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“Off your game, Viper?”
Reyna’s sneer was as taunting as it was confident as she unsheathed her knife from the back of a faceless ATLAS agent mere moments from catching a distracted Viper in the back with a canister of buckshot. The corpse slumped forward as she gingerly removed his finger from the trigger and claimed the dissipating wisps of his soul for herself.
“Right.”
Viper’s look of disdain did a poor job disguising the frazzled reaction ghosting across her face as she realized the narrow margin by which the shotgun had not been emptied into her body. Grimacing, she rose from her position and carefully retreated back to Reyna’s position.
Reyna smirked. “That didn’t sound like a thank you.”
Viper scowled. “I think you’ve enough self-aggrandizement to run on without my help. Let’s fall back.” The chemist’s mask extended and pulled over her head, as if to make a show of non-responsiveness.
Reyna casually followed. “Your earpiece is in your helmet; don’t pretend you don’t like my voice.”
Viper hissed. “Shh. I hear something.”
Indeed, Reyna could sense the muted clop of oncoming footsteps. Viper peeled herself against the wall, readying her gun. Reyna briefly moved to match her, but then, sensing an opportunity, immediately wheeled forward, hefting her gun. Viper reached out to grab her arm and pull her back into cover, but it was too little too late as Reyna shimmied out of her grasp and rounded the corner, opening fire on the array of approaching soldiers. A few had the prescience to fire back before joining the corpse pile—their souls healed the wounds they had inflicted. She glanced back expectantly at Viper.
“They’re dead.”
Viper’s mask obscured her expression, but Reyna could feel her glare through it. “I see that. And was there a reason for being so disastrously reckless?”
Reyna chuckled, staring down Viper’s irate expression. “I can think of a few.”
Viper did not respond. Instead, she turned her head away and sauntered towards the reconnaissance point, leaving Reyna to trail behind her. Some moments of silence passed, interrupted only by Reyna’s casual humming and the occasional stop as one of them cleared an alley or a vantage point.
As they neared their destination, Reyna piped up. “Viper?”
No response.
“Don’t leave me hanging, now, cariño.”
Viper continued walking.
Reyna poked her shoulder just as they approached the rest of the crew.
Viper wheeled around. “What?” she hissed.
Reyna smiled. “I like your mask. Only time I ever see it up like this is in the middle of a smoke cloud, it looks good out in the open.”
A pause. The mask rendered Viper’s expression inscrutable. “I’m sure that comment was utterly necessary and needed to be told to me during active deployment.”
Reyna grinned. “You wouldn’t want me to forget, would you?”
Viper turned away and retracted her mask, leaving the gas filter on her mouth but exposing the barest hint of a flushed cheek.
“You’re no fun, you know that?”
Viper cocked her head. “To the extent that I prioritize the mission and safety over frivolities, then yes, I am ‘no fun’.”
Reyna chuckled, leaning up to Viper’s ear. “Good thing I like you anyway, hm?”
~
Viper had absolutely no intention of giving Reyna what she wanted. She was fishing desperately for a reaction, trying to get Viper worked up enough to do something about it. Viper saw no reason to indulge such behavior, as granting it results would only incite the recurrence of the undesired behavior.
That wasn’t to say keeping her cool wasn’t difficult. Reyna was behaving recklessly for the primary purpose of getting her goat, a habit no amount of write-ups and proposed disciplinary actions (formal disciplinary actions, mind) could quell.
I hadn’t always been so bad; the duelist’s usual limits had been flirtatious comments and gentle ribbing, but that had turned on its head once Viper had begrudgingly admitted her affections, and, wine drunk and impatient, pulled the vampire into for a kiss. It was the first of many, a misadventure into something Viper refused to call romance, but Reyna often did. The rumors about them spread like wildfire, not helped in the slightest by the unprecedented increase in Reyna’s audacity, much to Viper’s chagrin.
Reyna was wandering her lab again—an exercise Viper had long-since given up on preventing—humming to herself while Viper did her best to ignore her and get work done. As she began to clean up for the evening, she cast a glance over her shoulder at the woman who demanded attention wherever she walked.
“I should let you know, your behavior is going in the mission report.”
Reyna drummed her nails on her cheek. “Did you tell them how effectively I removed the opposition?”
Viper glared at her. “No. I told them how you recklessly endangered yourself and the team to no tactical end and were lucky to have done so with as few natural consequences as you encountered.”
“Why should I waste my time with inferior men? I should remind you; you would have been staring down a gun barrel had I not arrived at the opportune time.”
Viper shook her head. “Which happened because someone who slipped behind my post specifically because you abandoned yours on a hunt for glory.”
“It worked.”
Viper frowned. “It worked because things went well. If things had gone poorly, we would both be recovering in the medical bay. We deal in sureties, optimization, not breaking formation and getting lucky.”
Reyna smiled, allowing her fingers to dance along Viper’s chin as she circled her form. “But that’s the difference. I’m not lucky. I’m right.”
“This time, perhaps. But will you be right again? And again? Each and every simple mission made complicated for the sake of an escapade, will they all go as well? I think not.”
Reyna wiggled her eyebrows. “Only because you place no value on the escapades themselves.”
“Correct. I do not.” Viper swept out of the room, closing the door and locking it behind her.
~
Reyna stared, befuddled, at the locked door separating herself from the rest of the protocol headquarters. In truth, she hadn’t even realized the door couldn’t be unlocked from the inside, let alone that Viper would consider trapping her in a room with all her prized experiments. At least, that was her initial impression until she realized that Viper had covertly locked each and every cabinet, a shiny new padlock fastening the giant chest freezer that stored the various samples she had seen the chemist work on in her day-to-day. Option one was out, and much as she was keen on causing trouble, it felt juvenile to do something as mundane and rude as destroying equipment. Such behavior was as likely to make Viper call the farce off as it was to actually accomplish her goals. Her purpose was to grind the chemist’s gears, not to actually piss her off.
After a spell, Reyna, bored with waiting, decided to make the best of her available time, and began plucking flasks and beakers off shelves and rearranging them into various other shelves and storage racks, swapping 200mL flasks with 20s, putting graduated cylinders where the beakers went, neatly stacking the chosen items in perfect order—just not in the places Viper knew them to be. Once she was finished, she gazed at the neat arrangement, admiring her own handiwork. This behavior in itself was perhaps flying too close to the sun, but Reyna was happy to get burned if it made her descent more glorious.
At this point, however, she was truly quite bored, and instead of waiting an eon for Viper to decide enough was enough, she sent her a message.
Viper, I’ve missed dinner, could you grab me some while I work?
An innocuous message enough to a passing observer, but Viper knew exactly where she was, and would no doubt have immediate suspicions about what she was up to. Exactly as intended.
No response came from her communicator, so Reyna patiently waited, grabbing a newly relocated beaker off the shelf and holding it in her hand in mock contemplation as she mulled over what her fate might be the moment the chemist returned.
She did not have long to wait, as shortly thereafter Viper stalked into the lab, carefully locking the door and closing the blackout shutters behind her as she looked up to meet Reyna’s eyes.
“Funny,” she remarked. “I don’t remember saying you could touch the glassware.”
Reyna wriggled her eyebrows. “You locked your samples away. I had to go to the next best thing, of course.”
“Go on then, put it back.”
“What about dinner?”
“If you were hungry, your message would have been worded differently.”
Admittedly, Reyna was a little hungry, but such a fact was unlikely to sway her captor. Instead, she calmly placed the beaker amongst its freshly rearranged siblings, glancing back to gauge a reaction. Viper’s eyes widened, a mixture of pride and horror alternating across her face.
“That’s not where it goes,” she said simply.
Reyna shrugged. “How was I to know? It’s where the other ones are.”
“You know,” Viper responded, closing the distance between them until Reyna was leaning back against a (thankfully, secured) gas tank. “Most people, when they want something, will have the consideration to ask for it.” As if to emphasize, she planted her knee between Reyna’s legs, cupping her chin in her hand.
Reyna covertly swallowed, feeling the cool metal of the tank against her rapidly warming back. Viper towered over her in this position, her hand forcing Reyna’s neck to crane upwards and keep her visible. Of course, if she desired, Reyna could handily throw the chemist’s weight from her and assert herself. However, a physical response would remove any chance of the result she wanted. It was a delicate art, to push back while maintaining the outer boundary, the illusory constraints of their little game. How much Viper would admit it was a game was her prerogative, but Reyna enjoyed the results just fine.
Reyna grinned. “That’s true,” she replied. “But I can hardly argue with the results, now, can I?”
Viper frowned slightly, then tilted her head, like a cat examining a cornered rat, peering into Reyna’s eyes.
CRACK!
Like lightning, Viper’s hand swept across Reyna face in a bruising slap that might have swept Reyna’s face cleanly to the side had Viper’s other hand not held it firmly in place. Reyna gasped at the sting, a warmth building between her thighs as her jaw began to throb.
“Wrong answer,” Viper replied firmly. “I think we both know what you want. Now, how do you get it?”
Reyna’s thirst was growing, but her impish desires held out. “By riling you up.”
CRACK!
The slap came backhanded against the other cheek this time, rattling Reyna’s skull as her breathing became heavier and a growing erection started pushing back against Viper’s knee.
“Wrong again.” Viper scowled. “And since it seems this isn’t effectively dissuading you, how about this. I expect you to replace every piece of glassware you have rearranged in my absence. This can either happen now, followed by your immediate expulsion from my lab, or you can very politely ask for something that you want first. The choice is yours.” As if to emphasize her point, she dislodged her leg, leaving Reyna’s heat exposed to open air.
Reyna instinctively bucked against the emptiness, gasping slightly despite nothing restricting her breathing. She met Viper’s eyes. “You wouldn’t,” she lied.
“Care to try me?”
Reyna stared at her, with less defiance than she had initially mustered, but the remaining spark was still present, nonetheless. She folded her arms.
Viper looked her up and down. “Fine, then. Pants and shirt, off.”
Reyna swallowed. She knew Viper better than to assume she’d go along with anything demanded of her, this was surely a trap.
Viper shrugged dismissively. “You heard me. Strip. Or start cleaning, if that’s what you really want.”
Then again, Reyna supposed, perhaps the whole point of the exercise was to fall for the trap, to allow Viper to execute whatever comeuppance she deserved. If she’d just wanted sex, Viper was right, she could have simply asked. Slowly, taking the time to idle and tease, removed her t-shirt and jeans, tossing her belt to the floor. Beneath, she was wearing a very revealing set of lingerie, which merely elicited a sarcastic eyeroll from Viper, who probably expected no less.
Leaning forward, Viper collected her clothes and folded them into a neat pile, setting the pile on a chair and sliding something into her palm. Seemingly satisfied, she sat down on top of Reyna’s clothes. “Go on, then.”
Reyna glanced at her, confusion only slowly dawning into horrible understanding. “Go on, what?”
“I told you, you don’t ask for what you want, you’ll replace my glassware and leave. So, get moving.”
Reyna briefly considered attempting a stare-down but immediately realized her disadvantage. The lab was freezing, and she was wearing next-to-nothing while Viper sat watching swaddled up in a sweater and casual clothes. As casual as she got, anyway. Reyna figured she might perish before she ever saw Viper in shorts or god-forbid a skirt.
Viper fiddled with something in her hand. “I’m waiting. The shelves are all labelled, unless you had the misfortune to decide to rearrange the labels, too.”
Reyna, thankfully, hadn’t even noticed the labels on her first pass. Shivering, she stood.
“Oh, take these.” Viper roughly tossed a carboard box in her direction, which Reyna instinctively caught.
Reyna looked at her inquisitively.
“Gloves. I think I’ve had enough of your grimy hands on my glassware.”
Reyna cocked her head, trailing her fingertips along a row of volumetric flasks. “I’ll have you know my hands are perfectly clean.”
If Viper was amused, she did not show it. “Do as I ask,” she said simply.
Reyna gave her a sour look but acquiesced, sliding gloves onto her hands. Moving back to the flasks, she grabbed a pair and walked towards their place of origin, now filled with beakers. Setting the beakers aside, she racked the flasks she had brought, then began the walk back. She truly had made deliberate effort to make it as inconvenient as possible to right her meddling, so it was perhaps only fair she paid the price.
“You know,” Viper began, watching as Reyna strutted around her lab mostly naked, “I had to take careful effort to make this lab safer, both in general for your persistent butting in, but especially every time I predict you to show up less-than-decent. Obviously, it’s always safe to a high standard, but the labels outside the space are there for a reason, and I must take great pains for someone who might unwisely place their naked ass on a benchtop.”
“How considerate,” Reyna drawled as she made her final return trip to grab the last set of volumetric flasks. “I might freeze, but you’ll spare me the chemical burns. Lucky—”
SNAP!
Out of the corner of her eye, Reyna saw Viper swiftly rise before flicking some object in her wrist, the only response being the sudden sound and sting of pain on her exposed ass. Thankfully, it sounded far more violent than it hurt, but it hurt, nonetheless. Glancing back, she saw Viper brandishing a belt, her belt, with both ends neatly wrapped around her hand and a loop retracting from where it had evidently used to spank her. She flushed.
Viper sat back down. “Quiet. Focus on your work.”
Reyna swallowed, grabbing the last set of flasks of the rack and walking to their original location. Viper watched her walk as a prowling cat might eye a trapped mouse, observing curiously as if planning her next move. Multiple times Reyna opened her mouth intending to add some snide remark, only to quiet once met with a stern smile, Viper clicking the belt’s buckle back and forth in her palm.
The air conditioning was getting to her now, making her shiver in her bra as she stalked to lab, slowly but surely remedying her mischief in frigid shame.
“Is this fun for you?” She asked.
SNAP!
Viper sat back down as Reyna winced in pain. The cold was dampening whatever arousal she might have felt, but nonetheless she could feel a wet spot forming on her lingerie.
“Insubordination,” Viper commented. “My enjoyment is unimportant; the important part is that appropriate punishment be doled out for misbehavior.”
“I didn’t freeze your ass off,” Reyna muttered.
The now-familiar sting of her belt’s leather was the only reply.
~
Viper watched Reyna finish cleaning with a veneer of feigned patience, quietly drumming her fingers on her inner thigh, low enough to be out of sight of the shivering duelist. She had half-expected Reyna to call the scene off by now, but her stubbornness evidently went even further than Viper had presumed. She should have known better, perhaps, but the result was nonetheless a positive one, one that left the door open to further exploration.
As Reyna put the final vials back in their proper place, Viper rose from her chair almost contemplatively, still toying with the belt in her hand but otherwise presenting the image of being utterly nonplussed at the mostly naked woman occupying about her lab. Reyna’s eyes darted uncertainly between Viper’s curious expression and the floor. Viper approached, squeezing the belt to hold her tension as she placed a finger on Reyna’s chin. Reyna’s cheeks were burning, though whether it was from the cold or from arousal it was hard to tell.
Viper cocked her head. “What have we learned?”
Reyna’s lips opened slightly as she glanced at the belt.
“You may speak.”
“Viper, I—”
Viper scowled and forced her chin up to make uncomfortable eye contact. “That was not the proper form of address, nor was it an answer to my question.”
Reyna glanced at the belt. This close, her heavy breathing was obvious, only adding to the thrill in Viper’s veins. Her grip on the belt tightened.
“No, miss Viper.”
Viper frowned in exaggerated contemplation at Reyna’s response. Reyna was admittedly a bit awkward, but doing what was asked of her was a step forward in its own right. “Hm. Acceptable. Now answer the question. What have we learned?”
A smile quirked at Reyna’s lips. “To figure out where the thermostat—”
SNAP!
Reyna stifled a moan as Viper rebuffed her remark, holding back slightly less than she had previously and leaving an angry red mark along Reyna’s upper thigh.
“Try again.”
“I should tease you more fr—”
SNAP!
Viper held her look of disdain as Reyna gasped in pain. Instead of prompting, she merely raised an eyebrow.
Reyna sighed. “To expect consequences for my actions.”
“Close, but I think you already knew that,” Viper drawled. “And don’t think this will end the way you want if you keep up this streak of insubordination.”
Reyna grinned. “It’s tempting.”
Viper silently guided her backwards by the chin, watching her wince as her bare ass pressed against the cold countertop, with Viper pressed against her hip. “Last chance.”
The light of mischief continued to dance behind Reyna’s eyes, but the battle it fought appeared a losing one, worn down through desire and negative(?) reinforcement. She exhaled. “I should respect your space and your belongings.”
Viper’s eyes flashed in satisfaction, her hand releasing Reyna’s chin, her other subtly loosening its grip on the belt to turn up the thermostat. “Good, so you have learned something. I take it this means you don’t want to leave just yet. Don’t speak, nod or shake your head.”
Reyna nodded.
“I expected as much.” Viper pulled away from Reyna, giving her space to lift off the countertop. “Turn around.”
Reyna turned around.
“Gloves can come off. The rest of your clothes, too.”
Reyna discarded the gloves, then removed her lace bra and panties, neither of which had been doing a good job of concealing their respective baggage. Both her breasts and her length sagged upon their release, her erection miraculously holding despite the cold air.
Viper allowed herself a slight smile. “Now, what do you want, Zyanya?”
Reyna swallowed.
“Go on, use your words.”
“Fuck me,” she hissed.
“Who?”
“Fuck me, S—”
SNAP!
Reyna recoiled, gasping, while Viper cooly frowned. “Try again.”
“Fuck me, miss Viper. Please.”
“Good, you’ve remembered your place.” Viper moved forward, slotting her body against Reyna’s as she immediately began fondling her chest, a second hand caressing her hip and lightly moving inwards to brush her bush. Reyna bucked against her.
“Stop moving. Use your words.”
No words escaped Reyna’s mouth save a feral grunt as Viper traced her nipple with a fingertip. Viper’s other hand coyly cradled her thigh as Reyna slightly moved again.
“Still.” Viper stopped her caresses until Reyna complied, only then sliding her lower hand up to the base of her erection, hearing Reyna’s breath tighten as she slowly slid her palm up the bottom of the shaft.
“It’s impressive, honestly,” she crooned. “You’d think freezing yourself half to death would diminish blood flow here, but apparently your pretty dick can keep up just fine. Perhaps you like cleaning? I could find some outfits more appropriate, if you want to play maid.”
Something there evidently did it for Reyna, who gasped and dribbled precum over Viper’s hand. Viper sped up, pinching a nipple while her hand moved faster up and down Reyna’s length, aided slightly by Reyna’s shifting hips, an infraction she elected to ignore.
“Perhaps not, though, if you’re keen on being so messy. What do you think, pretty thing, should I make you mop up your mess when you’re done?”
Reyna gave no indication of a response, merely gasping into Viper’s hands and uttering a breathy ‘please’. Her body tensed up, and Viper slowed down.
“Do you deserve this?”
Reyna nodded aggressively. “Yes, please, I need it, please.”
“Who do you need it from?”
“You, miss Viper, please, I want, I’m so close.”
“I do like that,” she remarked, resuming her stoking while she subtly ground her crotch against Reyna’s ass, grunting softly herself. Reyna whined softly and Viper obliged, speeding up her movement while the other hand slid down to brace against Reyna’s hip. The moment felt suspended in time, Viper’s pent-up arousal budding against Reyna while Reyna’s remained held in her palm. Reyna’s arms hung to the sides, allowing herself to be subsumed in the denouement of their little game.
Reyna gasped as she was finally thrown over the edge, making a mess of the tile floor as she finally came in great spurts, thrusting backwards into Viper who quietly moaned into her ear. Reyna fell backwards against her, fully spent.
Viper propped her up. “One round? You have some improving to do.”
Reyna frowned. “I spent twenty minutes organizing glassware in your frigid AC. You should be glad I didn’t pass out on you.”
“Like that’s my fault.” Viper tossed her a towel. “Get dressed and clean yourself up. I’ll tidy the mess you left in my lab. Unless you’re keen to get a head start on mopping duty.”
Reyna, who clearly wasn’t, took her cue.
~
Viper lounged in the couch of Reyna’s room as she finished washing herself off, evidently taking time to appreciate the benefits of the piping hot water coming from the tap. The reheated meal Viper had brought sat in the box on a table. As the tap finally shut off, Reyna emerged, towel covering her lower body but her chest fully on display. Viper rolled her eyes.
“We should probably talk about that.”
Reyna grinned. “What’s there to talk about, since we both so clearly enjoyed ourselves.”
“If there was no issue with the content, fine, but there’s another matter.”
“Which is?”
“You need to kick the habit of instigating in my lab. I’m not always going to be ‘prepared’ in advance and unless you’re keen on doing dishes next, it’s rather limiting both in what I can safely allow you to get up to and what we can actually do.”
“You’re saying you expected me to rearrange your supplies?”
“I—no. The possibility was there, and I underestimated your audacity. And I made you fix it in part because there was no way in hell I was going to clean up after you.”
“Naked, though?”
“I gave you an out, you’re the one with a fetish for humiliation rituals.”
“Doesn’t change the fact of whose idea it was, cariño.” Reyna tapped Viper’s nose, eliciting a scowl.
“Put a shirt on.”
“No.”
“I hate you.”
“You love me.”
Viper sighed. “Perhaps.”
A wicked grin caught Reyna’s mouth.
“Not a word.” Viper held eye contact despite the very exposed pair of distractions lying beneath.
Reyna turned away to grab her meal, satisfied. “Wasn’t planning on it.”
Viper glanced at her. “I meant it about my lab, though.”
“You’re so boooring.”
“Reyna.”
She rolled her eyes. “Fine.”