you and Hobi and tolerated Tae and Jungkook- condemning all the rest to hisses and claws, but Noodle settles with Namjoon's hand on the back of his neck. "See, that wasn't too hard was it?"

Noodle gives one last half-hearted hiss as Namjoon places him gently in the nest where he stays put after curled up around Tae’s head like a fluffy little hat. Purring and licking at her forehead. All but taunting Namjoon with his yellow eyes. Flinty and knowing in the darkness. Bushy tail flailing every time the alpha glances back.

You think you’re being quiet when you push yourself up onto your hands and knees. Untangling Hobi’s arm from around your waist and pulling yourself to the edge of the bed. He's out cold from the painkillers. Barely even stirring. 

Noodle stirs however, darting from the nest with a small murr sound as if to say, "see- she's awake so why can't I be?" Tail raised high as he prances to the doorway. 

You look striking in the half darkness, a pair of Yoongi’s green flannel pajama pants rolled up several times to fit properly around your hips. A thin white tank top that's almost falling down one shoulder. Namjoon’s heart pulses dully with the need to hold, the need to protect. He makes a soft noise in his throat and your head jerks in his direction.

You swallow, and your lips look dry, eyes glassy and innocent in their tilt when your mussed hair fluffs over your shoulder. Messy from where Hobi was nuzzling it in his sleep. 

“I was just getting a glass of water.”

Namjoon wordlessly holds his hand out to help you get out of the nest without teetering or disturbing the others. Noodle dashes back down the stairs with a soft meow. Tae sighs and re-settles, smacking her lips and Jimin’s arm tightens. Your mate turns face up in the nest, chest rising and falling, mouth opening like he can taste your scent on the air. 

Namjoon doesn't doubt he can, honed in on you and focused as he always is.

Namjoon doesn’t let go of your hand when your feet find the smooth floor. Instead, he checks the wounds on your hands and verifies that they’re clotting. The margins slotted together properly for minimal scarring (he'd redone the glue-suture after your shower with only gentle scolding). He presses a kiss to the bandages after they're re-fastened. Letting his lips linger there for a second.

Namjoon has always had big hands, warm and steadying as they cradle yours. Small and chapped and scarred.

Instead of continuing on downstairs, you linger for a second by Namjoon’s side. Eating up every breath he breathes, his scent, and the comfort of having him nearby. Something you know you won’t have forever. (Somehow- you know that this will be the last time that Namjoon holds you. You can wait one minute more. You can give him one more minute). He sets the gun to the side and pulls you between his legs.

“Joonie?” You ask.

Your pack alpha wraps his arms around your waist and nuzzles forward, rubbing his spiky head across your midriff. Nose nudging the dimple of your belly button and the slight pudge there with a quiet happy growl.

Namjoon will never not be happy that he can see the evidence of the pack’s love on you. Will never not feel proud of you and how far you've come. He nuzzles, resisting the temptation to bite and nip with a breath let out through clenched teeth.

Namjoon feels your quiet laugh against his cheek. Your warm soft skin swelling with laughter. Namjoon’s face is blushing red when he pulls back to look at you in the darkness. Corralled in the safe circle of his arms, fingers digging into your hips and squeezing.

“What are you doing alpha?” 

“Just thinking- just-” Namjoon’s voice gets so much lower in the nighttime, it's a gravely growl. A sound that paints pictures of lightning and clouds hovering low like a blanket.

“When all of this is over, I want to go somewhere new.” Namjoon's hands tighten on your waist. fingers pressing to either side of your spine, thumbs sitting on the soft bones of your hips. “-With you. Just you. Just the two of us. Maybe.” Namjoon fights back a fresh blush at the confused cock of your head. “Maybe- like- a fancy Airbnb? Or something? Would that be fun? Would you like that?” 

You pause, humming. Indulging Namjoon in this as he holds you, fingers rubbing endlessly up and down the sensitive small of your back. Eyes wide and imploring like a child. 

You're only too happy to forget for a second and imagine. What would happen if you didn’t leave tonight? What would happen if you found some way out of this?

It’s easy to go further than just thinking about a simple weekend getaway. You Imagine far into the future; a day that you'll never see. A future with Namjoon and the pack. It hits you with such a profound heartache when you think it that you half expect to look down and see your white tank top speckled with blood. The ache so keen and visceral but- 

Namjoon would be a good father. 

He’d be kind and patient. He’d never snap. He’d never yell. For a moment that’s all you want to think about- not a stupid weekend but a lifetime. A family. A world where you’re never yelled at, where you don't have to be afraid, where nothing is hard, and even if it’s hard you do it together.

If you had pups, you know Namjoon would treat every skinned knee like it was surgery. Would never tell them to walk it off or say it wasn’t that bad. You know that he’d go through every tea party with gusto and stay up late to help them with their homework. That he’d struggle to say no but that you might never need to. It would be lovely- getting to give something small and innocent so much safety. It would be nice to have pups with Namjoon.

You can’t say you don’t want it, but you know in that moment that you won't get it. You'll never get to see Namjoon be a father- even if the pups aren't yours or are just his and Jin's. You’d love them all the same. What use is it to Imagine things that you’ll never get? What good are dreams like this but to tease you, just out of reach. 

Namjoon nuzzles into your stomach again. His nose drawing soft circles just under your belly button. 

You’d be a shit mother anyway. Too fragile. Too nervous. Too hurt. Too much of everything. You'd fuck them up just by being you. You'd fuck them up the same way you've fucked up this perfectly good pack. You've brought nothing but destruction upon them. The evidence of your wreckage is everywhere. The bullets in the ceiling, the blown apart door. Your hands and Hobi's throat. All of this is because of you. 

You snap back to the present, swallowing down the lump in your throat. You’re gnawing at your own leg to survive. All things that bite cannot resist it. What good does hope do at the end other than to hurt?

You can't resist asking Namjoon for more, curled around you like a protective barrier to keep out all the world's hurts (or to keep you in). 

“If we went? Where would we go? If we made it- What would it be like Joonie?”

Namjoon rests his chin on your belly button and looks up at you. Completely unaware of the longing tearing its way through you, of what you’re thinking about. Not just one trip or one year, but ten or twenty or thirty. 

“Maybe south, to see the cherry blossoms?”

“We couldn’t go, not without Tae- cuz of the pink, and Hobi- cuz of the flowers”

Namjoon nods, agreeing. “Yeah- she does really like anything that’s pink.” There is a Tae-shaped smile on his face, you can feel it stretching your lips too. But he shakes it off, head bowed before you. Eyes closed against the image. 

“Still, somewhere safe and quiet just for us, just for you and I to take a deep breath and-” Namjoon trails off, looking up at you. His eyes sparkle with the idea of it, all the little moments he’s picturing.

A private morning where he wakes up to just you. Where you hog his warm spot and his pillow in the chilly spring air. Your cold toes pressed to his shins with nothing to do but appreciate each other and take your loving slow and intentional. Your body and his body and all the space and laughter that you want in between. An idyllic picture of two young people quietly in love. Gently in it.

After almost losing all of it, he wants the chance to properly appreciate you one-on-one. The others too- but they’re asleep, and sleeping vessels cannot reply to Namjoon’s daydreams. You are the only one awake.

(In Namjoon's fantasy, he'll give each of his packmates a different trip. every one of them even if it's just the ones he's recently almost lost that have him thinking of these particular plans.

Hobi would want just a day trip. Namjoon knows the alpha doesn’t really like to be separated from the pack for all that long, a few hours sure. Maybe to some vintage stores that he’s been eyeing to the city or the botanical garden.

Seokjin he’d take somewhere grand and big and full of adventure, maybe to 6 Flags or something. Jin likes to be reminded that he’s allowed to be a kid again, that he doesn’t always have to look after everyone all the time. That he has Namjoon to lean on.

Tae, he’d take somewhere gilded just as she is, like teatime at the Ritz- or maybe abroad to the castle of Versailles. The hall of mirrors and a million pictures of Tae in pretty dresses, twirling. In Namjoon’s head- he watches her turn and flutter slowly like a top. Spinning and spinning).

But none of that is quite your style. You don't really crave outings or adrenaline or gilded things. Your wants are much more simple maybe- because you've always known how priceless quiet and peace is. Gentleness is all you've ever really wanted- not excitement or acclaim or ego.

“A little cabin somewhere in the mountains, a spot for just us. We wouldn’t even have to do anything, A staycation. A night or two.” As the world spins on, you are who Namjoon craves to be still with.

You swallow hard, lingering, still half leaning over him still. Letting him nose at your jaw and purr.

“That would be so nice Joonie."

You swallow, throat thick with something. You lean forward pressing a kiss- too brief, to his lips, Namjoon’s lips part and he breathes gently. You blink back the glassiness in your eye and hope that Namjoon dismisses it as the light from the moon streaming through one of the skylights. All white and black. Wrenching you through something that feels like film. You commit the feel of him and the sound of his voice to memory and then pull back.

“I really need to get a glass of water.”

Namjoon shifts to get up, to come with you, but you just laugh at him and push at his shoulder, he flops back onto the bed.

“I can go on my own Joonie.” He grumbles but stays put. Nosing at the goosebumps on your arms and leaning to retrieve Hobi’s sweatshirt from where you left it in the nest. It smells like sleeping pups and Jin. Milky and soft and safe. Namjoon’s body shivers happily when he sees you put it on.

You squirm out from between his legs. His palm stays wrapped around the tips of your fingers. They slide out of his a little, and then all the way.

“It’s not safe.” You heave a tired sigh, what he thinks is a tired sigh but is actually you trying your hardest not to cry. You lean over him to grab the gun from where it’s rested against the nesting barrier. Getting your phone while you’re at it and sliding it into the pocket of your sweatshirt.

“Is that better?” Namjoon grumbles but still lets you go. Sitting there on the edge of your nest and guarding the others. You look back at him from the top of the stairs and smile.

The house is quiet, with no creeks on the stairs and no winds blowing across the roof. No sound at all in the house beyond your quiet footsteps that Namjoon listens to as you go down the stairs.

Feeling every second of your distance like the sluggish beat of his heart, thump thump thump. Namjoon looks back to look at his pack. Their bodies curled and resting, so gentle in sleep. After a few minutes, there are footsteps on the stairs, small soft ones.

Thump.

“They’re so beautiful” Namjoon comments to you. Waiting for reply.

The silence gnashes its teeth, still hungry.

When Namjoon turns back, it’s not you standing at the top of the stairs- just Noodle with his tail raised high. His yellow eyes glow almost florescent in the darkness, meowing and hissing so loud it might wake the others.

“Noodle, quiet.” The cat just doesn’t quit, batting at Namjoon’s ankles, claws and all. “Noodle- hush.” He scoops up the fussy cat, but Namjoon’s only reward is some claws to his forearms and some more squirming.

Downstairs, he hears a sound that makes him pause. Instincts going from at peace to on edge.

Thump

The front door opens and closes softly with a soft click of the metal doorknob.

Thump

Namjoon goes to the top of the stairs, holding Noodle in his arms before the cat squirms and falls to the floor with a thud. “Pup?” he calls, hushed. You don’t respond. Only silence greets him, sated at last.

Thump, breath, thud.

Namjoon waits a moment, listening for a response that doesn't come before he goes down the stairs, Noodle nearly trips him on the way down, hissing and pacing back and forth in front of the door. The ground floor of the house is completely absent of you- absent of anyone friend or foe. The room is soaked in the blue darkness of morning that is not quite dawn. The white countertops are unassuming and the plates stay in their places.

Thud.

The couch still has its dark spot from where Jin cleaned it. The tangerines are safely in the bowl back on the counter shining like several small suns or planets. Everything is empty empty empty.

Thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud

Namjoon checks the shoe rack. Your sneakers are missing, the same ones that match Hobi's and usually sit side by side with his. The spot where they should be empty.

Thud

Your wallet is missing from the bowl just inside the door.

Thud

Namjoon looks out onto the street and finds it empty.

Thud thud thud

Namjoon does not panic, Namjoon does not head out onto the street and chase you down- maybe he should have. He should have done any number of things. The sun is just barely rising turning the sky into that honey blue-green color and Namjoon just stands there and stares.

Namjoon is frozen. What kind of alpha is he- why kind of alpha freezes instead of fights or flights?

Thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud thud

A few minutes pass and something must tip off the packmates upstairs- either the empty nest or the sound of Noodle yowling and quite literally trying to bite Yoongi's ear off.

The next thing Namjoon is aware of is Yoongi is on the stairs, looking pissed off, looking terrified. almost falling down them with the speed at which he descends.

He takes the stairs down two at a time, colliding with Namjoon at the bottom of them. He looks like a puffed-up cat, hair wild and eyes equally as glaring as Noodles when he shakes Namjoon, just a little. “Where is she? Namjoon? Where did she go? Where is my mate!?"

Is it Yoongi's scent- acrid and angry- that knocks him out of his stupor? Or is it the top of his ruffled head almost colliding with the bottom of Namjoon’s jaw when the beta shakes him again.

Namjoon stutters, panic making him inarticulate. So scared he repeats it twice. "I don't know- I don't know, I- she said she was just getting a glass of water. I swear-"

Yoongi's fists tangle in the front of Namjoon's shirt. He sounds sick with it. Voice twisting in pitch.

"You were supposed to keep an eye on her- you weren't supposed to let her out of your fucking sight.”

There are other people on the stairs, roused by the sound of raised voices. A lone light flicked on sends everyone into yellow chiaroscuro. Namjoon is still staring at the street, heart thundering quicker than your footsteps as you run. The streetlights wink out behind you as you go. Fleeing with the night and bowing under the weight of oncoming daylight. Running as fast as your body can carry you.

Could he catch up if he started running now?

It's Jungkook, his dark hair pushed up at the side where it rested against the nest, who asks, “What happened?What’s going on?”

Tae’s eyes dart between Yoongi and Namjoon, her pink silk dressing gown wrapped tight around her shoulders. “Where’s the pup?”

"Yeah Namjoon, where the fuck is my mate??" Yoongi grits his teeth, shaking Namjoon so hard it almost knocks him off his feet and sends him careening a little into the narrow dresser table that the pack keeps by the door for gloves and mittens and keys and wallets.

“I don’t know, I don’t-"

Jungkook and Tae have just spilled out from the stairs into the entryway when Yoongi’s hands hit his shoulders, pushing and then digging into Namjoon’s skin. He’s shaking so hard he can hardly speak.

“You were supposed to be watching her. You were supposed to make sure she was safe-”

“Yoongi- hey- Stop” Tae’s not shaking anymore when gets her hands on his shoulders pulling him away from namjoon where he simmers. Jin is still asleep upstairs. Hasn’t been roused by all the tense voices. Too tired from yesterday- from staying up to scrub blood with Yoongi.

Jungkook skitters to the door as Jimin and hobi descend the steps. nearly bouncing on his heels as he opens the front door letting in a gush of cold air. “What are we waiting for? lets go."

Yoongi's face crumples. “I don’t get it, where did she go- why would she have-”

Hoseok swallows but talks softly, the swelling’s gone down enough even though the bruises look a million times worst in the sunlight streaming through the window. It’s not even 6am yet. His soft hiss is gentle, but the pack pauses to hear it.

“A deal- I think she made a deal.”

It's the first words he’s been able to speak since the attack. Vocal cords straining with every word. Everyone quiets to listen to Hobi. Jimin’s got the shotgun in his hands. He leans it up against the doorway. The heavy thunk punctuates the shocked quiet- but hobi continues.

“When the man was here- she tried to barter our lives with hers." Everyone looks to Tae. And her eyes lower to the floor.

“She did say that but I didn’t think she was serious, I just thought-”

The conversation is a flurry, everyone talking over each other as conversation explodes. Yoongi's face twists from devastated to enraged. “Jesus fucking Christ- that stupid stupid-”

Jungkook clings to Jimin's t-shirt, “What are we going to do? Hyung- what should we-”

Jimin hasn't spoken a word yet, and softly draws Jungkook's hands away from his shirt. “Where would she even have even gone?"

“Did someone pick her up?” Hobi’s words seem to ring out, even though his voice is so fragile.

Namjoon shakes his head. “No- I was listening, I didn’t hear any car in the road- not for like the whole hour.”

“So, you were listening enough to hear the street but not to stop her from literally walking away from us, great. Good to know Namjoon.”

“Yoongi that is like- the opposite of helpful.”

“There's still the matter of where would she have gone. She didn't take a car-” Hoseok looks up in Tae’s direction. She sees the realization light across his face.

“Hobi?”

But Hoseok ignores her, lurching to the small cabinet by the front door; the pack’s drop-off points for their keys, their wallets and your fuzzy little purse from your first ever date with jimin and tae as well as a good slice of Tae’s collection of little red pocketbooks. They keep their things this way because Namjoon loses his keys at least once a month a nd having a communal spot always helps the general disorder of having 8 people live in one house.

Hoseok scrambles not for your wallet but for his.

He reaches for his wallet. Opening it and searching but-

The train ticket is gone.

Your train ticket- the one that you gave Hobi for safekeeping so many months ago is missing from where he usually keeps it in the last slot. Right next to that folded poem of Tae's and an old gift card. In its place is just a simple folded note, a new piece of paper that hasn’t been worn soft at the edges yet. Torn from the same pad of paper that Jin writes the grocery list on. Hoseok’s hands shake as they fish it out. 5 words that aren’t nearly enough.

I’m sorry, I love you.

You’d never told him that- that you loved him. Not after you’d had sex and he’d confessed. Not in the tangle of moments that followed with Jimin bloody and the pack breaking. You’d never spilled your heart to him that way. In the back of his head, he realizes that there just hadn’t been time.

This is the first time you’ve told Hoseok you love him and maybe the last. Hoseok’s heart beats quick. She loves me. Thump. She loves me. Thump. She loves-

Hoseok shoots off like a bullet out the open door, thundering across the porch slats. Too fast for the rest of the sleepy pack to properly anticipate and follow. Peering out after him, a little sluggish and a lot shocked. His socks skid and slip as he tries to arrest his momentum and almost falls as He doubles back for his shoes.

The rest of the pack stares down at him blankly as he tugs them on, sprawled there on the floor just outside the door. Hands shaking too much for bunny-eared loops. He doesn’t even bother to lace them before he’s lunging for his car keys in the bowl too. Nearly knocking over the table in his haste.

“The train station- she’s going to the train station.” He gasps.

The words you shared that night ring in his head, playing on repeat. Like a record that’s been scratched too many times. He’s replayed those moments too many times. He’s not sure if he remembers it correctly.

“Give me one chance, let me try to convince you to stay and if I can’t- then I’ll let you go, and I won’t tell Yoongi what train you took.”

The countless times you’d joked with him after that, the moment so light that Hoseok didn’t notice the weight behind them.

“You still got that train ticket?”

“Of course I do.”

Hoseok never thought that you’d use it. He thought that the ticket would have stayed frayed and pretty in his wallet until you framed it or something. Until you could look back on it and laugh and say things like “remember that night? Remember how it used to be before we loved each other?”

“No, I don’t, can you remind me?”

This is not that, this is not the future that Hoseok had imagined for the two of you. This abject terror. Suddenly Hoseok is unmoored, suddenly he is falling. Usually, you can see the end from a mile away. Is it worse if you lose the person you love because of circumstance or because they decide to leave on their own? Hoseok never thought you'd actually do it.

Hoseok thought your promise last night meant something. Later when he’s not so scared he’ll remember that he’s angry about that.

The rest of the pack explodes too. Jungkook doesn’t bother to put on his shoes- just heaves Hobi up by his shoulders and pushes him towards his car. Yoongi snatches both of their pairs from the floor and joins them. Cold feet on the small pea-gravel driveway. Jimin darts forward wrenching off his arm sling regardless of Namjoon’s protests.

“I’ll drive” Jimin doesn’t have to wrestle with Hoseok’s keys for long. Even with his hands numb Jimin is still the best driver. He won’t pull corners or care about hitting curbs. He reeves it with a roaring purr while the rest get in and looks at Tae in the rearview mirror. Standing on the porch looking breakable and not all there still. Her eyes on his have that same peculiar weight, the same weight that makes Jimin’s blood sing with purpose.

If there was ever someone that Tae needed, it was you. Not Jimin. He will haul you back from the edge of hell if he needs to, for her. because this is not the ending that you and tae deserve. Jimin will tear you from hell. Teeth and sin and all.

Jungkook has barely shut the door before Jimin peals out, reversing until the tires screech against the asphalt and leave dark lines in their wake. Tire tracks, strings of fate, shoelaces. He shoots off down the street and out of sight, knocking over a trash bin with a clang and leaving Tae and Namjoon back on the porch.

Hoseok knows the name of the station you were most likely to go to but not how to get to it. It's an 15 minute walk, maybe a 10 minute run and it's already been 8 since you left. Jimin points his car in the direction of the main road while he pulls it up on his cell phone.

With every sharp turn Yoongi and Jungkook slosh in the back seat and hit into each other. Some early morning commuter honks his horn at Jimin but he doesn’t even see them. The scenery flickering by and the asphalt melting away underneath the wheels of Hoseok’s red car. The small grey towns melt away, Break lights bleeding less than they should. The engine stutters and engages but no one cares about the uneven acceleration. Hoseok would total this car in a heartbeat if it meant getting you in time.

At the straightaway Jungkook stoops to slip his feet into his shoes, Yoongi holding his shoulder. The phone in between them slides on the leather seat, spitting out its electronic voice, overly cheerful.

"Re-routing!"

“Wait Minnie- go left.”

“Fuck!” Jimin makes the turn just barely, sparks skittering and burning out as he goes over one of those tiny reflective dividers. Hoseok curses every pothole for damaging their momentum and slowing them down.

“Are you sure? Are you sure that it’s this station that she'd go to?” Hoseok’s heart is thundering in his ears, beating furious and fast.

“Almost positive.” Yoongi holds onto the back of Hoseok’s chair to keep himself in place.

“We have to get to her before she gets to the city. Can’t you go any faster?” Jimin jerks the wheel around a flashy BMW. Almost hitting them with how close he gets. Jimin lets the speedometer answer Yoongi's question. Pushing 60 in a 35 and then 70.

Your note is crumpled tight in Hoseok's fist, a tiny bit of yellow paper that he unfolds and looks at before shoving deep within the confines of his jacket.

Yoongi is not looking at hoseok when he says his next sentence. Hoseok's not even thinking about his old pack, he's just thinking about the fact that you love him and he never got to hear you say it. Not when Yoongi pulls himself almost between his and Jimin’s seat and repeats the same to Jimin again, the same only different.

Thud.

“We have to get to her before Moonbyul does, if she gets to her- I don't know what I'll be able to do Minnie- even with the power that I have Moonbyul still has more-”

Hobi’s flinch is visceral, jerking like he's shocked.

He turns around to look at Yoongi as Jimin blows through a stop sign and then a red light. Jungkook winces and doesn’t say anything. Pushing Yoongi’s shoes across the seat. “Hyung- you should get ready to run.”

Hoseok and Yoongi look at each other. Hoseok's turned almost all the way around in his seat to stare at Yoongi- more specifically Yoongi’s mouth. He’s not sure if Jimin’s painkillers would make him hallucinate but that’s the only logical reason his brain can come up with after hearing that name- her name- come out of Yoongi’s mouth.

“What?"

Jimin's voice is deathly quiet. "Hoseok- turn the fuck around. If I get into an accident at this speed you will die if you're not facing forward to the airbag."

Hoseok turns back to face the road. Jimin grips the wheel so hard his knuckles are white. “Thank you.”

The sunlight is just cresting the tops of the trees. Dotting the scenery blue and yellow. Hoseok’s ears are ringing with her name.

Yoongi pulls himself closer to Hoseok, hands still gripping the headrest, the only thing that keeps him from bobbing and moving with the movement of the car. Eyes locked on Hoseok's face in the rearview mirror.

"I said something- I said something and you're having a thought."

"I fucking hope so-" Jungkook's quip goes unnoticed. Unnoticed through the volley of honking horns as the red car tares through the street. By some miracle, they haven’t passed a cop car yet.

Hoseok looks in the rearview mirror, at Yoongi’s face. Biting his lower lip. “It’s nothing just that name.”

Hoseok looks at Yoongi and all he can think about is how he'd never said- he'd never told Yoongi their names. Saying them or even thinking them reminds Hoseok too much of his own begging. What kind of alpha begs for an omega to hurt them- to stay?

Yoongi just about puts himself in the front seat of the car as Jimin breaks hard to navigate around a tractor-trailer. Riding on the shoulder, the rumble strips vibrating all of them hard and roaring just like Hoseok’s blood thundering through his ears.

“Moonbyul? Moon Byul-yi? You know it?”

Hoseok shivers, the reaction of his body route, unavoidable. Jarring. Trauma builds itself into your bones whether you like it or not. Triggers are not so much a part of you as they are a light switch that makes the worst parts of you turn on.

"Yeah- I do. It’s the name of my ex-pack omega.” Now it’s Jimin’s turn to be distracted, and he almost gets into an accident for his troubles. They’re silent for a second, Yoongi and Jimin look at each other.

“It could be the same name.”

Yoongi scrambles for his phone on the seat right as Jimin makes a turn and it goes flying. He finds it underneath Hoseok’s seat, hands slippery with sweat on it.

“Hang on, I think I have a picture of her somewhere.”

Yoongi scrolls all the way to the back in his phone. Switches to Instagram, going back and back and back through time, and then he's sticking it in Hoseok's face.

Seeing her face feels like Yoongi’s slapped him. Her face is on Yoongi's phone. Why is her face on Yoongi’s phone? Her hair is longer than it was when they dated, she must not have cut it since. But it's definitely her.

Hoseok feels like he's spinning, it's been so long since he's seen her face but it's definitely the one from his nightmares, the one he sees grinning and crooning false praises that have stuck to Hoseok's soul like glue. The face that he sees behind his eyes and sees in every criticizing comment only on his bad days. She's standing shoulder to shoulder with Yoongi, both of them in black suits along with a man that looks enough like Yoongi for him to guess that that's his brother, your ex-husband.

Your abuser and his and Yoongi in between them. Hoseok can only hear ringing in his ears, he knows he sounds accusatory when he snaps. "How the fuck do you know my ex-pack omega?"

“She’s my cousin. Are you sure that's her?”

Hoseok feels like he’s spinning. “Yeah, I'm sure.”

“I thought you said your old pack was all omega’s?” Yoongi knows Hoseok’s lore, knows it like he knows the back of his hand. He looks up, hair falling across his face. Hoseok frowns jabbing his finger at the phone.

“I did. She’s an omega.”

The dissonance hits him and Yoongi almost wants to disagree but then-

Hoseok watches the lightbulb go off, Yoongi’s eyes widening imperceptibly as he paws at the phone and Hoseok’s hand. The car sickness lurches in his stomach as he turns to look back at Yoongi, and the g force hits him as Jimin takes another turn Impossibly fast. The seatbelt across Hobi’s chest engages with a click, digging into his skin and the bruises on his neck with a painful jerk.

“Are you sure? Hoseok- you have to be sure.”

“I’m sure.”

This is all a game of leverage. A game of who knows what secret and what gets exchanged for whom. Yoongi spent most of last night wondering about Moonbyul's motivation, and now he knows why.

Hoseok is holding onto Yoongi’s phone, they’re hands gripping it together. “Is this who she’s going too? The one who tried to kill us? Is-” Hoseok has to swallow to get the words out right. “Is Moonbyul the one trying to take her?”

“Yes.”

Hoseok shivers, eyes darkening, scent spiraling wildly. His muscles trembling as he thinks about it. You and Moonbyul.

Yoongi pulls himself around Jimin’s headrest. Hand on his throat, digging into his scent gland. He doesn't have time to explain to them.

Only alphas can lead the family, only alphas can rule. If Moonbyul isn't one- that calls into question the legitimacy of her rule. The families would never stand to see an omega on the throne, she'd be ousted, probably killed for daring to lie. The families would tear her apart piece by piece and Yoongi would let them.

If Moonbyul is the person who hurt Hobi- and now she's going after you- that's two people that Yoongi loves that she's directly hurt. Yoongi is thinking all sorts of dangerous things. But they have to get to you first.

If Moonbyul isn't an alpha then Yoongi's just found his leverage and maybe the whole reason why the pack was targeted in the first place.

A packmate for a secret. Yoongi imagines the worst-case scenario; Don't tell and I won't hurt her. Don’t tell anyone and she lives.

How long had she stewed and festered- knowing that Hoseok was out there- knowing that he knew the secret that could lead to her undoing. Maybe she thought his knowing would never come back to bite her, and had intended on tying up the loose end later. Maybe she didn't know Hoseok had found his way into Yoongi's arms until after the old Don and Beta had died. She probably thought that they’d never put it together- at least not until it was too late.

Whatever her reasons, this has gone on long enough.

Yoongi opens his mouth, but Hoseok’s body is taught like a spring-loaded and ready to burst. His voice a near growl.

“Jimin, I need you to drive.”

~-~

Tae and Namjoon are left standing there on the porch. Namjoon left staring after them as they hurl away from the house. Running his hands through his hair hard. Thinking of what to do until-

Tae tugs on his sleeve, “Your phone- Joonie- you should call her.”

“Right- fuck-” Namjoon goes and gets it, and comes back to stand with Tae on the porch. “Come on- come on pick up.” Namjoon paces back and forth on the front porch, the snowmelt from the roof drips out an uneven rhythm onto the railing. the cold spray hitting his stress-warm skin.

Tae stands by the door. Frozen, a statue of Namjoon’s distress. Inside, Namjoon hears a voice. Jin coming down the stairs, probably roused by the sound of the car screeching out of the driveway and down the road.

“Tae? Where is everybody?”

“Pup’s being stupid. The others left to go get her before she’s like- really really stupid.”

Jin freezes in the doorway, fist rubbing his eye. He sounds smaller and younger than Namjoon’s ever heard him. “Am I having a bad dream?” namjoon's pacing stutters and then starts up again. Jin doesn't need him right now, Jin he can help later.

Tae takes Jin's hand and leads him to the outdoor furniture. The cushions have to be damp but they sit anyway. Tae pulls her knees under her and rests her cheek on Jin's shoulder. “That’s what I thought too at first.”

Namjoon almost sobs when he hears it- the click of the dial tone and a single breath. He can hear the thud of the train in the background, the hiss of pressure against the scratchy speaker.

“Pup? oh thank god, stay where you are- the others are-”

“Namjoon? Joonie stop- I didn’t pick up so that you could convince me to come back. I only picked up because I never said goodbye.”

Namjoon freezes, and he feels like the snowmelt from the roof has just dripped down his back. Growing frigid more with each word. If there was ever a question on if you’d gone willingly or been taken- it was answered with that.

“Pup, come home right now or I swear to god-”

“No! For once you’re going to listen!” You’ve only shouted at him a handful of times and he’s hardly ever heard you sound so serious.

"No- you can't-"

“Namjoon, The second you say anything to try and convince me to stay is the moment I hang up, so what is it gonna be?”

Namjoon goes silent and stops his pacing. Holding the phone so hard it feels like the plastic and metal might break.

Namjoon’s very being hinges on every syllable you say, Like the ocean hinges on the moon. Water tethered and kept from the shore by something as simple as gravity. Tae is right there. Tae is watching the driveway not saying anything with that same blank look Namjoon has seen on your face countless times.

All at once Namjoon is reminded of you in the summertime back when he first met you and trauma had you all quiet. Staring off into space in much the same way. Small and fragile and worth saving. You’ve always been that for him; worth saving.

Jin scrubs a hand across his face, clearing himself of the last little bits of sleep. He holds out his hand for the phone, but Namjoon doesn’t give it to him just paces right by him as he listens to you.

“I only picked up the phone because I have some things that I want to say to you.”

You sound more settled and less angry but just as resigned and convicted of what you're doing. Like no part of you doubts your choices. Namjoon wishes you sounded angry, that you sounded sad, but you don’t sound like any of those things.

“I'm not leaving because I think I don't deserve a life with you and the pack. I’m not leaving because I think that I’m not worth your love. I’m leaving because for the first time I know that I am.

“For the first time I understand why Yoongi left and why he didn’t come back until he knew it would be safe. Because when you love something the way that I love you, you’ll do anything to protect them. Can you really blame me Joonie? For doing what you might have done?”

You continue on like you’re not wrenching Namjoon’s heart clean from his chest. Like you’re not a hurricane on his very being- dark and thunderous tearing through him as impersonal as wind. Namjoon’s heart thuds and thuds and thuds.

“Before I leave you, I want you to know that if I loved you less- I might have stayed.”

Namjoon’s lungs ache, ache and sting and swell with words he can’t say, he can’t breathe. His mouth screwed into a soundless sob. He actually might be having a panic attack. He's never had one before- he's not sure if he knows what one feels like. If it's like this- if it's like this he can understand why people call them an attack.

It's frantic, like he's chewing off his own leg to get out of your words. The panic is so terrible. Namjoon hasn't been this scared since he was a child. At least Yoongi had the fucking decency not to make his leaving so visceral.

Namjoon is bent over, tears dripping down his nose, sagging almost to his knees. “Why are you doing this to us!? To me!”

Something jiggles the phone, something that makes your voice all warbly- Namjoon imagines you on the train in a window seat. Resting your cheek against the balmy glass while you talk to him. Staring out at the scenery racing by. Hurtling towards your future like a comet or maybe an asteroid (something more destructive- more appropriate for the wretchedness filling Namjoon’s lungs like tar, the desiccated bodies of the dreams he had for you and the plans he made with you in mind clogging his lungs and making it hard to breathe).

Who knows, maybe off between the trees and the road, you see a red car zooming, trying to keep pace with the train.

Namjoon’s heart feels like it’s skipping too many beats.

“Something Jin told me the other day got stuck in my head and I keep thinking about it, would you like to hear it?”

You take his silence for permission and Namjoon does not turn to look at Jin and Tae sitting on the outdoor furniture. They just sit there; they don't do anything. Namjoon wishes there was something they could do or something he could barter for your safe return but you already have all of him and all of him wasn't enough to make you stay.

“Jin showed me this little article the other day- a few weeks ago now. He can tell you it in more detail but basically, it was about these mice.”

Namjoon struggles to say something- unsure where you’re going with this but desperate to keep you on the line. At least until the others get to you. Drinking down your voice, the whisper of your breath, everything.

“They made like- two test groups, they wanted to measure like- willpower- or how long they would try to live before they gave up. It’s kinda dark I guess. I'm not a good judge of things like that you know.”

Your laugh is the prettiest and saddest thing that Namjoon’s ever heard. He wants to record it and save it for later like some hidden track and he never wants to hear it again.

“Anyways- they put the mice and a bucket of water and timed how long it took for them to stop swimming, to stop trying to live. They’d try for a little while but give up pretty quickly. Like- an hour. That’s how much will to live that they had: an hour’s worth of it.”

Namjoon breaks, shouting, “I don’t want to talk about mice I want to talk about getting you the fuck home!”

Namjoon can hear your smile in your voice, And no-no-no you won’t even let him fight- you won’t even let him snap at you and engage with it. Namjoon’s seen you sad, he’s seen you defeated. He’s seen you so hungry you could hardly hold your head up. But seeing you convicted of this punishment is worse than anything.

“Anyway- they just killed the first group for a baseline. But with the second group just before they died- just before they went underwater- They took them out of the water and dried them off.”

Your voice goes hushed at the end. The morning sunlight cuts across the top of the house yellow. The tree too- it’s early morning- Namjoon’s favorite time of day and he won’t be ever able to properly enjoy it again. Won’t ever be able to wake up at this time of day and not think about the morning you left.

“They let them rest and gave them some food.”

Namjoon feels like he’s about to have a heart attack, blood thumping and hitting against his ribcage. Bullying out the flowers and the butterflies in his stomach.

“Cuddled them a little.”

Namjoon stands at the doorway to the pack den. Hands so tight in their fists that they ache and ache. Namjoon’s hands have saved countless people’s lives before, and they’ve saved yours too- but right now they just hurt.

“And when they put them back in,”

Noodle meows dolefully from the door, swatting at Jin’s ankles and then purring around Tae’s. Namjoon’s knees are shaking.

“They lasted for a whole 12 hours longer. Because they thought they might be saved. Because they had some love to remember. They were able to last for a lot longer than they would have otherwise.”

His face is screwed something terrible with how hard he’s sobbing. How is it that just an hour ago you were safe in his arms, talking about getting away from here. Just an hour ago. It's still 5am a time zone away, if Namjoon got on a plane and flew there- would you still be safe? Is there any way to turn back time?

You only get to love people for as long as you get and not a second more. You get what you get and you don't get upset. Yoongi might have been your lifeblood, the air in your lungs and your reason for existing, but you’d still be that fragile creature close to drowning if it wasn’t for Namjoon.

“Namjoon?” You say his name once and then softer, a croon. “Joonie.”

He's sobbing too hard to see, “Don’t-”

“Thank you for drying me off.”

The phone clicks and disconnects.

Namjoon falls to the stairs, ass in a puddle but none of him cares. He remembers the first day he heard you speak, sitting on these stairs while he helped Yoongi fix the railing. Namjoon remembers the summer heat and feeling scared for you for the first time- because the railing felt so rickety and the last thing he wanted was for you or Jungkook or Hobi to fall. Namjoon is the one who is falling, hurtling towards destruction that stops and ends with his heart.

His hands hurt. He remembers laughing with the others and stealing sips of sweet tea. Nibbling on the sour lemons, sweaty and hot and dusty. His eyes feel like they’re going to fall out of his head with how hard he’s crying. He remembers that you’d poked his dimples and called them pretty, he remembers feeling tired after but fulfilled for it.

One scene in summer and the other in winter now. At the beginning of a relationship and now at the end. The stairs still creek, the wind still blows and Namjoon's hands are still sweaty.

Namjoon sobs loudly and it echos across the empty cul-de-sac gut-wrenching. People cry differently when they lose people they love. Namjoon has heard people cry like this after he’s told them bad news, no sign of brain activity. We did everything that we could. I'm so sorry. It sounds different now that it’s coming out of his own mouth.

He actually might pass out with how hard he’s breathing. Teeth dig into his lower lip so hard he tastes blood. He’s still holding the phone to his ear. “Pup- wait- I love you- you can’t do this to us- to me.” But you’ve already hung up on him.

The dial tone tears through him like a bullet. Namjoon should be bleeding, broken hearts don't hurt this much without blood. People don’t hurt this much without actual wounds.

Eventually, something touches his back, a soft furry creature that only makes Namjoon sob harder as Noodle bullies his way under Namjoon’s arm and licks at his fingertips. Before long there’s hands on him. Jin and Tae pull him up and onto the furniture. One hand in his hair and the other on his shoulder. Jin grabs his wrist. Circling it gently before he holds his hands and nudges them until they relax from their clenched fists.

Namjoon cries.

Together they watch the road and wait for the others to return.

~-~

(Hidden playlist ▶ Play track?)

“Shit!”

They miss the first train by just a few seconds. It screeches away from the platform when Jungkook gets out of the car. Standing there for a breath and watching it pull away. The metal thud screech of it drowns out Yoongi’s voice.

Jimin hits the wheel and growls before he revs the engine and turns, almost hitting a fire hydrant with how quick and jerky he backs up and accelerates. Leaning forward through the window to snap at Jungkook.

“Get back in the fucking car!”

Jungkook does, the door barely latching and almost swinging free as Jimin peels out of the parking lot. Slamming back shut when Jimin does a near 180 to accelerate back onto the main road.

“Sorry hyung,” Yoongi doesn’t need to reply- they all know that every second matters.

Jimin almost collides with a car stopped at the light before he drives on the shoulder, spinning around them. The train matches the road at this part of the tracks so it’s easy to follow it. They keep pace with it as Jimin pushes 70 miles an hour and then 80.

Jimin keeps the gas pedal well acquainted with the floor until they're going faster than the train. Weaving in and out of traffic back and forth, getting honked at and almost cut off several times. Leaving his packmates to grip to seats and their handles. Worried about getting thrown off but still- not wearing their seatbelts.

“We’re never going to make it! It’s too fast! We’re going to hit traffic soon!” The closer they get to the city the less likely it is that they'll be able to catch up to you. It's nearly early morning rush hour, another 30 minutes and these roads will be at a standstill.

“Hang on- let me see the map,” Hoseok watches Yoongi look at it.

“If we go to the next station, we won’t make it. But, if we try to go to the one after that and cut it off-” A look around the car says everyone agrees with Yoongi. Jimin steps on it, and there are a terrifying few minutes where Jimin’s driving skills honestly make them all count their prayers and promise things to gods that they’re already not fond of- but when they skitter and screech into the next station he hears it.

“The next inbound train will be arriving shortly, please collect your belongings. And remember-“

Hoseok is hot on the announcements heals. Sliding to get out of the car before it’s really stopped. “If we miss this one just go to the next station without us-”

“-if you see something say something.”

The train is coming- Hoseok can see the lights about a 100 feet down the tracks and it's moving fast. Yoongi almost makes to get out but Hoseok just shoves him back inside. Jungkook gets out of the car too, bolting in the direction of the stairs. “Hoseok-”

“Yoongi- Just go!”

There are maybe three flights of stairs up, then 50 feet across the tracks, and then the same amount of steps down. He and Jungkook book it up them. Making every second count. Hurtling through time and air. Ignoring the sore and tired pulse of their muscles. They’re clearing the top step and the train is below them. A silver bullet careening and destined to do damage but slowing down.

They bolt across the landing past the ticket kiosk and through the push doors. The train is stopping with a hiss of breaks and a screech of metal. A release of pressurized air that billows up to them warm carrying with it the smell of tar and city.

Hoseok’s lungs are burning. Jungkook is usually faster by just a little bit and would be on any ordinary day. They might be roughly the same height but Hoseok doesn't do cardio nearly as often as Jungkook does. Jungkook's the one who runs every day, who does cardio like it's sleeping and marathons like they're mid-afternoon naps. Who works out and hones his body to a lethal edge just because he can.

But he doesn’t run like Hoseok does.

Hoseok runs like his life depends on it- the same way you would run if he was walking into Geumjae’s arms. You’d never let Geumjae touch even a hair on Hoseok’s head and if- if Moonbyul is who you’re going to- then there is more at stake than just your phsyical safety, too much at stake for Hoseok to be held back by his body.

Hoseok thinks of the tiramisu. Of walking with you on the beach. Of making your nightime stacks just the way you like it. Of holding you that one time you almost fell into the water. Telling you that you had to be careful. Hoseok remembers driving out in his car, tugging your seatbelt to make sure it fit snug. Standing with you side by side in the flower refrigerators at work and the feeling the first time you’d rubbed your scent gland to his. Every playlist of his with your name on it, every song that you ever shared. All of that- she’s going to destroy all of that if Hoseok doesn’t get to you in time.

He remembers how small she made him feel. How small you were when he first saw you. He won’t let you get that way again. Hoseok won’t let you disappear.

Jungkook is the one who would win this race on any other day, where the stakes any different, but just this once Hoseok is faster. Hurling himself over the concrete as fast as his body will take him. Hoseok cuts through the air like wind.

They run, feet thumping. Bodies thudding, hearts and lungs delivering oxygen to their needy muscles. Beat-up sneakers gripping the concrete. Down and down the stairs, plummeting. Almost tripping and falling on the slippery concrete steps. The doors start to close just as they round the corner.

By some miracle of blood and sweat, Hobi's the one who overtakes Jungkook. The doors are closing and the train's metal shell is beginning to hum and vibrate as it makes to pull away from the tracks.

In a last-ditch effort, Hoseok throws himself in the direction of the closing doors.

~-~

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~-~

Do i think that hobi could have actually warned the pack what she was planning to do? Yes. Do I also think that he thought he had more time to warn them and really wanted to sleep off his near death experience? also yes. Namjoon giving him drugs obviously didn't help. i honestly don't think he was thinking clearly.

this is one of those chapters where everything could have gone differently if they'd just been given a little bit more- but i digress- we all know life isn't so neat and tidy.

I can't not write thinking about the angsty alternative ending for bily- but you guys should know the namjoon/m/c scene...if things had gone poorly in this chapter- this would have been the last time they spoke or touched each other for 3 years- for those who are wondering about the alternative ending- i will NOT be posting any of it on AO3. Only on tumblr through asks! i'll try to tag the super triggering stuff but yeah.

when i think of namjoon and the m/c and their relationship- i think that what they want most for each other is to just see the other old and happy like- that becomes the foundation for their relationship. thats why it's namjoon who she thanks. it also doesn't escape me that yoongi is not in this chapter very much- this is intentional. just wait for next chapter and his anger! i swear its so fucking hot my god i really wanted them to fuck in the next chapter but i just don't think it's going to happen.

the og version of this chapter called for jimin parking hobi's car on the tracks and literally letting the train hit it- not derail- but just hit it. just to get it to stop for the m/c however i figured that was going a bit too far.

Me writing any part with jimin in it- "what if i added a bit of religious trauma to it?"

the line where namjoon talks about his hands hurting is like- directly related to me, because my hands didn't hurt all the time before i started writing bily but now my Knuckles hurt almost every morning. After writing for more than an hour they hurt. i guess when you love something enough it hurts you lol i don't mind.

the "you want a lifetime with them" lines are mostly a callback to like...grey's anatomy. namjoon's charecter is LOOOSELY based on mcdreamy of course the whole...neurosurgeon thing and i am 3 seasons into a re-watch so~ you will have to tollerate that cringeworthy refrence~

i've always wanted to structure a chapter around the thud and thump of a heart and yeah!! i think did a few back but i wanted to do it again~

i don't think i was very subtle with the hoseok train station and the train ticket parts of the story like- i think i forshadowed pretty heavily that it was eventually going to be used but! i hope you liked the big reveal.

how did you guys like the cliffhanger? should i spoil it for you when i've always said that bily would get a happy ending????? i mean...come on... we all know hoseok's gonna be fast enough right?

[theoddest1]

Let's Actually Talk About The Issues With Vivziepop

Okay, first off, hello you beautiful people! Sorry about this foreboding title, but I needed to catch y'all attention on this so I can break down the issues that I and many have with "Hazbin Hotel" and "Helluva Boss" creator, Vivienne Medrano. Now I am sure you all on here are already aware of at least a couple of the controversies that revolve around this particular creator and if you have seen my posts floating around already, some have been greeted with the problems surrounding her social media presence and just her overall as a person. I know seeing another callout on her seems very very tiring at this point, but I felt that a lot of the current callouts missed key details that were not at all addressed or properly delved on. I plan on shedding light on my issues with her and I hope you get where I am coming from when I say that she sucks.

BULLYING

Okay, I am starting off with Vivienne's blatant use of bully mentality, her agreeing or encouraging her fans to call people who see flaws in her works sub-humans or harass those who find issue or simply jest about her works trademark cussing and and overcrowded designs. She has had this issue for YEARS and refuses to grow up and act her age despite many telling her, even her own fans at times, that she shouldn't be acting so unprofessionally. Clearly, she doesn't care and thanks to her fanbase caring more about her feelings than her being better she feels as though she doesn't need to change or do better. This goes for her friend group as well, who defend her tremendously and act as though she is never in the wrong. Name one time a friend of hers called her out for acting childish, I'll wait.

Now, you're probably wondering, "Wtf could they have done to warrant such a response?"

Criticism...That's all they did. (White Text is random peeps they would speak with or maybe mutuals)

Keep in mind...they used to be a fan as well. They were also a minor at this point

But, Viv doesn't care, this person's critical yet harmless tweets about her shows is what lead to her painting them in a horrible light and making them out to be someone who has attacked her personally and as "nasty".

Rich coming from Viv since she is completely fine doing exactly that for "Ava's Demon". Not only does she criticize it, she takes a shot at the creator as well, but GOD FORBID others do the same towards her.

And according to someone who knew her well, it's all cause they felt creeped out by her.

Her hatred for criticism is so prominent that Ima makes that a section of its own. But let's get back on the topic of bullying.

Vivienne has a fanbase filled to the brim with pushy and overall annoying individuals who have harassed, threatened, disrespected, and wished harm on many people, all cause someone had a negative thing to say about Vivziepop's mid af show. One of the earlier known instances is the one revolving around a MEME of all things.

This was what started it all, and it led to both parties blocking each other and people being mad pushy and calling them an idiot and the like over their opinions. Now look, their take and you're opinion on said take is fine so long as you stay respectful and humane about it all, but don't dogpike someone all cause they think HH sucks. And while Viv can not control her fanbase, for they are not a hivemind (some of y'all act it tho, ima keep it real) she is seen here ENCOURAGING the behavior. Tell me how someone who doesn't even like your trash ass show has the sense to tell people not to harass others, someone with a smaller following, but not your grown damn near 30 year old ass?

Oh, but people wanna act like she can handle criticism, is a sweet person, and grew from her past experiences. Fam, she was 27 in this screenshot [December 16, 2019] and has shown no change from 2013 to fucking 2024. Over a decade of the same petty ass behavior, and keep in mind, according to several of her old friends and workers, she is worse behind close doors. WORSE. She's already acting like she got no damn sense out in the open, imagine behind closed doors.

Last but not least, a glimpse into her outright blatant slander towards Dollcreep, a once good friend of hers that she even visited and spoke with frequently!

She stated that they fetishized pedophilia yet according to the victim and friends of the victim who were once friends with Viv as well, Viv actually threatened to end their friendship if he hadn't drawn NSFW art of her character and his character having sex [Addi was 15 at the time this was drawn]

On top of that, she liked the post, something she didn't need to do. The art also depicted things she had regularly drawn on her own. Addi being tied up forcefully, being sexualized, being harmed to some degree through bondage, etc. The claim that she forced DC to draw this out is backed up by her own art depicting similar elements. Also, if my memory serves me well, Viv and Doll were 17-18 years old [Doll was 17 Viv 18] and have a 1-year age gap. The way Viv frames things here is as if DC was way older and imposed some sort of power over DC, which sources say otherwise. If anything, Viv had a LOT of control throughout all of this drama, which deserves its own section.

I'll be making posts that talk about the different issues regarding Viv, so one post isn't too long (this one is already lengthy enough) and that you can just pick at one post targeting certain issues around this creator.