KorTac is notorious for taking anyone as long as they can get the job done. Gender, designation, race, religion, mental and physical state do not matter as long as you can complete your task. They are also know to completely disregard pack dynamics. They run a private military; they form squads, not packs. That normally lead to extremely efficient teams that quickly implode on themselves. Except for one team. One team that as always performed way above expectation since their formation and as only kept growing in strength and cohesion.
From an outside perspective, they truly shouldn't be able to work together. A purebred Alpha more than happy to growl orders at you but unable to have a simple conversation because of social anxiety, a Beta so cocky and with so little self preservation that he always gets himself in troubles and an Omega so broken and paranoid from past torture that he would rater stab you in a vital point than open up to you? Truly, König, Horangi and Nikto should not make that good of a squad.
Little does most people know their success is all thank to that ridiculously small Omega wearing that giant fuzzy jacket over their military fatigues who clearly isn't afraid to wildly hiss and snarl at any of them. Because; König might be the Alpha and Colonel, it doesn't mean he always as to be the leader. Horangi might be cocky, it doesn't doesn't mean he as completely forgotten his more caring instincts. Nikto might be fundamentally broken, it doesn't mean he can be soothed anymore.
KorTac doesn't form packs, but it doesn't meen one might not form naturally. And it might just have the smallest, feistiest Omage at its leader.
It had been two weeks since you had seen any of them. This is not too unusual; so far, they have tended to disappear for between a few weeks and a few months.
When one of them did appear next it surprised you which one arrived. Deep in the walk-in, you had been putting away a delivery. Getting the new food put away required a lot of shifting so that the oldest items to the front. This delivery had arrived late, nearly ten pm and you were finally getting a chance to put it all away nearing twelve am. The bell ringing brought you from the chilled box.
Nikto stepped in the door, beanie pulled low and turtleneck and mask covering everything but the sliver of his eyes. You wonder if he would cover those too, Krueger did it.
Heavy boot treads deposit him at the counter to stare up at the menu.
“I know your order. Go and sit. I’ll bring it out in a moment,” you call from the back.
He shakes his head without glancing at you. His eyes are trained on the menu when you duck back into the chiller to finish your task. Nikto could wait. If other patrons appeared the job would need to wait. Another six or so minutes saw you free of the refrigerator and you were blowing your nose and washing hands before stepping back into view.
Your eyes land on him first. Damn, man is fit if nothing else. He isn’t beefy like König or Krueger. Neither did his height stretch his muscles. Nikto didn’t need more distance from the bottom of his boots. All the muscle you can see through his fitted sweater is fit and appealing.
Stepping up behind the cash register you lift a brow.
“Not wanting black coffee today?”
“No,” his voice is harsh but soft as if his vocal cords had been injured, “Your favorite.”
“My favorite?” Your face reacts without you as your brows lift.
He nods once, eyes drifting over every bit of you he can see over the counter.
“Sure,” shrugging as you tap in the blended chai with two shots of espresso.
Could never admit it to your boss but you didn’t like coffee all that much. Learning to get past the taste of it had been a critical step to passing so many classes as fast as you did but you would rather have a light cup of tea.
Setting the price and sending it through to charge his card you turn from the machine. Nikto doesn’t wait for an invitation to join you behind the counter, fingers drifting across the counters you cleaned recently.
“Quit touching, I will be done in a moment,” you snapped at him as you pulled out everything you needed for his drink.
When you had his drink all settled turning found him touching the counters, again.
A quick hiss and his blue eyes snapped to yours.
“If you can’t quit touching go sit,” pointing to the chair you lift your brows at him.
Once Nikto sat you crossed the small kitchen to hand him his drink and a straw. He took the cold drink in his gloved hands. Leaving him to his own devices you start on cleaning. While possible for more people to arrive cleaning up tables and the bathroom were good parts of closing duties that are easier if they need to be repeated.
Simon, one of your boss’ men, popped open the front door at nearly one-thirty am. Popping out the headphone in your ear you gift him a smile from between the tables, a couple more swipes and you would be done with that section of mopping.
“Hi Simon, what’s up?”
“Johnny said he forgot a book here today, any chance you’ve seen it?”
“Yeah should be on the staff counter in the back.” Pushing the mop bucket into the kitchen to the cleaning supplies you leave your focus on not letting the water spill.
“Why is he in the corner?”
The lack of any intonation in his voice told you that Simon had caught sight of Nikto.
“House cat wouldn’t stay off the counter,” you reply as you dump the water and prepare to turn it on again to mop the kitchen.
“House cat? More like a big cat.” Simon remarked, eyeing Nikto up with a knowing gaze.
You don’t spare either man locked in a death stare a glance. If you had you would have seen Nikto promising death to Simon if the big man fucked up his chance to spend more time with you. You would have also seen Simon assessing your level of danger and gotten more suspicious when he determined that the soldier that claimed no comfort would heel at your command.
“Mmm, I’m pretty sure he would purr for me if I asked.”
Leaving the mop where it was you snag a box for the remaining pastries. Simon could always be counted on to take them home. Simon’s side eye caught you as you drifted past to box up the leftover food.
“What? Big cat’s chuff, they can’t purr.”
“Something is wrong with you,” he says, concern between his eyebrows.
“Meh, you don’t really have any space to talk. I’ve seen some of your scars. Most people don’t walk away after those.” Feet keep moving, drifting past him as he narrows his eyes at you.
Stacking the pastries neatly and closing the lid you turn and hand it to Simon who has also found Johnny’s art journal.
“Need anything else? After I mop in here Nikto is going to walk me out and head home himself.”
“No,” he drags the word out like he is contemplating how to prolong his time here.
“Good, switch the sign and lock the door on your way out won’t you?” Calling over your shoulder while you begin to mop the kitchen so you can finally go home and rest.
“Yeah, yeah. Goodnight.”
Simon is a man who has learned when to leave well enough alone. The bells chime as the door clicks shut and the lock slides home.
“Why make him leave?” The same rasping tones come from Nikto as before.
Keeping your focus on the mopping you tap his knee with a finger.
“Pull your feet up until the floor is dry.”
He does as you ask, hand shooting out to hold yours in his gloved ones. The leather is soft on your skin.
“Why?”
Glancing at him you lift a brow.
“Funny you think I can ‘make’ Simon do anything. He knows I can handle myself and that if I didn’t want you here I would ask him to remove you.”
Lifting and dropping one shoulder you pull your hand back, stepping past him to finish mopping.
“We would do anything for you,” Nikto’s words are almost too quiet to hear.
“I’ll keep that in mind.”
You miss the sharp twitch of Nikto’s body and how his eyes glaze over slightly as he is pulled more into his internal world to battle the demons in his mind.
When the last of the closing duties is complete you collect your things and wait at the back door. Nikto gets the message from a glance and springs to his feet. He opens the back door for you closes it, and then waits as you lock it. He repeats the process with the car.
Starting the engine you roll the window down.
“Get some rest Nikto, you seem tired.”
He stares at you, the darkness of the night nearly swallowing him whole. Only the blue of his eyes was visible, like a cat watching from beyond the door frame.
this isn’t like finalized or anything but i’ve been mulling over what my fav kortac men as hybrids
i think konig might be a moose or grizzly bear hybrid, moose is a little more interesting than classic bear. i think it’s a, not necessarily better idea per se but it’s more interesting to see a herbivore/prey animal rise the ranks and become colonel. with bear i guess it’s kind of a no brainer that he’d make it to colonel but with moose konig i feel like that could definitely add onto his social anxiety bc of the preconceived notions that other hybrids have abt “prey” in positions of authority
nikto.. dearest nikto.. i think that he would also be either a bear or a hippo. his mask already makes him look like a cute little hippo :3 since i’m leaning more towards moose for konig, i think i’m leaning towards hippo for nikto too. those mfers are scary as hell. bear nikto is cool and all but the reason i fell in love with him is bc i saw a clip of him breaking some sad sap’s back bane style and i think that hippo nikto would do that. he can’t exactly tear and maul someone with a mask on unfortunately.
and for krueger, i think i’ll keep him as an eastern green mamba tbh. i mean it fits him, the veil in his danish frogman attire already looks like it has scales on it. he doesn’t talk much, swift and deadly and an efficient killer. i think snake also fits him bc he’s able to slink from place to place, organization to organization without being detected. also a lot of the fanart for hybrid krueger has him as a snake so y’know, why not.
horangi is obviously a tiger. it’s his name 😭 no debate there.
but what i do find interesting is that i see oni as a lion hybrid. or a hawk hybrid. i think that dragon might fit him well too but i want to keep things in the realm of semi-reality. i think lion might be too eurocentric for oni tbh. oni is so sleek and gorgeous.. i think hawk might be better. there’s a lot of symbolism around hawks but i particularly like the meaning of clarity and making decisions with a clear sense of purpose. (we gotta kill your dad hiro “oni” watanabe)
as for velikan… he’s mentioned as “heavy set” in the wiki, so that narrows it down just a tiny bit. croc…. crocodile velikan??? he’s american, and there are most certainly crocs in america. and crocs are also menacing, killer animals.. like velikan. they’re ambush predators, and velikan is well… very. very quiet, as in only 9 seconds of voice lines quiet.
i’m really glad that i didn’t walk out of this with them as the more typical hybrids, this was a really fun thought experiment.
as for reader insert… im gonna be a little boring abt my own particular insert. i think it’s gonna be a cat hybrid or lamb tbh. i’m leaning more towards lamb bc i think they’re slightly more original and they’re cute too.
More on Kortac x feistiest Omage pack leader because they live rent free in my brain
König has always been a good Colonel, but he was always reclusive before the formation of the pack.
Most people assume he was just tired of working with a bunch of bloody idiot, and that's why he was always retreating to his room when not on active duty. What few had realized is that the giant alpha, I was just socially outward and long to not have to be the one control. Everyone looked at him as if his status as a purebred meant he he automatically needed to lead, and he hated that.
So the first time you snapped at him during your mission, snarled to shut the fuck up and listen, everyone thought he would rip your head off. No one expected them to actually listen or to sit himself not next to you in the common room but at your feet. Not only did he not disappear the moment they all got back to base, but he was actively looking up at you like ad hung the stars themselves.
That's how you became the de facto leader when off duty.
Horangi, for his part, had always had a problem with authority. No wonder he has so many enemies when he just keeps pissing off the people he owes gambling money to.
He had no problem being cocky and talking back to König on the field, and you sure, as el wasn't going to go easy on you now that the big guy was following you around like a lovesick puppy. To him, you are just another person giving order and keeping betas beneath you, even if you had never talked down to him regarding his designation. He was being a dick, but you didn't mind clapping pack and reminding his humility was a thing.
That is, until he pushed too far, used something you had absolutely no control over against and you just...broke. No longer are you the feisty little thing leading König on a leach. No. Right at that moment your were an omega that to had their limit, someone who sometimes needed comfort just like everyone else, a little thing that couldn't take all of this right now
And that's when something in him changed. Like rediscovering instincts he had long forgotten. A need to care and parlance out the pack, something deep down telling him he wasn't lesser, but a valuable and necessary part of this pack.
Nikto truly didn't trust you at the beginning. Sadly for you -or him, depending on how you saw it- is sense of smell had been reduce to almost nothing because of the torture he had endure, making him unable to identify people or their secondary gender by scent. He also could no longer interpret the social cues that were coming with scents.
That's exactly why he had absolutely no clue what you and your intentions towards him were. But judging by the fact you had both König and Horangi listening to your without questions, he could only assumed you were just some other alpha.
So when you got a bit too close for his comfort after a particularly grueling mission, you couldn't help himself and just went for the stab. Imagine is confusion when you, very calmly, still tried to usher him towards a perfectly made nest with a knife sticking out of your side. He was just sitting there stunned as you tried to get him to relax, the two others absolutely going feral with worry over your state.
He would still stab any alpha that got too close without asking, including König, But now he knows you're safe. No matter what you are, you're the pack leader and you make some really comfy nest.
June 30th saw you up at midnight vomiting your nerves into the toilet. The stark experience of being alone, not even photos of the happy times dotting your walls, is what followed you to the ED for your first day. It stuck. Almost seemed as if the universe had inked its empty pain into you. It made everything worse at work: learning to navigate your attending, figuring out which nurses would teach you what they did or would be willing to answer questions, tracking down the cleaning staff to understand how they cleaned the room after a bedbug case. Okay, that one was purely to keep you from burning your clothes and walking the short distance home naked.
The little time you got to spend in your studio apartment was plagued with chaos. Either you needed a psych consult for yourself or you had visitors.
Your spices were constantly being updated, your underwear going missing, your dresser top getting completely flipped. When you say flipped, everything had been rotated 180°, from the shape your discarded bra made as it draped over the edge to the pen you had tossed there three days ago. Someone had started spritzing cologne on your pillow. It was almost as if without a normal way to greet you and beg for attention they reverted to something ‘safer’. It wasn’t. They had turned into feral cats desperate to understand love.
Horangi Kim got a simple text from you.
>Are they in Reno?
How did he reply to your question? Thumbs up. Fucker knew what they were up to.
>Tell them my schedule changed and I’m at the hospital tonight.
The fact he took the time to shift through the emoji reactions to find the saluting yellow face just served to piss you off. It added to the plans you crafted for each man who might arrive.
Your studio apartment opened directly to a view of your bed. You had a small patio table set on a round rug to break up the little space you had. To the left of the front door was a small coat closet and a boxy kitchen that had a pass-through over the counter. At least whoever designed it let the counter overhang for seating. Past the kitchen was the bathroom, not even big enough to have a tub. You could cross the room in six steps, three if you moved like you did for a code call. Whoever designed the building set all the plumbing on the same wall. The neighbor to your left had their kitchen abutting yours. And to the right? Well, their bed had to be on the same wall that yours was. Here’s hoping they were quiet when they had people over for nighttime activities.
Setting a spare pillow on the floor next to the bed, you settle in to wait. Sitting in the dark, except for your silly little dripping faucet night light in the kitchen, it doesn’t take long for the deadbolt to click open and the door to open to a shadow.
Once he stepped through and locked the door behind him, you stand.
The plastic curtains shift and sway as you stand. Krueger, Sebastian, shifted his stance as he leveled a gun on you.
“Put that away,” you snap at him. “And while you’re at it turn on some lights.”
He does as commanded. Much as they refuse to admit it, men who take orders for a living will often do as they are told. Tone is key.
The light clicking on has you squinting past the bright pain. And there he is. Krueger haunted your rare dreams that were not about work with his warm hands and his attitude. An attitude that had you wanting to bite into his neck and shake like a cat until it broke. He wore a pair of dark glasses, a cap, and a black medical mask. A long-sleeved shirt, the same color as the mask, hugs his muscles is tucked into his green cargo pants, which are tucked into his boots. God, you want to make him come undone. To send him out the door without looking flustered and startled.
Circling the bed, you snag the straight razor kit from the edge.
“Sit.” You point with a chin to the chair pulled away from the table at an angle.
He stares as you walk toward the kitchen, but does as you’ve commanded.
“I missed yo—”
Stopping, staring up into his hidden face, you reply.
“Sebastian?”
“Yes, how may I dazzle you today?” He smirks down at you.
“Shut the fuck up,” stepping past him, the kitchen welcomes you. Tipping the water to hot you let it run. Soaking a hand towel, you fill up a small tea cup and turn off the water. Before anything else, you set the brush in the hot water. Wringing it out as best as you can you head for Sebastian who watches you, eyes predatory.
No words are shared. Stepping between his feet, spread wide as if to assert dominance, you remove his cap, sunglasses, and mask resting them all on the table next to the arm he draped there. Wrapping his face starts with his ink-dark eyes. They stared at you as if you shifted too close you would be pulled into their depths, a singularity trapped in an iris.
He soaks while you prep the rest of the steps. Your grandfather had taught you how to use a straight razor. You had been thirteen and stuck at his house for the summer after ‘mouthing off’. Pointing out the inequity of ever-changing rules your mother laid down like laws, had resulted in being sent away. The exile to the middle of nowhere seemed like a bit of an overreaction. Pop-Pop’s words smoothed over your soul now, guiding your hands.
Dumping the water from the teacup, you prep the soap. Once a solid lather clings to the bristles you move the rest of the supplies to the table. Sebastian’s head shifts minutely, tracking your movements. Settling between his spread thighs you brush his shoulder first. Best to let him know you were near than scare him and chance him getting jumpy.
You settle a dry towel around his neck before lifting away the wet one from his face. His beard is speckled with red, a contrast to the blond of his head hair. Not what you expected. It is sparse, disappearing completely near a stripe on his chin, and gets patchy near his sideburns.
Smart man that he is, though entirely too cocksure and rude, he remains silent.
Once all your tools are arranged to your liking, you begin; pre-shave oil drips into your palms, warming under the heat of your hands. Taking your time you spread the oil from your skin to his. Dark eyes never leave you. Sebastian shifts under your touch, letting your directions guide his head as you now add the lathered soap. He shivered when the straight razor first brushed his face.
Your eyes flicked to his. Now? Now he wouldn’t look at you, avoided your eyes like a maiden caught sight ogling the strong men as they worked.
“Interesting.”
The murmured word settled between you as you pulled his cheek taut again. An easy glide of the blade you kept sharp took off the bulk of the hair as it passed. Wiping it against the towel around his neck Sebastian sucked in the tiniest breath when the back of the razor touched his neck.
This time you kept your eyes on your task. It continued like that, you touching him with purpose but not to relieve the pressure you could see growing in the stretch of the seat of his pants. You aren’t surprised that the man had a knife kink. He would be surprised when you sent him out the door with a clean face and a smack to the ass though.
Wiping the leftover soap from his face, you lather him up again. The second pass goes against the grain. Sebastian starts to breathe harder. There is less barrier between the blade and his skin now. You clean both cheeks and then his chin, before shifting to his neck. It is there that you pause.
Razor notched beneath his Adam’s apple you press slightly harder than needed, and wait. It takes him five seconds to focus his eyes on your face. His pupils have blown wide.
“If you, or the others, continue to fuck with my shit when you visit I will ask Horangi to tie you down as a castrate each of you.” The low menace in your tone, combined with the blade atoms from making him bleed, rips a groan from his throat. “I am busy and do not have time for games. Be helpful, or be gone.”
Three passes more and his shave is complete.
Sebastian is panting. His eyes track you now, boring into your face as you neatly avoid falling into his gaze. Your panties are soaked and your nipples are hard, begging for attention inside your bra. As much as you wanted to get railed into the mattress, until the bed frame gave way, if you let him touch you now he wouldn’t have learned his lesson.
Wiping his face clean of soap, you step back.
Dragging your eyes from his face to his boots and back you let yourself fall into his tree-dark eyes now.
“That’s all. Now, get out.”
“What?” The single word from the man who at times could not shut the fuck up to save his life gave you a savage level of joy.
Lifting your brows you let the vicious grin out.
“I didn’t stutter. That’s it. You will get no more from me tonight.”
“Your body begs to be touched,” Sebastian leaned forward, reaching for you even as you stepped beyond his grasp. “I can please you until you can’t walk.”
“My body always begs for touch—the needy bitch that I am would drain you dry. Too bad for you, men that steal my panties don’t get to see them on me.” That smile that would scare lesser men grew on your cheeks. “Now get out of my house, Sebastian.”
Sebastian Krueger was not a man that had been bested often. And never before had he been bested with no recourse. He stood, body flinching from the pinch of his pants against his erection.
Your mad grinning, wild in the way that crooned men to their deaths from the bow of the ship, spun a web around him. That web directed him out the door, the touch of your fingerprints and your blade still singing in his skin. The door clicking shut, and the deadbolt slamming home, did nothing to stop the sounds of your breathy moans seeping from beyond his reach. You had been affected too.
Forehead pressed to the peephole, Sebastian came without a touch at hearing your cries of seeing stars. He would destroy anything, anyone, for the chance to touch you like his still-hard body ached for. Help is want you wanted? Help he could provide. Hell, not even just him. Much as he hated the idea of König or Nikto touching you the way he yearned to they could remove your burdens and see which man survived being pulled under the waves.
Hell's Spawn | Do You Think My Boot Would Fit Up Your Ass?
Part 1 | AO3
CW: Minor burns, exhaustion
Krueger witnessing your relationship death, a marlin gasping for air on the deck of a boat, flashed through your mind at least once a day. Like the white man ripping the great beast from the depths, he witnessed your ending when nature intended it to be a quiet affair.
Ruminating didn’t help you feel better. Planning though? That helped. Krueger seemed, and let’s be honest all four of them, seemed to thrive on attention. Horangi didn’t piss you off, though he did seem to flourish under the smiles you gave him. Since it pissed off his teammates it made it all the more appealing to do. Krueger would be getting no attention whatsoever and if the cafe was empty you might invite one of them into the kitchen. Thinking it over Horangi wouldn’t irritate him badly enough but Nikto had yet to give you anything to work with other than the fact he liked to stare at your ass. That left König.
The lip curl that the thought of inviting König behind the counter brought nearly made you reconsider the plan. Each man reminded you of a war machine. It helped that you knew they were actually often in war zones since your boss’s boyfriends did the same thing for the UK government. König though? He commanded the machines and he was a pig about women.
The snide comments about being in the kitchen where women belong, or about needing a man to take care of you had you grinding your teeth to not rip into him. Each time he came in it got worse. He only ever commented in front of other customers. Maybe he wanted to rile you up and see what finally made you snap; almost as if he were twisting a wind-up doll a click too far. Taking a ceramic cup to his face, even if you could reasonably patch it back up, would make life harder. Your boss knew how these men could be but you doubted her leniency would bend that far.
Already rubbing your eyes and wishing for close at ten you fought back a groan when the door opened and they arrived. The shop had been dead. A Tuesday after a bunch of recruits shipped off to different bases, the bars were also pretty quiet. You called to check, if you went two hours without a customer you could close up early. Ten-fifteen would have been two hours.
“Y’all have the worst fucking timing you know that? I was fifteen minutes away from being able to lock up early and actually get to sleep in my own bed tonight.”
König, the cocky bastard, had to comment.
“You could sleep in my bed,” his eyes drifted over the parts of you he could see over the counter.
“Anyone else have any…pleasant…offers?”
Horangi laughed while both Nikto and Krueger stared daggers at König.
“You know what? Nikto, go and lock the door. Flip the sign-off while you’re at it. If we don’t have anyone here beyond you four we aren’t getting anyone else tonight.” Waving your hand you gestured for them to go and sit. “I’ll have your drinks out soon.”
“Think about us often? Have our drinks memorized,” Krueger settled his hands in his pockets.
“Know what? König, come and help me in the kitchen. The rest of you go sit,” you turned as you finished speaking.
For being such a persistent asshole the possibility of an opportunity seemed a bit hard for him to grasp. Keeping your eyes on your task of readying four cups for black coffee you wait until the others have shuffled off to the table before addressing him again.
“Do you not fit through the opening?”
Your snarky question sets him in motion. He ducks slightly as he enters the kitchen. The headspace opened back up again for him.
“I know somewhere that would be a tight fit.” The insinuation couldn’t go unchallenged.
“Do you think my boot would fit up your ass? These babies are pretty large for a woman,” you lift your foot, showing off your resoled boots that are laced up over your ankles. The dark red leather needed to be buffed again. “You’re such a big asshole I bet it will fit with enough force.”
Before König can fire off a rebuttal Horagi appears, ducking into the kitchen.
“As interesting as that would be to see,” he scans the room and heads to the corner where a stool has been collecting dust. His interruption is enough to stop you from committing to inserting something without a flared base.
“I am going to run these out and then will come back and teach you how to make me a latte,” you fill the tray with two black coffees, creamer and sugar. The two of them are still on the counter. “If you’re going to insist on continuing to bother me at work the least you can do is learn how to make me something.”
Lifting the tray you leave the room, ignoring the snarling behind you about how König is a man and can make a damn latte. Leaving the kitchen and turning the corner you find Krueger and Nikto set up at a table halfway across the cafe. Both men tracked you as you walked closer. The clattering of metal on tile reached your ears as the tray touched the table.
Cursing you turn away from the man who had yet to speak to you and the one who needed to be ignored and head back into the kitchen.
How that man managed to create such chaos in the moments you were gone will forever astound you. The steamer blasted, milk lay splattered on the floor, a metal cup in the puddle, and König stood with a hand cradled to his chest. Without a word, you start to fix the problems he created by his inability to wait.
Leaning over the puddle you turn off the steamer, silence now the dominant sound in the space. Stepping on dry patches of the floor you use a technique your mom always used when you were small to force your body to move. Settling your thumb over the meat of König’s uninjured hand you twist, pinching the nerves in the wrist. The big man had little flexibility in his wrist; he moved where you aimed him.
Forcing him to stand next to the handwashing sink, you turn the water on. When the water runs tepid, nearly body temperature you shove his hand under it. The whole of his palm is an angry red. Bastard must have held the cup around the sides instead of the tiny handle. Once he is settled you head further back into the kitchen and ready the mop. Might as well mop the whole floor and check that off the closing duties list. Once the bucket is ready you wheel it out and grab the first aid kit on the way.
You drop the kit on the counter and begin by mopping up the milk mess and working your way over to Horangi.
“Can I have your number?” He asks from the stool he commandeered in the corner of the kitchen.
“Sure. Pass me your phone?”
Holding Horangi’s phone in your hand you glance at König. A silent alarm had been triggered in your brain. He is where you left him, hand held under the running water. Eyes like shards of glacial blue stab at you across the kitchen.
“What? Keep your hand under the water for two more minutes,” you point with your chin and turn back to your task.
Four numbers are entered before his low muttering has you turning fully around to yell at him.
“I can’t hear you. If you have something nasty to say, speak up!”
König glares at you, your ugly stare comes out to match. A three-count passes before he admits defeat and looks down at his hand. You can only imagine at the mulish look splattered across his face. Looking back to the phone you erase the number you already entered and angrily slam your thumbs on the screen.
“That’s what I thought. If you want my number you gotta fix those misogynistic attitudes. When you can look at me and see a person and not a dick hole, I’ll think about discussing it.”
Number entered you pass the phone back to Horangi, who watches you with amusement in the lift of his cheeks beneath his mask and the tilt of his brows.
“What?” You snap at him.
He lifts both hands, one still holding the phone.
“Nothing. Never seen anyone put our colonel in his place so easily.” He is grinning even as he says it.
Without turning to look at him you point back at König, intention in every line of your body.
“He wants to touch, he pisses me off for no fucking reason, I would break him like a twig if his wrist weren’t the size of my ankle. He will behave because otherwise he will get ignored like Krueger is right now.”
“What did he do?” Horangi is gleeful as comprehension lights his eyes.
“None of your fucking business.”
Horangi’s eyes slide from your face to König’s in that sly kind of conversation that happens when you learn to speak the unspoken with another person. Snapping your hand before his gaze you lean forward.
“Fucker, if you don’t include me in conversations about me I will stop being nice to you.”
He stands, looming over you. Man could kill you but you would leave psychic wounds before you quit breathing. You had learned weapons as words at the breast of a narcissist. Four, five, six seconds pass and the only sound is that of the running water cooling König’s burn.
“You done?” Lifting a brow at him you settle your hands on your hips.
König busts into a small laugh behind you and Horangi is once again your friend and not a killer who leaves only a red mist behind him.
“She would survive a battalion of grandmothers.”
Horangi snorts and rolls his eyes before addressing you.
“We weren’t discussing you, but Krueger. He has been snappish since we were here last. Gotten into more fights and training harder than is needed,” he looks you up and down. “Seems you are the reason for the change in him.”
Humming you turn and head toward König, grabbing a towel along the way. You lower the water pressure before forcing his burned hand where you want it. Scrubbing your hands clean you rinse the soap before washing his. Rinsing the suds off you kill the water.
“I told Krueger to quit smoking, he smelled like a men’s bathroom.” All your focus is on patting dry the bubble without rupturing it.
König and Horangi both muttered something under their breaths, but the conflicting sounds of Austrian German and Korean entered your ears as verbal spaghetti.
Slathering petroleum jelly along the wound you lay a sterile bandage across it and wrap it with a layer of cohesive bandage. Why the fuck was there cohesive bandage in the first aid kit? Setting that thought aside for later you rub your eyes again. Uncaring of the deep pressure that caused lights to ignite in your eyes you knew if they didn’t leave soon you would end up falling asleep on the office floor.
“Leave that on tonight and follow up with your provider tomorrow. Now get out of the kitchen I need to finish closing duties. I can’t mop the floor if you are going to walk all over it.”
“Why do you ignore Nikto?” Horangi asked. Neither of them moved.
Lifting your hands away you take several seconds to blink away the vision issues.
“I’m not ignoring him, but if he doesn’t say anything I’m not willing to start a conversation.”
Both men give a grunt of confirmation and squeak across the floors as they leave the kitchen. Thankfully most of your closing duties were done and anything you couldn’t reasonably get to you would text Quinn a heads up. He offered often to help since he knew how hard you were working to get through school. Said his sister was in her first year of med school and wished he could help her more.
That last blink must have taken a long time because when you open your eyes again all four men are watching you from beyond the display glass.
König spoke for the group.
“John will be here soon to drive you home. Nikto sanitized all your tables.”
Another slow blink.
“Kay,” pushing off the counter you didn’t realize you had leaned against, you gesture for them all to move out the door.
The lock clicking home is your queue to turn and lay your head down on a cleaned table, John would come in when he arrived. He had a key. It wouldn’t be the first time one of your boss’ guys had driven you home due to exhaustion.
CW: Breakups, blood, and men Krueger not respecting boundaries
You had a boyfriend. Well…had a boyfriend. Did you keep him around to soothe the undercurrent of sexual need that wrapped around every facet of your existence? Yes, but it still hurt that he wanted to leave.
“I’m done. You’re never around and when you are you never want to leave the bedroom.” His pretty face has a tear sliding down into his beard.
Stretching your neck from side to side to try and relieve some of the tension tightening your traps.
“And you had to do this while I’m at work?” The words grind, breaks worn down to metal on metal.
“It’s the only time you aren’t studying,” your ex-boyfriend’s nose flared as he sucked in a breath.
You stood behind the cafe, near the garbage. He has popped in a few moments before, all smiles and sad eyes.
His sad eyes had drawn you in first, well that and the reports that he is DTF but doesn’t want more. Between school and preparing for residency you had allowed the label of dating when he asked. Clearly, that has been a mistake because something in you clung to the word now.
“I told you what I could give. Which was time in bed and my body on your couch as you played video games but nothing else. I don’t have the time for emotions or,” you wave your hand as if you could catch the nebulous, “anything else. I am gearing up for some of the hardest years of my life. And I told you that when this started!”
You tripped into yelling. Fuck. Yelling meant you were losing the battle to keep your emotions in check. Sticking one hand out to stop your ex from saying whatever bullshit would be coming out of his face.
Dammit, you were doing so good at keeping yourself from turning back into the hate-filled teenager who kept the air moving. Rage and spite had pushed you day by day for so long that they now fit like your favorite pair of shoes.
Three deep breaths with tightly shut eyes keep you from kicking his ass, verbally or otherwise. He is ready though, the moment you open your eyes.
“I didn’t want to hurt you, but I need this to be over. I’m leaving for my trip soon and between that and your lack of…well anything really I can’t keep doing this. I’m sorry.”
He stepped forward as if you hug you. The glare you sent him would have flayed his flesh from his bones if he got too close. Narrowed eyes tracked him down the alley until the darkness swallowed him.
“I can kiss away the pain.”
Krueger. Fuuuuuck you didn’t realize they would be in tonight. There was no note that the room had been booked.
“I bite.”
You sniffed back the emotions bashing against the inside of your chest.
He moves like a phantom. How the hell does a man wearing so many pieces of fabric move without a sound?
“The best way to get over someone is to get under someone else,” Krueger cooed into your ear.
Before you can snap at him rough fabric-covered fingers press into your eyes and dry, chapped lips are against yours. His other hand snakes around to rest against the dip of your hip.
Instead of pulling at the hand at your eyes, you settle a hand on his chest. The firm muscles don’t surprise you, the shudder at your lips does. His lips part with the breath. Snapping your teeth over his lip you bite, hard.
He tries to pull away. The glove over your eyes digging in harder. You respond with equal force.
“Two things,” you say past his lip bleeding into your mouth. “First, don’t assume I won’t leave a scar if I tell you I bite. Second, if you ever wanna get this close to me again quit smoking. You taste worse than a men’s bathroom smells.”
Releasing your shark sharp teeth from his flesh you pat Krueger’s chest twice and wait for his hands to leave your body. The hand at your waist disappears. A whisper of fabric and the cover on your eyes is gone.
Blinking to clear your vision you scan him up and down. One gloved hand is shoved up under his hood, likely applying pressure to his newest wound.
“Better luck never.”
Spinning on your heel you enter the back of the cafe. Rinsing the blood from your mouth the customer service smile replaces the sneer of disgust. What’s another night of men trying to push their opinions? Pretty damn normal.
Hell's Spawn | Hair Pulling Is Only For Paying Customers
Part 1 | AO3
Bodies slid into the empty chairs of the table you were cleaning. The cafe had opened only an hour before; sun shining cheerfully in through the windows.
Kitschy would be the word for the style here. Mismatched chairs tucked under scratched tables. The bathroom had been tucked neatly below the stairs that lead up to the conference room and the single office. At the back of the seating area a pair of chairs, a plush couch, and an unseemly number of plants nearly hid the art on the walls. Every wall here had art from local artists, all with a small tag near that held the price per piece.
Three masochists watched you as you sprayed down the table and sanitized it. Ignoring them always gave you a twist of pleasure. These men commanded attention by their presence alone; they held no power over your gaze.
Nikto sat closest to the wall eyes tracking the changes on your face. Those could only be deeper eye bags from scrambling to past tests and getting ready to apply for residency. Across from him Krueger’s head tilted to and fro, a hawk zeroing in on a rabbit from the sky. König sat closest to where you stood.
Braids were the easiest way to deal with your hair when life got too busy. König tugged on your hair now.
“No Horangi today. Will you speak to us with smiles instead?” Cocky. Made you want to tug him around by the balls to show him why cocks were only good when they had combs and crowed.
Sirens to your destruction, you listened to all the bad thoughts that whispered of how you could bring these men to heel.
Snapping straight you slammed the spray bottle onto the table, throwing the rag on top of it.
“Hair pulling is only for paying customers.” You held back on calling them bastards because the bell at the front door dinged.
Three distinct sounds of hook and loop pockets being opened filled the air before large bills were slapped onto the table by gloved hands. Collecting all three you tapped them even before folding and depositing them to the bottom of your pocket.
“Now if you would like to order anything you will need to pay up at the till. Pleasure was all your boys.”
You offer a cheeky smirk as you grab your supplies from the table and greet the cute lesbian couple reviewing the menu.
If someone had told you that single act would secure you three stalkers, you don’t know that you would have done anything differently.
