#this isn't overtly About that fandom

[cardentist]

hey, so people need to be aware that youtube is now (randomly) holding basic features for ransom (such as being able to pin comments under your own videos) in exchange for Your State ID/Drivers License, or a 30 Second Video Of Your Face.

not to pull a "think of the children," but No Actually. I've been making videos as a hobby since 2015 (and I've had my channel since middle school), I was a minor when I started and I'm not sure I would have understood the kind of damage something a seemingly simple as a video of your face can do.

this is a Massive breach of privacy and over-reach on google's part No Matter What, but if they're going to randomly demand a state ID or license then they absolutely should not allow minors to be creators.

google having a stockpile of identifying information on teenagers is bad enough, but the Alternative of recording your face and handing it over to be filed away is Alarming considering it opens the gates for minors who Aren't old enough to have a license.

and yes, there is a third option, but it's intentionally obtuse. a long wait period (2 months), with no guarantee of access (unlike, say, the convenience of using your phone's cameras for either of the other two), with absolutely No elaboration on what the criteria is or how it's being measured.

it's the same psychological effect that mobile games rely on. offer a slow, unreliable solution with no payment to make the Paid instant gratification look more appealing (the "payment" in this case being You. you are the product being offered).

and it's Particularly a system that (I think intentionally) disadvantages people who don't treat their channels like a job. hobbyists or niche creators who don't create regularly enough or aren't popular enough to meet whatever Vague criteria needs to be met to pass.

markiplier would have no problem passing, your little brother might not be able to. and while Mark's name is already out there there's no reason why your little brother's should be too.

something like pinned comments may seem simple, you don't technically Need it. but it's a feature that's been available for years. most people don't look at descriptions anymore. so when there's relevant information that needs to be delivered then the pinned comment is usually the go to.

for my little channel that information is about the niche series I create for. guides on how to get into the series, sources on where to find the content At All (and reliably so). for other creators it can be used for things Much More Important.

Moreover, if we let them get away with cutting away "small" features and selling it back to you for the price of your privacy, then they Will creep further. they Will take more.

Note: I have an update to this post here: [Link]

[katstiel]

After just having finished Teen Wolf for the first time, I can't stop thinking about Sterek. I am just so fucking fascinated by the phenomenon of this ship.

What is fascinating about it, is that there is BARELY any textual support for the ship at all. These two characters pretty much stop interacting after 2 seasons. If I'm being honest, their chemistry isn't even anything that wild. Any overtly shippable moments between the two can be counted on one hand.

What is fascinating, is that I firmly believe this ship exists due to the meta-textual context surrounding the show. Imo there are 2 main parts to this:

1. Sterek is a perfect example of queerbaiting in the original sense of the word. Because despite not having seen the show at the time, I vividly remember the boat video circulating. If you don't know what boat video I am talking about, just search YouTube for 'Sterek boat'. It is probably the most insane marketing stunt I've seen for a show.

And, after looking into it, it seems that the creative forces behind the show actively encouraged fans to ship Sterek through Asks here on Tumblr and other social media posts.

If this marketing hadn't happened, I don't think Sterek would've ever been as big as it became.

2. Derek as a character has no real purpose in the plot of Teen Wolf, except in the 1st and maybe half of the 2nd season. He is there mainly for the gratuitous nudity and objectification. Tyler Hoechlin is shirtless in so many scenes that frankly, it's a little ridiculous. In most other YA shows from the same era, he would occupy the love interest role for the main character... Except, Teen wolf's main character is, unlike most other fantasy/ya shows at the time, a guy. More importantly, the male main character Scott's entire motivation in the first few seasons revolve around his own love interest, Allison. So obviously, Scott isn't available to pair Derek up with. That leaves Stiles. Stiles isn't technically the main character, but he is the closest after Scott.

Stiles is also queer-coded like crazy. I don't know how the fandom reacted to the S3 moment where he talks to a bisexual girl, but if I had been in the fandom at the time, I would have taken it as explicit confirmation that Stiles is bi. There is no other way to interpret that scene, and no other purpose for it to be in the show.

So we have a classic, hot love interest character with no obvious romantic partner, and a queer-coded, almost-main character. The logical result is Sterek.

So like. Without the marketing or the context of similar shows of that time, there really is no reason to ship Sterek other than a vague "their dynamic is fun" that could be equally applied to many other pairings on the show. Which, for the record, is a completely respectable reason to ship something, but it would never have resulted in one of the biggest ships on Ao3 (at one point, it was second to only Destiel) on its own.

I'm not even gonna apologize for how long this post turned out because if I could, I would write an entire academic research paper on how this ship came to be. It is genuinely a fascinating case.

[explodingchantry]

Anders isn't my problematic fave because he isn't problematic. I think the wider concept of anders being 'wrong' the fandom has is a clear example of how biased the writing has been in the games. It's the same reason why people hate Jowan, or why they think the kinloch hold mages were stupid. There's a clear bias in the writing and framing of it all that guides the player towards feeling negatively.

The majority of answers you can give Jowan in Dao are negative, mocking, or downright insulting. The ones who aren't are just... Neutral. You can be a bit sympathetic to him in the circle origin but by the time you meed him in redcliff most of your dialogue choices are so fucking mean. In my replay I was trying desperately to be nice and sympathetic to him but the best you can do is be neutral and let him go but for every rude dialogue option there is no "you've been through something horrible, I'm sorry" or "you were manipulated, loghain took advantage of your vulnerability, I'm sorry" it's soooooo.

Likewise, I always make sure to speak to every single npc in the mage origins and the One mention of uldred before the broken circle quest is from the one mage who tells you about the different political faction enchanters are in, and it's with absolute disdain. That mage thinks uldred is annoying and it's implied that the other enchanters think so, too. Uldred who was an activist for mage liberation is treated as annoying for being an activist.

Then he turns out to be a blood mage and to have killed the majority of the circle, turning them into abominations. The message is clear: those who seek liberation are wicked. In the first game of the series, thus in the game which introduced the concept of circles at all, their existence is justified by the text. It overtly says: look at all those foolish mages, how dangerous they can be when One of them is wicked. Can you imagine if they were free? Can you imagine those abominations' destruction if they were out in the open?

Something similar happens in the mage origin, with Jowan. Through the whole origin, whilst Jowan is painted as annoying, he's definitely seen as a victim. Up until he uses blood magic, that is. Suddenly, the player is likely supposed to think "oh, so they were right to want to make him tranquil after all". Instead of being a way to show that the circle will often turn innocent mages tranquil, it shows you that greagoir was right to distrust Jowan, because he was indeed a blood mage. Instead of showing you how paranoid those in power are about mages, the writing justifies their fear and hatred.

Bear in mind this is the first game and likely the very first thing that happens to a lot of new players. The game does not expect you to know the intricacies of its lore yet, doesn't expect you to understand that blood magic is actually fucking neutral unless you sacrifice people for it. You might be tempted to argue that it's setting up for that realisation later and for you to feel bad about Jowan later, realizing he was led to blood magic because it was his only solution, because he and all other mages are caged like dogs (except this is ferelden, so the dogs are better treated than them). But then you've got the redcliff fiasco where it's obvious the writers expect you to fucking hate his guts

And while dragon age 2 is more overt in its depiction of mage suffering, it also tries to pass on the idea that kirkwall is a special case, that it's only the gallows that are this bad. That it's just Meredith whose craaazeyyy 🤪 and not just Meredith being a product of a corrupt system. The writers expect you to think of Anders as an unstable extremist, or as his writer puts it, a "bipolar terrorist" (note that ofc there's nothing fucking wrong with being bipolar, but I don't think his writer cares!)

With different writers and the exact same set of events, Anders blowing up the chantry would be easily recognized as a positive, as an act of justice, of rightful rebellion. Instead it's seen as a tragedy, a mistake. Instead Anders is categorized as a villain, morally grey even though Hawke themselves has a higher death toll than he ever will.

It's a lesson, I think. In narrative bias.

[raven-at-the-writing-desk]

Do you think all the characters are assholes?

Because i think they are despite their tragic backstories and i also don't think they appreciate Yuu enough, except for maybe the first years

I mean, the TWST characters are (mostly) inspired by Disney villains... Plus, they’re immature high schoolers still in the process of emotionally maturing. Of course they're not going to be perfect balls of sunshine. They're all going to be rude or have faults in their own ways, but they also have their strengths and charm points. I do call them assholes (lovingly), but I would hesitate to slap a singular label on any of the characters when they're all very well-rounded and morally ambiguous.

On the topic of Yuu, I think it makes sense that most of the cast doesn't really "appreciate" them. To begin with, most of the characters are not the openly sentimental types; they wouldn’t overtly express that gratitude even if it were present. Then we have to consider that Yuu isn't directly involved in their character growth or arcs in most cases; it's often the other characters who are confronting the OB boys or instigating, physically battling them to snap them out of it, and then comforting them afterwards.

As early as book 1, that pattern holds true. Ace is the one that initially pissed Riddle off. Adeuce are dueling Riddle. Ace decks Riddle and claims his last straw. Trey is the one calling out to Riddle as he's losing it. It's the members of Heartslabyul who gather around Riddle when he reawakens following the OB. (I'm not going to go through and list off what happens in every single book, but I'm sure you can think of many other instances... Lilia insulting Leona, Deuce and Epel having the heart-to-heart on the beach, Octavinelle's plot against Jamil, the twins checking up on Azul post-OB, etc.) To me, it feels like it is the boys and their bonds with one another responsible for the change, not Yuu's involvement. Yuu is usually along for the ride and actually does and says very little despite all the fandom jokes about "being the school's unpaid but overworked therapist" or Crowley's shallow claim that Yuu can help the boys learn to cooperate (which feels more like a vague ruse only shown in the prologue to shoehorn Yuu into the plot). There's actually very little in-game that shows them being active in helping the students change for the better. Much of the time, the boys can resolve their own struggles to get along without Yuu being there (like all those pair-ups in book 6–sure, it may have taken a while, but the fact remains that they did eventually resolve their own issues and cooperate without Yuu having to orchestrate for them; this also happens many times in events like Port Fest, Wish Upon a Star, Ghost Marriage, the Halloween events, etc). A very common complaint (at least among English speaking players) is that Yuu isn’t “involved enough” or that they don’t have a big impact on the events of the story. Therefore, most of the boys not feeling close or indebted to Yuu makes sense from their POV. What has Yuu actually and explicitly done to help them? Not much. It’s mainly in individual fan interpretations where Yuu/a Yuusona/an OC in Yuu’s role is actually able to play a more substantial part in each characters’ life and growth. In general, the standard in-game Yuu is more of a "fly on the wall" character that witnesses events unfold rather than someone who plays a large role in each book. The boys are seemingly the main characters, not Yuu. It's just convenient to have Yuu/a blank slate in the story because they, as an outsider, need TWST concepts explained to them (thus making it easier to give exposition to the players who may also be unfamiliar with the information). The first years, by comparison, are closer to Yuu simply because 1) Yuu is implied to be in the same year level as them (so they're more likely to be exposed to one another) and 2) their preestablished relationships with Grim, Ace, and Deuce opens them up more to first year interactions. "Friends of friends", if you will. It makes more sense than Yuu being appreciated and loved by everyone/most people in the main cast of 22ish. (How many people do you know irl that have 22ish significant friends?) They spend the most time together. Everyone else tends to stick to their own groups (with maybe the exception of Heartslabyul, since Yuu is already close with Adeuce). They’re just... not as intimate with Yuu, and therefore not as inclined to find much appreciation for them.

I want to clarify that this doesn’t mean there are zero instances of the characters outside of the first years expressing gratitude toward Yuu. Like, of the OB boys, it’s only Vil who consistently apologizes for the trouble he caused (note though: it’s not specifically to Yuu, but to everyone in the VDC/SDC squad. Yuu is then given prize money from most of the other boys as thanks for letting them crash at Ramshackle… Of those, only Kalim cites being grateful that he was able to stay and have fun with everyone because of Yuu green lighting the decision. This makes sense, as Kalim’s one of the few who wears his heart on his sleeve and is friendly to most. It just isn’t true for the majority of the cast, and we shouldn’t expect it to be.

As late as book 5, you can see characters like Leona not being so happy to be called out to or for Grim to act all buddy-buddy with him. That indicates to me that the rest of the cast is not that close to Yuu + related parties and doesn't have a real reason to be. (Note: I'm not counting character voice lines here as proof of friendliness with Yuu, as it can be argued that the relationships and events explored in the cards don't run in tandem with the main story and are meant more as fanservice for the players.)

Again, while it's not that fun to read in a narrative, it does leave things open-ended for anyone who wants to self-insert or to expand on those blank relationships for their own characters. I believe this is by design to appeal on an individual level to players. You get out of it what you put into it!

[ingravinoveritas]

electronic-chocolate replied to your post "Just wanted to make a separate post about this…”

I had an argument on here with someone who said that michael is a straight man who's just started queerbaiting bc he wanted to appeal to the gomens fandom💀

@electronic-chocolate Oh my God. That has to be right up there with someone calling Michael a non-practicing bisexual a few months ago. What's interesting to me is how five years ago, people talked a lot more easily/readily about Michael's sexuality--not his sexual orientation, but in the sense of viewing him as a sexual being--whereas nowadays, he's been rendered almost sexless. I know the "family man" image Michael has been boxed into is at least part of the reason for that, but it's hard to think that this isn't also an unconscious response to his queerness becoming more visible and more loud (as if it wasn't visible/loud enough already) in recent times--specifically, Michael's overtly sexual comments about David.

In 2014, Michael talked about Sarah Silverman putting her hand on his butt and made cheeky quips about Lizzy Caplan's breasts on the MoS commentary, and nobody blinked an eye. Ten years later, he's not making those type of comments about a particular woman, or any woman. Instead, Michael is making those comments about David--about his slinky hips, his sylph-like chest, about how attractive David is--and suddenly, it's a big deal. People are seeing what's in front of them and either rationalizing or outright ignoring it, all while choosing to believe those comments couldn't possibly have those same sexual overtones because Michael is talking about a man.

But not only is the argument of the person you mentioned entirely specious on a surface level (because as we know, real people cannot "queerbait," as that term applies to fictional characters/media), it also manages to ignore absolutely everything Michael has said over the last five years about playing Aziraphale and Good Omens in general: How he decided before filming even began that Aziraphale is in love with Crowley, and the acting choices he made in every scene with David that were in the service of that relationship. The way Michael has said he always misses being Aziraphale when they're not filming, and how he doesn't know where the character ends and he begins.

There is also the fact that Michael has played a tremendous number of queer roles over the years--long before Good Omens--and none of them had anything to do with appealing to a fandom or fan base of any kind. Michael once previously said that every character he plays is "him"--that is, there is some piece of the character that is a part of who he is. And when you take that sentiment and put it alongside the multitude of queer roles and Michael's recent comments on the death podcast about his crush on John Taylor and his struggles with gender expression, it forms a clear, rounded picture of exactly who Michael Sheen is.

Not "queerbaiting"...just queer. Even if he doesn't label it specifically, and also because he shouldn't have to. Insisting on calling Michael straight despite all of the above and everything else Michael has shared about himself erases every part of his sexuality, not just the parts someone is uncomfortable with. I just wish more people understood that...

[puppiekit]

One thing about the warriors Mapleshade hate train era of the fandom that still pisses me off actually is how people swore up and down that Mapleshade MUST be an unreliable narrator and so therefore nothing she expirienced or thought could be in any way accurate.

When in reality it was just the fandom making up bullshit headcanons out of thin air and portraying it as canon just so they can excuse Thunderclans blatant hatred/xenophobia, assault of a mother, and banishment of literal babies. Nobody wants to admit the fact that Mapleshade was severely screwed over and had every right to be pissed the hell off! (and don't get me wrong murder is inexcusable but like.... you guys baby so many other murderers in this series please stop playing)

Because outright saying "Mapleshade lying is worthy of assault and/or death" will reasonably earn you a WTF response, so people exaggerate her aggressors victimhood by making up bullshit about Mapleshade being a "baby trapper" or an "overtly possessive toxic girlfriend", and/or crafting some make-believe soppy sad backstory for Frecklewish. All to make Maples decision to lie seem worse than it in actuality was, or actively malicious in nature, and deserving of the recieved "punishment" (assault and death of her children).

Like... I cannot state enough how much it pisses me off when people discredit *the literal POV expiriences of the book protagonist* just to make up random crap about her clanmates and craft some elaborate tale where Maple is the worst and has sucked all along. When we know literally nothing about them, and especially Frecklewish, except that she made a stupid assumption, is willing to beat a mother in front of their kids, and quiet frankly didn't actually give a shit about those kids the moment she realized they weren't blood related. LOL

Like completley out of nowhere people decided Mapleshade lying was the worst crime ever commited in the history of the series... UNLESS you're literally any other character in the series to do it like Bluestar Leafpool Squirrelflight Yellowfang etc etc etc.... When they get flack for lying it's unfair and they were doing what they thought was right! But also it's completely unacceptable for Mapleshade to lie about her children's half-clan heritage in an environment where her peers are violently hateful and xenophobic. Because it hurt their feelings ... LOL

And don't even get me started on the fact that, quiet frankly, Frecklewish and Oakstar were being unreasonable from the very beginning by being hateful and blaming Riverclan for their loved ones death. They literally sent their son/brother INTO BATTLE and are now mad that he DIED? What the hell do they think happens when you send people out to beat eachother up (often to the death)??

Battle and death is such a normal and accepted part of clan culture it genuinely baffles me people dont realize that, as understandable as their grief, their anger/hatred is pretty crazy, even if Appledusk *had* killed Birchface. They were wrong to assume Birchface was the father and they were wrong to project their hatred on Mapleshade and her kits. Not a single action made by them was reasonable or excusable. You don't put that kind of pressure on a single mother who *explicitly avoided stating her kits father* and get all mad when it isn't who you assumed it to be. Like it's next level stupidity

[cl4ssyjazzy]

I'm incredibly pleased to announce that the "falling in love with a fish" novel is really sweet and delivers on the ridiculous premise AND MORE. The tyrant's pet fish is such an underrated gem I can't believe it doesn't have more fics and art and more fandom in general, and I can't believe I found it because of people joking about fish MPREG.

The MC isn't annoying, or overtly dumb, he is a bit clueless sometimes, mainly because he underestimates the ML ability to see how clearly THIS FISH IS NOT NORMAL, and the ML is surprisingly intelligent and even if he is called "A tyrant" he really isn't: he is a bit overprotective, jealous and ruthless to random npcs but considering he is in a politically vulnerable situation in a totally different era with different standards for "appropriate behavior of people in power™" you sort of understand his ruthlessness, specially because he is super respectful towards the MC, quickly learning from his mistakes and never pressuring him to do or say anything he doesn't want to. Even for MODERN BL standards he is a shining light, and they have really good communication considering one is a FISH WHO CAN'T TALK, and the other one was born mute

Please if you like transmigration, old chinese settings, and HAVING FUN, READ THIS NOVEL!!!!

[olderthannetfic]

People on fandomsecrets are really mad this week about other people reviewing fanfiction on goodreads and I don't want to litigate whether people should or shouldn't use that website in that manner right now, because the thing I'm actually wound up about is:

when someone asks why, they say "BECAUSE FANFIC ISN'T BOOKS!!!1!1!" as though this is supposed to explain everything, and when asked to elaborate they basically just find ways to say "fanfic, by virtue of being fanfic, is not a book, which is a different thing from fanfic, by virtue of books being books which are not fanfic" in more and more words without adding any coherent information.

Fanfic is a type of story. Books is a type of physical object. In the digital age there are now lots of professional ~official~ works of literature which have never once been published in a physical form. The comparison is meaningless to begin with and also doesn't answer the question.

Is this just a way of ignoring the goodreads thing entirely so they can stealth complain about the Wattpad thing where people used to that site call all stories "books"? Is that what's going on here?

--

Sighhh.

I know some people think Goodreads is for Real Books™, but a hell of a lot of what's on there is trashy romance novels. I myself am an author... of indie selfpub m/m mystery novels that are overtly fandom-adjacent in that BL way. Like most people in that space, I'm mainly focused on ebooks. Why are these things not fic? Well, because we sell them for money and we don't call them fic and because we've done a successful find and replace on the character names.

I think people have trouble articulating why fic is not books because they're used to thinking in terms of content, and they know perfectly well that Goodreads is full of content that might as well be from a fic.

But no, I don't think this is an anti-Wattpad thing at all.

What they're trying and failing to articulate is that fic is not a book by virtue of its author not intending it as one.

Fic authors, or at least ones adhering to a certain kind of AO3 culture, mean their work to be a not-for-profit gift for their fandom community. They often have a horror of it escaping containment to reach the eyeballs of outsiders.

Now, frankly, with the multitude of Goodreads users reviewing original omegaverse mpreg romance novels, I'm not sure that the site actually counts as outsiders, but that's how the people going "Fic is not books!" feel. It's a violation to bring fic there just like it's gross when a talk show host digs up some horny fan art to show to actors so they can have a good laugh at fandom's expense.

[butmakeitgayblog]

It's not talked about a lot in the fandom but I love how high pitched Lexa's voice is. I know Alycia tried her damned hardest to make it low and intimidating but damn that's the best it can do 😳 she looked hot af as Big Bad HedaTM but the moment she spoke on screen with her unmistakable "oh yeah that's Alycia" voice......... I was a GONER. Like the video of "not everyone, not you" you just posted?? Like somehow I never remember exactly how feminine she sounds when I'm reading fanfics 😂

Because Alycia quite literally was the perfect little delicate bean to play that role 😩

Not to get off subject but like, that's part of why I'd never want a spinoff. No one can play this character but Alycia. No one.

Because I feel like Alycia understood the assignment. In a way a lot of other actors probably wouldn't have, imo. She didn't strain to be something she wasn't or try to add a bunch of vibrato and bass to her voice, because that wasn't the kind of person Lexa was. She could do it to a degree, we see it in the scene when they believe Gus has been poisoned and she commands "No Skaiperson leaves this room!" But even then, filled with anger and fear of losing a confidant and father figure in her life... she still sounds like a young woman who is also just a pissed off leader. Alycia didn't strain to make it gravelier or darker. Because her power in that character doesn't come from false pretenses. She doesn't overtly or heavy handedly try and masculinize herself to convey strength. While I don't think there's anything wrong with that approach by any means, it just isn't always necessary.

And I know there is an argument to be made about them feminizing her even further in s3 for various sexist reasons, I do. But I still appreciated the overall performance and portrayal for what it was because despite all of the show's flaws (which were numerous 😒), letting a powerful woman figure be thoughtlessly and unremarkably feminine while also being a bad bitch just isn't something we see a lot imo. Usually if they're feminine, they're shrinking violets who are just shy and dainty and reserved. Stronger figures tend to be more masculine. More solid. More rigid. Deeper voices. Less feelings.

Lexa, however, was really none of those things when you truly look at her, despite the fact that she was unquestionably a larger than life presence on screen. She beat the shit of men twice her size and stood toe-to-toe with her enemies, commanded armies and led 12 warring nations under her iron fist leadership, she lost everyone she ever cared about and had her heart broken more times than she could count and still she dared to let herself fall in love again. Lexa was strong and she was vulnerable, she was lethal and she loved deeply. She was timeless and just a young woman trying her best to be a leader. Lexa was so many things all at once, and I appreciate the fact that Alycia didn't really bog it down with trying to convey her as something she wasn't.

And she did it all with that sweet dainty voice and her post apocalypse contacts and also impeccable eyeliner 💅

[powerfultenderness]

Death's Angel

Pairing: König (stalker/serial killer)/Fem!Reader

Rated: Explicit. 18+

Summary: "Please just let me go! I promise I won't tell! I have a wife! I have a child!" He's heard all the pleas before, but König is finally struck with the oddest dying wish he's ever heard. "Can you kiss me?"

Word Count: 22,480

Warnings:  Rape/Non-Con: Sexual assault, I do NOT go into detail on that part, but uh, it's there. Dub-Con/Consensual non-consent: (+mentions of rape/cnc porn). CNC as a coping mechanism, which (in this case) is dubious as it is not discussed beforehand. + Blood play, knife play, degradation. (Non-consensual) voyeurism (König is a stalker). Violence (König is a serial killer). Fluff (lol it's actually pretty sweet)

A/N: Based on [an ask] I got a couple of months ago. 4 parts in 1. [Read on AO3] for chapter divisions.

[Multi-fandom Masterlist]

[Death’s Kiss]

He cursed himself for getting distracted. But, as much as the military would like to believe he isn't, he is only human. And a particularly buxom woman overtly flirting with him had drawn his eyes from his target. He rejected the woman's advances (maybe he will find her later, there was nothing quite like fucking after killing), and went about searching for his target. Unfortunately he had to be discreet, he couldn't just push people out of his way, as much as he would love to.

He caught sight of a back exit and followed his instincts, they hardly ever led him astray, and took the chance that his target had left this way. He’d only taken a few steps into the dark alley when he heard sounds of a struggle. ‘What’s this?’ He followed the sound of a frustrated groan quickly followed by a “fuckin’ bitch!” and a woman’s scream cut short. 

König stuck to the shadows, plenty around this late, and slipped his sniper hood on as he rounded a dumpster. There was his target, a man in his thirties, with one hand over a woman’s mouth and the other holding a knife he just shoved into the woman’s stomach. 

Interesting. König couldn’t exactly say what drew him to kill certain targets. He just saw someone and decided. Sometimes he’d do recon, other times, like tonight, he’d just see what the night had in store for him. This was the first time he had come across one of his targets committing well, if the woman’s torn dress and the man’s hand now stuffed under her skirt were anything to go by, sexual assault and likely murder. 

König could understand murder. He might even respect it. But he could not tolerate rape. There were always one or two men in his unit he had to keep an eye on. Who were likely to take advantage of the women of a war torn country. Not only were those the easiest of his victims to cover up, but he had a sneaking suspicion that the higher ups placed them on his team on purpose. Let him deal with the troublemakers before they get out of hand. 

Why he should have contempt for one heinous act over another was also something he didn’t bother to think about. Thus he didn’t bother to think when he pulled his target off of the woman. 

-

Red. He’d forever associate this moment with red. Your eyes, which caught his for a fraction of second as he grabbed the man’s shoulder, were red, either from tears or because the man had hit you, or both. There was a bright red ribbon that matched the color of freshly spilled blood hanging loosely from your hair, spiraling elegantly down your shoulder before getting stuck to your skin with blood. Blood, dark red and spilling freely in some places, already clotting in others, almost looked fake. Too…pretty. Most beguiling of all, were splashes of red across your lovely white dress, from the top, which was now ripped free of your body, to the flared skirt.  

Red had always been his favorite color. 

The man was quick enough on his feet to regain his balance and pull out of König’s grasp, if only for a moment, as he reeled and threw a wild punch at König.

König caught the first easily, smiling under his mask, as the man’s eyes went wide as he realized how much bigger König was. “F-fuck!” 

He tried to yank his fist back, which König let go of as he hooked one boot behind the man’s foot. He chuckled as the man flailed and fell on his ass with an undignified scream. Before the man could get back to his feet and run away, König planted his boot on his chest and leaned down. 

“What should I do with you, hm?” König hummed playfully while leaning down and pressing his weight onto the man’s chest even more. He had been planning on taking the man to a secondary location, an out of the way warehouse at the edge of town, so he could take his time. But even now he was aware of a second set of eyes on him.

“N-nothing! You can have her, let me go!” The man struggled against König’s boot, and struggled to breath as König pressed down again. 

“Her?” He looked over his shoulder at you, hunched against a wall with blood slowly forming a puddle around you. 

You should have been crying for help, or trying to get to your phone that he could see a few feet from you. You should have been trying to save your life. But instead you were watching him. Your eyes were glazed over as your life slowly drained away, but you were watching him. No. You were watching him kill your attacker, waiting to see what happened. And a shiver of excitement ran down his spine. He never had a witness before…

Then he looked down again, “what use is a dead woman?” 

That’s when the man screamed, using what little strength he had to try to punch König’s leg. 

“Ow.” König deadpanned, but removed his foot from the man’s chest anyways. 

He let the man scramble to his feet, but when he turned to run away, König grabbed him by the back of his head, his giant hand making a viscous grip in the man’s hair, and yanked him back. The man screamed, hands flying to the back of his head to try to pry König’s hand off of him. König lifted the man into the air before slamming him face first into the brick wall in front of them.

Not even the muffled and gurgled screams could drown out the sickening crunch of bone. While still holding the man’s face into the brick wall, he turned to look at you, looking for the familiar fear that should be in your eyes. There was none. Again, you weren’t even looking at him, not really. You were looking at the man, weakly struggling against König’s hold. 

Hm. There was no fear in your eyes. But you were alert to…something. Too close to Death, maybe? He wondered what it would take for you to react.

Without even looking back at the man, he pulled his fist back for a moment, the man gasping for air through broken teeth, and slammed him back into the wall. It was at that point that the man went limp in his hand. Your only reaction was to cough, blood spraying from your mouth and down your chin.  

‘Nothing?’

Returning his attention to the man, König pulled the back from the wall again and with his free hand grabbed the side of the man’s face. In one quick motion he pulled and snapped the man’s neck. That earned him…a cough for sure, but, was that a laugh turned to a cough? 

He dropped the man and kicked the body over, making sure that he was really dead, when he noticed you moving out of his peripheral. You had wrapped both hands over the handle of the knife protruding from your stomach.

“You’ll only bleed out faster.” He raised his voice and turned his head enough to look at you again.

You froze and looked up at him as he slowly turned from the man to you. From where he had planted himself, he took  in more of your appearance, of your wounds. Your hands, now resting weakly in your lap, were cut from a blade and scraped up from the brick wall you were pushed into and cement below you, proving that you had at least attempted to fight back before being overpowered. There was a large gash below your neck and over your collarbone that leaked blood onto your nude chest. A shame, a quick thought crossed his mind, that such a pretty pair of tits is going to die.

His eyes followed down the rivulet of blood from your chest to your waist. Oh. Cherries. What he initially mistook as blood splatter all over your pretty white dress was in fact part of the dress itself, a pattern of cute little cherries. What a vision you were, must have looked like a little angel before you met your fate. 

“Hey,” you croaked out in a heavy, wet, sigh. 

Since it seemed to take so much effort to get one word out, he did you the favor of moving closer to you. Once he was near enough to you, his eyes drifted down to the knife. He didn’t kill that man to save you. In fact, it was his intent to let you die. He could finish the job. Do it quickly too, as a mercy. 

“Can you-” You breathed out another heavy sigh, attempting to curb a cough. “-kiss me?”

König’s eyes snapped up to your face, blinking and his head tilting even more as he processed your question. Did he hear you right? “What?” 

“I want,” you paused and licked your lips that were both dry but slick in blood. “My last kiss to be my choice.” 

Ah! He blinked once more as he looked at your pathetically small body and the puddle of blood under you. You knew you were going to die. 

He never had a witness to one of his killings. He also never fulfilled someone’s dying wish. An odd night of firsts. He dropped down to one knee next to you and nodded. “Alright.” What was the harm in it?

With one gloved hand he gently tilted your chin towards him and lifted the bottom of his hood with the other. His eyes slid shut as he softly pressed his lips to yours. He meant for it to be chaste, just a small peck to honor your wish, but the metallic tang of your blood slipped into his mouth, and he liked it. The coppery blood was tinged with a hint of what he could only describe as sweet. He had never tasted blood like that. His own was acrid in comparison. He wanted more. 

He leaned down closer and pressed his lips just a bit harder against yours, agitating the cut on your lip. He swiped his tongue across your bottom lip, gently sucking on the cut in your lip to draw more blood into his mouth and he had to hold back a moan. As tempted as he was to shove his tongue further, a pained whimper from you stopped him. He pulled away, licking his lips as he dropped his hood back in place.

You coughed out a muttered “thank you,” and sighed, like you were ready to accept your death. 

Too bad he hadn’t met you earlier in the night, he thought as he looked at you again. Then, and he’s not sure why he even tried, he pulled a knife from his belt and began to cut away at the top of your dress that was already hanging off of your body. “Remain calm, Engel.” 

Once he had a sufficient amount of fabric he pressed it around the knife wound. “Keep pressure here.” 

Your hands, small and weak, took over and despite the pained cry, you did as he said.

He stood up quickly and picked up your phone, or what he simply assumed was your phone. The screen was cracked but still lit up as he pressed a side button. The emergency number was just one press away from being dialed. 

He hit dial and returned to you, helping you stem the bleeding once more, and held the phone up to your mouth. “Tell them where we are. You might live if they’re fast enough.” 

You coughed out an answer to the operator, barely managing a weak “help” with a street name and the name of the club you stepped out of. 

You were unconscious by the time he saw emergency lights, but at least you were still alive. He remained with you as long as he could, daring even a few seconds too long, and slipped away before police and paramedics found you. And the body of the man who attacked you.

Even as König sat in his truck, forcing himself to relax, he knew it would be better for him if you died. 

He hoped you lived. 

[Death’s Touch] 

A week ago he met a dying angel with sweet and pretty blood. He expected the police to show up within a day or two. Even if he hadn’t shown his face to you, or done something so stupid as to give you a name, how many behemoth men with Austrian accents were there in the city? That simple description of him was the reason why he was careful there were no witnesses to his killings. That simple description was why he had considered letting you die in that alley. 

But the police never showed up. 

König frowned as he fit the last piece of the gun he had been meticulously cleaning in place. Did the police not show up because you…died? He waited too long to help you and now he’d never even get to know your name.

Of course, he didn’t know for sure that you were dead, and that had him anxious. He had to know.

A few days later, and an I.O.U to Hutch, König was able to read the police report from that night. He learned three important things. The first was that you were still alive. The second was that there was no mention of him, or even a rescuer. No description of a large man. No APB out on him. And lastly, he learned your name and address.

You lived in a modest flat, the worst thing about it was its utter lack of security. There wasn’t even a gate. It was too easy to find various watch points that looked into your flat. Or would have. You apparently weren’t in the habit of opening your curtains. Only a good thing, as far as he was concerned, who knows what kind of creeps could be watching?

For a day, he wondered if he had the right flat. He’d been watching all day and didn’t see you once. Just before his patience wore out the next day, however, food was delivered to your flat and he finally caught a glimpse of you again. 

That was it. The confirmation he needed. You were alive and for whatever reason you didn’t tell the police about him. Both good things. 

He could leave. He could forget about you now. 

…

It was two days later when you finally left your flat. Yes, he was still watching your flat, a sense of relief flooding him every time you opened the door for food. 

He followed you until you parked at a clinic. He knew there would be cameras all over the place, so he continued driving and didn’t pull into the same parking lot as you. Instead he drove to the next light, made a u-turn and parked at the drug store across the street. 

An hour and a half later he saw you leave the clinic. You were fast, one might even say you were lightly jogging. As he started his truck to follow you, he realized that you walked at that same speed when you left the flat. 

“Oh, my little angel. Are you frightened?” 

Too scared to leave the safety of your home most days, and barely leaving to see a doctor. Well, he couldn’t blame you.

A part of him was content knowing that he would be able to easily find you now. 

Just his luck, though, his leave was up and he had to ship out to a new base. Hopefully, by time he got back you would still be holed up in your little flat, safely tucked away for him.

-

By the time he was granted leave again, it had been four months since you were attacked. It didn’t take him long to find you again. Of course you were at home, and that morning he followed you to an office, then back home. A routine. Having a solid routine helped with his own anxiety, of course it would ease yours. 

The only thing that did surprise him was that from his old vantage point, and with the help of a scope, he was able to see into your bedroom now. Not a full view, but the curtains were cracked just enough. The weather had been getting better, had you opened your window at one point and weren’t so diligent with the curtains when you closed it? 

Blue light softly illuminated your room as you settled into bed that night. He could sympathize with you. He knew plenty of men who could not sleep without the aid of some kind of white noise. But as he watched you through his scope he realized that the tossing and turning he thought was keeping you awake was more intentional than not. There was no mistaking the way you were rolling your hips.

“Fuck,” he muttered under his breath as he leaned forward in his truck, as if that could somehow get him a better view through your window. 

His dick twitched when you turned to lay flat on your stomach, your hips rocking faster against the pillow (or blanket?) that you had between your legs. He thought about you in that alley, looking all pretty so close to death, “-kiss me?” and tasting so sweet. 

You pushed yourself up onto your elbows, your head hanging down but still turned away from him. Not that he could really make out your figure fully, his mind was filling in what he could not see. One of his hands dropped to his crotch to adjust his pants, but didn’t touch his semi-hard dick. He liked to think he had more self control than that. Until he remembered that little whimper you let when he kissed you too hard and he needed to hear you again.

Before he could stop himself to weigh his decision, he was already out of the truck and halfway across the parking lot. He was called a human battering ram, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t be stealthy, or pick a lock. In fact, he was already trying to think of a way to get you new, better, locks since it was so easy to break into your flat. 

The lights were all off and in dark clothes and his sniper hood, it was easy to blend into the shadows. The place was small, the door opened into an open concept living room to kitchen. He paid no mind to furnishing, focusing instead on the light that emanated from the bedroom. 

As he got closer to the door, left slightly ajar, the sound of heavy breathing got louder. It was a sound that sent an excited thrum through his veins as he leaned against the wall and peeked into the bedroom.

In the time it had taken for him to enter your flat, you had switched positions again. You were sitting up on your knees, back towards him (the door, rather), with a blanket pooled around you and a pillow between your thighs. You weren’t wearing anything provocative, just a large tee shirt from what he could see, but it was bunched up around your hips just reaching your bare thighs. 

He could feel his body getting hotter, his dick getting harder, but he was trained well enough to keep his breathing steady, quiet. Fuck though, what he would give to see you from the front, or below. To have you riding his cock like that, your soft hands planted firmly on his chest as you were now bracing yourself on the bed. 

You let out a gasp, such a sweet sound that went straight to his dick, and arched your back, one hand flying behind you to steady yourself while the other pulled the pillow harder against you. He closed his eyes for a second, savoring your breaths, as he imagined gripping your hip, you’d probably cry out from how rough his hands were, but you’d like it anyway. He imagined watching his cock stretching out your little pussy while his other hand played with your clit.

When he opened his eyes again, he glanced over at the laptop (the source of light that he initially mistook for a television) but it wasn’t angled right for him to see what was on the screen. It was obvious, with the way you kept your eyes on the screen, though. There was no sound that he could hear, so he figured you were wearing earbuds. What kind of porn did his little angel like to watch? Huge cock, perhaps? Did you fantasize about taking a cock as big as his? 

Underneath his hood he had to bite down on his lips to keep from groaning, especially when you started to moan as you started to bounce and grind your pussy harder onto that stupid fucking pillow. He could give you something so much better to rub your pussy on. 

One of your hands snaked under your shirt to play with your tits, your whines getting a little louder and he squeezed his fists hard. If he touched himself now, he wouldn’t stop until he came, and that was a little too risky right now. 

Just as he was about to give in and stuff his hand down his pants, you let out a muffled moan, one hand covering your mouth, even though no one was (supposed) to be around to hear you. Your hips slowed down to gentle rolls as you leaned forward, slowly stretching out and riding out your orgasm. His hips jerked forward, seeking friction against nothing, and his eyes rolled back at your moan. 

Your little whimpers still filling the air only made his cock throb painfully hard in his pants. He remained still, watching as you slowly got up and moved to the other side of the room. Judging by the light suddenly flooding the room for a second only to fade when he heard a door close, he assumed it was the bathroom. He sighed, leaning against the wall, and took a deep breath, hoping to catch your scent. 

He quickly left while you were cleaning up, and took extra care to make sure your door was locked. 

As soon as he made it back to his truck, he tore off his gloves, shucked his pants down just enough to pull his dick out and spit in his hand. He leaned back, eyes closed as he recalled what he had just seen with vivid detail. 

"Mmm, fuck. Engel." He mumbled under his breath as his hand pumped fast strokes up and down his cock. 

He could still see you humping your pillow, still hear the symphony of your moans filling the air. He squeezed harder, rolled his hand over the tip of his cock and spread the ample precum down the shaft. He was so close already. His hips bucked up as he fucked his fist, picturing you bouncing on his cock. He groaned, your name slipping out of his mouth, even though you had yet to formally introduce yourself to him. 

His whole body tensed, his breath coming out in desperate ragged pants, as he stroked himself faster. A litany of curses, in both English and German, filled the cabin as he came. He continued to stroke himself slowly, with a loose grip, as he eased himself down, just as had. He even imagined himself burying his nose in the crook of your neck, or resting his forehead on your shoulder, making you whimper from lazy and sloppy kisses.

He finally opened his eyes, a spark of sadness in his heart as he saw nothing but the roof of his truck instead of the vision that was you. He sighed and reached the hand that wasn't covered in his own cum around the passenger seat to grab a few napkins he'd thrown there earlier. 

Once he cleaned up, as well as he could, he returned home. He just needed a few hours of sleep. He knew your schedule, he'd return later.

-

He arrived back at your flat after you should have left for work. He scanned the car lot to make sure your car was gone (it was) and made sure the coast was clear to break into your flat again (it was). This time he did take a moment to take in the space. Everything was meticulously clean, spotless, not even dust in high up places. He wondered if you were like this before the attack, or if this was a result of self isolation. 

Then he moved over to the bedroom. Just like the living room, everything was nicely in order and the bed was perfectly made. Excited warmth spread through him when he saw two pillows sitting on your bed. He slipped his hood off, hooking it in his waistband, and dropped onto the bed. He took a deep breath and nuzzled his face into one of the pillows. An incredibly intoxicating mix of perfume and detergent and you filled his senses and he hummed in delight. 

One hand reached up and gripped the other pillow, feeling the softness, about to bring it to his chest when he paused. He spotted your laptop on the nightstand and sat up. He picked it up, a tube of cherry chapstick rolling to the other side of the nightstand, and opened it up. He watched the screen as it loaded. 

No password? Well, he supposed that made sense considering you lived alone. 

Now, he tapped away, what had you so worked up last night? 

His eyebrows shot up, eyes a little wide, as he made his way through your browser history. “Oh, Engel.” He felt himself getting excited as saw various types of CNC and rape porn. “You still think about that night.” Honestly, he did too. 

Before he got too turned on, he made sure to clear the history and set the laptop back where he found it. Then he got up and straightened out the bed. 

If that was what you wanted, he would be happy to help fulfill your fantasies.

-

It had been four months since your attack. Everyone around you had been sympathetic at first. It was a bit overwhelming, having people you barely talked to go out of their way to make sure you weren’t feeling unsafe. It only took two months for them to move on. It was a blessing in that you felt like you finally had space to breathe, but now people were unpredictable, unwanted casual touches or getting too close to you, and it had you retreating back to your cubicle every time. 

When you declined invitations to go out, people would joke that you were being boring. Maybe it was time you moved on too?

The next time you were invited out, you agreed, on the condition that you didn’t have to go home to change. 

“Yay! That’s fine! Trust me, it’ll be fun!” Your friend and coworker said as she slapped hand on your shoulder.

You winced and moved out of her touch with the excuse of needing to get back to your desk. The rest of the day was thankfully uneventful and you soon found yourself at a new bar.

Thirty minutes in, once the appetizers were gone and the alcohol flowing freely, your work friends got to be a little much. You didn't want to drink, you were assured that no one would be getting drunk. That was wrong, of course, and you silently wondered if you were invited just to be designated driver and get everyone home safely. You were not going to do that.

It was easy to slip away unnoticed. You just needed some space and so headed towards the back where the bathrooms were. 

For a Friday night it felt oddly empty. Maybe because it was out of the way, maybe because it looked like an employee only area. Whatever the case, you’re thankful for-

You didn’t even have to catch your breath before you were suddenly pushed into a wall, a large hand clasp around your mouth preventing you from screaming. Fear and panic shot through your body as memories of the night you were attacked surfaced, fueling your struggle. Not again, not here, not with so many people around. 

Both of your hands pulled at the hand on your mouth and you finally looked up only to freeze. Even the panic in you seized up, unsure whether or not you were being threatened. Piercing blue eyes stared at you from underneath a black hood. The bleach stained tear streaks are a frightening illusion of humanity that you’re not certain is even there. 

“You!” Well, at least that what you tried to say, his hand still muffled your voice.

This man, the man who saved you that night, held you up against the wall, your toes barely scraping the floor, with one hand covering your mouth. It was almost the exact same position your attacker held you in right before he stabbed you. Part of you wanted to panic still, had your heart racing and breathing quickly. But another part of you was just…confused. He wasn’t doing anything else but holding you. If he had wanted to kill you, among other things, he could have done it back in that alley. Instead he saved you. He killed the man who attacked you. He helped you call an ambulance. He stopped you from bleeding out. You didn’t even say a word about him to the police. So why would he want to hurt you now?

You tried to calm your breathing as you stared up into his eyes. Cold blue locked you into place, but the danger in his eyes wasn't malice. It was something else entirely. 

Finally he lifted his hand from your mouth, you drawing in a gasp of air, and set you fully back on your feet. His free hand remained firmly planted on the wall beside your head, keeping you in place flush between him and the wall. Then he gently traced your bottom lip with his thumb, landing where a now healed cut once split your lip. Your heart raced, heat blooming across your face, as you remembered his kiss. That kind of intensity in a kiss, in any other situation, would have been erotic. Really, you had been on the verge of death and it was still probably the best kiss you'd had in years. 

You whimpered at his touch. He had been so rough even though he thought you were going to die and now the pressure of his thumb on your lip sent an arousing wave of fear through you. 

He leered down at you, eyes starting to dilate, "tell me to stop." 

With your heart hammering in your chest, it took a moment for you to register his words. What? 

You opened your mouth, no words forming, and his thumb slipped past your lips and grazed your teeth. You whined, which only seemed to spur him on, and he pushed against your jaw even more, forcing your mouth wider. “Speak up, Engel.” 

He was so close to you, his knee slid between your legs, rubbing against your core and pushing you higher against the wall again. You let out a shuddering gasp, your hands flying from him in an attempt to stabilize yourself against the wall, but you made no move, made no demand, to stop him. He rocked his knee up, grinding slowly and gently into your pussy, drawing a quiet moan from you. Your pussy clenched when he put pressure on your clit and you bit down on his thumb, hot tongue brushing against the invading digit. 

König grinned, though you could not see it, and chuckled. He leaned even closer to you, hood pooling over your shoulder and growled in your ear. “Fucking slut.” 

This time your gasp was cut short as he slapped a hand across your mouth again. He lifted you with ease, tucked you against his body and dragged you out of the bar through the back door, not one person seeing the quick departure. 

You struggled against him, hands flying to the one over your mouth and you clawed at him, you kicked your feet but he was so big and tall that he easily held you above the ground. He wanted to chuckle. You reminded him of a feral kitten caught by animal control. Just as cute, or cuter, even.

He didn’t drop you until he reached the side of the bar. There was a gate separating the dingy little alley and the parking lot, decorative trees planted near the gate. It was unlocked, he made sure it was before he approached you, but it still would still provide the illusion that you were trapped.  

You grunted when your feet hit the ground, stumbling forward into the brick wall. You tried to duck around the man, but he easily swung you back in front of him, pushing you against the wall, though he cushioned the back of your head with one large hand.

You looked up at him as you drew in panicked, quick breaths. Just like before, he leered down at you as if he was waiting for you to say something. You bit your lip, his eyes flicking down to watch as your teeth worried at your bottom lip. “Wh-what do you want?”

His eyes looked back up and slowly he lifted a knife you hadn't even seen him grab to your throat. You stilled and tipped your head back, attempting to get the blade away from your delicate skin. There was a scar on your neck that you usually kept covered up, but like this, it was exposed to him.

He traced the scar with the tip of his knife, “what do you want, Engel?”

You swallowed thickly, holding as still as possible so he didn't slice through your skin. And you didn't answer him.

He huffed, “do you want me to stop?” The knife dragged down the scar to the collar of your shirt. “That's all you have to say, my dear.”

As much as you tried to control your breathing, your chest was heaving, drawing his eyes down to it for a moment before he looked up again. That hood made it difficult to read him, but his eyes were so expressive. You knew what he wanted. The heat in his eyes matched the nearly overwhelming heat his large body gave off. The same heat you could feel swelling in your body. You swallowed again, your mouth refusing to answer his question.

“No?” The knife slipped underneath your collar and he tugged, slicing through the fabric. 

It was so similar yet different to the sound of fabric being torn apart and ripped off of your body. It was cleaner, sharper and the definite but soft scratch of the tip of the blade on your heated skin sent your pulse wild. He hummed as he cut open your shirt, revealing the plain bra underneath.  

You hadn't even realized just how hard you were breathing, how much your chest heaved with every breath, until his blade bounced on the swell of your breast and he sucked his teeth. “Stay still.” He growled out, eyes flicking up to your eyes and away from your exposed chest.

You bit back a high pitched gasp, holding your breath as he dragged the blade across your chest, until he reached the left bra strap.

You shivered as you heard the soft ping of the knife slicing through the strap. He once again looked up from your chest to your eyes, his own narrowing in disapproval. “Perhaps you want to be hurt, hm?”

You whined and squeezed your eyes shut, attempting to hold your breath again to remain as still as possible. He slowly moved the tip of the knife across your chest again, this time angling it so more of the edge touched your skin. Another ping and you flinched as the other strap of your bra was cut.

He was silent for only a moment, the flat of the blade resting near the middle of your chest, just by your left breast, every beat of your heart making it jump ever so slightly. You could hear his heavy breaths, almost feel them against your face, even through that terrifying hood. For a moment, in that silence, you thought you were safe. That he was done.

Until he quickly shoved his free hand up the back of your shirt and unhooked your bra clasp. You squealed, eyes flying open, and jumped as he ripped what remained of your bra off of you. You only caught a glimpse of his eyes, blown wild with lust, before he spun you around and pushed you face first into the brick wall.

Your hands, which had been covering your chest in an attempt to save your dignity, were now bracing you against the wall so you didn't smash your face into it. You shivered again, remembering how he killed your attacker months ago, by shoving him so hard against a brick wall that he lost consciousness.

The hand holding the knife came to rest to the right side of your face against the wall. The metal gave an unnerving scrape against the brick that caused another shiver to run down your spine. His left hand snaked around to grope your left breast. His large hand, hot and rough, cupped your soft flesh with ease.

“Such pretty tits,” he hummed as he pinched your nipple, drawing another distressed squeak from you as your nipples hardened under his touch.

Your eyes were screwed shut once again and you attempted to wriggle out of his hold. You pressed your body as close to the wall as you could, but that only made him close in on you more, his crotch now firmly resting on your ass. He moved his hand to grope your other breast and bucked his hips forward with a deep grunt, the hard bulge of his cock rubbing against your ass. You bit back a whimper as your pussy clenched around nothing, arousal starting to pool in your panties.

His hand traveled down, grabbing what was left of your shirt and tearing it, leaving it hanging open on your shoulders. Your body welcomed the sudden partial nudity. The air was hot and thick and it felt like a cool relief to be free of even the light cotton. He pressed his hand against your stomach, pulling you against him even more, and for a moment he froze.

All the roughness in his touch disappeared as his fingers gently traced the nasty scar on your stomach. You whined, not from desperate arousal but shame. After what happened to you, you should be trying harder to fight this. You shouldn't want this, no matter how deep down it was, or how hard you tried to deny it. You dropped your head against the wall, resting your forehead against one hand as you waited for him to finish his assault.

König growled at your reaction to the scar on your stomach. You had looked up at him with growing lust, as tentative as that was, when he traced the scar on your neck with his knife. But the scar on your stomach, evidence of how close your brush with death had been, had paralyzed you. You were too quiet for him to enjoy this. He wanted to hear you cry and whimper, wanted to feel you rocking your body against his as you had been only a moment ago. Most of all, he didn't didn't want you to fear him.

He steadied you with his left hand, his hand heavy on your bare shoulder, and used his right to rip the rest of the tattered shirt off of you. You gasped and cried, and not in the way he wanted to hear, as you stood facing the wall with both arms crossed over your chest and your eyes squeezed shut. Then he removed the simple field jacket he was wearing and draped it over your shoulders.

You froze again as you were suddenly enveloped in warmth and spun around to face your savior/attacker. He roughly pulled the jacket closed, deft fingers fastening the button that fell just over your belly button. You were still somewhat exposed to him, but the scar on your stomach was now once again hidden underneath a layer of clothing.

Your mind barely registered the glint of his knife before it was pressed to your neck once more. He dug the point of the blade into the scar, not enough to puncture, but enough to draw your attention back up to his face.

His eyes were narrowed, furrowed brows peeking beneath the crudely cut eye holes of his mask. If you could see the rest of his face, he would probably be scowling at you.

As much as you wanted to grip the jacket closed, you kept your arms stiff at your sides. One wrong move could open up the scar on your neck again. 

He leaned down, his face inching closer to yours, his blade biting just a little bit more. "Say it." His voice is half a whisper, half a frustrated growl. 

Your lips part, tongue darting out to lick them, but you remained quiet, afraid to give him the wrong answer to his riddle. 

He growled again and pushed you harder against the wall. "Say it!" He practically screamed, and his knife finally pierced your skin, drawing just the slightest bit of blood. 

You flinched, as fear and pain laced adrenaline rushed through your veins, to your core, your clit throbbing as the knife stung your skin. Unconsciously, you steadied yourself by bracing your hands on his sturdy chest. His eyes flickered down at the movement, at the way you were clutching to him and squeezing your thighs together and he grinned under his mask. Oh you were scared of him alright, and you wanted it.  “Filthy fucking whore.” 

Your gasp, perhaps a protest of his words, if you even understood them, is strangled as you find yourself facing the wall again, his thick jacket protecting your hands and arms from the rough brick. 

His right hand holds his knife against the left side of your neck, still pressed against the old scar as his left is shoved down your pants. You whine and gasp and squirm as he circles your clit with two fingers. He groans behind you and his hips jerk forward, the motion causing the blade to cut your skin some more, a thin trail of blood starting to stain your skin. 

You cry, biting your lip and dropping your head against the wall, at the mixed sensations, the stinging pain blending with the pure pleasure of his fingers slipping up and down, around, your clit.

He groaned as his fingers slipped further down and spread your slick around your pussy. You squeezed your thighs around his hand and he pants in your ear before shoving a knee between your thighs, preventing you from closing them. 

His knee between your legs pushes you up against the wall and your toes barely find purchase on the ground. “You want this, ja?” He says as he starts to rock your hips against his thigh as his hand continues to play with your pussy. 

His fingers, hot and thick, slip into you as his palm rubs your clit. “Ja.” He grunts as he sinks a second finger into you, slowly pumping them.  His fingers pick up their pace and you moan when he inserts another digit. He curls his fingers just right as he pumps them, drawing out whines that you try to quiet. You hide your face in your hands, finding odd comfort in the warm scent that lingers on his coat, and choke back a moan as your hips are rocked against his thigh faster.

He pulls his fingers out, soaked in your juices, and goes back to focusing on your clit. “Of course you want this,” he half chuckles and half pants as finally removes his hand from your pussy, strings of cum sticking to your exposed skin as he nudges your chin with the knife so your head leans back against his chest. 

He held his hand up, spreading his fingers to show you your own arousal. "You wouldn't be this fucking wet if you didn't want this." 

You tried to turn your head away, so you didn't have to look at those lust clouded eyes in soft darkness, but he tuts and shoves two cum covered fingers into your mouth. He hummed as he watched you gag on his fingers, at least he relented enough that you were no longer deepthroating his fingers. “Wouldn’t be fucking my thigh like a desperate whore if you didn’t want this.” 

You froze, as if just realizing that with one of his hands still holding a knife to your throat and the other stuffing your mouth with his fingers, the eager grinding of your hips on his thigh was entirely you. He laughed and rocked his knee up into your aching pussy, “don’t stop now.”

The drag of his knee puts perfect pressure on your clit and you whine around his fingers as your pussy clenches around nothing. “Keep. Moving.” He growled in your ear as he glides the knife down the old scar down your neck to just above your collarbone, a thin line of blood beading against your skin. It stings and your cries are smothered by his fingers and he rocks his knee up again and you slide against his thigh just right that the pain becomes pleasure. 

He moans with you as you start to grind down in his leg again, back and forth and you even do your best to bounce while your feet barely touch the ground. His hips start to move with you, his hard cock on your ass adding fuel to the fire that burns within you. 

He’s grunting now, everytime you bounce against his dick, and he drops his hand from your mouth and starts to grope your tits again, making your shudder as he squeezes, his grip is bruising but your clit still throbs, your pussy still flutters with every touch of his rough hands.

The knife finally drops from your neck and he holds it against your waist then leans down, the mask he is wearing falling over your shoulder and you feel his breath on your bare skin.

“You belong to me now, Engel.” 

You gasp and shiver as he mumbles darkly into your neck, head lolling back so you can look at him, but all you see is the black of his mask. His grip on you tightens, the handle of the knife pushing into your hip painfully, his hand fondling your breasts roughly, his thigh pushing up against your pussy pleasurably. 

His tongue, hot and big, laps at your shoulder in a smothered kiss before he bites down, his sharp teeth catching the edge of the cut on your neck and that’s enough to push you into orgasm. You pussy wildly, almost painfully, clenching as you cum against his leg. 

He hums, strangely gentle, and slowly rocks you back and forth on his leg, letting your orgasm fade until your wanton moans are no more than the occasional whimper. 

You stumble forward into the wall when he drops his knee. Your clit is still throbbing as you pull the jacket closer to you and hide your face in your hands. You’re mostly just trying to catch your breath and calm down, but somewhere in the back of your mind you still feel shame at the way your cum gushes down your thighs, soaking into your pants. 

You barely register the shuffling behind you until you feel his hands on you again. You flinch, expecting him to be rough, but his touch is gentle as he rubs your arms. “You did good.” He mumbles his compliment into your hair. “Let’s go.” 

You can’t exactly say no to him, as he easily swoops you up off of your feet and carries you through the rickety gate to the bar parking lot. You absently note how easy it was for him to push the gate open, but do not let your thoughts linger on it once he unlocks a truck and sets you down in the passenger seat. 

He’s kind enough to adjust the jacket to cover your chest entirely before he buckles you up. His hips brush against your leg and you break out of the dazed reverie when you feel how hard his cock still is. 

 “Where are you taking me?” 

The man, your…savior (you feel hesitant to label him as your attacker, even after what just happened), slips off the hood before he looks up at you. His hair is disheveled and matted down with sweat and even in the faint street lighting you can see a few scars scattered around his clean shaven face. His eyes, icy cold blue, the only part of him you could see before, shine with something…soft? Unexpected, certainly. 

“Home.” He answers and drops the hood in your lap before shutting the door and walking around to the driver side. 

You hold the mask up in your hands as he starts the engine. The bleached tear stains and empty eye holes stare up at you suggesting danger and pain and death, and safety.

-

When he said home, he apparently meant his home. You felt silly for thinking he knew where you lived. The place he pulls up to is nice. Much nicer than you expected for a man so dangerous, more importantly you supposed, it’s spacious. There was some good distance between his house and the last house you saw and that has your pulse speeding up as he opens the door for you.

He doesn’t even wait for you to move, for you to second guess everything, before unbuckles you and carries you inside. You want to insist that you can walk on your own, but you are sticky with cum and dried blood and honestly, he’s so warm.

When he mumbles something about cleaning up you just nod and let him place you in a shower. You only react when he strips down and steps into the shower with you. 

It could have been a sensual shower, it was certainly big enough and as you catch a glimpse of how big his dick is when it is soft, your clit twitches at the memory of it hard and rutting against your ass. But he is quick to wash himself, and though he spends more time washing your body (or maybe he was just taking his time to feel you up), it couldn’t have been more than fifteen minutes. 

You want to tell him there isn’t really a point in applying that ointment he is gently spreading along the scar on your neck. It’s already healed to an ugly scar.  But he is so gentle as he bandages the fresh cut and rubs you dry with a soft towel as you sit on his very large bed. 

“What’s your name?” 

Would it have been better or worse to ask for his name before he fingered you in some dirty back alley?

“König.” He doesn’t give more than that.

“König.” You repeat and he looks up at you from where he is kneeling on the floor in front of you. “Thank you. For killing that man.” 

He hummed as he continued to pat your thighs dry with the oversized towel that was wrapped around you. “You didn’t tell the police about me.” 

It’s not a question. Somehow he knows that you didn’t tell the police, so you just shrug. “I told them I don’t remember what happened after I got stabbed.” 

His hands stop moving and rest on the outsides of your thighs, playing with the hem of the towel. “But you do remember?” 

You nod. “Everything.” 

There’s a beat of uncomfortable silence between you, his fingers start tapping against your thighs and he shifts his weight. The towel that he has wrapped around his waist threatens to fall loose and he uses the excuse to secure it as an opportunity to break his gaze with you.

“What you said back there, that I belong to you now. What does that mean?” 

This time he meets your eyes, “what it sounds like.” 

“...Does that mean you’ll protect me?” 

He doesn’t hesitate. “Yes.” And he drops a small kiss to your knee, letting his lips linger on your skin.

You reach out and gently cup his cheek to push him away from your legs. “Can you be gentle?” König moves his face just enough to kiss the inside of your wrist. “Yes.” 

Whether he takes your question as a suggestion, or he simply decided that it was time to move onto other activities, he leans down again and places another kiss to your knee, gently spreading your legs and moving his mouth to your inner thigh. As he moves his mouth to splay a kiss on your other thigh, one of his large hands comes up to remove the towel on you body, brushing against your covered breast for just a moment before he tugs on the towel. 

You don’t let the towel drop completely, holding it tight to your chest, and he pauses his sweet kisses.

“Look at me,” he demands, stretching up and leaning against the bed, one knee between yours as he grabs your chin and forces you to look at him. His grip is firm but not painful, not even close to how tightly he had grabbed you earlier in the night. 

Your eyes jump from one scar to another before settling on his steely eyes. “Good. Now,” he leans in closer, lips hovering over yours, “trust me.” 

His kiss starts off gentle before his tongue finds that spot on your bottom lip where it was once split, he nibbles and sighs as if he can still taste the blood that was once there. Your lips part when you feel his teeth and his tongue glides against yours. It’s slow and gentle and has you melting into his touch, dropping the towel that hides your scars from him. He wastes no time in tossing it off the bed, his lips never leaving yours even as he slides his hands over your waist to pull you closer to the edge of the bed.

You let out a little squeak at the sudden movement and he grins as he pulls away from the kiss, breathing against your lips. “Remember. Trust me.” 

You can only nod as he moves his mouth down your neck, placing soft quick kisses over the fresh bandages before he moves to the other side of your neck. His kisses on the juncture of your neck become sloppy, his tongue lapping at your skin like it is covered in something sweet. He bites down hard, teeth sinking into your soft flesh, turning your quiet little pants into a gasping moan. 

“You belong to me now.” He repeats his claim between gentle soothing kisses on the fresh bite mark he just made. 

You nod, accepting your fate, as you grip onto his shoulders. He hums and trails his mouth down your body, gently kissing the bruises that started to bloom on your breasts from how hard he groped you before. Your soft whimper, born of pleasure and pain, makes his cock twitch underneath his towel and he shucks that off too. 

He lays you down on your back and swirls his tongue around a nipple, enjoying the way you arch into his mouth. “Look at me.” He reminds you when he sees that you have closed your eyes.

When you look at him again he grins and playfully bites your nipple, laughing at the little squeak you let out before. Your giggles turn into a soft sigh as he moves to your other breast. His touch has you sinking into a cloud of lust. You want to throw your head back, close your eyes, and surrender to him, but you remember his order and keep your eyes on him.

You go tense when he trails his kisses down to your stomach. His eyes shoot up at you, making sure you are still watching him, as he traces the horrid scar with his lips and tongue. Eventually, with the help of his big warm hands running soothing touches up and down your body, you stop squirming uncomfortably. You’re still squirming, but for entirely different reasons. König notices and with a grin he pushes himself up, pulling you up with him and placing one of your hands on his stomach.

Admittedly, your touch and mind is drawn to the hard muscle, padded with a healthy layer of fat, flexes under your hand. You want to touch the rest of him, explore the rest of him. It is only after a second that you realize what you are touching. A scar. Raised skin in a jagged pattern, like someone attempted to twist the knife that stabbed him. You gently trace the scar as if you are afraid to agitate it. 

He senses your hesitation and laughs as he presses your palm against it even harder. “It doesn’t hurt anymore, Engel.” Then he reaches out to touch the scar on your stomach, smaller and cleaner, but fresher and still tender if pressed too hard. 

You look down at his hand on your scar and yours on his. They’re almost in the same place. He leans forward and presses a small kiss to your lips and rests his forehead against yours. “I should be dead. You should be dead.” This was simply proof that were meant for him, he was certain of that. 

Who needs matching tattoos when you have matching scars?

“König,” you breathe out, though you are not sure what you want to say to him. Instead, when his eyes meet yours, you kiss him. You wrap your arms around his broad shoulders and pull yourself as close to him as possible. 

He moans into the kiss and, tender moment over, pushes you fully against the bed again. He slides down your body again, stopping only momentarily to place a soft kiss on your stomach before he dives between your thighs. 

You don’t even have time to act shy before he’s spreading your legs and swiping his tongue through the folds of your pussy. He’s quick to circle his tongue around your clit, drawing out a soft moan between panting breaths, as your hips move up to meet his mouth. He groans, the subtle vibrations adding extra stimulation, and practically nuzzles your pussy, nose bumping against your clit as he sinks his tongue into your quivering hole. No matter what you do, hands pulling at his hair tightly or thighs clenching around his head, it only earns more moans from him. He laps at your pussy, your juices mixing with his spit and drags his tongue back up to your throbbing clit. 

He locks one hand onto your hip but the other travels up your body to your breasts. True to his word, he is gentle with them this time. No bruising grip sending you teetering on the edge of pleasure and pain. Instead he rolls your nipple, pinching just soft enough that it hardens under his touch. He moves his hand and repeats the action with your other breast, reveling in every little whine and gasp he pulls out of you. All the while he continues to eat your pussy like it’s his last meal.

He has you so needy and aching that it’s euphoric when he slips two fingers into you at once. Your pussy clenches around his fingers, reluctant to let him go but the slide of him pumping into you again makes you gush. One of your hands claws at his hair, gripping his locks to keep you grounded, but the other holds onto his hand that had been playing with your tits. Unable to properly play with your tits now, he laces his fingers with yours, holding your hand as he pulls and orgasm out of you,

Unlike the first time he made you cum, you don’t try to hold back your moans, you don’t hide your face from him, though at some point as he ate you out, you had thrown your head back and closed your eyes from how good it felt. He’d just have to forgive you for that.

König rests his check against one of your thighs as he watches you come down from your orgasm. 

It’s not until he gently squeezes his hand that is still holding yours that you look down at him. Somehow the sight of him between your thighs, face glistening with your cum, makes you blush even harder than you already were. 

“Ready for more, Engel?” 

You blink at him. “More?”

He chuckles and pushes himself up, first dropping a heated kiss onto your lips, his tongue sliding into your mouth and letting you taste yourself. As much as he could spend all night kissing you, right now he had another pressing need to take care of. He sat up on his knees, pushing your thighs further apart to accommodate him, and stroked his painfully hard cock.

Oh!

Your eyes are drawn to him and widen. You knew he was big. You’d seen him soft and felt it against your ass, but seeing it standing at full erection was another thing entirely. It’s easily the biggest cock you’ve ever seen, not even your favorite porn stars can hope to compete. 

You sit up and reach out to touch him, replacing his hand with your own and you swallow thickly. You wrap your fingers around the shaft, your pussy clenching when you see that your fingers don’t even meet. Still, you give gentle strokes, eyes glazing over at how much of his veiny cock you can still see around your fist. He’s already leaking copious amounts of precum, that you collect on your fingers to slick up your next stroke. You lean down and circle your tongue around the head, a shiver running down your spine when he moans wantonly as you wrap your lips around the head. 

You moan as you stretch your mouth around his cock and imagine what it would feel like stretching your pussy out. You let out a little gasp for air when you come back up, going from sucking to licking his cock, just so you can reach the base of it. König moans again and buries a hand in your hair. For a moment you think he’s going to force your mouth onto him again, but instead he pulls you up for another passionate kiss. 

“Another time. I need to fuck you.” He pants against your mouth when he pulls away.

You whimper and nod and throw yourself back onto the pillows, eager to accept the challenge of his massive cock. You drop one hand to your clit, rocking your fingers against the sensitive button. 

König produces a bottle of lube from the nightside and slicks himself up. In the future, he can take the time to make you cum enough times to take his dick naturally. But he is eager to feel you now. Besides, you look just as eager as he feels, as you watch him stroke himself. 

He nudges your hand away from your clit and replaces it with his own, rubbing lube along your pussy and drawing excited pants from you. He dips a finger in you, feeling your pussy clench around his finger and grins. “Engel?” 

You nod, “please, König!”

He slid the head of his cock through your folds, your pussy throbbing as the slick head rubbed against your clit. You whined at not being filled but the way his heavy cock bounced on your clit already had you desperately begging. 

He managed a strained chuckle, holding himself back from immediately fucking you was one of the hardest things he’s ever done, and pushed the tip of his dick against your entrance. He used his right hand to hold your hips, and used his left hand to rub languid circles around your clit. 

You choked back a garbled moan as you felt him begin to stretch you out.  Your chest heaved as you rocked your hips up, encouraging him to keep going. You were whimpering, writhing against the bed grasping at his shoulders as he sunk deeper into you. He was so fucking big and barely got the tip of his dick inside of you before you pussy began to frantically pulsate around him. He groaned and forced himself to stay still, for both of your sakes. You looked up at him, eyes brimming with tears and drool pooling at the corners of your mouth, and he almost lost it. He promised he’d be gentle though, at least this time.

He grabbed the bottle of lube again and squeezed some more out on his dick before thrusting forward again. Your pussy clenched around him, squeezing him desperately, as he slowly filled you. Though the size of his cock stretched you beyond anything you’d ever felt before, though it teetered to just the wrong side of pain, you couldn’t get enough of it. Especially with the way his thumb kept playing with your clit. You cried his name and tried to grind your hips up. 

He slowly dragged his cock out, moaning at the sight of your pussy clinging to him, and started another agonizingly slow push. 

“König,” you started with a breathy whine, “faster. Please.” 

He dropped down to one elbow and nuzzled his nose against the side of your face, missing your lips as he tried to kiss you and simply licking at your jaw. He muttered your name hotly in your ear, your pussy quivering at the sound of his strained voice. 

He snapped his hips forward, burying his cock deep in you and started frantic, rapid, strokes. You cried out, wrapping your arms around his neck and your legs around his hips, he was so big and heavy and hard that your world was reduced to the pleasure he brought with every stroke of his amazing cock. 

He promised to be gentle, he knew he shouldn’t do it, but he couldn’t help but clamp his teeth down on your uninjured shoulder, muffling his own obscene moans as your pussy spasmed around him. His eyes rolled back in his head and his thrust became erratic, chasing an orgasm, as blood filled his mouth. Your blood was still so sweet, divine, enough to send him over the edge. His hips stilled as he cock twitched inside of you, spilling inside of you. 

You moaned, or screamed, when he bit you, leaving a second mark on you, and the string of his bite brought with it white hot pleasure. Hot cum filled you, your pussy convulsing rapidly, milking him and refusing to let go. 

He pulled out with a long groan, the two of you overstimulated and your pussy was still clenching around him, and collapsed to the side of you. He draped an arm around you and held you close to him, muttering something about angels in German that you didn’t have the faculties to translate at that moment. 

He was the first to recover, propping himself up on his elbows and leaning over to lick and kiss the fresh bite mark on your shoulder. “I’m sorry.”

You gave a breathless laugh and lazily pulled his face up to kiss you. “Don’t worry, I liked it.” As if the mind blowing orgasm that followed the bite wasn’t a big enough hint.

“Now, can you let go of me?” 

“No.” 

Your laugh was sharper this time, and it brought a grin to his face. “Let go, I have to pee!” 

He sighed dramatically and grabbed your hand, bringing to his lips to press a gentle kiss on your knuckles. “Come back to me?”

Even as you pulled your hand out of his, you could feel the smile that graced his lips upon hearing you giggle. But at least he finally let you go. 

Your post orgasmic high wore off while you were cleaning up and your mind, having been clouded by lust since he grabbed you at the bar, was able to think straight.

You walked back to the room, feeling shy at your lack of clothing, and saw that he had changed the top blanket on the bed. The other soaked in cum, apparently. 

He looked up and smiled, bright and energetic despite how tired he was. “Engel, you came back!” He joked as he rushed over and pulled you into a hug. 

You kept still, but with his arms wrapped around you, you could do little else. He picked you up, much as he had done back at the bar, and set you down in the bed before he curled up next to you and pulled the covers over both of you.

“König?” 

He hummed as he nuzzled his face in your neck, inhaling your intoxicating combined scents.

“...I never told you my name.” 

[Death’s Promise]

“...I never told you my name.” 

König doesn’t answer you, only tightens his hold around you. It’s only when you try to shift, to put just enough distance between you that you can turn around and face him, that he speaks. His voice deceptively calm, if the way his arms tighten around you again is anything to go by. “I already told you, you belong to me now.”

You frown. That was no answer to how he knew your name. Or, now that you thought about it, how he knew that you didn’t tell the police about him. 

“It. It wasn’t a coincidence that you were at that bar tonight, was it?” You try not to stutter.

He doesn’t answer, instead starts to press his lips into the hickey on your shoulder. A reminder of his claim. 

“How long have you been following me?” 

His lips continue to move from your shoulder to your neck, stopping to nibble at your pulse point. You can feel the grin on his lips when your pulse speeds up.

Whatever he is making you feel, you repeat the question. “How long have you been following me?” 

“Go to sleep, Engel.” 

“At least tell me why.” 

“To make sure no one else touches you.” 

Well, it’s not like you wanted anyone to touch you anyway. And his touch isn’t unpleasant. Quite the opposite, really.

You should stop this. Get away from him. You knew he was dangerous, you saw it first hand, and who knows how long he’d been following you. Maybe since that very night you were attacked.

And yet, “...No one?” “No one.” 

That actually sounded kind of nice…

-

Work sucked. Mostly because of one person and the fact that you felt like you could do nothing about it. All you could do was race out at the end of the day and get home as quickly as possible. 

Home…It took all of a week for König to move you from your flat (he said it wasn’t safe at your old place and you weren’t going to question what he meant by that) into his house. Was it a rushed relationship? Sure. Was it a questionable, leaning towards dangerous, decision on your part? Absolutely. Did you regret it? Not at all. 

You let your frustrations out on a bunch of vegetables, your knife chopping through them and onto the cutting board with increasing force. You didn’t even realize how hard you were chopping until a large hand stopped your own before it hit the board again. You froze, König’s other arm wrapping around your waist as he leaned down to rest his chin on your head. 

“Careful, Engel. You don’t want to hurt yourself.” 

“Oh! König! I didn’t even hear you come in!” You crane your neck back so he could place a soft kiss to your lips. He does so with a pleased hum. 

His face is bare, a sight you quickly came to love. He leaves the simple mask he usually wears hanging in the entranceway. (His sniper hood he only dons when he’s deployed or when he’s “hunting”). 

“How could you with all that noise you were making? What did that poor carrot do to you?” 

You let out a sheepish chuckle, “sorry. Just thinking about work stuff.” 

You picked up one of the carrot rounds and held it up by your shoulder, where he leaned down and nibbled it out of your hand. 

“What about work?” 

You resumed your chopping, much less forceful. “Ugh. Nothing really. Just this guy keeps bothering me.” 

He tensed behind you, his grip on your waist getting tighter, not uncomfortably so, just more protective, as he growled out his question. “Has he touched you?” 

“No! Well, not like that…” The shoulder squeezes and lingering pats on the back were unwelcome, but, as your supervisor said, meant nothing more than that the guy was being friendly. “It’s really annoying to have to pick up his slack, especially after all of his little inappropriate comments.” 

König nodded as he listened to your rant, but all he heard was some man had dared to put his hands on you, even if you didn’t think it was sexual, and said something inappropriate to you. “Want me to kill him?” 

“Yes!” You giggle at the joke.

“Ok.” 

You freeze and turn around to face him. “Wait. I’m kidding.”

He smiles and presses a soft kiss to the top of your head. “Ok.” 

“No,” you press your lips in a straight line. “I’m serious. You can’t kill him.” 

The way he tilts his head is far too cute for someone as large as he is casually discussing murder. “Why not?”

It had been a while since he killed anyone. Why shouldn’t he kill someone you hated? Two birds, one stone.

“Because he works with me!”

“Not for long.” 

You laugh and gently push him out of the kitchen and into the living room. Once in the living room, you make him sit down on the couch, having to resort to pulling him down for a kiss to get him to settle. His hands naturally fall to your hips as you straddle him, clutching at the fabric of the simple cotton dress you had changed into after work. 

“Now, you listen to me,” you start with a firm poke to his chest, only to stop when you realize you were still holding the kitchen knife in your hand. Oops. Knowing him, though, he probably liked you threatening him with it. You twisted around in his lap just enough to drop the knife onto the coffee table in front of the couch and return your attention to him. “As much as I want you to kill the bastard, you can’t.” 

He furrows his brows, and is practically pouting as he asks his question again. “Why?”

“Because, everyone knows I have a problem with him.”

“And he still works there?” 

You had to bite back a laugh. He had a point. You were not the first to draw unwanted attention from the guy. Why complaints from more than one woman didn’t lead to any disciplinary action was questionable. Still, you ignore his question and continue.

“When the cops find him dead, or missing, I’ll be a suspect.” 

König chuckles as he moves his hands gently up and down your sides, moving your dress higher up your thighs with each pass of his hands. “You? Little one?” 

This time you do laugh a little. “Let me finish!”

Schooling his face, he nods. “Ok, tell me how you will be suspected of murder.”

“Not me!” You answer with a faux exasperated sigh. “They’ll look at me and realize I have a hard time even hurting a fly. But one look at you,” you start to drag your hands on either of his forearms, fingers dancing along his veiny muscles. “My giant, strong, military trained boyfriend and they’ll get suspicious.”

His smile has dropped, either from your prediction, or the way your hands continue to tantalize him and move up his arms to rest on his shoulders.

“Even if they don’t find proof, they’ll at least surveille you for a bit. Do you really want the police looking into you?” 

For a moment he is quiet, no joking, even his grip on your hips is still. He can’t pretend that what you said is entirely unsound. No matter how careful he was to leave no trace behind, the personal connection to you would always be suspect. 

“So,” you lean in close to him, your lips hovering close to his. “You’re not going to kill him, right?” 

He averts his eyes and doesn’t answer. He doesn’t want to lie to you, and your reason, while sound, isn’t enough to deter him. 

“König,” your voice is stern and you grab his chin and force him to look at you. 

“This man has touched you.” 

You want to roll your eyes. You want to pretend like he’s playfully overreacting. Certainly a couple of lingering pats does not warrant murder, but if there’s anything you’ve learned about König, at least when it comes to you, is that he’s intense. He is one hundred percent planning on killing your coworker just because he touched your shoulder. 

Your hands slide down his shoulders to rest on his chest, just above his heart where you clench at his shirt. “Promise me you won’t kill him.” When he still doesn’t answer you frown and press your forehead onto his. “I need you, König. I need you to stay with me.” Your voice wavers a little as you lock your eyes with his. “I need you to protect me.” 

“Fine, my love.” He finally sighs and captures your lips in a gentle kiss; he can’t stand to see you looking so sad because of something he might do. “I will not kill him.” 

“Good.” You nod and smile at him, and your smile is so brilliant that it is enough to sate his bloodlust. 

You lean forward again to kiss him, with all intentions to pull away and go back to making dinner. But his grip on your hips tightens and he holds you close and deepens the kiss. 

He smiles against your lips as you giggle when he doesn’t let you pull away. 

“I am curious.” You start, voice dropping like it wasn’t just the two of you in the house.

He hums against your lips then starts to drag his kisses down your jaw to your neck, grinning as your next words come out a little breathless. 

“If you were going to kill him, how would you do it?”

He actually stops and looks up at you, wondering if this was some kind of test.

You smile and give him a small peck on the lips. “Just hypothetically speaking, of course.” 

König licks his lips nervously, only relaxing when you take his right hand in both of yours and start to idly play with his fingers. 

“He touched you,” he starts and pauses again. You nod and give a little hum to encourage him to keep going. 

“I’d start with his hands.” 

You shift your eyes up to meet his before looking back down at his hand. You nod and turn his hand over, palm down in one of your hands as your free hand gently traces the veins on his hand. His fingers twitch underneath your touch and you sweetly smile at him, “keep going.” 

“I’d crush one of his hands beneath my boot.” 

You place his hand on the top of your thigh as you nod once again. You let out a quiet excited breath as he squeezes your thigh, his large hands hot against your skin. 

“Just one hand?” You ask coquettishly as you drag his hand down to the inside of your thigh.

He hums again, eyes locked between your thighs, at his hand slipping underneath your skirt. 

“I’d take my time with his other hand.” His knuckles brush your clothed mound, putting the lightest pressure on your clit. “Break his fingers one at a time.” 

You bite your lip and lock your eyes with his as you roll your hips forward, turning his touch on your clit from feather light to firm. 

His eyes darken, blood thrumming with excitement, and he can hardly tell what has him excited more, watching you squirm against his hand or sharing the kind of thoughts he long ago learned to keep to himself. The fact that he was sharing these thoughts with you, feeling your arousal dampen your panties, makes his heart beat wildly. 

He shifts his hand, turning it so that his thumb can start to rub small circles around your clit while his fingers dip into the edge of your panties. The back of his fingers slide against pussy, collecting your slick and dragging it up to your clit. You jolt and let out a small gasp at his touch, grasping at his shoulders to keep you upright so you can keep your eyes on him. 

He continued to tease your pussy, reveling in every little reaction from you, until you were a wet whimpering mess on his lap. “Then I’d smash his face in, for thinking he was worthy of even looking at you,” you moaned as he slipped a finger into you, “of breathing the same air as you.” He slowly started to slide his finger out, a smirk on his face as you rocked your hips forward.

“Maybe knock his teeth out for daring to talk to you.” He slid in a second finger, breathing a little faster as you moaned and fell forward further into him. You kissed him, tongue lapping at his lips before finding his own, as he pumped his fingers faster.

His free hand moved roughly from your hip to your breast, squeezing hard enough to draw desperate whimpers from you. He groaned and shifted to sit more comfortably, mouth dropping from your lips to your jaw, and pulled the top of your dress down. His lips capture your breast, tongue circling around the nipple, while his hand continues to knead and squeeze your other breast.  

Your head falls back and you gasp when he inserts a third finger, using his palm to rub your clit. He takes the opportunity to leave a surprisingly gentle kiss on the edge of the scar that peaks above your neckline. You shiver, despite how hot your body feels, as he pulls you closer to the edge. Your hips rock against his hand, your breath coming out in a combination of desperate pants and whines, every stroke of his fingers winding you up.

“But I will kill him with my hands around his neck, so I can watch him regret ever looking at you, as the life fades from his eyes.” 

Your whole body shakes as you cry out and fall forward, holding onto him with all your strength, as your pussy convulses wildly around his fingers, coating his hand in cum. 

König stilled as he watched you come down from your orgasm, panting and making cute little whimpers as he withdrew his hand. You were...glowing. It could have been the single ray of light coming in from a crack in the curtains illuminating your half naked body. Or the light sheen of sweat coating your skin that he was tempted to lick off you. But, he knew it was something else.

You had just come on his fingers as he described how he wanted to kill someone. You were truly an angel. A fucked up little angel sent to him by the god of death. If the military wasn't going to reward his skills, at least the universe had.

You shivered again and giggled into his shoulder before looking up at him with a smile. You hummed, squeezing your thighs together momentarily before sitting up and fixing your dress. You grabbed the discarded kitchen knife from the coffee table and planted a sweet and chaste kiss on his lips, as if he hadn't just finger fucked you to orgasm. "I need to finish making dinner."

He knew the moment he laid eyes on you, covered in blood and all, that he wanted you. He had no idea that he didn’t just want you, he needed you. 

He needed you. And he was just sitting there with a painfully hard boner while you walked back to the kitchen, legs shaky and making you lean on the walls and counter. He let you have a moment to calm down before bending you over the counter, ripping your soaked panties off of you and wildly fucking you. 

-

Not deployed and not “busy”, König's world revolved around you (and if his last deployment was anything to go by, you were his center regardless). He insisted on driving you to and from work. It was all great until you mentioned you would be working late one night. 

He went stiff and barely managed to get through his question without shaking in anger. “Will Christopher be working late with you?” 

You sighed, already dreading the late night dealing with your annoying coworker. “Yea, he's on my team.” Then you grinned, “maybe he'll see you when you drop me off and think twice before approaching me!”

König chuckled and leaned down to kiss you before slipping his face mask on. Honestly, he hoped that wasn't the case. He wanted an excuse to kill the man. 

That morning, of course, Christopher was late and didn't witness your incredibly large boyfriend help you down from his truck (not that you needed it, but he was ever the gentleman) as he dropped you off. 

You did your best to avoid Chris, but as the night dragged on, he became more persistent. 

“Someone’s a pretty little liar.” 

You sighed. You were already packing up, getting ready to leave, and he had to come and bother you one more time. “What?”

“I talked to Deb, and she said you don’t have a boyfriend.” 

Deb, the office gossip. 

“She doesn’t know everything about me.” 

Your phone buzzed just as you picked it up, a part of you was worried it was your supervisor, but one glance at the screen and you smiled. “And that’s him. He’s here to pick me up.” 

“I was just heading out, I’ll walk with you.” He clapped a hand on your shoulder and squeezed as he smirked at you. 

You stepped out of his hold and hurried to the door, confused when you didn’t see König’s truck waiting out front. Oh no. 

Your phone buzzed again, König telling you that he was in the far parking lot. 

“Well, where is he?” 

“Parked back there.” You gestured with your hand, from that distance even the truck looked small.

“What he can’t come get you? Maybe I should walk with you, talk to the guy.” 

You rolled your eyes and sidestepped his hand again. Whatever happened next was Chris’ own damn fault for being so fucking predictable.

Disabling the security cameras in the parking lot was easy. König sat in his truck, the temporarily distressed engine running idle, knee bouncing and fingers tapping the steering wheel excitedly. 

You hadn’t told him much about this Christopher, but from what you did, it was pretty much a given that he’d follow you through the parking lot. And lo and behold, König saw you and a man walking towards the truck. Every so often you’d take a side step and whenever König saw the man make the same step, closing the distance between the two of you again, his pulse just beat faster. 

Finally when you’re close enough, he jumped out of the truck and rushed to the passenger side. The sight of him even had you tense for a moment. Sure he was big, and the black tee shirt he wore did nothing to hide how muscular he was. But it was the sniper hood covering his face that made you pause. 

“What the fuck?” The man next to you muttered under his breath as you walked up to König.

König was fast to reach out and pull you to his side. 

At least he leans down to let you peck his cheek, though you got his chin instead, as a greeting. 

“Get in the truck. And don’t look.” 

You frown and pinch the edge of his mask. You’d only ever seen him wear it once. “I told you-”

“I know.” 

To Christopher’s credit, he was smart enough to try to get away as quickly and quietly as possible. König wasn’t having it though, and all it took was one giant step from him and he clapped his hand on Chris’ shoulder.

“Not so fast, hm?”

A shiver ran up your spine as you stood next to the truck. That cadence in König’s voice…

Chris tried to wiggle out of König’s hold, but his struggle only made König grip down harder. 

“You touched her-”

“N-no! I didn’t! She lied!” 

König’s eyes narrowed and Chris tried to stutter out another denial but was thrown into the asphalt face first, with a pathetic cry.

As Chris was trying to push himself up, König grabbed him by the back of his shirt and turned him around, pinning him on the ground.

Chris, a man who was in considerably good shape, still thought he had a chance to get away. He struggled, attempting to punch König in the ribs to get him to let go, but König chuckled. He then punched Chris directly in the face, a delightful burst of happy adrenaline running through his veins as he felt and heard the other man’s nose break underneath his hand.

Chris screamed, blood filling his mouth,  and rolled away from König, well, as much as he was allowed to. König stood back up, though remained hovering over Chris, who was doubled over in pain. After a few minutes, in which he shakily turned around and looked up, he managed to gasp out another plea. “Ok! Ok! I’ll leave her alone!”

“Good!” König beamed, his head tilted just slightly as he looked down at the other man. “But that is not enough.”

“W-what!” 

König grabbed a fistful of Chris’ hair and easily hauled him up and dragged him to the front of the still running truck. 

“I promised her no one would ever touch her again. What kind of man would I be if I let you get away with touching her?” Through Chris’ screams, he shoved Chris’ face onto the hood of his truck, the engine still running hot and burning the man’s face. 

As satisfying as it was to watch Chris get his ass handed to him so easily, things had already escalated too far. “König! That’s enough!” You shouted over the engine, over Chris’ fading cries and over König’s jovial laughter.

König froze and looked up at you, standing some feet away from the two men, and let Chris slump to the ground. “I told you to get in the truck.”

You resisted the urge to roll your eyes as you walked over to him, being careful to step around your barely conscious coworker. You looked up at him, his eyes were still wild, and his chest was starting to heave with how excited he’d become. If he had excess energy, you knew just what he could do with it instead.

You slid a hand up his chest to grip his collar, the fabric of his mask pooling around your wrist. He let you pull him down to your level and with your free hand, you lifted the mask just enough to kiss him. 

He moaned into the kiss, turning it heated rather quickly, his big hands on your ass and hoisted you up, your legs wrapping around his waist. 

It was only a pained weak cough from Christopher that stopped you. You pulled away from the kiss, his hood falling back over his face, and grinned at him. 

“I think you should get in the truck now.” You say with a seductive smile and a gleam in your eyes that he couldn’t quite place.

He nodded and instead of setting you on the ground, walked around to the passenger side of the truck, kicking Chris one last time for good measure, before gently setting you inside the truck and rushing over to the other side.

You’re careful not to hit the gear shift when he slides into the driver side and you slide up to him, lifting his mask to the bridge of his nose so you can kiss him again. His hands grab at you, pulling you as close as he could in the cramped space. One of your hands clutches at his shirt, landing on his firm chest and the other rests on his thigh. 

He breaks the kiss just for a moment, his breath starting to come out in a pant, and reaches up to grasp at the edge of his mask, but your hand quickly grabs his wrist and stops him, “leave it on.”

“O-oh?” He stutters as you palm his growing erection through his pants. 

“I like it,” you say as you lean forward and drop a kiss to his shoulder, then another below that, following the hem of the mask until you reach just below his collarbone. Your hand that sits on his chest has moved to his pectoral, where you give his nipple a little pinch, sending a shiver down his spine right to his dick. 

“Hah,” he breathes out half a laugh as you start to unbuckle his belt, “you like it?” 

“Mm-hmm.” Your hand drops from his chest so you can unbutton his pants.

He swallows hard when you take his heavy cock out and with a firm grip you wrap a soft hand around it, as much as you could, anyway. “It’s. It’s supposed to be scary.” 

“Oh, it is.” You look up at him, hand lazily stroking upwards, “that’s what I like about it.” 

He lets out a quiet groan when your thumb swipes across the underside of the head of his fat cock. Whatever other protest about his sniper hood he had is forgotten when you slide down the bench so you can put your mouth on him.  

He’s hard in your hands before you even lean down and his thick veiny cock throbs as you slowly part your lips. His left hand has an intense grip on the door, but his right hand flies into your hair, though he shakes a little as he tries to keep it gentle, so he can have a clear view of you. 

You start with small, feather light, licks to his swollen cockhead, one, two, and he’s already let out a soft whine and starts to nudge his hips forward, his cock following your tongue as it retreats back in your mouth. You smile and hum, giving in and swirling your tongue around the tip before pinching your lips just over the head of his cock, adding light suction as you do so.

“Please,” he whines, fingers starting to tighten around your hair. “Please, don’t tease me.” The way he has slipped back into his native language, his voice pitched higher as he thrusts his hips upwards when you sink your mouth further down his cock, makes your clit twitch and you have to squeeze your thighs together to help alleviate your neediness.

You moan around his cock, tongue continuing to circle the head of his dick, flickering at sensitive spots, as you take him into your mouth as far as you can. You don’t deep throat him, not yet, so your hand makes up for it by adding firm strokes in conjunction with the bob of your mouth. The cabin is filled not only with moans but the sound of wet suction, especially when you pop his cock fully out of your mouth and give greedy sloppy licks down his entire shaft. 

König loses a bit of control and when your mouth envelops him again, sinking down as far as previously, his hand pushes the back of your head down even more. You had been expecting it, the tightness in his thighs, the way he whined even more and babbled incoherently, and even though you braced yourself, you ended up choking and sputtering around his cock. It only adds more spit, more slip to the already sloppy blow job.

You sit up a bit and take a breath, hand still stroking up and down, before you dive back down. This time you look up at him as you sink your mouth on his cock, your eyes locking with his, even with his eyes so dilated they’re so blue in contrast to the black material of his mask that nearly blends into the darkness of the night. His eyes are wide, watering even, and when he sees you look up at him, mouth stretched around his big cock, his own eyes roll back as his hips start to buck harder, faster. He cries out his impending orgasm, first in German though, for your sake, he remembers to repeat it in English as well. 

Not that it matters, you offer him an encouraging, “mm-hmm” around his cock, letting him know that you wanted him to cum in your mouth and it drives him over the edge with a loud obscene moan, shooting rope and rope and rope of cum into your mouth.

You swallow what you can, the rest sliding down the side of your face as you sit up for air. His eyes are still closed as he pants for breath himself. Since he doesn’t seem to be paying any attention, you get a mischievous idea and lean in close to him, and use the edge of his mask to wipe your face clean.

He chuckles but doesn’t stop you, only taking your hand in his when he feels that you are done. 

Most of him is limp against his seat, except for the grip he has on your hand, his knuckles resting on your thigh. 

“Hey,” you reach over and gently tug at his hood, to which he leans down just enough for it to slip off. “You ok?” 

He gives you a lazy grin, face flush and hair starting to mat down. He doesn’t quite answer you though, instead pulls your hand up to his lips and places a gentle kiss across your knuckles.  

You smile and, blushing strongly at the innocent gesture despite the fact that you’d just swallowed a load of his cum, take your hand back so you could buckle up. “Let’s go home.” 

The ride home is somewhat odd. He hasn’t said a word since you had his cock in your mouth and that silence is a little worrying. It’s not until you’re back home that you finally break the silence.

“König? What’s wrong?” You stop him before he can retreat into the bedroom.

“Nothing, Engel.” 

“Then why are you so quiet?”

It’s almost comical to watch a man so big try to shrink away from your gaze. He’s squeezing one fist over and over, trying very hard not to twitch under your gaze.

You gasp, hands flying to cover your mouth, as you put two and two together. “Wait! Did you not like- Did I…Did I give you a bad blow job?”

König’s head snaps up. “What! No!”

“Why didn’t you say anything?!” 

“My love-” “Do you hate all my blow jobs?!”

He shakes his head vehemently and shouts your name, but you still talk over him. 

“Is it because I choke? I can’t help it! Your cock is just so big!” 

“No! My Engel,” he finally stops you with his hands on your shoulders, “I love watching you choke on my cock!”

You take a breath, forcing yourself to calm down and pout up at him. “Then what is it?”

He sighed and rubbed your shoulders for a moment before taking your hands in his. “I was just thinking about the first time we met.”

There had been a look in your eyes that night that he wrote off as you being so close to dying. But he saw it again tonight…

“Oh.” Your pout morphs into something much more stoic. “When that man…” You trail off, you both know what happened that night.

“Yea.” 

“What about it?” 

He glances away from you and chews on his lip before changing the subject. “Tell me, my love. Did you enjoy watching me kill that man?” 

“Yea.” You tilt your head, “why wouldn’t I? He got what he deserved.” 

He nodded. “Did you enjoy watching me almost kill your coworker?” 

This time it’s you that blushes and looks away. “Yea. I. I suppose being annoying doesn’t quite deserve that much violence, but…” what can you say? It was hot watching him so easily break the other man (oh and defending your honor too!). 

“And,” he paused, licking his lips, “did it turn you on?” 

Your face burns even more, “well,” you chuckle sheepishly, “that is why I blew you.” 

He frowned and dropped your hands, though remained somewhat hunched so he could properly look you in the eyes. “I kill people.” 

You squint at him, “yea…?” This wasn’t news to you…Why was he saying this? 

“Not just the man who tried to rape you. Not just in my capacity as a soldier.” 

Maybe you could understand where he was coming from. He never explicitly told you of his activities. You simply knew based on your first meeting and the way he spoke so casually about killing. “...Yea, I know…”

“I need you to know that, Engel.” 

You nod, “ok. Got it.” 

“But I would never hurt you.”

“I know. I trust you.” Which was a peculiar thing to say considering how just very recently you didn’t even know his name. 

Upon hearing your answer, König glanced away from you, face dusted pink and chewing on his lip. He was right. You were an angel made just for him.

You frowned, “what’s wrong?”

He was quick to pounce on you, giant hands on either side of your face and threading into your hair as he pressed his lips against yours in a passionate kiss. He swallowed your surprised little yelp, his tongue sliding against your lower lip and teeth nibbling at a particularly sensitive spot on your lip before slipping into your mouth. 

He pulled you close, one hand solidly wrapped around your waist and the other pressed into your back, as you melted into his embrace. He only let go slightly when he moved his kiss to your jaw, down your neck, nipping at the scar below your neck. 

You sighed, resting your hands on his shoulders as he continued to sink lower, pressing gentle kisses over your clothes and dropped to his knees. 

He finally pressed a lingering kiss to the scar on your stomach, hands on your hips, and looked up at you, your name falling lovingly past his lips.

“You are perfect. Marry me.” 

You really didn’t think he was a marriage kind of man. You assumed that when he told you that you belonged to him, that he would protect you from then on, that it equated to marriage in his mind. But with the way he was looking up at you now, looking both very serious and very vulnerable, to him, this was more than that.

“Oh, König,” you reply softly, your hand drifting from his shoulder to cup his face. He leans into your touch and never breaks eye contact with you.

You bend down and place a soft kiss on his lips. “Yes.” 

He laughs happily when he pulls you into another strong kiss. He’s still laughing when he picks you up and carries you to the bedroom. 

[Death’s Haven]

Your husband was a killer. Not some vigilante with a twisted sense of justice. No, he simply needed to kill. For most of his life, this need was satiated through his career in the military. However, now that he was in the private sector, he had more time between jobs. Which led to the current reason you were home alone late at night.

He'd been between deployments for four months now. Yelling at recruits and paperwork was nearly driving him insane. When he started disappearing at night, when he spent his free time in secret, you knew what he was up to. You didn't ask him about it. You just made sure he had dinner and a clean home to come back to.

You were already asleep in bed when he came home tonight. When you felt him crawl into bed, hands sliding across your waist so he could hold you to his chest. He was very tactile like that, once he had you, he always had to be touching you in some way.

You let out a quiet sigh and shifted to get comfortable, vaguely aware that he was only wearing his boxers.

"I'm sorry, Engel. I did not mean to wake you."

"What time is it?"

"Three."

You grunted. Much too late (or perhaps, too early). Though you supposed coming home at three am was better than him coming home at five only to wake up at six to go to work.

You yawned and shifted, turning around so you could kiss his cheek. "Welcome home." You sighed, eyes already closing again as you cuddled up to him and started to fall back asleep.

König hummed, his hand gently moving up and down your hip, slipping underneath the tee shirt that you stole from him to use as a nightgown.

His soft touch chased away your sleep as his fingers dragged up and down your lower back. You wiggled your hips, attempting to get away from his touch by pressing your body further into him. "That tickles."

"Sorry," he muttered, lips brushing against your temple. "I missed you."

If your eyes weren't closed you'd roll them. Your big, strong, serial killer of a husband was sweet, cute even, acting like you hadn't seen each other for weeks.

But then you felt his hard on pressing against your thigh. Oh. He missed you like that. Yea. That made sense. Even though he slipped in late at night or early in the morning to see you before you left for work, you hadn't had sex since he started his recon a few days ago.

You nuzzle against his chest and smile, "did you?" You slide a hand down his stomach and fiddle with the waistband of his boxers. "I'd never be able to tell." 

He groaned and pushed you onto your back, knocking your legs apart enough for him to settle between. His kiss is rushed, tongue pushing past your lips eagerly, while he starts to grind his hips into yours. You let out an airy gasp when his kisses trail down your jaw to the scar on your neck. A scar you were once ashamed of, once associated with a moment of indignity. König insisted that your scars weren't ugly or shameful, they were proof that instead of taking you for himself, the god of death had given you to him as a gift. 

“What?” You rolled your eyes when he first told you such. “Is he a king and I'm one of his kids he can just give away?” 

He threaded his fingers into your hair and pulled, forcing you to expose your neck to him. “I am your only King. And you are my Angel.” 

Your leg hikes further up his waist, one of his hands splaying across the back of your thigh as he ruts into you again. Your hands tangle in his hair, pulling his face back towards you as you attempt to kiss him again, instead he opens his mouth to mumble words against your lips.

“There was a witness.”

And you froze. The only witness he’s ever left before was you. For a moment you’re worried. Was this another damsel in distress that he saved? Was there another broken girl in his truck right now, waiting patiently to become your sister-wife? 

You push a steady hand against his chest that he ignores and continues to suck hickey onto your neck. “What?” 

He hums against your skin, moving his kiss down, where he nips at one of your breasts through the fabric of your chosen nightgown. He mistakes the concern in your voice as concern for him. He returns to your mouth, an eager heavy kiss pressed to your lips until he pushes his tongue into your mouth that you respond to tentatively. 

“I killed him too.” 

His hips grinding into yours, with his hard cock teasing your pussy through layers of thin fabric, draws out a needy whine from you. "O-oh?"

He grunts, breathing quickening as he starts to push your shirt up. "That's why I'm so late, my love.” He was quite eager, it seemed, as one of his hands slipped underneath your back to lift you so he could quickly pull the shirt completely off of you. “There was a lot of blood.” He finished his explanation (not that you asked for one) as he nuzzled his face between your breasts. 

You wanted to giggle, both because his slight stubble on your bare chest tickled and how silly you felt that he basically just motorboated you, but with the way he was already licking and sucking at your tits, your giggle quickly morphed into a moan. And then you finally registered his words. 

A bloodsoaked König, with his sniper hood hiding his face, looked like a monster straight out of a horror movie. The thought of it turned you on so much. “Yea?” Your arms wound around his neck, pulling him closer to you as you lifted your hips to meet his, pressing against his hard dick. 

He chuckled as he sat up on his knees, still between your thighs, and tugged at your panties. You raise your hips enough for him to pull them down and toss to the side.

He leaned over you once again, propping himself up on his left arm, while his right hand found its way to your thigh again. You sighed as he all but had you pinned between his large frame and the bed. There was something frightening about his size, he was almost too big to be human, and yet he also possessed the uncanny ability to make you feel safe, no matter how vulnerable you were.

His fingers dipped between your thighs, his chuckles fading into a low groan when he finds how aroused you are. “You like that, Engel? Want to see me covered in blood, hm?” 

A gasped, “uh-huh!” is all you can offer when his fingers, coated in your slick, rock against your clit. 

König pulls his hand away all too soon, and the frustrated whine you puff out isn’t missed by him. You almost think he is going to tease you, that he is going to revel in the way you’re so desperate for him already, but there is a vulnerable sincerity in his eyes when you look up at him. 

“...Are you proud of me?”

Your lust is momentarily forgotten as you slide a hand to his face, gently cradling his face. His eyes closed as he leaned into your soft and touch. 

It was one thing to know that you accepted his proclivities, another entirely to know that you loved that part of him.

You gently run your thumb over his cheek bone so he could look at you again. You supposed you hadn't shown much enthusiasm for his activities since he nearly killed your coworker. You pull him down for a gentle kiss, whispering your answer against his lips. "Yes."

You even have a surprise for him, but the kiss that followed was much less delicate and much more needy on his part. It’s like he’s trying to mold himself to you, trying to fuse your soul to his. It’s as if he doesn’t want to let you go. And you give into him, forgetting about the little gift. You don’t want him to let go either. 

You’re so pliable under his touch, the way you so easily give your body over to him reminds him of the first night he met you. When you were too weak to stop him from ripping the shreds of your dress off of your body, too weak to stop him from moving your hands to stem the bleeding of a knife wound that should have killed you. The memory of your body, pinned underneath him now, covered in the sweetest blood has him biting down on your shoulder roughly. You gasp and whimper underneath him, only squirming not to get away from him, but to get closer to him. 

He drags his mouth down your body, trailing searing kisses along your skin. As always he pays special attention to the scar that dips below your collarbone, tracing the contours with his tongue as if he hasn't already committed every inch of it to memory. As always as well, he takes his time with your breasts, switching between rough nips into your flesh and gentle swirls of his tongue around the nipple. Every little hitch in your breath, every whine that pushes past your lips, alights his blood on fire.

His hips buck forward, seeking relief in the friction of his hard cock against the soft warm plush of your thighs. You whine, one hand resting on his shoulder and one tangled in his hair, as you feel the hot velvety skin of his cock rubbing the insides of your legs, pre cum smearing on your skin and you're not sure whether to pull him back up so he can stuff your pussy with that massive cock of his, or to push him down so he can lavish his attention elsewhere on your body.

König makes the decision for you as he continues to kiss and nip and lick his way down your body. He attempts to repeat the loving kiss with the scar on your stomach, attempts to trace it with his lips, but you become impatient and push his head, making him chuckle into your skin, which in turn has you also giggling.

He presses a lingering kiss to your pubic bone with a grin plastered on his lips, "so eager for me."

You huff, and make sure to exaggerate the little pout you throw at him. "Don't tease. It's been too long."

This draws another chuckle from him, though he spreads your thighs further apart so he can comfortably fit between them. "Less than a week, my angel."

You prop yourself up on one elbow and reach for his face, forcing him to look at you as you hit him with a trembling lip and the saddest eyes you could muster in the moment. "You promised to take care of me, König."

He stills at your words, muscles tense and eyes so wide that even in the dim light you could see the whites of his eyes. You were right, of course. How could he deny his sweet angel what you desperately wanted, needed? Especially when it was him that you needed. He gently places a hand over yours, never breaking eye contact with you, as he pulls your hand from his face and gently kisses the inside of your wrist, taking your little teasing to heart. “I will.” 

That is all the warning you get before he is diving between your thighs. His breath is hot on your skin as he kisses and licks his way towards your pussy. He doesn't ignore any part of you, his left hand both massaging your inner thigh, kneading at the sensitive flesh and keeping your legs parted wide enough for him.

By the time he draws his tongue through your folds, you're already a quivering mess. His long, deliberate, slow licks have you moaning and gripping his hair. His right arm anchors your hips to the bed, keeping you in place as his tongue circles your clit. You try to muffle the obscene moans that fall from your lips, but König knows you, knows what you like, and drags his tongue down your slit, curls his tongue inside of you to lap at you juices. His own moans fill the air with yours, the subtle vibrations only driving you crazier.

His name is a chant on your lips, your hands gripping his hair even more as you try to fuck his face. He groans and releases the iron grip he has on your hips, right hand snaking up to your chest where he roughly gropes at your tits.

He holds you down for your sake, so he can lick and suck and nip without losing his place between your legs. But as you near your edge, he lets go because there's nothing he loves more than when you shove your pussy into his face. His mouth parted, tongue dragging over every inch of you and pushing into your pussy. His nose bumps and rubs against your clit as he enthusiastically moves his head, his stubble scratching pleasantly against the inside of your thighs.

He could, and probably should, stretch you out a little with his fingers, prepare you for the girth that is his cock, but he’s selfish and wants you to come on his tongue. He switches his pace, frenzied flicks of his tongue on your clit, followed by long firm strokes through your folds until he pushes his tongue into your pussy. He moans again, savoring the ambrosia that he pulls from you with every swipe of his tongue. 

It’s when he starts to rock his hips into the bed, seeking to relieve his aching cock, that it feels like a final wave pushing you to your orgasm. Your thighs squeeze around his head as you pussy clenches wildly around his tongue, aching to be filled and stretched out even more. He continues to slurp at your pussy, his tongue covered in your cum as he gently offers small and gentle licks to your clit, following the movement of your hips without holding you down. 

König is liable to spend too much time between your legs. Liable to ease you down from your orgasm only to pull another one from you. And you’re liable to forget that you were supposed to give him his gift before fucking.

“S-stop! I! I!” You cry and whine and try to push his face away from your oversensitive clit. 

With a grunt, he finally relents and drops a few soft kisses to your thigh before propping himself up on his elbows and running the back of his arm across his face. “What is it, Engel?” 

After a moment to catch your breath, you finally look at him and smile softly at the way he's looking up at you so adoringly. "I have something for you."

A grin breaks out across his face as he kisses your thigh and moves as if he's about to start eating you out again.

"Not that!" You laugh and lightly push his face away from your still sensitive pussy. "Come here," you pat the bed next to you, inviting him to sit down for a moment.

"I got you something," you say as you give him a quick peck to the lips when he sits down beside you.

His hand slides to your waist and you know he's about to pull you on top of him, but you pull away quick enough to turn to the nightstand and flip on the lamp.

There’s some shuffling beside you as you open the drawer. The first thing your hand catches is a bottle of lube, that’s not what you were looking for, but you set it on the table anyways.

One of his hands lands on your thigh and squeezes as he leans with you, his mouth dropping small kisses to your shoulder. “Do we have to do this now?”

“Oh, I guess not.” You say as you put a rectangular box on top of the side table and turn to face him again.

He’s shucked his boxers off, instead of shoving his dick through the opening in front, and has his left hand holding the heft of his hard cock. Your eyes drop down to the wide pink mushroom head and immediately forget that you had been trying to gift him something. 

His right arm wraps around your waist as you kiss him and he pulls you atop one of his thighs. You whimper into his mouth as you grind down on his thigh, your already slick pussy making the glide easier and the friction electrifying. Even as you rock your hips back and forth, one of your hands wraps around his cock, next to his own hand. You both groan at the contact, Him at the way you swipe your thumb over the tip of his cock, collecting pre cum and spreading it over down as you give him sensual little pumps. You groan as you and your pussy clenches achingly at the reminder of how big his cock is, the way there’s enough length for the both of you to stroke down, and the way your fingers don’t even meet around his girthy width. 

As you rest your forehead against his, lip tucked between your teeth as you continue to ride him, you notice his eyes flicker to the side table for just a second.

“You want to see it?” You ask with a breathless laugh, still chasing the pleasure grinding down on his thigh offers. 

He grabs the hand you have wrapped around his cock and makes you squeeze him harder, speaking with a groan as he thrusts his hips up. “Just tell me what it is.” 

“And ruin the surprise?” 

He grunts and grabs your hips, halting your gyrating, while simultaneously smashing his mouth against yours. The kiss is rough, aggressive even, as his tongue tangled with yours, preventing you from further teasing him. Still you moan and giggle into the kiss and blindly reach behind you until you find the box.

“Just open it real quick.” 

He sighed and reluctantly let go of your hips as he took the box from you. “What is the occasion?” 

The real reason? You wanted him to remember you. You were afraid you were nothing but a novelty to him. He wanted you for now, but soon he’d get bored of you and send you away. If you were lucky, he’d kill you, but you were never that lucky in life. He’d provide a safe home for you, make you feel safe standing next to him at the grocery store, or as he picked you up from work. Then he’d leave you, leave you fearing every shadow and bump in the night. To live in the hell that was his absence. 

“A hunting knife?” He unsheathed it, admiring the sheen and sharpness of the hooked blade.

It was deadly sharp, meant for skinning game. It wasn’t anything fancy. Perfectly utilitarian. 

You hummed and stretched out again, this time to grab the bottle of lube you set aside earlier. “You’re the one that asked me if I am proud of you.” You pour some lube into one of your hands, “I was thinking about what you do, and thought you might like this.” You wrap your hand around his cock, spreading the lube along his thick shaft, “at the very least it can make a cute paperweight for your desk.” 

König groans and shuts his eyes, leaning forward to rest his head against your shoulder, as you pump his now very slick cock. His hot breath fans over your skin as he mutters your name and nips at your shoulder. But he pauses when you lean to the side and expose the top of your scar to his mouth.

Suddenly he pulls away from you and looks back at the gifted blade. “You wanted to see me covered in blood, Engel.” 

It’s not a question, though you give him a quiet little “mm-hm" before you’re sitting stock still with a blade pressed against your throat. His cock throbs in your hands as your eyes flick up to meet his. His eyes, blown wide with lust, flicker between your own gaze and the knife he holds to your throat. 

“I have never seen blood as beautiful as yours.” 

Your heart thumps in your chest, and pussy, at his words. Did he think of your blood often? Did he still think of that night? 

You squeeze your hand, giving a tantalizing grip to his cock, and tilt your head to the side, whispering a loving taunt. “It belongs to you.” 

You see droplets of blood splatter across his face before you feel the sting of your flesh sliced open. You gasp, eyes squeezing shut, as pain catches up to you. There’s a clatter of the knife being tossed onto the nightstand before you feel his large hands digging into your hips and moving you so that you are fully straddling him. 

The head of his cock slides through your folds before nudging your clit and sends a wave of pleasure through you that distracts from the pain. You whimper and shudder when you open your eyes to see the look on his face. You imagine that this is what he looked like the night he saved you, but now you see him unmasked, see how the sight of you bleeding before him is nearly driving him insane. 

König moaned when he felt the first drop of blood hit his face, his cock jumping out of your hand and pulsing wildly. Your pained little gasp that followed did not assuage his desire, if anything it fueled it even more. He quickly discarded the knife and pulled you over him, his lubed up cock running along your slick pussy drawing moans out from both of you. 

He looked up at you, lost in bliss as you rocked your hips into him, rubbing your clit onto his cock, and snaked a hand into your hair to pull you down. He breathed in the air around you, filled with the scent of your combined arousal and sweat and, as he pushed his face into your skin, the light coppery scent of your blood. 

You whined again when he disturbed the cut on your neck, the fresh wound following the exact path of the previous one, only to cry out when he drug his tongue through the blood. 

“You have the sweetest blood, my angel.” 

And with a quick, rough, grip to the back of your head, he pulled you into a searing kiss. His tongue immediately found yours as if he was intent to share the taste of you, of your blood and cum. 

His face is smeared in blood when you pull away from his hungry kiss and look at him again. You rest your forehead against his and pant for breath, eyes locking with his as he lifts your lips and properly lines his cock up. 

You whimper when you feel the head of his cock start to spread you, but even his lust filled haze he’s aware enough of himself to go slowly, letting you sink down onto his girthy length at your own pace. 

“König,” you cry when you take him fully, your entire body hot and desperate to be close to him. 

You wrap your arms around his shoulders, his face tucked into your neck as you start to move your hips up, sliding back down with a moan as he fills you. 

He’s not quiet when your pussy squeezes and pulses around his cock, it feels too good to hold in the moan that rips out of his throat when you start to bounce on his cock. Slick. Your blood and sweat against his skin, your wet pussy around his cock, it’s all heavenly slick and he wants more. He groans and roughly guides your hips down to meet his own thrusts. You cling to him and moan as he easily lifts you only to slam you back down.

“My angel,” he growls hotly into your ear, his eyes rolling back when your pussy flutters tightly around his cock. 

He’s quick to shift positions, cradling the back of your head as he throws you onto your back. You only get to mourn the loss of his cock inside you for a moment before he is throwing one of your legs over his shoulder and bullying his cock back into your pussy.

The new angle allows him impossibly deeper, your moans are so loud you’re nearly screaming at this point. He moans loudly along with you when he glances down between your bodies and sees as he feels how your pussy clings to his cock, doing its best to not let go of him every time he pulls out. 

Your pussy aches and gapes when he pulls all the way out, slipping and accidentally brushing the head of his cock over your clit. You cry out, from the sensation of his slicked cockhead on your clit and for him, even this second without him filling you up is too long without him. You hook the leg he doesn’t have over his shoulder over his waist as he thrusts his cock back into you. It feels like he hits every nerve in your pussy, his pelvis grinding against yours and rubbing your clit and you can’t even say his name as your entire body begins to shake. 

Your orgasm is overwhelming, you claw and grab at König, yet at the same time the consistent grinding of his pelvis on your clit and his huge cock pistoning in and out of you has part of you wanting to push him away. He doesn’t let you, instead he continues to fuck you through your orgasm, chasing his own release. 

König’s head drops to your shoulder, chin hitting the cut on your neck, and groans loudly as you come on his cock, your pussy clenching around him dizzyingly tight. He growls and groans when you begin to struggle against him, sending him over his own edge. He breathlessly stills as his cock throbs, filling you with his cum as your pussy continues to clench around his cock. 

Eventually his hips slow down to a slow, sensual, grind, meeting your hips in the lazy aftermath. He drops your leg from his shoulder and braces himself on his forearms while he continues to nuzzle his face into your neck, sloppy open mouth kisses licking up blood and sweat.

“König,” you sigh and nudge him. He may be holding most of his weight off of you, but he’s still crushing you into the mattress and at this point it’s so hot that it’s starting to become difficult to breathe.

He grunts, his cock giving a final pulse as he pulls out, and rolls to the side. His hand lands heavily on your thigh, “give me a moment, Engel, and I will clean you up.” 

You whine at the sudden empty feeling and, with considerable effort, turn on your side and cuddle up to him, moving his arm around you. He embraces you, eyes closed as he basks in his post orgasmic bliss. 

“You look like a vampire.” You say with a light chuckle and brush a thumb across his chin.

He grins and opens one eye to look at you, “if I could live off of your blood, Engel, I would.” 

Your laugh is cut short with a grimace as you feel his cum leak out of your pussy. “Ok, I need to get up.” 

He sits up with you and pulls you into his lap before standing. “Let me.”

“You don’t always need to carry me to the bathroom!” 

“Can you walk?” 

Actually, probably not. 

König leaves the shower first, letting you relax under the hot water a little longer while he changes the sheets on the bed. There was too much cum, sweat and blood to ignore for the night. 

He’s waiting patiently for you when you finally get out of the shower. He’s thoughtful enough to lay one of his shirts out on the clean sheets for you to wear when he’s finished bandaging you up. 

“It’s not even that bad,” you say as you let him apply an ointment and a gauze bandage on the cut that’s barely bleeding anymore. 

He doesn’t really respond, just grunts and makes sure to secure the bandage properly before he turns around to set everything down on the nightstand. 

“Ah! König!” You gasp and slap a hand over your mouth when you see long scratch marks on his back, small beads of blood surfacing on his skin.

“What!” He turns quickly, eyes wide, afraid that he hurt you.

“I’m so sorry!” You squeak out behind your hand.

“What?” 

You hang your head and hide your face in your hands. “Your back is bleeding!”

“What?” He cranes his neck to look at his own back. 

“How embarrassing,” you mumble to yourself as you take the towel that’s wrapped around you and dab the bit of blood off of him.

His chuckles turn into a laugh, a full loud sound deep from his belly, as you fuss over him. He barely lets you touch his back before he is reaching behind him and pulling you onto his lap.

He stops your protests with a kiss, a smile still pulling at his lips even as he runs his tongue over your lips. “I cut you with a hunting knife, Engel, and you’re worried about little scratches?”  

“Fine,” you hum and pull away from him enough to slip on the tee shirt he laid out for you. “But if it scars, it’ll be the least cool story you’ve got.”

He turns off the lamp as you climb under the blankets. “I disagree. It’ll be my favorite. Next time, I will make you scratch my back even more.” 

König grinned at your little laugh as you settled into his embrace for the night. No, you didn’t hurt him and no he didn’t mind a tiny bit of blood spilled. He’d drown in your blood if he could, how could he not offer you the same? 

[firethekitty]

Ranking Every Wolfwood!!

happy wolfwood wednesday! i've ranked every wolfwood and it very quickly got out of hand and turned into more of a character analysis/meta. it was really fun and helped me better understand why i love this guy so much!

yes, really!

i hope you guys enjoy and that my autistic rambling makes sense!

1. trimax wolfwood. yeah he’s perfect. nothing else to say. god bless

while i can’t fit everything i love about him into one post, just know that i’ve written almost 30,000 words in wolfwood (and vash) character studies. so when i say “i like trimax wolfwood” that really means “i am fucking obsessed with trimax wolfwood”.

he’s the perfect mix of silly and heartbreaking, funny and serious, annoying like an older brother, deeply kind, so so painfully human; and a PERFECT foil to vash. simply phenomenal writing.

my only complaint would be that his tits are not on display like they are in the 1998 anime. but i can appreciate the subtly, so this doesn’t detract from his otherwise flawless score.

2. 98 wolfwood. omg hiiiii hehe twirling my hair ohh he’s so handsome what an absolutely beautiful design for him. his nose, his spider-esque shape, his TITS…… they even kept his little whiskers!

on top of an amazing design, he’s a very good balance of silly, irritable, playfully annoying, and serious! he fits pre-trimax wolfwood to a T!

but, as trimax progressed…

he’s cool. too cool. he has too much pull. wolfwood should NOT have swag. genuinely it is imperative to his character that he is, and i say this as lovingly as possible, a fucking loser with no friends.

wolfwood is a deeply traumatized man. he isn’t nearly as charming as we, the audience, thinks he is. no one laughs at his jokes, his insults are crude and immature, he embarrasses himself in front of literal children…

god, he is so painfully awkward. and who wouldn’t be in his situation? to have your childhood stolen and forced to grow up as a weapon? not allowed to interact casually with anyone else during the most important developmental stage of your life?

he's just not suave like tri98 wolfwood is. so, while 98 wolfwood is an excellent character, he doesn’t entirely read “wolfwood” to me. similar to how 98 vash is good on his own, but he’s just not “vash”. this is, of course, the result of making an anime out of a manga that wasn’t even 30% finished at the time. while i don’t understand the reasoning behind this, i know that nightow desperately needed the funds the anime brought in, as well as the motivation to keep making trimax, so i have to simply make peace with the dated characterizations tri98 has.

but don’t get me started on the milly situation. really a godawful writing decision, idk who approved that mess.

3. tristamp wolfwood. he is so bullyable. he’s like a sopping wet cat. absolute fucking dweeb.

i debated this for a long time—whether i should rank tristamp wolfwood above tri98 wolfwood. and i asked myself, do i love tri98 wolfwood because he’s a good character and is similar to trimax wolfwood? does he even remind me of trimax wolfwood at all? well, not really, he’s very clearly based on pre-trimax, just like tri98 vash is.

ultimately i decided i do genuinely just prefer tri98 wolfwood, but i felt the need to defend tristamp wolfwood because i see a lot of fair criticisms but also really dumb discourse throughout the fandom about him. so here’s my attempt at trying to address these:

so, there are some things i really enjoy about him and some things i really dislike; and, unlike vash, most of these criticisms are not a result of time/pacing issues. they’re easily fixable.

like, for the love of god he NEEDS to get sillier. they got the loser part down, but he’s a bit too overtly sad in tristamp. i think he will be more like his trimax self in season 2, but wolfwood’s humor is in-part a coping mechanism and important to his character. he’s an older brother! he’s fucking annoying! he thinks he's funny when he isn't! we do get a little bit of this with him and meryl, when he's tormenting her at the campfire, and that’s what i want to see more of. even if he’s playing it up, he should be working on getting their guards down, convincing them he isn't going to betray them.

since tristamp takes place in a weird prequel sort of canon, i get that he would look/act younger than he is in trimax. i think he was modeled after the teenage wolfwood we see in the flashback scenes of him training for the eye of michael, where he’s noticeably less outgoing and more reserved.

however, this doesn’t change the fact that he WAS silly as a kid in trimax, before his “teenage angst phase” (hate to call it that when it’s more like a “realizing he’s going to die by the gun and not being able to do anything about it” phase). but he’s still a lot quieter and reserved in tristamp as a kid, so i think we really need to find a good balance here in the trigun adaptations.

another example of an easily fixable issue—i really hate how they did the “vash sees how kind wolfwood is” scene, in which wolfwood gives money/snacks to children. in tristamp, wolfwood already knows the kid is zazie, which tells us absolutely nothing about his character. this scene is almost entirely worthless, only good for reminding vash that he should eat, which gives tristamp its own not-as-good hospital yuri scene.

and, so, about the elephant in the room… i don’t think he was whitewashed. let me try to explain my thought process.

tristamp, as far as i can tell, doesn’t seem to be taking any inspiration from tri98, whose wolfwood is very explicitly a brown man. trimax wolfwood i feel is a bit more ambiguous in his skin tone, which alternates between dark screentones and completely uncolored pretty much at solid 50/50 odds. just fairly inconsistent overall, even on the official manga covers.

but this doesn’t mean wolfwood is white in tristamp, and it doesn’t mean he doesn’t have his aquiline nose. the notorious scenes of him in the suns, looking white as a fucking sheet, shows us how a 3D environment can diminish a character’s silhouette and distinctive features.

compare this to scenes of wolfwood in a dim environment, or to the 2D scenes of child wolfwood and livio that i can't include bc i'm only allowed 10 pics. he looks MUCH better, much darker than vash, and as they both should appear in such lighting. it just doesn't add up—he should be much darker in strong light if they followed the same color values:

SO, even though i feel like all of this is more of a technical issue rather than malicious whitewashing, that doesn’t mean i think it’s acceptable. it looks fucking awful, and the lighting system needs major improvement to work with darker skin tones.

and, like, at the end of the day, wolfwood isn’t canonically latino, and he doesn't really have a consistent skin tone either. it’s a great headcanon, one i partially share, but it’s not canon. the only ethnicity that could technically be considered somewhat canon is japanese, as wolfwood was based off a japanese singer named tortoise matsumoto. you can see this resemblance best in early trigun!

and i really need to defend his nose!!! a lot of people say he lost his nose but he didn’t!! i promise it’s there!!! another victim of his 3D model, you can only see his nose from the side or in the 2D frame after he gets his shit wrecked. see how clearly he has a very well-defined nose when he’s hand-drawn? this is what i mean when i say a 3D environment can drastically alter a character’s important features, as much as i otherwise adore the animation for this show.

also, if you think nightow would let studio orange get away with not including his nose, you got another thing coming.

in conclusion, while i think tristamp wolfwood is a great start, he’s just not quite there yet. but i have immense faith that the next time we see him, he’ll look and act a lot more like he does in trimax!

i know this is true, because there are already some shots in tristamp where i’m just like. oh yeah. there he is. that’s wolfwood. there's the guy i love so much

...

well, that was long! this was really fun to write and i

oh jesus christ what the hell is that thing

4. badlands rumble wolfwood. ah, now here’s a great example of overt whitewashing. no lighting excuses this time, just blatant colorism.

even if he wasn’t ghostly white, there's just something about his design that makes me viscerally uncomfortable and i can’t pinpoint what it is exactly. he’s just so… angular. he has no scruff, no kitty cat mouth, his eyes are very oddly shaped, almost no eyebrows... i just really hate looking at him!

his ONLY saving grace is how mentally ill he acts in this movie. and his tits. otherwise i don’t really have much to say about him!

ok, now we’re done! and here’s a handy wolfwood chart i made to summarize everything.

really hope this was fun to read and if people liked this i'd be glad to write a vash version or other characters!! happy woowoo wednesday :)

[suffersinfandom]

When it comes to fandom, a thing that is supposed to be fun and not that serious, I'm usually a filthy moderate. I want everyone to feel safe and heard. I'll jump through a hundred hoops to avoid conflict. I only block people who are hostile or triggering because I know being blocked is hurtful to some. I genuinely try get along with everyone, even the folks I disagree with.

In OFMD fandom, I never tag my posts with "Izzy Hands," not even when it's a strictly canonical observation or analysis. I use the "Izzy critical" tag whenever I mention the guy just in case my bias against him shows. I don't outright call him abusive when I'm writing meta because I don't want to stir up drama or tempt anyone to deny my lived experiences of abuse. On the rare occasion when I reply directly to someone I disagree with, I do everything in my power to be neutral, polite, and understanding (when people aren't being overtly racist).

And you know what? It kind of sucks! I'm not having fun!

Every day I get to see people complaining about harassment that (when they link to it or refer to it directly enough for me to figure out what they're talking about) is just... other people disagreeing with them or challenging them. I see all kinds of spite and pettiness aimed at the low-media-literacy idiots who love OFMD, season two, and Ed and Stede. People like me who love Ed are called abuse apologists who're incapable of recognizing that he did things wrong (in spite of the fact that everyone I follow does recognize that, yes, Ed did do things wrong -- we just don't think that he's a monster). I get to see people telling me why Izzy, a man who does and says things that my abusers have done and said to me, is the actual victim, or why he and Ed are soulmates who invented love, or why the show would be better if the season one antagonist who abused the indigenous lead had been centered like he deserves.

Look. I don't care if people like Izzy. That's none of my business and I'm happy to leave Izzy enjoyers alone as long as they aren't being racist (that does happen) or running my mutuals off of social media. I'm not going to hang out with or trust someone who thinks Izzy was in the right, but I'm also not going to bother them. I love not bothering people! I've been doing it since I first poked my head into the fandom in June of 2022!

But, like, If you want the fandom to get along, maybe being a spiteful bully isn't the best way to accomplish that, you know? Maybe you shouldn't call people abuse apologists or idiots who are just too stupid to understand why the show that you're in the fandom of is bad and terribly written and a piece of shit with only the most lukewarm, heterosexual (?) queer representation.

And if the person who came into my inbox and told me that I'm a Zionist bitch who should set myself on fire is reading this, log off. Book a therapist.

[atthebell-moved]

hi, i completely agree that the fandom has a problem with misogyny and often fails at self-introspection. my question is, do you have any resources/tips/thoughts on how to be better about it? even, how to recognize it in yourself the first place? "ok i'll stop being a misogynist now" is a lot easier said than done, especially for people who might not be that educated on the subject, and majority of the people in this fandom are quite young as well.

this is long as fuck and possibly somewhat incoherent bc it took so long to write but i did my best

my biggest tip for people who don't know much about misogyny is to look at your own behavior and learn how to clock what you're doing as sexist.

are you criticizing a female creator? think about why you're doing it, what the actual beef you have with them is. if it seems to be just a sense of discomfort or thinking they're annoying or overly loud or pushy, think about male ccs who act the same way and why you dont consider them annoying. are you annoyed with them for being on a male cc's stream? why? does it feel like theyre taking up too much attention? do you get annoyed with them for talking too much or flirting with guys? for gaming especially-- do you get annoyed with them for not knowing something or being "bad" at a game? think about why that is and why its just funny when a male cc is bad at games or doesnt know something.

a HUGE problem i see in this fandom is the Madonna-whore complex, repackaged as the little sister-racist dichotomy (kudos to @yourlittlemenace for that phrasing).

if a female cc is deemed to be "playing nice" (doesnt talk too much, is "nice", streams with male ccs but doesnt flirt with them, isn't "overtly sexual"), she's the little sister of the group. all the male ccs "protect" her, she literally folds their laundry, she doesnt call out how people treat her, and the fandom pretends that this is a normal and cool way to treat women who are public figures. this also goes for mom/big sister/etc. if you think you haven't done this, think about all the aus where you've forced puffy into some kind of maternal or sisterly role when it made no sense. then think about how pissed people got when she decided not to be the server therapist and was "mean" to Tommy (in lore, with permission. that she didnt even need to get. see that clip i rbed earlier from her podcast.)

if the fandom decides she doesnt play nice, if she flirts with male ccs too much or stands up for herself or points out how unfair it is that she's being treated this way, she gets demeaned, harassed, and shunned by the fandom. consider, again, puffy. consider how niki flirted with wilbur and talked about misogyny and got called a racist for *checks notes* "speaking to schlatt and fundy" and "not being a native english speaker". she got called a slut and a queerbaiter for kissing another woman despite being bisexual.

consider how hard people went down on hannah for having said the r slur several years back versus how hard they went on dream for the same thing. and how people dug it up as a direct response to her being on stream with dream. consider how every time hannah talks about how unfair it is that the mcc subreddit treats her like trash, she has to delete all her tweets bc they harass her to hell and back and act like she's an asshole for pointing out their hypocrisy.

the fandom doesnt do this across the board; i shouldnt have to say this, but its not an everyone versus no one issue. some people do this outright and loud, some dont seem to realize theyre doing it, and a few people dont do it at all (incredibly rare, i can count on one hand the number of people who genuinely seem to try to avoid these issues, which is why im complaining).

in terms of lore, have you ever once done analysis on a female character? why do you think you haven't? the bechdel-wallace test is an (imperfect) way of gauging how a piece of media ignores women and prioritizes men. think about the fact that there are FOUR female ccs on the DSMP and they are continually ignored in favor of male characters. consider that puffy and aimsey both talked about trying to do genuine lore and getting shafted, either because no one was online and wouldn't put in the effort to stream with them or because they received insane amounts of criticism for breaking anything on the server, despite the clear lack of "no griefing" rules and the precedent that you can blow other people's shit up (tommy leveling one of puffy's builds, amongst many other examples).

a quick thing about ships: have you ever wondered why m/m ships are so popular? the general consensus amongst people who care about feminism and are into fandom studies is that for a long period of time, m/m was hugely popular because women are so rarely written as full and complete characters in any media. so people took to engaging with m/m ships and writing about them because they were the most fulfilling relationships, and because misogyny led them to be predisposed to be uninterested in female characters.

say an m/m ship is incredibly popular, something like, i dunno, john watson and sherlock holmes from bbc sherlock. lets also say the canonical media presents one or both of the characters with a female love interest. how do you think a fandom that prioritizes m/m ships and is primed to be disinterested in women as characters (either because of our society's role in teaching people that women do not matter or because of fandom's history in assuming female characters are not fleshed out) is going to react? if you said theyre going to send undue amounts of criticism her way and act like its an act of homophobia to give a canonically straight character a female love interest, congrats, you've figured out a huge component in fandom misogyny. take this, amplify it over several decades, and add the psychic damage that supernatural gave society. queerbaiting is bad but mistreating female characters in service of nonexistent queer relationships is also bad.

this is relevant in general but i also believe its relevant for the dsmp because of the complete lack of m/f ships. aside from phil and kristin, who are literally married irl and kristin isn't even on the server, there are no m/f ships that involve female creators. this is not, despite what you may think, due to the inherently yaoi nature of minecraft roleplay. this is because the creators, including the male ones, are afraid of the blowback of m/f flirting and how fucking awful people are to female ccs anytime it happens. once again look at niki. as another example, consider how notfounders harassed the living daylights out of mxmtoon for flirting with gnf on twitter. if i was a cc i would avoid it like the plague too considering how happy people are to dig shit up about them or accuse them of being a slut or an attention whore/"pick me girl" for speaking to a man.

one last thing, this is more about fanart than anything else but stop drawing women to look like teenage boys. the amount of fanart i see where i literally cannot tell if someone has drawn niki or tommy is fucking insane. niki has curves. draw her with them. if you cannot draw women or people outside a very specific body type you cannot draw. fatphobia and misogyny have a clear overlap.

i cant think of anything else and ive already spent forever on this. look into feminist media analysis. think twice about how you react to female ccs & female characters. consider not just what characters have interesting stories but who is allowed to have interesting stories. you might be neglecting someone who has a lot going on because you're dismissing a female character as inherently less likely to be interesting. you might not even know someone has an interesting story because the fandom neglects it so completely.

as a final little note: like i said earlier, if you're not familiar with gender & sexuality studies, you may not know this, but homophobia and transphobia are rooted in misogyny. the idea that gender is immutable and rigid is because of the patriarchy. this is why gendered slurs are used against queer people and why queer men in particular get accused of and demeaned for being feminine. your understanding of queerphobia is incomplete without considering how sexism plays a role.

also go read everything rayne fisher-quann has ever written but especially this piece on getting woman'd and listen to you're wrong about

[femdemon]

While I'm posting about my experiences with transandrophobia, I feel like people are weird about headcanoning characters as transmasc specifically. Like, obviously, there's your regular old gender and sex based bigotry a lot of the time about headcanoning any character as being anything other than strictly cis, perisex, and gender conforming, but people who allege to be progressive and open-minded get really weird and hostile about transmasc folks specifically seeing ourselves in fictional characters.

Like, okay. I've seen people say, "If you're only headcanoning overtly feminine characters as transmasc and overtly masculine characters as transfem, and you yourself are cis or whatever, maybe you should ask yourself why and whether or not you might have some internalized binarism you need to work on." And this is true, and good to point out! But then I've seen other people take this very good and true message and do some medicalism, gender essentialist bullshit to it like, "Yeah! Stop headcanoning feminine characters as transmasc altogether! Especially if you're a gender non-conforming transmasc person who heavily relates to the character in question and see a lot of yourself in said character. Don't you wanna be taken seriously by Normal People? Don't you wanna be seen as a Real Man? You can't headcanon this character as transmasc, then. Obviously, they're a trans woman, actually, like it's practically canon. In fact, you're Committing An Erasure if you headcanon this character as any gender other than a trans woman, and this is a crime that can never be forgiven and must be punished with Shunning until you admit that you're wrong."

And, like, I'm not saying that this never happens with other headcanons, I've absolutely seen it happen with other queer identities, I just see it a lot with respect to my own gender and I feel like it's bizarrely frequent. Why exactly are people so threatened by even just the idea that a character could be interpreted as transmasc? Why do people get this heated about basically any fiction or insist that it has something to do with representation when it was never canon to begin with? Some random person online who definitely isn't the author isn't in control of the story or characters, and it does nothing to the canon for them to have an opinion or idea about it that you don't like. I know that not everybody has gotten the "fandom isn't activism" memo yet, but even still, it just strikes me as really strange to sort of gatekeep who's allowed to relate to certain characters, or even just imagine them in ways that are different from fanon.

It kind of feels a lot like that thing people do where they're like, "Oh, the aces and aros want some characters they can see themselves in, we'll just give them the aliens and robots (never humans) and such, that should be enough." And then when we're like, "Okay, yeah, I can definitely see a lot of myself in this beloved robot character," suddenly it's all, "Nooo, beloved robot character couldn't possibly be aspec! You buffoon!!! How dare you!!!" It's like, even when we do get "permission" to have headcanons and characters we see ourselves in, we still don't really have it. And then I wonder why I'm always so drawn to inconsequential background characters who contribute nothing to the plot - I've totally been conditioned into it because liking and relating to the main cast is forbidden, I guess.

I know this is a very niche, small problem in the grand scheme of things, but it bums me out. Especially since a lot of this is coming from people who consider themselves allies and stuff, and we already face so much backlash just for daring to suggest that we have unique struggles. Not even when we're having fun storytime with our fan fiction do we get a break.

[punkeropercyjackson]

To explain the problem with how the Atsv fandom deals with Hobie a lot and sometimes with Gwen too............Hobie and Gwen have certain expectations put on them as a slightly older black character and a female character who's the male mc's love interest.Hobie is expected to be overtly sexual and uncommited to his partners('I hate labels' was him being nonbinary,please be fucking serious)and have a huge mean edge to him or either a caretaker to the Spiderband with no personality and stories of his own and Gwen is expected to be a 'normal' straight girlfriend-Hence all the emphasis put on her being a girl and Miles a boy even when it dosen't fit-including the toxicity frequent in white ones with black boyfriends specifically(that's what 'snowbunny' means btw)and her experiences as a friendless abuse victim who's trans and was kicked out by her cop dad for doing activism isn't something that you can ignore,because GWEN can't ignore it either and neither can Hobie with his own lived antiblackness and adultification that are inherently intertwined with eachother

Gwen wasn't written to be a stereotypical hashtag quirky cis white girl with no real problems besides wanting the guy to like her back,Gwen was CANONICALLY written as a usual TRANS girl and those are absolutely different because i known both closely and she reminds me infinitely more of tgirls who're pastel softgirls for gender validation instead of white woman fragility and the only reason her and Margo weren't a trio with Hobie pre-Miles is the same reason Peter B didn't come with Gwen to visit Miles and it's that writers wanted to isolate them from eachother to emphasize Ghostflower as if they didn't pull it off just fine in the first movie and when the only weak points in the second one are FROM them doing that and if you think about it for 5 seconds you'd realize that Margo and her have every reason to love eachother so much and hang out.And Hobie has plenty of interesting traits and potential even without his comics lore and he never shows interest in sex-Rightfully so,because this is a fucking children's franchise!!!-and any 'vibes' adult Hobie bullshitters got was them being creeps who can't turn off horny mode and you can just say you don't ship Ghostpunk and Punkflower instead of making a fool of yourself by denying how much mutual romantic interest and chemistry Hobie has with Gwen and Miles

And y'all WILDIN' if you actually think Hobie's Team Dad status to the Spiderband is something that takes zero toll on him but i know for a fact it eventually does and he tries to hide it because he feels guilty but they find out and let him breakdown and take care of him too starting from then on because he's not their ACTUAL Dad,he's a 17 year old and he's their best friend and that's what best friends DO.Gwen ain't a pick me either,she's a trans legend who didn't magically turn cis when she started passing contrary to how y'all think transfemininity work and Hobie didn't 'adopt' her,him taking her in was intersectionality and solidarity between black people and trans women which has an extremely important history in punk culture and deadass one of the first thing's i learned when i started my research after i decided to go pastel punk.You all look dumb as hell with these janky ass takes,especially those random hate comments i'm always seeing on Hobie x Spiderband posts and the defenses towards the cisfeminization of Gwen and don't even get me started on the Switfie allegations as if Hobie isn't obviously a The Cure fan and Gwen a Tv Girl one,and if you want minority characters to be written offensively with no depth so bad,go back to watching Danny Phantom and Miraculous Ladybug and leave Hobs and Gwendy tf alone!!!!!

[no-where-new-hero]

Chapter 31: Emily's Great Moment

I cannot believe we made it to the end of the book club! Thanks a million to @batrachised for hosting, @the-piper-and-the-lion for the memes, @bewareofitalics and @moonlightredfern for reblogging and sharing all the posts, and everyone who participated for offering metas and reactions and enriching the fandom of this oft-overlooked book! I enjoyed it quite a bit :)

This chapter's thoughts, feat. some spoilers, below:

I ONLY noticed this time around that Dean's habit of accompanying Emily through near-death convalescence is established from here, yet its outcome is totally contrasted to its outcome in Emily's Quest. Here, he leaves her to Teddy. There...

LMM is also very fond of these kind of...loaded benedictions following Emily's interactions with her prominent male mentor figures, each of which underscore this inevitability that Emily will have to give something up to have the life she wants. It started with Douglas and his "she will love deeply, suffer terribly, and have glorious moments to compensate." The sacrificial element isn't here, but still that notion of balance, of something being taken away for her glorious moments. Then Dean's "one pays a penalty when one reaches out for something beyond the ordinary." This is the reverse, overtly sacrificial, applicable to a number of areas in her life: her ambition, her desires, her freedom. It also comes up in his mentioning of paying the piper the price for an exciting life. He may have his ulterior motives for the insistence with which he talks about it, but it becomes part of a theme. And finally Mr. Carpenter talking about the gods and their debts and that Emily will need to pay, which is basically what Dean was saying (but no one ever faults Mr. Carpenter for his dire outlook, it seems).

This all feels very much like LMM's own attitude to her writing seeping through; later on in the series, Emily talks about her muse as a jealous goddess in a way that sounds lifted from Maud's own journals, and the theme of Emily as an inveterate journal-keeper is also established here. But it also makes a strong stance on this idea of being a woman and being a writer: it demands sacrifice, almost deprivation. We've seen it already in Emily burning her account book. I wonder if this is partly why people are skeptical that Emily continues writing after she marries Teddy; Maud has so thoroughly insisted that Emily cannot have her cake and eat it too. I personally don't agree with this conclusion, in my opinion Teddy is the only way that Emily doesn't have to sacrifice, because he's partially her muse and inspiration himself; but the fact stands that Emily is portrayed so often as having writing and nothing else that it's hard to imagine her being able to avoid these debts that everyone has been piling on her throughout this novel.

Final note is that, in the physical copy of the book I own, the final line--in complete and utter bathos--has a misprint of "diary" as "dairy," which has always annoyed me to no end.