Never Let Me Go - Rictor/Shatterstar - NC-17
Title: Never Let Me Go
Rating: NC-17
Fandom; Pairing: X-Factor; Rictor/Shatterstar
Word Count: 4528
Disclaimer: Full disclaimer in my profile. I don't own the story or characters. They belong to Marvel Comics.
Summary: Written for the marvel_kink meme. For the prompt: "Rictor/Shatterstar Bondage Star isn't letting Rictor go this time." Quickly before it gets Joss'd by the issue coming out this week!
Warnings: Uh, bondage obviously, but bondage paired off with canon issues of slavery and imprisonment. Also, WAFF, porn, and a smidgen of angst.
A/N: Many, many thanks to shinetheway for encouragement and inspiration. And to saphire_dance for the first spark.
Jamie Madrox liked the bigger house they’d set XF Investigations in. It felt homier, after all those years growing up at Xavier’s, having his little team all living under one roof with lots of rooms and weirdness-it just felt right.
But there was weirdness and there was weirdness. Shatterstar’s white leather and swords and facial tattoos really didn’t suit the noir look he aimed for, but when he was leaning against the kitchen counter talking about Spongebob Squarepants with Layla it just got to be too much.
She’s got one pigtail falling out, or intentionally left like that, and her socks don’t match. It’s still surreal that she’s a skinny little teenager again. She’s drinking coffee and Shatterstar is drinking some kind of green smoothie, and though it’s barely nine that kind of makes Jamie want a beer. Maybe he should just turn around now and hide in another part of the house.
“Morning Jamie,” Guido says, going for the fridge and totally announcing him.
“I’m so glad someone else can appreciate the deeper meaning of-Oh, hi Jamie,” Layla says. The switch in tones makes him feel like a creepy old man. She’s doing it on purpose, but knowing that isn’t enough to stop it from getting to him.
“So,” Jamie asks, to break the awkwardness. “Anybody seen Rictor? Or is someone gonna have to pry him out of bed as usual?”
“Oh,” Shatterstar says, polishing off his weird green smoothie. “Don’t bother.”
Layla giggles, which is totally not a good sign.
“I don’t want to ask,” Jamie tells the kitchen.
“What isn’t Jamie asking?” Siryn asks. “I definitely want to know.”
“He wants to ask why we shouldn’t bother getting Rictor out of bed,” Layla, ever so helpfully, supplies.
“And why shouldn’t we bother getting Rictor out of bed?” Terry asks, sidling up beside Shatterstar. She touches his shoulder. He seems amazingly unfazed, just turning away from her to rinse out the glass.
“We had a talk last night about many things,” Shatterstar explains.
“Mmhmm, that’s what they’re calling it these days, ‘Star?” Siryn jokes.
Jamie tries not to choke on his new cup of coffee.
“I don’t know what you mean,” Shatterstar tells her. It’s weird to him, but Siryn just gives him this little smile and says, “I wouldn’t expect you to.”
“Now what did you and Ric talk about?” Siryn asks.
“We talked about the time that has passed since he left me last,” Shatterstar explained. He looked a little lost and Jamie guessed maybe that wasn’t just because he didn’t know what to do with his clean glass. Jamie took it from his hand and set it away to dry.
“He admitted that he did not want to stay here with your team, Jamie, and he told me about…” Shatterstar trailed off. He looks at Siryn like she’s just going to understand. They used to be teammates, Jamie thinks.
“Oh,” she says. “You didn’t know?”
“No one told me,” he explains.
There is something brief and awkward between them, one arm around the bigger man’s shoulders. Maybe it’s a hug.
“So you and Rictor stayed up late talking and now he’s too tired to get out of bed?” Siryn asks.
And, okay, not what Jamie was thinking, but hey, maybe it’s true and maybe he should stop thinking weird thoughts about his friends.
“No,” Shatterstar tells her. “I tied him to the bedpost so he could not leave or hurt himself again.”
There’s a beat, during which Jamie has to politely spit his coffee back into his mug. Guido’s head emerges from the fridge, he slowly closes the fridge, and backs out of the kitchen.
“Alright then,” he says. “This is weird.”
Layla is smirking at him as he gets away from the situation. It’s not that he hasn’t seen a lot in his life, but Ric is a good friend and it just feels weird. And now there’s all these things he didn’t want to know and his hand still hurts, so he’s allowed to not like this Shatterstar guy, okay? It’s not Rictor, and he’s not homophobic. It’s just fucking weird.
He’s gotten used to weirder things, though, and he’ll get over it.
But right now, he walks away from the situation and heads back upstairs.
“Hey!” he hears Rictor. “Hey Guido! I hear you! Don’t pretend you can’t hear me!”
The door to his bedroom is cracked and Guido can’t ignore it. Ric sounds pissed. He pushes the door open slightly, bends to try to peek through the crack without shoving his broad shoulder through the doorway.
Rictor is on the floor, the bed sheets half yanked off the bed, but he’s fully dressed and, yes, tied to the headboard. He’s tugging on the binding and rattling the whole bed frame.
“Help me out, man,” Ric tells him.
Guido bursts out laughing. He totally misinterpreted the situation, but now that he sees that it’s not some kind of kinky gay sex thing and it’s just, quite literally, Rictor, fully dressed in the clothes he was wearing yesterday and looking angry as a wet cat, tied to the bed.
He laughs the whole time he’s closing the door and, as Ric is yelling at him, he’s so terribly entertained that he has to take off his sunglasses and wipe a tear or two from his eyes. Okay, maybe Shatterstar’s not such a bad guy after all. He’s funny, at least. Maybe not on purpose, but funny.
“Not cool, dude!” Ric yells. He yanks at the ties and pulls the corner of the bed frame up off the ground, but that won’t get the ropes down over the mattress frame to the foot. He keeps hoping someone will hear the thumping and yelling and come rescue him, or maybe the knot will give out, or maybe ‘Star will stop being such a pendejo and just untie him already.
Finally he gives up. His shoulders ache and for now he’s got to rest. He tries to find a way to be comfortable on the floor with his arms over his head. There’s really no position in which that’s comfortable and his wrists are rubbed raw and his shoulders are killing him, but he’s kind of worn out. And hungry. And tired. And sick of this stupid-ass bullshit.
Someone knocks on the door.
“Help!” he shouts. Pride be damned. It could be Pietro fucking Maximoff on the other side of that door. It could be that fucking anti-mutant bigot senator on the other side of that door, even, and Rictor would be asking for his help. But it’s probably Jamie or Layla, who will never let him live it down.
“Rictor?” ‘Star’s voice is cautious and quiet.
Oh, Julio thinks, great. He’s already asked, when he had a better sense of humor about it all, if ‘Star was going to let him go.
“No,” Shatterstar had said. “You might leave again. Or hurt yourself. And then what would I do.”
It seemed so ridiculous that he’d laughed, but it was all too terribly serious and now his arms were killing him and the hardwood floor was uncomfortable against his hipbones. He shouldn’t have tried to get out of the bed, at least he was comfortable in there.
“May I come in?” Shatterstar asks.
“Yeah, sure,” Rictor tells him. “It’s not like I’ve got much choice.”
His questions were all polite, but Rictor recognizes the stubborn set to ‘Star’s mouth and brow.
“Siryn told me that there are sexual connotations to tying you to the bed,” Shatterstar tells him.
“Well, duh,” Rictor snaps, instigating at least a minute of them just glaring at each other.
“You should have explained that,” Shatterstar tells him.
“You watch TV,” Ric snaps. “I figured you’d seen a porno or two.”
“I have!” ‘Star snaps back. “They just didn’t involve restraint techniques!”
“Yeah, so, it’s still weird!” Rictor shouts.
“It is not ‘weird’!” Shatterstar fights back. “It’s highly effective!”
He drops to the floor, effectively sulking and blocking the doorway at the same time.
For a while he’s just staring at Rictor angrily, as if it’s his fault. Slowly, his arms uncross and his hands slide up until he’s covering his face.
“I’m a fool,” Shatterstar says. “An absolute fool.”
At this point, Rictor is prone to agreement, but he feels at least a little bad. It’s not that he wants ‘Star to be all torn up about it. It’s just stupid.
“It’s nothing. It doesn’t matter,” Ric tells him.
“If I untie you now,” ‘Star begins to explain. “You’re definitely going to leave.”
Rictor blinks. He shifts in place, to try and relieve the ache in his wrists and his ass. He is going to be a whole new world of stiff when he gets out of this.
“I’m not going to leave,” he says, swallowing down some nervousness.
“You’re angry with me,” ‘Star points out. “And I’ve just embarrassed you in front of your new team.”
He flushes at the thought. Yeah, but Guido saw and this is clearly not whatever everyone else is going to think. And, okay, what he thought at first until it went totally off the rails. It’s all just a stupid misunderstanding. Those happen and it’s all very funny because, oh, haha, look at Shatterstar not understanding subtle Earth social cues and double meanings. Hilarious!
“I’ll live,” Julio says, grudgingly.
‘Star breaks the sulking for one moment to look terribly, terribly sad.
“Hey, seriously, it’s okay,” Julio reassures him. “I won’t leave. I won’t die. I promise. I just really want to be untied.”
Shatterstar gets up and crosses the short distance to the bed. He sits down on the floor beside Rictor and leans in close. There’s a whole lot of silence and not a whole lot of untying going on.
“I don’t want to let you go,” Shatterstar admits, after a long time.
Julio lets out a long, frustrated sigh.
‘Star’s hands reach up and touch the tender skin of his wrist. He knows it’s all red and irritated, because it’s got that sharp pre-bruise pain under ‘Star’s fingers.
“This is hurting you,” Shatterstar says, by way of some kind of apology.
“It’s not that bad,” Julio says, automatically. It’s really nothing. He’s not much, sure, but he’s not that weak that a little rope burn is so bad.
“It’s my own fault anyways,” he adds.
Out of the corner of his eye he sees ‘Star move and then he feels warm, soft lips kiss the raw skin of his wrists. Shatterstar’s lips are slightly damp, like he licked them just before he kissed, and they stick to the tender skin just slightly. It’s comforting and intimate.
The moment after, Shatterstar is very much in his space. He’s bigger than Julio, which usually doesn’t bother him, but he’s on the floor, tied to a bedpost, and now Shatterstar is practically crouched on top of him. He’s just staring too, like Julio is some very fascinating bug, or rather, some very fascinating commercial on TV.
“I was afraid you would leave again,” ‘Star says, softly, very close to his cheek. “Or worse.”
“I’m not going to-” He gets cut off with two fingers against his lips. It’s novel enough to actually shut him up.
“Were you thinking about sex when you let me tie you up?” Shatterstar asks.
Julio draws in a breath.
“Maybe?” he asks, unsure whether there is a safe answer to that kind of question. He was being so shallow and horny while ‘Star has been nothing but seriousness and concern. There’s a nervous knot in his stomach, which was there when ‘Star got the rope and that deadly serious look on his face, his warrior face, in the first place.
Inside his head, Julio is angry with himself. Shatterstar was just being concerned, in his deeply… unique way of his. It would be fucked up to get off on this, like it was deeply fucked up to get off on Rahne gouging not quite human nails up his back. ‘Star can’t possible understand this, can’t understand anything more than the literal, the real, and he will be freaked out because Shatterstar values freedom so much. There’s nothing funny to him about taking away someone’s control, so definitely not anything sexy.
But then Shatterstar leans in, cups the side of his face, and kisses him. He gives into it completely, even though it’s gentle, he opens his mouth to it and almost wants it to be more demanding.
“I don’t understand,” Shatterstar admits against his lips.
He pulls back and starts to undo the snaps at his neck until his collarbone shows and then there’s the groove between his pecs. Man-cleavage, Julio thinks, and he is both amused and aroused.
“But I don’t want to let you go,” Shatterstar tells him.
Big, forceful hands are rearranging his legs until they’re pulled together and he’s forced to sit up a little straighter. Then ‘Star is straddling his legs and slowly stripping out of his clothes.
“You don’t have to do this,” Rictor tells him, even though his throat has gone totally dry and he thinks his tongue is swelling or something. ‘Star is half naked and he looks so focused. His pale eyes feel like they’re burning into Julio’s and it’s amazing how startling his one eye is when he’s so focused and not quite giving that half-lidded star through his eyelashes. His lashes are that same bright orange color, red or ginger or whatever, and the skin of his eyelid is marked black from the starbust on that side of his face, but his lashes and his eyebrow are a strike of color against the dark. It’s so beautiful and it makes that blue-silver eye look like it’s glowing. The lines of the star accentuate his cheekbones and his strong jaw. He’s handsome, yes, but he’s also sort of pretty. Without his long hair or his usual headpiece, he’s got this striking GQ sort of face, only better because some trashy men’s fashion magazine that’s just softcore for twenty year old girls would never accept that black star on Shatterstar’s face or his bright hair color-those things that make him so utterly Shatterstar, and therefore so much more than just some prettyboy.
Julio breaks the stare, tracing the strong lines of Shatterstar’s neck, the sharp cut of his collarbone, and the lines of all his perfectly sculpted muscles. He’s a fighter, so all those muscles come from hard work and use, but he still looks like some kind of model rather than some toned gymnast or a total muscle-bound bruiser. Julio doubts he could look that good even if he worked out as hard as ‘Star does, which he doesn’t.
‘Star is so pale, with constellations of freckles over his broad shoulders, and a strong full body flush blooming in his cheeks and down his neck and even down to his chest. He has a perfect chest, perfect arms, a perfect stomach, with just the right amount of a tiny lip at the top of his navel and a line of red-orange hair starting faintly below it.
Shatterstar’s got his clothes pulled down far enough that Julio can see the start of ginger curls and appreciate the cut lines at ‘Star’s hips where his perfect abs meet tight hips. It’s the perfect lines of pelvic muscles that everyone wishes they could have, on them or on a lover.
Julio knows how perfect those lines are for digging his fingers into and his hands curl with the desire to touch, but he can’t. It’s the nice kind of torture. He’s done torture, really, maybe ‘Star doesn’t appreciate that. They’ve both done that “held against your will and forced to do all kinds of unpleasant things” and this isn’t quite therapy, but it’s nice.
If he told ‘Star to get the hell off of him and untie him right the fuck now, it doesn’t matter that he couldn’t shake the house down around their shoulders, Shatterstar would still do it. The soft kiss against his wrists said it all. He feels okay. He feels safe.
“Shatterstar?” he asks. “’Star? Baby?”
‘Star seems locked in some kind of trance, half-naked, and crouched over Rictor’s lap.
“There are things,” he begins. His voice is shaky. He’s leaning up on his knees for a moment and pulling his white leather clothes down past his hips, showing that he’s half hard already just from thinking.
Julio licks his lips and thinks a lot of lewd things, letting his eyes wander over flushed skin, the most perfect cock in the entire world, and the lines of ‘Star’s tense thigh muscles. One leg at a time, knee pulled up and calf muscle flexing, Shatterstar finally pulls off all his clothes.
“There are things I want to do to you,” he explains, as he strips. “When I think that I could do them and you would not be able to leave or protest or… do something stupid. I knew those things before and you left me and even when you returned-I could not tell you what I thought I might feel. I did nothing. I acted, I spoke, I felt, and you left again. It made me feel as if I could not… as if I could not feel again.”
It’s so heartfelt that he feels guilty for getting turned on as Shatterstar’s hands rake up his clothed chest.
“I want to make you my captive,” Shatterstar tells him. It’s kind of a ridiculous phrasing, but he looks guilty for saying it.
“I want to make you do things, even if you do not want to do them,” ‘Star adds. “It’s so wrong. I don’t want to hurt you.”
Julio shivers and half-expects that the bed and the floor are actually shivering and not him. He can’t speak. His tongue is numb and for all the languages he knows he hasn’t got words for that, or can’t think of them through the mind-numbing arousal. He’s so turned on just from words and a bit of nudity and bondage. Did his arms hurt before? They don’t now.
“Rictor?” ‘Star asks. “Julio? Please, say something.”
“Okay,” he croaks out.
“What?” ‘Star asks.
“Anything you want,” Julio says. “Just do it. I won’t leave, I promise.”
He’s slipped into Spanish, because his brain has totally short-circuited here.
“Do you mean that?” Shatterstar asks and Julio realizes that he’s asking in Cadre, which is both ridiculous and intimate. Words for just them, that no one else can understand.
“Yes,” he says, in English this time. Best to stick to that for now.
He licks his lips, out of nervousness and to try to get his tongue to feel normal again.
“Come on, man, I’m yours.”
For a moment, Shatterstar is simply frozen. He’s made himself as vulnerable as he can, naked while Julio is clothed, and he has admitted to feelings that are unbefitting of a warrior or a lover. He expected to be set low, to feel small and frustrated. He expected silence or anger, maybe something that would push him past his own honor or only something that would make him pull on his clothing and be the one to leave Julio this time-if such a thing is even conceivable.
This however? Is quite… He struggles for a good word and settles on ‘awesome.’
Rictor’s cheek is rough with stubble under his thumb and he scrapes his hand against the skin of Julio’s face just to feel it. He kisses him hard, violently hard, pushing his tongue into a Julio’s open, willing mouth. It is almost as if he can taste the moan that comes at the back of his throat, made of desire or protest or both. He runs his tongue over the hard edge of teeth, presses their mouths together until his teeth are digging into Julio’s lips.
When he pulls back he feels as wired up as if he stood amongst defeated enemies, true enemies in a real war. His heart is pounding and he is baring his teeth at Julio.
“Whoa,” Rictor says, looking him in the eye. “I didn’t know you had that kind of thing in you.”
It is exactly the kind of provocative comment to make Shatterstar kiss him again, first working his teeth against Julio’s lower lip, sucking on the flesh there until it’s softly swollen.
He puts an arm around Julio’s body, hand between his shoulder blades, and pulls their bodies together. His cock, yes, that’s the popular term at the moment, is so hard that the soft cotton of Julio’s shirt it almost too rough. Or perhaps it’s perfect, because he feels a groan rising out of his chest as he breaks the kiss.
Beneath him, Julio is looking pleased and wary at once. His arms are above his head and his wrists are abraded by the ropes so badly that the skin is being scraped off just slightly. He kisses that skin again, even drags the flat of his tongue over the tenderest parts.
“Oh god, ‘Star,” Julio says.
His neck is exposed, his head resting back against his arms. Shatterstar wonders if he knows what that means to him, that level of surrender. A part of him is panicked and wants him to stop, wants to tell Julio not to make such an easy target of all the dangerously delicate things underneath that tan skin. He wavers on the point and then leans down to kiss the softness of Julio’s pulse points and lick the sweat from his adam’s apple.
Without much further thought he’s dragging up Julio’s shirt, scratching blunt nails over his stomach, where hard muscle is there under the give of skin. Dark hair tickles his fingertips just before he reaches the button of Julio’s jeans. He wants to take him like this, perhaps it would be easiest to just have Julio inside of him. It isn’t anything his body could not handle and the edge of pain would be spectacular. Or he could rearrange himself, push Julio’s legs apart and be inside of him, while he was unable to squirm away or distract Shatterstar with all the things he can do with his hands that he can never remember clearly enough to do in return.
“You’re growling,” Julio says, breaking his daydream. “You’re actually growling.”
And Julio, Rictor, does not look the slightest bit afraid. It’s stunningly beautiful, the tilt of his swollen lips, the power behind his dark eyes.
“Is that… wrong?” he asks, fairly certain that it isn’t.
“No, no,” Julio reassures him. “With the biting and the bondage, it fits right in.”
He rocks his hips up underneath Shatterstar.
“I wish I could touch you,” he says, terribly seductive to Shatterstar’s ears.
Julio’s fly is easy to undo, it’s all so easy to have him in hand, to grind himself against Julio’s body. He can fit both their erections in one hand and it feels so good to have the slide of his palm and the slide of Julio’s skin at the same time.
“Oh Christ,” Julio says. He mutters out all his usual prayers, mixing in Shatterstar’s name with all the things he considers holy. He has never dared to ask what Julio means by it, but it makes him feel flushed and glorious.
Julio’s neck is bared again and Shatterstar bites the skin as a show of victory to Julio’s sign of surrender. It makes Julio sob and come to orgasm in Shatterstar’s hand. There is hot come all over his hand, dripping onto Julio’s bare stomach, getting caught on all the little dark hairs, and a few drops are soaking into his rumpled up shirt.
He let’s Julio go and uses his come as the perfect, slick, warm lubricant. Shatterstar pulls his thighs tight around Julio’s legs. He looks down at Julio, slack, hanging hard against the rope and the bed frame. His lower lip is so bitten that it may be bruised tomorrow. There is the stippling of a fresh bruise on his neck and small red marks where Shatterstar’s teeth pressed against taunt skin. Julio’s eyes are only half open and his chest his rising and falling rapidly as he pants.
“Mine,” he growls, possessive enough to frighten himself.
Shatterstar reaches a hand into Julio’s hair and pulls him in for another forceful kiss. He presses his cock against Julio’s belly, relishing in the soft skin, and grinding against the hard muscle underneath. It is so perfect. His skin prickles with feeling, everything comes down to the feeling of his tongue inside Julio’s mouth and his orgasm. His eyes are tightly closed and he comes with almost a keen of pain.
The moment that intensity fades, though, he feels embarrassed. He feels as if he has breached some code of respect between them, even if Julio gave all permissions, smirked and said he was his and bared his neck. He slides off of Julio’s lap and sees the mess they’ve made of Julio’s shirt, really sees the way Julio’s wrists are worn out. There will be ugly bruises tomorrow, on his wrists, his neck, his mouth, and Shatterstar does not want to see them.
His hand is sticky and he aches to pull his clothes back on.
“I’m sorry,” he says. “That was-“
“Really, really amazing?” Julio interjects.
“Uhm,” Shatterstar says and pauses a moment in pulling his clothes back on.
“It really is okay,” Julio tells him, always so perfectly forgiving and always arriving at the right moment or saying the right things.
“I’d just like to be untied now,” Julio adds.
“Yes,” Shatterstar says, leaning down to untie Rictor while still half naked.
Julio stands, rubbing his wrists and then his lower back. He traces one hand down Shatterstar’s bare chest and makes his muscles all shiver.
“See? I’m not leaving,” he points out. “In fact, let’s, ah, let’s…”
Julio is looking at him, but not quite really looking at him. His hands catch Shatterstar’s and pull him forward, toward the bed. He leans back against it, not quite sitting down on it, yet. Their hips are pressed together and Julio’s pants are falling down.
His hands are let go, lightly, and he watches as Julio falls back against the bed, sitting. He pulls his shirt off, stretching his strong arms so casually. He runs two hands through his hair and then leans back.
“Wanna try that again?” he asks. “Just, maybe, more comfortably and maybe with a safeword.”
“A safe word?” Shatterstar asks. “As opposed to an unsafe word?”
Julio bursts out in laughter and smiles. It makes Shatterstar smile.
"'Julio' is a very safe word," he points out.
"No, it's supposed to be something you wouldn't usually say during sex. Like..."
"Cable?" he suggests.
"Oh hell no," Julio tells him.
"But it is a very safe word and neither of us would usually say it during sex,"
Shatterstar points out.
"Alright, 'Star, let me explain this to you before you tie me to the bed again-"
Shatterstar listens, confused and slightly awed, but... Yes, satisfied.
Crossposted
Rating: NC-17
Fandom; Pairing: X-Factor; Rictor/Shatterstar
Word Count: 4528
Disclaimer: Full disclaimer in my profile. I don't own the story or characters. They belong to Marvel Comics.
Summary: Written for the marvel_kink meme. For the prompt: "Rictor/Shatterstar Bondage Star isn't letting Rictor go this time." Quickly before it gets Joss'd by the issue coming out this week!
Warnings: Uh, bondage obviously, but bondage paired off with canon issues of slavery and imprisonment. Also, WAFF, porn, and a smidgen of angst.
A/N: Many, many thanks to shinetheway for encouragement and inspiration. And to saphire_dance for the first spark.
Jamie Madrox liked the bigger house they’d set XF Investigations in. It felt homier, after all those years growing up at Xavier’s, having his little team all living under one roof with lots of rooms and weirdness-it just felt right.
But there was weirdness and there was weirdness. Shatterstar’s white leather and swords and facial tattoos really didn’t suit the noir look he aimed for, but when he was leaning against the kitchen counter talking about Spongebob Squarepants with Layla it just got to be too much.
She’s got one pigtail falling out, or intentionally left like that, and her socks don’t match. It’s still surreal that she’s a skinny little teenager again. She’s drinking coffee and Shatterstar is drinking some kind of green smoothie, and though it’s barely nine that kind of makes Jamie want a beer. Maybe he should just turn around now and hide in another part of the house.
“Morning Jamie,” Guido says, going for the fridge and totally announcing him.
“I’m so glad someone else can appreciate the deeper meaning of-Oh, hi Jamie,” Layla says. The switch in tones makes him feel like a creepy old man. She’s doing it on purpose, but knowing that isn’t enough to stop it from getting to him.
“So,” Jamie asks, to break the awkwardness. “Anybody seen Rictor? Or is someone gonna have to pry him out of bed as usual?”
“Oh,” Shatterstar says, polishing off his weird green smoothie. “Don’t bother.”
Layla giggles, which is totally not a good sign.
“I don’t want to ask,” Jamie tells the kitchen.
“What isn’t Jamie asking?” Siryn asks. “I definitely want to know.”
“He wants to ask why we shouldn’t bother getting Rictor out of bed,” Layla, ever so helpfully, supplies.
“And why shouldn’t we bother getting Rictor out of bed?” Terry asks, sidling up beside Shatterstar. She touches his shoulder. He seems amazingly unfazed, just turning away from her to rinse out the glass.
“We had a talk last night about many things,” Shatterstar explains.
“Mmhmm, that’s what they’re calling it these days, ‘Star?” Siryn jokes.
Jamie tries not to choke on his new cup of coffee.
“I don’t know what you mean,” Shatterstar tells her. It’s weird to him, but Siryn just gives him this little smile and says, “I wouldn’t expect you to.”
“Now what did you and Ric talk about?” Siryn asks.
“We talked about the time that has passed since he left me last,” Shatterstar explained. He looked a little lost and Jamie guessed maybe that wasn’t just because he didn’t know what to do with his clean glass. Jamie took it from his hand and set it away to dry.
“He admitted that he did not want to stay here with your team, Jamie, and he told me about…” Shatterstar trailed off. He looks at Siryn like she’s just going to understand. They used to be teammates, Jamie thinks.
“Oh,” she says. “You didn’t know?”
“No one told me,” he explains.
There is something brief and awkward between them, one arm around the bigger man’s shoulders. Maybe it’s a hug.
“So you and Rictor stayed up late talking and now he’s too tired to get out of bed?” Siryn asks.
And, okay, not what Jamie was thinking, but hey, maybe it’s true and maybe he should stop thinking weird thoughts about his friends.
“No,” Shatterstar tells her. “I tied him to the bedpost so he could not leave or hurt himself again.”
There’s a beat, during which Jamie has to politely spit his coffee back into his mug. Guido’s head emerges from the fridge, he slowly closes the fridge, and backs out of the kitchen.
“Alright then,” he says. “This is weird.”
Layla is smirking at him as he gets away from the situation. It’s not that he hasn’t seen a lot in his life, but Ric is a good friend and it just feels weird. And now there’s all these things he didn’t want to know and his hand still hurts, so he’s allowed to not like this Shatterstar guy, okay? It’s not Rictor, and he’s not homophobic. It’s just fucking weird.
He’s gotten used to weirder things, though, and he’ll get over it.
But right now, he walks away from the situation and heads back upstairs.
“Hey!” he hears Rictor. “Hey Guido! I hear you! Don’t pretend you can’t hear me!”
The door to his bedroom is cracked and Guido can’t ignore it. Ric sounds pissed. He pushes the door open slightly, bends to try to peek through the crack without shoving his broad shoulder through the doorway.
Rictor is on the floor, the bed sheets half yanked off the bed, but he’s fully dressed and, yes, tied to the headboard. He’s tugging on the binding and rattling the whole bed frame.
“Help me out, man,” Ric tells him.
Guido bursts out laughing. He totally misinterpreted the situation, but now that he sees that it’s not some kind of kinky gay sex thing and it’s just, quite literally, Rictor, fully dressed in the clothes he was wearing yesterday and looking angry as a wet cat, tied to the bed.
He laughs the whole time he’s closing the door and, as Ric is yelling at him, he’s so terribly entertained that he has to take off his sunglasses and wipe a tear or two from his eyes. Okay, maybe Shatterstar’s not such a bad guy after all. He’s funny, at least. Maybe not on purpose, but funny.
“Not cool, dude!” Ric yells. He yanks at the ties and pulls the corner of the bed frame up off the ground, but that won’t get the ropes down over the mattress frame to the foot. He keeps hoping someone will hear the thumping and yelling and come rescue him, or maybe the knot will give out, or maybe ‘Star will stop being such a pendejo and just untie him already.
Finally he gives up. His shoulders ache and for now he’s got to rest. He tries to find a way to be comfortable on the floor with his arms over his head. There’s really no position in which that’s comfortable and his wrists are rubbed raw and his shoulders are killing him, but he’s kind of worn out. And hungry. And tired. And sick of this stupid-ass bullshit.
Someone knocks on the door.
“Help!” he shouts. Pride be damned. It could be Pietro fucking Maximoff on the other side of that door. It could be that fucking anti-mutant bigot senator on the other side of that door, even, and Rictor would be asking for his help. But it’s probably Jamie or Layla, who will never let him live it down.
“Rictor?” ‘Star’s voice is cautious and quiet.
Oh, Julio thinks, great. He’s already asked, when he had a better sense of humor about it all, if ‘Star was going to let him go.
“No,” Shatterstar had said. “You might leave again. Or hurt yourself. And then what would I do.”
It seemed so ridiculous that he’d laughed, but it was all too terribly serious and now his arms were killing him and the hardwood floor was uncomfortable against his hipbones. He shouldn’t have tried to get out of the bed, at least he was comfortable in there.
“May I come in?” Shatterstar asks.
“Yeah, sure,” Rictor tells him. “It’s not like I’ve got much choice.”
His questions were all polite, but Rictor recognizes the stubborn set to ‘Star’s mouth and brow.
“Siryn told me that there are sexual connotations to tying you to the bed,” Shatterstar tells him.
“Well, duh,” Rictor snaps, instigating at least a minute of them just glaring at each other.
“You should have explained that,” Shatterstar tells him.
“You watch TV,” Ric snaps. “I figured you’d seen a porno or two.”
“I have!” ‘Star snaps back. “They just didn’t involve restraint techniques!”
“Yeah, so, it’s still weird!” Rictor shouts.
“It is not ‘weird’!” Shatterstar fights back. “It’s highly effective!”
He drops to the floor, effectively sulking and blocking the doorway at the same time.
For a while he’s just staring at Rictor angrily, as if it’s his fault. Slowly, his arms uncross and his hands slide up until he’s covering his face.
“I’m a fool,” Shatterstar says. “An absolute fool.”
At this point, Rictor is prone to agreement, but he feels at least a little bad. It’s not that he wants ‘Star to be all torn up about it. It’s just stupid.
“It’s nothing. It doesn’t matter,” Ric tells him.
“If I untie you now,” ‘Star begins to explain. “You’re definitely going to leave.”
Rictor blinks. He shifts in place, to try and relieve the ache in his wrists and his ass. He is going to be a whole new world of stiff when he gets out of this.
“I’m not going to leave,” he says, swallowing down some nervousness.
“You’re angry with me,” ‘Star points out. “And I’ve just embarrassed you in front of your new team.”
He flushes at the thought. Yeah, but Guido saw and this is clearly not whatever everyone else is going to think. And, okay, what he thought at first until it went totally off the rails. It’s all just a stupid misunderstanding. Those happen and it’s all very funny because, oh, haha, look at Shatterstar not understanding subtle Earth social cues and double meanings. Hilarious!
“I’ll live,” Julio says, grudgingly.
‘Star breaks the sulking for one moment to look terribly, terribly sad.
“Hey, seriously, it’s okay,” Julio reassures him. “I won’t leave. I won’t die. I promise. I just really want to be untied.”
Shatterstar gets up and crosses the short distance to the bed. He sits down on the floor beside Rictor and leans in close. There’s a whole lot of silence and not a whole lot of untying going on.
“I don’t want to let you go,” Shatterstar admits, after a long time.
Julio lets out a long, frustrated sigh.
‘Star’s hands reach up and touch the tender skin of his wrist. He knows it’s all red and irritated, because it’s got that sharp pre-bruise pain under ‘Star’s fingers.
“This is hurting you,” Shatterstar says, by way of some kind of apology.
“It’s not that bad,” Julio says, automatically. It’s really nothing. He’s not much, sure, but he’s not that weak that a little rope burn is so bad.
“It’s my own fault anyways,” he adds.
Out of the corner of his eye he sees ‘Star move and then he feels warm, soft lips kiss the raw skin of his wrists. Shatterstar’s lips are slightly damp, like he licked them just before he kissed, and they stick to the tender skin just slightly. It’s comforting and intimate.
The moment after, Shatterstar is very much in his space. He’s bigger than Julio, which usually doesn’t bother him, but he’s on the floor, tied to a bedpost, and now Shatterstar is practically crouched on top of him. He’s just staring too, like Julio is some very fascinating bug, or rather, some very fascinating commercial on TV.
“I was afraid you would leave again,” ‘Star says, softly, very close to his cheek. “Or worse.”
“I’m not going to-” He gets cut off with two fingers against his lips. It’s novel enough to actually shut him up.
“Were you thinking about sex when you let me tie you up?” Shatterstar asks.
Julio draws in a breath.
“Maybe?” he asks, unsure whether there is a safe answer to that kind of question. He was being so shallow and horny while ‘Star has been nothing but seriousness and concern. There’s a nervous knot in his stomach, which was there when ‘Star got the rope and that deadly serious look on his face, his warrior face, in the first place.
Inside his head, Julio is angry with himself. Shatterstar was just being concerned, in his deeply… unique way of his. It would be fucked up to get off on this, like it was deeply fucked up to get off on Rahne gouging not quite human nails up his back. ‘Star can’t possible understand this, can’t understand anything more than the literal, the real, and he will be freaked out because Shatterstar values freedom so much. There’s nothing funny to him about taking away someone’s control, so definitely not anything sexy.
But then Shatterstar leans in, cups the side of his face, and kisses him. He gives into it completely, even though it’s gentle, he opens his mouth to it and almost wants it to be more demanding.
“I don’t understand,” Shatterstar admits against his lips.
He pulls back and starts to undo the snaps at his neck until his collarbone shows and then there’s the groove between his pecs. Man-cleavage, Julio thinks, and he is both amused and aroused.
“But I don’t want to let you go,” Shatterstar tells him.
Big, forceful hands are rearranging his legs until they’re pulled together and he’s forced to sit up a little straighter. Then ‘Star is straddling his legs and slowly stripping out of his clothes.
“You don’t have to do this,” Rictor tells him, even though his throat has gone totally dry and he thinks his tongue is swelling or something. ‘Star is half naked and he looks so focused. His pale eyes feel like they’re burning into Julio’s and it’s amazing how startling his one eye is when he’s so focused and not quite giving that half-lidded star through his eyelashes. His lashes are that same bright orange color, red or ginger or whatever, and the skin of his eyelid is marked black from the starbust on that side of his face, but his lashes and his eyebrow are a strike of color against the dark. It’s so beautiful and it makes that blue-silver eye look like it’s glowing. The lines of the star accentuate his cheekbones and his strong jaw. He’s handsome, yes, but he’s also sort of pretty. Without his long hair or his usual headpiece, he’s got this striking GQ sort of face, only better because some trashy men’s fashion magazine that’s just softcore for twenty year old girls would never accept that black star on Shatterstar’s face or his bright hair color-those things that make him so utterly Shatterstar, and therefore so much more than just some prettyboy.
Julio breaks the stare, tracing the strong lines of Shatterstar’s neck, the sharp cut of his collarbone, and the lines of all his perfectly sculpted muscles. He’s a fighter, so all those muscles come from hard work and use, but he still looks like some kind of model rather than some toned gymnast or a total muscle-bound bruiser. Julio doubts he could look that good even if he worked out as hard as ‘Star does, which he doesn’t.
‘Star is so pale, with constellations of freckles over his broad shoulders, and a strong full body flush blooming in his cheeks and down his neck and even down to his chest. He has a perfect chest, perfect arms, a perfect stomach, with just the right amount of a tiny lip at the top of his navel and a line of red-orange hair starting faintly below it.
Shatterstar’s got his clothes pulled down far enough that Julio can see the start of ginger curls and appreciate the cut lines at ‘Star’s hips where his perfect abs meet tight hips. It’s the perfect lines of pelvic muscles that everyone wishes they could have, on them or on a lover.
Julio knows how perfect those lines are for digging his fingers into and his hands curl with the desire to touch, but he can’t. It’s the nice kind of torture. He’s done torture, really, maybe ‘Star doesn’t appreciate that. They’ve both done that “held against your will and forced to do all kinds of unpleasant things” and this isn’t quite therapy, but it’s nice.
If he told ‘Star to get the hell off of him and untie him right the fuck now, it doesn’t matter that he couldn’t shake the house down around their shoulders, Shatterstar would still do it. The soft kiss against his wrists said it all. He feels okay. He feels safe.
“Shatterstar?” he asks. “’Star? Baby?”
‘Star seems locked in some kind of trance, half-naked, and crouched over Rictor’s lap.
“There are things,” he begins. His voice is shaky. He’s leaning up on his knees for a moment and pulling his white leather clothes down past his hips, showing that he’s half hard already just from thinking.
Julio licks his lips and thinks a lot of lewd things, letting his eyes wander over flushed skin, the most perfect cock in the entire world, and the lines of ‘Star’s tense thigh muscles. One leg at a time, knee pulled up and calf muscle flexing, Shatterstar finally pulls off all his clothes.
“There are things I want to do to you,” he explains, as he strips. “When I think that I could do them and you would not be able to leave or protest or… do something stupid. I knew those things before and you left me and even when you returned-I could not tell you what I thought I might feel. I did nothing. I acted, I spoke, I felt, and you left again. It made me feel as if I could not… as if I could not feel again.”
It’s so heartfelt that he feels guilty for getting turned on as Shatterstar’s hands rake up his clothed chest.
“I want to make you my captive,” Shatterstar tells him. It’s kind of a ridiculous phrasing, but he looks guilty for saying it.
“I want to make you do things, even if you do not want to do them,” ‘Star adds. “It’s so wrong. I don’t want to hurt you.”
Julio shivers and half-expects that the bed and the floor are actually shivering and not him. He can’t speak. His tongue is numb and for all the languages he knows he hasn’t got words for that, or can’t think of them through the mind-numbing arousal. He’s so turned on just from words and a bit of nudity and bondage. Did his arms hurt before? They don’t now.
“Rictor?” ‘Star asks. “Julio? Please, say something.”
“Okay,” he croaks out.
“What?” ‘Star asks.
“Anything you want,” Julio says. “Just do it. I won’t leave, I promise.”
He’s slipped into Spanish, because his brain has totally short-circuited here.
“Do you mean that?” Shatterstar asks and Julio realizes that he’s asking in Cadre, which is both ridiculous and intimate. Words for just them, that no one else can understand.
“Yes,” he says, in English this time. Best to stick to that for now.
He licks his lips, out of nervousness and to try to get his tongue to feel normal again.
“Come on, man, I’m yours.”
For a moment, Shatterstar is simply frozen. He’s made himself as vulnerable as he can, naked while Julio is clothed, and he has admitted to feelings that are unbefitting of a warrior or a lover. He expected to be set low, to feel small and frustrated. He expected silence or anger, maybe something that would push him past his own honor or only something that would make him pull on his clothing and be the one to leave Julio this time-if such a thing is even conceivable.
This however? Is quite… He struggles for a good word and settles on ‘awesome.’
Rictor’s cheek is rough with stubble under his thumb and he scrapes his hand against the skin of Julio’s face just to feel it. He kisses him hard, violently hard, pushing his tongue into a Julio’s open, willing mouth. It is almost as if he can taste the moan that comes at the back of his throat, made of desire or protest or both. He runs his tongue over the hard edge of teeth, presses their mouths together until his teeth are digging into Julio’s lips.
When he pulls back he feels as wired up as if he stood amongst defeated enemies, true enemies in a real war. His heart is pounding and he is baring his teeth at Julio.
“Whoa,” Rictor says, looking him in the eye. “I didn’t know you had that kind of thing in you.”
It is exactly the kind of provocative comment to make Shatterstar kiss him again, first working his teeth against Julio’s lower lip, sucking on the flesh there until it’s softly swollen.
He puts an arm around Julio’s body, hand between his shoulder blades, and pulls their bodies together. His cock, yes, that’s the popular term at the moment, is so hard that the soft cotton of Julio’s shirt it almost too rough. Or perhaps it’s perfect, because he feels a groan rising out of his chest as he breaks the kiss.
Beneath him, Julio is looking pleased and wary at once. His arms are above his head and his wrists are abraded by the ropes so badly that the skin is being scraped off just slightly. He kisses that skin again, even drags the flat of his tongue over the tenderest parts.
“Oh god, ‘Star,” Julio says.
His neck is exposed, his head resting back against his arms. Shatterstar wonders if he knows what that means to him, that level of surrender. A part of him is panicked and wants him to stop, wants to tell Julio not to make such an easy target of all the dangerously delicate things underneath that tan skin. He wavers on the point and then leans down to kiss the softness of Julio’s pulse points and lick the sweat from his adam’s apple.
Without much further thought he’s dragging up Julio’s shirt, scratching blunt nails over his stomach, where hard muscle is there under the give of skin. Dark hair tickles his fingertips just before he reaches the button of Julio’s jeans. He wants to take him like this, perhaps it would be easiest to just have Julio inside of him. It isn’t anything his body could not handle and the edge of pain would be spectacular. Or he could rearrange himself, push Julio’s legs apart and be inside of him, while he was unable to squirm away or distract Shatterstar with all the things he can do with his hands that he can never remember clearly enough to do in return.
“You’re growling,” Julio says, breaking his daydream. “You’re actually growling.”
And Julio, Rictor, does not look the slightest bit afraid. It’s stunningly beautiful, the tilt of his swollen lips, the power behind his dark eyes.
“Is that… wrong?” he asks, fairly certain that it isn’t.
“No, no,” Julio reassures him. “With the biting and the bondage, it fits right in.”
He rocks his hips up underneath Shatterstar.
“I wish I could touch you,” he says, terribly seductive to Shatterstar’s ears.
Julio’s fly is easy to undo, it’s all so easy to have him in hand, to grind himself against Julio’s body. He can fit both their erections in one hand and it feels so good to have the slide of his palm and the slide of Julio’s skin at the same time.
“Oh Christ,” Julio says. He mutters out all his usual prayers, mixing in Shatterstar’s name with all the things he considers holy. He has never dared to ask what Julio means by it, but it makes him feel flushed and glorious.
Julio’s neck is bared again and Shatterstar bites the skin as a show of victory to Julio’s sign of surrender. It makes Julio sob and come to orgasm in Shatterstar’s hand. There is hot come all over his hand, dripping onto Julio’s bare stomach, getting caught on all the little dark hairs, and a few drops are soaking into his rumpled up shirt.
He let’s Julio go and uses his come as the perfect, slick, warm lubricant. Shatterstar pulls his thighs tight around Julio’s legs. He looks down at Julio, slack, hanging hard against the rope and the bed frame. His lower lip is so bitten that it may be bruised tomorrow. There is the stippling of a fresh bruise on his neck and small red marks where Shatterstar’s teeth pressed against taunt skin. Julio’s eyes are only half open and his chest his rising and falling rapidly as he pants.
“Mine,” he growls, possessive enough to frighten himself.
Shatterstar reaches a hand into Julio’s hair and pulls him in for another forceful kiss. He presses his cock against Julio’s belly, relishing in the soft skin, and grinding against the hard muscle underneath. It is so perfect. His skin prickles with feeling, everything comes down to the feeling of his tongue inside Julio’s mouth and his orgasm. His eyes are tightly closed and he comes with almost a keen of pain.
The moment that intensity fades, though, he feels embarrassed. He feels as if he has breached some code of respect between them, even if Julio gave all permissions, smirked and said he was his and bared his neck. He slides off of Julio’s lap and sees the mess they’ve made of Julio’s shirt, really sees the way Julio’s wrists are worn out. There will be ugly bruises tomorrow, on his wrists, his neck, his mouth, and Shatterstar does not want to see them.
His hand is sticky and he aches to pull his clothes back on.
“I’m sorry,” he says. “That was-“
“Really, really amazing?” Julio interjects.
“Uhm,” Shatterstar says and pauses a moment in pulling his clothes back on.
“It really is okay,” Julio tells him, always so perfectly forgiving and always arriving at the right moment or saying the right things.
“I’d just like to be untied now,” Julio adds.
“Yes,” Shatterstar says, leaning down to untie Rictor while still half naked.
Julio stands, rubbing his wrists and then his lower back. He traces one hand down Shatterstar’s bare chest and makes his muscles all shiver.
“See? I’m not leaving,” he points out. “In fact, let’s, ah, let’s…”
Julio is looking at him, but not quite really looking at him. His hands catch Shatterstar’s and pull him forward, toward the bed. He leans back against it, not quite sitting down on it, yet. Their hips are pressed together and Julio’s pants are falling down.
His hands are let go, lightly, and he watches as Julio falls back against the bed, sitting. He pulls his shirt off, stretching his strong arms so casually. He runs two hands through his hair and then leans back.
“Wanna try that again?” he asks. “Just, maybe, more comfortably and maybe with a safeword.”
“A safe word?” Shatterstar asks. “As opposed to an unsafe word?”
Julio bursts out in laughter and smiles. It makes Shatterstar smile.
"'Julio' is a very safe word," he points out.
"No, it's supposed to be something you wouldn't usually say during sex. Like..."
"Cable?" he suggests.
"Oh hell no," Julio tells him.
"But it is a very safe word and neither of us would usually say it during sex,"
Shatterstar points out.
"Alright, 'Star, let me explain this to you before you tie me to the bed again-"
Shatterstar listens, confused and slightly awed, but... Yes, satisfied.
Crossposted