#she kept on calling him zayn…

[unintentionalseductress]

Prescription For Pleasure

Warnings: MDNI, sex, masturbation, medical masturbation, use of vibrators, clit play, piv sex, use of latex gloves, oral (fem receiving), some praise, kinda slow burn A/n: I am not normal about this man in any way. Not really proofread. Please do not use my banners without permission.

You’re seated in Zayne’s office, trying not to squirm as he sets up your appointment. Although this was now the third time you were seeing him for this regular inspection, it didn’t alleviate your nerves the slightest. Each month, according to the Hunter’s Association regulations, every hunter needed to be seen by their primary care physician for 3 consecutive days for their health.

And although the association deemed it a necessity, it was an embarrassing requirement according to you. The Hunter’s Association had done a survey and discovered that many of their employees suffered from high levels of stress because they were isolated and lacked much-needed human contact. To combat this, they made it mandatory to get physical contact by a medical professional every month.

But when all the fancy jargon was pushed aside, all the hunters called it the same thing - medical masturbation. It had become wildly popular amongst both men and women hunters, eagerly marking the days on their calendar for when they could come in. When you heard about the rule, you wished the earth would open up and swallow you whole. You had tried talking to Jenna to insist that you were indeed taking care of yourself in that aspect, thanks to your trusted vibrator, but she had shaken her head no. 

“We need documentation. I’m subject to it, and so is everyone else in my order.”  Defeated, you’d walked out of Jenna’s office before remembering another mortifying fact with a jolt. Your primary care physician was Zayne. 

Your childhood friend, your trusted cardiologist, stoic and calm, who remained reserved during your general checkups, was going to be your medical masturbator. You had almost turned yourself into a ball on the floor, tweaked out at the insanity of it all. Although Zayne was your general physician, you had a separate gynecologist, and apart from asking if you’d had your annual PAP smear, Zayne had left that part of your anatomy unquestioned. It didn’t help that you were attracted to him, and sure, if he’d asked you out on a date, you would have been more than happy to let him inspect you all he wanted down there.

But this clinical setting, enforced by your organization was a little too much to bear. Wondering how to tackle this situation, you wander over to Tara who was humming as she made her medical bookings on her phone app. “Isn’t this exciting?” she squeals as she sees you. “God knows the dating pool is thin right now. This is just what I needed!”

Tara’s primary care physician was a woman, and you wondered if that was a pro or a con. On the one hand, dropping your panties for a woman doctor seemed less unnerving than for a man. But if you had a preference for men, would it work against your arousal? You shook your head at your ridiculous musings and focused on talking to Tara. “Are you really that excited about this?”

“You have no idea!” Tara taps her feet as she talks to you. 

“And you’re ok about having a woman stimulate you?” You probe, trying to gauge Tara’s reaction. Tara giggles and lightly pats your shoulder. 

“I don’t know but the idea is kind of hot. I mean, getting it on in a doctor’s office? Besides if I don’t like it, I can change the doctor the next time.”

Her words hit you like a ton of bricks. “You can change your doctor?”

“For this yes, the app gives you an option since it involves showing off a lot of intimate areas. You have to be able to trust your doctor right?”

You logged into the app, finding the little button to request a change in doctors, but for some reason, the page kept refreshing and crashing. With a sigh, you decide to get the worst of it over with and call Zayne, hoping he can make the change for you on his end. His voice is cool and professional when he answers your call.

“Yes?”

“So, you must have heard about…the new regulation?” you had put forth nervously.

“I am aware of it, yes.” 

“Well, for obvious reasons, I would like a different doctor.” 

Zayne smoothly says, “Of course. Patient comfort is always first. Do you have a doctor in mind?”

“Maybe my gynecologist? I tried doing it in the app but it keeps crashing.” There’s a moment of silence and you can hear Zayne’s fingers tapping away at his keyboard before a low hum leaves his end of the line.

“There appears to be a problem.”

“Problem?” you’d parrotted back.

“Yes. Because so many people are booking appointments at the same time, most of the available doctors are already taken. Including your gynecologist.” 

It felt like watching a bird crashing into a window in slow motion, that brief moment of hope that it wouldn’t hit the glass shattering in an instant. “Oh.”

There’s a pause before Zayne delicately says, “I’m sorry but it looks like you will have to make those appointments with me for this month. 3 of them according to the regulation. Hopefully, you can make the change for next month.” His voice sounded slightly apologetic.

“Won’t it be weird given that we know each other personally?” The question had fallen from your lips before you could stop yourself. 

“I promise not to treat you any differently than any of my other patients who are coming in for this inspection. I understand this may be a little unexpected, but I assure you I did a term of gynecology during my internship.”

A tinge of mirth carried over in his voice and you can’t help but make a noise of embarrassment. “Zayne, please!” His laugh was dry but not unkind, and you can’t help but want to hide your face even though he couldn’t see you. 

“Don’t worry too much. But I do advise you to make the appointments soon. My schedule is filling up rapidly.”

With those words, he’d disconnected the call and you were left wondering if an unknown god from another planet had cursed your existence. 

And changing doctors had proven to be more difficult than you’d thought. The entire organization seemed to be having a single thought. They had made appointments in the app almost halfway into the year, essentially blocking you from being able to do anything about your situation. Now on your third month with Zayne, you watch as he checks his notes from your last session, feeling like you want to scamper from the room.

The last two sessions had been incredibly stimulating, your arousal heightened by the fact you were attracted to Zayne. You’d never considered having someone watch as you touched yourself but found that you’d enjoyed it, at least, when it was him. He had remained professional, but you’d avoided him these last two months, save for when you had to get your monthly cardiac profile. He reads his notes from his computer as he prepares for your session. 

“Preferred device for stimulation still a vibrator, with a large, rounded, flexible head?” His eyes remain on his screen and you’re grateful for him giving you this smidgen of privacy. 

“Yes.”

“Preference for the doggystyle position still?” 

Your face burns. “Yes.”

“Still consenting for verbal stimulation?”

You nod your head.

“And still consenting for internal vaginal stimulation?” You make a noise of consent, squeezing your thighs together, your panties uncomfortably chafing against your already swollen pussy. 

“All right, I have everything I need.” He logs off and removes his lab coat, rolling up the sleeves of his shirt, revealing his well-corded arms, and your mouth almost waters at the sight of them. Clearing your throat, you shyly reach into your bag and pull out the vibrator in question, which he takes from you and clamps into a stand, adjusting it over the examination table you’d be on. A bottle of lube awaits on the tray next to the table and you swallow as he finishes the setup. 

“Whenever you’re ready,” he says in that deep voice, and feeling like your fingers are wrapped in thick woolen mittens, you reach behind you to untie the hospital gown you’re wearing, and it falls to the floor with a swoosh, your nipples pebbling under the sudden chill. A small set of sensors were taped to your chest and on the sides of your forehead, essential medical devices to ensure your orgasm was satisfactory. Unperturbed, Zayne gestures to the table and you make your way onto it, letting your feet settle in the stirrups as he settles on a stool between your legs, pulling on latex gloves before gently spreading your folds apart. You stare up at the ceiling as he does his initial checkup.

“Labia look healthy, no signs of trauma or abnormal discharge,” he murmurs, then runs a finger down the edge of the fold that separates your inner and outer lips, causing your core to clench involuntarily. You hold still, knowing very well he saw the action, holding your breath, letting out a little sigh as he lets go. 

“Normal reaction to stimuli, already semi-aroused,” he says, trashing the gloves and making another note on his computer. He glances over at you, leaning back uncertainly on the table. “You may begin.”

You swallow, then carefully turn onto your hands and knees, crawling towards the head of the table, grabbing the bottle of lube and squeezing the viscous liquid onto the head of the vibrator, avoiding eye contact as your breasts sway under the motion, nipples painfully hard from anticipation. You could feel Zayne’s gaze but can’t bring yourself to look up. Even though this was the third time, it hadn’t gotten easier, stripping naked and pleasuring yourself in his office. 

Once the rounded head of the vibrator is slick, you turn, the chill of the lube against your heated membranes causing more blood to flow into your already engorged nub, and run your moist slit across the surface to spread the liquid onto your slickened folds. Your hand fumbles for the little remote control and with a buzz, the vibrator turns on at the lowest setting. You click the button a few more times until it gets to the speed you liked, then fail to hold back a moan as the sensations pleasurably begin to take hold in your clit. 

The first time you had done this, nervousness had made you set the vibrator on the highest possible setting hoping to get a quick orgasm and sprint out of the office. Unfortunately, the sensors relayed this information into Zayne’s medical record that your climax had been unsatisfactory, and you had endured being lectured by him with the medical gown loosely draped on your body, your rear open to the cold office air. 

His tone wasn’t unkind but it hadn’t helped you feel better either. “It helps neither of us if you rush this. The whole purpose of this examination is to ensure you’re relaxing. I know it’s embarrassing but if you fail to have a proper orgasm, I’ll have to make you repeat the process until I get data that says otherwise.”

“The sensors are-”

“The only way to measure anything. Without involving another person anyway.”

His words had left you gobsmacked and your retort had died in your mouth. After that incident, you had learned. Even with the chagrin of having him watch you, you had learned to take your time and let the feelings build, leading to incredibly savory climaxes that made your body squirm from the aftershocks. 

Your hips sway, setting up a rhythm to brush your sensitive slit onto the head, letting it vibrate from cunt to clit, the lube aiding the frictionless sliding and making your core drip. Quiet noises of pleasure leave your throat as help yourself, arching your back and changing the curvature of your ass to maximize the sensations, then when the perfect pattern emerges, you let out a keening sigh, and try to remain still, letting the vibrator work its magic. 

Zayne, who has been quietly observing the computer this entire time, observing the spikes relayed from the sensors, asks, “Have you found your optimal pleasure form?”

“Yes,” you gasp, the timbre of his voice sending an arrow of lust into the deepest parts of your clenching core. You knew what was about to come next. The sound of Zayne’s desk chair moving, followed by the snap of latex gloves as he pulled a fresh pair onto those beautiful hands. He approaches the examination table and takes the bottle of lube you had set aside earlier, a wet squelching noise issuing from it as he squeezes it over his gloved hand, gathering the fluid on his index and middle fingers. He leans over to whisper in your ears; the verbal stimulation has begun.

The humiliating reveal that you had a heavy praise kink had come up during your initial session and despite your insistence that it wasn’t necessary, Zayne, the ever-diligent worker, had made a note in your profile, and he’d been fulfilling it each time. A tickle of hot breath near your ear, before he murmurs, “Are you enjoying yourself?”

The hum of the vibrator in the background coupled with his voice makes your breath catch in your throat. You nod, knowing you didn’t have it in you to form coherent words. 

“That’s a good patient. Good patients listen to their doctors you know. And you’re doing a wonderful job.”

Your hips snap back to push your clit against the rubber pad, letting out a whimper of pleasure, the action pushing your ass up higher, revealing your pathetically drooling cunt, fluttering with the dissatisfaction of being unfilled. 

“Are you ready?” He waits for your consent and you manage a husky, ‘mm hm’.

“Good girl. Take a breath.”

You inhale, trying to relax, then let out an uninhibited moan as Dr. Zayne inserts his middle finger into your needy cunt, the ring of muscles offering no resistance to the probing digit. He gently thrusts a few times, before curling the tip of his finger up into the delicate patch of nerves on your upper wall, the smooth come hither motion awakening a new level of pleasure in your body. Your fingers tighten on the edges of the table, sobbing, trying not to scream at the feelings that threatened to explode from you. He keeps up the gentle assault before asking, “Are you ready for another one?”

“Yes…” your voice comes out shakily, knowing you desired more than just his fingers, but that you would never get to experience it. 

“Perfect. So well behaved, taking exactly what I give you.” Zayne’s sensual voice floods your ear before his index pushes into you, the thickness of both his fingers sending you into overdrive. Your walls clench welcomingly around him, inciting an exciting pull of liquid heat in your abdomen, the muscles tensing in anticipation for the exquisite release you knew was about to occur. 

Feeling your inhibitions abandon you as you are stroked closer to orgasm your self-control slips and his name falls from your lips as he pushes over the edge.

“Zayne…” some partially functioning confine in the back of your brain registers what you had just involuntarily purred, but the spasms rocking your core, those gratifying waves of delight flooding your body made it easier to ignore it as your being is reduced to a pliant mess of pleasure. His fingers ease up as the fluttering in your pussy calms down, your clit pulsating weakly as the final vestiges of pleasure are wrung from your body. 

With a wet noise, his fingers leave your moist hole, the glove coated with your juices and the lubricant. Awareness finally comes crashing around you as you realize what you had uttered in the throes of passion. 

“I…I didn’t…I wasn’t in control…” You try to find a way to explain, to let him know you had very little choice in the matter of sobbing his name as you orgasmed, but everything feels flat, almost on the fine line between explaining and insulting. 

“There’s no need.” Almost as if he’s read your mind, Zayne matter-of-factly redirects the conversation. “It’s not uncommon to blurt out things during climax. Some people swear, and others call out names. It was a very normal reaction considering I was the one in the room with you.”

He throws the gloves in the trash and goes to check the computer, to ensure the sensors had given him the information he needed before starting the second round of the appointment.

“Oh.” You say quietly as he sits at his desk, feeling dejected. Although relieved he wasn’t making a big deal out of it, you can’t help but feel disappointed with his reaction. Shouldn’t a man be flattered when a woman cried out his name when she came? Maybe he really was treating you strictly as a patient. And here you were, pussy exposed and spread after being probed by his dextrous fingers, mooning over him like a high school girl. Perhaps the limit of your relationship with him was in fact, doctor and patient, the childhood friends aspect fading. 

So there was no romance here at all. You had a crush on him, and he was doing his job. Reality sucks. You sniff and suddenly feel cheap, and get out of the doggystyle position and try to find the hospital gown to preserve some of your modesty. Zayne glances over at your sudden movements.

“Are you cold? I can get you a blanket.”

“I’m fine.” You try to sound normal. 

“Your records show that you usually rest about 10 minutes before you are ready for the next round. Do you feel like that will be the case this time too?”

You find the gown and drag it up to your chin, covering your body as you lay back on the table. “Yeah. Actually a little sooner today maybe. I have somewhere to be.”

“You can’t rush these things. Your body will cum when it wants to. A forced orgasm doesn’t promote anything beneficial.”

“Well can we find a way for this to happen quickly and in compliance with the sensors?” You’re trying not to let your frustration show, the pleasantness of your orgasm fading. “I don’t think I have the patience to do two more rounds.”

Zayne listens to you impassively, but those amber eyes flecked with green had an underlying intensity you couldn’t place. “You don’t have the patience to do two more rounds?” He gets up and comes over to you. “You want to just leave then?” He approaches the edge of the table and there’s tension in his jaw. Perplexed, you look at him, his reaction unexpected. 

“No, I’m sorry, I know I can’t leave because of compliance and all that.”

“Compliance,” Zayne mutters under his breath before grasping your chin and forcing you to look at him, a gasp leaving your throat. 

“You’re getting frustrated because you have to do this a few times every month while being supervised? Do you have any idea what I have to do before you come in for these sessions?” His voice is a growl and you clam up, shocked by this aggressive display of expression from him.

“Every month I have to remain professional as you come in, pleasure yourself, and then leave. I have to endure seeing your beautiful body bare in front of me and control all my impulses to touch you, to not overstep my limitations as your doctor. I pleasure myself remembering the noises you make and ensure I’m well spent before coming in to do your appointments. You sit there, acting like it’s hard for you, but do you have any idea what you do to me?”

One of his knees is on the table, and he’s looming over you making you feel like a tiny animal caught in his fury. “It’s torture, to watch you. You’re not like the other patients I see. You never have been. Because with you, I always feel like I’m on the verge of losing control. Do you know how difficult it is to not do things to you that aren’t specified on your medical record? To have my fingers so intimately inside you, feel every little drop of pleasure clenching around my fingers, knowing at the end I can’t have you to myself? To hear you call my name and know that you only see me as your doctor?” 

Your face is a bright shade of red but you can’t look away from his face. His teeth are gritted, and when you dare to glance down, you see the noticeable bulge that has formed between his legs. He follows your glance and clicks his tongue, letting go of your chin. 

“I know I crossed a boundary today. It’s all right. You can go. I’ll reschedule you with another doctor. I know you didn’t want me in the first place.”

Your mind is a blur as you quickly reach out to grab his hand, your heart hammering wildly in your chest. His admission was like a prayer answered, and you weren’t going to meek about this. His breath hitches as he feels you pulling at his hand and gives you a look of uncertainty. Your lips part but the words you want to say refuse to come out. 

“Damn it,” he whispers ferally before his mouth captures yours in a rough kiss. It was wild and demanding, a contrast to the reserved, patient man he usually was. You’re swept up in the feeling of his mouth on yours, the taste of his tongue, and the softness of his lips. When you break apart, his hand cups your cheek, his eyes searching your face.

“This isn’t just because of the session right?” He asks keenly and you realize what he’s asking you. He’d been aching for you before this whole stupid policy came into place. The same way you’d been longing for him. 

“No, it’s not. I had a crush on you back when you became my doctor to check on my heart condition.” A sigh of relief leaves him before he tenderly presses his forehead to yours, and you’re caught up in the sweetness of the moment. 

“I just had to be sure.”

Boldly, you raise your head, delighted when he meets you, pulled back into his kiss, your tongues sliding over each other, your fingers tangling into his hair, scratching the nape of his neck, pulling him closer to you. 

You gasp as he breaks the kiss to drag his tongue down the column of your throat, pressing wet, open-mouthed kisses to the heated flesh, your blood humming in your veins as your eyes flutter closed. He pulls away the gown and pulls your perked nipple into his mouth, and you revel in the jolt of pleasure it brings you, each suckle felt in your clit which had already swollen up again in need. His fingers capture your other nipple, softly tweaking and pulling it and drawing little whines of desire from your throat. 

Your hand finds the junction between his legs and cups the heavy bulge, drawing a groan from him, palming him through his slacks, feeling it grow and tent the fabric under your ministrations. A low guttural sound leaves him and he gets off the table, and you almost protest until you see him dragging the small wheeled stool from earlier towards the table. He settles down on it, looping his arms around the tops of your thighs and pulling you closer to the table's edge until your feet find the stirrups again. 

“Stay open for me darling,” he instructs, his eyes glittering and you shiver as you feel his breath against your swollen folds. You squeak as he pushes your folds apart with his nose, inhaling your scent, his eyes growing dark with lust. “You smell delicious. I always wondered. Had to stop myself from sniffing my gloves after you climaxed. Not professional you know.” 

The musky tang of your pussy fills his senses, and his tongue darts out and dips into your slit, finding the swollen bud and licking it with just the right pressure that makes your toes curl and stars pop into your vision. 

Your hand rests on his head, tugging his beautiful dark locks, his name falling from your lips without barriers. Your hips rock against him, moaning, then let a sob as his lips suction around your clit. His fingers, free from the gloves at last, probe your entrance, scissoring inside to prepare you for what was to come before they curl up into that gummy patch that he knew too well. 

The sensations flood you, and the sheer knowledge of knowing you had Zayne touching you this way, unbound by the usual rules was sending you into a frenzy. Incoherent noises leave your mouth, crying out hotly as he teases the orgasm from you, your body shivering from the intensity. 

He wipes his mouth on the back of his hand and takes in your appearance, so soft and satisfied on his table, a dreamy look in your eyes.

“Are you prepared for the after?” he asks, you nod, more than eager to experience him. A sly smile crosses his face before he reaches over into the little chest of drawers by the table and pulls out a condom. 

“Hospitals have free condoms. It would be impractical to not use one when it’s on hand.” He explains seeing your questioning look and stands to undo his pants. You watch curiously as his cock is finally freed, eyes widening as it faces you, so impressive and veiny, standing proudly with a slight curve in its length. His pubes were neatly trimmed at the base, ebony curls visible behind the shaft. As he starts to roll on the condom, you feel your whole body heating up in anticipation. 

He leans down to kiss you before taking your feet and resting them on his shoulders, his cock at the perfect angle to enter you. As he sinks into your welcoming heat, you let out a sigh of longing, feeling the delicious stretch of muscle as he pushes up inside you, gasping as you feel his full length sheathe itself. As he bottoms out, his eyes close in bliss, hardly daring to believe that after all this time, he is finally getting to fulfill this private dream. 

Each stroke has him brushing against your gspot and kissing your cervix as he paces himself, feeling the primal urge to take you roughly and selfishly calling at his self-control. A growl leaves his throat as you whimper, straining towards him as the both of you struggle to keep a grip on reality. He feels the seductive way your walls clench around him, hears the soft noises you make, sees your face contort in pleasure with every roll of his hips. 

“Oh you feel so good,” he pants hotly, glasses askew, almost at the tip of his nose as he thrusts. “Clenching me so needily. Gonna milk me dry.”

Your response is a shuddering whimper, your back arching greedily to feel all of him, creating the perfect curvature to brush your clit against the base of his erection with each push of his hips. He feels the little bud on his heated skin, your combined fluids dripping onto his shaft, slickening the bundle of nerves with each stroke. 

“Be a good girl and cum on my cock the way you do on my fingers.” Zayne’s voice is husky as he tries to hold on, damned if he came before you. “I know you want to. I can feel the way your walls are spasming. They always do this pattern before you orgasm.”

The fact that he had memorized this knowledge of you was too much and you let go, your voice filling the room as you climax. Zayne’s hips stutter as he feels you around his length, pussy fluttering so him. His pace quickens, the sound of slapping skin becoming more and more urgent, his balls hitting your ass each time as he chases his orgasm. 

A shiver passes through his body as it happens and he buries himself in your warmth. You hum in satisfaction as you feel his cock twitch and pulse inside you as he spills his load. He pants, sweat on his forehead as he bends down to kiss you again, carefully lowering your legs which burn from the stretch as they settle on the stirrups. 

Threading your fingers through his hair, you brush your noses together, smiling shyly at him as he smirks, his eyes closing as he catches his breath.

“Can I see you outside of my office sometime?” he asks and you laugh at the invitation. 

“Are you asking me out on a date after having sex just once?” you tease as he grips the base of the condom and slides out, your pussy feeling the loss keenly. 

“I have been wanting to for a while. I was just wondering if I was misreading the signals. But I think I have a solid answer now.” He helps you sit up and cradles your body against his, idly stroking your skin, before gently removing the sensors off your body. 

“Let’s get dressed,” he murmurs, pressing a kiss to your forehead after a moment of cozy silence, and the both of you hunt down your clothes. As he fixes his tie, Zayne passes by his computer and lets out an amused huff. 

“Something funny?” you ask as you button your blouse.

“The sensors definitely gave enough information to make anyone’s head spin.” You walk over and snort as you see the window, full of sharp spikes. 

“Well, at least I am guaranteed you had a good time.” Zayne’s eyes sparkle mischievously as he pulls you in for another kiss. 

“I’m not changing my doctor,” you reassure him as you pull away. There’s amusement in his gaze when he replies. 

“Oh, definitely not. I think if the Hunter’s Association ever sees this record, they’ll heavily advise you to remain with the same healthcare professional.” 

© unintentionalseductress original work | no copying, plagiarizing or translating support banner by @/ cafekitsune @theimmortalbuns @otomegamesforlife @sweets-kozume @actuallysaiyan

[ladsonlads]

Impartial Hearts | Sylus - Part Two

Pairing -> Boss Sylus x Non MC Reader

Parts -> Part One | Part Two

Synopsis -> You’ve been working as Onychinus’s accountant for two years, and you’ve been carrying two heavy secrets for a third of it. You were in love with your boss, and your mother was dying.

A/N -> I'm sorry it took so long. I have been obsessing over trying to make part two perfect but I don't think I can. It's time I share my baby with you, and I really hope you enjoy it.

Tags -> Angst, fluff :)

Trigger Warnings -> Character death, heavily mentions grief. Some parts are suggestive but there is no smut.

Word Count -> 18.8K (it got kinda crazy)

Late October

It was cold, dark and gloomy; the weather a perfect pathetic fallacy to the narrative of your life. The freshly disturbed patch of grass failed to convey the significance of who laid underneath it. It was vexing, how the world continued to spin on it’s axis despite the fact that it stopped spinning for you. 

It hurt to think about the events that led to your undoing. The weeks prior to the moment your mother drew her last breath. You were a cracked vase filled with wilting flowers and overflowing regret. Every breath you took consumed more energy than you could spare and yet the world just. Kept. Spinning. 

“I brought you flowers. Yellow tulips, by the way.” The words felt like lead on your tongue. It was one thing to accept your mother was never coming back, it was another to try to act normal about it. “I know you never cared for them, but I didn’t think leaving a pack of cigarettes on your grave was very tasteful.” You bitterly smiled to yourself at the memories of your mom sneaking a cigarette in the backyard when she thought you were asleep. It was a nasty habit you did everything to rid her of. A fruitless attempt to protect her from the inevitable. 

“I’m sorry I haven’t figured out your epitaph yet. It’s just so hard to condense your entire life into a few words. Plus, they charge by the letter, so I’m trying to be really selective.” It felt weird, speaking into empty space, but you read online that it helped with grief, so you tried anyway. 

That was how you approached most things nowadays. Eating, drinking, sleeping, they all seemed meaningless. But, you knew you couldn’t survive on just antagonism and mourning, so you did it anyway. 

“Zayne called again. I know you told me not to hate him and that it wasn’t his fault, but I can’t bring myself to agree.” 

The moment Zayne told you that the heart that could save your mother’s life was going to someone else replayed in your mind like a scratched vinyl stuck on an aggravating note.

“I got so frustrated by his constant calls that I threw my phone into the ocean.” You let out a sad laugh. “Guess that’s the last time I bring anything with me when I’m walking along the coast.” 

You paused for a moment, feeling stupid. But you had so much to say to her, it all just began spilling out.

“I know you don’t want to hear this, but I might lose the house. I burned through all my paid leave, and the idea of going back to work for Sylus makes me want to put my head through a wood-chipper. I know I have to, but how can I focus on work when I have nothing left to work for?” You tasted the tears before you felt them, the saltiness reminded you of your weekends at the beach with your mom. You did everything to get out of joining her, you hated the beach, but it was her favourite place to be and in a desperate attempt to cling on to whatever was left of her, you forced it to be yours too.

“I’m sorry I never got you that house you dreamed of, or the dog. I’m sure there are lots of dogs in heaven, and at least the dogs there have been screened. With my luck any dog I would’ve gotten you would’ve been evil.” You teetered around the grievance you truly wanted to apologise for. 

“I’m sorry I couldn’t spend much time with you before you passed away. I was so sure you would get the transplant. I tried so hard to save for it. I should’ve been with you. If I knew—” The sobs raked through you with a force that knocked the air out of your lungs. You sat down next to her tombstone, leaning your head against the chiseled rock. 

There were moments when you’d wake up, and in the haze of your muddled mind you’d forget she was dead. But then the ache in your body is deciphered by your mind, and you’re reminded of just how much you’ve lost. Maybe that’s why they called it mourning. Grief dawned on you like the rising sun.

Life had a way of being entirely unfair, and there was nowhere to hide from fate’s piercing claws. And as if to ensure you hadn’t forgotten just how cruel life could be, your head whipped around at the sound of footsteps behind you to find the last person you wanted to see.

Sylus was dressed in a long black coat hanging effortlessly off of his broad shoulders, a black dress shirt that really should’ve been buttoned up to the top, and a pair of black slacks that made his long legs look impossibly longer. He looked every bit the cunning grim reaper, and it wasn’t just because he was surrounded by graves.

“I didn’t know you were back in the N109 Zone.” The words came out harsher than you intended as your head returned to it’s position against the rock. 

Sylus stopped in front of you, lowering himself to his haunches so that you would be face-to-face. It stung to look at him, so you focused on picking at the grass instead. 

“I only got back a few hours ago. I heard about your mother. I’m sorry.” Having been deprived of his voice for over a month, you cursed the butterflies that coursed through you like muscle memory. Part of you wished he’d returned disfigured, but you knew it wouldn’t have made much of a difference. Ugly or devastatingly beautiful, the storm that was Sylus could not be stopped, only weathered. 

“Sorry that she died or sorry that you weren’t there?” The bitterness in your tone was unfamiliar to you. Even though you knew it was unfair of you to expect him to have stayed, he left immediately after he dropped you off at the hospital and you hoped he’d have been there just a little longer. It didn’t help that you didn’t hear from him until two weeks later, and by then you were too engrossed in your battle against Akso hospital’s medical board to respond. 

“You haven’t been answering my calls; they’re not even going through anymore. You haven’t blocked me, have you?” Sylus countered your question with one of his own. If you cared enough, you might’ve called him out on his diversion. 

“No, my phone broke.” That was an understatement if there ever was one. 

“How long ago?”

“A week.” That much was true and since you couldn’t afford a smart phone, a shitty $30 flip phone weighed down your pocket. 

“And all the times I called before then?” Sylus’s eyes perused you with intensity, and you suddenly felt self-conscious. You weren’t dressed well, in a pair of black sweatpants that were too big on you and a matching hoodie. Grieving people were allowed to dress terribly without judgement, Y/N. It’s okay.

“I didn’t feel like picking up.” The grass continued to bare the brunt of your nerves as you answered. The you that wasn’t effectively an orphan would’ve made up some excuse to protect his feelings, but you were resolved to change that. Your mother was strong, independent, and she never backed down from a fight. Not against men like Sylus, and not against her illness. If you wanted to honour her memory then you had to live your life the way she’d want you to.

“Do you have a phone now?” 

You reached into the pocket of your sweatpants to take out the grey flip phone. You watched as Sylus bit back a laugh.

“I’ll get you a new one.”

“I don’t need you to get me anything.” You quickly retorted.

“You’re going to need a phone from this century if you’re working for me, Y/N.” He said it so casually, as if you were put on this earth solely to serve him as his accountant. 

“Right, about that…” Your determination to be confident and unapologetic began to dwindle as you wondered how to tell Sylus you needed more time.

“No. Resigning is not an option.” Twelve minutes. It took Sylus twelve minutes to return to his usual controlling self. You were impressed, truly, it was a new record after all. 

“We don’t have a blood pact, Sylus. I can resign if I want to. Besides, that’s not what I was going to say. I need more time off.” You didn’t sound very convincing, but it wasn’t like you could change who you were overnight. It would take a lifetime to unlearn your bad habits. 

Sylus looked conflicted, as if he didn’t know what to say. When he chose to finally open his mouth, you wished he hadn’t.

“I’ve given you a month, Y/N. That’s enough.” His statement came out so matter-of-factly, you wondered if you had imagined it. A month was not nearly enough to recover from losing your mom, but you figured a man who killed people for a living wouldn’t understand. 

“It’s only been two weeks since she died. And I’m sure the temp you’ve got is perfectly competent.”

“The temp doesn’t know the company like you do and I haven’t bothered teaching him on the premise that you were returning. If you’re not back soon I can’t promise you’ll have a job to come back to.” 

The tension in the air dissipated as you began to laugh. Loudly. Obnoxiously. Hysterically. 

“You— You seriously think I care whether or not I have a job? I can barely will myself to eat right now—employment is not my priority.” You wiped back the tears that began to spill out. Their origin unknown, between your hysteria and sorrow, your eyes were constantly puffy.

“People die all the time, sweetheart. It’s no reason to throw your future away.” Sylus stood up straight at the end of his statement, holding his hand out to you. 

The angel on your shoulder whispered that in his own peculiar way, this was his attempt at comforting you. But you stopped listening to that angel when they buried your mom under six-feet of dirt, and you couldn’t help the word vomit that escaped you like water barrelling out of a splintered dam. 

You pushed away his hand, and stood up to look at him with a ferocity you didn’t know you possessed.

“I get that something really dark and twisted must have happened in your youth to make you so heartless, but most people have shitty childhoods, sweetheart. We choose not to be terrible, insufferable people because of it.” The unbridled rage you’d spend so long trying to suppress seeped out of you uncontrollably as you screamed at Sylus. You walked toward him, your anger taking hold of you as you began to push him away. A few months ago you would’ve given anything to touch him, now all you cared about was making him feel a semblance of the pain he instilled in you. 

“Some of us choose to feel our emotions in their entirety, regardless of how much it hurts, because we’re not scared to love and lose. You’re a coward, Sylus and you may think that my mother dying is just an inevitable consequence of life, but my world will never be the same.” In an attempt to calm down, you took a deep breath.

“You can judge me all you want, but it won’t change the fact that when you die, no one will mourn you.” The word vomit continued, and when you saw the hurt flash briefly within his eyes, you felt the arms of regret begin to sink their claws into you. 

You shouldn’t have said that. It wasn’t you.

But before you could take it all back, Sylus’s phone began ringing and you figured from the urgency in which he answered it must’ve been her. 

“I lost track of time, I’ll be right there.” He spoke in a low voice in what you could only assume was an attempt to mask the fact that he was leaving you for something more important, again. 

He opened his mouth to speak, but you beat him to it.

“Just go.” You waved him off and turned back around to face your mother’s grave, though now the tears welling up in your eyes couldn’t be entirely attributed to the grief. 

Early November

You weren’t sure time could heal the gaping wound your mother’s passing left behind, but grief had settled into your life like an imposing aunt. It was in your home, touching your things, ruining your food, and never once leaving you alone. It didn’t feel so all-consuming anymore, but it clung onto you constantly like a shadow. 

You were watching the third Harry Potter movie at 8am when you received the eviction notice via Email. You’d been expecting it, ultimately you were behind on rent, but the reason plastered on the paper was exponentially worse than your own incompetence.

…Selling to developers…suburban expansion project…

As if losing your childhood home wasn’t bad enough, they were planning on destroying it. Memories were bound to decay with time, that was an inevitable consequence of being human. Sooner or later you’d forget the way your mom dressed, or the smell of her perfume. Tangible things like photographs, places, they kept those memories anchored. You couldn’t lose the house, it wasn’t an option. 

You spent the next hour trying to reason with your landlord over the phone, but he was committed to selling. He rejected every single one of your proposals, though even you knew they were weak at best. The developers were offering significantly more than market value, there was no way you could beat that. Stupid gentrification. But, your landlord told you he was sympathetic, and the deal hadn’t been finalised just yet. If you could match the developer’s offer by the end of the month, he’d gladly sell it to you instead.

Of course the developer’s offer was $800,000, and by the looks of your financials, you were about $796,312 short. 

Desperate for a catharsis for your unending frustration, you screamed into the throw pillow on your couch until your throat felt raw. Then, you opened up your laptop to figure out a plan. 

30 minutes later you had:

Sell your kidney to an organ broker and use the money to get a loan from any dodgy bank that would accept your mediocre credit score. 

Dabble briefly in prostitution and use the money to get a loan from any dodgy bank that would accept your mediocre credit score.

Become a squatter and protest the demolition of your home environmental-activist style. 

“Wow, Y/N. Graduated top of your class and this was all you could come up with, huh?” You muttered to yourself as you stared at the list of terrible ideas. Your mind hadn’t come up with something so horrific since the bed-in-breakfast Mother’s Day fiasco when you were 11. 

The only option that didn’t end in bodily harm or a prison sentence was to work as many jobs as humanly possible for the next few weeks in hopes you could somehow manage to accumulate the deposit for a loan. You could probably sell some appliances too, and maybe revisit the kidney idea if it came to it. 

Despite it being a long-shot, you had to try. You changed into a pair of flared leggings and a sweater. It was basic and borderline mismatched but traversing your explosive closet was a large undertaking you tended to avoid. You dug a copy of your old resume out from your file drawer, after all, it wasn’t like your experience as Onychinus’s accountant was going to do you any good. Further, listing Sylus as a reference would ensure you never got a job again. 

You figured the easiest place to start was the central district of the N109 zone, bars and restaurants there were constantly hiring and from what you’d heard their only requirement was that you had two functioning legs and arms. But when you tried to leave through the door to begin the job search you collided with a formidable wall. 

Since when was there a—

“Where you headed to, Y/N?” The familiar voice was so surprising it made you jump, the action accompanied by a shrill scream.

“What the fuck? Why are you just standing outside my door?” You rarely ever swore and you were sure that if your mother was still alive she’d throw her shoe at you for using the devil’s language. But of all the things you expected to see that morning, Sylus outside your door was not one of them. 

“Is that any way to welcome your old employer?” Sylus stepped into your home without an invitation. Conclusive proof against your theory that he was secretly a vampire. 

“What are you doing here?” You asked again, still staring at Sylus like he sprouted a second head. You couldn’t think of a single reason why he’d show up at your place of residence, he never did while you were still his employee.

“I need you to come back.” You choked back a laugh at his ridiculous request. Was he insane?

“Go to hell.” Your vicious response didn’t sway Sylus. 

“I’ve fired an accountant every week since you left. The accounts are in complete disarray, half my businesses are behind on their bills, the other half have been paying the wrong amounts to the wrong companies. My investors are unhappy, my debtors are one week away from assuming I’ve gone bankrupt and I haven’t slept in weeks. Come. Back.” While it stroked your ego to hear that the organisation was suffering in your absence, you couldn’t just forget the terrible way he’d treated you in and out of the workplace. 

“You insisted I was especially replaceable and now you’re saying you can’t replace me?” You chose to remind him of just how horrid of an employer he was, an action he didn’t appreciate. 

“If you’re going to dwell on the semantics I’d rather just cut to the chase. What’s it going to take to get you back?” Sylus’s tone suggested he was truly trying to negotiate with you. Of course a man like him didn’t know how to take no for an answer. 

“Pigs to fly.” You quipped, opening your door in hopes he’d get the hint and leave. 

“Y/N, I’m serious. We can’t survive without you.” His desperation went straight to your head, but you stood your ground. 

“Then die.” You tried to shove him out of your doorway, but he was about as easy to move as a truck. 

“Everyone has something they desire, sweetheart. Name your price.” While you were ready to fire up a quick retort, his suggestion reminded you of the very reason you were about to leave the house. 

Perhaps this was a sign; you could swallow your pride if it meant you got to keep your home. 

You pretended to give it thought, sighing loudly in contemplation. “Fine. I want a sign-on bonus. Or in this case, a re-sign-on bonus, I guess…” You trailed off, unsure if he would agree. 

“Alright, how much?” He was quick to accept your terms, and you decided to test the waters of just how desperate he was for your return. 

“A million dollars.” 

“Done.” 

Dammit, you should’ve asked for more. 

“I want a personal driver too, I’m sick of biking to work.” You would’ve been okay with just the bonus, after all, it was insanely generous. But you’d be a fool not to milk this opportunity for what it was worth.

“Anything else, princess?” The condescending nickname only added fuel to the fire as you fired off more requests. 

“I don’t want to share my office with the twins anymore, they’re loud and annoying and they have no respect for the sanctity of my monthly budgets.”

“Okay.”

You masked your shock at his sudden magnanimity. “One last thing. Since you’ve come to the realisation that I am, in fact, a valuable asset to your organisation, you’re not allowed to be a dick to me anymore.” 

“Elaborate.”

“No more calling me stupid or other degrading insults, threatening my job security, threatening my life — just no more threats in general — and if you’re going to assign me extra work that is beyond the scope of my job description, a please and thank you would be nice.”

“You’re pushing it, Y/N.” Of course treating his employees like human beings was the most difficult request. 

“You just agreed to give me a million dollars and being nice to me is where you draw the line?” 

Sylus sighed, deliberating in silence for a moment. When he saw that your resolve was unrelenting, he begrudgingly agreed. He wasn’t sure where your newfound confidence was coming from, but he would be lying if he said he didn’t find it the slightest bit attractive. 

“Alright, you’ve made your case. I’ll agree to your conditions. Now, please fix it.” 

It took every fibre of your being not to break out into song and dance at your victory. “Let me get my coat.”

______________

You stared at the horrific mess your beautiful spreadsheet had turned in to. This was a disaster. A colossal, unfathomable disaster. “How could you let it get this bad?” Your voice was dripping with fear, it was like staring a train wreck. 

“It wasn’t like it happened on purpose. Besides, if you’d never—” Sylus interrupted his own sentence which you were sure contained an insult, and you could almost hear the evil chuckle resounding in your head at the sight of his obedience. This was going to be fun. 

“This is going to take forever to fix.” It would actually only take the day, but you didn’t need to tell him that.

“I need it fixed by the end of the week. Please.” He looked pained as he added the nicety. Soooooo much fun.

“Add on a massage chair for my office and I’ll get it done by Wednesday.” You wondered just how far you could push his desperation. 

“Deal.” He held his hand out for you to shake and when you did, you felt a strange sense of accomplishment. Now you could tell people ‘How to Tame Your Dragon’ was loosely based on your life. 

“You know, Sylus, I’m liking this new dynamic.” Your shit-eating grin couldn’t be wiped off of your face no matter how hard you tried.

“Oh I can tell. Now, get to work.” Sylus made a show of pulling out your office chair for you, and when you sat in it for the first time in two months, you felt an overwhelming sense of nostalgia. And for once, the recollection of your past didn’t hurt as much as it usually did.  

Mid-November

This time around, your employment under Sylus was much more pleasant. Surprisingly, he’d actually adhered to your conditions. 

The twins were slightly offended that you no longer wanted to share your office with them, but their gratefulness for your return trumped any antagonism they had for you. You were kind of a celebrity in Onychinus’s executive team, their saviour, if you will. 

But, the enjoyment of your newly established status could not be savoured. Undoing months of mistakes was turning out to be positively exhausting. You were an accountant; socially awkward, stuck to her Excel sheets, spent most of her free time indulging in shitty rom-coms. You were not built for briefing CEOs, Chairmen, investors, subsidiaries and of course, debtors, on your commitment to stability via video call.

Sylus insisted it had to be you, even though he usually handled the bureaucratic part of the organisation. Something about him not being able to answer their questions regarding the numbers. You told him you would tell him what to say through an ear piece like a spy movie, but he responded with a resounding no. 

It was more like ‘hell will freeze over before I turn into a glorified puppet, Y/N, blah blah blah’.

Every single one-on-one conference call made you feel like you were getting hives. Not to mention the active effort it took you to refrain from making stupid jokes at every opportunity. When the last one with the representative from Onychinus’s main bank was over, you had officially smoothed over all bad blood between Onychinus and it’s stakeholders.

Giving yourself a moment to recalibrate from the sheer amount of social interaction you had been subjected to, you glared at the shared calendar event. ‘Miss Hunter’s Birthday in 13 days’.

You tried to distract yourself from that familiar sinking feeling in your gut with your work. Sylus never remembered your birthday, but it wasn’t like it mattered. You were his accountant, he was your boss. That was the extent of your relationship, even though you’d both said things to each other that would cause your HR department, if you had one, to self-emulate. But in the chaos of buying your home, going back to work and learning how to navigate life with your unwanted companion; grief, you’d forgotten all about your feelings for Sylus.

They weren’t gone but they were muted, like a voice screaming out to you while your head was underwater. Most of the time they were easy to ignore, but in times like these they were too loud to overlook.

You couldn’t dwell on your self-pity for long because there was a knock at your door. No one ever knocked on your door, people just tended to barge in.

“Come in?” Confusion dripped from your voice. When the door opened to a pair of twins with shameful smiles, you knew they were about to ask you for a favour.

“We… fucked up.” Three words you never wanted to hear coming out of either Luke or Kieran’s mouth.

“What have you done?”

“Long story short. Boss sent us to pick up a gem for Miss Hunter’s birthday. It’s really rare. The man who owns them is this older, heart of gold type old guy who refuses to sell to nefarious people because of his outdated principles. He wouldn’t give it to us, said something about us being part of Onychinus. We knew if boss didn’t get this gem today he’d have our heads displayed on mantels in his office, so we threatened the old man with a gun and then an entire arsenal of security appeared out of thin air and we were blacklisted from the property.” Kieran’s explanation left you astounded. 

The twins had their fair share of asinine mistakes, but this one might have taken the cake. 

“You threatened an old man with a gun…” 

“Yes.” Kieran responded. 

“Over a gem?” You asked in disbelief. 

“A very rare gem!” Luke corrected. 

“Huh. How am I supposed to help?” It was a genuine question, you didn’t really see a way out of this one. 

“Can you go and convince the old man to sell the gem to you?” Kieran’s request made your eyes widen in protest.

“No way! I’ve had my fill of uncomfortable business meetings.” And wasn’t that the truth. If you had to see one more man in a business suit ask you ‘if you even knew what you were talking about’ you might throw your laptop into the first body of water you could find. 

“Please, Y/N. Sylus will kill us. Do you want our deaths to hang over your conscience?” 

Luke’s question was an innocent hyperbole, but at the mention of deaths hanging over your conscience, you were reminded of your mom. Your face dropped, your fingers slowly forgetting what they were supposed to type. Kieran, the more observant twin, elbowed Luke.

“Fuck, Y/N. I’m sorry, I forgot.”

“No, no, it’s fine. You don’t have to walk on eggshells around me, I’m not going to burst into tears.” You weren’t sure that was true quite yet, but fake it till you make it, right? 

“Will you help us? Please. We’ll owe you big time.” The line was clearly rehearsed since they said it in unison, or maybe it was some weird twin telepathy thing. Either way, it freaked you out so much you agreed. 

“Fine, what’s the address?”

_____________

You knocked on the large wooden door of a beautiful home. It was classically designed, a perfect intersection between modernity and the timeless complexity of archaic house designs. It was rare to see homes like these in a society that prided itself on progress. 

When you heard the sound of soft feet shuffling toward the door, you felt the guilt eat at you internally. You were tricking an old man into selling a gem to people he very reasonably did not want to sell to.

“Y/M/N?” 

Did he— why did he call you by your mother’s name?

“That was my mother, I’m her daughter, Y/N.”

“Oh, thank god, I was beginning to think I’d finally lost it. Come in, come in.” 

Your interest had been piqued, and you forgot all about the gem as you entered the old man’s home.

“I must say, I’m surprised you’re here. Did your mother send you?”

You swallowed the lump in your throat. “She passed away just over a month ago.”

“Oh god. I’m so sorry, dear. Are you alright?” The question was filled with so much warmth it made tears well up in your eyes. Your mother never had any friends, and you were estranged from your extended family. You were all alone in your grief, and hearing someone who knew your mom in some capacity ask you if you were alright felt bittersweet.

“Yeah. I’m doing okay. If you don’t mind me asking, how did you know her?”

“You don’t know? I figured that was why you were here.” 

Right. The reason you were here, the gem.

“No, I’m actually here entirely coincidentally, I came to acquire a gem.”

“Which gem were you after, dear?” He asked the question as he looked around his living room for something.

“The Painite one.”

He stopped pacing and turned to you with an accusatory stare. “This wouldn’t happen to be related to those two rowdy boys who came by earlier, right?”

“Well…” You couldn’t lie to him. He looked like the old man from ‘Up’, it was entirely unfair. 

“I’m afraid I can’t sell to you. I’m concerned you’ve even gotten yourself wrapped up in such a terrible organisation.” He shook his head, his disappointment evident in his tone. 

“Look, I know what you’ve heard, but most of the rumours you hear about Onychinus don’t have a modicum of truth to them.”

“Then why hasn’t your boss cleared them up?” A great question. 

“In this business its good to have a reputation that instills fear in others. You’ve seen what people do for Protocores and black-market items. Onychinus serves as a… regulatory body of the underworld, the only people they harm are those that harm others.” The practiced speech came from years of listening to Sylus give it to yourself and others. 

“I don’t know dear, I’ve heard some horrific things about their leader, Sylus.” You were probably responsible for a few of those rumours…

“The only horrific thing about him is his sharp tongue. Seriously, he has a way of finding your worst insecurity and then using it to drag you through the dirt.” Recognising the unhelpful tangent, you digressed.

“But when it comes to business, he’s fair and when someone hurts the people he cares about, he’s merciless. He has a good heart, it’s just encased under a very thick layer of stone.” When he didn’t look convinced, you continued. 

“In fact, he wants this gem for a woman. She’s special to him and its her birthday in a few days. She’s a hunter, by the way, she saves lives. So, even if you don’t want to sell to Sylus because he’s probably half demon, you should sell it to her. You know, by proxy.” The argument was a stretch but you couldn’t help your rambling. 

“You are the spitting image of your mother.” 

The comment caught you off-guard.

“You think so?”

“I knew your mother when she was your age. She used to sing live at a bar I frequented with my friends. It was a simpler time, before wanderers attacked. I was head over heels in love with her, and I knew she felt the same way about me. But, she got wrapped up with the wrong guy, a real bad man, and it took finding out she was pregnant with you to break it off with him.” He recounted his past as he continued to search his drawers for something, when he came back to the couch in front of yours, he handed you a photo.

It was of your mother, except she was much younger. She was on a stage performing, a part of her life she never told you about. She looked happy and was glowing with the kind of ethereal beauty that never dwindled with time. He was right, you looked a lot like her. 

“Can I keep this?” You looked up at the man, and he gave you a small nod. 

“Of course. You know, I offered to help her when I found out, said I’d raise the baby as my own, but she told me I was destined for more than she could give me. Said she had to do this on her own. She was stubborn but she loved boundlessly, Y/N, just like you.”

You were confused, this man hadn’t known you for very long, how could he know such a thing? “What do you mean?”

“I don’t know what that Sylus man has done to deserve your adoration, but I can tell you love him. And for you to come here on his behalf to convince me to sell him the rarest gem in the world for another woman? You truly do have your mother’s heart.” 

His words sprouted doubt and introspection. Why were you trying so hard to get Sylus such a romantic gift when it was meant for someone else? Were you secretly a masochist?

“If it’s alright with you Y/N, I’d love to get to know you. Your mother was my first love, and it’s nice to have someone to talk to about her.” 

You gave him the sincerest smile you could come up with. “I’d like that. I don’t really have anyone to talk to about her either.”

“As for the gem, I’ll sell it to you but only if you promise to love a man who will go to these lengths for you, not someone else.” 

“I promise.” You’d promise to try, at least. You told the man, who you now knew was Dr Jeffery Hunt the geologist, that you needed to get back to work. You exchanged contact information with a promise to catch up later and trade stories about your mom. 

You left the house with the rarest gem in the world in one hand, and an infinitely more valuable picture of your mother in the other. 

___________

You walked toward your office where Luke and Kieran should have been to find the door slightly ajar. You stopped just outside the door when you heard Sylus’s voice from inside your office.

“You sent Y/N to get the gem? Was the task too difficult for the two of you?” You tried to sympathise with the twins, but it was kind of funny to see Sylus berate someone else for once.

“The owner said he wouldn’t sell to Onychinus—” Kieran’s attempt at an explanation was shot down instantly.

“So you pick some random person off the street and send them in instead. You don’t send the girl the gem is for to go retrieve her own present. You have completely ruined the surprise.”

Wait, what?

“No, it’s fine, we sent Y/N not Miss Hunter.”

“Miss Hun— why would you assume it’s for her?” The question hung in there for an uncomfortable moment, after all you assumed the same thing. 

“Her birthday’s in a few days.” Luke timidly added. 

“How do you know that?” 

“It’s in the shared calendar.”

“Fuck.” 

With your ear plastered shamelessly against the door, you smiled to yourself. He had a bad habit of putting personal events in the shared calendar.

“The gem was for Y/N. Thanks to you imbeciles I have to figure something else out.” 

Why was the gem for you? Was it poisonous? You started down at the velvet box in your hand and wondered if the gem was secretly a teeny tiny bomb. 

“Is it Y/N’s birthday soon too?” Kieran’s question offended you. Your birthday was in March and both he and Luke were at your celebratory birthday dinner last year. 

“No, that’s in March. It’s to celebrate her 3rd year with Onychinus. Although now I’m wondering if your time here has come to an end.” It was kind of sadistic, but it was comforting to know that Sylus threatened other people’s job security over minor inconveniences too. 

“No! Please, we promise we’ll make it up to you.” 

You stopped listening to the conversation as you opened the box in your hand. The gem glistened under the artificial lights as questions fired off in your brain. He wanted to give this gem to you? How did he even remember the day you started at Onychinus? And he knew your birthday?

Before you could search for the answers, the sound of footsteps approaching the door made you panic. You tried fruitlessly to escape the long hallway but Sylus stormed out before you could.

“I um, got that gem for you.” You pretended you weren’t eavesdropping and held the gem out to him, but he pushed it back toward you. 

“Thanks. I was going to have it turned into a necklace, but since the cat’s out of the bag, you can decide what to do with it.” He clearly knew you’d heard everything and gave the twins a pointed glare as they scurried out of your office. 

“It’s really too much. Most employers get their employees a gift card or something.” You tried to hand it back again, but he was unrelenting. 

“I’m not most employers, and you definitely aren’t most employees.” The loaded compliment made you bite back a smile. 

“In that case, a necklace would be nice. I have a photo of my mom when she was my age, she wore a necklace with a similar looking gem. Do you think you could find someone who can copy the design? It would mean a lot. I’d pay for it, of course.” You kept the photo in your wallet now, it quickly became one of your favourites. When you passed the photo to him, he looked at it for far longer than necessary. 

“Consider it done, and your money’s no good with me. Save it for something else.” He paused for a moment, took a photo of the necklace on his phone and returned the photograph. “I see where you get your beauty from.” The comment was so nonchalant and inconsistent with Sylus’s usual dialogue that you were left speechless. Your heart battered against your ribcage as if it were trying to escape and mount itself onto him instead. Traitorous organ. 

You watched him turn around and walk toward his office. The sight of him walking away from you brought back memories of that day in the graveyard and what you’d said to Sylus before he left. 

“You can judge me all you want, but it won’t change the fact that when you die, no one will mourn you.”

The guilt was eating away at your conscience, and you knew you had to let him know that you didn’t mean what you said. Especially not now. 

“Sylus, wait.” He stopped just as his hand reached the doorknob of his office door and looked up at you expectantly.

You raked your mind for the right thing to say, and Sylus didn’t make a sound as you prolonged the silence. 

“If you died, I’d mourn you.” And you meant it. You maintained eye contact despite the urge to look away from his intense gaze in an attempt to convey your sincerity. 

He shook his head with a slight chuckle in response, and walked into his office wordlessly. 

You figured he hadn’t given what you said a second thought. It was foolish to think you could ever hurt the impenetrable Sylus’s feelings. You weren’t even sure he had feelings. 

But, unbeknownst to you, when Sylus closed the door behind him, he felt himself let out a breath that alleviated a pressure in his chest he didn’t know he’d been carrying. What you’d said to him in the graveyard weighed on him like an uncomfortable tumour. 

Sylus knew you were right, but the idea of no one caring for him never bothered him before, not until you said it. It dawned on him that the only person who’s idea of him actually affected how he thought of himself was yours. 

Late-November

“Finish up, we have a reservation at six.” At the sound of your boss’s  voice, you looked up from your computer screen. Your eyes were watery from staring at the ledger for hours but you still couldn’t reconcile the $15.70 that was missing. It was driving you insane.

“Was there a meeting I forgot existed?” The calendar looked empty from where it stood on your second monitor. Well, it was empty now that Sylus deleted the shared calendar event for Miss Hunter’s birthday which should’ve been yesterday. 

“No, it’s just us. I’m taking you to dinner. Now hurry up.” You couldn’t help the frown on your face. There was surely an ulterior motive. 

“Taking me to dinner? Are you asking me out on a date?” You were teasing; hell would freeze over before Sylus would ask anyone out on a date. Though, maybe he already had, after all he was busy yesterday…

“Don’t be ridiculous. We’re celebrating your third year with Onychinus. As an employer I believe rewarding long-term employees can strengthen their loyalty to the company.” He regurgitated the words like they were toxic. 

“You stole that from the last issue of Forbes magazine. I would know since I was the one who gave you the article.” It was titled ‘Ten foolproof ways to make your employees like you’ and you thought it would be funny to leave it on Sylus’s desk. 

“And I’m responding to your feedback like number 4 on that list suggested. Now, do you want to go to this dinner or should I ask someone else?” 

You quickly scrambled out of your seat, you couldn’t miss out on a chance to see Sylus actively try to be a regular boss. Who could say no to dinner and a show?

“No, no, I’ll go.” You grabbed your bag off of the floor and followed Sylus out of the building. You asked him a series of questions about where you were going, when you’d be back, if you were getting paid for the time you were forced to spend with him, but he answered none of them. 

Sylus was driving for all of 2 minutes before you began to draft an appreciation letter to the inventor of seatbelts in your head. 

“You know, you may be harder to kill than a regular person, but I will die if you crash this car.” Pleading for your life in an expensive sports car was not how you expected to go. 

“It’s a little early in the night for your theatrics, Y/N.” Sylus’s deadpan tone did nothing to soothe your concerns as he turned yet another sharp corner with aggressive speed. 

“It’s also a little early in my life to die.” You unhelpfully added.

“Relax, will you? I’ve never crashed before.” 

Well, there’s a first time for everything. You thought as you tightly gripped the handle of the door. You found yourself suddenly missing the middle-aged man who would grouchily drive you to and from work. At least he drove like he valued his life. 

 _______

When you arrived to the place in one piece you felt severely under dressed. Sylus was wearing his regular attire, a suit without the tie, and you were dressed in linen pants and a turtleneck. Sylus never enforced a business dress code, though in that moment you found yourself wishing he did.

The restaurant was multi-level and sat at the top of a mountain. The exterior screamed affluence and you were sure everyone who dined there was in a different tax-bracket. Sylus reserved a table on the rooftop which unfortunately meant you had to ascend four levels in your mediocre outfit that made you stick out like a sore thumb. 

When you eventually reached your table, you quickly hid in your seat. While it was unrealistic to assume anyone would pay you any attention but your embarrassment was usually irrational. Nor, did it help that Sylus naturally made heads turn wherever he went. He was freakishly tall and unnervingly handsome; next to him anyone struggled to look attractive.

“You’re in a rush. Hungry?” Sylus asked across from you as you buried your face in the menu. You didn’t feel like explaining how being out with him made you feel insecure, so you forewent a response. 

The waiter quickly returned with a bottle of wine. Of course Sylus’s favourite wine was known universally. Why wouldn’t it be? He practically ruled the N109 Zone.

“Thanks, she’ll have a mojito.” Before you could tell the waiter not to bring you your favourite cocktail, he was gone.

“I’m not drinking.” Your protest fell on deaf ears. “Drinking with your boss is like number 1 on the list of things you shouldn’t do if you value your job.”

“You don’t have to worry about embarrassing yourself in front of me, Y/N. You’ve done that plenty of times sober.” Sylus smirked as he made the dry joke and you held back the urge to step on his foot under the table.

Never mind. You needed a drink pronto.

“Asshole.” You muttered under your breath.

“What was that?”

“Artichokes! I said the artichoke salad looks good.” You could tell Sylus wasn’t convinced, but he dropped the matter anyway. 

“Order whatever you’d like.” 

“There’s no prices on the menu.” You flipped it around every which way but not a single price appeared.

“Sweetheart, the people who can afford to dine here aren’t too concerned with prices. Don’t worry and order what you wish.”

Aw, how sweet. Sylus thought you enquired about the prices because you were concerned about overspending. As if. You knew that man’s financials inside and out, if anything, you wanted to order the most expensive things on the menu. 

“Jeez, my bad Mr One-Percent.” Your joke was not well received.

“Can we have one night without your incessant sarcasm?” The plea sounded genuine, but it was denied. 

“We could, but that’s no fun.”

“I find you painfully unfunny, Y/N.” You smiled to yourself at his blatant lie. Everyone found you funny. 

Before you could think of a retort, Sylus pulled out a large velvet box and slid it toward you on the table.

“What’s this?”

“The necklace.”

You opened it up eagerly and the sight of it brought pure bliss to your heart. It was exactly like the one your mother wore, and it was even more beautiful in person.

“It’s perfect. Thank you.” Feeling slightly remorseful for your attitude prior to the gift-exchange, you gave him a sheepish smile.

Sylus watched you lift it up to put it on, but quickly interjected. “Allow me.” He stood up, walking toward your seat. Flushed, you clumsily turned around so your back was facing him. You felt goosebumps on your skin when his cold hands bunched your hair away from your neck, the tips of his fingers leaving a trail of wired nerves in their wake.

You took your hair from his hand to hold it up, the mere feeling of your fingers brushing his gave you heart palpitations. The act was way too intimate, and despite how it good it felt to have him so close, your brain knew it was safest to pray it would be over soon.

When Sylus was done he spun you around to face him and shamelessly observed his handiwork. “It looks good.” Your brain short-circuited the moment your eyes met his, so you sat in front of him in complete silence.

The moment was rudely interrupted by the sound of a familiar voice.

“Sylus? Y/N? Fancy seeing you here!” You both turned to the source of the voice to see Miss Hunter in a beautiful baby blue gown. As if you didn’t feel bad enough about your choice in attire. You began to smile until you noticed that the arm linked with hers belonged to your mortal enemy. Dr Zayne. 

You got up to greet them, despite your primal urge to push Zayne off the roof, but Sylus beat you to it. “Miss Hunter, always a pleasure.” You tried not to gag at the sight of Sylus being so gentlemanly. It became particularly hard when he kissed the top of her hand. 

“I didn’t know you knew Dr Zayne.” The comment slipped out of Sylus’s tense smile with a twinge of what you thought was hostility. Was he jealous that she was with Dr Zayne? Were you jealous that he was jealous? Are you in a soap opera?

“Oh, he’s a childhood friend andmy doctor! I’m very lucky. How do you know him?” Before you could whisper to Sylus to make up some excuse, he was firing off information about your personal life to the last two people you wanted to discuss your personal life with. 

“He was Y/N’s mother’s doctor.” Everyone went tense, everyone except for Miss Hunter, of course. 

Your eyes followed her as she turned to you, praying she wouldn’t ask about your mother’s health. Instead, she praised your nemesis. “He’s brilliant, isn’t he?”

You wanted to scream in protest. You wanted to swing a chair into Dr Zayne’s head, and then use the broken scraps to beat him to a pulp. But you opted to force a painful smile instead. 

“He’s definitely something.” You looked right at Zayne, hoping he’d understand the implications of your backhanded compliment.  

“Well, we were just here to celebrate my birthday yesterday, but the hostess said it was all booked out and silly Zayne forgot to make a reservation. We just came up to the rooftop to get some pictures, but you guys should enjoy your dinner!” Miss Hunter’s polite dismissal was the perfect opportunity to end the painfully awkward interaction and move on with your night. 

“Thanks.” You were about to return to your seat when Sylus decided to continue with his commitment to ruining your life.

“You guys should join us, the more the merrier, right Y/N?”

The question you had no idea how to answer only poked at the jar of pent up murderous rage you were trying to suppress. It wasn’t like you were subtle about your hatred for the Doctor, why the hell was Sylus inviting them to stay?

“Right.” You couldn’t have sounded less sincere if you tried, but you couldn’t bring yourself to care. You had to focus on making it out of this building without a homicide charge.

When Miss Hunter happily agreed, Sylus quickly waved down a waiter and made them transform your two-seater table into a four-seater. Unfortunately for you, the seating arrangements somehow ended up with you next to Zayne and Sylus next to Miss Hunter . 

Zayne could feel the hostility radiating off of you in waves, but he was too scared to do anything about it. 

“Happy birthday, by the way.” You offered Miss Hunter the nicety, since she was really the only innocent person at the table. Your unfounded hatred for her took the back-burner when Zayne was around. 

“Thanks, Y/N. I love your necklace, where did you get it?” Yet another question you didn’t know how to answer. If this was how the entire night was going to be you might as well cut your losses and take your chances with jumping off the roof.

“It’s um, custom made.” You avoided Sylus’s glare. 

“Well it’s beautiful.” You couldn’t help but smile at her compliment. Her sunshine-y attitude could rival yours. 

“Sylus knows the guy who made it, I’m sure he could get one for you too.” You glanced at him only to see him quirk an eyebrow at your response. Was he seriously mad? You were practically the world’s greatest wingwoman. 

When Miss Hunter turned to look at him, he quickly shut her down.  “He retired right after making that piece, actually. Something about getting arthritis.” 

He was definitely lying. You weren’t sure why he was gatekeeping this jeweller and you never got the chance to ask. 

“Oh, that’s unfortunate. Hey Zayne, you’ve been awfully quiet. Say something!” Miss Hunter gave him a playful push on the shoulder as she teased him. The sight would’ve been adorable if it weren’t for satan’s incarnate sitting inches away from you.

“Yeah Zayne, how was work? Steal anymore hearts lately?” You asked the deceivingly innocuous question while breaking apart a piece of bread. The double-entendre was like a secret you both shared; though the idea of sharing anything with that waste of space made you inscrutably angry. 

Sylus silently observed the interaction with curiosity. Your passive-aggressiveness was a trait he thought you only reserved for him. You were always nice, to everyone. Seeing you treat Zayne so coldly was like witnessing a beaver play the piano. It was unnatural. 

“Work went as well as expected.” Zayne’s clipped reply left no room for further discussion. The conversation came to do a lull, and you took it as the opportunity to excuse yourself to the bathroom. You immediately beelined away from the table that currently situated your nightmare blunt rotation and toward the women’s bathroom that was positively Zayne-free. 

The bathroom was just as extravagant as the rest of the restaurant but you didn’t get to admire it before you splashed water on your face in an attempt to cool down. There was no way you could last an entire dinner next to Zayne. Maybe you could say you were feeling sick. Probably a bad idea when he’s a doctor. Work emergency wasn’t plausible, your boss was at the table. What if you just ran away? You could live with the shame and embarrassment.

You looked up at the ceiling and silently cursed the heavens for your terrible luck. Seriously, you must’ve been a serial killer in your past life to deserve this fate. It was a never-ending series of unfortunate events, and you were desperate for a break. 

When you eventually left the bathroom, Zayne was standing right outside the door. He startled you, but the moment the shock wore off your face morphed into a deadly glare. 

“Look, I know you think I’m a terrible person but—”

“Monster is the term I’d use, but go on.” You rudely interrupted Zayne. He chose not to acknowledge your comment. 

“I rarely get to spend time with MC and I’d really appreciate it if you didn’t ruin her birthday dinner because of me.” It didn’t take long for you to realise that MC must’ve been Miss Hunter’s first name. 

Zayne ruined everything he touched, he needed no help from you. 

“I’m sorry, does the fact that I’m angry at you for letting my mother die put a damper in your dinner plans?”

“Yes it does, actually.” Zayne responded quickly. He either didn’t understand sarcasm or was an even bigger dick than you thought.

“Then might I suggest you take her someplace else. It’s your fault you couldn’t get a table here. Why should I have to suffer because your incompetence knows no bounds?” You couldn’t think of a time you’d insulted someone so much in such quick succession. Dr Zayne brought out the worst in you, but you could reflect on your actions later. Right now you were at war. 

“We are perfectly capable of having an amicable dinner.” 

You rolled your eyes at his condescending tone. “You might be, I’m not that mature.” 

“Y/N. We’re both adults.” He pleaded.

“Bite me.” 

Before Zayne could open his mouth again, Sylus interrupted.

“Everything all good here?” For once in your life, you were grateful for Sylus’s interruption. 

“No.” You said.

“Yes.” Zayne also said, at the exact same time.

“Zayne you should head back to the table. Miss Hunter's waiting for you.” Zayne didn’t think twice before taking the out and you internally flipped off his retreating form.

Sylus grabbed you by the forearm, his grip tight as he dragged you to a secluded part of the rooftop and away from the bathrooms. 

“What’s going on with you?” He asked the moment you stopped moving, his hand still gripping onto your arm like a vice. 

“Can you let go? You’re hurting me.” He quickly released you, his eyes washing over with something you couldn’t recognise as you soothed the part he’d rubbed raw. 

“Why are you acting so childish?” His question would've angered you had you not been angry already.

“I hate his guts.” The response did not help your case, but you weren’t very articulate when you were upset. 

“What did he do to you?” Sylus’s eyes narrowed, and he spoke in a low tone that was laced with danger. You didn’t think too much of his strange reaction, Sylus acting strange was pretty much the only consistent thing in your life lately. 

You gnawed on your lip, unsure of how to respond. Your grievance against the world-renowned doctor was one you’d always kept to yourself. After all, everyone had nothing but praise for the brilliant Dr Zayne. 

“Y/N, if he touched you I’ll—” Your eyes quickly widened in shock at his interpretation.

“No! Nothing like that. It’s just, a few days before my mom died, a heart came in that was a match. But there was this other guy who was younger and needed it just as badly. The policy was that the hospital's medical board would vote on who got the heart and the entire board, Zayne included, unanimously agreed that the heart should go to the other guy.” They said it wasn't personal, that it had everything to do with survival rates, but there was no way to detach personhood from medicine.

You realised that when you said it out loud, your hate seemed unfounded. “I know it wasn’t entirely his fault, but he didn’t even try to give my mom a fighting chance. He didn't say anything to sway them, he just silently agreed. He was supposed to be her advocate.” The frustration began to boil over, and before you knew it there were tears welling up in your eyes.

“God, I spent every last dollar of my paycheque to make sure she got the greatest medical care money could buy. Everyone said he was the best, but when it really mattered, he did nothing for her. I was such an idiot.” There was an uncontrollable fountain of tears streaming down your face, and you were grateful for Sylus’s decision to drag you to somewhere secluded. 

The familiar tendrils of an oncoming panic attack began to wash over you as you began to hyperventilate. No matter how much you wanted to blame Dr Zayne, or the universe, or your shitty luck, the only person you could really blame was yourself. You sent her to that hospital, you convinced her to hold on for a transplant, you spent her last months on this Earth slaving away in another city instead of by her side. There was no way to get that time back. 

“Y/N, look at me. It’s not your fault.” Sylus’s voice was like a beacon of light that led you through the dark tunnel you were trapped in. He cradled your face in his hands, wiping away your tears as they continued to stream down your face. But when your tears showed no signs of slowing, he pulled you into his arms, his hands holding your tear-stricken face against his chest.

He ran his long fingers through your hair as he whispered everything you wanted to hear. "It’s not your fault. It’s okay to hate him. It will get easier."

You weren’t sure how long you spent with your face buried in his chest, but by the time you’d returned to reality, his white dress shirt was slightly transparent where your tears soaked through the material. 

You laughed a little at the sight, and the corners of Sylus’s lips raised ever so slightly at the sound. When he saw you were okay, Sylus began to speak. “Don’t move. I’ll grab your bag and we’ll get out of here.”

Before he could leave you tugged on the sleeve of his suit jacket. “Hey, I’m sorry I ruined your dinner.” You truly were. Sylus did not deserve to be subjected to yet another one of your meltdowns, but he seemed to have a habit of being at the wrong place at the wrong time. 

“No it's my fault, I ruined it by inviting them to join us. I promise I’ll make it up to you.” Sylus then manoeuvred through the restaurant toward the nightmare table. When he returned with your bag in one hand and the other outstretched toward you, your heart skipped a beat. Or two. He played the role of the knight-in-shining-armour quite seamlessly, and he looked every bit the handsome prince charming. You tried to remind yourself why it was so dangerous to be attracted to a force like Sylus, but when he smiled at you like you were the only two people in the room, all caution was thrown to the wind. 

_____________

In the spirit of making things up to you, you made Sylus take you to a restaurant of your choosing. It was a hole-in-the-wall dumpling place that charged so little one would question if they were serving real meat. But you never found better dumplings, so you took the risk anyway.

The dynamic was completely subverted as you sat on the table that was slightly sticky with cheap cleaning chemicals. Sylus was the one who looked out of place, his suit was unarguably the most expensive thing in the room and it brought joy to your miserable night to see him out of his comfort zone.

“How did you find this place?” The question was warranted, other than you two, the only other occupants in the restaurant were a few middle-schoolers.  

“I used to come here a lot with my friends in high school.”

“Did they all die from food poisoning?” Sylus seemed proud of his quick-witted joke. You gave him a pointed glare to convey just how unfunny that joke was. 

“Funny, but no. We just drifted apart after we graduated.” The clipped reply shut down any further inquiry. You thought back to the fond memories you had in that restaurant. Things were different when you didn’t yet know the cost of failure; before you knew what you’d be losing. And while everyone may have moved on from this small town in the N109 Zone, you never left. 

“Do you even have any friends?” You choked on your drink at the question. He was genuinely asking and the worst part was, you really didn’t.

Your constant struggle to make ends meet and maintain a high GPA for your academic scholarships made it impossible to have a social life. It didn’t help that you went to a college you couldn’t afford. It was hard to find people to relate to when everyone had grown up with silver spoons. Then after you graduated you landed at Onychinus, and it wasn’t exactly a friendly environment.

“Of course I have friends.” Your lie was a feeble attempt to preserve the last of your dignity. Sylus had seen you at your absolute worst, but there was something extremely dehumanising about letting him know you were insanely lonely.

“Really, who?” His genuine surprise only made your insecurity worse.

“You don’t have to sound so shocked. Plus, you wouldn’t know them.” 

“Try me.” Of course he wouldn’t drop it. When has Sylus ever let something go?

“Well, there’s Mr Demir, and Luke and Kieran, and my newly acquired friend Dr Hunt.” In a desperate attempt to keep up your lie, you pretty much just named all the people you knew. 

“Y/N, that’s the man who sells you your sandwiches, my assistants, and a geologist who sold you a gem.” 

“Has anyone ever told you that no one likes a know-it-all?” 

“I think you should get out more. Maybe tone down the sarcasm and you might just make a friend or two.” Your jaw-dropped in faux shock at his unsolicited advice.

“You’re one to talk, your best friend is a mechanical crow.” You snuck a dumpling off of his plate while he was distracted.

“I don’t need friends, they’re unnecessary burdens.” He took a swig of his beer. You thought he’d burst into flames if he drank anything other than red wine, but he adapted to his surroundings with little effort.

You put a hand on your heart as if in pain and jokingly gave him a solemn look.“Then why would you wish such a cruel fate onto me?”

“Because I hate seeing you this miserable, Y/N.” The amusement from your banter died a quick death at his confession. You thought you kept it together most of the time, though bawling your eyes out in the N109 Zone’s hottest restaurant probably didn’t do that facade any good. But for the most part, you handled the death of your mother relatively well. 

“I’m not miserable. Not all of the time at least. Like right now, I’m only mildly annoyed!” You tried to change the topic the only way you knew how, with humour, but Sylus wasn’t budging.

“You take care of everyone but yourself and all it’s done is isolate you. There needs to be a give and take, sweetheart. People don’t like feeling useless.” He spoke to you softly, as if he was scared the timbre of his voice would cause you to shatter into a million pieces. 

There was a sinking feeling in your stomach that followed his oddly specific guidance. He seemed to know more about you than you thought he did, and you were torn between feeling seen and feeling judged. 

“That’s sound advice. Guess you’ve been reading more magazines.” You were grasping at straws, willing to try anything to get the unwanted spotlight off of your inadequacies. 

“You also need to learn how to accept help without downplaying your problems.” 

“Okay, okay. You sound like my mother. Has her soul possessed you?” There you go Y/N. Play the dead mom card, that’ll work. 

He chuckled at your joke. You knew he found you funny.

“You don’t know when to quit, do you?”

“Yeah, the manufacturers didn’t include an off-switch. No refunds, sorry.” You stuffed a dumpling in your mouth as the tension subsided. 

“Oh, I’m not returning you, sweetheart. They’ll have to pry you from my cold dead hands.” While you knew he was probably referring to the value you brought his company as his accountant, you couldn’t stifle the butterflies that wreaked havoc in your stomach.

You didn’t move when Sylus’s car stopped outside your house. 

“Thanks for tonight, I had fun. Sorry it didn’t go to plan.” You turned to him after you unbuckled your seatbelt and the tight confines of the car felt even smaller.

“It’s fine, I liked this version of events better anyway.” His low voice reverberated through the small distance between you, nestling in your heart that was beating unhealthily fast. 

“Me too. Next time you take a girl to dinner you ought to let her know if she’s supposed to dress like she’s going to the met gala.” Your advice had a bitter undertone because part of you still wished you could be the only girl he’d take to dinner. 

“I usually do, but this particular girl doesn’t need a fancy dress to be the most beautiful girl in the room.” The candid compliment made the butterflies do summersaults, and while their gymnastics routine continued, you found yourself at a loss for words.

“Goodnight, Y/N.” Sylus leaned over the centre console and opened the door for you, completing the chivalrous act of opening the door for you in his own unique fashion. He was so close, all it would take was one small move and his lips could’ve been on yours.

“Goodnight.” You barely got the word out through the sudden bout of breathlessness you were experiencing. And when you were finally encased in the familiar four walls of your home, you thought about every moment you shared with Sylus and how different he seemed from the man you knew before. 

The weekend passed by in a blur. The necklace that looked like a carbon copy of your mom’s was nestled on your neck. A permanent reminder that made ‘Operation Sylus: No More’ infinitely harder to achieve. 

Perhaps you shouldn’t have asked him to stop being a dick, because what you thought would be an easy feat was beginning to feel like climbing a mountain with a peak you couldn’t even see. 

You were staring at the list on your notes app on your brand new phone in hopes of searing it into your memory. 

Operation Sylus: No More

The foolproof guide of getting rid of all feelings Sylus related by the end of November. 

Step 1: avoid Sylus and all thoughts of him at all costs.

Step 2: no more funny jokes, his laugh is seriously deadly. 

Step 3: force yourself to remember Miss Hunter in moments of weakness. She’s the one he really wants. 

Step 4: try to find love elsewhere, like the corner shop owner, he may be in his 50s and happily married but he’s kind of a silver-fox!

Step 5: do not, under any circumstances, allow yourself to be alone with Sylus for too long.

You violated step 5 that Friday when you let him take you to dinner and you were reaping the consequences of your mistake. There was no way you could survive the free-fall if you couldn't get your heart to obey your mind. The disconnect between the two vital organs might be the thing that kills you.

When you heard something shatter in the hallway, you quickly put your phone down and went out to investigate.

The door opened to Mephisto standing on a side table where an empty vase used to sit. The vase was now on the floor in pieces in front of your feet. 

“You did this on purpose.” You pointed an accusing finger at the bird, but all he did was tilt his head to the side as if he couldn’t understand you. You knew he could understand you perfectly well.

The cold war between you two started in your first week at Onychinus when he would swoop at your head spontaneously for no reason. Sylus told you he did it to everyone he didn’t trust and that he’d be over it in due time, but you were too vindictive to let it slide. 

Several back-and-forth pranks later, the bird seemed to have remembered the tradition you managed to forget. “If this is your way of saying you miss me then you take an awful lot after your owner.” Your words faded as you made your way to the kitchen to find the broom. However, upon your return you saw that the floor was flawless and the door to your office was closed.

You rushed in with unparalleled speed to see your worst nightmare; Sylus leaning against your desk in his usual model-like fashion with your phone in his hand.

Panic coursed through you like never before as you remembered what had been left open on your phone when you set it down and the painful fact that you left it unlocked. 

Prayers for a sinkhole to open up and consume you in that very moment went unanswered as Sylus looked up at you with a smirk on his face.

“Is my laugh really deadly?” He looked amused. 

Come on sinkhole. Anytime now. 

When you didn’t answer, Sylus moved toward you. When he was close enough to touch you, he leaned down to make sure your eyes were on his.

“Your deadline is fast approaching, Y/N. Care for a progress report?” The taunting question made heat rush to your face.

“It was stupid, I wrote it months ago.”

“Then why did you have it open?” 

You couldn’t exactly tell him that his willingness to change his cold and cruel demeanour just to keep you as his accountant revived the feelings you thought were long dead. You definitely couldn’t tell him that the necklace that suddenly weighed down your chest made your heart skip a beat every time you touched it. And there was no way you were telling him that the dinner you shared was the happiest you’d felt in a long time.

“I was going to delete it when I heard Mephisto break something in the hallway.”

“Delete it? Guess you don’t need it anymore.”

“Nope.” You popped the P on the word for emphasis. “Can I have my phone back now?” He placed the device into your outstretched hand. 

“So how do you feel about me now, sweetheart?”

You tried your best to appear unperturbed by his taunting. “Mad at your blatant violation of my privacy.”

“Forgive me. I saw my name on your phone when I went to check in on you and I was curious.”

“Mephisto told you I broke the vase, didn’t he?”

“Don’t deflect. Do you still have feelings for me?”

“No, they’re gone. Can we please drop this? It’s embarrassing.” You lied in favour of self-preservation and hoped he wouldn’t be able to see through your act.

“There’s nothing to be embarrassed about, Y/N. Many women confess their love for me every month.” You rolled your eyes at his ardent display of over-confidence and narcissism, though you knew he wasn’t exaggerating.  

“Okay, brace yourself there bachelor. No one said anything about love.” It was true, you never said you loved him. Whether or not you did, well that was a secret you’d take to the grave. 

“So then which feeling are we discussing?” The loaded question came out of his mouth so casually, like someone ordering a latte. A display of power that reminded you of just how little this mattered to him. 

Your feet felt like they were grounded in their place by an invisible force and you were sure your cheeks were beet red. You knew your mouth was slightly agape in shock, but you couldn’t even close it. Meanwhile, Sylus was unfazed, treating your feelings like a game. 

“Since when do you even care about how I feel?” The sudden outburst was accompanied by your hand running through your hair out of frustration.

Sylus’s jaw clenched and for a moment he said nothing. There was no hint of amusement left on his features. 

“You think I don’t care about you?” He seemed irritated by the premise, but you couldn’t figure out why. You thought Sylus was proud of his clear disregard for other people’s emotions. 

“You treated me like gum stuck to the bottom of your boot for years. What reason did you give me to think otherwise?”

“I don’t know, maybe the fact that I pay you more than my highest ranking footmen. Or that I had Mephisto tail you when you used to bike to and from work to make sure you got home safe. Hell, I invented the lunch budget when I hired you just to make sure you were eating— I even banned mushrooms from my kitchen in case you wanted to eat here. Not to mention the bullshit extra work I’d assign you just so you would stay longer.” 

Choosing not to dwell on the implication of his silent acts of kindness, you interjected. “Hey, I took those tasks seriously!” The twins thought you were crazy when you asked if Sylus was making those assignments up. You knew you were right. 

“Don’t interrupt me.” Your mouth clamped shut at his rather reasonable request. Sylus wasn’t a big talker, so when he monologued, it was important. 

“Your kindness, your humour, it all caught me off guard. No one ever treated me like you did and I had no idea how to feel. The little doodles you sent back to me on the notes I left you delineating tasks? I kept every last one. When Mephisto complained to me about that time you put corn-starch in his water fountain and almost destroyed his wiring, all I could do was laugh. I treated you like I treated all my men because I didn’t want people to find out that you were my weakness.”

You swallowed the lump in your throat, but the pressure wasn’t budging. There was so much you didn’t know about Sylus, so much you completely misunderstood. This revelation caused a series of chain reactions to go off inside your brain and the weight of what he was trying to say felt suffocating.

You dreamed of a time where Sylus would reciprocate your feelings, but the reality of it was more daunting than you realised.

“All my threats are empty with you, Y/N. You’re the only one who gets away with the attitude you give me. You tell me you crashed a car worth over half-a-million dollars and all I could think about was if you were okay. I even offered to buy your house for way more than it was worth just to get you back. Do you seriously think I don’t care?” 

All sound came to a stifling halt. 

“Wait, you were the ‘developer’?”

The inklings of betrayal wove their way through your skin as the pieces began to fall into place. The timing of the eviction notice, the fact that he’d shown up at your house the day you received it, the way he was so quick to agree to the ridiculous bonus. 

He manipulated you like a puppet on a string and let you think you were in control the entire time.

“Don’t look at me like I’m some traitor.” His audacious demand made your blood boil.

“You are a traitor! How could you do that to me?” You yelled.

“You were going to leave me like I was nothing!” For the first time since you’d met him, Sylus raised his voice to match yours. Your entire body went cold at his vulnerability. He was afraid of being abandoned, and that was a fear you both shared.

“Not seeing you every day made my heart feel like it was being ripped out of my chest. I could barely focus, all I could think about was what you were doing, who you were with. So imagine my surprise when I come to find that while I’m being tortured every minute I’m away from you, you needed more time.

“I knew I was being selfish, I knew that your grief had nothing to do with me, but I’ve never been good at putting my feelings into words. That day in the graveyard when you wouldn’t even look at me, I thought I’d lost you for good. It ate at me like a parasite. I had to get you back and I won’t apologise for not playing fair. There isn’t a rule I wouldn’t break for you, Y/N.”  

It was hard to hate him for what he did when you understood where he was coming from. You were two sides of the same coin. While you overcompensated for the lack of love in your life by becoming the ultimate people-pleaser, he avoided it at every turn, saw it as a weakness. But at the core of every human being was an innate desire to be loved and an inherent fear of being abandoned. 

People couldn’t leave your life if you never let them in. That was a philosophy you saw both your mother and Sylus live by. It was lonely and difficult, and if you had the power of hindsight you would’ve tried harder to convince your mother she was worthy of love. You couldn’t make that same mistake again. 

You loved Sylus, that much was ingrained into the flesh of your heart. For all his rugged edges, he had a way of making things happen that was akin to magic. His determination, his grit, it was admirable.

His intelligence was infuriating, you couldn’t get anything past him. If he received the Greeks’ horse instead of the Trojans, you were sure he’d have seen right through their ruse. 

His desire to make the N109 Zone a better place stemmed from a sense of altruism you could only hope to possess. And when Sylus did things for others, he never expected anything in return. 

But for all his greatest traits he had some difficult ones too. He’d hurt you more times than you could count, and even if he’d changed drastically since your mother’s death, you couldn’t quite trust that he wouldn’t hurt you again.

“You already know how I feel about you.” You confessed. It was no secret you wore your heart on your sleeve, despite your mother’s constant reminders that the world was filled with terrible people who’d take advantage of your candour. You chose to see the good in others, it boded better than the grim lifestyle that came with perpetual pessimism. 

“Then why are you fighting this?” His question came out pained, and it was one you could answer. 

“I’ve loved you for a long time, Sylus. I loved you even though you insulted me, ignored me, reminded me I was replaceable every chance you got.

“I told myself it was just how you were, that it wasn’t personal. But when you walked out on me in the hospital when I needed you the most, I loved you a little less.”

Sylus felt an unfamiliar twinge in his chest, like someone took a needle to his heart. He left that hospital because he wasn’t sure you’d even want him there, and it pained him to see you so distraught over a problem he couldn’t fix. When MC came to him with an important mission in Skyhaven, he saw an out, and like the coward he was he took it. If he knew that you’d lose your mother while he was away, he never would have left your side. 

“When you didn’t call until weeks later, when you showed up only to tell me I was being dramatic for grieving, I loved you even less. Every time you screwed me over you made it easier to live without you.”

It hurt to remember the pain you were in back then, the immense pressure of the burdens you carried. But if there was ever a chance of you and Sylus working out, he needed to know the truth. 

“I’ve only ever loved two people, Sylus, and in one month it felt like I’d lost them both. I still love you, I’m afraid I couldn’t stop if I tried, but I don’t know if I can be more than your accountant right now.” You couldn’t survive another heartbreak, that much was for sure. 

Even though Sylus looked like he was going to be sick, you continued. 

“I thought I was okay with you treating me like everybody else, thought I was strong enough to take it. But when I saw you with Miss Hunter and the softness with which you spoke to her, it broke me. I saw that you were capable of being gentle. You just didn’t think I was a worthy recipient of your kindness.”

He was quick to correct you. “That’s not true, sweetheart. Not at all. She has something I need, something I can’t take with force. It’s why I’ve had to adopt unusual methods. If I’d known it was causing you so much pain I would’ve explained. Fuck, Y/N, you deserve so much more than just my kindness, more than I could ever give you. I can’t even think of a person on Earth who deserves you at all.” 

When Sylus saw the tears begin to slide down your cheeks, he resisted the urge to wipe them away.

“I’ll give you anything you ask for, anything but letting you go. There’s nothing so broken it can’t be fixed, Y/N. You taught me that. Let me fix this.” He tested the waters by taking your hand in his and when you let him, he pulled you into his arms. 

For a moment, the room was silent. You listened to his heartbeat through his chest and it might have been even faster than yours. It felt like deja vu, reminding you of that moment in the restaurant, or that time in his hallway after Zayne’s phone call. Sylus was there to comfort you more often than not, why were you so scared of letting him in?

“I want to believe you, I just don’t know that I can.” Your voice was small, timid. As if you were afraid something you’d say would shatter the sanctity of this moment and you’d find out it was all a dream. 

“I won’t stop trying until you do, sweetheart. You’re it for me, there’s no one else.” He kissed the top of your head with a softness you didn’t know he possessed and the words were like bandages wrapping around the wounds inflicted by your own envy.

In the comfortable silence, Sylus made a vow. “I don’t have regrets — you know that quite well — but I regret the way I treated you. I’ll spend every lifetime repenting for my mistakes, Y/N, and I promise I’ll never let anything hurt you again.” He squeezed you tighter and the comfort his warmth brought you was a welcome change to the cold you lived in all the time. 

Desperate to diffuse the overwhelming angst of the situation, you pulled away from his embrace and clapped your hands together. “Okay then, as of today we commence ‘Operation Sylus: The Redemption'.”

His loud laugh resounded through your office, and it was a sound you’d never get tired of hearing. He grabbed your chin. “Have you always been this corny?” 

“I watch a lot of movies, okay? Now, shake on it.” You shook his hand off your face and held out your hand with an invitation that he instantly accepted. With his warm hand encasing yours, you whole-heartedly hoped this operation would be a success. 

Late December

You assumed the dynamic between you and Sylus would drastically change following your impromptu heart-to-heart. But the changes came in small waves. 

It started with the middle-aged man who silently drove you to and from work with a permanent scowl on his face being replaced by Sylus himself.

Then there was the sticky notes he’d usually place on documents explaining the task and deadline, now with an added addendum.

— That necklace was the best decision I’ve ever made.

— Your hair looks especially nice today.

— Did you switch perfumes? I like it.

— That new lipstick suits you. Your lips are all I can think about. 

You saved all of them in a drawer at your desk. 

He had someone bring you your lunch every day and spent your entire lunch break with you. Somedays you talked until your tongue felt like it was going to fall off, other days you just sat and ate together in silence. And every Friday afternoon, instead of taking you straight home, he’d take you to visit your mother’s grave with a new bouquet in his hands. 

You were glad he was taking things slow. His small gestures made your heart flutter without overwhelming you, but it had been a month since your confrontation, and he didn’t even try to touch you. 

While your inexperience with love, lust and romance never impacted any significant aspect of your life before, it was growing increasingly difficult to wait for Sylus to make the first move. He didn’t want to scare you, that much was understandable. But you were growing angsty waiting for him the tension between you two hit a boiling point.

The glorious plan came to you while you were shopping with Luke and Kieran for Onychinus’s annual Christmas gala. It was a networking event masked under the guise of a holiday celebration where the people hiding in the shadows of the underworld could spend one night communicating on the surface.

Every year, Sylus insisted he couldn’t outsource waiters for the event because of potential security leaks, so you, the twins and a couple other of his staff were forced to fill in as the help. Sylus told you that you wouldn’t have to participate this year, but you began to look forward to the event. It was like an unorthodox Christmas tradition.

Your eyes drifted to the costume section of the party store, and when they landed on a short red Santa’s helper dress, you felt a lightbulb turn on in your head. Maybe you had to give Sylus a little nudge.

“Hey, aren't you guys kind of bored of the slacks and the dress shirts he makes us wear?” You sowed the seed of doubt into your unwilling accomplices.

“Duh. I hate dressing like a butler.” Luke’s eyes continued to scan the aisle for decorations. The hall was professionally decorated, but you added your own little details every year. It made things less drab and it gave the twins an excuse to spend hours in the party supply store. 

“What if we went with Christmas themed costumes this year?” The twins turned to look at you with confusion, but they quickly warmed up to the idea when you pointed at the wall of seasonal costumes.

“I’m Rudolph!” They made their declarations in unison before breaking out into an argument in the middle of the party store.

“Just flip a coin!” You desperately suggested, taking a coin out of your wallet and placing it on your thumb, ready to flip. People were beginning to stare.

“I’m heads!” They said in unison, again.

“Kieran you’re heads, Luke you’re tails.” You assigned them the parts of the coin alphabetically and watched it flip through the air. When it landed in your hands, it displayed tails. You silently hoped they would move on from this unnecessary battle and restore peace to your shopping trip again.

“Sorry Kieran, Luke’s Rudolph.” Kieran complained for the rest of the day about how annoying being an elf was, and how, since he was an inch taller than Luke, it only made sense for Luke to be the elf instead. 

They argued like the siblings you never had, and for all the pain and suffering they caused you, there was no denying you loved having them around. Besides, working for Sylus left the three of you trauma-bonded for life. There wasn’t really an out from this unconventional friendship. 

_________________

You failed to remember to clear the costume idea with Sylus before the gala. He was just so busy trying to organise the event, and you were similarly swamped with ensuring all the invoices were sent out on time to the right vendors. You barely saw each other in the days leading up to the big event.

The dress was shorter on you than you anticipated. Coming up just above mid-thigh, it was nothing like anything you owned in your closet. The little hat it came with was cute though and you pinned it to your hair. The make-up you wore was the same as your everyday makeup, barring the eyeliner you’d spent way too long trying to perfect and your lipstick. 

Other than the dress, you really did look the same as you did most of the time. Would Sylus even notice?

Right on cue, a knock on your door snapped you out of your train of thought, and you took a deep breath before opening it. 

As you expected, Sylus looked unfazed by your choice in attire as you moved out of the doorway to let him in.

“I see we’ve foregone the uniforms this year.” His comment was a welcome distraction from your insecurities.

“Whimsy is part of the Christmas spirit, you know.”

“It’s cute. Did you get that dress from the children’s section?”

The question came so out of left-field it left you were stunned. Once the shock settled in, you suddenly felt self-conscious.

“No… Why? Does it look childish?” You couldn’t help the vulnerability in your voice. 

Sylus closed the distance between you in a few long strides, his hands were on you in an instant. His palm was holding onto your waist the other tracing alone the edge of your dress. 

“Quite the opposite, I’m just wondering why they’d make a dress so short for adult women.” 

“Adult women can dress however they want, Sylus.” You chided.

“I know, but I’ll have my hands full if I’m trying to host this event and take care of the hoards of men that will be chasing after my girl at the same time.” He whispered the words seductively into your ear, the hand on your thigh slipping ever-so-slightly under the dress.

You ignored the warm, fuzzy feeling that bloomed through you at the sound of Sylus calling you his girl.

“There won’t be ‘hoards of men’. This will be the third time I’m working your annual gala and I’ve only ever gotten hit on like four times.” You knew from the way his eyebrows furrowed that you shouldn’t have told him that.

“Four times? Men hit on you four times while I was in the room and you didn’t tell me?” He was clearly angry, his rage unwarranted since it happened right under his nose. 

“I didn’t think you’d care. Most of them were like fifty, anyway!” That was true, and every time one of them placed a hand on your shoulder or your forearm, it made you grimace. 

“If men approached you in long pants and a dress shirt with a plate of refreshments in your hand what do you think they’ll do when they see you in this get up?” He walked you back until you were standing against the wall.

He had a point. Maybe it was too suggestive.

“I can change—”

“No. You never have to do that with me, baby. Just stay where I can see you, alright?” 

“Okay.” You felt a blush paint your cheeks. The tension was bubbling up between you. His hand was searing into your waist, his other one moving dangerously high on your thigh. You really thought this would be the moment he kissed you. But then the warmth of his hands was abruptly gone. 

“Okay. You ready to go?” He held the door open for you. That was it? Frustrated at your lack of results, you silently walked out of your house.

__________________

“Did you see Sylus’s date?”

“Of course, she’s definitely the hottest girl here.”

“I bet she’s had work done.”

“If so, I need the name of her surgeon.”

You eavesdropped on the hushed whispers of a group of women who were gossiping in a corner near the kitchen. The second you walked through the doors of the extravagant event hall, you both went your separate ways and you hadn’t seen him since. So much for not letting you out of his sight. 

All you heard about the entire night was his mysterious date and her envious beauty. He never told you he was bringing one, nor did he ever ask you to fill the spot. But before you could completely spiral, you reminded yourself of Sylus’s promise. He wouldn’t do anything to hurt you. There had to be a perfectly reasonable explanation. 

“Now what’s a pretty girl like you doing working here?” Your train of thought was interrupted by the voice of a man. You turned around, expecting to see one of the many sleazy old men who frequented these events and saw you as an easy target, but all you saw was a young, attractive guy in a three-piece suit. Huh.

“Hors d’oeuvre?” You offered the plate to him in place of a response. 

“No thanks. I’ve had my fill, though I must say, the other servers aren’t quite as easy on the eyes as you.” His eyes shamelessly scanned every inch of you, head-to-toe, and you felt uncomfortable under the scrutiny of his gaze. 

“Oh, um thanks.” The blush on your cheeks was an unwanted biological reaction, you weren’t used to attention from men within your age range. It wasn't like you thought you were ugly, you were just a bit of a hermit.

“What’s your name, beautiful?” You were about to answer his question when someone did it for you.

“Y/N.” The voice belonged to the man of the hour who seemed to have appeared out of thin air. 

“Sylus, hello. Hors d’oeuvre?” Clearly you were running out of things to say if your default reaction was to offer everyone a snack, but it was hard to find the voice to speak when you saw the girl who had her arms wrapped around his. 

Miss Hunter. You should’ve known. Your eyes passed over her beautiful dress and pinned up hair. She lived up to the rumours, she was definitely the prettiest girl in the room. Next to Sylus the pair reminded you of a renaissance painting. They made sense, and clearly not just aesthetically if he brought her as his date instead of you.

Sylus saw the way your eyes trailed off to MC standing next to him. He saw the self-doubt turn your eyes glassy, and all he wanted to do was whisk you away to a private room where he could show you just how badly he wanted you, and no one else.

But his enemies were in attendance tonight, it was part of the reason he didn’t want you there. Sylus’s only weakness used to be his mortality, and even that was debatable. But now his biggest weakness was tangible, and she wore an adorable Christmas themed dress that made every man in the room brim with desire. Miss Hunter may have been the focus of all the women in attendance, but all the men could talk about was the sexy server in the little red dress. It was driving him insane. 

But MC was a hunter and if he endangered her, she could get out of it unscathed without his help. Their enemies were the same, which made them perfect allies, but it also made their loved ones easy targets. Sylus would never forgive himself if he let someone hurt you. So despite the excruciating pain that coursed through him at your hurt expression, he did nothing to quell your concerns.

But he couldn’t idly stand by and let this man make a pass at you either. It was clear Henry was not aware of Sylus’s newly established no-fraternising-with-the-staff policy. 

“Henry, not distracting my staff, are you?” Sylus directed his attention to his business associate. Henry ran a security company which supplied a large portion of their weaponry from Onychinus. The contract they shared was a substantial source of revenue that Sylus couldn’t afford to compromise. 

“I’m just wondering where you found such delectable staff.” Sylus felt his jaw clench at the way Henry undressed you with his eyes and your consequential discomfort. Fuck the contract, he was going to make that man pay. But he couldn’t inflict his revenge quite yet, so he played nice. 

“Unfortunately my staff are exclusively mine. I’m sure you understand how difficult it is to find loyal help.” Well, at least he tried to play nice. The subtle jab at Henry’s recent whistleblower scandal was a low blow, but he wasn’t above kicking below the belt.

Annoyed and slightly confused by the exchange, you rolled your eyes at the testosterone-fuelled men bickering and cleared your throat.

“I think I’m needed in the kitchen. Nice meeting you, Henry.” You gave him the kindest smile you could muster and gave Sylus no smile at all. It was the least he deserved for blindsiding you with his date. 

“I should check on the catering, excuse me.” Sylus followed you to the kitchen and the second he caught up to you, he pulled you into a nearby storage closet.

There was barely any room for the both of you in there, so you were pressed up against his body. You tried to create some distance between you two, but he just pulled you back in by your waist.

“What are you doing? I’m supposed to be working and you’re supposed to be socialising. We can’t do those things from here.” You berated him quietly, your voice barely above a whisper. You didn’t really need anyone from the staff discovering you in this compromising position. You’d had enough embarrassment in one night for a lifetime.

“Miss Hunter is just here with me on business.” Sylus’s statement did little to comfort the tumultuous storm in your mind. 

“I don’t care.” In a sense, it was true. It seemed your mind didn’t care whether Miss Hunter was there with him on business or not, it still hurt all the same. 

“Don’t lie to me, I can tell when you’re upset.” Sylus tried to caress your cheek but you pushed his hand away. 

“Okay, fine. I’m upset. Now will you let me leave?” You tried to wriggle out of his grasp but to no avail. His hand squeezed your face as he forced you to face him. 

“If you’re upset, talk to me about it. Don’t antagonise me by flirting with other men. It won’t end well for them.” The fire in his eyes swore retribution and you did not want to be Henry right now.

“I wasn’t flirting!” You tried to defend yourself but you knew he’d see straight through your ruse. 

“That sweet smile of yours is reserved for me and me alone.” There was no way Sylus would’ve let that over-the-top smile slide and this was exactly how you expected him to react, but it only made you more upset.  

“Right, but I just have to make do with sharing you with Miss Hunter.” The irony of the situation was not lost on Sylus, but he had a laundry-list of crimes, hypocrisy was the least of them. 

“I’m all yours, baby. I promise it’s just business.” He sounded sincere, and you trusted him to tell you the truth. Sylus never lied unless it was out of omission, but when you asked him a direct question, he never failed to answer honestly. 

“I can help you with business.” You tried to reason, your palm resting against his pounding heart. 

“Not this kind, sweetheart. I’m just trying to protect you. I need you to trust me.” You trusted Sylus with your life, with your heart. Which was why you knew you wouldn’t like the answer to the question you asked next. 

“Did you sleep with her?” The mere thought of it tasted like acid on your tongue. It wasn’t like you weren’t aware of Sylus’s past, but where the other women in his life came and left like the tide, Miss Hunter’s presence was persistent. 

You needed to know just how far they’d gone, even if it might destroy you. 

“Yes. It was one time when we first met in September. Before I realised how I felt for you.” The words pierced straight through you like bullets of radiation. Your palm slowly slipped off of his chest and you diverted your gaze to your heels. “Y/N, you know I only want you. It meant nothing to me.” 

Perhaps it wasn’t the fact that they’d slept together that hurt you so deeply. Maybe it was the way he looked at her, the way she got under his skin. Sylus may love you, but what if he wasn’t attracted to you?

The thought slipped out of you before you could mull it over. “How am I supposed to believe that when you were all over in seconds and you won’t even kiss me?!” 

A hint of recognition flashed through Sylus’s eyes as he realised the catalyst behind your frustration. For some odd reason that he could never figure out, you were insecure. Even though your charm bordered on lethal and your beauty was unparalleled, you still felt inadequate. It perplexed him how someone could look so divine and not be aware of it.

“I haven’t kissed you because I wanted to make sure you were ready, sweetheart. I was worried I’d scare you away, because I’m sure if I got a taste of you I wouldn’t know how to stop.” He sounded strained when he spoke, as if he was recalling his frustration at having to hold back. 

You watched him intently, his words dripped with a desire you both shared. With his body so close to yours, it was hard not to wish he’d just act on his primal instincts. 

“You’re entirely unaware of your affect on me. You have no idea how precarious the string holding me back from insanity has become. When I saw you in that dress, I was sure I wouldn’t be able to hold back. But then you'd look up at me with those angelic eyes and I realise I can’t risk losing you.” 

Before you could even think it through, your desire became overwhelming and your lips were on his in an instant.

It was nothing like you expected, nothing like the chaste, sweet kisses you saw in your movies. It was heated, messy, desperate. His lips ravaged yours like a man on death row devoured his last meal. You felt his desire with every movement and all the doubt you had dissipated instantly. His hands were all over you, one softly held on to your neck, while the other held on to your waist like you might disappear. 

His lips moved to your cheek, your jaw and eventually the sensitive skin on your collarbone. When he bit a particularly sensitive part of your neck, you let out a whine. You hoped he hadn't given you a hickey. His face came up to yours as he looked at your lips which were red from the impact and the desire running rampant in your eyes. It might’ve been the most beautiful you’d ever looked.

“Well? I’m still here.” You whispered against his lips before giving him a chaste peck.

Sylus knew you weren’t just talking about this moment. You never left, even when he gave you a million reasons why you should. He didn’t know what he did to deserve such luck, but he knew he’d never give you a reason to walk away from him ever again.

“We should get out of here.” Somehow you knew he didn’t just mean the storage closet. He shifted to lead you out but you quickly stopped him.

“You can’t leave your own party! What about your date?” As much as the idea of MC hanging off his arm made your skin crawl, it wasn’t right to just leave her alone. 

“She’ll be fine. The only woman I care about is right in front of me, and I want to do so much to her than kiss her in a storage closet.” There was an underlying promise in his tone, and you felt the slightest bit of fear that you might’ve bitten off more than you could chew.

“You’ve lasted this long, what’s one more night?” Your last ditch effort to escape the dangerous situation was unsuccessful. 

“Sweetheart, I can't wait another second.” He gave you a soft, gentle kiss that conveyed his fraying restraint. Your fear felt inconsequential when he was with you, you knew you could trust him wholly with every part of you. 

So, when he led you out of the storage closet and all the way to his bedroom, you never once felt scared. Or insecure. Or inadequate. Sylus worshipped you like you were his salvation and he never once let you doubt yourself again.

Later that night, as you laid in his bed underneath his covers, staring over at his peaceful sleeping expression, you realised he was your salvation too.

Christmas Day

“What’s the surprise?” You asked the same question for the umpteenth time. 

“Just be patient, we’re almost there.” You let Sylus lead you through what you thought was a building while you obediently kept your eyes shut. Eventually your feet came to a halt, and you were bursting with anticipation. 

“Alright, open your eyes.” When you opened them you were in the living room of a charming beach house. It was so bright it took your eyes a while to adjust, but when they did you noticed that it was decorated with splashes of your favourite shade of yellow. The large balcony doors opened to the sight of a familiar beach, and you felt a range of emotions wash over you all at once. Sadness, nostalgia, yearning. 

“Merry Christmas, baby.” Sylus’s voice behind you snapped you back to reality. 

“What is this place?” The awe in your voice could not be concealed.

“It’s yours. I know how much you hate being on the beach, but I also know it meant a lot to your mother. From this balcony it’ll be like you’re right there without actually being there.” He sounded almost nervous while presenting his gift to you, worried you might hate it. But there wasn’t a word that could describe the pure gratitude and love you felt for the man standing in front of you. 

“You bought me a house on my mother’s favourite beach?” The disbelief in your voice was almost tangible. 

“Yeah.”

“Sylus, all I got you was a pocket watch!” You thought that since you were both not very big on Christmas, you would exchange small gifts. Clearly small wasn’t a word Sylus kept in his vocabulary. 

“You gave me so much more than that.” The suggestion in his voice did nothing to soothe your guilt. 

“This is too much.”

“Y/N, you’re more familiar with my assets than I am, if this made a significant dent in my bank account I think you would’ve noticed when I bought it a month ago.” 

“You’ve had this for a month?” The shock persisted, but he was right. His expenses ranged from a box of paperclips to the purchase of a two-hundred-million dollar industrial complex. 

“Yes, I bought it the first time you asked me to take you to the beach after work.”

“But what if we didn’t work out?” A month ago that seemed like a palpable possibility, but now you couldn’t imagine your life without Sylus in it.

“I’d find a way to trick you into taking it anyway.” 

You all but rolled your eyes at the memory of his less-than-graceful plan to acquire your house until you ended up working for him again. 

“Right, of course. You’re quite good at that I hear.” 

“I’m good at many things, I’ll remind you later.” He drawled against your ear, but before you could force him to act on his promise he spoke up again. “For now, there’s one more surprise.” 

You let Sylus lead you out to the balcony with his hands on your shoulders, driving you forward. He stood behind you, his chest to your back. He pointed to a hill on the left of the house where a beautiful willow tree sat atop the beach on a cliff.

“I bought that plot of land too. I don’t want to overstep, but if you’d like, we could move your mother here. Have her final resting place be at the place she loved the most.” His voice kept you anchored as memories of your mother threatened to pull you away. It still filled your chest with overwhelming sadness when you thought of her, but the thought that she could spend forever in the place that brought her the most joy filled you with relief. You didn’t get to give your mother much, but at least Sylus helped you give her this. 

You couldn’t stop the tears streaming down your face if you tried.

Sylus had come a long way from that day at the graveyard, an even longer way from the day you met him. The fact that he grew to care about your mother as much as you did made your heart swell with love for him that expanded every day. Something you didn’t even think was possible.

“She would love that.” Sylus wrapped his hands around your waist, placing an ever-so-gentle kiss on your temple. “I wish you could’ve met her when she was alive, you would’ve loved her.” They were both the strongest people you knew, and it pained you that they never got to meet. 

“I’m sure I would have. After all, I am a huge fan of her work.” You couldn’t help the laugh that escaped you at his cheesy joke. You were rubbing off on him, that was for sure. He peppered kisses all over the side of your face at the sound of your joyful laugh and you had to squeeze out of his grasp to make him stop. 

While you wished you didn’t have to lose someone so important to you to gain another, things always had a weird way of working out. Your future was still murky, but what you did know for sure was that ’Operation Sylus: No More’ could officially be declared a massive failure. And even though the physical hole in your heart still existed, the proverbial one shrunk to half it’s size; and you had the silver-haired man with the stone-encased heart of gold to thank for that. 

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Sorry if you were tagged but didn't get a notif, I think some of you might have your tags off because your blog wasn't coming up for me >:c

[asteroshearts]

Postpartum Confinement

[Zayne (Li Shen 黎深 ) + Sylus (Qin Che 秦彻)]

In Chinese culture, mothers stay and rest for a month or more after giving birth to properly recover (zuo yue zi).

Xavier and Caleb

Zayne (Li Shen 黎深 )

Now, while you do go on your postpartum confinement period, Zayne is a doctor and can't help but ramble about the superstitions and old wives' tales that the zuo yue zi is built on.

"There's no need to take all of these rules seriously," he couldn't help but mutter lowly. Pushing up his glasses, he said, "Currently, there is no hard scientific basis on why postpartum women shouldn't shower or bathe. However, I can see where this superstition arose. Historically, clean, hot water was very difficult for the common woman to obtain, and bathing with cold water after giving birth—"

What he does entirely believe in is that the mother of his child should be stress-free and have as much rest as possible.

Vets the Yue Sao (postpartum care nannies) like crazy.

Many of the interviewees leave thinking that it was one of the hardest job applications they've ever done.

He's a bit crazy here: looks through all of their credentials, researching the programs they've graduated from, asks for references, etc.

In the end, he agrees on a middle-aged woman with over fifteen years of experience as a Yue Sao and is a mother of three herself.

He chose her because she aligned with his thoughts of science, she didn't lean too much into traditional medicine, and had a casual personality while being firm. He knew she wouldn't push you into doing anything you didn't want to do.

For the first time since he got into medical school, Zayne Li took a complete pause from work. No emergency calls, no midday meetings. He even left his pager and work phone in his office and Akso.

Surprisingly, he doesn't go stir crazy.

Instead, he dedicates his time to learning from the Yue Sao and taking care of your baby.

You would think he's studying for another medical exam with how he asks questions, takes notes, and looks over her shoulder as she's cooking you a meal, nodding along to her instructions.

He sat beside you as your nanny did your belly binding for the first time, staring with analytical eyes while your baby was rocking in his arms.

Then, when he tried to do the belly binding on you, his first attempt ended in failure as you kept on giggling, ruining your progress. You couldn't help but mess him up, you were too busy staring at the father of your child with such love in your eyes.

However, he does have one insecurity. Traditionally, the mother should prevent herself from being cold as much as possible, bundling up, and covering her feet and shoulders.

Zanye couldn't help but think that with his Evol—he might cause you or the baby long-term health issues. He'll wear gloves, a hat, and scarf indoors if you want him to—

Just tell him that it's silly. How could a man like him ever hurt you or your baby?

Every day you wake up well-rested, with the chores done, with someone looking after your baby, and carefully planned, cultivated meals laid out on the table.

He may be the Head Cardiac Surgeon at Akso Hospital, but here, he takes a backseat. He would never speak over a woman who was a mother, and there's a lot to learn.

He tries not to step on either of your toes, but if there's one thing he wouldn't let your Yue Sao do, it's make you red date tea.

He was the one who made you red date tea even before you got together, and he isn't going to stop now :)

Sylus (Qin Che 秦彻)

Books you the nicest room in the most upscale confinement center/hotel you could find for as long as you want.

All confinement centers come with doctors and nurses at beck and call, baby care, and meals, but he made sure yours was five-stars, with physiotherapy, massages, facials, hair treatments, and classes.

He even has his own men secretly upping the security of the building for your stay.

Although he took parenting classes with you, read some books in his free time, he can admit he's not knowledgeable, so he does what he does best: shuts up and listens to his woman 😌.

Some men are allowed to stay, like the father of the child or male relatives, so of course, he's with you and the baby the entire time.

It's a bit nerve-wracking when the staff take your baby away for a checkup or bath and he's silently standing over them with his dark red eyes.

You might be resting and napping throughout the day, but he'll be awake and following your baby around when the nannies or nurses take care of them or taking the parenting classes the center provides.

He's so annoying though!!!!!

Lays his huge body in your bed, sinking the mattress, and follows you to all your spa treatments. The hotel is thinking of charging you double!! (Not like he cares, money is no object.)

He loves annoying you and clinging to you as much as he loves, well, you.

Tried to rock your baby to sleep and sing to them once while you were napping and upset your baby so much, your sweet baby cried until you woke up.

The hotel had to send him an email politely asking him not to do that again.

You're tired all the time, and while the care center offers spa treatments, what kind of husband would he be if he didn't bring you your personal skin care from home, applying it on your face for you while you lay in bed?

Everything seemed perfect; everything was taken care of.

You thought there was something wrong with you, and maybe it was the hormones, but somewhere in the middle of your confinement period, you couldn't help but feel so ugly. You felt so undeserving of this treatment.

Your belly didn't look the way it used to, your hair wasn't the same texture as it was, and your breasts hurt. (Of course it wouldn't, of course it did. You knew this, but for some reason, you couldn't help but be so upset.)

You were his little Dragon Li, spoiled to the ends of the earth, and now you were crying because throughout all of this, even though he and the rest of the facility had gone above and beyond, you were upset that your nail polish was overgrown.

Something so little, but you couldn't help it. You just felt like you were never going to be the same again.

Sure, he could call your nail guy to come by and give you a fresh pair of nails, but if there was one thing Sylus took seriously, it was your health. He didn't know what kind of contaminants your nail guy could bring to you or your baby.

While you were napping and your baby was resting with you, you wondered what Sylus was doing to occupy his time.

After all, even before you were pregnant, he made it seem like he couldn't last a day without you by his side.

He thought you were glowing like an angel, but if his kitten was crying to him, pouring out your insecurities, he knew words meant nothing if he didn't prove them.

So when he sits at your bedside, pulling out a complete and fully-sanitized nail kit, you can't help but stare in awe as he pulls out the exact nail color you had been wanting, in the most non-toxic formula he could find.

Yes, he had taken nail tech classes while you and the baby were resting, and if you were upset with no one to help you, he was going to step up and do it himself.

[icarusignite]

he leaves you out like a penny in the rain (p.2)

Pairing: Zayne Li x Non MC Reader

Summary: You spent years orbiting Dr. Zayne Li, but when a careless comment shatters the fragile bond you thought you’d built, you walk away. Only then does Zayne realize what he's lost.

Warnings: Hurt/comfort, angst. slowburn. Zayne being emotionally constipated rip

Word Count: 6.7k

A/N: I did not expect all the overwhelming love and feedback on part 1, so thank you so much to everyone who read and interacted, you made my day.

There will be a part 3 later to explore them getting even closer, and that will be more fluff (I did say slowburn lmao). I know they don't technically kiss and make up in this one, but that would be unrealistic, and this chapter is essentially Zayne having an existential crisis lmao. Gotta make our man suffer a little. I may also make this a whole series with more snippets of their life together (dates, workplace shenanigans, wedding, etc.) cuz I am rather attached to the concept of Zayne x coworker lmao. As always would love ot hear yalls thoughts <3

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | AO3

"I didn't ask for her kindness. She's not helping anyone by wasting time with personal errands. If she spent as much energy on her department as she does playing nursemaid, maybe the pediatrics wing would run on schedule."

Zayne regretted the words the moment they left his mouth. In his head, they'd sounded like a neutral observation spoken in the abstract. But out loud? They were undeniably brutal.

He didn't even realize how harshly it had come across until he saw Miss Hunter's expression change. The easygoing smile slid off her face, and her eyes narrowed. She began gathering the files strewn across his desk in silence.

Zayne frowned. "What are you doing?"

Miss Hunter scowled without looking up. "Sometimes I forget that I'm speaking to someone with the emotional availability of a brick."

"Excuse me?"

She rolled her eyes as she shoved a folder into her bag. "I do sincerely hope, for your sake, no one else heard you say that. Your colleague may be a lot of things, but incompetent is not one of them. I've never seen anyone work as hard as she does. She bends over backward for her patients, stays longer than anyone else, and still finds time to show basic human decency to the people around her. You don't have to like her, Zayne, but don't you dare belittle her like that."

Zayne opened his mouth to reply, but the woman had already thrown her coat over one shoulder.

"Where are you going?" he asked. "Didn't you say you needed my help with the case? That is why you've been coming in, haven't you?"

"I think I have what I need. Someone from the Association will give you a call if we require anything else." Her eyes met his one last time. "Thank you for your time, doctor. Now don't let me waste any more of it."

Then she was gone, and the silence she left behind was deafening. It wasn't like her to walk out like that. Frigid departures were his specialty.

He sat down slowly, but didn't open the file in front of him. Instead, his eyes drifted to the spot on his desk where you used to leave his tea for him.

Miss Hunter was kind. You were, too. He never quite understood why people like that kept finding their way into his life. He seemed terrible at keeping them there. And now, he was starting to understand why.

The words he'd said earlier soured in his stomach, replaying in his mind like a low-grade headache he couldn't medicate away. He didn't even know why he'd said them. It wasn't like him to speak without thinking.

Miss Hunter was one of his oldest friends. She had known him long before he was "Dr. Li." Back when he was just Zayne. She knew his tells better than anyone.

If she had caught him glancing at you every time you entered his office, she would have known immediately. She would have teased him mercilessly, bothered him about something he didn't even fully understand himself.

And she was your friend, too. Which meant she would've told you.

He certainly hadn't wanted that. It would ruin things.

Not that there was anything to ruin, technically. You weren't involved. You weren't his. You weren't anything more than a colleague.

From the early days of med school to the quiet corners of the hospital now, you flitted in and out of his life with a warm drink in one hand and a smile on your face, offering sugar and comfort like it cost you nothing.

Zayne knew better than to believe it was just for him. You were like that with everyone.

You brought donuts for the night shift nurses, slushies for interns melting in the summer heat, and hot cider during the freezing winter. You volunteered to cover holidays and swapped shifts without complaint. You remembered birthdays, favourite snacks, and which residents were allergic to almonds.

You were a kindness machine, and he hated that it still got to him. Sometimes it was hard not to feel like there was something different about the way you smiled at him, and when you slipped out of his office after each delivery, Zayne found it nearly impossible to concentrate afterward.

Your presence left ripples. He had insinuated that you were a distraction, but not because you hindered the hospital. No, you were a distraction to him. When you were gone, he was thinking about you, and when you were near, he couldn't think at all.

So why had he said what he said?

Because he didn't want Miss Hunter to know what he was feeling? Because he didn't want you to know?

Zayne took off his glasses and rubbed the space between his eyes. He still didn't have a good answer. The only real explanation was the simplest, and the hardest to admit: He'd been cruel. And now he felt the guilt of it like a stone in his throat.

Zayne wasn't the kind of man who tracked people's comings and goings. He only paid attention to pathology reports, test results, and charts with clear logic. He didn't count footsteps in the hallway or wonder where someone's voice had gone.

At least, not until yours had been missing for three days.

At first, he told himself it was a good thing. You were keeping your distance, finally, after all this time. No more interruptions. No more unsolicited desserts or stickers pressed onto his notes like a child's reward chart.

He had, after all, been pulling away from you, too. Maybe you'd finally taken the hint.

He should've been relieved. This distance was what he wanted, wasn't it? He'd convinced himself that if you were gone—if your presence stopped softening the corners of his day—then he'd finally be able to focus again. Be more efficient. More himself.

But to his growing dismay, the effect was the exact opposite. He could focus even less.

He spent too long rereading documents, missed the timing on his own schedule, and found his attention drifting in the middle of patient reports. Every time he turned a corner and didn't see you, he wondered where you were. When he passed the pediatric ward and didn't catch a glimpse of you hunched over a chart or joking with a young patient, he slowed to search without meaning to.

Maybe you were on vacation. That was rational. Doctors took leave all the time, and you of all people deserved one. But when he asked a pediatric nurse in passing, he got an answer that deflated every illusion he'd been holding onto.

"She's still on duty," the nurse explained. "Very busy. You know how she can be."

That was worse. You were close by, and still not coming around. It became harder to ignore.

Occasionally, he'd get a glimpse of your coat disappearing down a hall, or the top of your head as you ducked into the operating theatre, but never your face. And he certainly never saw you in his office again, even when you should have been there.

His desk was cleaner now. No crumbs from lemon cake, and no more paper cups of oolong. During his breaks, he found himself rifling through his drawers, trying not to look at the stack of stickers he kept there. The ones he peeled off and meant to toss, but never did.

There was the glittering, heart-shaped one you'd slapped onto his clipboard months ago. A cartoon cat, a kidney with googly eyes, and a shiny peach. You'd stuck that last one on his stethoscope once, and he hadn't taken it off for days, claiming it made his youngest patients smile.

But really, it was because it made you smile.

By the fifth day of your absence, he found himself looking up every time his office door opened. He dared not say aloud what he was hoping for, but the disappointment in his expression was telling enough when his guest never turned out to be you. He hadn't realized how often you used to cross his path until you didn't anymore.

On the sixth day, he lingered by the pediatric nurses' station, claiming he was checking up on a shared patient, but he didn't find you.

On the seventh, he stopped by the eastern stairwell just before midnight, the one he knew you liked to take instead of the elevator because you were trying to get your daily steps in. It was empty, but he waited for fifteen whole minutes.

By the end of the week, something in his chest felt too tight. The silences were heavy, and his tea never tasted right because he had to make it himself.

It was nearing midnight when Zayne finally finished logging the last of his post-op notes. The hospital had thinned to its late-shift hush, leaving only the occasional overhead call and the low hum of fluorescent lighting that never truly turned off.

The unexpected sound of knocking almost made him flinch, but when the door opened, his shoulders practically slumped in disappointment.

"No need to look so disheartened by my presence," his colleague, Dr. Greyson, teased. "I'm only here to drop off patient files, as you requested."

Zayne didn't respond.

"I really wish you hadn't scared off our caffeine supplier, though," Dr. Greyson continued, unaware of the subtle shift in the man's demeanour at the mention of you.

"Excuse me?"

"You know. The doctor who used to swing by with desserts. She hasn't come by in a whole week. The whole cardiology department is suffering. Morale's at an all-time low."

Zayne rolled his eyes. "I hardly think anyone's suffering."

Greyson tilted his head, watching him with that infuriating look that said I know more than you think I do."Did you scare her off or something? You used to get visits like clockwork. Can't believe I'm saying this, but I find myself missing that 'you-forgot-to-eat-again' look of pity she used to give all of us."

"She is probably busy. As you should be."

Greyson clicked his tongue. "I'm not trying to pry—well, maybe I am, just a little—but I figure if she stopped showing up, and you started passing by pediatrics like you're casing the joint, something must've happened."

"Nothing happened," Zayne muttered stiffly.

"Sure. Except for the part where she's been sending interns to collect your reports instead of coming herself. And the part where you've looked like someone kicked your cat for three days straight. You're not as subtle as you think."

"It's none of your business."

"Isn't it?" his colleague drawled. "Because it's starting to affect your concentration. You missed a detail on that post-op note yesterday. Not like you."

Zayne's lips pressed into a thin line. "It was corrected immediately."

"Doesn't mean I didn't notice." Then he added, more gently, "You know, if she's avoiding you, there's probably a reason."

Dr. Greyson's words echoed long after he departed.

Zayne scoffed at first, but the question refused to dislodge itself, settling under his skin like a splinter he couldn't quite reach.

What had he done? What could he have done?

He turned the thought over again and again, as if studying it from every clinical angle might make it reveal itself.

Yes, perhaps he'd been colder than usual lately, but that wasn't new. You'd known him long enough to recognize the ebb and flow of his moods. You used to tease him about it. "Dr. Li, did your coffee betray you again today?" or "Should I come back when the glacier thaws?"

You always came back because you weren't the type to hold a grudge. And certainly not the type to vanish without a word. If something bothered you, you would have said it.

So, why disappear?

The only thing he'd done differently, the only deviation from the constant rhythm of your companionship, was—

His stomach turned.

No.

There was no way.

Had you heard what he said to Miss Hunter that night? Or worse, had she told you herself?

Miss Hunter wasn't the sort to do that, especially if she knew it would hurt you. But you hadn't been working that night. He'd checked the rota; you weren't even on call.

His voice sounded vindictive in hindsight. He had only meant it as a deflection. A way to keep Miss Hunter from pressing further into places he hadn't yet dared to look himself. He hadn't thought—

He hadn't thought.

His gut twisted. That would explain your absence. You hadn't simply disappeared, you'd withdrawn. And not just from him, but from his whole department.

He'd done something worse than push you too far. He'd made you feel small and irrelevant.

Zayne exhaled sharply and leaned back in his chair, overcome with guilt. He didn't know what he was going to do. He wasn't good with apologies. He wasn't even sure how to begin, but something had to be done.

If not for himself—he still wouldn't allow himself that admission—then at least for the others. For the people who looked to you. For the space you had filled so effortlessly, that now felt so cold and painfully quiet.

Maybe, if he could fix this, you'd look at him again the way you used to. Maybe it was time for him to stop watching his door and finally go knock on yours.

The next week, Zayne finally mustered the courage to approach you. He stood just by your office, waiting for you to arrive, but when you finally did, you were moving too quickly for him to say anything. Your shoulders were tensed as you ducked past him, and without thinking to ask for permission, he followed you inside.

You didn't even acknowledge his presence. You were hunched over a drawer, rifling through it with your good hand. The other one—your dominant, he noticed—was clenched in a bloodied fist, a crimson thread trickling from between your fingers and down your wrist.

"You're hurt," he murmured.

You ignored him, yanking open another drawer with more force than necessary. Your good hand trembled as you pulled out the first aid kit, and it clattered onto the desk, spilling slightly.

He took a step forward. "You're bleeding. What happened?"

Still no response, and Zayne was forced to watch as you clumsily opened the box, tugging at alcohol wipes and sterile gauze with one hand, fumbling with the bandage roll like it had personally offended you. When the antiseptic hit your wound, you hissed, and that was the last straw.

Zayne reached for your wrist, and you pulled back as if stung, your blood-slicked palm cradled awkwardly against your chest.

"I just want to—"

"Leave me be!" you snapped. "Please. I have work to do."

He didn't raise his voice. "You can't work like this."

"I am working like this."

"You can't take care of your patients if you can't take care of yourself."

You let out an incredulous laugh. "Is this your way of calling me incompetent again? Believe me, Dr. Li, I have no time for you right now."

Zayne pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed impatiently. "I'm not trying to—look, please, just let me help. You can snap at me all you want afterwards."

Without waiting for your response, he firmly nudged you in the direction of your chair, and you let him because standing suddenly felt too exhausting. Maybe the adrenaline had worn off, or maybe you were just too tired to argue anymore. You kept your mouth pressed into a thin, unhappy line as he worked.

Zayne didn't speak either, kneeling beside you tentatively. He did not look at your face as he pried open your fist, his frown deepening as he examined the wound. Then he cleaned it with uncharacteristic tenderness, wiping away the blood and wrapping the gauze, his fingers stalling against your skin a beat too long.

When he finally stood to pack the kit away, you stood too, your anger spilling past your lips in a venomous tumble.

"My apologies for wasting your precious time with personal errands, Dr. Li," you practically sneered. "But you don't have to play nursemaid anymore. You do have a department to run, after all."

His own words thrown back at him. Zayne winced, but met your gaze without faltering. He deserved every bit of your resentment. "That was...certainly warranted."

You scoffed, pressing your wrapped hand into your lap. "Damn right, it was."

He nodded stiffly, absorbing the blow without complaint. He would accept your barbed words because at least you were speaking to him. Anything was better than your silence.

"I..." He cleared his throat and tried again. "I wanted to say I'm sorry."

When all you could do was glower at him, he adjusted his lab coat just to have something to do with his hands.

"I have no excuse for what I said. Or for what you heard," he continued. "It was... awful. And cruel. And I was wrong. You work harder than anyone else here. You work too hard. And I never should've implied otherwise. I'm sorry."

"I don't accept it," you said simply.

"I—"

"I don't care if that makes me petty. I'm allowed to be angry. You don't get forgiveness just because you decided to feel bad about it now."

Zayne's mouth parted in protest. "I know this is about the conversation you overheard, and I—"

"The one where you called me pathetic? Questioned my competence? You essentially said I've been neglecting my job because I bring my colleagues refreshments every now and then?"

"You must know...I had no intention of hurting you."

"Didn't you?" You stepped back, putting some distance between the two of you. "Because I remember every word. Every. Word. And believe me, it wasn't the first time I've been told I'm not good enough to be here. I just never thought you'd be the one to say it."

He flinched, but you didn't give him the chance to say anything else.

You tipped your head toward the door. "Please leave, Dr. Li. As per your earlier suggestions, I am working on managing my time better, and part of that includes not engaging in pointless conversations."

You followed him to the door, closing it in his face with a click. It was worse than if you had slammed it, because this felt too final.

He was just about to leave when he heard the strangled sound from the other side. A whimper and then a quiet sniffle. Zayne stood frozen in place, hand hovering over the doorknob, wishing he could offer more than the hollow apology he had.

His voice, when it came, was hoarse. "Truly, I am sorry."

For the first time in all the years he had known you, there was nothing else he could say.

Zayne didn't try to speak to you again. You asked him to leave you alone, and he respected your decision enough to resist intruding into your life. But that didn't mean he stopped caring, and he certainly never stopped trying. He just changed the way he did it.

You never ran out of your favourite stationery, a new box appearing on your desk every time you were even close, and it seemed that someone had paid for a lifetime's worth of beverage orders at the cafe across the street where you frequented. Every time you showed up, the barista would grin at you and tell you that your order had been paid for, no matter what hour it was. It was absurd.

The nurses had started noticing, too. How Zayne signed off on consults for your shared patients before you could ask him to. And the fact that the smartboard in your office now auto-updated like clockwork because someone had programmed the algorithm to pull directly from the cardiology logs.

He didn't overstep, of course. He didn't want to do anything that would make you think he was questioning your competence or ability to get things done. He just handled the little things to make your life easier.

For Zayne, it wasn't about being forgiven. He wasn't delusional enough to think that any of this would win you over, but that wasn't the point. He just couldn't stand the thought of you being tired, overworked, or overlooked anymore.

He knew you were angry, and you had every right to be, but this was the only way he could think of to fix things. To anticipate your every need before it arose and solve it before it became a problem.

However, no matter how much he tried to stay out of your way, his eyes were always drawn toward you when he occasionally passed you by, like a reflex he couldn't kill. You never returned the look, and though it killed him, he never stopped refilling the frog stickers when the last sheet disappeared from your drawer, and making sure the lab results for your most critical cases were flagged top priority. He wasn't waiting for your gratitude. He just didn't know what else to do with the ache that sat where your laughter used to echo.

It became unbearable when he began messing with your break room. The one in the pediatric wing was barely even a room, really just a glorified closet with a dying microwave and a fridge that made suspicious humming noises when overfilled. But it had been your domain. A little corner of chaos you liked to keep warm for the interns and residents who rotated through your department, stumbling half-asleep between charts and crying toddlers.

You'd made it a habit to stock the cabinets with snacks. Caffeine bars. Gummy vitamins. Single-serve juice boxes and thermal mugs with weird slogans. It wasn't much, but it made the 2 a.m. shifts bearable. People had started calling it the "Sunshine Station."

But lately, something had shifted.

You didn't notice it at first because you were too busy. But then, one afternoon, you ducked into the room to grab the last apple juice from the mini fridge, only to find that the juice had already been restocked. Not just that, it had been rearranged neatly, the labels facing out. Right next to a new box of cereal bars that no one else even liked, but your most overworked intern swore kept her from fainting.

It was strange. You hadn't placed an order this month because you'd been shamefully distracted by your own indignation. When you checked the other cabinets, they were full too, and not just with generics, either.

The gummy vitamins were the exact kind your other interns liked, the ones shaped like bears instead of those awful chalky tablets. Whoever had placed the order had even remembered to get lactose-free yogurt.

When you asked around later that day, all you received were blank stares. Those who frequented the break room claimed that the items had been simply delivered as they always were, and that they thought you had been the one to handle it like you always did.

It unsettled you. For years, you had been the one to keep things stocked. You took pride in remembering everyone's favourites because you liked showing up for the people who worked under you. It mattered to you. But now it was as if someone had quietly picked up where you left off. Someone had taken the time to learn what your team liked. Someone who was trying very hard to make amends.

You shut the thought down fast. You didn't want to think about him.

But your interns had other ideas, it seemed.

The next evening, you were filling out patient notes at the corner table, half-tuned out, while they squabbled over a nearly empty box of mango pudding cups.

"I swear to god, Nam, that was my last one!"

"First come, first serve, Clara. You've had four already!"

"I'm dessert-loading for morale!"

You didn't intervene. Their bickering was strangely comforting, like white noise after too many days of stifling silence.

Clara finally wrenched the box from Nam's hands, only to gasp dramatically.

"They're gone!" she mourned, rattling the empty cardboard. "My pudding! This is an emergency!"

"Just ask Dr. Li to add them to the supply list," Nam muttered, crouching to inspect the fridge's bottom shelf for apple slices.

You froze. "Ask who?"

Nam's head jerked up, eyes wide. "I—I mean, like. I don't know why I said that. Just—someone else must've added them to the order since you've been so busy lately. That's all I meant."

Clara nodded with a false smile. "We must have a secret supplier in our midst who keeps us stocked. The Snack Phantom. Or maybe... the Nutrition Ninja."

Nam nodded sagely. "The Candy Courier."

"Or the Juicy Justice Man."

"Okay, now you're just being plain ridiculous," you snorted, rubbing your temple. "In case you forgot, I'm the one who places the orders. And I'm sorry I forgot to this month. So what's all this about Dr. Li? He's got nothing to do with us."

Clara's eyes bounced between you and Nam guiltily. "Oh. Uh...it's just that he asked us about our snack preferences."

Nam nodded. Then quickly shook his head. "Well, not all of them. Just like... a few specific ones."

You squinted suspiciously. "Like what?"

Nam hesitated. "Like, which flavour of chips you like. And which brand of protein bars Clara eats when she's on night shifts. And those gummies that Dr. Gao hoards like a dragon."

The silence that followed was uncomfortable.

"Dr. Li doesn't believe in vending machines," Clara deadpanned, trying to ease the awkward atmosphere. "I swear I've heard him call flavoured chips 'an affront to God' once."

"He's not trying to replace you, of course," Nam added hastily. "He's just taking stuff off your plate. We all know how busy you've been lately. You even have that health outreach drive this weekend."

Your jaw clenched, and you looked back down at your chart, trying to keep your expression unreadable. In your periphery, you saw the two interns nudge each other, mumbling something about a chart they forgot to update before scuttling off.

When the room cleared out a few minutes later, you were left alone with your tepid green tea, staring at a worn sticker someone had left on the edge of the table. The same kind you used to put on Zayne's mugs.

Suddenly, every little thing felt far too overwhelming. You didn't know what you were supposed to feel.

Gratitude? Bitterness? Some ugly combination of both?

You were just so tired.

It was past midnight when you finally finished with your tasks of the day, exhaustion making your limbs feel like they belonged to someone else. Your coat was slung over your arm, your bag slumped tiredly against one shoulder, and the charts you'd meant to leave in the admin office tilted in your grip like a collapsing tower.

You cursed under your breath when a few of them slipped loose and tumbled to the floor. When you bent, your back made an uncharacteristic sound, and you winced. You hadn't eaten dinner. Or lunch, or even breakfast, for that matter. Your feet hurt, and you still had a dozen things to do tomorrow, even though it was supposed to be your day off.

Of course, this would happen. Of course—

"Let me help."

You turned sharply, and there stood Dr. Zayne Li, just a few paces away.

His hair was impeccable as always, and his shirt sleeves were rolled up to the elbow, coat draped carelessly over his shoulder. He looked as tired as you felt. More, maybe. The shadows under his eyes had grown darker since the last time you really looked at him.

You hadn't seen him this close in months.

In the time it took for you to scrutinize him, he had already stepped forward to gather your scattered files. When he handed them back to you, his fingers brushed yours tentatively, but you did not thank him.

Nonetheless, he followed you to the nurses' station where you dropped your load off, and then outside toward the exit.

"I didn't think you'd let me help," he remarked.

You shrugged, and that earned the smallest quirk of his lips. Equal parts sad and knowing. He must have sensed some kind of brittle neutrality in your expression. Not forgiveness, but the absence of active malice. The first thaw in a long, punishing winter.

When the two of you stepped out into the cool night air, he held the door open for you. You didn't comment on it, and the silence stretched again.

Zayne cleared his throat. "You're off tomorrow, right?"

"How do you know that?"

"I checked the roster. I wasn't trying to pry."

You gave him a sideways glance.

"I just—" He adjusted his cufflinks. "I've been trying to apologize. Properly. I know I hurt you. I said things I didn't mean, and I let you believe things that weren't true. That you weren't—"

You turned to face him then, and he stopped talking.

"You did hurt me."

He swallowed. "I know."

"I still don't think I forgive you."

"I don't expect you to."

Your arms wrapped around yourself. "But holding onto it for this long has been exhausting, so I'm going to let it go. I'm not letting you off the hook. I am just letting myself off it. I simply don't care what you think of me, so you can rest easy, I suppose. I'm not angry anymore."

Strangely enough, you found that you meant it. It had been several months since the incident, and although for a short while it had bruised your ego, you needed to try and move past it. It was a lesson you had learned early in life when everyone around you doubted your abilities. You could not let their opinions of you make you waver. The same applied here. While you admired Zayne's intelligence and abilities, you refused to let his opinion of you affect your work. You had worked too hard for that to happen.

You were letting go more for yourself than for him. You wondered if Zayne knew that too, because he was looking at you with an expression of melancholy resignation, like he wasn't sure if he should be relieved or devastated. 

Was indifference any better than fury?

When you stepped past him to head in the direction of the train station, he called out after you. "You shouldn't take the train this late."

You didn't stop walking. "I've done it before."

"You're exhausted."

"Shocking, considering I just completed a 17-hour shift looking after tiny humans with fevers and sticky fingers."

"I'll drive you."

You glanced at him over your shoulder skeptically. "What, is this some sort of attempt at penance?"

"No," Zayne countered. "It's common sense. You're swaying on your feet."

You opened your mouth for a retort, but he was right, and frankly, you were too tired to protest on principle. So with a small, muttered, "Fine," you followed him to the parking lot.

You said nothing as you slid into the passenger seat and let the warmth of the heater begin to soothe the ache in your muscles.

You closed your eyes, and when you opened them, five minutes later, the streetlights outside looked wrong.

"This isn't my route."

Zayne didn't look at you. "I'm taking you to dinner."

"I didn't consent to that."

"You got in my car, didn't you?"

You turned fully to glare at him. "Where are we going?"

He disclosed the name of your favourite late-night restaurant, the one with the golden stew and free barley tea.

"How did you—?"

"I know you haven't eaten all day."

"Have you been having my interns spy on me?"

"You can't be both sleep and nutrition deprived. I've bagged up bodies that had more vitality than you."

"Oh, so now we've moved on to insulting my appearance? How novel."

"You're not hideous," Zayne remarked absently. "You just look like a Victorian ghost that's been wandering the moors since 1852."

You made a strangled noise of indignation. "I hate you."

"I know."

"Well, you should start acting like it."

But you lacked your usual fire. Then your stomach betrayed you, growling so loudly it echoed through the silence of the car.

Zayne didn't say anything, but the way he glanced over at you with that annoyingly subtle twitch of amusement at the corner of his mouth made your scowl deepen.

"...Fine," you grumbled. "But I'm not thanking you."

"Wouldn't dream of asking you to," he said dryly, pulling into the familiar lot.

You rolled your eyes but stepped out when he opened the door for you, letting the smell of garlic, chilli, and warm rice overpower the urge to strangle him.

The restaurant was nearly empty at this hour, only a few lingering patrons tucked into booths, and faint ballads played through the speakers like a lullaby. You sat across from Zayne, not quite looking at him, and the overhead light was dim enough to make everything feel like a dream viewed through steam.

The waitress didn't bother with menus because she knew your order. You'd been coming here ever since your residency days. She simply smiled and said, "The usual?" with a glance at you, then your companion, who gave a silent nod.

You watched her leave, then directed your attention toward him. "You didn't even ask what I wanted."

"You always get the same thing. Unless you've changed your mind in the last several years."

"And if I had?"

"Then I'd offer you mine."

That shut you up for a moment.

"I didn't expect you to say yes," he confessed candidly. "To dinner."

"Then why are you trying so hard?"

"Because I miss you." His response startled even him because he immediately avoided your probing gaze.

"Excuse me?"

"I miss..." He exhaled. "I miss your bad jokes. Your sugar bribes. The energy you bring into a room just by walking into it. I miss being someone who deserved all of that."

"Dr. Li...Zayne...what are you doing?"

Your use of his first name made his heart convulse in his chest, and he wondered with mild curiosity if he was having a heart attack. You tended to have that effect on him. "I'm trying to make things right."

You didn't have an answer for that, so you picked up your spoon and dipped it into your food that had just arrived. You let the warmth hit your tongue, sink into your bones, and settle somewhere deep inside the ache. This was easier than coming up with a response.

Across from you, Zayne stirred his bowl absently. For someone who dragged you here with such conviction, he wasn't eating much. You caught him glancing at you more than once, and each time, he looked away just as quickly.

Then he cleared his throat. "So, one of my interns fainted in the middle of a laparoscopic demonstration yesterday."

You blinked, surprised he was talking at all, let alone telling you stories.

"She nearly took down the anesthesia tray with her."

"Oh...is she okay?"

"She's fine. She may have forgotten to eat. Or breathe. Possibly both." A beat. "I told her if she ever wants to pull a stunt like that again, she has to warn me first so I can bill cardiology for Greyson's near heart attack."

You gave a reluctant huff of amusement, and he seized it like a drowning man to driftwood.

"And then, today, one of my residents presented a case that was very obviously plagiarized from a House episode. He even kept the ludicrous diagnosis."

"That's... dramatic."

"He said, and I quote, 'It's rare, but not impossible, Dr. Li.'" Zayne took a sip of water. "I told him so is being struck by lightning during a Sudoku competition. That doesn't mean it belongs on a discharge summary."

You snorted into your rice. He seemed pleased by that. As pleased as he ever looked, which wasn't much, but you saw the ease in his shoulders, and the faint wrinkle at the corner of his eyes.

It was odd, watching him do what you used to do. Filling the silences and stumbling awkwardly over attempts at connection. Sharing things he wouldn't normally bother to say out loud. You tried not to let it affect you.

Tried.

Zayne glanced at you again, then made a visible effort to keep going. "Someone else spilled an entire tray of empty vials. He dropped them while trying to open his pudding cup. I told him that's what he gets for eating like a five-year-old."

You smirked. "Dr. Greyson told me last year that you eat your sandwiches with a knife and fork."

Zayne didn't miss a beat, going along with your story just for the sake of hearing you talk. "I do. Why wouldn't I?"

"You... what?"

"It's cleaner. You get an even distribution. No hand residue. Structural integrity is maintained throughout."

"That is the most unhinged thing I've heard in months."

"I'm a surgeon," he replied unapologetically. "I value precision."

"You're a monster."

"Possibly."

Another quiet moment passed, but this time it was companionable, warmed by broth and faint humour.

Zayne stirred his stew with mechanical precision, then said, with no real preamble, "Did I ever tell you about the time one of my interns tried to impress me by diagnosing a nosebleed as a sign of brain-eating amoeba?"

"...Please tell me you're joking."

"I wish I were."

"And what was your response, Dr. Li?"

"I told her that unless the patient had just returned from a stagnant swamp in the middle of winter, she was catastrophizing. Then I handed her a nasal spray."

You pressed your hand to your mouth to stifle a laugh. "You're such a menace."

"She handed in a ten-page write-up on amoebic encephalitis the next morning."

"I'm torn between horror and pride."

"Greyson said I should start charging tuition."

"As if you don't make enough money already."

"They're all chaos." He shook his head. "One of them showed up in inappropriate footwear during an OR rotation and asked if we were doing anything fun today."

You choked on your rice, and Zayne offered you a napkin without comment.

"Inappropriate footwear? Would that be high heels or Crocs?"

"I cannot recall exactly."

"God. That sounds like something you would've done back in school."

Your dinner companion looked offended at the insinuation. "I would never have disgraced myself that way."

"True. You were insufferably by-the-book."

"I still am."

"You are." You chuckled again, reluctantly. You hadn't laughed this much in months.

Worst of all, you didn't hate the way it felt. But you hated that you missed it. You hated how much you'd missed him. You had to remind yourself that he was just trying extra hard to alleviate his own guilt, not because he actually wanted you to feel better. But it was hard to question his sincerity when he looked at you so earnestly. To you, his eyes had always been his most mesmerizing feature, and now, when he trained them on you, unguarded and sincere, you felt your resolve start to crumble.

Despite the distance and the cruelty that still stung at the edges of your memory, the ache hadn't lessened. There was something so familiar about him, the way his stories came out stiff and slightly disjointed, like they'd been rehearsed. The way he glanced up between anecdotes to check if you were still listening.

"I also miss not being verbally assaulted every morning by my ravenous interns asking where the 'sugar fairy' went." He gave you a gentle smile, something a little more than the usual twitch of his lips, and you chugged your glass of water to drown the sudden influx of butterflies that swarmed in your stomach.

You groaned. "I knew Dr. Greyson started that name."

"He did. But the students run with it like it's gospel. I overheard one say they were going to sacrifice someone to the snack deity if you didn't come back to our floor soon."

"And would that someone have been you?"

"You would enjoy that, wouldn't you?"

You laughed before you could stop yourself. You tried to smother it, but it bubbled up anyway. "Indeed, I would."

Zayne looked deeply, irritatingly satisfied, and you bit back another smile. For the first time in what felt like forever, you let yourself enjoy it.

You were too tired to resist the lull of good conversation and an old friend tonight. Tomorrow, you could try to go back to hating him. Tomorrow, you would take your grudge by the hand, but today, you deserved to let go a little.

Eventually, he stopped talking, and you looked up to find him watching you intently. Almost reverently.

"...What?" you asked, warily. "Do I have rice on my face or something?"

He didn't respond.

"Seriously. What are you looking at?"

Zayne hesitated. "I didn't mean what I said earlier."

"What?"

"That thing I said. About you looking like a Victorian ghost."

"Oh?" Your lips quirked up wryly. "Do I look worse, then? Let me guess. Forest cryptid instead? Decrepit hag?"

Zayne didn't crack a smile or tease you back, and something fragile fluttered just beneath the surface of his gaze.

No. You look beautiful.

Even like this. Even in exhaustion with dark circles under your eyes and your hair messier than you probably realized. You were beautiful in the way late-night hospital lights made you glow. Beautiful in the way you had always cared, even for people like him, who never knew how to deserve it.

He hated that it had taken him this long to notice. Or rather, that it had taken him even longer to admit it to himself, but he would spend the rest of his days trying to find the right moment to say it aloud, to make you believe it. 

Today, however, was not the right moment, so he just wordlessly refilled your cup of water.

You didn't thank him, but you didn't push him away either.

For tonight, that was enough.

Taglist: @floofycookie @heartandeye @lanxianschoenheit @loverindeepspace @treeteaofversailles @ikesimpleton @mysticcauldronspire @69-gojos-wife-69 @nm4565natty @ciexuvia @jeonjenny @plzdonutpercieveme @sylusgirlie7 @raethewargeneral @staarflowerr @eolivy @straykidslvr @lemurianmaster @preeyas-world @sillyfreakfanparty

Hope I didn't miss anyone ❤️

[kira-loves0905]

>> My Wedding Vow Is To Divorce You (One-Shot)

— what if you had the guts to break up with Zayne? the loverman who is still smitten on a dead woman. the one who will never love you the way you do to him?

warnings: 3rd POV, fast-paced, unrequited love, angst/no comfort, mentions of divorce, married life, rebound, non MC!reader, mentions of pregnancy, ooc Zayne, mentions of Xavier, not proofread 🥹 i wrote this on a whim cause i've been feeling upset these days

"—your guardian in fate seems to have mistaken your current lover to be yours. a star has already been made to be his, one that is still connected to his soul despite its star being all but fray. you ought to find your own star, else your heart will turn to stone."

she could only repeat the words in their mind over and over. yet she also berated herself for even paying hunderds of her money to listen on a traveling shaman, allured by its mysterious facade and enticing marketing.

(Name) could've win a medal for their patience. a woman persevering on a void relationship for twelve years? she could be a popular Reddit post if she ever voiced out her dilemna to the world. seeing themselves being shunned, mind breaking down with insecurities that grew over the years.

twelve years ago, a mission went astray. Miss Hunter was in a serious accident that had her experience multiple rounds of surgery. it was to no one's surprise that Zayne took over all of it. despite the long hours of gruel work, his feet numb from the relentless days of standing upright— he pushed through.

in Dr. Zayne's hands, she survived, albeit barely.

at this point, everyone subconsciously knew that Zayne was inlove with Miss Hunter. even if he didn't voice it out, his action spoke words that he can't utter himself. the way his rough, cold edges softened and began to illuminate warmth that was never seen before.

(but (Name) did. she experienced the warmth of his touch when the night was young. when MC still wasn't back to his life yet as his patient. when it was just the both of them, growing up as childhood friends and into medical school in dreams of becoming coworkers of the same field.)

that same warmth Zayne reserved for MC disappeared once more, when she died in her comatose.

it was quite expected, really. there was just a slim chance of MC ever waking up after the severe injury she had on the mission. (Name) knew that it was bound to happen, even in Dr. Zayne's care.

but to him? to the man that dreamed of her in every aspect of his life? the same person who pursued cardiology just for her protocore heart? to a man that yearned for MC's love that even just a glimpse of her was enough to satiate his boundless yearning self?

he was in shambles. utterly broken and gripping the bits of fragments the dead woman has before it all disappears.

suffice to say, those twelve years ago. (Name) took the gruelling case of taking care of Zayne. even when her arms grew numb from the long hours of hug she gave him, or when her voice went hoarse from the time she kept whispering comforting words to his ear. hoping that, for even a moment, she can be someone who can manage to chip down the cold wall he was starting to build around himself again.

well, she surmises that maybe she achieved her goal.

for in that same twelve years ago, Zayne married (Name). in that month, she deliberately ignored the hushed whispers of everyone she passes by.

a rebound, is what they say.

she knows that— feels that, but to accept it is a different case altogether.

(when they make love, she sees the way he forces his lips shut. for Zayne knows, subconsciously— that when he lets it loose, it would be another woman's name that spills on his sinful lips.

Miss Hunter.)

— — —

"love." in the night of silence, where birds go to sleep and the skies began to darken. Zayne carefully mutters his call. by the field of grass and flowers, they held their hands passionately. their skin basking in each other's warmth— fighting off the coldness of the wind.

for the nth time, (Name) tries to mask the way his petname stings ironically.

twelve years ago, it made her heart flutter. made her feel like a special (rebound) person. but honeymoon phase was long over, hearing it numerous times in that dead tone of his was sickening now.

"yes, Zayne?"

"it's her death anniversary tomorrow." he says, his eyes faraway. "I want to visit her tombstone alone, is that alright-"

"I know," she says seamlessly, as if the words were already wired in her brain. "say hello to her for me, yeah?"

".....mhm."

a beat of silence.

before long, Zayne dragged her back to the car by their joined hands. (Name) knew by then that there wouldn't be any more conversation until the next morning.

(this was so wrong. she knows. staying for a person that hadn't even given the same love she had given for twelve years.

ridiculously, it was just around this time that she had realized that.)

— — —

in the whole week of MC's death anniversary, the house was colder than usual. the presence of her husband unseen as he drowned himself in his work. a ritual he religiously practiced countless of times in this particular time of the year.

(Name) sat by the living room. papers scattered at the coffee table. her brows furrowed in concentration. the documents were unfamiliar, yet she forces herself to read all of texts in the page. honing in the information before proceeding in its entirety.

divorce papers.

it has been hidden in her closet for the past week. this was the only time she had the courage to finally work on it.

(because every year, with no fail, she kept dreaming that someday he'll start to love her for her. that the illusion of MC Zayne had adorned (Name) would dissipate. one day, they could live happily as a genuine husband and wife.

maybe she should've done this on the 3rd year. but a beggar for love had no choice but to cling on hope.)

"what are you doing?"

odd. he doesn't come home this early.

(Name) fumbles the papers in a hasty stack. trying to hide it before he sees its contents.

"how futile." his steps were quick, gripping her wrist in a tight hold. Zayne's irises flee over to the papers, pushing his glasses higher with his free hand.

"I see," he drawls, "you finally realized how defective this marriage is."

"don't start, Zayne." for once in her life, she managed to stare at him head on. "if I remember correctly, you initiated this."

"and yet," there was a huff as he walks closer. tilting his head with a hint of wicked mirth. "you had the right to deny so."

"you knew I loved you from the start!"

"and you knew that my heart was always with her. no matter how hard you try to earn it."

(Name) stopped in her fit of anger, eyes flickering with emotions akin to hurt. Zayne was right anyway, it was her fault she got into this mess. her shortcoming for being a fool for love.

"did I.. ever mean anything to you?" they were having a proper conversation for the first time in their marriage. she might as well take advantage of it.

"you were a mere friend," he says, as if a pang of nostalgia hit him for a brief moment, "a company when I studied in medical school."

"I repeat what I said, MC was the only one for me."

"nothing else?" desperate. she's desperate. spiralling. "nothing more? not even once in your life—"

"not even in the 12 years we've lived under the same roof?!"

"(Name)." his voice rumbles in a subtle warning. one that made their house way colder than it had ever been.

"you ought to accept it now." he picked up the papers once more, a pen in his hand already.

she looked incredelously at his attitude, on how dismissive he was to her— to her feelings. the treatment wasn't new, but being slapped about it in the face is.

"fine." she snatched the paper in his hands right after he signed it. "I'll see you in court, I hope you live a lovely life."

— — —

a few months later..

(Name) thought she would be utterly miserable after the divorce. twelve years is a long time after all. the home she once lived in was her safe space, even when the owner of it isn't.

her eyes flicker to the heaps of boxes in her new apartment. a fresh start of her life.

she was starting to heal against the wounds she bear. looking back, she regretted wasting her life on Zayne that didn't reciprocate the way she felt about him.

but alas, she can't continue to mull over spilled milk. it had already happened, she can't change any of her mistakes no matter how much she wanted to.

(Name) absent-mindedly caressed her stomach. looking down at the bundle of life that will soon become her joy, despite the guilt of a babe living their life without a biological father.

she knew about her pregnancy a few days after she grabbed her things from Zayne's place. it was an utter shock to carry that man's child. after all the things she had gone through because of him.

the baby is blameless though, in her eyes. she won't leave them to grow alone and unloved like her.

knock knock

"Ms. Name?"

she turns around and opens the door, a polite smile on her lips.

"ah, you must be my neighbor. Xavier, right?"

"yes," the man nods, rubbing their eyes as they yawned. "I heard it was a tradition to make something for a newcomer. so I made some cookies, if you don't mind."

(Name)'s gaze shifted down to the small bag in his hand. the clear plastic making the..... delicious.. (charcoaled) cookies see-through.

she suppresses a chuckle, smiling politely.

"come on in, I'd welcome some company."

stress-free life it is.

[bananabreads]

Small habits ⋆˚𖥔 ݁ ˖𓂃.☘︎ ݁˖

Dad!Rafayel, Dad!Caleb, Dad!Sylus, Dad!Zayne, Dad!Xavier — Dad!lads with their children's small habits around them (⁠￣⁠︶⁠￣⁠)

RAFAYEL — copycat

You weren’t even trying to eavesdrop. You were just passing by the living room with a bowl of snacks in hand when you heard it.

“Hmph. Predictable,” Rafayel muttered.

A beat later, in a tiny, high pitched, serious voice followed. “Predictable,” Seraphina echoed, snuggled under the same blanket beside him.

You slowed your steps and peeked into the room.

There they were, Rafayel stretched out on the couch, remote in one hand, face unreadable as some dramatic movie played on screen. And nestled right up against his side, wrapped in a too large throw blanket, was your four year old daughter, Seraphina.

Legs crossed the same way. Arms folded just like his. Staring at the screen with her best 'I’m an adult too' expression.

“This dialogue is terrible,” Rafayel said, taking a lazy sip of his drink.

“This dialogue is terrible,” Seraphina repeated, sipping from her juice box like she had a PhD in watching movies.

You bit your lip to keep from laughing and leaned quietly against the doorframe.

Rafayel tilted his head at the screen, his eyes narrowing. “I saw that twist coming twenty minutes ago.”

Seraphina immediately followed suit. “Saw it coming so early,” she mumbled, mimicking his head tilt.

Rafayel raised a single brow. “The villain has no depth.”

“No depth at all,” Seraphina echoed, hugging her plush closer.

You finally stepped into the room. “You two enjoying the movie?”

They turned in sync to look at you.

Same blank expression. Same slow blink. Same slight air of superiority.

Seraphina didn’t even miss a beat. “It’s tolerable.”

Rafayel added, “The movie's whole script is boring and plain.”

“Boring and plain,” Seraphina echoed.

You walked around the couch and plopped down beside them, raising an eyebrow at your daughter. “Are you copying Daddy again?”

She gasped, offended. “No! I’m just… agreeing.”

“She’s very agreeable today,” Rafayel said, gently brushing her waves away from her face.

“I’m so agreeable,” Seraphina nodded seriously, cuddling closer into his side.

You leaned in closer to whisper to Rafayel, “She’s literally become your tiny shadow.”

He smirked. “Imitation is the highest form of flattery.”

From the other side of him, Seraphina whispered to herself, “Flattery.”

You snorted into your palm. “I guess i have two rafayels now.."

CALEB — His daughter keeps on trying to scare him with the same prank every day.

It was already past 7 PM. Caleb had to work overtime at the fleet today because of important matters. You were currently cooking in the kitchen while your daughter was just running around the place.

As soon as she heard Caleb's keys jingling as he walked toward the entrance, she quickly rushed to the door, muffling her giggles with her small hand as she darted behind the coat hanging on the coat rack. She tried her best to disguise herself, holding the large coat that only covered her upper half. Her little feet, however, were clearly visible—though she thought she was completely invisible.

She kept giggling to herself as Caleb finally opened the door. He clearly saw her hiding there but played along, acting oblivious.

“Honey, I’m home,” he called out as he took off his shoes and placed them next to the coat rack.

Your daughter giggled harder, squirming a bit with excitement. Caleb could hear you cooking in the kitchen and kept pretending not to notice the little figure behind the coat rack.

“Sweetie? Daddy’s home,” he said again, stepping forward as if looking around the living room.

Your daughter took this as her cue. She leapt from behind the coat rack with her tiny hands raised like claws.

“Boo!” she yelled, standing proudly like a little monster. It made Caleb smile—she looked just like you used to when you were kids, trying to act fiercely.

He gasped dramatically and staggered back a step. “Sweetie, you scared me!” he chuckled, feigning shock in his voice.

Giggling, she looked up at him with sparkling eyes. “Was I scary, Daddy?”

Caleb gently scooped her up in his arms, showering her face with kisses as she squealed.

“Mhm, you scared me very much, sweetie,” he said softly, pressing a kiss to her forehead.

She giggled in triumph, proud of her daily prank, even though Caleb had seen it coming every single time. And still, every single time, he acted like it was the best scare he’d ever had.

SYLUS — When he’s away on a mission, she still needs him to sleep.

It had only been two days since Sylus left for a short mission, but your daughter already missed him like it had been weeks.

She refused to sleep in her own room without him there, not when she was so used to falling asleep with her father reading her story books and keeping her company. Sylus had always spoiled her, always staying until she drifted off, sometimes even pretending to be asleep just so she wouldn’t stir.

Tonight was no different. Except this time, it was you who had to step in.

She was curled up on your chest in your shared bed, breathing softly, using one of Sylus’ shirts like a blanket. It was clearly too big for her, but she held it tight, buried in it like it gave her magic comfort. Another proper blanket was draped over both of you as you gently rubbed her back.

You had your phone propped up, video calling Sylus, the screen softly glowing in the dim room.

“She didn’t want to sleep without you again,” you whispered with a small smile, glancing down at the little girl on your chest.

On the screen, Sylus gave a soft chuckle, but his eyes were warm, just a little sad. “She’s got me wrapped around her finger,” he murmured.

“She really does,” you said, adjusting the phone so he could see her more clearly.

She stirred a little, holding his shirt tighter in her arms, then mumbled in her sleep, “Daddy…”

Sylus’ expression softened even more. “I’ll be back in two more nights,” he whispered. “Tell her that?”

You nodded. “She knows. But she still wants to sleep with your shirt ‘cause it smells like you.”

“I’ll never wash it again,” Sylus teased softly.

You laughed quietly. “You’d let her get away with anything, huh?”

He smiled. “Only you and her, sweetie.”

You looked down at your daughter again, so peaceful and small, the weight of Sylus’ absence made a little easier just by his scent and his voice on the call.

“She’ll be okay,” you whispered.

“I know..” Sylus said gently, “But tell her… Daddy misses her too.”

ZAYNE — always gotta keep her parents updated..

The living room was warm and quiet sunlight streaming in through the half opened curtains, painting gold over soft blankets and scattered toys. Zayne sat on the edge of the couch, half distracted by the files he was reviewing on his ipad. But not so distracted that he didn’t look up the moment little footsteps padded over the rug.

“Daddy,” Jasmine said in her small but clear voice, tugging at the hem of his shirt with one chubby hand.

He immediately set the tablet down. “Yes, sweetheart?”

She stood up straight, expression serious, her favorite plush olaf tucked under one arm, hair slightly tousled from her earlier nap.

“I’m going to the kitchen to get a macaron,” she declared, pointing in the exact direction of the kitchen like it was a mission briefing.

Zayne blinked, then smiled softly. “Just one macaron?”

She nodded solemnly. “Just one. Mommy said I can have one if I finish my broccoli. And I did. So now, I get my macaron.”

Zayne gave a small, approving nod, as if this were the final step of a very important deal. “Alright, Mommy's little agent. Proceed with your operation.”

She giggled, saluted with her tiny fingers, and marched away.

Zayne watched her go with a chuckle before glancing down at the couch beside him, where you had dozed off mid-afternoon, curled up in one of his hoodies. He smiled to himself. Peaceful moments like this were rare in his line of work, and maybe that’s why he clung to every second of them.

A few minutes later, Jasmine was back, small crumbs around her mouth.

“Daddy,” she said again.

“Yes?” Zayne replied as he looked at jasmine.

“I’m done with my macaron. Now I’m going to my playroom.”

Zayne set the ipad aside completely this time, reaching out to lift her into his lap. She gave a surprised squeak but didn’t fight it—only snuggled in, resting her head against his chest.

“You always tell us what you’re about to do,” he murmured, brushing her hair back, “Why is that, hmm?”

She looked up at him like it was the most obvious thing in the world. “So you know where I am. So you won’t get worried.”

Zayne's chest filled with awe, “You’re very thoughtful, Jasmine.” he whispered, pressing a kiss to the top of her head. “Thank you for always telling us.”

She nodded, content. “And now… I’m going to sleep. On Daddy.

Zayne smiled, laying her gently across his chest, where her breathing started to slow.

“…Just so you know,” she mumbled sleepily.

“I know,” he whispered back. “I’ll be right here, just rest up, sweetie." He said as he gently kissed your daughter's forehead.

XAVIER — mastering balance

You crept down the hallway to check up on xavier and your son, but suddenly saw xavier napping on the couch—head tilted back, lips slightly parted, chest rising and falling.

And on top of him… chaos.

A small toy car balanced on his forehead.

A half eaten biscuit resting gently on his cheek.

A block tower three high stacked on his chest.

A sock turned into a ball, now placed in his hands.

A spoon in between his fingers.

Your three year old son was wildly focused— standing at the edge of the couch, tongue perking out in concentration as he slowly balanced a plushie on his father's knee.

You clamped a hand over your mouth to keep yourself from laughing.

Xavier, somehow, somehow, didn’t wake up.

Your son turned to you and gave a bright, whispery report, “Shhh, Mommy. I’m building a tower.”

“A tower, huh?” you whispered back, tiptoeing closer. “Why that?”

He shrugged like it was obvious. “’Cause papa's big and still. Like a mountain. And I’m making him comfy.”

You glanced at the block wobbling on Xavier’s chest. “You sure he’s comfy with all that on him?”

Your son nodded nonchalantly, “He likes it. He didn’t even move.”

You bit back another laugh. “He’s probably too tired to move.

Xavier snored softly in agreement.

You reached for your phone and snapped a quick photo of the masterpiece, because how could you not? It was a cute and funny father and son bonding moment.

Your son tugged at your shirt. “Mommy?”

You looked at your son and gently pinched his cheeks, “Yeah, sweetheart?”

“Can i put bunbun on papa's head?” he innocently asked

“…Let’s not.” you said as you lightly chuckled and sighed.

[himbodruid]

Bullet(s) For My Valentine

Sylus x Reader

Sylus has never experienced a fear like this, seeing you bleeding out in his arms after taking bullets meant for him

Heavy angst, hurt/comfort

CW: gunshot wounds, emotional af Sylus, Zayne is just bestie

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Searing flames ripped through you. You’d never experienced being shot before, but there was a first for everything. 0/10, would not recommend.

You didn’t even know how things escalated to that point so quickly. Some illegal protocore dealings needed to be investigated, and you’d volunteered for the job on the off chance Sylus’s crew was involved. The contract was supposed to be a simple in and out intel gathering ordeal, but the perps must’ve caught wind of the investigation.

Sylus was indeed involved, but from Onychinus’s own investigative standpoint. You’d run into him while entering the building, and he quickly hatched a plan to become your escort.

When the pistols came into play, Sylus wasted no time taking down a handful of men. His evol made quick work of those his pistol couldn’t, and you knew it gave him a thrill.

But, he was so focused on that thrill that he didn’t notice a man sneaking around the shadows behind him. You saw him and leapt in the line of fire before the bullets could strike Sylus. Your own weapon discharged, the man fell to the ground before you did. You couldn’t even tell how many times you’d been hit, you just knew that your body was on fire.

“No!” Sylus had never shouted like that before, and the power behind it scared you. The room went dark, his evol erupting from him to snuff out every single potential threat, including your intel target. Damn it, so much for the mission. But that was the least of your worries.

Sylus knelt over you, pulling you into his arms and assessing the damage. All the while he muttered a string of curses, which included what sounded like “you beautiful idiot”.

Black spots danced in your vision when he lifted you into his arms. The darkness that swarmed you was tinged red, and you couldn’t tell if you were losing consciousness or if he was losing control of his evol. Which was impossible, surely? Sylus was the epitome of precise control.

“Stay with me,” he kept telling you, over and over. You tried focusing on him, on his face, but it was so hard with the fire in your veins. You wanted to assure him that you weren’t going anywhere, but even you had no idea how bad the damage was. You couldn’t pinpoint any one specific place for the pain, it was everywhere.

“Sylus,” you whimpered, wanting nothing more than to give in to the darkness that spotted your vision, but you were scared. And stubborn.

“Shhh, I’ve got you, love,” he murmured to you with a shaky voice, clutching you closer to him. The weightlessness you felt amplified further, and then you knew the red tinge was indeed his evol. He made quick work of the distance between the gathering and the base, but you succumbed to the darkness the moment he landed.

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“She’s not waking up. Why isn’t she waking up?” Sylus demanded, pacing the length of the room. He ran his hand through his hair for what felt like the millionth time. The doctor gave an exasperated sign, turning his glare towards Sylus.

After dropping the Association’s target at their doorstep, thankfully just unconscious, Sylus had recognized the doctor in front of him as someone his kitten trusted. And he….may have possibly maybe accidentally abducted the doctor in a fit of panic. It was faster than sending for his own medic, anyway.

The doctor, Zayne, put up a good fight with his own evol, right up until he saw her laying on the bed. Then he was all business, assessing her wounds and working to fix her up. Sylus had the twins bring any and all materials Zayne needed for this impromptu house call.

But now she lay so frighteningly still, unnaturally pale, on his bed, and Sylus had never experienced a bone-deep fear like this before. And the impatience that came with it was maddening. Zayne watched him with those annoyingly assessing eyes of his, choosing his words carefully.

“She’s stable. She has two perforating gunshot wounds in the lower left abdomen, so thankfully I don’t have to attempt fishing out the bullets. All vital organs were missed, as well, so she is incredibly lucky. An inch in any direction, and the outcome would be very different for everyone involved.”

Sylus exhaled for what felt like the first time in hours. She’ll be okay, he kept telling himself over and over. He scrubbed his face with his hands, slumping into a chair a short distance away. With his face still half cradled in his hands, he watched the steady rise and fall of her chest. Meanwhile, Zayne continued his scrutiny from the stool Sylus had provided him.

“I’ll cut to the chase. I know very well who you are, but I want to know how you know her. And I want to know how she came to be in this condition, and if it will be a permanent issue from being around you.”

Sylus thought about his words carefully, ensuring that the adrenaline coursing through his blood wouldn’t make an enemy out of someone she respected. He was angry, but at himself and not the doctor in front of him. Zayne was right to be suspicious, since being the leader of a crime organization came with heaps of dangers that she would inevitably be exposed to. Yet the selfish side of Sylus abhorred the idea of letting her go to live a safer life.

“She was on a mission for the Association, and our goals happened to align. So, I went in with her in hopes of protecting her from dangerous people. Don’t look at me like that, I’m very well aware I’m also dangerous people,” Sylus said. “But somewhere, the mission went awry and she took the bullet that was meant for me, like a beautiful idiot.

“As for how I know her, that is a much longer conversation that I know you don’t have time for right now. And when she is out of danger and you have more time, we will talk about it and my intentions for her. Just know that I would give my life for her, I have given my life for her, and I will ensure she wants for nothing.”

Zayne kept his calculating gaze on Sylus, rolling his words around for a minute before relaxing his guard with a curt nod. Sylus’s shoulders drooped, thankful that the man in front of him seemed reasonable enough. Either that, or he was also insane. No matter, Sylus liked him well enough, and would do anything to stay on his good side for her sake.

“I may be her doctor, but I am also one of her closest friends. If you hurt her in any way, you will have me to answer to.”

And Sylus knew he would be good on his threat. Zayne was formidable with the ice in his veins, and Sylus was glad to have an ally out of him, rather than an enemy. The two men stood, clasping hands.

“Thank you,” Sylus said, his voice thick with an unnamed emotion. Zayne nodded once, turning to look at her again before stepping from the room. Sylus had arranged a car for him to take him back to Linkon. Under normal circumstances, he wouldn’t allow anyone to see the way to or from his home. But that privilege was extended to Zayne by proxy.

After a few silent moments, Zayne popped his head back in through the doorway. “She’s very accident prone, so you’re going to have your hands full. Good luck, and don’t hesitate to call for me.”

Sylus chuckled when he retreated once more. Accident prone, indeed.

He settled into the stool that Doctor Zayne vacated, waiting for her wake up. Anxiety coursed through him, despite the doctor’s reassurances. This was the first time in…a long time that he felt helpless. He just desperately needed her to open her eyes again, to hear her voice. Hell, he’d even take her casual bullying over this.

But all he could do was sit and wait.

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You wove in and out of consciousness, continuously being pulled back under despite your efforts to claw your way back to the waking world. Flashes of conversation with muffled voices you couldn’t focus on. At some point you swore you could hear Zayne in the room, but that would be impossible. From the few visual snippets you could snag, you were definitely in Sylus’s bed. The absurdity of that idea, that Zayne could be here of all places finally convinced you to give in to the depths.

You weren’t sure how much time passed when you were finally able to return to reality. You came to your senses much slower than you would have liked, but when you finally peeled open your eyes, you quickly shut them again. Even the dim lamplight in the corner of the room made you flinch. Yet, when you felt the weight of something by your hand, your eyes shot back open.

Sylus sat slumped over the side of the bed, his head resting on his crossed arms. It was a brief moment of vulnerability that he rarely showed, and something swelled in your chest at the sight. With great effort, you lifted your hand, brushing silvery strands of his hair from his face. He inhaled sharply in waking, and then his eyes sprung open once he realized you were touching him.

“Don’t you ever pull a stunt like that again,” he admonished immediately, his voice cracking with emotion. You thought you could see his eyes become watery, but he clenched them closed when he brought your hand to his lips. He held it there while he struggled to regain his composure. After a few deep breaths, he finally opened his eyes again.

“I’m sorry,” you croak. With a soft sigh, Sylus reaches over to the side table, pouring you a glass of water. When you tried to take it from him, he brushed your hand aside. He held the glass up to your lips, assisting you in taking long sips. Once finished, he placed the glass back on the side table, staring at it for a moment while he gathered his thoughts.

“Kitten,” he said softly. “I’m sorry. I’m not angry with you. I’m angry with myself.”

“But why?” Your voice was stronger now that the water eased the scratch of it. He closed his eyes again, jaw clenching as though he were in pain.

“Because I failed to protect you. If you’d been killed while under my watch…” he said in a strangled tone, one that suggested he had tortured himself incessantly with the what-ifs. Your heart lurched at the torment that laced his voice.

“i’m okay, though, Sy. My dumb mistakes aren’t your fault,” you said, reaching out to cup his cheek in your palm. He nuzzled into your touch, placing his hand over yours.

“I would have my every weakness exposed and exploited than to see you hurt like that again,” he murmured against your palm. A single tear escaped, trailing down his cheek before colliding with your hand. You used the pad of your thumb to wipe it away, heart breaking at the devastatingly beautiful man in front of you failing to maintain his usually rock-solid composure.

“Sy..” you whispered, not sure how to comfort him. You were alive and mostly intact, and now you were determined to be more careful in the future. You didn’t think your heart could bear seeing him like this again.

Before more could be said, there was a soft knock on the door.

“Boss?” Came Kieran’s voice on the other side. “The doc’s here.”

Sylus cleared his throat and stood. He let his eyes linger on you for a moment before going to the door and opening it. Dread filled you when you saw Zayne enter, and your eyes darted between the two men.

Zayne and Sylus exchanged a look before Sylus wordlessly nodded and left the room. Confusion and terror roiled through you and you struggled to grasp for any excuse you could come up with. But those excuses died on your tongue when Zayne turned his calculating gaze on you. He just stood there for a moment, staring, looking like he was collecting his thoughts. He said nothing as he approached the bed and placed his medic bag by the table. Only when he sat did he heave a sigh and then opened his mouth.

“Relax,” he said calmly. “You don’t have to try and make up some lie about who Sylus is, or how you know the head of Onychinus. I’m here as your doctor first, friend second.”

You relax, but only slightly. Zayne being here and knowing exactly who Sylus was spoke a lot to how scared Sylus was. You longed to pry for information about this new development, but you breath came up short when Zayne helped you to sit up. He removed the bandages and assessed your wounds, nodding in approval at seeing you were healing well enough. He redressed the wounds and then sat back in his stool. His gaze had always unsettled you- it felt like he could see right into your soul. As a result, you’d never been able to lie to him.

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have kept it from you,” you say, looking down at your fidgeting hands.

“How long has it been?” He asked quietly. You looked back at him, confused.

“For what?”

“How long have you known him? How do you know him?”

You took your time thinking back over the events of the last year, trying to pinpoint where your relationship with Sylus changed from business to something more intimate.

“I think…it’s almost been a year? I tried to infiltrate the N109 Zone, but ended up crossing paths with someone who intended me harm. Sylus and the twins swooped in and saved me. I hated him at first, but I realize now that there was a lot I didn’t know at the time. I thought he was responsible for Gran and Caleb…”

Your words trailed off and you shrugged. “But things are…different now. I’ve come to trust him almost as much as I trust you.”

Zayne gave you one of his small smiles, the kind you knew meant that he was content with your answer.

“I can tell that he loves you,” he said warmly, placing his hand on your arm to still your fidgeting. “When he dragged me here, I thought he intended to use me against you. But instead, he brought me here because he knew you trusted me. He also insisted on my monitoring your condition, rather than bringing in his own man. He also tried to pay me quite the sum for the perceived inconvenience.”

Zayne leaned in, narrowing his eyes slightly. “How did you end up hurt like this?”

“The Association sent me on an intel gathering mission and Sylus happened to be there for the same reason, though for his own research. A fight broke out, guns happened, and next thing I know I’m diving into the line of fire so he doesn’t get hit in the back. I know, I know, it was stupid of me,” you huff. “I did it without thinking, even knowing he can instantly heal from something like that.”

“The same story he gave m- wait.” Zayne’s eyes widened. “Instantly heal? And how do you know he’s capable of such a thing?”

You clamped your mouth shut, awkwardly staring at Zayne while he stared at you in shock. Unfortunately, this was another one of those moments that you wouldn’t be able to lie to Zayne, and he would never let the question go. His medical mind would hyper-fixate on it until he got his answer.

“W-well,” you start, wondering how you should word it. “I mmmmaybe…sorta…shot him point blank in the chest when we first met. But he started it!”

Zayne sat back in the stool heavily, eyes wide with incredulity. You could almost see the gears turning in his head. “And he…healed…from that?”

“Yeah, with his evol. Ask him if you don’t believe me, but he’s the one that provoked me!”

A small hmm sound was all he replied with. He didn’t get a chance to press it further, as Sylus knocked and poked his head into the room.

“It was still painful as all hell,” he quipped, clearly having heard the conversation. Zayne waved him into the room. “Thankfully, we haven’t had a repeat performance.”

Zayne sat in silence, turning this new information over in his mind. Sylus came in, sitting at your feet and placing a hand on your leg, over the pile of blankets covering you. Zayne’s eyes zeroed in on the motion and he looked back at you.

“As long as you are safe and happy,” he said softly, letting the previous conversation go way too easily. You could detect worry in his gaze, but he quickly hid it being that stoic facade he was masterful at.

“I am,” you reply with a smile. Zayne’s eyes darted between you and Sylus, and you could feel Sylus’s eyes locked on the side of your face. Zayne nodded and stood, followed by Sylus so he could show the doctor out.

“If he ever tries anything, you better tell me,” Zayne said sternly, narrowing his eyes at the other man. Sylus’s warm chuckle reverberated in the room at the thinly-veiled threat.

“She is more than capable of handling herself, but no harm will come to her ever again. I will see to it personally.”

Zayne nodded, content with Sylus’s declaration. He strode towards the door, rambling off a list of care details that Sylus listened to with rapt attention. Zayne’s approval meant everything to you, and you felt like you could breathe easier. You didn’t realize how much it weighed on you, having to hide your relationship from the only friend you had left from your childhood. You briefly wondered if Caleb, who was notoriously more protective of you, would have approved of Sylus, too. But that line of thinking was dangerous, so you pushed it from your head. Instead, you started thinking about how Zayne would try to figure out how Sylus’s evol granted him near immortality.

You settled back against the mountain of pillows that Sylus provided you. It looked like he went through the house and brought every single one available to you, along with hoards of blankets, effectively cocooning you in a nest of comfort. The thought and care in those small details made your heart swell and you smiled to yourself.

And then the absurd man reentered the room holding a massive bouquet of roses in one hand, and a bag containing takeout in the other. You let out a bark of laughter at the unexpected arrival, covering your face with your hands. Sylus flashed a brilliant smile at you, and it stole your breath away. You wanted to see that smile every single day.

“What’s all this?” You ask, still laughing merrily. He set the bouquet on the side table and you reached out to touch the velvety petals. The flowers were a deep burgundy color, darker and more purple tinted than typical red roses. Breathtakingly beautiful, just like the man in front of you.

“I had the boys run an errand, and had them pick this up on their way home before taking Doctor Zayne back to Linkon,” Sylus said, a soft blush staining the tips of his ears. Home. With Sylus. You decided you liked the sound of that.

The remainder of the night was spent splitting delicious food and engaging in light banter. He meticulously took care of you, even though exhaustion was evident in the dark circles under his eyes and the airy quality of his voice.

It took effort, but you finally convinced him to curl against your side, opposite to your wounds. The moment he did, his entire body relaxed into you and he fell asleep almost instantly. Days of running himself ragged finally came to an end, and you stroked his hair gently while he slept. All the while, you pondered your thoughts and assessing your emotions.

And you came to the conclusion that you were helplessly in love with the man at your side, the leader of Onychinus and the most wanted man on Earth, perhaps the universe.

[jinwoosbabyboo]

The School is Calling

You got a call about your kid(s) fighting at school ... this can't be good .... or is it? [Requested by: Anon]

Zayne

Principal: Your child got into a fight during lunch

MC: who started the fight?

Principal: That's not important the important thing is your daughter brutally beat up another child

Zayne: What was the fight about?

Principal: Another child took her fruit cup

MC: Is this the same kid who put slime in her hair two days ago?

Principal: Yes but-

Zayne: Is this the same kid who's been taking her notebooks for the last two weeks

Principal: well you see-

Zayne: This sounds like a case of bullying and it seems as though you and your staff have done little to discipline a student who has been bullying our daughter

Principal: I assure you we have a strict no bullying poli-

Zayne: It's not strict enough.

The principals lips snap shut.

Zayne: Now violence is not the answer, but this sounds like a case of self-defense you along with your staff need to handle the bullying problem you have in this school

Principal: ....

Zayne: Are we done here?

Principal: Yes we're done here sir sorry to bother you two

MC: Don't be sorry be better

Rafayel

Principal: Your children got into a fight during recess

Rafayel: Damn *turns to his kids* did you two win?

Your children rapidly nod with big smiles on their faces.

Rafayel: Hell yea! up top!

Principal: Sir this is not a good thing

Rafayel: Did they start it?

Principal: Well no

Rafayel: So they finished it?

Principal: Sir

Rafayel: Good talk ... tell your students to leave my kids alone now if we're done here im taking them to get ice cream

Rafayel walks outside with the twins in tow and finds you leaning against the hood of the car.

MC: So?

Rafayel: They didn't start it they finished it and they won

MC: That's what I like to hear ... Ice cream?

Rafayel & the twins: ICE CREAM !

Xavier

Principal: Your child got into a fight during P.E.

MC: Who started it?

Principal: That's not important here

Xavier: Answer the question.

Principal: ........The other kid shoved your child into the wall

Xavier: Which explains the bruise on his elbow

Principal: Your child then proceeded to punch the other kid in the mouth knocking his tooth out

Xavier: Sounds like self defense

Principal: Your son busted that kids lip sir

MC: Maybe that kid should've kept his hands off our son

Principal: We can't have your son fighting it goes against everything we stand for

Xavier: My son has told you and your staff multiple times this kid was being mean to him and you've done nothing

Principal: We've done everything we can

Xavier: No you haven't you let it slide until he stood up for himself and showed that kid that his actions have consequences we're done here

Sylus

MC: I just got a call from the school, but I won't be able to make it up there in time Sylus: I'll go I'm not busy MC: Okay let me know how it goes

Principal: Im sorry to inform you that we're going to have to suspend your daughter

Sylus: Why.

Principal: She tied up a student and stuffed him in a locker

Sylus: Why.

Principal:*mumbling* He .... He ripped one of her braids out

Sylus: Speak up.

Principal: Another student pulled her hair and removed a braid by accident

Sylus: If I do recall my daughter has reported this kid pulling her hair multiple times

Principal: Yes but we can't have her fighting

Sylus: She didn't fight .... she overpowered him and showed their difference in strength

Principal: but-

Sylus: You're lucky she doesn't like picking on the weak ... don't bother me or her mother with these trivial matters again ... lets go little dove

MC: How did it go? Sylus: Just a friendly chat nothing serious MC: What did she do? Sylus: Made me proud

[i-messed-up-big-time]

Lonely Birthday - Zayne

Zayne x Non Mc/Reader

a/n: here is Zayne's part! i hope you guys like it, gonna start working on sylus' soon, once im done drowning in assignments 😵‍💫

divider creds: @/cafekitsune

Tags: angst, happy ending, female pronouns, reader is not MC, female pronouns, cursing, reader is on their period, use of pet names (honey, my love), mentions of feeling insecure

word count: 3.4k

masterlist

Xavier Rafayel Sylus Caleb

Who knew that one could feel lonely even when they were with someone.

You were at Zayne's place for the weekend, wanting to spend some quality time with him, which is very rare with your conflicting schedules but you guys have always made it work somehow.

With his busy schedule you were never the one to get upset about him forgetting a few dates, he always managed to make it up to you.

You always kept quiet about your birthday, never too crazy about getting a lot of attention on just one specific day out of the year. You just liked spending your birthday with your loved ones doing something simple and eating some cake.

You were sprawled out on the couch, your mind giving up from all the paperwork you had to do. Being a business owner was no easy work, the endless amount of paperwork and business meetings always left your head reeling.

You had decided to take a much needed break, and that's how you ended up on the couch.

Bored out of your mind you scrolled through you social media, coming across an adorable video of a cat, you were about to send it to Zayne when you decided it would be more fun to show it to him in person, that way you could also get him to take a break with you too.

Getting up, you made your to his study. You saw him focused on the screen, typing away like a man on a mission.

He noticed you lingering by the door and beckoned you over to him. Happily making your way over you show him your phone screen.

A small smile makes it's way onto his face and the sight of the cat.

"Take a short break with me. You've been cooped up in here for hours."

You grabbed his chair and turned it so it was facing you and not his computer screen. Zayne opened his mouth to reject your offer but you were one step ahead of him.

"I have some of your favourite desserts in the kitchen."

He let out a small chuckle, grabbing your hand and taking you to the kitchen where his desserts await him.

You giggled at how cute he was, always ready to chow down on dessert.

You guys were silently enjoying the desserts together, his presence bringing you comfort.

But what would life be if it didn't interrupt your time together.

Zayne's pager went off. You let out a sigh of disappointed when he gave you that look that said 'I'm sorry but I have to go,' he kissed your forehead and quickly got ready to go to the hospital.

You walked him to the door, pulling him in for a quick kiss before bidding farewell to your ever so busy boyfriend.

The house was no even more quiet than it was before, you didn't want to be upset about being alone on one of your very rare work from home days.

If you thought your day couldn't get any better, you were in for a treat.

You felt all too familiar pain in your lower abdomen.

Letting out a little scream of annoyance, you made your way to the room you and Zayne share. Grabbing a shirt out of his closet and a pair of comfy sweats, you made your way to the shower.

●・○・●・○・●・

The shower was exactly what you needed.

Zayne, being the ever caring boyfriend, always had the bathroom stocked with all your feminine necessities for situations like this.

You dried up your hair and went straight to the bed, wanting to snuggle into the sheets.

You shot your secretary a message, she would handle everything in your absence.

Going to be spending the next few days with Zayne. Also just got my period so I'll be away from work, call me if there's anything urgent. If not, I expect you to handle everything.

Putting your phone down, you got comfortable and let sleep take over. It was nice and peaceful, almost like the calm before the storm.

●・○・●・○・●・

The next day you woke up to Zayne's side of the bed being cold, indicating that he had yet to return from work.

Letting out a sigh of disappointment you decided to freshen up and make some breakfast.

As you walked to the kitchen your eyes caught the date.

Oh, it's my birthday today.

You let a small smile grace your face, knowing that you and Zayne would at least spend the day together when he gets back, he always makes sure you're at the forefront of his priorities, outside of work that is.

You turned on some music and started humming along as you maneuvered around the kitchen. Just as you finished cooking you heard the door open.

You peeked your head out the kitchen and noticed Zayne taking off his shoes and coat. You made your way towards him but he just rushed off to your shared bedroom, not even a word of a greeting to you.

"What the heck was that?"

You were confused, you know Zayne had his off days but he wouldn't go as far as to you ignore you.

Following him to the room, you found him seated at the edge of the bed with his head in his hands.

Carefully making your way over to him, you softly called out to him.

"Zayne? Are you doing ok honey?"

You knelt in front of him, trying to get a look at his face. Reaching up you tried to move his hands from his face, but you were taken aback by the way he flinched away from your touch.

He got up from his spot and made his way to the bathroom, you were stuck in your spot for a moment before you jumped up and followed him.

"Zayne tell me what's wrong."

You asked, and what you got in response was something you never expected from him.

"Can you just leave me alone right now? I don't need you following me around like a lost puppy."

His voice was cold but you still pushed a bit, not wanting to give up.

"I just wanted to know—"

"I need you to stop talking already. I've had a long night and I'd prefer if I could just have some peace and quiet for once."

He cut you off, and as much as you would hate to admit it, you felt hurt by his words.

Without another word, you quietly left his room and went back to the kitchen.

You tried to eat the breakfast you made but your appetite was ruined. To make matters worse your cramps came back full force, you clutched your stomach in pain, silently cursing the gods for making you a woman.

Great, just great. Could this day get any worse?

Famous last words.

●・○・●・○・●・

You later got a call from your assistant about some urgent matters.

Apparently, some of your board of directors were colluding with your rival company and selling confidential information about a product that was yet to be released to the public, mainly due to the fact that it still had major faults that could be damaging.

You made yourself at home in the guest bedroom, not wanting to see Zayne in fear he might get upset at you again.

You were a strong and independent business woman, but at the end of the day you were still just a young woman still learning to navigate through life. Zayne's words had you feeling sad and a bit insecure, your mind constantly bouncing back and forth between finding a solution for the damage the information leak will cause your company and the fact that you might just be an inconvenience to Zayne.

Sighing, you decided to grab your bags and head to your apartment instead. Knowing if you stuck around here any longer you might just fall into a deeper pit of despair.

●・○・●・○・●・

A couple of hours had passed by and not once did Zayne message or call you.

So much for not falling into a deeper pit of despair.

Your period was making your emotions ten times worse than they already were.

You sat on your couch, you felt so lonely. Your day was just not going well, and you didn't even have any hopes that it would get better. It was just one problem after another.

You felt that familiar sting in your eyes, and instead of holding it in like you normally do, you let it all out.

Lately you've been having such bad days, it was like someone put some evil eye on you. You wouldn't doubt it if that was the case.

You felt tired after crying for so long, you didn't want to think of it this way but this was by far your worst birthday ever.

I just wanted to have a nice and relaxing day with Zayne.

Your lip quivered as a new wave of tears streamed down your face at the thought of your boyfriend, and how he had acted earlier today. You wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt that he probably just had a bad day, but you're still human at the end of the day. You still get hurt even if the other person didn't mean to hurt you.

Before you could wallow in sadness even more you got a call from your best friend, Tara. Needing a distraction you answered the call.

"Happy birthday bestie!"

You let out a little chuckle, her happiness rubbing off on you a little.

"Thanks Tara, how have you been? Hunter's Association keeping you busy?"

Your best friend was a data analyzer for the Hunter's Association, her job kept her busy so getting the chance to talk or meet up with her was rare.

"It's been busy, but we got to go home early today! Apparently one of the new hunters shares the same birthday as you!"

"Oh really, that's nice."

"Yeah, it was last minute but she wanted us to get some hotpot together, so that's where we're headed right now. Oh wait, is that your boyfriend?"

You sat up like you got shocked.

Zayne? What is he doing? Did he not even notice you left his place?

Your mind was running a mile a minute thinking about all the possibilities.

"Oh, I didn't think he knew MC. Why isn't he with you right now?"

Tara's question had you feeling upset and annoyed.

So he can push me away when I just wanted to know if he was okay, but now he's out celebrating someone else's birthday? While completely forgetting about mine?

"Oh I've been caught up at work so we planned on celebrating another day."

You said after a moment of silence, Tara seemed to have bought your excuse.

"Okay, as long as you knew he was coming here. I'll keep an eye out for anyone trying to get too cozy with him, you can count on me!"

Tara exclaimed, she always had your back no matter what. Which is why you felt bad about lying, but this was something you needed to deal with yourself.

You wrapped up your call with Tara, and decided you would just spend the evening on your own.

You freshened up a bit and stepped out to grab some of your favourite take out and desserts.

●・○・●・○・●・

You settled onto your couch and pulled up a show that has been sitting in your watchlist for a while now, finally getting the time to watch it.

You silently ate your take out, the show was interesting enough to keep you distracted from your depressing thoughts.

That didn't last for long though, when you got to your dessert your mind started to wander as the dessert reminded you of your boyfriend who was a fiend for anything sweet.

You let out a sad chuckle as you took a bite of the dessert before pushing it away, no longer in the mood to have anything sweet.

You grabbed the blanket that was on the back of the couch and decided to get comfy. Today was draining and now you just needed to become one with the couch.

The sound of the TV lulled you to sleep, the day being wiped from your brain as you fell into a dreamless sleep.

●・○・●・○・●・

At MC's dinner, Tara was seated across from Zayne. She eyed him down, wondering why he wouldn't just stay at home and wait for you instead of being here.

She wasn't one to comment on what people do with their free time, but it was odd to see him here, and for MC's birthday when it's just coworkers.

For the entirety of the dinner Tara silently observes him and MC, obviously he would never do anything to hurt you, but one could never say the same about other people.

Near the end of the dinner, Tara pulled out the gift she had prepared for you, knowing Zayne would be seeing you sooner than she'll see you she handed it to him.

He gave her a confused look as he eyed the gift bag.

"It's Y/N's birthday gift. You'll see her sooner than I will so can you give it to her?"

If it wasn't for Tara paying close attention, she would have missed the way his eyes widened just a fraction before silently nodding and taking the gift, bidding her farewell before rushing out.

I've never seen that man run out so fast.

Tara thought, turning her attention to MC as they made plans to go to karoke.

●・○・●・○・●・

Zayne had never felt as disappointed in himself more than he did today.

He not only had been extremely rude to you this morning, he also forgot your birthday.

He had no excuse, no matter how stressful or busy work got, he should've at least remembered what today was.

Rushing back home, he looked around for you. He couldn't find you anywhere, it seemed like you hadn't been home for a while. Zayne also noticed your keys weren't there either.

Did she go somewhere? But where could she have gone.

He racked his brain for any ideas of where you could have gone, taking a shot he decided to go to your apartment first. Hoping that you would be there.

●・○・●・○・●・

Once he got to your apartment, he hesitated to open the door. Unsure of whether you would want to see him or not.

He gathered some courage and opened the door, the sight in front of him had his chest hurting.

There you were, curled up on the couch with take out containers and a barely eaten dessert on the coffee table in front of you.

It seemed you had fallen asleep watching a show.

Zayne carefully made his way towards you, picking up the garbage to throw it out, and then packing the dessert away into the fridge.

After cleaning up he made his way back to the living room and knelt down in front of you. Immediately, he noticed how your eyes were red and puffy with a wet spot on the pillow indicating that you had cried yourself to sleep.

His chest felt tight looking at you like that. You were always so strong, barely ever giving into negative feelings, but I guess everyone has their limits.

Zayne gently gathered you into his arms and made his way towards your room. After tucking you in he decided to wash up and join you, hoping you would forgive him for neglecting you all day.

He slipped into bed quietly as to not wake you up, he pulled you in closer to him so that your head was against his chest and his arms were wrapped around your waist.

"I'm so sorry my love. When you wake up I'll make it up to you, I promise."

He placed a gentle kiss at the top of your head, letting himself relax with you in his arms.

●・○・●・○・●・

You woke up to arms wrapped around you, your brain not having caught up to the situation allowed your body to snuggle closer in to the warmth that surrounded you.

Wait didn't I fall asleep on the couch?

You shot up, or well tried to, the arms holding you restricted you from moving too much.

Looking up you came face to face with Zayne, seeing him brought back all of your feelings from yesterday and you tried to wiggle out of his grasp, only for him to tighten his hold even more.

"Stop moving so much and get some more rest."

His eyes were still closed as he spoke.

It irritated you that he could just act like everything was ok. You continued to move around until you finally escaped his grasp, darting straight to the bathroom.

You locked yourself in, not wanting him to come in. You didn't want to just forget it all and move on, it wasn't fair.

You were so lost in your thoughts you didn't hear Zayne knocking on the door.

"My love, are you ok? Can you please open the door?"

He spoke softly, as if he didn't want to upset me further.

You felt like you were being childish, but you wanted to ignore him the same way he ignored your requests about whether he was ok, and lets not get started about him forgetting your birthday.

You quickly freshened up and opened the door, Zayne stood in front of the door, patiently waiting for you.

He was about to say something but you just slid past him, not wanting to hear him out.

Desperate, Zayne grabbed your arm and pulled you to his chest, wrapping his arms around your waist to prevent you from walking away from him.

You wiggled in his hold. You felt your resolve to ignore him slipping the longer you stayed in his embrace.

He slowly moved backwards towards the bed, sitting down on it with you now in his lap.

You gave in and started crying, Zayne rocked you back and forth while rubbing a hand soothingly on your back.

“I’m sorry my love, I know it’s not an excuse but I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

He grabs ahold of your face and brings it to face him. The tears streaming down your face make him feel like a sinner.

He wipes them away as you slowly begin to calm down.

“Why did you go to her birthday dinner.”

You didn’t even have to say a name for him to know. He pulls out his phone to show you his texts with her, she basically lied to him about her heart condition acting up to get him to come out, and unfortunately it worked.

“I was concerned for my patient, it was nothing more than that. I was backed into a corner when she had asked me to join them for dinner.”

If there was one thing for sure, Zayne was never a man who would lie, even with reason. He always spoke the truth no matter what. This situation was also no exception.

“She was just one of my childhood friends who was diagnosed with a rare heart condition, if my head was screwed on right yesterday I would have never said yes. I’d rather spend my time with you.”

He gave you an adorable smile, but that didn’t mean you’d let him off the hook.

“You’re going to have to work for your forgiveness mister. Yesterday really hurt me, I’ve never felt more alone in a relationship than I did yesterday and we were supposed to be spending time together.”

You spoke, you needed to let him know how you felt, you wanted your relationship to work and in order to do that you needed to communicate.

Zayne nodded in agreement.

“I wouldn’t want you to forgive me so easily either.”

He pulled you in for a hug, wanting to comfort you as much as possible.

It was then you got this amazing idea, you knew exactly how you were going to get back at him.

“For making me sad your punishment is no desserts for a week.”

Zayne was about to protest what you interrupted him.

“Say one word of disagreement and I’ll extend it by another week.”

That got him to promptly close his mouth and begrudgingly agree.

“You also owe me massages for the whole week, I got my period and I’m sore all over.”

Now Zayne felt even more upset.

You were already in pain and I just added more to it.

Zayne thought.

“I’ll do anything you ask of me my love, whatever makes you happy.”

He pulled you in for a kiss, it was soft and sweet. Zayne’s actions always were louder than his words.

You kissed him back, enjoying the warmth he gave you both inside and out. You guys had your ups and downs but you always managed to make it work.

Zayne would be damned if he ever let someone so precious slip through his fingers.

[sleepymothafterhours]

Torture to Love You, Can't Live Without You

Zayne x Reader angst

Reader is not MC, MC Dies so I guess you could call it major character death? Angst with kind of no ending?

---> Part two here <3

Fic warnings: Death, grief descriptions, unhappy marriage but they're literally just grieving,

This fic is not beta read, and has been edited to the best of my ability,

Word Count: 4,000

Divider credit in my pinned post <3

Full fic under the cut, I have a part two planned out if this fic does well,

At the end of the day there was always you and her. You'd never be her but you were content with that, in school she was a good rival and maybe at first it used to irk you how special everyone seemed to think she was but as you got closer you realized she never asked to be treated that way. Tara had introduced you, such a social butterfly that girl. On missions you fought well, you worked together with ease often getting paired up on more dangerous outings. The day she died it was like part of you went missing. You could only imagine how it was for her close friend.

The day she died haunted you like a ghost. It would've been you, i could've been you. She didn't have to do that for you.

She didn't have to do that for you.

You sat in front of Jenna's office with a letter in your hand. You'd been on leave for months, stuck with office work to do at home to ensure you at least got paid so you could live while you were recovering. The time was fast approaching for you to either go back to the field or pick something else. Everyone you knew expected you to go back. In a lot of ways it felt like a dishonor to your dear friend not to. But you just couldn't. No amount of therapy took away the nightmares and so far no amount of meds was taking away the pain in your body from your own injuries. No doctor could clear you for the field with the level of pain you were still experiencing. You didn't want to go back anyway, you were scared. You waited outside her office for her other meeting to finish.

What you hadn't expected was for Dr.Zayne to walk out of that room. Too busy staring at him and wondering why he was here you entirely missed what he was saying to you. "Are you alright?" He asked kneeling down to your level, he held a cup of water out for you. You took it gratefully, "I'm alright. Thank you, Dr.Zayne." You two only spoke in passing, even out with your mutual friends. "I trust you've been well? Since.." He trailed off like it pained him to talk about the accident, you nodded. "As well as I can. That's why I'm here. I'm leaving the field." You said, a hint of regret in your voice. Zayne nodded, by the time his mouth opened to say something the doors to Jenna's office were open, and you were already on the way inside.

---------

That was all you saw of him for a year and a half. You didn't keep up with him, and it wasn't like he actively sought you out. It was probably a miracle you even found each other again. He found you in your favorite coffee shop of all places, after you'd finished teaching your classes. Teaching exhausted you, but it kept food on your table, and in the words of others, ensured you could still honor your friend. Regardless, you sat in your corner of the building sipping hot chocolate and working on a research paper about protocores. You'd written a few things on wanderers, architecture in Linkon, whatever seemed to catch your interest for the moment. You spotted Zayne first, though you almost didn't recognize his face. It was strange how someone could change so much after just 18 months.

Had you changed that much?

Or did you still look the same as you had that day.

The thought of it made your skin crawl and you focused on your computer to get it out of your mind. You didn't notice his approach.

"Do you make a habit to tune out everything around you?" His voice brought you out of it, closing a tab as you looked up at him.

"Doctor, what a pleasant surprise." You said moving your computer to invite him to sit down. "I don't mean to ignore you. I was just focused, I do a lot of work here. Do you come here a lot as well Doctor?"

Zayne gives you a slight smile and you can't help but cheer internally at the gesture, "Please, just call me Zayne." He says, his gaze lingers on you as you slip your computer into your bag. "Don't let me interrupt your work. I should be off anyway." He says moving to stand again, you still don't know why you stopped him.

"No. No trouble at all. You can only read so many articles about the rise of protocore modifications before your head starts to spin. Sit with me? Please?" You don't know why you keep talking and Zayne doesn't know why he's sitting, he really ought to be heading back to the hospital.

Maybe you were both drowning and maybe it was just easier to sink together.

Maybe that was why things happened the way they did.

The two of you talked for hours. It was refreshing the way he didn't bring the accident up. The way he didn't bring up losing her. You suspected it was as much for your benefit as it was for him. After a year and a half of pulling yourself through the trenches you finally found yourself talking to someone who made you feel, normal, it was like coming up for air after being trapped in a lake.

"I am happy to see you well after everything." Zayne says after a moment. "Is teaching future hunters as fulfilling as you found hunting to be?"

The truth? It nowhere close. But you don't hate it.

"It has its moments. I do enjoy what I do. And after everything I.." You trail off, struggling to find the right words. "I'm happy I could find a way to stay in this career. Regardless of what I'm doing." It was the most roundabout way you've ever told someone no, and you can tell that Zayne sees right through it. You wished you could have stayed.

He nods, "Maybe fate will take you back." He said giving you an almost soft look.

"You've written quite a bit about your research on Protocore syndrome right?" You ask, the silence that had drawn between the two of you becoming too much to bear. He nods, "Are you going to the gala in a couple weeks? They're celebrating some of the works that recently came out. I thought I saw you on the list they sent out."

He nods again, "I admit I was hoping to see you there." His ears redden as he says this and you can't help the smile that comes to your face.

"i was hoping the same. Everyone else is some old far or some posh snob who's never actually seen what its like out here, Ya know?" You take a sip of your drink, now long cold, "It'd be nice to have someone there that I know." Zayne nods his agreement to this and the conversation moves on for another hour, until you have to leave.

You thank him for sitting with you for so long, picking up your bag and discarding your drink. He stops you again before you can leave the table.

"Do you wanna go to the Gala with me?" his words make your heart skip and you find yourself nodding before you can even really put thought into it.

---------

Zayne came crashing into your life similarly to the way a snowstorm did, expected but sudden. He was always there in a lot of ways during your time as a hunter, you had enough mutual friends to at least know of him. The transition from acquaintance to friend was so subtle you didn't notice, you met weekly for coffee at the cafe when you could, or he'd find you there after work.

Then suddenly you knew his coffee order, and were taking him coffee and dinner during late nights in his office.

There were nights you would talk, and the two of you would have dinner in his office, you'd never been around someone who was so easy to talk to, Zayne just understood.

At one point you'd stayed to talk so long that you ended up eating dinner together, it was dark by the time you went to leave, and Zayne had insisted on taking you home.

He'd kissed you that night. After months of you thinking he was uninterested in anything more than simply colleagues.

You both got so busy that after you could do hardly more than text each other, it took a month of wondering if he'd meant to do it or not, a month for him to ask you out.

He proposed after four years, conveniently the night before another gala much like the one you'd gone to together before you got close.

Once again you were both being recognized for a lot of your work and researches, him, a deeper dive into protocore syndrome, you, a paper on how Evols affect personality traits and how that can be managed for people with more explosive evols and personalities. You used your relationship with Zayne a lot in that paper, with two completely clashing evols it was hard sometimes to get by.

Fire and ice,

maybe that was a sign you should've thought about before.

---------

You looked like the perfect couple. For awhile you felt like it too. You couldn't tell what happened. The two of you were doing better finally. You honored her every year on the day, holding each other and helping each other get through your grief everyday. You knew he loved you. You knew he loved her and you respected that. You understood as well as you could.

After your honeymoon you fell back into your routine, teach in the day, take Zayne lunch during your time to plan, go home and grade papers until he gives you a call that he should be home within the hour. You made dinner and the two of you spent time together until you fell asleep on the couch. Zayne would carry you to bed despite the countless times that you told him to wake you.

You couldn't pin point the day it all started going down hill. But you knew that it had something to do with the mission that dragged you back into hunting, the intercom ringing in your ears and the voice of an OTTO bot calling for every trained hunter in the building. Every student was to go back to their dorm. You tried, to leave with the students, with a soft spoken, "I don't do that anymore." said mostly to yourself as you followed students out to the dorms.

That was until you heard the cry. A little girl trapped under a building, you ran before your feet could keep up with you, the grace you learned in your training never left you, a hunter caught up with you, a student from a few years back. He helped you lift the bean that had trapped the girl and looked to you for direction. "Get her to safety and meet me a few blocks up." You ran the other way the minute he nodded right towards danger, right where you weren't supposed to be going.

Right where you wanted to be.

After the fight you assisted with cleanup, carefully avoiding the eyes of your old boss as you helped a little boy step into an ambulance. Zayne found you shortly after, sitting on a stump and bandaging your arm, people had begun to go home but the cut was pretty bad and you wanted to take care of it before you left.

"You're hurt." He said kneeling down to take the bandages out of your hands, "This is too tight, let me help?" His voice was soft, you couldn't tell if he was worried, angry or both. You nodded and carefully he unwrapped the bandage and began to clean it. "Sorry I broke routine tonight." you blurted, you weren't really thinking when you said, wrapped up in the crackling of a fire somewhere near you, and his laugh filling your ears. A laugh?

"My love. You're bleeding, but you're sorry for..breaking routine?" He looked up at you befuddled, his hands stopping their work on your injury. You shrugged, "You never cease to amaze me." He said after a moment. "We're going home. And we're ordering whatever you want for dinner and you are going to rest." His voice was more firm than normal and when your boss came over to you finally he seemed to stand slightly in front of you as if to keep her from taking you from him too.

She joked about you coming back, you told her you were just following instruction. The announcement called for all hunters. You politely declined her offer and stiffened when she joked about how you could make more if you came back. Zayne brushed her off for you, saying something about getting you home to ensure your arm healed.

The silence in the car home was almost unbearable. "She's right ya know." You said softly, "I'd make a lot more back in the field." Zayne kept his focus on the road but you could tell the words bothered him.

"We don't really need it. You and I are doing just fine." You slumped back in your seat at his words. "You never did it for the money anyway. Do you want to go back?" He asks and you can't answer right away. The answer used to be no, you used to be too scared but somewhere down the line you missed the danger, you missed the fire you had within you that had dimmed after the accident. Your evol felt suppressed from only being used to heat the forgotten teas you took to work or occasionally to light a gas stove.

You'd smothered your fire as best you could all these years but yet it still seemed to roar within, and consume you with every passing day. The answer should have been no but you couldn't bear lie to the man next to you.

"No." You waited too long to say anything,

"You've always been bad at lying." He's stopped at a light and turns to you to move a piece of your hair, you can see he almost looks defeated when you say nothing in response to this.

--------

If you could have pinpointed the minute, maybe even the second that he had started being distant from you, colder even, maybe you could have prevented it, but it was so hard to realize it was happening when he acted the exact same in public as he had before. He followed his routines almost to a T but he spent more and more time at work. Often coming home to you asleep on the couch waiting for him, until eventually he found you already in bed when he got there, always careful not to wake you when he climbed into bed. You could pinpoint the night he stopped holding you by the way your heart began to ache for it immediately.

It took 3 months to transition back into your old job and ever since it was like you lived with a ghost. He was gone when you woke for work, he was gone when you came home but there was always a dish in the drying rack and a paper on the counter that he had left behind to prove his existence. At least you could be sure he hadn't moved into his office even though every other piece of evidence told you otherwise. The times he was home with you it was like he was on another planet, that was if you could get him out of his office at the house for more than two seconds. His affection had a cold bite to it that made you stop seeking it and when he looked in your eyes it was almost clear all he saw in them was her. His coldness did nothing but make you more persistent at first. But after so long you just grew tired, you loved him with everything in you couldn't he understand that?

You liked to imagine that there was another life where you both weren't so different. But maybe in another life he ends up with her in the end, maybe there's a universe where she isn't a wedge in your relationship maybe you won't be together in this life, not the way you want but in the next... Maybe you just have to wait. What a cursed thin g love was.

He stood in front of you now for the first time in months, Tara had invited you both for drinks after work, a nice little place just a block away from your house, you were gonna walk together.

"You look lovely." He says and there's a flicker of something in his eyes that gives you hope that maybe he's looking at you for real this time, but then its gone. He's looking right through you.

Your response is as calm as you could manage to be, "I'm surprised you noticed."

The two of you left, making the walk there in a comfortable silence. Zayne played the dutiful husband role well. He held your hand, he held open the door for you, took your coat, pulled out your chair. To anyone else he looked so smitten with you, and you him. You shook your thoughts out of your mind, you were here tonight to have fun.

You didn't drink often, nor did you drink much. You figured offering him a sip of your drink would be fine, and he must've too because he took it. The way he scrunched his face in disgust made you giggle, he took a bigger drink than you thought he would. "Here, have some water, are you okay?" You ask pushing a glass of ice water to him. He waves you away, takes the glass and drinks but tells you to focus on your friends.

You forgot how much of a lightweight he was. One drink was enough to get him at least tipsy? It would have been funny, if you weren't concerned.

You'd been talking to Tara. who gushed over the two of you whenever she saw you. "Really i don't know how you two do it. You looks so happy all the time." She's smiling as she speaks, the only time you've seen her without a smile on her face was just after incident, it used to annoy you how one person could be so happy but you found yourself unable to frown whenever she's around now.

"Trust me Tara I don't know how we do it either sometimes." She doesn't know how much truth there is to your words. How this is the first time in almost a year that Zayne has been so close to you. How this is the first time in months you've seen or talked to him for more than five minutes. That this is the first time he's wanted to be around you since you became a hunter again.

+++

Zayne only seems to get drunker as the night progressed despite the fact that he hadn't had anything else but water.

"I think I should get him home." You said giving your friends a smile, you'd paid for your drink, the one you hadn't finished, too busy making sure your husband doesn't fall out of his seat. You help him up, he's not exactly hard to move but the man is stubborn. "Baby c'mon, lets home, I'm tired." He concedes finally at your words and you walk home. He's leaning on you for support the whole way out of the bar, even as you nod to your friends and wish them a good night.

You have to stop for a little while, sitting him down, the air is cold. You try not to shiver. "How'd this even happen huh?" You tease him softly, holding his face in your hands. It feels normal for once.

"I'm sorry my love." his words are slurred and he notices your failed attempts to hide your shivering, wrapping his coat around you clumsily. "I love you." He's looking straight through you again through unfocused eyes.

"Do you." Its not a question. You two walk leaning on each other until you reach the house. You drop your keys trying to unlock the door. When he hands them to you, you hear it. A mistake. A slip of the tongue. Maybe he could claim he was drunk but it was clear.

He'd called you by her name.

You didn't say anything. He tried covering his mistake, you said nothing. Pushing past him into the medicine cabinet in your kitchen you grabbed water and ibuprofen and took some. You slid past his attempts to be close to you guiding him to your room.

He's distraught, you feel like you're falling to pieces. "Lie down." You instruct. "You're not gonna feel good in the mor-" He interrupts you as you're trying to cover him in a blanket.

"Talk to me. Please." He's pleading, his voice breaking, it used to hurt your heart to hear it, maybe it still does but you can't feel anything right now other than anger, you feel like your on fire.

"You're drunk."

"Talk to me." There are tears in his eyes.

"What is there to say, Zayne. You called me, by your dead best friends name." You sit at the edge of the bed. "I can't b angry I know you loved her. I know you want her. I just wish you wanted me the same way." You get up and go to make your way out of the room. You need to calm down, maybe you'll go for a walk, or have some tea.

Flicking the light off you hear it. A quiet sob, and a small "I'm sorry."

You can't help the words that leave your mouth. "Don't bother."

The light is off and the door is shut and you the minute you sit down on a stool in your kitchen island you break down. You felt like two puzzle pieces that fit together just fine but were from two separate puzzles. You took time to put yourself back together, eventually getting up to go to your room, apologize if he was still awake and go to bed hoping to fix whatever rift has been growing in your relationship. Your hand is on the door, you just need to open it.

Your phone rings.

You can see the light come on from your hunter watch in the bedroom.

Ignore it. Go to sleep. Fix this. That's what you're telling yourself.

You answer it before you can stop yourself.

"Hello?" Your voice cracks from your breakdown.

"Hey." Its a newer hunter, you'd been working with her for months. You were too scared to get closer to her but for now you didn't mind mentoring her. "Got a mission. You're on the way can I come get you?"

Her words are so scarily similar to what you told your best friend that night. You turn away from the door. "Let's go then."

How strange the universe was in the way it worked. How strange the parallel was. You put on your uniform in silence. Zayne had fallen asleep as far as you knew. You stopped by his side before you left, kissing his head softly. You don't say anything else as you leave.

Unbeknownst to you. He wasn't asleep, he heard the whole thing. He too noticed the parallels. He wouldn't sleep that night. Or the night after.

He was losing you and he didn't know how to stop it.

You were losing him and it felt like someone was carving your heart from your chest.

Sleepy moths after thoughts: Everytime i went to work on this fic I either got called into work, or my friends wanted to hang out, thats why it took so fuckin long. Hopefully the wait was worth it, Thanks for reading and thank you everyone who supported this fic <3

Taglist: @theink-stainedfolk , @alfredosaws , @sylv-1a , @cordidy , @leighsartworks216 , @midiplier , @melonssoup , @sw3etfawn111 , @dhunhdchrih , @i-messed-up-big-time , @fandomenbylover , @notisekais

@theophxbia cus i know pookie probably wants to read it (ILY BESTIE)

[himbo-kuto]

idol!reader x pilot!caleb 

plot: your performing a song with some suggestive lyrics to hundreds and thousands of people 👀

caleb | rafayel | zayne | sylus | xavier 

“linkon stadium!” 

the sudden eruption of cheers from thousands of people in front of you made your heart warm. you had just finished your costume change for your secret stage that you switched up at every location and you were giddy with anticipation. it was a frilly green two piece that didn’t leave much room for imagination. 

caleb had asked you a billion times on what the song was since you told him all the others but you kept it under lock and key knowing that you were essentially dedicating this stage to him. 

“for the last time, no caleb! i’m not telling you!” you scolded as you propped your phone up on the bathroom mirror during your routine video call. you finished off your skin care routine with a lip mask, cleaning up the corners with your finger before looking right at the camera.   “but just know, that stage is dedicated to you.” he groaned in response, covering his now blushing cheeks with his hand.  “you’re going to be the death of me, pipsqueak.”

you knew it was rough on him as you were traveling the world and even though he was a pilot, you two rarely found yourselves in the same place but today you knew that caleb was coming and you couldn’t wait to be in his arms once again. 

you looked out to the audience to the section that your management had blocked off for your friends and family and if your eyes were correct, you could see him right in the middle wearing some light up headband with your name on it. 

“i feel blessed to be able to finish out my tour in my home town with my friends, family and partner out here in the audience tonight” another wave of cheers came through from your fans, and maybe you were crazy, but you thought you heard caleb’s scream as clear as day. you couldn’t help the smile that spread across your lips as you began to get into places for the beginning of the song.

“you have all have given me so much of your time and energy– i want to make sure we keep it up until the very end, what do you say?” you held your hand up to ear, and the microphone out to the audience.

“if you know the words to this song, i want you to sing them as loud as you can with me alright?” the lights dimmed, the crowd once again screamed at the top of their lungs in anticipation before the first few notes from sabrina carpenter’s nonsense started playing over the speakers. you read the conspiracies on what your fans thought your stage was going to be. you were proud in knowing that none of them guessed this song, leaving everyone in shock. especially the person whose reaction you anticipated the most. you secretly texted tara before heading on stage, asking her to record caleb’s reaction and she quickly obliged.

only a few lines into the first verse, you and your dancers could feel the energy of the audience as the lyrics could be heard loud and clear. you wanted to give them a good send off before you took a long break to recuperate and you were glad they were vibing along with you. 

I'm talkin' all around clock I'm talkin' hope nobody knocks I'm talkin' opposite of soft I'm talkin' wild, wild thoughts

on caleb’s end he was thankful to whatever god above that the venue was dimly lit because his whole neck and face were bright red. there you were, looking right at the camera that plastered your face on the big screens with your hair perfectly done and your makeup all sparkly. you looked immaculate and he was blown away. sure, he’s seen you perform– heck he’s watched every single one of your performances even the more suggestive ones. but he knew you chose this song with those lyrics intentionally and the fact that he could only stand there and watch from afar is what killed him. he didn’t even notice tara laughing out loud as she captured his reaction to the chorus, flashing back and forth from the big screens with your face to your tomato of a boyfriend.

he was rendered speechless and all he could do was absent mindedly clap along to the song, he couldn’t take his eyes off you. a sudden burst of screams broke caleb out of his trance. he watched as you reached out to a fan that was close to the stage and put on a pilot’s hat. you couldn’t even contain yourself at how perfect the timing was and laughed as you continued to sing the lyrics.

that man was done for. he loved seeing you in his uniform, whether it was his hat or jacket he would go weak at the knees, wanting to take as many pictures as possible (he was definitely going on to social media later and download all your concert pics) he couldn’t help but laugh as well seeing how much fun you were having up there. yeah it was hard being away from you for extended periods of time, but seeing you perform was always worth it. he was planning on giving you an ear full but maybe now there wasn’t going to be much talking. you were nearing the end of the song where different adlibs could be sung depending on the situation.

This song catchier than chickenpox is I bet your house is where my other sock is

you held the brim of your hat, with a flirty look on your face as you tried to hold your composure as you sang your practiced adlibs. 

He’s my pilot, i’ll meet him in the cockpit Mile High Club, can you keep a secret?

you gave a salute as your ending fairy, giving a knowing laugh as your boyfriend has most likely passed out on the floor. 

“thank you linkon, i’ll keep this night in my heart forever!” 

—

bonus:

“babe that’s literally the 20th time you’ve watched that clip– i’m right here” he couldn’t hear you as he kept replaying a video a fan took of the ending adlibs. he had surely given you a stern “talking to” when you were able to make it back to your house. he laid there freshly showered after doing all the things that were listed out in that song– you might add. smiling like an idiot at his phone as you made your way back into his embrace. you watched as he continued to scroll through more videos from your concert.

he put his phone down as he held you closer. you buried your face into his neck, closing your eyes as you inhaled deeply. you missed him dearly and it was good to be back. 

“we haven’t even had sex in my plane– are you trying to tell me something?” your eyes shot open as you landed a square slap right on his chest. 

“CALEB–” he laughed out loud as he held his hands up in defense. 

“you’re the one who said it pipsqueak, not me!” you bit his arm before making your way back into his neck. 

“would you rather have me say ‘that autopilot got me boun–’” the rest of your sentence was muffled as he covered your mouth. 

“shhh…. the world doesn’t need to know that much.”

[laddelulu30]

Grey Shirt Ovulation

tags: Breeding kink, multiple orgasms, mirror sex,

Pairings: POC Non-MC/Reader x Caleb

A/N: So.. This is dedicated to a fellow Tumblr whose prompt I found and immediately jumped at the idea. I know I have other WIPs that I’m already working on. But I honestly couldn’t resist. This is for you @minaaa444. Thank you for the stimulation…. I mean motivation. You came up with the idea and my debauched mind did the rest. I hope I did you proud. Likes, reposts, and comments are very appreciated. Because I have a praise kink. So, if you liked it, tell me I did a good job, that I was a good girl. And even if you didn’t like it, tell me anyway. It helps me learn what to do and what not to do.

also tagging: @ainsley-official @marvichi @fuckin0-0anime @harrys-sunflower-bakery

@unintentionalseductress @jinwoosbabyboo @aeyumicore @lyn31 @zaynes-wifey @someprettyname @uyai1101-lads

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* 　　 *:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

You had just sent in a request to have the next four days off. Which had taken an additional three days before Team Leader Jenna could approve it.

“Congrats Hunter, your four day leave has been approved. Should I be concerned why my most dedicated and talented Deepspace Hunter has requested time off?” she asks.

“Nothing serious, I promise,” you laugh, giving her an easy smile, “You have nothing to worry about. I’ll return to full duty as soon as my requested days up.”

“Alright,” she says, but you can tell by her expression that she doesn’t quite believe you, but she doesn’t press.

You take your things from your work locker then make your way home.

Standing in your living room, feeling the stillness in the air,

you start to feel restless.

Without a thought… or a plan for that matter. You take a trip to Skyhaven.

Almost as if you had been called there, you go to Caleb’s place. You have a key, and you know the code, so you don’t think to call or text him to let him know that you’re

So… you just walk in.

Not that Caleb would’ve minded. He likes having you in his space. But with your conflicting schedules, seeing each other became more of a pipe dream than a possible reality.

Until at this moment.

Closing the door and locking it behind you, you take a few steps inside then stop.

Looking around, you felt the same burning need to do…. something. You weren’t sure what, but you’d figure it out.

Touching everything fleetingly, like a gentle caress. It almost seemed like you were visiting him for the very first time, and you were curious about everything in sight.

But it wasn’t your first time here. And it was still early, nearly midday.

You didn’t know what to do with yourself. You had never been home around this time, not working or the very least on a mission.

So.. this was all new territory for you.

After a few more minutes of aimless idling, touching random

What to do? you thought to yourself.

things, you decide to cook something for yourself.

You make yourself a small pot of braised pork belly over rice. Which turns out to feed at least three more people.

You snort, mocking yourself for poor size control but then praise your cooking.

You’ve gotten better. Cooking with Caleb has been upping your cooking skills.

After polishing off your bowl, you clean up what you used to cook, then set the pot to really low heat and put the lid on it. You wash dishes then dry them.

Then you decide to soak in the bath… until you remember.

You didn’t bring anything with you.

But you’re already here. And there was no way you were gonna head home when there was a sliver of a chance that Caleb already has what you needed in his place.

And since Caleb kept his place so immaculate. Orderly. OCD type orderly. You were sure he had something you could use… and wear.

You really did act like an impulsive teenager coming all the way to Skyhaven without some semblance of a plan.

Taking a chance, you checkout his bathroom anyway. And you’re surprised when you find your favorite oils, bathing milk, body wash, shampoo & conditioner, and body lotion tucked underneath his cabinet in the bathroom.

You want to question it, but at this moment, you’re thankful more than anything.

He even had your strawberry cheesecake body scrub that you liked.

A man that listened and remembered. Was such a turn on. But you push the thought away, pouring the vanilla bathing milk in the hot water as it filled the tub.

When you got it where you wanted it, you turned the water off and got naked, sinking into the water. An appreciative moan echoes off the walls of the bathroom.

The water felt amazing.

You soak in the water for an hour before bathing and getting out. You clean the tub then wrap a towel around your thick, curvy figure, hair pulled up from a scrunchie that had been in Caleb’s cabinet.

A scrunchie you hadn’t realized you’d left, but he had held on to.

You go into his bedroom, curiously rifling through his drawers with one hand. And you discover that in one of the drawers… is a new pack of underwear. Lace. Your size.

You open them but they smell like fabric softener.

“He must’ve washed them and then returned them to their original package…” you muse aloud, eyes drawn to a pair of red lace boy shorts.

So… You put them on then allow the towel to drop, looking for one of his shirts you could wear. Your eyes stop on a grey shirt with the logo of the flying academy Caleb had gone to before going to work with the DAA.

You put the shirt up to your nose, inhaling it. The shirt is clean, but smells like him. Like cinnamon and apples. Crisp. And mouthwatering.

The scrunchie out of your hair. Your dark red hair falls down your back in a cascade of damp waves, caressing your lower back.

Mine. Your mind claims and so you put it on, taking

You look in the mirror, trying to admire your reflection. Your eyes take in your appearance. Thick plushy thighs. Smooth chocolate skin. Petite frame. Hazel green eyes.

To Caleb, you looked like a Deity fallen to Philos. A temptation he wouldn’t resist.

But to you..

You move away from the mirror, picking up after yourself so that you don’t make a mess or leave one behind.

Besides, you want to surprise him. If that’s possible.

You leave the room, going into his other bedroom, curious to see what’s in there.

It’s the guest room you had used once before but now, during your absence… was unrecognizable. He had remodeled it to fit your tastes.. Should you have wished to rest in a separate room.

“He’s so unbelievably sweet, it would give someone a tooth ache, or a cavity,” you laugh to yourself.

You have another thought. One darker.. more sinful.

“I bet he looks sexy in that uniform,” you murmur to yourself, fingers inching to touch. Him. Yourself. Anything to make the fire go away.

You look around, checking the clock on the wall for the time.

2:38 p.m.

It’s still early enough. Maybe you could… and maybe he’d be working and you didn’t have to risk him catching you rubbing one out in his shirt… and the underwear he bought for you.

You had to admit that the mere thought was sounding more enticing by the second.

Without hesitating for another second, you close the door to the guest room, locking it behind you.

You lay on the bed, observing that it also smelled like Caleb.

Had he slept here as well when he had his own bedroom? you wonder, the thought a whisper in the back of your mind.

Your mind hadn’t lingered on the thought for long.Your body had more… pressing urges.

You bring the hem of his shirt to your face and held the material between your teeth. Inhaling his scent, your body comes alive once more.

Urging. Craving. Hungry.

Tentively, you roll your nipples between your fingers with one hand and your needy, swollen clit is rubbed with the other.

You keep your moans and whimpers as quiet as you can, but your pussy has other ideas. So engrossed with satisfying your growing and insistent lust, that you don’t notice the front door unlock.

You also don’t notice the front door open and closing.

Caleb gets home early, feeling frustrated, an itch he couldn’t ignore. He had been feeling irritable all day, and he figured going home to shower and shamelessly stroke his aching cock to your name would help ease his mood.

Only… when he got home, he tossed his uniform jacket and hat on the arm of the couch then stilled.

Someone was in his home. He checked his bedroom and noticed that the thing he’d left for you, bought for you had been moved. Used.

Snatching off his shirt and kicking off his boots so that only his pants remained. He hastily pulled open the belt and opened the zipper of his pants.

He calls your name.

When there’s no response, he decides to hunt for you. His hunger for you growing with every step.

He yearned to taste you, to have his face nestled between your velvety thighs like soft, fleshy pillows.

He called your name again, and again there was no answer.

Had she come to take a shower then left again? he wondered for only a second. Then saw your pile of clothes that you had worn there in the hamper. So, she was either naked somewhere in the loft or she had worn my clothes to go out.

Either possibility made him impossibly harder. The thought of you wearing his clothes, his scent on your skin set off a primal hunger he had been trying to keep buried. His throat went dry and his thoughts grew muddy.

It became a need to find you.

His steps became more desperate as he nearly passed the guest room. Immediately noticing the irregularity of the door being closed.

He went to twist the knob. Locked. And his mind went absolutely feral but his demeanor didn’t change.

“Princess?” he said, and there was a sound.

He didn’t know what the sound came from, but now he knew for sure you were in the room. Could smell strawberries through the door.

Then he heard it. The sweetest, neediest moan he’d ever heard you make.

What were you doing? His mind pressed with the desperate need to get to you. To see why you would be making that sound, and why it wasn’t because of him.

“Princess, what are you doing in there?” he asked, his voice breathless from restraint, using his Evol to unlock the door.

He was, however, not prepared for the sight that lay before him. His knees nearly gave out.

You. In his shirt. Pleasuring yourself. Two fingers, knuckles deep in your pussy. Eyes closed, consumed by your own need and pleasure, unaware of anything happening around you.

The sounds. Gods. The sounds your pussy was making. It made him hungry. Hungrier than he had grown trying to take things slow with you.

But it seemed… slow hadn’t been doing either of you any favors.

Slowly, so that he doesn’t startle you, he padded barefoot to the bed. Ever so softly did he touch your thigh.

His voice was thick with need. Barely restrained self control. “Princess, is that… my grey shirt?”

Your thigh muscles tensed at the light touch, then relaxed. Your eyes snapping open. Pupils blown and cloudy with lust. And when he asked the question, you answer with a whining, “Yes.”

He almost moaned like a fucking hormonal teenager but managed not to make a sound.

That tone. That whine nearly caused his self control to splinter into nothing. He leaned between your thighs, gently running his nose along the inner part of it. Inhaling the scent of you. Strawberries

His voice was rough, soft and raspy, almost like a growl, “Do you… need help, little bird?”

“Yes,” came your reply, still as needy as before, the hand on your nipple fell away, reaching for him.

And that was all the permission he needed. With his stomach pressed into the bed, he moved his face closer to the heaven between your thighs.

You were so wet. And you smelled so good. It made him dizzy. But he moved slowly.

He wrapped his fingers around your generous hips, thumbs rubbing into your skin before he pressed into it, pulling you closer to him, slowly pulling your fingers away.

Your calves settled on his shoulders and he swallowed, barely able to control himself. But he needed to. Didn’t want to scare you. Didn’t want you to recede back into your reserved shell.

Not when this is the result of what happens when you let your desires take hold of you.

“How long.. had you been waiting for me, princess?” he rasps, gentle. Encouraging.

“I.. got here midday..” you admit, melting under the darkening galaxy of his purple and dusty pink gaze.

“Why didn’t you call me?” he asked, peppering the inside of your thigh with gentle kisses.

“I.. wanted to.. surprise you..” a raspy pant.

“For this?” he smirked, chuckling. It was to cover up the pathetic moan that almost escaped his lips.

“N-no. But then.. I smelled your shirt.. and I don’t know what came over me,” you admit, “But my fingers aren’t enough anymore.”

Caleb freezes. Doesn’t breathe.

“Please… I need you,” you whimper.

And the control he had held back snapped like a rubber band. It called forth the hunger that had burned within him that had grown progressively more intense.

But in your lustful state, you didn’t see it. The way the look in his eyes changed, the way his muscles tensed and moved beneath the skin on his back.

He rubbed his nose against your clit like he was trying to coat his face with your slick, you squeak from the sensation. And with a rumble in his chest, he takes a long and slow swipe of his tongue to your dripping cunt.

He moaned… fucking whimpered at the taste of you.

Then… he’s devouring you like you were a gift he’d received in the desert. An Oasis to his dry tongue and parched throat.

Fingers pressing deeper into your skin, pressing into the underside of your thighs. He pulls you tighter against his face.

Oxygen the least important thing to him at the moment.

He worshipped your pussy like it was a drugging need. Shameless. Loud. He licked and sucked, moaning against your wet folds.

And you whined, mewling at the attention his ravenous mouth slaked on you. He changed his speed, his angle on you, desperate to pull more of those cute sounds from you.

Deliberate now, he made you climax five times on his tongue before pulling away. Only for a few seconds.

Not bothering to push his pants all the way down, he simply pulls his throbbing cock from his pants.

Enthralled by your trembling body, he returned between your thighs. His fingers hooked under your knees, pushing them back toward you.

He places his hard length over your folds, moving slowly. He moaned as your weeping cunt wets the underside of his cock.

You press your fingers into his lower torso, whimpering.

Overstimulated. But still oh so wet and needy. Trembling.

He groans, gently grasping those fingers and bringing them up to his lips, placing gentle fervent kisses on your fingertips.

“Shh… it’s okay, princess, I’ve got you,” he whispers, moving over your glistening lips, wetting his cock further with your slick.

“Caleb,” you pant, voice calling his name, exhausted from the rapid fire, consecutive orgasms he had wrung from you earlier.

But he hadn’t had enough you. Never. He was just getting started.

“Hm? What is it, baby?” he practically croons, almost teasing.

“I can’t…” you start.

But you don’t get the chance to finish. He slowly, oh so slowly, pushes inside you. Eyes fluttering shut as a guttural groan leaves his lips, head falling back.

You groan just as he does, blending into one voice, one sound.

“You… feel so good,” he moans, leaning down to whisper in your ear, arms wrapping around your shoulders.

Your fingers dig into his lower back, legs tightening around his waist.

He lets out a breathless laugh. “You’re squeezing me so tightly like you’re… fuck.. afraid I’ll leave. I’m not.. (shaky gasp) going anywhere, baby.”

“Caleb..” you whine, arching.

"Shh…” his teeth nip your neck, gently sinking into the skin, “I’ve got you.”

His pace is slow, like he’s savoring the feeling of you, pulling one arm away from your neck to slowly trail up and down your thigh. His nail gently raking your skin, a shiver traveling through your body.

He gives your neck a lick and a claiming bite and your legs tighten around him, another orgasm tearing through you viscously. Unforgiving

He hisses, holding back his own, voice breathless, “Fuck, baby…” He doesn’t wait for your orgasm to pass, he continues to slide in and out of your quivering walls. Slowly. Deliberately.

It’s maddening pace but you’re drunk on the pleasure of it. The squelching and the feeling of absolute euphoria consume you, the sounds an echo through the bedroom.

“I… missed you…” you blurt out, a keening whisper.

Caleb stops, pulling back to look at your face. But the pout on your lips begs him not to stop. So he doesn’t.

“Oh?” he questions, breathless, arching a brow, his eyes glued to where your bodies met.

“Y-yes,” you reply with a broken whine, “I had… been trying to keep my distance… so that I didn’t seem …needy or clingy. Monopolizing your time.”

A ghost of a smile on his lips, “Princess, I would’ve loved for you to do that… to want to spend your time with me. Wanting me… I thought… we were taking it slow, because… you needed time to adjust.”

“No… I wanted… wanted,” another moan rips through you,

Cutting through what you were going to say.

“Baby.. you’re so sensitive right now. Is it because we haven’t… or is it… something else?” he groans as if he doesn’t know.

Like he doesn’t track your period or track how many times you’re eating a day. Like he doesn’t check what you eat and monitor how it affects your body.

But you know he does. You’re just not sure if he knows you know. But fine.. you’d play along. It was more fun anyway. Watching his reactions when you said out-of-pocket things and brushing them off as if they were nothing.

But there would be no brushing this off. Not when he was dick deep in your pussy. Evidence of your increased arousal both auditory and visual.

“I… think… I’m ovulating,” you admit, watching his face with droopy eyes.

So many orgasms, your body trembling, but it was evident that you needed more. More… something.

You watch his face shift, feel his body tremble. A hard tremor racing through him.

Ovulating? Yeah, he fucking knew. If the tracking app didn’t tell him, he would’ve known regardless. Could tell by the way you smell that you were ovulating. You had always smelled sweet. But during your cycle where you were ovulating, you smelled like forbidden fruit. Delectable.

You had kept your distance during those months, but he wondered what had changed.

And as much as it killed him, he asked, “Do you want me to stop?”

Faster than you’d registered in your mind, your body moved. Your fingers wrapping tightly around the base of his cock. Stilling him with the rest of his length buried inside you.

“If you pull out, I swear I will drive a knife deep into your abdomen,” you threaten, hardly recognizing your own voice.

He gasps, gaze locked with yours. Not by fear but by intense lust. A violent tremor traveled through him at your threat.

It had aroused him so intensely that he was mere seconds from plunging as deep as he could go and coating your drenched walls with every drop of his load and still going back for a second one.

He grunted with the effort of holding back.

“G-got it. I… (pant) got it, princess. I’m not going to stop… but if you… don’t let go… (whisper) I’m gonna cum,” his voice is strained, raspy. He’s holding out, but not for much long.

That whimper is what seals it. Emboldening you. Like a whisper or gentle stroke of fingers in your thoughts, you want him to. Want him inside, consequences be damned.

And you’re not sure if it’s because of the sound he made or because you had voiced your suspicion, making it real.

Were you ovulating? Or had the lack of sex made you absolutely feral and uninhibited.

Whatever the cause. Whatever the reason, a decision was made. And it wasn’t the one you would’ve normally made.

“You need to cum, hm?” your voice raspy, almost purring as your fingers loosened their grip on Caleb’s cock and slowly traveled to grasp the velvety sac of his balls, rubbing, gently caressing.

“Go on. Cum for me, Colonel,” you whispered, smirking, holding his gaze. Relishing in watching his eyes widen in shock.

Then he grunted, “P-princess.. don’t.. please.”

He trembled again. There was that whimper again.

“My sexy Colonel. Cum for me. Cum inside me. Your princess commands it,” you whisper, a slow drawl, heat thick in your voice and in your darkened eyes.

He wasn’t sure what had changed. What had caused the change. But whatever it was, was his undoing. His body trembled and with the sexiest whimper you’d heard him make, he came. Deep. Muscles tightening.

His hips doing little jerks as he released every drop of his seed into your waiting cunt, coating your molten and shivering walls thickly.

And it felt so good.

But it wasn’t enough.

Before he had a chance to recover, you pulled him to you and rolled you both over. You now straddling his waist, his cock so deliciously deep. A snug fit.

That was more like it.

“B-baby, w-wait..” but you couldn’t. Between his broken whimper, his begging, and the burning need in your veins. You were lost. Consumed.

You rolled your hips once, testing the new angle.

You had never been on top before. It felt good. Made you feel powerful. Desired.

He gasped beneath you, moaning, his fingers digging into your hips. Whether to pull you closer or push you away, you weren’t sure. But you didn’t really care. A need, all consuming and hot welled up inside you and you obeyed it. Mindless.

He groaned hoarsely as you began a slow teasing rhythm of rocking your hips, he was overstimulated. But this was long overdue, and you would apologize later.

Maybe.

“B-baby…” he whimpered again, gasping, groaning, fingers digging as his hips thrust upward into you.

Through the foggy haze, you heard his voice and you slow blink, looking down at him.

“Hm?” you croon.

“I’m… I need…” he was panting, breathless.

You brace your hands on his chest, lifting up slowly and rocking back down just as slow. You don’t slow down. You listen as he moans, gasping, struggling to breathe.

The sight, the sound is beyond delicious.

“Come on, baby, tell me. What do you need,” you smirk, enjoying the reverse of your roles.

You could get used to this. But with your shyness always at the forefront. You doubted there would ever be a chance like this again.

You lean down, your lips trailing slowly along his jaw. His throat. You inhaled the scent of his skin as you went, and your lust flared hotter. Burned brighter.

Your teeth caught the lobe of his ear and nipped it, your lips placing a teasing but gentle kiss just below his ear just before whispering, “Tell momma what you need.”

And suddenly he found his strength, pulling from your for a mere second before you found yourself laying on your side, facing the window.

And a full view mounted mirror.

But you hardly notice. Giggling, “Aww, what’s wrong, baby? Did I say something that got you all wet behind the ears?”

There’s a teasing lilt in your tone. You knew what you were doing. And you enjoyed watching him react.

Just as quickly as he had flipped you to your side, he was behind you, gripping your thigh. He lifted it high, his own thigh bent behind your other one flat on the bed. Tracing. Caging. Preparation for more to come.

“Oh, something is wet alright. I wanted to be gentle, princess. To savor this for us both. But it seems… based on your behavior, you don’t want gentle, do you?” his voice takes a dark edge.

And you were sopping wet from it.

He lifts your leg, suspended in the air, you are defenseless. Unable to do anything. Subjected to whatever course of action he wanted to take.

His own hips roll, his cock snapping into you once more.

Crabbing your chin firmly with his hand, his chest pressed to your back, his fingers skittered along your skin. Wrapped gently and firmly over your throat, a possessive touch. Claiming.

Then his lips were on the back of your neck, teasing. Tasting.

“I got something I think we both will enjoy. Look around the room, princess. Let me know if you find it,” he whispers against your skin. A purr. A promise.

“But…” You start.

“Use your eyes, princess. I know you’ve got good eyes. You may have already seen it. And didn’t realize you did,” he hummed, lips still kissing the back of your neck. His hips still plunging deep and slow into your greedy wetness. The sounds mind-numbing, adding to the pleasure.

It was becoming hard to focus again.

“Come on, my pretty bird. Use those beautiful eyes and tell me what you see,” he rasps, voice breathy in your ear.

So with effort, you open your eyes, trying to look around. You gasp and moan as he continues the slow deliberate pace of his hips. Your cunt still squishy and messy, coated with his cum from earlier. Slick. Slippery. Sopping wet.

You look around the room, trying to find what he’s talking about. Then you find it.

The mirror.

How had he managed to find that size? And how had he been able to mount it on the wall? It was large, angled from a direction where anyone from the bed could see their reflection. And at this angle, you could see everything.

Your core clenched tightly in response.

Caleb hissed at the new sensation. “Damn. You’re still so wet and tight.” Then he smirks, “Looks like you found it. Given how you clamped down on me, I guess you like it, hm?”

You groan, head falling back against again, ready to fall apart again. You whine, feeling the familiar pressure of another orgasm mounting impossibly fast.

“Shh. Don't look away, beautiful. Eyes on your reflection,” he hushes gently, he takes his handholding your thigh moves to your hand, grasping it.Then guides your hand to where his had been.

His now free hand loops to the front, snaking around your waist, trailing down between your thighs. His middle finger rubs lazy circles on your swollen clit, voice still soft and low, “Let go, baby. As many times as you need to. I’ve got you. I’ve always got you.”

“But what about you?” you ask, voice breathless and raspy.

“If you are ovulating as you say, I probably should’ve put on a condom,” he whispers back, lazy circles on your clit, driving you near to madness.

“I don’t care.” you gasp.

“Baby…” he grits out, “You don’t know…”

“I do and I don’t care. Fuck me. Cum inside me. Breed me. I don’t care. I just need you inside me. All of you. Every drop. However you’ll give it to me.” you gasp, desperate, burning.

He groans, whimpering, “Fuck, princess. Okay, if that’s what you want.”

And his pace changes. Hard. Deep. Unrelenting. His new pace sets fire to your body, and before you realize it, you’re at the edge of another orgasm. Then you’re falling.

You cry out your release. Your body stiffening, trembling. Burning. Stars bursting.

But he doesn’t let up, doesn’t slow down. He keeps going, plundering your quivering and spasming cunt like a man on a mission.

“There you go. That’s my pretty girl. Look at you. Falling apart so good for me. This pretty pussy, so needy isn’t she?” he coos, teeth grazing your neck as he keeps plunging repeatedly in and out of your hot, squelching walls.

His praises spark something else, awaken something else. A pressure. A coil you didn’t recognize mounting your orgasm before the previous climax ended, snapping harshly.

His release catches up with him soon after with a whining, chanting, whimper, “Oh fuck. Oh fuck. Oh fuck. Baby…fuuuck.”

And suddenly, you’re falling again. This time with a scream. This time with a gush. A flooding wetness coating your thighs and his. Your body trembles harder than it’s ever has. Your pussy clamps down so tightly, Caleb lets out a choked sob.

With a final thrust, he stills, cumming inside your waiting cunt, plugging your cervix, filling your womb to the brim and then some.

His hips do a few little jerks, giving him time to breathe. Then he slowly pulls out before slamming back inside.

“I hope you got some more left in you. Because you’ve started something and you better see it to the end,” he says, pulling out slowly then snapping forward once more.

New pace now, fast and searching, as he peppers kisses on the back of your shoulder.

“Let’s see how far I can stretch this pretty pussy. And if I can put a baby in you. Don’t go to sleep on me, baby. We’re not done yet. I wanna hear you scream as many times as I make you cum.” His voice dark with promise then it dips to a whisper, “Soar for me, my pretty bird. Sing for me.”

*＊✿❀　❀✿＊*

Dividen: @cafekitsune Caleb banner: yours truly.

[ravens-bird]

"You really want to test me right now?" - Zayne.

Pairing: Zayne x F!Reader/MC

Tags: Boyfriend Zayne, uh not-quite-smut smut, oral F!receiving, kissing, fingering, thought of adding semi-exhibitionism, but i have no brain juice left - it's literally 3am. "Love" used as nickname

wc: 1.5k.

Note: Y'all... Guess who just had a dream and decided to write this right after 😮‍💨 Definitely not proofread 🦦 (I don't know what happened, the post got fucked zo repost)

You arrive at Akso Hospital and make your way to the receptionist’s desk, finding Yvonne sorting through paperwork.

"Hey, Yvonne. Busy day?"

She sighs, rubbing her temples—a rare display of exhaustion. You quirk a brow.

"You have no idea," she mutters. "Between the long shifts and this mountain of paperwork, I could use a vacation."

You chuckle. "I bet. Speaking of rounds, do you know where Zayne is?"

"In his office. He just finished up his last patient visit, so he should be resting right now." Then, with a knowing glint in her eyes, she adds, "But he mentioned clocking out early today. I wonder why…"

A playful smirk tugs at your lips. "I might have an idea."

She grins. "Go on, then. Before something else comes up."

You thank her, and make your way up to his office, your heart picking up speed at the thought of finally seeing him after so long.

It had been two weeks since you’d last seen Zayne—his business trip to Mt. Eternal with Dr. Noah had kept him away, and by the time he returned last night, you were already gone on a last-minute mission. This morning, he’d left for work before you even got home, and seeing him had been the only thing on your mind the whole day.

Naturally, the first thing you did after getting off work was come find him.

Stepping inside, your eyes land on him immediately.

Zayne is seated on the couch, his coat and glasses set aside, tie loosened as he leans back with his head resting against the cushions. Was he asleep?

You hesitate for a moment before softly calling his name.

He stirs, blinking up at you in surprise. That’s all the confirmation you need. In a heartbeat, you close the distance, launching yourself onto him before he can even stand.

Zayne grunts at the impact but recovers quickly, wrapping his arms around you as you settle into his lap. "You could’ve just said hello, you know."

You nuzzle into his neck, inhaling the faint, yet familiar scent of his cologne. "Where’s the fun in that? Besides, I missed you."

His hands settle at your waist, fingers squeezing gently. "I missed you too." His voice is softer now, more intimate. Then, amusement flickers in his eyes. "You’re awfully energetic for someone who spent the night hunting down wanderers."

You groan against his skin. "I should just kidnap you for the weekend."

He chuckles, the sound low and warm. "Oh? And do what with me, exactly?"

You pull back slightly, to playfully glare at him. Before you can speak, he lightly presses the back of your neck to bring you closer, pressing a soft kiss to your lips.

“How was your day?” he asks, kneading the back of your neck gently and you melt into his touch, instantly distracted.

“Tiring, but it wasn’t as serious as Tara had made it sound,” you sigh. While the clean-up itself had been a walk in the park, the travelling had been tedious, even with the faster and advanced motorcycles from the Association.

His eyes were bright, and he was looking at you so warmly that you couldn't help but beam at him.

"Yvonne said you were clocking out early." Your fingers find the loose knot of his tie, tugging playfully. "Any particular reason?"

His gaze dips to your lips before he clears his throat. "I figured we deserved a night in."

"Mmm." You hum, letting your hand drift from his tie to his chest, feeling the steady pulse beneath your fingertips. "You’ve been gone so long, Zayne. Do you know how hard it was to sleep alone?"

His jaw tenses slightly, but instead of addressing the obvious implication in your words, he exhales slowly, as if willing himself to stay composed. "We have chamomile tea at home. Studies show it can improve sleep quality with its mild sedative effects when taken before bed."

You blink up at him. Then a slow, sly smile spreads across your lips. "Chamomile tea?" Your fingers graze the fabric of his shirt, trailing lower. "Right, but that wouldn’t help."

His brows knit slightly. "The white noise machine in the bedroom has a setting that mimics rainfall—"

"Not the same as having you next to me."

Your voice is softer this time, but there’s no mistaking the way your fingers press against his chest, the way your body leans into his just enough to make your point.

His grip tightens slightly. "We are still at the hospital," he reminds you, though his voice lacks its usual firmness. "And you're making this difficult."

You smirk, tugging the tie loose until it comes off. "Am I?" You shift just enough for him to feel the friction, watching as his breath catches. "I’m not even doing anything."

The first button of his shirt comes undone beneath your touch, your nails grazing his collarbone.

His hand snaps up suddenly, fingers wrapping around your wrist—not rough, but firm enough to make your breath hitch.

"You really want to test me right now?" His voice is a quiet warning, laced with something dangerous.

Your pulse spikes.

"What if I say yes?"

For a moment, he just watches you, tension coiling between you like a drawn bowstring. Then, Zayne exhales slowly, the warmth of his breath brushing against your skin before he tilts his head, capturing your lips in a kiss that steals your breath.

There’s nothing hesitant or soft about it this time.

A small gasp escapes you, and he swallows it greedily, his hands sliding up your back, pulling you closer, pressing you flush against him.

"You’re doing this on purpose," he murmurs, his voice rough with restraint.

You don’t deny it.

When he finally pulls away, you barely have a moment to catch your breath before he shifts beneath you, his hand trailing up your thigh and to your heat, rubbing you through the thin material of your pants.

"Zayne—" your voice hitches as his fingers press more firmly.

"Yes, love?" His tone is teasing, though his own breath is slightly uneven.

"What happened to being at the hospital?"

"You talk too much."

Before you could retort, he moves again, picking you up with startling ease and changing your positions until you're the one beneath him, pressed into the cushions. The feel of his weight against you, the press of his hips, and his growing arousal, makes your stomach flip in anticipation.

His fingers make quick work of the button of your pants after undoing your belt, pushing them down just enough before his hand dips between your thighs, his touch firm and teasing.

You suck in a sharp breath, hips jerking against his palm as he rubs you through your underwear. He watches you closely, his pupils blown wide with desire. His fingers slip beneath the last barrier of fabric. The sensation makes you whimper.

"So impatient," he speaks in a low voice, his voice a rough whisper as he presses down just right, making you arch into him.

"Zayne—"

He silences you with a heated kiss, swallowing every sound you make as he finger-fucks you. His free hand grips your hip, keeping you pinned as he builds a slow, torturous rhythm, his breath hot against your lips.

"Is this what you wanted?" His silken murmur makes you want to clench your thighs together, but he holds you in place, lips trailing down your throat. "Say it."

You barely manage to gasp out a needy "yes" before he rewards you with a deep stroke that has you trembling beneath him. His chuckle is dark, satisfied, as he continues his slow, deliberate pace, drawing every reaction from you with precise, practiced movements.

Your fingers clutch at his shoulders, nails digging in as the tension coils tight within you. You clench around his fingers, feeling the start of a wave of euphoria when he pulls his hand away, and a desperate, needy noise escapes you.

“Be patient,” he chastises, and you resist the urge to swear when he slides your pants down further, his fingers trail teasingly against your bare skin before he shifts downward, pressing open-mouthed kisses along your inner thigh.

A strangled moan escapes your lips as his mouth finds you, his tongue stroking in slow, deliberate patterns that have your fingers twisting in his hair, your thighs trembling around him.

Zayne works you open with his mouth and fingers, his name falling from your lips in breathless gasps as he devours you with unrelenting focus.

“That’s it, love.” The roughness of his voice was so damn sexy. “Be a good girl, and come for me.”

That finally did it.

When you finally shatter, he groans against you, holding you in place as you ride out the waves of pleasure.

As you pant, still trembling, he wipes the corner of his mouth with the back of his hand, his eyes locked onto you with something dangerously intent.

Before you can catch your breath, he’s already reaching for his belt, a wicked smirk playing at his lips. "We’re not done yet, love. You started this."

Masterlist

[lvl1l1]

hello!! i was wondering if you could do lads men with an mc who plays an instrument? specifically drums if you’re comfortable! hope youre doin well!

LaDS men with an MC who plays an instrument

pairings: Sylus, Caleb, Rafayel, Zayne, Xavier x GN!MC/reader

genre: some fluffy hcs

a/n: ahhh my first req tysm!! i love this idea sm. i play the guitar myself, so this is a lil self indulgent hehe not that familiar with drums, so i kept it a bit vague. i hope you like it!!!

Sylus

Sylus is a vinyl collector, honestly, he’d go as far as calling himself a music connoisseur. Music is something that connects him to you, even if you yourself don’t remember why exactly, it’s safe to say that he’d be delighted to know you play an instrument.

He’d always ask you to play something for him, anything really. Whether it’s a short piece you came up with yourself or your favourite song, he’ll gladly listen.

He would be so impressed whenever you played anything and he’s just grateful you’re comfortable enough to play infront of him.

If you were shy at first, worried about disturbing him or thinking you’re not skilled enough, he’d scoff and reassure you, not just in the moment but whenever he could,

“Sweetie, everyone lucky enough to witness your talent should feel honored.”

You stopped taking him to concerts because he’d always say something like,

“You could play better than them.”

He’s your biggest hype-man and tries to encourage you to never drop your hobby. He’ll buy a new set, expensive equipment, without you ever having to ask and he gifts you a whole band room in the base.

He’s always humming the melodies you practiced in the base and he’s always making sure no one disturbs you during your sessions.

Sylus is your biggest supporter, he wants you to play even during the day, assuring you it wouldn’t disturb his sleep.

He just loves how talented you are.

Caleb

He still remembers when you first picked up on your instrument.

He was so glad you had found something you loved, doing his best to show his support.

Back when you two still lived at home, he’d always clap after you were done practicing. If your grandma wanted you to stop playing because it was getting late or what-not, he would always defend you and tell you to keep playing anyway.

Now, with your newfound dynamic, he’s just glad you haven’t given up on your passion.

He’d get you another set just for his apartment in Skyhaven, so that you could play even when you were staying with him.

He doesn’t mind you playing even late at night, he’s used to hearing you practice and it even brings him a sense of comfort and familiarity.

If you learn how to play any of his favourite songs, he’ll feel incredibly honored and he’d start preferring your instrumental version over the official song.

He’d ask you if he could record you playing a song of your choice, so he could make it his ringtone.

Caleb would also 100% mention to everyone he knows that you play an instrument and he’d constantly brag about how talented you are.

He’s just so proud of you, his lil musician.

Rafayel

Rafayel found out by barging into your apartment one day after you gave him the key to your place, hearing you practice. He wouldn’t make himself known until you were done playing, he’d start clapping and cheering and then start acting offended, as to why you hadn’t revealed your talent to him before.

We know lemurians are good singers, just look at Talia and Rafayel himself. He’d be over the moon knowing you two could make music together now.

He’d ask you to play and start singing along, there’s nothing he enjoys more, bonus points if you get flustered from hearing him sing.

He makes a habit of painting while you play, saying your tunes give him inspiration.

If you wanted to, he could get you some gigs. She may sing classical but he’d totally set you up with Talia, if you wanted. And he tells you that Thomas could be your manager all the time, even if you insist you don’t want to make a career out of your hobby.

Rafayel can truly appreciate art, he compliments your skills all the time and he’ll never take you playing for him, for granted.

Zayne

Zayne would never stop being impressed. He already thinks you’re incredible, any new talent you reveal to him just leaves him awe-struck all over.

I don’t think he’d specifically ask you to play for him but he’s always happy to listen.

If you stopped playing because he was reading or working, he’d tell you it doesn’t bother him at all. It actually grounds him, knowing you’re right there with him and he loves that you two can enjoy each other’s company, even though you’re both doing your own thing.

I actually hc that Zayne used to play an instrument himself, the violin or cello maybe but he dropped it because he didn’t really have time to play anymore. So, it makes him all the more happy that you make time for your passion, even with your hectic schedule.

He’d love for you to ask him to buy you equipment, be it new drumsticks, a metronome or whatever else you could need.

Like Caleb, he likes mentioning your talent to his peers. Everyone working at the hospital knows what instrument you play. It’s mostly because it gives him an easy topic for small talk, but he’s also very proud of you.

Once you two move in together, he’d make sure you have a big space you can utilise. Whether you want a music room to yourself or just a corner in the living room, he’ll gladly provide you with whatever you need.

I definitely think his parents would also ask you to play for them whenever they come to visit. Zayne tells you, you don’t have to if you don’t want to but he knows they’re only asking because they’re as proud of you as he is.

Xavier

The walls in your apartment are thin, so he’s heard you play before but Xavier never mentioned it until you two started dating.

If you feel a bit embarrassed, that he’s heard all your practice sessions, he’d reassure you that he thoroughly enjoyed hearing you play.

Xavier wouldn’t mind you playing while he was sleeping at all, it wouldn’t be able to wake him anyway but he also tells you it helps lull him to sleep, regardless of your preferred genre.

“Xavier how does listening to metal make you sleepy?”

“It just does, so keep playing.”

It’s probably mostly because you’re the one playing, whenever you’re involved he just feels calm, doesn’t matter if you’re jamming to some death metal.

He might not be a conflict-seeking person but he’s willing to fight your neighbours for you, if they complain.

He thinks as long as you’re playing during the day, they can suck it up. You’re not even that loud, he says.

But he’d also be down to buy you an electrical drum-set/a quiet alternative to the instrument you’re playing.

Xavier would probably ask you to teach him how to play, it would be a great way to spend more time with you and learn more about the thing you’re passionate about.

Xavier also canonically plays the piano, so I think he’d be quick on the uptake with any other instrument, he can read notes already, good start.

He’d probably offer to teach you how to play the piano in exchange for lessons on your instrument. If you also play the piano, he’d definitely suggest playing some duets together, making sure you sit closely next to him.

He definitely thinks you look super cool while playing, his wallpaper is a candid shot of you with your instrument.

[always-just-red]

@lunariadew asked: 'Can you write a poly fic maby like a feel good fic or date night or something with all the boys! I’m greedy and I think there’s not enough poly fics as there should be'

I've wanted to do a fic with all the boys for SO long! (Infold, hire me to write a sitcom-style show for the guys, PLEASE) Have kept it platonic since it's early stages; it's open to interpretation about how many sparks are flying and between whom exactly..... 👀 But if ppl want more of this, I'm all over it. Platonic or romantic? I'll play it by ear!

Game Night

L&DS Boys X Reader

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3

Summary: The most important men in your life can manage one evening together, right? For you? Please? Pretty please?

Genre: Fluff + humour

Warnings/Additional Tags: f!reader, some swearing, a lil conflict, non-canon (I know some of the guys probably know each-other but we're pretending they don't 😇)

| Word count: 4k | Masterlist | Opt-in to my taglist here!

Disclaimer: Characters belong to Love and Deepspace. All work is my own, so please don't repost or plagiarise!

“Rafayel… what do you think this is?”

The artist stands at your open door, wearing a self-assured smile and one of the flashier outfits you’ve seen him in, and that’s really saying something. Between you is a bouquet of lilies, petals curled like frozen licks of fire that compliment— deliberately, if you had to guess— the warmer fires within his eyes. Those eyes narrow at your question.

“What do you think it is?” he says suspiciously, lowering the flowers.

“…Game night?”

You’re not sure why you phrase it so tentatively. You know what it is; you’re the host. You open your door wider, stepping aside to give Rafayel a better view of the apartment behind you, and the remainder of his smile sinks.

“Hi,” Xavier calls out, and you don’t have to see him to know he’s giving a wholesome sort of wave.

“Hi…” Rafayel answers, barely more than a whisper as his eyes flit between everyone else in the room, because he’s the last to arrive. “Game night, yeah,” he nods assertively, “I knew that.” Then a deep breath: “Can I, like, put these somewhere—”

“Kitchen counter,” you gesture.

“Got it.” He doesn’t have to be told twice.

Closing the door behind him, you watch as he skirts past the lounge and makes for your kitchen, where another bouquet already lies waiting. He zeroes in on it. “Looks like mine’s not the only heart you’re breaking tonight, huh, cutie? What are these—” he pokes at a petal— “daturas?”

“They’re her favourite,” speaks a distinctly low voice.

Rafayel doesn’t look up. He plonks his bouquet on top of the other and winces: “They’re really not, though.”

“He’s right,” you chip in, giving Sylus a sheepish smile, and now Rafayel looks up, beaming.

“She likes roses,” Zayne says, with the calm confidence he’d quote a medical journal. On the sofa beside him, Xavier nods, and you grin at them both.

“Noted,” Sylus chuckles.

Rafayel’s less convinced. “Since when?!”

“Since forever, Raf. I like lilies too, so I didn’t say anything, ‘kay?” You beckon him back to the lounge, ignoring his splutters of disbelief. “C’mere, let me introduce you to everyone.”

The man slinks to your side like a reluctant shadow, and your hands find your hips. “This is Zayne. Xavier,” you point out, putting faces to names; Rafayel’s heard stories about each. Then you nod towards Sylus. “Over there’s Skye.”

From his place by the window, Sylus lifts a hand in greeting.

“So… yeah,” you finish. Oh, wait! “Guys, this is—”

“They know who I am,” Rafayel shrugs, his fame apparently heavy on his shoulders. He glances around the room for validation, but he gets none, so he tries again. “You do know who I am, right?”

“Sorry,” Xavier admits with an awkward smile, glancing back at Sylus: you?

The man has to think about it. You know for a fact he’s traded more than one of Rafayel’s paintings for a profit, but he smirks and gives an even more exaggerated shrug than the artist himself.

Really?

“You’re Rafayel,” Zayne states plainly.

“Yeah! See, I told you, cutie—”

“You slipped on a paintbrush and checked yourself into Akso, right? The nurses still talk about it.”

Rafayel’s enthusiasm drains. He looks conflicted as he mulls over the additional information. “In, like, a good way?” he hazards.

Zayne stares back at him, wielding silence like a scalpel before cutting deeper with a: “…sure.”

You bite back a smile. Leaving the two to discuss the finer details of Rafayel’s notoriety at the hospital, you wander over to the kitchen, where you fish out a vase from the back of a cupboard. You fill it, set it down on the counter, then reach for Sylus’s bouquet. There’s a black satin ribbon; you untie it.

“Are you sure this is a good idea, sweetie?” asks the man himself, joining you discreetly.

The others can’t really hear you— they’re still talking. “What,” you smirk, retrieving your scissors from a drawer, “you worried Xavier’s gonna arrest you?”

Sylus laughs lowly, quietly. “That’s adorable.”

“Good.” You pick up a flower and trim a leaf from the stem. “Because even if he wanted to—” you wave it, just short of his face— “I’d protect you, ok?”

He regards the flower beneath his nose. Smiles smugly. “These can be toxic, sweetie.”

“Really? Whoops.” You put it down, then snatch up a lily from Rafayel’s bouquet. “En Garde!”

“These too.”

“What the hell?”

The flame-red flower drops from your fingers, and Sylus laughs more sincerely. “Stick to roses, kitten. Or…” He moves his hand over his deconstructed bouquet, his Evol pruning the rest of the leaves from the stems. A tendril of it gathers the flowers, delivering them to him so he can hold them out to you with a flourish. “Live dangerously. Who am I to judge?”

You take them, then plop them into the vase. “Cute.”

“I’m here all week,” he grins. “You’d better wash your hands, hmm?”

With a hmph of agreement, you turn to the sink. You spend half a minute, rubbing soap and warm water over your hands, and when you turn back around— still drying them— something is different. The lilies are gone. Sylus is looking at you, innocuous.

“Real mature, Skye.”

He makes no effort to defend himself. You’re about to tell him that his magic better extend to making flowers reappear when your attention is whipped back to the lounge. The voices from that side have raised, so you lean forward on your kitchen island, watching their owners in a sort of stakeout.

“I take it you have a plan,” Sylus whispers, leaning with you.        

You look at him. He looks back. “The plan is for hosts,” you scold, “not guests.” He’s much too close so you step away, reaching for the vase of daturas and holding them threateningly out, like you’re not afraid to use them. “Go back to the guests, deserter.”

Sylus lifts his hands in surrender, smirking in a way that says he knows he’s met his match. You shoo him further, back into enemy lines, then resume your stakeout. Xavier is sharing his own “embarrassing” medical story— talking about a time where he once passed out from exhaustion while fighting at your side, and you think it’s supposed to make Rafayel feel better.

It doesn’t, of course, and even Zayne is gazing down at the floor, self-conscious.

Sylus meets your eyes across the room, signals with a tip of his head: now's a good time for that master plan, sweetie.

Right. Your plan. Your master plan, yeah.

…

“You should have picked the doctor.”

Sylus’s words are near-silent: for you, not anyone else, and you pretend you don’t hear them. “But no,” he carries on, because he knows you can, “you just had to have the artist.”

“It’s Pictionary!” you snap, drawing all eyes in the room.

Lounging beside you, Sylus feigns an amused surprise, as though he hasn’t just been trying to elicit that exact reaction. On the other sofa, Zayne and Xavier stare, taken more genuinely aback. You give a smile of apology.

“Guys, concentrate!” Rafayel clicks his fingers at you. He’s stood in the centre of the space by a large drawing pad, and he goes back to frantically sketching on it. The drawing is… interesting. Abstract. Maybe even beautiful? But you don’t have a clue what it is.

“Thirty seconds,” warns Zayne, studying the little egg-timer he’s guarding.

You tilt your head at the drawing. There’s maybe a— wait, where did those extra colours come from? Where did he even get those pens? Anyway… there’s a circle. “A globe?” you guess. “Earth! No? Umm… oh! The sun! The moon!”

Rafayel shakes his head with every suggestion, adding even more intricate, unhelpful scribbles. Is that a fifth pen?! You nudge your other teammate, calling for back-up.

Sylus regards the drawing listlessly. “A unicorn.”

“What?!” Rafayel’s tone has reached a pitch that almost makes you wince. “No! C’mon, are you even trying?”

“No,” Sylus lilts with a pleasant smile, lifting the drink he’s been nursing to his lips.

You kick his foot. “A bowl of fruit!” you exclaim, determined to make up for the lack of enthusiasm. “A plate? A plate with food? Breakfast! Lunch! Dinner!”

“Time’s up,” Zayne interrupts, and it’s a mercy, really; you deflate with a sigh.

Rafayel puts his hands on his hips as he takes a step back to observe his work. He tucks four fine-liners back into his pocket— purses his lips as though he really can’t see a problem— and he’s keeping you all in suspense.

Sylus is up in an instant, stealing a card from where it’s been discarded on the coffee table. He reads the answer, then rolls his eyes. The original pen was also abandoned, so he plucks it up, then strides to the drawing pad.

He draws an oval. Then a triangle.

“A fish! A fish!” you cry out.

“You’re good at this, sweetie,” Sylus grins. He puts the lid on the pen with a click before dropping it into Rafayel’s hand.

“Is it my turn?” Xavier asks, trying to relieve the tension of the room. He gets up and smiles as Rafayel passes him the pen. “Your drawing is pretty. The composition is really—”

“Don’t,” Rafayel says. “Like, thanks? But don’t.”

“Fair enough,” Xavier chuckles.

You all prepare for the next round: Zayne handing you the egg-timer, Xavier re-organising the stack of prompt cards. Sylus takes a photo of the drawing pad before ambling back over— a moping Rafayel in tow— and they both sink down either side of you. You glance at the latter, giggling. “A fish, Raf? Really?”

“So I didn’t just wanna draw you some basic fish, ok?” The artist crosses his arms with a pout. “But fine, enjoy mediocrity, I guess.”

To your left, Sylus raises his glass in toast to the notion. There’s a noise: Xavier tearing the used page from the pad. You look up. “Xavier, can I have that?”

“Sure.” He brings it over to you.

You look at the drawing again, holding it at arm’s length and rotating it experimentally. You’re seeing a lot, but nothing that screams ‘fish’. There’s a circle, still. Oh! “It’s a fish bowl! Wait, wait, wait— is that Reddie?”

“Yeah!” Rafayel beams.

“Aww!”

The renewed team spirit drops off with Sylus; he’s on his phone, not paying attention. He seems to sense your scrutiny because he peers up, gives a ghost of a smile, then returns to whatever he’s doing. Meanwhile, Xavier is ready for his turn, so he signals for you to start the timer. You give him a thumbs up as you turn it over. “Go!”

He starts drawing.

“A car,” Zayne guesses after all of five seconds. Correct. Next. “A river? No. Oh. A snake.” Yes. “A cupcake?” Also yes. (In fairness, he was never going to struggle with that one.) “A person? Ok. Oh, a scientist, no? Ah, a doctor.” Yes again, and really— what?

Zayne continues to list correct answers, though thankfully, that’s the last of the coincidences. You watch on, vaguely in awe, until you feel your phone buzz in your pocket. You check it casually, aware that Sylus is next to you, looking down at it too.

It’s a text from him: The drawing… Can I have it?

You glance up at him subtly, meeting his eyes and giving a discreet yet firm shake of your head. He frowns. You’re not having this debate here, now, so you let your gaze return to the drawing pad while idly retrieving your drink.

A few seconds later, there’s another text: Found buyer

Then another: Quarter of a mil

You almost choke on that drink.

“Umm… cutie?” Rafayel asks, poking you. He points at the timer you’ve left on the coffee table, and the top half is empty.

“Shit, yeah. That’s time!” you call.

Xavier stops drawing. The small, crude sketches behind him have reached double digits. He looks really proud. “Great! How many was that?”

His eyes find you. Zayne and Rafayel’s, too. Were you supposed to be counting? Uh—

“Eleven,” says Sylus, and it’s way too smug to be a lie.

“Awesome!” Xavier flips the drawing pad over to where you’ve been tallying point totals. He adds eleven marks to one side. “That’s—” he counts both— “ah, thirty-three to nine.”

A silence falls over the room. Unsure of what else to do, you give a half-hearted round of applause and Xavier laughs awkwardly, still humble, despite it all. “I think we’re kinda done with Pictionary, yeah?” you suggest, rising from your seat. “I should probably get started on food, anyway.”

“Oh, don’t worry about that.”

The insistence came from Xavier, and you freeze suspiciously; he’s never turned down free food.

“You’ve already done so much,” he explains, “setting this all up for us. You should relax, really! Leave it to me.”

The word ‘relax’ is not synonymous with the image of Xavier anywhere near your kitchen, but he’s looking at you so earnestly, blue eyes brimming with warmth, and what are you supposed to say? No thanks, Xavier— I value my life? Everyone’s watching you. Gods help you. “That’s really sweet, Xavier. Thanks.”

Your fellow Hunter’s smile widens even more. He heads off to the kitchen, a spring to his step that makes your heart sink with dread. “Actually—” you glance at your ex-teammates— “could you two go help him? Zayne and I’ll tidy up over here.”

Rafayel and Sylus do as they’re asked, even though their expressions remind you that cooking is not, typically, a three-man job. It’s tactical, though. You wanted a moment alone with Zayne. “Are you ok?” you ask, once the others are out of earshot. “I know this must all be a lot. The guys can be, well… yeah.”

He knows what you mean, right?

Zayne has slipped away from the couch; he’s crouched on the floor, collecting a few prompt cards that have wandered astray. He glances up at you, pushing his glasses back on his nose. “I’m ok,” he assures with a fond smile. “Thank you, though.”

“You’re welcome.” He hands you the cards and you slot them back into their deck. Then you turn to the drawing pad. “You and Xavier make a good team, huh?”

The doctor straightens to his full height. “Mmm. It helped that we didn’t spend the entire game comparing the size of our… drawing abilities.” 

You laugh unashamedly. The pen’s still at-hand, so you pick it up— reward another point.

Zayne chuckles.

“Food’s gonna be a while.”

You both turn, following the voice back to Sylus, who has apparently decided he’s had his fill of kitchen duty. What was that— a minute? He seems to have anticipated your dissatisfaction, because he’s brought a bribe with him: the box of chocolates that had come with his bouquet. It’s already open and he holds it out, tempting you.

He’s right— you don’t know when you’ll next be eating— so you select a heart-shaped chocolate, popping it into your mouth with a smile and a muffled: “thanks.”

Sylus smiles back. Then he holds the box out to Zayne. “Doctor?”

It takes a nod of encouragement from you to prompt Zayne into taking something. He chooses a white chocolate truffle, mumbles his own thanks, but Sylus doesn’t relent— not yet. He shakes the box slightly, incitingly, and he doesn’t move it away until Zayne takes two more.

Your physician shoots you a surreptitious smile as Sylus falls back onto the couch, content he’s won your hearts, and that he won’t be sent back to the kitchen anytime soon. His long fingers lift another chocolate from the box, and he meets your eyes as he slips it slowly past his lips, humming like he’s enjoying himself.

You cross your arms, unimpressed. He gives you the least convincing look of innocence you’ve ever seen.

There’s an exclamation from the kitchen: “Hey, where did my flowers go!?” 

Shit. You hastily push the drawing pad aside then scurry over to assist Rafayel. You don’t have a plan, exactly; it’s not like you can help him look for them. “Umm… they’re around, Raf. I moved them somewhere safer, that’s all.”

“Where?”

“Uh—”

“Does it matter?” Sylus speaks from behind you, because he and Zayne are close at your heels. “She said they’re somewhere safe.” He leans on the kitchen island. “Don’t you trust her?”

Rafayel scoffs. “I trust her plenty.”

“So prove it. Drop it.”

“Skye,” you caution, “stop.”

Sylus does stop, but not because you asked. He’s done enough already, hasn’t he? Rafayel is bristling with indignance— a lit fuse— and behind him, Xavier sneakily checks the trash can, looking relieved at what he doesn’t find. He gives you a subtle glance: Where actually are the flowers?

You lift a shoulder an inch: Beats me!

There’s a soft, almost imperceptible crackle, and it draws your eyes to the vase of daturas between you all. They’ve caught light— their petals twisting, darkening, within larger flowers of fire.

“Rafayel!” you gasp. “No, no, no, the fire alarm!”

The torched flowers are encased, all of a sudden, in a fine layer of shimmering frost. Sylus blinks down at them, unmoved by their destruction. Zayne’s hand is still outstretched, snowflakes etched over his palm. Then something… odd happens. The ice doesn’t stop. It spreads over the rest of the kitchen island, to all of your bewilderment.

“Zayne?” Your voice is fraught with worry, but you don’t give a damn about your kitchen.

The man winces, and you so rarely see him out of control. The silver-white patterns have crawled up his wrist, and the ice continues to spread; even Sylus steps back. Sharp, jagged crystals start to form— inching out towards everyone.

“Zayne!” you try again.

His chest rises as he drags air through his teeth; it looks like it hurts, but the ice does stop. The others are still, suspended by momentary uncertainty, and you rush to Zayne’s side, taking his hand.

“What the hell was that?” Rafayel remarks, shaking away his surprise and thawing an icicle that’s way too close for comfort.

“He wouldn’t have needed to use his Evol if you hadn’t used yours.”

It’s Xavier, strangely— you would have expected Sylus. The Hunter’s tone is gentle as always, but there’s something behind it, this time: a frustration that lends an edge.

Rafayel hears it too. “Hey, I’m not the one who started this!” He points to Sylus. “He—”

“Has been lighting fires all evening,” Xavier finishes. “But at least his were only figurative.”

Sylus laughs, and it’s the kind of laugh where you just know he’s vying to make things worse. “Look at that,” he says, “the boy next door can bite.”

Xavier’s eyes sharpen. Beside you, Zayne slips his hand from yours. It’s an instinct you know well. This moment is volatile, and you have to be ready. It could go a dozen different ways; it’s just waiting for a spark.

“Guys,” you manage to get out, “please, just… everyone, take a breath, ok? Everything’s fine, we just have to—”

A spark.

There’s smoke. Actual smoke. “Xavier, behind you!” Zayne alerts.

It’s creeping out of the oven and Xavier turns— eyes wide— to open its door before any of you can stop him. Thicker smoke billows out, filling the air, and you all scramble away from it. The fire alarm triggers. You think Rafayel’s shouting something, but you can’t really hear him. Then Sylus is shouting. Maybe even Zayne. The alarm is piercing your ears and making you dizzy— or is it the smoke?

You feel a hand on your shoulder and suddenly everything changes.

There’s cool air, brushing over your skin, and it’s dark; you’re outside the building. You can still hear the alarm, shrill but further away, and your window is easy to spot: there’s a red light flashing behind it. Sylus leans into your vision, saying your name.

“Stay here,” he tells you, “alright?”

He’s gone in another moment, lost to a flicker of crimson-black darkness.

Gods, you’re so stupid.

…

You sit on a short wall outside of your building, and the street is full of people. You recognise most of them: neighbours. Every single one is mad at you. You’re all waiting for the alarm to cut out— for the all-clear to be given. The fire wasn’t that serious in the end, but there’s still a procedure. You would know; this isn’t exactly your first evacuation.

The guys are safe, which is good, because it means you can kill them later. They’ve all gotten lost in the throng, and your neighbours can keep them. Maybe they’ll kill them for you.  

“Hey, cutie.”

You were staring down at your feet, but you look up at Rafayel’s voice. He’s coming towards you, evoking a sense of déjà vu, because he’s clutching a bouquet of flame lilies. That’s… the bouquet of flame lilies. How?

“Skye gave ‘em back to me,” he explains, chuckling at your expression, and he’s close enough now to hold the flowers out to you. “I don’t know where he was keeping them. His Evol’s weird, huh?”

“Yeah,” you say timidly, taking the bouquet and gazing down into the petals; they still smell sweet.

Rafayel sits next to you, shuffling close, and he leans his head on your shoulder with a tired sigh. You want to be mad at him. You really, really do— but you’re suddenly not.

“I’m sorry, Rafayel.” The admission barely makes it out of your throat.

You feel his head lift. “You’re sorry?”

“I know it was just a misunderstanding,” you speak into the flowers, “but tonight… wasn’t what you were expecting, I get it. I mean, I kinda threw you into the deep end with all this. You didn’t know you were gonna be around other people, and I—”

“Whoa— cut that out, yeah? You’re killing me, cutie. I spend the whole evening causing trouble, and you’re gonna take all the blame? Nope. Not happening. It was a collaborative effort at least, ok?”

You giggle. “Ok.”  

“Good.” His head slumps back down on your shoulder, and yours tilts to rest against it. “Thanks, though. Really,” he whispers, so quiet you almost don’t notice.

Footsteps and familiar voices draw you from the intimacy of the moment. The others are wandering back to you, having finally escaped the veritable mob of your neighbours. They all look tired.

Xavier settles down on the other side of you, and Zayne sits beside him. Sylus takes a seat next to Rafayel with a huff, but he’s not half as unhappy as he’s pretending to be.

All of you sit in silence, gazes flitting between your window— where there are still glimpses of moving figures— and everyone else who’s been evacuated. For the first time all evening, the quiet isn’t tense. It’s peaceful. Easy.

“We’ll do better next time,” Zayne speaks softly.

Next time? You scoff. “Do any of you actually want there to be a next time?”

“I had fun,” Sylus chuckles. He’s taken his coin from his pocket, and he flips it, amusing himself.

“I had fun too,” Xavier grins.

“Cooking again, Xavier?” quips one of your neighbours, as they happen to pass by.

The man beside you laughs, but you can tell it’s forced. Your hand finds his; you give it a little squeeze, letting him know that it wasn’t his fault. His heart was in the right place. It’s always in the right place.

You nudge Rafayel away from you so you can sit up straighter, your free hand rubbing your arm, caressing prickled skin. You’re about to ask for a jacket when something heavy drapes over your shoulders. It’s a coat— still warm— and its owner is stood behind you; you didn’t even notice him get up.

“Thanks, Sylus,” you smile.

All eyes turn to you. What are they—?

Oh.

[nightplvmes]

*.⊹˚ ZAYNE | "zayne's girlfriend"

── ◜zayne x fem!reader — mini one shot 0.6k words ◜someone at the hospital accidentally calls her "Zayne's girlfriend"author's note here ★ masterlist here

She could hear the whispers behind her again. Or maybe she was the one who was overreacting, maybe it was just people talking and going about their lives in complete silence. But she wouldn't be surprised if they were talking about her. It was the third time this week she had been there and it was only Friday.

She knocked on the door in front of her. She was nervous, looking over her shoulder every two seconds as if everyone was watching her and judging her.

She was exaggerating, she was exaggerating, she was exagg… The door in front of her opened. Zayne stood before her in his typical robe that she was so in awe of.

"You're here." Zayne stepped aside so she could enter. She quickly did so, entered into the office as if she were running away from someone. "Are you okay?" he asked after closing the door.

"I brought you lunch," she ignored his question. She handed him a small bag where she had kept the toppers the previous days.

"Are you okay?" Zayne asked again. He could see the way she was tense and the way she had entered the office like she was running from something.

She sighed, leaving the bag on the desk and running her hands over her face in frustration. It took her a couple of seconds to compose herself and look at Zayne without feeling nervous, she had taken a couple of steps towards her but without getting too close yet.

"When I got to the hospital a guy came up to me asking if I was looking for something and… I asked if he knew where you were." She looked away in embarrassment. "He asked me if I was Dr. Zayne's girlfriend and told me you were in your office." She let out the breath held in her lungs, her own nails digging into the palm of her hands nervously. The mere memory made her cheeks turn slightly red.

Zayne nodded as he took off his glasses. He understood, he understood her nerves, the entire hospital had seen her there for most of the week. They weren't a couple but they weren't friends… they had just been dating.

"Does it bother you?" He asked, he wanted to make sure she was comfortable with the situation, otherwise he would go himself and tell every single person in the hospital to never call her like that again.

She raised her eyebrows in confusion but shook her head. It didn't bother her, it had made her nervous because she thought it was something that Zayne would be upset about since they weren't officially anything yet. "No… but I thought it would bother you.

Zayne fell silent as he walked behind the desk. He took off his glasses and looked at her with his intense eyes.

"It doesn't bother me either," he replied so naturally that it made her frown. Zayne had always been too reserved but she was surprised by the naturalness with which he had said those words.

She watched as he sat down, ready to begin his lunch hour that he always shared with her. She knew that they weren't official yet and that they had just been dating, if Zayne told her that it bothered him, she wouldn't feel offended.

She sat in front of him, starting to take out what she had brought for their lunch. She looked at Zayne for a few seconds, he seemed totally comfortable with her presence and with what he had said. Had he indirectly told her that he was serious about her? Letting hospital staff call her that even as a joke was something… too important.

Yes, it was his indirect way of letting her know.