X-men. Magneto/Wolverine. NC-17. ~2500 words. Movieverse. Dub-con. Post-canon.

My boy, the one thing you’ll learn straight away is that an animal in this house earns its keep.

The Same Deep Water

Knives, bullets, bare-knuckled fists, they all contribute to a world of hurts that Logan’s long-accustomed to. Others he’s only known the touch of once or twice like the wrong end of a howitzer; the creeping bite of flame; the dusty weight of rockfall; Stryker. It’s the lingering thorn of Stryker that’s led him here, plopped him down in an overstuffed wing chair with his spine ramrod stiff and his hands pinned to the arms.

His bones twist and strain—a teeth-clenching pain that’s grown frustratingly familiar in the last few years—and he’s helpless as a newborn to fight the pull. He resists it anyway until muscle tears from tendon, stitches itself up again while Magneto calmly watches him struggle. There’s no malice in Magneto’s gaze, no simmering violence. Most everyone Logan’s met, even the Eagle Scout poster boys, stink with the need to know where they land in the pecking order. Magneto though is a confident bastard, a believer, convinced he belongs at the top. It’s unsettling, gets Logan straight in the gut and heats his blood until he itches for a real fight.

Magneto’s hands rest in his lap, fingers relaxed and threaded together. His brow is lined with age but free of sweat or signs of strain, not even a vein popping to keep Logan in the chair opposite him. It’s screwed in the head to prop Logan here like this, sit knee-to-knee as if they were two old pals having a fireside chat. Logan’s not much for putting on a show, but in this case he’d prefer it to look like a bit of effort is going in to reducing him to a doll. Magneto’s lips thin into a faint smile before he asks, “What do you owe them, Wolverine?”

“About as much as I owe you.”

“Jean is dead. Charles, too.” Magneto leans forward, his suit rustling against the fabric of the chair. He lays a hand on Logan’s knee, the touch gentle compared to the brute force of his power clamped to Logan’s skeleton. “Nothing keeps you there. And now you’ve come knocking at my door. For what? To bully me with empty threats?” He shifts, scooting to perch on the very edge of the seat. Logan’s adamantium hums as Magneto saturates it with raw energy. “Or did you come here expecting to find a weak old man.”

“Tell me what I want to know and I’ll get going.”

“No, Wolverine, you won’t. You will stay as my guest.” Magneto rises, all strength and grace. He pats Logan on the cheek, the touch patronizing before slowing to a caress. His fingers curl lightly behind the hinge of Logan’s jaw, his thumb smoothing over the bristle of whiskers. “But my boy, the one thing you’ll learn straight away is that an animal in this house earns its keep.”

A snarl ripples up Logan’s throat.

“A year in the Brotherhood’s ranks and I will tell you everything you wish to know.” Magneto’s fingers ghost across the edge of whiskers to Logan’s lips. In the reverse of the tight frown tugging down the corner of Logan’s mouth, a small, bitter smile finds its way to Magneto’s. He moves to leave then, and when Logan finds himself free to turn his head and track him, Logan’s not sure what keeps him seated. He’s fought for less, spilled enough guts to fill a boxcar under the orders of uniformed pigs who didn’t deserve their rank or a lick of respect. Sold his body for every use under the sun at least once and lived through it.

My finest experiment.

“What guarantee do I have that you’re not just gonna use me and lose me?”

“Oh, I’ll use you, and plenty, for myself as you have surely guessed and for the Brotherhood. However, unlike Charles, I don’t renege on my word. Come to my bedchambers, Wolverine, and we can lay down the foundations of this arrangement. I promise you, it won’t be unpleasant.”

He’s free to go, to cut his way out and leave the maddening scraps of his past alone. He’s spent so long not really knowing who he is, doubt nibbles at him that things’ll be any different when he’s patched up those holes. The spaces between his knuckles itch; the aching nudge of metal presses at the tendons of his wrist. It lingers through the long walk down the hall, up a twisting flight of stairs and onward where the trail of Magneto’s passing is sharp with the traces of lust and triumph—pheremone scents that crawl like bugs under Logan’s skin.

The lush bedroom is massive, crowded full of carpets and tapestries laid over rich dark wood. A fire blazes in the hearth, deepening the shadows at the edges of shapes large and small. It could be a mirror of the professor’s quarters, and Logan breathes in half expecting a trace of the man, but there’s no ghostly presence riding the musky reminder of Magneto’s intent.

“Always the mercenary,” Magneto says, standing at the bedside and undressing slowly. Logan’s eyes track to the numbers inked on his flesh—his excuse for tyranny. Mouth quirking under the scrutiny, Magneto uses his powers on the chain of Logan’s dogtags. Logan’s lips curl away from his teeth as the stamp of his own numbers dangle accusingly in front of his face. They’d never been his excuse, no matter what that dog Victor had said.

Logan yanks the tags out of mid-air, crossing the room as Magneto slips out of his shoes and flicks a hand. The door swings shut, the click of the latch sealing the most delicate prison cell Logan’s ever found himself dumped in. “Drop your pants so I can get this over with and rustle up something to eat,” Logan says. He hauls his shirt and undershirt off over his head, leaving them tangled around his wrists as he plants himself elbows first on the mattress. He skids his legs wide, waits for the feel of his fly popping open and his jeans dragged down by the rivets.

“I think you’ve misunderstood the terms,” Magneto says, his touch light at Logan’s elbow. He slides onto the bed, waits with that same steady gaze that says he fears nothing, not even letting Logan crawl up over him and put teeth to his throat.

The bed groans under Logan’s weight as he holds himself in check. The body under him is lax, waiting, and he feels the temperature of the air rise as heat pours off Magneto’s skin. “What is this?” Logan asks, the question torn from him even as instinct tries to take over at the submission offered up sweet as syrup. It’s a goddamn trap that plays on his weaknesses, he reminds himself even as he noses at Magneto’s throat, breath coming quicker at the scent of blood rushing under skin.

“An exchange, and a mutually pleasurable one if you’ll permit it.”

“And if not–” Logan doesn’t need the answer, but gets one in a hard jerk of force that makes his knee push Magneto’s leg wide.

“Well, we already know I hardly need your permission, now don’t we?”

A sound builds like thunder low in Logan’s chest, makes it out between his clenched teeth and not much further as Magneto turns to kiss him. The soft press of lips hits him with a thousand volts, the shock jolting him to the core with more strength than it’d taken to render him immobile. Logan’s too numbed to do anything but kiss back as sure hands skim down his side and work swiftly at the waist of his jeans. This isn’t how he’d been prepared for things to go, and a new sound escapes him, thin, weak as he jerks away from the kiss.

“No kissing,” he says, claws disappearing back into his arms. He hadn’t even felt the pain of bone scraping bone. He flexes his hands as tiny goosedown feathers drift back down to the pillow they’d been ripped from.

“If you insist.” Magneto shrugs off his disappointment as he takes Logan in hand, the heady scent of his arousal going straight to the crudest parts of Logan’s brain. His body doesn’t care in the least what his thinking brain has to say about laying down with the man; his cock swells to fill the soft cradle of Magneto’s fingers. A shot of pride that’s hard to swallow chases the dizzy rush of all that blood going south as Magneto murmurs his appreciation and spreads himself wider beneath Logan.

Magneto had asked if Logan expected a feeble old man, and he had with how much of the ‘cure’ Beast had pumped into him, but mutant powers or not, he’s far from feeble. His age shows mostly on the surface; the muscle of his body remains fit, and the way his limbs open for Logan is stately not stiff. Logan presses bared teeth to the one flaw he finds, a poorly-mended break that’s left a permanent jag in the wing of Magneto’s collarbone. He growls and catches the bone between his teeth, remembers suddenly a different man’s body and the taste of blood welling against his tongue. Releasing his hold, Logan licks at the faint indent of his bite, the closest concession to nicety that he’ll give as Magneto’s slick hands find his dick harder yet.

It’s mechanical then, or it should be. Fucking doesn’t take much thinking and a rhythm is easy to settle into, but Logan’s mind doesn’t shut down like he wishes it would. Every sound Magneto makes, each twist against the sheets, it drives Logan on. It shouldn’t. It goddamn shouldn’t, but it hits him like a hot spill of innards across his claws, satisfying despite the stench. His stomach drops out, leaving him hollowed out with a strange hunger growing beside the pleasure.

“Surely you can do better than this,” Magneto says, his fingers digging into Logan’s shoulders. His head is back, a vicious, pleasured smile on his face. “A little more vigour, if you would. You can’t break me so easily.”

The accusation slides in like a stiletto to the kidneys. Logan fights the crackling rage that turns his hands to fists and the inky, sickly darkness that says he’s proven over and over just how easy he’ll give himself to another man’s will. He shoves up, weight propped on his knuckles, and Magneto’s hands settle to press light against his chest.

“Don’t make me do all the work. That’s hardly sporting.” Magneto’s words come with a faint hint of his power, drawing Logan steadily deeper by the very bones of his hips.

With a gutteral roar that’s raw and angry and filled with a shameful anguish, Logan resists the pull and jerks back, his cock almost slipping free before Magneto stops him. The fingers resting on his chest twitch, the slightest hint that this time, it requires willpower if not effort to work his power.

“Let me go, old man.”

Ecstasy flitters across Magneto’s face, echoed in the slight clench of muscles around Logan’s cock. He shifts, inching Logan deeper by the lift of his hips alone, and another hard clench forces a groan out of Logan. “When you’re not holding up your part of the bargain, why should I?”

“Still hard, ain’t I? You want it rough, I can do that.” The words burn like acid, as sharp and stinging as the pleasure of being granted control of his body again and fucking in deep enough to cut Magneto’s breath short.

There’s a darkly glimmering thread in him that thrives on the simplicity of watching a body squirm under his weight, moan weakly at the relentless slam of his cock, shiver and beg for another scrape of teeth on tender skin. It’s easier than he’d like it be to give in to the scent of blood pounding lustfully, let the red haze carry him through any qualms his conscience might serve up.

Better, yes, to lick at the thin trickling sweat at Magneto’s temple, to curl a hand underneath his body and brace it for the hard, rutting thrusts that turn rough breath to soft, frantic panting. Logan finds his own breath turning shallow, each lungful feeding his senses, muting the Professor’s weak leftover stamp of morality under a steady buzz of lit nerves. Logan’s attention arrows in on Magneto’s gaze as it goes steadily unfocused, the minute tensing of muscles as orgasm draws near. He’ll have a sliver of a chance when it hits, a whisper in the back of his skull tells him. He can punch a gutful of metal into that slender body and be done with this whoring.

Who has the answers, Wolverine? Those people? That creature in your arms?

He could fight the bit and maybe save God knows how many humans from Magneto’s crazed visions of a mutant only future.

One day, someone will finish what I’ve started.

Logan shudders, shakes off the clinging threads of doing the right thing that’s been dogging him ever since he got all tangled up with the Professor and his crowd. He’s as sick of being led along like a mule with a carrot as he is of letting a leash settle around his neck. The one thing he knows down to his toes is that he’s no saint, and it’s the devil in him that wants to see Magneto pushed over the edge, vulnerable for a moment that’ll flash by quicker than a memory. He tongues the point of a tooth as it happens, holds his own breath as Magneto’s eyes flutter and the air floods with the heavy scent of his come.

“Good enough for you?” Logan asks, ignoring the hint of relief when Magneto lets him pull away, finish himself off on the old man’s thigh with a few flicks of the wrist like a fucking porn star.

Uncaring of the mess, Magneto twists to follow as Logan rolls to his back. His fingers return to stroking Logan’s cheek, petting him. He draws near, pausing a hair away from a kiss, his lips quirking to the side as Logan’s muscles go tense. “Good enough for now,” he says.

Logan slides his eyes closed, listens as Magneto’s breath evens out and he stands, dressing himself as calmly as if he’d just risen from a nap. Everyone has a price, everyone has a weakness, and Logan’s long overdue for answers. If he gets to know this bed as well as he expects, there’ll be a chance to snap the leash if he gets sick of being led around. Magneto’s arrogance is unsettling but it’s also the one thing Logan can count on and use against him.

Grabbing a corner of the bedding to wipe himself off, Logan makes a soft grunt of acknowledgement as Magneto concludes their deal by offering him free reign of the place. He’s got a year to this sentence, there’s no sense rushing to have a look around. And the stink of sex grows more satisfying by the second. Logan licks the taste of sweat and cock off his hand.

No sense in rushing at all really when he’s already made up his mind. The scent of Magneto fades, leaves Logan alone with his decision. Never one to really look back, Logan snags a pillow to get comfortable and put the bed to better use.

*

End

White Collar. Neal/Mozzie. R. ~1000 words.
Mozzie procures a getaway vehicle of which Neal is less than enthused. Most importantly, it’s cold outside.

Cream of the Crop

Neal looks around the small space without bothering to mask his dismay. “This is the best you could come up with? Not exactly cream of the crop in getaway vehicles.”

The truck rocks as Mozzie makes for the driver’s seat. The metal buckle on the seatbelt clacks against the door as he eases behind the wheel. “May I remind you of the extremely short notice you gave me?” Adjusting the mirrors takes a minute, but they were on schedule so the pressure wouldn’t hit for another hour.

“An ice cream truck in the middle of winter is on the flip side of subtle, don’t you think?” Neal pokes through the nooks and crannies, opening then slamming shut the freezer beneath the sales window after letting a frosty gust of air blow out to make the space even more cold.

“Gift horse, Neal. Gift horse.”

“An actual gift horse probably would have been a better choice.”

“I’ll keep that in mind for the next time you call me up at four in the morning and tell me you need something refrigerated before noon the next day. Oh right, horses don’t have built-in refrigeration units.” Mozzie glances at the dash, wishing that running the heater was an option, but Neal’s target, whatever it was this time, was going to need to be iced ASAP; cranking the temp in here to a nice and toasty eighty-five would kill the job. Better the job than his toes, though. Mozzie shoves the seat back as far as possible to make the wait as comfortable as possible and wriggles his feet in his shoes, willing life back into the ten little piggies cryo-suspended in his favourite argyle socks.

“Cold?” Neal asks, coming to stand at Mozzie’s elbow as he apparently decides that the truck is up to specs if not ideal.

“Possibly,” Mozzie says, and Neal turns on a smile at the slow, sarcastic tone. Mozzie huffs, his breath a white vapour cloud of an exclamation point, but Neal takes it with the same ease as water on the proverbial duck’s back. He always does. It’s how they get along so well.

“We should pass the time,” Neal suggests, and Mozzie’s about to ask how when cold fingers slip straight down the front of his pants.

Mozzie inches up, back skidding halfway to the headrest. “Oh hey, that’s your hand.”

“I think you’re right,” Neal says, sounding amused, and the words go straight into Mozzie’s skull a whole lot closer and whisperier than he was in any way prepared for.

“What exactly is going on here?”

“Handjob, Moz. Go with it.” Neal nuzzles closer, the chill tip of his nose skidding above the coil of Mozzie’s scarf an instant before an open-mouthed not-quite hint of a kiss. “We’ll warm up, pass the time, get rid of the ridiculous sexual tension we’ve been carting around for the last month that you can’t even pretend you haven’t noticed.”

“Playing cards are for passing the time,” Mozzie points out, but that’s about all he really can protest. Somehow, his knees splay a couple inches without him trying and he discovers his hand gripping the dangling ends of Neal’s much pricier cashmere scarf. Neal doesn’t really seem to mind. In fact, Neal’s hand works a little lower in response, gets a firmer grip over the one part of Mozzie that’s gone stiff in a way completely unattributable to the cold.

Neal’s mouth finds Mozzie’s, but the dry brush of his lips draws away before Mozzie can stretch towards a kiss. “I didn’t bring any cards,” he says, swinging a leg over Mozzie’s to ease straight into Mozzie’s lap with more grace than the kind of girls who do that sort of thing for a living.

“Fair enough,” Mozzie manages in the scant time before Neal’s mouth closes to his. He pushes Neal back suddenly, groaning when Neal’s grip loosens, and the heavy look in his eyes blinks back to situational alertness.

Neal asks, “Problem?” even as his hand resumes its slow tugging, and Mozzie becomes aware of the soft rustle of Neal’s slacks open and the bare heat of his cock.

The sparks in his nerves that zip straight to his brain, his unmentionables, and everywhere inbetween were not making it easy to think. “We’re going to–oh shit–warm up the–holy moly–interior of the truck too much.”

“Moz,” Neal says, head tipped to the side, intent on convincing him to stop thinking and start paying attention to just how good it feels to have Neal’s now very warm fingers wrapping around both their cocks. “Moz, it’s winter. All we have to do is open the doors and windows.”

“Right, of course. Carry on.” Mozzie’s agreement gets lost in that kiss he’s been missing out on, and it’s everything it should be for the start of a make-out session in an ice cream truck rented under questionable circumstances. In a word, it’s awesome. He moans right into Neal’s mouth, and he’s helping before he knows it, frustrated a little by how much clothes they’re bundled up in even though the icy slivers of air across his belly keep reminding him of just how freaking cold it is. Soon enough it could be fifty below and he wouldn’t care because he’s got Neal’s hand moving in just the right rhythm and the slick mess of the kiss is getting sloppier than the final speeches at an award’s show.

Mozzie certainly feels equivalently tipsy, all the way to the point when Neal somehow loses it first, the hot spill hitting him like a punch in the gut and a bolt of lightning all in one. He practically blacks out when Neal’s grip turns as slippery as the kiss and then it’s only half a dozen strokes before Neal hits a home run, his smile dragging towards Mozzie’s cheek as Mozzie flops back in the driver’s seat utterly dazed.

He’s able to form complex thoughts just in time to see Neal scrape his hand clean on the edge of the seat. “That is not sanitary, Neal. No one is going to believe that’s melted ice cream.”

“In three hours and-” Neal checks his watch, “eighteen minutes, this truck is going to be on fire.”

“That doesn’t make it sanitary.”

“Fire, Moz,” Neal repeats, zipping them both up but not making any move to leave Mozzie’s lap.

Despite a zillion things more that deserve saying, Mozzie wisely keeps his mouth shut. After all, Neal’s as good a lap-warmer as a housecat. He even purrs.

*

End

White Collar. June/Neal. PG-13. ~500 words.

Not the least bit the shark, but more the hound, lean and earnest, eager for the chase and with just enough of a bite to make it prudent to run.

Sugar

“Good morning, Neal.” Though he’d hardly stirred when the coffee service had been set down or when June had taken her seat, Neal straightened at the sound of her voice. “I know Peter’s got you on a schedule, but up at the same time two days in a row? That’s not like you.”

His attention shaken free from the morning headlines, his smile dawned as dazzling as always. “Morning, June. Twice is coincidence.” He folded the newspaper crisply and set it well to the side, all his focus switching to the moment and her.

June’s heart beat a little faster as she slid a smile right back across the table. It was a dangerous game she played, riding the edge between being charmed and forgetting the fact, but there were some things that deserved the ‘just like riding a bicycle’ adage.

“Sugar for your coffee?” She nudged the dish forward with a fingertip. Neal seemed the type to have a sweet tooth, a vice he could indulge in amongst company and keep whatever other bad habits he had at bay.

“Thank you.” Neal forged sincerity better than anything. Soft in a way her husband never was, the truth leaked into his words to lend them weight and yet proved as damning as only the truth could. Byron had loved her, certainly, but he’d had the instincts of a shark and it showed in his every smile. In all her dealings with Neal, she hadn’t seen a glimmer of anything near as sharp. An entirely different sort of thrill, it was a bit refreshing, to be honest.

“Don’t hold back, take another.”

Neal’s gaze flickered away the dark mirror of the coffee and he grasped another sugar cube with the tongs, dropping it delicately into his cup. He watched her as he stirred. “You spoil me.”

“Of course I do.” June poured herself a cup to match, thanking Neal as he passed the sugar back. “And I enjoy it too, or else you wouldn’t be taking in the view.”

Neal raised his cup, smile lost in a sip. “That was a prime opening for flattery,” he said, attention still keenly fixed on her as if she were all that existed in his universe. Not the least bit the shark, but more the hound, lean and earnest, eager for the chase and with just enough of a bite to make it prudent to run. “June, I believe I’m starting to see your angle.”

“Not everyone needs an angle, darling.”

“But everyone has one.” Neal abandoned his coffee as carefully and precisely as he had the paper. He rolled his shoulders and ran his fingers down the lapel of the suit that had fit so keenly without needing any help from a tailor’s needle. “Unless you’re trying to tell me that all you’re looking for are a few trite words tossed across the table.”

June smiled demurely as he rose from his seat. She plucked a cube from the dish and popped it straight into her mouth, the too-sweet crunch of it dissolving quickly but not absent from her tongue when Neal leaned in, lips shivering near the corner of her mouth. His breath fanned warm across her cheek, inviting her to turn into a kiss, but her patience outlasted Neal’s and as expected he came begging for the sugar on her tongue.

Legion. Michael/Gabriel. NC-17. ~1200 words. Wingporn.

If they were to know their father’s wrath for this, it would be with one heart.

Transgressions

Gabriel stood as still as stone at the very precipice where Michael had chosen to defy their Lord. Michael’s chest tightened at the memory. He had fallen so swiftly–not to darkness as he had feared but towards a new understanding of the Lord’s chosen. How strongly they felt things. How deeply their passions ran.

Gabriel’s wings lay flat and tight along his back, his lingering shame visible in the occasional tremor of feathers. He turned at the sound of Michael’s steps, welcoming his approach, and he welcomed Michael’s touch upon his shoulder with the same guarded relief.

“How can you forgive so easily?” he asked, his difficultly in meeting Michael’s eyes clear. In his hands he held the slim silver trumpet that had been his burden to bear.

Despair bred on the lands below, terror of the sort that man had not known since the days of the prophets. Hope thrived as well, Michael knew, as his own had been renewed.

He moved his hand to cradle Gabriel’s face. His fingers slid like tears to catch at Gabriel’s strong jaw, and there they trembled with the same hesitation found in his kiss. Michael ran his thumb over the place high on Gabriel’s cheek where he had pressed his lips. “There is nothing easy about my forgiveness.”

“It is treasured,” Gabriel said, catching his wrist before he could turn and walk away. The wide span of his wings flared to better block Michael’s retreat. He lowered them, but not until he had returned the touch, his palm sliding warm against Michael’s cheek. Fear and hurt showed vivid in his eyes, and the rawness of it burned in the shiver of his kiss.

“Michael, I am sorry,” he whispered, his lips dry against Michael’s. It was impossible to know what he referred to, more so when he seized Michael’s shoulders and pushed him towards the smooth stone of a pillar.

When his mouth brushed Michael’s a second time there was a slickness to it, and a hiss of anguish at the transgression escaped between his teeth. He pinned Michael more firmly and kissed him again, his wings high and curled as if their shadow alone could hide the sight from God.

Michael twisted his head away, licked the taste of Gabriel from his lips. Beneath his armour, his body burned, the strange twisting emotions as powerful as they had been when he’d known true flesh. “My forgiveness is not what you will need to seek if you continue.”

The same heat clearly infected Gabriel’s form, and his hands slid down Michael’s arms to hold at his elbows. The pads of his thumbs rubbed against bare skin, the light touch radiating pleasure along Michael’s nerves. “I was wrong once in my choice to obey. I question doing the same for the feelings that I have now.”

Michael had no answer to satisfy, no guidance to follow save for the rapid beat of his heart. He raised his wings, slid them along Gabriel’s until the light softened and the shadows cast along Gabriel’s handsome face grew less severe. Sorrow should have no place there, he thought, as his hands found their own way and wandered down Gabriel’s front.

Now it was his wings that betrayed him, the sharp flap of feathers hardly masking the hasty intake of his breath as he felt Gabriel swell beneath his touch. He moved his mouth as if to speak, but no words were lost in the sudden crush of Gabriel’s lips to his, none left to form when a thrusting tongue followed.

They fell into simple rutting pleasure with startling ease, cared for nothing but one another as flesh met flesh. Gabriel surged hot in his hand, met a new kiss with equal passion, and Michael bit at his mouth to draw a low eager moan to the surface. Between deepening kisses, Michael shed his armour with Gabriel’s help. The weight fell and took with it his doubts. His blood ran fever hot, a sensation he had never known even in the midst of battle.

The restlessness inside him was not to be quelled, and as if they sparred, he ducked beneath the bracket of Gabriel’s arms. Michael surprised him with a hand to the centre of his back, forced him forward to stand where he had. He put his mouth to the nape of Gabriel’s neck as he released clasp after clasp and freed inches of skin for the greed of his touch.

The path of his kisses followed the flex of Gabriel’s spine and then the upsweep of his wing. He pressed his cock against Gabriel’s flesh, thought only at the last moment to slick it wet and ease the push. It could not have been the same blinding pleasure that Michael felt, but Gabriel took the length of him and moaned for it, shoved back to force him deeper until they fit together.

“Again,” Gabriel commanded when Michael drew back. The terrifying passion in him had dampened to allow reason, but it was little defense against the hand that reached back to clamp against his hip. “Again, Michael, or have me beg.”

This time as he buried himself in Gabriel’s willing flesh, all reason fled. He pressed himself tightly to Gabriel’s back and spread his hands to stroke them across the fan of feathers that shook beneath his touch. He gathered Gabriel in his arms shortly after, pulled him close and curled his wings around them both. Their bodies learned to move together, and Gabriel’s pleasure was evident in the shudder of his breath and the needful sound he made as Michael lay new kisses at the slope of his shoulder.

Michael felt Gabriel’s release almost as if it were his own. The sensation, so sharp and new, crackled into the very air with a rough groan to follow. The shock of it raced like lightning across Michael’s skin and his movements turned crude, nothing graceful at all in the desperate push of his body against Gabriel’s. For a moment he felt only a sudden tension, a restlessness centred in his very core, and in the next he pitched forward against Gabriel’s back, his mouth open and gasping. Pure euphoric bliss spread through his limbs, filled the whole of him as surely as he had filled Gabriel with his seed.

They sank to the ground, first he then Gabriel, to sit amongst the trappings of their armour. Wordlessly, Michael lay down and rested his cheek on Gabriel’s thigh. He drew in a deep and steady breath as Gabriel’s hand came to rest over the crown of his head and together they looked into the bright serenity of Heaven. If they were to know their father’s wrath for this, it would be with one heart.

*

End

Marvel. Teddy Altman/Billy Kaplan/Tony Stark. Steve Rogers/Tony Stark implied. NC-17. ~2500 words.

That sex tape was never going to be the same.

Bad Celebrity Influence

They’d made it to a charity event or two in the past but Billy wasn’t used to this sort of celebrity. Teddy wasn’t either judging by the shade of green he kept slipping in to. The guests at this gala were so out of their league it’d been torture trying to hold a smile and not sweat like a sprinkler. For the past two hours Billy had threatened to start chanting a spell to get them both the hell out of Dodge. Teddy pointed out that escape the old fashioned way would be a lot easier and eventually they’d been able to drop the smiles long enough to make a run for it.

They were pretty successful until a wrong turn landed them in a guest bedroom that was bigger than the entire apartment he lived in. A voice purred out of the darkness, stopping them dead in their tracks. “If you two are trying to ditch the fun, you’re going the wrong way.”

Billy’s eyes adjusted in time to see Tony Stark rise from a huge bed. He looked rumpled, Billy noticed, and of course he would because the bed was in no better shape. A pair of hands had clearly gotten friendly with his hair and his shirt hung open all the way down the front. “If you’re looking for fun, you just found it.”

Somehow with all the eyecandy, Billy managed words. “Sorry, Mr. Stark,” he said, and prayed his voice wouldn’t crack, “we just took a wrong turn.”

“And here I thought you two had come to rescue me from the utter disaster that was the past half hour of my life.” Tony moved towards them, and Billy glanced at Teddy. They couldn’t just leave without excusing themselves.

Teddy held up a hand and shifted with an obvious intend to hustle them back out the door. “Mr. Stark, we’re sorry, we didn’t mean to intrude.”

Billy nodded in agreement, but Tony hardly seemed to register the apology or the body language that came with it, and he’d crossed the room before Teddy could say another word. His shirt peeled wide open as he dropped a hand on each of their shoulders, and Billy knew he wasn’t the only one who couldn’t help but stare. Tony grinned like he knew it. “Stay a while, have a drink.”

“We’re not old enough to drink,” Billy said.

“But you’re legal for everything else, right?” Tony said, and Billy looked at the ceiling, then the floor, then anywhere else to avoid paying any more attention to the fact that Tony had a really, really nice chest. Like a leaner but equally ripped version of Teddy’s, with totally edible pecs and an enticing sprinkle of dark hair that ran down towards his navel—and holy fuck, they were being hit on by Iron Man.

Billy’s gaze was still stuck a few inches south of Tony’s navel and he only felt Teddy glance down at him. “Well-” Teddy said, and Billy noticed that it sounded more like a maybe we are than an we’ve really gotta go.

“Did I hear a yes? I think I did.” One of Tony’s hands slid from Billy’s right shoulder to all the way to his left, and he watched as the same happened to Teddy. Tony put his mouth near Teddy’s ear while his gaze slid over to Billy. Teddy had gone green from his hairline to his toes, and the high flush in his cheeks clashed something horrible. Billy was pretty sure he didn’t have enough blood left above the waist to manage a blush of his own.

“Was that a yes?” Tony whispered, his mouth staying open like a tease. Billy saw Teddy’s throat bob and then two pairs of eyes were looking his way like it was all up to him.

“We’ve, uh, never. I mean, we’ve talked about it, sure,” Billy stammered. They’d talked about it a lot to be honest, but the reality staring him in the face was a little daunting.

“You’re only young once, usually,” Tony said, and while Billy just stared, he put his mouth even closer to Teddy’s ear and whispered something that Billy couldn’t hear over the sudden resurgence of blood roaring through his head. Whatever it was got a slight nod out of Teddy, a wicked grin from Tony that was even sharper than the edges of his goatee, and then he found the arm around his shoulder curling him closer into one of the hottest kisses ever. Tony’s tongue slid straight into his mouth and transformed a completely humiliating squawk into a moan that Tony echoed right back. The moan hooked straight into Billy’s guts and he found himself melting like the main character of a romance novel. He was fucking being kissed by Iron Man.

“That was definitely a yes,” Tony said, pulling away.

Dazed, Billy licked his lips and opened his eyes in time to catch the second half of what was, no question, the actual hottest kiss ever. Teddy’s blush had faded and Tony worked his mouth against Teddy’s with a slow thoroughness that was making Billy blush instead. The soft flash of Tony’s tongue licking against Teddy’s hit Billy’s gut in the exact same spot with a hot spike of lust. He moaned and prayed the sudden wobbliness in his legs wasn’t going to turn into a full-out swoon.

He watched Tony pull away only to surge back and claim one more hasty kiss from Teddy. “Let’s move this to the bed,” Tony said, manoeuvring them around and giving the both of them a gentle shove towards the rumpled mess of it. He went to close the doors and Billy pulled Teddy into a hasty huddle.

“Is this really happening?” Billy looked up at Teddy, pretty sure his eyes were as big as the tent in his pants. “Are we really going to do this?”

Teddy shrugged his shoulders and tossed a glance to Tony, who simply arched a brow and leaned against a sideboard that could probably get Billy through a couple years of college. By the look of it, he was just counting down the seconds until they decided in his favour.

“I’m up for it,” Teddy said, dipping down to slide his mouth over Billy’s. As the kiss slowed and they parted, Teddy rested his forehead against Billy’s. “You?”

“Holy shit, am I.”

“Well,” Tony said, sliding right back in between them, “that’s two votes yea, motion approved. Let’s get this party going.” He wasted no time in physically herding them towards the bed. Somewhere in the dozen paces there he managed to get Billy’s tie loosened, his shirt untucked, and his belt slid out of the loops.

“It’s a skill,” Tony said, catching Billy’s astonished look. He tumbled into the bed without looking and yanked Billy down right between the wide sprawl of his legs. Billy craned around to look him in the eye as Tony’s arms wrapped around to his front and got to work on getting his shirt all the way off. “C’mon, big guy,” he said, and Billy felt Tony’s gaze burn straight past him to where Teddy hovered at the edge of the mattress. “Give me a hand, and while you’re at it, how about you do your thing and make my dreams come true.”

“What do you mean?”

“Oh, I think you know what I mean, but in case it’s not obvious that I’m utterly self-absorbed and would fuck my reflection if I could, what I’d like is for you,” Tony ran a hand down Billy’s chest and deftly undid his pants one-handed, “to shapeshift into me so I can watch myself getting fucked by your boyfriend.

“Better than a mirror,” he added, inching back and leaving Billy nowhere to go but to drop down on to his elbows. He was dazed like he’d just been knocked flat by Cassie sized up to match the Hulk, and Tony fucking Stark’s voice purring at him telling him to get with the program and wiggle out of his pants only ended up making him forget how his fingers worked. Plus he really didn’t think Teddy would do it, shiftsex wasn’t something they did outside of some experimenting with different er, sizes, but Teddy’s eyes changed first in colour then in shape, and in two seconds flat, Billy found himself in the middle of a Stark sandwich.

He was totally going to die of a coronary before he could legally buy booze.

Tony sized up Teddy as Teddy dropped right onto Billy’s lap as if he’d taken on some of Tony’s attitude along with the looks. The clothes he’d worn to the party fit more loosely now, the shirt hanging attractively off his shoulder and Billy flopped fully onto his back when Teddy snugly straddled his hips.

“Not bad,” Tony said from somewhere to Billy’s left. “Not bad at all. Now how about you show me how I kiss?”

“I’m gonna die,” Billy breathed, rewarded by a sudden rush of colour back into Teddy’s cheeks. Coupled with his chagrined expression, he made Tony’s face look…adorable.

The mattress dipped abruptly at Billy’s side and then Tony was there putting his fingers under Teddy’s chin. “That’s making eyes at your boyfriend, not kissing me,” he said, leaning forward on his knees to claim Teddy’s attention and take the kiss.

It was wet, lewd, and a completely awesome thing to watch. Teddy shifted, rocking against the erection stiff in Billy’s shorts, and Tony was murmuring little words of encouragement against Teddy’s mouth. “Take his dick out, would you?” Tony said, and Billy’s hands bumped into Teddy’s as both of them rushed to do exactly what Tony had told them. “One at a time, boys.”

Tony whistled sharply as he watched his double ease Billy’s shorts down and again when Billy helped free Teddy’s dick from his pants. That hadn’t shifted shape, and boy that felt a little awkward, more so when Tony piped in with, “Guess there’s always room for improvement.”

“Sorry, Mr. Stark, I’ve never seen a picture of you with all your clothes off,” Teddy said. He rubbed at the back of his neck and chewed at his lip. Billy tried to reconcile this latest burst of adorableness with the arch expression on the real Tony’s face and predictably failed.

“Miracles happen,” Tony said. “And you can call me by my first name unless you want to play teacher.” He slid his hands over the waist of his pants, thumbs hooking under the fabric, and the sudden cocky slant of his mouth made Billy jerk even before he shoved them down and gave them both a look at the real deal. Billy had seen pictures, and even the grainy sex tape, but this, holy shit, this was actually happening.

“Better?” Teddy asked, and Billy’s gaze leapt from one to the other. If he didn’t know Teddy so well, he would’ve been hard pressed to tell who was the real Tony Stark.

He almost shot his load when Tony reached out and wrapped his hand around Teddy’s cock. “Better,” Tony decreed, giving it a couple loving strokes before sitting back on his heels and digging around in the tangle of his slacks. A couple seconds later, he was slapping a condom and a pack of lube onto Billy’s chest. “Get to it, kid.”

This time Billy’s fingers didn’t fail him. He probably broke a world record for fastest application of a condom, and all that practice he and Teddy had gotten sneaking a quick fuck here and there earned them a murmur of appreciation as Billy slicked himself up and Teddy eased straight down onto his cock.

“Can’t build a robot for that,” Tony said, as Teddy shifted and let Billy fuck up into him sweet and easy. “Well, you know what I mean.”

Billy’s world went a little topsy-turvy after that. Usually he was a little more energetic but Teddy was doing a lot of the work, and Tony was helping with his mouth in more ways than one. A whole lot more ways than one. After one last string of dirty encouragement Tony just wriggled down and started sucking Teddy off, and Billy’s hand went straight for a handful of Tony’s hair.

“Is that a stop, sweetheart?” Tony asked, his mouth slipping off Teddy’s cock but waiting poised to suck him right back down again. God, Tony really did want to fuck himself bad. Not that most guys didn’t probably think about it, but….

Billy coughed, and managed a weak, “No.”

“Then how about you yank a little harder and show me what you’ve got.”

He did, and stupidly he’d thought Tony couldn’t get any more into it. A loud moan and a hand running up his thigh set him straight. Slippery fingers groped around the base of his dick while Teddy was grinding down, his mouth slack with pleasure, and that was there the illusion couldn’t keep up. Even in the sharp angles of Tony’s face, the neat cut of his goatee, and the perfect tousle of his hair, Teddy was unmistakable. Billy could read him easily, knew the soft sounds he made when he was about to come, and with only the tiniest bit of guilt he held Tony in place to get a mouth full of it.

He blew his own load watching the bob of Tony’s throat as he swallowed every last drop and kept sucking like he expected more. After what felt like minutes, Tony pulled away, stayed on his knees and finished himself off straight onto the bed.

“Now I actually mean thanks for the rescue,” Tony said, his voice a little rough. He dropped onto the scatter of the sheets, one arm flung out like he knew exactly the sort of debauched picture he made. “Never let anyone tell you that Cap won’t leave a man behind.”

Billy tried to wrap his head around whether or not Tony was joking, he really did, but then Teddy was climbing off him and all Billy could manage was a feeble noise.

The feeble noise returned when still wearing Tony’s face, Teddy stretched and said, “Thanks for the star fuck.”

“Always happy to add a notch or two to someone’s bedpost,” Tony replied. “I’m a generous guy like that.”

Before Teddy shifted back, his mouth twisted into a mirror image of the smirk sitting on Tony’s just long enough for it to burn its way into Billy’s brain.

That sex tape was never going to be the same.

*

End

Brat Pack RPS. Kiefer Sutherland/Robert Downey Jr. NC-17. ~1250 words. Drugs/Drunkenness.

Kiefer sure as shit is a smooth talker when he’s got a double-whammy of coke and tequila loosening him up.

Not Quite Ready for Primetime

Sobriety isn’t even a word they know. It’s so fucking far out of their vocabulary it makes sense that they’re shoulder to shoulder in the backseat of Billy’s shitty car giggling and whispering like schoolgirls and still in the fucking trench coats.

Kiefer pulls it off though, looks fucking dangerous with the collar high and knockoff Guess jeans, the soft feather of his hair catching the light of the streetlamps going by. The smoke of the club clings to him along with all the glitter that’d fallen off the dancer’s tits, and Kiefer sure as shit is a smooth talker when he’s got a double-whammy of coke and tequila loosening him up.

Robert just gets horny, in the way that makes him shift fitfully, cock thick against his leg and bent awkwardly. Kiefer’s telling a story that’s making Billy laugh and Robert couldn’t give two shits because all he’s really paying attention to is the soft shapes of Kiefer’s lips and how much he’d like to lick them.

“I could just eat your mouth right now,” Robert says, half the filters between brain and vocal chords completely not functioning. He might’ve followed up with a giggle, but it’s hard to tell when he’s busy trying to catch the lapel of Kiefer’s coat with his teeth.

“Now I know you’re shitfaced,” Kiefer says, curling towards him instead of away. It makes biting at his coat easier and Robert glances up into the ocean blue of Kiefer’s eyes. His hair tickles against Robert’s forehead, his mouth close enough for a kiss.

Robert spits out his mouthful of black cotton canvas and wets his lips.

“No fucking in the backseat of my car, you assholes,” Billy says, forceful enough to get them jerking away from each other.

A second later they’re laughing and tumbling closer like somehow Billy’s acknowledgement is permission to go ahead and make out. Robert sneaks a peek at the rear-view to find Billy’s eyes skipping to watch Kiefer bury his face against Robert’s neck. He winks before the sucking kiss at the spot just under his jaw makes him moan and slink back, trying to find as much space as possible in the tiny fucking import to let Kiefer’s hand up under his shirt.

“No fucking, scout’s honor. Just don’t drive us off a cliff before we’ve hit the big time.” Robert bites his lip as Kiefer’s hand skids up his back. The evening’s warmth is long gone, but his skin’s sticky from the heat of the club. For a second, Robert imagines what it’d be like to have Kiefer pounding into him, their bodies slapping together and peeling apart with the same sort of friction. He nearly jizzes in his fucking shorts.

“Eyes on the road, Zane,” Kiefer murmurs after leaving another mark to purple on Robert’s throat.

“I’ve stopped caring. Fuck, play chicken in the other lane if it gets your dick hard,” Robert adds, fingers knotted in the softness of Kiefer’s hair and shoving him back in an attempt to return the favour. His tongue runs wide over Kiefer’s throat, feels the hard bob of his adam’s apple as he swallows and makes this gorgeous sound that’s probably illegal in most mid-western states.

Kiefer grabs for the holy-shit bar above the door and Robert untangles his hands to take the very appealing invitation to bite and grope his way down Kiefer’s shirtfront. “Thank God you’re not too drunk to get it up,” he says, reaching the button of Kiefer’s jeans and contorting himself enough to rub his mouth against the hard swell of cock outlined so damn perfectly under the denim. “You want a blowjob?”

Kiefer’s answer is to pop the button on his jeans one-handed and take a turn skimming his fingers through Robert’s hair.

“Too bad you can’t see this, Billy, I know you’re dying to know how well I can smoke a pole,” Robert says, head angling towards the light scratch of nails on his scalp. If he could purr, he would. Instead, he pulls out Kiefer’s cock, presses the heat of it to his cheek, and breathes in the heady smell of earthy sweat that fills the close air. It’s gonna be a sloppy blow, and he knows it even before his mouth catches the tip of Kiefer’s cock, sucks it in with a wet, lewd sound. Robert plays it up, drunk and high enough that the leap from sloppy to messy sounds like the best fucking idea in the universe.

Kiefer’s on board with the idea, fitting himself into the very corner of the backseat to give Robert all the room he can. Robert takes every inch given of both leeway and rock-hard cock, his mouth popping off every few dips of his head only to catch the spit-slick length and try and get it back in his mouth in the noisiest way possible.

“All four wheels still on the road?” he asks, rubbing his whole face against Kiefer’s dick until his own spit is smeared all over his cheeks.

“Smart mouth still working on that shitty blowjob?” Billy calls back, but there’s a strained tone to his voice that says he’s caught at least some of the show. Robert grins and nuzzles Kiefer’s crotch.

Fingers light on his face urge his mouth back into place, and Robert strains to look up as he fists Kiefer’s cock and wraps his lips around it all over again. Kiefer still looks dangerous, a little wild with the faint smudge of eyeliner and the cocky slant of his mouth.

Belatedly, Robert realises he never got a real taste of those lips. He makes a mental note that promptly vanishes off the bulletin board of his brain as Kiefer’s eyelids flutter and the hand that had migrated to the back of his neck squeezes what’s probably a warning. Robert can’t help but moan, trying to gauge in seconds if it’s hotter to let Kiefer jizz in his mouth or shoot spunk all over his face.

The choice is made for him when the car swerves, Kiefer swears a blue streak, and his fingers squeeze tight just in time to keep the jerk of Kiefer’s dick spitting come high in the air aimed roughly at his face and not Billy’s damn upholstery. He ends up fucking splattered, the mess of it streaking from his cheek to his eyebrows, and there’s no way he’s going to open his eyes until he’s wiped away the feel of come quivering on his lashes.

“Caught it all like a pro,” Kiefer says, answering the question like he can read Robert’s mind. Maybe he can, when his thumb swipes quick and efficient and surprisingly precise to push the cooling mess of come away from Robert’s eye. Robert stays half-kneeling on the floor of the car and yanks up the front of his tee to mop up the rest of it.

Flush with the pleasure of a job well done, it’s a long span of seconds before he realises he never saw what Kiefer did with the messy smear on his thumb. He flops back onto the seat and eyes the satisfied quirk of Kiefer’s mouth with suspicion, and almost asks but then they’re zipping past an intersection and the street sign catches his attention.

“Hey,” he says, hauling Kiefer by the front of his coat towards a kiss that’d answer the question just the same. “Almost home.”

*

End

X-men Origins:Wolverine. Victor/Logan. R. ~700 words. Amnesia.

There’s a feeling that he can’t shake, like he’s missing a whole lot more than who he used to be.

Trouble Has a Way

Logan slings his bag over his shoulder. There’s not much packed in it beyond a few changes of clothes and basic toiletries. Even when he finds a decent job willing to pay cash and look the other way when he doesn’t have a scrap of ID, he doesn’t stay in one place for long. There’s a feeling that he can’t shake, like he’s missing a whole lot more than who he used to be. Wherever he lays his head, his bed seems empty and no one he’s found to fill it has made up for that.

He’s given up on looking to fill up all the blank spots yawning in his memory. There’s no sense in it, when the years have turned all the trails cold and everything about what’d happened at Three Mile had coverup stamped all over it. Government is something Logan had known right away he didn’t want to tangle with, and the first time he found knives springing out between his knuckles he knew he’d made the right choice.

“Where you headed?”

Logan looks at the guy who’s been taking up most of the bench at the stop for a good ten minutes. The nape of his neck had been prickling since the guy had shown up and sat down, his big arms stretched wide over the back, casual but somehow threatening. A wickedly curved claw–mutant, just like Logan–picks at the grain of the wood as Logan sizes the guy up proper.

“Who’s asking?”

A smile then, sharp as the claws, and Logan’s treated to an odd twinge low in his guts. The smile disappears and the guy shrugs, casual, dismissive. “Someone who might be headed in the same direction. I could offer you a lift, maybe save you a few bucks. Name’s Victor.”

Logan drops his bag back to the curb in case it turns out he’ll need his hands free. He does his best to stay out of trouble, but trouble has a way of cropping up. “You don’t quite look like the charitable sort, Victor.”

“No, don’t suppose I do,” he says in a deep purr that just burrows right into Logan’s skin, gnaws through his bones to resonate in the marrow. It’s familiar, hauntingly so, and Logan can’t shake off the feeling any more than he can ignore the coppery scent of danger in the air.

In the end, he goes, and if he’d anticipated that in following he’d be treated to the feel of those claws on his skin, he hadn’t expected this. They press light against his sides, tips spreading wide as the heat of Victor’s palms curve around the span of his ribs. Victor’s mouth brushes against the slope of Logan’s neck, and a shivering threat of a bite turns to a wide lick that wets a span up to Logan’s ear.

“Not the charitable sort at all,” Victor murmurs, nipping a path back down as his hands skim down Logan’s front and takes over undoing Logan’s belt. Logan fights the hard kick of lust but doesn’t fight the kick of Victor’s boot on his to force his stance wide. There’s an odd sense of right that he hasn’t felt since the first time he wrapped a hand around a beer, or woke up to smell dawn after having spent a night sleeping on the bare ground. Logan’s not sure what this says about him, that he likes it when Victor’s hand slips down his pants and roughly grabs his cock, but he goes with the punches, and reaches back to fumble at Victor’s fly and return the favour.

His hands curl to fists when Victor hauls back to spit straight on skin. Logan forces his fingers to relax as Victor slicks the wetness all along the crease of his ass. “This mean I don’t need to give you money for gas?” Logan asks, his words slurring a little as a moan tries to push through.

Victor offers a quiet laugh instead of an answer, and lays the hot weight of his dick against Logan’s skin. “This means whatever you want it to,” he says, and pushes.

*

End

X-men Origins:Wolverine. Stryker/Victor, Victor/Logan. R. ~250 words. Substitution Sex.

Like any animal, Victor’s needs are simple.

Liberties too Dangerous

Stryker’s hand hovers above the broad stretch of Victor’s naked back. There are scars, faint ones, so old that they must’ve bitten into his flesh when he was still a boy. Long and straight, born from a whip or a belt, Stryker guesses, and slowly he curls his fingers and resists the touch. He resists a lot when it comes to Victor; some liberties are too dangerous to take. What a pleasant surprise that Victor had come begging for this one.

Victor is tight around him, fucking back against his cock when the slam of his hips goes still and he savours the raw strength contained and trembling, bent double for him. Victor’s claws ruin the sheets, dangerous even on his short leash, but so very easy to control.

He wants to ask if this how it always was between the two of them, or if taking it face down makes it that much easier to pretend. Victor’s growl is muffled in the pillow, the muscles in his back and arms shifting, a map of tension that leads, as it always does, to Logan. Like any animal, Victor’s needs are simple.

Stryker curls forward, sinking deep until he’s pressed snug against Victor’s ass. “Good boy,” he says, and bites back the moan at Victor’s sudden and violent thrashing. “You’ll have him again soon enough.”

*

End

Batman. Batman/Gordon. R. 700 words. Infidelity. Secret Identity.

It’s here, in the smothering dark, where Jim tries hardest to pretend with the rest of the city that he doesn’t need the Batman.

Most of All

They sleep in separate beds these days, him and Barbara, like they’re some kind of 50s television couple. Jimmy asks questions, but Babs doesn’t, the sweetheart, and that more than anything makes his ticker twinge. She and her mother have a whole world of hurts and accusations and there’s nothing that can undo Harvey’s flip of a coin and prove them wrong. So it’s strained smiles over the orange juice and toast, more smiles when there’s company, and eventually, when the separate beds turns into separate rooms, Jim only has a whisper of guilt when the shadow at his window turns his pulse into a jackhammer.

He’s good at ignoring the whispers of his conscience when the shadow lingers, steps inside more often than not to fill scraps of stolen midnight with hushed talk and the sort of secrets that keep Jim going through one long day after another. Tonight like always, Batman fills the room, too big even for the step up that this apartment is over the last. With every visit, Jim tries to picture what kind of place the guy calls home. He never gets far. Some things are beyond the scope of his imagination.

“Commissioner.”

The air slicing in around Batman’s cape is colder than the gleam of moonlight on the casement. “I’m in my boxer shorts, you’d think you could call me Jim. Or James, at the least.”

Batman’s mouth stays in a line. Jim scoops his eyeglasses off the nightstand and unfolds them slowly. Like everything these days going right on down to the stone of Gotham’s sidewalks, the stems feel fragile, ready to crumble out from between his fingers.

“I wanted to thank you for earlier, with the problem at the club.” The words have just the slightest hesitation to them, and it’s a little terrifying to hear that sort of uncertainty in the graveyard rasp of a voice.

“You’re welcome.” Jim smiles to himself and knows it shows ragged at the edges, but what else can he say.

There’s a rustle and a blur of movement and Jim forgets for a second the aborted sound that’d made him think the Batman had something more to say to him. But it’s not back out the window and zipping up towards the rooftop to vanish, it’s a hand on his face with a gloved palm that’s textured to grip and tugging almost painfully at the dust of whiskers on his cheek.

“You don’t understand how much this means to me, Gordon.”

The intensity burns straight through the mask, shudders with the heavy thump of a heartbeat that Jim can feel drumming a beat not much different than his own. “Trust is a rare commodity,” he says, and turns away from the hand pressed shakily to his face in order to remove his glasses again. His nightvision has always been shit, and without the glasses he’s blind as his visitor’s namesake, but he closes his eyes anyway and upturns his head. He doesn’t flinch as the blindfold is laid over his eyes.

“One of the few things a man can’t buy,” Batman says, his voice softening towards something almost recognisable. Warm breath tickles near Jim’s ear before Jim can feel the mask being pulled away, the soft thump of it being dropped on the floor. Jim seeks out the kiss, the odd gentleness of it that always soothes the ache of anonymity, the chill of knowing Barbara’s down the hall in the room across from the kids.

Jim’s got more of Gotham in his bones than he’d like to admit, finds himself fighting the changes with the same agony of the city herself. It’ll be an official separation soon enough, the inevitable divorce to follow, but for now, he has this: A secret and a lie and more of both tangled up in the knot of sheets that he finds himself easing into.

It’s here, in the smothering dark, where Jim tries hardest to pretend with the rest of the city that he doesn’t need the Batman. But whoever the Batman is, his hair is short and soft between Jim’s fingers. He’s human and vulnerable when the armor comes off, and Jim needs to know that most of all.

*

End

Baccano! Fermet/Czeslaw. NC-17. 250 words. Non-con. Underaged. Torture.

Nerves were simple things, they turned on and off, and pleasure and pain were not so different when pushed to the very extreme.

More Games

Czeslaw used to try to gauge the pain, before he had died enough times to realise that Fermet wasn’t going to stop. He’s not sure when he gave up. Nerves were simple things, they turned on and off, and pleasure and pain were not so different when pushed to the very extreme. It hurt, the things Fermet did to him, and that was all that Czeslaw knew.

“Again, Czes?” Fermet asked. “Shall we play some more?”

Fermet lifted Czeslaw’s penis with the flat edge of a knife. The blade had been glowing red when Fermet last touched him with it, driven it into his belly and pulled his guts out steaming and sizzling.

Fermet had done it after he’d come. “Shh,” he’d said, mouth smiling around Czeslaw’s seizing prick and Czeslaw remembered the iron smell of the knife as it heated in the brazier. “This feels good, right? See, I can still make you feel good.”

Czeslaw squirmed as Fermet kissed it hard again, made promises Czeslaw couldn’t hope he’d keep. Czeslaw didn’t have to watch, but he couldn’t keep still. The chains at his wrist rattled, scraping the skin raw with new wounds that would never scar.

Helpless, he blinked away tears when Fermet kissed the inside of his thigh, and the shape of Fermet’s smile pressed to his skin was sharper and more painful than the scrape of the knife on his ribs.

“A few more experiments,” Fermet said, deciding for them both. “It’ll feel good again soon.”

*

End