⚠️ Warning: kissing, suggestive intimacy, hickey/marking, & possessive Jay Walker
Ninjago City never really slept. It only pretended to.
From above the skyline, the neon signs blinked like tired eyes, and the wind carried static through the rooftops where the patrol routes never changed. Only the people running them did.
Cole had taken night patrol again.
Years had passed since Jay disappeared. The city stopped saying his name out loud after a while. Like it would make the absence heavier. Like silence was easier to carry.
Cole didn't believe in easier.
He just believed in movement.
A kunai cut through the air before he saw the thrower.
It pinned into the billboard beside his face with a sharp thunk, wood splintering on impact.
Cole didn't flinch. Just exhaled slowly. “You're getting predictable.”
“Predictable works,” Rogue's voice came from behind, layered and unreadable. “You're still standing there.”
Cole finally turned.
Rogue stood on the opposite ledge, cloak settling around them like it had its own gravity. Red-tinted goggles caught the neon glow of Ninjago City below, and that slight tilt of their head meant they were already smiling under that mask.
Cole didn't smile back.
“You weren't on East route last Wednesday,” Rogue said, landing the jump between buildings without a sound. They landed too close. Always too close. “Red was insufferable about it.”
“I was busy.”
“You're always busy when you're avoiding something.”
Cole's jaw tightened. “I don't avoid.”
Rogue stepped closer. “You do. You just call it 'being strategic.'”
Cole stepped forward too.
Their shoulders hit lightly.
Neither moved back.
Rogue's smile sharpened beneath the mask. “There he is.”
“Disappointed?” Cole asked.
“A little. You were getting boring.”
They were close enough now that Cole could smell the city on them—concrete, wind, something faintly metallic like the edge of a well-kept blade.
Cole didn't step back.
That was the rule between them. Neither gave ground.
Rogue tilted their head, studying him through those goggles. “You look worse than usual.”
“Flattering.”
“I'm not trying to flatter you. I'm trying to figure out why you're standing on a rooftop at midnight like you forgot what you're supposed to be doing.”
Cole's hand twitched at his side. “I know what I'm doing.”
“Do you?”
The question hung between them, sharper than any blade.
Rogue clicked their tongue, “So… why didn't you patrol last Wednesday?”
Cole's expression went sharp. “I told you.”
“No,” Rogue said. “You didn't.”
Silence stretched.
Cole's jaw flexed.
He didn't want this conversation.
Didn't want any conversation that dragged memory into the present.
Last Wednesday wasn't complicated. It was just a a walk.
A quiet visit.
Jay's parents.
A door he hadn't knocked on in years because every time he did, it felt like admitting nothing was going to change.
He didn't tell Rogue that.
He didn't tell anyone that.
“I was busy,” Cole said again, more forcefully.
Rogue stepped closer. “That's not an answer.”
Cole's voice dropped. “Drop it.”
Rogue didn't.
Instead, they studied him like they were piecing together something broken but still functioning.
“You're terrible at lying,” Rogue said.
Cole let out a short laugh. “And you're terrible at minding your own business.”
“Yet here you are. Still answering me.”
“Someone has to supervise you.”
Rogue reached up slowly, deliberately, and pulled their mask to have the lower half of their face caught the citylight.
Cole's eyes narrowed. “What are you doing?”
“Leveling the playing field.” Rogue's voice was softer now, less layered. More human. “Take yours off.”
“No.”
“Then I'll keep mine on too. But I want to see you.”
Cole stared at them for a long moment.
Then, slowly, he reached up and pulled his own mask off.
The cold air hit his face immediately.
Rogue didn't speak for a few seconds.
Just looked.
Then, quietly: “That's unfair.”
Cole frowned. “What?”
“Nothing.” Rogue's voice was different now, less guarded. “Just… nothing.”
They stepped closer.
Close enough that Cole could see the shape of their mouth, the slight curve at the corner.
“You're worse without the mask,” Rogue murmured. “More distracting.”
“You talk too much.”
Rogue hummed. “And you keep staring anyway.”
Cole's eyes narrowed. “Confident.”
“Observant.”
“Annoying.”
“You like annoying me.”
“I like winning.”
“And you don't talk enough.”
Rogue's hand came up. Slow, giving Cole time to stop it, and rested against his collar.
Not pulling.
Just holding.
Cole's breath caught.
He hated that it caught.
“You're tense,” Rogue said quietly. “You've been tense since I got here. Since before I got here.”
“I'm fine.”
“You're lying.”
Cole's hand shot up and grabbed Rogue's wrist. Not hard enough to hurt. Hard enough to stop.
Rogue didn't pull away.
Didn't try.
Just waited.
“You always do this,” Cole muttered.
“Do what?”
“Push until someone pushes back.”
Rogue tilted their head slightly. “And?”
Cole's grip tightened just enough to make a point. “Careful what you ask for.”
…
“Last Wednesday,” Cole said, voice low, “I was dealing with something. It's handled now.”
Rogue's thumb moved slightly against his collarbone. “That's not an answer.”
“It's the only one you're getting.”
Rogue considered that.
Then, instead of pushing, they did something Cole didn't expect.
They leaned in.
Slow.
Deliberate.
Giving him every chance to turn away.
Cole didn't.
The kiss was soft at first. Almost questioning. Like Rogue was testing whether this was allowed.
Then Cole's grip on their wrist shifted, pulled them closer, and the kiss turned into something else entirely.
Rogue made a soft, surprised sound against his mouth.
Cole noticed immediately.
Satisfaction flickered across his face for half a second.
Finally.
A point for him.
Rogue made another quiet sound against his mouth—approval, surprise, satisfaction—and their other hand came up to cup Cole's jaw.
The rooftop wind didn't matter.
The city below didn't matter.
Nothing mattered except the way Cole's back hit the wall between structures, controlled but not pinned, and the way Rogue's mouth moved against his like they'd been thinking about this for longer than they'd admit.
Rogue's hand slid from Cole's jaw down to his shoulder. Fingers finding the edge of his gi collar, pushing it aside just enough.
Cole didn't notice until he felt lips leave his mouth and trail down.
“Wait—”
Too late.
Rogue's mouth pressed against the junction of his neck and shoulder, hot and deliberate. Teeth grazed skin, then closed gently, sucking hard.
Cole's breath hitched.
His hand flew up, fingers tangling in Rogue's cloak, pulling, but not away. Closer.
A soft, broken sound escaped his throat.
Not a gasp.
A whimper.
Quiet. Barely audible over the wind.
But Rogue heard it.
Of course they did.
They pulled back just enough to look at the mark they'd left. A dark, blooming bruise against Cole's skin, visible even in the low light.
Rogue's thumb brushed over it gently.
“There,” they murmured. “Now you're marked.”
Cole gave a breathless laugh. “You really need to win everything, huh?”
“Obviously.”
“This isn't a competition.”
Rogue's grin turned sharp. “That's where you're wrong.”
Cole's voice came out rougher than he wanted. “You're insane.”
“You noticed.”
Cole shoved them back enough to create space.
Rogue let him, grinning.
Cole's hand went to his sleeve automatically, pulling it up to cover the mark.
Rogue caught his wrist.
“Don't.”
“I have to.”
“No, you don't.” Rogue's voice dropped. “Leave it. Let everyone know.”
Cole's ears went red. “I'm not— That's not—”
Rogue laughed softly.
Then they reached down, picked up Cole's mask from where it had fallen, and held it out.
“Put it back on,” they said.
Cole frowned. “Why?”
“Because,” Rogue said, stepping closer again, “if you don't, I'm going to keep looking at your face, and you're going to keep looking at me, and neither of us is going to get any patrol done.”
Cole's hand hovered over the mask.
“You can't focus,” Rogue added, voice teasing. “I can tell. You keep looking at my mouth.”
Cole finally looked at them directly.
“And you stopped talking three times after I took the mask off.”
Silence.
Rogue recovered too fast to be innocent. “You counted?”
“I notice things.”
Cole snatched the mask from their hand.
“Shut up.”
He pulled it on, the fabric settling against his skin, hiding his expression.
Rogue tilted their head.
“Better?”
Cole didn't answer.
But his shoulders dropped slightly.
Rogue noticed.
They always noticed.
“Same route?” Rogue asked, turning to walk alongside him.
Cole started moving first.
“Don't slow me down.”
Rogue fell into step beside him, close enough that their shoulders brushed.
“I never do.”
They walked in silence for a few seconds.
Then Rogue leaned in slightly.
“The whimper was cute, by the way.”
Cole's stride faltered for half a step.
“I will throw you off this roof.”
“No, you won't.”
“Try me.”
Rogue bumped their shoulder against his as they jumped to the next rooftop.
Cole immediately shoved back harder.
“Subtle,” Rogue said.
“Move faster,” Cole shot back.
Rogue laughed again.
And just like that, it became a race.
And Cole—
Cole didn't shove them away. This time.
❈❈❈
Safe to say these following fics were written after seeing @centipede-death's post of needing more suggestive Bruise content-
