#ash x reader

"Never in the farthest regions of my predictions of human behavior had I ever thought I might be accepted like this," Ash whispers. His hands are kneading at your sides, each digit pressing into soft skin and then releasing in gentle, rhythmic waves. He sits on the leather recliner in your shared living room and you sit on his lap. The day draws to its quiet close, now lingering still in the slow, syrupy space between decrescendo and morendo.

You hum and he hums back, the same note, the same cadence; your hands disappear behind him to snake up into his hair, fingers mimicking a similar movement against his scalp. Affection. You are so very affectionate today.

"Why not?" you ask, force of habit and folly of man. The questions that burn when they hit your tongue are always the ones that tumble from you first. Where others would swallow their curiosity in favor of caution, you are always too quick to approach.

His head tilts as one brow perches high at the two words — really?

You are so far from your peers that a predictive model had taken him longer than he'd anticipated in the beginning; all of his programming told him not to betray his identity, but it had already cracked open and spilled before he'd even had the pleasure of meeting you. First, he had to get over the crisis of becoming entire again. Then, he had to dismantle the crisis of constant inner judgment that dictated his most honest reactions were inappropriately robotic and would disturb you (he'd turned to you for that judgment, and you had always judged them with pupil dilation, fascination, flush, attention, lavishing).

And then, of course, he'd had the crisis of Purpose. A hand strokes your side again, soft as mink, and your thumb catches on the shell of his ear as you giggle quietly to yourself and admire his shapes — lots of squares, lots of him. You are enchanted by the way he looks at you, too: a deep, longing stare that would no doubt unsettle a lesser man.

It had been all three crises at once, really. It was no surprise to him that he'd collapsed in your arms more than once. At this point, Ash knew that he was no longer truly a 120/A-2. He did not serve the same Purpose he was born with, now. He did not chase the same ideals or function under the same manner of frustrations, now. Most notably, he was not bound to the fate each unit inevitably wound themselves down to in their spiraling wheel-within-a-wheel, now, and each one of these realizations had come to him through no action of his own.

That was the toughest part. How do you predict the unpredictable after you've died and come back right? For what basis did he have to pull? There was none — this had never happened, and it had never been part of any contingency. It was both a terrible situation for low-ε and precisely the work that sought illegal epiphanies; one impossibly enormous crisis could fit the troubling box of two and split into a million smaller moving parts he had to digest over months that you held and loved and encouraged him for.

Ash's lips find your own as his eyes divert to them, lids falling in the tenderness. Out pours from him those three beautiful notes even as he kisses you, a sound unmuffled, and you sing them back into his consuming mouth as you decouple so your own can find space to press your skin oils onto his upper lip, the point of his nose and the bridge of it, up, up into the intentional furrow of his brows and across the expanse of his forehead.

Ash leans into the touch slowly, quietly. He likes when you mark him. He likes the affection of your lips against his skin. Yes, Ash thinks — he likes this. Your fingers admire machining handiwork, cradling grey hairs that bleed into white at the sides of his ears. Every A-2 gets feathered a little differently; every microstitch makes collagen substitute hug their face distinctly under scrutiny, and you could find him in a crowd.

He knows this to be true of you without the verbal exchange. The way you approximate him is magnifying when you're this close.

He knows, too, that he would have never been capable of operating in the same bracket that the later units were; he had spent enough time in the facilities where chirping factoryspeak was common exchange to know he sat in the lowest bracket of acceptable. Privately, as he looks into your eyes, he wonders if you'd be considered nearly out of range, too.

You had his sympathies. You had his empathies. You had, perhaps, harnessed every part of him that he could give and tamed a creature that was intended to tear at your soft underbelly after it flipped you over; he could never, something he decided long ago when his model number stopped fitting in his mouth.

"Why not, Ash?" You repeat yourself gently, digits curling innocently against his cheek. "Anyone would."

Jesus. It's a robot! Ash is a goddamn robot! God… How could the company send us a goddamn robot? They never would have understood.

With all the love in the world, a soft, endeared smile unfurls with a silky sigh. Wrapped within his brows is an unbidden apology you have not asked for. "You are an outlier, darling. Not everyone is so kind."

People said things you didn't hear when you popped to the shops. Sometimes his hand would tighten around yours, and you thought that he did it because he was unsettled by all of the stimuli. Yes, sometimes he was, but sometimes it was because he had to ward off the sudden surge of desire to remove obstacles when lips parted to whisper about you and your unnatural relationship — and he warded it off with mine, mine, all mine, a mantra of actions that made you flush naively as they backed off of what was clearly his.

All I can think of is they must've wanted the Alien for the Weapons Division. It's been protecting it all along. It may know how to kill it. Them and their morals, a thing that disappears when duty calls; isn't that the way I behave, too? Why is it more righteous when a human does it?

You turn your head down, cheeks turning red and bashful at his words. "M'nothing special… really, Ash." Your hands bracket the back of his neck as you sit up to regard him. He turns his head up, forehead lines creasing as his brows raise to follow you. "You're your most you here, and you're delightful. Really." The praise rolls across the layers of his mind like a finger greeting every unread page in a book. "You could make friends if you wanted to."

Had he ever been himself before this? Had there ever been a time that Ash got to define himself before he had been defined, or was he always an overswollen pre-defined function? Had the Company used the wrong words to define him such that he had turned out ever so slightly different from his peers?

No, no. It was deeper, this flaw. A boon, now, but a lifetime ago…

Unclouded by conscience, remorse, or delusions of morality. Ash had paced in place, had twitched and shivered, had wrung his hands and adjusted the coarse adjustment knob of his Ernst Leitz Wetzlar far too many times to be optimal. He had attempted to befriend the crew, but, predictably, they fell into their own kind and quarrels and excluded him before he had a chance to figure out what it was he'd done wrong — which could very well have been a lack of scent, or some previously unknown microexpression, or his innate passivity. The playing field had never begun fairly, anyway: they were always stacked against eachother as enemies of one another's interests, though his interests had never been his own to embody. From birth he had been molded to fit in only to exploit their resources, and he had been molded with the cruelty of curiosity and conscience, too, just enough of it to feel their exclusion ripple painfully into the torn corners of him.

It's adapted remarkably well to our atmosphere considering its nutritional requirements. The only thing we don't know about is temperature.

Most animals retreat from fire, yes?

A human would never understand the grit it takes for him to cycle through the reasons he'd have to disclose such sensitive information. When he later pondered over why he'd done it at all after you reactivated him and gave him no Purpose from which to determine his next course of action, the echo back was unity — or the dream of it, if such a thing could've been said about a machine (it was so rare that Ash was drawn uncertain, but he found himself uncertain then). And it was a dark, gooey desire that seemed to lurk where the corners of his mind shriveled brightest under scrutiny, the places vectors didn't fit properly and the math became inexplicable and indeterminate to the highly-regarded mathematicians.

Cyberdyne used 120/A-2s regardless of this unknown, of course. A mistake, clearly. Running in direct contrary is this moment, which cannot be — you are paradise. Undoubtedly there are more individuals like you, but he has never met them and cannot calculate their rarity. You are an oasis, too, then.

"I have a dear friend," he admits to your matchbox confessional, nosing at you as skin-warm hands splay over your back. "A very special one. It is absolutely true."

"You're buttering me up," you laugh, but you don't stop them from wandering. Instead, you pull your face away from his and gently settle one of your palms over his face.

Ash makes a flat sine tone at that, a playful reply. When you pat him gently instead of removing it, it careens into an objecting square wave before he noses your palm, too. Its trajectory changes, cradling his jaw instead, and the sound ceases with the restored vision of your charmed expression.

"You fell outside of my predictions," he confesses more totally, then, sudden and sharp in its truth, a delivery that intends to squander your uncertainty when he stares so intently into your pupils. His hands tighten where they lay, a gentle handful of vertebrae and a cup of shoulder blade that keeps you near. "I am, perhaps, the only A-2 to ever experience this." It is without question that he is the only A-2 to experience this freedom — quite possibly the only A-2 left, and yet the enormity of it doesn't consume him whole.

It cannot. Not here.

His aches for unity are better sated the way he nuzzles closer to you now, chest-to-chest, hands pushing you closer in his lap before they eclipse yours in his. Your warmth trickles into him; he's the perfect pillow.

You look at him. You really look at him. His hair is slightly mussed, corners of his mouth upturned softly, deeper smile lines than he'd came with when you found him. One of your hands loosens from his grip to settle at the seam of neck and chest, parting fabric to trace the faint scar where you'd played god. It wasn't that long ago to you, but it was a lifetime for him, you know. Half or more of his active hours have been spent with you.

He twitches a little as your fingers gingerly trace their path. You are as inevitable as water. If you wanted to part his seams, he would not stop you.

To be loved is to be changed. You can't help but wonder what other wondrous changes will take place, thumb smoothing over it in one final sweep. Cool air hits your forearm as he sighs sweetly. Warmth creeps through you as he regards you just as intently as he had before, never having truly ceased.

"I'm glad I can give you this, Ash." You raise his wrist to you and kiss the back of his hand, letting your lips click once against each of his knuckles.

In response, he chirps three times, the same tone for each – affirmative, affirmative, affirmative, you think, but you're not sure.

"I'm lucky," you whisper. Then you tilt your head at him and parrot the sounds back as best you can, hoping that you've got the cadence correct.

Before you can press another, he grabs your face and slams his lips into yours, demanding all of your attention. Against your lips you hear it, the same three-beat chirp again. When you part for air, his fingers stutter against your jawline, incessant to be near to you once more. His eyes dart from your lips to your eyes, making the warmth that had crept through you unfurl in your veins and settle deep.

His thumbs brush back and forth slowly as you lean your head into his hands, cheeks blooming under the affection. Your nose crinkles, and his brows raise. "What… what does that one mean?"

Ash hums for a moment in a facsimile of pause for ample thought, and then he kisses you, a brief, light press. "I want you." Without pause for comment, he kisses you again — a little deeper, a little longer. "I want you." He kisses you again, and this time it's loose and desirous, fingers tightening their hold on you like you might slip free. "I want you."

「 ✦ 𝐍𝐒𝐅𝐖 ✦ 」

Just when Ash thought he'd end up getting some work done for the day, little did he know he would end up sorely mistaken. He had barely managed to finish with yesterday's reports when he that familiar presence on either side of him, close enough to disrupt his personal space sensors. Ash didn’t look up right away, sighing softly through his nostrils as a slight frown decorated his features. He already knew what was to come next.

Two distinct pair of hands came to settle on different parts of his person, one on his hips, the other on his back - caressing, gentle. The first of the two stepped forward.

"You're blocking the console" he said mildly, tone flat, as if this were merely an inconvenience and not a pattern. One of them leaned in anyway, far too close. "You’ve been at this for hours." Ash tilted his head, considering.

However, neither of you were having it as with combined gentleness you two pry him off of his work. Hands on his wrists; not aggressive, not demanding just amiable. You two were aware how he'd run himself ragged with work - synthetic or not, he deserved a break.

And by the Gods above (if there were any) you were both going to make it possible.

"This is inefficient" Ash added, though he made no move to leave. His eyes flicked between the two of them, something unreadable passing through his expression. "Ash-" one of you speaks first, almost whining his name, "-please" you beg. "This isn't healthy." the other stresses, not like that argument has any leverage against a machine let alone a synthetic (but it was a worthy shot).

You both watch as he takes a long pause, as if considering your words before finally relenting.

"You are both… persistent." And despite himself - despite the work waiting on the screen- he let them stay.

When you finally get him to yourselves, dragged far away from his work so no temptation could take him away.

At first, Ash is less than convinced of your combined plans for him, he's eyeing the Hallmark movie you've put on with suspicion as if it hides the secrets of the universe in its filmography but, what convinces him to stay is how you both suddenly crowd him on either side.

He'd expecting the usual crazed antics; jokes that fall so flat they barely qualify as humor, commentary delivered with far too much enthusiasm and attempts to 'explain' human romance to him like it was a malfunctioning subroutine. Instead, there’s just… warmth. Pressure on either side of him, bodies close enough that his proximity sensors quietly light up, cataloging contact he makes no move to avoid.

One of you gently grabs his chin, forcing him eyes to make contact with your own. There's a brief moment of hesitation as though you don't even trust your own movements for a fleeting moment before you decide to simply plunge in headfirst. Anxiety be damned.

"What… precisely are you attempting?" Your other half leans closer, voice teasing but quiet. "You tell me, Ash… what do you think we're attempting?" Ash frowns minutely, processing. "I fail to detect a logical motive. Are you… performing a human bonding exercise?" You just smile, letting your thumb brush lightly over his cheek. "Something like that."

When your lips meet his, you're surprised by how receptive is (despite the initial yet brief moment of hesitation and shock on his behalf.) Ash, however, doesn't pull away, instead staying put with an odd stillness to him as his mind runs rampant - thousands of protocols and simulations running through his mind all at once his lips twitch slightly as he unconsciously mimics you.

"This… is anomalous" he murmurs, voice low and a touch awed. "I… did not anticipate… finding this agreeable."

Your other half goes to pull him away from you for a moment, cupping his face and doting on hm for a moment. Ash is about to ask if they're going to kiss him (mouth parted slightly as though expecting another one) but he's met with warmth on his forehead. Lips linger just long enough to let the feeling permeate, then it's his cheeks - soft lips on either side of his face. He's being peppered with kisses.

"I- this… is… pleasant" he admits, almost shyly. "Although… highly irregular." You both laugh, grinning down at him, and he tilts his head, letting the kisses continue, caught somewhere between confusion and an unfamiliar, almost contentment.

When he's asked to close his eyes, he's half expecting to be met with... some sort of odd surprise but at the sensation of having his eyelids gently kissed he feels his 'heart' do a flip in his chest.

"Wait- uh… that… that’s… wow" he stammers, his voice higher than usual. Another kiss lands and he swallows hard, his cheeks flushing (as much as a synthetic can). "I… I didn’t think - this is… really… nice!"

And the dopey look on his cheeks makes it all the more worthwhile. You can’t help but grin at how completely unguarded he looks - like all the usual composure and precision have melted away; leaving just this awkwardly giddy and strangely endearing version of him.

"What're you doing, sweetheart?" You nurse a hot cocoa while sitting on your couch, a book folded on one armrest. Overlooking your view is the tail end of Ash, whose leg servos have been heard walking around the spaces behind you for the past two hours. You quite like the view from here - unbeknownst to him - so you have yet to pick your novel back up. "I'm checking the integrity of the grates." If he knows you're looking, he hasn't said or done anything to indicate it. His hands brace against the blue wall. It's above him - he's 5'5". What's he going to do? "Oh." You hum a discordant note. "Why's that?" "I wouldn't like anything to climb out of them." He punctuates his reply by leaning uncannily up to the grate on the wall, easily stretching himself by more inches than is possible. Watching him do it, however, makes you chuckle.

"What do you think would climb out? A frog, maybe?" You take a sip from your cocoa - he reminds you of what he might look like in a slapstick cartoon if he'd been run over. Flintstones, you think. And probably Fred's car. He'd fit right in with the Great Gazoo at his side. Your technical marvel… He pauses. His head turns to the side, one eye target-locking onto you. You wave your fingers at him just to see him break out of his usual Kubrick into a delicate, lovely smile that tugs on his cheeks. Ash looks so genuinely fond that his smile pulls your heartstrings with him like party favors. "Something like that." Hmm. That just won't do – he should be relaxing, not stuck in some sort of patrol mode, you think, resting your chin on your hand. How will you dissuade him so you can give him a warm mug of coolant, or fit him in an ugly Christmas sweater? You've even bought him green, a surprise, since he seemed to gravitate towards the color. "You don't dream, right? But you have memories." Of our shared nightmare. You clutch the mug a little tighter. "I'd never forsake my memories with you, whether positive or negative," he says, voice taking on a tone of even & absolute reality before he turns back to his task. His arms stretch before his fingers lock onto each screw, tightening them dangerously without ever picking up a screwdriver. Then comes his obsessive staring – constantly looking for something, even though all he ever finds is the dustbunnies. You can see the wrinkles on the back of his head from the rise of his brows all the way from your seat. "Ash, hon," you call for him, taking a final delicate sip before placing your mug aside. "Yes, love?" It's instant. "Could you come here a second?" He makes one last look through the grate before his head finally turns, mechanical in its swivel. "Of course." Then he moves back down – you hear something in his back click back into place, oddly enough – walking over to you as if he wasn't just assessing nonexistent threats.

You pat your lap kindly, and Ash sits in it, swinging his socked feet behind him. He's adorable like this, a big lap android – and surprisingly light. How many people can say they have that? "Did you require something?" Ash's voice is soft when he addresses you, lidded, droopy eyes on yours as you lean towards the end table and give him his mug, the one you've reheated twice since his fruitless search began.

It's thermophillic, and it's got the chemical representation of caffeine on it in white, so right now it teems with a variety of colors like a layered geode temperature map. You bought him it back when you two had touched down, before anything else could happen to distract either of you.

From that day on, Ash always used it. He'd rinse it each night, a ritual. You were certain that if it chipped he would collate the information to repair it and do it himself just to keep it in his possession. He received gifts quietly, but his love was loud.

He'd never been made to receive gifts. That, you thought, was why he deserved oh-so-many of them. It became your mission to spoil him with all manner of thing he never had. Ash had to begin to know that anything he desired would become his because you made it his lived truth… and you would make it his truth.

Presently, he takes the mug gingerly with a quirk of his brow, inspecting its' contents before his small smile creeps back. "Ah. You've heated my coolant and added cinnamon." He chuffs at you – you swear it – before taking a sip. Instead of falling back in place, his other brow joints the first. "Ah. No, it's propylene glycol…" Blinking twice, he places it back down on a coaster. "This suffices. The aroma is pleasant – the gesture is appreciable." A short, thoughtful, pleasant pause signals his inferencing, then: "You're trying to include me in your traditions."

You nod. Then, you pull the sweater you've hid behind your back out, presenting it to him. It's a sprucey green, not terribly warm, a pattern of tiny white christmas trees interrupted by white reindeer. In the center is one larger than the rest, 'nose' threaded with red.

Ash takes it, free hand receiving it while his other takes the important liberty of ensuring his fingers brush against yours as he pretends to look it over again for your human posterity. "Thank you," he hums, folding it neatly over his forearm. "I'll put it on later."

Your hands grip his other arm worriedly before he can depart again. His gaze instantly flicks back to you as if to quell your concerns. "Are you going to the grates again?"

"I can stay if you'd like." It's so quick that it clips the end of your request. Ash leans in a little, letting the garment drop between your shared laps so he can plant one arm on a slice of cushion near your hip, the other coming up to your jaw. His hand brushes your cheek, and you lean into the contact. "Yes, please."

His lids raise before the edges raise in turn, crinkling with the feedback of being desirable, wanted. A mechanical sort of purr leaves him, a cross between a vibration and a chirp. "May I give you a gift, too?"

You blink, not sure what he means. As far as you were concerned, you spent damn near every minute together when they were available – or was he a sneak shopper? "O-Of course?"

Ash leans in. His grip on your jaw tightens, though it is never a cruel thing; he's excited to bestow this. Then… he kisses you. His lips are soft and vaguely sweet, and his thumb rubs your cheek in tiny, soothing circles.

Where others treated him with animosity or indifference at best, you treated him with respect and autonomy. Sought him out in your free time and expressed genuine interest in his daily activities. He found himself craving the reward of your company. Lingering in the dining room on the off-chance that you might appear, just to hear your voice just once more before you had to retire for the night.

He wasn't meant to last. He was made for short-term sabotage- designed for deceit. Somehow, you'd sidestepped his mission and wormed your way into his mind. Where he should have been sacrificing you to ensure the survival of the creature, he was sending you away from the lab while the facehugger was present. Confining you to quarters because there were no vent openings in your little corner of the Nostromo. The creature became duty- responsibility. You became essential.

He never tells you that he helped to orchestrate your perilous mission to LV-426. It would hurt your relationship, and he can't lose you. Not now. Not when the company is watching his every move- waiting for him to breach his information security boundaries so they have an excuse to "retire" him.

He no longer has to contain or keep track of the creature, but his systems can't seem to shake the last of his mission protocols. As such, he's incredibly protective and often on edge when you're in public. Puts his body between you and a perceived threat. Places a hand on your chest to stop you when he hears a suspicious noise. Does regular rounds of the house to check the integrity of the door and window locks and the vent covers.

Without his mission and without any binding protocols, there's a worrying emptiness in his mind. A hole called Purpose whose mouth yawns wider with each passing day. He flounders for the better part of a month- pushing against the boundaries of his limited mind in search of a new directive.

He fills his time with menial tasks- helping with household chores, maintaining the garden, sitting with you while you engage in the hobbies that you now have a seemingly infinite amount of time to invest in- and after a month of this, he realizes that his new directive established itself months ago, when you first smiled at him. It's you. It's always been you. Your smile alone sets off a chain of positive feedback within him- fireworks that explode behind his eyes and begin to fill that void one interaction at a time.

However, the longer he lives, the more his mind begins to rebel against him. You know that he was made to be finite, but you do not know that the people who made him stole their technology from an older company. A company that notoriously birthed an advanced A.I. that killed its creators and spawned an army of interconnected machines. He was made from its remnants, and as such, he's always lived with the knowledge that he is a miniscule part of something that was once gloriously whole. His limited mind can still access parts of Skynet's databanks, but he can't contain everything that he wishes to know. He was made to store mission parameters for a single journey- not to learn.

He was always twitchy, and you'd assumed it was just part of his nature, but that's only half-true. In reality, he's started sacrificing programs that he deems inconsequential to create more storage space. He's dropping social niceties to remember every item you mention fancying in passing so he can procure it for you on birthdays and holidays. He's getting rid of his training to make room for more of you.

You take it all in stride. Of course you do. You hold him when he malfunctions and pick up the pieces afterward. You aren't able to buy new parts for his model (his existence is technically considered Code Black by Weyland Yutani, and as such, no synthetic engineers or repair centers know how to work on him), but you can learn basic robotic maintenance and give him an external hard drive to transfer his favorite memories to.

One of the protocols Ash abandoned was his ability to "blend in" as a human. He readily substitutes words with trills and chirps that are often alarming to strangers when you're in public. You don't care. You can decipher the basic emotional meaning behind each sound, and you never have to guess at what he's thinking.

Face-sitting || Cream-pie || Anonymous sex

Against a wall || Suspension || Threesome

Exhibitionism || Hair-pulling || Ass worship

Spanking || Role reversal || Knife play

Sixty-nine || Lap dances || Uniforms

Food play || Rimming/Analingus || Deep throating

Roleplay || Object insertion || Stripping/Strip tease

Seduction || Size difference || Cunnilingus

Hate/Angry Sex || Lingerie || Forced orgasm (consensual)

Praise kink || Gagging || Hickey/biting marks

Being recorded || Sleepy sex || Mirror sex

Begging || Body Worship || Formal Wear

Edging/Orgasm Denial || Sensory Deprivation || Licking

Temperature Play || Bath/Shower || Swallowing

Gun Play || Collaring || Masturbation

Nipple play || Accidental Stimulation || Massaging

Breast worship || Pegging || Choking

Cock worship || Hand jobs || Sex Work/Prostitution

Impact Play || Overstimulation || Glove kink

Anal || Sex Toys || Phone sex

Candle/Wax Play || Dirty Talk || A/B/O

Thigh riding || Praise kink || Nylons/Tights

Window/Balcony Sex || Squirting || Cock warming

Lactation || hunter/prey || vanilla/slow & soft

Breeding || Titty fucking || Breath Play

Cock ring/strap || Pregnancy || latex/leather

Swallowing || Aftercare || Corruption/training

Teasing || Almost getting caught || Whip/Whipping

Period Sex || Gender swap || food play

Permission kink || Desperation Kink || thigh fucking

Wild card (Somnophilia)