atomicblues

[fadedradio]

𝚜𝚒𝚐𝚗𝚊𝚕 𝚏𝚘𝚞𝚗𝚍… 𝙳𝙴𝙲𝙻𝙰𝙽 𝚃𝙷𝙾𝚁𝙽𝙴.

“and i’m gonna fucking eat you if i want to,” wren growled, his expression sharpening as he looked back at declan. there was something horribly satisfying about the sight of declan’s magic spilling into every corner of the room, warm gold pressing softly against all the darkness wren had collected around himself. it looked like it belonged there. like declan belonged there. the thought made him hum with quiet delight, his gaze dragging slowly over him.

when declan spoke again, wren tilted his head and stared up at him, his expression going deliberately flat. god, he *loved *that soft little voice. loved the way it caught when declan apologized, like he was already trying to make himself smaller beneath wren’s attention. “you didn’t mean to?” he repeated, and then laughed, dark and mean. heat coiled tightly in his stomach as he took in the sight of him. he wanted to make declan wait for it. wanted to drag the moment out until he was squirming and breathless, until that pretty apology turned into begging. wren wanted to be cruel about it, wanted to punish him for teasing and pretending he hadn’t known exactly what he was doing. but, as much as he’d deny it, wren had spent the entire night waiting for declan to be free enough to give him his attention. and that stupid little animal inside his head was fucking obsessed with him. wren pressed his nose against declan’s skin again, dragging it slowly along the inside of his thigh. his teeth followed, grazing lightly before sinking down hard enough to make the muscle tense beneath his mouth. not deep enough to break the skin, not enough to feed, but enough to leave something dark and unmistakable behind. wren hummed against the forming bruise, pleased with himself, then soothed the spot with slow, kitten-soft licks. “didn’t mean to,” he mocked quietly against his skin. “sure, baby.” he stood then, metal clinking together as he unzipped his jeans, pulling the fabric away from him, freeing his cock. inked fingers wrapped around the base of his cock, hard enough to kill the throb, as he stared down at the fae on the bed. his face remained a mask of absolute, devastating boredom. he held the silence, letting it stretch until it became a physical weight in the room, heavy and suffocating. "do you think you deserve to come tonight?" his voice was flat. conversational. he might have been asking about the weather. he gave his cock a slow, deliberate stroke, base to tip, watching the way the fae’s eyes tracked the movement. "do you think you deserve to get fucked tonight? "because from where i'm standing," he continued, tone dropping half an octave, rougher now, "you look like you haven't earned a single thing. you look like you're exactly where you belong – on my bed, begging with your eyes, dripping for something i haven't even decided to fucking give you yet." "so tell me," he said, towering over declan with a sneer. "why should i? why should i let you feel good when you haven't done a single fucking thing to deserve it?"

📡 attn: @atomicblues.

[atomicblues]

declan flushed gold at the dark laugh that followed wren's wors, the sound sliding under his skin hotter than any touch could have. "i didn't." he insisted, voice already soft and defensive, the glow under his ribs flaring in spoiled protest. "i just wanted your attention!" his hands flexed against the sheets, restless, the light in the room brightening around them both like it was trying to argue on his behalf.

declan gasped sharp and high when wren's teeth sank into his thigh, cracking halfway into a broken moan. the golden light under his skin flared harder in answer, flooding every corner brighter, warmer, until the shadows wren carried looked soft at the edges. his hands fisted the sheets and his thighs trembled. the muscle jumped under wren's mouth and he couldn't stop the way his hips twitched upward, chasing more of the sting even as the mockery still rang in his ears.

"didn't - ah - didn't mean to make it look like i wanted anyone else." he managed, voice alreay ruined, petulant and breathless. the correction slipped out because he couldn't leave the technical truth sitting wrong. "i only wanted you watching me. i only wanted this."

his glow pulsed again when wren licked the forming bruise and declan's head tipped back against the pillows with a soft, helpless sound. he watched every movement of wren's fingers over his cock, eyes wide and bright with gold, lips parted in wait. the sight of it made his own cock twitch against his stomach, already flushed and leaking, and his glamour reached without permission, soft gold curling through the air like it wanted to wrap around wren's wrist and pull.

when the silence stretched and wren's voice dropped into devastating boredom, declan felt it like a physical weight. his breath stuttere. the light in the room flickere once, bright then softer, as if even his magic wasn't sure whether to submit or flare brighter in challenge.

"why should you?" he repeated, quieter, the words trembling on the edge of a whine. he pushed up onto his elbows, looking up at wren, spoiled, reckless shine in his eyes, the kind that said he knew exactly how pretty he looked and he was going to use it. "because i waited all night for you. 'cause i'm alreay dripping for you and i haven't even touched myself once." his voice cracked on the last word.

he swallowed, then offered the truth. "'cause i want to be good for you. 'cause i'm yours." his thighs parted wider without being told, golden light spilling down his stomach and over his aching cock like an invitation. "tell me what i have to do. please?"

[fadedradio]

the corners of damien’s mouth lifted at the joke, but the smile disappeared almost as quickly as it came. he bit the inside of his cheek hard enough that borrowed blood spilled into his mouth, sharp and useless, and shook his head. “i don’t complain because – ” if taylor hadn’t still been holding his wrists, damien would’ve shoved a hand through his hair. “i don’t – ” he stopped, swallowing around the knot in his throat. maybe the kinder thing would’ve been to be honest from the beginning. “i don’t complain because i was being selfish,” he admitted. “i think.” his thumb brushed over taylor’s skin, soft and restless. “i didn’t want you to think about the harder parts of being a vampire. i wanted you to laugh, and explore stupid abandoned houses, and be happy.” his gaze fell to taylor’s hands around his wrists. “you mean so much to me. i’ve spent a long time being alone, and then you were here, and i just…” his voice thinned. “i wanted this to be better for you than it was for me.” when taylor looked at him like he couldn’t believe damien was scared, damien laughed. it came out watery and sad, barely a laugh at all. “i’m scared all the time.” his thumbs moved over the tops of taylor’s hands. “and it’s not a bad thing to be hungry. it’s not a bad thing to want good food.” a beat passed, and his nose wrinkled slightly when taylor asked if the hunters had been what drew the animal out. “i don’t want to hurt people, but…” he sighed. “it’s what i was born to do, isn’t it? every part of me was made to hurt someone. or something.” his gaze dropped, shame tightening his expression. “i grew up in a family of hunters. i was a legacy. i was supposed to be good at violence, and i was. then someone embraced me because i was the best at what i did, and after that, he made me hurt my friends.” his mouth trembled before he pressed it shut. he still couldn’t remember that night cleanly. it came back in pieces, blood and screaming and praise, the horrible certainty that he’d wanted it. “it’s an animal,” he whispered. “it makes me feel like an animal. every impulse i have gets amplified until it’s the only thing i can hear. it’s still me, and that’s what scares me. because i don’t know how to live with it instead of being afraid of it.” he knew people who could. vampires who lived beside the beast instead of trying to starve it quiet. damien had never learned how to do that. he’d been born into violence, remade by violence, and all he’d ever wanted was to be soft. “i’m scared of it because i want to be nice,” he said, voice breaking around the confession. “i want to be good.” his eyes flicked away from taylor’s face. “i spent a long time wondering if god could forgive me. for what i did. for what i still have to do to keep existing.” a beat passed before he gently peeled one of taylor’s hands away from his wrist and brought it to his cheek. “i should’ve been honest with you.” damien leaned into taylor’s touch, eyes shining with something fragile. “i don’t want you to feel sick. i don’t want you starving yourself because you think suffering means you’re doing it right.” his hand settled carefully against taylor’s cheek. “i want you to feel good. it’s okay to be hungry. it’s okay to want living blood.” his thumb brushed beneath taylor’s eye, smearing the last of the drying blood there. “i’m really, really sorry i made you think it wasn’t.”

[atomicblues]

selfish isn't the word taylor would've chosen.

he doesn't think there's anything selfish about wanting to be happy. if anything, it makes something ache beneath his ribs that damien had been quietly arranging himself around taylor's happiness this whole time. protecting him from things taylor hadn't even known he needed protection from. trying to give him abandoned houses and stupid jokes instead of five hundred years worth of reason to hate what he'd become.

"that's not selfish." taylor says it immediately, because there are some accusations he won't let damien make against himself. "you wanted me to be happy." and he had been. he still is. some of the only moments since he'd died that hadn't felt like something had been violently ripped away from him had been because damien was standing beside him. taylor had spent those first nights terrified that death had taken everything good with it, only for damien to keep handing pieces back. laughter. affection. somewhere to go when the sun came up.

someone who wanted him around.

his grip softens around damien's wrists. "you did make it better." the words are quiet, but certain. whatever damien thinks he failed to do, taylor won't let him have that either.

taylors brows pull together when damien says he was made to hurt people. he listens without interrupting, which might be proof enough that something has shifted. damien talks about hunters and legacy and violence like they're things written into him so deeply that nothing could ever pull them out, even five hundred years later. he talks about wanting to be soft like softness and violence can't possibly belong to the same person. but taylor doesn't understand that. he'd spent most of his life being soft with other people and violent with himself.

sometimes that violence had been obvious, hidden behind sleeves and locked doors. other times, he'd found pretties ways to hurt himself. another drink when he'd already had too much, someone else's hands leaving bruises, going home with somebody he didn't really want because being wanted badly enough to be used felt close enough to being love if you didn't look too closely.

taylor had never been good at protecting himself from pain. only making sure nobody else had to carry it. so he can't make damien's violence mean what damien thinks it means. he'd seen it, watched damien tear through hunters, watched him become something terrifying enough that taylor should have been afraid, and somehow the memory had rooted itself somewhere warm beneath his ribs. because damien had been violent and taylor had still known, with absolute certainty, that his hands would never hurt him.

"but you're still nice." it sounds stupid after everything damien has confessed, but taylor means it. "you're nice to me. you keep saying things like they're supposed to make me think you're bad." his voice goes quieter. "and i don't." maybe he couldn't.

taylor had already placed damien somewhere too high to reach. every confession damien offered didn't drag him down from there; taylor only found a way to make room for it beside everything else he worshipped.

taylor's gaze drops at the mention of god. he knows that kind of bargaining. wondering how much suffering might finally balance the scale. whether denying yourself enough could make wanting the wrong things matter less. whether god might look down and see how fucking miserable you were trying to be good and decide that counted for something. apparently death hadn't cured either of them of it.

damien peels one of taylor's hands away and presses it against his cheek, and taylor's fingers move instinctively, thumb brushing half dried blood over his face.

"oh." the realization is quiet and unpleasant. because he's done this before. not the blood, obviously, but the shape of it. taylor had spent years finding new ways to make himself hurt whenever something inside him felt wrong. sometimes he'd known exactly what he was doing. something he'd dressed it up until it looked enough like fun that even he could pretend. this time he'd called it discipline. control. he'd let himself ache for five days and every time his body beggd him to fix it, he'd thought refusal was getting better.

"i didn't think i was doing that." his voice is smaller now. "hurting myself, i mean." the admission leaves him feeling strangely exposed. more than the bodies do, almost. " i thought i was being good." the same stupid fucking word that had followed him through churches and bedrooms and locked bathroom doors had apparently followed him into death too.

damien tells him its okay to be hungry, okay to want living blood, and taylor looks up at him like he's just rewritten scripture. "you mean that?" his gaze searches damien's face, open and painfully trusting. "because i don't want the bags. i don't wanna feel sick all the time. i don't wanna be hungry."

his eyes flick briefly toward the room around them before returning obediently to damien. there's guilt waiting for him. he knows that. but there's something else beginning beneath it now too, something quieter and far more dangerous. damien doesn't think wanting blood makes him bad, and taylor believed damien before he believes himself. "teach me different." his eyes go wide, pleading with him. "whatever you think i should do, i'll listen. please?"

[fadedradio]

“i don’t hate you,” damien said softly, thumb brushing over taylor’s skin. his head shook once. “you couldn’t do anything that would make me hate you.” and that was true, wasn’t it? taylor could’ve killed a hundred more people and damien wouldn’t have loved him any less. he might’ve been afraid for him, afraid of what it would do to his heart, but not of him. never of him. hearing taylor admit that he thought he could hold himself back because damien did made something terrible twist in his chest. oh. his expression softened all at once, guilt cutting through it. “taylor, i’m so much older than you,” he said quietly. “you’re so young. you’re…” he searched for something light, something that might keep his voice from breaking under the weight of everything he should’ve explained sooner. “you’re two apples tall. you’re not supposed to be able to do things i can.” but then taylor kept talking, and damien realized exactly how dangerous his own restraint had looked from the outside. had he really made it seem easy? had he really painted himself as some perfectly controlled thing, surviving on cold blood because he was good and disciplined and not because he was terrified of what fresh blood woke inside him? his gaze dropped to the blood drying on taylor’s clothes, and he swallowed hard. “why didn’t you tell me?” his voice came out so, so sad. not angry. not disappointed. just heartbroken that taylor had been carrying that hunger alone. “i wouldn’t have been upset. i understand.” his thumb moved gently along taylor’s cheek. “nothing helps it like warm blood.” the admission settled heavily between them, too honest to soften. “i know that. i should’ve told you that.” his eyes searched taylor’s face again, careful and worried and guilty. “how do you feel now? are you still hungry?” a beat passed, and then something occurred to him, sharp enough to make his brows pull together. “do you feel an animal in your chest?” he asked suddenly. “something that’s always with you? like it’s part of you, but not… not all of you?” damien’s hand lowered from taylor’s face, fingers curling briefly at his own chest like he could touch the thing living beneath his ribs. “my sire was embraced by someone who came from caine’s bloodline. the first vampire. that’s what i am.” his voice went quieter. “i feel like i’m always fighting to be me. like there’s something in me that wants blood and obedience and violence, and it’s always waiting for me to get tired enough to let it take over.” his eyes closed for a second. “cold blood helps keep it away. that’s why i drink it.” a humorless little laugh left him. “not because it tastes good. it doesn’t. believe me, i know. it’s awful. it’s dead and thin and never enough.” when he opened his eyes again, there was something raw in them. “but it keeps me from wanting too much.” damien looked back at the bodies around them, then forced himself to look only at taylor. “but you can’t starve yourself because you’re trying to be like me.” his voice trembled, barely. “i’m not the standard.. i’m scared. that’s all.” a beat, softer. “and i don’t want you hurting yourself because i made fear look like control.”

[atomicblues]

taylor shouldn't believe damien would never hate him. maybe there was some part of him capable of recognizing how dangerous a promise like that could become in the wrong hands, but damien's hands never felt wrong to him. taylor had spent so much of his life anticipating the exact moment someone's affection reached its limit that being offered something without one felt like being told gravity didn't apply to him anymore. impossible, probably, but damien said it and taylor wanted to badly to live in a world where it was true.

his expression softens despite everything, right up until damien calls him two apples tall. "fuck you." the laugh that escapes him is wet and startled, but real. his nose wrinkles beneath the pad of damien's thumb. "i'm almost as tall as you!" its stupid. there's blood drying on his mouth and people dead around them, and damien still manages to make him laugh. maybe that should feel wrong too. everything tonight probably should.

instead, taylor holds onto the sound for as long as he can.

his smile disappears when damien asked why he didn't tell him. "because you don't." the answer comes almost immediately. taylor looks down at where his fingers are still curled around damien's wrist. "complain, i mean. you never act like its hard."

maybe that had been the problem. damien had made five hundred years of suffering look graceful enough that taylor mistook it for something he was supposed to aspire to. he'd never seen fear when damien drank from a bag - he'd seen discipline. he'd never looked at damien denying himself something he wanted thought he's scared.

he'd thought that's what i'm supposed to be. damien dismantles that image himself and taylor goes still. "you're scared?" there's almost something disbelieving in his voice, not because taylor thinks damien is lying, but because fear had never fit into the shape he'd made for him. damien was the person he went to when he was afraid. damien was supposed to know what lived in the dark because he'd already lived it.

but maybe gods only looked like gods from far enough below them.

taylor's gaze drops to damien's hand when it curls against his own chest. he thinks about it seriously. past the shame and the bodies and the fact that he still hasn't let himself look anywhere damien told him not to. there is something there. hunger had never felt entirely like hunger after he died. something it felt closer to having another set of instincts laid over his own, something that noticed heartbeats before faces.

"maybe." his brows pull together. "i don't know. i thought that was just... being a vampire." his eyes return to damien. "when i got hungry, it got louder." taylor hesitates. "or i did. i don't fucking know, dude."

the distinction feels less important now than it would've an hour ago. whatever part of him had done this, it belonged to him. taylor remembers wanting it to clearly to pretend otherwise. it should horrify him, and it does, but not as completely as it did before damien walked through the door.

he thinks back to the night the hunters found them, how quickly damien had changed when taylor's blood his the air. taylor had seen it then - the thing damien was describing now had looked out through his eyes, had torn through the room with a violence taylor still didn't have the words for. he remembers being afraid. just never of damien.

damien had stepped between him and a threat taylor didn't even understand. taylor remembered the black blood and bodies, remembered the hunter begging before damien sunk his teeth into his neck. he'd watched something ancient and vicious tear its way to the surface and after, taylor hadn't thought monster.

he'd thought safe.

"with the hunters...?" he asked. "that was this?"

his eyes move over damien's face, trying to reconcile the creature he'd seen that night with the fear damien is admitting to now. taylor had spent so much time turning that memory over in his head, but he'd always remembered it with something dangerously close to awe. damien had been terrifying. beautiful. completely beyond anything taylor could imagine becoming.

and he'd done it for him. "i didn't know you were scared of that." damien could tear the whole world apart and taylor might still forgive him as long as his hands stayed gentle when they reached for him. "you came back. you were still you after." taylor's fingers loosen around damien's wrist, sliding down until their hands meet instead. damien had spent centuries terrified that wanting blood made him something terrible. taylor had spent months desperately trying to imitate that fear because he thought it was control.

and now, he's wondering whether either of them has to be quite so afraid.

[fadedradio]

damien remembered it, too. the first time he’d lost control, he hadn’t been himself in any real sense of the word. blackthorne had still held him in that iron grip, dragging obedience out of him like it was love, like devotion and hunger were the same thing. damien remembered being on his hands and knees, smiling through the blood on his mouth, practically shaking at the thought of being praised. that was the worst part of vampiric compulsion – at least, for whatever species of vampire damien had become. he remembered all of it. every second. every scream. every friend whose face had twisted in horror when they realized he was the thing killing them. but he also remembered wanting it. until blackthorne died, damien had wanted to do everything he asked. he’d wanted to be good for him. he’d wanted the blood, wanted the violence, wanted the approving hand in his hair afterward. he remembered the wet slide of blood and sinew dripping from his mouth as he looked up at his sire, eyes full of stars, waiting to be told he’d done well. and he did it again and again and again, until someone finally killed blackthorne and the fog lifted, leaving damien staring down at his hands in horror. because, for as much as he knew he’d had no control over his body, he had wanted it. the want had been real. manufactured, twisted, forced into him by someone else’s will, but real enough to remember. real enough to hate himself for. five hundred years of cold, dead blood had made him forget what warmth felt like. or maybe he’d made himself forget. then the abandoned house happened. the hunters. the rush of fresh life against his tongue, the way his beast had stretched awake and purred like it had only been waiting for permission. damien had remembered all at once, and it terrified him almost as much as it thrilled him. his expression softened when taylor whispered, “don’t.” he let taylor’s hands wrap around his wrist, let him hold on like damien might disappear if he didn’t. damien shook his head, voice quiet but firm. “but you are,” he said. “you are my love, and there’s nothing wrong with you.” i fucking liked it. i didn’t want to. the words settled heavily in damien’s chest, somewhere tender and bruised. he reached for taylor again, slower this time, his touch careful against his blood-wet skin. “i know,” he whispered. “i know what that feels like.” his thumb brushed over taylor’s cheek, smearing red beneath his eye. “that’s the part nobody tells you how to deal with. not just what you did, but the fact that some part of you enjoyed it.” his gaze flicked around the room despite himself. the bodies were still warm. he could smell it, thick and sweet in the air, warm blood calling to the worst parts of him with an intimacy that made his hands twitch. damien swallowed hard and forced his eyes back to taylor. “five days is too long,” he said softly. “you can’t do that to yourself.” and it was horrible, he knew, that the dark little thing in his chest wanted it – wanted to reach out again and lick the blood off taylor’s fingers – and it was by a miracle that he didn’t.

[atomicblues]

taylor's face crumples a little more when damien insists thats what he is, like its the most obvious thing in the world. like my love isn't something taylor can earn his way out of the second he becomes too difficult to love - and taylor believed him.

he'd stopped believing in a god years ago, or at least he'd gotten good at pretending he had. god had always been something watching from very far away, tallying every way taylor failed to become the person he was supposed to be. somewhere along the way, taylor had started treating damien keeping him like the salvation he had been searching for. maybe that should have scared him.

whoever made taylor hadn't stayed long enough to teach him anything. no rules, no explanation, no hand reaching down to pull him out of the grave they'd made for him. damien had found him afterward and filled in every empty space they left behind. when taylor was hungry, damien fed him. when he was scared, damien explained. when something new and horrible happened to his body, damien was there to tell him what it meant. taylor didn't have a sire to look toward, but he had damien.

if damien told him there was nothing wrong with him, some part of taylor wanted desperately to accept it as gospel. "you don't know that." there isn't any real fight behind it. his fingers stay wrapped around damien's wrist, thumb pressed into the place a pulse should have been. "you can't just say there's nothing wrong with me. that's, like, objectively fuckin' insane right now."

he tries to laugh, but it catches in his throat, but his eyes never leave damien's face. he's searching for something. disgust. disappointment. taylor knows what that looks like. he'd spent most of his life learning the tiny shifts in someone's expression that meant he'd finally become too much, and damien had become the one person whose disappointment he couldn't stand the thought of earning.

damien tells him he understands instead and something in taylor goes quiet. of course he does. there hadn't been a single awful thing about this that taylor had brought to damien and found him incapable of understanding. hunger, blood, strange new instincts that scared the shit out of him - damien always had an answer. sometime staylor thought damien could reach inside him and name things before taylor knew what they were.

"you don't hate me for it?" the question slips out before pride can stop it. embarrassingly small for someone sitting in the middle of so much violence. taylor's gaze drops for barely a second before finding damien again, because he needs to see his face when he answers. needs to know damien isn't just being gentle because taylor looks like he might fall apart.

damien's approval had become close to necessity. taylor wanted him to think he was learning. wanted damien to look at him and see something worth keeping. every time damien praised him, something warm opened beneath his ribs that taylor chased with a devotion he didn't examine too closely.

"i know." his gaze drops immediately, no irritation in his voice, only shame creeping in around the edges. "i thought i could do it. you did." his eyes lift again. five hundred years. taylor could barely comprehend that amount of time, but he could look at what it had made damien into. controlled where taylor was impulsive, certain where taylor was constantly scrambling for something solid beneath his feet. damien could have blood dripping from his mouth and taylor would still look at him and see something beautiful. something better.

"you figured out how to control it." his fingers tighten around damien's wrist. maybe that wasn't true. taylor was beginning to understand there were pieces of damien's history he'd never touched, wounds old enough that taylor couldn't even imagine carrying them. but worship had never required knowing everything about a god.

only believing.

"i thought if i did what you did, maybe i'd get good at it too." the admission is painfully earnest. damien survived on cold blood, so taylor decided he should be able to. it made his stomach turn, but damien had enough control so taylor treated every growl of his own hunger like another failure to become more like him.

"the bags make me feel like shit." he admits." they make it quieter, but it never actually goes away. and like, they taste like shit. i thought i'd just get used to it." his eyes threaten to wander toward the bodies again and he hears damien's words repeated in his head. don't look at them right now. so he doesn't. taylor turns his head to damien instead and doesn't even notice how instinctive the choice has become.

[fadedradio]

he giggled when dante started walking over, the sound bright and nervous and already a little ruined. then he squeaked when dante settled behind him, heat creeping slowly up his neck as he hummed in delight and wriggled between the two of them. keaton, apparently, was very on board with whatever dante was doing, because the second archer shifted too much, his hands found archer’s hips and held him there. archer swallowed hard at dante’s words. i already told you what to do. should i start telling keaton what to do with you instead? oh. jesus christ. his hazel eyes went hazy almost immediately, lust and attention fixing him in place as dante kept talking. archer nodded, breathless and already too warm, only for dante’s voice to curl around him again. i asked you a question. can you be good for me? or do i need to start asking keaton? archer nodded faster this time. “no, no, i can be good,” he whined, even though some horrible, thrilling part of him thought the idea of dante telling keaton what to do was so – god. his heart raced in his chest, breathing shaky as heat spread through him all over again. “i can be good, baby,” he promised, voice tiny and breathless. he didn’t want to tear his eyes away from dante, didn’t want to stop looking at him for even a second, but if he was going to kiss keaton properly, he kind of had to. so his gaze lingered on dante’s for half a second longer, soft and desperate and so totally gone, before he turned back. his arms wriggled upward, bruised fingers tangling into keaton’s dark hair, and another giggle slipped out of him as he looked up at him. then their mouths met again, messier this time, archer melting into it with a soft little sound as he let himself get lost in the kiss. and he did like kissing keaton. he did. it was fun and warm and familiar in a way that made his chest feel light. but dante was behind him, watching them, and that changed everything. the thought of those dark eyes on him, taking in every little reaction, every sound… archer tried so hard to listen, and that sent heat straight through his stomach. he whimpered at the thought of it, unable to help himself. when he finally pulled back from keaton, his cheeks were flushed, lips parted, chest rising too quickly as he twisted enough to look back at dante. his eyes were bright and pleading now, all that bratty confidence softened into something needy. “baby,” he whispered, voice nearly breaking around the word. “i wanna kiss you too.” a beat, and then the whine slipped out, completely shameless. “please?”

🕯️attn: @atomicblues.

[atomicblues]

dante kept archer caged in against the bar with his body, chest pressed to his back, one arm braced on the sticky wood beside him so it looked like he was just leaning in close to talk over the music. keaton was pressed closed on the other side of archer, the three of them taking up just enough space that no one could easily squeeze past.

archer was kissing keaton like he couldn't help himself once he started; soft, messy, a little desperate. dante could feel every shift of it against his chest - the way archer's body leaned forward into the kiss and then leaned back like he needed the contact on both sides to stay grounded. the sight of it made something dark and warm settle low in dante's gut.

he let his free hand rest heavy on archer's hip, thumb stroking slow circles over the fabric of his jeans, holding him in place while he watched the way archer's mouth moved against keaton's. "look at you." dante murmured against his ear. "you like having an audience, baby?"

there was not jealousy in it. watching archer melt into keaton's mouth only made the heat in dante's chest pull tighter, warmer. he liked the way archer looked when he was being kissed. soft and a little ruined, body caught between them like he didn't know which way to lean. it did something to him, seeing the two of them together, knowing he was the one who got to keep archer pressed close while it happened.

he tipped his head, mouth brushing the hinge of archer's jaw as he spoke again, low and rough. "deeper, baby. let me see you get stupid." his fingers tightened on archer's hip, guiding him forward another inch into keaton's space. "that's it, baby. let him have you. you're so fucking pretty when you're like this."

dante's free hand stayed braced on the bar, but his body pressed closer, letting archer feel exactly how affected he was by the whole thing. the crowded bar and the sticky wood, the bass thumping through the floor all faded away a little. all he could focus on was the soft, desperate sounds archer kept trying to swallow and the way keaton's hand slipped between them to rest on archer's back.

"we should get out of here." dante murmured after another long moment, lips still on archer's skin. "my rooms close."

[fadedradio]

“freaks can be fun,” he laughed, tapping against the glass. tap. tap. tap. hemlock shifted, head tilted as he stared at her. dragons were notorious for liking pretty things – and she was beautiful. “i’m hemlock.” a beat. “now you know me. and i know you – ingrid.”

🕯️attn: @atomicblues.

[atomicblues]

ingrid's gaze followed the movement of his finger against the glass. each one made something restless twitch beneath her skin, the wolf paying considerably more attention to him than ingrid would've liked. she'd spent enough years behind a fence to know curiosity was usually how trouble found its way inside.

"that's not how knowing someone works." he nose wrinkled, something amused hiding beneath the suspicion in her voice. ingrid shifted her weight, arms folding across her chest as she studied him in return. the wolf like him. or was interested in him, which was arguable worse. it pressed against the edgs of her awareness, drawn toward something old and unfamiliar in him, and ingrid immediately shoved the feeling back down. absolutely not.

"you know my name." she corrected, eyes narrowing slightly. "and you're still staring at me. so, i'm not convinced you're not a freak yet."

[atomicblues]

continued for @fadedradio

taylor always thought losing control would feel like losing himself. something dramatic. a switch flipping, the person he had been disappearing beneath whatever monster had crawled into his body the night he died. that would've been easier, maybe. easier to wake up surrounded by bodies and tell himself that something else had done it. that the thing with its teeth buried in somebody's throat hadn't really been taylor at all.

except he remembered everything. he remembered the first heartbeat catching his attention. remembered trying not to listen to it, because damien had taught him better than that. because he had gotten better at this. bagge blood tasted like shit and left him feeling like someone had taken everything good about eating and replaced it with drinking lukewarm pennies, but he could survive on it. he had been surviving on it.

but three days turned into four because he'd gotten busy, and four had turned into five because admitting he was hungry meant admitting that he needed something. taylor had spent his entire life being too much of everything already. too loud, too needy, too impulsive. being turned had only given him another appetite to apologize for.

the first person had been an accident. after that, taylor didn't know what counted. he was still sitting there when damien found him, knees drawn up loosely, staring at his own hands. blood had dried darker in the lines of his palms, beneath his fingernails, smeared over the stupid rings he'd forgotten to take off. there was so much of it that eventually it had stopped looking like blood at all.

taylor flinched when damien said his name. not away from him. somehow, even now, never away from him. his gaze lifted slowly, red eyes finding damien's face only after his hands were already against taylor's cheeks. my love. something inside him cracked so quickly that an ache tore through his chest. "don't." the word came out small. embarrassed. taylor's face twisted, because damien shouldn't be looking at him like that. shouldn't be touching him like he wasn't covered in evidence of exactly what he was. "don't call me that right now." he really wanted him to anyway.

his eyes tried to slip past damien when he asked how long it had been, dragged helplessly toward the bodies before damien caught his attention again. don't look at them right now. taylor swallowed hard. there was still blood in his mouth, he could taste it when his tongue moved against his teeth.

"i don't know." a lie. damien would know it was a lie too. taylor was fucking terrible at them even before somebody could probably smell dishonesty on him. "like -" his voice broke. he laughed instead, one sharp, miserable sound. "five days." saying it out loud made it sound worse. five days of deciding he could deal with it later. five days of ignoring the ache in his jaw and the way every heartbeat followed him through a room. five days because some stupid, stubborn part of him had decided needing blood was something he could opt out of.

damien asked if they hurt him, and taylor started at him. for a second, he genuinely couldn't understand the question. then his expression crumpled. "no." taylor's hands finally moved, catching around damien's wrists. his grip tightened until bloody fingers were wrapped securely around him, anchoring himself to the only person in the room who could possibly understand what he'd done without taylor having to explain it.

"no, damien, they didn't fucking hurt me." his voice grows more frantic, hollow laughter building in the back of his throat. "i hurt them." taylor's mouth trembled, and he pressed his lips together hard like he could physically keep everything else from spilling out. he'd cried over feeding before. apologized to people who couldn't hear him. spent nights staring at the ceiling wondering if whatever god he spent his childhood terrified of could still see him now that he was dead.

but this wasn't feeding. "i couldn't stop." his voice dropped into something frightened, eyes wide and frazzled. "i knew i should stop and i just -" he shook his head, crazed laughter falling out of his mouth. "i didn't want to." his fingers tightend around damien's wrists again. "that's fucked up, right? like, that's - you can't tell me that's just hunger. i fucking liked it."

that was the part he didn't think he could survive. giving up the relief that he felt after. the awful, perfect silnce that had settled inside him when warm blood finally hit his tongue and for the first time in days, nothing hurt. nothing ached. nothing begged. he'd felt good. taylor finally looked at damien again, eyes wet and terrified. "what the fuck is wrong with me?"

[fadedradio]

for as much as the creature in his chest clawed toward declan, it seemed that declan's glamour reached just as hard. wren felt something pulling him closer – an invisible tether hooked somewhere behind his sternum, tugging him forward with every shallow breath declan took. every whimper, every sound that spilled from declan's parted lips – it spurned him on, fed the thing that was climbing up his throat like a living thing, and the tiniest black lines started dragging down his face from the corners of his eyes, thin as veins, spreading like ink dropped in water. he gasped – air he didn't need – when he felt declan's fingers trail down his chest. slow. deliberate. lower. until his hand pressed past the waistband, palm cupping his cock, and wren rolled into the feeling immediately. his head threw back, and a groan tore from his throat – deep, guttural, nothing human about it. the sound vibrated in his chest, resonated through his ribs, and the black lines crept further down his cheeks. he could feel the beast pressing against the inside of his skin, restless and hungry. declan's blood trickled down his mouth, and when wren looked back, eyes half-lidded, his pupils had narrowed into slits. a low growl rumbled in his chest, quiet and possessive. it would be so easy. so, so easy to take it all and then give it back – sink his teeth into something soft and vital, and then press his mouth to the wound and fill it with vitae until declan was his in ways that couldn't be undone. the thought curled through him like smoke, and his fingers twitched. but despite the beast climbing up his chest, pressing against the back of his throat with clawed hands, wren wouldn't succumb to that thought.

instead, clawed fingers tore the fabric of his sweatpants – the cotton splitting down the front with a sharp rip. whatever. he could buy more. he pushed against declan's chest with an open palm, pushing him down onto the bed. wren followed, crawling over him, settling on top of him with his knees bracketing declan's hips. he stared down at him and his eyes burned with something that was half devotion and half starvation. his expression was a war – possessiveness and desperation tangled so tightly together they were indistinguishable. "poor baby," he said quietly, his voice a low rasp that didn't quite sound like his own. his hand wrapped around his cock, thumb swiping over the slick head. his other hand tangled in declan's hair, fingers threading through the strands, lifting his head. once he was at the right angle, wren slapped his cheek with his cock. a wet, heavy sound against skin, the head dragging across declan's cheekbone. he did it again, slower, pressing the length of it against declan's mouth, feeling the heat of his breath against the sensitive skin. "you want me?" his voice was calmer than he felt. calmer than the thing inside him screaming to bite, to mark, to take. his thumb traced declan's lower lip. "you want more?" wren's mouth opened. not wide – just enough – and venom dripped past his lips in a thin, glistening thread, landing on the head of his cock. "suck it."

🕯️ attn: @atomicblues.

[atomicblues]

declan felt the shirt the second wren's control frayed. the black lines that started crawling down his cheeks like ink in water, the way his pupils thinned into something sharp and inhuman, the low grown that lived somewhere in his chest instead of his throat. it should have been terrifying. instead if made the gold under declan's skin burn hotter, glamour spilled outward in restless waves that made the sheets bloom in tiny white flowers around their bodies. every petal unfurling felt like another confession he couldn't keep inside anymore. he was so far gone for this man that it barely even registered as fear.

when wren ripped the sweatpants open and shoved him flat, declan went willingly, breath punched out of him in a soft, shaky laugh that turned into something closer than a whimper when wren settled over his hips. he could still taste his own blood on his tongue, still feel the slow drip of venom working through him like liquid heat, and the fight of wren above him, eyes half starved and half worshipping, made something in his chest twist so hard it hurt. i love you. the thought came unbidden, sharp and helpless. i'm obsessed with you. i'd let you ruin me a thousand times over if it meant you kept looking at me like that.

the first wet slap of wren's cock against his cheek dragged a broken sound out of him. declan's lips parted on instinct, chasing the heat of it, tongue flicking out to taste the smear of precome and the thin, glistening thread of venom that had just landed. the flavor was sharp and sweet and wren, and it only made him hungrier. gold flared bright along his throat and down his chest, tightening like a second skin, trying to pull wren closer, trying to wrap around the black lines on his face and soothe whatever was clawing it way out of him, to convince it that declan belonged to it. flowers spilled across the mattress in thicker clusters, climbing the sides of the bed like they were trying to hold them both in place.

"yeah," he breathed, voice already wrecked, eyes glassy with want and something softer, something that felt dangerously close to devotion. "i want you. i want more. i want everything you'll give me." his hands slid up wren's thighs, fingers digging in hard enough to leave marks, holding him there whil ehe leaned up just enough to drag the flat of his tongue along the underside of his cock. slow, deliberate. tasting every inch of the venom slick skin like it was the only thing that mattered. "you're so beautiful like this."

he opened his mouth wider, eyes locked on wren's face, and took him in - hot, heavy, the head pressing against his tongue as he sealed his lips around it and sucked, soft and eager, like he'd been waiting for the order his whole life. the gold under his skin pulsed with every bob of his head, glamour trying to pull wren closer, trying to say things that his mouth was too busy to form. i'm yours. i've been yours. take whatever you need. i'm yours. every wet sound, every careful drag of his tongue, every soft moan that vibrated around the thick length felt like another piece of himself offered up without hesitation. he was in love with the way wren looked at him. obsessed with the sound of that inhuman growl. and right now, with venom on his tongue and flowers blooming under his back, declan couldn't think of a single place he'd rather be.

[fadedradio]

if there was anyone he felt compelled to believe, it was dante. and he knew that. underneath all the fear and panic and distrust, archer knew he felt safe with dante  – and that meant something to him. it meant a lot. the feeling of calloused fingers pulling him closer had him closing his eyes with a sigh. he knew his vision would blur if he opened them, so he kept them shut. squeezed them shut – but then dante said that. i’ll always come back to you. and archer felt something soft and fragile crack open in his chest. his eyes opened despite the tears spilling from them, his gaze locking onto dante’s. he stayed silent. didn’t move, didn’t even try to kiss him. instead, he settled his head against dante’s chest and listened to his heartbeat, trying to calm himself. “i think – ” he shook his head. “i’ll come back to you, too.”

🕯️attn: @atomicblues.

[atomicblues]

dante had made promises before. most of them had been easy when he made them. i'll call, i'll stay, i'll be here. things that sounded true when somebody was warm beside him and leaving was still an abstract thing waiting somewhere down the road. then morning came, or expectation did, and suddenly every promise felt like a hand closing around his wrist. dante had spent most of his life convincing himself that leaving first was kinder than waiting around long enough to disappoint somebody.

this hadn't felt like that. maybe because he'd already done it once. he'd gotten scared, fucked everything up, put distance between them like that could somehow undo how much archer had started to matter, and still ended up right back here. sitting in archer's bed with his fingers curled against him, realizing there probably wasn't any version of this where he could make himself stop wanting to come back.

so archer's answer hit somewhere dante wasn't prepared for. his hand stopped against archer's back. for a second, he didn't say anything. archer's cheek was pressed over his heart, which was unfortunate considering the stupid fucking thing started beating harder. there was no hiding that. no joke quick enough to cover it when archer could probably hear exactly what those words had done to him. "yeah?" it came out quieter than dante would've liked.

his fingers curled into the back of archer's shirt, pulling him closer even though there wasn't much space left between them to begin with. dante lowered his head until his cheek rested against archer's hair. his throat tightened. "careful," dante murmured, because apparently even now he couldn't resist giving himself somewhere to hide. "might start expectin' you to." there was the faintest tease to it, but it didn't hold up well with the way his hand spread over archer's back, holding him like something precious. dante swallowd. then quieter. "i'd like that though. knowin' you'd come back."

[atomicblues]

closed for @atomflower

archer could ask him for almost anything when he looked like that. it was inconvenient as fuck. dante liked being the one with all the control, liked watching archer squirm beneath him and knowing exactly what every sound meant. that was easy. it fit neatly into the version of himself dante knew how to be: wanted, confident, untouchable. archer asking to be held was somehow infinitely more dangerous than archer asking to be fucked.

for half a second, dante only stared at him. then he laughed. he wanted it to be mean, but there wasn't even enough bite behind it to pretend that he was making fun of him. something warm cracked straight through dante's chest, softening his smile until there was nothing sharp left. "oh, baby." his grip loosened immediately, thumb brushing once over the heat gathered high on archer's cheek. "you got all worked up over askin' me to cuddle you?" there was teasing affection all through his voice, impossible to hide. archer was going to fucking kill him one day, probably without ever realizing he'd done it.

"c'mere."

dante let go of his face only so he could rearrange them, dropping onto his side and pulled archer with him until there wasn't any space left between their bodies. one arm slid beneath archer's neck while the other wrapped firmly around his waist. tugging him against his chest like this was where he'd wanted him all along. maybe it was. dante wasn't going to examine too closely.

he pressed a kiss against archer's forehead first. then the bridge of his nose. his cheek. the corner of his mouth, deliberately avoiding what archer had asked for until dante could feel him getting impatient under his hands. "this what you wanted?" another kiss landed against his cheek, slower this time, and dante's hand slipped beneath the back of archer's shirt only far enough to settle warm against his skin. no agenda behind it, just touch. "wanted me to hold you and kiss all over your stupid little face?"

it should have felt suffocating. usually, this was the part that did. tenderness came with all these invisible expectations that dante didn't know how to handle, but archer wasn't asking for any of that yet. he was sleepy and flushed and tucked against dante's chest, asking for something so painfully simple that dante couldn't find a reason to run from it.

[fadedradio]

he threw his arms in the air with a shrug. "nah, but my brother is trying to figure it out." his nose scrunched at that. "i keep telling him not to, but, like, he's..." gerard sighed, stretching across the counter. "if you met auggie, you'd get it." his voice dipped then, and he looked away from dakota. "it's gotta suck. our parents, then me... it sucks. i know he's lonely. i wish this didn't happen."

🕯️ attn: @atomicblues.

[atomicblues]

dakota's expression softened immediately. "hey." his hand moved toward gerard on instinct before stopping short, fingers curling back against the counter when he remembered there was nothing there for him to hold. "you didn't choose this." his gaze stayed on him even when gerard looked away. "and auggie still has you. maybe not the way either of you wanted, but he does." a small, sad smile pulled at his mouth. "i think i'd probably try to figure it out too, though." sometimes he tried. he just didn't know how to really start.

[fadedradio]

wren spent years wondering if big town really was as nice as the other kids had said. it took two nights there to realize that, no, it was not. it took two weeks to realize that most people weren’t gonna make it. and he’d been out here for a decade and a half after that, surviving off spite and bad luck, basically. he wasn’t about to let a super mutant, a slaver, or some desperate asshole with a pretty story take him that easily. fuck them. fuck all of them. he’d rather die than let somebody drag him off in chains, and he sure as shit wasn’t gonna fall for some dude stumbling out of nowhere and claiming he was from a vault. wren tilted his head, eyes narrowed at the man in front of him. he looked disheveled, clothes dusty, hair a mess, face drawn tight with exhaustion – but didn’t they all? the wasteland chewed everybody up eventually. some people just had the decency to look honest about it. “you got a gun? knives? weapons?” wren asked, grip tightening around his own weapon. “kick them over.” he didn’t move any closer. not yet. pretty faces, sad eyes, shaking hands – none of that meant shit if there was a blade tucked against someone’s ribs or a pistol hidden under their jacket. wren had learned that lesson young, and ugly, and more than once. “all of it,” he added, voice flat. “i find out you kept something on you, and this conversation gets real fucking short.”

[atomicblues]

declan's gaze dropped reluctantly to the weapon in wren's hands, then back to his face. apparently being pretty didn't make him any less likely to shot declan, which felt unfair somehow. "yeah, okay." there wasn't any fight behind it. declan was exhausted enough that fear had started settling into something duller, his body incapable of maintaining the level of panic the wasteland apparently expected from him at all times. at least wren was asking before he robbed him. that was practically manners out here.

slowly, carefully, declan reached for the pistol shoved through his belt with two fingers and lowered it to the ground. he'd found it on a dead man two days ago, along with twelve bullets and absolutely no instructions on what he was supposed to do when those twelve ran out. the vault had taught him how to shoot. it had not taught him to count every bullet like it might be the difference between eating and dying. his foot nudged the pistol across the dirt towards wren. "that's it." a beat passed and declan's mouth twisted. "mostly."

he could already tell from wren's expression that mostly wasn't going to get him very far. "don't shoot me." declan moved even slower this time, pulling the little utility knife from his jacket pocket and dropping it beside him. "its barely even a weapon. i've mostly been using it to open things." another push sent it scraping after the pistol. he hesitated before patting himself down like there might be another weapon he'd forgotten about, hands moving over pockets and ribs before he finally lifted them again. "that's actually everything. promise."

there should've been indignation somewhere in there. declan was usually very good at finding it. he didn't like being ordered around, didn't like the implication that he was lying, and really didn't like surrendering the only two things standing between him and everything he'd spent the last several days discovering wanted to kill him.

instead, relief had begun creeping embarrassingly beneath all of it. because wren hadn't shot him. because there were walls behind him, however shitty they were, and people inside them. because someone was finally talking to declan instead of trying to take his things or sell him something he didn't understand. because for the first time since the vault door sealed behind him, he wasn't entirely alone. "is this actually a town?" he looked around the battered buildings. "because i'm not trying to be rude, but the name feels a little misleading."

[atomicblues]

closed for @atomflower

the hand closing around him steals the last of taylor's breath.

it wasn't just touch. it was claim. damien's fingers drag a broken, high sound from taylor's throat that he can't swallow. his head drops back, resting on damien's shoulder, the cold of the older vampire's skin a sharp contrast against the fever that has begun to burn under his own. every stroke feels like being rewritten, every careful drag feels like a brand.

taylor's free hand finds damien's hip and holds on like he might otherwise fall. he grinds back into the hard length pressed against him, slow and desperate, the layers of fabric between them steadily growing more and more intolerable. he wants them gone. he wants the ancient, possessive thing that has been watching him all night to stop holding itself in check and take what it has already decided belongs to it.

another stroke, firmer, and a wrecked little moan slips out of him. taylor turns his face into the cool column of damien's throat, fangs brushing against cool skin, aching as badly as they did before he knew he needed to feed.

you're ever going to want anyone else.

damien says it like a promise, like there isn't any room in the universe for taylor to be discarded once damien has decided to keep him and every tender part of taylor folds beneath the weight of it. the words sink deeper then the venom, deeper than the hand still working him with devastating care. his hips stutter, pressing back harder. how could he begin to explain to damien that there could never be anyone else?

[atomicblues]

closed for @atomflower

declan had imagined the sky differently. that was the stupid thing he kept coming back to.

his entire life, there had been a ceiling above him. sometimes painting white, sometimes grey, sometimes dressed up with cheerful little murals meant to convince children that living beneath several hundred feet of earth was perfectly normal. the vault had pictures of the world before. books, too. blue skies stretching endlessly over green fields, sunlight caught in the leaves of trees that weren't dead.

nobody mentioned how big it would feel.

the first time declan stepped outside, he'd stood there until his neck hurt from looking up. now several days later, he mostly wished the enormous fucking sky would stop raining on him.

"okay. great." declan stared down at the little blinking figure on his pip-boy with growing resentment. according to the map, there was supposed to be something here. civilization, hopefully. a roof would be nice. a chair would be incredible. a shower had become such an obscene fantasy that he'd stopped letting himself think about one. his vault suit was filthy. he'd pulled an oversized jacket off a body two days ago and had spent several hours afterward trying not to think too hard about the fact that he'd done so. there was dried blood on one knee that he was reasonably certain belonged to him. his hair felt disgusting. everything hurt. and he was down to one bottle of water.

declan looked from his pip-boy to the collection of ruined buildings ahead of him. "big town." he read aloud. a pause. there were walls... sort of. more importantly, there were people. actual, living people. relief his him so quickly that it hurt. "hey!" every lesson he'd learned over the last several days should have stopped him from announcing himself. unfortunately, declan had spent twenty nine year learning that other people meant safety and less than a week learning that sometimes other people wanted to shoot you.

vault habits were proving difficult to kill. he lifted one hand as he approached the barricade, the other kept away from the pistol he'd shoved awkwardly through his belt. "hi. i'm not -"

they raised a gun. declan stopped and every bit of relief disappeared. his hands went up immediately, eyes widening as he stared down the barrel. guns weren't unfamiliar. security carried them back home. he'd evn fired one before, although paper targets generally hadn't pointed anything back. "dangerous!" probably would have been more convincing before he'd nearly shouted it. "i'm not dangerous." he repeated quieter this time. his gaze darted between the stranger and the buildings behind them, searching automatically for someone who looked marginally less likely to murder him. "i'm from a vault. i just need -"