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It was supposed to be a state secret, at first.
The only person who knew for the longest time was Woods. There had been others who'd known, once upon a time. Hudson, the elder Mason. That secret had died with both of them. Supposedly the knowledge was filed away somewhere in a CIA server, but the names were encrypted -- anyone who knew did not, strictly speaking, know who this information pertained to. Only that there was a black ops bioweapon program, and that one of the specimens was assigned to the aircraft carrier USS Obama, the ship's last line of defense against the kind of cyberattacks that were more and more of a risk with each passing year in the 2020s.
Menendez knew, purportedly -- or, had known about Mason's father, at least -- but there was no way he could prove it without making himself a madman. And so the world's favorite cult leader of 2025 continued to waltz around the globe preaching an infuriating mix of bleeding-heart tearjerkers, genuinely reasonable points, and terrorism.
Of course, the Navy knew as well. Well, not quite the Navy, strictly speaking. Not even JSOC. Realistically, the President and a handful of people employed by the CIA were in the privy. But the general consensus that he'd tried to push as hard as he could, with Woods' support of course, was that he did not need a handler. So in general, none of his colleagues knew. Except the medics, on a need-to-know basis.
So it passed that Harper did not know until he very much needed to know, even though he wasn't exactly a medic. No, he was the one to make David reconsider his opinion on the whole handler idea. He was the person who generally needed to know, where David was counted.
What could possibly go wrong?
The reasons to keep it from him aren't entirely professional -- David has been keeping him at arm's length on purpose, so as not to ruin what they have if he found out, nor to have him find out if they started fraternizing, since this could ruin his job. It is, after all, a state secret. No matter how he might think he can trust Harper, the knowledge of who -- what -- he is -- this is more hazardous than David himself could ever be. Simply knowing puts Harper in more danger than being by his side. Mason suspects Harper has been harboring feelings for him for a while, anyways. How could he ruin that? How could he throw a wedge in what they have, this fragile thing?
So, even though he thinks about it, he doesn't tell Harper. Even though Briggs suggests, now and then, that he could look for a candidate handler among his current colleagues, among the JSOC fellows, David keeps it in the back of his mind, only.
Harper finds out anyways, eventually. It's only a matter of time.
When David takes the plunge, it's for good reason. Yes, it is an impulse decision in the moment, but he reveals himself and his personal state secret in order to save Harper's life in the field. The mission doesn't matter -- which mission, which objective, how it lands in the grand scheme of the battlefield. In the moment all David can think of is the paralyzing fear of losing Harper.
The bad news is that he'll never get away with something like this again; he knows from the second he breaks the biochemical bonds keeping his powers at bay that he won't walk out of this unscathed. The good news is that he chose a rather convenient venue in which to reveal himself, in terms of who he did it in front of. The only witnesses being himself, of course, and Harper, and the mark that had pushed Harper into harm's way.
The mark is brought in dead. No big loss; the capture orders had been dead or alive. Briggs'll be pissed about the potential loss of intel, but at least there's no one running around extraneously privy to David's little secret. just Harper. Who is still extraneous in the Navy's eyes.
The consensus afterwards is that David needs a handler in the field to preserve his secret and national security, but if it'll be anyone, it should be Harper, since he knows now, and is a good candidate anyways.
So if Harper knowing isn't, professionally, a problem, then the other thing isn't, well, any more of a problem than it already was. Professionally, that is.
It becomes both less and more of a problem after Harper finds out. Mostly due to how he finds out.
There was no hope of Harper being one of the ones who would get away with a lie. The kind of unknowing civilian or private, those blissfully ignorant contractors who could be given a few sedatives and placated with the same lecture about how the human mind makes up all sorts of things in a state of shock and panic.
No, Harper's far too sharp for that. he knows what he sees, and he knows better than to allow anyone to let him forget that.
It's seared in his memory from the moment it happens, freezing him in time -- David jumping out, blowing his own cover when their mark tried to shove Harper over a railing and run, and preventing Harper from taking a nasty fall by catching him. Harper takes an adrenaline-soaked moment to realize that there's no way a human being could have covered that distance in such a short time, no way human anatomy could've reached and rescued him in time. Then the thick black ropes wrapped around him must be... oh, fuck.
Some latent instinct in his primal brain rears its head, telling him that the thing touching him now is a predator, is higher on the food chain than he is. Run for your fucking life his instinct tells him, and also holy fucking shit that's David. It is his rigorous training that allows him to suppress both instincts as they war in his mind, and to stay intentionally very still -- to raise his gun arm and fire off two shots before the force of impact knocks the gun from his hand, clattering, one bullet flying wide, the other hitting its target in the leg. The mark falls over the railing, taking the plunge he'd tried to force Harper into, and distantly Harper registers the sickening crack of bone and flesh on concrete.
His attention dilates, focuses again, narrowing back down to his lungs heaving, burning, and David standing before him, and he blinks and David looks entirely normal again but Harper knows what he goddamn well saw, knows the way his heart is pounding in his palms and his throat and his gut is pure raw survival instincts and that those don't fire for no reason.
Knows that this means they won't walk out of this with the same ignorance they walked in holding onto -- himself, especially.
Unharmed, unscathed, nothing but the light imprint of sucker marks and slight bruises on his wrists and forearms where David had gripped a bit too forcefully in his panic. Still, for a creature of his strength, the restraint demonstrated is impressive. Harper is almost envious.
His heart is still pounding with adrenaline the entire VTOL ride back, even after painkillers from the in-cabin medkit, too aware of how David looks at him, eyes on the back of his head when he thinks Harper isn't paying attention. And, how, when he can tell that Harper is paying attention, he won't even look at him.
Harper sits there white-knuckling his seatbelt, wishing he were the one piloting the evac if only to give him something to do with his hands, something -- anything else -- to do with the solid chunk of his focus that is currently running in circles screaming inside his head. Panicking a little bit because he keeps thinking about David. About the flash of inky black void, the way he'd blurred around the edges, liquid in a way a human person shouldn't be, about how uncanny it was, how... how it should have been terrifying, but instead Harper's heart is still racing for more than one reason. Like when you see something that isn't scary so much as awe-inspiring but you feel like you should be scared of it as a human person, right? Your instincts are warring.
Eventually his drifting, looping mind settles on a thought. The VTOL rocks through turbulence and even with the way his stomach is churning akin to the clouds, he closes his eyes and imagines his own hands piloting the craft through the rough patch and the strange familiarity of the muscle memory is enough to calm him. When the VTOL settles again he, too, comes out the other end of the tunnel of events repeating, and he realizes what it is. Realizes how safe he felt and how oddly loved he felt in that moment when David's extra limbs were wrapping around him so securely and dragging him out of harm's way. And he wants more.
The absolutely terrifying part isn't anything about David, or the implications of his newfound (to Harper, anyway) power, nor those of the fact that he blew his cover to save Harper's ass; not even the fear of what could've happened if he didn't step in, if he hadn't lashed out for Harper's sake.
No, none of that was outside of the realm of shit the Navy trained men like them to deal with. Even the slightly glossed-over implications of David saving his ass -- that wasn't entirely textbook, but it happened often enough. They weren't stupid. They'd fooled around before, but they'd never taken it further than mutual masturbation and half-clothed frotting in bed. David had never taken his pants off, and while he wasn't generally shy about taking his shirt off, he also tended not to leave it off for long periods of time. Harper had never questioned why; he assumed it was to do with David's personal medical history as a trans man, and that wasn't his business unless David felt like telling him about it, in which case he'd be happy to listen. And look. And touch, extensively. But he'd been happy with whatever David was willing to give, and elated to give in return, whatever David was willing to take. He'd saved his complaints, even when it started to become apparent that neither of them was getting quite as much as they wanted out of their arrangement, and there was something holding them back.
Now that something might not be a problem any more.
But first there's the matter of how to deal with the repercussions -- how to come out the other side of this, professionally, still intact. Oh god, will he be reassigned? Has he seen too much? Will they let him work with David again?
He stifles his anxieties on the VTOL ride back and keeps his mouth shut, hoping for the best, mentally bracing himself for the worst.
Briggs is pissed to no end. Harper, standing outside his office, can still hear the muffled sound of his voice being raised, though the exact words escape him, through the closed door. He can also see, through the frosted glass, Briggs pacing back and forth, gesturing occasionally, no doubt chewing Mason the fuck out.
The gist of it is clear, even without full context: David is in trouble.
Harper expects to start hearing about a court-martial the second he's called into the office, too, but to his surprise that's not quite what Briggs has in mind.
Luckily, Section evades a court-martial, but only because it happened to be specifically, exactly Harper who he was so indifferent in front of. Of all the people to accidentally reveal his personal state secret to, Harper would have to be about the least dangerous, partly because of his role in relation to Section and JSOC, and partly because, well, it's Harper. That's why, when Briggs gloweringly suggests he needs a field handler to keep him on his best behavior, the first suggestion is, well, Harper.
David seems to think Harper will be turned off by the idea. Harper is, well, surprised, to say the least, but certainly not opposed to the idea. He's not exactly used to being a handler, but he finds himself in a support role for David often enough anyways, and he's certainly fine with being the cavalry.
"It'd be a commitment," Briggs warns him -- warns them both. "This isn't something you can step into and step back from if you decide it's not for you. You already know about Section, so there's not much we can do other than swear you to secrecy, but I think I speak for all of us when I say the most efficient way to do so is to place you by his side. Two birds with one stone, don't you think?"
They're swearing him to secrecy by keeping him in the same place as Section, by assigning him to Section's side. As far as punishments go, it could be a hell of a lot worse -- he's already there most days, anyhow.
When he's through with Section, Admiral Briggs has Harper hang back a second, looking at him knowingly -- maybe a bit too knowingly. "You're a good man, Harper," he says. "keep an eye on him, use his power responsibly. Treat him properly."
"Yeah," Harper croaks, then clears his throat. "Yes, sir," he repeats. "I'll do my best."
Briggs gives him a curt nod. "Good man. The Navy's counting on you."
Harper makes his exit, and escapes with what's left of his pride.
At least the professional side of things panned out to a relatively easy resolution. Privately, the results are a bit more complicated. David's act of impulse didn't just reveal his state secret to Harper, it nudged aside a wedge that had been placed between them, by both of them; it forces both men to acknowledge what was and had been building between them.
They'd kissed before, is the thing. They'd even done a little more than just kiss, but Section always found himself pushing Harper away after, scared of going too far and potentially losing control of himself. Previously, his concern had mainly been about being out of control and hurting Harper -- to say nothing of the complications if he'd tried to keep his secrets as such and had been forced to explain to Harper in, well, a more intimate context. But now his prior concerns are no longer concerning, because Harper has the context required to give fully informed consent.
If he's willing to take the risk, then it's really just a matter of David confronting his own fear of accidentally harming Harper, and he finds he's willing to do that, now, knowing that Harper knows, that there's no risk to his job since Harper needs to know for the sake of his job, now, and that Harper clearly, visibly wants it. His want for David practically radiates off of him; David thinks that even without his heightened perception, his sixth sense for the subliminal chemical messages humans don't even consciously notice themselves picking up and leaving off half the time, he'd be able to tell.
Or maybe not. After all, according to Harper he could be pretty dense about the whole thing, at times.
The most cumbersome part was the process of getting to this point. now that they are here, and David's secret is out, it's just a matter of him teaching Harper how to work with it, and really, it's just another extension of their dynamic in the field, right? How hard can it be?
Maybe it's the... the way it almost feels illicit. Then again, half the shit they get briefed on for black ops is like that. It's just that this time it really is only in their hands. It's David's autonomy theyre talking about. The feeling of really being trusted with something like this... maybe it's odd to Harper because it feels like something personal. Because it feels like they're the ones taking advantage of it, like he's the one doing something he shouldn't.
Well. He'll just have to stay professional. He can do that, surely. Surely the fact that he's already thinking about it like he's been caught red-handed doesn't betray, even in his own mind, what he really wants out of this whole enterprise. What he's been thinking about since David's inhuman tendrils lashed out and wrapped around him and dragged him back to safety like their severed fulcrum didn't, couldn't after a tree snagged it that one time.
When they both finally step out of Admiral Briggs' office and their shoulders slump and they look at each other, Harper with a new responsibility weighing on him, he says "what now?" and David says "well, now is the part where I brief you on using me like a weapon."
He means tactically. Harper knows he means tactically, means in the field. It doesn't change the way heat lances through his body at the wording.
Still -- "you know nothing's changed, right? Like, the way I see you. You're still a person. You still control yourself. I trust you, Section."
Section looks thoughtfully at him. "I know that," he says, slow and soft. "But I also know that, to the Navy, I'm a tactical asset before I am a person. And if you're going to be by my side through all that that entails, you should know how to handle me. Everything that I am."
He turns, and takes a step, then pauses. Looks back over his shoulder at Harper. "C'mon," he says, "I'm grimy as fuck, and you need a change of clothes. Let's go hit the showers."
Harper's heart jumps in his throat. His boots squeak on the floor as he scrambles to follow David, and yeah, they probably both need a change of clothes, even if Harper's the only one whose pants look pre-ripped a la American Eagle jeans circa 2012. Thank fucking god for his bulletproof vest, too -- based on the borderline painful friction of dried blood and tight-stitched fabric against his bare chest, he's pretty certain his tits are fully revealed by the tears in his shirt.
They do not keep it professional when they get to the showers. David takes one look at the suggestive tears in Harper's shirt and bursts out laughing, and the levity of it is mundane enough to get Harper to relax a bit, though David quickly sobers again when he sees the bruising that had also been hidden by the bulletproof vest.
Harper doesnt find it in himself to hide how his breath hitches when David's fingers graze over the purple blooms all up Harper's side.
"You should get this checked out," he says, and Harper winces, but doesn't push him away. his eyes find David's in the dim light of the locker room, searching.
"Tomorrow," he says, "it's not that bad. Nothing broken."
Two fingers press down between his ribs, and he hisses at the sting of pain. It really isn't that bad, though, and the warm, damp air of the locker room helps soothe his aching muscles a bit.
"Fine," David huffs, "have it your way. C'mon, let's get cleaned up."
He's nonchalant as anything stripping down and tossing his clothes on the bench, and Harper casts a gaze at the door, hesitating. Not even because of what he thinks they might be about to do -- they've done this kind of thing before, after all, and so the itch in Harpers bones is familiar and well-worn, the urge to crowd in next to David and press himself up against the other man's heat and solidity.
But, maybe this time they need a little more privacy. Or is Harper reading this all wrong? -- did David bring him here just to clean up before he gets to see... well... all that?
"You just gonna keep staring?" David asks, turning on the hot water in one stall, looking for all the world like he's waiting impatiently for Harper, and Harper isn't quite sure what to do with that information. He stands there uselessly for a good moment, watching the flex of David's biceps and the sluice of sudsy water over his shoulders, lathering standard-issue shampoo from the wall dispenser into his hair already. Harper's mouth is suddenly very dry.
David ducks his head briefly under the spray, then shakes his wet hair out like a dog, seemingly unfazed by Harper's awkwardness. It's like nothing has changed between them -- like he hasn't even acknowledged that the reason they'd been holding back is no longer a concern. Like he's daring Harper to step up and change things between them, to make that first move.
But does that mean it's okay for Harper to put forward first? Is that actually what David is waiting for?
"Lock the door if you're that worried, man. Not like anyone's gonna be down here but us at this hour, though."
Fuck, he's right. David with his internally memorized map of the whole damn ship, his effortless mental recitation of how everyone's schedules intersect.
Harper fiddles with his dataglove for a moment and manages to remember which access code is for locking, not unlocking. He realizes that he feels horribly overdressed compared to David, and he's glad for taking the plunge when he says fuck it internally and begins to strip his clothes off.
He doesn't miss how David turns back to look at him, gaze lingering, trailing over Harper's bared chest.
"Ugh," he says, dangling his torn and bloodstained shirt from one finger, "don't think this is salvageable."
David laughs. "You can take one of mine, there's extra in my locker."
Again, Harper's traitor body lashes him with molten heat. How easily David offers to share his clothes like it's nothing -- like Harper won't be driven insane by the latent scent of David clinging to him, by the knowledge that the same fabric caressing his skin will have also caressed David's.
Sharing clothes isn't new, neither is sharing one of these little technically-communal but definitely not intended for sharing shower stalls. Even the strange charge to their interactions isn't new; they've fooled around together before, done plenty of mutual masturbation and some lazy clothed sex, but nothing more physically demanding. Harper had kept himself from questioning why, before, not wanting to ruin a good thing. now he thinks he knows the reason, though. Thinks maybe it does have to do with David's body, but not in the way he'd thought, once upon a time.
Deep breaths. focus -- sound of water hitting the tiles, hiss of steam, creaking of the pipes. Harper steps forward, slippery floor, but he keeps his footing despite the way his heart is pounding.
David's body language speaks only of familiarity and comfort, shoulders still sagged easily, as Harper crowds up against his back. He sighs like he's relieved at the first press of Harper's skin against his, chin hooking over his shoulder, hands skating over his abs, enjoying how he twitches, sensitive, beneath the featherlight touch.
"David," he whispers, and pretends even he can't tell how obviously raspy, how obviously turned on he sounds. "Have you been holding back on me?"
David sighs, like he's letting out weeks -- months, even -- of pent-up anxiety and exhaustion. His body shifts, weight pressing back against Harper, who gladly shifts his own mass to hold David. "Maybe," he admits quietly. "I didn't -- don't want to hurt you."
And Harper didn't know, before. What David was capable of, nor what he was hiding, nor why. And now it's all out in the open; now Harper's capable of asking. How it all works, how to handle it, how to navigate it. Now he knows, in confidence, what David's capable of -- and he wants to take that risk even more, now.
"You know I've wanted you," Harper says, and dips his head, letting his lips brush an errant scar that crosses the nape of David's neck onto one shoulder.
David shivers against him. "And I know you've wanted me too," he continues. "So tell me, is this why you've been holding back? The whole... bioweapon thing?" He says it with the distaste he feels for the idea, the notion of David being a weapon, anything less than an entire person.
David tilts his head, nestling into the crook of Harper's shoulder. His eyelashes flutter, dark and heavy and dewy with moisture. "Yeah," he admits, breathy. "Didn't want you to be -- nhh -- scared of me." It's a bit difficult to take him entirely seriously when he whines like that at the graze of Harper's teeth over his skin, featherlight.
"Nah," Harper says easily. "I know you too well to be scared of you. I know I can talk to you, man-on-man." The laugh that gets out of David rumbles his torso pleasantly where his back is pressed flush against Harper's chest.
"Man-on-man, huh?" David chuckles. "That your angle?"
Harper snorts, realizing how his wording sounds. "Sure," he jokes. "But seriously, David, you can tell me anything. If you... if that was your only misgiving, then... I don't want to keep holding back anymore. Not when we don't need to. I want you, Sec."
"Even knowing I'm secretly a freaky tentacle monster trained for combat?"
"Especially knowing that, holy shit. Not like... don't get me wrong, it's not just that. I wanted you before I knew that, you know that. But it doesn't... it's not just some kink. I never even thought about anything like that before, it's just because it's you. It's you I want, David. You're David Mason, first."
David sags against him, like that confession has taken something out of him, even more so than it took out of Harper to admit.
"Okay," he whispers, "alright." He chuckles lightly, maybe just to himself, at some private thought, then twists in Harper's arms, looking pleadingly at him. "One more thing you should know, then."
"What is it?" David sounds... not quite concerned, but consequential. Like this is something important, and Harper wants to give it the attention it deserves.
David purses his lips. "Maybe it's better if I show you." He raises one hand, fingers trailing over Harper's jaw, and leans in.
"Is this okay?" His breath puffs hot over Harper's chin, making him shiver, and he nods.
"Yeah," he rasps, quiet, and then David is kissing him.
It's not their first kiss, but neither of them are counting anymore. The sensation of David's mouth on his is familiar enough that Harper takes only moments to sink into it, though David tantalizingly keeps it light, and Harper realizes something is different than usual as soon as David's tongue swipes between his lightly parted lips. There's an ionic tang, a bittersweet taste somewhere between ozone and honey on David's tongue, and Harper finds himself sparked with desperation suddenly, a need for more.
Harper needs to see this how David sees it in order to understand it; simply explaining with words wouldn't be enough if he doesn't experience a taste of it, too.
Harper needs to taste it in order to understand why David is so ashamed of himself every time he has the urge to kiss how his body really wants him to, because his only reference point for this is how carefully he's been trained to not ever accidentally use his pheromones for unsolicited applications in the field, how carefully he's been trained to release the right dose, at the right time, and nothing more. It didn't even occur to him, for the longest time -- even if he conceptually understood that one of the uses of pheromones in the natural world is to aid in sexual reproduction -- that in suppressing these urges, he might be suppressing natural parts of his own physiology. Not just the hunter's instinct to snare prey, to silence competitors, to ward off potential predators -- if indeed he even has any natural predators, whatever he is, taxonomically -- but there's something else, too.
The drive to replicate. To find a suitable mate and be coupled, like particles bound by intrinsic forces. And so it follows that as soon as he knows Harper knows -- and is therefore fairly certain that Harper is not only into him, but into it -- into the fact that David is a fucking freak of nature with shapeshifting tentacles and pheromone powers he's afraid he can't control -- he finds himself actively becoming aware of just how much effort he expends, on a daily basis, trying not to release the wrong chemicals around Harper by accident. Like, now that he knows which button, which vague fleeting feeling he always tries to repress because that must be part of the monster, which one goes a little further than just loosening up someone's tongue.
But now that he knows, now that he can separate this feeling from the others that he's used to allowing to pass him by, it's only a matter of time before David slips up. A matter of time before he's not paying attention, and his body is acting up anyways. And, well, here in the quiet, vulnerable enclosed space of the locked showers, he asked if he could show Harper, and Harper, clueless, agreed.
He can't fuck this up. He can't take it too far. Just enough to show Harper. No more.
In his defense, it's an honest mistake -- he's used to the dataglove doing half the work for him, maintaining his external human appearance and suppressing most of his inhuman biochemical signals, and without it he's as good as naked. Without it, the moment his body kicks into gear, he loses his careful grasp on his own control.
It's not like he has much experience to weigh this against, but it's telling when Harper moans a little too hard, David thinks, for how deeply he's being kissed, and he leans into it because it sounds nice and it feels nice and Harper's mouth is very warm and surprisingly soft against his, even with the scar on his chin and how chapped his lips are. And then Harper moans again, almost slurred, almost like he's drunk, and the same feeling begins to flood David's system and he -- oh.
Oh no.
Pulling back and fumbling for the right physiological switch leaves his heart pounding in a decidedly unpleasant way, but it also gives Harper a much-needed moment to breathe.
When David, too, regains his composure -- though more lost from embarrassment than the effects of any particular chemicals in his saliva -- he braces himself for the worst as he looks at Harper again.
"Holy fucking shit," Harper says, wiping his mouth. Blinking hard, trying to shake the residuals of the feeling -- part of him scrambling, at once, to retain it, to remember it even as it dissipates. "Holy shit, what was that?"
Give me more, he wants to say, I liked it, but the way David is looking at him he feels like he shouldn't just jump right back into it.
David looks terribly flustered, and concerned. almost guilty -- "Hey," Harper rasps, and coughs to clear his throat, "hey, what's that face? What is it?"
David scratches his neck, looking anywhere but Harper. "They're, uh, well... pheromones."
"Pheromones?" Harper repeats, dumbfounded. "Like... like an ant?"
"Well. Well, uh... yeah. Pretty much. To be honest, I've only recently begun to discover how strong they can get. I didn't ever have, well, a target for it. I got used to suppressing my urges because I assumed they were related to hunger."
Yeah, one kind of hunger, maybe.
And his face tells Harper everything he needs to know -- that this, too, is something David has had so well trained into him, so well engrained in his mind, something he's so damn well disciplined about, that the thought of taking personal advantage of it would be almost unthinkable. He's scared he'll hurt Harper if he can't control himself; Harper, on the other hand, wants nothing more than to be the testbed for David to learn his powers. There's nobody he'd trust more to experiment on his body. Admitting he wants it too is one thing, but getting the proper context to realize those urges he's been pushing back aren't just 'the monster', they're sexual in nature...
If not for the fact that Harper has put the thought in his mind. And, well... Harper won't be so brazen as to claim it outright, but given the look in David's eyes, he somehow gets the feeling he's not the only one who's had fantasies that started something like this.
Truth be told, he's kind of into the idea. More than kind of -- knowing that such a fantasy is right before his fingertips, realistic and hopefully as simple as his informed consent to David... oh god, he wants it. He really wants it. He wants David to melt his brain and unravel him entirely. Maybe that's his kink, in the end -- David.
He's flattered enough that David was flustered so much by his presence as to not be able to control himself for a moment, that it makes him not fucking care at all that he'd be totally releasing himself of his inhibitions if David were to give him more than a microscopic taste of the stuff.
"Pheromones, huh... " Harper says again. He bites his lip, looking David up and down thoughtfully. "What can they do?"
He responds like he's paraphrasing a list he memorized. "In microdoses, they can make subjects more... agreeable."
"So, they work as a disinhibitor for interrogation?"
"Generally, yes." Oh, how stuck-up and professional he sounds, how businesslike. It makes Harper's skin crawl. Oh, man -- he's really gonna clam up about this, isn't he? Harper doesn't want to pressure him too much, but he also wants to know -- how far David's head is up his own ass about this, that is.
"Could they be used in... other scenarios?"
Something almost fearful, distasteful flashes in David's eyes. "I wouldn't." Like... not like he's been asked before, but like he's barely even considered it himself because someone else told him he should never even think about it.
Well, screw that. Harper's going to make him think about it. If he doesn't get his ass kicked for just insinuating as much, he'd very much like to make David think about it.
"What about in higher doses?"
"I've never tested it, and the results of those studies were never disclosed to me." He sounds a little bit disappointed.
"Those studies?" Harper doesn't like how this is starting to feel just a bit like an interrogation, but there's some things he's still itching to know, before he asks David to just outright get freaky with him.
David shrugs, like it's not a big deal. "Like, on samples I provided."
"With your informed consent, I hope?"
David blushes, at that, hiding his face in one hand for a moment. "Yes, mom. Jeez, you worry so much about me. Look, I think it wasn't disclosed because the studies were inconclusive, okay? I spat in a cup a bunch of times, and I didn't really learn much from it. I get the feeling the researchers had a similar experience with my biosamples, though, if it makes you feel any better. I did learn one cool thing -- if I eat like, I dunno, regular MRE shit, rations, whatever, my spit does fuckall, but with enough of the right proteins, it gets a lot more potent. Salmon, natural aphrodisiacs, y'know."
"Do you know how potent?"
"Well, I think it'd be at least a little bit stronger than just truth serum, I'll put it that way."
Harper takes a breath. thinking. weighing. "Do you," he starts, "ever think about testing it?"
"I haven't really had the opportunity," David says honestly.
"What if you had a willing test subject? If... " Harper leans forward, hovering before him. No flinch, no recoil, nothing -- David just looks expectantly at him. So Harper puts a hand on his arm, not encroaching, just comforting. Looks him in the eyes. "If I asked you to. If I wanted it. If I wanted you to... manipulate my body and mind like that."
David's gaze is calculating, but almost hopeful. "You'd be into that?"
Harper shows his full hand: "It's all some good consensual fun, yeah? Even if I can't meaningfully consent when I'm, say, under the influence, I can still tell you beforehand that I'm willing to take that risk, I trust you to be good to me when I'm so horny I can't think, and from that little taste you accidentally gave me, I have a pretty good idea what I'm in for."
David's brows furrow, the same usual stress line making itself evident in his forehead. "And what if you stop wanting it partway through?"
"Then I'll do my best to tell you that. Or you can just... stop. I won't hold it against you." He laughs. "It's not like we can't keep talking to each other, y'know. You've seen me drunk."
David looks away, then back. "I know," he says, almost shy. "I just... I don't really know the extent of my powers, in this context. I don't want to hurt you by accident. Even if you're... even if it feels good for you in the moment."
Harper picks his hand up off of David's elbow and flips it over, offering it to him, palm up. "Hey," he says, reassuring, "look at me, Sec."
He does. And he places his own hand hesitantly into Harper's, their fingers softly interlacing.
Harper squeezes his hand, gently. "You're not gonna hurt me, okay? We can go stoplight system -- green, yellow, red, use a safeword too, and if you really, I mean really think the vibes are getting weird or something, like I said -- I won't hold it against you if you just stop. My dick might hold it against you for a little while, but... " his voice softens, humored but also serious, "it's okay. I'd rather kill the mood than have it hurt more later."
Section says nothing. After a moment, letting Harper's words sink in, he squeezes Harper's hand in return. "Okay," he says quietly. "Okay," again, with more confidence.
"D'you wanna take this somewhere more private?" Harper offers, and, casting a meaningful glance at the hard tiles, "maybe a little more... comfortable?"
David smirks, then his grin goes lecherous, a little heated in a way Harper very much likes.
"Good idea."
Harper misses the closeness when David steps back, but he saves his complaints when he towels off and shrugs into David's extra shirt, as promised. It smells like him.
He sees those inhuman shapes again in the dark, but they vanish before he can get a good look, as soon as David's dataglove is back on. Expedient as ever getting redressed, Harper hopes he'll be afforded another look soon.
"My quarters?" David asks, tilting his head just so, and something hungry flashes in his eyes. Harper gulps, feeling slightly pinned, and like he's about to be devoured. He jumps headfirst: "you lead the way."
As if he doesn't already have the route memorized by heart.
They both keep it professional going somewhere more private, redressed enough to hide how worked up both of them are. once they're into his quarters, though, they can't keep their hands off of each other for long.
By the time they've made it to David's couch, both of them still fully clothed, David hasn't even taken off his stupid coat, and Harper is happily straddling his waist, one hand on his cheek, the other hanging onto a thick tendril of David's, which is, in turn, wrapped around him all the way from wrist to forearm.
He'd been the one to reach out first -- the tentacles were reaching out, too, of course, they had been the whole time, had been every time Harper came close to him since they'd met, curiosity of their own, or maybe just something buried so deep David hadn't put a name to it yet. He was well schooled in masking their constant motions to make it seem, even now that Harper could see them, like they were just idly shifting around. But it seemed Harper knew better, or had his own ideas that eerily matched David's subconscious, because he'd kicked off his shoes and then, the moment the tentacles had begun to free themselves from David's coat, evidently sensing a safe environment now that he, too, was bending to remove his own shoes, had instinctively reached out for one curious tendril. David had opened his mouth to reply, and before he could say anything the tentacle was wrapping around Harper's wrist with a mind of its own, and he was licking his lips, mouth suddenly so very dry, and looking up to find that Harper's pupils were totally eclipsing those pretty cornflower irises, and he was shifting closer, and -- well, that's how they made it to the couch.
Harper pulls back, eventually, and continues their previous conversation. "You're telling me you've had to hide these things every time we've fooled around?"
And boy, if that doesn't get David flushed like nothing else.
"Tell me I'm wrong -- you do want to know what you can do with 'em, right? Like, full extent and all that?" he casts his gaze pointedly at the dark tendrils amassing beneath David's coattails, the swarming mass very clearly having its interest piqued by all this discussion of what it can do. How much of this is conscious and how much isn't, he can't quite tell, but he's rather flattered by how responsive David's body is, both the human parts and the... other ones.
David's eyes flick up to meet his, and oh. Oh. Dark, dark, hungry tidepools regard him. "I do," he says, and his voice is suddenly a bit breathy, like he's strained by some thought only he knows.
Harper takes his hand, drawing it up to kiss his knuckles. "Then I'm all yours, hotshot." His breath fans out hot over the back of David's hand; David, before him, shivers violently. Then he stands abruptly, tendrils fanning out around him like a skirt, and one rather large tentacle moves as if with a mind of its own, latching onto Harper's pant leg and slithering up. He lets it come, lets it curl around him, thick and muscular and foreign but unmistakable in its strength and flexibility.
"Come to bed," David says, enthused, insistent, confident.
Harper grins lecherously at him. "Seducing me, now, are we? Gonna sweep me off my feet?"
At once, he feels something slippery beneath one heel, and he does, in fact, get swept off his feet, tripping comically on the end of one of David's squirming tendrils laid out like a convenient banana peel, only for a combination of strong arms and potentially even stronger tentacles to catch him.
He swoons. Alright, yeah, he's a grown-ass man. He still definitely one-hundred percent swoons when he falls into David's snug grip, already a little dizzy with the knowledge that David's latent strength is enough to hold all one hundred-ninety pounds of him seemingly effortlessly, seemingly without breaking a sweat.
Well -- there is a bead of sweat glistening on David's forehead. But Harper gets the feeling it's not quite from exertion, noticing just how flushed his cheeks are -- and his neck, pale skin peeking out beneath the collar of that ridiculous coat he's always hiding under.
Harper loops an arm around his shoulders, tugging at the lapels of the woolen monstrosity. "Get this shit off," he says, "I wanna see you for real."
David's chest shakes with laughter, a rumble that has Harper feeling like a kitten curled up against the side of a much larger cat, and he hoists Harper up in his arms, adjusting his weight before carting him all the way to the bedroom.
He tosses Harper into the bed like a sack of flour, leaving the smaller man to recollect himself from a pile of limbs, greedily watching David shuck off his coat. He's expedient, efficient about it, but his shoulders seem to shrink without it, like he's embarrassed to show himself, as he sets the mass of dark fabric aside. Without it, Harper can make out how the tendrils don't even seem to spawn from one single location, creeping out from his waistband, and suddenly it makes sense why he never tucks his shirt in.
Harper's heart beats faster as David advances on him, looming over the edge of the bed like a tall, dark silhouette. Except he can see David's eyes gleaming, reflecting light in the way humans' eyes shouldn't, this close in the dark. Tapeta lucida.
"Hello," David says, voice incongruously soft.
Harper props himself up on his elbows. "Hey there."
"Safeword is Anchorage, alright?" David says, without preamble. It makes Harper's heart skip a beat, but he likes the sensation. He doesn't mind feeling like he's lost his footing, a little bit, with David. He knows he'll always be caught if he stumbles.
"Good by me," he says, and he hears the clink of a belt buckle and the sound of fabric falling, then a different, unfamiliar sound -- one that is rapidly becoming more familiar to him. David swings one leg up onto the bed, and several dark tendrils come with him, barely more than a slightly different shape in the darkness of the room, pooled shadows, but he senses their mass.
One curls around his ankle as if for support, and his brain shorts out for a moment entirely -- this is it, this is really it.
David, infuriatingly, decides to take his sweet time. As if he knows just how impatient Harper is to get on with it and get it on, he's extra careful to make sure this is good, that he doesn't rush Harper through anything, that everything Harper takes is something he's prepared for. That's a boon, if anything -- he'll need it, with how much he plans on taking, if he can handle it all.
David settles his weight over Harper, carefully arranging his mass so he doesn't crush or constrict him in any way, and for the first time he allows Harper to touch him, to explore his body. Tentacles begin to swarm out from under his shirt, and Harper touches those with equal excitement and interest to the way he touches the rest of David's skin, stroking over the varied textures from smooth to bumpy, slightly ridged. A chunk of Harper's brain splits off like ice from a glacier, sinking into the ocean with a resounding crash -- long gone to the thought of how those little ridges would feel inside him, just a bit harder and rougher than the rest of the flesh around them -- how it'd feel catching on his rim, dragging over his prostate -- fuck.
Okay, he's getting way ahead of himself. One damn thing at a time. Pants off and then he'll ask David to fuck him.
David's tongue teases at Harper's, just barely dipping between his lips for a moment before receding. There's something almost-sweet, almost-bitter on his tongue, that ionic tang to his saliva again, an odd taste on his mouth. Heat diffuses through Harper's body, and when David pulls back the heat does not recede with him, instead strengthening in magnitude. Harper instinctively tries to follow, chasing the kiss, but David's hand cups the back of his neck, gently urging him to lie all the way back down. Conceding to the soft touch, warm and very much welcome, Harper lies back and allows the feeling to overtake him, spreading throughout his entire body.
This time, David does not pull back. This time he licks deep into Harper's mouth, and when Harper pulls his full weight down on top of his body, David allows himself to be moved, reads the wordless plea to claim Harper as his own, and responds in kind.
This time, he allows the trickling molten heat from his core to seep through him, to free itself in the tangling of tongues. He allows the brazen furnace-warmth to overcome both himself and -- knowing that Harper very much wants it, as it spreads -- Harper too. The tension slowly melts out of Harper's body, nothing left but that deep, subconscious instinct that must be telling him the thing on top of him isn't quite human in the same way that he is. Even that dulls a bit, though, before the intoxicating force of David's pheromones, seeping into Harper's bloodstream, making him dizzy with need. He's so warm he can hardly bear it, even as he and David fumble with each other's remaining clothes, freeing himself does little to soothe the itch overtaking his entire body.
"Mmghh, sec, need you," he mumbles into David's mouth, and David chuckles back at him without breaking the kiss, a hot puff of air across his chin.
"Feel good?" David's voice is light with mirth, a bit smug, but also just a tinge nervous, when he checks for Harper's confirmation.
"Yeah..." Harper sighs, sinking deeper into the mattress. "Kinda high, 's'nice." His filter is gone, and that'd be the loosening of his tongue, but he can't bring himself to care or be embarrassed more than a tiny flicker, not when David exudes a delighted warmth, every cell in him practically screaming that he's every bit as into this as Harper is.
Every motion is a question, any encroachment a little hesitant, always giving Harper room to push back, to pull away, to indicate without words if he's not into it.
He doesn't need to push back. He welcomes the curious curl and crawl of David's many tentacles, wrapping around his limbs like so many snakes, and when they probe between his legs he's the one to open them first, excitedly spreading his thighs so quickly he garners a startled laugh from David, who clearly expected him to be a bit more shy.
Joke's on him -- Harper knows damn well what he wants, and with all his inhibitions swirled away down the drain, he's going to fucking get it.
"Gahhh, David," he moans, "David, want you to fuck me."
"How?" David asks, a smile curling at the corners of his lips.
"D'you have..." he smooths one hand over David's chest, thumbing the seams of scars under his pecs. "Mmgh," he says, helplessly, distracted by the peaked hardness of one nipple against his fingertips, and the way David squirms and whines between closed lips when he rolls it around under his thumb. He seems to understand what Harper is asking, though.
"I can shift things around a bit as I see fit," David explains, not ceasing for even a moment to touch Harper soft and infuriatingly teasing, tentacles exploring everywhere. "Got the parts I was born with, but they look a little different now, since I've been on testosterone for a long time. As for, well, the other stuff... I can give it to you and take at the same time, if that's what you're asking."
For a long moment, Harper is too lightheaded with that revelation to formulate any sort of response.
"Yeah," he croaks, "give it to me good, yeah? Take if you want, too, I don't care. Oh, fuck, d'you wanna ride me?"
David laughs sharply. "Think you can take it?"
"One way to find out," Harper challenges him.
When David pulls back to kick his pants off, Harper finds his hands fumbling, hesitating as he goes to remove his own clothes -- they're both feeling terribly overdressed, now -- and Harper worries for a second that they're moving too fast. David's almost always been the more hesitant of the two of them in their past encounters, and Harper has played by his tune.
David notices his pause, though, and looks up curiously at him, at the way his eyes are lingering, curiously. A teasing smirk plays over his lips -- "you alright?"
Harper blinks. "Yeah, I just... " he tries, and fails, to find the words. I didn't expect you to take your pants off so fast. What does that even sound like? Does it convey anything like the meaning he thinks?
"What, you surprised?"
Harper flushes, scratching the back of his neck. He has to look away for a second to regain his composure. "Yeah, a little. I dunno, I thought you might be... I didn't want to assume you were uncomfortable showing certain parts of your body or anything, but I also didn't want to pry by asking, y'know?"
David chuckles softly. "Aw, you're so sweet." He shrugs. "But nah, I'm not that kind of guy. I like what I have -- though I think that's also because I can change it at will, to some extent."
A sound forms and then dies in Harper's throat. "You can...?" he trails off, not sure how to word what it is he's asking.
David smirks. "I can give, and I can take," he repeats. "I'm sure I could do both at once, too, but it'd take a bit of heavy lifting."
Harper thinks he's ready to see David's junk. He stops thinking altogether when David tugs down his boxers, too, freeing everything for Harper to get an indulgent eyeful. The tdick isn't the part that startles him, though he's never seen a trans man's genitals up close, in the flesh, before -- just pictures in online sex ed articles, stuff like that. He's admiring it for sure, curiosity piqued by how it clearly shares the anatomical root of a clit, but is enlarged and erect like how his own penis gets. Fucking cool as hell, is what it is -- it's so incredible that David can literally just... inject himself, every now and then, and his body will sing for him in this way.
The rest of it is what really gets Harper's head spinning, though: the way the flush under David's skin darkens to purple, then almost ink-black, like his blood is poisoned, like something else is running in his veins. His skin takes on an almost greyish tinge, here, tones that would seem pallid and bruised out of context but instead give the impression of a blooming flower in this place. David's hole is dripping with an unnaturally reflective slick, itself tinged like a lighter shade of ink, feathering pigment in glossy clear fluid, and when Harper looks closely he can make out the shape of many small tendrils undulating inside, like this hole is just a sheath for much more than Harper can fathom. David's cock pushes against the constraints of its folded hood, as if it, too is just a sheath; the appendage seems to pulse, tissue shifting beneath the skin, like it could change shape and grow at any moment.
Given David's wording, Harper suspects it can and will do exactly that.
It seems like the shapeshifting also extends to the ability to make himself wet more or less at will -- the sound when David slips an exploratory finger, then two into his hole is so wet, so obscene it makes Harper's cock almost painfully throb between his legs. He's content, almost -- if he could call the desperate way he's starting to feel content -- to watch David finger himself, biting his lip, eyes fluttering shut in bliss, eyelids kissing the flush high on his cheekbones as he arches his back into the curl of his own fingers, indulgently rocking his hips, bracing himself in Harper's lap.
Harper, totally enthralled, obediently holds down David's thighs, allowing him to rut against Harper's still-clothed erection. Harper practically whimpers when David finally takes mercy on him, freeing him from his boxers -- precome already in a wet smear at his tip.
David looks at him hungrily, like he wants to devour Harper.
"Later," he whispers, voice a seductive rumble, "remind me to suck you off until the only thing you can remember is my name."
Harper's dick twitches against his thigh, already hard, the glans so red it nearly looks painful. It nearly feels painful, how fucking erect he is, how deliriously lightheaded David's made him. he doesn't even think all of it is the pheromones.
Even so, the part of him that perks its ears up and stands at attention for service... that part is still singing just as loud as the siren-hymn of the pheromones, liquid sugar in his veins. It doesn't quite scratch that inflamed itch to draw closer to David's undeniably alien genitalia, but he's starting to enjoy the itch.
Starting to think, maybe he can challenge himself a bit. See how long he can draw it out, how long he can make it last before the hum of chemical fervor is too much.
He dutifully holds David's thighs steady while the larger man gets himself comfortable, a small tendril curling out from nowhere identifiable to begin licking into David's entrance, opening him up. He whines quietly, making eye contact with Harper as he does so, and Harper can't look away. Half unconsciously, his hand finds his own dick, slicking it up with the precome that has dripped from the slit, hard and very much turned on from watching David's self-prep, watching him wantonly open himself up on his own damn tentacles, holy shit.
The noises alone are enough to give Harper something to pull from his memory banks for the next ten years, every time he'd want to get off. The tiny, delicate whimpers that shouldn't be capable of coming from the mouth of such a large man.
A second tentacle joins the first, each tugging gently on the folds at each side of his slippery entrance. He's already dripping arousal, and Harper becomes a little lightheaded with his own arousal at the sight of one tentacle-tip curling to press the slick back where it came from, lubricating David's hole as he works it open like he's simply fingering himself, the easy ministrations of his tendrils like hands.
At some point, the realization strikes Harper, that every time he's heard David fingering himself and thought 'fuck, he must be so wet', maybe it was actually this he was hearing. How many times has David hidden this beneath one or two layers of clothes, between the separation of a blanket, how many times has he freed this part of himself in the dark, just a few feet away from Harper?
Well, it doesn't matter. He had his reasons for not letting Harper know, then; and now, that's not a problem anymore. Now, he gets to watch -- and listen -- to his heart's content.
He watches, enraptured, as David opens himself up; ears drinking in every little whimper and moan that escapes between David's lips.
"You do this when you get yourself off?" he whispers, a man possessed, eyes unable to divert from the scene before him. "Think of me and do this?"
David whines; "yeah," he gasps raggedly, and the squishy sound of one tendril plunging deep and then tugging its way back out hits Harper's ears so hard you'd think he was the one getting physically stimulated by it, not David.
Well, soon enough he will be, too.
David's a tease, but he's efficient. When he's decided he's gotten himself wet enough, or loose enough, or whatever it is that specifically matters to him, he's adjusting himself in Harper's lap and Harper can see what he wants in his eyes, feels as ready for it as he'll ever be, so there's really nothing for it but to brace hands on David's hips and let him go to town.
David sinks down onto him without preamble, and Harper's head spins with the sensation of a tight, warm, undulating hole rippling around him, tendrils moving both inside and out of it, like they're sheathed inside his hole just as easily as they root around his groin.
Harper saves any purely analytical thoughts about David's anatomy for later, as he barely has enough brainpower as it is to think of anything at all, with how David's tentacles swarm between his legs, curling around the base of his cock to tease the last inch or two that haven't sunk into David's slick cunt.
He doesn't really care if the tentacles are rooted inside or outside of David's body, anyhow -- they're making him feel incredibly fucking good right now, and that's approximately all Harper can bring himself to care about when he's got David hot and heavy and wonderful on top of him.
David's thighs flex as he pushes himself up, then back down, the same tentacles from before still hovering around his legs, grabbing onto whatever they can find for support -- some curl around David's limbs, some around Harper's, some around both of them, indiscriminately, as if they are simply two different organs comprising the same being. His insides swarm, milking Harper's dick for all he's worth.
Tendrils snake out from all around David's entrance, his clit hard and reddish-purple and proudly swollen with blood, organic and human and peculiarly natural amidst the swarm of ink-stained tentacles surrounding it, though its shade darkens at the base, melding into the coloration of the rest of him. It's odd, and inhuman, and Harper hardly knows what to do with it, but somehow, looking at the whole mess of it, it feels like one coherent whole. Like whatever he's staring at, though he doesn't have the words for it, is inexplicably a part of David's body that exists for a purpose, and that its form belies that function. He blinks, and he swears David's clit wasn't that dark or that long before, didn't move like that, didn't melt away into one long, thick tendril that snakes around and slips back between their thighs to slither its way up to Harper's hole. It slides over the puckered entrance, just enough sensation to make Harper clench and then let go reflexively, hole twitching in anticipation, balls tightening.
Inside, the feeling of David's body is warm and slithering, cunt slick and inviting and unmistakably meant for copulation, though his muscles undulate and throb in a way that they shouldn't, milking precome from Harper one torturous drop at a time. Maybe David's just unnaturally wet, but Harper swears he's never leaked this much in his life, and the feeling grows when David's clitoral tentacle coils back to curl up against his hole, something equally slick and slippery and intoxicating dribbling over his ass and thighs.
Oh, they're gonna make a fucking mess.
"Can I --" David pants, nudging just the tip against Harper's entrance; both of them twitching at the deluge of sensory feedback.
"Please," Harper gasps, "please, oh my god, yes," and the hungry gleam in David's eyes says he didn't know Harper was this much of a freak but he's liking it. Harper feels similarly. he's gotten himself off like this before, plenty of times he's had a hand on his dick and the other behind himself, a finger, then two, three in his ass, David's name on his tongue. The real feeling of it, the physical, organic texture of something alive and wriggly and feeling like it was designed for this exact purpose, is something else entirely. His head is spinning, slightly, and each pulse of heat through his body melts his conscious thought just a little more, pushes him further into the murky haze of nothing coherent but pleasure, even that not so coherent, more of a vague idea so thick and fluid he could swim in it.
He barely even registers the first press of just the tip inside him, for it's so minimal, so gentle it's almost nothing out of place. back-and-forth, stimulating the slightly puffy, elastic flesh, loosening him up. At first, David moves in simple thrusts, in and out, no unusual sensations. Gradually his motions become less like those of a regular penis and more like something else, something fantastical and wild. Twitching, pulsing, squirming around to fully, thoroughly stretch him in a total radius before probing deeper. Pulling entirely out, trailing so much unknown slippery wetness in its wake, before nudging right back into place. They haven't used a single drop of lube. With whatever the hell David is capable of secreting, his tentacular mucus seemingly just as aphrodisiac as his saliva, Harper's pretty sure they won't need it. Two-fingers' breadth of tendril up his ass, and not even the slightest burning sensation, no discomfort save the usual ache, the good kind; David's pussy gushing around him like a veritable waterfall -- yeah, they'll be fine.
David twitches around him, and at once there's the nudge of that tendril up against Harper's prostate, David found the damn thing twice as quick as Harper did the first time he fingered himself, and Harper would be jealous if not for the way that first little press shoots white-hot fire through his nerves, all the way up his spine and then back down from head to toe. He thrashes on the bed, losing his grip on David's hips, and David huffs out a tiny breath of a laugh, bouncing himself that much harder on Harper's dick without the hands bracing him, lightly restricting his motions.
Beneath him, Harper moans pitifully, brain melting out from between his ears. David kind of wants to shut him up in the simplest way possible, but he entertains himself only with the passing thought, and saves it for later -- after all, he doesn't want to totally ruin Harper their first time.
Unless Harper wants it, of course. David would be more than happy to spitroast him, in that case.
David's tentacles wrap around his upper body for support and comfort, replacing his hands now that they're doing nothing but claw desperately into the sheets, and Harper's gasps are music to his ears.
"Fuck, fuck," he spits among a string of indecipherable curses, "fuck me, please," and David leans down over him, a teasing smile playing at his lips.
"I am fucking you," he purrs, "is there something else you want? You can tell me, you know. You want something, be good and ask for it."
Harper's head flops back on the pillows, hair a mess around his face. He's grown it out just a little; David likes it like this, how it curls gently and frames the shape of his face, the roundness of his jaw, the angle of his cheekbones.
"My mouth," he gasps. "I want it all."
My goodness, David thinks. Leans closer. "Why, you absolute slut," he whispers, and doesn't miss how Harper shivers under him.
But Harper keeps looking at him with the same expectancy, unfaltering, which is how David knows he isn't joking. something in his eyes says he's remembering how he'd been flustered when David's tentacles first snaked out to grab him in the field, thinking of how David held him like something precious. Wanting it again but like this, wanting to be smothered and overwhelmed in a loving way.
This gives David pause, evaluating the weight of Harper's enthused request against how imbibed he is in the moment, how well he can gauge his own limits.
"Are you sure?" David asks, voice so low and so smooth and so damn soft it makes Harper's heart ache, hovering carefully over him, hands wandering with a gentle ease that contrasts and complements the firm, uncompromising grip of many, many tendrils.
Harper, in response, takes one of the tendrils in hand, stroking it coolly, enjoying how it -- and David's whole body, when he uses just the right amount of pressure -- shudders against his touch. Carefully he tugs it away from his shoulder and raises it to his lips.
"Trust me," he says, eyes heavy-lidded, regarding David with rapt focus, David's own gaze glued to the twitching, oozing tendril held before Harper's mouth like some feast. "I want this."
He dips his head forward and pulls the appendage into his mouth.
David's answering moan is the sweetest noise Harper thinks he's ever heard, head tossed back, ecstatic bliss.
Harper reluctantly pulls off from suckling the squirming tip. "Sensitive, eh?" he teases. David shivers again, and the tendril flicks his bottom lip, dragging over it in such a sensual manner as to cause Harper to pause, freezing in utter aroused shock for a moment.
"Yeah, 's'what I thought." with that, he resumes his work, bobbing his head on David's slippery length.
David quickly regains his composure, though he's clearly affected by Harper going down on what must at least be a secondary sex characteristic, if not definitively a sex organ. he has, as always, an uncanny sense for Harper's physical limits, and he sets their pace quick, but not so quick Harper can't take it. just fast enough to give him a little bit of that pressure, the tendril in his mouth thickening and coiling around itself and driving deep before long.
He invites it in, tries to remember to breathe through the torrential, heady feeling. It's good, so good, inhumanly good, but he's no expert at sucking dick, and this is a million times wetter, and so it's not long before he's choking and spitting, throat refusing to accommodate the foreign object trying to enter. It's so slippery, he can't even find the purchase to push all the way through, and there's just pressure and pressure and not quite as deep as where he wants it.
For one infinite moment he is suspended, breathless, in the full-body convulsion, the reaction of choking on David's tentacle, gagging, making a mess, drooling around it. He's a wreck, eyes watering, looking like he's crying, practically like he's being tortured.
David is a considerate partner, and pulls out before Harper needs to indicate his discomfort. When David yanks the thick, wet tentacle from his throat, it recedes unfairly quickly, in a way that would hurt terribly if not for how slippery the thing is, torn from his throat like a taproot, leaving a harsh rasp and a drooling deluge of slick in its wake. It leaves him feeling jarringly empty, unfulfilled, though he's also relieved he can breathe again. Harper coughs wetly as David soothingly rubs his back, guiding him through each breath, but he looks, if anything, like he's really enjoying it. All of it, even the feeling of his gag reflex going off, his body struggling to accept David into it.
The second time, David is gentler. Throat thoroughly lubed by the first attempt, Harper hollows his cheeks and, when he feels the telltale flex and relaxation of his throat muscles allowing David to slip past that barrier and fill him entirely, forcing him to breathe only through his nose, the throb of his dick is unmistakably a direct response to the almost-suffocation.
"Hmm," David says conversationally. "You like it when I try to ruin you, huh?"
Harper, of course, cannot respond. The best he manages is a wet, throaty moan, more of a vibrating rumble around the tentacle filling his gullet than anything else. jammed as far down his throat as he can manage, and with David's tentaclit, tentadick, primary tentacle --whatever the fuck he should be calling it -- steadily stretching his hole out, working the sphincter until there's barely any resistance to its undulating, thickening mass, he feels truly and wholly fucked. Full up on David, filled from both ends, and David's writhing pussy is still devouring his cock all the while, clenching around the base every time he thinks he might get a little too close to finishing.
Okay, maybe he is being tortured, just a little bit. But he quite literally asked for it, and he's definitely enjoying it, too. He probably won't be able to raise his voice for like, an entire week after this -- to say nothing of the limp he's going to have, with how a cluster of smaller, thinner tendrils are beginning to tease his entrance, curling around his balls and squeezing just enough to make him whimper, toying with the base of his cock like they have a mind of their own and that mind knows just when Harper is about to tip over the edge. But those are trivial thoughts -- this, all of this, is worth it. Especially for the warm glow in David's eyes, the happiness radiating off of him, deeper than lust, deeper than any solely physical attraction. The way he hovers over Harper's body, so attentive, so focused, so clearly enamored by every part of him.
It's not like Harper would be totally uninterested in freaky tentacle sex otherwise -- like he told David, it's never particularly been a fetish of his, but he'd also have to be genuinely off his rocker to have the opportunity put before him and say no to it -- but the fact that it makes David so obviously happy is a decided bonus. The fact that it seems almost like David is a little bit in love with him, too, looking at him like that. and he'd probably be able to live with himself if it weren't like that, but the fact that it is... that does a lot, for him.
When David pulls out of his mouth, Harper gags and coughs and, wholly, misses the sensation of being filled up. Not for long, though -- David kisses him again, and shivers run up and down his spine at the sensation of a ridged tongue swiping over his lips. Harper is the one to pull back, this time, just enough to see, to realize that David's tongue, too, is a coiling tendril far longer than it should be, muscles rippling seductively as Harper draws it back into his mouth, letting it slip deeper and deeper until it's filling the lonely space in his throat.
His eyes might be rolling back in his head, but they're far too wet with tears of exertion for him to tell, the instinctive response of his body to being intruded upon like this, no matter how enthusiastic about it his mind may be.
He's totally caught in David's grasp, physically, emotionally, body and mind ensnared, and it's never been easier in his life to let himself go, not to anything, anyone. He loses track of time, how many times David's worked him up and then stopped him before he could spill over the edge, how long it's been that the white-hot ache low in his gut has been building and building, pressure rising with each languid drag of bumpy, ridged tendrils over his prostate.
Harper barely even registers it when David comes, too fucked-out, brain too gone to pay much mind to the sensation of David's insides clenching and fluttering around him, a torrent of slippery, clear fluid easing the way out when David finally pulls off, leaving Harper's dick hard and red and needy, leaving David to grind inside of Harper.
Distantly Harper wonders if David can, will come again, if the tentadick(?!) functions like he'd assume, and can bring him over the edge separately from internal ministrations. It seems to be the case, especially with how smoothly David switches to grinding against Harper's ass, tentacles spreading his thighs further to make room for David's bulk, pinning and manipulating him like a toy.
Harper probably shouldn't be so turned on by the thought that he, now David's handler, is also being played with like a doll for this... this creature. But David's not just some creature, no matter how inhuman the tendrils wrapped around Harper right now may be, and at the end of the day the arousal comes from the fact that it's David, he's a toy for David, and yeah, okay, he's been gone for this man for longer than he'd like to admit.
David twitches inside of him, and he needs, and all he can think of is the pulse of heat in his veins, the fiery hunger, barely a thought so much as a base impulse, a flicker of recognition for the hum of the pheromones firing up once more now that he knows what it feels like, and he cries out at the curl of a tendril around the base of his cock, expecting to be denied once more, already wanting to wither with the anticipation, but this time David allows him to crest that hill, allows him to ride the edge until he loses control.
It takes a while for him to come back to himself, realizing that the slippery mess between his thighs is as much David's as his own. There's something warm and liquid but not quite like his own cum, dripping out from where David's primary tentacle is now softening and receding from Harper's thoroughly well-used hole. That's not to discount his own cum, though -- his dick, also softening, gives up one last valiant spurt of the stuff for the insistent curl of David's fingers around the base, surprisingly intimate, coaxing out a final pulse of orgasm until Harper is shaking with overstimulation, nerves frayed, this close to asking David to stop.
Neither of them says anything for several minutes. It is, however, a comfortable silence, David slumped over Harper's side, several tentacles gone or receded, just as many still hanging out, draped over both their limbs. It's a little heavy, and more than a little wet and sticky, and it'll be gross sooner rather than later, but Harper can't find it in himself to hate the overall sensation. The experience of having David snuggled into his side, relaxed and open, is a good one. This is different from how they've laid together before, rawer, more vulnerable -- but also more open. More intimate, in a way, too.
Also -- yeah, Harper doesn't think he's come this hard in his life, before. Not just because David physically has the means to work him over the edge in such crazy ways, but because, well, it's David. And tonight was the first time he got to see David truly uninhibited.
Maybe it's just the pheromones talking. Harper doesn't really think the pheromones are responsible for the warm, fuzzy feeling somewhere deeper in his chest, though, as David nuzzles into the crook of his neck, making a soft, sleepy noise. A tendril flops heavily over his chest along with one arm, both appendages curling around his side.
"Mm, Sec, think we should take another shower," Harper tries, hand settling on the back of David's neck. The gesture just makes David press even closer, seeking his warmth.
"In a bit," David murmurs into his collarbone. "You're warm. Feels good."
Harper chuckles. "Pheromones got you too, huh?"
"don't know what you're talking about," David says, which is totally a lie, but Harper lets it go.
In a bit, it is.