#force visions... force ghosts... force suggestions

The voice doesn't reply immediately, though he does notice the scratching has stopped. There's a bit of shuffling, and Lohen tries to shift his gaze to see what's happening around him. The moment he looks away from the blank white ceiling, his stomach swoops. He squeezes his eyes shut and lets out a quiet groan at the sudden wave of nausea.

"Easy, easy. You don't want to throw up now. That'll only make you feel worse," Accompanying hands gently coaxes him flat on his back against the surface beneath him, "Thirsty? My apologies, Vice-Captain, but any ingestion could lead to choking or aspiration. You'll have to wait until you recover..." A soft chuckle follows, "Hehe... recover."

The hands supporting his head linger, unlike that first fleeting touch, but there's a heavy weight settling over him. He blinks and glances downward, confused, because there's nothing on him aside from the loose cotton shirt he's wearing that's starting to stick to his skin from the sweat. He tries to lick his lips, suddenly aware of how dry they are, but his tongue refuses to cooperate. Instead, he ends up drooling slightly. A bead of saliva gathers at the corner of his mouth before spilling over and trailing down his neck.

"Hm... maybe you overestimated yourself. You don't look so good," The tone doesn't sound displeased, even if the words suggest otherwise. He feels something brush against his throat, tracing along the... sternocleidomastoid muscle? He vaguely remembers someone calling it that. Ugh, a word that long is enough to make his head throb violently. He winces, his eyes squeezing shut once more so he doesn't have to look at the black spots dancing in his vision, and waits for the brief wave of pain to fade into something tolerable.

"...You know, the seniors tell ghost stories about you. About how you always charge headlong into the fray, how you're never afraid of getting hurt. Even Grandmaster Varka praises how tough you are compared to him, and says that whenever you're the one sent out, your team suffers the fewest casualties," The voice drones on, seeming to speak as much to itself as to him. He parts his eyes a sliver, just enough to make out a face beginning to take shape above him. His brain takes a while to catch up, sluggish and fogged over, but he knows that face from somewhere.

"T-This isn't what it looks like!"

You look so startled that he can almost hear your teeth chattering. For a moment, you seem caught between two instincts: staying exactly where you are to hide your spoils behind your back, or scrambling to your feet to salute your superior. The struggle is written plainly across your face, and Lohen finds himself briefly amused by how transparent it all is. Almost feels a bit unfair to be the one standing over you like this.

"Oh? How so?" Lohen smiles, a little indulgent, as he plants a hand on his hip and leans to the side for a better look at whatever had prompted you to abandon such perfectly good flowers. Hm. He thinks he recognizes that mushroom. “It’s not rare, nor particularly dangerous. Still, that is poisonous. With how nervous you look, I'd wager you knew that already. I cannot ignore a recruit collecting it in a way that could be interpreted as an attempt to harm someone."

"I-I wasn't going to use it on anyone! Promise! It's..It's just research! Self-study? Cause-ahem, because, uh... You can't know how to protect the body without learning what harms it? A-And plenty of medicines started out this way! Give the body a tiny, controlled dose, and suddenly the thing that could kill you is helping you heal," The explanation spills out of you, as if speaking too slowly might give him time to interrupt. By the end of it, your shoulders are practically touching your ears. Still, Lohen has to admit there’s a certain logic to it, granted it's messy and overexcited, but logic nonetheless. Not the usual excuse he hears from recruits caught doing something questionable.

"Are you lecturing me, trainee?" The teasing question is meant to lighten the air, but whatever confidence you’d managed to gather evaporates into thin air. Ah. Perhaps he misjudged how strong your nerves were.

"No! I mean- no, sir." Your voice droops along with your posture as you stare down at the dirt caked onto your shoes, "...Does this mean I'm kicked out of the Knights?"

For a moment, Lohen simply blinks. Kicked out? You look genuinely devastated by the possibility, fists clenched so tightly your gloves squeak faintly. He exhales lightly through his nose. A timid thing then, and yet not without merit. Plus, he liked the excited look in your eyes during your rant, and Varka always says he needs to be more lenient to the newbies. Plus...this wouldn't be the first time he's "experimented" with medicinal practices. Being alone as an adventurer requires you to take what you can and learn what your body can resist.

"Come along now, and don't forget to bring those mushrooms."

Your head snaps up at his words, his back already to you, as he gestures for you to keep up.

"Let's see what you can do."

The new batch of recruits... right. He'd originally wanted to test the waters, to see if they were truly ready to become part of the Knights. A new combat medic, the reports had said, the Knights could always use more of those. Funny, he'd expected someone steadier like Albedo or Barbara. Instead, he'd found a little mouse tottering through the fields, uprooting flowers and digging through the dirt in search of toxic fungal mushrooms.

Huh..actually..even with his blurry vision, he doesn't remember your face being this expressive. You look just as elated as he does when he's fighting.

"I know I'm only a beginner, but I really, really want to be the one to treat you. To see someone as strong as you like this..." Whatever you were about to say dissolves into a distant murmur as he sinks beneath the surface, drifting into unconsciousness.

- 🐑

Ryland shifted and rested his elbows on the sticky surface of the bar, his head bowing forward as if he were praying. “They’re calling it the 'Antarctica Sacrifice' in our official documents." His voice was raspy like he hadn’t used it in days as the man reached up and pressed his pointer finger against the condensation of his drink. He drew it up the bottle’s neck before pinching there with a few fingers and bringing it to his mouth.

“Sounds better than ‘We nuked a continent because we’re running out of time’.” You whispered and tipped your beer bottle. It was empty and it went rolling down the way of the bar top, the bartender plucking it without a word and setting another down for you a moment later. A humorless smile touched Ryland’s mouth from behind the bottle but it was gone as quickly as it had appeared, “Yeah, well, PR always was a special kind of evil.”

Silence descended again but it wasn’t like before. This was shared, the weight of it settled between you and made it more tangible and easy to swallow. There was something more Ryland wanted to talk about, you could see it in the way he was holding the bottle, the way his leg bounced almost impatiently. All things seen out of the corner of your eye as you finally balled enough courage to look over at him. His blue gaze was fixed on the fish tank, on the mindless circling of the captive creatures. But you could see it in the deep set furrow of his eyebrows. 

The reality that the world was really going to end if the mission failed and so would Humanity and with that, any retroactive thought that the friendship he’d been building with you, the engineer for a suicide mission, becoming more being severed like a head. You had to laugh bitterly at the irony. Nothing puts a damper on blossoming feelings quite like the extinction of an entire planet. 

“You okay?” You finally asked after a few minutes drowning together. Just enough for Ryland to get his beer down, his fingers raising and requesting another in silence. The inquiry feels clumsy, inadequate and childish. You looked down at your drink. Ryland didn't turn towards you as another bottle replaced his empty one, his stare intense and focused on the brown neck of the glass. “I keep thinking about the penguins.”

You almost choked on your drink at that, coughing a bit to get the musky and hoppy taste out of your vocal cords. Of all things, of all the monumental, world altering horrors to fixate on, he chose that one. It was so absurd, so out-of-pocket that you weren’t sure if you needed to recommend him to the medbay for a psychological evaluation or if you needed to laugh but it was heartbreakingly a sincere thing for Ryland to think about as if the world itself wasn’t actively on the verge of collapse. “Huh?” “They had no idea what was happening.” He continued, his voice distant as he took an almost contemplative sip of his drink. “You know, most of the population in Antarctica lives along the coast where we planted the nukes. I just keep thinking about them just… Wadding around. Doing their own thing. Being penguins and then… nothing.” 

Ryland finally turned his head, his eyes seemed hollow and tired, lost in a memory that you couldn’t share despite the desire to live in the moment with him. “I used to teach my students about them. About the mating process of Emperor penguins. How the fathers balance the egg through the Winter for months, without eating. They needed to protect something tiny and fragile against the most hostile place on Earth.” His voice cracked on the last word as he forced himself to look down at his hands now clenching tight fists against the bar top. “They were just doing their job, what evolution had dictated and we just…” He whispered, voice barely audible. “We erased them.”

The raw, unadulterated grief in his voice was a physical blow, coupled with the shine of a few tears falling down the bridge of his nose and off the tip. It was about the fathers on the ice, protecting their eggs.

Their babies, their futures. It wasn’t just about saving Humanity, but about a world so much simpler than the ones you’d been born in, an innocent world you two just actively helped destroy. Something about that, something about the empathy from a broken man next to you, not for his own future, but for the future of innocent animals and Humans made you shuffle a bit in your seat which had become remarkably uncomfortable. There was nothing to say to it, but you managed as Ryland’s broad shoulders slumped forward and he was back to bowing his head, his hands now grasping the sides of his face as he let loose a few more tears, colliding with the oak of the bar below, a few stray streams landing on the lenses of his glasses. “We didn't have a choice, Dr. Grace---” “I know!” He choked out, swallowing so hard that it was audible in the otherwise sterile and dry air of the bar. “I… know…” The blonde man breathed out as if he realized that countering you with frustration built into aggression was not the way to go. Especially since you were there. You witnessed it just like he had… You were always there, if Ryland really thought about it. A singularity in an otherwise chaotic mess. Blue eyes trailed from the swirls in the wood of the bar top over to you like somehow, someway, you were going to keep him from floating off into the oblivion. 

 “I… W… We know the math, huh? The two of us. The logic of it all… But (Last Name)... That doesn’t make it easier.” Your heart clenched at that as you glanced at the beer bottle in front of you, suddenly afraid to meet the eyes of perhaps the only person on this ship having a mental breakdown about penguins.

Your lips parted. Not just about them… You’d have to be a fool to think that’s the only thing. With buckling courage under a few drinks in your system, you jumped yourself out of the barstool that had been your home for the last few hours, feeling the strange sensation of blood rushing down your legs and pooling into your feet as you walked to Ryland - slow and unsure.  

Like it was your first time meeting, Engineer to Molecular Biologist. Like this was your first time meeting, Human to Human though there had been speckled moments of something more in the lessons he laid out for the Hail Mary Team, the way he let his eyes linger in yours, or the way your fingertips brushed his when he passed you things. Just sand slipping through your fingers and splaying against the ever-prominent darkness like stars trapped in a glass. You were going to die on the mission and Ryland? He was going to die some day, either sooner if the crisis on Earth got any worse, or later, suffering just the penguins. 

There was a cascade of your scent entrapping Ryland’s nose as you sat down. That all too familiar bustle of your body chemistry, alluring him in and calming in some weird biological way mixing with the faint trace of the standard issued soap on board and a spritz of something floral. He imagined, in any other circumstance, any other bar on the planet, he’d look at you with the shy reservation he’d carried for most of his life. Ryland wanted to imagine he’d… Smile at you and you’d smile back at him, strangers in a world that offered many things for your futures. 

You’d tell him your name, let him buy you a drink. He’d tell you his name, perplexed why you’d find someone like him so interesting. A coward who ran away from the field he had a deep passion for because he couldn’t keep his own emotions in check, a teacher who was afraid for himself sometimes more than his students. A man who… Just wanted to be seen as something more than his mind, but that was such a far-fetched idea now. That’s all he did for the project. Another brain to calculate and manipulate into place. Used and then set out to dry.

Those were just fantasies. This was a reality he needed to start living in. 

“I just keep seeing it.” He admitted in a shaky tone, a confession torn from the deep recesses of his soul. “The flash.” Your eyes widened in recognition. “And then just… Nothing. How do you… how do you come back from that?”

It took you a moment of silent reflection to realize… You didn't have an answer. There was no answer for that because it would just make it worse. Ryland was spared a glance from you, the immediate regret dragging across your stomach as you were suddenly overcome with being sick. The raw emotion, terror mainly, drifting between his pupils and irises, the way Ryland’s entire frame seemed to vibrate with trauma unseen by the human eye set aside what little hesitation you had. Sure, there was no answer for his questions, but you had something else. 

You leaned forward in your seat next to him, across the small distance that felt entirely too big and let your hand shatter against him. Your palm was full of purpose that on one side felt incredibly instinctual, to comfort… a friend… And the other side completely intended to comfort someone who could have had the chance at something more if the circumstances were different. Call it what you wanted. A lover, partner, inamorata, soulmate. 

Your grasp covered as much of his larger hand as you were able, his skin cold to the touch, his knuckles white from the force of his own grip as his hand was laying clenched against the surface of the bar once again. At the contact, Ryland flinched, a sharp intake of air hissing between his teeth. His gaze, which had been lost somewhere in the shared, horrifying memory, snapped into motion, down to your hand. 

He drew a trembling breath in, the frantic energy of an imminent mental breakdown now on pause, the reel playing back a nightmare tapering out and burning to pieces. There was nothing said between the two of you, the only thing that could dictate your desire to speak was a simple, soft and steady pressure to your hand, the silent promise that he wasn’t alone in this and never needed to be. 

Slowly, achingly so, the tension in Ryland’s hand began to disappear in a cloud of self-loathing and deprecation. You could see his tongue peeking out to wet his lips as his fingers uncurled minutely, no longer that awful off-pale color from a heavy fist, and now nothing more than a trembling hand beneath yours. Ryland didn't pull away despite his nerve endings telling him that reciprocation was against the calculations of risks he set up when he realized there could have been more between you. The shift was subtle but sent a jolt of electricity down Ryland’s spine to rest uncomfortably in his tailbone. Because… Instead of just accepting your comfort like a normal person would, he turned his cold hand over, palm facing the ceiling and began to move with a shared flicker of intent of solidarity and eagerness to comfort. Human behavior he couldn’t bring himself to override.

The desperation in your clutch was replaced as his long fingers began curling in on yours, one by one. His index finger was first, tracing a soft, questioning line along the inside of your wrist before settling. Then, his middle finger followed, pressing gently against your pulse point. 

You shuddered at that, watching the motion and letting Ryland enjoy the thudding beat of your heart through the point of contact. Ring and pinky fingers followed suit, just happy to be there, not grabbing, not holding but enveloping. And the catalyst that made you feel a ring of fire along your entire body was his thumb, shy, reserved, coming to rest on the back of your hand, set to stroke a slow, hypnotic circle against your warmer skin. 

The gesture was sensual, intimate, like Ryland was finally set in the language of a man who was so used to being invisible, now making himself profoundly seen in the most discreet way possible. Sniffling a bit, his azure gaze was set in your hands, never daring to imagine more than that as your fingers squeezed at his gently. Smoothly, like you knew what he wanted without asking. The grasp on each other wasn’t just a simple affection, it was a question. The silent, scared plea that went far beyond the need for comfort from a shared traumatic event. It was an invitation. 

I see you. I want you. Please… Don’t let this be the only time you see me like this.

A thick yet smooth silence rested between the two of you, wrapped in each other's grey clouds of semblant comfort, the only sound the mournful hum of the fish tank filter. The joining of your hands on a sticky bar surface felt like a fragile bubble protecting you from the vast, empty void outside the viewport, away from the prospect that your death was now a countdown and it was eagerly ignored. 

For a moment, this was enough. The grounding sensation of Ryland’s thumb stroking your skin, the thawing of his cold skin into a blanket of warmth against yours. You were just two, tiny creatures adrift in the dark, clinging to each other while the ghosts of actions that were not yours to be made swirled around you in the form of methane in the atmosphere. The promise that it would give humanity more time. 

Ryland let out a long, shuddering breath both at the contact, his fingers tightening around yours. Don’t let me go. He said without words and opened his mouth to speak, voice so low it was almost swallowed by the sound of the filter. “Am I a good man, (Name)?”

The whisper of the question was enough to pull you out from the reverie you were drowning in. The sound scrapped against your nerves like nails on a chalk board, drawing to a somberness that was felt in the depths of your bones. The question was laced with the exhaustion of a thousand sleepless nights, tossing and turning in refuge for an answer. Clearing your throat, you shifted uncomfortable on the stool, the worn vinyl groaning under your weight. The movement felt too clumsy, loud in the oppressive quiet that took place from the earlier air of adoration. “Why are you asking me that?” Came your reply. The words felt brittle off your tongue, fragile in the charged air between you. You couldn’t bring yourself to look at him, afraid of what you might see in his eyes, afraid he might see the same reflected in your own. It hung there for a few seconds, the weight of expectations settled on your shoulders, heavy and far too suffocating. The scent of your soap and perfume you’d used earlier, maybe even hopes of running into Ryland in the first place, felt nothing more than a cloying reminder of a world that no longer existed. 

“I… I….” Ryland’s jaw clenched, you could see the draw of the taut muscles under the dimmer luminescence of the on-board bar, covered only faintly by his facial hair. The shadows of the room pooped against the dips and curves of his face and for a second, he looked more like a ghost of himself, the idea of someone who wanted to do the right thing. “I… Want to believe I am… In the same way that LeClerc believed he was.”

The name danced between you, a spectator of what could have been, hopeful but void of much else. Drawing a soft breath in, you finally turned to look at the blonde who captivated your attention more often than not, despite your best efforts. It hurt, immediately. The haunted searching of his eyes against yours, begging for you to give him what he wanted. And god… You wanted to so badly. Why… couldn’t you…?

“Our beliefs don’t matter anymore,” You whispered to him, “Our hopes and desires… We can’t afford to think just about ourselves anymore…” That seemed void of any emotion as you looked away towards the fish tank once again. You wanted to be one of them. Just watching the unraveling of a beautiful man instead of being a variable in it. The admission from you seemed to… Break something in Ryland. Not the sort of hard breakage, the kind that left him on the floor, on his back, but that softer, slower kind that made him feel like he was stagnant in a fall, the pit in his stomach never going away. 

His hand, which had been such a point of warm connection, needing, wanting felt like a vise, keeping you in place. The fingers which had been hugging yours so carefully, tightened with a new onslaught of desperate realization, the bones of his knuckles turning white as he crunched your fingers. It wasn’t an angry action, it wasn’t meant to cause you pain. From the look in his eyes as they lingered in yours, it was clear what it was.

Ryland was terrified. 

“Then what’s the point of this…?” He asked, his voice raising just a notch and cracking under the strain of trying to keep his tired emotions in check. But, he was an emotional lightweight drunk, and he’d downed two beers in probably too short of time. Ryland lifted his free hand up and gestured vaguely, a sweep that took the entirety of the bar, the ship and the empty space of the ocean all in one. “Of us? Of holding on if we’re just… Machines without feelings? Automatons following a script?” His gaze was wild now, your mouth parting as Ryland tugged your hand, almost causing enough momentum for you to tumble out of your chair had you not grasped the side of the bar with your free hand. He was searching for an escape hatch from his own mind, maybe in you, maybe in something he’d wanted for himself for so long.

The fish in the tank had the right idea, their mindless, soothing swimming juxtaposed to Ryland coming undone in a metaphorical and literal way. You could feel the hummingbird beat of his pulse through your joined hands, a drum against your skin that would have been nice to enjoy in any other circumstance. The scent of him was sharper now with his movement. Tinged with the metallic smell of his fear, Ryland was a conduit now for emotions you were afraid to feel. He leaned in closer, your heart jumping into your throat at that, his body coiled with tension that was painful to watch. “I-If we’re not good people… If we-we’re not anything at all… Then what did we trade Antarctica for?” 

The words were a ragged gasp, coming from a place of intense self-anguish. 

Your eyes widened, the question in the air a raw, bleeding thing that Ryland had no answer for anymore and neither did you as you watched him, frenzied, broken and grappling for some sense of self. “What did we trade our souls for?”

The hard tone echoed off the sterile walls of the bar. You swallowed hard, looking at Ryland’s twisted expression causing you to immediately look away towards something. Anything. Focus on something that wasn’t the way he was holding your hand like a lifeline. Your bottom lip quivered as you found it in yourself to shake your head, feeling like you were in a vat of water, no gravity and stuck in slow-motion, throat too tight to form words. Ryland watched it carefully, the way your hair drifted with the motion, your glassy eyes finally meeting his own as it dawned upon him the results of the consequential emotional unload. The glint in your gaze, the squeezing of his hand under your touch, the reckless abandonment of rules put in place by your overly-critical mind, to his self-sabotage was all it took. 

Something in the blonde man snapped. The appearance of desperation in his pretty eyes was replaced by a sudden and fierce intensity, one that had to rival how he talked about his students from time to time. The hand holding onto yours put forth a motion full of authority of too many drinks, too many thoughts and too many ideas of the end of the world. Your weight was pulled, harder than you expected, surely more than you thought the lanky scientist was capable of, and with a small gasp, your wrist bone cracking a bit, the stool you were on scraped harshly against the floor. “Ryland---” His name fell from your lips like a siren, a warning and a plea all at once. In one fluid, clumsily coordinated movement, you were yanked ungracefully off balance and left stumbling towards him. The air seemed too thin yet so thick that words weren’t processing out of your vocal cords. Ryland’s other hand shot out, hard and sure for the first time in a long time, catching you just below the shoulder before you went face first right over his lap onto the floor.

 A shuddering breath escaped you, not from fear, but in anticipation, a thrill shooting down your spine. Ryland let go of your hand to grasp at your upper arm, his long fingers wrapping around your bicep, spreading warmth through the thin fabric of your mission jacket, and for a second, you could see his eyes staring at the name patch embroidered on your breast. Your skin tingled, mind hazed, wanting for more as you re-adjusted to the strength you hadn’t thought to imagine about as he sought to steady you. 

Like it was second nature, you were standing between his parted knees, the bony nature of them digging almost into your hips at how he was eager to keep you still, trapped in the circle of his long arms. Ryland was… so close, you could feel the heat of him in waves, crashing against you over and over again, a welcome contrast to the cold metal of the ship around you. There was the wild and fractured light in his eyes, the color almost completely swallowed by the black of his pupils. The stare he had you in dropped to your lips, the air between you became stifling, suffocating you with the unspoken grief and terrifying horizon of desire. You were powerless to stop him as Ryland leaned his head in, lowering to your level and holding there, his breath shattering perfectly across your face. It was warm, inviting and smelled faintly of the beer he’d been drinking. It was close enough to shuffle your eyelashes, to make the fire hairs on your cheek stand on end. It wasn’t forced, but rampant, a desperate act to prove a point. That he could feel something real, that you were something real, to prove that he still existed as he had before and that he was not an endless cog in humanity’s nain attempt at survival. Twenty, thirty years… However long he had left, you both had to bargain that you were only allowed a short amount of time until the mission launched and he had to deal with a new onset of grief for his longing. By himself, for the rest of his life. There’d never be another, Ryland was so sure of it. 

This was it. Now or never. You reached your hands up, grasping at the front of his shirt without reserve. Your fingers, trembling slightly, twisted into the soft, worn fabric of his standard-issue crew neck. It was thinner than you expected, soft from countless washes, and you could feel the solid, unyielding plane of his chest beneath it, the beating of his heart right under your knuckles.

You tugged the large blonde closer, a silent encouragement and the motion brought your bodies almost flushed together without you being ardently on top of him. The hard line of his thighs pressed against the sides of yours kept you grounded in the overwhelming reality that you found yourself in. 

Flickering your gaze down, you traced the shape of his mouth at the prospect of what came next. His lips were parted slightly, glistening with saliva in the dim light, and you could see the faint white line of his teeth where Ryland was biting down on his lower lip, a gesture of barely restrained control. A faint shadow of stubble darkened his jaw, a contrast to the pale skin of his throat and you had the urge, hot and heady, to lean in and press your lips to what you imagined to be a fluttery, pretty heart beat there. 

His room or yours? Yours most likely; it was bigger. One of the perks of volunteering to die for the Earth. The thought was a distant, logical consideration in the roaring chaos of your mind. All you could think of was the heat of Ryland’s body seeping into yours, the intensity in his eyes that promised you everything and nothing, and the aching idea that the vital connection you were going to share was already doomed. 

There was such a small price to pay at the start for you, but now… Ryland’s mouth barely grazed over yours, taking your breath straight from your mouth, his blonde hair tickling at your forehead, a feathery touch that was more devastating than a real kiss, your head tilting back to give him the best angle you could as you called your hands into fists over his clothed chest. You came head to head with the worst of it, but it wasn’t enough to stop yourself. Ryland Grace was the highest price you were ever going to pay, whether here on Earth or 11.9 light-years away, on the trip towards your death. 

And then, as quickly as it began, it was over. Ryland froze, his entire body going rigid in a disgusting way against yours, no longer conforming or confirming what you both wanted. The hand on your arm tightened, convulsing with a painful grip that was more about his own self-induced panic than to actively hurt you, but you could sense the bruises against your tender flesh that would surface tomorrow. Ryland ripped his head back as if he’d been shocked, his blue eyes flying open with widened horror, not directed at you but it was hard not to feel offended, your stomach dropping in loathing that mirrored the pace of which Ryland dropped all defenses only moments before. “N-no…” He whispered, the word hard on your ear drums as you coiled your hands tighter in his shirt, as if holding him closer would get him to subside back to your selfish desires. “Ry---” You were going to cry, he could see it written on your face. He opened his mouth to say something comforting, but his rationality won out as it so often did. Rejection at its finest, refined and hard-hitting and he was stupid enough to let it happen to you. 

The risk assessment of you two having anything going on was far too great. He’d end up heartbroken again, he’d have to watch you die. How could you be selfish enough to let him do that!? Ryland swallowed hard. He wanted to yell at you all of a sudden, tell you that you weren’t being fair as if he hadn’t been the one about to kiss you. As if he wasn’t the one using grief as an open door.

You looked at him. And something about the gaze, deep inside of your body and the way you reacted to him… Ryland shut his eyes for a moment, the muscles of his neck convulsing. You saw him. For what he was, not who he was supposed to be and that… That couldn’t be allowed. 

“Ryland---” “No, I can’t.” 

He shopped himself away from you with such force that you took a step back, nearly tripping over the stool behind you and you were forced to let go of him. Your hands still lingered in the air, a connection between the two of you that grew cold and reeling like a yo-yo.

Ryland followed suit, scrambling off his stool, his movements so panicked and unnatural that he nearly tripped over his own feet in the eager haste to put some type of distance, physical and emotional, between the two of you. His face was drained of all color when he finally met your gaze again, tears at the corner of your eyes now and threatening to break the waterline. “I-I’m sorry.” Ryland gasped, holding his hands up as if to ward you off but you were unable to move. “I’m so sorry.” He knew that wasn’t good enough. “I shouldn’t have… We… I can’t do this…” 

“Ryland, wait-!” Without another word of regret, another action made under pressure, the scared blonde turned to flee. His foot caught the leg of the stool he had forgotten was right behind him and stomped forward a bit with a sharp grunt of surprise. His arms flailed for balance that was already lost, and for a heart-stopping second, you thought he was going to fall completely, but he managed to right his large frame at the last moment. 

His hand slapped against the polished wood of the bar. The collision itself sent the stool skittering sideways with a metallic scream that seemed to shatter the silence like a pane of glass. He was breathing hard, looking at where his hand had landed, no longer enjoying the swirls of the oak as a fun pattern, but more like a precursor to how he was going to lurch over the edge of the ship in distaste as soon as he could. Beer never did settle well with hum, especially when chugged. “Ryland, wait.” You whispered, moving a bit to help him back up, your entire body lagged and tired now, no excitement, no anticipation. 

He brought his eyes up to meet yours and you stopped moving. Frozen in time, you could see something that looked painfully like regret in his stare, but alongside with it was the longing, the crippling fear and the way he was waging with himself. It was the man who almost kissed you and the boy who was terrified of what it meant.

You watched his chest heave, and for a moment as you looked at each other for what you felt was going to be the last time, you thought maybe he might say something. Your name, an apology… Anything…

You opened your mouth to say something but weren’t given the chance as Ryland straightened himself up, eyes tearing away from yours as if the very sight of you was lewd and offensive, and without another backwards glance at you, he was fleeing the room, letting his long legs take him as far away as possible. The door swung shut behind him, leaving you alone with the echoes of his presence and the ghost of his last, tortured look. 

A sharp, piercing tone cut through the quiet moment, shrill and insistent like an alarm. It grew only louder, vibrating your skull and shaking your ear drums, that disgustingly twisted high-frequency whine that seemed to bypass all concepts of sound waves and burrowed directly into the hippocampus of your brain. 

The dim lighting of the bar flickered violently, the colors of the fish tank bleeding into a nauseating swirl of muddle pond water. The sticky surface of the bar seemed to dissolve like a pill in stomach acid, replaced by something cool against your skin, soft and plush but also brutally unforgiving. The sweet scent of Ryland’s body so close to yours, the floral waves of perfume and the stale beer - all ripped away and replaced by the sterile, recycled air of the Hail Mary. You were surfacing through warm water, everything soft, heavy and a little disorienting. You were still there. Standing in that memory… No… That wasn’t right. That… segmented reality you had to bargain with. Ryland being far too close, the crisis in his voice as he asked you questions you couldn’t answer, his hands on you like he didn't quite know where he was allowed to touch you. The air that passed between your lips, like it was inevitable. 

He was going to kiss you. 

And you were going to let him. Your chest tightened uncomfortably and it felt like someone was holding a pillow to your face.

What did we trade our souls for?

Your eyes snapped open with a small gasp from your parted lips. 

They took a few moments to recognize the surroundings. The messy notions of xenonite walls to the side, the familiar weight of your body on the bed, the soft glow of the primary console display that casted shadows playfully across the room, the familiar curved ceilings above. Your heart was a hammer to your ribcage, the lump in your throat so hard you thought that it was going to choke you at any moment. Something wet tickled your lips. Pouting at that, you raised your hand to your face, tracing right under your eye along your cheekbone. Your skin was cool to the touch, but your insides were burning up as your hand came back into focus and there was dampness against your fingertips. You forced yourself to take a deep breath in as a few more salty nodules came from your eyes, down the curves of your face to seep into the bed below. Why… Were you crying?

A soft, rapid series of clicks breaks through the quiet and you're back to facing reality. It’s not a loud noise - the echolocation markers - but they were close by. Almost careful in their precision to read the room without ever visualizing it the same way your eyes did. They slip into your awareness slowly, like a soft song, threading through the remnants of your dream, the one you tried to change over and over again but always found yourself standing in the bar, unable to go after him.

Unable to stop the events that lead you back here as if it was always the Universe’s intent. And maybe it was, you huffed out of your nose. There was never going to be a way of knowing. 

Your breathing stutters small staccato puffs into the air like you’d forgotten how to breathe, still trying to catch up with a reality that seemed to bend your mind’s ability to accept. Sniffling gently, your eyes trailed from the white ceiling of the ship, downwards, vision blurring and warping, lashes still damp, to see the creature responsible for the rhythmic chirping. 

Rocky was perched near the edge of the bed, as close as he could get in his xenonite enclosure, and for a moment, you let yourself imagine you could relish in the blazing heat you knew that wall was keeping away from you.

You wondered if it felt like Ryland’s hand. Hot, steady and secure. You swallowed gently, a few more tears trickling from your eyes and down the bridge of your nose as you forced your pupils into submission to focus.

The Eridian was angled toward you in a way that was unmistakably attentive, an emotional state that seemed to transcend alien species. All five limbs were anchored firmly, just enough to stabilize his heavy body, but there’s a subtle tension in them. Almost like he’d been deliberately still for longer than usual. 

Watching. 

Waiting. 

Observing. 

“(Last Name) awake.”

He finally said, the computerized voice of the translator tickling your ears just right. And somewhere in there, you were included to almost here the layered tone of relief in Rocky’s chords. There’s a faint delay before you respond, body trying to remember how and what was appropriate to say. You let out a shaky breath, one you hadn’t realized you were holding, your chest uneven as the air left you. 

“Y-yeah…” You managed, voice rough and frayed around the edges. “I--- I’m up.” The words feel thick on your tongue. You wanted nothing more than to go back to sleep, feeling like you got none in the first place in a fit of restlessness.

Another rogue tear, this one heavy with the dream, slips free before you have time to react, trailing warm and slowing down the scape of your temple towards your ear as you look over at Rocky completely. You swipe at it this time, more self-conscious now that you knew you weren’t alone, dragging your palm across your cheek in some vain attempt to erase the evidence. You know right away from the shift in his carapace that Rocky noticed. “(Last Name) leaking.” He observed. “Much like Grace. Leak out of many orifices. Inconvenient.” A weak, breathy laugh escaped you despite everything running circles in your mind, fragile and a little broken but the heart was still here. “Great. Love that for us. We’re just big leaky space blobs.” You hate the way your voice cracks at the end, betraying the wall you were trying to put up as you dragged the back of your hand under your nose and sniffling.

Rocky stopped all trace movements other than the shift towards you, just a fraction closer, careful, but definitely noticeable. One limb lifts and sets down again with a precise placement, the faint metallic tap soft against the floor. “Distressed sleep-cycle observed.” Ah. You squeezed your eyes shut for a brief second and nodded in resignation. There’s no dodging this. No brushing it off. Not with Rocky. Not when he’s already observed it. There was no excuse for what your body decided to do while you weren’t awake enough to hide it.

“Increase respiration. Irregular movement. Vocalization. Unpleasant. Bad. Bad. Bad.”

That pulls something new from you, something between a wiry laugh and a groan. “Yeah… well…” You propped yourself up, the thin blanket ripping down your body to bunch around your waist. Dragging a hand down your face, you let it rest there and press your palm into your eyes, hard enough that you see stars. “That sounds about right…” As your hand fell away, it left your vision a little spotty as you blinked up at the ceiling again. The shine from the console flickered faintly, catching the lingering wetness of your cheeks. “I uh… Didn't mean to…” You trailed off because what would you even finish that sentence with?

I didn't mean to feel? I didn't mean to care?

I didn't mean to let it get this far? None of those things were true as your throat tightened like someone had taken all the oxygen out of the room. “It was just a dream, Rock.” You said forecefully instead, but still reserved this time like saying it softer might make it hurt less. “Just my brain being… Annoying.”

Rocky is still for a moment, you imagined he was going through his memory to recollect the moment that Ryland and you had to explain to him what dreams were after Ryland had very much rolled off the bed and onto the floor during a very intense REM session. “Dream uncontrollable variables.” He chimed. “No intent assigned.”

You let a small breath out through your nose in a huff. “Yeah. Wish that made them a little less---” “Dream about Grace.”

Not a question.

You tilted your head slightly toward him, just enough to meet the direction of what you estimated to be his gaze without fully turning like you were clinging to the desperation of the memory that seemed to seep into the bed below. “You’re… not going to let it go, are you? No matter how many times I ask?” “No.” At least he was honest. Someone here had to be. 

A tired, faint smile pulled to your mouth before it faded again into nothingness. You just didn't have the energy to keep it in place, and it wasn’t like Rocky was relying on the human behavior of reading facial cues. 

“It was just a…” You hesitated and brought your knees up to curl against your chest. The words were right there, but they made your chest hurt… “A… moment… Or well, almost… a moment.”

Rocky didn't move at that, he wasn’t interrupting and you took that as your opportunity to continue despite wanting to shut the door on the topic once and for all. “We were so close, Rock.” You explained, voice a gentle noise in the hum of the ship. The memory itself might hear you after all, if you spoke about it too loudly, and it would call you back to re-live it over and over again. “And I thought… He was going to… Kiss me.”

Saying out loud did what your mind was unable to do. It made it real in a way that recollection was unable. And that just made the tears already bustling at your waterline break, trailing down and catapulting off your chin.

Your gaze drifted away from the Eridian, unfocused, catching on nothing as the moment replied its bitter self anyway. The shift of Ryland’s weight in front of you, the catch of his breath in the hollow of his throat, his mouth eager to form words but nothing came to mind. The absolutely foolish way that you couldn’t pull away. 

“But he didn't…”

“No understand.”

“I don’t want to explain.” You admitted as silence stretched between you and your friend. He was observing again. 

You could hear it in the rhythmic tap of one of the limbs against the floor, slow and meaningful and incredibly patterned. Not random, never random. It was the same cadence he used when working through some complications, something with too many variables and not enough clear answers, and admittedly, that was your fault for not clarifying but you just didn't have it in you without another breakdown coming right after. 

Rocky’s carapace shifted, the plates on the top adjusting for a beetle angle toward you, catching what bounced off the room he was able to calculate. You could almost feel the way his attention narrowed, focused only on you, on the small details you couldn’t comprehend, your body giving them away like unguarded secrets. 

Rocky could observe the way your shoulders sat, not fully slumped against the knees in your chest, but not steady either. Held in that in-between tension like you were trying to keep yourself upright without committing to it and one poke to your side would send you tumbling. You were folding in on yourself.

Your hands were resting by your sides before coming to wrap around your knees. Tight. Harder than needed, he could almost hear the tension of your muscles contracting to keep yourself in a hard ball shape.

Your breathing came last. Not as uneven as before when you had first woken up, but not settled. Shallow, held at the top of each inhale for just a split-second too long before letting go, your chest didn't fully release and you were constricting yourself intentionally. 

“Grace made error, question?” Rocky’s harmonized voice was softer this time as if entangling with the notion of empathy. 

And for a second, just a second, you almost let yourself believe that Rocky was right. That it was really that simple. That it was Ryland’s mistake, but then the memory in your head shifts again to reminisce on the scientist’s hesitation, your lack of control to stop the situation for spiraling. The space between you that was never crossed but still tempted you despite boundaries. Furrowing your eyebrows at that, you felt a pit in your stomach at the implications of that. And it was a shame it wasn’t that simple. You could brush it under the rug with a simple ‘Yeah! He just made an error and we’re back to the way things were!’ It was never going to be that. You shuffled a bit and looked over at the Eridian.

There was certainty in his posture from the deductions he had to have made on his own with no other context clues than your flying back-and-forth emotions, a fragmented dream you woke up from crying about and the fraught way you were defending yourself against it now. Not just yourself. You were defending Ryland for putting you in this position unknowingly and that hurt more now than before. You shook your head, languid this time, the movement more thoughtful than dismissive to Rocky’s deduction. You’d humor it if you needed to feel better about yourself, but you were more than okay that reeling into your self-loathing for a little bit longer. The mattress shifted below your weight as you swung your legs over the side of the metallic cased bed. Your feet hovered just above the floor for a moment before settling, the cold surface shocking the rest of your body awake. 

“I don’t…” You started, the words catching somewhere tangled in your chest and throat.

You glanced at your hands waiting for some answer to be written into the faint lines of your palms but at the end of the day, they were still just hands. Empty. Longing. 

So your eyes drifted instead. Past them.

Past Rocky. 

Past the deep void of space that hugged you more intimately than you ever cared to admit. Toward the open threshold of the dormitory into the dim corridor beyond. The low light stretched ominously along the curved walls, longer than it actually was, leading deeper into the ship. To places you weren’t but the places Ryland was. 

The lab, maybe. Pacing, probably, about the Petrova Line problem, running a hand through his hair and muttering to himself under his breath like he always did when his brain refused to slow down. You’d offer him some advice usually, he’d lull it over, talk to Rocky about it and decide that you were a genius. 

The cockpit, strapped in the Captain’s chair waiting for Rocky to come in so he could roleplay another Star Trek episode. Purposefully getting too close to you when you came in to check the diagnostics. Trying to get you to play along but you’d excuse yourself before it could become more than just a friendly game. Or your favorite - Sitting at the cupola window in the lab, ramen in an oversized cup as he stared out at the tau-light with his pretty blue eyes, still wondering how he ended up here as his brain started counting the stars and wondering how they’d look from the surface of Adrian instead of caught in the suspended orbit. Sure, there were heartbreaks at the instant memories lost.

It took him longer to remember his name than you, it took him longer to remember where he came from, where you came from, and even in the tangle of the memories coming back, there was still no inclination that he recalled a single thing about you while you were forced to sit back and remember everything about him.

Meeting for the first time aboard Stratt’s Vat, Ryland wearing that ridiculous San Fran shirt with the fat cat on the Golden Gate Bridge. It felt seared into your eyelids as you let them fall shut. A charming smile from an awkward man as he began explaining Astrophage biology like it was just another walk in the park. It was impressive, how his body moved juxtaposed to the knowledge in his head. 

He was introduced as Ryland Grace by Stratt, Yao and her sharing some curious Mandarin about what you had to assume was his… Eccentricity as you looked at one another, your eyes trained to read his emotions, his eyes scared of what it meant to meet only your gaze despite there being twenty other people there. He smiled at you. Your heart fluttered a bit at the sincerity of it before he turned back with Stratt, leading you away from the corridor to continue the tour of the ship.

The very first time you and your colleagues, your crew mates… You drew a sharp breath in. Your family for the last stretch of your life sitting in one of the small, tucked-away conference rooms, trying to understand the flying words from Ryland’s mouth. Something about Astrophage and its combustion rate? You had raised your hand. Ryland clocked it immediately, looking at you from over the rim of his glasses. “Can I see the vial you’re holding? I--- Want to see how it looks up close. The… Astrophage.” You raised an eyebrow. There was something there, Ryland stood frozen on the spot at the way your words formed, the way you had raised your hand like one of his students, the question, the curiosity, and like a puppet on strings he was set to motion, moving too eagerly across the small room.

The tiny glass vial full of the black plague of space was transferred from his hand to yours, slowly, your eyes never drifting apart as your fingertips touched one another. “Y-you’re the Engineer for the mission, right?” “Sure am.” You confirmed, looking at the vial and squinting your eyes. Ryland couldn’t stop himself from lingering by you the rest of the lesson.

His reasoning? You were admiring the Astrophage the entire time and he was afraid you’d drop it and pfffff---- the entire ship, gone. The reality? There was something about the way you looked at it, fearful but a flicker of intense interest that called to the two battling sides of his mind. Scientific intellectualism and innate Human desire to understand the unknown, even if it costed lives.

The day Stratt chose him, the day that he was sent up with you. But there was always something worse eclipsing it, you were just too stubborn and mission-driven to ever bring it to the forefront. That was just the excuse you told yourself to feel better about it. That was one memory you weren’t going to unlock, you couldn't bring yourself to face it. Ryland… 

Your lips parted at the desire to just say his name in a way that could help him remember half of the memories you had of him. Your fingers twitched against the bed, grasping handfuls of the thin sheet. He couldn’t remember… Because he was forced here.

You shuttered a breath in. Ryland didn't know that he was missing anything. It was never about the distance. Not the silence. But stifling closeness that only you had memories of. You were forced to remember enough for both of you and that coupled with the forced proximity of the mission was enough to strangle a regular person to death. What else were you supposed to do than shove him away like he had done to you? Resentment? No. Necessity? Yes.

All the while, there he was, Ryland Grace in a lot of ways, space wanderer in others. A stranger, almost. Somewhere close, and somehow… Always right out of reach.

You thought back to Rocky’s question. His… Way of prying knowledge out of you that was just beneath the surface. 

Grace made error, question?

“I don’t think he did, Rocky.” You finally broke the silence with words meant more for you than him, you decided. Your own personal confession to a burden you were required to carry.

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You had been so preoccupied with your thoughts that it didn’t take until reaching your bed for you to notice that your new standing mirror had moved. Bought from an old estate sale, the vintage piece was intricately carved, dark oak only slightly splintered with age. Sure, the glass was a little foggy and there were elements of a strange black residue on the back panel, but it was a timeless addition to your collection. It called to you the moment you saw it, drawing you in and making it impossible for you to jump in your car without it in the trunk. 

The thought of a burglar sent your naked body into a cold shock, using the small towel to cover up your front half. 

“Hello?” You called, ridiculousness brooding in you for talking to the air. 

Between the perpetrator that moved the mirror either being a malicious ghost, or a human intruder, you didn’t know which sounded worse.

But that thought dissipated upon a new sensation, your concerned mind now instead flooded with confusion. 

Something pressed between your legs-- not warm, not cold-- but it was there, lying unquestionable pressure. Your exposed sex was currently being massaged, cupped with a gratifying hand. You could feel the separate fingers, the grab of another hand as it groped the inside of your thigh. Hungry. 

“What are you-- what is this--!” 

You spread your legs, looking down for the offending touch-- only to find nothing. Your left thigh had indents on it, as if it was gripped tightly, yet nothing appeared to hold it. The image of flesh being squeezed by nothing disappeared, the groping now moving across your body in rough waves. It slithered up your soft, delicate stomach, palming hard at your wet chest. Large-padded thumbs ran over your nipples with cruel intention. 

The grab forced you backwards, slamming you against what felt like the chest of another person. The newfound closeness increased the sharp breath hovering over your neck, thick clouds of exhale visible from your peripheral vision. Something exhaled labored breaths, running one hand down towards your crotch, the other stayed to grope and pull at your chest. 

Fear had never crossed your mind-- merely sheer befuddlement. What was touching you-- how was this possible, that you couldn’t see it? Were you going crazy? And, was it so wrong that it felt… good?

Looking to the mirror you could see the defined outline of something ‘other’ manhandling your body. Handprints came across your hips, something wet and callous sliding down your shoulder. A hickey started to form, the gentle squelch of sucking radiating in your room. 

If it had a voice, it didn’t speak, merely indulging in your body with loud pants and nose born exhales. Perhaps it was insane of you to suggest it-- but it sounded… masculine. From the size of the hands roaming your body, to the broad, chest-like wall you seemed to be pressing back against, it all felt too familiar, full of audacity you could only attribute to the husky breathing of a man.

“I don’t know what you are, or what you think you’re doing, but you can’t just come into my house-- Mph!” 

Your voice is shaky, uncertain as a tight grip pulls your chin upwards. 

A tongue like jellified liquid enters your mouth, salty and so undeniably lubricated you think it might drool from your lips. It tussles with yours, enveloping your mouth with a sightless heat. You stare at the ceiling, eyes searching desperately for someone-- something. 

But nothing appears. You’re met with the usual state of your bedroom-- unkempt, bare of anyone but yourself. 

The insatiable need of the invisible creature only seems to grow tenfold by your struggle, the delicious surrender of your mouth. It stumbles you to your bed with an invisible grip on your hip, forcing you to sit down at the edge of your bed. 

You look as if you’re hovering over the unmade sheets, your thighs resting on top of what appears to be nothing, but feels like wet skin beneath your ass. Your thighs are spread apart by unseen legs, knees pressed in between yours to keep you wide in front of the mirror. 

You can see yourself-- gaping, swollen with need as a hand comes down to play with your arousal. 

You can’t help but offer a small moan at the invisible hand’s placement, every new touch and sensation a surprise. Two fingers push apart your flesh, showing your hole to the mirror, watching as you pulsate around nothing. You can feel its eyes on you, your body eaten up by its invisible gaze.

The act has you embarrassed, feeling filthy as water continues to drip down your hair, onto your back.

“Don’t d-do that-- not that,” Your head falls against a heavy shoulder, back still pressed against its chest as it tilts you further into humiliating exposure. “How can you even-- how’d you even get in here?” 

Your attempt at an assertive tone falls short as the invisible thing’s finger swirls around your hole, something thick lying hefty between your legs. You don’t have to ask to know what it is, what the rutting of it between your thighs means.

Without grace or patience, the weighted flesh pushes inside of you, stretching you for your eyes to see in the mirror. It appears like magic, as if pure air has you spread wide and clenching. But it feels like anything but invisible in sensation-- slick and heavy, it makes you shiver as it pushes deeper inside. It draws out a lewd sound from you, your hands gripping into the bedsheets.

The invisible person barely waits to enter fully before he’s thrusting up, pounding unseen thighs against yours. Heavy hands hold your hips to bounce you on his cock, thick breaths increasing once the warmth of your hole accepted him so graciously. 

A cracked cry leaves your throat as the intensity shocks you, unseen dull teeth digging into your shoulder as a tight grip forces you up, and down. 

The lewd wetness of combined arousal drips out of you, so clearly in the mirror from the way your skin glistens; it makes you all the more bewildered and aroused at the sight. It splatters against your ass, coats of mysterious liquid flecking onto the mirror to show mere shadows. 

You turn away, shutting your eyes at the sight. Relying on the intense grinding inside you to carry you away, you force your head back in foreign ecstasy.

But you can’t lie there for long, not when a sharp thrust digs the invisible cock all the way inside you, a hand gripping up your throat, right to your jaw. Your head is forced to turn, looking at the squeezing of your hole around nothing. It causes you to shudder, moaning at the deepness that kept itself buried up to the hilt. 

“Look,” A choked whisper lets out, grinding up into you in circles, letting the vulgar sound of skin on skin resound. “I won’t let you turn away.” 

Logan had always been a man of jagged edges.

A man who carried the weight of lifetimes on his broad shoulders, whose knuckles were more familiar with blood than tenderness. He was built for war, made for the wild—gruff and hardened by the years, by loss, by the ghosts of memories too tangled to unravel.

And then there was you.

Soft. Sweet. Sugar spun into a real, breathing thing. Everything he wasn’t.

Everything he didn’t think he’d ever get to have.

He had no business being with you, and yet, somehow, you had taken one look at the sharp edges of him and decided you weren’t afraid of getting cut. Had smiled that sunshine smile, touched him with hands made of silk and stardust, and looked at him like he was something worth keeping.

Damn if that didn’t ruin him.

You weren’t just gentle—you were delicate in the way flowers bloomed in the spring, in the way lace wove itself into intricate, beautiful patterns, too fine to be touched without care. But that softness didn’t make you fragile. No, you were something far more dangerous than that.

You were warmth. And Logan had never been good at handling warmth.

But oh, how he wanted to.

If he had to pick his favorite thing about you—which was impossible because there were too many—then maybe it’d be the way you dressed at night.

Dainty little nightgowns in all shades of pastels, adorned with lace or silk or sheer fabrics that teased against your skin. Always pretty, always delicate, making you look like something out of a dream. A doll come to life. A vision he didn’t deserve to hold, but one he’d fight tooth and nail to keep.

And you had to know what you were doing to him.

There was no way in hell you didn’t notice the way his breath hitched every damn time you walked in, the way his muscles went taut beneath his skin, his jaw clenching so hard it could crack. The way his hands twitched with the need to grab, to hold, to feel.

Tonight was no different.

Logan was already in bed, lounging with a book in hand, though he wasn’t reading a damn word. His focus was elsewhere—waiting. Anticipating.

And then you appeared.

Padding into the room like you hadn’t just made his lungs forget how to work.

Tonight’s nightgown was a soft blush pink, lace trim tracing the hem and neckline, the fabric sheer enough that the golden glow of the bedside lamp kissed your skin right through it. The delicate straps barely clung to your shoulders, one already slipping down in a way that made his throat dry up.

You weren’t even trying, and yet you had him right where you wanted him.

“Somethin’ on your mind, sugar?” You asked, throwing him the sweetest little smile.

He exhaled sharply, shutting his book with a little more force than necessary. “You’re gonna be the death of me, sweetheart.”

You blinked up at him, all innocence and mischief, and his chest ached with how damn much he loved you.

“Whatever do you mean, Logan?” You teased, tilting your head, pretending you didn’t know exactly what he meant.

Oh, you little—

His gaze dragged over you, slow and heavy, drinking you in like the last drop of whiskey in a bottle. And you—perfect, angelic you—just smiled that sweet, knowing smile, padding over to the bed like you didn’t have him by the throat.

Logan ran a hand down his face, exhaling hard through his nose. “You know exactly what I mean.”

You giggled as you climbed into bed beside him, the sound soft and airy, the kind of laugh that made his stomach flip. “Well, I certainly hope not. I’d miss you too much.”

With a low growl, he reached out, catching your wrist, tugging you closer until you half-fell into his lap. You squeaked, giggling as you braced yourself against his chest, palms pressing over hard muscle.

“You’re real cute, y’know that?” His voice was low, rough, like gravel smoothed by whiskey and smoke. His lips brushed against your forehead.

You beamed up at him, all sunshine and mischief. “I like when you call me cute.”

Logan huffed, shaking his head, but his hands—big, warm, roughened by years of fighting—slid down to your hips, thumbs grazing the soft, silky fabric of your nightgown. “You wear these damn things on purpose.”

Your lashes fluttered, feigning innocence. “What things?”

Logan leveled you with a look. “These,” he muttered, tugging lightly at the lace-trimmed hem. “Your little nightgowns.”

You bit your lip, smiling, and he just about lost it.

“I like feeling pretty,” you said simply, and the honesty in your voice made his heart clench.

He swallowed. Hard. Because damn it, you were pretty. You were the kind of pretty that made his chest ache, made his hands itch to touch, to worship, to hold on tight and never let go.

“You’re more than pretty, sweetheart,” he murmured, voice rough with something too big for words.

Your cheeks flushed, the blush dusting over your soft skin, and Logan swore it was the best damn thing he’d ever seen.

Still holding you close, he let his fingers trace absent patterns along your thighs, the heat of his touch seeping through the delicate fabric. “I ever tell ya how much I love you?”

Your smile softened, eyes shining as you nodded. “All the time.”

“Good,” he muttered, dragging you impossibly closer until you were nestled against him, warm and sweet and everything he didn’t know he needed. “I’m gonna keep tellin’ you.”

And just like that, the rest of the world faded away.

Because here, in this moment, with you wrapped up in his arms, dressed in something soft and sweet just like you—Logan finally felt something close to peace.

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