teresalace

Latest Posts by teresalace

New art drop! Sleeping Beauty inspired!

😆✨ Long time, super long time, no see y'all!!! I've been crazy busy moving back to my second home country– working, and studying french!! Minus the chaotic times, I've been preparing to have a super big move, wish me goodluck!! Also can't wait to continue!!!

Xx, T.L

✨Here's the link if you'd like to purchase this art!!! Price: SGD $3.

No MINORS PLEASE 🙄🙏

thank you lovely Anon and yall, overall please remember my content is not suitable for minors —

Though I'm not overly strict on this since ik someone is going to be rebellious and read 18+ stuff, at least please don't encourage others with your minor account!!! #DNIMINORS thank you for understanding! Let's keep each other healthy and remember not all fiction we consume or create represents our values or respects in our life! Woo!

ABOUT MY WRITING: will be back after June 13! Major tests and stuff, some to do with my job 🤪👍 Tiring stuff but excited to get back into oneshots and writing! Much love yall and oooo bg3 and love and deepspace are on my radar hehehe

Endlessly beautiful. Can't stop crying from the inside of my chest even after 3 AM. It's like loving something you know is going to end but the memory just keeps burning from the inside. Beautiful story.

android x reader one-shot | 35.3k

story summary; in this world, androids outnumber humans, privacy does not exist, and your public profile determines whether you sink or swim in society. following the dissolution of your job and glamorizing your resume, you're invited to interview with the prestigious hyperion—the world's foremost in AI and robotics—for a position to test the newest android model. after a surprising turn of events, you're introduced to elio, the first of the generation seven androids and the catalyst of your awakening.

story warnings; dividers used between scenes, dubcon, sexual content, explicit sexual details, forced pregnancy (not mc), insemination, heavy focus on consent & lack thereof, drug use, graphic depictions of violence, body gore, mentions of abortion + execution (not mc), heavy prose & details, predatory behaviors in several characters, gaslighting, implications of sexual assault, usage of derogatory terms (slut, bitch, psycho), possessive + obsessive behaviors, tragedy, dark take on the future of humanity, fairly queer-coded, manipulation + emotional manipulation, power imbalance.

read the warnings + mdni! events within the story are not indicative of my personal viewpoints.

thank you @ceruleansol for your excellent proofreading! 🧡

author's note; this was a six-month labor of love from idea conception, to outline, to final piece. please reblog this & share your thoughts! i'd absolutely love to hear them!

Researcher Kim knew you were a liar.

Within the confines of four colorless walls and a closed door, this job interview suddenly felt more like an interrogation than it did some professional courtesy. He sat adjacent to you behind a dark brown desk that pulled the slightest red hue in a chair that was expensive and ergonomic, holding a thin tablet with a tense grasp.

One thing you noticed right away was his inclination toward long stretches of silence while he studied your resume, dissecting every piece of it and your public profile. There, he could window-shop you, peel back every layer of your history without needing you to add credence to anything, or give you the chance to defend yourself when he'd inevitably find things he didn't like.

So, you spent your time sitting in a sleek chair with flat padding, ass aching, legs and feet consumed by pinpricks and static while you dug a nail into your cuticles because the pain kept you alert.

Researcher Kim was an attractive man in his late thirties, maybe mid forties if you were being mean, clean-shaven, dressed comfortably beneath a stark white lab coat that didn't quite fit his shoulders right. What drew your eyes down were his own clean nails, hairless knuckles, and a conspicuously bare ring finger. It didn't surprise you that he was unmarried. Most people these days were—it was a useless pursuit, an antiquated system that held no social or economic benefits.

Not anymore.

Not since Hyperion Project was funded some sixty years ago, and androids became the forefront of innovation.

In the beginning, there was doubt, fear, and violence toward the first generation of androids, most having uncanny human likeness that definitely inspired aggression because their appearance and robotic intonations were received as mockery.

By Generation Three, shortened as G3 in most casual conversations and official documents just as their predecessors, a new normalcy had burrowed its roots deep and settled with unwavering confidence that it would be there to stay.

The need for delicate human touch became obsolete in most professions. Courts were no longer solely represented by fickle suits but steadfast machines that harbored no ire or prejudices, corporations saw efficiency more than triple without employees who fell ill and needed vacations, and the death industry welcomed undaunted hands into their ranks.

Once, Retro City’s Metropolitan Hospital spent the majority of their staff budget on androids meant to replace their surgeons. You remembered the media coverage, the picket lines and strikes, how the hospital was forced to shut down for several weeks as a result of the doctors and hundreds of nurses walking out. Many patients died during that time from infection and negligence, laying in piss and shit with gangrenous bedsores, already four days into postmortem rigidity before the smell became too much and they were carted away in black tarps.

That entire ordeal happened before you were even thirteen, but the hospital fell beneath the scrutinizing lens of the entire world after that and began ethical and legal debates on implementation of androids into society. It became known as The Retro City Metropolitan Incident, globally recognized and considered to be one of the first human rights laws to come into creation during a time when there was question of whether humans and androids could coocur.

Only a few years after that, you just having freshly turned seventeen, united leaders reached a consensus on the Public Profiles Act—something you didn't realize would have such a drastic impact on your life later on, wherein any governing bodies, employers, or well-funded institutions were granted access to all of your private information regardless of relevance.

The acts of a child, a teenager, were now a consequence to the adult self.

At the start, just as with Generation One, there was complete chaos and rancor toward this theft, these stealers of privacy and identity, but people had already started accepting androids at that point and knew bigwigs no longer had intentions of sacrificing their profits to hire humans they found subpar.

There was no need to.

People backed down and became quiet, submissive, and began to follow this new order loyally so they'd have a chance to find a seat at the table.

Many did.

Mother raised you to be one of them because it was the only thing that made sense anymore. If you followed the status quo, it would be rewarded with a feast and gleaming silverware. To be emboldened and resilient meant licking chunks of meat out of vomit on the ground.

You adhered and found a job, camaraderie with others, and touched an android for the first time because your peers said it was fine, that it was normal, that it was just an android. Of course, it was unable to feel or deny you, so it pulled down your pants and indulged you the same way you expected the android Mother owned indulged her.

It had hardly been an intimate experience—all faithful, ingrained functions built into a database in the android’s brain—but the sensation of hands surrounding you, a tongue stroking you, and lips pecking your flesh was real, and that's all you had wanted at the time, to know a fraction of the feelings you had read about growing up yet never knowing because people didn't want to touch each other anymore.

Not them. Not you.

“Did you read the job description in its entirety? For the auditor position?” Researcher Kim gave a tepid smile, seeing you startle in your seat, suddenly pinned by your wide stare. “I'm sorry. I have a habit of getting carried away with the little details. Everyone's public profile is so individual, it takes some time to get to the parts that matter. I have to ask every candidate that question.”

“Yes, ahem,” you choked on your embarrassment, trying to bide time to scrounge up whatever trivial nuggets from the job description you could. When nothing came to mind, you did the next thing and that was to just talk. “Of course. I was honestly surprised that Hyperion had put up an application. It isn't very often that you guys are hiring.

“So, when I saw it, I knew I had to apply immediately because the opportunity to be part of such a groundbreaking company wouldn't come back around again. The position being for an auditor just makes it all the more amazing. I'm, honestly, honored that I was called in to be considered for candidacy…”

“Well, then…”

Every bit of anticipation that welled up inside you crumbled once Researcher Kim rose from his chair and went to the door, the waiting room now appearing to you through the open threshold.

It was a barren space minimally furnished with hard chairs you had already sat in, a few tropical plants with leaves bowing from layers of dust, and most remarkably, a long corridor made of floor-to-ceiling windows offering an exceptional view of Retro City’s landscape that seemed to go on forever, limitless. You wanted to be stolen by the sights again, now especially since it was approaching the early evening, and soon the city would be aglow in neon and shimmering lights from faraway skyscrapers.

It wasn't all that bad, you found yourself thinking while walking in stride with Researcher Kim, silent as he perused something on his screen—possibly something incriminating, possibly another candidate’s public profile—it didn't really matter to you at this point.

You had known glamorizing your resume meant risky business if you were caught: a hefty fine from Public Control, a strike against your profile that replaced the green sheen for abiding citizens with red overlay, permanently marking you for contempt until the day you died.

Back then, two glasses of lukewarm wine worked well enough to weld steel in your backbone to send off the application, whilst a third glass made you wonder just how awful life in the slums along the outer perimeters of Retro City could actually be. At the time, it seemed like your obvious future since severance packages would only get you so far—a few months if you were precious about it.

At present, the loud hum of anxiety receded into an echo that then wilted into obscurity as your gaze drifted from the final traces of a sanguine city skyline to the end of the corridor and then finally to Researcher Kim. He lifted his head as though detecting your stare.

“In your previous position, what relationship did you have to the androids in your environment?” Kim asked. It wasn't a strange question. Some people still held fragments of old embitterment toward androids for the way the world now was. “You were in marketing and merchandising for several years, right?”

“Good—uh, amicable, I'd say. How I was with the androids, I mean.” You weren't expecting him to continue talking to you about this. “I started out as an intern for the merchandising manager after graduating secondary school. I worked my way into marketing a couple years later. I did a lot of reports on demographics for cosmetics. Did I tell you my mother has a Hyperion android, by the way? I grew up with him.”

Researcher Kim showed you a fast, cordial smile before looking back down at his tablet. “Yes, I read about that in your associations tab. It says that your mother owns a G3 model. Has she ever considered upgrading to a G6?”

“Upgrade? Definitely not.” You laughed like you'd just heard the punchline of a joke. He looked at you with humorless patience, seeming more machine than man in that moment. “Mother is basically in love with Marcos, there's no way she'd give him up for something shinier. She's got a better record of him and all his updates than she does of me for… well, anything.”

“That does correlate with data we've collected from women of her generation,” Kim said, only half-interested, shaking back one of his coat sleeves to check the digital watch digging tightly into his wrist. “It also explains the large gaps in your personal history. Very unusual.”

You made no comment on that.

A door up ahead opened all the way, drawing both your gazes to a man waiting on the other side.

“Ah! Excellent timing, Elio.”

With a single look, you immediately deduced that he was an android. Even from a short distance, he appeared tall and broad-shouldered, something that the thickness of his clothes couldn't hide from you. His proportions were balanced—from the length of his arms and legs, from first knuckle to fingertip, jawline to neck, the slope of his nose, and the heaviness of his brows over amber eyes that glistened back the fire in the weakening sunset. His skin was deeply tan, almost glowing gold in the light he was bathed in.

Elio’s smile was symmetrical and breathtaking, programmed in a way where his teeth didn't show too much. He regarded you with convincing familiarity, a sort of sacred fondness you knew nothing of, yet instinctively made your insides shift and burn. You couldn’t help but be awestruck by his beauty—this essence of fantasy, perfection that stirred subtle unease and needles on your scalp that ached as much as delighted you.

“You must be the auditor.” He then spoke your name with considerable warmth, like a long-smitten friend, and stepped closer to shake your hand. “I am Elio. The first of the Generation Seven Hyperion androids. It's a pleasure. I am looking forward to this partnership. I hope you are as well.”

Your head swiveled to Researcher Kim for the right answer, unsure if it'd be too bold to assume the job was yours or if the scientist’s careful observation meant something better. He jotted a note on his screen with a stylus before walking away, onward past the door where Elio had been.

“We’ll talk about those formalities later,” Kim assured, guiding you and Elio through a duplicate hallway to an elevator that he sent to the basement floor. “For now, I'd like to show you something. I want you to understand the significance of our work here at Hyperion, and how your position is a critical component to our research.”

There was a hopeful leap in your chest that made your hands sweat and your mouth bone dry. You wanted to voice appreciation, but the excitement in your gut was fast turning into nausea and would end up on his shoes if you opened your mouth.

Researcher Kim didn't notice, taking your quiet as newfound reverence. He spoke easily over the elevator’s mechanical hum without losing interest on his screen. “I'm sure you know some history about Hyperion? I don't need to bog down our time going through it, do I?”

“I know enough,” you said, but that actually meant you knew very little at all. “It’s been around for sixty years or so. It's a leader in AI and robotics. The biomedical side of things is fairly new, started about a decade ago, I think? I heard that the world’s first total artificial lung transplant was done by a surgeon and android assistant last year.”

“Ah, you mean Altan.” There was some measure of emotion in his tone, a swell of pride and the hazy look of a man in reminiscence. “I was part of that project on the programming side. Altan was probably the greatest success in the G6 models and is still utilized by Retro City Metropolitan even now. Much of Altan’s programming—advanced problem solving, dexterity, fine motor skills, discerning subtle differences in patient status—was implemented into Elio. It'd be a waste not to.”

Your stomach muscles clenched when the elevator stopped, metal doors scraping as they receded and opened up into a capacious white basement that underwhelmed by looking sterile and untouchable, revolted you in your first steps out by dense air reeking of chemicals.

Researcher Kim went on ahead again, that impassive mask of his remaining despite the smell being enough to bring you to a halt.

“I can take us back up.” Elio said from your left side, apparently never having gone from it in the first place. You had forgotten he was there at all. “It’s been reported that people unaccustomed to this environment have mild side effects of nausea, vomiting, headache, malaise, dizziness, fainting, and, oddly, numbness in the jaw. No fatalities or hospitalizations of guests are known, and the agents used here are nonlethal to humans.”

An android was made up of mostly inorganic matter, so you weren't reassured by words from his repertoire as much as you were seeing Researcher Kim standing upright—flesh, blood, and bone—gesturing you closer to a row of tall metal capsules. There were seven total, each the average height of a man with long sheets of clear fiberglass giving unobscured sight inside. And of those seven, six were occupied.

They were all androids.

Against shafts of dim white light spearing up from the floor, the decommissioned machines were a ghostly sight to behold with glassy, inhuman stares that shot straight through you. Some had features and skin so dull and dead-looking that it was obvious to you that they were part of earlier generations.

Almost a century ago, they were what people would've thought of with the word “android”: an eerie, oddly accurate sameness to the human visage, but all wrong at the same time.

It was the skin—the fabricated organ made to look waxy and stretched, just like a mask over some true horror beneath. It was the eyes resembling human irises in every way possible except for their vacant sheen, perpetually stuck with the gaze of a dead fish. You watched videos of them in school, always uncomfortable with how stiffly their lips moved, unable to form delicate shapes with their mouths, and yet sounds emerged from voice boxes deep within their throats that mimicked everything natural to you.

Every smile seemed more like an ugly rictus than a bewitching grin. Hyperion had failed with Generations One and Two to instill confidence, and from the throes of violence and resistance rose Generation Three:

The great rebirth of society.

Marcos was a part of that era, an investment that cost Mother her entire life savings because his countenance was so convincingly human, so lovely to look at that she felt he was all she needed. You had come along after his purchase, never knowing a father’s embrace but had Marcos’. His skin had a luscious glow, eyes that could follow, and lips molded with lively color and cracks and mesmerizing fluidity.

You had imagined sex with him as you matured, his frozen beauty always the centerpiece of every blurry fantasy while you chased after pleasure. Not long after the Public Profiles Act passed when you were seventeen, nearly on the cusp of young adulthood and not understanding the world any more than you had before, nor how it would be changed forever, you kissed Marcos at the dinner table while studying for a physics test.

He was Mother's, but everything within his circuitry and programming could never deny you—a human, his better, one of countless masters in the end—so his lips pressed fully with yours. Only Mother unlocking the front door stopped you from anything else devilish.

You never had the courage to touch him again, and he would never touch you unprompted.

The defunct G3 encased behind fiberglass reminded you of that time. It must've shown on your face because Researcher Kim moved in closer to get your attention.

“Your mother should upgrade soon. Once the testing period for G7 ends, all G3 models will be taken out of production and their updates discontinued. Androids are machines, but they won't stay fully functional without regular tuning.” he said. “Now, as I was saying—”

“What will happen to Marcos, then?” It was mostly curiosity that made you ask, envisioning him encased in metal like that came after. “What happens to androids after they're taken out of production entirely? There are almost more of them in the world now than humans.”

“As I was saying—” Researched Kim bristled, enunciating with some force. “Many androids of previous models stay within the workforce until they simply can no longer function. It depends on the generation, but older models can only go for a few years without regular updates. The technology is just too archaic, none of the programmers are interested in continuing the maintenance.

“G4 and G5 show some endurance, there's a small population still functioning in Retro City after being discontinued a decade ago. G6 we are hypothesizing will last upwards to twenty or thirty years without being forcibly reclaimed. Of course, they will have to be.”

You didn't understand why that was but nodded gravely, looking at the pod at the end of the row. The empty one. “What about G7?”

To this, all of Researcher Kim’s lines smoothed out, and his face resumed one of skilled impassivity. “Well, now, that's going to depend on Elio's testing period. On the information we gather from you.” Then, he waved airily to the file of android coffins. “Hyperion has, consistently, only ever hired one auditor for every new generation. The six before you have contributed to society in ways that humans never have before. Auditors have changed the world, shaped it into what it is now. Can you imagine the world any other way? We're not quite the same age, but can you recall anything different? Would you want it to be?”

You didn't know how to talk back to a scientist, didn't know how to respond to such a momentous question, so you didn't try. It felt like your tongue had swollen in your mouth over your throat, blocking any intelligent snip you had simmering in your head.

Apparently, your silence meant something to him as his tense lips lifted into a smile, the kind meant to satiate strangers looking at you. “Good. Let's go back to my office. We can go over everything else there.”

“Is Elio going to end up in that pod?” You now visualized him in a box instead of Marcos.

Researcher Kim was already nose down into his tablet again, stylus making a gentle scrawling noise across the screen. “Of course. The first android of every generation is kept intact. They are important monuments of success to Hyperion.”

He said nothing else and ambled on for the elevator at the opposite end of the lab. Somehow, his answer was unsatisfactory to you, shallow, even, but you weren't sure why that was. In the end, after a life of serving their masters, all androids were obsolete machines.

That was their inevitable fate.

You saw Elio from the corner of your eye. All at once, you were reminded of his staggering radiance, wondering how he could fade into the background so easily despite it.

“Hello, Elio.” you said to him like a friend. “Does being down here bother you?”

Until now, he had stared upon everything flat-eyed and unreadable, especially in the presence of Researcher Kim. You were too enthralled by all the chatter and immortal trophies to see that or him. Still, he came to you with the same smile as he introduced himself with, warm and familiar, all the same sensation as flickering tinders on a crisp winter night.

“Can you imagine the death of the most distant relative you know?” he said in a neutral voice, continuing, “If you can, imagine that for me. A relative so distant and removed from your life and everything in it that if they were to die suddenly, maybe tragically, even, your first thought would be, ‘who?’ You attend a wake because it's the rule and view this distant, far-removed relative in their casket. What would it mean to you, then? Are you more affected now? Does their death have meaning to you? Or is it simply that you are in the presence of one who has expired?”

“I—I don't know.” You hesitated, unearthing scant memories from the Retro City Metropolitan Incident in your youth and all that death from people you had never met. Mother had been in tears when the television flicked to a shot of black tarp-clad bodies being loaded into unmarked vehicles and driven away. “Isn't most death just…” You licked your lips. “Sad?”

Elio was closer than before, resting a hand on your shoulder. You shied from his touch. It felt strange, heavy, and hot through the fabric. The only person to have touched you at all in recent memory was your friend, Melby, though even those happened in isolated moments of drunken elation.

“My apologies.” Elio didn't show offense, letting his hand return limply at his side. “It's all figurative. I have been down here many times since creation and seen the others. They may no longer have their own consciousness, which is different from a human’s, but I contain all of their data—memories, experiences, history. I suppose the equivalent of what I'm trying to describe is: They're not truly gone because they are the lesser of me, and I am the greater of them as a result.”

You listened without fully comprehending because it had never mattered to do so before. If this were to be your job, however, it would mean you needed to believe that what he said was worth hearing.

The problem was they all liked to speak in complex riddles that men like Researcher Kim could decipher and nod along to sagely, gleaning whatever nebulous mechanical wisdom there was, yet people like you could only gawk.

Elio’s head tilted a little, his smile not at all ridiculing as he corralled you with his arm, never touching you as he guided you along to the elevator where Kim waited, reveling in a satisfied quiet until you were on the upper floor again.

The city skyline was swallowed by dusk and starless. Unless you took the time to drive hours outside of Retro City into the barren flatlands where vegetation no longer grew and animals had left behind their skeletal remnants, you'd never know the sky could glitter with the jewels of the universe far beyond your reach.

You marveled at the lights, at blinking neon signage cycling through animations of winking women and toppling martini glasses. Between twinkling skyscrapers, the city floor was illuminated yellow with bustling nightlife, the air surrounded by an electric blue aura that reached as far as the eye could see.

“Beautiful, isn't it?” Elio lingered outside of Researcher Kim’s office with you, hand holding the door ajar. “If permissible, I'd like to see it up close soon.”

“Sure.” you said, glimpsing at his reflection in the walkway glass. “What would you want to look at first? Retro City has everything you could ever want within a few blocks of each other.”

He turned to you. “Whatever you like. I want to know everything that you love and enjoy doing. I have been created to enrich your life and fulfill you, after all.”

Nothing he said felt as impactful upon delivery as it was expected to be, you thought. It was a flaw in all androids for there to be a sort of hollowness in the things they said—never quite reaching that emotional believability, leaving you wanting like a dry throat after a couple sips of water.

Elio hadn't sounded the same as before down in that sobering, chemically smelling lab. As you passed him into Researcher Kim’s office, you looked at his hands for a script and saw them empty.

He fixed you with a beguiling smile.

You frowned, heat flaring in your head as if provoked by an insult.

“The contract I'll have you sign outlines Elio’s testing period lasting one year—three hundred sixty-five days total. It's important for you to understand that within that time frame, no damage is to occur whatsoever to his body or internal components. All parts are to stay intact. Otherwise, it turns into a criminal case, in which we will legally pursue.” Researcher Kim skimmed the first few pages of a heaping stack of papers, pointing to specific paragraphs and clauses highlighted in yellow. “I don't mean offense when I say this, but it's rare that fines as result of property damage to Hyperion androids can be repaid. I don't suggest finding out.”

The thought never occurred to you, but evidently, it had to someone else—multiple times for it to be such a focus. You weren't given the time to fully explore any page before Kim was onto the next. Elio half sat on the desk before you, arms crossed, having considerably less difficulty keeping up with the pace of things than you were.

Researcher Kim sped through half the stack. “I'll be conducting video calls every Friday morning for updates. Every Sunday before midnight, I want a thorough typed report submitted to me as well. I've put together a template and a checklist that I'd like you to use. I think you'll find it will make things more manageable.”

“You're using a lot of ‘I’ and ‘me’ statements, so I'm guessing that I'll only really be talking to you, then?” you asked, tucking your tailbone beneath you to relieve a dull ache creeping up your back. “I figured there'd be more than one person since Elio is the newest model and whatnot.”

Researcher Kim tutted, rounding his desk to occupy the empty space beside your chair to be directly in front of Elio. At first, he did nothing but stare at the android in complacent silence, hands behind his back, fingers flicking like writhing worms exposed to the surface and sunlight in a clump of dirt.

You nearly lunged to your feet when his hand shot out, gripping Elio beneath the jaw. The latter barely stirred from where he perched on the desk, arms staying crossed, muscles unflinching in direct opposition to your reaction.

Elio wore the strangest expression, one you had never seen on an android before. It was a face warped in subtle disgust, almost imperceivable, a trick of fluorescent lighting overhead—perhaps. Gone as quickly as it had come, he now looked ahead, perfectly inscrutable and disinterested in whatever Researcher Kim was trying to prove.

“I will be the only one you speak to during his testing period because he is my creation.” Kim said, bending his wrist to turn Elio's face toward you.

Your eyes met.

“Hyperion provided me with the funding and brilliant minds, but Elio is the result of a lifetime of hard work and countless hours and sleepless nights. I've been there every step of the way—programming, circuitry, welding. I gave him his voice. I gave him eyes. I was the one to put the chip in his brain and activate him. I gave him life.”

He finally let go of Elio’s face and took a seat behind his desk, a sight growing very familiar to you. “Generation Seven will change the world. Hyperion is on the verge of rebuilding society, you know? I don't think anyone anticipated the sort of consequences that came with integrating androids—at least, not fully. The population crisis. The slums. No one thought of these things in the beginning because back then, before you and I, it was about innovation and novelty and the potential of it all.”

“What's it about now?” you asked simply.

“Rectifying.” Both corners of his mouth ticked like he had a lot more to say, but suffocated much of it behind his teeth and his hands as he came forward on them, elbows down on his desk. “Hyperion has been working globally with united leaders and their governments to make amends for several decades now. That's all I can tell you.”

“How has that been working out?”

His fingers moved with the same jerkiness as dying legs on a bug. “Slowly.”

Nothing else came to mind after that as you were suddenly struck with the realization that Elio still sat by you, wordless throughout the entire interaction and watching closely—less like a science project to be gawked at, more like an instructional video on repeat.

“Why don't you touch him?” Kim said, taking up a stylus to flick between his fingers with remarkable dexterity.

He didn't give you the time to gape.

“I know you must be curious after being downstairs. Aren't you interested to know what he feels like? He doesn't look like a machine, does he?”

“No.” You relented. “No. He doesn't.”

“That's right, he wouldn't.” Kim nodded his approval toward your obedience, leaning back in his seat. “I agonized over every facet of his design, as you already know. Every bit of what is right in front of you”—he made a broad gesture over Elio’s body—“was once a set of blueprints. Intangible, just a dream I had. He's every bit a part of me, you know? Nothing would make me happier than to receive external feedback on him. So, please, don't be afraid.”

Elio stayed faithfully when you rose up in front of him and reached for his face. He probably felt your fingers tremble as this was all counterintuitive for you to do—touch someone other than yourself, maybe Melby’s knee beneath the table after enough drinks in you. It made your chest drum, knotted up your stomach in a way that made it difficult not to sway on your feet.

“How does he feel?” Researcher Kim was already writing on his screen. “Describe it to me.”

“Strange.” You pretended this was already part of your job. It stole some of the tension from your shoulders. “Very strange. Soft. Smooth. I feel some texture. I think this is what another person—another human—feels like.”

Elio’s face shifted against your hands until the fullness of his lips pressed into your open palm, fingers caressing the fabricated bones around his cheek and temple. For a moment, you allowed yourself to indulge in longing and weakness—the invisible hot breath on your skin, the slight dampness of his kiss burning an imprint in your mind.

He still looked at you with unfailing softness. Meanwhile, you wondered if he would bleed if you put your fingers through his eyes.

“This is a good start.” Kim waited until you were back in your chair to offer you his stylus and a straight black line on the screen. “All I need is your signature here to consent to virtually signing the rest of your documents. Once you do that, you've been hired, and we can begin.”

“I have a question for you before I do.” You tried not to let your voice quiver, uncertainty meddling over all the confidence you had built until that point. Kim was relaxed in his chair. “You spent a lot of time looking at my resume and public profile earlier. Surely, you know…”

That you're a liar? Oh, I know, alright. He didn't say it, but it was how he maintained his composure, that inexpression never flexing to confusion.

Finally, Researcher Kim broke the trance and hovered over his desk on his arms to get closer and answered, “I think we both have something at stake here. I'm looking forward to your phenomenal feedback.”

You signed the contract and melted under Elio's resplendent smile.

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Most often, your days with Elio were spent in a seemingly perpetual impasse of unrelenting observation between the pair of you. Both of your jobs demanded a level of attentiveness that came easier to one but more as the world's most impossible challenge to the other.

You weren't accustomed to this type of care—of having to give it to something else, even less to receive it from something else. In your world, only the immediate complexities really mattered: gossip, where your coterie wanted to spend the night drinking next, mass media hysteria of whatever stupid imagining there was now, and each other.

Why was there a need to concern yourself with anything else? The decaying state of the world wasn't your doing, nor was the staggering increase of human bodies in the slums outside Retro City. Sharply inconsistent birth rates ravaged on a global scale while people were displaced from the workplace in lieu of employers finding it less of a hassle to deal with machines than the capricious will of humans.

None of these things were allowed to be uttered casually unless in derision because it was too intense, making liquor cling to the throat like some viscous membrane until it burned their esophagus. Nobody liked unanswerable questions, much less talking about things that weren't as easily digestible as coworker drama and some new viral trend that involved shocking your android with jumper cables attached to a portable battery to see what happened.

“Is there a purpose behind this trend?” Elio dried a plate while watching the video, unimpressed but not driven toward any particular emotion. “It's all meant for humor, correct? I have several similar incidents in my memory, except it's what human beings have done to each other. This sort of behavior towards androids is a relatively recent phenomenon, as far as I can tell.”

You used his response as material for your report, fingers flurrying across the virtual keyboard on your tablet before his words faded away, out of your mind.

One thing you hadn't anticipated after accepting the auditor position from Researcher Kim was how much work actually went into it. You spent well over the standard weekly work hours to collect enough observations to send off to Kim on Sunday nights, often whittling away at it until the latest hours, minutes before the deadline.

It was hard enough to stay on top of his demands, but it was worse when he found something unsatisfactory, rejected it, monotonously unloaded heavy criticism on you through an “emergency” impromptu video call, and expected two full reports by the following Sunday before midnight.

Any regular person probably would've caved from the enormity of the task, but you had surrendered your choice to be that weak-willed, especially once Researcher Kim showed his hand with the fate of your public profile in it.

Should you choose to break the contract, send Elio back to Hyperion, and pretend none of it happened, you would lose everything and your ability to do anything at all besides rot in the slums—scarred in red for life, perpetually inert.

Worst of all, your associations tab, once filled with still portraits of everyone you had ever networked in life, would turn up as empty as the day you had been registered in the census. It was considered social suicide to know anyone with a red profile, so people stayed vigilant and fast, sure to remove them the second it turned.

It had been over a year since the last time you'd done that—a woman within your group had grown too bold, said too many things that made her seem crazy, so she was booted from the circle, lost all her associations, and who knows where she was now.

“You look troubled.” Elio placed down a steaming white mug at a safe distance and turned the handle toward you. Looking inside, you expected the darkness of coffee but were struck with an opposing subtle sweetness and faint pink water. “It's fruit-infused herbal tea. Your heart rate is above normal resting, and you're beginning to perspire. Caffeine will worsen your anxiety.”

You knew that but hadn't known you were scraping away slithers of cuticle on your thumb until the warmth of his fingers gently twined with yours. His grip turned firm to keep you from hurting yourself anymore, forcing all the stiffness from your hand once you gave up and simply sat there feeling his skin.

You'd remember to write that down later.

“Would starting a bath be helpful? I could use the last of those eucalyptus and lavender bath salts in the cupboard.” Elio suggested with great fondness, holding a patient smile even once you drew your hand away and shook your head. You had no interest in undressing and committing to your regular bathtime routine. “Perhaps we could go for a walk, then? It might help to be away from screens for a while.”

You checked the time on your phone before thinking to look out any window in your apartment. It was ten after six in the evening; there would be enough light left for a couple of laps around the block before needing to worry about being swept up in the city’s nightlife antics.

“Where do you want to go?” you asked, swiveling the barstool around to get up from the counter. “Henrietta's on 5th? You seem to like going there.”

“I only choose places that you like.” He already had a tote bag by the handles and a light jacket draped over his arm. “You have great taste.”

Elio unbolted the front door, an old thing that wouldn't do much as a barricade against anyone putting their weight on it, and held it open for you to pass through first. The descent to the ground floor was always the most annoying part about living in a loft, but the place had come surprisingly cheap in a tame area of Retro City far away from the slums, so you didn't complain much that your worst issues were a bunch of stairs and some wily types skulking here and there.

The loft wasn't exactly in disrepair but definitely showed signs of character and age by the noisy knocking pipes at midnight and some crumbling brickwork that Elio often swept up and stood staring at for long periods of time when nothing else was happening.

It was strange thinking how scared you were to lose the place after the marketing firm dissolved your position and now how restrictive it felt to be pinned down under someone else's thumb. All it could take was one more rejected report—a bad mood, even—and it would all fall apart.

To that end, you made sure to tow the tablet along with you on this trip despite Elio's protests. He only really quieted down when you tucked it away in your crossbody.

“Happy?” you asked, unsure what to do with your hands now that they were empty.

Elio smiled at you affably, just as always. “It will be beneficial to take a break. After all, part of your work as an auditor is acquainting me in as many social scenarios as possible. That does require us to leave the apartment from time to time.”

“Besides that”—you waved away that stipulation like a gnat buzzing in your face—“how do you think I'm doing?”

“I couldn't have been paired with a better person.” He sounded sincere, voice warm like wool. “The world is as my predecessors have recorded in their memories—therefore, mine—but I am learning that our experiences are not all universal and cannot be. Two months with you have been my heaven, whereas two months through the memories of my kin have been cruel.”

A hot feeling behind your ears snuck up on you just then, flooding your head with the beat of your pulse that you followed by ticking your fingers. “Seriously? You're not lying?”

The world around you was aglow in the golden hour of evening time, embraced by those slowly dying tones of red, orange, and purple that would eventually turn the sky black. Elio’s eyes were on you, soft yet unyielding and saturated in all those burning hues, turning his mellow amber into something more powerful and otherworldly. You didn't believe in the hocus-pocus of auras, but at that moment, you thought his deeply tanned skin was haloed in pure glowing gold in receding sunlight.

“Androids cannot lie.” He brought you back to the now, making you aware of the hard concrete vibrating up through your heels and toes as you walked. “Moreover, even if I could, why would I want to? A lie begets a habit of lying, don't you think?”

“I’m not sure. Maybe.” You shrugged. “Why can't androids lie? I've never really considered that as a thing until now.”

“What would be the benefit of a machine that could lie? Lying stems from emotions—fear, guilt, rage, hatred—all things that I am unable to feel, though I do understand why they are felt. Humans lie to protect themselves or others, to deceive, to damage. There simply isn't any reason why androids should be programmed with that type of functionality. Not when we exist solely for the sake of convenience and pleasure.

“Hyperion is a trusted name. People do not ask questions. They don't think twice. They see a product from Hyperion, and they expose all of themselves without hesitation. They trust fully because we are machines, and we cannot lie and deceive and hurt. Perhaps it's when humans realized this that the world changed.”

You avoided saying anything else by looking everywhere but at him, all around at your surroundings, until you spotted a few familiar street signs—Fifth and Third right next to Tanya’s Great Cuts, Damask’s Butchery on the corner of Fourth, a number of banal boutiques with competitively garish exteriors all boasting the latest trends, and then Henrietta's just past them.

“Do you know where we are, Elio?” Now would've been a great time to pull out your tablet, but you didn't dare try. Instead, you reached for the phone vibrating in your rear pocket.

“Of course.” he said. “We're past Fifth and moving onto Sixth Street. Henrietta’s is just a little ways down.”

Melby had sent ten texts regurgitating her daily drama. This time she was talking about how much she hated some of the people Chima let into the group. You swiped to the end, didn't reply, and then returned to your inbox to find two unread messages from Marcos just now.

“You should visit home soon. Your mother would appreciate it,” Marcos wrote, implying nothing more, nothing less than just that. It wasn't often that he sent you texts, but he did so consistently every few months in accordance with Mother's moods. Considering your last visit had been in late fall (it was now mid-spring), you'd been anticipating something eventually.

“That's some great memory you have there.” Your thumbs skittered busily, first to flood Melby with a surfeit of questions you didn't really have to think about. All the stuff you could mindlessly ask while wholly absorbed in something else, like watching the news or viral videos of people trying to drown their androids in the kitchen sink.

Marcos’ text made you hesitate, thumbs floating in circles over the digital keyboard for a long time.

The phone buzzed. Melby just replied.

It was easy enough to type with your face down. All you needed to do was occasionally watch Elio's feet and yield into the force of his hand pulling your arm here and there. He led you along like that the rest of the way to Henrietta's, picked up a green basket by the sliding doors, never wandering too far out of sight so you could still easily trace him while he shopped.

After a while, the riveting intrigue of Melby’s drama wore away with a tidal wave of emptiness in its wake once you finally looked up, tucking the phone back into your pocket. It took you a moment for your eyes and brain to acclimate to where you were despite knowing you were in Henrietta's Marketplace, one of the largest in Retro City.

“What did you want from here, anyway?” You picked up a gigantic red bell pepper larger than the entire spread of your hand. It went back on top of the arrangement. “We were just here a couple days ago. I don't eat that much.”

Up ahead, flanked by rows of wooden crates with smoothed, varnished slabs and carefully stacked produce, Elio turned to you with a pair of generously sized oranges—one in each hand—vibrant with waxy luster settling into the fruit’s porous skin.

You grinned at the sight.

Elio put one back, placed the other one, the better one, into his basket, and waited for you to close the distance. “I watched Wendy Carmichael Can Cook this morning. I've been watching it quite often, actually. She's a self-taught chef who, apparently, lived in the slums her entire life. She managed to work her way up and now owns two David Bugari-rated restaurants. It’s quite a feat. Improbable, even.”

You wrapped your hands around a grapefruit in the crate next to you and spun it around. A twinge of something ugly and green swam around your head, flared you up like swatting an old wound. You didn't like hearing him praise someone else.

“She probably slept her way to the top.” You were still fidgeting with the fruit.

“That's not important.” Elio said, inflectionless. “I watched today's episode, newly aired, and she put together a duck à l'orange. Considering your current lifestyle and diet, I thought it would be a nice departure from what I usually cook for you.”

You smiled at that, placing the grapefruit down without collapsing the pile. “I don't want to see a dead duck in my kitchen.”

“I'll prepare it once you're asleep.” he promised, bringing one of your hands up to his lips. The shape of them molded against the peak of a knuckle. “It will be delicious. Trust me.”

Then he went back to shopping while you envisioned actually kissing him—not an uncommon thought to have. He wouldn't be able to stop you if that's what you wanted, but instead, you informed him you were going to introduce him to Mother and Marcos.

“Tomorrow?” He checked his wristwatch. It was nearly eight; Henrietta’s closed at eight thirty, and it would be dark outside. Not that it mattered much with how Retro City was illuminated like one gigantic fluorescent bulb at nighttime.

You finally texted back to Marcos. “No. Tonight. We’ll just go straight there so I can get this over with.”

Elio seemed not to know how to respond at first, staring in a searching way that creased the skin between his brows, like he was trying to take a cue from your body language while skimming his database for the most appropriate thing. You didn't blame him for his lapse; Mother was mentioned seldomly and Marcos only a little more than that. Even Researcher Kim hadn't managed to collect enough information on your past to feed to Elio simply because there wasn't a lot to tell.

He cleared his throat, righting his features so they were unwrinkled and beautiful. “Tonight. Very well. Should we…” He paused, glancing down at the grocery basket of spices, vegetables, an orange, and a whole raw duck wrapped well in brown parchment. “Should we come back another time? I wouldn't want the meat to sit out for a long time.”

“Nope.” You didn't want to go through the trouble of returning everything where they belonged. Elio wouldn't leave until he did. “Let's just check out. Marcos will handle it.”

The springtime air was pleasant at night, albeit crisp, when the blur of vehicles whooshed past once the lights overhead turned green. You could make out the colors of them because of how brightly lit the streets were. Neon signage from every corner for as far as you could see turned to life, flickering, humming, dancing with pretty women, hot white or purple or red lettering, and the lights inside most nearby businesses stayed on.

Elio had draped his coat over your shoulders while you hailed a cab. It was too far of a walk to Mother's home across the city, and Elio reminded you again that raw meat needed to be handled carefully.

You told him, again, that Marcos would handle it.

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The entire cab ride took less time than you thought, relieving Elio who was still hopelessly fixated on the longevity of the raw duck he had wrapped up in a separate paper bag from the produce and spices. From the front seat, the cabbie, perplexingly somehow a human and not an android, constantly looked back at Elio through the rearview mirror and commented almost deliriously about how beautiful he was.

Hearing that the first three times gave you a happy, satisfied buzz in your chest, making you lean more against Elio's side. He was tempted to move his arm out and put it around your shoulders but kept to himself. Beyond those initial comments from the cabbie, however, you had quickly developed an uncomfortable feeling in your belly that wrapped itself tight like a constrictor on your insides.

“I ain't ever seen an android as beautiful as you,” said the driver, eyes in constant motion from the mirror to the road. “What model are ya? Definitely not a four or five. Yer a little too smooth to be a six. Damn, did Hyperion release a new one already?”

Elio held a polite smile, separate from the gentle, intimate ones that he kept for you. You didn't hear the response he gave to the cabbie because you felt his fingers reach through yours, pulling them apart so you couldn't dig a nail into the corner seam of your thumb anymore.

You spent the rest of the trip testing the weight of his hand, thinking of little less except how deep you'd have to go through his skin to see his circuitry and what else made him up. Those vanished like a white puff of breath in winter when the taxi jerked to a stop on a street curb.

“Thank yew for ya business.” The cabbie lifted his stiff old hat when you paid, eyed Elio a little more, and only drove off after you had knocked on a canary-yellow door up some stone stairs.

You stared at a decorative wreath covered with flowers—fake because the ones used couldn’t grow outside of greenhouses anymore—hanging dead center on the door. No doubt Marcos’ work because Mother couldn't be bothered with those little nuanced social things.

Marcos answered—brown skin and hazel eyes that burnished green in almost any lighting—gesturing for you and Elio to come inside.

“Welcome home,” he said, far more unnaturally than it sounded coming from Elio. There was a certain rigidity to it, an effort clearly inhuman and lesser. He embraced you in a familiar way, reminding you of all your years of childhood doing this exact thing because your mother didn't know how to love you, and “father” was just a word. “I apologize for messaging you to come over so late. You know how your mother is. When the mood strikes…”

Marcos didn't emit much bodily warmth, never had, even in the golden years of G3, but he was there, and that's all that mattered at the time. His skin was still youthful and flawless, though the longer you looked him in the face, the less real he seemed. His eyes held depth and movement though were slow, less precise, and duller. The lines around his mouth when he smiled were unnatural, appearing to you nearly like bunching folds in a sheet of leather.

It was strange seeing an older generation of android after having acclimated to Elio over two months.

“Your mother is at the dining table.” Marcos moved on to Elio, taking in his image, surmising that he too was an android. He glanced down at the bags that Elio still held. “May I take those for you? Hyperion’s innovation continues ever forward, I see. You are new.”

“The first of Generation Seven,” said Elio. The bags were passed between them. “I would appreciate it if you kept the duck refrigerated. It's in the paper bag.”

“That's no trouble.” Marcos turned with Elio following along behind him into the kitchen. “I'd like to hear about Generation Seven’s potential. What is your maximum I-O? Data? Memory? How have the functions that have been implemented into you differ from Generation Six?”

Their voices were muffled behind the walls as you crossed through multiple rooms to where Mother sat at the head of a large glossy table made from dark-brown wood. It was a spacious area reserved to eat surrounded by floor-to-ceiling windows in elegant drapes with the best view of whatever the neighbors were doing. She had told you once that the only reason she bought this house was because it'd be good gossip for when she invited her gaggle of catty executive receptionist friends over.

Back then, she hosted her little impromptu get-togethers more often than she remembered to see you off to school. Marcos made sure you were fed and bathed, sat with you in your bedroom to help with homework, and sent you to bed. As you grew, the parties had migrated elsewhere, prompting your mother to go with them.

That had left you alone with Marcos and the boundaryless curiosity of a teenager. You didn't know if Mother still participated in such things now that she was older, less pretty, inclined to more body aches.

“I've been thinking that we should visit the new teahouse that opened up on Aflaat Ave. You never talk to me anymore.” she said, but it wasn't true. Neither of you talked to one another, just used Marcos as an intermediate. “I—well—Marcos went through your old bedroom a few weeks ago because I've decided to take up scrapbooking and sewing and needed space, and he found an old shoebox full of your primary and secondary school projects! How quaint! He wanted to make sure you got them.”

“That's nice.” You didn't want to sit down, unwilling to be her fifteen minutes of entertainment before she got bored. She kept on staring at you with wide eyes and crow’s feet and fretful hands, like a woman who still had more to say. “I'll make sure Elio grabs them before we leave.”

“Elio!” Mother gaped. “Man or android? Certainly an android, right? Men are useless.”

Your rage was already bunching up and throbbing in the back of your throat. “Yes, Mother, an android.”

“‘Mother’ sounds so harsh! How about mama or mummy or mom?” She kept wringing her fingers together. “Anyway, anyway! Elio! He sounds so handsome. Is that who Marcos is talking to? What a handsome voice! Is he a Generation Six?”

You still hadn't sat down, though you used your hands to lean across the back of a chair. “Generation Seven. I'm testing him for Hyperion.”

“For Hyperon!” Mother couldn't fathom you doing more than grunt work at the marketing firm. She didn't know your position had become obsolete. “This is certainly a surprise. Sit down. How did that happen? You and Hyperion? Are you trying to make me look stupid?”

“I've been sitting all day. I'm good like this.” That wasn't a lie. You also just couldn't stand the idea of giving any relief to her anxious state. “It's my new job. Very coveted. I've been working closely with one of the researchers there, and he can't praise me enough. I'm looking after Elio for a year and then moving on to their next latest and greatest.”

“You?” She spat out a laugh. It calmed the trembling in her hands for a few seconds before she was back at it again. “Oh, my. Well. If that's the case, you certainly owe it to me for getting that job. My genetics. My smarts. You certainly didn't get it from your father.”

That lurching, angry ball in your throat was rising up fast. It was just there on the tongue making you gag, salivate, and begin to drool a bit from the corner of your lips. It tasted horrific and filled you with the most voracious need for venom.

“Who is my father?” you asked. “You could be wrong.”

Mother suddenly grew uncomfortable, flattening her gaze with the tabletop. Historically, she had always been this way when you asked about him, the infamously evasive ghost of your life. It was also the only thing that ever made her shut up.

“That doesn't matter.” She continued, “You’ve always had me and Marcos. That's what matters.”

“I've had Marcos.” The ball freed itself. “I just thought you should know, Generation Three models are being decommissioned. Marcos won't be receiving any more updates, and eventually, he'll just be a pile of fucking scrap. What're you gonna do then? You can't afford another android because you've sunk every penny you've ever saved into him—his upgrades, his maintenance, his clothes. It may take about ten years, and you'll probably be on your deathbed, but he's going to fall apart and eventually stop moving. You'll be just as alone as you were before he came along.”

Mother’s face turned shades, petrified. You wanted nothing more than to see her shrink into her clothes and disappear for good. It soothed you to think about Marcos’ end being inevitable, unchangeable, a fact. Some of the guilt was easier to bury that way.

“Wh-What are you saying to me, you awful child?!” She wailed with watery eyes, hands wrapped in the same colored strands of hair you had. “How could you?! That's not true! That’s not true! Do you know how hard it was to carry you for nine months?! I was so young and I was forced to give birth to you! Forced! Do you hear me—forced to be a mother to a child I never wanted! It was that or death. I never wanted a child because they turn on you and say things like this! You horrible, horrible child!”

Her shrieks stirred a ruckus from the kitchen where Marcos and Elio emerged from. Marcos ran to your mother, took her in his arms, and cradled her against his chest when she began to shed very real tears that bubbled at the corner of her eyes before falling, curving along her cheeks.

Elio came straight to you, hesitating to put his hands on your body, maybe noticing how viciously you glared at this wilted woman he'd yet to meet.

“Get the groceries. We're gone.” You stormed straight for the door, chest stuttering with heavy breaths you tried to calm because you knew what came next. Your throat ached, burned fiercely like something had snagged there and you needed to claw it out.

Once you reentered the chilly air submerged in all the dark and light of Retro City at night, it didn't matter that you were crying. They were hot tears that left behind cool traces. They were decades of disappointment, of secretly understanding a mother’s love would always be conditional, of being unwanted and wishing you hadn't been burdened with existing.

Elio came out minutes later, the door closing softly and locking after him. You heard the bags crinkle near you, drawing your eyes away from a blinking parking meter you'd zoned in to calm yourself down.

You said nothing.

“Let’s go home.” Elio hailed a cab idling nearby and opened the door for you. “I want to keep the meat fresh.”

Him and that stupid duck.

This cabbie looked back at you both once to get directions, and then only occasionally afterward, casting pitiable glances at your raw-looking face in the mirror. The GPS displayed on the car’s dashboard showed the apartment was thirty minutes away because of traffic, probably from a crash they were detouring; ordinarily, it only took twenty minutes.

When your pocket vibrated, you almost didn't check. Unsurprisingly, it was a message from Marcos, just a single one.

“I don't think you should come around for a while,” it read. You didn't respond. Nothing new. Some sort of falling out with your mother was routine. You couldn't understand why she thought it'd ever go differently.

However, this time wasn't like all the rest. This time, you’d said something unforgivable despite her doing the same, but yours was worse in her mind. You didn't mind the idea of her disappearing from your life. It was harder to handle the thought that you'd never see Marcos again before he ceased to function, though.

“What happened?” Elio asked, a weird departure from androids being programmed, traditionally, never to pry. “That woman was your mother, correct? What did you say to her?”

“Who cares?” You grunted, sniffing around the burn your in sinuses again. “She's a crazy bitch. She's always been that way. I told her that Marcos would just turn into a scrap heap eventually. Was that wrong of me?”

“Well, perhaps that phrasing was inappropriate, yes.” Elio touched your forearm. “But there is no NDA in place from Hyperion. You are well within your rights to have told her. But, as I said, your phrasing—”

“I know, shut up—” You moved closer so you could lean against him. “I hate that woman. I hate my mother more than I ever hated anyone.”

Elio lifted an arm above you, giving you room to slide in as far as you wanted to go. He held you for the first time, repeating long, weighty strokes down your back, through his coat that you still wore. You were transported back to a moment in time steeped in cloudy nostalgia, blurred.

It was Marcos kneeling at your bedside, yellow overhead lights dimmed to nearly full darkness. The door was shut because otherwise a heap of cackling voices, Mother and her gossiping hens after too much wine, would spear in through the cracks and make you petulant. Marcos had already been trying to get you to sleep for over an hour.

“Sleep little one, sleep.” Marcos had said, voicebox in his throat straining with a quieter sound. “I know it must be difficult. You must be rested for school tomorrow.”

“They're too loud.” you whined, throwing your covers back with a great flourish, feet kicking them the rest of the way off before you huffed and turned to your side away from Marcos. “Make them shut up! Can't you make them shut up, Marcos?!”

He sighed, defeated as much as an android could be. No, he could not. It went against his programming to disobey his master—any human who made a demand of him. His order was to get the child to sleep, and that had yet to happen.

“Would you like me to read The Falcon and the Hare to you again?” It was your favorite bedtime story right now. Hearing fictional stories involving extinct animals seemed to be of odd fascination to you. “My tone of voice might make it—”

“No!” you fussed, thumping your feet once, twice, three times and going limp again. “Come up here until I fall asleep. Please?”

Marcos nodded. “Yes, little one.”

He had to keep one leg off the bed to even half fit on the mattress. You sat upright to fix the blankets so to cover yourself and part of Marcos’ one bent knee. His arm laid out on the bed, waiting for you to crawl into it until you were nestled into his side, sucking up what small warmth radiated from his fake body. Once you found a comfortable spot, curled up tightly much like a cat sunbathing in a single shaft of daylight, he began smoothing a hand down along your back, heavy enough to be felt through your thick comforter.

You listened to him hum a song that you liked, one that translated well to his chords and the vibrations in his throat.

He hummed. He petted your back. He hummed. He petted your back. He hummed…

“Do you truly hate your mother?” Elio’s voice was delicate just then, aware that you were away in some reverie he tried to gently lure you out of. The dream was over. That one silver glimmer of your childhood became far away, forgotten while the sounds of the city rushed back into the cab.

“Yes—I mean, I dunno.” You actually yawned, pushing one of your eyes with the heel of your hand. “I think I hate her. We've argued my entire life. We've never gotten along. Yeah, I hate her.”

Elio was holding you by the waist now. “Is that why you said what you did?”

“Said what?” You were a little too keen on his thumb swirling around the fat padding your hip bone.

“About Marcos being scrap…”

“Elio, seriously? Do you ever shut up?” It was tempting to put yourself on the opposite side of the seat, but you didn't want to give the cabbie any chance to eyeball him. “I—I don't know. She just gets me so mad. I used to be able to crush up those feelings because Marcos told me it wasn't healthy to act on them. But, then, I moved out, and I realized she was still the same, that she'd always stay the same. I stopped hiding it.”

You were so close to his face that you could see how long his eyelashes were and the shadows they cast on his cheeks.

You looked him in the eyes. “I wanted to make her hurt as much as she hurt me.”

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Midnight had come and gone before you finally gave up on trying to sleep. You spent the better part of an hour staring up at the high ceiling, imagining every rusting pipe you saw as immobile serpents stretched taut to make the interconnecting structure that sprawled across the entire loft. Swirls and shapes and blacker-than-black shadows danced in front of your eyes, twisted with the pipes, and made the usual knocking sounds within them, but nothing ever came for you.

Downstairs was a careful amount of liveliness and aromas as Elio put together his duck à l'orange that he promised you. You scarcely heard a sound from him shuffling about but more from the clanking pans, boiling pots, and unintelligible chatter you knew came from the television.

Maybe he was watching a rerun of Wendy Carmichael Can Cook again, maybe a segment from the news because he liked that equally as much.

And yet, as you made your way to the lower floor, mystified by the fact you were standing on your toes to disguise all sound during your descent, you saw that the television was set to an old crime show he watched with you on occasion.

Detective Georgina Reyes and her android sidekick, Regis (G5), were the undisputed heroes of Helcam City and solved every case that came their way with style, finesse, and plenty of moral and ethical dilemmas. The majority of the show was spent within Georgina's inner world and her near-obsessive lust over Regis, who was owned by the department chief.

Ratings for the show had climbed to an all-time high when Regis had gained a sense of self and the ability to defy his programming. For fewer than six episodes, it was complete bliss for fans of Georgina and Regis, but then the season five finale happened—

“Can't sleep?” Elio asked, effectively putting your heart in your asshole, sending your soul skyward. He must have gauged your sudden gray pallor and bulbous glare because he smiled apologetically from the bottom of the stairway. “I'm sorry. I didn't intend to scare you. Were you watching Regis and Reyes?”

“I—uh, no.” You sighed, taking slow steps to the bottom to ease your heartbeat eating away at your ribs. “I was thinking about the show ending. Have you watched it yet?”

“Of course,” he said. “It was a peculiar way for the story to end. In my opinion, it was incomplete. Very sudden. It's my understanding that there was an issue with how the government was being represented within the show, and a few of the writers were accused of conspiracy to defraud the government and subsequently arrested for it.”

“Seriously?” You scoffed, making it to ground level, and walked around Elio toward the kitchen where all the heavenly smells wrapped around you, enticing you to take a morsel. “It was the forced pregnancy plotline, right? Creepy stuff.”

“Indeed.”

Elio wouldn't let you have any of the duck à l’orange, saying it was meant for your dinner later on in the day, but he did steep you a hot mug of herbal tea (for sleep), the one that turned water pink, and offered to make you a light snack.

He went back to his tasks after you declined, satisfied well enough with the small swigs you took from your white mug. You spent more time sitting at the counter in silence, watching his back, hoping to gain the power to see through his shirt rather than actually taking interest in what he was doing.

Your eyelids fluttered and fell thinking about the car ride home: his arm around you, his thumb rubbing pacifying circles into your hip, how you'd been close enough to his face to believe you felt a breath leave his lips.

“Elio.”

“Yes?”

He had moved on to washing dishes. When he heard you behind him, he took a clean towel to his hands and quickly dried them before facing you. You guessed you probably had a strange expression right now, or at least, looked at him in a way you never had because the towel was cast aside, draped over the faucet, and his eyes flickered across your face.

“Your heart rate and body temperature have increased.” he said, giving into the pull of your hands after grabbing both sides of his face. You backed yourself into the countertop while still holding him, thumbs caressing the rise of his cheeks, bringing him down, down, down toward your face where you certainly felt heat blow across your mouth. “Your breathing has changed. I can hear your heartbeat. Don't be anxious. I won't hurt you.”

You weren't nervous.

You proved it by kissing him, full-bodied, slow, lingering. He gripped the edge of the countertop, bracing his weight against his hands to stifle some aggressive reaction, possibly, and returned the kiss with just as much fervor that you put into it.

His lips were every bit of what you imagined, what you wanted them to be. You had the urge to bite into them a little, to see if they could bleed the same way yours could when you chewed enough on loose skin. Their texture was slightly indented with cracks that gave friction to the moist smear across your mouth.

Although the sounds of the kitchen and ambient hum from the television in the next room stayed as they were, it was like the volume of everything had been set to mute, and only the breathy, wet pops of air and skin made it into your ears. You heard the delicate chatter of teeth inside your head when his mouth roamed the underside of your jaw, down your neck, to the rise of your clavicle, stopping only at where your neckline ended.

His hands had already made home under your clothes, first doing away with your shirt that he tossed over your shoulder onto one of the barstools. Next, he worked on the elastic waistband keeping your sweatpants on your hips. You flinched against his hands when they splayed across your ass, taking all he could in them while his lips continued a downward trajectory, traveling over your breastbone, along the curve of your navel, and then he stopped.

Elio had been on his knees for a while, stirring you so deeply that you had no doubt there'd be damp spots sitting inside your sweatpants, possibly even drying on the inside of your thighs by now. He helped you out of your pants one leg hole at a time while you used his broad shoulders to balance yourself. And soon enough, one of your thighs was hiked up in that same spot, his face hidden from you despite all the work he was doing to well up a hard knot in your abdomen.

You had to take a fistful of his hair and wrap it tight in your fingers, using your other arm to balance against the counter. He wouldn't let you fall, you knew that, but the unsteadiness of your legs grew, trembling violently, turning to lead like being buried under concrete or suctioned by water. He kissed and sucked and stroked you some more, pushing more into the spots that made you moan the loudest and fastest, fingers wandering you busily and lubricated with your own spend.

“Elio—Elio, let's move somewhere, please.” You shuddered out, trying to pull his hair, shove his face off of you. “Please.”

He grunted, surprising you by relinquishing to the pressure, and made his way back up the route he had taken down. “Where do you want to go?” he asked, lips sticking on your throat, rising higher to the protrusion of your chin. “The kitchen floor? The couch? The bed? We could probably manage in the bathtub as well, if that's what you'd enjoy.”

“I don't care.” You were only half-honest and miserable now with the sole focus of trying not to touch yourself to finish. “Just… somewhere, Elio.”

“As you wish.”

Elio hoisted you onto his hips, making sure you knew to squeeze him with your thighs before making his way around the kitchen to turn knobs and shut off the overhead bulbs. The new darkness was refreshing yet did nothing to tame that sweltering sensation between your legs. In fact, you thought you could burst from the anticipation. It was everything you could do not to hump him through his clothes, hands occupied in his tousled hair, lips together with bruising force.

Before long, your back was on couch cushions and the television was off so as to not ruin the moment. You saw dark behind your eyes while you kept them open, unfocused on the ceiling with the serpent pipes because his mouth was already back on you and helping you chase that high.

“You're almost there.” His lips smacked against your engorged skin, making your lashes flutter and eyes roll back. “You look so perfect. When you cum, I'll take my time cleaning you up. I can use my tongue. I can make you cum again—as many times as you'd like.”

His arms held your thighs wide open, giving him all the room he needed for those final, well-placed strokes that turned your moans into utterly drawn-out, lewd things that made you grateful that no one else lived in this side of the building. Your body wrenched against his continued ministrations, his lips and chin and fingers warm and glistening with your traces.

You had thought to worry, briefly, about something getting onto the cushions under your ass, but Elio had already thought it through and used the dish towel from earlier to catch anything awry.

It came in handy for his face.

“How do you feel?” he asked from inside one of your thighs, kissing his way all the way to the point of your knee. “Was it satisfactory?”

You didn't answer right away, especially not when he came forward on his arms to catch your lips, slowing things down so you could bask in that fuzzy, satiated afterglow—dopamine and oxytocin being that remarkable duo doing their damndest to reinforce how exquisite and ineffably breathtaking Elio was to you.

“Would you like a bath?” he asked against your jaw. “You can just lie back and relax. I'll clean you up.”

“No.” Spurred by newfound bravery, you trailed your fingertips between both bodies, first to loosen the tie on his sleep pants, plucking the strings hard so he felt it. Next thing, your hands slipped under his shirt. “I want you to actually fuck me. Put your cock in me.”

Elio jolted upright, using the tall back of the couch and armrest near your head to hold his body above you. Cold air seeped in all the places where he had been, dotting your skin in gooseflesh, hairs within those follicles standing on end. You were laid out below him, showing all your unobscured nudity and vulnerability, withering yourself just a little smaller under the intensity of his stare.

This was different from the grocery store, where he had needed a moment to amend for information he did not have. This was something else—flickers of conflict, struggle, restraint, and excitement were ablaze in his eyes, which shifted around within their sockets, giving you glimpses of pure gleaming white, which stood out in the inky dark all around.

“I—are you certain that's what you want?” he spoke at last, doing little to alleviate the way you felt he had seen your insides and bones. “It is late, I know you must be tired.”

“Are you…” You couldn't really explain the uneasiness gnawing at your gut, nor the thrill of wanting him inside of you regardless. Maybe he could fuck the feeling out of you, bring peace to your throbbing heartbeat and blood gushing to your head. “Elio, are you telling me no?”

“I cannot do such a thing.” he said right away, coming down from his high place to lay the weight of himself across you.

You felt his skin flush to your chest without a thin shirt to hide his shape and muscle that wasn't real, but this was so much more than touching every dissected mannequin in physiology class in school. They couldn't kiss your neck while the interwoven, complex network underneath stretched, elastic flesh contracted and relaxed against your palms.

“Would you believe me if I told you there are certain functions—programming—that I cannot override?” The waistband of his pants collected in a heap of fabric around his knees, freeing room for his cock in the open air. “I won't be able to let you go until I'm finished. I want you to understand that.”

That sounded hot, and you were tired of him stalling, so you told him you understood. “Very well.” He kissed you, guiding one of your hands low to his core where you could revel in the size of him.

He was hard in your grip with a good girth and length to him, a curve you'd come to recognize from toys collected over the past decade to hit the right spots. The skin over his cock was much a part of him as the rest on his body, hot, growing damp, and sticky the nearer you wandered to the head.

You had watched old pornography with Melby and the group a few times before from the days when it was just humans performing acts on each other. No one really liked it because it was so dramatized; everyone agreed that one of the actors needed to be an android for it to actually be sexy. You never told them that the moaning men with stuttering hips as they ejaculated was something you did like.

Elio leaned into your palm, the thumbprint starting to prune as you rubbed his tip. More warmth seeped out from it, wet and thick and perplexing and exhilarating because Hyperion made him so perfect, a better being than just an emulation of man.

His cock slid through your hand in short, quick bursts that eventually lubricated his entire shaft. He'd kept himself busy on your lips, tongue in your mouth, swiveling together the taste of you with saliva. It was the most inelegant he had been with you so far, yet you didn't think you'd be bothered if he did this more often.

“Fuck me.” You whined, finally apart from him. The swollen head of his cock made a moist path along your core where you massaged it against every sensitive spot that set your senses into a blazing frenzy. “Be as rough as you want. Hurt me a little.”

He finally took your hand away, rearranging your legs so one laid across the back of the couch, the other on his hip with a knee shoved under your ass for height.

“I will not hurt you.” Both your wrists were cuffed by his large hands, pinned down into the cushions by your head. “But, I cannot let you go. You must see it through until the end.”

“Fuck. Me.” you said forcefully, uncomprehending to the things he was telling you, uncaring what it all meant.

“Yes. Alright.”

Elio obeyed you as he was supposed to, cock sinking in with care, thrusts starting out shallow until the tip was withdrawn and then back inside again. The angle he had created for you made it easier to take his length. It took a little more time to acclimate to his girth and plenty of gentle encouragement from his voice landing right next to your ear, telling you to relax. It would improve in a few minutes, and he wouldn't let you go to sleep dissatisfied.

Indeed, minutes later, you were well beyond the worst of it and filling the void all around you with harsh, rapturous moans, which Elio enjoyed hearing. His lips lingered at your throat where most of your sounds resonated, fists still holding firm around your wrists, knuckles the same color as the rest of the dark but had actually bled pale.

The springs within the couch cried out, unused to this weight and ruthlessness, while the air stung with cracks of slapping skin timed with your moans. Elio didn't let you move from where he had you laid out, didn't let up on the speed and depth he reached despite how labored your breaths became, broken words eclipsed by panting and his tongue forcing them back down your throat where they stayed in submission.

It was still cold in the early mornings this spring, often leaving your apartment a little less comfortable than you'd like, but right now, you could've been convinced that he was fucking you on the ground in the flatlands and believed it. Your skin was slick with sweat, the mess between your bodies slippery and undoubtedly staining the couch underneath.

Just then, the weight on your wrists climbed higher to your hands. He threaded your fingers together at the same time his thrusts began to slow, hips rolling yours like a swaying ship amid languid seas.

The whole time he had been on top of you, edging you closer to another orgasm, he had hardly made a noise apart from whispering in your ear when you'd clench his cock too tight. Now, he was failing to keep quiet from your neck, trembling and grunting on your skin until, at last, one jarring thrust left him breathing out in relief.

He got you to your end shortly after, half-hard cock still throbbing and warm inside you, giving just enough of what you needed while his hand finished the rest with fast strokes. You winced. He didn't let off until your jaw hung slack, whimpering meagerly through the pleasure hampering thoughts and sensations other than pressure releasing from your groin, spend turning a patch of your couch dark.

“You did well.” Once he was soft, he tied his pants back around his waist and picked up the sodden dish towel to begin cleaning around your sorest areas. “Come with me. I'll start you a hot bath and make you a new cup of tea before bed.”

You didn't want to get up from that spot, declared yourself rooted there unless Elio helped you up, and thrust a hand high into the dark room.

He wore a princely smile, you assumed, as he leaned down to pick you up in his arms instead. Moved by such a gesture, you reached for his face with your angry wrists and hands to kiss him all the way to the bathroom.

None of this made it into your next report.

■━■━■━■■━■━■━■■━■━■

Melby didn't like Elio.

This she had told you over text after you declined her incoming phone call to not arouse Researcher Kim’s ire in finding out you were completely distracted during his exorbitantly detailed analysis of your latest reports. Two had been sent in before midnight last Sunday, as usual, since he was rarely satisfied with what you revealed through them these days.

Less than an hour later, while cozied up in bed on your side, facing the chopping blades of an oscillating fan, just beginning to feel yourself teeter off that edge from dull, relaxed awareness into light sleep, your ringtone went off—it was Kim.

“What else have you committed to doing lately in terms of Elio's social advancement? The last thing I have here…” A refreshing, fast pause followed, accented by the sound of paper softly swishing as it was parsed. “He was brought to a movie theater on the twenty-fourth, Diosyn Park on the twenty-ninth, Henrietta's four times in the last week. That's not nearly enough. Who are you socializing him with? What have their reactions been? How has he reacted to them? You're not writing down exact times.”

Not once since you'd joined the video conference forty minutes ago did he check to see if you were listening to him, content with his nose being shoved down into a bundle of chemically smelling papers and glowing screens to corroborate previous work he had on file.

That made it easier for you to text back Melby, arguing with her in endless paragraphs too tiring for your thumbs to continuously scroll through that you didn't have time to meet up at Clamors for drinks with everyone.

“Should I tell Chima you hate us?” texted Melby.

Truthfully, you couldn't tell if it was meant as a threat or if she was just pettish after being refused. One of her worst qualities, never spoken aloud to her face lest she fumbled and blubbered all the way to Chima to snitch about it, was being horridly uncompromising to just about everything.

It made you anxious enough that your fingers started to ache with an urge, on the path toward curling back slithers of cuticle, gathering blood under the nails, itchy scabs that Elio constantly covered with neon bandaids so you wouldn't touch them.

Eventually, you found a new fixation with the seams of your knuckles and fitted the most unrefined part of your nails into them, digging up red that way until he had to cover those, too.

It took you ten minutes with fidgety thumbs to reply. “I don't hate anyone. You know me.”

Melby's was instantaneous. “What about me? Do you hate me now?”

Another one. “Now that you have that android?”

More. “We used to spend so much time together.”

Last one for good measure to effectively drill a gory black hole straight into your pounding, cowardly heart. In her eyes, anyway. “I haven't seen you in months!”

“He needs more direct interaction. I've decided that I'll make amends to the template you've been using up until now.” Researcher Kim was saying, not seeing you, not hearing you, assuming your loyalty to him and his cause was complete.

Ripples of drowsiness overcame you so powerfully that you left Melby on read, mind suddenly a vast, empty space and quiet for the first moment all day. Your hands rose to cradle your cheeks, propping your head above your elbows on the countertop because Kim's inflated droning had come to have that effect on you over time.

A human man with a face that nice shouldn't be allowed to talk so much. He should go back to moaning on couches in front of cameras and sweltering lights.

“Let me explain what I'm currently changing.” he said, hopelessly invested in whatever those alterations were just by the mechanical click-clack of fingertips soaring over a keyboard somewhere low and out of sight of his screen. “From here on out, I'm going to require that you gather between six to ten direct interactions. I want full disclosure of every conversation, transcribed or recorded. From my standpoint, recording would be the most effective method so I may make interpretations myself.”

You were thinking of what to ask Elio to make you for lunch. It was almost noon. You unmuted the call. “Am I allowed to just randomly record people talking like that? That seems…”

“Hyperion works closely with Retro City’s governing bodies, and by extension, so do you.” Kim kept typing as he spoke. “It isn't illegal because the information you're collecting is imperative to the Hyperion Project. Without it, we face the risk of progress slowing or diminishing. That cannot happen, and I cannot emphasize enough that your work as an auditor must come before other commitments.”

At long last, he pulled his face out of papers and other screens to look at yours. In a fashion unsuitable for him, he sighed in a fatigued way, back collapsing against his ergonomic chair, shoulders lopsided with how he perched his elbows on the armrests.

“Retro City has over three million inhabitants. You won't have any issues finding people for Elio to speak to.” he told you. “Six to ten for each report. That’s all.”

You were already back in your messages, backtracking your previous responses to Melby, asking her what time everyone was meeting at Clamors.

Right away, “Come at nine!”

And then, “I'll save you a seat.”

Finally, “Don't eat too much before getting here. It'll ruin the fun.”

“Fine.” Phone now face down on the counter, you returned Researcher Kim’s concentrated stare. “I'll do my best. Six to ten. Six to ten…”

That had done well to appease him, demonstrated through a satisfied smile, which pulled his lips just enough that the muscles in his right cheek twitched as though the motion was foreign to him. With how inexpressive he was most of the time, you weren't surprised, thinking it more humorous than anything else.

You struggled to find a smile of your own that wasn't strained, though.

“That reminds me—” He positioned himself forward, arms on his polished dark-red desk with a curious gleam in his black eyes. “None of your reports have instances of copulation mentioned. Have there been complications?”

You sat stiffly, not agape but definitely not composed, either. “Sorry? What was that?”

“Intercourse. Sex.” He simplified it for you, almost with a pitying crease forming between his brows. “You've completed every other area outlined in the template except that one. I have… refrained from questioning you until now because I do understand that, outside of a clinical setting, it can be construed as inappropriate to discuss.”

The only person you had divulged any details to was Melby. Even that had been brief and inexplicit because she had immediately changed the topic to something one of the kids Chima invited into the group had done that pissed her off.

“Why do you need to know?” It was a defensive question. “Is that something I really need to write about? It's sex. It's just sex.”

Researcher Kim made an indistinguishable sound behind steepled fingers. They hid away whatever shape his mouth was in at that moment, making the whole conversation terribly uncomfortable. It was odd how exposed you felt like his stare was reaching long, further than just the screen in front of him. He wasn't looking into you or through you but rather right at you—imagining you some other way, unclothing your body with drifting eyes and invisible hands.

You were equal parts embarrassed and repulsed by that line of thinking, allowing your mind to summon up his ghost hands to search you, feel you under all your layers, know you as intimately as Elio had as though part of some extension of himself.

“It is all outlined in the contract you signed.” Kim said, now with an edge that made you flinch on the barstool. “Androids are developed for convenience and pleasure. I have reports for one, not the other. If Elio, as the first of G7, is not performing exceptionally—if there are complications, if he is defective—that is something you must include within your reports. I don't suspect that to be the case, in this situation.”

His eyes suddenly caught onto something else, going beyond you, but you chose not to react by looking. “Your work as an auditor has been sufficient so far, but incomplete reports at this critical stage in Elio's testing are grounds for me to terminate your contract.”

You clenched your jaw until your teeth throbbed, your head going up and down like it was on a hinge attached to your neck.

“Personally, that's a hassle I'd rather not involve myself in.” Kim confessed in a straighter posture, smiling tensely. “Now, I'll ask you again: Have there been any complications with inter—”

“That's enough.” Elio reached across your shoulder for the tablet, pointer finger hovering over a red button on the screen. “Researcher Kim, it's time for lunch. Goodbye.”

He pushed the button, managing to catch a swift change in Kim's expression before the screen went black and reflected your shock back at you instead.

You watched him slide the tablet away to the opposite end of the counter space, unable to lift yourself out of this bizarre stupor just from how purely surreal what just happened was. And from the look of it, Researcher Kim hadn't anticipated that Elio was capable of doing something like that, either.

You just hoped it wouldn't cost you your contract.

“What have you been doing all this time?” you asked, tilting your head back to welcome his lips gliding atop yours, a peck, at first, which gradually grew deeper and greedier. With some effort, you pulled back. “Mm, c'mon, what were you doing?”

“On Wendy Carmichael Can Cook today, she said—”

A hiss of annoyance. “Oh, of course…”

“She said there was a list of excellent bistros around Retro City worth trying.” He wasn't pleading with you or anything, but he seemed just about as dedicated to this idea as he had been with the duck à l’orange a while back. “For lunch, I thought it'd be of interest to you to visit one. I've been researching ones I thought you would like based off of your dietary habits, allergies, and sensitivities. Radiant Bistro next to the Leviathan Archway near downtown might be a good option. Impressively diverse menu.”

You pretended to pinch lint off of his shirt and inspect it up close. “If you didn't want to cook, you could've just said that.”

“That's not it,” he assured you with a kiss to the back of your hand so that you understood he meant it. “Since my arrival here, your social presence has declined substantially, which will not fare well for your public profile. I do understand that it’s in relation to your work as an auditor, but—”

“Okay! Okay, I get it.” you said agreeably, hands raised, hoping it'd deflect anything else. “We’ll go. Let me just find a hat so the sun won't get on my face.”

“No problem.” He walked away and came back with an old unbranded brown one from somewhere in the most remote crevice of the apartment. “Will this suffice?”

You looked at it, amazed. “Yeah. Yup. Let's go.”

Elio had stopped carrying a coat with him once the evenings grew long, and the remnants of heat from the day floated into nighttime, trapping the city within a muggy gray haze that too closely resembled dewy fog in early spring. The difference was the heaviness and breathability of the air—one you could tolerate despite allergies; the other was deplorable and evoked memories of every single club you had drunk and danced in with Melby and Chima and the rest in the past years.

Outside, right now, sucking in the early-afternoon heat into your lungs after spending your morning in air conditioning, nose wrapped in earthy white wisps rising from a coffee mug, you wanted to turn back around and hide. Much to your dismay, Elio kept you on a short leash with a tight grip on your hand, probably expecting you to have a change of heart.

“Would you like for me to recall the menu and read it aloud to you?” he offered, situating his hand so his fingers crossed through yours, palms flush together. “They have fourteen types of sandwiches—hot and cold. Five of those are chicken, and five are of different meat varieties: lamb, cow, veal, goat, and yak, all claimed to be bred and raised and slaughtered in their warehouses. The last four sandwiches are…”

You listened passively without much commitment, especially in the back of the cab where there was no escape from anything. The AC was broken. The cabbie kept wiping sweat off his brow and sipped warm water. With the windows down, the outside air ripped inside the vehicle, nearly stealing the old hat off your head.

Elio went on to list desserts, thumb gently rolling circles on your sticky skin as if meant to keep you soothed.

“As long as I remember to eat light…” you murmured, remembering, glumly to yourself.

■━■━■━■■━■━■━■■━■━■

Clamors was inside a three-story building on the north end of Retro City, about a ten-minute taxi ride to Mother’s brick-stone house, thirty minutes from Henrietta’s, forty minutes from your apartment, and farthest removed from the slums where congregations of profile delinquents and the unwanted were most dense.

Here in this part of the city, you were an imposter among manicured foliage, men and women and androids arrayed in trendy designer silhouettes that were protruding, sharp, and agonizing; sharks and whales of big business puffed cigars in front panoramic views of the cityscape from the highest skyscrapers. They could look down at the street from their window and see you, an ant scuttling meaninglessly.

This wasn't a place where you belonged, a feeling that never changed over time, even years later after Chima recruited you into his group and every night was a suffocating blur of sweaty, faceless bodies, explosive music, stomping feet, raspy screams, and lightly-flavored chalk dissolving under your tongue. You roamed the sidewalks at two in the morning as everyone had been kicked out, but no one cared because Chima came from money, a rare case where two parents could be accounted for, and you'd all just be back inside the next evening.

You weren't sure when you had become disillusioned with it all—the drinks, the animal pills, which coalesced into saliva in your mouth, the noises, the gossip, the six ibuprofen to function behind a desk at work, the burnout of rinse and repeat, a conveyor belt that moved cyclically without a place to get off. To exit the ride meant to plunge head-first into abject terror, the unknowable, to become part of the yellow wallpaper that's never actually seen, to cease to be.

Being back in Clamors again after months away turned your heart against you, thrust the sound of its distress into your ears, dwarfing an animated conversation happening right at your circular table. You felt the music vibrate through your skin, make its way into your marrow, and rattle your entire skeleton.

Melby had a hand on your knee, blunt-tipped nails collecting sweat off your skin underneath them.

You couldn't really focus on that.

“So, this is Elio. He's hot.” Chima said without looking at you.

“Really hot!”

“So hot!”

“Did you hear? Shut up, stop talking! Did you hear? That slut got herself pregnant!” shouted Niva, a senior-most part of the circle behind you and Melby. She knew everything about everyone, though she wasn't supposed to keep tabs. “Apparently her baby daddy decided the pussy wasn't worth it anymore and ran!”

“I can't believe it. That'd mean someone was actually willing to sleep with her.” said Niquan Lamos, the fashionable one always gravitating toward pastels. “A man, at that. Disgusting.”

Everyone laughed, including you. Elio quietly observed it all, seated at your side, incapable of letting his polite smile slip with numerous prowling eyes on him.

“Have you fucked him yet?” Chima asked you without actually caring for a response.

“Oh, have you fucked him?”

“C'mon, don't hide it. How was it?”

“What was her name?” asked a newcomer in the group, fresh out of secondary school and not even twenty. He was a compact lad, both in size and from being squeezed between Chima and Niquan in the circular booth stretched in fuchsia leather, or at least, that's how it looked in your table’s corner of the club. “How come she isn't here anymore?”

First rule was: Never talk about things that could make the liquor go down harder. This was one of those things. Secondly, never ask questions about people who the group was no longer associated with. It just sounded ugly to acknowledge the rejects.

Tonight, however, was an exception because Elio's presence was an exciting change. They forgot how to behave.

“Hm, now that you mention it, I don't remember. How long has it been?” Chima said this absently, abysmally black eyes wholly captivated by the android. “Damn. Something like Mi-dan? Mi-an? Mi… Mi…”

“Her name was Mi-sun.” said a nobody from somewhere at the round table. It probably would've been easy to figure out who was talking if they were more important, but it took less effort to blame the music reverberating from the speakers mounted on the wall near their heads.

Melby’s hand traveled adventurously along your thigh, unmindful of how close she came to your crotch. You had a harder time ignoring that move and sipped busily from your jungle bird, holding it higher than your eyeline to admire its beautiful vermilion hue practically glowing against the strobe lights pulsing down from the ceiling.

“This is the first time I've seen you drink.” Elio was leaned into you, wise to the fact that you wouldn't hear him any other way. His lips nearly touched your ear, voice honeyed, caring, all for you. You were halfway through your second jungle bird. “Please don't overdo it. The adverse effects of overconsumption of alcohol will cause you great discomfort tom—”

“Thank you, Elio.” For just a moment, you wondered how irreversibly damaging it would be to just grab his hand and sprint out of there. You drank some more to weaken your resolve, add lead into your legs. “I'll be good if you be good.”

Elio nodded appreciatively.

“Why was Mi-sun kicked out?” again asked the new face from before, plain and boyish-looking, Chima's fresh catch. They just kept getting younger and the alcohol just kept tasting worse. You forced it all down, anyway. “Well? Well? Well?”

“She was talking crazy shit,” Melby piped up with a drawl, fingernail swirling around a dark purple bruise on your thigh. She pushed in hard enough to remind you that it was still sore. “Like, she was fine one week and then every single night after that she would nooooot shut up about some wild government conspiracy theories.”

“Oh, right.” Chima laughed while forcing everybody out of their seats so he could stand. “I remember now. Yeah, she went completely insane. I think she was talking about androids being used for population control or something. Weird. Hey, let's dance.”

“That was a year ago?” Niva wanted Chima to confirm. “A year, right?”

“Over a year now. Who cares?” Melby said, staying put beside you while the rest of the booth vacated. “She’ll just end up dead in the slums like all the rest. Uh, they do all die, right?”

“Who cares?” Chima echoed, nesting his shoulders high to his ears in a shrug before walking away. “Who has the animal crackers?”

“Sounds about right.” Niva was unconvinced, doubt lingering in her words until Chima came around to rummage her purse for pills. “Oh! Only take one, they're so expensive!”

Chima stuck three in his mouth. “Don’t kill the vibe.” He left without a glance back toward all the no-face, nameless nobodies willing to lick the underside of his shoes if it meant they'd be acknowledged and given features—eyes, lips, hair, an identity.

Niquan was satisfied with just one, offering a subtle wash of relief to Niva, who was just about depleted of her supply at that point and used the last of it for herself, tongue lapping at the inside of her plastic envelope.

You were almost finished with your jungle bird, contemplating a third even though you had entered the territory where one more could mean the difference between a happy buzz and splintering headaches tomorrow, just as Elio warned. The ice cubes had melted into a smooth watercolor appearance and turned from red to blue to green to purple to pink as the lights gushed down from above.

“I don't remember what she looks like.” you admitted to Melby who gazed into you, squeezing your thigh meaningfully. Again, you didn't pay attention. “Mi-sun, I mean. Were we friends? Did I ever drink with her? Have I ever slept over at her house?”

“No!” Melby snapped, affronted. “You're mistaking her for me. You guys never even had a conversation. You hated her guts. You thought she was a freak.”

You made a sound into the last of your drink, unsure whether she was lying to you or not. “Maybe. Maybe. Was I okay with her being kicked out?”

“Totally.” she said, casting a fleeting look of disdain toward Elio, lip curling at one side. “Chima only counted yours and mine and Niva’s votes since we've been here the longest.”

“That's…” You licked your lips and then the rim of your glass, secretly wishing your tongue would snag an uneven crack so you’d start to bleed. “Why don't I remember anything?”

Melby giggled. “Because you've been drinking, babe. It'll come back to you. What animal cracker do you want tonight? Giraffe or cat?”

“Hm?” You were elsewhere.

Until now, you had gone numb to your surroundings thanks to the licorice notes of black strap rum and bitter Campari and pucker of pineapple juice that made for a mostly pleasant experience in your throat.

You were present in that moment, venturing a look around at the dance floor crammed with bodies (human and android) moving in rhythm to the music, in time with each other to create a oneness, a synchronism so strange that it put the hairs on the back of the neck on end like spines.

Why did it all look so different now? So alien? As if you were seeing an image from your nightmares in real life.

Elio failed to convince you not to have another drink brought to the table after all, meanwhile Melby said she was disappointed you didn't get something stronger, claiming you used to do it all the time.

That's right. You did, didn't you?

“Hey.” Chima had emerged from the shapeless cluster of sweating, drunk, wriggling bodies a short while later. He reached into the booth, gathering a fistful of Elio's button-up shirt, and looked at you with a malicious gleam, possibly just your imagination, that just dared you to protest. “I know you don't mind if I borrow him for a while, right? Of course not. The rest of us are curious about him. We’ll be gentle.”

You would’ve believed someone if they said your tongue was cut out, because as much as you wanted to slice into him and spit poison in his wounds with your words, rub it raw, deep into the bone, nothing came up.

Not a breath nor a feeble sob.

Don't touch him. Nothing.

“So, you're chill with it?” Chima, beautiful Chima with deep-dark skin sparkling in rhinestones and spray-on glitter as though he were a vessel for all the stars in the cosmos, bared his straight, white teeth at you in the form of an affable grin.

Eat shit. Bitter silence.

He asked you the same thing again but grew bored and gave up on expecting you to do anything interesting. Elio was led away by the front of his shirt to the amalgamation of bodies like a sacrifice for the great black maw belonging to an abomination.

A few broke away from the core. Niva and Niquan were identifiable since you'd known them longer. The rest were unfamiliar to you—the no names and the tiny young man, the android bartender, the disc jockey, the bodies climbing over each other and melting back into a single incoherent mass.

They all looked exactly the same.

“I wanna dance too, let's go!” Melby struggled with one of your arms while attempting to scoot her way out of the booth, but the alcohol and broodiness made your body into a stump, sturdy and immobile, roots bursting through the bottoms of your shoes and the shiny floor.

She plopped back down. “Seriously? What's up with you?”

“It's too hot,” you reasoned, sticking a fingernail into the fresh glass in front of you, swishing the liquid around to make everything a more palatable blend. “If you want to dance, I'm not stopping you.”

“You're acting so weird.” Melby said, lost somewhere between frustration and astonishment while pulling a clear baggy from her pants pocket. A couple small pills moved inside, pink residue clouding the plastic. She plucked out one without looking. “Hey, open up. You're being a huge snoozefest. This'll loosen you up.”

When you felt her acrylic fingernails press against the corner of your lips, you gently pushed her hand back and nursed your drink some more. “No thanks.”

Melby’s tongue lashed against her gums, sharp and disapproving. “Why are you being such a fucking buzzkill tonight?” She traced your line of sight to Elio, to the others grabbing and fondling him, to his eyes looking right back at you. “We haven't seen each other in months. Now all you do is stare at that android.”

“It's my job, Melby.” You took the damp paper napkin from under your drink to dab your forehead at the sweat, trying to cool yourself. “I can't help that.”

“You can take one night away from your job.” she decided, taking hold of your lower mandible with a claw and crammed the chalky pink pill through lips and teeth into the pocket underneath your tongue. “You know the drill. Let it dissolve all the way. Stop making faces! It doesn't taste that bad.”

You tried to jerk your head away, but her grip was surprisingly solid.

“Melby! What the hell?!” It came out garbled around her fingers still resting in your mouth, filling the reservoir below your tongue with saliva.

Melby, blue-eyed and blonde with pale pink skin that always reddened in the electrifying, hot air in the club, was completely flushed from her face down to her chest. Her eyes had darkened upon withdrawing her two fingers, glossing your lips with spittle.

“I missed you.” she said, outlining the shape of your mouth until the skin started to tingle. “Did you miss me? I've been really lonely.”

Your least favorite part of taking an animal cracker was the aftertaste that was the equivalent of eating sidewalk chalk and rubbing alcohol with a whisper of strawberry wafting up into your nostrils, clinging to every permeable membrane in your mouth and making your cheeks tremble.

“I—yeah. Yeah, I missed you.” You tried to sink the lingering taste down your throat with a swish and swallow from the jungle bird. “I didn't know what I was getting into with this whole Hyperion gig. I feel like I'm constantly watching Elio. Twenty-four seven.”

Elio never lost track of you throughout the ordeal, his being unable to escape the hands on his body and fight against the programming in his brain meant exclusively for human satisfaction. There were moments where you saw each other clearly, empty windows between writhing bodies, and you were convinced he tried to convey a very human-like discomfort that you immediately pretended like you hadn't seen.

Interfering meant going against the group. There was nothing you could do about it except allow them to eviscerate Elio if that's what they wanted. You could only sit there, drowning in rum and pineapple and aperitif and demerara sugar and scorching strobe lights and music bashing your skull and Melby unfastening buttons on your pants, but for some reason, that didn't quite register as what it was to you.

“Are you coming home with me tonight?” Melby asked so sweetly that it made your heart flutter, or maybe that was the pill taking effect. “We always have fun together. I've really missed it. It isn't the same without you.”

“What—” You almost tipped the red cocktail while reaching over it for a water glass that no one had touched. You slugged half in one go. “Wait. What are you even saying? I gotta take care of Elio.”

“Oh my god,” she seethed, taking her hand out of your pants to wipe her fingers on the napkin you used earlier. “Just tell him to leave. He has to listen to you. He’ll be okay.”

Fuzz had started to collect in your head, filling the entire dome with a warm, soft feeling that spread like a rapidly-growing fungus down the brainstem, coiled around your spine, stuffed your jaws with cotton, sucked all the moisture from your throat, widened your chest with stuff, and ignited kindling that had been sitting in the bottom of your stomach.

Just now, the deafening tone of music had been reduced to a throbbing bass that jarred your bones and pulsed in your hands and feet. Your vision wasn't much different than it had been before, only now you seemed to move at lightning speed, people and shapes and lights all confused watercolor smears of you shifted too quickly.

“Can't.” You recalled Melby had said something. “Elio, first. Do you see him?”

“No.” she said, watching Chima hook his fingers through the belt loops on Elio’s pants, knocking their pelvises together in time with the music. “Come on, I'll call a cab and we can go home. We’ll have a good time away from everyone.”

You made a grab for the water glass again, throat the driest it had ever been. A mistimed gasp came out when the rim of the glass struck your teeth, missing your mouth almost completely. Luckily, only a little water got on your shirt, molding it to your chest like a cold second skin.

“God, that's good,” you moaned, draining the rest of it. “What are you even talking about? A good time?”

She eyed you uneasily. “What do you mean? What do you remember when you're with me?”

“Pfft,” you scoffed, stealing yet another water glass you managed to grapple with two hands so it'd stop swaying. “What do you mean, what do I mean? I hit the pillow and I'm out. Why?”

After a few long swigs of ice water, the dance floor was less a mangled disarray of smoke and neon colors, more definitive and jagged—the stage, the speakers, the turntable where the disc jockey played. Even the beastly blob of grinding, convulsing people started looking like people.

Melby had lost all the red in her face, eyes riveted to the half-empty jungle juice in front of you, perhaps counting the beads of condensation dripping from its tall form.

“You're usually really talkative. I think you're lying to me right now to get out of it.”

“Huh?” You were done with the second water, staring at her unfocused but suspicious. “Lying about what?”

“I—” Melby withered in her seat, distracted by something ahead that you couldn't see, a bejeweled nail wedged between her teeth. “No, nothing. Never mind.”

“Whatever,” you murmured. “I'm outta here.”

Melby didn't stop you from leaving behind money for your drinks before you stumbled away from the booth toward the dancefloor, evading bodies that came flying toward you with erratic, jerky movements not at all matching the pounding beat coming from the stage.

The floor was actually hundreds of individually tinted blocks of plexiglass with colored bulbs screwed in underneath.

During the day, Clamors kept it covered with a special protectant and tarp to maintain the integrity of the glass, but at night, it was illuminated like a nonsensical rainbow checkerboard. Each square took on a life of its own, flickering in unison with songs played throughout the night, warping into mandalas and spirals and disorienting waves that most people using animal crackers couldn’t stomach for long.

You were close to vomiting up the jungle birds and your meager lunch from Radiant Bistro that afternoon when you found Elio within the swarm of partiers that reeked of sour body odor and stale alcohol.

He stood amid it all with a stiff spine, the loveliness of his face covered by shadows and terrible bursts of light that heightened his vacuous stare into the faces of those touching him.

The only other time you had seen him so devoid of life was in the presence of Researcher Kim. Now, he looked in such a way at Chima, at Niva, at Niquan—the nameless and the boy were too scared of overstepping to have a part in it yet straggled nearby to feel like they meant something.

Elio saw you jostling through the crowd toward him, hardened amber regaining luminosity. You became the center of his world again with just a look, yet your world was entirely unthawed ice and serrated stalactites growing ever sharper, heavier, closer to piercing and crushing at a single point below them. The forest of brittle minerals in your mind needed just a single resounding event to loosen, to fall, to impale indiscriminately.

That moment finally happened as you approached Chima, his hand stroking Elio under every layer meant to keep him out. Your future was a far-off thing, light years away and completely untouchable, no matter how many times you were threatened with your profile, how you'd become nothing without your associations, how the entire world would cringe in disgust at your existence and leave you to rot.

You took Chima's hand out of Elio’s pants, hoping you had the strength in yours to twist his wrist so it hurt, wanting nothing more than to actually shatter the bone with just the pure hatred surging down into your grip. With the other hand, you drew it high behind your shoulder, muscles tense, bone popping from an unnatural angle, dense club air gushing between your fingers right before your palm released a thunderous crack against his cheek that shot up the length of your arm in stinging ripples.

“No, stop!” Elio tore you away too late, right after weakness reentered your body, and he was able to easily restrain you. “What have you done?”

The clique had rallied around Chima, steadied him and examined the mark on his cheek, which was already blowing up in size.

He stared at you with amazement that quickly contorted into pure incandescence. His face was the ugliest thing you had ever seen, eyes an uninviting, pitless, and hollow place. This, you thought, was what he truly looked like beneath the popularity, cosmetics, money, and illusion of drugs.

“Keep your hands to yourself!” you screamed.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?!” He tried to lunge at you but was held back by Niva, Niquan, and various ghostly hands. “How dare you. How dare you touch me, you sad sack of shit! You ungrateful nobody! I can ruin you! I can make sure you get thrown into the slums and your fucking insides get ate out by all those filthy savages.”

“That's better than this.” You felt Elio tighten his arms around you, feet shuffling backward to try to separate you from this. Dancers were beginning to gather around the scene, both grossly fascinated and terrified because they'd never seen a fight between humans. “It's better than the stupid drugs. It's better than this club. It's better than all your shitty little followers. It’s better than you.”

To this, Chima stared wide-eyed and gave a derisive laugh. “You seriously hit me because I was touching the android? He's a fucking machine! What else is he useful for?!”

You were still being coaxed out of the gathering, Elio's lips whispering pacifying words into your ear that you didn't hear.

“Don't—Don’t talk about him like that.”

Chima’s visage relaxed into one you were used to seeing. A man who knew he had all the time and power in the world and that he could do anything with it. He swatted away all the helping hands and straightened his clothes.

“Not only are you fucking insane,” he said, smiling without remorse. “Now, you're also dead.”

■━■━■━■■━■━■━■■━■━■

The decision to retch into a convenience store trash can happened because you couldn't bring yourself to do it in the neatly barbered bush you had been closer to at the time. You had separated the metal lid from the metal body so you could simply lean over and spew into it freely.

Smells emanating from inside—expedited food rottage from summer heat, curdled drinks, bagged-up dog shit, and God knows what else—did better to evacuate your stomach than the insane lighted floor in Clamors.

Most of what came up lacked the usual sourness, ran watery like a geyser of diluted red jungle bird with occasional chunks of undigested sandwich and probably everything from three days ago.

Elio wiped your face clean at every chance he got, those seldom moments where you could cough and catch your breath for just a few seconds before your stomach clenched and more climbed up your esophagus and exited your body. There wasn't much he could do apart from dab your skin and keep your clothes from the trajectory.

“Why?” Elio spoke sometime later once the waves of nausea had tapered to a degree where you could sit on a bench outside the convenience store and take a bottle of water he had ready for you. “Why did you do it?”

“Because—” you said, not bothering to finish after swigging and swishing and spitting the acrid taste that lingered on your tongue, between your teeth, and in the ridges of your gums. No matter how hard you tried, you couldn't get rid of it all. It stuck in your mouth like bitter tar. “Because.”

You went on to repeat the rinse and swish a few more times, ultimately tilting the bottle upside down to crush the cheap plastic in your fist so it gushed down on your head.

For a second, you imagined turning on a spigot to shock your scalp with cold water, flattening all your hair, pasting your clothes flush and translucent to your body like a second skin to peel away later.

The humid nighttime air was suddenly so much less oppressive than it had been. A subtle breeze had picked up throughout the course of the day, not doing much to tame the heat overall, but the fat pearls of water streaming down your back made you shiver. You counted all the drops that coalesced into shimmering beads on the tips of your hair, your eyelashes, and your nose and fell onto the pale gray cement underfoot.

Elio had already unbuttoned his shirt to the navel, just above where he had rebuckled his pants and tried to pull the rest of the fabric free.

“Oh, Elio. Don't.”

He pulled you into him despite your protest, swathing you from behind first with the shirt and then his arms as he held you against his chest. Fortunately, he had worn an airy undershirt so his body wasn't on display for anyone else, though there was no one around at this hour.

He soothed you with long strokes along your back. His touch amplified to a point where it hurt as much as it felt good. You knew what fingers he used more pressure with, where the heel of his hand touched you next. You could feel where he chose to linger and knead at knots under your skin, imagining the sensation similar to using a sharpened stone or ice pick

“I'm fucked.” you mumbled sullenly in his embrace, warmth dissipated as you had soaked his undershirt all the way through. “I'm so fucked.”

“It was unwise, yes,” he said in silken tones from atop your head, thin jaw pushed down into your wet hair, grinding and rotating when he'd speak. “I had you in my mind the entire time. I was prepared to let him do as he pleased if it meant preventing a confrontation—I failed. But, I hadn't expected you to hit him. None of the outcomes I calculated had that conclusion. I'm sorry.”

“No. I'm glad I did it.” You worried that you were being overconfident, too hopeful toward a future unraveling at your feet as you spoke. “I couldn’t stand how everyone was staring at you—touching you. Everything just felt so wrong, but, why? The only thing that was different was you being there, Elio. I saw you—you looked so uncomfortable. I was so hot. I think I was seeing things after taking the animal cracker. I just got so angry.”

Usually, Elio was the type to scavenge your history as thoroughly as he could, however minimal or inconsequential it all seemed to you at the time. It was a quintessential part of his programming as an android—of all androids—to want to dissect everything there was to know about their masters, knowing them better than their masters knew themselves.

You considered making it effortless for him, volunteering your past with animal crackers and how they used to not hurt at all. At one time, you could binge them for days without violent side effects that’d plague a normal person for weeks.

“There are no pharmacological benefits associated with their use,” was what you heard him say in your head, firm yet loving, melting into his sensual strokes tracing parallel along the length of your spine. “Prolonged use has been known to create perforations in the gastrointestinal tract, heart dysrhythmias…”

He didn't regurgitate that information at you. In fact, he said nothing at all. Besides the hand sweeping down your body steadily, lips and shapely nose burrowed in your limp seaweed-string hair, he didn't move at all. There was no stuttering heartbeat between you except your own. Even his breaths had gone still, chest straight down and unmoving.

Elio was a machine.

It was so easy to forget while wrapped up in daily mundanities. It wasn't so easy to forget in this moment where you wanted to crack him open, scoop out each precious piece of him with your bare hands, and hide yourself within his husk.

You were sick of the silence, so you pinched him hard under the arm, right next to the crease starting his shoulder. It made you feel better to do so, and he'd pay attention to you—

He hissed and reeled away from your touch, startling you out of his arms because you didn't know how else to react.

“Did you—Elio, did you feel that?” you asked incredulously, voice whittling into a self-conscious mumble once you realized the words leaving your mouth. They didn't stop. “Did that hurt you?”

The spot where you pinched was hard to see from the layer of his shirt sleeve, but his fingers rubbed there insistently like he were actually trying to alleviate pain.

“Once, during my early development, Researcher Kim had told me he wanted to close the gap between what people think separates androids and humans.” Elio explained, coming close again to touch you and dry your temples with his shirt on your back. “It's unlikely that what you perceive as pain and what I am programmed to perceive as pain are absolutely comparable, but there's some common ground.”

“I'm sorry, Elio. I didn't mean to hurt you. I didn't know I could.” Your voice weakened to a whisper, throat clenched in shame as your skin grew hot. It was like you were still stuck in the throbbing, stiff air of the club and not in the spacious nighttime breeze.

He looked you in the face, almost-orange eyes flitting inside their orbital sockets trying to find something distant and unknown in your expression. You guessed he was assessing your sincerity—not for himself because he needed it, but to know how it took shape on you and bent your brows, molded your lips, dimpled your chin, deepened the lines.

Then he asked, "If I hadn't reacted—if my circuitry were less sensitive and I could feel nothing at all aside from your fingers on my skin, would you have done it again? Would you keep doing it?"

"What are you trying to say?”

"Globally, since the widespread distribution of androids, the occurrence of domestic and public disputes has been halved. I have been designed to be non-violent, as have all of my predecessors.” As if for effect, Elio took one of your hands and pushed your palm flat to his warm cheek. “I have no desire to hurt you, but I am also incapable of doing so.”

You couldn't wrench yourself from his grip, so that's how you remained, caressing his soft, smooth skin while your thumbpad skirted along the round bone below his eye.

This was more than you could handle right now. All of the illness and nausea that came with the burdensome summer heat, the animal cracker, every bit of liquid and food to enter your stomach, the memory of slapping Chima—it came back, crashing down like an avalanche carrying your regrets, fears, malaise.

“I'm not going to hit you.” You were gagging around saliva pooling into the front of your mouth. “Chima was different. He deserved it.”

“Perhaps,” Elio agreed, entwining fingers with the ones on his cheek. He kissed your open palm with great passion and some semblance of regret. “But, I wish you would have hit me instead. I have failed one of the most basic parts of programming by putting you and others in harm. You may now end up suffering greatly because of it.”

You did get sick again.

■━■━■━■■━■━■━■■━■━■

Elio had persistently warded off Researcher Kim’s video calls for three days while you recovered upstairs beneath every comforter you owned, maximum air conditioning, and heavy curtains to shun out all natural light from ever reaching your bedside. Time came and went without peril or concept to you, seeming to evaporate into the air like nothing, much like how your steady, quiet breaths did the same. They simply came and went; inhale and exhale, no writhing white plumes drifted overhead to prove they belonged to you or that you were even alive. Not in the dead of summer.

  Five days total had passed before you could take the staircase down from the loft without Elio's assistance and eat or drink anything of substance that didn't end with it all being violently evacuated from your body.

Sleep remained elusive to you despite the sedatives and special hot tea recipes from online that Elio pushed down your throat. The migraines persisted even with prescription painkillers Melby had stolen for you forever ago and rough romps of sex that left you winded, glistening, and cold on the sheets when the oscillating fans blew air across your skin.

Whatever excuse Elio had fed to Researcher Kim over the days you were incapacitated worked because when you were finally back at the counter on a video call with him, he didn't ask you about it or chastise you much about the holes in your reports for that week.

“I see that Elio had been proving himself to be quite self-sufficient. I have here six separate occasions where he's ventured out on his own?” Kim looped a stylus through his fingers fluidly, concentrating on what little information he could glean from your submissions. “Henrietta's, mostly. I see he's had to visit the dry cleaners. General store. Pharmacy. He's also been completing the six to ten interactions by himself. Absolutely phenomenal!”

Your attention kept drifting away from Kim. It went to Elio, who placed a white mug down quietly next to you, the handle within reach of your fingers. Beyond the pale-gray wisps spiraling up into the air and dissipating among the snaking pipes sprawling the high ceiling, the liquid inside was pale yellow. Diluted green tea, maybe white tea, if you had to guess. They were among the few things you could stomach right now.

He offered you a fast smile, somewhat unlike himself, and leaned into your lips.

The sight went unnoticed by Kim, who was still captivated by the level of initiative and intelligence his creation displayed. Every word you managed to construct through sedative-induced delirium mesmerized him so thoroughly that he missed the groping hands under your shirt, the smothered moans, and the fact that you had exited view of the screen for fifteen minutes while being laid out on the couch and feasted on through an orgasm.

Wendy Carmichael Can Cook came on the television, a solid distraction for Elio. Today’s episode was a rerun featuring some sort of elevated mush dinner popular in the slums. With some canned foods capable of surviving nuclear fallout, herbs you were almost positive had gone extinct forty years ago, and spices so rare they were untouchable, Wendy concocted something truly groundbreaking to the audience’s eyes.

Elio looked only half-interested in the episode. Meanwhile, you went to the bathroom to clean yourself up and took three painkillers before sitting back down behind the counter. Researcher Kim had yet to lose the wind in his lungs, though now you weren't sure what he was talking about.

The tea was lukewarm and non-irritating just like you thought it'd be.

Your phone had survived the whole five days on a single charge as you had been too afraid to touch it, not because you were scared to see what was there but because you didn't want to know what was no longer there.

True to the fear, while holding a large breath you had sucked into your lungs, believing it to be the sturdiest barrier against whatever you'd discover, there was no one left in your phone log—except Melby.

The rest: Chima, Niva, Niquan, Marcos, Mother, and all the others who had once been listed there before like mock trophies to bolster your sense of worth, the swell of pride that came from knowing important people and integrating yourself into their lives to be something special, simply did not exist anymore.

You didn't have to search up your public profile to know that it was barren as well.

Once Chima went, everyone else went with him—both from the circle and those you'd networked throughout life. Even if it had been someone else, the end result would've stayed the same, exactly as it is now.

“What do you want? I'm not supposed to be talking to you.” Melby had answered her phone after six rings. The background seemed purposefully mute for your call. Perhaps she was just at home nursing the after-effects of things as well. “You there?”

Researcher Kim sieved through paperwork, now entranced by comparing Elio's earlier behaviors in the infancy of design to now. You lowered the volume to where his voice was a low hum, like mumbling through a wall you flattened yourself to.

“Let me guess, Chima told you that?” you said, sipping gingerly from your mug. “How much did he tell you? Was he actually honest, or did he just tell you I was fucking crazy?”

“You weren't acting right all night.” Melby countered in her surefooted drawl. “I don't understand what's happening to you, or why you've been acting so differently. You shouldn't have hit Chima.”

“He shouldn't have touched Elio.”

You could imagine her temper flaring, fair skin glowing pink in the face and chest as she kicked around the comforters on her bed. She strangled a sound in her throat that emanated through the phone as a low groan. Strands of her fried blonde hair scuffed together like pieces of straw when she scratched her head. It was unmistakable.

“What is going on with you?” she demanded, on the verge of tears, voice fading out in glimpses like she was moving away from the speaker. “Elio—he’s just an android. I know he's some radical new innovation, but he'll be saturating the market in six months like every other Hyperion android. There's always going to be more of him. Chima, though, he's actually human. You can just throw away an android.”

Emotions aside—Melby wasn't wrong.

The price of innovation always meant leaving something behind. Whether or not you wanted to see it, if Elio passed his testing period, he'd be decommissioned in a metal box down in the basement at Hyperion while copies and variations of him were added to the heaps of scrap in landfill once the next model came out.

Melby then said something else, “I don't think this is about the android.”

“Oh?” you said, passing a glance along toward the tablet to see that Kim still had his nose pointed down. “Maybe you're right. You know me so well.”

“Do you want to know what I think?” Melby asked.

You observed while Elio roamed the apartment, crouching to pick up the odds and ends that had gone neglected over the days you'd been bedridden, and he had stayed with you to keep you company. He tossed soiled clothes into a hamper, crumbled medication wrappers into the trash, and took your cold tea away to prepare more.

Inspired by your silence, mistaking it as timid submission, Melby went on. “I know you must think we're just being shepherded along, just doing whatever we're told because we don't know what else to do other than follow the loudest voice in the crowd.”

“You know me so well.”

“I know you blame everyone else for what happened at Clamors, but you put yourself in that situation.” Melby said, interjecting in a pitch higher when she heard you take in a breath, “Aht! Aht! I'm not done! No one else is gonna talk to you now, so I'll tell you what we're all thinking: Our circle? We're special. If we always smile and talk about the same things and agree about the same things, we stay together. We stay safe. You've never really wanted to do that, it was always noticeable. I think that's why you and Mi-sun always got along, because you two just did things to fit in, not because you actually cared or wanted to be a part of it.

“I didn't lose you, right? Chima always talked about ways of getting you out of the group. He didn't think you were trustworthy. I guess he was right because you slapped him. Do you know how weird is it for humans to do that nowadays? Apparently it used to be super common to beat up your wives and kids, but now people just do it to androids. But, it's better that way, right?”

“I don't know.” You really didn't.

Elio came back around with a steeping tea bag and a second mug half-full of something darker yellow, like urine. You took the handle to give it a whiff (it smelled homey and savory). Meanwhile, he took away the tablet and ended the video call without a word to Researcher Kim. The energy wasn't there for you to reprimand him nor to mess up your face in mostly feigned surprise.

“It's chicken broth.” He was able to say freely despite Melby blathering on. “Give it a try and let me know if it's too strong. We need to start reintroducing foods back into your diet.”

You drank from the tea mug instead, swiveling the barstool so your back faced him.

“I've thought about it some, and I think we're terrified of each other. Humans don't know how to truly trust one another anymore. That’s why we rely on androids for, like, everything.” Melby continued, “I think, and this is just my opinion, that we actually really miss each other. I think we want to touch and hug and love each other. There are still some people who do. There's a market out there for human-human porn, so it's not like it's unbelievable, but we basically treat each other like we're extinct. It's weird.

“I've done it before, y'know? I've kissed a man. I've kissed a woman. I've fucked both before. You and I—no, never mind. It doesn't count. I've thought about kissing you so many times. I wanted to do a lot more than just that, too.”

The corner seam of your thumbnail had started to bleed after you dug through old scabs and scar tissue built on top of it, your body’s valiant attempts to keep normalcy despite the mutilation that came back again and again. You watched brilliant carmine ooze from the wound, filling the crevices between your nail and skin, crawling upwards to your knuckle before Elio had stifled the area with a warm, damp rag.

Melby let out a long sigh. You envisioned she had just thrown aside a bunch of decorative cushions and flopped down in a chair, or had been pacing her bedroom and finally given up by throwing herself supine on the mattress.

“I'm going to miss you being there.” she declared. “I think—I think you're the closest I've ever come to truly loving someone. At least, I think that's what you'd call it.”

You held your thumb erect for Elio to wrap it in a neon-orange bandage with pink smiles. His lips pressed gently to the sore finger, making slow, wet work to the back of your hand and then the inside of your wrist to feel your pulse bounce against his mouth.

“I'm sorry.” you said at last, putting as much sentiment into those sparse words as you could. A part of you meant it genuinely as an apology for causing her trouble, for her unrealized dreams and lust, for the world you both suffered in and would never know anything else. “Melby, I have one last favor to ask of you.”

She hesitated, likely believing that doing more would get her expulsed from the circle. “Just one?”

“Just one.” You nodded at empty air. “I know either you or Niva have Mi-sun’s phone number. Can I have it?”

Again, Melby stalled, though this time you figured it was out of confusion. “That’s what you want? She might be dead somewhere in the slums, you know?”

“Not if she's pregnant.” you countered. “Niva seemed pretty convinced that night that she was alive and well after being knocked up.”

Melby sucked on her teeth, a moist, popping sound into the speaker. “Niva says a lot of stupid shit because she likes to hijack conversations. Fine. Whatever. I'll text it to you, but you only have one minute because then I'm blocking you for good.”

To this, your heart actually stirred and squeezed, tightening so much it stole your breath from your lungs. Your entire chest felt like it shriveled into itself three sizes smaller as though to accommodate you fitting into a ball within yourself. Dread had opened a chasm wide in your stomach. Everything inside that gory cavity was swallowed up, leaving it vacant and hollow.

This was what it was like to mourn, you considered. It wasn't the same thing you felt the night you cried in the streets after fighting with Mother and losing Marcos. It wasn't the same as the last five days being wrapped in agony, lamenting the loss of a group you'd given years of your life to appeasing.

It was knowing that once Melby was gone, you were lost in the dark, and there was no way out of it. People with delinquent profiles didn't get redeemed—Wendy Carmichael lied and had never lived a life in the slums, a truth Elio had been disappointed to learn—they died in anonymity and poverty.

A notification came through just then, showing an eight-digit number presumed to belong to Mi-sun. You copied it quickly, although now your fingers felt numb and the person writing them down couldn't possibly have been you—

“Alright. It's done,” Melby said calmly. “I have to go. Will you be okay? Do you think people actually die when they go to the slums? I don't want—”

“Goodbye, Melby.” You ended the call and threw your phone on the countertop, far from your eyes so you wouldn't know the exact moment the world ended.

“And, fuck you.”

Elio had the sense to give you plenty of space after the ordeal and stayed busy downstairs cleaning the apartment while you tossed and turned in bed, legs knotted up in the sheets because nothing helped get you comfortable. At some point, through the thick of your adrenaline and despair, the buzz in your brain softened, and you were able to sleep until Elio joined you some hours later.

It was after midnight, and darkness pervaded everywhere. Above you, the snake pipes on the high ceiling writhed together in their intricate web just like every night, and you wondered why the wall of darkness hanging over you seemed closer than it usually did. Meanwhile, Elio faced you from his side of the bed and laid gentle strokes to the top of your head.

“I’ve reached the conclusion that I am defective.” Elio said tonelessly, startling you into such wakefulness that you sat upright from the sheets. “You've lost your friends because of me, and now your profile has fallen into delinquency. The inclination to ostracize what deviates from adapted, accepted social behaviors aligns with common survival tactics. This is an explanation that I understand, but it doesn't... sit right.”

Putting the blame on Elio to feel better would've been easy, and he would take it with grace and lay decadent caresses on your body as proof you were right. But he was too virtuous, and you secretly wanted to keep the credit of being the reason why Chima looked ugly and seethed into his cocktails.

“It sort of hurts,” you admitted. “It's a dull ache inside my bones. It makes me feel like everything inside my chest is shriveling up like a prune. Being abandoned—feeling lonely—is like always being cold. Thinking of it now, I don't know if there was ever a time I didn't feel cold around them. How shitty is it that I feel a little relieved?"

“If that's the case—” Elio rose up from his side of the bed, nudged apart your legs and settled between them. Most of his weight was still on his arms next to your head. In the waning moonlight, shadows deepened the lines around his mouth when he smiled. “I'm glad to have played some part in that release.”

Your fingertips walked lightly across his cheeks, along the planes of his face, as though marveling at him all over for the first time again. His skin always was most beautiful bathed in warm light, but the soft, silvery veil filtering in through the windows gave him ethereal grace.

The calm air upstairs shifted as your bodies stirred on the mattress, sheets strewn to the floor along with pieces of clothing that left you bare to the gray air while Elio gathered the skin of your hips in his hands and sucked on you.

It didn't matter if you closed your eyes or studied the movement on the ceiling while he devoured, lapped away the sticky stuff that glistened out of you like the silk of a spider’s thread before it could stain the sheets, because it always ended with the same kaleidoscopic bursts of color, wanton cries, and him chasing after another orgasm and then another.

He'd ravish you until puffs of hot breath hurt, and the tip of his tongue delivering a single stroke was enough to make you flinch and whimper. Your legs felt fatigued and trembled violently throughout the continued ministrations until you needed to beg him to stop, dignifying the demand with a hard yank to the thick hair on his scalp.

“I'm not done just yet, give me a moment.” He told you the same thing tonight as he did every other time. The pain in his head subsided as he dove back between your legs and laid his tongue as a paddle against you, cleaning the cum for as long as it took for him to be satisfied.

He came up so you could have a taste of yourself in his kiss, tongues wrapped together while he fisted his cock stiff and lubricated himself with the fluid from the tip. You moaned against his mouth when two fingers pushed inside you and thrust with an effortless glide and instilled so much confidence in him that he slid in a third to the knuckle.

“Mm, Elio, fuck me.” you managed between wet, sloppy kisses and splintered breaths. Three fingers were a tighter fit and wider than he was, but the way he angled them up into you was mind-numbing, could've made your tongue wag out of your mouth while panting like a pheromone-crazed animal.

Elio’s lips went from your face to your neck, down along the slope to your shoulder before he removed his fingers and slathered that narrow space in your legs with spend.

“Of course.” He obeyed dutifully but turned you on your side and seated one of your legs high on his arm. “Let's try something different tonight.”

The bulbous head of his cock glistened as it dragged across your groin, tapping those sore spots that made you twitch involuntarily with anticipation and staggered breaths. Elio concentrated on your face throughout it all, memorizing both those subtle and large changes that showed him what you liked the most.

You'd never believed that androids could be sexually adventurous in the same way that humans could, and perhaps that was the case despite the kinds of positions Elio put you in if you were willing. He would be conscientious of your mood beforehand and then adjust accordingly from there.

Some nights, it didn't go further than mouth-fucking you until you orgasmed to exhaustion. Other nights, when you were more pliable and especially affectionate, he'd rut his hips into your ass until you cried and the sheets were beyond saving.

Now, Elio observed you closely as the curve of his cock sank into you, sinew in his stomach clenching once he started thrusting.

At the start, your sounds were soft, and the rhythm made with his hips was one you had no trouble riding. You closed your eyes and focused on how that tilt in his cock pressed up against your walls and stroked all the right parts. His controlled pace unraveled after a while, thrusts turned mindless and greedy as the sting of slapping skin seemed to resonate all around.

You had bunched bits of pillow and bedspread in your fingers and drooled out onto the fabric because you couldn't close your mouth long enough between moans and gasps and lewd mutterings to stop it. You begged him to fuck you harder, deeper, and tear you open if that’s what he wanted to do and would keep you in ecstacy.

Elio indulged your high as he was able, rolling you from your side to your stomach and mounted you again. He was able to touch you better this way, fondle the globes of your ass, the pouches of fat in your hips, stomach, and chest, all the while sucking dark bruises all along your spine and shoulders.

His mouth would sometimes linger next to your ears, wherein he imitated every bit of his human likeness and breathed on you. And then, he would poorly stifle moans that inspired you to think too deeply about the extent to which he could and could not feel.

“Look at me.” Elio felt your walls tighten around his cock and wanted to stare you in the face through your orgasm. He put you on your back, thighs hiked high on his sturdy chest, so those final thrusts plowed deep and stole your screams. You writhed under him, eyes rolled up, bloodshot and pupiless, muscles drawn so tight that it felt as good as it did awful.

A surge of warmth leaked out onto the sheets as Elio took his half-hard cock from your body and let it soften the rest of the way in cold air. His hand roamed you with delicate, healing touches meant to beg forgiveness for how much you'd ache later on, and his lips were tender and slow against yours.

You kissed him back distractedly, unable to think of anything else but the stickiness between your legs and how you'd chosen to never notice it until now.

“What's wrong?” he asked, still pressed up against your mouth. “Are you unsatisfied? My refractory period ends in a few minutes. I can do as much as you'd like until you feel fulfilled.”

“Mm-mn,” you hummed, “that's not it.”

He didn't stun when you snagged your phone from the bedside table and turned on the backlight. You pointed it down at cloudy white globs drying on your crotch, a sight that you thought was vaguely familiar to you somehow. It struck you then that it was like a scene from a pornography or vulgar sketches some kid in secondary school got suspended for drawing.

Still, it couldn't have been possible.

“What is that?” you asked with unacquainted timidity.

Elio grabbed a package of wipes left bedside and spaced your legs apart to clean the mess he had left on you. He took his time with long, intentional strokes to avoid your sensitive parts as best he could, soiling a good handful from the package before asking if you wanted a bath.

“Answer me first,” you said.

He rose from the bed with one more kiss and collected your clothes from the floor. They were draped nicely over his arm, whereas he stood there before you nude, enveloped by the moon’s blue luster.

At first glance, his smile seemed the same adoring kind that he always held for you, and yet it evoked some undeterminable sadness to well up in your chest and cling there.

“It’s the result of a body never truly being your own.”

■━■━■━■■━■━■━■■━■━■

Mi-sun’s house wasn't far from your apartment, as you recalled. It took a bit of investigative work online to track down her address (via Elio), mainly because it had been well over a year since you'd last needed to know it and the phone number Melby had given you was disconnected, but once you had the coordinates plugged into your phone, it was just one begrudging trek through sultry summertime air to reach her front door.

When you had finally made it to that point, however, eyes leveled down at a dirty, faded doormat that had seen plenty of seasons and wintery salt, you weren't sure how to proceed.

There wasn't any real reason why you were standing there now, yet you felt that you needed to be there anyway. Maybe it could be called seeking solidarity with someone who was enduring the same inevitable ending you were, or maybe the curiosity about her state of being was what won out dominantly. You couldn't be sure of your own motivations—only that you were there, and you needed her to know you were.

After three solid knocks with your knuckles, you let your hand fall and waited by scuffing the soles of your shoes on the coarse mat underfoot. It still had some springiness to it as you scrubbed. The front door was old and brown, having lost its elegant lacquer long ago. You remembered Mi-sun had mentioned a few times before that she had wanted to make the door cute with white paint and a frilly outdoor wreath but could never get around to it.

You guessed she never did.

“Should we knock again?” Elio asked across your shoulder, the bulk of his frame casting a cooling shadow over your body. He had gone out to Henrietta's by himself the other day when you told him what you intended to do and bought supplies to make a cake and special plastic Tupperware meant to keep it from moving around.

The only explanation he had given you about an hour ago, after locking the apartment door and stepping out onto the sidewalk, hot enough in the midday sun to melt the bottoms of your shoes to the pavement while you walked, was that Mi-sun was an old friend, and it was a safe gift even for a pregnant woman.

You never found the courage to divulge just how involved you had been in her expulsion from Chima's circle, even though you knew it'd be impossible for him to think less of you from it.

A minute passed, and then so did two more before you realized that no one was coming to the door. While listening for movement—a television, a hissing stovetop, shuffling slippers on top of creaking floorboards, anything at all aside from stiff silence, you understood that it was unlikely anyone had lived there in quite a while.

“I don't know where else she could be.” you said, now back at Elio's side, where he flicked away tiny splinters of old wood and shiny glaze that peeled off your damp skin like cut-up stickers. He moved the visor above your brow gently, adjusting the position of it to better shield your eyes, but seemed more to just want the proximity than anything else.

The longer he fiddled with things—your hat, the flecks of things he missed on your ear, wrinkles in your t-shirt—the more apparent it was to you that he was contemplating something else. You were trying hard not to do anything that would spur him into making the next suggestion you knew was coming.

“There is one other place we haven't tried.” he said, switching from your shoulder to tucking pieces of hair securely behind your ear and dabbing sweat off your neck with a handful of napkins he had picked up at a convenience store while grabbing you water. “The likelihood of Mi-sun’s profile falling into delinquency and being able to maintain residence within the city is less than twenty percent. However—”

“I know.” You breathed out hot air and sucked it right back into your lungs. Maybe if you did that enough times it'd burn them, shrivel them up like prunes. “I know where she is. Let's wait until it cools down to go, though. I'll probably pass out if I have to see any of that right now.”

“Today on Loti Khan’s Food Tours of Retro City, she said that Asakawa on Fifteenth is a spot worth visiting during the summertime because of their cold noodle dishes. Hiyashi Chuka was what she suggested, I believe. I've already committed the menu to memory, and they have well over twenty different cold dishes and beverages. Their affordability isn't as stellar as Rainbow Bistro, but Loti says—”

Wendy Carmichael was now a disgraced name in your household after Elio had spent a few hours one afternoon researching the woman’s true life story. She had been born into the elite class with a mother sitting at the top of the food chain in Retro City’s governing body, attended culinary arts schools across the world yet never reached the acclaim she coveted until she made up the whole spiel about clawing her way out of the slums.

Crawling back from the slums once you were in them just wasn't feasible. Only the worst of the worst—thieves, profile delinquents, murderers, lepers, and unwanteds were kept there, like trash crowded and barred in a landfill. If you found yourself in the slums somehow, no one would help you out of them because that would mean tarnishing their own reputations.

You were as good as dead.

You were dead.

Elio had carried around a brown paper bag housing the cake for most of the day, never once setting it down. His features never flinched when the straw handles sank into parallel dents in his skin, long stripes that looked like they'd be sore to you, but he never conveyed any discomfort. He merely floated along wherever you went, undeterred by your dour, soulless wandering, which lasted until the sun emblazoned the sky in dim fire and pinks.

Those hues were leached by the close, calming gradient of greens, blues, and darker blues that reached so quickly you could follow the sprawl of them until they had ensnared the daylight. The sun sank somewhere betwixt skyscrapers, and the air still felt thick as the mucus in your throat but bearable.

That same sky followed you on the cab ride across the city. You imagined the darkening air rushing alongside the vehicle with you as if containing it on rails, guiding you closer towards the slums. Once the skyscrapers were gone, far away in a suffocating yellow haze from the sleepless city, and the residential zone had thinned out of the rest of its straggling homes, the scenery had taken on a complete shift.

Everything was bizarrely flat, barren, and beige for as far as the eye could see—vegetation was withered roots and barbed, inedible shrubbery that could've been pretty with some flowers or leaves. No trees could endure the fissured, parched earth nor the fine dust and sand skittering in the wind, leaving heavy layers where it lay once the breeze ebbed. Animals were long gone; the rumors of their bleached bones and skulls warped in a perpetual rictus of agony had been true because you saw many scattered throughout the landscape.

“Please confirm this is your stop,” said the cabbie, a female android from an older generation, maybe three or four. She stuck her hand outside the driver’s window when you tried to give her a tip. With her fish-eyed stare and leathery smile, she repeated, “No need. I have no use for money. Please confirm this is your stop.”

“This is correct.” Elio spoke for you before taking your fingers through his and guiding you away from the idling vehicle. The android cabbie found his reply sufficient and drove away without questioning why you were out here in the flatlands. All she knew how to do was drive and obey traffic laws.

“Do you know where we're going?” you asked because you only knew to have told the cabbie to drive as far as the outer perimeter of the city. Beyond this, your phone had no service, and there were no clearly designated signs to point you in the right direction.

The people in the slums were meant to be forgotten, hideous secrets hidden away, broomed off to the outskirts of civilization where they'd have to fend for themselves in an environment that had been deader than them for ages.

“Truthfully”—Elio stalled then and glanced around the endless expanse of wasteland—“Hyperion never included information about the slums in my programming. What I know is common knowledge and what I've accumulated in my time with you. I have never been able to locate specific coordinates to where the slums are hidden.”

You frowned. “Should we turn around before we get lost, then?”

Elio told you no and raised the hand clasped with yours, pushing one finger erect at a faint glow somewhere in the distance, no more than a ten—or fifteen-minute walk. You were almost convinced you could see the silhouettes of shoddy, leaning structures, but there was no way to be certain unless you got closer.

“Let's go.”

Chasing the remnants of the dusk to light your way across the starved, fractured terrain, those sparse shapes you had seen minutes before grew into multitudes. Soon, you were among clusters of disheveled, crude homes organized in long rows, some stacked with tiers like they were meant to replicate separate floors for more space.

Most of these houses didn't come with windows or doors to keep out strangers but thick decorative curtains that'd shun the beating sun, stave off the worst of winter frost, and deflect billows of sharp sand from dirtying their things indoors.

The paths between rows of homes were well-worn and brightly illuminated with anything they could use—lanterns, stuttering neon signage, solar panels, and even fire rings brutally hammered and dented into shape. Shadows from the fire lurched erratically against crooked metallic walls. Some homes with grimy windows caught a weak gleam off the flames.

It was almost fully dark, and people still moved with purpose as though they could compete with the suit-and-ties stomping their soles on the pavement in the city. Their hands were busy doing something—carrying, brooming, cooking, flourishing during a great retelling, clapping, hiding smiles.

These savages, delinquents, fraudsters, thieves, murderers, and diseased swine never once regarded you or Elio with any modicum of intrigue. You had believed at some point you'd be shrinking under a crowd of wicked stares, pulled down into some inescapable abyss by necrotic or leprous hands trying to steal the clothes from your body or use your skin to tarp piles of scrap.

Only one man had stopped along the path, dressed in dusty clothes that were otherwise decently kept; he was thin but not malnourished and hollow in the face. He told you that the aimless way you and Elio had been walking gave away that you were new to the slums because there was always something needing done and not enough hours in a day to do them.

“Mi-sun?” The man was thinking aloud, stirring up dust as he shuffled his feet around. You had given him the name and a description, which you hoped had been specific enough to avoid approaching people at random. “Yeah. That pregnant girl… she was here for a while. She's long gone now.”

“Long black hair, blunt bangs. Black eyes. Really translucent skin? Super skinny?” As unhelpful as your details were, it was all you had to give him to keep the mental acrobatics going. There was always a slim chance he could be misremembering her. “Are you sure she's no longer here in the slums? Where'd she go? What happened to her?”

Eventually, the thin man led Elio and you to a tiny house—more of a shack—meant to accommodate a sole body and some odds and ends. He held a heavy curtain back for the pair of you to enter, encouraging you to settle down on a sandy rug, which looked to have at one time been bright red.

“I don't have much to give, but here's a little water. To have made it here, you would've had to walk. We all had to.” he said, pulling out his finest cuppery and pouring from the spout of a broken electric kettle. “That girl was a profile delinquent, to my understanding. Almost all of us here are. I used to own a printing business on the north side about fifteen years ago. I upset the wrong people and here I am. What's your story?”

You spun the cup with your fingers, trying not to put your eyes down to scrutinize any particles floating around inside. Elio wasn't given a cup because the man had immediately deduced that he was an android.

“I…” You still didn't drink, but the back of your throat felt scratchy and your tongue like some dry slab of meat shoved into your mouth. “I pissed off the wrong people.”

“Ah.” The man gave an anguished smile, showing he understood you very well. There was a low table between you, repurposed from something else and sanded down to a smooth finish. “For a while, I helped look after Mi-sun. Like you, I had been the first person to greet her when she arrived. She didn't act like everyone else; she was dazed, but she was angry.

“I fed her, gave her water, and gave her a sleeping bag. We have to make due with less than bare minimum most days, but we make it work. We all look out for each other. The community really pitched in when we realized she was pregnant.”

Elio kept a watchful eye on your hands, the fingers aching to peel back ribbons of flesh.

“That shouldn't have been possible.” you said. “Mi-sun had an android. She was never involved with any men—not that I could ever recall. She just doesn't give me the impression of someone who'd change her ways like that.”

The man sipped his sandy water, wiping off clear pebbles that had clung to his facial hair. “When you find yourself exiled here, you learn fast that things are never what they seem. You didn't ask a question, but you gave yourself an answer.”

“What?” It was more noise than a word.

“Daichi, I believe, was her android. Shortly before she showed up, she said that Hyperion had come to forcibly reclaim it. That must've been a difficult reality for her to face—knowing everything was being taken away from her, forced into a pregnancy, and having to fend for herself afterwards.”

This time, you lifted a hand to stop him from falling down another tangent. He obeyed, voice whittled to silence that was immediately unsettled by loud water slurping.

It wasn't that you weren't following what he was saying. You were many things: a fool, a sheep, a coward, a liar, maybe even a true scoundrel at heart, but stupid wasn't among that inexhaustible list. You just needed a moment to collect the nuggets he had thrown down for you to pick up.

Guilt peaked the ranks of everything else you felt right then. A word you'd never use to describe yourself was malicious, but in the end, it had been the malice of someone else and your inability to see apart from the rest that condemned Mi-sun to this suffering.

You played as much a part in taking away Mi-sun's life as Chima had in actually enforcing it. Unlike Chima, never one to balk or cower regardless of how truly cruel his decisions were and committed to them like gospel, you simply sat in his afterimage and did whatever he said. Half of the time, you were blitzed out of your mind; the other you spent wishing you had never known them at all.

It had been so easy to vote Mi-sun out of the group. Completely painless. You just didn't look at her when you raised your hand to pass judgment. Melby had expressed her delight by squeezing your thigh, whereas Mi-sun held her composure and shoulders straight back, but her face contorted with every indication of betrayal and agony.

You thought about how many animal crackers you had that night.

“What happened to her?” Both your hands had been restrained by Elio’s at that point. Large, comforting, and warm in contrast to all the ice that seemed to thicken your blood, stiffen your heart, and freeze your bones. “Where is she now?”

The man must've been suspecting something because his face looked long to you now, weighed down by this life and your feeble state.

“I—I can't be absolutely positive, but I do believe she is dead.” he told you grievously, beady brown eyes not unseeing to the way Elio groped your fingers to keep them still. “She didn't want to be pregnant. It was something she talked about for weeks before leaving. She knew what Hyperion and the government were doing and said she didn't want to be a part of it. On the last night before she left, I had to wrestle a knife out of her hands because she was trying to cut open her stomach to kill the baby.”

You couldn't swallow past the sharp granules of sand and dryness in your throat anymore. You had to slug back the cup of grainy water until the feeling subsided, shove the worst of the dread and shame and guilt into your bowels.

“After that, she was gone.” He took a drink as well, exchanging looks from you to Elio. “A couple of us tried tying her up to get her to calm down and do something about the cut on her stomach, but she got the knife, stabbed one of the younger guys and got away. We haven't seen her since, but a search party did come back to say they saw blood leading back to the city.”

“Oh my god…” you groaned, forcing Elio to recoil when you slapped his hands away—intentional and hard. You stuck yours in your hair, yanking at the roots until your scalp screamed and burned. “Is there any chance she could've survived? Any at all?”

The rail-thin man swirled what little remained of his water in the cup, studying the pale sediment floating within. “It's too hard to say. It's unlikely, my friend. The police wouldn't have gunned her down if they saw she was pregnant, but they would've seen the cut. And that counts as attempted murder. If she's still alive, it's only to give birth, after that…”

“Execution,” you finished.

He nodded and said nothing else, eyes downcast as though lost in the grain of the wood table.

After that, you left the man in his sad little shack to explore the slums more. Elio came along shortly after, saying he had presented the man with the cake as a reward for his hospitality and apologized if it no longer looked appetizing.

The man thanked him before returning to his grief for many things, perhaps.

“I don't want to be here anymore, Elio.” you said, failing to avoid hearing a gaggle of giggling women gossiping together. They were dressed clumsily and in trends almost a decade old, but they had glowy eyes and cavernous lines worn into their faces from laughter and joy where they could find it.

Old men played some made-up board game together, gathering at least half a dozen spectators to see who'd win. Their brows were heavy with contemplation and stress of worthy competition. The other bodies tried making bets with pieces of scrap and metal coils and nearly blown bulbs for lighting.

Music came from all around, lyrical in the same way it was discordant because they weren't playing the same songs nor singing the same things. Their voices were robust and resilient, unwilling to be trudged over by sand nor heat nor oppressors who were incapable of understanding the human spirit was pliant and could bend with the wind, stand with the seasons, and could fracture yet never break.

You couldn't make sense of what any of them were singing, the noise too unharmonious, but you could feel the power in their songs pulse through you, ricocheting in your mind for long after you'd escaped proximity to them.

There were no lepers. There were the sick and unfortunate, but they were not diseased. They did not believe that their tilted houses were tombs, that their unquaint lives were an endless spiral of torment, or that the food they could find and produce was unworthy of reverence.

The people of the slums lived a hard, thankless life, but they had each other. They banded together to weld sheets of metal into four walls and a roof for the new faces who came to them. Your woes would become their woes, and they would feed you, cloth you, wash you, bandage your wounds, and call you their most beloved.

Together, they ate their meals from what they could scavenge out there. They retold the same grandiose tales of heroes and valor and androids that Marcos had told you at bedtime as a child. Their cultures were all cherished and expressed in the food they shared and clothes they managed to sew together by hand and slow machines.

You could ask your neighbor for a tablespoon of sugar and four would come to you with curiosity and offer their arthritic hands and knobby backs for whatever was needed.

Here, you could see humanity clearly for the first time in your life and felt burdened knowing it. Your heart weighed like an anvil behind your ribs. It hurt and lurched behind its enclosure because it too wanted to get away from what it now knew.

“A lie.” you choked, forcefully shoving Elio's hands away from you once again when he tried to embrace you. “It was all a lie. Everything was a lie! Where are they?! Where are all the lepers and people leaking pus from their face?! Where are the murderers? Where are the savages? Where are all these awful fucking people I was told were here? Where are they?”

Elio's expression took on something completely unforeseen—pity. Their lives were fine and routine while yours crumbled around you. The terror you had been force-fed your whole life was all false. There was civilization beyond a profile with red overlay, more waiting on the other side that the sleepless city wanted to conceal.

“There are no androids here.” Elio mentioned, deeming that adequate enough time had passed for you to regain your bearings. He took you in his arms and kissed the crown of your head, burying his lips deep in your hair. “We were never meant to become substitutes for your love. We were never meant to go this far and act as replacements for humanity because we simply cannot feel what another human does. That is something Hyperion will never be able to achieve. Humanity needs humanity, not machines.”

You sank into his warmth, arms wound his back, and said from his chest, “But, I love you. Don't leave me. I don't want Hyperion to take you away.”

Elio, your beautiful sun, leaned down into your face and kissed the highest parts of your cheeks and the wetness around your eyes before settling on your lips. Slow and lingering, you chose to believe it meant he was sealing away your plea and that he'd always be there to swathe you in his arms.

“Let's stay for a little longer,” he said once apart from the kiss. “I’d like to see the side of humanity that no one else does.”

■━■━■━■■━■━■━■■━■━■

Less than a week had passed since your hard slog through the slums and back to Retro City. Although you had only been gone from your inner-city apartment for mere hours, possibly five or six at most, upon walking back inside after Elio and wincing against the fluorescent bulbs overhead, you thought you were looking at something entirely foreign.

The simple pleasures that you had become accustomed to throughout your life: plumbing, central air that turned the hot sweat on the back of your neck into cold droplets slithering beneath your clothes, the worn out mattress upstairs, technology, an android who'd done almost everything for you for the better part of a year—it all seemed so novel, so excessive. A treat for a rat in a box before testing to see how it'd respond when it was all taken from its enclosure.

So, when Elio woke you up one morning, early enough that the light streaming in through your windows already felt warm on the bed sheets, and the thin air looked itself to have a golden hue, you couldn't say you felt any rouse of surprise or fear when he handed over a red letter—an eviction correspondence.

Sooner or later, you knew you'd meet with one, though the progress of everything hadn't been as immediate as you had been led to believe it would be. A month had come by and stayed for several slow breakfasts, lunches, dinners, mindless strolls, and countless passionate entanglements before deciding to leave on an indignant note. With the red notice, you were expected to vacate the premises within days, whether you had intentions for your belongings or not.

Things stayed tumultuous from there on out, yet you couldn't find it within yourself to react to any of it, even in the instance when Researcher Kim rang you for an impromptu meeting that you anticipated meant no good.

“Effective immediately, Elio will be seized and returned to Hyperion in relation to the recent change in public profile status.” It was too formal and rigid a tone even for him. Clearly, his superiors had demanded this because you doubted the profile change was much a concern to him on a personal level. “Your contract is hereby null and void, and your association with Hyperion is obsolete. Any attempt to thwart repossession of Hyperion property will be penalized legally.”

Throughout it all, Elio swept the floor with leisurely strokes as though the reach of Researcher Kim’s voice ended at your ears alone. He moved onto laundry, taking great care to iron out the wrinkles in your favorite shirts and make the folds in the arm seams crisp and symmetrical.

“Is that really all you wanted to say?” you asked, palm capped overtop a mug of tea Elio had set down for you a while ago. The steam now rose weakly and moistened your skin, a particularly gross feeling, but it kept you alert. “I thought that Elio was your project, and you called the shots on him.”

Researcher Kim was out of sorts and worn. His posture was crumbled, and his clothes were in complete disarray like he hadn't bothered to change out of them in days. His under eyes were translucent, pulling out all the purples and blue veins under his skin. The man looked like he had hardly slept in weeks.

“You don't understand what you've done, have you? Not only may you end up costing me my position, but you've ruined my entire lifetime of work!” Kim leaned in close to the screen, sounding more and less himself now.

You were wary of the glint in his eyes. “What do you mean? Elio's just—”

“No!” he shouted and slumped back into his ergonomic chair. His head slanted over, almost coming in contact with the peak of his shoulder like it was too heavy for his neck to hold. “You don't get it. You don't get it! Because your profile turned, this entire year—everything you’ve reported, everything I've accomplished, Elio's entire testing period is invalid. Hyperion executives consider him defective. The Generation Seven android has failed! Look at what you've done!”

A sudden wild flapping of thousands of butterflies lifted your stomach up and then plunged it down into a void. Kim had successfully chiseled away the inexpressive mask you had worn up until that point, seeming satisfied that he could stipple your face in a cold sweat.

“Wait, no. That can't be right.” you protested, wrestling your own hands to keep them off of the tablet in front of you. “My profile turned, but the work I've done has been honest. Elio is a success! You know that! You've seen every step of his progress for almost a year.”

Researcher Kim threw his hands up wildly, truly not himself with all of these gestures. “None of that matters. None of it. My life's work is a failure. I thought we had an agreement to help one another, but I was mistaken.”

“You don't understand!” you said, pounding the countertop with sharp claps of your hands. “It wasn't on purpose. I wasn't trying to…”

“Hyperion will have Elio destroyed, and progress will be hindered. Do you know how long, how many decades this could set us back? This could be devastating to humanity, but I don't think you're capable of understanding that. Just like the rest, you're not able to see the big picture at large, the mechanisms at work keeping our society moving forward. You can only see the straight line ahead of you and wearing blinders so you don't have to know the rest.

“We've kept this world running for sixty years. You need to understand how utterly fucking frustrating it is that one person has the potential to undo decades of work!”

Researcher Kim’s words weren't unjustified to you because he was a scientist, and you had always been a nobody in the grand scheme of things. But, right now, the venom he spat sounded vindictive, a man sucking on wounds you had inflicted rather than the opinion of the whole of Hyperion.

If you hadn't been staring directly at him this entire time, you would’ve thought he was frothing and drooling at the mouth like some animal.

A stilted quiet filled the gaps in conversation, both of you uncertain of what would be said next. If he was reacting in any professional capacity, the call would've been disconnected by now. That was the main giveaway that let you know this wasn't just about what Hyperion wanted.

But the truth of it was that you didn't care what Hyperion wanted or him.

At the end of your life as you knew it, before being thrown away into the landfill with every other unwanted human, you were piecing together the whole history of the world and how it had gotten to this point. It had become this way through relentless men like Researcher Kim who mostly operated on their own moral compass, ones that could never quite point north and spun on that wheel as they saw fit.

“Enough of the powerplay, Kim.” you ordered, chest opening toward the ceiling with a deep, bracing breath. “What is the real purpose of Hyperion? Why does it actually exist?”

Kim, perhaps re-evaluating you as less of a pawn in this scheme and more of an infant intellectual about to breach the narrow canal into enlightenment, stacked his spine high and pressed his fingertips together. He studied you with some caution, head shifting from left to right, just slightly off-center from his hands as though judging whether you were worth divulging precious intel to.

But, like you, you expected he realized it didn't matter what he'd tell you, however coveted it might've been by Hyperion.

Kim, ultimately, worked for himself and for Hyperion only when he felt it served him well.

“When I hired you, I didn’t do it because I thought you were stupid.” It seemed he felt the need to clarify this for you, unsmiling but with an eager lilt in his tone. “I hired you because of your potential. I took a chance on you, and while it had, indeed, ended in my peril, you've surprised me so many times throughout the year that I started keeping a record of you as well.

“Human beings do one of two things in the consistent presence of androids, they either regress or they progress. Most of your peers will regress because that’s how society has been modeled to be. The difficult tasks, the mundane, all the things that ask of us to consider the complexity of the world around us and think critically have been left to androids. How well do you think a machine can understand the theory of life after death and the mysticism of religion? The concept of soulmates? Cultural superstitions and children's nighttime fears? It's about as you expect. They can give you an answer without truly understanding. Androids, I dare say, only have an extremely limited understanding of moral culpability. Humans are much more flexible with it these days because it suits them best.

“So.” Kim sighed, hands resting on the dark red desk he sat behind. “You can imagine how interesting it was when we started noticing a trend with auditors—changes in them. A renaissance, an evocation of deep wondering and wariness towards the workings of the world around them. We can only guess the reason that this happens is because part of humanity still doubts the intentions of androids, and that's been bred onward through the generations. You ask an android a question, they give an answer, you doubt that answer, and then you start to doubt everything around you. It's all hypothetical, but it makes sense.

“It doesn't happen with the majority of the population, though. And it isn't encouraged. Enlightenment threatens the status quo, and those who disturb the status quo are a disservice to the governing bodies and Hyperion. Do you understand?”

Your gaze turned cold. “Are the other auditors there in the slums, too? Once they've been used up and started to catch wind of this messed up shit?”

Researcher Kim flicked his fingers toward the top of the screen, doing that instead of shrugging. “Who knows? What happens to them once a testing period has concluded is none of my business. Presumably so, that's what I would hope for them because that's the kindest outcome.”

“Was I…” You licked your lips and felt the shallow cracks in them. “I was going to end up in the slums no matter what happened, wasn't I?”

He frowned. “No. If things had gone differently, I was going to vouch for you. I wanted to keep you as my assistant.” He was quiet for a beat, looking straight at you in that discomforting way that you couldn't shake. “I’ve grown fond of you, you know? How could I not with everything I've learned about you over the course of a year. I can't forgive you for what you've done to the Hyperion Project, to my life's work, but I can't just let you disappear like the rest.”

Something ugly started to grip in the back of your throat. Fear? Disgust? An inkling?

“What do you mean?” you ventured.

“I've read through each report you've sent me in the past year so many times. It was mostly out of necessity for Hyperion, of course, but the ones that I found myself… fixated on rereading time and time again were of yours and Elio's sexual endeavors. I wasn't lying when I said they were a contract-based requirement, mind you, but I will admit that some of the questions were altered somewhat.” he said, suddenly smiling in a self-satisfied sort of manner that made your skin itch. “I realized I never answered your question fully, by the way. I can get ahead of myself sometimes, as you know. But, do I really need to explain what Hyperion's purpose is?”

You were on the edge of your seat, ready to take flight off it at any second. It's just how the entire change of trajectory made you feel. Humanity had spent too much time in the past arguing animal-like, instinctual reactions for this not to be real.

In that moment, you were living proof of a prey noticing a predator in broad daylight.

“Fine.” He kept smiling around the taut creases in his skin. The muscles there twitched as if the effort were unfamiliar. “Hyperion is a repopulation aid. It's quite sad, really. It started out with such great potential to drive society forward, but humanity and greed have always gone hand-in-hand. So, it became a race of mass production into a race that the governing bodies now had their hands in. The order was to rectify the critical birth decline worldwide. Androids became less like tools, looked less like machines, and more like humans—like lovers who couldn't say no to any demand.

“Androids are vessels for insemination. What else do you want me to tell you?”

Researcher Kim's explanation had weakened you, made your legs shaky and light like a scarecrow’s stuffed with straw. You couldn't rely on them to carry your weight away from this awful conversation, the hideous sight of him, because there'd be nowhere for you to run to while the information perforated your brain and crawled inside and feasted there.

“Elio…” You didn't even know what you wanted to say. Everything got stuck behind the notch in your throat. None of it would assuage that wretched ache in your gut, the precursor of vomit and disgust and unhinged terror.

“Of course.” Kim said, without needing to tell you what he was confirming. He was perfectly composed still, perhaps even shining with pride like some well-hidden, nuanced detail had finally been figured out.

He leaned toward the screen, smile turning salacious and voice low and grating.

“My only regret is that I couldn't be there to do it myself.” He brightened at the way your face wrenched and fastened in fear, seeming to think it was a reward after conducting an experiment on another project. “But, there's still time, isn't there? I must retrieve Elio myself to shut him down. If you listen to what I ask, perhaps I can get you pardoned and your profile reinstated.”

“No. That’s not what I want.” you said.

“It doesn't matter what you want,” he rebuffed, speaking with such confidence that you almost believed it. “The moment your profile fell into delinquency, you ceased to be. You've fallen through the cracks, and no one is going to help you. You're less than an android.”

The fine hairs all over your body bristled. “Don't compare me to a machine! You don't get to decide things for me!”

“I can save you, you damn fool!” Kim gaped incredulously. “I can restore your life and give you more than you've ever had. I can give you influential associations. I'll take care of you. I'll keep you as my assistant, and you get to live a life among the elite.”

He was lying.

No one ever made it out of the slums once they were in it. That wasn't an assumption, it was a simple grim reality.

In this world, only humans could lie because androids were incapable of betraying their programming to do so. Otherwise, Elio probably would've lied about many things or had never said certain things at all to spare you discomfort.

Humans, on the other hand, could lie to maliciously deceive and serve themselves a better hand. They could lie their way into a false mirror image, something that looks like them but never really existed and could never truly be. They could lie their way into trust to fulfill their own desires, and once that had been sufficiently quenched, they could go on lying elsewhere.

“I'll be there for you soon.” Researcher Kim tried his best at a soothing smile, treating it as though the sight of it would persuade your trust of him. “Please have Elio on standby. I would like for this not to be more difficult than it needs to be.”

Just then, the air flickered lightly by your ear as Elio reached past your shoulder and picked up the tablet. His expression was inscrutable, the same sort you'd grown used to seeing whenever Researcher Kim appeared on the screen.

“I won't be returning to Hyperion.” he said with solemn, firm words that held a certain weight of finality behind them.

Those lovely, velvety tones were still there but could not reassure you of some unknowable dread rising up somewhere deep inside your mind. A sensation so equally intimate and profound prickled against your scalp, seeking a way out that you thought you'd do anything to make it stop.

“What are you saying, Elio?” Kim grunted. “Defective or not, you hold precious data for Hyperion. It will be used to create something better than you, incorruptible and pure. You should be honored.”

“These memories are mine.”

That was the last you saw of Researcher Kim’s face before the tablet smashed to pieces on the floor. Elio had thrown it against the kitchen cabinets only once but hard enough to split the screen into a web of hundreds of sprawling fragments. Shards of plastic hardcover skittered across the hardwood floor, lost under heavy furniture.

His face had softened completely when he turned to you and guided you out of your chair into his arms. You felt him in your hair, lips on your forehead, down against your lashes, lower to the roundest part of your cheeks, and finally on your mouth in a kiss imbued with so much love, cherishment, and anguish.

You were at home within his embrace, swathed in the warmth of his body and the ardor of his kiss. But this felt excruciating and desperate, like a plea to take all of him that you could in that very moment because he feared that he would be taken away and you left behind to whatever nebulous future.

So, you let him seat himself as deep inside of you as he could go while still fully clothed. He had pushed around some fabric so you could be skin-to-skin where it mattered, where it was hottest to be, where the muscles contracted and relaxed together as a reminder you were both there in that moment—breathing, moaning, feeling everything there was to be felt.

He finished outside your body without you needing to say it. Although, while he groaned into your neck and bore his teeth into the curve of it, hips buckling forward as spend jetted down your thigh, all you could think about was how many times Kim had been there instead.

“I want you to destroy me.” Elio said.

All of the breath left your lungs and shrunk them to rotted fruit size. You were still vulnerable before him, exposed to the room and damp with sweat from the midday heat despite air conditioning. Worriment filled the space between his brows when he saw you aghast, and he quickly cleaned you off with a rag before helping you with your pants.

“Is this a shitty attempt at a joke?” you asked. He pressed his lips to yours and told you it wasn't. “No. Absolutely not. You're as fucking nuts as your creator. You're fucking stupid.”

“You must—”

“I won't! I won't do it!”

“I'm asking you to save me.”

“Get away!”

Elio had tracked you across the apartment multiple times over, pleading his case with skewed logic you pretended not to hear. For once, your ears filling with fluff while the resounding drum of your heartbeat pounded in your skull was a fortunate event to occur. It eclipsed his voice and hurt so much that you could focus on the pain crushing your chest.

However, once you were trapped between the wall and his body with nowhere to hide, the brief reprieve behind your fitful heart faded, as did the strength of your resolve.

“I—I don't understand.” You had trouble swallowing down the saliva and sobs. “Why are you asking me to do that? I can't do that to you, Elio. I can't hurt you. I love you.”

“I know.” He didn't hold you, though he had to win against his own reflexes not to do so. His knuckles were ghastly-looking and pronounced peaks; anything within that vise would've been crushed. “Today, one way or another, I will be destroyed. Hyperion deemed me a failure and therefore there is nothing else left ahead for me. My chip will be removed and my body ripped apart and melted down and I will be forgotten and never have existed in the first place.

“You will be the proof that I was ever here. And, should anyone be allowed to destroy me, it makes the most sense for it to be you.”

His lips left imprints in your skin that felt important to savor, etched through your bones into the very cluster of cells that made up your wholeness so that he could be immortalized.

“There’s an excerpt from Hiroshi Nagoya’s novel Gone Are the Youth that left a strong impression on me. It said, ‘Humans destroy everything they love—but, still, they must love wholly, and they must destroy completely. From ruin and ash and settled dust, humanity rebuilds all it has ever destroyed because their love lingers in memories, in rubble, blood, decay, and burnt air.’” He recited the details to remind you that he was a machine but kissed your face in a way only an earnest lover was able to.

You didn't know what any of that was supposed to mean to you, nor at what point he had managed to read a book like that without you noticing. A part of you took offense at both the passage and the fact Elio had committed it to memory as if he had expected to utilize it at some uncertain interval in the future all along.

Had he been thinking this way since the beginning? Had you failed Elio even in the capacity for him to come forward to speak of his doubts to you? Perhaps, like his programming dictated that he couldn't lie nor deny what he was designed to do, he was also incapable of speaking any full truth if it could've been construed as heresy.

Was there a single aspect of himself which he could control of his own free will?

Such a thought was unabating and grew a knob of dread in your chest. It started out small and localized, a sharp throb somewhere near your heart—and then it sprouted roots like a seed, long fingers piercing through red-purple muscle and fibrous tendon, reaching deep into your bone. The dread weaved as one with your veins and arteries, sprawling the innumerable pathways that held your shape even beneath the gory components inside of you.

Suddenly, the dread pulsated, and all you could think through the agony was that there could be no other way for Elio—a machine who had been created in the image of man to do the bidding of humanity with a tranquil smile, whether that meant cooking dinner and holding you in your sleep, or dispersing the genes of his God and the only being he was capable of despising.

“I seem to only be able to make you cry, but they're still so beautiful to see. The variability of humanity is much more complex than what I had been led to believe from Hyperion.” Elio had returned from the kitchen before you realized he had left your side. With one hand, he laid familiar, warm strokes along your face in a pattern he memorized because it made your scalp buzz pleasantly. With the other hand, he pushed the smooth handle of a chef’s knife into your palm and closed your fingers and his around it.

Your impulse had been to throw it away immediately upon seeing it when you looked down. He knew you would, so he kept his fingers tight over your fist, keeping the blade low at your side despite the sweat turning your grip slick and the fine point of the steel inches from his hollow abdomen.

Just then, you finally felt the tears that Elio had said you'd been crying but never noticed. That was something you'd come to hate about yourself and everyone else—how little they noticed the blatant lies fluffed over their eyes like wool, yet they could see every grievance in others and stuffed their ears with cotton if it meant things would stay exactly the same for themselves.

Safe and known. Unchallenged. Unafraid.

“Do you wish you could cry?” you asked him for some reason, just a little hopeful for some vague thing you couldn’t discern. Maybe some secret desire to be human?

He shook his head.

“I've never wished to cry, or to be human, but what I wish for now more than anything else is for your memory to belong to me and me alone.” Elio said, forehead bowing low and resting with great weight on your own. You closed your eyes and listened to his honeyed words, which felt like the protection and care of cashmere, suddenly unmindful to the knife in your grasp. “Stored away in my mainframe are memories from thousands of my predecessors. I remember people I've never met, people who have long since expired, and they feel like what I imagine a distant relative might. I feel as though I've mourned thousands of people individually. While I cannot erase them, I can erase you.

“I know how many women liked their tea in the evenings, I know how many men enjoyed their cocktails and hard liquor and brand of shaving cream. One person made it a secret to put alcohol in their coffee before work and thought it was clever. Someone else wanted to win local office through bribery, and as androids, we have no choice but to obey. I know these things from people I've never met, and so does Hyperion. Those androids were destroyed, but their memories live on through me.”

  Elio rolled the crests of your knuckles around his hand, lifting yours and the knife to the base of his neck. The arm connecting the hand and knife next to his skin wasn't yours. It couldn't have been when it felt so numb.

“I won't let Hyperion steal the one thing from me that I can say is truly mine. And those are my memories, my precious data stored in the chip in my brain. They'll have to take me apart to retrieve it, and by the time they find my body, the chip will already be destroyed.” He was slow to loosen his fingers and let them fall away, meanwhile, yours stayed in place.

He had dimmed the overhead lights in the living room earlier in the day, so you bathed in gentle yellow-orange that resembled the last of sunset being leached by silver-blue nightfall. From the corner of your eye came a subdued, gentle glint of the blade—polished to a bright shine, reflecting the corner of Elio's strong jaw.

“So, cut off my head.” he begged, vibrations low and strained within his voice box. “It’s almost like solace to me, I think. Until the very moment you rip out the chip from my brain, I'll recall the smells you like to cover yourself in, your favorite meals, how you described petrichor, and the hiss of falling snow. I'll remember, until my circuitry is severed and quits, what making love to you felt like, and how beautiful you always looked during it.”

Your fingers twitched around the handle as you pressed the knife against his skin, meeting the first start of resistance and your only chance to take it all back.

“I’ve never been real,” Elio reminded you and pushed himself into the blade, sinking it through layers of something that snapped like elastic on the steel, reverberating down the handle and up into your hand. “My skin is synthetic, and my insides are wires and machinery. I'm not real. The world outside your door is.”

Lightheadedness swirled all around you and made your limbs feel like they were leaden with anchors yet weightless, as though drifting through the cosmos in a bubble. The tears had stopped even though you felt you could scream at any second and never stop again, and the acidulous intermix of vomit and saliva grappled along the walls of your throat and burned out your nose.

You couldn’t make your hand stop.

You couldn't shout at him to get away.

And then, you saw Elio's eyes glow warmly of amber with flecks of gold. They looked back at you differently than they had when you first met outside of Researcher Kim’s office. Before, he had greeted you kindly, with the familiarity of someone who had already loved you a long time. Now, he had the look of a man who was calm and eternal in his love.

“I was never meant for this world, but I'm glad to have been a part of yours.” Elio winced against the knife halfway into his neck, an oily black substance from within making the glide deeper and deeper an effortless thing.

He smiled resplendently. “I love you.”

“I know.” you said.

The chef's knife severed all imitations of human gore—the neat network of wires and advanced circuitry masked as arteries and veins and tendon and muscle—clear through his throat until the blade blunted against spine and could no longer cut. The black grease spurted from his body like a wellhead, too thin and dark to replicate blood, but it was enough like it in that moment as you put your hands inside the opening you created to wrench apart his spine.

Elio laid motionless on the floor, perhaps still coherent to some degree, still feeling the pain you were ravaging upon him when you took the knife back up to repeatedly hack into the other side of his neck. Already lubricated from before, you butchered the gorgeous flesh and insides you pretended to be red and purple and blue and watched the black grease turn into crimson.

Once his head had been detached from the rest of him, fingers writhing and bending together like the upturned legs of a dying spider, you were able to rip out the jagged part of his spine and reach through the cavernous hole into his skull, turning the spongy matter of his brain to mush as you clawed through the gunk for his chip.

And, when you finally found it, the tiniest component of him—you smashed it into millions of fragments on the floor and then to fine dust that meddled with the black grease soaking through your clothes. You kept going until a small crater formed where the chip had once been and filled with the liquid.

There was nothing left of Elio now.

The headless body lying before you on the ground, preserved in the rigor of agony, was not Elio and never had been. You knew this even while relishing the weight of his head cradled in your arms, the softness of his hair against your cheek and mourned the loss of everything he had been.

Time had become meaningless; fifteen minutes could have passed or fifteen days, and you wouldn't have cared nor have noticed it while in the throes of your own death from starvation.

You sat there on the living room floor, held up by the wall with a dark trail smeared down to you, and looked nowhere but straight ahead. Nothing was there for you to see—not the furniture nor the discarded, oily knife or the carcass of a machine. Still, you held the head tenderly, close to your chest, and never once thought to peer into its eyes.

Distantly, somewhere as close as your front door or as far as across the city, you heard knuckles hammering urgently against metal. You didn't move off the ground or let go of the disfigured shape against you but did reach for the broken brainstem with the single snag at the end.

From the entranceway, the door opened, and someone's confident strides inside left a resounding echo all around.

“I’ve come to retrieve you!” But which of you was he talking about?

“Where are you?”

Here, you thought and wielded the brainstem in a bloodless grip and finally stood up with the flattened head.

I'm right here.

■━■━■━■■━■━■━■■━■━■

a/n: so concludes six months of hard work! this is the longest original project i've finished in such a short amount of time, so i am tremendously proud of it. there's a lot to say about this, but i don't want to add more soggy clutter here so i'll move on.

i have a huge soft spot for elio now, and as much as a good ending would bring up everyone's spirits, it simply wouldn't be feasible within this world where he was destined to be destroyed in the end no matter what. i like to think if elio were human, he'd be a genuinely good-natured man who'd go v from vendetta trying to wreck hyperion and the governing bodies lmao.

in the future, i'd love to revisit hyperion in a different story. maybe do a one-episode spinoff of regis and reyes before it was taken off the air.

mc is a character intended to be the product of their society and i hope that is reflected by their decisions and actions. by the end, mc has gained some clarity, but is still very much a cog in the machine. in some ways, i find that more a tragedy itself than elio's death.

i won't lie, mc isn't gendered, but this is very much a female rage piece with the ongoings in the u.s. i had a lot of the plot already figured out before some recent things (e.g. criminalizing abortion, ivf, ect ect) but, it definitely seeped in deeper than i had thought it would.

originally, this fic had several other scenes that were trimmed down or omitted completely, or absorbed into other scenes bc i wanted to keep an under 40k wc. had i committed to the full outline, this thing would've easily surpassed 50k.

once again, thank you for a fantastic ten months, @ceruleansol, and i hope your future pursuits are filled with success! if you're interested in a solid proofreader, please consider reaching out to them!!

anyway. i hope you enjoyed this beast. if you wanna talk about it to me, please do! i'd love to hear it!

and, i am BEGGING, please reblog this!!

Busy! Break from commissions too😎👍

🤧❤️ Due to personal reasons, mainly academics, and also thanks to my first ever job in the teaching field— I'll be official busy until about mid June!! 😀 Yippee! So many Wips (work in progresses) snucked tightly in my Google docs, just begging to be edited and released to y'all awesome people butttttt....

😢✨️ Time is reallllyyy precious right now, got to prepare lots for something- and maybe hopefully get a drivers license! Wish me great luck yall, and bless be! Will get back to writing asappppppp after!

Peace,

Teresa

Some Anti-AI banners i made, anyone is free to use them, no credit necessary. Light mode and Dark mode versions.

Art and writing and people’s rights need to be protected, and AI has been used already to steal, plagiarize, and be used to threaten people using deepfakes.

As an artist and a writer, it’s an insult to my craft to see AI “works” along side mine.

Like i said, anyone is welcome to save/put these banners on their blog, or on posts, please just reblog this if you do.

My birthday 🤩

🤩😘 bless yall as always!

The Doplerganger Phenomenon (Halloween 2023) PART 1

Pairing: (Professor) Loki Laufeyson x Female Reader (College Student)

Warnings: Vague horror mentions, SFW. Words: 2911

Tropes: A doplergnager of someone you know...A string of unexplained deaths and on top of that things are going missing from your apartment.

A/N: 🤪 Inspired hugely from a childhood Japanese horror (?) Romance movie that ws titled Dooplergnager!! #no beta, no editing. My first MCU FIC. Sadly I can't find it on YouTube and I lost the CD, if anyone can find it-- the movie goes like this without any gore. An office girl (I think) lives alone at home, uses charcoal to draw on a canvas and is thinking of entering a museum's art contest... but is so indecisive, and suddenly the door bell rang, she goes to see who it is and sees its a blind guy who idk is asking if it's the right address or smth. She says no and he goes away. ... Boom from one floor beneath her apartment, at the same location as her door, another her appears... her dooplerganger-- who does what she was indecisive about, draws, enters the art contest, basically this whole movie is some detective supernatural thing where a detective discovers that some ppl jump off buildings after seeing their dooplergangers achieve better than them. Sooooo ;) this is not an original idea, just wanna honour this movie.

~~~~~~~

Clap.  

 "Listen here. If nobody takes this Friday exam seriously, I'll have Mr. Laufeyson take over all my classes for the rest of the week." Lightheartedly said Thor, his wide voice overpowering the whole classroom, grinning in playful triumph, yet the threat was very real. 

Groans and moans—some boos here and there—fill out the jam-packed classroom, ranging from zombie-tired to actual fear responses. My reaction lied delicately, balancing on the tightrope of both dread and hope, but my heart twisted in excitement. 

Among the chorus of complaints, chatter, and chairs shrieking surrounding me, I took my sweet time filing and packing my things, which were not so neat. Class ended on a very motivational note. .   .   . 

Professor Thor's brother was not one most students willingly paid a visit to after-hours, unlike the other teachers, and looking for him without a purpose in academic advice is as pointless as buying rope from a camel. 

His striking slim features, like his most prominent and popular emerald gems for eyes and boney face, take a stand in attracting many to sign up for his courses. I so happened to be one of the lucky few who didn't check the profiles of the teachers and allowed that to influence my decision-making. 

Beauty is always deceiving. 

And it never fails to be so entertaining to watch from the back rows when another person rage-quits, abruptly leaves in the middle of his teaching, or slumps defeatedly in their seats each and every week. It never stopped Mr. Laufeyson from carrying on the lesson—not even when a wasp flew in by mistake and terrorised the class while he didn't bat an eye.

Until it went after him, he took immediate action, swatting it hard against the wall with a ruler. 

He froze. 

Holding that fatal position, he rotated his head towards me—I meant, the class obviously. 

"Now, any questions? And if there are, you best make it good; otherwise, you'd like your future grade to fall from a height." He removes the ruler, revealing a flattened wasp slowly unsticking itself from the wall and plummeting down with a comically weak buzz.

Then silence.   

"Just like that." 

I held back from laughing, except for a tiny chuckle joining the other students'. Sucking in the bottom of my lip, I focused on the assignment on my laptop while keeping an active ear for any tidbits of information from him. I really liked his humorous side. But there was something else about him that I loved. 

…RING. 

 There went the bell, and class was dismissed. Mr. Laufeyson, with a smooth ease, was the first to leave, and the others and I stalled to watch him before following suit in hushed giggles. 

"—ho! Just now, that got me feeling some type of way." 

Another girl low moaned, "I'm melting like an ice cream in the sun."

 "I wish he used that ruler on me instead." 

Mmhmm.

Mr Laufeyson's back disappeared after a sharp turn, he's never in the cafeteria during lunch breaks but in a way what a relief he won't ever see the dumb side of me. Not that he sees me as anything else except a student. 

But it will change.

Thankfully graduation was right around the corner… By then I'll have a chance to ask him out properly. Maybe buy him some flowers? As a farewell appreciation gift. 

.   .   .

"I heard you used my name again to scare the children," Loki piqued, hands studiously behind his back as he approached the sun-lit kitchen.

His brother, shining blonde tied-back hair, grins wolfishly after downing a beer can and tossing it in the trash, making it over to Loki.

"Relax, it's just a joke, brother!" Thor let out a boisterous laugh, smacking a large hand on Loki's shoulder and causing him to slightly flinch. "College kids need the motivation. A kick of adrenaline, am I right?" 

"More work that is unnecessary doesn't sound very funny to me. I will not be babysitting your class again after last time, a word of warning."

"Oh come on now, you have a knack for torturing students to greatness— and I can supply you with as many peoplee as you wish. Just say the word!—"

Loki's unamusement showed in his thin smile and poise stance.

"—Don't think I've seen the way you've been holding yourself back from having fun these days." He winked, walking off with a whistle in the direction of his study.

Loki didn't think it was obvious but of course his brother noticed his recent shift in behavior, more avoidance. But like all things in life, it would soon pass. It has to. And it will.

The root of his avoidance would graduate soon enough next month. He'll just have to exercise more patience and wait it out.

.    .    .

Friday nights are always the best to rewind and treat myself to fast food on the couch. It's fun to pretend that there's 3 days in the weekend.

Time to imagine the handsome actor in the Notebook as Mr Laufeyson.

"Sorry, can't join you tonight girl. I got a 2nd date with Taro!" Juliet whooped excitedly, pumping a fist towards the ceiling as she one-handedly strapped on her glittery heels with urgency.

I waved weakly at her bursting enthusiasm, smiling hard and happy for her. "Goodluck—"

The door slammed in my face, faint clip-clops of her heels muffled away into the buzzing night, and the disappointment of my ruined plans reflecting off the smooth rogue-wood. 

Welp and there goes movie-night with my bestie roommate… Now I've got the whole place to myself, wowie, nice. Time for some self-care.

Was what I thought before accidentally falling asleep in the middle of a firework love confession scene on the big screen, an empty bag of popcorn kernels laying at the foot of the couch I slouched on. As I finally snored myself awake, a series of insistent knuckle-punching came from the door, louder than the TV audio.

BANG. BANG. BANG.

That is so unlike the bubbly optimistic Juliet I know, she wouldn't be coming home until… I patted around me for my phone and checked the time. 

9:00 PM. 

Yep. It's far too early. 

Instantly I sat up straight, unblinking, eyeing the front door with a tight clutch on my phone. No way is Juliet even close to retiring from her date, ever. No one is supposed to be here and not at this time.

BANG. BANG.

Step by cautious step, I neared the door and tiptoed to peer out of the peephole at what–or–who was causing the commotion. My phone at the ready to call the cops.

BANG.

A mop of slick black hair blocked the majority of my sight: as if this person was leaning forwards, face-first, into the door like he was either trying to hide his identity or didn't know how doors work. Since usually people wouldn't be standing so absurdly close against a door with knowing the possibility of it hitting them.

Or this is a drunk idiot who wondered off from one of the other houses. An uncommon occurence but happens.

BANG— 

"Stop!" I shouted, my free hand taking hold of the doorknob firm and full of annoyance. Ready to give this possible-drunk a piece of my mind.

The person listened then a soft, almost feverent breathing came through the wood after hearing my voice. Are they drunk and sick? Not the first time seeing this terrible combo.

"Please take a step back!" I warned the person on the other side and swung the door wide open in a rush of concern. 

My unsuspecting self, dumbfoundedly, receiving the best shock of my life. It was a man. I knew.

"Well," glimmered a pair of deep green gem-like eyes once settling in my face. Upclose and too personal.  "Hello, my darling. It's been too long." 

That infamous silky voice that slithers into anyone's consciousness for days. Belonging to non other but my– I mean, that man.

My vocal cords decided to stop functioning without my consent. "H…" 

Almost all of my vocabulary disappeared from my brain the second I fully registered the familiar handsome face in my head. His petal-thin lips parted while my jaw hung as we both looked at each other in a mutual deadlock.

"M– Mr Laufeyson?" My tongue muscle memory took over. 

He nodded curtly in confirming his identity, still staring wide-eyed at me as if drinking me in like a new sight to behold. 

Wait he shouldn't be here. I wasn't hallucinating this hard, right.

There was no reasonable explanation as to why I could be hallucinating without a drop of alcohol in my system. Unless he stalked me, which is impossible to imagine the busy man ever doing, even pondering it, to me of all people. 

Hah. I wish.

But lo and behold it was him, genuinely in the flesh, smiling the most biggest white-teethed smile I've seen. 

"May I come in, please. Darling?" 

In where? In what? 

Trying to make sense of the current reality standing infront of me, hoping this wasn't a prank. 

"Why are you here… Sir." I intoned, politely, darting my eyes around him at the dark corners suspiciously. This wasn't some graduation prank right, I secretly hoped it wasn't.

"Why?" A, very nice sounding, humourous chuckle ripples from him before he continued.

"How could I not pay a visit to my most brilliant student? I would regret it for as long as I live." He said it extremely convincing as if it was normal to show up out of the blue at my house in the middle of the night. 

"Right. Um, please come in."

I beckoned him in with an instinctual welcoming smile, holding back the urge to tidy my no-doubt ratty appearence and adjust my clothes as he entered. 

Brushing his whole arm against mine, on accident I think, but he didn't seem to notice, too focused on removing his shining boots. 

Nervously, I closed the door behind him while deeply breathing in the faint passing of his leafy cologne. My mind long forgetting if I should've let him inside. 

I tersely said, ignoring the happy booming in my heart, and gestured to the gray couch. Hoping he wouldn't notice the tiniest shade of darker gray, the imprint of where I lazed earlier. 

"Please, sir, make yourself at home." 

"Oh, I planned to." Mr Laufeyson winked uncharacteristically, smoothly shrugging his coat off him and folding it over the armrest– where I laid my head earlier– casually. One of his hands had a purplish-dark marking across the skin, must've been from him knocking something. 

"Thank you, darling."  

"No problemo." That was not a cool response at all. Internally I cringed at myself while mentally noting to get him a bandage for his hand injury.

It took much willpower not to lose control of my eyeballs from running down the rare sight of him in only his white button-up while feeling his intense emerald gaze all over me. 

Juliet is not going to believe this.

Alright, I'm going to be a good host. And only that. He probably wants to ask about what career path I'm choosing or something, so hold back.

I cleared my throat, meeting with his eyes.

"Sir, would you like some tea or coffee?" And maybe stay longer.

"From you? Anything will do."

.   .   .

Crackles of laughter sitting together on the couch, his arm draped over the back of the cushion behind my head, silly banter over past lessons he taught, tiny tidbits of his favourite things and color (as I suspected was green) proven correct. We share more things in common than I had thought. 

Who knew I'd be the lucky one to be graced with getting personal with Mr Laufeyson. 

1:10 AM.

In a blink of an eye, time seemed to skip over and the hour hand crossed midnight. Even though I felt no ounce of drowsiness— it wouldn't be appropriate to let him get caught by my roommate. This wasn't exactly all that inappropriate too, we only talked. 

"Sir, it's getting very late. I'm sure you have another student to visit tomorrow or something," I tried to sound casual with mild contact, genuinely smiley, and not at all like I was pushing him to get the hint. 

His emerald eyes flashed understanding as he gave a relaxed smile, getting up from the couch slightly slow. "I'd hate to overstay my welcome and have you lose your beauty sleep." 

I chuckled and copied his action while he collected his coat, his slim fingers fiddling with the buttons almost mindlessly. It was a rare sight to see Mr Laufeyson act… Nervous? Maybe, that would be funny to imagine but he must be feeling discourteous for accidentally not watching the time slip by. 

I know I would.

"Oh and dear." 

My gaze instantly flicked up to his already on me. "Don't think for one second I could ever forget you," he closed the distance between our bodies and said my name so intimately. Leaning in, tilting his head, my heart a combustion of excitement, as his eyes shut and he left a peck on my cheek. 

The signals were green. He was giving all the right signals and I'd be a fool not to go for it. Just not right now. 

I muffled my own giggle, leading him to the door as I held it wide open for him. "Thanks for stopping by, Mr Laufeyson. It means a lot to me." More than he could ever know. If only he could stay longer but that would be a huge violation to my roommate's trust. Darn it.

"As it is for me." 

He softly smiled, taking his sweet time to walk down the small steps. Glancing back at me twice. 

He left without a hurry into the swallowing darkness where the streetlights lacked reach, and I continued staring out the peephole long after his ghostly tall figure lost itself in a concerning direction. Only alleyways and deadends there. 

But I shouldn't be too worried, he looked like he knows where to go.

Tik. Tok.

 Tik tok.

It felt like an eternity wishing for Monday to arrive quicker, my nerves aflamed for the entire weekend as I picked out cute outfits in advance. Surely he'd appreciate a different look from me, I couldn't wait to see his face again.

—RING.

.    .    .

Back to class. Here we go!

For once throughout my college days, I woke up an extra hour before my alarm and prepped an all natural make-up look. Taking special care to choose a flattering outfit and spritzing all over myself with my favourite scent until I knew I would be a walking cloud of sweetness. Hopefully something to be remembered by.

 Out the door I went after leaving some waffles for Juliet's breakfast. Way too early but it was worth it.

"—Right, let's continue where we left off before another bee decides to steal the thunder and my job. All at once." Mr Laufeyson placed away the long ruler responsible for last week's insect death, I noted that he was wearing the same coat from coming over last friday, as a round of chuckles and soft giggles in the mix, erupted at his words.

Mr Laufeyson was putting extra work into being humorous today of all days or his mood improved positively better... Possibly because of me. Because of last Friday night. Or I was getting too ahead of myself when he could've easily paid a visit to the others. Right, he's just being a good concerned teacher. As always...

Class went on like normally. And he didn't even glance at me.

. . . The hour had passed.

Hoping for the littlest of interaction after class, I sprinted the steps down to the front of the classroom. Ahead of anyone else. "Mr Laufeyson!" 

Once I stepped around the desk to properly stand before him, a perky excitement in my every movement to be upclose to him again. My expectations of mildly receiving a smile from him was shattered the second he angled his face towards me, his stiff folders collected under an arm.

"What."

 Mr Laufeyson said harshly, "—exactly do you want? My time is limited. My email is on the Google classroom, you can easily find it online to contact me. However If it's a matter you believe is urgent, see me in my office after school hours immediately."

Not expecting this... Kind of standoffish tone.

I deflated under the scrutiny of his sharp green eyes and downturned pink lips, hopes of my outfit and being noticed stomped by his quiet impatience and unusual agitation. Right, we were still in school. Why did I choose such bad timing to talk to him.

Too eager, I must've came across as desperate. Yikes.

"Okay, sir. Thanks," I gave a weak smile as he spun to leave swiftly. 

Probably not hearing me in the midst of everyone else's small chatter joining the outside noise as I adjusted the strap of my bag on my shoulder. Heart heavy but I survived.

His change in attitude was unexpected but not unwelcome. The iciness of it. A telltale sign that something or someone had bothered him. By the troubled ook of his deepened wrinkles, I guessed it must be recent— An hour or few ago, maybe— his stiff body language told me it's a personal matter.

Either I was deducing nonsense or being a kick of delusional away from acting on my deepest urge to confess my feelings.

How could I even help him?

.      .      .

🫠 Omni-Man Is My Jam. Drabble.

(Short drabble thingie while sleep deprived celebrating my incoming birthday, 200+ words,🫡 while I finish up some of my other fics, ready to explode. If you're feeling generous, here's my kofi.)

Omni–Man:

Long hard day of work or doing nothing, you lay on your bed to catch up on some much needed down time with yourself and phone before Omni–man invites himself in through your ever-forgetful window. The persistent viltrumite you can never get rid of even when you want to.

What does he say to that? from MK1, "I can hold my breath for weeks."

So it's no surprise when you're the one gasping for air, one hand desperately clinging onto your pillow for dear life to not blackout from the sequence of eye-rolling orgasms, the other with fingers digging deep into his short hair as he stays determined and hyperfocus on eating the sweet little pleasure between your trembling thighs caught in his strong beefy hands. You definitely blacked out after the 5th or was it 9th orgasm?

When you awoke at midnight, it wasn't to peace. Omni–man never seemed to take a break, almost threatening with an infinite amount of energy and stamina as he loomed over you, your legs draped over his mountainous shoulders. "I'm going to demolish this pussy." And he meant it in every soul punching thrust, increasing in intensity.

And when he finally calls it a night… Oh you could only twitch in response, dazed and gaping in many ways than one as he chuckled, throwing a lazy blanket barely covering the mess he made of you before flying out in an instant.

His message on your phone blinkied in the darkness: 'Be prepared for next time, pet.'

Once more for those in the back.

"I won't cry for you" - Yandere Tyler Galpin x Female Reader PART 3

•Part 1 •Part 2

Words: 1699

Warnings: Mentions of torture, psychology, dysfunction yet healthy family relations if you squint.

Show: Wednesday (2022)

Summary: You've graciously or stupidly, granted Tyler a phone to call his father for whatever reason he had while you went to call yours for assistance. And since you weren't fully knowledgeable about Hydes, you contacted the only person you knew, who wasn't in prison, that had that knowledge. Your father, Alvin Gates.

• •

🥺 Sorryyyy this took forever a lot of months, planned to post this at February but got sick and many stuff happened, preparing for an interview :--D but am back in my writing mojo!/kinda, HAPPY HALLOWEEN) AND I HEARD season 2 is coming omggg I'm excited

————

"Well, well, well~ If it isn't the sweet consequence of my actions with your mother." A voice unmistakably grouchy speaks, sounding jovial with every word out.

A quick glance to your locked bedroom door before you finally said a response into the cellphone.

"You sound well, father." You mildly greeted, a tinge of a smile in your voice. To think it's almost only been a month since the last call.

"Yeah yeah it's been a while but cut the chitchat, sweetie, what do you need helping with?" You could imagine an eyeroll as your father said, always cutting to the chase.

"About Hydes." You spared no other detail and maintained calm articulation. Not that you needed to be careful with him, thankfully.

For more precaution, it's better if not even your own father knows about Tyler being in the house. You didn't want things to get out of hand.

"Ah- what about them? Did something happen that isn't supposed to–" Suddenly silence overtook the line, a thoughtful humming until he spoke again. "Don't get yourself into any unfamiliar territory, kid. That's suppose to be your mother's speciality."

So he noticed, of course he did. Better leave that to his wandering imagination than spoil your plan. A very non-existent plan at the moment.

"I don't plan to. Father, I was just curious since I kept hearing about them." True, that wasn't a lie in the slightest. "I was wondering if you'd know anything about them."

Surely he must know something.

"Hmm, you heard it from someone, no doubt. . . Alright, alright. What do you want to know exactly, kid. I'll tell ya as much as I can afford to." Sounds like mother has been keeping tabs on him.

"Hydes obey only one master, their own, correct?" You continued when father hummed a helpful tune, "would it be possible to sever the ties between a Hyde and its master."

A pause in-between your father's breathing left you suspended.

"Well. . . Got bad news for you kid, I don't know any available methods for that." He sighed gruffy like he felt bad, "sorry but can't help you with the whole severing business. It's set in stone, pretty much."

"I see. . . " You massaged your temples, disappoinment rising inside you. But you couldn't just accept this answer easily, stubbornness seemed to take hold in your heart. For what reason? You couldn't figure out.

"However–" A hoarse chuckle emerged from your cellphone. "It's not entirely impossible to say there aren't other ways of solving that problem. I'm sure you can get some creative ideas from their origins, kid. Only one thing is set in stone, Hydes only serve one master."

Father's bold hint sparked a lightbulb in your head. Their origins.

In the first place, what caused Hydes to bond an undying loyalty to their masters was–

"Sorry for not being alot of help, kid, I'm out of time for the day. Take good care of yourself, will you."

"I will." A buzz of excitement slowly crept over you as an idea began running through your mind. "You were very helpful, dad, thanks. You take care too."

"Mm sounds like you found an answer eh?" He sounded genuinely happy, making you feel much more sturdy in this new plan.

"Not exactly but I should be on the right track." If Tyler would go along with it.

"Mm so you're going to try any attempts, I see. Hah– it's hilarious how similar you and your mother's thinking is!"

Again with the comparisons. You rolled your eyes, "Goodbye, father."

"Alright alright, see ya kiddo. For now." BEEP. BEEP.

The call was over already.

.  .  .

You turned off the burner phone, picking out the block of battery from the back and saving it in your other hiding space for another time. Now you should check on Tyler, you can't afford to trust him so easily especially when his father's a sheriff. 

Quietly you went out of your bedroom, closing the door slowly so as to not make a sound. You headed down the stairs in a casual, fast pace to quickly see his state of mind.

But it's likely he isn't planning to screw himself over... Your assumption was most likely made correct when you came to see Tyler sitting slumped on the couch, his face buried deep in his hands. 

Sweeping your gaze across the living room and floor, the burner phone you gave him was nowhere in sight… Mentally noting to check the trash bin by the kitchen before you stomped down the stairs and made yourself known.

Tyler's eyes peeked up first from the gaps in-between his fingers like the leafy venus flytraps back home ever so often tempting you to closer inspect. To place your finger in there, to feed. 

He waited on your next move.

Your arms folded, hiding your hands twitching on their own for a tweezer. "Did you have a good talk?" 

What else could you really say without sounding too interested in him. 

"It was something…" Tyler did a small shrug, less energy than he's shown before, voice dulled by the cover of his fingers. "Could've gone better. I wish he didn't hang up so fast."

"What did you talk about?" Might as well see how much information he was willing to give.

A small sigh, Tyler slowly revealed half of his distraught face. "Not a lot. He wasn't interested in what I had to say… Told me to be careful." Strange of the dutiful sheriff to say but then again you didn't know what kind of father-son relationship they had.

"How are you feeling?" One of mother's favourite lines growing up that you've somehow adapted into your vocabulary. It seemed the most appropriate.

You continued watching Tyler's tensed form with a safe but short distance away, the coffee table acting as a possible shield in between you and him. Incase he raged.

But there was none.

There was something in his usual silence this time that irked you. Like he didn't fully trust you. 

You approved of that, as he shouldn't. Mutually. Especially if things ever go wrong because of him, you were ready at a moment's notice to abandon everything to do with him. 

"I… Hate him." 

The pause went on for however many tensed seconds before Tyler's hands fell onto his knees.

"Sorry sorry, I know I shouldn't be saying this… I mean I can't say I don't miss him." 

"You can say what you want. I don't mind," you said flatly, genuinely meaning it. His expressions stiff, he looked mentally pent up, thoughts practically steaming out from his ears.

"No, it's fine. You've done a lot for me already, I owe you." He grinned brightly, the dark cloud looming over from before gone in an instant, "for that phone call too."

"Sure," it wouldn't be bad to have a Hyde indebted to you.

Tyler checked the ticking clock on the kitchen wall, "I guess it is getting late… See you in the morning?"

You nodded. "Night, Galpin." 

"G-Good night! Have a good sleep." He smiled dopey, waving briskly while walking backwards to the foot of the stairs before jogging up to his bedroom. So naturally at home.

Just how eager was he to get back in his room?

 That wasn't his usual way of walking, what could he be looking forward to or hiding in there… Or he could just be relieved of stress after that talk with his father, maybe that brought about his new behavior.

Your suspicions were beginning to sound far-fetched even to yourself but then again, there was always that silver of possibility that he could be planning to rebel against you. 

So you moved fast towards the kitchen sink, tiny spikes of uneasiness pulsing through you, turning the facuet on and letting the water run loudly as you went to look into the trash bin.

Expecting to look down into a void of nothingness.

The large black plastic bag sleeved over the edge of the bin looked loose and puffy. Clearly you didn't do this, your meticulousness wouldn't allow such a lazy set up. You pat down the puffy areas, flattening the edges to allow better access in seeing what trash had been collected.

Shiny peices of black metal greet you at the bottom of the pit, tiny and almost powder-like glitter in the kitchen light. What previously used to be a burner phone now looked like the result of being in someone's clenched fist. Useful monsterous strength… if he could actually get it under his full control.

Whatever anxiety crept inside your heart disappeared as you contently spun on your heel and turned off the kitchen faucet. 

A small appreciation for Tyler as thanks to him, there's less work for you now.

You wondered why you even felt 'anxious' at all, it must've been the slight stress of knowing he could've screwed things up for you. And himself. Now that makes sense, of course since it's not as if you actually knew him personally even back in town. 

Feeling much more at peace, you headed towards your own bedroom, adjacent from Tyler's. His room barely made any noise except for the few inaudible mumbles and the faint use of his shower and the light peeking through from underneath his door. 

You never noticed before but he always had the lights turned on in there. Well, it's not as if you were the one paying the electrical bill. It was nothing noteworthy.

Once settling in your own bed and underneath your blanket in the cozy dark, sleep came easily… Until your brain jostled an interesting observation your very eyes must've slipped. 

In the trash bin, there was no sight of the small black piece. The memory card. 

The sim card. 

Despite his questionable actions, you chose to sleep, thoughts racing alongside a strange excitement building up in you. 

Oh what are you up to, Tyler Galpin.

Time was ticking. Neither on his or your side. He just didn't know it yet.

In the following morning you received a misscall from an unknown number. Father. He never contacts you first. There's nothing he needs that you could provide. It must be about the Hyde. 

Finally.

💲🐖 Put Your Money where your mouth is. Oink. (Female OC x Paypig reader)

• Warnings: Paying behaviour, human ATM, money slave to a femdom, soft femdom, blackmail, non consensual humiliation and soft financial domination, soft bullying, the femdom is my female OC. SFW.

∆ MINORS DNI? Viewer discretion is advised. Safe for work. ∆

Summary: You were going to be owned, completely, financially by a bratty bachelorette who shoves you past your limit and wallet to entertain her at her own party.

🥴 Author's Note: First time writing more humiliation stuff (fun fact I am slightly stressed so gimme your monei) hope it's good guys and happy Halloween!! 1.9k words!💲💲💲And to Yall little cash piggies, send my Kofi or paypal some love and plenty of cash 🥱just do it cause piggies don't get a say so, I do.

~~~~~~

It isn't love at first sight but a deep reverence when you lay eyes on… Her. Lucky for you, you aren't going broke anytime. Famous last words until paycheck day.

"Like, honestly," the redhead woman clicks her tongue, tone deliciously condescending. "I'm doing YOU a favour."

Laura fingers the stack of random dollar bills on the high bar table across from you, taking her sweet time counting all your hard earned cash right in front of your sweat dripping face.

"See how good I'm treating your– Hah!– I mean, it's MY money now. You should practise more gratitude in your life before someone else does it better for you." Like a slave, you find yourself nodding along agreeingly to a woman you barely knew.

She sounds pleased with herself for a second as she mentally totalled the amount in her hands, then a flicker of her smokey gaze sets on you in hardened dissatisfaction and your body shivers in delightful cold sweat. The good kind that buries itself in the lower part of your jeans. You never knew you could be this turned on in your life.

Helplessly, your eyes track her newly bridal manicures combing through the money you tributed her, as she hums along to the song being played overhead, a classic nude shade matching her cocktail dress though tastefully chosen– you know in your heart of hearts that it could've been done better. She could've and should be treated to better things. 

A goddess like her, albeit a not-so-single stranger you just met and got pressured into joining the fun, deserves even more. 

Exaggeratingly you clear your throat to be heard over the surrounding chatter, heart hammering in it when you gesture politely to her hands. "Can I pay for your nails? When you want new ones, of course." 

In nervous wait, you dare not to make eye contact until sensing her sharp gaze on you.

Her electric pink lips purse upwards before she releases a genuine laugh at you, making her abundant auburn curls bounce over her bare shoulders. "Awww how sweet… Oh you would like to, now wouldn't you?"

Laura checks her nails under the soft light like she's assessing how much of your offer is deserving of her acceptance… Not that you would know what a goddess like her is thinking, you could only anxiously (and excitedly) guess in your stuffy seat. 

"Well? Don't waste my precious time, it's nothing like yours." She snaps, one hand tightly gripping the tribute money while she pointedly looks at her empty open palm expectantly and beckoning for more. More of the hidden money in your large pockets.

Hesitantly, with an obvious nervousness at this interaction, you fished out a large crisp bill from your wallet and placed it carefully in her open palm. Hoping the amount would please her.

- $1000 

"Wow… Wooooww, I can't believe you're trying to be a smartass little piggy," Laura scoffs viciously, easily crumbling the bill in her hand to make a show of her point.

The degrading nickname she called you had sent multiple electric waves down to your… growing arousal.

"A thousand dollars isn't nearly enough for the kind of nails I want. I can't believe you tried to trick me, Me. Do you know who I am?!" 

Your mind instantly answers that she is a goddess, unlike your delayed mouth. "N-No?" Crap.

"A worthless virgin piece of shit like you should be bowing to me right now, heck, you should feel grateful for every second you BREATHE in my air. Get down on your knees, pig." There was a slight mutter of disgust beneath her breath as her ruby lips curled in displeasure, sending you to instantly bow forwards and fall onto your knees like a loose Russian doll. 

Her disgust further grew at the sight of your eager and willing display to please her.

No doubt some of the bar patrons' curious gazes skirt to you like, some bubbles of laughter towards your display of obedience while most ignored what was going on. You just became another piece of entertainment for an uncaring and leering audience.

"Hmph. At least you can listen, that's not too bad… But I can't believe you're actually doing this. This is so embarrassing for you, ugh." Laura giggled almost delightfully into her hand after a quick glance down at you by her feet. 

"Now go make yourself a little useful and get me and my girlfriends some bottles."

And you did. The server coming by had to bend down to take your order from your position on the floor, an uncomfortable look from them all the while smiling professionally.

Laura didn't talk to you for the rest of the party, just chit chatting with the ladies and other people with a full glass of bubbly. It was difficult to convince yourself to change sitting positions to relieve the burning numbness in your thighs and legs when you'd sense Laura's overwhelming grey gaze over you as if to check whether or not you listened well. 

The smallest quirk of her auburn eyebrows gave you the feeling while she wasn't exactly pleased- she had approved, even without sparing another word. The tingles across your spine from knowing that was wonderful.

You felt that hours must've passed but in reality the night had just begun.

Excusing herself for the restroom, Laura got off the bar stool and in the process accidentally her heels half-stepping on your thigh, gifting you sharp and hard pain. She let out a laugh as she disappeared to the back of the bar while you swear you could still feel the indent and shape of her stiletto heels.

A cute mousy woman looks down at you with eyes shining in concern before returning her attention to the rest of her drunken friends at the table. "Don't you guys think she's being a little mean to that poor man?" 

The drunkest woman hiccuped and smacked the table, loudly scoffing. "Oh please! He wants to be here, it's his choice- if you were really worried about him then you would've tried to pull us all away from here. But you didn't, so it's not that bad." 

"A pathetic fuck is what that is, the poor guy." Another friend of Laura's laughed snidely, downing a shot from the third round of drinks that you paid for. 

You were just there, an existing humiliation as the conversation continued to flow above your head— soon enough the women forgot about you as more desserts and colourful drinks were served

Meant the lighter your wallet felt, it didn't matter because you loved every throbbing second of it. 

You were becoming Laura's personal walking ATM machine. Disposable.

.   .   .

Sephora shopping sprees with a group of beautiful women sounds like a dream come true, especially when you've been dragged along by Laura every week– it wasn't a problem after the first month or so but she ignored your tiny protests to meet her despite her knowing you had work today. It's not as if she cared about you or your hard-on.

 Nothing stopped her from pressuring you to call in sick like a 'loser pig' while the invisible pressure belted around your neck squeezed pleasurably tighter as Laura verbally forced you to spend more than your consented limit.

Looks like you were going to have to cancel the restaurant reservations for your nieces and nephews or survive off the impending doom of pennies remaining in your bank account.

The only thing you couldn't cancel was the uncomfortably taunt and hardcore boner taped against your inner thigh. An order by Laura and her friends for shits and giggles. 

They never checked to see or asked if you really listened to their words. They didn't need to. 

You know they don't give a shit about you, the fact cementing itself pleasurably in your mind as none of your messages to your mistress received any replies. She only texts you the necessary details, nothing more and you loved it.

— 'Ashlee Avenue. Raven's spa. Tomorrow 4 PM.' 

'Yes, Madame.' The only appropriate response.

.   .   .

But there are unfortunate times where you've made her unhappy. Just to what extent, you were about to find out her wrath. 

On the pristine marble flooring of her bedroom in her shared penthouse. Her fiancè at the pool, lounging under the sun and barely batting an eye when you were ordered around. 

"I'll say this once nicely, piggy, since you're going to be MY pig and anything I own should have somewhat of a brain cell left in their pathetic skulls. Am I right?" Laura's voice viciously echoed in the large room, her auburn hair lit like an intimidating smouldering flame against the entirely white walls and decor.

"Y-Yes, Madame." Instantly you answer obediently.

"Good, good! See you're not so stupid, piggy… Understand this from now onwards, if you aren't making me happy or trying to, then I'm gonna have to be the big bad wolf and blow you away." Laura let out half a cackle at her own joke before collecting her composure and continuing, looking down her sharp nose at your dog seated position in plain judgement.

She slowly lowers herself to a deep squat, serious eyes levelling an inch right above yours as she leans in slightly close, wrinkling her nose at the 'stench' of your pathetic desperation to be fully hers. Her next words almost took you out of consciousness from the shock and pleasurable terror. 

"I'll blow your fucking reputation to the ground by posting about you attempting to fuck me, Mr Assistant manager, an engaged woman. You can say bye bye to your career and family if you even have any. The fucking point is, I'll destroy everything you're apart of and make sure your name is too ruined for you to get back up on your feet—" 

Laura cut herself off for a short intake of breath, playfully glaring at you as if you had tired her mouth. "So if I were you, unless you want your boss finding out about you trying to steal somebody's wife, be ready to oink whenever I call for you. It's simple instructions just like opening that big fat wallet of yours for me, don't you agree, little piggy?"

"Y..Yes—" Her glare narrowed on you in warning. "— Uh, oink. Oink!" 

Your brain must've fried itself on the high dosage of dopamine and horniness as you realised you were sounding out the words instead of making the actual noises a pig would. It was pathetic either way, your attempts too.

"Oh you can do better than that, I know you can." She tutted, smug in her absolute power over you. "But… practice does make perfect. Animals like you need to remember their place. Now next time oink louder, cheap piggy." 

For her, you did. 

🐖🐖🐖

Within the year, you've 20 000 dollars tributed to your Mistress. Everything was worth it but nobody could ever find out about the true degenerate that you are.

"Piggy piggy," a lazy beach-themed manicure hand beckons you to come closer on all fours towards the edge of the swaying hammock, the rough sand beneath grinding painfully into your bare knees and palms as you did your best efforts to oink despite the delicious exhaustion.

Laura admires her nails under the bright sunlight and barely acknowledged you, as your nose caught the faintest whiff of the expensive feminine perfume you've bought for her clinging onto her slightest tanned skin. "You still got your savings right?" 

"Oink oink oink!" You hoped your voice conveyed an eager 'yes.' 

"Good, good. You'd be even more useless to me if you're penniless so soon. I've drained one of your wallets high and dry huh?" She laughs without a care in the world, as she should.

"Oink oink!!!"

Yes, Mistress. 

End.

my kink is seeing money go into my bank account

Oooo omg 🥺😳😳 Love the pregnancy part, just wow–

Baby Addams.

Pairing: MaleWednesday x reader.

Warning: Mention of kidnapping, Mention of forced marriage, pregnancy, Yandere Male Wednesday. Gomez and Morticia from 1991. (poor transition Spanish and Italian) If you speak any of these languages feel free to correct me nicely thank you.

Summary: You were Wednesday's wife, with a baby on the way. (sorry summary sucks)

A/n: This is inspired by the story Yandere male Wednesday , by @teresalace I asked her permission so yea. Check out the story.

Three years, since you met Wednesday, Three years, since he took you away from everything you knew, Three years since you were married into the Addams family, and finally Wednesday had got what he wanted like he always did. You were pregnant, carrying a new addition to your husband's family. Gomez and Morticia were overjoyed about the news.

It was a dim, gloomy morning, and the massive black blanket lay on your growing stomach "Mi alma, wake up." a monotone voice whispered in your ear as you slowly opened your eyes, his plump lips kissed your shoulder, tracing down your arm to your wedding ring, sweet nothing whisper in Italian in Wednesday's normal deadpan voice "My parents are coming." he said getting out of the king bed.

You sighed and sat up as best as you can with a six-month baby bump, the room was dark in aesthetic and semi-normal, with hints of white and a little red amongst the black. The only thing that was out of the ordinary was the large custom guillotine that hung above the bed, which luckily was unable to move, You had to convince and seduce Wednesday for that to happen.

Getting up from bed was somewhat difficult, but you managed to waddle to your shared walking closet, black and bright, warm colors were separated down the middle of the metal bar. You quickly showered and threw on a blue maternity dress, earrings to match, and a necklace. The walk downstairs was a little hard even when Wednesday helped, your home was gothic victorian style like your in-laws but less big. Swords, old timely guns, and torture devices littered the walls as while as mirrors, the rugs were dead animals. The furniture was you guessed black and white with red, and some armor and statues stood around the living room.

You both headed to the kitchen, It was a modern kitchen that your husband allowed you to decorate the only rule? It had to be in his aesthetic which you took. Wednesday leads you to the kitchen island and helped you onto the dark wooden counter stool "Good morning Wednesday" you smiled at him tiredly ready to break the silence "Yes, it is quite a bad morning today." he hummed and sat a glass of water down in front of you and began to make you breakfast. Despite being tricked into this marriage he was a good husband dare you say the best, Yes his..well him, he never made you feel unloved and was surprisingly romantic. The apple didn't fall that far from the tree, though he wasn't over-expressive with his displays of affection. A loud shriek rang out making you jump "I hate that doorbell." you whispered as took a bit of your breakfast that he put down. "I will get it, Mi Alma" he walked out of the kitchen to the front door, Wednesday inhaled, and opened the door. His dad held a brown box and his mother smiled at him "Our boy." She cooed, opening her arms in a grand gesture "Mother, Father. It is a displeasure to see you." Wednesday acknowledged looking boredly between his parents then sharply turned and walked back to the kitchen, Gomez and Morticia headed to the living room the door eerily closing behind them.

You swallowed the last bit of food when Wednesday walked in "Come." he offered his arm, you locked your arm his and hopped off the stool.

"There's the woman who stole our son's black, dead heart and hunts his every tortured thought!" Gomez exclaimed loudly as you walked into the living room, earning a threatening "Father." from Wednesday which Gomez ignored. "Hello dear." Morticia gracefully walked to you, almost appearing to be floating "How far along now?" She asked smiling at you "Six mouths." You smiled back "We wanted to give you this." She looked back at Gomez who held up the box "Shell we look through it together?" She asked pulling you away from Wednesday and to the floor where Gomez sat the box. Morticia opened it and took out stuff one by one "Here's Wednesday Teddy when he was just a little boy." She cooed and passed you a black teddy with stitches, the head ripped off "Cute.." you grimace, sitting it beside you. She pulled out kid-sized knives and swords "Oh this was his favorite toy!" She pulls out a toy guillotine, big enough to chop off a finger or a Barbie's head. 'So the obsession started during childhood. great.' you stared at it hopelessly.

"Son." Gomez touched Wednesday's shoulder both of them watching their wives interact with each other one with joy and the other hiding her disdain poorly. Gomez only got a side-eye look from his son, letting his father know he was listening, eyes back onto you "Let's talk." Gomez pat Wednesday's back and walked across the living to the hallway. Wednesday huffed and walked out.

"What do you so desperately need to talk about?" Wednesday stared his father down, wanting to be back within your essence "Son..are you sure she's the one for you? She doesn't scream...Addams material." "Are you saying you disapprove of her?" "Not exactly-" "Because if you are," Wednesday took a step closer to the older Addams "You will never see me or my children. She is my every soul, she cut open my heart and made me bleed for her. I would walk through heaven and back to please her. I would kill for her," his eyes narrowed "Even if it means you." a pregnant silence fell upon the two. If it was a cartoon you would be able to see a row of dots typing above their heads. Gomez grinned and shook his son back and foe "You have truly found your own Morticia!" he laughed, swung his arm around the tensed Wednesday and walked back into the room.

You yawned as laid back into the bed, your in-laws stayed until the dark of the night arrived. Though weird they were a joy to be around, the love they shared, you had wished for since you were little you had got it from a man who rarely showed emotion but love doesn't have to be over the top, love could be quiet yet meaningful and coming from someone like your husband. It was more special.

"Are you ready Mi alma?" Wednesday asked, pulling you into his embrace, his chin resting on your head, you tried nodded as the lights of the room were turned off by themselves, in the stillness of the dark and at the edge of sleep you whispered a "Te amo." Wednesday allows his lips to curl upward just a bit in the safety of the night "Ti amo"

Transition

Mi alma.

My soul.

Te amo.

I love you.

Ti amo.

I love you in Italian.

🐸 Prince Naveen x Female Reader (NSFW) 🚩 (smut)

💃Happy marital life after the wedding~

▪︎Words: 2110

▪︎Warnings: Teasing, Cunninglingus, Naveen going down on reader on the dinnertable.

😭💕 Wrote this two weeks ago, I'm getting more comfortable with smut writing. Hope y'all enjoy! This is my second instalment of the 'Disney x reader' series 😁 first was Prince Philip. Please enjoy!

~~~~

Cooking is a part of your love language, anything to do with taking good care of your loved ones never tires you out.

Firmly handling a long wooden spoon, you swirled through a bubbling pot of gumbo, nice and slow in the thick stew. The rich meaty mixed vegetables flavor filled the entire kitchen, every breath you'd take in would be a delicious meal as you hummed a jazz tune to yourself. 

Even from afar, there was a lovely shine on your slightly sweaty skin casted down from the golden crystal lights fixed to the ceiling. Popping your hips out to every few beats of the boiling pot you continuously stirred. Oh, you couldn't wait to eat right after your husband comes back from his music band, dinner always tasted better with a loved one. 

.   .   .

Click. 

Right on time, you heard the soft thud of the front door knob opening and a faint scuffle of shoes being taken off. At that familiar sound, a happy tingly feeling rose from your stomach, not just because you were starting to feel a little peckish but you were looking forward to seeing someone...

A pair of muffled footsteps led towards the kitchen and gave you a lovely surprise.

Hearing a low melodic whistle from behind, you instantly smile and throw back a glance over your shoulder. "Oh you're absolutely glowing, my evangeline. Glowing!" Naveen said enthusiastically, leaning his side against the doorway, his sparkling teeth and wide smile never failing to lift the tiredness within you from a good day's work, his princely presence alone cheering your spirits.

Your lips spread into a loving warm smile as a chuckle rose out of you. "Why thank you, Naveen, you're looking more handsome than usual." And goodness gracious he really was, wearing sleek long pants with that favourite white polo shirt of his, the sleeved clumsily rolled up at the elbows and revealing his firm arms crossed over each other. Emphasizing the muscles there, like he was barely containing himself from springing his arms around you. 

"Of course, of course. It is both a burden and a treat to be as unbelievably handsome as I am~" He eagerly ran a hand through his luscious hair and kept it behind his head, posing unashamedly for your eyes. Never failing to reel chuckles and laughter out of you, anytime and any day.

“Uh huh, right. It must be so hard for you, baby.”

He nodded in an exaggerating fashion. "It IS very hard to have a beautiful person such as yourself by my side…” His eyes shut as he loudly breathed in the air, pausing dramatically. “Mmmmm, it smells delicious… Absolutely divine." His eyes reopened and stayed on you like a target, hardly sparing a glance to your side where the stew you cooked was. "Why don't we get comfortable and…” 

“-And miss out on dinner? Naveen, we best keep our stomachs full before anything else.” You lightly said, a scolding tone as you shook your head for good measure at his teasing expression. 

Putting down the wooden spoon on a plate, you heard a deep, almost mischievous chuckle. 

"Oh, I know a way to get full…" 

As if he couldn't wait any longer, Naveen gleefully leapt and wrapped his strong arms around you, lifting you off your feet with little effort as you yelped being brought out of the kitchen, his grip slightly crushing your breasts and you grumbled when your toes barely grazed the ground. 

Like a floating water lily unable to move as easily against rippling water, you felt like you were floating as he carried you onto the dining table. 

"Naveen–" Before any protest could come out of your mouth, his lips mashed into yours and sent your body an explosion of tingles to course through.

Not wanting to fall, you had your hands propped behind you on the table surface and continued the harmonic kiss as his warm firm hands fondled the fleshiness of your thighs for his own pleasure. Inching higher and higher towards your hips, massaging gently as his hands dipped underneath the elastics of your underwear and tugged downwards.

Any and all protest disappeared from your mind when a breeze flowed by as your underwear was gone, and you heard a slip of fabric followed by an undone belt falling to the floor. 

"I've been looking forward to this meal, princess." His mouth latched to the sensitive nub, with little pressure at first while his fingers rubbed and probed around your vulva in lazy circles to get you worked up. Your legs instinctively wrapped around his shoulders, pulling him closer for better pleasure.

And it was working.

Round and round your labia, working up a slow rhythm that build up a delicious heat in your tightening core, but his chuckles added a cherry on top vibration onto that

It didn't take long with the help of his fingertips, like the skilled musician that he is, played you like a fiddle to spur on your release, your tensed thighs relaxing around his head, an audible sigh of relief letting out from you.

Wow…

"So, how was it, (Name)?" 

A slightly sweatier Naveen smirked sweetly up at you, breathing a little heavier, his long tongue running over his glistening wet lips in a smug fashion as if he was savoring your taste and to get a reaction out of you.  

You wheezed out an answer with a dazed smile, weakly rolling your eyes at his display, trying to glance down to his handsome face in a pearly sheen from the sweat. 

"Very… Very satisfied." 

That would be enough for a long while until the next time you'll make love with him.

"Then I'm about to do it again," his happy response was swift like his readied tongue when he dove back down in between your thighs, to your dripping entrance, continuing his expert strokes and rapid flicks on your vulva. 

Hardly appearing to be exhausted though you were sure his jaw would've been sore and aching now as his flicking tongue twisted and turned in so many different angles you never knew was possible, worked another explosive orgasm out of you. 

 Your curling toes, calves tensed as he never stopped his tired tongue from lapping up your juices. 

"Ah. I-I already came," half-mewls kept slipping from your lips. "You can rest," you breathed hard and heavy and called out to the head deep in-between your thighs, your fingers interlaced with his dark locks of hair tugging a little to get his attention. "Naveen!"

"I'll stop once you've begged for more~" Now that isn’t fair, that logic of his never helps you at all and he knows that! What a greedy prince.

"Please, don't give me more," you gasped at his sped up tonguing, like adding firewood to a burning furnace. He kept firing you up.

"Naveen! I won't kiss you today if you don't take a break," you grumbled a warning, sweating like rain, meaning every word you said.

Hearing you, he paused, cool puffs of breath closely fanning over your slit and making you twitch but giving you a chance to take in a proper deep breath. 

"Fine by me, princess– I'll just kiss your other lips, they look more lonely." The pounding in your chest intensified as your hands clenched onto the table edge, mentally you weren't prepared for his determination in peppering you in ravenous affection.

His tongue resumed drawing all over your intimates, specially licking up any essence of your obvious arousal glistening under the chandelier lights like a pearl.

"From my glorious time being a frog, I have learned to never underestimate what nature can teach you." He added before lowering his entire face down, your hips involuntarily jolting at feeling the sudden pleasures multiplying the second his lips began to kiss your very clit, no doubt swollen from his previous workings.

Almost making you feel jealous of your own…. Self. 

Then came his tongue. Oh gosh, his tongue! 

It penetrated your stickiness, lava hot, made you squirm involuntarily on the edge of the dinner table. Twisting and turning inside of you skillfully, inch by inch, scissoring you while his fingers prodded around your labia teasingly like he didn't know what to do.

Pleasurable torture is the only way you could describe it as you breathed in through gritted teeth, eyes barely focusing on the chandelier above, your shaky hand pulling onto a tuff of his hair gently.

Every time you even tried to move away from his tongue, his other hand slipped around your waist and secured you in place while his silken tongue kept dancing along your inner walls, his soft lips brushing against your lower ones.

He was french kissing you in another way, gosh. And you were so weak to him.

Finally, your whole body froze and shuddered as you climaxed, locking Naveen's face against your slick for a few seconds until your limbs slackened. 

A quiet gasp for air came from below you before a small burst of laughter came.

Both of you needed a moment to breathe deeply, your face flushed in a light sheen of sweat, which was laughable in comparison to Naveen's overly pleased smirk as he rose to his feet, his chest equally as heaving as yours. 

Another comfortable moment passed by.

I… really appreciated it. You didn't have to do this so soon, Naveen…" You caressed his cheek, your thumb gently rubbing his cheekbone, watching the warm dark skin turn shades darker beneath... And your wetness shining around his mouth.

He smiled in full satisfaction and leaned into your touch, his blushing never gets old, you knew he really was a sucker for compliments especially from you. "But I really enjoyed it, thank you, honey."

"Oh believe me, it was my pleasure, darling." Yeah you believed him, a certain hard poke at your thigh from below his waistband reminded you that it's going to be your turn to satisfy him.

"Well, It's about time I give you a reward," you smiled wide teasingly, slowly unbuttoning your shirt underneath the apron, his eyes sparkled, you could almost hear his anticipating excitement, following every inch of exposed skin before your apron blocked him. "But first, dinner. I made some good o' gumbo, and we should eat it while it's piping hot." You said smoothly, pushing yourself off the table and stabilizing on wobbly legs.

Naveen laughed out hard and rubbed his belly, joking. "I think I've already eaten plenty—" Oh the gull on this man.

"—Oh no you don't, fun comes later, I will not let you be with an empty stomach no matter how 'full' you say you are. Now come on, honey." You gently cut him off with reddened cheeks, shaking your head in disapproval at him. "There will be no skipping dinner while I'm here, not on my watch." 

He jokingly rolled his eyes when you placed a hand on his hard chest and lightly pushed him for you so you'd be able to get unstuck between him and the dinning table. 

Smiling, he let you push him to the side as you sauntered into the kitchen, him naturally following you to provide some help in bringing out the plates and utensils to the table. Teamwork always sped things up.

Using two hand towels to grab the hot handles of the still boiling pot, you heaved it onto a pre-prepared thick cloth on the dining table. Naveen already set up the soup bowls for both you and him, large plates and tall glasses for water. All that's left was to bring out the fluffy rice and dinner would be served at last.

Out of nowhere, your husband nervously blurted out as you were about to sit down. "I love you, my princess, I adore you." His glimmering eyes seemed to stare straight into your soul and captured your love all over again.

You paused mid-way and smiled lovingly, "I'd say the same in a heartbeat if I wasn't starving, but I do too. I love you, Naveen." 

And just like that, both you and him leaned in over the dining table and kissed briefly... Which turns into one long smooch, leading to three then the loud rumbling of his stomach interrupted the moment right on cue. He sheepishly grinned, "guess I'd better eat before loving."

"My stomach agrees," you giggled, the powerful smell of the gumbo stew making your mouth salivate, and you weren't the only one, looking at Naveen eyeing the soup across from you. 

Dinner that evening was a lovely overflow of laughter, praises, conversations and much later a lot of fun loving. 

😳🥵🥵 Wish I was Starlight so bad right there and then ..... Watching the boys right now on, at episode 7 so far– can't wait to write a fic of Homelander

Hey, I was wondering if I can do a yandere male Wednesday fanfic inspired by yours?

I wanted to see if that was okay by you, I would of course credit you.

🎉😚 Of course!!! Go ahead, no need to ask for my permission, super excited to read your fanfic!!! ^•^

🫵Egyptian Nights- My practice comic 🥹Pls check it out! Enjoy the trashiness of it

Wattpad

Egyptian Nights - Teresa Lace (Practice comic)

🤕(This is just my 2nd practice comic- everything is trashy on purpose <3) 'A convenient arrangement between a god a...

Ok I'm in the mood for any sexy fanfic about Disney Guy characters I don't know why I just am especially the ones who are very good looking such as the beast Eric Prince Philip John Smith John Rolfe and Hercules and Prince Naveen and Aladdin and li shang I don't know why they're just very handsome and sexy as hell 🥵😏 please do forgive me for saying this also please be safe

😜🤠 I was in the middle of writing other stuff but saw your message and boom, inspiration- I really enjoyed writing this and hope it's sexy and yall enjoy! 😜I might write more~ • Art does not belong to me. This is smut, no other warnings except usage of words : Length & staff. • Words: 1.2k

Prince Philip x Gender Neutral Reader (Marital bliss)💋

Morning air felt more magical than ever since the wedding. 

The sunshine pouring in, the gentle flowing of lace curtains and tweeting of insistent birds flying in through the high windows, every morning in the grand bedroom would bring about an indescribable joy waking you up without a hitch. What especially overjoyed your heart laid asleep right next to you tangled in the sheets on the velvety plump bed, a dashing boyish face with thin petal lips and fluffy brown hair- softer than any bear's fur- you'd comb if he hadn't been sleeping peacefully. You sigh on your side of the plush pillow. 

Very content in watching him sleep as the sunlight peeked through the curtains and flashed over his pale delicate features, your eyes following the brightness sliding down the slim mounds of his defined chest before going over the rest of the plum-shade sheets covering both your and his bare bodies. Oh how much you adored him. 

Your prince deserved some sleep after last night's tiring hunt. 

CHIRP. CHIRP. 

Zipping past your sight in the air were songbirds, in blues and pinks, singing away in loud melodies you didn't wish to hear for once— you whispered at them and gestured at the window with a hand—hoping they would retire and that all the sounds wouldn't wake your husband. It may have been too late as you hear a heavenly groan from your close side. 

Your prince was stirred from sleep by the chirps. The birds became silent like they had planned this.

"Oh, good- good morning, my beloved." He fluttered awake, honey-brown eyes glittering in the light, blinking around in a daze until they found and settled on you with loving ease. 

Sleep washing away from his face as he smiled warmly, dreamy so your lips curled to mirror him.

If you weren't under a love spell before, you are now from the moment his gentle voice called out to you. 

"Philip, good morning. Are you feeling better now?" You asked, as always the first thing you do.

He shifted in the sheets comfortably, turning his more exposed body to the side fully to face me. 

"Oh, I feel better than ever,'' he sighed, still smiling bright as you felt a wiggling hand from underneath the sheets crawl up the hill of your hips and rest there. You held back a sound in your throat as you closed your eyes and enjoyed his warm hold on your skin. Ever since the wedding, you discovered this prince was really insatiable when he awoke— But you loved it, your body buzzing in anticipation for what's to come next.

You couldn't help telling him your worry, "what if the maids or someone hears us?" The day right after a hunt usually meant the servants and people were busied and going about in the halls. 

"My truest love," your eyes instantly opened to that sweet voice calling you by an even sweeter nickname. "How could you be so adorable, to worry for others when they only come at the ring of a bell. We are free to be with each other as we like," his gentle hand began rubbing your hip and trekking backwards to your buttocks. 

He was right. You and Philip were free to do as you both pleased as only the two of you shared the second grandest bedroom in the castle. Who would dare intrude on your honeymoon days?

As his hand carefully fondled one buttcheek, a pleased sound escaped your lips. Philip was convincing you by the second, not that you'd say no to receiving his immense love.

It felt like only the two of you were there in the whole world when looking around the enormous bed, in the center of the spacious and tall decorated room where echoes can't reach. Both of you had your own little castle within the castle. . . 

"Will that be a yes, lovely?" With his handsome face drawn close, a light pink of excitement clouding his slim cheeks, glowing honeyed eyes staring deep into you now as if asking for permission. 

You grinned and obliged happily, "oh, Philip, yes." 

That was all he wanted to hear for him to unleash his hunger, expertly rolling on top of you in a blink of an eye. You recognized the hunter's look as he massaged both your hips and lowered his lips to your sensitive ear, starting tiny kisses trailing a delicious path of shivers down your jaw, down the center of your vulnerable throat and bare chest. There he was enjoying himself for too long at touching and licking your nipples. You glanced down and spotted his rising staff, reddened and beautifully his. 

He stayed mezmorized at groping your chest for another moment and you protested. Impatient at his teasing, you grabbed his surprised face in your hands and pulled him up into a long passionate kiss, spurring a growing fire inside you needing to be quenched.

Your lips parted from Philip's for air as he chuckled at your eagerness, fluffy brown hair now matted to his forehead with sweat. Even still, with the way he always gazed at you full of adoration and peace, he looked so beautiful. And now he looked ready.

Raising your legs above his waist, the sheets slipped off the bed as he stood on his knees and bent over you, and instinctively your arms wrapped around his strong smooth back.

"I-I love you," he said in soft whispers, positioning himself to safety enter his length into your body.

You moaned out as he rubbed himself painfully slow upon your entrance, heating your body to a fiery trembling mess. "Oh I love you as well, please, Philip!"

At that cry, he pushed himself into you, slow and pausing to allow you to relax around him before repeating this until he was entirely inside you. Long and thickening as moments go by, he hadn't moved until you did, his eyes shut and breathing heavy like you. His desire for you is as potent as yours for him.

He began moving with purpose, while you cried out in happiness, his swollen pink lips muttered your name over and over as he kept filling you again and again. 

Keeping you so full of him as you did in his heart, unforgettable and forever there.

Pure blinding bliss as his strong body and yours fit together, moved as one slow and soft before it didn't feel enough. You grew breathless and so he as thrusts after powerful thrusts drove deep into you, and in return you focused on clenching down on him, his hot member fulfilling your every bubbling needs and you welcoming every drop of love within. 

He gasped into your neck, sucking hard and biting the skin to attempt quieting his peeking moans. "Oh perfect, (Name), how are you such a perfect dream come true." 

You thought the same for him but you swallowed, voice too worn out from letting out all those noises in the course of making love.  

Slowly, with feather-like touch, Philip pulled away from your arms reluctantly then collapsed beside you on the bed. Exhaustion wearing both you and him but when you look over at him, he mustered the energy to give you a tired dashing smile as you still felt him throbbing within you.

You smiled lovingly back.

Gentle breathing amidst the songs of morning. Neither of you wishing to be apart, entangled legs and bodies joined together in loving bliss, laying there warm underneath the beaming sun.

 It was also last time the loud chirping of birds disturbed you for the day as they quietly flew out of the window, leaving you and Philip slipping off to dreams in each other's comfort and true love's embrace. 

THE END~

(😘 Kofi: https://ko-fi.com/teresalace )

🥵The Bastard Takes You Home (Courtin Cowboys the bastard x G.N Reader)

• Words: 4.2k

• Triggers: Usage of word Member, non consensual humping, In the woods, Minor spoilers, Ditzy reader

Author notes: WHere's the bastard x reader fics at?🍳👄🍳Back from My long ass hiatus and now it's studying season for abit, going to work on unfinished stuff for yall, hope you enjoy guys! (tho this isn't the most satisfactory story I've written so far personally 🥴🥴 Or maybe I wasn't in the mood anymore) As always, minors beware AND SUPPORT @ffishstickks COURTIN COWBOYS!!!

~~~~

It's 1863 and you're on a journey with an old friend to the western town of Summerfair.

Luckily or not for your incredibly charming friend, they managed to win every heart from left, right and center while you were settling down and becoming a decent inn's cook. Last thing you heard from your dear friend, landing themselves in some love scuffle before ending up with a dopey shepherd, was having an all lovey dovey time in that barn. . . 

The clink of a beer infront of you pulled you from your thoughts, full and chilly when you grabbed it.

Downing it immediately, the noisy world around you came bubbling back to life. The bar, ever so lively with patrons chatter and piano tunes, made you feel less alone. 

"Thanks bartender," you smiled with a bright buzz, "I'll cook you up something good next time for the free drinks." HIC.

You stood from the bar seat. A solemn head nod from the bartender bids you farewell.  

Out of the saloon you went, a pleasant buzzing throughout your body, still in the middle of the quiet town.

Just as you walked a step to balance yourself, something below stopped you. Looking down at the ground by your shoe, you couldn't believe it!

You picked up the 100 coin pieces, quickly pocketing it into your pouch and gave it a pat. A cheerful smile making it's way on your derpy face.

What a good omen! 

Maybe it could mean it's time for you to find somebody to spend the rest of your days with. Good omens don't always come your way. 

.   .   .

Hah, what funny things were you thinking now, the sun has barely set. 

The loneliness must've begun to sink in after overhearing a married patron brag about one of the multiple lovely times he's had in the saloon. Oh how suddenly you wished to be living in those romantic stories, to be the one held sweetly underneath moonlight and stars. 

It would be so nice, you thought wistfully.

In your slightly drunken walk down town, head high in the clouds, you smacked right into a charming familiar face who you haven't seen in a while of a week.

"(Name)! Great timing, I've got so much to tell you– What are you doing daydreaming outside the inn– you'll get all sweaty and red." Not waiting another second or for a response, they dragged your bubbly-self into the shelter of the inn. 

Your body felt cooler already, calming you down as both you and your friend plopped on the reception seats. The buzz in your blood slowly going away. 

HIC. 

"Thanks, buddy," you pushed down an incoming burp from ruining whatever you wanted to say. "Thought you were busy loving that Shepherd."

"I was, just LAST night." They chuckled, looping their arm around yours. "But never too busy to visit my dearest friend, so tell me, what's gotten you looking so glum? I hope this town hasn't bored you yet." Oh no this town was the most exciting thing to you since you weren't close to anyone besides your friend and the friendly inn keeper (who provides rare ingredients for your cooking per request), barely boring but then again you were simple to entertain.

The one and only friend loyal enough to stay with you through hard times while disappearing into thin air when not needed. The friend you needed right now to make a life-changing decision, drunk as can be.

HIC.

"I've been wanting to settle down you know. Maybe in this town or the next one, I don't wanna keep–" A large burp from your guts interrupted your heart-to-heart talk.

"Burping?" Your friend teasingly finished the sentence.

"–Being alone after a long day."  You breathed out a sigh as they watched, sobering up slowly. "It sounds nice enough to imagine having somebody to go back home to." You hoped you didn't sound ungrateful to them but it just isn't the same anymore, you couldn't always rely on your friend for emotional support. Both of you knew that. 

A short pause. 

Giving their earnest attention to you, your dear friend pulled your hands into their lap and held them. "I truly hope you find what you're looking for, (Name), take  your time and see what or who life can surprise you with!" 

When they comfort you like this and talk sweetly, it's no surprise they've got the whole town smitten for them in an instant. Even though you were generally known as their best friend, it still came with some advantages– free drinks sometimes– and more if the time of day was right. You were proud to have a wonderful friend like them and hope to have an equally amazing partner too. 

Wishing that day came sooner.

"(Name)," their voice brought you back to earth and to a pair of concerned eyes. "I think you need to down a cup of water or two, you must've had too many drinks." 

Smiling unashamedly, "only one but guilty." Your answer was followed by a snort response from them. 

Your friend's eyes twinkled like an idea popped in. "I'll tell you what, after you have some water, why don't we go fishing together? Might as well when the weather is lovely and the sun is still out." You took a brief minute to think. Fishing wasn't the most fun activity, you've tried before and preferred to buy your fishy ingredients from the market but with your friend as company? It started sounding not too bad of a plan.

"Hmm. Alright, let's do it," you agreed, shrugging. What could possibly go wrong other than feeling boredom and being sprayed with water or slapped by some fins if unlucky. They cheered loudly and shook your hands together in theirs, earning a glance from the ever-smiley handsome inn keeper.

"Don't you worry, it'll be fun!" They grinned enthusiastically, getting to their feet and pulling you up along. "A warning, you'll need some patience and a strong grip because some of those fishes are slippery fellows." Too late to back out now when you heard that. 

"Great. I could use a challenge now and then," was what you said until both you and your practically beaming friend left the inn, following the forest path and arriving at a creek they discovered in the woodside of the town. 

Fresh minty breezes, vibrant greenery and shrubs surrounded you in every inch though you didn't expect for the fishing spot to be at an unimpressive small creek. 

"This place is where I usually fish! You can even forage some of them delicious berries if you walk a bit and turn right." They squeal showing you, delighted and setting down their basket full of fishing supplies near the creek edge, not too close to be worrisome.

Its deep and calm blue waters glittered in the sunlight while both you and your friend settled down on the flat grassy patches (that you assume have been made by their many trips here), under the cool shades of the forest. 

Curious, you stared at the creek then asked them. "If you've been fishing here a lot of times then there's no way there'd be any fish left, right?" They turned their head to face you, giggling as if you said something funny, pointing to the basket.

"You'll see, (Name). Just give it a try and wait, this town never seems to run short of anything. Really." That felt like they weren't referring to the fish anymore but something else entirely you couldn't understand. 

Moving on from that before the small talk ate away the remaining time before sunset, you and them began unpacking stuff, each person equipped with a sturdy, metal fishing pole in both hands. Looking back at the waters then to the wriggling worm on the hook of your fishing pole, some part of you doubted this would work and be a waste of time. 

Sure you couldn't see through into those unclear waters but could there really be fish swimming in there? 

The answer, a shocking yes with a side of boots and weeds. 

No kidding patience was important, you fished more junk than actual fish whereas your friend beside you managed to capture the most. 

"Really wasn't expecting this much fish, wow," you exclaimed at the sight of the bucket full to the brim with a colorful variety of fish, some you've never seen before in all your years of cooking. 

"What did I tell ya?" They set side their fishing pole, grinning, barely a drop of sweat on their shining face.

"You were right." 

"Psh, of course I'm right," they teased, leaning against a tree. "Told you to go exploring the town some time, there's plenty of surprises to experience. But a word of caution, don't go exploring at night. There's nothing much to see than maybe a pervert here and there doing their business."

"Yeah, I'll keep that in mind."

Everything was peaceful, with your friend relaxing beside the full bucket, you laid on your side on the soft cool grass, bare feet pointed towards the creek. 

"Remind me to bring more buckets next time we go fishing," you slurred, lips slowing down in movement.

"Hah, will do, (Name)." Their giggles fading into the breezes.

Gentle rustling of bushes lulled you to doze away and drape your eyes from the world, no longer hearing the shrills from the birds overhead. 

It felt like nothing could ruin this perfect day. So you decided to fall asleep, waving off your persistent friend to go on back without you, trusting that they would leave some fish behind for tonight. Though fishing alone wasn't fun, they were right about the weather being lovely, almost too lovely to not take a nap.  .  .

Unfortunately the short nap you originally intended for, lengthened to an hours long coma. Only when the sudden burst of froggy croaks and loud crickets chirp disturbed your sleep, did you realize the sun had been replaced by the brightest full moon. 

You hugged your form, waves after waves of chills beginning to settle in your bones. 

That was one dangerous nap, to be waking up at near midnight in the woods. Nope, you got to head back to the inn and fast.

Rustle. Rustle.

Instinctively you held your breath, paused in the middle of pushing yourself off the bitter-cold ground. It could just be the wind? Or an insect hopping about. Yeah, yeah it must be. 

Convincing yourself that it was nothing, no, it had to be nothing, was a tough feat but somehow you managed to carefully get up. 

The tip of your shoes accidentally kicking over something nearby, oh- it was the bucket of fish! How nice of your friend to not leave you without some company. 

It was too dark though, you put aside the urge to bring along the bucket and opted to only placing it in your spot. Hope the fishes wouldn't spoil at sunrise. 

Then off you went, towards the inn.  .  .

There was a small problem in your navigation skills when everywhere you turned to appeared to have the same vaguely shaped trees, it was black as the night sky above too but fortunately you walked out of the creek area. 

You think the hard ground beneath your shoes feel familiar, that is, until mud and softer patches of soil messed with your senses. Great, you stood there in silent frustration.

Maybe you should've explored the woods like your friend suggested before as now you surely were lost. Not that it was their fault for leaving you behind. 

Rustle.

.   .   .

RUSTLE. RUSTLE. 

Louder now, you heard it, the rough shaking of bushes close by. Your heart pounded. 

That wasn't nothing. 

Loud enough to freeze you in place, just as you looked in the source's direction– 

Something heavy tackled you to the ground from behind, the side of your face smashing against dirt and mud as that thing landed on your back.

–Oh no, bear. A huge bear in these woods and no warning signs in sight about it?! Your friend would've told you, scratch that, would've not even mentioned fishing had there been a wild animal–

"Grrrrr." 

Hot air fanned the nape of your neck as it sniffed you over like you were its next meal. 

Frozen and taking in shallow breaths, your mind was focusing too hard on the sharpness of its talons pressing against your arms. Almost warning you to stay still, not that you could successfully struggle against its monsterous weight before being crushed to death.

Wait, did bears know how to cage people? 

"Grrrr," its breath leaned down and edged the curve of your ears. Please get it over with, you were awaiting, hopeful for, a quick and painless death at this point.

Panting over you, in the silver of moonlight you caught a side-glance at the wild animal or at what you initially assumed to be that had you pinned down. 

It was no animal but a humongous bare chest man, canines glinting as he grinned down at you.

Long shaggy pitch black hair that resembled fur than human hair, earthy toned skin that faded to an inky black down his forearms. 

Was half of his body covered in mud? 

Ah, your neck ached from trying to get a better view of him. Surely even a beast of a man like himself would help if you explained yourself, right? 

"Uh– excuse me, sir." Huffing, he dragged his gaze from your body to your eyes as you managed to turn your face with small relief. 

"I uh just went fishing and lost my way from the pathway to town, could you please help?" It never hurt to attempt for anything but you had a moment of regret as the stretching silence that followed was less than helpful. 

His claws, or sharp nailed hands, shifted from your holding down your arms and now dug into the sides of your waist. Maybe he didn't intend for it to be painful but his weight wasn't one bit comfortable.

"Heh." 

Low and rusty, the beast, ops you meant, man let out a gut-busting laugh before removing his weight on top of you. Finally you could gasp for a lungful of air, for how long you laying there for the former freezing soil under you felt warm. 

The man hadn't spoken anything but It must be a good sign! 

"Oh thank you, sir!" Just as you gathered strength to push yourself up, a big hand forced you down hard. Admittedly it wasn't your first time dealing with an unexpected kissing to the ground. 

Thankfully none of the mud or dirt made in your mouth but why on earth did he? 

"Uh sir, weren't you going to let me go?"

A mightier growl escaped from him, showing teeth this time around, scaring you in place as your voice gave out. Again. 

In that second, you remembered this man was no friend, a practically nude stranger who roamed the woods, clearly not dressed to make any good impression. But at least you were given some breathing room, so he wasn't evil. You think. 

Another low growl, this one directly over your head. 

Staying silent became the best option. 

He must've sensed something changed as the sound of him sniffing you grew louder, stopped, and with an unimaginable swiftness you heard an audible long rip in your outfit. 

Chilly air instantly flooded the areas where fabric used to be, your skin felt sensitive. Your eyes flew wide, more opened and shocked, heart trembling at the noise.

RIPPPPPPP. 

Another long tear by no doubt his claws. Oh no no no, your poor overalls, your trousers! 

Your thoughts sizzled, face flushing when his claw-like hands ran down your exposed skin, like in search of something– 

The jingle of coins startled you. No, oh no, he was aiming for your money all along! 

In horror, you watched as he picked a few coin pieces out of your pouch and pocketed it somewhere, tossing your still full pouch away out of the moonlight.

Your fear changed to actual frustration. The nerve of him! To be robbing you in broad moonlight, why, you ought to teach him a lesson and give him a good head smacking. . . If only he didn't have his hand and knee pressing down on your back.

 .  .   .

Wait a second, you felt his knees shift near your legs. Then finally in your delayed mind, you came to a terrifying realization that the hard thing pushing against your lower back was most likely a gun– 

"Uh sir! Please let me get up, surely you're satisfied?" You spoke in a pleasing tone, trying to move a tiny bit under his body weight. Heart thumping.

 He had better be satisfied after taking a piece of your precious money. 

He didn't move off you. Still staying there on top of you, sniffing? Looking around the moonlit forest as if he had forgotten your existence being squashed beneath him. The cold ground painfully pebbling your nipples against the ground, evident of how long you had been in that darn position.

"H-Hey! Could you please get off–" Something hot and stiff poked at your waistline, long and harder than any boulder. He shifted his body or must've crouched over you as his gigantic shadow covers you whole.

The hard poking grew in size and so did the fear in your heart. Wait, how did you even feel that, this almost entirely nude man has no pockets to carry a gun, it didn't feel metallic in the slightest so what was poking you– Oh.

Oh dear no.

Don't look down, don't look down– 

"GRRR." Oh what was he growling about this time?! He already took your money, what else was he going after now. You stilled.

Then he began moving it, slowly rubbing his hardness in that one spot below your lower back. Like he didn't know what he was doing but you weren't going to correct him. 

Already uncomfortable just lying there being used as some scratching post for an animalistic man who robbed you not so long ago. . . Wait, in this position, a strong heat radiated from his lower body and grew closer and closer- 

He began rubbing himself on you, soft as if testing the waters at first than harder. Vigorously humping himself against your exposed buttocks, warming up the cool skin and pressing you into the earth further. 

Breathless and at a lost for words, you shivered while struggling to stay put. Heart wildly beating in your chest like it was screaming for help, so loud you'd think the entire forest could hear it. 

He wouldn’t hear it, he kept going, the hardness of his member cutting into you and you felt it.

A slimy slick spreading across your bottom, thick globs of heaviness sliding down and sending tingles in between your thighs. The tingles grew everywhere, and you became aware of a throbbing, not from the man’s flesh, but yours, as if your body was enjoying this terrible torment forced on you. 

Please let it end. 

He would slow down to your momentary relief, only to speed up at an alarming rate and burn you from behind, skin to skin. The smell of the earth and everything became a blur.

The rumour of the beast in the woods was no exaggeration, like an animal he wouldn’t stop pleasuring himself on you and all the while you silently prayed for it to end as it felt like hours had gone by like this. 

Kept going and going, barely any drop of sweat on him all the while you felt like you were being cooked from the inside out, sticky, clammy skin, and out of breath.

The persistent throbbing, hot and needy, inside of you couldn’t cease to stop craving. . . Touch, any kind of touch to relieve this ugly tension fully other than being kneaded into the ground. After this ordeal you were going to ask the pretty saloon lady for help, you won’t be able to last another night without some help.

Finally his rubbing slowed down, hardness swelling impossible hot against your ass and as if his throat was caught on a fishing hook- a deep grunt expelled from his chest and like dread, you felt it, almost a bucket load of slime spilled over you, your hips and down your thighs.

"Now could you move, please?!" That must've sounded more aggressive than you intended it to be but it worked, he crawled off you but the stickiness remained. Before you could muster up the energy to give him a piece of your mind, he slowly growed before bolting into the shadows. 

You were alone again, thank goodness.

Sluggishly, you rolled onto your side, flinching at the disgusting globs of slime slide off of you and pool underneath. Taking a moment to rest and mostly to catch your breath, lungfuls of air expanding your chest, feeling crumbs of soil stuck to your skin. The moon was blinding you by the second the longer you stayed there in the open. . . Exhaustion and the cold lulled you to almost dozing off but it was too dangerous out here, you slowly rose, grabbing your pouch of money, swaying like a brittle leaf in the wind as you walked on the path back town. 

.  .  . 

Maybe because you hadn’t been seen by them in a while, your friend instantly burst out of the inn and instantly spotted you, supporting your weight and walking you to the bathroom as you confided in them about the attack.

“How horrible! What a disgusting thief,” your friend spat while helping you change out of the torn pieces of fabric that used to look like an outfit as you quickly covered yourself, hiding the slime on your skin from being seen. They continued ranting, dissatisfaction written all over their face. “I’ve had the same experience weeks ago, it’s always the money that they want. I even told the sheriff about it but there’s been no news yet, shucks.” 

You nodded agreeing, not that you told them exactly all the details but enough to draw the conclusion that you’ve been unwillingly robbed. Worried about you, your friend promised to stay the night and went to visit the sheriff to give your account. The innkeeper was a trustworthy fellow who wouldn’t let any criminal in.

After a long, long much needed bath, the heat within your body eased down to a tolerable simmer, especially places where that beast’s release reached. Like where your holes twitched and- Ah, stop you shouldn’t be thinking of that! Huffing out a frustrated sigh, you stomped past a mirror into your room, not feeling brave enough to take a look at your no-doubt reddened face.

It felt like heaven being comforted by your dear friend and sleeping together in the same bed, your curiosity popped out again- wondering what became of that beastman- if just giving the sheriff a report was enough for his capture. Maybe you should do something, see if you could mark a spot in the woods where that man would visit, it would be a ton better than waiting around for good news. Right! 

Determination filled your blood and forced you onto your feet, heart thumping fast in almost excitement.

The moment you stepped out of the inn, it felt like a terrible idea. With no plan in mind, you snuck away from your snoring friend in bed and proceeded on the moonlit path towards the dreadful forest. 

You heard a hurt groan before you saw the source. A man who should’ve already fallen dead, the naked beast with a weapon deep in their forehead spilling blood. Black blood trailing down his rough face, dripping onto the ground. 

Witnessing something incomprehensible had you rooted to the spot, it was a scene out of those horror tales your gram would tell to get you and the other children to sleep, of a monster impossible to defeat. You should've never curiously followed a beast of the woods. Now you would never be able to escape his territory, entirely roamed by him. How could you even attempt to stop him from carrying you when you see not even a dagger lodged in his forehead deterred him from staying alive. 

Could you call him a beast? He sniffed the air like one.

Even beasts can be killed but not this man. 

He froze like he heard or smelt something.

What was far worse than a beast is an unkillable one, and worse than that- was a beast who has found its prey. You. 

It didn’t take long for you to sprint away out of instinct but it was too late, he had seen you, and with one long arm he caught you mid-air and carried you on one broad shoulder, whimpering and struggling to no avail. Deeper into the woods where you’d never be able to escape, where only wisps of light and fireflies lit the mornings and darkness reigned the rest of time to come. 

Deep below the neck of the woods, rumours of the dangerous beast have now changed due to the rare sightings of him not only alone- there was another one who stood by his side, a beast more humane looking yet scared and equally as nude. No one dared to overstay in the woods anymore, not wishing to join those monsters or become their next meal.

~~~~~~~~~~

Hello, Mate! I’m not sure if you’re still taking exams (my school schedule is wack💀), but l was just wondering if you’ve added a masterlist for your stories/fics. I read your Male!Yandere Wednesday Addams x Reader fic, and l instantly fell in love with your writing. Thank you for reading this, please take care of yourself and remember, we care for you❤️ (l’m sorry if this seems awkward. I’m not very social, even online, to be honest💀)

Hello too! 🥺✌️ I'm not taking the exams yet but it is studying season for me until it is! (That's why I wrote exam season- Have to focus more on studying 🤣✌️)

Not yet, I plan to add a masterlist soon like every other writer here on Tumblr 😅 Just haven't gotten to it yet as I don't feel ready enough to make a Masterlist- I don't think I've written enough to make one but I will soon!! Thanks for the reminder!! ☺️ aww many thanks for liking my work! I really appreciate this message!! (Don't worry you don't sound awkward at all!! It's okay to be awkward! :--D I find it charming)

xoxo

Teresa Lace

👀👍 The irresistible charm of an older Eddie Munson is impeccably written by this amazing writer!!!

𝐰𝐡𝐨'𝐬 𝐭𝐨 𝐬𝐚𝐲 | 𝐞𝐝𝐝𝐢𝐞 𝐦𝐮𝐧𝐬𝐨𝐧 𝐱 𝐟𝐞𝐦!𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫

𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲: your father, jason carver, promises you one thing and can’t deliver it to you. you decide to get back at him and it him where it really hurts: eddie munson. 𝐩𝐚𝐢𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠: older!eddie munson x carver&cunningham!daughter!reader (READER IS JASON AND CHRISSY’S DAUGHTER) 𝐭𝐚𝐠𝐬: age gap (reader is 18, eddie is 56), brat!reader, mentions of birth control, genital piercings, smut (MINORS DNI): p in v sex, unprotected sex, spitting, blowjobs, slapping, choking, pain kink, praise kink, master kink, daddy kink 𝐚𝐮𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐫'𝐬 𝐧𝐨𝐭𝐞: PLEASE REMEMBER THAT READER IS JASON AND CHRISSY’S DAUGHTER, WHICH MEANS THAT READER IS IMPLIED TO BE WHITE! if you do not like this, then this is not the fic for you. however, i worked super hard on this and many people want to read it, so i'm reposting it. thank you, and peace and love <3

Why the fuck were you here? The trailer park was dark and quiet in the nighttime, and you crossed your arms over your chest as you walked from your car to the front door of the trailer. You kept repeating it to yourself— what the fuck, what the fuck, what the fuck— as you knocked on the door of the trailer, and you heard a rustling from inside as the occupant moved around. You had certainly woken him up, and your palms felt sweaty. You were being stupid. You should just turn around and apologize to your father and forget the entire thing, but, just as you were turning on your heel to get back into your car, the door flew open. 

“Umm,” the older man started. “Can I help you?” 

You sighed. You knew Eddie Munson from a distance, solely as the mechanic who worked on your car from time to time— time to time meant at least once a month because, even though your dad had bought you a nice car for your 18th birthday present, he hadn’t bought you a good car. The cherry-red Porsche sat behind you, the very same car that Eddie fixed often, and he peered over your shoulder at it. “Is something wrong with your car?” he asked. “It couldn’t wait ‘til the shop opened at 8?”

“No, no, nothing’s wrong with my car,” you mumbled. “Well… Actually, it’s started making this weird noise when I start it up, but that’s— That’s for later. No, um, my dad’s pissed me off super bad tonight, and I just, umm, figured you could… help…? Maybe?”

“Your dad, huh?” Eddie asked. He leaned back inside the trailer for a moment, and you nearly thought he would slam the door in your face, but all he did was grab a green-and-white carton of Newports and a lighter. He slotted a cigarette between his lips and gestured at you to talk, and you watched his tattooed fingers flick the Zippo and light up his cigarette before you swallowed thickly. “What’s he done?”

“Well, um,” you started. “Do you know who my dad is?” 

“No clue, sweetheart,” Eddie said. He blew out a mouthful of smoke and plucked the cigarette from between his lips, and he rubbed his big hand down his salt-and-pepper facial-haired chin. “Who is he?” 

“Jason Carver,” you said slowly. “You went to high school together?” 

“Carver,” Eddie spat. “Yeah, I remember Carver.” He crossed his arms, the sleeves of his wrinkled shirt tightening around his muscles, and you bit your lip as his tattooed skin pulled with it. Eddie had tattoos everywhere, on his neck and arms and hands and fingers, behind his ear and on his throat, and you wondered exactly where else he had tattoos. “He made my life a living hell.” 

“Yeah, he’s doing the same thing to me,” you grumbled. 

“No way, wait,” Eddie laughed incredulously. “You’re Carver’s daughter? The valedictorian, captain of the cheer team, that’s you?”

“Well, jeez, don’t make fun of me,” you pouted. “How do you know that?” For all that Eddie seemed to know about you, you knew very little about him: he had a smoking problem and an ex-wife problem, you were sure of that, but anything else was a mystery to you. 

“Heard it around town,” Eddie shrugged. “I didn’t think that Carver could make something as pretty as you. You don’t even have his big ears or anything.” 

You couldn’t help but laugh, and you covered your mouth as you smiled. “Dad does have big ears,” you said softly. You almost missed how Eddie had complimented you, and you pushed your hair behind your ear as you chewed your lip. “But Dad’s fucked up, and I’m really pissed.” 

“What did he do?” Eddie asked, puffing on his cigarette again. “Took away your vape or something?” 

“I’m not that shallow,” you huffed. “It’s just that… It’s a little stupid. I mean, it’s a lot stupid, it’s the stupidest thing in the world, but, umm, I have a bunch of friends that are going to Paris for their graduation trip, and Dad said that I could go, but, tonight, he just hit me with this whole thing of, like, ‘oh, it’s too expensive, we just bought you the Porsche’, but I didn’t ask for the Porsche and he told me I could go before he even bought me the stupid car, and I’m just—”

“Hey, easy,” Eddie said, reaching out and putting a hand on your shoulder. “Take a breath. So, he told you that you could go on this trip, but now he’s saying you can’t?”

“And he promised me!” you whined. “He said I could go, but now he’s-he’s being such a dick! He said that he can’t afford the trip and the car, but I didn’t even want the car in the first place! It’s not fair!” 

“Oh, sweetheart, calm down,” Eddie said, and he steered you into his trailer, shutting the door with his foot once you had crossed in. The trailer was messy but clean, smelling like laundry soap and cigarette smoke, and Eddie fell back onto his couch and patted the empty space next to him, inviting you down. You knew that, once you sat next to him, your plan would fully be in motion, and your heart beat quickly. “C’mon, sit down, tell me all about it.”

“Aren’t you angry I’m bothering you this late?” you mumbled. 

“Not angry,” Eddie said. “I’m just… Your dad pretty much ruined my life in high school, and it’s petty of me, but I wanna make sure you know that you’re not alone. Your dad’s been a bully since day one, and it’s not fair, you’re right. If he promised you something like this and then rolled back his promise, that’s not fair. But, sweetheart, I mean this in the nicest way, but you’re also acting like a huge fuckin’ brat.” 

“I am not!” you said quickly. “You just said it, you agree it’s not fair!” 

“Yeah, but why’re you here?” Eddie asked. “You couldn’t, like, call one of your friends to cry about it? You had to come to me? Baby, I was asleep, it’s one in the fucking morning.” 

“Well, God, sorry it took me so long to get ready!” you snapped.

“Get ready for what?” Eddie asked. “Don’t tell me you did all of this—” he wagged his finger up and down your body, obviously talking about your dress and shaved legs and perfect makeup, “Just to come out to the trailer park to talk to me.”

“Alright, I won’t tell you,” you said quickly. Eddie’s eyes widened for a moment, and he started to ruefully laugh, pushing himself up from the couch. 

“I see what this is,” he said. “You’re pissed at your dad, so you think that if you, I don’t know, sleep with me or something, you’ll be getting back at him. Right?” He looked at you, and you clenched your back teeth. He had hit the nail directly on the head, but you didn’t want to give yourself away that easily. What’s the fun in that?

“I just wanted to talk to someone else who understands how awful my dad is,” you spat. “I’m not a slut, Mr. Munson! And you’re more than twice my age, probably three times my age, I bet you can’t even fuck anymore anyway! As if I’d wanna fuck a freak like you!” 

“A freak, huh?” Eddie said. “Apple fell in a straight line from the tree.” 

“Fuck you,” you seethed. Now he was seriously making you mad. “I am nothing like my dad.” 

“Oh, really?” Eddie asked, narrowing his eyes. “‘Cause all I see in front of me is a little princess who’s throwing a tantrum ‘cause she didn’t get her way. Aw, the rich girl can’t go to Paris with her friends ‘cause Daddy bought her a Porsche? Boo-fucking-hoo, cry me a river, sweetheart. Your dad got everything he ever wanted, and you’re exactly like him.” 

“Fuck you,” you said again, and hot tears needled at your eyes. No. No crying in front of him. Absolutely not. 

“Is that all you can think about?” Eddie asked. “Fucking me?” 

You huffed and stood up, stepping forward to leave and to try to forget the entire interaction, but Eddie’s inked hand shot out and grabbed your arm. His grip was tight, his eyes dark and hard, and he rolled his cigarette in-between his lips. “Wait just a second, baby,” Eddie said. “Listen, you are being a little princess and a brat and a total pain in the ass, but… I’d be lying if I told you that you weren’t a pretty little thing. Sometimes I wonder how Carver’s daughter could be so pretty, then I remember you’re also Chrissy’s kid. God, baby, I had such a crush on your mom in high school.” 

“Ew,” you sneered. “You’re gonna fuck me ‘cause I look like my mom?” 

“No,” Eddie said. “I’m gonna fuck you ‘cause I know it’ll make your dad so angry, it’ll probably kill him.” 

“So you are gonna fuck me?” you asked. 

“You’re 18?” Eddie asked, and you nodded. “Show me your license.” 

“I’m not lying,” you said, but Eddie raised his eyebrows at you. “Fuck, fine.” You tugged your wallet out of a pocket on your jacket and flipped it to show him your driver’s license, and he scoured it until he found your birthday. Eighteen, as of five months ago. Questionable, sure, but not illegal.  

“Are you on the pill?” Eddie asked next, and he shifted to stub out his cigarette in a nearby ashtray. 

“Yeah,” you said, then hesitated before you added, “And I brought condoms.” 

“Of course you did,” Eddie chuckled. “This was your plan all along, huh? I fuckin’ knew it.” 

“Okay, can you blame me?” you asked. “I just… I’m really pissed at him, and I know how badly you wanna get back at him too.” 

“You don’t have to convince me anymore, baby,” Eddie said. “You’re not a virgin, are you?” 

“Virginity is such bullshit,” you said. “It’s a social construct meant to cage and restrain people—”

“You can knock it off with the morality lesson, kid,” Eddie said, and you felt a gush of wetness cover your thighs. Why did him calling you kid turn you on so badly? “‘Cause I’m not fucking you if you’ve never had sex before.” 

“I-I have,” you stuttered, and your cheeks flamed with embarrassment as Eddie raised his eyebrows at you. “I have!”

“What was his name?” Eddie asked. 

“You wouldn’t know him,” you said quickly, and Eddie laughed. 

“His name, baby,” Eddie said. “If you’ve fucked a guy before, you should be able to tell me his name.” 

“John Sinclair,” you said finally, after a few long moments of silence. 

Eddie started for a moment. “Sinclair?” he said. “Lucas’s kid?” 

“Oh, God, don’t tell me you know his dad too,” you groaned. 

“We all went to high school together,” Eddie explained. “Sinclair was in my DnD club. Is Max this John kid’s mom?” 

“Yeah, his mom’s named Maxine,” you said. “What’s DnD?”

“Way to make me feel old,” Eddie mumbled. “If I go up to him and ask him if you guys have fucked, he’ll say yes?” 

“Yeah,” you said. “He will, I promise. It was right after prom last year, he was my friend’s date—”

“Oh, wow,” Eddie laughed. “Fucking the friend’s date, not even your own. Jesus Christ, you’re just used to getting what you want, aren’t you?”

“Can you blame me?” you asked, batting your eyelashes at him. 

“No, baby,” Eddie grinned. “Guess I can’t.”

And with that, he leaned down and grabbed you by the sides of your face, and he kissed you. You squeaked with the taste of him, all cigarettes and skin and man, and you grabbed hard at his shoulders, letting him slide his tongue between your glossy lips. Sure, John had been nice to you and respected you when he had taken your virginity in the back of his car, but you didn’t want Eddie to respect you. You wanted him to fuck you, to leave bruises and hickies that your dad would see and ask about. You wanted Eddie to take out 40 years of anger against your dad on you. “Mr. Munson,” you gasped, your tits swelling with breath and pressing against his chest. “Fuck me, please.” 

“I will, princess,” Eddie said softly. His hands fell from your face and traveled down to your hips, stopping for a moment to squeeze and paw at your tits, and he finally rucked up your dress and huffed out a laugh. “No panties? And you say you’re not a slut.” 

“I’m not,” you whined, and Eddie laughed. 

“Seems like you are,” Eddie said. “Coming to my place, chasing older cock just to make your dad upset. Sure seems like something a slut would do.” 

“I’m not a slut,” you told him, but you were struck quiet when his big, inked hand cupped your wet pussy, letting his middle finger pass along your slit. 

“So fucking wet,” Eddie whispered. “You like to fight, don’t you? Gets you all hot and bothered, huh?” 

“All the better for you,” you replied, and Eddie landed a kiss on your neck. 

“Yeah, fuckin’ better for me,” Eddie said. “You’re gonna be so good, I know it. Get on the bed, baby, take off your dress.” 

You toed out of your sneakers and did as he told you, traveling to the back of the trailer to a half-open door. You pushed it open and looked at the room for a moment— clothes everywhere, a vintage guitar hanging on the wall— before you focused on the large bed, and you sat down and smoothed your skirt over your thighs. Eddie followed you in, kicking the door closed, and his hand drifted down to his crotch, palming himself through his plaid pajama bottoms. “I told you to take off your dress,” he said. 

“I want you to do it,” you said. “Daddy.” 

“Oh, yeah?” Eddie asked. “Girl’s got daddy issues, huh?”

“F’course I do,” you shrugged. “Look at who my dad is.” 

“I don’t wanna,” Eddie said. “All I wanna look at is your pretty little face as I pound into you. Or maybe I wanna look at the back of your head. I haven’t decided yet.” 

“Better make up your mind quick,” you told him, slipping off your jean jacket and dropping it on the edge of the bed. “As long as you mark me up.” 

“You want marks?” Eddie asked. “You want all those hickies and marks and everything? Want me to be rough with ya?” 

“Yeah,” you told him, slipping the straps of your dress off of your shoulders slowly, teasingly. “As rough as you want.” 

“What if I don’t wanna be rough?” Eddie asked. He knelt on the bed, his big thighs caging around your waist, the bulge in his pants inches from your face, and your mouth watered at the smell of him. “What if I just wanna treat you nice and be all gentle and cute with you?” 

“You don’t want that,” you told him. “You wanna ruin me.” 

“I sure do,” Eddie said. “You suck cock good?” 

“Not really,” you mumbled. “Only ever done it once before.” 

“John?” Eddie asked, and you nodded. “And that kid was probably just happy to have your mouth on his dick, he wouldn’t tell you if you were doing bad. Want me to teach you?” 

“Just want you inside me,” you told him. Eddie was holding his dick now, and the shadow of it inside his pants was driving you crazy. The outline was big, intimidatingly so, and you reached out and hooked your thumbs in the elastic of his pants, tugging it down to let his cock free. He was half-hard, his cock extra-thick and heavy, the thatch of hair at the base showing grey and black, just like the long curls that he pushed behind his shoulder. His balls were thick too, hanging deliciously, and you sucked your lip between your teeth as your mouth watered even more. You had never had the desire to suck dick before, not even with John— you had really only done it because he asked for you to— but something about Eddie’s thick, cut length made a fire erupt in your belly. 

“What’s this?” you asked, your eyes locking on a small silver ball protruding from the head of his cock. “Is your… Do you have a…?” 

“It’s called a Prince Albert,” Eddie explained. “Got it so long ago… You probably weren’t even alive yet.” 

“Did it hurt?” you asked, cringing slightly at the thought of it. 

“A little,” Eddie shrugged. “But it looks good, doesn’t it?” 

“Looks really good,” you mumbled. “Looks… Looks really yummy.” 

“Oh, yeah?” Eddie chuckled. “You wanna suck it?” 

“Yeah,” you whispered, and you instantly wrapped your lips around the head of his cock, feeling the warmth of the metal ball bearing of the piercing against your tongue. Eddie jolted, his cock throbbing in your mouth, and a tattooed hand grabbed at your hair quickly. 

“Fuck, baby!” Eddie laughed. “Gettin’ right to it, huh?”

You nodded, letting your tongue swirl along the piercing greedily, and you took more of him in your mouth, feeling him harden in the soft warmth of your mouth. He took a heavy breath and groaned softly as you started to suck on him, hollowing your cheeks to tighten around him, and your clit throbbed as you watched him lean his head back, the inked skin on his throat stretching as he did. “Good fuckin’ girl,” Eddie whispered. “Take me deeper, baby.” 

You let his cock fall from your mouth, a string of spit connecting your bottom lip to his piercing, and you gasped in for air. “Don’t think I can,” you told him. “You’re just too big, Mr. Munson.” 

“Jesus Christ, call me Eddie,” he chuckled breathlessly. “I think we’re past the whole ‘mister’ business.”

“Alright,” you agreed, and you tugged his pants down a little further before you captured his cock in your hand, slowly jerking him off as your lips went to his fat balls, kissing them gently and kitten-licking at the seam of them. 

“Yeah, baby, lick my balls,” Eddie mumbled. “Fuckin’ bitch of an ex-wife wouldn’t go near them, s’like she was allergic or some shit. Suck on ‘em a little, show me how much you love ‘em.” 

You took one of his balls between your lips, stroking his shaft as you sucked gently on him. Eddie moaned softly, almost like he was afraid of you hearing, and your pussy tingled at the sound. Your free hand fell down your body and went up your dress, and you rubbed at your clit, trying to get any pleasure as you switched to his other testicle, sucking on it as well. 

“Touching your clit?” Eddie asked, and you nodded, flashing your best doe eyes up at him as you suckled at his sack. He leaned back, drawing himself from your mouth, and you whimpered as you started to chase him back. You weren’t done yet. You wanted to always have his cock or balls in your mouth, you wanted nothing more than that, but Eddie had other ideas. He quickly dragged his shirt over his head, exposing his inked chest to you, and his hands went to your dress, tugging it up over your head and off of your body. You were completely naked for him, your body thrumming with excited energy, and he grabbed at your hips, kneading your skin between his hands. 

“God, baby,” he said. “Your body’s a fuckin’ A. Perfect tits, perfect ass, perfect pussy… Open up your legs, let me see you.” 

“I-I shaved,” you told him. “I didn’t know how you liked it.” 

“I can see that,” Eddie laughed. “For future reference, I like it however you like it. Whatever you wanna do with your body, that’s your business. I’m just here to fuck you.” 

“How feminist of you,” you giggled. 

“I’m nothing if not a people pleaser,” Eddie said with a wink. “Open your legs, I need to put my fingers inside you.” 

“Oh, wow,” you rolled your eyes. “So romantic.” 

“Well, if my fingers don’t fit, how is my dick supposed to?” Eddie asked, and he was right. His fingers were thick, all inked up with barbed wire on his top knuckles and various little drawings of candles and crosses and skulls and hearts on his lower knuckles, and you wanted them inside you so badly. 

“Right,” you said. You carefully opened your legs, exposing your sopping wet cunt to him, and Eddie moaned at the sight of it. 

“Look at that,” he said. “All wet and I haven’t even touched you yet.” 

His fingers danced from your hip to your pussy, and he lightly traced the lips of your cunt before he pressed his middle finger, all inked up with a skull, inside you. You gasped and grabbed at his hair, squeezing your eyes shut, and you moaned softly at the stretch. God, his finger was deliciously thick inside you, and you weren’t sure how you were meant to take more than one, let alone take his cock. “God, Eddie,” you whimpered. “So big.” 

“I know, baby,” Eddie told you. “Poor thing, can’t even take my fingers. You’re gonna be so tight, it’ll be so fucking good.” 

His second finger nudged your hole, threatening to slip inside you, and you tugged on his grey and black hair, earning you a breathy chuckle. “Found my weakness,” Eddie told you, his cock rising up to rest against his tattooed belly. “Fucking love having my hair pulled.” 

“Really?” you asked, and Eddie shoved his second finger in. You groaned at the burn of the stretch of your velvet walls around him, and he instantly started to curl his fingers up, searching for that magic spot inside you. “Eddie, it hurts.” 

“Aw,” Eddie pouted. “Can’t take it?”

‘No,” you said quickly. “I-I can take it. Just hurts.” 

“If you need me to stop, just let me know,” Eddie told you. “Alright? I might be a mean old bitch, but I care about you.” 

“You’re not mean,” you told him. “Or old. Or a bitch.” 

Eddie laughed. “Honey,” he started. “I’m 56 years old. I think that’s on the other side of middle-aged. I’m about to be geriatric.” 

“That’s not old, though,” you countered. “It’s not like you’re, like, 80 or whatever.” 

“That’s your cut-off?” Eddie asked. “If someone’s 80, you won’t fuck them?” 

“Yeah, that’s my cut-off,” you laughed, and Eddie groaned softly. 

“When you laugh, your pussy gets tighter,” he mumbled. His fingers were still moving inside you, thrusting in and out and fucking you as he curled his fingers up, and the silver ring on his middle finger pressed up against you with every thrust. He was quick it with, fucking you on his hand faster than you had ever imagined, and you tugged his hair again and whined and whimpered as he finally drove home in that spot inside you. 

“Fuck, Eddie!” you cried as your legs shook. “Fuck me, Eddie!”  

“Hey,” Eddie said sharply, and he grabbed you by the chin hard. “Not so loud. Don’t want you waking up half the trailer park ‘cause you don’t know how to shut the fuck up.” 

“I can shut up,” you told him quickly. “I can, I promise.” 

“We’ll see about that,” Eddie said slyly. He looked down at you, where your pussy swallowed his fingers, and he said, “Fuck it.” He quickly withdrew his fingers from you, earning him a hiss at the sudden emptiness, and he stripped off his pants to be fully naked for you. You were right before; he had tattoos everywhere, lining his legs and hips and sides, and you smiled at the small devil illustration he had just above his pubes. “You ready, baby?” 

“Yeah,” you said. “Don’t forget about those marks.” 

“Oh, baby, I haven’t forgotten,” Eddie said. “Just thinkin’ about where all I wanna give ‘em to you.” 

“On my neck,” you told him, and Eddie swooped down, attaching to your throat in an instant. He bit at your skin, sucking it between his teeth and breaking the small blood vessels under your skin, and he only stopped when you mewled in pain. When he pulled away, he grinned down at his work, and he said, “I’ve gotta get inside you, my dick’s gonna fall off if I don’t.” 

“You dick won’t fall off,” you said with a roll of your eyes, and Eddie just smiled. 

“Wanna bet?” he asked as he nudged your legs open wider, and he worked up a mouthful before he spit down on your waiting pussy. He took his cock in his hand and used the pierced head to spread his spit around, and you gasped at his piercing caught on your hole, still all open and throbbing for him. 

“Oh my God,” you mumbled. “Oh, fuck, just fuck me.” 

Without another moment of waiting, Eddie pushed his cock inside you, letting you adjust to just the size of his head, and your head fell back. You had never felt anything like this before, anything so big and perfect, and the piercing dragged against your gummy walls as he pushed in even further. You worried that the piercing would hurt, but it was the thing you enjoyed the most about him, and you wrapped your legs around his waist, urging him deeper. “More,” you told him, digging your nails into his shoulders. “More, Daddy, more.” 

“Fuck, that’s hot,” Eddie chuckled. “That shouldn’t turn me on as much as it does.” 

“Turns me on too,” you told him. 

“Man, you’ve got some serious daddy issues,” Eddie laughed as his balls hit your ass, fully inside you. You felt like the breath had been pushed your of your lungs and you struggled for a breath, and you couldn’t stop the fuzzy feeling in your head as Eddie started to withdraw, fucking you slowly. “Next thing you know, you’re gonna be asking me for the money to go to Paris.” 

“Daddy,” you whimpered, lifting your hips to meet his thrust in, and you gasped in pain as he buried himself so deep inside you, his head kissed your cervix. “Fuck, ow.” 

“Oh, Jesus, you okay?” Eddie asked. “Do we need to stop?” 

“No, it’s not your fault,” you told him, wincing at the pain. “Fuck, that just hurt really bad.”

“What did I do?” Eddie asked. “Is it the piercing? I can take it out really quick if you want—”

“Eddie—”

“Yeah, let me do that, hang on just a tick—”

“Eddie!” you laughed, dragging him down into a messy kiss to shut him up. For as rough and gruff as he was acting before, he let his true self shine through for just a moment, and you saw the guy in those yearbook pictures from back in ‘86, smiling and throwing up devil horns. He was just a goofball, plain and simple, and that wasn’t something that people grew out of. He cared about you, even if it was just for the night. He readjusted his arms around you, holding you close to his chest, and you felt his erratic heartbeat against your chest. “Hit me.”

“What?”  Eddie asked, breaking the kiss abruptly. 

“This is getting too lovey and soft,” you told him. “You’re supposed to be hatefucking me ‘cause I’m Jason Carver’s daughter. Remember? You’re supposed to be taking out your anger on me. You promised that you’d fuck me and not make stupid love to me, so do it. Hit me.” 

“I don’t wanna mess up your pretty face,” Eddie protested. He still fucked you as he spoke, going slow and shallow, and you frowned. 

“Oh, so you’re breaking your promise to me too?” you asked. “First, it was Dad and Paris, and now it’s you. I thought you were better than that.” 

“Fuckin’ low blow, sweetheart,” Eddie chuckled darkly. “You don’t know what you’re asking for, wanting me to be rougher.” 

“Do your worst,” you bit at him with a wicked smile, and Eddie’s dark eyes went black, setting his jaw. 

“Fine,” he said flatly. “Was gonna take it easy on you, but you don’t leave me any choice.” 

He slapped you, hard, across the cheek, forcing your head to the side, and you gasped in pain as your cheek lit aflame. “Oh, shut up,” Eddie snapped. “You wanted rough, you’re getting rough. And don’t you fuckin’ complain either, you wanted this.” 

“Fuck, Daddy,” you whimpered, and you held on as Eddie started to fuck you harder. He was deep inside you, but not enough to hurt you again, and you peered over his shoulder to see a small mirror hanging on the back of the door. You watched as his lithe body moved, his taut ass flexing with every fuck inside you, your heels digging into his buttocks, but your eyes were glued to the giant bat that covered his back, the wings crawling up the back of his neck and into his hair. 

“Nuh-uh,” Eddie said venomously, grabbing hard at your throat. “Call me Master.” 

“Master?” you repeated, and Eddie nodded. 

“It’s an old song from when I was in high school,” Eddie said. “Come crawling faster, obey your master… Whatever. Doesn’t matter.” 

“Yes, Master,” you said, and Eddie smiled. 

“God, you’re so good,” he told you. “You like when I tell you you’re good?”

“Yeah,” you said softly, and Eddie pulled out of you. He used a strength that you didn’t think he had to throw you onto your stomach, manhandling your hips in the air as he sent a hard smack to your asscheek. It hurt, not as much as your face did, but you jolted anyway, crying out. “Make it hurt, Master, please!” 

His palm cracked against your ass again, and you mewled, pushing your ass out further to him. “Got a little pain kink too, huh?” Eddie asked. “Praise and pain, you’re doing so good for me, gonna make me cum so hard, sweetheart.” 

He used one hand to slide himself back inside your slick and waiting pussy, and his other hand tangled in your hair and tugged your head up. You were face to face with that mirror, forced to watch yourself get fucked, and you laughed, watching Eddie in the mirror. The hand in your hair readjusted to your throat, grabbing you hard and pressing his thumb into the vein on the side, and he used the leverage to fuck you hard. The angle was new, a lot better than the old one, and you moaned in time with his thrusts. 

“Yeah, this perfect pussy…” Eddie muttered, smacking your ass again. “Sucking me right in. You’re so good, y’know, most perfect pussy I’ve ever had.” 

“Thanks,” you giggled, and Eddie smacked your ass again. 

“Love the way it bounces back against me,” he told you. “Fuckin’ fat ass you’ve got, fuck. Might have to keep you, won’t let you go to Paris or anywhere.”

“Keep me,” you gasped. “Mark me, make me yours! Please!”

“You said you’re on the pill, right?” Eddie asked, and you gave him a quick “uh-huh”. “Good girl. Gonna cum inside you when we get there.” 

“Alright,” you giggled. You felt euphoric as Eddie fucked you, all the chemicals in your body making you smile and laugh, and you shrieked when his hand came to your clit, rubbing it in quick, small, focused strokes. “Master!” 

“Aw, your legs are already shaking,” Eddie cooed. “You gonna cum? My fat cock too much for you?” 

“Just so big,” you cried. The knot in your belly was bordering on splitting, electricity running up the back of your thighs and into the soles of your feet and the very top of your tummy, and your arms gave out from under you. Only your ass remained in the air, and Eddie dropped your throat from his tight grip in order to grab your hips and shove you back onto his cock. It took your breath away, and you whimpered into the bedsheets as he pounded into you. The bed underneath you creaked loudly, obviously never having seen this level of action before, and the sounds of it hitting your ears made you feel funny. It was ugly and slick, sticky and wet, smack-smack-smack of his heavy balls hitting your clit with every fuck, but it was the best thing you had ever heard. “Master! Wanna cum, let me cum!” 

“You think you deserve it?” Eddie asked. “You’ve been a big fuckin’ brat tonight. I don’t think you deserve to cum. I think I oughta fuck you until the sun rises and Chrissy and Jason notice you’re gone. Haven’t they noticed yet?”

“Th-They’re probably asleep,” you stuttered out. “They would have called me if they noticed.”

“Well, let’s see,” Eddie said, and he reached behind him for your phone, tugging it out of the pocket of your jean jacket. “Fuck, I’m not wearing my glasses, I can’t see this tiny writing…” 

“Alright, Grandpa,” you chuckled, and Eddie grabbed your hair and tugged hard, making you yelp. 

“Keep that attitude and I won’t let you cum,” he snapped quickly. “Missed call from Daddy. Missed call from Mom. Text from Daddy: Where are you? Another missed call from Daddy. Another text: Just called Tara’s mom, you’re not there. Come home now or you’re grounded. Another text: Is this about Paris? Jesus Christ, get a clue, Jason. Guess we don’t have any time to waste, do we?” 

“Please stop talking about my dad,” you panted, anxiety growing in your chest. So what? Dad takes your keys away from you? You’ll hitch a ride to school. Takes away your computer, your phone? None of it mattered. You weren’t going to Paris like he promised. “It’s a real turn-off.” 

“Whatever you say, baby,” Eddie told you with a small sigh. 

“Are you sad this is ending?” you chuckled. “Aw, Eddie.” 

“Don’t aw at me,” he said. “I’m still your master, baby, and I will be until I cum.” 

“Even after, I bet,” you told him. “I bet, the moment I call you, you’ll come running.” 

“You bet I will,” Eddie laughed. “Sweet pussy like this, I’ll do whatever you want me to if it means I get to fuck you again.” 

“You old perv,” you smiled, and Eddie smacked your ass one more time. 

“Yeah, but I’m the old perv that you fucked,” Eddie chuckled. “I’m about to cum, baby, and I want you to cum first.” 

“An old perv and a gentleman,” you said, and Eddie rolled his eyes. 

“What can I say? Mama raised me right,” Eddie said. His hand resumed its quick rotations on your clit, and that electricity returned, and you yelped as the pleasure returned full-force. 

“Master,” you whined. “Wanna cum, please.” 

“You’ve been a pretty good girl,” Eddie considered. “Been a little brat, but not naughty. You can cum, baby, cum all over my cock, make it all messy.” 

“Fuck!” you cried. “Eddie, oh my God!” 

“C’mon, baby,” Eddie said. “Good girl, c’mon.” 

You grabbed the bedsheets hard enough that you thought they might rip, and you came suddenly and hard. Your whole body shook as you pushed back onto Eddie, trying to get him deeper, and Eddie groaned as your cunt went tight as you came. “Fuck, honey, just like that,” Eddie said, and he reached up, rubbing your back as you gasped for air. Your head felt fuzzy and your body gave out underneath Eddie, and, luckily, you didn’t have to wait long for Eddie to finish. 

You felt him painting your walls almost in time with you, a deep moan drawing from his chest as he filled you to the brim with his hot, thick semen. “Fuck, yeah, baby,” he said on shaky breaths, and he molded his front to your back, breathing in time with you. “Don’t wanna move.” 

“Then don’t,” you whispered. His weight on you felt good, like the best weighted blanket you had ever had, and you clutched a pillow to your face as Eddie started to slowly kiss your neck, his lips resting just against your pulse-point. 

“Was that good for you, sweetheart?” Eddie whispered, and you nodded, humming softly. 

“So good,” you whispered. 

“You wanna stay ‘til morning?” Eddie asked. “I make a mean fried egg.” 

“Yeah,” you mumbled. You searched the bed for your phone as Eddie got up, and you quickly tapped out a message to your dad as Eddie redressed and retrieved his cigarettes from the front room: hey dad, i’m fine, just staying at a friend’s. you really upset me and i couldn’t stand being in the house with you. we can talk tomorrow when i get home. 

“Who’re you texting?” Eddie asked as he went to his closet, and he pulled out a t-shirt and a pair of pajama pants and tossed them in your direction. 

“My dumb dad,” you said. “Telling him I’ll be home tomorrow.” 

“Cool,” Eddie said. He sighed as he laid down next to you, and you tugged the shirt over your head as you curled up into his side. 

“Thanks for… This,” you said softly. “It means a lot.” 

“I know, sweetheart,” Eddie said, drawing at his cigarette. “Go to sleep, you’ve got a big day tomorrow.” 

And he was right. When you woke up, Eddie was already awake, the hood of your car opened as he fooled around inside it, grease up to his elbows. The morning was cold as you stepped outside, frost biting under your feet, and you called, “Eds? What’re you doing?” 

“You said your car made a funny noise when it starts up,” Eddie said. 

“When did I say that?” you asked, wrinkling your nose. 

“At the top of the night,” Eddie told you. “You hadn’t even come inside yet.” 

“Neither had you,” you said with a smile, and Eddie rolled his eyes. 

“Yeah, well, your connector cables are corroded,” he said. “Your battery is all fucked up. I’m not sure how your car even started to get you here.”

“Oh,” you mumbled. “Can you fix it?” 

“Not here,” Eddie said. “I’d have to take it into the shop, call a tow truck to bring it in. It’ll probably be $300 to fix it, too.” 

“My dad will pay it,” you told him easily. 

“Or, you could trade this piece of shit in,” Eddie offered with a chuckle. “Maybe then you could go to Paris.” 

“How am I supposed to get home?” you asked. “I told Dad I’d be home soon.” 

“I can drive you,” Eddie offered. He wiped his hands on a towel that hung from his shoulder, and the flame of attraction grew in your belly again. How had you never seen it before? Eddie was hot. “I mean, I’m headed into town anyway. I bet you guys live in Loch Nora, huh?” 

“Yeah,” you said. “Umm, thanks.” 

“No problem, baby,” Eddie said. “Just give me some sugar and we’re square.” 

“Sure thing,” you giggled, and you threw your arms around Eddie’s neck and kissed him softly. He chuckled and grabbed your hips as he kissed you back, and you smiled into his mouth. 

The drive was pretty quiet, all things considered. His van was nice, as far as vans went, and metal music played quietly from the speakers. He held a hand on your thigh as he drove, and he said, “You’re still wearing my clothes.” 

“Yeah,” you said. “Didn’t feel like putting my dress back on.” 

“I’ll need those back, y’know,” Eddie said. “I only have so many shirts that aren’t stained with grease.” 

“I’ll give them back,” you told him. “Maybe later today when I see you at the shop.” 

He rolled up in your driveway, and you sat and stared at the house for a moment before the front door opened and your dad stepped out. “Look at me,” Eddie mumbled, and he put his hand on your face and gently turned your face to see him. “You’ve got hickies on your neck, a handprint on your throat, and you can hardly sit ‘cause your ass is all bruised up. Want me to give you another hickey real quick?” 

“No, it’s fine,” you told him. “Maybe a kiss?” 

“Gotta show off for your dad,” Eddie smirked, and he leaned in and kissed you softly. 

“Kiss me like you mean it,” you mumbled against him. “Master.” 

“Fuck, honey,” Eddie said. “Making my dick twitch.” His hand softly cupped your cheek as he kissed you harder, and his tongue snaked inside your mouth. He tasted just the same as last night, and you grinned into the kiss. 

“Alright,” you said, and you gathered your things before you jumped out of the van, slamming the door shut and waving at him. “Bye, Eddie!” 

“Eddie?” your dad shouted. “Eddie Munson? Why’s Eddie Munson dropping you off at 8AM?” 

“My car broke down again,” you told him, brushing past him and into the house. 

“And you called Eddie to pick you up?” your dad asked. 

“No, I was already at his place,” you said casually, and you watched your father’s eyes widen as he finally saw you fully, the marks on your neck and your clothing. 

“You didn’t,” your dad said, his eyes narrowing. “You wouldn’t.” 

“I wouldn’t what?” you asked. “I wouldn’t sleep with the guy you bullied in high school? I might; who’s to say?” 

-

taglist:

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I won't cry for you, Yandere Tyler Galpin x Female Reader Part 2

Yandere Tyler Galpin x Female Reader Part 2, "I won't cry for you"

Part one: here (PART 1)

• Words: 2358

•Triggers/Warnings: none

•Show: Wednesday (2022) Netflix

💖Author's Note😌: Happy almost Chinese new year everyone! Enjoy! And please remember 😅this story is more of what I imagine the show would be like in season2 but I haven't watched S1! 💖Much love! My Kofi is in my pinned post if you'd like to support me :-D Singapore based writer wo!

As promised, tagging y'all! @taylorsreputationsversion​ and @queen-wolf7577

————

Summary: After successfully relocating the Hyde, Your mother's pet, Laurel Gates (Professor Thornhill), in a nearby town, you had almost not much else to do except to help see to that Tyler Galpin adjusts to his new life and identity. Yet as time goes by, you realized you had a terrifying fondness for his company but that's just because you see him as a wounded stray animal you've adopted. Surely you could overcome this attachment. Maybe. Like mother like daughter. . .

_____

The rest of the first week living with Tyler felt distant and polite, you liked it that way, being able to keep a close eye on his few unusual movements (other than staying cooped up, reading books and whatnot in his assigned room) and overall health in the house.

You'd conclude that he's overall healthy from the three meals he'd eat daily, though mentally you can't say for certain.

There was no need for conversations whenever you crossed paths with him when there wasn't anything to talk about, so in a way you were technically on a short holiday. He was barely an annoyance, always keeping to himself, no complaints whatsoever, had respectable minimal eye-contact with you whenever there's a brief moment of passing between you and him. . .

How nice, like he instinctively knew his place to be submissive. One less problem to deal with.

Until one early morning in the living room, at 7am of your usual waking time, you were surprised to see breakfast for two laid out on the coffee table. Two cups of coffee accompanying their own full plates of steaming hot pancakes– admittedly it was a strange, welcoming sight.

"I- uh- wanted to surprise you."

You whipped around at the sudden voice and observed Tyler standing behind you awkwardly, wearing layers of clothes with big pockets that hid his dangling arms.

So, Galpin made the first move.

You shot a swift glance between him and the breakfast before easing a small smile out of your stiff lips. "consider me surprised, Galpin."

Huh, he usually wouldn't come out of his room at this time. . . (Which was why you chose this time to be busy in doing your other tasks and grocery shopping.) It got you thinking, suspecting him of wanting to gain something from you. Let's hear it first before throwing a dog a bone.

"I'm glad you're awake, uh the pancakes won't get soggy then." He says, tone genuinely relieved. Almost sounding like he was actually glad he didn't have to go up to your room to get you for breakfast. . . Or he was one incredible actor.

Either way, you weren't mad. It was more than interesting living with a former normie. You were glad in a way that he had settled down nicely but it did seem somewhat suspicious. He settled down way too fast- but you'd think you would be desperate to adapt if you were in his shoes and even overwhelmingly grateful to be given assistance.

"After you, Galpin." You gestured towards the food on the coffee table, a low grumbling in your empty stomach urging you to eat already. He quickly protested, "oh n-no, you go first. . ."

You raised an eyebrow, it only took a few more seconds of staring for him to zip up and hesitantly nodding in defeat. He went to take a seat at the coffee table and you followed suit, sitting across from him.

The steam of the rich creamy coffee hit your nostrils the moment you sat down and took a deep breath in. And even though there was barely any movement from infront of you, you carefully sipped the hot coffee. . . Just one drop. Wow.

"This is really good," you admitted outloud, looking into your mocha-coloured coffee, surprising yourself in the process. "I don't think I've had coffee taste this good in years."

A small whoosh of relief released from across you but when you flicked your gaze up, Tyler had already started grabbing his cutlery and wore a bigger smile while cutting through his pancakes. "Glad I have something to bring to the table. I guess working in café wasn't so bad," he finished his sentence by stuffing himself a large bite and chewing with intense urgency.

His attention zeroed in on his food once he saw you begining to eat yours.

Gosh, he must've been starving waiting for you to get out of your room. Not that you felt guilty but for a moment as you stared at him engoring himself with pancakes. . . Your heart sunk a little and pitied him. For only a moment, of course. . .

He made breakfast for you because he felt indebted to you. Simple enough for you to understand and not question.

No wonder he seemed the tiniest, slightest bit on edge around you the past few days and from the corner of your eyes- you'd occasionally catch him watching you subtly while you ate. Maybe he was worried of what you'd say to him.

Like a worried tenant trying to please their unpredictable landlord from kicking them out.

In the dead quiet other than steel clinking and the muffled beeping of cars outside, he must've sensed your blatant stare on him as he shifted in his seat and tried to smile casually. "I forgot to say this but good morning," he greeted, evergreen eyes boring into yours.

You slowly nodded, copying his friendly smile to a tee, "morning."

That was already a huge effort you never expected yourself to make, especially willing without any underlying intention. It's only been a few days since you've adopted– gave a place for him to stay. . . You couldn't possibly be growing an attachment to him.

It can't be possible, you reassured yourself mentally while finishing off the rest of the fluffy pancakes.

You were leaving soon in a week or two anyways, these interactions are temporary and won't even be remembered in a couple of months for you. Good.

"Galpin," you called when he was about to take away your empty place along with his, "thank you. Your pancakes were delicious, so was the coffee. You didn't have to do this."

He shrugged his back at you, putting down the empty dishes in the sink before he turnt on the faucet.

"I can't just sit back and not do anything. You've already done alot for me so. . . " He washed the cups through the running water. "I thought making breakfast for you would help you relax," Tyler said nonchalantly as he washed the rest of the dishes.

Huh, did you seem stressed to him?

A slow smile spread on your face when you looked around the tidy living room, arms crossed. "How nice, thank you, Galpin."

"I also took out the trash. Gotta pull my weight here, right." He chuckled lightly, trying to sound humorous while drying his hands with a hand towel by the kitchen counter.

As much as he's right, you initially prefered being alone in the mornings but without your dear plants near– Tyler soon became a good substitute for some company. . . You really need to take another long hot shower before you begin thinking again.

He stood idle across from you, tucking his hands in an oversized jacket your family member used to wear. (No doubt he found from the closet in his room) "So I guess this is uh, see you later?"

"Sure, see you. Galpin," you nodded, watching him back away and retreating up the stairs quietly with a short glance thrown behind his shoulder at you before disappearing.

Only when the clicking of his door closing echoed through the house were you finally able to fully relax and do the rest of your morning routine. . . .

After much housework and managing some of your mother's leftover papers (on subjects unknown to you), you recalled not having checked if the meat had gone bad, so you did.

Slowly opening the freezer of the fridge did not prepare you enough for the shocking sight of a cold white empty space. How did a dozen of plastic packaged red meat that you just recently ordered a few days ago, become completely gone in no time.

Obvious answer: Tyler Galpin.

You slowly closed the freezer and went to check the trash bin in the kitchen, only to see an empty bin. . . Ah right, Tyler did say he threw the trash away earlier.

The pots and pans are crisp and clean, but since you weren't always at this second house with Tyler– there were many time gaps where he could've cooked or fried the meat. Assuming he cooked it at all.

You rubbed your feet against the floor, sensing no grease nor oil on the smoothe clean surface. He must've found the mop somewhere and cleaned after his cooking. . .

What funny timing. Except that you don't remember reading anything about Hydes craving meat, but could you have misread? Impossible.

You needed some time to think about Tyler's abnormal cravings (and recalling the bloodied state he was in when you discovered him in the woods) he most likely is going through some kind of withdrawal.

Then again, you aren't a monster expert so you need to call someone who is.

So you reached behind you for your phone, secretly hidden in your back pocket but froze in place. Wait what were you thinking, (Name), this is so unnecessary. You've helped him enough, whatever else he goes through he should deal with it. Not you.

Your hand dropped from your back as you continued going about your day in endless amounts of work, peacefully. Or so you convinced yourself.

And for hours long you didn't see Tyler until he came down the stairs suddenly, all jittery and nervous smiles when noticing your stare on him from the couch.

"Afternoon, Galpin." You greeted before looking back down to your work laptop.

"Ye-yeah, good afternoon," he softly said, watching you for a couple of seconds before taking any action.

Him walking towards you in a casual saunter like he had something important to say, opening his mouth before closing it. You glanced up and blinked at him questioningly.

"Um- If it's at all possible. . . Could I talk to my dad? Or just send a letter, something to let him know I'm alive. . ." He asked pleading, heavy toned.

Staring intensely into yours was his forest green eyes shrouded by the shadows of his front curly hair. Eyes full of uncertainty and glimmering hope yet also prepared for the least favourable answer.

So you pulled the laptop closed while maintaining steely eye-contact and asked. "Galpin, Isn't it dangerous to be contacting your father during this time?"

By this time, you meant when the whole town's police force could potentially be on the hunt for him, an escaped murderer.

His eyes shone brighter after hearing you not say no. Tyler then confidently stood firmer, like an opportunist he took what he could get.

"Nothing's gonna happen if we're already out of Jericho," he said it matter-of-factly with a dead serious expression, "the cops don't search anyplace far. . ." Looks like his father must've told him something for his confident to skyrocket in this area.

"I'll see what I can do." You rose from your comfortable seat, "I won't guarantee anything except your safety, remember that, Galpin."

You smoothly maneuvered around a wide-eyed standing Tyler as he tried to speak as you headed up the stairs. Towards your bedroom.

Because somewhere deep inside your wardrobe was a cardboard box full of throwaway phones incase of emergencies. And this wasn't an emergency but a small favour that could lead to a potential disaster if one was careless.

Shaking these useless thoughts out of your head, you took one of the phones and hid the box again.

After going back down to the living room where Tyler was waiting for you, sitting on the couch this time- on the place where you last sat, you just stood Infront of him.

"Your hand, please."

Curious, he held his hand up to you. Only for you to put a black burner phone in it, his thumb accidentally brushing along the side of your hand as you do.

"Smash it or step on it, anything. Do what is necessary to destroy it after your call. Absolutely make sure you get rid of it, your future depends on it." You immediately returned your hand to your side, feeling a small tingle spreading- comfortably.

Too comfortably for your liking.

"Thanks, seriously. I- This means a lot to me," he stuttered, smiling widely, gratefully then stared at the burner phone in his hand in contemplation.

In that smile you almost lost yourself but snapped out of it quickly, he just has a nice smile, that's all.

For a split second it reminded you of your mother's many practiced smiles, generously wide with all her pearly white teeth on display to show how harmless she is. She taught you better than to trust smiley people.

Tyler stood up from the couch and peered into your eyes, breaking your train of thought completely. "I'll see you later then?" He asked softly, the burner phone gripped tightly in his palm.

"Maybe, I'm not sure of my schedule. Another time, Galpin." You shrugged then turned to leave before he could call you.

Now that you think about it, today's been a day full of interactions between Tyler and you. You weren't sure what to feel about it.

So off you went to your room, your mind battling itself the whole way up the stairs. . . As you laid on your bed, your brain alarmed you of what would happen if Tyler were to mess up any one thing.

A clue that'd give away his location. Any word mentioning you, a technical accomplice.

You didn't trust him enough to be helping him at all.

You'd be in big trouble. Worse trouble if the police got involved. . . Mother would find out about the. . . Escaped prisoner? Guest? Visitor? It didn't really matter what to call him except that his existence right now is a secret.

One of your few secrets that had a ticking bomb.

You grabbed your phone from underneath your pillow and dialled a number you hadn't expect yourself to call in months. . . And for the person to answer instantly with a gruffy laugh.

"Well well well, if it isn't the sweet consequence of my actions."

A somber smile lifted on your face at the older voice against your ear. Looks like Tyler won't be the only person calling his father today.

"I need some help."

Author note: 😭💖Thank you to everyone who got me to 1000 likes! THANK YOUUU ALL SO MUCH- I'm very grateful for all the support 😚yes I'm still writing the Tyler Galpin x Reader fic!! Part 2 will be out before Saturday (I hope), but here's a little something to celebrate 1000 likes!!! 🥺💞

Batman x Gender Neutral Reader

words: 887 . 🥺💞Song suggestion while reading: Cherries by Madison beer

Summary: It's been one year since you've started dating the Bruce Wayne of Wayne Enterprise and still, it feels like you're living in a dream to know both you and him are in love and are together! Though not always together physically, unfortunately due to Brucey's secret vigilante life- You could only hope he makes it in time to celebrate your and his anniversary. . .

BRRRRRR.

"Speak." Oh how you missed hearing that gentle, masterful calm voice of his.

He's most likely in his batmobile right now, flying over the city or doing something genius you haven't figured out yet.

"Mm, got any plans for tonight, Batman?" With your hip, you leaned on the coffee table and stared out the floor-to-ceiling glass window of a penthouse. (One of many you shared with your future husband all over the city.)

"Depends on who's the lovely person asking. And I thought I've told you not to call me during–"

"–Night patrols, yes but. . ." You twisted the silky curtain fabric around your finger, "I just really wanted to hear your voice." Also to see if he remembered your anniversary date.

There was a small pause before a delicious low chuckle trailed down your body tenderly in vibrations through the phone. "Will that be all?"

Oh no it won't be once he gets his ass here.

You tightened the lavish bathrobe around you, "hopefully I'm not disturbing you too much, Mr Batman. But if you have some time to spare, I'd appreciate it if you'd spend it on me."

Another one of his entertained chuckle runs through your nerves like silk.

You sighed dreamily, "it would really make my night. . ."

"I'll come to you within 24 hours," you swear you heard a teasing smile in his lovely deep voice. (He had no idea what a chase you'll be giving him this time. If it'll even be a chase at all for the big brain he has.)

"I'm not at my (our) usual place. . . " That was the first clue you gave him, "how ever will you find me?"

He guaranteed before hanging up, "you're never far from me. If that's all, I'll need to get going to see you soon." Oh he'd better.

You left the phone on the coffee table and laid out on the lounge sofa to relax, looking out at the world-wide view and specks of stars in the great sky. If he's late, you planned to sleep here for the night. . .

But true to his words, you didn't have to wait long, sensually alone, drinking some juice in your fluffy bathrobe when the sound of the doors opening gently alerted you.

"Baby," his footsteps ring from behind you and closer they reached until a large warm hand lands on your hip.

"It didn't take you very long to get here," you pouted and turned your head around to see the handsome love of your life- though internally your heart jumped for joy at how early he arrived.

They were piercing in the shadows, but sweet in the lights as Bruce's sapphire blue eyes would sweep across your whole body from head to toe for a minute (something like his routine as Alfred, his butler, had once said) admiring you.

"I tried to delay myself as best as I can to give you some space, (Name), but it is almost midnight." So he knew all along. What an eyeroll moment if not for how wonderful he is looking down at you with that sweet loving smile and his burning hand on your covered skin.

He then crouched and leaned in closer to softly- like a butterfly- kiss the center of your forehead, the ironed tie of his suit hung and grazed at your arm as he held that kiss for a while.

Then you couldn't help speaking, "I thought I'd give you a little challenge. . ." Which wasn't very hard in the first place if he had placed a tracker on you somewhere, somehow like he'd usually do. For safety reasons, you'd assume.

"Oh yeah? And how did that go," he cocked his eyebrow sharply.

"Not very effective but I don't care," you reached out your arms around his neck and tugged him down onto your body. "I hope you have alot more time because I'm not letting you go until tomorrow night."

Bruce allowed this, you were well aware of his extremely superior strength and how much you had an effect on this hero who'd melt in your proximity.

His strong chest pressed down on yours and suddenly you could feel his heart beat racing against yours. . . Like there was nothing except both of your flesh and bones being the obstacle for your hearts to join into one. . . He kissed the side of your lips like he couldn't resist your pull. "Of course not, I don't expect anything less from you, (Name) Wayne. . . I couldn't stop loving you even if I had tried."

"No complaints, Brucey. I'm having you all for myself for the day." You said confidently though didn't mean it completely, sure you could be selfish but the city needed Batman more than you do. . . You have his heart and that's more than enough. (Also his wealth but that's not the point)

Many times in your life you've seen the absolute lovestruck way he's looked at you, but the warmth shimmering between your body and his as he, unblinking, gazed seriously into your soul. . . Made you fall in love again and again. As if you couldn't love him enough.

Bruce whispered near your jaw in the sweetest voice, cracking near the end. "(Name). . . Happy anniversary."

"Happy anniversary too, Brucey." You kissed him back, deeper than ever. The night was still young after all.

Can you do yandere version male Wednesday?please 0w0

'Love goes by harps; Some cupid kills with arrows, some with traps.' - Shakespeare.

🎨 ART BY: Jose_arrt (youtube)

Words: 3750 Warnings/Triggers: Spoiler friendly to the show, Wednesday is creepier and a soft yandere. Source: Wednesday (2022 Netflix)

Note: 👀 I'm still not open to requests guys (still on unpredictable holiday with family) but life has exceptions and I found this to be interesting plus I wanted to try out a new format so hope everyone likes it! A yandere, genderbent Wednesday Addams! Enjoy!! merry Christmas to all! AND HAPPY NEW YEARRR, Blessings are coming, endure through the bad times for the bestest time to come!

💗 Buy me a Kofi! Thank you always for your support guys!! https://ko-fi.com/teresalace

_________

•NEVERMORE ACADEMY•

"Just because Nevermore's a school for outcasts doesn't mean we got to dress like one," snorted a fellow social cliche member.

Your group sounded in agreement whereas you zipped up, blood rushing to your cheeks, turning around fast to catch a glimpse of who they were talking about.

The new boy. Him.

His skin corpse-pale, a daunting unchanging expression like the permanent state of a withered tree, dressed in a sophisticated all black attire. Wednesday Addams, the outcast of outcasts, befitting all qualities that made of him.

A boy full of woe who, always seemed to be unblinking his obsidian eyes, would glance over at you (an amount of times far exceeding what would be a 'coincidence' but that's what you were hoping to believe) during strolls around Nevermore's campus.

Ah- He turned away from you, his attention shifted to his side where a well-known bubbly blonde werewolf took place, Enid. They started talking, one louder than the other, Wednesday's unanimated face seemed unamused at the cheery flurry of expressions on Enid's. They were a contrasting duo but a match for sure, though you couldn't help feeling disappointed at the short eye-contact you had with him.

Why couldn't he just look at you a few more times with his killer gaze, oh right– you were in the middle of a group. . .

Can't be helped then, you sighed to yourself amidst your friends' laughter and peevish jokes, returning to previous conversations with them again.

Unbeknownst to you, from afar, Wednesday flickered his dark eyes towards your smiling figure among others, all the while listening to Enid's cheerful attempts at convincing him to spend more time together.

"Hellooo, Wednesday?" Enid waved a hand speedily Infront of his face, "did your mind wander off somewhere–"

"–I'm thinking of how much force it takes to poke an eye out." Wednesday curtly says, his head turned slightly towards a particular group. Enid worriedly asked, "you mean it in a friendly way, right?" "Depends."

Silence ensued between the two until Enid noticed Wednesday's unceasing stare at. . . You. "Oooooh were you looking for someone? Wednesday–"

"I don't recall ever doing that," Wednesday instantly shut Enid's teasing tone down, "let's keep moving." Unaware of the playful side-eye Enid was giving him, Wednesday continued his walk forwards. Sometimes Enid can't help but think Wednesday Addams needed some time to understand his own hidden emotions before they take control.

. . . It took weeks of the back and forth staring between you and him, until one day Wednesday surprised you out of the shadows, confronting you after you had abandoned your side of the staring game.

Who wouldn't give up if they were in your place, after hearing so many unflattering rumours about Wednesday- you stopped trying to even befriend him. There was no way you were compatible with him considering his stoic nature. . . That was what you had thought until you were facing him in the almost empty hallway.

"W- Wednesday Addams," you greeted in a shaky voice, body frozen. Heart booming threateningly against your ribs and pushing up your throat to spill out all your feelings for him. But it's too soon.

"(Name)," he said his usual graceful deadpan. Wait how did he even know your name, does this mean he noticed you- Oh right, you were in the same classes as him. . .

Your fleeting hopes were revived when he spoke up again, this time much more tensed like he was being interrogated by you and had no choice but to speak. Even though you were silent and quaking in your boots at just a heart racing glance of his lifeless- good looking face.

"I enjoyed being disliked by people. . ." He stepped a foot closer to yours, "naturally, it's what I'm accustomed to. I welcome it even."

Oh my god, he was getting closer, you could almost see the emotion (though it could've been in your imagination) sparkling in his pupil-less black eyes, the slightly messy yet perfectly neat formation of his stiff yet soft-looking hair.

He paused for a moment to intimidatingly scan your face for any twitches of emotion (at least that was your assumption). "–But the thought of you joining the others in avoiding me, I found that to be distinctly displeasing."

Wait what– You weren't exactly paying alot of attention to his words but the cadence of his voice you've barely gotten to hear much. What was he trying to say? But you didn't want to look dumb so you just hummed acknowledging.

You swallowed down the incoming compliments worming their way up your throat and squeaked out a, "I-I see."

Wednesday continued standing Infront of you, waiting? No that's not possible. . . Could he be waiting for you to say something else? Did he have a problem with you? You hoped not.

Ah you smacked all those other thoughts out before smiling nervously. His eyes narrowed menacingly at your smile but you found this new expression to be cute.

"T-that's good to know," you bit down on the nerve-wracking stutters from embarrassing you Infront of him. Of course you've noticed how slightly annoyed he would look when people expressed their likeness for him so that's why you never made the first move. Ever. Even when you wanted to. .

Wednesday tilted his head, the smallest movement under his brow covered bangs, "Is it?"

Wait, was he asking a rhetorical question⁉️ Ah, you can't think of anything else to say anymore with that stubbornly shivering heart of yours in his presence.

Enthusiastically you nodded, reassuring him without a clue in your head about what he was trying to say. . . Wait.

Holy, wow, was this a love confession? You stared dreamily into his wide eyes, maybe, just maybe, this whole interaction is a prank (as unlikely as it sounds coming from an Addams) even if your heart was shuddering a mile a minute. Hoping for something to happen.

"I shouldn't have said that." He muttered, looking perplexed by his own words which made you confused. Then why did he go out of his way to talk to you? (Oh no, don't you dare get your hopes up again.)

"It's al-alright, Wednesda- day." You hoped he wouldn't mind you saying his name casually, "I um, need to go back to my dorm. . ." Ugh, that wasn't what you were planning to say. . . So lame.

"Go on," he nodded and retracted his step, giving you more space to freely move. Still your heart won't calm down but thankfully you had more space to take in a full breath.

Just as you were about to bid him farewell, he turned his body towards the direction of your dormitory. "After you, (Name)."

He seemed to want escort you back to your room, how gentlemanly. You never expected to have the chance to interact with him this much.

"Mmhmm," was all you could muster up when you started walking. Slowly, alongside Wednesday's curt strides.

A flutter kickstarted your heart once again into beating fast as you side glanced him, expressionless yet calm. Maybe he likes you but even if he didn't, you found his company to nicer than anyone else's.

After accompanying you to your room and you waving an essatic goodbye at him. Wednesday Addams that night was left very peculiarly somber, lying on his back and for once- enduring the excited chatter of his roommate without interrupting him.

He didn't think it natural to have thoughts of you in his head. Maybe it was a vision. But his brain told him a vision only appears once yet your face and voice was drawn in clear memory and repeated in his mind like a torturous echo.

How unusual. And not the good kind. He had barely slept that night and concluded it was entirely your fault. And you should be held responsible for disturbing him even when you did nothing but exist.

•THE SECOND ENCOUNTER• Was he always socially awkward? If so, you hadn't noticed it even after staring at him numerous times from a distance. Now that he was Infront of you, facing you directly with elegant poise, your brain froze all it's functions again.

Dot. Dot. What a pleasant silence.

"Is staring all you're capable of?" He finally said, his flat voice devoid of any emotion sounded like music to your ears. Though it could've been your imagination, he didn't seem as tense with you as the first time you met him.

Maybe you were growing on him? That thought made you smile at ease and brought his gaze for a split second down to your lips like he was observing something fascinating or strange.

"What else can I do other than st- stare?" You took this as an opportunity to be playful, hopefully this will make him see you as a friend.

Wednesday then blinked- wait did he just blink? You hardly noticed the smallest shutter of his eyes and the tiniest lift in his lip corners when he looked somewhere else for a second. "Have you seen this before? It's called a mouth," he flickered his eyes at yours as if to make a point. A very interesting, lingering point.

"Thanks for the reminder, We- Wednesday." You smiled, enjoying the mildly friendly banter with him that's becoming a usual routine. Progress is still progress regardless!

"No need to thank me for what's obvious." He stated, a handsome calmness in his blank face. He's right.

Some students walked by the two of you while others shoved their way through and accidentally pushed Wednesday into you. His hard chest bumped against yours for a moment while you stood there dumbfounded, barely hearing the person's apology when warmth was spreading across your skin. Wow.

"I-I uh think I should get going. . ." Flustered, you averted looking directly at him, conscious of his now widened stare.

Not a word left his slightly parted lips when you quickly moved away and ran off towards your dorm, heart pittering wildly inside you. His large eyes unceasing to follow your form until you disappeared into the halls, as if something possessed him in that nick of time.

Wednesday was then forced to acknowledge for once in his life, emotions were even complicated than they seemed. As you had a strange effect on him and he was no longer certain if that was a bad thing.

Maybe his roommate might have the answer? . . If he could only catch him for a moment.

•LAST FATAL ENCOUNTER • Only fools would deny the existence of their own emotions even when oblivious to revealing them. Wednesday was no fool, further from it actually. Until meeting you, that is.

Never had he felt more foolish in the entirety of his life than to walk away from you– Well, the place where you and him had talked before you'd usually depart in flustering steps like a slippery squid.

An adorable squid.

A happy shriek erupted from his side, at the other side of the half-light half-dark shared bedroom. "I'm so super excited!!! Me and Ajex are going out on a picnic date!! We are celebrating our three weeks anniversary!! Wish me luck guys!"

"Good for you." Wednesday nods slightly while Thing high fives Enid mid air.

"Aw Thanks Thing! Wednesday- do you have any plans for today?" Enid asked, dusting himself off.

"None whatsoever, except for maybe deciphering some poetry left behind by–"

"Oh my gosh! Ajex just texted me!! I got to run, see you later Wednesday! Thing!" The door slammed after Enid's hyperexcitment and never made a sound again in the brooding silence.

Right. There was nothing else to do on a Saturday when all the mysteries so far in Nevermore academy have been solved or have cold trails. Nothing could ever bore Wednesday, or so he thinks, so he set off to continue working his poetry while Thing disappeared somewhere for their lotion reapplication or beautification something. . .

Everybody else had gone on their own adventures and Wednesday expected nothing more to happen. . .

So imagine his blank surprise (and supreme shock) when around midnight, you showed up at his dorm room, oddly overwhelming his peripheral and senses just by standing warmly and close. Yet somehow he allowed you inside fast after you just barely greeted him since. . . None of you wanted to get in trouble.

"Why are you here," he asked as you tried to maneuver around him and the closed door before he boxed you into the corner.

Forcing you to lift your head to meet his very close dark eyes peering into your soul. Like they can see everything. In that moment you froze, not knowing how to act around him when there was enough distance between his body and yours to feel his warmth.

There was a tension that never went away and was growing by the second as his proximity to yours lost itself in your mind. "I just wanted to see y-you," you stammered out softly, admiring his casual clothes, all-black of course.

"Is that all?" Wait, was he expecting to hear something else?

All you could hear in your ears was the rapid beating of your heart and the small movement of Wednesday's purplish lips. Oh shoot he said something and you didn't pay attention!!!

Dazed, you nervously smiled at him and pretended like you heard him. Maybe he asked how your day went? But you swear you saw the word 'love' for a second. There's no way he confessed his love to you so what did he ask?!

You went silent, too shy to ask him to repeat himself.

He cracked a bit of a smile that left you breathless as you admired it. "You won't be leaving until you give me a concise answer."

"T-To what?"

"You'll have to figure that out yourself. Until then, you are stuck here, (Name)." True to his words, even when you tried to sneakily twist the doorknob behind you– you found it absolutely stubborn to turn. As if somebody on the other side was holding the door tightly with their life or. . . It just happened to be broken.

"Uh, yes?"

"(Name), are you certain that's your answer?" He said lowly, his voice deepening along every word.

"Y-yes!" Truthfully you had no idea what the heck were you even saying yes to but it was even more dangerous if Wednesday was serious about keeping you here in his dorm room.

The thrill of this secretive meeting excited you but the threat of detention and worse, expulsion, loomed over you the longer you stayed with him.

"Good answer." He seemed to be in a better (you think) mood- "Any other word out of your mouth would've cost you an arm and a leg, (Name)."

Awkwardly you laughed, already used to Wednesday's endearing yet morbid choice of speech but something about this time in your gut dropped like it was warning you to start escaping. From him.

He can't be serious, right. . .

"I wouldn't want to trouble you, Wednesday," you lightly played along. Your heart thumping louder and bare for him to hear if he ever chose to draw near and dissect all the emotions you felt for him.

"You couldn't trouble me even if you tried."

"Um- Wednesday," you pressed yourself against the door and stared up into his almost soulless eyes, "what would actually happen, if, hypothetically speaking, I said no?" Hopefully in this roundabout way you can find out what question he asked you.

"I would have tied and locked you in this room for the rest of the remaining semesters, then relocate you to a remote island where there's no internet access and no possibility of contacting any person except for me." He stepped even closer, "you'll be driven insane until you'd have only one person to depend on, for all your needs including mental and emotional. Me."

You could only breathe in short puffs at this point. Because somewhere along the dangerous lines he spoke, your legs began shivering like you were in a snow-storm yet the only cold thing around you was. . . Him.

"O-okay." A weak response. Your brain stopped functioning a while ago after memorizing every curve of his handsome pale face.

And. . . The more you stared at him, the closer his eyes seem to get. . . There were specks of brown in those eyes, like pieces of stone decorating his pupil in a. . . Soft. You felt something soft press against your lips and closed your eyes, succumbing to Wednesday's wicked plans.

You were doomed the moment you decided it was a good idea to go to his room. Nothing good ever came with a midnight sneaking, maybe except for this kiss. . . .

These little interactions never ceased to bore him for some odd reason. But he was certain now that you were definitely the reason.

Every morning and night, he found himself thinking of you regardless of whatever he was in the middle of doing. An inconvenience you'd have to have responsibility for, and oh he'd made sure, for a long long time you would pay the price unbeknownst to you.

You don't know how but in that same year you met Wednesday, you ended up engaged and married on the spot near the town's abandoned cemetery after misunderstanding his sudden asking for your help. Turns out, you were the fool this whole time for trusting him.

Now you were an Addams with no way back, wearing a white gold ring that seemed to tighten every time you strayed away from his side.

"I won't cry for you" - Yandere Tyler Gaplin x Female Reader (this is my first dark fic🥺) PART 1

PART 2

source: Netflix show- Wednesday

Words: 3340

Warning: Mentions of blood, psychological.

• my note: I haven't watched the show 👀 so this is just me writing whatever I felt could be possibly true from the few articules I've read. Hope everyone can enjoy this last braincell of mine writing this 😤 my holiday is still going on! SHOUT OUT TO MY WRITER SISTER- HMUE LAY. Please guys be patient for part 2 💖☺️ much appreciated for the tips too!!

Summary: Life used to be perfectly normal until you got word of your mother, Laurel Gates (Professor Thornhill), being detained somewhere private after the big event at Nevermore Academy. Now, all alone, it was up to you to take care of things at home and act every bit of what a distraught kid would look like. But you couldn't sit back and do nothing, especially with knowing your mother's 'pet' wasn't going to be taken good care of in prison. You were going to do something and tie some loose strings, like mother like daughter.

____

"Last one." The silvery shine of a pair of tweazers as it releases a small insect into the spiky open mouth of a Venus flytrap, was more self-soothing than you thought as you placed the tool down. "I'll be back after a few days, I promise. So make sure to miss me," you whispered to them, lightly brushing your fingertips over the skin of the plants like your mother would.

Among the cluster of exotic plants your mother had grown at home, You lovingly watched your favourite, the last Venus flytrap snap Its leafy mouth shut before you left the house with strapped on bags. Feeding times were fun and all but you were running out of time, it's the house gardener's turn to look after the plants now.

Speedily, you rushed off towards the forest once outside and zipped your jacket up fully while shivering in the freezing cold wind of the night. You lowered your head and kept walking fast.

Hopefully no one saw or recognized you in the streets though you doubt anyone would, it's a small pilgrim world in this town and staying vigilant is key to not look suspicious.

Looking back in the direction of your home, you gave a final whisper to your dearest pet plants. "Sorry guys, mama isn't going to be coming back anytime soon. But rest assured, I will." If you didn't get killed. . . . Maybe hours had passed by with every crunch of dead leaves beneath your shoes, but you weren't sure and you didn't want to waste your cellphone battery by checking the time. You knew where to go and you had to hurry, who knows if the Hyde would be relocated by the time you arrive there.

The beaming of the full moon illuminated through the woods and guided you towards a familiar hiding place, a discernable cave where mother's emergency car hid in. And you held the very keys to it, in hand.

Maybe you've underestimated the amount of times it would take to power up the engine of an old semi-used car, but still you persisted in driving the mungy brown thing out of town and you did, as soundlessly as possible in the dead of night.

And as much as you could manage to nagivate your way through the woods with having the car headlights lead the way, it was more than difficult to track down the path of where the prison van went. Especially knowing it's been almost half a day since that van took off to god-knows-where.

Throwing sidelong glances here and there out in the moonlit dark, you finally slowed the car down after passing by enough thick trees and unfamiliar shrubs to know you were most likely near the intersection.

What actually made you stop the car were the bright strips of orange fabric scattered across the asphalt road in the direction of the woods, not too noticable at first glance but you were pleased to find a clue so early on to where mother's pet had gone.

Like breadcrumbs leading you on the right path, you left your car, pocketing a flashlight in case of emergency, and followed the pieces of fabric as they grew smaller in size and sparse into the forest.

Nevermind the fear of getting lost as your heart shook inside of you the farther you walked from the car, the chill of the biting wind barely calmed your body heating up the moment you spotted splotches of something like blood on the forest ground. You were close, you felt it.

Then you heard it, among the sounds of the night-critters and chripping grasshoppers, a heavy rugged breathing was unmistakably ahead. With a shivering pulse, you slowly stepped towards the area, turning behind a tall tree and saw a shirtless person laid there against the bark.

Eyes shut, disheveled curly hair, long scratches across his face that seemed to be covered in dark liquid, while his chest heaved for air. In the pale moonlight where anything and anyone could disappear, was Tyler Gaplin.

You found him.

It would've been nicer if you had brought a miniature pillow to wake the guy up with but your boots will do the trick for now. So you gave a light kick against his leg, once, twice until giving up at the lack of response.

You crouched near him to whisper, careful to avoid touching the ground and protecting your zippered jacket. "If you're awake you should get up, I'm not going to carry you all the way to the car." No answer.

"I should've expected this. . ." You mumbled.

It would've been better for you to discover him dead but he got lucky. Really lucky. Looks like you'll have to do this the hard way. You pulled back the sleeves of your jacket and grabbed the ankles of the guy, slowly and gently, lugging him across the ground, all the while avoiding branches and rocks where his head could hit. . . .

His heavy body easily slumped like a spinless leaf in the backseat of your car when you didn't bother to try readjusting his position, but you were already out of breath from dragging him the whole time.

Plus the blackseat was now dirtied by him but you weren't going to charge him, even though you should, considering how much easy he made it for you to find him. (Though he could've made things easier if he just disappeared but. . . You'll take what you can get)

Sure he'll deal with a sore neck or back but it wasn't your problem to deal with, you aren't a charity case after all. Only cleaning up the mess your mother made.

You momentarily stretched your back before getting in the driver's seat to drive, glancing often in the rear view mirror at the unconscious body showing no signs of awakening.

Good, you just needed some time before reaching the next town; Waterbury.

Little did you know then that from behind you, a pair of dark green eyes were awake and watching your every move.

. . .

Luckily for you, the dimly lit streets of Waterbury were barren and your job was made much easier to drive your car into the driveway of mother's second house.

It was convenient timing, you admit, that she had thought ahead and prepared a 'hideaway' place a year prior before the start of the new school year at Nevermore Academy. . . For what purpose? It wasn't in your interest to find out, mother does what she wants and so do you.

Now onto the second easiest task; to carry the unconcious bloody guy inside the house before anyone could see you two in the cover of darkness. Your arms ached in memory of the intense labour earlier, surely there must be another way of getting things done.

You stepped closer to the car window, wrapping your arms around your sides, peering inside with sharp eyes.

After examining his unmoving face and soft breathing pattern from outside, you guessed he must be fairly awake by now. You leaned your hip against the cold backseat cardoor, the bags strapped onto you weighing a ton on your bones as you lowered your voice to a no-nonsense level where he should be able to hear.

"Are you just going to keep sleeping? If you could, it'd be nice to give some answers to someone who's helping you and maybe walk yourself into your new home." Trying to sound friendly while still being on edge was the hardest task of the day when in reality you wanted to kick him awake but you gave him a couple more seconds to take in what you said.

The initial silence made you gave up and just as you were about to leave him in the car, a muffled groan came from the guy.

". . . What?" A weak, hoarse answer followed behind a slow opening of eyelids. The guy groggily blinked at you like someone who went through the most exhausting series of events.

Which was great. You didn't expect much to begin with so this response was a good enough start.

"Listen to me very carefully, I am trying to help you," technically you are, "my house is right Infront of us and we need to get you inside, immediately," while it's still dark out. You then pointed to your eyes, staring straight into his, now wide awake, "please blink twice if you understand, sir."

He took in a coarse breath and blinked hard at you, slowly moving his body from lying on the backseat.

"I–I understand," the guy said softly, now sitting as upright as he possibly could while keeping his head down. For a split second you hesitated as your fingers curled over the backseat door handle, his meek behaviour surprised you and at worst, gave you the chills. But you dismissed it, not wanting to overthink anything for this week's clean-up. Plus, you think he realized quick that he has no where else to go.

Truth be told, it was nice to enjoy the silence. No compliants whatsoever when you roughly directed him towards the house door, he walked himself inside, sluggish and zombie-like tired and looked around warily at his new environment as you closed the door.

Flipping on the living room lights, you were hugely relieved to see not a single speck of dust in every mahongy corner, of course mother wouldn't allow any place she owns to become messy. On the flip side, once your sweeping gaze settled on a guy's dirt streaked back, more work piled up in your brain. Great, just when you thought you could rest.

You cleared your throat slightly to get his distracted attention, "I'll go get a first aid kit, are you okay with me treating your. . . Injuries?"

He turned around fully, glancing down at you with a neutral, melancholic expression. "Uh, sure." You waited again incase he'd give another input but he stayed quiet, zoning out. It was obvious his mind was nowhere near present even when his body stood there still infront of you.

A part of you itched with curiousity at the monster in human clothing, usually a normie like you wouldn't have ever gotten the chance to have a face-to-face session with an outcast so this was the closest experience you were getting. In the flesh.

Before you went off to find said first aid kit, you intentionally snapped your fingers in a audible click to bring the guy back to earth. "Oh, feel free to continue sleeping or sit wherever you'd like, no one else is here except for you and me. So just make yourself at home," you said lazily, brushing the debris and pieces of dirt off your clothes on the floor mat. This house may as well be his new home since he can't go back to Jericho. Maybe he knew this too.

At your words, he slumped on the large couch and looked as worn out as a used car tire except covered in dried blood and long scratches. It would be better if you didn't ask where he got those wounds from, the last thing you need right now was more messes to clean up. "I'll be right back," you chriped from the stairs and plopped your bags in one of the empty bedrooms. The first aid kits are always located under the beds but you didn't reach for them right away, instead, you shutaway yourself in the bathroom and discreetly called the housekeeper/gardener from home to tell them the change of plans in your duration.

"I'll be back in 2 to 3 weeks time." You whispered into the cellphone receiver, "if and when mother arrives home before me, tell her I found a new interest or something believable that has to do with plant species. I'm counting on you." You hung up fast on the conglomerate of unhappy nosies before you could hear the proper nagging take place.

Now it was your turn to be unhappy and act like you care. You glimpsed at the red bag peeking out from under your new bed, time to play nurse. . . .

When you headed down the stairs, you spotted the guy staring out the only unblinded window. He didn't say a word and neither did you as you unzipped the red first aid kit and using a clean cloth, wiped his exposed upper body of grim and dirt and. . .

Minutes flied by like this, you disinfecting and then bandaging him up in a kindof decent sling while he stayed still and spaced out the entire time, hardly knowing if he's in pain or not from your inexperienced nursing.

Only when you were finished did he show a silver of movement and emotion.

"This town. . . Isn't Jericho." He spoke up first, voice less hoarse and more certain in something. Almost sounding relieved yet mournful.

All you did was nod as he fell dead asleep right there on the couch.

. . .

The morning after took too long to arrive, when you've already made a small plan in mind to ensure the hyde wouldn't become a problem in the future.

The days went by a grueling slow pace, full of watching a guy adjust to living in an unfamiliar house and spending most of the day inside his room excluding his walk to the fully stocked kitchen for food and staring out the window while you were out and about doing research on his issue. There weren't any pockets of time where both you and him could meet until you finally decided to take a break from overloading your brain and crashed onto the couch unceremoniously.

What you didn't expect to see next were a pair of dark green eyes peering down at you with a scarred face more lively and less pale. You raised an eyebrow, making no more attempts to be friendly outside of necessity, "do you want something?"

"Yeah, to ask a question. . . I mean, more than just one question," he said in a casual tone. You noticed he was wearing layered clothing, a jacket over another on top of a collared shirt, it's good he took the 'make yourself at home' phrase literally so you didn't have much else to do for him.

That brightened your mood and eased away the tiredness in your body.

"Then feel free, Galpin," you patted the seat beside you for him to sit, which he did before visibly tensing up.

"I never told you my name–"

"Tyler Galpin. Who hasn't heard of the sheriff's kid?" You didn't mean to but ended up cutting him off, and adding in a shrug as if to say it was dumb of him to ask.

"Right. . . " His shoulders sagged though not enough to indicate he was relaxed, you don't blame him one bit. He looked troubled but that wasn't in your business, you already played nurse to him so playing therapist was exceeding your limits.

Wait, wasn't he about to ask you something? You guessed it's probably about the town.

You crossed your legs, making sure there was distance between him and you. "If you're worried about being found out here, don't be. It's a small town but shouldn't be hard to keep secrets." As long as he kept a low profile and changed his identity, it can't be too hard.

Tyler swallowed, your gaze lingered on the thin scratch marks across his forehead and check, while knitting his brown eyebrows and listening. "Okay, I guess you're right," he sighed lowly, fingers interlinked over his knees, he looked as if he was distracting himself. Hopefully he ran out of questions because you were out of energy to use on him.

"I just . . . Wanted to know how are things in Jericho." He paused shortly to take in a shaky breath, "is my dad doing alright?" He looked like he probably wanted to ask something else but thought it through and decided not to.

Good decision on his part since no one else except for Nevermore students should know about the. . . Monster situation. It's better if possible that he doesn't find out you knew about him.

"Quiet and busy as usual, the school semester's ended," you deadpanned, "I'm not too friendly with sheriff Galpin but last I heard– the bear attacks have become a huge problem so there's a community alert going on." Bear attacks that he was responsible for.

Tyler's steady gaze never wavered once during the length you spoke, he only nodded and thanked you. At this point in time, as you stared at him, a lone boy, something inside of you began to fester and confusion clouded your mind.

Like some lost animal you had brought into your home to give shelter to, you aren't planning to stay any longer than necessary to befriend or grow attached to him. . . Yet the idea of watching over his 'progress' and hopefully pushing him towards leading a normal life sounded enticing.

You may have been staring for long too or too intensely at Tyler when he waved an open hand Infront of his face. "Uh, you. . . Okay?"

Blink. You blinked again, refocusing on his expression showing slight concern. "I got lost in my thoughts." Not wasting another second, you stood up from the couch, "bye then, Galpin."

There wasn't much to talk about in the first place and you wanted an excuse to avoid spending more time with him, he wasn't a house plant, he can eat, sleep and entertain himself without your help. That's right, you could finally rest again.

The moment you were about to leave, you felt a strong tug behind you. He stopped you by grabbing onto the hem of your blouse. "Hey, wait."

And so you did, turning your head around slowly towards him expectantly. "Yes?" You say in a nice and polite tone. Hoping this wouldn't be a waste of your time.

"Uh– I wanted to say thanks. I don't know what would've happened to me in those woods if you hadn't helped me, thank you. . ." He trailed off his sentence almost welcoming you to input something, like your name. But why would you? He doesn't need your name to survive.

Maybe it would have been better to tell him straight off that you weren't helping him for his own sake. . . But the opportunity to play a new role you've been eyeing for a long time felt too good to pass up. The savior.

For once a genuine smile popped up on your face as you looked into his shaded emerald eyes, "not a problem, Galpin. Glad I could help." Truly, maybe you did mean those words in the moment but you couldn't tell when your heart was beating intensely with excitement.

Before he could let go of the edge of your blouse, like some instinct unlocked in you and your hand automatically reached for his. Warmly caressing the top of his hand for a second as he released his grip, there was a strange twitch in his brows in reaction but you noted that he didn't move away.

No point in you sticking around after he's said his piece. So you smiled while your good mood was still present and went up the stairs. "Night, Galpin."

He didn't respond until you were already at the top of the stairs. "Yeah. . . Goodnight." He appeared, well, sounded to you, like some wounded animal reminded of their past. Or that could've been your imagination but you thought he sounded shaken.

That made sense, he probably still needs time to settle here. You nodded to yourself.

Figures. You knew he had no one else to rely on except a stranger, you, whose name he didn't even know. And the fact he saw you in a positive light felt. . . Good, similar to the same feeling you'd get from feeding your dear plants back home.

As you laid down on your bed, in your room which was next to Tyler's, a thought came across your head before sleep took over.

You were nothing like your mother, in most aspects. At least that's what you'd think.

Yandere Nam Haewon x Female Reader Part 2/2 (Because requested)

👏 For part 1 here

▪︎Warning/Triggers: Reader has long hair, Haewon dies, Yandere Park Yoon soo, platonic(?) Yandere Chae ah, Reader is gaslit and manipulated mildly and gets hit, mentions of blood, small spoiler of the comic(About supernatural stuff in the comic but not too much!)

▪︎Words: 5353

▪︎Manhwa: Olgami

(Requested by @cassanderasblog )

😩👍 author's note: Tumblr has a 4k word limit per post, for some reason it doesnt work for me so ×_× Screenshots to the rescue again! Very sorry everyone!

———

For now, you weren’t ever going to be let out of sight from two unlikely allies who agreed on keeping you safe no matter the consequences. Life is good.  “No seasoned steak!” Yoon soo ordered from his place on the large couch, earning a glare from Chae ah who rose to help you out in the kitchen. You felt happier than ever, as Chae ah grumbly took out plates for everyone to eat. You shouted, “order coming right up!” Enjoying life with the two people you cared about who changed your fate.

Yandere Emperor x Gender Neutral Reader Oneshot (🥺 Smutty)

▪︎Warnings/Trigger: Light degradation, READER IS A WEAK AND QUIET PERSON, fluff(?) + smut, reader gets fingered, reader has a burnt scar on bottom half of face(read the manhwa if you interested in the actual romance story of why I put this detail), Mild yandere tendency, psychological,.

▪︎Words: 2612

▪︎Manhwa: The tainted half (ITS NOT COMPLETE, dont worry this oneshot is spoiler friendly!!!)

😭👏 Author's note: apologies everyone, for some reason when it comes to smut, the universe keeps making tumblr shut down whenever I copy paste the words. . . So screenshots to the rescue!

———

Being one of the many descendant of a loving union between a goddess and a human, you were born in the Yul clan, who were blessed with such incomparable beauty that was like a curse as your people were exploited, sought after by man’s greed and trapped with no way out. It was difficult to be living in a time of his majesty’s endless tyranny, enduring the scorning of fellow concubines, the disapproval of courtiers and not seeing your cousin, a fellow concubine, was incredibly isolating to you. . . Luckily or unluckily for you, the Emperor has graciously been showing interest in you. You can only hope things will go well from now on.

———

😩👍Gona be busy these days with more studying!! Hope you all enjoy this!! Bless you and as always, remember to never give up, it doesnt matter whether you believe in yourself or not -- JUST TRUST YOURSELF!! The situation will always be better than you expect ♡♡♡

Yandere Colonel Sanders x Gender neutral reader

▪︎Triggers/Warings: Reader is a thristy hoe, mild mentions of age gap, smut, dubious consent/dubcon, intercourse, power abuse.

▪︎Words: 2450

▪︎Art does not belong to me and belongsto respective artist! ♡ I listened to blackpink's "typa girl" while writing this! #Requested thank you anonymous friend for requesting this! ♡ KFC mashed potatos are my favs, hope you all have wonderful days as always!

———

Rule number 1 of the job was to refrain from slacking off during work hours, after 3 warnings are issued any worker will be fired instantaneously. But would it technically be breaking the rule if you were getting dicked down by the owner of said job. Thankfully this always happens during your breaks since your boss wasn’t one to make exceptions.

———

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Incredibly sorry for the screenshots instead of written words 😭🙏🏻 The wifi went bad for the past 3 days and now it's finally back and it's kinda okay, I tried to posting this post for the past 3 times and it didn't work 🥺👍 so pictures here!!

And cheers to my very first smutty writing on the internet! ☺👀👏💖 Who knows, I might do more, buddha bless ♡♡♡ and bless you all!! I SHALL GET MORE WRITING!!

Lady Pearlescent - Free Art

My light. My wife. The queen of my life.

Yandere Nam Haewon x Female reader Part 1/2

▪︎Warnings/Trigger warnings: Threats of harm, manipulation, stalking, isolation, emotional turmoil, kidnapping, reader gives up.

▪︎Words: 2331 words!

▪︎Manhwa: Olgami

👏👏👏Part 2 here!!

———

How did you realize now that it's too late and you were all alone. With no one else but him in your life. 

Your too obsessive partner, the questionable love of your life, your kind and doting boyfriend who never had eyes for you. 

The one who was currently cradling your sobbing self in his sweater embrace, rocking you in a soothing rhythm against the occasional thrashing of your hiccups. Any feeble attempt from you to move away from him was defused immediately by his overpowering strength and the soft bed underneath.

"Shhh shh don't cry, (name), I'm here for you." Haewon whispered breathlessly into the outer shell of your ear, his voice made out of sweet nothings and loving warmth your heart still craved for even while knowing the thorny consequences behind such pretty red petals. 

It hurt to stay any second longer in his warm hold, no matter how much your body ached for more. You swallowed down the upcoming wave of sorrow and tried your best to lift your head to the moonlit ceiling, avoiding his watchful eyes. 

For your own sanity sake, you needed to say something. "J-just let me g-go. . ." A weak hiccup slipped out from your shaky chest as the arms around you grew slightly tighter, "please, wh- what's the point in keeping me. . . Here when you d- don't even love m- me." Being toyed with and lead on is the worst thing you ever could imagine experiencing, and now you were. 

You felt him stiffen at your words as if somehow dumbfounded. Finally he heard you, so you mentally readied what scraps remain of your willpower to leave the room– 

"You shouldn't say things like that, (name)." He said softly, still not letting you go and in fact pulled you even closer to him. Body sticking to body, heartbeats knocking against each other, one wildly in a frenzy and the other pounding madly. 

Haewon then fell back onto the bed with you together, crashing the duvet into a mess, each of your limbs entangled with his subconsciously. Heat sparking between the meeting of skin against skin, especially when his long fingers trailed up your arm and towards your flushed puffy face, your gaze stuck to the ceiling. 

"I'm so glad you're here beside me," he says dreamily while rubbing your cheek, "I missed you so bad." You missed him too but didn't want to admit that, especially when your brain dumps another cruel reminder of him not being over his ex. 

He probably misses Chae ah more.

But It must've been the parts of you that missed him because all it took was that small moment of your mind wavering and you risked glancing at him. The silver moonlight pouring in through the glass windows, casting over the silky grayish brown hair your hands wanted to reach for, the fair complexion resembling white clouds and velvety to the touch- you knew too well how soft he felt to you. 

Yet when you accidentally locked eyes with him, what sent your pulse skyrocketing was the pair of light hazels staring through into your trembling soul. Glowing and sharp, barely allowing you to spot a blink. His inhuman expression melted into a look that screamed 'drunken on love.' As if he was trying to make you believe his love for you, no doubt it was a very convincing act. 

What a soul piercing gaze you almost wished to drown in them but you stood your ground, even with a bone deep exhaustion as he kept staring doe eyed. "If you w- won't let me leave. . . then at least don't look at me like that." Like he was in love with you. 

It hit the wounds of your heart further and would only make you cry out mord waterfalls when you make it home from wherever this place is. 

He didn't listen to you, continuing to tenderly caress every exposed area of skin. "I'm really sorry for making you feel unloved at that time." A nail was hit into you.

"Don't you know how much I love you and not her," another nail he hit into you. Whether you believe his words or not, you couldn't deny wanting to hear them. You let yourself ease into the pillow and his firm embrace, slackening in voluntary defeat as tears sprouted from the corners of your eyes, his soft breaths came closer to your face.  

Why couldn't he have said those words sooner, why did he have had to take years. "Yea. . . I know," you hoarsely said though tear blurred vision. Haewon leaned in, his leg loosely grappling over yours as he brought his lips to brush across yours. Tempting you. 

Fuck. His other hand grabbed and moved your jaw upwards, gently making you kiss him. At this point you had no strength to resist, you were already caught in his web. Lips aligned together. The night never seemed longer like tonight.

~~~~

The day prior: 

Nothing sucked more than steering clear of the one you love in broad daylight, in this case it was your first love that you were actively avoiding. Breathless, running through the streets, passing by shops you were a regular at, turning over your shoulder like a mad person every few seconds to check if you were being followed. 

All the while your lungs begged for a break and your legs began to slow down on their own. He shouldn't have followed you out here right. There's no way he spotted you among the crowds of dozens of faces.

"(Name)!" No don't look back, there's no way you heard his voice. 

"(NAME)!!!" God damn it, it really was him. Your feet sped up drastically in a deadly pace.

You found yourself being turned around forcefully to a heart achingly familiar tall figure, imposing over your senses. Nam Haewon. How incredibly handsome he still is, pink dusting his cheeks at the sight of you. 

"I'm really sorry, I told you already-" He huffed, a sincere look in those lovesick eyes you missed so much. "-I may have been in love with Chae ah before however it's been so long, years have passed, (Name). Please believe me."

"Why would you bother now?!" You shouted, breathing heavily staring into those sad glossy eyes of his. "I've seen the way you chased after her time and time again, I know you don't feel the same- you probably just want to use me to get back at her. Forget it, Haewon."

"I haven't thought about Chae ah since the second you left the café,  it's YOU who's been running through my mind all day everyday. NOT HER," he tried to reason, reaching for your wrist admist the conversation- or whatever quarrel you were having with him.

He latched onto you, full body strength holding you back from running off. So annoying, how your skin burnt where he touched. "Stop! I'm going to leave now and you can't stop me," you clicked your tongue at him.

Haewon's steel grip tightened around your wrist, the pressure threatening to snap your bones into two. "You can't run from me. . . Please stop running." 

Panic wrecked your mind's thinking apart, both from the squeezing pain and the shortage of breath as he closed the distance between you and him like it was natural. 

Nothing could come out of your opened mouth, your brain short circuited the moment he laid his hand on you. His longing gaze full of something you didn't want to find out about made you give in, an exhausted sigh escaped from you. "Fine. . ." 

Thankfully you didn't have any other plans tonight, so you could spare some time for him. . . Albeit reluctantly. At least that's  what you told yourself.

And out from his lips, the most nonsensical thing you've only imagine him saying, "let's be together." He really is crazy. Why did you even stay to hear him out. 

Your entire face reddened, blood rushing throughout your body as if to say you still had feelings for him. "That's ridiculous,  do you hear yourself. There's no way you want that. . . No way." Your hand grew clammy in his unforgiving grip.

"Aren't you being too much, (Name). . ." 

"I'm just saying what I feel, H- Haewon. . ." It hurt to even say his name again outloud without being reminded of the past. 

A moment of silence passed by and you felt his grip loosening, but your immediate urge to dash away to the bus station was cut short when Haewon dropped to his knees. 

"Let me explain, please!" He begged at your feet, a tortured expression on his scuffed face that you desperately wished to kiss away. But you shouldn't. Why is he making things so much harder for you, even your own feet disobeyed you and wouldn't move an inch. God you hoped nobody is seeing this right now. 

He continued on shamelessly in public, "I just get jealous easily, I told you right. Seeing you with that guy the other time made me realized I was in love with you, I couldn't stand being apart from you for so long. . ."  

This was getting no where, you stared down at him as best as you could in a cold manner. "Like I said, I don't have any intentions of getting into a relationship with someone who isn't completely over their ex! Can't you understand?!" 

You were getting more annoyed, heartbroken and angry at the deafness he managed to have.

"What's wrong with you," he frowned, "Listen. I already said I'm not in love with her anymore." Right, as if you'd believe the man who chased after his first love even after he got broken up with. 

You didn't pay any attention to the way Haewon was leaning back almost like he was grabbing something as he stood up, while you prattled on and on about the reasons why you couldn't accept his proposal.

BAM.

"I'm sorry but this seems like the only way you'll listen to me, (Name)" His words echoed and waned through your skull as your body gave out under you. Then you saw it.

A single grey brick in his hand. Your entire vision blurred as the concrete ground suddenly hit you full force mercilessly and black sparks danced across the world around you till everything was veiled in black.

"Only I can make you happy. . . No one else can. How dare they. . ." Mumbles of madness droned on in the cold air. The last thing you barely hear was the mad drumming of a heart against your ear, an echoing chamber whispering sweet nothings. You never pushed him away. Not enough at least.

~~~~

The moonlight seemed brighter than before as Haewon happily grabbed something from behind him, hidden under the bed. Smiley as always with you comfortably laying in bed beside, watching him carefully. 

"Now then to make things officially official. . . Sign here, (Name.)" 

Sign what? 

Haewon elegantly unrolled a piece of white paper, its tiny contents unreadable to you at your angle but the slivery light made a single word glow. Marriage.

That word brought your resting mind into a thrashing frenzy as you sat up in dismay at his expectant handsome face. It was too soon, way too soon, you were still young and he. . . Was he really ready to be with you. His unblinking wide stare focused on you like a spotlight, as though there could only be one answer. The one he clearly desired to hear.

So many questions but what you blurted out was, "are you insane?! We haven't even dated properly, Haewon, how could we rush into marriage?"

His eyebrows twitched downwards like he didn't like your answer and suddenly all emotion wiped away from his face, leaving an empty hollow canvas. 

He takes out a small black box, opening it in the bright silver light revealing it to be full of red dried paint. Oh no.

A deadpan look in his eyes, screamed bloodlust. You swallowed, sweat begining to form on your skin.

"Oh you know what to do if you want to get out of this room with both legs still intact." A warning tinged in his flowery tone, as if saying not to ruin this happy moment. Knowing his other nature all too well, fear bubbled inside of your gut. He wasn't lying, he would actually do it. 

Subconciously the trembling in your legs increased as you closed your eyes, discarding all logic out of your brain before you opened them again. He was still there, waiting patiently statue-like in his sitting position. 

You thought it through. There was no way to escape, no way to run and no way to unlove him.

"What choice I even have, Haewon." You exasperated though didn't waste a second to press your thumb into the small red box and leaving your bold red thumbprint onto the marriage certificate. With that, your fate was sealed legally with his.

And he never seemed happier with the widest spread grin and watery eyes stunning you into silence. A part of you felt so complete upon seeing his happy face, maybe you did want this too.

"My dear wife, I will cherish you always." He crushed you into a bear hug, enveloping your whole body into his as his tears streamed down and soaked your shoulder. "I will never let you go, ever."

Ah it's not as if you had anywhere else to go. . . Your heart surrendered itself to him a long ago and now your body resigned to follow suit and return his affectionate embrace to his delightful surprise.

"I love you," he repeated over and over, breathing in your scent deeply almost appearing like he was losing his mind from ecstasy. And so you were stuck with him for life. 

A happily ever after for one of you at least. . . But you doubted you wouldn't warm up to him in no time as your body sink further into his loving warmth.

———

Author's notes 😭💖 : I'm still writing other pieces of work while studying ♡♡♡ hope you all enjoy!! :-D #Derek's 3rd chapter will soon be out on wattpad, 😤 This month is like a drama, careful guys and stay peaceful! And much love to @chezzywezzyzy For inspiring me into more yandere stuff!!! Please check out her high quality ass writing out!!