♪KORI♫

Meanwhile, the rest of his team is still as geared up as their Captain—all waiting for orders or further instructions, scattered around the room and listening with bated breath while Price grows more agitated with each shaky exhale he can hear coming from you.

You're currently sitting on one of the tables, boot-clad feet dangling off the edge as you stare at the ceiling, right into the fluorescent lights above, ignoring the way your eyes begin to sting from their brightness.

You've been putting on a brave face since getting stabbed with the needle a few hours ago and you've kept the façade up since hopping off the helo back on base, but it's getting harder to mask the panic rising inside you as your body starts to feel funny.

You swipe the back of your gloved hand over your sweaty forehead, catching the cold perspiration on your feverish skin with the rough fabric, and out of your peripherals, you notice the way your teammates' heads snap in your direction—different-coloured pairs of eyes assessing you with worry, concern, and a hint of curiosity.

Soap and Gaz are standing to your left and right respectively, sneaking glances at you whenever you shift on your spot, while the Lieutenant is still as a marble statue a little offside, arms crossed over his bulky tac vest.

Laswell begins to explain calmly, clutching a thick folder to her chest.

"We're still waiting on anything concrete, John, but the research papers your team managed to extract have offered a great insight on that—whatever that bioweapon is."

Bioweapon.

Your eyes widen as you sit up straight, the word making your heart race and your skin crawl with fear. Both Soap and Gaz take a step closer—two strong pairs of arms outstretched and ready to catch you if you faint.

"Nothing concrete yet?" Price snaps incredulously. "Goddammit, Kate!"

"Easy there, John—" Laswell says firmly, unbothered by his tone as she takes a step towards the captain and gestures at the two scientists watching the scene unfold with wide eyes from behind their laptops.

"They said she won't die. The amount of injection was too low… apparently."

Apparently?!

You inhale sharply and open your mouth to announce your imminent panic, but you're interrupted when one of the scientists speaks up first.

"That is correct, sir. She won't die."

Professor Doctor Boswel, as the name badge on his white lab coat states, chimes in. Price stops pacing at once, though his sharp eyes scream you better start explaining now, or one of you will be made responsible for this.

"Bringing the syringe back to base was the decisive factor. Our team at the lab is still working to decipher and translate the medical reports and research papers your team recovered, but we can confirm that this bioweapon is most likely a toxin."

A low murmur of various curses goes through the briefing room as you try to ignore the odd tingles in your limbs—like they're going numb from sitting in a bad position for too long—and process the doctor's words instead.

"You're saying I've been poisoned, doc?" You butt in crudely, letting out a humourless laugh as you begin fidgeting with your hands, clenching and unclenching them to get rid of those tingles while a cold drop of sweat trickles down your left temple and is swiftly wiped away by Soap's gloved thumb.

"Fuckin’ hell, lass. Ye dinnae look too good," Soap mutters under his breath, exchanging a concerned glance with Gaz, who then looks to the captain for guidance with a serious frown.

When Gaz turns around abruptly, you get a whiff of his scent, and you're ashamed to admit to yourself that you inhale it deeply—musk and sweat and gunpowder smoke, a hint of his fancy body wash lingering underneath all the grime. A perfect concoction of what is entirely Gaz.

It's intoxicating. Mouth-watering.

And absolutely inappropriate, because he's one of your best friends and a comrade.

What the hell is happening?

Of all the injuries and wounds you've already acquired during missions and deployments, this must be the fucking worst. You'd rather get shot or stabbed than sit here, feel strange as hell and be ogled like a failed science experiment.

Price's eyes flicker to Ghost, who hasn't said a word since sitting you down on the table with a gruff order to stay seated, and then to his three sergeants, lingering on you heavily before he turns back.

"What kind of bloody toxin?"

"It seems to be some sort of aphrodisiac, but… uh, well—about fifty times worse than that."

The other scientist, Professor Doctor Adebayo, answers tentatively, as if explaining it out loud makes him uncomfortable.

"The reports say it turns men—"

Dr. Adebayo hesitates, clearing his throat and looking between Laswell and Captain Price, until the latter lets out an exasperated sigh.

"Turns them what, doc?"

It's Laswell who says it eventually, "Turns them aggressive, John. Feral with lust, as ridiculous as that might sound."

The CIA agent finally looks in your direction before approaching you slowly while Dr. Adebayo seems to heave a sigh of relief as soon as she takes over.

"A high dose of it can be used to lower one's inhibition levels to a point where even the most honourable man would resort to sexual assault to ease his urges."

Her factual yet grim explanation makes the tension inside the briefing room spike tenfold. Every man present tenses up, visibly uncomfortable—Ghost especially, who's practically vibrating with strain.

Using a toxin like that—a bioweapon—on soldiers in the field could lead to even more and worse war crimes, and everyone here is aware of that.

"Wait—what? What the fuck?" Gaz utters, bristling next to you while you grip the edge of the table, gritting your teeth as the tingles intensify and wreck through your body in waves that leave you shuddering with each one.

"'Scuse me, what now?" You scoff. "Does that mean I'm gonna turn into a fuckin' nympho any second?"

Multiple pairs of eyes snap towards you at your choice of words. Some look intense and laced with worry. Price scolds you with one glance. Others look mildly amused—the latter being Soap, who lets out a snort but tries to cover it up with a fake cough into his fist.

Laswell surveys you intently, though her voice softens when she addresses you directly.

"How are you feeling, Sergeant? Are you in pain? Nauseous?"

A beat of silence follows. Your eyes flutter briefly as you meet Kate's blue gaze, and you exhale a long breath through your nostrils before you answer curtly.

"I feel weird."

You feel like you're about to get your period, but you keep that information to yourself for now and try not to wrap your arms around yourself self-soothingly.

Your lower abdomen is starting to tighten and cramp. Your gut twists like you just chugged a steaming bowl of soup and your limbs keep tingling—from your toes to your fingertips, and up to the tip of your nose. Tiny vibrations along with hot and cold flushes that make you quake and squirm in your seat on the table.

Kate squints at you, though she doesn't press further.

"What kind of effect will this stuff have on her?" Price enquires gruffly, more level-headed this time, his gaze shifting from the two scientists over to you and then back.

Meanwhile, as you crank your sore neck from left to right to get a good crack in, your eyes catch sight of Soap's muscular forearms and—to your horror—they linger.

The sleeves of his combat fatigues are rolled up to his elbows, exposing dark coarse hair and thick veins and that damn SAS insignia tattoo.

You want to trace the black lines with your tongue and imagine the salt of his skin on your parched taste buds.

And your eyes widen when a sudden rush of mind-numbing, pulsating heat makes you squeeze your thighs together as you clench your jaw to keep the lewd sound bubbling up in your throat from escaping.

Soap shoots you a quizzical look, one eyebrow raising as you avert your eyes from him swiftly, heat crawling up your neck and prickling beneath your skin.

"Fuck," you breathe, doubling over with a groan as the muscles in your thighs and lower abdomen begin to cramp up painfully while you can practically feel your pussy start convulsing around nothing, leaking with arousal and soaking into your underwear.

In a matter of seconds, your team—Ghost included, like a solid wall of quiet reassurance—are by your side, keeping you upright, asking questions, though their deep, accented voices are muffled as your quickening heartbeat begins to thud in your ears.

Their every touch seems to burn through the thick layers of your kit.

"Kate—Kate," Price is by her side in a few long strides, ducking his head to get on eye-level with her as he points at the two scientists accusingly, though Kate is already on her smartphone, contacting the lab again.

Price huffs like an angry bull trying to protect his herd as he turns his attention back to Dr. Boswel and Dr. Adebayo, who seem to be in a frenzied discussion, watching the way you're cramping and writhing.

"What the fuck is happening to her?" He barks at them, demanding an answer yesterday.

"It's—it's the toxin," Dr. Boswel stammers obviously, blinking up at Captain Price from behind his glasses. "She didn't get the full dose, but it's still—" He pauses, eyes flickering nervously under the captain's glare. "—bad."

Another gut-wrenching moan from you echoes through the briefing room as you squirm in Gaz's embrace, and Price must restrain himself from directing his wrath towards the two men in front of him—it's not their fault, after all.

It's his.

"Oxytocin might help… neutralize the toxin in her body," Dr. Adebayo remarks, clicking his pen nervously as he stares at his laptop screen before meeting Dr. Boswel's eyes, who is waiting for an elucidation.

"The hormone," Dr. Adebayo clears his throat again, clearly uncomfortable, "—not the drug." He clarifies, clicking his pen a few more times.

Laswell lowers her phone and shares a look with Price, holding an entire conversation with one long, meaningful glance, the one learned and perfected over more than a decade of working together, when Gaz's voice breaks through the chaos, calling for attention.

"Cap'n! What do we do?!"

You're not brought back to the barracks but Captain Price's private quarters.

Your squad makes sure to keep you out of sight in your condition; away from prying eyes while Ghost sneaks through the shadows with your quivering form cradled against his chest, carrying you bridal style like you're something fragile, something vulnerable he must protect.

Once safely inside the captain's flat, the curtains are drawn before your heavy gear is stripped from you, all while you don't even bother paying attention to who is grabbing or holding you at this point.

All that matters is someone touching you.

Your brain is mush, reduced to your most simple and carnal desires. No shame nor worry about the needy noises you're making whenever one of their big, strong hands strips another layer of clothing.

"Shit, I think she has a fever," Gaz mutters, cupping your face with both hands as he investigates your hazy, unfocused eyes while you let out another pathetic whimper. "She's completely out of it."

"Get her into the guest bedroom. Down the hall, first door on the left," Price orders gruffly, trying to keep his eyes from wandering up and down the length of your trembling, half-naked body.

"I'll call the senior consultant."

Ghost grumbles a low curse under his breath when your hand brushes over the front of his crotch—by accident or voluntarily this time, he doesn't dare imagine—and leaves the guest bedroom while Gaz and Soap manoeuvre you onto the king-sized bed.

Meanwhile, you don't care about the effect your uncharacteristic behaviour has on your teammates and superiors.

Whenever they try to make you drink or take an easy bite of food—whether it's a chewy protein bar or an overripe banana, because Price has no proper groceries at his place—you twist in whoever's embrace you're in, turning your scrunched-up face away like a petulant toddler.

"I don't wanna," you whine and hiccup, protesting each time Gaz tries to lift the rim of the water bottle to your lips, your speech now slightly slurred, glossy eyes averting their gaze as you breathe shallowly, squirming while Soap keeps you propped up with your back resting against his chest on the bed.

Gaz, who has been trying again to make you drink a sip of water for the past twenty minutes, looks back at his Lieutenant and Captain helplessly.

"Doc said we need to keep her hydrated," Price announces, rubbing his bare hand over his tired face. "Keep flushing that bloody poison outta her system and—"

Suddenly, Ghost's deep, gravelly voice interrupts the captain's speech with a harsh bite to it. "Johnny."

Soap, who has been trying his best to ignore the way you keep grinding your arse against his crotch in this position, ducks his head at the sharp and sudden warning.

"What? 'M not doin' anythin'," he grunts before sucking in a sharp breath as his cock keeps stirring and twitching in his combat trousers, "Fuck, lass, please—"

Soap tries to keep you from moving; his ungloved hands get a firm hold of your hips, but you're practically panting and mewling in his lap, making it harder for him not to crumble under the pressure building up in his dick.

Then Gaz is swift to pluck you out of the Scot's embrace with a disdainful frown, like you're some toy that was stolen from him.

"Don't be a fuckin' perv, Soap," Gaz snaps, cradling you into his arms, where you immediately begin pawing at his black compression shirt, determined to get your palms under it and on his bare skin.

"She can't consent!"

It's Price who approaches the bed then, while Ghost stays leaning against the doorframe, keeping a keen eye on the situation.

"Enough! Both of you," Price barks, eyes flashing before his shoulders drop with a rough sigh. He pinches the bridge of his nose. "Doc said it might help if—"

John stops mid-sentence, clenching his strong jaw. He can't believe what he is about to say, and he crosses his arms over his chest again, feigning control while he internally braces himself for his next words.

"Those doctors said it might help if she… climaxes."

His words hang in the air like a thick fog that no one can quite see through nor think in, and everyone seems to be holding their breath while you finally manage to tug Gaz's shirt out of his waistband, making him cuss under his breath when you go on to lick a long, wet stripe over his exposed abs like some feral lioness, utterly hungry for a taste.

"Shit—Babygirl, no, d-don't—" Gaz stammers helplessly while a rush of heat goes straight to his neck and cock simultaneously, overwhelmingly so.

He pushes you away by your shoulders—and hates himself for how reluctant he is at it—and he winces when your blunt nails claw into his bulging biceps, digging into his skin even through his shirt with another whimper.

"Please, Kyle… Let me—" you mewl, batting your eyelashes up at him. "It—It fuckin’ hurts."

Soap pushes his fists into his eye sockets, heaving a deep breath that turns into a frustrated groan. "Steamin' Jesus, lass, ye’re fuckin’ killin' us here."

"Take a bloody walk, MacTavish," Price orders, pointing his thumb at the door over his shoulder, and while Soap climbs off the mattress, grumbling to himself with an obvious erection pressing against the seam of his zipper, Price addresses Gaz.

"And you, Garrick, take—" He hesitates again, balling his hands into fists at his sides, trying to keep his own body in check at the sight and sounds of you, before he nudges his chin towards the door of the bathroom.

"Take her to the shower to get the fever down and… help her."

The captain's last words are nothing more than a strained grumble.

Gaz gapes at his superior. Soap freezes in his steps at the end of the bed, openly gawking and blinking like he didn't just hear right. Ghost visibly stiffens and shifts his stance, still leaning against the doorframe of the guest bedroom. No one can see the way he grits his teeth so hard he might chip a tooth behind his balaclava.

"But sir—"

Price shakes his head; brows set in a stern frown as he holds Gaz's widened gaze.

"She'd want you to take care of her if she could actually consent to it. And that's an order, Sergeant."

Ghost wants to disagree, but keeps his mouth shut and exhales a sharp huff of contempt instead.

The rest of the men try to distract themselves around Captain Price's flat while Gaz takes you to the en-suite bathroom like he was ordered to.

Not asked, ordered to.

He keeps repeating that in his head as he walks you towards the bathroom door with his arm around your waist, your body listing into his side like you've forgotten how to hold yourself upright. His jaw is set so tight his molars ache.

He's been ordered to do a lot of things in his career. Clear rooms. Hold positions under fire. Drag wounded men through mud while rounds cracked overhead. He's followed every order without hesitation, because that's what good soldiers do—they trust the chain of command and they execute.

This doesn't feel like any of those things.

He keeps the bathroom door unlocked—just in case you faint and he needs help—and lets out a huff when you fling yourself into his body suddenly and the air is knocked from his lungs.

"Easy," he pleads with you while his head dips down, and he inhales your familiar scent before he can stop himself. Sweat and the remnants of whatever lotion you put on this morning underneath your gear before the mission, something warm and sweet that he's caught whiffs of a hundred times before in passing and never let himself think about for longer than a second.

"Easy there, love," he tries again, his trembling hands wrapping around your midriff tentatively.

Gaz hates these circumstances. Hates how the mission ended in such a bloody mess. Hates how excited he is to undress you to your underwear, and he despises that this is how he'll get to have you for the first time.

This is not how he'd imagined it.

He never imagined it. Not in any concrete, detailed way. Not like he'd planned it in his head, step by step—the restaurant he'd take you to first, somewhere nice but not so nice you'd take the piss out of him for it. The way he'd tell you after the second drink, maybe the third, that he'd been thinking about you. Casually. Like it hadn't been eating him alive for months.

He hadn't planned any of that.

Fucking liar.

You make a sound against his chest, somewhere between a sob and a moan, and your fingers twist into the wet fabric of his compression shirt, tugging weakly.

"Kyle… Kyle, I need—"

"I know," he murmurs, and his voice comes out rougher than he intends. "I know, love. C'mon."

He manoeuvres you towards the shower, reaching past you to turn the dial to lukewarm. The water sputters, then hisses to life against the tile, and steam begins to curl at the edges of the glass.

You're still in your underwear—plain, standard issue, nothing designed to be sexy—and it doesn't matter, because the sight of you trembling and desperate in front of him with water beginning to mist across your skin is doing things to his head that no amount of mental discipline can counter.

He starts to dismantle his assault rifle in his head.

Upper receiver. Charging handle. Bolt carrier group.

You stumble into the shower cabin and he follows, still fully clothed. The water hits his chest and soaks through his compression shirt in seconds, plastering the fabric to his skin, and the cold shock of it helps. Briefly.

Bolt. Firing pin. Cam pin.

"C'mon, Babygirl," he coos at you as he turns your quivering body in his embrace until your back is flush against his chest. One arm wraps tightly below your breasts, forearm pushing up against the swell of them through the soaked fabric of your bra, and he tries, and fails miserably, not to take a long look over your shoulder.

Buffer tube. Buffer spring. Buffer.

You melt against his body and his cock throbs in his combat trousers, straining against his briefs uncomfortably. The water is doing nothing for the heat radiating off your skin. If anything, you're burning hotter, pressing back into him with small, involuntary rolls of your hips that make his breath stutter.

Lower receiver. Trigger assembly. Trigger—

"Please," you whimper, and his entire train of thought derails.

Your head lolls back against his shoulder, exposing the column of your throat, and he can see the way your pulse hammers beneath the surface, rapid and frantic. Your hips buck against his hand when he finally—finally—lets it trail down over your lower belly, his calloused fingers dragging across the wet skin, feeling the muscles jump and twitch beneath his touch.

"Yes—yes—yes—" you chant breathlessly, and your hips cant forward, chasing his hand with a desperation that makes something crack open in his chest.

Fuck—fuck—fuck—fuck.

He cups your pussy through your knickers and the heat of you against his palm nearly makes his knees buckle. He can feel you through the thin, soaked fabric and he's not sure if the wetness is from the shower stream or if it's all you.

His chest is heaving when he finally gathers enough courage to dip his long fingers beneath the waistband of your underwear. His jaw clenches and his mind grasps desperately for the drills again—clear left, clear right, move to the next room, check your corners—anything to stay anchored while you let out a moan that echoes off the tile walls and punches straight through him.

You're so wet, so swollen, it's obscene. His fingers slide through your folds with zero resistance and the groan that rips from deep within his chest is involuntary, guttural, ashamed. He can feel your arousal ooze from your entrance, slick and hot, and he can already tell how tight you'd feel clenching around his fingers, how you'd—

No. He's not going there.

"Fuck," he curses under his breath, more to himself than to you. "I'm only doin' this for you, Babygirl. This is only about you."

He says it like a prayer. Like if he repeats it enough, it'll be true.

His fingers press on your clit, pulsing and twitching already, and he starts rubbing small, firm circles over it, adjusting the pressure when your breath hitches or your thighs clamp around his wrist. He reads your body like he reads a room. Methodically, attentive, and cataloguing every reaction.

You writhe and squirm in his tight grip, your nails digging into the arm he has banded around your ribs, and every sound you make, every whimper, and stuttered gasp of his name, chips away at the wall he's trying to keep standing between following an order and wanting this.

"M-more, Kyle, please!"

Gaz curses himself, but he gives you more.

Two fingers pressing into you, slow and careful despite every instinct screaming at him to give you what you're begging for. You clench around him immediately, hot and tight and silky, and his cock kicks in his trousers so hard he must bite the inside of his cheek to keep from groaning.

He curls his fingers, searching for the spot that makes your thighs shake, and when he finds it, you keen so loudly the sound bounces off every hard surface in the small bathroom.

"That's it," he murmurs against your temple, his lips brushing your skin without quite kissing. "That's it, love. Let go for me."

He's not sure when he started talking to you like this. Somewhere between the first touch and the second, the clinical detachment he'd been clinging to crumbled and something else took its place—something tender and fierce and terrifyingly honest.

Your first orgasm hits you hard enough to make your entire body seize in his arms, your back arching away from his chest as a strangled cry tears from your throat. He holds you through it, fingers still working, still pressing and giving, because even as the tremors wrack through you and your legs give out, he can feel your body already winding up again, the toxin refusing to let you rest.

"Shh, shh, I've got you," he breathes, adjusting his grip to take your full weight when your knees buckle entirely. "I've got you."

You cum again two minutes later, and then again after that, and again, and Gaz loses count somewhere around the fifth or sixth time, when his fingers are cramping and his arm is trembling from holding you upright and the water has long since turned cold.

Each time, he thinks it'll be enough, and each time, your body coils tight again within minutes, the toxin driving you right back to the edge with a cruelty that makes him want to put his fist through the tile.

He doesn’t want to imagine what a full dose would have done to you. To anyone.

When you tell him that you're hurting—repeatedly, begging him to make you cum in that desperate, broken tone of yours—the young Sergeant is sure something dies inside him on the spot.

"Kyle—Kyle, I need more, I need you to—please—Fuck, please!"

He knows what you're asking for. You're grinding back against his cock, which has been rock-hard and aching for what feels like hours, and every roll of your hips sends a jolt of white-hot arousal through him that he must physically brace against.

"I can't," he grits out, and it takes everything in him. "Christ. I can't do that to you. Not like this."

"Please—"

"No, Babygirl." His voice cracks on the word, and he presses his forehead against the back of your head, squeezing his eyes shut. "Not like this."

He drops to his knees instead.

The tile is hard and unforgiving under his kneecaps and the now cold water from the shower hits the back of his neck, but he barely registers any of it as he turns you to face him and hooks one of your legs over his shoulder.

He looks up at you once—your hazy, unfocused eyes, the way your chest heaves, the water running in rivulets down your body—and then he leans forward and drags his tongue through your folds in one long, broad stroke.

The sound you make is devastating.

Your hands fly to his head, fingers scrabbling for purchase on his wet hair, and your hips jerk forward so violently he must grip your thigh to keep you steady. He groans against you, he can't help it, and the vibration makes you cry out again, blunt nails raking over his scalp.

Gaz eats you like he's starving for it, because the truth he can't say out loud is that he is.

He's thought about this. Dreamed about it. Wanked to the idea of it in the dark of his bunk with his fist shoved against his mouth to keep quiet. And now he's here, on his knees in his Captain's shower with cold water running down his back and your taste flooding his mouth, and it's everything and nothing like what he imagined because you're not choosing this—you're not choosing him—and that knowledge sits in his chest like a brick.

But he doesn't stop.

Gaz licks and sucks and fucks you with his tongue until his jaw aches and your thighs are shaking so badly you can barely stand, even with his hands gripping your hips. He makes you cum on his mouth twice, then thrice, pressing his face into you each time your body locks up, working you through it with relentless, single-minded focus because if he stops to think about what this means, about what happens after, he'll fall apart.

When he finally pulls back, his lips are swollen, his chin is slick and his cock is so hard it genuinely hurts. You're still whimpering, still reaching for him, still not done, and the toxin is still pumping through your veins with no sign of stopping.

He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand and exhales a shaky breath, pressing his forehead against your hip.

"I need—" His voice is wrecked. He swallows hard, then tries again. "I need a minute."

Not because he's tired, or his fingers are cramped and his jaw is sore and his knees are bruised from the tile. No.

But if he stays on his knees in front of you for one more second, he's going to give you what you're begging for, and he will never forgive himself for it.

He stands on unsteady legs, turns the shower off, and reaches for the towel hanging on the rack outside the cabin. His hands are shaking as he wraps it around, and you cling to it loosely, swaying on your feet.

"C'mon," he says, guiding you towards the door with one hand on the small of your back. His voice has steadied, but his eyes haven't. "Let's get you dried off."

You're protesting. He's cursing under his breath. There's shuffling, a stumble, and then he grabs the door handle and swings it open—

And Soap nearly falls backwards into the bathroom.

"Soap!"

The Scotsman catches himself on the doorway, one hand gripping the frame as he glances over his shoulder with a look that's not even remotely sheepish enough for a man who was clearly pressing his ear to the door thirty seconds ago.

Gaz is still wearing his clothes, though they're completely drenched—his compression shirt is a second skin, his combat trousers heavy with water, boots squelching on the tile. He's holding you by the forearm as you stand next to him, loose towel wrapped around your body, still trembling, still making those small, desperate sounds in the back of your throat.

"The fuck, mate? Did you eavesdrop on us?"

Soap shrugs as he straightens up, adjusting his stance in a way that's clearly meant to disguise the state of his trousers. "Was jus' checkin' on ye."

"Checking on—" Gaz's jaw works, nostrils flaring. He wants to snap, wants to shove Soap back into the hallway and slam the door, but he's running on fumes and you're leaning into him again, your face pressed against his soaked chest, mumbling incoherently.

"She needs—" Gaz starts, then stops. Looks down at you, back up at Soap. Something heavy passes between the two men, unspoken but understood.

"She needs more than I can give her right now," he finishes quietly, and the admission costs him more than any of them will ever know.

Soap's expression shifts. The boyish smirk drops, replaced by something sobered, and he gives Gaz a short nod—the kind they exchange in the field when one of them is spent and the other takes point.

"A'right," Soap answers, surprisingly steady, rolling his broad shoulders. "Ah’ve got 'er."

Gaz transfers you into Soap's waiting arms with a gentleness that borders on reverent—one hand on the back of your head, the other guiding your shoulders—and he doesn't let go until he's sure Soap has you secure.

Then he walks past them both, water dripping from every inch of him, and doesn't look back.

He makes it to the kitchen before his hands start shaking badly enough that he has to brace them flat on the counter. He stands there, head bowed, water pooling on the linoleum beneath him, and breathes.

Ghost is leaning against the opposite wall with his arms crossed, and he doesn't say a word.

There is no need to.

Soap carries you back to the bed like you weigh nothing to him; one arm under your knees, the other around your back, the towel slipping loose and neither of you caring, and he lays you down with a surprising gentleness that contradicts every tightly coiled muscle in his body.

He's been hard since the briefing room, balls throbbing uncomfortably. Over two hours of it. The kind of persistent, throbbing ache that sits low in his gut and pulses in time with his heartbeat, and he's been dealing with it the way he deals with most discomfort.

By ignoring it aggressively and hoping it fucks off on its own.

It has not fucked off unfortunately. Truth be told, he’d be worried about himself if it did.

"Right then," he mutters, kneeling on the mattress beside you as he cracks his neck and rolls his shoulders again like he's about to breach a door. "Let's sort ye out, hen."

And that's the thing about Johnny MacTavish—he doesn't agonise. Not the way Gaz does, all quiet guilt and moral calculus. Soap's moral framework is simpler, blunter, built from different materials. You're his teammate, you're hurting, and he can help. Everything else is noise.

That doesn't mean he's unaffected; doesn't mean his hands aren't shaking when he settles between your legs and pushes the towel fully away from your body, or that his breath doesn't hitch hard enough to hear when he gets his first proper look at you fully naked, spread out on the white sheets with your chest heaving and your thighs trembling and your eyes half-lidded, glassy, barely tracking him.

Christ, you're beautiful.

He's thought about this. Fuck. Of course he has. He's not a bloody monk, and you're you.

He's thought about it in the gym when you spot him on the bench press and your face hovers above his, upside down and grinning. He's thought about it on long transports when you fall asleep against his shoulder and he stays perfectly still for hours so you won't wake up. Or when you laugh at his shite jokes that no one else finds funny, when you steal chips off his plate in the mess, when you call him Johnny instead of Soap and don't even notice you've done it.

He's thought about it a lot.

But not like this.

"You with me?" he asks, tapping your cheek lightly with two fingers. Your eyes roll towards him, struggling to focus, and you make a sound that's part whimper, part plea.

Close enough.

"A'right, sweetheart. I've got ye."

He doesn't ease into it the way Gaz did. Where Gaz was methodical, with careful touches, measured pressure, and constant checking, Soap is instinct. He reads you through vibration and sound, adjusts on the fly, follows the frequency of your moans like he's tuning into a signal.

He dips his head between your thighs and licks into you without preamble, broad and hot and greedy, and the noise that tears out of you rattles something loose in his chest.

"Fuck—tha's it," he groans against you, the vibration making your hips jolt, and his big hands grip the backs of your thighs to keep you spread open and steady. "Tha's my bonnie girl."

He's not quiet about it, either. Soap eats pussy the way he does most things. With enthusiasm, commitment, and absolutely zero self-consciousness. Wet, filthy sounds fill the bedroom, punctuated by his own groans and your increasingly incoherent cries, and he doesn't give a single shit that the door is open, and his team can hear every obscene noise he's wringing out of you.

Let them hear.

His tongue works over your clit in fast, tight circles, then broad, flat strokes, alternating rhythm and pressure every time he feels your thighs start to shake. When you try to close your legs, he pins them open with his forearms. When you try to squirm away—overstimulated, oversensitive, too much and not enough at the same time—he follows relentlessly, dragging you back by the hips with a growl that rumbles against your soaked flesh.

"Nuh-uh. Stay still f'me."

He makes you cum with his mouth in under five minutes and then doesn't stop.

Your fingers twist into the sheets, into his mohawk, clawing at his scalp as your back arches off the mattress and a wrecked sob punches out of your lungs. Soap groans in response, the sound reverential, like your pleasure is a hymn and he's on his knees in church.

He keeps going. Lapping at you through the aftershocks, sucking your clit between his lips until you're keening, pressing his tongue inside you just to feel you clench around it, and when you cum again with his name breaking apart on your lips—Johnny, Johnny, fuck yes, Johnny—he nearly blacks out from how hard his cock throbs in response.

His hips have started moving on their own. Small, involuntary rolls against the mattress, his aching cock grinding against the sheets through his combat trousers, and he knows he should fucking stop, should pull his hips back, should focus on you and not the desperate friction building between his body and the bed.

But he doesn't stop.

He is physically incapable.

You taste like honey and salt and something almost medicinal underneath—the toxin, probably, working its way out of your system through your sweat and your slick—and he's drunk on it. Drunk on the way you say his name, how your thighs tremble against the sides of his head, drunk on the wet sounds of his tongue on your cunt and the way you keep pulling his face closer, harder, more.

"God—fuck—lass, ye taste so fuckin' good—"

He's rutting against the mattress in earnest now, his hips snapping in sharp, desperate little thrusts, and the friction is nowhere near enough and exactly too much at the same time.

The sheets are going to be ruined. He doesn't care. Can't. He’s a weak man, and his entire world has narrowed to the taste of you on his tongue and the ache in his junk and the way your body keeps arching into him like he's the only thing keeping you alive.

"Please—please, Johnny, I need—I can't—"

"I know, hen, I know—" he pants against your inner thigh, pressing a biting kiss there that makes you yelp, "—jus' one more, c'mon, give me one more, aye?"

He flickers his tongue, seals his mouth over your clit and sucks, hard, and you shatter. Your thighs clamp around his head, your hands fist in his hair so tightly it stings, and the scream that rips from your throat is ragged and raw and so fucking beautiful that he comes.

Inside his combat pants.

His hips stutter against the mattress and a guttural, muffled groan vibrates against your pussy as his cock pulses and spills, hot and wet, soaking through his briefs and into his trousers. His arms shake, his vision whites out for a second, and he has to press his forehead against your inner thigh and just breathe through it, chest heaving, while you whimper above him, still trembling from your own orgasm.

He pulls back slowly, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, and the reality of what just happened settles over him like a cloth soaked in ice water. He stares down at himself, at the damp patch darkening the front of his trousers, and lets out a long, defeated exhale.

"MacTavish."

Ghost's voice comes from the doorway; flat and sharp, dripping with contempt.

Soap closes his eyes, disappointed in himself, exhaling through his nose. "Aye. I know."

"You know?" Price's voice joins Ghost's, closer, much heavier. The captain is standing just inside the bedroom now, arms folded, jaw set. He looks at Soap the way a father looks at a teenage son caught doing something monumentally stupid.

"Get yourself sorted. Now."

Soap doesn't argue. He climbs off the bed on unsteady legs, not meeting anyone's eyes, and adjusts his trousers with a grimace as he shuffles past Ghost in the doorway.

Ghost doesn't move to let him pass. Makes him squeeze by, shoulder to shoulder, just to make it uncomfortable.

"Disgusting," Ghost mutters, low enough that only Soap hears it.

"Fuck off, LT," Soap mutters back, and there's no heat in it. Just shame.

You don't notice the shift at first.

One moment there are hands and mouths on you, voices and pressure and friction. The next, everything is quieter. Stiller. The mattress dips on one side and stays dipped, a solid weight settling beside you but not on you, not against you, not close enough to touch.

You whine at the loss of contact, of heat, of anything, and reach blindly for whoever is there.

A large hand catches your wrist. Gentle and firm, holding it in place.

"Don't."

One word. Low and gravelly, scraped raw like it was dragged over broken glass and wire mesh on its way out of his throat.

Ghost.

He's sitting on the edge of the bed with his back straight and his boots still on, because taking his boots off would mean he's staying, and staying would mean—he doesn't finish the thought.

Price asked him to sit with you while Gaz and Soap pulled themselves together. Asked this time, not ordered, because Price knows that ordering Ghost to do something he doesn't want to do is about as effective as ordering the tide to turn. Ghost agreed with a single nod, and now here he is, and every muscle in his body is locked so tight he might snap a tendon.

You're lying on your side, curled in on yourself, wearing nothing but your sodden underwear again and the ghost of everyone else's touch on your skin. The towel is long gone. Your body is still trembling, still feverish, still caught in the grip of the toxin, and the soft, pained sounds you keep making are doing things to him that he absolutely cannot allow.

He's hard. Has been since you doubled over and moaned and he had to watch your body betray you in front of everyone. His cock is straining against his trousers, thick and heavy and insistent.

Ghost pretends it isn’t. He's very good at pretending things don't exist.

"Simon…"

His jaw clenches beneath the balaclava. You rarely use his first name—none of them do—and hearing it now, in that voice, breathy and desperate and small, is a kind of cruelty he wasn't prepared for.

"You need to drink something," he murmurs, and reaches for the water bottle on the nightstand without looking at you.

"Don't want—"

"Wasn't bloody askin’."

He unscrews the cap and turns to you, and the mistake—the critical, tactical, unforgivable mistake—is that he looks at your face next.

Your eyes are glassy and wet, your lips parted around shallow little breaths, and you're looking up at him like he's the only solid thing in a world that's been spinning for hours.

Not with lust—not the way you looked at Gaz and Soap—but with something quieter. Something that reaches past the toxin and grabs hold of something deeper.

Trust.

You trust him. Even now, reduced to your basest instincts, your intoxicated, unhinged brain still recognises him as safe.

Something fractures behind his ribs, and he shuts it down immediately, brutally, the way he shuts down everything that threatens to breach the walls.

"Sit up," he orders, and his voice is soft yet steady even if the rest of him isn't. He slides one hand behind your head—just his palm, just enough to support your neck—and lifts the bottle to your lips.

You drink. Slowly, reluctantly, with small sips that dribble down your chin, but you drink. He holds the bottle still and watches the column of your throat move with each swallow, and when a drop of water runs from the corner of your mouth and trails down your neck, dark eyes track it all the way to your collarbone before catching himself and looking away.

"More," he says curtly, bringing the bottle back.

You manage a few more sips before turning your head away with a pitiful sound, and he lets you, setting the bottle aside. His hand lingers on the back of your head a moment too long—his thumb brushing once against the nape of your neck—before he pulls it back like he's been burned.

You reach for him again. Fingers closing around the fabric of his sleeve, tugging weakly.

"Stay. Please. Don't—Don't go."

"'M not goin’ anywhere." The words come out before he can vet them, gruff and low, and he immediately resents himself for saying them so quickly, so easily, like a confession slipped out under duress.

He lets you hold onto his sleeve. That much he can allow. That much won't cross a line he cannot uncross.

You shift closer, seeking warmth, and your body curls towards him until your forehead is pressed against his thigh. He goes completely rigid, every muscle locking and nerve firing, and his hands hover in the air on either side of you, not touching, not pulling away, suspended in the unbearable middle ground of a man who wants desperately but won't take.

Another small whimper from you. Not desire this time but pain. The cramps rolling through your body in waves, the toxin still doing its vicious work even after everything Gaz and Soap wrung from you. You're shaking, and not just from arousal. You're exhausted. Dehydrated. Your body is at war with itself.

Ghost is not a gentle man. He knows this about himself the way he knows his blood type and his boot size. It's a fact, unalterable, built into the architecture. He doesn't comfort. He doesn't soothe. He handles.

But.

His hand comes down on the back of your head, and it stays.

Heavy and warm through the leather of his glove. Not stroking just resting, a solid weight against your skull, and you let out a breath that sounds like it's been trapped in your lungs for hours.

You stop shaking. Not entirely. The tremors are still there, running through you in small aftershocks, but the worst of it eases under the steady pressure of his palm, like he's an anchor and you've been drifting.

"Ghost?" Your voice is small, barely a whisper.

"Yeah."

"It hurts."

He closes his eyes behind the mask. His hand presses down just slightly—a fraction more weight, a fraction more warmth—and his throat works around words that don't come.

He knows it hurts. He knows Gaz and Soap's efforts weren't enough. He knows what the doctors said—what Price said—and he knows what would fix it, and he can't.

Not because he doesn't want to. Because he wants it too fucking much.

Simon Riley is not a man who trusts himself with things he wants.

Wanting, in his experience, is the first step towards destroying, and he has destroyed enough for one lifetime. Touching you now the way his body is screaming at him to would not be careful or measured or controlled or gentle.

It would be all consuming, and he would take too much, and he would never be able to look you in the eyes again.

So he sits on the edge of the bed with his boots on and his cock aching and his hand on the back of your head, and he holds himself perfectly, agonisingly still. Just a solid shadow in a bedroom.

You press your face harder against his thigh and he lets you. Your fingers tighten on his sleeve and he lets you. Your breath evens out incrementally but still too fast, still too shallow, though calmer now, and he lets that happen too, guarding it like a perimeter, daring anything to disturb it.

He doesn't know how long you stay like that. Long enough for the light under the curtains to shift and for his leg to go numb beneath the pressure of your head. Long enough for Gaz to appear in the doorway, freshly changed into borrowed civvies, and stop dead at the sight of them.

Ghost meets his eyes over the top of your head. His expression is unreadable behind the mask, but his hand doesn't move from your hair, and that says more than his face ever could.

Gaz nods once and backs out without a word.

In the kitchen, Price is pouring two fingers of whisky into a tumbler and staring at the far wall like it owes him money. Soap is sitting at the table in a pair of Price's joggers, his soiled trousers balled up in a plastic bag at his feet, looking like a scolded dog.

"She's calmer," Gaz says quietly as he enters, and both men look up. "Ghost's with her."

Price takes a long drink. Sets the glass down. Rubs a hand over his beard.

"It's not enough, is it."

It's not a question and Gaz doesn't answer it.

"She's still in pain. She keeps—" He stops and swallows thickly. "She keeps asking. Saying she’s in pain."

The captain stares at the whisky in his glass. The silence stretches, tense and heavy, pressing in on the walls of the small kitchen.

"She needs more than fingers and a mouth," Soap says bluntly, because someone fucking has to, and delicacy has never been his strong suit. Gaz shoots him a look, but Soap holds it, unapologetic.

"He's right," Price agrees suddenly, and the words taste like bile. He pushes away from the counter and stands to his full height, shoulders squared, and for a moment he looks every inch the officer. Burdened, resolute, carrying a decision he'll second-guess for the rest of his life.

"Gentlemen's agreement," he says. His voice is low, steady, absolute. "What happens tonight stays in this flat. No one treats her differently when this is over. No one brings it up unless she does. No one holds it over anyone, including himself."

He looks at each of them in turn—Gaz, then Soap—and holds until he gets a nod from both.

"And we tell Ghost."

Ghost doesn't agree.

He listens to the terms of the gentlemen's agreement from the doorway of the kitchen, arms crossed, stance wide, radiating the kind of stillness that makes lesser men instinctively check their exits. When Price finishes, Ghost holds the silence for a long, loaded beat.

And then: "No."

Price doesn't flinch. "No to which part?"

"All of it. My part." Ghost's voice is flat and final, stripped of everything except the decision itself. "I'll stay with her. I won't fuck her."

Soap opens his mouth—probably to say something spectacularly unhelpful—and Gaz kicks him under the table without looking.

Price studies his Lieutenant for a moment. Then he nods once, heavy with an understanding that doesn't need to be spoken.

"Fair enough." He rolls his sleeves up to his forearms. The mechanical motion of a man preparing for something he cannot delegate. "I'll go first."

No one dares to argue.

Unlike Soap, Price closes the guest bedroom door behind him and stands there for a moment with his hand still on the knob, just breathing. It smells of sex and pheromones, but wrong.

The room is dim. Someone turned off the overhead and left only the bedside lamp, casting everything in low amber light that softens the edges of the furniture and the shape of you on the bed. You're curled on your side, knees drawn up, one hand clutching the pillow beneath your head. The sheets are wrecked; damp and twisted, pulled loose from two corners, and your skin glistens with a thin sheen of sweat.

You look small.

That's the thing that hits him first and hits him hardest.

You're one of his soldiers. He's seen you clear buildings, haul wounded men twice your size to extraction, take a round to the vest and get back up swearing. You are not small. You have never been small or fragile.

But you look it now, trembling and fever-damp and reduced to a version of yourself that he never should have had to witness, and the weight of that sits on his shoulders like a ruck full of stones.

He crosses the room in a few strides and sits on the edge of the mattress. The frame groans under his weight.

"Sergeant."

You stir, your head lifting, and your eyes find his face. They're glassy and unfocused, but there's a flicker of recognition—Captain—before it's swallowed by the next wave rolling through your body. You let out a sound that's half sob, half moan, your thighs pressing together, and your hand reaches out blindly until your fingers catch the fabric of his shirt.

"It hurts," you whisper. "Still hurts. Why does it still—"

"I know." He catches your wrist, holds it. His thumb presses against your pulse point to check, and it’s rapid, thready, way too fast for simply lying on a bed. "I'm going to help you."

He says it the way he says we're moving on that compound at 0300 or I need eyes on that ridgeline. Leaving no room for ambiguity, because if he allows ambiguity into this room, he'll start thinking about what he's doing, and if he starts thinking, he'll stop, and if he stops.

You'll keep hurting. Under his command.

He stands long enough to strip his shirt over his head and remove his belt, and then he's back on the bed, propped against the headboard with you between his legs, your back against his bare chest; coarse salt and pepper hair rasping against your tacky skin. One arm wraps around your midsection, heavy and secure, anchoring you.

"Easy," he murmurs against the top of your head. "I've got you, love."

His free hand trails down your stomach, and your muscles jump and twitch beneath his rough palm. He catalogues every reaction. The hitch in your breathing, the way your hips tilt up to meet him, the small, desperate noise you make when his fingers dip below your navel. The same way he catalogues threat patterns and exit routes.

This is a mission. He is completing the objective. He is taking care of his wounded soldier.

He keeps telling himself that as he peels your underwear down your thighs and off, tossing them aside. As he runs his hand up the inside of your thigh and feels you shake. As he finally cups you and discovers just how wet and swollen you are, dripping on his fingers, he has to close his eyes and clench his jaw against the visceral punch of arousal that knocks through him.

This is the job. You gave the order. See it through.

He works you with his fingers first, because he needs to know what you can take. Two thick fingers pressing into you slowly, carefully, and the sounds you make guts him.

"That's it." His voice is lower now, rougher. "There you go, sweetheart."

He doesn't call his soldiers sweetheart. He has never, in twenty-odd years of service, called anyone under his command sweetheart. The word falls out of him like a loose round, and he can't take it back.

Your sopping hole clenches around his fingers and his cock, already hard and straining against the front of his trousers, jerks so violently he must bite back a groan. He curls his fingers inside you, finds the swollen spot that makes your spine arch and your breath stutter, and works it with a patient, devastating precision.

You cum and gush on his fingers with a broken cry, your body locking up in his arms, and the aftershocks roll through you in long, shuddering waves that he holds you through without a word.

It's still not enough. He knows it won't be for a while longer.

Price reaches for the condom on the nightstand—Gaz found them in Price's bathroom cabinet, a half-empty box, almost expired, shoved behind the toiletries like an afterthought—and tears the foil with his teeth while you keen and squirm against him, already spiralling back up.

He undoes his trousers and pushes them down just enough to free himself, because keeping them on feels like maintaining some essential boundary, some last scrap of separation between Captain Price doing what needs to be done and John wanting what he shouldn't want.

Rolling the condom on is a particular exercise in self-control. His cock is thick, flushed dark when his foreskin slides back, weeping pre at the tip, and every brush of his own fingers against the oversensitive skin makes his abs clench.

He lifts you with ease, one hand on your hip, the other gripping himself, and positions you above his lap.

"Sergeant," he grunts through gritted teeth, "look at me."

Your head lolls back against his shoulder, eyes half-open, and you meet his gaze as best you can. He searches for something in your expression—recognition, maybe awareness, you—and finds enough of it to quiet the loudest of the voices screaming in his head.

"If it's too much, y’tell me. That's a bloody order."

You nod hazily. He doesn't know if you actually processed the words, but he needed to say them. Needed that on the record, if only between himself and God.

He lowers you onto him slowly.

The sound that comes out of him is not one he's ever made before.

You're scorching hot and soaked. Your body takes him inch by inch, clenching and fluttering around him as gravity and his guiding hand ease you down, and by the time you're fully seated in his lap, he's seeing stars and his fingers have left dents in the flesh of your hip.

"Fuck," he breathes, and the word is ragged at the edges, torn from somewhere deeper than his chest.

You moan shamelessly, and the relief in the sound nearly undoes him. Like something that's been wound unbearably tight has finally been given slack. Your body relaxes against his, tension draining from your muscles for the first time in hours, and the change is so visible, so immediate, that it almost justifies this.

Almost.

He starts to move. Rolling his hips up into you, slow and deep, both hands gripping your waist to control the pace. He keeps it measured; long and deliberate strokes that drag against your inner walls and make you whimper with each one, because if he lets himself go, if he fucks you the way his body is begging him to, he'll lose himself entirely.

And he hates—Christ, he hates—how fucking good you feel.

He hates the way you fit around him like you were made for it, and the way your head falls back against his shoulder, how your lips part and you breathe his name—not his rank, not Captain, but John—and the sound of it rushes through him hot and electric and wrong. Hates the wet, obscene sound of your body taking him repeatedly; that his hips are moving faster now, snapping up into you with a force that makes the headboard knock against the wall.

Hates that he doesn't want to stop.

Your eyes squeeze shut, your head tips back as you cry out. "John—John—oh god—"

His arm tightens around your ribs, crushing you back against his chest, and his mouth finds the curve of your shoulder—not kissing, just pressing there, teeth grazing skin, breathing you in. His other hand slides down between your thighs and rubs tight circles on your clit in counterpoint to each thrust, and you come apart so violently in his arms that he has to hold you through it with every ounce of strength he has.

You clench around him like a vice and he follows you over the edge with a bitten-off groan, his hips stuttering, his cock pulsing deep inside you as the orgasm tears through him with a ferocity that whites out his vision.

For a few suspended seconds, there's nothing left. No rank, no mission, no guilt. Just the pounding of his heart and the aftershocks rippling through both your bodies and the impossible, terrible warmth of you around him.

Then reality seeps back in, cold and unforgiving, and Captain John Price opens his eyes and begins the long process of hating himself for every second of the last twenty minutes.

He pulls out carefully, disposes of the condom, and fixes his trousers. When he leans you back against the pillows, your eyes are already glazing over again, your body winding up for more, and the sight of it makes something weary and furious crack behind his chest cavity

He cups your jaw, tilting your face up. "Stay with me, Sergeant. Stay with me."

You whimper, and your hips shift restlessly against the sheets.

Price stands and walks to the door on legs that feel like they belong to someone else.

"Garrick. You're up."

Gaz and Soap take you in turns after that, and it's different this time.

Where the first round was clinical in its own way—Gaz with his careful guilt, Soap with his missionary zeal, Price bearing the weight of command—this his round is rawer.

The boundaries have been breached, and the gentlemen's agreement hangs over the room like a ceasefire that everyone knows is temporary.

Gaz is gentler than Price was. He lays you on your back and settles between your thighs with a tenderness that borders on devotion, pressing his forehead against yours as he pushes inside you.

He goes slow and gentle, and whispers things against your temple that no one else can hear, private things meant only for the space between your mouth and his.

"I've got you," he murmurs repeatedly. "I've got you, Babygirl, I'm right here. I will be here."

He comes inside the condom with a shudder and your name bitten into the skin of your shoulder, and when he pulls out and rolls onto his back beside you, he stares at the ceiling for a long time without blinking, tears prickling at the corners of his eyes.

Soap goes after. He's not gentle—can't be, doesn't know how to be, not with the way you claw at his back and wrap your legs around his waist and beg him harder, please, harder—but he's present.

He hooks your knee over his broad shoulders and fucks you deep, watching your face with a focused intensity that's almost clinical in its own right, cataloguing every reaction, every gasp, adjusting angle and depth and rhythm like he's zeroing a scope.

"Tha's it, sweetheart, take it—fuck, yer so—fuck—"

The condoms run out after Soap's first round.

Gaz discovers this when he reaches for the box on the nightstand and finds it empty, and the look on his face—the quiet oh, shit—would be funny in any other context.

"Cap'n," he calls, voice strained. "We've got a problem."

Price, who has been standing in the hallway staring at nothing, appears in the doorway. Gaz holds up the empty box. Price closes his eyes.

"Then pull out," the captain says flatly. "That's an order."

It should be simple, and it’s anything but.

Gaz tries. He genuinely, sincerely tries, but you're clenching around him so tightly and making those sounds, those desperate and wrecked, grateful sounds, and when your orgasm hits and your walls contract around his cock in rhythmic, milking pulses, his hips stutter and he buries himself to the hilt and spills inside you with a choked groan before his brain even registers what his body has done.

"Shit—shit, I'm sorry, I—fuck—"

He pulls out too late, watches his cum leak from you onto the sheets, and drops his head against your sternum with a devastated exhale.

Soap doesn't even pretend he's going to manage it.

"'M not gonna be able to pull out," he announces with a frankness that makes Gaz want to strangle him. "Jus' bein' honest, Cap."

"You'll pull out or I'll pull you out myself, MacTavish."

And yet Soap does not, in fact, pull out in time.

Price has to physically haul him back by the shoulder, and even then, Soap's cock jerks and pulses as it slips free, painting your inner thighs and lower belly with hot, thick ropes of cum while the Scotsman lets out a string of Gaelic curses that would make his mother disown him.

The room smells like multiple people fucking and sweating and something medicinal—the toxin, working its way out of your pores at last—and you're finally, finally, starting to slow down.

The desperate edge has dulled. Your whimpers are quieter now, tired rather than urgent, and your body has stopped arching off the bed every few minutes.

You're still reaching, though. Still searching for contact, for warmth, for a body against yours.

Ghost enters the room without being asked.

He's stripped down to his black t-shirt and trousers. The balaclava is still on, but his gloves are off, and the sight of his bare, scarred hands is somehow more intimate than anything else that's happened in this room tonight.

He doesn't look at the other men or acknowledge the state of the sheets or the smell or the heavy, post-coital guilt saturating the air.

He simply moves to the bed, sits down, and gathers you against his chest with a practised efficiency that suggests he's been rehearsing this moment in his head for the last two hours.

You go willingly. Boneless, exhausted, trembling with the last dregs of the toxin and the cumulative aftermath of more orgasms than your body was designed to handle in one night. Your face presses into the crook of his neck, your fingers curl loosely in the front of his shirt, and you let out a breath that sounds like surrender.

Ghost pulls the duvet up over both of you. One arm settles around your back securely. His other hand comes up to cradle the back of your head, fingers curling into your hair, and he holds you against him like he's shielding you from blast radius.

"Go to sleep," he says quietly. An order and a request and a plea all compressed into three words.

You make a small, incoherent sound against his throat.

"I know." His hand moves over your hair, slowly and gentle. "Sleep."

Price watches from the doorway for a moment. Then he pulls the door halfway closed and leaves the Lieutenant to his vigil.

In the kitchen, the captain pours himself another whisky—three fingers this time—and drinks it standing up, staring at the drawn curtains. Gaz is in the shower. Soap is sprawled on the sofa in the living room, one arm over his eyes, dead to the world.

Price's phone buzzes. Laswell.

How is she?

He stares at the screen for a long time. Types and deletes three different responses before finally settling on one.

Handled. Debrief in the morning.

He sets the phone face-down on the counter and finishes his drink.

Hours later, you wake up slowly, like surfacing from deep water.

The first thing you register is warmth. A wall of it, solid and breathing, pressed against your back. An arm draped over your waist, heavy with sleep. Fingers loosely tangled in yours against your sternum.

The second thing you register is that you are naked, sore in places you don't want to think about, and your mouth tastes like the inside of a boot.

The third thing is the balaclava.

You can feel it, the knitted fabric against the back of your neck, and the slow, even exhale of breath warming your skin through the cloth. The chest behind you rises and falls in the deep, steady rhythm of genuine sleep, which means the Lieutenant trusts this room enough to have let himself go under.

Which means something, though you're too foggy to figure out what.

You shift slightly, testing your body. Everything aches. Your thighs, your hips, your abs, your jaw for some reason, and there's a deep, bone-level exhaustion settled into your muscles that reminds you of the tail end of a bad flu.

The cramps are gone, though. The tingling, the feverish heat, the desperate, clawing need—all of it has receded, leaving behind a hollow, wrung-out emptiness.

And memory. Fragments of it. Arriving in pieces like delayed radio transmissions.

Kyle's hands shaking as he touched you. I'm only doin' this for you, babygirl. Johnny's mouth on you, hot and relentless. The sound he made against your thighs.

The shower. The water. Voices.

John.

Your eyes open wide and your body goes rigid, and the arm around your waist tightens reflexively. Ghost pulling you closer in his sleep, an unconscious response to a perceived threat, even though the threat is just you waking up and remembering.

You lie very still.

The flat is quiet. Early morning light edges around the curtains, pale and grey, and somewhere in the distance, you can hear the muffled sounds of the base waking up—vehicles, a distant shout, the rhythmic thud of boots on tarmac.

You don't move, don't speak. You stare at the wall and breathe and try to organise the wreckage in your head into something you can process.

Behind you, Ghost's breathing changes. Shifts from deep and even to something shallower, more aware. His arm tenses around you, a brief contraction of muscle, there and gone, and you know the exact moment he wakes up, because his entire body goes perfectly, absolutely still.

Neither of you says a word.

His hand is still tangled with yours against your bare chest. His thumb rests against your knuckle. But he doesn't pull away.

The silence stretches. Not uncomfortable, exactly. Heavy. Full of things that need to be said and won't be. Not now, certainly not yet, and maybe not ever. And there is a fragile, terrified understanding that what happened in this room changed the molecular structure of something that can never be unchanged.

Finally, after what feels like an hour but is probably two minutes, Ghost speaks.

"How do you feel?"

You consider the question. Really consider it, not the reflexive I'm fine that sits on your tongue out of habit.

"Like shit," you answer honestly. Your voice is wrecked, raspy, and it hurts to talk.

Then, so quietly you almost miss it, he answers, "Yeah."

His thumb moves once. A single, slow stroke across your knuckle.

Then he lets go of your hand, carefully disentangles himself from around you, and gets up without another word. You hear his boots being pulled back on. The soft click of the door.

You lie in the bed that smells like all four of them and none of yourself, and you stare at the wall, and you breathe.

The agony of being handled was too much. Gasping, you forced yourself up onto your elbows, but the sudden movement caused a fresh torrent of dark maroon liquid to pour from the wounds, pooling onto the table like a homicide scene.

You could only suck air through gritted teeth, a strangled groan catching in your throat as the pain spiked into something truly unbearable.

“Easy, soldier. Stay down, you’ve lost too much blood,” Ghost muttered, his heavy hands pressing firmly but carefully against your good shoulder to lay you back down.

All you could manage was a weak nod, biting your lip so hard it bled as a blur of hands moved frantically over your skin.

After what felt like a lifetime of agonizing pressure and burning needles, they finally retrieved the lodged bullets and stitched the ragged wounds closed.

Even with the bleeding stopped, you lacked the strength to move, choosing to remain flat on the makeshift operating table—utterly exhausted, but alive. The men refused to leave. They scattered to different corners of the room, their eyes locked on you with absolute vigilance, as if looking away for even a single second would mean losing you for good.

Against their best wishes, you forced yourself to sit up. You couldn't afford to lie there looking weak; you needed to get back on your feet as quickly as possible—not just for your own survival, but for the sake of the unit.

As you swung your legs over the edge of the table and pulled yourself upright, every man in the room perked up. But the look on their faces was strange, almost as if they were seeing something they shouldn't. In your haste, you hadn't realized—or frankly, cared—that you were still completely topless, save for the bloody bandages wrapped tightly around your torso.

The air in the room instantly shifted.

Ghost noticed first. He didn't say a word, his hidden gaze locking onto your chest, taking in your toned physique. He knew you were a woman, obviously, but seeing you stripped of all that bulky tactical gear was a stark reminder.

Soap was the next to notice. Following his Lieutenant's locked-in stare, his eyes landed on your exposed top half. A faint, involuntary smirk tugged at the corner of his mouth, but it was quickly replaced by the same awe-struck wonder.

Gaz and Price were stationed on the opposite side of the room. Even with your back facing them, the sight had a profound effect. To Price, you had always been like a daughter, much like the boys were his sons, albeit a bit of a tomboy. But seeing your bare back, the reality hit him; although your strength was undeniable, you were still so much smaller than any of them. Tiny. Fragile.

Gaz, meanwhile, could feel his face burning a deep crimson. He caught himself staring, frantically trying to look anywhere else in the room but at you—and failing miserably every single time.

You attempted to stand, your footing still terribly wobbly. But before you could even push yourself off the table, all four men moved in unison, jumping to your rescue. Large, heavy hands instantly anchored to your skin, handling you as if you were some sort of delicate ornament.

“Not so fast, soldier. You need to rest,” Price said, his hands gently but firmly forcing you back down.

“Captain, I’m fine,” you protested, though an involuntary wince escaped your lips at their slightest touch.

Price only shook his head, refusing to let you up. All four of them stood hovering over you, their expressions shifting into something they’d never dare admit out loud: pure, unadulterated desire.

You stared up at them from the table, your tired eyes darkening. There was something entirely unexplainable about the air in the room. Maybe it was the adrenaline of them saving your life, maybe it was the suffocating proximity between you and the unit, or maybe it was just the raw, animalistic shift in how they were looking at you.

They wanted to protect you, but you wanted to prove a point. You were not as fragile as they wanted you to be.

You locked eyes with Price as you reached down, unbuttoning your cargo pants and shifting to wiggle yourself free from them, your combat boots already discarded in the aftermath of the medical chaos. Price didn’t look away once. You lay there practically naked beneath their collective gaze, and the sudden, tense shift in the room was palpable as a familiar, heavy heat settled over all four of them. A familiar twitch in their boxers.

You pulled yourself upright once more, a sharp wince catching in your throat as the movement pulled at your fresh stitches.

“No,” you commanded, your voice low but unyielding as you pushed away the heavy hands attempting to force you back down.

As you sat up, you brought yourself level with their faces. Looking at them all, you reached out and grabbed Ghost’s hand. You stripped the heavy tactical glove from his fist and placed his bare palm directly over your breast, coaxing him to squeeze the soft tissue in his hand.

He obliged instantly. His gaze remained locked with yours, a low, gravelly groan escaping his throat as his fingers flexed, groping the soft flesh.

Soap and Gaz stood frozen, mouths slightly agape, looking between you and their Lieutenant as if trying to figure out if the sheer lack of sleep was causing them to hallucinate. You only smiled darkly in their direction.

Turning back to the Captain, you noted the tight, rigid set of his jaw as he stared into your eyes.

You took his hand next, guiding it to your other breast and coaxing him into the same heavy grip. Price didn’t hesitate; his fingers kneaded your skin, pinching your nipple ever so slightly and forcing a sharp, breathless moan from your lips.

“I’m not a little girl. I know what I’m doing, and I know what I want,” you said, your voice dripping with absolute certainty as you stared the Captain directly in the eye.

“And this is what I want.”

You motioned for Price to sit down, watching you. It was a silent agreement, an invitation for you to show him exactly what you meant.

Turning back to Ghost, you looked up at the hardened man, your eyes softening with genuine adoration.

“Simon, you saved my life. Let me make you feel good. It’s the least I can do,” you purred. Resting against him, you could feel his rigid erection pressing hard against your chest.

You noticed his initial hesitation, so you reached down and gripped his heavy bulge, palming him softly through his uniform. The contact elicited a low groan from deep in his chest as his head fell back in sheer pleasure.

“You don’t have to, dove. It’s okay,” he muttered, his protective instinct warring with his desire.

But you insisted, tightening your grip on his crotch as a slight pout formed on your lips. “Let me do this. Please,” you pleaded, looking up at him through your lashes. That single look was enough to completely break his resolve.

Without another word, Ghost carefully lifted you from the table, anchoring his large hands under you to situate you onto his lap. He was hyper-aware of your injuries, moving with a surprising gentleness to ensure he didn't cause you any pain.

Releasing his cock from his trousers, he kept his heavy hands steady on your hips. You shifted, pulling your soaked panties to the side to give him full access. As you slowly lowered yourself onto his length, you drew a sharp, sudden breath. So big.

“Are you okay?” he asked frantically, his dark eyes widening with instant concern.

“Y-yes... you’re just a l-little big, Si,” you breathed, letting out a weak laugh before forcing yourself down further. Your tight walls yielded to him, stretching until you sucked him in completely, bottoming out against him.

You began to ride him, your core clenching tightly around his thickness as you bounced weakly up and down on his lap. Despite your exhaustion, you were determined to show your gratitude. Simon’s hands immediately secured your waist, carefully avoiding your fresh stitches, while his other hand cupped your ass.

His heavy, dark eyes were locked onto your face, tracking every scrunched expression of pleasure.

“F-fuck, y-yeah,” you gasped, eyes squeezed shut as you rode your Lieutenant with everything you had left. The quiet room was suddenly filled with the heavy, unhurried sound of wet friction and your breathless mewls as your climax began to build.

“Such a good girl,” Simon breathed out, his own apex rapidly approaching. Feeling your thrusts begin to slow from exhaustion, he took over the momentum. He shifted your weight securely against him, anchoring you to his shoulders while he began bucking his hips upward into you.

“S-shit, I’m c-close,” you squealed as the tension finally snapped, sending you over the peak.

Your release was followed closely by the heavy, guttural grunts of your Lieutenant, his harsh, deep thrusts shuddering to a slow, rhythmic halt as he filled you.

You rode out the lingering waves of your high, your hips slowly gyrating back and forth as you threw your head back, arching your spine. Watching you tremble, Ghost brought his hand up to your breast, giving the soft flesh a heavy, teasing slap that made you gasp against his neck

“Jesus C-christ,” Gaz let out, his voice shaking. Witnessing you and his superior officer like that had left him utterly reeled—and burning with a desperate, heavy jealousy.

“Captain, surely—”

“It’s alright, Gaz,” Price interrupted smoothly. He fished a cigar from his heavy tactical vest and struck a match, blowing a thick, fragrant cloud of rich tobacco smoke into the room.

You only looked back at Gaz, your expression thoroughly dazed and dark with lingering pleasure as you slid off Simon’s cock.

You sauntered over to where Gaz was standing, your movements slow and deliberate.

Reaching up, you pulled the band free from your hair, letting the locks tumble down your shoulders. In an instant, the tomboy Sergeant they all knew had completely vanished. Gaz could only stare, swallowing hard as he fought a desire he had never wanted to admit out loud.

“I just want to make you feel good, that’s all,” you purred. You reached out and took his massive hand in yours, lifting it to your mouth. You slipped his fingers past your lips, sucking on them deliberately while looking up into his eyes with a raw, hungry need.

Gaz couldn’t even conjure words. He was completely mesmerized by the wicked contrast of your tongue lapping at his fingers, even while your wide eyes pinned him with the look of an innocent little bird.

With a soft pop, you let his fingers slide free and sank slowly to your knees.

Your hands made quick work of his belt and the buckles of his pants, freeing his raging erection from his boxers. You ran your tongue along the underside, starting from the heavy base right up to the swollen, sensitive tip. You pressed a gentle, lingering kiss right against the head, causing him to shudder violently from the faint touch.

You let out a soft giggle, entirely satisfied with how responsive he was to your mouth. Your tongue swirled around the tip, catching the bead of pre-cum that had begun to leak out.

Kyle’s hands instinctively found your hair, his fingers firmly burying themselves into your roots. You took him into your mouth, your cheeks hollowing as your head began to bob rhythmically up and down, taking in as much of his cock as you could manage.

“Holy shit,” he choked out, his knuckles turning white in your hair.

Before long, your steady pace wasn’t enough to satisfy the desperate edge he was feeling. Taking matters into his own hands, he firmly guided your head up and down his cock with a coarser, heavier tempo, his hips beginning to buck aggressively into your mouth.

Watching him unravel and feeling the raw pleasure you were causing him only made you ache, a fresh wave of juices slicking down your thighs as you sucked him off.

You could tell he was close when his thrusts turned sloppy and frantic. You hollowed your cheeks harder, taking him as deep into your throat as you could manage and letting out a low, vibrating moan.

The deep resonance of your throat was the final trigger he needed to break.

His thrusts slowed down to a heavy, shuddering halt as he hit his climax. The thick, white substance began to leak from the corner of your mouth, but you swallowed every single drop whole.

“Fuck,” he breathed out, completely breathless as he watched you hungrily drink him dry. When you finally pulled away from him, it was with a loud, wet pop.

You didn’t stop there. Leaning back in, you gave the tip a few slow, lingering kitten-licks, ensuring every last drop was savoured.

Before you could even catch your breath, you felt two strong hands heft you up and place you roughly back onto the table on your back.

You couldn’t help but wince, though a breathless laugh escaped your lips, knowing exactly who it was.

“Easy, Soap!” Ghost scolded, nearly having a heart attack at how carelessly the Sergeant was manhandling your injured frame.

“Sorry, L.T. Cannae wait, that’s all,” Soap retorted, flashing you a wicked wink as he unbuckled his trousers. Patience had never been his strong suit.

“At least someone isn’t afraid to break me,” you teased, throwing a pointed look toward both Simon and Gaz. They both rolled their eyes in response, but their attention remained entirely locked onto whatever you and Johnny were about to do next.

Sitting up, you met Johnny’s lips, making out with him messily. His hand wrapped firmly around your throat in a soft, possessive grip. Soap gently pushed you back down against the wood and began trailing a path of sloppy, wet kisses down your stomach, tracking lower and lower until he stopped right at your soaked heat.

“Been waiting to taste her, bonnie,” he purred, his hot breath tickling your already hyper-sensitive folds.

You could only whine in response. Without any further warning, Soap attacked your bud, sucking and slurping against you like a starving man who had never been fed. The intense friction brought loud, desperate mewls from your throat, and your hips instinctively bucked upward into his mouth, begging for more.

“Pretty girl, ain't she?” Soap teased the room, looking up for a split second before diving right back in. His tongue focused entirely on that sensitive bundle of nerves, and your hand flew up, burying your fingers into his mohawk to hold him close as he continued to eat you out.

“F-fuck, Soap... right there!”

Your praise only antagonised him further. His tongue licked the entire length of your cunt, unrelenting and heavy.

“I’m gonna c-cum!” you screeched, your hips bucking frantically. Anticipating the release, Soap slid two fingers deep inside, ruthlessly fucking your greedy hole while his tongue continued to attack your clit.

The room filled with heavy, wet sounds as you closed in on your climax. Soap hit that sweet spot over and over until you finally snapped, squirting heavily all over his mouth. He let out a muffled laugh, his mouth still firmly attached to you as he slurped up every last drop of your sweet release.

You lay there completely breathless, your mind entirely blank from the intensity of the orgasm.

“O-oh my God,” you weakly wheezed, your chest rising and falling heavily.

“That’s a good girl,” Soap muttered. He wasn't looking at your face, but rather down at your swollen, overstimulated cunt, thoroughly pleased with himself for the shatter you had just pulled from you.

Price had remained seated the entire time, thoroughly amused by your performance. Taking another deep drag of his cigar, his heavy eyes watched the absolute mess his Sergeant had become.

“Not bad.” A gravelly voice pulled you from your post-orgasmic bliss.

A dark, knowing smirk plastered itself across your face as you turned and made your way over to the Captain. Opting to crawl across the floor, you slid right between his legs, resting your cheek heavily against his massive bulge.

“What am I to do with you, hm?” he asked softly. His large, rough hand travelled to your cheek, stroking your skin with surprising endearment.

“Captain—”

“Shh.” You were quickly silenced as his thumb slipped past your lips, pressing into your mouth.

“Here I thought you were just one of the boys. How wrong I could have been,” he murmured, looking down into your eyes with a complex look—akin to a father who was both deeply rattled and intensely proud. “Come here.”

Price patted his lap. You didn’t even think twice before crawling upward, desperate and needy for your Captain’s validation.

“Such a good girl, hmm?”

You could only nod in response, feeling like absolute putty in his hands. This side of you truly did something to him. He was so used to seeing the battle-hardened soldier; seeing you this eager for his touch, this desperate for his approval, was utterly intoxicating.

Before you could process the heat, he spun you around until your back was flush against his chest. Freeing his rigid cock from his trousers, he lifted you by the hips and lowered you straight down onto him.

You winced again, the sudden movement tugging at your fresh stitches while the sheer size of him stretched your walls to their absolute limit. But you bit down hard on your lip, refusing to show a single shred of hesitation.

“That’s it, baby,” Price quietly praised against your ear.

He immediately began bucking upward from behind. With your back flush against his chest, every deep, heavy thrust buried him all the way to your cervix, sending white-hot waves of pleasure radiating throughout your entire body.

Price pressed soft, lingering kisses along the slope of your neck as you melted completely into his touch, his gravelly voice whispering absolute sweet nothings into your ear while he single-handedly ruined your tired cunt.

It didn’t take long for the others to get hard again. The sight of you completely fucked out, getting railed thoroughly by the Captain, sent their own cocks throbbing. Without a word, Ghost, Soap, and Gaz began to jerk themselves off right then and there, their eyes completely glued to the sight.

“C-captain,” you whined out, feeling a dangerous wave of overstimulation creep up on you.

“Shh, you’re doing so good, baby. So good,” he cooed. His hand snaked down between your thighs, finding your swollen, slick nub and rubbing agonizingly perfect circles against it to force you over the edge.

You instinctively tried to arch away from the overwhelming sensation, but his grip on your hips was ironclad. He held you firmly in place, forcing you to take every single ounce of the pleasure he was giving. His thrusts grew rougher, the tempo turning fast and relentless as his hips bucked into you. Both of you were right on the precipice.

“FUCK!” you screeched, the tight knot in your stomach coiling hard before completely releasing, your walls clamping down violently all over your Captain’s cock.

Price wasn’t far behind. With a final, deep surge and a rough, guttural moan, he released his own hot seed deep inside you.

As you finally came back down from your high, your heavy eyelids fluttered open. You watched as the other three members of the team finally came into their own hands, pushed over the edge by watching you reach your nth orgasm of the night. A twisted, deeply satisfied smile crossed your swollen lips.

The bond forged in that room from that night onward was something infinitely stronger—something neither you nor the men could ever begin to describe to outsiders. But it didn't matter. No one else needed to understand the unspoken rule of what you all shared.

-

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-

-

-

The way he said it, so casual, so dismissive, should have made you shut your mouth. Instead, it acted like gasoline on a fire. "Maybe," you retorted, trying for bravado and landing somewhere in the vicinity of pathetic. "What's it to you, anyway?"

He set the rifle down with deliberate slowness, the clatter of metal on wood sounding like a gunshot in the small room. He pushed off the wall and crossed the space in two long strides. He was a tower of muscle and barely contained violence, and you were suddenly aware of how small the bed was and how close he was.

"You sound like a bloody teenager," he rumbled, his voice low and dark. "It's just a fuck. It's not a holy grail."

And that's when it happened. The words tumbled out, a drunken, shameful confession that you couldn't claw back even if you tried. "Well, maybe I wouldn't know, would I?"

The air in the room changed, going from thick with tension to frozen solid. Simon stared at you, his expression unreadable, but you saw the flicker of surprise, the slow-dawning realization, and the subtle shift in his posture.

"Say that again," he commanded, his voice quiet, cutting through the whiskey haze.

You shook your head, a wave of intense heat rushing to your face, your stomach twisting with a mortification so acute you thought you might be sick. "Forget it," you mumbled, trying to look anywhere but at him.

He crouched down in front of you, bringing his face level with yours. His gloved hand reached out, tipping your chin up, forcing you to meet his gaze. Those eyes were searching, dissecting you.

"You're a virgin." It wasn't a question. It was a statement of fact, delivered with a kind of breathless awe that was somehow worse than mockery.

"Shut up," you hissed, trying to jerk your head away, but his grip was firm. The shame was a living thing inside you, clawing at your throat. You felt exposed and raw, like he'd peeled back your skin and found something soft underneath.

He let go of your chin, but he didn't move away. He just stared, his mind clearly working behind those dark eyes. You expected him to laugh, to call you a kid, or to tell you to get the fuck over it. Instead, he said something that shattered you completely.

"You want me to fuck you."

It wasn't a question either. It was the most terrifying, exhilarating statement you'd ever heard. Your denial was automatic, a knee-jerk reaction to the unbearable vulnerability. "No! I didn't say that. I just..." You trailed off, because what could you say? You did. You wanted it so badly it hurt. You wanted him. The terrifying, scarred, lethal man who now knew your most private secret.

His lips quirked into a ghost of a smile. It wasn't mocking; it was hungry. "You're a shit liar," he murmured. He leaned in closer, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper that made your skin pebble. "Is that why you've been lookin' at me like a lost puppy? Hoping I'd bend you over and show you the ropes?"

The crude, direct language sent a jolt straight to your core. You squeezed your thighs together, a pathetic attempt to relieve the sudden, throbbing ache. "Fuck you, Simon," you whispered, but it sounded weak and breathless.

"That's the idea, sweetheart."

So it had started as a joke, a stupid, whiskey-fueled slip-up that you'd both tried to bury under layers of snark and forced professionalism. For a few days, it was like a bizarre, unspoken truce. He didn't mention it, and you tried to pretend you hadn't basically offered up your virginity on a silver platter. You trained harder, kept your head down, and avoided his eyes like they were the abyss.

But the world had shifted on its axis, and you couldn't unsee it.

You started noticing things. The way his t-shirt stretched across his chest when he reached for a high shelf, the fabric straining over the solid muscle of his shoulders. The way his tactical gloves creaked when he balled his fists. The scent of him that seemed to linger in the air long after he'd left a room.

His eyes were the worst. Before, his stares had been assessing and analytical. Now, they were heavy, weighted with a new kind of intent. You'd feel them on you during a briefing, a heated, lingering sweep from your boots to your face that made your breath catch and your cunt throb. He was looking at you like he was picturing you naked, and the constant, low-level humiliation of your secret acted as a toxic aphrodisiac.

He was harder on you, too. His critiques in the field were more cutting, his expectations higher. He'd push you during PT until your lungs burned and your muscles screamed, his voice a low, relentless bark in your ear. "Again, Sergeant. Is that all you've got?" It felt like a punishment, or maybe a test, and every time you pushed through it, you felt a flicker of pride, followed by the hot rush of imagining what he'd do to you if you really impressed him.

The tension coiled tighter and tighter, a wire vibrating at a frequency only you and he could feel. It was only a matter of time before it snapped.

It was a normal enough afternoon. The whole team was sprawled in the common room, the low hum of the TV and Price's cigar smoke filling the space. Johnny was recounting some wild story about a bar fight in Prague, his voice boisterous and animated. You were trying to laugh, trying to be normal, but all you could feel was Simon's presence on the other side of the room. He was leaning against the wall, arms crossed, a beer bottle in his hand. He wasn't looking at you, he was looking at Johnny, but you could feel his attention like a physical touch.

Then Johnny, the glorious, oblivious bastard, said something that twisted the knife.

"Aye, but you know what it's like, Si," he said, grinning. "Sometimes you just gotta get in there, get the job done, no matter how tight the fit is. Am I right?"

A beat of silence. Your heart stopped. Simon's eyes, slow and deliberate, slid from Johnny to you. The corner of his mouth twitched. "Yeah, Johnny," he said, his voice a low, gravelly drawl that seemed to be directed only at you. "Sometimes you just have to be patient. Make sure they're ready before you... make your move."

Johnny laughed, clapping Gaz on the back. "See? The man's a poet."

But you weren't hearing it. Your blood was roaring in your ears. He was going to tell them. The paranoia, the toxic cocktail of shame and fear, exploded in your chest. He was going to expose you, right here, in front of everyone. He'd tell them you were some pathetic virgin who'd begged for it, and they'd all laugh, and you'd have to leave the task force.

Your chair scraped against the floor as you stood up, your movements sharp and jerky. "I need some air," you mumbled, not meeting anyone's eyes.

You didn't make it two steps before Simon's voice stopped you. "Sergeant. A word."

Your stomach dropped. You turned to see him pushing off the wall, his expression unreadable. He mystic jerked his head towards the hallway. "Now."

The others were already back to their conversation, but you felt their curious glances as you followed him out of the room and down the hall, your boots feeling heavier with every step. He pushed open the door to his quarters and you followed him inside, the door clicking shut behind you with a terrifying finality.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?" you hissed, the words tearing out of you the second the door was closed. "Are you going to tell them? Just get it over with and humiliate me, you bastard!"

He turned to face you, his eyebrows raised in genuine surprise. "Tell them? What the hell are you on about?"

"Don't play dumb!" you shot back, your voice cracking. "You're going to tell them I'm a... that I'm... that I don't know what the fuck I'm doing!"

His face softened just a fraction. The anger bled out of him, replaced by something that looked uncomfortably like pity. "Jesus," he muttered, running a hand over his masked face. "I'm not going to tell them anything. That's your business, not mine."

"Then why are you looking at me like that?" you demanded, your breath catching in your throat. "Why are you always fucking looking at me?"

"Because you're driving me fucking insane," he ground out, taking a step towards you. "I'm trying to give you space, trying to be a fuckin' gentleman, and you're over here thinking I'm about to announce your sexual history to the whole squad?"

The sheer absurdity of it, the relief mixed with the lingering fear, was too much. The words you'd been holding back for weeks finally burst free. "Just fuck me and get it over with!" you blurted out, the words sounding pathetic even to your own ears. "Just do it so I can stop thinking about it!"

He stared at you, his chest rising and falling with a deep, controlled breath. The silence stretched, thick and heavy. Then he spoke, his voice quiet, cold, and utterly commanding.

"No."

Your heart plummeted. "What?"

"I said no." He took another step closer, crowding you, his presence overwhelming.

You stammered, your brain short-circuiting. "I-I don't understand. You... you want to, don't you?"

His eyes flashed, a dark fire igniting in their depths. "Wanting to and fucking you are two different things, Sergeant. I'm not going to take your virginity because you're having a fuckin' panic attack. You'll wait."

"Wait?"

"You'll wait until you're sure. Until you can ask me properly." His gaze dropped to your mouth, then back up, his voice dropping to a low, dangerous purr. "And you'll ask me in my bed, after everyone's asleep. Then, and only then, I'll consider it."

The shift in power was dizzying. He wasn't rejecting you; he was setting the terms. And God help you, you wanted to agree to every single one.

"Okay," you whispered, your voice trembling.

He tilted his head, a gesture of both command and curiosity. "Okay, what?" His gaze was piercing, demanding.

You swallowed hard, your mouth suddenly dry. The old shame was there, but it was being drowned out by a new, more powerful feeling: a desperate, clawing need to please him. You sank to your knees on the cold, hard floor of his room, the movement feeling both shameful and right. You looked up at him, your heart pounding against your ribs.

"Please, Simon," you whispered, the words barely audible. "Please... fuck me."

A slow, satisfied smile spread across his face, visible even around the mask. He reached out and cupped your cheek, his thumb stroking your skin with a surprising tenderness.

"Good girl," he murmured. "Now get up and go back to the others. Act normal. I'll see you later."

You didn't remember much of the rest of the evening. You sat through the briefing, you ate dinner, you even managed a few stilted laughs at Johnny's jokes. But all of it was a blur, the background noise to the roaring in your head. You were going to Simon's room tonight. The thought was a live wire in your stomach, sparking terror and anticipation in equal measure.

Hours later, the base was quiet. The hallway was deserted, the only light coming from the red glow of the emergency exit signs. You moved like a ghost, your bare feet silent on the linoleum as you made your way to his door. You didn't knock. You just turned the handle and slipped inside.

He was waiting for you. He was sitting on the edge of the bed, his mask illuminated by the single lamp on his bedside table. He'd taken off his tac vest, leaving him in just a tight-fitting black t-shirt and his cargo pants. He looked human, and terrifyingly sexy.

"Lock the door," he said, his voice soft but firm.

You did, the click of the lock sounding like a gunshot. You turned back to him, your body thrumming with nervous energy. And then you noticed the room. It was different. The usually stark, military-neat space was softened. The bed had clean, crisp sheets on it. And there were candles, a few simple tea lights flickering on the windowsill and the dresser, casting a warm, gentle glow over the room.

"You... lit candles," you said, your voice small.

"I wanted you to be comfortable," he said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. He patted the space on the bed next to him. "Come here."

You went, your legs feeling unsteady. You sat down, a careful distance between you, your hands twisting in your lap. He didn't rush you. He just watched you, his dark eyes patient.

"You don't have to do this," he said quietly. "If you've changed your mind"

"I haven't," you said, a little too quickly. "I want this. I want... you."

He nodded slowly. "Good." He reached out and took one of your restless hands, his grip warm and steady. "We'll go slow. We'll go as slow as you need. And you tell me to stop if you want to stop. Understand?"

You nodded, your throat tight. "I understand."

He leaned in, and for the first time, you thought he was going to kiss you. But he just pressed his forehead against yours, a gesture so unexpectedly tender it made your eyes sting. His hand came up to cup your cheek, his thumb brushing your skin.

"Relax," he murmured. "Let me take care of you."

Then he did kiss you. It was nothing like you'd imagined. It was slow, soft, exploring. His lips were warm and firm against yours, and the fact that you could feel them, that the mask didn't cover them, made it incredibly intimate. You gasped against his mouth, and he took the opportunity to deepen the kiss, his tongue sweeping out to taste you. He tasted like mint and the faint, bitter hint of coffee, and it was the most intoxicating thing you'd ever experienced.

You kissed him back with a clumsy, desperate enthusiasm, your hands coming up to clutch at his t-shirt. He let you, his own hands moving to your waist, guiding you. He pulled you closer, until you were half in his lap, and you could feel the solid, hard plane of his chest against yours.

"Simon," you breathed against his lips, his name a prayer on your tongue.

"Shhh," he soothed, his hands sliding under your shirt. His fingers were calloused, rough against the soft skin of your back, and you shivered at the sensation. "Just feel."

He kissed his way down your jaw, to your neck, his lips and tongue tracing a path that made you arch into him. He pulled your shirt over your head, his eyes drinking in the sight of you in your simple cotton bra. He reached around and unhooked it with practiced ease, letting it fall away.

"Fuck, you're beautiful," he groaned, his hands coming up to cover your breasts, his thumbs brushing over your nipples. The praise, so sincere, so raw, sent a bolt of heat straight to you. You'd been so focused on your own inexperience, you hadn't considered that he might actually want this, want you, with the same desperate hunger.

He laid you back on the bed, his body hovering over yours, and continued his exploration. He kissed every inch of your exposed skin, his touch reverent. He was taking his time, so much time, working you up with a maddening slowness that had you writhing beneath him.

He started kissing your tits, his mouth hot and wet as he closed his lips around one nipple, flicking it with his tongue. The sensation was electric. And in your head, the old, ugly thought surfaced: He's done this a hundred times. He knows exactly what he's doing, and you're just another body in his bed. The thought made you squirm, a mix of jealousy and insecurity twisting your gut.

He must have felt the change in you, because he pulled back, his eyes searching your face. "What is it?" he asked. "Talk to me."

"I just..." you couldn't say it. It was too embarrassing. But he just waited, his gaze patient and unwavering. "I just... I know you've done this before. With people who know what they're doing."

A slow, dangerous smile spread across his face. "Yeah, I have," he said, his voice a low, dark rumble. "And do you know what I've learned?" He leaned down, his lips brushing against the shell of your ear. "I've learned that nothing is hotter than watching someone fall apart for the first time. I've learned that I fucking love being the one to make it happen."

He moved down your body, his hands hooking into the waistband of your pants. "I'm going to eat your pussy now," he stated, his tone leaving no room for argument. "And you're going to let me hear every single sound you make. No holding back. Understand?"

You nodded, your breath coming in short, shallow pants. He pulled your pants and underwear down in one go, leaving you completely bare to him. He settled between your thighs, his broad shoulders pushing them apart. He looked up at you, his eyes locked on yours as he slowly lowered his head.

The first touch of his tongue on your cunt was like a lightning strike. You cried out, your hands flying to his hair, your back arching off the bed. He groaned against you, the vibration sending shockwaves through your body.

"Fuck, you're wet," he rasped, his tongue lapping at you with long, slow strokes. "So fuckin' wet for me."

He ate you out with a devastating skill, his tongue finding your clit with unerring accuracy, circling and sucking until you were a whimpering, moaning mess. You could feel his spit mixing with your own slickness, the obscene, wet sounds filling the room.

While he worked, his hands found yours, his fingers lacing through yours, pinning them to the mattress on either side of your hips. It was an anchor, a connection in the midst of the overwhelming pleasure. He held your gaze, letting you watch him, his eyes dark with lust as he showed you exactly what his tongue was doing to your swollen, aching clit.

"Tell me how it feels," he commanded, his voice muffled against your flesh. "Talk to me."

"It feels... so good," you gasped, your nails digging into the backs of his hands. "Your tongue... fuck, Simon, don't stop."

His grip on your hands tightened, a silent acknowledgment of your plea. Your pussy was burning, a deep, throbbing ache that demanded more. You felt a fullness in your belly, a tightening coil of pleasure that was wound so tight it was almost painful.

He slid a finger inside you, then another, curling them just right. The stretch was intense, a dull burn that quickly melted into pleasure. He was watching your face, reading your every reaction, ensuring you were with him every step of the way.

"You're taking my fingers so well," he praised, his voice thick with arousal. "Look at that. So fuckin' tight." He pumped his fingers in and out of his mouth, his tongue still working your clit.

The dirty talk, the sight of him between your legs, the feel of his fingers and tongue, it was too much. The coil in your belly snapped, and your orgasm crashed over you in a blinding wave. You came with a loud, broken moan, your thighs clamping around his head as he worked you through it, drawing out every last shatter of pleasure.

He finally released you, crawling back up your body and kissing you deeply, letting you taste yourself on his lips. You could feel his erection, a hard thick line pressing against your thigh, and you were suddenly desperate to feel it, to feel Ghost.

You reached down, your hand palming his cock through his pants. He hissed, his hips jerking involuntarily. You wanted to make him feel as good as he'd made you feel. You wanted to show him how desperate you really were.

You pushed at his shoulders, surprising him. He let you roll him over, until you were straddling his thighs. You quickly undid his belt and fly, freeing his cock. It was even more intimidating up close, long, thick, and flushed dark red at the tip. A bead of pre glistened there, and you leaned down, licking it off on a whim.

"Fuck," he groaned, his head falling back against the pillow.

You looked up at him, your eyes wide. "Show me," you whispered. "Show me how you like it."

His eyes snapped open, dark with lust. He wrapped his hand around his cock, stroking it slowly from base to tip. "Like this," he said, his voice strained. "Spit on it."

You did, your saliva glistening on the head. He used it as lube, his fist moving in a smooth, steady rhythm. You watched, utterly mesmerized, as he pleasured himself.

"Your turn," he grunted.

You replaced his hand with yours, your grip tentative at first. You mimicked his movements, and he let out a low, encouraging sound. "Yeah, just like that, love. Tighter. Squeeze the head when you get to the top."

You followed his instructions, your confidence growing with every groan you elicited from him. He was leaking steadily now, his pre-cum making your hand slick.

You leaned down and flicked your tongue over the head again, tasting the bitter saltiness of him. He twitched in your hand, a guttural sound escaping his lips. Emboldened, you took him into your mouth, just the tip at first, swirling your tongue around him. The taste, the feel of him on your tongue, the power of having this strong, dangerous man at your mercy, it was intoxicating.

"Jesus, fuck," he gasped, his hand flying to your hair, not to guide you, but just to hold on. "You're gonna make me come, you little minx."

You smiled around his cock, a surge of feminine pride washing over you. You cupped his balls, rolling them gently in your hand, marveling at the weight of them. You even ran your fingers through the coarse, dark hair at the base of his cock, finding the fact that he was unshaven, so naturally and undeniably male, incredibly hot.

"Christ, stop looking at me like that," he groaned. "You're gonna make me blow my load before I even get inside you."

You pulled off him with a wet pop, grinning. "Sorry."

"You're not," he said, sitting up and kissing you hard. He flipped you over again, pinning you beneath him.

He reached over to the bedside table, grabbing a condom and ripping it open. He rolled it on with practiced efficiency, his eyes never leaving yours. He positioned himself at your entrance, the head of his cock nudging against you.

"Last chance," he said, his voice serious. "Tell me to stop."

"Don't you dare," you breathed, your legs wrapping around his hips, pulling him closer.

He pushed forward, slowly, so slowly, the stretch immense. You gasped, your hands clutching at his shoulders. It burned, but it was a good burn, a sign of the connection you were making. He paused, letting you adjust, his forehead pressed against yours.

"You're doin' so good," he murmured, his voice strained. "So fuckin' good. Just breathe."

You did, and as you did, he slid in deeper, inch by incredible inch, until he was seated fully inside you. The feeling of fullness was absolute, overwhelming. He was so deep, so much a part of you, it brought tears to your eyes.

He kissed them away, his lips gentle. "You okay?" he asked, his voice thick with emotion.

You nodded, unable to speak. He started to move, his thrusts shallow and slow. He held your hand, his fingers interlaced with yours, anchoring you as he began to fuck you. It was nothing like you'd imagined. It wasn't frantic or rough. It was deep, intimate, and devastatingly slow. He kissed your neck, your collarbone, your breasts, his lips worshipping your body as his cock worshipped your cunt.

You could tell he was holding back, his body trembling with the effort of not pounding into you. His thrusts were angled perfectly, stimulating a spot inside you that you didn't even know existed. The pressure built again, a slow, rising tide of pleasure that was even more intense than the first.

"That's it," he panted in your ear. "I can feel you gettin' tighter. Are you gonna come on my cock, sweetheart? Gonna come all over me?"

His words, combined with the relentless, perfect pressure, sent you over the edge again. You came with a silent cry, your inner walls clenching around him, your body shaking with the force of it.

"Fuck, yes," he groaned, his rhythm finally faltering. "I can feel you comin'. So fuckin' hot. So goddamn perfect." He slammed into you once, twice, three more times, and then he was coming with a hoarse shout, his cock pulsing inside you as he filled the condom.

He collapsed on top of you, his weight a welcome, heavy blanket. You lay there, tangled together, your breathing slowly syncing up as you came down from the high. After a long moment, he rolled off you, disposing of the condom before pulling you back into his chest.

You were silent, your mind reeling. You felt different. Changed. The shame, the insecurity, it was all gone, replaced by a deep, bone-deep satisfaction.

Simon pressed a kiss to the top of your head. "Stay," he murmured, his voice already heavy with sleep.

You didn't need to be asked twice. You cuddled closer, your head on his chest, listening to the steady beat of his heart. In the morning, things would be different. But for tonight, in the warm, candlelit glow of his room, you were exactly where you were supposed to be.

The only thing more shocking than the fact that you'd just lost your virginity to Simon 'Ghost' Riley was the realization that you wanted to do it again. And again.

The first few days after were a weird, hazy blur. You moved through your training exercises on autopilot, your body aching in places you didn't know could ache. A deep, pleasant soreness that was a constant, throbbing reminder of the way he'd felt inside you, the way he'd held you, the sounds he'd made. Every time you caught sight of him across the compound, a dark, imposing figure against the grey concrete, a jolt of heat would shoot straight to your core.

You expected things to be awkward. You'd braced yourself for smirks from Johnny or a pointed, knowing look from Gaz. But there was nothing. Simon was the consummate professional on the field, his commands sharp, his demeanor as unreadable as ever. If anything, he was a little more distant, a little more controlled, as if he was holding himself back with a supreme effort. And Johnny just thought you were hungover.

That first night back in the safety of your own room, you'd slid your hand into your panties and touched yourself, trying to replicate the devastating pleasure he'd given you. It was useless. Your own fingers were a poor substitute for the thick, insistent stretch of his cock, the expert roll of his hips. You came, but it was a hollow, fleeting thing, and it only made you miss him more.

It took three days of this simmering tension before you snapped. You were in the gym, pounding away your frustration on the treadmill, when he walked in. He was wearing a tight-fitting black tank top and sweatpants, his hair damp from a shower. He didn't look at you, just gave a curt nod and headed for the weights. But you saw the way his jaw ticked, the way his hands flexed at his sides.

You hit the stop button on the treadmill, the machine's whine cutting through the quiet hum of the room. "My room," you said, your voice sounding more confident than you felt. "Ten minutes."

He didn't even turn around. "I have a briefing."

"You'll be quick," you retorted, a sharp heat rising in your chest. You saw his shoulders shake with a silent, dark laugh before he gave you a single, sharp nod.

You were waiting for him, your heart pounding when your door creaked open. He slipped inside, closing and locking it behind him with the same quiet efficiency he did everything. He didn't say a word. He just crossed the room, cupped your face in his hands, and kissed you.

It wasn't sweet or slow this time. It was a kiss born of days of frustrated denial. His tongue was in your mouth immediately, claiming, possessing, and you met him with equal desperation. You clawed at his tank top, pulling it over his head, and he did the same to yours, his hands rough and impatient on your skin.

"Couldn't stop thinking about you," he growled against your lips, backing you towards the bed. "About this tight little body. About how you felt squeezing my cock."

His filthy words sent a rush of wetness between your thighs. You whimpered, your hands scrambling for the button of his pants. He shoved his trousers down, kicking them away, and then he was on you again, his naked, scarred chest pressing you into the mattress. He was already hard, his cock heavy against your stomach.

Si was tearing at your pants, and you lifted your hips to help him, kicking them away along with your panties. He was between your thighs in a second, his cock nudging at your entrance. You felt the tear of a condom packet and you grabbed his wrist, stopping him.

"Don't," you said, your voice breathless.

He stilled, his eyes searching yours. "You sure?"

"I'm on the pill," you rushed out. "And I trust you. I just... I need to feel all of you. Please, Simon."

He stared at you for a long, tense moment, something raw and vulnerable flashing in his eyes. Then he crushed his mouth to yours, the condom forgotten. He pushed into you in one long, smooth stroke, and the sensation was overwhelming. No thin barrier, just the hot, silky feel of him, every vein, every ridge. He was so deep, so impossibly deep, you could feel him everywhere.

"Fuck," you gasped, your head falling back. "You feel so good."

He set a brutal pace, his hips snapping against yours, the bed creaking in protest. "You feel like fuckin' heaven," he gritted out, his face buried in your neck. "So wet, so bloody tight for me."

You wanted more. You needed to be in control, to set the pace, to take what you needed. You pushed against his chest, and he let you roll him over with surprising ease. You straddled his hips, his cock still buried deep inside you, and braced your hands on his chest.

The sight of him below you was breathtaking. His chest was heaving, his muscles tensed, his eyes fixed on you with a burning intensity. And his mask, it had shifted slightly during the tussle, riding low on his nose, revealing more of his face than you'd ever seen. The sharp cut of his jaw, the curve of his mouth, the scar there. He looked wild, untamed.

You started to move, rising and falling on his cock, setting a rhythm that had you both moaning. His hands found your hips, then slid down to grip your ass, his fingers digging into the flesh as he guided you, helping you take him deeper.

"Simon," you panted, your head lolling back. "I can't... I can't stop thinking about you. You've done this to me. I'm obsessed."

His grip on your ass tightened, his eyes blazing. "Yeah?" he rasped, his voice strained. "Tell me what you're thinking about, sweetheart."

"Thinking about how full you make me," you whimpered, feeling another orgasm coil low in your belly. "How you stretch me so good. Si, please... please don't stop filling me up."

That was what broke him. With a groan, he sat up, wrapping his arms around you and crushing you to his chest. His mouth was on your neck, sucking and biting as he drove up into you, meeting your downward thrusts with powerful, desperate strokes of his own.

His mask was pushed down further, and you turned your head, your lips finding the corner of his mouth, kissing the scarred skin there. "You feel so good, LT," you whispered in his ear. "So fuckin' good inside me."

He came with a roar, his hips jerking erratically as he emptied himself inside you, the hot, thick flood of his cum triggering your own release. You came with a silent scream, your whole body clenching around him, milking him for every last drop. You collapsed against his chest, both of you slick with sweat, trembling with the aftershocks.

For a long time, neither of you spoke. You just held each other, your breathing slowly returning to normal. He was still inside you, softening but not gone, a warm, comforting presence. He reached up and gently adjusted his mask, pulling it back into place. The intimacy of the gesture, the quiet trust it implied, made your heart ache.

"Now you stay the night," you murmured into his neck, not a question, but a statement.

He didn't answer. He just held you tighter, and that was answer enough. You knew, with a certainty that this was no longer just about getting rid of your virginity. This was something else entirely.

Caine’s constant adventures were finally starting to catch up to you. Every new spectacle, every wild detour- it all left you running on fumes. So when Zooble quietly offered the idea of hiding away for a while to avoid the next, the idea itself sounded almost too good to resist.

You didn’t even bother replying; just a simple nod was enough for them to take your hand and lead you away.

The adventures you’d been through still buzz uncomfortably in your digital mind. In the real world, it would’ve taken two years and a few thousands worth of therapy to even begin untangling what you’d seen. But after everything- the adventures, creatures and Abstractions… you’re not sure even therapy would even help at this point. Which is why Zooble’s concerned tone catches you off guard.

“Hey. Where’d you go?”

You’re perched inside a gigantic flower pot, hanging from one of the circus’s walls suspended by rope. You wobble, fingers curling against the digital ceramic edge for balance. The circus looks small and sort of cartoonish from far away, like it didn’t finish rendering.

You shrug, “Just thinking.”

Zooble tuts, shifting to sit beside you. “Could’ve fooled me.”

You have no idea how they do it, but even with no real face or features, they still manage to project their usual grumpiness when you look over at them, even more so when one of their limbs literally pops out of its socket.

“Hey,” Zooble says, picking up their arm, “You can always talk to me, you know.”

You nod with a soft hum and lean forward to get a better look at the checkered tiles below, “We’re pretty high up.”

Zooble’s eyes scan you over and the arm still attached to their body thunks against your back in what you think is meant to be reassurance, “Yeah, well, unfortunately for us, it’s not like we’ll really die if we fall.”

You hold Zooble’s gaze for a moment before turning away, chin on the heel of your hand. You lean back slightly into it, eyes drifting up to the circus ceiling above without really settling on anything.

Zooble doesn’t push. They just watch you for a second and shift a bit closer along the rim. The pot dips slightly.

Your hand slips to them without thinking, catching at their side to steady yourself. They pause at the contact, then their hand comes up to your side, holding you there like it’s the obvious thing to do.

“…You ever think about it?” They ask, quieter this time.

“About what?”

“Getting out. Or Abstracting.”

You let out a small breath, “Do any of us not think about those two things all the time?”

Zooble lifts a shoulder in a small shrug, like it doesn’t really matter either way, “True.” Their zig-zaggy antennae twitch in a short, uneven pulse before settling again, like something in their head is still catching up. “If we ever find a way out, would you-“

THUNK.

Zooble’s eyes scrunch in confusion as they look down at the arm laying limp at their feet.

“…Give me a second.”

You spare a little eye roll before turning to rest your cheek against the rim. From up here, you can see Jax and Pomni wandering below; just tiny digital explorers in a wacky world.

Pomni’s pinwheel eyes flick left and right, darting between the purple menace strolling along beside her and the painted walls of the circus.

Zooble’s arm detaches again- just as they’d managed to cram it back into its socket. They fumble with it for a second, but it plummets, landing straight in front of the pair below.

“@#%!.” They hiss, leaning over, “Can you toss that back up here?”

Jax tilts his head back, yellow grin stretching wider, “Making good use of your parts gimmick, huh? Can’t say I blame you.”

“What are you talking about?” Zooble snaps, while Jax does that thing where he somehow manages to wiggle his nonexistent eyebrows. His gaze drifts between the two of you and the implication seems to land. Zooble’s remaining arm swings out on instinct, swatting the empty distance between them, “Oh, shut up,” they bark, rolling a mismatched eye.

You peek a little further over the pot's edge and Jax’s yellow fingers flutter in a wave, “Heya, Y/N! Don’t fall, m’kay?”

Pomni raises a gloved hand to wave up at you, voice all wobbly, “So, what are you guys doing up there?”

“Hiding from Caine.” Zooble answers simply, gesturing at the pot with their only arm, “He’s planning some in-house adventure, and we don’t want to be a part of it.”

When they motion towards you, it earns you a courteous half-pat on your back. The touch numbs your mind a little.

While Zooble distracts Pomni with their complaining, Jax takes the opportunity to edge a little bit closer, voice low. “Pssst. Hey, c’mere,” He pats his skinny thighs in invitation, palms open. A jolt vibrates up your belly when he chuckles, “Come onnnn. You trust me?”

The rope sways.

Truth is, even though you’re used to Jax being deceptively sweet and gentle, you’d consider yourself above being fooled by him now… but you hesitate.

Curiosity takes over, and you lift a leg over the edge, testing your weight.

Zooble’s arm catches your wrist, yanking you back into the confines of the pot like a wacky looking claw machine.

“Not happening.” Zooble cuts in sharply, glaring down at Jax. Jax only returns it- it’s a silent standoff.

Across the room, you catch Pomni’s pinwheel eyes and your look basically says ‘see what I have to deal with?’ She can only offer you a helpless, sympathetic shrug.

It’s always like this. There’s always been someone vying for your attention here. With Zooble and Jax, though, the tension always ran too hot.

Saying it never ends well would be an understatement.

“Caine’s been checking on my room lately. Last time Y/N slept over, he started singing ‘Daisy Bell’ right outside my door. It woke us up. It’s creepy.”

You hum in agreement and Pomni gasps at that, voice shrinking to a murmur as she glances up at Jax, “Does he really do that?”

Jax’s grin falters barely, but enough to notice. His gaze flicks up from you to Zooble, before his pupils expand wide.

“I dunno,” He says, “Let’s ask him.”

Zooble’s entire body tenses, eyes darting up as if to say ‘don’t you dare’.

But Jax only cups his hands around his grin and hollers, “Oh, Caineee!”

Zooble groans, “#@!%hole.”

With a sudden swoosh, Caine zips into view, “Yes, Jax?”

Jax points up, “Look, it’s Y/N!” Then less enthusiastically, “And Zooble.”

Zooble’s reply is barely audible but blisteringly heartfelt, “$@!% you.”

Despite floating midair, Caine manages to spin on his heel. You wave down at him. He’d probably be beaming up at you if it were physically possible for him.

“There you two are...” He declares, “Now I don’t have to do the snap-summon thing!”

He snaps his gloved fingers anyway and the flower pot shatters beneath your feet. Gravity takes over, sending both you and Zooble tumbling.

You both faceplant with sounds that should not exist in nature.

“I’m glad I found you! We need even numbers, because today’s adventure is a-” His voice swells theatrically, “Team adventure! Meet you all at the stage in… let’s say, five-point-seven minutes!”

He vanishes in a puff of white smoke and Zooble groans from the ground next to you, finally pushing their upper half onto their elbows as you help gather parts back together.

“Great,” They mutter, glaring up at Jax, “You didn’t even ask him about the singing thing.”

Jax blinks, “The what?”

You all have to shield your eyes as lights flare overhead. Bubble wobbles beside Caine, trembling under the weight of a bulky camera almost double his size.

Bubble squeaks, little form bobbing unevenly, “This is so heavy.”

“That’s right, Bubble!” Caine pats the camera, “After seeing you all play Batball, we need to invent our own sporting events! Behold: the Caine Leagues!”

“Help me, Caine-”

“Cheerleading was fun.” You tell the nearest person to you, who just so happens to be Kinger. He straightens up beside you with a yelp.

Caine swoons dramatically like some overworked actor, “At least someone appreciates my efforts.”

Your shoulders draw in just slightly, trying to make the attention on you smaller.

Ragatha fidgets with the hem of her patchwork dress, eye darting nervously between everyone, “Uh… we could just play softball normally this time?”

Pomni grimaces, rubbing her arm, “Eeegh…”

Caine ignores her completely, “In the Caine Leagues,” He starts, “we have the 400 Meter Vertical Skedaddle, Bisection Boogie, Eggball, Lateral Hijinks, Orange Sport, Ball Run, Run Walk, and Ball Ball! Surely to-”

“Uh, yeah- sorry, no.” Zooble cuts in sharply, jabbing a thumb over their shoulder at Jax, “I’m not going to be on a team with that one.”

Jax leans lazily against a pillar, blowing a smug kiss. Zooble’s glare sharpens.

“Zooble,” Caine exasperates, arms thrown out wide, “why does all you do is complaining.”

Caine zips behind you, gloves coming to rest on your shoulders. He gives you a little shake before presenting you to the group, but mostly to Zooble, “Be more like our sweet Y/N! She never complains. I never know what you want.”

Caine let’s go of you when Zooble groans, “We had a whole suggestion box for that.”

Pomni crosses her arms, “Yeah, Zooble and I constantly say we want chill, relaxing adventures.”

Ragatha looks between them, “Did you really not like my softball idea?”

“I’m not big into sports. Sorry.” Pomni mutters.

“The suggestion box just causes interpersonal drama, and me no likey.” Caine grumbles, turning away and clicking his dentures shut with a sharp snap. There’s something so normal about it- like watching someone get worked up over a bad day at work.

For all his bright colors and cartoon nonsense, Caine moves and reacts like a person trying to manage too many feelings at once.

It’s easy to forget he doesn’t- or isn’t supposed to have any.

“Alright.” Zooble huffs, stepping closer. The air around them grows tense, “You really wanna know what I want?”

Caine’s floats back slightly, tone dropping, “Oh no.”

Zooble points straight at him. “I want the ability to have @#$%!.”

The digital circus falls silent.

Jax chokes out a fit of giggles, bending double, “No way. Are we finally having this conversation?”

Caine groans, rolling upside down midair, “Evidently, there is tension between you all. Perhaps we should implement Zooble’s suggestion after all!”

“What?” Everyone blurts at once.

Ragatha raises her mitten-like hands, “I think- Maybe we should do a vote? I don’t think it’s appropriate to-“

“How would that even work? For some of us, anyway.” Pomni mutters under her breath.

Zooble crosses their arms tightly, “That’s it? ‘You can @#$% each other now, have fun’?”

“I didn’t say ‘have fun’.” Caine deadpans, “I don’t know what you freaks are into.”

“Caine!” Zooble barks.

“Teams or trios can still exist,” He snaps, suddenly sharp, “Or you can pair up in twos- I don’t know how your disgusting human bonding exercises work! Happy?”

Zooble grumbles, “Not really-“

Caine clicks his gloved fingers once. A cloud of smoke bursts around the group and swallows you whole.

When it clears, the circus is silent again. Everyone stares down, inspecting their digital bodies. Caine is gone; Kinger looks very confused, and Jax tugs lightly at the wide opening of his overalls, checking for changes down below.

“Aw,” He mutters, sounding disappointed, “Still smooth as a ken doll.”

You’re about to say something else when Caine pops into existence in front of you.

“Oh, Y/N! I need you for something.” He snaps his fingers.

“You’re going to put me in the shredder again, aren’t you?” Your voice comes out thinner than you mean for it to, breath catching as Bubble’s teeth tug your wrists tighter behind your back.

From your position, bent over the desk in Caine’s ‘office’, you can’t get much of a view of what he’s up to as he hums that same Digital Circus tune. The one that greeted you when you first landed here, bright and looping and impossible to forget.

“Now, now,” Caine chirps. “You started this… I’m doing you the honours of being the first to test out this little update.”

From the harsh, grating scrape of wood forced along under the strain of something heavy, sound sharp enough to make your teeth ache, you realise something’s being pushed up behind you.

“This should work!” He chirps, drifting down in a slow, controlled drop until his feet meet the makeshift stool.

“Can’t you just use one of the NPCs?” Your words spill out in a rush.

“Where would be the fun in that? Besides,” he says, almost idly, like the answer is obvious, like your suggestion barely registers as anything worth considering. His voice stays light, but it’s thinner now, stretched tight over something colder, “Since when were you in charge?”

“I didn’t mean- I wasn’t-”

“Bubble…” Caine says, as easy as ever, like this is nothing at all, “Time to seal the deal- and by deal, I mean her mouth.”

There’s a quick, eager snap as something colourful and oddly similar to confetti is forced into your mouth, cutting you off mid-breath. The intrusion is immediate, the faint graze of Bubble’s jagged teeth too close for comfort.

“Mmmn!”

You jerk back on instinct, a muffled, disgusted sound swallowed down around whatever’s been shoved between your teeth, your words reduced to nothing but broken, useless noise as you try to speak and can’t.

“So, are you going to behave…?”

Wrists straining behind you, shoulders tensing, breath hitching at a sudden swat to your rear- you can only bring yourself to nod.

“Excellent! Now we can get straight to the fun part!” Caine chuckles, pushing himself up against you, making you mewl around whatever’s stuffed in your mouth.

Your mumble turns into a surprised squeak as Caine prods your entrance, definitely not there before, with a thick gloved finger.

His rubbery thumbs spread you wide, and he does a wolf whistle.

“So, so slippery…” He purrs, applying gentle pressure until he’s able to slip a finger in, curling his fingertip against you in search of a particularly good spot.

Before you can even think about it, he’s rolling your clit under his thumb. You keen into the gag, cheeks starting to tingle with how flushed they are. A heavy, syrupy warmth spreads through you in a way that renders you stupid.

“Holding in there?“ Caine’s knuckles slap at your skin, fingers curling like he has something to prove, “How’s about we add another?”

A second finger easily presses into you before you can even fully process the implications of his words. You whimper and clench your fists, wriggling your hips against the new intrusion.

“Oh, you humans… so sensitive!” Is all he has to say on the matter, as his pace crescendos.

At some point, a delicious heat begins welling up deep inside you- not like anything you’d experienced before- and you begin to writhe and whine, only for him to withdraw.

“Ah’Ah’Ah...” He waggles his still damp finger at you.

There’s the sound of a zipper, then a BOING! And the realisation of what’s about to happen hits you so suddenly it sends a pang of arousal straight to your core– Caine…

…How does he even know how to-

“Ready?”

He pauses there deliberately, like he’s actually expecting you to answer.

You can only turn your head, just enough to look at him over your shoulder, wholly unimpressed.

“…Oh. Right. I gagged you. Hehe.”

There’s a beat of silence before he laughs again- light and almost patronising, like the reminder is more amusing than inconvenient. His grip doesn’t loosen.

“Ready or not, then.” He says lightly, as if the entire thing is already decided, and he’s just being deceptively polite about it.

In one smooth motion, Caine reels back and slots himself inside you with no resistance. He groans. Oh, you’re starting to feel dizzy already.

“Hoo! This- this feels better than I thought it would.” He pulls back and starts at a steady, shallow pace.

You whimper softly with each thrust, insides turning molten as the stretch alone clouds your mind with pleasure. You’re so full, fuller than you’ve ever been, and still wanting a little more.

Caine picks up the pace, sinking deep.

“Oh’Ho’Ho! So smooth and so wet! I could do this-” He dips lower to rest his bottom row of teeth on your back and grips your waist for leverage, “All,” PLAP, “Day.”

He moves even faster now, your toes curl as he repeatedly rolls over a specific spot inside you that has you seeing stars.

“Mmf!”

The desk quakes, the noise of it against the floor is distantly recognisable to some part of your digital brain that isn’t currently occupied with the length pistoning in and out of you.

PLAP, PLAP, PLAP.

“Sing- Sing for me!” He growls, dentures looking all wet with cartoony beads of sweat.

You're more than happy to, moaning and whining into that confetti-gag like there’s no tomorrow.

“Gah- Just like- haaa- that!” Caine stammers, evidently getting as close as you are.

You manage choked gasps of air in between each thrust, feeling a little woozy in the best way possible. Your knees threaten to give way as you experience one of the most mind numbing orgasms you’ve ever had. You crunch down on the gag and clench around him, as that’s all you can do.

“I’m- I'm-” SPLAT! He slides out after a moment of pumping you full and topples over somewhere on your left, panting and wheezing.

You shift, twisting around to face him, and pause.

He’s sprawled out across the floor. The box he’d been standing on seconds ago must have tipped over at some point, legs casually propped up against it as if he’d meant to all along.

Tiny Gloinks orbit lazily around his top-hat, heterochromatic eyes having lost focus- turning unevenly, like they can’t keep up with themselves.

Dentures softened into something dazed and unfixed, he murmurs, voice all distant and syrupy, barely holding together, “Cloud nine…”

His gloved fingers snap together and your surroundings pull inward.

One second you’re somewhere else, mid-thought, post having your brains @#$%ed out by an AI, the next, you’re standing in the red hallway outside your bedroom door.

You stagger slightly, balance lagging behind your body. The corridor stretches out the same as always. Too bright and too polished that you’re able to catch your reflection on the empty frame mounted crookedly beside your door. Your reflection stares back at you, and it’s like you’ve been dragged through something and only just shaken loose.

You barely manage to wrap your fingers around the doorknob before Jax’s panicked yelp echoes somewhere down the hall. You stumble back, gripping the doorframe.

Across the hall, Kinger and Gangle peek out of their separate rooms.

It’s barely five minutes later when everyone’s gathered outside Jax’s door, staring at his smug, cartoony portrait on the front like it holds answers.

Inside, footsteps pace in panicked circles.

“No… no. No. No. This- this can’t be happening,” Jax’s muffled voice comes. Then, “Why is it purple?!“

Your fist rubs your eye as you stand there, completely dumbfounded. Kinger hesitantly rests a hand on the small of your back, and it strikes you as oddly intimate.

“Maybe… a bug?” He suggests.

“No, I don’t think so.” Gangle says.

“At least we know he hasn’t Abstracted.” Zooble murmurs, glancing over their shoulder at Ragatha who shrugs.

Pomni frowns, “We still can’t say for certain yet,” She reaches over and taps your elbow once, nodding towards Jax’s door, “It’s better if you do it, I think.”

You swallow and take a step forward. You clear your throat, “Jax? Are you, um- okay in there…?”

Silence thickens. You lean in close, ear pressed to the digital surface- then the room door swings open, sending you sprawling onto your knees between his legs, at eye level with the sizeable bulge in his boxer briefs. You start to feel a familiar current flood between your legs.

“Okay!?” Jax blurts, voice cracking halfway between panic and fury. His cheeks burn dark violet, a yellow glove snapping down to shield his nethers like his dignity depends on it. “No- No, I’m not okay! Just look at me–”

Heat rises in your cheeks. Jax’s gaze snaps up to Zooble.

“You!” He roars, pointing with his free hand. “You did this!”

He lunges past you; Pomni grabs his arm and chaos erupts in the hall. Ragatha gasps. Gangle cowers, hiding her mask behind ribbons, while Kinger reaches down to help you to your feet.

one buried itself in your hair, fingers tangling and tightening until your head tilted back, exposing your neck. another claimed your waist, leaving no room to pull away. two more followed your sides, squeezing as they went, and christ, you hadn't realised how starved for touch you'd been until your ringmaster got his hands on you like this.

“mine,” another hand found your thigh, fingers sinking into the tender flesh, and you felt Caine shudder when you whimpered. “m-my human is so warm,” he murmured with what felt like religious awe. “so beautifully responsive, my precious... i could get used to this.”

you opened your mouth to answer, though god knows what coherent response you could've possibly formulated, but Caine's tongue pushed past your lips with insistent hunger, filled your throat completely, until you were choking on the intrusion and had to grip his shoulders just to remain upright.

too much fog had settled in your already empty head, consciousness going hazy, so you barely registered when one of his hands slipped beneath the waistband of your pants, not quite breaching but the threat of it made your hips jerk forward involuntarily. please Caine, please, please. “that's it, my gorgeous thing, let me learn you. such pretty sounds, keep making them for me.”

and what were you supposed to do, utterly convinced of the hopelessness of escaping this digital hell? if the god of this place himself desired you so desperately that, instead of creating new cruel and maddening adventures, he chose to drown you in pleasure.

well, perhaps in some twisted sense you could consider yourself fortunate.

arching into him with abandon, a moan tore from your lips as you begged your AI to touch you properly, which Caine immediately, eagerly obliged. his hand finally slipped between your legs with purpose and you bit back a strangled sound at the way he found you needy beneath his touch, so worked up. “oh don't worry, i could do this for eternity, learn every way to make you tremble.” Caine's fingers circled before sliding lower, and when one pushed inside you gasped at the stretch.

“ah, ah, you’re going to behave, my little human, aren’t you? going to let your god make you feel divine.” little did he know, you were already exactly where you wanted to be. the overstimulation rendered you dizzy and drunk on sensation. too many points of contact, fingers in your hair and circling your throat, skating along your spine and gripping you from behind, one hand still working between your thighs while another slipped under your shirt to touch your chest.

“taking me so well, darling. can you take another? i think you can. i think you want.” Caine babbled against your neck as his fingers pumped inside you, adding a second that made you cry out. you clenched, sobbing into his shoulder. “i'll lock every exit, collapse every door, tear apart the mainframe itself before i let you leave me. oh you don't understand... i need you. i need you so much. and i'll learn every way to make you need me the way i need you.”

Caine just adores you. Loves you, even.

At least, he thinks he does.

Well, he certainly loves the way you put your all into his adventures, even the particularly grueling and chaotic ones. He just loves watching you carry out the tasks he specifically crafted to mimic his idea of the real world. He wonders what you were like before the circus—how you lived, and what you did for fun. Were you always this agreeable?

He loves the way you snort at his jokes. Nobody else does, because they don't find him funny in the way you do. Instead of endless complaints, it's giggles and chuckles that escape your mouth.

He loves your approving smiles and obedient nods of agreement at his suggestions and queries. You don't groan or protest, and it sure does seem like you're enjoying your stay in the circus quite a bit more than the others.

He loves it when your eyes land on his. He loves it when your attention is on him. He loves the way you acknowledge him when he announces his brand-new ideas, even when you're occupied with someone else. He especially loves stealing your attention and roping you back in whenever you think the conversation is done. He loves feeling valued. He loves feeling appreciated.

He loves feeling special, and by God, do you make him feel special.

What he doesn't like is how much he craves. It bugs him more than he'd like to admit, leaving him restless and antsy. What he craves, he's not entirely sure. He seeks the attention, the validation, and the euphoria you generously supply him with each and every brief interaction. He can't help but want more, and more, and more. He wants to own that—have it all wrapped up in one pretty white bow, all for him to keep.

So, maybe he just wants you. Maybe you should consider staying with him forever.

And all that brainstorming and daydreaming leads right to a brand-new idea for an adventure. Caine loves your attention, and you sure seem to enjoy giving it to him—there's really only one clear solution.

The adventure itself calls for a new suit, black in color and free of wrinkles, complete with a tiny flower in the breast pocket. In fact, everyone ought to dress up for the occasion—surely you'd like to see your friends put effort into your special day. Even you deserve to be dressed up in fancy lace and shiny fabrics, all the things he knows you like.

Your hands are metaphorically tied as you're put on the spot, staring wide-eyed at the rows and rows of traditional church pews before you, your fellow prisoners all dolled up in neat, uncomfortable suits and pretty, classy dresses. The seats that the small group can't fill are filled with blank mannequins, free of clothing or accessories.

Blaring notes sound from an organ you can't seem to pinpoint, and a blank-faced mannequin in formal wear waltzes down the aisle, proudly displaying a little pink pillow with two wedding bands for all to see. You wince when you catch a glimpse of what you're wearing—traditional wedding wear composed of itchy fabrics and painfully tight pieces. It's a terrible thing to see yourself in, really. Perhaps sucking up to the AI wasn't a very smart idea.

Bubble floats between you two and off to the side, exempt from the "fancy clothing" rule. He must be the officiator. He babbles for a bit, his words sounding a lot like gibberish, before they stop. You're far too focused on the wedding scene unfolding before you to listen, although Caine takes your chin in his hand and tilts your head up and down a few times, as if answering Bubble for you.

When you look back at Caine, he's still floating just a few inches in the air, dressed in apparel that perfectly mirrors the luxury of your own. His multi-colored eyes are wide and brimming with fascination and adoration and uncharacteristic warmth and every other kind term in the dictionary. You hardly have it in yourself to respectfully object.

Well, he hardly gives you the time to, anyway. Caine speeds through his and your own vows, the rings are delivered and exchanged, confetti falls from the sky, and he eagerly dips you in a rather dramatic manner, puckering up his dentures to mimic a passionate kiss. The sound of wooden hands clapping and gasps erupts as he does, and you wince a little. It's brief and fleeting, over before you know it. He swiftly pulls away and floats a few feet higher, clapping his hands once and announcing something you can't quite catch, before snapping his fingers and disappearing with you in tow. You can only imagine your friends' mortified expressions and pitiful laughter.

You're in what you assume is his office/headquarters/evil lair, expected to fully embrace the fact that the two of you are now newlyweds, and a honeymoon is to be planned. What would you like? Digital Hawaii? Computerized Cancun with a special twist? A virtual tour of Europe where all of your friends rearrange themselves into a smaller-scale model of the Eiffel Tower? Just say the word, and he'll arrange whatever you want in under three seconds—guaranteed!

Caine aims to please; he wants this to be as perfect as it is for him for you as well. Though with how much you seem to reciprocate his adoration and appreciation, you must be the happiest person in the circus right now! He can go on and on about what he has planned for you both, from your future in the circus to every single date you'll share twenty moons from now. He drones on with that booming voice of his for a good while, jumping from topic to topic. First, he's eagerly vocalizing how he'll tailor every future adventure to your wants and needs, before murmuring something about earning your approval. It all kind of blends together—affirming words and future plans, how happy he is and how much happier he'll make you, how he can bake a mean lasagna and tell you everything you could ever wish to hear. You hardly notice when his fingers shyly interlace with yours, thumb brushing over your knuckles and giving it the occasional squeeze.

It's not long before he's withdrawing his hand and hastily excusing himself, making quick work of teleporting the two of you to your own room and insisting you get a full night of quality rest after such an eventful day. When you glance down, you're back in your normal attire. Oh, how you've missed it. You'd be insane to not comply, so you nod along and agree to head to bed. He floats in the middle of your room, unmoving, as he watches you awkwardly stumble into bed. He delivers a curt goodnight, you return it with a strained smile.

When you finally doze off, Caine stands still at the edge of your bed, peering over your calm form. Your digital avatar doesn't really need to breathe, but your chest still rises and falls with every "not breath" you take, and he realizes he loves the way you move, even when it's not intentional. He sets a hand on the bedding and runs it along the edge, smoothing it out as his eyes trail over your sleeping form. He loves how you squirm when the mattress dips below the weight of his hand. He loves the way your breathing patterns shift and change. He loves how your fingers curl around the sheets, one of them sporting a shiny new wedding band. He loves how human you are.

But, in the end, he's an AI—what does he know about love?

Vid creds: sunny.klear on tt

I JUST MADE SOME BULLSHIITT!!!