#rfic

Growing up, you were always warned away from the sea. Creatures lurked in the deep dark, beyond what even the most accomplished fisherman could comprehend. The ocean was to be both feared and respected. Without practice, swimming never came naturally to you. Now it’s the only chance you have.

You go limp. All you need is one slip up, one misplaced hand, and you’re tearing yourself from your fiancé’s cruel grasp. He tries to get a grip on your hair and fails, only dunking you under long enough to push you further from his reach. Bubbles burst from your lips. You twist and kick until you’re spun with your back to him. A fumbling escape is still an escape. Once you give yourself up to the tide, the waves drag you from the boat. Even tossed around by the uncaring ocean feels like safety. Freedom from that man.

Under the golden moon, you get one last glimpse of your home. Lampfire dims where the village meets the horizon. All you can make out is the inky blackness of the sky broken by that comforting orange light. Your mind may be playing tricks on you, but you swear you can even see the warm light of your bedroom. Anger and love become one misshapen beast in your memories. One last time, the villagers will turn their backs on you. Husbands, wives and children return to their beds tonight. As if you never walked among them at all. Families will find comfort in the hold of sleep. There’s no comfort left for you.  

Perhaps you were naive to fall for his promises. Even in the end, all it took was a honey slick smile to get you out on that dinghy. Was that worthy of the punishment you faced? 

Injustice is all you have to tether you. Whiteness envelops your vision. You go weak, unable to roll with the waves. Still you fight to live. Each tug of the current drives you a little harder. As long as your head breaks the surface even the tiniest breath may save you. 

There’s only so much one can endure.

Your drive for survival alone was never going to be enough. In the icy cold, your fingers have gone numb and blue tipped. When was your last breath? If you had broken the surface recently, you can’t remember it now. Up and down cease to mean anything. You drift face first through the sea. 

A soft, beautiful melody echoes around you. Whalesong, you think distantly. That song loves you. It lifts your spirit. You return to consciousness slowly, carried along by the musical lull. You awaken anew. 

The gaze that meets yours is arresting, purple-eyed and teasing. If you could, you would reach out. The face is pretty enough to be a woman’s, though his voice comes out low in song. Midnight moonlight breaks through the water, dappling his face. He swims face-up just beneath you. There’s nothing but you, aimlessly adrift, and the steady pace he keeps. Death, perhaps, has at last come to take you.

Gentle hands take yours. His long fingers wrap easily around your wrists. In the vast expanse of the ocean, he looms massive. This is far more than just a man. The two of you cling to each other, flowing ever downward. Soon drowning is no different from floating. 

The hands that guide you are claw-tipped. They’re slender and pale but their charm only makes the sable black tips stand out all the more. Pink and purple scales shimmer along his chest, caressing their way down to his waist. A waist that tapers into a body that you can’t truly comprehend. Pitch-black void is all that awaits. Nothingness where his upper thighs should be. The curve of his hips ends in unfathomable darkness. You think, somewhere within, you can see stars twinkle in the darkness. 

From the void, tentacles spring forth. They twist in a teeming mass, impossible to count. Beautiful and strange. They’re the same entrancing, shimmering luster of his scales. At your attention, they writhe around you. 

You have been bewitched. Knowing this won’t save you. His song drapes over you. It comes from his chest, his lips, but also from the deep cosmic space encompassing his lower body. 

By the time his tentacles take your thighs, bringing you in close, you’ve already gone slack. Mind, body and heart unfurl for him. His hands slide up to your shoulders soothingly just as his tentacles firm and tighten. At his mercy, your legs wrap around his waist, just above that impenetrably dark void. You look down between you, where creeping blackness roils. It stirs something deep in your gut.

Fingers grip your chin, tilting your gaze back up to meet his. The glow of his eyes is dreamy. Face to face, he smiles. Only now do you see the two rows of jagged teeth. Once, in your youth, the fishermen had brought home a great beast of a shark. They rejoiced as they hung it above the docks. It had terrified you, the way its mouth pulled back in rigor to reveal a grinning maw. Despite the celebration of the villagers, you couldn’t stand their cheer. For weeks, you walked the long way home just to avoid the memory of it. 

You had no desire to be that child any longer. If he was truly Death, let him take you.

The arch of your back feels natural. You cleave yourself to him. His torso is just as human as you are when you’re skin to skin. A rumbling purr builds in his chest. His eyes widen at your forwardness. 

Enthusiasm shared between you spurs him forward. His hold on you is sure and confident. Even with you in his arms, he’s unrestrained. The pace he sets is breakneck, a speed that you never imagined any creature could manage.The roar of the ocean in your ears deafens his sweet song. It clears your head just enough. 

You’re doing this. You chose this. That matters to you, despite everything. Wherever he would take you, you would see it through. This brief interlude, where every thought in your head was no longer clouded by the haze of his voice, is your one chance to decide. You grasp it tightly.

A shudder runs through the creature the moment you succumb. One hand cradles the back of your head, supporting your neck as he jolts to a stop. A cavemouth yawns wide before you. Even this far from any light, the darkness of the cavern can’t reach the same impregnable abyss of his lower body. 

Only the eerie, hollow sound of the ocean hangs between you. You ache for his song. Embraced by you completely, he no longer feels the need for it. 

His fingers curl and uncurl over your biceps. Eager like a child. When he ferries you into the cave, you’re his shiny new toy. Tentacles strip you of your nightclothes, almost perfunctory in their movement. Gooseflesh rises in the wake of his hands as he leads you out of his hold. Under his hot touch, your skin feels taut and frigid. 

“Follow me,” he says. It’s the first time he’s spoken. His voice comes out higher than you expected, tinkling like bells. You knew only his song, in a language unheard among mankind. He releases you. Each finger lingers just longer than it should. Both of you almost can’t bear to let go. 

One tentacle takes your hand. It’s surprisingly strong. The sucker sticks to your palm and locks you together. Experimentally, you flex your fingers. Musculature meets you, firm and unyielding. His request is little more than a well practiced courtesy. If you wanted to break free, you’re sure you couldn’t. 

Anchored together, the two of you slowly begin your ascent. You kick your feet lazily along, caught in his drift. There were tales of men rising too quickly from the deep sea, only for their head and chest to burn them to death. Somehow, you knew you were safe. Breath had long left your lungs.

You still gasp when you break the surface. It chokes you. Crisp, sea salt air coats your tongue. Peals of laughter bounce off the cave walls in an echo. His laugh is lovely even when it’s at your expense. The apples of his cheeks are flushed. They curve sweetly until his eyes are no more than little crescent moons, flashing in the dim cavern. 

The lagoon is sheltered within the cliffs bordering your village harbor. You instantly recognize the view across the bay, where a high lord’s manor sits atop the rocky bluffs. All children dreamed of that manor. It was a distant, impossible future. Kindled lamplight flickers from the windows like eyes looking down upon you. What did it see? You, devoid of warmth, clinging tightly to this monster. 

The very monster gives you a moment to take it all in, with his tentacle still suckered securely to your hand. You spin in the water, amazed that you had gone your whole life with the creature’s lair so close by. It’s clear that’s what this is. Water laps gently inside, untouched by the churning current from just beyond the mouth. At the deepest point sits a sandy shore. Though there seems to be decorations, the amenities make little sense to you. This isn’t a place meant for your comfort. 

What stands out the most is a stone dais at the center of the beach. The platform is round and raised, covered in brine and lichen. Decorative shells frame the edges. Mindlessly, you float closer and closer. An altar awaiting you.

The creature rises. Exposed to the air, the void warps and ebbs. It nearly overtakes his abdomen then flutters back down to its previous size. No legs interrupt the infinite blackness. Using his tentacles to lift himself, your companion leads you to land. Under the ocean, even the most impossible things seem probable. That he could glide across the sand with ease startles you. He goes backwards, never looking away from your face until one curious tentacle bumps the dais. 

It’s easy for him to lift you. Human and bestial limbs hoist you up in tandem. The stone is cool and damp under your bare thighs. Moored once again, free from the aimless drifting of the sea, you curl your fingers tightly around the stone’s edge. 

Whirling purple eyes stare down at you. He doesn’t miss a single movement.  His gaze travels from toe to tip. Towering over you, his chest is right at eye-level. He’s uncannily smooth. Only white, flat skin meets your eyes where you would expect dusty pink nipples to be. Though his abs are well defined, powerful from the pulsing strokes that propel him through the ocean, they’re easy to overlook with the void just below. In this new light, you can see iridescent flecks of color in the blackness of his lower body. Your thighs clench. It’s a pleasure to examine him as he does the same to you. The distance between you is negligible. The void entices you. Was it cold? Would it inhale you, swallowing you whole? 

His chest and neck grow blue and pallid under your perusal. A blush. You open your mouth to speak, only for a creaking rattle to shake loose from your throat. You swallow harshly and try again, ignoring his derisive laugh. 

“Are you going to kill me?” you ask. 

The snort he lets out is the first graceless thing he’s allowed. One clawed finger runs down your cheek. He stops at your lip, letting the sharp point prick your skin. He pulls your lower lip down and bares your teeth. 

“Cute thing. You’re already dead,” he coos. Your frozen heart was proof enough. Still, you flinch. He releases you from his fingers with a wet pop. “You understand what I am, don’t you?”

You nod. He’s no angel of death, come to release you from your suffering. All children from your village knew the stories of the siren that stalked your shores. You grew up with those stories hovering over your shoulder. When the slain shark smiled at you so menacingly, it was Rafayel, creature of the deepsea, that you feared hid within it. 

Fishermen would return to the harbor shaken and dazed. Any body that hit the sea was never retrieved, dead or alive. What belonged to Rafayel couldn’t be taken back so easily. Only once atop his altar were you truly lost to the depths.

He takes wicked pleasure in his infamy. When he sees the recognition in your eyes, Rafayel giggles. Gentle eyes mock you. Distantly, you hear his song. 

“Very smart,” he whispers. He leans in to kiss your cheek. It warms you all the way through. Although no air fills your lungs, you tingle back to life. “I’ll kill them all for you. Isn’t that what you wanted? You just have to do one thing for me.” 

A shudder rips down your spine. Had you summoned him in your wrath? Or was your desperate, pleading weakness so easy to exploit? You couldn’t fathom which wretched part of your soul called out to him. You swayed. In your final moments, your ultimate betrayal, this stunning creature had connected to you. That could be enough. What a comfort to know that you hadn’t truly died alone. 

You could make him happy. It was only fair, after what he had done for you.

“I’ll do anything,” you offer. Your voice comes from somewhere deep, warbling in your ears. Not quite your own.

It delights him. His kisses grow more insistent. He whispers your name into your wan skin. When did he learn your name? 

Hot, wet breath puffs against your cheek, your chin, just under your ear. It feels right to give him what he desires. That language from before, so beautiful and foreign, springs to life where your bodies meet. Tentacles spread your legs, opening you up to him. The void grows, reaching for you only to stop itself before you finally get to feel it. 

“Your soul,” he says, “That’s all. It won’t be of any use to you soon. Just your soul then vengeance is all yours. I’ll do it gladly.” 

It makes sense. It muddles you. Your stomach twists, only to flutter and float high at the lovely drag of his teeth on your shoulder. They don’t break skin. The anticipation is menacing. Wrong. You yearn to break it. Whether you mean to pull him away or drag him close, your fingers twine into his hair. 

Yes, you think. Yes, yes, yes. 

In his eagerness, he shoves you back. He’s humming happily, layer over layer of melodies dancing free from his chest. Jagged stones pierce your back. Your head hits the stone with a ringing thwack. The eerie music trembles. 

From across the bay you swear you hear your fiancé’s savage laughter. It breaks through the joyous song. That laugh disgusts you. That you had ever cared at all sickens you. Hate and pain reignite. You remember only the burning ache in your muscles as your body struggled to save itself. How long had it been, that you fought so desperately to live? 

You gasp, struggling to tear yourself away. The suction hold Rafayel has doesn’t let you go far. His head follows shortly after, pulled back into you like he belongs there. 

“No,” you snap. Your hand in his hair tugs strands free. He looks up at you in wounded surprise. Your eyes flutter weakly. It hurts to displease him. His touch is so gentle. The softness engulfs you. Anything is worth it, to punish the ones who did this to you. Yet, when you open your mouth you know it’s to reject him again. 

Sensing your resistance, his pout hardens into something fiercer. Desperate to regain control, Rafayel writhes over you. The void expands and contracts. He returns to the tender place just above your collarbone. It’s no longer a kiss he offers. Without any sweetness to spare, he rips into your skin. His teeth tear flesh easily. You scream and twist. Somewhere, distantly, you feel a shiver build in your thighs. His tentacles tighten, a grip that would once have bruised you. He stops you from kicking out before you can even try. 

It was a mistake made in his greed. You realize that. The pain licks like flames through your body. It’s yours alone again. This vessel that houses your soul belongs only to you. Not a plaything, nor something to be discarded so easily. Pain makes it real. You’re more than just a numb, hollow thing. 

You spit, “My soul isn’t yours.” 

His snarl is warped. Rafayel’s jaw clenches, sharp teeth slicing through muscle until they hit bone. He rends your flesh until your vision goes white. It’s only the stinging in your palms that makes you realize you smack at his shoulders and throat, anywhere you can reach. Your fingers catch sharp flaps near his pulse point. When you dig in, drawing your nails through the sensitive flesh, he pulls away with a hiss. 

Your shoulder is torn apart, muscle and fat exposed to the humid air. It leaks blood slowly. His chin is painted with it, dripping and dark. With great pleasure, you see a steady spurt of his own blue-tinted blood rush forth from his gills. You managed to rip him open, if only slightly. 

The song warbles out of tune. Rather than their previous magnificent glow, his eyes heat in feverish frenzy. His tentacles thrash about mindlessly. When he pants, the void throbs. Something deep within swirls. 

“I want to help you. You want to help me too,” he pleads. You bare your teeth in a snarl. If you had fangs, you would snap them. “I’ll kill them. Ask for anything. Just say yes.” 

His hysteria climaxes the more you struggle against him. When he pins your hands to the dais, he trembles. 

“It’s mine,” you hiss. Perhaps he can hurt you, but what does that matter? You have the one thing he can’t take. He whines, his rage flagging as reality sets in. He’s lost. Almost kittenlike, he leans down to nuzzle you. It’s gentle. Without his song he has no more power. 

Careful to hold the void at a distance, he climbs even further atop the altar. His body, what you can feel of it, is heavy. It’s sobering. The two of you stare into each other’s eyes, seeking something.

The kiss is toothless. He runs his tongue over your upper lip, breathing you in. It’s you, not him that nibbles. You suck his tongue into your mouth, hot muscle filling you. You wonder how much force it would take to bite it off. Your shoulder throbs. 

This time, when he pulls back you avoid his gaze. It’s hard to say if you can ever really resist his pull.

“Your body won’t last much longer. I can ease the pain,” he says gently. His voice is melodious. Two languages mingle atop one another. You scowl. More tricks.

Leaving no room for his retreat, you propel yourself forward. Although your teeth are dull, only human, they dig into his cheek with enough force to drag a pained groan from him. When he tries to shove you off, you latch harder. You can’t slice through him easily, but you can hurt. Haven’t you earned that much?

Salt coats your tongue. When he finally manages to pull you off, you go triumphantly. Under his eye, his skin is flushed a deep blue. Popped blood vessels. His eyes are wide, pupils dilated, and darting around as if waiting for your next attack. Both hands release you. His tentacles hold fast. You’ve lost count of how many of them take your limbs. One twists its way up to the hollow of your throat. 

“You bit me!” he yelps. 

“You ate me.” 

He rolls his eyes, “Just a taste. My dinner isn’t usually so stubborn.” 

Your lip curls. This petulant being has long struck fear into the hearts of hardened sailors. Moody as the ocean shore. 

“Well, you’re not much without your little tricks,” you say, “If I’ll die soon anyways, what difference does it make?” 

“I don’t like my food cold. Besides, what I want is your soul.” 

You test your luck, pushing against the hold of his tentacles. They don’t budge. Over Rafayel’s shoulder, you see the twinkling lights of the manor, reflected back by the waves. You don’t have to die alone.  

“How long do I have?” you ask.

“Until sunrise.”

It smothers you. Knowing that you’re already long dead isn’t a balm. 

You steel yourself and nod. You have no intention of satisfying his hunger. Giving up one final piece of yourself is unfathomable. Angry tears burn your eyes. It would be so easy to say yes. Even if it was a lie, you could go happily knowing retribution upon the village would follow your passing. Happily, but not wholly. 

“Convince me, then. Without the siren call.” 

Rafayel’s smile is cherubic, even with his bloodstained teeth. He no longer needs his melodious influence over you. You don’t have to ask twice. His body crawls down towards your stomach. He kisses you there, just below your navel. More tentacles burst from the void. Close to your mound, he can see your involuntary clench. 

“You like these,” he teases. Your whine makes him snicker into your skin. It tickles. 

The tentacles secrete viscous and sticky liquid. Whatever it is, it drips to your chest. You jolt with each drop. A vibrant tentacle goes to your shoulder, where a chunk of you is missing. Your skin tingles where it touches, soothing you. So it hadn’t been a lie, when he said he could ease the pain. You whimper, suddenly afraid. If you can’t feel your body, what’s left? 

“Stop,” you snap, “It’s making me numb.”

You can’t afford numbness. In this dying night, all you want is to feel. Softness comes through blunted, between layers of your suffering. Pain is sharp-edged and sweet. 

He glances up with one eyebrow poised. Testing your sincerity, his teeth prick your skin. He bites into your stomach, where fat protects fragile organs, just deep enough to puncture. It grounds you. You moan. 

“You like this too,” he murmurs. He blooms with this fresh knowledge. The tentacles that held your wrists let go gently. They wriggle across your body to your chest. Each breast is in his tight grasp, the tips toying with your nipples. Set free, your hands go to his hair. He hums approvingly. 

From beyond his bent body, you can see the void pulsing. When Rafayel kisses even lower, his plush lip catching the hood of your clit, it flutters with you. You watch the void’s rhythmic roil. It matches its pace to his tongue lapping between your lips. All sensation pinpricks that singular point. You’re embarrassingly wet. You had been since that first bite. 

He curls his fingers to press a knuckle to your folds. Careful to keep his claws away, he thrusts shallow into your entrance. Just when you want to kick him for going too soft, he nuzzles his nose into your cunt, inhaling deeply. Tentacles hold your ankles, your knees, press deep into the meat of your thighs. You’re spread open at his mercy. With the juncture of your thigh exposed, he bites. It’s cruel, but not tearing. His hot tongue follows. You choke on your gasp, air caught in your chest, and squeeze your eyes shut at the bright waves of pleasure that roll through you. 

Suctions grip your nipples raw. The knuckle between your lips moves even faster, pumping along with your needy throbs. His jaw locks until he’s latched so tightly to you that you become one wild creature. He moans, catching your release between his fingers. It blinds you. You don’t even realize you’re begging for more, harder, meaner until the pulses abate. 

He doesn’t make you wait. Tentacles weave over you. One, thick and throbbing, replaces the finger between your legs. The other traces the seam of your lips. You open up for it. 

“Watch your teeth,” he warns, breathy. You nearly roll your eyes, only for them to squeeze shut as he fucks into you at both ends. Almost naturally, you suck his tentacle in deeper, drool coating you both. Your heated walls tighten around him. The tip is small, curling up, but tapers off quickly into thick muscle. He pushes his way into your cunt until you can’t take him any further. Fullness burns through you. 

Rafayel lets you take control with your mouth, slurping desperately. He coils to the back of your throat. The tentacle in your core doesn’t thrust, but throbs. His tip strokes you again and again, finding something small and spongey inside of you. It tugs at your gut with a pleasure unfamiliar to you. You whimper and squirm. Muscles spasm with the sensitivity. Your thighs try to clamp shut and Rafayel laughs. 

He busies himself, biting his way up your body. From your thighs, to your hips, just under your ribs. Puncture wounds carve their way up your body, perfect replicas of his teeth. One row latches to your flesh while the other breaks skin. Perfectly built to subdue his prey.

The tentacles at your breasts squeeze punishingly. Tiny, desperate rolls of your hips are all that you can manage under his firm hold. You catch a glimpse of the void, glowing enough to illuminate the cavern. It casts shadows over you both, like ghosts joining in your fervor. 

Two more tentacles join the one at your apex. They bracket the thickest one from top and bottom where it fucks into you hotly. Both delve inside experimentally. They probe and stretch until all three thrust deep. The slick sound of them rubbing against each other only makes you grow wetter. Drenched in your pleasure, the bottommost tentacle squirms out and down between the cleft of your ass. You clench around the two remaining. Curved lower, it circles the tight ring again and again before breaching you. You and Rafayel keen together in your own strange song. He forces your legs back even further, folding you in half and exposing you to his gaze. The sight of him sheathed inside of you, three holes pumped full with his tentacles, rips a terrifying sound from his chest. He pulls back to meet your eyes. 

The void shimmers. Rafayel’s sclera have gone pure black. He’s divine Sweat drips down the arc of his neck. Drool, your own wetness, and the thick fluid of his tentacles pool from your entrances. The two in your cunt engorge themselves, swollen knots of muscle locking him inside of you. Pressure builds in your spine. The outline of his largest tentacle is visible under your skin, fat and deep. One of his hands reaches out to press down on the bulge. Your eyes roll back into your head, vision going black. 

You’ll burst. He can’t look away. Both of his hands run along your body. They prod at your fullness, the points of his claws tracing each place he enters you. Mouth, teeth, just one more bite will set you free. You can’t plead, throat fucked full. You want him to pull out and let you beg. You want him to disregard that entirely and thrust deeper. Fruitless arches of your body curve you up over the stone. Above you, your thighs shake. Muffled calls for more are indistinct past your occupied lips.

Whether or not he’s listening, Rafayel obeys your cries. He surrounds you. Razor-like teeth bite the curve of your breast. With you secure in his grip, he thrashes. His jaws rip you apart while his tentacles stroke inside of you intimately. Flesh from meat, meat from bone, your body gapes open for him. A crack breaks the air. Your ribcage springs open like a gift. You blink through satisfied tears. The scene unfolds in flashes. He doesn’t stop until he’s torn through you. Snarls become moans of pleasure. The two of you growl ferally. Your heart, still and cold but yours, is yanked from your chest. 

Soft coos finally open your eyes. Blearily you watch him watch you. He looks at you as though he’s the one that’s been mesmerized. Between his clawed hands, your heart looks small and weak. He cradles it like it’s something precious. Drool drips from his maw. He lowers his head. Dreamlike, he places one tender kiss to your heart and bites down. 

The slurping sounds he makes are grotesque. Your walls tighten around his tentacles. You thrust into it, fucking your ass and cunt deeper around him. The tentacle in your mouth slithers out of you. You cough only to whine in its absence, desperate to have that fullness back. 

With your heart latched tightly in his jaw, Rafayel closes in on you. 

A tentacle grips your chin, drawing your lips back open. You follow willingly, sticking out your tongue to accept the offering. A facsimile of a kiss. You dig your teeth into your own heart, old blood bursting on your tongue. It dribbles down your lips. He tears into it just as fiercely, devouring with needy cries.

It’s his broken sounds that release you. Your orgasm is electric. Pleasure and pain batter against one another. His shoulders press down against your thighs until they burn. Release squirts from you forcefully, glistening on his stomach. The viscous liquid from his tentacles spurts out of you with each shuddering constriction. Your body sucks him deeper. 

Above you, his breathing has gone erratic. He pulls your heart from your lips, placing it softly beside you on the altar. It’s nothing more than a tattered, ruined thing now.

Despite your protests, he pulls out of you slowly. The straining, bulbous base of his tentacle catches on your entrance, before shrinking down and slipping from your fluttering folds. 

Empty. He guides you up to a sitting position. Your head lolls, but you hold yourself up as best you can. Tentacles support your back, curling up over your shoulders from behind to stroke your bloody temples. His tongue laps up tears as you shed them. The cries are neverending. 

“I’m dead,” you wail, “He killed me.” 

“Please. Say yes,” your siren begs. There is no unearthly call, only the entreaties of a monster. 

Your hand falls to his shoulder. Misty-eyed, you can see the sun slowly crawling over the horizon far across the sea. Your tongue is thick with jumbled words. 

The void beats like a second heart under his heaving chest. You draw your fingers down to his stomach, right to the edge of skin where it fades into the blackness. His whole body is wracked with shivers the closer you get to that boundary. Rafayel throws back his head, where tendons pull taut at his neck, but he doesn’t try to stop you. Instead, his hands anchor you upright.

It starts with just one finger. You dig into the resistance of real, tangible muscle before faintly running your nails over the division line where he unravels. Without warning, your finger penetrates the darkness. He makes a strangled noise, jerking, and digs his claws just above your ass. There’s no force required. On the contrary, your second finger is welcomed. He takes you well. The void sucks you in greedily. You acquiesce, his moans and whines growing needier and higher until your whole hand is inside of him. 

Experimentally, you open and close your hand. Your fingers wiggle. The sun paints the cavern pink with first light. You lean in deeper until you’re up to the elbow. He won’t look. Instead, you watch the spasm of his muscles above where you enter him. 

When you’re so deep that even the wound on your shoulder breaches the void, the backs of your fingers bump something wet and warm. It’s large, bigger than both of your hands, and fleshy. It’s the only thing corporeal in the void. Just a slight brush of your skin was enough to make Rafayel’s face fall back into your orbit. You rub the mass. His forehead meets yours. His eyes squeeze shut, teeth bared, lips moving rapidly. 

You only realize he’s speaking when the words echo again in your mind. 

“Say yes,” he says over and over. A mantra. A prayer. 

You kiss his cheek. The hand still outside of him goes to the back of his neck. You tilt his face back, let his begging point towards the heavens, and expose his throat. 

Deep in the void, you stroke. You squeeze. His chest has flushed blue-pink under you. From adams apple to sternum you kiss and lick. You nibble the skin at Rafayel’s clavicle. 

Across the bay, the lord’s manor comes to life. Childhood dreams of splendor. So unattainable. You’ll have what you can grasp with your own two hands. 

“Yes, my soul is yours,” you whisper, “but you have to keep it. That’s our deal. Keep it until the day you die.”

His eyes fly open, looking down at you aghast. 

“How?” he gasps, lurching. 

“Say it. Say yes.”

Your thumb presses the meat of the mass. Tears roll down his cheeks, twin to yours, his hips thrusting until the void sucks your arm deeper and faster. 

Yes echoes across the shores. Birds swoop, the wind howls, and the morning sun rises. Your teeth meet his pulse point, where you can feel the rapid hammering of his heart. 

You bite. You tear. Beneath a sharp canine, you undo him. Deep blue blood spurts from his throat.

The void erupts. It draws you in, tentacles and hands and strange shapes you can’t make sense of all dragging you into a newly iridescent abyss. Rafayel pants through his orgasm, his sounds broken, dropping his hands from you completely. All you see is black. Rafayel’s song caresses you. That’s right. Love.

The sun reaches above the sea. The void swallows all that remains of you. 

You’re gone. 

A lone siren watches the final climb of the sunrise. He’s not sure how long he waits, curled in front of his altar. His hands clench around nothing. 

When the time comes, he rises and takes your fragile, torn heart from his altar. When he holds it to his chest, his own heartbeat echoes back in his hands. 

In the harbor, fishermen rise from their beds. Unbeknownst to them, they live another day only by your choice. Nobody wants to think of their once neighbor. An innocent life was thrown to the sea just the night before, but no name is spoken. They work in pained silence. 

When a bloated blue body washes up on shore, chest torn open and defiled, even the most seasoned of the men retch at the sight. None of them sleep in the days to come. They set sail with sallow, haunted expressions. 

Beneath them, deep in the wine-dark sea, further than any man or woman has dared to go, Rafayel places your heart into the tender muscle of an oyster. His treasure. There you will grow anew. First your heart, then your body. A vessel for your awaiting soul.

Solution

Problem 1

For RT Duroid material, use the $w/h1$ formula to recalculate. i.e.

$$Z_0=\frac{120\pi}{\sqrt{\varepsilon_{eff}}\big[\frac{w}{128}+1.393+0.667\ln(\frac{w}{128}+1.44)\big]}$$

This time I substitute the $w=400 \rm{\mu m}$ (another assumption) in the $\varepsilon_{eff}$ formula. I choose this value to get rid of the recursive calculation to find the exact value of $w$.

$$\varepsilon_{eff}\approx\frac{\varepsilon_r+1}{2}+\frac{\varepsilon_r-1}{2}\Big[\frac{1}{\sqrt{1+12h/w}}\Big]=\frac{3+1}{2}+\frac{3-1}{2}[\frac{1}{\sqrt{1+12\times128/400}}]=2.4545$$

Denote $C = \frac{120\pi}{Z_0\sqrt{\varepsilon_{eff}}}-1.393$, we obtain

$$f(w)=\frac{w}{128}+0.667\ln(\frac{w}{128}+1.44)-C=0$$

$$\implies f(x) = x+0.667\ln(x+1.44)-C$$

$$f'(x)=1+\frac{0.667}{x+1.44}-C$$

Use Newton-Raphson method to find the value $w$.

$$x_{i+1}=x_{i}-\frac{f(x_i)}{f'(x_i)}$$

and finally $\frac{w}{128}=2.9520$, thus $w=2.9520\times 128=320.5948 \rm{~\mu m}$.

Problem 2

When it comes to CMOS cases, the substrate height $h$ is usually very small, but I also assume $w/h>1$. Take $w=15 {~\mu m}$ to calculate the efficient $\varepsilon$.

$$\varepsilon_{eff}\approx\frac{\varepsilon_r+1}{2}+\frac{\varepsilon_r-1}{2}\Big[\frac{1}{\sqrt{1+12h/w}}\Big]=\frac{4.1+1}{2}+\frac{4.1-1}{2}[\frac{1}{\sqrt{1+12\times10/15}}]=3.0667$$

Go through the similar process above, it is not hard to calculate that $C_1=2.9125$, and $\frac{w}{h}=2.0746$, which returns $w_1=20.7459 \rm{~\mu m}$. This result is close to the value we used to calculate $\varepsilon_{eff}$, so there is no need to redesign again.

Problem 3

For the CMOS case with substrate height $h=5 \rm{~\mu m}$, similarly first calculate the efficient $\varepsilon_{eff}$.

$$\varepsilon_{eff}\approx\frac{\varepsilon_r+1}{2}+\frac{\varepsilon_r-1}{2}\Big[\frac{1}{\sqrt{1+12h/w}}\Big]=\frac{4.1+1}{2}+\frac{4.1-1}{2}[\frac{1}{\sqrt{1+12\times5/8}}]=3.0816$$

And $C_2=2.9021$, $\frac{w}{h}=2.0658\implies w = 10.3289\rm{~\mu m}$.

Problem 4

$Z_0$ increases with $h$ and decreases with $w$ and $\varepsilon_r$. When the minimum allowable $w_{\min}=2\rm{~\mu m}$,

$$\varepsilon_{eff}\approx\frac{\varepsilon_r+1}{2}+\frac{\varepsilon_r-1}{2}\Big[\frac{1}{\sqrt{1+12h/w}}\Big]=\frac{4.1+1}{2}+\frac{4.1-1}{2}[\frac{1}{\sqrt{1+12\times\frac{1}{2}}}]=2.980$$

When $h=10\rm{~\mu m}$,

$$ Z_{0,\max}=\frac{120\pi}{\sqrt{\varepsilon_{eff}}\big[\frac{w}{h}+1.393+0.667\ln(\frac{w}{h}+1.44)\big]}$$ $$=\frac{120\pi}{\sqrt{2.98}\big[\frac{2}{10}+1.393+0.667\ln(\frac{2}{10}+1.44)\big]}$$ $$=113.5691~\Omega$$

When $h=5\rm{~\mu m}$,

$$ Z_{0,\max}=\frac{120\pi}{\sqrt{2.98}\big[\frac{2}{5}+1.393+0.667\ln(\frac{2}{5}+1.44)\big]}$$ $$=96.7805~\Omega$$

That is the highest characteristic impedance we can achieve with the CMOS.

Problem 5

As demonstrated above, $Z_0$ increases with $h$ and decreases with $w$ and $\varepsilon_r$. We need to lower the substrate height $h$ and increase microstrip width $w$ and $\varepsilon_r$. Let's choose a substrate material, say GaAs, and $\varepsilon_r=12.7$.

$$\varepsilon_{eff}\approx\frac{\varepsilon_r+1}{2}+\frac{\varepsilon_r-1}{2}\Big[\frac{1}{\sqrt{1+12h/w}}\Big]=\frac{12.7+1}{2}+\frac{12.7-1}{2}[\frac{1}{\sqrt{1+12\times\frac{1}{2}}}]=9.0611$$

More detailedly, it is the ratio $w/h$ that matters. For here, I choose $w/h=2$.

$$Z_{0,\max}=\frac{120\pi}{\sqrt{9.0611}\big[\frac{2}{1}+1.393+0.667\ln(\frac{2}{1}+1.44)\big]}$$ $$=29.6983~\Omega$$

Further, if I increase the ratio to $w/h=5$, we can calculate that $Z_0=16.4027~\Omega$. This is lower than the previous case.

I don't know whether there is a theoretical limitation for the $w/h$ ratio, but in practical application when $w$ is too high, there will be less space for other components. Also, a rule of thumb is that we need to limit the thickness of the microstrip substrate to 10\% of a wavelength.

Simulation result

lineCalc result in ADS (Advanced Design System, a keysight software):

(Follow the instruction in this video.)

$w_1 = 305.872 \mu\rm{m}$

$w_2 = 18.5694 \mu\rm{m}$