Rebecca and Kana really like going out, anywhere with a good atmosphere. That could be a local festival, taking a trip to a concert, or--and I'm going to pretend there is one of these in Nivio even though I have no proof of it--dance halls. They loooove dancing together. Clubs are also an option, but Rebecca prefers the slightly quieter atmosphere, and Kana prefers making Becca comfortable.
Rebecca/Sebastian
Sebastian really likes dates that are just doing something together at home--cooking together, watching movies, mutually vibing in the same room while they read different books--and Becca is super into that. But if they're going to go out, I think they would do something traditional like going to a nice restaurant together, especially one that takes a while to drive to so they can just vibe in the car.
Sage/Li/Sebastian
Favorite dates for these three would be incredibly nerdy shit. They love staying in and piling under blankets to watch the extended LOTR films, but they would also probably do shit like going to a hobby store to buy and gush (argue) about comics. 100% go to cons together, too.
Yoshiko/Azalea
This is the only couple I have a single, really specific date in mind for lol. Yoshiko and Az love having picnics in Az's garden. They'll spend the morning making each other's favorite foods (Yoshiko needs her sister's help sometimes though bc this woman can and will burn water), and then they meet up and throw out a blanket under Az's maple tree and lounge around together while they eat snacks.
Summary: Speaker should not be allowed on tumblr during breaks!
Warnings: None
Notes: This is really just a very silly story based off a situation from college and a quote I said to my roommate then. (See above title) I couldn’t get the concept of these characters in this scenario out of my head soooo here!
It’s one of those nights where it is too late and everyone has been at work for much too long in the Delaney household. Everyone sits around the living room with varying bits of research in front of each of them. Nellie and Laurie huddle on the sofa leaning over the map on the coffee table. Azalea and Sebastian are sticking posted notes along the white board and connecting them with dry erase markers. Josephine and Li sit back to back on the floor next to Barkspawn surrounded by books.
With a heavy sigh Josephine leans back on Li folding them over the book she has in her lap uncomfortably. “Break time! I’m calling it!”
“Yeah yeah. Get up then.” Li says trying to straighten back up. Josephine just slides to the side off of Li and cuddles into Barkspawn.
“Let us finish this up first.” Laurie says, still very interested in the map.
“You at least love me. Don’t you?” She pets Barkspawn as she speaks, Li just rolls her eyes. His tail starts wagging whether at her words or the pets she can’t be sure. Josephine pulls out her phone to check her phone and scrolls through her notifications until she sees one from tumblr. She opens her phone to a post about fanfictions with terrible crackships, so naturally she has to share with the class. Moving to stand in the middle of the room she holds her phone up and starts with an introduction. “So I found this post on Tumblr.”
“Well that doesn’t bode well.” Sebastian sits in the free chair, him and Azalea having found a breaking point. This comment earns him a hush and a playful glare.
Looking back at her phone Josephine returns to her mission. “It’s all about terrible terrible crackships. We start off easy with Steve Rogers/Clint Barton, lord farquaad/thelonious, Berry B Benso-”
“No the moment you bring up the Bee Movie nothing good can follow. Stop.” Laurie says.
“What exactly is a crackship?” Azalea chimes perched on the arm of the sofa.
“A relationship that fans pair from characters that don’t really seem to match up.” Li explains. She gives Josephine a mischievous side glance. “And Laurie is right nothing good follows Berry B Benson in these conversations.”
“I take that to mean you are encouraging her?” Sebastian observes, somewhat defeated. Best to let this play out, it’s only a tumblr post, right?
“Go ahead, finish the post.” Nellie offers, good naturedly.
“Uh-hum. Berry B Benson/Shrek,” An evil smile spreads across Josephines face as her sister lets out a sound of frustration that sounds like “see!” Josephine continues on the list that only gets worse. “Sonic the HedgeHog/Waluigi, Spongebob/Barney,”
“These don’t make any sense!” Laurie screams with genuine confusion. Josephine bursts out laughing while everyone else just watches with varying degrees of just waiting to be over and enjoying the show (Li) “Why do they exist!?”
From her peels of laughter, Josephine manages, “Oh, dear sister mine, there is someone on the internet for everything! You have to admit they are funny! Anywho, Dr. Phil/Peppa Pig, Shrek/Toothpaste!!”
Josephine has to stop to catch her breath from laughter and Laurie takes the opening to get up and try to wrestle her phone away. She makes her way around the coffee table but Josephine runs around it keeping the table between them. Both Cowles siblings move their limbs out of the way, enjoying the chaos.
“Get the phone! Stop her!” Laurie pleas for anyone. Both Cowles siblings shake their heads. Azalea blocks off the room past the chairs and sofa while Sebastian just stays in his place not blocking the path between the chair and coffee table but not giving an easy escape. This causes Josephine have to shimmy in place long enough that her sister rounds the table. In Josephine’s attempt at a quick escape past Sebastian she manages to catch her feet on something and trip herself. Landing herself right on top of Sebastian in the chair. He manages to grab the phone from her before she can regain her bearings and hold it out of reach. Laurie lets out a whoop of victory.
“Draco/Hogwarts squid….., Robbie Rotten/…..Elmo,” Josephine squints towards her phone screen still in view. Laurie covers her eyes so that she can’t see anything let alone the phone. “Citizen Can/Fred Jones, Naruto/SansUndertale.”
“Stop!”
“I don’t need my eye to hurt you.” Josephine laughs getting ready to think up more as her sister moves her hands to cover her mouth. As an after thought she covers her nose lightly enough that it only looks like attempted murder.
“Shhhh go to sleep go to sleep.” She releases after the joke is over though.
“Alright you win.” Josephine says getting off Sebastian’s lap. “Sorry about that Sebastian. Can I have my phone back.”
“I think you’ve lost phone privileges for now. Some of those were really terrible.” He says pocketing the phone.
I absolutely love your hurt/comfort bingo, so much angst! And happy endings! Please write "Cradling someone in their arms" for Speaker and Liam 🥺
Title: Cat’s Cradle
Summary: Liam casts a spell to protect you all in a place that encourages magic to backfire.
Warnings: Major character injury, hyperventilation
Notes: It’s been a minute since I’ve done a BTHB piece, and this one is going to be much shorter than some of the old ones, but I really like this idea. (If you sent me a BTHB prompt a long time ago, I will fill it, don’t worry! I just have some late gift pieces to finish first.) I’m sorry that this ended up being a little more gen than you probably intended, but I just needed to give Li some comfort after all of the things @speakergame‘s author dropped on us in the Discord. I hope you like it.
Also here on AO3.
Lily version.
Your first thought is that you should have known. Somehow. It’s not like the clues weren’t there, but you all came here to solve a completely different mystery, and so they might as well have been whispers in a hurricane. Your sister’s headache, Rory complaining of the dark being harder to see though, Kana being even less willing to use their voice than usual... it wouldn’t surprise you, now, to hear that Sebastian or Azalea had been feeling the strain, too. You’re glad that neither one of them had tried to use their respective powers down here.
But Li--
Li.
“Liam,” you gasp, moving forwards as your vision finally clears and the smoke settles, to see him lying on the ground with violet magic sparking from his arms like the tattoos there are a circuit board, not part of a human body. The others are still standing, and you can hear them call out at all different volumes, various degrees of concern ranging from fully-panicked (your sister) to handling-it-but-worried (Kana).
Sebastian starts to say something about someone checking the exits--that’s right, you were all locked in here, right before--and searching for supplies, other dangers, but his voice fades in the face of Li’s shallow, pained breathing. You reach down to try and take his hand when it feels like someone shoves a hot knife through your palm and into your forearm.
“Ah--” You hiss and pull your hand away on reflex, only to see sparks of Liam’s magic crackling off your fingertips as you move.
“Careful,” Azalea says, taking your hand gently in her own. The red impact mark of whatever just happened fades as she rubs her fingers over it, and your heart clenches before you realize she’s not using any magic. The marks are just being soothed away. “We--I think his own spell hurt him. He wiped out...whatever those things were trying to attack us, but it hit him, too. I just don’t know...”
“We have to help him,” you say, and Azalea looks at you with determination and sadness in equal parts. She knows, but she doesn’t know how.
“--have to go,” rasps Liam, drawing your attention. You look down, and there’s a second where it looks like his eyes are completely black. They’re not, of course; they’re normal, but it takes you a second to blink away the panic, and that’s enough time for Liam to curl in on himself, turning away from you as he repeats, “Go. Bef... Before m-more of them--”
He breaks off on a gasp. You’re not sure if it’s the way his whole body shakes through a wince, the way his breath sounds like it’s getting shallower, or the words themselves, like he expects you to leave him there, that hits the hardest.
But it doesn’t really matter because before you can think better of it, you’re reaching out. It’s a good thing your body knows what your heart wants to do and doesn’t need your mind’s help right now because as soon as you touch Li again, that bastardized version of his magic floods into you like the world’s spikiest mouthful of a too-hot drink. You grit your teeth and breathe through the pain as you roll Liam back towards you, getting an arm under his back as you go so that you can pull him up into a hug. One of his hands lands on your arm and the other on your stomach, trying to push you away. But you hold on.
“No,” you grit out. “No, I won’t leave you.” Liam freezes in your arms at the words, and it’s a shard of ice in your heart.
“Wait!” you hear Azalea say suddenly. To your horror, the next thing you feel is a hand on your shoulder. The magic that’s now sparking off of you, just like Li, jumps to whoever touched you faster than you can turn your head, but when you do, you realize with a sinking feeling that it’s your sister who reached out.
It takes another second to realize that it doesn’t hurt as bad anymore. Your sister's hand grows almost painfully tight on your shoulder, but she doesn't instantly pull away like you had, like she’d touched a hot stove. And Liam isn’t almost hyperventilating against your shoulder, either.
“Ow,” your sister says, and she lets go, shaking her hand in the air. “What’s happening? Are you two--?”
Her words stop suddenly when the pain comes back and you hunch forward, putting more of your body over Liam’s like a shield, even though you’re getting the sense that this doesn’t work like that. Liam actually cries out this time, and you squeeze your eyes shut. If he’d started acclimating to the pain, then feeling relief only for it to get worse again was probably harder than getting hurt in the first place.
“I think I get it,” Azalea says. She sounds as frantic as she does hopeful, this time, and you look over to her from the corner of your eye. You want to stop her as you see that she’s also reaching towards you, but you can’t without letting Li go. Her hand lands on your knee.
A soft sound, like she’d just lifted something really heavy (heavy for her, of course), passes her lips, but she doesn’t pull away. Instead she nods, and when she speaks again, it’s loud enough for everyone to hear. (You realize that Liam’s cry probably got all their attention, when it became obvious he was still hurting despite your best efforts.) “Something here is making all our magic turn against us. It’s why some of us have had a headache, and why Kana started feeling sick when they talked. When Liam cast a spell, his magic backfired, and his body can’t absorb it back up because it’s... Well, it’s like it’s been poisoned.”
She uses her free hand to point to the almost thorny lines of violet covering you, your sister, herself, and Liam. It really doesn’t look like Li’s regular magic except the color.
The touch on your shoulder comes back, and you hear your sister hiss a little bit this time. But her grip stays solid, and the pain lessens again. “But this helps?” she asks.
You don’t respond as Liam tries to push away from you again, saying, “Don’t-- I’m fine...”
“Aw, I see!” says Rory, voice bright, circling around the group of you clustered on the floor. “Spread the force over a bigger area, and the pressure gets lighter, right?” Rory’s hand lands solidly on Azalea’s back, and this time you barely notice a reaction at all except for your own pain decreasing. Against your chest, Liam is breathing more deeply, and his muscles are no longer so tight that you feel like you’re holding wood instead of a person.
Kana comes up behind you, crouching in a manner that you’re sure is unfairly graceful before putting a hand on your elbow. They still don’t speak, probably more acutely aware now than ever about how dangerous it is, but their thumb brushes comforting, silent patterns across your arm. Sebastian, at almost the same time, reaches a hand down to your sister, who takes it with a smile as she catches the look of concern on his features.
With all seven of you, it barely takes a few more seconds for the pain--now reduced to a feeling like slightly-too-hot shower water rather than anything truly dangerous--to drain away completely, leaving Liam spark-free and flushed as his face remains buried against the front of your shoulder.
For a moment, you all just breathe.
Then you hear movement. Footsteps, maybe, or something else; you’re sure Rory and Sebastian can hear it more clearly even if the result is a bit of a headache down here.
“Are you good?” Sebastian asks, looking between you and Liam. As soon as you nod, he lets go of your sister’s hand and goes back to trying to find a way out, and one by one, the others go to help.
You notice Liam trembling slightly in your arms as they all move away, and for a horrifying second, you think he's still in pain. But you’re still holding him, and you feel nothing except the heat of his breath where it’s trapped between you. You’re about to ask what’s wrong when he speaks, quietly as always but somehow smaller.
“Told you you should’ve left,” he says, and his voice breaks on the last word. You have a feeling from the tone that he was going to continue and couldn’t. You hold tighter.
“Liam Michael Cowles,” you say thickly, dropping your forehead helplessly onto his shoulder, “we are not going to leave you. Don’t even joke about that. You’re a part of this team--” (family, you think) “--and you’re my friend, and I won’t leave you behind for anything.”
His breath hitches in your ear. You pull back just enough that he has to put an arm down to hold himself up as you move your hands to press against his face. “Whatever’s coming,” you say, “we’ll face it together.”
You smile at him and long for the day when he won’t be surprised to hear you say he’s a part of you.
When you're up for it I would love if you could write a romantic 35 -kiss between the shoulder blades for speaker and Li. <3
Ha ha you said you'd let me write yearning so please enjoy some Suffering. (I hope you like it <3)
Li's gender is not specified here, and the Speaker is referred to with they/them. Also kind of vague heads up that sex is heavily implied to have happened prior to this sad internal monologue, but there is no smut in this story.
35. a kiss on the space between shoulder blades + Speaker/Li
Adrenaline makes everything easier. The impulse to take a leap is so clear, so sweet, so simple, and then the pure rush of the fall is everything. It’s the warm pulse of a heart, something cool rushing through the hair, the glorious weightlessness—that’s the easy part.
It’s the impact that sucks.
When one’s heart is beating so gaily and furiously, it’s almost impossible to think of whether or not that pulse will survive the ground after the fall. The painful return to reality.
Li should know this by now. It’s a lesson that’s been learned a dozen times, and yet, without that adrenaline, life would just be a series of more and more painful “afters.” So, Li thinks, fuck me, I guess, for wanting something that doesn’t suck.
Then: Ha, Li thinks, humorlessly. Lips twist into a smile that might as well be a mess of brambles for how sharp it is.
The sheets are still warm, even if at least one layer of them was ruined and now sits cast off in a corner, and yet Li still shivers. Just once. Just enough to feel it. (No need for melodrama, here, after all; it’s not like there’s an audience.)
Li’s favorite person in the world is lying there, still tangled in the sheets that are left, breathing deep and easy in the way that indicates they’re getting some actual, real sleep. And even though Li is a little bitter—can’t help it, idiot—the witch is mostly relieved. That’s three happy endings here, even if none of them will survive the night.
The only ending that will do that…
(Li’s heart clenches desperately.) Nothing about this will last, and it was never meant to, and Li knew that going in. Obviously. Just because this is Li’s favorite person doesn’t mean there’s anything else here but some stress relief and comfort. It doesn’t mean it’s mutual. It never is.
That also doesn’t mean that Li is going to stop pouring heart and soul into protecting them. Body, too, if it’s needed, because there is no one else in the world Li would rather be with, no matter the cost. And whether the protection takes the form of spells or of soft words and warm hands, Li will give it; whether it’s to keep them alive or to keep them happy, Li will give it.
But here, in the dark, where the only sound is their breath (Li’s own has been held for too long), Li is selfish enough to curl up at their back and share warmth, to lean over with eyes squeezed childishly tight and place a kiss on their back. It’s the only kiss Li has given them tonight that doesn’t come with a mark.
It’s also the heaviest. If anyone else looks too closely at it, they might see the cracks from where Li finally stopped falling.
Helo! The previous Li/Seb poly anon is back!😅 I'm pretty sure you're bored of me, but your writing of them is so addictive! Soooo, can please have another Li/Seb poly prompt? I don't know which one to request tho, so can you pick for me and write whichever you want or something?
Hey, guess what, my arm doesn’t hurt today! So I decided to write. :D Anyway, here’s a little bit of a different flavor of the poly than usual, which is me leaning a little more heavily on the parts of myself that are similar to Sebastian and also indulging in some fun pining. I didn’t link this to any particular prompt from the list, though, and this is longer than 10 sentences. Just started writing and this is what happened. I hope you like it!
(Also, anon, I am never bored of you. I love getting asks for this game and in general.)
“They’ve always been like this,” the Seer said one day as she handed Sebastian a mug of coffee, both of them watching as Li and the Speaker constructed a plan one fragmented sentence that the other would finish at a time, sitting cross-legged on the floor, knees touching, and yet never once hitting each other as they gestured (like a single body rather than two). And it suddenly made so much sense.
“It,” of course, meaning why Sebastian always felt like he was intruding when it was the three of them together, why it always felt like more than his height that kept him from walking perfectly in step with either of them. Why he couldn’t, for once in his life, be honest about his intentions. (Having these stirring feelings for them both only made it worse--or maybe better. Maybe, at least this way, he knew that they were both good for each other, that they would both be happy, that he could walk away knowing they would both be treated with as much care as two people in love could manage.)
(It wasn’t actually better, but he told himself it could be.)
He really wasn’t sure what to do, then, with the fact that there were also moments when Sebastian forgot to realize he didn’t belong. When Li picked up some thread of his dry humor and and wove it into something like banter, or when the Speaker relied on him like trusting Sebastian was as easy as breathing. Talking himself out of flirting with them--either or both--in moments like that was incredibly hard, especially when it wasn’t like he wanted to disrupt what they clearly already had (even if neither, apparently, was able to say it aloud). Sebastian didn’t want to come between them but to go with them. To be a part of the world they sometimes pulled him into with those gestures and not wonder if he was the alien.
No, stamping down on these feelings would be so much easier if he was just jealous like any normal person. Jealousy was aggressive and vile and easy to condemn, an easily-identified toxic byproduct, but longing? Longing was a subtler poison. It hurt no one but him, after all, so long as he had the self-control not to act on it.
For a second, the room fell silent, and Sebastian blinked, wondering if someone had asked him a question. But the woman on the couch at his side wasn’t looking at him, and neither was Li or the Speaker, who were instead staring at each other, eyes wide and cheeks lifting into matching grins.
“--the banana rug horoscope trick!” they both said suddenly, at the same time, only to immediately fall into laughter. Sebastian looked at the Seer, who thankfully didn’t seem to understand any better than he did. He wondered if the look on his face was as fond as hers.
“Incredible,” Sebastian muttered to himself as the two of them seemed to argue about whether whatever they meant before would really work.
“You know all of that stuff about how when AIs talk to each other, their language evolves too quickly for people to keep up after a few minutes?” Seer asked quietly, a sly little quirk to her lips.
Sebastian huffed out a chuckle. Yes, he said without speaking. If he didn’t already believe it, those two would have convinced him.
In another instant, the Speaker rushed from the room and up the stairs, just as Li leaned backwards, flashing a lazy grin in Sebastian’s direction. He returned the look with an unimpressed, raised eyebrow, face already having lost its amusement if only for the purpose of telling Li how unbelievable the two of them were.
“Don’t pretend like you aren’t part of this,” Li said, and Sebastian had to remind himself that Li was talking to both him and the Seer, that it didn’t mean what his heart wanted it to.
What passed his lips was, “We all know we’re stuck with you.” What he held back was, I want to be. Li kept smiling at him, even when the Speaker returned with a bundle of something under one arm, squeezing his shoulder on the way past, and Sebastian felt warm.
He knew better than to let his feelings get in the way of work, but this didn’t hurt. Not them, not anyone they were meant to help, and (Sebastian realized with a breath of relief) not even himself. So maybe it was alright, for now, to let the whole thing be. He could sit by and keep longing so long as it was unobtrusive...so long as it meant he could enjoy that warmth.
For all that Sebastian could rationalize emotion, he would not convince himself it was a bad thing if his heart fluttered seeing the two people he cared for most being in love and happy.
Title: Wide Open
Summary: Sometimes, fighting is a very serious business, and sometimes...this.
Warnings: None.
Notes: This is just a short piece for some specific trope-loving friends on the @speakergame Discord server, which you can find in the pinned post on that blog. This story assumes nothing about either Speaker or Rory’s gender, only that Speaker is shorter than Rory.
Also here on AO3.
It wasn’t like there was a whole lot else you could do. Yeah, maybe it wasn’t the smartest decision in the world, but Rory was protecting your sister, and that meant your instincts said to protect Rory, who was now wide open. It was just that simple. Never mind the fact that Rory was both taller and stronger than you, especially now, after everything. And never mind the fact that you didn’t have a weapon at this point.
You just needed a little more time for the others, and whether you had to buy it with your fists or your words wasn’t nearly as important as making sure you all got out safely.
“Hey, no,” you heard from behind you, just at the same second that you felt two warm hands circle your waist and lift. A clumsy imitation of a dance move you were pretty sure you’d seen done before, except this was both exasperated and a little more desperate. You turned around as soon as you could, looking up into Rory’s eyes (and definitely not getting lost in those freckles, not in a situation like this, no matter how cute the blush growing behind them was). “My turn to be your knight in shining armor, highness.”
The playfulness in Rory’s voice, the little joke you’d had since that first meeting, struck you with something that felt a little like an adrenaline jolt and a little bit like seeing Rory for the first time all over again. It was simultaneously invigorating and disorienting, especially with the way the alley backlit those honey-brown curls.
And then, the whole moment shattered, as Rory smirked and added, “Also, you’re too short for anyone to take seriously as a human shield.”
“What--” you started to say, only to realize abruptly that despite Rory’s back being between the two of you and your foe, absolutely nothing had happened. Except that you could hear your sister, behind you, laughing, as what sounded like badly-repressed giggling quickly escalated into a full cackle, if only for a moment.
You looked over Rory’s shoulder--rather, around Rory’s shoulder--to see the others nearby, as well as what you were fighting, now wrapped up neatly in some actually pretty sick violet chains. The moment you made eye contact with Li, all you got was a shrug.
“We didn’t want to interrupt,” was the reply.
“It was cute!” said Azalea, seeming for all intents and purposes completely genuine, which only made it worse because you knew the other three were not.
“Ugh,” you groaned without heat, flopping forward dramatically so that your forehead fell on Rory’s chest before waving a hand vaguely in your friends’ direction. “You’re welcome.”
To your surprise, you felt the press of skin against your own as Rory ducked down, face pressing into your neck as you were enveloped in a quick but breathtaking hug. “Thank you.”
@iamkatsudone requested some steamy or smutty content for @speakergame‘s poly route featuring his Speaker, Kaidan. I had a lot of fun with the banter in this one ngl...and honestly, I have a pretty clear idea of where this is going, so even though I found a stopping point for the purpose of this being a prompt fill similar to the ones so far, there will be a continuation of this in which nsfw things actually happen instead of simply being discussed. ...I’m still putting it almost entirely under a cut, though, because it’s really skirting the line lmao.
10. kiss on that space where jaw connects + 15. a kiss on the jawline + Liam/Kaidan/Sebastian (NSFW)
It had been too long, in Kaidan’s extremely expert opinion, since he’d been able to actually be alone with his boyfriends. Either of them, or together—being on the road solving world-changing mysteries would do that, and of course in the grand scheme of things, Kaidan couldn’t think of anything he’d rather do than helping Kira, keeping her safe from the offensively boring man with a god complex. But that didn’t mean Kaidan didn’t also sometimes wish he could have enough of a break to make good on all of the smirks and burning glances between him, Bas, and Li.
Sebastian had, for better or worse, completely validated his frustrations when even he, as the one with the most self-control between the three of them, had leaned over Kaidan’s shoulder as Liam was working a spell to say, “Been a while since he’s shown us what else those hands can do.”
And Kaidan might not have been expecting Bas to start something just then, so he couldn’t help the wistful sigh he’d given in response, tipping his head back against Sebastian’s chest. A slow smirk pulled at his lips, and he shifted just enough to tip his head up and place his lips at the hinge of Sebastian’s jaw.
“Or his mouth,” Kaidan had whispered playfully. His tone didn’t quite match Sebastian’s level of soft, consuming rumbling, but it was still quiet enough that the words sank only into Sebastian’s skin, staying between the two of them. “Or yours, Bas.”
Kaidan felt Sebastian swallow as he turned the soft exchange into a kiss, breath catching for just a second against his back, and the knowledge that he’d pushed Sebastian that far with four words sent a pulse of heat straight between Kaidan’s legs. Another followed it a second later when he lowered his eyes to catch Liam, staring at both of them with a slow, churning fire in his eyes. Kaidan’s tongue peeked out from between his lips as his smile grew wider, and Liam bit his lip very deliberately in response.
Hands brushed Kaidan’s waist, but they didn’t get any further before the three of them were no longer alone and reluctantly—willing to make their frustration everyone else’s problem—pulling apart. For now. But the promise of later became too much to resist because they did, in fact, make sure that all three of them could be alone in a hotel room that night.
And the door to their room was slammed shut by Liam pushing Sebastian against it as soon as they were all inside. Kaidan took a second just to lean against the wall and watch, overcome with affection as well as desire for the two people who always picked up whatever might try to weigh him down and still looked incredibly hot carrying it.
Liam taking Sebastian’s chin in one hand and tilting his face so that Liam could kiss the same spot as Kaidan earlier, however—also incredibly hot. “So what exactly did I miss earlier?” Liam asked.
Sebastian chuckled. “You’re about caught up,” he said, shrugging out of his coat.
“Almost,” Kaidan corrected playfully as he finished taking off his shoes and kicking them into the dusty closet if only so no one would trip over them later. “Bas was saying how much he missed your hands.”
“Among other things,” Sebastian conceded.
“That so?” Liam asked, arching an eyebrow as he worked at the first button of Sebastian’s shirt. “You could’ve just asked.”
Kaidan snickered quietly as he came up behind Liam. Of course it wasn’t that simple, really. But when it was just them, just this, it absolutely could be.
“Liam Cowles,” Sebastian said, voice utterly serious as he leaned down to brush Liam’s forehead with his own. One of his hands snaked around Liam’s waist while the other reached out to Kaidan, who caught it and used the leverage to pull himself closer. “I am asking you and Kai to fuck me.”
“Well, not exactly poetry,” Kaidan said, even as he felt himself grow breathless.
Liam hummed his agreement, drawing a finger from the exposed skin at Sebastian’s collar up his throat and under his chin. “Say—”
“Please,” Sebastian finished, and it never failed to melt Kaidan (or Liam, whose shoulders dropped a little at the promise that this was really happening) how sincere their boyfriend was when he started to let go for them. Sebastian’s hand slid from Kaidan’s to squeeze lightly at his forearm instead.
“Of course,” Liam said, running a hand through Sebastian’s hair, mussing it even with the movement held back by Bas’s hair tie. “Meet you at the bed.”
“Preferably naked,” Kaidan added, grinning, and while he might not have needed to say it since they all understood, feeling Liam chuckle and seeing Sebastian bite his lip as he moved past them was very worth it.
Liam turned to face them, then, face a little flushed, eyes notably dark, smirk sharp and tempting. Kaidan leaned up to taste it as he wound his arms around Liam’s shoulders and let the taste of mint and magic wash over him. Ever impatient, Liam bit Kaidan’s lip almost immediately, seeking entry, and Kaidan gave it, even as he pressed a leg in between Liam’s. He wasn’t exactly surprised to feel Liam hard against his stomach as he pressed against his boyfriend from thigh to chest, but it was still gratifying, and a soft moan escaped between them as soon as Liam pulled away.
He didn’t go far, though, kissing over Kaidan’s jaw and down the side of his neck with a kind of vicious desperation that had Kaidan griding against him as he expertly worked through the layers of Liam’s clothing. By the time Liam was shirtless in front of him, Kaidan was also missing his flannel, and he had gained a number of dark marks across his throat that had nothing to do with Liam’s black lipstick.
Liam massaged circles into his hips as they stood there for a second, breathing hard, hyper-conscious of Sebastian’s eyes on them from the bed. And all that Kaidan could think of to say through the haze of finally having what he wanted at his fingertips was, “Hi.”
To his credit, Liam only blinked once in surprise before smiling. “Hello,” he answered playfully. An open-mouthed kiss over Kaidan’s brow piercing, and then, “That all it took to shut your brain off, Kai? Maybe we should wait more often.”
Sebastian groaned in annoyance at the same time Kaidan gasped, “Don’t you dare,” punctuating his statement with a playful swat to Liam’s ass. “Bas and I will just have fun without you.”
“Can’t have that,” Liam agreed. He took Kaidan by the hand and tugged him towards the bed where Sebastian sat at the edge in just his underwear. But there was something strangely vulnerable in his voice as he added, “’S not the same without all of us.”
“Never,” Sebastian agreed firmly, leaning back on his arms. The position caused the muscles of his chest and arms to ripple, and Kaidan frankly could not wait to have his hands re-exploring every inch.
Still, he nodded to Liam, holding him close until the smile there solidified again and Liam was stage-whispering with him about how they might plan to fulfill Sebastian’s request.
It really had been too long. Whoever came up with the bullshit about absence making the heart grow fonder, Kaidan thought, had clearly never had anything like this. There was no world in which not having both of his boyfriends was a good thing, and he was absolutely going to prove it.
Title: Strange, Familiar Magic
Summary: There’s probably something to be said here about the red string of fate, but all Angus would like to do with it is play, thanks very much.
Warnings: None.
Notes: The @speakergame Discord server was in dire need of Li fluff, so I stole @tpcignits‘s Speaker, Elizabeth, whose gamestate includes Liam, and this was born. Someone should give me a prompt for Lily because the next fic I’m writing also includes Liam. (Open invitation.)
Also here on AO3.
“She’s a familiar, not a housecat, Ellie,” Liam was saying, but Ellie recognized that particular tone of voice, the one that came up when Liam was just determined to be right instead of actually being right.
She looked down at the cat on the old couch between them, eyebrows raised so high she knew it made her face look ridiculous as she watched Angus nuzzle into the palm of her hand, long strands of fur slipping between her fingers. “The nature of cats is universal, Li,” she said, hand slipping under Angus’s chin to scratch very softly up her neck. “She’s purring. Pretty sure that’s proof!”
Li just sighed, flopping dramatically back onto the couch. “Cats purr when they’re nervous, too, you know.”
“So you admit she’s a cat!”
Liam spluttered. “No, what--”
“Besides, she’s connected to you, right?” Elizabeth said, the hand not petting Angus falling onto the couch by Liam’s thigh so she could lean closer (and not thinking about that closeness, nope, not right now). Her voice fell to a conspiratorial, shocked whisper. “Liam M. Cowles, are you saying I make you nervous?”
“Maybe,” Liam answered, arching up so their noses were touching. Elizabeth was so enamored of the blush that Li couldn’t hide on his pale skin, especially not this close, not to mention the way his voice grew tight and eyes crossed to look at her (just like his cat), that the smirk on his lips went unnoticed. “Nervous you’ll crush Angus, anyway.”
It wasn’t like their bodies were super close together, like this, but clearly, Angus did not think she had enough space if the indignant meow she let out was any indication. Elizabeth looked down suddenly, starting to pull away (just because she had a dog, or whatever the technical classification for their demon was, didn’t mean she did not understand the cardinal rule of cat ownership: it’s the cat’s house, and you just live in it). And there was the perfect distraction as Liam reached over and poked her hard in the ribs.
“Liam!” Elizabeth swatted at his hand, missing intentionally as she stood up. “More like nervous I’ll bring up your favorite hoodie aga--”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Liam said, crossing his arms as Elizabeth moved across the room to where the skein of red yarn had been left after their friends’ latest brainstorming session.
“Someday I will have photographic evidence, and then you will be at my mercy,” she said. It didn’t take too long to measure out an arm’s length of the string.
“Luke will burn them.”
“Bold of you to assume Luke isn’t on my side.”
Elizabeth punctuated her statement with a soft snip of the scissors, cutting the red string free and then wiggling it between two fingers. Exactly as predicted, she saw Angus’s ears twitch slightly as the cat looked towards her. “If I can get your cat, I can definitely sway your brother,” she said, coming back to the couch just as Angus jumped off of it and down to the carpet.
“You planning to bribe him with string, too?” Liam asked, rolling his eyes.
Elizabeth sat back down, then realized the string was too short to keep Angus safely away from her feet like this. “I can’t tell you all my secrets,” she said coyly. After a second of consideration, she pulled her feet up onto the couch, then laid sideways so that her arm and the string could flop onto the carpet and into Angus’s reach. “There you go,” she hummed, whipping the yarn into patterns for Angus to chase.
For a few minutes, the only sounds in the room were the little pap-pap-pap of Angus’s paws on the old carpet and the occasional breathy laugh as she did something that looked impossible if not for the immutable truth that cats were actually liquid. At some point, Liam must have remembered that he did technically have an excuse to come over that wasn’t Elizabeth’s obviously stellar company. When she looked up, at least, she noticed a book in his lap that hadn’t been there before. But he wasn’t reading it. He was looking at her.
Or, rather, had been, because as soon as Elizabeth looked up, his eyes darted back to the book, then bounced to his cat, then back to the book, and Elizabeth couldn’t help laughing. “What?” Liam asked, the blush returning with a vengeance.
“Nothing,” Elizabeth hummed, tucking her feet up against Li’s leg as she shifted a little on the couch.
Angus, impatient to have further attention lavished on her, bapped Ellie’s hand where it had fallen still, dangling by the couch. “Okay, okay,” she laughed, going back to making the string into acceptable prey for Angus.
“You know she’s going to expect this from you now, right?” Liam asked, and there was something soft in his voice that made Elizabeth wish she’d still been looking at him when he spoke. Still, even just a quick glance revealed a smile in his eyes that was as teasing as it was warm.
Looking away from the yarn for a split second as Angus pounced was all the cat needed to yank the red string from her fingers and begin to tear it to shreds with the utmost glee. Elizabeth laughed. “I think I can live with that,” she said, and if she didn’t know any better, she’d think Angus was smiling, too.
