#uh first post here in a long time

[dykesevika]

my wife :3

[meamiki]

5% of a color headcanon.... two versions since b&w emphasizes the dagger more i think but i still like the warm tones ASFSADA

i am not biased towards rainbow daggers whatsoever i promise (lie)

((also friend is streaming now and im there too!! bit more info linked here, its rated mature tho))

[luck-of-the-drawings]

!!! FLASHING LIGHTS WARNING!!! [IM NOT FUCKIN AROUND!!]

REACHED THE CUSP OF 'THIS MAY NEVER BE ABSOLUTELY FINISHED N IF I DONT SHOW IT NOW, IT WILL NEVER SEE THE LIGHT OF DAY.' SO HERE, A PROJECT IVE BEEN ORBITING AROUND UHH SINCE 2021 OR SO.

[literaryvein-reblogs]

hello; i just wanted to say i respect you immensely for the resources you publish on a daily basis. i'm sure you have your own motivations for doing so, but if it ever becomes hard for you to manage, please take some time to care for yourself and your health. you are far more important than i feel you give yourself credit for.

You are so sweet, dear Anon. No worries, though! About +90% of my posts on this blog are now queued. It seems like I'm always on here, but I'm not. Usually you can tell I'm here when I answer replies on posts, or messages like this. But sometimes these are queued too. Or is it.

[sysig]

The most fun you can have, barring the pain and torture (Patreon)

[skrunksthatwunk]

arcade

[acourtofquestions]

Kingdom of Ash Chapter 55-56

Chapter; Highlights, Notes, Tags, etc.

The Thirteen were on edge. They hadn't yet decided where to go. And hadn't been invited to travel with the Crochans to any of their home-hearths. Even Glennis's.

None of them, however, had looked his way when they'd prowled past. None had recognized him.

Dorian had just completed another walking circuit in his little training area when Manon stalked by, silver hair flowing. He paused, no more than a wary Crochan sentinel, and watched her storm through snow and mud as if she were a blade through the world.

Manon had nearly passed his training area when she went rigid.

Slowly, she turned, nostrils flaring.

Those golden eyes swept over him, swift and cutting. Her brows twitched toward each other. Dorian only gave her a lazy grin in return.

Then she prowled toward him.

Another assessing stare. "I would have thought you'd pick a prettier form."

He frowned down at himself. "I think she's pretty enough."

Manon's mouth tightened. "I suppose this means you're about to go to Morath."

"Did I say anything of the sort?" He didn't bother sounding pleasant.

Manon took a step toward him, her teeth flashing. In this body, he stood shorter than her. He hated the thrill that shot through his blood as she leaned down to growl at him. "We have enough to deal with today, princeling."

"Do l look as if I'm standing in your way?" She opened her mouth, then shut it.

Dorian let out a low laugh and made to turn away. An iron-tipped hand gripped his arm.

Strange, for that hand to feel large on his body. Large, and not the slender, deadly thing he'd become accustomed to.

Her golden eyes blazed. "If you want a softhearted woman who will weep over hard choices and ultimately balk from them, then you're in the wrong bed."

"I'm not in anyone's bed right now." He hadn't gone to her tent any of these nights. Not since that conversation in Eyllwe.

She took the retort without so much as a flinch. "Your opinion doesn't matter to me."

"Then why are you standing here?"

Again, she opened and closed her mouth. Then snarled, "Change out of that form." Dorian smiled again. "Don't you have better things to do right now, Your Majesty?" He honestly thought she might unsheathe those iron teeth and rip out his throat.

Half of him wanted her to try. He even went so far as to run one of those phantom hands along her jaw.

"You think I don't know why you don't want me to go to Morath?"

"Tell me to stay," he said, and the words had no warmth, no kindness. "Tell me to stay with you, if that's what you want." His invisible fingers grew talons and scraped over her skin. Manon's throat bobbed. "But you won't say that, will you, Manon?" Her breathing turned jagged. He continued to stroke her neck, her jaw, her throat, caressing skin he'd tasted over and over. "Do you know why?"

"Because while you might be older, might be deadly in a thousand different ways, deep down, you're afraid. You don't know how to ask me to stay, because you're afraid of admitting to yourself that you want it. You're afraid. Of yourself more than anyone else in the world. You're afraid." For several heartbeats, she just stared at him.

Then she snarled, "You don't know what you're talking about," and stalked away.

His low laugh ripped after her. Her spine stiffened. But Manon did not turn back.

Afraid. Of admitting that she felt any sort of attachment.

It was preposterous.

And it was, perhaps, true.

But it was not her problem. Not right now.

Manon stormed through the readying camp where tents were being taken down and folded, hearths being packed. The Thirteen were with the wyverns, supplies stowed in saddlebags.

Some of the Crochans had frowned her way. Not with anger, but something like disappointment.

Discontent. As if they thought parting ways was a poor idea.

Manon refrained from saying she agreed.

Even if the Thirteen followed, the Crochans would find a way to lose them. Use their power to bind the wyverns long enough to disappear.

And she would not lower herself, lower the Thirteen, to become dogs chasing after their masters. They might be desperate for aid, might have promised it to their allies, but she would not debase herself any further.

Manon halted at Glennis's camp, the only hearth with a fire still burning. A fire that would always remain kindled.

A reminder of the promise she'd made to honor the Queen of Terrasen. A single, solitary flame against the cold.

Manon rubbed at her face as she slumped onto one of the rocks lining the hearth. A hand rested on her shoulder, warm and slight. She didn't bother to slap it away.

Glennis said, "We're departing in a few minutes. I thought l'd say good-bye."

Manon peered up at the ancient witch. "Fly well." It was really all there was left to say.

Manon's failure was not due to Glennis, not due to anyone but herself, she supposed.

You're afraid.

It was true. She had tried, but not really tried to win the Crochans. To let them see any part of her that meant something. To let them see what it had done to her, to learn she had a sister and that she had killed her. She didn't know how, and had never bothered to learn.

You're afraid.

Yes, she was. Of everything.

Glennis lowered her hand from Manon's shoulder.

"May your path carry you safely through war and back home at last."

She didn't feel like telling the crone there was no home for her, or the Thirteen.

Glennis turned her face toward the sky, sighing once. Then her white brows narrowed. Her nostrils flared. Manon leapt to her feet.

"Run," Glennis breathed. "Run now."

Manon drew Wind-Cleaver and did no such thing. "What is it?"

"They're here." How Glennis had scented them on the wind, Manon didn't care.

Not as three wyverns broke from the clouds, spearing for their camp.

She knew those wyverns, almost as well as she knew the three riders who sent the Crochans into a frenzy of motion.

The Matrons of the Ironteeth Witch-Clans had found them. And come to finish what Manon had started that day in Morath.

The three High Witches had come alone.

Rushing steps crunched through the icy snow, halting at Manon's side just as Dorian's scent wrapped around her. "Is that—"

"Yes," she said quietly, heart thundering as the Matrons dismounted and did not raise their hands in request for parley. No, they only stalked closer to the hearth, to the precious flame still burning. "Don't engage," Manon warned him and the others, and strode to meet them.

It was not the king's battle, no matter what power dwelled in his veins.

Glennis was already armed, an ancient sword in her withered hands. The woman was as old as the Yellowlegs Matron, yet she stood tall, facing the three High Witches.

Cresseida Blueblood spoke first, her eyes as cold as the iron-spiked crown digging into her freckled brow. "It has been an age, Glennis." But Glennis's stare, Manon realized, was not on the Blueblood Matron. Or even on Manon's own grandmother, her black robes billowing as she sneered at Manon.

It was on the Yellowlegs Matron, hunched and hateful between them. On the crown of stars atop the crone's thinned white hair.

Glennis's sword shook slightly. And just as Manon realized what the Matron had worn here,

Bronwen appeared at Glennis's side and breathed, "Rhiannon's crown."

Worn by the Yellowlegs Matron to mock these witches. To spit on them.

A dull roaring began in Manon's ears.

"What company you keep these days, granddaughter," said Manon's grandmother, her silver-streaked dark hair braided back from her face. A sign enough of their intentions, if her grandmother's hair was in that plait. Battle. Annihilation.

The weight of the three High Witches' attention pressed upon her. The Crochans gathered behind her shifted as they waited for her response.

Yet it was Glennis who snarled, in a voice Manon had not yet heard, "What is it that you want?"

Manon's grandmother smiled, revealing rust-flecked iron teeth. The true sign of her age. "You made a grave error, Manon Kin-Slayer, when you sought to turn our forces against us. When you sowed such lies amongst our sentinels regarding our plans— my plans."

Manon kept her chin high. "I spoke only truth. And it must have frightened you enough that you gathered these two to hunt me down and prove your innocence in scheming against them."

The other two Matrons didn't so much as blink. Her grandmother's claws had to have sunk deep, then. Or they simply did not care.

"We came," Cresseida seethed, the opposite in so many ways of the daughter who had given Manon the chance to speak, "to at last rid us of a thorn in our sides."

Had Petrah been punished for letting Manon walk out of the Omega alive? Did the Blueblood Heir still breathe? Cresseida had once screamed in a mother's terror and pain when Petrah had nearly plunged to her death.

Did that love, so foreign and strange, still hold true? Or had duty and ancient hatred won out?

The thought was enough to steel Manon's spine. "You came because we pose a threat."

Because of the threat you pose to that monster you call grandmother.

"You came," Manon went on, Wind-Cleaver rising a fraction, "because you are afraid."

Manon took a step beyond Glennis, her sword lifting farther.

"You came," Manon said, "because you have no true power beyond what we give you.

And you are scared to death that we're about to take it away." Manon flipped Wind-Cleaver in her hand, angling the sword downward, and drew a line in the snow between them. "You came alone for that fear. That others might see what we are capable of. The truth that you have always sought to hide."

Her grandmother tutted. "Listen to you. Sounding just like a Crochan with that preachy nonsense."

Manon ignored her. Ignored her and pointed Wind-Cleaver directly at the Yellowlegs Matron as she snarled, "That is not your crown."

Something like hesitation rippled over Cresseida Blueblood's face. But the Yellowlegs Matron beckoned to Manon with iron nails so long they curved downward. "Then come and fetch it from me, traitor."

Manon stepped beyond the line she'd drawn in the snow.

No one spoke behind her. She wondered if any of them were breathing.

She had not won against her grandmother. Had barely survived, and only thanks to luck. That fight, she had been ready to meet her end. To say farewell.

Manon angled Wind-Cleaver upward, her heart a steady, raging beat.

She would not greet the Darkness's embrace today. But they would.

"This seems familiar," her grandmother drawled, legs shifting into attacking position.

The other two Matrons did the same. "The last Crochan Queen. Holding the line against us." Manon cracked her jaw, and iron teeth descended. A flex of her fingers had her iron nails unsheathing. "Not just a Crochan Queen this time."

There was doubt in Cresseida's blue eyes.

As if she'd realized what the other two Matrons had not.

There—it was there that Manon would strike first. The one who now wondered if they had somehow made a grave mistake in coming here.

A mistake that would cost them what they had come to protect.

A mistake that would cost them this war.

And their lives.

For Cresseida saw the steadiness of Manon's breathing. Saw the clear conviction in her eyes. Saw the lack of fear in her heart as Manon advanced another step.

Manon smiled at the Blueblood Matron as if to say yes.

"You did not kill me then," Manon said to her grandmother. "I do not think you will be able to now."

"We'll see about that," her grandmother hissed, and charged.

Manon was ready.

An upward swing of Wind-Cleaver met her grandmother's first two blows, and Manon ducked the third. Turning right into the onslaught of the Yellowlegs Matron, who swept up with unnatural speed, feet almost flying over the snow, and slashed for Manon's exposed back.

Manon deflected the crone's assault, sending the witch darting back. Just as Cresseida launched herself at Manon. Cresseida was not a trained fighter. Not as the Blackbeak and Yellowlegs Matrons were. Too many years spent reading entrails and scanning the stars for the answers to the Three-Faced Goddess's riddles.

A duck to the left had Manon easily evading the sweep of Cresseida's nails, and a countermove had Manon driving her elbow into the Blueblood Matron's nose.

Cresseida stumbled. The Yellowlegs Matron and her grandmother attacked again. So fast. Their three assaults had happened in the span of a few blinks. Manon kept her feet under her. Saw where one Matron moved and the other left a dangerous gap exposed.

She was not a broken-spirited Wing Leader unsure of her place in the world.

She was not ashamed of the truth before her.

She was not afraid.

Manon's grandmother led the attack, her maneuvers the deadliest. It was from her that the first slice of pain appeared. A rip of iron nails through Manon's shoulder. But Manon swung her sword, again and again, iron on steel ringing out across the icy peaks.

No, she was not afraid at all.

Around him, the Crochans thrummed with fear and dread. Either for the fight unfolding or the three Matrons who had found them.

But Glennis did not tremble. At her side Bronwen hummed with the energy of one eager to leap into the fight.

Manon and the High Witches sprang apart, breathing heavily. Blue blood leaked down Manon's shoulder, and small slices peppered the three Matrons.

Manon still remained on the far side of the line she'd drawn. Still held it.

The dark-haired witch in voluminous black robes spat blue blood onto the snow. Manon's grandmother. "Pathetic. As pathetic as your mother." A sneer toward Glennis. "And your father."

The snarl that ripped from Manon's throat rang across the mountains themselves.

Her grandmother let out a crow's caw of a laugh. "Is that all you can do, then? Snarl like a dog and swing your sword like some human filth? We will wear you down eventually. Better to kneel now and die with some honor intact." Manon only flung out an iron-tipped hand behind her, fingers splaying in demand as her eyes remained fixed on the Matrons.

Dorian reached for Damaris, but Bronwen moved first.

The Crochan tossed her sword, steel flashing over snow and sun.

Manon's fingers closed on the hilt, the blade singing as she whipped it around to face the High Witches again. "Rhiannon Crochan held the gates for three days and three nights, and she did not kneel before you, even at the end." A slash of a smile. "I think I shall do the same." Dorian could have sworn the sacred flame burning to their left flared brighter. Could have sworn Glennis sucked in a breath. That every Crochan watching did the same.

Manon's knees bent, swords rising. "Let us finish what was started then, too." She attacked, blades flashing.

Her grandmother conceded step after step, the other two Matrons failing to break past her defenses.

Gone was the witch who had slept and wished for death. Gone was the witch who had raged at the truth that had torn her to shreds.

And in her place, fighting as if she were the very wind, unfaltering against the Matrons, stood someone Dorian had not yet met.

Stood a queen of two peoples.

Yielding only those few steps, and nothing more.

Because Manon with conviction in her heart, with utter fearlessness in her eyes, was wholly unstoppable.

The other two witches had fallen back, as if waiting to see what might happen.

But she yielded no further ground. A wall against which the Yellowlegs Matron could not advance. The crone let out a snarl, attacking again and again, senseless and raging.

Dorian saw the trap the moment it happened.

No one seemed to breathe at all as Manon plunged Bronwen's sword into the icy earth beneath and bent to take the crown of stars from the Yellowlegs witch's fallen head.

He had never seen a crown like it.

A living, glowing thing that glittered in her hand. As if nine stars had been plucked from the heavens and set to shine along the simple silver band.

The crown's light danced over Manon's face as she lifted it above her head and set it upon her unbound white hair.

Even the mountain wind stopped.

Yet a phantom breeze shifted the strands of Manon's hair as the crown glowed bright, the white stars shining with cores of cobalt and ruby and amethyst.

As if it had been asleep for a long, long time. And now awoke.

That phantom wind pulled Manon's hair to the side, silver strands brushing across her face.

And beside him, around him, the Thirteen touched two fingers to their brow in deference.

In allegiance to the queen who stared down the two remaining High Witches.

The Crochan Queen, crowned anew.

The sacred fire leaped and danced, as if in joyous welcome.

"Go."

The Blueblood witch blinked, eyes wide with what could only be fear and dread.

Manon jerked her chin toward the wyvern waiting behind the witch. "Tell your daughter all debts between us are paid. And she may decide what to do with you. Take that other wyvern out of here."

Spared by the Crochan Queen on behalf of the daughter who had given Manon the gift of speaking to the Ironteeth.

Within seconds, the Blueblood Matron was in the skies, the Yellowlegs witch's wyvern soaring beside her.

Leaving Manon's grandmother alone.

Leaving Manon with swords raised and a crown of stars glowing upon her brow.

Manon was glowing, as if the stars atop her head pulsed through her body. A wondrous and mighty beauty, like no other in the world. Like no one had ever been, or would be again.

And slowly, as if savoring each step, Manon stalked toward her grandmother.

Warm, dancing light flowed through her, as unfaltering as what had poured into her heart these past few bloody minutes.

She did not balk. Did not fear.

The crown's weight was slight, like it had been crafted of moonlight. Yet its joyous strength was a song, undimming before the sole High Witch left standing.

So Manon kept walking.

She left Bronwen's sword a few feet away.

Left Wind-Cleaver several feet past that.

Iron nails out, teeth ready, Manon paused barely five steps from her grandmother.

A hateful, wasted scrap of existence. That's what her grandmother was.

She had never realized how much shorter the Matron stood. How narrow her shoulders were, or how the years of rage and hate had withered her.

Manon's smile grew. And she could have sworn she felt two people standing at her shoulder.

She knew no one would be there if she looked. Knew no one else could see them, sense them, standing with her. Standing with their daughter against the witch who had destroyed them.

Her grandmother spat on the ground, baring her rusted teeth.

This death, though ...

It was not her death to claim.

It did not belong to the parents whose spirits lingered at her side, who might have been there all along, leading her toward this. Who had not left her, even with death separating them.

No, it did not belong to them, either.

She looked behind her. Toward the Second waiting beside Dorian.

Tears slid down Asterin's face. Of pride- pride and relief.

Manon beckoned to Asterin with an iron- tipped hand.

Manon raised a hand. "Let her go."

When there was no trace of the Matrons left but blue blood and a headless corpse staining the snow, Manon turned toward the Crochans.

Their eyes were wide, but they made no move.

The Thirteen remained where they were, Dorian with them.

Manon scooped up both swords, sheathing Wind-Cleaver across her back, and stalked toward where Glennis and Bronwen stood, monitoring her every breath.

Wordlessly, Manon handed Bronwen her sword, nodding in thanks.

Then she removed the crown of stars and extended it toward Glennis. "This belongs to you," she said, her voice low.

The Crochans murmured, shifting.

Glennis took the crown, and the stars dimmed. A small smile graced the crone's face.

"No," she said, "it does not."

Manon didn't move as Glennis lifted the crown and set it again on Manon's head.

Then the ancient witch knelt in the snow.

"What was stolen has been restored; what was lost has come home again. I hail thee, Manon Crochan, Queen of Witches."

Manon stood fast against the tremor that threatened to buckle her legs.

Stood fast as the other Crochans, Bronwen with them, dropped to a knee. Dorian, standing amongst them, smiled, brighter and freer than she'd ever seen.

And then the Thirteen knelt, two fingers going to their brows as they bowed their heads, fierce pride lighting their faces.

"Queen of Witches," Crochan and Blackbeak declared as one voice.

As one people.

[traumawhomst]

Me: Yeah this blog will just be a fun easy place to word vomit my ideas. I probably won’t post consistently.

Also Me: Yeah but what if wrote like three tiny isty-bitsy stories? Nothing more than 10,000 words promise 🙏🏻

[emmafaeru]

hooooly fucking shit I just realised as of 3 hours ago I'm one month clean. holy shit. it has been such a goddamned uphill back-and-forth battle with myself to get to this point and it continues to be such a monumental struggle for me to not slip back into but for one time, for at least one second, I was finally able to make it. oh my god. I think I'm going to go cry for a minute

[theinfinitedivides]

studio recording of The River <<<<<<<<< every single live version ever done of that song. send tweet

[faedotexe]

Moonlike marbles, pink blemishes Like craters on their surfaces - From port to starboard they roll And it hurts as they move - Their quiet heartbeats On the synthetic floor (Careful not to hear the rattling at the door)

The column that holds the place, It strains against every step or Breath - Growing gardens of bones on its wing, Blossoming with bubbles of white Translucent chrysanthemums - in grapes So heavy it might fall.

They wear cowls And flowing capes And skin-tight, dimly coloured suits And drape themselves so they won't Know that they have skin: They shiver at mirrors And shiver at the wind.

They built stairs Leading to nothing - to forget Which doors open where. They taped windows to the walls With masking tape - too weak to hold The weights of both looking Within or peering without.

Sitting on cratered wood, they hold onto Strands of vines, and stalks and grains All turned to black, streaked with silver veins - Smelling of soil and colder ash - ( Harvests have been scarce - Distant thunder blessing baskets With a mere pound of stars)

The roots have grown Into knots, and on the knots Lakes of mold, and in the mold Those eyes await, wide awake. As the roots twist and grasp The wood burns and breaks and Screams in the secret tongues of the second sky.

There is this drumming In the stone of the column In the glass of the dome (where they painted the stars) It comes as the tide and breaks with the waves - It leaves in a sigh - and paints with a hush - The sand in sleeping greys, the coast with a burning brush In colors that left their name to a world of scars.

They wear hoods, Short black vests, Shoes that look like shoes and Pants that look like pants. They go from east to west and sing A song that leaves no trace - But when they stop - the dream is dreamt, and the tears are wept.

They push viscous sludge into The rotting metal tubes That run from the cellar to the house, Green and smelling like strawberry. (Artificial and sour, from a fizzy drink Forgotten in the fridge.) They push with hands and feet through dark aluminium grates.

As it goes down, the tubes Spasm and contract - So they keep pushing with their hands, They keep pushing with their feet, Until it goes down and down and they sit. (Then they buckle as the tide comes back And their hearts spill - in a geyser of bile black.)

None of them has the strength To lift hammer or titanium nails. They limp back and forth Grabbing papers and putting them down Forgetting where they went or why they would drown. So the roots will knot and the tubes will spasm - And the column will crack and the marbles will roll -

But look! Look at the painted sky over the house! Full that it is of all the colors from the waves! And the shells in cradles, the chitin in the tombs! In porcelain sets and golden shimmering wounds - Brimming with shades taken from her breath on your neck, From the hand in your hair - Sure, the house will someday fall, But the house hasn't fallen - that day hasn't come yet!

25/09/24

[jellybean-tv]

(Please, nobody feel the need to respond and/or provide any answers or anything, I'm just... trying to be brave and put my voice out in general. Otherwise, you know, don't mind me. OuO"""""")

I really wanna find, like... my own little "place" I fit into in this community. You know? Like a niche in the niche that I have fun with, that comes naturally, and that people have fun seeing when it shows up on their feed. But... I dunno what that is yet.

I guess it'd be something I stumble into, huh? TuT Which means there's no way to determine how much time it's gonna take to get comfortably settled in. But jeez, it's extra hard to wait when you're already SO bad at letting people know you're in the community at all. Forget about not being able to say the T word - I can't write an original post here without panicking and (usually) deleting it before it's scheduled to go up. >.>"""""""""'

How do you "open up" on a secret account for a community about your goofy little (SFW, GODDAMMIT) guilty pleasure without feeling like you've accidentally shared too much and people will know who you are?

Jeez... usually I'm not too awkward socially, but here? I'd have an easier time putting myself up on the wall and pretending my TV head's an inconspicuous painting of a wallflower.

[a-simple-spiders-oc-dump]

The Kiddos From Universe 1 At Calypso Water Park

so one of my favourite character-building exercises I like to do is figure out how my OCs would act going to the theme park I used to go to a lot when I was in high school - Calypso Water Park. and while I've done this for the Realm Kiddos before, I haven't done it RECENTLY, and especially not since the canon shift. so fuck it!! we ball!!

Lydia is very much the Mom Friend of the group. She's the one who makes sure everyone's brought everything they need before heading out, and the one who pesters everyone to put on sunscreen (on Trinity's behalf). She's not the biggest fan of a lot of the slides, but she'll go on the smaller ones, especially if they're two-person slides and only one member of the group wants to go on 'em. Otherwise, she spends the day relaxing in the lazy river and spending time with Trinity to make sure she feels included. Probably gets a stomach ache from eating ice cream and then immediately getting roped into going on slides.

Sinclair is ADAMANT about going on literally every single slide in the park, probably bragging the whole time that these slides are child's play for them. In reality, they're fucking terrified of slides like Adrenaline (basically a straight drop), and completely chicken out at the Aqua Loops. They do get very competitive during races the group have on the Fast Track, and eventually it's just Sinclair and Sydney doing the ride over and over again until one of them is the definitive victor. The two bond afterwards over their bruised stomachs and somehow managing to steal the entirety of their meals (because both of them decided the food was super overpriced and thus it was stupid to pay for it).

Cynthia is largely just trying to keep track of everyone, since that's just instinct for her at this point, but after some time she starts to relax and do what she wants. I think the wave pool would be her favourite attraction, and she'd spend a bunch of time there just seeing how long she can last against the waves in the deep end of the pool (probably having a friendly competition with Dylan to see who can last the longest at least once.) She doesn't care too much for the slides, not because she's scared of them - they just don't really interest her. Still has a relatively good day against all odds!

Dylan is going fucking EVERYWHERE. He's doing Fast Track races with Sydney, Sinclair and the twins. He's going on Canyon Rafting with as much of the group as he can gather in one place. He's lounging in the lazy river. He's surviving the wave pool with Cynthia. He's eating a big hot dog and then immediately going back into it and then needs to rest on one of the lounge chairs in front of the wave pool because he gave himself a stomach cramp. Dylan is in his element here and he's having the TIME OF HIS LIFE. I think he might end up going into a bit of a funk for a few days afterwards because he got so much serotonin from this trip that he simply cannot get in his daily life. Plans on making this an annual event the second they leave the park at the end of the day.

Morgan loudly complains the whole time everyone is planning this excursion, calling it a waste of time, saying it's dumb baby shit, asking to stay home... But then everyone gets to the park and they learn that Morgan has a well-hidden thrill-seeking side. Sinclair TRIES to go on every slide in the park, but Morgan SUCCEEDS. Although, this comes with a downside... There are multiple slides that require two people that only Sinclair, or worse, Sydney are willing to go on with her. She definitely bullies Sinclair over being scared of the Aqua Loops and rubs it in their face when she does it, like, "see? I survived the big scary plastic slides. coward." Sinclair will probably seethe over this for the next week.

Sydney. is. fucking. ELATED. You just brought the Realm's biggest thrill-seeker to a water park that claims to have the fastest slides in the world! Peak enrichment!! Much like Dylan, she's absolutely everywhere, and it's really hard to track her down. Much like Morgan, she also goes on every single ride in the park, minus a couple because she got so caught up with the Fast Track bullshit. She and Sinclair get to do crime together too, which is just a nice bonus. She does get some weird looks due to her extensive scars, because sometimes people suck, but Sydney Could Not Care Less About This, There Are Slides To Be Conquered And Friends To Compete With Over Stupid Shit.

Trinity is deathly afraid of heights. This means basically every slide is off-limits for her. Additionally, she's pretty self-conscious about her death scar on her neck, and this doesn't help her social anxiety much. Mostly just sticks to Lydia, Dylan, Cynthia or Morgan's sides for the majority of the trip, watching everyone else have fun, but after a bit Bianca and Troy coax her to come with them to Pirate's Aquaplay and she starts to really enjoy herself. The three of them go under the bigass bucket there together (because when you go to Calypso you HAVE to step under the bucket) and the twins keep her from getting knocked over by the water, and it's the loudest anyone's heard Trinity laugh before.

Bianca desperately WANTS to keep up with Sydney but. holy shit. that's a LOT of slides. Her paranoia kinda ebbs and flows throughout the day regarding Troy, because on one hand, More People = More People Who Could Hurt Him, but on the other hand... who'd kill a kid surrounded by so many people?? (The latter reasoning is mostly her trying to fight that shit off with a metaphorical stick for the sake of actually being able to enjoy her day. It... only kind of works, much to her own chagrin.) And, at the very least, the two spend most of their day with Sydney, who Bianca full-heartedly trusts. (Maybe not to keep them safe from over-exertion, but at least to keep them safe from anyone who might try to hurt either twin.) She joins Troy in his gremlin antics at Pirate's Aquaplay, and is the one to suggest that Trinity come and join them to experience The Bucket. She heads to the gift shop early while Troy and Sydney are hanging out and gets everyone surprisingly thoughtful souvenirs from the day.

Troy is that little shit who goes to Pirate's Aquaplay and dumps the mini-buckets on kids' heads when they pass under it. I know this, because I was that little shit when I was a kid, and I know it's exactly the kind of thing Troy would love. A lot of the slides scare him more than he's willing to admit, and he especially hates any of the covered slides because they make him feel claustrophobic, but the big exception to this is the Turbo Lab. Partially due to the theming, partially due to the fact that they aren't super fast or tall slides, and partially because the ones he likes best are ones he can go on with his friends. By and large, though, he's mostly just following the group and joining in on activities like Canyon Rafting and Fast Track races. I like to think he and Bianca also make a bet on whether they can last more than five minutes in the kiddie pool without being kicked out. They barely even last a minute.

Gamma got volunteered by Alice to be a chaperone. He fucking hates it. Not just because it's REALLY hard to keep track of nine humans when they're all going on different rides on different ends of the park, not just because there are more people in the park that day than Gamma's seen in his entire life, but because Gamma has a secret phobia of drowning/being underwater. Being around this much water? That's hell to him. Either Alice or Sinclair has to explain the concept of a "lifeguard" to him to keep him from spontaneously combusting out of stress, and he can't look at the wave pool without his stomach twisting up in knots. Also? He refuses to wear swimwear. He's still in his fucking suit. He only vaguely understands why he's getting strange looks from everyone. Needless to say, Gamma does not have fun, but the humans had a great time and no one got seriously hurt, and once it's all over, that's all that truly matters to him. (He still needs to take a day or two to recover tho, because being hyper-vigilant for that long is fucking exhausting. And by 'take a day' I mean he spends a little more time than usual reading between patrolling the woods and making sure his siblings do their jobs, because Gamma doesn't understand that he can take a sick day without everything exploding, so there's no way he's taking a mental health day voluntarily.)

Alice would fucking LOOOOOOVE to go, but because of the Mechanics Of How Realms Work, she physically cannot. (The humans obviously can't go back to their homeworld, so they have to go to a different Reality in order to go to Calypso, and Alice is shackled to her Realm and the Reality it branched off from. I'm torn between it being a "if I leave I die instantly and I Do Not Want That" situation or "yeah I've got a built-in aversion to leaving this place that's kind of like a primal fear and I'm Not Fucking With That" situation. Could be both!) She still makes an adorable swimsuit for herself just for fun and watches everyone's day through portals while eating popcorn. She also spends a good amount of time talking with Gamma over his communication device whenever he starts getting overwhelmed by the. fucking EVERYTHING happening that day. Absolutely gets him to bring her back a souvenir from the park. (Oh, also, the group circumvents the money issue via Alice basically creating counterfeit money. Hey, they're only there for a day! What are the cops gonna do, track them down across time and space for a couple of forged twenties?)

[chocum]

LIKE THAT !

— their favorite positions feat. kento nanami, toji fushiguro, choso kamo, ryomen sukuna.

WARNINGS. fem reader (she/her), v penetration, toys (vibrator, butt plug), slight overstim, switch nanami, boobjob, sub cho, pssy job, choking, mean kuna (duh) kunas tongue hands note: hiiiii this is my first post on here! im nervous but vv excited to be starting a blog. feedback + reblogs are greatly appreciated! also sorry if my characterization is off ;( ty and enjoyyyy ᡣ𐭩

KENTO NANAMI & MISSIONARY — “baby, let me look at you. wanna watch you take it” + “that’s it, my gorgeous girl. stick your tongue out. so cute when you go dumb”

no matter how hard he tries, nanami always finds himself cumming too fast. embarrassed, he’ll nuzzle into the side of your neck, flushed nose bridge dusting your sensitive skin as his milky cum spills into your warm pussy. long, fluffy, blonde lashes curl up when he screws his eyes shut at the overwhelming feeling of your gummy walls and he’s praying you don’t hear how pathetic he sounds whining, or feel the way he shakes and trembles being sucked dry by his sweet girl.

on the other hand, nanami also found that when he fucks you from the front— his hand wrapped tightly around the base of your ankle, the other holding your favorite vibrator against your puffy clit, you cum too fast. your back arching so prettily for him as he forces your shaky thighs apart so he can keep fucking into you through your high.

he only finds pleasure in yours, so naturally it becomes his favorite position.

plus, he loves to watch your pretty tits bounce with every deep stroke— your face contorting, jaw slacking at the feeling of his thick cock stretching your pussy out as he does so, so well.

ᯓ

“don’t look away, keep those pretty eyes on me,” nanami’s hair is mussed, eyelids drooping low almost completely covering his brown irises. his flushed ears swallow the filthy, filthy sounds that you make at the feeling of his fat veiny, cock dragging against your sticky walls. they’re pornstar-esque and your hips buck up at the constant vibration against your poor abused clit. body growing limp, eyes fogging over, rolling back—

“uhn uh baby, look at me”

you do as you’re told: whimpering out a breathy, “yes sir” the air in the room is heavy, a thin layer of sweat sticks in your body, and nanami’s musky scent envelops you as you write underneath him. “my baby feels good? feels good when i fill your pussy up, hm?”

tears start slipping down the apples of your burning cheeks as you nod sheepishly. he’s rolling his hips, making you feel all of him at every angle.

your clear slick drips down his heavy balls and he’s gritting his teeth, strokes turning sporadic because fuck he’s getting close, “yeah my messy girl, show me how good it feels. let me fucking feel it.”

TOJI FUSHIGURO & BOOBJOBS — “you look so pretty with my dick between your tits like that” + “keep fucking goin. gonna paint that face. know you love it when i do, my dirty girl”

toji’s hands are always, always glued to your boobs. sometimes he jokes he can’t even sleep without sliding his hands underneath the hem of your shirt so he can grope and pinch at your tits. they’re just so soft and pretty, he thinks. especially when your nipples harden against his warm tongue, his teeth lightly grazing the sensitive buds.

the first time you gave him a boobjob, he felt dizzy. it was too good. so warm, so soft. his leaky cock slipping between your smooth mounds with every quick jerk of his hips.

he gets so sensitive. vocal, too.

ᯓ

“feels so good when you push them together like that fuck baby,” toji’s chest heaves as he groans, eyes fluttering shut at the feeling of your pillowy tits embracing him, taking him in so sweetly, “spit on it”

you’re looking up at him through long lashes with big heart eyes, giggling before you purse your plump lips, dipping your head to let a fat glob of foamy spit fall onto his tip. it glides down over the slit of his cock— “shit” before sliding onto your chest making his head spin, a long string of curse words sounding under his breath.

“cum for me toj’ want it all over me” your tongue pokes out to lick and lap at the salty pre oozing out his reddened head.

“you’re so fucking dirty,” his chest heaves some more— body jerking, his toned abs flexing. then there it is, that fucking smirk. the scar on his lips jumps up following the change in his expression.

“ask me s’more. i might give you what you want, but only if you beg for it. fuckin’ drain it out of me, doll”

CHOSO KAMO & COWGIRL — “ride me baby, please. love when you bounce on me” + “you're too pretty shit. make me cum so fast m'sorry”

you are choso’s first everything. he had never been in a relationship before you and he doesn’t plan on leaving, so you’ll be his last as well.

the first time you two were intimate, you took your time with him, pressing soft kisses to every inch of his toned body, showering him with your warm love.

before lowering yourself on him, you were grinding against his needy cock. hips moving in fluid motions, back .. and forth .. leaving him a pretty whimpering mess underneath you. putty in your little hands.

when you finally let him in, your pussy hugging him so so tightly he came before even bottoming out :(

ᯓ

“fuck- yesyesyes” choso’s grip on your waist is tight, his hips slamming up against your ass as he fucks into you so deeply, leaky cock twitching inside your silky walls. “feels so good, oh my god”

it’s so cute how eager he gets— his face all pinky, blush covering his pale skin. your hand dances up his lean chest before reaching his neck, fingers wrapping around him, your nails sinking into his skin, branding little crescent-shaped marks. and his eyes roll back in such a sultry way, his adam’s apple bobbing up as he groans, it should be fucking illegal.

“fu- ple- ba-by” he can’t even speak. he’s trying so hard— so, so hard to be good and ask for your permission, but pretty whimpers fill the room in its place and he’s cumming, filling your pussy up to the brim as he cries out your name mixed with “sorry”’s because he knows he’s supposed to ask for it.

RYOMEN SUKUNA & FULL NELSON — “who gave you permission to be so fucking messy, huh? creaming 'round my dick, fucking filthy.” + “screaming like a cheap whore— be quiet and take it. unless you want to be treated like one”

sukuna is just so rough when he fucks you. mean too, throwing you around like you weigh nothing, using every limb to his advantage. he gets off to seeing your ruined face, red teary eyes, and mascara smeared all over your flushed cheeks with drool sliding down your chin.

he loves it when you’re helpless, either tied up or his arms holding you in place.

ᯓ

sukuna’s thick cock is buried deep in your sloppy pussy. his arms snaked underneath your thighs— hands on the back of your head, forcing you to watch how greedily your pussy sucks him in. “what a filthy fucking whore. ‘s fucking pathetic.”

white cream jackets his cock and it glistens against the dim lights in his palace every time he pulls out before slamming you back down.

he’s a feral fucking animal, rutting into you feverishly with deep grunts. one of his hands is on your clit—tongue flicking against your otherwise neglected nub. it’s too much. you’re already struggling to take the inches he’s bullying into your tight pussy and here he goes adding more.

“so f- full ‘ku”

“be grateful,” he grunted, one of his thumbs pushing a pretty diamond butt plug into your tight ass— using your slide as lube while two fingers shove down your throat.

“i could’ve chosen one of the other concubines— be grateful and fucking take it.”

[kosmic-kalamity]

i should become an undertale blog. i think it'd be fun

[joeloverture]

deadfall | enemy!j.m. x f!reader

masterlist | notifs blog | on palestine

pairing: dad’s enemy!joel miller x f!reader summary: joel miller, rival raiders with your father, is the last person you expect to save you from the group that captured you. he’s also the last person you expect to sleep with. [post outbreak] warnings: (mdni) canon typical violence (stalkers, mentions of death), porn with plot, game or tv joel, reader born before the outbreak, reader has a present/loving father figure (HAH), alternate universe — joel never went to boston, implied age gap but how big is up to you, self indulgent humor, quicksand, explicit smut, reader is a biiiit of a peeping tom, close proximity, only one bed, (brief) accidental somnophilia so dubcon, dry humping, degradation, humiliation, mirror sex, unprotected piv (he’s snipped dw), doggy style, manhandling (he fucks you in a headlock), mild breath play & choking, brief hair pulling (reader has hair!), scratching/biting, brief orgasm denial, hatefuck [no use of y/n] word count: 9.5k author's note: pwplot! a joeloverture first. also my first foray into somno! and post!ob joel! lots of firsts here. special thanks to @joelsdagger for taking a glimpse at this for me (and for being the PIONEER that forged joel fucking in a headlock) and @lovesickonmybed for being the best sounding board ever. i hope y'all like this one, i sure do.

There are no infected in the swamp — not this far out. They prefer the slant of buildings or the maw of split pavement. Blood-bloated leeches and black-trunked cypresses aren’t their domain.

You can’t say you blame them. One day in, and you’re already sick of this shit.

A few gnats have flown up your nostrils as you wade through the ankle-deep sludge. Mist curls at the edges of your vision. Your feet keep slipping on the slime covered stones that are half-submerged in the deep. Sweat crystallizes on your nape as your toe catches on a downed branch.

Before you faceplant in the sludge below, a burly hand snags your collar and hauls you up. “You always this much of a klutz?” It’s the first few words he’s said to you in hours.

A scowl buckles your lips. You shove Joel Miller’s arm off your back, splashing up scummy water as you step over the branch this time. You say nothing — don’t even dignify him with a passing glance.

“You’re a real peach, ain’t ya?” Joel says. When he takes his next step, water splashes at the backs of your calves. “Save your ass and this is the thanks I get.”

Joel Miller doesn’t want thanks. Up until he accidentally burnt his thumb with boiling hot coffee yesterday, you’d been convinced he didn’t feel anything at all. As long as his pulse is woven between bullets and stab wounds, he doesn’t give a damn what happens to those around him. His heart, much like the rest of the people at the end of the world, is calcified. Only beating out of necessity.

You’re silent as you footslog forward. The slurp of mud stretches between your shoe and the ground. Your pack jostles against your back. The ache in your bones has proven to be a better company than Joel – at least that is tolerable.

A deadfall lays flat ahead, a tree with cambered branches that droop with moss. Joel cups a hand over his eyes to block out the sun and squints past.

You go to walk past him, around the deadfall.

“Nuh uh,” Joel tugs you back by the scruff. You grunt. “‘S deeper out there. I’d sure like to see you get swallowed up by a gator, but that doesn’t work for me, kid.”

It sure works for you. If you see one of their bumpy snouts protruding out of the water, you’re using him as bait.

You don’t say that, though. Just hitch your foot up over one of the branches in the tree and start to haul yourself up. It’s a nagging ordeal – full of hissing through your teeth and feeling wood tear small cuts into your skin. Your hand tangles in an unoccupied spiderweb before you toss yourself through the other side of the bramble. Water sluices around you as you right yourself, rubbing a bead of blood from one of your knuckles.

Joel’s quick to follow, even quicker to take front again. You’ve learned he likes being ahead of you — unless you’re climbing a ledge or a fallen oak.

The hours wear on. You refuse to be the first to call it for the day. Even when you get stinging salt water into your open cuts, you grin and bear it. When the sun lounges on the chaise of the tree-sketch horizon, he drops his pack on an island of mulch that’s nestled in a grove of dead vegetation. 

You slump down next to him, rifling through your pack for a bite of jerky. Joel’s knees pop. He grunts as he slips down into the dirt and unrolls his sleeping bag. He rolls over, facing away from you. Hand wrapped around his gun like it’s a lover. 

When you do the same, it’s with a barbed insult on your tongue that’s better left unspoken.

At the end of the world, everything is ruleless. But you grew up with exactly one rule: don’t talk about Joel Miller.

You hadn’t been expecting him to kill you.

The Cockroaches, the lesser raider group in Northeast Texas, had captured you. Apparently your dad had some unpaid debts, and in taking you as leverage, they’d intended to get close to him. All they got were bullets in their heads.

You’d sighed in relief when the hatch to your basement confinement had finally opened. A spillage of sun sliced down through the opening, and you were expecting the familiar warmth of your father, an apology, and reassurance that he wouldn’t let them take you again.

Instead, you got Joel. With his hulking gun, broad figure that blocked out the sun, and the scowl that would be the last thing you’d ever see.

You had fumbled against the post you were tied to, feet scrabbling against the floor. You’d winced away when he raised his knife. “Don’t–”

…And cut into your restraints.

You’d rubbed the chafing from your wrists and stared at him, nebulous and delirious. “Get the fuck away from me,” you’d croaked.

“They touch you?” he’d asked. You’d shaken your head. “Hurt ya?” Another shake.

“Good. Now get up and get ready to haul ass.” He turned around, but not before throwing his knife to the ground next to you. The clatter it made against the concrete made your ears ring.

You grabbed the knife.

“Why are you helping me?” you ask him. They’re the only words you’ve spoken since you’d seen him in the cellar. 

“I ain’t,” he says. His voice is gruff. Sandpapery. 

“Looks like helping,” you say, nodding at the pack he’d given you. He’d come out prepared. To get you.

“Your daddy ain’t the only one with debts,” he says.

You stop, booted feet sinking into the mud. Shit. “So that’s what this is. You take me away just to hand me off to some other shitty group?”

“Yeah,” he says with a shrug. He turns around, already mid-stride.

You yank his knife out of your pocket and dive at him.

“Hey, hey, fuck – you little brat,” he spats. He goes off balance before he twists around. You corral him against a tree, leg hitching around his waist as you knee at his thighs, aiming for his crotch. His spittle sprays your cheek as he grunts. His fist wraps around your hand, and the knife splats into the mud. His booted heel slips and he goes sliding back as he shoves you away, hard. You cough as you slam into a tree trunk. The knot that swells out of the bark digs into your head. You drag a branch up off the ground, pushing yourself off the tree as you heft it.

Before you grab it, he slaps you. Hard. Your head goes spinning as you stumble back into the muck. He jams his boot down against your chest, mud smearing across your tank top. “I gotta tie you up, or you gonna fuckin’ listen to me?”

You reach up to grab his ankle, and he just stomps harder against your chest. You wheeze, flopping back in the sludge. “B-bastard,” you hiss.

“Yeah, yeah, shut the hell up. ‘S your dad’s shitty group I’m talkin’ about.”

You give him an incredulous look.

“Your old man ain’t the only one with a coupla debts under his belt.”

“You’re shitting me,” you say. Voice squished in your throat from his tread against your chest.

He shakes his head and finally lets his boot up. You suck in a breath, another cough rattling your ribcage. “Quit being all uppity and pickin’ fights ya can’t win if you wanna learn, dumbass.”

“Why didn’t he just come get me himself?” you grit out as you lean back against a log. You use it to lift yourself, legs feeling gelatinous from being shoved about.

“You didn’t see? Cockroach shot ‘im in the leg.” Your lips tremble, but you straighten them. “He’s fine.”

You scowl. “And you didn’t tell me this sooner?” You march forward. Your arms cross solidly over your chest.

“Figured you wouldn’t take it well.” He looks you up and down. “And I was right.”

You curse under your breath. Dip to grab your knife. Toss it in your hand while you think. You don’t flinch when it slightly nicks your thumb — it’s hardly a poke with all of the scraping you’ve been doing through undergrowth — but Joel smirks. 

He sees you as juvenile. The product of a world that you haven’t earned the right to be in, always cowering behind your dad’s back. 

You’ll prove him wrong.

“How far are we from the nearest city?” you ask. You want to go home. Your arms ache not just from swinging at your side or lifting you up toppled trees, but to wrap around your father. Your bones protest at the thought of being in your skin. Your tank top sticks to your flesh with mud and the parasites that squirm in it.

“I’m not a goddamn fortune teller,” Joel says. “Your guess is as good as mine.”

“Then we better get moving.” You readjust your pack and jostle him as you march on.

Three days later, and there’s no end in sight to the swamp. Whatever towns you’ve encountered are home to only a derelict gas station and ransacked mom-and-pop stores. They’re no place for pit stops.

You (reluctantly) stay close to Joel, who you’re lucky to hear so much as a murmur out of. Most of the time, he’s redirecting you, tugging you out of the way of half-decade old hunter’s traps or reminding you not to go too far.

“The world isn’t gonna end if I step out of your imaginary line, Joel,” you say. You test your foot on the side of the bank you’re walking on. Nothing happens.

“Ki–” Joel says, brows crunched up.

“See? Fine.” You press more of your weight into the ground. He reaches for you, but your body tilts.

Your foot is sinking.

“You’re a fuckin’ pain in my ass,” Joel says. He pinches his nose bridge. “Shoulda left ya down there.”

You glare at him, bending yourself at the waist so you can try to wiggle yourself with your upper body strength. Your free knee is propped up on the squishy ground. You grunt, palms slipping against the oily, grass-filled mud. “I got it,” you rasp out as he crouches in front of you.

“Uh huh,” he says, frowning pointedly.

“I got it.” You slap his hand away and thresh your leg in the sand. It barely even wiggles. “Fuck.” You strain your leg, huffing and puffing. Dirt fixes itself under your nails.

Joel wraps his arms under your shoulders and you flail in protest. “I said I can handle it!” Instead of listening to you, he tugs at you like pulling a toy from a dog. You keep windmilling your arms.

“Quit thrashin’!” Joel yells. “Any harder and you’re gonna drag me in with you.”

Your face is too close to his. Too close for the uncomfortable heat. His humid breath fans against your sweat-slippery cheek as he groans. Your foot loosens. You prop your calf up on his thigh as he wrests you out of the quicksand. You’re chest-to-chest with him as you tip over the muck, dropping flat against him. “Mmph.”

Joel shoves you off of him, and you fall on your ass in the mud. By all odds, your boot has remained strapped to your foot. He’s already up and moving when he says, “Jesus Christ, you are just like your fuckin’ dad.”

The mud still caked into your shirt has started to flake by the time you reach a city called Monroe. Just off of I-20, you and Joel trek further into what you imagine must’ve been a medium-sized city during its heyday.

You’re bone-weary. Your back keeps popping with every step with how you keep having to sleep on the ground. You’d be thankful for even a mattress of moss — but luckily, you won’t have to settle. Sunset is nearing, which means you can see the blue water (imagine that, blue water) tainted pink and orange below. Houses and the city clocktower reflect into the gentle pull and ebb of the tide.

Joel nods at a half-bent blue roadway sign. “YMCA up ahead,” he says. He wipes the sweat off his brow and clutches his gun closer to his side. “Stay close.”

You keep your hand around the grip of your knife, following him into the city.

It’s quiet as you navigate through a labyrinth of abandoned, rust-gutted cars. At one point, you manage to slip ahead of him, and he allows it for long enough (fifteen seconds) that you opt to take a shortcut through a parking garage. You climb over the edge and dip inside, feet scraping over roots that have grown between concrete slabs. The shade is a brief respite from the scorching sun, but the humidity still wrings the sweat from your pores.

Joel slips ahead of you again, taking long, dragging strides that look as exhausted as you feel. Four days of hiking through swamp and gunk and slapping mosquitoes against your skin has made you grateful to just be walking on solid ground again. Joel steps past a busted, sticker-covered van.

A streak flickers against the dark canopy of the garage. “Infected!” you shout, but Joel falls back on his ass.

His gun flies out of his hand and skids across the concrete. He grunts, shuffling backward, but the stalker’s already on him, its mouth sewn partially shut by fungi. It croaks and slashes at him, blind left eye battering and twitching. Joel throws a hooked punch, but the stalker takes the opportunity to grapple him, snarling in his face.

He’s going to get bit.

You launch forward, knife in-hand. You fling yourself into a tumble with the stalker, legs strewn over Joel’s. Adrenaline plummets through your body. You stomp on its shin and it shrieks. The knife almost slips from your grip as you start to stab blindly. You thrust the blade up through its eye socket.

The thing cackles and caws, its vocal chords clacking with mold and rot. Rusted blood trickles from its nose and down your wrist as you twist the blade further until you meet bone and then whatever is left of a brain is beyond it. You cringe as you drag the knife out and wipe it across your pants. It slumps back in a mound and then falls over.

Your chest heaves as you look between Joel and the stalker. His hands are scraped up as he grabs his gun.

You extend him a hand. He seems to think about it for a second before latching onto you and letting you help him up. He grunts in acknowledgment. “C’mon,” he says. “Let’s get cleaned up.”

This YMCA in particular isn’t like the others you’ve stopped at with your dad. Instead of glass windows and tin roofs, it’s brick and mortar. You and Joel climb in through the window, and you almost sob in relief when you see at least a dozen oversized yoga mats. That’s a suitable homemade mattress, you think. 

There’s a basketball court whose court has been warped and fossilized by the leaks in the roof. A peek of sunset dives in through a hole, lighting up the western side of the room. You expect the pool room to still smell of chlorine. It’s a little weird when it doesn’t even though the pool’s been drained for years, you imagine. From there, you two reach the showers.

Before you let yourself get excited, Joel fiddles with the knobs. Water sprays out of it. “Still hot,” he says, absorbed in the droplets that are spraying his hand. He turns it off.

“Fuck it,” you say, tearing your tank top over your head.

“Woah, woah, woah,” Joel says, turning to face the wall.

“You aren’t the one who’s covered in mud!”

“Yeah, you’re right, I ain’t the one who went jumpin’ into quicksand. I also ain’t the one who deserved an ass whooping.”

You glare at his shoulder blades as you unzip your jeans, fumbling out of them. They’re nearly crunchy with the amount of mud you’ve been traipsing through. “They did charity drives at these things, right?” You never really went to any YMCAs before the world went to shit. “Maybe they’ve got clean clothes.”

“Maybe,” Joel says. “Maybe you shoulda thought about that before you turned this place into a strip club.” You roll your eyes and hook your bra on the shower curtain, followed by your panties.

“I didn’t know you were a prude, Miller,” you say.

He bristles at the accusation. “Maybe I should get an eyeful. Being ‘round you is like wishin’ the Lord would strike me down.”

You laugh. Joel made you laugh. First (and only) time, probably. 

“Yeah, right, you’d get struck down for something a whole lot worse before he started getting mad at you for peeping.”

You fiddle with the shower curtain and step in. There’s old body wash in an automatic dispenser on the wall. It doesn’t work, but it’s easy to wrangle open and squeeze the pouch into your hand. The grout is odd under your bare feet, but quickly becomes familiar as you twist the lever. Water spits down at you, and a satisfied sound leaves you. “Fuuuck,” you sigh. “This is nice.”

Joel clears his throat. “I’m gonna go look for clothes. And deodorant.”

“You should shower too,” you say instead.

You can almost hear the face he makes.

“God, don’t be so much of a Holy Joe, Joel. It’s practical. This water isn’t going to last that damn long, and I am not taking a cold shower when the hot stuff is all right here.”

“You’re a real pain in the ass,” he says like he hasn’t already told you.

Eventually, you hear his belt unbuckle.

He strips down a lot quicker than you. Habit, maybe, you think. His jeans slump against the floor, and then he’s in the shower. You hear the other faucet come on as the water warms against your skin. You sigh, lathering yourself with the Dollar General body wash. It forms iridescent bubbles along your body, and it smells faintly like artificial strawberries. You wonder if it ever used to smell stronger than this.

There’s a slit in Joel’s shower that exists between the curtain and the wall. You should look away, but you shouldn’t have plunged your foot into quicksand, either. There’s many things you shouldn’t do that you take it upon yourself to do anyway.

So you watch the dirty water cascade down his sharp, scarred shoulder. You eye how the gnarl of his bone adjusts as he lathers himself with soapsuds. He stretches to get his hair and his bicep tenses with the movement. He’s built, and built well. From years of survival, trekking through swamps not so different from these, and aiming guns in places he wanted to and places he didn’t. The way the sun flits through the rectangular windows makes him look golden.

You imagine how it’d feel to walk up behind him, to massage the knots out of his sore muscles. You don’t even notice it, but your hands are traveling your own body now, fingertips going to pluck at your pebbled nipples. He’d been rough when tussling with you in the swamp. Would he be rough with you in bed, too? In your mind, you run soft, open-mouthed kisses down his back, reaching your hand between his legs to wrap around his—

A clanging noise stops your hand in its tracks. You drop it limp at your side. A wave of revulsion crawls like insects up your back.

“Shit!” Joel says, fumbling around in his shower stall.

The plastic body wash dispenser goes sliding out under the curtain, foamy with soapsuds.

You can’t help it. You snort. And eventually, your snort becomes full-fledged laughter, breaking the seam of your lips as you lean against the wall of the shower.

“Shut up,” he says, but you hear the tinge of a chuckle embedded between his vowels. You hear his half-huff of laughter before you force yourself to stop giggling.

You two stay under the shower streams until the water runs cold and bitter and all of the mud that had banded around your limbs is congealed in the drain. 

You leave the showers first, roaming around until you find a discarded cardboard box that’s brimming with clothes in your size. There’s jeans that should do well in the elements and another tank top suited for the crushing heat. 

When you’re dressed, you call out to Joel that you’ll be in the yoga room. You spend the down time arranging the yoga mats into two separate mattresses. Joel’s feet will hang off a bit, but you imagine it’ll be better than sleeping on the floor.

Footsteps scrape from the doorway, and your head snaps up.

Joel Miller cleans up nice, it seems. He’s kept his boots, but apart from that, looks like a completely different person; his jeans now hug his hips tighter, his raggedy tee from earlier has been replaced with a form-fitting ribbed tank top. Any traces of mud, sweat, or gunk have been washed off his skin and down the drain. His hair hangs in wet stripes, sticking to his crinkled forehead.

You haven’t realized you’ve zone out until he’s waving a calloused hand in front of your face. “Hey, peach, anyone home?”

You clear your throat and replace it with a scowl. “Don’t call me that.” It’s deflection, and you know it. You think he knows it, too.

He gives you a funny look. “Uh huh,” he says. He taps his fingers along his hip bone. “Well, what the fuck are ya doin’?”

You furrow your brows at him. “Setting up camp…?”

“This is a shit camp to set up,” he says. “Stalkers in the parking garage, city I ain’t ever been in before? No, we need a vantage point.”

“And I assume you have one in mind?” you ask.

“Yeah, I do. ‘S a hotel, ‘lil further into town. Got three floors, we probably can block the stairwell from the inside to keep any raiders out.”

You nod and heft your backpack over your shoulder. It’s bulging from the extra clothes you’d stuffed into the bottom, and your arms are sore from the wrangling you’d given it after the collar of one of your new shirts jammed the zipper. 

Joel turns to stand guard at the door while you collect your stuff. You can’t seem to focus much on that, though, not with his ass practically at your eye level. The tighter denim definitely does him favors. You swallow the newfound lump in your throat and stuff your water flash into the side of your pack.

It has to be the lack of human connection. It’s been two weeks since you’ve seen anyone other than your captors, and the majority of this week since you’ve seen anyone other than Joel. Joel, who with every word, breath, movement, flinch, gets a rise out of you. Joel, who stirs the pot with you at every chance he gets. Joel, who almost certainly looks at you and sees a reflection of your father whom he hates.

He’d said so, early on.

This isn’t only one-sided. It’s a living, breathing disaster.

“‘S a hotel’ my ass, Joel, this place looks like a loaf of moldy bread.”

Joel insists on staying on the third floor. Says that the second floor is ‘too low’ and that being on the third floor poses a good choke point for any raiders or infected who might stumble upon your camp. He wants to ‘bottleneck’ any intruders, whatever the fuck that means.

The issue with the third floor? There’s mold. Everywhere. In the days after the outbreak, a leak must’ve happened somewhere in the pipes that bled through the ceiling and all over the top floor. None of the rooms you’ve checked have been left unscathed so far. It’s embedded into the rugs, the walls, the ceiling, all of it. At least it’s a good deterrent for the people that pass through. The infected, however? You have a feeling they’d be just at home.

“Would you shut the fuck up?” he says through his teeth. He pinches his nose bridge – he does that a lot, or maybe you just stress him out a lot – and glares at you.

“No, Joel. I’m fucking exhausted,” you hiss. “I’ve been roughing it with you all week, all you do is give me shit. The only thing this voyage of ours has taught me is that my dad has perfectly ample reason to hate your guts.” You’re closer to him now, knocking him back with your fist to your chest.

“Quit bein’ cute,” he scowls. “I’m the only reason your ass isn’t eyeball-deep in quicksand.”

“Yeah, and you’d be stalker food without me. So I guess we’re even, aren’t we, Joel?” You shove past him. “I’m just a way for you to pay off your stupid ‘debts’ anyway,” you mutter under your breath. He wasn’t protecting you, pulling you out of that damn pit. He was saving his own skin.

The hotel room door at the end of the hallway is slightly ajar. You lift your knife just in case, and step inside. 

It’s lacking the mold that the rest of the rooms have. People have definitely stayed in here before, what with the rumpled blankets left on the bed and a flashlight situated upright on the dresser. The thick layer of dust on the flashlight tells you that they never came back.

The room itself is satisfactory enough. Beige, almost green walls, close in at all sides. A cloudy mirror is hung by the window. Moonlight stipples the room. There’s a busted, corded phone on the nightstand that’s propped up on a Bible, a shattered nightlight, and a small table. You toss your pack onto the quilted bedspread and collapse onto the mattress. For an old, creaking thing with a busted spring or two, it’s still the most comfortable thing you think you’ve ever felt in your life. You sigh in relief and nuzzle into the pillow.

Joel clears his throat from the doorway.

“Find your own room, dipshit,” you say, nudging your pack off your bed with your knee. It thunks against the floor.

“I don’t think so.” He crosses his arms.

“I’m not sharing with you. You snore.”

“I don’t snore.”

“You do.”

You don’t have to look up to know he’s doing that thing where he pinches his nose bridge again. “You’re a fuckin’ piece ‘a work, kid, you know that?” You hear his pack drop against the ground. He drags a chair across the room and you cringe at how it squeals against the floor until he jams it under the doorknob. Then, the mattress dips.

You look at him sideways. “Get off my bed.”

“‘Your’ bed? You just discovered it two seconds ago.”

“Finders keepers.”

“Well I’m takin’ it from you. Losers weepers.”

You grit your teeth so hard you hear the bone scraping bone in your ears. 

“That’s now how this works–”

“We’re even now. You don’t wanna owe me one, and I sure as hell don’t wanna owe you one. So roll your ass over, act like an adult, and go to bed.”

You grouse under your breath, but with Joel, you have to pick and choose your battles. So you roll back over and wiggle yourself under the quilt, tucking your face into the musty pillow underneath you.

You sit in silence for a couple of minutes, staring at how the moon spills milky light along the alabaster ceiling. Then, you roll over again, stretching out the knicks in your back. Despite being the comfiest you’ve been in days, you’re feeling restless. You know Joel wouldn’t hurt you in any substantial way – you’re a bargaining chip to him. Nothing less, and certainly not anything more.

In spite of that, you find yourself drifting off with your face to him.

When Joel first wakes up, he thinks a clicker’s gnawing at his leg

Blinking the crust from his eyes, he realizes nothing’s gnawing on him at all. 

Rather, it’s you.

In your sleep, you’ve thrown your leg over his thigh. Your crotch is angled up against the bulk of his leg, a furnace that sears him through his jeans. Your head has dipped, forehead overheated and angled against the crux of his neck. If it were just that, he’d roll you over (maybe hard enough for you to crash on the floor) and hog the blankets for himself.

But you’re thrusting your fucking hips into him, letting out sleepy little whimpers while you fuck yourself on his leg. That explains why you’ve been acting dumber than a box of rocks. He oughta tan your hide for this. Bitching at him all week and really, you just need to get dicked down. Ironic, ain’t it.

He should still shove you off the bed. Call you a whore and leave you to rub your pussy raw in the bathroom instead of on his leg.

You give a particularly hard thrust, a keening little sound catching in the netting of your teeth. He swears you’re soaking through the denim.

He bites his tongue. The moonlight accentuates your closed eyes, your lashes fan out across your cheeks, there’s a cute little pinch in your lips as you unwittingly try to muffle the sounds coming out of you.

He can’t help himself. He raises his knuckles to your cheek and taps, taps, taps at the bone until your eyes startle open.

When you first wake up, you think you’re dying.

There’s a shortness of breath in your lungs. You feel like you’re being burned alive, your skin hot to the touch. You’re mummified in the crusty, flaky hotel sheets. Each intake of breath is musty and clings to your nostrils. You’re throbbing. Between the legs and elsewhere. Confusion puckers your brows. There’s slick between your legs — and Joel’s leg between your legs.

You tear away from him, making a disgruntled noise as the sheets tangle around your legs. His hand is raised to your face. There’s a moment where all you register is the judgmental squint in his dark eyes.

“What the fuck– you pervert,” you hiss, slapping him across the chest. A queasiness squiggles in your stomach as you inch your way back.

“Oh, no, peach. That was all you,” he drawls. He wraps his thick hand around your hipbone and pulls you back. You kick him in the shin, but there’s no real force behind it.

“Y-you’re lying,” you snarl. But a brief look at his lap tells you he’s not. He’s barely touting a semi, yet you’ve got the entire Mississippi River in your YMCA-issued panties.

Joel shakes his head at you. “‘S why you been actin’ up, you little shit? Just needed to get fucked?” He grips your hip so hard that it stings and hauls you against him. You tell yourself that the moan you let out is more of a hiss.

“I don’t– you’re making shit up, old man,” you say, squirming in his grip. You can’t help the way your hips sway at the tease of friction his knee gives you. You feel lightheaded, a freshly kindled bonfire.

“Am I?” Another squeeze to your hip. “Don’t look like it.” He notches his knee tighter against your swollen cunt, and your head dips forward as you bite into your lower lip. “Look’s like I’ve got a ‘lil slut more worked up than a hornets’ nest that spent all night rubbing her needy fuckin’ pussy on my leg.”

You squeeze your eyes shut and whine.

“Jus’ say the word, peach. I’ll do ya real good. Make that ache go away.” He rubs his thumb in a circle along your skin. The calloused pad of his thumb slips underneath the hem of your tank top, a lit match dragging along your skin.

“I don’t think you have it in you, Miller,” you say. But your voice gives you away. It’s breathy, coarsened by your sleep-stained, lust-stained rasp.

“Yeah? Well I didn’t think you had it in you to be humpin’ this ‘old man’s’ leg, but ya learn something new everyday.” He doesn’t grind his knee into your cunt — more so wedges it up. Pain blurs a watercolor line with pleasure as your back arches. His hand drifts from your midriff to your thigh, arm hooking around it so he can heft you up against his thigh proper. You grunt as you end up chest to chest with him. Your hips rock into his, guided by the North Star of his hands clutching at your hips. “Can feel ya,” he says. “Drippin’ all over me.”

You grind your teeth, digging your fingers into his shoulders. He groans as your nails claw at the skin there. “Shut the fuck up so I can pretend you’re someone else.”

He chuckles. “You can play pretend all you want, but I’m the one you’re soaking, ain’t I?”

You make an aggravated sound. Your left hand drags down his arm, leaving angry red tracks in their wake. Before he can gripe about it, you slap your right hand over his mouth. His eyes flare. Eye for an eye, his teeth sink into the flesh of your palm. You hiss at the sting. It only makes you pump your hips against him faster. The friction of your shorts and panties against the bulk of his leg and the wrinkle of his denim jeans makes your clit twitch against him.

Your flesh stretches as you tug it from his teeth. Your hand plants itself in his hair instead, dragging his head to the side. His eyes flutter, lidded and dark. “Don’t act like you don’t damn near cream yourself when I talk to you like this. You like being told what a nasty. Fuckin’. Slut. You are. Don’t look at me like that. You are. Been cruisin’ for a bruisin’ this whole time — just didn’t know you were after a pussy beating instead of a real one.”

Your eyes roll back. Your hips roll more languidly, only jerking when Joel gives a particularly brutal tug at your waist. You let out a pathetic moan into his neck. You nip at the skin there, tongue laving over the scars and blemishes he’s collected over the years. He reaches down and grabs a handful of your ass, groaning. “Too pretty to be actin’ a fool, baby.”

You dig your teeth into his neck, hard enough to leave cavernous bite marks in your wake. Your tongue digs through the craters your teeth left behind, saliva pulling from your lips to his skin. He smacks your ass hard enough for your hips to jerk, and you almost glare at him as you separate from your throat. Instead, your eyes squeeze shut.

“Don’t wanna look at me, do ya peach? Mmmm, well thas’ okay.” He fists his hand in the roots of your hair and tugs your head to the side. You hear Joel groping at the nightstand in the dark, and then the flashlight ticks on.

Your eyes blink open to yourself reflected in desilvered glass. Mirror rot surrounds your luminescent face, but most of all, you can see your hips and how they rock shallowly into Joel’s leg. “Watch yourself fuckin’ yourself stupid on my leg,” he croons in your ear. When you go still, his thumbs press hard into your skin. You stare at him. “You already fucked yourself stupid or somethin’? ‘S a simple instruction, sweet cheeks.”

“That’s dumb, Joel–” you sneer, going to look away.

He jerks your head back to where he had it and rocks his leg into your clit. You watch your face contort around a ragged moan. Pleasure thrashes through your system. “C’mon, you’re a dirty girl. Watch how pathetic you look while you get yourself off. Pretend I’m your pillow if you have to, but it ain’t gonna change how I’m the one gettin’ you off like this.”

Your thighs clamp around his. He smirks at you in the mirror. Your knee grazes his bulge, and a breathy moan loosens from his lips. “Two way street, Miller,” you say. But you’re weak — and so, so wet.

You give your hips a languid roll, watching yourself in the mirror. You’re a mess, mouth parted, eyes lidded, skin slick with sweat. Your hips shudder and start against him as you start to properly buck yourself against the meat of his thigh. With the shelves of your teeth, you try to smother the depraved noises coming out of you. Joel rolls his eyes.

“Gonna wake the fuckin’ dead with all that whining of yours.” Mid-moan, Joel shoves two fingers into your mouth and pries your jaw open. His fingers are bulky and ridged with callouses against your tongue. His thumb presses a dent into your jaw. “‘S okay, baby. I like ‘em loud.”

“I like you shutting the fuck up,” you say around a mouthful of his knuckles. You can’t help it. You bite at his fingers, not hard enough to hurt, but definitely hard enough to sting. He hisses and presses down on your tongue. You make a sputtering noise.

“You were sayin’?” he asks, tensing his thigh. You whimper against his fingertips. He tightens his grip on your hair, and in the mirror, you see yourself bared raw for him to see in all ways but the physical. You rut into his leg with increasing need.

“Mmmph, Joel–” you say around his fingers. 

“Oh, now you’re moaning my name? What was it I said? Cruisin’ for a bruisin’, peach.”

Wetness leaks down the insides of your thighs. Your swollen clit hitches on a wrinkle in his jeans. You’re shaking, thighs trembling where they’re wrapped around him. Your fingers grapple for purchase and find some anchored in his hair, tugging wildly. You eye yourself in that damn mirror, the way your chest is slotted against his, how your hips pitch into his over and over again in your pursuit of release.

“Ask for it, baby.” Joel grinds his leg up into your cunt. “You wanna come on me, you gotta ask for it.”

You shake your head wildly. You aren’t a beggar — especially not for Joel Miller. You’d rather throw yourself back into quicksand. Jump in front of a clicker. Step on an alligator.

Joel pouts mockingly at you. “Stubborn for a slut who’s willin’ to spread it open all hours ‘a the day.” You rub your knee into his bulge, tenting his jeans, in hopes that it’ll be a suitable distraction. He groans, knee jerking. His thigh rams against you, and your back arches. You see your brows pucker in your reflection, your hips undulating against him.

“F-fuck,” you whine out, bouncing against him.

“You wanna come, don’t you, peach?” You nod frantically. “Wanna soak me, huh?” At that, you grit your teeth and snarl at him. You do you do you do. But you don’t want to admit it.

You squirm on his leg, desperately rocking into him. You dig your feet into the creaking mattress, fisting your hands into the fabric of his shirt. Tremors wrack your body as you work yourself on him. Your cunt flutters, and you almost taste your orgasm.

Joel tosses you off of him.

“You son of a–” you shriek, thrashing and out of breath. Your clit throbs and your hole twitches at the stolen promise of release. You bounce on the mattress, sprawled on your back and twitching.

“I told ya,” he says. “Gotta ask for it.”

“I’m not asking you for shit, asshole–”

“Yeah, yeah, you’ll change your tune when I stuff your right full.” He grabs you by the back of your shirt and coaxes you into spinning around. He yanks you onto all fours, forehead meeting the mattress.

You back your hips up as he reaches around your shorts for the button. The zipper squeals as it comes down and he shuffles them down your legs. He nudges your knees apart. You can feel his bulge, insistent and pressed against the back of your thigh. He grips the inside of your thigh, fingers sliding through the slick that’s there.

“Shit, baby,” he groans. “No wonder you were humpin’ me. Just needing someone to take away that ache, don’t you? Jus’ a horny girl wanting to go cock dumb.” His fingers graze over your clit, barely even a brush, and you let out a mangled sound into the comforter. “See? So desperate and sensitive. You’re cute when you’re not a pain in the ass.”

“That makes one of us,” you say.

Joel snorts. “She’s got jokes.” He rubs a circle into your clit, and then another, and all you can do is rock your hips into his hand. Impatient, you brace yourself on your elbow so you can reach behind him and fumble with his belt buckle. Joel laughs under his breath, working at the zipper while you undo the buckle. It chimes as his belt falls loose and his pants slump on his hips. You work the button open. 

You wriggle your hand into his briefs and pull him out, giving him a series of quick pumps. Joel grunts. “Just like that, peach. Fuck, yeah, you know what you’re doin’.”

He teases the tips of his fingers at your entrance. Razor sharp want slices up the insides of your warm thighs as you clench and drip more of your wetness along his hand. “I’ll throw you a bone,” Joel says. Then, with no warning, he slips a finger into your warmth and curls it just right. You claw against the sheets, whimpering.

“Nasty thing.” He hooks his finger and you fully mewl. Heat rushes into your cheeks. “Barely gotta do anythin’ to get you writhing and wanting.”

Warm tears brim at your eyes from the heady, deadly mix of arousal and hatred. Your cunt tightens around his finger, and without warning, he pushes another one in, twisting and hooking them brutally inside of you.

Your fingers fist in the sheets, temple pressed into the mattress. You can see the cocksure look on his face in the mirror, the way his forearm flexes with each thrust into you. “Fuck me already,” you spit. You know it’ll hurt if he fucks you without really preparing you. You want it to hurt. You want it to ache like the tread of his boot stamped on your chest. You want it to sting and simmer like the cuts that the wetlands left in a collage across your arms and legs. You want him to split you open and leave you flayed by your own pleasure.

“Alright, alright,” he says as he pulls his fingers out of you. He gives your clit a light slap that makes you squeal. You almost black out when you see him bring his slick-stained fingers to his mouth and suck. “Yeah, taste as sweet as a peach, dontcha sugar? Such a tasty little cunt for such a smart-mouthed brat.”

You could cry with how bad you want hi— no, his cock. 

“Gonna hurt, baby. But you want it to, don’t you? Wanna feel me all up in here.” He roams his free hand across your stomach, then back around to your ass where he tugs you back. There’s the smack of flesh as your hips meet each other, the whimper between your netted teeth as he nestles his cock between your slippery folds. You nod, head slinging forward. “Don’t gotta tell me. I know ya do. Girl like you, always such a smartass. Yeah, you want it rough.” His voice is gruff, lust-addled. “Act stupid all you want, peach. I got you all figured out.”

He slots his head against your hole and you let out a strangled noise into the mattress. Your vision swims as he pushes into you, thumbs dug into your ass cheeks so he can watch how you take him. You mewl, back arching into and away from him at the same time. Your body can’t decide where to go. If it wants to be further, or as close as possible to him. Joal groans as he sinks into you.

“Tight as a fuckin’ hose pipe, peach,” he says. He reaches around to give your flick your clit — a move that makes your entire body spasm. 

“So about as small as your dick, then?” It’s bullshit — you know it, and he knows it. He’s not even fully inside of you, but the difference is startling. He’s stuffing you to the brim, leaving you to scrabble and claw against the sheets.

He slams into you, a blatant disregard of your comfort. You feel his balls smack against your clit, and hear the same thigh you’d been humping slot against your own. A ragged cry rips from your throat. “Joel,” you whimper, hips trying to writhe against the bed. “Joel, fuck—”

“Feels pretty big now, don’t it?” You whine, petulant, but it breaks off into a moan as he pulls back and then punches back into you.

All you can do is take it, take it, take it as he bashes your swollen cunt with his fat cock. You gasp raggedly, each snap of his hip bringing pleasure-pain tears to your eyes. Joel’s nails dig into the meat of your ass and yank you back on him. The sting is renewed, then, as he props his leg up on the bed and pounds into you. You whimper, helpless to his whims.

Between one thrust and the next, the bite in your cunt turns into a thrum of pleasure. A persistent swarm of heat and your own slick leaking down his cock. “Like I said,” Joel grunts as he fucks you. “A nasty fuckin’ slut with a sloppy ‘lil cunt.”

You whine, squeezing around him. Your head spins. “Fuck,” he spits.

“Joel, please, please, ple–”

“Quit beggin’, it ain’t ladylike.” You prop yourself up on your elbow and reach behind him, tugging his wrist away from your ass so you can slip his hand between your thighs. His pistoning into you falters. “What’d I say?” Joel grunts. His knees adjust over the backs of your calves to hold you down.

“Keep touching me,” you whine. “Please, you asked me to ask for it, so I’m fucking asking for it.”

“Told you to ask permission, not cry at me like a kicked puppy,” he says. “I call the shots here. Like it or not.” He goes to yank his hand away from your clit, but you yank at his knuckle.

Joel scowls, and so fast you might get vertigo, his other arm’s bicep locks around your neck and heaves you back against his chest. You sputter, drool pooling in your mouth. Your hands briefly tug at his arm, but fall limp when he says, “Oh, shut the fuck up, I ain’t gonna kill ya. Gotta keep you on your toes, peach.”

You arguably shouldn’t. But you trust him. Enough to keep you alive, at least.

With another thrust into the warm vise of your cunt, your body’s running hotter than an engine and twice as fast. He squeezes tight enough that your air is in short supply, and with it, everything is amplified. Pleasure crinkles through your body like crumpled aluminum foil, serrated and clinging to you. The crook of his elbow is warm, and you can’t help your head lolling back to give him a look that’s purely salacious. He tips his head down at you and smirks.

“Yeah, that’s my hungry little cockwhore,” he says. With his free hand, he tugs your hair. You seize around him, struggling for what to hang onto. You let out a rasping, strangled moan. With your head tipped back, you can see the tilt to his lips as he moans, feel his scruff scraping at your forehead. “Takin’ it like you were made for it. Shit.”

Joel moans as you clamp down around him again.

Tears might be sliding down your cheeks – you don’t know. You’re too trapped in this, in this moment, in the feeling of his cock slamming into your throbbing, aching cunt. “Mmph,” you whine low in your throat as he fucks up into you. He’s damn near bruising your cervix. Each thrust makes your cunt flitter around him. 

“You look good like this,” Joel grunts against your ear, using the leverage of his propped-up leg to bounce you on his cock. “All quiet ‘n sweet ‘n whorish. Goddamn, never thought a slut could feel this fuckin’ tight.”

Your eyes slip shut, vision spotting behind your eyelids. He keeps forcing himself into you. Making room. Making a mark that you’ll never forget he carved into you.

Your body is limp as he gets himself off, his hand moving from your hair. He gropes at your tits, flicking your nipple in a way that draws a sloping moan out of you. He slides it down your side, each callous bumping against your skin until he reaches your clit. You nod wildly, and he chuckles into the shell of your ear. “You think you’ve earned it? All you’ve been doing is whinin’ like a little bitch, baby.” He taps his fingers against your clit, once, twice, mounting the tautness of the tension drawn tight like elastic through your body. You gasp down air as he ever so slightly loosens his grip around your neck. He keeps thrusting into you, jerking tiny moans out of you as he does.

Your legs tremble. Your brain feels like mush. You wring his cock with each strain of your pussy. “I don’t want you,” you gasp out between thrusts. “I want you for what you can — fuck — give me. So I guess… that makes… us even. Doesn’t it?” Joel’s finger stills where it hovers over your clit, and you almost don’t notice the falter in his hips with how subtle it is.

“Yeah,” Joel pants. “Guess it does, peach.”

He presses his thumb down on your clit and the whole world makes sense.

You cry out as your juices soak his cock, dripping down his balls and thighs. “Joel, Joel, Joel, Joel,” you chant in between moans. He’s holding you up now by the underside of one of your arms, his fingers toying with your nipples. Each touch sends laser hot electricity between your legs.

He slams up into you again and you shriek. “Fuck, you’re a mess,” Joel says. “All stuffed full ‘a me… yeah, that’s how you’re s’posed to be. Sprayin’ your pussy juices all over me while I ram my cock into this drippy little hole.”

You whine, clit twitching against his finger. Tears burn at the edges of your eyes like fire on parchment. “I wanna come,” you whisper, voice tinged with need. “Please, Joel. I–”

“Who do you want to make you come?” he asks as he rolls his hips up into you. An undulating pace that makes you want to scream.

The curdling pleasure in your stomach brims, stews, steeps. You’re drowning in it, in the fire lashing through your body. Fire that he lit and stoked and now, only he can put out. “You, Joel!” you cry out. “You! I want you to make me come, please, I need it, I want t-”

“I got you, peach,” he says. He mashes the pad of his thumb against your swollen nub, rubbing circles, circles, circles. You scream this time, head slumping against him. “Throbbin’ for it,” he growls out. “All swollen and whinin’ like you’re in heat. You needed this. Needed me.”

“I needed you,” you nod, exhaling. You think you’d agree to anything he said right now. “Fuck,” you wail. Your hands anchor themselves on his forearm.

“Don’t fight it, baby, don’t fight it,” he coos. Your nails scratch angry red tracks down his burly arms. “Come on me, see if it gives you an attitude adjustment.”

To your chagrin, that does it.

Your orgasm shatters you. You’re fragile as it tears through your body, tying knots around your racing heart and making your legs quiver. You feel yourself gush around Joel’s cock, gasping for air as your lungs empty. Your cunt flutters around him as pleasured tears spill from the corners of your eyes. Everything’s hot and melting, your arousal dripping out of you in droves. Joel rubs at your clit through it, coaxing in your ear, “That’s it, theeeeere it is. Shit, baby, I’m comin’— squeezin’ me so damn good—”

Joel twitches inside of you, and you whine at his absence when he pulls out just in time. With a throaty, reverberating groan, he sprays the small of your back with his cum. You gasp as it splashes against you, your chest heaving against his hand. 

You sit in the silence, high off of the come down, panting in delirium. 

Joel clears his throat. “You alright, peach?”

“You don’t have to pretend to like me now that we’ve had sex, Joel,” you say. “I get it. We fucked. We got it out of our systems. Hooray. Do you want me to pop some confetti poppers?”

“I was being courteous, goddamn,” he grunts as he stands up. You watch as he tugs his jeans back up. “Clearly ain’t nobody ever treated you gentlemanly before.”

“Says the man who got off on choking me out.”

He shoots back, “The feeling was mutual, if I remember five minutes ago correctly. I ain’t that old.” He buckles his belt up. As he redresses, you toss your own shorts off to the side. He’s already been in your whole pussy — you’d rather not sleep in the denim shorts.

When you’re done, you give him a look.

He pinches his nose bridge and sighs through his teeth. “We oughta hit the hay. Long day ahead. And you should be too exhausted by now to be wakin’ me up again.”

You clench your fists at your side. “Fine.”

You reach for his flashlight and turn it off.

Reunion Tower is the first building you see.

Dallas. Home sweet home, for better or worse.

The skyline slowly eases up and out of the treeline as you and Joel meander up the car-cluttered I-20. Remnants from a life that’s long gone, all but skeletons with the organs of another time.

You and Joel have scarcely talked. Mostly, it’s just him pointing out directions. But he does other things. He helps you through wreckage or rubble instead of leaving you to muscle through on your own. He gives you part of his rations. He tosses you a magazine he finds in a store. He keeps watch.

You had meant what you said. You fucked. That was that. He was still the man your father told ghost stories about. The thoughtless killer. The unforgiving bullet to a skull. Hundreds, maybe thousands, of peoples’ deliverance to the afterlife. The man who’d betrayed your father all those years ago, a story of which you only know the vague specifics of.

Maybe you’ll ask him while he’s on bedrest from that bullet wound. (Or maybe you’ll just ask him. He’s not the sort of man to stay down for long.)

Regardless, as you two cross the exit a couple blocks from your dad’s base, you ask him, “Do you think he sent people after me?”

“Maybe,” Joel says. “Probably went up to Oklahoma instead. Louisiana ain’t famous for bein’ easy hikin’ material. Shocker that them Cockroaches brought you all the way out there.”

You nod and kick a rock with the toe of your shoe. “You think your group’s doing good on their own?”

“Who fuckin’ knows,” Joel says. “Left Tommy in charge of the place, I’ll be lucky if it ain’t burned down by now.”

“Well, you’ve got a whole new world ahead of you. Free of debts and all. Maybe my dad will finally get off your ass. Could skip town, if you wanted.”

Joel’s feet drag on the concrete. You watch him out of the corner of your eye as he scratches the back of his neck. “There were never any debts, peach,” he says.

Your brows furrow as you stop in your tracks. “The fuck do y—”

“Got you of my own volition,” he says. “Your dad and I might be on shit terms, but that don’t mean I don’t care about him. I…” He pauses. “I know what it’s like to lose people.”

“Everyone does,” you say.

“Yeah,” Joel nods. He turns to make eye contact with you. “Everyone does. But I don’t exactly wanna go about losin’ you,” he says.

“That’s a bold claim, Miller,” you say.

“You’re good company. Even if you’re a shitass.” He pats you on the shoulder. His hand slides down your arm to your hand, and he gives it a squeeze before letting it drop. “Now c’mon. Let’s get you home.”