Bere~Chans Home

"We're out of green onions," he announced with his head inside the fridge. "And ginger. Grandma said we have to buy soy sauce and it has to be the right brand."

"Which brand?"

He turned around with an expression that said he had absolutely no idea.

"Great," you said. "Really helpful."

"She showed me once. It has a red label. Or maybe yellow." He pulled out a tote bag from the cabinet and dropped it on the counter in your direction. "We'll figure it out when we're there."

"The market is a fifteen minute walk in this heat."

"Then we should leave now."

"Caleb—"

He was already heading for the door. "Come on."

You grabbed the bag and your sunglasses and followed him out into the heat, which hit you like a wall the second you stepped off the porch.

The neighborhood was quiet on summer afternoons, everyone wanted to be inside with their fans on. You walked beside Caleb through streets you'd both known since childhood, past the park, past the corner ice cream store with the faded awning, past Mrs. Yuen's house with the wind chimes that had been making the same sound for fifteen years.

He was telling you about an incident with a new recruit that had happened at a training exercise last month and you were laughing.

"Did he get hurt?" you managed.

"Bruised his ego more than anything." Caleb pushed your sunglasses up. "Poor guy spent the rest of the session pretending it hadn't happened."

The market was cool and smelled like the same brand of air freshener they'd been using since you were ten. You grabbed a basket and split off toward the vegetables while Caleb wandered in the direction of the snack aisle, which —you'd learned over years of shared grocery runs— meant you were going to spend the next several minutes complaining about his choices.

You found the green onions. Found the ginger. Turned the corner into the snack aisle and found Caleb standing in front of the chips with two bags in his hands, deliberating.

"We don't need chips," you said.

"Yes we do."

"We have food at home."

"Chips are not food, chips are a separate category." He held them both up. "Salt and vinegar or barbecue."

"Neither. We're here for dinner ingredients."

"And chips." He put the barbecue in the basket.

You took it out. He put it back in.

"Caleb."

"It's for the walk home. You'll want some on the walk home."

"You are so—" You stopped, pointed at his chest. "Fine. One bag. And you're carrying it."

He was already reaching for a second one.

"One bag."

"Salt and vinegar for you, barbecue for me. That's technically one bag each which is—"

"That's two bags."

"One per person."

You let him keep both bags because the alternative was standing in the snack aisle for another five minutes.

The soy sauce took longer. You found the section, found approximately ten different brands, and stood there for a moment in silence.

"Red label or yellow?" you said.

"I said I wasn't sure."

"You said you'd seen it."

"I'd seen it, I didn't memorize it."

"Caleb, if we get the wrong one—"

He picked one up, turned it over, put it back. Picked up another. "This one looks right."

He put it in the basket and you picked up a different one, compared the labels side by side, and put his back and kept yours.

He switched them back the moment you turned away.

------

You were outside, bag on Caleb's shoulder, chips already open when your hunter's watch went off.

The sound cut straight through everything. Your hand was in the chip bag one second and at your holster the next, the muscle memory of it faster than conscious thought. The screen had gone red.

Wanderer detected. Class: High energy anomaly. Proximity: 100 meters.

Caleb stepped in close "Behind the market. Let's go."

You were already moving.

---

The alley ran behind a row of shops, narrow and shadowed, the air warping at the far end and that meant the Wanderer had already been there long enough to disturb local reality. You pulled your gun and kept your back to the wall, moving fast. Caleb came in on the other side, gravity already building at his hands, the air around his knuckles bending in a way that meant he was ready.

The Wanderer was enormous, the geometry of it not quite making sense no matter which angle you looked from. It moved fast for something that size, swinging a limb in your direction before you'd fully cleared the corner.

You fired twice. The shots connected and it shrieked, momentum redirected enough that the hit meant for you shattered a section of wall instead.

"Flank!" Caleb called.

You were already going wide. He pulled gravity in from the left, compressing the Wanderer's movement, slowing it just enough for you to get behind it and put three more shots into the joint where two of its limbs connected. It screamed and lurched sideways.

"Keep it off the street," you yelled over the noise.

"Working on it." He dragged it backward with a gravity pull that made the pavement crack under the force of it, steering it further into the alley.

It was not a clean fight. It kept redirecting, slamming into the walls, filling the alley with debris that you had to dodge while maintaining your sight lines.

Eventually the thing started to slow. Eventually it disappeared.

Then you saw it.

On the ground where the Wanderer had dissolved — a Protocore, small, throwing off an iridescent white that you'd never seen from a Wanderer before.

"That's not standard," Caleb said, coming to stand beside you. He crouched down to look at it without touching it. "I've never seen one this color."

"Me neither." You holstered your gun. "I should take it to HQ."

"Agreed." You crouched beside him, reaching for the core at the same time he did, and your hands closed around it simultaneously.

White light erupted.

It collapsed inward, pulling everything —sound, light, air, the alley— into a point of white noise and wind, and then nothing, a few seconds later there was a floor coming up very fast.

You hit the carpet with a thud that knocked the breath out of you.

Caleb landed beside you, one arm slamming down to catch his weight before he pushed himself up.

"Are you hurt," he said, breathing hard.

You did a fast inventory. "No. You?"

"No." He looked up. Looked around.

You were inside a huge apartment. Carpeted floor and warm light from the windows. A long couch. A coffee table with papers on it. A mug. A jacket draped over the back of a chair.

Someone's apartment.

You stood up slowly. Caleb was already at the bookshelf, and you followed, and then you saw the first photo and everything in your chest felt strange.

It was you. You and Caleb, standing somewhere sunny, laughing at something out of frame. You were wearing a jacket you didn't own. His hair was slightly different, grown out and pushed back.

There were more. The two of you at a restaurant, faces close across a small table. A shot of you asleep on a couch, and Caleb sitting at the other end with a book, but whoever had taken the photo had caught him looking at you and not at the page.

Your throat felt tight.

"This is my apartment," Caleb said quietly, from somewhere to your left.

You turned to look at him. He was looking at the leather jacket on the chair. His leather jacket, the one currently in his wardrobe back at the base. A pilot's manual on the shelf, the same one he'd been working through. A mug from the Farspace Fleet. A framed photo of your grandmother that matched the one at home.

"The photos—" you started.

"I know."

He crossed to the coffee table, picked up the newspaper and scanned the top page. He held it out.

The date at the top was two years from now. Exactly two years.

---

You spent the rest of the afternoon going through the apartment with careful attention, very aware you were somewhere you weren't supposed to be. You were trying to understand what the last two years had produced.

Caleb's future self left notes everywhere. Fridge, desk, bathroom mirror. His handwriting but with a different quality to it, more settled. There were more photos than you'd first noticed — tucked into the edges of the mirror in the hallway, stuck to the inside of a cabinet. A birthday card in your handwriting on the desk, standing open. A second toothbrush in the bathroom.

You both looked at that for a moment.

"I'm not going to say anything about any of this," you said finally, standing in the kitchen with your arms crossed.

"Good call," Caleb said, from the doorway.

"I'm —this is a lot of information."

"It is."

"And I'm not drawing any conclusions."

He went quiet.

The sun went down. The apartment went from warm gold to dark while you sat on the floor of the living room eating crackers you'd found in the cabinet, your backs against the couch, the Protocore sitting on the coffee table throwing faint white light across the ceiling.

"We'll figure out how to get back," Caleb said.

"I know."

"Same energy that brought us here should be able to—"

"Caleb, I know. I'm not panicking."

He looked at you sideways. "You're quieter than your normal quiet."

"I'm just thinking."

He nodded slowly. Ate a cracker. Didn't push it, he knew when to let something sit. Almost two decades of knowing each other and he'd learned exactly where the lines were.

You were about to say something else when you heard it.

Voices outside.

Both of you were on your feet before the door handle moved. Caleb stepped toward the entryway on pure instinct and you grabbed his arm with both hands and pulled.

"Don't," you said, low and fast.

"I just want to see—"

"You cannot make contact with yourself. Do you understand what that does to the timeline? Do you understand what happens if you alter something?"

"I wasn't going to —"

"Caleb." You got in front of him, hands on his chest, looking up at him with full seriousness. "We hide. Right now. We have to wait."

He looked at the door. The handle was starting to move.

"Fine," he said before he grabbed the protocore and then your wrist to pull you toward the hallway closet in two long strides, opening it fast and pulling you in after him, easing the door shut.

The closet was full. Coats, bags, a stack of boxes on the floor that immediately became a problem because you had nowhere to step back, which meant you were now pressed against Caleb from your shoulders to your knees.

You could feel every breath he took.

"This is very small," you whispered.

"I know," he said, directly behind your ear.

His arms were on either side of you because there was nowhere else for them. His chin was above your head. You could feel him making adjustments to keep whatever minimal distance physics was willing to offer, and it was working as well as you'd expect. Which was not well.

You were two childhood friends in a closet in an apartment that was apparently his, two years in the future, surrounded by photographic evidence of something neither of you had said out loud yet, and he was doing his very best not to press against you and his very best was losing badly to the laws of spatial reasoning.

The front door opened.

Through the slats of the closet door, the living room light clicked on.

"I told you." Your own voice, but looser, threaded through with laughter that had a very specific quality to it. "I told you we shouldn't have had that last drink."

"Yeah," came the reply. Caleb's voice, except it was rougher and stripped of the easy warmth you knew and replaced with something that made the back of your neck prickle. "You were flirting with the bartender just to watch me lose it."

"Maybe I was." Future you sounded unrepentant about this.

Through the slats you watched two people stumble into the living room and your brain took several seconds to process what your eyes were seeing. She was in a dress, form fitting, gorgeous, currently half unzipped down the back. Future Caleb had shed his jacket somewhere between the door and the living room, his shirt untucked with half the buttons open, chest visible, hair slightly wrecked.

Behind you, Caleb had gone completely rigid. You felt it happen, every muscle in his body locking up at once.

Then future Caleb grabbed future you by the waist and walked her backward into the living room wall.

The impact was loud. What followed was louder, the sound of them kissing, which was not the word for what was happening, kissing implied something with more restraint than this. Future Caleb had his hands in her hair and on her waist and sliding down to bunch the fabric of her dress up her thighs, all at the same time.

You made a sound you hadn't planned on making.

Caleb's hand came over your mouth so fast you didn't even see it coming, his palm pressing firm and warm against your lips, his forearm across your collarbone. His chest was heaving against your back and something else was pressing against the small of your back that you were both absolutely not acknowledging.

You made a muffled sound against his hand anyway.

His arm tightened.

Future Caleb pulled back just far enough to speak "You want to play games tonight?" A pause, heavy with intent. "Let's find out how loud I can make you scream."

He pushed his hand up her skirt.

You'd never made that sound in your life. Or apparently you would. In two years. Against that wall.

"Caleb—wait, wait—the couch—"

That was it. That was enough. Your hand shot out in the dark and found the closet door handle and you grabbed it.

Caleb's hand came off your mouth and closed around your wrist, pulling it back against you, his mouth dropping to your ear.

"Don't you dare," he breathed.

"We have to stop watching this—" you hissed.

"If you open that door they'll see us—"

"Then they see us—"

"And alter the timeline," he said. "Your words. Two minutes ago."

He was right and it was the worst possible moment for him to be right.

"Just—" His voice came out strained "Just don't move."

"Caleb—"

"I'm a guy, and you are literally grinding into me," he snapped softly, though there was no real anger in it. His forehead dropped briefly to the back of your head. "Just..." sigh "give me a second."

Outside the closet Caleb lifted her clean off the floor. Her legs wrapped around his waist as he carried her the few steps to the couch and dropped her onto it.

His hands yanked the straps of her dress down, baring her breasts. He pinched a nipple, and she arched with a sharp cry. "You are so fucking wet already. Been thinking about my cock all day? Want me to stretch that pretty pussy out right here?"

"Yes—fuck, Caleb, touch me," she gasped, hips grinding up.

Your breath hitched. Heat flooded between your legs, sudden and embarrassing. Caleb's cock twitched against your ass and you had to bite your lip to stay quiet.

Future Caleb reached down and shoved his pants off. You couldn't look away. He was big, thick, flushed, veins standing out. Ready.

Panic hit you. "Don't look," you whispered frantically. "That's... me. Turn around or do something—"

"Like hell," he said against your ear, teeth grazing the shell. "You're the one staring. You like seeing him like that? Seeing what I— what he wants to do to you?"

"Caleb, shut up," you whimpered, thighs pressing together.

He didn't fuck her right away. He grabbed her ankles, yanked her to the edge of the couch, and spread her wide. Dropped to his knees.

"Caleb—" she started, but it dissolved into a broken moan as he buried his face between her legs.

The sound of his tongue working her was loud and messy, completely shameless. Her head dropped back against the cushions, fingers twisted tight into the fabric, her whole body shaking every time he dragged his tongue over her clit in greedy strokes. He licked broad stripes up her slit before focusing on her clit again, sucking it into his mouth with a low groan.

"Fuck, you taste so good,”Caleb growled against her pussy, voice muffled but clear enough to carry.

"Just like that baby” she moaned, one hand fisting his hair, the other still twisting in the couch cushion.

He pinched her nipple hard with his free hand, rolling it between his fingers as he sucked harder. Her thighs trembled around his head.

Behind you, Caleb let out a broken groan that made your knees go soft. His arm snapped around your waist, holding you steady, fingers digging into your hip the exact same way his future self was gripping her out there.

“Fuck,” you whispered, head falling back against his shoulder before you could stop yourself. Your pussy was throbbing, aching so bad it almost hurt.

“Listen to that. Listen to how wet you get for me.” Caleb shifted his hips, grinding the thick ridge of his cock against your ass through your jeans, dragging the seam right over your soaked cunt.

On the couch, she was losing it. "I need you inside me. I can’t wait anymore.”

Future Caleb pulled back, mouth shiny, breathing hard. He stroked himself once, twice, then lined up and drove into her in one rough thrust. Her legs wrapped around him as he started fucking her deep and hard, the couch creaking like it might give out any second. His back and ass flexed with every thrust, hips snapping forward. “Gonna come on my cock like a good girl?”

He leaned over her, one hand pinning her thigh higher as he fucked her. “Gonna fill you up. Want you leaking my cum the rest of the night. You love being my dirty little slut, don’t you? Say it.”

“Oh my god,” you choked, voice barely there. Watching yourself get railed like that—by him—was too much. The guy whose arms were currently locked around your waist, the same guy you’d known since you were kids, was pounding into a future version of you like he owned her.

She gasped between moans, nails now digging into his back. “Yes—your slut, Caleb—harder—”

“That’s my girl.” His hips snapped faster “Come on my cock like you did last night."

In the closet, Caleb’s forehead dropped to your shoulder, his cock twitched hard against your ass, hips making tiny, helpless thrusts.

You couldn’t tear your eyes away, every filthy word making the ache between your legs worse.

“Jesus,” Caleb whispered raggedly “We really talk like that?”

You twisted hard, trying to turn around in the cramped space so you wouldn’t have to see it anymore.

“Stop moving,” Caleb gasped, his control fraying fast as your ass rubbed right over the head of his cock.

“I can’t watch this—let me turn—”

Your foot caught on a heavy boot buried in the mess at the bottom of the closet. Balance gone.

“Whoa—” Caleb grabbed for you, but it was too late. Your combined weight slammed into the door.

The cheap magnetic latch popped open with a sad little click.

The squeaking of the couch cut off like someone had yanked the plug on the whole universe.

The silence that followed rang in your ears. You pushed up on your elbows, face so hot you were surprised you hadn’t spontaneously combusted. Caleb was beside you, shirt rucked up, the very obvious, very hard line of his erection pressing against your thigh.

You both slowly turned your heads toward the couch.

A few meters away, future Caleb was frozen mid thrust, hands locked on future you’s hips, his body still buried deep inside her. She had one leg hooked high around his waist, hair a wild mess, chest heaving. Both of them stared at you with identical expressions of what the actual fuck.

They were a sweaty, flushed disaster, very naked and very, very mid fuck.

“What the…” future Caleb started.

Future you blinked slowly. “Is that… us?”

You opened your mouth, brain offering the most useless sentence in history. “We were just looking for soy sauce—”

The white light from the Protocore exploded again. The apartment, the couch, your naked and extremely confused future selves—all of it ripped away in a roar of rushing air.

Thud.

You hit the dirty alley hard enough to knock the wind out of you again.

Caleb groaned beside you, flat on his back, one arm flung over his eyes. His chest rose and fell in sharp pulls. You could still feel the ghost of his hardness against you, the way his fingers had dug into your hip in the closet. Your own body was still buzzing, thighs slick, pulse pounding between your legs like a second heartbeat.

For a moment, neither of you moved.

Then Caleb let out a shaky laugh that sounded half hysterical. “Soy sauce. Really?”

You rolled onto your side, wincing at the scrapes on your elbows. “It was the first thing that came to mind, okay? We just watched ourselves— I mean, they— we were—” You gestured vaguely, face burning all over again. “You know.”

“Yeah,” he said quietly. “I know.”

He sat up slowly and ran a hand through his hair. The front of his shorts was still a bit tented. He didn’t bother trying to hide it. You weren’t exactly in a position to judge, your nipples were tight against your shirt, and you were pretty sure your face was the color of a ripe tomato.

The protocore gave one last weak shimmer and dissolved into harmless blue dust that scattered across the pavement.

Caleb looked at you. “So… two years from now, huh?”

You swallowed. “Apparently we, uh… figured some things out.”

He huffed another laugh, but it was softer this time. Almost wondering. He reached over and brushed a bit of alley dirt off your cheek with his thumb. The touch lingered.

“We should probably go”

You nodded, but neither of you stood up right away. The air between you felt thicker than the summer humidity, charged with everything you’d just seen and felt in that stupid closet.

Caleb’s gaze dropped to your mouth for a second, then flicked back up. “When we get back to the house…”

“Yeah?” you whispered.

He smiled, small and crooked and a little nervous, the same smile he’d given you a thousand times growing up, except this one felt different.

“I’m not waiting two years,” he said.

Your heart did something complicated in your chest.

You grabbed his hand, pulled him up with you, and the two of you started walking out of the alley like nothing had happened.

But everything had happened.

And as your fingers brushed again while you walked, neither of you pulled away.

Nerd! Zayne Part 5 coming soon. I promise.

"I know! I had a mission." You took a small step sideways, positioning yourself between her and the hall. Just in case. "A successful one. Very successful. But something came up and I need to drop something off at the Association right now."

Your hand pressed against your pocket. The Protocore was still there, solid and cold through the fabric. A white one. Pulled from a Wanderer less than an hour ago, which meant you were standing in the middle of Akso Hospital smelling like smoke and looking like a mess.

"Look. I'm ok, I don't need this appointment, when I get home, I ice whatever needs icing and I'll come back Thursday looking normal and healthy and I'll let him do his little checkup and everyone goes home happy." You pressed both palms flat on the desk. "Nobody has to know I came in today."

Yvonne folded her hands on top of her keyboard. "And if he asks why you cancelled?"

"Tell him I'm—" You paused. "Tell him I have food poisoning."

Yvonne's expression changed.

"I can't let him see me today"

"And why is that?"

"Because." You shifted your weight and immediately regretted it, a dull throb moving through your left side but you kept your face neutral. "He's going to look at me and know."

"Know what?"

"That I'm slightly—" you tilted your hand back and forth "bruised."

Yvonne's eyes moved to the tear in your sleeve.

"It's fine," you said. "I'm fine. I can still move around and I'm not bleeding from anything important. If Zayne finds out he's going to do the thing." You straightened slightly and squared your shoulders, dropping your voice into a flat imitation of his. "'This is not a minor concern. Your body is not a tactical asset you can simply override with willpower. Sit down and don't argue with me.'" You let your face go back to normal. "And then the staring. Yvonne, you know about the staring."

Yvonne pressed her lips together and very slowly raised one manicured finger to point it over her left shoulder.

You frowned. "Don't try to redirect me—"

She gave you a look. Wide eyes, like something was happening behind her that she could see and you could not.

"Why are you making that face," you asked "Are you okay? Is something wrong with your neck?"

Yvonne covered her mouth with a manila folder.

A chair in the corner moved.

It rotated slowly on its base. Dr. Zayne had a tablet on his knee. Coat perfect. Hair perfect. Expression completely neutral.

He looked at you.

You looked at him.

"That was a fairly good impression," his voice was exactly as low and measured as yours had been when you were doing it. The similarity was hideous. "But I don't rush my sentences."

Yvonne made a noise behind the folder that she converted, poorly, into a cough.

"Dr. Zayne." Your voice came out very small. "How long have you—"

"You are twenty three minutes," he said.

You looked at your watch, trying to avoid his stare "My watch says twenty one."

"Your watch is wrong." he stood and looked at you the way you'd been specifically trying to avoid being looked at, unhurried, starting at your torn sleeve and then back up to your face without any change in expression.

"You mentioned a mission"

"Yeah"

The folder was covering Yvonne's entire face now. Her shoulders were shaking.

He turned and started down the hallway toward his office at a pace that expected to be followed. "Since you're already here," he said, not looking back, "leaving would be wasteful."

"I have somewhere to b—."

"Yes and you are already 24 minutes late."

He didn't check over his shoulder. He simply walked, because the possibility that you wouldn't follow had apparently not entered his mind as something worth considering.

You stood there for a moment. The exit doors were fifteen feet to your left. Glass. Automatic. You'd be through them in four seconds.

You thought about what happened last time you ran. He'd shown up at your apartment forty minutes later with a medical bag.

Yvonne lowered the folder from her face. Her eyes were wet from the effort of not laughing. She mouthed something at you that looked like I tried.

You pointed at her and she gave you a small, apologetic wave before you followed Zayne down the hall. "You could at least slow down," you called after him.

"You could have been on time," Zayne said, without breaking stride.

Yvonne's laughter followed you all the way to his office door.

------

Today the silence in Zayne's office was not peaceful. In the Association's building it was always loud, always some radio crackling, some door slamming, someone having a crisis in the corridor and normally Zayne's office functioned as a kind of sensory decompression chamber. White walls. Clean air.

Today it felt like a holding cell.

You sat on the edge of the exam table and the paper underneath you crinkled every time you moved, which was constantly because you were not capable of sitting still when your face was this hot. You had tried, approximately forty seconds of total stillness before your left knee started bouncing. Your cheeks felt warm and that meant they were the color of something embarrassing.

Getting caught did that to you.

Getting caught specifically in the middle of mocking the way Zayne talked and telling Yvonne about his terrifying doctor stare.

He had his back to you. You had known him long enough to know that the silence didn't necessarily mean anger.

He turned around. Stethoscope already hanging around his neck "Deep breath"

You inhaled so fast it was almost a gasp and the metal of the stethoscope hit your skin. Cold. It was always cold. Years of checkups and you had never once successfully braced for the temperature.

Upper left. Upper right. You tracked the movement of the chest piece. Clinical. Impersonal. You were a patient, he was a doctor and this was a routine checkup and not in any way the specific recurring experience that had convinced you it might be safer for your general wellbeing to simply never be examined by Zayne again.

"Your heart rate is elevated."

Obviously.

The top button of his shirt was getting very familiar. Dark navy. Very professional. "It's just... adrenaline from the mission."

He made a sound. You did not look up.

Penlight next—he checked your pupils, which meant he was close again, you dealt with it by focusing very hard on the anatomical chart of the circulatory system on the wall behind him. You had extensive, unwanted knowledge of that chart at this point.

"Reflexes are fine." He moved to his tablet. "Lungs are clear. Aside from the laceration on your sleeve and your ongoing commitment to arriving late, you appear intact."

"Wonderful." You were already moving "Great news. Really good appointment, always a pleasure, I'll just—"

His hand appeared and he placed his palm against your upper arm—barely any pressure—and pushed you back onto the table. Your spine went straight and you looked up at him.

His brows were drawn in slightly when he set his tablet on the rolling tray.

"Do I make you uncomfortable?"

The question landed so far outside your expected conversational territory that your brain rejected it for a moment. "What?"

In the years you had known him, if you counted childhood, you had never heard him phrase something as though he was uncertain of the answer. Uncertain was the wrong word too. Zayne was never uncertain. But something under that question had an edge you couldn't name.

"I reviewed your appointment history," he continued, and your stomach did a slow drop because you knew where this was going and there was no good exit. "Over the last six months you've attempted to reschedule or cancel your routine checkups more than any other patient under my care."

"I've been really busy—"

"If my manner as a physician is— if the history between us makes it difficult to have a professional doctor-patient relationship I can make some arrangements. Dr. Hale handles several Hunter Association cases. She's thorough. Given your condition, I would need to remain as your cardiologist, which means you'd still see me on a reduced basis, but your primary care wouldn't—" something behind his eyes changed. "You wouldn't have to find reasons to avoid it."

"Zayne, stop."

You had never heard him ramble before.

"You're not making me uncomfortable." The words came out faster than you meant them to. "I don't want Dr. Hale. I don't want to be transferred to anyone." You looked for somewhere to rest your eyes and found nothing that worked. "Can we just— can we not do this right now?"

"You were negotiating with Yvonne to have your name removed from my schedule."

"I know what I was doing."

"Then explain it." he held your gaze, looking for a lie.

The honest answer was "because you make me feel like my ribcage is a bad fit for everything inside it, and I think your stethoscope is going to eventually give you evidence of something I have been working very hard to hide"

What you said was "Because of this."

You reached into your pocket and pulled out the Protocore. Held it up between you. It sat in your palm, throwing off a strange light.

"Look."

Zayne's gaze dropped toward your hand and you became acutely aware of how close he was standing. His shoulders blocked the rest of the room. If you inhaled you would be breathing air that had just come from him.

You could see the shadows under his eyes. He'd probably worked late again. The small shift in his expression wasn't something you could have described to anyone else. Just a slight draw of his brows and a tilt of his head that changed the light across his eyes.

"I've never seen one in this color." He extended one hand, long fingers open. "May I?"

"Yeah"

His fingertips touched the protocore.

But they touched your palm too—the side of your hand, just the briefest contact before the sound arrived. Not through your ears. Directly inside your skull, high and sharp and then the air was simply gone. Your lungs understood immediately that there was nothing to breathe and reacted accordingly in a moment of absolute panic before the wind hit.

A vacuum, pulling from every direction at once, until the ground disappeared and you hit something in a dull impact that rattled every thought out of your head.

You lay there for a moment and let your sense of direction reconstruct itself piece by piece.

Zayne was already on his knees beside you "Are you alright? Did you hit your head?"

"Fine," you tried to sound fine. "I'm fine. What happened—did it explode?"

"No." He stood and pulled you up in one clean motion "The room is intact, but—"

You looked up from the elbow you'd scraped on the way down, and looked around.

It was his office but the light was different. The clean white fluorescents were off, replaced by the warm amber glow of a single desk lamp. The air felt different too. Warmer.

There was a plant on the windowsill. A real one. Green and clearly watered with intention and care. In a space where Zayne usually kept a strict anti allergen policy.

His office felt wrong.

On his desk there was a picture frame. You leaned down to look.

It was a garden in winter, stone paths, bare trees, frost on the ground. Zayne was in a dark wool coat you'd never seen, a gray scarf loose around his neck, looking at the camera with a smile on his face. A real smile. One you had seen once or twice over the past few months.

You were in the picture too. Standing on your toes. Your arm looped around his neck, mouth pressed to his cheek.

You straightened up. You had no coherent thoughts. The inside of your head was filled with white noise, like a radio station that had lost its signal.

"Look at this."

Zayne was by the coffee table, staring down at something.

You went to him on autopilot. He was pointing at a newspaper, his finger rested on the top right corner.

"That's two years from now."

"Yes."

"Zayne," you panicked. "What do we do? How did this—"

Footsteps in the hallway. Two people, maybe three. Coming closer, not going away.

"My future self," he explained, "could walk through that door any minute."

He moved. Across the room in a few long strides, your wrist in his hand before you'd felt him reaching for you. He pulled you toward a tall wooden closet in the corner, pushed the door open with his shoulder and guided you inside, then he stepped in after you and drew the door shut.

The closet had not been designed for two people.

It had been designed for lab coats and medical encyclopedias. You pressed back into the hanging fabrics to give him room.

"Stop moving" he whispered.

"I'm sorry" you whispered back.

"The protocore," he said, dragging you back to the problem "We need it to go back"

"I don't know where it is"

He tilted his head toward the gap in the door and the motion brought his face closer to yours "I see it. Near the left leg of the desk."

"I'll go," you breathed. "Quick. In and out. He—you—whoever is in the hallway won't even—"

Your hand was already reaching for the door when his fingers closed around your wrist and brought your arm back.

"No"

"Zayne—"

"Listen."

The office door opened and footsteps moved through the office.

Future Zayne came in first.

He was the same but he looked like he hadn't slept in days, dark circles pressed deep beneath his eyes. He was holding himself together. Just barely, and visibly.

Behind him, softer footsteps followed. You.

She crossed to the window without rushing and stood there with her hands loosely clasped, watching him. Waiting.

"I was worried about you and you didn't care."

She said nothing.

"You were supposed to be gone a few days." He moved to his desk "I understand the mission was classified. I understand you couldn't give me details but you don't get to lie to me about your health."

He reached up and pulled his coat open, then pushed both hands through his hair "I've lost count of how many times I've been close to losing you. I'm trying my best to protect you and I can't... not when you're the one I'm fighting against." He exhaled, slow. "You have no idea what that does to me."

She crossed the room slowly and sat beside him on the edge of the desk, close enough that their arms touched. She reached over and covered his hand with hers before he turned his head and looked at her for a long moment.

Your throat tightened and he took her face in his hands to kiss her.

Inside the closet, Zayne's grip around your wrist went tight enough to hurt.

Outside, Zayne pulled back just enough to breathe and then went back in, slower this time, one hand sliding to the back of her neck. His coat came off. Hers followed, dropped onto the floor of his pristine office.

He moved behind her, his mouth finding the side of her neck, both arms wrapped around her.

"I missed you." Rough at the edges. Almost unrecognizable. "I've been going out of my mind for weeks."

His hands moved, her shirt came down off one shoulder, her bra with it and his fingers found her hard nipple and pinched , her head dropped back against his shoulder with a sharp hiss.

Beside you Zayne was losing his fucking mind. He turned his head away from them and his eyes found you instead.

The sounds outside filled the silence between you, her breath catching, his low exhales against her skin. Zayne was trapped between watching his future self handle you like a starving man or staring directly into your eyes while listening to the filthy moans leaving her lips outside.

You were completely speechless. Your mouth parted to say something—anything—but no sound came out. Your face felt like it was on fire.

"You have to stay quiet," Zayne murmured against her ear, his thumb moving in slow circles around her nipple. "Can you do that?"

Her answer came out soft and shameless"Yeah"

"Can you take your punishment like a good girl?" Another low murmur. His hand moved to her hip. "I'll reward you if you behave."

Present Zayne closed his eyes.

"Here?" she asked.

Future Zayne made a sound low in his chest. "I can't wait."

The Zayne squeezed beside you stopped moving. His face was flushed so red it looked ready to explode, his jaw clenched so hard the muscles in his neck were standing out like steel cables.

She turned around and sank to her knees in front of him. She reached up, slowly pulling down his zipper to let his thick, fully erect cock spring free.

The sound that left present Zayne was barely audible —a short, compressed exhale, like all the air had been taken from him at once. His free hand went to the wall beside him.

"Zayne," you whispered. "you have to breathe."

You grabbed his hand on your wrist —before he could do something catastrophic —and pressed your fingers through his. He held on.

"Do I need to fuck the brat out of you again?" future Zayne's voice sent a wave of dizziness straight to your head.

"Mmm..." she hummed against his bare flesh. She didn't argue. She leaned in, pressing a soft kiss right to the weeping tip of his cock, before sliding her lips down and taking him deep into her throat.

He reached down and fisted her hair with a grip so firm and aggressive it looked painful, forcing her to take him all the way to the base. She made a choked, muffled sound around his cock and your eyes fluttered shut.

"Are you sure about that?" he growled down at her.

He began to fuck her throat, hips rolling forward as he took complete control of her mouth. The wet, filthy sounds of her choking, swallowing, and taking every inch of him filled the office.

"This is a serious violation," present Zayne started, barely a whisper "Of medical protocol. Multiple protocols. I am — this is gross misconduct. If the board—"

"Zayne—"

"I don't speak to patients like that." his eyes were fixed on the ceiling of the closet. "I am an attending physician. I do not use that kind of language. I do not call patients—"

"Zayne. Stop talking."

He couldn't stop. But despite his horrified, clinical rambling and the deep blush radiating through his skin, you couldn't help but notice the prominent tent straining against the front of his trousers.

"Good fucking girl" future Zayne praised her as he petted her hair while ruining her mouth. "Taking it so well for me... such a sweet, obedient little mouth..."

Every word of filthy praise made present Zayne flinch. The heat coming off him had nowhere to go. Neither did yours. You were both standing in it, hands locked together, not looking at each other, listening to every sound from the other side of the door.

Zayne kept the same deep rhythm, she had tears running down her face but not from distress because her hands were still gripping his thighs like she was holding on by choice.

He reached down with his thumb and wiped one away. Carefully. Gently. Like he was checking on a patient.

While doing what he was doing.

The contrast was so specifically him that you almost laughed. You didn't. Mostly because of what he said next.

"Look at you. Are you going to behave from now on or do you want me to collect every one of these—" his thumb dragged beneath her eye again, "and use them—fuck—to stroke myself in front of you next time you decide to be difficult."

You became aware of several things simultaneously. The heat moving to your pussy. The fact that your teeth were in your bottom lip hard enough to draw blood. The motionless presence of Zayne against your shoulder.

You did not look at him this time. You were not going to look at him.

"I —" His voice came out hot against the side of your neck. "That is — the use of lacrimal fluid — I would never —"

"Jesus " you whispered.

"He's threatening to use ocular secretions as —" his brain was clearly trying to cope with what he'd just heard.

Outside, she was nodding. Enthusiastically.

Something against your hip moved. You were both pretending it wasn't there but that pretense was getting less convincing by the minute.

Future Zayne pulled out of her mouth slowly. "Up"

He got his hands under her arms and pulled her to her feet "Let's see," his hands moved to the hem of her skirt "if you're as desperate here."

Patterns of frost trail from Zayne's hand and then dissolve against the heat of his skin.

"He's going to—"

"Yes."

"On the desk."

"Yes."

"My desk."

He pushed the skirt up to her waist, his thumb dragged up her inner thigh and stopped half an inch from where she needed it and then said, very quietly, "There she is, my pretty needy pussy"

He worked her open with his fingers, watching her face the whole time. "Tell me what this is"

"Zaynie—"

"Use your words."

"It's yours, It's—please—it's yours—"

"It's mine," he agreed. "And it doesn't go four weeks without me because you decided to be a brat. Understood?"

"Yes—god—yes—"

"Good." He pulled his fingers back and she made an absolutely destroyed noise. "Then ask me properly."

"Please, Zayne. I need you to fuck me. Please."

He looked at her for one more second and then pushed inside.

One deep thrust that drove all the air out of her lungs and moved his desk two inches.

"Four weeks," he said again, each word landing with a thrust.

She was past words, only making sounds.

"This is what you get when you think your care is optional."

Her eyes rolled back.

"Eyes on me" he ordered "You're going to look at me the entire time and the next time you think about lying to me—" a deep, grinding roll of his hips made her sob, "you're going to remember what I'm giving you."

"Yes—Zaynie—please—"

"Please what." Still moving. Still that same rhythm.

"Harder—"

"You want it harder?"

"Please—"

"You don't deserve harder. What you deserve," he pulled back until only the tip of his cock remained inside "is to feel exactly how much your body missed me and think about why that happened."

"I know why—I know—"

"Tell me."

"Because I was—because I didn't—"

"Because you were being a brat," he said simply, and drove back in, hard.

Crack. A slap to her pussy.

The sound was loud enough that you actually jumped.

Zayne's hand left yours. His palms hit the closet doors. They swung open and he walked out.

You stepped out behind him and the four of you looked at each other.

Future Zayne looked at present Zayne. The two of them stared at each other with an expression you could only describe as mutually horrified recognition.

Present Zayne spoke first.

"You need a haircut," he said.

Future Zayne blinked. "I — what?"

"The back. It's uneven."

Future you, still on the desk, raised her hand slightly"What the fuck?"

Everyone looked at her.

"Are you—" she pointed her finger toward you and Zayne.

You tried to explain. "It was a protocore, a white one. We touched it and ended up here. We were in the closet."

She stared at you. "For how long?"

"A while."

"How long is a while?"

You looked at the floor.

"The whole—"

"The whole thing," you confirmed.

"Including—"

"Yes."

"And when he said the thing about the—"

"Yes."

"Great, that's great."

Present Zayne looked at future you. "Are you ok?"

"I'm great" she said, very flatly. "Do you mind?"

"Right." Present Zayne looked at his hands briefly like he was checking they were still there. "Can I ask one thing, just one?"

Future you looked at him.

"Is this— do you—"

The White Protocore pulsed from under the desk. You grabbed it and then grabbed his leg. Looked at your future self still sitting on the desk looking at him with an expression you recognized as pity?.

"She's going to be just fine" she told him and you held the Protocore tighter.

White. Wind. Gone.

You landed and stayed on your knees for a moment. The protocore dissolved the moment it hit the ground.

Zayne was on one knee beside you, one hand still on the floor where he'd caught himself.

Eventually you sat back on your heels.

Zayne straightened up. Slowly.

"We're back"

Brilliant. Very useful contribution.

"We are"

"Are you okay," you said.

"I'm fine," he said. Instantly.

"Okay."

"It would be helpful to have some time to—"

"I'm gonna go"

He looked up.

"I have to head back to HQ" you said, getting your jacket, moving toward the door because if you didn't he was going to combust and you were going to watch it happen.

"Right, yes. Can we—"

You turned around.

He was looking at his desk. Ears still bright red. "It's nothing, drive safe."

The door clicked shut behind you and you stood in the hallway for a few seconds.

Then you walked to the elevator, pressed the button, stared at the doors and tried not to think about a future version of you getting railed on his desk.

You thought about it the rest of the day.

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