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[purpleorchidprincess]

The Healer and The Brute: Apothecary reader x Heian Sukuna

·༻𐫱 In which an adopted apothecary has to help the vicious emperor due to his... 'medical complication'...

wc: 7.8k

Includes:

Dominant reader (she's extreme, but she could be worse) and submissive (sexually) Sukuna (ooc because he would never be like this, but a girl can imagine)

The reader has a loving mother from whom she gets her sass. (I, <3 her mom)

Reader is whimsy and loves nature.

Kinda crack-ish (?)

I hope I wrote the dominant reader correctly because I don't match her by ANY means.

Not proofread, sorry </3

Smut: Cunnilingus, handjob, mutual masturbation, use of 'good boy,' Sukuna whining, Sukuna has two tongues, fingering, reader is on the cream team, blood warning... (only a few lines), impact play, spit & cum play, teasing, edging. A lil nasty :)

The birds tweeted at the crack of dawn. The sun peaked above the horizon, rising slowly yet gradually. 

The windy air was dewy and slightly humid. The air tickled your body, stirring you out of your sleep. Your shoji door was cracked open enough to let you see the weeping petals of the ornate cherry blossom tree. 

You lived in a small but comfy shack about an hour's walk from the bustling capital city, where the main palace was. The area near you was deserted, but there was plenty of foliage nearby to keep you company.

The animals also frequented your yards for little treats when they felt like it. You came to know some of them personally, and they became your little pets. 

You enjoyed the city, yes, but you also enjoyed your tranquil little slice of heaven in the middle of nowhere. 

You rolled off the mat onto the floor to stretch a little before rising. You’d tidied your appearance for the day. 

You lathered homemade camellia oil into your skin to keep it moisturized. You took your hygiene most personally. 

You looked through your clothes and decided to put on a newly sewn robe that you’d made. You’d grown to be quite resourceful and crafty for a girl your age. 

You’d lived on your own for as long as you could remember. Your biological mother was apparently from another place besides the main city. She’d dropped you at an orphanage when you were 2. You hardly even remembered the woman. 

You bounced in and out of multiple orphanages as a child before finally being kicked out and relying on yourself from age 5 onward. 

You did everything you could to survive as a child, sometimes even resorting to minor crimes…

One day, a woman caught you attempting to steal a piece of her fruit wrapped in rope. She saw you immediately. She hit you repeatedly on the head with a fan violently. 

You cried out repeatedly for her to stop profusely, but instead, her free hand moved to pinch your ear viciously. 

“You insolent child! What business do you have trying to steal my fruit? Are you aware how much peaches of this quality cost?”

You place your hand atop your head, attempting to protect your head from damage. “I’m sorry, Miss! I was just hungry! I apologize, I swear.” 

A tear dropped from your cheek as your lip began to tremble. You really didn’t know what else to do. to get food. You couldn’t find a job at your age anyway. All you knew how to do was steal. 

“Where is your mother, child? Bring her to me now," the woman demanded, her tone sharp. 

Tears began to flow more; you’d have to be honest with the woman. Maybe she’d considered giving you food. 

“I am an orphan, Miss. My mother left me when I was a baby, and I was kicked out of the orphanage when I was about 5. I believe I am 6 now, Miss... I just wanted something to eat. I am sorry!” At this point, you’d reduced yourself to pleading while sitting on your knees. You hoped to beg her forgiveness, for your fear of being publicly chastised would kill you. 

The woman looked you up and down. Your hair was messy, and your skin was stained with the tan-colored dirt that sprawled along the road. Your outfit consisted of oversized rags tied together. You looked much lower in quality, even compared to those of the lowest class. 

The woman held out her hand to you. You stopped crying and just looked up to her, confused. You rubbed the tears off your face. 

“Pick yourself off the filthy floor this instant, child.” You hesitated to grab her hand, although it seemed like a nice gesture. She outstretched her hand forward sternly. “What are you waiting for? Let's go!”  

You hurriedly grabbed the woman's hand and waddled to your feet. The woman took a piece of fruit off the cloth and handed it to you. You began vigorously eating the fruit in anticipation. Peach juice splattered all over your face. You’d never tasted such flavorful and succulent fruit. This was definitely high-quality fruit, possibly even meant for those of noble birth.

“You're very well spoken for a 5-year-old, but we’ll have to teach you how to eat with some manners, won't we?” You were just so happy that you continued to eat the fruit with one hand. The woman enveloped your other hand so closely. Anyone would think you were her child. You two didn’t even look alike at all. 

The woman brought you into a house with multiple stories. At the bottom floor, it seemed to be a house full of courtesans. 

You curiously looked around to look at the beautiful women. They were truly breathtaking, with luxurious garments and ornate makeup all over. The atmosphere smelled of high-quality perfumes and oils. Men bustled all over, some arm in arm with the women. Others are taking their distance from the others, probably ones of higher status. 

You looked up at the woman curiously as she looked down at you. “This is not for you, child. You, my dear, are far too young and innocent.”

The woman picked you up and carried you up the stairs. Her hand softly pressed your head onto her shoulder. 

After what felt like two more flights, she put you down, letting you waddle on your own again. She then led you into an expansive room. 

The room was beautiful and luxurious. Silks were all over the room, and there was even a vanity with stocked beauty products. 

The woman put her goods down on one of the other desks before turning to you and discarding the peach pit in your stubby hands. 

“Undress, child. You will need to shower & bathe. You are far too dirty. It cannot be good for your health.” You did so, and the woman carried you into a bathroom to get the dirt off of you. She scrubbed your skin furiously, managing to rid you of all possible dirt that could have lingered. 

She then let you sit in the warm water at a private bathhouse, which was tranquil and peaceful. You’d never taken such a detailed bath in your life. You felt really clean. 

She calmly told a servant to fetch you some clothes from a nearby boutique. When you were done, the woman dried you with a towel and sat while the servant fetched your clothes and food. 

You happily swung your legs as she dried you off. Humming and singing to yourself. 

She stopped rubbing the towel for a second as her eyebrows furrowed. “Child, what is your name?” 

All you did was shake your head as she handed you a cracker to munch on. The orphanage didn’t really give you a name, they just ordered you around by 'you.' 

She stroked your cheek while looking at you critically. “Well, child, we shall call you…[y/n]. You are now under my care.” 

You nodded, a smile on your face as you just persisted in your nibbling on the cracker. With a filled mouth, you asked the woman, "What shall I call you?"

“You may call me Fuyuka or mother, perhaps." You smiled with closed eyes at the woman while you kicked your leg off the chair. 

“Ok, Mom!" Your mother continued to caress your face while smiling down at you.

Later on, the servant dropped the clothes off. The robe was extremely comforting. It had a silky texture that made your body feel smooth and luxurious. 

After that, the servant came back with a plate of wheat noodles paired with duck. On the side was more of that yummy fruit from before. You ran to the table and began grabbing the food with your hands to eat. 

Your mother came up next to you and struck your hands with her folded fan. “You will learn table manners! That is not the way for you to eat.” 

And from that day on, she took care of you like you were born from her. You’d learned later on that she was infertile and unable to bear children, so her finding you was like a saving grace. 

Your mother was quite wealthy. She owned multiple businesses & buildings, the main one being the brothel where you resided growing up. 

She gave you a high-class education with the best tutors. You grew up to be a business-savvy young woman. You also gained her keen characteristic of sass, although you were a lot more polite than she was. 

Mother was blunt and strict, especially when it came to business. She even taught you how to run your own. But you always knew business wasn’t your calling. You found your passion one day when you were dropping off some documents to one of your mother's businesses. 

She ran an apothecary shop a few blocks from the brothel. Of course, she was never there, but she employed everyone and ensured the stock. 

When your 10-year-old self went into the shop, it was empty, with the apothecary nowhere to be found. So while waiting, you took it upon yourself to look at some of the herbs… and maybe a few of the books… and maybe try to make something. 

When the older apothecary walked in with his cane, you were grinding some mint leaves to make a tea for liver support! 

“You must be Fuyuka’s child, she told me I’d be expecting you.” 

You turned around shyly, realizing you’d been caught doing what you shouldn’t have. “I'm sorry, sir! I shouldn’t have touched any of your stuff. I am deeply sorry!” 

You pleaded with the man while he just slowly laughed at you. You just stood there looking at the gentleman, wondering how he’d react. 

What you didn’t expect was for him to come up next to you and guide you into using a pestle and mortar. “Grind in a more circular motion, it’ll help quicken the process.” 

The old man looked into some jars behind you, and you continued to grind the leaves. His tip surprisingly worked well. 

He gathered some other ingredients for tea making. He’d taught you how to make 5 different variants of liver support tea that day. You swung your bag on your shoulder and walked away gleefully. 

When you arrived home, you’d made your mother and some of the courtesans sample every single tea, to which they obliged. Your mother did notice your very ambitious connection to the art of medicine making. 

She surprised you on your 11th birthday with a little shack an hour away, solely meant for growing herbs as you wished. The little shack was turned into renovated housing by age 15. Since you spent such a prolonged time growing herbs, your mother figured it was never too early for you to move in. She has been fantastic at making sure you are an independent young woman. 

The man at the apothecary had taught you everything you needed to know about medicines, medical situations, surgery, herbs, teas, and other important facts. When you turned 16, your teacher had died. While doing an autopsy, you confirmed that he had passed peacefully in his sleep from cardiac arrest, which gave you some solace. 

From that day on, your mother allowed you to take over as the general apothecary. Most people were shocked, but being extremely smart helped you a lot. Despite the lack of experience, you were a comparable, and maybe even a better, apothecary than your teacher was. 

You watered and checked on the herbs in your garden before getting ready to walk to the city. You took some plants you were low on so you could restock for the week. 

On the counter were leftovers of rice and trout that you had made the night before. You decided to eat it for some energy before beginning your walk. 

You then packed your bag with water, some tea for your mother, and herbs. You left, making sure to say goodbye to your house as per usual. 

The walk was long, but it was extremely scenic. Also quite good for picking up herbs and plants on the way. You managed to find some mugwort on your way there. 

You always wondered to yourself why some people didn’t want to enjoy the beauty of nature. Maybe if people weren’t so enthralled with things like vanity, they could find more value in what's natural rather than fake. 

An hour later, you arrived at your mother's house. You greeted some of the courtesans as per usual before heading upstairs. 

Your mother was sitting in her chair, drinking some tea while brushing out one of the younger servants' hair. She found that in her free time, she was quite good at styling hair. 

“Hello, my child.” You walked over to her and gave her a polite kiss on her cheek. “Morning, Mother." 

You pulled the tea out of your bag and left it on her vanity table. “Dried peach, monkfruit & goji berry tea. It's a new flavor I created.” She picked up the bag to get a whiff of the aroma from the tea. Her face relayed satisfaction. 

She caressed your cheek as always. “What shall I do with you, my gem? I hope no terrible man swoops you up, but of course, you're too smart to make such a foolish decision.” 

You smiled at her, moving your arms to engulf her in your embrace. “I shall be on my way, Mother. I have to open the shop for the day.” She bid you goodbye, and you started your walk to the shop. 

When you got in, you made sure to restock all herbs as well as extra ingredients you’d picked up along the way. You readied the prescriptions and typical medicines for the day. 

It was the middle of the day, and you’d already sold plenty of things. Over 100 people had already come in, but the rush had died down. Still, your tiredness persisted. You were just one girl, after all. 

You were reading a book when you noticed hushed whispers from the street beginning to bustle. People cleared the roads and opened a path, but what for? 

An ox-drawn carriage appeared in front of your shop. The carriage was large and decorated with gold and unique artistic moldings. The carriage must have carried those of extremely high status. 

2 women stepped out of the carriages and began walking toward you. Soldiers followed directly behind them. By their appearance, they must've been concubines, probably of imperial or honorable rank. 

You bowed down to the two women as an honorific. Wouldn’t want to get your head chopped off by Ryomen Sukuna. 

From what you heard about the man, he was quite an asshole. Slaughtering enemy villages, killing servants for small mistakes, and drafting men from his villages without even a care for their wives & daughters. Overall, he was a war criminal who deserved to burn in the lowest pits of hell for his terribly immoral acts. But of course, you'd never let your political ideas be known! You were just a 20-year-old girl who really cared about what you thought. For who knows how he’d torture you for ‘treasonous ideals.'  

One cocubine with long, blonde hair ran up to you and immediately grabbed your hands. The other with brown hair panicked as she ran after the woman, holding her back slightly. 

"Oh, how pleased I am to meet you! I’ve heard so much about you from servants and my counterparts. You are the most educated young lady, aren't you? Do you know what people call you? The queen of your craft—oh, I've never heard of young women of your age being so skilled. I wish I could be more like you—” 

Your face immediately warmed from the attention you received. The blonde woman was quite…energetic, to say the least. It overwhelmed you a little. You were used to calmness.

The woman with the brown hair slapped the girl lightly to cease her rambling. She smiled at you with an adorable closed-eye expression. “Hello, I'm Furi, and this is Hiina.” She pointed to the blonde woman who waved at you softly. 

“Pleased to meet you, Lady Furi and Lady Hiina.” You bowed again out of respect. 

“No need for such formalities. Hiina and I both know your name since we’ve heard so much. I bet we should just cut to the chase here. May we speak with you privately?” You nodded and led them to a more secluded area in the back. 

You prepared some dacha for them both and brought it to the table with block sugar. 

They both sipped the tea, and their faces were elated. “Furi! Furi! This is the best tea I've ever had!” 

Furi covered her face politely and giggled. “I suppose it is extremely good, Hiina.” Furi rested her hand on Hiina's lap softly, as if she meant to calm her down. 

Furi cleared her throat to gather attention. “We needed to come to quite an experienced apothecary. One of the ladies in waiting recommended you. See, we have quite the complex problem.” Furi whispered. 

This had to be a most critical issue if they, women, couldn’t even speak about the issues in front of their guards. Furi hesitated to speak, looking down as she fidgeted with her hands. “I cannot say it.” 

Spontaneously, Hiina screamed in a whisper. “Lord Sukuna's mass arises too frequently,& it becomes an issue for everyone! He is filled with anger and often begins to take it out on everyone! Sometimes even Uraume. It is terrible—” As Hiina spoke more, her voice began to rise to a higher volume. 

Furi slapped her hand across the woman's face to stop her rambling yet again. “Hinna!” The girl just whimpered as she felt the hand hit her face. 

You just sat in your chair, witnessing the two women arguing. You cut them off with the big issues that lingered in your head. “Excuse my language, but I thought the job of concubines was to ease the pleasure that he feels.” 

The two women paused as Furi cleared her throat. “As you’ve heard, Lord Sukuna can be quite…difficult, per se. Basically, he refuses to let any of his concubines please him. There are only 20 of us, 4 of whom are ranked in order of importance. I and Hiina being the top two.”

All this did was further your confusion. Hinna took a sip of her tea and slammed the china down in irritation. “He hates us all. It's not like any of us want to please him anyway. He already is terrifying enough. Imagine how much more scared we were when he showed us his two cocks!” The girl whimpered again in fear. 

“So do you guys know exactly why his, uhm… things are always erect?” The women both shook their heads side to side. 

“How often?” 

“Every day, all day. Even if he touches himself," said Furi. Your eyes popped open. That's highly concerning.

“Even the doctors can’t help,” Hinna whispered with her hand next to her mouth. 

“I am not sure what exactly the problem is, but I hypothesize that his testosterone is too high. I'll curate a blend of herbs and plants that will help lower the amount in his system. He may have to take it multiple times a day to decrease the issues. I’ll try working on a more frequent cure after I see how he reacts to the teas. I’ll get it made now.” 

You immediately got up to start curating the blend. You planned to make a spearmint-green tea blend with some licorice root. 3 minutes later, and it was done. 

You handed the women the tea, and they immediately rushed out, throwing coins on the table.  They must’ve been in quite a hurry.

“Thank you!” as the carriage moves on. 

Three days later. 

You heard the familiar clop of the ox's feet near you. You were trying a new perfume recipe, merging flowers, herbs, and cloves with a base of beeswax.

You added ground cloves with green tea and orchids. The aroma appeared to be quite delightful. Maybe even something you’d wear. 

It wasn’t until you turned around that you noticed the two women looming over your back. Startled, you scrambled to the floor. 

Furi gasped and moved to help you off the floor. “Oh my, we didn’t mean to startle you. We apologize.” Hinna just giggled lightly next to her before murmuring, 'Sorry.' 

Hinna leaned her face closer to the pot and just sniffed the air. “This smells amazing…is it perfume?" 

You nodded and looked down at the curious girl. “Yes, my lady. It's a new blend I came up with. How’d you know?” 

“My family runs a perfume business 3 hours away from here. Would you mind if I purchased a sample? You nodded and moved to get a jar. 

“Sure. But you’ll have to wait till it solidifies to use it.” The girl mmmhmed and pulled out some coins for you. 

As you packed the perfume, you had the two women sit down at a nearby table while they waited. A new, curious tea combination awaited them.

After packing, you’d settled down at the table with them. “So, what brings you back?” Furi pressed her lips together before clearing her throat as usual. Gosh, she must really need the damned tea. 

“Good news: the tea worked. His rampant rages have subsided…but…he drank all the tea in one day. The next day, it was back. We all fear he needs something stronger.” Kuri clasped her hands together, her face showing defeat. 

Hinna just silently nodded along before she explained the rest of the situation. “He’d questioned us mercilessly on where the tea was from, and we tried not to tell him, but his advisor, Uraume, tracked where our carriage had gone. The guards ended up splurging on things for you.” 

Kuri had moved closer to you and rested her hand on your knee. You looked up to her slowly as she blurted out, "His majesty requests your presence at the palace!” 

You looked at the girl and sighed. “Ok, that's not as bad as I expected.” The two women looked back and forth at each other, confused. 

“You’re not scared?” You shook your head. A big man with fluffy hair and four arms didn’t sound very intimidating to you. If anything, he reminded you of a butterfly, a very cruel one, though. 

“Well, we’ll let you get ready to close shop. We will be back here tomorrow at 10 in the morning, sharp. Please be on time, His Majesty is most particular about it.” The two women stood up and scurried out hurriedly as before.

What have you gotten yourself into? 

The next day

You walked upstairs to your mother's room and knocked on her door before sliding it open.

“My child!” She walked over to the room to greet you. Kisses and hugs as always. She adopted that from a French envoy who visits the brothel once a year. 

You hugged her back, finding comfort in her embrace. “Hello, Mother. I'm in quite a hurry. Sit down, won't you?" 

“Oh. Have you come down with some sickness?” She furrowed her eyebrows and pressed her palm to your head.

You grabbed her hand and led her to sit down. She picked up her glass of water and took a brisk sip. “I am fine, Mother. Well, kind of. I’ve been summoned to the palace by Lord Sukuna.” 

Your mother never shrieked so hard in her life. It was so loud that the majority of the first floor managed to spark some panic. She dropped the glass of water and fell to the floor. Her kimono was left slightly damp from the iced water. 

“MY CHILD! What on earth could that brutish man want with my innocent daughter? What have you gotten yourself into this time? Hot tears started to spill down her cheek. 

“Mother—” 

She clawed at the wooden floor, attempting to grip absolutely nothing. “Will I ever even see you again? You know he eats people like us? What if he makes you into a stew?” 

“Mother, please, the servants are watching—” 

The dramatic woman crawled onto her back. “I’d managed to get you out of that terrible selection process! Oh, how much effort it took. All that just for him to swoop up your beautiful innocence at a request.” She wailed as if she were a toddler. 

“Mother! I am being summoned because I made him medicine, not because he wants me as a cocubine.” She slowly rose from the floor with a quiet 'oh.'

She smoothed out her kimono and sat down, looking to regain her composure. She shot watchful eyes at the servants, and they immediately straightened their heads. “Well, in that case, be safe, and get back to me in one piece, daughter.” She snapped her fingers for tea, whispering a quiet ‘thank you’ to the servant. 

You got up and hugged her, making sure to place an extra kiss on her forehead. You ran off to the building with swiftness, making sure you weren't too late. 

You got there fully on time as the guards helped you into the carriage. Well, what next?

The carriage came to a stop after you reached deep into the inside area of the palace. You stepped out to be greeted by an androgynous figure with white and red hair. You bow as always. 

“Follow me," is all they say before turning around and leading you to an ornate building. “I am Uraume," is all they said after. They're the ones who got you dragged into this whole situation. Trust that they’ll reap what they sow. 

After a few minutes of confusing corridors and multiple sliding doors. You stop at a door bigger than all the others. You assumed this is where he was. Uraume just turned back to you with the same stoic expression. “Good luck.” They slid the door open and led you in. 

You walked in to see the miserable man. He was bigger than you expected, 7 feet tall at least. His fluffy pink hair was slightly disheveled, signaling his distress. His lower two arms rested near his sides. One of his upper arms held his face up with a fist while the other rested on the arm of his chair. 

His body was sculpted perfectly, his muscles were defined and carved smoothly. His arms, face, and body had neat jet-black markings all over. The hakama lay loosely and low around his waist. As you looked further down, his two cocks were obviously bulging against his pants with two thick, long silhouettes. 

His two piercing blood-red eyes found you walking toward him. His eyes lazily followed your body. 

You walked in and immediately folded into a symmetrical bow. You’d hold the stance until the man told you to do otherwise. “My lord.” 

“Stand straight.” You stood up immediately, your hands clasped in front of you. 

“You know what you're here for, yes?” You pursed your lips, shaking your head slowly. “Well, not exactly.” 

He slapped his fingertips along his forehead, looking down with dismay. "Foolish, stupid humans.” Big, brutish monster. 

“You are here to solve the issue with my cocks. That's all, make a cure and leave. In return, I spare your life.” Great, my time is being used to solve his damn penile issues. 

“You will have your private quarter and access to anything you need to help me.” You nodded quietly. The two of you stood in silence for a brief second. 

“What are you still standing here for, you idiot? Move along.” You exited the room, eager to get away from the overly hormonal man. 

You had one of the guards walk you to the quarters of Lady Hanni’s quarters. As you expected, Kuri was already there, attached to her side. 

You bowed to the women and then proceeded to sit down. There were some questions you had. "Hello, my ladies, I'm pleased to see you.” 

The two women smiled while drinking their tea. “Hanni and I are glad to see you. How have you been acclimating to the palace?” 

Hanni nodded in agreement, snuggling her head onto Kuris's shoulder. “I am doing quite well, thank you. I actually came because I have a few questions.” 

Kuri set her tea down and gave you that same usual closed-eye smile. "I'm glad we can help, ask away, my dear.” 

“Why is Lord Sukuna reluctant to have bed with any of his cocubines?” The two women's bodies immediately ceased movement. Their faces held visibly shocked expressions. You even heard the guards & ladies-in-waiting gasp behind you. 

Kuri sent a piercing glare at the ladies in waiting as well as the guards, prompting them to usher them out of the room quickly. 

Kuri cleared her throat and set her teacup down. “Well—it is quite the complicated situation.” Hanni raised her head from Kuris's shoulder. She was about to blow.

Words began to fly out of Hannis's mouth quicker than 24 fps. “No, it is not. Lord Sukuna really likes to be dominated in bed by women, and we're all too scared of him to even come close to him, so typically, he's left irritated and unfulfilled. His cock is also too large inside. What if he breaks us? I tried t—” 

Kuri’s striking hand flew down on Hannis's head, stopping her rambling speech. “Hanni, must you always speak out of bounds?” 

The girl rubbed her head soothingly while Kuris's face grew red and angry. “But, yes, Hanni’s words are true. He hates it when women tremble in fear. Sometimes I wonder how most people even fear him. He’s just a big toddler. Throwing a tantrum because women won't yell at him.” The woman ‘tsked’ and persisted in drinking her tea. 

You finally believe you came up with the correct cure. After days of trial and error, you noticed that when the concentration of spearmint was heightened, along with licorice root. The results became more long-lasting. You figured white peony would also have stronger results due to its ability to convert testosterone to estrogen. 

You hummed happily as you walked to the man's quarters. You’d finally be able to go home to your little cottage and your mom and your shop! 

You opened the door and bowed as usual before preparing the man's tea with the mix of leaves. He watched your bustling body move in disdain. His red eyes were focused enough to burn a hole into you. 

Any more movement from your disobedient ass and maybe he’d stick his c— 

You walked up to the man with the tea and forced him to drink it. Ten seconds later, he was writhing in pain in the chair. The man began to groan and squirm uncomfortably. 

“You bitch. What have you done to poison me, you foul temptress?" You looked down at his pants to see his cocks throbbing erratically in his pants. It was bulging and visibly twitching, even while covered. 

“I beg your pardon, my lord, but I have done absolutely nothing.” 

He rose from his chair. He was even struggling to walk. “You must've done something, my cock is inflating in size. It pains me.” All the help you've given him, sacrificing your business for what? 

"Respectfully, my lord, I have not done anything but give you a tea to decrease your male hormones.” 

He began to grip the arm of the chair so harshly that the wood cracked. “My hormones are fine. Maybe it's your incompetence that cannot solve my issues.” 

You crossed your arms while the disgust on your face grew. "You're supposed to be the most powerful being on earth, yet you cannot solve your own bodily issues.” 

“I am the most powerful being, so that means I have the power to summon you at a snap so that you can solve my bodily issues. So solve my issue this instant.” The goosebumps on your body rose while your patience lowered. 

Maybe if he’d stop being such a scared bitch, he’d resolve his issues. 

“I fear I may no longer be able to assist you, my lord. Maybe if you’d use one of your concubines to solve your issues, we wouldn't even be here! Respectfully, my lord.” 

He swung the table between you two with his foot against the wall in pure rage. “I do not desire to fuck any of those useless women. I will not waste my time on dotish human beings.”

You widened your eyes in shock. The man was a walking contradiction. “Useless? Yet you beg for women to degrade you. You desire to be degraded, yet you're trying to do it to me now.” 

“I have roamed this earth for years. I have never begged for anyone's presence." His fist balled in rage, and his body grew sweaty and red. 

You were not afraid of him, you stepped closer to him, defying all mannerly principles you’d been taught as a child. “Then why are you begging for my presence like a dog in heat?" 

The man's facial expression went soft, and all four of his eyes focused solely on you. “I shall have you beheaded for your insolence.” 

“No, you won't. Your desire for my body is stronger than any other, and I can practically smell it on you. If you want my help with your issues, you will need to solve the request on my behalf as well.” 

Sukuna breathed out so hard, you’d think steam would flow out of his nostrils. “You're not worth begging for.” 

You turned around on your heel and began to stomp off. You are no man's peace. “Stop walking.” 

“No.” His selfish pleas could never work. 

“Be still at once, woman.” His loud feet began to smack the ground as he walked toward you. 

You reached to open the door, but his tall stature loomed over your back. “If you will not, beg. I will not entertain your foolish words. My mother raised me to fear no man.” You pointed your finger at his chest, pushing a dent into his hardened chest. “You do not scare me, Sukuna.” 

“I am—I, I’m sorry,” he whispered, looking at the floor. For the first time, you’d seen the man avoid eye contact. 

His body went fully lax as you moved to reach your arm atop his shoulder. You pushed his big body down slowly as he fell to his knees. He grinds upon your foot needfully to try to relieve just a little bit of the agonizing desire he felt. 

“Good boy.” You unwrapped your kimonos, letting them fall to the ground slowly. He viciously threw it to the side of the room. He proceeded to rip your undergarments in half, making them fall to the ground. 

You slapped the man across his face. Printing a red handprint on his face. “I did not permit you to rip my clothes. You will make me a new one.” 

He nodded and ran his hand down your soft thigh. “I’ll get you a new one. I am so, so sorry.” 

You ran your hand through his hair, pulling his head back softly so all he saw was your torso and up. 

You pushed his head down so that his head sat in front of your damp underwear. “You are not permitted to touch me until I tell you to. You crazed beast.” 

He nudged his nose closer to your pussy. You could hear his muffled sniffs as his hands bore crescent-shaped marks into your thighs. He exerted so little force yet managed to pull you so much closer to him. 

You pulled his hair tighter. “I said, Do not touch me. You have to earn the privilege, my lord.” He silently 'mmm'-ed as he lowered his hands down your legs slowly. 

You turned around and walked toward his bed slowly. You turned around to see the man crawling toward you on his hands and knees before you crawled onto the bed yourself. 

You lie back and spread your legs open. You curled your fingers seductively, telling him, “Are you hungry?” 

He pounced onto the bed like the beast he was. He eyed you like you were his prey, little did he know it was the other way around. 

“May I devour you like you’re my last meal? Please.” Sukuna said pleadingly. His head lay between your thighs while he gazed at your sopping wet pussy. 

“I’m not sure, you haven’t done a good job at listening to me. You yell and belittle me like I'm a mere servant.” 

Sukuna's breath grew untimely and erratic, he was beginning to spiral without touching you. “I said sorry. I’ll be good, I swear to it. You can use me, I'll be your servant.” 

You raised your head to get a good view of the pathetically desperate man. You knew the throbbing of his cock was bothering him, he’d do anything just to even lick you. “You shall refer to me as ‘my lady.' From this moment on, you’ll listen to every demand I give you. If you do not, it will result in punishment. Ok?” 

"Yes, my lady.” Sukuna's hands began to latch onto the silk covers. You heard small tears around you, he was becoming too angsty. 

“You may eat me.” He didn’t even hesitate before he dived his face into your wetness. His tongue extended and swirled around your sensitive clit. 

He sucked on and mauled the bundle of nerves like he’d been starving for days. His left pair of arms pulled you closer to his face as your body squirmed in a circle. "You're doing so good..." 

He was so focused, he didn't even have time to respond to you. Suddenly, you felt something extremely foreign to you. 

It felt like he had two tongues???  

One of them massaged each side of your clit and up and down while you felt his sharp teeth latch onto your mound. Both of your legs tensed up, and it felt like they’d begin trembling any second now. 

You heard him moaning and whimpering down below as he slowly writhed against the bed.

Gruntled sounds exited your mouth while one of his tongues made its way slowly down from your clit into your cunt. The other one stayed persistently lapping circles around your clit.

The tongue was so long that he managed to elicit a choked moan from you just by inserting it inside. The muscle swirled around and curled itself in multiple directions, all while the other tongue flicked your clit ruthlessly.

"S-Sukuna… you're such a good boy…” You heard a deep grumble come from between your legs. It seems like your words taunted him…he sped up 3 times his previous speed before. It seems like praise was his golden buzzer. 

Your eye twitched, and you grabbed his hair tighter. His finger gripped you harder. He’d surely be on his way to piercing your skin. 

You felt yourself reaching your climax. Your cream, sweet and tangy, filled his mouth to his delight. His tongue lapped up the substance into his mouth and moved it around before spitting it back into your cunt. He wasn't done. 

Sukuna's desperate grip tightened for the third time. He used one arm from each side to force your knees to your head. He truly wanted to test your flexibility.

Sukuna plunged two fingers into your cunt as you rolled your hips into him. He scissor-curled his fingers inside of you in a steady pattern. All while worshiping your clit with his two tongues. 

He pulled his head up for a second while he continued to finger your pussy. “Am I doing well, my lady?” 

You nodded while pushing your head back deeper into your cunt. “Yes, s’good. But did I tell you to stop eating after I so graciously gave you the rare privilege?” 

You heard his muffled 'mmm-mmm' as he shook his head. I know that's right. 

You murmured, 'Insolent man—’ under your breath until his fingers became quicker and sloppier. The pressure that was built up was familiar & intense. 

Every deep breath you let out delayed your orgasm, but at the speed he was going, he managed to outpace your choked breaths. 

It wasn't long until the psychedelic sensation began to spread throughout your body. Your legs trembled desperately. 

Sukuna's fingers bored into you, leaving 10 piercing holes in your skin. Blood slowly beaded at the points. 

You creamed all over his fingers, coating them with a warm, creamy white. Still, he pushed until you told him to stop. 

You suddenly felt the need to pee as you closed your thighs around his head. The blood rushed to your face as your body got more restless. 

“Ngh, mmm…Sukuna!” 

Your squirt covered his face as he rubbed your clit ferociously. He dived back in and drank every drop of your juices. 

You lie back on the bed with your head comfortably on the pillow. 

“I think I did, exquisitely, my lady.” You sat up, your arms supporting your back. 

“You did very well, Sukuna.” Your hand reached for his chin and clawed it. “But did I tell you to draw blood? NO!” 

Your hand bolted as you moved to backhand him. The big beast just sat on his knees and whimpered like a bitch before you. “M’sorry, my lady.”

He moved his hands to sit patiently on your thighs. His head just faced the floor with guilt. “Lick all of the blood before it makes a mess on the sheets, you damned brat.” 

He crawled onto the bed and began to lick the blood from your wounds. He was careful not to suck blood anymore from off the surface. Just soft little kitten licks. 

When he was done, he lay his head onto your thighs as he continued to rut against the sheets. You’d almost forgotten his cock was inconsolable in its hardness. 

You stroked his head softly. “You’ve been a good boy, Sukuna. How about you let your lady help with your issue?” 

He looked up at you with big puppy-dog eyes. He was so needy it was pathetic. He killed people for fun, and look where he is now. 

You scootched back on the bed before opening your legs for him. “Sit between my legs, dear,” and he listened as he was taught. 

You released his cock from his undergarments. The thick leg sprained. It was so red and irritated. His throbbing made the poles spatter like a volcano. Bits of precum flew out and slid down his cock. 

“Someone looks like he needs to cum…” You grabbed his balls and massaged them to feel how firm, tight, and warm they’d become. His balls were almost rock hard. 

You moved your hand to your cunt to gather some of the slick, then spat in your hands just to be sure you were lubricated enough for both of his cocks. 

You let the substance drip from your fingers slowly onto his cock, making him twitch and whimper. 

One of your hands moves to spread the substance slowly all over his cock. You heard his breath in your ear become shallow and needy. 

You pulled your hand back, then used two fingers to swirl around the precum coming out of his cock. 

“M-my l-lady, please…” Sukuna had become a stuttering mess, slurring and breaking his sentences. 

“Please, what?” He rutted his hips up, pushing his cock into your fingers. “Rub my cock, please?” 

An evil grin appeared across your face. “You are under absolutely no obligation to make demands of me. I am in charge. Not you.” 

You slapped both of his cocks down so hard they hit his thighs. Pained moans left his throat as the stinging sensation spread through his cocks. 

"N-ngh, I'm sorry. So sorry. Won't do it again.” You jerked one of them soothingly, just as a little reward for apologizing. “You will have to beg if you want to come. Ok, my darling?” 

He nodded up and down frantically, but you wanted more. “Words.”

“Y-yes,” he panted out. 

“Beg.” 

You finger-teased the side of his cock, tracing his electric-blue veins up and down. “I’ll be a really good boy. I’ll be courteous. I’ll worship you and give you what you want. Please.” 

You laughed at his pathetic pleas. “Will you stop giving the concubines a hard time?” You pinched the tip of his cock, making pre-cum spurt out. 

“N-ngh, mmm. Of course, my lady. Anything for you, please. I’d do anything.” You licked his ear, slowly, making his face flush a deep red. 

You took each of your hands and began to rub each of his cocks. Your finger rubbed over his tips to spread the creamy, clear-white substance all over. 

His hips moved in various directions and rubbed all of your hands. His thrusts were brutal and sloppy, typically making his cocks glide off your hands. 

He leaned his head back onto your shoulder so that you could see his face. His eyes were tired and low, staring directly into yours. 

You moved your lips toward his to embrace him in a sloppy kiss. Your tongue dominated his as he moved weakly through your mouth. Your tongue flicked against his in what felt like a battle. You pulled back and spit into his mouth before going back to kissing. 

Your tongue ran over his lips before he moved in closer to melt into yours. Your lips moved down his neck, creating dark red marks all over. 

You began to move your hands in twisting motions as you proceeded to jerk him off harder and harder. His moans began to build up in volume. He was finally going to cum.

“My l–l lady." 

“Not yet.” Your hands sped up, as did the twitching of his cock. 

“P-please.” You kept refuting his pleas. 

“Not until I say so.” His moans filled your ears like a symphony. 

“U-ugh.” Your hands tightened around his cock. 

“You can cum now, pathetic man.”

White long spurts of cum fell over your hands and his thighs as you continued to jerk his cock. The hot spurts erupted out of him for what felt like an eternity. The more he came, the more his body shook, and the farther the cum sprayed. 

By the time he was done, his body was weakened and tired. Loads upon loads of cum covered your hands to your delight. You licked all of it as if it were a treat.

You swallowed most of it but made sure to leave some for when you sloppily kissed him. You kissed the man for about another 10 minutes before he began to doze off. 

“Y’actually did it…” he whispered.

“Did what?” 

“My cock hasn’t gotten hard again…” 

Oh yeah, that's why you’re here. 

Can u tell i got slight inspo from the apothecary diaries

Ok I leave

[fukiouh]

How to Evict a Cowboy | cowboyjo x reader

You inherited a ranch in the countryside from your great-aunt. The issue? Half the inheritance went to a pretty cowboy who didn't seem to take a hint. So, your plan was very simple. Evict him, sell the ranch, and secure your rich city-girl retirement plans. Instead, you get tackled into the mud by a rogue cow, seduced by a foreman in leather chaps, and completely outplayed by your dead great-aunt, all while realizing the only villain in your little story is you. But hey, you win some, you lose some.

pairing: Gojo Satoru x reader

warnings: 18+ (mdni!!), explicit sexual content, afab!reader, modern AU, cowboyjo, enemies to lovers (one sided), slow burn (the burn is mostly her being an delulu idiot), crack treated seriously, found family, cowboy dialect written with full commitment (you have been warned), fluff, smut, angst, hurt/comfort, reader is a bit of bitch, piv, creampie, praise kink, size kink, spanking, hair pulling, light degradation, dom/sub undertones, oral (m and f receiving), gojo is down bad, he fell first and harder

word count: 30k+

The GPS had been "recalculating" for the past twenty minutes and you were starting to think it was doing it on fucking purpose. You were also starting to think that your lovely great-aunt had a very specific sense of humor for someone you only ever saw like once or twice a year at your grandma's house. Every single holiday she would corner you in the kitchen and try to get you to come out here for whatever ass reason.

"Come see the ranch again, it's beautiful during the summer, you'd love it," she'd insist and you always said no. You used to come there a few times when you were a kid. But now you were always too busy, or to be honest too uninterested. You belonged in the city, always did. And yet here you were, inheriting half of it. A piece of land with horses on it and also, like, mud and the smell of poop and other ranch things.

Half of it. Could have been the whole thing, because you were the favourite niece for whatever reason. Which you were not going to dissect and why your family thought money + career = good person, though the holidays were definitely going to be eventful this year. Get that, fucking cousins.

The other half was left to the ranch's foreman. Some guy you had never met, inheriting a solid amount of money according to Shoko, your lawyer. Must have been some village gold-digging freeloader who had somehow charmed a lonely old woman into signing away half of a multi-million-dollar estate. People really had no shame. What happened to working like the rest of us?

Your great-aunt must have been going senile and the guy must be fucking sly. Which was why you came. You needed to sort this mess out. Convince the guy into agreeing to get bought out for a sensible amount, or straight-out bully him into forcefully giving you his half, the one that should belong to your family, to you, anyway and not to some village bumpkin who probably thought conning elderly ladies was fun.

But it did start to smell a bit funky as you drove through the countryside. But a smell was just a smell, and dirt was just dirt, and according to the pre-evaluation currently burning a hole in your bag, your half of this dirt was worth exactly, roughly, a lot of, the money you needed to invest, get rich, and finally quit your soul-sucking corporate job. You were fucking done being a corporate slave.

You just had to assess the property, convince the squatter to get the hell out, take the cash, even if only hypothetically now, and get back to civilization.

Yes, this was a pain in the ass, but how long could liquidating one crusty ranch in the middle of nowhere possibly take? You kinda just answered yourself here. Crusty and in the middle of nowhere, sure, but the real estate market was vast. There was definitely a target group for these types of properties. You just had to clean it up a bit, call a good photographer, make it look like a trad fam wet dream to appeal to the rich and morally ambiguous, and boom. Millions cashing in.

Your GPS finally managed to cooperate — mental note to just use Google Maps next time instead of trusting the car navigation. You threw the car into park with a loud crunch of gravel, shoved your sunglasses up your nose, and opened the door. Your heel immediately sank half an inch into the dust.

You could almost giggle at how cliché your arrival was. What would come next, some hot ranch hand emerging from the barn with a piece of hay between his teeth?

Actually, probably not. Instead of a hot cowboy, you were about to meet whatever rat-ass sugar baby had sweet-talked his way into half this inheritance, single-handedly complicating your rich-city-girl retirement plans. 

You just didn't understand why your mom was so sceptical when you whined into the phone about the guy. Like, why did only you and your lawyer seem to take some random guy as a threat to your family's financial wellbeing? Oh god, did he try to charm away your mom too when she was visiting last summer?

And look, the ranch was actually, objectively, fine. Less impressive than you remembered from when you were twelve, but still pretty-ish. Green and wide, annoyingly picturesque, and okay, it had real potential. But that only meant getting rid of it would be easier.

You hauled your overstuffed weekender bag over your shoulder and marched up the steps of the wraparound porch. The wood groaned under your amazingly inappropriate shoes, but hey, slay was mandatory no matter where you go. You just needed to get inside, set up your phone hotspot, and start firing off emails alongside with financial and legal threats left and right.

You jiggled the front doorknob. Locked. Obviously.

You dug through your purse, aggressively shoving aside lip glosses and tampons on the loose, before you kinda realized that Shoko hadn't given you a key. She'd handed you a stack of folders, offered her condolences, and sent you on your way.

"Fantastic," you muttered. "Worth millions and I'm fucking locked out."

You dragged your bag down the steps again, heels clicking against the wood before sinking into the grass, and made your way around the side of the house. There had to be a back door. There was a back door, as far as you could remember. Maybe a loose window? You were NOT about to spend your first few hours of rural homeownership waiting on a locksmith in a town that probably only had one, if any.

You found the back door off a screened-in patio. You rattled that knob too. Also locked.

You knocked. Knocked again. Then you banged both fists against the peeling paint of the door.

"Okay, great. Perfect. I'll just sleep in the car. Or maybe I'll kick the door in. Who's going to arrest me, the local sheriff? Have some western-style shootout," you muttered under your breath, chuckling.

"Wouldn't kick that if I were ya, darlin'."

You froze. You spun around so fast you nearly rolled your ankle on the back door mat.

He was leaning against the corner of the patio, one shoulder against the wood, arms loosely crossed. Ends of his white hair were peeking under the hat. Canvas jacket and worn-in jeans that stretched across his muscular legs just right. And — you actually wanted to fucking scream — a literal stem of sweetgrass tucked in the corner of his mouth.

And someone fuck you, are we for real now?

He tipped the brim of his hat back, just a bit, almost cartoonishly, in the true m'lady fashion, revealing bright, entirely too-amused eyes. Gorgeous eyes.

"Door's solid wood," he drawled, his voice slow and warm, as he peeled himself off the post and walked over. God, he was too tall as well. Annoyingly tall. "You're just fixin' to break a toe. And them shoes ain't exactly built for it."

"How long have you been standing there," you said. It did not come out as a question.

"'Bout as long as it took ya to go around the front." He sent off one cheeky smile. "Front door's been sticky since April. Shoulda just knocked."

You looked at the door you had been knocking on for the past two minutes and then back at him. "And you are?" you crossed your arms, eyeing him down. Was this the sugar baby? Well, at least your aunt had taste, you gotta give her that. 

"Co-owner," he flashed you a proud smile and you just glared at him. Co-owner my ass. Not for long. "There's a trick to it," he added, and produced a key from his pocket, unlocked the door, and held it open. What a prick.

"I did knock, m-multiple times —"

"Yeah, seen ya." He now leaned against the open doorframe, looking you up and down like he was confirming something. "Your aunt said ya were stubborn."

You stopped dead in your tracks. "Excuse me?"

"Pardon me for lockin' up," he continued seamlessly, ignoring your shock and shifting the sweetgrass to the other corner of his mouth. "Didn't realize her favourite city girl was fixin' to kick our door in."

"My door in," you hissed, and walked past him without another word, feeling a betraying flush spread across your cheeks. So he seemed to know who you were. And he was talking to you so crude and straightforward so no surprise some old lonely lady would get swayed by his sweet tongue. But you were not like that. You were young, smart, and knew exactly why he was trying to charm you. He was not getting your panties nor your half either.

He called out behind you, way too pleased with himself. "Gonna want different shoes, by the way."

You went in. The spare keys were by the front door, lying on the side console, mocking you. But you had plenty of time to actually look around.

The house itself was pretty average — ranch looking, kitschy decor pieces here and there, crocheted blankets galore. Apparently every room had been assigned at least one horse painting, and if you stared at the wallpaper long enough it would probably give you an ugly headache.

It was also surprisingly spacious. You claimed the master suite, settled in, and spent a good while beating the dust out of things before your stomach reminded you that you hadn't eaten since the gas station off the highway.

You followed your nose downstairs. The smell was offensively good. You were expecting the lingering scent of mothballs or dusty staleness. Instead, the kitchen smelled like garlic, butter, and seared meat. Why did your kitchen smell like garlic, butter, and seared meat?

You walked downstairs to find the hot, who said that, guy from the porch standing at your great-aunt's stove. He had ditched the canvas jacket, leaving him in a faded henley that did entirely too much for his shoulders. His infuriating hat was currently resting on the kitchen island, revealing white hair that was a bit slicked, a bit messy, and had absolutely no business looking that good unstyled. 

"What are you doing in here?" you demanded, pausing with one hand on the doorframe. "Do you live in this house?"

"Nah, not fully," he drawled, not looking away from the cast-iron pan as he flipped a steak with a pair of tongs. "Fam's got a place down the road. Usually head back there 'round sundown."

"Then why are you cooking in my kitchen?"

He finally glanced over his shoulder, flashing that same cheeky smile from earlier. "Our kitchen, ya mean? Figured a pretty city girl like you wouldn't think to stop for groceries. Auntie always said you practically lived on overpriced coffee. Can't have ya starvin' to death on night one, can we?"

You leveled him with your best hostile glare. "Stop talking about her like you knew her better than I did. And why exactly did my aunt give you half of this property? Who are you? ‘Cause you're using my house —"

"Satoru Gojo," he said easily, not letting you finish, man really was rude,  putting a perfectly seared cut of meat onto a plate. "Foreman. Manager. Owner of the other half of this ranch. Currently actin' as your personal chef."

The audacity of this cowboy gold-digger seemed to know no bounds. The man standing between you and your generational wealth, and you would not have that, thank you very much.

He set the plate on the table and gestured to the chair. "Take a seat, darlin'. Food's gettin' cold."

You crossed your arms, prepared to tell Satoru Gojo to pack up his steak, his cowboy hat, and leave, but then your stomach rumbled.

His smile only widened. It was infuriating. It was even more infuriating that five minutes later you were sitting at the dining table eating the best piece of steak you had ever tasted in your life. You refused to give him the satisfaction of a compliment. Last thing this man needed was to know his cooking skills were as superior as his shoulder-to-waist ratio. Instead you chewed, swallowed, and mentally decided to dismantle his little squatter dream right over the medium-rare beef.

"Just to be clear, Satoru," you said, pointing your fork at him across the table. "Don't get used to cooking here or whatever. I'm selling this place. Which means you are going to sign off on it. I'll make sure of it."

You waited for the panic. The sudden realization that his free ride was over. Instead, he leaned back in his chair, stretched his long legs out under the table, and rested his arms loosely across his chest. He looked like he had been expecting you to say exactly that.

"Sure ya are," he hummed, his eyes tracking the way you stubbornly cut another piece of meat. "How's the food?"

You stared at him. The sheer audacity. It was a small-town disease, it had to be. Some terminal inability to grasp how the real world actually worked. Let him sit there looking all smug and broad-shouldered in his little cowboy fantasy. Let him think his stupid, slow-drawling cowboy routine was going to stall a multi-million-dollar liquidation. You had a hefty folder of documents ready, a schedule, and an unyielding need to get out of your current life and no man was going to ruin that. Let alone some tall, thieving cowboy.

You shoved another piece of steak into your mouth, chewed aggressively, and refused to look at him for the rest of the meal.

You slept til ten. You would probably sleep til noon if the cows and whatever other animals outside wouldn't be so loud. Like, don't get me wrong, you loved animals, okay? You weren't some psycho. But you loved these kinds of animals mostly on your FYP through cute little short videos where you didn't have to be close to them. Beauty sleep was important, but also you hadn't had any hot yoga in the morning in so so long, so sleeping in felt appropriate and also important for the ruthless negotiation performance you were going to execute today. It was simply strategic.

You were going to assess. To start figuring out how fast you could get this place on the market and this man out of your life. You were going outside to take a slow and thorough assessing walk. To assess. Not because you were curious about what he looked like in daylight doing actual ranch shit.

You marched downstairs like a woman with a plan. The house was empty, a fresh pot of coffee on the counter, and a note on the table that said good morning <3 in handwriting that had no business looking that nice. Also a heart? Now c’mon. That man's intentions could be a glass house and you were standing outside with a rock in hand.

You were not going to say no to the coffee though. Even if it definitely wasn't the artisan blend you always bought downtown. You only scoffed at the note. Satoru Gojo did not deserve any other reaction.

It was a nice morning. The air smelled like grass and something warm, the sun already shining. There were people already working. You counted five of them, including Gojo, spread across the property doing various ranch-related things you probably did not even have vocabulary for. The first one to spot you was a guy with pink hair, who lit up like you were the most exciting thing that had happened all week.

"Oh, you're auntie's niece!" he said, jogging over, already grinning. "I'm Yuji. We heard an awful lot 'bout ya."

You were going to ask what exactly they had heard, and from whom, and in what context, but he was already pointing across the property. "That there's Megumi—" a dark-haired guy by the barn who was currently taking a break "—Nanami's over by the water trough, an' Nobara's in the stables—"

Five people working here? The ranch must be waay larger than you remembered. But the question kinda remained, and it was who was paying them? Because your lawyer had surely not mentioned any post-mortem fund to cover ranch workers. Look, if they weren't going to ask you for money, who were you to argue.

"Co-owner," you introduced yourself flatly, despite him already knowing who you were. "Nice to meet you all."

Yuji grinned wider, if that was possible. You're exactly like she described ya," he announced to no one in particular. You did not know what to do with that, so you did nothing with it. Were you supposed to be offended?

Over by the fence line, Gojo was with the horse currently chilling in the outside pen. He was wearing a white t-shirt today and his forearms on display like this were frankly disrespectful, but you didn’t hear it from me. 

He was soothing the animal, murmuring low, his gloved hands running over its flank. You shamelessly, SUBCONSCIOUSLY, okay, eyed him down, because you wouldn't do it CONSCIOUSLY. You were into finance bros, Wall Street kinds of guys, thank you very much. But you had read the cowboy romances. You in retrospect should not have read the cowboy romances.

The display was doing things. And you were NOT looking at things. But he spotted you before you could look away and cheekily waved in your direction, and you gulped, rolled your eyes, and looked at Yuji who was currently looking at your shoes.

"Them's some cool shoes," said Yuji. 

"Thank you," you said and smirked. How they all thought you were some inexperienced city girl who didn't know what shoes to wear, but take that, cowboys! You had worn your trusted hiking Salomons. The pink ones. You came prepared.

"Gonna get destroyed, though," he added cheerfully, and went back to work.

As if. They were waterproof. Or at least claimed to be. You had never actually tested them on a hike, because you didn't go on hikes.

You spent the next hour trailing around the property with your phone out, taking photos for the appraiser follow-up and pretending you were not keeping precise track of where Gojo was at all times. Because you were not. Because that was not what you were doing. You were doing a thorough and professional property assessment that happened to occasionally require looking in the direction where a man was doing something with a post and a mallet that you did NOT find interesting at all.

At some point Megumi walked past you carrying something heavy, looked at your shoes, then at your face, and said "hm" in a tone that was the whole opinion. Nobara, when you passed the stables, gave you a long once-over from where she was working and said "cute outfit". You decided to take it as a compliment and move on. Nanami simply nodded at you and then decided to ignore you all the way.  

At some point Gojo sauntered over to the fence when you walked past. "Mornin'. Sleep good? Bet ya must have, seein' as ya slept 'til ten."

"Ten AM is average waking hours," you clipped, aggressively tapping your blank screen. "Look, I need the exact acreage of the grazing pastures and a list of any structural issues on the property."

He leaned his forearms against the top rail. He smelled like sweat, dust, and actual physical exertion. It was fucking awful.

"Barn roof needs a patch 'fore winter. Pastures stretch 'bout forty acres back to the tree line."

"Great. And the soil quality? I need to know if the land is viable for commercial rezoning once we liquidate."

Gojo tilted his head, his eyes flashing with that same stupid knowing amusement from last night.

"Commercial rezonin'? Ain't exactly the most pragmatic approach for this topography, considerin' the watershed."

You blinked. Huh. "I'll let the appraiser decide that tomorrow."

"Sure thing, darlin'," he hummed, pushing off the fence and turning back toward the barn. "Just don't go wanderin' into the north pasture in them sneakers. Mud's deep today."

Sneakers. The absolute nerve of these people. These were premium quality shoes suitable BOTH for city and hiking, thank you very much.

You followed as he gestured you around the property. He pointed things out as you went — which pastures flooded, where the good water was, how many head they were running right now. You kept your appraiser brain running on a loop: acreage, fencing quality, water rights, how many rich city people would pay premium to play cowboy for a weekend. You could already see the listing. It was going to be soooo easy to sell. Please insert the money-tongue emoji. 

Except every time he turned to look at you the summer sun caught on his white hair under the hat and your stomach turned. He walked you back to the house and stopped at the bottom of the steps, looking down at you with that cute, annoying little smile.

"Still plannin' on bullyin' me into signin' by dinner? Tour didn't change ya mind, sweets?"

You crossed your arms. Sweets. So now y'all were on cute pet name basis? That man was moving fast, clearly a shameless veteran of the con. "By Friday if I can swing it."

Gojo tipped his hat back with one finger, eyes bright and way too amused. "Sure thing, darlin'. Just let me know how that goes."  Then he turned and walked back toward the barn like he hadn't just made your entire plan feel like a joke you were telling yourself.

You stood there a second too long, watching him go, heart doing something annoying in your chest. It was surely because of his condescending tone and the stupid, uncalled-for pet names. Trust.

"Asshole," you muttered under your nose, and went inside before you could do something even dumber like follow him and watch his back muscles coil behind the washed-out white fabric.

You made yourself busy in the kitchen. Lunch, or whatever could pass for lunch when the fridge did not contain avocados, prosciutto, and a hummus from the farmer's market, just farm things and one sad block of cheese. You were rummaging through the cabinets for something edible when you spotted a book.

It was just sitting there next to the coffee maker like it lived there. It was your favourite book. And it made your stomach turn in the best way. Oh my god, you didn't know your lovely aunt had a taste for good literature too. It suddenly made you a little sentimental.

The spine was cracked in three places, dog-eared every fifty pages or so, almost just like your copy back home. Aight, alright then. Time for a reread. You picked it up and took it upstairs.

It was strategic. Because everything you did here was strategic. You simply needed something to read before bed, and also your phone was at four percent currently, so you plopped down on your bed and started reading — the old bookmark falling silently onto your bedsheets.

The appraiser arrived the next afternoon, armed with the pictures you took yesterday and very long, very frustrated emails you had sent off since you arrived. You waited outside with your trusted thicc folder of the pre-eval from Shoko and a very clear agenda that did not include any Satoru Gojo.

But Satoru Gojo was hovering by the porch outside when the appraiser's car pulled up.

"Gojo," you smiled through your teeth, using your most professional voice that could still curdle milk. "You don't need to be here for this."

"Well I'm a co-owner, ain't I?" he said pleasantly, and pushed off the railing to shake the appraiser's hand before you could. "Satoru. Good to meet ya."

The appraiser was in his mid-fifties, clipboard in hand, shook it warmly. "Great spread you've got here."

"We're selling it," you interrupted as you shook his hand too.

"Might be," Gojo shrugged with the stupid smirk and gestured for the appraiser to lead the way.

The walkabout took about two hours. Gojo trailed behind you, next to you, hands in his pockets, answering the appraiser's questions before you could even try, pointing out things you hadn't even thought to mention. Making it extremely difficult to maintain the fiction that you were the one in charge here.

He knew where every fence line ran. He knew the load-bearing issue on the barn roof and the drainage pattern on the pastures and could rattle off the grazing capacity per acre without looking anything up. It was very annoying. It was also a little bit impressive, but that was all against your better judgment.

At some point the appraiser asked about the property's existing tax classification and whether you'd looked into agricultural exemption status for the sale. Gojo paused and looked over at you.

"That one's yours, darlin'," he murmured, stepping back slightly with his arms crossed.

So you answered. Answered well, actually better than well even. You'd done your homework the second you stepped out of your lawyer's office. Taxes, agricultural exemptions, the step-up in basis on inherited property, comparable county sales, all of it.

"Right," the appraiser said, making notes.

Gojo made a small sound of agreement. "Auntie said ya had a head for money," he said as he started to walk next to you again. "She was real proud of ya."

You furrowed your eyebrows and scribbled something in your tablet that made no sense, just so you didn't have to answer that one. You were not going to be sentimental about that. So why did it make you all woozy? That Yuji kid had made it clear that your great-aunt had a thing for talking about you, but why did it feel different coming from him? Because! it felt like a privacy violation! Exactly that. You were here to sell a ranch, not to stand in a dirt field and catch feelings about a dead woman being proud of you, relayed by the man currently standing between you and the money. That was manipulation, probably. Surely had to be.

"And this section here," the appraiser was saying, gesturing toward the east field, "good flat acreage, nice aspect. You thought about any alternative use options instead of selling? Agritourism's been doing well in this county. Glamping setups, farm stays, that kind of thing —"

"We're liquidating the full property," you interrupted. Last thing you needed was these men giving each other ideas. You wanted the money and to get the hell out, and you were going to repeat this shit until the moment it actually happened. It was called positive affirmations.

"Could be viable for a boutique rental operation, dependin' on how ya market it," Gojo interrupted you right back. Great. Now he was giving him an annoying idea. But also... huh.

You turned to look at him. Because huh. He was looking at the east field like he was already imagining it.

"Just a thought," he shrugged, and met your eyes briefly before looking back at the appraiser. "Carry on."

You were still looking at him, a little dumbfounded. Because that was a bit out of a cowboy's pocket. It was actually a legible idea, and you hated that you recognized ball when you heard it.

You were so busy trying to wedge yourself back into the conversation that had slightly gotten away from you, ping-ponging your attention between the two men, that you didn't notice the ground getting slick and spongy under your left pink Salomon.

A hand closed around your arm. Gojo redirected you gently, pulling you to his side of the path, and you could feel the warmth of him through his flannel.

"Watch where ya goin', darlin'," he murmured, low enough that it was just for you. "Can't have ya all wet n' muddy now, can we." He let go and kept talking to the appraiser like he hadn't been tracking exactly where you were walking for the past two hours. 

You looked at the puddle and it was a big puddle. You looked at him, a betraying flush already dusting your cheeks, and he glanced back at you just to check if you were okay. The expression was quiet, strangely real, and gone before you could name it. 

You both looked away. The skin on your arm was warm and tingling and your heart started to thrum in your ribcage, which made you furious. This man was trying to cause a cardiac arrest so he could have the entire ranch to himself. That was obviously what was happening here.

The appraiser cleared his throat. "I'll need about a week to compile the full valuation report. Some water rights questions I'll need to verify with the county, and the barn will require a structural engineer before I can sign off. I’ll return with the updated documents next week, and let you know which day."

"A week?" you repeated.

"Give or take. We will likely need to assess some things in greater detail."

You thought about your weekender bag left half-packed back in the master suite. You had packed only about three days of clothes, your skincare bag, and a laptop charger. You looked at the ranch stretching out around you, annoyingly large and annoyingly beautiful in the late afternoon light. You looked at Gojo, who was gazing at the middle distance serenely. So you were going to have to stay here even longer.

"And can’t we do like a Zoom call or something?" you demanded, scowling at the very idea of staying here with him and his annoying cowboy life.

"I’d appreciate if we could meet here again in person."

You bit the inside of your cheek, blinked down at your already muddied-up shoes, RIP, and nodded in defeat.

"Fine," you hissed. Now you were going to have to explain to your boss that you were taking more days off, and that no, you were not living out some cowboy romance fantasy, and that you had apparently chosen the slowest appraiser in the entire world.

"Fantastic," he said, winking at you before flashing that very sweet, very crooked smile. "Least ya got more time to try n' change my mind, sweets."

"I don't need more time, I will make you," you scoffed, narrowing your eyes. "We ARE signing."

"We'll see," he answered, still smiling down at you. "Least ya get a proper look at the inside of the house while ya here, darlin'. Plenty of space, ain't there."

You stood there by the porch again in your Salomons, holding up completely fine, for the record, and thought that you were going to need more underwear. Also possibly a therapist. But mostly the underwear.

Fuck. You didn't have enough clothes.

"Where is the closest mall?" you blurted out.

Gojo paused and looked back. "Mall?"

"I don't have enough clothes for a week," you answered, genuinely horrified.

"Relax," Gojo said, walking the appraiser to his car. "Got a washin' machine. And Nobara can lend ya some things." He glanced back at you over his shoulder, that infuriating not-quite-smile on. "Least they'll be more ranch appropriate."

You woke up to a small pile of clothes sitting right outside your bedroom door. Kinda on cue, because you had just officially depleted your clean panties supply and were more than ready for a small laundry day. You wanted to slap yourself because why did you only take three extra pairs of panties anyways? Whenever you went somewhere just for a weekend you took like two weeks' worth, just in case you would shit yourself approximately every two hours. This time, you were being way too ambitious.

You brought it over to your bed. There were two outfits that clearly belonged to Nobara judging by the sizing. But underneath them, three of Gojo's t-shirts. Soft from washing, faded, and obviously his because they were stupidly large.

Why though. You asked yourself as you INEXPLICABLY took a lungful of one of them. Was this kinda deranged domestication game he was trying to pull on you? Thinking that giving you his clothes would make you more pliable in his wicked evil squatting plans?

But two can play the game, as you pulled it over your head. Put on one of the two pairs of pants from Nobara and padded down. He was in the kitchen in the middle of making a fresh batch of coffee for you again.

"Mornin'—" he stalled as he turned around and saw you drowning in his favourite tee.

You braced for the smirk, the cocky comment and how you would retaliate even meaner. But he just blinked at the way the short sleeve was almost at your elbows and how the hem was hitting your mid-thighs. His eyes flickered and darkened, the corner of his mouth almost twitching, and then he swallowed hard and looked away first.

"Coffee's fresh," he muttered, turning his back to you.

You nodded, looking sideways, why was it suddenly so hot in here? And Satoru, I mean GOJO, started to wonder that too, as he caught his reflection in the microwave glass with a blush adorning his sun-kissed skin.

You took your coffee outside before either of you could make it weirder.

You spent the rest of the day doing laundry, arguing with your boss over the phone, finding signal to argue with your boss over the phone, then arguing with your mom over the phone, the good signal spots moving all over the fucking property like it tried to piss you off. Which guess what, it fucking worked. You then found the tree swing you used to play on when you were a child, so you argued from there too. You then watched Gojo and Nanami take the horses for a ride, rolling your eyes at the obvious hot cowboy shit, who said that again, and spent some time with Megumi, who showed you how to pet a cow named Betsy.

The next day started off fantastic. The appraiser called to say he'd powered through and would arrive in two days instead of five.

But the tall cowboy sugar baby was everywhere, unbothered, breathing down your neck. Surely because D-day was approaching and you were NOT yielding. You had resolve made out of titanium. You would be sitting at the island, dissociating in the appropriate i’m-on-a-ranch-and-have-nothing-to-do way over your filtered coffee, which was kinda growing on you now, which you hated to admit, and he would just stroll in, grab a wrench, fix the squeaky cabinet hinge you'd whined about the day before in under two minutes, wash his hands, and leave. It was vile, and the way his bicep and tricep flexed while he did it was even viler. Ugh.

By late afternoon you were sitting on the porch steps, holding your phone up to the sky like a sacrificial offering to the cell tower gods. Zero bars. You just needed one fucking bar to send this email.

Down by the fence, Satoru was working with Yuji and Nanami. He was hauling heavy wooden posts, his t-shirt clinging to his sweaty back. Yuji tripped over a coiled rope, nearly eating the dirt, and Satoru laughed.

He threw his head back, resting his hands on his hips, and the sound carried itself right over to where you were sitting. It was a booming, tingly sound that went straight to your belly and made you feel all warm. You lowered your phone and stared in their direction. The air was hazy in the early twilight light. Your chest did this weird little flutter, and for a second you completely forgot you were supposed to be liquidating his life. He just looked so—

"See ya watchin' him all the time." 

You jumped out of your skin, almost dropping your phone down the stairs into the mud. Nobara was walking past the porch, lugging two heavy buckets of feed.

"You like him, huh?" she added, casually dropping the bomb over her shoulder. And it felt like getting shot straight in the underbelly. Because it WASN'T true, it OBVIOUSLY wasn't true. You were just assessing the ranch workers, doing ranch work stuff on the ranch. Simple as that.

"Nuh-uh!" you sputtered, your voice cracking horribly as you scrambled up from the steps. "I was just—"

Nobara paused, turning back with a single judgmental eyebrow raised.

"I was just looking if anyone doesn't need any help!" you blurted out, speed-walking down the steps in a blind panic. "There is no signal again and I have absolutely nothing else to do!"

You marched right up to her and violently wrenched both of the heavy buckets out of her hands. Nobara didn't even resist. She just let her arms fall, looked at her empty hands, and then up at your manic face.

"Right," she said smoothly, smirking. "Follow me then, hard worker."

She continued walking, strolling toward the stables with you in tow, aggressively out of breath, holding fifty pounds of horse feed, which was fine because you frequented the gym, while drowning in Satoru's t-shirt.

Which in retrospect you shouldn't have done because now you were lounging on the couch, fucking sore day later. You were still wearing the t-shirt and it's nobody's business that it might have been the third day in a row. You were finishing the book you found prior, absolutely eating up the best part of the story.

"Well, well," Satoru suddenly appeared over your lying form, eyeing you again. And you're saying again because you caught this creep eyeing the way his t-shirt fit you every single time he came into frame. He looked at the book in your hands and crossed his arms. "A little book thief, ain't ya, sweets?" 

He pointed at the book and his bookmark currently lying flat on your belly. Huh. It's his book?

"I didn't steal it," you said, defensive, pressing the book flat against your chest to hide the cover. "It was left in a common area. I simply... took it."

"Took it," he repeated, tilting his head as he sat on the armrest by your feet. "That what we're callin' it?"

"I don't know what else you'd call reading orphaned books lying around. Clearly you're a bad owner."

That got a real laugh out of him, short and surprised. And instead of pushing the teasing forward, his bright blues dropped back down to the book clutched to your chest. The cocky, crooked smirk faded into something softer and more observant.

"At the chapter with the train station, ain't ya." 

You blinked, completely thrown off guard. "How did you—"

"'Cause yer white-knucklin' the spine,"  he said softly, nodding at your hands. "Best part of the book. Read it 'bout four times myself. Rhetoric in that monologue's somethin' else. 'Sides, can tell by where it's cracked open." 

You only blinked at him, surprised. He loved this book too? And you were reading his copy too… No. No. NO. Again this must have been some stalling tactic. Your entire family knew you loved this specific book, because you couldn't shut the fuck up about it over Christmas break back in freshman year. Auntie must have accidentally mentioned it too, and now he was using this against you.

You swallowed hard, suddenly feeling incredibly exposed. AND suspicious. "It's... yeah. It's really good."

"Take your time with it," he murmured, his eyes staying on your hands a second too long. "Ain't askin' for it back anytime soon, darlin'."

He stood and stretched, unfairly tall in the low afternoon light coming through the window. “Also came to tell ya, I'm headin' home early today. Dad wanted some help with somethin', an' one of our ranch hands got sick, so gotta help the old man myself.” 

"Yeah, uh, okay," you said, picking up the book from your chest again, looking up at him with unknowing puppy eyes. His expression softened even more at that. Fuck. "Tomorrow the appraiser comes back, at 11 am, so be back by then?"

He smiled. "Don't worry, sweets, I'll be back at eight sharp, like always. Don't miss me too much, will ya?" He tilted his head, cooed. Then he walked out the front door, the screen slamming shut behind him, leaving you lying alone on the couch. Your heart was doing a stupid tap dance against your ribs again.

You stared down at the book, then glanced down at his t-shirt.

Fuck indeed.

You realized that you were in so much trouble. Not even your titanium hard resolve could stay on the offensive forever.

The house remained quiet, and frankly, you became kind of bored and antsy. Nanami and Nobara had disappeared somewhere toward the far pasture with a truck full of fence posts, and Yuji and Megumi were off doing something with the hay bales that involved a lot of yelling and, from what you could hear, at least one near-death experience for Yuji.

You wandered out to the porch and looked toward the pasture. There were cows.

Megumi had shown you how to pet Betsy. It was basically just a large dog that ate grass. You marched over, zeroing in on a brownish cow closest to the fence rail that was aggressively chewing its cud. You climbed over the wooden rail and approached the animal with your palm out.

"Here, Betsy two-point-zero," you cooed, using your best networking voice, murmuring something you'd heard Gojo murmur to the horses. It surely wasn’t Betsy, because Betsy had a notch out of one ear and the general demeanor of a woman who gave about zero fucks. But a cow is a cow, isn't it? Yesterday went well. Great, even. You were basically a natural cow petter.

So today you were going to do it again. Because you were an adult woman temporarily owning large farm animals, apparently, and the cows were kind of soothing to be around.

The cow stopped chewing. It slowly turned its massive head, glaring at you with hostile, beady eyes. Uhh. Before you could even reconsider moving onto another, more friendly-looking cow, Satoru’s truck came tearing back up the driveway, parking half on the grass. You whipped your head around, but the sudden movement, combined with the car crunching the gravel, spooked the cow. It let out a demonic moo and lunged forward.

Being the sensible person with great reflexes that you were, you naturally turned and bolted instead of just calmly backing away from the charging cow. But the cow took it as a game of tag and started running after you.

You shrieked, scrambling backward as you tried to change direction, but your premium waterproof Salomons found absolutely zero traction in the mud and manure, still slick from last night’s rain. Your feet flew out from under you.

There was a loud whistle that spooked the entire herd, sending them running in the opposite direction including the gladiator cow.

"Gotcha!"

Satoru appeared quite literally out of nowhere. His arms wrapped tight around your waist, hauling you backward before you could literally eat shit. But his momentum was too fast, the mud was too slick, you were spooked too, and physics was a bitch. You both went down hard anyway. Yummy.

“Well,” he said, voice warm and way too delighted despite the fact that you were currently rolling in mud, “sure wasn’t expectin’ a rodeo.”

You flailed in a blind panic, wildly trying to push yourself up. Your elbow jabbed him in the ribs and your knee caught his thigh. You were in shock from the freezing cold mud and the smell, but also from how warm his body was underneath you, and how tightly his arms were still wrapped around your waist.

"Stop swingin'!" he groaned, shifting his weight to trap your legs beneath his so you wouldn't kick him again.

He rolled you off of him and ended up fully pinning you into the mud, his forearms planted on either side of your head, his chest heaving, his hair splattered with brown dirt. He hadn't wanted to get you dirtier, but oh well.

“What are you even doing here?!” you shrieked, violently shoving your muddy palm over his mouth to stop whatever smug comment was forming there. “You said you were leaving!”

His bright blue eyes crinkled at the corners. He didn't even try to move your hand.

"Forgot my wallet," he mumbled, his voice warm and vibrating directly against your palm.

He kissed the center of your muddy hand before gently prying your wrist away so he could speak properly. Oh god.

"Had to come back for it," he smirked down at you, chest still heaving against yours. "Couldn't risk ya stealin' my social security number and signin' shit without me knowin'."

He knew he should let you go. Your expression was somewhere between flustered and furious, because how dare he think you would do such a thing! Not that you hadn't thought of it yesterday when he was giving fresh hay to the horses, but still.

You had mud in your hair and everywhere else, wearing his favorite t-shirt and completely ruining it. Yet you were the prettiest thing he had ever seen. It was, in hindsight, a bit of a stupid thought to have about a woman covered in cow shit, but he was having it anyway.

Fuck, he thought, the realization hitting him so fast and so hard it actually knocked the remaining breath out of his lungs. He was in so much trouble.

Auntie’s photos hadn’t done you justice. Neither had her stories, told over coffee on the porch with that soft, knowing look she got whenever your name came up, like she already knew something he hadn’t figured out yet. He’d built you up in his head over two years of hearing about you before you ever set foot on this land. Then you’d walked in wearing heels and being an absolute bitch to him, and he’d liked you before you even said a real word. He’d been kinda fighting it ever since.

He really should let you go. But studying your pretty face now, feeling the frantic pulse in the muddy wrist he was still holding... he kinda didn't want to. And was he crazy for wanting to stay exactly like this? In the mud, with you pinned beneath him? It was pathetic.

He wanted you to steal his books, and wear his clothes, and yell at his, well, your, cows forever. But then your eyes dropped, heavy under his gaze, staring right at his mouth. Well. There it was. He was in it now, and no amount of good sense was gonna talk him back out of it. He was, after all, just a man head over heels for a woman.

He let his weight settle a fraction lower and your breath went shallow. Traitor lungs. The mud was already drying at his temple, one strand of white hair stuck flat against his forehead, and his eyes weren't doing the cocky thing anymore. 

"Darlin'," he said, low, breath fanning over your cheeks.

Your hand was still loosely caught in his, wrist turned up, his thumb tracing absent circles against your pulse point like he wasn’t even aware he was doing it. Every single working brain cell you owned had relocated its entire focus to that one spot on your skin.

He tipped his head. Not much. An inch, maybe less, could've been him just adjusting his hat if he'd been wearing one, except he wasn't. You could smell mud, sweat and something underneath that you already recognized as him, and you must have hit your head on the way down but you leaned in too.

But your brain caught up to your body about four seconds too late, the way it always did around him, and pure animal panic did the rest.

You slapped a muddy hand over his mouth.

Again.

His eyes went wide, startled this time, caught in the moment, and something that might have been a laugh got trapped somewhere behind your palm.

“Nope,” you said, breathless, voice cracking clean in half. “Nope. We are not. I am not. This is mud delirium. We hit our heads and probably inhaled some mud bacteria already eating our brains.”

He said something back, muffled completely against your palm, warm breath ghosting over your skin. You had absolutely no idea what it was and every intention of never finding out, because knowing would mean acknowledging that some small part of you had wanted to hear it.

You scrambled backward out from under him so fast you nearly went down in the mud again. He let you go this time, sitting back on his heels, and watched you flee toward the house at the speed of light.

“I need a shower,” you announced to no one, to the yard, to the traumatized cows, and speed-walked the rest of the way inside without looking back once.

You did not, in fact, need a shower nearly as badly as you needed time alone to NOT think about the fact that you’d wanted him to kiss you with mud on his face, in a field full of manure, and that some small, stupid part of you was furious he hadn’t managed to before you panicked. And that the kiss he’d left in the center of your palm was still burning.

You slept like shit, heart still erratic, dreaming weird-ass dreams, and had only about four minutes of peace before you remembered the appraiser was coming today.

Exactly in an hour. Which kinda gave you no time to figure out what you were supposed to do with your face around Satoru after yesterday. You felt like the cow might as well have run over you, actually, the entire herd might as well have. Every muscle ached, and your brain was a buzzing mess of mud, lips, pulse, panic.

Satoru's gray t-shirt, completely ruined and stiff with dried mud, was crumpled in the corner of the room where you'd thrown it yesterday.

You stared at it, feeling your cheeks heat up again. Then, looking around the empty room like you were committing a federal crime, you snatched it up, folded it aggressively, and shoved it at the very bottom of your weekender bag. You were throwing it away. Obviously. You just... needed to throw it away in the city.

He was already on the porch when you came down, coffee in hand like always, and for one horrible second, neither of you said anything at all.

"Mornin'," he said, testing the water.

"Morning." You didn't look at him directly. You couldn't bring yourself to. Your stomach hurt, and you couldn't tell if it was because you needed breakfast or because you were trying so hard not to look at his flushed cheeks.

The appraiser arrived thirty minutes early, his folder thick with the finished valuation. You sat across the kitchen table from him, determined to make today feel like any other Tuesday in your old life.

Numbers. Signatures. Clean.

The guy talked about the process, spreading topographical maps across your kitchen table. He droned on about riparian water rights, soil degradation, and grazing easements. You tried to focus on the numbers, nodding along like a shark smelling blood. But you couldn't really lock in. Not when Gojo leaned over the table, planting a hand next to your coffee mug to casually correct the appraiser's boundary lines. He effortlessly traced the east pasture, tossing out phrases in that drawl of his that, you finally had to admit, made your toes curl. Damn those unreasonable cowboy romances that had apparently planted weird shit into your subconscious.

You sat there, spine rigid, staring at a pie chart you weren't actually seeing, aggressively ignoring the way everything he did was sending weird, electric tingles straight down in between your thighs.

"Report's solid," the appraiser finally said, sliding a copy of the finalized valuation across the table. "Given everything we assessed, you're looking at a strong number either way—as a straight sale or if you wanted to explore the other angles we talked about. If you two have reached an agreement on the buyout or liquidation, I have the preliminary sign-offs right here."

This was it. The moment you had been plotting since you got the lawyer's call. Your fingers were tingling with anticipation. Your rich city-girl dream was just a few letters and a signature spot away.

You turned to Satoru, your heart hammering against your ribs, giving him the widest eyes.

"Well," you said, your voice tight and overly bright. "We're liquidating. Satoru is signing his half over for the buyout. Right?"

Satoru looked at the appraiser, then slowly looked at you. And god fuck him, because why did you choose this moment to finally call him by his first name, the exact second he was probably about to crush your heart?

"No," he shook his head.

The appraiser's pen paused mid-air. "No, as in—"

"No, as in I ain't signin'," Satoru said, his voice low, and devoid of its usual teasing lilt. "I ain't sellin'. Not today, not next week. The ranch stays."

You blinked at him. Once. Twice. Waiting for the joke, for the crooked smile, for him to say gotcha again and produce a pen from his back pocket like this was one more bit in a week that had already had way too many bits for your personal liking. The appraiser looked awkwardly between the two of you, slowly closing his folder and clearing his throat like he wanted to be literally anywhere else on the planet.

"We talked about this." Your voice cracked upward and you hated it instantly. "You knew this was happening today. You knew the appraiser was coming with a report and sign-offs and you just—what, let me sit here? Let me say all that in front of him? You couldn't have told me before I—"

"Talked 'bout it when, exactly?" Satoru interrupted as he furrowed his eyebrows. "When ya were tellin' me yer sellin' without even askin' what I actually wanted?"

"Are you kidding me?!" you yelled, pushing your chair back so hard it screeched against the floor. You didn't even care that the appraiser was practically shrinking into the wallpaper. "You are literally holding my life hostage! You're just being arrogant and stubborn—"

"Ya think that's what this is? Think I'm holdin' ya hostage out of spite?"

The appraiser, wisely, had begun quietly gathering his papers and backing away.

"I want to go home!" you whined, your chest heaving, the sheer panic was making you cruel. "I want to go back to my actual life with this entire thing done, and you are standing in my way because you want... what? To win some stupid game? To have this house all for yourself?"

He flinched at that. And whatever raw thing that had been sitting behind his eyes since yesterday disappeared as quickly as you put it in there. The warmth completely drained from his face as he bit his lip and his eyes dragged over the papers again. His eyes returned to you and searched yours. He wanted, no needed, you to realize that his refusal to sign had absolutely nothing to do with acreage or payouts, and everything to do with the fact that the second you both signed, you were going to walk out the front door and never come back.

"Fine," Satoru said. He stood up slowly, frustrated and upset that he couldn't make you stay if you were this determined to run. "Go home, then. But I ain't signin', sweets."

You were shaking. You were so furious at him, and even more furious at the sudden, horrifying thought that maaybe you didn't actually want to sell. Panicking at the sight of the usually bright blues losing their glint, and the cowboy hat sitting at the table suddenly looking less annoying than it ever did. But your pride was a titanium trap, and it snapped shut, locking you inside.

"I am leaving," you hissed, backing away from him, your pink Salomons, which were pink no more, but rather a crusty, dirty brown from the mud, loud against the wood. "But I will be back. And I will make you sign that paperwork, Gojo. Even if I have to blackmail you to do it."

You turned on your heel, marched upstairs to grab your weekender bag, left his book still unfinished on your nightstand, and practically ran out the front door. You threw your car in reverse, spitting gravel everywhere, and drove away without looking in the rearview mirror once.

The first thing you did when you arrived home, finally, was throw the stolen t-shirt in the washing machine on the heaviest cycle you had. Twice. You told yourself you were killing whatever mud bacteria had survived the first wash. The second time was just to be sure, before you would eventually throw it away.

It still ended up in your bed three nights later. All your silk pajamas were at the dry cleaner, and you were tired, and it was right there and clean. Purely coincidence. The fact that it still smelled faintly like him was irrelevant. Coincidence, again. You kept wearing it every single night out of pure spite, because you were being just practical.

Your usual eight-dollar oat milk latte suddenly tasted like burnt dirt water, which made no sense, because it was from the good place, the place with the little chalkboard sign, and you'd loved it for three years. Now all you could think about was the cheap drip coffee Satoru brewed blindly at seven in the morning.

You caught yourself hovering over the search bar. What brand of coffee do ranches use. You deleted it fast though. You were just curious, and the curiosity just dissipated. Don’t search for anything behind it!

And on top of that, work was even shittier than usual. You stood in the breakroom and watched some guy from acquisitions spend three full minutes trying to lift and flip the new water jug onto the cooler. He was panting, his shirt was wrinkling and making annoying small sounds every time it slipped. Ugh. Stupid incompetent men. For whatever reason you thought of Satoru effortlessly hauling fifty-pound wooden fence posts over his shoulder, his big triceps flexing in the sun. You actually had to leave the room because you were viscerally angry at nothing in particular!

And no amount of meditation, pilates, or the cowboy romances you suddenly kept seeing everywhere in your favorite bookstore would flush out the paranoia and this weird feeling from your mind.

You kept thinking about him. You kept assessing him, that's what it was. Trust. TRUST. Okay? Because thanks to your dwelling little sessions, sitting on your couch in his t-shirt and zooming in on the pictures you took over the week for the appraiser, in which he MIGHT have been in a corner or in a distance, you cartwheeled into the realization that Satoru wasn’t just a stubborn cowboy, he was a manipulator. Surely. He wanted you off-balance. Gave you his clothes to trojan horse you. The pet names were calculated to disarm you. A man that competent didn't tackle a woman into the mud by accident. It was strategy, retention. Keep the city girl soft and stupid and sentimental long enough that she wouldn’t push the sale.

It all made perfect sense.

You did not fantasize about him standing in your kitchen, making you coffee from the drip machine you might have recently bought, out of pure coincidence again. You did not wonder what it would have felt like if you had fallen and pinned each other to your plush living room carpet instead of the cow shit mud. You did not miss the way he said darlin' and the way he would smile at you. None of that. Obviously.

He was trying to emotionally manipulate you into backing off, just like he’d manipulated your great-aunt. But you were not going to fall for it.

And then, to forcefully snap you out of it, Shoko called you into the office. Hallelujah. Your mother wasn't exactly nice to you when you told her you tried to sell the ranch, and then nicer when you told her the buyout stalled, and then not nice again when you added FOR NOW.

It was just you and your lawyer against the world. She then lowkey dropped a nuke on you, explaining that if Satoru refused to sign, a forced legal sale would take three to five years, require endless court appearances, and bleed hundreds of thousands of dollars out of the estate in legal fees. Three to five years. You would be a cautionary LinkedIn tale in three to five years.

Panic set in, quickly followed by a manic spite. If you couldn’t force the sale from here without wasting money and time you didn’t have, then you needed leverage. Something that would make him tap out without dragging this through the courts.

So you then spent days locked away in your apartment. You went through every note from the appraiser. Every line about barn repairs and property tax increases and the financial reality of running a ranch that wasn’t printing money. You cross-referenced county zoning laws and agricultural exemptions and cost projections until your eyes burned.

By the end of the week, you had a about forty-page murder-binder. Color-coded, tabbed, and legally terrifying. You were going to corner him with the math until he had no choice but to fold and cry. 

This was about winning. And stalling the buyout, not cashing your paychecks, wasn’t really winning. This was about proving that whatever game he thought he was playing, you were better at it. And you sure as hell will die on this hill.

You were going back. You washed your pink Salomons, which miraculously became somewhat pink again, repacked your weekender, and off on a hitman mission you went.

You showed up the next week with the paperwork shotgun and even colder smile. The car crunched to a stop in the same spot as last time, but everything else felt different. It made you feel sick. You’d practiced this in the mirror. Rehearsed it on the drive. You were not going to let proximity or pet names or whatever the hell had happened in the mud get to you again.

Satoru walked to the front of the house when he heard your car pulling in, which felt, annoyingly, inevitable at this point—like he had some kind of internal radar that went off whenever you crossed the county line.

"Back already, sweets?" he said, not moving from the rail of the porch. He was in his chaps, probably interrupted him mid-ride when you pulled up, and you hated that you recognized that already.

You didn’t bother with small talk. “I had my lawyer look over everything. We need to talk.” You took the binder off the passenger seat and started walking to the front door.

"Do we?" he asked as you walked into the house, his arms crossed over his chest as he tailed after you.

You walked into the kitchen and immediately went for the filtered batch that was, again, sitting on the counter. Fuck, you needed this. Finally some good coffee. Satoru had to bite his lip to prevent himself from smiling. He could smell blood on you.

"Alright, what're we talkin' 'bout," he sat at the table, and you dropped the binder on it with a loud thwack! You sat opposite him, your mug, your favorite one, in hand.

You walked him through the numbers — barn repairs, property tax jumps, zoning restrictions, thin profit margins. Going through your tabs, your notes with total precision, acting like something didn't just lodge in your throat when you glanced at him and saw he was actually listening with  a little furrow between his brows. You kept your voice steady even when you glanced up and saw the small dirt smear on his jaw, or the way his hair was still damp with sweat, or the way the smell of him hit you again and made something in you feel both uneasy and strangely calm.

You waited for the pushback, for him to cross his arms, lean back, and call you darlin' in that stupid, condescending drawl. You had a rebuttal prepared for everything. For anything. But he only took the binder, flipped through it, and asked a couple of clarifying questions about the tax projections and the structural engineer’s notes.

"Okay," he said quietly.

You blinked. Your brain stalled. "Okay?"

"Yeah. Numbers look thorough." He closed it, sliding it back toward you. He looked up, his blue eyes so uncharacteristically polite. "I'll run it by my lawyer, see where it actually holds up. Math's as airtight as yer sayin', we'll go from there."

It was somehow worse than if he’d laughed in your face. Fuck. You felt it strangely in your chest, and your stomach plummeted. "You're... you're just going to send it to your lawyer?" you asked, hating how your voice lost its sharp edge.

"That's standard procedure for a buyout, ain't it?" he replied smoothly, already reaching into his pocket for his phone. "Shoot me the digital copy. I'll forward it to him this afternoon so we can get ahead of it."

"Right," you managed to choke you, digging your own phone out of your purse with numb fingers. "What's your email?"

He rattled off a standard, boring gmail address. You typed it in and pressed send. It felt like a business transaction. It was awful.

"Got it," his phone buzzed in his hand. He stood up and grabbed his hat. "Nanami's waitin' for me by the stables, we're goin' on a ride. Make yerself at home." He paused at the door. "I'll have 'em reach out to yer side directly. Don't reckon I'll be back tonight. See ya ‘round, sweets."

You stared at him. “That’s it?” And you weren't exactly asking about the negotiation process, either. "What'd ya want me to say?" You didn't have an answer to that, which was, in itself, infuriating. "For now," he said, fixing his chaps. God, why did they look so good on him? "I'll holler once I hear somethin'." 

And then he left, leaving you in the kitchen staring at the empty space he was in just seconds ago, feeling a flush adorn your cheeks, but not from him saying something stupid this time around.

By late afternoon, you found yourself standing on the back porch, a cup of his coffee warming your hands. It was your fourth cup of the day, and it was no one’s business if you would be able to fall asleep, because you probably wouldn't be able to anyway, watching him out in the round pen. 

He and Nanami had returned from their ride and were working one of the younger horses. The one Yuji was struggling with the entire day, the one Yuji waved you over to pet again, even if his voice wasn't as warm as the last time you two spoke.

Satoru’s voice carried over the quiet yard, low and steady as he directed the animal. The late day sun caught the lines of his shoulders beneath his faded henley.

You felt like an intruder in a house that you legally owned, and it felt fucking terrible. The cool summer wind bit your skin as you hovered there, not knowing what to do with all of this. You had braced yourself for a big fight, an ugly shouting match, some resolution from the last time you saw him, but certainly not him giving zero flying fucks about you. Giving you nothing to push against. Last time he had hovered close to you as much as possible, even if the blatant flirting with you made you sick. But the sick you were feeling now was so completely different from what you felt when he still thought he had you.

Later, when you went upstairs, you found the book, his book, the one you didn't get to finish last time, still on your nightstand. It made you bite your lip so hard it almost bled. He didn't take it back. You lay on your bed for a long time. You'd come here to strong-arm, and could not, for the life of you, remember why that had ever felt simple.

The next morning you packed slowly, suddenly realizing you might have overpacked, perhaps thinking you would get stranded here like last time. Dragged your bag out to the porch and left it by the steps. Then you made yourself one last cup of his coffee, because apparently you were a masochist now.

You stepped out, walking over to the chilling cows by the fence. The gladiator cow was already watching you, but this time it let itself get petted finally. It felt like even she was mocking you.

She started to lick your hand, and her coarse tongue was tickling you when Satoru walked up to you from the stables, a coiled lead rope slung over his shoulder. He was in his chaps again, probably working intensely with the horses this week. He looked at the porch where your packed weekender sat, and he bowed his head like it confirmed something he’d already expected.

"Mornin'," he finally said, his voice softer than it had been yesterday. "Takin' one of the mares up to the east ridge. View's real nice this time of day." He paused, his blue eyes searching your face, offering one little olive branch. "Wanna come?"

The offer landed like a trap. Your mind immediately started spinning. Alone with him. Close to him again. Being friendly when you were supposed to be hostile and fighting. The panic rose fast and ugly. It mixed badly with the flutter in your chest, making you stammer over your words.

“I…” You swallowed. “Uhh-perhaps... perhaps next time.”

Satoru nodded once. The small warmth in his voice vanished completely. It was enough for him to know. "Right," he said, his voice dropping all of its color. "Next time."

Satoru reached over your hand and petted the cow's head too before stepping away, adjusting his hat. It had no business making the fluttering feeling intensify even more. He looked past you toward your bag. "Lawyer'll handle the rest from here. Ya don't gotta stay on my account. Nothin' holdin' ya here now that we've talked the paperwork through." He paused, putting on his gloves. 

You opened your mouth, but nothing came out. He gave you only a small, humorless smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes. "Won't be actin' out my sugar baby dreams while yer gone, promise."

It hit like a slap. Well, it was meant to hit like a slap. You stood there frozen as he turned to walk away, the words still ringing in your ears. 

"Satoru—" you started, the panic seizing the opportunity to break through your self-imposed trap. You hated how small your voice sounded.

He stopped but didn’t turn around. "Safe drive back." 

"Wait,” you stepped forward in his direction, "I don't — I don't wanna. Can we just talk? Actually talk, not — not through lawyers, just—"

His shoulders were stiff and his head bowed, watching his boots. "I think," he said, turning only his head a bit, "ya oughta go home."

You saw the tired, the hurt in his pretty blues, and it stopped you frozen in your pink shoes over the dirt. It wasn't cruel, but it was final, and that made the knife twist in your gut. He only kept on walking until the barn door swung shut behind him, and you stood there with a half-finished cold cup of coffee, and one hand slick with cow spit outstretched as if reaching for him. And the worst part is that if you would see yourself like this just a month ago, you would slap the fuck out of yourself. And then you would slap your old self right back. Going slap for slap.

You'd won the negotiation, yes.  He was letting you win. He was letting you leave. His lawyer would confirm it, and the partition case was going to be a serious problem for his side.  But why did you feel like a massive loser right now?

Which, you weren't the only one who felt like that. Satoru tossed the lead rope onto a hook and braced both hands against the rough wood of the stall door, dropping his head as a heavy breath shuddered out of him.

You’d said next time in that clipped voice that was so, so painful to listen to, like you were declining a date invite from someone you didn't want to offend. He knew what that was. He'd been watching you do it all week. Reach for something real and then pull back into whatever that felt safer. He'd done it himself, to be fair. He didn't have a lot of room to judge.

Your aunt had warned him. “She's gonna fight you on everythin’,” she'd said, watching the livestock, with that cheeky smile of hers. “Stubborn as anything. Gets it from my sister, same as her mom. It runs in the family.”

He had laughed it off back then. “But she’s worth the headache, I promise you,” she had added, giving him that infuriatingly knowing look.

Satoru closed his eyes, the memory of you stammering, looking so panicked and pretty in your expensive, stupid clothes, burning a hole in his chest. Auntie was half right, anyway. You were a headache. But he wasn't going to let you treat his, well, your, home like a real estate playground, and he sure as hell wasn't going to let you play games with him just because you didn’t know what you wanted. 

He could see it in your eyes, which made it even worse. You were just breaking both of your hearts in the process. But if you wanted out, who is he to hold you off? He just needed to find a way where you wouldn’t fully disappear now that you were finally in his life, and not just in his head rent-free.

He fixed his gloves on and straightened up. You weren’t ready to be honest yet and that was fine. But Satoru wasn't going to let you practice being dishonest on him until you figured it out, but that wasn't the same as giving up. Satoru was locked in and ready, he just needed you to be that as well. 

Pretty silly thing.

Your favourite coworker from marketing left a succulent. You stared at it from across the open-plan office before your monitor's screensaver kicked in and you realized you hadn't typed anything in half an hour.

That was the week you came back. By the next week, two more desks had been quietly emptied. By Friday, HR sent a company-wide email with the subject line “Exciting Organizational Updates!” aka the corporate equivalent of someone saying “now don’t panic” right before they ruin your life.

You were not panicking. You were, however, sleeping like shit, actively losing your appetite, and refreshing your bank account every morning just to remind yourself the safety blanket was still there. But the looming dread of the layoffs wasn’t the only thing keeping you up at night, and you refused to talk about the rest of it with anyone.

If they let you go before you could quit on your own terms, the ranch money kind of stopped being a silly little get-rich-quick plan and became a necessity. Because you knew you wanted to quit, but that's where the rest of the planning went. 

You didn't know what else to do other than working, and you were dead set on not spending more years in corpo than you already had. You would say shit like time to become a trad wife since you already own a ranch, but since the possibility wasn't that far from reality anymore, you didn't find it exactly funny this time. Yikes.

You couldn’t tell anyone you actually needed the money. So far you’d acted like selling the ranch was about freedom and city socialite fantasies, not a fucking lifeline. Least of all him. The idea of Satoru knowing you might need that money, that you might actually need him, made you want to literally crawl out of your own skin.

You were still sleeping in his t-shirt. You’d kind of stopped pretending it was by accident. It was nicely  soft and it made you feel safe in a way that pissed you off. You still put it on every night like some kind of fucked-up security blanket. The cheap drip coffee maker you'd impulse-bought now sat on your counter right next to your expensive espresso machine. And you must have hurt your head somewhere, because why were you considering buying the horse painting you'd seen in a thrift store last weekend?

You'd kind of reached your personal low. White-knuckling life while all you could think about was Satoru's cold eyes. Fucking awful, if you ask me. Why was it YOU who inherited this ranch? You had cousins! Why couldn't it have been anyone ELSE? But at the same time, thinking about Satoru wrestling in the mud with any of your bitch-ass cousins made your stomach turn. Ugh.

If only he'd agreed to sell, perhaps the guilt wouldn't be eating you alive. You were pulling overtimes just to stay employed, while trying to come up with another plan — one where you wouldn't need the money or the job anymore. If only there would be someone rich who wanted you... Should you buy some get-rich spell from an Etsy witch, just in case?

So you did get the spell… Just in case.

And then, after a few weeks of silence, Shoko forwarded you an email.

Subject: Gojo/Estate — Request for Joint Counsel Meeting

Your eyes darted over the text. Satoru’s legal team was requesting an in-person meeting. Holy motherfucking shit, you almost jumped out of your office chair. He was folding.

THE SPELL WAS WORKING. Everything would work out after all! You just needed to make Shoko convince them to meet in the city, because you probably wouldn't be able to think straight coming back to the countryside anymore. It was only fair to do it on your terms, in your space, because that's what winners deserved after all!

It took her a hefty email thread to just agree to meet in her office. Home turf through and through. We are oh so coming home.

But then you got nervous. Because alongside it coming home, it was also Satoru coming here, and that felt even weirder than you just going to the ranch.

And the nervousness got even worse by the time you arrived there twenty minutes early. You bounced your leg under the table, fiddling with your fingers in your lap as you darted glances between the door and Shoko, who was watching you with a weird expression on her face. You wanted to believe that you didn't look crazy right now, that your heart almost didn't pound straight out of your chest, that you hadn't been stress-buying cowboy boots and Etsy witch spells for the past month just to force the man who was about to walk through this door out of your mind and see him only as someone who was holding you back. And bet he was! You'd written it over and over in your manifestation notebook, so it must have been true. And not like a man you wanted to wear your cowboy boots for. Not that you wanted to. You got the boots because they're trendy right now! 

And when he and his lawyer arrived, you wanted to scream. He was wearing a suit and a cowboy hat, and for some reason it made your toes curl in your heels to the point you almost tripped over your own feet.

"'Been a minute, sweets," he murmured, shaking your extended hand, his calloused grip completely swallowing yours. He gave you a once-over, the corner of his mouth ticking up. "Lookin' real good, as always."

You absolutely did NOT blush and squeezed his hand back. "Likewise," you managed to choke out in a voice that definitely did NOT crack, to which he gave you a very small private smile, to which you certainly did NOT blush again, and sat back down. The fact that his hand was so warm and the ghost of his touch lingered along your palm, and that he smelled like himself, and that you kind of caught yourself inhaling more than you should, because you certainly did NOT miss the smell, were all irrelevant information.

The meeting started and it lasted four hours. Full of documentation, counter-documentation, revised assessments, and sub-clauses that seemed to breed more sub-clauses every time someone closed a folder.

His lawyer was not difficult, which made it even more annoying. Every figure your lawyer produced, he had a newer figure. Every assessment from your side, they had a follow-up.

You weren’t fighting, which was kind of a relief but also a bummer, because that would at least explain why you felt so hot all over the entire time. Especially whenever you caught Satoru watching you across the table, his hair messy from the hat even if he’d tried to smooth it out, tilting his head at you when he caught your eyes darting to him.

Though he stayed mostly silent the entire time, read what the lawyers handed him, nodded at stuff that needed nodding at, just like you. Then, somewhere in hour three, Satoru leaned forward slightly and asked one question about the watershed boundary relative to the county’s updated flood plain mapping from last spring.

Both lawyers paused. The appraiser flipped back three pages. Neither of the lawyers could produce a legible answer, and the appraiser just shrugged because he deadass didn’t know either.

So long story short, hours in and with no signs of resolution, both lawyers just closed their folders in unison and reached a general consensus that enough was enough and that the meeting was postponed until further notice.

“We can reconvene next week,” his lawyer suggested. “That gives both parties a week to review the adjusted figures.”

You looked at Satoru in absolute horror. 

"Works fine by me," he said softly. "Ain't in no rush."

The meeting adjourned and you felt like a failed experiment in Mythbusters. You wanted to cry into your useless papers, drink your drip coffee that still tasted like shit, and piss off, instead of going to a joint dinner the lawyers proposed to ‘lift the parties' spirits’ or whatever. The only spirit you needed right now was to spirit yourself into oblivion and not spend more time in his general cowboy vicinity.

You went because saying no would’ve looked weak. And you WEREN’T emotionally weak. To hell with that. You were waiting for the cringe, for the inevitable, for Satoru to squint at the menu's French terms and ask the waiter if they had a burger, or a Bud Light, or do anything that would confirm your narrative that he was a simple, uncultured cowboy. You needed him to fumble. You needed to feel superior again.

Instead, Satoru ordered the duck confit and then asked the sommelier for a specific bottle of Nebbiolo, discussing the vintage notes like he did this every fucking Tuesday.

You stared at him. Shoko stared at him. The sommelier fucking stared at him.

Satoru caught your eye and flashed a smile, dimples and all. "What? Auntie liked the good stuff. Taught me a thing or two."

You ordered the steak, because you needed protein and for the first time in weeks you genuinely felt hungry, and you weren't paying so might as well.

"How's the food?" Satoru asked casually, just as you stabbed into the meat and it was definitely not medium rare, just how you'd wanted it. You hated that it didn't taste like the steak Satoru had made you the very first evening on the ranch. And then you hated that you were even thinking about it at all.

"Fine," you said, chewing through the not-so-tender cut with a completely straight face.

So you did the only reasonable thing and tried to get drunk on the wine he ordered, downing your glass every time he smiled at you just so you'd have somewhere to look. It wasn't exactly working in your favour. 

Your lawyer, who happened to also be your friend from college and who had clearly decided somewhere between the entrée and the dessert to, not only financially, but also personally ruin your life, put her hand on your upper back. "What about one more drink?" she asked, batting her eyelashes at you. "To toast the progress. You've been uptight the entire day, we need to loosen you up a bit."

You oh so obviously needed to get shitfaced. Your life was falling apart, so of course the right response was to poison yourself with enough alcohol alongside your hot enemy, like some plot of a below-average manhwa. You were just being… well, not exactly strategic. But that was all beside the point. You had been psychologically manipulated by that shitty steak and the wine Satoru requested.

So off to the bar, you even helped to choose, all of you went. You slid into the booth in the back and Shoko immediately ordered tequila shots. Which, bless her, but you already knew you would wake up with a terrible hangover tomorrow and have to call in sick.

“To successful negotiation!” she toasted. The shots clinked, the awkward polite social-cue eye contact entailed, and you spilled the burning liquid down your throat like there was no tomorrow.

You cringed and washed it down with the drink you’d ordered, which didn't make it any better. But it loosened you up a bit, which made the conversation less stiff. Your lawyer was complaining about her clients, Satoru complained about some of his, well, yours, horses. 

“There are cross-departmental lay-offs happening, the fucking worst timing imaginable,” you added, waving your hand like it was just another annoying email from HR. You had bitten your lip and had that little frown on your face, the one Satoru already recognized you used when you weren't exactly joking.

"Well, that's why the buyout's gotta happen, so take that, Gojo," you deflected, toasting your glass and looking at him expectantly, half-serious, half-joking. The table chuckled at that, because you were the queen of comebacks and whimsy.

"Can't promise ya anythin', sweets." He tilted his head and took a sip of his beer, then flashed a quick, uncharacteristic look at his lawyer.

Now what was that. You didn't like it. You narrowed your eyes and turned your head to Shoko, who just shrugged, obviously clocked out of the lawyer-doing-lawyer-shit factory for the evening. You weren't drunk enough or sober enough to pry further, so you let it slide. For now.

The conversation loosened even further as the drinks stacked up. Shoko was clearly dead set on getting home on all fours—nth drink in, complaining about a client who kept CCing her on emails she had explicitly asked not to be CCed on. His lawyer had a counterpart story about a property dispute that had somehow involved a neighbor's goat in the middle of downtown. 

Satoru turned to you and said something. Over the course of the evening the music had gotten louder, the crowd had gotten louder as well, and you had apparently gone partly deaf, because all you caught was the vague shape of a question. The lawyers had drifted back into their own orbit, something about agricultural legislation, an amendment that had apparently been deeply controversial in circles you did not run in, and the conversation forked. Shoko and his lawyer turned toward each other with great purpose, absolutely ditching you, which left you sitting there like a spare part. And there goes having a nice evening when you're an adult.

"What?" you said, probably too loudly.

He leaned in slightly and repeated it. You caught the gist—something about the horses, one of the mares. The one he liked to ride. It was, yet again, infuriating that you already knew this detail. He must have used some kind of Etsy witch spell as well, because why the hell were you retaining so much? You were there for nine days total. Nine! You leaned in a little more to catch the rest, close enough that his scent hit you properly, warmly enveloping you.

"Hold on," you said, shutting your expression down and snapping the fuck out of it. "I gotta piss."

Very smooth. Very ladylike. Extremely elegant. Yes, that was you.

You stared at yourself in the dim bathroom mirror, eyeing the stickers plastered on the inside of the door. Right at eye level there was a fuckass sticker that said this ain't my first rodeo in bold western font, a little illustrated cowboy hat sitting right on top of the O.

Your eye twitched. You had the upper hand. The buyout would finally happen and soon you would be the big city socialite you were always meant to be, completely free of ranches and their foremen and their specific, nice smells and the way they looked at you with those panty dropping blues. Out of sight, out of mind. The sooner this evening ended the better as well.

That's why you smoothed your hair. Then decided it looked like an ugly cowlick, so you fluffed it back out again. That's also why you uncapped your sparkly lip gloss, the good one, the bad bitch one, the one which you certainly did not save only for dates. It simply happened to be the only one in your purse. Trust.

That's also why you stopped at the bar on your way back and picked up two beers. Purely strategic. You were marginalizing your enemy by handing him alcohol, loosening him up, extracting information. An evil plan, completely airtight, totally unprovable.

That's why you slid back into the booth a little closer than where you'd been sitting before. Tactically. Obviously.

Satoru picked up where he’d left off, repeating the question for about the fourth time. Something about the mare. He'd apparently been thinking about breeding her. There was a stallion his parents recently bought, good bloodline, good temperament, but the timing had to be right and he wasn't sure yet.

And you were following along, which was the horrifying part. You were already imagining a little baby horse trotting around doing whatever it was baby horses did.

"Why are you asking me?" you said, when he paused. "I don't know anything about horse breeding. Well, about horses in general."

He considered that for a second. Looked down with that small, cheeky smile and took a sip of his beer. "Dunno." A small shrug. "We were sittin' in silence an' I guess I just wanted to talk to ya, sweets."

Well, now. You took a swig of your beer and pursed your lips, because you had absolutely no idea what to do with that, and you already hated that the butterflies in your stomach had gone and responded to it instead. He was watching you be flustered—sitting so close, close enough that you were acutely aware of how warm he was, his scent hitting you even more aggressively than before—and all you could do was look him in the eyes and then, helplessly, drag your gaze down to his thighs, very nicely filling out the slacks he was wearing, and then immediately curse yourself for doing it.

He tilted his head. Something in his expression shifted, went a little softer, a little more serious. 

"Aren't you supposed to be angry at me?" you dared to look back up at him, curious why he is always so nice to you. 

"Bein' upset an' hatin' are two completely different things, darlin'." The corner of his mouth ticked up. "Thought ya were a big girl an' knew that."

Before you could gaslight, gatekeep, or girlboss your way out of that one, Shoko resurfaced from whatever legislative rabbit hole they had disappeared down. She turned to face the two of you with an expression that meant absolutely no good.

"Okay." Her voice cut straight through the music as she leaned forward. "I have to ask."

You already didn't like this.

"I don't wanna sound unprofessional," she said, in the tone of someone who had fully committed to being unprofessional, "but I have been dying to ask this the entire day." Her eyes darted quickly to you and back to him. "I've never actually talked to a real cowboy before, so I have to know—is it true what they say? That cowboys have insane stamina? From all the riding?" she giggled. "Like, do you work out, or does it just naturally come with the hat?"

"Shoko—" you gasped, because it was indeed unprofessional, all of you were supposed to keep working together, where had this come from, what was happening—

"Well," Satoru bit his lip, like he was trying to make it less awkward, or perhaps just awkward in a completely different direction.

He looked at you instead though as he picked up his beer. "All I'm gonna say is... with the right horse, a cowboy can go all night long."

Shoko absolutely fucking lost it, fully cackled, hand flat on the table. And you love—NO. Hated. You hated the implications. Obviously. What was even happening right now, for real, genuinely, someone please explain this to you—

You picked up your drink and put the whole thing away in one go.

"That's what I thought," Shoko said, giggling away as she turned back to his lawyer like nothing ever happened.

His lawyer left right after he finished his drink. He missed his wife, had a court case tomorrow morning, and had clearly reached his absolute limit for sexual tension that didn't involve him. Handshakes, and off he went. You almost envied him.

Shoko did not have a wife at home or an early morning, and she had decided she was not done yet. She ordered one more drink with the confidence of a woman who had started a fire and intended to watch it burn. She told a long, winding story that had somehow, gradually become about horses. You weren't entirely sure how. Then she stopped mid-sentence, looked at both of you and stood up, not entirely steadily, and gestured at you to follow her. You slid out of the booth and she hauled you toward the door, just far enough that the music covered your voices.

"You didn't tell me Satoru looked like that," she turned to you with the expression of someone personally betrayed. "I can't blame you, girl, though I don't entirely understand your restraint."

"The fuck you mean? And wait, let me grab my purse, I'll leave with you—"

"Nuh uh, you stay. You get the D. You two have been eyefucking each other the entire day anyway."

"What?! No, that's not true! And I can't sleep with him, he's the opposing party, have you lost your entire mind?!"

"You will lose yours if you don't rodeo the fuck out of his dick," she whispered fiercely, pointing a finger at your chest. "Relax. Y'all are on a property case, not a murder trial. Easy. I won’t tell anybody."

"Wait—"

"Text me,” she knowingly winked at you and it sounded more like a threat than a suggestion. The door swung shut behind her and gone she was. You stood at the edge of the bar for a second, staring at the door swinging shut behind her. 

"She's a menace, yer lawyer,"  he murmured as you slid back into the booth, next to him. "She is a great lawyer," you argued weakly, staring at your empty glass. 

“We can leave too, ya know,” he said, his voice dropping sweet and low right by your ear, effectively moving the conversation elsewhere. He draped his arm over the back of the leather seat, caging you in—inviting and annoying. He could see the slight unsteadiness, the flush on your cheeks that wasn't exactly only from the alcohol.

He was being a perfect gentleman, which was honestly the most infuriating thing he had done all day and he had done a lot of infuriating things, like looking at you nicely. He cleared his throat, his thumb gently, experimentally brushing the curve of your shoulder. He was giving you the out.

"It's late. Don't wanna keep ya if—" 

You squeezed your shoulder blades at the touch, leaning a bit closer, chasing the warmth. You eyed your empty bottle, his half-finished one, and Shoko’s words uncharacteristically ringing in your ears.

“One more drink,” you blurted out, not even letting him finish. And then your treacherous mouth added one desperate "please" for grand effect. You didn't mean to say it, and you couldn't take it back. His thumb instinctively went a little rougher against your skin. He stopped, fully taking in your flushed face, the way you were leaning into his space, and trying to understand exactly what that please meant.

"Yeah," he murmured softly. "Okay."

It was the closest you had been all evening. It was also the warmest the night had felt. Satoru, without further questions, went to the bar and returned with the last round. What the lady asks, the lady gets. He caged you in again, perhaps on instinct, as he handed you your drink. You, already tipsy and feeling dangerously floaty, gleamed up at him.

The conversation flowed naturally after that. Who would have thought that when you stopped being a deliberate bitch, he was actually incredibly nice to talk to. He talked about the ranch, about Yuji doing something incredibly stupid with a tractor, about Megumi delivering a devastating insult to a feed supplier in five words or less.

You listened. Not just listened, you talked back. You told him about the time you spilled an entire coffee down yourself on the subway right before an important meeting, about the traffic jam where you almost peed yourself. You realized mid-sentence that you hadn't even told Shoko that one. Yet here you were, offering it up freely to the man who was actively stalling your dream, giggling at him with your head tipped back against his forearm on the seat.

Satoru was watching you with something careful and warm in his expression. Maybe regretting getting the last drinks. Grateful for them all the same, because he was finally seeing you like this — unguarded, easy, your pretty smile doing something genuinely unfair to him from up this close.

“You coming back to the ranch?” you asked, turning your head and subconsciously nuzzling your cheek against the sleeve of his suit jacket. Satoru had to bite his tongue. You were being so fucking adorable, it genuinely hurt him.

"Nah," he said, once he trusted himself. "Gonna stay in the city 'til we get it resolved. Don't wanna be goin' back an' forth." 

“Then you left our house unsupervised?" you gasped softly, pulling back slightly. "What about the animals? Already told you you were being a bad owner.”

And now, fuck him. Our house? You might as well have stabbed him straight through the heart, because you certainly had a way with words and a thing for timing. It sounded dangerously natural and familiar coming out of your mouth, and he almost dared you, begged you, to fucking repeat it.

“No worries, sweets,” he finally managed, his voice coming steadier than he felt. “Nanami an' the kids are takin' care of it as we speak. Well, not now, they're dead asleep. But it's in the best hands possible.”

“Who are they, anyway?” you asked curiously. He always talked about them so sweetly, yet he had never given you anything else. Satoru’s gaze softened. He looked down at you, at the way your cheek was still pressed against his arm, and something in his chest actually physically tightened. He hadn’t expected you to ask.

“Known Nanami since high school,” he murmured, as he flexed his biceps under your head on reflex, maybe on purpose too, who knows. “He’s the only one who can actually put up with me for more than ten minutes. An’ got to know Yuji through auntie. She knew his uncle back in the day."

He took a sip of his beer, his eyes distant for a fraction of a second before focusing right back on your face. "We needed some new part-timers a while back, extra hands for the stables. So I just asked him. Kid showed up the next day an' brought Megumi an' Nobara along." 

He left it at that. Not that Satoru wasn't chatty, he just felt weirdly vulnerable talking about his life with you. You might have been giving him the most adorable, glassy doe eyes in human history, but you were still trying to take the ranch away from him. He still remembered the way you looked at him when he refused to sign the papers. But yet, being so close to him, feeling his warmth while he felt yours, your hands itching to touch him—it was so domestic, so impossibly intimate.

You blinked up at him, your alcohol-soaked brain trying to process everything. You wanted to ask more, get lost in his masculine voice, have him murmur into your ear more. You were dangerously close to letting yourself get entirely too attached to the idea of this man and his life. You were drunk. It was fine. A little fantasy, a little pretend before the sun came out again... Right?

But before you could open your mouth, the bartender came over to inform you the bar was about to close. And then, with the timing of all romcom timings, a sudden heavy drumming hit the front windows. You both looked toward the entrance. It was raining.

And there went your little horny fantasy.

"Uh," you sighed, blinking away the daze of the booth. You sat up, suddenly hyper-aware of how deeply you had melted into his side, and shakily reached for your purse. “I guess we should get going then. Lemme go pay—”

You tried to scramble up, fishing in your bag, but his large hand softly closed over yours, prying it away. “No need, darlin'. Already paid when I got the last round.”

"You didn't have to pay for that," you pouted.

"My treat, sweets," he said, already leading you toward the exit. He looked down at you, the faint, infuriatingly handsome smile returning. "Let's get a cab, alright?”

And something must have seriously possessed you, because under normal circumstances you hated the rain with a capital H. “I wanna walk home.”

“It's just five blocks from here, yeah?" he asked. You had apparently said that out loud at some point tonight.

"Yeah," you bit your lip. Your skin was buzzing, perhaps from the cold draft from the door hitting your heated skin, or from his resolve-killing blues looking down at you so, so sweetly.

You swayed unsteadily, looking higher, eyeing his Stetson, his white bangs cheekily sticking out from underneath. Without thinking, you reached up, yanked it from his head, and put it squarely on your own. He blinked at the intrusion, a faint, sudden flush adorning his cheeks as he watched you adjust it.

"Looks better on ya anyway," he muttered.

Though your silly little drunk idea of walking home was acutely crushed by the literally biblical downpour happening outside. Well, you said walking, so walking it is. 

One block over and both of you were drenched, shivering and mentally voting how much of your aura it would cost to beg for that cab after all. He shrugged his suit jacket off without breaking stride and dropped it over your shoulders.

"Satoru, you're going to freeze," you pointed out, gripping the lapels and pulling them closer to your chest anyway. It engulfed you so nicely, smelling like his cologne, a bit of clean air and so much like him.

"Well, better me than ya, ain't it? Ya were already freezin', just keep walkin', sweets."

You hated how good that sounded. You hated that you were letting him walk you home in the pouring rain like this was some kind of romcom and not the messy disaster your life had become.

The rain was relentless. His white hair was dripping, plastered to his forehead, and his shirt was doing increasingly interesting things in the rain. Somewhere between the second and third block your hand found his. Well, sort of. You hesitantly looped your pinky around his, testing the waters, waiting to see if he'd interlace his fingers with yours. You were feeling daring and dangerous — or maybe not. Surely not thinking entirely straight.

“C’mere,” he murmured, and tugged, bringing you shoulder to shoulder, his hand snaking away from yours to find your lower back instead. You were definitely too drunk for this. Or not drunk enough.

You stopped in front of your building. You dug your keys out of your purse, your fingers fumbling slightly as you stood under the awning of your building's entrance. 

"You're soaking wet. Just come up," you tried to tug him in.

He looked at you for a second, like he couldn't tell if you were joking or dead serious. Hell, you didn't know if you were joking or dead serious. "I'll grab a cab to the hotel. Already super late anyway. No worries, sweets, it's fine—"

"Please,” you pouted again, absolutely not knowing what had gotten into you. Why were you inviting this man up? Do we need to answer that though?

"Sweets." His voice was low, something in it wasn't quite steady. "Yer 'please' is gonna kill me one day, ya know that?"

So you went up, the elevator was warm after the rain, making the world tilt slightly. You swayed into his shoulder without meaning to, sleepy and damp and thoroughly done with your own defenses for the evening. Your hand found his, more confidently now, and your fingers interlaced.

Satoru went very still for a short moment. Then his hand closed around yours, and you watched his throat move as he stared straight ahead at the elevator doors.

You fumbled with your keys at the door. And then it was just the two of you in your quiet apartment.

It looked even better with him filling up your tiny entryway like this, and no daydream had ever done the image justice. You couldn't even be mad at yourself for thinking it at this point.

He swiftly glanced around and clocked your stupid pink Salomons lying near the shoe rack. You’d  thrown them there since you'd got back weeks ago, deliberately, maybe, never really bothered putting them away. The corner of his mouth ticked up at the sight. He turned to you. You were watching him half-expectantly, half lost in your own head. His hat looked so good on you. The suit jacket too. Well, any of his clothes did — specifically that t-shirt of his he didn't seem to be able to find. You bit your lip as he tilted his head at you.

His eyes were already blown out and hazy and fixed exactly on your mouth, just like yours were on his. It was now or never, because that’s what you say about kissing your supposed enemy. You took a step closer, then another, tipped your head up and crashed your sparkly lips against his. 

Satoru made a low sound in the back of his throat as your fingers tangled into his wet hair. The gentlemanly restraint he'd had going on clocked out. His hand flew to grip your waist, fingers curling into the soaked fabric of your dress, kissing you back,  because this was everything he'd wanted ever since your bloody aunt, may she fucking rest in peace, told him about you. Who would have guessed his dream would come true in your small apartment, in the middle of a property dispute, drunk. He finally had you and you finally had him. But that was exactly the issue. Drunk. And Satoru wasn't raised a dick.

He tore his mouth away. He caressed your cheek with his thumb as he cradled the side of your head. 

"Satoru," you breathed, chasing his mouth. He groaned at the needy tone of your voice — god, he wanted to hear more of it. Even needier, under him, and only for him. But he held you firmly in place, at war with himself and every moral he'd ever had, so you couldn't close the gap again.

"No," he rasped. "Not like this, sweets."

You froze, the rejection feeling like a bucket of ice water.

"Yer drunk," he murmured, brushing a wet strand of hair out of your face. "An' yer not thinkin' straight. An' tomorrow mornin', when the sun comes up, yer gonna hate me for it. An' I ain't gonna be a mistake ya regret."

"I'm not that drunk," you informed him, trying to counterargument him, desperately clinging to him. And there went your bad bitch persona. 

"You were asleep on my shoulder in the elevator."

You glared at him. He slowly, reluctantly let go of your waist. He reached up and lifted his hat off your head, putting it back on his own. “I was just resting my head,” you muttered, pouting at him. He definitely could get used to that pretty expression.  

"Sure ya were." He looked at you for a second, something warm and certain in his expression. "Let's just put ya to sleep, yeah?"

"Wait," you blurted out, the sudden realization piercing right through the warm haze. "You're... you're leaving?"

Satoru tilted his head, the brim of the hat casting a shadow over his eyes, as he took your hands gently into his. "Not unless ya want me to."

You groaned into your pillow as you came to slowly. Your bedroom was nicely dim, the blinds surprisingly closed—you usually never bothered with them, you only got them because they were pretty, anyway.

You immediately registered the blunt pressure in your head. Ah. Hangover. But it was swiftly overshadowed by the unfamiliar warmth enveloping you, tickling your belly, and the god-like smell you were inhaling all around you. Satoru’s arm was slung over your waist, holding you in, and his bare chest was pressed flush against your back as he snored softly into the pillow behind you.

Wait. Whose hand is slung over you?! Holy shit— Did y’all…? No. No, you didn’t.

The actual going-to-bed part was slightly fuzzy in your memory. Him putting you to bed, him saying that he would sleep on the couch, you tugging him next to you anyway. Or something like that.

You let out a soft exhale and sank a fraction deeper into his arms. You decided to bask in it for exactly a little while before you would deliberately turn into the bitch you were supposed to be and say something like yesterday was a mistake.

You carefully turned around to watch him. He looked so peaceful, almost angelic in your bed, his mouth slightly open, faint freckles scattered across his unfairly pretty face. He stirred a bit and brought you snug against him, your legs tangling together. His body was all hard and soft at the same time, and you hated that you were already imagining yourself waking up like this more often.

But then your eyes drifted to your nightstand and  your alarm clock. It was ungodly late, and you were supposed to be at work today. Then, your eyes noticed a glass of water and two aspirin set beside it.

Another hazy memory resurfaced of him asking, his voice all low and soft in the dark. “Where d'ya keep your medicine, sweets?” He had actually pre-gamed your hangover. You bit the inside of your cheek, a betraying flutter going off in your chest. Asshole. How were you supposed to ruthlessly negotiate with a man who took care of your morning misery before you even asked?

You very carefully snaked away from the bed so as not to wake him, not ready to fully face him just yet. You downed the water with the pills and disappeared into the bathroom. You made a quick and miserable call to your boss to call in sick today, then went to the sink to brush away your post-night-out morning breath.

Then you looked in the mirror to assess exactly how much of a disaster you looked like. Uh. Eh. Ew. Not the best, not the worst, head still throbbing just enough that you couldn't fully dissect why your hair looked both greasy and like a bird's nest at the same time.

"Okay," you told your reflection. So. You'd kissed him, and he'd kissed you back. But he'd stopped it, but he still stayed. And now he was in your bed.

Oh, god. Oh, fuck.

You should have left with Shoko yesterday, but that felt almost worse than bringing him home. You still couldn't believe your drunk self, that you were so willing to jump his dick so vehemently. What happened to attract, not chase?

You washed your face with the coldest water possible, once, twice, scrubbing last night, the shame, the what ifs your off skin like that was something you could actually do. It helped approximately nothing. 

You buried your face in the towel and let out a pathetic, muffled groan into it. You were going to lift your head, look at yourself in the eyes, and remind yourself that you didn't do things you regretted. You were going to be rational, in control of —

Two arms came around you from behind. He was awfully quiet for someone his size.

He'd been already half awake when you'd slipped out of bed. Laid there for a minute in the warm space you'd left, staring at the ceiling with shit-eating grin, because what the fuck, and listening to the muffled sounds coming from the bathroom. He probably should have thought about this more carefully. He'd expected almost anything to happen yesterday. Like, you not talking to him at all, you being all cold and distant or just collegially friendly as far as the legal stuff went. But not you blushing the very first second you saw him. And especially not him waking up in your bed. You had no idea how much he'd had to physically restrain himself yesterday.

But god, he'd had you in his arms the entire night. You'd even cuddled him first! It was all he could have asked for, and he was pretty sure you knew it. Took you long enough — but then, maybe he'd been just impatient.

"Mornin', sweets," a sleep-heavy voice rumbled right against your ear. He was so warm and sleep-slow, his bare chest fitting so perfectly against your back as he nuzzled his face into your hair. It sent tingles down your spine and settled low in your belly, right where his hands were.

He let out a contented sigh, pulling you a fraction tighter. "Hidin' from me already?" he mumbled, sounding like he was about to fall right back asleep standing up.

"I'm not hiding," you managed, your voice muffled by the towel you were still pressing over your face to hide the blush.

"Could've fooled me," he hummed, his thumbs lazily stroking the sides of your waist, and it made you lean into him even more, against his— Oh. "Ya bolted outta bed before I could even say good mornin'."

"I needed to call in sick," you finally dared to lower the towel and turned your head toward him. His white hair was messy and sleep-tousled, his eyes still half-closed.

"Head hurt?" he asked softly, burying his face into the crook of your neck, his breath ghosting over your collarbone.

"A little," you whispered, completely forgetting how to be a bitch.

"Told ya." He looked at you through the minor, watching the beautiful timid flush spreading across your cheeks. "Should've let me take ya home earlier, big girl."

“We should talk—” you started, but the rest of the words never made it out. His fingers caught your chin, tilting your head back, and before you could utter another syllable he pressed his mouth to yours and kissed them right out of you.

Satoru let out a satisfied sound as you didn't even bother resisting, because why would you anyway. His lips were so soft, so much better than yesterday, though perhaps that was just because you weren't drunk anymore. He turned you around and pinned you between the sink and himself, cradling the side of your face, kissing you so reverently, so impossibly sweet.

“Mmm, soo good,” he mumbled against your lips, nuzzling his nose against yours. He kissed you like he’d been waiting months, years, for it. Which he kinda had, so you couldn't really blame the poor guy. Especially not when you melted so instantly against him, a tiny sound catching in your throat as your fingers curled into his bare shoulders and the kisses turned hungrier.

And you also got grabby fast. Hands sliding down his chest, over his stomach, reaching lower to palm his cock. He was already hard and straining in his boxers. Satoru groaned roughly, tugging at your hair as he pulled back just a bit to look at oh how nicely you were gripping him. A wicked, sleep-flushed smile spread across his face, because holy fuck, your hand was finally, finally on his dick, though his hands gently caught your wandering wrist, stopping your assault. He felt flattered that you simply couldn’t fucking keep your hands to yourself! But there were priorities.

“Nuh-uh,” he muttered as he caressed your blushing cheek. “Wait, baby. Gotta get ya in the shower first.”

You blinked up at him, dazed and chased his mouth again. “Huh?”

He chuckled at that and pressed a small kiss to the tip of your nose. "You'll feel better. Promise.” Then he started trailing open-mouthed kisses down your neck, sucking softly, and it made your knees buckle. The inner bitch packed her bags and left for the other side of the world. But hey, you were all soft and into neck kisses, so who could blame you? His hands slid under the hem of your sleep shirt as he worked the fabric up.

“Been wantin’ this,” he murmured against your jaw as his fingers ghosted up under your breasts. “So sorry, wanna take my time with ya.”

He slid the shirt higher, his thumb flicking over your peaked nipple, and you both gasped at that. You immediately put your arms up so he could get rid of the shirt altogether.

Satoru’s eyes darkened as his gaze raked over your newly exposed skin, looking at you like you were the only meal he’d been allowed to eat in a decade. And do NOT even pity him, because it was all he ever wanted anyway.

"Fuck," he practically moaned. "Yer so fuckin' pretty." He lowered himself and kissed your sternum, fingers grazing the skin of your tits before his mouth closed over your nipple, sucking hard enough to make you whimper, before letting it go with a wet sound.

"Satoru—" Your fingers flew to his messy hair as he lowered himself to his knees, ghosting kisses everywhere he could reach. It was fucking maddening, it made your stomach hurt so, so much.

He hooked his fingers into your panties next, tugging them down slowly. He pressed a deliberate kiss to your hip, then the inside of your thigh, then higher, just barely, making you clench around nothing. Satoru had to bite his lip. He didn’t want to be a teasing fucker, but god, you were making it so easy and so hard right now. You were already soaking, your slick dragging down as he stripped your underwear, and he could taste you just from the kisses pressed to your inner thigh.

He looked up at you from the floor with an expression that was going to probably ruin you. You buckled your hips almost instinctively as you tried to bring him closer.

“Said shower first, pretty girl," he said, completely straight-faced, and stood back up.

You made a frustrated little sound but he just hooked an arm around your waist and into the shower you went. He kicked off his boxers and stepped under the overhead stream and you just needed a moment. A moment to shamelessly gawk at him, because holy motherfucking shit, he was so pretty, so hot, so big.

He pulled you under the water immediately. His hands ran down your arms, your back, washing off last night's rain, last night's bar, all of it. It was almost stupidly normal. You tipped your head back into the stream, closing your eyes and letting yourself just be there for a second, warm and clean, his hands moving over you like it was the most natural thing in the world.

His mouth found yours again, pressing you flush against his straining cock. He rutted into you gently as he licked into your mouth, and you blindly reached for the shampoo before your knees could completely go out of commission before he'd even done anything properly to you.

"Let me," Satoru said, and took it out of your hand. He stepped behind you, his fingers finding your scalp, and you immediately understood that nothing in your life had prepared you for this. He was so gentle with your hair, working the lather through to your roots, and the sound you made was embarrassing and music to his ears. Your head dropped back slightly as you felt his cock grinding lazy and slow up and down your ass and lower back.

"Good?" he murmured.

"Mm," was all you had.

One of his hands started to wander around your body, caressing, positioning you better, while the other stayed tangled so nicely in your hair, massaging the crown of your head. You were getting absolutely lost in the reverence of his touch. His cock slid from between your cheeks to between your thighs, dragging through your slick folds.

“Sorry,” he murmured, not sounding sorry at all, as he tipped your head to the side and kissed your neck. “Can’t help it.”

He kept working through your hair, even as his hips started rolling more deliberately against you. His cock catching on your clit everytime he pushed into you.

"Hands on the wall f’me, yeah?" So you put your hands on the wall. He made a pleased sound and nudged  your legs a little wider and then the blunt cockhead was pushing into you, stretching you so open while his soapy fingers never stopped massaging your scalp.

"Fuck," Satoru groaned, his forehead dropping against your wet shoulder as he fully bottomed out. "Yer so fuckin' tight. Jesus Christ."

"Ngh — 'Toru—"

"I know," he rasped, loving the way that slipped out of you, pressing his mouth to the side of your neck as his mushroomy tip kissed your cervix. "Just take it. Doin' so good for me, pretty girl."

He rolled his hips into yours, every stroke dragging over that plush spot inside that made your walls flutter. You were already lost in it, his breath huffing warm against your ear, his hands stroking over your stomach and hips like he simply couldn't stop touching you, the hot water coming down over both of you, though it had nothing on the heat of your own skin under his hands.

It was too much. Infuriatingly too much, and you hated that your legs had started shaking. You could feel yourself clenching around him harder every time he bottomed out, feeling him so impossibly deep, and from the broken sound he made he could feel it too.

"There she is," he rasped into your ear, voice gone rough. "Feel how tight yer gettin' for me? Ah— baby—"

One hand snaked to your lower stomach and pressed firmly, right where he could feel himself moving inside you. "Feel that?" he moaned, filthy and soft at the same time. "That's how deep I am. Takin' every inch an' still tryin' to pull me deeper."

He pressed gently on your lower back, coaxing you to arch up for him even more, then leaned over you and stole another heated kiss from your sweet mouth. You moaned into it, grateful he was holding you up because without him you would have dissolved straight down the wall into a puddle by now.

He found his rhythm. Thrusts turning a little messy, a little desperate, but knowing exactly where to drag his cock while his palm kept pressing from the outside, adding to the assault.  And it was all—

Gosh.

You stood no chance. It demolished any fantasy you’d ever had about him and we are not going to talk about the fact that you’d had any.

“I—I can’t—” you couldn’t even finish that. You came hard and sweet, a broken cry punched out of you as your cunt clamped down around him, pulsing and absolutely milking him. Your legs nearly gave out completely. Satoru had to put both arms around you to keep you upright while he fucked you so nicely through it, letting you feel every second.

“That’s it… that’s it, baby. Just like that. Give it to me.” He lasted maybe eight more strokes before his movements stuttered. Couldn’t really blame him, you’d gotten so infinitely wetter, so impossibly tight and warm. And trust, he wanted to stay buried inside you like this forever, but his cock was a desperate bastard, especially when he had you like this, completely broken from what had barely even been a proper fuck.

His forehead dropped against your shoulder as he bit you there lightly and he groaned, grinding deep against your cervix as he buried himself as far as he could go and came. He moaned filthy little praises against your skin while he rode it out, filling you up so so nicely.

He stayed like this for a moment, just breathing you in, the smell of sex on your skin already becoming his favourite scent, while one hand still gently stroking your tummy like he was soothing both of you.

“Fuck,” he finally muttered, almost laughing under his breath. “You alright, sweets?”

Now, were you? He had just fucked you in your own bathroom, leaving you all needy and pathetic, but was it also the best fucking sex you’ve ever had? So, yes, and yes.

You frantically nodded as he slipped out of your still-pulsing pussy, the cum already starting to run down your thighs. He turned you to face him and cupped your cunt gently, feeling the sticky mess he’d left leaking out of you.

“Shit,” he murmured, almost in awe, watching it drip over his fingers as he teasingly slipped his index finger just a little bit back inside. “Look at that.”

Satoru kissed you lazily, feeling the water already getting a little cool. “C’mon,” he said quietly, reaching behind you to turn the water a little warmer again. “Let me get ya cleaned up before ya get cold.”

And he had just fucked you physically and was absolutely fucking you sideways emotionally, because why was he so nice, so careful, so genuinely caring — it was making your poor heart do things at the sight of his dazed eyes, his dripping wet hair, the soft expression on his face that would probably send you to an early grave and you would send him a thank you card from the afterlife for it.

He still insisted on washing you carefully after that. Gentle hands between your legs, rinsing his cum off your thighs, soaping your skin while you tried, heavy on the tried, soap his, but you felt like warm jelly floating in the afterhaze. 

But hey, good thing the hangover had completely disappeared! Perhaps the aspirin finally kicked in or perhaps Satoru just fucked it away. Both were plausible. Every now and then he’d lean in and kiss your shoulder or the corner of your mouth, like he still couldn’t quite believe he was allowed to.

Only when you were both clean and the water was starting to run lukewarm again did he shut it off. He wrapped a towel around you, rubbing your arms dry. 

Somehow you ended up in the kitchen, still wrapped in towels, hair dripping onto your shoulders and all over the floor. Your legs were a little unsteady, but it was such a nice feeling.

You took two mugs out of the cabinet while he leaned against the counter next to you. His towel was slung low on his hips, and he looked so unfairly good, so completely comfortable in your space, that you didn't know if you wanted to scream or just bury yourself in his arms.

You looked sideways at the drip machine. “Can you make the coffee, please?” you asked timidly, immediately hating yourself for sounding so stupid and small. You crossed your arms over your towel, shivering slightly in the cooler air, and looked away. The post-orgasm haze was absolutely ruining  your usual defenses in the best and worst way possible.

"I missed your coffee," you mumbled to the floor. "Mine still tastes like shit."

Satoru was quiet for a second, then he let out a soft huff of a laugh and when you glanced up he was looking at you like you just broke his heart, put it back together, broke and put it back together again. “Yeah?” he said, his voice dropping low. “Want me to show ya how to make it taste good, sweets?”

“Yes,” you nodded, bit your lip and he smiled and gestured toward the counter. “C’mere. Up you go.” And before you could prepare yourself his hands were at your waist, lifting you clean off the floor and setting you on the counter like it was nothing.

"Watch," he said simply.

So you watched. Satoru stepped right between your dangling legs to reach the coffee machine for absolutely no reason, gently nudging your knees wider with his hips. It made it infinitely more difficult for him to actually prepare the coffee when he had no business being that close, but he just couldn't help himself, and you weren't going to complain either.

He started messing with the filter, pouring the grounds. The kitchen filled with the smell of fresh coffee and something very warm and domestic. And once the machine finally started brewing, he caught the dazed way you were looking at him. You were still blushing so cute, hair damp, towel barely staying put. His hands settled on your bare thighs under the towel, thumbs stroking your skin slowly.

“Got it, baby?” he asked teasingly, though his chest was still super floaty from the fact that you’d admitted to missing the coffee he loved making for you. He nudged you closer to the edge of the counter, planted a soft kiss to your lips, and god help everyone because he loved, loved kissing you — the way your lips fit so perfectly against his or the way you tasted. 

"So, okay," you said, slightly breathless against his mouth. "But I still don't understand what you do differently because I took a picture of literally everything you use at the ranch. Same beans, same filter, same everything. And mine still tastes like burnt water. It's a filter machine, it's supposed to be—" He pulled back from the kiss and looked at you. "—idiot proof," you finished, somewhat even more breathless now.

The corner of his pretty mouth curled up. So you really did miss him that much. It made his heart and his dick jump all the same. Holding your gaze, he slowly loosened your towel. Let it fall open, pooling around your hips, baring you to the cool morning air of the kitchen.

His eyes dragged down you and back up and you kinda forgot what you were saying, instinctively moving to cover yourself. “What—” 

And before you could even form a coherent thought, let alone finish that question, Satoru sank to his knees right in front of you. He nudged your thighs wider and planted your feet on the edge of the counter, opening you up for him.

"Shh." He pressed a kiss to your inner thigh, one on each side, and looked up at you through his white lashes. The coffee machine rumbled in the background, the warm scent filling the kitchen, as his hot breath ghosted right over your already swollen cunt.

"It's kinda simple," he drawled, blowing air against your slick folds, making your pussy throb in response. "Thought ya would've figured it out by now, big girl."

That man absolutely loved to tease you, even when that smug-ass mouth was hovering right between your thighs. And please, do not send help for either of you, because you were both exactly where you wanted to be.

He kissed the sensitive skin right above your slit, then your hips, making you shift impatiently against the cold surface. You didn't exactly know if you were dying to hear the answer or just dying to finally have his tongue on you.

"Ya just gotta make it with a little love.” And then he put his tongue on you, giving you both.

Your head instantly dropped back against the upper cabinet with a soft thwack! as you let out a shameless cry. Satoru purred in approval, the sound vibrating right against your sensitive flesh. He started with short licks first, right near your clit, making your stomach clench, so close, yet so far. His large hands gripped the backs of your thighs, pinning you in place so you couldn't squirm away even if you wanted to.

He went in broader this time, his flat tongue dragging all the way over your clit before he finally sealed his mouth around it and sucked.

“Fuck— Satoru—”

One of your hands flew to his damp hair, while the other flailed blindly around you, trying to grab hold of the countertop, the upper cabinet, anything to keep yourself upright.

Satoru let you grind down slightly against his mouth, giving you just enough, and then pulled back to press a teasing kiss to your inner thigh while you whined in utter frustration. He was cruel and relentless in the best way possible. He kept alternating between fucking his tongue into you and sucking hard on your clit until your thighs started actively shaking around his head.

He mouthed your folds, teasingly licking the blushing skin, and then he looked up. His mouth was completely covered in your slick, his blues were blown out, and the sight alone almost fucking finished you.

“Close?”

And you couldn't even play it cool and say no, because under normal circumstances you probably wouldn’t be, but this man was holding something over you that made you all dazed, woozy, and entirely soft for him. It was fucking terrible, truly.

Though he didn't get an answer from your mouth, your eager pussy answered for him by clenching over nothing, whining so prettily for him. So, the gentleman he was, he hoisted your legs right over his shoulders and fucked two of his long fingers into you. He swiped right over that gummy spot that made your walls flutter violently around him, pressing up from the inside while he went right back to sucking your clit.

This man truly loved a good double assault in any combination, huh.

"Please—" You were gripping his hair with both hands now, hips rolling shamelessly, completely beyond caring. "Please, 'Toru, please—"

He groaned against you at the please, like it did something to him every single time, and went a little faster, making you cum on your kitchen counter with his name in pieces on your tongue.

"That's it, yer just so pretty I couldn't help myself," he mumbled as he drank down your wetness. "Let it go fer me real good."

Your thighs clamped tightly around his head, which made him groan like he was the one getting off, and he licked you right through it. Slower now, gentler, dragging every last pulse out of you until you were trembling, oversensitive, and trying weakly to squirm away.

You were left panting and basically boneless. Satoru pulled away, licking his fingers clean and swiping the leftover slick from his chin with his tongue as he looked up at you like he’d just found religion between your legs.

He stood up slowly, pressing small kisses to your stomach, your sternum, and your collarbone before finally landing on your mouth again. You could taste yourself on him, which made you moan a little all over again.

He reached behind you without breaking the kiss and poured two mugs. "Coffee's ready," he drawled.

And the most infuriating thing was that the coffee was of course perfect. It was rich, smooth, and absolutely not tasting like burnt water in the slightest. 

You somehow found your very wobbly way to the couch, feeling completely spent all over again despite having just woken up and currently sipping on a strong cup of coffee. Satoru jogged back toward the bathroom to grab his discarded boxers, and on his way back, he noticed a suspiciously familiar-looking gray fabric slung over your armchair.

“So this is where that t-shirt went, huh?” he drawled. He picked it up with a fond smirk and strolled over to where you were sitting, dropping it gently right into your lap.

“Put it on, sweets. Can't be wrapped in a towel forever,” he said so sweetly, and you flushed hard, maintaining as much dignity as someone caught stealing their cowboy's clothes possibly could.

You pulled it over your head and he smoothed the collar down once you threw it on, leaning in to press a tender kiss to your forehead.

"Keep it, then," Satoru murmured, his bright blue eyes crinkling at the corners as he looked down at you. "Looks a hell of a lot better on ya anyway, darlin’."

You spent the next half hour just chilling. It was bizarre, but so peaceful — curled up on your own couch, nursing his coffee while Satoru lazily traced circles on your bare knee. The morning light caught the dusting of freckles over his nose, making him look unfairly soft and relaxed for a man who had just spent the morning fucking you stupid in two different rooms.

You padded back to the kitchen for a glass of water. Satoru leaned back on the couch, dropping his head against the cushion.

"Still can't quite believe it," he murmured out of nowhere, his drawl breaking the quiet of the room. You stopped midway back. "Believe what?"

"That I actually have ya," he answered, a sincere smile tugging at his lips. "Still feels like I'm dreamin'."

Your stomach tightened anxiously at that. Because he did have you, kind of, probably, in some unclear way. But he also had half a ranch you were still trying to figure out what to do with. The whole buyout thing was still unresolved, complicated, and looming over you, and either of you most likely even wouldn’t wanna start this discussion any time soon.

Oh, no. No, no, no. You were so not doing this right now.

He was so blissed out from this morning's fantasy that he had kinda forgotten you were supposed to be the cold bitch and he was supposed to still be at least a little upset with you, and not looking at you like you hung the goddamn moon.

"I — well —" you stammered, your face burning. Your panicked eyes darted around the living room, desperately looking for a way out. They landed on his hat sitting on your dining table, where he’d put it last night.

You reached for it before you could overthink it. Settled it on your head and tipped the brim up just enough to look at him properly. Deflection time, baby.

"You said a cowboy can go all night with the right horse," you said, voice light, almost careless. "Were you just talkin' shit for Shoko, or was that actually real?"

Satoru let out a short bark of a laugh that didn't quite reach his eyes. The couch shifted as you sat back down next to him. He saw right through your terrible attempt at a defense mechanism, immediately, but was going to let you have it anyway. 

If you wanted to play a game to avoid talking about your feelings, he was more than happy to oblige. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes. 

"Talkin' shit, huh?" he raised his eyebrows as he leaned in and trapped you against the arm of the couch. "Darlin', I don't make promises I can't keep."

"I don't know," you challenged, crossing your arms defensively over your chest. "So far, I've only seen you perform in the morning. Going all night is a completely different rodeo, cowboy."

Satoru's eyes flashed with absolute delight. Oh, you were so asking for it. If you always deflected by trying to get on his dick, he would let you happily deflect as much as you wanted, any time you wanted.

"Is that right?" He chuckled, his thumb coming up to trace a slow line along your jaw. "Seems to me you were the one whose legs gave out before noon, but suppose my memory could be just a little fuzzy."

You let out an offended gasp, swatting his hand away, but he just took your hand and pressed a kiss to the inside of your palm. This time without any mud, though.

“I—I’m just saying that, statistically, all night is not really probable,” you stammered, but it came out more like a choked-out moan than anything.

He tilted his head and smiled, his unfair dimples finally arriving to the party, too.

"But hey," Satoru murmured against your skin, his eyes lifting to yours with a predatory gleam that made your thighs press together completely against your will. "If yer really doubtin' my stamina..."

He let it hang there, perhaps waiting for another smartass retort from you, as his eyes flickered lazily over to the wall clock before turning back to your flushed face.

"You did say you called in sick today, didn't ya?"

He took the hat right off your head and put it on himself. He didn’t even give you time to answer before claiming your mouth in a hungry kiss. His tongue, all mean and demanding, raked over yours, swiping across your palate. You might have moaned at that right into his mouth, but that didn't mean you were putting the attitude to sleep. You apparently had no survival instincts whatsoever, because when he pulled back, you smiled.

“Well golly, mister,” you said in a terrible fake accent, chin tipped up. “You gonna keep talkin’, or you actually gonna do somethin’? And the hat stays on.”

Satoru scoffed, because now you were just mocking him. And he wouldn’t have that, especially with that shit-ass imitation of the way he spoke, thank you very much.

He wrapped his hand around the back of your neck. “Turn around,” he ordered, his voice ice-cold as he guided you down onto your knees. His hand ran slowly up your spine, hiking the fabric of his t-shirt up, leaving your pretty ass and blushing cunt completely exposed for him. He kicked off his boxers again, settling right behind your perked-up cheeks.

“All that mouth,” he muttered, and spanked you, making you jolt. “Runnin’ around actin’ like you still don’t want this. Look at you now.”

Another spank, right where the first one had landed, harder this time.

“Stubborn as hell. Just like a horse that don’t know it’s already been broken in.” He traced the stinging red mark with his thumb, and you made a sound that had no dignity in it whatsoever.

"Gotta remind you who's holdin' the reins, darlin'."

You opened your mouth to snap something back, but he spanked you again, making you gasp and arch your back instead. Your fingers curled into the back cushion as the stinging sensation was making more than just your eyes wet.

He pushed in, sliding right into your sopping hole as he bottomed out immediately and stayed there. He ground against you in circles, one hand gripping your hip hard enough to bruise.

"Fuck—!" you cried out, your elbows instantly giving out as you dropped flush against the cushions, making him go instantly deeper.

"Still so tight—" he rolled his hips, slow and testing. "Still tryna act like yer not fuckin' soaked for me." Another tentative roll.

Once he saw your shoulder blades weren't squeezing together in response to the tight burn, to getting used to the stretch, he started moving properly. Hard strokes that shoved you further into the cushions.

You still tried. Because hey, your pride might have been crumbling, but if the cornerstone was still intact, you weren't going down without a proper fight.

"I'm—" you gasped into the cushion. "—I've—ah—been wetter—"

He shifted, changed the angle and drove into you harder, absolutely railing you into the cushions, making your pussy clench and squelch around him — was it really any wetter? You moaned into the upholstery, face buried, completely betrayed by your own body.

"That so," he said completely conversational. Like he hadn't just rearranged something inside you. His hips snapped forward again, harder, finding an even meaner angle and locking onto it, because Satoru always did things thoroughly.

"Go on then," he said, breathless but steady, hips not letting up. "Finish that sentence."

You know your mouth opened, but what came out was like a half a syllable and then just a broken moan as he fucked into your cervix and you felt him in your stomach, which wasn’t exactly the comeback you had been reaching for.

"Thought so," he murmured, smug as hell, rewarding your shut-the-fuck-upness with a slow caress across your lower back. But you weren’t done. You were… just taking a breath. Trust. You turned your head to the side, fighting through the haze just enough to gasp out, "Gonna have to— try harder than that, Satoru—"

“Oh?” he murmured, his tone almost gentle. But you were kinda pissing him off right now. He knew exactly what you were trying to do—trying to goad him into absolutely railing you into next week, perhaps literally. But did you really have to be such a brat about it? What happened to just asking nicely? Though Satoru would be lying if he said he wasn’t enjoying toying with you like this, because he ceased all movement. 

His dick stayed unmoving, you could feel his veins faintly pulsing against your swollen walls, and you certainly did NOT feel the way your poor cunt kept fluttering trying to pull him deeper even though he refused to give you anything, because that was what was NOT happening.

You clenched on purpose, because the heated stillness was maddening. 

"I—" you tried to rally again, but your voice faltered, shifting your hips experimentally, trying to push back into him, but his hand on your hip tightened to stop you. "Wait, you can't just—"

"Ah ah," he said warningly, making your cheeks burn even hotter, if being a bitch gets you this, can't blame a girl for acting like one all the time.

“Move,” you whined and whined, white-knuckling your poor couch. 

“Ask me nicely then, such a pretty girl but so so impatient,” he tsked and put one of his arms on the backrest like he was taking a break, it was so hot and so infuriating, you hated it made your pussy throb. Ugh.

You made a sound of pure outrage into the cushion. "I am not — you can't just — this is so unfair—"

"Mm," he said again, but his hand left your hip, as it snaked up your back and into your hair. Satoru pulled back gently, forcing you to arch your spine and lift your chest off the cushions. 

"Can't just what, darlin'?" he murmured right against your ear. He finally rolled his hips again, tickling your insides.

You made another broken, frustrated sound. “You can’t just— stop like that—”

"I can," he said simply. "And I will." His lips brushed the shell of your ear. "Until ya say what I wanna hear." And with another shallow roll, his fist tightened in your hair, pulling, making your spine curve.

“Wha-ohh!” He didn't even let you get another stupid remark out. He thrust upward with more power this time, the sharp arch of your back making you feel him so, so deep.

"Say ya want it, baby," he cooed, impossibly sweet for a man actively trying to rearrange your spine. His lips grazed your ear, your jaw, the side of your neck. "Stop hidin' behind that mouth, sweets. Tell me what ya want." A pause, another slow roll that made your toes curl. "Tell me ya want me."

What a jerk. You knew he was a jerk from the very beginning, you were aware. And now he was trying to emotionally manipulate you into admitting something that might have been the truth, but for legal reasons, you were NOT going to examine it right now. He was basically holding your poor orgasm, which was already forming so embarrassingly quickly in your lower belly, hostage.

"No—" you started. You expected another shallow roll, but the fucker started to pull out, making your poor pussy spasm at that in protest, because what the hell NO?!

"Fine, FINE," you gasped, completely past caring, this was psychological torture and you had nobody to blame but yourself. "Fine. I want it. I want you. I've wanted you, okay, I've — for a while, I've wanted you for a while, but — I want you. I want this. Please, Satoru, please—"

You would ramble like the absolute desperate whiny mess you were for longer, but you ran out of words.

"Yeah?" Satoru praised, or perhaps teased, you weren’t entirely sure. He let go of your hair, letting you plop face-first back into the cushion like a very undignified sack of potatoes. His large hand slid down to caress your spine again. "That's my good girl. 'Bout damn time." He thrust forward. "And—ngh—ya said it so nicely." A slow roll. "Guess I can go back to work."

He shifted his weight, because now it meant business since you'd finally decided to be good. Satoru planted one foot firmly on the floor, giving himself the leverage he needed, and pinned you back down with one hand. The other flew up to hold his hat in place, because he meant business now and intended to demonstrate exactly how much stamina he had.

Although he could feel, that the demonstration wasn't going to need to last very long at all. Your pussy was weeping so, so much around him, clenching and fluttering and sucking him in like it was trying to keep him there permanently, and he could feel you coiling tighter with every single movement. So, who didn't have stamina now, huh?

The wet sounds immediately filled the quiet apartment, skin slapping against skin, the squelch of your wet hole drooling every time he shifted. You had absolutely nothing, face pressed into the cushion while he used you exactly the way he’d wanted to since you put the hat on his head in the first place.

"Fuck — look at ya," he rasped, not slowing this time. "Takin' it so well now that ya stopped bein' a brat."

His hand released your hip and slid underneath you, pressing flat against your lower stomach, feeling himself move inside you again.

"God," he breathed, his rhythm stuttering for just a second before he drove deeper. "Feel that? Feel how perfect ya take me?" His fingers found your clit. "This pussy was made for me, sweets. Nothin' else fits ya like I do."

Was it the words, was it the way he rolled your throbbing clit around his fingers? You couldn’t really tell,because you fucking came hard again. A broken cry punched out of you, getting partly muffled into the cushion as you turned your head to look at him. He looked so fucked out, so smug. His stupid cowboy hat still on, that smile spreading across his flushed face, and you squeezed around him harder just out of spite.

"For such big words," he rasped, still moving through your aftershocks, "didn't last that long, sweets. How am I supposed to prove anythin' when ya turn into a sobbin' mess so quickly, mm?"

A few more deep thrusts, and then he pulled out suddenly.

"What—" you protested weakly, though it didn't have much effect on anything. He grabbed your arm and guided you gently down onto your knees while you were still seeing stars behind your eyelids.

Satoru stroked his cock over your face. He looked down at you with those pretty blown-out eyes, his chest still heaving. "Now look at ya," he murmured. "Kept lookin' down at me. Pretendin' yer above all this." His thumb brushed your lower lip. "Who's under who now, sweets."

You watched him with completely glassy, dazed eyes, gaze darting between his darkened blues and his slick pink cock in his hand, your mouth already watering, wanting to taste him—

"Ah—" he moaned, his hand moving to cup your jaw. "Open up for me."

You didn’t have to be told twice. He pushed into your mouth, one hand steadying the back of your head while the other cradled your cheek like he didn’t just hit the back of your throat until you gagged. He kept your head in place, gently fucking your mouth, deep throating your poor mouth.

Just like that, pretty girl. Just — yeah, exactly like—" 

His hand tightened in your hair, your cheeks hollowing as you swiped your tongue across his length, tasting yourself on him.

"Been thinkin' 'bout this," he rasped, barely audible, his head dropping back as his thumb kept brushing your cheek. “Ever since ya walked onto our porch in them heels of yours with that condescendin' expression... God, how I wanted to fuck that attitude right out of ya then—”

He cut himself off. His hips stuttered forward. "Sweets," he gritted, "I'm gonna—"

You sucked harder, your hands gripping his muscular thighs to bring him even closer, your nose burying into his white happy trail. He came hard, heavy pulses of his salty cum hitting the back of your throat as he held you firm and snug until he finished completely.

He dragged his thumb across your lower lip again, collecting a stray drop, and pushed it right back into your mouth.

“Good girl,” he murmured, feeling you suck on his thumb. “My pretty girl.”

You didn't talk about the buyout that morning. Or the next. Or the next after that.

You two silently agreed to pack the word ranch into a box, wrap it in caution tape, and shove it somewhere dark. It was a haze of stolen touches and the smell of actually good coffee that you shamelessly started bringing to work too. It was his hands lazily tracing your spine while something played on TV. It was the weight of his arm thrown over your waist in the middle of the night, holding you against his warm chest. It was him fixing your creaking bedroom door without being asked. 

But he tried to bring it up. Of course he did, because unlike you, Satoru actually had a spine. He would pick you up from work and start saying something that began with "look, about the meetin'—" and you kissed him stupid on the sidewalk so he would forget what he was even trying to say. He would try again in the morning, you getting ready, still sleepy and usually with your defenses down, him leaning against the kitchen counter with his phone in hand. He would start again with "my lawyer sent over—" and you would shut him up by dropping to your knees right there.

And yes, it is said that you should not fix what isn't broken. Even if it was a stupid game of avoidance, you were a coward who would rather experience the sweetest week of her life wrapped in the thickest blanket of delusion rather than come clean with reality. The reality you had also kind of self-imposed, by the way.

You knew you were playing the stupid game. You were its best player, afterall. But god, the prize felt so good. But what were you supposed to do when the timer was finally up and Satoru was giving you the same eyes across Shoko's meeting room table that he gave you whenever he cuddled you? You hated that you didn't know where you stood now that you were finally standing where you'd wanted to be all along. And suddenly, looking at him from across the table, you didn't really see a villain anymore.

Shoko had her professional face back on, even if she suspiciously glanced your way multiple times, because you were wearing a turtleneck.

But look, self-imposed or not, in this reality you were supposed to be the shark smelling blood. The one with the upper hand. The one who was going to get rid of the ranch and— Wait. Did you want to get rid of him too, though?

"Shall we begin?" Shoko said, voice perfectly even. So you did. The discrepancies from last time got cleared up, everything explained, all the points covered again in order. You breezed through it to the point you were buzzing with petty anticipation, just because you had apparently become a full masochist.

But as Shoko moved to pull up the revised final valuation figures, Satoru's lawyer held up a hand. "If we could pause before the final numbers," he said, sliding a folder to the center of the table. "My client would like to present a new proposal." He looked around the table. "A full buyout of your fifty percent stake. Fair market value, sixty-day closing, clean transfer."

Huh.

Satoru held your confused gaze and there was something in his expression that wasn't quite an apology but was in the same neighbourhood. Something like I tried to tell you and I know and I'm sorry it's happening like this all at once, without saying any of it out loud.

"Additionally," his lawyer continued, "in the interest of full disclosure, Mr. Gojo has been personally funding the ranch's operational costs for the duration of the estate dispute. Staff salaries, equipment, general maintenance. All out of pocket." He glanced at Satoru. "Which should all be taken into account when we get to the final figures."

You had been calling this man a freeloader for months. In your head, out loud, to Shoko, to your mom, in your affirmation notebook! Gold-digging freeloader. Sugar baby. Village bumpkin. And he had been paying everyone's salaries out of his own pocket the whole time. Yuji. Megumi. Nanami. Nobara. All of them. His people. Funded entirely by the man you were trying to evict.

Your face felt suddenly very warm and you became aware that your grip on your pen had gotten extremely tight.

"We'd of course welcome the opportunity to look over the figures in detail," his lawyer added smoothly, sitting back. "But we wanted the proposal on the table before proceeding."

Shoko looked at you — though she looked at you now more as a friend than as someone who was supposed to be professionally winning you this case. Oh god. You felt stupid. You felt betrayed. You felt unsteady. But you didn't, wouldn't, feel like a loser.

She cleared her throat. "We appreciate the transparency regarding the operational costs," she said carefully, clicking her pen. "That context is certainly relevant to the overall—"

"It's a generous offer," Satoru's lawyer politely interrupted, nodding. "We're confident the figures will reflect fair—"

"And we'll of course need time to review the proposal thoroughly," Shoko continued, reaching for the folder, "before my client can make any formal—"

Satoru said something then. You didn't catch what, because the blood was very loud in your ears as the conversation steadily got away from you while you quietly experienced a very embarrassing implosion of your entire narrative of everything that was, is, and would be.

The plan had been to say something sharp. Something professional that would reestablish the hierarchy in this room. Lean back, politely decline the immediate offer, remind everyone who was steering this ship. But trying to be the captain doesn't really work when you feel handled, managed, and like you're about to be tossed overboard.

"Just because we slept together," you blurted out, absolutely sinking your composure and the ship alongside it, "doesn't mean you get to write me a check because you feel like it's the righteous thing to do."

Satoru stood up immediately, hands raised slightly, voice low and careful. "Sweets. This didn't come out of nowhere, I promise. I tried to talk to ya about this all week. It's why we proposed the meeting altogether—"

"I—" you started.

"Perhaps," Shoko cleared her throat, hastily gathering her things, "we should give the parties a moment." She looked at you with an expression that was equal parts girl what the fuck, good luck, and I will be charging you extra for this. She picked up her coffee and followed his lawyer out without looking back.

"You played me," you fired off once the door shut.

"I didn't play ya," Satoru said, his voice stupidly calm. He stepped away from the table and took a step closer to you.

"You used the entire week to soften me up!" you accused and paced a line behind your chair. "You played dumb and then you played house with me and let me think—let me think we were actually... and the whole time you had this sitting in your back pocket!"

You pointed at the damn folder still sitting on the table. 

"I tried to tell ya," he reminded you gently. "Every single day. Ya didn't wanna hear it."

"Because I didn't know you were trying to get rid of me!" you shot back immediately, feeling how your throat was tightening. You felt betrayed and humiliated, all of it stinging your eyes. "All the flirting, all the sweet talk.. It feels an awful lot like you got exactly what you wanted out of me, decided what was best for me without asking me. It felt like you used— And now you're just trying to be decent to pay me off to do that!”

Satoru physically flinched at that. "Is that really what ya think this is?"

"What else am I supposed to think?" you demanded, crossing your arms tightly over your chest to keep your hands from shaking. "You played the struggling cowboy for months. And now, suddenly, you're dropping buyouts and funding payrolls like it's nothing. So what is it? Some trust fund  you're using to push me out because you want the ranch all for yourself?"

"It's my savings," he answered, though the hurt was visible in his face. "I emptied out my own accounts to make that offer."

Okay, now you were the one who flinched, taken aback.  "I wasn't tryin' to push ya out," Satoru continued, he took another slow step closer. "I was givin' ya an option, sweets. Not an ultimatum. I wasn't gonna let ya be trapped in somethin' ya clearly didn't want just because ya felt obligated."

"I thought if I proposed this ya'd agree without—" he faltered at that, suddenly looking at the floor.

"Without what," you coaxed him and your jaw was tight. His head snapped back up and his eyes were glassy with desperation.

"Without fuckin' leavin' me behind, okay?!”

He never raised his voice like that. It felt like a gunshot going off. Oh my god. No. No. No. This wasn't supposed to go this way. In your little mental script he was supposed to say something… something vile, something ugly, something that would justify you being a bitch and him being the villain. You couldn't handle him being the good guy, because if he was the good guy, that meant you were the villain of your own story.

"Then why didn't you just tell me?" you demanded, still reaching for any possible crack. "Why let me come down there for months and fight with you tooth and nail over this— this mistake?"

"Because it wasn't a mistake,” he said, his voice dropping so low it was almost inaudible.

"What?" you breathed out.

"Your aunt left us both this place on purpose, sweets," he bit his lip. "Because she wanted us to find each other.”

Okay, what the fuck now? Not only he really wasn’t what you’d spent months trying to paint him as, now apparently your own dear great-aunt played you both by playing some fucked up posthumous matchmaker. Legally tying you to a man she’d oh so graciously picked for you herself, via inheritance law. You felt trapped in your own lie, in this entire situation, under the weight of his pretty, now sad-looking eyes.

“I wasn't tryin' to be pushy. I gotta admit I was smitten with ya the second I saw ya," Satoru confessed. "But I knew ya were upset. With your aunt, with the whole inheritance situation, with me. So I didn't say anythin’ because I thought ya didn't like me back anyway. Figured it was irrelevant.” He took a breath. "Your aunt was real important to me. She took me in when I had a fallout with my own family. I started helpin' her out and we got close. She was like my own grandmother. And then she started talkin' about her one niece that was my age." The corner of his mouth twitched. "Painted ya like this brilliant, driven, beautiful woman. And I was gone before ya ever set foot on that property. And yeah, sounds stupid, I know."

What the FUCK now, for real?! So that was why she had wanted you to visit, more so often these past few years. She wanted you to meet Satoru. That's why she made sure to see this through even after her death. And you couldn’t tell if this was totally fucked up or the best, and the most stubborn thing someone had ever done to you. Probably both, to be honest. You hated her for it and adored her even more.

But here’s the thing. You hated NOT being in control. And this entire situation, for its entire duration, had never been under your control, no matter how much you tried to convince yourself that it was. Satoru had known, he’d had time, and he’d had opportunities to tell you. But he’d let you live your delusional little of a story, because he thought the truth was irrelevant. He let you think he was a dick. And somehow, right now, that was what made you the angriest.

“Y-you—” you stammered, looking out the window. Tears were starting to well in your eyes, and crying in here would be the last thing needed for your completely crumbling resolve. "Keep your damn money," you spat out. Your somehow voice steadied itself, which was the only victory left available to you in this damn room. "I'll find a way to buy you out and sort this myself. I never asked you to do any of this in the first place."

“Okay,” he said quietly as he ran hand through his hair. You gathered your shit and walked out. The door shut behind you and it was the loneliest sound in the world. The spell was supposed to work, but the witch said don’t fish for fortune upon someone’s downfall, and now the one who fell down was you, for fuck’s sake.

The last cherry on top was receiving THE dreaded email from HR a few weeks later. So, yes you did get fired on top of everything, exactly how you didn’t want! And they dared to write it so politely, too, “role elimination”, while your entire existence felt thoroughly, physically, and emotionally eliminated in every other way, too. But what a great way to finish off this particular arc of your life. Honestly? Served you right. Served you absolutely, completely, and justifiably right for being a bitch.

You always thought you would absolutely freak the freak out if you ever got fired. Full meltdown, floor-level, calling your mom in tears. Instead you were kinda... chill? You already felt like your life was over for completely different reasons, so what was not being financially secure going to do to you damage-wise at this point?

You almost felt relieved. Scary, I know. You thought about calling your boss, like, to give them the option to reconsider, but you thought about this for like a minute and then just accepted it. You wanted to quit sooner or later anyway, so what a little sooner than expected was going to do. 

The universe had just beaten you to it, which was annoying, but fine. That was apparently just how things went for you recently. You made a plan and then the plan changed without your knowledge and went in a completely different direction, and you ended up standing in your kitchen in a dead man's t-shirt with no job, no strategy, and the worst cup of drip coffee you had ever tasted sitting cold on the counter next to you.

And the worst part was you couldn't even tell if you were the loser or the winner of the situation anymore. You win some, you lose some, but lately these things had started to blend together that you kinda couldn't tell which was which anymore. 

So you had tried to seek validation from the one person biologically obligated to give it to you. Your own mother.

A few days prior, you had called her, desperately looking for emotional comfort. 

But instead of being unconditionally supportive, like any good mom should and would be when their child is clearly in the wrong, she had decided to fully cement the fact that you were actively ruining your life to make it even clearer for you. Thank you very much, mom.

Long story short, it turned out she had actually met Satoru last summer, and was now describing him as a perfectly lovely young man who had even fixed the flickering light on her car for free!

She admitted she hadn't wanted to interrupt your little inheritance warpath over the last few months, but she graciously took the chance to let you know that trying to sell the ranch out from under that sweet boy would make your great-aunt incredibly disappointed. And that you should definitely not talk about this in front of your grandma, because she would curse you out for trying to sell her dead sister’s house. So there was that. Great.

Oh! And apparently he also had wonderful shoulders and cute dimples, so she simply didn't understand your decision-making process and told you to fix this mess immediately.

So, yes. You were not only at the rock bottom of your entire life, but also being actively humiliated by your own mother, who had been on his side long before you even knew who he was. You really couldn't make this shit up. What would come next? Your landlord deciding your request to fix the non-working doorbell was unjust and not in alignment with your tenancy agreement and kicking you out? 

Shoko called you into her office later, so you dragged your ass all the way downtown. As you sat in the waiting area, you couldn't help but glare at the frosted glass of her door. Did she find more shit to bill you for? She had just bought a new car, shit must have been expensive, so of course she was dragging you in to squeeze a few more billable hours out of your misery.

When you trudged inside and slumped into the chair like the dignified lady you were, she immediately slid a folder across the table your way. The same folder. THE folder. Satoru's lawyer's new deal proposition, sitting there on Shoko's desk like it hadn't already caused enough emotional damage to your life.

You glared at it. "Get that thing away from me. Did you call me in here just to torture me?"

"Jesus fucking Christ, calm down," Shoko rolled her eyes and flipped it open. "Did you even read the full proposal?"

You shook your head. "Of course not. Why would I? They made it pretty clear when they said buy me out. You were there."

"I know. I'm still charging you for the emotional damage of whatever the fuck that was." She flipped to a specific page and turned it to face you. "But if you had bothered to read past the first page before deciding to be the victim, you would have seen the addendums."

"Fuck off," you said, but you straightened your posture. "What addendums?"

"The operational roadmap," Shoko said, tapping a nail against the page. "Read it."

So you read it once. Then again. Then some specific parts a third time just to make sure.

Turned out he wasn't offering you the buyout so he could turn the place into a bachelor pad or whatever. The dude had a plan. Real hospitality plans. Landscaping blueprints for the east field to host events. A very rough but preliminary draft of a proposal for boutique rental cabins — just like he'd floated to the appraiser all those months ago, the idea you'd been pissed about because you were too busy trying to wedge yourself back into the conversation to properly clock it. Plus, a clause regarding profit-sharing for the original stakeholders.

And you hated that it was good. You hated that it made sense. And you hated that it wasn't your idea, and that you had lowkey stifled it for months just because your ego was bruised. He was thinking about a future while you were only thinking about the present. About money. About an exit.

"Babe, he wasn't really trying to kick you out," Shoko said softly, sounding dangerously close to pity. "He really isn't the bad guy. And I know you like him. Losing—"

"No, stop," you interrupted, still reading the same paragraph over again. You might have been dumb about a lot of things lately, but you were NOT stupid.

You sat in silence for a while. When Shoko wasn't allowed to speak she at least had the decency not to send you nonverbal pity vibes. You finally looked up, catching her eye as the lightbulb finally went off in your head. "I need you to draw something up for me." 

You already had the ranch's address saved in your navigation. And unlike last time, you were armed with your well-trusted pink Salomons, your overstuffed weekender, and a folder that hopefully wouldn't sever your connection to him this time, but rather, hopefully, save it.

What a turn of events.

The drive felt like it took both ten seconds and ten years. The GPS, regardless of the saved destination, kept recalculating anyway like an old habit, because you still hadn't switched to Google Maps like you'd told yourself you would.

When your tires crunched to a halt in the exact same spot you always parked, you killed the engine and just sat there for a second, hyping yourself up. Because you were haunted by the very real possibility that he wouldn't want to see you after what you'd managed to theatrify back in the meeting room. But look, you were already here, the legal stuff still needed to be dealt with anyway, and it was now or never, baby.

It took just a few awkward steps around the back porch before Yuji spotted you from the stables, where he was doing something with Megumi again. He paused, squinting against the afternoon sun, and when he recognized you he sent off a very friendly wave in your direction, like you hadn't recently tried to financially ruin their boss. 

Nobara was tending to the cows and Nanami was washing off his horse near the pen. But Satoru was nowhere to be seen, and you were too embarrassed to ask, because what the hell were you even doing here anyway.

So you went to pet the cows. Betsy was by the fence again and you needed your hand to be licked for emotional support. It was a reasonable thing to need. And as you stood there, you noticed that the barn roof was fixed. It was now neatly patched with fresh shingles. And while Betsy actively worked on trying to dissolve your sleeve into a wet mush, you looked out toward the east field and suddenly, you could picture it all. The future he had been quietly building, while you were busy trying to tear it all down.

"Didn't think I'd be seein' you around these parts again so soon."

Your heart dropped directly into the mud under your feet. You spun around, yanking your soggy sleeve away from Betsy's sandpaper tongue.

Satoru was standing a few feet away, a little further back than he usually stood, with a smudge of dirt across his sun-kissed cheek and wearing his chaps again. How could you be reasonable when you just wanted to kiss him stupid for looking so pretty? And yeah, you're putting this on the record. You had always wanted to do that while he was wearing them, so fucking what.

You had a speech prepared, like you always did—an explanation of the new legal parameters of your partnership alongside an epic but logical apology, and it all instantly went out the window the second you looked at his thighs.

He stood there with a little frown on his face, like he was bracing for another fight, probably waiting for you to hand him the promised eviction notice.

“I—uh—I,” you very beautifully stammered as you bit your lip, feeling the blush creep terribly up your neck and all over your face. “I—” Okay, forget the speech. You had also apparently forgotten what words were.

He only raised an eyebrow, rested a hand on his hip, and patiently waited for you to produce a legible sentence. You absolutely panicked. Reminding yourself what you held in your other, non-salivated hand, you shoved it his way. “I—I stole the book last time. I’m s-sorry. I just wanted to return it because I finished it and I d-didn't return it when you were over.”

You looked at the ground, idly kicking a small stone between your shoes.

"Sweets, what—"

"And I got fired," you continued. "Or, technically, my role was eliminated. And my mom hates me. Well, she doesn't hate me, but she loves you, and she thinks I'm a terrible person for trying to take the ranch from you." Aaaand full word vomit sequence engaged. "Which I'm not doing anymore! Because at first I hadn't read the proposition, because I was dumb, but then Shoko made me read it and then I saw all the plans and I'm an idiot, okay?!"

Satoru just stared at you, his mouth slightly parted, but you couldn't stop talking if you tried.

"I'm not buying you out—or, like, not trying to," you babbled, shoving the papers you and Shoko cooked up at him next. "I had Shoko draft a new agreement. You get full operational control. I'm keeping my stake though, because my grandma would kill me, but nobody is selling anything, and you don't have to give me your savings! And I understand if you hate me after how I acted, and I'm not asking you to forgive me, I just needed to fix this mess because I was wrong and—"

He didn't let you finish that one. He took a step forward instead, not even glancing at the documents you were currently using as an emotional shield, letting them drop alongside the poor book into the dirt, and caught your face in both hands.

"Sweets."

"—and I'm sorry," you finished, as his thumbs brushed your cheekbones and he gazed down at you with very soft eyes for a man who was supposed to be very upset with you.

"God, sweets." He exhaled, biting his lip as he searched your face for something that might tell him to stop himself. "I love you. What are you even talkin' about?"

Oh.

OH. 

You looked shocked, but not shocked the way you'd expected to be. A cheeky smile with a few tears slipping down your cheeks finally broke through the panic on your face. Because after all of this, all of that,  and everything, you were standing here in your trusted pink Salomons, completely in love with a cowboy.

"I—" you started.

"The papers are fine," he interrupted again. "We'll sort the papers." His thumb moved slow and tender against your cheek, catching the few stray tears. "That ain't why you drove out here, is it?"

"Well, kinda," you admitted shyly, and shrugged, which he dignified with a small chuckle. "But also not."

You finally brought your arms around his neck and looked at all of him for a moment, the hat, the dirt smear on his cheek, the chaps, and suddenly remembered something.

"Does the horseback ride offer still stand?" you said. Your voice came out slightly trembling, which was fine, because you'd told yourself to finally be honest and you felt slightly wrecked now, so what. "Since it's — you know. Next time."

Satoru laughed  and pulled you flush against him. The wet and slimy sleeve could be damned. "Yeah, darlin'," he murmured into your hair, inhaling you, planting a small kiss there. "Offer still stands."

It was a few months later when you found yourself zipping your, at this point, threadbare weekender back up. Only this time, instead of your pink Salomons, you packed your bad bitch heels instead. 

"You're really leavin' me alone again?"  Satoru was leaning against the bedroom doorframe, wearing the most obnoxious, unfair pout.

"I have meetings in the city, Satoru," you answered, tossing your laptop in and pulling the zipper shut. "Somebody has to secure the funding for phase two of the boutique cabins, and they refused to do it over Zoom"

"Thought you were supposed to be takin' a day off."

"I will take a day off when I’m sure the east field is fully funded," you countered, grabbing your bag and marching toward him. He caught you by the waist, not letting you through the doorway.

"Ya know, under the new operatin' agreement, I got full day-to-day authority," he drawled, his nose brushing against yours. "I could formally request you stay put."

"And as your financial stakeholder," you whispered and hugged him back, "I have veto power. And I am vetoing your request until Friday evening." He chuckled and kissed you until you almost forgot your own schedule.

Or it was when you were both stuck in your car in the middle of a traffic jam on the way back from said meetings.

"How folks can live in this kinda chaos is beyond me," Satoru groaned, gripping the steering wheel as he glared at the endless sea of red brake lights. "We've been stuck in the exact same spot for twenty minutes! The damn cows move faster than this!"

"It's just rush hour, babe. Normal weekday experience," you said softly from your passenger seat, typing away on your laptop.

"I ain't embracin' nothin'," he grumbled, leaning his head back against the headrest. "I just miss my tractor."

He looked so stressed, sporting the same cute pout he always did when he didn't like something. He looked so adorably out of place, and was only putting up with it just to drive you back from your meeting. You suddenly felt an uncomfy pressure in your lower tummy, and you couldn't help the giggle that bubbled up in your chest. You widened your eyes, giggling harder as he narrowed his eyes at you. "What's so funny, darlin'?"

"Oh shit," you snickered, closing your laptop and clutching your stomach. "I kinda need to pee."

Satoru's head whipped fully toward you, absolute horror flashing across his face. "Do not tell me this right now—"

"I don't know, twenty minutes is a long time," you teased, laughing harder at his panicked expression as he desperately started looking around for a gas station that definitely didn't exist on this block.

And look, you win some, you lose some. But no matter where you were, if it was being stuck in traffic, covered in mud, in a boardroom, on the ranch, or in your apartment — having this beautiful cowboy by your side? Yeah. You had definitely won both.

── Dividers from dollywons (other post) and bbyg4rlhelps!

[purpleorchidprincess]

In light of me starting nursing school in 2 weeks (💔) … pick a character for the nurse reader

Pick.

Sukuna

Toji

Voting ended onAug 6

[purpleorchidprincess]

Promises of Sukuna

‎·༻ In which the palace gets stormed, and you're left to patiently wait for Sukuna.

wc; 999

A damned massacre.

Screaming. Smoke. Fire. Ashen bodies. Blood. 

You had locked yourself in the hidden room of the Palace. That's where he told you to hide. You imagined the bloodshed out there was enough to fill a river.  

The palace had been stormed by enemy forces. 3 quarters of the army had turned on Lord Sukuna. You weren't surprised. 

You told him to treat his army nicer. All he did was laugh and call you a silly woman. 

Being an advisor to the king was no easier than being his lover. He was tough, critical, and most of all, cruel. Yet he managed to be gentle with you, and he was yours while you were his. 

You met him as a servant. You did menial tasks while managing to practice magic in secret. He never knew of your existence; if anything, you’d been glad. 

One day you were in the garden tending to some dying flowers. You managed to perfect a spell that could automatically regenerate the plant's cells to revive it. 

The rose slowly regained its color as you focused all your energy on it. A beautiful rose it was. Plump, velvety, and vibrant. 

“Tampering with my garden?” he said, his feet slapping on the hard stone. 

You quickly turned around and bowed. “L-lord Sukuna. My apologies, I did not mean to impose on your garden. My apologies, again.” He grunted and continued to walk toward you. 

He was face to face with you as he reached for the revived rose. “Beautiful…” You trembled under him. Would he slit your throat for touching his property? 

“You hone an extravagant skill.” Did he just… complement you? 

“You are a talented woman. I've never met a magic user in my lifetime. Tell me, were you born with such an ability?” 

You nodded quickly. “Interesting.” He mumbled as he walked off. 

After that, Sukuna saw to it that the two of you remained closer. You were made to be his personal maid.

You’d tend to him day after day while he examined your skill. The two of you slowly began to enjoy each other's comforts. 

Having to be by his side, he would begin to ask for your input on things. During military meetings, you began to speak out. They were hesitant at first, but Sukuna always trusted you. Your plans always proved right due to your prophecies. He then made you his personal advisor. Anyone who disagreed with you was personally slaughtered.

Your relations had started as quiet looks during meetings. His arm wrapped around your waist while the male militia spoke with you. Small kisses in the garden. Makout sessions while hunting. That elevated to the two of you having passionate sex in his chamber after meetings. After that, you weren’t allowed to leave his side. Ever. He promised he’d never. 

He was going to make you his queen; that was another promise. He was going to start a family; he was going to make you your own garden. He’d build an infirmary in your name. All promises. He said he’d never leave your side. He wasn’t a dishonest man. Not the type to break a vow. 

Time passes slowly while you wait for him. He’d come back to you. 

You imagined that you’d tell him about the pregnancy. You were going to do it a few hours ago. You believed in him. You believed that he could defeat them all. For the sake of you and his unknown child. 

But the way things seemed to be going…you just hoped he’d come back. His dying wasn't a prophecy you’d been granted, but neither was one of him living. 

The hidden door in front of you opened. You jumped up and ran to him tearfully. “My love…” He wrapped all 4 of his arms around you tightly. One of his hands stroked your hair firmly. 

“I love you" is something he’d never say. Too sentimental. So why did he say it? 

The scent of blood flooded your nose; your hands shook as you pulled them off his back. The viscous, warm, red pooled on your hands. 

You tried to catch him as his heavy body fell to the ground. His breathing slowed, bit by bit. 

You lowered to your knees, attempting to find the wound or whatever was piercing his skin. “Just stay awake, my love; I can fix this. If I get some herbs or salves, I can close your wound in a minute.” 

His weak hand reached up and grasped yours with the last bit of strength he had in his body. “I’ve betrayed you,” he whispered. 

Your trembling hands caressed his cheek. His skin felt so cold. “You could never betray me. You’ve shown me, love.” 

His eyes fell while his cheek weighed on your hands. “Ryomen… Stay awake. Please.” 

“I’m sorry,” he said with genuine emotion. Tears fell from your eyeline onto his face. This couldn’t be happening. He can’t die. He's too powerful. 

“But we’re going to rule together.” Your throat choked up as you struggled to breathe. The blood in the air was so strong. 

“What about the garden? Who’ll tend to your garden?” 

“What about the infirmary? I was going to teach you how to heal.” 

“What about our family? You cannot leave us now.” You reached for his hand, letting it rest on your stomach. But his hand didn’t move; it went limp. 

You lowered your head to his mouth to listen for a breath, but you heard nothing. You hit him. "Wake up.” 

You hit him harder. He was just being stubborn. “Ryomen, this isn’t funny.” Hit. Hit. Hit. 

“You cannot leave me, you promised to stay by my side!” You lay down on his body, hoping and praying that he’d take a breath. That this was all a silly joke. 

“Please.” 

You lost your lover & your child that day. So, do promises really matter if they’re left unfulfilled? Or will a promise curse the succession of a dream? 

“Goodbye, love.”

I apologize lolz

[purpleorchidprincess]

Law and Lechery: Higuruma x Fem Reader

‎·༻𐫱 In which a young woman, navigating Regency England, has to face the trials of one of England's richest men.

Chapter 2: Quite a Boring Man

wc: 1170

Credits 4 dividers: saradika-graphics & rmstitanics

The hall was loud as drunken, boisterous voices danced upon the wooden floor. It seemed the whole town had gathered to greet our newest bachelors. 

All the girls wore their prettiest new dresses with fresh-cut and colored ribbon. It might be universal that some mothers had rushed their daughters' debuts. 

Your family walked into the hall to the typical grove of greetings from every family in Elizabethshire. You might not have been the richest, but your family was definitely held in high regard. 

You quickly found Nobara in a little corner of the room sipping on some punch. Probably spiked.

You began to walk toward her; her eyes followed you, and her demeanor lightened. “Oh! It feels like it’s been ages since I’ve seen you. I've missed you dearly!” 

You pull her into a tight hug as her arms wrap around you. “Oh, my dear, Nobara, I’ve missed you more.” 

She pulls away, but one of her hands latches onto yours. Her eyes get narrow. She gives you that look when she wants to say something but remains hesitant. “So.” 

“So?” 

“New men in town?” You slap her arm humorously. Her grandma had been quite persistent in getting her hitched & out of the house. You could say the same for your mother. Men were unfortunately quite important to the average young lady. 

“As if I’d be interested in the next spoiled man to walk in here.” She nudged your arm playfully. “I bet if a wealthy, attractive suitor walked in here, your eyes would be turned onto him.” 

You scoffed and crossed your arms stubbornly. “Well then, I’d rather live by my mama’s side for the rest of my life than turn my head to face theirs.” 

“Oh, you lie!” The noise of feet dancing in synchronized tones had completely halted. Everyone's eyes were turned to the doorway. It was eerie. 

3 noble bodies stood in the foyer. On the left was a woman with long brown hair in a dark red dress that looked like it was of the most pristine quality. Silk.

On the very right was a man with hair as white as snow. His eyes were glowing as blue as the summer sky. He was tall with a chipper glee on his face. 

And in the middle… you looked upon the most miserable man you’d ever seen. Maybe it was horrible to judge at first sight, but his facial expression obviously said he’d wanted to be anywhere but here. 

His hair was dark, his nose was hooked, and his posture remained straighter than a line. His dark eyes hung low. You could sense the overwhelming presence he exerted over the room. Despite his displeased expression, you’d admit he was quite agreeable in terms of looks…. He is a rather handsome man. Your eyes seemed to follow him as he walked into the room. Hard, dominating steps. 

You slipped back to consciousness as you heard Nobara’s snapping in your ear. “What was this about not wanting to turn your head toward men?” 

You gave her a sharp, mean look that could make anyone shudder. “Apologies. I’m not sorry, though.” Suddenly you’d seen your neighbor gathering your family; you immediately rushed over with curiosity.

“Y/n! Guess what?” screamed Fairy excitedly. 

“W-” 

But before you could even speak, Fairy yelled out, "We're to be introduced to the town's new guest!” Ugh. You loathed social interactions more than anything. In society, socializing is all gossip & marriage. No intellectual conversation. 

As your family walked closer to the group, you changed your behavior quickly. A good first impression will always last. 

“Miss Shoko Ieiri, Sir Gojo & Sir Higuruma. I would like to introduce you to the current family that holds the blood of the original proprietors of Elizabethshire.” Your family did the modest bow as always, to which the 3 reciprocated. 

Your neighbor went down the line as your family introduced themselves one by one. Then it got to you. 

“Pleased to be of your acquaintance. I’m [y/n l/n]. I hope you enjoy your time here. Our town is stunning. I recommend you visit the library.” From behind you, the music could be heard starting back up in the background, signifying the next dance.  

Gojo held his hand to your sister… “Miss Georgiana, I would be delighted if you’d join me in a dance.” Your mother gasped loudly and opened her fan as if she were about to pass out.

Your sister nodded & courteously took his hand. “Sir Higuruma, you look like you’d enjoy a dance as well. Miss [y/n] loves to do her turns about the floor.” Your neighbor pushed your back slightly, bringing you closer to him. 

“I fear dancing may be for fools. Only the ones who hone the meticulous skill care to not face embarrassment.” You were floored; what an asshole. The man was a disfigured grump. 

“How does one know they are a good dancer until they’ve tried? Socializing doesn’t cost much, sir.” The man looked down upon you with a considerably growing frown. Your words clearly couldn’t sway him. 

His eyes widened slightly before he grunted, turning away to walk in another direction. The woman named Shoko finally cleared her throat. “My apologies for him. Sir Higuruma can be quiet… unsettling at times. You know how it is when you need to use the loo badly.” 

Fairy and Kiku shared a laugh while Shoko winked before walking away. “He seems like an arse. Mama hit you harshly on top of your head with her fan, making you flinch. “Do not speak of him in such a tone! He could be your husband one day, child!” 

“I’d rather tend to our pig’s feet.” 

4 rounds of dancing later and ¾, Sir Gojo Satoru had spent dancing with your sister. It looks like someone will be betrothed soon… This round, Sir Satoru had been confined to the abilities of his friend, Sir Higuruma. 

You and Nobara were sitting behind a pole before the two men sat right in front. 

“Miss Georgiana is quite incomparable to the other ladies here,” Gojo said with a giddy tone. “She is definitely handsome, I suppose…" said Sir Higuruma monotonously.  

Sir Higuruma's tone held a boredness to it. Was he always in a state of disinterest? “Her sister is definitely agreeable as well…” You could hear the tease in Sir Gojo’s sly voice. 

“She is not nearly handsome enough to catch my attention. Quite boring, if anything. Nobara tried to pull you as you rounded the corner, but you were known for your… rather sharp tongue. 

“Sir Higuruma, you insult me greatly. A boring woman will remain supreme over a man who’s too afraid to personally express his discontent over a woman's appearance. You are quite contradictory in calling me boring; you won't even share a dance! Now, I, who definitely am not boring, shall go dance instead of being a womanizing hog.” 

You grabbed Nobara and stomped off. The nerve of him to basically call you ugly. He has some audacity.

last chapter next chapater

Still trying to get better at dialogue writing for the 1800s, like they had some weird-ass insults

Taglist : @frigga13 @alebrasil0101

[purpleorchidprincess]

Law and Lechery: Higuruma x Fem Reader

‎·༻𐫱 In which a young woman, navigating Regency England, has to face the trials of one of England's richest men.

wc: 795 (just a short intro to the reader & her family)

credits 4 dividers: saradika-graphics & rmstitanics

On the bright, golden morning, you walked through the overgrown field with a book in your hand. You adored books. 

You tried to focus, but the buzzing bees sucking the sultry nectar out of the flowers often distracted you. They mingled about with the dragonflies. 

Under your feet, the ants, worms, and other hypogeic beings you've read about. They work in organized groups; some choose to stay alone. Organized beings, just like society. 

You were in the drawing room when your boisterous sister's feet slammed against the floor above you. 

You were trying to enjoy a talk with Papa about the last book you read. It was about the emergence of scientific techniques. Mama sat in her chair doing simple embroidery while telling the servant what should be prepared for dinner. 

“What I’m trying to say, Father, I—" A servant handed him the long-awaited mail, prompting your sister's feet to come down the stairs ferociously. All four of them had descended from their rooms. 

Georgina was your eldest sister, she was 22. Grace was younger than you by 2 years, she was 18. Florence, whom we called Fairy, was 17. Kiku was the youngest at 15. 

Your father looked utterly perplexed by the group of girls coming to jump him. Fairy pounced on your father's shoulders with excitement. “Father, we heard you received a letter from Mr. James." 

Your father turned his head toward your sister. Hearing her scheming tone. “Yes, my dear. Why ask? It just arrived about a minute ago.” 

“I saw Ms. Garinder's daughter in town; she talked about her father writing to you," said Fairy. 

Kiku took a seat directly next to Father, gripping his arm with anticipation. “Don’t tease us so, Papa! You know he's a huge town gossip.” 

Grace sat down at the piano, clearly disinterested in the conversation. Fairy began to whine in a high-pitched voice. “Father! We’re going to die from boredom if we don’t hear any interesting news.” 

“Young women such as yourself shouldn’t meddle in adult affairs.” Fairy & Kiku let out loud audible groans before your mother slapped Papa’s shoulder. “Do not vex them so. I also would like to know what regards he sends…” 

You snort a little, making your mother turn to you with the same flabbergasted expression. Georgiana rubbed your mother's arm with her same bright smile before breaking the silence. “Nothing wrong with wanting a little daily fix, Papa."

At this point, all eyes were on Papa in anticipation. Even Grace was staring despite her antisocial mood.  

Papa grabbed his spectacles off the table, slipping them on his face. His hand grasped the fresh letter off the table. He grabbed the tableside knife and split the letter open. 

1 minute of reading later, everyone was still on edge. “So, it seems Elizashire is due for two new wealthy bachelors. They’re visiting from a richer province near London.” 

Fairy and Kiku stood up and began jumping in energetic circles. "Oh, I must get new ribbons, Father. Mama, please take us to town!” Fairy began to rake her hand through her thick hair. 

“One of them has rented out the old manor down the road.” Your attention was caught. The manor was huge, making it expensive to rent. He must’ve been exorbitantly rich.

“He must be most well-off.” Papa nodded, looking at the letter with intensity. "The letter says his acquaintance owns a bigger fortune. He related to the queen from a few lines away.” 

Your mother began inspecting Georgianna's appearance. “We must call on them for an audience. My dear beautiful Georgie must be married soon!” 

Your father took his glasses back off before making quite the impactful statement. “Ah, they'll also be attending the monthly ball at the community hall.” 

Fairy and Kiku began to shriek even louder than before. "MAMA, I MUST GET A NEW DRESS! OH MAMA, WHAT IF THE ARMY MEN WILL BE THERE?" Fairy's exuberant noise pierced your ear. 

“You mustn't make a fuss, Fairy. Papa will surely let us go. Right?” You turned toward your father, but his expression didn't quite answer your question. “Right?” Georgiana said behind you. 

Your mother was reduced to a kneeling plea. “Surely, you must let the girls go. For my sake, I may croak if you shouldn't." 

Your father looked down at your mother, knowing he’d feed into her desires. “Fine.” The room broke out in a state of joy. 

You were quietly excited you’d be allowed to go. This may be a great chance to see your friends. You haven’t had tea with them in ages! 

“Father, what is the name of the manor owner?” asked Georgianna. Your father picked the letter back up, searching for the names. 

“Ah, here. Gojo Satoru.” 

“What about his acquaintance?" 

“Hiromi Higuruma. A wealthy barrister.” 

Next chapter

taglist: @frigga13

im so eggcited for this story because I love Pride and Prejudice!!!

[purpleorchidprincess]

Law and Lechery: Higuruma x Fem Reader

‎·༻𐫱 In which a young woman, navigating Regency England, has to face the trials of one of England's richest men.

Inspired by Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice (2005 movie version)

You do not need the movie to read this, but I do recommend watching the movie or reading the book

art: _suracii_

Latest chapter

Chapter list:

1: The Family of Elizabethshire

2: Quite a Boring Man

Comment to be added to the taglist

[purpleorchidprincess]

Who should be the man for the pride and prejudice themed mini fic (if I can be consistent this time)

Toji

Sukuna

Higuruma

Voting ended onJul 28

Short description of pride and prejudice via Google:

an 1813 novel of manners that follows Elizabeth Bennet as she navigates love, marriage, and social class in Regency England, learning to overcome her own prejudice and the pride of Mr. Darcy (it’s a really good book. I read it twice!!)

Comment for taglist

[starmapz]

written in the stars - r. sukuna

☾⋆ trueform alien!sukuna x entomologist astronaut f!reader [alien au] ☾⋆ oneshot

❝ in space, no one can hear you scream. they can't hear you wake up alone in a hunk of space junk against your will. they can't hear your ship get engulfed by a much larger and very alien one. and they certainly can't hear you fall in love with the four-armed grumpy alien you meet while you're trapped within your own ship. ❞

☾⋆ cw ; mdni, 18+ only. strangers to lovers. slow burn. hurt/comfort. angst. fluff. smut. depictions of [likely inaccurate] science experiments. medical discussions. needles. illness. reader and sukuna can't exist in the same atmosphere. they're both huge nerds. bug discussions. mild violence. pet names [human, ange, baby]. trueform!sukuna. piv. inter-species sex. fingering. oral [f! receiving]. monsterfucking. sukuna has 2 dicks. size difference. biting. manhandling. licking. spitting/drool. inspired heavily by project hail mary/iron lung/alien earth. mild modulo spoilers. sukuna is simurian. changed simurian lore.

☾⋆ wc ; 37.9k. wattpad || ao3 || main masterlist

Your lashes flutter, eyes opening to sterile, controlled lighting. Lifting an arm feels like a hurdle to overcome when your muscles behave far more like limp pasta than something meant to support a full biological system. After your arm protests the very concept of movement, you flex your fingers, adjusting to the harsh whites of your surroundings.

“Movement detected.”

Blinking hard, you slowly take in your surroundings, expecting a hospital bay, only to be met with smooth white surfaces that tell a different story. Space.

It hits you like a truck and by sheer force of will, you lift an arm to your head, expecting some sort of blunt force trauma. That you must be seeing things. Rubbing your temples makes you aware of several tubes all connected to a tight white suit clinging to your skin. As you begin tugging on the tubes, many release with a hiss while others simply come loose without fanfare.

“Crew aboard: one member. Arrival imminent.”

You have to be dreaming. Hallucinating. Something.

Managing to weakly push to your feet, you stumble through the halls of the ship on a weak gait. It’s a small vessel, with a science bay through a sealing door just outside the medical bay where you awoke, four bunks and a washroom in what you assume is sleeping quarters, and the bridge itself. It’s small, but clearly designed for more than one crew member. Your heart drops at the thought, because that’s when it truly comes flooding back.

Your work. The project. The disease. The creature.

Several pieces of the same puzzle, but each one troubling in its own right.

Still groggy from the induced coma, you force yourself to take a seat in the hall, grateful for what you can only assume is artificial gravity. You might have been sick if you had awoken in zero gravity.

Taking a breath as you sit in the center of a large octagonal hall, you force yourself to breathe. Long breaths, drawing each one out in an effort to keep yourself from boiling over when memories of the very thing that put you here feel fresh in spite of your ten year induced coma. It shouldn’t be you here. You, some entomologist they found online for a paper suggesting beetles are smarter than people think.

You weren’t even really good with people. Just bugs. You spent most of your time alone with your stag beetles, attempting to bring out the very intelligence you’d written about. You never minded being alone. Maybe it’s sad that you spoke to the beetles, but they kept you company in their own way. Yet here you are now, onboard a space ship by sheer coincidence, if it can even be called that. And it’s not the loneliness you fear.

No, you’re content to grab a marker and draw a face on one of the many white walls, call it ‘Wilson’ and name yourself the next Tom Hanks, even if your acting credits are undeserving.

What scares you is the narrow hallways holding you hostage in a vacuum. Once you reach the supposed ‘destination’ that the ship’s programmed voice spoke of being imminent, gravity will cut out. The ship will rely on your ability to navigate yourself through its halls and hell, even navigate the damn hunk of metal through space yourself to send the mission target back. You’re a fucking entomologist. A bug scientist. What the hell are they hoping for from you?

With a sharp inhale, you push back up to your feet, navigating through the cramped hall until you reach the bridge. There are a number of screens and what feel like countless buttons and switches, all labeled with tape. You suppose that’s meant to be for your convenience given that you’re no pilot, but the amount of labels is a textbook in and of itself. Frustrating.

Slipping past the second of two chairs on the bridge, your eyes are glued to the first window you’ve seen. Your lips part as the marvel of space itself comes into view when you slip into the nook by the window.

It’s beautiful. Stunning. It’s full of twinkling stars and the far more consistent shine of distant planets. There’s debris of various different kinds of space rock meandering endlessly through a void. There’s a gorgeous mildly yellow-green planet not too far away with pink and blue accents. Its surface is probably unlike everything you’ve ever seen.

Seeing a planet from space is another kind of beast. Space travel is relatively new to humanity as far as the general public is aware, and you certainly never envisioned yourself aboard a spacecraft. In another world, under other circumstances, it might even be a dream.

The nearest sun has you staring down at your fingers, wondering if the faint heat you feel might be from its rays or if you’re imagining things already, hardly a few minutes into your trip. That is, if you don’t count the several years in which you were in an induced coma.

Flexing your fingers again as you stare at them, it’s not until a shadow takes away the sun’s distant rays, that you notice something incoming quickly. Your eyes widen at the sight of a ship, alien in appearance. Long, slender, dark grays in sharp and jagged angles all come together to build a ship that makes yours look not entirely unlike the very bugs you study. Very, very small. Insignificant.

“Oh shit,” you gasp in wide-eyed disbelief as something straight out of a sci-fi movie moves in a line straight towards you. “Oh shit” you gasp again, racing to push yourself to your feet and clamber for the pilot’s chair as though the labels will push you into action. Paralyzed on the chair, the most you can do is skim each word in hopes that one might magically say ‘turn one hundred and eighty degrees and get the hell away from the giant evil-looking alien spaceship’.

Unfortunately, you never find that button. With your hands hovering over the controls, you find yourself watching in horror as you’re swallowed whole by the other spacecraft. “Oh shit.”

Your ship is harshly jostled as all of a sudden the hull drops like a stone onto something hard and metal, screeching as it slides across what you can only assume is a bay of the other ship as you stare into the darkened corridor of the inside of an alien spacecraft. You grip the chair for purchase in an effort not to get thrown aside while your ship blares warning and lights flicker.

“Oh shit,” you breathe when the lights outside your ship flick on and flood the bridge with the harsh lighting of a warehouse. There doesn’t seem to be any other ships aboard if this is a bay or hangar, but it certainly looks like one… Though you suppose you’re basing that off of movie knowledge, which is probably stupid. Especially for a scientist at the top of your field.

Slowly descending from your chair, you approach the window in awe, staring out into the metal box. It’s largely human, with pipes running up the walls and across the ceiling, lights in long bulbs overhead and lower lighting from small circular vent-like structures. The structure seems rougher than the smooth metals of your ship, almost as though it’s made of an unpolished mineral, with a luster that dictates something akin to quartz or obsidian, but it’s slightly off. The only thing inhuman about the entire thing is the text. It’s not entirely unfamiliar, the sort of thing that you wager you could decipher in time, but when you spot movement at the far bay, you figure time isn’t exactly on your side.

What a way to wake up after ten years.

The alien figure that approaches your ship isn’t human. But… they aren’t inhuman either. You know they aren’t human, with an extra pair of limbs attached to their upper torso and an extra pair of eyes aboard a plate of some sort on the right side of their face, but otherwise the only thing inhuman about them is their massive size, standing at what must be ten feet tall.

A tight shirt clings to their upper torso, some sort of spacesuit loosely draped from their torso in an off-pink that matches their short hair. Markings line their jaw, coming up just beneath their eyes not unlike tattoos, though you can’t be sure whether or not that’s what they are. The most inhuman feature of all, however, is the blood red gaze they fix your ship with as they walk in an even, calm stride towards the door.

A creature with a calm like this is one that knows it’s powerful. It’s the type of confidence befitting of someone who far outclasses everything they’ve ever come across and doesn’t fear the beyond like you do. “Oh shit!”

It’s just about the only words you can manage as you clumsily navigate towards the small porthole of the door where the alien has deduced they may find you. Peering out the small circular window, you can only pray you aren’t about to be probed or something similar.

When the alien approaches your ship with some sort of technology in-hand, you tap on the glass to get their attention. The large alien’s head rises, their brow lowering to a scowl of sorts as they examine you. This close, they look startlingly like a human man. Like the kind of man you might see in a gladiator movie given his sheer size and musculature, sure, but human enough to reason with. He speaks some sort of language, but you can’t understand a word he utters.

The language is a mix of huffs, growls, clicks, and what you would otherwise consider sounds not unlike the languages found on earth. Between each noise that reminds you vaguely of an echolocation sort of noise is a very human syllable. If you were to put the syllables together without the clicking, you might even get something akin to human vocabulary.

By all accounts, this is an intimidating encounter. His gaze is sharp, almost grating in looks alone. His pupils have rings surrounding them that give him a formidable appearance. His mother tongue is so different from any language you’ve ever encountered– human or animal– that the only thing you even can compare it to are films. Some part of you is wired to expect a Xenomorph to uncurl from wires and silently drop to the ground, acidic saliva dripping from its mouth, and yet the man remains still, awaiting your reply before he answers in kind.

Maybe it’s your poor instinct for danger, but you’re far more intrigued than you are concerned.

“Uh– Hello!” You attempt to reply in an effort to keep the peace, further perplexing the alien whose eyes narrow. Your heart pounds behind your rib cage as you give your best effort to not get eaten. Or examined. Or whatever this species does. “I come in peace!” You offer, making a peace sign through the door with a wide grin.

His gaze slides to your hand, his deduction of the action clear in the way his narrowed eyes regard the action. He frowns like you’ve caused him an inconvenience, gliding his finger along the device in his hand briefly as he looks away. You almost wish he was more animalistic. You’re a better read on animal behaviour than human.

“Okay, um– hold on!” You hold up one finger, clumsily dashing back through the ship to the science bay. You grab a white board and marker, making your way back to the porthole. The four-armed alien is tapping on what you assume to be the screen of the device he brought with him, though his attention returns to you once you reappear. You draw a circle and the general outline of the continents, presenting the image to him. “I’m a human. From Earth,” you say, pointing to your drawing.

The alien’s gaze lowers to your drawing, then he taps on the screen of his device, growing more frustrated by the moment. When the device doesn’t seem to give him the results he wishes for, his shoulders visibly fall in frustration as he faces you again. His gaze fixes the drawing, then you once more.

When he doesn't reply, you quickly erase the drawing of earth, and draw something that might be more familiar. You draw the very thing you’re here in search of as clearly as you can from memory.

CRM-12. A creature so foreign, the scientists never even gave it a name. Beetle-like in appearance in spite of its size, which begged your attention, one of the heads in entomology. A creature intelligent beyond any credit they were willing to give it, treating it as lesser than even rodents. It was no more than an experiment, and your reason for being in the middle of uncharted space.

You present the drawing of the creature, a metallic brown beetle with accents that resemble an oil spill, iridescent pinks visible in the sun. Its eyes, however, are completely unlike any insect. Cat-like, they follow movement like the eyes of a higher being. Like they know. You hope that comes across in a crude drawing with a black marker.

The alien looks at the drawing you present, seeming to recognize it. He stares at you and chuffs, almost like a tiger, followed by a syllable unrecognizable to you.

“You know it?” Your brows raise eagerly at the reaction that you’re fairly sure is a yes given the way big cats so often use the first portion of the sound.

Another chuff in reply, then the syllable. You can work with that. The recognition in his gaze tells you that it isn’t a no, which means you’re communicating, even if it’s preschool-level communication. Even if he seems frustrated by the whole ordeal. Or maybe by you. Or the device. You really can’t say.

“Oh my god, you know it? I’m looking for it!” You point with a grin, intrigued by the alien life that seems to be as advanced, if not more than humanity.

He watches your eager movements with hooded eyes, all four following the way your body almost seems ahead of your mind as you attempt communication. In a far more languid movement, he lifts an arm, simply tapping once on the door as he stares at you, awaiting.

You purse your lips, fairly confident you understand. “Oh– I can’t leave my ship,” you glance down at the door’s handle. “Um– hold on.” You raise one finger again, drawing another picture on your whiteboard. This time, you present the alien species with a poorly drawn version of your ship, an ‘X’, and a stick figure of you, with your tongue out and an ‘X’ for either eye. “I would die in your atmosphere. I mean, probably. I guess I don’t know.”

One of his brows raises at the crude demonstration before he looks you up and down once through the porthole. He huffs, something of disbelief or maybe annoyance, before looking around the bay. He replicates your motion, raising one finger in a ‘hold on’ type of manner, disappearing for a minute. When he returns after a few moments, he lifts a lower arm to present to you a new device. From the device comes a hologram far more advanced than anything earth has managed thus far.

Your eyes widen at the sight of the very beetle-like species you’re here for. You nod, giving a thumbs up. “Yes! Yes, that’s it!” You loudly proclaim with a grin.

He recoils, though you can’t quite place why. He watches your reactions, the smile, the thumbs’ up, the nod, and chuffs in reply. Alright, communication. 

“Hey, um, there’s–” You stammer over words, before giving your signal for ‘hold on’. Quickly and crudely attempting to draw your best version of the window by the bridge. You hold it up to the person opposite you, pointing in the general direction of the much larger window across the ship.

His sharp gaze follows the direction you point, his head moving in that direction altogether, before chuffing and surprisingly disappearing. You blink, before quickly moving in that direction as well, cables and tubing still drifting listlessly behind your clothing from when you awoke. You stare down briefly at the ordeal, at the mess you’re sure you look, and figure that’s a problem for when an alien isn’t staring you down.

You’re just grateful he isn’t looking at you in the same way humanity looked at that beetle. That stupid, god forsaken alien beetle. Even if he does seem a bit annoyed with you.

Dragging the cables along with you, you slip past the chairs in the bridge to the larger window where your new alien peer is curiously examining the circuitry within the bridge. “This is the bridge,” you explain, pointing behind you. “For the captain.” You turn to face him again, unsure if he understands a word you’re saying, but the need to fill the air is unfortunately at the forefront of your mind. Slipping into the nook of the window, you watch as his crimson gaze tracks your movements, dropping to the cables that he examines for a moment. “These are just cables,” you explain, holding them up.

He grunts through a deadpan expression as though he has that figured out already, and it’s at this moment that you realize how grateful you are that there’s an atmosphere at all in his ship right now to carry either of your voices so that you can communicate. The entire thing is fascinating beyond any kind of entomology you’ve ever been witness to. Of course, you’d have an easier time grasping his behaviour if he were a bug, but you suppose you didn’t get much of a good understanding of CRM-12’s behaviour anyway in light of the events that took place with the species on Earth.

CRM-12. The thought makes you wonder. “Do you have a name?” You glance down at the whiteboard, but you aren’t sure how much it’ll help. “A, uh–” You point to yourself, stating your name, then to him. “What’s your name?”

He straightens, and in a very alien language gives you a series of growls and hisses, along with a series of somewhat more human-sounding syllables. You attempt to replicate the sound, you really do. The problem is that your vocal chords simply can’t shape the same noises that his can. He frowns as you can’t reach one of the clicks in your vocal range, and surprisingly offers something more familiar.

“Sukuna.”

Your lips purse as you stare out the window at him. It’s shockingly close to the syllables that sit intermittently between the clicks and growls in his name, like his language might not be as far off as you originally hypothesized.

“Human.” He adds, then replicates your name, shockingly nearly perfect.

“Yeah!” You agree with a grin. “That’s my name. I’m human.”

“My name,” he forms the words, copying them in his deep baritone voice. It sounds somewhat foreign after you’ve heard primarily chuffs and hums, but he doesn’t struggle to form the words. They’re clipped, like his tone isn’t intentional and there’s a rasp to his words like his throat wants to add the clicking to the words, but doesn’t.

You have an itch to write and document everything you can, but your lab is a few light years away and your journal is… yet to be found, since you awoke. You do what you can to catalogue every detail for later in your mind.

“Okay, okay.” Beyond interested and excited by the ordeal, you make a wild motion with both arms towards– well– everything. “This is my ship.”

Sukuna’s gaze lifts to the exterior of the ship, then returns to you. An upper arm lifts, muscle that’s inherently humanoid rippling beneath what looks to be something similar to a performance long sleeve clinging to his arm. He taps twice on the window. “Ship.” Then directly in front of you. “Your ship.”

“Yeah,” you breathe in disbelief. “Is this your ship?”

He points back, chuffing. “My ship.”

The velocity of his ability to learn is stunning. In fact, you would wager a bet that not only is he so far advanced that he outclasses Humanity by miles, you would be willing to be there’s more to it than that. The scowls, the grimaces, the huffs. Could he be annoyed that you’re not capable of picking up his language? “Are you–” you point to him, then the chair behind you, “the captain?”

His gaze examines you as you point towards the seat on the bridge behind you. Understanding your gist, he chuffs.

“Holy shit,” your breath. Looking eagerly past him into the rest of the hangar bay, you press your hands to the window. He straightens, taking a step back as he stares at you with a raised chin. “Where are the rest of you? Do you have a crew? Do you have scientists?”

He growls, but it doesn’t appear to be a warning. Your limited knowledge of his language tells you it may just be a vocalization that’s within his language, but you can’t say for sure. You can’t be sure whether he’s answering in his own language or simply frustrated with your onslaught of questions. Maybe both.

“Are you alone?” You offer the option. “Just you?” You point.

To that, he straightens slightly, his gaze dropping as he evaluates your stature. He must determine you aren’t a threat, because he finally replies with a chuff. “Alone. Just Sukuna.”

It’s unbelievable, truly. It’s not the fact that there’s other intelligent life that baffles and equally excites you, but the fact that not only does he seem to be far more advanced, but it’s clear you’re both studying one another’s behavior. More interestingly, he’s making sense of your language so quickly without so much as forgetting a word that you’re fairly sure his species can outdo humanity’s feats in an evening. You watch him pick up words before you’ve even used it in much more than a sentence to yourself. He adjusts so quickly that it has you questioning everything you know about life outside of Earth. About life on Earth. About behavior, intelligence, and everything you’ve studied so hard when it comes to entomology.

Much of the… day? Is spent going back and forth, focusing primarily on language using the whiteboard, and you’re surprised to find Sukuna doesn’t just keep up, but clearly surpasses your intelligence. He’s offput by noise and moves at a much slower pace that gives you the impression that he wouldn’t know the expression ‘life is short’. You wonder how many years he’s wandered the universe.

He primarily listens and learns, letting you yap about tenses and grammar with little more than an aloof frown. He rarely inquires, but as his knowledge grows, he becomes more at ease. The rigidity in his upper and lower shoulders releases, and his expression shifts from one of skepticism to intrigue. Before you can inquire about his species or language, however, your ship comes online. With a robotic timbre, an announcement comes across the speakers. “Please report to the lab for documentation.”

You stare back into the ship for a moment before facing your new companion. “I need to go make a report,” you explain. “The humans back on Earth want a video of how things are going.”

You can’t be sure how much of that he understands given that he’s largely a closed book, but he chuffs his general understanding.

“Do you… sleep?” You make a motion of sleeping. “Or eat?” And point to your mouth.

The mere suggestion has him yawning, revealing primordial fangs behind his lips. He doesn’t grace you with a reply otherwise.

In a series of clicks and hisses, he says something you’re unable to translate and turns on his heel. Your best assumption is that he’s wished you a goodnight, so you opt to do the same. “Goodnight, Sukuna!” You call loudly from your side of the glass.

He tilts his head slightly, then shakes it, but doesn’t look back.

You watch the spot where he disappeared for a long moment. In the barren bay, the lights click as one by one they shut off until you’re left with only the ambient light of the interior of your own ship. Stepping back from the glass, you blink to yourself. He’s unlike anything you could have imagined when it came to aliens. It’s not like you haven’t met one, given that your assignment on Earth was studying CRM-12 and your assignment now is simply to retrieve more of them, and while you know even that creature’s intelligence was largely underestimated, you never imagined another planet like Earth could exist.

Maybe the atmosphere doesn’t match your own. Maybe there’s no oxygen. Maybe his planet is overruled by dinosaurs. You wouldn’t know. But somewhere out there is a planet with architecture and entire civilizations that you don’t know the first thing about.

As you make your way to the lab, a small camera prepped for you to record, you swear you’re still jittery with excitement. The scientist that swims in your veins can’t wait for tomorrow to come, ignoring every natural instinct to exercise caution. You don’t see yourself sleeping well in spite of the fact that your body remains heavy with the weight of several induced years of sleep.

Without thinking twice, you flip the camera’s screen to look back at yourself and begin recording. You recount your ship being engulfed, describe Sukuna, and explain your findings in largely scientific terminology.

“I know he’s not what I’m here for, but– This could be… I mean…” You shake your head. “I’m not giving up on this research,” you steel yourself, staring into the camera. Chewing on your lower lip, you reach for the camera, shutting the screen and effectively stopping the recording without signing off.

You take the extra time in the evening to put yourself back together. You’re not trained for space, or even for the use of this vessel as a whole, but you track down a sponge bath and washroom, before finally managing to find a small compartment with your belongings.

Dragging the compartment out from the netted area in which it resides, you open it slowly. Within are some clothes– some your own, most provided by the company responsible for your launch– along with a few general sanitary items. It’s largely impersonal, which you suppose you expected. Having prepared for this, you reach into the pocket of a hoodie and pull out the one thing you hoped to keep with you.

You breathe out a sigh of relief, unfolding a photo. The lines through the center block out only a modicum of the happiness held within it, but at its core it’s everything you wanted to hold onto. You’re holding the camera with a huge grin, an Extatosoma Tiaratum, a large stick insect, climbs along your shoulder, and your beloved Lucanus Elaphus, an Elk Stag Beetle, is in your hand. To your left is your best friend Shoko and her German Shepherd puppy, a month after she adopted him. She’s holding him like her pride and joy in spite of the fact that throughout her entire veterinary medicine degree, she swore she’d stick to an animal with less genetically pre-disposed health problems.

You had just gotten back from a research trip back then and were meeting her pup for the first time while she cared for your bugs while you were away.

It’s strange to think that she’s ten years older now. Your bugs are surely dead, and Shoko hasn’t seen you in over ten years. Your heart pangs as you pull the familiar hoodie on over your head and tuck the photo back in your pocket as you make your way back to the bed that didn’t exactly do wonders for your neck as you make way for the second day in uncharted territory.

–

The morning greets you in the same way it did yesterday. Cold, sterile, and controlled. The white lights flick on without asking, deciding your schedule before you ever do. You blink away the sleep in your eyes, grabbing a dehydrated granola bar sort of thing to bring with you to the bridge as you dress yourself in white pants and your own hoodie.

Sukuna still isn’t there when you arrive at the bridge, so you do the only thing you really can do in the enclosed ship bay. You come prepared this time, with a model of your ship, your whiteboard, some snacks, water, and a journal and pen to note your findings. Not necessarily for humanity’s sake, but out of habit, for you. With everything spread out around you, you reach into your pocket, pulling out your photo with Shoko. Your thumb smooths along the fold lines before you set it off to the side in front of you. Then as you would on any other day, you note your findings with small drawings in the column of your journal.

After a short wait, the bay’s lights flick on one after another with a metallic clang as each one begins pulling electricity to the large hangar. Sukuna has also come more prepared, with another new device in one of his many hands and what looks to be a spacesuit draped over another arm. He’s wearing much the same top in a slightly deeper tone of gray and baggy pants this time around, with that same overall neutral expression on his face.

Neutral is generous, given how grumpy he looks in human terms. Given how grumpy he is. Maybe it’s just his species, you can’t be sure, but he gives you the impression you frustrate him.

You perk up at the sight of him regardless as he approaches in the direction of the door’s porthole, changing his stride when he spots you at the window.

He clicks and grunts, which you assume is a greeting of sorts.

“Hi, Sukuna! Did you sleep good?”

He doesn’t beat around the bush. “Sleep bad.”

“Oh. Why?”

He approaches the window, dropping the suit on his arm into a pile on the floor. “Human loud,” he states, pointing accusingly at you with a finger to the window.

“Me? This ship is huge, there’s no way you heard me. I don’t even snore!” You pout first, but your mind doesn’t give you the time to be offended as something occurs to you. “Wait, is your hearing really good?” You ask, pointing to your ear.

He chuffs. “You loud.” He makes a motion to his chest, demonstratively inhaling and exhaling in kind. “Like that.”

“Oh my god, you could hear me breathing across the ship?” You instinctively bring up your fancy space pen and journal, scribbling down messy notes as your mouth gets a few steps ahead of your brain. “Wait, but the ship is on. I can’t be louder than like– Is your engine not loud? Or the life support systems? You must breathe some sort of gas or–”

He huffs, tapping the glass with a subsequent growl. Much like yesterday, it’s not a warning but something entirely else. “Ship my design. No sound.”

“No sound? Your design?” You gawk, sitting down at the window. Sukuna follows suit opposite you behind the glass. His movements are heavier in nature and far more languid, one corded muscular arm keeping him upright as he takes a seat. In spite of his constant aloof expression, you note that he does still seem intrigued. “Wait– oh my god, are you an engineer?”

He shifts his jaw, eyes narrowing thoughtfully as he attempts to use context clues to put the word engineer into place in his mental dictionary. He says something in his own language, reaching for the device he used yesterday to show you a hologram of CRM-12. This time, he flicks it on into some sort of 2D image, a screen of sorts. In concise, easy strokes, he pulls up a blueprint of his ship. “Engineer?” He queries, confirming the term.

“Yeah,” you breathe in disbelief. “Yeah, you’re definitely an engineer. Holy shit,” you laugh, tone wrought with disbelief. “The photo you showed me with that yesterday, the uh– beetle species?”

His gaze narrows and he grunts, almost a low growl.

“Um–” you lower your gaze to your whiteboard, drawing a quick sketch of CRM-12 again, writing its name beside the image. “This guy.”

The confusion rife across his features dissolves as he chuffs. “Kerm.”

“Kerm?” You blink, unsure where this word has come from.

He points to ‘CRM-12’ like it’s the most obvious thing he’s ever pointed out, blatantly frowning. “Kerm one two.”

You laugh, airy and light, grinning. “Yeah, Kerm. Yeah, okay. Kerm. Um, you’re looking for them too, does that mean you’re a scientist too? Like, um–” setting the whiteboard aside, you tap your fingers listlessly along your thigh. “You study life and elements? And learn about creatures?”

That clicks with him and he chuffs again.

“Holy shit,” you practically bound to your feet, quickly sitting back down at the revelation with a multitude of further questions.

Sukuna’s brow tents as he watches, disdain dripping from his expression as though you’ve offended him in your bout of excitement when he shuffles back slightly. He leans back on one arm, the other three held as though you might present a threat to him. Still, he remains silent.

“Wait, so you’re the captain, engineer, and a scientist? Oh my god, that’s incredible. Human life is so short we could never even dream of studying all three things and exploring space.” You don’t even pause as your thoughts simply spill from your lips. “You must be able to live so much longer than us. Or maybe you’re just that much smarter. Wait–” Your hand presses to the glass. “Where are you from? What planet–”

“Human.”

“–are you from? How long are your years? How old are you?”

“Human.” Sukuna’s hand presses to the glass with a jarring bang as he leans over you in spite of the barrier, the size difference growing apparent. His voice booms, stopping your endless trail of words in their tracks. Once he has your silence, Sukuna proceeds to click and growl in a series you’ve heard once before, though you now recognize it as displeasure.

It doesn’t take an understanding of his language to put together that he’s calling you ‘too much’. He’s telling you you’re annoying.

Your cheeks heat up and you take the opportunity to sit back, sucking in a breath.

Sukuna’s hand peels from the glass, his prints remaining in the spot where it was. He sits back with a loud huff, rubbing at his temple with one hand as he leans back on another. “Planet is–” he states the name in his language first, then pauses to think before providing something you understand. Removing the noises between the syllables, he lands on a simple name. “Simuria,” he starts, choosing one of your questions and going with it. “Age–” he glances down at the hologram, waving his hand through it to erase the blueprint. He makes ten markings through it like a whiteboard, then clicks, his word for ‘ten’.

“Ten,” you nod your understanding.

He points at the markings. “Ten tens.”

“One hundred,” you nod your understanding.

“Ten one hundreds.”

Your lips part. “One thousand?”

He chuffs, staring blankly at you. 

“You’re over one thousand years old?” Your disbelief is palpable as your jaw hangs slightly ajar, taking in the details of his face and overall physique. He looks to be in his late thirties or early forties, but if there’s one thing you’ve learned in your time interacting with aliens, it’s that you don’t know the first thing about them.

He chuffs again, like it’s plain to see and his age is obvious. “How old you?”

“Um, three tens,” you hold up three fingers. “And a five,” you demonstrate the next number. “But I, uh, spent the last ten years sleeping to get here,” you offer a tight-lipped smile. His eyes narrow as he attempts to decipher the emotion written across your face, but you train your expression back to neutral before he can. “We only live to be about nine tens, though.”

“Nine tens?” He recoils at the mere thought. “Weak.”

You let out an airy laugh. “Weak, yeah. Humans tend to be.”

“Three thousands. Or more.”

“You can live three thousand years?” Once again caught up in the sheer difference in time you’ve both experienced, you’re forced to sit back, leaning on your arms. “Holy shit.”

That’s not even beginning to touch on the fact that his planet’s years could also be longer than Earth’s.

Sukuna has come to recognize your exclamations as disbelief and puffs out his chest. You can’t be sure whether it’s pride or a sort of bragging right he holds over your head, but it’s heartwarming to bond with someone so similar, and yet so different.

“Where your crew?”

“Oh–” You push a hand over your neck, staring back into the ship. “No crew. Just me. Just a scientist. I’m an entomologist. I study bugs.”

His brow dips as he attempts to put together what he understands based on your statements. “No captain?”

“No. No captain,” you reply coolly, the most calm he notes you’ve been since arrival.

“Captain?” He points to the photo of you and Shoko as he peers closer.

“No, that’s my friend Shoko. Another human, on Earth. And these are my bugs. I’m a bug scientist.” You point to the beetle.

“You study bugs?”

“Yeah!” You grin, followed by the familiar feeling of information running through your brain as your most passionate subject arises. “There are thousands and thousands of them on earth. Like, a thousand thousands. More than that. We’ve barely scratched the surface of what we know about them!” You pridefully explain.

“Scratched the surface?”

“Like, we barely know anything about them. So I study them to learn more.”

Leaning back on one pair of arms, he crosses the other pair over his chest, fixing you with a perplexed expression as he clicks and chirps out a word, followed by ‘human’.

You smirk, lopsided but wholehearted. It’s yet another of those familiar moments where you recognize the word from context alone. Weird human, he called you.

“Do you not like bugs?”

“Bugs on Simuria big.”

“They’re big? How big?”

He tilts his head to either side, casting a quick glance off to the side as some sort of debris hits the hull of the ship. His gaze returns to you, unbothered otherwise by the noise. “Big like that,” he presses his finger to the glass separating you.

Following the direction in which he points, you whirl around to find he’s pointing to a duffel bag of sorts. “Oh, we have some like that. Most are smaller though,” you explain as you turn back. “These two are my friends, like Shoko. That’s Spike,” you point to the stag, “and Stipple,” you point to the spiny stick insect.

“Stipple like Simuria bugs.”

“Really?” Your eyes widen, filled with wonder, and Sukuna’s head tilts as he lets out a pleased chuff. The revelation only brings up more questions. “Simuria,” you breathe the word like something sacred. Were the circumstances of your trip to reach CRM-12 any different, you might even be racing to document this beyond messy scribbles in a journal. “Do you all have four arms and eyes?”

Sukuna follows your gaze before he growls, which you take as a no.

“Is it based on region? Or– oh, maybe modification or–”

Sukuna huffs loudly, staring intently at you. “Human weak and loud.”

Ah– insults. The default when you’re bothering him or going too fast. “Sorry Sukuna,” you laugh, still lighthearted and chirpy in spite of his grumpy demeanor.

“Simurians all different,” he explains, waving his hand through the hologram still sitting off to the side to erase it. He draws a stick figure of sorts with horns and an eye on its forehead, then another with a tail that seems prehensile from what you can tell, like a monkey.

“All different? So, it’s not based on regions?”

He growls, confirming your thoughts. “I need four arms for science and making ship,” he points broadly around him.

You blink in complete and utter disbelief, the buzzing of the bay lights audible even over the gears turning in your mind. “So you… grew two extra arms? Like, your body made them yourself?”

He chuffs, pleased once again by your disbelief with a hint of what you might call a smile. You’re coming to notice that he seems to like that. He enjoys praise, even if it’s of his species rather than himself. He enjoys being above you in any way he can. It’s probably one of the most human things about him, in a roundabout sort of way.

“That’s incredible,” you shake your head regardless, watching as he puffs his chest out again, his chin tilted up. You can’t help a smile at the sight of him, the boyish pride on his face is something of a marvel. “What other adaptations do you have?”

He considers this for a moment, before running a hand through his hair and presenting a second ear hidden under pink strands over his humanoid ear. It’s far less human than the first pair, you would consider it closer to an owl. Your lips purse as you near the glass, leaning with both hands splayed across it. He then lifts the hem of his shirt and you damn near choke.

You can’t even decide which part it is that actually chokes you. The fact that he’s sporting a six pack like no other and a second pair of pecks that sends heat to places you do not want to think about while trapped in a box in space, or the huge mouth plastered where a belly button would otherwise be. You cough to distract him from the way your throat seizes, then sit back in an effort to disguise how you’ve reacted to an alien you hardly know.

Sukuna tilts his chin up slightly as he regards you. You want to chalk it up to nothing more than a natural reaction to your cough, but there’s a gleam in his eyes that you recognize. You’re then unfortunately reminded that his hearing is like nothing you’ve ever experienced and he can likely hear your pounding heart. It puts an idea in your head that his sense of smell may… also… be better on that note, too. Breezing past the moment as quickly as you can, you cough once more. “What’s, uh– what’s that for?”

“Eating large food.”

The sensation is jarring, but it occurs to you that you’ve never once asked what he eats. “Like… what?”

To your surprise, he smiles. Actually smiles. “Noisy food. Good food.”

“Are you joking with me? Are you joking about eating me?” You sputter.

His toothy grin is replicated on his stomach mouth as he lets the hem of his shirt drop and for the first time you hear him rumble in laughter.

You don’t even have the instinct to wonder if he’s lying when you’re too intrigued by the whole ordeal and just shake your head. “Oh, so you have jokes now?”

“Always have jokes,” he grins, wide. “You not understand, weak human.”

You scoff. “I see how it is,” you tease, curious about his ability to pick up not just language but the deeper meaning behind it. With a sigh, you cast a glance back at the spot where he revealed the stomach mouth, focusing back on your mission. For as curious as you are, at the end of the day you’re trapped in a box in space with a limit on time and supplies. “How quickly can you evolve?”

He tilts his head from side to side, something he’s seen you do when you reply with ‘maybe’.

“Does it depend? Is it based on how your surroundings are?” You make a motion to everything around you.

“Yes,” he replies affirmatively for the first time in your language, rather than his usual Simurian response.

“How fast are we talking?”

His brow tents, head tilting like the question is stupid. “We talk at normal speed for you.”

You bark a laugh at the realization that he’s now completely misunderstood. “No, it’s a saying, sorry. How fast can you evolve? One planet rotation around the sun? Two?”

Clearly displeased with your laughter, he takes a moment to fix you with a glare before replying. “Not one planet rotation. Smaller time.”

“Less than one planet rotation around the sun or less than one planet rotation?”

“Less than one planet rotation.”

You swear you need to pick your jaw up off the floor. “Less than a DAY?” You shout in disbelief, hand raising to the glass in a slam that echoes over the metal bay.

Sukuna growls, recoiling away from your reaction. It’s not out of fear, but rather that you’re being noisy again. “Human. Weak human. Stop.”

Sitting back down, you offer another apology to the begrudging man sitting across from you. Pieces of the puzzle all suddenly begin to click into place. That’s why he picked up your language so quickly. He didn’t just learn, his throat adapted to the sound. His vocal chords changed in less than a day to work around the fact that humans can’t. His species is advanced in the kind of way you could only dream. Hell, you never even realized he lost the strange rasp to his vocalizations in your language. “Sukuna, I–” you pause, raising a finger as you become aware that you’re about to get ahead of yourself when you go dashing back to the lab.

You gather a space meal, several beakers, pipettes, gloves, and a sterile handling box. When you return and dump it all on the ground beside you in a cacophony of glass, Sukuna still seems displeased with the noise.

“Humans sent me here because of this,” you present a phial of liquid to him. Held within the small glass container is a dark red, almost black liquid with yellow separation. “These are Alveoli. Normal ones. They’re cells in our lungs,” you point to your chest. “And this,” you present another phial, but the color of the liquid is off, almost more of a brown. “Is Alveolarium. It appeared on Earth I guess ten years ago now and we can’t find a cure. Around the same time it showed up, I got called to an island in the middle of nowhere to research a new discovery,” you explain. “They sent a ship somewhere around here back then, and picked up a CRM– um– a Kerm.”

Sukuna doesn’t move, but you have his attention.

“I was sent to research behaviour since it looks like a bug, but they also discovered that Kerm have cells in their shell that are really similar to the pathogen causing Alveolarium which was spreading a lot, but Kerm cells seem to carry properties that might help or stop or kill the disease or something,” you explain, shutting your eyes tightly as you search for vocabulary he’d know. “Basically they have similar cells,” you explain.

Sukuna inhales, long and slow as he sits up. Interestingly, his gaze splits as he looks over both samples at once. His languid movement makes sense when you consider that he’s well over a thousand years old and still has two thousand to go, if not more. Of course life isn’t short for a creature like him.

“We had one Kerm,” you continue. “But it died.”

“Died. Gone?” Sukuna confirms the meaning of the word.

“Yeah.”

He grunts. There’s no real emotion behind it, it’s nothing but sheer acknowledgement.

“So I need to get more Kerm. It’s…” You stare down at the sealed contaminated cell sample. “It’s bad, Sukuna. A lot of humans died. Probably way more since I’ve been gone.”

He stares at you for a long moment, his jaw moving as he evaluates your expression and every little micromovement of your body. He has a way about the manner in which he moves like he’s above life itself, everything in his mannerisms is lazy and unbothered– that is, until you grate on his nerves, anyway. There’s something almost kingly in the way he carries himself. After a long pause, he sets a forearm on his leg, leaning forward. “You want cells. Mine.”

Your jaw hangs open as you attempt to explain yourself. “I mean– you might be able to save us, but obviously only if you’re okay with it! I just– We don’t actually know anything about the Kerm, and I can’t guarantee if it’ll make it back alive or even at all, and–”

“Human.” There’s less heat in his voice as he shuts you up with the low rumbling of his timbre. “I help. You get suit,” he speaks like he’s ordering you, pointing.

“Suit?”

His eyes narrow as he gets to his feet, offense dripping from the very click of his tongue he gives you. “You scientist. You help.”

Your jaw hangs open as you glance back between him and the ship. You seal your lips into a tight line, staring down at fidgeting hands. “Sukuna, I–” You shake your head.

“Your atmosphere weak, humans weak. Use your second heart, my ship pressure not crush you. Stop scared movement,” he points mildly at your twiddling thumbs.

Before you can explain the truth, you’re perplexed by his words. “Second…? I only have one heart.”

He huffs. “Then I help reinforce oxygen tank to survive pressure of sulfur gas atmosphere. Weak human. Foolish weak human.”

You’re left in utter disbelief and mild shock, frozen in place as he turns on his heel to, you suppose, make you a new tank fitting of the pressure of his ship. When the hell did he even pick up the word foolish? Did you say that? Shaking your head of the thought, you need to focus on what matters here.

“Sukuna!”

He stops a short distance away, his gaze thrown over his shoulder.

“Sukuna, I can’t– I can’t leave.”

He crosses his arms– all four of them– unimpressed. “Why?”

“This was always meant to be a one-way trip. I don’t get to go home. I’m sealed in here. I have no depressurization pod, no suit, no way to unseal the ship without losing the oxygen in here. No portable generators, nothing. When the ship loses power, that’s it.”

Slowly, he turns towards you, straightening as he regards you. He doesn’t just look displeased, he looks downright offended. His usual go-to doesn’t seem to cut it either as he spews out something more than just ‘weak’. “Wrong.”

It likely doesn’t convey what he wants, but you get the gist anyway. “Yeah. It’s stupid,” you agree.

“Your stupid.”

“Yeah,” you laugh half-heartedly. “My stupid.”

Clearly realizing you’re butchering your own language to appeal to his limited use of it, he turns on his heel again, muttering something under his breath. Your hand slips away from the glass keeping you safe and trapped in tandem as you watch Sukuna disappear. You find yourself staring at the photo of you and Shoko again. What you wouldn’t give to check in on her right now. Or ever again.

This will be it for you. Your food supply is limited to what it was deemed was a reasonable amount of time to– somehow– procure not just one but multiple specimens of Kerm or CRM-12, or whatever you’re meant to call them. Your power will fizzle out. Your oxygen supply will end. Your ship’s fuel is already near its limit. You’re sealed in a death trap as a final sentencing. You shut your eyes tightly, rubbing your hands over your face in an effort to reset.

When Sukuna doesn’t return in a couple of minutes, you move around the ship in an effort to clear your head and get some exercise. Anything that stops reminding you of just how trapped you are in a void of uncharted territory with an alien that far exceeds any of humanity’s feats.

You grab a bite to eat, rehydrating some macaroni and cheese in a flimsy bag. It’s unappealing as all hell but it’s better than starving. Eating straight out of the bag, you meander back towards the window, blinking when you find Sukuna setting up a mobile science lab of some sort just outside the bridge. You jog closer to the window, taking a seat to watch as he sets out largely similar and recognizable equipment, although the shape and build of much of his technology is infinitely more advanced. Bigger, too, given his size.

One set of eyes glides to your movement, an eerie feat of having an extra pair, while he continues to set up. Your mind goes into overdrive trying to figure out just how much that sets apart his biology from yours to have the energy production and sheer brainpower to manage so much at once.

His nose wrinkles when he watches you spoon food into your mouth. Chuckling, you approach the nook by the window, presenting the bag to him. “It’s macaroni and cheese.” You tilt the bag in his direction.

“It’s bad.”

“Hey!” You chide with a grin. “It’s better than it looks. You can’t call it bad until you try it.”

With an unusually pompous huff, he turns back to the mobile set-up and picks up a box-like device, connecting it to the window by suction. He runs his thumb along the edge like a dial and it comes to life, seeping a sort of caulk onto the glass before it begins drilling through the window. Your survival instinct recognizes the structural instability. Your curiosity chooses to ignore it as the device uses some sort of nanotech to recreate its shape on the inner glass, sealing itself.

You purse your lips, your spoon held in mid-air. “A mini pressurization chamber.”

He chuffs. “Give macaroni and cheese.”

“You need to learn manners,” you mutter more to yourself than to him as he literally holds his hand out to bluntly demand your lunch with that unnatural edge to his voice that never quite fits his genuine intrigue.

“Manners?” He queries, though his hand never moves.

Chuckling to yourself as you give in and offer the small bag and spoon of food to him, you watch as your door closes and the pressure within the device changes. “We say please when we ask for something and thank you when we’re given something if we want to be polite or nice to someone.” When his side opens, the bag and food as a whole are crushed under the pressure of his differing atmosphere, presenting him with a dripping mess of squished pasta.

Admittedly, it does look bad now. As it begins dripping melted cheese that’s entirely too watery out the other side straight onto his shoes, he stares at you with the kind of tight-lipped expression that transcends any language barrier.

He’s not thanking you for this.

“Sorry,” you wince, offering an apologetic grin.

He growls, trudging back across the large expanse of hangar bay to get something to clean up the mess. By the time he returns and cleans up the cheese, he finally opts to take a bite of the crushed food, fixing you with a glare.

“Bad. Bad food for weak human.”

You can only smile, because it figures that he would hate it. “Fair enough,” you laugh, watching as he sets it along with the dirty rag he used to clean the cheese. Your eyes widen a fraction at the thought. “Wait, what do you–”

Rolling his shoulders, he points to the small chamber that connects you. “Give Alveolarium.”

Your thoughts are already long forgotten as you pick up one of the cultures, chewing on your lower lip as you examine the glass. “I think your ship’s atmospheric pressure might crush the vial.” You hold it up to him. “It’s pretty thin.”

With a hum, Sukuna offers a box through the exchange to put the phial in. As you exchange materials and Sukuna begins separating the infected cells into smaller cultures within an oxygen-controlled box with barometric pressure equal to your ship’s, it occurs to you that in spite of your life being cut short, some part of you is happy for this experience. Even if your notes and findings get stranded out here, you can say you found companionship in a grumpy ten-foot-tall genius alien, and that’s pretty cool.

With your plights long forgotten as you watch Sukuna work with your face practically plastered to the glass, the technology and rate at which he’s able to work grabs your attention. Your chest practically rattles in excitement as he moves through practiced motions like he already knows what to do.

“What’s that?” You query, watching eagerly as he injects something into a lower arm.

One pair of eyes flicks to you. “For cells.”

“For stem cells? Like from your bones?”

He chuffs, pulling out a rubber band as he restricts his blood flow to take a sample.

“It’s that fast?” You gawk as he already begins drawing a sample.

His brow twitches as you break his concentration, but he chuffs to give you a reply regardless.

“Oh my god. We have a drug that does that too, but it takes a while before it produces any neutrophils– um– stem cells. You’re so much more advanced than us, I never imagined how much different life could be!” You watch as blue blood is extracted from his arm, and he begins separating the sample in order to work with it. “Your blood is blue? Is that because of the differing atmosphere? Or maybe it’s an adaptation somehow–”

“Human,” Sukuna groans, disenchanted with your rambles. He fixes you with a tired expression, pointing to the experiment in an effort to get you to focus. “Stop. Noisy.”

“Right, sorry!” You apologize with a wide grin.

A series of clicks, syllables, and growls escape the brutish man as he mutters something to himself, undoing the band from his arm and flexing his fingers a couple of times before pulling a sleeve back down. As he introduces his cells to the Alveolar cells that are infected in the controlled environment, he moves a small device over the culture slide, projecting hologram of the microscopic cells. His cells are so different from anything you’ve observed on Earth that you have no issue telling which belong to him in spite of your differing major.

The cells collide once, the Alveolarium attempts to attack Sukuna’s cells, then simply… backs off. “They’re incompatible,” you state dryly, your shoulders dropping. 

Sukuna grunts. “Alveolar cells still functional. My cells not see issue.”

“That could be it.” You shrug.

He hums, tapping a finger twice along the table. “Then we change environment.”

“Create artificial stress until your cells react,” you breathe, your hand snapping down to the ground beside you with a metallic clang that has Sukuna flashing you another glare.

“Loud. Loud human.”

“Sorry, I just– I’m a bit overexcited,” you offer with a smile.

Sukuna continues to stare for a moment, then adjusts the pressure within the glass box where the experiment is taking place to something more dense. He attempts to alter the environment enough that his cells recognize a threat, while not outright killing yours. Striking a balance between them proves to be a multi-day endeavor. In the moments where you can only wait, you slowly begin to unravel the enigma that is Sukuna.

You can’t count how many times Sukuna huffs or makes his disdain known with a very dramatic look in your direction when you suggest something altogether dumb, but you also note that he tells you you’re noisy less often. He picks up on more scientific terms, and even begins to pick up on prepositions purely from your use of them. He teaches you about Simuria, how the Simurians all have extra eyes, two hearts, and are fairly large compared to humanity, though they largely don’t resemble one another. He teaches you about one with horns, who you assume is a friend. He, on the other hand, refers to the horned Simurian as a neighbor.

You get the feeling Sukuna isn’t the friendly type.

“You’re invasive,” he gruffs out in reply to your question.

Your head falls back as you stare at the ceiling with a groan. “I literally just asked if you choose to be alone!” You retort lightheartedly. “You don’t even have to give me a reason!”

“You’re invasive. Like Kerm.”

“Like–” You gawk at him, watching a slow smile curl at his lips. “Like Kerm?”

“Loud like them too.”

“Hey!”

His head tilts as you exclaim your displeasure with that statement, but it’s one of the rare moments where he does seem pleased, which brings a smile to your face regardless. For whatever reason, nothing seems to get him boastful quite like belittling humanity. And since his only knowledge of humanity is you, that puts you at the center of his jokes.

“You know,” you meander back to the topic of Kerm, pulling the smile straight from his lips when you change the subject. “You never did tell me why you’re here. You know the Kerm too, so is it for them?”

He chuffs. “I did tell you. The Kerm are invasive.”

“That’s not really a reason. That’s just like– a statement.”

Seated on the floor with his back against the glass that separates you, he rolls his head along the rigid surface, his gaze finding you. “Kerm are smarter than you humans think,” he grumbles out a baseline explanation. He utters something in his language, then puts together a few sounds until he has a new word for you. “Methalonian weapons. They aren’t natural. They’re–” he taps his fingers on the bay’s floor briefly in thought. “Created by another species.”

“Methalonian,” you test the word. “Are they artificial? Or are they mutated? Like, completely not real or mutated from something that already existed?”

He taps his finger decidedly. “Mutated. Another species mutated them. I’ve been circling this planet for a while now to find where they come from,” he explains. “There are no other species here. They ate all of their resources. Now they invade.”

“How do they even leave? Are they that smart?”

He growls. “They attach themselves to ships and invade.”

“Oh. What are you planning on doing to them, then?”

He sucks in a breath. “Killing them.”

You freeze, staring at him as he examines your expression. You’ve never been much good at training your emotions, your pupils narrowing to mere pinpricks. You swallow, gaze averting to the photo of Shoko. “You were never gonna let me take any.”

“... No.”

“That’s why you trapped me. You knew I was here for them.”

“Made a guess,” he agrees with a hand motion that you’d equate to a shrug.

Slumping back against the bridge’s floor, you stare at the ceiling. Your alien counterpart watches in silence as you process what you know of the Kerm, your current situation, and your species’ survival. You consider Shoko back home, and the rest of your family and friends. You consider your nights out together ten years ago and what that might look like now if you ever make it back. You consider the failing government, and how it’s possible everything has completely fallen apart since your launch. But what really gets to you is that if this doesn’t work, there’s no world where Sukuna lets you send a Kerm back.

Maybe you shouldn’t care. You’re physically welded into a ship in the middle of nowhere. Yet here you are, even after everything, still being hopeful. It’s the most human thing you could possibly do. “What did The Kerm do to you?” You quietly murmur, still staring at the ceiling.

He inhales once, long. His eyes shut. “They’re mutated to kill,” he grunts. “The cells your scientists found in their shells…” his jaw ticks as he clicks, something you can’t decipher as syllables follow it. “It is not your cure.”

You lift your head, leaning on two elbows to look at him.

“It is your cause.”

Your lips part, brow furrowing. “But– I– That’s not–” Your chest tightens, emotions betraying you as you feel your waterline wet. Quickly wiping away the evidence, your fingers curl against the metal floor beneath you.

Sukuna doesn’t budge, his fiery gaze pinning you to place.

“But Alveolarium has been around longer than the Kerm was on Earth.”

He moves a knee, tilting his head. “Has it?”

“I… Don’t know, actually.” At last, you admit it, but things don’t fully add up from what you know. You let yourself fall onto your back again. “The company that sent me here, we had a bit of a disagreement. I guess… Maybe they were right, but still.”

Sukuna’s eyes narrow, minute, as he attempts to decipher the vagueness of your statement, but by nature of a language barrier, he can’t make out what emotion it is that you’re so graciously dancing around.

You swallow hard. “Did… Did they kill a lot of Simurians?”

“Yes. Humans?”

“If it’s them then… yeah, I guess. Millions. Like, thousands upon thousands.”

Morbidly intrigued, Sukuna shuffles to get a better look at you, his face closer to the glass than ever. “How many humans are on Earth?”

“Um–” You quickly pull up the whiteboard, demonstrating a number for ten, then a thousand, then a million, then a billion. “There were eight billion.”

This is the most baffled you’ve ever seen Sukuna, who physically recoils at the mere thought. “How do you keep distance? How do you celebrate the union of humans?”

“Union of humans?” You laugh. “Weddings? I don’t know, you invite a hundred people and call it a day.” But the question sparks something in you as you sit up to face your baffled friend. “How many Simurians are there?”

“Seventy nine.”

“WHAT?” You gape, noting that he doesn’t complain about your noise in spite of his narrowing eyes and defensive posture. “Are you guys close to going extinct? Like, being gone? Are you not worried?”

He simply growls in reply. “No, human. Things are…” He hesitates, his gaze averting. “We all have space and resources, it isn’t cramped.” He rolls his shoulders back. “We celebrate all weddings every year. Then stay alone with our partners.”

There’s a pit of jealousy in your stomach that you cover with a smile. “So you have someone you’ll be going back to, hey?” You grin, prodding at him through the window. You equate the unsettling feeling to a yearning for having someone like that back home, or even the option to return, but it would be ignoring the bigger picture that you’ve both been sitting in this bay for several days together and you’ve grown fond of him. You may not have a choice in being here, but he does. And he chooses to help in spite of his own goals. Your heart likes that he chooses you a bit too much.

To your surprise, your question irks him and his eyes narrow. A harsh hiss erupts from his throat as he suddenly turns back towards the pressurized box where your experimentation is taking place.

Your shoulders fall, watching the muscles over his back pull taut as he busies himself with little more than prep work for a next experiment as you continue to wait.

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist (hah) to realize that Sukuna has no partner. The thought trickles through the pockets of your mind. Seventy nine people on a planet total… You can only imagine how lonely that gets. Even you, who chooses to be with bugs a majority of your life, always returns home to Shoko and your bugs at the end of a trip.

Seventy nine. That’s thirty nine weddings. Is he the only Simurian with no partner? “Sukuna…” You watch him work, his movements unbothered as he dilutes samples and ups heat to push his cells to react. “Are you lonely?”

He freezes. A muscle in his cheek twitches as he flexes his jaw, choosing not to reply when he continues in his motions.

Your shoulders fall as you watch him silently work, pulling the rug out from under you on the reality of your relationship. A working relationship, really. He’s always chided you for being invasive, and you suppose this is why.

“I’m lonely,” you offer, quietly. His movements don’t freeze altogether, but they slow. He moves as though any noise might distract him from what you’re saying, in spite of the fact that there’s no keeping secrets from a man with ears like him. “I wish I could go back to Earth. Or maybe meet the Simurians, or see more of the universe. I wish I could study bugs again.”

When he still doesn’t reply, but his movements slow to a crawl, you pick up the photo of you and Shoko, presenting it to him again. “I’d love to tell my friend what we’re up to.”

After an extended moment’s silence, he removes his hands from the box, resting them on the table he rolled in. The dense metal protests his weight, even though it was designed for him. Likely designed by him, too. He still doesn’t face you, choosing to protect himself from your prying eyes by continuing to face somewhat away from you.

“It’s not so bad up here though, you know. I mean, I met you. That’s pretty cool.” You scoot closer to the glass, hoping to find common ground through friendship, if you can call this such a thing.

Your movement grabs his attention. His gaze flickers towards you, the only sign he’s heard you at all. He continues to face forward, his shoulders hunched over the cool metal table.

“Why are you alone?” He finally speaks up, unmoving otherwise.

“I’m uh– pretty noisy,” you offer with a grin in terms he knows well, deflecting the question. “So I guess it just never worked out with other people.”

Sukuna straightens, turning to face you. “Not what I meant.”

You smile, half-hearted. “I’m a criminal, Sukuna.”

“Criminal?”

You nod, pulling your knees into your chest as he slowly nears the glass again. He takes a seat, cross-legged as he leans over his forearms to give you his full attention. “I did a really bad thing. Other humans got hurt and I’m here as a punishment. Our technology isn’t as good as yours and the crew that signed up for this mission knew they wouldn’t get to go back to Earth. The choices I made landed me here instead of them.”

“What did you do?”

Your arms tighten around your legs as you settle your chin along your knees. “The Kerm, you know how I told you we had one?”

He chuffs.

“We put it in a cell, a big cage or room,” you explain to the best of your ability. “I was told they just caught it and I was brought in to study it, because it looks similar to our bugs so people in charge made assumptions,” you haphazardly point at the photo where your bug pets are crawling on your clothes. Their features are close enough to the Kerm that you can see the train of thought that led to you. “In my time studying it, I realized it was smart. Like, way smarter than any bug on Earth. Maybe even smarter than any animal. It was listening. It was learning.”

“You opened its cell.”

With a drawn out sigh, you bury your face in your folded arms, muffling your words. “I opened its cell.”

“It ate them all.”

“It ate the crew for this mission. Every last one of them. And then the people in charge killed it, too.”

With two arms relaxed in his lap and two holding him up, Sukuna watches in relative silence as emotions swim through your eyes. He doesn’t have a name for most of them, but he’s seen them in himself. Over a thousand years of life will do that to you.

Your voice is a mere whisper. “It was so smart, Sukuna. I just couldn’t watch it live out its life in a cell.”

“Now you live your life in a cell.”

You lift your head, gaze flickering across the buttons you never bothered to figure out and the white walls you never quite grew accustomed to when all you ever see is Sukuna. “Yeah, I guess so. Funny how that works, huh?”

“It’s not funny,” he hisses, his brow furrowing in such a way that actually has you curious.

It’s not as though you didn’t consider yourself acquaintances at least with him by this point. You've spent several days together and he chooses every day to return when he could have dropped you off at any point and cleaned up his scuffed hangar, but he doesn’t. Every day, he pushes his own goals and mission back another day into the future and chooses to help the trapped little entomologist residing in the back corner of his ship. The whole thing is funny if you’re grim enough about it.

In spite of his frustration, you shuffle forward, pressing a hand to the glass. “It’s okay. I’m glad we met before I’m gone.”

His brow twitches not once but twice as he stares at your hand like it’s a personal affront. “My ship can get you home.”

Your fingers curl just slightly against the glass. Your body inadvertently winces at the thought. “Maybe. But if I go home, I’ll still be arrested and live life in a cell down there. That’s… worse.”

“Even if you bring back a cure?”

“Humans are… complicated.”

“Stupid.”

A puff of air leaves your nose. “Yeah. Humans are stupid.” You do what you can to mask your underlying sadness as your lips curl up into a smile.

You can’t read Sukuna’s expression as his intense crimson stare burns into you. You know there’s a level of disbelief and maybe even frustration at your self-sacrifice in his eyes. Whether you want to admit that an alien could feel something like that for you is another story.

You can see the internal battle raging within him, although you can’t identify what battle it is that he fights. In spite of his troubled scowl, you’re shocked when an arm slowly lifts from where his elbow rested on his thigh. He brings it to the glass, his fingers pressing first over each digit, before his palm splays over yours. The heat he radiates is warm enough that you feel it through the glass, befitting of a ten foot alien that expends far more energy than you. As if you weren’t already aware, it makes it apparent just how much he dwarfs you.

You peel your gaze from his hand, examining the way he refuses to look at you. Softly, you pose a question that might answer some of your own. “How many Simurians were there before the Kerm?”

His frown deepens, his head falling. “Over one thousand. I evolved. Most… did not.”

Something briefly occurs to you of the whole ordeal. You wonder if maybe there was someone that even he– a scientist and engineer clearly capable of incredible feats– could not save. “Your family?” You query, your voice a near-whisper that you know he picks up on.

His eyes slowly drag across the glass, staring straight through you as his reflection startlingly pins him in place. He swallows hard, refusing to confirm when it’s not you staring him down, but his own misplaced guilt that reflects back at him.

His jaw locks, teeth grinding as he pulls back suddenly, on his feet in an instant with an expression you can’t place. He’s scowling with wide eyes, turning on his heel as he excuses himself with nothing more than an “I’m tired,” trudging away with footsteps that echo throughout the bay.

Sitting back, you let out a sigh as you’re left alone once again.

–

The somber tone of that day never fully recuperates itself into something easier. There’s a constant pressure looming overhead that unfortunately isn’t barometric. It’s that of a ship set to fail and a man who treats revenge like a cure for loss. But on the other hand, one thing does change. Sukuna opens up.

He shows you a hologram with images of Simuria that leave you wistful for the greater universe. Space was never your forte, but the dense petrified wood forests and gaseous craters and mountains have your brain tripping over itself in curiosity of what insects could exist in those biomes, much to Sukuna’s dismay as he brushes you off as noisy.

As the days pass and your food supply begins to run short, you’re left with no option but to eat less as you quietly enter survival mode upon realizing Sukuna eats… well, rocks. So you’re left only with what was packed for you.

You were intended to have sent Kerm back by now. You weren’t intended to find life like Sukuna. You weren’t intended to bond. You weren’t intended to be left with a yearning to explore the universe and see the things he’s seen. You weren’t intended to slowly begin to wither. There was an out for you, as morbid as it is. A single dose ready to take once your mission was complete.

And yet, every day, Sukuna brings something new for you to see or experience. It’s small, but it’s surprisingly meaningful. He shows you the vast cliff faces of a Simurian coast that’s a famous vacation spot. He tells you stories of the gaseous craters within the planet that make much of it uninhabitable, hence the far smaller population across it, even before the Kerm. He demonstrates the use of four arms to their full extent and how his brain adapted. He shows you his tattoos. God, the tattoos.

He tells you all about how they each have meaning. How in Simuria, they’re a mark of life events. His wrists were banded when he finished an equivalent of elementary school at twenty-eight. His upper arms were an equivalent of high school at thirty-six, and something akin to university marked his shoulders at sixty-two. It’s a wonder to hear someone graduating university at sixty-two with their life still ahead of them.

He lifts his shirt and points to stripes along his shoulder and back. You swear you’re paying attention. You swear. He smirks, but he tells you nonetheless that they were from what you might consider a bachelor’s degree equivalent.

“What about your face?” You ask, tracing the ink on his jaw along the glass as you leave behind a smear.

“That,” he states, “was my choice. We all choose what our face will look like.”

“No special event?”

“Just me,” he breathes.

It makes you smile.

He hates how much that very action sits under his ribs. It pokes at him, prods at him like it belongs there, reminding him that this won’t last forever.

One morning, he arrives with dark circles under his eyes. He notes that you both look tired. He knows his reasoning, but he can’t place yours. Your energy is largely spent, yet you just awoke. You’re not noisy anymore. He places a circular device on the ground. A holographic device, you recognize it right away, but it’s far larger than the usual one.

“You wanted to see the mountains,” he states simply, ignoring the failed experiment to his left, in spite of the fact that he needs to start a new one with time of the essence. “You will.”

Awaiting him in your usual nook by the window, you’re wrapped up in a blanket, smiling in spite of yourself. For the first time since you met, weak feels as though it properly describes your appearance, but you refuse to give up despite your body’s shortcomings as your stomach rumbles. Sukuna never points it out.

He runs his finger along the outer dial that his machinery tends to run on and it springs to life. You bring a hand up to block the light protruding from a high-lumen-count projector, squinting as the hologram doesn’t just project something in a controlled, small environment, it extends to every wall as though you’re there. The bulb remains bright as Sukuna steps away from it, allowing you to see a mountain as though you’re there.

It’s not a rebuilt landscape either, you realize as you press your hands to the glass to get a better view. It’s a video. It’s a bit shaky, and you’re certain that if it played audio, you might hear the camera operator panting. Every time it shakes and the hologram can’t make sense of what it’s projecting, you squint, but it comes back in a moment. When it flashes suddenly, you catch a glimpse of Sukuna, following along behind the camera operator. He looks young. In human years, you would guess his twenties. Maybe three hundred for him. You can’t help a smile as you note that he doesn’t seem to have four arms. You wonder if they came later.

The camera flashes again as the operator moves it, revealing his own face along with Sukuna and four laughing Simurians. Sukuna still bears his usual aloof expression, but the joy in his eyes is palpable as they all pose for a photo. The camera operator looks largely like Sukuna, though he bears no facial tattoos and only a simple set of extra eyes. A twin, perhaps.

To Sukuna’s left is a Simurian with shoulder-length white hair who’s much shorter than the rest of them with an eye in the center of their forehead, a tall and slender Simurian with horns and the same third eye, one with shaggy white hair and six striking blue eyes, and one with silky-looking black hair and four eyes, purple beyond your wildest beliefs.

“Are those your friends?” You query, covering a cough in your elbow.

Sukuna intently watches the action, chuffing when the camera turns away. “We went on a trip after my fourth tattoo.”

“You look young.”

He steps around the projector, moving closer to your window. “I was.” He’s never been the most talkative, but he does ask more questions. You chalk it up to scientific curiosity. “Are Earth mountains like this?” Were you more keen, you might realize he’s deflecting you from the subject of the friends of which he’s mostly lost.

You stare around at the landscape. Simuria is largely rocky with giant craters. It’s covered in iridescent minerals that seem to form under the far more gaseous and toxic-leaning environment. “Some,” you decide. “The more harsh environments get colorful like this. Mostly, they’re gray with trees. Kinda spiky green ones with pointed tops. We get snow, too, at the tops where it’s colder.”

Simuria is warm, from what you’ve gathered, and his head tilts curiously at the thought of snow.

“You know when you bring a liquid to a cold temperature and it freezes?”

He chuffs.

“Like that, but tiny shavings of it. It’s white and cold. It falls from the clouds.”

“Fascinating.” And he means it, too. It’s the most intriguing part of all of your interactions with him. You don’t learn through questioning as scientists anymore, you learn through sharing as friends.

“It’s beautiful,” you murmur to yourself, watching the video clip play out. It cuts off without so much as a sound of warning, the room returning to the usual bright and barren metal appearance you’ve grown accustomed to. “Snow doesn’t have much friction, so humans would go to the top of mountains and slide down.”

“You have no cliffs?”

“Not really on the snowy mountains.” You scoot forward, leaning your shoulder against the window as you pull yourself into a tight ball with a blanket draped over your shoulders. “Mostly in deserts. Desert mountains look more like Simurian ones, but mostly one color. They’re warmer, too. Most of the time.”

Subconsciously, Sukuna leans against the glass, his shoulder warming you enough that your eyes flutter shut. “What color?”

You yawn. “Orange. It’s kinda like a darker version of your hair. If you squint.”

Absently running a hand through said locks, he stares out at the hangar’s walls, where the hologram projected mountains mere moments ago. “I think I know the color,” he murmurs mostly to himself. Rising from where he leans against the glass, his lips part to speak when he finds you sound asleep slumped against the glass.

His jaw tightens, a sharp pain rising behind his teeth at the sight of the tiny Human he’s grown fond of curled into a little ball aboard her ship. His friend. Slowly, a hand rises to the glass as something in his chest twists painfully. He recognizes the feeling, he’s no fool. He’s spent over a thousand years alive and isn’t a stranger to the pang gnawing at him as the noisy stowaway he picked up passes out in his presence.

To you, he’s safety. To him, you're more than just company.

And you’re wasting away in his hangar bay because some species he’s never come across decided that would be the case simply for having compassion. It brought about a mistake, sure, but you had compassion nonetheless where they did not.

He sucks in a breath, taking long strides over the metal floor to continue experimenting until you rise again. He works quietly, although he knows your hearing doesn’t compare to his. He moves with silent ease in spite of his lumbering form and watches with a frown as every environmental change he puts either of the cells through doesn’t bring out the result he wants. His cells adapt to the environment, but never recognize the Alveolarium as a threat.

Stepping back as he attempts to re-evaluate, he casts a glance back at you. Even if your energy wanes, your heart still beats steadily in his keen ears. He can get you back to Earth so long as he can figure out a solution to get energy back into your system somehow given that his food doesn’t fit within your diet.

You stir with a yawn, seemingly roused by his glance. You press against the glass, sitting up and blinking a number of times. When you meet his gaze, a spark of energy ignites that has Sukuna wincing. You clamber against the metal, some sort of button or zipper on your clothes clanging hard against the metal. “Sorry, Sukuna! I didn’t realize I fell asleep.”

He growls, rubbing absently at his second ear tucked within salmon locks. “It’s fine,” he grumbles, although your company is more welcome than he gives off as you sit upright to watch his experimentation once more.

You offer suggestions that get you deadpan expressions and a dramatic roll of the eyes given your lack of knowledge on the subject of medicinal chemistry is lacking. You figure you’re better at telling stories anyway, and even if you lose your place here and there when your tiredness catches up with you, Sukuna always offers a guiding suggestion when you falter.

The following day is when he starts to notice a trend that doesn’t greet either of you with warmth.

You drag yourself to the bridge later than usual without your morning granola bar. Sukuna offers you a mineral, but he knows it would break your teeth. He also offers meat, but you both already know your system rejects it. The blanket you’ve been dragging around with you for the past few days is bundled so tightly around you that Sukuna would wager a guess that you’re colder than usual, too.

When you make a motion to point at something on the table, his gaze lingers on your trembling finger. He can hear your stomach. He knows you’re starving. He’s watching your spirit fade, completely helplessly.

Sukuna, a man who’s spent over two hundred years coming to terms with the past and adapting to being alone, finds himself completely at a loss and frustrated beyond his means when he finds you the following morning. Or– more accurately– when he doesn’t find you.

His footsteps are even as he makes his way across the hangar. Your belongings remain at the glass, but you aren’t there yet. He tilts his head, catching your heartbeat as a slow, steady thump that keeps him at bay, and moves to check on his most recent experiment. He frowns as he finds after the allotted time, his cells remain by their lonesome, still unable to identify your Human disease as a threat.

Truthfully, it perplexes him. You determined early on that you share enough DNA to potentially be susceptible to the same diseases. Hell, by all means this is something Simurians have already overcome. It came from the same source, so he can’t figure out why his stem cells have yet to take to yours.

Carding his finger through his hair, he lets out a forlorn sigh, eyes shut for a long moment. Your heart is a steady drum in his ear, a reminder of what it is that he’s working towards. Had someone told him two weeks ago that he’d be helping such a pitiful little species overcome a disease of their own doing, he might not have believed them. But there’s more to you than your brittle bone structure and weak muscle mass. You’re smart. Perhaps not as advanced as he is, but you’re smart far beyond your thirty five years.

You’re smart in the kind of way Sukuna can only dream. He’s seen the way your mind works, how thoughts pour out before you even have time to put them together. He’s seen how resilient you are in the face of certain death. But what really gets him is your attitude. You grin through every shortcoming. You ensure him that if you keep trying, eventually your minds will come together and you’ll figure it out. You never acknowledge that breakthroughs like this take centuries. You didn’t even blink when he revealed that he’s been searching for the source of the Kerm for over a hundred years.

You’re unlike anything Sukuna’s ever known. And something dark crawls beneath his skin when you don’t rouse by the time you’re usually eating. Noon, you called it once.

With his experimental cells set in an extremely cold environment, he leaves the workspace to round your ship. His head tilts as he listens for your heartbeat as though it ever left his periphery, but it’s as sound as it’s ever been. Slowed by sleep perhaps, but sound. He comes to a halt when it grows louder as he nears your sleeping bay. His hand drifts across the scraped metal where your ship tilted on its axis when it scraped the ground as he scooped you up, resting along the damaged hull.

He hones in on you, and finds you’re still breathing. Still there. Still alive. But shallow. There’s no wheeze, no sharp inhales. It’s simple and shallow.

His brow furrows as he turns to fully face the ship. You aren’t just malnourished anymore. Something is wrong. His gaze lifts, traveling along the mechanics that keep your ship in one piece, far more primitive than the smooth and compact design of his. He doesn’t know what he expects to find, but when what he’s faced with isn’t an easy explanation, he turns on his heel.

He moves with more severity than he has in a century, no longer silent as he pads over extended corridors of metal that leave him questioning ever having a ship of this size. When he reaches his lab, he reaches for a scanner and jogs back to your ship.

It only takes a moment to calibrate its sensor to search only for organic matter. He lifts it to your ship. Alveolarium, as expected. Blood, and healthy stem Alveolar cells, as expected. All in small quantities.

Until everything lights up red. Immense amounts of blood, of musculature and tissue, along with a high volume of water. He’s found you. And along with everything he expects of an organic creature, a revelation that makes his blood run cold.

An uncontrolled quantity of Alveolarium. You’re infected.

Somehow, between the multitude of items you’ve exchanged and the experiments you’ve run by your lonesome, you must have been exposed. Your energy is being sapped because your body is fighting a disease engineered to kill.

He harshly clicks and growls to himself in a series of muttered curses, as he stares at the reading. For the first time since the bioweapon you call Kerm was found on Simuria over two hundred years ago, he finds himself completely and utterly helpless yet again. Control slips through his fingers like the sands of time as he raises the scanner once more as though it might reveal a different fate, but it never does. 

His chest rises and falls heavily, his arms falling to his sides as he stares blankly. His mind takes a moment to wrap around the reality that you’re not Simurian. You’re human. You’re noisy and weak, your mind can’t keep up with your thoughts, and you’re invasive as hell– you won’t adapt to the illness. And god, is it quiet without you.

Urgency kicks in like a long-dormant volcano coming to life as he moves back to the table, evaluating how many samples he has left. He draws more of his cells, ignoring the tingling feeling in his arm as he injects himself with a drug to draw stem cells from his marrow. He drags more of his lab to the hangar, setting out tables and creating extra boxes able to pressurize to the same barometric pressure as that of an oxygenated atmosphere.

He lowers incubation times to do more tests, changing the parameters so often that his notes become a mess.

You don’t move. He hears you shuffle once on the first day. On the second, he grits his teeth as he listens to your harsh breaths. Your moans, your groans. You move at one point in what sounds like a drag of your feet and he hears water, but he’s not even positive if you make it back to your quarters.

As he watches one of his cells back off from Humanity’s infected lung cells, he leans over the table on two arms, sucking in a long breath. He doesn’t know how long he has. He doesn’t know how long you can survive without food. He doesn’t know if you have more water.

His second pair of hands ball into fists at his sides as he shuts all four eyes tightly. He didn’t know what to do two hundred years ago watching something so similar take out his entire species. He doesn’t know what to do now, stuck in the same situation. His knowledge is far more advanced than everything he knew back then. His technology and abilities exceed everything from back then. So why the fuck can’t he figure it out?

Is it that your suggestions were more useful than he gave you credit for? No, is it that he simply misses them? That they kept his mind from running off-rails into mania?

He works himself to the bone until he’s leaning with his back to your window. With one knee pulled up, he rests his elbow atop it, using his hand to block the light from his pounding head. He absently rubs at the bridge of his nose, eyes shut as he runs through formulas in his head until his mind begins to give in. The only thing he can bring his mind to hone in on is the sound of your heart. The steady reminder of the noisy human he’s doing this for in the first place.

Just as he begins to drift off, the gentle buzz of lights in your ship comes to a halt, a mechanical voice brought to life by necessity.

“Backup power activated. Life support systems online.”

The alien jolts, his slumber interrupted as he stares up at your ship with wild eyes. They flick all around the bridge as he takes in the red light and the way the buttons along the navigation board have dimmed, many shutting off altogether.

“Backup?” He states the word as though the program might respond to him. “Online?” Neither word is in his vocabulary, and as he gets to his feet, all four hands pressed to the glass, he searches desperately for meaning. “Human? Human?” His mind is too worn out to fill in the gaps with context as panic coats his movements like a snake slowly seeping its venom into its prey.

With a final call of your name, his fingers squeak as they drag along the glass. He turns back to his work station, dragging his hands violently over his scalp. He clicks and growls to himself, slamming a lower hand down over one of the sealed pressurized boxes. It cracks easily from his strength, putting his experiments immediately at risk. His eyes widen, two hands raising as though he might be able to stop it with his bare hands. He rushes back through his ship, racing through corridors to find something capable of stopping the crack before it shatters altogether.

Returning with a handful of options, he opts to melt a stone element from his planet into the crack. It’s the safest option he can think of. Sitting back from the soldering gun, he collapses onto the floor in a flurry of exhausted limbs. His stomach mouth parts as his body expends much of his energy on his mental state, only furthering his trouble.

In an effort to gather his thoughts, he leans over his knees, dragging his hands down his face. Backup. Red lights came on, some systems shut down. Using context clues, he can put that together. He pushes down his panic as he works on the second word. Online. He can still hear your ship whirring. He can hear your breathing. Life support must be working.

Okay. One problem down.

No matter how he changes the co-culture or adjusts the selective pressure, no matter how he adjusts his hypothesis or the duress he puts his cells under, the results remain the same. His cells adapt. But never to the disease. They co-exist in separate worlds.

Two eyes flick towards your ship, reminded of you, stuck on your own in a cell of your own doing. His fingers curl into his palm as he drives his focus back to his makeshift lab.

He can’t figure out why his cells won’t recognize yours. You may be different species, but his cells should recognize the pathogen in the Alveolarium as similar to the same illness that took out a majority of Simuria. He’s already adapted past it, and the cell structure isn’t that different.

He drags his nails over his scalp while his lower arms remain in fists. How much power do you have left? How much longer can you survive without water? You’re largely compounded of it based on his scan, can you survive without intake?

With a harsh growl, he pushes to his feet, ignoring the way his muscles protest. Pain simmers as he pushes them, keeping the reins on his control over this situation with an iron grasp. He pushes through the burn, pushes his mind to its limits as he works out chemical compounds with what brain power he has left, all the while continuing to alter the cells’ environment until he has nothing left to give.

–

Your ship doesn’t do its usual chime come morning. What’s worse is that your coughing startles him awake. Your heart stutters, a deadly sound for any species.

Hunched over in an odd position on the floor, Sukuna cracks his neck, rubbing at it as adrenaline pumps through his veins.

You’re dying. For all the tireless work he’s doing, you’re still dying.

He reaches out for the window where you once sat, dragging his fingers over it like your very ship might fall from his grasp at any moment. His breathing accelerates, his chest leaden with the gravity of the situation. Resting his entire body against the glass, all four arms settle along the panel. His head rests unevenly on the panel, off-kilter at the whim of the plate that resides over the right side of his face. A low rumble starts from deep within his chest, erupting in a full-blown furious fit of hisses, clicks, Simurian syllables and roars.

He curses in his mother tongue like he did over a hundred years ago. He’s spent over a century learning, advancing, and searching the damn stars for a bioweapon only for the very same thing to be his demise once again.

Peeling himself off of your ship, he reaches back to rub at a kink in his neck. His first issue was a lack of understanding of your ship system. He fixed that. His second issue is the cells. He can’t fix that without trial and error. His third issue is you dying, which is made up of two issues. The pressure of his ship would crush you, but your own life support systems are failing. When your ship depressurizes, the hull will be crushed, your oxygen will flow out into the sulfuric compounds that make up his air, and you’ll suffocate.

And then there’s the dehydration. And he doesn’t know which one is a more immediate threat. Regardless, his immediate problem is your ship. He stares at it in an effort to figure out how to remove it from the equation.

He could create a new box for you, something smaller than your ship, create his own life support systems for you and pressurize the box by pumping in oxygen and out carbon dioxide, similar to the box he uses for experiments. It’s not impossible in theory, but he doesn’t have the materials on-board to build a box of that size, nor does he have an extra generator capable of creating oxygen at that scale.

The only materials aboard are from your ship, the very thing he can’t tear apart right now. 

He drags his hand back through his hair, tearing it straight from the scalp as he fails to find a way to guarantee containment while also pressurizing whatever he can work out. On a small scale, he can manage with what’s in his lab. On a large scale, all he can truly manage is his ship itself. His shoulders fall slowly. His ship.

The pressure of your atmosphere wouldn’t be a big deal on a creature like him. His ship could handle that without question. His muscles would survive. He could wear a suit, pump the sulfuric components through it. He could save you from the immediate threat. For a moment, the thought sits with him. It slips into his chest along his ribs, curling around his pounding hearts. It almost doesn’t feel real.

But when the dust settles and he’s left simply staring at your window, it becomes suddenly, startlingly, real. He turns on his heel like a man on a mission, moving through the ship as he heads for the mechanical room. He wrenches the small metal door with too much force, causing it to bend as he slips down into the tight space.

Machinery hums and breathes around him, worn pipes humming on every side as he shimmies through the space you might think was built by someone else given how much Sukuna is forced to squeeze through it. A whirring tank brushes his skin– hot– burning him in the process, but it’s barely a distraction when he’s aiming for the back of the room.

Sure enough, the sulfuric gas generator residing at the back comes into view quickly. The generator currently keeping his ship pressurized could be repurposed for oxygen through chemical reactions similar to what’s currently generating his sulfuric gasses. He can suit up, and–

His hands come to a halt as he finds himself scanning his surroundings like it might change his fate.

]He only has one generator. He can only create sulfuric compounds for his own atmosphere on a small scale with what he has onboard his ship, but not enough to support him long-term, and what’s currently stored won’t last forever. And that’s only the tip of the iceberg, when he considers that he still has to kill the Kerm, on a planet whose atmosphere he knows nothing about, with creatures built to kill whether through sheer violence or illness. He can’t risk using what sulfuric compounds he has stored while aboard his own ship.

In the cramped space with the generator’s hatch open, he presses the ball of his palm against his temple. There’s an answer. One that he’s already considering. But the cost could be his life. He could make the change to oxygen and pray his body is forced to adapt and maybe save you, should he survive. It’s either that or sit here and listen to your heart and breathing weaken until you’re nothing but a shadow in his hangar bay.

On the flip side, if he doesn’t adapt, then you’re both dead.

Sukuna has always been a man of certainties. He chose science because it makes sense. He chose science, because variables don’t react without reason. He chose science because it gives him control of his outcomes through error and studious attention. But this decision isn’t about science or reason.

This decision is about the hundreds of Simurians he feels responsible for losing. It’s about his revenge against the Kerm. It’s about the noisy human wheezing in his hangar bay who told him she wanted to see Simuria. It’s about the stupid girl whose heart stuttered as she solemnly lied to him about being okay with her fate. It’s about how cold your hand felt, even through the glass.

He barks out a Simurian curse, reaching for the tools necessary to begin generating a different gas.

He wrenches on a cable, giving it a harsh twist to unlock it from its position. The ship comes alight with warnings that he opts to block out as the pressure of the hull begins to shift. It’s not painful to begin, even as the ship’s very structure complains with harsh moans and groans. He floods the chamber with sodium chloride and ups the heat until it begins producing oxygen. As the remaining sulfuric gas runs into a reserve chamber, he shuts the generator and continues to ignore the creaking and warnings his ship spews.

Getting to his feet again, he slides through the tight space, sucking in every last breath he can of sulfuric gasses as they begin to dissipate.

Oxygen hurts. He pushes through the pain, trudging through the halls as he fails to catch his breath, certain that the generator is working when his muscles feel loose as the pressure of the ship adjusts to the new gas flowing through its chambers. He turns down a long hall, ignoring the flashing lights along every wall while the hull groans. When he finally reaches the hangar, his chest doesn’t ache or burn, it sears like something is clawing at him from within, begging to be let out. It’s not his first brush with pain like this, but there’s something different when it’s his lungs. Tears form along his lash line as he lacks sulfuric gasses to his brain, the compounds unable to pump blood to his most important organs.

When he reaches your ship, he stumbles into it, still upright through sheer willpower alone. He slams his fist into the panel nearest where he last knew you were, loosening the edge. His fingers curl around the newly revealed edge and with all the might left in his body, he tears it off. Along with it comes a series of mechanics as your ship begins to beep and protest in tandem with his. Only once he tears through some wiring with a series of flashing lights does your ship finally shut off.

This is it– the test of his own scientific capabilities. Whether or not you survive in the environment he’s artificially created within his own ship.

The blaring alarms mitigate his ability to find you, his head whipping one way or the other. He drags himself through the pain, through the mind-numbing brain fog, picking up a half-finished bottle of water he spots on a counter along the way, until he finds you.

You’re sitting awkwardly in a corner, shivering, but conscious. Alive.

Your eyes are harshly lidded when you stare up at him, clinging to your blanket like it’s a lifeline. Your dry lips part, a look of sheer confusion falling over your expression like you doubt what you’re seeing in the dark corridor of your ship whose systems have completely failed.

Sukuna’s chest struggles to rise and fall evenly, every breath furthering the pain behind his eyes as his lungs fail to pump sulfuric compounds into his bloodstream and his brain function falters. He doesn’t let his knees give out until he’s able to hand you the water bottle.

“S’kuna?” Your voice sounds as though it’s been scraped against the very compounds that make up Simurian mountains. You sound as though you don’t trust your voice, let alone your mind.

Close enough to leave the water within your reach, the giant alien’s body finally gives out. The water hits the floor beside you just within reach as one arm attempts to grab the counter that you lean against. His palm brushes the surface, but his body drops like a stone to the floor beside you, scraping his palm. His vision is narrow as he uses what little strength he has left to envelop you in his arms, acting as a blanket for your shivering form.

The moment he touches you, clarity shoots through your mind like lightning. This is no fever dream, you’re not waking up out of sheer necessity of needing water or a way to warm up. It’s a shock to your system in more ways than one. He’s not just warm– his body runs like a furnace in comparison to yours. He’s so warm that curling into him isn’t a choice, it’s survival and he knows it.

The very thing that kept you apart for so long hits you harder than the shock that Sukuna is beside you. “Wait–” the word comes weakly as you give his arm a shove. It barely affects him. “You can’t–” A cough settles at the back of your throat, interrupting your thoughts. “What did you do?” You rasp out between the kind of coughs that wrack your body and send spikes of pain to every receptor that will listen.

But he doesn’t respond, any semblance of consciousness long gone as his arms go limp. You can’t move him. You can barely move yourself. The most you can do is hope that his body takes to oxygen like it did to science, or whatever it was that truly gave him an extra pair of arms. You assume that’s his hope too.

The flashing lights and warning buzzers continue to blare outside the hull. Your ship offers very little cover from the noise, but enough that your already-foggy mind is able to drown out the noise with the static of illness. Unable to fight the heaviness held over you, you shakily grab the water. You may be too delirious to grasp the true gravity of the situation and what Sukuna’s done, but you know better than to overlook the gift of water.

The massive alien wrapped around you on the ground makes it easy to lean into him, basking in his warmth as it quells a modicum of your shivers. The longer you sit there in the flashing lights and blaring sirens, the more your body gives in to the grasps of the sandman. Subconsciously, you lean into Sukuna– passed out beside you– until your head leans against his shoulder. It doesn’t rise and fall, but you find comfort in the fact that when you press a hand to his chest in search of something, anything, that might give you hope, his heart pushes a single beat through. One after another, each of his two hearts continues to push through the unlikely situation.

That reassurance makes it easier to give in to the forces pushing you to unconsciousness. Because you recognize Sukuna’s actions as more than just kindness in the face of danger.

This is a species you’ve never witnessed whose primary goal was revenge, brought to his knees by the very stowaway he huffed and puffed over being noisy. Not by manipulation or force either, but by choice. Sukuna didn’t just choose to save you. He chose pain, he chose to bet on low odds. He chose to put off his mission, and he chose to endanger and expose himself to disease, all for you.

He isn’t just asking you to live. He’s commanding it.

–

Sukuna doesn’t stir for forty eight hours. You aren’t much better, but at least your body faces wakefulness in the face of dehydration. You don’t know how long Sukuna can survive without food or water, but you have no other option but to hope it’s longer than you.

Midway through the third day is when he finally stirs. It comes in twitches at first. It’s not dramatic, but in the few moments where you’re awake and delirious and you spot any semblance of movement, you cling to him like your life depends on it. Because it does.

Next come the wheezing breaths. Then groans, and sharp inhales that sound unnatural. You feel his pain deep in your ribs like a stabbing sensation. His fingers drag so harshly against the metal floor that his fingers break through it, the metal proving to be little more than an ant to his elephant strength.

Consciousness is dramatic for him.

Like a switch being flicked, his body comes to life and with it, his pain and confusion. He flies back, head ramming harshly into the cabinets you had been leaning against. He huffs out his displeasure, but the sensation is harsh in his chest. His lungs may have adapted, but oxygen is a harsh forced change to sulfur. The compounds shred within his chest, something that has one of his many hands flying up to grip at his chest.

He mutters a harsh curse under his breath in his mother tongue that sends pain back through his throat like a ricocheting bullet. In the cramped confines of your torn-open ship’s hull, he rests his head back against the door to the lab. Every breath is fire in the large expanse of his chest, his lungs accepting the oxygen not out of desire, but need.

He mutters a curse again, recoiling far less as he pushes through the pain. Ignoring the deliriousness of pain and the cramping in his gut, he cards a hand through mildly oily locks, pushing them away from his forehead. When his gaze glues itself to you, blearily watching him from the floor in a state of suspended wakefulness, he freezes altogether.

You’re alive.

His chest finds a new way to deliver pain as he hunches forward, sliding back to the spot where he had clearly been your pillow if your odd position is anything to go off of. He glides over the floor, taking a seat where he had been in an effort to provide a pillow.

The sensation of his returned warmth has your lashes fluttering as you stare up at him. He can see the gears physically turning in your mind as you make sense of him being there, awake, and alive as well.

For a moment, his brain betrays him. He moves on instinct, brushing his thumb over your collar. Only to be met with a weak smack to the chest. He blinks, staring down at you with confusion woven within his fondness.

“You could–” you cough, “have died.”

A series of growls and clicks between syllables you don’t recognize fall from his lips like he’s giving you a full scolding in a foreign language. It almost brings a smile to your dry lips as you recognize only two words.

“Noisy human.” His muscles are fraught from disuse as he hoists you into his lap.

The alarms may have stopped blaring, but the lights around him continue to flash in warning, reminding him of the reason he underwent this in the first place. Under the duress of having very little energy after evolution and his chest protesting his every movement, he groans as he pushes to his feet with you cradled close. He pulls you into his chest, casting a glance down at you as even in sickness, your eyes seem to shine as you watch your environment change. You never fail to bring wonder along with you, no matter the circumstances.

He treats you with the fragility of a flower as he brings you to his lab, moving over a panel that has no identifiable buttons, yet as Sukuna moves his hand over it, you hear the shift behind you. A bed reveals itself from the wall, not entirely unlike that of a human, though it’s a far harder material that he makes adjustments to in order to conform to your body as he lays you down.

His medical equipment isn’t unlike yours. He gets you started on an IV without hesitation, preventing the first of his major worries, and watches as your body shuts down, grateful for the new fluid intake. Every time you fall asleep is no easier than the last. One of his hearts skips, then the second one, but he takes the opportunity to continue his work. He moves the samples back to the lab, no longer bothering with the oxygenated box as he’s able to work faster now.

Waiting is the hardest part. It leaves him feeling powerless, pushing himself to his limits to distract himself from the fact that you look weaker every time his eyes glue themselves to you.

“Dabura’s anniversary was yesterday,” he mutters one morning, standing between you and his experiments where he can monitor both.

His lower hands rest on his waist, the upper arms crossed over his chest like twisting wrong doesn’t still send a shock to his system as his lungs continue to mold themselves to their new dual-purpose. He pushes through, idly taking a step towards you and the pile of blankets he stole from your ship that keep you from shivering.

“You would like the celebration,” he remarks, meandering to the side of your bed. He lowers himself to take a closer look at you, before sinking to his knees. His upper arms rest along the edge of the bed, chin seated atop them. “We have a–” he pauses, glancing aside at the realization that he frustratingly can’t even tell you about the celebration because he lacks the words. He growls, his expression pushing into a scowl as he utters the Simurian word for ‘fire’. “A heat light. It’s big,” he presses on. “We use chemicals to create oxygen vacuums,” he continues. “Everyone comes from across the planet. We eat a lot. Drink.”

You don’t stir.

“You would have liked Satoru. He was noisy, too.” His gaze rises from where he sits to sweep your face. You don’t have the gentle look he’s grown accustomed to anymore, your features sunken and permanently pulled into a pained expression. It wrenches at his chest more than the pain of evolution somehow. “He studied the Kaliyans. Some Simurians have deep ties to them. Neither him or I did, so he chose to study them. We never did find answers before…” He huffs, muttering a curse of clicks and growls. He lets his cheek fall to his arms, at a loss. He shuts all four eyes at the sound of a timer going off, sucking in a breath as he wearily pushes to his feet.

He stares at the hologram emptily. It irks him to see the Alveolarium still rampant, but he expects no less at this point. He doesn’t know what exactly he’s expecting to get out of these at this point when experiments like this don’t just take days. They take years. They take materials and vigorous testing and… He throws his gaze over his shoulder, noting how shallow your breaths are now.

He doesn’t have years. He might not even have days, yet again. He bought himself more time, but he’s back to square one with control slipping through his fingers yet again. He grits his teeth so harshly it sends a sharp pain straight to his brain. One would only catch his wince if they were paying attention, as his bottom left eye twitches from the sensation.

Padding out from the room to give himself a break to eat as he overthinks every equation until there’s no semblance of hope left, he sits casually at the bridge, staring out at the planet below. Green clouds and space debris make up the remnants of the species that created the Kerm, long extinct by the hands of their own bioweapon. Below those clouds are the pinks and blues that make up the largely crystalline surface where the beetle-adjacent species now resides, hungry and in search of new prey.

Kerm. The thought settles between his ribs alongside the pain of his evolution. He always envisioned his arrival at their planet to be more triumphant. He envisioned traveling to its surface to ensure that his hypothesis was correct and they’ve eaten beyond their means, invasive to their own planet and destroying its very ecosystem until all that remains are themselves. Then leaving without a trace of the Kerm, the planet, or his own actions.

Yet all this trip has done is resurface every scar he buried a century ago. He scratches at them until what remains are no longer just scars, but open wounds. Forcing down what food he can manage, he drags a hand down his jaw, staring out at the planet, Methalon. It’s silent for a long moment as he inhales and holds the breath.

In Simurian, he finds himself muttering to himself. “What if you’re right, human?” Another extended silence as the thought lingers. “What if… Kerm are more than your cause? What if they’re your cure, too?”

He taps his finger along the panel in which controls reside as he mulls the thought over, before springing into action. He doesn’t have the luxury to consider the consequences, pressing a palm to the controls as they react to electromagnetic pulses emitted from his brain and read through his fingers as he brings the ship to life for the first time in a couple of weeks, disturbing the spacerock that’s settled around the ship.

With a groan, the ship’s nose shifts as he points it towards the planet’s surface. The pressure surrounding the ship shifts as he nears the atmosphere, far more dense than what you would be accustomed to, so he thanks the stars that it’s him going in place of you. He stops the ship a short distance from the planet’s surface, setting it to hover within the densely gaseous atmosphere. It’ll keep you out of reach of the Kerm, which he hypothesizes shouldn’t be able to reach you with their stubby wings.

Should he be wrong, he supposes you’ll both succumb to his stupidity. He almost cracks a morbid smile at the thought. Not that you both might be a lost cause because of his decisions, but because he so often chides you for being stupid, when he’s recklessly allowing himself to be stupid now, too.

But he’s certainly not noisy. No, he talks to you because you like it. Not because he does. He’s quiet.

Suiting up, he drops to the planet’s surface with his limited sulfuric compound supply, his tank unsuited for oxygen. Gravity pulls him down like nothing he’s ever experienced as he drops heavily to the surface. He expected the dense atmosphere, but it still presses down on him like a weight.

Crystallic compounds crunch underfoot, and he shouldn’t consider himself shocked when he comes across the first series of Kerm, or as he knows them, Methalonians. He supposes the name isn’t very fitting, however, given that they’re unnatural. They killed whatever species was more befitting of the name.

The first one turns towards him, its head swiveling as its iridescent shell reflects the gorgeous light of the crystalline environment aiding it to blend in. It regards Sukuna with an entirely animal head tilt that might fool someone who doesn’t know their methods, but Sukuna isn’t fooled. He grips his EMP gun tighter, preparing himself for the inevitable. While the Kerm believe he’s fooled, he sets down a heavy containment pod, opening it with a hiss.

When he faces the group again, all fifteen or so creatures are facing him. Their wings buzz and hiss as they communicate, their antennae twitching through the air as they coordinate what Sukuna already knows to be an attack.

This time, however, he’s prepared. The first one approaches him slowly and curious, feigning a kindness they don’t possess. The brutish alien keeps up the facade in an effort to keep himself from being buried by a sea of Kerm.

He reaches a suited-up and reinforced hand out to the creature, watching its mandibles click together. It approaches slowly, peering up at Sukuna’s outwardly non-threatening demeanor. Its head tilts as it nears, nudging his fingers like it might provoke him.

But it’s not Sukuna that breaks the facade first. The creature zips forward, smashing its mandibles together where Sukuna’s hand just was, giving him enough time to lunge back. As the rest of the group moves in a coordinated hive towards him, he unleashes a small EMP attack that temporarily disorients the Kerm, sending them in more varied directions.

One that approaches him meets the fate of a heated vibrating dagger to its thorax, while another leaps at Sukuna’s shoulder. He spins, wrenching his shoulder in an effort to dislodge it from his suit, but its mandibles dig into the material. The material is impenetrable by their mandibles, but fuck if it doesn’t hurt anyway.

Hissing, Sukuna throws an arm around the Kerm to prevent it from leaving as he pulls the gut-ridden blade from the previous Kerm to lodge it into the next one. He remains largely in control, throwing one off to tear another from its own thorax with the blade the following moment until the smaller crowd re-coordinates itself. Sukuna launches another small EMP attack, throwing two of the group off, while the remaining four all leap at him at once. Mandibles clamp down on one shoulder, while another clings to his abdomen, choosing to methodically jab at the spots where his organs are.

Smart little asshole.

Sukuna recoils, hissing as pain rips through his stomach just beyond where his second mouth can reach. It momentarily disorients him, knocking him to the ground long enough that the remaining two Kerm are able to pile themselves onto him as well. They separate him from both the EMP and dagger, the sound of the vibrating tool over the crystalline earth grating on his nerves.

He shuts his eyes tightly, attempting to reset himself as he evaluates how much he’s been stamped down. He grits his teeth, grunting as he manages to lift an arm and throw one creature off with enough force to disorient it. The freed hand allows him to get enough leverage to flip himself over, slamming one hand straight through the creature’s shell. With one fierce glare, he flips the fight back in his favor, grabbing an incoming Kerm by the head and crushing it in one hand.

With a majority of his movement freed, he picks up the EMP again, blasting the remaining three insects and smashing them too, leaving only the one he tossed aside earlier. He grabs it by the thorax, wrangling it between two arms as he shoves it into the containment box with his spare set of hands. Once it’s inside, he lets out a huff, staring down at his gut-covered suit. He’ll need to be sure he carefully washes himself and his suit after this, given that he doesn’t want to expose you to more diseases that the bioweapon could have hidden beneath its shell.

Getting back to his feet, he better evaluates the surrounding environment. There’s evidence of trees, of civilization and buildings in the distance now turned to rubble and ash. He doesn’t have much sulfuric compounds left to breathe, so he figures he’ll do a once-over of the planet from within the ship, focusing his efforts back on a cure for you as he returns to the safety of his ship.

–

Splaying the Kerm’s insides across his workbench proves to be a disgusting feat. Even within a containment box, the smell permeates the damn room. He ends up moving it into the hangar, which by some grace has better filtration, but Sukuna finds himself further beaten down by the smell. As if his failures weren’t enough.

Unlike his cells, the Kerm’s stem cells do attack the Alveolarium… Unfortunately, no matter how he attempts to alter them, they only ever seem to act as aggressors.

For as smart as Sukuna is, he finds himself missing your curiosity. Your stupid questions. You challenge him. Not just because you’re noisy, but because you’re far more willing to approach the unlikely with an open mind. You lack the knowledge he has, specializing in natural biology where Sukuna excels in chemistry, cytology, geology, archeology, and engineering, but he’s also had a few extra years. Your lack of specific knowledge allows you to excel in general knowledge that Sukuna found himself praising you for.

Mentally. It’s easier to show fondness through actions than words, after all.

Bringing a hand up to his eyes, he presses a thumb and forefinger into them, yawning as every continued failure sets him back not just physically, but mentally too.

He collapses at the base of your bed, your breathing setting his nervous system into a furious rage of emotion as he realizes for the first time how close he truly is to losing you, with no cure in sight. Your species is weak in every sense of the word. Your muscles lack the build that Simurians have, your brain’s capacity is low, your immune system could be knocked over by a harsh wind, and yet Sukuna can’t help but find you endearing. Your lifespan is barely a smear in the grand scheme of his life, and yet the brutish alien, a species who mates for life, finds himself wondering how many ways you might be able to throw his life into disarray.

He wants your annoying quips. He wants your too-loud rambles. He wants to feel you warm in his arms, your eyes bright and wide as he shows you a Simurian mountaintop in some dumb-looking suit of his creation.

He slams his head back against your bed with enough force to rattle the very stone that makes it up. Dragging his hands down his face, the most he can do is stare at the experiments as one by one the timers go off and he’s left with one failure after another. His gaze splits as he looks between not just one, but four separate failures. Pushing his hands back through his hair, he balls his fists within the strands, eyes shut tight. Sitting so close to you, he still feels far. He finds himself mourning something he has yet to lose.

You haven’t awoken in several days, and as much as he wishes he could equate it to illness, the fact is that you’re dying. He can pump as many nutrients as he wants straight into your body without allowing your stomach the opportunity to reject his food, it’ll only do so much when it’s not your stomach fighting you anymore. It’s your lungs.

Every round of failed experiments is another scathing tear at his wounds as he leans against your bed on the floor. His gut aches where the Kerm attempted to strategically puncture his suit and beneath his performance longsleeve are several mild puncture wounds that only serve as annoyances in the grand scheme of things.

“I’m the foolish one,” he states simply out of the blue. “Not you.” He doesn’t follow it up with a long-winded explanation or flourish, it’s as simple as he makes it. You only ever did what you thought was right, giving every living creature the benefit of the doubt. It landed you in a cell, parked in his garage, but god damn it. You gave life your all. You lived without regrets. Sukuna’s lifespan trumps yours, and yet he lives with every weight he’s ever conjured still boiling under his skin.

He’s spent over a hundred years building himself into an impenetrable wall. The kind of man that doesn’t let his past haunt him. Yet here you are, under his skin like a leech and wrapped around his mind with roots that dig straight for his hearts.

He’s so wrapped up in his thoughts that he doesn’t feel your hand at first, as it slips into his hair. He jolts when at last he feels movement against his head, whipping up to face you. He meets your eyes from barely over the bed, heavily hooded as you regard him with a small smile in spite of yourself.

His shoulders fall as he approaches the side of the bed again, resting his head atop his arms. His lips press into a thin line as he doesn’t just let you reach back out, but leans into your touch against his cheek.

“You know,” you rasp, unsurprisingly coughing. “I was wrong about Kerm, but I wasn’t–” another cough, “wrong about you.”

His brow furrows, a deep scowl overtaking his features. Your words sound startlingly like the kind of thing that one might say when they’re coming to terms with the decisions they made in life, further wrenching his hearts.

“Thanks for trying to help Earth.”

He growls and clicks his displeasure with your words, earning a laugh that feels warm even in sickness. When you quiet down, his muttering is nearly unintelligible. “I don’t care about Earth.”

“I know,” you smile, your thumb trailing down his cheek as one lower eye flutters shut. “I like you too, Sukuna.”

He allows himself the peace of shutting his eyes, kneeling beside your bed with his cheek in your hand until his legs go numb and you pass out again. Pain spikes through his knees when he finally rises and straightens them, sighing as he wearily looks over his experiments again. His gaze passes over a hologram displaying one of his cells idly standing by as he considers what the hell he could possibly be doing wrong when something finally hits him like the full force of a jet engine as something dangerous surges into his chest– hope.

His cells are part of a system. A system capable of sending electromagnetic pulses like thoughts to his cells in order to trigger mutation. Sure, the cells will mutate on their own no matter what you put them through, but could the reason they aren’t accepting your cells be because there’s no system to indicate to his cells that there’s an issue?

He’s been approaching the whole situation under the lens of his cells being anti-pathogens, when in fact they’re closer to mutagens. They aren’t a cure, they would never be accepted as a cure. In fact, he’s willing to wager a bet that you’re right and there is a cure that could be pulled from the Kerm, but he doesn’t have the time to figure that out.

His cells could very well re-write your DNA. They could overwrite important information, they could make you more sick. He doesn’t know. His experiments will never work without a live test subject. But on the flip side, they could save you. They could mutate your cells into something capable of handling Alveolarium. Quite frankly, when both alternatives are death, he’s willing to give it a shot.

He moves across the room quickly, hitting a dial that brings to life a hologram in order to act as a whiteboard. He takes your weight and general body size, measuring the exact quantity of his cells that would need to be injected in order to fight a full system infection without the dose being lethal, or possibly mutating beyond control. Gene therapy is a risky move by all means, but he doesn’t have any other options.

He moves through the lab with ease as he extracts a new sample from his lower arm, moving it in a box to ensure his cells aren’t contaminated. He isolates the cells necessary at a dosage he prays is non-lethal and injects them into a sample of healthy stem cells you provided before you got sick to act as carriers.

With a final check of his calculations, he moves to your bedside, praying the healthy cells trick your body into accepting his cells. Sucking in a breath, he injects the gene therapy, and pulls up a chair to wait.

There’s nothing ceremonious about the wait. Sukuna busies himself by continuing to search for a cure, something you can send to Earth assuming he didn’t rip through the return vessels in his effort to get to you. After every pair of gloves he tosses aside, he always returns to the same chair to wait, resting his head on the edge of your bed.

On the second day when he wakes up with his hair glued to his forehead by sweat and drool dripping down his cheek, he moves to wipe it when he finds his head weighed down. He blinks, unable to see past the arms crossed under his cheek, but when he lifts his gaze just slightly, he finds you’ve shifted for the first time in days. Your hand is settled on the back of his head, fingers curled into his hair.

When he tries to tilt his head, your hand falls away again. You’re still asleep, but the hope in his chest surges.

Your face fills out properly over the next couple of days. He seems to miss your waking hours whenever they do happen on his horribly varied sleep schedule, but your coughing fits begin to die down and your breathing evens out.

It’s almost a week later when you wake up with an ache in your muscles like no other, but relief in your chest. The ceiling should be unfamiliar, but even within your fever dreams, you knew glimpses of him were real. Your head lolls to the side, the bedding beneath you rough in spite of its conformity to your body. Across the room, Sukuna moves around the ship in a frantic bout of quick movements. There’s a crudeness to his movements that doesn’t fit the put-together Simurian you’ve come to know. You catch a glance of the side of his face, noting the dark circles under two eyes that rest in a familiar fashion on his face, while those that sit angled along flesh are simply squinting more than usual.

He yawns, betraying the obvious. There’s a slight tremor to his hand as he uses a pipette to transfer cells. He sets a phial down, his lower arms heavily leaning over his work table. It’s obvious weariness plagues him to his marrow, but he doesn’t stop for a second.

“Sukuna?”

Crash!

In the flurry of his limbs leaving the table as he whips around, he sends an empty flask to the floor. Not a single one of his eyes shifts to follow the mess, frantically flickering around your face as he searches for signs of illness. Rather than the dull look he’s faced for the past week, he finds a gleam that he mentally pockets for later. He moves towards you in slow, lumbering steps like he doesn’t quite believe what he’s seeing, before lowering down to a kneel. His skin is deeply calloused, far denser than human skin, as his hands come to rest on your cheeks.

You find yourself biting back a smile as the stoic alien you’ve come to know keeps his intense gaze on you as he nuzzles his nose against you. You may not know Simurian, but you know animals. In some species, that’s a kiss.

“Sukuna?”

He hums.

“Was that a kiss?”

His lips press into a line, nudging his nose slightly against yours again like action is easier than a reply.

“Humans kiss with their lips,” you explain softly.

He doesn’t move immediately, his face a breadth from yours. Something cocky and knowing gleams within his gaze. A laugh bubbles from within your chest but it comes out as a cough, which you attempt to stifle, pulling back momentarily. Sukuna drags you back like he can’t stand the mere thought of distance.

Your laughter subsides quickly as you try hard not to grin.

The stoic Simurian’s breath comes out in an eager puff against your face. “Lips are usually for other things,” he offers with a suggestive tone. But he doesn’t know how to deny you anymore. The corner of his lips quirk up as he surges forward, engulfing you in a claiming kiss. You don’t know what exactly a kiss means for a thousand-year-old being that spends their life with one person when you only live a fraction of his lifespan, but in spite of that you don’t think you mind finding out.

Everything about the kiss is all-encompassing. His smell floods your senses first, the sort of sterile musk that comes with a man working himself to the bone in a lab. His taste doesn’t match it, though. There’s a spice to his taste that isn’t Earthly in nature, but it’s pleasant like a warm herbal tea. It’s intoxicating and addicting all the same, the kind of taste you could get drunk on, should he let you.

His grip doesn’t let up, hands sliding up the base of your scalp as he tips your head back to deepen the kiss. Your hands fly up to his collar, curling into the thick material of his muscle-tight shirt for purchase. It’s dizzying, and not just because your head is spinning with the sheer amount of thoughts bouncing around your overactive mind like ping pong balls. His lips move against yours in the kind of rhythm that doesn’t just insinuate passion, but something far deeper. A desperation that can only be conveyed through actions.

You can sense his resistance as you pull back, but you find yourself laughing as your hands splay across his broad chest. “Sukuna,” you tease. “I’m feeling better, but you still need to give my lungs a break.” You laugh airily, chest rising and falling heavily as he refuses to break contact.

The lumbering giant’s shoulders tense for a moment, then relax, his hands gliding down the column of your neck to rest on your shoulders. He takes the opportunity to envelop you in all four arms, grateful to find you’re no longer shivering. You don’t hesitate for even a moment, arms snaking around his neck as you bury your face into his neck.

“How’d you do it?”

He inhales, letting out a breath of relief as he relaxes into your grip in spite of his awkward hunched position over your bedside. “My cells aren’t like yours. They react to neural oscillations and signals sent through electromagnetism. We were trying to use them like anti-pathogens, but they aren’t.”

“They’re mutagens,” you finish the thought in an excited burst, pulling back to face him with those wonder-filled wide eyes he’s come to adore. “You did gene therapy.”

He chuffs proudly, puffing out his chest under your hands. It’s somehow far more endearing up close.

“Wait, oh my god–” You proclaim suddenly like you’ve come to the greatest realization on earth. “Do you think that means I can breathe sulfur? Or– Or maybe I can grow extra arms,” you murmur, wiggling your fingers over his chest.

His expression deadpans. “No.”

“But if you changed my DNA with alien DNA–”

“That’s–” He breathes out a sigh, amused with your overactive imagination and how fast your mouth moves before your mind can catch up. “That’s not how gene therapy works.”

“Bummer,” you pout. It’s clear the word perplexes him as he narrows his eyes, but he cracks a hint of a smile. He gets it regardless.

You let the moment hang, laughing airily as the reality of your last two weeks truly hits you. Sukuna doesn’t handle the situation with the same lightness as you do, pulling you back into his chest and muffling your laughter altogether. You wrap your arms around his torso once more in reassurance. “I’m still here,” you promise.

“Stupid human,” he mutters, his chin dipping over your shoulder as he locks you tightly against him with a squeeze. When you bury your face into his broad chest, he winces, hiding it behind another squeeze as he attempts to ignore the meager injuries left behind by the Kerm. “Stupid, weak human.”

“I know,” you murmur into his chest. “I know. But I’m here now.”

–

The difference between Human and Simurian traditions turns out to be greater than you think. Not in the sort of grand way you might expect, but in the sense that Sukuna doesn’t quite seem to know what to make of being close. Of course, Humanity aims to choose a person for life, but not without trial and error. For Simurians, there’s some sort of instinct. Something Humans don’t possess that has Sukuna uncertain how to navigate the idea of courting you. In particular, while you’re still recovering.

Your pulse increases to a steady waking beat as your lashes flutter open. You’ve gotten accustomed to the strange way the stone bed conforms to your shape, but you have yet to grow accustomed to the way you’re greeted every morning, even a week into your recovery where– by and large– you just have a cough.

You’ve barely roused when Sukuna’s hand is firmly planted on your jaw, tilting your head left and right. “Nngh, Sukuna,” you sigh, fingers wrapping around his wrist. He doesn’t budge, not satisfied until he’s determined that you’re still on a steady road to recovery. His fingers loosen once he lets out a steady breath, his palm sliding down to your cheek. He doesn’t hesitate for so much as a moment to lower himself to his knees and brush his nose against yours. The Simurian nuzzle is something you’ve grown fond to waking up to and even in your half-asleep state, you find yourself unable to hold back a grin.

“You haven’t coughed yet.”

“I just woke up,” you reply groggily, amused.

“You’re better.”

“Getting there,” you chide, staring down at the mountain of a man on his knees for you. Every morning gets easier, and every morning you have a menacing-looking puppy greeting you at your bedside. It makes recovery easier, especially when you’re forced to eat some sort of alien vegetables he cultivated for you upon converting his compost room to a garden as the only food your body won’t reject, alongside nutrients he continues to inject into your bloodstream.

Slowly pushing up to a sitting position, you suppress a cough that comes across as a personal affront to the bulky alien, who stands upright with you. “How did the experiment from last night go?” You query, your vision still mildly blurry from sleep as you look over the holograms opposite you.

“We’re close,” he murmurs, long strides taking him across the room. “Your hypothesis was right. The Kerm cells react to heat, but not too much heat. I was killing them before.”

Rubbing your eyes, you smile. “So we’re close to a cure that we can send back?”

He pauses, facing you. He’d been unwilling to send his own cells back to the very people who sent you to your death, but at your request, he’d continued experimentation for a cure that didn’t require gene therapy. “I don’t understand why you care.”

“There were eight billion Humans, Sukuna.” Your head tilts in sympathy for the fact that he resents a whole species for their treatment of you. “The hundred or so involved in sending me here shouldn’t be responsible for punishing the rest of the species.”

“Punishing,” he repeats the word, though he doesn’t need an explanation when he can use context clues.

Pushing to your feet, you walk on weakened feet to join him, sidling up to his warmth. “You know, I never got the chance to thank you.”

Two eyes flicker down to you, questioning, while the other two evaluate the weakened state of your muscles.

“You’re breathing oxygen.”

“I am.”

“And you risked getting Alveolarium from me.”

He stubbornly looks up. “I did.”

If there’s one thing that remains the same between your species, it would seem it’s embarrassment. Sukuna is over one thousand years old with no partner. You can only assume he never found someone, or prefers solitude. Or, more aptly, preferred. It’s safe to say he doesn’t know how to navigate your healthy return to his life.

As you jovially grin at his side, Sukuna adjusts the temperatures of his experimentations, each by a fraction of a degree, before he turns to face you. The tension in his shoulders has released upon seeing you eagerly facing him with clasped hands. “Yes, human?”

“Can I see the rest of your ship?”

“Not until you’re well.”

“I’m literally fine!”

He crosses both pairs of arms over his built chest. “You coughed.”

“There was something in my throat,” you counter.

His lip curls in haughty frustration. He clicks with intermittent syllables that you’re unable to put together. Missing the word, he goes with the simplest train of thought. “No.”

Stepping towards him, your palms settle over his lower veiny forearms. Your thumbs rub small circles into his tough skin, the hair on his arms noticeably standing on-end. “Please? I promise I’m okay.” His eyes narrow a fraction. “I wanna see how you keep your food, and where you’re growing those turnip things. Oh–! And the bridge, and– Wait, your ship is so big, what else do you even have here? Do you–”

He huffs loudly, but you note that in spite of the scowl pulling his brow down, relief floods his gaze and his lips fluctuate wildly between a frown and smile. It doesn’t take much for him to give in, loosening an arm as he wraps it around your shoulders in an effort to steady you as he leads the way through the ship.

It’s massive beyond anything you could ever comprehend. Metals you’re not even positive exist on Earth line the walls and natural bioluminescent amoebas are used to light long stretches of hall where wasting energy is unnecessary. Light only exists where needed, like bathing a large medical bay with a missing bed and several bottles and boxes thrown astray as though the room was flipped upside down in search of supplies. Your heart surges with something dangerous at the sight, as you know the stoic creature beside you– who doesn’t so much as bat an eye at the mess– did this for you. He tossed aside equipment and tore through supplies in order to keep you alive, who barely lives a fraction of his lifespan.

Hell, he’s almost twice your height and keeps walking at your unsteady and slow pace without so much as a peep. His hand shuffles from your shoulder to your back as he briefly points out a food hall complete with a garden and a large freezer for overgrowth and cured meats. There’s a pungent smell to the room befitting of what was once a compost bay.

“Is this what I’ve been eating?”

He chuffs, lifting a heavy arm to point at what you would otherwise describe as a radish. He states its name in his mother tongue, not bothering to translate given that the syllables thrown in between each click sound painfully like ‘engine’ and he’s heard you use that word before, so it simply doesn’t translate into a word you can both use. You nod your approval as he continues his tour with little fanfare, his hand gliding from your back to your elbow.

“I’m lucky,” he states, “they’re the only plant that will grow in oxygen from what I tried.”

Next, he leads the way through an exercise hall, a gravity converter, and a communications bay. His ship dwarfs yours in every possible way and it’s all intended for just one person. The real enigma, however, is the way his hand keeps shifting on you, like he isn’t quite sure what to do with himself now that he has you back and you’ve kissed.

“I didn’t think you’d be so awkward,” you blurt out without a care in the world, pleased as you tilt your head to find his expression narrowing just slightly.

“Awkward?” He searches for confirmation despite being able to put the context clues together.

“You keep moving your hand. Seven times now, Sukuna,” you tease, your grin widening.

“I’m guiding you,” he grumbles dismissively.

“I don’t need a hand to guide me through a ship. I’m a good follower.”

His gaze glides to the side, teeth gritting as he clicks his disapproval. “Noisy.”

Laughing, you give him a nudge that pulls his attention back. His usual aloof gaze briefly flickers across your face like he expects signs of sickness before fixing on your chiding grin. “You’re allowed to be nervous, Sukuna.”

“I’m not.” He growls out some sort of curse word in Simurian, continuing on the walk through the ship as he finds the explanation he needs. “I don’t know Human traditions. I don’t know how to move forward.”

You bite back a smile at the sweet admission. “Well, humans are a bit different.” You give him a thoughtful peek from beneath your lashes, catching the way it disengages the tension in his shoulders. “We try to stay partners for life, but we’re complicated. Emotions get in the way, people change–”

“You would separate from your partner in such a short life?” Sukuna sounds utterly shocked at the thought, his nose wrinkling as he stops dead in his tracks. He turns to face you, staring at you like he wants to shake the mere idea from existence by your shoulders.

“We try not to. But sometimes it’s inevitable.” You shrug. “Sometimes you fall out of love with the person you marry or date, or sometimes things change or distance gets in the way–”

“Then you talk about it. Or visit.” His voice comes out clipped with edge. You can’t tell whether he intends it to.

“Our transportation isn’t very advanced. The ship I was in,” you explain, pointing over your shoulder, “it’s the tenth one capable of space travel beyond our own moon.”

The brutish alien’s scowl lessens as something of far greater importance occurs to him suddenly. You allow the silence that stretches on as you recognize his troubled expression. He’s grappling with something he doesn’t know how to address. The ship stands by idly in the moment where Sukuna straightens, settling a pair of hands on his hips while the others cross over his chest. He doesn’t move as he speaks with a flat tone that almost conveys solemnity. “I can take you back. To Earth. Along with the cure, once it’s ready.”

Somewhere between the kiss, the illness, and the acceptance that your fate was to die, you forgot that there was another option. “What if I don’t want to?”

Sukuna’s gaze travels listlessly left and right. It’s clear this is something he’s considered. After all, imprisonment awaits you on Earth regardless of the cure. What point is there in returning? And yet, Simuria would be imprisonment in a roundabout way, too. You can’t breathe the sulfuric gas. He isn’t even confident in your ability to withstand the barometric pressure in one of the suits in his ship.

He doesn’t answer immediately, either pretending something caught his attention by tilting his second ear towards something, or genuinely listening to something. Regardless, he glances aside as he considers your question before proceeding to completely ignore your query. “How do Humans wed?” He mutters, as though the concept that he doesn’t know makes him mad.

“We date first,” you chuckle. “We impress one another. We go out and do fun things together. We give gifts and spend time being intimate. Like, cuddling and kissing. Oh–! And then if things are going well, one person presents the other with a ring with a pretty stone in the middle and if things are right, that person says yes and then they wed and there’s a big ceremony, and then both people get rings, and friends come visit, and–”

Sukuna bends down to your height, nudging your nose once, then kissing you. “What’s a ring?”

Giddily, you can’t help a giggle as he shuts you up without complaint of your noisiness, simply backtracking to the portion of your rambling he doesn’t understand. “It goes around your finger.” Instinctively reaching for his face, your finger traces along the edge of the protruding plate from his face. One of his eyes twitches, but he allows you to do so. “It signifies to humans that you’re in a committed relationship with another human.” Your finger traces the side of his face as he stays bent to your height. “Do Simurians have something like that?”

“Tattoos.”

Your eyes brighten. “Humans do that sometimes in place of wedding rings, too. Basically, you present one ring when you want to get married, and then when you do get married, you get matching tattoos around your fingers instead of matching rings. It’s actually really–”

He kisses you again, that familiar spice of tea flooding your senses pleasantly.

Undeterred, you inquire about Simurian traditions. “What about for you?”

“We simply… Know.”

You pout at the mere thought. “Like love at first sight?” You whisper eagerly.

He nudges your nose, growling his disapproval. “Instinct.” He straightens. “No rings. The date of the ceremony is decided based on when other Simurians are available.”

“Oh right, they’re like holidays.”

He chuffs.

“Were they always, though? You said… I mean, you–”

“There used to be over a thousand of us, yes.” He doesn’t bother skirting around the question. “No, we didn’t always do things this way. We used to be selective.” He sucks in a breath, pushing past the question with little fanfare. “The ceremony has a fire,” he states now that he has the word after some experimentation involving it, “and a ceremonial dance.”

“I can’t picture you dancing,” you giggle.

His eyes narrow. “I don’t. The dancers dance.”

“Of course, of course, my bad,” you grin.

“Then, we braid one anothers’ hair, and an elder tattoos us.”

You smile at the differing culture. “That sounds beautiful.” Your gaze slowly rises to his short, pushed back hair. “Your hair isn’t very long, though.”

“Our hair has to be long enough to braid before Simurians can be wed. Or in some cases, exceptions can be made.”

“So you’d have to grow it out?” When he chuffs, you tilt your head with a grin. “That’s kinda hot.”

Catching the compliment in your tone, Sukuna shifts, a rare smirk crossing his features as he tracks the way your hands rest on your hips.

“Are we talking like a braid in your whole hair or just a small portion?”

“A small portion.”

Your grin widens. “That’s kinda cute. You’d be like a Jedi apprentice! Only, I don’t think it’s fitting to call you an apprentice, you’re more like–”

“Human.” Sukuna’s chiding carries far less annoyance since your recovery. “I don’t know ‘Jedi’.”

“Oh–! Right, yeah, I guess you guys don’t have Star Wars. Well, at least you avoided the sequel trilogy,” you mutter more to yourself than him when he lets out a huff as you turn to explore his ship again. He no longer leads the way, allowing you to explore all on your own, only keeping a hand on you to ensure steadiness as though your dwindling cough might blow you over. At least, that’s what he would tell you if you asked why he insists on keeping a hand on you.

His ship is vast. It could be compared to several acreages where your ship is barely the equivalent of a small apartment. The size is staggering, and you begin to realize exactly what he meant when he said Simurians enjoy having large properties to themselves.

“So, do your instincts just like… line up with the other person?”

“Generally.”

“How do you tell one another that you’re in love?”

Sukuna is silent for so long that you stop at the precipice that leads down into a storage and whip around to face him. He’s scowling at you with that kind of look that has you realizing your bug-based brain has missed a very Human– or in this case, Simurian– social cue.

“We nuzzle.”

You purse your lips as you’re faced with an intensity that’s oddly sweet given the frown it’s accompanied by. It’s not like you haven’t figured out by now that Sukuna is fond of you, but the reality of Humanity and Simurians is that he’ll outlive you. You’ll be nothing more than a distant memory by the time his hair goes gray. Assuming it does that, anyway. That’s not even beginning to address the planetary differences, atmosphere issues and dietary needs amongst other things.

Or the fact that you’ve known him for only a few weeks. Unusual by Human standards to be in talks of marriage, but by Simurian standards, you suppose he’s implying he chose you already. As much as the very Human part of you wants to call him yours, the scientist in you knows only compatibility. He’s a Thorny Devil Stick Insect to your Isopod Cubaris. Everything about the situation is absurd and your brain and your heart are fighting for keeps– Sukuna, or the reality that you should return to Earth and let Sukuna find a Simurian that allows his instincts to kick in.

As you stare blankly at him with pursed lips, he steps closer into your space, examining the way you fiddle with the hem of the hoodie draped over your shoulders. His movement kicks you back into the present.

“O-oh–! The nose, uh– The nose thing? The kiss?”

He huffs, shockingly cross as he averts his gaze. “Yes, the nose thing.”

You swallow hard, the reality of your harshly pounding heart bringing to light every issue you’ve already gone over in your head in spite of the fact that you’ve spent so long craving the touch of this ten foot tall man you have no right to. “Sukuna, I barely live like a thirtieth of your life span.”

The noise he lets out is something between an affirmative chuff that he knows and a grumble of sorts. He lets the moment hang, unsure what to make of it before brushing it off with something too simple. “Instincts,” he grumbles, nearing you again as his face lowers to yours. Without knowledge of dates or Earthly traditions, the most he can do is press his lips to yours. There’s something pleading in it that melts every reservation your brain screams at you.

His lips are never soft, neither in texture nor movement. He’s a being that lumbers around and his strength is beyond obvious. You feel that, too, in the way he aims to claim you, should you let him. When he leaves the ball in your court, you press forward, wrapping your arms around his neck as the kiss deepens.

Your tongue slips against his lips like an invitation that he doesn’t hesitate to grasp as he takes charge again. He still tastes of something with an overall spicy tang that you can’t place, but it’s no less pleasant now than it was the first time. No longer weakened by illness, he takes the opportunity to lift your thighs with his lower arms while his upper arms support your torso as he hoists you up, straightening. His lower hands knead your thighs in what feels like a subconscious manner, thumbs gliding over the stretch marks and scars of a life not yet fully lived.

He stumbles towards the wall, caging you between him and it, the strange coarse texture of the metals that make up his ship cool against the spot where your hoodie’s ridden up. He presses in, his lips moving faster, his body pressed against yours so tightly that you can feel the fact that his stomach mouth is panting.

The things that does to your body should be studied. Just as you grip him tighter, fingers curling into fists in his hair, he pulls back with a strange rigidity to him. “You never– I can still bring you back. To Earth,” he offers through pants in a tone that doesn’t suit his usual clipped and formal one. The uncertainty swimming in his gaze is unbefitting of him.

“Wh–” You look around like someone might be around to share your incredulous stare. “You’re asking that now?”

He swallows hard, the movement betraying his embarrassment. Good to know he’s capable of that, truly. “I want to give you the option.”

“Is it greedy of me to ask for both?”

He tilts his head curiously, something of a clicking noise coming from deep within his throat as he places just enough distance between your faces to take in your expression.

“It would be nice to make sure the cure gets delivered to the right people when we get there,” you admit, “but I’d like to say bye to Shoko and my family.”

He sucks in a breath. “You lost ten years getting here. You would lose another ten returning, and–” his hands dig into your thighs, his shoulders tightening as he calculates distance based on where you identified the Milky Way in your many scientific discussions prior to your illness. “Seven more, at least, on the trip to Simuria.”

Your gaze falls. “Oh.” Leaning back against the cool wall that suddenly feels nice on the back of your head, your fingers curl into Sukuna’s multi-sleeved compression shirt. “So I’d be over fifty,” you murmur. It shakes you to your core, and you lean into Sukuna.

He adjusts his arms to embrace you, nuzzling his face into the crook of your shoulder. “I’m sorry.”

The silence that follows is a welcome one of mourning. You had accepted death sealed in a tin can in the void of space. You had accepted death faced with illness, grateful to have met such a wonderful otherworldly being. You had been satisfied knowing you fell for someone, even if it never came to fruition. It had all been enough.

Until Sukuna came barreling through the hull keeping you imprisoned, unwilling to let death be an option.

To say you fell harder would be an understatement. If the option ever presented itself, there was never a question what you would choose. There is no question what you’re choosing.

After an extended period of silence, you lift your head from Sukuna’s shoulder. “The pods aren’t too damaged to make it to Earth?”

He blinks a number of times, questioning your decision-making. “I didn’t damage them.”

“Then… As long as my friends and family know I made it to the cure, that’s enough.”

Slowly, Sukuna sets you back on the ground, a surprising amount of conflict in the way he runs his tongue over his teeth, casting his glance at the makeshift garden whose artificial sun has set.

The low bioluminescence of the hall light glows softly over his features as you watch his expression pull taut. “You don’t seem happy.”

“I am,” he argues, flashing you a glare as he mutters something under his breath in Simurian.

“Then what’s wrong?”

He sucks in a breath, stepping forward as he leans his massive form down to your height. “You’ll be stuck aboard this ship until I can figure out something better.”

“I could use a suit!” You offer gleefully. “Actually, that would be kinda cool if you think about it–” you begin, your mind wandering. “It’ll be kinda like all the movies and shows I watched growing up and then I can come back to my little– no, actually this place is huge– my huge ship, or I guess our huge ship–”

Sukuna doesn’t interrupt you for once, chuffing not in affirmation but amusement. There’s almost a purr to it as you prattle on about how every kid on Earth dreams of being an astronaut and here you are on an alien ship. He casts you a sidelong glance as you make commentary on the hot alien company you’ve found, sidling up to him with a grin as you compliment him.

“Hey, um– Do you wait until marriage?” You query with warmth in your cheeks, sending the conversation in a complete one-eighty.

“For what?”

“Sex.”

Sukuna’s jaw shifts as he regards the small being beside him. “Sex?”

“Um–” Your gaze averts as your cheeks warm further. “Like reproduc–” you pause when you narrowly catch his lip quirking up out of the corner of your eye. “You know what I mean. You’re fucking with me.” You face him with a deadpan expression.

The creature rumbles in amusement. “Noisy human,” he chides. “I’m not having sex with you here. My ship is meant for one. We don’t wait, but this is unsightly.”

“Oh, so now you have decorum?”

Using context clues to put together the meaning of your retort, he straightens. “When have I not?”

“You call me annoying all the time!”

“I call you noisy. And I’m right,” he puffs his chest out as he crosses his arms over his chest as he continues your little tour.

–

The long-awaited day comes far sooner than Sukuna could have imagined. After countless temperature adjustments and endless suggestions from you that may have had him rolling his eyes weeks ago, the fresh Kerm stem cells attack the infected Alveolar cells, curing them.

He straightens, watching the immediate reaction under the duress of an exact temperature, and replicates it once more. Then again. And again.

You’re already watching, on the edge of your seat as you set aside the roasted turnip you were eating. You both wait with bated breath as the fifth experiment comes out as a success.

“It worked,” you breathe, getting to your feet. “You did it.” Disbelief coats your tone, the dimmed lab lighting reflecting off of Sukuna’s gloves as he discards them and steps back, staring at all five successes.

“A cure,” he states. His disbelief is plain, but there’s something far greater woven within the way his fists ball up at his sides and his shoulders rise.

He failed once and his species suffered for it. Maybe it’s not Simuria, but Earth means something to you. And this time, he didn’t fail.

As control weaves itself back into his grasp, he stares down at his hands, sucking in a breath. Blinking as tears prick his waterline, he stays put so as to not reveal his vulnerability to you.

But you’re already bounding towards him, practically whipping yourself around his immovable form to hug him with unmatched ardor. “You did it!” Your whole body trembles with relief at the thought that just maybe Shoko is still out there, and this might save not just her, but your entire home. Your family.

With a sharp inhalation, Sukuna’s arms curl around you, lifting you effortlessly, as he hides his relief in your shoulder. “We did.”

But as you put together instructions for cell breeding and duplication and prepare the cure to be sent to Earth, so too comes the day Sukuna has been dreading.

Staring out the window after sending off the cure, you lean over the control panel, wide-eyed as the stars twinkle back at you. You whip around to face your companion, but your question is met with a solemnity you aren’t expecting. “What now? To Simuria?”

Sukuna’s lips are drawn into a frown. It’s not unbefitting of him, but the dullness of his cerise eyes tells another story.

The pieces fall into place with every ounce of tension in his musculature. The gleam in your eyes burns out like a solar system’s light at the realization that faces you. “You’re gonna destroy the planet.”

Two slanted eyes turn to face you, followed by the two more humanoid ones, his arms crossed over his chest as his heart pangs at your disappointment. He’ll never fault your compassion, but this is something he can’t let go.

“It’s a sacrifice,” he admits. “A few to save many.”

“I know they’re the cause of so much destruction but… do you have to? It feels… wrong. Even if they’re artificial.”

The alien’s voice is a low rumble. “You’re kind, little human. I like that.” The warmth in his compliment echoes over hard stone lining the interior of the bridge. “I flew over the planet’s surface while you recovered,” he explains as he stares down at the stark green gas buildup around the planet that’s been increasing the longer the ship sits just outside of orbit. “There are no other species on the planet. No flora, no fauna. Where there were cities, there are now ruins. Trees are shredded. There’s nothing left. If I leave them, they will evolve. Someday, they will escape, or another unsuspecting species will do what Simuria or Earth did.”

When he puts it like that, you can understand his reasoning. After two hundred years of searching for the Kerm, you can sympathize with his need to follow through.

“This decision doesn’t need to involve you. This would have happened regardless.”

You turn to face him with your arms around your middle, hugging yourself. “I know, but after letting that one go on Earth, I feel like I’m involved now.”

“You had no way of knowing. Then or now,” he excuses your action, something you’re grateful for, as much as you’ll always harbor that guilt and the vision of a creature tearing through a crew.

After a moment of silence as he allows you to grapple with reality, he moves towards the control panel, sliding his finger along a series of sensors as his ship turns to move further from the planet while more systems come to life as he prepares a laser.

The planet looks beautiful from a distance. Pinks and blues scatter the surface, while a gaseous blue-green surrounds the planet. You don’t doubt Sukuna told the truth, but your heart pangs to know that the gorgeous sight will dissipate in mere moments at the hands of someone you care for. Hell, maybe even at your hands, if you think too hard about it.

Guilt bubbles in the pit of your stomach as the whirring of Sukuna’s ship ramps up, a bright light beginning to form somewhere from the side of the bridge where you can’t see. The brutish alien glides his hand over a few sensors, pressing something with finality before returning to your side. His palm settles along your shoulder, pulling you into him as his chest rises and falls, his own guilt palpable in the air between you.

The whirring of the ship comes to a sharp halt, the laser’s light suddenly brighter than the sight of the sunlit planet itself. Sukuna’s grip on your shoulder tightens as he moves deftly, pulling you face-first into his chest and wrapping you tightly in all four arms to prevent you from seeing the blast. With one hand on the back of your head, he prevents you from turning your head.

Even in your peripherals, you see the light. You shut your eyes tight, Sukuna’s grip on you increasing as the blast goes off. Some part of you expects to hear something, forgetting that space is a vacuum, and you’re met with nothing. But nothing is worse. An entire species eradicated, and you’re met with nothing.

Sukuna’s heart pounds hard as he watches the planet splinter. His curse to live with, but never your burden to bear. He won’t let it be. He holds you tight until the planet’s remains are little more than debris floating every which way. You’re far enough away that whatever else was blasted into space isn’t visible, and for that, he’s grateful.

He holds you so long that he isn’t sure whether it’s for him, or for you.

“It’s done,” he murmurs, allowing you at last to look out over the wreckage as his ship’s whirring slowly winds down.

“They won’t hurt anyone else,” you murmur as your brow tents when you look over the wreckage of stone and crystal that floats where Methalon–as Sukuna referred to it– once was.

“Let’s hope that’s true,” he murmurs in return, his body hunching over as he drops his face to your head, eyes shutting tightly.

–

It’s a wonder you make it to Simuria at all. Not because of any extenuating circumstances, but because you have so many questions and queries and noisy impulses that Sukuna seems to perpetually scowl at you. On equal grounds, however, you catch him with a longing stare when you least expect it.

In the midst of a full explanation on the reproduction of Scorpions. When you’re desperately trying to yank a Simurian radish’s roots from the ground while it protests you, sweat dripping down your spine. Even when you’re sifting through the remnants of your belongings from Earth. He trails after you with nothing short of zealous loyalty.

When you arrive on Simuria, you’re trapped on the ship as you expected, only able to experience the planet from the bridge’s window. Still, it’s more than you ever could have hoped. Not unlike Methalon, Simuria is primarily crystalline in nature with petrified trees growing crooked from mountains. You’re able to expand your diet to more vegetables, supplementing your vitamins with injections that Sukuna is damn-near overbearing about.

“Sukuna, I can do it myself!” You try to insist as he nuzzles you, intermittent with kisses.

“It’s my job to take care of you,” he insists into your neck, nipping at the sensitive skin to distract you before pulling back to inject your daily supplement into your thigh while you’re distracted.

“You’re a menace!” You insist through giggles, and the injection becomes nothing more than an afterthought.

Still stoic, you see his warmth within that familiar four-eyed gaze. “You chose me without instincts,” he points out in a teasing manner, pride held within his straightened back. “Now come.”

Rolling your eyes at his shockingly witty retort as he gets too good at your language, you let him lead the way through the ship until you reach the exit door. You’ve only seen the planet’s surface through glass as he promised you an oxygen tank to withstand his atmosphere someday. It had been taking so long that you figured he ran into a snag, but as you stand at the bay and watch his hand glide along the sensors, you realize just how foolish you had been.

For the first time, the bay opens up and you find yourself instinctively trying to search for a way to protect yourself from the sulfur.

“Sukuna, I–”

“Give me your trust, ange.” He holds your bicep as you begin to back away, his gaze insistent.

Ange. The syllables that, intermittent with clicks and growls, make up the word ‘angel’ in Simurian, and french–the language of romance– and his favorite nickname for you. He had explained that when he takes you to meet the rest of his kind, it would be helpful for you to understand more of his language, and that if you paid attention to– and spoke– in only the syllables of the words, you would largely be able to communicate with his kind without issue. The clicks and growls come out of necessity of Simurians having broadly low voices and living in craters. The second ears and extra sounds in each word allow them to communicate from longer distances without the necessity for the syllables, but the same is true for communicating without the clicks. The syllables can also stand, mostly, on their own.

Your jaw tightens as you stop resisting his grip, allowing him to lead you through a small bay door where you’ve often seen him leave through the pressurized chamber. When he leads the way through it, there’s shockingly no change in barometric pressure. Or oxygen.

Off to the side of the ship where you aren’t able to see from the bridge, Sukuna has built out a massive domed biome with oxygen production within, allowing you to touch the surface for the first time. Your lips part as your feet scuff over the crystal-threaded dirt beneath your shoes.

You take small steps at first, glancing to the left where petrified trees protrude from a cliffside within the barrier of the biome, hanging over the mild seafoam that coastal waves leave behind. You tread towards the beach, your shoes sinking into the sand as you take in the smell of the salt water, your mouth still agape at how massive the space is.

To your right is a cavern that you know to be partially artificial, Sukuna’s home held within. You turn to face him, the shock of it all pinning you in place, when you’re met with another surprise.

He’s not down on his knees, but in his hand is a ring crafted from metal with a gorgeous off-pink crystal in the center, clearly carefully procured. It’s simultaneously gorgeous and obvious. The jewel matches his hair. It’s romantic, but it’s claiming too, something you’ve realized of Sukuna over the months that you’ve resided within his ship.

Your hand raises to cover your lips as you stare down at it. “Are you…?”

He runs a hand through his locks. “My hair’s not long enough yet for a ceremony,” he states, the strands falling through his fingers, “but I think your traditions are different.”

“I–” You breathe, staring down at the stone. It’s not like you didn’t know this would all happen in time, but to wrap your brain around being proposed to by an alien who made a barometric dome of oxygen for you is still a feat. Slowly, you reach for the gorgeous stone. “Yes. I’ll marry you.”

His brow scrunches as though there was no need for an answer and he already knew such a thing, but he hands the ring over regardless, watching as you slide it down your ring finger with a gorgeous grin.

“This is beautiful, Sukuna,” you breathe.

He chuffs pridefully, four palms finding their place along your body– two on your hips and two your waist. He doesn’t hesitate to pull you in, his fingers kneading your skin as he nuzzles you hard. His hooked nose rubs against yours before he dips down to kiss you passionately.

Given that kissing in its Simurian form is so different from Humanity’s version, it’s almost unfair just how good he is at it. Your body goes warm as you grip the Simurian robes he’s begun wearing now that he’s home.

Kisses with Sukuna are never slow and sweet. There’s intention behind every swipe of his tongue as he invades your mouth, pleasantly flooding your mouth not with the usual herbal tea you’ve come to expect, but something more minty, like there was thought behind this kiss that makes you smile into it.

He swallows your smile as he deepens the kiss, tilting your head up. There was a point where you were convinced you would die alone in the darkness of a welded ship without feeling the warmth of the sun on your skin again, and by some miracle, the very man who held your life in his hands now holds your heart instead.

When he pulls back, his thumb brushing your waist softly, he inhales, long and deep. “It isn’t Earth,” he concedes, a rare vulnerability within his baritone voice. “But I hope you’ll be happy here.”

Reaching for his cheeks, your thumb brushes the plating along the side of his face. “Sukuna, this is everything I could have hoped for.” You smile softly, turning around in his grip to stare out at the ocean as you shed your shoes and wriggle your toes in the sand, his hands never once leaving you. “I could live here for a lifetime.”

“Good,” his chest rumbles behind you as he chuckles, watching the tide swim ashore to your feet. “Because you very well might, ange.”

You grin up at him, wading further into the warm water. The planet is so much warmer than Earth due to the heavily gaseous atmosphere that the water isn’t cold like much of Earth’s oceans, pleasant around your ankles. “I’m kinda like Sandy Cheeks, if you think about it.”

“What?” Sukuna’s nose wrinkles, perplexed.

You laugh heartily, staring down at the stone around your finger. “Don’t worry about it.”

–

“Are you sure I look okay?”

“You,” your fiancé heartily purrs, “look like my dinner for tonight.”

The worst part is that you can see the maw on his stomach grinning from under his white robes.

You whack his arm softly, earning a playful chuff in reply as he looks you up and down, already mentally undressing you of the traditional Simurian wedding gown that Sukuna had an elder Simurian make for you, giving your measurements and no further details as he perplexed the poor elder on just who his bride-to-be might be.

The robes drape over your shoulders elegantly, the pale green accents of the off-white robes complimenting your traditional makeup. The sweet young (in Simurian years, anyway) woman doing your makeup and using traditional natural skin dyes hadn’t stopped gushing the entire time about Sukuna finding a mate, something you had picked up through broken understanding of their language.

You had even caught on that as it would turn out, he was the only Simurian adult who lacked a mate of those remaining.

“Have you picked out your tattoos yet?” She excitedly inquires, sure to slow her speech down so you can piece together what you can.

In extremely broken Simurian, you reply, “Yes! He chose design and I chose placement.”

She squeals in excitement, going on to tell you about how a Simurian named Dura recently took up tattooing, and you two would be his first wedding tattoos. There’s a certain solemnity in knowing that, with dwindling numbers, you very well may be his last, too.

Your nerves hit hard as you grow closer to emerging from Sukuna’s home where you’ve been prepping.

“If you’re still worried,” Sukuna offers as the young woman heads off to prepare herself for the ceremony, “just remember you and I are the only ones that can breathe oxygen. They’ll all be in suits.”

You’re pretty sure he just told you to picture them all in their underwear essentially, but it helps ease some nerves regardless.

“You’ve got a point,” you breathe out a sigh of relief before sucking in a breath. “Remind me how this goes again?”

Sukuna steps towards you, lowering himself to a knee to speak with you. His hand raises, his fingers gliding along your palm as he takes a moment to stare at your palms pressed together. To think that glass once separated you feels like another reality now. His gaze moves from your hands to your eyes as he intertwines your fingers. “You will wait in a tent by the beach as I am readied,” he explains, referring to his own traditional makeup that needs to be applied, his hair shaggy and a complete mess now that it’s much longer and ready to be braided. “Dabura is to wed us, as he’s my closest ally. He’ll come get you. There will be a ceremony with dancers and a large bonfire, then Dura will tattoo us.”

“And then?” You chew on your lower lip eagerly.

“Then,” he nears you, his fingers delicately brushing your robes. “The night is ours.”

You let out a breath, biting back a smile at the thought given that you had chosen to wait to have sex after all when it took so long to get you out of the ship.

“Are you nervous?” He gruffs, tilting your chin with a calloused hand.

“For the sex, or the wedding?”

“Either.”

It takes you a moment to consider the thought. “Yeah, I guess so. Both.”

“No one can understand your language. If you need something, just say so. I’ll be here the whole time.”

“You know, you never would have had me thinking you were so sweet when we first met.”

His brow twitches, his gaze averting. “I’m not.”

Stubborn.

“Noisy.”

Your eyes narrow. “Just curious, can you hear my thoughts?”

“No, why?”

“No reason.”

The night carries out as he promised. Seventy eight Simurians gather from far and wide, of tribes from a bygone era, of all ages and appearances. A fire is stoked and dancers do what you’re sure was once a much more elegant dance without the added bulk of spacesuits beneath traditional outfits.

The Simurians are kind to you, regardless of your broken ability to speak their language. They pick up on the occasional word in your language too, not unlike Sukuna.

Once the grand part of the ceremony is over, the rest of the Simurians take their seats on the beachside surrounding you and Sukuna as you both take small portions of your hair and braid them for one another. Your husband’s fingers are surprisingly deft, and upon finishing the braid, he gets the rest of his hair cut back down to his preferred length. Once the ceremony is complete, you’re met with cheers as Dabura declares you officially wed.

The horned alien is somehow more aloof than your husband, and the largely disinterested looks he shoots everyone you come to realize is his neutral. Were you not surrounded by far more boastful Simurians, you might even think they’re all like this.

Following the cheers of the ceremony, as things begin to quiet down, you’re approached by a Simurian with long, flowing white hair tucked into his spacesuit. He has a friendly look about him as he grins at you. “Dura,” he introduces himself, extending his hand.

Your brow raises at the realization he’s given you his name in your language, keen to the fact that your ability to speak is broken. Sukuna seems to respect that, taking a step back from the protective shadow he’s been all night with so many people so close to you, wary that someone might disprove his choice to wed a Human. You shake Dura’s hand in turn, offering your name as though he hasn’t been hearing it all night.

“Have you chosen a design?” He asks in his mother tongue.

He speaks slowly, allowing you to keep up. “Sukuna chose design, I chose– um–” your brow furrows as you attempt to place the syllables for the word in Simurian.

“Placement?” Dura steps in.

In a harsh tone, Sukuna steps forward, his lip curled into a snarl. “My wife is talking,” he snaps, the growls and clicks far more bitter than you’re used to hearing.

Dura’s hands raise. “I was just helping with words, Sukuna,” he smiles easily, waving the white flag before anything breaks out amongst the Simurians still lingering from the ceremony. “I wasn’t interrupting.”

You exchange a sympathetic glance with Dura, setting a hand on your husband’s arm. “It’s okay, Sukuna,” you murmur. “I just didn’t know the word, he was helping,” you agree.

Your husband’s shoulders fall slowly into something less aggressive, his gaze immovable as it glues itself to Dura. The tension between the two men is brief, before Sukuna gives into your sweet touch and softens, describing the design and placement to Dura. The white-haired man proceeds to prepare a table for you, sanitizing everything and pulling out what, by Earth’s standards, would be traditional handpoke tattoo materials.

Once ready, Sukuna goes first. The design is small, two zigzags mirroring one another with a simple tear in the center right where you chose– on the ring finger. He’s completely still throughout the process without any complaint, and you find yourself embarrassed when you wince at the first tap of the stone tool. Dura does what he can to distract you, attempting to speak with you– though at you is probably more apt given how broken your Simurian is. Still, you’re proud of yourself for your proficiency with the language and your ability to sit through the tattoo, which isn’t so bad once the first few punctures are through.

Once it’s complete, you hold your hand up to Sukuna’s, comparing the ink to one another with a bright smile before Dura bandages them. Your husband leans down to nuzzle and then kiss you, succinct but meaningful.

As the night winds down and the attendees begin to take their leave in ships of varying sizes, you sit by the entrance to your now-shared home with Sukuna. The stars twinkle overhead as you marvel at how different they are from Earth’s. In spite of everything, you stare out at the same vast expanse of space as your family back home does. You wish they could see that you got married. Pulling your knees to your chest, you rest your chin on them as you stare up at the sky, only able to wonder.

A bulky shadow leans over you after saying his goodbyes to Dabura and shutting the dome for the final time of the night. He blocks your view of the stars, pulling your attention to his ever-intense gaze. His chest rises and falls evenly as he regards you fondly. “I’m sure that was a lot.” Sukuna doesn’t often apologize, and you’re fairly sure it’s what he intends when he speaks.

“I liked meeting everyone,” you shake your head, relaxing as you lean back on your splayed palms. “I just wish my friends back home could see.”

“See how well the robes compliment you?” He comments in a smooth tone, although his expression remains unchanged.

You scoff, shaking your head. “The ring. The tattoo. That I’m married. Here, Simuria. All of it, really.”

Sukuna’s fond smirk fades as the moment hangs. The waves washing ashore have an ambient white noise that barely manages to hide his small sigh. “I’m sorry,” he starts, kneeling down to your level in an act that reminds you just how big he is. “But Humanity doesn’t deserve my ange.”

You let out a breath through your nose, offering a lopsided smile. “Thanks, baby.”

It took him a moment to get used to that nickname, but now he fondly chuffs. “But,” he tacks on, a little more chipper than you’re accustomed to. “I do have something for you, too.”

“For me? Is that something we were supposed to do?” You worry. “Oh god, I didn’t get you anything– I don’t even know what I would–”

“Always so noisy,” he jeers, growling out what you recognize as a Simurian word for ‘mouthy’ even as he offers his hand to help you to your feet.

“Hey!” You smack him playfully, earning a grin as he casts a glance at you, his gaze dipping down to the portion of your leg that protrudes from your robes as he helps you up.

He’s quiet as he leads the way into your shared home, strings of lights and domed bulbs decorating the walls at your request given that your then-fiancé lived largely in the dark aside from bioluminescence, much like his ship.

It seems to be the Simurian version of when men just put a chair and a TV in a room and call that decorating. Despite living in a cliffside, the rest of the house is well-decorated, just not well lit. It isn’t largely personal by any means, something you hope to change with art and photos, but at least you can say he does have furniture.

When you reach your bedroom, the most expansive room in the house, decorated with plants and a small bug-like creature you found within the dome that you’ve been studying– to Sukuna’s dismay– he reaches within a closet and pulls out a large box. Blinking as you stare down at what you recognize as a device, you slowly approach the box as he sets it atop the bed that you requested he make plush, rather than the conforming stone he was accustomed to. With a glide of his thumb, a hologram comes to light.

“What is it?” You ask your engineer husband, nothing immediately giving it away as the light displays nothing.

“Your species uses frequencies to speak from long distances on Earth, right?”

You straighten, staring at the brute in disbelief as he continues fiddling with the machine. “Sukuna, you didn’t.”

It’s all you can manage as you watch Sukuna fiddle with a dial, tapping his nail along the smooth surface of the machine as he makes calculations to figure out how many parsecs the signal will need to travel and at what speed in order to allow you to speak to your friend in real time. Once he’s finished fiddling with it, he turns back to you like this is just another day, handing you what, effectively, looks like an old phone hooked up to the box.

“You use numbers, right?” He chuffs for the latter portion of the sentence, completely ignoring your slack-jawed expression.

“I don’t– I can’t– You did all of this for–”

“Ange.” He chuffs, nuzzling your nose as he pulls you close. “Dial the number.”

A lump sits at the back of your throat, but no amount of swallowing will rid the feeling as you stare at your husband. Tears prick your eyes as slowly you find yourself needing to set the device down in shaky hands, curling into his chest as warm tears trail your cheeks. “You did this for me?” Your voice is hardly a whisper, frail in its delivery into his chest as your makeup inevitably stains his white robes.

“Obviously,” he clicks in his mother tongue, positive you know the meaning.

“You didn’t have to,” you sniffle, muffled. “I brought a bug into our room and I know you think I’m loud–”

“Human,” he growls, his voice clipped as he pulls back. The ceremonial red makeup streaking across his forehead and nose has smeared with the day’s activities, a sheen of sweat over his skin as he lowers himself to your height, holding your cheeks. “You are loud. You are noisy. And you are my wife. I want you to be those and more.”

“Even the bugs?”

A pair of eyes swivels across the room to the beetle-esque creature in a large glass enclosure. A grumble begins in his chest. “I’m less fond of those,” he admits. “But, yes.”

You smile. Lopsided, but genuine. “At least you’re honest.”

“Put in the number for your friend.”

Given that it’s not common to memorize numbers anymore, you’ve never been more grateful in your entire life that you actually know Shoko’s off the top of your head. Your fingers betray your disbelief by trembling as you turn back to the remote of sorts that he gave you, typing Shoko’s number with no regard for what time it might be. It rings once, twice, three times, and a final fourth before your friend picks up.

“Hello?”

Your voice breaks into something between a sob and a gasp the moment you hear her. She sounds older. There’s a rasp to her voice that betrays the weariness of her trade, but she also sounds well. Not sick. Alive. “Sho?” You breathe her nickname in sheer incredulity.

The shuffling on the other end is immediate, a flurry of static as you can practically imagine her flailing out of whatever chair or bed she was slumped over in. “You’re alive?” More static follows, a distraught shout for someone, then, frantically, “oh my god, I thought you were dead, or– I mean after the cure got here, I just had to assume you had taken the drug and I just– where are you? Can you facetime or something?”

It brings a smile to your face to hear your friend again, tears continuing to silently trail down your face in disbelief as tremors ripple through your muscles like waves. You laugh airily at just how much she sounds like you, her mouth at least ten steps ahead of her brain. Turning to Sukuna, you wipe your tears with the back of your hand. “Sukuna? Is there a way to connect to video?”

Standing idly behind you, his gaze lowers to the glimmer of fresh tear trails, his adam’s apple bobbing as he steps forward. He lowers himself to nuzzle your nose first, undoubtedly wiping tears along his own cheek, before fiddling with the box. “What frequency are your videos run on?”

Shoko is practically vibrating on the other end of the line. “Oh my god, who is that?”

“I don’t think Facetime uses frequencies, I think it’s on like… internet. Or LTE, or something.”

Sukuna hums, though he doesn’t seem confident.

“Google says two point four gHz to five gHz!” Shoko much more helpfully adds on the other side.

“Tell Google that helps,” he gruffs as he fiddles with frequencies until the blank hologram gains static.

There’s a brief silence on the other end as Shoko attempts to process how strange that sentence comes across to someone on Earth, but she doesn’t have time to question it when at last a video is displayed for each of you.

It’s clear when the video connects that life has been harsh in far different ways on each of you. Neither of you are the spry twenty-five year olds finishing up degrees and putting out papers that put you at the top of your fields at young ages. Smile lines adorn the corners of her mouth and her eyes have an ever-lidded look to them that only time and exhaustion could bring about. To your surprise, you recognize another acquaintance in the background in Utahime Iori, Shoko’s biggest crush at the time and a big rock on her ring finger.

A wide smile crosses your face and if she were right in front of you, you would surge forward to hug Shoko. Utahime, too.

Shoko’s gaze flicks around your surroundings as she holds up her phone. “Where the hell are you?” She queries as Sukuna rises from where he was fiddling with the long distance radio, popping into the frame behind you.

“Simuria. It’s gorgeous, and the people are so kind, you would love it here.”

“What’s on your face?”

“Oh–! Right, it’s ceremonial makeup,” you explain as you hold up your ring finger to display both your engagement ring and wedding tattoo. “I got married like two hours ago,” you giggle, bubbly.

The sight has your husband closing in on you, unable to stand so far apart when the very sound of your happiness draws him in like a moth to a flame.

With her jaw already on the floor at the revelation of your marriage, she can hardly contain her next question. “Who is that?” Shoko exclaims again, her image a blur as she nearly drops the phone at the sight of your husband.

“This,” you hold a hand out to the brutish alien, “is my husband. Sukuna, this is Shoko.”

It’s not often that Sukuna greets others in your mother tongue, so as he leans into frame, revealing four arms and four eyes, he simply waves at your gawking friend.

“Nice to meet you!” She starts, before it devolves into that scientific disbelief programmed into her brain. “He’s– I mean–” Shoko shakes her head incredulously as she attempts to make sense of the situation. “Aliens are real,” she mutters to herself. “Not just beetle things, either.”

“I feel like you’re really breezing over the four arms and eyes part here,” Utahime comments, surprisingly calm given the situation. You were never particularly close, but the way she evaluates you both seems to anchor your best friend. “Also hey,” she greets you by name with an easy smile. “We’re married too.”

Before you can even congratulate them as well, Shoko is already continuing, too many things to catch up on in too little time. “Honestly after CRM-12, nothing comes as much of a shock.” It comes as an observation more than any kind of blame as she evaluates your towering husband behind you. When he hums, you note that his more talkative personality may be reserved for you only.

“Congratulations, by the way! Wait– Sho, did the cure get there?”

“THE CURE!” She cries out suddenly. You grin through a laugh as everything hits you both at once, over ten years to catch up on. “Girl, yes. You saved– I don’t know, billions of people. And you didn’t even need to send any of those fuckass beetle things back. The company was pissed at first, but I swear they didn’t actually want a cure.”

“They still spread the cure out though, right?”

“They didn’t have a choice. One of the pods landed with NASA. We got lucky.”

“Thank god. I was worried about that.”

“Wait, speaking of beetles–” The hologram flashes and flutters as Shoko moves about the room, a clicking noise followed by something snapping and at last the camera faces her again. “Look!”

You stare in disbelief at the Stag Beetle on her fingers. Sukuna curiously leans forward.

“There’s no way in hell Spike survived this long.”

“Meet Spike Thirteen!” She grins as the stag’s antennae reach for her phone, its mandibles curiously snapping together.

Barking a laugh, you lean back into Sukuna’s warmth. Under the dim lighting of the strung up bulbs, he relaxes into your touch as he instinctively reaches for your waist. “Thirteen makes way more sense.”

Changing the subject again with so many things she wants to go over, Shoko sets Spike on her shoulder. “Are you able to come visit?”

You knew the question was inevitable. The one you were dreading hearing, for there’s no easy way to say it. “I can’t. We’re about seven years apart. I’d be almost sixty by the time we get home.”

There’s a brief somber silence, but it surprises you when Shoko smiles, genuine and kind. “Home.” She repeats the sentiment. “Never thought you’d find one. I think I’m okay with that, knowing that you found a home.”

Your vagabond tendencies make her sentiment make sense, and a tender smile graces your features as Sukuna’s remaining two hands find your hips, like he’s grounding himself in his own home. “Yeah. I hope you did, too.”

“Yeahh, Hime and I are doing pretty well,” she agrees, mirroring the sentiment that perhaps home can be unconventional. For you, an alien in a dome (and just one little bug in a tank), and for her, a person.

“Good. That makes me happy,” you murmur softly.

Shoko’s lips part and it’s clear she has further questions and ten years’ worth of stories to fill you in on, but she shuts them with a smile. “I should let you enjoy your wedding night.” She sits back, Utahime’s hand barely in frame as it rests on Shoko’s shoulder, opposite Spike Thirteen. “Can we talk again?”

You swivel towards Sukuna for confirmation. He shrugs. “I built it for you. Use it as you wish.”

Your hand finds his, threading your fingers through the thick ones resting on your waist. “Yeah, I’ll talk to you soon, Sho.”

“You too,” she can’t help her grin as the line cuts out.

Leaning back into Sukuna, you bask in the thrill of seeing your closest friend again. It doesn’t quite compare to your old dinner and ice cream outings where you claimed dessert was for your second stomach and nearly threw up when that proved to not be the case, but it’s more than you could ever have expected. The lumbering form of your husband leans down slowly, nuzzling your neck from behind. His hooked nose nudges your chin. “Happy, ange?”

“Than I ever thought I could be,” you murmur, tilting your head as you allow him access to the sensitive skin of your neck. There’s a level of harshness to just how much he grinds his face into your neck, earning a giggle as he pulls you closer with ease.

“My wife deserves nothing less.” His lower arms anchor you to his chest as his upper hands trail delicately along the green accents of your robe. One hand dips between your breasts, resting on the tie around your waist. In Simurian, he mutters, “may I make you mine?” against the warm skin of your neck.

A shiver runs stark up your spine as you nod. He sets the transmitter aside, effortlessly lifting you onto the plush of the bed.

“I don’t know how you ever had sex on those stone beds,” you comment breathily as Sukuna parts your legs with a knee.

“My skin is denser,” he replies between nips and licks at your skin. “You’re weak.”

“Yet you married me.”

“Weak and noisy.”

“Whatever you say,” you hum when his lower palms press your hips into the mattress, his torso slipping between your thighs. It comes as a shock when he’s wet on his abdomen and you’re damn sure you’re not the reason. You instinctively search for the cause to find his stomach maw must be drooling under his own robes, more emotive than your husband is himself.

Eager to feel him, your hands slip to the tie of his robes where he leans over you, pulling one end until they hang loosely from his shoulders, revealing a toothy smile along his stomach. The maw’s grin widens, his tongue slipping from within teeth so jagged one would almost think your husband were a predator, not that he eats rocks. Along with his drooling maw, you discover something far more debauched that you had yet to come across.

Simurians don’t typically wear undergarments during wedding ceremonies given that it’s typical to give oneself to the other following the ceremony, hence why the party left at a reasonable hour.

So why on Earth– or in this case, Simuria– does this man have two massive dicks?

“Why do you have two?” You query in bewilderment as he deftly unties your robes.

His expression twists as he lifts his gaze to you, searching for an explanation to your perplexity in the fact that–

“Why don’t you?”

“Why would I need two?”

He points to his two throbbing dicks, each with a black band around the base. “Two,” he states plainly.

“Yeah, I–” You chuckle at the absurdity of it all. “I see that you have two dicks, Sukuna.” Covering your face as you can’t help laughing, you shake your head from behind your palms. “But why?”

“Twice the pleasure,” he states, letting out a throaty noise that you recognize as Simurian for ‘duh’. “Where’s your second one?”

“I don’t– Humans don’t have a second one, Sukuna!”

He hums, something of a grumble. “We’ll make it work.”

Left staring straight through your husband as he moves on while you’re still caught up on him having two dicks, on top of the fact that he’s almost twice your size, he returns to his musings. His nose trails the length of your neck, nudging your robes aside and kissing along the red dyes used to mark you for the ceremony, leaving new marks in their place.

“Gorgeous,” he clicks and purrs in his mother tongue, slipping his hands beneath the ceremonial garments as he pulls your mind to the present. Slipping your arms from the sleeves, you let your hands run along the tattoos that wrap over his shoulders, reveling in the way his rough skin still seems to get a rise from your touch, goose bumps following your fingers’ trail. Ten feet of alien bulk and a tiny human still brings him to his knees.

You let out a gasp as drool from his stomach drips to your abdomen, trailing down to your thighs, warm and wet. If he wasn’t already obvious with how hard he is, his stomach mouth gives him away entirely.

“You’re soft,” he comments, the words slipping from his lips like an idle thought unintended to be spoken. A large tongue swipes from the bottom of your slit to your clit, the sensation sending shivers up your spine as you breathe in a soft gasp.

The room is already warm with the anticipation of arousal, the musky smell of the night’s earlier activities pungent around you. Your husband drinks in the way your back arches for him when he gets a taste of you, a languid pace to his movements as he crawls further over you in spite of his eagerness. Once he realizes he has something, he’s not quick to let it go. The size difference between you allows him to lap at your entrance with his second mouth while he delves his tongue between your lips. Your fingers curl into his shoulders as your nails leave stark half-moons in their wake.

When he adjusts the way in which he laps at your dripping pussy, the flat of his tongue puts pressure on your clit as you realize that his tongue has a mildly rough texture as though it’s intended for your pleasure. Your back arches once more, separating your kiss. One pair of hands drives your hips further into the mattress, while the other pair steadies your cheeks, allowing him to swallow your moans once more.

It’s downright euphoric the way he uses his tongue to work you to the edge so quickly. You want to chalk it up to being over ten years since you’ve felt this sensation, but the only thing to blame here is him. Not unlike your language, he’s learning your body. Fast.

“Hah- fuck–” You breathe when he finally lets up for air, his chest heaving as you cling to him for purchase. “Don’t stop, Kuna.”

His chest rumbles as he lowers himself to one pair of forearms, continuing to knead the plush of your hips with the other pair. His fingers run along the imperfections of your skin, committing each and every stretch mark, scar, and beauty mark to memory without so much as pulling his gaze from your expression.

He drags his massive tongue slower against your clit, the barbed texture pulling you closer and closer to the edge and leaving you breathless altogether. Blood roars in your ears as he slows his pace to keep you right where he wants you, crimson irises mere rings as his blown pupils watch whimpers pour from your slacked jaw.

“I like you like this,” he murmurs, his nose nudging your cheek where makeup has already smudged. “At my mercy and begging me not to stop.”

“That’s because you have a superiority complex,” you mutter even through the haze, still mouthy at the worst of times.

His tongue pulls back, your head lifting in disappointment just in time to watch his stomach maw nip at your inner thigh. You yelp, clinging tighter to his shoulders as you undoubtedly leave behind marks. “I like you noisy during sex, but not mouthy,” he coyly remarks.

“You’re such a–” You sharply gasp when his tongue returns to your clit with another long drawn out stripe up your slit.

“Don’t be smart,” he chides in Simurian, although he speaks so fast he’s positive you don’t catch it. Your head’s already in the clouds, thrown back into the mattress as you cling to him for purchase when at last he gives you what you want.

Adding to the pressure of his tongue, he finally throws you over the edge with shorter, faster licks. Stars encroach on your vision, your nails digging into his tough skin as he nuzzles your chin affectionately while your body twitches with each jolt of static to your abdomen that could damn well be slowing time and you would never know.

When your vision begins to even out, you shift against your husband, suddenly very aware of just how much drool and cum has collectively pooled between your thighs. Your movement rouses his attention as he lifts his head to inspect you. The bliss lighting up your features has his chest puffing out, that stupid prideful and boastful purr that you’ve grown fond of rumbling his chest.

Your lips part as you catch your breath, pulling him back into your shoulder. He doesn’t protest, nuzzling into you so hard you might think he wanted to live there.

“I love you too, Sukuna.”

He lifts his head, his slanted eyes curiously narrowing. “Is that how humans express partnership?”

You smile as he picks apart your traditions so scientifically. “It’s one way,” you murmur softly, tracing a finger along his cheek. His left eyes flutter shut, only opening when your nails rake through his hair.

He chuffs his approval, returning his attention at last to your body with kisses to your breasts. He shifts you up the bed, spreading your legs over his thighs as he sits between them. His cocks are heavy against your stomach, twitching, and equally slick with his own drool and your cum.

As he leans over you, kissing you once more with ease given his extra height. Two thick digits gather the mix of cum and drool, bringing it to his mouth. He runs his tongue along his lips, bringing his wet fingers down to your core. Regardless of species, he clearly knows better than to try sex without adequately working you open for him. You’re small and he has no intention of hurting his wife.

One finger eases in without any friction, the saliva coating it acting as a natural lubricant. The second is met with little resistance too, and he uses the opportunity to pump them slowly. He moves his fingers not like a human might, but as though he’s searching. Like he knows, biologically, that you derive pleasure from a specific point. And god, does he find it. Your hips buck for him as he locates your g-spot, a devious smirk curling on his lips. Your nails rake down his back with each slow pump of his fingers, your arms trembling as you cling to him.

A third finger swipes up the amalgamation of drool and cum and slowly he slips it in to the first knuckle. He watches your shoulders tense, allowing you to pull him closer until your chests are slick with one anothers’ sweat. Your walls don’t clamp so tightly around his fingers as you adjust and slowly, he slides the third one in to the knuckle.

The stretch of three fingers from your massive husband is immense as-is. You both know he isn’t fitting the second of his dicks in you, but he seems satisfied regardless as he watches your expression with blown pupils.

“Fuck, that feels good,” you breathe as he works you open slowly but surely, picking up the pace until he’s got you damn-near at the edge again.

He hums, pulling his fingers away with a wet squelch just as your nails dig into his skin. “Keep that feeling going for me, ange.”

When he lines himself up with you, a shudder rocks your body. He’s always been big. From this angle, he looks massive and his cocks are no different. The upper cock is heavy as it rests atop your abdomen, leaking pre-cum and coated in saliva all the same, both of you equally a mess. When he pushes in the tip, you suck in a breath, a hand flying to his chest to stop him from pressing in too quickly.

He hisses at how tight you are, the size difference more apparent than ever. Swallowing hard, all four eyes turn their attention to you. “Relax, baby,” he coos, his voice dropping an octave as he uses your preferred pet name for him on you. Anything to allow you to anchor yourself. His gruff attitude flips on a dime, with no intention of causing you anything but pleasure and the knowledge that it’s not only been a long time, but you aren’t the same species.

He wets his thumb with his mouth, bringing it down to your clit to massage small circles into it. Your lashes flutter, the muscles in your arms slackening as the pain of the stretch twists into ecstasy, searing and hot. His body runs so warm that the sensation of him stretching you open all the while warming you up is nothing short of heady and intoxicating. Slowly, he sinks in past the black band around his cock until he reaches the hilt, heavy balls resting against your ass.

Your walls convulse, still short of an orgasm but grappling with his size, until they finally let up and he shifts his hips slightly, testing how you react. You throw your head back in a searing moan as you grab his shoulders again, the kind that rips from straight in your chest and to your surprise, your husband groans in response. “Fuck, that’s it,” he gruffs with a pleasureful lilt to his tone. He’s only ever heard you curse twice, but it seems he got the gist of its meaning quickly.

He pulls out to the tip, his breath hot on your sweat-slicked chest, gliding back in swiftly, though he watches you carefully. When he’s met only with a louder moan and your hands raking down his back, he takes the opportunity to dive in.

His hips rock slow at first, speeding up as he chases both of your highs. He keeps one finger perpetually on your clit, moving in calculated circles in spite of the fact that his hips now snap into you. Moans, pants, and the sound of his balls slapping against your ass fill the air as the scent of sex fills the room. 

Your head is too hazy to look, but you’re fairly sure his stomach’s tongue is pleasuring his upper cock, if the feeling of pressure on your abdomen is anything to go off of. It’s like nothing you’ve ever experienced before, and just as his hands ball into fists in the sheets where they rest on either side of your head, both begin twitching. A heavy load of cum fills your pussy and coats your stomach all at once. He doesn’t stop once they begin jerking, chasing your orgasm and riding his own out.

The sensation of his cum filling you is enough to push you over the edge moments later like glass shattering as it rocks your body in ways you’ve never experienced before. You cling to him as your vision goes black, the world around you fading into an afterthought when all you can think of is your massive husband, hunched over and finally having stopped his movement. All four of his arms hold him upright and in one unsteady movement, he lowers himself to his forearms.

Both of your chests heave as you ride the highs, eyes lidded when he nuzzles the crown of your head. “I love you,” he murmurs into your hair, a hint of a question to the statement, as though he isn’t positive that he’s using it correctly.

Through pants, you chuckle at his uncertainty, lifting your hands from his back to the nape of his neck. “I love you too.”

He slowly pulls himself from within you, rolling to the side so as not to crush you. As you come back down, you give yourself a onceover, blinking at the mess along your stomach and thighs and coating the sheets.

“Sukuna, there’s drool everywhere.”

“That’s your fault,” he grumbles, eyes shut as he lays to your left.

“Literally how?”

With no words in your language for the matter, he replies in his mother tongue. “You feel too good.”

You can’t help a smile, but you do take the opportunity to turn and curl into him, coating him in every fluid you’ve shared.

“Mm,” he hums as you intertwine your legs, your head resting on his bicep. “You might be right.”

“Just a little bit.”

“I’ll clean us up,” he murmurs, leaning down to nuzzle the crown of your head. “Just give me one more moment of this.”

–

The tides are low as you sit with your bare feet in the wet sand. The water scarcely reaches your toes, coming up to your husband’s calves as he naps in the sun, a hat laid over his head. He stirs every so often as you read a Simurian romance novel with your legs thrown over him, the written text coming easier to you these days.

The couple in the novel are so young– relative to the species– that it has you feeling wistful for days long past.

“Sukuna?”

You know he’s awake, having recently adjusted his hat. His chest rises and falls in a content sigh before he chuffs.

“What will you do when I’m gone?” You wonder about your husband, a species that mates for life.

He moves lazily as he sits up, hunching over you to parse what you’re reading. When it isn’t of interest to him, he adjusts the hat back over his head to block the sun. “I’ll mourn you.” He stares out across the ocean of the dome he’s grown into a much larger space over the years. “But I’ll celebrate your life, too.”

The thought brings a smile to your face in spite of the somber tone of your conversation. “Will you take care of my bugs?”

“That’s what you’re worried about?”

You shrug. “Yeah, a little.”

He sighs. “Not the ones that sting. I don’t like them.” He wrinkles his nose at the thought of them. “But the rest, yes. I like the ones with extra legs.”

“Yeah, the tarantula-looking ones are pretty cool,” you agree, leaning back into his chest.

His gaze softens as he looks over your features. You’ve aged beautifully over the past several years of marriage, and he knows your reservations about the difference in your species’ lifespans, but he knows something else, too.

Your aging has slowed to a near-halt. At around forty in Human years, your body stopped showing the signs of age that you so often describe. He’s more than positive that you haven’t noticed, but every minute change in your features is something he categorizes mentally.

It was never on purpose, but by the will of some God, whether Human or Simurian, his injected cells have slowed your aging. He isn’t sure if he’s gained a lifetime with you, or simply a few more years, but he considers the action the sort of thing you might call star-crossed. Like the gene therapy that saved your life acted as a string of fate too, bonding you together not just for your life, but several Human lifetimes.

One pair of arms holds him up as he leans back on them, the other pair sliding around your waist as he pulls you closer, the feeling of your bare skin familiar and comforting to the lumbering man. His fingers curl into your skin as he watches you happily turn a page, content with his reply. His gaze lingers on the ink on your ring finger that matches his.

However many lifetimes it may be that you’re blessed with, he knows he’ll cherish each and every one.

☾⋆ a/n ; okay so i watched phm and between that, iron lung, and alien earth, i got alien sukuna brainworms. i didn't anticipate it being like 38k 💀 i hope you enjoyed though!! this one was a lot of fun and i'm proud of how it turned out. you may also notice a difference between the tumblr and ao3/wattpad versions of this fic which is because i found tumblr's post limit (1000 paragraphs) and had to do some quick combining/editing. forgive me for any strange pacing on this piece in the tumblr version <3 i also wanna take the time to thank you all for the patience while i deal with some medical issues, i promise my regular series should be coming back soon <33 ☾⋆ taglist ; @lilrosyhaven @tiny-mimi @grimm3r @yujisredkicks @knittybritty98 @sukunahs @saezzi @epicderpface @ynishalee @pandabiene5115 @silibiliballs @ane5e @feyrinnn @jkslvsnella @maomimii @megumuro @beereadzzz @sukunas-one-n-only-peach @beaniesayshi @ryomeowie @suguusatoo

writing, format, dividers & art © starmapz. do not repost, translate, or copy.

[mikaiswolfsbane]

the concept of a japanese anime character using the pet name 'ma' will never not be funny to me😭

[torupng]

GIRL’S FUN .ᐟ

゛★ kirara hoshi is your best friend… with benefits.

headcanons .ᐟ ⋆ uni au ⋆ wlw ⋆ kirara has a dick ⋆ fingering ⋆ p in v ⋆ nsfw | mdni 18+ ⋆ art by @ teethink.

bfwb!kirara hoshi texts you after class almost every day just to come over and make out. she’ll let herself in with the key she has to your dorm and straddle your lap, her lips crashing onto yours instantly while her hands skim your waist and inch upwards, brushing the underside of your breasts as her tongue slips into your mouth.

bfwb!kirara hoshi who makes you do her uni work and assignments while she sits for hours in front of your mirror trying out new makeup looks she finds on pinterest. she has a whole board of flashy and colorful looks she wants to test. she’s never been the academic type, and you’ve always been the studious one, so she knew you’d be down to help her.

bfwb!kirara hoshi rewards you for your hard work after she finishes her makeover by finger-fucking the hell out of you until you’re a shivering, whining, aching mess under her. she loves how needy you get for her when she touches you just right. she’ll stuff two slender fingers inside, pumping and curling them deep until you’re begging her to let you cum. “my pretty girl wants to cum, does she?” she’ll tease, kissing you with her fresh lipstick on. “cum on my fingers. you earned it for working so hard.”

bfwb!kirara hoshi loves doing your makeup. she’ll sit on your lap, thighs on either side of your legs with her palette laid out on the bed next to you. and when she’s done she snaps so many pictures of you and her, adding them to the album she has dedicated to you on her phone. it’s filled with pictures of the two of you—some family-friendly and some definitely not. after she’s done with your makeup, she’ll pull your panties off and bury her face between your legs, her tongue working you over until your tears ruin the makeup she just put on you.

bfwb!kirara hoshi who comes over just to stay the night and cuddle with you. she loves burying her face in your neck or your chest, one leg thrown over yours while she plays with your hair, fingers twirling your strands around them until she’s out cold.

bfwb!kirara hoshi who doesn’t do it often, but sometimes she’ll fuck you for real. her cock sliding through your soaked folds—back and forth, up and down—until you’re dripping, and then she’ll slip inside, letting out a soft moan. she leans down to press her lips to yours while her hips thrust into you slowly and deeply, her cock hitting all your sweet spots as she murmurs things like “you like that, hm?” and “it feels so good inside you, my pretty girl.”

bfwb!kirara hoshi who always makes sure you cum before she does. she’ll hold back just enough for you—those slow thrusts driving you over the edge until you’re spasming and twitching around her dick, nails digging into her back. then she’ll pull out and grind herself against your folds until she finishes too. she’ll collapse onto you, sighing and breathing heavily. “fuck, that was really nice…” she’ll mumble before falling asleep right there on top of you.

bfwb!kirara hoshi who’s always dragging you out shopping. she’ll spend hours in stores trying clothes on and making you help her decide what to buy and what to pass on. even though she’s more than capable of picking out her own stuff, she just wants you there because she loves your company and craves your approval on everything she gets.

bfwb!kirara hoshi who starts catching feelings because maybe she isn’t built for the whole “no strings attached” thing. she doesn’t confess—she’s too unsure for that. what if you don’t feel the same? or worse, what if saying it out loud makes things weird and she loses you as both a best friend and a fuckbuddy. so instead she just buries her feelings and pretends they don’t exist.

bfwb!kirara hoshi whose liking for you starts bleeding through in more ways than one. she wants to be around you more. gets needier when you’re having sex, pulling you tight against her and whispers the sweetest, most intimate things in your ear. when you’re done she cuddles you even closer than before, asks if she can spend the night—and who are you to ever say no to her?

bfwb!kirara hoshi who loves, more than ever, having her tits played with. seeing you grope and tease them gets her harder than anything. she loves when your nails flick and tease her pretty nipples, when you take them in your mouth and suck while she’s sitting in your lap. the way your tongue feels so warm and attentive. her fingers tighten in your hair and she presses her chest harder against your mouth.

bfwb!kirara hoshi who one day lets it slip that she likes you. it happens so stupidly while you’re just chatting about whatever. she gets flustered immediately, tries to take it back, but before she can even finish, your lips are on hers and your hands are wrapping around her waist as you pull her down onto the bed. after that, she lets you take the lead, doing whatever you want to her. “fuck, I was so worried—” she’d whimper, breathing heavily. “I thought I fucked it up.”

bfwb!kirara hoshi who ends up being the sweetest, most loving and attentive girlfriend you’ve ever had. she loves you so much and she makes no secret of it—she gets jealous, she gets needy, she gets clingy, she gets insecure—but that’s what makes her who she is and you love every part of her.

© nagumolvr | all rights reserved.

[purpleorchidprincess]

The Healer and The Brute: Apothecary reader x Heian Sukuna

·༻𐫱 In which an adopted apothecary has to help the vicious emperor due to his... 'medical complication'...

wc: 7.8k

Includes:

Dominant reader (she's extreme, but she could be worse) and submissive (sexually) Sukuna (ooc because he would never be like this, but a girl can imagine)

The reader has a loving mother from whom she gets her sass. (I, <3 her mom)

Reader is whimsy and loves nature.

Kinda crack-ish (?)

I hope I wrote the dominant reader correctly because I don't match her by ANY means.

Not proofread, sorry </3

Smut: Cunnilingus, handjob, mutual masturbation, use of 'good boy,' Sukuna whining, Sukuna has two tongues, fingering, reader is on the cream team, blood warning... (only a few lines), impact play, spit & cum play, teasing, edging. A lil nasty :)

The birds tweeted at the crack of dawn. The sun peaked above the horizon, rising slowly yet gradually. 

The windy air was dewy and slightly humid. The air tickled your body, stirring you out of your sleep. Your shoji door was cracked open enough to let you see the weeping petals of the ornate cherry blossom tree. 

You lived in a small but comfy shack about an hour's walk from the bustling capital city, where the main palace was. The area near you was deserted, but there was plenty of foliage nearby to keep you company.

The animals also frequented your yards for little treats when they felt like it. You came to know some of them personally, and they became your little pets. 

You enjoyed the city, yes, but you also enjoyed your tranquil little slice of heaven in the middle of nowhere. 

You rolled off the mat onto the floor to stretch a little before rising. You’d tidied your appearance for the day. 

You lathered homemade camellia oil into your skin to keep it moisturized. You took your hygiene most personally. 

You looked through your clothes and decided to put on a newly sewn robe that you’d made. You’d grown to be quite resourceful and crafty for a girl your age. 

You’d lived on your own for as long as you could remember. Your biological mother was apparently from another place besides the main city. She’d dropped you at an orphanage when you were 2. You hardly even remembered the woman. 

You bounced in and out of multiple orphanages as a child before finally being kicked out and relying on yourself from age 5 onward. 

You did everything you could to survive as a child, sometimes even resorting to minor crimes…

One day, a woman caught you attempting to steal a piece of her fruit wrapped in rope. She saw you immediately. She hit you repeatedly on the head with a fan violently. 

You cried out repeatedly for her to stop profusely, but instead, her free hand moved to pinch your ear viciously. 

“You insolent child! What business do you have trying to steal my fruit? Are you aware how much peaches of this quality cost?”

You place your hand atop your head, attempting to protect your head from damage. “I’m sorry, Miss! I was just hungry! I apologize, I swear.” 

A tear dropped from your cheek as your lip began to tremble. You really didn’t know what else to do. to get food. You couldn’t find a job at your age anyway. All you knew how to do was steal. 

“Where is your mother, child? Bring her to me now," the woman demanded, her tone sharp. 

Tears began to flow more; you’d have to be honest with the woman. Maybe she’d considered giving you food. 

“I am an orphan, Miss. My mother left me when I was a baby, and I was kicked out of the orphanage when I was about 5. I believe I am 6 now, Miss... I just wanted something to eat. I am sorry!” At this point, you’d reduced yourself to pleading while sitting on your knees. You hoped to beg her forgiveness, for your fear of being publicly chastised would kill you. 

The woman looked you up and down. Your hair was messy, and your skin was stained with the tan-colored dirt that sprawled along the road. Your outfit consisted of oversized rags tied together. You looked much lower in quality, even compared to those of the lowest class. 

The woman held out her hand to you. You stopped crying and just looked up to her, confused. You rubbed the tears off your face. 

“Pick yourself off the filthy floor this instant, child.” You hesitated to grab her hand, although it seemed like a nice gesture. She outstretched her hand forward sternly. “What are you waiting for? Let's go!”  

You hurriedly grabbed the woman's hand and waddled to your feet. The woman took a piece of fruit off the cloth and handed it to you. You began vigorously eating the fruit in anticipation. Peach juice splattered all over your face. You’d never tasted such flavorful and succulent fruit. This was definitely high-quality fruit, possibly even meant for those of noble birth.

“You're very well spoken for a 5-year-old, but we’ll have to teach you how to eat with some manners, won't we?” You were just so happy that you continued to eat the fruit with one hand. The woman enveloped your other hand so closely. Anyone would think you were her child. You two didn’t even look alike at all. 

The woman brought you into a house with multiple stories. At the bottom floor, it seemed to be a house full of courtesans. 

You curiously looked around to look at the beautiful women. They were truly breathtaking, with luxurious garments and ornate makeup all over. The atmosphere smelled of high-quality perfumes and oils. Men bustled all over, some arm in arm with the women. Others are taking their distance from the others, probably ones of higher status. 

You looked up at the woman curiously as she looked down at you. “This is not for you, child. You, my dear, are far too young and innocent.”

The woman picked you up and carried you up the stairs. Her hand softly pressed your head onto her shoulder. 

After what felt like two more flights, she put you down, letting you waddle on your own again. She then led you into an expansive room. 

The room was beautiful and luxurious. Silks were all over the room, and there was even a vanity with stocked beauty products. 

The woman put her goods down on one of the other desks before turning to you and discarding the peach pit in your stubby hands. 

“Undress, child. You will need to shower & bathe. You are far too dirty. It cannot be good for your health.” You did so, and the woman carried you into a bathroom to get the dirt off of you. She scrubbed your skin furiously, managing to rid you of all possible dirt that could have lingered. 

She then let you sit in the warm water at a private bathhouse, which was tranquil and peaceful. You’d never taken such a detailed bath in your life. You felt really clean. 

She calmly told a servant to fetch you some clothes from a nearby boutique. When you were done, the woman dried you with a towel and sat while the servant fetched your clothes and food. 

You happily swung your legs as she dried you off. Humming and singing to yourself. 

She stopped rubbing the towel for a second as her eyebrows furrowed. “Child, what is your name?” 

All you did was shake your head as she handed you a cracker to munch on. The orphanage didn’t really give you a name, they just ordered you around by 'you.' 

She stroked your cheek while looking at you critically. “Well, child, we shall call you…[y/n]. You are now under my care.” 

You nodded, a smile on your face as you just persisted in your nibbling on the cracker. With a filled mouth, you asked the woman, "What shall I call you?"

“You may call me Fuyuka or mother, perhaps." You smiled with closed eyes at the woman while you kicked your leg off the chair. 

“Ok, Mom!" Your mother continued to caress your face while smiling down at you.

Later on, the servant dropped the clothes off. The robe was extremely comforting. It had a silky texture that made your body feel smooth and luxurious. 

After that, the servant came back with a plate of wheat noodles paired with duck. On the side was more of that yummy fruit from before. You ran to the table and began grabbing the food with your hands to eat. 

Your mother came up next to you and struck your hands with her folded fan. “You will learn table manners! That is not the way for you to eat.” 

And from that day on, she took care of you like you were born from her. You’d learned later on that she was infertile and unable to bear children, so her finding you was like a saving grace. 

Your mother was quite wealthy. She owned multiple businesses & buildings, the main one being the brothel where you resided growing up. 

She gave you a high-class education with the best tutors. You grew up to be a business-savvy young woman. You also gained her keen characteristic of sass, although you were a lot more polite than she was. 

Mother was blunt and strict, especially when it came to business. She even taught you how to run your own. But you always knew business wasn’t your calling. You found your passion one day when you were dropping off some documents to one of your mother's businesses. 

She ran an apothecary shop a few blocks from the brothel. Of course, she was never there, but she employed everyone and ensured the stock. 

When your 10-year-old self went into the shop, it was empty, with the apothecary nowhere to be found. So while waiting, you took it upon yourself to look at some of the herbs… and maybe a few of the books… and maybe try to make something. 

When the older apothecary walked in with his cane, you were grinding some mint leaves to make a tea for liver support! 

“You must be Fuyuka’s child, she told me I’d be expecting you.” 

You turned around shyly, realizing you’d been caught doing what you shouldn’t have. “I'm sorry, sir! I shouldn’t have touched any of your stuff. I am deeply sorry!” 

You pleaded with the man while he just slowly laughed at you. You just stood there looking at the gentleman, wondering how he’d react. 

What you didn’t expect was for him to come up next to you and guide you into using a pestle and mortar. “Grind in a more circular motion, it’ll help quicken the process.” 

The old man looked into some jars behind you, and you continued to grind the leaves. His tip surprisingly worked well. 

He gathered some other ingredients for tea making. He’d taught you how to make 5 different variants of liver support tea that day. You swung your bag on your shoulder and walked away gleefully. 

When you arrived home, you’d made your mother and some of the courtesans sample every single tea, to which they obliged. Your mother did notice your very ambitious connection to the art of medicine making. 

She surprised you on your 11th birthday with a little shack an hour away, solely meant for growing herbs as you wished. The little shack was turned into renovated housing by age 15. Since you spent such a prolonged time growing herbs, your mother figured it was never too early for you to move in. She has been fantastic at making sure you are an independent young woman. 

The man at the apothecary had taught you everything you needed to know about medicines, medical situations, surgery, herbs, teas, and other important facts. When you turned 16, your teacher had died. While doing an autopsy, you confirmed that he had passed peacefully in his sleep from cardiac arrest, which gave you some solace. 

From that day on, your mother allowed you to take over as the general apothecary. Most people were shocked, but being extremely smart helped you a lot. Despite the lack of experience, you were a comparable, and maybe even a better, apothecary than your teacher was. 

You watered and checked on the herbs in your garden before getting ready to walk to the city. You took some plants you were low on so you could restock for the week. 

On the counter were leftovers of rice and trout that you had made the night before. You decided to eat it for some energy before beginning your walk. 

You then packed your bag with water, some tea for your mother, and herbs. You left, making sure to say goodbye to your house as per usual. 

The walk was long, but it was extremely scenic. Also quite good for picking up herbs and plants on the way. You managed to find some mugwort on your way there. 

You always wondered to yourself why some people didn’t want to enjoy the beauty of nature. Maybe if people weren’t so enthralled with things like vanity, they could find more value in what's natural rather than fake. 

An hour later, you arrived at your mother's house. You greeted some of the courtesans as per usual before heading upstairs. 

Your mother was sitting in her chair, drinking some tea while brushing out one of the younger servants' hair. She found that in her free time, she was quite good at styling hair. 

“Hello, my child.” You walked over to her and gave her a polite kiss on her cheek. “Morning, Mother." 

You pulled the tea out of your bag and left it on her vanity table. “Dried peach, monkfruit & goji berry tea. It's a new flavor I created.” She picked up the bag to get a whiff of the aroma from the tea. Her face relayed satisfaction. 

She caressed your cheek as always. “What shall I do with you, my gem? I hope no terrible man swoops you up, but of course, you're too smart to make such a foolish decision.” 

You smiled at her, moving your arms to engulf her in your embrace. “I shall be on my way, Mother. I have to open the shop for the day.” She bid you goodbye, and you started your walk to the shop. 

When you got in, you made sure to restock all herbs as well as extra ingredients you’d picked up along the way. You readied the prescriptions and typical medicines for the day. 

It was the middle of the day, and you’d already sold plenty of things. Over 100 people had already come in, but the rush had died down. Still, your tiredness persisted. You were just one girl, after all. 

You were reading a book when you noticed hushed whispers from the street beginning to bustle. People cleared the roads and opened a path, but what for? 

An ox-drawn carriage appeared in front of your shop. The carriage was large and decorated with gold and unique artistic moldings. The carriage must have carried those of extremely high status. 

2 women stepped out of the carriages and began walking toward you. Soldiers followed directly behind them. By their appearance, they must've been concubines, probably of imperial or honorable rank. 

You bowed down to the two women as an honorific. Wouldn’t want to get your head chopped off by Ryomen Sukuna. 

From what you heard about the man, he was quite an asshole. Slaughtering enemy villages, killing servants for small mistakes, and drafting men from his villages without even a care for their wives & daughters. Overall, he was a war criminal who deserved to burn in the lowest pits of hell for his terribly immoral acts. But of course, you'd never let your political ideas be known! You were just a 20-year-old girl who really cared about what you thought. For who knows how he’d torture you for ‘treasonous ideals.'  

One cocubine with long, blonde hair ran up to you and immediately grabbed your hands. The other with brown hair panicked as she ran after the woman, holding her back slightly. 

"Oh, how pleased I am to meet you! I’ve heard so much about you from servants and my counterparts. You are the most educated young lady, aren't you? Do you know what people call you? The queen of your craft—oh, I've never heard of young women of your age being so skilled. I wish I could be more like you—” 

Your face immediately warmed from the attention you received. The blonde woman was quite…energetic, to say the least. It overwhelmed you a little. You were used to calmness.

The woman with the brown hair slapped the girl lightly to cease her rambling. She smiled at you with an adorable closed-eye expression. “Hello, I'm Furi, and this is Hiina.” She pointed to the blonde woman who waved at you softly. 

“Pleased to meet you, Lady Furi and Lady Hiina.” You bowed again out of respect. 

“No need for such formalities. Hiina and I both know your name since we’ve heard so much. I bet we should just cut to the chase here. May we speak with you privately?” You nodded and led them to a more secluded area in the back. 

You prepared some dacha for them both and brought it to the table with block sugar. 

They both sipped the tea, and their faces were elated. “Furi! Furi! This is the best tea I've ever had!” 

Furi covered her face politely and giggled. “I suppose it is extremely good, Hiina.” Furi rested her hand on Hiina's lap softly, as if she meant to calm her down. 

Furi cleared her throat to gather attention. “We needed to come to quite an experienced apothecary. One of the ladies in waiting recommended you. See, we have quite the complex problem.” Furi whispered. 

This had to be a most critical issue if they, women, couldn’t even speak about the issues in front of their guards. Furi hesitated to speak, looking down as she fidgeted with her hands. “I cannot say it.” 

Spontaneously, Hiina screamed in a whisper. “Lord Sukuna's mass arises too frequently,& it becomes an issue for everyone! He is filled with anger and often begins to take it out on everyone! Sometimes even Uraume. It is terrible—” As Hiina spoke more, her voice began to rise to a higher volume. 

Furi slapped her hand across the woman's face to stop her rambling yet again. “Hinna!” The girl just whimpered as she felt the hand hit her face. 

You just sat in your chair, witnessing the two women arguing. You cut them off with the big issues that lingered in your head. “Excuse my language, but I thought the job of concubines was to ease the pleasure that he feels.” 

The two women paused as Furi cleared her throat. “As you’ve heard, Lord Sukuna can be quite…difficult, per se. Basically, he refuses to let any of his concubines please him. There are only 20 of us, 4 of whom are ranked in order of importance. I and Hiina being the top two.”

All this did was further your confusion. Hinna took a sip of her tea and slammed the china down in irritation. “He hates us all. It's not like any of us want to please him anyway. He already is terrifying enough. Imagine how much more scared we were when he showed us his two cocks!” The girl whimpered again in fear. 

“So do you guys know exactly why his, uhm… things are always erect?” The women both shook their heads side to side. 

“How often?” 

“Every day, all day. Even if he touches himself," said Furi. Your eyes popped open. That's highly concerning.

“Even the doctors can’t help,” Hinna whispered with her hand next to her mouth. 

“I am not sure what exactly the problem is, but I hypothesize that his testosterone is too high. I'll curate a blend of herbs and plants that will help lower the amount in his system. He may have to take it multiple times a day to decrease the issues. I’ll try working on a more frequent cure after I see how he reacts to the teas. I’ll get it made now.” 

You immediately got up to start curating the blend. You planned to make a spearmint-green tea blend with some licorice root. 3 minutes later, and it was done. 

You handed the women the tea, and they immediately rushed out, throwing coins on the table.  They must’ve been in quite a hurry.

“Thank you!” as the carriage moves on. 

Three days later. 

You heard the familiar clop of the ox's feet near you. You were trying a new perfume recipe, merging flowers, herbs, and cloves with a base of beeswax.

You added ground cloves with green tea and orchids. The aroma appeared to be quite delightful. Maybe even something you’d wear. 

It wasn’t until you turned around that you noticed the two women looming over your back. Startled, you scrambled to the floor. 

Furi gasped and moved to help you off the floor. “Oh my, we didn’t mean to startle you. We apologize.” Hinna just giggled lightly next to her before murmuring, 'Sorry.' 

Hinna leaned her face closer to the pot and just sniffed the air. “This smells amazing…is it perfume?" 

You nodded and looked down at the curious girl. “Yes, my lady. It's a new blend I came up with. How’d you know?” 

“My family runs a perfume business 3 hours away from here. Would you mind if I purchased a sample? You nodded and moved to get a jar. 

“Sure. But you’ll have to wait till it solidifies to use it.” The girl mmmhmed and pulled out some coins for you. 

As you packed the perfume, you had the two women sit down at a nearby table while they waited. A new, curious tea combination awaited them.

After packing, you’d settled down at the table with them. “So, what brings you back?” Furi pressed her lips together before clearing her throat as usual. Gosh, she must really need the damned tea. 

“Good news: the tea worked. His rampant rages have subsided…but…he drank all the tea in one day. The next day, it was back. We all fear he needs something stronger.” Kuri clasped her hands together, her face showing defeat. 

Hinna just silently nodded along before she explained the rest of the situation. “He’d questioned us mercilessly on where the tea was from, and we tried not to tell him, but his advisor, Uraume, tracked where our carriage had gone. The guards ended up splurging on things for you.” 

Kuri had moved closer to you and rested her hand on your knee. You looked up to her slowly as she blurted out, "His majesty requests your presence at the palace!” 

You looked at the girl and sighed. “Ok, that's not as bad as I expected.” The two women looked back and forth at each other, confused. 

“You’re not scared?” You shook your head. A big man with fluffy hair and four arms didn’t sound very intimidating to you. If anything, he reminded you of a butterfly, a very cruel one, though. 

“Well, we’ll let you get ready to close shop. We will be back here tomorrow at 10 in the morning, sharp. Please be on time, His Majesty is most particular about it.” The two women stood up and scurried out hurriedly as before.

What have you gotten yourself into? 

The next day

You walked upstairs to your mother's room and knocked on her door before sliding it open.

“My child!” She walked over to the room to greet you. Kisses and hugs as always. She adopted that from a French envoy who visits the brothel once a year. 

You hugged her back, finding comfort in her embrace. “Hello, Mother. I'm in quite a hurry. Sit down, won't you?" 

“Oh. Have you come down with some sickness?” She furrowed her eyebrows and pressed her palm to your head.

You grabbed her hand and led her to sit down. She picked up her glass of water and took a brisk sip. “I am fine, Mother. Well, kind of. I’ve been summoned to the palace by Lord Sukuna.” 

Your mother never shrieked so hard in her life. It was so loud that the majority of the first floor managed to spark some panic. She dropped the glass of water and fell to the floor. Her kimono was left slightly damp from the iced water. 

“MY CHILD! What on earth could that brutish man want with my innocent daughter? What have you gotten yourself into this time? Hot tears started to spill down her cheek. 

“Mother—” 

She clawed at the wooden floor, attempting to grip absolutely nothing. “Will I ever even see you again? You know he eats people like us? What if he makes you into a stew?” 

“Mother, please, the servants are watching—” 

The dramatic woman crawled onto her back. “I’d managed to get you out of that terrible selection process! Oh, how much effort it took. All that just for him to swoop up your beautiful innocence at a request.” She wailed as if she were a toddler. 

“Mother! I am being summoned because I made him medicine, not because he wants me as a cocubine.” She slowly rose from the floor with a quiet 'oh.'

She smoothed out her kimono and sat down, looking to regain her composure. She shot watchful eyes at the servants, and they immediately straightened their heads. “Well, in that case, be safe, and get back to me in one piece, daughter.” She snapped her fingers for tea, whispering a quiet ‘thank you’ to the servant. 

You got up and hugged her, making sure to place an extra kiss on her forehead. You ran off to the building with swiftness, making sure you weren't too late. 

You got there fully on time as the guards helped you into the carriage. Well, what next?

The carriage came to a stop after you reached deep into the inside area of the palace. You stepped out to be greeted by an androgynous figure with white and red hair. You bow as always. 

“Follow me," is all they say before turning around and leading you to an ornate building. “I am Uraume," is all they said after. They're the ones who got you dragged into this whole situation. Trust that they’ll reap what they sow. 

After a few minutes of confusing corridors and multiple sliding doors. You stop at a door bigger than all the others. You assumed this is where he was. Uraume just turned back to you with the same stoic expression. “Good luck.” They slid the door open and led you in. 

You walked in to see the miserable man. He was bigger than you expected, 7 feet tall at least. His fluffy pink hair was slightly disheveled, signaling his distress. His lower two arms rested near his sides. One of his upper arms held his face up with a fist while the other rested on the arm of his chair. 

His body was sculpted perfectly, his muscles were defined and carved smoothly. His arms, face, and body had neat jet-black markings all over. The hakama lay loosely and low around his waist. As you looked further down, his two cocks were obviously bulging against his pants with two thick, long silhouettes. 

His two piercing blood-red eyes found you walking toward him. His eyes lazily followed your body. 

You walked in and immediately folded into a symmetrical bow. You’d hold the stance until the man told you to do otherwise. “My lord.” 

“Stand straight.” You stood up immediately, your hands clasped in front of you. 

“You know what you're here for, yes?” You pursed your lips, shaking your head slowly. “Well, not exactly.” 

He slapped his fingertips along his forehead, looking down with dismay. "Foolish, stupid humans.” Big, brutish monster. 

“You are here to solve the issue with my cocks. That's all, make a cure and leave. In return, I spare your life.” Great, my time is being used to solve his damn penile issues. 

“You will have your private quarter and access to anything you need to help me.” You nodded quietly. The two of you stood in silence for a brief second. 

“What are you still standing here for, you idiot? Move along.” You exited the room, eager to get away from the overly hormonal man. 

You had one of the guards walk you to the quarters of Lady Hanni’s quarters. As you expected, Kuri was already there, attached to her side. 

You bowed to the women and then proceeded to sit down. There were some questions you had. "Hello, my ladies, I'm pleased to see you.” 

The two women smiled while drinking their tea. “Hanni and I are glad to see you. How have you been acclimating to the palace?” 

Hanni nodded in agreement, snuggling her head onto Kuris's shoulder. “I am doing quite well, thank you. I actually came because I have a few questions.” 

Kuri set her tea down and gave you that same usual closed-eye smile. "I'm glad we can help, ask away, my dear.” 

“Why is Lord Sukuna reluctant to have bed with any of his cocubines?” The two women's bodies immediately ceased movement. Their faces held visibly shocked expressions. You even heard the guards & ladies-in-waiting gasp behind you. 

Kuri sent a piercing glare at the ladies in waiting as well as the guards, prompting them to usher them out of the room quickly. 

Kuri cleared her throat and set her teacup down. “Well—it is quite the complicated situation.” Hanni raised her head from Kuris's shoulder. She was about to blow.

Words began to fly out of Hannis's mouth quicker than 24 fps. “No, it is not. Lord Sukuna really likes to be dominated in bed by women, and we're all too scared of him to even come close to him, so typically, he's left irritated and unfulfilled. His cock is also too large inside. What if he breaks us? I tried t—” 

Kuri’s striking hand flew down on Hannis's head, stopping her rambling speech. “Hanni, must you always speak out of bounds?” 

The girl rubbed her head soothingly while Kuris's face grew red and angry. “But, yes, Hanni’s words are true. He hates it when women tremble in fear. Sometimes I wonder how most people even fear him. He’s just a big toddler. Throwing a tantrum because women won't yell at him.” The woman ‘tsked’ and persisted in drinking her tea. 

You finally believe you came up with the correct cure. After days of trial and error, you noticed that when the concentration of spearmint was heightened, along with licorice root. The results became more long-lasting. You figured white peony would also have stronger results due to its ability to convert testosterone to estrogen. 

You hummed happily as you walked to the man's quarters. You’d finally be able to go home to your little cottage and your mom and your shop! 

You opened the door and bowed as usual before preparing the man's tea with the mix of leaves. He watched your bustling body move in disdain. His red eyes were focused enough to burn a hole into you. 

Any more movement from your disobedient ass and maybe he’d stick his c— 

You walked up to the man with the tea and forced him to drink it. Ten seconds later, he was writhing in pain in the chair. The man began to groan and squirm uncomfortably. 

“You bitch. What have you done to poison me, you foul temptress?" You looked down at his pants to see his cocks throbbing erratically in his pants. It was bulging and visibly twitching, even while covered. 

“I beg your pardon, my lord, but I have done absolutely nothing.” 

He rose from his chair. He was even struggling to walk. “You must've done something, my cock is inflating in size. It pains me.” All the help you've given him, sacrificing your business for what? 

"Respectfully, my lord, I have not done anything but give you a tea to decrease your male hormones.” 

He began to grip the arm of the chair so harshly that the wood cracked. “My hormones are fine. Maybe it's your incompetence that cannot solve my issues.” 

You crossed your arms while the disgust on your face grew. "You're supposed to be the most powerful being on earth, yet you cannot solve your own bodily issues.” 

“I am the most powerful being, so that means I have the power to summon you at a snap so that you can solve my bodily issues. So solve my issue this instant.” The goosebumps on your body rose while your patience lowered. 

Maybe if he’d stop being such a scared bitch, he’d resolve his issues. 

“I fear I may no longer be able to assist you, my lord. Maybe if you’d use one of your concubines to solve your issues, we wouldn't even be here! Respectfully, my lord.” 

He swung the table between you two with his foot against the wall in pure rage. “I do not desire to fuck any of those useless women. I will not waste my time on dotish human beings.”

You widened your eyes in shock. The man was a walking contradiction. “Useless? Yet you beg for women to degrade you. You desire to be degraded, yet you're trying to do it to me now.” 

“I have roamed this earth for years. I have never begged for anyone's presence." His fist balled in rage, and his body grew sweaty and red. 

You were not afraid of him, you stepped closer to him, defying all mannerly principles you’d been taught as a child. “Then why are you begging for my presence like a dog in heat?" 

The man's facial expression went soft, and all four of his eyes focused solely on you. “I shall have you beheaded for your insolence.” 

“No, you won't. Your desire for my body is stronger than any other, and I can practically smell it on you. If you want my help with your issues, you will need to solve the request on my behalf as well.” 

Sukuna breathed out so hard, you’d think steam would flow out of his nostrils. “You're not worth begging for.” 

You turned around on your heel and began to stomp off. You are no man's peace. “Stop walking.” 

“No.” His selfish pleas could never work. 

“Be still at once, woman.” His loud feet began to smack the ground as he walked toward you. 

You reached to open the door, but his tall stature loomed over your back. “If you will not, beg. I will not entertain your foolish words. My mother raised me to fear no man.” You pointed your finger at his chest, pushing a dent into his hardened chest. “You do not scare me, Sukuna.” 

“I am—I, I’m sorry,” he whispered, looking at the floor. For the first time, you’d seen the man avoid eye contact. 

His body went fully lax as you moved to reach your arm atop his shoulder. You pushed his big body down slowly as he fell to his knees. He grinds upon your foot needfully to try to relieve just a little bit of the agonizing desire he felt. 

“Good boy.” You unwrapped your kimonos, letting them fall to the ground slowly. He viciously threw it to the side of the room. He proceeded to rip your undergarments in half, making them fall to the ground. 

You slapped the man across his face. Printing a red handprint on his face. “I did not permit you to rip my clothes. You will make me a new one.” 

He nodded and ran his hand down your soft thigh. “I’ll get you a new one. I am so, so sorry.” 

You ran your hand through his hair, pulling his head back softly so all he saw was your torso and up. 

You pushed his head down so that his head sat in front of your damp underwear. “You are not permitted to touch me until I tell you to. You crazed beast.” 

He nudged his nose closer to your pussy. You could hear his muffled sniffs as his hands bore crescent-shaped marks into your thighs. He exerted so little force yet managed to pull you so much closer to him. 

You pulled his hair tighter. “I said, Do not touch me. You have to earn the privilege, my lord.” He silently 'mmm'-ed as he lowered his hands down your legs slowly. 

You turned around and walked toward his bed slowly. You turned around to see the man crawling toward you on his hands and knees before you crawled onto the bed yourself. 

You lie back and spread your legs open. You curled your fingers seductively, telling him, “Are you hungry?” 

He pounced onto the bed like the beast he was. He eyed you like you were his prey, little did he know it was the other way around. 

“May I devour you like you’re my last meal? Please.” Sukuna said pleadingly. His head lay between your thighs while he gazed at your sopping wet pussy. 

“I’m not sure, you haven’t done a good job at listening to me. You yell and belittle me like I'm a mere servant.” 

Sukuna's breath grew untimely and erratic, he was beginning to spiral without touching you. “I said sorry. I’ll be good, I swear to it. You can use me, I'll be your servant.” 

You raised your head to get a good view of the pathetically desperate man. You knew the throbbing of his cock was bothering him, he’d do anything just to even lick you. “You shall refer to me as ‘my lady.' From this moment on, you’ll listen to every demand I give you. If you do not, it will result in punishment. Ok?” 

"Yes, my lady.” Sukuna's hands began to latch onto the silk covers. You heard small tears around you, he was becoming too angsty. 

“You may eat me.” He didn’t even hesitate before he dived his face into your wetness. His tongue extended and swirled around your sensitive clit. 

He sucked on and mauled the bundle of nerves like he’d been starving for days. His left pair of arms pulled you closer to his face as your body squirmed in a circle. "You're doing so good..." 

He was so focused, he didn't even have time to respond to you. Suddenly, you felt something extremely foreign to you. 

It felt like he had two tongues???  

One of them massaged each side of your clit and up and down while you felt his sharp teeth latch onto your mound. Both of your legs tensed up, and it felt like they’d begin trembling any second now. 

You heard him moaning and whimpering down below as he slowly writhed against the bed.

Gruntled sounds exited your mouth while one of his tongues made its way slowly down from your clit into your cunt. The other one stayed persistently lapping circles around your clit.

The tongue was so long that he managed to elicit a choked moan from you just by inserting it inside. The muscle swirled around and curled itself in multiple directions, all while the other tongue flicked your clit ruthlessly.

"S-Sukuna… you're such a good boy…” You heard a deep grumble come from between your legs. It seems like your words taunted him…he sped up 3 times his previous speed before. It seems like praise was his golden buzzer. 

Your eye twitched, and you grabbed his hair tighter. His finger gripped you harder. He’d surely be on his way to piercing your skin. 

You felt yourself reaching your climax. Your cream, sweet and tangy, filled his mouth to his delight. His tongue lapped up the substance into his mouth and moved it around before spitting it back into your cunt. He wasn't done. 

Sukuna's desperate grip tightened for the third time. He used one arm from each side to force your knees to your head. He truly wanted to test your flexibility.

Sukuna plunged two fingers into your cunt as you rolled your hips into him. He scissor-curled his fingers inside of you in a steady pattern. All while worshiping your clit with his two tongues. 

He pulled his head up for a second while he continued to finger your pussy. “Am I doing well, my lady?” 

You nodded while pushing your head back deeper into your cunt. “Yes, s’good. But did I tell you to stop eating after I so graciously gave you the rare privilege?” 

You heard his muffled 'mmm-mmm' as he shook his head. I know that's right. 

You murmured, 'Insolent man—’ under your breath until his fingers became quicker and sloppier. The pressure that was built up was familiar & intense. 

Every deep breath you let out delayed your orgasm, but at the speed he was going, he managed to outpace your choked breaths. 

It wasn't long until the psychedelic sensation began to spread throughout your body. Your legs trembled desperately. 

Sukuna's fingers bored into you, leaving 10 piercing holes in your skin. Blood slowly beaded at the points. 

You creamed all over his fingers, coating them with a warm, creamy white. Still, he pushed until you told him to stop. 

You suddenly felt the need to pee as you closed your thighs around his head. The blood rushed to your face as your body got more restless. 

“Ngh, mmm…Sukuna!” 

Your squirt covered his face as he rubbed your clit ferociously. He dived back in and drank every drop of your juices. 

You lie back on the bed with your head comfortably on the pillow. 

“I think I did, exquisitely, my lady.” You sat up, your arms supporting your back. 

“You did very well, Sukuna.” Your hand reached for his chin and clawed it. “But did I tell you to draw blood? NO!” 

Your hand bolted as you moved to backhand him. The big beast just sat on his knees and whimpered like a bitch before you. “M’sorry, my lady.”

He moved his hands to sit patiently on your thighs. His head just faced the floor with guilt. “Lick all of the blood before it makes a mess on the sheets, you damned brat.” 

He crawled onto the bed and began to lick the blood from your wounds. He was careful not to suck blood anymore from off the surface. Just soft little kitten licks. 

When he was done, he lay his head onto your thighs as he continued to rut against the sheets. You’d almost forgotten his cock was inconsolable in its hardness. 

You stroked his head softly. “You’ve been a good boy, Sukuna. How about you let your lady help with your issue?” 

He looked up at you with big puppy-dog eyes. He was so needy it was pathetic. He killed people for fun, and look where he is now. 

You scootched back on the bed before opening your legs for him. “Sit between my legs, dear,” and he listened as he was taught. 

You released his cock from his undergarments. The thick leg sprained. It was so red and irritated. His throbbing made the poles spatter like a volcano. Bits of precum flew out and slid down his cock. 

“Someone looks like he needs to cum…” You grabbed his balls and massaged them to feel how firm, tight, and warm they’d become. His balls were almost rock hard. 

You moved your hand to your cunt to gather some of the slick, then spat in your hands just to be sure you were lubricated enough for both of his cocks. 

You let the substance drip from your fingers slowly onto his cock, making him twitch and whimper. 

One of your hands moves to spread the substance slowly all over his cock. You heard his breath in your ear become shallow and needy. 

You pulled your hand back, then used two fingers to swirl around the precum coming out of his cock. 

“M-my l-lady, please…” Sukuna had become a stuttering mess, slurring and breaking his sentences. 

“Please, what?” He rutted his hips up, pushing his cock into your fingers. “Rub my cock, please?” 

An evil grin appeared across your face. “You are under absolutely no obligation to make demands of me. I am in charge. Not you.” 

You slapped both of his cocks down so hard they hit his thighs. Pained moans left his throat as the stinging sensation spread through his cocks. 

"N-ngh, I'm sorry. So sorry. Won't do it again.” You jerked one of them soothingly, just as a little reward for apologizing. “You will have to beg if you want to come. Ok, my darling?” 

He nodded up and down frantically, but you wanted more. “Words.”

“Y-yes,” he panted out. 

“Beg.” 

You finger-teased the side of his cock, tracing his electric-blue veins up and down. “I’ll be a really good boy. I’ll be courteous. I’ll worship you and give you what you want. Please.” 

You laughed at his pathetic pleas. “Will you stop giving the concubines a hard time?” You pinched the tip of his cock, making pre-cum spurt out. 

“N-ngh, mmm. Of course, my lady. Anything for you, please. I’d do anything.” You licked his ear, slowly, making his face flush a deep red. 

You took each of your hands and began to rub each of his cocks. Your finger rubbed over his tips to spread the creamy, clear-white substance all over. 

His hips moved in various directions and rubbed all of your hands. His thrusts were brutal and sloppy, typically making his cocks glide off your hands. 

He leaned his head back onto your shoulder so that you could see his face. His eyes were tired and low, staring directly into yours. 

You moved your lips toward his to embrace him in a sloppy kiss. Your tongue dominated his as he moved weakly through your mouth. Your tongue flicked against his in what felt like a battle. You pulled back and spit into his mouth before going back to kissing. 

Your tongue ran over his lips before he moved in closer to melt into yours. Your lips moved down his neck, creating dark red marks all over. 

You began to move your hands in twisting motions as you proceeded to jerk him off harder and harder. His moans began to build up in volume. He was finally going to cum.

“My l–l lady." 

“Not yet.” Your hands sped up, as did the twitching of his cock. 

“P-please.” You kept refuting his pleas. 

“Not until I say so.” His moans filled your ears like a symphony. 

“U-ugh.” Your hands tightened around his cock. 

“You can cum now, pathetic man.”

White long spurts of cum fell over your hands and his thighs as you continued to jerk his cock. The hot spurts erupted out of him for what felt like an eternity. The more he came, the more his body shook, and the farther the cum sprayed. 

By the time he was done, his body was weakened and tired. Loads upon loads of cum covered your hands to your delight. You licked all of it as if it were a treat.

You swallowed most of it but made sure to leave some for when you sloppily kissed him. You kissed the man for about another 10 minutes before he began to doze off. 

“Y’actually did it…” he whispered.

“Did what?” 

“My cock hasn’t gotten hard again…” 

Oh yeah, that's why you’re here. 

Can u tell i got slight inspo from the apothecary diaries

Ok I leave

[shayinstarlight]

Ma man ma man ma man-

[purpleorchidprincess]

Gotta Be Real Quiet on the Creek: Fisherman Toji X Reader

⋆.ೃ࿔* In which a bored woman wants to get out of the house, and decides fishing might be her calling

inspired by this clip of Saucy Santana

“You gotta be real quiet on the creek !” #santana #explosion #fyp #viral

“You gotta be real quiet on the creek !” #santana #explosion #fyp #viral

wc; 1.1k

dividers; allegedlylonely & sisterlucifergraphics

Includes:

Crack

Tiny bit of smut

Ai-hate <3

This is so chronically online

Unproofread work because this was so embarrassing to attempt to read back

You stretched out on your bed. It's been an entire week since you lay in the house doomscrolling, just to end up playing Roblox later. The constant pattern only satiated your boredom a little. 

You were currently scrolling on TikTok with absolutely no goal. A confused look curled onto your face when you saw a horribly done AI advertisement with terrible, staticky music that sounded fresh out of a horror movie. 

It was some kind of theme song singing about a one-on-one fishing trip in your area. At Mitia Creek. There was a generated photo of a man whose muscles looked like they were going to pop any second. 

It was a pretty good deal for what you got. Luxury boat, luxury rods, and you get to keep the fish you catch! Under one of the amenities on the ad, it said “Free cock," but it probably meant “free cook.” 

Buuuut… You saw the fishing trip was only $50, so you ran with it. 

Quite a good deal… You hope.

The mosquitoes attacked your legs fiercely as you walked toward the meeting area. The tour guide's name is Toji. But… when you arrived, nobody was there. Just an empty…wooden boat. 

Well, shit. You didn’t know what you were expecting. There were many red flags during the booking. 

First, it's AI. You can't even use Canva? You couldn't pay an Etsy artist the $3?

Second, you had to book through Instagram. The page didn't even have a profile picture. It was also named Brokedilf.

Not to mention, there was an OnlyFans link in the bio that you didn't care to click.

Third, when you asked for photos of the experience, the guy said you'd be the first client.

You were looking for your phone, formulating a text to this ‘Toji’ guy. Maybe you went to the wrong spot. It was supposed to be a luxury boat. Just a silly mistake on your part. 

Suddenly, a hand touched your shoulder, sending you into flight or fight mode. You chose to fight. Your fist flew back into the nose of the person behind you. You then shoved them down onto the floor. This was probably some kidnapping setup! You knew it was too cheap. 

The person's bags fell to the ground, and so did… two rusty fishing rods. Oh. Shit!

You crouched down to check on the big man on the floor. "I'm so, so, sososo sorry! I thought you were a kidnapper!” 

He rubbed his hand over his head while slowly rising off the floor. “S’fine… not the first time I’ve been mistaken for a kidnapper. Won't be the last either." 

You helped get his stuff off the floor, picking up bags of supplies. “Sorry again. Here’s your stuff.” 

He began to load the wooden boat quietly. Stacking heavy supplies on the back while it rocked back and forth. “Is this the escort boat?” 

He looked up at you with confused eyes. “Uh, na, this is the boat.” Your eyes widened, your face displaying clear shock. “Oh!” 

You stood in awkward silence as he finished filling the boat. He managed to fall into the water about 5 times during it. He was very clumsy for a big, burly man.  

"C'mon," he waved his hand to usher you onto the boat. You took his hand, warily. Imagine if you fell in the water and a bunch of catfish came to eat you alive. Do catfish even eat humans? 

Toji’s hand was rough and calloused. Like a hard-working man. Like you’d feel every single scuff when he thrust his hot fingers into your p—. 

You suddenly felt your head hit the rim of the boat, leaving you flat on the floor while pulling Toji down with you. 

“Ouchie!” his big, warm body lay atop yours. His muscles were firm and hard. Like if a big block of warm cement was made into a blanket. “M’sorry bout that. Spaced out. Let's try again, yeah?” 

He got off the top of you and pulled you to your feet. You took his hand and stepped onto the boat, slightly losing your balance, but eventually you managed to sit. “Atta girl.” 

Your face began to warm at his praise. He stepped on the boat after you and sat down roughly. The boat rocked so hard you thought there was an earthquake. 

Toji began to row the boat into the middle of the creek. It was beautiful; the water was green & glistening. You could hear all types of wildlife moving about in the distance. They’re all peacefully living. 

Not too far from you was a— “You know, I used to go fishing when I was a little boy. You gotta be real quiet on the creek if you want to catch any bastard fish. Y’know?”

Bastard fish— “Uh, yeah.” Toji put the paddles down once you two got to a slightly deserted area in the middle of the creek. 

“Alright. Are you ready for your service?” You mean the fishing you’d been so desperately waiting to do? Absolutely! 

You hummed in excitement as Toji took on a deep grin. Suddenly, he pulled his cock out of his pants as it was slightly beginning to harden. 

“What the fuck! Why is your dick out?” He looked at you, confused, then scoffed. “You paid for this service.”

You crossed your arms and moved toward the back of the boat to get some distance from him. Yes, he was hot, yet his dick was huuuge; yes, you’d probably pay him to fuck for an extra $50 in his pocket, but him exposing himself to you was a no-go! 

“I never paid for you to make yourself indecent in front of me.” He persisted in sitting there with his dick out; you couldn’t help but look. It seemed to be getting more angry & hard by the second. 

“It’s listed on the flyer under ‘free cock.' It's also in the contract you signed.” Now that you think about it, "cock" and "cook" are two very different words.  

“Oh,” silence filled the boat as the two of you sat awkwardly looking around. You could hear a cricket chirp, literally. “So. Do you still want the service?” 

Toji had you on top of him, bouncing on his cock symmetrically as the boat rocked side to side. His hand reached up into your top to rub your hardening nipples. 

He teased the perky nub between his two fingers, making sure to stimulate every nerve. His mouth moved up to your neck to place small, delicate kisses. 

“Harder!” he began to thrust into you harder, yet he made sure not to slap your ass with his thighs. “You know—ngh. When I’d go—god. Fuck—fishing with mi tia. Sooootight. She told me to—you're squeezing— ‘You gotta be real quiet on the creek.’ Shit—your pussy is so good.” 

You rolled your hips, grinding on his lap before lifting back up. “You told me that—wait, are you trying to tell me to shut up?” you said while breathless moans filled the words in between. 

“Yep.” You started to moan even louder. You made sure to take advantage of the fact that you were on top of him, making sure to plant your pussy down with a loud slap every time. 

“Oh fuck! Toji, you're so—” Before you knew it, his hand was wrapped around your mouth. You felt his warm breath hit your ear as he whispered, “You gotta be real quiet on the creek.” 

You picked up the pace to start bouncing harder with maximum efficiency. You bit his hand, making him yelp out loudly. At the same time, you felt his warm release coat your insides. His cum squirted against your cervix. Your body twitched and convulsed at the desirable sensation. 

"Oh—that was so nice.” 

“Yeah, yo—” you screamed as a large chomp bit at the side of the boat, grazing Toji's thigh. You tried to swim away, but by the time you’d started swimming, all that was right of Toji was the right side of his body. The alligator has taken a circular chomp out of its left side. 

You tried to swim away, but the alligator was right behind you. And boy was he a hungry, hungry hippo. 

Your hand reached out above the water while the alligator feasted on your cum-filled lower half. 

Next time, you’d be real quiet on the creek. 

There will be a part two where they're reincarnated as a fish and fisherman.

[purpleorchidprincess]

Punish: Geto x Reader

⋆.ೃ࿔*:

Lightly inspired by the song "Punish Demo ii" by Ethel Cain

Dividers: angeliicide & strangergraphics

wc: 2.1k

Disclaimer. This is a hot mess, but it's my hot mess

Angst.

Def has a plot

The reader is depressed

Very slight mention of suicide

comfort from the geto

small stalking mention

The final funeral. The last two people dropped into the cold, lifeless ground as you watched. Your conscience is slowly dissociating in silence. 

There you stood, glassy-eyed and all. You zoned out so much that the world became a blur. Your body swayed in the wind. You let the breeze move you with no fear of consequence. It was a dark, gloomy day. 

Everyone was dead, leaving just you. Mother & father died last. You didn’t bother watching as the cemetery staff began to pile dirt on top of the caskets. You walked off the plots, unsure if you’d ever return. You were the only person there to watch your parents be buried. They’d outlived everyone else.

Grief is a normal feeling. But when dealing with it alone at a young age, the emotional toll configures into a body of insanity. Losing someone you love isolates you in a bubble. 

Instead of going insane, you choose to isolate yourself. To marinate in your sadness. To acknowledge the danger of your existence. 

In your eyes, the world moves slowly. You’ve heard the phrase 'time flies when you're having fun,' but that must be the explanation for why your days seem to drag on, one after another. 

Time begins to move like water dripping from a faucet. The sink holding the drop is plugged. Soon enough, the water will overflow the sink. An overfilled sink ruins the room. If it keeps flooding, it ruins the house. And a ruined house is left abandoned. You think of yourself as the house. Flooded by the toll the days take on you. One day to be disposed of due to the damage. 

Your demeanor remained stoic while walking back home. It was a two-hour walk. Your family was too poor to afford a car. 

Walking was normal for you. 30 minutes to the town, 2 hours to school, 4 hours to the city. 

You flinched as a drop of water struck your forehead. Shit. You frantically tried to cover your head with your bag to keep the rain from soaking your clothes. Too much rain and you’d be sure to catch a cold. You definitely couldn't afford medicine after paying for the two caskets to be buried. The walk was another hour. You needed to find shelter. 

The rain began to descend hard. Thunder boomed through the air. Bolts of angry lightning began to fester in the sky. You didn’t bother keeping your bag atop your head. You slipped it down, letting the rain soak you. There's no use. The harsh water stung your eyes. 

You rubbed your eyes harshly until you felt a body hit you. The scene was blurry; you really couldn’t see well. There was a man along with his friends. In his hand was a hot cup. Well, he was holding a coffee.

Some of the coffee spilled on his shirt as he bumped into you. The rage in his eyes was clear. You quickly needed to make amends and be on your way. “I’m sorry! I couldn’t see. It's my mistake. I’m s—” 

Ouch. Scolding hot coffee burned your face, making you yelp. The man had thrown the leftover coffee onto your face. Why? 

You fell to the ground trying to wipe the coffee off of your face. Your eyes scalded with pain, which further hindered your eyesight. “Watch where you're walking, bitch," he yelled. 

“How does that coffee feel, whore?" said one guy. 

“Worthless cunt.” Spit out the other. 

“Your apology isn’t worth shit, bitch.” Then they all walked off, laughing at your misery. 

You're curled up into a ball on the cold, hard concrete. You began to cry. It wasn’t slow; it was rapid. It matched the pattering of the rain. Drop, drop, drop. Every tear.  

You screamed into the ground. A shriek like you were being murdered. The pain you felt from your world falling apart matched the pain of a stab wound. Why you? You hurt nobody. Not on purpose. You lived your life passively…

…Everything burned. Your eyes, your chest, your body. A burn the cold couldn’t soothe. You couldn’t breathe. You cried so hard you choked on your own breath, struggling to catch air. 

You thought back to how you got here. You were cursed & blessed. When you love, your life will fall. Being able to heal people was an invaluable skill of yours. Your family never explained; it skipped many genetic lines, but the bullet landed on you. 

An ability not inherited but somehow exactly like your past ancestors. A useful skill. But a curse to you. It’d haunt the narrative of your existence. You’d wish it’d go away. You never truly knew what the ‘curse’ was. But you knew how to prevent it from chaos. That meant giving up something important, love. 

Before you were aware of the curse's power, everyone had described you as the lifeless, angelic little girl. But they also knew to stay away. Your parents knew your affection was dangerous, so they’d gotten distant. But that didn't stop you from loving them. So you were the reason they died. 

You snapped out of your thoughts. Your now delicate body curled into a ball on the ground. Maybe you’d let the rain and cold swallow you whole. You hoped the rain would take you out. Hypothermia wasn’t that bad; you’d feel warm when you left. You deserved it, you think. 

“Careful with her, Nanako. You mustn’t waterboard her with the towel.” A man's voice. 

You were lying on a plush bed that almost felt like a cloud. You stirred lightly as the warm water hit your forehead. “Oh, she's awake.” A female voice said. 

Your vision was slow to develop. You blinked frequently in hopes of clarity. In front of you were two girls and a man. The girl to the left had blonde hair in a bun, complementing her brown eyes. The girl to the right had brown hair. Her brown eyes were similar to the girl on the left. They both looked quite young, about 8. Maybe related.  

The man in front of you had long black hair with some of it in a bun. His eyes were a unique shade of brown; purplish undertones stood out. His face was carved as if he were one of the most beautiful men you’d ever seen. An angel. 

He looked down upon you with a sweet, inviting smile. “Ah, you're awake. Here, drink some water.” 

He moved behind you to help prop your body up. You still felt sore and weak from—yeah. That. It all came rushing back to you at once. All the turmoil. 

He held a glass of room-temperature water to your lips, letting you slowly sip as he rubbed your back comfortingly. “Thank you.” Your words were quiet, enclosed & emotionless. 

You sat there for a second, the strangers watching you. The warm-faced feeling dawned upon you, your chest began to slow, and your throat closed. Not again. Your eyes burned. Tears began to stream down your face. 

“Are you ok—" The girls spoke at the same time but were promptly cut off by the man in front of you. Your choked-out tears multiplied. Your emotions were balling up, finally coming out now that you had only a second of peace. 

“Girls, exit the room for a second.” The man wrapped his arms around you even tighter. It was warm & cozy. 

His long hair smelled of incense and jasmines; it was nice. You might've gotten out of your comfort zone, but you gently held his hair, to which he had no objections. “But Geto-sama—” 

He gave them a stern but soft look. “When people are in a state of weakness & distress, they need space.” 

They looked back and forth at each other before nodding in understanding. “Ok, Geto-sama," the girls said. They must be twins. 

They got up and walked out. Simple. 

At this point, you were still sobbing, but this time he let you cry in his arms. There was something… soothing about it. “Why do I have to suffer?” 

“Why do I seek to punish myself?” 

“Do I deserve this?” 

“Will it be like this forever?” 

Vital questions in a moment of panic. You soaked his sleeve as he continued to comfort you; slow shushes left his mouth. After a few moments, you finally settled down. 

“You don’t deserve it.” You looked up to him, slow tears still soaking your cheeks. “I know what's following you. It's a burden bestowed on you by someone who's...not like us. Someone weak.” 

You looked up at him with pure, dazed confusion. “Something is following you. Do you feel it looming?” 

You nodded your head hesitantly. You always felt like something was breathing on your shoulder. Haunting you from a distance. 

Sometimes you saw it… well, sort of. It was like purple… you’d seen its ‘teeth’ once. You thought you were hallucinating. You convinced yourself you were. 

You knew what he was talking about, but you just couldn’t articulate it to him. You couldn’t explain it. He looked right through you. 

“Tell me the story. You know it, don’t you?”

You tilted your head, wiping a salty tear from your waterline. “What story?” 

He laughed amusingly with a slight tinge of mockery in the back of his voice. “The story? The one that your family told you?” 

How the hell did he know about the story? The one that explained why you’d been… cursed.

You sucked up your tears and looked up at him, then back to the floor. "How—where did you hear about the story?” He caressed your cheek with his index finger. 

“Don’t worry about it… just tell me. I’m just curious. Okay?” You nodded reluctantly. You think you can trust him. He saved your life after all… You took a deep breathe before trying to remember the story to the best of your ability. 

“564 years ago, a common ancestor of mine lived in a village; she was quite popular, very sought after by men and women alike. Her job as the village healer made her get along with everyone. 

One day, the emperor's son proposed to her. She declined; the emperor was evil, but his son was worse. A heinous man. He only wanted her out of greed. She’d hated that. She declined him many times. 

One day she’d devised a plan to run away with her love, and so she did. They lived peacefully. Had two children in a cozy home. One day, the emperor's son found both him and her. He tied them up. Killed one child whilst the other ran away. He proceeded to tie them up, then took his life in front of them.  

His evil had manifested into a curse of some sort. Strong enough to kill my ancestor and her lover. He couldn’t find the child. But vowed the curse would latch onto our bloodline.

A child with a heart as pure as our ancestor may carry a similar ability to hers. But the curse will detect it, and the curse will follow it. 

Father used to say, 'Hearts pure as quartz do no harm. They heal,’ and I've lived my life by that principle.” 

The man looked at you with a serious face. No—it was more sympathetic. He felt for you. And he was a man who felt for nobody. 

“A quartz lodged in the ground is futile. In its purest form, it's useless for nothing but vanity. You’ve been plucked from the ground. You're no longer futile, yet your heart remains pure. But you are being tainted by the disgusting people with power who fail to match yours. Those without powers as talented as yours…” He smeared his last sentence with pure disgust. 

“Monkeys, barbarians, all of them. They wish to hurt you. They did hurt you. My sweet girl, I'll teach you how to protect yourself. We will succeed in making the world see the beauty of your power.” 

He wrapped his hand around your nape; the sudden wave of affection was weird. It made chills run down your spine—but it felt comforting. 

“Everything will be just fine. Nobody will hurt you again. I’ve been watching you for so long. I know how they treated you. I watched your family disregard your feelings. I watched them leave you. I will never leave you. I’ll be the family you needed. My healer. My angel.” His soft breaths hit your cheek. 

Despite his delusional rambling and spewing of affectionate words, you melted into him. You believe he actually cared. It felt good to have comfort. Maybe you won't drown yourself in a green lake. Maybe you’d drown yourself in his affection instead. 

You didn’t even know his name, but he’s warm. Not hot like the coffee. Not cold like the rain. But warm.

If i wasnt procrasinating this wouldve been longer and better but YOLO

ok bai

[jumexju]

why don't you close you're eyes and reinvent me?

[purpleorchidprincess]

I’m so serious I’d slurp this man until he’s nothing but a pulp I’m so serious like I’d go to war for him nothing is stopping me. I’d go through his mind games willingly 💔. Like I’m so serious I’d let him get me pregnant more than 10 times. Nobody loves him like I do. I am purely devoted. That’s my man.

[purpleorchidprincess]

Mama, I'm in love with a criminal: Reader x Criminal Toji pt. 2

part 1

⋆.ೃ࿔*:･ In which a lonely woman seeks excitement, thrill & love in her life, so she seeks arrangements with an incarcerated man. She'll really do anything for him.

wc: 2.1k

dividers: anitalenia & cursed-carmine

smut: p in v, creampie, exhibitionism (a little), switch reader, bondage (?), use of handcuffs, baby trapping (both sides kinda.)

You were up one night finishing some casework in your office. Your phone vibrated from the familiar trill. Toji's ringtone. You swiped to accept his call; you’d been looking forward to hearing his voice all day. 

Toji FaceTiming you had become a bit of an everyday habit. 10+ hours of screen time just from him…

He looked down at the screen with his familiar sultry grin. “There's my favorite girl.” Your face began to grow warm at his term of endearment. Every single time. You were so easy for him. 

“Hi, Ji. I missed you,” he chuckled softly as you watched him set his phone down. You could see from the background that he was probably in the facility gym. 

“I know, baby, I miss you too, all the time. Wanna see you so bad…” He picked up a set of heavy weights and began to lift. 

He was lifting 70-pound weights with his chest glistening wet with sweat. His sweatpants hung low on his waist as always, threatening to peek a little lower. 

You bit your lip and just stared at the scene on the screen. “I got some good news, doll.” You pulled your hands back swiftly and attempted to fix your appearance. “Mhm?”  

“I was overhearing some guards talking about a temporary psychologist job opening. A 2-week contract for next month…” but you already have a job. 

“... and I just happen to score a psychological evaluation with the judge. Now, if I'm deemed mentally unfit, they’ll let me out a lot earlier since I wasn’t mentally well when I tried to kill the guy.”  

You nodded your head in agreement; you were beginning to understand what he was saying. He was smart for an incarcerated man. “So, do you want me to apply so I can get you out early by deeming you mentally unfit?” 

He smirked at the camera and continued lifting his weights. “Bullseye.” 

“Ok, I’ll do it. Anycthing for you.” 

He chuckled lightly and pressed a kiss on the camera. “Good girl.” 

Your heels clacked on the ground as you walked toward the guarded prison building. You made your way over to the security booth. 

The chubby man opened his side window as you approached. “Morning, Miss. How can I help you today?”

You smiled, sweety, and pulled out your ID, sliding it under the glass barrier. He inspected it, looking at the image and then right back at you.

Before you knew it, you heard the buzz along with the creaking of the slow gate. He slid the ID back under the glass and just nodded. 

“Thank you, sir.” You walked into the guarded building and passed police officers. They’d searched your bags, body, etc. 

It wasn’t long before a guard escorted you into a room with a simple one-way mirror, a cold metal table, and two chairs. 

You pulled out your files & instruments, placing them on the table. You read Toji's files meticulously. Analyzing every little part of his history, criminal record, and background check. One thing he failed to mention to you was the fact that he has a child. Guess you’d have to play stepmom when he got out of jail. 

You heard a firm knock on the door. Must be the guard. “Come in.” 

When the door opened, it was like a portal to heaven had been especially carved out for you. There he was, Toji Fushiguro. 

He wore a standard orange jumpsuit that fit a little too loosely on him, highlighting his muscles. His black hair was messily down. His mouth was etched into a devious smirk. Both his strong, veiny hands met in front of his crotch as the handcuffs bound him. 

“You fine with me uncuffing him?” The guard asks you with a thick Italian accent. “No. I think for my safety, you can keep him cuffed.” Just to make sure you're not too suspicious.

The guard simply nodded and pulled out a chair for him to sit. Toji planted himself down with a wide manspread, letting you see the outline of his cock. It was big when he was soft. The guard began to walk out, but you halted him. 

“And please, I’d appreciate it if the two-way mirrors were turned off. For patient confidentiality. Don't want to get my license revoked.” You gave him that sweet, innocent smile that he reciprocated—basic psychology on social treatment. 

“No problem, miss,” and the door shut behind him. 

The man stared at you fiercely across the table. His dark green eyes burning into your heart. The silence was loud. 

Both of you leaped toward the middle of the tables. His lips intertwined with yours quickly, his tongue licking and pushing into your mouth with pure dominance. 

His tongue fought yours as it reached for the back of your throat. 

"Fuck," he breathed into your mouth. A knock hit the door, prompting you to rush down into the chair. You fixed your hair and clothes before yelling, “Come in!” 

The same guard walked back in casually. “Just came back to tell you that the two ways are off now.” He awkwardly walked back out the door but didn’t question anything. Heat rushed to your face. Toji could see the sheer panic in your eyes. 

“Oh my gosh—” 

“Don’t worry, baby, I'm cool with him. He smuggles shit for me from time to time. Y’know?” You nervously nodded. 

Awkward silence filled the room as both of you sat quietly. You cleared your throat before speaking again. “Ok, here’s how this is going to go. I plan to fake the results so that it skews more towards severe bipolar disorder. They’ll let you out soon, probably, have me prescribe you some meds, and put you in therapy of sorts. You do as you need, get into no danger, be on your best behavior, and parole should go by quick.” 

He nodded, prompting a slow whistle. “Thanks, Bunny.” The two of you fell into silence again. 

“So, we got a lot of time in here, right?” You nodded at him, looking straight into his eyes. “2 hours…” Your thoughts started to get to you. You were so nervous. Your mind was racing. You didn’t know what to think. You just met your future husband. Is he real? Is this real? What would you guys do for the rest of the time? 

“Doll?” Your head shot up as you made eye contact with Toji's. “Mhm?” 

“Come sit on my lap, got something to tell you.” You trembled lightly, getting out of the chair, like a fawn trying to catch its balance. The chair scraped against the floor as he made space on his lap for you. 

You sat down neatly, making sure your posture was correct as you stared at the wall. “Ready to hear?” You nodded hesitantly, yet Toji leaned closer to your ear. 

“You’ve done so much for me.” The feeling of his breath tickling your earlobe made chills spread on your body. 

“I think my baby deserves a reward.” His hands trailed down to the end of your skirt. Tracing the end back and forth like the tease he was. 

“Y’wanna know what reward?” You murmured ‘yes’ softly into the crook of his neck. “Good girls use the magic word.” 

You squirmed nervously in this hold. The fact that this room even had a one-way mirror puts you on edge. “Please?” 

“I’m gonna let you bounce on my cock, then m’gonna cum inside you. And you're gonna love every second of it, since you're such a good girl.” You burrowed your head further into his neck like a shy deer trying to avoid danger. 

(I love deer analogies if u can’t tell.) 

“Look at me,” you resisted, trying to ignore his perverted words. He thrust his hips into your ass, staring at you to attract your attention. He rubbed his thick bulge, making you wetter. “Look at me. Now.” You slowly raised your head to connect your eyes with him. 

He had the meanest look on his face. Worse than the tantrum he’d throw when his cellmate, Sukuna, kept cumming on the floor, leaving him to step in it. “Pull my pants down.” 

You slid to the cold concrete floor, positioning yourself under the table. You ghosted your hands over his clothed crotch, where a small bulge began to rise. “You're lucky I can’t pull your hair now. What did I tell you to do?” 

“Sorry…” He’d never been this mean with things. Always the sweet man on the phone. He was definitely more demanding in person. You pulled his sweats down slowly as he raised his hips. 

“Good girl…now my underwear next. You're doing good; just keep listening.” Your hand slightly trembled as you hooked your finger into his waistband. You’d never seen a man in such a manner. The bulge in his underwear twitched and pushed against the fabric, threatening to rise higher. 

You pulled his underwear down, and his cock sprang out. He had long black hair trailing along the base of his cock, making a trail to his stomach. You’d never acknowledge how much hair he really had. He sometimes resembled Bigfoot without the hair everywhere. 

You nudge your face against the mass before slowly sticking out your tongue to gloss up and down. Just like the videos in your bookmarks. 

You grabbed his cock with both hands and began to jerk up and down carefully. “Am I doing it right?” He softly began to thrust his hips, his breaths coming out rhythmically. 

“Spit in your hands a little, babe.” You did just as he said and wrapped your hand all around his cock to make sure the spit got an equal distribution. 

You began to rub your hand over his cock again, but this time your hand began to glide and slip, so you tightened your grip. Toji’s moan began to get more breathy and desperate. 

You moved one of your hands to hit balls and massage carefully. “I-I’m close.” You slid your hands down and 

 The force from his hips caused you to rock lightly into the air. Mercy be upon you if he weren't handcuffed. With a loud groan, he came into your mouth, his hot white load filling your mouth. The taste was foreign but nothing you couldn’t handle. You just swallowed. 

You were so wet. So needy for him. Your clit throbbed so hard it practically hurt. You wanted it to go away. 

Toji looked at you confused as you pulled your panties down. “What are you doing—FUCK!” You aimed his cock into your entrance and sunk in quickly. You engulfed his cock with your pussy, sitting on his lap fully. 

Your legs began to tremble and shake. A loud yelp of pain came out your mouth. You’d gotten too cocky. You were still a virgin. Hopping on it hurt. Really bad. But it also felt good. Really good; you wanted more. You hope the guard would enjoy the show. After all, you're a psychiatrist. People tend to watch the taboo when they think nobody’ll catch them.

You held Toji’s cock straight as you pulled off. The substance between both of you created quite the slippery situation. You plunged back quickly. “Slow down.” 

You yelled, “Shut up," and he did. You were so frustrated by your arousal, you just wanted more. The squelches between the two of you got louder as you plunged on his cock repeatedly.  

He was so big. So huge. Hot and meaty with the perfect amount of girth to satiate your craving. Friction became non-existent due to how wet you were. It was just a mindless slip-n'-slide. 

Toji bucked his hips while he convulsed in the chair. You could tell how overstimulated he was from your movements. For once, he couldn’t match.

“Thrust harder, Toji." His hips slammed into you repeatedly to the point where he almost slipped off the chair. 

“Wanna touch you so bad.” 

“I know.” You matched his reckless speed to the point where you felt his tip touching your cervix. Applying that sultry, eye-rolling pleasure you both sought.  

The big man behind you began to babble incoherent words. He was lost in the sauce. “Mmm—ngh—fuuuck—love-” 

He moaned, “Shit—I'm gonna cum," into your neck as he continued to thrust sloppily. 

In the daze of the moment, you respond with, "Gonna give your son a sibling?" not thinking about what you’d just said. It's utterly shameful of you. 

With one last powerful thrust, his seed filled your hole in groves.

He fucked the cum into you. Making your body fall onto the table from fatigue. He still was steadily fucking into your sensitive pussy. “Mmph. No more—Toji, please.” 

But he just kept going harder. You tried to grip the cold metal table but failed. “Need. To. Make. Sure. You’re. Knocked. Up."  

 He relaxed his muscles, making you sit down on his lap. Your body calmed down as panting filled the background. Your body still twitched and spasmed softly. 

“How’d you know I got a kid?” You shrugged and kissed him deeply. 

“I had a hunch.” 

im done writing this! It only took 3 weeks for 2k words!

Anyways you guys should all watch Gachiakuta, like i love it, its the best go watch it now. Especially you Madison.

ok bye.