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vivid-ink · 7 months

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Kinktober #31 - A/B/O Omegaverse "I See You"

fem!Sub!OmatikayaReader x dom!Alpha!Neteyam

Story Summary: Neteyam is your best friend & he seems intent on keeping you that way only... But he's the only alpha male that you truly desire... Will you succeed in convincing him to let you in, to let you show him what a perfect omega you could be to him, while he battles with his inner demons to resist you?

Note: No use of 'Y/N' in this - I've given the reader a name. So, your name in this is 'Leiko'.

Based off THIS REQUEST and incorporated with the Kinktober Omegaverse prompt.

Warnings: 🔞Sexual content 18+, MDNI 🔞 Word count: 10.4k Content: Smut, rough sex, squirting, slick, knotting

Author's Note: I know this prompt is early, it's not quite the 31st yet. However, I'm heading overseas and I won't have my laptop or the internet to post this after today. So, here is the full piece! Thank you to all those who showed their interest from the teaser snippet I posted! I believe I've tagged all of you who asked to be below (and a few others who might be interested 😋). Enjoy the ride! 🥰 Thank you to @cinetrix-deactivated20231007 for the render of Neteyam I've used in the cover shot.

Tag list: @marriedtolike18fictionalmen @taintedlovesworld @vintaqestar @ntymavtr @plooto @rav3nh3aven @crazy4books1 @investedreader @qcswrites @neteyamssyulang @neteyamsyawntu @glimmering-darling-dolly @erenjaegerwifee @oasiswithmyg @delacruzyari @daeneeryss @nilsavatar @pandoraslxna @blue-slxt @wheneclipsefalls @adrianarose7 @tallulah477 @itchaboi-itchyboy @neteluvr @live-laugh-neteyam @itssomeonereading @bluecooki3 @pandorxxx @notnat02 @spicymayyo @iman-lu @creepytoes88 @flyingspacewhale @justonesadlonelymoth @oasiswithmyg @luvteyams @teymars @akoyaxs @c-h-i-l @ele-sme

***~~~***

It was getting more and more difficult for Neteyam to smile politely in acknowledgement at the women who lingered around him. Their loitering presence was becoming a nuisance and his patience was wearing thin. He attracted them all currently, alpha, beta and omega alike. Their delicately twitching noses sniffed the air around him and his scent told them everything they needed to know.

An unmated alpha male in his prime, approaching the time of his rut, was a very juicy temptation for females indeed.

The women batted their eyelashes at him, lips dancing in demure smiles. Their tails skimmed his calves interestedly as they passed him and several bolder females even made direct offers of assistance, hoping he would accept. However, Neteyam turned them all down.

The females were only doing what was natural to them, what was instinctual. After all, his body was emitting pheromones that called to them like bees to nectar and his own instincts were urging him to respond in kind, his body also acutely aware of how good they smelled and how appealing their slender bodies were.

Smaller, softer bodies that would so willingly bend under his… arched backs and flushed faces… rumps pressed against the front of his thighs as he rutted into the sweet heat of them…

Neteyam vanished the thought.

No. He rebelled against his instincts, protested the impulse to give in to his animalistic desires like a creature with no sense or thought. He hated feeling out of control and that was exactly what he was during his ruts, wild and unrestrained. His ruts were an agonising dichotomy that made his body war with his mind. How could something that felt so unbelievably good also make him feel like a complete stranger to himself?

Neteyam quickened his pace, hastening on the path back to his family’s kelku (home). The sooner he got back, the sooner he could get his dose of suppressant tincture from Kiri.

A long-suffering sigh sounded from behind him and a firm hand clapped him on the shoulder, “Honestly bro, it’d be so much easier if you just agreed to see out your rut with a woman. There are plenty of females who’d be more than happy to assist.”

Shrugging his brother’s hand off, Neteyam continued his speedy trudge, “No. I won’t be a slave to my hormones and treat a woman like a piece of meat for three days.”

Lo’ak snorted and scoffed, “They enjoy it. What about that don’t you get? They get pleasure out of it too. I mean, I didn’t see Mali complaining after that one rut she saw you through a couple of years ago. She’s offered again since, hasn’t she?”

Neteyam chewed on his bottom lip and his forehead wrinkled in a deep frown. He remembered that rut. It’d been his second one. Ruts started in males around the age of eighteen and occurred approximately once every year. The first one usually came on suddenly and unexpectedly with little lead up. As a result, most males spent their first rut alone in one of the clan’s designated havens. Thankfully though, first ruts were also milder in general as the body slowly accustomed itself to the potent rush of rut hormones.

Despite the milder intensity of his first rut, Neteyam still remembered it being an unpleasant experience. Hot, bothered and painfully aroused with no partner to slake the burning of his flesh, he’d struggled through it to ease his elevated desires on his own. So when the symptoms signalling the impending arrival of his second rut had surfaced the following year, he’d gratefully accepted Mali’s offer of assistance.

Mali was a fellow hunter-warrior and they were familiar with each other, having worked alongside each other for years. She was an attractive beta female and he got along well with her. Overall, the one rut he’d spent with her could be called a success. She was warm and willing and despite him not being able to knot her due to her beta designation, the sex had still been incredibly satisfying and it had done a lot to soothe the raging lust in in his veins. However, there’d been an unexpected side effect to his experience.

All through the lust-filled haze of his rut, his body riddled with aching desire, Neteyam had felt feral and unbridled. He’d felt so detached from and unlike his usual calm and measured self, that it had alarmed him. It’d felt like being trapped in a stranger’s body, looking out through his own eyes and yet unable to stop himself from behaving like an untamed beast. He’d demanded and performed so many lecherous acts on Mali and while the pleasure had been intense in the moment, he’d been revolted by his own behaviour after his rut had passed.

“Bro,” Lo’ak said when Neteyam didn’t answer, having clearly gotten lost in his thoughts.

“Sorry, what?”

Lo’ak pursed impatient lips and gave several disapproving clicks of his tongue, “See? The rut fog is starting.”

“I haven’t got rut fog.” Neteyam grouched, “I’m just thinking.”

“Mm hmm,” Lo’ak didn’t sound the least bit convinced, “Yeah right. You’ve been spaced out for days, bro. You can’t keep staving your ruts off with the suppressant. Something’s going to have to give, sooner or later.”

“I know.” Neteyam snarled tetchily, “I’ll just get through this week’s work and then I’ll just get it over and done with after.”

“And you need to let a woman help you this time.”

Neteyam emitted a soft growl, “No, bro. I’m going to see it out on my own.”

“For the love of Eywa! Why are you such a stubborn ass about this? No other alpha male sees his ruts out alone. It’s unheard of!” Lo’ak cried in exasperation, “Why would you suffer through it on your own? It’s fucking horrible, especially when there are so many willing women, willing omega women who are eager to help!”

“I feel so out of control during my ruts that I don’t recognise myself! And the things that I did to Mali…” Neteyam exclaimed before he paused, his face twisting into a grimace, “She’s a person, and I didn’t treat her as such.”

Lo’ak would have rolled his eyes and proclaimed his brother a righteous asshole, but he knew Neteyam wasn’t behaving like this to be better than everyone else or to prove he had more control than other alphas. His brother had spent his last two ruts on his own and Lo’ak knew they’d both been difficult and harrowing experiences. No alpha male would suffer like this for the mere sake of sanctimony. As an alpha male himself, Lo’ak knew this for a fact. Neteyam was genuinely distressed by his own behaviour.

“This is going to sound so bad, but the women want to be used and abused. The omegas want to be pinned down and knotted.” Lo’ak offered mildly, maintaining quick strides to keep up with his brother, “They wouldn’t offer otherwise. You’re the most sought-after male in this clan. Future olo’eyktan. The opportunity to be noticed by you and potentially chosen by you as a mate is very enticing.”

“I don’t want to do to another woman what I did to Mali.”

“You didn’t do anything to Mali, you did things with her. She was perfectly happy and she’d do it again.”

“Nope.” The ‘p’ in the word was uttered with an audible pop of Neteyam’s lips, “You’re not changing my mind, Lo’ak. Drop the subject.”

Lo’ak had never been a quitter though and being annoying was his forte, “You know, what you need is an omega to knot. Mali’s a beta, maybe you wouldn’t feel like that now if you’d been with an omega female during your first rut. Great Mother, knotting feels so fucking good-”

“Lo’ak.” Neteyam’s hiss was a warning.

“Seriously, bro. Maybe try an omega you’re familiar with. Leiko is an omega-”

Lo’ak’s didn’t get a chance to finish his sentence. His words died on his tongue when his brother whirled around to face him with an aggressive and rumbling growl, “Don’t even say it! She’s my best friend!”

Hands held up in surrender, Lo’ak dropped the subject, “Alright, alright!”

Reaching the threshold of their family’s kelku, Neteyam pushed the entry flaps aside testily and strode into the space. His mother was stirring a pot of what smelled like sturmbeest stew over the central hearth and his sisters were seated not far from her, chopping vegetables and grinding herbs. Muttering a greeting of return to them under his breath, his eyes sought Kiri’s and he tipped his chin up at her twice in an unspoken query.

Kiri knew exactly what her brother was asking for and she shared a disapproving look with their mother. Neytiri merely shook her head and breathed out a deep sigh, noting how her eldest-born son was studiously avoiding her gaze.

Kiri rose gracefully from where she was crouched to rummage through her chest of medicinal supplies. Finding the bottle she was after she uncorked it and decanted a dose of its contents into a small drinking vessel. Approaching Neteyam she held it out to him, her nose wrinkling uneasily, “It’s losing efficacy. I can smell you from a mile away.”

Tipping the vessel’s contents into his mouth, he ingested the full dose in one astringent gulp. He grimaced at the foul tang of it, “Thanks. I know. I just need more time.”

The sudden sound of wood clattering harshly echoed in the kelku, shattering the previously peaceable atmosphere. All eyes turned to their mother, who’d intentionally slammed the wooden ladle she’d been using onto a platter at her side.

Neytiri was irked, her ears pinned and her breaths were deep, “How much longer will you deny your nature, son? This is the path the Great Mother has chosen for you to walk. You are an alpha male! Your ruts are a natural part of you. Your strength and dominance, your virility, they are all gifts to be embraced, not repressed!”

The Sully children collectively winced at their mother’s bark. It was at times like this that Neteyam was reminded of his mother’s own alpha designation. Female alphas were not extremely rare, but they were uncommon, as were male omegas.

Females typically presented as betas or omegas when they came of age, and males tended to present as betas or alphas. Though out of the three classes, betas were the most common. Alphas were inclined towards more dominants traits and behaviours, while omegas displayed more passive traits. Betas were a mixture of the two.

Individuals were free to mate whoever they wished, and while you did see alpha-alpha matings and alpha-beta matings around (like their parents, their father being a beta male), betas typically mated other betas and alphas tended to mate omegas. The physiological presence of an alpha male’s genital knot appeared to influence this, with only omega females possessing the bodily capability to be knotted and tied.

Neteyam clenched his jaw and shuffled apprehensively on his feet, “I understand that, sa’nu (mother). But the hunter-warriors have a busy week this week and I have duties to tend to at work. It’s only for the next couple of days until the new week begins. I’ll stop the suppressant then.”

Neytiri gave a reproachful hiss of frustration, “You are grown now. I pray to Eywa that she will bring you a good match soon, a good omega female to take care of you. She will bring you comfort and such a match would breed strong children to ensure the clan’s line of succession.”

Taking the empty drinking vessel from Neteyam, Kiri huffed and grumbled something under her breath as she moved to re-pack the medicinal chest, something about him being stupid, blind and stubborn. Annoyed, Neteyam was about to demand that his sister repeat what she’d muttered aloud, but another severe glare from his mother stopped him. Neytiri wouldn’t take kindly to any bickering from her children under her roof when she was already in a fractious mood.

The Sully children knew that if they wanted dinner, they’d better be on their best behaviour or there would be nothing but twisted ears and empty bowls awaiting them.

***~~~***

You sat on the woven mat in the tsahìk’s hut, grateful for the quiet day. Mo’at was out visiting her usual schedule of older patients in their homes and apart from a little one who was recovering from a particularly nasty bout of fever, there were no other patients about and no one else had come through to be tended to. The little boy was napping in the far corner behind a wooden partition while you and Kiri milled about peeling fruit, steeping roots and making herbal pastes.

It would’ve been a wonderful opportunity to catch up with Kiri, perhaps indulge in some girlish gossip, but Kiri was not in a chatty frame of mind. She hadn’t whined, she hadn’t grouched, but you knew her like the back of your hand and you knew she was grumpy. You were close with the Sullys. Your parents had been fast friends with Jake and Neytiri since their younger years. You’d grown up alongside the Sully children as a result and you were closest in age to Neteyam and Kiri.

Being the oldest of four yourself, you and Neteyam had gotten along well, bonding over the mutual responsibilities of being the eldest and having to simultaneously watch your siblings. You’d both pursued different paths from an early age; Neteyam knew he wanted to be a hunter-warrior, whereas you’d always found solace in nursing and healing the sick and injured. Despite these differences in schooling and interests, you remained close friends as you both grew up. You were close to Kiri too, but Neteyam was your best friend. Not a single day had gone by where you hadn’t hung out and spent time with each other.

Until the day you’d officially presented as an omega a few moons after your eighteenth birthday…

Neteyam had started putting more distance between you then. It had been three years since and while you were still close to him, it wasn’t every day that you hung out anymore. It was more like once a week, but you both made the time still and blamed everything else on the busyness of adulthood. While that wasn’t untrue, you knew that it was also his alpha designation and your omega designation that caused him to distance himself.

“You’re cranky.” You pronounced playfully, a small smile dancing on your lips as you watched Kiri sigh over her bowl of mashed roots.

“I’m cranky because everyone at home is cranky, and everyone is cranky because Neteyam is cranky.” Kiri complained, her beautiful face wrinkled and pouty in annoyance. “Honestly Leiko, you need to talk to him. He won’t listen to any of us. Not even Grandmother.”

You chewed on your bottom lip pensively, knowing full well the reason for Neteyam’s touchy demeanour, “You know that I’m the last person he wants to see right now given his circumstances.”

Kiri decanted her masticated blob of roots into a bigger vessel and testily plopped more boiled tubers into her bowl to begin the mashing process all over again, “Yes well, unfortunately you might also be the only person who can convince him to stop his madness and accept the nature of his designation. I’m not saying that you need to be the one to see him through his rut. It can be anyone else! He just needs to let it happen!”

Kiri’s exasperation was clear and you frowned in sympathy, “I don’t know, Kiri.”

“The both of you are close. Best friends right? That’s what you always say?” Kiri pleaded, “He trusts you. He listens to you. See if you can talk some sense into that skxawng.”

You pondered Kiri’s request, hesitant because it was a very touchy topic between you and Neteyam. You’d confronted him once, years ago when the distance between you had first begun to grow. You’d been hurt and confused by his avoidant behaviour, and you’d eventually cornered him one night after communal last meal. You’d sought him out for two reasons. One was to confront him around his strange behaviour and the second was to ask him to see you through your next heat.

You’d had your first heat the year before that and as it had come on very suddenly, another alpha male in the clan had seen you through it. Even prior to your official presentation as an omega, you’d known that it would be your likely designation. There had been signs in your behaviour and your manner. Neteyam’s own alpha designation had been similarly predictable and he’d never shown any sign of discomfort at the idea. In the back of your young mind, you’d always known that you wanted Neteyam to be your heat partner.

Gentle, responsible and charming Neteyam... You knew he’d take care of you… You recognised back then that your feelings for your best friend had grown into more than friendly. However, when you’d cornered him that fateful evening and confronted him, what had followed was the most heated row you’d ever had with your best friend.

Neteyam had confessed to you what had happened during his second rut with Mali. He’d condemned his behaviour, rejected his designation, and told you he wanted you both to spend less time around each other, especially when either of you was approaching a heat or a rut. Shocked and confused, you’d called him silly followed by all sorts of stronger words when your argument had continued to escalate.

When you’d offered to see him through his next rut, thinking the close bond you shared might quell his uneasiness, Neteyam had recoiled with such aversion to the idea that it had stunned you speechless. And you’d been quietly hurt by it. He’d been so adamant. Perhaps it was your natural submissiveness, or the fact that you’d been so afraid to lose his friendship, but you’d acquiesced and pushed him no further. Needless to say, you never asked him to see you through any of your heats after that.

Even now the thought was sore, but you buried your feelings and carried on.

“Please?” Kiri’s voice beseeched, interrupting your train of thought, and you realised that you hadn’t answered her yet.

“He won’t want to see me. We have an agreement that we keep our distance at times like these.” You countered, tucking one of your stray braids behind your pointed year. You resumed your task of peeling, avoiding Kiri’s eyes in the hope that she would give up on her attempt to convince you.

Kiri sagged in defeat and her expression turned troubled, “It’s unhealthy, what he’s doing. He can’t change what Eywa has given him.” She was growing in upset, her large doe-eyes shining with tears, “I just want him to be happy, and he’ll never be if he can’t accept this part of him.”

Hating the sight of Kiri’s distress, you reached out to pull her into a tight hug, “I’ll try, OK? I can’t promise anything, but I’ll talk to Neteyam.”

***~~~***

You weren’t a hunter or warrior by any means, but here you were, rather successfully stalking one of the clan’s apex warriors.

To be fair, the rising intensity of Neteyam’s rut hormones were likely clouding his senses, dulling them, but you gave yourself a mental pat on the back nonetheless. You may have ultimately chosen to pursue the art of healing under the tsahìk, but all young clan members were required to learn survival basics as part of passing their rites, and those skills were not entirely lost on you even after all these years.

The mossy bark was both soft and rough in parts against the skin of your front. You kept your torso low against the large tree bough you were perched on and the tuft of your tail weaved in a mischievous dance behind you. You raised yourself a little on your forearms, watching your prey as he moved in the woodland glade below you.

Neteyam’s hair was pulled back and secured by a loose tie, which was very unlike his usual preference for having his braids free. However, the tie kept his hair away from his neck and you could see the swollenness of his scent glands on either side of his neck, raised and sensitive. You watched soundlessly as he knelt on the bank of a small clearwater spring, cupping handfuls of water and splashing his face, chest and forearms, likely trying to alleviate the prickling burn of his skin, another symptom of his impending rut.

Neteyam had retreated from the rest of the clan after last meal and you’d trailed him here. You’d called on every single lesson you could remember around the basics of hunting: soft and sure feet, quietly measured breaths, keeping enough of a distance etc. You’d ensured to stay downwind from him the entire time so that your scent would not carry towards him and alert him of your presence.

However, staying downwind from him meant that his scent was washing over you in a constant stream in the light breeze and Great Mother did he smell amazing. He was on the brink of his rut and his elevated alpha pheromones beckoned to your omega senses like the most delectable fruit; sweet, spicy and juicy. But Neteyam was forbidden fruit to you... He’d set that boundary, clear as day, all those years ago. You were his best friend… And he appeared to want to keep you that way only.

Your lips turned into a small pout and your face twisted into an unhappy moue at the thought. Deep in the darkest, most hidden part of your soul, you knew he was the only alpha male you truly wanted. He was your best friend and you loved him as such, but you wanted to love him too as more than that…

Your last two heats had been spent with another alpha male, Nalu. While Nalu was lovely and being knotted by him served to assuage your raging heat hormones well enough, it was always Neteyam’s face and form that you fantasised of in place of his. Another alluring waft of Neteyam’s scent drifted up to your nose and you reminded yourself sternly of Kiri’s assignment: Convince him to accept a partner for his rut and nothing more.

Deciding that now was as good a time as any other, you shifted to balance yourself on all fours, creeping back along the large bough towards the tree’s main trunk to climb down to the forest floor. You intentionally shuffled noisily as you descended, not wanting to startle Neteyam.

“Who’s there?” His deep voice called.

“It’s just me.” You replied calmly, letting go to hop to the ground once you were low enough. Approaching him gradually, you could see he wasn’t pleased to see you. You attempted to broach conversation with a light-hearted jibe, “Gotcha! I’ve never been successful tracking you unnoticed before.”

Neteyam’s tail was stationary, hanging stiff and straight behind him. His ears were pinned so flat you almost couldn’t see them and his nostrils were flaring intermittently. You maintained your cautious approach. Little rivulets of water were cascading down his muscular chest from where he’d splashed himself earlier and you quietly rebuked yourself for ogling. But he looked so good, so perfectly alpha male… And he needed you… His pheromones were screaming for you, for an omega…

“What are you doing here, Lei?” The words were ground out tightly from Neteyam, but a soft part of you thrilled at the use of his shortened nickname for you. Only he called you that.

Stopping just over an arm’s length away from him, you felt saliva pool hungrily in your cheeks as his alpha male scent swirled around to envelope you in an invisible embrace. His scent was so concentrated at this distance and it was making gooey warmth pool in your tummy and farther below. Your eyes met his and you saw his jaw was clenched tightly, his nose wrinkling and twitching involuntarily. He could definitely smell you too…

“Kiri asked me to try and talk some sense into you.” You stated in as even a tone as possible. You wanted to reach out and touch him, trace the pads of your fingers over the hot skin of his brawny chest and impressive biceps.

Neteyam’s sigh was mixed with a growl of frustration, “We’re not going to talk. We agreed that we wouldn’t go near each other at times like this.”

Steeling yourself you fixed him with an obstinate glare, “I wouldn’t be here if you listened to Kiri and your family. Take a partner this time for your rut. You’re being ridiculous riding it out on your own like this every year. It’s not healthy for you to do this.”

You watched while Neteyam pawed vexedly at his eyes, irritation scrawled across his usually handsome and charming face. His fingers moved to press at the scent glands on his neck and you knew, no doubt, that they were aching.

“Just leave me alone. I don’t want to be lectured. I’ve ridden things out on my own the last two years. This one will be no different.” Neteyam grumbled tightly. He turned then and began to walk away from you.

Nope, you weren’t having that.

Striding after him, you snagged at one of his wrists to stop him and Neteyam recoiled, wrenching his wrist from your grip with a snarl. An apology was quick to leave you when you realised you’d grazed the other set of sensitive scent glands on his inner wrist in the process, “Sorry! Just stop walking away!”

“I can’t be near you right now! You should know better than to come and find me!”

“I’m worried about you! As are the rest of your family!”

“I’ll be fine. Leave me be!”

The tension was rapidly escalating between you. Neteyam was growing more and more agitated with each passing second, but so were you.

“This is part of you, Neteyam!” You scolded, purposely stepping into his path so he came face to face with you, “I know the rut you spent with Mali was disturbing for you somehow, but what you experienced was completely natural!”

“It’s natural for me to be a mindless brute?! Out of control and like an animal?”

You had to suppress the urge to roll your eyes and tug at your hair in exasperation. The healer in you bullied its way to the forefront of your mind and you exclaimed, “Yes, that’s why it’s called a rut! Your hormones need to peak in their cycle and they will influence your actions and urges. This is the Great Mother’s way of ensuring future generations!”

Neteyam’s laugh was caustic and he spat in response, “Ugh, you sound like my mother.”

“Well, your mother is right!” You pressed, and your clenched fists mirrored Neteyam’s own as you both stared each other down.

“No. It’s not who I am! I don’t want to use a woman’s body like that!”

This was the same battle his family had fought with him for the last two years. You didn’t understand where Neteyam’s distress came from. It was unusual; no other alpha male behaved like this or had any qualms about undergoing their ruts. Kiri had a theory that perhaps Mali’s beta hormones hadn’t gelled with Neteyam’s the way an omega’s might have, resulting in an out of kilter experience that had harmed more than helped him.

“Kiri thinks things might be different if you let an omega help you this time! Please don’t be stubborn!”

“Oh, and I suppose that’s why my sister sent you along to convince me?” Neteyam hissed, his face marred by a disgruntled scowl. To your surprise he stepped towards you, his much larger frame looming over yours.

“No, that’s not why she sent me. It’s because I’m your best friend and she’s hoping you’ll listen to me.” You muttered quietly, swallowing the lump in your throat. He was so close to you, his chest heaving while his deep breaths fanned over you.

You could feel your own omega instincts taking hold of you. An alpha was in need of an omega; your chosen alpha… The alpha that your inner omega had craved for the last few years… You wanted to yield to him. You wanted him to dominate you, bend you into a mating press and slake his rampant lust with the use of your body, and to hell with the rest of it.

Neteyam gritted his teeth and he backed away from you then, shaking his head, “No. I’m done talking. Leave.”

“I can help. Let me help you.” You entreated. This wasn’t part of your plan, but your instincts were working in full force now, urging you to serve your alpha, “I don’t want you to suffer. It’ll be different this time.”

A tormented groan left Neteyam and he pressed his hands to his face in aggravation. His tone was brusque and he was clearly losing his cool, “No, go awayLeiko!”

“Neteyam please-”

“NO! What part of ‘go away’ do you not understand?!” Neteyam bellowed harshly, “I DON’T WANT IT TO BE YOU!”

The alpha-tone was clear in his command and you flinched hard at his shout. You shrank from him, hurt by his words. You would have sunk to your knees in complete submission if not for the last shred of your dignity that you were desperately clutching on to. He’d refused your offer to see him through his ruts once before. Despite already knowing his outlook, hearing the words again didn’t dull the sharp sting of them.

He didn’t want to be your alpha and he didn’t want you to be his omega… Your arms intuitively wrapped around yourself and you kept your head bowed in submission while your vision blurred, your eyes pooling with unbidden tears.

You fought the sob that was making its way up your tightening throat and you stammered out, “It doesn’t h-have to be me. There are other omegas who are willing. I spoke to Nani earlier. She’s on standby if you want h-her instead.”

You swiped at your eyes with the back of your hands, desperately trying and failing to hold back the streams of wetness that were determined to trace a path down the planes of your face. Your mortification at being so plainly rejected burned hot on your neck and cheeks, but even so, every fibre in your being was compelling you to convince Neteyam that he needed you, that you would be a good omega for him, that you could be everything he needed to soothe and satisfy him during his rut.

The scent glands on your neck and wrists tingled emitting your own potent scent into the environment. Your closed stance and bent head screamed your submission, and you heard Neteyam grate out a harsh and muffled curse. Lifting your gaze a bit to peer at him, though your head remained dipped, you saw that he appeared to be fighting a battle of wills within himself. His face was a grimace, but the pupils of his eyes were dilated wide and you didn’t miss the way they scrutinised your body hungrily.

Neteyam’s gaze lingered on your chest and his throat bobbed as he swallowed. The conscious effort of restraint was evident in his voice when he spoke, “It’s not that you don’t appeal to me. That’s not what I mean when I say that I don’t want you to see me through my rut.”

A little frond of hope unfurled inside you and it gave you enough courage to lift your chin to look him in the eyes. Perspiration was beading along his hairline and his breathing was too controlled, almost as if he was resisting the urge to pant.

Meekly, you asked, “Then why won’t you let me help you? I want to.”

His expression turned aggrieved, “Because I don’t want you to see what I’m like. You’re important to me, Lei. You’re my best friend and I can’t bear to have you think less of me.”

You shook your head at him slowly, your feet shuffling closer to him, “This is only one part of you. I would never think less of you for doing what’s only natural.”

Neteyam didn’t move and he showed no objection to you inching closer to him. His eyes tracked yours as you drew nearer until you were so close that he was looking down his nose at you, your forehead a scant hand’s length from his chin. With the height difference between you, your head was tilted a fair way back to maintain the eye contact.

Eywa, he was so much bigger than you… Neteyam had always been taller, but his alpha hormones had really taken root in the last few years. He’d shot upward, his chest and shoulders had broadened, and his torso had filled out with bulky muscle. He was the very epitome of an alpha male: Strong and dominant, protector and provider.

The omega in you would do anything and everything to please him if it meant you’d have a chance at mating him one day, a chance at him fathering and raising young with you. Of course there were societal customs that had to be abided by too. Having children outside of a mated bond was frowned upon, so while instinctual heat and rut cycles had to run their course, there were various medicines that could be used to prevent conception.

In alpha-omega pairings, conception was also at its most potent when both male and female were simultaneously in heat and in rut. It was not uncommon in mated alpha-omega pairs for the female’s heat to trigger her mate’s rut and vice versa. And while conception was still possible outside of this mutual spike of fertility, it was less common. Your last heat had already been and gone a couple of moons ago, so the risk of pregnancy was low. Not that this in any way diminished your inner omega’s desire to see Neteyam through his rut and enjoy the mindless pleasure you knew would come with the experience.

Parting your lips, you let your breath sip in simultaneously through your mouth and nose, smelling him and tasting his captivating scent on your tastebuds. Neteyam’s lips were parted too, no doubt scenting you the same way.

“You reek.” Neteyam’s statement was frank, but despite his undesirable choice of words, his tone was unconvincing. His words came out like more of a rough moan than a growl.

Unable to resist your yearning to touch him any longer, your fingertips grazed the jut of his hip bones where you settled your palms against him. You whispered in response, “You smell really good too.”

You stepped right up to him, slotting your feet between his wider-placed ones to press yourself against his front. Your fingers tantalised his sides and you splayed your hands against his ribs, relishing in the feel of his scorching skin beneath your palms as you smoothed them up towards his shoulder blades. You hugged him, rubbing your cheek and jawline against his shoulder, marking him with your own scent glands. You could smell nothing except the heady and enthralling aroma of his pheromones now, and your thighs clenched with your rising desire for him.

A quiet and strangled sound escaped Neteyam, “Last chance. Get out of here.”

In spite of his words, his body was playing a very different tune and you almost laughed at the contradiction. One of his arms had shifted to snake around your back, trapping you against him, and his other hand had slid down to squeeze at one plush round of your derriere. He was nosing through your hair, sniffing you, and you could feel the unmistakeable hardness of his arousal pushing against your abdomen.

You sighed out a breathy moan. The solid strength of his body against yours wasn’t enough; you wanted his heavy weight bearing down on yours and you wanted to be entangled in the cage of his strong arms while your bodies joined and moulded to each other’s in the most carnal of ways. Intoxicated by your primeval craving for him, one of your hands skimmed down to caress the skin of his hip while the other encircled his tail near its base, stroking it in a crude mimicry of what you could be doing to his cock instead.

Angling your head up you nuzzled at his jaw, “I don’t want to get out of here. Take me. I’ll be good to you, Neteyam.”

Neteyam’s tail tensed, arcing into a stiff curl towards his upper back as he enjoyed the tormenting stroke of your hand over one of the most erogenous zones of his body. His pelvis rolled lightly, rubbing the clothed length of his erection against you. His breathing was coming in harsh pants by your ear now and his frame juddered with barely reined control.

The fragility of his restraint was palpable in his voice when he growled out a final warning, “I won’t be gentle or patient. I will use you, fuck you and knot you until you’re overflowing with me, in your hands, in your pussy, from your lips; you’ll taste me on your tongue for weeks.”

You pushed your nose into the crook of his neck and took a deep inhale of him, followed by a daring lick of your tongue right over one of his scent glands. Your response was a wanton hiss, “Yes, alpha.”

You both felt and heard Neteyam’s restraint snap. He crushed your slighter frame to his with a coarse growl that sent hot shivers prickling through you. The thin ties of your delicately strung top strained against your skin for only a brief moment before they gave way in a burst of beads, feathers and leaves, as he tore the garment from your body to expose your breasts.

Your nipples kissed the cooling night air and your gaze tilted skyward when he fisted one hand in the braids at the base of your skull, bending you backward with a strong arm around your waist to support your weight entirely. You only managed a glimpse of his eyes, ravenous with lust, before he delivered a swift and biting kiss to one of your breasts. The rasp of his tongue over the pointed bud made you cry out and molten heat began to liquefy at the junction of your thighs.

You’d succeeded in awakening the rutting alpha and you knew that you would be devoured tonight and for the next three or four days until his rut subsided.

Neteyam’s hands were vise-like around you, clutching you to him as you arched backward, partially suspended in the secure cradle of his hold. You had one leg hitched around his hip while the other remained grounded. He growled feverishly as he feasted on your breasts, nipping, sucking and leaving purpling love bites that would mark your skin for days. You could feel yourself descending into a lust-filled haze of your own and a sense of urgency speared through the deepening fog when you remembered you were both in the middle of a glade where anyone could walk in on you.

Your fingers squeezed at the firm muscle of his shoulders and you urged him with a gasp, “We need to get to a haven.”

Neteyam’s only response was to scoop a forearm under your bottom to lift you upright and back you against the trunk of the nearest tree. The skin of your neck was the next location of his desirous assault. His tongue laved against your scent glands and when he sucked on the sensitive spot in an open-mouthed kiss, you felt the first gush of slick wet your inner thighs. One of his arms loosened from beneath your rear and he palmed at one cheek of your bottom with his freed hand. His fingers snaked towards your core to probe at the drenched fabric over your pussy and you felt more than heard the animalistic rumble of approval in his chest.

“You smell so fucking good.” He remarked, his voice deep and gravelly, “Bet you taste good too.”

You gave an involuntary squeal when two of his fingers pushed roughly past the side-seam of the fabric to penetrate you down to his last knuckle. Though sudden, the entry was easy, your slick making your core slippery as a river eel. Your pussy clenched down around his fingers, welcoming them into your snug heat. Neteyam pumped his fingers several times and your head lolled, thudding back onto the tree bark behind you, your eyes rolling into your skull at the pleasure.

Your inner walls pulsed and throbbed while his fingers worked and when he withdrew them moments later, the whine of protest you let out was pitiful. Through half-lidded eyes you watched him bring his fingers, shining with your slick, to his mouth where he then sucked the digits clean with a primal groan of satisfaction.

He fixed you with wild eyes as he licked his lips and smirked, “You taste like the sweetest nectar.”

You whimpered at his salacious action. There was no trace of restraint left in the burning amber of his eyes. He’d succumbed fully to the impulse of his rut and there would be no stopping him now. You needed to get to a haven or he’d take you with wild abandon here on the forest floor of the glade.

You squirmed against his hard body, still thoroughly pinned between his torso and the tree, “Neteyam, let’s go. There’s a haven not far from here.”

He brushed your comment off with a scoff, busying himself with nibbling at the delicate shell of one of your ears instead. He murmured, “No, I want you here. Now.”

Great Mother, you wanted to just give in to him… But the risk of being walked in on was only one of your concerns. Neither of you would be thinking straight soon and it was dangerous out in the open where predators lurked. Havens provided a safe and sheltered space for individuals and couples to weather the blissful storms of heats and ruts. They were also well-stocked with food, fruit and plenty of water to last several days. It went without saying that a lot of moisture was lost during these liaisons, so water to rehydrate was of great importance.

However, convincing a rutting alpha male using logic wasn’t going to work, so you had to work smart.

Gathering what was left of your wits, you purred to him, “Yes, alpha. Take your tewng (loincloth) off and have me then.”

Neteyam’s grin was a leer of endorsement at your suggestion and he shifted to remove his clothing. The moment he stepped back enough to allow your feet to touch the earth, you seized the opportunity darting out to the side away from him and broke into a run towards the nearest haven. His roar of outrage at your escape was thunderous and it echoed through the canopy above.

You pumped your legs as hard as you could, knowing that you were ultimately no match for his warrior athleticism and male strength. He would catch you sooner or later. You could see the thatched roof of the haven hut in the distance and you could only hope you reached it before he caught you. His heavy footfalls were swift at your back and your body thrummed with exhilaration at the chase. Your pussy throbbed and tingled in anticipation and another gush of warm slick trickled down your thighs. Your loincloth was ruined you were sure. You didn’t think any amount of washing was going to remove the pungent scent of your arousal that had thoroughly soaked its fibres.

Neteyam’s growls sounded like they were right behind you and you didn’t know if it was your imagination, but you swore you could feel his hot breath against the nape of your neck. Your nipples prickled, erect, as your pert breasts bounced while you ran. A little spark of triumph burst in your chest when you realised you’d succeeded in getting Neteyam to accept a rut partner. The fact that you’d seduced him into accepting you as the partner in question was just an added bonus.

Eywa you couldn’t wait for him to touch you and consume you in his desire… You’d fantasised about this countless times…

Reaching the draping flaps of the haven, you burst into the space just as you felt Neteyam’s limbs tangle with yours when he reached out to grab you. You tripped over one of his feet, falling to your knees when he didn’t manage to grab your upper arms in time to stop your tumble. The woven rug on the haven floor cushioned your knees, thankfully, and apart from a slightly painful thud from the impact, you were otherwise unhurt.

Spinning on all fours to face him, you were forced back onto your haunches when you found him looming over you, barely an arm’s length from you. His chest was rising and falling deeply, but it wasn’t because he was out of breath. No, a warrior’s stamina was unmatched. His uninhibited desire was the cause of his heaving breaths. He was completely naked, having managed to rid himself from his loincloth, and his arousal was clear from the jutting length of his impressive erection.

Still on sitting on your heels, you peered up at his towering form. The look in his eyes was voracious, feral, and you thrilled in anticipation. Eywa help you, his cock was gorgeous… It was long and girthy, and abeautiful striated blue with swirling tanhì adorning its length. You could see the beginnings of his knot at the base of it, though it hadn’t yet begun to swell. His cock was topped with a fat and blushing mauve head, its slit already dribbling a tantalising string of pre-cum.

Neteyam approached you, his teeth gleaming in the diminished light of the haven’s interior. He grouched petulantly, “Don’t you fucking run from me again.”

“I-I thought it was best that we settle here.” You stuttered in response, your eyeline still very focused on his rigid cock as it neared your face with his approach.

“You thought it best, huh?” Neteyam mocked, and his expression turned wicked as he proceeded to run the head of his cock against the seam of your lips, “I think it’s best if I stuff that mouth of yours, omega.”

Your mouth popped open in unrestrained agreement and you moaned when he pushed the fat tip into your eager mouth. You felt your jaw stretch to its limit as he pushed the remainder of his length past your lips and you fought your gag reflex as the head of him hit the back of your throat. This wasn’t the first time you’d seen an alpha through his rut. Your arrangement with Nalu was a mutual one; he saw you through your heats and you assisted with his ruts. So, the deep blowjob wasn’t new, but Neteyam wasn’t small by any means. Like his tall stature and brawny frame, he was proportionate here too.

The taste of him was tangy and musky on your tongue while you swallowed him down as best you could. Neteyam’s groans of pleasure rang out around you, and he threaded the fingers of one hand through your braids at the crown of your head while his other and cupped your cheek. His hips began to piston, fucking your face in a slow and deliberate drag of his hard flesh in and out of your mouth. You encircled the base of his cock with one hand where the bulbous tissue of his knot was burgeoning.

“Fuck, you look so pretty with your mouth full of my cock.” Neteyam hissed tightly, his upper lip curled upward in a carnal snarl of enjoyment.

You groaned around him and your free hand moved to tweak at one of your nipples, which sent electrifying jolts of pleasure straight to your clit and core. Your slick must be pooling on the rug beneath you now, you were certain. Your pussy burned with molten pleasure and every nerve ending there was impatient to be touched, but you had to serve your alpha first.

Neteyam picked up the pace of his hips and tears stung in the inner corners of your eyes as you concentrated on breathing through your nose while choking on his cock every time he bottomed out. You continued to massage his knot, loving the way the length of him pulsated in bliss in your mouth.

“You’re a good girl. Good little omega. You like choking on your alpha’s cock, do you? Yeah, that’s it. Reach down into that tewng and play with yourself for me.”

Great Mother, Neteyam’s dirty mouth was so sexy… This certainly was a side of him you’d never seen, the alpha male side that he’d fought so hard to keep hidden from you. You loved it… This was better than any fantasy you’d ever had…

You loosened the ties of your loincloth with your free hand, letting the sodden fabric peel away from the hottest part of you. When your fingers ghosted past your swollen clit you whined wretchedly, earning a strangled grunt from Neteyam as your whine vibrated around his cock. You rubbed at your clit whilst intermittently fingering your sopping pussy and the bliss your actions wrought on your core caused another squirt of slick onto the rug.

You could feel Neteyam’s pre-cum sliding down your throat as mumbled words of encouragement spilled from his lips, telling you how good your mouth felt, telling you how he loved that you were so slick for him.

“Oh I’m going to fill your mouth up so good and then I’m going to fuck and fill your slick-drenched pussy up too.”

You knew his first release was nearing by the way his cock hardened impossibly further and you gripped his swollen knot tightly, squeezing it to coax his first orgasm from him. It worked almost instantly and he tensed with a final thrust into your mouth, a choked cry escaping him as he spilled his seed down your throat. You rubbed frantically at your clit, thanking Eywa when you were rewarded with a small orgasm of your own.

Neteyam withdrew from your mouth and you swallowed down the remnants of his release, gasping a little for more breath now that you were able to fill your lungs fully. Reaching for you, Neteyam clasped hold of your upper arms and hauled you to your feet, and your loincloth slipped off your hips and tail to fall to your ankles.

He cupped your cheek with one hand, his thumb stroking your cheek, “You’re being such a good girl for me. Do you want me to fuck you now? Do you want me to knot you, little omega?”

Your legs were wobbly and you almost wanted to cry from the relief of his question. Of course you wanted him to fuck you… You wanted to be stretched out and locked onto his knot… So it was an easy answer, “Yes please, alpha.”

Neteyam’s mouth found yours in a fiery kiss and you opened your mouth to allow him to plunder it. His tongue swept against yours as your heads twisted and melded, flooding your mouth full of his alpha pheromones.

An alpha’s saliva was sweet and saturated with rut pheromones that could bring on an omega female’s heat if she was close enough to that part of her cycle. In other cases, the pheromones would signal the omega’s body to produce a copious amount of slick to aid and enable the knotting process. Not that you needed any encouragement, mind you. Your pussy was clenching and squeezing impatiently and your slick was already running down your thighs to your lower legs.

You’d daydreamed before of what it would be like to kiss Neteyam. Somehow you’d always imagined it to be soft and sweet; maybe after an evening meal in the fading light of the bonfire on your birthday, on his birthday, or maybe just one day in your dreams when he decided that he wanted you too. Perhaps it was his adamance in the past that the two of you would never share heats and ruts together, but you’d never envisioned your first kiss with Neteyam to be like this; passionate, wild and full of unbridled lust. The reality far outweighed your dreams, you decided.

Your fingers scrabbed for purchased at his shoulders as you pushed onto the balls of your feet to return his ardent kisses. Neteyam had looped an arm around the small of your back again, securing your front to his, and the drag of your pebbled nipples against the skin of his chest was torturous. He slipped a hand between your bodies to run the flat of his hand over your core, deftly letting your swollen clit slip between two of his fingers while he stroked you back and forth.

A high-pitched keen was your reaction and your hips bucked into his teasing touch. Your pussy ached to be filled and stretched to full capacity. You felt desperate, almost more desperate than Neteyam appeared to be, which was unexpected considering he was the one in rut. However, the roguish smirk on his handsome face while he watched you pant and whimper told you that this alpha enjoyed a bit of a build-up; he liked to play with his toys.

“Alpha, please.” You importuned, your body releasing yet another squirt of slick as Neteyam rubbed insistent circles around your sensitive bud, “I need you. I need your knot.”

He hushed you with a kiss, whispering a taunt against your lips, “So eager, you poor girl. Does it hurt that I’m making you wait?”

“Yeah,” Your voice was breathy and unstable, and you backed your response with several nods of your head. It was so agonisingly good, what his fingers were doing, rolling and rubbing your sweet nub.

“Show your alpha where it hurts, go on.”

Neteyam gently pushed you away from him, indicating with an upward tip of his chin towards the lush pile of bedding behind you. You backed up towards the little nest of blankets and mats, and you hastily settled yourself on your back in the centre of it all. Spreading your lithe legs wide and hitching your knees up as high as they would go, you put yourself on display for him. You didn’t need to look to know your pussy was puffy and swollen, glistening with slick.

A harsh groan grated out from him and you watched as he began to stroke his still erect cock. That was the thing with ruts. Alpha males had little to no refractory period during this time. They were able to copulate multiple times and ejaculate repeatedly without issue. Neteyam’s knot was an angry-looking purple now and his cock was littered with veins and ridges that stood out along its shaft.

Your fingers found your core again and you penetrated yourself with all three fingers of one hand while its twin took care of your clit. The squelch of your pussy was lewd, your slick pouring out of you now as your inner walls clamped and released with pleasure.

With a whimper of his own, Neteyam knelt between your parted thighs, fisting his cock furiously, “Is that all for me, sweet thing? You hungry for my cock?”

Your answer was barked out in desperation, his teasing too much for you now, “Yes, just fuck me now!”

The pressure low in your pelvis was unbearable where your fingers pressed and rubbed at your g-spot inside you. And you squeezed your pelvic muscles outward, forcing a gushing squirt to splatter all up Neteyam’s front. You might have made even more of a mess, but it did the trick.

Neteyam surged over you in the next instant, slamming his pelvis into yours within the cradle of your hips. His elbows and forearms caged you on either side of your head as he settled over your body. You could feel the thick tip of his cockhead probing through your slippery folds, and with a sharp and unforgiving thrust, the full length of him breached you, tip, shaft and knot.

Your scream of gratification was hoarse, as was his cry of pleasure. His knot was swollen but not yet to its full extent and with each brutal roll of his hips, the bulbous flesh of it pushed in and out from your lower lips with a fleshy pop. As a healer and spiritual priestess in training, there were many times that you gave thanks to Eywa, but never more so than in this very moment. The extreme pleasure was dizzying, the ridged girth of him kneading against the walls of your pussy while his knot continued to stretch your entrance.

“You feel like heaven.” Neteyam moaned by your cheek and you turned your head to claim his lips again in a searing kiss.

He was hot and hard over you and your inner omega revelled in the sensation. You never wanted this to end as his hips continued their onslaught. His thrusts were becoming slowly becoming shallower. He was deep inside you, but the main point of friction between you was focussed on his swollen knot pulling and pushing from your tight entrance. Your nipples were hard, tingling peaks; your pussy was fluttering, your clit was throbbing and even your toes were curled inward tightly.

“Alpha, I’m close.” You mewled, clutching at his torso, your fingernails scoring lines down his back, “I’m almost there!”

With a fluidity and an ease that was testament to his brute strength, Neteyam sat back onto his haunches and without pulling out of you, he threw one of your legs over him and manoeuvred your hips to elevate them. Your rump was raised high in the air while he knelt behind you. You moved onto all fours to accommodate the new position, but you felt him reach forward to grasp your kuru (neural queue) tightly and push your face back against the bedding.

You emitted a soft cry of discomfort at his tight grip on your kuru, but you bore it because the pain only seemed to heighten your pleasure. Neteyam set a brutal pace of thrusts then, rutting into you roughly. The furious snap of his hips against your bottom caused a series of jarring wails to leave you, the lascivious sound muffled only because your face was partially obscured by the bedding beneath you.

“Fuck, you good little omega. I’m going to knot you so hard after you cum for me.” Neteyam vowed, rumbling curses and growls falling from his lips as he sped you both to your inevitable climaxes.

His knot was bigger now, engorged to its maximum and when the bulbous round of it slipped past your entrance on his next thrust, your orgasm slammed into you. Your pussy squeezed and clamped down hard around his knot, locking him into place within you as several streams of squirt spurted from you with each glorious pulse of your climax.

Neteyam’s roar of ecstasy was uncontrolled and ear-splitting. His strapping frame collapsed over yours, his front aligned with your back, and his thighs quaked against you while he ejaculated. His knot left you both tied to each other and prevented any of his semen from escaping your locked bodies. You felt the viscous build-up of it within you like an aching heat in your lower pelvis.

Thoroughly spent for the moment, Neteyam gingerly rolled onto his side, taking you with him into a spooning position. Your tail lay limp over his hip and your breaths were noisy while you recovered from your high. Immense contentment and satisfaction washed through you and you smiled to yourself and brushed several damp strands of hair from your cheek. His knot still pulsed lightly, emitting more semen periodically into your body.

You both lounged in blissful silence for a while until Neteyam spoke.

“Lei?” Neteyam’s voice was quiet, meek almost, and the sound was a stark contrast to how he’d just been.

Craning your neck back as comfortably as it would allow, your turned your head to look at him. His gold eyes were wide and anxious, and there was a clarity in them now that was absent before in the raging heat of his rutting. There was always a period after sex and knotting when an alpha’s rut hormones would wane, before escalating again to repeat the entire cycle. Neteyam was clearly experiencing this moment of lucidity.

“Hey you,” You breathed with a shy smile, “Feeling better?”

Neteyam swallowed tightly and his forehead was wrinkled in a worried frown, “I’m sorry, was I too rough? I couldn’t help it. I don’t know what came over me, I just- It’s so-”

Silencing him with a gentle nibble of his bottom lip, you soothed him, “Shh, it’s alright. You weren’t too rough. It was wonderful and natural, and everything it should’ve been. Don’t apologise. I enjoyed it a lot.”

“Not so gentlemanly after all, am I? Now you’ve seen what a brute I can be.” Neteyam fretted and his shame could be heard in his voice.

“Hey, stop it!” You hissed, rebuking him sharply, “This is only one part of you. It doesn’t define you. You’re still my charming and gentle Neteyam. You’re my best friend, I know you. I see you.”

Neteyam’s frown faded, relief colouring his handsome features. He rested his forehead against yours and returned the sentiment tenderly, “I see you. You’re my best friend too. Maybe a little more than that now?”

“No more stubbornness.” You declared matter-of-factly, though a delighted grin stretched your cheeks at his words, “You’ve filled me to the brim once now, might as well do it every time you need a partner from now on.”

You smirked wickedly at him then and intentionally clenched your pelvic muscles around his knot again. Your action forced another round of ejaculation from Neteyam and his groan was piteous as pleasure wracked him once more. His knot wouldn’t subside for at least another hour and you settled back against him, comfortably tied. Your eyes felt heavy and you knew the smart thing to do was to take a little nap to recharge. After all, that was only round one. There would be many more rounds over the next several days and you planned to enjoy them to the fullest.

***~~~***

Author's Note: Thank you all for reading! 😘 Your support means the world to me. As always, your reblogs, comments & likes are all very appreciated. Much love to you all. 😍 (Reblogging especially helps circulate content better, so remember to always reblog an artist's work if you enjoyed something.) I'm going to head off on my trip now & while I won't have much internet, I'll check in periodically. Gosh I'm going to miss ya'll until I'm back! xx

#neteyam smut #neteyam te suli tsyeyk'itan #neteyam fic #neteyam x reader #atwow neteyam #neteyam sully #neteyam #avatar neteyam #avatar james cameron #atwow smut #lunaskinktober2023 #alpha neteyam #omegaverse #atwow #avatar movie #neteyam x y/n #neteyam x you #neteyam x na'vi!reader

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thebibliosphere · 10 months

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Whenever I get a particularly nasty message, I always check to see if they're following me first. Nine times out of ten, they're not. But they're also, unfortunately, the same people who feel entitled to send me multiple messages in a row, most of them heavily steeped in the language of moralization and purity.

Like whenever I talk about painkillers or pain management, I always get a handful of well-meaning people who are maybe new to my blog or are just young, asking me if I've tried diet/exercise/meditation, etc.

Sometimes I'll respond to them. Other times I'll just ignore them because I get those kinds of messages so often it's like white noise, and maybe part of me hopes if they stick around on my blog, they'll learn it through exposure via my incessant bitching.

When you see me responding to someone offering that kind of advice, it's either because I'm at my fucking limit or because I'm hoping it's a teachable moment and an otherwise seemingly nice person might unlearn some harmful biases.

The people who don't follow me are not interested in any kind of conversation on the subject. They do, however, feel the most qualified to tell me, someone they didn't know existed until one of my posts crossed their dash, how to manage my life, everything I'm doing wrong, and why I'm a bad person.

And for them, my disability is proof that I am a bad person because they view health as a moral issue.

If you're sick, it's because you don't exercise enough, don't eat the right foods, don't pray enough, don't do enough. They genuinely believe that if they say and do all the right things, like a Good Person, they'll never get sick.

It's their security blanket against the harsh reality that anyone is one bad day away from disability. One faulty gene, one bad infection, one bad accident away from a life-long diagnosis. And if they do get sick, it's a test. A challenge to be overcome with Willpower as they learn the True Meaning of Life.

It can never just be a simple fact of life that sickness happens. That disability exists without a moral reason.

And it's suffocating.

Day in, day out. Folks who don't know me from fucking Eve telling me I'm being punished. Not always as outright as that. They don't always use that word. But sometimes I appreciate it when they do because at least then they're being honest. They're not couching it in the softer language of leftist circles. Not hiding it behind concern.

Because the truth is, there are just as many folks who think they're liberal and enlightened who'd be happy if disabled people just stopped existing. They don't like thinking about us because it makes them think about themselves. About their own fragility and mortality, and they hate that. They hate that there's something they can't control with their thoughts and actions. That they can't moralize their way out of.

Honestly, it's a relief when people are just cunts about it because I can hit the block button, safe in the knowledge that they were never the kind of person who would see me as a person. But when it's some 20yo kid with their pronouns, orientation, and "ACAB" in their profile spouting the same kind of moralization, sometimes even with the language of eugenics, it feels like such a betrayal. Like a loss.

And perhaps if I wasn't multiply disabled, I'd have the energy to pull them back. To tell them why they're wrong and hope like hell they realize what they're doing is harmful. But then, if I wasn't disabled, they wouldn't be messaging me, so I wouldn't be dealing with it.

I wouldn't be expected to use my existence as a teachable moment to spoon-feed them compassion. But I am, and I do. When I can. Not always with the grace that's warranted. Not always with the thought and compassion I ought to. (And I don't; I acknowledge that. I'm prone to anger and off-the-cuff remarks that are hurtful too. Though I try to keep most of it to myself or save it for therapy.)

Basically, if you've made it this far through the TED talk, don't be fucking cunts to disabled people. Don't tell chronically ill people to try yoga. Don't moralize pain relief. Suffering is not noble.

You need to kill the cop and the priest in your head telling you otherwise.

And also if you're the nice people sending me nice messages. Thank you. It helps cushion all of *gestures* this.

#chronic health tag #long post #ableism #thanks for coming to this huge rant I'll probably delete later #also sincerely #thank you to everyone who does send nice messages #you are the majority #it's just that the assholes are louder

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roosterforme · 2 months

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Covering the Classics Part 4 | Bob Floyd x OC

Summary: Anna was afraid to face her new friends after the night out at the bar. Admitting she was attracted to Bob was easier to do than explain why she couldn't have him. When she finally sends him some book recommendations, she finds his taste in books familiar in an all too intimate way.

Warnings: Fluff, angst, adult language, eventually 18+

Length: 4700 words

Pairing: Robert "Bob" Floyd x Female OC (this story is part of the Beer Boy/Sugar and Jake/Jessica universe)

Covering the Classics masterlist. Check my masterlist for more! Thank you to @mak-32 for the beautiful banner!

Anna spent the rest of her weekend working on lesson plans and looking at Bob's number saved in her phone. She had compiled a mental list of titles she thought he would like, and she'd even pulled a few dog-eared books from her own collection and stacked them up on her narrow counter. She would absolutely love to have Bob borrow them from her, but she'd completely messed everything up.

Why, when confronted with a decent man, did she shut everything down and destroy all hope? Because of Kevin. That's why. She knew this crush on Bob was a bad idea. Nothing good could come of it, but she still caught herself looking at his contact information on Sunday evening with longing in her heart.

She made herself a sad sandwich for dinner and packed herself a second sad sandwich for lunch the next day and then she settled in with her computer. The idea of taking her sad sandwich to the quad and eating with her friends was making her anxious. What if they didn't even want her around now that she'd made a complete fool of herself in front of their friend? What if they looked up at her as she approached them sitting on the bench with their perfect, beautiful lunches and scowled with their perfect, beautiful faces?

"Oh no," she groaned, covering her eyes with her hand. She really liked them, but they probably hated her now. And she really liked Bob, but he probably went home with that better looking woman who was at the Navy bar and hadn't thought about Anna one time since.

She forced her attention to her computer screen which was prompting her for a password. She entered Kev1n1s@t00L and watched as the website she'd had open on her browser came to life. She sighed as she scrolled through her saved favorites on PoetsAmongUs. It was kind of pitiful that she knew what she was going to end up reading before she could actually admit it to herself.

Your whispers call out in the darkest shadows, My heart answers like a flame, Igniting this shared space with every breath I take, Giving you a love that will never find the end. It binds me to you, pulsing through my veins, Emotions like I've never known before. I've doubted that I could reach this place, But I feel endlessly sure here now.

Anna whined from her bed in her sad little apartment as she looked at the pen name of her favorite poet before clicking on it. He either never finished filling out his profile or he was being purposely vague. Male, 30s, United States.

"Sky Writing. The only man I would trust with my heart ever again." She read the poem once more. That was her favorite passage, but she knew everything he posted by heart and got excited every time something new from him popped up every few months.

It was late enough that she could probably just go to sleep without acknowledging that she hadn't texted Bob and probably never would. She couldn't set foot back in that bar ever again. Maybe that other place that Jessica loved so much would be somewhere she could check out next time she had nothing better to do. Chippy's or something? She started to doze off.

When her alarm started blaring, it was almost like she had slept too well. She'd dreamed about a faceless man with beautiful hands reading poetry to her while he ran his fingers slowly up and down her bare thigh. She couldn't shake the delicious feeling even as her alarm got louder. When she managed to turn it off, she lay there wishing she had time to go on the poetry website and masturbate before work.

"Stop it," she whispered as she got up and started getting herself ready for the day.

At least she got to teach English 522 this afternoon. Feminist Literature was becoming one of her favorite classes, as evidenced by her well worn copy of Carmilla by Sheridan Le Fanu which was in her bag. When she stood in her kitchen and ate a peanut butter granola bar and drank some coffee, she looked at the books she had pulled out as options for Bob, but she shook her head and left for the day without dwelling on how disappointing her life truly was.

Relying solely on public transportation meant leaving a lot earlier than you wanted to, but Anna still barely made it to her office in time to grab her notebook and teach her first lecture of the week. Half of the students still looked like they were asleep while the other half were looking at her like she was a literary messiah. It was almost comical, and when lunchtime rolled around, she was in a pretty great mood. Until she realized she was still on the fence about going to the quad.

"Just do a vibe check," she muttered as she grabbed her lunch from her office. "If they look pissed off, you can come right back here and never talk to anyone else again for the rest of your life." She could subside on sandwiches and online poetry and only speak when she was giving lectures. That sounded simultaneously amazing and also terrifying.

The college campus was bustling today. There were some guys skateboarding through the quad, and she recognized a few other faculty members from the English department who waved to her. But that didn't stop her palms from sweating and her heart from thudding in a sickening rhythm that Edgar Alan Poe would think was beautiful. When she spotted the two women on the bench in front of the weird tree, Anna was shocked to see them waving to her with smiles on their faces.

"Anna!" called Jessica. "You'll never believe it! The vending machine just gave me my bottle of Pepsi and a bonus bottle of ginger ale! Like it knew I was about to see you!"

"Chaos Theory at its finest," said the other woman before she bit into her carrot stick and hummus.

"It's really more of the Butterfly Effect," Jessica replied. Anna had no idea what they were talking about, but they scooted away from each other on the bench to make room, so she decided to stay.

Anna swallowed hard as she sat and opened her pack of peanuts. "How was the rest of your weekend?" she asked the two of them, and soon her nerves calmed down.

"Excellent. Bradley and I took a tour of the library yesterday."

"Pretty good. I helped Jake make waffles for breakfast. Lots and lots and lots of waffles. What did you do with the rest of your weekend? After the Hard Deck?"

Anna accepted the bottle of ginger ale that Jessica handed to her as she said, "Um, well I did my lesson plans for the next few weeks. And I started writing my midterm exams. Nothing exciting."

She was met with a bit of awkward silence, and she could feel the two women sharing a look behind her head. "Did you happen to text Bob?" Advanced Calculus asked cautiously, and Anna knew this was the part where it was all over. The dramatic climax, except she was actually the villain in this story.

"No, actually. I think that ship has sailed," she replied softly.

"Why?" Jessica asked, not unkindly. "When we figured out that you and he already met at the bookstore in North Park, we were ecstatic. He's the mystery guy you were losing your mind over, Anna! The handsome one with glasses who smells so good!"

"He really does smell good," Advanced Calculus muttered as she dipped another carrot into the hummus which was probably unfairly homemade. "Are you no longer attracted to him? Was it his nerdy tee shirt? Or were all the guys so obnoxious you couldn't wait to leave?"

Anna held onto the cold bottle of ginger ale a little tighter as she said, "It's not that at all. I mean, who in their right mind wouldn't be attracted to Bob? And I thought his shirt was kind of charming. And the rest of the guys were welcoming in a slightly intense way."

Now Jessica was turned to face her, eyes wide behind her glasses. "Bob thinks you ran away from him twice now because he's unappealing and boring."

Anna jolted and the pack of peanuts went flying to the ground, nuts rolling in every direction. "He does?" she asked, palms beginning to sweat again.

"Yeah. Big time. But he's quite attracted to you. Apparently the red hair is a thing."

"Oh my god," Anna moaned in embarrassment. Bob liked her red hair? "Oh no. No. No. He's just.... he's so.... and he's also.... I can't even." She took a deep breath as she kicked at the lost peanuts. "Bob is so handsome. It's hard to look into his eyes for too long, because you start to feel like you're going to break out into song. And I don't think I've ever been around a man who smells quite that nice. And he's funny and just a touch nerdy, but that's a good thing."

There was another beat of silence before Advanced Calculus said, "I'm not really understanding what the problem is."

Anna shook her head and unwrapped her sandwich to keep her hands busy. "Listen, none of my weirdness is because of him. It's all because of me. I can't have a crush on him. I can't be interested in him. I can't be interested in any men whatsoever."

Jessica nudged her shoulder and said, "Maybe you could just text him? Maybe making another new friend wouldn't be so bad?"

--------------------------

"Well if you can't find a girlfriend, I hope you're at least getting your rocks off with an attractive lady."

Bob was cradling his forehead in his hand and trying to escape from Suzanne's house without having this conversation. Whenever he stopped to pick up dinner instead of cooking something at home, he always brought something for her, too. It was the neighborly thing to do, especially when your neighbor was decades older than you, but right now he just wanted to vanish.

"I wouldn't tell you even if I was," he replied, earning a laugh as she opened up the container of soup at her kitchen table.

"Sit down and stay for a while," she told him, pointing to the empty chair. "I'll pay you back for dinner with my charm and witticism since you won't accept any money."

His phone started to vibrate in his uniform pocket, and he dug it out thinking it was probably Jessica having finished mocking up her barbarian character for their campaign, but it was a text from an unknown number. He was about to pocket his phone again, but then he saw the words book recommendations and paused. He quickly unlocked the phone and started reading the texts that were coming through.

I have some book recommendations for you if you still want them. I'm sorry I didn't send them over the weekend.

This is Anna, by the way.

I should have started with that information.

Wow. This is already embarrassing.

Bob laughed and started to type back immediately, and then Suzanne's voice cut across his thoughts. "Are you sure you don't have a special lady? You're smiling an awful lot at your phone."

He looked at her and shook his head. "I'm sure. I like this girl, but she doesn't return my feelings that way. She's just sending me some recommendations." He started to back away as he added, "Enjoy your soup. I'll see you later, Suzanne."

"Good night, Robert."

Bob ended up standing just inside his front door as he saved Anna's number and typed back a message to her. He thought keeping it simple would be his best move. Anything more than that and he'd embarrass himself once again by getting ahead of himself with his feelings.

I would love some more recommendations from you. You're the expert.

He only had to wait about a minute for her response, which was just a list of book after book after book that he'd never even heard of. The first were the ones she'd given to him verbally on Friday night, but the rest were just as foreign to him.

Anna Webber: Persuasion by Austen. Northanger Abbey by Austen, Lady Chatterley's Lover by D. H. Lawrence, The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton, Far From the Madding Crowd by Thomas Hardy, Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Woolf, Cranford by Elizabeth Gaskell, and The Black Tulip by Alexandre Dumas (because you like poetry so much)

Bob quickly ate his own container of soup while he read the list over and over again. Then without changing out of his uniform, he grabbed the keys to his beat up truck and headed to the bookstore in North Park to see if he could find any of these titles before they closed.

The store was virtually empty, and when he climbed the stairs up to the slightly dusty loft he could practically picture Anna's pretty hands and painted nails gliding along all of the spines. He could imagine her pretty, wide eyes looking up at him before she figured out he was boring. He could hear her laugh as he made his way to the spot where they had been standing together.

That horrible Vonnegut book was still there which made him chuckle. "Figures nobody else would want to read it," he muttered as he reached for it. Then he backtracked a little bit to start collecting everything from Anna's list. He referenced his text messages several times, hunting all over the Classics section until he had almost everything in order. Then he spread them out along the shelf and took a photo. He texted it to her before he could second guess himself after he added a short caption.

Did I miss anything?

He was walking back down to the poetry section when his phone vibrated.

Anna Webber: You're at the bookstore right now? The one in North Park?

Bob froze in the middle of the stairs. He embarrassed himself without even knowing it. He must seem desperate right now. Running out to the store as soon as she sent him the list. "Shit," he groaned softly. When he got another message, he was almost afraid to look at it.

Anna Webber: I LOVE that store. I wish I were there right now, too.

Bob thought that sounded perfect, actually. Maybe if she were here now, she wouldn't run away this time. He'd been playing those kinds of scenarios over and over in his head, ones where she liked him back the way he liked her. Ones where they left the bookstore holding hands.

He continued downstairs to look for the book of poems she suggested for him, which he found quickly, along with Votive by Keiran Goddard. Would Anna like a copy of his favorite book of poetry? Did he even want to ask her? At this point, he had nothing to lose. She wasn't going to suddenly want him, but that shouldn't stop him from sharing a recommendation of his own. Especially when she might really enjoy something he found so spectacular.

Bob held the book up and snapped a quick selfie, sending it away into the universe before dwelling on it too much.

--------------------

Anna was preparing a piece of toast with jelly for herself or dinner, desperately wishing she were back at the bookstore. Bob was there, probably smelling so nice and luring everyone else who was shopping closer to him. Perhaps he was wearing another Dungeons & Dragons shirt like he'd worn to the Navy bar. Perhaps his biceps were straining against it.

She didn't have to use her vivid imagination for very long, because suddenly Bob was staring at her through her phone screen with his crooked little smile and his beautiful eyes. And his uniform.

"Oh my god." The toast slipped from her fingers and landed jelly side down on her plate as she took in every single detail. Navy uniforms were khaki? Why had she assumed they were all navy blue? Why didn't she know more about the Navy? She was going to take the time to learn everything she could about the United States Navy.

When she realized her mouth was dry, she reached for her glass of water and downed it. She was in a daze. A Bob Floyd induced daze. Even all the little pins on his shirt were distracting. She wanted to count all of them. She wanted to touch them. She wondered what they would feel like if she pressed her lips to them.

"Stop," she gasped. But she couldn't. Now her eyes drifted up to his face again, and she thought she'd only really ever seen the exact color of his eyes in a Kandinsky painting at the Guggenheim. She couldn't look away. "No. No. No!" she moaned. And then she finally read the actual message he'd typed out after gawking at his photo for five whole minutes.

Bob Floyd: Have you ever read Votive by Keiran Goddard? It's my favorite collection of poetry.

Anna laughed a little hysterically. She hadn't even noticed he was holding up a book at all. His graceful fingers were wrapped around the damn thing, but she'd been too distracted by him to actually look at the book. But now the fact that she'd never read Goddard before had her flushed and flustered, because Bob had sent a book recommendation to her. Nobody ever did that, and all she could think about was how she absolutely needed to get her hands on a copy and devour the whole entire thing if it was something he liked.

Very calmly and rationally, she typed back to him.

I have not read it yet, but I'll add it to my list of things to check out of the library.

When she set her phone down and realized her toast had become a casualty to this text conversation, she moaned and flipped it back over. Her heart was still beating a little erratically from looking at Bob's photo for too long, and she didn't think she could even eat. There was no way she could waste any food in her current financial state though, so she took a bite anyway as he texted her back.

Bob Floyd: I'll just pick it up for you while I'm here. I hope you'll like it, but if you hate it, that's okay too. It's a bit of an acquired taste.

Oh no. She couldn't let him buy it, because she didn't have any extra spending money at the moment to be able to pay him back. But admitting that to him would be excruciatingly embarrassing, and she didn't even think she could do it. Perhaps she could scrape together twenty dollars if she skipped a few meals, but then she wouldn't be able to join the girls in the quad at lunchtime. They'd notice her lack of food right away.

"Why are you such a disaster?" she asked herself as she scarfed down the rest of her toast and typed back to him.

Thank you. I can pay you back for it later.

She would figure it out. She always did. Even when she didn't want to, she managed to find a way to solve her problems. Even when it hurt.

Bob Floyd: It's my treat. I can give it to Bradley or Jake at work tomorrow. I'm sure either of the ladies wouldn't mind getting it to you when they see you. Or if you feel like it, we could meet for coffee one day and I could give it to you in person. Just let me know.

"Oh, Anna," she whispered, already typing out a response before she could think better of it.

--------------------------

Bob was surprised Anna took him up on his offer to meet for coffee, but he found himself looking forward to it in spite of the fact that he was still pining a bit. He'd get over it in time. He'd find someone new to crush on, or maybe he'd meet another girl that he was interested in, and maybe she would be interested back. But none of that stopped him from being excited at the prospect of being around her again. And none of that prepared him for the way he felt when Anna pushed through the door of the coffee shop on Wednesday evening and looked around tentatively. Her red hair was in another loose braid, and her freckles were so endearing.

As soon as her eyes landed on him, she looked less apprehensive but also more resigned. When she approached the table where he was sitting with three books, he stood. "Hey. Anna. How are you?"

"Hi, Bob." Even her voice was soft and sweet as her eyes swept along his face and body. She blushed a pretty shade of pink as she said, "Thanks for the book. Will you let me buy you something to drink?"

He didn't respond beyond nodding and leading the way toward the counter. He listened to her order a small coffee before he ordered a large hot tea, and when she reached for her wallet, he was already handing over a twenty. When she looked up at him with wide, brown eyes, he just smiled. "You don't have to buy me a drink."

She watched the money leave his hand as she said, "Well, you don't have to buy me one either."

"Too late."

She was quiet as they returned to the small table with their hot beverages, but as soon as she sat, she said, "You'll have to let me pay next time."

Bob slid two of the books across the table as he asked, "Next time?" But she didn't respond as she let her fingers brush along Votive before she picked it up to reveal the one underneath it.

Anna's laughter filled the small space as her eyes darted back up to meet his. "You bought Cat's Cradle? I didn't think that was the kind of thing you were looking for?"

He glanced down into his tea. "Uh, it's not. I got it for you."

"Bob," she said quietly, her fingers tracing the spine now. He liked her nail polish and wanted to touch her hands. "You did not have to get me two books."

"Yes I did," he said with a smile. "Vonnegut sounds horrible. I felt bad for it because nobody else was ever going to buy it. I couldn't just leave it to rot on the shelf when I know the only person who would be willing to give it a nice home."

When she laughed again, she seemed resigned to the fact that the books were both hers. "Thanks. Money is a little tight for me right now. You know how it is when you first move," she told him while she fidgeted a bit. "But next time, I'll buy your drink. Or your book. Or something."

"You keep saying 'next time'."

Anna poked at her coffee cup and said, "I thought maybe.... we could be friends."

"Friends." His voice felt and sounded stale. The word made him feel sadder than it should have. "Of course."

She looked even more relieved now as she took a sip of her coffee, but Bob was busy trying not to memorize the pretty pattern of her freckles across her nose and the way her lips were pursed. He wouldn't look at a friend that way.

"Which book is that?" she asked, nodding toward the last one in front of him.

He flipped it over so she could see the cover, and he said, "Oh, it's The Age of Innocence. I'm almost done reading it, and I was just hoping to get your opinions on a few things."

Anna's eyes went wider. "You're almost done reading it? Already?"

"Yeah." His voice sounded like a groan, and he knew he should be embarrassed since she recommended it two days ago, but he said, "Once I start a new book, I can't put it down if it's good."

"So you like it?" she asked, leaning a little closer to him as a smile played along her lips.

"It's fantastic," he replied, and her foot brushed his softly beneath the table.

Anna licked her lips and shifted in her seat as she made a soft sound that just made Bob want to get closer to her. She clasped her hands on the table in front of her and cleared her throat before she blurted out. "You're really handsome." His lips parted wordlessly, unsure how to respond, but he didn't have to as she immediately said, "And you're not boring. Not at all. I could have stayed in that dusty bookstore all afternoon, tucked away in the loft, talking to you about book after book."

"Oh," he replied, his brow furrowed in confusion. "Really?"

"Yes. Really," she said, and it sounded like she meant it. "I didn't disappear because of you. I disappeared because of me. And I'm really sorry about that."

Then he realized what was going on. His friends got to her already. He'd told Jessica on Saturday night that he was sure Anna ditched him because he's probably not as handsome or interesting as she's used to. And now he was going to have to text her and tell her to lay off. This whole thing was embarrassing enough without having to hear Anna pity him like this.

"Don't worry about it," he told her softly with his best attempt at a smile. "We can be friends."

When he got home, she texted him to thank him again for the books and the coffee. But he was still thinking about her freckles and how far down her neck they might go. Maybe they made a pretty pattern across her shoulders, too. Maybe they would disappear into her bra, a perfect treasure for another man to find. But not Bob. Bob and Anna were just friends.

------------------------

When Anna finally got home after taking two buses, it was so late, she knew she should go right to bed. But she was wishing for another cheap bottle of wine to try to take her mind off of Bob. He was perfect, and she couldn't let herself have him. They could be friends, but nothing more. She could send him texts, but they couldn't flirt.

She already missed his soft voice and the way he gave her his entire focus when they were together. He bought her two books! Nobody else ever bought her books! And he read the ones she recommended to him! Maybe Kevin was to blame for most things that had gone wrong in her life, but literally no man she'd ever known was as kind and thoughtful as Bob.

She collapsed back onto her bed in her sad apartment were she could look at her kitchen and her bathroom at the same time, and she opened the book of poetry. Bob's favorite poetry. Within minutes of reading the first few pages, she felt warmer and maybe a little flustered. The passages were romantic and insightful in such a familiar way. Something was tickling at her brain, trying to trigger a memory. She kept reading, making it fifteen pages in before she gasped and realized what it was.

"Sky Writing," she murmured, reaching for her computer in favor of the book. She was reminded of her favorite novice poet from her favorite website. The poetry in the book sounded a bit like the poems written by Sky Writing, and now Anna was even more of a mess knowing that this was the kind of intimate literature Bob preferred to read.

She wanted him. She wanted to know what his big, sturdy hands would feel like on her body. What his lips tasted like. She wanted to erase that pinch of doubt she saw on his face when she tried to reassure him that even though they were going to be just friends, she definitely found him attractive.

The next time she went shopping, she was going to need to stock up on some more bottles of cheap wine.

-------------------------

Just friends. Okay, Anna. Sure, babe. Let's see how long that lasts. Bob's wingwomen are powerful. Thank you @lauratang for the book/reading list! And thanks to @mak-32 and @beyondthesefourwalls

PART 5

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#bob floyd x oc #robert bob floyd x oc #robert bob floyd #bob floyd #bob floyd imagine #robert floyd imagine #bob floyd fic #bob floyd fanfiction #robert floyd x oc #robert floyd fanfiction #robert floyd fic #robert floyd #top gun imagine #top gun maverick imagine #top gun fanfiction #top gun maverick fanfiction #roosterforme #covering the classics

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slut4thebroken · 3 months

Text

Stress Relief

── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ──

Pairing | Cillian Murphy x reader

Summary | Holidays with your family are hard, but Cillian makes it a little more bearable.

Warnings | Smut, 18+, sexual content, large age gap (unspecified), fluffy ish smut, oral (kind of), praise, a lil degradation, kissing, fingering, I need him to talk me through it 😭

Words | 3.6 k

Notes | Pretend I posted this 2 months ago💀🤫 Also wow- first /not/ dark smut in a while I think skdhdk

Ao3 link | <3

Masterlist

With a heavy sigh, you flopped down onto the bed as he looked through his luggage.

“Just a few more days.” You said through a breath.

“Let’s get you changed, yeah?” You grunted out an acknowledgement, keeping your eyes closed and not moving. You heard him chuckle, then your shoes were being taken off. “I can’t tell if I make things better or worse by being here.”

“Better. Definitely better.” You sighed and he unbuttoned your pants before pulling them down your legs.

“I’m not sure they like me very much though.” He was saying it like a joke, but you knew he didn’t like the fact that most of your family disapproved.

“I don’t care.” You muttered. When he pulled your torso to slip your sweater off, you whined in displeasure. He dressed you in your sleep shirt, then lifted you to carry you over to your side of the bed and lay you back down. If your family saw this, they’d probably understand. But he’s always been a perfect gentleman— polite, kind, respectful. You didn’t get why his age overshadowed all of that. When your eyes fluttered open, you turned your head to the side to watch him change into his pajamas, then he was pulling the covers back and joining you.

“Thank you for being here.” You said softly, turning on your side to face him. He gave you a warm smile and brushed your hair away from your face.

“I just hate seeing how stressed you get.” He murmured, gaze trailing all over your face.

“You help a lot. More than you know.” You returned the smile and placed a hand on his arm. He stared at you for a moment, then reached behind himself to turn off the lamp.

“C’mere.” He said quietly, pulling you into him. He placed a gentle kiss on your head and you buried your blushing face in his chest, enjoying the feeling of his arms wrapped around you. After a while, he started trailing one hand up and down your arm, relaxing you even more. That is… until his hand started straying to your hip.

“Not here.” You whispered. It took every ounce of self restraint you had to gently bat his hand away, but he was undeterred.

“You can be quiet.” His hand was gripping your hip now, teasing the fabric of your underwear.

“Cillian, you can literally hear everything in this house.” As if to emphasize your point, you heard a cough come from one of the rooms.

“Then don’t make any noise, baby.” He pushed you onto your back and started kissing the side of your neck as his warm hand rubbed your stomach, beneath the shirt. You let out a pleased sigh and tilted your head to give him more room, making him chuckle quietly. He suddenly moved his hand down, beneath your underwear, and swiped his fingers through your slit.

“Christ.” He whispered, making you whine from embarrassment, but he quickly shushed you, reminding you to be quiet.

“Cillian.” You said through a breath. You brought a hand up to grip his bicep, but you didn’t try to pull him away. His fingers rubbed slow circles over your clit and he gently nipped at your neck. You wanted nothing more than for him to suck the skin into his mouth, mark you as his… but you knew that would only make things worse between him and your family. When you whined quietly, he seemed to pick up on what you were thinking because he pushed your shirt up your body to kiss your chest, leaving a few marks.

His free hand suddenly covering your mouth almost made you moan, but his fingers slipping inside was what actually made the sound come out. He pressed down harder, trying to muffle your sounds even more. You breathed heavily through your nose as he slowly curled his fingers inside you. Scrunching your brows, you stared at him with wide eyes and shook your head beneath his hand.

“Let me be your stress relief, baby.” He whispered, starting to move his fingers a little faster now. You whimpered quietly, his words and actions making you melt.

Your hips were squirming against his hand now, trying to get more from what he was giving you. He leaned back down and softly kissed your jaw, then worked his way down your neck, stopping just below your ear.

“Can you be quiet?” He whispered, breath fanning your ear, and you nodded even though you didn’t believe it. The second he removed his hand, his face was going back into your chest, this time paying attention to your breasts. Your breath caught in your throat and you brought your hands up to his hair when he sucked your nipple into his mouth.

“Cillian..” You whispered, hips grinding against his hand.

“Shh, baby. No sounds.” He said softly, barely pulling away enough to speak. Once he deemed your nipple hard enough, he moved to the other one to give it the same treatment. “Good girl.” That made you whine and pull harder on his hair. You bit your lip until it hurt, trying to keep the sounds in. But when his fingers sped up and the heel of his hand started stimulating your clit, you knew you couldn’t do it.

“I can’t— I can’t.. fuck.” You whispered, squeezing your eyes shut and putting all of your focus into staying silent.

“You can.” He kissed up your chest and neck until he reached your face. “Let me make you feel good, baby.” You opened your eyes when you felt his breath fanning your lips.

“This door doesn’t even lock.” You protested weakly.

“All the more reason to stay quiet.” Before you could say anything else, he leaned down and kissed softly. His fingers slowed into a gentle curling motion, not trying to bring you closer to the edge yet. When you snaked a hand down his stomach, he broke the kiss and gently pulled your hand away. “This is just about you, love.” He explained, making you frown.

“But,”

“None of that.” He scolded softly. “Anything I do with my cock, you won’t be able to stay quiet for.” Even though you knew he was right, you still weren’t happy about it. “Don’t be a brat.” He warned when he saw your expression.

“m’not.” You muttered, still pouting.

“Should I stop? Leave you like this and go to bed?” You looked away from him, still wanting to argue, but not wanting to be denied. “Thought so. Now be a good little girl, lay there and take my fingers,” his eyes darkened as he leaned closer to you, “and keep your fucking mouth shut.” He hissed, using his hard dom voice. You stared at him with wide eyes, chest heaving as you squirmed, getting needier just from a few words.

“Do you understand?” You nodded quickly and he raised his brows.

“Y-yes.” You corrected yourself. His fingers picked back up almost immediately and your hand shot up to cover your mouth, muffling the moan that slipped out. He didn’t bother building back up to the pace, he just went from zero to one hundred.

You breathed heavily through your nose, scrunching your brows together in concentration. His lips were slightly parted as he stared down at you with half lidded eyes, clearly affected by this situation as well.

When he hit that particularly good spot inside of you, your eyes widened even more and you shook your head with a quiet whimper, warning him. There’s no way you’ll be able to stay quiet. His fingers were moving almost violently and you sobbed out a moan, making them stop instantly. You whined in response and he used his free hand to grab your neck, squeezing the sides tightly.

“What did I say?” He hissed and you removed your hand from your mouth finally.

“I’m sorry— I’m sorry. I’m trying…” You whispered through a breath. “Please.” When you pouted and bucked your hips, his expression turned into one of amusement.

“Fine.” He resumed the relentless pace, keeping his hand on your neck. “You want to moan like a slut for the whole house to hear? That’s fine by me.” You faltered because, no… that’s not what you wanted. “Give them a show, baby. Make sure they all know how good I make you feel— how easy it is to turn you into a brainless little whore, unable to keep your fucking mouth shut.” He hissed, making you even needier.

“Cillian..” You whined.

“Yes, love?” He asked innocently.

“I’m trying.” You whimpered, feeling tears of humiliation and desperation stinging your eyes.

“I know, baby.” He cooed mockingly. “I know you are.” It almost seemed like he wanted you to be loud with the way he started grinding his palm against your clit and moving his fingers faster. Wet noises were just barely audible beneath the blankets but you knew he heard it too when he let out a breathy laugh. “Such a needy fucking pussy.” He whispered with a small smirk. “You’re dripping down my hand too.”

“Stop teasing me.” You whined with a pout.

“I’m sorry, baby. I can’t help it.” He chuckled warmly.

“You’re being mean!” Under normal circumstances, this would’ve been when you raised your voice at him.

“Fingering my girlfriend is mean?”

“Stop it!” You whined, louder this time. Your frown deepened, but it was hard to keep the expression with his fingers still curling against your walls.

“Enough.” He growled, his grip on your neck tightening even more as his fingers inside you came to a stop. “Tell me the safe word.” He ordered, tone slightly softer, but still stern. You bit your lip and averted your gaze, making him squeeze your neck harder until you looked at him again.

“…Red.” You muttered.

“That’s right. The only time I want you to open your fucking mouth is to say that. One more word and I’ll shove my cock so deep down your throat you won’t even be able to make any sounds.” He warned. He’s big enough where even when you deepthroat, you can’t go all the way down. So you took the threat to heart. “Do you understand?”

“Yes.” You whispered, then quickly closed your mouth. He didn’t bother replying before slowly moving his fingers again, getting you used to the feeling. You tried to take deep breaths through your nose to stay calm and collected, but you were still looking at Cillian, his face lit up by the moonlight.

His gaze flickered between your eyes and your mouth and you instantly recognized the facial expression he had— The hunger and heat in his eyes as he prepared to ravish you. Normally that look was followed shortly after by him mounting you as he kissed you, swallowing your moans and pushing his cock inside, only stopping when he was buried all the way in. Judging by his heavy breathing and the way his cheeks tensed as he clenched his jaw, you figured he was thinking the same thing.

You almost moaned his name, but remembered just before the word could come out. So you pleaded with him silently by furrowing your brows and looking up at him with wide eyes. He cursed under his breath and closed his eyes for a moment as he composed himself.

When he suddenly got up on his knees and settled between your open legs, you felt a flicker of hope that you’d get what you wanted. He leaned down to kiss you, but made no move to take out his fingers or push down his pants. It took everything in you to not whine.

He started kissing over your jaw and down your neck to your chest. When his lips latched on to your nipple, you quickly covered your mouth to hold in the sounds begging to escape. He rolled the other one between his fingers gently and your free hand went to his hair, tugging on it and pulling him impossibly closer. He let out a low groan from the slight pain on his scalp, the sound adding to your arousal.

“You’re such a good girl, aren’t you?” He murmured, lifting his head to look at you as his hand started rubbing up and down your side. His fingers picked up, going faster and harder, bringing you closer to the edge. “My perfect little girl.” He whispered, leaning back over you and cupping your cheek.

He suddenly kissed you again, his lips moving passionately against yours, claiming you in whatever way he could. While you were distracted with the kiss, he forced a third finger inside, making you release a startled moan that was muffled by his lips. Once you quieted down again, he reluctantly pulled back.

“Can you come for me, baby?” He rasped, almost sounding desperate for it. When you nodded quickly, he gave you a warm smile. “Good girl… Can you be quiet while you do?” You looked away sheepishly, not sure if you should be honest or tell him what he wants to hear. You looked at him again and nodded slowly, your face almost looking guilty while you answered him. He chuckled quietly and gave you another kiss, this one much quicker. “That’s my girl.” He whispered proudly, making you blush and buck your hips into his hand.

His fingers suddenly sped up, curling against your walls as his hand pressed firmly against your clit. Your blush darkened when he continued staring down at you, his eyes half-lidded with arousal. You couldn’t wait to finally go home so he could actually fuck you. It’s barely been a week and you’re already going crazy without having his cock inside you.

Maybe you can convince him to take you to the “store” or something tomorrow and then park somewhere secluded and fuck in the car. But also the build up of so many days without it will make for some pretty fucking good sex when you get home… You couldn’t help but think about what he’d do— how many times he’d make you come, how sore and bruised your body would get, how much he’d fill you up, breed you until he didn’t have any come left to give you.

“Fuck,” You choked out, clinging to his shoulders as the knot of arousal in your stomach tightened considerable. “I- I’m…” You whispered, unable to say anything else. His hand suddenly covered your mouth again, making you moan quietly.

“Come for me, baby. Let me make you feel good.” He begged, voice incredibly raspy now.

Your orgasm finally crashed over you and you clenched your jaw, trying to stifle your sounds. His fingers never faltered as your walls clamped down on them tight enough to almost force them out. “Good girl… I’m so proud of you, baby.” He cooed, making you whine and arch up into him as you rode it out to the very end. When you finally sagged back into the bed and started panting, he released your mouth and slowly pulled his fingers out. You watched as he instinctively lifted them toward his mouth, then suddenly stopped, staring at them for a moment. Cursing under his breath, he reached over to the nightstand and grabbed a tissue to clean them off. When he looked at you again and saw your confused expression, he explained.

“If I taste you, I won’t be able to stop myself from eating you out and you're even louder during that.” You blushed, but laughed quietly because he was right. Finally, he laid down next to you and when you got up to move to the foot of the bed, he pulled you back with a gentle hand on your wrist.

“I’m okay, baby.” He said softly, but his voice was still thick with arousal. “Tonight was just about you.” He kissed the top of your head and you couldn’t help but blush.

“But…” You can literally see his hard on from beneath the covers. And also your mouth is already watering at just the thought of tasting and feeling him. “I want it.” You pouted, like a child who was denied a treat.

“Not tonight, love. You’ll be too loud and it’s too messy.” You frowned, but didn’t protest because you were already coming up with a plan in your head.

“Fine. We’ll just sleep then.” You grabbed his wrist and pulled as you turned onto your side, facing away from him. He cuddled you from behind, being careful to keep his hips far away from yours. After maybe a minute, you subtly shifted around, pushing your ass back. You didn’t reach his bulge before he grabbed your hip hard to hold you still.

“Stop.” He warned, breath fanning your neck, making you shiver.

“I’m just trying to get comfortable.” You said innocently, making him scoff.

“No, you’re being a brat.”

“I thought tonight was about me and what I want. Well this is what I want.” You reached behind yourself and palmed his bulge before he could stop you. He grunted in surprise, then his grip on your body got infinitely tighter.

“Fuck— fuck. Fine.” He muttered, turning to lay on his back. You smirked and moved down the bed until you were laying between his legs. Without wasting any time, you freed his cock and stroked him slowly, making him sigh quietly.

“In your mouth.” He ordered and you obeyed eagerly. When you started going up and down, keeping your hand at the base, he stopped you. “No. I’m going to fuck my fist and you’re going to keep your mouth on it until I come. Understand?” As soon as you realized that you weren’t going to be actively participating, you pouted and looked at him with puppy dog eyes. “It's either this or I go jerk off in the bathroom and finish in the toilet instead.” You whined loudly and his hand shot out to grab your hair and pull roughly. “Quiet.” He hissed.

“Cillian..” You whined again, quieter this time. When all he did was stare at you, you frowned and removed your hand, letting his replace it. Once his hand was on his cock, you took the tip in your mouth and closed your lips around it with a quiet whine.

“Good girl.” You whimpered, then started suckling on it, getting needier when you could taste some precum. For a while he just stroked his cock, enjoying the feeling of your mouth on him. But you needed more.

“You’re not close yet, right?”

“No.” He said through a breath. You immediately dove down and started kissing and licking his balls, forcing a choked moan out of him. You chuckled quietly and shushed him, but kept going. When you sucked one into your mouth, his hips bucked and he threw his head back, biting his lip to stifle any sounds. The sight had you squeezing your thighs together, but you forced your focus back onto the task at hand.

“Shit, baby…” He whispered. Other than his heavy breathing, the only other sound that filled the room was your mouth, licking and sucking as saliva started building up. If you were at home, the sounds would’ve been far more obscene and spit would’ve been dripping down your chin by now, but you tried to keep things quiet and mess free.

“Back on my cock.” He rushed out, stroking himself faster. You leaned up and wrapped your lips around him again, suckling on the head and swirling your tongue around it. One of your hands moved to gently play with his balls, giving him even more stimulation.

“Christ… Don’t stop, baby. Please don’t stop.” He whispered, jerking himself impossibly faster. You hollowed your cheeks and sucked him down a little more. Instead of reprimanding you, he cursed under his breath and reached his free hand out toward you. “Hold my hand.” He begged. “I won’t be able to stop myself from pushing you down.” Even though your whole body was craving that, you knew it would be too loud, so you gave him your free hand and he squeezed it tight.

He didn’t give you any warning before his abs contracted as his whole body tensed up, then the first shot of come hit the back of your mouth. You let out a surprised sound and his grip on your hand got even tighter. He fisted his cock rapidly, giving you every last drop as his lips parted in a silent moan and his brows scrunched together from the pleasure.

Even though this seemed like one of the more tame ways you’ve given oral, it still felt dirtier than most. He wasn’t fucking your mouth or your throat, using you to get himself off. He was getting himself off and just using you as a cumdump. He wasn’t using you for pleasure, he was using you the same way he would a toilet, had he gone to the bathroom to jerk off. The thought had you moaning loudly before you could hold it in.

When his body finally relaxed and his hand slowed to a stop, you pulled off and opened your mouth, showing him how well you’d done your job. His cock twitched and you smiled even though your mouth was still open, making him curse under his breath. You finally closed your mouth and swallowed all of it, then opened it again and stuck your tongue out for him to see.

“Get up here.” He said almost breathlessly. With his hand still holding yours, he used it to pull you up until you were laying on your stomach, half on the bed and half on him. “You’re a damn tease, you know that?”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.” You said innocently, with a small smirk.

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#cillian murphy x reader #cillian murphy smut #cillian x reader #cillian murphy

638 notes · View notes

loaksky · 1 year

Text

— 𝘪𝘯 𝘧𝘶𝘭𝘭 𝘣𝘭𝘰𝘰𝘮

the deets — lo'ak is the black sheep in the family, clinging to honor by a precarious thread. you are the well-loved songstress in the tribe. he should resent you for being everything he's not, but his fickle heart can't bring him to do so.

the who — lo'ak x fem omatikaya!reader

the word count — 10.2k (rip yall)

the tags — (one-sided) rivals-to-lovers, angsty angsty, hurt / comfort, reader gives lo'ak a big ol smooch (perhaps more than one), lo’ak is the biggest dumbass and because of this he’s mean asf, reader has a big ol heart and just really wants lo’ak to like her, aged!up characters for maturity’s sake.

the warnings — language, lo'ak is in luv but doesn't realize it, he's in denial that the feelings could be reciprocated, this is super dramatic so put your seat belts on!

the notes — was feeling extra sad and wanted to write something self-indulgent. this lovely anon requested something, and i used their ask as inspiration to finish this beast. fine line, bags, and love in dark are the three main songs i listened to finish this, so if you wanna be in your feels, have a listen LMAO. despite all the support, i’m still so mf nervous posting this ejsjsjdjs

masterlist

SOMETHING UGLY KINDLES IN THE PIT of Lo'ak's stomach at the mere mention of your name. It's sour on his tongue, bitter in his brain. He doesn't know when he's started to feel like this, started to feel absolutely dreadful anytime he'd hear the timbre of your voice.

It's warm, thick like nectar and it makes him sick.

Ever since you all were little, the elders crooned over what a great girl you were growing into; strong, intelligent, beautiful. It made him boil how much they'd sing your praises, the high esteem everyone held you in as one of the clan's most talented.

Something dull would pick at him being compared to his older brother, but nothing burned more than being compared to you.

Maybe it's because it's always implied whenever your names share the same sentences, that lingering implication that he could be more like you. The clan fans the flames of your mere existence while Lo'ak is snuffed out like a dying fire.

He hates it. He hates you.

He thinks.

It'd be easier to, if you were awful behind the scenes. Arrogant, stuck up, but you're none of those things. You're kind, gentle, mighty when you need to be. It doesn't help that you shine like the brightest star, engulfing everyone in your light, in your warmth.

But Lo'ak resists. He sees right through you, sees right through every saccharine smile you send him. He can see it in your eyes, how you really see him. Despite standing a full head taller than you, he sees the way you look down your nose at him.

It grates his nerves, how disgustingly sweet you are towards him despite all attempts to rebuff you.

Certainly doesn’t soothe his ego when you always seem to be around the bend every time he gets bitched at by the clan, eyes soft and filled with pity. To add insult to injury, you frequently tail him like a shadow after these moments when all he wants is to be alone.

Like now, you linger.

It's after dinner and Kiri and Spider stand before him. They come together like the three points of a triangle and you stand an awkward distance away from them.

Kiri notices you first, her face splitting into a big smile as she waves you over.

Lo'ak breathes a deep sigh before locking eyes with Spider who tries his best to suppress an amused grin.

“Hi,” you chirp and Lo'ak can't help but roll his eyes.

Spider and Kiri greet you eagerly. Lo'ak simply nods his head in acknowledgement before tightening his fist around his dagger.

“We going or what?” he finally says.

You perk up.

“Where are you guys heading off to?” you ask curiously, hands clasped behind your back.

Spider opens his mouth to answer, but Lo'ak cuts him off quickly.

“No where important,” he says, unsure if you'll blab about their whereabouts to the elders, or worse, his parents.

You roll your lips and shift on your feet.

“Can I come?” you ask hesitantly, eyes hopeful.

Kiri's smile grows as she links her arm with yours.

“No,” he says sharply. “Absolutely not.”

Your face falls and something pulls inside his chest when you fail meet his gaze, your frown barely perceptible.

You make a move to pull from Kiri's grasp, but her arm tightens through yours. She levels Lo'ak with a weighty glare and you fidget uncomfortably under his narrowed eyes.

“Don't worry about it,” you say, like someone's hit a reset button. You smile that pretty smile and Lo'ak wants to scream. "It's okay, I think Rutan needs help with clean up."

You slip from Kiri's grasp and the three watch you walk off.

“Do you always have to be such a bitch?” Spider scoffs a disbelieving laugh.

“She's just gonna tag along so she can snitch,” Lo'ak grumbles.

“Oh c'mon,” Kiri argues. “________ just wants friends.”

Lo'ak sneers.

“I don't want to be friends with her,” he says firmly, knuckles white around the handle of his knife.

“Weirdo,” Spider mumbles. “She’s cute. Think she likes you.”

Lo'ak's spine stiffens.

“It's an act” Lo'ak grumbles. “She just wants to look good in front of the elders to keep up whatever nice girl show she's putting on.”

Kiri rolls her eyes hard.

There are moments when Lo'ak thinks he's being harsh, but he can't help himself. It's like he loses all semblance of a filter when it comes to you.

“Hi, Lo'ak,” you greet him sweetly, lowering yourself onto the fallen log he's perched on, fashioning arrows to practice with later on in the evening with Neteyam.

He shifts away from you, putting the distance of two bodies between the two of you as he pauses his task at hand.

“Hi,” he says flatly.

“Can I help?” you ask tentatively, fingers twitching towards one of the untouched sticks in a pile next to his feet.

His kicks them closer to himself, out of your reach before leveling you with a sharp glare.

“No thanks,” he says quickly and you recoil slowly, letting out a shaky laugh before fixing that stupid smile on your pretty face.

“Oh, sorry,” you apologize, straightening in your seat.

A silence so uncomfortably palpable settles over the two of you as you shift so that your knees are turned towards him.

His throat bobs when his gaze travels from your little toes all the way up to your inquisitive gaze, golden and searching. It makes something unruly settle in his gut and he turns his attention back to carving his arrows.

“Do you need something?” he breaks the silence finally. “I'm kinda busy.”

You bite your lip before scooting a little closer to Lo'ak's hunched figure.

“My birthday's coming up,” you start.

“I'm aware,” Lo'ak almost scoffs.

It's all the clan has been able to talk about for the past few days. How they'd be able to prepare for the golden girl's next birth cycle and what they'd be able to do to make you smile the brightest.

“Your birthday is a week before,” you state and his head whips towards you.

“How do you know that?” he asks sharply, accusation heavy in his gruff tone.

You flinch and he falters for a moment before your smile simply widens.

“We grew up together, Lo'ak,” you say and the way his name sounds from your mouth sounds absolutely heavenly. “You're my friend.”

Friend.

He scowls at the term.

“We're not friends,” he bites back.

If the statement bothers you, you don't show it, simply tucking a strand of hair behind your ear before putting on a brave face.

“I want to celebrate with you,” you say shyly.

“Hard pass,” he says too quickly, gathering his sticks and fashioned arrows under his grasp.

He leaves you in the clearing on your own.

You must be fucking with him. You have to be. It'd be the only explanation for why Jake pulls him aside a few nights later and tells him that you've requested to work with him and Neteyam during archery practice.

“No,” he says stiffly, shaking his head.

His dad levels him with a hard glare and Lo'ak sighs deeply.

“She's a nuisance, Dad,” he argues. “Me and Neteyam are making good progress with our training and we'll have to start at square one if she joins.”

“Lo'ak, this isn't an ask,” Jake says sternly.

“But, Dad!”

“Lo'ak.”

Lo'ak huffs, snatching his bow and quiver angrily before storming off.

“You're doing great,” Neteyam says to you once the three of you have convened in the training circle.

The three arrows you've shot have all landed within centimeters of the mark and to say that Neteyam is impressed is an understatement. Lo'ak, on the other hand, fumes not-so-silently as he tears his arrows from his target.

Yet again, you have another person wrapped around your finger and it makes his blood simmer as he assumes his position at the marker and loads his arrow. It splinters through the air and hits the target right on the bullseye. The arrow punctures through the hide and lodges its way into the wood from the sheer force of Lo’ak’s shot.

You start at him moon-eyed, lush lips breaking into a full smile.

“Perfect shot,” you observe. “That was awesome.”

Lo’ak scans your features hesitantly before his gaze flits to his older brother, waiting for any acknowledgment that he’d done a great job, but Neteyam is taking notes on the arrows still stuck in the fabric of your own target.

His heart sinks.

“Fuck this,” Lo’ak grumbles, bundling all of his belongings.

He stalks through the clearing, past his brother, to leave you two.

He doesn’t know what fuels the fire more, the fact that Neteyam didn’t even bat an eye at the feat they’d been practicing for for the past three weeks because he was too immersed in you, or the fact that you bore witness to his first clean shot and gave him that sickeningly sweet smile that made his stomach turn.

“Where are you going?” Neteyam sighs.

“Somewhere you two aren’t,” he grumbles under his breath, ducking through the brush of the lofty forest.

You lick your lips, locking eyes with Neteyam as you give him a bashful grin and slowly break away to follow Lo’ak’s path.

He isn’t far ahead as you push through the vines and low-hanging leaves, the path lined with large plants and the spindly roots of the looming trees. The grass is plush between your toes as you scamper to follow Lo’ak from a distance, watching as his lithe body climbs through the dense flora.

“Why are you following me?” he calls after a few dozen paces, stopping in the middle of the path to whirl on his heel.

His golden eyes are syrupy, warm despite the edge, and you can’t help but flash him your pearly whites in a genuine smile that takes up your dimpled cheeks.

“Why’d you run off?” you ask him. “You were doing so well!”

His chest rises and falls with a scoff.

“You can give it a rest, you know?” Lo’ak says flatly, fist so tight around his bow he feels like he’ll crush the wood.

Your expression morphs, eyebrows furrowing in a way that makes Lo’ak throat bob, something pinching behind his ribcage.

“What?” you ask, frown marring your pretty face.

“I don’t know what you’re playing at, but you can stop acting like you wanna be friends with me,” Lo’ak says matter-of-factly.

“You are my friend,” you protest quietly.

Lo’ak rolls his eyes.

“Dude, whatever,” he mutters, turning his back on you.

“Is it so wrong?” you murmur and he stops in his tracks, refusing to meet your gaze. “To be friends?”

Friends.

That stupid fucking word again.

Lo’ak bites his tongue and stalks off, leaving you on the path.

Neteyam rips him a new one when he sees him at dinner later that night. Lo’ak hangs his head as Neteyam digs in.

“Is it so hard to be nice?” Neteyam asks, hand squeezing his shoulder as they stand a handful of meters away from the main circle.

As his eyes wander, he notices you sitting with his sister, head thrown back in laughter that glitters and wafts with the rising smoke of the fire. He swallows turning his attention back to his older brother.

“Just don’t like her,” he admits. “I want her to leave me alone.”

“You don’t like her or you like her too much?” Neteyam asks, brow bone raised.

Lo’ak’s face scrunches.

“Ew, no,” he blurts. “Why would I—”

“________ just wants to fit in,” he sighs. “She has trouble making friends.”

“Yeah, I wonder why,” Lo’ak mocks. “I don’t know why Kiri and Spider are always up her ass, she’s—”

“Lo’ak,” Neteyam warns.

“Dude, everyone is always ________ this, _________ that! I don’t understand what’s so great about her—”

A throat clears and the brothers both turn their attention to the newcomer. Lo’ak could groan in frustration seeing that you’ve abandoned your seat and now stand nearby with two wooden plates.

“They’re going to start cleaning up soon,” you say hesitantly. “Wanted to bring you some.”

Neteyam takes it graciously from you, nodding his head in thanks while Lo’ak stares down at the plate you’d arranged for him, abundant in vegetables and thick cuts of meat.

“No thanks,” he says flatly.

You try to coax him.

“C’mon Lo’ak, you say gently. “I know you haven’t eaten yet.”

“No thanks,” he repeats stonily, holding his hand up.

You offer up the plate again.

“Lo’ak–“

“I said no thank you,” he grunts, annoyed.

He’d only meant to push it back towards you, but one second it’s in your hands, the next you’re wearing dinner, the plate clattering onto the ground.

“Lo’ak!” Neteyam scolds.

“Shit, I didn’t–”

“It’s fine,” you breathe an airy laugh and Lo’ak freezes when he hears your breath hitch. “It was an accident.”

“Oh, ________…” Neteyam sighs, but you’re picking up the plate and scurrying off, ignoring the nearby snickering.

“Whatever you got going on, you need to cool it,” Jake scolds him in the family tent after dinner that night. “________ is a good girl, she’s trying to find her place. Can’t really do that if you’re gonna be a jerk to her all the time.”

Lo’ak resists the urge to roll his eyes because, yet again, someone is sticking up for you, admonishing him about how he could be nicer, how he could take you under his wing, how he–

“What about me?” Lo’ak argues. “I tell her to leave me alone all the time, but she doesn’t listen. Why do I have to be nice to someone who doesn’t respect–”

“Cut the bullshit,” Jake thunders. “You haven’t even tried being her friend.”

“Why should I?” Lo’ak counters.

“Because maybe you two are more alike than you’d care to learn,” Jake says knowingly. “Now go apologize.”

“Dad!”

“Go, Lo’ak.”

Lo’ak sucks in a deep breath before squeezing his eyes shut and blowing out through his nose.

“Fine, fine, whatever,” he grumbles, ducking from the tent into the humid night air.

He starts into the jungle, fingers brushing over the leaves and petals of the plants and flowers. He takes the moment to regulate his pounding heart in his chest before trying to wrack his brain for any words that he could scrounge into a believable apology.

When he crosses the glowing waters of a skinny brook, something rustles nearby and his hand is on the hilt of his dagger in the blink of an eye.

He turns to face the noise, knife drawn, but then you emerge and his body relaxes a fraction.

“Fuck, ________, you scared me,” he sighs in relief.

You fidget and swallow down the lump in your throat.

“Sorry,” you say sheepishly.

A brief silence dawns the two of you and Lo’ak notes that you’ve cleaned up from the evening meal’s debacle, now wearing a longer loincloth threaded with round pearlescent beads that refract the luminescence of the surrounding forest.

Your grasp tightens around a leather bound journal and for a moment, he wonders what you could be writing about.

When you follow his gaze, you shyly tuck the journal behind your back and give him an uneasy smile.

“I wanted to–”

“I came to–”

Your words clash and you breathe a little laugh through your nose as you gaze at him with brilliant eyes. You start closing the distance and Lo’ak’s hands grow clammy.

“You first,” you offer.

Whatever threads of an apology he’d crafted in the moments prior have evaporated now that you stand before him, absolutely glowing.

“Lo’ak?” Your head tilts and his cheeks warm.

“Sorry,” he says hoarsely. “For what happened at dinner.”

You shake your head quickly.

“You don’t have to apologize,” you assure him, reaching out to touch him.

He recoils, clearing his throat as he retreats to put an ample amount of distance between the two of you.

You eye the berth and something shutters across your face as you rock back on your heels and flash him another uneasy smile.

You haven’t even tried being her friend, his dad’s words echo like a call in the night. Maybe you two are more alike that you care to learn.

Were you? You and Lo’ak were as different as they come, you molded by the love and adoration of the clan, him built up by the lessons and lectures he received from his parents and Neteyam.

“Where are you going?” you ask, blowing by the previous conversation.

He shrugs.

“Dunno,” he admits. “I was looking for you.”

The way you freeze is almost covert, your lips rolling as you try to hide the smile threatening to split your face.

“Oh,” you hum. “Wanna go for a walk?”

No, he wants to say. He absolutely does not want to spend anymore time with you than he has to. Likes to believe that he wouldn’t even bat an eye if he were to never see you again, but you’re looking at him expectantly and his dad’s words are like a mantra in his head, so he agrees begrudgingly.

It’s awkward at first, silent except for the natural soundtrack of the vicarious jungle. But like you do so well, you break the silence and Lo’ak has to resist rolling his eyes for the third time that night.

“What are your favorite colors?” you ask suddenly.

“I dunno, green?” he offers.

“Are you sure?” you laugh quietly.

Lo’ak thinks a moment before nodding his head.

“Yeah, green,” he finalizes. “And blue.”

He barely notices that you’d fallen behind, and when he turns to look over his shoulder, he sees that you’re scratching something into your little journal.

“And your favorite fruit?” you press, nose still between the pages.

Lo’ak breathes out a laugh and your head shoots up.

“What? You gonna send this list to the lab?” Lo’ak asks.

You give him a shy smile, shifting on your feet.

“No,” you say softly, then whisper to yourself, “just compiling a list to win your heart.”

Lo’ak barely hears you, ears twitching as his eyes narrow in confusion.

“What?” he asks.

You snap your notebook shut, shaking your head quickly as you pad through the grass to catch up to him.

“Nothing.”

Something ripples in the fabric after that night, you and Neteyam both notice when Lo’ak enters the training clearing the next afternoon and greets you with a nod instead of flat out ignoring your presence like he had the last training session.

And you think that the moment is fleeting, a one off, but as the days progress, you realize that maybe Lo’ak is finally softening around you.

He stays for entire lessons, the most minute of smiles twitching at his lips whenever you compliment his shots. He waits near the edge for you as you pack up your things, and while the walk back to the village is a quiet one, you bask in his company, triumphant when he doesn’t run off.

And while your evening walks are few and far between, you savor the moments he affords you, wedging yourself between him the crumbling walls of his facade.

Tonight is one of those moments, sitting on adjacent branches overlooking the lively forest, when Lo’ak lets you peek farther into his life than he’d originally intended.

“He never understands,” he sighs, popping a few berries from his satchel past his lips.

Tonight’s topic is his father and you listen intently, eyes fixed on the way he reclines on the branch and looks up at the stars.

“I try hard, you know? To make everyone proud, but all they see is my failure,” he says, obviously annoyed. “No matter what I do, it’s not good enough.”

“You do great things, Lo’ak,” you say quietly, the first words you’ve said all night.

And like your voice is a reminder, Lo’ak’s spine goes rigid, throat bobbing as he realizes that he may have said too much to you. He’s getting too comfortable and you’re all the willing to absorb every insecurity and every worry he has.

But something about quiet moments like these makes him loose-lipped, eyes fluttering to where you’ve got your notebook balanced in the seam of your thighs, scrawling something on the pages as you eat your own berries.

The words are leaving him before he can stop them.

“Easy for you to say,” he murmurs. “You’re perfect.”

The laugh that escapes you startles him and a few of the berries he was about to devour slips from his fingers and plunk down the leaves.

“I’m not perfect,” you assure him.

“Only someone who’s perfect would say that,” Lo’ak grumbles, peering over the edge of the branches to spot his fallen fruit. “The whole village loves you, everyone’s always so ready to bat for you.”

You look down at the pages of your journal with a sad smile.

“It’s a lot of pressure,” you admit quietly. “Everyone’s watching your every move, waiting for you to mess up.”

Lo’ak shifts uncomfortably.

You continue.

“And most of the villagers our age don’t like me,” you say, thumbing one of the pages. “They say I kiss ass, that I’m always trying to keep a leg up.”

Lo’ak winces, knowing that he’s the source of at least one of those sentiments.

“The elders think you’re honorable,” Lo’ak argues gently. “You’re talented, you have something to offer the people.”

“Honor means nothing if you’re bound by it,” you say finally, closing the cover to your journal. “If anything, I want to be more like you.”

“Like me?” Lo’ak asks incredulously, eyebrows furrowed in confusion.

You nod, smiling at him.

“Yeah,” you whisper. “I think you’re brave, fearless. And even if you care what people think, you do what you want.”

Lo’ak is quiet, taken aback by your confession.

Before he can respond, you’re gathering your things, bidding him a warm farewell as you begin climbing down the tree to disappear into the night.

After that night, you think that maybe you’re just imagining things, that you’re reading too much into the fact that Lo’ak has begun to finally act like you exist, but then Kiri says something and the hope sends your heart soaring.

“Seems like he finally got his head out of his ass,” she says a few mornings later as you two stand near a shallow stream, eyes peeled for any fish you two could bring back to the village.

“Think so?” you ask nervously, arrow trapping the flailing fish to the pebbles of the stream’s bed.

Kiri shrugs.

“He actually pays you mind now,” Kiri observes. “That’s a step up for sure. I think you just need to spend more time with him.”

You smile, splashing through shallow waters to capture the fish and add it to the growing pile in the basket between you and the middle Sully.

“Yeah?” you wonder

So you test the theory, basket filled with various peeled fruits and a little container of nectar you squeezed from the petals of a flower.

It doesn’t take long to hunt him down. When you enter the training circle, he’s packing up his things, quiver strapped to his back and bow in his fist.

Before you make yourself known, he’s turning on his heel to face you, eyes wild as he swallows down the lump in his throat.

He’d be the last to admit that the last night you two spent together was branded in his brain, that his mouth had dried up so much so he felt his tongue could crack.

There were so many implications in your words and it horrified him, scared him so much that he knew he couldn’t let you that close again.

But now you stand before him, pretty as can be, hopeful even, and he’s at a war with himself, absolutely caught between resenting you for being everything he’s not and giving into the draw.

“Hi,” you greet, basket heavy in your hands.

You look more radiant than usual, skirt brushing the forest floor, the woven vine of your top banded to expose your midriff.

“Hey,” he replies hesitantly.

“Where you going?” you ask curiously.

His throat bobs as he gestures behind him.

“Hunting,” is all he says.

“Do you want to go for a walk?” you ask eagerly.

He doesn’t. He shouldn’t. Because things are shifting and he’s not sure if he’ll be able to stomach the change. If he’ll be able to admit to himself that you’re wearing him thin, that you make him feel things he’s never felt before and that it makes him feel like he has no control.

Because when it boils down to it, you make him lose control, make him lose his filter, and make him feel every emotion twice as hard.

“No,” he says.

And in that moment, you feel like you’re back at square one, watching as his eyes turn stony and his jaw sets firmly.

“You shouldn’t go hunting on your own,” you say softly. “Will someone be with you?”

“It’s fine,” he argues. “I’m fine.”

“I can go with you!” you offer. “I thought maybe we could sit by the stream and talk, but we can go hunting instead. We can–”

“No,” he says again, pinning you with eyes so lethal, it makes you wonder if you really had imagined the moments you shared with him, if you had imagined Kiri telling you that she saw it too.

You try again anyways.

“It’ll be good practice and–”

“I said no, ________,” he barks. “You’re dead weight and I want to be alone.”

Your lips seal and you bite the inside of your cheek.

Lo’ak could nearly scream in frustration when he notices the way your shoulders sag and it makes something in his heart cinch.

“Okay,” you agree, nodding quickly. “Be safe and–”

The words die on your tongue when you notice the look of annoyance on Lo’ak’s face.

Lo’ak is in deep shit, you come to find out hours later.

You sit outside of the training circle, knowing that Lo’ak will return down the path after his hunting trip. What you don’t expect, however, is Jake and Neytiri emerging with the entire line of Sully kids and Spider.

Jake grips the back of Lo’ak’s neck tightly as they march past wandering eyes, straight to the family tent. You don’t miss his wounds though, varying in depth, some bleeding, some sore.

You’re hot on their heels, standing right outside of the entrance as Jake tears into the middle Sully.

“Time and time again, I have to get on your ass for doing the complete opposite of what I ask you to do!” Jake’s voice is thunderous inside the tent. “Do you not realize that you not only risked your life but your sisters’ too?”

There’s a beat of silence before Jake continues, obviously pacing from the way his volume fluctuates.

“And what were you thinking bringing Tuk? She’s nine, Lo’ak!” he shouts, the anger and the hurt evident in his tone.

“I’m sorry,” Lo’ak mumbles.

“Yeah, I bet you are!” Jake scolds. “I don’t ask for much. All I want is for you stay in line. Just stay out of trouble and work hard on your training. I paired you with ________ and Neteyam in hopes that maybe you’ll tighten up and be more like them, but you’re always disappointing me.”

You frown.

Whatever Lo’ak had done probably didn’t warrant such deep admonishment and something tugs especially hard at your heartstrings knowing that all he wants to do is make his dad proud.

“You’re surrounded by good influences, but you always have to go against the grain, Lo’ak,” Jake says, the edge in his tone softening. “I’m getting tired of the bullshit, son. You need to clean up your act. Hear me?”

“Yes sir,” Lo’ak says quietly, voice almost a whisper behind the hide of the tent.

“Now go get yourself cleaned up,” Jake huffs.

Your spine is straightening when you hear foot steps closing in, holding your breath as the flap to the tent billows open and Lo’ak is emerging.

His eyes flit to yours and his expression sours further.

“Lo’ak,” you murmur, reaching out to him.

He’s shrugging you away, wincing when a wound on his shoulder stretches especially taut.

“You’re hurt,” you say quietly. “I’ll–”

“Leave me alone,” he says, eerily level.

“But you’re–”

“I said leave me alone, ________,” he warns, pushing past you in what should be the pursuit of his grandmother’s quarters.

Instead he’s making a beeline for the jungle.

You’d seen the look in his eye before he stonewalled you, seen the hurt and heaviness that most people didn’t seem to notice because he was always so adventurous and carefree.

You follow after him.

“Lo’ak, you know he’s only worried for you,” you try to reason gently, fingers reaching for his own as you duck under massive leaves and fluttering insects.

He whirls to face you, swatting your hand away.

“Don’t fucking touch me,” he bites. “You don’t know anything.”

You swallow, holding your hand to your chest as you watch him lay down every brick to wall himself off.

He hates it. He hates how you look at him, how you seem to pity the life he has to live. It makes him sick, thinking that you two have it the same. He’d rather be hated for being great than hated for being a let down. It’s insulting, how you think you know how it feels.

“Let’s go back. I’ll wrap your wounds and–”

“Of course, clan’s golden girl is gonna patch me up and make it all better, huh?” he seethes facetiously. “Just fuck off!”

You flinch, blinking at the boy you holds so much rage in front of you.

“I know you’re hurting, but you don’t have to be mean,” you whisper, taking in a shuddering breath to will yourself not to cry.

“Mean? Mean?” Lo’ak bristles. “I’ve tried telling you to lay off nicely, tried telling you to just leave me alone, but you don’t listen. You just pry and overstep and you make every little thing about you! Oh, it’s so much pressure, villagers our age hate me, of course they would! You already have everything and just have to go rub salt in the wound!”

You shrink, eyes welling as your lip trembles.

“Lo’ak, stop,” you whimper.

“We’re not friends, ________.We never were and we never will because I don’t like you,” he spits. “Now please, for the love of god, will you just leave me alone!”

The forest is silent save for Lo’ak’s ragged breathing, fists clenched as he glares down at you.

“I-” Your breath hitches and you choke out an apology. “I’m sorry.”

Lo’ak’s heart softens a fraction as you take a step back, turning quickly on your heel.

“Fuck, I’m sorry,” you rasp, tripping over your own feet as you stumble into a run, putting as much space as you can between you and the middle child who stands in the middle of the forest, unable to wrangle every harsh word he’d said to force back down his throat.

You dropped your journal.

Lo’ak is sure you’re looking for it, know that you’ve always got your nose stuck in it. You had dropped it running off and now he has its leather bound in his hands.

It’s been a couple of nights since the faithful evening he’d blown his top and he’d only seen whispers of you. It was so unlike you to disappear, to not be entertaining the masses as they fell to your feet.

He’d cooled off significantly, and when he replayed the conversation in his head, he winced, body folding in on itself as he realizes how harsh he’d been.

“Are you actually thinking thoughts?” Spider claps him on the shoulder, startling him so badly he drops the journal.

It lands spine down, the pages fluttering open.

He chances a peek before Spider is rounding his lithe figure to pick up the notebook. All he makes out is a rough sketch.

“You write?” Spider asks, intrigued.

“No, it’s ________’s,” Lo’ak answers.

“Oh, your little girlfriend’s?”

Lo’ak gives the human a cross look, snatching the book from his grasp as he stands up.

“Trouble in paradise?” Spider pries, scurrying to keep up with Lo’ak’s long strides.

A beat of silence before Lo’ak finally answers.

“Made her cry,” he mumbles, embarrassed.

Spider winces behind him.

“You serious?”

Lo’ak sighs.

“Yes, dude, fuck,” he breathes, hand coming to the back of his neck. “I don’t know what came over me. Dad was ripping me a new one and Neteyam already chewed me out before they got there and she was being annoying, so I just…”

“Bro,” Spider scoffs in disbelief, scratching the back of his head. “You’re a real dickhead sometimes.”

Lo’ak’s eyes wander as he shifts uncomfortably, feeling incredibly small as his friend glares up at him.

“I mean, I told her I wanted to be left alone!” Lo’ak tries to defend weakly. “I- I didn’t mean to.”

“She likes you a lot, dude,” Spider reiterates. “She just wants you to like her back.”

Despite the glaring signs, Lo’ak has trouble believing that your feelings for him far surpass charity work. They couldn’t, it was impossible. Because at the end of the day, you’re you and he’s…him.

He opens his mouth to say something, but Spider beats him to it.

“Did you at least apologize?”

Lo’ak squirms.

“Dude!”

“Look, I know, I know,” he tries to assuage the situation.

“________ is literally the sweetest girl in the entire clan you just–“

“I get it, bro, I get it!” Lo’ak huffs.

“Get your head out of your ass,” Spider says. “She might not stick around long enough for you to realize.”

“Realize what?” Lo’ak snaps.

“Are you really gonna play stupid right now?”

He blinks at the human.

“You like ________,” Spider says matter-of-factly. “You always have, ever since we were kids.”

“Oh, piss off,” Lo’ak grumbles.

“Dude, you’re literally my best friend, but I sometimes I wanna shove my foot so far up your–”

“I do not like ________,” Lo’ak says sharply.

“Everyone sees it but you, dipshit,” Spider scoffs. “You like her, but you’re scared. She’s perfect and she intimidates you. Think she’s gonna see you for what you really are and turn her back on you like everyone else does when you fuck up, but she’s not like that, Lo’ak. She’s been there whether you like it or not. But she might not always.”

Lo’ak swallows down the knot in his throat, fingers tightening around the notebook.

“Everything clicking?” Spider asks knowingly.

Lo’ak throws him a final narrowed glare before stalking off.

It’s Lo’ak’s birthday and just like every orbit, he spends it alone in the forest.

At first, he’d been burdened with the weight of hurting your feelings, but now his conversation with Spider weighs heavy on him as he climbs dirt walkways and flowered paths.

It doesn’t help that your notebook weighs heavy in his satchel, a silent reminder that he still has a piece of you while you cling to his peace of mind.

I think you’re brave, fearless. They’re the words you uttered to him that fateful night you turned the reality of you two on its axis.

As he splices all the moments you two shared like a reel, he realizes that it’s endless. That you’re always there, you’d always been there, like a layer of impenetrable atmosphere surrounding him.

He really should apologize, he knows this much, but you’ve disappeared like a wisp of smoke. Training sessions have returned to a sibling affair and he’s too prideful to ask about you.

It’s almost eclipse when he begins making his way back for the evening meal, knowing that a scolding will await if he arrives even a minute late.

After what had happened with you, he was lying low, trying to diminish his blip from the radar.

As he closes in on the village’s main circle, he notes that it’s quiet. A little too quiet. It puts him on edge, makes him draw his bow and feel around for an arrow in his quiver.

A few more paces and he’s broken into the clearing, a few stragglers milling about. Another half a dozen steps and it’s like the forest melts into a celebration, whorls of blue pouring into the circle as villagers begin trilling.

Lo’ak is hoisted into the air as the dying fire in the center of the camp begins to slowly roar.

“Happy birthday, baby bro!” Neteyam caws loudly as they begin jostling him into the air, chanting and dancing as the dense crowd of clanspeople celebrate him.

It’s like time slows as he peers from side to side eagerly, seeing the way Spider, Kiri and Tuk dance happily among his people. Jake and Neytiri stand near the fire, smiles wide when they see the look of awe on their middle son’s face.

When he’s finally set on his feet, he wobbles, childlike as he turns, taking in the glowing streamers that crisscross between the tents. Flowers of green and blue thread through the vines, gleaming like lamplight as the forest buzzes around them.

“Wha– What is all this?” Lo’ak croaks in disbelief, eyes flitting wildly as he notices Norm and Max standing next to a table they’d hauled from the pod to the circle, piled high with meats and vegetables wrapped in leaves.

A platter of yovo fruits, his favorite, are at the center, surrounded by a painted sign with his name and the handprints of dozens of villagers on it.

“You survived another orbit!” Neteyam laughs heartily, head-locking the younger boy before roughly digging his knuckles into the top of his head.

A laugh bubbles from Lo’ak’s lips, swatting his brother away as villagers and clan members he’d grown up with approach him one by one to greet him.

As the night progresses, he doesn’t even realize he’s searching until your mother approaches and his spine goes rigid, cheeks warming under her piercing gaze.

“From my ________,” she says, setting a pouch into his palms. “She toiled over these for many eclipses. Please take care.”

Lo’ak’s nod is delayed as his satchel shifts on his shoulders, a dull reminder that your journal still remains with him, begging to be read.

“Where– Where is she?” he asks suddenly, feeling your absence all the more now that your gift sits in the palm of his hand.

“My daughter does not feel well,” your mother says simply. “She wished to be excused from the festivities.”

His chest feels hollow, stomach tight as his cheeks burn. You’d mentioned this to him, all those days ago in the training circle, about wanting to celebrate with him.

His eyes flit to the flowers looped through the vines, the mountain of yovo fruits, the gift in his hands. He doesn’t want to be presumptuous. Doesn’t want to fuel the tiniest ember of hope in chest, but he can’t help it.

He can’t help but read into it, into the implications of this celebration you’d planned all for him, into every word you uttered to him in the quiet of the forest’s chirping.

It’s all it takes for him to lock himself in his own head. The feast melts into the background, dull, as his eyes cut the crowd for you.

You have to be here, gotta be hanging around the outskirts silently. The idea taunts him, makes his gut twist hard as images of you dancing in the circle, singing to him, celebrating him, loving him—

Lo’ak freezes, blinking incredulously at the thought that’d just crossed his brain. It makes him queasy, makes the regret and the guilt gnaw at every nerve ending as your crying face flashes like an unwanted slideshow in his brain.

It’s all he can think about as the festivities die, as villagers begin turning in the for the night and he helps his family clean up the aftermath of another orbit finally finished.

Spider helps Tuk and Neteyam near the fire, and as Lo’ak moves through the motions like he’s caught in a tide, Kiri watches, knowing all too well what consumes her brother’s mind.

It isn’t until Lo’ak is shrouded by the stillness of the early morning, his family tucked in their tent, bodies and limbs splayed as they sleep together, that he sits in a swinging hammock, your journal and the pouch in his lap.

It feels wrong, the way he thumbs the cover, working up the courage to turn it open. But Ewya, fate, would have never left it in his wake if it wasn’t meant to be read.

As his finger ghosts the etchings of the front cover, worn and loved by you, something tickles his leg as he admires the leather. He blinks in disbelief when he sees a singular woodsprite resting against his thigh.

Before he loses his nerve, he’s opening the pages with bated breath.

Recipes, nature notes, short thoughts fill the sheets and Lo’ak feels like he’s reading into your brain, seeing all the little things no one bothers to know.

he is like the sun,

shines so bright,

but burns the closer you get.

Lo’ak’s pointer finger glosses over the ink, over your curly handwriting.

he is so incredible, but he doesn’t even know it. i want to shout it to every creature in the forest, every tree and every flower. oh, how i wish to be as fearless as him.

His chest heaves as the words blur.

Fearless.

In this moment, he feels everything but. He feels like a coward.

He continues to flip, throat lodged as he sees drawings, both rough sketches and full renderings. He hadn’t even known that you liked to draw, yet here he was, observing his home through your artistic eye.

Flowers, leaves, trees, creatures, insects, fruits mar the stained papers, etched like it’d been caught in real time.

likes green and blue.

likes yovo fruits.

The entry from the day you’d first walked with him through the forest.

When he turns the page, his breath hitches.

In full color, you’d captured his bullseye from your first training session. His back taut from the release, expression shaded stoic. He looked mighty, like the strongest warrior, and it was all through your eyes.

Lo’ak doesn’t even realize he’s crying until the bullseye in the illustration bleeds from a fallen tear. Another one drips from his chin, then another.

The next page is the night you two had poured your hearts out to each other. Again, in full color, he’s watching the stars. You don’t leave out the glow of the freckles that smatter his face and body, don’t miss the smile that plays at his lips as he quietly points out that his dad had come from a star.

He flips again and different iterations and designs for what seems like jewelry litters the pages, shaded with different colors of blue and green, marked with varying notes, x’s marking through ideas you didn’t like.

Lo’ak remembers the pouch, sitting untouched in his lap, and his shaky fingers undo the ties. He shakes the contents on the flat of the notebook and the most intricate beadwork fits into the crease.

His eyes widen as he picks up the necklace in a trembling hand, the eclipsing sun catching the etching in the flat stones.

Four five-fingered hands and four four-fingered ones, each separated by jewels scavenged and cleaned from the bed of the glowing river.

A small scroll flutters from the pouch and Lo’ak chokes back as sob as he unrolls the hide.

Happy Birthday, Lo’ak. I am always grateful to know someone like you. May your next orbit be filled with endless blessings from Ewya and may you see yourself how I see you.

You see him, he realizes. You’re his supporter, a silent force that consumes every insecurity and swallows every doubt. You believe in him more than he believes in himself.

He stands from the hammock and runs.

You’re sitting in the same tree the two of you had rested in the night you’d confided in Lo’ak, watching as the sun eclipses and begins to light up the sparkling forest.

Something rustles and you sit up, hand on the hilt of your dagger as you search the area for movement.

As your eyes lock on the source, you almost wish it had been a beast coming to devour you whole. But as Lo’ak climbs the branches of the tree quickly, you feel the dread begin to solidify in your veins.

You take your satchel, hanging from a nearby branch and sling it over your shoulder, pulling your shawl over your head to prepare for your escape.

“________, wait,” he chokes breathlessly. “Please.”

You feel like crying all over again, feel so unbelievably stupid thinking that Lo’ak would ever see you the way that you see him.

You pause a beat as he settles on the branch across from yours, chest heaving as he tries to catch his breath.

Something glints in the sun and your eyes widen when you see that Lo’ak has fastened the necklace you made him around his neck, right above the the leather chain that holds his beloved claw charm.

“You’re wearing it,” you whisper, lips twitching into a frown as you try your best to keep your tears at bay.

“I’m sorry, ________,” Lo’ak apologizes hoarsely. “Fuck, you don’t understand how sorry I am.”

The tears well on their own.

We’re not friends. We never were and we never will.

The words haunt you like a broken record and you shake your head, moving from your perch to move down the branches.

“Wait, wait,” Lo’ak pleads. “Please don’t go, I–”

“I hate you,” you whisper. “I hate you, Lo’ak.”

He freezes, watching as you balance on a branch below.

“I tried so hard to be your friend,” you whimper, angrily wiping away your tears. “You’re amazing. You’re strong, and you’re fearless, and you are everything I want to be, but you’re heartless.”

Lo’ak lets out a shuddering breath, a chill running down his spine as you look up at him like he’d smashed every star in the sky.

“I wanted to be with you, you know?” you let out a watery laugh. “I hoped that maybe if I stuck it out, you’d see how much I cared, how badly I wanted to be with you, even if it was from a distance.”

“I do, _________, I do!” he argues.

He hadn’t always, but he sees it now. He sees you.

You shake your head again.

“You don’t,” you sigh, voice trembling. “It’s my fault anyways. You were right. You told me to leave you alone and I was being too much.”

“Stop–”

“Let this be the last time,” you assure him. “Let’s just– Let’s pretend we never met.”

“No, _________. Wait!”

You’re climbing down the tree and disappearing into the brush and, like a fleck of ash, you’re disintegrating into nothingness.

Most people think he’s being moody, that he’s just been scolded by his father or older brother, but Neytiri knows better.

She sees the way her son has changed over the course of the past few weeks. She knows there is a great burden that he carries, but much like her beloved and her eldest, he suffers in silence.

“Maitan,” she says quietly, brushing a braid from his face as he folds the leaves around a chunk of steaming meat.

Lo’ak pauses almost imperceptibly, but continues his task.

It isn’t like him to stay home and work with Neytiri. If anything, he’d be the first one out of the tent, Tuk, Spider, and Kiri tailing after him as they galavant through the endless forest.

“Something weighs heavy in your heart,” she tries again, hand coming over his.

Lo’ak stops and leans back, unable to meet his mother’s searching gaze.

“I hurt someone,” he says quietly.

Neytiri stiffens.

“What?”

“I hurt someone I care about,” Lo’ak admits. You’d called him fearless, strong. He needed to live by your word. “I hurt her and I don’t know how to fix it.”

“Oh, Lo’ak,” she murmurs, squeezing his hand gently.

Her face has softened as she takes in his stony expression.

“My son, some things cannot be fixed,” she says honestly. “But all things require great effort. Sometimes those efforts will fall through, but that is the natural order of life.”

Lo’ak swallows.

“Whoever this special person is, if you have hurt her, she deserves the full effort of your heart, no?”

You do, he knows you do. You deserve every last effort. But a niggling streak of insecurity tells him that you don’t deserve someone like him. You don’t deserve someone who takes your affections for granted. You deserve someone who will love you with every breath, who will love you fearlessly.

“I really messed things up, Mom,” Lo’ak says quietly. “I don’t…”

Neytiri’s hand comes to Lo’ak chest.

“The night I first met your father, Ewya gave me sign,” she says. “He has a pure, strong heart. You do too.”

Lo’ak swallows.

“Be brave, Maitan,” she says. “Sometimes that is enough.”

Lo’ak’s fingers hurt from picking berries.

His cuticles bleed, pricked by the thorns of the fruit’s bush. Kiri hums beside him, weaving a little bag out of ropes of thin vines.

“You’re not gonna help me?” he whines.

“Why should I help you with your mess?”

You look beautiful under the glow of the evening meal’s crackling fire. It’s the first time you’ve emerged since before Lo’ak’s birthday feast and you’re being flocked by elders and villagers, wishing you well and asking about your supposed ailment.

He sits across the fire, fists tight as he searches for a lull in the crowd.

Spider snickers next to him, devouring the contents of his plate like he’s starved, watching Lo’ak’s useless pining like a show.

Be brave.

He’s standing to his feet before he can back out, crossing the circle to approach you. The villagers watch like they know something he doesn’t and the nerves are eating away at him as he steps into your space.

You look up from your conversation with a girl your age, the smile slipping from your lips.

“Can we talk?” Lo’ak asks, eyes wandering to watch the way everyone watches him.

You remain jaded.

“Now’s not a good time,” you say quietly and a few onlookers snicker in the background. “________,” Lo’ak tries again.

You stare up at him, the shadow of the fire dancing over your features as you seemingly look right through him. It’s humiliating, the way you remain seated and watch him fidget, but he figures he deserves the cold shoulder after months, years of casting you to the side.

“Let’s go?” you ask the girl, nodding your head over your shoulder.

The girl chances a glance between you and Lo’ak, noticing the telltale sign of your work etched into the stones of the choker he hadn’t taken off since his birthday.

She gives him a sympathetic smile as she follows after you.

He’s going to have to try a lot harder than he has, he realizes as your birthday looms right around the corner. The next eclipse, in fact.

He’s losing hope, losing courage, but he can’t give up on you two just yet.

He makes sure the berries he picked the days prior are packed tightly in his bag, the lid to the nectar fastened, and his present wrapped nicely.

It’s his last hope, his last shot to make things right.

Spider, Tuk, and Neytiri surround him, Neteyam and Jake off on a hunt.

They’d all been privy to the fact, aiding him in his endeavors as he organized his final grapple with your heart.

“Kiri said she’ll bring her right before eclipse,” Spider says, peeking from the flap of the tent. “That’s in, like, minutes.”

Lo’ak is nervous. Doesn’t know what he’ll do if he loses you for good, but he knows he has to give it his best effort. It’s the least you deserve.

Be brave. Sometimes that is enough.

Lo’ak glances at his mom and she gives him a warm smile, ruffling his braids.

“You are the son of Toruk Makto,” she assures him, pinching his cheek. “There is nothing you cannot do.”

The words are carved into his brain as he rushes through the forest, the the stream that the curls and bends through the forest. It glows beautifully at night and that is his final push.

“Wait, give me like three seconds, I left something.” Kiri’s voice is muffled behind the trees.

“Huh?” Lo’ak sees the way your head tilts through an opening in the foliage.

“I’ll only be a second!”

“Wait, Kiri!”

Kiri is running straight for him, comes barreling through the bushes, and continues down the path.

“Good luck, egghead!”

Lo’ak takes in a final breath to quell the tremor in his hands before ducking through the bushes to reveal himself.

You’re sitting on the embankment, on a woven mat that Kiri had laid out for you two, decorative vines edging the seams.

“Oh, you were–”

You peer over your shoulder and your expression falls.

“Lo’ak…”

“Happy birthday, ________,” he breathes.

You don’t look amused, slinging your bag over you shoulder as you rise to your feet.

“Kiri and I are hanging out,” you tell him.

He scratches the back of his head.

“I…I had Kiri bring you here because I knew that you wouldn’t come with me if I asked,” he admits. “And of course, I don’t blame you, but I– I just really need to talk to you.”

You bite the inside of your cheek, unable to look him in his eyes as he draws nearer.

“Just give me some time, please,” he pleads.

You finally meet his gaze, searching his eyes as he looks down at you earnestly.

You give him the tiniest nod, reluctantly shedding your satchel to reassume your seat on the mat.

The waters rush gently, like a song as Lo’ak lowers himself next to you.

His palms are clammy as he fidgets in his seat, the scent of herbs and flowers wafting from your dewy skin. He can’t bring himself to look at you, afraid that every sentiment he’d crafted in the hours of the night will escape him, so he watches the bubbling of the stream.

“Well?” you whisper, like you don’t want to shatter the fragile sheath of peace that layers you.

“I’m sorry,” he says quietly. “I know I’ve said it already, but I really am, ________.”

“I know,” you murmur and his gaze flits to yours. “Even if you don’t act like it, you have a good heart, Lo’ak. You feel everything, even the things you don’t want to.”

He swallows.

“I didn’t mean it,” he says carefully. “I was mad and I took it out on you. That wasn’t fair.”

You sit silently, knees hugged to your chest. Your cheek rests against your knee, watching Lo’ak with seeing eyes. It makes him trip over his words.

“My whole life, I’ve always been compared to Neteyam,” he says. “The entire village would whisper about me and how I was nothing like the mighty warrior.”

When he glances at you, he notices your fingers twitch, like you want to reach out to him.

He squashes his fears and turns to face you, five-fingered hand coming up to thread with your four. You watch the union, uncertainty obvious in the way you tense, but Lo’ak squeezes.

“And then when we started growing up, you were just another person I had to live up to,” Lo’ak whispers. “You’re perfect, ________. You’re kind, and you’re smart, talented. You’re everything I’m not and it made me hate you.”

You shrink, but Lo’ak pulls you towards him, hand coming up to brush your cheek.

“But you’re all of that and more,” he continues, the words gushing like a river. “You’re always there, you support me and you defend me and see things I don’t.”

You become shy under his gaze because for the first time, he’s seeing you. He’s seeing you for every single thing you’ve been to him and it makes your stomach knot.

“I have something to tell you,” he says. “Please don’t be mad at me.”

Your gaze is soft, palm still in his as he turns and reaches into the bag he discarded next to him. Your eyes widen when he produces your notebook, edges curled the slightest as he hands it to you.

“My journal,” you say, taking it from him quickly. “I’ve been looking for this. Why- Why do you have it?”

He looks guilty, lips rolling as he avoids your gaze.

“Did you…”

“I wasn’t going to,” he admits. “But there were woodsprites and I knew it was a s–”

“Lo’ak this is private,” you murmur incredulously. “Why would you read this?”

“How long, ________?” he asks quietly, grip on your hand tightening.

“Lo’ak, don’t–”

“How long?” he presses desperately.

Your eyes are watering, like that wicked night all over again and Lo’ak begs Eywa for the final push.

“Since we were ten,” you whisper brokenly. “It was my first performance and it was so stupid, but I was throwing up because I was nervous and you talked me through it.”

Lo’ak is stunned, the memory like the faintest of outlines.

“We didn’t even know each other that well,” you hiccup. “But you patted me on the back and you gave me this–”

You pull your fingers from his grasp and flip the journal to the last page, revealing a hidden pocket. Your nimble fingers pull a tattered string, the remnants of a vine, threaded with wilted flower petals, preserved from being pressed inside your notebook.

“You said that they made you make it during lessons,” you say, breath hitching. “That it’d be my good luck.”

He’d forgotten all about the memory completely, too caught up in driving whatever wedge he could between you two, building up walls to seal you out.

“And you kept it this whole time?” he asks, face scrunched in disbelief.

“I’d hold on to anything you give me,” you admit in defeat. “Heartbreak included.”

He lets out a shaky breath.

“________, I’m so sorry,” he repeats, hand coming up to your neck. “You have to know that. I’m really fucking stupid, but if you give us a shot, I won’t mess it up.”

Your hand comes up to his wrist, crumpling as you bow your head.

“Don’t do this to me,” you beg, moving to break away from him.

“Please.”

His hold tightens, other hand twining with yours.

“If I…if I give myself to you, I’m giving you everything,” you say hesitantly. “If you break this, you break me. I don’t think I can come back from this.”

Lo’ak presses his forehead to yours, breath warm against your lips as he searches your gaze for any semblance of hope.

“This is me being fearless, ________,” he whispers.

You melt, pressing your lips to his tentatively. He’s frozen for the shortest of moments before relenting, pushing up onto his knees to deepen the kiss.

He’s cradling your face and your hands are wandering and Lo’ak can’t help but think he could get used to loving you.

To being loved by you.

BONUS

“I was gonna give it to you on your birthday,” Lo’ak says sheepishly a few nights later under the stars. “But, you know…”

Your usual place among the branches of the looming trees have a lot of memories both bitter and sweet, but you suppose you could make new ones.

“You don’t have to give me anything,” you say sweetly, tail swishing to wrap around his ankle. “You’re all I need.”

Lo’ak doesn’t think he’ll ever get used to your saccharine words if the pounding in his chest is anything to go by.

His hands are shaky as he pushes the hide towards you, a bow made of vine tied neatly around the gift.

“Wanted to,” he says simply, moving the hair from you face to see your reaction better. “Open it.”

You’re gentle with the present, like you are with most things, but eager to see what he’d gotten you.

A tiny gasp falls from your lips when you finally see it, wide eyes meeting his as you free the jars of paints he’d mashed up, the brushes he fashioned, and the brand new journal he bound himself.

“Lo’ak, wow…”

“So you can paint me more,” he says, then adds timidly. “Or maybe us. Maybe you could paint us.”

an — holy shit guys, this was such a big project for me because i really wanted to dive into so many different things in this fic. to everyone who was waiting patiently, thank you sososo much. as usual, i took a lot of creative liberties with this one, but i hope you guys enjoyed nonetheless! although requests are paused for me to catch up, like always, if you wanna chat with me about literally anything, my askbox is open. lots of love hehehe :) xx

taglist: @nao-cchi , @jkiminpark , @philiasoul @amart-e , @s-u-t , @netesbby , @tayswiftlovebot , @dumb-fawkin-bitch , @ewackmn

#lo'ak x reader #lo'ak sully #avatar the way of water #avatar way of water #avatar #atwow #avatar the movie #lo'ak imagine #lo'ak avatar #lo'ak angst #lo'ak fanfiction

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