I Can See You | Ellie Williams X Reader

i can see you | ellie williams x reader

“ i can see you in your suit and your necktie

passed me a note saying, "meet me tonight"

then we kissed and you know i won't ever tell ”

summary : frustrated from the monotonous nature of your job and relationship-status alike, you decide it's high time that your co-worker, who happens to be the philosophy professor realizes what she's missing out on. warnings : mdni. librarian!reader, professor!ellie, sexual tension, workplace romance so [kind of] forbidden, traces of loser!ellie if you have the vision, semi-public risky sex, fingering & oral (r!receiving)

a/n : i'm proud of this one and spent ages writing so you guys better read the fuck out of it and tell me how it was (affectionate)

It's a surprisingly calm day at Greenwood High, which you take as an opportunity to bask in the few minutes of silence before a nerd comes shuffling through the rusty doors to disturb your sense of peace with the usual banter. Quite a few of the students have assumed you take pleasure in it, spilling their guts out informing you of details you couldn't care less about. So much for the bewitching nature of the profession that had drawn you here ages ago.

Now, you're the cheerful librarian. The one adolescent girls find to ramble about their new favorite novel or their clueless boyfriends looking for help with the same department, the one who has to endure listening to the Non-fiction Loyalists as they go on and on about historical facts and of course, one of the few people of the staff who's much respected by students yet somehow disregarded by the co-workers. It isn't often you spend time in the pantry with them, not that you'd have similar occurrences to share even if you did. Long story short, you content yourself with the run-of-the-mill library with your books and bite-sized snacks.

The loud electric bell breaks the trance of calm, your head tipping up as you pinch the bridge of your nose and raise yourself from the uncomfortable seat to get something for lunch. A heavy breakfast had left you full already, so just a cheap pack of chips from the vending machine would suffice for the time being. There's something strangely appealing about those local brands the school can afford. Moreover, it's pretty beneficial with balancing your budget. All the aesthetically pleasing aspects of the job you'd anticipated come with a price, and boy is it costly. If it wasn't for your undying affection towards books, you'd have quit months ago.

Even the corridors are surprisingly quiet. If you catch a pair of adolescents making out near the gym, you're too unbothered to mention it. Being the adored staff member among students often brings you to moments that make you seem way too lenient about certain situations, you've got the hang of it quite easily. Your wedge boots thump over the granite floor, the evident sound of it slowly diminishing as you descend towards the noisier and much chaotic ground floor. The mere sight of enthusiastic hugs and chants across the hall makes you feel fortunate about the silence on your floor. It would be really exhausting, having to deal with that. Almost makes you sympathize with the ground floor teachers.

Five aggressive punches to the vending machine and you're already exhausted, stomping your way to the parking lot. It's the one place you can find solace in without having to worry about being too clumsy for the teachers and too unentertaining among the students. For the few minutes of lunch break you can enjoy your bag of chips and the summer breeze. That is, until you bump into Ellie Williams— Professor Williams is what the students call her. Although she never seemed like the kind who would force them into it.

She's leaning against a brick wall, one arm crossed over the other as you take notice of her trying to hide the cigarette she'd been holding on to. Smoke break. Seems fair enough, she takes three classes on the ground floor. The flicker in your eyes between her hand and back to her face shows she's aware of your having noticed it, but there's no sense of nervousness. Good, you're not quite sure how you'd have handled her being agitated over being found out. You'd probably be more scared than Ellie herself.

"Want one?"

You wave her off and join her up against the wall, looking back to ensure the brick isn't leaving any idling dust behind. Nope, safe. With a gentle nudge, you offer her your bag of chips. Ellie squints at it as if the snack could possibly be more life threatening than her cigarette.

"Cream and onion? I'd rather eat my own flesh."

You roll your eyes at what's hopefully a hyperbole, brushing your crumb collected hands over your pants. They need a wash today anyway. Ellie offhandadly puts out the cig under her converse shoes— quite an odd match with the those pants, as you stand staring in disbelief. It's her turn do the eye-rolling as she bends down with a grunt, picking it up and shoves it in her pocket. If she feels any shame from her act, she's quick to sneakily mask it with a "what now?" face.

You're not sure what's next, usually you finish the snack in your car listening to some music but it's too late to go for that option. Moreover, it would feel awkward leaving Ellie hanging around even though you're familiar with her preference towards being left to her lonesome. While you chose not to mingle with the teachers, Ellie was almost treated like an outcast. You'd heard the rumors from a few students— arguments after a meeting, negotiations being made. While it offered as an entertainment to them, a part of you sympathized with her before you came back to your senses and realized you were better than that.

She hadn't exactly felt sorry for you on the field trip a few months ago, when she kissed you against a tree after everyone was asleep. You'd felt your stomach doing somersaults, knees giving away as she helped you back up against the uneven bark. You'd never been kissed that way by anyone before and then she proceeded to avoid any confrontation whatsoever about it. It wasn't as if you were any desperate for her attention back then, just out of a long and dreadful relationship. But a small conversation about what led to it in the first place would've helped.

"I— uh, needed a book from your library," Ellie breaks the deafening silence. "Think I sent one of my students earlier? Had to do with Pragmatism and all that, 'm not sure if you'd want to..."

"Next time you should show up in the libary with your own card, Professor." You realize how dumb the emphasis sounds after the words are out. "It's just one floor, shouldn't be a pain in the ass."

You're amused by your own response. Ellie seems too, or at least she's satisfied enough to pass a smug smirk with a tilt of her head in acknowledgement. You decide that's enough conversation you can have with a co-worker you happened to kiss without any explainable reason and decide to finish the rest of it in your comfort zone, the one place you don't have to worry about past situationships— if that's what you'd term this— disturbing your sense of calm.

"Fine," She mutters as you begin to walk away. "I'll be there, since it's not a...pain in the ass. You should refrain that language around in campus, though."

It's surprising to note she does in fact show up the very next morning, leaning in the same manner by the hallway before you've even made your way to open the library door. Early morning and her first thought is to grab a book about whatever she takes interest in teaching, existential crises and all that. Ellie stands behind you as you unlock the door, hands buried deep inside her pants' pocket. The door greets you with it's usual creek followed by orbs of dust, you realize it's time for the monthly cleaning soon.

"They about to give away the upper floors to some horror house for public expeditions?"

Your eyes roll at her remark, fingertips brushing through a bookshelf as you stalk towards the wooden desk that sticks out of the comparatively older furniture. You'd had it changed a few months back, your taste clearly clashing from that of the builders from a few years ago. It's fortunate Ellie doesn't come up with more comments about the library's condition by the time you're on the other side of the table. She's giving herself a tour through the shelves, which you're sure would keep her busy enough for you to go through your daily paperwork.

She's back with not one but three books in her hands, two of which are thick enough for it to be difficult for her to hold them out. She allows you to help herself quite politely, so you decide it's only fair you try and ignore the brush of her fingers against yours when you reach for the books. She does clear her throat when it happens, but you turn a blind eye to it by focusing on making her an issue card.

"I didn't know you had that big of an erm— of a collection going on here."

"You don't show up here that often now, do you?"

Ellie's eyes visibly glint at that and you're yet again reminded of those few seconds it'd happened behind the tents what now feels like forever ago. It's worse how you'd had enough time to acknowledge it, make a mind map back when you had the chance but took it for granted. But how far could you blame yourself? You'd expected more. Of course you had. When a kiss knocks you off your feet and has your fingers digging into the arm of someone you shouldn't be caught kissing in the first place, it's natural to expect more.

And then— just like that, not a mention of it again. Despite the numerous times you'd walked into her by the corridors or that awkward bus ride back school, she'd never brought it up again and clearly neither could you. There didn't seem a proper way to start the conversation anyway. Everything about it was improper and wrong and...forbidden. You'd guessed Ellie suspected the same and realized it would've been a mistake in the first place.

"I will, now." You hear Ellie speak sheepishly. "Show up more often— for the books, of course."

An awkward pause follows right after, your pen scribbling her name over the card as she stands tapping her fingers on the wood. Her eye catches the succulent you keep by it and like everyone else, she muses at the over the top pot shaped in the form of what appears to be a goblin. Ellie is grinning by the time you hand her the card, and you're left with the urge to groan over the prospect of repeat the same old sob story to defend yourself. Maybe not the entire thing today, it's clear she has a dozen more tasks to tend to.

"It's a gift," You mumble. "And no, that's not Shrek."

"I wasn't even thinking about Shrek."

Her grin turns into a devious smirk that you wish you could wipe off her mouth, it'd almost be irritable if you weren't secretly attracted to it. There were quite a lot of scenarios you could play out that involved her smirking shamelessly at you. Some more vulgar than you should be allowed to imagine, at least not at this place and time. Or ever— provided you're the only one thinking of it and Ellie couldn't care less. She's clearly more interested in having conversations about...Shrek with you instead. Which you would have to settle on for the moment.

"Must be a special gift," She muses, absentmindedly running her tip over it's pot belly. "If you're still keeping it around. And here of all places."

"Making an effort to be nice."

Give it a try, you want to add. But that feels too mean— hence a contrast to your statement as well. Ellie doesn't owe you anything after that kiss and it's high time you make yourself believe the same. If anything, you should be grateful things didn't turn out the way you could've expected. Why should you worry about risking your job towards something unprofessional if the person involved hasn't considered it in the first place?

"You are nice." Ellie mutters under her breath, taking you by surprise. "I— uh, my students...well, you often get brought up in our conversations. They think you're kind."

"And what do you think?"

She didn't see that coming. It's concerning how prompt you are at making Ellie lose her composure over a question. What's more concerning is her ability to blush over a simple question, you notice with a peek at her ears that are close to turning pink. Maybe she isn't as full of herself as you perceive her to be. Either that or your massive deficiency in physical affection has caused your flirting skills to elevate in a manner that never existed before.

"Me? I– I guess you're sweet?" She stutters, then laughs. "Haven't had the chance to know you enough to judge that."

It almost makes you want to bring up the conversation about that kiss again, how she casually mentions she didn't happen to have the time for it. As if there wasn't enough on that field trip or the unbearably awkward bus ride home. To this day you're convinced that if it wasn't for your headphones, you might've just jumped out of that bus' window. Undoubtedly better than having to sit next to her without being able to utter a word about the fact that her lips happened to be on yours the previous night.

"And books!" She speaks again. "You've got decent taste in books. Book club's words, not mine."

"Ellie," Your voice sounds more stern than you'd expected it to. "I specifically asked you for your words."

She chuckles, then proceeds to rub the back of her neck. It should be an act of embarrassment but Ellie manages to make it seem calculated. Or maybe you're reading into things. It would be sensible enough considering your urge to gather some personal information— even if it's a grain of it, through her.

At this point it doesn't necessarily have to involve that secret kiss. Yet you can't stop yourself from recalling the first brush of her lips, surprisingly bold for someone who didn't feel the urge to mention it over again. You catch yourself staring at her mouth and have to physically pinch your own arm under the desk to control yourself. And it's still not enough. You're already finding yourself lost in the loophole of daydreaming about that mouth and the hundred thousand things she could do with it.

"So," You force yourself to utter some probably futile words. "No words from your side, Professor?"

That somehow does it for her. It's visibly obvious how you can notice something switch inside of Ellie at the term she should be acquainted with by this period of time. Her eyes flicker behind you before she makes eye contact that you'd feel lasts long enough for your own eyes to find some newfound interest in the dull grey floor as if on accord. Your pulse is already racing and she hasn't even touched you.

"I could give you mine from a psychoanalysed point of view," Ellie responds. "Or I could go for a more...layman approach, if you prefer that? Not sure about it."

"I'm not your student, Ellie. Just tell me what comes to your mind."

"I agree with the kindness part. Same with the books. Guess I could say your lips—"

"May I come in?"

Fucking awesome.

It is when Ellie practically shoves herself off from against the desk that you notice she was invading your personal space in a manner so comforting it didn't even occur to you before she pulled away. You feel a surge of emptiness while greeting the student that's stepping in before you've even answered the request, a tick in Ellie's jaw brings momentary satisfaction.

You haven't even diverted your attention to the kid dressed in all black and Ellie is already stepping her way out towards the hallway while you're left to stand dumbfound. The faint sound of some recommendation for a fantasy novel ripples in your ears but your main focus is on the professor before you turning to leave. The professor and her fantastic ass.

"You said you needed more chaperones."

Early March. The assembly room is more crowded than ever, unmistakable scent of sweaty bodies and axe deodorant causes your nose to scrunch up as your head twists in Ellie's direction. With the amount of staff memebers surrounding you with similar expressions of disinterest, it's unlikely there could be a lack of chaperones.

Ellie shrugs but keeps her attention focused at the dancing couples. That gives you the opportunity to not-so-sneakily take a look at her outfit. You're left with an open jaw as you take a look at the suit she's worn over the usual crisp white shirt that you've seen with her sleeves rolled up, a new look on her and yet just as insatiable. Fortunately no converses under her dress pants either, you take notice within a blink while also becoming self-conscious of your own outfit.

"And the outfits," She turns when you speak this time. "I thought you said casual worked. Look what you've done to me."

She whistles a low tune as you wave a hand in front of the peach sundress you'd just pulled out. It must've stood out among the black everyone else happened to be wearing the moment you stepped in. Ellie's gaze drops to the floor and back up in a manner that couldn't count as nonchalant and you're left with a tingling sensation down the pit of your lower belly.

"But this works just fine," She mutters under her breath, head leaning next to your ear for her words to make more sense when the music picks up. "If I'm being honest, the color suits you better than these darker shades."

It's safe to say the vague compliment floats around in your head as you help yourself to some confiscated 'fruit punch' behind the pantry's door. You're still responsible enough to make sure the alcohol doesn't get to you, specially considering the unimaginable drama that took place in last year's prom. Reckless as you could get on crowded occasions, you wouldn't risk your job for it.

Or at least that's what you had in mind until you found Ellie stalking towards you as you walked back towards the room. You stop short in the hallway, hands dug into the luckily present pockets in your dress. She's imitating your actions but pulls her fist out on noticing the same. You don't seem to mind, choosing to clear your throat and wait for her to speak up. It's a surprise she doesn't utter a word and instead takes another step forward to stand right by your side.

You watch with utmost attention as a pair of girls pass the two of you, hands linked together and leaving an air of extroversion with their loud laughter. Ellie waits for them to leave before nudging you on the shoulder, your head lifting to find her eyes guiding your own down. As you do, you notice she's attempting to hand you a piece of paper. Couldn't be grades, too small for that. Not the library card either, it's colorful unlike what she's holding. You peek at the scribbled letters as soon as the crumpled white in your palm.

'Meet me tonight. Janitor's closet. Half past nine.'

So you do. Seven minutes after the assigned time as an attempt to not come off as too eager, even though the rhythmically loud beating of your heart states otherwise. She's already leaning against a wall, the familiar punch in one hand while the other rests against a rusting cabinet. Ellie passes you the first smile of the night when you get sheepishly lock the door behind yourself, unsure of whether it would even be necessary but going along with the decision anyway.

"I'm an idiot."

"Hello to you too, Professor."

She rolls her eyes at your statement but between the back and forth flirting you've had over the last week by your library desk, the flicker of a different emotion in her eyes doesn't go ignored by you. Someone else would barely notice it even while squinting, your regular conversations have led to something different though. You've learnt just the right things that make her flush, the innumerable ways to rile her up as well.

"You're not letting that go, are you?"

"You don't seem to be complaining."

And complain she doesn't. Instead she leaves the plastic cup against a cabinet and steps forward close enough for your back to press against the cold wood of the door. Your breath catches in your throat— all the flirting and stolen glances aside, you've never been this close to Ellie. Well, at least not until the night of the kiss that's occupied your mind ever since.

You're taken aback when her hand raises only to rest next to your head instead of how you'd have expected her to cup your jaw instead. She notices your surprise but doesn't act on it, choosing to lean in close enough for her hot breath to fan over your face. You wonder if she can feel yours as well— if you're even capable of breathing in the first place. Shaking the thought off, you focus on how she has so sneakily draped the other arm by your waist that it went disregarded by you.

"I think I want to kiss you," She mutters almost as if in thought. "It's unprofessional and forbidden and wrong and— and I'm fucking tired of giving myself this speech every night. So yeah, I'm gonna kiss you now."

You'd like to ask her what it is that has her conjuring up speeches in her own head at night but by the time your mouth opens, her own captures it skillfully and swift as an arrow. That's not bad, in fact you'd rather have her kiss you over quite literally any other activity in the whole world. So, you happily return the favour by kissing her back with more enthusiasm. The gentle hand by your waist pulls you closer not-so-gently, your chest pressed flush against hers.

The kiss lasts long enough for all concerns regarding your professional skills or hers to evaporate off to replace much filthier thoughts. There's no other way out, not when she's nudging a knee between your legs and you have to fight back the urge to clamp your thighs. It's as if Ellie already sees it coming without your mentioning it because right when the thought crosses your head, she's pressing you up by your thighs against the door and spreading your legs open to rest between them.

It creaks behind your back, leaving you to hope the sound is muffled behind the music outside. Likewise for that of your loud gasp when she squeezes your thighs between her fingers. Your eyebrows furrow out of fear, the hand that's wrapped behind her neck probably squeezing in a manner that catches her attention.

"Worried about getting caught?" She questions. "Just try to be quiet, yeah? Shouldn't be that difficult with all that time you spend in the library."

Calloused as her fingers are, when they find their way between your legs it's effortless how they slide their way under your panties. Skillful, even. Your head falls against the door with a thud, the aftermath of that ache being nothing close to the unattended one between your legs. Fortunately, Ellie's tending to the one you'd rather have taken care of.

Your fingers thread through her hair when she runs a thumb vertically all the way over your slick folds. One gentle tug and she's already going animalistic, pressing a side of her hips over your own to keep you in place. You were somehow still squirming until she did it, blame goes on her for being that damn attractive. If that wasn't appealing enough, a strand of hair sticks to her forehead damp with sweat. Your fingers itch to brush it off, but you're distracted by her middle finger stretching you out following an obscene sound.

"More— please,"

Your breath picks up when she adds another with no hesitation or teasing, the metal of her ring cold between your legs. You don't have to look down to ensure her fingers are glistening at this point. Surprisingly, she's the one who helps you with it. Your eyes widen as Ellie's fingers pull out and she brings them up in front of your face. Dumbfound, you stare in confusion until she taps them over your lips and you realize exactly how nasty she is.

"Suck," She orders. "Then I'll give you more."

Your mouth falls open at the prospect of that, closing in around her fingers as you taste yourself. She stares like it's a sight she's never witnessed, chewing on her bottom lip hard enough for you to be worried about her drawing some blood. Just chapped lips, you notice when she releases her bottom lip. Tears well up in your eyes when she pushes her fingers further down your mouth, gentle but insistent.

A string of drool sticks from your lips to the tip of her fingers when she roughly pulls them out with a grunt, probably blaming the whimper you'd let out somewhere along. Your eyes trail down out of embarrassment but unlike you, Ellie is shameless enough to grasp your jaw with the same spit-covered fingers to force your gaze back on her.

"Watch."

Eyes forced open, you watch as she bends to her knees down with a grunt. Your tongue swipes over your lips in anticipation, mouth falling open when she lifts your dress up to press a gentle kiss over your soaked panties. You're taken by surprise from the affectionate gesture, but you never know when it comes to Ellie. By the time you're registering it, she's already pushing them to the side with her thumb. You almost close your eyes but remind yourself of her command, trembling fingers closing into a fist as if that would somehow diminish the urge to do the same.

"Look at you," She whispers, breath warm against your cunt. "Bet you could just hump my mouth if I stopped right now."

"No— no, please don't stop—"

Stopping is the last thing in her mind right now. No, she won't stop until you cum on her mouth. Then she'll have to take you back home because what else is supposed to happen when she gets a taste of what's she's been craving since months?

Her next kiss is on your inner thigh, not the teasing kind despite the placement. It's open mouthed and messy, Ellie's mouth trailing from the sensitive skin towards her much anticipated destination. It takes a lot of hard work not to allow your head to fall back again. Yet you squint your eyes open to look at her darkening ones, and being the cocky professor that she is, Ellie smirks presumptuously. You're almost planning on begging your way through some more blabbered words when Ellie helps you gulp down your words by wrapping her lips around your pulsing clit.

There's no time to waste now, she hints by sucking— hard. Your fist falls open, one hand scratching it's way to her scalp and tugging the ends of her hair to have her proceed further. You're panting already, then realise that the quivering exhales aside, you are kind of bucking your hips over Ellie's mouth. Humping. It should be embarrassing. The location, the timing, your lack of morality in the moment, the unethical nature of your act. But it doesn't matter now. You need to let go. Fortunately for you, Ellie's more eager towards having do the same.

You release a gasp of relief when she pushes you open with two fingers, rough and hasty this time. She's simultaneously careful not to hurt you, squeezing her other hand over your thigh to keep your legs parted. If it wasn't for that support, they'd be wriggling like noodles at any point of time. You're physically pulling at her hair when she begins to pump them with an even, unrelentless pace. It's commendable how despite all the attention hitting that spot might require, she has equal expertise in sucking your clit while doing it. The faint slurping sounds amongst the louder thumps of beats make your knees buckle, forehead creasing as you make an effort towards maintaining eye contact.

"It's okay," Ellie stops for a moment to respond in a composed tone. "You let yourself enjoy it now, baby."

Breathing a sigh you'd been holding on to since minutes, you find relief upon squeezing your eyes shut. Your brain feels like it could shut off from the pleasure itself, all mush with various versions of curse words and Ellie's name. When she curls up her fingers further while barely grazing the front of her teeth over your clit, you realize your whole world is spinning upside down. Clenching around her fingers with a whine, your vision blurs as you feel yourself practically blacking out. Ellie's rhythmic pumping forces you to stay conscious as you bring yourself to push her away once the pounding in your head subsides.

After much grunting and some inaudible murmurs, she pulls herself up while the popping of her knees makes you laugh through your glossy eyes. Ellie laughs along, smirking when you pull her close by the end of her necktie for a kiss. She cups your jaw so gently that it confuses you whether the same person just did something impermissible to you seconds ago. Not that you're guilty, it was definitely worth it. Ellie's face doesn't carry any signs of regret either.

She does have something more complex in mind— that part you can assume by the now familiar glint in her eyes. Instead of calculating her next move, you run the back of your hand over your sweaty neck. Things are far more comfortable and cozy now. Almost as if you keep your eyes closed then the fact that you just had an earth-shattering orgasm in the janitor's closet would cease to exist. Little do you know that it's the first of many she'll reward you with tonight. Or ever, at that.

── ⋅⋅⋅ ────꒰ ୨ ♡ ୧ ꒱───────

ellie : @thatgiraffefromtlou @nicolicht @alexpritch @violetsellie

tags : (reply here to be added to my taglists or have your user removed)

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trigun stampede is so realistic cuz the final big battle is between two brothers who are kicking and screaming and biting each other over a cube and they decimate an entire city. this is exactly how sibling fights go speaking from experience

Chuuya Nakahara x afab!Reader

wc: 14k+

general warnings: afab!reader (gn pronouns/nicknames, afab genitalia), mer!chuuya, eldritch mermaid au, author plays fast and loose with the definition of eldritch, thunderstorms, injuries, tension, strangers to lovers, cult references, island survival, hunting, descriptions of food & preparation, unedited writing

nsfw warnings: MINORS DNI, fingering, oral & penetrative sex (all reader-receiving), unprotected sex, handjobs, multiple orgasms, biting & blood, mild dacryphilia

written for the teahouse server's mermay collab, hosted by @petrichorium !!

Rain has notoriety amongst humans for a plethora of reasons.

Some people find it calming, revitalising, a sweet nurturer of life from the heavens. Others live in fear of the rain’s tender lovers, the thunder and the lightning, who join their sweet peacebringer when turbulence rages through the skies.

And one thing that you have learned about rain in particular is how such a gentle nourishing sensation can feel just like shards of glass against your flesh when you’re caught in the throes of a storm. 

Soft droplets that kissed your skin when the clouds were still close to white turn sharp and violent as the wind picks up, whipping them around in a frenzy and sending them hurtling back at you. 

The small rowboat you’d taken out with you isn’t by any means well-suited for these elements, swaying and sloshing through the ocean with such fierce turbulence that you’re surprised its still holding out on you as you desperately try to navigate your way towards the eye of the storm. By now, the floor of your vessel is drenched, puddling, soaking your poor feet even further. Surely the wood will crack under the damage, the interior not made to withstand contact with water like the hull. 

For now, you grit your teeth and carry on, oar so tight in your hands you may very well contract splinters. You are rocked and shaken from side to side within the confines of your little boat, battered by the torrential downpour above and bombarded from all angles by the sea below. 

A sharp crack splits from under you. 

You are sinking. Fast. 

The water rises higher within the body of your boat, reaching your ankles now. Each splitting strike of thunder from above resonates through your body with every desperate oarstroke, and you fight against the elements with all that you can muster. 

Foolish of you to think that you could power through against the inexorable rampage of the rain and her tempestuous partners. 

Contact with land is inevitable, you suppose, with how long you were drifting on the splintered remains of your boat. Weeks, or even months could have passed with how fragmented time feels when you are on your own out at sea. Of course, the fact that you’re still alive reminds you it has been shorter. But several days must have gone by at least, floating in and out of a hazy state of unconsciousness, becoming aware of yourself for the scarce moments you could drag some soggy old rations from the bag you’d kept around your person before zoning out once more. 

And then there is something beneath you, suddenly, a rocking motion that rolls you from the planks of wood you’d clung to, forces you onto something hard that does not bob atop waves. 

Whilst the rain from the previous storm continues to drizzle, the winds have ceased on land and the storm itself has all but ebbed. Thick, wet sand clings between your fingertips as you anchor yourself on your palms and rise to your feet. The tide pulls waves up to the beach, which lap at your toes as you double over and catch your breath. 

You're lucky not to have drowned out there.

Some machination of fate must have a watchful eye out for you, perhaps. It's a rather daunting prospect to dwell upon. 

In the distance, there lies a forest. Small, like the island itself, but you are sure to find decent sustenance within. Through the other side, poking out above the trees like a beacon, is the top of an old lighthouse. You’re sure it probably works, but the light inside is off and moss lies encrusted in thick patches around the walls. If it does still run, it’s surely abandoned by now.

The first order of business, you decide as you make your way along the beach, circling the forest to get to the lighthouse with less issues, is to see if you’re alone on this island. 

And hopefully soon, before night falls. 

Having a secure shelter is a blessing. Some of the lighthouse walls have holes from years of dilapidation, but there are whole floors still perfectly intact, and the entire top half of the building is still in one piece. 

The storage room is the most well-preserved, though the metal barrels and wooden crates that line the walls are all strangely void of contents. Almost as if it was the least used, which you’d think is strange for a lighthouse that clearly must have been operated by someone at one point. At least, you think, there should be some old canned goods that might just about still be edible. But there’s no food stock in sight, nothing more than a few bags of salt- supposedly to cure fresh meats. 

It doubles as some sort of records room, you realise when you find the neatly stacked collection of papers on the shelves. These must be the documentation of past keepers, all penned in a language you don’t have a clear grasp over. Similar to writing you’ve seen in older treasures you’ve witnessed over the years, but with scripture that doesn’t fit the patterns you’re used to. Maybe ancient, or perhaps from a lost civilisation you’ve never come across. Either way, you quickly have to give up trying to decipher it. 

Your journey through the lighthouse brings you further up to the next undamaged room, what must have been the keeper’s living quarters. It’s almost uncomfortably scarce, no more than a single thin bedroll in the far corner with a handful of crumpled sheets piled on top. You’ll have to try and wash them before you use them, you think to yourself with a crinkle in your nose as you bypass this floor to try and find the control room. 

As you ascend the spiral staircase that skirts the inner edge of the lighthouse, you can’t help but notice the strange symbols etched into the walls. They’re scarce on the lower levels, but increase in frequency the higher you climb, until they reach a point where they cover the surface of every single brick. 

They lead to the control room, far darker than the other floors so far, only a few small portholes filtering daylight through. There are switches all around, some across the walls and more still upon the various short plinths that stick up from the floor. It looks like they’re arranged in a circle of sorts, with a taller and thicker pedestal in the middle. 

Unease settles into the room with you like an old friend, your most constant companion since you had washed ashore. But you need to try and get this thing running, and these switches seem to be the way to do it. 

You’ve never had to operate a lighthouse before, and judging by the type of writing you’d found in the other room you’re sure there won’t be any useful instructions around to give you any sort of help. The best you can do for now is try, and surely turning everything on would be a good start. 

Making your way to the nearest plinth, you turn one of the switches and another one starts to emit a faint light from beneath. Like a trail of breadcrumbs, you weave your way around the room lighting each plinth in turn. It doesn’t quite follow the circular shape they’re laid out in, criss-crossing over one another as you move from one to the next, but it’s the best possible lead you have to getting this working. There’s surely no harm in keeping up with it. 

As the final toggle switch is flicked, the center console glows an ominous deep red. Light runs like a stream of blood along the grooves etched through the room, filling up the various runes and circles until you are surrounded on all sides by bright lines of claret. 

There is a resounding shutter-like thunk! from above and, through a tiny porthole window near the ceiling, you can see the lamp at the top of the tower come to life and flood the sea with brilliant white light. Intense and blinding, it shifts to fill the control room and you shield your eyes with your dominant arm to avoid any lasting damage to your vision until everything fades. 

By the time you can finally peel your limb back to your side, even the red lines have dissipated. Everything seems to the naked eye like it has returned to normal. And yet, the air is thick, causing each breath you take to feel rougher, heavier. Like something is pressing against your lungs with every single inhale. 

It is night-time now, and colder still than it had been. Though the rain has subsided, a sharp chill whips through the building and bites through to your very bones. Each step you take away from the control room is accompanied by an unnerving sensation, something grander than yourself, a malevolent force that is encompassing and suffocating. There is an errant humidity that lingers in your lungs, thick and heavy and far too warm. 

Despite the atmospheric clemency, you need to get some air. 

It floods into you all at once when you breach into the open, the juxtaposition dizzying as you find yourself able to breathe again. The sounds of waves crashing against the beach, of birds making their way home for the night, distant leaves rustling, all bring you back to your center as you force through several deliberately paced inhales and exhales. 

Upon the beach stands a man. 

Unremarkable in stature, yet with an aura surrounding him that fills you with a strange sort of dread deep in the pit of your stomach. A creeping sort of fear, that lingers in the corners of your mind and holds on tight to your shoulders, wraps around your wrists and your ankles, keeps you where you are in the sand, frozen. 

Something within your subconscious tells you not to entertain the notion of interacting with him. 

Something incomprehensibly stronger entices you to take a step forwards. 

“Who are you?” you call. “What business have you here?”

“You don't know?” barks the man, incredulousness in his tone. “You summoned me here.”

“I fixed the lighthouse,” you correct. “I did not summon anything.”

The moonlight reflects the jewels that hang around the stranger’s neck on silver chains, bounces off the iron buckles of his boots, and drapes along the hints of white undershirt that frame the dip of his chest, deep and v-lined. Around his waist, you can make out the tinge of bright red, a thin scarf belt decorated with little chains and common gems. He wears a black coat and a tricorne hat hemmed with silver, smaller and less fancier than the ship captains you have seen in the past, but grandiose enough to tell you that this man is important to his crew. 

He has frowned at you for so long now that you’re certain it’s a permanent feature of his visage. The downturn of his lips is deep-set above his chin, disapproving, and a frustrated huff slips through them as he observes you. 

“What I’m taking from this is that neither of us have a way to get off this fucking island, yeah?”

“For now, pretty much,” you say, “yeah.” 

“Brilliant.” His arms raise in exasperation, and he turns away from you. “First I’m woken up late, and now I’m here in the middle of nowhere with some idiot who can’t recognise a pharos when they see one.”

“Pharos?” you repeat. “What do you mean?” 

He sighs. “You really are clueless, huh?”

“That’s mean.”

“Get used to it, sailor.” 

Your pointed jab of the tongue in retaliation goes ignored, sidelined as he continues to speak.

“A pharos,” the stranger says, “is an ancient lighthouse. A lot of them got used for rituals, for summoning eldritch deities to do their bidding. They got taken over by a bunch of cults a few centuries back. This one-” he takes a quick respite in his explanation to turn his attention to the building behind you- “seems newer, but still at least a hundred years old.” 

“So why are you here then, if these were meant to summon ancient gods?” You mean it more genuinely than it sounds, but you can’t help taking a bit of a jab at the man who has been nothing but abrasive towards you until now. 

“Why do you think?” he returns. 

“You can’t be,” you chuckle, disbelief riotous through your tone. “You’re human.” 

He scoffs, focusing his gaze somewhere far past you. “You’d be surprised.”

“And what’s that supposed to mean?”

“Come on then,” the stranger interjects, swiftly changing topic as he walks towards you, and then passes you by. “Let’s see the damage you’ve caused, we’re going inside.” 

“Hey,” you call out as you catch up, legs starting to burn a little from all the exertion of running around the island that you’ve undertaken today. “If we’re going to be stuck together, can I at least get your name?” 

“Call me Chuuya.”

“Alright.” You introduce yourself in turn, giving him a name you actually won’t mind being called. “No more of that nickname stuff, okay?”

“You got it, sailor.” 

Oh, this is going to be torture.

The trip to the lighthouse- the pharos, apparently- is less daunting when you’ve already taken it once before. You know what you have to expect, and pretty much remember which parts of the early levels of the staircase to avoid so that your foot doesn’t come crashing through the wood. 

Though it still seems to stretch upwards endlessly on your way up, the runes on the walls let you know that you’re closer. They’re not glowing any more, and you assume they must have faded once the pharos’ work was complete. 

For a moment, you watch the way the Chuuya walks around the space, approaching a wall and running a gloved fingertip across the divots, tracing the shape of one of the runes. You wonder if he’s able to understand them. If maybe he can even read the scriptures you found downstairs. 

“You fixed this place up?” asks Chuuya after a while, hands resting on his hips as he continues to idly observe the control room. “Tell me you noticed the cult runes on the walls when you did it.”

“I was a little busy,” you huff, “trying to get help so I could get the hell off this island.”

“And now we’re both stuck here,” he retorts. “Genius work, sailor.”

“Like you could do any better.” Frustrated, you cross your arms over your chest. “Aren’t you supposed to be some fancy eldritch being? Why can’t you just magic us off of here?” 

“It doesn’t work like that.” 

“Of course it doesn’t,” you scowl. “Well, what are we supposed to do, then?”

“Why are you asking me? You’re the reason we’re here, you think of a way out.”

“The only thing I can suggest is building a boat. Or at least a raft.” 

“Then it looks like you need to start collecting some wood.”

“Oh no you don’t, mister. You’re stuck here too, the least you can do is help us both get out of here.”  

“Why should I?”

“You’re a pirate, right?” You gesture vaguely towards his outfit. “You know the importance of teamwork. We’ll get this over with quicker if I’m not the only one working my ass off.” 

“Fine,” he concedes. It seems you struck a nerve. “I’ll help. On one condition.” 

“Yes?”

“I get to be the one that gathers our food. I don’t trust you.”

“Okay,” you agree. “If you’re taking control of that, we’ll both prepare whatever you bring back. And I’ll take the lead on finding things to make a decent raft in the meantime.”

Chuuya doesn’t dignify that with a response, instead turning on his heel to leave. “Let’s get started. The sooner we’re done, the sooner we can get the fuck out of here.” 

“It’s nighttime, you really want to start now?” You have to jog a little to catch up with him, taking a few stairs at a time until you’re closer. “Do eldritch deities not need sleep, or something?”

“No, we don’t,” he replies smoothly, and you barely just catch a glimpse of the amused grin that flickers across his lips. “Better get to work, sailor, you’ve got a lot of late nights ahead of you.” 

As it turns out, building a raft from scratch isn’t as easy as it looks. 

Only a few planks of wood tied together and something to function as a sail would be needed, you’d thought. Simple design, easy to carry out, that’s why it was the go-to survival plan for being stranded at sea. 

But when you have to scrounge for the wood yourself, because somehow this lighthouse doesn’t even have spare logs lying around for firewood, things become substantially more difficult. Thankfully, you’d been taught how to chop lumber in your youth- a friendly face when you’d first been out on your own, a skill you’d never forgotten. That doesn’t stop it from being absolutely gruelling work, though. Especially when you then have to haul those very same logs you’ve felled from the forest to the beach. And then try to tie them together with the rope you’ve managed to salvage from one of the busted lower floors of the lighthouse. 

In a turn of fate, Chuuya ends up being more helpful than you first expect of him- considering how he’d treated you upon first meeting. It’s still abrasive, clipped speech and thinly veiled insults, but it’s help. You’ll take it. 

Besides, he’s not all bad.

You catch him one night finally settling down to sleep long after you, having stayed up late to do… well, he’d never quite told you. He pads into the room quietly, and you assume that he’ll immediately head to his side and fall asleep without any fuss. That’s what he’s been doing lately, and it’s not like you’ve any reason to expect anything different. 

And yet this time, he stops. 

After a few moments of quiet, you feel a soft weight drape across your body and then the footsteps retreat at last. A blanket rests atop you now, something to fend off the harsh chill of the breeze that cuts into the bedroom from the lower levels of the lighthouse. You don’t know where he found it, you’re sure you scoured this building top to bottom for things like this, but you’re certainly not about to complain. 

It’s small things like this that remind you that Chuuya is just out here trying to survive, just like you. It wasn’t his fault he got stuck with you here, and all things considered he’s taken to your new forced dynamic as well as he could. 

If you’d been thrust into the same position, you know you wouldn’t have taken things in stride the way he has. It was one thing to have been washed ashore upon an island in the middle of nowhere with no way to escape when it was your own seafaring misdeeds that had brought you here. It’s another entirely to have been going about your day as normal only to have been plucked right from it and dropped into this situation by somebody else. 

Even so, he doesn’t seem to hate you. Not really. 

He may make the odd quip that seems purposefully vicious, a jab here and there designed to hit hard, but it’s just for show. At least, that’s what the hidden smiles formed from exasperated laughs when he thinks you aren’t looking seem to tell you. The playful gripes that weave their way in with the hounding until the entire ordeal feels like something far more endearing. 

Chuuya’s just trying to get by, you think, the same as you. When this is all over, you’ll likely never see one another again- and that’s fine. But you’re still glad that he’s trying to make things somewhat pleasant in the meantime. 

One of the few pleasantries of being stranded out in the midst of nowhere is certainly the scenery. A small island like this is the best place to find views unlike any other, to see the beach and the sea spread out in front of you like a feast for the eyes, a veritable buffet of colour and feeling. 

The sand crunches between your toes with each step, your shoes swinging gently in your grasp, and the feeling of fresh sea air is as refreshing to your senses as it always has been. 

You can practically taste the salt upon your tongue as you reach the waves, the timid little things lapping at your toes in cautious flowing motions. Gulls cry overhead, desperate shrieks that sound like home. 

As you stand there at the edge of the water, you look out to the horizon. 

It takes the breath from your lungs with ease. Such a grand sight, the ocean stretching out endlessly in front of you, reflecting the array of reds and golds, pinks and purples that paint the sky in the wake of the sun. Spots of white twinkle where the light hits at its strongest, and the unfathomable depths of the water already feel like the blanket of night that is set to descend. 

And then something moves, breaks the gentle cresting of waves. 

A fin, by the looks of it. Large, but bright; a striking orange shade you’ve yet to see on any sort of shark. 

It slices through the water effortlessly and then dips back below the surface once more, proof of its existence only found in the ripples that fade out from the epicentre of the breach. 

This creature, whatever it is, is a hunter. Skilled and deadly, if the silent precision of its movements is anything to go by. 

You step back, your toes suddenly far less safe this close to the tides, and hold your breath in anticipation. Whatever is lurking beyond the shoreline, close enough for you to see it so clearly, is new. It’s dangerous. 

Despite your self-preservation instincts screaming out to retreat as fast as you can into the safety of the lighthouse, you are so very intrigued. 

But the mysterious being never resurfaces. 

One beat, and then another, you hold on just to see. Just in case. 

Perhaps it had noticed you and is now in hiding, just as bemused by your existence as you have been by it. Maybe it is biding its time, sizing you up as its next potential prey. It was certainly large enough to make swift work of you. If you had been unlucky enough not to spy it beforehand, you could very well have become its next meal. 

Or, perhaps, it had simply swam away. 

Before you have the chance to dwell on it for much longer, your new begrudging acquaintance is approaching. Bucket in hand, which sways to and fro as he walks, you are met with a bewildered look. 

“What are you doing out here?”

“I was bored,” you explain. “I came out to see where you’d gotten off to.”

“There are more fish down by the cliffs,” Chuuya says, jutting his free thumb over his shoulder for emphasis. “I went over to catch them.”

The bucket is practically bursting with fresh fish, some still writhing as the light of their life is snuffed under the intensity of the beating sun. It’s difficult to ignore the gleam of red that lies embedded within the grooves of the wood, as though some of the poor creatures were caught by something far more violent than a simple fishing line, but you’re not granted the opportunity to dwell upon it when Chuuya walks past you, lugging them along with him towards the lighthouse. 

“I’m impressed,” you call out, jogging to catch up with him. “You caught a lot, there’s enough here to feed us for at least a week.” 

“I told you,” he shrugs, “there were more of them over there.” 

As you get inside and start to help him prepare the fish to store them away for the week’s meals, salt-curing the ones you didn’t plan to eat that day, your mind wanders back to the creature you had seen upon the beach. 

“Hey,” you speak up, “do you think we’re really alone on this island?”

“Of course we aren’t,” Chuuya scoffs, deboning one of the fish in a singular fluid motion. “There’s a forest, there’s bound to be all sorts lurking where we can’t see them.” 

“I mean something sentient- “ you throw your hands down dramatically, small particles of salt flying across the room from the motion- “something big. Not just little bunnies or whatever in the woods.” 

“Why are you convinced there’s something out there?”

“I saw something at the beach. A creature, in the water.” 

“A shark?”

“No, this was different. I’ve never seen something like it before.”

“Whatever it is, I’m feeding you to it first.” Chuuya rolls his eyes, tossing the last of the fish onto the tray to move to the storeroom.

“And here I thought we were finally making progress,” you sigh dramatically. With a cheeky smile and exaggeratedly batted lashes, you turn back to him. “You really wouldn’t save me from the big scary sea monster?” 

“Nope,” he hums, hauling the tray into his grasp and walking out of the kitchen. He throws one last glance over his shoulder towards you, a grin playing upon his lips. “You’re on your own, sailor.”

A few days later, you find yourself making decent progress on your escape plan. 

The raft is all but ready in terms of the base materials. You’d spent the best part of a whole week cutting down enough trees to provide sizeable logs that will bind together to float two people- with a little help from Chuuya along the way- and now the next step would be to try and assemble them all. 

With any luck, you’d be done in only a few more days. 

That is, at least, if you didn’t keep running out of rope. 

The lengths you have managed to scavenge from inside the lighthouse are heavy, but deceptively short. By the time you wind them securely around two logs, it’s all but run out. Which leaves you running back in and out of the building more frequently than you’d like to as you try to work in order to look for more. 

On one of your trips, you don’t notice that Chuuya has decided to sit horizontally across the platform that joins one floor to the next, taking a rest from his own duties. 

Before you realise what’s happening, your weight has been displaced from under you. Arms splaying out to brace your fall, the rope you’d been holding tangles itself around you and makes for a whole new level of accident as you tumble your way back down the stairs. 

Luckily enough for you, the plateaus between each floor are rather wide- so you don’t end up falling all the way back down to a lower level. Not to mention, leaving the ordeal with nothing more in terms of injury than an ache in your lower back, though you just know it’ll persist for the rest of the day. 

“You should look where you’re going,” snickers Chuuya, looking down at you with an amused simper. He goes to hold out a hand to help you up, but you petulantly bat it away. 

“You shouldn’t have been in the way!” you exclaim with an exaggerated pout, folding your arms across your chest and huffing. “Who even sits on the stairs like that?” 

“I thought you were out working on the raft.” 

“I was, but I came back to find some more rope.” 

“Seems like you’re really tied up with that,” he jibes. 

“I’m going to kill you,” you threaten halfheartedly, picking yourself back up off the floor. 

It’s more of a hassle to get yourself out of the mess of ropes you’ve dropped than it was to stand, and you find yourself stumbling around the plethora of loops in some haphazard sort of dance as you struggle to maintain your balance. 

“Here,” Chuuya says, “you’re going to fall again if you keep that up.” 

His hand comes to your shoulder to make you stop moving, and the other grabs onto the rope and starts to untangle you. On instinct, you cling to his forearms for stability. 

They’re tense to the touch, firm, but you don’t get much of a chance to focus on them as you’re instructed to lift your leg so that you can step out of a particularly perplexing knot that had made its way all the way around your knee. The tips of his fingers brush against your thigh as he slides the rope from your body and an involuntary chill passes down your spine. 

Something about this current proximity brings a searing heat to your chest, and the gentle look that he gives you when his gaze flits back up to check on you holds enough power to still your damned heart entirely. 

He’s far more caring than he gives himself credit for. 

Even now, as he mumbles under his breath about how ‘we’re never going to get off this island if you keep playing with the ropes instead of helping build the raft’, his touch is so tender and cautious. Making sure that you’re entirely safe before he takes a step back starts to loop the rope around his arms to make it easier to carry. 

“Thank you,” you say quietly, taking the rope back off him.

“Of course,” he nods. “Now, get to work sailor. I’ll go hunt for tonight’s meal.”

With the raft mostly ready, but a bad rainfall hitting for a handful of nights in a row, it takes several more days until you’re next able to head out to the beach to work on it. 

You let yourself get up a little later that day than you have been, a luxury you grant to yourself knowing how near you are to your goal. Only a few hours of work at the most if you apply yourself- and even less if you can cajole Chuuya into giving you a hand. He’s far more agreeable now than he first was, and more often than not you barely even need to bully him into helping you out these days.

Running into Chuuya on the beach as you step out is a welcome surprise. 

When he leaves before you in the mornings, he tends to spend the majority of the day fishing or in the forests scavenging. Either way, he ends up entirely out of your sight and you tend to not see him until you’re ready to prepare food for the night. 

Now, he’s sat by the edge of the shoreline. A stretch of hope assumes he might be there waiting for you, but as you step closer you see that he seems oddly… elsewhere.

He’s taken his hair down from the low ponytail you’re used to seeing, ginger strands splayed across his shoulders like a waterfall, slightly damp from the fresh sea air. 

Salt clings to your tongue as you watch him quietly, settles in your throat and keeps you silent, savouring the peaceful moment. 

The muscles of his bare back tense and contract as he shifts, not incredibly defined but prominent enough to know that he clearly must be strong. He leans forwards, fingers dipped into the water below his makeshift seat upon a large flat rock. It ripples out from the point of contact, tiny little disturbances that flow and change as his hands brush through the liquid. 

There is a contemplative rhythm to his movements, as though he’s deep in thought. Pensive, you think, is the best descriptor for it. Somewhere lost between wistful and sad. 

Chuuya’s sights are set firm on the horizon in the distance, the sun dipping low and painting the sky orange in its wake. You wonder briefly what he must be thinking about. 

An idle crab wanders past your feet and you walk around it carefully, not wanting to risk a nipped toe whilst you’re out here. The last thing you need whilst you’re trying to get off this island is something that stops you for a while. 

But now that your angle is adjusted, a few steps forwards and to the side, you can take in the full sight of what is in front of you. 

No longer does Chuuya have the steady pair of legs you had accidentally barrelled over the other day. In their place lies a mesmerising fishtail, scales of orange and white and black dappling the surface reminiscent of the koi fish you have seen on travels to the Caspian Sea. Each one reflects the light, iridescent and shimmering, practically twinkling like the night sky under the radiant sun. 

The shape, however, is unlike any of the typical fish you have seen in your lifetime. This is larger by far, tapering towards the end, extending out past the rockpools and swaying idly in the water, more akin to some sort of eel or sea-snake. 

A webbed caudal fin splays out at the tip just above the water’s surface, stirring up tiny waves that froth and foam and fade away, ochre spines thick and long and extending out past the membrane to curl softly at the ends. It’s easily as big as your torso and as broad as your armspan, if not moreso, not to mention the several feet of tail that it is attached to. 

“Wow,” you breathe out quietly, coherency lost to you as you watch each subtle shift of Chuuya’s tail. 

He startles at the sound of you, a loud splash as he scrambles back from the water and onto the beach. As the scales begin to dry off from the tailfin up, they shrink and morph back into human flesh, until two bare legs greet you once more. 

It is now that you realise what has been piled beside him, what you had assumed at first glance were simply more rocks, or perhaps some loose seaweed. Chuuya’s clothes are folded neatly, shoes resting on top to weight them down, and he is entirely bare before you. 

“What?” he snaps. A scarlet blush buds on his cheeks and blossoms along the entire length of his body, betraying his tone. “This the first time you’ve seen a guy naked, or something?”

You avert your eyes, though the temptation to take another peek is almost overwhelming. “You caught me off-guard, is all.”

“I caught you off-guard?” he laughs. “You’re the one sneaking up on people on the beach.”

The scoff of retort you were about to release quickly gives way to a sigh. “Okay, you’ve got me there. I just didn’t want to interrupt you. You looked… peaceful.”

“I was just thinking,” he says.

“About home?” you ask.

Chuuya laughs. “I don’t have a home.”

“Everyone has a home.”

“Well, where’s yours?”

“Hm.” You pause. “Can I turn around yet, or are you still just weirdly naked behind me?”

“You’re good.”

Chuuya is still in the process of slipping his arms through the sleeves of his shirt when you turn to face him, and you’re stilled by the sight of a few stray water droplets rolling down his stomach. The sunlight beating down from above bends and twinkles and reflects the image of those pretty orange scales back towards you in each trailing drip, as though even the slightest contact with the water is enough to spark his transformation. 

His lips are pursed in concentration as his head pops up through the collar of the shirt and you can’t deny that you’re almost disappointed in how the rest of the fabric falls across his skin and obscures it from view. 

And then you’re hit for the second time as he grabs hold of his hair ribbon and places it between his teeth, keeping casual eye contact with you when he gathers up the loose ginger strands and ties them back into place. 

There’s only one thought running through your mind- he’s beautiful.

“Well, come on then. Out with it.” He stands where he is, in stasis with his hair half-tied, hands still stretched back behind his head. 

You have to force yourself to snap out of your distraction to finally respond with a half-assed “what?”

“Your home, tell me about it.” 

“I don’t remember a lot about my home,” you admit. “I’ve been on my own for a while, going wherever the sea takes me. I’ve spent time with crews on ships here and there, travellers and explorers, researchers and the like, but none of it ever felt right. So I’d always end up alone again.”

“Anyway,“ you interject yourself suddenly, barely allowing Chuuya the chance to process your words, “what about you?”

“I don’t have a home.” He turns away from you, finally lets go of his hair and looks out towards the horizon. “But I found people, and they’re good to me. I like being with them.” 

A wistful ache tugs in your chest at his words, how clearly dichotomous his life is to your own. “That sounds nice.” 

“It is,” he nods. “I… miss them, sometimes.” 

“We’ll get you back to them,” you vow. “I’ll make sure of it.” 

“Do you have anywhere to go once we’re off this island?” 

“I’ll probably keep travelling. I’m going to stick to the land for a while though, I think. Don’t particularly want to get stuck in the middle of nowhere and accidentally summon any more eldritch gods, you know?” 

Your speech is light, tinged with gentle laughter, but you can’t hide the way that your inflection cracks at the end. You only hope that Chuuya doesn’t catch on to it, or at least that he will choose to ignore it. 

You don’t know him well enough to be acting this vulnerable. He’s still a stranger to you at the end of the day. A stranger who has abilities far beyond your comprehension, who isn’t even human. 

And yet, he’s been more realistic with you in the past few weeks than anyone you’ve ever met. Everyone has an agenda, a reason to strike up a conversation with you. He’s no different- you’re supposed to be helping him get out of here. But despite all of that, there is something so undeniably relieving about his presence, especially in the quieter moments like this. Something that, try as you might to tell yourself otherwise, makes you feel comfortable. 

Besides, for being the vessel of an eldritch being, he’s not exactly been intimidating towards you. In fact, he’s been downright kind through all of this. Helpful, co-operative, like it’s his natural state of existence. Like he needs to be useful like this with others. It’s sweet, and you can definitely see why he’s the type of person to prefer other peoples’ company if he’s like this. 

Chuuya laughs, an unrefined sort of noise that sounds far more natural than the times he’s chuckled teasingly at you before. There’s a little snort to the end of it as he tries to stop himself, and an embarrassed flush to his cheeks as he realises you’ve just witnessed this. 

“I don’t think you’re gonna have to worry about that any time soon.”

Three more weeks pass before you’re finally content that the little sailboat you’ve put together is sea-ready. The decision to try and upgrade the initial from a raft to something more sturdy had pushed your escape date further back than either of you had wanted, but it was acquiesced at the potential that this way you were more likely to actually make it off the island and far enough to reach land- or at the very least some other ship that could help. 

When you first tried to float the raft you’d built, the poor thing was barely suited for the type of journey you’d need to make. Even in the slightest of breezes, it swished this way and that upon the water, barely controllable. There was nowhere to keep hold of any rations you’d have to bring with you for the trip- who knew just how long you’d end up at sea before you come across any more land? Worst of all, despite your efforts to make the floor of the raft large enough, you’d still ended up practically sat on top of one another when you’d set up for your test run. 

But now you had something better, stronger, more resilient to face the turbulent sea and come out of the other side of it unscathed. 

Or, at least, that’s what you’d both thought. 

The little boat you’d put together was surprisingly well-made considering your limited resources, and it had held strong for the first ten minutes of rowing out. As the island grew smaller and smaller behind you, you’d even let yourself imagine that maybe just maybe this time would be the one that worked. 

Angering the spirits of the skies seems to be something you’re uncannily good at, without even trying. A storm, fiercer even than the one that you’d faced that had landed you on that island in the first place, strikes up with a deadly intention. Lightning flashes and thunder roars, and even the sea itself is in fear of their power as it whips and frenzies in an attempt to escape their wrath. 

Your poor craft is caught in the middle, tossed from side to side until it fractures and cracks. 

The rain no longer merely kisses your cheeks. It spits and slashes, stinging your skin and biting into everything it can reach. 

Making a pair of oars for both yourself and Chuuya was a godsend now in hindsight, as it gives you a better semblance of control as you force your boat to stay upright even with the water that rushes in from a gash along the side. His arms gleam with each new flash of lightning from above, iridescent scales making themselves forcefully known as they abrase the fabric of his clothes. 

Though his shins have been folded below his thighs as he kneels to get more traction with the oars, by now it’s no surprise when you start to see the flexing orangey tips of a tail poking out from behind him. 

The water starts to lap higher and higher along the sides of your sinking ship, and distant waves crash ever closer, building up ever taller. If the storm doesn’t ease up soon, it won’t be the integrity of your boat you have to worry about. 

It’ll be the water itself that claims you. 

“Listen,” you say tersely, deliberately avoiding eye contact. “If uh… we don’t get out of here… I just want you to know. It’s not been all that bad being stuck with you.”

“We’re going to be fine,” Chuuya promises. He goes to reach out to place a hand on your knee comfortingly, but another oncoming wave has him recoiling back to grasp his oar harder. “You don’t get to get rid of me that easily, you know.” 

One incredible rush of water comes up like a goliath, hulking its way towards the boat with a deafening roar that pierces through your eardrums and reverberates against your very soul. You can feel it consuming you internally before it even reaches you, and you’re thrown into the depths with the most ungodly of crashes. 

Something whacks against your side, probably a part of the boat as it fractures underneath the pressure of the tidal wave that’s assaulted you. It screams pain through your body, numbs out your brain until you can’t think straight, close to blacking out. 

In the distance, as you force yourself to maintain consciousness and desperately kick your legs to bring yourself up to the surface, you think you hear a familiar voice cry out. 

When you feel like the last of the air is leaving your lungs, another hefting weight slams you up to the surface. 

It almost feels like you’ve come face to face with the afterlife. Everything’s too bright, too painful, and the view that greets you as you slowly peel your eyes open, rain still falling slick down your cheeks, is something you’d never encounter in the mortal realm. 

Chuuya is the one who’s saved you, that much is clear. 

But he looks different, in more than the senses you’ve grown used to. This is more severe than the simple manifestation of a mer’s tail that you witnessed weeks prior. 

This is something ancient, dangerous, the type of creature you hear horror stories about from passing tradesmen. 

Fins run the full length of his back, and the outline of several more protrude from where his ears and hair used to be. You can’t make out any clear details, especially not with your head tucked against his collar like this, but it is incredibly clear that he is no simple mer in this moment. 

His hands are webbed now too, thick membrane joining fingers that are clawed and dangerous. The scales that litter the edges of his palms are rough like sandpaper as he grasps onto you, biting into your flesh and leaving small abrasions in their wake. 

You cling to his shoulders as he drags you up to the surface, forcing your head above the water to take a sharp inhale of air. It rushes into your lungs like lava, setting your body ablaze as you gasp and splutter. 

And it hits you. This is what you saw that day at the beach, not the subtle transformation you had witnessed days later. 

This is a version of Chuuya at the peak of his eldritch influence, so far changed that he barely seems the same man whom you accidentally summoned to your side all those weeks ago. And yet, it is still so unequivocally him before you now. 

Though it isn’t easy to see him under the quickly falling blanket of night, he feels like the man you know. It is something intangible, unexplainable, and overwhelmingly real. 

Bobbing above the water like this, you can finally see more of the man in front of you as you try to stay afloat. You already know that this is more than the form you had seen in the rockpools, monstrous in comparison, but he is astoundingly beautiful in a way you can’t quite comprehend. 

Chuuya’s irises have narrowed into slits and his eyes are framed with more scales, spreading out across his forehead and cheeks, all the way up to his hairline and around to where his ears used to be. They are the same dark orange of his tail, but the edges of these scales are lined with a deep crimson that catches the occasional flashing of light like blood. 

In place of his ears sit two fins, similar in shape to his tail, but smaller and thinner, translucent and pinkish in the rising moonlight. His hair has been replaced by these as well, gossamer-looking fins that scintillate and lay like bunches of silk all the way down past his chin.

Upon his neck, below the jawline, a set of gills idly flex open and shut as he breathes. His teeth are sharp as well, barely contained within mostly-human lips. They peek diamond-esque out of his maw, like the enticing light of an anglerfish in the deep. 

Weaving across his torso are familiar red markings, though rougher around the edges than the smooth carvings in the lighthouse, jagged and visceral like scars cutting into his flesh, these are without a doubt the same sort of glyphs and runes you had been surrounded by for the last month. The skin here is thicker- calloused like the rest of him, but not as rough as the scalier areas- a thin salty sheen catching the starlight and making him all but glow in front of you now. 

“Sorry,” he rasps, voice lower and harsher, like the words find themselves trapped in this body. “Didn’t want you to see this.”

“It’s okay,” you say, hands bracing themselves against his chest as you keep one another afloat. You run the pad of your thumb across his pectoral, water slicking below your touch and running in a rivulet past your nail. Quieter, with tenderness as you meet his troubled gaze, you repeat, “it’s okay.”

You dip closer and press a comforting kiss to his cheek, surprised by how cool the rough skin feels on your lips. Around you both, tiny star-studded waves lap at your sides and keep you swaying gently upon the water’s surface. Like a dance in its own way, slow and intimate, and the fond look in Chuuya’s dark slitted eyes beckons you with all the allure of a siren guiding you towards your final perfomance. 

“You’re strange,” Chuuya says quietly, breaking the silence. “You aren’t scared.”

“Why would I be scared of you?”

The sharp rows of teeth peeking out from behind his lips practically gleam in the moonlight, large and powerful. They could bite through you in a single, swift movement, with no resistance even against your bones. 

“Why wouldn’t you be?”

You drift ever closer, until your chests bump together. Your nose brushes past his own, lips less than a hairsbreadth away. This close, you can feel the erratic beating of his heart, and you’re certain he can feel yours in turn. 

“Because I know you won’t hurt me.”

“I’ve hurt people.”

With a steadfast deliberation to your movements, you reach up to cradle the sides of Chuuya’s face and press your lips onto his. Just once, pulling away as quickly as you had swooped in, but affirmingly, leaving him endearingly bewildered as he stares at you like you’ve sprouted a second head. 

“You won’t hurt me.” You release a breath, shakier than you’d like it to be, and shift your hands down along his arms until you reach his webbed hands. “Come on, let’s get back to shore.”

Clumps of seaweed try to cling to your ankles as you’re guided back to land. The injury you’d sustained from the crash can’t be anything serious if you’re still able to kick your legs like this to keep yourself afloat, now no more than a tentative hand on your back from Chuuya to make sure you’re still with him, but it’s still enough to slow you down and tire you out faster. 

It’s a slow swim. Arduous, even. 

The large presence at your side is soothing. Chuuya is colder than he has been when you’ve made contact in the past, in part due to the rain still pounding from above and the other part due to his more monstrous form at present. Occasionally, an exposed patch of your skin brushes against his and it’s rough, enough to make you grimace with how otherwise tender you feel right now, but you’d take it over a potential lack of company. 

“Thank you,” you utter when you finally see the shoreline coming close. “I think I might be dead without you.” 

You don’t get a response, but Chuuya’s arm moves from behind you to encircling you, squeezing lightly. Like he doesn’t quite want to face the fact that, yes, you really could have perished out there. You suppose you shouldn’t dwell on it too much, either.

As you haul yourself onto the sand, you notice that Chuuya deliberately tries to slip from your grasp. He frowns at you, though it’s far more toothy than you expect it to be, and it seems more like he is just… staring. 

“You can’t change back.”

He shakes his head. The upper half of his body has started to dry, and yet not a single scale has returned to flesh. As if stubbornly proving his point, the thick lines of red that cross his chest glow brighter. 

“Too hard,” he rasps. “Went too far.”

“You’re going to be okay, right?” you ask. “You will change back eventually… right?” 

“It’s never been this bad.” 

He’s distressed, though he’s trying to hide it. You can tell in the way that he keeps looking over your shoulder, not quite bringing himself to make eye contact. In how he shifts uncomfortably within your arms and leans towards the sea, desperate to reach somewhere that he can escape from this situation. 

“We can worry about it later,” you declare quietly, pressing a deliberate kiss to his forehead. “For now…”

A contemplative hum leaves you as a new issue arises. You glance over your shoulder towards the lighthouse, then back to Chuuya, who watches you with his eyes narrowed in curiosity. 

“Do you need any food? Or… anything?” 

He shakes his head. “No.”

“Okay,” you nod. “Well, I don’t think we’re going to be able to do much to help you whilst it’s so dark out. I should head inside, and we can figure something out in the morning.”

A more aggressive shake, a firmer “no.”

“No?” you echo. “You want me to stay out here? I can get some sheets from the lighthouse and sleep on the beach.”

“No!” 

“Stop saying ‘no’! What do you want from me, Chuuya?” 

“Stay with me.” 

“I will,” you say, “but I can’t do that if you don’t let me sleep on the beach.”

“It’s not safe for you out here,” he says. 

“So, what do you suggest?”

His gaze shifts towards the lighthouse and you stare at him blankly for a moment as you process just what he’s insinuating. 

“You want me to carry you inside? Seriously? You’re going to be heavy!” 

“You can do it,” he states. “I know you can.”

“I don’t like you right now,” you huff, stepping towards the shoreline. Taking a knee, you offer your arms out to heave him up onto the land. “Come on then, let’s get this over with.” 

He’s unfathomably heavy, but you’ve gained a unique set of skills over the past few months- namely, dragging massive bulking trees across the island. Though he’s bigger than any log you’ve had to haul to date, the technique is mostly the same. Lift from the knees, don’t put your back into it too much, take advantage of the soft shifting sand below to readjust when you need to. The bulk of his weight is balanced around his upper body, so even though the length of his tail is utterly tremendous, you find its no more hassle than some sort of trailing veil. 

“So,” you say after a moment, “what’s with the blunt speech, anyway? I noticed you’re even more straightforward than normal.”

“This form,” Chuuya explains, “isn’t for talking. It hurts.” 

“Oh,” you say, “I didn’t realise. You don’t have to keep talking if it’s too much for you.” 

“Worth it,” he says, “for you.” 

Getting to the lighthouse itself is a little more of a struggle, namely trying to drag him up the stairs to reach the washroom. With the wooden banisters, he’s able to support himself better without your assistance- which allows you room to breathe and rest. But for all you’ve taken this very same trip on the regular, it seems to stretch on immeasurably now. 

You take a small break upon one of the plateaus between floors, resting back against the wall to catch your breath. Your muscles ache and burn, and the thwacking you’d taken from the capsizing boat earlier starts to throb from all the latent flooding adrenaline in your system, but you can’t give up just yet. There’s nothing you’ve learned from all of this lately if not how to be incredibly resilient. 

“I feel like,” you say between heaves, trying to break the tension in the silence that has descended, “I’m trying to sneak you past my parents, or something, like a kid. Silly, huh?”

Chuuya hums quietly, as if he doesn’t really share the sentiment, and you have to wonder for a moment just how much of a childhood he was really allowed to have. Being a human vessel for an oceanic eldritch deity since you’re barely fresh from infancy probably isn’t conducive to a warm and fulfilling life.

Though he hasn’t divulged much about his past to you, you’re sure it wasn’t all sunshine and rainbows. He seems happy enough with his place in life now- with the Port Mafia crew, if you remembered correctly- but whether he had been with them this whole time or not is unknown to you. 

You’re sure he’ll tell you whenever he’s ready. He’s opened up to you enough lately as it is. 

Finally picking yourselves up again, the washroom is reached at last and you start to run the water in the tub so that Chuuya doesn’t have to worry about drying out. 

“Do you know if that… actually will affect you whilst you’re like this?” Your question earns a uncertain headshake. “Well. Better safe than sorry, right?”

The running water echoes in your ears as it sploshes around the tub. There won’t be enough to cover Chuuya entirely, but it’ll be adequate at least. By the time he’s in and the fluid has a chance to displace around him, it’ll work. He’s mostly quiet as you finish up, and you don’t even have to help him to lift up and lower into the tub when you’re done. There’s a bit of a far-off guilty look in his eyes as he sits there at first, as though he’s feeling bad about you having to be here like this. 

“I like this side of you,” you admit quietly, idly trailing your fingertips across the scales on his upper arm. “You’re not as mean… and more honest.” 

That earns you a splashing of water, a loud thud echoing through the room as the ends of his tail thwack against the walls of the tub. 

“Alright, you’re just as mean!” you gasp out as the coldness hits you all at once, blinking droplets out of your eyes. 

Flashing his sharp fangs at you, Chuuya is smiling now; giving you the best approximation of a self-satisfied smirk that he can manage. 

He looks utterly ridiculous crammed into the tub in the washroom. It’s surprisingly spacious, really, especially considering it’s part of a lighthouse that clearly didn’t see regular use- just not when an oversized eldritch mermaid is occupying it. 

“You know, we could have stayed on the beach,” you chuckle, perched on a stool near the side of the bath. “But someone insisted I take him indoors because I wasn’t allowed to stay outside at night or leave him alone.” 

“It’s fine,” he insists. 

The constant fidgeting tells you otherwise. In your peripheral you catch the idle shifting of his caudal fin like that time you had seen him at the beach. The muscles of his upper arms flex and contract as he tries to keep his torso comfortably upright. His hands, webbed as they are and far less than suitable for their current task, grip tight to the edges to keep him from sinking too far into the tub. 

“It’s clearly not,” you note, trying to keep your tone light and non-confrontational. Sparking up an argument right now wouldn’t do the situation any good, and would probably only leave Chuuya in a worse state than he already is. “Please, if there’s anything I can do to help. Let me.” 

“Anything?” he repeats quietly, almost shy at the prospect of whatever he has in mind. 

Perhaps the room has heated up too much from the bath you’ve drawn, because your head starts to spin at the realisation of such a complete lack of proximity between the pair of you. It hadn’t been a problem before, when you had been so focused on making sure Chuuya would be safe. Now, at his insistence, at the situation unfolding between you, it’s hard to ignore the fact that you have your knee pressed up against the thick muscle of his tail. That he is bringing a clawed fingertip towards your shirt, hooking against the fabric and pulling you closer. 

That he has brought your face towards his, and that you can now see every single smattered red freckle that has persisted upon his cheeks through his change of appearance. Every individual scale, each of which shift hues so subtly in the dim candlelight of the washroom, sparkling at you enticingly, urging you to lean in. 

He stops you before you’re too close, splays out the hand that was holding onto you so that it spreads across your chest. “You can say no.” 

“I know,” you nod eagerly. “I don’t want to, though.” 

Chuuya’s mouth is cold as you press your lips to his, the sudden sensation almost enough to make you withdraw quickly. But something snaps in the moment that you connect, a tension that has broiled away for the better part of a few months. 

The first kiss you share is tentative, cautious. The next is hungry, impassioned, and your shirt is being fisted once more as Chuuya tries to bring you closer, to the point that you’re practically hanging over the edge of the washtub, nearly falling in. You bring your arms out to steady yourself, bracing against his shoulders, clinging onto him. 

“You sure you don’t want to be comfier?” you ask, thinking of the way you’d seen him shuffling only moments prior. “This can’t be nice for you.”

“Don’t care,” he says, stealing a third kiss from you, “not anymore.” 

He must be fine, you think, by the way that he takes hold of your hip with his free hand and pulls you onto him. Your own earlier injury declares its continued existence through a prolonged throb, but it’s the last thing on your mind when something else starts to stir within your core. 

The water in the tub splashes up your thighs, soaks your knees, drenches your clothes thoroughly as you fall onto his chest. You don’t miss the way his slitted eyes trail along the folds of wet fabric, keenly observing how it now clings against your skin and outlines your figure. If you weren’t in such a compromising position, you could be fooled into thinking the look he gives you is that of a hunter seeking out its prey, ravenous, and you are his prized meal.

If there had been any lingering doubt in your mind before about the creature you’d seen at the beach weeks ago, this was by far your most decisive proof. 

“This might be a bad idea,” you say between each feverish kiss, but Chuuya is desperate in the way that he clings to you, claws skimming the fabric of your shirt and threatening to tear it to shreds. 

“I want you,” he says simply. Kisses you again.

And you’re not exactly in a position to argue with him when he has you all but pinned to his body like this, one arm snaked around your waist and the other still pressed in between you, firmly sunk against the flesh of your chest. Not that you’d want to anyway, you think, as heat swells in your stomach and a fervent desire pleasantly clouds your mind. 

“Okay,” you agree against his mouth. “I’m yours.” 

Your declaration seems to spark something feral within the eldritch mer, fiercer than the behavious he’d already exhibited, and far more exhilarating. One of his claws tears into the fabric of your shirt and rends the poor thing straight off of your form, the remains falling off your shoulders and into the tub below the pair of you. 

Having your body exposed to him like this is thrilling, a chill running along your spine as he takes hold of your flesh within his large hands and squeezes tentatively. A rough thumb runs across the bud of your nipple and it rouses at the touch, pebbling in the cool air of the washroom. His mouth finds your neck, tongue lathing along your throat, making you arc forwards into his touch. 

“Can I?” he asks hoarsely, hand stopped just above where you need it most, and you grind down against the pad of his fingers in response. 

“Please,” you whine, “I need you.” 

The pressure of his thumb against your clit is fucking heaven as he brings his mouth back to yours and kisses you hard. The heady intoxication of sex in the air combined with the powerful friction brings you close to your first orgasm far quicker than you could have expected. And yet, despite his clear thirst for you, Chuuya manages to take his time to fully coax that first tantric climax from you. It bubbles up slowly, quietly, blossoming from your core until your entire being is consumed by flames, hot and heavy, and so damn good. 

He isn’t neccessarily skilled or not at the act, in fact you wouldn’t be surprised if he’s only done this a handful of times before- and most likely not at all in this current state of being. But there is a abstruse emotion that dances with you as you move together, reaches its peak with you and flows out between you. It wouldn’t matter even if he was bad at this, you think. It’s simply the fact that it’s him making you feel this way that has everything so very heightened. 

The same man you’ve spent the past few months with such a budding tension growing between you, who you’ve shared late night talks with and vulnerable conversations- even though he’d been so standoffish with you upon first meeting. You’d gotten to know him, as much as he’d let you. And he had in turn learned about you. 

Sure, part of it feels like it was a necessity to ensure your continued survival on this island- there’s no way you’d have made as much progress on your inevitable escape if you’d continued to be at odds- but you won’t deny that it feels like so much more than that. 

And that is why, as you come for the first time that night, crying out your partner’s name as your nails find scaled flesh and dig in tight, riding out your high against those thick rough fingers, you are already so very desperate to seek out more. 

Continuing to grind against his hand as your afterglow washes across you, thoughtless movements that ebb and flow and pulse your orgasm away with them, you shift to balance yourself against his chest with your palms. 

The new angle brings about a new sensation with it, something warm and hard pushing against your ass. His cock has released itself from the confines of the slit it was previously tucked away in, still humanlike in size but textured with ridges and bumps that press into your skin and give you a precursor of what’s to come. 

It’s not huge, but it certainly isn’t small either. And the prospect of being stuffed full of it is so very enticing. 

Indulgently, your hand slips between your bodies to take hold of the organ. 

To the touch, it’s far slicker than you’d expected, and Chuuya hisses at the sudden contact, his mouth finding your neck to stifle the noise. There’s a moment of pressure as his teeth graze your skin, and then a release, the sharp fangs puncturing the first few layers and drawing small wells of blood into your clavicle. It’s by no means deep enough to do any real damage to you, but it certainly causes you to gasp out in shock at the sensation, making you grip onto his cock harder. This in turn has him run his tongue against the wound, eliciting another salacious whine out of you. 

“Fuck,” you exhale, a bubbled laugh catching in your throat, “you’re rougher than I thought you’d be.”

“You thought?” he echoes, unable to quite bring himself away from you for long enough as his mouth finds your jaw, then your cheeks, then your lips again. 

“Mm.” You roll your hips down absently, indulging in his kiss, pulling away to pepper smaller ones across his cheeks. “I thought about it a lot recently, how this would feel. Admittedly, I didn’t expect you to be-” you run your fingertips across a small patch of scales- “quite like this. But I’m not complaining.” 

With his cock still in your hand, you move to align it underneath you. The anticipation of what you’re about to do builds within your chest, exciting, enthralling, and you pause right on the very precipice. 

“Is this okay?” you check. 

He nods.

“Alright, tell me if you want me to stop.”

“I won’t,” he assures, leaning in to place a kiss to your forehead. 

The tip alone is thicker than it looked, and it spreads you apart far more than his fingers had. Your jaw tenses as you try to adjust to the sensation, and Chuuya notices this. Leans down and kisses along the tightened muscle to try and soothe you, trailing absently along your neck and all the way back up again. 

“I can stop,” he mutters against your cheek. 

“Please don’t,” you beg. 

To prove your determination, you try to sink yourself down a little lower, and both of you keen out at the sensation. It had been a while since you’d had sex like this, a few months even before you’d been stranded out here let alone after, and the fullness is such a profound experience. 

Once the initial discomfort has passed, a euphoric bliss takes its place. 

Feeling bold enough to start moving, you set a slow pace. Lifting yourself up just a little, barely enough for him to really shift inside of you, but enough to feel that delicious drag of his cock in your cunt. The descent feels even better, the slight rub of your clit against the hard scales that surround his sex, and you let yourself sit there, speared by his full length, eyes shut tight to sink into the sensation. 

“You feel amazing,” you coo out, stealing a kiss as you move again. His hands come to your hips to keep you in place, purposefully gentler around your side injury. “Wanna make you feel good too.” 

Fucking Chuuya like this brings a warmth to your veins, holding onto one another like a lifeline as you clench around him and ride your way to another climax. It’s tantric, emotional, and every single thrust of your hips makes you feel closer to him in a way you’d never imagined. 

Your second orgasm starts to creep up on you unexpectedly. A combination of the perfect friction, the angle you’ve sat at where his cock curls against your g-spot each time you fuck down onto him, and the ardour that seeps into the air between you, all building up within you until you’re close to exploding. 

As it hits, you curl forwards into Chuuya, bracing yourself hard against his chest with your palms. He takes over the brunt of the work, gently fucking up into you as you pulse and throb around him. When his own climax peaks, he pulls from you, releasing onto your stomach with a breathy pant. The worst of it becomes one with the water you’re sat in, and you grimace at it briefly, knowing you’re going to need to change that out when you’re done. 

But for a moment, you can rest, basking in the afterglow of your sex. 

Empty now, but emotionally sated, you rest your head against Chuuya’s chest as his arms wrap around your torso. But it’s not to let you relax, you find, when he lifts you from below the arms and sits you down on the edge of the washtub. 

“What are you doing?” you giggle breathlessly, heart still pounding. 

“Want to taste you,” he says simply. 

Exactly how he plans to do that, you don’t understand at first. Until, that is, he picks you up again, firmly grasping your thighs to keep you stable, and shifts so that he is on his front and your back has been pressed up against the washroom wall. It’s freezing cold and your body jolts at the contact, but it is very quickly replaced with an overwhelming warmth when Chuuya dips between your thighs and kisses your clit. 

You’re still sensitive from the two orgasms you’ve already had, but that isn’t about to stop him. His tongue is hot as it flicks out to swipe along your folds, slowly, teasingly. He really is going to take his time to savour you, you think, and your head comes to fall back against the wall as your back arches forwards to lean into the friction. 

It feels like he’s swallowing you whole as his tongue eases into your cunt, so incredibly long and just textured enough to drag against your insides in the perfect way. The tips of his fangs graze across the outer skin of your pussy, gentle like he’s actively trying not to hurt you. Your hands find the back of his head and push him against you harder, working with his mouth to bring you to the edge once more. 

This orgasm takes longer to peak, even with how desperately you grind with him to reach it. The overstimulation in your core has all of your nerves feeling like raw electricity, frazzled and intense. 

When it hits, it courses through you slowly. Bubbles up from the pit of your stomach until it crescendoes into a bursting supernova, a cry of utter bliss falling from your lips like a holy mantra. A song of worship, all for the archonic mer that is settled between your legs, swallowing every last drop of your essence like its the first morsel of real food he’s ever had. 

There are tears welling up in the corners of your eyes as you come down from this third high of the night. Your hands don’t know where to put themselves as your spent energy dissipates into the musky, sex-steamed air of the washroom. You settle for idly running along the sides of Chuuya’s body as he pulls away and balances himself in front of you, chest to chest now. 

Traces of a glossy sheen linger around his mouth, and not from the water in the tub. It awakens something possessive in your soul, seeing parts of you across him like this. With the way his own eyes sweep the expanse of your body, it looks like he’s thinking the same thing about the marks from his teeth and claws that now litter your skin. 

“Was that good?” he asks, voice notably less raspy than it had been earlier but still tinged with something gravelly. 

“It was wonderful,” you chuckle. Your head falls into the crook of his neck and he holds you there just like that with him. The steady beating of his heart echoes in time with your own. “Thank you.” 

“Thank you,” he echoes with a grumbly laugh. “I needed that.” 

You press a kiss to the scaled skin beneath your lips and pull back. For just the smallest moment, everything feels so unimaginably right. 

Then the bruise on your side starts to pulse again. It has blackened now, a bristling purple that spreads across the tender skin like a cluster of flowers, made far worse from all the jostling about of the last hour or so. 

Now that you’re coming back down to reality, every muscle in your body seems to be aching tenfold. 

“I think I need to get some sleep,” you say lightly, giving a squeeze to his shoulders. “Are you going to be okay like this?”

“I’ll be fine,” he replies, leans in to press a kiss to your cheek. “Get some rest.” 

You clamber out of the washtub as adeptly as you can manage given your condition. Before you have the chance to leave him fully, Chuuya takes hold of your unhurt side and pulls you back. Spreads kisses along your neck and collarbone as he takes hold of one of the washcloths settled nearby and tries to clean you up. It’s a little difficult and unrefined with his hands webbed like they still are, but the effort is unbelievably sweet, and you let him do the best he can before you finish the job yourself. 

“Good night.” The tiles on the floor are cold as your damp feet press against them, and you jump a little at the contact, almost slipping and falling from the momentum. But you gather yourself up before Chuuya even has the chance to worry, laughing it off. “Yeah, I really need to go and rest, huh?”

As you turn back one last time, a sleepdrunk smile on your face, you could swear the eyes that gently smile back at you have more of a human gleam to them. 

It’s still dark when you first wake up, the faint silvery light of the moon idling through the porthole window above the dingy little mattress you’d settled on. Only a couple of hours had passed, but that didn’t seem too strange. Sleep has been a bit of an anomaly for you ever since you’d first washed ashore on this island. 

You find that you’re alone, which isn’t a surprise. After the events of last night, you’d dragged yourself back here to get some ample rest- but it feels almost too quiet on this level of the lighthouse. 

There’s no sound of moving water coming from the washroom, unlike how you had fallen asleep, and you bolt upright to check on Chuuya. 

Missing. The water in the tub has been thrown out and any mess that had splashed around is long gone from the bathtowels lining the floor, cleaned up deliberately. So he must at least be okay, but that doesn’t answer the more pressing question of just where he’s managed to run off to considering you’d had to haul him up here in the first place. 

Your search drives you out to the beaches, the most sensical place to look. The early morning sunlight starts to edge its way above the horizon, the post-storm air still just chilly enough to warrant you wrapping your arms around yourself to hold in your body heat. 

Below your bare toes, the top layer of sand shifts and molds itself to your footprints, clinging onto your skin each time you lift your feet. You’d lost your shoes to the storm, unfortunately, and hadn’t found the time to fashion yourself new ones between returning to land and the other… events that had unfolded the night prior.

You were right, though. He’s out here just as you had expected. With his back to you, looking out towards the horizon, the same way you’d found him near to the start of your time together. 

“Figures I’d find you out here,” you say loudly enough to alert Chuuya to your presence. “Did you even get any sleep?”

He sits the same way you’ve seen him before, legs morphed into a pretty tail as they lay submerged in the rockpools. Smaller than what you’d seen last night, more controlled. It’s a relief to see his eyes back to normal, lighting up upon sight of you as he turns around. In fact, his entire upper half is notably human again, and you can tell he’s just as relieved by the change as you are. 

“Sorry, I didn’t want to wake you up.” 

“That’s fine, I just wanted to make sure you’re okay.”

You step carefully around the sharp rocks and make your way to his side, sitting down and letting your toes dangle in the water. It’s cool, refreshing, and the view of the horizon stretched out as far as the eye can see before you makes the entire experience all the more relaxing. You can see why Chuuya likes to do this. 

His shoulder presses against yours at this proximity, but it’s pleasant, warm even, a nice contrast to the sensation of the flowing tides below. Impulsively, you give in to the urge to rest your head upon his shoulder. In turn, he rests his against you. 

“I’m glad you’re back to normal,” you say, hand finding his and fingers interlocking. “I was worried for you.” 

“I think you helped,” he admits. “I’ve never been stuck like that for so long, but you being around made it all feel like it wasn’t going to be the worst thing in the world if I couldn’t turn back.” 

“I’d have stayed with you, you know,” you confess, “if you had to stay that way.” 

“I thought you didn’t get along with people,” Chuuya teases, bumping his shoulder against you and making both of you sway gently. 

You push him right back, stifling a giggle. “You’re not exactly ‘people’ are you, mister vessel of an eldritch deity?” 

He squeezes your hand pointedly, “okay, you’ve got me there.” 

The air between you quiets, but there’s no awkwardness. It’s pleasant, this silence, relaxing. Morning breaks above your heads and showers you in comforting sunlight, warm, inviting. If it weren’t for the fact that you were both actively trying to leave this place, you’d almost feel inclined to stay. 

“Hey…” you speak up after a moment, fiddling with the hem of your shirt, “can I ask you something? It’s a little personal, so I don’t mind if you say no.” 

“After last night?” Chuuya laughs. “Ask away.” 

“Okay,” you nod, bracing yourself for the topic you’re about to broach. “Why didn’t you just… stay with the cults when you were younger? Let them worship you as a god, be revered and adored by so many people?”

“You could have had it all,” you continue. “Riches, power, people worshipping you and laying their lives down for you. Whatever you wanted.”

“It's all bullshit,” scoffs Chuuya. “You know what happens when you have a bunch of people at your feet? There's nobody left to see eye to eye.”

“That’s why you found a crew.”

“I may have subordinates on the ship, but more importantly I have their respect. Not their fear.” 

There’s a far-off look in his eyes as he speaks, reminiscent and light. Clearly, he misses these people- cares for them greatly. You know he’s the type of person that thrives around the company of others, unlike yourself. He’s built himself into a community, into a life that works for him. And it happens to be so very different from the type of life you’re used to. 

But you can’t say it isn’t the sort of life you wouldn’t try to give one final chance to. At least, certainly not when it also involves the company of someone you’ve very much grown to enjoy over the past few months. 

“Well,” you say, breaking the silence at last. “We’re no use to anyone moping around on this beach. Let’s scavenge what we can of our old boat and start to fix it up.”

“You want to try again?”

“What else would we do?”

“And if it fails?”

“We try again,” you insist. “And we keep trying until we finally get out of here. Or until someone finds us, whichever comes sooner. I’m sure your people are already looking for you, if they’re as family-oriented as they seem to be.”

You almost miss what Chuuya asks next, words much quieter and fragile. They slip from him as if involuntary, and he silences himself immediately after. 

“Would you come back with me?”

A determination fills your soul, resilience surging through your veins. And you smile. You smile so brightly that it is your turn now to be envied by the elements, by the rain and her lightning and thunder.

“What else would I do?”

author notes: i've popped these down here bc the warnings are SO LONG they were already making all the pre-cut stuff horrendous lmfao. anyway, i hope if y'all made it to the end that u liked it <3 i personally feel like it gets rather ooc in parts because of how much i was fighting this tooth & nail in the writing process, but i'm still very proud that i finished this and that's good enough for me >:)

on the cruelness of fifteen

@/petrichara // the shape of a girl, joan macleod // @/cowboyvamplikeme // fifteen, taylor swift

᯽ wet dreamz • osamu dazai

synopsis • you’ve been having some dubious dreams about one (1) osamu dazai and you let it slip.

warnings • swearing, lucid dreaming, fem!reader, ņsfw, dazai (he needs his own warning, yes), nickname “bella” is used, hair pulling, some light hand stuff/teasing, oral (f -> m), no set dynamic (both parties switch), masturbation (f), clothed sex, edging, finger sucking, slight choking, creampie, overstimulation, pussy drunk dazai, this is a long one >.<, also mildly unedited

wc • 6.8k

a/n • ahahahaha i don’t know

his hands are all over you, all at once, but it’s still not enough. you can’t pinpoint why because in all honesty it should be borderline overwhelming. but it’s not.

maybe you’re just greedy. you’ve been waiting for this for so long that you’ve been dreaming about it. dreaming? something washes over you and, once again, you can’t place it. you shake it off internally. how could you pay anything much attention when what you should be paying attention to is the man underneath you pawing at your skin.

he’s demanding all of your attention and you’ll gladly give it to him. you don’t remember how you got here, or how you got his shirt off but you dip down and kiss his exposed and surprisingly sun kissed skin. everything is blurry, the feeling of his skin under your lips, the image of him shirtless underneath you and the sensation of his nimble fingers kneading at your ass. 

before you can overthink it, he gets impatient and guides your hips to grind down on his hardened crotch. your mind is the next thing to become blurry. you straighten up and throw your head back as the sensation of the friction overtakes your senses. you want more, need more.

as if the brunette could read your mind, he’s tugging at your panties. it’s only then that you realize, he’s pantless as well. things felt like they were going too fast and also too slow all at once. you sit yourself back down on his length and continue to grind down on him.

your head is swimming and distantly you hear ringing in your ears. you ignore it though, the sounds of his moans drowning out any other noise. his grip on your bottom tightens and he lifts your hips up expertly aligning himself with your entrance.

he’s about to sit you back down and stretch you out but the ringing gets louder and everything goes white.

᯽•᯽

you woke this morning in a pool of your own sweat — thighs rubbing together desperately seeking out the same sensations you experienced in your dream. 

now you’re sitting at your desk feeling extremely embarrassed and, frankly, frustrated that you had yet another wet dream about your coworker, dazai osamu. 

you let out a huff while typing up a report on yesterday’s case. of all people in this office it just had to be the most insufferable of them all. why did he have to be so gorgeous? why couldn’t you think the same of kunikida? hell, even ranpo would have been a better choice than dazai. you think your subconscious is cruel. laughing at you, making fun of you by giving you wet dreams. you felt like a fucking teenager. hell, you don’t think you even had wet dreams when you were an adolescent going through puberty. how utterly embarrassing.

you let out yet another exasperated sigh, brows furrowed and fingers typing furiously. you were making a spectacle and your deskmates had long since noticed your sour mood. atsushi and kunikida were the smart ones, they simply let you be, figuring if you wanted to talk about it you would bring it up. 

dazai, however, is nosey. his natural curiosity always getting the better of him. he builds a simple paper airplane and shoots it through the air. it lands right on your keyboard and your aggressive typing finally ceases. you stare at the airplane as if you’ve never seen one in your entire life. you refuse to look up, fearing that if you look at dazai you’ll be reminded of what your subconscious thinks of him. you don’t think you can handle that quite yet.

dazai watches, slightly perturbed, as you seem to try to make his little creation spontaneously combust. no matter how unsettling, dazai still isn’t deterred. atsushi shoots him a warning look, as if to say this wasn’t a good idea. the brunette blatantly ignores the boy and wheels himself over to your part of the desk, which was a show in itself since you’re on the complete opposite side of where he was sat. that means dazai has to push himself past either atsushi or kunikida. of course, him being the menace that he is, dazai chooses the harder path of going around kunikida.

you don’t see it because you’re still having a staring contest with your little gift but kunikida’s eye twitches as dazai swivels past him. the blonde was going to take the high road though. he was going to let it slide since you seemed to need the distraction. but dazai was clumsy and clipped his wheels on the ones of his partner’s chair. kunikida’s eye twitches and he can’t help himself.

”dazai…” it’s a simple warning. one that the brown eyed detective promptly ignores.

dazai makes it to you without another hitch and gingerly reaches over to replace the airplane with a paper rose.

you blink. stare some more. then finally look up. “dazai, what the fuck?” 

“oh c’mon, bella. you’ve been in a mood all day. i thought a rose would cheer you up enough to tell me what’s got you in such a sulky mood.” dazai pouts at you and it takes everything in you to look away for your sanity.

you can feel your cheeks heating up by just the small interaction. if these dreams persist, you’re not sure you can keep your composure. you were barely hanging on by a thread as it was. you distantly think maybe it’s your subconscious telling you that you need to get laid. you almost scoff at the thought.

yes. it has been some time since you last slept with someone, but there is no way that was causing the dreams. if that was the case you would be having dreams about more than just dazai. he was simply plaguing your mind and you think you might go insane if this kept going on. 

so instead of dealing with it like a sane person, because you aren’t right now, you decide to take it out on the very man that has been haunting your mind. “i’m trying to get my work done and i’m certainly not in the mood. go bother atsushi if you’re bored, dazai.”

you hear a small complaint come from across the desk and look up to see atsushi giving you an accusatory expression. you immediately feel guilty for throwing him under the bus and finally relax for the first time all day. you toss the weretiger an apologetic smile then whip around to glare at dazai for a moment.

”i changed my mind. you’re buying me lunch at the cafe. let’s go.” you don’t give dazai any time to answer. you save your work, shut your laptop and promptly stand up and walk off. you weren’t going to give dazai any room to argue. you figured if he didn’t follow then he wasn’t that curious and you got to enjoy a break in silence.

unfortunately you hear dance-like footsteps coming from behind you, indicating that dazai was, in fact, following. you both step into the elevator and about halfway down dazai finally opens his mouth.

”so, what’s got a beautiful woman such as yourself in such a mood today?” his smile is lazy and eyes dull.

you hate this. you hate when he acts like this. you do genuinely like dazai, just not this version of him. the shut off version, the one that puts on a facade and plays with people for fun. you don’t have much time to think about it though. the elevator jolts to a sudden stop and dings, indicating that you’ve made it to the ground floor. you scurry out of the small space and make your way to the cafe. 

when you enter your mood instantly sours seeing that it wasn’t lucy in today, but rather the waitress dazai is always making eyes at and wistfully requesting her to perform a double suicide with him. you muster up a smile to offer the owner and wave at him before taking your seat at one of the booths. dazai plops himself on the other side across from you.

the waitress comes over and you brace yourself for the encounter that’s about to transpire. dazai watches you closely, head tilting to the side curiously. 

“welcome, detectives, what can i get you started with today?” her smile is sweet and you feel bad for your previous annoyance. it’s not her fault dazai doesn’t understand the art of subtlety. 

dazai speaks up before you can get a chance to. “go on, bella, you order whatever you want.” dazai addresses his attention to the waitress next. “everything will be going on my tab, miss waitress.”

”how very generous of you, mr. dazai. i assume you finally invested in that life insurance policy i recommended?” her smile is sweet but her words are clipped and condescending. you let out a little snort as dazai starts to sweat a little. 

before dazai can quip back, you order. “i’ll take an iced latte and the sandwich of the day, please.”

“of course miss. what about you, mr. dazai?”

dazai almost shrinks at her faux warm demeanor. “i’ll just take a cup of coffee.” 

you raise your brow at him disapprovingly and before the waitress can scurry off you quickly get out, “can you make sure my sandwich is cut in half?”

she smiles at you genuinely and nods her head. after she walks off you catch dazai staring at you once again. you know he’s about to speak again and you dread whatever it is that’s going to fall from those surprisingly full lips of his. 

“so, are you going to tell me what’s gotten your panties in a twist all day?”

nice.

how eloquent of him. 

you scowl at him and hiss out, “could you not refer to it as that?”

”sorry, bella. would you rather i ask why you’ve been so sour all day in a different way?” dazai grins at you clearly pleased at getting a rise out of you. 

you huff and roll your eyes. “would you believe me if i told you it’s because i had a dream of you?”

”oh? did you now? what was the dream about? you must regale me with all of the details.” dazai sets his elbows on the table in between the two of you. his fingers intertwine and he rests his head atop his hands. 

it’s almost eerie, the way he’s looking at you but you can’t quite place why. you wince internally realizing your mistake. how the hell are you supposed to tell dazai that you fantasized about— no. you didn’t fantasize, it was a dream. a creation of your subconscious. not of your control. you want to shrivel up and die. 

how the hell are you supposed to explain that to dazai?

you don’t. it’s the only sane reasoning you can come up with. but now you have to scramble to come up with something to dazai. the longer you just blankly stare at him the more suspicious he’s going to get. you can see it in the way his eyes become hooded and his right brow shifts up.

dazai perks up a bit and, oh god, here it comes. the realization you’ve been dreading. “don’t tell me you dreamt about me in that way.” he hums dramatically. “what a naughty girl, thinking about your colleague in such a way~”

you involuntary freeze. sure you knew this was coming but there is no way he saw through you that easily. he came to that conclusion so fast and you know for a fact you aren’t an easy person to read unless you want someone to. he couldn’t have just picked up on your thoughts like that. no, you have to remind yourself this is dazai osamu. he could have done exactly that. regardless, you refuse to admit it to yourself, let alone dazai.

“absolutely n-“ you’re cut off by the waitress dropping off your drinks and the sandwich. 

clearly she understood what you meant by your earlier request because she brings you an extra plate. you thank her one more time before she walks off. placing the slightly bigger half of the sandwich on the extra plate and scooting it towards dazai.

“eat.” he looks at you curiously but obliges when you give him an expectant glare.

you know he won’t drop the previous subject but luckily for you he’s too busy with eating to make much conversation. you both enjoy your respective halves of the delicious sandwich in silence. it was peaceful, a stark contrast to what usually transpired when you’re with dazai. you observe him quietly, subtly, as you chew on the last bite of your food.

he’s picking at the bread after only two bites. his coffee was finished within the first few minutes of it being set in front of him. a clear avoidance. keeping himself busy with sipping on his coffee so he wouldn’t have to eat. the few bites were to appease you. unfortunately for him you know all of those tricks, maybe a little too well.

you cross your arms over your chest and think about this tactically, you know if you scold him outright he’ll brush it off easily. you have to think like him for a moment. what would he do if your positions were switched.

playing dumb. “you know, it’s not very polite to let a lady eat more than you…” 

you pout and look away from him, trying to seem embarrassed. you’re not sure if it’s worked. you’re honestly too nervous to look. you think it must look real because you’re now actually embarrassed by the probably god awful acting you just displayed.

but then you hear distinct chewing and peak over to something that pleasantly surprises you. he’s taken another two bites, significantly larger than the last two, because he’s almost finished with the sandwich by the time you fully turn to look at him. 

for the first time all day you finally crack a smile at him and let out a fit of giggles. dazai almost chokes on the sandwich from the sound alone. it’s a sound he’ll never get used to nor will he ever get tired of it. you’re too busy trying to calm your giggles to notice dazai’s internal struggle as he finishes off his own food all the while staring at you in amazement.

you take a few calming breaths and look at him, still all smiles. dazai resists the urge to clutch his chest, something in it stirs — an extremely alarming and foreign sensation for him. dazais nerves are suddenly on fire. he suddenly recalls what you said earlier, how you dreamt about him. he knows you planned on denying his earlier implications but the way you paused makes him think you were having those types of dreams about him. 

dazai’s fingers twitch at his sides. he’d be lying if he said he didn’t think of you like that. hell, he’d probably have the same types of dreams if he actually dreamt. dazai’s breathing shallows and he need to get away from you. his self control thinning with each passing second he thinks about you in the most intimate of ways. 

he knows it’s wrong. at least in your case you can’t control it. but here his is, shamelessly fantasizing about you like you aren’t sat right in front of him. dazai disgusts himself. he wants to bash his head in, his thoughts swimming, making it hard for him to focus. vision blurring and ears rushing like there’s water stuck in them.

dazai abruptly stands up and announces, “we should get back to work. kunikida will get on us if we take any longer.”

you’re so perplexed because when has dazai ever cared about what kunikida thinks about? then you notice it, the unmistakable bulge straining against the crotch of his pants. you swear you didn’t mean to look, it was just currently at eye level. you’re suddenly given an opportunity, something you need to make a decision on and quickly. 

as calmly as you can, you slide out of the booth and wave to the owner and waitress before grasping onto dazai’s hand and dragging the brunette away with you. dazai is far too dazed to protest at how assertive you’re being. you lead the way to the elevator and the ride there is painstakingly quiet and slow. the second the contraption dings and the doors begin to open you’re slipping through with dazai still in tow.

the lanky man is thoroughly confused when, instead of going back to the office, you shove the two of you in the supply closet. he wants to ask but something tells him he doesn’t need to. your body language gives way that you’re going to explain yourself.

thank god there’s a lock on the inside of this room. you really did not want to relocate to the bathroom for this. dazai is still dazed, unsure of what’s happening, just letting you toss him around like a rag doll. everything is still on fire making him feel detached from his body. the sensation is almost numbing.

“you know what’s so frustrating?” your breathing is just as shallow as his is now. the ride on the elevator working you up far more than it should have. 

although he’s detached, your voice anchors him. he looks down at your flushed face and he almost whimpers at the sight. he croaks out, “what is?”

“you. you’re so frustrating. your stupid act, your stupid need to play dumb, your stupid big brown eyes, your stupidly long fingers, your stupidly handsome face and your stupidly careless actions. y’know, you’ve had a hard on since you stood up at the cafe. practically shoved it in my face.” you have him trapped, his back is hitting the end of some shelves.

you don’t touch him yet. you look up at him and gauge his reaction. he seems to be battling with what he should say and you could laugh in triumph. you’ve never seen someone render the dazai osamu speechless, but you just did it with a few suggestive sentences. 

dazai takes a shuddered breath collecting his wits before grinning down at you after fully processing your words. “my apologies, bella. that wasn’t my intention, but what is yours? this is quite the damning position you have me in.”

your confidence falters but you quickly recover and click your tongue. “it would be rude of me to not help you calm down… especially if i was the cause.” 

you look away, embarrassed by your own proposition. dazai takes a moment. he knows what you’re implying, he’s sure of it, but he’s having a hard time wrapping his head around it. after what feels like an eternity— it’s not, you’re just being dramatic— it finally clicks in dazai’s head. you’re being serious, if the look on your face is any indication. 

the detective hums and reaches out. his hand cups your face and glides up into your hair, fingers tangling with the strands and tugging just a little too harshly to be considered gentle. he was needy, you could see it in the endless sea of honey that are his irises. something was stirring. 

“how am i supposed to say no to that? i’m a weak man, unable to deny a beautiful woman when she makes such an enticing offer.”

you don’t have time to bite back with a witty comment because his lips are quite literally crashing into yours. the second his chapped lips make contact with your own every single touch and action from him comes from a place of desperation. although skilled, his actions are sloppy and almost rushed. his free hand grips your waist and draws you even closer. 

your hands land on his chest to brace and balance yourself. you try to catch your breath but dazai is proving that difficult with how his tongue dances along your own. his actions steal your breath away from you and make your lungs burn, screaming for relief and air. 

the lack of air and the sensation of dazai’s tongue tangling with your own dizzies your head. you can’t get a proper thought out. instinctively your mouth is moving with his, tongue smoothing over his, and hands fisting at the cloth on his chest but you couldn’t move out of your own volition. 

dazai pulls your head back by once again tugging at your hair. you let out an involuntary whimper, making sure to stay quiet as you gasp for air. dazai dips his head down and speaks in between littering kisses on your neck.

“i thought you were going to help me calm down, bella. so far i’m doing all the work and now i’m far more worked up than i was in the cafe.” 

his words bring you crashing down to reality and you scowl. of course he would still tease you. he loves getting a rise out of you. 

you don’t entertain him, though. instead your hand travels down his torso and starts tugging at his shirt. you pout at him mockingly. “i didn’t realize some mild kissing would work you up so much. ‘didn’t realize you were so sensitive -- so needy.” 

dazai wants to quip back at you but as you’re talking you’re undoing his pants and your last word is emphasized by you shoving your hand down his pants. your hand almost falters when you realize he’s not wearing anything underneath. instead, though, you take your index finger and teasingly run it along his length. it feels endless, he’s long, you realize. you briefly wonder just how far, how deep, he could reach inside of you. 

dazai shudders at the feather like touches to where he needs attention the most right now. you lean up and with your free hand you tug on dazais collar to bring him down to your level. your breath fans over his ear and, god, he shudders again. 

you hum. “‘s this where you need attention right now?”

“yes.” dazai breathes out the word. clearly affected by the way your finger is twirling around the leaking tip of his cock.

you maintain eye contact with dazai as you sink to your knees. the implication alone has dazai’s nerves coiling tighter. he brings his hand up to cover his face, head falling back as he groans. his breathing becomes more erratic as you withdrawal your hand, he barely contain a whimper from falling past his lips at the loss of contact. but you make quick work of shocking his pants halfway down his thighs and finally freeing his strained length.

your mouth begins to salivate involuntarily. his cock is surprisingly pretty and just as you suspected — his length is impressive, definitely above average. the leaking tip is flushed pink and his veins are visibly throbbing. you want nothing more than to choke on it but first, you think you need to tease him some more.

you rest your cheek on his trembling thigh and stare up at him innocently. “osamu.” he could cum, right then and there with the way you say his given name.

dazai looks down at you. the sight in front of him bringing him embarrassingly closer to release. all dazai can muster is a hum of acknowledgment and even that sounds a little pained.

you smile at his obvious desperation. “if i help you out here you need to follow a couple rules. be quiet and no touching. think you can do that for me?”

dazai tries so hard to pay attention to your words but barely registers them. did you say no touching? no touching what? and him being quiet? a bold request of him.

you seem pleased with how quick he is to nod at you in obedience. you waste no time, ready to indulge both of your fantasies. you lick a long stripe along the vein on the underside of his cock. dazai is twitching at the one action alone. how embarrassing of him — you both have the same thought. 

the brunette’s fingers itch to touch you but his mind is coherent enough to remember your stipulations. no touching. how cruel of you. to resist that temptation when you’re making him feel this good is just downright wicked.

you don’t miss the way his fists clench in a desperate attempt to keep his word. how could you not reward him for that? listening to you like such a good and obedient puppy. your tongue darts out to swirl around his flushed tip. the taste of his precum floods your tastebuds and you’re instantly hooked like an addict to their drug of choice. dazai’s taste was your new vice. 

your lips wrap around his head and you hollow your cheeks. dazai is panting. his head spinning from the pleasure at just the slightest of touches from you. his head hangs back and he brings his fist to his mouth and bites down. he wants to groan, wants to whimper, wants to moan your name. but you’ve denied him that privilege and he has a feeling that you would be merciless if he gave in and disregarded your requests. 

you take more of him with each bob of your head and with each stroke of your tongue you unravel the tight coil that had formed in dazai’s stomach. he was already so close. what a sight it would be to watch you choke over him as he spills everything he has directly down your throat. the thought almost undoes him. he bites down on his fist harder and he thinks he may have broken skin.

you observe dazai and it’s all so hot. his pants, his facial expressions, the way sweat is starting to form on his face and cause his hair to stick to it. you can feel yourself getting worked and you’re impatient. thank god the weather permitted you to wear a pencil skirt instead of the usual slack you usually wear. you use your free hand to bunch up your skirt at your waist. the actions makes your movements on dazai’s cock a little sloppy. he hadn’t noticed yet but his brows furrow as if he’s starting to. you try to fix your pace but it’s too late. he is already picking up his head and peering down at you. 

you were trying to touch yourself. if his head wasn’t already spinning this is what would be what sent him into a spiral. you had the audacity to call him needy but then in turn do something like this. it was unfair. 

Dazai can’t help himself. “bella, are you trying to touch yourself?” it comes out as a teasing whisper. you don’t miss the amusement in his voice. 

you suppose you asked him to stay quiet, not to stay silent.

still, your brows furrow and you ever so slightly graze your teeth against his cock. the sensation is something dazai sickeningly loves. his eyes are rolling back into his head and he let’s out a short moan. it’s quiet and you’re quite annoyed that he’s found a loophole. 

you can’t deny that his noises aren’t doing something for you, though. you’re even more desperate than before to slip out of your panties. you maneuver around and manage to shimmy them off. it’s almost embarrassing how wet the crotch of them are. you try to care but you just can bring yourself to do so when dazai’s hips begin to thrust and force the small bit of his length you’ve been unable to touch down your throat. 

you gag around him and dazai’s grasping at the shelves behind him for leverage. you spread your legs the best you can, being on your knees like this and sneak your hand up your thigh. you can feel the heat radiating off of you. you run a finger through your slick and moan around dazai when the digit brushes your clit.

“fuck, fuck, fuck ‘s so good, bella. your mouth ‘s so perfect for me.” his voice is hushed and breathy.

you’re not even listening to his babble as your nose continues to brush against his pelvis every time your sucking him back into your mouth. gagging, choking, on his cock. your eyes are watery, tears spilling from that and the sensation coming from below your pelvis. your finger makes expert work of your clit.

it’s too much.

you can’t breath right, dazai can’t think right, you gag with every thrust, dazai can’t control his stuttering hips, your one hand is playing with yourself and the other reaches up to cup dazai’s balls. 

it’s not only too much for you, it’s too much for dazai. the added sensation makes nerve, every cell, every fiber that makes up dazai ignite. he was about to cum, he needed to warn you. he needed to open his mouth and say something but it just flapped, no noise was coming out.

you bob your head back and peer up at dazai, his erratic breathing becoming suspiciously loud. the look on his face is absolutely breathtaking — it’s flushed, almost beet red, tears of his own trickle down his cheeks in droplets. he looked like a fallen angel, beautiful and dangerous all at the same time. 

you moan at the sight. fingers traveling down to your entrance and slowly pushing through. you suck in a breath and fold your lips over your teeth to keep yourself from grazing his length with them. the initial stretch feels divine but your fingers themselves aren’t enough. you need dazai’s twitching cock inside your cunt.

you note that dazais cock is throbbing painfully and starts to twitch quite a lot.

oh, you realize, he’s going to cum. 

you smirk deviously. you push your mouth down on dazai until his tip is hitting the back of your throat. with your eyes still on him you hollow your cheeks and swallow. dazai almost yelps at the added stimulation. his head snaps up and finally his attention is on you.

“shit.” he hisses, this time a little louder, so you glare up at him. “sorry- sorry but- fuck- gonna cum, please, ‘m so close.”

the second those words leave his mouth you’re backing up and removing your fingers from yourself. dazai let’s out a mangled noise, something between a sob and laugh. it was almost unnerving but the blissed out look on dazai’s face tells you he’s enjoying this game far more than the average person.

you watch his chest heave, his breathing heavy. his face is as red as a blooming rose. you think it’s a sort of beautiful sight to see. dazai never gets flustered, so seeing him like this, you can’t help but to feel special. 

you stand up as you pout at him, mock empathy written all over your face. “sorry, did you wanna cum? don’t think i can have that quite yet. not when you haven’t even fucked me. right, osamu?”

there it is again, the sound of his given name falling from your lips. something in dazai snaps. the thread of his sanity that you’d been stretching thin ever since the cafe finally tore in two. his eyes darken dangerously and you only have a moment to realize the shift before he’s picking you up by your thighs and wrapping them around his thin waist. you can feel his stiff cock lightly bouncing against your ass as he flips you around and pins you against the shelves.

his head dips down and he lips scant across the skin of your neck. he’s careful to only leave feather light touches. scraping the rough skin of his mouth on one of your most sensitive areas sends a shock of electricity through your body. you so badly want to tug at his hair but you’re coherent enough to realize your fingers are still coated in your own slick. 

you smile slyly at the detective as he peers at you through his ridiculously long lashes. you grab his chin delicately and bring your soiled fingers to his lips. his eyes light up in immediate realization. he wordlessly opens his mouth, tongue lolling out a bit as he happily waits for his treat like a puppy, you can practically see his tail wagging. you let out a breathless laugh, because you think you may be screwed. dazai osamu has you wrapped around his pretty and lithe fingers and you think he already knew that. 

you think about making him beg for it but you’re so momentarily mesmerized by the brunette that you find yourself leaning in and gently interesting the digits into his mouth. dazai is quick to appreciate your offering. his lips encase your fingers and his tongue makes quick work of lapping up and savoring your taste.

dazai’s hip involuntarily rut into yours and you can’t help yourself. all the pent up frustration you’ve felt since the dreams started finally gets to your head. you’re desperate to feel him inside of you. a sensation you were always denied of, waking up before actually getting fucked by the very man holding you each time. you reach down to guide his cock then expertly shift your hips and he becomes perfectly aligned with your entrance. dazai is sucking on your fingers but his actions become sloppy as he watches what you’re doing with intense concentration.

you waste no time sinking yourself down on his length, he’s already well coated in your slick and eases into you. you bite on your lip to avoid making any obscene noises but dazai snaps you into reality when he carelessly moans loudly. you panic and shove your fingers further into his mouth. he hums appreciatively and if his hips rocking into yours didn’t feel so good you’d hop off his cock right then and there and leave him blue balled. you could bring yourself to do that though, not when you’ve been waiting for this for so long.

you settle for hissing out, “shut the fuck up, dazai.” 

dazai gives you a shit eating grin as he snakes an arm under your ass and squeezes before slowly shifting his hips away from yours, leaving you virtually empty, before sliding himself back into you at the same painstakingly slow pace. he repeats the slowed movements a few times before you’re slipping your fingers out of his mouth and bracing yourself on his shoulders. you try to move your hips on your own but dazai is quick to catch you.

“ah, ah, bella. can’t have you doing whatever you want right now. unless you want me to get louder, you’ll let me set the pace.” his voice is slightly strained and hushed, but despite his seriousness, you can hear the tiniest bit of teasing mixed in.

you let out a whine but resign to him setting the pace. in the meantime your fingers find their way to his hair and tug. dazais hips stutter, showing you that he is far too needy to take full control. taking full advantage of just how distracted he is, you grind your hips into the detective’s with each thrust and dip your head to leave sloppy wet kisses along his jaw and down his neck.

“shit, you’ve been so wound tight all the time lately that even your perfect cunt has a vice grip on me. it’s so perfect, feels so good.” you can tell how hard dazai is trying to be quiet and you note that you should reward him for that later.

it doesn’t take long for his pace to increase, his rapid movements making the shelves behind you rock and creak. dazai still seems displeased with the pace, his brows knitting together in concentration. you catch his eyes flitting to your neck and lingering there. 

you’ve always worn your tie loose, the first couple buttons if your dress shirt undone. it drives dazai mad. your neck and cleavage are always on display in the most tasteful way. he wants nothing more than to run his hand over your velvety soft skin and wrap his nimble fingers around your neck. now that he has the chance to do so, he can’t pass up the opportunity.

your grip in his hair tightens as he shifts you, keeping you up with one arm as he keeps his pace. you have no room to question him when the new positioning has his cock nudging your sweet spot so deliciously. your head becomes dizzy and your mouth falls open in a silent moan. 

dazai’s hand travels up your body, palm flush with your skin so he can feel every bump and curve. he starts at your upper abdomen and slithers it up. he completely ignores your breasts which you vaguely think was his goal. you have no time to act surprise over it bc his hand is gently wrapping around your neck. he wants to squeeze, fingers twitching, but he resigns to a light grip to simply test the waters. 

your response is something he wasn’t expecting. your eyes roll back and you let out a hushed whimper. that’s when he realizes, he wants to do this forever. he wants to fuck you senseless so he can see that beautiful expression on your face forever. so he can feel you tightly wrapped around him forever. dazai wants you forever. the fleeting thought scares him just a little but he has no time to dwell on it because the coil in his stomach is unraveling once again.

“dazai-“ your interrupted by him bringing you in for a sloppy kiss. you think the noises from the kiss alone are far more obscene than the noises from him bullying his cock into you, which is a hard feat considering those are, by no means, quiet or pure. 

when the brunette detaches himself he breathes out. “osamu- shit- ‘s osamu…”

“osamu. ‘m gonna cum. so close- please.” you let out a quiet sob as you babble.

dazai has no time to respond. it’s embarrassing, the way he can’t even give you any other warning but him shoving his face in your shoulder, grip tightening around your throat ever so slightly. the whimper he lets out tells you everything you need to know before he starts spilling his cum inside of you.

the throbbing of his cock and sensation of him filling you up has your walls contracting and you’re diving off the deep end yourself. you bite your lip hard. desperate trying to keep yourself from making more noise than the whines sticking in your throat. your vision blurs and and hearing goes muffled as your senses become overwhelmed by your high.

dazai is still rutting his hips into you, guiding you through your orgasm despite his twitches and obvious overstimulation. when you come back to your senses, dazai is whimpering a lot louder than previously. his grip on your neck is lost as he leaves soothing strokes on your side. you tug at his hair to lift his head so you can look at him.

his face is somehow even more flushed than earlier, you’re almost concerned. the look in his eyes though makes something stir inside of you. his glazed over and hooded eyes, completely unfocused. his lips parted as he’s letting out short and shuddered puffs of air. dazai has lost all senses but the feeling of him inside of you. 

“osamu. hey- look at me. you need to calm-“ you his when his rutting becomes more intense, thrusts becoming less shallow but hips and cock still twitching wildly, you have to stop him otherwise you’ll both lose yourselves in this supply closet and you can’t afford to do that when everyone is still in the office next door. “osamu we need to get back.”

dazai seems to have regained some of his consciousness. “again.”

you let out a breathless laugh, eyes glimmering in genuine amusement and adoration. “not right now. later. we need to get back. i have a case i need to finish working on.”

dazai finally fully comes back to you and he lightens up at the promise of later. that means this isn’t just a one time thing. something in that back of his head always told him if he crossed that line with you, things wouldn’t be the same, he’d only have one shot. but your words are such a relief he could cry. he can’t help himself, he has to clarify.

“later? after work and… again anytime after that?” his eyes are pleading and hopeful and you can’t help but melt under his soft gaze.

you nod and open your mouth to affirm his statement but you're rudely interrupted by a loud rapping at the closet door. “you two better have not done any of that by my emergency snack stash and you better clean up after yourselves. hurry up, i can't keep stalling and kunikida needs staples.”

ranpo’s voice rings throughout the room. you groan in embarrassment and bury yourself into his chest. dazai lets out a gleeful laugh still dizzyingly drunk on the idea of your promise.