Ink mars the paper in a scattering of dots and minuscule streaks where the pen taps out an agitated rhythm. The dim circle of lamplight subtly yellowing the pages of a notebook lying open on Ian’s desk. His elbow rests atop it, partially obscuring the untidy breakdown of a budget three times rewritten.

It’s too thin, even with his own contribution bolstering it, and not for the first time does he suspect Olivia of withholding funds meant for the rescues. If he could see for himself the bank statements and not the cash she presses into his hands each month…

A patch of floor squeaks its protest as wandering feet tread the hall, and with no other rooms on the west side of the second floor the sound is a herald of an interruption. It’ll be the third that night. Ian sighs as he drops his head into the support of his hand, eyes flicking to the morose glow of the digital clock. 1:13am. Proper sleep always evades him on the nights he spends at the safehouse.

The lower hinge of the study door gives a plaintive creak under the tentative touch that swings it inward. The noise spikes his ire—nothing in this house is capable of being used in silence. But he forces his expression smooth and his back straight as he turns eyes on the rescue who pokes his head into the room.

A little of the frustration melts from him as he looks over August. The easy one. The pretty one. With short waves of auburn hair and eyes the color of polished emeralds.

“Yes?”

“Ian?” August eases a step inside, shoulders tense and hands twisting in that habitual way of his that betrays fraying nerves. “C-can I… I can’t sleep, can I sit with you?”

Ian dips his gaze to the pen in his hand as the request sets to fluttering something eager beneath his breastbone. He runs his thumb over the ballpoint, and watches the ink that marks his skin to give himself a thing to look at that isn't the allure of the rescue. Averting his eyes does nothing to diminish the temptation that comes alive in him when the rescues - particularly this rescue - come to him, with their hearts in their eyes and begging for praise.

In his peripheral, August takes a tentative step. “Sir?”

Ian tries to stifle the gratification that rushes through him each time a rescue projects that title onto him. In the beginning he dissuaded it, now though- “Yeah. Yeah, you can.” The words taste of impropriety. But there August stands unmoored, with unfilled hours between them and the dawn that will bring the safehouse out of slumber. If nothing else Ian can play the anchor… and garner his own pleasure from its role.

Tossing the pen atop the notebook he rises, the muscles along his spine aching their displeasure after too long spent in the chair. With a hand he beckons August to him, and the rescue steps into his arms like a moth to the flame. Smaller body tucking neatly against his and shivering beneath the soft touch of fingers that Ian trails down his back.

When the tips of them come up against August’s waistband he hesitates to retrace the path they’ve taken. Lingering there in a conflict of morals that kicks up the pace of his heart. That washes through him a warm wave that carries away the traces of his tiredness. All at once he’s wide awake and hyper aware of their proximity. He considers withdrawing. The thought is fleeting.

“Were you dreaming again?” Ian pitches his voice low, sweeping a hand between August’s shoulder blades to try to soothe the tension there.

“Yes.” August curls a hand to clutch at Ian’s shirt. “I was-“ A hitch of breath cuts him off as Ian slides under fabric. Fingers questing over a hip and tracing contours shaped just for them.

August stiffens in his embrace and Ian touches lips to his hair, thumb rubbing circles over a soft spot on his upper pelvis. A whine, beautiful and small, slips from August as instinctively he tips his head up to brush his face against Ian’s neck. The contact births a burst of tingles that swoop and sail through Ian’s abdomen, and it’s all he can do to keep from pressing himself more suggestively to the rescue. If this is wrong, then why does it have to feel so right?

“What were you dreaming?” It’s more husky than he means it to be, and August loops arms around his waist in response. Does what Ian is reluctant to and presses their bodies flush together.

“I was dreaming of you,” August says, and it’s a lie. A string of empty words meant to play for his appeasement. A conditioned response that Ian recognizes but does not wholly dislike.

“Was I good to you in it?” He whispers it to try and temper the desire so plain in his voice.

“You’re always good to me, Sir.”

Again, that pleasure, the one that comes with these broken people so desperately searching for authority in a world now alien to them. And Ian can give them that much, can’t he? Can soothe their worries with murmured words of want, of praise, can help them find their footing by keeping them in his grip.

August shifts, and later Ian will tell himself it was belatedly that he recognized the reasoning. But in the moment he knows immediately that August is going to kiss him, and he does nothing to stymie the warm press of lips to his.

-

@ashintheairlikesnow

A scream resounds off alabaster walls, the inconsolable rescue chasing it with a stainless steel frying pan that arcs through the air and narrowly avoids hitting Ian.

The safehouse volunteer jerks away from the projectile and flinches as it noisily dents the wall and bounces to the floor, the sound eclipsing that of the former pet’s panic.

Ian draws in a shaky breath, hands lifting in a visual display of surrender that contrasts the frustration - the anger - throbbing through him in time with his heartbeat.

“It’s okay,” he tries, a little too loud, struggling for composure. “You’re safe here, everything’s fine.”

In answer the rescue seizes the tea kettle and throws it, forcing Ian to dodge, stoking his ire when pain blooms as he knocks a hip against the kitchen table.

Were it not for being the only non-rescue currently there, he would pass them off to someone else. Someone more qualified, more naturally placating. Someone who knew where they had gone wrong and how to amend it.

But he is, and he doesn’t, and the rescue stares at him without recognition as they blindly grope along the counter behind them for a new weapon, hand touching on the knife block and-

“RESPECT!”

It bursts from Ian before his conscious mind has time to consider its use, and the result is instantaneous.

The rescue’s knees come unhinged, hitting the floor with a bony thunk. They curl in on themself, forehead touching tile as they wrap their hands over their head.

Ian presses a palm atop the table, bracing himself as his heart thunders in his ears, and something dark and heady and mildly unsettling shivers through him at the sight of a switch being so easily flipped. It takes the time for his pulse to slow to realize the rescue is talking.

“-sorry, I’m sorry, please f-forgive me, I’m sorry Sir, I’m-“

“Hush.” Vying emotions soften the word, but it still has all the effect of an owner snapping for silence at their dog.

The rescue goes quiet, breath and body trembling on the kitchen floor, and doesn’t move as Ian straightens and walks to them. He hesitates, aware that he’s towering and that they’re cowering, but equal parts uncertain and entranced by the naked display of obedience and fear.

A sound overhead makes him blink. The creak of a floorboard sustaining pressure, another rescue shifting somewhere in the hallway on the upper floor.

The reminder that they’re not alone impales him, the weight of his actions crashing down on him and he goes to his knees, hands hovering over the rescue.

“I-“

What else was he supposed to do? Continue to take bombardment from a person so caught up in their own ruinous mind that they couldn’t recognize him? Wait until one of the pots or pans or knives hit their mark and he was the one needing help?

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean… Look, you’re fine, alright?” Taking their wrists he pulls their hands from their head and guides - it’s not force, it’s just guidance - them into a sitting position, and tries to ignore the predatory pleasure that thrums through his chest at how pliable they are.

It’s not right, it isn’t right, I’m supposed to be helping them.

“Can you look at me?”

They do. Chin lifting just enough to bring their eyes together. A shiny brown stares back at him, moist and hollow and hurt, and waiting with an unnerving readiness to obey the next directive.

“I’m sorry,” Ian says. His fingers loosen their grip on the rescue, and their hands shake under his. “I didn’t know what else to do, I shouldn’t have… I’m sorry.”

“I’m sorry,” the rescue echoes. Paper thin and just as fragile, ready to rip beneath another unkind word or an unwanted touch.

The guilt hits Ian again. It chases away the residual pleasure the brief control had born in him, and leaves him feelings of discomfort.

“Let’s… let’s get you to your room, okay? Do you want to go to your room?”

The rescue nods, slow and hesitant, and moves easily as Ian gently guides them to their feet.

Content warning: bbu, panicked rescue, triggered via touch, referenced noncon, dubcon touching, creepy caretaker.

It strikes him like the embedding of a blade. Thrust to the hilt and given a twist that arrests his thoughts and stalls his breath. A plunge of panic that sets him to trembling as lascivious fingers that masquerade as benevolent trail a line down his chest.

The touch evokes a noise from him, and it must be wrong because the contact withdraws, and on instinct he chases it with a forward step. An apology on his lips, and a desperate desire to appease squeezing the contents of his ribcage.

August flinches hard as hands trap his face, pulling a whine from him as his body predicts the steps to come. Palms to his shoulders pushing him down. Fingers hooking the waistband of his pants and giving a tug. A voice thick with lust that tells him be still, be silent, just relax and make this easy, alright?

“Look at me.”

He blinks. Blinks again when his vision blurs. It occurs to him that he’s begun crying when thumbs swipe at the cascade spilling down his cheeks. Sir hates it when he cries.

“M’sorry,” he says, and it quivers with the knowledge that breaking silence will earn him punishment, but the words erupt from him like spooked birds taking flight and he doesn’t have the means to catch them. “I can do it right, I can, I can be quiet, please, I-“

“August!”

The snap of his name makes him jump, and a breath sucks sharply between abruptly closed teeth as he stares at Ian. Ian, who’s standing idle, not forcing him down. Staring back with hands on his face and not on his hips.

“Relax. Just breathe. Can you do that?”

August nods. Exhales. Catches the uneasiness that coils in Ian’s eyes as they flick toward the study door, through which drifts the muffled noises of safehouse life.

A small noise crawls from him as Ian drops his hands to catch one of his wrists, and his body moves with ingrained compliance as he’s towed toward the futon pushed up against the far wall.

An unpleasant flutter of dismay lifts from his stomach to turn loops beneath his ribs, and he raises a hand that shakes to grip at Ian’s sleeve as he’s maneuvered to sit.

Ian must read the apprehension written in bold print across his expression, because he tells him, “You’re fine.” But old uncertainties have been rewoken and August isn’t able to remember how to beat them back.

It hitches his breath when fingers curl over the curve of his neck, and he leans into it as Ian’s weight settles beside him. Eyes darting to Ian’s in search of validation, of praise, of any hint that he’s doing something right. What he finds is enigmatic.

“What happened?” Ian asks, releasing his wrist to wipe at the residual dampness on August’s cheeks. “You’ve always been fine with… with this.” With a hand Ian gestures vaguely between them, and August blinks when the meaning clicks. Their unspoken arrangement. Interactions indulged in private and out from under the eye of the rest of the residents because…

Because it’s a safehouse. It’s safe.

“What happened?” Ian repeats, softer this time.

“I-“ August tries, but the words drown in his throat as he swallows and cuts his gaze to the side. The explanation is there. A thing crouched in darkness at the forefront of his mind, summoned by a touch inadvertently perfect. An accidental match to the hundreds before it given to him by another’s hand. The explanation is there - but the words fail him.

In his peripheral Ian drags a rough hand through his hair, and panic swims through August’s chest at the thought that he’s ruined this thing between them.

A moment passes. Another. And then Ian’s palm returns to his face, angling it back to bring together their eyes. He tries to take comfort from it as a mantra beats through his mind in time to his heart. Ian is safe Ian is safe Ian is safe.

“It’s fine,” Ian tells him, looping an arm around August’s shoulders, and the smallest of pulls is enough to have him shifting closer. Pressing with gratitude to the solidity of Ian’s body as a shiver rolls through him.

Ian runs his fingertips over the back of August’s neck, resting his chin atop his head as the rescue tucks himself against him. “Everything’s fine.”

Everything’s fine.

Content warning: bbu, nightmares, trauma response, noncon touching, unsafe caretaker.

August wakes with a jerk to the kickstart of his heart. A thunderous pulsing born of phantom dreams beating an aching rhythm in his chest. Dreams of hands and tongue and teeth, and whispers in the dark that promise their pleasure from his pain.

A full body tremor rocks through him as he scrambles to leave the bed, the blankets tangling their reluctance to allow his escape and following him as he loses his balance and hits the floor.

There’s no escape there’s no escape there’s no esca-

He chokes on a sob. Hands scrimmaging with the fabric to loosen it and set himself free. Sweat slickens his skin as he clambers to unsteady feet and backpedals until he comes up against a wall.

A wall in his room. A wall in the safehouse.

Bending double he grabs fistfuls of his hair, and welcomes the pain of the grip. Begs it to chase from him the memories of deeper agonies, that curl and twist and chew through the heart of him.

His breaths come quick and shallow as he tries to calm. Tries to orient himself. His eyes flick to Alexis’ bed, and a new flavor of fear touches his tongue as he finds it empty. He can’t be alone. Not now, not ever. If he’s alone…. if he’s alone with him…

August shoves from the wall and slips through the door. Bolts into the hall and makes for the stairs. He stumbles down steps that curve from view, and only just keeps from falling.

A soft light spills from the kitchen. Illuminating the edges of the rooms around it as it does every night. A reassurance for restless rescues who wander the house when all others sleep.

It draws at him. A place that is, if not safe, at least safer. Void of shadows and the things that exploit them. Things that slink and whisper and take and-

“August?”

A jolt cuts a jagged path through his chest as he startles. Spinning from the beckon of the kitchen to face the shrouds that drape the living room. Eyes fixing on the figure lurking in the vicinity of the front door. A moment passes before his mind resolves the figure as being Ian.

“Are you alright?”

Ian, with jacket donned and a bag slung over one shoulder. Ready to vacate the safehouse and make a return to his apartment. To a life outside of caring for the people who have been broken by it.

“August.”

August folds his arms around himself. Adding to the pressure already sitting weighty on his lungs, as if with enough of it he can keep himself from falling to pieces. He doesn’t move as Ian sets his bag beside the door.

“Hey.”

Ian approaches with movements a little too quick, and August drops his eyes to the floor. Hunches his shoulders, locks his knees. I will not kneel. I will not kneel.

You’re pretty when you’re on your knees.

He swallows against the phantom obstruction in his throat, and manages a word squeezed by tears. “Please.”

Moisture races down his cheeks as he ducks his head. Breath hitching as a hand slides beneath his chin and tips it back up. Ian blurs and wavers in August’s vision, and it’s impossible for him to discern the expression he wears.

A hesitant silence envelops them, until Ian breaks it with a whispered, “Please what?” Something in his tone flutters desperation through August on panicked wings.

“Please s-stay.”

Ian’s hand falls away, and August chases him. Taking a tentative grip on his jacket before he can consider the action. His body coils as muscle memory expects a blow for his insolence, but when contact comes it’s with careful control.

An encircling of arms that pulls him near, a hand between his shoulders, the other in his hair. August shivers as he leans into the solidity of Ian and takes comfort from the warmth of him. A heat that doesn’t hurt.

“Alright,” Ian murmurs. His hand glides down August’s spine. Fingers capturing the hem of his shirt and rubbing the fabric thoughtfully between them. “I can stay.”

Content warning: bbu, unsafe caretaker, relapse during recovery, brief dubcon/noncon touching (not sexually written but definitely suggestive).

“August.”

The kitchen chair that supports Ian gives an ominous creak as he straightens. Face lifting from the luminosity of the phone screen to fix the rescue with a stare. “What?”

The rescue brings his hands together in a twisting of fingers. Anxiety swelling in his chest and threatening to inhibit the motion of his lungs. “August.” He flicks his eyes away from the intensity of Ian’s. “M-my name. It’s August.”

The longest residing rescue there, and the last to name himself. The brief following of silence feels weighted with the knowledge that he’s been the slowest to make progress.

“August.” Ian draws it out, testing. The legs of his chair grate against the floor as he pushes it away from the table to better face the rescue.

The too quick beat of August’s heart sings through his ears with more volume than the divulgence can account for. There’s a desire in it. One that keeps him rooted in the doorway after he gives a nod of confirmation. Lingering in Ian’s presence as the instinct to retreat wars with want, and he gives up pretending that announcing his name is the only reason why he’s there.

No one touches him. Alexis is averse to it, intimate or casual it makes no difference, they avoid it at all cost. It leaves August feeling lonely during the long nights spent in their respective beds in the room they share.

The other rescued occupants of the safehouse could be compelled, he thinks, but he’s loath to coerce them. It would be wrong, monstrous, and would lack the flavor of contact his skin begs him for.

Olivia is rarely there, and a woman besides.

But Ian…

“Is there something-“

“Sir?” The interruption is hardly more than a breath, but it sets his pulse to racing. Comfort and alarm rising in equal measure as he brings his eyes back to Ian’s and reads some semblance of authority in them. Of abrupt excitement in them. Does he like being called Sir?

It pulls him a step nearer, and he drops his hands to his sides. Curling them into fists in effort to keep them from trembling as doubt flickers through his mind. Does he want this? Or does he think he wants this?

There’s a palpable tension in the room as they consider one another. Alarm begins to tip the scale as August watches something complex, almost pained, pass over Ian’s expression.

“August, I…” Ian glances away. Watches the thumb he slides over the edge of his phone before setting it with exaggerated care atop the table. He takes a breath, holds it, and August holds his with him. Wanting, and not wanting, and-

And then Ian exhales, and an air of control fills the space left behind as his eyes snap back to August. “Come here.”

There’s an edge of command to the tone that August immediately obeys. Closing the distance between them and dropping smoothly into position two.

The hungry sheen of Ian’s eyes contradicts the way he hesitates, the way his hands hover after being raised. August knows that look. It’s one that he loves. It’s one that he hates.

His skin crawls as he blinks up at him, and he isn’t able to decide if it’s towards or away from the prospect of being touched.

I want this.

A shaky breath leaves him as Ian smoothes a hand over his hair, eyes closing as he lowers his forehead to Ian’s knees.

Something in his chest is wound up tight. Constrictive, half strangling him, even as his muscles go slack with pleasure - with obedience - under the contact. As a whine, half needy, half fearful, slides free of him at the tightening of fingers in his hair.

It bundles beneath his ribcage, aching in time to the pound of his heart, as a hand falls to his shoulder, rubs at the back of his neck, dips under the collar of his shirt.

I…. I want this.

@summer-of-whump

Takes place shortly after this piece.

Content Warning: BBU, questionable caretaker, vague depictions of sadistic desires and control.

The tainted sense of ascendency returns to him in variance. As gratification ghosting fingers beneath his ribcage at the averting of a rescue's eyes. As a hungry flutter in his abdomen when the raising of hand or voice elicits a flinch.

At times it sits solid in his chest, like a creature weighty and waiting, thrumming its eagerness at the vivid vulnerability too easily evoked. And oh, how easy it is. A motion, a word, a look, and they come apart at the seams like cheaply sewn suits.

And with each moment of empowerment the guilt follows, nipping at its heels and leaving it deflated and abrased. Smothering it back beneath the morals he tries to hold fast to. Sometimes, it feels, by the tips of his fingers.

Those opposing wants war within him as he goes to a knee on threadbare carpet, eyes running over the rescue huddling between the dingy green couch and the off-white wall.

Their gazes lock, and a little thrill tingles his skin as her arms tighten their grip around her legs, drawn up and folded. Her eyes blow wide with fear, and he wonders if she can recognize exactly what it is inside him.

“Come here.” He says it softly, voice pitched low with a calm reassurance that doesn’t feel entirely sincere.

She blinks, shakes her head. Shifts as though capable of cramming herself deeper into the space she’s already occupying.

The quiet defiance prods at him like a poker at a smoldering fire.

“Now.” Just as low so as not to carry, but with an unpracticed sharpness that expects obedience.

And it works. Tears fill her eyes, and there’s wary reluctance in the way that she moves, but moves she does. Unfolding her limbs and crawling - crawling! - toward him.

When he offers his hand she takes it hastily, and blood sings triumph in his ears as the victory sets his heart to pounding.

And the guilt is there. Dampening the little conquest and making restless that sense of wrongness that accompanies each desire of aberration.

Part of him begs to indulge it. Part of him believes he should quit the safehouse, and pursue an avenue of employment safer for all those involved. Something away from the easy exertion of control over people already broken.