#rover

The wind on the Huanglong plains always carried that faint, electric hum, like the world itself was breathing resonance through the grass. You and Rover had been riding side by side for hours, the rhythm of your mounts a steady counterpoint to the easy silence between you. He had one hand loose on the reins, the other resting on his thigh, close enough that his fingers occasionally brushed your leg when the horses swayed. Deliberate, you knew. Everything he did was deliberate.

“You’re staring again,” he said, voice low, amused.

You didn’t bother denying it. “You have something on your face.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Dirt?”

“No. Smugness.”

He laughed, the sound warm and rough. “You like it.”

You rolled your eyes, but you were smiling. Three years of traveling together had turned you into this—constant teasing, sharp edges softened by familiarity. You had met when he dragged you half-dead out of a collapsed ruin in the Nexum Wastes. Somewhere between shared campfires, back-to-back fights, and nights where “staying warm” became an excuse to tangle limbs and mouths, partnership had become something possessive. Intense. His.

You never complained. Not out loud.

Until you did.

It started small. He vetoed solo scouting missions. Tracked your resonance signature when you were out of sight for too long. Once, during rumors of a Threnodian surge, he locked you inside a warded safehouse for three days. “For your safety,” he said. You screamed that you weren’t his fucking prisoner.

When he finally let you out, he looked wrecked—eyes shadowed, hands shaking as he pulled you into him. He kissed you like a man starving, desperate and pleading, murmuring over and over that he’d only done it because he loved you too much to risk even a scratch on your skin. And you forgave him. You always did. Because how could you not?

He always made it feel like devotion, like the only sane response to a world that wanted to tear you apart. In his arms, with his mouth promising forever, it was easier to believe the cage was protection, not possession.

But the cracks grew.

The night you ran, thunder cracked the sky open. You had fought again, words cutting deeper than any blade. You told him he was suffocating you. That his love felt like chains. He grabbed your wrist too hard, eyes wild. “You think you can survive out there without me?”

“I survived before you,” you spat, yanking free.

You bolted into the storm. He followed, shouting your name over the wind. Lightning illuminated the ravine ahead too late. Your foot slipped on wet stone. You fell.

The impact stole everything.

When you woke months later, your body was a map of healed fractures and synthetic grafts. The people in white masks told you your name. Told you Rover had abandoned you. Told you he was dangerous. They trained you relentlessly: combat forms until your muscles screamed, resonance tuning until your frequency burned violet and lethal. Nightly sessions where they whispered that your only purpose now was to eliminate the target.

You became their perfect weapon.

Months passed before they sent you after him.

You found him in the ruined coliseum outside old Jinzhou, moonlight spilling through the shattered dome like liquid silver. He stood in the center, sword sheathed, coat snapping in the breeze. Waiting.

You stepped into the light. “Rover.”

His head snapped toward you. For a heartbeat, raw hope lit his face. Then devastation. “Y/N.” Your name left his lips like a prayer cracked in half.

You drew your blade. Violet resonance crackled along the edge.

The fight was brutal and one-sided.

You moved like a storm—feints, spins, strikes aimed to kill. Every form drilled into you by the Fractsidus flowed perfectly. He blocked, parried, dodged, but never attacked. Blood bloomed on his sleeve where your blade grazed him. He didn’t even flinch.

You drove him back across broken marble, fury rising. “Fight back, you coward!”

He met your eyes, steady and heartbroken. “I won’t hurt you.”

The words enraged you more. You slammed him against a pillar, forearm crushing his throat, blade poised over his heart. One thrust and the mission would be complete.

He didn’t resist.

His pulse thrummed fast under your arm. His breath was warm against your wrist. “If you’re going to do it,” he murmured, voice soft, “don’t hesitate. You hate it when you hesitate.”

Your hand trembled.

The tremor spread through your entire body, a betrayal deeper than muscle memory. Something inside you recoiled from the killing blow. An ache bloomed in your chest, sharp and unfamiliar.

You shoved away from him, blade lowering. “What the fuck are you doing to me?”

He stayed against the pillar, watching you with unbearable tenderness. “Nothing you aren’t doing to yourself.”

Confusion and rage collided. You turned and ran.

You sprinted through vine-choked corridors, vaulted fallen arches, heart pounding. His footsteps followed, not hurried, just inevitable.

You stopped in a small grove where glowing flowers cast pale blue light. You spun, blade raised. “Stop following me.”

“I’m not following,” he said, halting at the edge of the clearing. “I’m staying.”

“You think I won’t kill you?”

His smile was tired, wounded, devastatingly real. “I know you won’t.”

Something inside you fractured. You attacked again, strikes wilder, fueled by frustration. He disarmed you gently, catching your wrist and pulling you off balance. You crashed into his chest.

For a moment you were pressed together, breathing hard. His scent hit you: ozone, cedar, something achingly familiar. Your free hand fisted in his shirt without permission.

He released you instantly, stepping back, hands raised. “Let me tell you who we were.”

You should have killed him. The mission burned in your veins, cold and clear. Instead you stood frozen, blade still in your hand, and listened.

He spoke softly, carefully. About the first night after the ruins, when your bedrolls somehow ended up pressed together and you both pretended it was only for warmth. About how you mocked his snoring and he swore your off-key humming could wake a sleeping Discord. About the time you almost set the stew on fire and he ate every charred bite just to see you laugh.

He told you quieter things, falling asleep on his shoulder during long rides, him learning to braid your hair because the wind always knotted it, you stealing his cloak on cold nights and acting like it was an accident. How you fought together like you shared the same pulse.

The memories were small, warm, painfully ordinary. They settled in your chest like embers.

Your grip loosened. The blade slipped from your fingers and hit the grass with a soft thud.

He watched your face, golden eyes cautious. He took one slow step closer. Then another. You didn’t move away.

When he was near enough for you to feel his warmth, he lifted a hand and brushed his thumb across your cheek. Then he leaned in and kissed you.

It was gentle—barely a touch at first, asking without words. You froze, startled by the way your body recognized it, the way you tilted into him before your mind could protest. He deepened the kiss just enough to make your chest ache with something you had no name for.

When he pulled back, he stayed close, forehead resting lightly against yours, breathing uneven.

You were trembling. Not from fear. From the sudden heat blooming inside you, like a locked door had just eased open.

But reality crashed in. Days lost. Brainwashing. A stranger’s memories burning in your mouth. You shoved him away. “I need time. I need to think.”

You once again turned to leave, not bothering to wait for whatever he might say.

The night air felt colder as you walked, boots crunching over fallen leaves and soft grass. Your pulse hammered in your ears. A few steps, that was all you managed, before the hairs on the back of your neck rose.

Someone was behind you.

You started to spin, hand already reaching for the blade you no longer carried, but a strong arm slid around your waist from behind, pulling you back against a solid chest. Before you could struggle, a sharp prick stung the side of your neck.

The sedative hit fast, burning, then numbing. Your limbs went heavy in seconds. The world tilted. You staggered, glaring at him through blurring vision. He caught you as your knees buckled, arms careful and strong.

“I tried,” he whispered against your ear, voice trembling with something dark and tender. “I really did. The good way. Talking. Being patient. But you kept running, baby. You’re making it so fucking hard for me.”

His lips brushed your temple. “There’s no way I’m letting you out of my sight again. Not after all this time.”

Darkness swallowed you.

You woke to silk sheets and the scent of pine. Your head throbbed. Soft golden light filtered through wooden shutters. You tried to sit up and metal clicked.

Your wrists were cuffed to the headboard with resonance-dampening restraints. Sleek, unbreakable, humming faintly. Your ankles were similarly bound, spread just enough to keep you immobile but not painful. Yet.

The cabin was small, cozy. A fire crackled in the hearth. Rover sat in a chair beside the bed, elbows on his knees, watching you with dark golden eyes.

You yanked at the cuffs. They didn’t budge. “You fucking kidnapped me.”

He tilted his head. “I prefer ‘retrieved my girlfriend.’”

“You drugged me. Restrained me. This isn’t retrieval, this is—”

“Necessary,” he finished softly. He rose, moving to sit on the edge of the bed. His fingers traced your jaw, gentle despite everything. “You were going to run again.”

“So you chain me like a dog?”

His smile was slow, dangerous. “Like a princess who keeps trying to escape her tower.”

Heat flooded your cheeks, anger and something worse. Your body remembered his touch even as your mind screamed danger. “Let me go.”

“No.” He leaned closer, breath warm against your lips. “I lost you once because I was too soft. I let you run. I won’t make that mistake again.”

His hand slid down your throat, over your collarbone, stopping just above your breast. “Do you know how long I searched? How many nights I jerked off to memories of you just to stay sane? You were gone, and I was hollow.”

You swallowed hard. “The Fractsidus—”

“They lied,” he said flatly. “They filled the empty space in your head.”

You stared at him. “What do you mean?”

He went still for a moment, then spoke low. “That night, you were running from me. We’d fought. I grabbed you. You slipped and fell into the ravine.”

“I heard you hit the bottom. By the time I got down there, resonance fog had rolled in, thick, blinding. I searched for days. Weeks. Couldn’t find a trace of you.”

Your breath caught.

“The Fractsidus found you first,” he said, grip tightening on your skin. “They took you. Brainwashed you. Turned you into this perfect little assassin aimed right at my heart.”

It hit you all at once—too much, too fast. Your mind reeled.

His thumb brushed your lower lip. “But now you’re here. And you’re mine. And this time, I’m not letting go.”

He leaned down, mouth hovering over yours. “You can hate me all you want, baby. You can fight. But your body remembers.” His hand slid lower, cupping your breast through your shirt, thumb circling your nipple until it peaked. “And deep down, you never stopped loving me. That’s why you couldn’t kill me.”

You turned your face away, but your back arched into his touch traitorously.

He chuckled darkly. “We have all the time in the world now. No running. No Fractsidus. Just us.”

His lips brushed your ear. “And I’m going to remind you exactly who you belong to. Slowly. Thoroughly. Until you beg to stay.”

You tugged at the cuffs again, heart racing with fear and something darker.

He smiled, eyes gleaming with twisted devotion.