Archive of Our Own

You stand hesitantly at the threshold of the master bedroom, feeling like an intruder in his private hell. Kai is sitting hunched on the edge of the bed, his face buried in his hands, shoulders convulsing with each sob that shakes his entire frame. His trademark blue hair is now gone, shorn close to the scalp in a buzz cut—Kai had asked Winter to shave it off, moments before he strangled her to death. Like a fucked up modern rewrite of Samson and Delilah, only there was no betrayal on her part—but a mole in the cult.

The single strips of red and yellow tape wrapped around his thumb and ring finger—you’ve never fully understood why he wore them—stand out against his all-black attire, a dissonant splash of colour.

“Fuck!”

Wincing, you take a tentative step toward the bed, your heart hammering painfully in your chest, the sound of it loud in your ears. Your hands tremble as you move closer, each step feeling like you’re treading through a minefield.

You regret ever telling him the truth. It would have been easier to let him live with the lie, to let him believe that his sister had betrayed him. Over the past few months, you’ve watched watched his paranoia fester, fuelled by his Adderall addiction—really taking a leaf out of Jim Jones’ book, with all those amphetamines swirling in his system. He’s talking to himself now, too—imaginary people who gladly pour poison into his twisted, hyperactive mind. As if it wasn’t messed up enough already.

Now, you wish fervently that you had kept your mouth shut. The truth has shattered him, and in doing so, it has shattered you too.

“I killed her over nothing,” he wails, the words broken and distorted as they slip through his fingers. Standing directly in front of him, you place your hands on his shoulders. Your fingers tremble as you move them to the nape of his neck, grazing the short, uneven stubble of his freshly shorn hair in a pathetic attempt to offer some measure of comfort. It feels woefully inadequate, like trying to hold back the tide with your bare hands. Somehow, you’re even more nervous now than when you stabbed a knife into Speedwagon’s neck two nights ago.

Being in a killer clown cult really desensitises a person to these type of things. Bart Simpson voice: knife in, knife out.

Without warning, his hands shoot out to grasp your waist, pulling you toward him with a desperate, visceral need. The sudden force nearly knocks you off balance. You stagger slightly but quickly find your footing, awkwardly wrapping your arms around him. His grip tightens as if he’s afraid you might slip away, and he pulls you toward him, burying his face in your chest. His tears soak through your sweater, the dampness spreading against your skin as his body trembles violently with the force of his sobs.

You’ve faced Kai’s wrath before, felt the sharp sting of his anger across your cheek, but this… this is different. The sharp edge of his fury was something you could tame, something predictable. You knew how to handle the fists through dry walls, the conspiracy rants about woke warriors and red pill nonsense, his whole 4chan-fuelled superiority complex. It drove you mad—God, it drove you up the fucking wall—but at least you knew where you stood with it. Nothing a manwich and blowjob can’t fix (at least you get to spit in his manwich, and on his dick). Now, seeing him like this, so broken, you’d take the rage in a heartbeat. Because this bone-deep despair? This, you can’t stand.

Instinct takes over as you hold him close, your fingers brushing against the back of his neck. His sobs are guttural and broken, each one wracking his body. He hiccups between gasps, his entire form trembling against yours. You begin to rub soothing circles on his shoulders and back, your touch gentle and steady as you stand, slightly hunched over him.

It chills you to think that less than an hour ago, this same man—now broken and crumbling in your arms—had been meticulously running through his grand plan of “The Night of a Hundred Tates,” You try to push away the mental image of Kai, calmly demonstrating how to plunge knives into anatomical models of pregnant women, guiding the blade with a steady hand, showing his followers the precise angle and depth to ensure a fatal blow.

Focus on the task at hand.

As the minutes pass, his sobs gradually begin to subside, the intensity of his cries slowly ebbing away until only the occasional hiccup remains. His grip on you loosens slightly, the desperate edge fading, leaving behind a heavy exhaustion. With a soft, steadying breath, you pull back just enough to look down at him, your hands still resting gently on his shoulders.

“Kai?”

you whisper, your voice tender as you cup his tear-streaked cheek in your palm. His skin is warm and damp beneath your touch, bloodshot eyes still clouded with pain as they flicker up to meet yours. For a moment, he seems lost, as if he’s searching for something—some sort of salvation you’re unsure you can provide.

“Baby,”

You cringe internally. The word feels alien on your tongue, like a borrowed phrase that doesn’t quite fit. With a firm yet gentle touch, you guide him to his feet, coaxing him up from the edge of the bed. Kai rises without protest, his movements sluggish and drained, as if the confidence and swagger that once fuelled his every step have been stripped away entirely. His legs buckled slightly, and he collapsed onto the mattress with a defeated exhale.

You straddle him, your thighs trembling as they settle on either side of his hips. His hands find your waist, clutching at you with such desperation that it’s almost as if he fears you might slip away if he let go.

Gently cupping his face, you lean forward, closing the small distance between you until your lips meet his. Kai responds immediately, his hands sliding up your back as he pulls you closer. His lips move against yours with a fierce, almost feverish intensity, there’s nothing tender in the way he kisses you—nothing soft. It’s raw, jagged, fueled by a need so deep it feels like he’s trying to consume you, to drown out his pain through sheer force of will. His teeth graze your lower lip, and you gasp into his mouth. The kiss is a cocktail of everything—guilt, anger, despair, lust.

You stand up, shedding your clothes and tossing it carelessly to the floor. Beads of tears still clinging to his eyelashes, his gaze roams over you, drinking in the sight of your bare skin, the curve of your hips, the twin peaks of your breasts. Giving a slight sway of your hips, you step in between his legs, you begin to unbutton his shirt, tugging it open to reveal his toned chest and abs, his skin glistening with perspiration. He’s hard, you can tell. Moving lower, you unbuckle his belt and unzipped his trousers. He lifts his hips to aid you, and you shove them down his legs until they pool around his ankles.

You climb back on top of him, and he kisses you again, harder this time, more desperate. His tongue traces the line of your lips before probing into the wet cavern of your mouth. You can taste the salt of his tears, and the bitter anguish of his grief.

He claws off your bra as you sink slowly onto his cock. The pain is exquisite—a mixture of sadness and arousal, the former a dull ache in your heart, the latter a familiar pulsating desire between your legs.

———