Work Text:
The decided upon neutral ground is a dimension of Moon’s choosing: a great expanse of enchanted wood, secluded and quiet this time of year. They were going to the apparent eloping grounds of a certain fae species, having gone to the edge of their territory where the rivers had warmed beneath the magical energies of the summer sun; said fae wouldn’t be back until fall.
As for how Moon is aware of this, both his Moon Haven and Sun Sanctuary profiles note he has a long history of exploring dimensions and worlds for research purposes. Since he was first capable of daring, Moon has ventured wherever a Pizzaplex Daycare Attendant Model has no right to be, rife with his own brand of fae-like curiosity. He is intrigued by all manner of things, dares to stick his nose into whatever he pleases, and asks insensitive questions, looking for insensitive answers.
In this way, Dahlia and Moon are equally blunt and rude, which is how this whole thing started: Moon said something rude, and Dahlia replied in kind. They each asked a rude question and received a rude answer. Rudeness then trickled into genuine curiosity and genuine curiosity into discussion, discussion into action, and now here they are touching foreign, fae soil rich in magic and hyphae and humus and the aroma of light rain and freshly tilled earth.
The pathway stretches on, shadowed and mysterious, silver dapples of moonlight spilling through the leaves of black, blocky tree trunks and fine branches. Fireflies drift lazily through the air, and crickets chirp endlessly. Somewhere, a toad croaks.
The pale white glow of a tablet screen illuminates Moon’s silver and black face, and midnight blue fingers tap and swipe on the surface in expert haste.
He never once bothers to look at the road ahead or in Dahlia’s direction, captivated by his own intense wonder at whatever the tablet is showing him. The spark of his working intelligence somehow makes him seem physically brighter, and Dahlia tries not to be drawn to it like a mindless, light-dazed insect.
This is meant to be a business exchange, cold and impersonal by design, despite the incidental romantic midnight walk through nature’s splendors. The seriousness of their texts and tone when discussing all that would happen tonight would have had one thinking they were planning a murder instead of an evening designed around Moon’s initial rude sentiment, "Fuck you", and Dahlia’s initial rude reply, "Do you promise?"
Dahlia mentally double-checks the things they’ve brought to ensure they’re decently prepared the way Moon wished them to be, his makeup box and backpack heavy with supplies as they trek on, surrounded by the musical din and vitality of the silver-brushed wood.
Moon, meanwhile, carries his own backpack over his slim shoulders. A heavy lunchbox sits slung over his chest by a shoulder strap, bumping against his hip as he walks. The clunky thing only accentuates his thin, willowy build, and Dahlia drinks in all that he is: a short, lithe metal automaton clad in a black turtleneck and starry night pants plus cap and curled, belled shoes, like some impish thing from a half-remembered dream.
The pants specifically look baggy and loose enough to hide practically anything underneath, and no one would know.
Tonight, Moon is going to be dressed by their hand, conjured into a worthwhile beau, and then brushed out like a fine tablecloth beneath their hands before the main course arrives to decorate his visage.
Dahlia takes a longer stride to Moon’s side, a hand smoothing down the smallness of his back. “You know, you’re—"
“Jesus!” Moon startles as if he’d forgotten Dahlia was there at all. The tablet fumbles right out of his hands towards the humus and leaf litter, but Dahlia catches it with a whispered spell of anti-gravity magic.
The tablet floats a few sparse feet above the ground, caught in a soft, golden glow that touches the silver crescent upon Moon’s face.
Moon seems too mystified to reach for it, like a dazed moth, so Dahlia does it instead, plucking it out of the air to return it to his deft fingers. Their hands brush in the exchange, and Moon’s hands feel notably warm and alive despite his metal.
Once more, the romance of it all goes ignored by both parties. As the smell of earth suggests, it is not a night for romance but dirt, filthiness, pure and fruitful.
Moon carefully receives the tablet, grumbling, “I, uh, thanks. What were you saying?”
“Only that you’re cute. I fear the atmosphere for it has been ruined, however.”
“Um, right,” Moon says, nonplussed. He clicks off his tablet and slides it into his backpack. Dahlia can only wonder what else he’s stored inside its numerous pockets, though he thinks he catches sight of a bottle of lube before it gets zipped shut.
Moon truly doesn’t have much of a libido to speak of, so assistance will be necessary. Dahlia even brought their own brand just to be safe.
“Apologies for my confusion, but is being called cute not what you wished to hear tonight?”
“No, yeah, sure. But only at the right time in the space we both agreed to use it in. Not so… here and now.” Moon waves a hand at the open woods.
“You said there would be no one around due to that fae migration. Or whatever it is—”
“We’re secluded. It’s just—It still feels weird. I don’t know.”
“A good weird? Or a bad weird?”
Moon’s face glows slightly. His hands press low on his abdomen. “It’s around here I’m feeling it, I think? But that means it’s good, right? That’s where the feeling is supposed to be? It’s where I installed the new… You know.”
“I wouldn’t know what arousal for an animatronic feels like, exactly. You’ve designed yourself to function rather like a human, of which I am certainly not one. However, my own arousal typically starts in roughly the same place you are experiencing it now.”
“Right. I guess I’m not used to it. Just… keep to the script, alright? It’ll be better that way.” Moon points ahead, at the great base of a hundred-year-old willow tree. “It’s there.”
Moon approaches the old trunk and taps his wrist against it. There’s a solid, echoing thunk as the hidden scanner reads his dimensional signature and the door unlocks. It swings open with a rusty creak, and Moon turns around to start climbing down a rusted ladder into the bunker.
Dahlia does not like ladders. The smooth, clawless tarsi at the end of each of their legs don’t tend to handle smooth metal bars well. It’s a pain, really, and not one of those disabilities he must consider often.
They close the door behind them and climb down the ladder backwards, so as not to use their feet at all (they’re not about to go falling down a ladder like an untrained larva). Instead, they lower themselves mostly using their arms to hold their weight, sitting down one bar at a time until they get to the bottom.
Moon looks at them like they’re a petri dish full of something intriguingly unidentifiable. Before their tarsi touch the ground, he reaches out and brushes a hand down the perfectly smooth layer of exoskeleton. “Single-segmented tarsi. No tarsomeres. And you don’t have ungues at the end of your pretarsus. Seems ineffective if you ask me.”
“You are aware that I am not a full-blooded insect?”
“But all your people’s legs are like this, right? I’m… trying to understand the evolutionary benefit, I guess.”
Dahlia heaves a sigh. Well, this is quite the mood killer.
“I used to have 4-segmented fore-tarsi and mid-tarsi upon my tarsus. And a pair of ungues.”
“Used to. What happened to ‘em?”
“Removal of one’s ungues and tarsi subsegments was a form of torture.” Dahlia drops the last of the way down, leaving him and Moon a mere few inches apart, with Dahlia towering nearly twice as tall over him. “Do you have any more questions?”
Moon isn’t intimidated. Instead, he looks a little sad. “They declawed you.” His eyes wander down, toward their torso. “Is that what—?”
“No. My mesothoracic arms are a different tale. One I would rather not get into right now.” Dahlia reaches out and thumbs at Moon’s faceplate. “At least… not before I’ve at least gotten some wine out of you.”
“Right… um…” Moon looks around like he’d completely forgotten what they were here to do. “We can set up over here.”
Dahlia knocks on the deep brown wall beside them as they walk and notes that it’s still metal; it just happens to look exactly like they’re on the inside of an actual tree, every surface covered in winding, painted titanium to form vines and roots. Real nature seems to have poked past the rusted holes, crawling stubbornly into the corners of the ceiling. Real vines intermingle with the fake, metal ones, and flowers bloom out of a wide crack in the back living room wall.
They leave the ladder entrance and enter the literal hole in the ground that is the bunker itself.
Dahlia trails their fingertips through the dust along the entertainment system in the tiny living room with its quaint wooden coffee table and moth-eaten couch. The kitchenette is only a few paces away, same as the bedroom, which looks entirely taken up by a queen-sized bed with a white comforter, numerous pillows, and fluffy, patchwork quilts strewn atop.
“It’s kind of small and not very technologically advanced, so there’s not much to write home about. Couch and TV there. Kitchenette there. Computer and lab setup through that door in the back. And the, um, the bathroom and bedroom are that way. I haven’t been here in some years, though, so it’s kind of worse for wear, but you said you had a spell for that, right? So it can be clean for us once we get started?”
“I haven’t any spell to reverse the damage, but I do have one to at least get everything tidy and sanitized.”
Dahlia reaches the end of the entertainment system, their fingers falling off the dusty surface. They rub the fine grain between their digits with a grimace, then draw a line of runes directly in the dust and utter the appropriate enchantment.
At once, the dust and filth sweep off the various surfaces and across the floor with a dry trickle. It gathers into a pile at the tips of Dahlia’s tarsi, and it’s quite a nasty sight. Dahlia snaps their fingers and sends the filth outside of the bunker, where it will be out of the way, then claps the dust off their hands, uttering a healing spell specific to cleansing and disinfecting germs.
Just like that, the filth is gone, the surfaces are pristine, and the space and their hands are sanitized.
Moon pushes the couch to the far back wall. The coffee table gets placed off to the side, close enough that they’ll be able to access it. The plastic roll attached to the bottom of his backpack swishes out, crinkled and covered in fold creases. Dahlia sets out to help Moon smooth and flatten it.
They have many spells to tidy up a mess, but not a single one to fix technology in case the spill happens to get on any important plugs or computers within the bunker. It’s better to be safe than sorry.
The plastic rustles beneath Moon’s feet as he steps onto it, his tone dripping with sarcasm, “If that doesn’t get you in the mood, I don’t know what will.”
Dahlia hums without comment and opens their backpack while Moon opens his lunchbox, each of them pulling out an assortment of chilled bottles, wrapped meats, cheeses, fruits, nuts, honeys in varying colorful flavors, and then the little wooden boards to make everything pretty and presentable. Much like Moon will be fashioned, once they’ve settled.
Moon returns from the kitchenette with a couple of melting pots. Cheese fanatic that he is, he owns multiple to make fondue, and Dahlia hands him the carefully wrapped packages of cheese and a bag of white chocolate.
As the night has already been intricately planned and discussed, and the white chocolate plays quite a part in it, Moon hurriedly dumps it into the pot and turns away from it to instead start opening wine bottles.
They’ve been discussing what they each want out of this ad nauseam for the past few nights while working around their busy schedules to make this happen, uninterrupted.
Combining sex with food to appeal to both their tastes was Dahlia’s idea, of course; they are chock-full of good ideas, though most of them are at Moon’s expense.
This will not be a quick session. Dahlia and Moon are creatures who like to learn and explore; they are innately curious, and they have sworn they will be patient with one another in the hopes that this will suit their tastes and satisfy their individual needs.
Dahlia is about to start cutting through a block of fresh cheese to make cheese cubes when a glass of white wine gets pushed towards him. Moon sits on his knees beside Dahlia, only inches away, shy and flustered as he gulps from his own glass with two hands clutched around the stem.
Dahlia can’t help but smile, continuing to prepare the wooden boards with food. “You don’t drink wine much, do you?”
Moon finishes chugging the glass with a gag. The base clangs against the table. Glass rings against glass as he hastily pours more. “No. Wine sucks. It’s gross.”
“Well, you seem to be enjoying it well enough to go for seconds.”
“I’m just using it to destress.” Moon continues opening wine bottles. He starts pouring each of them into more glasses, setting them into colorful flights.
They work quietly next to each other for several minutes, arranging food and drinks for the night, nearly elbow to elbow. The silence is only broken as they ask to have things passed over.
The cheeses and white chocolate have finally melted, and as Dahlia stirs the little pots, he clears his throat and says, “We’re about done here. How are you feeling? I am aware this is extremely out of your comfort zone.”
Moon is now on his third glass of wine. He'd been plucking off bits of meat, cheeses, and grapes to go with the alcohol, and Dahlia does not presently mind his light snacking. He meets Dahlia’s gaze fully, looking much more relaxed and a little more glow-brushed.
“I am famished, Dahlia,” he says slowly.
Not “I’m hungry” or “do you want to eat,” but "I am famished, Dahlia."
The line was chosen because it’s not something Moon would say naturally.
Dahlia closes the distance and pulls him into a searing, hungry kiss.
Moon’s tongue doesn’t fight back against Dahlia’s as it dips into his mouth. It doesn’t try to taste of its own accord. The black, serrated tongue merely lies there at the bottom of Moon’s jaw, no matter how much Dahlia tries to coax it out.
Moon stares and sits and receives, his silicone lips doing hardly anything to seal their mouths.
Dahlia stops kissing him because it’s starting to get weird how unreceptive he’s being. He looks at Moon pointedly. “Hello?”
“Hi.”
“You said the line. That’s supposed to mean I’m ready. So, are you ready, or aren’t you?”
“I didn’t think you’d start trying to eat my face off!”
“I wasn’t! I was trying to—! Oh, gods, you know, I don’t think I’ve ever had a make-out session go so poorly before.” Dahlia places a hand on his cheek, embarrassed that he’d tried to initiate at all. Now they feel insecure.
“You think I know how to make out with someone?! Man, I’ve never even kissed anyone before!”
Dahlia sighs and scratches at the base of their right antenna, thinkingly. “Alright, well… I suppose I didn’t think to ask that. It makes sense in hindsight. Do you not want me to kiss you on the mouth like that again?”
“Y-you can try, I just don’t know how to—y’know—reciprocate!” Moon shuffles awkwardly on his knees. Even turned away, his tenseness permeates the air.
“Look, there’s no rush,” Dahlia reminds him. This dimension’s temporal flow is much slower than the one back home. They could be here for a full day, and hardly a few hours will pass in Moon’s dimension or in the Sun Sanctuary. “We have time on our side. If you need a few more moments to prepare yourself, we can try again in another few minutes, or we can stop altogether.”
Dahlia shuffles closer and sets his hands on Moon’s shoulders, rubbing softly. He feels Moon shiver beneath his touch, turning his face away as Dahlia experimentally places a kiss on his neck. Moon's face screws up like he’s in pain.
Dahlia sighs. “Green, yellow, or red? I need a clue, here, Moon.” He tries not to let his frustration get the better of him, but it’s like talking to a brick wall.
“I don’t fucking know! Just-!” Moon tucks his head low, shoulders hunched, hands clutching onto his knees, every part of him rigid. “Shit. Yellow. I don’t want to stop, I just… Sorry. I don’t know what the hell is wrong with me. I talk like I’m hot shit, but really I’m just… clueless. About all of this.”
“You don’t have to be sorry or start degrading yourself over it.” Dahlia stops and backs off at once. “Is it how I’m touching you or something else?”
“I’m just not used to… being so physically close to people.”
“Are you nervous?”
“How could I not be?”
“Ah. Indeed. That is a fair notion. After all, I have done this countless times, and this will only be your first.” Dahlia moves to sit daintily on the little green moth-bitten couch and extends their right leg, resting their tarsus on the coffee table. They pull up their dress, revealing the entirety of their tarsus until the fabric sits at their lower tibia. “You wanted to study my anatomy. Why don’t we start with a biology lesson?”
They’ll play to what Moon recognizes and get him to lower his guard that way. It seems to work well enough. Like a cat to curiosity, Moon closes the distance and kneels to get a good look at Dahlia’s legs. He reaches to grab their tibia, but startles at his own boldness. “Um, am I allowed to…?”
Dahlia turns their leg towards him. “Touch as much as you like.”
Moon’s hands smooth down their legs, exploring. He’s going into it with a scientific mind, but Dahlia’s mind can’t help but slough down into the gutters. Moon’s hands feel nice against their hungry, Spring-flushed body, and Moon hardly even realizes just how deliciously firm he grabs and attentive he is as he smooths his fingers from tarsus to trochanter.
“You really can’t see where the segments of your tarsomeres were removed,” Moon mutters to himself.
Dahlia watches Moon’s hands as they push the dress further up, exposing more of the hard, pale-yellow armor until Moon has reached the end of their coxa, so, so achingly close to where Dahlia needs him most.
“My species sheds its skin and regrows it, so scars are rarely permanent, though, as you can see, I still have quite a few.”
“Really? So, eventually, even these will disappear?" Moon’s attentions move to the arm holes. He stares with rapt attention, gazing into the abyss of the socket on their right side until he makes out the thin layer of hardened integument, just transparent enough for him to see the gnarly, sensitive purple flesh it covers.
“The arms themselves will never grow back, but the holes will continue to get shallower the more I shed and grow. Currently, the skin over it is still rather thin and soft.” Dahlia rests their upper arms on the back of the couch to allow Moon to see more of the inside. "I used fire magic to cauterize the wounds. The heat stopped the bleeding, and the sigils I branded into the insides of them gave me the ability to conjure new arms to replace them at will, not twenty-four hours after my original arms were forcibly removed.”
Moon’s head snaps to him, his mouth agape. “Holy shit! That's cool!”
Not the reaction Dahlia was expecting, but... alright.
Moon reaches for the empty arm socket. “Can I?”
“Go ahead.”
The tips of blue fingers enter Dahlia’s lower right arm socket. The old wound is deep enough that his fingers don’t touch the end of the socket until he’s almost to his second knuckle.
Moon feels the soft, thin bit of exoskeleton that’s just started to layer over the injury. It has the texture of a skin callus, rough and dry beneath his fingers. “Feels weird...” He rubs harder, and Dahlia can feel the prodding deep enough that it feels like Moon is pressing into their lungs, and they writhe uncomfortably against the hard touch. They grab Moon's wrist and pull his hand away sternly.
“Gently,” he warns.
“My bad.”
“It’s fine. Here.” Dahlia unclasps their dress and lets the top half pool around their hips. They take their pink top off and set it aside, then point out the arm socket before Moon starts feeling awkward about the fact that he’s gone half-naked. “Did you feel the grooves? That’s where my exoskeleton grew over the scar tissue. It wasn’t a clean tear, so that’s why it’s uneven.”
Moon’s attention diverts, however, fingers instead tracing along the groove of a triangular crack along their left pectoral, where the shell seems shallower. “What about this?”
“An enchanted spear pierced past my defensive spells. Believe it or not, I used to be missing a layer of my exoskeleton on my entire left pectoral.”
“But you’ll just keep shedding and regrowing your shell until one day it’ll be totally gone.”
“Correct.”
“And here? What was this one from?”
“Arrow,” they say as Moon’s fingers trace a shallow mark on the left side of their ribs, a few inches beneath the open arm hole. They slide towards their abdomen to a mark just beneath their sternum, tracing the long, perpendicular line across.
“Axe,” Dahlia answers the unspoken question in a hush, relishing in the slow drag of Moon’s fingers as they shift from scar to scar. He finds another long stretch by Dahlia’s navel, causing Dahlia to shiver and throb beneath the attention.
“Sword,” he grits out, swallowing and silencing a moan.
Careful, Dahlia, don’t scare him off.
Luckily, Moon scarcely notices Dahlia’s hands drift to his hips and pull him onto his lap, invitingly.
Moon’s right hand drags low on their abdomen, tracing little patterns over the exoskeleton, eyes piercing through the darkness of the lightless underground bunker. He watches Dahlia intensely as his fingers drag further down, painful centimeter by painful centimeter.
Dahlia keeps his expression carefully neutral, so as not to send the nervous virgin in his lap skittering away in the face of wanton desperation. It’s difficult. Moon looks nice sitting on his lap. Feels nice, too. Despite his dainty frame, he has a weight to him, thanks to his heavy metal.
The hand drifts lower and lower until it meets Dahlia’s pelvis, nearing the tip of the bulge beneath the dress pooled at his hips.
Moon’s hand suddenly meets the heat between Dahlia’s legs, palming the length of their hardening ovipositor. “What about this one?” he asks, strikingly bold, red eyes burning into Dahlia’s golden ones. He has the audacity to sound bored as he tacks on, “Is it something to be impressed by?”
Dahlia’s tongue lashes out before he can think better of it, “Open those pretty legs of yours and find out, why don’t you?”
Moon’s hand stills. Dahlia fears he’s scared him off, and he proves himself right as Moon removes himself from his lap and starts pacing in front of him. “I’m stupid—I’m so stupid. What the hell am I thinking? I can’t do this…”
“Do you want to start packing up?”
“No! I just… I touch you, or you touch me, and it feels…” Moon drags his hands up his own arms, shivering. “I don’t know… Can you just do it quickly? Like, fully put your arms around me until my body acclimates or something?”
Dahlia isn’t sure if that’s how it works, but he stands from the couch, slipping the straps of his jumper dress back over his shoulders, and steps before him. “Ready?”
Moon’s hands ball at his sides. He nods once in acknowledgement.
Dahlia’s touch lands softly on Moon’s shoulders, but Moon still flinches like he’s been struck. Pale yellow thumbs rub gentle circles into the seam between where his arms meet his body. The little ball joints creak beneath Moon’s turtleneck, gears straining and tensing harder as Dahlia trails light patterns down Moon’s arms.
A hand cups his face, but Moon’s head turns the other way.
Dahlia holds him steady. “Are you alright?” he asks gently. “Do you want me to let go?”
Moon shakes his head again. “No. Green. Keep going.”
“Don’t force it—”
“That’s the point!”
“I don’t want to hurt you.”
“I’m not hurt! I just need to fucking adjust—just let me adjust, alright!”
“Fine. I’m going to hold you now. Ready?” Dahlia wraps an arm around Moon and pulls him into an embrace, arms wrapping around his small back. The contact makes Moon hiss like a rabid thing, and hiding his face in Dahlia’s stomach, hands clenched at their back as if bracing himself for some kind of impact. Dahlia hovers awkwardly over him, shadow dark and overhanging as they press him tightly against their body.
Eventually, they pull Moon back and start to move so they can crouch, because he doesn’t think hovering like this is helping Moon feel any less crowded, and—
Moon’s hands scramble against Dahlia’s back as if he’s the only stable ground left in the world. He chants in rising panic, “Dahlia, Dahlia, Dahlia—!”
“You’re fine. Run your fans higher. Calm yourself.”
“W-what are you doing?!”
“I was just getting lower to the ground so you didn’t feel as cornered.”
“Well, don’t! I don’t need you to treat me like I’m fragile, alright? Just stay standing, prick!” Moon stills and opens his vents, blasting Dahlia’s stomach with hot steam. “I just need a bit! This just—it’s a lot of input—it’s a lot for me!”
“You wanted me to do it.”
“I know, asshole!”
“And you do understand there will be a lot of touching involved if you decide to do this with me, don’t you?” Dahlia snaps, hissing and insectoid. “Don’t you?”
“Of course I understand that!” Moon snaps back, low and mechanical. “It’s just difficult for me!”
“I know. Just as you know every step of what’s going to happen tonight.”
“I do.”
“You did almost all the planning yourself.”
“I know!”
“You wanted this.”
“I-I did!” Moon vents again. “I still do!”
“And if you’re getting second thoughts at all?”
“Then I can back out whenever I need to, using the stoplight system. And we stop. But I don’t want to stop! I just… I just need a fucking second! Just let me fucking vent, for god’s sake!”
“Alright!” Dahlia huffs. “Listen, I’m not going to hurt you in any way you don’t want to be hurt, and I will stop the exact second you tell me you’re uncomfortable or tired or ready to go home. Tell me you understand that. I’m not forcing you. I’m trying to do exactly as you’ve asked of me, Moon.”
“I know!” Moon relaxes a fraction in their hold. “I know. Okay? I get it. I’m not trying to be a stubborn jerk, I just…” He shakes his head. “I’m working on trying to communicate, and it’s hard because I’ve never had to communicate anything like this before!”
“I’m aware. Once again, just like I said over our text messages: If whatever I put on you starts to get itchy or annoying or too awkward, you can take it off. It won’t hurt my feelings. Same thing with the makeup and everything else here. We can stop wherever we are and get you cleaned up.”
Moon grumbles something under his breath, disgruntled.
“Moon.” Dahlia puts a knuckle on the silver crescent-curve of his chin to raise Moon’s face to meet his gaze, but there’s resistance as Moon instinctively jerks out of his grasp. “Look—”
“Don’t.”
“Look at me.”
Moon’s optics flicker towards the ground to stare at nothing in particular. “No.” He jerks his head away from Dahlia’s grasp once more, this time purposefully.
“Look at me, you stubborn little thing!”
On the third try, Moon lets his head be tilted, his pouty, glow-flushed face towards Dahlia. “What?” he snaps irritably, before squirming uselessly in their hold.
“You don’t have to wear anything you don’t want to, but a part of me hopes you do at least try it on first before you dismiss it. This seems like a hurdle you need to face, and you know I will not judge you while you do it. I mean, I’m a cockroach in a dress for crying out loud.”
Moon snorts, and his body language loosens a bit more. “Yeah. I get it,” he grumbles. “I get it.”
“I’m still green.”
Moon vents slowly, taking his time. After a few beats, he says, “Yeah. Green.”
“Ready to start again? For real, this time?”
“I am famished, Dahlia,” Moon spits.
Dahlia pinches the cheeks of Moon’s faceplate, deciding to test the waters. “Are you? You don’t sound it.”
Moon glows bright enough to light the dim space. “I’m…” He hesitates.
Dahlia closes what little space remains between them and brushes their lips against his cheek, “You?” They move slowly around to Moon’s backside, leaning low, forearms resting laxly around his shoulders. Dahlia moves his face around to the back of Moon’s head, exhaling softly against the exposed wires. Moon stiffens as their breath tickles his sensors
A silver and blue hand lands on the forearms looped loosely around his neck, claws digging in, Moon arching his spine and cowering lower beneath his shadow. “Dahlia,” he strains through his teeth.
Dahlia’s nose nuzzles against a red wire, feather soft. “Are you, Moon? Famished?” he breathes. They let their lips delicately close around the wire, so soft he could deny he’d done it at all, but Moon grunts as if he’d bitten right into it.
They stand. Silent. Still. Breathing. Existing. Long enough that Moon’s body relaxes in Dahlia’s hold, fans evening out.
Their antenna whispers by the rivets holding his faceplate to his CPU, sensing the electrical pulses in his blinking lights and his static. Moon smells like the warmth of an overheated computer and afternoon naptimes on fresh linens and copper traces and lavender detergent.
“What are you supposed to say, Moon?” Dahlia asks, making sure every word has enough breath to glide against the most secretive aspects of his fragile computerdom and soul. “Say it. If you really want it, say it and mean it.”
“Dahlia,” Moon begins, voice lowered and deepened, crisp as the cool night even as his fans tick up in warmth. Beggingly and softly, he utters, “I am famished, Dahlia,” as if Dahlia were a god. God of food and wine and sex and insects and war and all things. Maker and unmaker, many-armed, many-armied, and before them now is an offer in exchange for his mercy.
“Oh, really?” Dahlia coos sweetly. “Well, a soldier needs to eat, doesn’t he? So he can get big and strong to defend that which is greater than himself?”
Moon reacts positively, face glowing, and a shy yet needy look enters his eyes. He prods back in a gravelly whisper, “I’m strong enough.”
“Are you?” Dahlia leans forward until their faces are a mere inch apart. Their egg pouch feels overly full, and Moon looks like just the right candidate to receive them from either end.
“Why? Am I not enough for you?” Moon grabs pitifully at Dahlia’s hands, and his knees are shaking as if Dahlia’s fucked him raw already. “I could fight for you. I could kill for you. I could seek revenge for you. It’s what I’m good for.”
Dahlia’s lips press against the back of Moon’s neck pipe, kissing each segment with every offer Moon gives him. “Could you pledge your body to me?”
Moon’s mouth opens. He’s silent. His fans pitch then settle, pitch then settle, stuttering like he’s panting for breath, like something truly, unmistakably alive in Dahlia’s grasp.
“Could you?” Dahlia peels his lips back, his teeth closing around the delicate wire with hardly any pressure.
Moon writhes, struggling against the secure hold and threatening teeth, whining like he’s on the cusp of orgasming right here, right now, just from this alone.
The anticipation and sensitivity of virgins is something else, Dahlia can’t help but think. Or perhaps this is something Moon-exclusive. Either way, he is such a delectable little thing. They want to grab him and have him right now, push him over the coffee table, and pound into him at brutal speeds, just because of how Moon’s hands are pawing cutely at his arms, so needy and desperate.
But Dahlia must be patient.
Moon is likely hardly even wet enough or stretched at all. His sensitivity is dialed up to eleven compared to other animatronics, his metal hungry from lack of contact, leaving him shivering and breaking beneath even the faintest touch. This isn’t sexual pleasure so much as the aftershocks of rippling overstimulation from a robot who has rarely ever been held gently. Gentle is unknown territory, and Moon’s programmed response is to take it as some form of an attack.
Dahlia needs to take things slow. Moon is like starlight and porcelain, new and shiny and breakable, never so much as ever been polished before, not by himself or anyone else.
They have their itinerary for the night, and it will be more rewarding if he waits and takes his time appraising Moon’s body inch by inch to its very first undoing.
“Pledge yourself to me and my cause, if you really mean it,” Dahlia whispers. He drags his thumb along Moon’s bottom lip. “Make yourself mine to do with whatever I please. Be it a soldier or… something else.”
Moon swallows thickly. Whatever doubt melts from his mind as Dahlia speaks, sloughing beneath the waves of arousal. “My body is yours.”
Dahlia smiles. “Then I name you small and pretty and all for me.”
“I’m not small and pretty, sir. I pledge myself a soldier to your cause—”
“A soldier? You? Is that what you think I wanted you for?” Dahlia laughs at him. He smacks Moon’s thigh hard enough to make him yelp at the unexpected contact. “You’re practically a cute little doll compared to me. I have no need for little tin men.”
“Then what!” Moon looks up at him like a pitiful, pathetic creature. “Tell me what!”
“You’re here for me to make beautiful, of course.”
“I don’t like frilly, girly stuff like that!”
“Oh? Really? But your cause thinks you would make such a pretty girl! I bet you’ve even thought of wearing pretty bras and panties before…”
“No! I haven’t!” Moon snaps, his face glowing hot from a mix of fake anger and arousal. “I-I wouldn’t!”
“No?” Dahlia’s hands slide up Moon’s chest, fingers playing at the hidden elastic along his shoulders. “Then there’s no possible way you could be wearing anything like that right now, surely, in secret?”
Moon shakes his head adamantly. “N-no! I’m not!”
“Hm.” Dahlia stares at Moon in pretend suspicion. “You seem too beautiful and too soft for that to be true.” Their hand squeezes the definitive padding on Moon’s chest, undeniably present, before they step back and move to grab the wine glass they hadn’t touched. “It can’t be only my imagination. This is not the make of a soldier, but a dainty princess.”
They wrap themselves back around Moon, hovering over him, and slowly pull the rim of the glass towards their mouth, but instead, they ‘accidentally’ pour some over Moon’s shoulder.
“Oops. Clumsy me! Oh, but it’s so delicious, I can’t possibly waste it. Luckily, you should work just as well as a wineglass.” Dahlia sticks out his tongue and drags it over the wet, black fabric, wine tasting directly off the turtleneck.
Moon whimpers, shuddering under his mouth, even with the layer of fabric between them to dull the touch.
They close their mouth around the fabric and suck. The taste of the wine feels dull and pointless beneath the delectable scent of Moon and whatever brand of detergent he uses. Dahlia finishes sucking what he can out of the fabric and nips at Moon’s shoulder through it.
Again, even with the layer between them, Moon whines as if Dahlia had just bitten him hard and directly. His metal is about as starved of touch as the shriveled stomach of one depraved of sustenance.
“You know, you don’t quite taste like a soldier to me. It’s much too…” Dahlia whispers against the side of his faceplate. “Fermented and feminine.”
They pull back, hook their finger into the collar of Moon’s turtleneck, and pour wine right down his backside.
Moon drops down with a pathetic whine, trying to get away from the cold trickle of it.
Dahlia’s knees drop to the floor, and he hunches over Moon’s back, licking wine from the collar of his turtleneck before taking it between his teeth. He makes sure Moon can hear every wet suck.
They move centimeter by centimeter along the dark trail downward, nursing wine directly from the fabric. Every spinal strut gets care and attention from what Dahlia remembers of the diagrams of Moon’s endoskeleton.
They pinch the nearly invisible line beneath the turtleneck and pluck delicately at the bra straps beneath. “I could swear you’re wearing something else beneath your shirt. There’s an almost familiar feeling to it… But there’s no way a big, strong soldier like you would lie to me about wearing a bra! No one who claims to be masculine would ever stoop so low, surely…?”
A half-suppressed moan slips out of Moon’s voicebox. “N-no. Of course not. You’re just imagining things. Like you said.”
“Hmm…” Dahlia reaches the end of the wet wine trail at the base of Moon’s spine and climbs back up. They pull Moon over before the charcuterie spread and then press him down until he joins Dahlia on his knees. They reach over him to grab a grape and a cheese cube from the wooden charcuterie board. He hovers it an inch before Moon’s mouth.
“I bet you really must be hungry,” Dahlia coos. “But I’m sure a man like you is very patient, isn’t he? Despite how pretty he tastes? And how small and cute?”
Instead of pressing it past Moon’s lips, Dahlia brings it toward his mouth instead, savoring the salty-sweet blend of dairy and fruit.
He can feel Moon swallow, jealousy and hunger and something hotter certainly twisting in his gut. He’s been fasting all day per Dahlia’s harsh instruction that he be hungry when he arrives and having them pluck another grape so they can eat it by first peeling the skin off with their teeth, right next to his audial, must be driving him crazy.
Dahlia drags his tongue back over the wet patch on Moon’s shoulder, then, with a long strip of grape skin peeled away, the flat of Dahlia’s tongue lathes the exposed, soft, nude flesh. When he finally puts it into his mouth, he crushes it in such a way that it squirts and dribbles down his chin and onto the dark wet section upon Moon’s collar.
Dahlia giggles at Moon’s disdain. “Tell you what. I have a fun idea.” With that, Dahlia stands and waves a hand shooingly at Moon. “Since you insist that you are so manly and fit to be my soldier, why don’t you stand over there at attention for me and wait like a good little tin man?” Dahlia’s white teeth flash wickedly at him. “Think you can do that?”
Moon stands from his hunched position, forced to walk over to the mat with his shirt all wet, fibers clinging uncomfortably to his metal.
Meanwhile, Dahlia drags his fingers down the table, walking down and perusing its offerings. His phantom touch lingers on Moon’s overly sensitive metal like static electricity.
He stands on the center of the mat, hands at his sides, feet together, chin up, gaze ahead. The over-masculine, stoic performance of a soldier is purposeful. Dahlia has spent a lifetime of obedience to a cause; it’s like his base programming (like the leftover fragments of a killcode). Servitude is a familiar aftertaste in his mouth, and Moon is hoping to wash away the old hunger and replace it with a new one.
He watches Dahlia’s every movement like a prey animal watches a predator once it goes noticed.
“The cause is hungry; it’s always hungry. But what to start with? Well, the wine, obviously. Oh, but pair it with what—that’s the true question. Let’s see… Dinner? Or dessert? It’s a difficult decision. I don’t particularly care for cheese… What do you think, private?” He tips his head into his hand and eyes Moon cheekily. “Oh, but of course you’ll go for the less sweet options because you’re a man, isn’t that right?”
His golden eyes flicker over the way Moon is standing at attention for him. His antenna perk upward, pale white pupils widening with hungry interest beneath perfect wings of eyeliner. The thought has Moon’s eyes wanting to flick toward the innocent-looking bag and makeup tote Dahlia brought with them, equal parts excited and nervous enough to make his hungry stomach churn, but he keeps his gaze ahead.
“I think I’ll have to forgo any cheese tonight. It doesn’t exactly favor me right now.” Dahlia’s voice sounds breathy and hurried. A little bit deeper, too, and a lot more wanting.
Moon cannot deny that the idea of skipping over the cheeses fills him with a sense of dread, and he hopes Dahlia is just saying that for the anticipation and not because he’s actually going to skip the cheeses. He was really hoping to try some of the more soft-ripened buttery ones tonight.
His mouth fills with saliva, and he swallows and licks his lips.
God, he’s so hungry, and he would be on the cusp of throwing a tantrum if it weren’t for the fact that he knows Dahlia will keep his word about ensuring he’s stuffed full before the end of the night, if Moon can handle making it that far. His inhibitions have been greatly impacted by the alcohol in his system, however, and he feels loose and floaty. Maybe needy, but he’s not sure how to identify it, unless it’s the way his abdomen clenches.
Dahlia dips his index finger directly into the bowl of warm chocolate and sticks it into his mouth, sucking it off. He hums in satisfaction. “Chocolate. I do enjoy chocolate. However…” Instead, he grabs a jar tied up with some cloth and twine. “I’m feeling peckish for honey, of course.”
Moon says nothing of it. He hates honey, but that’s the point; this is Dahlia’s pick to make, and it’s a highly on-brand choice, like their mark, calling card, or signature.
“Pâté. What do you think? Honey, Pâté, Malbec? Maybe I shall reward you with cheese after all, if you don’t mind the piquant blue cheese to pair with it.”
Ugh. Honey is so gross that it can even make cheese sound nasty.
“You call that standing at attention? You look like a girl. Weak and little. Is that what you are? A weak little girl?” Dahlia brings a glass of Malbec over with the honey and blue cheese and Pâté, leaning down to get in Moon’s face, eyes icy cold. “Get on your knees, private.”
Moon kneels while Dahlia sets the wine glass down on the floor out of the way.
“You’ll enjoy this.”
Dahlia knows he will not, in fact, enjoy it, no matter how he gently wafts the smell of the red towards himself and hums in appreciation. Or how delicately he drizzles honey onto the meat and cheese, careful not to spill (not yet).
“Open your mouth.”
Moon opens his mouth with the hopes that his submission will come with a reward. Maybe one of those super buttery cheeses that he actually wants to try.
The blue cheese and Pâté drizzled in honey get shoved directly against his molars, Dahlia’s fingers disappearing up to the second knuckles into the cavern of his mouth. He pushes against the inside of Moon’s cheek, holding it there so Moon can’t chew without risking biting him, long enough for the drool to pool and almost roll off Moon’s tongue.
Dahlia presses the pad of his thumb to the center of his pallet and holds it down. Moon stays carefully still, swallowing back spit and just… staying.
Dahlia’s thumb slowly drags down to the tip of his tongue, his fingers sliding out of Moon’s mouth, wet with drool, and sticky with honey following, until they at last make their exit.
Moon continues to stay, and he doesn’t start to chew until he’s instructed.
“Go ahead,” Dahlia permits. “Savor it. Show your cause your loyalty; show it how much you enjoy its kindness.”
Moon chews, forcing back a wince as the saccharine, sweet honey that he hates combines with the saltiness and pungency of Pâté and blue cheese, until it becomes a horrible paste.
Finally, Dahlia orders, “Swallow it.”
Moon swallows and miraculously doesn’t grimace in disgust.
Dahlia stirs and smells the wine in the glass before forcing Moon to smell next, then presses the rim against Moon’s mouth. “Drink this in one go, if you're man enough.”
Moon doesn’t like Malbec. Or most reds. This has been a perfect combination of all the things he personally hates, and Dahlia knows it. The spicy, juicy flavor of the wine makes him gag.
Fucking gross.
A few trickles of red come spilling out of the corners of his mouth to drip down the front of the turtleneck, though Moon manages to swallow the rest Dahlia forces down his gullet. He’s made to swallow the entire glass. It settles like battery acid in his stomach, and he blinks up at Dahlia, tears in his eyes from the sour tang, and takes in a vent of air for show rather than any real need to breathe.
Dahlia jerks Moon’s head hard enough by his chin that his neck smarts. “Tell me how delicious it was for you. Your cause wants to hear you appraise its choices.”
“No, it—it was great. Thanks.”
Dahlia chirrups pleasantly, then pulls Moon into a searing kiss, wine tasting directly off his lips. His tongue laps at the dribble of red at the corners of Moon’s mouth and on his chin, cleaning off the black half and silver crescent of his face.
“You’re right,” he breathes against Moon’s mouth. “Delicious. A bold saltiness washed away by fruitiness and spice. It all has a certain sharpness to it, yes? Though it doesn’t exactly match you, private. First, you lie in the face of your cause, then you don’t follow through with orders. I said to swallow all of it. Which means there is no man in front of me. I know what this is, and it’s no soldier loyal to his cause; this is the bossy little princess who ordered it to begin with from the comforts of her castle.”
The switch-up from sweet to cruel, honey to salty Pâté, makes Moon’s stomach drop and something in him squeeze. “Dahl—”
Yellow fingers jerk Moon by the collar close to Dahlia’s face, a gentle smile contrasting against the hard, golden glow of their eyes. “You think I didn’t notice? You are the cause of the cause; it knows your filthy, lying mouth because it was spoken into creation by it.”
“I-I’m not lying, sir—”
“I am beyond your worthless words. You’re going to keep that pretty mouth shut unless I tell it to—” Dahlia shoves more Pâté against his teeth, scraping the softer metal of Moon’s gums on his hard fingers—“open.”
He opens his mouth again, and Dahlia shoves the meat to the back of his throat without allowing him to chew, triggering Moon’s gag reflex and making him choke.
“Swallow your own filthy lie, princess,” Dahlia demands, knowing how much Moon is disgusted by the lonesome saltiness of it.
Moon swallows. It hurts a little going down.
“Do you enjoy the luxuries of that little bra you’re wearing?” Dahlia coos. “Pretty girl in a pretty tower with a pretty little pussy she’s been hiding?”
Moon shivers.
“I bet that little bra matches your underwear. Is that right? Are you enjoying a pair of soft little panties, too, hm?”
Moon shakes his head with a whimper, more tears gathering in his eyes.
“No? Oh, babydoll, always lying to my face and hurting my feelings. I know you’re enjoying the spoils of war while you watch the world burn all around you. It brings you a sense of deep satisfaction, doesn’t it?”
Dahlia strokes down Moon’s tongue with his pointer and middle fingers until he pushes them deep enough for him to gag again and holds his bottom jaw down, Moon’s mouth open wide for him.
“I figured you’d gag at the mere thought of my blood-soaked fingers entering your mouth. But, really, you’d suck on them all night if I wanted you to, wouldn’t you? I think you like the taste of violence, princess. Filthy, lying, deceitful girl. You lie even to yourself, don’t you?”
Dahlia pumps his fingers slowly, back and forth, over Moon’s tongue, watching his eyes get slowly more and more watery as he struggles not to dry heave.
“You’re going to look so cute, wrapped in silk and lace. You claim yourself to be a big, tough soldier, but the cause knows you better than you know yourself, and it’s telling you that if you’re going to be so pretty and weak, then you’re going to give back something strong in return to keep its aching fire stoked. You’re going to give me the soldiers of the future from your own loins.”
The words shoot that hot, weird, heavy sensation right to Moon’s sleeve, and he whines pathetically.
Dahlia’s eyes burn, like a hungry dragon’s belly full of fire. Like the burnt village. Like the sun.
“You’re going to be such a pretty mommy, all dolled up so you can be stuffed full of little soldiers just for me! All of them, for me! All of them, mine! To give you and to take from you!”
Finally, Dahlia withdraws his fingers, a line of spit following. He wipes his hand off on Moon’s turtleneck, then presses the flat of his palm against it, leaning into Moon’s audial to whisper.
“And do you want to know the best part?”
Moon shakes his head pathetically. “No, sir.”
“Poor, poor princess, the best part is that I can outgrow your will,” Dahlia hisses low and warning. “And I already have. You started the war, and you’re not going to be able to stop me once I’ve begun. I’m going to take from you and take from you. Until you lie ravaged and limp beneath the weight of me. But before that, how about a little reward for that pretty face you’re making? Here, princess, are your spoils. I think the high fat of goat cheese will pair wonderfully with a light and dry sparkling wine. What do you think?”
Moon nods drunkenly at the thought.
Dahlia kisses him on the jaw. “Little princess, so vain, so bloodhungry, so selfish.” He steps gracefully, swaying his hips on his way over to the spread. He runs his fingers down the table as he leans over the different cheese options. “Let’s see, here.” He pretends to mull this over in-depth. “Which one was it again? Oh, I can’t seem to remember…”
Moon swallows, watching as his hand lands on the right cheese, then flits away.
“Was it this one…?”
He grabs at the blue cheese again, and Moon whines, “Give it to me!”
“Spoiled rotten by the spoils of war.” Dahlia winks at Moon over his shoulder. “I’m only teasing, princess. Don’t worry. You get to have everything in the world before it all burns down.”
Maybe there’s some sick, twisted, killcode part of Moon that likes that thought, who would very much love to be lovely and weak and watch from a castle as the fires close in on all sides. The cause outgrows him. It will make and unmake him. Dress and undress him. Force his hand into bearing children to become heirs for his bloodied throne, and then just as quickly take them away.
Dahlia slips a cheese knife off the table and delicately cuts a slice of goat cheese, then grabs a glass of sparkling wine from the selection of flights. He returns to stand over where Moon is kneeling, forcing him to watch as they gingerly take a bite out of the cheese with a soft moan.
Moon seethes with jealousy. The cause takes. It is more selfish and powerful than he is, and he can do nothing about it but watch.
“Do you remember when I kissed you? I wanted rather terribly for you to reciprocate. But I think with the right incentive, I could receive some better results.” Dahlia takes another small bite of cheese before stooping down to pull Moon into a hot kiss. His tongue darts into Moon’s mouth, leaving the delectable taste of butter for him to chase.
Moon successfully pushes his tongue against Dahlia’s and retrieves a bit of his reward, swallowing quickly before it can be stolen back and then diving in for more. He searches desperately for every piece in Dahlia’s mouth, the wet brush of their tongues, the careful closing of their mouths so nothing is lost between transfers.
There is nothing more ruthless than the whim of a princess and the war she set in motion along the way, and the war gives her all she could have ever wanted. The war is bloody, beautiful, powerful, and strong, like an endless natural disaster, just like she wanted to prove herself to be.
In reality, she is weak, pathetic, selfish, and evil.
She never loved the man she slaughtered to enact this entire thing. She loved only what came after.
Dahlia pulls away to take another bite from the slice, chews, and his mouth meets Moon’s again, each of them hungry for something different yet enjoying the exchange just the same.
After several minutes, Dahlia pops the last bit of cheese into his mouth and stands up, turning away from Moon before he can steal more morsels. Instead, he chews the remainder and swallows it himself, then takes a sip of white sparkling wine.
Dahlia downs the whole glass and sets it beside the other empty one on the floor.
“Do you understand?” he pants. “I’m only here because of the depravity you hide beneath your shadowed guise of being a soldier and a worthy, respectable leader. In the jowls of war, gold flows, princess. And it tastes like blood.”
“It’s delicious.” Moon heaves breathlessly, warm and flushed and satisfied, and he might not mind trying it again without the incentive.
Dahlia takes in his open and flushed expression, more than happy with what he sees. “Look at those pretty eyes. Well, you had your reward for being a good girl. I would like one as well. I get hungry, too, you know.” He slowly starts to undress, reaching first for the claps of his dress. It falls to the floor in a pool of green, like the leaves themselves all snuffed out beneath a yellow blaze.
What remains is the black beneath, like old blood woven into lace, adorning the marred body of War.
Dahlia gently grabs hold of Moon’s waist and presses him back.
Moon starts to lower himself into a proper sit.
Dahlia pushes him down and down until his back meets the floor, then he grabs Moon’s wrists and pins them above his head, settling them so Moon’s left hand holds onto his right wrist, fists relaxed. To arms. To arms. To arms.
“Legs down. Lay them flat.” Dahlia’s tarsus spreads Moon’s legs apart with less than gentle kicks. “Further. Further. There. That’s how I want you, sweetheart.” It’s open and makes Moon feel vulnerable, all his vitals on display, every sensitive and soft part of him, ripe to kick if Dahlia so chooses.
Dahlia steps carefully forward and stands directly over Moon’s face. They look like a skyscraper like this, towering over him. They unscrew the jar of honey, take the little stick and dip it greedily, scooping out what they want and leaving the excess to fall over.
It dribbles over his hands, his fingers getting sticky, and Moon watches the gold flow and drip, drip, drip slowly down until he feels something sticky land on his face.
Dahlia raises the honey stick, tilting his head way up, arching his back, and pressing his chest upwards in a beautiful display of strength. His long tongue gathers around the end of the stick, lapping up everything it oozes and moaning at the taste. War takes everything and leaves only droplets in its wake.
Moon watches him suck and lick, the squelch of his lips and the sound of his swallowing a pure sin to fill the otherwise quiet bunker.
Dahlia drags the end of the stick over the flat of his tongue, then holds the jar over his mouth like he’s going to let the whole thing pour down his throat.
Instead, last minute, he holds the jar over Moon’s chest and lets it pour directly over him, coating him in the meager remainder of the wealth from the emptied honeypot.
It feels weird and sticky and weighted, clinging to the fibers of his turtleneck. Moon writhes in discomfort. He wants to wipe it off, yet also run his hands through it, drag the room-temperature ooze through his fingers like its sensory slime, but he holds himself unmoving on the floor at the mercy of his own monster.
It’s degrading, humiliating, both a complete sensory hell and utter sensory bliss, and makes Moon feel small and vulnerable. He deserves it; it’s recompense to be drizzled over and played with like food by the maker of famine itself, and that thought makes his head feel impossibly fuzzier and tightens that free-falling knot in his abdomen.
It feels exactly as good as he feared…
Dahlia swallows the mouthful of sticky gold before dropping the jar from his hand. It clatters onto the large plastic sheet covering the hard floor, dropping like a bombshell. They take a few slow steps back and drop into a crouch, hovering over Moon’s stomach.
He laps the spillage off the fabric of the turtleneck, dragging his tongue from Moon’s navel to his chest. He swallows.
“Delicious.” Dahlia slaps his sticky hands onto the plastic sheet, either side of Moon’s head, their faces inches apart. Gold trails drip off Dahlia’s chin and onto Moon’s mouth, which he keeps carefully closed so as not to consume any of it.
“Yellow.”
Dahlia freezes at once, some semblance of himself returning to his golden eyes. He raises himself off Moon, concerned. “What is it?” he asks, his voice dropping to a softer register. “Are you okay?”
“I think… I just have a question.”
“…Alright. Go ahead.” The gentleness after so long of Dahlia playing his character makes Moon pause, a little bit put off by the change in tone. He almost forgot Dahlia is sweet beneath his marred exoskeleton.
“D-do I want to know if any of this is real? You made it up, right?”
Dahlia sits up, laughing softly. “Yes, Moon. This is fiction. Make-believe.”
“It doesn’t make you weirded out at all, does it?”
A pale-yellow hand runs over Dahlia’s antenna. “It doesn’t, but… Maybe it should. Trauma makes you a little weird in the head, however.”
“Don’t I know it,” Moon sighs. “Alright. One more question. W-where did this honey come from? When you were texting me the story, and, like, saying it was meant to represent some… symbolic thing. Like… ‘death spreading its seed’ or—or—look. That’s not cum, right? You’re not pouring cum on me, are you?”
Dahlia throws his head back, cackling. “No, no! It’s not! I-I take care of bees! I’m so sorry for not clarifying!” They shake their head, giggling behind their sticky hands. “No, it is not cum! Goodness! I mean, look, this was a rather sizeable jar—not that I think I can’t fill it, especially once you consider the eggs—but I—Did I weird you out? We can step back, if you want.”
“No, no! I just—I was just wondering.” Moon laughs and turns his flushed face slightly away, feeling a little dizzy. He tries to peel one of his arms off the plastic sheet, but it comes up with his metal. He flops the arm back down, giving up on that task for now. “The alcohol is starting to kick in, I think. Um, green. We can keep going.”
“I will say this…” The plastic crinkles as Dahlia’s sticky hands peel away from it to instead grip Moon’s collar. “Honey to my species is potent stuff, you know. What takes you four glasses of wine takes only a jar of honey for me.” Dahlia grins down at him, swaying a little, flushing past their rosy makeup blush. “If I start now, I might not be able to stop. Not until I’ve had you in every position I can think of, devoured you until I’m satisfied, and stuffed you full from both ends.”
Moon swallows thickly, arousal heady and thick.
Dahlia taps him on the nose, leaving a goopy dollop of gold behind. “I really want to dress you up already. Here. We haven’t had much to eat yet. Take a bit of a breather with me.”
“Uh, can you—”
Dahlia tilts his head.
“I-I liked it, actually, when you kissed me with cheese in your mouth.”
Dahlia smiles at him with lidded, hazy eyes. “Did you! I’m very happy about that, actually. Here! Lemme…” He stands, tipping and stumbling to the left before he gathers his legs under himself.
“Holy shit, you really are drunk off your ass on honey!”
“Mmmm-hmmm,” Dahlia giggles. “Mushrooms are weak shit to me in comparison.” He collects the bowl of white chocolate from the melting pot, strawberries, and some crackers from the table. He returns, drops clumsily to his knees, and places a cracker between his teeth.
He leans down so Moon can bite the other half off.
They each chew their respective pieces while Dahlia drips a strawberry into the chocolate and licks it sensually off the red flesh of the fruit. He then sticks it between his teeth and leans down so Moon can bite the other half.
They share strawberries between them in this way, lips and teeth brushing.
Dahlia always eats the top part with the leaves. Moon wants to comment on it, but 1.) he doesn’t care to ask right this second, because he’s finally being fed properly, and 2.) it seems like Dahlia enjoys the leaves.
Dahlia swipes a bit of honey from Moon’s chest for the next strawberry. They chew their halves before Dahlia kisses Moon again, pushing the chewed-up nectar into his mouth. Moon laps up and swallows every morsel.
Dahlia sits back, takes Moon’s hand, and drops it in a bowl of warm white chocolate. He pulls Moon’s digits towards his mouth, letting the chocolate roll down and drip onto their naked thighs.
Moon watches, raptly, as he makes a mess of himself before he sticks Moon’s coated fingers into his mouth and sucks.
Dahlia’s purple tongue circles around his digits and between, odd and sensual, making Moon shudder. His antenna bobs as he moves his head up and down.
Moon’s gut clenches, and he can feel the slick gathering between his legs. His knees want to come together, but he keeps them spread out exactly where they are, open and vulnerable and shameful.
Dahlia pulls off Moon’s fingers with a wet pop and holds the bowl over his mouth, tipping it back. Chocolate drips into his wide-open mouth and pours out like a flood, white coating his chest, spilling all over his front.
Dahlia sets the dripping bowl aside, and the excess rolls down his chin. He swallows the cheekfuls of sugar in one big gulp, then sticks his tongue out to show Moon his empty mouth in a pornographic display of depravity.
Their jaws shut with a click and a flash of canines. Dahlia hums, giggles, and leans over Moon, white chocolate and honey making their knees and hands stick to the plastic sheet. “Mmm. What a mess…”
Dahlia’s left hand lands beside Moon’s chest on the sheet, his right dragging through and mixing the substances, carding over the turtleneck and spreading the oversweet mixture all the way up to Moon’s collar, letting it slough over and onto the pipe of his throat. Moon shivers at the sensation.
Dahlia’s hand keeps moving up until he presses his palm directly over Moon’s faceplate and drags his fingers like he’s raking his nonexistent claws down it, leaving five white streaks along Moon’s face.
“You paint a pretty picture, like this. Maybe one day, it can be something else that paints your visage. What do you think about being used like that? Carmine and I, perhaps, using your mouth for our pleasure and granting it something else to swallow? Both of us are patient. We’d be willing to wait our turn.”
Dahlia drags his hands down over his own face, like wiping war paint down his cheeks, trailing his fingers to his neck, over his chest, waist, hips, and stopping at his thighs with a long, sensual moan.
Again, the display is so pornographic, so filthy, that Moon can’t help but stare in a sort of mesmerized awe.
“What do you think, princess? Or would you prefer we take turns filling your pretty pussy instead?” War returns a bit drunker than before, and Moon affixes himself back into the role of its poor, intoxicated princess.
“No, sir, I don’t have a pussy. I’m not a girl…” Moon slurs.
“You want to bet on that, do you? And what do I get if I peel off your panties and find a wet cunt underneath, hm?” Dahlia grabs his wrists and presses them on either side of Moon's head. “Let’s take a look, shall we? Knees up, princess!”
Moon drags his knees up to rest on either side of Dahlia’s hips.
“Good girl. Now strip. These clothes are hardly pretty enough for a doll like you.”
Moon hesitates, then shakes his head. “No, sir. Please. I don’t want you to look…”
Dahlia’s fingers grab onto his chin. “Strip,” he says, dangerously cold. “Go on. Do it.”
Moon’s thumbs hook slowly into his pants, and he feigns being small and frightened and defenseless while Dahlia’s gaze zeroes in on him, watching his every move.
Dahlia slaps him on the cheek impatiently, not hard, but not soft, either. “Hurry up.”
Moon drags the waistband of his pants achingly slow downwards. He raises his hips, shimmying his pants down his thighs, then down his knees, maneuvering around Dahlia’s body so he can kick them off, revealing the lacy black panties beneath.
Dahlia hums, shuffling downwards to press his thumbs into Moon’s hips and kiss his pelvic bone. Moon arches into his mouth.
“Ohhh, look at that! Is this for me?”
Moon trembles, nervous yet also excited, as Dahlia pulls his knees apart. Once they’re successfully spread, he drags his hand up under Moon’s shirt again.
Moon burns all over as Dahlia’s hand finds the soft lace and padding on his chest, slightly wet from the wine and what leaks through his turtleneck of honey and white chocolate.
“Oh,” Dahlia breathes, peeling the sticky black fabric up to reveal the lacy black bra that matches the underwear. Just when Moon didn’t think he could get more aroused, Dahlia groans and drops his face onto Moon’s stomach, looking up at him like he’s the entire world. “Filthy fucking liar. Look what I’ve found. You really are my little princess, aren’t you, baby?”
Dahlia drinks the look of him in, Moon in his lacy, black bra and panties and tight-fitting black turtleneck, drenched in a mess of honey and white chocolate and lying spread willfully across the plastic on the floor.
His hands drag beneath Moon’s shirt, trailing the saccharine stickiness over his stomach. The combined fluids heighten the feeling of his warm touch, and Moon arches into the contact with a drawn-out whine. It’s just a hair off from being too much contact and yet, at the same time, not enough.
“I’m going to check how wet you are, beautiful,” Dahlia whispers against his ear.
Moon only whimpers, reduced to wordlessness; otherwise, he’s going to start stuttering as badly as Sun.
Fuck, fuck if Sun saw him right now, doing this, he’d never live it down! He’d die on the spot! He’s such a hypocrite! Such a shameful, disgusting—!
Dahlia slips his hand into his underwear, and Moon feels the sticky intrusion of his fingers contrasting with the slide of his slick.
Dahlia slowly dips a finger in.
Moon hisses, closing his legs tight and slapping his hands over his eyes. “Stop! Don’t!”
“Quiet.” Dahlia growls and smacks his thigh with his sticky hand, hard, silencing Moon’s protests at once. He will not stop, just like they agreed. He would take and take unless Moon used their stoplight system.
He reaches over and grabs a bottle placed nearby on the mat by Moon. He snaps open the lid and pours a generous amount of clear lube over his fingers, rubbing it between them so it warms up a little.
“There, you spoiled lil’ brat. Might work a bit better than honey and white chocolate, I s’ppose…”
Even with them drunk and fumbling through their roles, and Dahlia’s hands are growing increasingly more unsteady, he still waits for Moon to vent and relax before he inserts his finger again, and the intrusion is easier this time.
Moon grunts and arches, biting down on his bottom lip at the sensation of something entering him for the first time.
So that’s what that feels like. Fuck…
He looks down to see that Dahlia’s slick and precum have leaked right through the thin, lacy material of their own lacy black panties. He watches desperately as he inserts another slick finger, forcibly stretching Moon and pulling a longer wine from his throat.
He can take the momentary pain and even finds some relief in being filled after this much teasing, but he can’t help squirming, heels digging into Dahlia’s thighs. “It’s a lot,” he gasps, breaking character.
Dahlia’s fingers stop, letting Moon merely sit with the feeling of fullness. “Are you alright?”
Moon flushes and looks away. “Can you slow down?”
“Of course. Vent. Relax all the tension right here for me.” Dahlia taps Moon’s abdomen.
Their fingers retreat, the pressure in Moon’s sleeve departing to give him some more time to breathe and unwind.
Dahlia squeezes more clear lube onto his fingers and re-enters, slower, with only one finger again. They stroke gently, barely an inch or two into the sleeve.
Moon tenses, fingers curling into tight fists against the sticky, filthied plastic sheet he’s lying on. The stickiness clings to him. It feels like he’s been dumped in a vat of tar, and there’s something truly perfect as Dahlia leans over him to lap at his caramelized neck, moaning like he’s lapping at something truly delectable, finger still leisurely stroking against his most sensitive nodes.
His head drops flat onto the plastic, joints unwinding with a subtle creak of gears releasing as they no longer strain against themselves, and he limpens.
“Good, very good,” Dahlia whispers against his ear as the wet sleeve stops clenching so tight on his digit, allowing him to add the second finger again without pain this time.
The fingers drag with a come-hither motion, stroking the sensitive nodes in the top of Moon’s sleeve and making him feel like his stomach is doing somersaults. Moon’s optics close, mouth open and lax, as he clings to the sensation, riding the warm haze it blankets over his frame.
He can feel every drag right to the tips of his fingertips like sparks of pleasurable electricity.
Dahlia spreads his fingers, scissoring him open slowly, further and further, until the movement stops as he carefully inserts a third.
The stretch feels much better. Arousing. Enjoyable.
Dahlia reaches deeper, stroking Moon meticulously and expertly, the pleasure building higher.
Moon’s brow pinches, and the husky, breathy “Don’t stop” that exits his voicebox sounds like it belongs to another animatronic entirely, too high-pitched and whiney to possibly belong to him, surely…
“Are you going to cum?” Dahlia pants.
Moon cracks his eyes open, staring up at Dahlia, who has apparently been watching his every minute expression and twitch with intense hunger.
Moon doesn’t know how to answer the question. He doesn’t know what that feels like, though he can sense his body twitching through the throes of pleasure, gradually rising and rising—he just doesn’t know when it’s going to stop rising.
The squelch of Dahlia’s fingers inside of him, the way his eyes glow down at Moon like he’s something to be eaten, wrapped in sticky sugar and, and—oh, oh, oh—there, there, there, right there! The ledge, the end, something—!
His sleeve tightens so impossibly perfect on Dahlia’s fingers. Moon squeezes his optics shut, shuddering with a short, high-pitched cry.
Dahlia dares to coo at him like he finds witnessing Moon’s first orgasm cute, and if his fingers weren’t so fucking delicious in how they slow down and continue pulling thrills of pleasure from Moon’s circuitry, Moon might have something to say about that, but—
He’s so good, so good, so good—!
Shit, shit, shit—!
“Dahlia,” Moon sobs, as the pleasure grows teeth and gnaws him open. The word to advance to the next scene spills off his tongue, “I’m not sustenance!”
Dahlia withdraws his fingers from his entrance.
“Oh, but aren’t you?” Dahlia hisses cruelly. His other hand quickly collects Moon’s hands and pins them above his head when he starts trying to push him off, leaning his weight into them. He strikes Moon across the face harder than the other times, earning a shout of pain.
“I highly recommend you sit still and let me fuck you before I start getting impatient.”
“Stop it! Stop it!” Moon cries, wriggling to no avail.
“And here I thought you’d be a good little toy, but I guess you still haven’t gotten it through your head.” Still holding Moon pinned in place by his arms, Dahlia reaches for a glass of red wine and starts spilling it over Moon’s face.
Moon coughs and gags as it enters his fans. He sputters, and his body writhes more earnestly. There’s something grossly thrilling about it, and he can feel his guts continue to twist as Dahlia treats him as less than nothing, as a thing to pin in place and use however he wants, his little princess to defile and make filthy and sticky and disgusting at his whim, to order around for his pleasure.
The icy cold, red nectar pours down his chest, over his arms, down his stomach and crotch and legs.
Red, red surrounding him like blood, like his own viscera. The dredges of Moon’s killcode reel, gnashing its teeth.
He is only food; he is Dahlia’s food. Sustenance. Moon stares hazily up at the ceiling like a filled porcelain plate placed onto a plastic tablecloth. Sustenance.
A princess served rare. To be eaten away by her own cause.
The wineglass lands on the plastic sheet by the clothes with a hollow clamor, crystalline rolling away out of view as Dahlia’s hands and knees splatter into the concoction they’ve made, and splashes over Moon to crawl back over him.
He pulls down his panties just enough to remove his squirming ovipositor, so desperate for friction, he almost can’t pry it off his own hands, so he can guide it to the spread of Moon’s body. It's oozing precum joints the puddles on the floor.
“Yellow.”
Dahlia stops again with a long, pained groan. “Moooon! Ffffuck!” Dahlia sits back on the balls of his feet, swaying in place. “What is it? What do you need? I’ll get you anything if you let me fuck you. I’ll take your thighs, even; I’ll rut against your shoe; Moon, please, gods, anything!”
Moon smirks at being able to have this kind of power over Dahlia. Here he is drunk and wanting nothing more than to fuck Moon into tomorrow, but at a single word, he has to stop everything he’s doing. Moon’s the one in control. He planned most of the night, and somehow that didn’t click in his fuzzy processor until just now.
He blinks up at Dahlia prettily. “Your princess feels filthy and not much like a princess, Dahlia.”
“What, do you want glass slippers? A real castle? A pony?” Dahlia rambles, eyes darting to the ceiling while they think through the arousal and brain fog.
Now, Moon starts to feel shy. His eyes dart toward the makeup kit.
Dahlia perks up, eyes widening, excitement managing to pierce past their disheveled state. “Dress up? You want me to—?”
“I feel like we’ve fucked around with food long enough, right? This turtleneck is starting to feel really gross, so…”
Dahlia stands straight, uttering a spell that backfires and causes a puff of smoke that makes them cough. They wave the smoke away from their face. “My fault! Slurred my words.” They try again, and this time come out of it squeaky clean, honey and white chocolate and other fluids removed from their body, though they remain straining against their lace black panties.
“You, on the other hand…” They look at him sharply and speak another short spell.
Moon suddenly finds himself shot off the ground, scooped up in a golden bubble. “HEY!”
Dahlia floats him over to where Moon had pointed out where the bathroom was, throws back the shower curtains, and dumps Moon into the porcelain tub.
Moon sputters as Dahlia turns on the tap directly on his faceplate and sits up, the cold water immediately sobering him. “YOU ASSHOLE—!”
Dahlia pushes him back down into the tub, pinning Moon in place beneath the tap like he’s waterboarding him. “You don’t need to breathe for real. You’re fine.”
“Still!” Moon’s voice sounds out of the voicebox in his chest. “Not cool! Also, you’re getting my turtleneck and underwear all wet!”
“They were all filthy anyway. And I have a much better outfit for you.” Dahlia pulls the turtleneck over Moon’s head, then unclasps the bra. It gets tossed to the other end of the tub with the turtleneck.
At last, the panties are pulled down Moon’s legs, leaving him fully bared.
At the sight of the sopping wet dark blue sleeve, leaking a mix of slick, honey, white chocolate, and lube, Dahlia can’t help but grab Moon’s knees and press them to either side of the tub before slowly dragging his hands down his inner thighs.
Their thumbs pull the folds apart, Dahlia taking a good, long look and making Moon feel vulnerable and small beneath him.
Moon sits off to the side of the faucet, water rushing down over his shoulder as he asks, teasingly, “What, you want a taste?”
“When you’re less of a mess, maybe.” Dahlia grabs a bar of soap, lathers a rough rag, and starts scrubbing Moon free of white chocolate, wine, and honey.
Impatient as ever, Moon gripes, “Couldn’t you have just magicked me clean like you did for yourself?”
“Sadly, that spell only works on men. Not pretty little princesses.”
Moon hates how that comment shoots right to his cunt. “Oh, you piece of shi—!”
Dahlia shoves his faceplate back under the water and scrubs hard until there’s no residue left. He wipes down every part of Moon’s front, leaving nothing untouched, before grabbing Moon roughly by the shoulders and pinning him onto his stomach at the bottom of the tub.
Manhandled and embarrassed and aroused, Moon whines at an annoying pitch, “Dahliaaaaa!”
“Oh, hush,” Dahlia snaps, scrubbing down his backside. “Do you want to be beautiful or not?”
Moon grumbles, letting Dahlia finish cleaning him off.
Once he’s done, Dahlia pulls him up, lets the tub drain, and rinses him off with the showerhead one last time.
He has Moon sit on the edge of the tub, wrapped in a towel, another in hand so he can drag the soft fabric of it over his legs, trying to polish up the seams, without any real success. A faint sugary stickiness still shines on the inside of the joints.
Dahlia leans down and kisses Moon’s knee, hands dragging up his metal calf. Their gentle, purple tongue drags against the metal joint, licking at the crystallized sugar.
Moon sits inhumanely still, making sure not to pinch the softness of their mouth as they close their lips around the joint and suck, pulling more stuck sugar from the ball joints. It’s not part of the script, but Moon doesn’t really give a fuck right now.
“Dahlia. Can I cock warm you while you put my makeup on?”
Dahlia hums with need, the vibrations echoing up Moon’s metal and causing him to shiver. Their mouth comes off his knee joint with a wet pop. “Yes.”
They scoop Moon into their arms and carry him out of the bathroom, leaving the sopping wet turtleneck, bra, and panties in the tub. Instead, they grab their bag and makeup kit, drag them into the room, and set them at the foot of the bed.
Moon watches as Dahlia hurriedly unzips his bag, only to pause and look at him, “Close your eyes.”
Moon does.
He can hear Dahlia as they shuffle around him, and the whisper of silken fabric against itself.
Hands find his shoulders and slowly caress down his arms, the sensation heightened without his vision to rely on. Once they reach the ends of his hands, ruffled straps pushed over them and slide sensually from his wrists, up his elbows, and onto his shoulders.
Dahlia moves silently around him, reaching behind his back and pulling the clasps together.
The bra feels silky and smooth. Not one of those bras with a lot of wire and scratchy parts. It feels like Dahlia had considered what would annoy him and overstimulate him, and Moon is sure he glows bright at the realization. His hand is grabbed again, and something else slipped individually onto his arms, stopping at his bicep.
“Beautiful,” Dahlia whispers against his ear, lithe fingers gently carding Moon’s hat off his head and fitting something else on top of it.
Something frilly gets tied around his slip of a waist, the ruffled edges brushing Moon’s thighs. Dahlia moves down, slips off each of his belled shoes, and sets them aside.
“Raise your right foot, princess.”
Moon does, allowing Dahlia to pull what he can only assume is a thigh garter up above his knee.
“Now your right. There we go. Oh, such a good little princess for me. Don’t you look pretty? So delicate and perfect?” Dahlia scoops him up again, the unexpected and sudden contact making Moon squeak. “You want to sit on my cock while I put your pretty makeup on, sweet thing? Hm? Is that what you wanted?”
Moon tries to look up at him. “D-Dahlia—”
“No, no, gorgeous. Keep your eyes closed. I want it to be a surprise.”
They sit on the edge of the sheets and pull Moon directly onto their lap, his silvery thighs on either side of their hips, making Moon plainly aware of the bulge in their panties as they lie out various products and swatches and kits.
A pair of warm, magically conjured secondary hands settle on Moon’s ass, pulling him tantalizingly close. The arms work to keep Moon from sliding off Dahlia’s lap and to give him some light to work with in this lightless den of a bunker Moon has fashioned.
“I’ll have to skip some of my usual steps. I don’t think metal exactly needs to be moisturized.” Dahlia says in a sultry hush. Now that they’re actually in the bedroom and Moon is pressed so close to him, this has taken a much more intimate tone. “But don’t worry, I’ll still make sure you’re pretty as can be. So you can suit my tastes perfectly.”
“…Promise?” Moon grinds down against the bulge between his legs, dragging a half-swallowed moan from Dahlia’s throat.
“Promise, babydoll.”
There’s a squelch of a lube bottle, then a hand slips between them, and Moon can feel the heat of it as it strokes up and down over Dahlia’s cock, coating it.
“Are you ready?”
Moon nods quickly and needily. What he can only assume is an apron pulled up so Dahlia can feed the tip of his slickened cock inside of his tight cunt.
Moon pants at the size of it. Fuck, it feels good. Big and hard, though the skin is strangely soft.
He steadies himself using Dahlia’s shoulders, all four of their hands working to hold him in place and keep him from dropping down faster than he can handle.
“Slowly,” Dahlia warns him. “Don’t get impatient.”
Moon’s sleeve is filled centimeter by centimeter, until it feels like Dahlia is touching the end of his stomach hatch, and that’s where things start to get a bit too intense. Moon winces, and Dahlia stops at once, rubbing circles into his hips.
“You’re okay. Relax. Almost there.”
The tension settles after Moon sits still a moment, venting. “I’m good.”
“Good job,” Dahlia appraises sweetly, making him shiver.
The last two inches slide in, Moon sitting directly on Dahlia’s lap once more, perfectly full. He sets his hands on Dahlia’s shoulders and relaxes just before Dahlia scoots further back on the bed without warning, pulling Moon with him. He keeps him steady with his four hands so as not to jostle and press up into him too hard, but the movement still causes a spark of pleasure-pain to thread up Moon’s sleeve.
He hisses at the sensation, clawing at Dahlia’s shoulders.
“Sorry,” Dahlia apologizes. “Still adjusting?”
“A-a little…”
“I’m going to take my time, don’t worry. I won’t have to move again until I’m done, so you can just sit and get comfortable until I’m finished.”
Moon adjusts his knees and carefully wiggles on Dahlia’s lap until he’s comfortable.
Once they’re both ready, there’s a soft clatter as Dahlia rummages through his makeup. Every one of his little shuffles and grabs makes his cock twitch in Moon’s sleeve. It’s drool-inducing. Moon can feel the heat of him, every little throb and ridge.
A hand grabs the bottom of his chin gently, keeping his head in place. “Open your mouth slightly.”
Moon swallows back saliva, feeling something sort of waxy press against his lips.
Dahlia does indeed take his time, applying different products and powders and things Moon doesn’t know the names of because cosmetology doesn’t exist anywhere within the realms of his knowledge base.
All he knows is that every little soft brush tickles, every touch sends shivers through his circuits, every instruction to part his lips, roll his eyes up, or tilt his head has him panting, and cooed words of appraisal shoot right to his sleeve and have it twitching around the hot intrusion between his legs.
The hands cupping his ass squeeze, and Dahlia apologizes, saying it’s because he started slipping off his lap, but they both know that’s bullshit. Really, he just likes the occasional heady blast of hot air it pulls from Moon’s fans.
Moon is certain he’s turned into honey himself, the way his body melts. He’s sure made a sticky, wet mess of Dahlia’s thighs...
He’s not sure if Dahlia is aware he’s started doing it, but his hips give subtle twitches, pressing himself up into the back of Moon’s sleeve and making the sensors light up and throb with need.
He finds himself right back on the edge, straddling the line.
Dahlia feels so good.
Moon doesn’t know if he’ll ever get over it. The throbbing heat and the musk and the building pressure.
“Like a little doll,” Dahlia whispers, leaning back to appreciate his own work. “Look at me, Moon.”
Moon opens his eyes, finally meeting Dahlia’s golden gaze as they drink him in beneath dark lashes. His expression is so adoring, so hungry, as he runs his gaze savoringly over Moon’s body.
Moon’s hips stutter downward, hands gripping Dahlia’s shoulders tight. Fuck, I want him; I need him to—!
Something he’s only ever thought of as the desire for violence scrapes at his code, a low growl escaping him, but Moon knows it is not violence. It’s addictive like violence. It salivates like the bloodhunger of violence, but that’s not what it is. It’s a need. A filthy, depraved need.
“Fuck me,” he says. “Fuck me right now.”
Dahlia hums, a finger tapping at the side of their cheek. “Well now, that doesn’t sound very lady-like, does it?” Dahlia grabs Moon’s face and jerks it towards where a mirror sits in the corner of the bedroom. “You tell me: does that sound like something a pretty little princess like her would say? Hm?”
The maid’s ruffled, white headband on Moon’s head, with its little pink bows, pairs with a light pink bralette with its white, ruffled straps upon his chest, like delicacy wrapping delicacy. The cutesy, bright pink bow upon the frilled white collar around the base of Moon’s throat would make for a beautiful, silken handhold, if necessary.
Ruffled pink cuffs upon each delicate upper arm, and a white apron that looks like a skirt, but leaves nothing to the imagination. A white thigh garter decorates the long, silver length of Moon’s right upper thigh.
The maid in the mirror’s makeup is pink, glossy, glittery, and soft.
He looks like fragile cherry blossoms falling on a silvery, moonlit night.
Moon’s guarded edge drops beneath the heat that rises in his gut as his fingers rub at the ruffles on the apron. He’s so adorable, like a little doll, just like Dahlia said.
“No,” he mumbles, “she wouldn’t, probably.”
Dahlia watches them in the mirror as the distance closes between them, the soft princess perched on his lap with his cock deep inside of her as he whispers, “What do you think a lady as pretty as her would be saying?”
“She would never find herself being fucked over by anybody,” Moon says haughtily. “She’s really too good for you, but she’ll make do, I guess.”
“I suppose I shall make do as well. I don’t really care if you’re lady-like; I like your filthy mouth. It’s the reason this whole thing started in the first place.” Dahlia turns away from the princess in the mirror to look up at Moon. “I want you.”
Moon looks appalled that he would say such a thing.
Dahlia continues with their groveling. “I need you, Moon. Like this. Like perfection. Like everything I could have ever dreamed of.” Their war-calloused hands clutch gently at the frilly hem of Moon’s skirt, his flustered face next to Dahlia’s own darkened, lustful gaze, peeking over the small curve of Moon’s shoulder, and the back of the pretty, frilly white and pink bralette. Moon is fucking pretty. So beautiful, so perfect, so delectable— “I want to raise you to queen status.”
Moon’s expression is a cross of dumbfounded and intrigued.
Slowly, his hand brushes the top of Dahlia’s head, pressing down his antenna and petals, the warmth of their body felt even through his exoskeleton.
Dahlia chirrups and leans into his soft petting. “Please?”
Their gazes remain hooked in the mirror, Dahlia witnessing as their own hands curl around Moon’s ass.
“Do you want to watch in the reflection?” Moon asks.
The question pulls a moan past Dahlia’s slightly parted lips. “Yes.”
Dahlia grabs Moon, plucking him from off his lap and standing straight.
“What the hell! Don’t drop me!” Moon yelps, wrapping his arms and legs tight around Dahlia’s hips and shoulders.
“I’m not going to drop you. I’m just moving you into a better position.”
He lies Moon down in the center of the bedspread, his head pointed toward the mirror in the corner of the room, and crawls over him, setting his upper two hands by the side of Moon’s head and releasing the spell on the lower pair. It’s for the best. Moon likely wouldn’t do well beneath the attention of four hands, given how he’s already rolled himself into a protective ball the moment he touched the sheets.
“Is this okay?”
Moon looks up at him with wide eyes. “Um…”
Dahlia backs off, sitting back on his haunches. “Moon? Are you sure you still want to do this? You look actually terrified right now.”
“I’m not! I just… Now we’re past the weird fuck-ass roleplay and getting into the real stuff, so… I don’t know.”
“I did promise not to hurt you. You should be well stretched and wet enough by now that this shouldn’t hurt. And if it does, you have the stoplight system.”
“I don’t—! Look, I just wasn’t expecting you to look that… big, hovering over me like that.”
“I can lie down, and you can have more control from the top?”
“You sure about that? I won’t know what to do up there.”
“I can still instruct you from the bottom. Don’t worry.”
Moon hesitates, and Dahlia gets the sense there’s something more to Moon’s refusal to get on top of him. He finds himself proven correct on that front when Moon wiggles deeper into the pillows with a little sigh. “I don’t wanna get up. It’s comfy on the bed…”
Ah.
“So, in your notes, when you wrote ‘lead at this part’, what you really meant was, ‘Dahlia, please do all the work’?”
“Yup.”
Dahlia pauses, things clicking into place in his head. “Princess,” they repeat, astounded. “That’s what you really are—a pillow princess.”
“Dude. How are you just realizing that? You’ve been doing all the work this whole time.”
“Don’t call me ‘dude’, Moondrop; you’re ruining my immersion.”
“I got bored with the scene! Look, I’m in the slutty, pink maid outfit! Just fuck me already!”
“Hm.” Dahlia turns their face away boredly. “Maybe if you beg.”
“How’s about I rip your ovipositor off and use it like a dildo?”
“Beg.”
“Dahliaaaaa—!”
“No. Tell me how much you want it.” Dahlia strokes down the dark purple length teasingly, Moon’s eyes following the motion instantly. “As a matter of fact, I want you to say, Dahlia. I’m so sorry I made you carry all those eggs without any reprieve for months because I kept getting cold feet and rescheduling at the last second. Please, oh, please breed me properly until I can’t think anymore!”
Moon kicks his thigh. “You’re a nasty bitch.”
“That’s a bit harsh.”
“That’s the truth!” Moon kicks him again when he continues to hover, his pretty face slowly getting angrier and angrier. “I swear to god, Dahlia!”
“If you won’t say it, then I guess you can go rip off some other insect’s ovipositor and have your fill.” Dahlia moves away from Moon’s kicking and sits at the very end of the bed with his arms crossed. “You’re a brat.”
Moon gets up, reaching for him, “Dahlia—!”
“Yellow.”
Moon stops. He sits with his legs tucked beneath him and sets his hands on his knees, head low, considering. After a few beats of awkward silence, his eyes flicker up at Dahlia beneath the pink and glitter gloss and thick eyeliner. “You really want me to beg?”
“I do.”
“Alright…” Moon thinks of what possible pure filth could spill from his mouth, raging amorous desire like he’s never felt before (and alcohol), making his head swim. “I need you. I need you to breed me full of eggs. I want you to finish the job of taking my virginity. I want to watch while you fuck me in the mirror.” And then, softly, “Please, sir?”
Dahlia stares at him in silence for a beat before he breathes an “Oh, fuck,” and clamors over Moon, pushing him back onto the sheets to make love to him in every way Dahlia knows how. He appraises Moon in chirps and rattles, a heavy thickness pressing back between his legs.
“Say that again, Moon, say please again, just like you did before,” he says in a rush.
“…Please?” Moon asks softly.
“Please what?”
“Please, sir? Please, I need it. I-I need…” Moon feels his body burn all over, embarrassed to admit needing anyone, and it feels so wrong but so right, “I need you, Dahlia…” He clutches at Dahlia’s arms pitifully. “Please, please!”
Dahlia bends down to kiss him hard enough that Moon’s lipstick transfers and darkens their own. “That’s a good little princess.”
He’s entered quickly, and Moon whimpers. It doesn’t hurt, but it’s still a new and different kind of pressure he’s not sure he’ll ever get used to.
Moon’s legs wrap around Dahlia’s waist, excitement tingling through him. Their purple tongue laps at his shoulder and neck, lathing his metal, trailing everywhere Dahlia’s much taller form can reach while hunched over him.
Dahlia tugs their length out an inch, then sinks back in with careful slowness.
Moon’s mouth opens in a silent moan, arching his back up to meet his thrust. The thought of being used like this, by Sun’s own mentor, no less, fills him with an aura of filthiness and shame and arousal.
Dahlia pushes out another inch and presses back in, going just the tiniest bit deeper, taking in Moon’s hooded stare beneath dark lashes and pink eye makeup.
Dahlia trembles beneath their hard, scarred pale-yellow exoskeleton. “You feel so good,” he whispers. He runs his hands along Moon’s sides. “You don’t have to hold back with me. I want to hear you.”
“I-I’m not, I just…” Moon glows. “I-I don’t know what to say. I-I think I just—want you to move faster…” He sits up on his elbows and rocks gently back and forward, raising and lowering himself on the throbbing length. “I need you to. I want it.” He spreads his legs, staring down at the center of their connection, then back up expectantly. “I want to give you children.”
Something overcomes Dahlia’s eyes, an expression Moon has never seen on him before, something a little broken around the edges and desperate. Perhaps he’s never seen it because he’s never fucked anyone in earnest until now. Maybe everyone makes that face right before they cum inside of someone. He doesn’t know, but Moon’s killcode finds the vulnerability in it extremely hot.
Dahlia slips almost all the way out of him, and Moon thinks he’s about to call off the sex for a terrible second, but instead they pull back their hips, grip Moon’s hip joints, and slam back into his body with full force.
Moon cries out, throwing his head back. It’s far too much length to take all at once, let alone slam right into his mechanical womb. Speared on the heat between his legs, he whimpers and bites down on his tongue, trying to recover from the assault on his guts.
Dahlia rolls his hips against him, the hard length poking around at his insides without care, rhythm, or direction. It’s merely a reminder of how deep it reached, rearranging Moon’s systems with ease, rough and insistent.
Then the speed builds with Dahlia’s grip on his hips strengthening, keeping him from going anywhere.
Moon sinks into the warmth of fast, hurried, desperate sex. The pace is brutal, making Moon’s optics roll back and fill with tears as he’s pounded at Dahlia’s leisure, permitting them his conquering, letting his body fall into their hard, rough thrusts.
The quiet room is filled mostly with the sound of exoskeleton meeting endoskeleton and the old bed creaking.
Moon wishes he had anything to add, any filthy words, any perfectly whorish moans he’d perfected, so at least he’s not lying like a mostly silent sex doll, but he doesn’t have anything. He can’t hide behind roleplay, either. This isn’t a war and its royal maker; it’s just Dahlia and Moon, now, and there’s something slightly terrifying about it.
Dahlia starts to pant heavily above him, and Moon wraps his arms around them, letting their body cover his completely. Dahlia’s self-control breaks, and he starts thrusting wildly, gasps pitching into a string of high-pitched moans.
Moon digs his fingers into his scarred back, hips pressing up onto the throbbing connection, fighting for more pressure, more weight, more depth, until he’s sure they’re going to fuse themselves to each other and never come undone.
Dahlia hooks Moon’s chin in his hand and forces his head sideways to face the mirror.
The pair in it look like strangers. Dahlia with little makeup, his feminine dress and frills discarded, and their body muscled and scarred like a great warrior. Moon, dressed in pink lingerie and pretty makeup, made soft and gentle, and a never-before-made fucked-out expression of pleasure on his face.
Dahlia speaks their praises in some purring, tongue-rolling language. It sounds ethereal, like something ancient and beyond this world. They look as mesmerized by Moon as Moon is of them, gazing at his reflection with adoration while they stroke fast into his sleeve, installed specifically for them and them alone.
Moon raises his head but keeps it tilted to the mirror, watching in the glass as his tongue swipes salty sweat from Dahlia’s broad, scarred chest. The sweetness of its exploring tongue, tasting his exoskeleton and enjoying it, has Dahlia whimpering like an injured animal. The sound sends jolts of pleasurable electricity to the tips of Moon’s fingers, and despite his babydoll beauty, he likes the sound of empires crumbling. Maybe they were two dual weapons, crafted for blood and death, finally reunited.
His back arches, and he digs his claws into Dahlia’s armholes without thinking, Dahlia shrieking above him like a dying cicada in summer, before he remembers Moon can’t understand his mother tongue and cries in English, “Don’t let go! Don’t let go! Moon, fuck, please, harder! Hurts! It hurts so good…!”
Dahlia’s fingers intertwine with Moon’s, and he lies flat on top of him, and it’s a good thing Moon doesn’t need to breathe, or he’d be suffocating beneath these violent, rolling waves atop the sea of pleasure. Dahlia’s voice the calling song of sirens hoping to lure him to his death. Moon licks more salt from the ocean his body sweats, rocking into him, and screws his eyes shut.
The pace picks up, and he bucks into it, his hands grabbing the holes in Dahlia’s sides to anchor himself, digging into the soft scars under his claws, thighs tightening around hips, sex straining against sex. He bears against the rapid shoving and sucking of his insides, hitting his high.
“Dahliaaa!” he cries his name pathetically. It’s more of a mewl, and Moon’s embarrassment rolls through him like the orgasm that hits all his systems at once.
Dahlia hisses, chasing, shoving him past a pleasure that burns white-hot, slamming him into the mattress with impressive strength that has Moon seeing stars. His fangs scrape at the metal of Moon’s throat, climbing up his jaw, until they’re face-to-face, their mouths open and nearly brushing. The hot air is shared between them as Dahlia crashes his length into his sore, unraveling body, and Moon swears he’s being pulled apart atom by atom.
The tears pool, and his first string of muffled whimpers grow into shouts, breaking his sex-doll silent streak, the waves going irregular, pulling hard enough to sink ships and rip away jutting cliffsides.
“I’m going to cum,” Dahlia warns him. “Did—did you still want me to lay the—?”
“Yes! Yes!” Moon sobs.
Dahlia thrusts slow. His body turns into a wall of hard muscle against Moon’s hands, and with a vicious, rattling insectoid scream like a war cry, lava invades his cool, nighttime waters, steaming and hot within his depths.
He’s poured full, Dahlia trembling through it as the thickness lodged inside of him jerks and pumps.
“Oh my God, oh my God…!” Moon grips the armholes, the greater weight of their body, twice his size, blanketing him, and the heat between his legs locks into place and pumps scolding honey-sweet nectar into him until he’s full and tight.
Then the first of them, Dahlia’s eggs, press inside. They feel big going in, though Moon knows from the sample Dahlia had brought him for research that they are quite small, 11-12 millimeters. The sample Dahlia had brought him was like a squishy pearl, golden and shining, but it was like a chicken egg with no yolk. They’re supposed to grow several more millimeters during development once properly fertilized; however, Dahlia is quite infertile, and Moon is curious to know the reason.
Luckily, this experiment will provide him with far, far more samples…
But he’s getting distracted.
The first egg enters his sleeve, pressing through the entrance at the very back to be deposited into the containment unit, acting as a womb within Moon’s body, designed to hold and preserve the eggs until he can take them back to the lab for further study.
Dahlia said he normally lays between fifteen and thirty eggs, and he fashioned the glass container to hold the maximum amount, including some room for additional fluids.
Moon’s systems keep track of the number as Dahlia lays his eggs in the chamber.
Two, three, four.
Their hips continue to rock into Moon’s, pulling him back over the edge, despite how Moon tries to focus—
Five, six, seven.
Moon trembles beneath Dahlia's body, legs squeezing around him as he orgasms again.
Eight, nine, ten.
Dahlia grabs his face again, forcing him to look once more into the mirror, cheek to cheek with him. Rather than meeting Moon’s drunken gaze, his eyes are on himself as he ravages him and fills him to the brim.
Eleven. Twelve.
There’s something about Dahlia’s vanity, about the way he licks his lips and keeps pounding without paying any attention to Moon—like Moon really is nothing more than a little sex doll beneath him—that makes something stir in Moon’s gut.
Thirteen. Fourteen. Fifteen.
Halfway to max capacity.
Fourteen, fifteen.
Moon only included sensors on the inside of the chamber and containment unit because he thought he might need to know when it started overflowing or if it burst. He didn’t anticipate that the pressure of it being filled would be so pleasurable.
Sixteen, seventeen, eighteen.
Dahlia keeps fucking him and filling him, and Moon’s eyes roll back, mouth open, drooling. Drooling a lot, actually, like he’s just seen his favorite meal.
Nineteen. Twenty. Twenty-one.
The shocks of pleasure are starting to get painful. A string of moans gets pushed out of his throat with every thrust and egg, and Moon thinks he’s going to shut down if this doesn’t end soon.
“D-Dahlia! Dahlia! I’m going to need you to pull out in a little bit!” Moon pants warningly. “I can’t—I can’t take much more of…!”
Twenty-two, twenty-three, twenty-four.
“Dahlia, I need you to slow down! We’re going to reach max capacity and…!”
In the mirror, the princess’s face is ruined by the tear-streaked ash trailing down her face. Moon’s makeup runs as he cries pitifully beneath Dahlia, taking a sickening sense of delight in watching himself be slain slowly and completely.
Twenty-five. Twenty-six. Twenty-seven.
The chamber is starting to overflow.
“Dahlia! Dahlia, please, I need you to pull out—!”
The slivers of killcode writhe in confused satisfaction; it revels in anything’s demise, even his own. Moon tries to keep his wits even as he’s pushed through one orgasm and into another, gritting his teeth—
Twenty-eight, twenty-nine, thirty—
Max capacity!
A warning alarm blares in Moon’s head. Shit, shit, shit!
He panics and digs his claws hard enough into Dahlia’s sides that he draws blood, purple, hot, and thick.
Dahlia screams in pain and moves away from him.
Moon’s sleeve slides off his cock, golden cum gushing out in waves, relieving some pressure from the chamber. He closes the containment unit, but not wanting to lose precious samples, he quickly moves to swallow down Dahlia’s cock.
His mouth floods with an overly sweet, honey-like substance. It’s not quite like honey. It’s duller than that. More like a milkier version of the sugar water inside plant stems.
He startles as the first little egg hits his tongue, slimy and small.
Thirty-one.
Dahlia grabs the back of Moon’s head, fingers entangling into the frilly maid headband, and pushes him down on his cock.
Thirty-two. Thirty-three…
Moon supposes he did just claw the fuck out of him and finds the manhandling a little fair. Plus, he’s never sucked cock before, and, well, now’s a great time to practice.
He sucks hard, his mouth quickly filling, but taking everything Dahlia gives him. The backs of their knees hook over his shoulders.
Thirty-four, thirty-five…
Moon uses his tongue to carefully push them to the sides of his mouth so he can swallow the excess honeyed semen without risking swallowing them down with it.
Thirty-six, thirty-seven, thirty-eight.
Finally, at last, thirty-nine.
Nine extra eggs, slippery in his mouth. Moon dives for his backpack, fumbles to rip an extra vial he didn’t know he’d need, but packed just in case, and spits the nine soft little golden orbs into the tube before quickly sealing it.
Moon gasps and coughs around fits of laughter. “Holy shit!”
Dahlia is still sitting on the bed, looking dazed out of his mind.
His body sways, and he falls backwards onto the sheets, looking like a poor, thirsty flower gone limp in the summer heat.
Moon slowly gets up again, legs trembling like a newborn calf, and flops onto the bed beside him. He holds up the vial before his eyes, looking at the pearlescent orbs inside.
“You clawed me,” Dahlia slurs, exhausted.
“Sorry,” Moon says. “You weren’t listening, and I panicked.”
“I thought it was part of it. You said not to stop unless you use the stoplight system, so… I apologize, did I hurt you?”
“No. I’m fine. I just didn’t want to lose any samples.”
“Well, then, you owe me.” Dahlia taps his wrist. “Sit on my face.”
“Good god, Dahlia, are you trying to kill me or something?” Moon drags himself back up anyway, fumbling his way over Dahlia’s body and slowly lowering down.
Dahlia lifts his head, lapping at Moon’s folds with a sort of half-asleep slowness. His lips latch onto his clit, sucking lazily.
They pause momentarily, murmuring, “You taste good,” before diving back in.
“I figured you might enjoy it.” Moon sighs, letting himself relax. “I put flavored lube in my tanks. It’s supposed to taste like blueberries or something…?”
“The marvel of robots.”
“You taste pretty good yourself.”
Dahlia hums low and contentedly as they continue lapping and sucking lazily at him.
“I don’t know if I have much to give you, though. My tanks are running a bit empty by now.”
“I’m taking everything you can give.”
And, by every god and Astral out there, Dahlia gives.
Moon’s head is spinning, not from alcohol anymore, just from how exhausted and satisfied he is, his thighs shivering with the effort it takes to keep them apart and hold himself over Dahlia’s face.
Dahlia, unlike Moon, needs to breathe. Their petals are soft, right in between his thighs, tongue even softer as it treats him like a dessert to savor.
The minutes trickle by. Slow and quiet in the dark, minus the sound of Dahlia’s mouth on him, swapping between the flat of his tongue and sucking with his lips, softly. It makes Moon sigh in gratitude.
How long can they go without coming up for air, he wonders?
Dahlia continues with his pattern, over and over again, coaxing Moon carefully back towards the edge where he wants him, breaking Moon’s silence, dragging little exhales and tiny whimpers out with his skilled tongue, as if undoing a silencing spell without ever having to speak a word.
They take a pause, pull back the hood of Moon’s clit and flick their tongue over it, wet and fast and hot.
After a few more long sucks, he comes off it with a slick pop and replaces his mouth with the pad of his thumb, gently massaging it.
They work their way through this pattern once more, switching between their mouth and their thumb, never quite enough to bring Moon over the edge, just enough to keep him there.
It feels like hours, but Moon’s internal clock tells him it’s only been a long and ruinous seven minutes in heaven, and he started leaving behind quite the mess as the last of his reserves trickles out of him. Dahlia’s face shines with spit and blueberry flavor.
Dizzy and lightheaded, the only thing keeping Moon from collapsing into a heap of metal anatomy is the worry of suffocating Dahlia between his legs, and how they keep him beneath constant, gentle pressure.
Moon’s eyes are half-lidded, mouth slacking open, lips wet with drool, and his face damp from the mascara-blackened tears running down the pink blush on his cheeks, claws of charcoal cutting through cherry-blossom beauty.
They suck on Moon like a slice of fruit, pulling the nectar from him, and Dahlia moans at the taste. The grip he has around Moon’s silver thighs tightens, and if Moon were human, it would have left finger-shaped bruises behind.
His tanks are empty, now, Dahlia having passionately drunk everything he’d given, but Dahlia pinches his brows together and hungrily keeps indulging. The long tongue plunges into him, deep, and a breathy yip of surprise punches out of Moon's voicebox.
Dahlia growls hungrily at the sound and pushes that hot, wet muscle along with purpose against every one of Moon’s sensitive nodes, slipping right over them.
Moon constricts around his tongue, closer and closer to the edge, but not there.
"Fuck!" he shouts, gripping the sheets above Dahlia’s head. "Oh god, please! Dahlia!" he whines.
Judging by the dangerous glowing allure in Dahlia’s half-closed eyes, he knows exactly what he's begging for.
"Does my little princess want to cum?” he asks with a savage little bite.
“Yes, yes!” Moon cries senselessly. “Let me cum, Dahlia, please let me cum!”
“Hmm.” Dahlia massages against the sweet bundle of sensitive nodes.
Moon cries out, his thighs trembling around Dahlia’s head, and he swears he’s crushing the petals beneath his knee joints into the bed, in a way that looks kind of painful, but Dahlia doesn’t acknowledge it.
He lathes Moon’s clit, applying just the right amount of pressure, and then takes it away. Give and take, like the spoils of war, over and over again.
Moon pulses against his tongue and curses and pouts.
Dahlia could probably do this for hours, and Moon might let him, as a sort of thanks for the weight in his abdomen from the glass tube that sits full of precious research.
He pulls back, his tongue slipping out with loud, wet squelch, and leaves kisses along the puffy, blue lips of Moon’s well-used sleeve. God, he still looks drunk, despite how much time has passed. Maybe the honey is still in his system, or maybe the lube in Moon’s tanks did it, or maybe just Moon in general.
Dahlia mutters breathlessly, but Moon doesn't quite catch what he says, though it sounds like the enchanting language of his decimated people.
"I'm so fucking close,” Moon sobs.
Dahlia smiles and coos against him. “That’s cute.” He goes right back to doing nothing more than keeping Moon on the edge. "Keep begging,” they rasp, and Moon is vaguely aware by the glow behind him that their secondary arms are back, moving with a frantic heat.
“Dahlia! Dahlia, please!” Moon rambles, filthied pleas falling out of his mouth, and he can taste the shame of it, but he doesn’t care. It feels like his components are melting.
It feels like he's careening in slow motion into the ocean, black waves crashing over him one after the other. Dahlia’s touch on him is like static and magnets, and maybe it’s the kind that’s bad enough to fuck up his hardware, because his vision starts spotting.
He can feel Dahlia moaning and panting as they continue to eat him whole and fuck into their lower hands. Their tongue and mouth and lips attack him on all fronts.
"Dahlia!" he shouts. "I’m gonna cum, I'm so close! Baby, I’m so close! Please, please, keep going, just like that! Please, please, please, please…!”
Dahlia’s tongue flicks faster into him, a hint of teeth dragging against him.
Moon doesn’t know if his audials cut off, too, but he’s sure he screams when he orgasms dry, even though the room sounds so completely silent.
Dahlia slows down momentarily, letting Moon float there in bliss for a moment, high on pleasure.
The little tremors of aftershocks wrack through Moon’s body, not yet trickling off or lessening. It’s a steady, overwhelming twitchiness.
For certain, something in him has malfunctioned; his AI has been snatched away, turning him into a thoughtless, lagging, unintelligent computer.
He might have crashed. He doesn’t really care; he’ll look at the error report later.
The sensation returns to his fingers first, then his arms and legs. And then he’s back in agonizing, beautiful bliss, beneath the haze of an orgasm he’s sure might last forever.
Dahlia’s tongue continues fucking Moon through his peak, and now that Moon’s audials have reset, he realizes the wet hiccups of sobbing between pleas not to stop are coming from him.
Moon squirms, plunging into overstimulation, and it hurts so deliciously; his killcode is filled with glee. Now this is war. All-consuming and violent.
Moon laughs through the agonizing friction, the jolts of overwhelming pleasure as Dahlia mercilessly delivers blow after blow after blow, stringing Moon through orgasm after orgasm, crash after crash, ripping more squealing and laughter from his voicebox.
Their secondary hands continue pumping over their ovipositor, chasing their own pleasure without paying any mind to Moon's writhing and sobbing as he falls into madness. Annihilated by Dahlia's own preserverience.
And then, finally, Dahlia’s eyes are squeezed shut, and big pearls of tears roll down his flushed, slickened face as he boils up from the inside of his exoskeleton, and Moon is happy to watch the last gasps of war as it reaches its peak beneath him.
Dahlia stills. His muscles spasm under Moon, a sword shattered into a million little pieces against a shield. Their petals flattened and crumpled beneath Moon’s knees, antennae limp with sweat.
His cock throbs in his own hold, thick spurts of cum warm landing over his stomach.
His tongue at last drags out of Moon’s pulverized sleeve.
Moon merely spills over onto his side, collapsing onto the bed like a rag doll.
They both lay still for a long few minutes, basking in the afterglow and catching their breath.
And then there’s the crash. Moon hiccups out another sob, trembling and curling into a tight ball, and close to hyperventilating. He’s not sure why he’s freaking out, what caused the sudden adrenaline spike. Maybe his body took the intensity of what just transpired as a new trauma, maybe it thought he’d been chased down by a real predator, and he was on the cusp of being actually eaten alive—
Dahlia hushes him, dragging his sticky body up and lying directly over Moon. “Breathe. Calm down. Be still.”
The pressure is nice and grounding, like being held in the arms of something greater than himself. Four arms hold him tight and close.
Rather than the touch feeling odd and uncomfortable, it helps to calm Moon, this time, even though they’re both sticky and disgusting now.
“Breathe. Shh. You’re alright.”
Moon simulates the action of breathing, and it helps.
Dahlia hushes him again, and he makes for a very nice big spoon to Moon’s little spoon.
The bed sheets will need to be cleaned. And the plastic mat. And they’ll need to put away the charcuterie board or maybe sit and eat for a while before they do it.
But Moon can’t deny that food, real food, sounds really, really good right now.
“You wanna go out to eat?”
Dahlia, halfway to falling asleep, curled around him in the wake of their own filth, snorts awake. They think for a spell and then groan and get up to help fulfill the needs of their princess.
“Sure…”
Moon peels off the lingerie and stands naked for a few moments just to enjoy the feeling of being freed from all the straps and ruffles. Yeah, it was sexy and pretty soft, but also a bit overstimulating for him.
They move from the bedroom to the living room, picking up the mess they’d made together. Luckily, there are spells for cleanup and incinerator dimensions to dispose of things Moon doesn’t feel like cleaning, like the plastic sheet and the bedspread.
The food gets wrapped and put away in the cooler again beside the corked wine bottles, and the lingerie gets tossed into a mini washer in the bathroom.
Dahlia uses the cleaning spell they’d used on themselves earlier to fully clean out Moon’s seams and the makeup off his face. Then does the same for himself to rid himself of sweat and other bodily fluids.
“So, that spell is not just for men,” Moon says.
“Of course not. I just figured it would rile you up.”
“You were right.”
Dahlia smirks at him knowingly as they retrieve fresh clothes from their bag.
With everything clean and both of them dressed, that marks the end of their transaction, technically.
Except for—what is he forgetting?
Oh, right.
“Hang on a sec.”
Moon pushes the couch back where it’s supposed to be and sits down, pulling up his turtleneck.
Dahlia takes the spot next to him, not sure what he’s doing, but happy to let his body have some time to rest. He clearly doesn’t expect it when Moon opens up his casing, revealing the internals inside, and reaches deep inside his own guts.
Moon unlatches something and jerks it to the side, and then a glass container comes sliding out of his pelvis with wires attached.
The wires are pulled out and tucked back into Moon’s stomach cavity, then he sets the filled, glass tube beside the tube containing the nine extra eggs.
Dahlia stares at all thirty-nine eggs in a daze. “Well,” he begins, watching the golden orbs float in a suspension of golden fluid, “that’s something I never thought I would see before.”
“Cool, right?” Moon pats the top of the container, then reaches back into his stomach, twists, and pulls something else out. He unplugs all the wires attached to himself from it, then holds the blue sleeve tantalizingly. “Y’ wanna take it for a rainy day?”
Dahlia takes the sleeve, speaks his cleaning spell, and stuffs it into his backpack.
“Oh, I wasn’t expecting you’d actually—y’know what? Never mind. Keep it.” Moon closes his hatch, done with disemboweling himself for now, and stands from the couch. The egg cannisters get gently placed into his backpack, then he flicks his head toward the entrance of the bunker.
“So, what are you thinking? I’m thinking burgers!” Moon starts, as if he hadn’t just been thoroughly attended to over the course of several hours and received thirty-nine eggs on top of it.
Dahlia summons their staff and uses it like a walking stick as they limp after him through the portal.
The recovery period of robots is something else…
On their way out, they catch a glance at themselves in the reflection of the mirror by the bedroom, and between Moon’s chipper talk about burger joints and Dahlia’s wilted exhaustion and the brand-new injuries to his arm holes, it looks like Dahlia was the one who was drizzled in honey and eaten alive for sustenance, not Moon.
There are, of course, a few pretty things capable of surviving the whims of war, and Moon is certainly a more than capable pretty thing.