iâm not sure if anyone will even see this or if anyone particularly cares but i will be taking an indefinite hiatus from writing :) itâs been a stressful couple of months for me & iâm afraid it will only get worse from here. iâve also been stuck in a rut when it comes to writing; i have so many ideas but no time or motivation to actually write them. if i do end up managing to cough up some words i will try to post them here but tbh my interest in writing x reader fics has gone down considerably so. ÂŻ\_(ă)_/ÂŻ
i do have two wips iâd like to get out soon (one for an event and one for a friend) but apart from that, if i do get back into writing again, it will be only on ao3 or on a new blog. please do not ask me for the usernames.
Hey div! Not sure if youâll see this and ignore me if Iâm overstepping but I just wanted to pop in and say that I completely understand and support your decision to go on hiatus (tho it will be sad to see you go) and I hope that all your problems will get solved soon.
Take your time and prioritize you and your mental health! And if you do decide to come back to writing, I know that everyone (especially me) will support you no matter what :))
Remember everything always works out in the end
Ok ily bye
hiii my lovely caylin i could never ignore you! iâm still active on tumblr, just not writing and mostly lurking & keeping to myself :,) thank you so so much for your support and well wishes ⥠i hope youâre doing amazing too đ«¶
HI DIV!! im not sure if you're gone yet, but i just wanted to let you know it's been months since I've come back to this app! i really love your writing a lot, and i think your ghostjo fic definitely made me feel something i didn't lnow i had inside of me, it just resonated so well.. i hope you're doing all right, and please take your time, we all care about you a lot! no matter what happens, prioritize yourself over meeting expectations every time!! that all being said, we'll always be here if you ever decide to write fics again!
â đ” anon
hi đ” anon!!! itâs been a while, itâs so great to hear from you! i hope youâre doing well :) thank you so much for your support, i appreciate you so much đ„č take care! xx
you think you quite like the idea of the chief justice of fontaine having to stifle his moans while heâs sequestered away in his office.
anyone can hear us, heâd said the night you proposed it, lying boneless and curled up against his side. heâd slid a finger down your cheekbones and down to your jaw when you offered him a cheeky grin. thatâs part of the fun, youâd told him. heâd agreed, thenâhow could he not? you have him wrapped around your little finger. and so, the next week, heâd arranged for a comfortable pillow to be kept under his desk and for his office doors to remain closed no matter what for a few hours.
âitâs important work,â heâd informed everyone, âand i would prefer not to be disturbed.â
to his credit, he is finishing up some work. poorly, yes, but no one can argue against him being productive.
you hear the shuffle of papers above you, the little clink of his pen dipping in the inkwell, and drag your tongue along the underside of his cock.
he taps his foot, and you hear the rustle of his clothes. you do it again, licking across the vein that runs down the length of his cock, before wrapping your lips around his swollen head. neuvillete groans, though it sounds muffled. when you look up at him, you find him furiously scribbling something down, eyebrows knitted together in a frown and one hand covering his mouth. it makes you feel slightly powerful, knowing you can reduce the most powerful person in fontaine to this.
âdonât move,â he commands, bringing the hand which was covering his mouth down and placing it on top of your head. âyouâre only here to keep it warm, my love.â
you nod your head in agreement. the movement makes him slip more of his cock inside your mouth, and he groans again. your mouth is so warm, your throat so tight. when you swallow around him, neuvillette groans again, his hand in your hair tightening just a little, as if to hold you in place.
you hollow your cheeks around him, sucking diligently. the scratching of his pen slows down, then stops entirely, followed by a sharp inhale. his hand in your hair tightensânot painfully, but with a firm, possessive pressure that pins you exactly where he wants you.
âi told you not to move,â neuvilletteâs voice comes from above, low and strained. he doesnât pull you off, doesnât push you deeper. he simply holds you there, his thumb stroking your temple. you feel the tremor run through his thigh where your palm rests. the chief justice of fontaine, reduced to a man fighting for control behind his down desk, while you kneel between his legs with your mouth full of him.
you hear the rustle of paper again. heâs trying to go back to work. you feel him shift, pick up his pen again, and you hear the careful scratch of nib against parchment. but his breathing is too uneven now, his grip in your hair still tight, and when you let your tongue trace a lazy circle around the head of his cock, the pen clatters.
neuvillette exhales. you feel his hand shift from your hair to cup the back of your skull, his long fingers threading through the strands with a tenderness that belies your filthy actions.
âi should have known better,â he murmurs, more to himself than to you. âi should have known you would never simply do what you told me you would.â
you hear the creak of his leather chair as he leans back. his other hand, the one that had been gripping his pen, comes down to rest on the edge of the disk.
âlook at me.â
you obey, tilting your head upward, your lips still stretched around the swollen, flushed head of his cock. the sight that greets you sends a thrill straight to your core. neuvillette has shed his usual mask of authority. his eyes, usually calm as a deep lake, are dark with lust, half-lidded. a lock of his long, silver-blue hair has fallen loose from its usual neat arrangement, brushing against his collarbone.
âthere you are,â he breathes, his thumb tracing the curve of your cheek. âso beautiful like this. so eager.â
he holds your gaze; then, slowly, he begins to move his hips. not thrustingânever that, not yetâjust a subtle, shallow roll of his pelvis that pushes his cock a fraction of an inch deeper into your waiting mouth. he tastes like salt and skin and something uniquely him, clean and faintly oceanic, like the breeze that rolls off the waters of fontaine. you moan around him, the sound muffled and desperate, and feel him in twitch in response.
âshh,â neuvillette soothes, though his voice is strained. his hand in your hair guides you, gentle but firm, setting a slow, languid pace. âwe must be quiet, my love. the walls of this office are thick, but they are not that thick.â
he punctuates his words with another shallow push, and you feel the head of his cock nudge against the back of your throat. you gag, just slightly; he pauses immediately, his hand stilling.
âbreathe through your nose,â he instructs. ârelax your throat. i have you.â
you do as he says, focusing on the slow inhale and exhale through your nostrils, the way your throat loosens around him.
âgood,â he praises, and the word washes over you like warm honey. âyou take me so well. my perfect, obedient little thing.â
but you are not obedient. not entirely. as he resumes his slow, shallow rhythm, you let your tongue dart out, lapping at the sensitive underside of his cock where it rests against your tongue. you feel him shudder above you, hips stuttering.
âahââ the sound escapes him before he can stop it, a moan that he quickly smothers by pressing his palm against his own mouth. his eyes screw shut for a moment. you imagine what he must be thinkingâthe struggle between the controlled, dignified chief justice and the man who wants nothing more than to grip your hair and fuck your throat until he forgets his own name.
when neuvillette opens his eyes again, he reaches down with his free hand. his fingers find the collar of your shirt. he toys with the fabric for a moment, then slips his hand inside, his cool palm pressing flat against the warmth of your chest. he can feel your heartbeat, rapid and wild.
âtell me,â he says, âdo you enjoy this? having me at your mercy like this?â
you canât answer with your mouth full, so you simply hold his gaze and hum, a low, pleased sound that vibrates around his cock. his breath hitches, and his hips press forward involuntarily, sliding deeper into your warm, wet mouth.
âfuck,â he hisses, the curse sounding foreign and filthy on his lips. he never swears. never. but you have broken something in him, cracked the veneer of his control.
his hand on your chest slides upwards, his fingers tracing the line of your throat, feeling the slight bulge where his cock is. âi wantââ he shakes his head, a rueful smile tugging at his lips. âno. i mustnât be greedy.â
but you want neuvillette to be greedy. you want him to take and take and take until he has nothing left to give in return. so you reach up, your hand finding his where it rests on your throat, and guide it downward, pressing his palm against your breast.
his eyes widen, just a fraction. are you sure?
you answer by taking him deeper, swallowing him down until your nose brushes against the coarse hair at the base of his cock. neuvillette groans, not bothering to muffle it this time. his hips buck once, twice, and you feel his cock throb against your tongue, taste the salty bead of precum that leaks from his tip.
he begins to move, a slow, rolling rhythm that pulls his cock out of your mouth slightly, and back in. the desk creaks beneath him as he spreads his thighs wider to accommodate you. the papers he had been working on are long forgotten, scattered and crumpled beneath his elbows.
âlook at you,â neuvillette says, his eyes fixed on the sight of you kneeling between his legs. your lips are stretched around his cock, your eyes watering but your gaze never leaving his. âso beautiful. i could keep you here forever.â
he thrusts slowly at the word forever, making your eyes roll back. you feel him hit the back of your throat, feel the way your muscles contract around him. his pace quickens, just slightly.
âclose,â he warns. âiâm close. if you want me to stopââ
you cut him off by hollowing your cheeks and sucking hard, making him moan. the sound of itâthe wet, lewd noise of his cock sliding in and out of your mouth, the ragged gasps of his breathingâmakes your stomach warm. you rub your thighs together, hoping for some friction. he comes soon after, his cock pulsing against your tongue. you swallow around it, your throat milking every drop from his spent cock.
when he finally stills, his hand in your hair goes slack. he strokes your scalp, a gentle, apologetic gesture.
âcome here,â he says, tugging at your hair and guiding you off his cock with a wet pop. you gasp for air, your throat raw and aching, but the look in his eyes makes it all worth it.
he pulls you up, out from under the desk and into his lap. you collapse against his chest, your cheek pressed to the fine fabric of his coat. his arms wrap around you, holding you close, and he presses a kiss to the top of your head.
âi love you,â he says. âyou did so well for me.â
âi know,â you say, your voice raspy. âsee? i told you itâd be fun. now get back to work, chief justice. you have a nation to run.â
a/n: please do not perceive me this is all @zozo-01âs fault (affectionate)
âif you love this character then you must make him happy in your fics, right?â wrong. the horror. suffering. internal hemorrhage. hospital. immediately
CONTROVERSIAL OPINION AHEAD: Ok I love kingdon and everything
But it just kind of bothers me that theyâve only known each other for like two day đ and with a ten month break in between
And it just seems like (to me atleast) that neither of them seem ready for a relationship (?) with the family/marriage/addiction issues Frankâs having and the fact that Mel doesnt really know who she is outside of taking care of her sister
I think that they would make a cute pair later but I really hope that they have some character development first and discover themselves before a relationship
âŠPls donât throw tomatoes at me đ
Ok bye
no tomatoes from me! i do ship them but i also agree with everything you said :) both of them definitely have a LOT of baggage they need to work through before jumping into a relationship but that said, i probably donât have much grounds to stand on because i still havenât finished s2 yet đ so there could be context iâm completely missing! i think they have great slowburn potential though LOL to me they just fit but i donât really want to see them getting together in the near future either >:)
synopsis: âthereâs something going on,â he says. âa chain of robberies, not random. itâs clean, professionalâin and out in under four minutes. iâve been watching them hit warehouses all across marmoreal. whatever theyâre after, itâs coordinated. and i canât keep up on my own.â
in which spider-man enlists the help of his favourite detective to uncover a series of robberies in new okhema city.
tags: modern!au, spider-man!au, romance, angst, action, smut, frenemies to lovers. profanity, violence, oral sex, fingering, blood and injuries, mentions of drug abuse & human experimentation, etc.
word count: 19.5k
a/n: reposted from my old account. thanks for reading!
Phainon thinks heâs a pretty good guy.
Okay, maybe not, like, great. Heâs not out here winning humanitarian awards or remembering to replace the Brita filter before it turns green. But still. He flosses most nights, and tips well on the rare occasions he orders pizza for dinner. He saves cats from trees, catches robbers in the middle of getaway attempts, and makes a decent grilled cheese when the mood strikes. In the grand cosmic scale of morality, he figures that puts him somewhere between a broke college student and a D-list superhero with a heart of gold.Â
Which is why, as heâs currently being pursued across rooftops by New Okhemaâs most persistent detective, Phainon feels the situation is a little unfair.
âI donât deserve to be chased like this!â he yells over his shoulder, breaths short, voice muffled through his mask as he narrowly avoids tripping over a pipe. âIâm a pretty good guy!â
The boots pounding behind him donât slow. âYouâre obstructing justice!â
âYouâre harassing a concerned citizen!â
He vaults over a low vent and instantly regrets it, the rooftop pitching sideways beneath him as he skids and catches himself just in time to avoid faceplanting into a rusted-out AC unit. Graceful. So graceful. Just like the comics. His heartâs doing the worst kind of cardio in his chest, the kind that feels like guilt and adrenaline and that specific brand of dread that only ever shows up when youâre behind him.
Because if thereâs one thing Phainonâs sure of, itâs this: you hate him.
Maybe not, like, hate-hate. Maybe not enough to tase him out of the sky. But enough to chase him across rooftops with the hopes of finally arresting him for good.Â
He can live with that. Heâs been hated before. (He just wishes it didnât make him kind of want your approval.)
âYouâre breaking at least three laws just by standing there!â you shout as he swings up and over the next building.
Youâre getting closer. He can hear it in your voiceâless winded than his, more focused. Heâs not sure if heâs impressed or terrified. Probably both.
âDo you ever take a break?â you snap as you land behind him with a clean, practiced roll.
Phainon whirls around, arms raised. âDo you ever let anyone live?â
Your eyes narrow like youâre imagining the paperwork it would take to make his disappearance look like an accident.Â
âOkay, okay! Truce! Five minutes.â He backs up, hands still in the air. âNo chasing or tasers. Please.â
You donât answer, which means youâre at least considering it. Heâs getting good at reading your silences, which is probably not a good thing. He should stop doing that. He should stop noticing things about you at allâlike how you always pull your sleeves down when youâre thinking, or how you furrow your eyebrows when youâre about to disagree with someone but donât want to start a fight.
âLook,â he says, tone dropping, just a bit. âThis isnât about me dodging patrol or stealing snacks from that convenience store on 14th Streetââ
âYou stoleââ
âBorrowed,â he corrects quickly. âWith intent to pay.â
You stare at him. The wind rustles your coat. Somewhere, a siren wails and dies out.
âThereâs something going on,â he says. âA chain of robberies, not random. Itâs clean, professionalâin and out in under four minutes. Iâve been watching them hit warehouses all across Marmoreal. Whatever theyâre after, itâs coordinated. And I canât keep up on my own.â
He expects you to laugh. Or roll your eyes. Or say something sharp and cutting thatâll make his stomach twist in that way he hatesâbecause youâre usually right.
âI think theyâre watching me,â he adds, quieter now. âI think someone knows who I am.â
The wind blows sharp across the rooftop, carrying the tang of rain and smoke and summer dust. It scrapes over the worn brick under Phainonâs boots and rustles your coat, but you donât move. You just look at him, your face unreadable in the way that always makes his stomach knot a little too tight. Itâs the kind of stillness that unnerves himânot because he doesnât know what youâre thinking, but because he wants to. More than he should. Phainonâs chest rises and falls, just a little too fast.
âThatâs a bold claim,â you say slowly.
Yeah. He knows. He also knows youâre not brushing him off, which is scarier than if you had. Youâre listening, evaluating. That furrow between your brows is your tellâheâs seen it before, in passing shadows and glimpses from across precinct crime scenes. The way you tilt your head slightly to the left when youâre filing pieces together in real time.
âYou have proof?â you ask.
Phainon knows you wonât move without proofânot a whisper, not a theory, not a gut feeling scraped together from caffeine and paranoia. But he doesnât have clean lines or neat bullet points. What he has is scraps; disconnected threads; a slowly closing hand around the back of his neck every time he turns a corner too sharp. And that feelingâthat awful, skin-tight certaintyâthat something out there has started moving towards him, not away.
âI donât have anything concrete, but⊠Iâve been tracking the hits since the first one three weeks ago,â he says, starting to pace now, in small, tight circles, just enough movement to bleed out some of the nervous energy crawling up his spine. âTheyâre too clean. Like, unrealistically clean. No alarms triggered, no broken doors, no fingerprints. They even bypassed the retinal scanner at one of the biotech labs. Who does that? And for what? Theyâre not stealing cash or valuables. Theyâre taking very specific thingsâequipment, hard drives, chemical canisters.â
âShow me,â you say. Your eyes donât leave his face. (Well, the mask. But he swears youâre looking through it.)
He blinks. âWhat?â
You cross your arms. âThe footage. The files. Whatever youâve got. If youâre serious about this, I need to see everything.â
âOh.â Phainonâs voice pitches up an octave in surprise. âCool. Okay. Should we, like, grab dinner? I know a good deli down at Kephale Plaza. Best dill pickle sandwiches on this side of Okhema.â
Phainon didnât lie. Chartonusâ Deli, tucked between a laundromat and a building thatâs had a For Sale sign tacked onto the door for fourteen years, does serve the best dill pickle sandwiches in New Okhema City. The fluorescent sign above the deli flickers intermittentlyâCHART NUSâ on a bad night, HARTONUS DEL when itâs feeling generousâand the inside smells like mustard, old fryer oil, and vinegar.
Heâs perched in the booth furthest from the window, under a buzzing ceiling light that flickers every now and then. The vinyl seat squeaks every time he shifts, and the table has a wobble. Thereâs duct tape across the far corner of the laminate, and someoneâpossibly Chartonus himselfâhas carved NO CRYING IN THE DELI into the tabletop.
Phainon has his mask pulled up just past his nose, letting the cool air hit the sweat still clinging to his neck. His hairâs damp, and thereâs a tear in the seam of his left glove he only just now noticed. His sandwich is halfway demolished, crumbs gathering on the dark fabric of his suit, pickle juice already soaking into the paper wrapper.
He looks across the table at you. Youâre the only person in here not eating, only sipping from a chipped ceramic mug of what Chartonus had claimed was coffee with a shrug. Your coatâs slung over the back of your seat, and your badge is tucked out of sight, but everything about you still screams copâstraight spine, steady eyes, the way your fingers twitch every time the door jingles.
âI told you,â Phainon says around a mouthful of rye and mustard. âBest sandwich in the city.â
âThis is where you wanted to debrief?â
He shrugs. âThey know my order here.â
You roll your eyes and pull the folder Phainon had handed you on the rooftop from your bag, placing it on the table between you. âYou said these started three weeks ago?â you ask, flipping it open.
Phainon nods, brushing crumbs off the table. âWarehouse on Little Thorn. Then a lab two nights later. Then another warehouse. Then the lab again, but a different wing. Theyâre hitting specific targets, looping back, almost like theyâre refining their technique.â
You glance up. âAny pattern to what theyâre taking?â
âThatâs the thing.â He leans in, placing his half-eaten sandwich on the paper wrapper. âItâs weirdly⊠modular. Like, theyâre not emptying vaults or swiping entire systems. Theyâre taking parts. Pieces. Very specific ones.â
He slides a finger across one of the printouts. Itâs a manifest list from the Little Thorn warehouse, half the lines redacted, but a few still visible.
Carbon-neutral polymer casings
Fiber-optic microarrays
Refrigerated storage containers, Class III
Unknown compound, biohazard sealed
âDoesnât scream smash-and-grab,â you say, studying the list.
âExactly. This is purposeful.â
You turn another page. âThe camerasââ
âLooped,â Phainon says. âEvery time. Not just disabled. The footage looks uninterrupted, except for this weird flickerâlike it skips half a second. But the timestamps donât change.â
You sit back in your seat, fingers drumming on the edge of the table. He watches you thinkâsees the line between your brows deepen, the way you press your lips together when something doesnât add up. He likes watching you think. Thatâs a problem.
âDo you think theyâre testing something?â you ask. âOr building it?â
âThatâs what I was hoping youâd help me figure out. Detective Brain and Spider Legs. The dream team.â
âNever say that again.â
He gives you a one-shouldered shrug and returns to his sandwich. âCanât make promises I donât intend to keep.â
You shake your head and go quiet again, flipping slowly through the rest of the folder. Pages rustle under your hands. The old man behind the counter mutters something unintelligible to the deep fryer. Outsider, a police cruiser drives by without slowing.
When you speak again, your voice is lower. âYou said you think someoneâs watching you.â
Phainon freezes with a piece of pickle halfway to his mouth. Slowly, he lowers it back to the wrapper. âI donât think,â he says. âI know.â
You look up.
âTwo nights ago, I was tailing one of their runners. Lost him. That shouldâve been the end of it, except when I got homeâŠâ He hesitates. âMy apartmentâs locked down. Triple bolted, windows sealed, motion sensors in every hallway. And yet, my closet door was cracked. My spare suit was missing. Nothing else.â
Your expression hardens. âDid you call it in?â
He snorts. âYeah, sure. Hello, 911, someone stole my crime-fighting spandex, I think Iâm being haunted by a bunch of dudes with attitude problems.â
You donât laugh.
âSorry,â he mutters. âDeflection. I know.â
âYou shouldâve told someone sooner,â you say sharply. âIf someone has your gear, they might have access to yourââ
âThey wonât,â he cuts in. âThe techâs locked down. Biometric, failsafes, the works. But it means they were inside. Not watching from across the street. Inside. And that⊠thatâs not normal.â
You nod. âYou think itâs connected to the thefts.â
âI think Iâve been getting too close,â he says, quieter now. âAnd someone wants me out of the way.â
You lean forward, resting your elbows on the table. The cracked TV in the corner flickers, playing a rerun of some late-night court drama with the volume turned down low. A door slams shut somewhere in the back. The deli is empty now except for you two.
âThen we need to get closer,â you say.
Phainon blinks. âWaitâwe?â
âThis is serious,â you say simply. âAnd if someoneâs watching you, they might come for me next. This is bigger than your usual masked hero antics, Spider-Man. So, yeah. We.â
Heâs staring again. He knows he is. He should probably say something witty or obnoxious, but his throatâs dry and his heartâs doing that thing again. âCool,â he says finally, and it comes out a little too quiet. âCool cool cool cool cool.â
You push the folder back towards him, then stand and grab your coat off the back of the chair. âTomorrow night,â you say. âBring everything else youâve got. We set up a timeline, match it to police records. I want this mapped out by morning.â
He gives a mock salute. âAye aye, Captain.â
You pause at the door, just long enough to glance over your shoulder. âWash your suit,â you say. âYou smell like mustard.â
The bell jingles as the door swings shut behind you. Phainon stays in the booth for a while, finishing his sandwich in silence. The TV buzzes in the corner. The ceiling light blinks once, then steadies.
The alley off Cortland Street feels shadier than it is in the almost-darkness. Every step Phainon takes echoes just a little too sharply off the damp brick walls, the soles of his boots scraping against cracked pavement slick from the afternoon rain. The air is thick with the tang of gasoline, rotting leaves, and whatever chemical sludge is leaking from the storm drain at the corner. Itâs the kind of place you walk faster through on instinct, even if youâve got super reflexes and unnatural strength.
But for once, heâs early.
The wall behind him is papered with maps: big ones, small ones, some he stole from news kiosks and the city library, others he scrawled himself in the middle of the night, half-asleep and hunched over his kitchen counter with a sharpie in his mouth. Heâs patched them together like a spiderweb, the red and black marker lines bleeding over each other, looping through neighbourhoods and dead ends. Itâs messy, barely legible in some places, but it serves its purpose.
He shifts on the overturned milk crate heâs using as a seat and pulls his mask halfway up to breathe properly. The flickering streetlight above him hums like a dying bee. Thereâs a smear of mustard on his glove from the sandwich last night. He tries not to think about how long itâs been since heâs properly showered.
He hates waiting. But heâd never admit that heâs anxious. Especially not for you.
Your footsteps break the quietâsharp, sure, even. The same way they always sound when youâre walking up behind him like youâre about to read him his Miranda rights.
He doesnât turn around immediately. That would be too obvious. Too eager. âI was starting to think you ditched,â he says instead, flipping a page in the notebook balanced on his knee.
âYou said nine,â you answer. âItâs eight fifty-nine.â
He smiles, just a little. Canât help it. âWow. A punctual cop.â
You walk past him, wordless, and he catches the faint scent of your shampooâclean, sharp, maybe citrus? (He needs to stop.)Â
You step up to the wall of maps, arms crossed. The light glints off the corner of your badge, half-tucked beneath your jacket. You tilt your head to the side, the same way you always do when youâre processing too many things at once. God, heâs noticed that too many times.
âThis is a mess,â you say flatly.
âOrganised chaos,â he corrects.
You shoot him a look, then kneel to examine the clustered marks around Marmorealâs industrial sector. Your fingers trace a wide red loop that sounds four separate Xs.
Phainon hops down from his crate and joins you, dropping into a crouch beside you. âThose are the first confirmed break-ins. They form a pretty clear arc if you connect the dots. Started on the western edge. Theyâre moving clockwise.â
âSo whatever theyâre after is in the centre,â you muse.
âBingo,â he says, tapping the innermost circle. âAnd guess whatâs smack-dab in the middle of the whole thing?âÂ
He holds up a photo of a nondescript warehouse, overgrown with weeds, one wall tagged in massive purple spray paint that says I HATE BEES. Itâs ugly. You frown and say, âThat place?â
Phainon nods. âUsed to be a government R&D site during the old tech boom, but it was supposedly shut down after an acid leak took out the foundation. Now itâs just a lot with a locked fence and shit ton of asbestos.â
âWhy hasnât anyone investigated it?â
âBecause itâs boring,â he says. âThereâs no power running to it. No reported disturbances. No reason for patrol to bother. But if you dig deeperâlike, old permit records and city zoning logsâthereâs a basement thatâs sealed off. No blueprint access since 2013.â
Your silence stretches. Phainon watches the gears turning in your head and realisesâagain, and with an unfortunate amount of clarityâthat he likes watching you think. He really, really shouldnât.
âSo theyâre not just building something,â you say. âTheyâre hiding it.â
âOr staging it.â
âWeâll split up,â you say. âTonight. You take the chemical plant on Fifth. Iâll hit the battery storage facility near the docks. If either of them gets hit, we regroup.â
âCopy that,â he says lightly, brushing the dust off his gloved palms as he stands beside you. âThough I think you just want to get rid of me.â
âI want to get results,â you correct, already scanning the nearest cluster of notes on the map again. âAnd weâll cover more ground this way.â
Fair, rational, efficient. So typically you. Phainon swallows down the inexplicable disappointment in his throat and tries to focus. âThe chemical plantâs been shut down since the fires in March, but Iâve seen movement thereâshadows mostly, heat signatures. And one of the power boxes was tampered with last week. Could just be squatters, butâŠâ
âBut this group doesnât leave power boxes half-cut,â you finish, glancing at him. âThey donât miss steps.â
Exactly. He doesnât say it out loud, but the tension in his shoulders eases a little. Youâre starting to see what he sees.Â
You turn back to the wall, fingers brushing one of the maps again, slower this time. Your brows are furrowed, the crease between them deeper than usual. âIâll have to log this in quietly. My teamâs not going to love me going off-grid again.â
âYour team doesnât know youâre chasing me around rooftops?â
âThey know. They just donât know why,â you say. âWhich is probably for the best.â
He huffs out a half-laugh, kicking lightly at the cracked asphalt near your foot. âFlattered.â
âYou shouldnât be.â
âStill. Thanks for not turning me in.â
You shrug. âYou havenât made it worth my while yet.â
He wants to tease you for that. Wants to say something dumb and stupid about buying you a terrible coffee from a 24-hour diner or bribing you with Chartonusâ sandwiches, but instead, he asks, âYou have a burner?â
You nod. Phainon reaches into one of the hidden pouches sewn inside his suitâpast the web cartridges, the crumpled snack wrapper, the broken-off pen cap he meant to throw away yesterdayâand pulls out his own cracked phone. The screenâs a mess of spiderwebbed lines, the plastic casing half melted at the edges from some accident involving an exploding rooftop generator last week.
You raise your brows. âThatâs a phone?â
âTechnically,â he says, unlocking it with a swipe and opening a new contact. âGive me your number. Iâll send coordinates if I catch anything tonight.â
You rattle off a sequence of numbers, and add, âBurner ends in zero-nine. Donât call me unless itâs urgent.â
âDefine urgent.â
âExplosion. Gunfire. Alien invasion.â
âSo⊠brunch?â
Phainonâs lucky day starts with a pigeon dive-bombing his head, continues with a missed web shot that sends him careening into a fire escape, and somehow still manages to improveâbecause you said yes to brunch with him.Â
Or, well, with Spider-Man, which is still him, but in that weird, glass-wall kind of way. You donât know what he looks like beneath the mask, donât know his name, his address, his real voice, or the fact that he thought he was going to be late because he tried to hand-sew a rip in his suit and pricked his thumb seventeen times.
You flip through a manila folder with highlighter streaks and dog-eared corners, diagrams of circuits, and what look like stolen security camera stills, all stacked and filed with precision. Heâs seen you interrogate a guy in less than five words before. Watching you cut a pancake with that same level of intensity is kind of terrifying.
Also: kind of hot. But thatâs not relevant.
âSo,â he says, because the silence is beginning to grate at him, âhave I won you over with my sparkling personality yet, or are you still planning to arrest me after this?â
You hum and reach for the syrup. âI canât decide if youâre more irritating in daylight or when youâre dangling upside down on a fire escape at 2 a.m.â
Phainon takes a sip of espresso, squinting through the bitter taste. âWhy not both?â
You glare at him.
âIâm trying to be helpful,â he says, quieter now. He leans in a little, lowering his voice in case someoneâs listening. âI know Iâm not the most traditional source, and Iâm aware Iâm breaking, like, a thousand chain-of-command rules just by talking to you, but Iâve been watching these people for weeks. And Iâve never seen anything like this. Theyâre too clean. Too prepared.â
You nod. He can tell youâve already connected the dots. Youâve probably connected ten more he hasnât even noticed yet. Your eyes are sharp, alert, focused in that laser-sight kind of way that makes his skin itch under the mask.
âI went by the Marmoreal site last night,â you say. âDidnât go in, thoughâjust circled. But there was movement in the back. A truck with no license plate.â
âSame model from the Fourth Street hit?â
âCouldnât see,â you admit. âBut the sound was the same. The engine was too quiet to be local, so it was clearly modified.â
Phainon exhales slowly. âSo theyâre still active.â
âVery.â You stab at a piece of pancake and glance up at him. âYou sleep at all?â
â...No,â he mutters, sheepish. âBut I took a power nap at a bus stop for twenty-seven minutes and dreamed I was being eaten by a vending machine, so that counts.â
âHealthy,â you deadpan.
He shrugs. âYouâre one to talk. When was the last time you took a break that wasnât⊠this?â
âIâm not the one with a possible concussion and jam on my mask.â
âI like jam,â Phainon says.
You shake your head, but he catches the faintest hint of amusement in your face, quickly hidden behind your coffee cup. He doesnât say anything; just watches as you lean back in your chair, face finally relaxing into something that looks a little less like a detective building a case and a little more like a person enjoying a few minutes of peace.
Thatâs when it hits him: this is the first time heâs seen you still. Not mid-chase, not interrogating, not tearing through evidence. Just you, and pancakes, and a soft patch of sunlight warming your sleeve.
Heâs in so much trouble.
You glance at him, then, like you can feel it. âWhat?â
âNothing,â he says quickly, fiddling with a sugar packet. âJust thinking.â
Phainon hesitates. He wants to say itâs because itâs his favourite. Because the coffeeâs bad but the people are nice. Because the chairs donât match and the chalkboard menus always misspell something. Because it feels safe. Because maybe, somewhere in the back of his idiotic brain, he wanted you to like it.
Instead, he shrugs and says, âThought youâd appreciate the pancakes.â
You study him for a second longer. Then, finally, finally, you smile. âDonât make a habit of being right, Spider-Man,â you say, spearing another bite.
It turns out that Phainonâs theory is, horrifically, right.Â
One week. Thatâs all it takes.
Seven days of split patrols and encrypted texts, of cataloguing movement and double-checking routes, of scribbling half-mad notes in the margins of maps and losing sleep trying to figure out what the connection is. Heâd hoped, stupidly, that the quiet meant progress. That maybe, maybe theyâd spooked whoever was behind it. That maybe the worst thing waiting for him that week would be another broken web-shooter or a pigeon with a vendetta.
Youâre okay. That should be enough. It should settle the spike of cold panic in his chest, should anchor him where he stands, balancing on the lip of a lamppost on 39th Street. But he rereads it again. Then again.
His fingers tighten around the edge of the lamp. The city breathes below him, neon-drenched and unaware. Somewhere in the distance, a police siren howls. Closer, a car door slams and someone yells about a parking ticket.
Phainon jumps.
The wind is sharp against his skin as he swings, the air slapping his cheeks even through his mask. Heâs faster than usualâmore desperate than smooth. Itâs a graceless sprint across rooftops, the kind that leaves him barely clearing ledges, boots skimming waterlogged gutters, lungs burning. He doesnât know if youâre hurt. You said youâre okay, but âokayâ is such a vague, terrible word when it comes from someone who faces dangerous situations for a living.
The warehouse by the docks comes into view fast, hulking and silent beneath the sodium lights. Thereâs a scorch mark across the landing bay door, the acrid scent of melted insulation still curling up into the air. Two squad cars are parked askew outside the chain link fence, but the cops are gone, or inside, or too distracted to notice the figure scrambling onto the roof with shaking hands.
Phainon crouches low and peers through the skylight.
Youâre inside, standing near a bank of empty battery casings and shattered glass, a radio pressed to your shoulder. Youâre not limping. No visible blood. His heart slows half a beat. He taps lightly on the glass. You look up fast, instinctive, already half-reaching for your weapon before you register him. Your eyes narrow, but only briefly. Then you jerk your chin towards the fire escape.
He meets you on the second floor, slipping in through a side window. Youâre alone in the room, save for the mess of forensic markers, scorch marks, and the bitter ozone of post-explosion cleanup.
âIâm fine,â you say, even before he can speak.
âYouâre not fine,â he snaps, more sharply than he means to. âYou said crossfire. Thatâs not, like, a stubbed toe.â
âIt wasnât aimed at me.â
âThat doesnât help!â
He hears his own voiceâtoo loud, too worried, echoing off concreteâand he turns away before you can see the guilt settling between his shoulders. He runs a hand over his head, dragging his glove against his scalp like he could rub the fear out through friction alone.
You step closer. Your boots crunch over a piece of broken casing. âSpider-Manââ
âWhat happened?â he cuts in. He needs to focus, needs to understand it before he spirals into full-blown panic. âWalk me through it.â
You sigh, but nod. âI was watching the south entrance. Nothing for over two hours. Then, just past ten, the sensors I set up on the west wall tripped. I saw three figures, all masked. One of them had a disruptorâfried the cameras before we could catch a clear face.â
âLithium?â
âGone,â you confirm. âThey knew exactly where to go. They broke open the storage lock, took one unit, and left the others untouched.â
âOnly one?â
âOne. And Spider-Manââ your eyes meet his again, steady now, seriousââthey werenât just fast. They know how to fight. They looked trained for this kind of shit.â
He exhales through gritted teeth. âYou think theyâre building something.â
âI think they already have,â you say grimly. âAnd theyâre just waiting for the right battery to turn it on.â
Phainon shifts his weight and finally asks the question thatâs been sticking in his throat like a splinter. âDid they see you?â
âIâI donât know. Maybe,â you say.
âMaybe?â His voice rises again.
âI lost one in the dark. I think they doubled back. Iâm not sure.â
Phainon wants to scream. Or punch something. Or grab you and teleport you somewhere far away where no one has disruptors and no one bleeds on cold warehouse floors. But he canât do any of that. He can only stand there, vibrating with a kind of fear he doesnât have the vocabulary for.
âI should have been there,â he mutters.
âYou were across the city.â
âThatâs not an excuse.â
You step into his space, close enough that he can hear your breath. âSpider-Man. Stop. Iâm not dead.â
âYet,â he says.
âIâve been trained for this,â you say. âI know how to handle myself.â
He doesnât doubt that. Not even for a second. But he also knows what it feels like to arrive too late, to find a scene thatâs already stained with the blood of his loved ones. He drags a hand down his face. âYou need backup.â
âIâve got it,â you say, your voice firm. âIâve got you.â
Itâs not meant to do what it does, but those words dig into him deeper than any bullet could. He stares at you for a beat too long, every possible response crashing into each other like waves in his skull.
Finally, he says, quietly, âYeah. You do. Can I take you home?â
Phainon expects you to disagree. Instead, you let your shoulders slump with relief, and say, âYes, please.â
The wind cuts sharp along the docks when he leads you out, the air heavy with the smell of brine, old smoke, and burnt copper. Thereâs a metallic haze still lingering over the scene, but you donât flinch from it. You walk steadily beside him, chin up, even if your hand hovers just a little closer to your holster than usual. He doesnât miss that.
The streets are quieter now. Most of the cops have cleared out. A few plainclothes agents hang back to assess the scene, but they barely glance up when he web-slings both of you onto the nearest rooftopâlow enough to keep out of view, high enough to get some space from the mess below. You donât complain. You never do. Even now, when your knees must ache from crouching in dark corners, when your head probably pounds from the tension of nearly being caught in open fire, you simply follow him, like itâs normal. Like you trust him.
Phainon keeps his hold light but steady around your waist, one hand braced just beneath your elbow. Youâre warmer than he expects, heat leaking through your jacket into his gloves. Every time he movesâshoots a string of webs, pulls you forward, steadies your landingâhe feels you adjust to match him. Fluid. Familiar. (He shouldnât like that as much as he does.)
Your buildingâs only three blocks away, and you whisper the directions into his ear. Phainon doesnât want to rush it. He doesnât want to leave you alone, not yetânot while your jaw is still set a little too tight and the adrenaline hasnât fully drained from your bones.
When he finally lands on your fire escape, he lets go reluctantly.
You ease away from him, brushing your hair back, your expression unreadable as always. âYou donât have to walk me all the way up.â
âI know,â he says, already crouched on the rail. âI just⊠wanted to be sure.â
âThanks.â
He nods and tries to act casual. Tries not to stare too hard at the soft light spilling out of your apartment window, or the way your fingers fidget at your sides like youâre still half in the fight. He wants to ask if youâre okay again, wants to tell you that the word âcrossfireâ nearly gave him a heart attack. But youâre already halfway to the window, unlocking it and ducking through the frame.
âSpider-Man?â you say, just before you disappear inside.
âYeah?â
âDo you, uh, want to come inside?â
He blinks. Of all the possibilities that had been ricocheting around in his headââstay safe,â or âthanks for the ride,â or âyouâre worrying too muchââthis had not made the cut. Not even close.
It stalls him, mid-perch, one gloved hand gripping the rusted iron railing of the fire escape, the other resting loosely on his knee. The mask hides his face, but heâs pretty sure his surprise is obvious anyway, just in the way his breath catches or how still he suddenly goes.
Your silhouette is soft in the glow of your apartmentâs light. Youâve already kicked off your boots inside the window, standing barefoot on the wooden floorboards, one hand holding the window open, the other resting lightly on the frame.
âI mean,â you say after a second, brows furrowed. âOnly if you want to. You donât have to or anything. You probably have rooftops to gallivant across andââ
âI want to,â he says quickly, too quickly. Then he clears his throat and tries again. âI meanâyeah. If youâre okay with it.â
Your mouth curves, not quite into a smile, but something close enough to make something twist behind his ribs. âYou literally carried me three blocks through the air. I think weâre past the point of stranger danger.â
He huffs out a short laugh and swings one leg over the windowsill. It takes a bit of maneuvering to avoid smacking his knees against your desk, and heâs painfully aware of every scuff his boots leave behind on your floor. The space smells like laundry detergent and something warmâcoffee grounds, maybe. Or cinnamon. The kind of smell that makes his shoulders start to relax before he even realises it.
Your apartment is small but lived-in. A stack of case files teeters on the kitchen table next to a mug. Your precinct jacket hangs over the back of the couch. There are photos pinned to the side of the fridge with mismatched magnets: city skylines, a blurry shot of you at what looks like a precinct holiday party, someone in a ridiculous Halloween costume posing like a superhero. Phainon feels something tug deep and stupid in his chest.
âMake yourself at home,â you say, heading into the kitchen and flipping on the kettle without needing to ask. âIâve got tea or instant coffee. No milk, though. Sorry.â
He stays standing for a second longer, then slowly pulls off his gloves and tucks them into his belt. His mask stays on. He lifts the bottom edge just past his mouth, enough to breathe easier, but not enough to riskâwell, anything else.
âTeaâs good,â he says.
You nod, moving with a kind of efficiency that reminds him again that youâre still running on fumes. Thereâs a scrape as you grab two mugs, the clink of metal as you stir one without sugar. You hand him the other without ceremony.
He takes it carefully, fingers brushing yours. âThanks.â
âNo problem,â you return, then gesture to the couch. âWe can sit. If youâre staying a few minutes.â
He is. He knows he is. He follows you to the couch and lowers himself into the corner, stiff at first, like his body hasnât caught up to the fact that heâs safe here. With you. Thereâs a blanket balled up on one side and an old remote wedged between the cushions. You move them without thinking and curl one leg beneath you, facing him.
âSo,â you say. âDo you want to talk about it?â
Phainon frowns. âThe break-in?â
âNo,â you say, looking at him squarely. âYou. You were⊠panicked tonight.â
Phainon goes still. Itâs not immediateânot sharp like a flinch, but a quiet kind of freezing, like someoneâs gently pulling the emergency brake in his chest. He doesnât look away from you, but he doesnât answer either. His tea cools between his fingers.
You shift forward a little, your voice low. âLook, Iâm not asking because Iâm nosy. Or because I want some dramatic unmasking moment sort of thing. I justâŠâ You pause, exhale. âI got lucky tonight. Thatâs what it was. Luck. If I hadnât ducked at the right second, if theyâd come around the corner just a little fasterââ
âBut they didnât,â he says quietly, cutting you off.
âThatâs not the point.â
Youâre sharper now, sitting straighter, your knee pressed to the cushion. Your eyes flashânot with anger, but fear, the kind you donât let people see if you can help it. But he sees it. And worse, he knows it. He recognises it in the widening of your eyes, the way your fingers curl against your palm.
You swallow. âIâm scared, Spider-Man. I know youâre helping. I trust you. But thisâthis thing weâre chasing⊠if something happens to youâI wonât even know your name. I wonât know who to look for. Or if I should look at all. Thatâs not just reckless, thatâsâcruel.â
He flinches at that. You notice.
âI just want to know whoâs standing next to me,â you say. âThatâs not so much to ask.â
âI canât,â he says, before heâs even fully processed it. âIâm sorry.â
âThatâs not good enough.â Your voice isnât raised, but thereâs a new edge to it now, sharper than anger. Hurt, maybe. Disappointment. It slices straight through his armour. âYou trust me with your life out there. Every night. You trust me not to shoot you in the back, or get in your way, or blow your cover. But you donât trust me enough to know who you are?â
âItâs not about trust,â he says quickly, too defensively. âItâsâGod, you think I donât want to tell you? You think I donâtâdonât lie awake wondering what would happen if I did? I think about it all the time.â
âThen whatâs stopping you?â
He looks at you, then. Youâre not angry. Youâre scared. Scared of whateverâs coming next. Scared of losing control, of losing him.
âYou donât understand what that means,â he says. âIf you know who I amâreally knowâit changes everything. You donât get to walk away from that. You donât get to un-know it if something happens. If someone finds outââ
âIâm a cop, Spider-Man. Iâve seen worse things than secret identities.â
âItâs not just mine,â he says. âItâs everyone around me. You knowingâyou become a target.â
âIâm already a target.â
âNot like this,â he bites out. âIf someone traces it back to youâif they think you matter to meââ
âI do matter to you.â
You suck in a breath like you didnât mean to say it that way. But you donât take it back. You sit there, across from him, eyes steady and hurting and unshakably honest. And all Phainon can think is: Shit.
âYou do,â he says, barely audible. âOf course you do.â
âThen why wonât you tell me?â
He closes his eyes, and rubs a hand over the edge of his mask like he can somehow erase the pressure building behind his skull. âBecause the second I do,â he says, âyou stop being just a cop with good instincts and better aim. You become mine. And that makes you vulnerable in a way I donât know how to protect you from.â
You shake your head, frustrated. âYou donât get to make that decision for me. Iâm not asking for your social security number, or something. Iâm asking to know whoâs at my side when the bullets fly. When the lights go out. When itâs 2 a.m. and I canât sleep because I think I saw someone watching my window. I need more than a voice behind a mask. I deserve more.â
He doesnât argue. He doesnât tell you youâre wrong, because youâre not. But still, he stays silent.
You stare at him for a moment longer, and when itâs clear he wonât budge, you get up. The mug of tea still has steam spiralling out of it as you walk to the sink and set it down, the sound softer than your next words: âI think you should go.â
Phainon doesnât try to stop you, or ask you to reconsider. He simply nods, and stands. Thereâs a strange heaviness in his limbs as he pulls the mask down over his face, tugs his gloves on with fingers that feel numb. He moves to the window but pauses with one foot already on the sill.
âI do trust you,â he says. âMore than anyone.â
Itâs not that youâre avoiding each other.
Itâs that youâre both avoiding each otherâwhich, in practice, amounts to the same thing.
Patrols become asynchronous: silent intel dumps in the encrypted folder, maps updated with colour-coded marks that speak more than either of you will via text. There are no more late-night debriefs on rooftops, no post-mission walks home, no casual banter about who has the worst taste in energy bars. When you text, itâs clipped, tactical. When he replies, itâs mechanical.
(âWest dock checkpoint cleared. No sign of activity.â
âCopy. South alley tripwire still intact.â)
Phainon doesnât know what hurts more: the silence, or the fact that itâs entirely his fault. Maybe he was right. Maybe the secret is safer kept. Maybe you are less of a target this way.
But God, itâs lonely.
Thereâs a rhythm to the city that used to make senseâpulse and swing, fire escapes and antenna towers, the rough percussion of tires against potholes. But now it all feels flat. The rooftops are colder. His landing sticks a little less clean. Even the pigeons donât heckle him like they used to.
Itâs been two weeks. Two long, aching weeks, until, at 3:37 a.m., Phainon receives a text from you, and it takes him less than a minute to reply.Â
He doesnât stop to think, or worry if this is a trap, or a joke, or worseâif youâre still mad at him. When he lands outside your apartment, the windowâs already cracked open. Inside, the lights are on low, and thereâs a corkboard spread across your living room wall now, half-covered in photos, schematics, lines of red string and sticky notes scrawled in tight, impatient handwriting he recognises from your field memos.
You donât greet him. You just hand him a folder, your eyes dark with something between fear and exhaustion.
âBiotech division out of Theoros Labs,â you say. âIt used to be focused on adaptive immunotherapy, but they lost funding three years ago and went dark. The shell company they reopened under is tied to a private security contractor out of Styxia. And guess what their latest research files are tagged under?â
Phainonâs already flipping through the pages. His gloved fingers still. His stomach drops.
ARACHNID-BASED ENHANCEMENT TRIALS â SUBJECT 33550336. MODEL NAME: FLAME REAVER.
He looks up. âTheyâre trying to replicate me.â
âNot just replicate,â you say, shaking your head. âWeaponise.â
Your voice is thin, dry, like it costs you something to even say it aloud.
âTheyâve been pulling data from old surveillanceâfight footage, patrol patterns, even the way you move. You know how we assumed they were looking for high-density batteries to power a device?â You tap one of the diagrams on the corkboard, the spine of it shaped like a human thorax with branching nodes along the shoulders. âTurns out itâs a synthetic neuromuscular system. And thisâthis lithium coreâitâs the ignition switch.â
Phainon stares at the blueprint. Itâs rough, unfinished, but horrifyingly clear: a bipedal unit, modelled after him. Spinal cord wiring where his web shooters would be. Photoreactive visor instead of eyes. Muscle clusters designed for explosive vertical leap. Neural sync modules buried in the wrists and calves.
A Spider-Man, stripped of the man.
âWhy?â he says, voice hoarse. âWhy build this?â
âI donât know yet,â you admit. âBut someone out there sees you as more than just a vigilante nuisance. They see you as a prototype. A formula. Something to replicate, mass-produce, and control.â
He sinks onto the edge of your couch, folder open in his lap. The diagram stares back at him, accusatory and unforgiving. Itâs him. The curve of the stance, the wide-set shoulders, the way the unitâs balance favours its left side, just like he does when his kneeâs aching. They didnât just study him; they dissected him.
âHow long have you known?â he asks quietly.
âA few days,â you say. âI wanted to be sure. Didnât want to come to you with a hunch and nothing to back it up.â
âAnd you texted me anyway.â
You meet his gaze across the room. âBecause itâs you, Spider-Man. Look, I know you think hiding your identity keeps people safe. But this? This proves it doesnât. Theyâre coming for you whether or not I know your face. They already have your gait, your voice, your power levels. Theyâre not trying to figure out who you are anymore. They donât care. They just want to turn you into something they can sell.â
He sets the folder down. His hands wonât stop shaking. âHow⊠did you find out about all this?â
âDonât get mad.â
When Phainon doesnât say anything, you sigh and look away.Â
âI visited the old R&D site. Alone.â
âAre you serious?â Phainon gestures so wildly that his web cartridge knocks against the back of your chair. He stands abruptly. The folder falls from his lap, papers scattering across your rug. âYou went alone. To Theoros. To Styxia-backed labs that specialise in high-risk bioweapons. Without calling me.â
âI called you when I had proofââ
âYou shouldnât have gone in the first place!â he explodes. âWhat the hell were you thinking? Do you want to get dissected? Shot? Replaced with one of thoseâthose thingsââ
âYou werenât talking to me!â you shout back. âWhat was I supposed to do? Wait until they raided another warehouse?â
âI was trying to protect you,â Phainon grits out. âAnd instead you threw yourself into a place that couldâve had armed personnel, pressure sensors, live prototypesâanything.â
You throw your arms out. âAnd what was the alternative? Sit on my hands while they build a weaponised version of you? Wait until thereâs a second Spider-Man crawling up government buildings with a built-in kill switch? I donât know how to sit still, Spider-Man. Not when Iâm this scared.â
âYou think Iâm not scared? You think I havenât been replaying every second of that night at the docks? That I havenât imagined a dozen versions of how it couldâve gone wrong? You think Iâm not scared every time I donât hear from you for a few hours?â
âThen why didnât you say any of that? Why did you shut me out?â
âBecause if I said it out loud,â Phainon spits, pacing again, hands flying to his head, âthen it would be real. It would beâyou would be real. Not just someone chasing me on my patrol route. Not just someone whoâs helping me out. Youâd be a person Iâd have to lose.â
You blink, thrown. âYou think youâre going to lose me?â
âI know I could,â he says, almost like it hurts. âBecause itâs already happened. Every time I get closeâevery single timeâit ends the same way. Either they die, or I leave first. Because thatâs the only choice I ever get.â
He doesnât even hear how loud his voice has gotten, doesnât notice how heâs gesturing wildly, storming back and forth across your living room.
âI canât protect you from this. I canât protect you from them. I canât even protect myself. You want me to give you a name, but thatâs the one thing I canât do. Because once you have that, itâs over. Youâll look at me differently. Or worseâyouâll stop looking at me. And I canâtâGod, I canât stand that.
âDo you know what itâs like to see yourself turned into a blueprint? To see a file full of numbers and heat signatures and recorded footage and realise someone out there has broken you down into a fucking algorithm? That they donât see a personâthey see a weapon?
âI didnât sign up for this shit! I didnât even sign up to be Spider-Man. I just⊠was. And now theyâve taken that and turned it into something else. Something that walks like me and fights like me and could kill you without thinking. And the worst part is that if youâd died at that lab, Iâno one wouldâve even known. Youâd just be another casualty they scrub from the recordsâand that wouldâve been my fault.â
His voice has dropped to a whisper. His hands are trembling.
He doesnât realise until you doâuntil your eyes go wide, and your breath catches like youâve been sucker-punched.
His mask is gone, not pushed halfway up, or nudged for a sip of tea. Gone. Somewhere in the middle of that breakdownâwhile he was talking too fast and breathing too hard and tearing at his suit like it was suffocating himâhe took it off.
His hairâs a mess, flattened by the fabric, and his face is flushed, mouth parted slightly as he sucks in breath after breath. Thereâs a bruise blooming along his cheekbone, and a cut healing just beneath his chin. He looks young, with silvery-white hair and bright blue eyes that are rimmed with the redness that comes with exhaustion and caffeine.
â...Oh,â Phainon says, stunned. âShit.â
You blink, slowly, as though grounding yourself in reality again. âYou took your mask off.â
He starts to lift a hand to cover his face, instinct kicking in too late. Gently, more carefully than anything else thatâs passed between you tonight, you reach up and take the mask from his hand. Your fingers brush his knuckles, and he flinches, but he doesnât pull away.
Phainon drops his hand and lets out a shallow breath. âI⊠didnât mean to.â
âYou didnât mean to,â you echo. âJesus.â
Phainon canât say anything, so he simply stands there, feeling as naked as the day he first stepped onto a rooftop and dared to believe he could protect anyone. His heart pounds loud in his ears. He can feel it in his throat, his fingertips, his teeth.
âCan Iâ Will you tell me your name?â you whisper.
He wets his lips, and says, quietly, âPhainon.â
You nod, once, and say it back. âPhainon,â you repeat, like itâs a truth youâll guard with your life. âOkay. Iâm not afraid of you. And Iâm not leaving. So either you let me help, because you asked me to, or I break into another lab and do it anyway. Your call.â
Phainon stares at you: you, with your voice barely holding steady; you, standing in your living room full of maps and stolen schematics and caffeine-fueled desperation; you, tired and stubborn and loyal enough to make him fall to his knees.
âOkay,â he says quietly.
You reach out, then, and Phainon thinks youâre handing his mask back to him, but instead, you wrap your arms tightly around his torso and pull him into you.Â
He doesnât move at first. Youâre pressed to him, arms wrapped tight around his torso like you mean to hold the pieces of him together before they scatter to the wind. Your cheek rests just above his heart, right where it beats too loud and too fast, thudding like itâs trying to break free from his ribs. His hands hover uselessly in the air for a second, fingers twitching, stunned by the contact, by the way you came to him so easily, so willingly, after all of it.
He exhales. The air leaves his lungs like itâs been caged there for years. His shoulders drop an inch. His spine slackens just enough for him to bend down.
He lifts his arms slowly, like heâs learning how to move again. His fingers brush your back, light and unsure, but you donât flinch. You donât pull away. So he lets his palms flatten, one at the curve of your spine, the other curling loosely over your shoulder.
He breathes in.
God, itâs you. Soap and smoke and citrus shampoo. A hundred times heâs seen you crouched beside him on rooftops or hunched over a laptop, bathed in the blue glow of surveillance feeds. But this is different. This is you, pressed to him like you belong there, like the world outside can wait.Â
His grip tightens, no longer tentativeâarms looping fully around you now, hands grasping like he needs to keep you tethered, like if he lets go, youâll disappear back into a nightmare or a lab or a headline with your name misspelled. His chin tips forward until his face rests in the hollow of your neck, and itâs instinct, not thought that guides him there. His breath stirs the hair at your temple. He swallows hard.
(Itâs you. Itâs you, and youâre warm and safe and alive in his arms.)
Phainon closes his eyes and pretends like everything else in the living room doesnât existâthe weaponised duplicate in the file folder, the surveillance footage broken down to frames per second, the machine built in his image but stripped of everything human. He forgets about the mask you dropped, crumpled on the floor, and the voice in his head screaming that heâs made a mistake, that youâll leave once the shock fades, that nothing good can come of this.
Instead, he listens to your heartbeat. He memorises the slope of your shoulders beneath his palms, the soft way your hand has fisted in the fabric of his suit like youâre afraid he might vanish, too.
It comes to himâterrible and quiet and so obvious it aches.
He could be in love with you.
Not the kind of love he can shove into the seams of his second life. Not the safe, armâs-length affection that lives behind jokes and shared intel and the occasional brush of fingers across a coffee cup. No, this is the dangerous kind. The kind that makes you stupid. The kind that makes you soft. (The kind that makes you want.)
He wants a future he doesnât dare picture. He wants to walk down the street with you in broad daylight. He wants to take off the suit and be Phainon, just Phainon, and know youâll still look at him the same way.
(His hands tremble. You hold him tighter.)
Itâs that simple. You donât push. You donât speak. You just breathe against his chest, steady and unwavering and constant, like you always are. Phainon presses his mouth to your hair. His eyes sting, but he doesnât cry.
Itâs five in the morning, and Phainon is walking down a cracked sidewalk beside you with his suit half-zipped, his mask stuffed into your hoodie pocket, and a buzzing under his skin that heâs trying really hard to ignore. Youâre beside him, arms crossed against the early chill, leading the way like thisâwalking, togetherâis something you do all the time.
Itâs not a date, he tells himself. Itâs really not.Â
But you mentioned waffles. And your voice had been tired but warm when you said it. And he hadnât wanted to leave yet.
So here he is. Not skipping, because heâs got some dignity, but definitely walking with a little too much bounce for someone who found out heâs being reverse-engineered into a murder bot a little over an hour ago.
The cityâs quieter than it ever gets during daylight, the kind of hush that only exists in the space between the last bar closing and the first train running. A low mist clings to the ground, curling around traffic lights and benches and empty newsstands. Itâs eerie, maybe, but not unfriendly. Like the cityâs holding its breath right along with him.
Phainon doesnât know what heâs supposed to be feeling. Dread, maybe. Paranoia. Existential terror. But instead, all he feels is this weightless hum in his chest, the kind that makes you walk a little taller, swing your arms a little looser. The kind that makes you forget youâre still half in your gear and probably look completely insane.
You glance over at him as you cross the street, the corner of your mouth twitching like youâre trying not to smile. âYouâre doing that thing again.â
âWhat thing?â
âStaring at me.â
Phainon stumbles on a crack in the sidewalk. âIâm not,â he says, too quickly.
âYou are,â you say, not unkindly. âLike Iâm going to vanish or something.â
Phainon rubs the back of his neck, grateful for the relative darkness. âWell. I mean. You did break into a lab by yourself, so I wouldnât put it past you.â
âOkay, fair,â you concede, nudging him lightly with your elbow. âStill. Youâve got that face on. The one that makes me feel like Iâve got, like, a mysterious smear of radioactive ink on my forehead.â
âI donât have a face.â
âYou do have a face,â you say. âThatâs the problem now, remember?â
Phainon huffs out a laugh and looks away, suddenly all too aware of the morning air on his skin, of the fact that heâs not wearing his mask, of how easy it is to joke with you. Heâs not sure what scares him more: being turned into a weapon, or feeling like this.
You walk in comfortable silence for a block or two, hands tucked into your sleeves, your breath fogging slightly in the chill. The sky is bruising lavender and gold now, the edges of dawn beginning to soften everything.
Phainon chances a glance at you. Youâre watching the sky change colour like itâs a magic trick only you know the secret to, your expression soft and unreadable. Thereâs a crease between your brows, faint, but it smooths a little when a breeze picks up and rustles your hair. You look tired, not just from the lack of sleep, but from the kind of exhaustion that sinks into a person when theyâve seen too much, done too much, but still canât stop moving.
The diner sign glows into view at the end of the streetâwarm yellow and flickering red, letters half-burnt out so it reads INE R & GILL if you squint. Thereâs a figure leaning against the counter inside, wiping down the same spot with a rag thatâs probably older than both of you, and the place smells faintly of grease and syrup.
You pause in front of the glass door, one hand on the handle. âThis place okay?â
âItâs perfect,â Phainon says before he can stop himself.
You smile and push open the door. The bell on top jingles, and the waitress glances up from the far end of the counter. She gives you both a once-over, raises a tired brow at Phainonâs boots and long sleeves, and gestures to a booth without asking questions. Thatâs the nice thing about New Okhema City; nobody cares too much.
You slide into a booth with a contented sigh. Phainon sits across from you, knees knocking against the underside of the table. The vinyl squeaks under his weight, and the Formica is sticky, but he doesnât care. His hands feel strangely clean without gloves. The menu sticks to his fingers when he flips it open.
You donât even bother looking at yours. âWaffles, scrambled eggs, hash browns. Extra syrup.â
âThat specific, huh?â Phainon says.
You shrug. âGotta know your diner defaults.â
The waitress arrives with two glasses of water and a notepad. âYou kids look like youâve been up all night,â she says, though she canât be more than a few years older than you and Phainon.
âWe have,â you say sleepily, âbut we cracked a supervillain conspiracy, so it was worth it.â
The waitress doesnât blink. âCoffee?â
âYes, please,â you say, and Phainon nods too, grateful. She leaves without another word.
Silence stretches between you again, but itâs easy now, filled with warmth. The sky outside shifts more boldly into gold and peach, casting long shadows against the window. Phainon leans back into the booth and lets himself exhale slowly, deeply.
Your foot brushes against his under the table. He freezes. You donât move it.
He looks up, and your eyes meet his over the rim of your water glass. Thereâs something quiet there, soft around the edgesâexhaustion, sure, but something else too. A kind of trust heâs not sure he deserves. (Still, itâs there.)
Phainon thinks about how this shouldnât be possible. How the night started with fear and screaming and blueprints of his body, and somehow ended with this booth, this silence, this person across from him.
[18:04] Detective Brain: Spidey-lookalike broke into storage depot by Kephale Plaza. Iâm already on scene. Itâs not you, right?
[18:05] Detective Brain: Phainon. Please respond.
Phainon is already out the window by the time your second text comes through, barely bothering to latch it behind him. His fingers fumble for the web shooter at his wrist, and his heart is a fist hammering against his ribs. He almost misses the first jumpâlands hard on the ledge and has to steady himself with a rough palm against brick.
He doesnât even suit up properly. His gloves are half-fastened, the zipper of his suit stuck one-fourths of the way up his spine, but thereâs no time to care. Phainon swings hard across the cityâs mid-rises, momentum jerking through his shoulders, his aim slightly off with each launch. It doesnât matter. Heâll take a bruised wrist if it gets him to Kephale Plaza thirty seconds faster.
Kephale Plaza is a glass-and-steel monstrosity, flanked by wide loading docks and a security perimeter that no longer seems to matter. Phainon can hear the distant thrum of police radios as he swings into the industrial district, following the echo of sirens. Squad cars line the street outside the storage depot, lights flashing in fractured red and blue across the cracked pavement. Officers are forming a perimeter, but thereâs no crowd. Theyâre keeping it quiet.
He lands on the roof of an adjacent building, crouched low as his eyes sweep the scene.Â
He finds you posted just outside the warehouseâs side entrance, pacing like youâre trying not to burst out of your own skin. Your bulletproof vest is cinched tight, and your standard issue sidearm is still holsteredâbut your fingers are twitching near it, like youâre weighing every possible outcome of the past ten minutes. Your hairâs tied back, but loose strands stick to your face from the sweat already clinging to your skin. Heâs never seen you look so still and restless all at once.
He leaps down from the rooftop, landing in a crouch just behind a darkened patrol vehicle. No one sees him yet. He keeps to the shadows as he makes his war towards you.
The second you hear the shuffle of his boots, you whip aroundâand relax just as fast.
âJesus,â you exhale, taking a step forward. âOkay. Okay, thank God. I wasnât sure youâd even seen the message.â
âI left the second I did,â Phainon assures. âWhatâs the situation?â
Your lips tighten, and you turn, nodding for him to follow you a few paces away from the rest of the officers. Behind you, the front entrance to the warehouse stands yawning and dark, a single loading dock shutter half-raised.
âIt showed up fifteen minutes ago,â you say, pulling out your phone and flicking to the security cam footage. You angle the screen towards him. âTook out the motion sensors, and walked in through a window on the north side. No sign of forced entryâit knew exactly where to go.â
The footage is grainy, flickering, but the figure is unmistakable.
It moves like him. Too much like him. In the footage, the figure slinks down the hallway with the same kind of gait Phainon sees in himself. Every footfall, every pause, every angle of entryâitâs like watching him pace through a mirror.
Only this version is sleeker, meaner. Its limbs are thicker with muscle plating, and its suitâif you could even call it thatâis matte-black with streaks of purple circuitry flashing along the ribs and spine. Thereâs no emblem, no mask markings, just a blank, silver faceplate that reflects the ceiling lights like a shuttered camera lens. One blink and itâs gone, vanishing into the blind spots of the camera feed like it knows exactly where every pixel falls.
Phainon swears under his breath. âThey built it,â he mutters. âThatâs Flame Reaver.â
You glance up. âYou sure?â
He nods. Heâs gone through your stolen documents so many times that it feels like theyâve been branded into his skull. âPositive. Same proportions, same gait. But itâs not scanning the building. Itâs buying time.â
âFor what?â
Phainon doesnât answer at first. Heâs too focused on the still-looping footage. The moment the prototype slips out of view, he sees itâa flicker of something. It wasnât raiding. It wasnât looking for intel. It walked into that depot like it had a schedule to keep.
The realisation hits him like a slap to the sternum.
âWait,â he says sharply. âWhereâs your radio?â
You blink. âWhat?â
âYour radio,â he repeats, scanning your hip and vest and frowning when he sees the wire coiled but your earpiece missing. âYou always keep it on.â
âI took it out for a second. There was interference on the line.â
âNo.â Phainon turns, scanning the scene again with a new sharpness in his eyes. âNo, thatâs wrong. Thisâthis whole thingâitâs not a distraction. This is the distraction.â
âWhat are youââ
His head whips around, eyes scanning the perimeter. You were just here, right beside him, one step behind. Your breath was fogging the air. You were talking.
Now youâre gone.
Phainonâs heart lurches.
âWhere is she?â he hisses aloud, and suddenly heâs on the moveâscrambling up onto the nearest shipping crate, trying to get height, trying to see. The precinct lineâs holding firm around the building. Thereâs no breach. No one has come or gone.
Except you. Except whoeverâor whateverâcame for you.
He swings to the rooftop in seconds, breath tight in his lungs, wind clawing past his ears. His eyes sweep the blocks below in sharp, jerking passesâalley to alley, rooftop to ground, looking for anything that feels off.
On the north side, nestled between two disused factories and a rusted chain-link fence, an unmarked van idles in a narrow alley, almost hidden in the dip of a service road. Its brake lights pulse once, too soft to draw attention, but deliberate. A second later, the engine stutters and dies. The door clicks shut. Phainon stills.
From this height, the sounds of the city thin into a muffled hush: sirens echoing somewhere far behind him, police radios buzzing with disjointed chatter. But that alley, that vanâitâs too smooth, too clean. Thereâs no urgency to it, no panic. Just the slow, mechanical precision of something following protocol.
A figure steps away from the van, heading down a side street without looking back. Their stride is steady. Familiar.
Phainon freezes.
It looks like you: the same jacket, same utility belt, even the soft sway of your hair against your collarbone. Your badge glints faintly under the streetlightâyour badge. Not a replica.
Except itâs wrong. Youâre not there.
You wouldnât leave the perimeter without backup, wouldnât ditch your squad without a word, or abandon the very scene that had triggered every instinct in your body just ten minutes ago. At least, not without telling him.
And whoeverâor whateverâthis is, itâs walking away like it knows the exact timing window itâs working with. Like it wants him to follow.
âTheyâre splitting us up,â Phainon breathes, the words ripping themselves from his throat. Suddenly, the air feels thinner, sharper. His lungs burn.
He doesnât hesitate, doesnât even think before launching himself off the rooftop with a grunt, webline snapping out, slicing through the fog-damp air. He swings low, barely clearing a lamppost, and lands in a crouch beside the van. He can smell petrol, faintly.
Phainon yanks the door open. Itâs emptyâno driver, or equipment. Just the sharp, sterile scent of plastic and ozone. Itâs a burner vehicle, then. One they didnât plan on keeping.
âDamn it,â Phainon curses under his breath. He spins on his heel, already movingâuntil he hears a faint crackle. The buzz of a police radio. Your police radio.
He follows the sound, weaving between crates and dumpsters until he skids to a stop at the mouth of the alley, and finds your comm unit on the ground. One of the earbuds still dangles loosely from the coil, blinking a faint blue every few seconds. The rest of the radio is scuffed; not broken, just discarded deliberately, placed just far enough from the van to suggest you followed something willinglyâuntil it was too late.
A boot scuff mars the concrete nearby. There is another drag mark next toâa toe, maybe. Someone shifted. Or struggled. Phainon crouches low, brushing his fingers across the ground. His mind races through probabilities, scenarios. None of them are good.
It wasnât just a prototype in the warehouse. That was the shell, a puppet to get the cops talking, to trigger an investigation. Something visible, something obvious.Â
But this was the play: lure him in with the decoy, use it to lock the precinctâs attention, then send the real threat to steal what they really neededâyou.
Phainon grits his teeth as he stares down at your radio. His mind flashes to the schematics youâd shown him on your wall. Neural mimicry, behavioural mirroring, photo-accurate masking. It wasnât a bluff. They had footage, voice samples, enough to build a close-range approximation of him. Theyâd studied him down to the limp in his left knee.
Of course they had enough on you. You were the officer who was most often assigned with the task of tracking him down, after all.
He thinks of your laugh; the way you tilt your head when youâre about to argue; the furrow in your brows when youâre thinking too deeply. If theyâve copied thatâyouâdown to the way your voice hitches when you say his nameâ
His stomach flips.
âThey took her,â he says aloud, more to steady himself than anything else. âThey took her.â
Phainonâs fingers twitch, curling tight into fists. His web shooters press firm against his wrists. His gloves are still half-fastened. He fixes them now, fastens every strap, zips his suit the rest of the way up roughly. The breath in his chest is shallow and burning, but his hands are steady.Â
He swings back up to the rooftop, lands in a three-point crouch, and bolts across the ledge without a second thought. Every muscle in his body knows where heâs going: the old R&D site, the remnants of what used to be the government-sanctioned Theoros Labs.
Itâs a twenty-minute drive through the industrial corridor to get there. Heâll make it in seven.
Every swing feels sharper now, each launch of webbing tighter, more exact. The buildings blur past him, and his breath comes in hard, rhythmic exhales. He canât afford to be wrong. Canât afford a detour. The further they pull you away, the less chance he has of reaching you before whatever they built decides it doesnât need you alive.
Phainon lands on a rooftop, skids into a roll, fires another web and propels him back into the air. Hold on, he thinks. Please, just hold on.
The air near Theoros Labs smells like ozone and old metal.
Phainon lands hard on the broken rooftop of a utility shed just outside the main building. Itâs darker here than it should be. The outer perimeter lights have all been shut off, either manually or by remote override. Only a few flickering emergency bulbs remain, casting a jaundiced glow over the facilityâs skeletal frame. Ivy creeps up the cracked walls, half-swallowing faded corporate logos and biohazard signs. The chain-link fencing has been torn down in places and rusted through in others.Â
Itâs too quiet.
He moves carefully, sticking close to the shadows as he approaches the main entranceâwhatâs left of it. The glass doors have been forced open, one of them dangling from its hinges. Inside, the lobby lies still and cold, floor tiles coated in dust. But someoneâs been through recently. Fresh boot prints disturb the grime, overlapping in frantic patterns. You were here. He follows your footprints past collapsed hallways and rusted biohazard doors. Most of the rooms are strippedâjust empty labs and decaying workstationsâbut the deeper he gets, the cleaner it becomes. Dust thins. Wires appear. Lights flicker to life as he passes.
Theyâve reactivated the lower level. Phainon descends a wide staircase lined with old safety tape. The sub-basement has power. Soft white fluorescents hum overhead. The floor is concrete, sealed and buffed, with clean drag marks across it. The walls are lined with black server towers, cords feeding into sealed doors.
Phainon stops mid-step; thereâs a tingle in the back of his neck. Someone else is here, too. His muscles go taut, fingers curling half-ready near his web shooters.
âAh, Mr. Spider-Man,â a voice drawls, drawing out the vowels. âOr should I say⊠Phainon?â
Thereâs a hiss behind one of the sealed doors to the left. A vent releases a thin ribbon of steam.
âDonât be shy. Youâve already made it farther than most,â the voice says, and this time, itâs accompanied by footsteps echoing against the polished concrete, slow and confident. âI imagine you have questions. Thatâs good. I admire curiosity. Itâs a very human trait.â
The man who steps into view is tall, lean, draped in a sleep lab coat far too pristine for a place like this. His shoulder-length hair is slicked back, and most of his face is covered by a visor. His ID badge is clipped to his chest, name and clearance codes etched in a crisp black print.
Lycurgus smiles like heâs greeting an old colleague. âThis facility was never truly abandoned, you know. That was just a convenient myth. Theoros was⊠restructured. Privatised. Reoriented towards more ambitious pursuits.â He gestures to the space around him. âWelcome to our prototype cradle. Or, as we researchers like to call it, Stage Zero of Irontomb.â
Phainonâs voice is low, sharp. âWhere is she?â
âYour detective, yes?â Lycurgus says. âShe is safe. Unharmed, though mildly sedated. Sheâs being prepped for mapping. Itâs better if she doesnât wake up mid-scanâthe sensory feedback can be unpleasant.â
Phainon steps forward. âYouâre going to let her go. Now.â
âOh, Iâm afraid thatâs not going to happen.â Lycurgus tilts his head. âSheâs far too important. As are you.â
He moves towards a glass-paneled observation window. Behind it, a dark chamber pulses with slow, blue strobe lighting. Machines hiss softly within. Something looms in the shadowsâtaller than a man, hunched forward, hooked into a loading rig like a sleeping animal.
âI know what you think weâre doing here,â Lycurgus continues. âMass production. Automation. Violence. And, to be fair, yesâwe are building weapons. But not just weapons. Weâre building evolution.â
âYouâre building copies,â Phainon corrects.
Lycurgus lets out a chuckle, quiet and indulgent. âFlame Reaver was a crude iteration. Incomplete, too reliant on mimicry. It served its purposeâchased its prey, gathered its data, misled your little precinct. But Irontomb⊠Irontomb will do more than chase. It will predict, integrate, override, think.â
He turns back to Phainon. The placid smile fades, replaced with something hungrier.
âWeâve spent years reverse-engineering your every decision. Every rooftop sprint. Every moment of hesitation. Every kill you didnât make. We mapped your instincts, modeled your reflex latency, simulated the split-second calculations behind your webbing patterns. All of it.â
He taps the side of his own head. âBut it wasnât enough. Something was missing. Something the data couldnât replicate.â
âYou mean her.â
âYes.â Lycurgusâ smile returns, tight and reverent. âYour control variable. Your compass. We needed to understand how a creature like you formed attachments, what altered your judgement. What humanised you.â
Phainonâs voice is a growl. âSheâs not a variable.â
âSheâs your pivot, Spider-Man. The reason your risk matrix fluctuates. The reason you pause before you strike. She made you less efficient, and, therefore, more valuable. Which is why we modeled her too. Her responses, her patterns, her tone modulation, her biometric data when sheâs afraid. Itâs poetic, really. We used her to finish the algorithm that began with you. The perfect balance of speed and restraint.â
The lights behind the glass pulse brighter. The figure in the chamber stirs. Itâs not the Flame Reaver. Itâs something else.
Its silhouette is bulkier than his, but it looks wrong. It has slender limbs with plated joints; a split maskâhalf red, half mirrored black; a narrow torso fitted with impact dispersal panels. Something that looks like a spine runs down its back, glowing faintly green. Phainon doesnât recognise the material, but he can feel the heat rolling off it through the glass.
âItâs a neural sync model,â Lycurgus says, not even trying to hide his pride, âcoded from your reflexes and her empathy thresholds. Itâs capable of piloting independently or under network command. It doesnât hesitate. It doesnât panic. And, most importantly, it doesnât forget.â
Phainonâs heart hammers. His blood feels like itâs gone cold. âYouâre trying to make a Spider-Man that doesnât need a person inside.â
Lycurgus meets his eyes. âExactly.â
The machine twitches, then steps forward. Its footfalls are silent. Too smooth.
âYou two were only ever reference material,â Lycurgus intones. âAnd now that the templateâs completeâwell. All we need are the final scans.â
âWhere is she? Where is she?âÂ
Itâs all Phainon can do to stop himself from ripping Lycurgusâ throat out. The scientist merely adjusts the sleeve of his lab coat, as if the demand were a mild inconvenience.
âSheâs nearby,â he says coolly. âLower containment. Cell B-4, off the neural calibration wing. You wonât get far without triggering lockdown, of course. And even if you doâby the time you reach her, Irontomb will already be online.â
Behind the glass, the machine lifts its head. The sound it makes isnât mechanical. Itâs worseâsoft, distorted, like the playback of a familiar voice through cracked speakers. It twitches once, then again, shoulders rolling into a combat stance eerily like his own.
Phainon doesnât wait. He fires a webline directly at Lycurgus and yanks. The man stumbles, but Phainon slams him against the server wall hard enough to knock the breath out of him. Wires clatter. A tower crashes sideways.
Lycurgus laughs, even as Phainon pins him in place. âYou think youâre here to save her,â he says, breathless, âbut youâre too late. Sheâs already part of it.â
âI swear to Godââ Phainon hisses, pressing the heel of his palm to Lycurgusâ throat. âI swear to God, if you touched herââ
âI didnât have to,â the man croaks. âShe volunteered. Not knowingly, of course. But those scans she took from our systems? They included a compressed tracer file. As soon as she opened them, our systems opened her. The sync began the moment she pieced it together. Everything she knowsâtactical behaviour, voice modulation, interrogation strategyâitâs all feeding the AI as we speak.â
âYou fed off of us.â Phainonâs grip tightens. Lycurgus grunts.
âYes,â the scientist says. âAnd you should be proud. Irontomb wonât just replicate your choicesâit will refine them, strip away all the guilt, the softness. It will be cleaner. Smarter. Perfect.â
Something shudders behind the glass. The observation lights dim.
A low thrum starts up from behind the glass, like a heartbeat filtered through static. The strobe pulses once, then again, casting the chamber in a deep, electric violet. Inside, Irontomb lifts its hand with unsettling grace and slowly curls its fingers into a fist. The joints click into place with too much precision. A webline ejectsâthin, metallic, laced with a crackle of electric currentâand shoots into the rafters. It latches onto the ceiling brace, and just like that, the chamber is empty.
The reinforced door behind Phainon slams open with a hydraulic hiss. He whirls around. Lycurgus barely has time to flinch before Phainonâs hand closes around his collar and hurls him to the ground. The scientist crashes into the wall beside a rack of servers, skull cracking against plastic. A second later, the emergency klaxons explode to life, screaming overhead in jagged bursts.
CONTAINMENT BREACH. HALL A-7. PRIORITY UNIT ACTIVATED.
Red warning lights flare to life, pulsing in harsh rhythm. The sterile corridor floods with shadow and noise. Phainon bolts.
Thereâs no time to thinkâhe fires a webline into the open mouth of the elevator shaft and dives. Wind roars past his ears. He drops three floors in seconds, catches himself on a rusted support beam, and slams down onto the concrete sublevel with a bone-jarring thud. His boots hit the ground hard enough to rattle the pipes overhead.
The lower corridors are not like the rest of the facility. Thereâs no dust, no decay. These halls are clean, too cleanâlike the world above was only a façade. Bright, artificial light hums from the ceiling. Every footstep echoes.
He sprints forward, ducking under support beams and sliding past corners. NEURAL CALIBRATION â, the wall tells him. He follows the signs, pulse thundering. Every flicker of motion at the edge of his vision makes him tense. Every blinking light feels like a red eye watching.
Phainon skids to a halt in front of a door labelled Cell B-4.
The door is solid, made of reinforced steel with a flat-panel biometric reader. Thereâs no handle, or keypad. Phainon swears. âCome on, come onââ
From the other side, something shifts. He hears a voice, muffled and strained. â...Phainon?â
He chokes on relief. âIâm here.â
Youâre alive.
He scrambles to his web shooter, fingers flying over the dial. He adjusts the pressure valve, toggles it to maximum discharge, and fires at the scanner from point-blank range. The panel erupts in sparks. Circuits shriek. The door eases open, exhaling sterile, recycled air into the hallway.
Youâre inside, strapped to a containment recliner, limbs limp but intact. Wires trail from your temples, your clavicle, your pulse points. A monitor nearby is still running diagnosticsâwaveforms still climbing and falling in time with your heart. Your eyes crack open, bleary, and your head lolls to the side.
âHi,â you whisper, voice thin as gauze.
âHi, yourself,â Phainon says, crossing the room with long strides. His voice breaks.
His hands go straight to the leads, fingers trembling as he tears them free. Adhesive snaps off skin. Electrodes clatter to the floor. He moves gently, cradling your jaw to keep your head upright as he removes the final lead from behind your ear.
He lifts you from the chair. Your body sags against his chest, legs folding beneath you. You groan softly as your feet try to hold your weight, but he doesnât let them. He tightens his grip until youâre fully anchored against him. You smell like static and sedation. Like cold metal and something scorched.
âIrontomb,â you breath, half-slurred. âItâs awake. It⊠used me. Ran simulations. My voice. Myââ
âI know,â he murmurs. âI know. Weâre getting out of here.â
You lean heavier into him with every step he takes away from the chair. Your breathing is uneven, shallow. But Phainon can tell youâre coming backâyour pulse steadying, your fingers twitching where they rest near his collar. He wants nothing more than to get you out, to break every wall between here and the surface, to make you forget this place ever existed.
But the walls hum. The lights tremble. Heâs not fast enough. The reinforced door behind him explodes inward.
Irontomb barrels through in a burst of silver and red. The strobe overhead flickers with the force of its entry, casting the scene in freeze-frame shadows. It doesnât look like a machine as it charges. Phainon spins, turning his back to the blast to shield you. Debris pelts his shoulder as the room shakes. Irontomb stops, silent and still, in the doorway. Its mirrored mask splits slightly, revealing a narrow gleam of green light that pulses in rhythm with the lithium core humming somewhere deep inside it.
The voice it speaks with is your own.
âPhainon.â
The blood drains from his face.
You stir weakly in his arms. âThatâs notâthatâs not meââ
âI know,â he whispers.
It tilts its head, mimicking the motion exactly. âYou hesitate at a 3.2% deviation rate when sheâs within ten feet. Your aim skews left. Your heart rate spikes.â
Phainon doesnât respond. He adjusts his grip around your waist, gently easing you towards the floor behind him.
âYou always protect the variable, even when the variable is hunting you down,â Irontomb says. âThat makes you predictable.â
Phainon doesnât wait for it to move. He fires. A blast of webbing snaps towards the machineâs legsâbut it dodges, not quickly or instinctively, but perfectly. It anticipates his angle, catches the web in midair with one mechanical hand, and yanks hard.
Phainon is ripped forward off his feet and slammed into the wall hard enough to fracture plaster. He recovers fast, flipping up and sticking to the ceiling. His shoulder throbs. The moment Irontomb lunges again, he launches, meeting it midair. They clash in a whirl of webbing, steel, and bone. Irontomb fights like itâs studied him for yearsâand it has. It parries his kicks, reads the tension in his arms before he swings. It knows where heâll move before he does.
Every strike Phainon throws is met with a calculated block, every dodge answered with a counter-blow. The machine is faster. Stronger. But not desperateâand Phainon is desperate.
âThe server room!â you shout, and Phainon sees you staggering up to your feet, still valiantly trying to fight whatever they injected into your bloodstream. âTake it to the server room! Follow me!â
Phainon doesnât hesitate. He hears your voiceâunsteady, but clearâand thatâs all he needs. He spins midair, flips back onto the ceiling, and fires a pair of quick weblines towards Irontombâs shoulders. They stick, just barely. The machine lunges to rip them off, but Phainon yanks hard, using the momentum to slam Irontomb face-first into the far wall with a screech of metal on metal. The moment the machine hits, Phainonâs already moving.
âGo!â you shout again, breath ragged. âDonât fight it hereâthey control the lithium core from the server room!â
Phainon tears towards you, lands beside you, and sweeps an arm around your waist to stabilise you just as you start to buckle. Your skinâs cold with effort, sweat sheening your forehead, but your grip on his suit is firm.Â
âCan you run?â he pants.
âCan you carry me?â
He grins through bloodied teeth. âAlways.â
He hooks one arm under your legs and lifts you effortlessly, pivoting towards the corridor just as Irontomb peels itself from the wall. The lights in the hallway ahead flash red with the alarm, casting everything in pulses of warning. Phainon doesnât look back. He runs.
You clutch at his shoulder as he barrels down the corridor, webbing the corners ahead of him to pivot faster. Irontombâs footsteps are thunder behind youâprecise, mechanical, relentless. It doesnât rush. It doesnât pant. It just follows, its gait perfectly even as it absorbs every new piece of data from your movement, your trajectory, your speed.
âItâs learning again,â you murmur.
Phainon grits his teeth. âTell me where to go.â
âLeft!â you gasp, pointing weakly down the branching corridor as you cling to his shoulder. âThe blueprints said the server room was by the freight lift, and IâI stole Lycurgusâ key card before he sedated meââ
Phainon veers sharply, feet sliding for purchase on the slick floor as he swings you into the left hallway. Behind him, Irontomb adjusts its trajectory instantly, recalibrating mid-chase, its movements eerily silent save for the low whir of its servos and the electric buzz of its core. Every footstep lands with surgical precision, not wasting an ounce of energy.
He finds the lift shaft up ahead, the gate already torn off its hingesâsomeone had passed through here in a hurry. Phainon doesnât stop running. He fires a webline to the upper scaffolding and swings both of you through the open shaft.
The moment youâre both airborne, Irontomb enters the shaft behind you. You hear it climbing. It doesnât need webbing. Itâs fast, powerful, climbing straight up the walls like a spider. A cold burst of static prickles the back of your neck as you look over Phainonâs shoulder and see its split-face mask glowing faintly with that same green hum pulsing in time with your own heartbeat.
âDonât look down,â Phainon mutters through clenched teeth.
âYou mean donât look up,â you reply, voice tight.
He doesnât argue. Two more floors. Thatâs all you need.
Phainon angles towards the next levelâs opening, yanks hard on the web, and swings both of you clean through it. You hit the ground hard, momentum rolling you both across the floor in a rough tumble. He absorbs most of the impactâshoulder first, then hipâbut keeps you tucked in his arms the whole way.
The server roomâs door looms ahead, sealed with thick glass and reinforced by a biometric panel.
âCan you override it?â he asks, already placing you down on your feet.
You stagger once, then nod. âIâI can try.â
Phainon presses a palm to your lower back, steadying you as you stumble towards the wall-mounted keypad. You swipe your stolen access cardâLycurgusâ clearance still hot in the systemâand slam your hand against the override scanner. It flashes yellow, then green.
The second the server room door hisses open, Phainon knows itâs wrong. The air is too clean, too still, not like a hospital, but lifeless, like the room itself doesnât care if he walks in or burns alive. Server towers stretch in columns across the floor, blinking. The lights arenât just white, theyâre clinical, buzzing just above his pain threshold. Everything smells like copper and static and scorched plastic.
At the far end, housed behind reinforced glass, is the core. It pulses, like a heartbeat, except itâs not alive. Itâs lithium, itâs electricity, itâs something that was never supposed to breatheâbut it is, somehow.
He doesnât like it.
He crosses the threshold, half-dragging you with him. Youâre a weight he doesnât mind carryingâyouâre grounding, real, a reminder that not everything in this godforsaken place is synthetic or made in a lab.
âIâll buy us a minute,â he mutters.
You donât respond. Youâre already goneâmentally, physicallyâmoving with purpose even though you can barely stay on your feet. He wants to help you, wants to make you sit down, but he doesnât. Youâve always been like this: stubborn, focused, razor-sharp under pressure. He admires it even when it scares him.
He stations himself at the door, arms braced and knees bent. His ribs hurt. His headâs still ringing from the last slam against the wall. But adrenaline is louder than pain.
The wall explodes. He hears it before he sees itâthe thrum of Irontombâs feet, the deep thunk-thunk-thunk of heavy footsteps.
âPhainon,â it says again, in your voice. âYou hesitate at a 3.2% deviation rate when sheâsââ
âYou said that already, dipshit,â Phainon snarls, hurling himself forward.
He slams into Irontomb. The impact jars through every vertebra in his spine, but he doesnât stop, doesnât give it time to recalibrate. His shoulder clips its chest hard enough to knock them both off balance, and they go crashing through a row of server towers in a spray of sparks and shattering plex.
Irontomb hits the floor, skidding, its limbs flailing for a fraction of a second. Phainonâs already on it, knee to the chestplate, webbing its arm to the ceiling in a single fluid movement.
âYou donât get to use her voice,â he spits, voice hoarse, hands shaking as he fires again. Webs stick to its mask, its joints, anything he can reach. âYou donât get to be her.â
Irontomb doesnât flinch. Its head tilts again, that creepy mimicry sparking rage like gasoline in his chest.
âShe is a variable,â it says, still in your voice. âAll decisions lead back to her. All risk converges.â
He grits his teeth. âShut the fuck up.â
It wrenches its arm free from the ceiling and drives a knee into his ribs. Something cracksâhe doesnât have time to find out what. The air is knocked out of him, but he rolls, using the momentum to web-sling up to the overhead rigging.
He fires a line down, yanking hard. Metal groans, and a rack of exposed conduit tears free, crashing down onto Irontombâs legs. The machine stumbles, crushed under the weight for a beat too long. Enough for Phainon to dive.
He hits it again, fists slamming into metal, fury blinding him. He doesnât have a plan anymore, doesnât need one. He just needs to keep it away from you. Even as he fights, he hears the beep of the console across the room, feels the glow of the core intensify.
Youâre doing it. Youâre actually doing it. Irontomb knows.
It shoves him back with unnatural strength. Phainon hits the wall hard enough to dent the steel. Before he can stand, itâs already halfway across the room, limbs unfurling, shoulder joints clicking, webline primed to fireâ
âNo,â Phainon croaks. He pushes himself up, panting, every inch of him burning, and fires. Web meets Irontombâs leg. The pull is immediate. But instead of resisting, he yanks himself towards itâinto itâslamming shoulder-first into the side of its neck just as it raises an arm to fire at you.
They crash to the floor, grappling, fists slamming into one another like machines. Except Phainon isnât one. His body gives, bruises, bleeds. Irontombâs doesnât.
âYour biology is compromised,â it says. âYou are inefficient, slower, in pain. The variable will not survive long without augmentation.â
âYouâre not her,â he spits. âYou donât even sound like her.â
Out of the corner of his eyeâthrough the haze of painâhe sees you rise to your feet, the console spitting warnings in every direction. Your hands hover over the control screen. One more step, one more commandâ
The core behind the glass begins to scream, not audibly, not to the ears, but inside his skull. Irontomb shudders beneath him. Its limbs jerk erratically, the green glow from its spine flickering. Sparks burst from the plates along its back.
You did it.
Phainon throws himself back just as Irontomb seizes violently, crashing to the floor, limbs twitching. Its mask fractures. Smoke pours from the base of its spine as the lithium core begins to destabilise.
He doesnât exhale until the lights stop flickering. Heâs already moving before the sound fades completely, his muscles sluggish, overworked, body bruisedâbut moving. His chest is burning. His lungs taste like copper and ozone. His ribs feel cracked. But none of it matters.
Youâre still on your knees, hunched over the console, and for one horrifying second, youâre not moving.
âHey.â He drops down beside you fast. âHeyâhey. You good? Talk to me.â
Your head lolls towards him, eyes glassy with exhaustion but alert. You nod and he catches your weight as you say sideways into his shoulder.
âIâm here,â you say, voice like sandpaper.Â
âYeah,â he breathes. âYeah, you are.â
He pulls off his mask and folds one arm around your back and steadies you against him, his gloved hand cradling the back of your neck, just to prove youâre really here. Still warm. Still breathing. Your heart thuds weakly through your shirt when he presses his other hand to your chest, just fast enough to reassure him that the nightmare hasnât reset.
You lean into him more fully, your head tucked under his jaw, like youâre afraid to look at the room behind you. Good. You shouldnât have to. Heâll look for both of you.
The servers are smoking. Irontomb is a heap of metal now, sparking quietly beside the remains of a shattered cabinet. One of its hands is still twitchingâreflex, probably. Not real. Not alive.
Still, Phainon keeps you close.
You shift, barely enough to get your mouth near his collarbone. âYou okay?â
Phainon lets out something halfway between a laugh and a groan. âGonna need twelve years of physical therapy. Minimum.â
Your breath catches on a tired laugh. It sounds like a miracle.
âYou look like hell,â you murmur, slurring a little now, like the adrenalineâs finally wearing off.
âYeah, well,â he mutters, pressing his forehead to yours. âYou shouldâve seen the other guy.â
Itâs three in the morning, and the sky is the colour of soot.
The city below doesnât sleep so much as it holds its breath. The clamour of traffic has thinned to a distant hush, streetlamps stutter, and a single train rumbles across a bridge miles away. Sirens have long gone quiet. No engines scream. No horns beg for way. The night is still, but not gentle.
Itâs a stillness born of aftermathâsharp-edged and hollow, as if the concrete itself remembers what happened.
Phainon hangs upside down from a rusting fire escape three storeys above your apartment window, legs hooked neatly over a bar that groans faintly under his weight. Heâs perfectly still, suspended in gravityâs indifferent hold, his fingers hanging loose above the cracked sidewalk below.
This is how he thinks best lately: inverted, half a world away from the one that keeps asking him to play hero. The metal is cold through his suit. The air smells like dust.
Heâs grown used to these late hours. Heâs begun to need them.
After Lycurgus vanished off the grid, escaping into whatever black-market pipelines recycles men like himâscientists with messiah complexes and fingerprints scrubbed cleanâPhainon finds his pulse only slows in those long hours between dawn and dusk.
He watches your window. Itâs open again, just slightly. It always is now. Heâs never asked you why.
The official line is a âbiochemical systems breach.â Itâs what the public got. But the real reportsâclassified, sealed, redacted in wide black strokesâtold a different story. Theoros Labs didnât just go rogue; they were funded, sponsored, protected. There was infrastructure behind Irontomb, names buried in layers of clearance, strings running all the way up into the gut of the government. Someone had authorised the prototypes. Someone had approved neural mapping. Someone had known what they were doing.
Youâve testified three times already. You come home each time stiff-backed and silent, eyes rimmed in exhaustion, your voice quieter than usual like youâre still somewhere inside the sterile halls of the oversight committee. You never tell him the details, but you donât have to. Heâs seen the files. Heâs seen it in person. He knows what Irontomb made of your voice, how it pitched your laugh, how it whispered his name. He knows what it did to you.
You both have nightmares now.
Sometimes itâs Irontomb itself, eyes burning green behind a mirrored face, moving too perfectly to be real. Sometimes, itâs worse: itâs you, only not. Itâs him, only cold. Versions of yourselves that werenât forged in kindness or fear, but in numbers and algorithms, in prediction models and nerve signal scans. He wakes choking, palms clenched, sweat cold on his back.
Thatâs when he comes to you, climbing through the window, silent and unmasked. You never greet him. You just shift in bed, roll slightly toward the wall, and make room beneath the blanket without opening your eyes. Some nights he lies on his back and stares at the ceiling. Others, he faces you. Sometimes your fingers find each other under the sheets and tangle in that uncertain, half-asleep way that makes the silence easier to bear.
Phainon stares at your open window, at the way the curtain ghosts inward on the faintest breeze. The world looks soft from up here, but his world is down there, just beyond the windowsill.
He drops from the fire escape without a sound.
The thud of his landing on the balcony is soft. His boots press against the worn stone for half a second before he steps toward your window, one gloved hand brushing the glass as he ducks inside.
Your apartment is dim, lit only by the sleepy spill of orange streetlight filtering through the curtains. The air is warmer here, touched with the faint smell of cinnamon and coffee roast, and the remnants of detergent in your sheets.
Youâre curled up under the blanket, spine facing him, shoulders rising and falling in that slow rhythm heâs memorised. He doesnât know if youâre asleep or pretending. It doesnât matter. You always know when heâs here. You always leave the window cracked just enough.
He toes off his boots quietly, then strips off the top half of his suit, the fabric sticking to sweat-damp skin. His body aches with something deeper than bruises, like fatigue. But it fades the moment he lowers himself into the mattress behind you.
(Heâs in love with you, heâs pretty sure.)
âDo you want to date me?â
The question startles Phainon so much he almost drops the wire heâs threading back into place, and nearly slides off the metal railing altogether. He catches himself with a clatter, boots locking tighter to the beam, arms splayed for balance.
â...Sorry, what?â he calls down.
Youâre standing several feet below him, arms crossed, watching him with an unreadable expressionâequal parts brave and vulnerable. You donât repeat the question. You just lift your chin a little, eyes steady.
Phainon blinks at you from his upside-down perch, hair hanging towards the concrete, the city stretching behind him. Heâs in his suit, sleeves rolled up, mask bunched around his neck, grease on one knuckle, a thin wire looped loosely around his fingers. The early evening air is warm, golden light pooling along the skyline.
âYouâyou mean date-date?â he asks dumbly, like thereâs another kind.
You nod once, not smiling. âYeah. Date-date.â
Phainon stares at you, the wire still slack in his fingers. The sunlightâs catching on the edge of your cheekbone, painting it gold. You look so certain, so calm, like you havenât just thrown his entire nervous system into a tailspin.Â
He opens his mouth. Closes it. Then he scrubs a hand over his face, smearing a bit of grease across his jawline. âOkay. Thatâsâjust to be clear, youâre asking me if I want to date you. Like, go on dates, hold hands, maybe make out a little? Eat food together that isnât waffles at five in the morning?â
âYou make it sound so romantic,â you say dryly.
âIâm hanging upside down in my Spider-Man suit with wire cutters in my hand,â he says, voice rising an octave. âYou kind of caught me off-guard.â
You raise an eyebrow. âYou want me to come back when youâre right-side up?â
Phainon laughs, but itâs strained, caught somewhere between breathless and disbelieving. He shifts slightly on the bar. âNo,â he says. âNo, donâtâdonât go. I justâŠâ His fingers curl loosely around the railing. âYou really mean it? Like, seriously?â
You shrug, but your voice softens. âWhy would I joke about that?â
âI donât know,â he says. âI mean, have you met me?â
You walk a step closer, now standing directly beneath him. âYes. Thatâs kind of the point.â
Phainon stares at you, still upside down, still blinking like he hasnât quite caught up with reality. His breath stutters, shallow through parted lips. The last of the sun has dipped below the horizon, and now the city is painted in deepening blue, rooftops etched in sharp lines against a sky the colour of cobalt ash.
You, however, are still golden; still lit from the inside out, like the question didnât cost you anything, like you didnât just tip the entire balance of his world in six words flat.
He swallows hard.
âI want to,â he says. âI want to date you.â
You nod, just once. But the tremble in your exhale betrays you. âOkay.â
You shift a little closer to where heâs hanging. The wind tousles your hair. You squint at him.
âCan I kiss you now?â you ask.
Phainon opens his mouth. No sound comes out.
His brain is screaming, Yes, God, yes, obviously, what do you think Iâve been dreaming about every night for the last year? But what actually escapes his mouth is an undignified, âI meanâyeah. If you want.â
You smile, small but warm, and step forward until youâre close enough that he can see the flecks of light in your irises. His pulse pounds at the base of his throat.
âHold still,â you say.
And PhainonâSpider-Man, night-patroller, rooftop-skulker, awkward wreck of a man in loveâholds so, so still.
You reach up, slowly. Your hand is warm as it cups the curve of his cheek. He flinches a little, not because of the touch, but because of how gentle it is. Heâs not used to being touched like that. Your thumb brushes the edge of his jaw, dragging across the grease-stained skin. He forgets how to breathe.
Then, you lean in and kiss him.
Itâs awkward, at first. The angleâs all wrong. You have to stand on your toes, and he has to tilt just right, his body swaying slightly with the breeze, but none of it mattersânot when your lips touch his, not when the world goes so achingly, impossibly quiet. Itâs soft, firmer than he expects, and yet not rushed. You kiss him like youâve wanted to for a long time, like youâve thought about it, like the moment had already existed somewhere in your mind long before you asked the question.
Phainon melts. He doesnât move for the first few seconds; just hangs there, lips barely parted, letting you take the lead because heâs terrified that if he so much as breathes, youâll disappear. But then something in him sparksâan ancient, quiet wantâand he kisses you back.
He moves slowly, deliberately, meeting you where you are. His lips are dry and chapped from hours in the wind, but heâs warm beneath them, and his breath hitches in that small, helpless way that always happens around you. He tightens his grip on the bar, as though holding himself in place is the only way to keep from falling for real.
Eventually, you pull away.
His eyes open slowly, lashes low over dark, dazed pupils. His lips are parted, red and kiss-bruised.
âThat wasâŠâ He clears his throat. âWow.â
You smile, head tilting. âStill want to date me?â
âI want to marry you,â he blurts, then immediately flushes crimson. âI meanâhypothetically. Not now. Obviously not now. Iâm hanging upside down. Iâve got wire cutters in my pocket. But you get the idea.â
You laugh, and he grins.Â
âCome down, you idiot,â you say, still smiling. âBefore your brain floods and I have to explain to emergency services that Spider-Man died because he let his blood rush to his head.â
âYes, maâam,â he mutters, already adjusting his grip. With a practiced motion, he swings backward once, then forward, and flips cleanly down onto the concrete beside you in a crouch, landing with a thud and a soft grunt. He straightens slowly, rubbing at the back of his head.
When he looks up again, youâre already walking towards him. You grab the front of his suit, tug gentlyâand then kiss him again, properly this time. He melts into it, hands hovering at your hips. You take the initiative again, stepping closer, your fingers sliding up his chest to cup his face as your mouth slants against his. The second kiss is deeper, more certain, less careful.
When you pull away, you donât go far. You rest your forehead against his, both of you breathing hard. His hands settle around your waist now, not hesitant anymore, not unsure.
âYouâre sure about this?â he whispers.
âIâm sure.â
âOkay,â he says. âOkay.â
He kisses you again, because he can, because he wants to. Because thereâs no machine looming over his shoulder, no countdown, no artificial voice running simulations on how to hurt you best.
Thereâs only this: you, and him, and the golden hour dimming into twilight. Phainon lets you pull him back into the world right-side up.
Phainon thinks heâs a pretty good boyfriend.
Okay, maybe not, like, great. He has a running tab of things heâs fumbled: texts left on read for six hours because he was halfway across the city chasing someone with rocket boots, half-finished promises to pick up groceries, laundry thatâs been folded but never quite put away. Date nights sometimes fall through. Movie plans get postponed. He loses track of time a lot.
But he always comes home. He always makes you laugh, even when you pretend to be annoyed with him. He never forgets the dates that matter, and never lets you go to sleep without hearing that he loves you, mumbled or whispered or scrawled on a Post-It if heâs back late. Heâs trying. God, heâs trying.
And right now, looking at youâmessy-haired, breathless, flushed and sprawled across the mattress like you belong there, like you belong with himâhe thinks maybe heâs doing alright.
Phainon kisses down your ribs, trailing his mouth across your stomach. You shift beneath him, a little restless, a little expectant. He likes thatâyou trusting him enough to be open like this. It still hits him sometimes, like an aftershock, that you let him touch you like this. That you want him to.
He exhales slowly as he nudges lower, one arm curled under your thigh. His lips brush the inside of your hip, the softness of your skin, and he feels you shiver. Gently, he moves lower, and flicks his tongue over your clit.
You gasp, hand threading into his hair, and he smiles against you, slow and lazy and a little smug. He likes knowing he can do this to you. Likes knowing exactly how your breath hitches when he moves just right. He doesnât rush. He never does with you. Every motion is measured, learned, almost reverent. He listensâto the catch in your throat, the flex of your fingers, the little half-sigh you try to swallow and canât.
His grip on your hips tightens as you shift, as your thighs close around his shoulders, and he groans low in his chest, the sound vibrating softly between you.
âPhainon,â you whisper, voice thready. He loves the way you say his name. He hums again in response, and the way you respond to thatâyour spine arching, your mouth letting loose a litany of moansâmakes him want to give you more.
When he finally slides two fingers into you, careful and deep, you let out a sound that makes him smile. Phainon exhales against your thigh, the sound shaky with restraint. Your muscles flutter around him, every inch of you wound tight. He watches you fall apart in incrementsâyour fingers twisting in the sheets, your jaw slack with pleasure, your chest heaving.
âRight there?â he murmurs, half-teasing but wholly focused.
You nod, or maybe you donâtâyouâre too far gone to speak, but your body answers for you: the way your hips shift, the way your leg curls around his shoulder, the soft whimper that escapes your lips. He presses in again, just a little firmer, curling his fingers the way he knows you like.
His mouth trails slow kisses along the inside of your thigh, tongue flicking over sensitive skin. He never rushes. He never wants to. Not with you.
âPhainon,â you breathe again. âOh, fuckââ
He presses his mouth back to your folds, his fingers still working inside you with the same care. Heâs mapping you like heâs been doing since the beginningâlike every sigh is a star to chart by, every moan a signal flare. Heâs learned to read you in a language no one else gets to learn.
Youâre shaking now, your whole body strung tight as wire beneath his mouth. Your nails bite into his shoulder and you donât even seem to noticeâdonât seem to careâbecause youâre so close, teetering at the edge of your orgasm, sharp and sweet and inevitable.
A few more strokes and sucks and licks have you coming for himâarching, gasping, crying out his name. When the aftershocks start to fade, he eases off, kisses the softest parts of your skin as you tremble under him. His fingers slip from you gently. He brushes a hand over your thigh, up your hip, until heâs sliding over you again, kissing a slow trail back up your ribs and chest until heâs beside you.
Your eyes are closed, lips parted, still catching your breath. He watches youâeyes half-lidded, lashes damp, chest rising and fallingâand then you blink up at him, a smile tugging at your lips like youâre not quite sure how to speak yet. Your skin is still warm, flushed in a way that makes Phainon want to memorise every inch of you all over again.
He brushes his knuckles over your cheek in that way he does when he doesnât know what to say. âStill in there?â
You blink once, then smile with that crooked little grin he loves. âAsk me again in five minutes.â
He huffs a soft laugh and shifts to lie beside you, propping himself up on one elbow. His hand trails lazily over your stomach, fingers smoothing across the soft skin just above your hipbone, drawing idle shapes.
âNot bad for a guy who forgot to buy milk this morning, right?â he says.
You laugh and shove his shoulder. âPhainon!â
âI mean, I mightâve failed you on the breakfast front, but I like to think I made up for it in⊠other areas.â
You scoff, but itâs half a laugh, and the sound curls like a ribbon in Phainonâs chest. He watches the way your face softens when youâre amusedâhow your eyes crinkle at the corners, how your mouth fights not to smile wider.
âThatâs debatable,â you say, rolling to face him fully.
âOh, come on,â he says. âYou sounded pretty convinced a few minutes ago.â
âDonât let it go to your head.â
âToo late.â Phainon grins, and leans forward to bump his forehead against yours.
He feels like his heartâs trying to claw its way out of his chest, not in the life-threatening, nine-storeys-up, villain-hurling-him-off-a-building kind of way, but the kind where itâs just him and you, tangled in sheets, skin flushed. The kind of moment that makes his brain go a little fuzzy and his chest go tight, because heâs pretty sure this isnât just a good dayâitâs the day. The one people write songs and poems and stupid rom-coms about.
(Youâre right there, inches from him, breathing the same air, and all he can think is: I hope I never forget this.)
He tries to play it cool, like heâs not falling apart from something as small as the curve of your smile, the way your fingers brush along his jaw like youâre trying to memorise him right back. But itâs a losing battle. Heâs smiling too hard, the stupid kind that tugs at his cheeks.Â
âYouâre staring,â you say.
âYeah,â he says, without even pretending otherwise. âI know.â
His hand is still on your waist, the tips of his fingers tracing small, slow patterns into your skin. He wants to tell you a thousand thingsâabout how heâs never felt safer than he does when heâs beside you, about how it doesnât matter if the world ends tomorrow so long as he got to know what your laugh sounded like when it was just for him. But the words get stuck somewhere behind his teeth.
You roll your eyes at him like you always do when youâre trying not to smile. âWhat are you thinking?â you ask.
Phainon opens his mouth to say something clever. He doesnât. Instead, he says, âThat I like you.â
âYeah?â you say teasingly. âI had no clue.â
He smiles. âSometimes I think this isnât real. Like Iâm gonna wake up in some busted rooftop vent or in the middle of a car chase, and all thisâll just be some nice dream I had when my brain was low on oxygen.â
âItâs real,â you whisper. âDo you want me to kiss you like real people do? Because I will. Donât test me.â
(Phainon kisses you first, just to prove heâs real enough to do it.)
a/n: this is my favourite fic that iâve ever written. thanks for reading!
synopsis: âthereâs something going on,â he says. âa chain of robberies, not random. itâs clean, professionalâin and out in under four minutes. iâve been watching them hit warehouses all across marmoreal. whatever theyâre after, itâs coordinated. and i canât keep up on my own.â
in which spider-man enlists the help of his favourite detective to uncover a series of robberies in new okhema city.
tags: modern!au, spider-man!au, romance, angst, action, smut, frenemies to lovers. profanity, violence, oral sex, fingering, blood and injuries, mentions of drug abuse & human experimentation, etc.
word count: 19.5k
a/n: reposted from my old account. thanks for reading!
Phainon thinks heâs a pretty good guy.
Okay, maybe not, like, great. Heâs not out here winning humanitarian awards or remembering to replace the Brita filter before it turns green. But still. He flosses most nights, and tips well on the rare occasions he orders pizza for dinner. He saves cats from trees, catches robbers in the middle of getaway attempts, and makes a decent grilled cheese when the mood strikes. In the grand cosmic scale of morality, he figures that puts him somewhere between a broke college student and a D-list superhero with a heart of gold.Â
Which is why, as heâs currently being pursued across rooftops by New Okhemaâs most persistent detective, Phainon feels the situation is a little unfair.
âI donât deserve to be chased like this!â he yells over his shoulder, breaths short, voice muffled through his mask as he narrowly avoids tripping over a pipe. âIâm a pretty good guy!â
The boots pounding behind him donât slow. âYouâre obstructing justice!â
âYouâre harassing a concerned citizen!â
He vaults over a low vent and instantly regrets it, the rooftop pitching sideways beneath him as he skids and catches himself just in time to avoid faceplanting into a rusted-out AC unit. Graceful. So graceful. Just like the comics. His heartâs doing the worst kind of cardio in his chest, the kind that feels like guilt and adrenaline and that specific brand of dread that only ever shows up when youâre behind him.
Because if thereâs one thing Phainonâs sure of, itâs this: you hate him.
Maybe not, like, hate-hate. Maybe not enough to tase him out of the sky. But enough to chase him across rooftops with the hopes of finally arresting him for good.Â
He can live with that. Heâs been hated before. (He just wishes it didnât make him kind of want your approval.)
âYouâre breaking at least three laws just by standing there!â you shout as he swings up and over the next building.
Youâre getting closer. He can hear it in your voiceâless winded than his, more focused. Heâs not sure if heâs impressed or terrified. Probably both.
âDo you ever take a break?â you snap as you land behind him with a clean, practiced roll.
Phainon whirls around, arms raised. âDo you ever let anyone live?â
Your eyes narrow like youâre imagining the paperwork it would take to make his disappearance look like an accident.Â
âOkay, okay! Truce! Five minutes.â He backs up, hands still in the air. âNo chasing or tasers. Please.â
You donât answer, which means youâre at least considering it. Heâs getting good at reading your silences, which is probably not a good thing. He should stop doing that. He should stop noticing things about you at allâlike how you always pull your sleeves down when youâre thinking, or how you furrow your eyebrows when youâre about to disagree with someone but donât want to start a fight.
âLook,â he says, tone dropping, just a bit. âThis isnât about me dodging patrol or stealing snacks from that convenience store on 14th Streetââ
âYou stoleââ
âBorrowed,â he corrects quickly. âWith intent to pay.â
You stare at him. The wind rustles your coat. Somewhere, a siren wails and dies out.
âThereâs something going on,â he says. âA chain of robberies, not random. Itâs clean, professionalâin and out in under four minutes. Iâve been watching them hit warehouses all across Marmoreal. Whatever theyâre after, itâs coordinated. And I canât keep up on my own.â
He expects you to laugh. Or roll your eyes. Or say something sharp and cutting thatâll make his stomach twist in that way he hatesâbecause youâre usually right.
âI think theyâre watching me,â he adds, quieter now. âI think someone knows who I am.â
The wind blows sharp across the rooftop, carrying the tang of rain and smoke and summer dust. It scrapes over the worn brick under Phainonâs boots and rustles your coat, but you donât move. You just look at him, your face unreadable in the way that always makes his stomach knot a little too tight. Itâs the kind of stillness that unnerves himânot because he doesnât know what youâre thinking, but because he wants to. More than he should. Phainonâs chest rises and falls, just a little too fast.
âThatâs a bold claim,â you say slowly.
Yeah. He knows. He also knows youâre not brushing him off, which is scarier than if you had. Youâre listening, evaluating. That furrow between your brows is your tellâheâs seen it before, in passing shadows and glimpses from across precinct crime scenes. The way you tilt your head slightly to the left when youâre filing pieces together in real time.
âYou have proof?â you ask.
Phainon knows you wonât move without proofânot a whisper, not a theory, not a gut feeling scraped together from caffeine and paranoia. But he doesnât have clean lines or neat bullet points. What he has is scraps; disconnected threads; a slowly closing hand around the back of his neck every time he turns a corner too sharp. And that feelingâthat awful, skin-tight certaintyâthat something out there has started moving towards him, not away.
âI donât have anything concrete, but⊠Iâve been tracking the hits since the first one three weeks ago,â he says, starting to pace now, in small, tight circles, just enough movement to bleed out some of the nervous energy crawling up his spine. âTheyâre too clean. Like, unrealistically clean. No alarms triggered, no broken doors, no fingerprints. They even bypassed the retinal scanner at one of the biotech labs. Who does that? And for what? Theyâre not stealing cash or valuables. Theyâre taking very specific thingsâequipment, hard drives, chemical canisters.â
âShow me,â you say. Your eyes donât leave his face. (Well, the mask. But he swears youâre looking through it.)
He blinks. âWhat?â
You cross your arms. âThe footage. The files. Whatever youâve got. If youâre serious about this, I need to see everything.â
âOh.â Phainonâs voice pitches up an octave in surprise. âCool. Okay. Should we, like, grab dinner? I know a good deli down at Kephale Plaza. Best dill pickle sandwiches on this side of Okhema.â
Phainon didnât lie. Chartonusâ Deli, tucked between a laundromat and a building thatâs had a For Sale sign tacked onto the door for fourteen years, does serve the best dill pickle sandwiches in New Okhema City. The fluorescent sign above the deli flickers intermittentlyâCHART NUSâ on a bad night, HARTONUS DEL when itâs feeling generousâand the inside smells like mustard, old fryer oil, and vinegar.
Heâs perched in the booth furthest from the window, under a buzzing ceiling light that flickers every now and then. The vinyl seat squeaks every time he shifts, and the table has a wobble. Thereâs duct tape across the far corner of the laminate, and someoneâpossibly Chartonus himselfâhas carved NO CRYING IN THE DELI into the tabletop.
Phainon has his mask pulled up just past his nose, letting the cool air hit the sweat still clinging to his neck. His hairâs damp, and thereâs a tear in the seam of his left glove he only just now noticed. His sandwich is halfway demolished, crumbs gathering on the dark fabric of his suit, pickle juice already soaking into the paper wrapper.
He looks across the table at you. Youâre the only person in here not eating, only sipping from a chipped ceramic mug of what Chartonus had claimed was coffee with a shrug. Your coatâs slung over the back of your seat, and your badge is tucked out of sight, but everything about you still screams copâstraight spine, steady eyes, the way your fingers twitch every time the door jingles.
âI told you,â Phainon says around a mouthful of rye and mustard. âBest sandwich in the city.â
âThis is where you wanted to debrief?â
He shrugs. âThey know my order here.â
You roll your eyes and pull the folder Phainon had handed you on the rooftop from your bag, placing it on the table between you. âYou said these started three weeks ago?â you ask, flipping it open.
Phainon nods, brushing crumbs off the table. âWarehouse on Little Thorn. Then a lab two nights later. Then another warehouse. Then the lab again, but a different wing. Theyâre hitting specific targets, looping back, almost like theyâre refining their technique.â
You glance up. âAny pattern to what theyâre taking?â
âThatâs the thing.â He leans in, placing his half-eaten sandwich on the paper wrapper. âItâs weirdly⊠modular. Like, theyâre not emptying vaults or swiping entire systems. Theyâre taking parts. Pieces. Very specific ones.â
He slides a finger across one of the printouts. Itâs a manifest list from the Little Thorn warehouse, half the lines redacted, but a few still visible.
Carbon-neutral polymer casings
Fiber-optic microarrays
Refrigerated storage containers, Class III
Unknown compound, biohazard sealed
âDoesnât scream smash-and-grab,â you say, studying the list.
âExactly. This is purposeful.â
You turn another page. âThe camerasââ
âLooped,â Phainon says. âEvery time. Not just disabled. The footage looks uninterrupted, except for this weird flickerâlike it skips half a second. But the timestamps donât change.â
You sit back in your seat, fingers drumming on the edge of the table. He watches you thinkâsees the line between your brows deepen, the way you press your lips together when something doesnât add up. He likes watching you think. Thatâs a problem.
âDo you think theyâre testing something?â you ask. âOr building it?â
âThatâs what I was hoping youâd help me figure out. Detective Brain and Spider Legs. The dream team.â
âNever say that again.â
He gives you a one-shouldered shrug and returns to his sandwich. âCanât make promises I donât intend to keep.â
You shake your head and go quiet again, flipping slowly through the rest of the folder. Pages rustle under your hands. The old man behind the counter mutters something unintelligible to the deep fryer. Outsider, a police cruiser drives by without slowing.
When you speak again, your voice is lower. âYou said you think someoneâs watching you.â
Phainon freezes with a piece of pickle halfway to his mouth. Slowly, he lowers it back to the wrapper. âI donât think,â he says. âI know.â
You look up.
âTwo nights ago, I was tailing one of their runners. Lost him. That shouldâve been the end of it, except when I got homeâŠâ He hesitates. âMy apartmentâs locked down. Triple bolted, windows sealed, motion sensors in every hallway. And yet, my closet door was cracked. My spare suit was missing. Nothing else.â
Your expression hardens. âDid you call it in?â
He snorts. âYeah, sure. Hello, 911, someone stole my crime-fighting spandex, I think Iâm being haunted by a bunch of dudes with attitude problems.â
You donât laugh.
âSorry,â he mutters. âDeflection. I know.â
âYou shouldâve told someone sooner,â you say sharply. âIf someone has your gear, they might have access to yourââ
âThey wonât,â he cuts in. âThe techâs locked down. Biometric, failsafes, the works. But it means they were inside. Not watching from across the street. Inside. And that⊠thatâs not normal.â
You nod. âYou think itâs connected to the thefts.â
âI think Iâve been getting too close,â he says, quieter now. âAnd someone wants me out of the way.â
You lean forward, resting your elbows on the table. The cracked TV in the corner flickers, playing a rerun of some late-night court drama with the volume turned down low. A door slams shut somewhere in the back. The deli is empty now except for you two.
âThen we need to get closer,â you say.
Phainon blinks. âWaitâwe?â
âThis is serious,â you say simply. âAnd if someoneâs watching you, they might come for me next. This is bigger than your usual masked hero antics, Spider-Man. So, yeah. We.â
Heâs staring again. He knows he is. He should probably say something witty or obnoxious, but his throatâs dry and his heartâs doing that thing again. âCool,â he says finally, and it comes out a little too quiet. âCool cool cool cool cool.â
You push the folder back towards him, then stand and grab your coat off the back of the chair. âTomorrow night,â you say. âBring everything else youâve got. We set up a timeline, match it to police records. I want this mapped out by morning.â
He gives a mock salute. âAye aye, Captain.â
You pause at the door, just long enough to glance over your shoulder. âWash your suit,â you say. âYou smell like mustard.â
The bell jingles as the door swings shut behind you. Phainon stays in the booth for a while, finishing his sandwich in silence. The TV buzzes in the corner. The ceiling light blinks once, then steadies.
The alley off Cortland Street feels shadier than it is in the almost-darkness. Every step Phainon takes echoes just a little too sharply off the damp brick walls, the soles of his boots scraping against cracked pavement slick from the afternoon rain. The air is thick with the tang of gasoline, rotting leaves, and whatever chemical sludge is leaking from the storm drain at the corner. Itâs the kind of place you walk faster through on instinct, even if youâve got super reflexes and unnatural strength.
But for once, heâs early.
The wall behind him is papered with maps: big ones, small ones, some he stole from news kiosks and the city library, others he scrawled himself in the middle of the night, half-asleep and hunched over his kitchen counter with a sharpie in his mouth. Heâs patched them together like a spiderweb, the red and black marker lines bleeding over each other, looping through neighbourhoods and dead ends. Itâs messy, barely legible in some places, but it serves its purpose.
He shifts on the overturned milk crate heâs using as a seat and pulls his mask halfway up to breathe properly. The flickering streetlight above him hums like a dying bee. Thereâs a smear of mustard on his glove from the sandwich last night. He tries not to think about how long itâs been since heâs properly showered.
He hates waiting. But heâd never admit that heâs anxious. Especially not for you.
Your footsteps break the quietâsharp, sure, even. The same way they always sound when youâre walking up behind him like youâre about to read him his Miranda rights.
He doesnât turn around immediately. That would be too obvious. Too eager. âI was starting to think you ditched,â he says instead, flipping a page in the notebook balanced on his knee.
âYou said nine,â you answer. âItâs eight fifty-nine.â
He smiles, just a little. Canât help it. âWow. A punctual cop.â
You walk past him, wordless, and he catches the faint scent of your shampooâclean, sharp, maybe citrus? (He needs to stop.)Â
You step up to the wall of maps, arms crossed. The light glints off the corner of your badge, half-tucked beneath your jacket. You tilt your head to the side, the same way you always do when youâre processing too many things at once. God, heâs noticed that too many times.
âThis is a mess,â you say flatly.
âOrganised chaos,â he corrects.
You shoot him a look, then kneel to examine the clustered marks around Marmorealâs industrial sector. Your fingers trace a wide red loop that sounds four separate Xs.
Phainon hops down from his crate and joins you, dropping into a crouch beside you. âThose are the first confirmed break-ins. They form a pretty clear arc if you connect the dots. Started on the western edge. Theyâre moving clockwise.â
âSo whatever theyâre after is in the centre,â you muse.
âBingo,â he says, tapping the innermost circle. âAnd guess whatâs smack-dab in the middle of the whole thing?âÂ
He holds up a photo of a nondescript warehouse, overgrown with weeds, one wall tagged in massive purple spray paint that says I HATE BEES. Itâs ugly. You frown and say, âThat place?â
Phainon nods. âUsed to be a government R&D site during the old tech boom, but it was supposedly shut down after an acid leak took out the foundation. Now itâs just a lot with a locked fence and shit ton of asbestos.â
âWhy hasnât anyone investigated it?â
âBecause itâs boring,â he says. âThereâs no power running to it. No reported disturbances. No reason for patrol to bother. But if you dig deeperâlike, old permit records and city zoning logsâthereâs a basement thatâs sealed off. No blueprint access since 2013.â
Your silence stretches. Phainon watches the gears turning in your head and realisesâagain, and with an unfortunate amount of clarityâthat he likes watching you think. He really, really shouldnât.
âSo theyâre not just building something,â you say. âTheyâre hiding it.â
âOr staging it.â
âWeâll split up,â you say. âTonight. You take the chemical plant on Fifth. Iâll hit the battery storage facility near the docks. If either of them gets hit, we regroup.â
âCopy that,â he says lightly, brushing the dust off his gloved palms as he stands beside you. âThough I think you just want to get rid of me.â
âI want to get results,â you correct, already scanning the nearest cluster of notes on the map again. âAnd weâll cover more ground this way.â
Fair, rational, efficient. So typically you. Phainon swallows down the inexplicable disappointment in his throat and tries to focus. âThe chemical plantâs been shut down since the fires in March, but Iâve seen movement thereâshadows mostly, heat signatures. And one of the power boxes was tampered with last week. Could just be squatters, butâŠâ
âBut this group doesnât leave power boxes half-cut,â you finish, glancing at him. âThey donât miss steps.â
Exactly. He doesnât say it out loud, but the tension in his shoulders eases a little. Youâre starting to see what he sees.Â
You turn back to the wall, fingers brushing one of the maps again, slower this time. Your brows are furrowed, the crease between them deeper than usual. âIâll have to log this in quietly. My teamâs not going to love me going off-grid again.â
âYour team doesnât know youâre chasing me around rooftops?â
âThey know. They just donât know why,â you say. âWhich is probably for the best.â
He huffs out a half-laugh, kicking lightly at the cracked asphalt near your foot. âFlattered.â
âYou shouldnât be.â
âStill. Thanks for not turning me in.â
You shrug. âYou havenât made it worth my while yet.â
He wants to tease you for that. Wants to say something dumb and stupid about buying you a terrible coffee from a 24-hour diner or bribing you with Chartonusâ sandwiches, but instead, he asks, âYou have a burner?â
You nod. Phainon reaches into one of the hidden pouches sewn inside his suitâpast the web cartridges, the crumpled snack wrapper, the broken-off pen cap he meant to throw away yesterdayâand pulls out his own cracked phone. The screenâs a mess of spiderwebbed lines, the plastic casing half melted at the edges from some accident involving an exploding rooftop generator last week.
You raise your brows. âThatâs a phone?â
âTechnically,â he says, unlocking it with a swipe and opening a new contact. âGive me your number. Iâll send coordinates if I catch anything tonight.â
You rattle off a sequence of numbers, and add, âBurner ends in zero-nine. Donât call me unless itâs urgent.â
âDefine urgent.â
âExplosion. Gunfire. Alien invasion.â
âSo⊠brunch?â
Phainonâs lucky day starts with a pigeon dive-bombing his head, continues with a missed web shot that sends him careening into a fire escape, and somehow still manages to improveâbecause you said yes to brunch with him.Â
Or, well, with Spider-Man, which is still him, but in that weird, glass-wall kind of way. You donât know what he looks like beneath the mask, donât know his name, his address, his real voice, or the fact that he thought he was going to be late because he tried to hand-sew a rip in his suit and pricked his thumb seventeen times.
You flip through a manila folder with highlighter streaks and dog-eared corners, diagrams of circuits, and what look like stolen security camera stills, all stacked and filed with precision. Heâs seen you interrogate a guy in less than five words before. Watching you cut a pancake with that same level of intensity is kind of terrifying.
Also: kind of hot. But thatâs not relevant.
âSo,â he says, because the silence is beginning to grate at him, âhave I won you over with my sparkling personality yet, or are you still planning to arrest me after this?â
You hum and reach for the syrup. âI canât decide if youâre more irritating in daylight or when youâre dangling upside down on a fire escape at 2 a.m.â
Phainon takes a sip of espresso, squinting through the bitter taste. âWhy not both?â
You glare at him.
âIâm trying to be helpful,â he says, quieter now. He leans in a little, lowering his voice in case someoneâs listening. âI know Iâm not the most traditional source, and Iâm aware Iâm breaking, like, a thousand chain-of-command rules just by talking to you, but Iâve been watching these people for weeks. And Iâve never seen anything like this. Theyâre too clean. Too prepared.â
You nod. He can tell youâve already connected the dots. Youâve probably connected ten more he hasnât even noticed yet. Your eyes are sharp, alert, focused in that laser-sight kind of way that makes his skin itch under the mask.
âI went by the Marmoreal site last night,â you say. âDidnât go in, thoughâjust circled. But there was movement in the back. A truck with no license plate.â
âSame model from the Fourth Street hit?â
âCouldnât see,â you admit. âBut the sound was the same. The engine was too quiet to be local, so it was clearly modified.â
Phainon exhales slowly. âSo theyâre still active.â
âVery.â You stab at a piece of pancake and glance up at him. âYou sleep at all?â
â...No,â he mutters, sheepish. âBut I took a power nap at a bus stop for twenty-seven minutes and dreamed I was being eaten by a vending machine, so that counts.â
âHealthy,â you deadpan.
He shrugs. âYouâre one to talk. When was the last time you took a break that wasnât⊠this?â
âIâm not the one with a possible concussion and jam on my mask.â
âI like jam,â Phainon says.
You shake your head, but he catches the faintest hint of amusement in your face, quickly hidden behind your coffee cup. He doesnât say anything; just watches as you lean back in your chair, face finally relaxing into something that looks a little less like a detective building a case and a little more like a person enjoying a few minutes of peace.
Thatâs when it hits him: this is the first time heâs seen you still. Not mid-chase, not interrogating, not tearing through evidence. Just you, and pancakes, and a soft patch of sunlight warming your sleeve.
Heâs in so much trouble.
You glance at him, then, like you can feel it. âWhat?â
âNothing,â he says quickly, fiddling with a sugar packet. âJust thinking.â
Phainon hesitates. He wants to say itâs because itâs his favourite. Because the coffeeâs bad but the people are nice. Because the chairs donât match and the chalkboard menus always misspell something. Because it feels safe. Because maybe, somewhere in the back of his idiotic brain, he wanted you to like it.
Instead, he shrugs and says, âThought youâd appreciate the pancakes.â
You study him for a second longer. Then, finally, finally, you smile. âDonât make a habit of being right, Spider-Man,â you say, spearing another bite.
It turns out that Phainonâs theory is, horrifically, right.Â
One week. Thatâs all it takes.
Seven days of split patrols and encrypted texts, of cataloguing movement and double-checking routes, of scribbling half-mad notes in the margins of maps and losing sleep trying to figure out what the connection is. Heâd hoped, stupidly, that the quiet meant progress. That maybe, maybe theyâd spooked whoever was behind it. That maybe the worst thing waiting for him that week would be another broken web-shooter or a pigeon with a vendetta.
Youâre okay. That should be enough. It should settle the spike of cold panic in his chest, should anchor him where he stands, balancing on the lip of a lamppost on 39th Street. But he rereads it again. Then again.
His fingers tighten around the edge of the lamp. The city breathes below him, neon-drenched and unaware. Somewhere in the distance, a police siren howls. Closer, a car door slams and someone yells about a parking ticket.
Phainon jumps.
The wind is sharp against his skin as he swings, the air slapping his cheeks even through his mask. Heâs faster than usualâmore desperate than smooth. Itâs a graceless sprint across rooftops, the kind that leaves him barely clearing ledges, boots skimming waterlogged gutters, lungs burning. He doesnât know if youâre hurt. You said youâre okay, but âokayâ is such a vague, terrible word when it comes from someone who faces dangerous situations for a living.
The warehouse by the docks comes into view fast, hulking and silent beneath the sodium lights. Thereâs a scorch mark across the landing bay door, the acrid scent of melted insulation still curling up into the air. Two squad cars are parked askew outside the chain link fence, but the cops are gone, or inside, or too distracted to notice the figure scrambling onto the roof with shaking hands.
Phainon crouches low and peers through the skylight.
Youâre inside, standing near a bank of empty battery casings and shattered glass, a radio pressed to your shoulder. Youâre not limping. No visible blood. His heart slows half a beat. He taps lightly on the glass. You look up fast, instinctive, already half-reaching for your weapon before you register him. Your eyes narrow, but only briefly. Then you jerk your chin towards the fire escape.
He meets you on the second floor, slipping in through a side window. Youâre alone in the room, save for the mess of forensic markers, scorch marks, and the bitter ozone of post-explosion cleanup.
âIâm fine,â you say, even before he can speak.
âYouâre not fine,â he snaps, more sharply than he means to. âYou said crossfire. Thatâs not, like, a stubbed toe.â
âIt wasnât aimed at me.â
âThat doesnât help!â
He hears his own voiceâtoo loud, too worried, echoing off concreteâand he turns away before you can see the guilt settling between his shoulders. He runs a hand over his head, dragging his glove against his scalp like he could rub the fear out through friction alone.
You step closer. Your boots crunch over a piece of broken casing. âSpider-Manââ
âWhat happened?â he cuts in. He needs to focus, needs to understand it before he spirals into full-blown panic. âWalk me through it.â
You sigh, but nod. âI was watching the south entrance. Nothing for over two hours. Then, just past ten, the sensors I set up on the west wall tripped. I saw three figures, all masked. One of them had a disruptorâfried the cameras before we could catch a clear face.â
âLithium?â
âGone,â you confirm. âThey knew exactly where to go. They broke open the storage lock, took one unit, and left the others untouched.â
âOnly one?â
âOne. And Spider-Manââ your eyes meet his again, steady now, seriousââthey werenât just fast. They know how to fight. They looked trained for this kind of shit.â
He exhales through gritted teeth. âYou think theyâre building something.â
âI think they already have,â you say grimly. âAnd theyâre just waiting for the right battery to turn it on.â
Phainon shifts his weight and finally asks the question thatâs been sticking in his throat like a splinter. âDid they see you?â
âIâI donât know. Maybe,â you say.
âMaybe?â His voice rises again.
âI lost one in the dark. I think they doubled back. Iâm not sure.â
Phainon wants to scream. Or punch something. Or grab you and teleport you somewhere far away where no one has disruptors and no one bleeds on cold warehouse floors. But he canât do any of that. He can only stand there, vibrating with a kind of fear he doesnât have the vocabulary for.
âI should have been there,â he mutters.
âYou were across the city.â
âThatâs not an excuse.â
You step into his space, close enough that he can hear your breath. âSpider-Man. Stop. Iâm not dead.â
âYet,â he says.
âIâve been trained for this,â you say. âI know how to handle myself.â
He doesnât doubt that. Not even for a second. But he also knows what it feels like to arrive too late, to find a scene thatâs already stained with the blood of his loved ones. He drags a hand down his face. âYou need backup.â
âIâve got it,â you say, your voice firm. âIâve got you.â
Itâs not meant to do what it does, but those words dig into him deeper than any bullet could. He stares at you for a beat too long, every possible response crashing into each other like waves in his skull.
Finally, he says, quietly, âYeah. You do. Can I take you home?â
Phainon expects you to disagree. Instead, you let your shoulders slump with relief, and say, âYes, please.â
The wind cuts sharp along the docks when he leads you out, the air heavy with the smell of brine, old smoke, and burnt copper. Thereâs a metallic haze still lingering over the scene, but you donât flinch from it. You walk steadily beside him, chin up, even if your hand hovers just a little closer to your holster than usual. He doesnât miss that.
The streets are quieter now. Most of the cops have cleared out. A few plainclothes agents hang back to assess the scene, but they barely glance up when he web-slings both of you onto the nearest rooftopâlow enough to keep out of view, high enough to get some space from the mess below. You donât complain. You never do. Even now, when your knees must ache from crouching in dark corners, when your head probably pounds from the tension of nearly being caught in open fire, you simply follow him, like itâs normal. Like you trust him.
Phainon keeps his hold light but steady around your waist, one hand braced just beneath your elbow. Youâre warmer than he expects, heat leaking through your jacket into his gloves. Every time he movesâshoots a string of webs, pulls you forward, steadies your landingâhe feels you adjust to match him. Fluid. Familiar. (He shouldnât like that as much as he does.)
Your buildingâs only three blocks away, and you whisper the directions into his ear. Phainon doesnât want to rush it. He doesnât want to leave you alone, not yetânot while your jaw is still set a little too tight and the adrenaline hasnât fully drained from your bones.
When he finally lands on your fire escape, he lets go reluctantly.
You ease away from him, brushing your hair back, your expression unreadable as always. âYou donât have to walk me all the way up.â
âI know,â he says, already crouched on the rail. âI just⊠wanted to be sure.â
âThanks.â
He nods and tries to act casual. Tries not to stare too hard at the soft light spilling out of your apartment window, or the way your fingers fidget at your sides like youâre still half in the fight. He wants to ask if youâre okay again, wants to tell you that the word âcrossfireâ nearly gave him a heart attack. But youâre already halfway to the window, unlocking it and ducking through the frame.
âSpider-Man?â you say, just before you disappear inside.
âYeah?â
âDo you, uh, want to come inside?â
He blinks. Of all the possibilities that had been ricocheting around in his headââstay safe,â or âthanks for the ride,â or âyouâre worrying too muchââthis had not made the cut. Not even close.
It stalls him, mid-perch, one gloved hand gripping the rusted iron railing of the fire escape, the other resting loosely on his knee. The mask hides his face, but heâs pretty sure his surprise is obvious anyway, just in the way his breath catches or how still he suddenly goes.
Your silhouette is soft in the glow of your apartmentâs light. Youâve already kicked off your boots inside the window, standing barefoot on the wooden floorboards, one hand holding the window open, the other resting lightly on the frame.
âI mean,â you say after a second, brows furrowed. âOnly if you want to. You donât have to or anything. You probably have rooftops to gallivant across andââ
âI want to,â he says quickly, too quickly. Then he clears his throat and tries again. âI meanâyeah. If youâre okay with it.â
Your mouth curves, not quite into a smile, but something close enough to make something twist behind his ribs. âYou literally carried me three blocks through the air. I think weâre past the point of stranger danger.â
He huffs out a short laugh and swings one leg over the windowsill. It takes a bit of maneuvering to avoid smacking his knees against your desk, and heâs painfully aware of every scuff his boots leave behind on your floor. The space smells like laundry detergent and something warmâcoffee grounds, maybe. Or cinnamon. The kind of smell that makes his shoulders start to relax before he even realises it.
Your apartment is small but lived-in. A stack of case files teeters on the kitchen table next to a mug. Your precinct jacket hangs over the back of the couch. There are photos pinned to the side of the fridge with mismatched magnets: city skylines, a blurry shot of you at what looks like a precinct holiday party, someone in a ridiculous Halloween costume posing like a superhero. Phainon feels something tug deep and stupid in his chest.
âMake yourself at home,â you say, heading into the kitchen and flipping on the kettle without needing to ask. âIâve got tea or instant coffee. No milk, though. Sorry.â
He stays standing for a second longer, then slowly pulls off his gloves and tucks them into his belt. His mask stays on. He lifts the bottom edge just past his mouth, enough to breathe easier, but not enough to riskâwell, anything else.
âTeaâs good,â he says.
You nod, moving with a kind of efficiency that reminds him again that youâre still running on fumes. Thereâs a scrape as you grab two mugs, the clink of metal as you stir one without sugar. You hand him the other without ceremony.
He takes it carefully, fingers brushing yours. âThanks.â
âNo problem,â you return, then gesture to the couch. âWe can sit. If youâre staying a few minutes.â
He is. He knows he is. He follows you to the couch and lowers himself into the corner, stiff at first, like his body hasnât caught up to the fact that heâs safe here. With you. Thereâs a blanket balled up on one side and an old remote wedged between the cushions. You move them without thinking and curl one leg beneath you, facing him.
âSo,â you say. âDo you want to talk about it?â
Phainon frowns. âThe break-in?â
âNo,â you say, looking at him squarely. âYou. You were⊠panicked tonight.â
Phainon goes still. Itâs not immediateânot sharp like a flinch, but a quiet kind of freezing, like someoneâs gently pulling the emergency brake in his chest. He doesnât look away from you, but he doesnât answer either. His tea cools between his fingers.
You shift forward a little, your voice low. âLook, Iâm not asking because Iâm nosy. Or because I want some dramatic unmasking moment sort of thing. I justâŠâ You pause, exhale. âI got lucky tonight. Thatâs what it was. Luck. If I hadnât ducked at the right second, if theyâd come around the corner just a little fasterââ
âBut they didnât,â he says quietly, cutting you off.
âThatâs not the point.â
Youâre sharper now, sitting straighter, your knee pressed to the cushion. Your eyes flashânot with anger, but fear, the kind you donât let people see if you can help it. But he sees it. And worse, he knows it. He recognises it in the widening of your eyes, the way your fingers curl against your palm.
You swallow. âIâm scared, Spider-Man. I know youâre helping. I trust you. But thisâthis thing weâre chasing⊠if something happens to youâI wonât even know your name. I wonât know who to look for. Or if I should look at all. Thatâs not just reckless, thatâsâcruel.â
He flinches at that. You notice.
âI just want to know whoâs standing next to me,â you say. âThatâs not so much to ask.â
âI canât,â he says, before heâs even fully processed it. âIâm sorry.â
âThatâs not good enough.â Your voice isnât raised, but thereâs a new edge to it now, sharper than anger. Hurt, maybe. Disappointment. It slices straight through his armour. âYou trust me with your life out there. Every night. You trust me not to shoot you in the back, or get in your way, or blow your cover. But you donât trust me enough to know who you are?â
âItâs not about trust,â he says quickly, too defensively. âItâsâGod, you think I donât want to tell you? You think I donâtâdonât lie awake wondering what would happen if I did? I think about it all the time.â
âThen whatâs stopping you?â
He looks at you, then. Youâre not angry. Youâre scared. Scared of whateverâs coming next. Scared of losing control, of losing him.
âYou donât understand what that means,â he says. âIf you know who I amâreally knowâit changes everything. You donât get to walk away from that. You donât get to un-know it if something happens. If someone finds outââ
âIâm a cop, Spider-Man. Iâve seen worse things than secret identities.â
âItâs not just mine,â he says. âItâs everyone around me. You knowingâyou become a target.â
âIâm already a target.â
âNot like this,â he bites out. âIf someone traces it back to youâif they think you matter to meââ
âI do matter to you.â
You suck in a breath like you didnât mean to say it that way. But you donât take it back. You sit there, across from him, eyes steady and hurting and unshakably honest. And all Phainon can think is: Shit.
âYou do,â he says, barely audible. âOf course you do.â
âThen why wonât you tell me?â
He closes his eyes, and rubs a hand over the edge of his mask like he can somehow erase the pressure building behind his skull. âBecause the second I do,â he says, âyou stop being just a cop with good instincts and better aim. You become mine. And that makes you vulnerable in a way I donât know how to protect you from.â
You shake your head, frustrated. âYou donât get to make that decision for me. Iâm not asking for your social security number, or something. Iâm asking to know whoâs at my side when the bullets fly. When the lights go out. When itâs 2 a.m. and I canât sleep because I think I saw someone watching my window. I need more than a voice behind a mask. I deserve more.â
He doesnât argue. He doesnât tell you youâre wrong, because youâre not. But still, he stays silent.
You stare at him for a moment longer, and when itâs clear he wonât budge, you get up. The mug of tea still has steam spiralling out of it as you walk to the sink and set it down, the sound softer than your next words: âI think you should go.â
Phainon doesnât try to stop you, or ask you to reconsider. He simply nods, and stands. Thereâs a strange heaviness in his limbs as he pulls the mask down over his face, tugs his gloves on with fingers that feel numb. He moves to the window but pauses with one foot already on the sill.
âI do trust you,â he says. âMore than anyone.â
Itâs not that youâre avoiding each other.
Itâs that youâre both avoiding each otherâwhich, in practice, amounts to the same thing.
Patrols become asynchronous: silent intel dumps in the encrypted folder, maps updated with colour-coded marks that speak more than either of you will via text. There are no more late-night debriefs on rooftops, no post-mission walks home, no casual banter about who has the worst taste in energy bars. When you text, itâs clipped, tactical. When he replies, itâs mechanical.
(âWest dock checkpoint cleared. No sign of activity.â
âCopy. South alley tripwire still intact.â)
Phainon doesnât know what hurts more: the silence, or the fact that itâs entirely his fault. Maybe he was right. Maybe the secret is safer kept. Maybe you are less of a target this way.
But God, itâs lonely.
Thereâs a rhythm to the city that used to make senseâpulse and swing, fire escapes and antenna towers, the rough percussion of tires against potholes. But now it all feels flat. The rooftops are colder. His landing sticks a little less clean. Even the pigeons donât heckle him like they used to.
Itâs been two weeks. Two long, aching weeks, until, at 3:37 a.m., Phainon receives a text from you, and it takes him less than a minute to reply.Â
He doesnât stop to think, or worry if this is a trap, or a joke, or worseâif youâre still mad at him. When he lands outside your apartment, the windowâs already cracked open. Inside, the lights are on low, and thereâs a corkboard spread across your living room wall now, half-covered in photos, schematics, lines of red string and sticky notes scrawled in tight, impatient handwriting he recognises from your field memos.
You donât greet him. You just hand him a folder, your eyes dark with something between fear and exhaustion.
âBiotech division out of Theoros Labs,â you say. âIt used to be focused on adaptive immunotherapy, but they lost funding three years ago and went dark. The shell company they reopened under is tied to a private security contractor out of Styxia. And guess what their latest research files are tagged under?â
Phainonâs already flipping through the pages. His gloved fingers still. His stomach drops.
ARACHNID-BASED ENHANCEMENT TRIALS â SUBJECT 33550336. MODEL NAME: FLAME REAVER.
He looks up. âTheyâre trying to replicate me.â
âNot just replicate,â you say, shaking your head. âWeaponise.â
Your voice is thin, dry, like it costs you something to even say it aloud.
âTheyâve been pulling data from old surveillanceâfight footage, patrol patterns, even the way you move. You know how we assumed they were looking for high-density batteries to power a device?â You tap one of the diagrams on the corkboard, the spine of it shaped like a human thorax with branching nodes along the shoulders. âTurns out itâs a synthetic neuromuscular system. And thisâthis lithium coreâitâs the ignition switch.â
Phainon stares at the blueprint. Itâs rough, unfinished, but horrifyingly clear: a bipedal unit, modelled after him. Spinal cord wiring where his web shooters would be. Photoreactive visor instead of eyes. Muscle clusters designed for explosive vertical leap. Neural sync modules buried in the wrists and calves.
A Spider-Man, stripped of the man.
âWhy?â he says, voice hoarse. âWhy build this?â
âI donât know yet,â you admit. âBut someone out there sees you as more than just a vigilante nuisance. They see you as a prototype. A formula. Something to replicate, mass-produce, and control.â
He sinks onto the edge of your couch, folder open in his lap. The diagram stares back at him, accusatory and unforgiving. Itâs him. The curve of the stance, the wide-set shoulders, the way the unitâs balance favours its left side, just like he does when his kneeâs aching. They didnât just study him; they dissected him.
âHow long have you known?â he asks quietly.
âA few days,â you say. âI wanted to be sure. Didnât want to come to you with a hunch and nothing to back it up.â
âAnd you texted me anyway.â
You meet his gaze across the room. âBecause itâs you, Spider-Man. Look, I know you think hiding your identity keeps people safe. But this? This proves it doesnât. Theyâre coming for you whether or not I know your face. They already have your gait, your voice, your power levels. Theyâre not trying to figure out who you are anymore. They donât care. They just want to turn you into something they can sell.â
He sets the folder down. His hands wonât stop shaking. âHow⊠did you find out about all this?â
âDonât get mad.â
When Phainon doesnât say anything, you sigh and look away.Â
âI visited the old R&D site. Alone.â
âAre you serious?â Phainon gestures so wildly that his web cartridge knocks against the back of your chair. He stands abruptly. The folder falls from his lap, papers scattering across your rug. âYou went alone. To Theoros. To Styxia-backed labs that specialise in high-risk bioweapons. Without calling me.â
âI called you when I had proofââ
âYou shouldnât have gone in the first place!â he explodes. âWhat the hell were you thinking? Do you want to get dissected? Shot? Replaced with one of thoseâthose thingsââ
âYou werenât talking to me!â you shout back. âWhat was I supposed to do? Wait until they raided another warehouse?â
âI was trying to protect you,â Phainon grits out. âAnd instead you threw yourself into a place that couldâve had armed personnel, pressure sensors, live prototypesâanything.â
You throw your arms out. âAnd what was the alternative? Sit on my hands while they build a weaponised version of you? Wait until thereâs a second Spider-Man crawling up government buildings with a built-in kill switch? I donât know how to sit still, Spider-Man. Not when Iâm this scared.â
âYou think Iâm not scared? You think I havenât been replaying every second of that night at the docks? That I havenât imagined a dozen versions of how it couldâve gone wrong? You think Iâm not scared every time I donât hear from you for a few hours?â
âThen why didnât you say any of that? Why did you shut me out?â
âBecause if I said it out loud,â Phainon spits, pacing again, hands flying to his head, âthen it would be real. It would beâyou would be real. Not just someone chasing me on my patrol route. Not just someone whoâs helping me out. Youâd be a person Iâd have to lose.â
You blink, thrown. âYou think youâre going to lose me?â
âI know I could,â he says, almost like it hurts. âBecause itâs already happened. Every time I get closeâevery single timeâit ends the same way. Either they die, or I leave first. Because thatâs the only choice I ever get.â
He doesnât even hear how loud his voice has gotten, doesnât notice how heâs gesturing wildly, storming back and forth across your living room.
âI canât protect you from this. I canât protect you from them. I canât even protect myself. You want me to give you a name, but thatâs the one thing I canât do. Because once you have that, itâs over. Youâll look at me differently. Or worseâyouâll stop looking at me. And I canâtâGod, I canât stand that.
âDo you know what itâs like to see yourself turned into a blueprint? To see a file full of numbers and heat signatures and recorded footage and realise someone out there has broken you down into a fucking algorithm? That they donât see a personâthey see a weapon?
âI didnât sign up for this shit! I didnât even sign up to be Spider-Man. I just⊠was. And now theyâve taken that and turned it into something else. Something that walks like me and fights like me and could kill you without thinking. And the worst part is that if youâd died at that lab, Iâno one wouldâve even known. Youâd just be another casualty they scrub from the recordsâand that wouldâve been my fault.â
His voice has dropped to a whisper. His hands are trembling.
He doesnât realise until you doâuntil your eyes go wide, and your breath catches like youâve been sucker-punched.
His mask is gone, not pushed halfway up, or nudged for a sip of tea. Gone. Somewhere in the middle of that breakdownâwhile he was talking too fast and breathing too hard and tearing at his suit like it was suffocating himâhe took it off.
His hairâs a mess, flattened by the fabric, and his face is flushed, mouth parted slightly as he sucks in breath after breath. Thereâs a bruise blooming along his cheekbone, and a cut healing just beneath his chin. He looks young, with silvery-white hair and bright blue eyes that are rimmed with the redness that comes with exhaustion and caffeine.
â...Oh,â Phainon says, stunned. âShit.â
You blink, slowly, as though grounding yourself in reality again. âYou took your mask off.â
He starts to lift a hand to cover his face, instinct kicking in too late. Gently, more carefully than anything else thatâs passed between you tonight, you reach up and take the mask from his hand. Your fingers brush his knuckles, and he flinches, but he doesnât pull away.
Phainon drops his hand and lets out a shallow breath. âI⊠didnât mean to.â
âYou didnât mean to,â you echo. âJesus.â
Phainon canât say anything, so he simply stands there, feeling as naked as the day he first stepped onto a rooftop and dared to believe he could protect anyone. His heart pounds loud in his ears. He can feel it in his throat, his fingertips, his teeth.
âCan Iâ Will you tell me your name?â you whisper.
He wets his lips, and says, quietly, âPhainon.â
You nod, once, and say it back. âPhainon,â you repeat, like itâs a truth youâll guard with your life. âOkay. Iâm not afraid of you. And Iâm not leaving. So either you let me help, because you asked me to, or I break into another lab and do it anyway. Your call.â
Phainon stares at you: you, with your voice barely holding steady; you, standing in your living room full of maps and stolen schematics and caffeine-fueled desperation; you, tired and stubborn and loyal enough to make him fall to his knees.
âOkay,â he says quietly.
You reach out, then, and Phainon thinks youâre handing his mask back to him, but instead, you wrap your arms tightly around his torso and pull him into you.Â
He doesnât move at first. Youâre pressed to him, arms wrapped tight around his torso like you mean to hold the pieces of him together before they scatter to the wind. Your cheek rests just above his heart, right where it beats too loud and too fast, thudding like itâs trying to break free from his ribs. His hands hover uselessly in the air for a second, fingers twitching, stunned by the contact, by the way you came to him so easily, so willingly, after all of it.
He exhales. The air leaves his lungs like itâs been caged there for years. His shoulders drop an inch. His spine slackens just enough for him to bend down.
He lifts his arms slowly, like heâs learning how to move again. His fingers brush your back, light and unsure, but you donât flinch. You donât pull away. So he lets his palms flatten, one at the curve of your spine, the other curling loosely over your shoulder.
He breathes in.
God, itâs you. Soap and smoke and citrus shampoo. A hundred times heâs seen you crouched beside him on rooftops or hunched over a laptop, bathed in the blue glow of surveillance feeds. But this is different. This is you, pressed to him like you belong there, like the world outside can wait.Â
His grip tightens, no longer tentativeâarms looping fully around you now, hands grasping like he needs to keep you tethered, like if he lets go, youâll disappear back into a nightmare or a lab or a headline with your name misspelled. His chin tips forward until his face rests in the hollow of your neck, and itâs instinct, not thought that guides him there. His breath stirs the hair at your temple. He swallows hard.
(Itâs you. Itâs you, and youâre warm and safe and alive in his arms.)
Phainon closes his eyes and pretends like everything else in the living room doesnât existâthe weaponised duplicate in the file folder, the surveillance footage broken down to frames per second, the machine built in his image but stripped of everything human. He forgets about the mask you dropped, crumpled on the floor, and the voice in his head screaming that heâs made a mistake, that youâll leave once the shock fades, that nothing good can come of this.
Instead, he listens to your heartbeat. He memorises the slope of your shoulders beneath his palms, the soft way your hand has fisted in the fabric of his suit like youâre afraid he might vanish, too.
It comes to himâterrible and quiet and so obvious it aches.
He could be in love with you.
Not the kind of love he can shove into the seams of his second life. Not the safe, armâs-length affection that lives behind jokes and shared intel and the occasional brush of fingers across a coffee cup. No, this is the dangerous kind. The kind that makes you stupid. The kind that makes you soft. (The kind that makes you want.)
He wants a future he doesnât dare picture. He wants to walk down the street with you in broad daylight. He wants to take off the suit and be Phainon, just Phainon, and know youâll still look at him the same way.
(His hands tremble. You hold him tighter.)
Itâs that simple. You donât push. You donât speak. You just breathe against his chest, steady and unwavering and constant, like you always are. Phainon presses his mouth to your hair. His eyes sting, but he doesnât cry.
Itâs five in the morning, and Phainon is walking down a cracked sidewalk beside you with his suit half-zipped, his mask stuffed into your hoodie pocket, and a buzzing under his skin that heâs trying really hard to ignore. Youâre beside him, arms crossed against the early chill, leading the way like thisâwalking, togetherâis something you do all the time.
Itâs not a date, he tells himself. Itâs really not.Â
But you mentioned waffles. And your voice had been tired but warm when you said it. And he hadnât wanted to leave yet.
So here he is. Not skipping, because heâs got some dignity, but definitely walking with a little too much bounce for someone who found out heâs being reverse-engineered into a murder bot a little over an hour ago.
The cityâs quieter than it ever gets during daylight, the kind of hush that only exists in the space between the last bar closing and the first train running. A low mist clings to the ground, curling around traffic lights and benches and empty newsstands. Itâs eerie, maybe, but not unfriendly. Like the cityâs holding its breath right along with him.
Phainon doesnât know what heâs supposed to be feeling. Dread, maybe. Paranoia. Existential terror. But instead, all he feels is this weightless hum in his chest, the kind that makes you walk a little taller, swing your arms a little looser. The kind that makes you forget youâre still half in your gear and probably look completely insane.
You glance over at him as you cross the street, the corner of your mouth twitching like youâre trying not to smile. âYouâre doing that thing again.â
âWhat thing?â
âStaring at me.â
Phainon stumbles on a crack in the sidewalk. âIâm not,â he says, too quickly.
âYou are,â you say, not unkindly. âLike Iâm going to vanish or something.â
Phainon rubs the back of his neck, grateful for the relative darkness. âWell. I mean. You did break into a lab by yourself, so I wouldnât put it past you.â
âOkay, fair,â you concede, nudging him lightly with your elbow. âStill. Youâve got that face on. The one that makes me feel like Iâve got, like, a mysterious smear of radioactive ink on my forehead.â
âI donât have a face.â
âYou do have a face,â you say. âThatâs the problem now, remember?â
Phainon huffs out a laugh and looks away, suddenly all too aware of the morning air on his skin, of the fact that heâs not wearing his mask, of how easy it is to joke with you. Heâs not sure what scares him more: being turned into a weapon, or feeling like this.
You walk in comfortable silence for a block or two, hands tucked into your sleeves, your breath fogging slightly in the chill. The sky is bruising lavender and gold now, the edges of dawn beginning to soften everything.
Phainon chances a glance at you. Youâre watching the sky change colour like itâs a magic trick only you know the secret to, your expression soft and unreadable. Thereâs a crease between your brows, faint, but it smooths a little when a breeze picks up and rustles your hair. You look tired, not just from the lack of sleep, but from the kind of exhaustion that sinks into a person when theyâve seen too much, done too much, but still canât stop moving.
The diner sign glows into view at the end of the streetâwarm yellow and flickering red, letters half-burnt out so it reads INE R & GILL if you squint. Thereâs a figure leaning against the counter inside, wiping down the same spot with a rag thatâs probably older than both of you, and the place smells faintly of grease and syrup.
You pause in front of the glass door, one hand on the handle. âThis place okay?â
âItâs perfect,â Phainon says before he can stop himself.
You smile and push open the door. The bell on top jingles, and the waitress glances up from the far end of the counter. She gives you both a once-over, raises a tired brow at Phainonâs boots and long sleeves, and gestures to a booth without asking questions. Thatâs the nice thing about New Okhema City; nobody cares too much.
You slide into a booth with a contented sigh. Phainon sits across from you, knees knocking against the underside of the table. The vinyl squeaks under his weight, and the Formica is sticky, but he doesnât care. His hands feel strangely clean without gloves. The menu sticks to his fingers when he flips it open.
You donât even bother looking at yours. âWaffles, scrambled eggs, hash browns. Extra syrup.â
âThat specific, huh?â Phainon says.
You shrug. âGotta know your diner defaults.â
The waitress arrives with two glasses of water and a notepad. âYou kids look like youâve been up all night,â she says, though she canât be more than a few years older than you and Phainon.
âWe have,â you say sleepily, âbut we cracked a supervillain conspiracy, so it was worth it.â
The waitress doesnât blink. âCoffee?â
âYes, please,â you say, and Phainon nods too, grateful. She leaves without another word.
Silence stretches between you again, but itâs easy now, filled with warmth. The sky outside shifts more boldly into gold and peach, casting long shadows against the window. Phainon leans back into the booth and lets himself exhale slowly, deeply.
Your foot brushes against his under the table. He freezes. You donât move it.
He looks up, and your eyes meet his over the rim of your water glass. Thereâs something quiet there, soft around the edgesâexhaustion, sure, but something else too. A kind of trust heâs not sure he deserves. (Still, itâs there.)
Phainon thinks about how this shouldnât be possible. How the night started with fear and screaming and blueprints of his body, and somehow ended with this booth, this silence, this person across from him.
[18:04] Detective Brain: Spidey-lookalike broke into storage depot by Kephale Plaza. Iâm already on scene. Itâs not you, right?
[18:05] Detective Brain: Phainon. Please respond.
Phainon is already out the window by the time your second text comes through, barely bothering to latch it behind him. His fingers fumble for the web shooter at his wrist, and his heart is a fist hammering against his ribs. He almost misses the first jumpâlands hard on the ledge and has to steady himself with a rough palm against brick.
He doesnât even suit up properly. His gloves are half-fastened, the zipper of his suit stuck one-fourths of the way up his spine, but thereâs no time to care. Phainon swings hard across the cityâs mid-rises, momentum jerking through his shoulders, his aim slightly off with each launch. It doesnât matter. Heâll take a bruised wrist if it gets him to Kephale Plaza thirty seconds faster.
Kephale Plaza is a glass-and-steel monstrosity, flanked by wide loading docks and a security perimeter that no longer seems to matter. Phainon can hear the distant thrum of police radios as he swings into the industrial district, following the echo of sirens. Squad cars line the street outside the storage depot, lights flashing in fractured red and blue across the cracked pavement. Officers are forming a perimeter, but thereâs no crowd. Theyâre keeping it quiet.
He lands on the roof of an adjacent building, crouched low as his eyes sweep the scene.Â
He finds you posted just outside the warehouseâs side entrance, pacing like youâre trying not to burst out of your own skin. Your bulletproof vest is cinched tight, and your standard issue sidearm is still holsteredâbut your fingers are twitching near it, like youâre weighing every possible outcome of the past ten minutes. Your hairâs tied back, but loose strands stick to your face from the sweat already clinging to your skin. Heâs never seen you look so still and restless all at once.
He leaps down from the rooftop, landing in a crouch just behind a darkened patrol vehicle. No one sees him yet. He keeps to the shadows as he makes his war towards you.
The second you hear the shuffle of his boots, you whip aroundâand relax just as fast.
âJesus,â you exhale, taking a step forward. âOkay. Okay, thank God. I wasnât sure youâd even seen the message.â
âI left the second I did,â Phainon assures. âWhatâs the situation?â
Your lips tighten, and you turn, nodding for him to follow you a few paces away from the rest of the officers. Behind you, the front entrance to the warehouse stands yawning and dark, a single loading dock shutter half-raised.
âIt showed up fifteen minutes ago,â you say, pulling out your phone and flicking to the security cam footage. You angle the screen towards him. âTook out the motion sensors, and walked in through a window on the north side. No sign of forced entryâit knew exactly where to go.â
The footage is grainy, flickering, but the figure is unmistakable.
It moves like him. Too much like him. In the footage, the figure slinks down the hallway with the same kind of gait Phainon sees in himself. Every footfall, every pause, every angle of entryâitâs like watching him pace through a mirror.
Only this version is sleeker, meaner. Its limbs are thicker with muscle plating, and its suitâif you could even call it thatâis matte-black with streaks of purple circuitry flashing along the ribs and spine. Thereâs no emblem, no mask markings, just a blank, silver faceplate that reflects the ceiling lights like a shuttered camera lens. One blink and itâs gone, vanishing into the blind spots of the camera feed like it knows exactly where every pixel falls.
Phainon swears under his breath. âThey built it,â he mutters. âThatâs Flame Reaver.â
You glance up. âYou sure?â
He nods. Heâs gone through your stolen documents so many times that it feels like theyâve been branded into his skull. âPositive. Same proportions, same gait. But itâs not scanning the building. Itâs buying time.â
âFor what?â
Phainon doesnât answer at first. Heâs too focused on the still-looping footage. The moment the prototype slips out of view, he sees itâa flicker of something. It wasnât raiding. It wasnât looking for intel. It walked into that depot like it had a schedule to keep.
The realisation hits him like a slap to the sternum.
âWait,â he says sharply. âWhereâs your radio?â
You blink. âWhat?â
âYour radio,â he repeats, scanning your hip and vest and frowning when he sees the wire coiled but your earpiece missing. âYou always keep it on.â
âI took it out for a second. There was interference on the line.â
âNo.â Phainon turns, scanning the scene again with a new sharpness in his eyes. âNo, thatâs wrong. Thisâthis whole thingâitâs not a distraction. This is the distraction.â
âWhat are youââ
His head whips around, eyes scanning the perimeter. You were just here, right beside him, one step behind. Your breath was fogging the air. You were talking.
Now youâre gone.
Phainonâs heart lurches.
âWhere is she?â he hisses aloud, and suddenly heâs on the moveâscrambling up onto the nearest shipping crate, trying to get height, trying to see. The precinct lineâs holding firm around the building. Thereâs no breach. No one has come or gone.
Except you. Except whoeverâor whateverâcame for you.
He swings to the rooftop in seconds, breath tight in his lungs, wind clawing past his ears. His eyes sweep the blocks below in sharp, jerking passesâalley to alley, rooftop to ground, looking for anything that feels off.
On the north side, nestled between two disused factories and a rusted chain-link fence, an unmarked van idles in a narrow alley, almost hidden in the dip of a service road. Its brake lights pulse once, too soft to draw attention, but deliberate. A second later, the engine stutters and dies. The door clicks shut. Phainon stills.
From this height, the sounds of the city thin into a muffled hush: sirens echoing somewhere far behind him, police radios buzzing with disjointed chatter. But that alley, that vanâitâs too smooth, too clean. Thereâs no urgency to it, no panic. Just the slow, mechanical precision of something following protocol.
A figure steps away from the van, heading down a side street without looking back. Their stride is steady. Familiar.
Phainon freezes.
It looks like you: the same jacket, same utility belt, even the soft sway of your hair against your collarbone. Your badge glints faintly under the streetlightâyour badge. Not a replica.
Except itâs wrong. Youâre not there.
You wouldnât leave the perimeter without backup, wouldnât ditch your squad without a word, or abandon the very scene that had triggered every instinct in your body just ten minutes ago. At least, not without telling him.
And whoeverâor whateverâthis is, itâs walking away like it knows the exact timing window itâs working with. Like it wants him to follow.
âTheyâre splitting us up,â Phainon breathes, the words ripping themselves from his throat. Suddenly, the air feels thinner, sharper. His lungs burn.
He doesnât hesitate, doesnât even think before launching himself off the rooftop with a grunt, webline snapping out, slicing through the fog-damp air. He swings low, barely clearing a lamppost, and lands in a crouch beside the van. He can smell petrol, faintly.
Phainon yanks the door open. Itâs emptyâno driver, or equipment. Just the sharp, sterile scent of plastic and ozone. Itâs a burner vehicle, then. One they didnât plan on keeping.
âDamn it,â Phainon curses under his breath. He spins on his heel, already movingâuntil he hears a faint crackle. The buzz of a police radio. Your police radio.
He follows the sound, weaving between crates and dumpsters until he skids to a stop at the mouth of the alley, and finds your comm unit on the ground. One of the earbuds still dangles loosely from the coil, blinking a faint blue every few seconds. The rest of the radio is scuffed; not broken, just discarded deliberately, placed just far enough from the van to suggest you followed something willinglyâuntil it was too late.
A boot scuff mars the concrete nearby. There is another drag mark next toâa toe, maybe. Someone shifted. Or struggled. Phainon crouches low, brushing his fingers across the ground. His mind races through probabilities, scenarios. None of them are good.
It wasnât just a prototype in the warehouse. That was the shell, a puppet to get the cops talking, to trigger an investigation. Something visible, something obvious.Â
But this was the play: lure him in with the decoy, use it to lock the precinctâs attention, then send the real threat to steal what they really neededâyou.
Phainon grits his teeth as he stares down at your radio. His mind flashes to the schematics youâd shown him on your wall. Neural mimicry, behavioural mirroring, photo-accurate masking. It wasnât a bluff. They had footage, voice samples, enough to build a close-range approximation of him. Theyâd studied him down to the limp in his left knee.
Of course they had enough on you. You were the officer who was most often assigned with the task of tracking him down, after all.
He thinks of your laugh; the way you tilt your head when youâre about to argue; the furrow in your brows when youâre thinking too deeply. If theyâve copied thatâyouâdown to the way your voice hitches when you say his nameâ
His stomach flips.
âThey took her,â he says aloud, more to steady himself than anything else. âThey took her.â
Phainonâs fingers twitch, curling tight into fists. His web shooters press firm against his wrists. His gloves are still half-fastened. He fixes them now, fastens every strap, zips his suit the rest of the way up roughly. The breath in his chest is shallow and burning, but his hands are steady.Â
He swings back up to the rooftop, lands in a three-point crouch, and bolts across the ledge without a second thought. Every muscle in his body knows where heâs going: the old R&D site, the remnants of what used to be the government-sanctioned Theoros Labs.
Itâs a twenty-minute drive through the industrial corridor to get there. Heâll make it in seven.
Every swing feels sharper now, each launch of webbing tighter, more exact. The buildings blur past him, and his breath comes in hard, rhythmic exhales. He canât afford to be wrong. Canât afford a detour. The further they pull you away, the less chance he has of reaching you before whatever they built decides it doesnât need you alive.
Phainon lands on a rooftop, skids into a roll, fires another web and propels him back into the air. Hold on, he thinks. Please, just hold on.
The air near Theoros Labs smells like ozone and old metal.
Phainon lands hard on the broken rooftop of a utility shed just outside the main building. Itâs darker here than it should be. The outer perimeter lights have all been shut off, either manually or by remote override. Only a few flickering emergency bulbs remain, casting a jaundiced glow over the facilityâs skeletal frame. Ivy creeps up the cracked walls, half-swallowing faded corporate logos and biohazard signs. The chain-link fencing has been torn down in places and rusted through in others.Â
Itâs too quiet.
He moves carefully, sticking close to the shadows as he approaches the main entranceâwhatâs left of it. The glass doors have been forced open, one of them dangling from its hinges. Inside, the lobby lies still and cold, floor tiles coated in dust. But someoneâs been through recently. Fresh boot prints disturb the grime, overlapping in frantic patterns. You were here. He follows your footprints past collapsed hallways and rusted biohazard doors. Most of the rooms are strippedâjust empty labs and decaying workstationsâbut the deeper he gets, the cleaner it becomes. Dust thins. Wires appear. Lights flicker to life as he passes.
Theyâve reactivated the lower level. Phainon descends a wide staircase lined with old safety tape. The sub-basement has power. Soft white fluorescents hum overhead. The floor is concrete, sealed and buffed, with clean drag marks across it. The walls are lined with black server towers, cords feeding into sealed doors.
Phainon stops mid-step; thereâs a tingle in the back of his neck. Someone else is here, too. His muscles go taut, fingers curling half-ready near his web shooters.
âAh, Mr. Spider-Man,â a voice drawls, drawing out the vowels. âOr should I say⊠Phainon?â
Thereâs a hiss behind one of the sealed doors to the left. A vent releases a thin ribbon of steam.
âDonât be shy. Youâve already made it farther than most,â the voice says, and this time, itâs accompanied by footsteps echoing against the polished concrete, slow and confident. âI imagine you have questions. Thatâs good. I admire curiosity. Itâs a very human trait.â
The man who steps into view is tall, lean, draped in a sleep lab coat far too pristine for a place like this. His shoulder-length hair is slicked back, and most of his face is covered by a visor. His ID badge is clipped to his chest, name and clearance codes etched in a crisp black print.
Lycurgus smiles like heâs greeting an old colleague. âThis facility was never truly abandoned, you know. That was just a convenient myth. Theoros was⊠restructured. Privatised. Reoriented towards more ambitious pursuits.â He gestures to the space around him. âWelcome to our prototype cradle. Or, as we researchers like to call it, Stage Zero of Irontomb.â
Phainonâs voice is low, sharp. âWhere is she?â
âYour detective, yes?â Lycurgus says. âShe is safe. Unharmed, though mildly sedated. Sheâs being prepped for mapping. Itâs better if she doesnât wake up mid-scanâthe sensory feedback can be unpleasant.â
Phainon steps forward. âYouâre going to let her go. Now.â
âOh, Iâm afraid thatâs not going to happen.â Lycurgus tilts his head. âSheâs far too important. As are you.â
He moves towards a glass-paneled observation window. Behind it, a dark chamber pulses with slow, blue strobe lighting. Machines hiss softly within. Something looms in the shadowsâtaller than a man, hunched forward, hooked into a loading rig like a sleeping animal.
âI know what you think weâre doing here,â Lycurgus continues. âMass production. Automation. Violence. And, to be fair, yesâwe are building weapons. But not just weapons. Weâre building evolution.â
âYouâre building copies,â Phainon corrects.
Lycurgus lets out a chuckle, quiet and indulgent. âFlame Reaver was a crude iteration. Incomplete, too reliant on mimicry. It served its purposeâchased its prey, gathered its data, misled your little precinct. But Irontomb⊠Irontomb will do more than chase. It will predict, integrate, override, think.â
He turns back to Phainon. The placid smile fades, replaced with something hungrier.
âWeâve spent years reverse-engineering your every decision. Every rooftop sprint. Every moment of hesitation. Every kill you didnât make. We mapped your instincts, modeled your reflex latency, simulated the split-second calculations behind your webbing patterns. All of it.â
He taps the side of his own head. âBut it wasnât enough. Something was missing. Something the data couldnât replicate.â
âYou mean her.â
âYes.â Lycurgusâ smile returns, tight and reverent. âYour control variable. Your compass. We needed to understand how a creature like you formed attachments, what altered your judgement. What humanised you.â
Phainonâs voice is a growl. âSheâs not a variable.â
âSheâs your pivot, Spider-Man. The reason your risk matrix fluctuates. The reason you pause before you strike. She made you less efficient, and, therefore, more valuable. Which is why we modeled her too. Her responses, her patterns, her tone modulation, her biometric data when sheâs afraid. Itâs poetic, really. We used her to finish the algorithm that began with you. The perfect balance of speed and restraint.â
The lights behind the glass pulse brighter. The figure in the chamber stirs. Itâs not the Flame Reaver. Itâs something else.
Its silhouette is bulkier than his, but it looks wrong. It has slender limbs with plated joints; a split maskâhalf red, half mirrored black; a narrow torso fitted with impact dispersal panels. Something that looks like a spine runs down its back, glowing faintly green. Phainon doesnât recognise the material, but he can feel the heat rolling off it through the glass.
âItâs a neural sync model,â Lycurgus says, not even trying to hide his pride, âcoded from your reflexes and her empathy thresholds. Itâs capable of piloting independently or under network command. It doesnât hesitate. It doesnât panic. And, most importantly, it doesnât forget.â
Phainonâs heart hammers. His blood feels like itâs gone cold. âYouâre trying to make a Spider-Man that doesnât need a person inside.â
Lycurgus meets his eyes. âExactly.â
The machine twitches, then steps forward. Its footfalls are silent. Too smooth.
âYou two were only ever reference material,â Lycurgus intones. âAnd now that the templateâs completeâwell. All we need are the final scans.â
âWhere is she? Where is she?âÂ
Itâs all Phainon can do to stop himself from ripping Lycurgusâ throat out. The scientist merely adjusts the sleeve of his lab coat, as if the demand were a mild inconvenience.
âSheâs nearby,â he says coolly. âLower containment. Cell B-4, off the neural calibration wing. You wonât get far without triggering lockdown, of course. And even if you doâby the time you reach her, Irontomb will already be online.â
Behind the glass, the machine lifts its head. The sound it makes isnât mechanical. Itâs worseâsoft, distorted, like the playback of a familiar voice through cracked speakers. It twitches once, then again, shoulders rolling into a combat stance eerily like his own.
Phainon doesnât wait. He fires a webline directly at Lycurgus and yanks. The man stumbles, but Phainon slams him against the server wall hard enough to knock the breath out of him. Wires clatter. A tower crashes sideways.
Lycurgus laughs, even as Phainon pins him in place. âYou think youâre here to save her,â he says, breathless, âbut youâre too late. Sheâs already part of it.â
âI swear to Godââ Phainon hisses, pressing the heel of his palm to Lycurgusâ throat. âI swear to God, if you touched herââ
âI didnât have to,â the man croaks. âShe volunteered. Not knowingly, of course. But those scans she took from our systems? They included a compressed tracer file. As soon as she opened them, our systems opened her. The sync began the moment she pieced it together. Everything she knowsâtactical behaviour, voice modulation, interrogation strategyâitâs all feeding the AI as we speak.â
âYou fed off of us.â Phainonâs grip tightens. Lycurgus grunts.
âYes,â the scientist says. âAnd you should be proud. Irontomb wonât just replicate your choicesâit will refine them, strip away all the guilt, the softness. It will be cleaner. Smarter. Perfect.â
Something shudders behind the glass. The observation lights dim.
A low thrum starts up from behind the glass, like a heartbeat filtered through static. The strobe pulses once, then again, casting the chamber in a deep, electric violet. Inside, Irontomb lifts its hand with unsettling grace and slowly curls its fingers into a fist. The joints click into place with too much precision. A webline ejectsâthin, metallic, laced with a crackle of electric currentâand shoots into the rafters. It latches onto the ceiling brace, and just like that, the chamber is empty.
The reinforced door behind Phainon slams open with a hydraulic hiss. He whirls around. Lycurgus barely has time to flinch before Phainonâs hand closes around his collar and hurls him to the ground. The scientist crashes into the wall beside a rack of servers, skull cracking against plastic. A second later, the emergency klaxons explode to life, screaming overhead in jagged bursts.
CONTAINMENT BREACH. HALL A-7. PRIORITY UNIT ACTIVATED.
Red warning lights flare to life, pulsing in harsh rhythm. The sterile corridor floods with shadow and noise. Phainon bolts.
Thereâs no time to thinkâhe fires a webline into the open mouth of the elevator shaft and dives. Wind roars past his ears. He drops three floors in seconds, catches himself on a rusted support beam, and slams down onto the concrete sublevel with a bone-jarring thud. His boots hit the ground hard enough to rattle the pipes overhead.
The lower corridors are not like the rest of the facility. Thereâs no dust, no decay. These halls are clean, too cleanâlike the world above was only a façade. Bright, artificial light hums from the ceiling. Every footstep echoes.
He sprints forward, ducking under support beams and sliding past corners. NEURAL CALIBRATION â, the wall tells him. He follows the signs, pulse thundering. Every flicker of motion at the edge of his vision makes him tense. Every blinking light feels like a red eye watching.
Phainon skids to a halt in front of a door labelled Cell B-4.
The door is solid, made of reinforced steel with a flat-panel biometric reader. Thereâs no handle, or keypad. Phainon swears. âCome on, come onââ
From the other side, something shifts. He hears a voice, muffled and strained. â...Phainon?â
He chokes on relief. âIâm here.â
Youâre alive.
He scrambles to his web shooter, fingers flying over the dial. He adjusts the pressure valve, toggles it to maximum discharge, and fires at the scanner from point-blank range. The panel erupts in sparks. Circuits shriek. The door eases open, exhaling sterile, recycled air into the hallway.
Youâre inside, strapped to a containment recliner, limbs limp but intact. Wires trail from your temples, your clavicle, your pulse points. A monitor nearby is still running diagnosticsâwaveforms still climbing and falling in time with your heart. Your eyes crack open, bleary, and your head lolls to the side.
âHi,â you whisper, voice thin as gauze.
âHi, yourself,â Phainon says, crossing the room with long strides. His voice breaks.
His hands go straight to the leads, fingers trembling as he tears them free. Adhesive snaps off skin. Electrodes clatter to the floor. He moves gently, cradling your jaw to keep your head upright as he removes the final lead from behind your ear.
He lifts you from the chair. Your body sags against his chest, legs folding beneath you. You groan softly as your feet try to hold your weight, but he doesnât let them. He tightens his grip until youâre fully anchored against him. You smell like static and sedation. Like cold metal and something scorched.
âIrontomb,â you breath, half-slurred. âItâs awake. It⊠used me. Ran simulations. My voice. Myââ
âI know,â he murmurs. âI know. Weâre getting out of here.â
You lean heavier into him with every step he takes away from the chair. Your breathing is uneven, shallow. But Phainon can tell youâre coming backâyour pulse steadying, your fingers twitching where they rest near his collar. He wants nothing more than to get you out, to break every wall between here and the surface, to make you forget this place ever existed.
But the walls hum. The lights tremble. Heâs not fast enough. The reinforced door behind him explodes inward.
Irontomb barrels through in a burst of silver and red. The strobe overhead flickers with the force of its entry, casting the scene in freeze-frame shadows. It doesnât look like a machine as it charges. Phainon spins, turning his back to the blast to shield you. Debris pelts his shoulder as the room shakes. Irontomb stops, silent and still, in the doorway. Its mirrored mask splits slightly, revealing a narrow gleam of green light that pulses in rhythm with the lithium core humming somewhere deep inside it.
The voice it speaks with is your own.
âPhainon.â
The blood drains from his face.
You stir weakly in his arms. âThatâs notâthatâs not meââ
âI know,â he whispers.
It tilts its head, mimicking the motion exactly. âYou hesitate at a 3.2% deviation rate when sheâs within ten feet. Your aim skews left. Your heart rate spikes.â
Phainon doesnât respond. He adjusts his grip around your waist, gently easing you towards the floor behind him.
âYou always protect the variable, even when the variable is hunting you down,â Irontomb says. âThat makes you predictable.â
Phainon doesnât wait for it to move. He fires. A blast of webbing snaps towards the machineâs legsâbut it dodges, not quickly or instinctively, but perfectly. It anticipates his angle, catches the web in midair with one mechanical hand, and yanks hard.
Phainon is ripped forward off his feet and slammed into the wall hard enough to fracture plaster. He recovers fast, flipping up and sticking to the ceiling. His shoulder throbs. The moment Irontomb lunges again, he launches, meeting it midair. They clash in a whirl of webbing, steel, and bone. Irontomb fights like itâs studied him for yearsâand it has. It parries his kicks, reads the tension in his arms before he swings. It knows where heâll move before he does.
Every strike Phainon throws is met with a calculated block, every dodge answered with a counter-blow. The machine is faster. Stronger. But not desperateâand Phainon is desperate.
âThe server room!â you shout, and Phainon sees you staggering up to your feet, still valiantly trying to fight whatever they injected into your bloodstream. âTake it to the server room! Follow me!â
Phainon doesnât hesitate. He hears your voiceâunsteady, but clearâand thatâs all he needs. He spins midair, flips back onto the ceiling, and fires a pair of quick weblines towards Irontombâs shoulders. They stick, just barely. The machine lunges to rip them off, but Phainon yanks hard, using the momentum to slam Irontomb face-first into the far wall with a screech of metal on metal. The moment the machine hits, Phainonâs already moving.
âGo!â you shout again, breath ragged. âDonât fight it hereâthey control the lithium core from the server room!â
Phainon tears towards you, lands beside you, and sweeps an arm around your waist to stabilise you just as you start to buckle. Your skinâs cold with effort, sweat sheening your forehead, but your grip on his suit is firm.Â
âCan you run?â he pants.
âCan you carry me?â
He grins through bloodied teeth. âAlways.â
He hooks one arm under your legs and lifts you effortlessly, pivoting towards the corridor just as Irontomb peels itself from the wall. The lights in the hallway ahead flash red with the alarm, casting everything in pulses of warning. Phainon doesnât look back. He runs.
You clutch at his shoulder as he barrels down the corridor, webbing the corners ahead of him to pivot faster. Irontombâs footsteps are thunder behind youâprecise, mechanical, relentless. It doesnât rush. It doesnât pant. It just follows, its gait perfectly even as it absorbs every new piece of data from your movement, your trajectory, your speed.
âItâs learning again,â you murmur.
Phainon grits his teeth. âTell me where to go.â
âLeft!â you gasp, pointing weakly down the branching corridor as you cling to his shoulder. âThe blueprints said the server room was by the freight lift, and IâI stole Lycurgusâ key card before he sedated meââ
Phainon veers sharply, feet sliding for purchase on the slick floor as he swings you into the left hallway. Behind him, Irontomb adjusts its trajectory instantly, recalibrating mid-chase, its movements eerily silent save for the low whir of its servos and the electric buzz of its core. Every footstep lands with surgical precision, not wasting an ounce of energy.
He finds the lift shaft up ahead, the gate already torn off its hingesâsomeone had passed through here in a hurry. Phainon doesnât stop running. He fires a webline to the upper scaffolding and swings both of you through the open shaft.
The moment youâre both airborne, Irontomb enters the shaft behind you. You hear it climbing. It doesnât need webbing. Itâs fast, powerful, climbing straight up the walls like a spider. A cold burst of static prickles the back of your neck as you look over Phainonâs shoulder and see its split-face mask glowing faintly with that same green hum pulsing in time with your own heartbeat.
âDonât look down,â Phainon mutters through clenched teeth.
âYou mean donât look up,â you reply, voice tight.
He doesnât argue. Two more floors. Thatâs all you need.
Phainon angles towards the next levelâs opening, yanks hard on the web, and swings both of you clean through it. You hit the ground hard, momentum rolling you both across the floor in a rough tumble. He absorbs most of the impactâshoulder first, then hipâbut keeps you tucked in his arms the whole way.
The server roomâs door looms ahead, sealed with thick glass and reinforced by a biometric panel.
âCan you override it?â he asks, already placing you down on your feet.
You stagger once, then nod. âIâI can try.â
Phainon presses a palm to your lower back, steadying you as you stumble towards the wall-mounted keypad. You swipe your stolen access cardâLycurgusâ clearance still hot in the systemâand slam your hand against the override scanner. It flashes yellow, then green.
The second the server room door hisses open, Phainon knows itâs wrong. The air is too clean, too still, not like a hospital, but lifeless, like the room itself doesnât care if he walks in or burns alive. Server towers stretch in columns across the floor, blinking. The lights arenât just white, theyâre clinical, buzzing just above his pain threshold. Everything smells like copper and static and scorched plastic.
At the far end, housed behind reinforced glass, is the core. It pulses, like a heartbeat, except itâs not alive. Itâs lithium, itâs electricity, itâs something that was never supposed to breatheâbut it is, somehow.
He doesnât like it.
He crosses the threshold, half-dragging you with him. Youâre a weight he doesnât mind carryingâyouâre grounding, real, a reminder that not everything in this godforsaken place is synthetic or made in a lab.
âIâll buy us a minute,â he mutters.
You donât respond. Youâre already goneâmentally, physicallyâmoving with purpose even though you can barely stay on your feet. He wants to help you, wants to make you sit down, but he doesnât. Youâve always been like this: stubborn, focused, razor-sharp under pressure. He admires it even when it scares him.
He stations himself at the door, arms braced and knees bent. His ribs hurt. His headâs still ringing from the last slam against the wall. But adrenaline is louder than pain.
The wall explodes. He hears it before he sees itâthe thrum of Irontombâs feet, the deep thunk-thunk-thunk of heavy footsteps.
âPhainon,â it says again, in your voice. âYou hesitate at a 3.2% deviation rate when sheâsââ
âYou said that already, dipshit,â Phainon snarls, hurling himself forward.
He slams into Irontomb. The impact jars through every vertebra in his spine, but he doesnât stop, doesnât give it time to recalibrate. His shoulder clips its chest hard enough to knock them both off balance, and they go crashing through a row of server towers in a spray of sparks and shattering plex.
Irontomb hits the floor, skidding, its limbs flailing for a fraction of a second. Phainonâs already on it, knee to the chestplate, webbing its arm to the ceiling in a single fluid movement.
âYou donât get to use her voice,â he spits, voice hoarse, hands shaking as he fires again. Webs stick to its mask, its joints, anything he can reach. âYou donât get to be her.â
Irontomb doesnât flinch. Its head tilts again, that creepy mimicry sparking rage like gasoline in his chest.
âShe is a variable,â it says, still in your voice. âAll decisions lead back to her. All risk converges.â
He grits his teeth. âShut the fuck up.â
It wrenches its arm free from the ceiling and drives a knee into his ribs. Something cracksâhe doesnât have time to find out what. The air is knocked out of him, but he rolls, using the momentum to web-sling up to the overhead rigging.
He fires a line down, yanking hard. Metal groans, and a rack of exposed conduit tears free, crashing down onto Irontombâs legs. The machine stumbles, crushed under the weight for a beat too long. Enough for Phainon to dive.
He hits it again, fists slamming into metal, fury blinding him. He doesnât have a plan anymore, doesnât need one. He just needs to keep it away from you. Even as he fights, he hears the beep of the console across the room, feels the glow of the core intensify.
Youâre doing it. Youâre actually doing it. Irontomb knows.
It shoves him back with unnatural strength. Phainon hits the wall hard enough to dent the steel. Before he can stand, itâs already halfway across the room, limbs unfurling, shoulder joints clicking, webline primed to fireâ
âNo,â Phainon croaks. He pushes himself up, panting, every inch of him burning, and fires. Web meets Irontombâs leg. The pull is immediate. But instead of resisting, he yanks himself towards itâinto itâslamming shoulder-first into the side of its neck just as it raises an arm to fire at you.
They crash to the floor, grappling, fists slamming into one another like machines. Except Phainon isnât one. His body gives, bruises, bleeds. Irontombâs doesnât.
âYour biology is compromised,â it says. âYou are inefficient, slower, in pain. The variable will not survive long without augmentation.â
âYouâre not her,â he spits. âYou donât even sound like her.â
Out of the corner of his eyeâthrough the haze of painâhe sees you rise to your feet, the console spitting warnings in every direction. Your hands hover over the control screen. One more step, one more commandâ
The core behind the glass begins to scream, not audibly, not to the ears, but inside his skull. Irontomb shudders beneath him. Its limbs jerk erratically, the green glow from its spine flickering. Sparks burst from the plates along its back.
You did it.
Phainon throws himself back just as Irontomb seizes violently, crashing to the floor, limbs twitching. Its mask fractures. Smoke pours from the base of its spine as the lithium core begins to destabilise.
He doesnât exhale until the lights stop flickering. Heâs already moving before the sound fades completely, his muscles sluggish, overworked, body bruisedâbut moving. His chest is burning. His lungs taste like copper and ozone. His ribs feel cracked. But none of it matters.
Youâre still on your knees, hunched over the console, and for one horrifying second, youâre not moving.
âHey.â He drops down beside you fast. âHeyâhey. You good? Talk to me.â
Your head lolls towards him, eyes glassy with exhaustion but alert. You nod and he catches your weight as you say sideways into his shoulder.
âIâm here,â you say, voice like sandpaper.Â
âYeah,â he breathes. âYeah, you are.â
He pulls off his mask and folds one arm around your back and steadies you against him, his gloved hand cradling the back of your neck, just to prove youâre really here. Still warm. Still breathing. Your heart thuds weakly through your shirt when he presses his other hand to your chest, just fast enough to reassure him that the nightmare hasnât reset.
You lean into him more fully, your head tucked under his jaw, like youâre afraid to look at the room behind you. Good. You shouldnât have to. Heâll look for both of you.
The servers are smoking. Irontomb is a heap of metal now, sparking quietly beside the remains of a shattered cabinet. One of its hands is still twitchingâreflex, probably. Not real. Not alive.
Still, Phainon keeps you close.
You shift, barely enough to get your mouth near his collarbone. âYou okay?â
Phainon lets out something halfway between a laugh and a groan. âGonna need twelve years of physical therapy. Minimum.â
Your breath catches on a tired laugh. It sounds like a miracle.
âYou look like hell,â you murmur, slurring a little now, like the adrenalineâs finally wearing off.
âYeah, well,â he mutters, pressing his forehead to yours. âYou shouldâve seen the other guy.â
Itâs three in the morning, and the sky is the colour of soot.
The city below doesnât sleep so much as it holds its breath. The clamour of traffic has thinned to a distant hush, streetlamps stutter, and a single train rumbles across a bridge miles away. Sirens have long gone quiet. No engines scream. No horns beg for way. The night is still, but not gentle.
Itâs a stillness born of aftermathâsharp-edged and hollow, as if the concrete itself remembers what happened.
Phainon hangs upside down from a rusting fire escape three storeys above your apartment window, legs hooked neatly over a bar that groans faintly under his weight. Heâs perfectly still, suspended in gravityâs indifferent hold, his fingers hanging loose above the cracked sidewalk below.
This is how he thinks best lately: inverted, half a world away from the one that keeps asking him to play hero. The metal is cold through his suit. The air smells like dust.
Heâs grown used to these late hours. Heâs begun to need them.
After Lycurgus vanished off the grid, escaping into whatever black-market pipelines recycles men like himâscientists with messiah complexes and fingerprints scrubbed cleanâPhainon finds his pulse only slows in those long hours between dawn and dusk.
He watches your window. Itâs open again, just slightly. It always is now. Heâs never asked you why.
The official line is a âbiochemical systems breach.â Itâs what the public got. But the real reportsâclassified, sealed, redacted in wide black strokesâtold a different story. Theoros Labs didnât just go rogue; they were funded, sponsored, protected. There was infrastructure behind Irontomb, names buried in layers of clearance, strings running all the way up into the gut of the government. Someone had authorised the prototypes. Someone had approved neural mapping. Someone had known what they were doing.
Youâve testified three times already. You come home each time stiff-backed and silent, eyes rimmed in exhaustion, your voice quieter than usual like youâre still somewhere inside the sterile halls of the oversight committee. You never tell him the details, but you donât have to. Heâs seen the files. Heâs seen it in person. He knows what Irontomb made of your voice, how it pitched your laugh, how it whispered his name. He knows what it did to you.
You both have nightmares now.
Sometimes itâs Irontomb itself, eyes burning green behind a mirrored face, moving too perfectly to be real. Sometimes, itâs worse: itâs you, only not. Itâs him, only cold. Versions of yourselves that werenât forged in kindness or fear, but in numbers and algorithms, in prediction models and nerve signal scans. He wakes choking, palms clenched, sweat cold on his back.
Thatâs when he comes to you, climbing through the window, silent and unmasked. You never greet him. You just shift in bed, roll slightly toward the wall, and make room beneath the blanket without opening your eyes. Some nights he lies on his back and stares at the ceiling. Others, he faces you. Sometimes your fingers find each other under the sheets and tangle in that uncertain, half-asleep way that makes the silence easier to bear.
Phainon stares at your open window, at the way the curtain ghosts inward on the faintest breeze. The world looks soft from up here, but his world is down there, just beyond the windowsill.
He drops from the fire escape without a sound.
The thud of his landing on the balcony is soft. His boots press against the worn stone for half a second before he steps toward your window, one gloved hand brushing the glass as he ducks inside.
Your apartment is dim, lit only by the sleepy spill of orange streetlight filtering through the curtains. The air is warmer here, touched with the faint smell of cinnamon and coffee roast, and the remnants of detergent in your sheets.
Youâre curled up under the blanket, spine facing him, shoulders rising and falling in that slow rhythm heâs memorised. He doesnât know if youâre asleep or pretending. It doesnât matter. You always know when heâs here. You always leave the window cracked just enough.
He toes off his boots quietly, then strips off the top half of his suit, the fabric sticking to sweat-damp skin. His body aches with something deeper than bruises, like fatigue. But it fades the moment he lowers himself into the mattress behind you.
(Heâs in love with you, heâs pretty sure.)
âDo you want to date me?â
The question startles Phainon so much he almost drops the wire heâs threading back into place, and nearly slides off the metal railing altogether. He catches himself with a clatter, boots locking tighter to the beam, arms splayed for balance.
â...Sorry, what?â he calls down.
Youâre standing several feet below him, arms crossed, watching him with an unreadable expressionâequal parts brave and vulnerable. You donât repeat the question. You just lift your chin a little, eyes steady.
Phainon blinks at you from his upside-down perch, hair hanging towards the concrete, the city stretching behind him. Heâs in his suit, sleeves rolled up, mask bunched around his neck, grease on one knuckle, a thin wire looped loosely around his fingers. The early evening air is warm, golden light pooling along the skyline.
âYouâyou mean date-date?â he asks dumbly, like thereâs another kind.
You nod once, not smiling. âYeah. Date-date.â
Phainon stares at you, the wire still slack in his fingers. The sunlightâs catching on the edge of your cheekbone, painting it gold. You look so certain, so calm, like you havenât just thrown his entire nervous system into a tailspin.Â
He opens his mouth. Closes it. Then he scrubs a hand over his face, smearing a bit of grease across his jawline. âOkay. Thatâsâjust to be clear, youâre asking me if I want to date you. Like, go on dates, hold hands, maybe make out a little? Eat food together that isnât waffles at five in the morning?â
âYou make it sound so romantic,â you say dryly.
âIâm hanging upside down in my Spider-Man suit with wire cutters in my hand,â he says, voice rising an octave. âYou kind of caught me off-guard.â
You raise an eyebrow. âYou want me to come back when youâre right-side up?â
Phainon laughs, but itâs strained, caught somewhere between breathless and disbelieving. He shifts slightly on the bar. âNo,â he says. âNo, donâtâdonât go. I justâŠâ His fingers curl loosely around the railing. âYou really mean it? Like, seriously?â
You shrug, but your voice softens. âWhy would I joke about that?â
âI donât know,â he says. âI mean, have you met me?â
You walk a step closer, now standing directly beneath him. âYes. Thatâs kind of the point.â
Phainon stares at you, still upside down, still blinking like he hasnât quite caught up with reality. His breath stutters, shallow through parted lips. The last of the sun has dipped below the horizon, and now the city is painted in deepening blue, rooftops etched in sharp lines against a sky the colour of cobalt ash.
You, however, are still golden; still lit from the inside out, like the question didnât cost you anything, like you didnât just tip the entire balance of his world in six words flat.
He swallows hard.
âI want to,â he says. âI want to date you.â
You nod, just once. But the tremble in your exhale betrays you. âOkay.â
You shift a little closer to where heâs hanging. The wind tousles your hair. You squint at him.
âCan I kiss you now?â you ask.
Phainon opens his mouth. No sound comes out.
His brain is screaming, Yes, God, yes, obviously, what do you think Iâve been dreaming about every night for the last year? But what actually escapes his mouth is an undignified, âI meanâyeah. If you want.â
You smile, small but warm, and step forward until youâre close enough that he can see the flecks of light in your irises. His pulse pounds at the base of his throat.
âHold still,â you say.
And PhainonâSpider-Man, night-patroller, rooftop-skulker, awkward wreck of a man in loveâholds so, so still.
You reach up, slowly. Your hand is warm as it cups the curve of his cheek. He flinches a little, not because of the touch, but because of how gentle it is. Heâs not used to being touched like that. Your thumb brushes the edge of his jaw, dragging across the grease-stained skin. He forgets how to breathe.
Then, you lean in and kiss him.
Itâs awkward, at first. The angleâs all wrong. You have to stand on your toes, and he has to tilt just right, his body swaying slightly with the breeze, but none of it mattersânot when your lips touch his, not when the world goes so achingly, impossibly quiet. Itâs soft, firmer than he expects, and yet not rushed. You kiss him like youâve wanted to for a long time, like youâve thought about it, like the moment had already existed somewhere in your mind long before you asked the question.
Phainon melts. He doesnât move for the first few seconds; just hangs there, lips barely parted, letting you take the lead because heâs terrified that if he so much as breathes, youâll disappear. But then something in him sparksâan ancient, quiet wantâand he kisses you back.
He moves slowly, deliberately, meeting you where you are. His lips are dry and chapped from hours in the wind, but heâs warm beneath them, and his breath hitches in that small, helpless way that always happens around you. He tightens his grip on the bar, as though holding himself in place is the only way to keep from falling for real.
Eventually, you pull away.
His eyes open slowly, lashes low over dark, dazed pupils. His lips are parted, red and kiss-bruised.
âThat wasâŠâ He clears his throat. âWow.â
You smile, head tilting. âStill want to date me?â
âI want to marry you,â he blurts, then immediately flushes crimson. âI meanâhypothetically. Not now. Obviously not now. Iâm hanging upside down. Iâve got wire cutters in my pocket. But you get the idea.â
You laugh, and he grins.Â
âCome down, you idiot,â you say, still smiling. âBefore your brain floods and I have to explain to emergency services that Spider-Man died because he let his blood rush to his head.â
âYes, maâam,â he mutters, already adjusting his grip. With a practiced motion, he swings backward once, then forward, and flips cleanly down onto the concrete beside you in a crouch, landing with a thud and a soft grunt. He straightens slowly, rubbing at the back of his head.
When he looks up again, youâre already walking towards him. You grab the front of his suit, tug gentlyâand then kiss him again, properly this time. He melts into it, hands hovering at your hips. You take the initiative again, stepping closer, your fingers sliding up his chest to cup his face as your mouth slants against his. The second kiss is deeper, more certain, less careful.
When you pull away, you donât go far. You rest your forehead against his, both of you breathing hard. His hands settle around your waist now, not hesitant anymore, not unsure.
âYouâre sure about this?â he whispers.
âIâm sure.â
âOkay,â he says. âOkay.â
He kisses you again, because he can, because he wants to. Because thereâs no machine looming over his shoulder, no countdown, no artificial voice running simulations on how to hurt you best.
Thereâs only this: you, and him, and the golden hour dimming into twilight. Phainon lets you pull him back into the world right-side up.
Phainon thinks heâs a pretty good boyfriend.
Okay, maybe not, like, great. He has a running tab of things heâs fumbled: texts left on read for six hours because he was halfway across the city chasing someone with rocket boots, half-finished promises to pick up groceries, laundry thatâs been folded but never quite put away. Date nights sometimes fall through. Movie plans get postponed. He loses track of time a lot.
But he always comes home. He always makes you laugh, even when you pretend to be annoyed with him. He never forgets the dates that matter, and never lets you go to sleep without hearing that he loves you, mumbled or whispered or scrawled on a Post-It if heâs back late. Heâs trying. God, heâs trying.
And right now, looking at youâmessy-haired, breathless, flushed and sprawled across the mattress like you belong there, like you belong with himâhe thinks maybe heâs doing alright.
Phainon kisses down your ribs, trailing his mouth across your stomach. You shift beneath him, a little restless, a little expectant. He likes thatâyou trusting him enough to be open like this. It still hits him sometimes, like an aftershock, that you let him touch you like this. That you want him to.
He exhales slowly as he nudges lower, one arm curled under your thigh. His lips brush the inside of your hip, the softness of your skin, and he feels you shiver. Gently, he moves lower, and flicks his tongue over your clit.
You gasp, hand threading into his hair, and he smiles against you, slow and lazy and a little smug. He likes knowing he can do this to you. Likes knowing exactly how your breath hitches when he moves just right. He doesnât rush. He never does with you. Every motion is measured, learned, almost reverent. He listensâto the catch in your throat, the flex of your fingers, the little half-sigh you try to swallow and canât.
His grip on your hips tightens as you shift, as your thighs close around his shoulders, and he groans low in his chest, the sound vibrating softly between you.
âPhainon,â you whisper, voice thready. He loves the way you say his name. He hums again in response, and the way you respond to thatâyour spine arching, your mouth letting loose a litany of moansâmakes him want to give you more.
When he finally slides two fingers into you, careful and deep, you let out a sound that makes him smile. Phainon exhales against your thigh, the sound shaky with restraint. Your muscles flutter around him, every inch of you wound tight. He watches you fall apart in incrementsâyour fingers twisting in the sheets, your jaw slack with pleasure, your chest heaving.
âRight there?â he murmurs, half-teasing but wholly focused.
You nod, or maybe you donâtâyouâre too far gone to speak, but your body answers for you: the way your hips shift, the way your leg curls around his shoulder, the soft whimper that escapes your lips. He presses in again, just a little firmer, curling his fingers the way he knows you like.
His mouth trails slow kisses along the inside of your thigh, tongue flicking over sensitive skin. He never rushes. He never wants to. Not with you.
âPhainon,â you breathe again. âOh, fuckââ
He presses his mouth back to your folds, his fingers still working inside you with the same care. Heâs mapping you like heâs been doing since the beginningâlike every sigh is a star to chart by, every moan a signal flare. Heâs learned to read you in a language no one else gets to learn.
Youâre shaking now, your whole body strung tight as wire beneath his mouth. Your nails bite into his shoulder and you donât even seem to noticeâdonât seem to careâbecause youâre so close, teetering at the edge of your orgasm, sharp and sweet and inevitable.
A few more strokes and sucks and licks have you coming for himâarching, gasping, crying out his name. When the aftershocks start to fade, he eases off, kisses the softest parts of your skin as you tremble under him. His fingers slip from you gently. He brushes a hand over your thigh, up your hip, until heâs sliding over you again, kissing a slow trail back up your ribs and chest until heâs beside you.
Your eyes are closed, lips parted, still catching your breath. He watches youâeyes half-lidded, lashes damp, chest rising and fallingâand then you blink up at him, a smile tugging at your lips like youâre not quite sure how to speak yet. Your skin is still warm, flushed in a way that makes Phainon want to memorise every inch of you all over again.
He brushes his knuckles over your cheek in that way he does when he doesnât know what to say. âStill in there?â
You blink once, then smile with that crooked little grin he loves. âAsk me again in five minutes.â
He huffs a soft laugh and shifts to lie beside you, propping himself up on one elbow. His hand trails lazily over your stomach, fingers smoothing across the soft skin just above your hipbone, drawing idle shapes.
âNot bad for a guy who forgot to buy milk this morning, right?â he says.
You laugh and shove his shoulder. âPhainon!â
âI mean, I mightâve failed you on the breakfast front, but I like to think I made up for it in⊠other areas.â
You scoff, but itâs half a laugh, and the sound curls like a ribbon in Phainonâs chest. He watches the way your face softens when youâre amusedâhow your eyes crinkle at the corners, how your mouth fights not to smile wider.
âThatâs debatable,â you say, rolling to face him fully.
âOh, come on,â he says. âYou sounded pretty convinced a few minutes ago.â
âDonât let it go to your head.â
âToo late.â Phainon grins, and leans forward to bump his forehead against yours.
He feels like his heartâs trying to claw its way out of his chest, not in the life-threatening, nine-storeys-up, villain-hurling-him-off-a-building kind of way, but the kind where itâs just him and you, tangled in sheets, skin flushed. The kind of moment that makes his brain go a little fuzzy and his chest go tight, because heâs pretty sure this isnât just a good dayâitâs the day. The one people write songs and poems and stupid rom-coms about.
(Youâre right there, inches from him, breathing the same air, and all he can think is: I hope I never forget this.)
He tries to play it cool, like heâs not falling apart from something as small as the curve of your smile, the way your fingers brush along his jaw like youâre trying to memorise him right back. But itâs a losing battle. Heâs smiling too hard, the stupid kind that tugs at his cheeks.Â
âYouâre staring,â you say.
âYeah,â he says, without even pretending otherwise. âI know.â
His hand is still on your waist, the tips of his fingers tracing small, slow patterns into your skin. He wants to tell you a thousand thingsâabout how heâs never felt safer than he does when heâs beside you, about how it doesnât matter if the world ends tomorrow so long as he got to know what your laugh sounded like when it was just for him. But the words get stuck somewhere behind his teeth.
You roll your eyes at him like you always do when youâre trying not to smile. âWhat are you thinking?â you ask.
Phainon opens his mouth to say something clever. He doesnât. Instead, he says, âThat I like you.â
âYeah?â you say teasingly. âI had no clue.â
He smiles. âSometimes I think this isnât real. Like Iâm gonna wake up in some busted rooftop vent or in the middle of a car chase, and all thisâll just be some nice dream I had when my brain was low on oxygen.â
âItâs real,â you whisper. âDo you want me to kiss you like real people do? Because I will. Donât test me.â
(Phainon kisses you first, just to prove heâs real enough to do it.)
a/n: this is my favourite fic that iâve ever written. thanks for reading!
â geto suguruâs guide on fraternising with the enemy.
pairing: slytherin!geto suguru x gryffindor!fem!reader
synopsis: geto suguru has been your greatest rival since your first year at hogwarts, always outdoing you in class and always getting under your skin. when heâs picked as the hogwarts champion for the triwizard tournament instead of you, you think you couldnât possibly hate him moreâuntil he corners you one evening and asks for your help.
tags: romance, angst, action, rivals to lovers, hogwarts!au. profanity, jealousy, mild violence, etc. please let me know if i missed anything!
word count: 24.1k
a/n: reposted from my old blog with minimal changes, for posterity.
The only thing worse than losing to Geto Suguru is being expected to smile about it.
When the Goblet of Fire coughs out the charred piece of parchment with his name written on it, it feels as though the entire Great Hall erupts around you. Hoots of excitement ricochet off the enchanted ceiling, mingling with groans of disapprovalâchiefly from your housemates, who baulked at the audacity of a Slytherin representing Hogwarts. You, however, couldnât join in either chorus. No, you sit frozen at the Gryffindor table, lips pressed tightly together in an attempt to keep your tears at bay.
Geto Suguru stands from his place among the Slytherins, shrugging off his best friendâs arm from around his shoulders. His head turns, and somehow, through the sea of cheering faces, his gaze locks onto yours. There is something almost incendiary in his lookâsmugness molded into a smile, something defiant in the tilt of his jaw. You grind your teeth, irritated.
Suguru is now the Hogwarts Champion, elevated above the rest of you. You are nothing more than the runner-upâa title no one cares enough about to utter aloud.Â
âHard luck,â Utahime, your friend and the Head Girl, murmurs beside you, her hand light as a feather on your shoulder. Her voice is low and kind, yet utterly ineffective against the disappointment you feel. You give her a tight, forced smile, though your silence only seems to amplify her sympathy.
This wasnât how it was supposed to go. Not after years of outpouring your soul into every spell and hex you learnt, every essay you wrote, every late night spent at the library. You had scraped, clawed, and bled for this chance, and somehow, despite all your efforts, Suguru had stepped in and robbed you blind. The betting pool Shoko and Mei Mei had organised suddenly feels cruel in hindsight. Everyone had bet on either you or Suguruâno one else had even come close to being a contender.Â
The cool air of the corridor hits you like a balm, soothing the heat rising in your chest. You walk with no real destination, footsteps echoing faintly against the stone walls, until you reach one of the tall windows overlooking the grounds. Moonlight spills across the landscape, painting the Forbidden Forest with silver. You lean against the cold stone ledge and inhale deeply.
The bitterness simmering in your chest refuses to ebb. You had wanted this so badly, had poured every ounce of effort into proving you were the best, not just to Hogwarts but to yourself. But, as always, Geto Suguru had swooped in and stolen it from you.
âRunning away so soon?â
You donât turn immediately. Instead, you close your eyes and inhale slowly once more. When you finally turn, Geto Suguru stands a few feet away, leaning against the wall. His black hair is tied back neatly, save for a loose strand that falls against his cheek.Â
âI didnât realise I needed your permission to leave,â you say coolly, crossing your arms over your chest.
âItâs not as much fun winning,â Suguru says, âif my competition isnât around to see it.â
âCompetition?â You scoff. âThat implies we were on equal footing to begin with.â
His smile widens, and he takes a step closer. âYouâre not giving up that easily, are you? I thought Gryffindors were supposed to be brave.â
You want to snap at him, say something cutting enough to wipe that stupid self-satisfied grin off his face, but the words stick in your throat. Heâs insufferable, yes, but you know thatâs exactly what he wantsâto pull a reaction from you. And Merlin help you, heâs good at it.
âWhat do you want, Suguru?â you ask, exhaustion finally seeping into your tone. âShouldnât you be celebrating with the rest of your house?â
âOf course, but like I said, itâs no fun if my favourite rival isnât around to see it.â
You bristle at his words. âFavourite rival? You were desperate to beat me, Suguru.â
âSo were you,â he points out, and it takes all your self-restraint not to do something horrifically stupid like punch him in the face. âIf Iâm desperate, it only means youâre worth the effort.â
âCongratulations, Suguru,â you say hollowly. âYouâve won the Gobletâs favour. What do you want, a parade?â
âI want your help.â Suguru steps forward, his movements unhurried, his expression calculated.
You blink. âWhat?â
âYou should be proud,â he says. âYou were a close second.â
The words sting more than you would like to admit. You narrow your eyes at him. âSpare me your pity.â
âItâs not pity,â he replies. âItâs acknowledgment. Youâre good. Maybe even better than me in some ways.â
You suck in a breath sharply, thrown off balance. This is not what you expectedânot from Geto Suguru, at least. You ask warily, âIs this some sort of tactic to get me to like you?â
Your rival chuckles wryly. âNo, but itâd be stupid to ignore the fact that youâre good. You wouldnât have been the biggest threat to my name being called otherwise.â
His admission leaves you momentarily speechless, a rare occurrence when it comes to Geto Suguru. You canât decide whether to feel insulted or flattered, so you settle for glaring at him instead. The torch light softens the planes of his face, casting a warm glow on his cheekbones and the edges of his smile. He infuriates you so much.
âHelp me,â Suguru says again.
âAre you out of your mind?â
âIâm serious,â he says, folding his arms. âYouâre as competitive as I am, and you hate losing. If anyone understands whatâs at stake in this tournament, itâs you.â
âThatâs a very pretty way of saying you want me to do your work for you,â you shoot back.
âIâm asking because I know youâre capable,â he presses on, ignoring your jab. âYou think I havenât noticed how good you are at strategising? Or how quick you are to spot weaknesses, whether itâs in a spell or a person?â
You stare at him, suspicious. Itâs not the first time someone has acknowledged your abilities, but itâs the first time heâs done it. As much as you loathe to admit it, Suguru isnât the type to hand out compliments lightly.
âYouâre insane,â you say finally, shaking your head. âYou want me to help you win the tournament I should have been chosen for?â
Suguruâs expression hardens. âI want you to push me,â he says. âTo challenge me the way only you can. And when I winâbecause I will winâitâll be as much your victory as it will be mine.â
You consider his words. A small, reckless part of youâthe part that thrives on competition, on proving yourselfâbegins to wonder what it would be like to be a part of this, even from the sidelines. To have your brilliance tied to the triumph of something bigger than either of you.
âFine,â you say, voice clipped. âBut donât think for a second that this makes us friends.â
âOf course not.â Suguruâs easy grin slips back in place. âLetâs meet at the library tomorrow after dinner. Donât be late.âÂ
You donât reply, merely walking past him and heading back into the Great Hall. Utahime is probably wondering where you vanished off to, and as much as you hate her sympathy, you donât want to worry her, Shoko, and Mei Mei just because you were a sore loser.
The fireplace in the Gryffindor common room crackles with a sort of joyousness you canât be bothered to feel. Its warm glow dances across the walls, a merry flicker that feels utterly inappropriate given your current mood. The plush armchair youâve claimed for the eveningâone thatâs usually a source of comfortâis perfect for brooding. You curl into yourself like a grumpy gargoyle, letting your misery seep into the cushions.
Laughter echoes off the wallsâthe other students are busy gossiping about the Triwizard Tournament. Discussions about the champions and the potential tasks all merge into one unintelligible blur. The Triwizard Tournament is a magical contest held between the three largest wizarding schools of Europe: Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, Durmstrang Institute, and Beauxbatons Academy of Magic, with each school being represented by one champion, chosen by the infamous Goblet of Fire. The selected champions compete in three tasksâeach designed to test the studentâs magical ability, intelligence, and courageâand the winner gets to take home the Triwizard Cup.
The Durmstrang championâs brute strength, the Beauxbatons championâs unnatural graceâit all seems so irrelevant compared to the singular thought lodged in your mind like an annoying splinter: Geto Suguru is Hogwartsâ champion.
Youâre still seething about it. Not only has he outdone you in classes year after year, heâs now claimed the one thing you truly wanted. And then, as if that wasnât enough, the boy had the gall to corner you after dinner with a request that still makes your head spin.
You groan and bury your face in a pillow, muffling your frustration. The universe, it seems, has a cruel sense of humour.
âStill sulking, I see.â
You donât have to look up to know itâs Shoko. She has an unnatural knack for finding you at your most pitiful moments. When you peek over the pillow, you see her leaning against the back of a sofa, her robes askew and her hair half-tied.
âSulking is putting it lightly,â Mei Mei comments, her pale hair shimmering in the firelight. She takes a seat on the armrest of your chair. âIâd say this borders on full-fledged wallowing.â
You glare at both of them, hugging the pillow tighter. âGo away.â
âNo,â says Shoko, simply.
Mei Mei leans in conspiratorially, resting her chin on her hand as she observes you. âHonestly, itâs not the end of the world. So you didnât get selectedâbig fucking deal. Thereâs always nextâoh.â
âNext time?â you snap, sitting up straight. âThere isnât a next time, Mei Mei. This was the last chance.â
âExactly,â she quips with mock cheerfulness. âAll the more reason for you to savour your second-place status. Itâs a rare opportunity for someone as annoyingly competent as you.â
Before you can retort, Utahime appears, carrying a steaming cup of tea. She sets it down on the small table beside you and gives Mei Mei a pointed look. âStop tormenting her,â she says, shooing the girl off the armrest.
Mei Mei sighs dramatically but moves to the nearby sofa, lounging on it with her legs hanging off the arm. âSorry for trying to motivate her.â
âMore like antagonising her,â Utahime mutters, taking Mei Meiâs vacated spot. She turns to you, her expression softening. âAre you okay?â
âNo,â you admit. âBut I donât want to talk about it.â
âOh, for Merlinâs sake.â Shoko rolls her eyes. âItâs not like you lost to someone undeserving. Suguru is very competent. In fact, Iâd say heâs as good as you.â
âIs that supposed to be helpful, Shoko?â Utahime hisses. She pats your hand comfortingly. âIgnore them. Theyâre just jealous that they werenât even in the running.â
âJealous? Hardly,â Shoko says. âCan you imagine studying for our N.E.W.T.s while having to worry about whether weâre going to survive these godforsaken tasks?â She shudders, the thought of the end-of-year exams enough to make her lips turn downwards.
You shake your head, exasperated, but her words bring a small smile to your face. Utahimeâever the observant oneânotices, and squeezes your hand gently. âYouâll be alright. This doesnât define you. Youâre still brilliant, still one of the best witches Hogwarts has ever seen. And if Suguru doesnât see that, thenââ
âHe does,â Shoko cuts in unexpectedly. She crosses her arms, her gaze flickering over to the fireplace. âTrust me, he knows exactly how good you are. Why do you think he asked for your help?â
You gape at her. âHow didââ
âSatoru told me. He said Suguru left the Great Hall and didnât celebrate with the rest because he was busy searching for you.â
You blink. Youâd known Satoru, Suguru and Shoko had known each other since they were childrenâthey all belonged to three of the most prominent Pureblood families in the Wizarding Worldâbut you didnât think they were that close. Evidently, you were wrong.Â
But thatâs one of the main reasons youâre so desperate to prove yourself. Youâre a mere Muggleborn, a witch born to non-magical parents, and getting thrust into the magical world so quickly felt overwhelming. All of a sudden, you had an explanation for all the oddities that occurred when you were a childâteacups breaking even though you never touched them, books floating straight out of the bookshelf and into your hands. But it was clear that in the world of witches and wizards and strange creatures youâd only ever read about, you still had to claw your way to the top.
Geto Suguru, because of his privilege as a Pureblood, having grown up witnessing magic firsthand, was already one step ahead of you.
You despise him for it.
Shokoâs reminder of Suguruâs request makes irritation bubble up inside you all over again. âItâs not fair,â you say, fingers curling into the soft material of the cushion. âHe doesnât get toâhe has no right to ask me for help after I worked so hard to get here.â
Utahime and Mei Mei stay silent, not willing to come to any conclusions, but Shokoâs gaze snaps to you, her eyes narrowing. âAre you saying Suguru doesnât work hard either?â
âNo, Iâmââ You falter, the words getting lodged in your throat under Shokoâs unwavering stare. âI needed this. I needed to prove myself.â
Utahime squeezes your hand again. âIf you really donât want to, you could always say no.â
âCan I, though?â you ask, more to yourself than anyone else. âIf I refuse, and he loses, Iâll think itâs my fault for not helping him. And if I help him, and he wins, Iâll have to live knowing I contributed to his victory.â
âIs that really so bad?â Mei Mei chimes in. âIâm not sure what exactly is going on here, but from what I can gather, it feels like Suguru is genuinely asking for your help because he thinks youâre the best person for the job.â
âListen,â Utahime says, âwhatever you decide, it doesnât change anything about how smart you are, or how strong of a competition you were to him. Youâre still one of the top students Hogwarts has ever seen, and one silly competition isnât going to change that.â
You want to rebuke her words. The Triwizard Tournament isnât just some silly competition; itâs the one way you thought you could prove that you belong in the magical world just like Suguru and Satoru and Shoko, and the rest of the Purebloods do. But Utahimeâs gaze turns imploring, and you know Mei Mei and Shokoâs patience is running thin, so you muster up a smile.
âThanks, Utahime,â you say gratefully. âIâll think about it tomorrow.â
Shoko rolls her eyes, though not unkindly, and Mei Mei flashes you a grin. âWell, if weâre all done rescuing this one from her lonely little pity party, Iâm ready to go to bed,â she says, stretching her arms above her head.
Utahime glances at you questioningly, so you tell her to go ahead and that youâll come up to the dormitory in a few minutes. Shoko stays behind. When you meet her gaze, sheâs already looking at you, brows furrowed in a small frown.
âIâm sorry you didnât get in,â she says finally, âbut donâtâdonât do something reckless or hurtful, okay?â
She turns around and strides up the staircase to the girlsâ dormitory before you can ask her what she means by that. The common room is quieter now, the excitement of the champion selection having died down. You stare at the fire still crackling, and push down the sting of rejection that still hasnât gone away completely.
Geto Suguru is late.Â
Are you surprised? Of course not. If thereâs one thing he can be relied upon for, itâs his remarkable ability to waste your time. Still, knowing all this doesnât make it any less irritating, especially when he was the one who sought you out in the first place.
The library is colder than usual, the stone walls and high ceilings doing little to trap the dayâs residual warmth. You wrap your cloak tighter around yourself. At this rate, youâre starting to feel like a fool for agreeing to this. The library is otherwise deserted, as it usually is at this hour. Itâs just you and the librarian, Madam Pince, as well as a trio of Durmstrang students who have no business being here. They stare at you every now and then, huddled together. Your cheeks burn; if Suguru doesnât show up soon, youâll have wasted the evening for nothingâand youâll have the added humiliation of curious foreign students studying you like theyâve never seen another human being before.
The table before you is cluttered with blank parchment and unopened books, all untouched. The light from the sconces creates shadows that flicker and dance over them. Normally, the library is where you find peace. You can drown yourself in tomes about advanced charms or obscure potions, tuning out the noise of the castle. Tonight, however, the quietness grates on your nerves as you tap your quill against the tabletop impatiently.
The clock on the wall ticks. You glance at it for the fifth time in as many minutes, annoyed.
The doors creak open at last, and Geto Suguru finally strides in. His dark robes billow slightly as he walks. Thereâs a faint flush on his cheeks, and a stray lock of hair clings to his temple. He doesnât look the least bit apologetic.
âYouâre late,â you say, when he finally stops opposite you. You donât bother keeping the accusation out of your tone.
Suguru slides into the seat opposite you, entirely unbothered. âI had things to do.â
âLike what? Admiring your own reflection?â
âThatâs not a very nice thing to say, little lioness.â Before you can snap at him for the nickname, the Slytherin continues, âIf you must know, I was hunting for something important.â
âMore important than the meeting you asked for?â you retort, narrowing your eyes at him.
âIâd argue theyâre related,â Suguru says, and before you can press him further, he pulls out a crumpled piece of parchment from his pocket and spreads it out on the table.
You lean forward, your annoyance eclipsed by curiosity. The parchment is covered in messy, scrawled notes, and the handwriting is illegible in some places, but certain words stand out: fire, movement, creature.
Frowning, you ask, âWhat is this?â
âInformation.â
âAbout?â you prompt, though you have a sinking suspicion on what it is.
âThe first task.â
You blink. It hasnât even been twenty-four hours since the champions were chosen. Geto Suguru works quickly, you must begrudgingly admit. âWhere did you get this?â
âSnuck into the Headmasterâs office and nicked it from there,â he explains. âThe Durmstrang and Beauxbatons champions already know, Iâm sure.â
You nod. Heâs right. The Triwizard Tournament is more than just a friendly competition between schoolsâitâs a way for each institution to gain power and prestige. Itâs a matter of honour and pride, and a way to showcase each schoolâs magical prowess. Thereâs no doubt that the other champions are being helped by their respective school heads.Â
âWonât they notice itâs missing?â you ask, scanning the parchment once more.
Suguru scoffs. âDo you think Iâm an amateur? I duplicated the original parchment and brought it.â
You clench your jaw, fingers tightening around your quill. The words swim before your eyes, forming a picture you donât want to see. Fire, movement, a creatureâthereâs only one possible scenario, and your stomach churns at the thought.
âDragons?â you ask, voice quieter now, tinged with unease.
âPossibly,â Suguru says. âBut it could be something else. They might want to mix things up.â
âLike what?â you press. Different creatures run through your head, each more terrifying than the last. âManticores? Chimaeras?â
âToo wild,â he muses. âTheyâd want something dangerous but controllable. Something they can contain.â
You frown, thoughts racing. âA griffin?â
âUnlikely,â your rival says, tapping his fingers on the table, âbut not impossible.â
You sit back, arms crossed. Despite all these possibilities, Suguru doesnât seem fazed. He leans back as well, mirroring your position, eyes flickering to the parchment he stole from the Headmasterâs office. How is he not afraid? Your heart rabbits at the thought. Thereâs less than a month for the first task to take place; you and Suguru will have to map out all the possible outcomes and prepare for the worst. In a way, youâre gratefulâmaking a to-do list and crossing things off it one by one is one thing you can handle. The rest is up to Suguru.
âIf it is dragonsâor something similarâyouâll need to prepare for fire,â you begin. âA lot of it.â
âGo on.â
âYouâll need protective charms,â you say, scribbling it down on the blank piece of parchment in front of you. âAnd something to help with visibility. Smoke can be just as dangerous as fire if you canât see what youâre doing.â
Suguru nods slowly, his expression thoughtful. âGood points. What else?â
You hesitate, studying him. For once, he seems genuinely interested in your input, not just humouring you. Itâs disconcerting, seeing him so serious, so focused. âIf itâs not dragons, or any other big creature,â you say cautiously, âthen it could be something smaller but equally dangerous. Fire crabs, maybe. Or Blast-Ended Skrewts.â
âCreatures with coordinated attacks,â he murmurs, brows furrowing slightly. âThat would be challenging.â
âAnd if itâs not a creature at all?â you add, mind spinning with possibilities. âWhat if itâs something more abstract, like a puzzle or an obstacle course involving fire?â
He considers this, shifting in his seat. âThen Iâd need to think on my feet,â he says finally.
âYou mean youâd need to rely on luck.â You scoff.
Suguruâs placid smirk returns, and you immediately regret opening your mouth. He glances at you, and says lightly, âLuck has served me well so far.â
âOverconfidence isnât a strategy, Suguru.â
âNeither is pessimism,â he counters sharply.
You bristle at the remark but bite back the retort on your tongue. Arguing with him isnât going to get you anywhere, and despite your frustration, you know he needs your help. If he goes into the first task unprepared, it wonât be just his pride on the lineâitâll be Hogwartsâ, too.
You sigh, dropping your quill into your inkpot. âFine. If weâre doing this, then weâre doing it properly.â
He spreads his arms out, palms facing upwards. âThen thereâs only one thing left to do. We have to find a place to practice.â
The Room of Requirement is something of a Hogwarts myth, the kind of thing that people will bring up in conversation only to sound far more interesting than they really are. Itâs a concept shrouded in mystery, its existence neither confirmed nor denied, referenced only briefly in Hogwarts: A History as âa chamber of peculiar use, appearing only to those in great need.âÂ
For most students, the idea of a room that appears when one is in great need is nothing more than a charming storyâlike the rumours about the Bloody Baronâs long-lost treasure, or Peeves the poltergeistâs supposed alliance with the Slytherin Quidditch team.
Pacing up and down the seventh-floor corridor, opposite the tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy attempting to teach trolls ballet, you find yourself hopingâreluctantlyâthat this particular myth holds a grain of truth.
Mei Mei had mentioned it once, offhandedly, when discussing the lengths sheâd go to for privacy. âThe Room of Requirement,â sheâd said. âItâs the kind of place that knows what you need before you do. A bit unnerving, if you ask me.â At the time, youâd rolled your eyes and dismissed it as Mei Mei being her usual cryptic self. But now, with Suguru expecting a place where you can practice in secretâaway from prying eyes and endless questionsâyou find yourself clinging to the possibility of its existence.
You pause mid-step, glancing at the blank expanse of the stone wall. It looks as unremarkable as every other corridor in the castle. âGreat need,â you mutter to yourself, feeling a bit foolish. âRight.â
You begin pacing again, focusing on what you need. Your footsteps echo faintly in the empty hall. I need a place to practice, you think. A place where no one will interrupt. A place with enough room to practice spellwork, with everything I need.
On your third pass, something shifts. The air around you seems to hum faintly, and the smooth stone wall ripples like water stirred by some invisible hand. A door begins to materialise, the brass handle gleaming slightly in the torch light. For a moment, you just stare, half-expecting it to vanish as suddenly as it appeared. But it doesnât. It stands there, solid and tangible, as if it had been there all along and youâd just failed to notice.
Taking a deep breath, you grasp the handle and push the door open. The room that greets you is nothing short of extraordinary.Â
Itâs cavernous, the ceiling arching high above you like the vaulted nave of a cathedral. The walls are lined with shelves stocked with spellbooks, potions ingredients, and various magical artifacts. At the centre of the room, thereâs an open space with a dueling platform. You take a tentative step inside. To the side, there is a row of practice dummies, some made of rusty metal and some made of scuffed wood. The door closes softly behind you, sealing you into this impossibly perfect place.
âSweet Merlin,â you breathe out, marvelling.
You walk slowly around the room, taking it all in. The books on the shelves seem to shimmer faintly, their spines marked with titles like Defensive Charms for Advanced Duelists and The Art of Magical Adaptation. Some of the titles are ones youâve come across on your rare trips to the Restricted Section of the library, while others are entirely unfamiliar.
Still, a part of you canât shake the feeling that youâre trespassing. The room feels alive in a way the rest of the castle doesnât, as though itâs watching you, waiting to see what youâll do next.
You turn your attention to the dueling platform, running a hand over the smooth, polished wood. If Suguru has any hope of surviving the first taskâand youâre still not entirely sure why you care if he doesâthis is where youâll need to start.
The thought of working with him here, in this quiet, secretive space, stirs a complicated mix of emotions. Annoyance, of courseâheâs insufferableâbut also a grudging respect. Suguru may be arrogant, but heâs also skilled, and you canât deny the challenge of matching wits with him.
You sigh, glancing towards the door. Youâll have to tell him about the Room of Requirement soon, but for now, you allow yourself a moment of quiet triumph.
The Room of Requirement is real, and you found it.
Geto Suguru is understandably skeptical about the Room of Requirementâs existence, but words fail him when you take him to the seventh-floor corridor and show him. His incredulity crumbles into quiet awe when the door takes shape in front of you both, and you canât resist the smug grin that forms on your lips.
You push open the door, and, theatrically sweeping your arm out wide, say, âLadies first.â
âHow mature.â Suguru rolls his eyes but steps inside tentatively. His eyes widen when he scans the room, sees the bookshelves and the practice dummies and the dueling platform. A small scoff escapes his lips. âWow. I canât believe you found the Room of Requirement before me.â
âIâm sure being the Hogwarts champion means youâre always busy,â you comment, sarcasm dripping from your tone.Â
The champions arenât busyânot yet, at leastâand a lull in the excitement about the tournament was brought about chiefly by the professors assigning copious amounts of homework and essays. You have an essay on the influence of tea leaf clumping on upcoming Quidditch matches for your Divination class due tomorrow, but you canât bring yourself to care.
Suguru scowls. âForgive me for not wanting to waste my time on a wild goose chase.â
âI found the Room of Requirement, Geto. Itâs hardly a goose chase if it exists, is it?â
âTch. This was a fluke.â
âAre you going to continue debating about this roomâs existence while weâre in the damn room, or are you going to actually practice?â You sniff disdainfully, crossing your arms over your chest.
âYou want me to hex a practice dummy?â His smile returns, faint but just as mocking as ever. âHow riveting.â
âNo, actually,â you retort, your own lips curving upwards. You step onto the dueling platform and hold out your wand. âI want you to hex me.â
He falters, blinking at you owlishly. âYou want me toââ
âDonât get all worked up,â you interrupt. âItâs a practice duel, not a declaration of war.â
Suguru grins, teeth flashing in the dim light. He shrugs off his robes and leaves it in a heap on the floor. His tie is loose, and his shirt untucked, but he quickly ties his long hair up and clambers onto the platform, gripping his wand tightly. He steps back, adjusting his stance, and gestures for you to begin.
You donât hesitate. âExpelliarmus!â
He deflects the spell easily, wand slicing through the air. âProtego.â
The red flash of your spell rebounds harmlessly off the invisible shield he conjured, and before you can regain your footing, he counters with a quick Stupefy. You barely dodge it. The jet of light whizzes past your shoulder and strikes the wall behind you.
Gritting your teeth, you flick your wand and say, âIncarcerous!â
The ropes that shoot from your wand nearly catch him, but Suguru is quicker. He steps aside neatly, his wand a blur as he attacks with a Disarming Charm. âExpelliarmus!â
Your wand flies out of your grip and straight into Suguruâs waiting hand. You huff, cheeks flushed with heat and sweat beading on your forehead. Glaring at him, you gesture for him to toss it back to you. He obliges, maddeningly proud, and not a single hair out of place.
âI didnât realise Iâd be dueling someone so⊠unprepared,â he taunts.
âYou were just lucky,â you retort. You step back into position, determination to best him burning in your chest. âAgain.â
For the second round, youâre more prepared. Spells fly back and forth, crackling through the air. Suguru is fast, but youâre clever, weaving around his attacks and shooting back with different sorts of jinxes.
âConfundo!â you shout, aiming directly at his chest. Suguru deflects it with a flourish, but his stance falters for a split second. You donât waste the opportunity. âRictusempra!â The Tickling Charm hits him squarely, and he lets out an undignified yelp, doubling over with laughter.
âY-youââ Heâs laughing too hard to finish the sentence, face red and eyes watering. Clutching his side, he tries to regain control.
You lower your wand, a victorious grin spreading across your face. âWhatâs the matter, Suguru? Ticklish?â
He glares at you through his laughter. With a flick of his wand, he casts Finite incantatem, the general counter-spell for any minor jinxes or hexes, straightening up and smoothing out his shirt. âUnnecessary.â
Your smile widens. âOh, I donât know about you, but I found this particularly amusing.â
âResorting to petty jokes now, are we?â Still, you can sense the grudging respect in his tone. âNot bad, little lioness.â
âHigh praise, coming from a conniving snake,â you say, though the words lack their usual bite.
You enjoyed it, you realise. You enjoyed dueling with Geto Suguru, the one person who youâve had it out for ever since you joined Hogwarts. Flopping onto the floor and catching your breath, the thrill of the duel doesnât seem to wear off. Even Suguru fidgets with his wand, mouth set in a grim line. You tear your gaze away and stare at your own wand instead. There is something about being evenly matched with him, the way both of you anticipate each otherâs next moves, the way you dodge and attack with equal strength.
âSame time tomorrow?â Suguru breaks the silence.
You hesitate, then nod. âYeah. Same time tomorrow.â
In the centre is the bane of your existence himself. His long hair is half-down and pinned back. His robes are neat and pristine, the Slytherin crest and his Prefect badge gleaming. He twirls his wand between his fingers, lips curled upwards in a lazy smirk, though his eyes are as sharp as ever. The headline underneath the picture reads:
CHAMPIONS PREPARE FOR GLORY: INSIGHT FROM THE TRIWIZARD FRONTLINES
The Great Hall is noisy during breakfast, the smell of food and the cacophony of students eliminating all other senses. Your hand tightens around your fork and you stab at your eggs aggressively. Utahime takes the newspaper and flicks it open to the page with the Championsâ interviews.
ââHogwarts Champion, Geto Suguruâ,â she begins to read aloud, ââimpresses everyone with his unparalleled spellwork and ability to stay calm under pressure.ââ
Shoko, halfway through her toast, snorts. âSounds like he wrote it himself.â
ââWhen asked about his preparation for the first taskâ,â Utahime continues, ââhe credited his regimen to âcareful planning and focused practiceâ.ââ She pauses, raising an eyebrow at you. âDoes that sound familiar?â
You refuse to rise to the bait, though your cheeks warm despite yourself. Two weeks of training in the Room of Requirementâof dodging his spells, practicing wandwork, and biting back your own irritationâhave left their mark.Â
Mei Mei, peering over Utahimeâs shoulder, comments, âOh, look. He also mentioned something about collaboration. About how it elevates oneâs abilities.â
âHow diplomatic of him,â you mutter. âHe really loves the sound of his own voice, doesnât he?â
âTalking about me again?â
You freeze, the unmistakable drawl sending a shiver of annoyance down your spine. Looking up slowly, you find Suguru himself standing opposite you, flanked by Gojo Satoru. âMorning, Gryffindors,â the latter greets cheerfully, blue eyes twinkling. Suguru, however, merely slides into the seat across from you, his dark eyes not leaving yours. You grab your goblet and take a sip of your pumpkin juice just to have something to do with your hands.
Satoru drops unceremoniously on the bench next to Shoko without invitation, snatching a piece of toast from her plate. âMerlin, itâs lively here.â
âGo away, Satoru,â his female friend replies. âGet your own toast.â
âSharing is caring.â Satoru bites into the toast with gusto.
âI hope you choke on it,â Shoko says flatly.
Utahime mumbles an apology and leaves when the Head Boy, Nanami Kento, calls her over. They have to discuss something about the first Triwizard Tournament task that will be taking place the next day. Mei Mei escapes to the bathroom, leaving the four of you sitting by the Gryffindor table. Itâs a sight in itself, really, because itâs rare for Slytherins to be mingling with Gryffindors so amicably. Yet, Shoko and Satoru remain oblivious to the stares as they continue to bicker over breakfast, while you shift uncomfortably.
Suguruâs eyes flick briefly to the half-folded Daily Prophet near your hand. âEnjoying the article?â
Your stomach twists. âI havenât read it,â you lie, glaring down at your mutilated eggs.
âShame. I was curious about what you thought.â
âDonât flatter yourself,â you snap, though the heat crawling up the back of your neck betrays you. âWhy would I waste my time reading about you?â
âYouâre awfully defensive for someone who doesnât care,â Suguru says.
âI donât care.â
Satoru leans over. âDo you think theyâll hex each other before the first task? Iâve got ten Galleons on it.â
âMake it fifteen,â Shoko says, âand Iâll lend you my wand for the counter-curse.â
You glare at both of them, but Suguruâs voice draws your attention back. âSince youâre clearly not invested,â he says, tone light but eyes determined, âany advice for tomorrow?â
You blink. Of all the things youâd expected him to ask, it hadnât been this. âDonât get yourself killed,â you say bluntly.
He huffs out a soft laugh, shoulders shaking slightly. âNoted.â
âWell, this has been fun,â says Satoru, standing up and stretching his arms over his head. âBut I think Iâve exhausted our dear Shokoâs hospitality.â He swipes her goblet and downs her pumpkin juice.
âTouch my plate again, and Iâll set your robes on fire,â Shoko warns.
With a laugh, Satoru ruffles her hair and saunters off, leaving you and Suguru alone in this tense, uncomfortable silence. âGood luck tomorrow,â you say finally, not meeting his gaze.
âThanks,â he says, quieter than usual.
When he stands up to leave, you canât help but feel a pang of unease. The first task is tomorrow, and while you would never admit it, you hope he comes out of it unscathed.
Dragons. Your hunch about the first task was right.
The cold November air is sharp as knives, cutting through the layers of your robes as you grip the railing of the stands surrounding the makeshift arena. Excitement and dread churns together in your stomach, though youâd die before admitting the latter. The stands are packed, students and professors bundled in thick scarves and gloves, all leaning forward eagerly to catch a glimpse of the champions. Amidst the black of the Hogwarts robes, there is also the pale blue of Beauxbatons and the dark red of Durmstrang. The excitement is palpable, everyone buzzing with anticipation for the first task. You find yourself crammed in between Utahime and Shoko.
You swallow hard, keeping your eyes fixed on the arena below. The dragons are corralled in an enclosure just beyond the championsâ tent, their massive silhouettes casting long shadows on the frosted ground. Even from this distance, you can hear the occasional growl and the rustle of leathery wings.
âDragons,â Utahime mutters, rubbing her gloved palms together worriedly. âHow can they call this a school competition and then throw dragons at the students?â
âTheyâve done it before,â Shoko drawls lazily, though her sharp eyes betray her worry. Satoru stands next to her, arms crossed over his chest and lips pressed into a grim line. You shiver; itâs bad enough that Shoko is worried, but seeing the normally cheerful Satoru so serious makes you anxious. âAt least theyâre not asking them to fight them barehanded,â she continues. âThat would be more fun.â
You donât contribute to their conversation. Your gaze moves to the championsâ tent, barely visible through the enchanted mist that swirls over the field. Suguru is in there. You wonder how heâs preparing himselfâheâs facing one of the most dangerous magical creatures alive, after all. The thought makes worry pool in your stomach.
From somewhere below, a voice booms across the field, magically amplified to reach every corner of the grounds. âWitches and wizards, welcome to the first task of the Triwizard Tournament!â
The crowd erupts into cheers. Utahime wrings her hands beside you, and the most you can manage is a weak clap.
âThe task,â the announcer continues, âis as daring as it is dangerous. Each champion must retrieve a ring from the heart of the arena. But guarding the rings are some of the fiercest magical creatures aliveâdragons!â
A collective gasp ripples through the crowd, followed by excited whispers. Utahime lets out a low groan. âThey canât be serious. This isnât a tournamentâitâs a death wish.â
Shoko shrugs. âTheyâll be fine. Mostly. The Ministry of Magic wouldnât let them die. Probably. They could get horribly maimed or injured, though.â
âReassuring,â you mutter. Youâve been pretending to be indifferent for ages, but the truth is, youâre terrified for Suguru.
The announcerâs voice booms again. âOur champions will face their dragons one by one, drawn randomly to determine the order. The task is not merely about bravery, but also ingenuity, strategy, and magical skill. The ring holds a crucial clue to the next taskâso it is imperative that they succeed!â
Your hands are numb against the railing, but youâre not sure if itâs because of the cold or because of something else entirely. The first task is madnessâcomplete and utter madness. And yet, as the announcerâs voice booms again, calling out Suguruâs name, something in your chest curdles with a chill far worse than the cold.
âFirst, Geto Suguru, representing Hogwarts, will face the Hungarian Horntail!â
The sound is deafening. Cheers erupt from every corner of the stands, the Hogwarts students roaring loudest of all. Even the Slytherins, with their restrained, cold demeanourâthe exception being Satoru, of courseâcannot contain their pride.Â
Geto Suguru steps into the arena, holding his wand loosely in one hand with the other tucked into the folds of his robes. His long hair is swept up into a tight knot. You canât hear him over the noise, but you swear you see him mutter something under his breath.
The Hungarian Horntail is enormous. Even from a distance, its obsidian scales glint ominously, and its massive, bat-like wings shift restlessly as its amber eyes lock onto Suguru. The ring lies just beyond the dragon, perched atop a precarious pile of boulders. It gleams like a star, a tiny thing thatâs almost not worth the effort, you think. But of course, Suguru is just like you, and pride comes before anything else. Youâre sure heâs already thought of a dozen different ways to get past the beastâbecause itâs something you would do, as well.
The Horntail snorts, sending a plume of smoke spiraling into the air. The arena is silent now. Suguru takes his first step towards the dragon.
âIs he insane?â Utahime whispers, voice trembling. âDoes he not see the size of that thing?â
âHe does.â Itâs Satoruâs first proper sentence this morning, and the assurance with which he says it alleviates some of your worryâthough not by much. âHeâs Suguru. He always knows exactly what heâs doing.â
You remain silent, not taking your eyes off him. He moves slowly, with the kind of deliberacy that makes it clear heâs prepared. No step is wasted, no motion is hurried. Heâs in controlâor at least, thatâs what he wants everyone to think.
âConfringo!â The spell erupts from his wand, creating a fiery blast that hits the ground near the dragonâs massive claws. The Horntail snarls, tail lashing out and gouging deep scars into the earth. The Blasting Curse he used isnât meant to hurtâitâs meant to provoke.
Suguru casts another spell, this time to conjure a dazzling array of shifting, flickering lights. The dragonâs attention is drawn to the display; it tilts his head and looks up, mesmerised. You clench your jaw. Itâs a bold move, because dragons are intelligent, but their curiosity is a double-edged sword.
âHeâs trying to confuse it,â Utahime murmurs, clutching the ends of her scarf. âThatâs risky.â
Risky is an understatement, you think. Suguru doesnât stop. He moves his wand, pointing it low, and you see him mouth a spellâGlacius. The ground beneath the dragon becomes a slick sheet of ice. The Horntailâs claws scrape against the surface, wings flaring out as it tries to balance itself.
But it recovers quicklyâtoo quickly. With a guttural roar, the beast lunges towards him, jaws snapping. Your heart thuds in your chest, but Suguru dives out of the way and smacks hard into a large rock. He slumps against it, chest heaving with heavy breaths. You hear Utahime and Shoko gasp beside you, but itâs drowned out by the sound of your own blood rushing in your ears.
Get up, you want to say. Get up and get that bloody ring, Geto. Itâs sillyâof course he canât hear youâbut thereâs a gash on his arm, and his robes have darkened with blood, and it feels like if you somehow think it, Suguru will make it happen. Itâs a flimsy mindset, but youâll take whatever shreds of comfort you can get.
The dragon charges towards him, nostrils flaring and eyes gleaming. Suguru scrambles to his feet, the ends of his robes frayed and face streaked with dirt. He lifts his wand and casts a Protego maxima, a shimmering shield that briefly halts the dragonâs fiery breath. The shield holds for just a moment, but itâs enough time for Suguru to reposition himself, his eyes darting towards the ring.Â
âCome on,â you say under your breath, fingers tightening around the railing.Â
âLumos maxima!â
A burst of brilliant, blinding light shoots out of his wand, illuminating the arena. You let loose an exhale; heâs clearly learnt from the dragonâs reaction to light earlier. Itâs a good strategy, you will admit. The Horntail lets out a snarl, massive eyes narrowing against the glare. It thrashes, swinging its tail wildly, but Suguru has already limped away.Â
The dragonâs claws gouge into the earth once more, its bat-like wings flapping violently as it tries to shake off the distraction. Suguru uses the brief opening to dart closer, his focus entirely on the ring. His wand moves in a tight arc, and the light shifts into a pulsating sphere, hovering just beyond the Hungarian Horntailâs reach. It works. The orb of light draws the dragonâs attention away from Suguru.
âHeâs using it as a decoy,â Shoko says, leaning forward.
âSmart move,â Satoru chimes in, hushed.Â
His blue eyes glitter knowingly at you, though, and you turn away, feeling your cheeks heat up. Suguru must have told him about all the research you did about dragons and their different breeds, and how theyâre not so different from catsâif you take out the fire-breath and the wings and the long tail or the fact that they could eat a human alive in a heartbeat.
Suguru raises his wand again, muttering an incantation. A shimmering net of magical energy bursts forth, wrapping around the dragonâs front claws. The Horntail roarsâbut its movements are hindered enough to give him the opening he needs.
The ring glints in the faint sunlight, and with a quick Summoning CharmâAccioâit soars straight through the air to him.
The Horntail senses it immediately. With a furious roar, it pounces, its massive jaws snapping shut mere inches from Suguruâs outstretched hand. But Suguru is faster. With a final, desperate leap, he snatches the ring out of the air, landing hard on the frost-dusted ground. He rolls to his feet, the ring clutched tightly in his fist, and sprints towards the edge of the arena.
The Horntail thrashes behind him, but itâs too late. The magical barrier seals shut just as Suguru crosses the threshold. The dragon lets out a frustrated roar that echoes through the stands. The crowd erupts into cheers, the noise ringing in your ears. Hogwarts banners wave wildly in the air, and Satoru and Shoko let out a series of loud hoots, while you simply sigh, relieved.
âHe did it,â Utahime breathes out.
âOf course he did.â Shoko beams proudly.
You donât say anything. Your heart is still racing, your chest still tight. He did it. He passed the first Triwizard task.
Suguru hobbles past the stands, dark eyes scanning the crowd, one hand pressed to where the gash on his arm is. You curse yourself for feeling irrationalâfor wanting him to look at you. He does. His gaze lands on you, and he pauses for the shortest of moments. The corner of his mouth curls upwards in a small half-smile, and then heâs gone, disappearing into the tent where the champions will be tended to.
âHe couldâve died,â Utahime mutters, shaking her head as the next champion is announced.
You glance back toward the arena, frosted fingers loosening their grip on the railing. The first task is over, but the dread in your stomach doesnât subside. The dragons may be gone, but the Triwizard Tournament is far from over.Â
The Room of Requirement glows faintly in the dim light of the lanterns it conjured up, their golden halos casting long, flickering shadows over the stacks of books and piles of scrolls you and Suguru pulled out of the bookshelves lining the walls. You sit cross-legged on a soft, velvet cushion on the floor. Suguru paces in front of you, the soles of his boots soft against the tile.
The ring, when Suguru gives it to you, is warm to the touch and made out of the same gold the wizarding world uses to shape Galleons out of. A part of the ring is flattened into a signet, engraved onto which are a collection of dots. They look like pockmarks on an otherwise smooth surface. You rub your thumb over them curiously.
âLook inside,â Suguru says. He picks at the ends of the bandage wrapped around his arm, restless and jittery. âThereâs something written on the inside of the ring.â
Turning the ring over in your palm, you bring it close to your eyes and squint. The words are tiny, and, for all intents and purposes, make no sense to you whatsoever. The ringâs golden surface glints, the engraving on the signet catching the shifting light. You roll it between your fingers, the faint warmth oddly soothing, though Suguruâs squirrely pacing sets your nerves on edge.
âWould you stop fidgeting?â you snap, squinting at the letters once again. âItâs hard enough to focus without you stomping around like a restless Hippogriff.â
âIâm thinking,â Suguru retorts, though he halts mid-step and folds his arms across his chest. âUnlike you, whoâs just staring at the thing as if itâll start talking.â
âIt might!â you fire back. âItâs magical, isnât it? Who knows what sort of enchantments itâs got?â
âItâs a ring, not a bloody Howler. Let me see it again.â
Reluctantly, you pass it over, careful not to touch his injured hand. His fingers brush against yours anyway, and the warmth lingers annoyingly on your skin. Suguru holds the ring up to the lantern light, tilting it to study the dots engraved on the signet.Â
âThese dots look like theyâre arranged deliberately,â he murmurs, tracing the marks. âTheyâre not random.â
âWell, obviously.â You roll your eyes. âThe question is, what do they mean?â
He ignores you, dark eyes narrowing as he turns the ring over and studies the inscription. ââEgo sum principium mundi et finis saeculorumâ,â he reads aloud, the Latin rolling maddeningly smoothly off his tongue. âIt sounds ominous.â
âIt means something,â you say, leaning forward to snatch a book off the pile in front of you. Itâs a dusty tome with Enigmatic Latin Phrases emblazoned on the cover, though you have a sinking suspicion itâs going to be less helpful than you hoped. âIt has to. Why else would it be engraved on a magical artifact?â
Suguru plops down onto the cushion opposite you, sweeping away a bunch of scrolls. He places the ring on the ground in between you both. âIf itâs a clue for the next task, then it has to be related to the Triwizard Tournament somehow. Something symbolic, maybe?â
âBrilliant deduction,â you deadpan, flipping through the pages of the book. âDidnât realise you were such a scholar.â
âAnd I didnât realise you were such a comedian,â he drawls. âLetâs focus. What do you think it means? The phraseââI am the beginning of the world and the end of agesâ. What does that sound like to you?â
You blink at him. âHow did you translate that?â
âStudied Latin and French when I was kid,â he says smugly, in a manner that makes you want to deck him. Wonderful. Another aspect in which Suguru is already one step ahead of you, you think bitterly. âBut thatâs not the point,â he continues. âWhat do you think it could refer to?â
You look down, tapping your quill against the edge of the book. âIt could be a reference to time,â you muse aloud. âThe beginning and end⊠It's cyclical. Like a clock, or a calendar, maybe?â
âOr a journey,â Suguru adds, tilting his head. âSomething that starts and ends with the same person. The champions?â
âPossibly. But it could also be something more abstractâlike fear. Everyoneâs afraid of something; itâs universal. The start and end of every challenge.â
Suguru picks up the ring again, running his thumb over the dots. âAnd this?â he says, gesturing to the engraving. âWhat if itâs pointing us somewhere? A location, maybe? Or a specific kind of task?â
You frown and lean closer. âThe arrangement of the dots,â you say slowly, âlooks⊠familiar. Like a pattern.â
âLike a constellation,â Suguru supplies. âYouâre right. Itâs got to be one.â
The conclusion settles over you both, but it doesnât offer much clarity. You chew on the inside of your cheek, considering. âIf itâs a constellation, then itâs symbolic, right? They all have stories tied to themâmyths, legends.â
âYeah, but which one?â Frustration creeps into his voice. âThese dots could be anything. Thereâs no clear shape.â
âIt could be something obscure,â you suggest. âMaybe even something specific to the wizarding world. I think weâll have to make a trip to the Astronomy Tower some time soon, though.â
âGreat,â says Suguru flatly. âSo weâre supposed to decipher a constellation in a shape Iâve never seen and an inscription that sounds like it was prophesied by a second-rate Seer.â
âBetter than wandering blindly into the second task. Though, knowing you, youâd probably manage to make it out alive. Cockroaches always do.â
He scowls, but his lips twitch upwards by the slightest. âAnd here I thought we were having a moment.â
âWe werenât,â you say immediately. The back of your neck prickles with heat.
Suguru rolls his eyes, though not with malice. He stretches his arms over his head. The action causes his shirt to ride up slightly; you avert your gaze quickly. âIâm starving.â
âWhat?â
âIâm hungry,â he repeats, standing up. âAll this thinking has drained me. Fancy a trip to the kitchens?â
âItâs nearly midnight,â you point outâbut your stomach growls faintly in agreement. âAnd Iâm not sneaking around the castle because you canât stop eating.â
Well. Youâve always been weak to chocolate. Muttering a curse under your breath, you scramble to your feet and find yourself following him, the ring warm inside your pocket.
The Hogwarts kitchens are a marvel, a hidden oasis of warmth nestled beneath the castleâs chilly stone walls. Suguru finds the painting of a fruit bowl by the Hufflepuff common room, and tickles the pear. It lets out a loud giggleâyou cringe, hoping Filch, the caretaker, and his evil pet cat, Mrs. Norris, are nowhere around. The pear transforms into a shiny brass door handle, and the moment the painting swings open, youâre met with a rush of buttery heat and the mingling aromas of chocolate, caramel, and freshly baked bread.
The kitchens are bustling with movement. House-elves dart about with a speed and efficiency that puts magic itself to shame. Pots clatter, ovens hum, and enchanted trays of golden pastries glide through the air.Â
A small, wiry house-elf with parchment-like skin and eyes like twin garnets appears in a puff of flour and indignation, his thin arms folded over his chest. A neatly pressed tea towel with the Hogwarts crest embroidered on it covers his tiny body.
âYoung master should not be here!â the elf scolds. âIt is forbidden to disturb the kitchens so late at night!â
Sukunaâs bat-like ears quiver, his expression contorting between outrage and resignation. âMaster Geto always does this. Always sneaking in like a naughty student. Not even a little bit nice and polite like the young Hufflepuff miss who always comes to say hello.â
The elf huffs, though his cheeks flush slightly at the praise. His gaze shifts to you, eyes narrowing slightly. âAnd this one? Is this young miss also here to pilfer desserts?â
Suguru leans against the counter, lips tugged up in a smirk as he regards you. âDonât be shy,â he says, gesturing towards the tray. âSukuna wonât bite. Probably.â
Despite yourself, you reach for one. The pastry is warm, its golden shell yielding easily beneath your fingers. When you bite into it, the rich, velvety chocolate spills over your tongue deliciously.
âGood, isnât it?â asks Suguru.
You hate that heâs right. âItâs passable,â you say, lifting your chin imperiously.
He barks out a laugh, brushing crumbs off his trousers. âSure it is. Thatâs why youâre reaching for another one already.â
Suguru raises an eyebrow, feigning offense. âIâll have you know Iâm perfectly capable of eating and thinking at the same time.â
âYouâre more a connoisseur of distractions. Very good at distracting yourself,â you say, without any real bite in your voice.
âDistractions are necessary,â he says lightly, gaze steady on your face. âSometimes, stepping back helps you see things more clearly.â
You chew on that for a moment. âFine. Iâll admit you have a point there. But the second task does seem to be rather interesting, donât you think?â
He grins, teeth flashing in the light. âIâd be disappointed if you didnât think so.â
You roll your eyes, but a small part of you warms at the compliment. Across the room, Sukuna reappears with a teapot and two mismatched cups. He sets them down with a flourish.
âIf young master and young miss insist on loitering, at least have tea,â the elf says, somehow managing to sound both fond and exasperated at the same time.
Suguru raises his half-eaten dessert in a mock toast. âTo Sukuna, the real hero of the Triwizard Tournament.â
The house-elf grumbles something unintelligible, though you catch the faintest beginnings of a smile before he disappears again.Â
âAre you always this insufferable?â you ask.
Suguru smirks, taking a small sip of tea. âOnly with people who make it fun.â
âAlright,â Suguru says finally, setting his cup down with a clink. âDonât fall asleep on me, little lioness.â
ââm not falling asleep,â you mutter sleepily.
âI think weâre done for the day,â he says. âIâll walk you back to the Gryffindor Tower.â
âI can walk back on my own.â
Suguru sighs, not unkindly. âI know.â
The Yule Ball is one of the highlights of the Triwizard Tournamentâa night where students get the opportunity to dress up and dance, and indulge in the sort of revelries Hogwarts is usually so strict about. Utahime is convinced that some students will find a way to smuggle in Firewhiskeyâwizarding alcoholâand is currently stressing out over how to regulate the intake of beverages of the students over a plate of hash browns and scrambled eggs.Â
Nanami Kento, the Head Boy, is trying to diffuse a situation thatâs taking place at the Slytherin table. Some poor Hufflepuff girl (the captain of the Hufflepuff Quidditch team, you later recognise) had the balls to ask out Fushiguro Toji, notorious womaniser and blood purity freak, as her date for the Yule Ball. You nearly drop your cutlery when he calls her a Mudbloodâa slur meant for people like you, born to Muggle parents. Gritting your teeth angrily, you glare at the back of Fushiguro Tojiâs head. What a nasty, vile excuse for a man.
The situation is diffused when the girl passes out, a ball of yellow fabric clutched tightly in her hands. You have to give it to her; it takes serious guts to publicly ask out someone, though you wonder what sort of curse possessed her to ask Fushiguro, of all people.
âAbsolute menace,â you mutter under your breath, stabbing your scrambled eggs with unnecessary force.
Mei Mei turns a page of Witch Weekly with a sigh. âHonestly, these pureblood types are so predictable. Such flair for cruelty, yet so unoriginal.â
âYouâd think heâd at least come up with a creative insult,â Shoko adds dryly, her teacup balancing precariously on her saucer.
âMissed me, ladies?â Satoru, perpetually grinning like a Cheshire cat, plops himself onto the bench opposite you. His white-blond hair gleams under the enchanted ceiling of the Great Hall, and his tinted glasses perch at the end of his nose in a way that makes him look both ridiculous and infuriatingly charming.
Shokoâs reply is swift. âNot particularly.â
Mei Mei grunts out a greeting, and you merely smile politely at him. Utahime, still fretting over the logistics of conducting the Yule Ball, slides out of her seat in a hurry and mumbles something about finding Nanami so they can discuss things properly.Â
âYou wound me, Shoko,â Satoru says, clutching his chest theatrically. âAnyway, Iâve got a pressing matter to discuss.â
âDoes it involve you somehow setting fire to the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom again?â Mei Mei asks, not looking up from her magazine.
âThat was one time,â Gojo replies, feigning outrage. âNo, this is much more important. The Yule Ball. Whoâs asking who? Gossip is flying around faster than a Nimbus 2000.â
Of course, wherever Gojo Satoru goes, Geto Suguru is bound to follow. He approaches your little group, dark hair tied back neatly, expression as composed as ever. He slides onto the bench beside you with a nod of thanks to Mei Mei, who moved her plate of toast to accommodate him.
âTalking about the Yule Ball, I presume?â Suguru asks, reaching for a slice of buttered bread.
âOf course we are,â Satoru says, leaning forward conspiratorially. âItâs the event of the year, Suguru. Surely someoneâs asked you by now.â
Your fork pauses in mid-air. For some reason, you find yourself wanting to know the answer.
Suguruâs lips quirk upwards, the ghost of a smirk. âAs a matter of fact, someone has.â
The table collectively turns to him. Shoko raises a curious brow. Even Mei Mei closes her magazine in favour of staring at Geto Suguru like heâs just sprouted a pair of antlers on his head.
âDetails,â Satoru demands, grinning wide.
âSheâs from Beauxbatons,â Suguru says. âAsked me yesterday afternoon. I said yes.â
A sharp pang blooms in your chest, prickly and unwelcome. You drop your gaze to your plate, pressing your lips together and willing yourself not to react. It doesnât matter. You donât care. Suguru could go with whoever he wanted. He isnât your friend, and he certainly isnâtâno. Absolutely not.
âLeave it to you to snag a Beauxbatons girl,â Mei Mei comments. âThey always go for the broody ones.â
Gojo snorts. âBroody? Suguruâs about as broody as a cauldron full of kittens.â
âAre we done analysing my date?â Suguru asks.
âNot even close,â Satoru says, but his attention soon shifts to Shoko attempting to balance her goblet of water on her saucer as well as her teacup. Mei Mei picks up her copy of Witch Weekly once more and flips through the glossy pages.
You pick at your food, your knife scraping against your plate. The thought of Suguru dancing with some elegant Beauxbatons girlâsomeone undoubtedly beautiful and graceful and more poised than you could ever beâmakes your stomach churn unpleasantly. The image of them laughing together, her delicate hand resting on his shoulder while his wraps around her waist, is as vivid as if it had been etched into your mind.
âYouâre quiet,â Suguru murmurs, soft enough that the others canât catch it.
âJust tired,â you lie, not meeting his gaze.
He doesnât push further, but you feel his eyes linger on you for a moment longer before he returns to nibbling at his toast.
Shoving aside the annoying ache of jealousy, you straighten in your seat and force a pleasant expression on your face. Fine. If Suguru had a date, then so would you. Someone handsome. Someone confident. Someone who would make him think twice before flashing his perfectly polite little smile at you and your date.
âYou know,â you begin, loud enough to draw the attention of your friends, âI think Iâll ask one of the Durmstrang boys.â
âOh?â Shoko says, interest clearly piqued. âGot anyone in mind?â
âNot yet,â you admit, grabbing your goblet and swirling your pumpkin juice absentmindedly. âBut thereâs bound to be someone suitable. Theyâve got that rugged, intimidating thing going on.â
Satoru bursts into laughter, nearly knocking over a plate of sausages. âMerlin help whatever poor bloke youâve set your eyes on.â
You scowl. âWhatâs that supposed to mean?â
âOnly that youâre not exactly the type of person to swoon over a man thatâsâwhat did you say it was?ârugged and intimidating.â
âWell, weâll see,â you say, lifting your chin defiantly. âMaybe Iâll surprise you all.â
With that, you turn back to your half-finished breakfast, and Satoru launches into a dramatic recounting of his supposed rejection by a RavenclawââHer loss, reallyââand you donât look at Suguru at all. Still, as the meal ends the Great Hall empties, your resolve falters. You canât help but glance at Suguru one last time. Heâs listening to something Satoru is saying, lips curving upwards in a smile.
The pang returns, sharp and insistentâbut you ignore it. After all, there are plenty of Durmstrang boys to choose from. Surely one of them would do just fine.
There are many ways to get yourself a date for the Yule Ball. Youâve watched it happen over the last week: dramatic declarations of affection in the Great Hall, quiet notes slipped between textbooks, bashful confessions in various corners of the castle. But this? This is different.Â
This is not the ideal method of asking someone out. Borderline stalking the Durmstrang champion because you saw him trudge through the snow towards the Black Lakeâwhere the Durmstrang ship is dockedâfrom the window of the Gryffindor common room is hardly what anybody would call dignified. Yet, here you are, braving the sharp, icy wind, and the crunch of snow underfoot, determined to follow through with your ill-conceived plan.
Your goal is straightforward, or so you tell yourself. Aleksandar Ivanov is a handsome man, someone impossible to ignore. His broad shoulders are draped in a thick, fur-lined coat that seems to defy the chill of Scottish winters, and his sleek, dark hair catches the fading light of the afternoon. He looks like something out of an old wizarding tale, that sort of unrealistic hero who was carved out of marble and brought to life.
Aleksandar Ivanov is not your type at all.Â
No, this has nothing to do with the hulking Bulgarian himself, and everything to do with Geto Suguru.
You hate the way you felt when Suguru mentioned his date. You hate that the image of him dancing with someone elseâthat faceless girl draped in blue satinâfeels like a thorn lodged deep in your chest. Most of all, you hate that you care. So, youâve decided on a solution: the bold, handsome Durmstrang champion on your arm at the Yule Ball. Thatâll show him.
Aleksandarâs strides are long, the dark fur of his coat fluttering slightly in the breeze. Heâs alone, his hands tucked into his pockets. You can see the faint outline of the Durmstrang ship in the distance, its masts swaying gently as the lake ripples against the hull. The sight fills you with a sudden sense of urgency. If you donât catch him now, youâll lose your chance.
âExcuse me!â you call out, your voice carrying over the air. Aleksandar slows, then turns, his piercing green eyes locking onto yours. For a moment, you feel rooted to the spot, your carefully rehearsed words scattering like leaves to the wind.
âYes?â he says. Thereâs a faint accent to his voice.
You force yourself to take a step closer, and then another, until youâre standing just a few feet away. âGood evening,â you say, forcing a smile. âAleksandar, isnât it?â
âIt is,â he says, the corner of his mouth twitching, though it doesnât become a full smile. âAnd you are?â
You hesitate. Your name feels oddly small when you say it. The cold nips at your cheeks, and you resist the urge to shove your mittened hands into the pockets of your jacket.
âWell, then,â Aleksandar says, tilting his head slightly. âWhat can I do for you?â
âIâŠâ You clear your throat, cursing the way your voice wavers. âI was wondering if youâd like to go to the Yule Ball with me.â
Aleksandarâs expression doesnât change, but something flickers in his eyesâamusement, maybe, or curiosity. He takes a step closer, and you resist the urge to back away. âInteresting,â he says at last, drawing the word out. âYou do know youâre not the first person to ask me to the Yule Ball, yes? Youâre very beautiful, but why, exactly, would you want to go with me?â
Your cheeks flush with the heat at the sudden compliment, but your prepared responsesâsomething about his reputation, his charm, his skill in the Tournamentâsuddenly feel hollow. You canât tell him the truth, either, that this is about someone else. So you scramble for a suitable response.
âWell, youâre the Durmstrang champion,â you say, aiming for nonchalance but landing somewhere closer to desperation. âIt seemed fitting.â
Aleksandar raises an eyebrow. âFitting? Is that all?â
âYes,â you lie, though your voice lacks conviction.
For a moment, he says nothing. The silence stretches, broken only by the distant lapping of the lakeâs waves against the shore. Then, to your surprise, Aleksandar smilesânot the cool, detached smirk you were expecting while he brutally rejects you, but something warmer, almost amused.
âVery well,â he agrees, his voice carrying a hint of humour. âIâll be your date.â
âReally?â The word escapes before you can stop it, and you cringe at how eager you sound.
Aleksandarâs smile widens. âYes, really. Though I must admit, I am curious about your true intentions.â
âMy intentions?â you repeat, trying your best not to sound sheepish. âWhat do you mean?â
âYou see,â he says, âmy intentions with you are rather simple. Word travels fast around the castle, and I know you were the closest person to best the Hogwarts champion in claiming the title. Besides the fact that you are very pretty, I think it will also make my competitor waver a little, no?â
You bite your tongue. Heâs right. Aleksandar Ivanov is more than just a pretty face and brute strength. Heâs also cunning and intelligent. Youâre certain he would be a Slytherin if he attended Hogwarts instead of Durmstrang Institute.
âAnd you,â he continues. âYou donât strike me as the type of person to make bold declarations for the sake of tradition. There is something else, isnât there?â
The same thing as you, Ivanov. I want to see the Hogwarts champion waver, you think. Instead, you stiffen, and say, âThereâs nothing.â
âHm.â Aleksandar doesnât look convinced, but he doesnât press the issue. âWell, whatever your reasons, I look forward to the Ball. I trust youâll make for an⊠interesting evening.â
You nod, too flustered to do anything else. âOf course.â
âLetâs match,â he says. âWhat are the colours of your⊠house, as they call it?â
âScarlet and gold.â
âWear a red dress. Until then, dovizhdane.â Aleksandar turns back towards the ship.
You blink, but manage a stiff nod before walking away. Youâve done it. Youâve secured a date for the Yule Ball. But why, despite everything, do you still wish it was Suguru youâd be meeting on the dance floor?
âLupus,â you read aloud, from the book Celestial Phenomena And Their Meanings placed on your lap, âis a constellation that is associated with wolves in Greek and Roman mythology. The stars that now form the constellation Lupus used to be part of the Centaurus constellation. They represented a sacrificed animal impaled by the centaur, which was holding it toward the constellation Ara, or the altar.â
Suguru rolls the ring around in his palm, chin propped on his other hand, sitting cross-legged across from you. âInteresting,â he muses. âAnything else?â
The signet catches the light of the Room of Requirement, glinting golden. It wasnât hard to map out the dots to pictures of constellations and figure out which of the star-clusters was engraved on the ring. The harder part, now, is trying to piece together what it could possibly mean, and how it is related to the Latin inscription on the inside of the ring.
You clear your throat and say, âIt says itâs also connected to the founding of Rome and the story of Orpheus.â
He straightens up at that, dragging a hand through his hair. Heâs left it loose for the evening, and it spills over his shoulders, long and soft. Your hand itches to smoothen out the top of his scalp, but you bite back the urge and internally scold yourself for being an irrational mess around him.Â
âCan I have the book?âÂ
You wordlessly pass it to him, leaning back on your arms and stretching your legs out in front of you. The velvet cushion is downy to the touch and warm under your fingertips. An enchanted fire crackles in the corner, preventing the chill from outside from creeping in.
âIt could also represent King Lycaon of Arcadia, who was turned into a wolf by Zeus,â he reads, eyes roaming over the page curiously.
âThe question is,â you press, âwhat does all this mean? Lupusâwolves in general, reallyâhave always been associated with survival, but the myth says it was a sacrificial animal caught by the Centaur. What does that mean? How does this connect to the inscription inside the ring?â
Ego sum principium mundi et finis saeculorum. I am the beginning of the world and the end of ages.
âSome great sacrifice, perhaps?â Suguruâs brows furrow in that way they always do, pinched together when heâs thinking hard about something. âBut what would we sacrifice?â
âThe answer to the riddle?â you suggest.
âWhich is, what, exactly?â
You grimace. âIâve no clue. It could be anything.â
He hums, fingers tracing the signet of the ring. âI wonder,â he murmurs, âif this is a test of more than just knowledge. The Headmasterâs riddles are rarely based on facts alone. He likes to see whatâs in people, not just what they know.â
âA moral riddle, then?â You raise your eyebrows, shifting slightly on the cushion. Leaning forward, you peer at the ring once more. The Latin inscription glints faintly, almost as if itâs daring you to unravel its secret. âIt could be literal. A physical sacrifice. Orââ You pause, chewing your lip. âOr it could be metaphorical. Something symbolic. The myths about wolves and sacrifices arenât just about death. Theyâre about transformation. Survival. Endings and beginnings.â
âHm.â Suguru tilts his head, his dark hair shifting with the movement. His gaze shifts from the ring to you. âTransformation. That ties neatly with the inscription, doesnât it? The beginning of the world and the end of ages⊠sounds rather apocalyptic, donât you think?â
âDonât start spinning doomsday theories. We have enough to worry about without you prophesying the end of the world.â
âNot the world. Something about the world.â
âOr⊠Maybe it does have something to do with sacrifice. An emotion attached to it, maybe?â The question is rhetoric, simply you tossing out whatever unrealistic theories you can come up with, but Suguru leans forward, interested.
âYou mentioned fear last time,â he says. âI think that makes sense, but what would the second task be? Dementors? Do they expect us to know how to cast a Patronus Charm?â
âI donât know, Suguru,â you say. Your shoulders slump, defeated. Your head spins with various possibilities, each more far fetched than the last. âThis is annoying me.â
Suguru huffs out a soft laugh, shoulders shaking. âTired already, little lioness?â
âDonât call me that,â you grouse.Â
âNoted.â He grins, all teeth and lips. You look away and ignore the way your pulse quickens. The sight of him like thisâlong limbs sprawled about, hair framing his face, his shirt creased and tie undoneâmakes your stomach flip in ways you donât want to comprehend. âBy the way, have you found yourself a date to the Yule Ball yet?â
You blink, disoriented by the sudden question. âActually, I have,â you admit, face flushing with heat for no apparent reason. âAleksandar Ivanov.â
âIvanov?â Suguruâs voice trembles with something that sounds suspiciously close to disbelief. You want to crow with victoryâthis is what you had wanted, after allâbut instead, all you feel is a strange sense of dread growing in your abdomen. âThe Durmstrang champion?â
âYes,â you say, lifting your chin slightly. âHeâs⊠nice.â
âNice?â Suguru scoffs. âThatâs the best you could come up with?â
You glare at him. âWhatâs wrong with nice?â
âNothing, if youâre describing a cup of tea or a particularly fluffy cat. But a date to the Yule Ball?â He shakes his head, exhaling sharply. âIvanov isââ
âWhat?â you interrupt, your irritation rising. âHandsome? Intelligent? Charismatic?â
ââa pompous peacock with an accent that makes people swoon for no good reason,â he finishes, his voice dripping with disdain.
You bristle, crossing your arms. âYou already have a date to the Ball. I donât see how it matters to you who I go with.â
âIt doesnât,â he says quickly. âI just didnât take you for someone who falls for shiny boys from other schools.â
You bite back a retort, unwilling to give him the satisfaction of riling you up further. Instead, you turn your attention back to figuring out the constellation, rifling through the pages of another book you pick up from the stack in front of you. The silence stretches, and Suguru is the first to break it, tentatively.
âDid you hear about Nanami docking points from Slytherin? Twenty this time. All because of Toji and that Hufflepuff girl.â
Your stomach twists at the mention of Fushiguro. âHe called her a Mudblood,â you say bluntly. âShe fainted because of it.â
Suguruâs fingers curl into fists, his expression clouding. âFushiguroâs an idiot, but docking points for something he said? Thatâs unfair.â
âItâs completely fair,â you say, anger rising in your chest. âHe used a slur, Suguru. Against her. Against people like meâMudbloods, as Fushiguro would say. So yes, I think Nanami was right to take points away.â
The words hang in the air, heavy and cold. Suguru says nothing, his expression unreadable. Then, finally, he sighs, shoulders slumping. âI didnât meanââ
âDidnât mean what?â you bite back, voice rising. âDidnât mean to defend him? Didnât mean to make excuses for someone who thinks people like me are lesser than him?â
âIâm not defending him,â Suguru snaps. âI just think punishing the whole house for someone elseâs stupidity is unfair.â
âUnfair?â You laugh bitterly. âYou want to talk about unfairness? Try walking around this castle knowing there are people who look at you and see something dirty. Try hearing that word every time you walk past a group of pureblooded Slytherins. Try knowing that despite everything you do, you will always, always be ousted by someone simply because they were born into the fucking wizarding world while you werenât. But, of course, you wouldnât know what that feels like, would you, you privileged ponce.â
Suguru flinches. You pick up your wand and cloak from the discarded heap on the floor and, anger still simmering in your chest, stride out of the Room of Requirement without a glance back.
As per custom, the selected champions must always enter the Yule Ball after everyone else. After days of gruelling ballroom dancing practice brought upon you and your housemates by your head of house, who did not want you to besmirch the Hogwarts name by acting like a âbabbling, bumbling, band of baboons,â you like to think youâre quite the connoisseur of waltzing.
Aleksandar offers his arm to you, the dark red of his dress robes accentuating his cheekbones and eyes. Your own gown ripples with every movement, the deep crimson satin soft against your skin.Â
You descend the staircase carefullyâtripping because of your heels would be an embarrassment you donât want to experienceâand donât look at Geto Suguru. Youâre still furious at him, and you want absolutely nothing to do with him at all tonight.
âYou look very beautiful,â the Durmstrang champion murmurs under his breath. âIt is an honour to be with you.â
You laugh shakily. âThank you. And likewise.â
He smiles without teeth. âI believe your champion is glaring at us.â
âIs that so?â You glance sideways at your date. âHe should be paying attention to the pretty girl on his arm instead, donât you think?â
Aleksandar opens his mouth to say something, but before he can reply, the doors to the Great Hall open, and a professor hurriedly begins ushering in the couples.Â
Next, is Suguru. You stare at the back of his head while he leads his date into the Great Hall. His long, dark hair is tied back in a loose ponytail, held in place by an emerald green ribbon. His dress robes are the same colour, swishing around his knees with every step he takes. And, of course, thereâs his dateâthe nameless, faceless Beauxbatons girl who matches his elegance and grace in every manner possible. Youâve heard her name being tossed around, but you refuse to acknowledge it. Jealousy is a fickle thing, and you are petty enough to succumb to it. They are the epitome of a perfect wizarding couple, you think; something in your mouth sours. The fact that you are still angry at Suguru does nothing to ease your mind.
You snap your gaze away as soon as they enter the Great Hall. Aleksandar nudges you gently, a faint smile playing on his lips. âShall we?â
You nod, and he leads you forward. The Great Hall is breathtaking, even though youâd seen it earlier when helping Utahime with the decorations. The enchanted ceiling reflects a clear winter night sky, complete with gently falling snowflakes that vanish just before reaching the floor. The tables along the edges of the wall are laden with sweets and drinks. The floating candles that are normally present above your heads are nowhere to be seen, instead replaced with glittering chandeliers. A large space in the centre has been cleared for dancing, and a live wizarding orchestra has set up their instruments in the far corner.
The applause, as Aleksandar leads you out, feels distant, like a dull roar in the back of your head and you force a smile to your face. You can still see Suguru out of the corner of your eye, his emerald robes catching the light while he and his date glide further into the hall. He doesnât look back, which is somehow worse than if he had.
Youâre startled out of your thoughts when Aleksandar leans close to murmur, âYouâve gone quiet. Thinking about something?â
âNothing important,â you reply quickly, flashing him a grin that doesnât quite reach your eyes.
âGood,â he says with a wry chuckle, âbecause Iâd hate to think I made you lose interest already.â
The comment earns him a genuine laugh this time, albeit a small one. The Bulgarian seems pleased, though, and gently steers you towards the centre of the hall, where the champions are to open the first dance. The room is full of expectant eyes, students from all three schools whispering and staring. You spot a few familiar faces in the crowdâShoko with Haibara, looking like theyâve been dragged into something way out of their depth; Nanami with the Hufflepuff girl heâd rescued from Fushiguro, a rare, happy smile on his face; Mei Mei and Utahime laughing at something by the dance floor.Â
And, of course, thereâs Satoru, leaning against the refreshments table with a goblet of pumpkin juice in his hand and a knowing smirk plastered on his face. He doesnât look the least bit disgruntled about not having a dateâa rare feat, considering how much of a drama queen he is. He catches your eye and wiggles his eyebrows at you, mouthing something indecipherable that youâre certain isnât polite.
âEyes up,â the Durmstrang champion says, low but not unkind. âYouâre with me tonight.â
Thatâs right, you suppose. You are, so you shake your head and smile, turning to face him and resting your left hand on his shoulder. The orchestra strikes up a slow, elegant waltz, and Aleksandarâs hands find your waist.
The music swells, filling the enchanted hall with a lilting melody. Aleksandar guides you across the polished floor with a confidence that matches the proud poise of his bearing. For all your nerves, you fall into step easily, your waltzing practice smoothing out any initial awkwardness.
âYou are good at this,â he murmurs, soft.
âI think Iâm just very good at faking it,â you reply, glancing at the other couples. Suguru and his Beauxbatons date are near the centre of the hall, their movements seamless as if theyâve been dancing together for years. Itâs a sight that would have been mesmerisingâif it wasnât so maddening in your eyes.
Aleksandar notices the flicker in your gaze but doesnât comment on it. Instead, he shifts closer, his hold steadying you as he turns you in a spin. The room blurs briefly, the crowd fading into a swirl of colours before youâre pulled back into his orbit.
âYouâre distracted,â he says lightly, though thereâs an edge of knowingness in his voice. âIs it the crowd? Or is it something else?â
You open your mouth to deny it but catch the quirk of his brow, the faint amusement in his expression. He knows. Of course, he knows. âIââ
âIt seems your true intentions were not so different from mine, after all.â Aleksandar smiles, a quick flash of teeth. âI suppose I must try harder to ensure I have your full attention.â
Aleksandarâs green eyes hold a hint of mischief in them. You smile, despite yourself. The waltz continues, each musical note cascading into the next. Around you, students start filling up the empty spaces on the dance floor, twirling and gliding, some with excellent prowess, others with two left feet. Still, your mind lingers on Suguru. Itâs infuriating, how he fills up the crevices in your head, his absence from your line of sight louder than the applause once the dance ends.Â
The song draws to a close with a flourish. Aleksandar bows low to you; you return the gesture with a curtsey, your gown sweeping the floor. When you straighten up, he leans close to you, his voice low enough only for you to hear. âIf you need an escape, just say the word. Iâd be happy to whisk you away from⊠whatever it is that is troubling you. Consider it a favour.â
You laugh softly, his offer half-serious and wholly tempting. âThank you, Aleksandar.â
Before you can say more, you catch Suguru moving from the corner of your eye. You glance upâand there he is. Geto Suguru, standing a few paces away with his date, his dark eyes locked on you in a way that sends a shiver down your spine. He doesnât smile, doesnât nod, doesnât do anything except look, and itâs enough to make your breath hitch.
Aleksandar shifts, stepping just slightly closer, his hand brushing against yours. âShall we get drinks?â
âYes,â you say, far too quickly. âLetâs.â
You let Aleksandar lead you away, but you canât shake the feeling of being watched, his gaze burning into your back long after youâve disappeared into the crowd. Despite yourself, a small smile graces your lips when you spot Satoru, still lounging against the snacks table. He grins and waves when you catch his eye, and sets his goblet down when you and Aleksandar approach.
âWell, well,â Satoru drawls, ocean eyes roaming over your figure. âImpressive. I didnât think youâd clean up this well.â
âAt least Iâm not a lone stag at a coupleâs event,â you retort, smile widening despite yourself. Satoru does look rather dashing, however, clad in navy blue dress robes with golden curlicues embroidered all over. âSatoru, this is Aleksandar, as Iâm sure you know. Aleksandar, this is my friend, Satoru.â
Aleksandar offers him a polite nod. âA pleasure to meet you. Iâve heard⊠Well, not much, actually. Though I imagine your reputation precedes you.â
Satoru snorts, unfazed. âNot much? Oh, Iâm wounded. Surely the great Aleksandar Ivanov, Durmstrangâs star champion, has at least heard of my devastating good looks.â He flashes his most charming grin, but it only seems to amuse Aleksandar further.
âIâm afraid that hasnât reached Durmstrangâs halls. Perhaps you should consider advertising.â
You stifle a laugh, glancing between them. âDonât encourage him,â you say lightly, earning yourself an exaggerated pout from Satoru. âHe already has a big enough head as it is.â
âThat, I can believe.â The Bulgarian casts a sidelong glance at you.
âSmart guy,â Satoru muses. âI like him.â
âAnyway,â you cut in, cheeks warming. âWe were just getting drinks.â
Satoru gestures dramatically to the table laden with butterbeer, pumpkin juice, and other sparkling drinks contained within golden goblets. âHelp yourselves. And I would greatly appreciate it if neither of you told Utahime that all these drinks have been spiked with Firewhiskey by yours truly.â He points with his chin behind your shoulders to where Utahime is clumsily attempting to teach Mei Mei how to do the two-step.
Aleksandar grabs a goblet of something orange and fizzy, passing one to you before taking one for himself. It tastes sweet, and slightly sour, and it bubbles deliciously on your tongue before you swallow. The two of you bid farewell to Satoru and venture towards a quieter, more secluded spot. âThis is nice, no?â he asks, and you hum in agreement.
âYouâre quite popular tonight.â
You freeze, recognising the tone before you even begin to turn. Slowly, you glance over your shoulder to find Suguru standing a few feet away, his date nowhere to be seen. You hate how seeing him alone fills you with a twisted sense of triumph. His expression is carefully blank, unreadable, and for a moment the noise of the Great Hall fades away.
âI didnât realise you were keeping track,â you reply evenly.
His lips curve slightly, not enough to be a smirk but enough to make your skin prickle. âOf course not. Just observing.â
You tilt your head, offering him a smile that borders on a grimace. âThatâs very thoughtful of you. Maybe you should focus on your own date instead of mine, though.â
Aleksandar shifts beside you, but he remains silent. Suguruâs gaze flicks briefly to him before settling back on you. âSheâs more than capable of taking care of herself. Besides, you seem to enjoy the attention.â
âIâm sorryâare you implying something?â
âNot at all.â Suguru steps closer, and, voice low, continues, âJust that you seem to be⊠compensating.â
The jab cuts deeper than you want to admit. âCompensating for what?â
He doesnât answer immediately, letting the silence drag on long enough to make your stomach twist. âYou tell me.â
Before you can respond, Aleksandar clears his throat, his green eyes darting in between you both. âI think Iâll grab another drink. Excuse me,â he says, and slips away with a polite nod.
âGreat,â you mutter, glaring at Suguru. âNow youâve scared off my date.â
âOh, please. Heâll come back. Heâs too invested in playing the perfect gentleman to leave you alone for too long.â
âAnd what about you? Whereâs your date, Suguru? Or did she finally realise what an insufferable prat you are?â
His eyes narrow. âSheâs fine. Unlike you, I donât need to flaunt her to get a reaction.â
âWhat, in Merlinâs name, is your problem?â you hiss. Your heart pounds against your ribcage, a mix of anger and something else you donât want to name.
âMy problem?â he repeats, a dry laugh escaping his throat. âYou, apparently. Always finding a way to needle at me.â
âYouâre the one who came over here,â you shoot back. âIf you have such an issue with me, why not stay on your side of the Great Hall?â
The Hogwarts championâs gaze flickers briefly, something shuttering in his expression. âDonât get ahead of yourself. I just wanted to see how long youâd keep up the act.â
Your brows furrow; your patience is wearing thin. Placing your half-empty goblet on a nearby floating tray, you cross your arms over your chest. âWhat the fuck are you talking about?â
âThat guy,â he says, gesturing at Aleksandarâs retreating figure. âPretending like youâre actually interested in him.â
You stare at him, your chest tightening at the implication. âStop it,â you say quietly, steadily.
âStop what?â
âStop acting like you care,â you snap. âYou made it perfectly clear earlier whose side you were on. Donât act like you suddenly care about who I spend my time with.â
The mention of your earlier argument over Toji hangs heavy between you, and for a moment, Suguru looks away, jaw tightening. Really, youâre thankful Fushiguro isnât anywhere near you both. Knowing him, you think heâs the sort of person who thrives off of attention, no matter whether itâs good or bad. Heâd be elated to know that Hogwartsâ beloved champion and the schoolâs runner-up are locked in an argument over himâbut itâs not really about Fushiguro Toji, is it?
âI donât care,â he says finally, though his words lack conviction. âMaybe I just donât like seeing you waste your time.â
âFunny,â you reply. âI could say the same about you.â
The words linger in the air, stubborn as static. Suguruâs eyebrows knit together, and he reaches out and grabs your wristânot roughly, but firmly enough to send your pulse racing. âWeâre not doing this here,â he says, through gritted teeth, pulling you towards the door.
âWhat are youââ you start, but he cuts you off with a brisk, âJust come with me.â
You inhale sharply, but follow him down the hallways and up the staircases. You know where heâs taking you before the door to the Room of Requirement even appears. Once inside, the door shuts with a soft click, leaving the two of you alone in the dimly-lit space. You pull your hand free, glaring at him.
âWhat the hell is this about, Suguru?â
âYou infuriate me,â he says, voice cutting and low and breathless. âYou drive me fucking insane, did you know? I dislike you so much.â
You blink at him like heâs just sprouted another head. âWhat the fuck? How much did Satoru let you drink?â
âIâm not drunk,â he says, eyes narrowing. âIâm just angryâand jealous. Iâm so envious, Merlin help me.â
âWhatâs wrong with you?â
A wry, sardonic chuckle escapes his throat. He lowers his head, strands of hair that spill out of the ribbon framing his face. âI donât know.â
âYouâre such a hypocrite.â You swallow around the lump that forms in your throat. Goosebumps erupt across your shoulders when a sudden cold draft of wind makes you shiver. âI hate you.â
He lifts his face, then, gaze resting on your lips. His mouth parts slightly, as though to say something, but no words come out. Instead, he takes a step closer, and it feels like the room shrinks around you with each inch of space he eliminates. âYou hate me?âÂ
Your heart pounds as you glare up at him, refusing to yield. âI do,â you snap, though your voice wavers just slightly.
Suguru lets out a bitter laugh. âLiar,â he says, so quietly, it almost doesnât register. His hand moves before you can think to react, cupping your jaw, fingers brushing along the sensitive skin behind your ear. His thumb skims your cheek. âYou hate me so much, but youâre still here. You can walk away. I wonât stop you.â
Your breath catches in your throat. You stay rooted in the spot, and your nails dig into your palms. âShut up,â you whisper, though it sounds more like a plea than a command.
He doesnât. Instead, his thumb moves lower, brushing along the corner of your mouth, lips turning up in a half-smirk when he sees the way your eyes flutter shut for the briefest of moments. âYouâre flustered,â he notes, soft, âbut you hate me, right?â
Something inside you snaps. With every ounce of venom you can muster, you repeat, âI do.â
And then youâre grabbing him by the front of his emerald green dress robes, yanking him down until your lips crash against his. Itâs uncoordinated, a clashing of teeth and anger and frustration. Suguru freezes for half a second before he groans against your mouth, his hands sliding to your waist as he pulls you flush against him.Â
Itâs not gentle. His lips are rough, demanding, teeth scraping your bottom lip as if to punish you for every word youâve ever said to rile him up. But youâre just as relentless, fingers tangling in his hair while you blindly undo the ribbon holding it in place, pulling sharply enough to draw a hiss from his throat.Â
âYouâre impossible,â you mutter against his mouth, breath coming out in short gasps.
âSo are you,â he fires back. His lips trail down to your jaw, teeth grazing the skin there. âYou drive me mad.â
You donât bother replying, instead tugging his hair harder, forcing his mouth back to yours. His hands tighten on your waist, fingers digging into the silk of your dress as if heâs afraid youâll disappear if he lets go. Youâre barely aware of the way Suguru backs you up against the nearest wall, his body pressing against yours while his mouth moves hungrily against your own.
âSay it,â he murmurs against your lips, low but somehow pleading.
âSay what?â you breathe out, though you know exactly what he means.
âSay you donât hate me,â he demands, the words said into your neck, teeth skating over your skin and making you shudder.
Your fingers tighten in his hair, and you bite back a gasp. âNo,â you whisper defiantly.
He pulls back just enough to meet your gaze, eyes dark and wild, chest rising and falling heavily. âLiar,â he mutters again, before crashing his lips against yours and swallowing any further protests.
(Later, when you stir from sleep, your dress barely doing anything to shield you from the chill, the first thing you notice is Suguru beside you. His head rests against the stone floor, hair unbound and spilling like ink over the cold surface. You donât know when you fell asleep, but you do know how you ended up so close, your hands almost touching.
When his eyes flutter open, heavy with sleep, neither of you speaks. He exhales softly, gaze dipping to where your fingers nearly meet, and though his lips donât form the words, the apology is there. You know this because he hooks his little finger with yours, and squeezes.)
For the next month, you do the logical thing: you avoid Geto Suguru at all costs.
This, youâve decided, is a perfectly reasonable course of action. A brilliant one, even. It takes careful planningâadjusting your usual routes between classes, lingering longer than necessary in the library, arriving at meals either too early, or too lateâbut you are nothing if not meticulous, and you refuse to let him and your feelings for him become an inconvenience.Â
You do feel guilty, however, about not helping him out with the second task, but the way you see it, Suguru is more than intelligent enough to figure it out on his own. (You refuse to acknowledge the fact that you spend time trying to piece it out when you canât sleep at night, staring up at the canopy of your four-poster bed.)
Youâre doing quite well, really. Or, you would be, if not for your insufferable friends.
The courtyard is unusually lively today. The air hums with the lingering remnants of winter, crisp but pleasant beneath the afternoon sun. Studentsâboth Hogwarts and notâlounge in clusters across the stone benches and patches of grass, basking in the rare moment of warmth. Laughter carries through the open space like birdsong.
You sit with your friends at one of the broader stone benches, a small pile of books and a stray Golden Snitch hovering in the air beside you (pilfered from the Quidditch supply closet by Slytherinâs star seeker, Gojo Satoru himself). It should be peaceful. It should be, butâ
âYouâre objectively wrong, and I refuse to entertain this nonsense any further.â Utahime crosses her arms, looking positively scandalised.
Satoru scoffs. âUtahime, be serious.â
âI am serious! Youâre the one who sounds like an idiot.â
âI am an idiot,â he says, as if itâs obvious. âBut at least Iâm right.â
Shoko exhales slowly, pressing her fingers against her temples. âMerlinâs beard, what are you two even arguing about?â
âMore importantly,â Mei Mei pipes up, swiping the Snitch from the air, âare we supposed to care?â
âYes,â you say dryly, âif only to prevent them from tearing each other apart in the middle of the courtyard.â
Utahime turns to you, looking deeply affronted. âYou agree with me, donât you?â
âI donât even know what the argument is about.â
Satoru gestures broadly with both palms. âIâm simply saying that if a Thestral and a Hippogriff were to fight, the Thestral would obviously win.â
Silence. You blink. âThatâs what youâre arguing about?â
âFirst of all,â Utahime says, ignoring your incredulity, âthat is completely wrong.â
âOh, this will be good,â Satoru says, only a tad bit sarcastic. He sprawls onto a patch of dewy grass and leans back on his hands. âDo explain.â
âHippogriffs are way more aggressive than Thestrals,â Utahime says. âAnd they have stronger beaks and claws. Theyâd win in a fight easily.â
âThestrals literally eat meat,â Satoru argues. âTheyâre meant to take things down.â
âSo do Hippogriffs!â Utahime points out. âThestrals eat meat, but that doesnât mean theyâre fighters. They hunt only when necessary. They wonât even attack unless provoked.â
âAlright, but letâs say they were provokedââ
âBy what, your stupidity?â
Satoru grins. âAt least Thestrals donât try to smite your face off because you bowed down to greet them at the wrong angle. Plus, they have the advantage of being invisible to everyone except those whoâve come face-to-face with death.â
Utahime makes a noise of frustration, and before you know it, the conversation has devolved into a full-blown debate. Mei Mei, ever the neutral one, watches with amusement, and Shoko starts taking sides. She and Utahime argue passionately in favour of Hippogriffs, citing their sheer power and aggression, while Satoru insists that Thestrals are stronger due to their skeletal structure and ability to take down large prey. You are promptly dragged into the discussion, despite having absolutely no opinion on the matter.
âItâs obviously a Hippogriff,â Utahime exclaims, gesturing wildly.
âYou would think that, wouldnât you?â the only Slytherin in the group shoots back.
âWhat is that supposed to mean?â
âI donât know, but Iâm sure itâs insulting.â
You pinch the bridge of your nose. âHonestly, this is the dumbest thing Iâve everââ
âYou agree with me, donât you?â Satoru rounds on you, eyes gleaming.Â
You exhale, immediately regretting being within earshot of this conversation. âWhat?â
âYou agree that a Thestral would win.â
You narrow your eyes. âI never said that.â
âYeah, but you will.â
You sigh defeatedly, looking to the others for support, but Utahime merely juts her chin out. âSuguru wouldnât agree with you,â she says pointedly.
Satoru snorts. âSuguru would agree with whatever sheââ he points to youâ âsays.â
And just like that, your world tilts. The conversation continues around youâmore bickering, more laughterâbut it all fades into a dull hum, a sort of background noise to the sudden rushing in your ears. Suguru would agree with whatever you say.
Itâs absurd. Itâs just Satoru being Satoru, throwing out careless words without stopping to think about them. But the worst partâthe part that unsettles you the mostâis that he might be right.
You think of the way Suguru used to argue with you, sharp-tongued and obstinate, yet never truly cruel. How he always listened, even when he pretended not to. How, more often than not, he did end up on your side, whether by reason or sheer inevitability.
You inhale sharply, hands curling into fists on your lap. You make no move to join back in on the conversationâbecause, really, what is there to say?
That you can still feel the ghost of his hands on your skin? That you can still taste the Butterbeer heâd had on the eve of the Yule Ball when he slotted his lips against yours? That his name has lodged itself between your ribs, stubborn as a curse? That your heart stutters at the mere thought of him; that you cannotâwill notâlet yourself dwell on what could be if you let go of your pride, and he relinquished his arrogance?
No, thereâs nothing to say at all.
When you agreed to help Utahime rearrange the awards and plaques in the Trophy Room after classes, you certainly were not expecting her to lock you up in said room with one Geto Suguru. If it was any of your other friendsâShoko, Satoruâyou would not have been very inclined to help out, but it was Utahime who asked, which is why you acquiesced. At least you can say, with utmost certainty, that sweet, loving Utahime Iori is not sweet or loving at all.
Thereâs a brief moment of silence as the heavy door slams shut behind you; you reach for your pocket instinctively to pull out your wand and cast Alohomoraâthe Unlocking Charmâand make your escape. Then, you belatedly realise that youâd left your wand in your dormitory after classes. Your fingers curl around nothing, and you feel rather stupid.Â
Dust motes dance in the golden afternoon light, settling over gleaming plaques and silver trophies, their engravings telling stories of menial victories long past. The air smells like polish, but you hardly notice. Your pulse roars in your ears, loud enough to drown out all other sound but the one voice you had hoped to avoid indefinitely.
âUtahime,â you call through the door, voice strained but not yet desperate. âThis isnât funny.â
Thereâs no answer, save for the sound of retreating footsteps. You spin on your heel, fully prepared to ignore Suguru entirely until Utahime returns, but then he shiftsâjust the slightest movement, a tilt of his head, a shift of his weight from one foot to the otherâand itâs as if some sort of invisible thread yanks you to him.
âI didnât expect the Head Girl to actually agree to bring you here,â he says, voice low.
He looks tired. You hate that you notice.
His hair is loose, strands slipping over his shoulders, dark against the pale slope of his throat. His uniform is slightly disheveledâtie loosened, shirt sleeves rolled up to his elbowsâbut itâs his face that makes something in you twist uncomfortably. There are shadows beneath his eyes, bruised with exhaustion, and though his usual easy arrogance lingers in the set of his jaw, his shoulders are rigid, as though heâs bracing for impact.
You force yourself to turn away, to focus on the nearest plaque. The etched names are a blur as you try and fail to appear unaffected. Draconius Falmoy: Head Boy, 1869, it reads.
âYouâve been avoiding me,â Suguru says. There is no accusation in his toneâjust fact, cold and clear as glass.
You trace the name engraved on the plaque with a fingertip. âIâve been busy.â
A humourless laugh. âRight. Too busy to even look at me?â
You clench your teeth. âDonât be dramatic.â
âDramatic?â His voice sharpens, something brittle underlying it. âYou havenât spoken to me in a month. I donât even know if youâd still acknowledge my existence if we werenât locked in her together.â
You suck in a breath sharply, counting backward from ten in your head. Youâve spent weeks perfecting the art of pretending Suguru doesnât exist; youâre not about to let him unravel it now. âI donât know what you want me to say,â you manage to say, turning around to face him properly at last. âThat Iâm sorry? That I feel guilty?â
Suguru watches you, unreadable, dark eyes wrought with something you canât name. âI didnât ask for an apology.â
âNo,â you say, crossing your arms over your chest, âbut you clearly want one.â
Something in his expression flickersâhurt, maybe, or something close to itâbut it vanishes so quickly, you think you might have imagined it. He sighs, running a hand through his hair, pushing it back from his face.
âI donât understand you,â he says finally. âYou kissed me, and then you disappeared.â
Your stomach lurches. âIt wasnâtââ
âWhat?â He steps forward, gaze locked on yours. âIt wasnât supposed to happen? It didnât mean anything?â
You hesitate, because you know thatâs what you should say. You should roll your eyes, scoff, tell him heâs being ridiculous and move on like the Yule Ball never happened. He takes another step forward, and heâs close, nowâclose enough that you catch the faint scent of parchment and cedarwood, familiar enough after all the weeks youâve spent in the Room of Requirement with him. You should say, Of course it didnât mean anything, Suguru, donât be stupid, but the words stick in your throat, prickly and unyielding.
âTell me it meant nothing, and I wonât bother you ever again,â he promises, soft, and somehow thatâs worse.
You swallow hard. âSuguruââ
He shakes his head, a bitter smile curling at his lips. âNevermind.â He turns away, shoving his hands into his pockets. âYouâre good at that, arenât you? Pretending.â
 The words cut deeper than they should. You donât respond, because what could you possibly say? That heâs right? That every morning, you tell yourself it was a mistake, that it didnât matter, that you can keep pretending it never happenedâonly to feel his touch lingering on your skin like a phantomâs fingers?
No. You canât say any of that. Instead, you press your lips together and say nothing.
The silence that follows is thick and heavy and suffocating. You donât move. Neither does he. You count the seconds in your head, waiting for somethingâanythingâto break this unbearable tension.
Then, at long last, a knock raps against the door. âAlright,â Utahime calls out, sounding far too smug for your liking. âI think youâve suffered enough.â
The lock clicks. The door swings open. Suguru doesnât spare you a glance as he strides past, his shoulder just barely brushing yours as he leaves. The Trophy Room suddenly feels too big, too quiet, and youâre left standing alone amidst the gleaming remnants of past victories, your heartbeat echoing loud in your ears. (You have the gnawing feeling that Draconius Falmoy, Head Boy of Hogwarts in 1869 would laugh at your predicament.)
âIâm sorry,â Utahime tells you, as you fall in step with her. âHe kept asking me to help him find a way to talk to youâhe even promised he would donate the thousand Galleons he gets as prize money for the Triwizard Tournament to St. Mungoâs Hospital of Magical Maladies and Injuries, if he wins.â
You donât say anything, only look down at the stone floor of the corridor as you walk back to Gryffindor Tower. You canât fault Utahime; she has always been extremely kind-hearted and gentle, and you know the idea of a donation to the wizarding hospital would sway her completelyâespecially considering the fact that itâs been her dream to become a Healer after she graduates Hogwarts.
âAre you mad at me?â she asks, after a beat.
âNo,â you say, flashing her a small smile that you hope is convincing. Truthfully, youâre just mad at yourself.
The plan is simple: bribe Geto Suguru with sweets and pray he doesnât hex you on sight.
Itâs not your most sophisticated scheme, nor your most dignified, but after an entire month of avoidance, and the disaster that was the Trophy Room incident, youâve resigned yourself to desperate measures. You are doing this, not because you feel guilty, but because you had agreed to help him out with the Tournament, and you donât want to feel like a shitty person for going back on your word. Regrettably, it is incredibly difficult to help someone when you canât look them in the eye.
The aforementioned desperate measures include grilling Shoko for every last detail about Suguruâs favourite things. She doesnât make it easy.
âYouâre acting like youâre about to woo him,â sheâd remarked, flipping idly through the pages of her Potions textbook and entirely uninterested in your plight.
âIâm not trying to woo him.â
âYouâre learning all of his favourite things, buying him chocolates, agonising over the best way to give them to himâall on Valentineâs day, too. Iâm certain that thatâs called wooing.â
Your face had burned; it wasnât your fault the organisers decided to conduct the second task only ten days before the holiday of love. âIâm apologising,â youâd insisted.
Shoko had hummed, but despite her incredulousness, sheâd humoured you and rattled off a list of trivial details about Suguruâs preferencesâhis favourite tea (jasmine), his favourite book (something tedious and philosophical), the subjects he likes best (Charms and Transfiguration, though you knew this already). Most importantly, of course, the only Honeydukes chocolates he actually cares for: dark chocolate-covered honeycomb. (âBut only from Honeydukes,â Shoko had warned. âHe says the other ones taste like burnt sugar.â)
Which is how you find yourself in Hogsmeade, the wizarding village closest to Hogwarts, the morning air crisp and cold, clutching a small, carefully-wrapped box of sweets like your life depends on it. Hogsmeade is lively, bustling with students eager to escape the castle for the day. The scent of butterbeer and freshly-baked pastries wafts through the air. All around you, couples wander hand-in-hand, jumpers pulled tight around their bodies to ward off the early spring chill, and their laughter bright against the grey sky. Shopfronts are decorated in ridiculous shades of pink and red, hearts and flowers strung across windows in celebration of Valentineâs Day.
The sight makes you feel vaguely ill, because this is not a romantic gesture. (Then why does it feel like your heart is about to leap out of your throat every time you think of him?)
You donât linger in HoneydukesâHogsmeadeâs best chocolatierâfor longer than necessary, as much as the toasty warmth and aroma of cocoa makes you want to stay. Making quick work of purchasing the chocolates, you step back out onto the cobbled streets, heart hammering at the thought of what youâre about to do.Â
Itâs not that youâre nervous. Not really. Itâs just that approaching Suguru after everything feels a bit like facing a sleeping dragonâyou donât know if heâll tolerate your presence or scorch you on sight. Still, you have to try.
You find him standing outside The Three Broomsticks, a pub and restaurant owned by the friendly Madam Rosmerta. He is not alone; Satoru and a few Durmstrang students surround him. He looks relaxed, hands tucked into his pockets, but thereâs something in his expression that wasnât there before. The tiredness clings to him still, there in the worn-out slump of his shoulders. Guilt gnaws at your ribs.
You hesitate, watching him laugh at something Satoru says. Maybe this is stupid. Maybe he doesnât care anymore. Maybeâ
Suguru turns and sees you. You donât think youâve ever stood so still in your life.
For a long moment, neither of you moves. The noise of Hogsmeade fades into the background, muffled and distant, like the world has shrunk down to just the space between you. His expression is shuttered, brows knitted together in a frown.
Your fingers tighten around the box. You should leave. You should turn around, pretend you never saw him, andâ
His gaze flickers to your hands. Oh, Merlinâs beard.
With a sharp inhale, you straighten your spine and march forward before you can change your mind. Satoru notices you first, perking up like a dog catching sight of a squirrel. âHey, look who it is! Fancy seeing you over here.â
You ignore him and stop directly in front of Suguru. His eyes widen slightly, like he hadnât expected you to actually approach him. You shove the box into his hands.
Suguru blinks, catching it before it can fall. âWhatâ?â
âItâs an apology,â you mutter, staring at the ground. âTake it or leave it.â
He doesnât say anything immediately. You wonder, vaguely, if youâve made a horrible mistake. If heâll laugh, or hand it back, orâ â...Honeycomb?â he asks quietly.
â...Yeah.â
Something shifts in his eyes, something subtle and indecipherable. He stares at the box, fingers tightening around the edges. When he finally looks back at you, thereâs something in his gaze that makes your breath hitch.Â
You donât wait to see what he does next. Instead, you turn on your heel and walk away, determined to ignore the pounding of your heart.Â
You donât look back. You donât see the way he watches you go, either.
(That night, when you tentatively enter the Room of Requirement for the first time in what feels like forever, you find Suguru already there, sitting cross-legged on one of the cushions. The box of Honeydukes chocolates lies open on the ground in front of him. You drop down onto the cushion opposite him, and wordlessly, he pushes the box closer to you.)
The sky is pale, streaked with the last wisps of winter clouds, the sun still struggling to bring warmth to the February chill. It is not quite cold, not quite warm, that strange in-between where the air nips at exposed skin but doesnât truly bite. The Quidditch pitch has been transformed. The stands are packed with students, banners waving in the light breeze, and an expectant hush hangs over the crowds, despite the murmur of conversation.Â
The Black Lake gleams darkly in the distance, but the task does not take place in its depths. Instead, the champions stand in a row on the dewy grass of the Quidditch pitch, preparing for whatever horrors the second task of the Triwizard Tournament entails.
You already know what those horrors are.Â
The riddle had taken a frustratingly long time to decode, to come up with a proper answer instead of a mere hunch. Ego sum principium mundi et finis saeculorum; once the answer had clicked into place, it had seemed almost too simple. I am the beginning of the world and the end of ages. What was the first thing humans ever knew? What was the last thing they felt before death?Â
Fear.
And so, the second task would force the champions to face their deepest fears, drawn from the constellations carved into the rings they had procured from the first task. It is an elegant, cruel bit of magicâone that ensures their struggles are uniquely personal.
From your place in the stands, youâre offered a clear view of the champions standing in the centre of the field, their expressions barely concealing their tension. Their rings glint in the light, the engraved constellations gleaming like ancient runes. Anticipation coats each of the champions like a second skin, shoulders stiff, hands clenched, magic thrumming in the air. Youâd arrived earlier than your friends, so you sit alone, fingers curling into the hem of your robes.
In front of the champions is a large, dome-like structure that shimmers faintly with spells and charms. That is where the task will take place, hidden from the eyes of the over-eager audience to grant the champions some semblance of privacy while they complete the second task.Â
You spot Suguru immediately. He stands with his back straight, arms crossed over his chest, face completely blank. His long hair is tied back loosely, a few strands slipping free and brushing against his cheeks. He does not fidget, does not shift from foot to foot like the other two, but there is a tightness to his stance, a rigidity in the way his shoulders refuse to relax.
A hush falls over the crowd as the first champion is announced to enter the dueling arena. Aleksandar Ivanov tries to hide his nervousness, but you can see the slight hesitation in his step and the way he grips his wand so tightly, his knuckles turn white. His ring bears the constellation Hydra, the many-headed serpentâa symbol of resilience, of something that cannot be easily destroyed. You wonder what he fears.
A glittering door begins to take shape, starting from the base of the dome. It creaks open, revealing a dark, yawning abyss beyond. Shadows slither across the ground, shifting and twisting, while the Boggart inside, enhanced by Tournament magic, begins to take form.Â
Boggarts, as youâve studied in your Defence Against the Dark Arts class, are amortal, shape-shifting non-beings that take on the form of its observerâs worst fear. Because of their shape-shifting ability, no one knows what a Boggartâs true shape is, as it changes form instantly upon encountering someone. The incantation used to banish a Boggart is simpleâdispel the fear with amusement while casting Riddikulus. However, seeing as the Boggarts the champions must face are magically enhanced, you suspect a simple Boggart-Banishing Spell will not be enough. The thought alone is enough to fill your mind with worry.
Aleksandar steps into the darkness, the door vanishing behind him. The rules are simple: Each champion must navigate a maze of illusions, battle their own fears, and rescue the person chosen for them. The champion who succeeds in the shortest amount of time will earn the most points. An enchanted hourglass hovers in the air, grains of sand slipping through its neck to mark the passage of time.
You barely breathe as the minutes tick by, until Aleksandar finally emerges. His friendâthe person he had to rescueâjogs out behind him, looking ashen but otherwise alright. Itâs the Durmstrang champion whose face is drawn, whose hands are trembling. He is victoriousâbut shaken.
You swallow hard as he steps forward, the light catching the gold of his ring, the constellation Lupus etched onto its surface. The wolfâstrength, transformation. But strength does not mean the absence of fear.
He does not hesitate, moving towards the domeâs entrance. You can hear people whispering around youâstudents murmuring their predictions, placing their bets, trying to guess what exactly a boy like Geto Suguru could possibly fear. You grip the edge of your robes tightly.
The door shimmers into existence before him, tall and forbidding. It creaks open slowly, revealing the same thing it has for the previous two championsâan abyss of darkness, shifting and coiling like smoke. He steps inside. The door disappears. The enchanted hourglass flips, grains of sand slipping through its narrow neck. You exhale, only then realising that you had held your breath.
The stands are still buzzing with conversation, but it is nothing more than a distant hum in your ears. Your entire focus is on the closed dome, on the way your heart beats faster than it should, as if your body already knows something your mind is yet to understand.
What is he afraid of?Â
Suguru is not fearlessâno one isâbut he has always carried himself in a way that makes him seem like he is. Unshaken, unbothered, his composure held so effortlessly that it has always frustrated you in ways you dare not name. He stands with an arrogance that makes it hard to imagine him afraid of anything at all.
Still, you know that arrogance is a performance. A shield. Suguru hates appearing weak, more than anything else, so he deludes everyone else into thinking he is not. You had thought that the riddle that you had agonised over for weeks was cruel in itself, but this is worse. The waiting. The not-knowing.
Your stomach twists into impossible knots as the minutes drag on. Five minutes. Six. Eight. You count each grain of sand slipping down the hourglass. Ten minutes pass.
Twelve minutes, and thenâ
The door bursts open. Suguru steps into the light, and he is not alone. Your breath catches in your throat.
Gojo Satoru stumbles behind him, blinking against the sudden brightness. His white hair is disheveled, his expression more one of confusion than relief. He shakes Suguru off with a scowl, tugging his sleeve free from where Suguruâs fingers still grip the fabric.
âYou didnât have to drag meââ Satoru starts, but he stops as soon as he catches sight of Suguruâs face. His expression shifts; wariness replaces irritation, amusement slips away like a mask crumbling at the edges.
Suguru stands rigid, shoulders taut with unnatural tension. His face is stony, unreadable, perfectly blank in the way that only means heâs holding something back.
The hourglass stops. It has only been slightly less than thirteen minutes.
Geto Suguru is the fastest champion to finish the second task of the Triwizard Tournament.
The cheers begin, slow at firstâsomeone in the stands starts shouting his name, then another, and another, until the entire pitch is filled with applause and hoots. You barely hear it.
Suguru is not okay.
He doesnât acknowledge the cheering, doesnât even react to it. His jaw is clenched so tightly that you can see the strain in his muscles. He isnât even looking at Satoru anymoreâhis gaze is fixed somewhere beyond him, unfocused and distant.
Then, as if pulled by some invisible force, his eyes liftâand he sees you.
For a fleeting moment, something breaks in his expression. A flicker of something raw and fractured, a crack in the mask. He huffs quietly, tiredly, and he walks away without a word.
Your stomach sinks. Something is wrong.
You barely notice the way the crowd is still celebrating his victory, the way students are excitedly chatting about how he finished faster than anyone else, because of course he didâGeto Suguru is the strongest, after all.
(But strength does not mean the absence of fear.)
Your fingers tremble slightly as you watch his retreating figure. His posture is stiff, and his steps are too controlled. You should look away, should let him leave. You should accept that whatever happened inside that dome is his burden to carry.
But you canât, because suddenly, all you can think of is the way he looked at you just now. Like he needed to see you; like you needed to see him.
And, well, itâs quite silly in retrospect, but itâs a realisation that settles over you quietly, as if itâs been there all along and youâve just stupidly buried it underneath your own pride and arrogance: you donât hate Geto Suguru at all.
âGo away,â Suguru says, stubborn as ever. He is propped up against a pillow on one of the beds in the Hospital Wing. An empty vial of Calming Draught is placed on the stand next to him, though you donât mention it. Beside it, a half-empty box of Honeydukes chocolates.
âNo,â you tell him, just as obstinate.
Suguru scowls. âI donât want company.â
You ignore him, dragging a nearby chair closer to his bedside with an obnoxious scrape against the floor before sitting down. He doesnât look at you, his gaze fixed somewhere beyond the tall windows of the Hospital Wing, where the afternoon light spills golden over the Hogwarts grounds. His hair is slightly dampâmost likely due to sweatâand the dark strands cling to his forehead.
âAre you hurt?â you ask, eyes flicking to the empty vial of Calming Draught.
He scoffs. âWouldnât be here if I was.â
âYou are here.â
He sighs, pressing the heels of his hands against his eyes, as if trying to rub away whatever still lingers in his mind. âItâs just protocol. The Healers made me take a Calming Draught after the task, and apparently, that warrants a few hours of observation.â
You glance at him. He might not be physically injured, but there is something wrong, something unsettling in the way he carries himself.Â
âYou were in there only for thirteen minutes,â you say carefully. âThatâsâthatâs insane, actually.â
âI won, didnât I?â he mutters.
âThatâs not what I asked.â
He barks out a short laugh. âNo. It isnât.â
Silence, again. Suguru isnât like thisânot normally. He thrives in competition, in the thrill of battle, the excitement of a challenge. He doesnât dwell. He doesnât let things linger like ghosts at the edges of his thoughts. But right now, it feels like he is being haunted.
âI saw your face when you came out,â you say, quieter this time. âYou werenât okay.â
His fingers curl into the sheets, gripping tightly. âIt was just a Boggart.â
âA magically enhanced Boggart,â you remind him. âWe donât know how they worked, what theyââ
âItâs over,â he snaps, cutting you off. âIâm done talking about it.â
You stare at him, waiting for him to meet your gaze, but he doesnât. His shoulders are rigidâdrawn tighter than they were before the task commencedâand his body is tense, as if heâs holding something in so tightly, it might crack him apart.
â...Was it Satoru?â you ask gently. âIs that what youââ
Suguru flinches, and somehow, that tells you enough. Your stomach twists. What did he see? Suguru and Satoru had come out of the dome togetherâSatoru unharmed, though clearly confused. The task had required him to rescue someone, and heâd done just that by saving his best friend. But what had he seen in there?
Suguru finally exhales, turning his head to you. âIt was just a task,â he says. âAnd I won. Thatâs all that matters.â
âStop pretending,â you say, voice sharper now. âI saw you after the task, and you werenât fine. You still arenât.â
Suguru narrows his eyes at you, but doesnât respond. Instead, he looks away again, staring out the window like it might offer him some escape. You wait for some kind of acknowledgement, some crack in his carefully constructed walls.Â
âIâm fine,â he says, but itâs too strained to be convincing. âIt was just a stupid Boggart. Itâs over.â
âNo, itâs not,â you argue. âItâs obviously still bothering you, so justâjust admit it. Tell me what happened, Suguru. I can try to help.â
He whips his head back toward you, eyebrows furrowed, patience wearing thin. âI donât need to explain myself to you,â he snaps. âItâs over. Iâm fine. End of story.â
You refuse to back down. âDonât shut me out. Iâm not going to just sit here and pretend I didnât see the way you almost cracked when you came out of the dome!â
Suguruâs eyes flash with anger, his fingers curling into fists on his thighs. âI donât need your pity, alright? So just drop it.â
âNo, I canât just drop it.â Your voice trembles with frustration. Why wonât he just listen? âI fucking care about you, and I can see itâs bothering you. What the hell are you so afraid of?â
His entire body stiffens at your words. His gaze darts away again, and you knowâyou knowâheâs trying to hold something back. He opens his mouth like heâs about to say something, but then he shuts it again.
âIâm not afraid,â he mutters, but thereâs a brittleness to his voice that betrays him. âI told you, Iâm fine. Itâs over. Stop pushing.â
âYouâre lying. What is it? What did you see in there?â
Suguru glares at you, his chest rising and falling with short, shallow breaths. Then, in a sudden burst of frustration, he spits out the words that heâs been holding back for far too long. âIt was you, alright?!â
You freeze. â...What?â
âIt was you,â Suguru repeats harshly. âI saw you in thereâbut you werenât you.â he falters, but the words keep coming. âYouâyour eyesâthey were empty, like something had taken you and left nothing behind. I couldnât reach you. You were just standing there. Gone.â He stops, swallowing hard, trying to reign in his emotions, but itâs too late.
Your mouth runs dry, your pulse racing as his words echo in your head.
Suguru turns away from you, but you can see the rigidness in his back. âI couldnâtâcouldnât bring you back. I tried, but you were just gone, and there was nothing I could do.â He inhales wearily. âLike a Dementor had sucked the soul out of you, and I couldnât do anything about it because my Patronus Charm wouldnât fucking work, andââ
Your mind whirls. You know his fear now. Itâs not some grand disaster, some monstrous threatâitâs losing you. Losing you in some way that he canât fix.
âIâm sorry,â he mutters. âI shouldnât have said that.â
For a long moment, you donât speak. The only sound between you is the faint rustling of the Hospital Wing curtains shifting in the late afternoon breeze. Suguruâs chest rises and falls unsteadily. He refuses to look at you now, as if saying it out loud was already enough, as if giving his fear a form has made it real.
Of all the things you could have imagined, youâd never expected this. Suguru, who meets every challenge with an infuriating smirk, who stands unshaken even in the face of the impossibleâhe had been terrified. And it had been because of you.
You open your mouth, then close it. What do you even say to something like that?
Your heart aches at the way heâs withdrawn, curling in on himself as though heâs trying to make himself smaller. As though, now his secret has slipped, heâs bracing himself for whatever comes next.
So, instead of speaking, you move. Slowly, cautiously, you reach forward and wrap your arms around him.
Suguru stiffens immediately. His whole body goes tense under your touch, like heâs caught between the instinct to pull away and the desperate need to hold on. But then, after a beat of hesitation, he exhales shakilyâand lets himself collapse into you.
It almost knocks the breath out of your lungs. His arms lock around you, tightâso impossibly tight that it almost hurts. He buries his face against your shoulder, and he grips onto you like heâs afraid that if he lets go, youâll disappear; like heâs trying to convince himself that youâre real, that youâre here.
You donât say anything. You just hold him.
His breathing is uneven, shallow at first, but gradually, as you rub slow circles into his back, it steadies. One of his hands curls into the fabric of your robes at your waist, clutching you like youâre a lifeline.
You feel him take a shuddering breath. âI know it wasnât real,â he murmurs into your shoulder. âI know that. But itâfuck, it felt real.â
You nod, letting him press himself closer. âI know,â you whisper.
âI couldnât do anything,â he admits. âI couldnât do anything. I was right there, and youâyou were just standing there, and I kept calling your name, but you didnât even blink. And my Patronusâit wouldnât work.â His grip on you tightens. âIt wouldnât fucking work.â
You donât need him to explain why that matters. A Patronus is a partially-tangible positive energy force created from the casterâs happiest memories, either incorporeal as a burst of white mist, or corporealâstronger than the incorporeal oneâwhere it takes the form of an animal. Itâs used to ward off Dark Magic, most commonly, creatures known as Dementors, which thrive off of negative emotions. The image of you, hollow, is what happens if a Dementor gets close enough to a person to perform the Dementorâs Kiss: sucking the soul out of a person, leaving them a shell of their former selves. The Patronus Charm is complicated and difficult, so much so that most experienced wizards themselves struggle with casting it.Â
You know how powerful Suguruâs magic is. The fact that, in his fear, he hadnât managed to cast itânot even an incorporeal oneâÂ
You swallow past the lump in your throat. âYou wouldâve saved me.â
He makes a sound at the back of his throat, something like a scoff. âYou donât know that.â
âYes, I do,â you say fiercely, protectively. âIf that had been real, you wouldâve found a way.â
Something in him seems to rupture in him at your words. His arms tighten just a fraction more before he finallyâfinallyârelaxes against you. The tautness in his muscles begins to ease, his breathing growing softer, deeper. He still doesnât let go, but it isnât out of desperation. Itâs something else now.
âI hate this,â he says, after a pause.
âHate what?â
âThat I had to see that.â He exhales against your skin. âThat you had to hear all of this.â
You shake your head, pulling back just enough to look at him. âSuguru.â
He finally lifts his head. His face is guarded but tiredâso tired. His eyes, dark as ink, roam over your face. You meet his gaze and let your hands move up, threading gently into his hair. âI donât care that youâre afraid,â you say, softly. âIâm afraid, too.â
Suguru looks at you for a long time, unreadable. You wonder if heâs going to argue, if heâs going to brush you off, or deflect with sarcasm, the way both of you have been doing all this time. But he doesnât.
Instead, his hand moves to your face. The touch is hesitant at first; his fingers ghost over your cheek, like heâs still trying to convince himself that youâre real. Then, his thumb brushes over your skin, slow and soft. You donât dare to breathe.
His gaze flickers down to your lips, then back up. âYouâre still here,â he murmurs, so quietly that you almost miss it.
And then he kisses you.
It isnât rushed. It isnât desperate. Itâs slow, reverentâlike heâs memorising you, like heâs savouring the fact that youâre here, that youâre warm and breathing and safe in his arms.
Your fingers tighten in his hair as you press closer, melting into him while his lips move against yours. Itâs gentle, but when you sigh softly into his mouth, he lets out a quiet groan and deepens the kiss. His hand cups the back of your head, his other arm winding around your waist to pull you closer.
(The door to the Hospital Wing swings open.Â
âOi, Geto, you decentâoh, Merlinâs saggy ballsââ
A loud, scandalised gasp echoes through the room, followed by Gojo Satoruâs unmistakable cackle. You barely have time to react, to get off Suguruâs lap, before he stiffens, head snapping towards the entrance. Standing in the doorway are Shoko and Satoru, both with varying expressions of shock and amusement.
âOh, donât stop on our account,â Satoru drawls, sporting a shit-eating grin. âThis is way better than what we came here for.â
Shoko hums. âYeah, I was expecting to find Suguru all sulky and broodingânot getting snogged to within an inch of his life.â
Suguru groans, dropping his forehead to your shoulder. âKill me.â
You, on the other hand, are trying very hard not to combust. âOh, sweet Merlin.â
Satoru dramatically clutches his chest. âMy best friend, growing up so fast. Next thing I know, youâll be writing poetry about her eyes, or something.â
Suguru, who absolutely has thought about writing poetry about your eyes (though he would rather die than admit it), scowls. âShut up, Satoru.â
âCanât. This is the highlight of my week.â
You groan, hiding your burning face in your hands. âI hate both of you.â
âAw, donât be like that,â Shoko coos. âShould we give them some privacy? Maybe light some candles to help them set the mood?â
Wordlessly, Suguru raises a hand and lifts up his middle finger.)
June brings summer hand-in-hand to the castle, and along with it, the third and final task of the Triwizard Tournament. The days leading up to the third task are restless. The maze looms at the edges of the Quidditch Pitch, its towering hedges charmed to shift and writhe, concealing whatever dangers the tournament has yet to unveil. It is a final trial of wit and endurance, a labyrinth where victory lies at the centre.
You hate it.
âYouâre scowling,â Suguru observes, watching you from his spot on the grass. Heâs leaning back on his elbows, legs stretched out in front of him.
âYou should be worried too,â you counter, plopping down next to him. âThat thing is practically breathing.â
âAnd what would you have me do? Duel the shrubbery?â
You huff, glaring at the maze once more before turning back to him. âYouâre taking this too lightly.â
He grins. âBecause youâre worrying enough for the both of us.â
You reach over and flick his forehead. He lets out a dramatic groan, falling onto his back as though youâve mortally wounded him.Â
âUnbelievable,â you mutter, shaking your head, though youâre biting back a smile of your own. âHow am I supposed to be stressed when youâre like this?â
âThatâs the idea,â he muses, folding his arms behind his head. His dark hair spills over the grass, strands catching the sunlight. âI canât have my little lioness fretting herself to an early grave.â
You smack his shoulder without hesitation. âCall me that again, and Iâll start rooting for the maze.â
Suguru barks out a laugh, turning his head to look at you properly. Heâs smiling, eyes crinkling at the corners. âIâll be fine.â
You reach for his hand, threading your fingers through his. He squeezes once, gently, before tugging you closer. You let out a small oomph before sprawling onto the grass next to him.Â
The sun dawdles in the horizon, stretching out the day for as long as it will go. You turn your head and brush your lips against his, content and happy. The third task waits, unseen and uncertain, but at least there is this.
Whether Geto Suguru emerges victorious or notâwell. Thatâs insignificant, you think.
a/n: this fic is also part of a collaboration i wrote with my friend a while back. check out ravenclaw!nanami fic here :)