#my friend was making a bunch of jokes about how short i am and it just got to me

[r3dships]

Thinking about how height difference relationships are always seen as cute and hot when the short one is a woman but not when the short one is a guy. The rare times it is seen as cute and hot with a short guy, the short one has to be a skinny hairless twink

I'm totally not self-conscious as a short fat guy what do you mean haha

[doqt33th]

SINGULARITY

MIRAGE/READER

SUMMARY: You and Mirage have been pining for each other for a while now. A nasty summer storm drives you straight into his arms. Shenanigans ensue.

WORD COUNT: 18k. Sorry I’m insane

WARNINGS: 18+ and I CANNOT STRESS THAT ENOUGH!! Explicit PWP, fingering + oral (fem receiving), penetrative sex, mild spit kink. Reader is fem and uses she/her pronouns but is written fairly androgynous. No descriptors of appearance beyond the basics and no (y/n) used.

Familiar streets flashed by at increasing speeds, traffic and pedestrians flickering by and blurring together into a smorgasbord of color, all gilded by the setting sun. Unconsciously, you dug your fingers into the seams of the leather seat beneath you, worrying the stitches. Out of the corner of your eye, the radio blazed to life with color and that oh-so-familiar symbol.

“Hey, hey, easy on the merchandise, hot stuff,” Mirage crackled out of the speakers lightheartedly, and you immediately yanked your hands into yourself like they’d been burned. In your worrying, you’d seemingly forgotten about what — or rather, who — exactly was your ride.

“Oh— my bad, I wasn’t thinking,” you said, sinking your weight back and down, instead picking at your nails to give your hands something to do. God, you were so nervous, and for what? Mirage knew all these people— these bots, and knew them well. They were all friends! Or amiable towards each other, at the very least. And they were the good guys. Saved the world and all that.

So why were you so anxious?

“You’re good, don’t worry ‘bout it.” He slowed to a stop at a red light. Your leg started to bounce. “Sooo… you wanna tell me what’s on your mind? Save me a trip to Noah’s repair shop? I’d hate for you to start taking your emotions out on me, y’know.”

You scoffed, eyes sliding to the radio. The grin that pulled at the corners of your mouth was one you were helpless to stop. He just had that effect on you, where around him you became a slave to your laughter and, additionally, also became one half of a terrible joke machine that Mirage happily completed.

Leather creaked as you nudged the inside of the door with your boot to chastise him. “You love when I take my emotions out on you, dick. Don’t lie.”

“Only the good ones,” he shot back, and you could hear the grin in his voice. “You nervous about meeting the others?”

His probe was successful; you fought the urge to shrink at your feelings being read so accurately and so immediately. “I— yeah. I am, and I don’t even know why. I’m sure they’re all great, I’m just working myself up over nothing.”

Red faded to green. Carried on the tide of forward-moving traffic, Mirage rolled ahead, eventually slipping over to make a turn. You watched him twist his mirrors to check his blind spot.

“Ah, c’mon. Nobody could blame you, you’re meeting a bunch of aliens for the first time. Pretty trippy for anyone. ‘specially if those aliens are, like, double your size. And robots.” A short chuckle topped off his words.

“Right. I just don’t wanna fuck it up or embarrass myself, you know how it is. I don’t wanna embarrass you, either.”

“Oh, Primus, trust me. You’re not gonna embarrass me. I don’t even think that’s possible. Prime’s seen me in a lot worse shape than bringing you in to meet him.” The world continued to roll by. Brick buildings blotted out the sunshine in intermittent flashes. “You got good marks from your favorite bot, you’ll be fine.” The dismissive tone of his voice was working, in a weird way, to assuage your fears.

“Excuse me,” you said, crossing your arms over your chest pointedly. “My favorite bot?”

“What, am I not?” A downright theatrical gasp hissed out of the speaker. “Have you been cheating on me?”

Cheeks hot with a flush at even the joking insinuation of being together, you glanced away from the impassive Autobot symbol on the radio and out the window. Still, the laugh barked out of you was sudden and sharp, and quickly dissolved into giggles. “Yes. Mirage. I’m sorry. There’s another ten foot tall alien robot in Brooklyn that’s been vying for my attention. We’re done.”

“I should throw you out on the street right now,” Mirage fussed playfully, his evident pout tinging his voice. “For breakin’ my spark. Also I’m taller than that.”

“You wouldn’t dare. I’m fragile.”

“I dunno. Noah gets his ass kicked around pretty good and he’s still kickin’ it.”

“I am not Noah,” came your tongue-in-cheek rebuttal. “And Noah just refuses to give up even when it’s good for him.”

“Thought qualities like determination were supposed to be big things with you guys.”

“In moderation.”

Mirage barked a laugh. “Ha! Should tell that to Prime. He’ll blow a gasket.” You opened your mouth to reply, only to be cut off. “No, seriously, tell it to Prime, we’re here.”

The easy confidence that your playful back-and-forth had teased out instantly chilled into a dense mass in your stomach; Mirage was rolling slowly up to a nondescript warehouse buried deep within the old industrial part of Brooklyn, and the way the worn brick loomed over you even in the car made your heart rate pick up.

Now or never.

Familiar alien whirs and clicks of shifting and setting metal filled your ears as Mirage rose into his bipedal mode, the driver’s seat gently ejecting you onto your own two legs on the pavement. Following the motion, you took a few steps forward, but still balked a little at the half open door. Inside, you heard voices of varying timbre, and you fought the urge to turn tail.

Now. Or. Never. Gritted teeth accompanied the repetition of your thought.

The displacement of air behind you — and the soft, constant mechanical noises emanating from his body — signaled Mirage’s presence before his voice.

He said your name with surprising care, using a tone that only came out when he was really being sincere. You couldn’t help the way your face warmed at it as you turned, craning your neck up to meet his gaze. “Hey, you, uh, you want me to go in ahead of ya? Normally I’d be like ‘ladies first’ and all that, but you said you weren’t feeling too jazzed about going in—“

“Yeah, actually, if you could, that would be… great. That would be great.”

“Gotcha. Let you psych yourself up a little more before you go in, I see how it is. Let me do the talking,” he affirmed with an easy grin and a nod, bouncing on the balls of his pedes a few times before striding forward. His long legs folded easily under him as he ducked under the lowered garage door, and you traipsed after, smoothing your thumb over your knuckles repeatedly.

The warehouse yawned beyond you, orange shafts of light cutting gashes into otherwise brownish darkness. Old graffiti sprayed across the walls told you that Ramona had been there once, then Nick, then Darnell, and a million others. And you were there now, feeling impossibly small, yes, but a little more resilient with the fading sunlight at your back and Mirage, like always, at your side.

He’d become a permanent fixture in your life from the day you’d met him — when you’d strong-armed Noah into giving up his secret about his Porsche, and the mysterious car had ended up being a twelve-foot-tall robot with a literal motormouth that made a playful pass at you within the first hour of your first conversation. You’d been flustered out of your mind, but had just kept coming back out of unfettered curiosity and outright fascination. Aliens were real, and Noah was friends with one, and it— he could turn into a Porsche.

Mind-shattering observations on the surface, yes. Mirage tended to deflate the grandeur, though, because he never acted like aliens did in the movies or in books. There was no ‘We come in peace!’ bullshit. He was so easy. Everything with him was so easy. He was loudmouthed and extroverted and genuinely hilarious; you spent hours in Noah’s garage trading terrible jokes — mostly bad sexual innuendos — or buckled to Mirage’s driver’s seat as he flew down Central Avenue on the wrong side of the limit and blasted Haddaway so loud it nearly busted your eardrums.

Weird to say an alien robot was your friend, but he was. He gave you rides to work, to your lectures, to your labs, wherever; in fact, he got petulant when you dared to take the bus one day to give him a break, and made it a point to pry your routine out of you so that he could take you wherever you wanted, no fares needed. 

So infuriating. You loved it.

You loved… maybe more than just the back-and-forth. Maybe more than the bad jokes. Maybe more than the late-night drives. You were starting to think— starting to realize you loved big blue optics, and the rumble of a 260 horsepower engine when you made just the right innuendo, and broad, incredibly intricate servos that dwarfed yours in size but were so, so careful…

Man. You tried not to think about it too much. It as a concept made you laugh with its own absurdity. Poor human chick fell in love with the giant alien robot that made her laugh. It wasn’t… debilitating. You still functioned like a normal adult. Mostly. Except for that one night like two weeks ago where you’d been arguing with him about some stupid shit and he’d scooped you up, right off the ground, in both servos and held you there, digits interlaced against your back and thumbs on your front.

It wasn’t the first time he’d ever held you like that — he’d done it a few times — but something was different that night… even if he’d only done it to gain an upper hand in your bickering. The air crackled with latent electricity, made your skin buzz in all the right places, especially when Mirage had gone quiet for once in his life as he stared at you in his grasp. When you’d prompted him with his name, he’d only responded by gently stroking a thumb over the swell of your chest, which had made you gasp air in so sharply that it burned in your throat. The metal left a tingling path on your skin under your shirt in its wake and immediately sent your heart rate skyrocketing past whatever the fuck was a normal BPM.

He’d snapped back to reality at the sudden expansion of your lungs and had attempted to play it all off as a joke. You remembered how you’d still stumbled when your shoes touched the ground, an absolutely insane feeling of genuine heat rocking you as your brain seized the feeling of his touch while it still sparked against your nerve endings and helpfully replayed it over and over and over again. Sure, the rhythm of banter came back after a stuttering beat, but you never really cooled the warmth on your face for the rest of that night — and when Mirage had dropped you off at your apartment, your door was shut and locked for about five minutes before your shaking hand was frantically worked beneath the waistband of your pants.

…Whew. Definitely something a little more than friendly there. Maybe even more than pure love, something a little slicker and deeper that buzzed against your bones and coiled low in your stomach. It made you feel a little weird — just objectively, because of what Mirage was — but damn if it didn’t feel good to indulge.

God, fuck, why were you thinking about that now, of all times? Escapist fantasies be damned, you were going to meet Mirage’s comrades-friends-coworkers and leave a good impression. Not drool over the worn-out memory replaying in your head for the thousandth time this week.

Out of the darkness and around corners, they emerged. The stealth wasn’t on purpose; you didn’t even think they could be stealthy. Oh, one was coming right for you now — tall was the only word your brain could muster. Tall and red and square were added to the list of adjectives as the stately bot approached, servos collected into fists at his sides and shoulders thrown back.

“Priiiime,” Mirage greeted warmly, throwing his arms out at his sides in his favorite pose. “Look, hey, I know what you said about bringing more people around, but I swear— Hey!”

Completely ignoring your friend’s (status pending) greeting, the bot— Prime, holy shit, this is THE Prime, was kneeling down, leaning forward, and he was right in your face. You fought the very biological urge to flinch. Blue optics considered you for a moment before narrowing and flicking to your right from his lowered position.

“Mirage,” Optimus started with a gravelly tone  from behind his faceguard that communicated exasperation above all else. “I explicitly stated that for our safety — and yours — that we were to come in contact with no more humans.”

“Sir, I gotta be honest with you. Kinda hard on a planet that’s got, what, five billion of ‘em? Six?” Mirage glanced at you for backup. You stared back flatly, refusing to say anything that might put you on the business end of a laser cannon.

“You were told to remain incognito so you could recover.” Optimus continued, his gaze returning to you. With a shunk of shifting metal, his faceplate slid away. His faceplates were weathered; the chipped metal around his optics gave the illusion of wrinkles and eyebags. Tired. He seemed tired. “This is not incognito. What is your name?”

You gave it after taking a beat to steady yourself. He repeated it back to you. “How did you come in contact with Mirage?”

“I, uh— Noah, Noah Diaz, he’s my friend. I basically pried it out of him,” you said with a nervous laugh. “So it’s not Mirage’s fault. I’m just nosy.”

At the mention of Noah, Optimus seemed to visibly relax; he moved back slightly, though he remained kneeling, and the narrowed, suspicious squint of his optics rounded out into something much softer.

“…I see. Then I assume you understand the… precarious nature of our existence on your planet.” he said, his tone grave and his optics searching your face.

You nodded, pressing the flesh of the inside of your cheek between your teeth for a moment as you came up with a suitably diplomatic response that still conveyed your friendliness. “I do, yeah. Noah told me most of it. What he could, anyway. I just wanted to make it clear that I’m not— I’m not a threat here. Like I don’t work with the, uh, the government or anything. Whatever you guys need help with, I’m available, even if that just means keeping my mouth shut.”

Christ, you were glad this wasn’t your day job. You’d be such a shit ambassador. I’m available. What the hell did that even mean? Fuck yes, you were available, your brain guffawed, thinking of broad metal thumbs brushing over your chest.

You blinked hard, squeezing your eyelids together until the world came back in a photo negative, to scold yourself.

Although you’d stumbled through your reply, Optimus seemed to approve. He rose with a great creak of metal off of his knee and backed up to give you space, though he still regarded you with those sharp blue optics that felt as though they pinned you to the concrete below. “I see Noah chooses his company well. I should have assumed his sentiments would extend to his companions.” He shut his optics for a moment and dipped his head, as if considering deeply what to say next. “I am not sure how much Mirage — or Noah — divulged to you.”

“A fair amount— well. Any amount that won’t get them in trouble,” you called up, taking in deeper breaths to project your voice up the two stories of height to his head. To your side, Mirage snorted. “I know your name— Optimus, I know that, and I know about the Autobots. A little bit about the— fuck, what were they called—“

“Terrorcons?” Mirage supplied, and you were impressed at how quiet he’d been otherwise.

“Terrorcons, thank you. Other than that, not much. How much should I know?”

“Your knowledge is sufficient. All we fear — and all we risk—“ Optimus added with a pointed look at Mirage, who looked incredibly sheepish. “—at the moment is discovery. So long as you maintain secrecy, no harm shall come to us… or you, for that matter.”

It almost sounded like a threat, but Prime worded it very much like a warning. You decided it was best to heed his word — not that you really had another option.

“Right. Okay. Well— I mean, it was nice to meet you. People — humanity, I guess — aren’t bad. Most of us aren’t, anyway. Just, uh, let me know if there’s something Noah and I can get or do for you.”

Prime’s gaze shifted away from you. In fact, it seemed to shift away from the warehouse in general, looking somewhere far beyond the now-shut garage door. “Your generosity is admirable, but it is not humans primarily that we are concerned with.”

Brows furrowed at his vague answer, you thought it over for a second — and then decided not to push it. He probably knew best when it came to whatever foreboding nebulous space threat loomed over your collective heads; you would leave it up to the experts.

“Oh, well, golden rule and all that,” you still offered in terms of a response. That got his attention. His massive head tilted downwards to look at you once more with curiosity. “If I crash landed on someone else’s planet, I’d want them to be hospitable, y’know? Just trying to make the best of a shitty situation.”

Like he couldn’t handle the terrible punishment of silence anymore, Mirage butted in. “See, Prime? I told you she was cool.”

A short jolt shook the broad, boxy line of his shoulders, and at first you had thought he’d coughed, and then you realized he laughed. It was barely anything, a huff of a chuckle, but you glowed with the indirect affirmation. Just made Optimus Prime laugh. Maybe you weren’t such a terrible diplomat.

He wasn’t looking at you, though, rather at Mirage, and you swore from your low vantage point you could see a barely-there smile on Prime’s faceplates communicating…was that smug amusement? As the tall bot carefully made his way past you, he stopped in front of your companion, and let a heavy servo land on the headlight adorning his shoulder.

“No matter what you may feel, you chose well, Mirage.” Optimus rumbled out, before removing his servo and traipsing off into a darker section of the sprawling warehouse, ducking through a much-too-small cutout and speaking to Arcee about something indistinguishable. However, you couldn’t care less about whatever her and Prime were discussing — what the hell did he mean by Mirage choosing well?

You turned your head towards said bot, mouth open for inquiry and one brow raised. Mirage looked mortified, in every sense of the word; he stood shell-shocked, lips slightly parted and servos up and open as if to defend himself. His head was whipped around to follow Prime’s departure from the room. A whir started, bouncing off the walls — Mirage’s fans came on and off intermittently to keep his ambient internal temperature at safe levels, but the steady hum of this fan let you infer that he was flushing something fierce.

“Mirage? What—“

Interrupting you by breaking, nearly jumping, out of his trance, he clapped his servos together and started talking at a million miles a minute. “Well, damn, look at that, haha, it’s late, ain’t it? You got work in the morning, right? C’mon, hop in, I’ll drive you home—“

“No, Mirage, hold on, what was he talking about—“

“Seriously, c’mon, he was just messing around—“

“You’re telling me Optimus Prime was joking? Is he even capable of that?”

He said your name with a finality that nearly made you flinch. “Look, I can’t really— Just drop it, please?” It wasn’t angry, nor was it even commanding; in fact, his eyes were wide and pleading with you out of embarrassment. You knew the feeling all too well, and in the interest of sparing his feelings, decided to let it go, despite your intense curiosity.

You put your hands up in surrender. “Okay. Dropped.” A few beats of silence passed while Mirage was still tamping down his fluster. “You wanna take me home now or are we waiting for Prime to come embarrass you more?”

“Please, let’s get outta here,” he affirmed, dropping into his alt-mode and popping the driver door for you. As you slid in, you couldn’t help the little mischievous smile that grew on your face as your brain cooked up some other joke to take the edge off.

The garage door opened on its own. Mirage rolled into the noticeably darker alleyway. The burnt umber glow of the sunset-stained sky was only visible overhead; otherwise you were boxed in on the sides by blacked-out buildings.

Stifling silence was broken by a joke. Your joke, actually. “…Can’t believe your dad made fun of you in front of me.”

The noise Mirage made was only comparable to a squawk. But obviously much more masculine, clearly. Still, his tires jerked on the road, betraying his surprise. “Hey— Prime is not my sire— or dad, or whatever you wanna call ‘em. He wishes.”

“I dunno,” you mused, arms crossed over your chest and back sunk deep into the seat. Brooklyn in transition blurred by in messy constellations of lit windows. “He got you pretty good there. Pretty standard dad behavior.”

“Hey, I don’t know what suddenly inspired him to go for comedy, but I do not appreciate it. That’s my thing. He’s stealin’ my thunder!”

“Maybe you’re just rubbing off on him.”

Silence.

The radio crackled. “Ew.”

Accompanied by the loudest eyeroll you could muster, you whacked the dashboard with an open palm, though you couldn’t stop your bubbling laughter. “Oh my god, you are so gross, Mirage! I hate you!”

“Ahh, don’t say that, c’mon! You love it here!”

“You wish.”

The rest of the ride home was spent that way, bickering like normal, and although you couldn’t let go of what Prime had said, nor his knowing look while he said it, you appreciated the return to baseline. When you got home, Mirage parked directly in front of your apartment building, and you lingered on the sidewalk for several minutes after you got out of the car. With the passenger door opened so it looked like you were talking to the ‘driver’ and not completely insane, you leaned on the doorframe and traded jabs with your ride until the humidity of the night air got a little too persistent to ignore. Damn you, Brooklyn. 

“See you tomorrow?” Mirage never said goodnight. He only ever asked when he could see you again, corny bastard.

“Tomorrow. My roommate’ll take me to work, don’t worry about it. I’ll just stick my head in the garage when I get home.”

“I thought we had a thing goin’, man!” His faux petulance returned. “You movin’ on already? You just met my folks!”

Your jaw dropped for a second at the fact he’d turned the damn bit around on you. “I met one folk, and you literally said he wasn’t your dad.”

“Maybe I was warmin’ up to the idea!”

Another lethal eyeroll. Your smile still remained locked on your face. “Whatever. Get the hell out of here, asshole,” you said, playfully shutting the door just a little harder than you needed to and slapping the roof like a horse you were trying to send off into the desert.

Even as you turned to walk into your building, you could hear the way his window shot down, far faster than a normal roll. “Ay! Merchandise!”

You stuck a middle finger over your shoulder, thumb out and all, to give him an idea of what he could do with his merchandise. Tires peeled against pavement as he screeched out of his spot and down the otherwise quiet street, letting you know in return how he felt about that.

Smiling like an idiot as you climbed the stairs to your apartment, you felt… airy. You were always smiling after hanging around Mirage, you couldn’t help it — especially as of late. But still, you were dying to know what Prime was talking about when he was messing with Mirage earlier. You chose well. Chose what? Your brain briefly entertained the thought of Mirage returning what you felt, and it made blood rush to your face.

It couldn’t really… work. You had made peace with your physical differences weeks ago. The both of you got along just fine despite the size difference, and it never impeded your normal interactions. But you doubted Mirage felt the same; no matter how familiar, how friendly you were with him, you could never shake the feeling of being just a little too alien. Your greatest similarities were in personality. The closest resemblance you held physically was the fact you were both humanoid in shape.

That didn’t stop you. No, not at all. It didn’t stop you from dropping into bed after a quick shower with a heavy sigh, your hand inevitably sinking beneath the covers as you thought of digits — Mirage’s digits, so well articulated for their size and so careful — playing with the hem of your underwear instead of your own fingers, pushing the fabric aside just a little roughly to explore your alien anatomy. It took very little time for you to grind yourself to climax; in fact, it was embarrassingly quick, and it left your face hot with some special kind of shame as you slunk out of bed to wash your hands. The entire time, you avoided your reflection in the mirror.

Even with the ancient AC cranked on and chugging away, it took you a long while to fall asleep.

Off in the industrial district of Brooklyn, meanwhile, Mirage was burning rubber as he took ninety-degree turns at sixty miles per hour. His processor was thrumming at max capacity, and his engine felt like it was about to either stall or explode.

Primus, it was all too much. Your teasing always got him some kind of hot and bothered, tight under his interface paneling, but the acidic rush of embarrassment still prickled at his cabling. Prime, come on, man. Mirage was still floored at the fact that Prime of all bots had embarrassed him like that, in front of you, no less!

He had it bad for you, and he knew it, but apparently every other bot in that warehouse knew it too. Ever since he’d met you, you’d stuck in his processor, the way the light glinted off your eyes and your all-teeth smile and the way he could get you to laugh. Sure, his flirts were only playful at first — and he only did them to mess with Noah, who’d harbored an on-and-off crush on you for a while — but the more he did them and the more you returned them, the more he started really… considering it.

It was so shameful. Primus, it was shameful. He’d barely ever interfaced in his life — there was just no time, especially not on Cybertron — and never with organics. After that one night where he’d hefted you up with ease in both servos and completely blanked when confronted with your soft, warm weight in his hold, he’d been on a spiral. It wasn’t just enough to be friendly with you; he was plenty friendly with Noah (though with the amount of stupid passes Mirage made at him, Noah would probably say too friendly) and he wanted something more with you.

He’d lost count of how many times he’d rolled into some long-abandoned warehouse or pitch-black deserted alley and scrabbled at his interface panel to pressurize his spike before he feverishly, frantically humped his fisted servo for relief, mental processors supplying increasingly filthy fantasies of your soft skin against his chassis and your mouth, Primus, your mouth on his own, on his spike, wherever, he didn’t care. Every single time, though, after coming down from his high with steam pouring off his lax frame, he felt just a little more discouraged than the last — because he knew that his fantasies would have to stay that way. Fantasies. Your friendship was enough, had to be, no matter how bad he wanted you, because he’d be damned to the Pit before he scared you off by being stupid and admitting his feelings.

Ugh. Ugh. He took another corner too hard and felt his tires shriek, let the burn travel upward and reverberate in his frame. The chaos in his mental processors quieted as he neared HQ. All he knew was that it was late, and he couldn’t be too loud or Prime would get on his ass for interrupting his stasis.

Can’t believe your dad made fun of you in front of me. Your voice played, unbidden, from some file that popped open in his memory bank. He willed it away with a vengeance as he rolled into the warehouse-turned-headquarters as quietly as he could, transforming as soon as the door was shut and stretching out his back. Clicking echoed off the walls as his spinal struts reset, and the residual burn in his scraped tires tingled.

Mirage turned, and—

Yelped. Bumblebee was standing right there, shoulder against the wall and fiddling with some holographic projection from his forearm. Mirage coughed into his clenched servo to preserve what was left of his dignity.

“‘Sup,” he greeted through gritted denta. “I, uh, didn’t see you there, man. How’s it hangin’?”

Bee gave him a flatly unamused look that communicated ‘No shit, you didn’t see me.’ very well. The projection phased out of existence and left the two of them in the dimmed space in some kind of standoff.

“Well, y’know, beauty stasis and everything, I’m just gonna—“

“I wanna know, what you’re feeling! Tell me what’s your mind!” burbled Bee’s radio in place of his voice. Mirage jerked back for a second, not expecting Information Society at whatever unholy hour of the morning it was.

“Look, man, I don’t really wanna talk about—“

“There are some things you can’t hide!” insisted the same song. Bee gestured for Mirage to talk. Clearly he wanted to know.

This was as good a time as ever to spill, he guessed.

Mirage groaned and clasped both of his servos over his face after explaining the bones of it, his head tilted upwards, optics fruitlessly searching the water-stained warehouse ceiling for a solution to his problem. His… very human, very embarrassing problem.

Not that he thought you were embarrassing— not at all, never. But Prime would have his head over falling for a human. Okay, well, maybe not his head; it was more like Mirage would be in for a lengthy disapproving speech about responsibilities and goals and distractions, and Primus, just thinking about it made the former option of decapitation the preferable one. Even though he seemed to approve of his choice, considering what he’d said earlier, the ‘Bots were still at war, and there wasn’t time for human distractions. Literal human distractions.

It wasn’t like he could help it. You were funny, okay? And smart. And you teased him in just the right way that made his cooling fans sputter, and you were so curious about… everything about him, he thought, remembering your impromptu Cybertronian anatomy lesson with a hot flash in his processor. He couldn’t help but be flattered by your attention.

“Ugh, Bee, I don’t know what to do, man,” he said despairingly after a moment, pacing in circles in front of said squat yellow bot leaned against the nearby concrete wall. “I mean, look at this, she’d be missin’ out if she said no,” he added, arrogance staining his words in an attempt to console himself. It didn’t work; insecurity eviscerated his bravado moments after he said it. “Or… I guess we’d both be, huh.” A short, self-deprecating laugh left him.

Mirage wasn’t entirely sure why he’d come to Bee of all bots for advice, but he was sure as shit not going to Optimus after today, and Arcee would have just told him anyway. Plus, considering that Wheeljack wasn’t even in the country at the moment, his options were slim. Besides, Bee had… experience with this sort of thing. Dealing with humans and all. Just… not in this way. But it was close enough, and Mirage was totally lost; if he thought about it by himself for any longer, his processors were going to fry.

Speaking of, Bee tittered through his gutted voice synthesizer to get Mirage’s attention. Expression drawn into a very human grimace, Mirage turned to face his friend, servos planted firmly on his hips.

“Well, you gotta tell her— wanna know what love is— want you to show me,” Bee’s radio clipped, first from a talk show, then from a nearby station, and Mirage felt energon surge to his face in a hot rush at a very personal song being blared back at him.

He had the words memorized at this point. The shape of them was practically burned into his memory files, considering how much he played it for you. It was reserved for days on both ends of the spectrum, bad and good; Mirage would pick you up in his alt-mode and take you for joyrides across the city, flying over the Brooklyn Bridge at daredevil speeds, all the while blaring music loud enough to make your head pound.

The two of you had discovered a few favorites, but the Foreigner song was at the top of the list, right next to Careless Whisper, of course. The sound of your voice belting at the top of your lungs, softened with that specific human accent, thrumming and reverberating through your chest— you sounded so alive, but so different from what he was accustomed to.

“Dude—” Mirage nearly barked, voice up a full octave before clearing his synthesizer into his fist and repeating himself. “Dude. I can’t just do that. Aliens— we’re aliens. Well. She’s an alien, too, I guess, but we,” he paused to gesture frantically between himself and Bee, “are the aliens here. I don’t really think humans are into the whole giant robot thing.”

“Noah?” Bee played a clip of Mirage’s own voice back at him questioningly.

“Yeah, well, Noah’s a different story.”

With a whir of his actuators, Bee shook his head and looked away for a moment, big blue optics considering the floor. With a soft clunk, he crossed his arms over his chassis.

“Come on, man, you gotta give me something,” Mirage urged, tilting his head to follow the other bot’s motions. “Should I just leave it? I mean, I don’t want it to be weird, I just—“

Bee straightened up off the wall, clearly done thinking. His arms opened out in a shrug and his optics squinted, communicating I don’t know what you want me to say, dude, far better than his vocal synthesizer ever could have.

His radio clipped again, this time a few seconds of a Beatles song and then Noah’s voice. “She loves you, yeah, yeah, yeah— right?”

“I don’t know, that’s the problem,” Mirage groaned, rolling his head back with a pained expression and letting his body follow the motion as he paced another tight circle. His faceplates felt hot at the insinuation. “And if I ask, it’s gonna be weird. And if I make it weird, I’m never gonna—“

He stopped rambling when a four-digit servo thumped on the headlight atop his shoulder, rooting him to the spot. Bee’s optics stared him down, wide and bright blue, and it made Mirage press his lips together firmly as he awaited whatever sage advice he was about to impart.

ABBA filtered through the radio first. “Should walk right up to her and say—“ What came next made Mirage’s brow ridges shoot up so high he thought they were going to fly off his helmet. “—when I get that feeling, I want sexual healin’!”

Mirage’s jaw dropped. Immensely flustered and ten times more frustrated at his friend’s useless advice, he shoved the other bot off. “Are you serious, dude? Primus, I never shoulda asked you. Thanks, I’ll go walk right up to her and ask to interface on the warehouse floor, that’ll go super well.”

Bee nodded quickly and gave him a double thumbs up with a series of approving beeps and chirps, the bottoms of his optics flattening into an amused look. Mirage dragged his servo down his faceplates in mortification, although his cooling fans kicked on a click higher than normal.

Sometimes he wished he’d been left on Cybertron with Soundwave and all his other goons. This was one of those times. As he dropped back into his alt-mode with an embarrassed mumble about ‘going on patrol,’ Bee whooped behind him, and the last thing Mirage heard before peeling out of the warehouse was “There’s nothin’ wrong with me lovin’ you, baby, no, no!”

Whoever gave Bee access to Marvin Gaye needed to be whacked upside the helm.

Knowing Mirage’s luck, it was probably you.

He stayed out for the rest of the night in his alt-mode, wandering the streets and staying away from your apartment, no matter how bad he wanted to go. The pool of people with any useful advice to offer for his predicament was steadily shrinking; after the disaster with Bee, Mirage just needed to stay away from that warehouse and let his processors cool.

Sometime in the morning he returned, though not to the warehouse. He almost immediately crashed into stasis as soon as he rolled into Noah’s garage, his simultaneously pent-up and exhausted processors eager for a chance to refresh themselves and defrag.

Ha, he thought blearily as he sank into stasis. Defrag.

You were waking as he was crashing, though you weren’t happy about it. The eight hour shift that loomed ahead of you on top of the bullshit from last night was a pretty potent combination for a headache of a day, especially when you couldn’t have your morning jam sesh with Mirage on your way to work. Thankfully, though, your roommate was a kind soul, and there was an extra cup of coffee waiting for you on the counter when you stumbled out of your bedroom.

As you sipped it, you wondered just how long you could keep the front up. By some small grace of God, your roommate’s schedule didn’t align very well with yours; you barely saw them in your daily life even before you met Mirage. It wasn’t on purpose, of course. It just happened that way. But on a few occasions, they’d been home when Mirage had dropped you off, and you’d been just calling him a ‘friend with places to be’ to excuse the fact that he never walked you to your door. Being somewhat prescient, they’d nudged you a couple times about this ‘friend’ turning into a boyfriend, but had never pushed it.

You just hoped it stayed that way.

Breakfast was a quick and quiet affair, though you traded a few jokes back and forth that had the both of you giggling into your food. The ride to your job was similar, and your roommate wished you a good shift before driving off leisurely — such a stark difference compared to Mirage’s affinity for peeling off into the street at Mach-fucking-10. Thinking of him made your face burn and your mind race. You tried not to.

Time was an especially cruel mistress today, though. You swore that people were actively winding the clocks back every time you looked up at them, and your shift felt like a thick slog, knee-deep, that you had no choice but to wade through. The worst part about slow shifts was that your mind wandered with nothing else to do, and like a moth to a flame— or rather, like metal to a magnet, your brain circled around to Mirage again and again and again.

Damn that bot. Damn it all. Every time you thought of him, it was some stupid joke he’d cracked or silly offhand comment he’d made or ridiculous flirt he’d lobbed your way — always accompanied by memories of his body, surprisingly lithe considering what he was made of, all legs and a dramatic waist topped with wide shoulders that made your own engine purr.

“Mirage, did you go upstate or something? You’re disgusting,” you’d laughed as you raked your gaze over his pecs, pretending to eye the dirt smeared there and not something else.

“Disgusting?! You gotta be kidding me, I’m not half as bad as the rest of ‘em. You should see Bee, dude!” He’d gestured out the door of the warehouse, where you assumed the other bot was lurking in dirt-covered shame.

“What the hell were you two even doing?”

“Pfft. Practicin’.”

“Practicing body-slamming each other?”

“Yeah, want me to show you?”

“Mirage,” you’d groaned, laughing despite yourself.

“C’mon, I know a few good ways to pin a bot down,” he grinned, winking at you. You fixed him with the most dead stare you could muster before breaking into a half-smile of your own.

“I’ll pass on the whole getting crushed thing, but I could be persuaded to spray you down by hand,” you flirted back, just for fun. 

No, not for fun. Real flirt. It was real, all of it was, and you couldn’t shake the memory of his optics widening, brightening, with eagerness and the way he’d pleaded. Playfully. Playfully?

“Please,” he begged dramatically, clasping his servos together, optics enormous. “I’ll be good! Maybe even stay still!”

You pinched your nose bridge between your fingers and tried to think about something else, because you were starting to press your thighs together a little and you were still at work, damn it. Professionalism was something you were aiming to maintain.

Hot. It was hot. That’s what you were thinking about. You’d glanced at the weather report earlier in the morning, and seeing a row of little sun icons clued you in on an insufferable heatwave that didn’t have any intention of breaking any time soon. Even now you felt sweat collect under your shirt and dot your hairline; all you could do was wipe your face with the back of your hand and keep working.

And working.

And working.

And. Working.

And then, eventually, you watched the clock tick over the last minute of your shift, and you heard angels sing a holy choir as you all but slammed your things down and sprinted to clock out. Well. You didn’t sprint, but you did speed walk, which counted for something.

Such was your haste to leave your workplace and talk to Mirage that you speed-walked headfirst into the lashing rain outside without a second thought. Genuinely caught by surprise, you stumbled back into the safety of the entryway, eyes wide as you watched the storm front swallow the last dregs of the golden evening sky and pour rain on the streets outside. Ink blots bleeding across paper. Rorschach tests. Some other poetic fluff came to mind over the supremely annoying realization that you were going to have to walk to the garage in wet clothes.

At least it was a quick walk.

Patience waning, you nearly considered calling Mirage — or even Noah — to come get you, but at the last second your roommate swooped in, pulling up outside and honking the horn a few times to let you know your knight in shining Prius was here to rescue you.

They cracked a few jokes at your expense when they saw your wet clothes, but it was nothing you couldn’t handle. Not after the trials and tribulations of Mirage. With a few clicks, the rest of your ride home was filled with Boyz II Men and intermittent conversation as you watched raindrops race each other down the window and considered what the hell you were going to say to Mirage tonight. 

Mostly, you were dying of curiosity to know what Prime had meant to get him so flustered. Thinking about that, though, just made you go down a spiral of what-ifs… especially considering that one of them was ‘What if he feels the same way?’

You could handle rejection. You were an adult who paid taxes. But just this one time, you weren’t sure if you could handle reciprocation. Especially full reciprocation.

Mirage’s friendship was something you felt privileged to have. You were just quite scared to fuck it all up and lose out on all the things that made being his friend worth it — including him. Jaw tightening, you blinked and looked away from the window. No use stewing in it.

At home, your dinner was quick and light — something in a Tupperware that you didn’t look at too hard after microwaving. When your roommate asked about your rush, you came up with some lame excuse about hanging out with Noah, waving your hand dismissively.

Don’t worry about me. I’m going to go break Hynek’s scale of close encounters. Don’t worry about it though.

“In this weather? You’ll be soaked thirty seconds out the door. You were soaked thirty seconds out the door.”

“I’ll bring an umbrella,” you said, barely listening to them over the cacophony of your own thoughts. Mirage. Mirage. Mirage. I’m seeing him tonight. I’m talking to him tonight. I’m not going to pussy out of anything tonight. Now or never. “The place is like two blocks up the street, I’ll live.”

“If you’re so inclined to catch a cold, I’m not gonna stop you. Not making you chicken soup, though.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” you snarked affectionately, and the last thing you heard before exiting your apartment was their familiar laughter. That bolstered you somewhat.

Even if the rain whipping at your face made you reconsider your stupid horny stubbornness.

Only two blocks felt more like two dozen as you tucked your chin to your chest and gripped your hood to keep the wind from snatching it off your head; in your other hand you white-knuckled your umbrella to keep it from tilting the wrong angle and washing water down your back. Thunder rattled your bones more than once and made you think offhandedly of Kris, the poor kid. He hated storms but refused to admit it out of pride; he was probably curled up in a ball under his covers right now trying to block out the worst of the noise. And you thought of Noah alongside him just out of pure association, and you weren’t sure what made your stomach turn, but it did.

God, you hoped Noah wasn’t with Mirage right now. You didn’t want to slam the door open to the garage soaking wet and wrestle Mirage’s true feelings out of him while Noah spectated. Wrestle. Soaking wet.

Fuck my life.

The side door to the garage was jammed like it always was, even after you unlocked it, and you huddled against it to stay under the mediocre cover of the awning as you shoved your shoulder into it to force it open. Old metal hinges wailed as you ground them open, and the blessed dry warmth of the garage — the temperature always heightened with Mirage’s presence — sighed against your freezing skin as you wormed your way inside. 

“Mirage?” you called tentatively as you leaned back against the door to get it to shut and latch. A beat passed before your senses came to you and your hand fumbled behind you to lock it. Not for sordid reasons, honestly. You just didn’t want anyone to even have the chance of walking in on Mirage when he wasn’t folded into a Porsche.

Speaking of, you saw him then, pacing around the garage and seemingly very involved in a conversation with himself. Although the rain outside provided a dull roar of background noise, the whirs and clicks of his actuators and soft whooms of his pedes against the concrete filled your ears with their familiarity. It was Mirage, and you knew Mirage, and it helped dull the edge of abject nervousness in your gut.

He cut a sharp figure under the hanging ceiling lights, making sure to duck and avoid smacking his helm on them. When those bright blue optics registered your existence, you swore they flared with delight; he said your name with such enthusiasm it almost made you excited. For what, exactly, you didn’t know. “Hey, sugar, what’s k— Primus, you, uh, swim on your way here? Or do I just make you that wet? Cuz I appreciate the compliment.” He grinned wolfishly at you. Sparks flew off your rubbed-raw nerves.

The unimpressed stare you gave him was lethal. “That is not how that works,” you said, shaking your umbrella off on the floor and setting it against the wall to drip dry. “All the wetness is— would be in one place, dumbass.”

“Sorry. Wasn’t paying attention during my anatomy lessons. Wanna reteach ‘em to me? I’ll behave, swear on my spark.”

A scoff. “When have you ever behaved in your life?”

“When it counts! C’mon, you know you like it,” he said, gesturing down the length of his body with a flourish of his servo. “I mean, what isn’t there to like?”

“If I answer that question, I’ll hurt your feelings.” Excess rainwater dripped off your jacket as you peeled it off. Mirage’s optics followed the motion intently.

Amber lighting nearly glowed against the sleek metal of his torso. So what if your own eyes had wandered down it at his emphasis? He’d invited it. Expressly. He loved your attention, loved flaunting everything about himself just for a glance his way from you, for anything you’d give him.

It took him a second to register your words. He gasped and clasped a servo over his chassis— his spark, you remembered that from your own anatomy lesson a few weeks ago. “Gonna break my spark talkin’ like that. I hurt your feelings or something, sugar? What’s got you so bent?” With his question, he sank into a deep squat, draping his forearm over his thigh and leaning close to you.

A deep exhale left you. Your shoulders deflated. “It’s not you. Just the weather.” A short huff of a laugh, barely humorous, left you. “I mean, look at me.” You held your arms out and spun in a slow circle, errant droplets flying in every direction. “I look like a drowned rat.”

The lightbulb over his head was nearly visible. “You, uh, want a hand drying off?”

You stopped dead in your tracks. Your hands fell to your sides. Something akin to lightning danced up your spine.

“What?”

“Hold on, hold on, I got an idea,” he said,  holding his hand out at you to tell you to wait, excitement ramping up in his voice. What the hell was he planning? Nothing good, you figured. Or hoped.

Otherwise harsh sounds of metal against metal were softened by the alien chirrs and trills of the mechanical viscera working in his chassis as he settled on the ground in a sitting position. His back was leaned against the wall, carefully adjusted so his darling paint job was away from the rough concrete. To keep his balance, he rested against his tires and scooched his hips away from the wall, kicking his long legs out with a flourish and gesturing at his lap.

Although he was shorter this way, it was still a climb you didn't want to make while you were damp and the general slip hazard was high. “Can you give me a lift so I can see whatever shit you’re planning?”

“I got you, sugar, don’t even worry about it. Just hang on,” came the reply, and your brain blanked just a little at the feeling of his servos on you again, picking you up just like they had done on that night two weeks ago. With zero effort — seriously, you didn’t even hear any mechanical creaking — you were scooped upwards.

Your damp clothes clung to your body, a fact both you and Mirage were painfully aware of; the chill of the soaked fabric contrasted against that fascinating living heat of your skin nearly made the sensors in his servos short-circuit. He’d thought about this, exactly this, so much that it had probably worn a path into his neural processors. So soft. You were so soft.

A shudder ran up his spinal strut and he prayed you didn’t notice.

You were set down with your feet firmly on the flat tops of his thighs, ignoring the slight wobble in your knees. Arms raised a bit for balance, you looked down at the living machinery beneath you. The flight paths of the butterflies in your stomach grew more frantic. Broad servos released you from their hold, but they didn’t leave; no, they skated down, down, down until they settled on the flare of your hips and stayed. They were so heavy.

A breath caught in your throat like a wild animal in a trap. “If I fall, I’m gonna be so pissed off. You know that, right?” Anything to make this more normal. You had no idea how you kept the shake out of your voice.

“Relaaax, hot stuff, I’m on it. I got it, I got it,” he replied, his voice a full octave lower than what you were used to. “‘sides, I’m Mirage, remember? Protecting humans is kinda my thing.”

You scoffed. “Not with the way you drive.”

“Hey, I drive perfectly fine! You’re the one who’s scared of fun.” His servos left your hips to brace themselves on the floor. “Mirage, don’t drive so fast! Mirage, that’s a red light! Mirage, there are cops behind us!” His voice pitched up into something high and nasally to poorly, poorly mimic yours.

It was your turn to be affronted, though your mouth was open in a disbelieving sort of smile. “I don’t even sound like that, you fucker! And sorry for trying to keep us from getting arrested!”

“I dunno, you all sorta sound the same to our audio processors.” He was lying, and blatantly so. He had the distinct tone and pitch of your voice memorized down to the wavelength. “And besides, we wouldn’t get arrested.” His own voice took on a smug, self-satisfied edge, accompanied by the raise of his brow ridges.

“Oh, really? Why’s that? Please, enlighten me,” you snarked, crossing your arms over your chest and staring him down. In response, he leaned his head in, closer to you, closer than you expected, and an insufferable smirk crawled across his faceplates.

“Cuz cop cars can’t drive that fast,” he whispered conspiratorially, like it was a clever response.

What should have been a minute movement — just a shift of the head — actually became very noticeable on a twelve-foot-frame; his hips repositioned of their own accord to account for the redistribution of weight, and the change was enough to trip you up. Especially when you had been leaning in already to match his movement.

The world tilted as you started to fall forward; fearing injury or worse by tumbling off your semi-precarious perch, you jammed your hands out in front of you—

And slammed your palms directly on his chassis. It was all very fast after that. Mortified, you stared down at the planes of metal beneath you, feeling heat creep up, up, up your neck and seep into your face. Mirage had cursed above you out of surprise, and you felt the displacement of air as his servo shot up behind your back and hovered. Right there. He was right there, and he always would be.

You raised your head and made eye contact, and you knew it was over. His optics were wide with surprise, and they searched your face for any expression of pain or discontent. They cycled once, seeing none, and then flickered down to your lips.

He was so done for. Something in his expression sagged at your proximity; in his field of view, he saw an alert stating that his internal temperature was rising beyond ideal levels, and he would have laughed if not for you. Finally. Finally. Finally. He was half-expecting this to be a dream, something cooked up by his fried processors that he would wake up from any minute now. 

His servo was still hovering over your back.

“Can I—“

“Yes,” you said immediately in a sharp exhale — before he could even get the question out — and there it all went.

He surged forward like a flood from a dam, closing the distance between the both of you with a hungry rev of his engine. Explaining the logistics of it would sound silly; all you could do was go with the flow, just like every other time you’d ever kissed someone. All you knew was that it was satisfying, supremely so, and completely encompassing. Every sense was filled by him, and you realized with a kick of your heart that you never wanted it any other way.

Though your hand shook, you shoved past the fear and indulged in everything you had wanted for weeks, let yourself sink deep into that pit of want and refused to come up for air. Your fingers skated his curves and edges; you brought your palm up to the sharp angles of his jaw and smoothed it upward until it ran over the curve of his cheek.

He reacted to your touch like it was a live wire. Minute jerks of excitement ran through his frame, and when your hand rested on the side of his face, he tilted his helm into the kiss with barely restrained excitement. He was so careful, it made something inside you purr. That kind of caution was only reserved for something precious. You were precious. He couldn’t ever risk hurting you. Especially not by his own hand.

First impression was that his lips were far softer than you’d ever assumed. Pliable, hot metal pressed greedily against your mouth — more, more, more was a mantra echoed wordlessly between the both of you. The hovering servo came to rest on your back, pushing your front against his chassis as you shifted up on your toes to keep the angle of the kiss correct. Digits splayed against the planes of skin they found there, pressing down to feel your warmth — your heart slammed against your ribs so hard that Mirage could probably feel it against his palm.

With a hot flash, you wondered if the metal of his lips would bear the dent of your teeth from a bite. So you bit. It was more of a playful nip than anything, but the reaction you got was so instantaneous it was like Mirage had been waiting for it. Again, his engine throttled, the powerful rumble surging through you as his servo pinned you to his chassis. Against your mouth, his lips ticked up into a smile.

Air. You needed air. He let you pull away with no resistance, though his head did trail after your mouth for a moment.

You let your forehead sink down and rest against the top of his chassis for a moment; the condensation from your breath fogged the metal. Out of nowhere, manic giggles erupted from you. They shook your body incessantly as you rose and fell in time with Mirage’s heavy vents, your knees feeling weak and mind frazzled. From one kiss. One.

Laughter rocked his frame too, short chuckles of disbelief as his thumb rubbed circles into your back.

“Oh my god,” you murmured into the warm metal beneath you through shocks of giggles.

“Not exactly, but, eh, I’ll take it,” Mirage replied above you, and while he laughed at his own joke, you groaned and whacked him lightly with a palm. It wasn’t like he was unaffected though — far from it, in fact, judging from the steadily heating chassis beneath you and the tinge of static fringing his words.

“Bring me up,” you said hoarsely, twisting an arm behind you to paw at the servo on your back.

Without question, his other servo came up and curled under your thighs, hoisting you up so that his face was easier to reach. With most of your body now resting on his chassis and very much secured in his grip, you grasped his face in both your palms; he leaned so far into your touch with a shaky ex-vent that your noses almost brushed.

“Again?”

“Yeah, again,” he agreed, and this time you pulled him in, fingers hooking in some unseen seam behind his jaw as you crushed your mouth against his. Hunger, latent and now finally triggered, drove you closer, as close as you physically could, until your skin was starting to hurt from the random edges being pressed into it.

Curious above all else, you licked your tongue into the front of his mouth. The searing heat inside surprised you; it teetered on the edge of uncomfortable and reminded you very much of your computer at home when it ran for too long, with that special kind of mechanical stress and burning warmth that only came with overworked processors.

“‘S like that, is it?” he murmured into your mouth with a grin, his engine kicking up a notch and the vibration of his chassis hitting you very nicely right where you needed it most. You made some soft noise, half-gasp, half-groan, and hiked one of your legs up so it was bent at the knee, flattening your hips against his chest and fuck, there it was. The consistent rumble of his motor pressed a steady vibration right into your cunt over the seam of your jeans; a particular grind made you gasp and falter as you rolled your clit against the line of denim and held it there.

“Whoa-ho-ho! Heyyy, hot stuff, something feel good down there?” His voice was bursting at the seams with some rich kind of excitement; you breathed into his neck cabling as your hips jerked a little against his chassis. One servo pawed at your ass, clumsy with its eagerness, gripping and massaging the soft flesh it found there with intent.

Experimentally, his servo pressed down, pushing your pelvis down with it, and the pressure on your clit pulled a groan of satisfaction out of you that had his cooling fans sputter.

“Fuck,” you hissed through gritted teeth, and before he could say something stupid, you leaned your head down and pressed kisses to the delicate cabling of his neck.

A delighted noise rattled out of him, and his helm rolled back against the wall to allow you more access. Impatient, your kisses soon turned to bites, playful nips that tugged at the sensitive wiring and made his body jolt beneath yours like he’d been shocked. To your utter delight, you found that Mirage’s proclivity for talking extended to situations like these, too — noises streamed from his mouth as your curious teeth and hands worked over such a fragile part of his anatomy in ways that only a human could.

“Oh, Primus, babe, babe—“ he stammered out, and you lifted your head for just long enough of a window to allow him to swoop down and kiss you again, feverishly now.

Something thick and wet prodded past your teeth experimentally. For just a second you balked— and then remembered it was his glossa. His tongue. Yeah, you remembered that from your anatomy lesson; he’d stuck it out and pointed at it in a dumb way then, but fuck if it didn’t have your thighs tightening now. The hot biomesh probed your mouth, and it was so big you inadvertently drooled around it — but Mirage didn’t seem to mind at all. In fact, you were pretty sure the spit dripping from your mouth around him was getting him even more worked up, judged by the way his digits tightened their grip on your ass.

You had been cold when you’d walked in that garage. Keyword there was had. Now your skin seared with a deep flush and steadily increasing heat; mindlessly, your hips started a slow, staccato rhythm that kept your breathing heavy. The servo on your back slid upwards to the point where it encompassed the back of both your neck and head. He could not get enough of your taste. He wanted it burned into the sensors on his glossa, for all he cared. Spit and lubricant swapped between the both of your mouths — you found that the metallic taste that seeped into your tongue did nothing but turn you on further.

Pulling away again for a deep inhale of air, you propped yourself semi-awkwardly on an elbow to look at him. Open adoration was written across his faceplates, along with blatant want that made his optics cycle frantically.

“I thought you were— fuck, I thought you were supposed to be drying me off,” you said, breaking in the middle of your sentence as his servo carefully started to move you. Just barely — just enough pressure to keep your hips working against him and chasing your pleasure.

“You really wanna?” He grinned at you, spit shiny on his chin. “I dunno about you, but I think I’m likin’ you being wet more.”

“You’re awful. That was terrible,” you laughed, brain foggy with arousal and general swelling affection for the bot underneath you.

“How many more of those you got left in you before you start admitting the truth that I’m the funniest bot you’ll ever meet?”

“I mean, you don’t exactly have stiff competition.”

“Aaand the best-looking.”

“I dunno… Optimus is kind of—“

“Hey!” he interrupted, bringing you up for another kiss to silence your thought before you could finish it. You happily complied, laughing into the heat of his mouth and then moaning in the same breath as his servo ground you down against his rumbling chassis again.

Hot. You were getting really hot. The damp clothes sticking to your skin were not helping; in fact, they felt as though they were going to start steaming being pressed against your skin like this. Against your wishes, you pulled backwards again, bracing yourself against the warm vents that substituted for his collarbones. They cycled hot, dry air against your fingertips, though it didn’t burn. Not yet, at least.

“Mirage,” you breathed, and that got his attention immediately. “…Are we fucking?”

“Please,” he instantly replied, so eager that it made your cunt throb. His enormous blue optics watched you with such intent that it almost made you want to shrink away from the scrutiny — but you steeled your resolve. You had him, and you had him right where you wanted. Opportunity of a fucking lifetime. You were not about to waste it.

You glanced down for a reprieve from the eye contact. “Fuck,” you swore softly, staring at the metalwork beneath you for a few heartbeats before shaking your head and glancing back upwards at him. “Okay, well— I— Okay. Let me just— do this—“

Hands shaking slightly, you balled your fists in the hem of your work shirt and wrestled it up and off you; the damp fabric lingered and peeled off of you, which made Mirage’s motor throttle powerfully underneath you. Other than that, though, you got no reaction, which made all that heat in your abdomen cool rapidly into a dense ball of abject horror.

Oh, you made a mistake. This was too much, you were too alien, too different—

The servo not supporting you against his chassis slid around from the planes of your back to your front, and you gasped sharply as he did the same fucking thing that drove you insane the first time, however many days ago. His thumb, warm on the palm-side, gently passed over the peak of your chest. His optics narrowed in on the indent in your soft flesh his digit created. Nerve endings in the trail it left behind sparked.

“Oh, you don’t know how long I’ve been waiting to do that,” he said reverently, voice steeped in a combination of awe and victory.

Oh-kay! You sucked a deep breath in, a litany of responses running through your head. The boost to your ego was very much appreciated, and it helped lighten the sinking mass of worry that had formed in the pit of your stomach.

Mirage nearly groaned when you placed your soft palm atop the junction of his digit and the heel of his servo. “Do it again,” you decided on, and that worked damn well.

As his servo groped at your chest, he leaned in, tucking his face under your jaw. To accommodate, you tilted your head up and away—

Only to swear into negative space as he very much returned the favor from earlier and began carefully sucking the world’s biggest hickeys into the skin of your neck. Breaths came harsh and choppy as the expanse of his glossa, hot and spit-slick, laved over the gentle bites he worried into your skin with his denta. 

“Ah, Mirage, Mirage,” you breathed; every mention of his name spilling from your bruised lips made his circuitry heat just a little more. It was so much all at once — his servos were so broad that their expanse covered huge swaths of skin at once, and his mouth on such a sensitive part of your anatomy wasn’t helping either. Your hands clawed for purchase against his helm and the back of his neck. One palm flattened as much as it could on the back of his head, trying with all of your laughable human strength to bring him as close as possible. The other ended up cradling the side of his head, your thumb brushing over the audial disk there. With no small amount of wonder, you watched the plates of his back ruffle at your touch.

Mirage wasn’t trying to be weird, but he could die happy so long as he had the taste of your skin still registering on his glossa. It was more addictive than any high-grade he’d had back home by leagues. That human flavor of salt and skin and some kind of sweetness had his processors thrumming at maximum capacity; you made his mouth flood with lubricant, a fact you could corroborate by the amount that spilled over your bare sternum. The feeling of his own spit sliding down your front between your bruised breasts made the muscles of your abdomen twitch. Fingers shaped like claws now, you pressed weak kisses against the smooth curves of his helm wherever you could reach.

Your jeans were just getting in the way at this point. The minute shocks of pleasure you derived from grinding your clit against the inseam were just that — minute. You needed something more now or you were going to get frustrated, and you’d dealt with enough sexual frustration over the past weeks to be very sick of that feeling.

“Oh, fuck, okay— Mirage,” you said breathlessly, giving him a light tap on the side of his helm to get his attention. Reluctantly, he pulled away from your chest, optics dimmed with pleasure. They cycled once and returned to their full brightness as he cleared the fog of arousal — barely — away from his processors.

“All systems go, sugar?” Static hissed underneath his words.

You tried and failed to stifle a snort of a laugh. “Corny ass,” you mumbled, although you were absolutely close enough for his audial sensors to pick up on it. He made a sound of indignation, but you pushed forward regardless. “I, um, I need to get these off.” Hooking your thumbs in the waistband of your jeans to emphasize your point, you glanced up at his optics again.

Blankness for a second. Then it registered. “Oh, right, right, of course, haha! You, uh, want help? Or you got it?”

“I think I can manage taking my pants off,” you laughed. “Just— let me sit on like— the top of your chest, there we go,” you instructed, and the hand under your ass pushed you up until you were turned around and seated on the lip of the top of his chassis. For a second, you wrestled with the denim — still not fully dried — but you managed to kick both your jeans and your shoes off. They were thrown somewhere in the direction of the door. God, you were so glad you locked it.

Underwear went next. There was a beat of hesitation — for what, you weren’t sure — but like you’d done so often as of late, you just ignored your trepidation and worked the elastic down your legs. A laugh barked out of you when you lifted the fabric up and saw the downright ridiculous wet spot that stained the gusset.

“Jesus Christ, look what you did to me,” you said with a faux accusatory tone, holding your panties out for Mirage to inspect. Two digits delicately took them from you; he held them up to his face, so close that it made you blush from sheer embarrassment.

“Wow. You weren’t kiddin’ ‘bout all the wet being in one spot, huh?” He examined them with no small amount of fascination, much to your mortification.

“Mirage! Put those down, oh my god,” you said, covering your mouth with a choked noise.

“What, I can’t admire my work?”

“No you can not.”

Mirage pouted at your denial, and mumbled something about you being no fun, but he still lifted you off his chassis regardless. Like he was helpless to your draw, he pulled you in for another kiss, though he couldn’t stop his mouth from wandering. Down, down, down, until his nose was nestled in your chest and he spoke into the soft flesh of your stomach. Shaky ex-vents tickled the damp skin there.

“Shit, baby, tastes so good,” he mumbled, and you were impressed by his ability to sound completely sex-drunk without even having done anything yet.

Your hips rolled against nothing; they bumped into his neck cabling and the top of his chassis fruitlessly, and a noise of frustration eked out of you. Mirage seemed to get the memo and pulled you away. Your body was brought down until your ass was sat firmly on his hips — his interface panel nestled right in front of your dripping cunt — and your back was leaned up against the flat support of his thighs; his knees were tucked up and his pedes placed firm and flat on the floor to give you the most stability. Fumbling for a second before you found somewhere to place your own feet, the enormity and absurdity of the situation brought more of those breathless giggles to your mouth that seized your chest and shook your shoulders.

Toootally breaking Hynek’s scale here. So beyond abduction. Way beyond abduction.

A few careful digits slipped around your knee, wormed their way between your legs. “Can I—“ 

Your thighs fell open without a word.

What had made you fall for Mirage the hardest was his motormouth. He never stopped talking; he always had something stupid to add, something to pitch in with, some silly joke to crack. There was a lightness he teased out of you that even you didn’t expect. But now? Now, for once, he was speechless. It made uncharacteristic shyness flare in your gut and heat your face as he studied your very bare, very human form with slightly parted lips and enormous optics.

His body caught up before his mouth did. The servo on your knee slid over it until it gripped your bare thigh; he watched the flesh shift back and forth under his touch with no small amount of fascination.

“Is it— it’s okay?” Your voice sounded very small. It was a special kind of insecurity to be faced with.

“Oh, yeah, it’s okay. It’s cool, you’re just— just different. A lot different.” He jiggled your thigh again playfully.

“Good kind of different though, right?”

“Very good.” To punctuate it, his engine snarled again, seemingly in response to the drool of your cunt on the hot metal of his interface panel. “Primus, you look good, babe. Shit.”

Ego boost! You smiled. Any other partner — any person — and this would be too much, this position too unflattering, your everything too open… With Mirage, though, it just felt like it always did. Easy.

One of your hands rested atop the servo still holding onto the meat of your thigh. The other slid down over your shining chest, passed over your stomach and pubic mound, and brushed past wiry hair, shiny with slick, in order to slide a finger up your folds. A whine ripped its way out of you at direct contact with your clit after mere heavy petting, and you couldn’t stop yourself from drawing tight circles with your fingers and twitching your hips forward to eke out more of that delicious pressure.

The servo on your thigh dug into your skin. Mirage’s vents became far heavier at the open display of your arousal; it has always been him vying for your attention. Now that it was the other way around, he wasn’t sure if he could handle it. Transfluid was seeping between the seams of his interface panel, joining your own fluids in a shiny pool that sent sparks up his struts. He made you like this, made you so wet you dripped, made your clit swollen enough to be visible, made your cunt tight with heat and Primus, he needed you on his spike so bad, he thought he might die without it.

He verbalized these thoughts with an unintelligible noise of adoration.

It was enough encouragement for you to slide down from your clit and venture two fingers into yourself. Zero friction. They glided. Christ, when was the last time you were this wet? You’d slept with a handful of people, especially in your first couple years of college, but you’d never been soaked like this. Mirage’s cooling fans choked at the sight of your fingers vanishing into you. His thumb dug into the crease of your thigh and hip as he leaned just a little closer to watch.

Very little time passed before it devolved into your fingers working inside your walls, crooking against that one spot that made your breath hitch and hips jump. Mindlessly, you ground against your palm, catching your clit on the heel of your hand with a sweet moan that nearly shorted out his processors. He had to hear that again. Without thinking, he moved his servo over, resting the digits on your lower stomach and gently, gently nudging the heel of your hand out of the way to replace it with his thumb.

“Ah!” spilled from your lips at the insistent, broad pressure of his thumb, and your hips jerked against it, working your fingers that much deeper. Tears pricked at your eyes from pure sensation. “Mirage, mmm, just— just rub, up and down— or circles, just move, I don’t ca—are,” you floundered, the last word breaking as he did as he was told, carefully sliding his thumb up and down on the bead of your clit and sending twinges of searing pleasure up your spine.

You found quickly that just your fingers weren’t enough. Not when the reminder of his servo lay heavily on your lower stomach, tips of his digits digging into the soft fat there insistently. Although you were loath to part with your hand, you pulled your fingers out with a sigh. Mirage froze, optics flicking to your shiny hand as you spread your fingers, examining the strings of fluid that connected them with a far-off feeling of pride.

“Sugar, you’re killin’ me here,” he groaned, and you saw, for one endearing second, a puff of actual steam rise from the vents near his shoulders as he ex-vented harshly.

“Okay, well, here,” you said, unable to come up with anything clever with the purr of arousal in your cunt fanned by the heat of his interface plate and consistent, maddening rumble of his engine. Your hand, still shiny and wet with your fluids, grasped the top of his servo and gently pushed it downwards, until the tips of his digits rested against your drooling entrance. To fight the whimper that threatened to claw its way out of your throat, you nearly chewed a gash into the inside of your cheek. A gasp of an in-vent jolted his frame in awe.

“You sure? I mean— it’s cool?” His flustered stammering was so damn endearing; supreme affection for him swelled in your chest. 

“I’m sure. Just— just go slow.” His adoration was fueling your bravery. You knew he wouldn’t hurt you; if he did, it would never be intentional, and it would never be something he couldn’t fix.

He paused for a second before remembering the position of your own hand and flipping his servo so it was palm side up; you dragged a large enough breath in to balloon your lungs fully at the sight. Anticipation danced in the burn of your spread thighs. For a few seconds, it was just exploration; his digits slid over your silky folds, collecting the gathered slick with minute trembles. One delicious slide all the way up from entrance to clit had you gasping. Mirage silently thanked Primus above that your whole set-up was similar enough to his valve to know at least some of his way around it. It was just hotter. Wetter. Softer. So much softer.

“‘Raj, just— fuuuck,” you groaned out, your head rolling back as the tip of one digit sank into you, soon followed by the rest as it slid all the way to the base. Stars flickered behind your eyelids. The width matched the two fingers put together you’d just pulled out of yourself, though the texture was so wildly different to anything you’d ever put up there that it made your brain stutter for several moments as your nerve endings processed the feeling. The individual ridges and articulations of his knuckles dragged against the silk of your walls in a way that pulled the breath right out of you; your chest rose and fell rapidly with shallow breaths as your thighs twitched.

You were a mess. Mirage was in love. “Holy shit, baby, I get you this bad?” It was only partly teasing. “l— fuck, a second one good?”

“Good, yes, please.”

All thoughts were wiped clean from the forefront of your brain with the addition of a second digit. Slick noises and the sound of dripping fluids landing on metal and concrete filled your ears over the steadily climbing racket that Mirage’s entire body was making — his cooling fans competed with his engine to make the most noise, over top of the typical whirs and clicks that came with his motion. You couldn’t look, could only feel with your eyes squeezed shut as Mirage pumped both digits in and out, in and out, in and out. One arm was thrown up behind you, hooking loosely around his knee to ground you somewhere. The other was occupied: your hand clutched his wrist like a lifeline, white-knuckling it even as your sweaty palm slipped over the metal cuff. When his thumb returned to your clit, swirling clumsy but eager circles on top of it, that only contributed to the tight, hot coil building in your gut.

Mirage had half a mind to pop his interface panel right then and service himself, because the sight of you, shining with sweat and slick with his spit as you rode his digits, was almost too much to bear. The plush folds of your cunt, tight with arousal, were so soft against the hard planes of metal that comprised his servos; the contrast was short-circuiting him. Under his paneling, his spike was already pressurized. Had been for what felt like hours. Your ass was beginning to slide back and forth just a little due to the transfluid collecting underneath you; the rippling motion of your flesh was driving him insane. As were your walls, Primus, your walls that sucked greedily around his digits as they glided in and out of the tight ring of muscle that made up your entrance.

Your name left his lips in a groan that was an octave too high to be suave. The thought of your cunt clamping down on his spike — so soft, so hot, so wet — like it was doing on his digit had his hips rolling against nothing, working fruitlessly for friction they weren’t getting.

Sweat collected wherever skin touched skin. Condensation fogged wherever skin touched metal. The combination of his digits stretching you, curling in you when he realized what a dramatic reaction it incurred, and his thumb working your clit was getting to be too much. Heartbeat roaring in your ears like the rain outside, you clawed a grip into a seam in his leg and jerked your hips against his servo with breathy noises and gasps that you certainly wouldn’t be proud of later. For now, though, all it did was fuel Mirage’s ego and go straight to his spike.

Almost there. You were almost there, grinding your way towards it, sweat beading on your hot skin—

He pulled out. He pulled his digits out. A keen tore out of you at the loss of feeling, tears springing to your eyes as the hot edge you were so fucking close to fell away, your hips working unconsciously against a servo no longer there. With a gasp of a breath, you wrenched your eyes open, blinking away the collected tears and nearly baring your teeth at the bot beneath you — until you saw what he was doing.

In utter astonishment, you watched as the digits that were just inside you slid into his mouth, peeks of his glossa flashing as it worked them clean.

“Oh fuck,” you said before you could stop yourself. One of your hands slapped over your mouth; you tasted sweat and metal. His optics slid to you, lidded and cycling frantically as he processed your taste. A harsh ex-vent slumped his shoulders — the servo not preoccupied with his mouth clutched your hip like you were something precious.

“Sugar,” he breathed, static grating on the word. “Fuck, c’mere.”

Servos hefted you up, and you clutched onto them out of instinct as he helped you up to his face. Without thinking, you lunged forward to kiss, your tongue seeking out his glossa and tasting yourself with a resurging thrum of arousal. He cut it short, though, ignoring your protests as he cupped your ass in one servo and held you aloft. 

For a second, you stared at him in confusion. “What are you—“ Then it hit you. “Oh.” Your heart rate skyrocketed.

The grin stretching his faceplates was downright devious. “Hang onto something, wouldja? Not that you’re gonna fall. Just want you to enjoy the ride.” A short, heady chuckle rounded out his words.

“You’re insane— oh!” Your lighthearted scold was immediately interrupted by the press of your hips against his face and the slide of his slick glossa over the entirety of your sex. “Oh my fuck!” sobbed out of you as your upper body jackknifed over his helm. One arm curled around it with clawing fingers; the other slammed, palm flat, against the concrete wall.

A groan of satisfaction rumbled into your cunt as the taste of salt and sweat and girl bloomed on his glossa — just like earlier but so much stronger now. The proud line of his nose bumped your clit for a second before his glossa followed, narrowing so he could flick at it experimentally. Lubricant spilling from his mouth mixed with your own slick and ran down his chin; his cooling fans sputtered and spun weakly for a second as he pushed up further against your hips, malleable mesh drawing shapes between your clit and your hole.

Your fingernails scraped against the wall as your hips jerked of their own accord; the edge stolen from you earlier had very much returned, and the feeling of his faceplates sliding over the plush, soft skin of your inner thighs was doing something terrible to you.

“Mirage, ah, ah— I’m— fuck, fuck!” Broken syllables and curses streamed from your lips as a substitute for real words. When he closed his lips around your clit and sucked, it was over. It was so quick, embarrassingly quick. The orgasm that had been building suddenly snapped free and tore through you like a fucking hurricane, leaving spasming muscles and a wonderful endorphin afterglow in its wake. As you sobbed out his name, he slid two digits of his free servo back into you just to give you something to clamp down on, and it made tears spill down your burning cheeks from pure stimulus. Mirage drank you; he wanted nothing more than this, to swallow you down and leave your taste buzzing on his glossa like high-grade. Several thundering heartbeats later found you hunched over his helm as his glossa continued to work lazily against you, forcing twitches out of your thighs from pure overstimulation.

“Okay, okay,” you managed to croak, voice hoarse from weeping moans and boneless from what was probably one of the most insane finishes of your life. You tapped out weakly on the side of his helmet. Reluctantly, he pulled your pussy away from his face and cradled you in both servos, one noticeably damper than the other, in front of him.

His chin was shiny with you, his grin wide and completely self satisfied, and his optics dimmed with pleasure. If you were being honest, he’d never looked better, but in your frazzled state you weren’t sure if you had the capacity to string together enough words to form a compliment.

“I gotta say, compliments to the chef,” he hummed, and you stared at him, words not processing.

“Did you seriously— you just gave me head and that’s what you’re gonna say?”

“Uhh, yeah, babe. And I meant it.”

A genuine laugh shook you. “Oh my god. Ohhh my god. Okay. Well, put me back down there, you corny fuck,” you said with a gesture back at his hips.

“Oooh, keep sayin’ that. I’ll start thinkin’ you mean it.” Your body, errant trembles still running through it, was set carefully down back near its original position. This time, you sat in something closer to a straddle, back straight instead of leaning.

The garage air had gone from temperate and warm to fucking scorching. Outside, the rain droned on, occasional rumbles of thunder sounding so far away that they may as well have not been real. Your entire world had been compressed down to one point — a gravitational singularity in this garage, crushing space and time down until only bricks and concrete stood between you and the oblivion outside. All you knew was living metal and Mirage’s voice, trembling with excitement and fuzzy with static, and that was all you wanted to know. His chassis was making so much noise that you probably, under any other circumstance, would have been concerned; if he blew a gasket fucking you, though, you would wear that with pride.

Pure adoration reflected right back at you from his optics as his servos settled on your hips, his thumbs stroking your slick skin. Any concerns he had about Prime’s reaction to you, or to this — well, maybe not to this specifically, but to the both of you being together — were completely null and void in your presence; the reality of your soft weight in his lap was enough to short out his circuits.

Your hands slid down from the cooling fan in his abdomen spinning at maximum speed towards his soaked interface panel; glancing up at him demurely through your lashes, you spoke.

“You gonna let me return the favor?”

“Huh?” He broke out of his reverie. “Oh, right, um— yeah. Yeah, please.”

A smile crawled over your face at the reminder that despite all the poetic words you could come up with in your head, Mirage was still, and always would be, Mirage. Dazed already, he ran the subroutines to open his interface panel. Machinery shifted with a few clicks, and there was a hiss and an outpour of steam as his spike swung up before you, clearly aching for some kind of touch.

You heard more plates shifting lower, too, and out of curiosity peeked downward; something slick glowed lower down, but the nervous shifting of Mirage’s hips and his closed thighs obscured it from view.

Probably better to just focus on what’s in front of you. Your eyes roamed the length of his array first, your mouth going dry just at the size of it. It was bigger than any toy you owned, anyone you’d slept with, and bigger than his digits, too. Still, though… what were humans if not persevering?

And flexible?

You wrapped a hand around it right below the tip, and a full shudder lanced up Mirage’s frame; it was so thick that there was still space between your fingers and thumb left over. Transfluid, milky in consistency but pearlescent pink in color, spilled from the flared head. Curiosity overtook you, and you swiped a thumb up to catch an errant bead of it as it trailed down the side. The fluid was semi-oily, and smelled… fairly innocuous. Metallic, sure, but that came with the territory.

The array itself was as impressive as it was pretty. Like everything else about Mirage, it was fancy, mostly chrome with blue striping up the sides that led to a fully blue head. The biomesh it was made of — similar to his glossa — gently throbbed with alien pulses as you stared at it. Oh, that was hot. Why was that so hot?

Exploration in full was rewarded with soft noises spilling unbidden from Mirage’s lips, his hips twitching uncontrollably as you carefully slid your hand down from the tip to the base in one fluid motion, feeling the transfluid slick under your fingers. “Mmph, I— ah,” he choked out through gritted denta as you observed him.

Oh. Oh. The realization of the power you held over the big mech made a special kind of arousal thrum through you. Another slow pump had his hips jerk up once and a servo clamp over his mouth.

“This was not included in your anatomy lesson,” you said pointedly, a cheshire grin on your face as you hovered dangerously close to his spike. It throbbed in your grip, working another bead of transfluid out of the tip.

“Oh shit, babe,” he groaned, rolling his helm back against the wall. “Uh— hands— hands-on learning?” he offered weakly, unable to focus on anything other than the soft, damp skin of your palm around his spike.

He made the mistake of looking down as you let spit drool out of your bruised lips and spill over his spike for additional lube, and he snapped his optics shut to avoid from a spontaneous overload right there. The noises he made as you slid your tongue over the head were pitiful.

“Fuck, baby, fuck, fuck, fuck,” he hissed, spinal struts clicking as they arched. Primus, was he seriously about to overload in your mouth? Your lips closed around the head and sucked lightly, and he yelped. A servo shot out and carefully grabbed your shoulder, though the tremors running through his digits told you of the restraint he was barely employing. A string of spit and transfluid connected your mouth to his spike as you lifted your head, and he had to force himself to look away for a second with that same servo clutched over his mouth to keep steady. “‘m not gonna last like that, you— can we just—“

“Fuck?”

“Primus, yes.”

“Yeah, we can. I guess.” Despite the leap of excitement in your stomach, you rolled your eyes.

“Don’t even start with that, c’mon,” he said fondly, one servo supporting you as you lifted yourself above his spike and stared down at it with no small amount of trepidation.

It looked a little more manageable from above, but working with something the size of your forearm would cool anyone’s heels, even if there was slick drooling down your inner thighs. Mirage’s servos settled heavy on your hips and you braced yourself on first his knees behind you, then his wrists as you tilted your pelvis to align your entrance as best you could. You sank. The head pressed insistently against your hole. Relax. Relax. Relax.

A deep breath filled your lungs, then whooshed out, deflating your shoulders. Unable to help himself, Mirage inched one of his servos over and ran his thumb through your folds, rolling over your clit and jolting your hips enough to slip the head inside. A long sigh of  “Fuuuuck.” was all that managed to come out of your mouth, your toes curling at the stretch and then the pop of the flared head sliding past your entrance.

Mirage’s entire frame trembled. His vents became shallow and sharp, and the tips of his digits clamped onto the soft meat of your hips desperately as the sensors on his spike reckoned with the realization of just how wet and warm humans really were. “Babe, babe, babe, shit,” he stammered out. “That’s— um, fuck, that’s good!” A weak laugh escaped him as his chin sank down to his chassis, cooling fans hiccuping from stress.

“Hold on, just hold on, I can… shit.” Sweat-dampened palms slid off his wrists for a second before you resituated yourself and leaned back a little, letting your upper back rest against his tucked up thighs. Whatever you were doing worked, because you sank further, and you thanked whatever god was listening that you’d already finished once, making your body quite boneless and that much easier to maneuver.

Mirage, on the other hand, was as taut as a fucking bowstring, made helpless to his own pleasure and completely powerless to you. His optics first scrunched shut, unable to look at you for fear of overloading at the sight of you finally on his spike; then they flew open at the realization that he wanted this burned into his visual processors forever.

Your skin shone with sweat and lubricant; rivulets trailed down your body like a visual pointer to your slick sex, nestled within wiry hair and stretching so beautifully around his spike that it tore an honest-to-Primus whimper out of his vocal synthesizer.

“Mirage, I need you to— mmnh, fuck, I need you to just touch— please,” you gasped, his spike punching the air right out of your lungs. Although your words were broken, he seemed to get the memo, and despite his minute tremors, brought his thumb back to your clit and pressed down. Just the surface area alone made you sigh and roll your head back in pleasure, and it loosened you enough to take him right up until the head nestled against your cervix and your ass brushed his hip plating. There was maybe an inch or two left, but you felt immense pride at managing to work most of his spike in — and immense pleasure, too. If he moved his thumb at all, you were done; you were so fucking full you could barely breathe, and you felt the slow, rhythmic pulses of his biomesh throb through you.

Mirage had never been one for restraint. He did things all-in, one-hundred-and-ten percent, all with a flourish to top it off; the feeling of the hot silk of your walls flexing around his spike just sitting there was enough to quite literally kill his cooling fans via a micro-short in an attempt to divert more power towards keeping his hips still. Senseless praises streamed from his lips, voice whining and roughened by static fuzz. “Yes, yes, yes, sugar, Primus, that’s good— feels so good, please, can I move, please,” he fumbled, jaw slack and optics flickering with the power surges cascading throughout his frame.

“Just— let me start,” was your response, tears pricking at your eyes, and although Mirage groaned pitifully underneath you, he listened.

You had a fair amount of experience with riding toys, and you knew what felt good; the lightbulb above your head became apparent. A shift in your position pushed further weight to the back so that the ridges and nodes of his spike pressed insistently toward the front — though, to be fair, it pressed everywhere — and oh, fuck, right there. Now shoved against that sweet spot inside you, the pleasure teetered on the edge of pain, and you dragged yourself up with a vicious grip on the seams of his thighs behind you. Mirage whined and shifted his hips just slightly; it was enough to pull a moan from your lips as you slid upward. Thick, sluggish droplets of slick swirled with transfluid oozed down his spike. He watched — it was all he could do — with an open mouth and rapidly cycling optics.

The flared head caught against your entrance; a spike (ha!) of pleasure lanced through you. “Okay, now, you can— help me, please,” you stammered out, dizzy with pleasure already and feeling a loopy kind of open-mouthed grin situate itself on your face. 

Your words were all he needed. Although he desperately, desperately wanted to snap his hips up and chase the vice-grip of your slick walls, he’d rather take on Megatron alone with his servos tied behind his back than risk hurting you. Especially while interfacing. He did not want to have to explain that to anyone.

Thumb slowly working your clit, his servos gripped your hips just a little too tight and assisted; you could feel the tremors lancing up and down his arms as he helped you establish a rhythm. At a word, the dam would break, but for now, you maintained tenuous control over the mech and over yourself as you rode him with his help.

Well. Rode was a strong word for it; he all but dragged you up and down the length of his spike, earning each of you luxurious groans from the other, but your quivering thigh muscles assisted as best they could. Heat surged through your body at the drag of his nodes against your walls, and you realized with a hot flash that Mirage was going to fucking ruin you for anybody else, and you liked that. Which was good, because he could have stayed buried in your cunt for the rest of his life and offlined happily just like that.

It was good. It was really good. But even the overwhelming stretch wasn’t enough. Just like earlier — it seemed like light years away now — when you’d still had pants on and hadn’t been completely lost to metal-on-skin debauchery, the grind of your clit on the seam of your jeans had been good, but not enough. Your fingers clawed at his wrists. The burn of your thighs from exertion seared through you, mixing with the jolts of pleasure from your clit to create some new, terrible monster that had you twitching with shameless ecstasy.

“Mirage, Mirage,” you croaked, as he slid you down his spike again and pushed it into your lungs, “I’m— fuck, please, faster, please, please.” In any other scenario, your begging would have immensely embarrassed you; now, though, it seemed like the only viable option to get him to fuck you like you needed him to.

“Shit, baby,” he hissed, and you gasped as he kept moving you, legs jerking uselessly. “You— fuck, you sure?”

“Yes, please, just— oh, fuck!” The cry — and the air in your lungs — was knocked right out of you by a single desperate snap of his hips upward, his spike driven straight home. Your entire upper body crumpled forward, kept upright only by a tenuous grip on his wrists, and then he really started fucking you, and you were gone.

His cooling fans surged back to life as he slammed into you, power no longer diverted towards holding the actuators of his hips back. No, now he was fucking jackhammering into you, and you were barely moving as his spike pistoned in and out of you, slick drooling from your cunt. Like he remembered himself, his thumb began to work furiously against your clit, and you rewarded him with a gasp and more than a few uncontrollable moans of his name, which only served to fuel him more.

Not like he was being quiet, either. You were glad that the building was solid brick and the rain continued to pour outside, because the amount of noise coming from his chassis and spilling from his lips was worrying. Praises and broken mentions of your name streamed from him; he tossed his helm back against the wall with his optics squeezed shut to keep from overloading prematurely. It was too much— it was way too fucking much. Your poor overworked cunt was nearly bruised with sensitivity, barely able to keep up with the stretch of his spike as the nodes pulsing along it raked that sweet spot inside of you mercilessly. Neither of you were going to last long; not your fragile human body nor his torqued-up frame could handle much more of this.

Every sharp thrust paired with the frantic, messy circles he pressed into your clit brought you viciously closer and spilled tears from your eyes. All you could really do was hold on as Mirage wrung pleasure from both your body and his. Impossibly, his thumb worked faster, his pace got even more brutal, and you were almost seizing from pleasure as your nerve endings were frayed raw. That peak was building in your gut, that familiar tight coil of heat, for the second time that night, and you knew it was going to completely destroy you, and you wanted it to.

Without warning, Mirage spread his knees apart, slammed his pedes flat on the floor, and thrusted up. His spinal struts arched again to get his spike that much further inside of your yielding body, his overload imminent and warning signs flashing in his optics’ periphery. “Fuck, yes— yes, baby, yes, yes, ah, shit!” His frenzied whine rang in your ears as steam from his vents heated the air around you; the only thing that rang in your ears besides your thunderous heartbeat was the heady slap of skin against metal, everything slick with your combined fluids.

You responded in kind at the new angle with a cry of his name and some noises that resembled words, but the way he sheathed his spike inside you — fuck, was it all the way in? — and ground his thumb against your clit was too much— too much— you couldn’t—

You shattered. Doubling over from pleasure, you sobbed incoherently as your climax slammed into you. Pleasure crackled through your veins like lightning; a fog of pleasure dulled your senses until the only thing you could focus on was his spike pulsing in your cunt and his thumb still grinding against your clit. Tears pricked at your eyes, joining the ones already wetting your cheeks, as jolts of pleasure lanced up your spine. Maybe you moaned his name, maybe you didn’t. You couldn’t tell.

Mirage went soon after you, because the feeling of your walls clamping around his spike as if trying to suck him in impossibly further did him in instantly. His optics snapped open wide before slamming shut and he cried your name as the best overload of his life wracked his frame; the actuators of his hips trembled violently, along with his servos, as transfluid gushed into you and was immediately forced out by the pure lack of room inside your cunt. Engine snarling, cooling fans nearly spinning off their axles, he held your hips as flush to his as possible while the both of you rode out your respective climaxes, twitching around each other violently. Minute jerks of his hips attempted to work more transfluid inside of you. Brain still wiped blank with pleasure, all you could do was make soft noises and let the aftershocks spasm through you.

Consciousness eventually came back to you in gritty waves. Mirage had set your body down, leaned back against his thighs, his spike still seated within you but depressurizing slowly. Transfluid seeped out of your puffy folds, and you lifted a shaking hand to collect some of it and taste it. Metallic. Like you’d expected.

Enormous vents whooshed through his frame as he attempted to cool his chassis; coolant dripped from him, some of it turned to steam by the pure heat of his internal mechanisms. Body shaking and feeling very small and human, you stroked a thumb over his wrist where you held it, feeling both its ambient warmth and a surge of affection. And satisfaction.

You were absolutely going to feel this in the morning, holy shit. Thank God you didn’t have work tomorrow.

Mirage eventually came back down to earth, his optics cracking open and cycling a few times before they flared to their usual brightness. Lids heavy and a dopey grin on his face, he carefully lifted you off his spike — it slid out of you with a slick noise that made you flush — and brought you up to face-level. With one servo, he held you tight against his torso; he planted the other flat on the floor and resituated his hips so he could slump down further against the wall, his entire frame lax.

Self-satisfaction beamed at you from his faceplates. “Oh, that was good, huh?”

You scoffed, too tired to get riled up at his teasing; you knew he was feeling the same as you. “Yeah, pretty good. I don’t know if I’ll be able to walk tomorrow, to be totally honest.” An exhausted laugh left you.

“Gonna count that as a win.”

“You… do whatever you want.” You waved a limp hand at him dismissively, letting the rise and fall of his chassis with his vents rock you.

“Well, then, I wanna do this,” he purred, and brought you in for a kiss that communicated all his smug affection without any of his stupid jokes. You returned it gratefully, a smile on each of your mouths as you basked in that pleasant post-sex glow.

The rain still droned outside. A boom of thunder rolled through the building; the lights flickered. Both you and Mirage glanced upward. His optics slid back down to you first.

“You thinkin’ about going anywhere in this weather?” he asked, raising a brow ridge.

“I dunno, do I have a ride?”

“Nah,” he replied playfully, kissing you again, and you found that it could storm for the rest of your life, and you wouldn’t really care. So long as you had your favorite — yes, your favorite, not that you could ever admit around him — to keep you company.

[inuyashaluver]

can you write a jessie x hockey!r, where r gets into a fight during one of her games and jessie is watching from the stands with some of the chelsea players? thx

cheeky - jessie fleming

jessie fleming x reader

description: in which your girlfriend brings her friends to her cheeky girlfriend’s game

warnings: jessie still plays for chelsea!! let’s pretend ucla offers women’s hockey 🫠 swearing, mentions of a fight, suggestive

a/n: you guys don’t understand how much this request has infiltrated my tiny brain, thank you you so so much, my love, enjoyyyyy

⋆ ★ ⋆ ★ ⋆ ★ ⋆ ★ ⋆

you and your girlfriend, jessie were quite literally some of the nicest people alive. every time someone was around the two of you for either a short or long time, they came out feeling lighter, happier and all round just more positive.

you and jessie just radiated love, a special bond between the two of you that was just undeniably beautiful.

—

you and jessie met at a college party years ago. you both went to ucla yet never crossed paths until this party. you weren’t really a party goer and neither was jessie, you both found refuge in the backyard of the house you were at.

both of your friend groups had unknowingly ditched you and you both wanted some air, away from all the drunk frat boys and sorority girls.

“sorry, do you mind if i sit here?” you ask the brunette where she sat on a small bench. her head snapped up from her phone at hearing a familiar accent. canadian.

“oh, yeah, go ahead!” jessie stutters, scooching over a little and patting the spot next to her. you smile at her gratefully, sitting down with an exaggerated huff.

jessie lets out a laugh when you sat, both of you looking at each other with bright smiles. you both thought the other was breathtakingly gorgeous, feeling like the party was a little worth it at this point.

“you sick of seeing people basically fucking each other everywhere too?” you ask her with a shake of your head, your eyes falling on a couple making out in a way that should definitely be behind a closed door.

jessie chuckles, looking down at the cup in her hand and nodding while taking a sip of it. “that and my friends ditched me” she rolls her eyes, you nudge her shoulder with yours, “mine too, don’t worry” you grin, making her return one shyly.

“i’m (y/n) by the way” jessie smiles, repeating the name in her head that she would surely never forget.

“jessie” you smile at her, pink cheeks a little evident on the both of you when you made eye contact again.

“sorry if this is weird but are you from canada?” jessie asks nervously, your eyes widen comically, your face brightening at the girl's question.

you didn’t really have many friends from back home who came to the states for college. sure there was a bunch of canadian girls at college but none of them were this pretty. or this easy to talk to.

“i am! don’t tell me you are too?” you question, jessie smiled at your excitement, her heart beating quickly at your glistening eyes. she nods, making you start rambling with where she was from.

you both continued to chat and it was scary how much you had in common.

the conversation was full of laughter, shared jokes and most definitely a shared attraction. “so, jessie, what do you do besides being an environmental warrior?” you say cheekily, the girl scoffs, slapping your thigh gently and rolling her eyes,

“i play soccer” she mocks, you give her an impressed smile as she explained how good she really was, “mhm, i should come and watch you sometime, superstar?” you flirt, giving her a charming smile that had butterflies swarming in her stomach.

you’d both gone far from friendly conversation, the flirting taking over after about 2 hours of you familiarising yourself with each other.

“yeah, maybe you should, and you? miss number solver?” she teases back, referring to you doing an accounting degree.

“i play hockey” you move a little so you could face her better and she does the same, although, her face has a shit eating grin on it.

“what’s so funny?” you narrow your eyes at her, “you’re so canadian” she laughs, you shake your head as she throws her head back in laughter, clearly enjoying how you’re not even defending yourself.

she encourages you to talk about your sport and to say she fell in love with you there was an understatement. you spoke with so much passion she really loved to see and hear it.

you also admit you fell in love with her when she talked about her sport, but even more with how intently she was listening to you, soaking in every word you said and clarifying things she didn’t understand.

you both felt something bubbling under the surface as you talked, so much so, when the party started to filter out, she asked if you wanted to get some ice cream and who were you to decline?

the teasing and the flirting throughout the whole night was so unbearable, you asked her out on a date without a second thought, smiling brightly when she accepted without any hesitation.

you both began to date after a few months, becoming one of the ‘it couples’ around campus when everyone could truly tell how much you were in love with each other.

you went to each other’s games with bright, adoring smiles, wearing each other’s jerseys with pride.

you had study dates together, most of the time getting distracted but neither part was complaining.

you were there for each other throughout all the ups and downs, talking and listening to one another for hours and somehow feeling not enough when you were with each other every second of the day.

you’d both established a career before you even graduated college, star athletes in the making in your respected sports.

you’d do anything for each other, so much so you moved with her to england when she signed her contract to chelsea.

—

while jessie played for chelsea, you still continued to play hockey in england also. it was hard being away from home but jessie made it all better.

your continual support for each other offering a sense of security that nothing else could. it also helped that you both represented canada nationally, often getting the opportunity to go home together.

—

the chelsea girls knew you too well, you came to every single game without fail with a bright grin on your face in the ‘fleming’ jersey that was almost worn as much as your own.

“your wife’s here” niamh teases as she warmed up with jessie before a match, the two of you weren’t married, or engaged even, not yet at least but this didn’t stop niamh from wishing you were, knowing how much her best friend adored you.

“where?” jessie grins, stopping all movement and frantically looking for you, niamh directs her head to where you were sitting in the friends and family section and her heart swelled with pride.

you wave at her brightly and she returns it instantly, her face growing warm at the smile you sent her, snapped out of her trance at niamh’s laugh. “such a sap” she smiles, jessie just gives her shoulder a little shove, continuing to warm up.

when the match was over after an easy win, jessie bounded over to you without a second to waste. “hi, baby” you smile as she walked into your arms, the barrier making it a little difficult but you both didn’t care.

“hi, gorgeous” jessie says breathlessly, pulling you into a sweet kiss with her hand on your cheek. you smile against her, your own hand on the side of her neck, your thumb brushing against her skin gently.

“my superstar” you say as you pull away, brushing away some stray hairs from her face before pulling her into a tight hug.

“gotta impress my wag, baby” she says cheekily, kissing your cheek repeatedly to make you giggle, working successfully like it did every time.

“i’m definitely impressed, baby canada” you smile, pressing another quick kiss to her lips as you pulled away slightly.

her hands make her way to your waist, rubbing up and down gently as you chatted, only lasting for a couple of seconds before you ushered her to interact with the fans.

“i’ll see you at home, beautiful” she winks, pecking your lips before running away, shouting a quick “i love you” over her shoulder that you quickly returned before leaving to drive home.

—

you had an upcoming game, an important one at that. you’d been nervous about it all week, jessie frequently having to calm you down so you could breathe. you were the captain, both for this team and the canada team so a lot of pressure fell on your shoulders.

the only reassurance you had was knowing jessie would be there, even inviting some of her teammates to come and watch you since they had the day off.

jessie wasn’t one to miss an opportunity where she got to ogle her talented girlfriend and show you off at the same time so she was extremely excited.

the morning of, let’s just say it was extremely difficult to get you out of the house.

“what if i fuck up?” you whine, turning from the door and walking back to jessie who was watching you from the doorway. “you won’t” she assures, pinching your cheek softly before turning you around and giving you a soft push to the door.

you turn back around, “what if something goes wrong?” you say nervously, “baby, you’ll be fine, we can deal with it” jessie chuckles, you throw your head back in annoyance.

the people who only knew you from hockey would be shocked to know you did this before every game. they’d be shocked to know how soft you were when it came to your girlfriend.

“i don’t want to go” you groan, jessie draws you in by your waist, her arms wrapped around them securely, “baby, you’ll be amazing, like always” jessie says earnestly, her brown eyes looking directly into yours so you knew she wasn’t lying.

“but you don’t know that” you pout, jessie quickly smiling before pulling you into a sweet kiss.

“i’m your girlfriend, i know everything” she says cheekily, pecking your lips a couple of times and managing to pull a small smile out of you.

“you go do your best, that’s all i want from you” she smiles, her hands now cradling your face as your arms wrap around her. “okay” you breathe out, determined.

smiling before pulling her into a breathless kiss that made both of you feel dizzy, sharing a quick i love you before she had to physically push you out of the house, knowing you’d convince her to stay.

—

jessie made her way to the arena in your jersey, your number written neatly tiny on her cheek. she was accompanied by niamh, zećira, aggie and hannah.

to say jessie got teased the entire time was an understatement but she didn’t care, she had no shame with the amount of love she had for you.

when you skated out on the ice with the ‘C’ over your heart, you had no ounce of nervousness at all. a complete contrast from the morning.

the truth is, on the ice, you were ruthless, completely contradicting how you were off the ice.

you carried yourself with complete confidence, expecting nothing but the best. you were a little rough but one of the best players and everyone knew it. you didn’t take any bullshit.

you were strategic, smart and calculated. you knew what you were doing and you were the captain both in this league and nationally for a reason. a team leader without fail. a role model, a borderline legend.

jessie and her friends cheered loudly for you when your name was announced on the loudspeaker. jessie watched as you waved around the arena before locking back in, skating around the ice in preparation for the game.

jessie was on the edge of her seat the entire time watching you, scoring 2 points in a short amount of time. you were playing exceptionally well, jessie’s heart swelled with pride but she was extremely nervous how this one player kept trying to rile you up.

she knew you didn’t take any disrespect and knew this girl was about to get her ass handed to her.

the girl was being overly physical with you and you would counter it every time. she was the other captain and knew she’d get thrown into the box if she tried anything too much. her behaviour was surprising.

but the girl continued, having the nerve to be near you every time with something to say every two seconds.

you’d ignore it, having dealt with people more annoying than this but it flipped when she started talking about jessie. your jessie.

she started with the insults about you until she said, “is your girlfriend some sort of puck bunny?” you fucking lost it.

you dropped your stick and both of you break out into a heated fight. fists flying before you grabbed her by her shirt, slamming her into the glass and spitting out words that we’re definitely not family friendly. jessie’s eyes were so wide in shock, never really seeing you in a fight like this before.

“talk about my girlfriend like that again and i’ll shove the puck down your fucking throat” you exclaim, getting pulled back by the referee and getting told to go to the penalty box.

you send a glare to the girl and she falters almost instantly before you skated to the box. you sat down with a huff, arms crossed over your chest as you watched your team dominate the other.

jessie shook her head while she looked at you, niamh and zećira cheering you on throughout the fight and even more now that you were in the box.

when your ten minutes was up, you played the rest of the game with passion, finishing with an easy and well deserved win. jessie ran down to where the change rooms were, her teammates waiting nearby.

jessie watched as you skated off the ice, catching your breath as you quickened your pace to jessie. her face was etched with worry as you approached, watching as you took off your helmet hastily and took out your mouth guard.

“hey, baby” you say brightly, bounding over and wrapping jessie up in a hug, your face instantly tucked into the crook of her neck, your cold nose brushing against her warm skin.

“for someone that just beat the shit out of someone, you’re very happy” she says amusingly, her arms wrapping around you without hesitation.

“she deserved it, trust me on that” and jessie did. you pull away from her at arms length, a cheesy smile plastered on your face as you looked at her.

“are you okay?” she asked, her voice clearly laced with worry, you nodded, kissing jessie’s cheek tenderly as you drew her a little closer.

“i’m fine, love, especially since my biggest fan is here” you grin, “you should see the other guy” you laugh as jessie slaps your shoulder lightly, “cheeky” she chuckles, pulling you into another tight hug in absolute relief you were okay.

you could tell she was on edge because of the circumstances, the hug telling you everything you needed to know. you hugged her tightly, letting her find solace in you and honestly calming you both down.

you wave over at her teammates when she pulls away and chat with them excitedly. you held onto jessie’s hand the entire time you all chatted, thanking them for coming and watching.

“what does that say on your stick?” niamh questions, you smile, moving your hand to show that you’d written jessie’s name with a little heart next to it on your tape, a tradition for you ever since you’d started dating.

“good luck charm” you grin, both of you getting teased for your bright pink cheeks. you say goodbye to them before they leave, turning back to jessie with a sweet smile. this is the side of you she knew the best. an absolute softie.

before you get changed, you draw jessie into another kiss, unable to stop yourself from smiling against her when she whined against your mouth.

you give her an amused expression, seeming as though she was a little riled up about the whole situation. “shut up” she groans, pushing you away by your chest slightly but you came right back, pressing a sweet peck to her lips,

“i didn’t say anything” you mumble against her, squeezing her hips gently before you ran to the change room, wanting to get back home as quick as possible.

let’s just say violence is never the answer but is excusable only for the way your girlfriend reacted to you when you both stepped through the door of your shared apartment.

⋆ ★ ⋆ ★ ⋆ ★ ⋆ ★ ⋆

liked by niamhcharles17 and 44,232 others

_jessflem: you wouldn’t know she beat someone up 10 minutes before this but here we are

view all comments

yourname: so worth it

↳ _jessflem: really was actually

niamhcharles17: your girlfriend’s got a crazy fist on her but is SUCH a softie

↳ yourname: watch it niamhy

↳ _jessflem: biggest softie ever

↳ yourname: you’re supposed to defend me

↳ _jessflem: i love you?

↳ yourname: yeah. whatever. i love you too.

[justwinginglife]

thinking of a Hoshina/narumi x Vice captain! reader who was raised to be a traditional wife for wealthy clans 🤔 Like she looks and acts like what people would scream wife material and in the field she be an aggresive fighter but still keeping a graceful look on her....i imagine she'll be the type to use aggresive weapons like SMGs just to contrast her character

Disclaimer- I am a Hoshina girlie through and through and idk if I would even know how to write Narumi but I will give it a shot for you anon. Thanks for trusting me with this request, I will do my best.

Three's A Crowd

You always thought you'd marry well, after all, you'd always been told that being a wife was what you were made for. And not just because you'd been raised by a governess in a proper household, no- you made the act of being a wife look effortless. If being a wife was a job, you were the CEO. If being your husband was a prize, the raffle tickets would've sold out.

Your parents would joke to family friends that you glided out of the womb in stilettos, ready to host dinner parties with your best wine and your best smile. And then when you were the youngest female to ever make Vice Captain in such a short amount of time, people just assumed talent was in your DNA at this point. You could completely brutalize the hell out of a kaiju, not even get your hands dirty or break a sweat, and then be back home in time to instruct the household staff which table settings to use for dinner and maybe even recommend a nice dessert pairing for whatever meal the chef had prepared.

Now, coming from a well-established clan, you had always assumed you'd marry one of the Hoshina brothers as your family had deep ties to the Hoshina clan and you'd known them since you were young, but you had also recently caught the attention of the Captain of the First Division and you could never resist a man with power.

As the Vice Captain of the Second Division, you were constantly meeting with the Captains and Vice Captains of other divisions, but for some reason you didn't meet the Captain of the First Division at any of those stiff meetings. In fact, he never showed up so you thought you might never meet him. But fate must've had other plans because one day as you were on your way home from meeting with the Vice Captain of the First Division, a kaiju decided to take a bite out of a nearby building and that's where you met Gen Narumi.

It's like he had known they were going to strike because he was onto them in a matter of minutes, skewering them like a kebab. You were impressed but you didn't want to let him have all the fun, especially since this might be the only time you ever interacted with him again. So you raced him to take down the remaining kaiju in the vicinity, gunning them all down with equal parts aggression and grace. He had been quite impressed by your agility and the elegance with which you slew each creature. So much so that he actually started showing up to his meetings from then on just to get a glimpse of you. And then he got greedier and a glimpse just wasn't enough for him anymore, he wanted to talk to you, get to know you.

Soon, a rivalry had formed between Gen and Soshiro as they both raced after your heart. The two of them were so different, pretty much the only commonality they shared were their feelings for you.

Gen was a quiet lover, he'd shrug people off when they'd ask if he was seeing you, keeping to himself about the details. But then he'd secretly leave a vase of your favorite flowers for you to find the next morning and if you confronted him about it he'd simply say your apartment looked so sad that even a bunch of weeds he'd scrounged from some random field was an improvement to the place. The flowers were not in fact wildflowers as he claimed, you could tell he'd gone to great lengths to buy the most expensive bouquet he could find from the hothouse but he'd never acknowledge it.

Soshiro was the exact opposite- he was loud about his love. He'd sling his arm around you, and brag to anyone who'd hear him about what a catch you were. He'd remind you everyday how much he adored you. And though it bothered him that Gen was attempting to court you too, he always felt he had the upper hand, having never seen Gen make any grand gestures for you or declare his love for you as openly as he did.

You were used to many men vying for your attention but you never thought that two of the most powerful fighters in the JAKDF would be among your long list of suitors. In fact, the two of them paid such frequent visits to the Second Division that you didn't think you'd even have time to look at any other men. Not that they'd let you look anyway, they'd pretty much assumed that one of them would be the one to marry you.

They weren't wrong. You did intend to choose from one of them as you'd grown quite fond of your little daily routines with each of them. Soshiro was always the first person to text you something sweet in the morning, he wanted you to get a taste of what it would be like to wake up next to him. Gen was always going out of his way for you, picking up dinner from your favorite restaurant an hour away or buying you a pair of earrings you mentioned in passing months ago, once he'd saved up enough for them (you had expensive taste).

It was the first time you felt like more than just some prize, you were actually wanted and desired as a human being. You felt like maybe even if you didn't say the right things or laugh at the right time, even if you fell short of the perfection you'd worked so hard to achieve your whole life, they'd accept you as you were.

It was both a blessing and a curse as you knew you'd have to pick eventually. As different as Gen and Soshiro were, they both did not share well and this little arrangement you had, seeing both of them, would not hold up for long.

But you'd hold out for as long as you possibly could. For as long as they'd let you.

After all, true love is hard to find and you'd stumbled on double the jackpot.

[junowritings]

Hi! Can I rqs for a platonic Malleus x Fem!reader imagine please? During their NRC days,reader jokingly asked Malleus to be her maid of honour if she ever got married. Then,years later, on her wedding day, Malleus shows up,fully intending to keep his promise.

Thx!

I AM SO IN LOVE WITH THIS IDEA YOU HAVE NO IDEA. Listen this started off jokey but ended up kinda wholesome like he would be so touched??? and take it so seriously???

Also I'm thinking about the whole Fae living longer than humans but this didn't fit into the drabble so can I just say you can absolutely bet that decades/centuries after your wedding he is telling EVERYONE he meets about his fav child of man and that whole thing bc he'd think the world would be poorer off if he didn't tell everybody about his friend and the happiness they wanted him to play such an important part in.

BUT YEAH I hope you enjoy how this turned out!

=====

“If I ever get married, you’ll be my maid of honor, won’t you, Mal?”

Such a simple request, spoken so boldly from one he considered his true confidant. How could he have ever refused?

To you it was made in jest, on a quiet walk out on your dorm’s grounds as you had done for so many months now. It was easy to fill the silence with idle chatter on the nights where you found Daisomnia’s dorm leader meandering through Ramshackle’s old bones; a comforting routine that had fallen into place merely by being in the right place, at the right time. Often you would coax the odd memory from the fae of his life before Night Raven College; but Malleus was far more interested to learn of your affairs. Of friends, of family, of the many wonderful experiences crammed into such a short existence as your mortal life. 

You had become such an invaluable part of his life, it would be only natural to bask in your every word and commit it to memory, would it not? If only to ensure that not a single memory of his dear friend became lost to the flow of time that followed after you. 

So when you had turned to him, expression alight with a grin that made your eyes sparkle and the corners of your mouth crinkle with well-meant mischief, your question gave Malleus pause. 

To anyone else, your joke would have earned a playful nudge or a flat out refusal. But to Malleus, the man who you so earnestly called your friend even after everything that had transpired since your arrival? 

That small request is bound to his heart, with every intention to see it through simply because you asked. 

The days from that single night trickle into months, and then years. Faces change and friends part ways between that time, though the close bond is never lost.. A blink of an eye for your fae friend, but almost a lifetime for yourself. The moment is lost within the recesses of your fond memories, as you find a life of your own and find a love who makes your heart race and brightens the very world in their wake. Lost, but always lingering somewhere in the peripheral of your mind each time you’d looked down at your hand, now decorated with an engagement ring - a promise for the life to come.

Even as you stand now before your mirror, donned in fine fabrics of beautiful colors that makes your smile shine and your heart feel full you reminisce. It brings a chuckle to your lips, shaking your head at how easily you had joked back then about getting married, only to find yourself now doing what seemed like a distant ‘what if’ scenario just years ago. Your eyes close for a moment, your wedding attire bunched in your hands as the memory flickers briefly through your mind.

And then your eyes open, and suddenly that very memory is standing in the reflection of your mirror.

But it’s not just a reflection. You feel a hand on your shoulder and you know that it’s real as you spin around to face your old friend, face breaking out into that same telltale grin Malleus had seen such a short time ago.

“Malleus!”

The years have changed Malleus so very little, but you see it in his face. His smile is softer at the edges as he regards you with a warmness once shielded behind the result of decades of isolation. It’s a welcome sight, and you’re only pulled away when you spot the envelope in his free hand, your own writing scrawled on the cover. You recognize it immediately, and your heart swells with relief.

He’d received your invitation. He’d actually made it.

There is no hesitation as you throw your arms around the fae’s shoulders, no doubt making a mess of the pristine finery he’s wearing but too elated to care. You can’t resist a joke about how Sebek would have your hide for almost bringing the ruler of Briar Valley crashing down into the bridal suite mirror. The comment is met with a hearty chuckle from Malleus who returns your embrace eagerly, though unlike you he is careful to avoid creasing your clothes; he wouldn’t want it to impede on one of the happiest days of your life, after all.

There are so many things to catch up on. So much time to fill in on every little detail that couldn’t be expressed through letters and calls. But that will have to wait, especially as a knock at the door just moments later brings you back to the present, the wedding planner peeking their head in to ask if you and your maid of honor are ready for the ceremony. Now that gets your attention, and Malleus fails to hide the amusement that glints in his eyes watching your eyes widen, eyebrows raised in surprise as your gaze darts from the planner to your friend. 

He can see the gears turning in your head, piecing together that carefully hidden fragment that Malleus had kept close to his thoughts all of these years. And then he sees that smile again, now wobbly at the corners as your misty eyes blink back the emotions you feel welling up in your chest, and he feels pride in knowing just what his presence here on your wedding day now means to you.

Standing tall, Malleus moves to stand by your side and offers his arm. Today he is not the king of Briar valley. Today, he is your friend, confidant, and the best maid of honor you could have asked for on one of the happiest days of your life.

“Come now, I Believe I made a promise to you, child of man.” he speaks warmly as you hook your arm over his. “I hope you didn’t think I’d forget so soon.”

[demonslayerunhinged]

Unhinged theory

Sanemi and Giyuu are exes (Part 2)

Ok so this part is just spoilers galore but if you don't mind then ok. Here's part one.

The second beginning

During the final battle after they have both unlocked their demon slayer marks. They are more open with each other, Sanemi has learned to trust others and Giyuu has learned to trust himself and Sanemi throwing the sword is awesome for him because it's Sanemi telling him that 'I trust you, don't let me down!' and Giyuu thinks 'Yes! I'll do my best!'. The previous training that they've done now comes into play because they know each other's moves and are able to fight together seamlessly!

The last shot of them eating Giyuu's favorite dish together not only calls back to Sanemi's offer, but I feel that it's also a way for Giyuu to begin opening up, like he's telling Sanemi 'This is me' and that he wants Sanemi back and wants to mend their relationship.

The side eye Sanemi's giving Giyuu is so funny because he seems wary. I can just imagine their conversation.

Sanemi: You'd better not fuck this up again, or I will leave your ass for good.

Giyuu (already playing the part of the whipped husband): Yes, dear.

Some proof

Like I said in the Part 1, I already talked about the romantic undertones in Giyuu's attempts to connect with Sanemi by his body language and expressions. It's obvious Giyuu wants him and now that Tanjiro has touched his heart a second time, he now has a stronger understanding of his emotions and what he wants.

Here, I'll list a bunch of tidbits that point to them having a previous relationship.

Giyuu and Tanjiro's discussion about Sanemi post coma-inducing punch should've stopped at theories as to what type of bean paste he likes, but they kept on talking about him. I don't think Giyuu would do that if he didn't know more stuff about Sanemi, maybe through their past interactions, his own observations or both.

Giyuu describes Sanemi as grumpy and hot-tempered in the Corps records, contrast this with his thoughts on Obanai. He feels sad and doesn't know why our snek boy doesn't like him but with Sanemi the short description he gives is similar to one I would give about someone I'm familiar who has a major flaw that I can't ignore that makes it hard for me to connect with them.

How did Sanemi know where Giyuu's training grounds were? Even Tanjiro who has spent a considerable time with Giyuu still needed a map for directions. You might argue that Sanemi's crow probably told him where Giyuu's place is, but neither of their crows are present during the entire scene. So Sanemi has to have known where, which means he's probably been there before and has sparred with him in the past.

I've talked about how their fight was similar to a conversation than actual training, and the way that they're able to perfectly counter and dodge each other's moves tells me that this isn't their first time sparring. There's also Sanemi's demeanor during the fight, in his training with Obanai and Muichiro, he was serious but with Giyuu he's...smiling? He was enjoying himself, even his taunts to Giyuu had a playful edge to it. It's like he's happy to be sparring with an old friend.

Giyuu's lack of reaction when Sanemi suggests that they beat each other up. He doesn't seem threatened, it's like he knows that Sanemi isn't actually going to hurt him and based on Sanemi's annoyance at Tanjiro coming between them, there's a small chance that Sanemi might have been joking and Giyuu knew it. It wasn't as big of a deal as Tanjiro made it out to be.

In Conclusion, Sanemi and Giyuu probably have history, which is why the vibes between them feel like they're an old, married couple.

*Yes, I am crazy and yes, this is an ADHD, 4 hours of sleep, caffeine-induced breakdown. Their relationship is my current hyperfixation, and I'm going to make it everyone's problem 🙂. It's all Ufotable's fault.

[vampwritesstuff]

🤍 𝐒𝐊𝐙 𝐚𝐬 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐥𝐢𝐭𝐭𝐥𝐞 𝐛𝐫𝐨𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐫 (hyung line)

overprotective!little brother!ot8(separate) x older sister!reader

Request: Hello, I was excited to see you’re opening requests. I've had this idea brewing in my head but I cannot write to save my life. Am thinking of a version for each SKZ member - overprotective younger brother SKZ who's proud of your success in the corporate world (you're all he talks about and hes got them intrigued), but refuses to introduce his noona to the member because he's wary of their flirtatious ways or even crush on you. And then you turn up at an event to surprise your brother and then... I'll leave the rest to your talented imagination because I don't know what kinda ending I'd want for each SKZ member.

cw: none really, just me trying to be funny, the short scenarios are lowkey bad but it was so difficult to come up with different situations and not reuse the same one over and over 😭

Ngl, I giggled and squealed when I saw this request, thank you for being my first request for Stray Kids and I’d be happy to make this for you! Buckle up buttercup, this one’s a long one! This was taking so long to post, and I feel so terrible about that, so I’m going to make two parts for this, the next part being the Maknae line and hopefully that will be done soon! If you guys do enjoy my writing, please consider checking out my masterlist !

Bang Chan

You’re not much older than Chan, but you’re so successful at your corporate job back in Australia that Chan often talks about you to his members and sometimes his fans.

He has for sure mentioned you on his lives, and everyone can see that he really cares about his older sister.

Definitely doesn’t take kindly to fans asking if you’re single or attractive, he’s never given out your name or shown what you look like just because of that.

With the members, it’s not that he thinks they’ll purposely flirt with you, but his protective brother side just gets the better of him and he’d rather not take the chance. The boys are very interested in meeting you but even they don’t know your name or what you look like, and they love their lives enough that they don’t push Chan.

The boys are so confused when you first show up at the concert in Sydney, confused as to who you are until Chan calls you Noona, then they’re all over you once Chan (reluctantly) introduces you to them.

Personally, I don’t think they would be able to flirt with you knowing you’re their hyung’s older sister, which makes you older than them obviously.

I.N and Felix absolutely would ask if they could call you their Noona too 🥹 Seungmin would totally have to hold back on his ‘Chan is so old’ jokes just cause he doesn’t want to make you feel old.

You were waiting backstage for Chan with Hannah, your little sister had practically begged you to come with her to the Stray Kids concert. You hadn’t been to any of your little brother’s concerts before as your job always kept you busy, and you felt a little guilty that you hadn’t been able to attend before now. So when the concert date coincided with your vacation days, you knew you had to jump on the opportunity.

The cheers from the stadium arena were so loud that you wondered how Chris and his members were able to handle it. You kept yourself occupied with Hannah by talking about Chris and his friends, Hannah claimed that they were a rowdy bunch and from what you had seen online while trying to be a little involved in Chan’s idol career, you didn’t think for a second that she was wrong.

You heard him before you saw him, his voice unmistakable to you. He was laughing and joking with his members, whom you regrettably couldn’t name off the top of your head. What can you say? Chan never talks about them with you, and you don’t see much about them often enough in order to memorize them.

“Christopher Bang Chan, what do you think you’re doing to that poor boy. Put him down.” You chided your brother as you saw him walking backstage with one of the boys thrown over his shoulder. The sound of your voice made Chan stop dead in his tracks, making a few of the members behind him bump into him. “Y/n? Noona, what are you doing here?” He asked in surprise, ignoring the looks from his members, as he set down the fox looking boy and walked over to you to engulf you in one of his infamous hugs, he also pulled Hannah in for a hug too despite her protests.

“Decided to surprise you, my vacation days lined up with the concert and Hannah begged me to bring her so.. surprise?” You hummed once he let go, “Chan hyung, are you going to introduce us or are we gonna be left in the dark over here?” Seungmin pipes up. Chan definitely tenses, realizing he needed to introduce you to his friends but you beat him to it, already walking over to them. “Hi, I’m Y/n, Chris’s older sister.”

That’s all it takes for the younger ones to start asking you more questions, and your heart swells when Felix and Jeongin ask to call you Noona as well. “Yes, of course you can!”

Lee Minho

I actually don’t think Minho would talk about you much to anyone but the other members, like yeah, the fans know he has an older sister but any more information they have runs dry after that.

The boys are definitely curious though, cause Minho actually talks about you a lot with them, saying how you’re the co-CEO of a company that raises and donates money for charitable causes.

Even though he shares a lot about you to his friends, he gets weirdly protective over his calls with you cause he doesn’t get to speak with you often.

Literally locked the boys out of the dorm once cause they would not shut up while attempting to say hi to you during one of your rare phone calls.

“I am going to stuff your mouths with tissues and air fry all of you.”

Minho and the rest of Stray Kids were at a fansign event, they were all exhausted. They loved getting to interact with Stay and everything, but it always took a lot of energy from them to keep up with their fans’ excitement. Minho was the last seat, the line of fans seemingly unending to him.

You were at the fansign, unbeknownst to your poor little brother, who had tried so hard to keep you from meeting his rowdy group mates. You had introduced yourself to each member by just your name, and conversation was smooth. Weirdly enough, each boy had felt like they had heard your name and voice before, but they passed it off on being tired. You were the last in line anyway.

Minho hadn’t noticed you until you were literally standing right in front of him, had to hold himself back from leaping over the table towards you. The boys have never seen him talk so animatedly with a fan before. Then they heard him call you noona and they immediately realized who you were.

Chan may or may not have asked staff to keep you afterwards, or it might’ve been Lee Know. You won’t be finding out any time soon.

When the fansign event was over, all of the boys found themselves rushing to properly greet you. But Minho had picked you up and kept you away from them.

“Hyung! Let the pretty lady down!” Changbin whined, but that just spurred Minho to keep you to himself. “Nuh uh! My noona, you guys can’t have her!”

Seo Changbin

You’re his older sister by 5 minutes, yes you’re his twin.

You could’ve easily followed him into the idol industry, Changbin tells you all the time that your visuals would kill. But you just didn’t want that life for yourself, and he respected that.

He’s actually very proud to call you his noona, and doesn’t let anyone forget that he has a successful sister.

“My twin sister is an ambassador for a corporation, and is one of the most reputable women in her position.”

Has told the members how you were his biggest supporter during his predebut days. They secretly admire you very much for that.

Very thankful for you cause they otherwise wouldn’t have Binnie as a member and friend if not for you.

Fans know he has a twin, and you’re actually very active on his socials so fans actually know who you are, they love you. I think the boys at one point looked up your socials and got shy because of how pretty you look, definitely felt a little guilty for thinking like that, but they couldn’t help but agree with Changbin about your visuals.

Tbh, I really don’t think he would try to keep you from meeting them on purpose, they’ve definitely asked but Changbin just never had the chance to set anything up with you since both of you have extremely busy schedules.

“Binnie!” A familiar feminine pitched voice shouted from the front row, Changbin turned around quickly on stage, surprised to have even been able to hear you apart from the crowd.

Changbin excitedly moved over to the other side of the stage where you were standing in the front row, a huge smile on his face as he waved at you. The cameras caught this moment, showing you on the large projection screens in the stadium. The crowd cheered loudly at seeing the Seo siblings in the same place. Obviously, this caused the other members to noticed as well.

For the rest of the concert, each of the boys had, at some point, come around to you and interacted with you a little bit. Changbin made sure to put on a show of shooing them away from you. The rest of the concert was fun, you occasionally appearing on the screen when Changbin would start rapping as you hyped him up, cheering the loudest from your section of seats.

After the concert, some staff had corralled you backstage and a loud, excited Changbin came running up to you and picked you up in a bear hug that made you laugh loudly. Once he set you down on your feet, all the other boys had gathered around to meet you officially. You bowed respectfully as you introduced yourself and the boys couldn’t help but think you were the cutest person to bless their eyes.

Hwang Hyunjin

You’re a famous model that also owns your own clothing line, it’s also very well known that you’re Hyunjin’s older sister.

Hyunjin is always wearing something from your brand, and Stay has made a game out of finding what piece of his outfit is from your brand, it’s even got its own hashtag on social media.

Hyunjin will even model for you when he has the chance to do so, but let’s be fair, he does it everyday anyway.

He’s so proud of you, and always talks about you with anyone who will listen.

Felix is the only member who has met you because you had been at a Louis Vuitton fashion event that Felix had been invited to attend.

Hyunjin definitely wasn’t happy about not being there to introduce you himself. (And maybe worried that Felix had charmed you)

You were sat at a table, enjoying a flute of champagne and eating fancy food that you couldn’t pronounce the name of. These kinds of fashion events had always bored you, sitting at an assigned table with designers and models that you knew nothing about and having to listen to the event host drone on and on about what a privilege it is to have so many guests attending.

But your interest was suddenly piqued when the host announced that they had a few special guest models, all the way from South Korea. Your eyes widened greatly and you nearly spat out your champagne when you watched Hyunjin and seven other males step onto the the runway, modeling random designs. Your brother and his bandmates had come to this event as well and you hadn’t even known.

When the event was over, the guests were left to mingle. You immediately stood from your seat and made your way towards the table you had seen your brother sit down at. When you got there, Hyunjin had his back facing you as he spoke with Felix, who smiled when he noticed you. “This is treason, Hwang Hyunjin.”

Your sudden voice behind him made the poor boy jump in surprise and nearly spill his drink on Felix who just laughed. Hyunjin quickly turned and met your eyes with surprise. “Noona? I didn’t know you’d be here? And what’s this about treason?” He asked, still recovering from the shock.

“Modeling for someone else, I see how it is, your noona’s designs aren’t good enough anymore.” You feigned your sadness dramatically, which had Felix pitching in, “Ah, no worries, I can always replace him as your model!” Which had Hyunjin raising his hands in defense and attempting to sputter out an argument. “I may have to take you up on that offer, Jinnie doesn’t seem to love his noona anymore.” You jokingly pout, jutting out your bottom lip and looking away from your little brother with exaggerated movements.

“I see where Hyunjin gets his dramatic personality from,” Felix says, finally able to see the resemblance now that you and your little brother were standing side by side. Laughs erupted from around the three of you as the other members watched the exchange and saw both you and Hyunjin give Felix the same side eye.

“Oh yeah, I can see a resemblance, right down to their attractive looks too.” Han commented, immediately gaining a scowl from Hyunjin who very much disliked that his friends may think you were attractive, it was already apparent that Felix thought so.

Consequently, this cause Hyunjin to spend the rest of the evening corralling you away from his friends at every chance he got.

[sirfrogsworth]

I posted the below on my Facebook. I am secretly trying to head things off at the pass. Every time people see pictures of me out and about, they think I have been magically cured or my health status has improved. And I know going to Florida is going to give people that impression.

But also, I just wish a few of my relatives could understand my situation better. And why I didn't come to Christmas. And why I might try to come to Christmas now.

I guess I'll see how this goes.

-----------------------------------

One of the biggest struggles I've had my entire adult life is explaining why I appear fine whenever people see me. I say I am very sick and bed-bound and then they see me and I am out of bed and talking and joking and... a normal healthy person.

What many don't realize is I am making a choice.

A choice to get sick.

I can use up all my energy in a short time frame to accomplish a difficult chore or entertain a friend or go to a doctor, but that is going to have a consequence.

The more I do, the more severe the consequence.

In the ME/CFS world this is called "post-exertional malaise." (for those interested, you can read more about it here: https://rthm.com/art.../what-is-post-exertional-malaise-pem/ )

Imagine every time you wanted to do something, you were *choosing* to get the flu.

Take a walk, get the flu.

Exercise, get the flu.

Spend a night out with friends, get the flu.

And you might be thinking, "Okay, it can't be as bad as the flu. I've had the flu and the flu sucks. No one would choose that."

I may not get the nasty respiratory symptoms, but everything else is pretty much the same. Crippling fatigue, horrible aches, and the loss of the will to do much of anything. Sometimes it is much worse than the flu. Some people don't know how much being this exhausted can hurt. They have never used up enough energy that their body is unable to power itself properly. I usually say it is like every cell in my body is starving and screaming for energy. I feel it in every inch of my body—and not just on the surface... through and through. So, like... cubic inches.

Sometimes I don't even have the energy to power my legs. Trying to stand feels exactly the same as trying to lift a barbell with way more weight than you can lift. I can't get upstairs or even walk to the kitchen. It's a concentrated misery that defies description, despite my constant attempts to try.

Sometimes I get lucky and this flu lasts for a day or two. But the more active I am, the longer it can last. And the severity increases as well. There is also a cumulative version of this—where if I do a bunch of little things over a longer period of time, eventually it will catch up to me and I may be stuck in bed for a few weeks.

And when I say "stuck in bed" I mean stuck in bed.

Short trips to the bathroom and a few minutes in the kitchen to make food. If I spend too much time upright, my legs will literally give out and I will be stuck on the floor until I recharge enough energy to get up again. It would be like every time you needed to get up, you had to hold your breath. Not to mention, the more I do, the longer the recovery will take.

For a long time I chose to never get the flu. I stayed in bed and did just enough to avoid the worst of PEM. I skipped family get-togethers. I didn't see my friends. And I lived my life inside the computer. Some may find that sad, but I actually found a way to make this work. I ran a successful blog that was seen by millions of people and I met my two best friends who I now consider my new family.

One thing that allowed me to choose not to get the flu was my parents. I fear some thought they were spoiling me. They did my laundry. They helped clean my room. They got my groceries. They cooked my food. They took on any chore they could so I could avoid the flu and live some semblance of a life on my computer. There is a lot of guilt wrapped up in that. I didn't ask them to do that. They just sort of... did. And I am so grateful to them.

To be fair, they would have to do these chores for themselves anyway, and tacking on my stuff wasn't a huge deal. But I know it caused them a little extra pain and a few post exertional consequences of their own. So I appreciated that sacrifice more than I can put into words.

But then they both got very sick. And not only could they not help me with my stuff, I had to help them with their stuff. And this was a difficult transition. I had to choose to get the flu to take care of my parents, but then if I got the flu, and I couldn't take care of my parents. I believe this is called a catch-22.

My initial solution was to just not take care of myself. At all. My health and mental well-being was set aside and I just gave all of my energy to them. I didn't shower. I forgot to take important medicines. I didn't do a single thing that brought me joy. And I'm reminded of that analogy of the airplane emergency where the oxygen masks drop. You put on your mask first before you put one on your child. Your instinct is to save them first at all costs. But if you pass out, they are screwed.

So I kept getting that cumulative version of the flu. I'd help them as much as I could for a week or a month and then I'd be useless to them for just as long. Living in the basement did not help. Stairs were very hard for me and constantly going up and down was a huge waste of energy.

And I'm sad to say, the level of care I gave to my mom was not great. I didn't know what I was doing. I didn't understand how to balance my needs with hers. And it led to costly mistakes. She had several preventable falls that caused injuries. At one point she spent hours on the floor because I fell asleep and did not check on her. When you know someone needs regular supervision, you need to synchronize sleepy time.

Thankfully I learned from all of these lessons. Maybe not as quickly as I would have liked, but I did figure it out. I just wish I had learned them before my mom passed. I just wasn't able to give her the help she needed.

And you can tell me "you did your best" all you like, but this isn't a guilt I am choosing. It's just there and I feel it no matter what anyone says. In time I am hoping it will get lighter, but I'm afraid it cannot be wiped away with a well-intentioned platitude.

But with my dad, I decided to move upstairs. That was something I should have done much sooner. But I liked having my personal space and that was hard to give up. When he slept, I slept. When he spent 4 hours at dialysis 3x per week, I would make sure to take care of any personal needs. I would do chores a tiny bit at a time. 5 minutes here, 5 minutes there. And then I would lay on the couch in between and regain my strength. I did everything possible to not get the flu. And I got my flu shots so I wouldn't get the actual flu. (Get your flu shot! 50K die from it every year!) The only hitch in my plan was when I got a kidney stone at the same time my dad was in rehab. I have no idea how I got us through that.

I was very proud of the care I was able to give my dad. And I'm so grateful I was able to pay back just a tiny bit of what my parents did to help me. And the care I gave my father is the only thing that helps me feel better about my failures with my mom.

But now I am entering a new chapter of my life. And I find myself choosing to get the flu more often. I have decided sometimes it is worth the consequences. Part of that is because I am more used to it after dealing with it for 20 years. I have coping mechanisms and procedures and techniques to manage the symptoms. It doesn't make them suck any less, but it definitely makes it more manageable. It's akin to people with chronic pain who still feel the pain just as profoundly as when it was new, but they get so used to it that they forget that isn't how they are supposed to feel.

I approached this scientifically. I did tests. I went to the movies. I tried once a week and that was too much. Then I scaled it back and that was more manageable. Then I realized I had movies at home and decided to end that experiment.

I started to put my energy into something I enjoyed more. My photography. So I have been finding new ways to take pictures again. More experiments. I'm designing a simpler studio that requires much less energy. I'm creating a little product photography workstation where I don't have to set up everything each time I want to take a cool picture of an object. It will just be "turn on the lights" and "take the pictures."

Figuring all of this out made me realize how much I missed photography. And since I have been shooting test pictures here and there, my mental health has been noticeably better. And once I get this all figured out and set up, I am hoping some of you will let me take your photo. Or a photo of your kid. Or a pet. Whatever you have that needs photographing, I'm game.

I'm not going to charge. It's not going to be a business. I do not have the energy to "hustle." And asking people for money just sucked all of the fun out of my beloved art form. It corrupted it. I just love taking pictures and if you need a photo, I'd like to do that for you. I also restore old photos for fun. I'll talk about all of this more in another post when I am ready to start.

And then my grand experiment is coming next week.

I am going to travel.

I am going to see my best friend in Florida for two days. Two days of travel and two days of visiting. This is a scary choice. I know the aftermath is going to be difficult. But I need to get out of this house. I need to see my chosen family in person. And I have never been on a plane and I love the perspective from high places. I know people hate air travel, but for me, looking out that viewport is stunning television that cannot be matched.

Purposely making myself sick sounds like a bad idea. But it isn't life threatening. I have the free time to recover as long as I need to. And I can always choose not to get sick for a while if it gets too hard.

I just ask that people not see this as going from a worse life to a better one. I was really proud of the life I was able to create for myself while staying in bed. That took a long time to figure out. I met some of my favorite people. And I accomplished things I couldn't imagine in my wildest dreams. Please do not shit on that life and think it was sad or meaningless. I was given that life as a gift from my parents and it kept me alive. It has always been a huge insult when people pitied that precious gift they gave me.

This is not a better life that I am trying to figure out. It is just better for me right now. My needs have changed. I have changed. So I am trying to adapt. I just ask that people understand when I go out and do something, please remember the choice I am making.

You may be tempted to say, "You are doing so much better!" I am not any better than I was 10 years ago. Actually, my health has degraded. It's just that before I didn't think getting the flu every time I did something was worth it. And I would hope everyone would understand that was a valid choice.

And now I am inviting those consequences.

On purpose.

Give me the flu, I guess.

[cursedcatchild]

Ok, so this is very random, the inspiration kinda jumped me. 😅

If anyone wants to know the funny, but long story behind it I put it under the cut alongside with an alternative version.

So, story time!

Basically me and my fam ( We are prety much the found family trope. I have a little sister [adopted] and a little cousin [ also adopted by my family so he's like my little brother now] + 7 of my friends living with me.) held Mall Tour Day. ( We like to party so we have a bunch of made up holidays especialy during summer.) During this "holiday" we wake up extra early and travel to the capital to explore/shopp in either weird and our favoire malls.

But a few days before we went, I hurt my leg ( and my arm but that's not important in the story) in a pretty bad chool fight. It's nothing serious , and I told the fam I can walk, but they (especially my childhood best friend nicknamed RAT [ Don't ask why we call the guy that, they likes cheese to mutch and he lives in my garage]) insisted that I can't. So I told them: "Then how am I supposed to walk trough half the capital?" And RAT was like : " I'll carry you Bitch!" ( Bitch used verry affectionately.)

And then they did. Godness gracious from 6 in the morning till 10 at the evening I was princess carried trough like 8 mall.

Anyways we was going trough our last stop. The Mall that only sells Christmas decoration ( It's the middle of june, there is 30° outside, we are walking around in tanktops and shorts and other heatwave clothes. It was trippy!) And my little cousin was sleepy ( Welp, he's a 7 years old and he was up walking what like 16 hours? Even for a hyper child that tuckers them out.) so he climbed in my lap and fallen asleep on the spot. And RAT stuck carrying the both of us. " Heh! Eat wast you cooked dumbass!" (Again very lovingly.)

Now the pic about the mall in the backround of the art is made in the actuall Christmas mall. And the pose is the exact pose RAT, me and my lil cousin were in.

As for the idea of drawind the Disater twins and Mikey in that position.... It's kinda an inside joke in our friend group, but RAT and I are ofen being jokingly called Disater twins. Partially because I am a medical student so there goes Leo being the medic status, and RAT is the tech/handiman of the group. ( Sure he won't invent sentient AIs, hopefully, they're not that smart, but hey if the guy can fix our fridge it's close enoug for us.) Not to mention that appernatly we were born on the exact same day, our mothers even shared a Hospital room. 🤣

And for Mikey, literally both my litle sister and little cousin has Mikey vibes. My sister is an artist and cooks, my little cousin is hyper and cheery. So it seemed fit to make him a Mikey.

Anyways, that's the whole story behind the art, if anyone was curious.😊

[mpchev]

Update on fanbinding dissertation: more typesetting, more test prints, more guillotines!

I’ve now spent 23 hours learning how to fanbind! Having SO MUCH FUN, despite the tiny bit of panic that has started to settle in — everything else also takes a lot of time, and these fanbinding hours could have been spent reading more of the abundant fanbinding / fan studies / folklore research, or working on transcriptions, or getting some writing done. Going for equal parts of “it’s all about balance” and “fuck it we ball”.

I ordered some supplies from Ratchford a few days ago — I’ll need to order some more because I was mid flare-up when I did it, so brain was mush and I forgot a bunch of things, but! I now have enough supplies to do some of the next steps.

My new best friend the blue guillotine from the last update? Not such a good friend after all, test signatures were very uneven. Mentioned I was looking for an alternative to one of my profs, and he lent me his own! (Thanks Tom!) It is also blue, I’ll miss it dearly when I have to give it back. Walking around campus casually carrying a guillotine made me feel like the most interesting person in the world, many opportunities for French revolution jokes, highly recommend.

Spent a day at the library finishing up the typesetting, and doing some more printing and cutting tests. With the actual fic on the page instead of the SFW version, so here’s a title reveal if you squint (I’m binding 5 short fics together, had to come up with something). Was worried about regular printer paper looking way too blue-white for a book, but that printer had recycled paper as an option and it looks so much better. Huge thanks to Kait for the moral support, the carrying of the guillotine when I couldn’t, and the pictures of me doing things.

Spent the night making a punching cradle out of millboard (using embroidery scissors as an x-acto knife?! do not recommend) and PVA glue, after seeing someone else posting about how easy it was. (Now, is it somewhat functional? Yes. Should I maybe have googled it a little instead of just eyeballing it in a trance state of Must Do Something Now? Also yes. Later found a great youtube video of what I should have done instead, might give it a go later.) Then punched some holes (so far, feels like I didn’t need to get an awl/my awl is way too big, but we’ll see), and then sown my two more test signatures, one with more embroidery floss and one with the linen thread I now have. Something feels a bit off in the very-thin linen thread + recycled paper + big awl + wonky punching cradle combo, not sure which one to blame, probably a bit of everything. The collection of test signatures keeps on growing!

Went back to the library the following day, printed one more test signature (in case the printer had decided to grow a new personality overnight), and then the two copies of the actual book! Sliced all the sheets in half, put them in the right order, folded the pages, arranged them into signatures, and sliced them to the actual size. Thought I messed up by folding the signatures before cutting them to size, but that turned out to be a better way to do it. They look SO GOOD and SO REAL, I am SO HAPPY, this is SO SATISFYING, I desperately want to learn how to make paperbacks next to carry them everywhere. Also want to bind bigger books. Look at that happy autoethnography face.

Next steps: sewing the signatures, getting the missing supplies, attacking the terrifying ordeal of casing those bitches.

[canmom]

NieR Orchestra Concert 12024 [the end of data] (London, 15/2/2024)

NieR concert was incredible just as expected. Honestly, from the moment I got there - the cosplayers, the general atmosphere, it was just a good place to be surrounded by NieR nerds lmao. So many people happy to chat with the stranger next to them, kind of a con vibe.

But of course we were there for the music! And it was fuckin amazing. The emi evans/j'nique nicole duets😭These were special orchestral arrangements specifically for this concert, and the way the sound of the orchestra fills the space, how you can see a phrase physically ripple across the orchestra... I don't get to go to a lot of concerts but I really should try to go more often, because it's something else to hear orchestral music.

below: further comments on the concert, lots of cosplay photos.

The multimedia elements also worked really well - every piece was accompanied with backing videos using either demosceney abstract visuals or images from the games, along with text that told a short story over the course of the concert, with some segments voice acted by the English voices of 2B and 9S (Kira Buckland and Kyle McCarley, who have previously made their own performances of the original Japan-only concert readings). I won't spoil the story in this post since there are still concerts to come, but it was... not that substantial I'll admit, but sweet, and a nice framing device to create a flow through the songs and various moments from the games.

Hearing J'nique Nicole's voice live though, that was incredible. Emi Evans was there just as last time, and just as amazing as always - but this time we had both of them on stage together, and it was absolutely sublime. We all went wild. They performed duets in several songs, with the standouts naturally being A Beautiful Song, Ashes of Dreams, and of course Weight of the World. I think we all thought that was the end because we gave it a standing ovation but then Emi came back out to perform Kainé. After that we got into the groove of standing up and stood up again like three more times lol.

Yoko Taro and Yosuke Saito showed up at the end and made a bunch of rapidfire jokes in Japanese that the translator couldn't keep up with, bless her. But we got to give them like the fourth standing ovation of the night, and made a lot of noise when Yoko Taro suggested it would persuade the president of Squeenix to fund a sequel. I'm sure they appreciated it lmao. I think it must be so weird for Yoko Taro to go from someone with a career of niche, unsuccessful games to being internationally renowned to the point that a massive auditorium full of people in multiple countries will go absolutely nuts just to hear him speak a language we mostly don't speak.

Good mix of people who were at a NieR concert for the first time and people who'd been to the last one. There was a guy near me who had apparently been to the Berlin concert just a few days before, and snagged a ticket for this one literally yesterday just to get it again with better acoustics. I respect it lol. Everyone I spoke to was remarkably friendly - last time I went to one of these things I felt really nervous about approaching anyone but it seems I've gotten better about that kind of thing in the last few years. Anyway, people had come from all over - I chatted with a pair of Americans from Boston all the way down the merch line.

Here are some pictures, mostly of cosplayers. I am still getting used to shooting with the DSLR my friend gave me, so not all of these came out perfectly steady and some of them the exposure wasn't right,, but there are some nice ones in here...

bokeeeeehhhhhhhhh... I spoke a bit to the owner of this 9S doll. Her mum was there too, and it turns out she's a haberdasher who makes cosplays for her daughters and has now done over 70. That's a legendary mum right there.

The 9S cosplayer here gave me his instagram. he's a pro photographer so I feel a little embarassed at the quality of the photos I took of him ^^'

I got some merch too, since I understand it's the main way events like this support themselves.

That Kainé thing isn't a print, it's a vinyl record with a few arrangements of Kainé. Though I was totally prepared to buy it as a print because it's a lovely drawing. I don't actually own a record player, but one day I'll surely listen to it ^^'

I was too fatigued to make a cosplay this time, but I'm sure there will be another concert and next time, for sure, I will go as Devola or Popola. Unless Yoko Taro comes up with another redhead character in the meantime lmao.

[stabbyfoxandrew]

double the ask double the arson!

my beloved you're incredible if you're tired of the arsonist or don't want people requesting the same wip twice I am also more than okay with your lovely guardian angel au! I wanted to catch up on that one anyway! so your pick <3

ps this is really cool and im super excited!!! what did we do to deserve this little treat from you?

WIP Wednesday (4/3) | Arsonist Neil / Firefighter Andrew AU (Part 135)

“We can show you,” Renee says. Then she scans the room. “Hey, Matt! Come here, please?”

Andrew gives her a look. “Are you serious?”

“Yeah! Last thing, I promise. Then you can go back upstairs and brood.”

Andrew rather does like to brood, but this time he has a reason. He just has to hide it. He doesn't want the others to know he's on the outs with his... Something. “He called me short, Renee.”

“You are short.” Renee reasons.

“He’s shorter than me.”

“He’s eight,” Renee laughs. 

Matt, who had apparently been in the truck, weaves through the kids to stand in front of Andrew and Renee. “Hey, what did you need me to do?”

“Can Andrew pick you up?” Renee asks.

Matt looks him up and down, making Andrew expect a joke about his size. But then Matt smiles, “I mean, he’s not really my type but—” He laughs. “I’m kidding. Yeah, go for it.” 

With a bit of effort, Andrew lifts Boyd up off the ground and tosses him over his shoulder. He even carries him across the room before setting him back on his feet. Then he does a bow and retreats to the lounge upstairs where he removes his gear and drapes it over the back of one of the kitchen chairs.

He pulls his phone out and still nothing. Fuck.

Andrew There’s a bunch of kids at work today. A field trip was arranged behind my back by my friend Renee. It’s just as fun as it sounds. One of the kids heckled me, then another asked how strong I was. So I was made to carry my very large coworker across the room. What’s new with you?

[silver--scar]

INTRODUCING ME

🚫PLEASE HEED WHAT I WRITE BELOW🚫

The Basics

My name is Silver Scar! I use any pronouns and have many floating interests! I sometimes use tone indicators, and I love gaming, art, and talking/hearing about interests!

I AM AN ADULT!

While I do not mind chatting and having fun, making moots and friends here and there, at the end of the day, we are NOT EQUALS if you are a minor. I am a firm believer in keeping proper boundaries in place and making the internet safer for the younger people. Again, I don't mind making friends! But remember that I will not treat you like an adult if you aren't one. It's for the best, even if you hate me for it.

I do my best to be respectful and educated, but I am a bit slow. If I say something wrong, PLEASE HOLD ME ACCOUNTABLE FOR IT AND INFORM ME ON HOW TO DO BETTER! The last thing I want is for people to let it slide or immediately attack me.

My Platforms

Aside from tumblr, I also have other social handles you can visit! The main ones I have are:

Tiktok

Instagram

Twitter

https://x.com/SilverScar360?t=s_Gldynda0uxih9ZIgAWvg&s=09

Twitch

Here, and on all of these other platforms, I AM NOT A SAFE SPACE FOR THE FOLLOWING:

PEDOPHILES

ZOOPHILES

NAZIS/ZIONISTS

RACISTS

HOMO/TRANSPHOBES

PRO/COMSHIPPERS

It will result in an immediate ban. I do not care. I know it's ironic that (currently) I am a South Park fan, but even I do not like the things that occur within the show, regardless of satire or jokes, and I'm tired of people hiding behind this fact or using it as an excuse.

My Interests

I have a few things I enjoy which will all change in the future. So far, this is a few bits of what I'm into:

South Park

Red Dead Redemption 2

Minecraft

Stardew Valley

Dauntless

TheHunter: COTW

Warriors

Call of Duty (Story Mode only)

Percy Jackson and the Olympians

Slime Rancher

Hermitcraft

Gravity Falls

Bonus Bits

ART REQUESTS ARE OPEN

This status will change from time to time!

I love to write short stories in my spare time, but I am no means a good writer.

I have a pet dog! Her name is Missy, and she's a Pitbull/Boston Terrier mix.

I'm a heavy procrastinator, but I'm trying to change it up this year!

I love creating ideas. Even if I suck at it. Whether stories, art, AUs, concepts, I love to explore the "what ifs" in things.

I'm a rambler. I'll talk, dump a bunch of images, or spam a lot about many things big and small. But I also love hearing people ramble! Like, yes! Tell me more about why your oc did this thing or why you think this film is your roman empire! /gen

My online persona is Gumbo from Fortnite. I have stolen him and he is mine. I am literally a monster gumball machine guys, believe me. /j

Lastly, I do commissions! You can ignore this last bit, but if you ever consider supporting, you can look at the examples below!

Anyways thank you for taking the time to read this! I hope to deliver stuff you all will enjoy!

[officalroyalsofpierreland]

Future Planning

Highland House, Edinburgh, Kingdom of Scots

Oliver: Mao Gaol....what has you so upset? Evie called me when you passed on lunch with her...

Hortense [sniffling]: I'm sorry mon prince, I- I'm still...thinking about something Charlotte mentioned to me before I left Tulleries

Oliver [anger rising]: What did she do? She may be the Empress of the French but she is making your cry and-

Hortense: It was...nothing malicious on her end...nothing intentionally malicious this time...she just...commented that she hopes that our children will be good friends...and...I'm sorry mon prince I don't know why it is bothering me so much.

Oliver: Love, it clearly has affected you. How can I help you feel better?

Hortense: I don't think you can...it is...something I've feared for a long time.

Oliver: Hortie...what is this fear?

Hortense[whispering]: I...I fear pregnancy....and childbirth...it...it was all so so traumatic for Mere...that was the reason it is only Louis and I, it would've been life ending if she had attempted another pregnancy...I just [sighing] I fear that it will be the same with me...and that I'll fail you and the Kingdom-

Oliver: My love...whether we have none, one, two, or ten children. You will not fail me. You could never fail me. You could never fail the Kingdom because you will be one of the best Duchesses of Rothsey this nation has ever seen. You are kind, loving, so much more intelligent than me [A soft giggle from Hortense] I can wait for children my love. What you and our relationship has taught me it is patience.

Hortense: But most couples after they are married-

Oliver: They are not us darling. I know you want to finish your degree at the Polytechnic, and I want us to just, enjoy this time and get used to being married. There will be plenty of life shifts happening for us that I think we can fend off questions of children for a good number of years. If God wants us to have children in that time, then it shall happen. If not, then it won't.

Hortense: I...I just...can imagine what people will say...

Oliver: Well they can all shove it up their-

Hortense: Oliver!

Oliver: It is true! And for all we know, I could be the one with the issues...it took my parents forever to have me and even that was somewhat traumatic for my mama and da. You'll drive the pace of when we'll have kids since you are doing the heavy lifting. I have the easy and fun part! [Hortense laughs] Yes! I have you laughing my love! I am victorious against Simparte induced blues.

Hortense [giggling]: You are such a dork! I cannot believe it will be soon. The amount of time I've just...stared at this ring is something I'm a bit embarrassed by.

Oliver: I cannot wait either. Soon the protocol police will end their watch on us-

Hortense: If somebody didn't push the envelope, he wouldn't be on such a short leash with them!

Oliver: They have insane rules! The fact you don't have a phone for instance, our children shall have individual phones when they're 14 cause we'll actually trust them!

Hortense[teasing]: You say that now but if we have daughters-

Oliver: I won't trust the boys their age love...boys are dumb until the hit about 25 with brain development and all that stuff, if I have a bunch of mini yous running around, I'll have to worry about all the boys trying to break down our doors!

Hortense: You'll know how Papa felt about you even though I know he approves of you.

Oliver: I hope he does. It will soon be my job to protect you and ensure your happiness. And I will take that very seriously.

Hortense: You will love. Do not forget that Louis does have a lot of control over the military in Francesim [joking] he won't hesitate to send the Navy up here using ships made by your Uncle!

[Oliver and Hortense laugh]

@empiredesimparte

[dirty-bear-rick-sanchez]

Squanchy's Terrible Stand-up Phase

Finally, finally, i'm posting this fic that I've had in my WIPs for almost 2 years now 😅 thank you to everyone who submitted an ask for a snippet/commented on them, it helped me get some confidence and motivation to finally finish and post this!

I'm sure the title gives away the time period this is set in 😅 it's some messy unrequited(?) Birdrick with a bit of everything - we've got pining, we've got smut, we've got angst, we've got mating season, we've got a very specific James Acaster reference.

Summary: A mishap during one of Squanchy's stand-up performances gives Rick and Birdperson the chance to act on some feelings. ~6k words.

“Hey everybody, I’m Squanchy! I just flew in from the Andromeda system and, boy, are my arms tired!” 

The short feline’s voice rings out across the room, met with silence from all but two members of the audience, who give awkward, forced laughs. If Squanchy is aware of his friends’ insincerity, he shows no signs of caring, grinning happily and carrying on. 

“Haha, nah, I’m just squanchin’ with you guys. How ‘bout that space-line food, huh? Anyway, I was on my way over here, and I was squanchin’ next to this guy, right, this Zofleepian dude…” 

As he launches into a squanch-heavy spiel, Rick and Birdperson both glance away from the stage and meet each other’s gaze with twin grimaces. Somehow, Squanchy has landed a gig as the warm-up guy for what is apparently a fairly popular act, meaning that the venue is significantly bigger and busier than any he’s performed at before, either doing stand-up or as part of The Flesh Curtains. As such, the two other band members have found themselves seated mostly out of sight and earshot of the stage. Small mercies.

Birdperson turns to Rick and speaks quietly.

“Rick, I realise I am not a comedy expert, but I must admit that Squanchy is… not good at this.”

Rick snorts. “That’s putting it lightly! And how are you just now realising? D-do you not remember any of his other shows?”

“It is true that Squanchy’s stand-up has not been particularly up to standard in the past, but I thought that he would have made some improvement by now.”

Rick makes a show of looking around the room, then turns to Birdperson with a devilish grin and leans in to whisper surreptitiously. 

“Well, you know, it is a pretty big crowd. I don’t think he’d miss us if we snuck out.”

Birdperson's face shifts, subtly, but Rick knows him well enough to recognise it as an expression of disapproval, and feels a flicker of panic and defensiveness start to rise in his chest.

“Rick, Squanchy is our friend. We must support him, even in his flaws, just as we support you in yours.” 

Birdperson’s words sting, and Rick’s guard comes up even more. 

“W-whatever.” he grumbles. “Geez, I was just joking, Pers. D-d-don’t get your feathers in a bunch.”

Rick shifts in his seat so that he’s facing away from Birdperson, crossing his arms over his chest. He feels a gentle touch on his hand, making his breath catch in his throat. Although he’s loath to admit it, even to himself, Rick is developing a serious crush on his ex-bandmate slash roommate slash best friend, and he can’t help but turn back to Birdperson. The other man is looking at him with concern in his serious deep brown eyes.

“Rick, it was not my intention to offend you. However, I do not wish to upset Squanchy by leaving.” 

Birdperson speaks matter-of-factly as ever, but he doesn’t remove his hand from Rick’s. Rick tries to breathe normally, to act as if nothing is out of the ordinary. Despite many, many hookups, he hasn’t felt this way about anyone since Diane, giddy and sappy and in love. He knows how delicate love is, how easily it can break or be taken away, and is acutely aware of the consequences. He’s still angry and bitter and hurting, and he doesn’t know if he could take any more of those feelings that would inevitably come with another relationship. However, he’s been starting to notice small, almost imperceptible changes in Birdperson’s behaviour recently, and it’s becoming increasingly harder to convince himself to ignore them, tell himself he’s reading too much into things, and that anyway it’s not worth the risk of letting himself be vulnerable and getting his heart broken all over again. 

Unfortunately, despite what Rick might like to think about himself, however logical and intelligent and detached he might like to believe himself to be, he knows that he’s a slave to his own emotions. No amount of reasoning or experience can stop the butterflies from swirling furiously in his stomach when he sees Birdperson smile at him, or beat his powerful wings in flight, or emerge glistening from the shower with only a towel concealing his dick from Rick’s longing gaze. 

He hates the fact that Birdperson always manages to sneak past his defences, hates knowing that Birdperson can get away with almost anything because the part of Rick’s brain that’s meant to be in charge of his emotions suddenly forgets all negativity when it comes to BP. There are only two other people Rick has ever known who he could never stay angry with, and both of them are dead. 

He can’t afford to let that happen again, but he’s helpless at the hands of his crush. 

Rick snaps back to the present with a blink. He’s speechless, half because he doesn’t know how to respond without fucking things up, and half because the light touch of his friend’s hand on his is taking up all of the processing power in his brain. Instead of saying anything, he flashes a helpless, almost sheepish smile at Birdperson, who mirrors the expression and moves his hand ever so slightly so that he can squeeze Rick’s hand in his. The feeling is so intense that Rick has to avert his eyes, and he hopes the dimmed lighting above the audience is enough to hide the heat he can feel in his cheeks. 

Luckily for him, it’s not long before a distraction arrives. An audience member, apparently dissatisfied with the stand-up and clearly very inebriated by some sort of illicit substance, stumbles up onto the stage, much to the jeers and cheers of the rest of the audience.

“I can do better than this shit!” he declares. “So, I was at Birding Man last year, and in the tent next to mine, I could hear this couple going at it, you know what I mean? Yeah you do! And the guy goes ‘I’m gonna cum in your pussy’!” 

Squanchy stares on in disbelief, and the noise of the crowd drops instantly into stunned silence, the atmosphere palpably different from moments before. The interrupter seems to panic, and repeats, even louder, “I’m gonna cum in your pussy!”

Still receiving no response, the man suddenly takes drastic action in the form of dropping his pants and starting to masturbate furiously. Almost immediately, the audience roars to life, booing and jeering and shouting. As the room around him devolves into chaos, Rick feels a tug on his hand. He looks to see Birdperson standing up and allows himself to be pulled to his feet. Birdperson makes a hasty retreat amid the pandemonium and Rick follows, neither of them dropping the other’s hand. 

They exit into a foyer, where Rick expects Birdperson to stop. However, he heads for a door, which he opens to reveal a supply closet.

“Let us wait it out in here.” he says simply, and Rick shrugs.

“Eh, sure.” 

They both enter, pulling the door shut behind them. Rick perches on a small table, while Birdperson leans against a wall opposite him. The room is small enough to force them into each other’s personal space, and Rick has to try hard to keep his composure.

“So, uh, what happened to not leaving?” Rick asks, trying to seem casual.

“My main concern was that Squanchy would see us leaving, or otherwise notice our absence. However, I think he should be sufficiently distracted for a while.” 

Birdperson is close enough that Rick can feel the air brush against his face when he speaks. Rick has to stop himself from shivering at the feeling. He focuses so hard on not reacting that he doesn’t notice another, much more visible, sign of his arousal until Birdperson addresses it.

“Is that a gun in your pocket, Rick Sanchez, or are you just happy to see me?” 

His tone is almost exactly the same as always, but Rick can detect the note of cheekiness in it. He quickly crosses his legs and looks away, knowing this time that his blush is definitely visible. His mind and mouth both scramble for an excuse, but before either can form anything even remotely coherent, Birdperson speaks again.

“Rick, if I may be frank, I think that we might be able to help each other out. The truth is, it is approaching mating season for my people, and I am starting to feel the effects of it.”

Rick can’t quite believe his ears. He wants this so badly, and if it was anyone but BP, he wouldn’t hesitate. However, fucking things up with a stranger in a bar is very different to fucking things up with your best friend and roommate, and Rick doesn’t trust himself to read the situation correctly.

“W-w-what’re you sayin’, Pers?”

“If you wish, we should have sex.” Rick stiffens, but Birdperson continues. “During mating season, my people experience greatly heightened libido, and you are clearly in a similar state of arousal, so I believe it would be mutually beneficial.” 

Something about hearing Birdperson state things so simply really turns Rick on. He’s no stranger to directness or dirty talk, yet something about Birdperson’s factual candour sends a jolt of passion through him.  

“Rick, if I have misread the situation or overstepped my boundaries, I apologise. I-” Birdperson’s deep voice snaps Rick out of his reverie and Rick realises how long he must have paused.

“N-n-n-n-no it’s fine! I would love to have sex with you!” he blurts, the words pouring out before he even realises what they are. As soon as he processes what he’s just said, he panics immensely. Goddammit, what is it about this man that turns his brain to mush? Rick’s wildly out of his depth, used to being smooth and suave and confident around his romantic interests. The flustered nervousness is unfamiliar to him, and he has no idea how to act. Without a script, more words hurry out of his mouth. 

“Fuck! I mean, I, uh, I would be happy to help you out! I mean-”

“Rick.” Birdperson interrupts, calmly, quietly, yet assertively enough that Rick instantly falls silent. A brief flicker of arousal passes through his body as his brain readily supplies a fantasy of Birdperson using this exact tone in the bedroom and - no! Not fucking now!

“It seems you are uncomfortable. If I have done anything to cause this, I offer my apologies.”

“No, no, Pers, it’s OK! It’s just, um…” Rick pauses, trying to work out how much he can afford to give away. He takes a deep breath and lets his guard down, just a little. “I-I just… didn’t think you would be interested in me like that.”

“You mean sexually?”

Rick nods, unable to meet Birdperson’s gaze. How is it that he can normally say and hear the most explicit, filthy things without so much as batting an eye, but even the tamest comment from Birdperson has him acting like a schoolboy with his first crush?

“So you feel insecure? Is that the only reason?” 

Birdperson’s statement, combined with his unexpectedly gentle voice, catches Rick off guard. Part of him fights against the vulnerability, coiling defensively in his stomach like a snake, while another longs to relax into the safety of Birdperson’s soothing tone. The maelstrom of thoughts and emotions trick Rick’s brain into allowing the truth to slip out of his mouth before he can even process what the truth is.

“I feel like I’d be… betraying Diane, or, or cheating on her.” 

“Forgive me, Rick, but I do not understand. You have ‘hooked up’ with many people since I have known you. Why is this different?”

Rick panics, not sure how to get out of this situation. His frantic brain can’t cook up any lies, so he settles for a half-truth, omitting as much as he can.

“All those hookups are people I didn’t know or care about. None of them meant anything… it was just sex. We’re… friends.”

“So it is different to have sex with friends?” Birdperson asks. Rick nods, not sure how to elaborate without giving away his feelings. They’re still fresh and raw, and he’s not ready to reveal them yet. Thankfully, Birdperson continues.

“Is this a human concept?”

“Y-yeah, I guess so. I never really thought about it. Humans usually only have casual sex or sex within relationships.” 

Even as he’s saying the words, he knows they’re not strictly true. Plenty of people were friends with benefits - he and Diane with Nimbus, for instance - but he’s found an excuse and he’s too much of a pussy to offer any information that might raise questions. 

Birdperson’s brow furrows as he mulls the concept over. 

“This is interesting. Although I never had any friends on my home planet, I know that it is very common for my people to help relieve their friends during mating season. We have two terms, messoo yabah and messoo sorah - ‘flesh mate’ and ‘spirit mate’. ‘Flesh mate’ is for someone you have sex with - a friend or stranger - and ‘spirit mate’ is for a life partner, with whom you would have children and a soul bond. I had assumed that ‘hook up’ was equivalent to mesoo yabah.”

Rick raises one side of his brow. Birdperson looks so similar to him, it’s easy to forget that he’s not just a human with bird features, but a member of an entirely different species, with different customs and views around things such as sex and relationships. 

“Huh. I guess that makes sense.” 

“Forgive me, Rick, I did not realise that my offer would be out of the ordinary for your species. It seems that we have encountered another cultural difference.”

Rick coughs out a nervous laugh. “Y-yeah.”

They stand in awkward silence for a few moments, the small distance between them only adding to the tension, thickening it so that Rick struggles to breathe. 

Eventually, Birdperson breaks the silence.

“I did not understand the gravity of what I was asking. If you wish, we can simply move on and not mention this ever again.”

A tiny, cowardly part of Rick wants to seize the opportunity to run away from his problems, but the rest of his being is crying out for Birdperson so thoroughly that he knows he’ll never forgive himself if he doesn’t take this chance. 

“N-no! Let’s, let’s do it!” Rick cringes at how enthusiastic and awkward he sounds.

“Are you certain? I do not wish to pressure you into anything. I would not have asked had I realised the implications for you.”

“No, Pers, i-it’s OK. I’m not exactly like most humans anyway. Besides, what else are we supposed to do while we’re waiting for this to blow over?” Rick gestures vaguely in the direction of the performance room, where the sounds of struggle are still audible.

“If this is truly something you want, I need to hear you say it.” Birdperson stares intensely into Rick’s eyes. Rick swallows but finds he can’t look away.

“I want this. I want you. Now.”

Almost before Rick can process what’s happening, Birdperson has closed the tiny space between them, one hand squarely in the small of his back, the other arm wrapped around his shoulders, their lips meeting more gently than Rick would have expected. Rick feels his body melt into Birdperson’s touch, the tension leaving his muscles and instead pooling into his growing erection. He kisses back hungrily, fuelled by the months of pining and suppressing his attraction, reaching to wrap his own arms around Birdperson, burying his fingers deep into his friend’s feathers. Birdperson seems to take this as a cue, pulling Rick even closer to him and allowing his lips to fall apart to make way for Rick’s eager tongue. 

Rick feels Birdperson’s hand trail down to rest on his hip and squeeze his ass. The touch coaxes a gasp from his mouth and Birdperson pulls back. Rick’s brain protests the loss of sensation, a low whine spilling out.

“Is this acceptable?” Birdperson murmurs, his eyes inquisitive and caring.

“Yes, God, yes, Pers, please.”

That’s all the confirmation Birdperson needs to swallow Rick’s mouth up with his own once again. Rick digs his fingers deeper into Birdperson’s plumage and is rewarded with a shaky exhale directly into his own mouth. Feeling the consequences of his own actions sends yet more blood coursing downwards and he can’t help but push his crotch against Birdperson’s hip at the sensation. As he does, he feels Birdperson’s boner pressing into his thigh and his own cock throbs in response.

Birdperson lets his hand drift even further down, claws brushing tantalisingly against Rick’s inner thigh. He’s careful not to cause any actual damage, but Rick is so desperate for more that it feels like torture anyway. 

Rick has to pull his mouth away to breathe, panting as though he were the one in heat, but keeps their bodies as close to each other as possible.

“Pers, please, I need you to take me.” he moans.

“You want me to fuck you?” Birdperson is so straightforward it’s almost unbearable.

“Yes, God, yes!”

“Do you have lube?”

“In my-in my wallet.” Rick moans, fighting to get the words out as Birdperson’s claws still caress his delicate skin.    

Birdperson removes the stimulating hand to retrieve the lube from Rick’s jean pocket, letting his mouth suck Rick’s neck with such primal abandon he could just as well be devouring the flesh instead of kissing it. The sensation only heightens the burning ache that Birdperson’s hand is no longer satisfying and Rick could almost cry with need. In desperation, he reaches his own hand down to stroke his dick.

Birdperson places his hand firmly on Rick’s shoulder and turns him around, bending him forward over the desk. His clawed hands come forward to rest on Rick’s belt buckle.

“Is this what you want?” he whispers, the words tickling their way down Rick’s neck.

“Yes!”

Birdperson’s hands undo the buckle agonisingly slowly before finally pulling Rick’s jeans down to expose his bare ass. Rick hears the sounds of Birdperson tearing open the packet of lube and applying it to his own dick. As he does so, he keeps his lips next to Rick’s ear, teeth grazing the sensitive skin, and mutters,

“Do you know how often I have fantasised about doing this? Whenever I am behind you during a performance, or in the kitchen, and I see these jeans clinging to you, all I can think about is pulling them down and bending you over the table.”

A distant part of Rick’s brain is surprised by this information, but horniness takes over as Birdperson’s comment riles him up so much that he writhes with impatience.

All of a sudden, strong hands, one still slippery with lube, grab his hips, stilling their motion. A breath stutters its way from Rick’s lungs and his brain short-circuits and he thinks for a second he might come from that alone. Just when he thinks he’s reached the peak of pleasure, a finger probes its way into his entrance, the claw retracted.

“Oh god, please, more.” He’s not sure if the words are even comprehensible, pulled from his mouth by Birdperson’s stroking finger. More sounds that could be words or could just as easily be mindless gasps of pleasure spill out, begging for more.

Rick’s moans become a whine as he feels the finger retreat, only to change back to a cry as he finally feels Birdperson’s cock inside him. He gasps until he feels like his lungs will burst, letting the air out in a series of moans as Birdperson begins to thrust. Rick’s fingers curl around the edge of the desk until his knuckles go white. Birdperson’s hands are on his hips again, his claws pricking against Rick’s skin in a way that feels so good, the pain mixing with the pleasure like the delicious contrast of salt against sweetness.

All Rick’s aware of is hands on his hips, dick inside him, both of them belonging to Birdperson. The sensations build and build until they breach the barrier, overwhelming his brain and body in a flood of endorphins. Rick’s legs shake so violently that he collapses into the table, warmth shooting from the end of his cock. He cries out, held aloft by a cloud of pleasure, his orgasm tingling throughout his body. Distantly, he’s aware of Birdperson coming inside him with an animalistic cry, and he wants to commit the experience to memory forever, but the thought quickly slips from his grasp, lost to the haze of his climax.

After what could be a second or a decade, Birdperson withdraws, leaving Rick with a vague feeling of emptiness.

“Are you alright?” he asks, still breathless. Rick nods, his own breathing heavy and rapid. Birdperson turns Rick over with incredible gentleness and brushes his hair from his sweaty forehead, his hand coming to rest in Rick’s hair. Rick feels his heart evaporate in his chest.

Birdperson rests his forehead against Rick’s, their hot breath coasting over each other’s skin. Despite what they’ve just done, Rick can’t help but feel shy at this level of intimacy. At the same time, he never wants it to end. 

Regrettably, it does.

“We should clean up.” Birdperson states, his tone so businesslike that Rick gets a sinking feeling that this didn’t mean as much to Birdperson as it did to him.

Rick gestures vaguely, his overloaded brain taking a few seconds to find the words. “Wipes… in my wallet.”

Birdperson retrieves them, a small smile gracing his face. “You really are prepared for every situation.” 

Rick wants to retort with his signature snark and perhaps just a touch of flirtatiousness, but he can’t conjure up anything, instead letting his mouth curve into what he’s sure is a ridiculous lovestruck grin.

He’s almost disappointed when Birdperson hands him a wipe instead of cleaning Rick up himself, but he tries to bring his mind back to reality. It’s probably a good thing for him to do this himself, instead of allowing himself to become dependent on someone else. They clean themselves - and the desk - up in silence.

Birdperson clears his throat. “We should hydrate. I will locate water.”

He adjusts his clothing so that he’s decent - much easier when your only garment is a skirt - and exits the room, presumably in search of the aforementioned water. Rick realises that he should do the same, and wrangles his orgasm-weakened body back into his jeans before lowering himself to the floor and leaning against the wall.

After a few minutes, Birdperson returns with bottled water, a tray of fancy-looking hors d'oeuvres, and a mischievous smirk.

Rick raises one side of his brow. “Where exactly did you find this?”

Birdperson rests the tray on the desk and removes the lid from the bottle. 

“I may have liberated them from a nearby Witi Fri.” he raises the bottle to his lips and takes a swig before offering it to Rick.

Rick takes the bottle with a grin, revelling in the moments Birdperson’s rebellious side shines through, contrasting with his apparently straight-laced persona. Witi Fris - disgustingly extravagant displays of wealth - are held by Tt’orees, just the sort of people who deserve to be relieved of some of their fancy party snacks. Rick drinks eagerly, the water blessing his parched throat, trying not to think too hard about his lips resting where Birdperson’s had only moments earlier.

Birdperson picks up the tray once again and sits down next to Rick, the enclosed space forcing them close together. Birdperson swings an arm around Rick, making him almost choke on the water he’s swallowing. He rests the tray across both their laps and picks up one of the snacks, popping it into his mouth in a way that Rick swears is flirtatious. He stares dumbly for a few seconds until Birdperson nudges him.

“While I have no objection to eating this entire platter myself, social norms dictate that I am obliged to share.”

Rick smiles shakily before handing the bottle back to Birdperson and taking one of the hors d’oeuvres, some sort of tart filled with veiny purple leaves and a bitty grey substance. It wouldn’t seem appetising to most humans, but Rick is familiar enough with alien foods that it doesn’t bother him. He places it into his mouth and finds it to be wonderfully umami with just a hint of sweetness. The taste breaks his appetite and he finds himself shovelling down more, not stopping until he hears a faint chuckle next to him. 

Rick’s eyes flicker across guiltily to Birdperson, realising he’s eaten most of the tray already.

“Whoops.” he mumbles flatly, dropping his gaze to his lap. Birdperson’s hand squeezes his shoulder reassuringly.

After a few moments, Rick feels Birdperson’s gaze burning into him in a way he can’t ignore. When he turns to face Birdperson, his friend is wearing a concerned expression and Rick knows exactly what’s coming.

“Rick.” Birdperson begins in his serious manner. “Now that our physical needs have been taken care of, are you alright… emotionally?”

Rick stares into Birdperson’s eyes, the eyes of someone who can penetrate through any walls or facades he puts up, eyes full of care. Even though he’d been steeling himself for the question, something about the tenderness in Birdperson’s expression breaks him. A strangled sob chokes its way from his throat before he can stop it. His hand flies up to cover his mouth, too late to hide the outburst of emotion. Rick frantically tries to pull himself together but the floodgates have been opened and there’s no way he can push them shut again until the raging tide has calmed. He feels Birdperson wrap his other arm around him and buries his head in his friend’s shoulder to spare himself at least the embarrassment of Birdperson seeing his face as he breaks down.

Birdperson holds Rick tightly, one hand reaching up to stroke his hair gently. Rick feels his body spasm with sobs that wrench themselves from his lungs, hyper-aware of the tears and snot making a humiliating mess of his face. Birdperson makes a strange, melodic cooing sound, something from his native language that Rick doesn’t have a hope of understanding but can assume is meant to be reassuring. 

Eventually, his body begins to tire itself out, and Birdperson’s repetition soothes his brain. Rick sniffles and takes a deep breath.

“I just… I miss her so much, Pers.” his voice is thick with emotion, and he cringes at its sound. “I’m meant to be out here finding her killer, finding Beth’s killer, but I can’t do it. I know I can’t do it, so I try to numb myself, with alcohol, and drugs, and sex, but it doesn’t work, a-and other times it works too well and all I can think is what a monster I am for having a good time when my daughter is dead.” Rick’s breath hitches dangerously on the final word and he has to fight to keep from collapsing back into sobs again.

Birdperson’s repetitive coo changes into another phrase from his language, before he switches back to common.

“Rick, I am sorry. I could tell you that you do not need to feel guilty, that it is not your fault, that your revenge will not bring them back, but I know that this is not what you want to hear. I know that it is not what I would want to hear. I can only offer my comfort and solidarity in having something taken from you that you can never get back. Even if our rebellion against the Gromflomites succeeds, it will not bring back all the people and culture lost to their invasion. It will not bring back my parents. But I still intend to, as you say, ’kick their insect asses’.”

A harsh, tearful laugh breaks through Rick’s sadness for a moment. Rick clutches onto Birdperson, the pain still stabbing through his chest, puncturing his lungs and snagging his breathing, feeling the slightest relief and appreciation for his friend knowing him well enough not to offer meaningless platitudes. He takes some small solace in their shared pain.

Birdperson continues to hold Rick, his digits stroking gentle, comforting patterns into Rick’s back and scalp, until Rick pulls back, scrubbing furiously at his streaming eyes and nose.

“Fuck.” he whispers, pulling his hands down his face and flicking away tears. He clears his throat roughly. “OK. I’m good.”

Birdperson squeezes Rick’s shoulder. “We do not have to return if you do not wish to.”

The offer is tempting, but Rick knows that he can’t hide here forever. 

“No, i-it’s OK. We’d better get back before Squanchy notices we’re missing.” he pauses, then adds, “But maybe I should find a bathroom first.”

Luckily, there’s a bathroom just around the corner. Birdperson waits while Rick blows his nose and splashes water on his face before they make their way back to the performance hall. Rick feels exhausted, but Birdperson’s reassuring touches and smiles give him just enough energy to force himself to carry on. 

Thankfully, they manage to slip back into their seats without being noticed. Somehow, the crisis has resolved itself and Squanchy is now back to performing his terrible routine. Rick’s hazy brain manages to clock the jokes as being near the end of the routine and he sends a silent prayer to a god he doesn’t believe in that he doesn’t have to deal with more standup on top of everything else.

Mercifully soon, Squanchy’s routine ends, and the host comes onstage to announce the main act. Squanchy leaves the stage and joins them, a huge grin on his face.

“I think that went pretty well!” he whispers to them.

Rick and Birdperson exchange a brief incredulous look, but offer encouraging smiles anyway.

Neither of them are particularly interested in seeing the main act, and Squanchy’s lashing tail betrays his burning need to talk about his performance, so they get up and leave. Rick remains mostly quiet for the walk back, allowing Squanchy to fill the air with excited ramblings about the evening.

When they make it back home, Squanchy decides to celebrate by - to no one’s surprise - getting high. Rick retires to bed but, despite the exhaustion plaguing his mind and body, fails to sleep, his mind preoccupied with trying to process the evening’s events. At one point, he hears Birdperson’s footsteps approaching and his heart soars at the thought of Birdperson coming to his room. Before he can smother the feeling, he hears Birdperson’s door open and shut, the sound reverberating through his abdomen like a punch. 

Idiot. 

He should’ve known not to get his hopes up, but he had anyway. He rolls out of bed and sits at his desk, pulling out his latest project. He stares blankly for a few minutes before trying to tinker with it, but quickly pushes it away in frustration. Another few minutes pass before he hauls himself out of the chair and wanders into the living room to find Squanchy draped across the top of the couch.

Squanchy slurs something that Rick assumes is a greeting and holds out a zazzle worm in offering. Rick accepts and collapses into the sofa before taking a hit. He glances to the TV, which is playing some sort of documentary in a language that neither of them speak. Squanchy is entranced anyway, giggling and lazily batting a paw in its direction. Rick takes another hit, closing his eyes and letting the waves of inebriation wash over him. When he next opens them, he notices the swirling colours of the TV. The alien sounds of the narration vibrate his ears and tickle his brain. The couch cushions, notoriously uncomfortable and hard, soften like clouds as they allow his body to sink into them.

When he comes to, it’s with a pounding in his head and a weight on his chest. He hears a groan that sounds just like he feels, and forces his eyes open to see Squanchy curled up on top of him, Rick’s own body sprawled across the couch.

Rick tries to sit up and Squanchy falls to the floor with a yelp.

“S-sorry, man.” Rick groans, pinching the bridge of his nose. Squanchy blinks, his eyelids drooping.  

Gradually, the two of them haul themselves to their feet, fumbling through cupboards in search of painkillers. Eventually, Squanchy finds some while Rick identifies the glass that looks least like a biohazard from the pile of dirty dishes in the sink and fills it with water. They take turns swallowing the much needed pills. 

Rick begins to stumble in the direction of his room. After only a few steps, he gives up and collapses back onto the sofa. He feels Squanchy clamber up to join him, settling across the back of the couch. Thankfully, the grogginess doesn’t take long to pull him back into blissful unconsciousness.

The front door slams and Rick shoots awake.

He hears a voice in the hallway, unfamiliar but distinctly feminine. He glances up to see Squanchy still passed out, drooling and twitching, and feels his heart begin to sink. Laughter rings out, a high-pitched giggle and a deep rumbling. 

Birdperson’s door opens and shuts. Rick squeezes his eyes shut and flinches as the sound seems to reverberate through his entire body.

All of a sudden, he’s upright and marching towards the front door, his vision still swinging slightly from the hangover. His heart pounds and burns in his chest. The door slams shut behind him.

Rick thunders his way down the stairs, the sound echoing in his head. From the countless times he’s been disturbed by others doing just that, he’s sure that everyone else in the building can hear it too. Good. Serves them right for doing the same to him.

He exits the apartment building and heads for the bar on the corner. Barely halfway there, he’s stopped by an alien.

“Excuse me, sir. Have you heard the message of G’gxzhgar?”

Rick whips round to face the insectoid, their exoskeleton covered in the telltale grey fur of  criscipiticae gxzhgaris, so named for the god its hosts inevitably begin to worship. He’s always thought of religion like this, an infection that spreads from person to person and takes over their brain, but this is that concept in its most literal form. Its victims have no control over its effect once the root takes hold, no way to see that they are being brainwashed by a fungus. They’re helpless, innocent. It isn’t their fault.

“I don’t give a fuck!” Rick snaps. “Your god is a-is a fucking disease! It just wants you to spread it to as many people as possible so it can eat you from the inside and you fucking deserve it for being so fucking stupid!”

The alien steps back in shock. Rick’s suddenly aware of his rapid breathing, of all the eyes judging him for shouting at the alien equivalent of a leper.

“Y-y-you think you’re better than me? If you don’t say anything, you’re just as sick as this guy!”

He storms off before any member of the crowd can recover enough to retaliate and barges into the bar. As soon as he sits down, a drink is placed in front of him; the bartender knows him well enough. Rick downs the glass and slides it back to be refilled, perhaps with more force than necessary. 

The alcohol burns his dry mouth and empty stomach, but he chokes it down anyway. He needs something to drown out the thoughts beginning to swirl inside his head.

It’s not until he’s downing his fourth drink that he finally begins to feel the blessed, dizzy pull of inebriation. His head throbs in protest as he continues to drink, fighting the urge to close his eyes.

Eventually, when his thoughts reach the desired incoherency and his head becomes too heavy to hold up any longer, he allows it to rest on the bar. A puddle of spilled alcohol sticks his cheek to the wood. He’s too drunk to care.

His eyes scan the rest of the bar for the first time since arriving. In every direction he looks, he sees couples flirting, kissing, interlocking tentacles.

He’s too drunk to care.

[wonik1ss]

baby project — ja.k

pairing : jake x f!reader

song rec : keeping tabs - niki + boyfriend material - gareth.t

a/n : second longest fanfic you will EVER get from me

“ FUCK U JAKE SIM!! “. You yelled hair covered in ketch up as Jake from the very back of your English class laughed maniacally at you. As your teacher had your bff Yunjin bring you to the bathroom to freshen up.

“ I can’t believe him! “. You yelled as you had your head under the schools faucet as Yunjin washed your hair out with some soap she for whatever reason had in her locker.

“ I really don’t understand why he is always pranking you! I have been with you since pre-k and I don’t have a single reason why he would be doing this! “. You nodded as you grabbed a bunch of paper towels and dried your hair. 

“ Think he was just born to annoy me at this point “. You said as Yunjin giggled.

“ I am so glad I have this class with you Jinnie If I didn’t I think I would die “. You pretended to faint as the girl giggled and grabbbed your hand.

“ I know I know now let’s get back to class before Mr. Young sends Jake to get us “. You gaged as the girl loudly laughed as you walked back to class.

-

“ What did I do to you? “. You whispered while looking up as Jake laughed.

“ Are you talking to your demons now? “

“ Ya guess you would know because you are one “. Jake rolled his eyes as Yunjin walked over to your desk.

“ Think.. Think of this of a bonding moment! “. You took both of her shoulders in your hands as you began to talk.

“ If I don’t make it out of this project alive make sure Yuna never touches my plushie collection “. Yunjin rolled her eyes and walked over to her partner, as you sighed.

Your teacher decided to place you and Jake as partners for this “ Baby Project “ your school decided to introduce this year. 3 weeks taking care of a baby with a male of female partner of your teachers choice.

“ Ok what do you want to name it? “. Jake asked as you raised your eyebrows.

“ It stupid it’s a boy! “. You hit Jakes head as his eyes went wide.

“ How did you know that? “

“ It fucking has a penis! “. You practically screamed as you pointed straight at your baby. Jake stared at his table as you rolled your eyes.

This was going to be a long 3 weeks…

-

“ TAKE THE DAMN BABY JAKE! “. You had spent all night with the baby crying and needing to be changed and coddled you were tired of it. Plus it was Jakes turn to take the baby but for some odd reason he just wouldn’t.

“ I.. I just can’t “. You rolled your eyes. Tf does he have to do on a Saturday night?

“ Why? “

“ I have soccer practice.. and the guys will make fun of me.. “

“ Do I look like I give a fuck just.. stuff it in your locker and I’ll text you when it needs something.. you have my number and the baby app on your phone right? “. Jake nodded as you handed him the baby and started to walk home before he grabbed your arm.

“ Don’t try to stalk me at practice now no visitors allowed “. Jack winked as your checks grew pink.

2 weeks left.. Just 2 weeks left..

-

You laughed at your friend Ning Nings joke as you got of the lunch line and walked to your groups table. Your group consisted of 3 girls which included you, Yunjin and ningning and Sunoo who just kinda popped into your group.

“ I swear that bitch Sooha wants to tustle with me and I swear if she tells me to back of Heeseung again I will fight her “. You laughed as Ning Ning went on and on about the one crazy girl in your class as you felt a shadow cast over you.

“ I’ll take the baby now.. If you want “. You looked up and titled your head.

“ But I have her till 3 period tomorrow? “

“ I know you have dance practice and Layla gets mosey around then.. so I’ll take her now “. You nodded and were about to pass the baby to the awkwardly boy until you remembered something.

“ You named him.. Layla? “

“ Ya after my dog “. You giggled.

“ You know his a boy right? “

“ Ya.. we can just call him Lay for short! “. You smiled and passed the baby over as Jake went to his table, and you swore you saw a pink tint on his ears.

“ Ooooh “. Sunoo cooed as you turned to him confused.

“ What? “

“ He likes you.. “. Yunjin said as her eyebrows went up and down.

“ What! no way! “. Your friends nodded as you stared at your plate of food in confusion.

Why did you whole friend group think you liked Jake.. and why was your stomach feeling so weird today?

-

“ Your seriously going to teach or baby to play soccer? “. You laughed as Jake pulled Lay from his back. The before almost naked baby now in a little Jersey and shorts. You burst out laughing as Jake pulled out a little soccer ball from his pocket too.

“ Ofcourse! We got to have something in common “. You smiled and followed the boy as he set the tiny ball down, you were on one side of it and Jake was on his knees behind the baby getting to ready to act like it was playing.

Then on the count of three you tried to kick the little ball into the goal but somehow everytime Jake won.

“ That’s unfair he has a soccer dad how am I supposed to beat that! “. You said as you tried your best to get the ball into the goal but once again Jake blocked you. But this time you tripped and fell on him.

You opened your eyes to see Jake’s worrying eyes looking all over you.

“ You ok Y/n? “. Jake hadn’t called you by your actual name for the bast 3 years you have known him…

“ Uh.. Ya ya “. You said as you slowly got of the worried boy,

“ Is.. Is the baby ok? “. You said looking around the grass for your little baby Lay.

“ Ya moved him out the way before you fell “. You laughed as Jake looked at you confused till he looked at the baby. It’s head had a dent.

“ That looks like 3 deducted points to me! “. Jake said acting like your teacher by even going the extra mile you wave on of his fingers around like he did.

Shit.. did Jake always look this cute?

-

“ That looks like 3 deducted pint to me! “. Your teacher said as you giggled.

“ Something funny Ms. Y/l “. You shock your head as Jake smiled at you as you were dismissed to your seats.

“ Got his reaction down to a tea “. You giggled as your teacher started talking about what you should have learned from the experience.

“ Y/n.. I have a question.. that you can totally ask me not to ask if yo- “

“ Just tell me Jake! “. You said as the boy rubbed the back of his neck.

“ You sure? “

“ Yes “

“ Like absolutely sure? “

“ Yes Jake “

“ Lik- “

“ Just tell me Jake! “

“ Would you want to go out with me this Friday? “. Your eyes went wide as Jake bit his lip while you stared at you.

“ Sure “

“ That didn’t sound like you want to.. “

“ Ok.. yes Jake I would love to go out with you om Staurday your so hot and nice why would I say no! “. You exaggerated as the boy blushed and laughed.

“ Something funny Mr. Sim? “. Your teacher asked as him and the rest of the class turned to the two of you.

“ No Mr. Young I just bagged myself a real life so I’m feeling pretty good right now! “. The whole class erupted into giggles and laughter as your cheeks flushed red and Jake sent a wink your way.

Boy were you happy for this Baby Project now..