A/N: For Ro, who wanted Zechs in lingerie. I cannot ever express my thanks to you for encouraging me and putting up with my dozens of unfinished stories and my emails at all hours about the most random shit and for your friendship. Thank you so, so much.
A/N2: un-beta'd because I finally fucking finished something and wanted to post it and also as a surprise-gift-"see I did something" for Ro.
Warnings: smut, language, sacrilege? Literal sacrilege. Angst. I swear to fuck it wasn't going to happen but at the end it just APPEARED out of NOWHERE and I couldn't… I had to. I'm sorry.
Pairings: Rx5, 1x3, 2x6
Sacrilege
Halloween was awful. Awful in the painful way that only got worse the more Duo drank. Awful in the sense that he was alone, at a party he had been dragged to very much against his own will. Alone and getting drunk but definitely not drunk enough and alone while literally everyone else seemed to be having a roaring good time.
He didn't get it, never had - this passion for dressing up - or down, in most cases very very down to the absolute bare minimum - and drinking and just…
It was weird, and it was awful.
He could still remember the first Halloween party he had gone to, at the tender age of seven. There had been bobbing for apples and some kind of pinata that was vaguely witch shaped and had felt wrong to hit because it was also vaguely Ms. Alexander, his teacher, shaped. The other kids had made fun of him, which Duo was used to, but instead of calling him a girl or a sissy or stupid or short or any of the usual insults, they made fun of his costume. The costume that his mom, who wasn't great at sewing and had discovered a pure and unbridled passion for gluing fabric, had made the night before, when Duo had received the belated invitation to the party. None of the kids knew what he was supposed to be - hell, Duo, didn't really know what he was supposed to be. Maybe a grape or an eggplant or a tumor like the kind that had killed his dad? That's what one of the kids suggested, anyway.
Halloween parties had not improved with time. And they weren't improved enough with alcohol.
Duo had managed to find a window-seat, in what he assumed was the library, of the giant house that belonged to the provost and whose son - the beautiful and kind and so laughably out of Duo's league it was actually not very funny at all, Quatre Winner - had invited Duo to come. He had even sent an escort, in the form of Duo's roommate and Quatre's best friend, Trowa Barton, to make sure he actually came to this party and didn't dodge it like he had the last two years.
His seat was just out of the way enough of the main action that Duo didn't feel overwhelmed, but the library still had people in, still had a few couples making out completely indiscreetly, what looked like a dance battle on the massive desk in one corner of the room, and - the reason Duo had come into the library in the first place - a lively and almost violent argument between two English majors, Relena Darlian and Wufei Chang, over some two hundred year old book that they waved at each other and snarled over. Duo wasn't even sure what they were arguing about - but it was pretty entertaining to sit back and imagine.
Not nearly as entertaining, however, as watching Trowa, dressed up like a pirate - complete with hat and eyeliner and a fake yet strangely animated parrot on one shoulder (Duo was fairly certain it was fake, but Trowa had almost gotten them thrown out of the dorms last year for rescuing a baby racoon and keeping it in their room for two months until it was discovered) - dancing with Heero Yuy, Duo's best friend and the long-time secret crush of Trowa's, dressed up as a cowboy.
Duo wasn't sure which of them had confessed their undying and cringe-worthy because seriously love for each other first, but they were both doing that thing where their lips tried to smile and they tried their best to fight it.
Halloween was awful, but there were a few - maybe more than two even - bright spots. It got people out of their comfort zone - all the costumes, or lack of, and alcohol. Hell, Duo would lay down good money that Trowa and Heero would never be dancing together and looking at each other with that warm and fuzzy and also naked lust kind of look if they weren't also dressed up in ridiculous costumes. And Relena and Wufei wouldn't be arguing about the dusty book - let alone speaking to each other ever since that night freshman year when Rey and Wufei had hooked up at a party and Rey hadn't called him the next day and Wufei spent the next three years vacillating between wondering if there was some way he could convince her to just try dating him instead of holding fast to her 'I'm too young and have too much to do to tie myself down' mantra or irritation over the fact that she had never called him in the first place.
It was as if Halloween was some kind of artificial liminal space - entirely a figment of everyone's brain yet somehow allowing them, encouraging, hell maybe even forcing them to do things they would never do in daylight. And tomorrow, well… tomorrow Rey and Wufei would likely go back to not speaking and Trowa and Heero… that one, Duo didn't know. Because they seriously looked on the verge of just finding a chapel and getting their asses married pronto.
Duo realized that he was probably going to have to make plans to spend the night elsewhere - there was no way that Wufei, Heero's roommate, would do anything but complain if Heero and Trowa went back to their dorm tonight. And as much as Wufei probably dreamed of going home with Relena, Duo didn't really see that happening.
This house was big enough, maybe Quatre would let Duo just… kind of pass out in a corner.
"Or I could take you home."
The voice, a rich, amused baritone that sounded somewhere on the scale between 'creepy voice from a dark shadow' and 'so sexy you might actually come in your pants if I say the right words', made Duo look away from the slow-dancing-their-way-to-marriage couple across the room and focus on the person standing literally in front of him.
Which, awkwardly but not disappointingly, put Duo's eyes directly in front of a bulging, pink satin covered crotch.
A little confused, Duo first looked down - at impossibly long legs encased in fishnet tights and combat boots, then up, past a garter belt and that seriously mouth-watering crotch, and up to a leather corset that covered a muscular torso but absolutely did not cover a pair of seriously sexy tattooed pecs and - rouged? - nipples.
Duo licked his lips, he couldn't help it, and then he dared to look up even farther.
Big mistake.
The man's face was as stunning as the rest of him. Ice blue eyes emphasized by black eye makeup, wide lips curved in an expression that was somewhere between a sneer and a smirk and covered in glossy dark red lipstick, and a tail of platinum hair that had been styled into some kind of mohawk thing and then left to fall free down his back.
Duo stared. And continued to stare.
And then realized.
I could take you home.
That… sounded like a fucking amazing idea.
Except - it meant that either this walking wet dream could read minds or, tragically and predictably more likely, Duo had been speaking aloud.
Judging by the amusement on sex god's face - yep.
Oh fuck. Duo realized he was still fucking doing it.
He cleared his throat.
"Uh. Hi."
Sex god quirked an eyebrow in amusement.
"Hi? After listening to you wax poetic about liminal spaces I was expecting a little more."
Duo felt his face burn.
Fucking hell. How long had he been talking to himself? And how long had sex god been listening?
More importantly, how long had that delicious pink groin been inches from his mouth without Duo even noticing?
"Sorry," he mumbled, apologizing for literally everything from Eve biting into a fucking apple to Duo opening his fucking mouth.
Sex god shrugged one shoulder in a sinuous roll and then sat down beside Duo, crossing his legs casually and leaning back against the windows to look at Duo better.
"I take it you aren't enjoying the party," sex god suggested.
Duo shrugged and finished off the last of his drink - something that tasted like fruit, cinnamon and grain alcohol mixed together and left to ferment in a locker room for about a millennia - and grimaced.
"It's… a Halloween party. Not all that much to enjoy."
Sex god arched his eyebrow again and Duo had the utterly bizarre urge to lick the subtle curve, to swipe his tongue across that patronizing brow.
"I know it doesn't have vaguely shaped pinatas or barrels to bob for apples in, but surely there is something redeeming about it."
Duo was pretty sure that if he blushed any harder he was going to burst a capillary - or a hundred - in his face.
"You, uh, heard that part?"
Sex god's eyes twinkled.
"You aren't exactly quiet when you sit in the corner talking to yourself." He sounded somewhere between amused and charmed.
Duo, on the other hand, was somewhere between mortified and - and whatever was a thousand times more painful than mortified.
"I, uh… I'm Duo Maxwell," he said, apropos of literally nothing but incapable of finding anything to say to sex god.
"And I'm Zechs Merquise." He held out one hand, and Duo reflexively took it, fascinated by the way sex god's hand engulfed his own, by the black nail polish on his elegant fingers, and by the scars Duo saw on the pale flesh of his wrists.
"Zechs." It even sounded like sex. Perfect. Terrifyingly perfect.
"What are you?" Zechs asked.
Duo looked away from their joined hands, forced himself to ignore the pleasant, burning tingle of the touch and the shiver of pleasure that seemed to ripple through his entire body when Zechs rubbed his thumb over Duo's knuckles.
"Uh… junior. Journalism Ethics major. You?"
Zechs was back to arching an eyebrow and his lips were doing the sneer-smirk thing.
"First year doctoral candidate. Geography. But I was asking about your costume?"
"Oh… yeah. Of course."
Because who the fuck sat around at a Halloween party in pink satin panties asking what your fucking major was? No one. Literally no one.
"I, ah… I'm a priest?"
It had been a protest choice - all black except for the white dog collar that was seriously itchy as hell and Duo wondered if it felt like to real priests, wondered if it was supposed to? Like some kind of reminder that God was always watching or that life sucked or bodies were flesh prisons?
Quatre had lifted his golden eyebrows in question when he saw Duo, but his lips had instantly curved upwards into that beatific smile that only Quatre could manage and Duo had barely even heard Quatre say he was glad Duo was there because all he was thinking about was how much warmer the world was when Quatre smiled and how good it felt when Quatre gave him a brief hug before stepping aside so he could greet his next guest.
"Mm. And are you taking confessions tonight?"
Duo was finding it really difficult to focus on what Zechs was saying - every time he opened his mouth to speak the lipstick glinted in the light and Duo wondered what it tasted like. Wondered what it would feel like to have Zechs leave a trail of blood red lipstick over his body.
"I... " Duo's brain filled him in on what he had been missing while he fantasized about Zechs's mouth. "Do you… need to confess something? Have you… sinned?"
Zechs was still holding his hand, and he trailed his fingers over Duo's palm and wrist, the nails just barely scraping his flesh, and Duo shivered.
"Mm. Oh yes. Bless me, father, for I have sinned. Are you willing to hear my confession?"
Duo was going straight to hell. Like, literally, straight there - any second a hole was going to open in the floor and Satan was going to reach up and drag Duo right the fuck down there.
His mother still went to mass on Wednesdays, Saturdays and Sundays. Still guilted Duo into going with her when he was home on break, still gave him that wounded look when he stayed seating instead of rising to take communion, still told him he should go to confession every time they spoke on the phone even though he hadn't been to confession since he was twelve and admitted to masterbating while thinking about Patrick Swayze in Dirty Dancing and had promptly been sent to a summer camp that 'encouraged' homosexuals to renounce their sins.
But he looked at Zechs's sneering smirk and his satin crotch and decided he did not give a flying really, really needed to know what kinds of sins sex god had committed.
"Usually confessions are a little more private than this."
Zechs's lips twitched in amusement and he stood up in a swift, elegant motion, pulling Duo up with him.
"Then let's find someplace a little more private."
Duo let Zechs pull him out of the library, up the ornate and seemingly never-ending staircase to the third - or fourth - or seventh? Duo lost count a few steps into the first flight of stairs because Zechs's ass in those panties was fucking criminal - floor and then down a long hallway, trying doors as he went, peeking in and then closing them until at last he found one he liked and dragged Duo inside.
"Uh…"
They were in a small room, furnished with a bed, dresser and small sitting area that looked like it was from a museum exhibit on loan from Versailles.
"You must know your way around this place," Duo couldn't help but say.
"I'm a cartographer. I have a natural sense of direction."
Duo arched an eyebrow at that and Zechs chuckled.
Oh holy fucking fucked. I am fucked.
He'd been a sex god before. But now - after that - after that sound he was definitely promoted to Sex God with a capital god-damn S and G because fuck.
"I stayed here as a guest when I interviewed for the program," Zechs admitted.
Duo thought it was… pretty damn kinky that Zechs had stayed in the Provost's house, in this room while interviewing to become a student and now he was about to… well. Confess his sins?
Duo wasn't a sex god or a Sex God but he'd had sex and he was something like 65% confident this encounter was heading down that path and 500% okay with that.
"So, uh… about those sins…"
Zechs smirked again, no hint of a sneer this time, and he closed the door and turned the lock.
"Shame I couldn't find the room with a confessional already set up," he said.
Duo laughed, this house had so many fucking rooms and the Provost was just weird enough that honestly there might actually be a confessional somewhere.
"We can improvise," he said and then had an idea. "Kneel with me."
He sank to his knees on the floor and looked up at Zechs. The expression on his face made it clear that Duo in that position was definitely to his liking.
Duo reached over and wrapped his fingers around Zechs's wrist, tugging him closer and down.
Zechs knelt in front of Duo and reached for Duo's other hand, and clasped all of their hands together. It was… kind of erotic but also intimate in a way that Duo hadn't really anticipated. It made his heart stutter, looking over their joined hands and into Zechs' eyes.
"Well?" Zechs prompted after a moment of Duo trying not to drown.
"Oh. Right. Uh, how long has it been since your last confession?"
Zechs snorted.
"Maybe sometime in a past life," he muttered and Duo had to smirk.
"Then I'm sure you have a lot to atone for. Tell me your sins."
It definitely wasn't the catechism - but Duo was completely okay with that. The less this felt like his last confession, the fucking better.
Zechs offered up another sneer-smirk.
"Where to start… I've had impure thoughts, father."
"What kind of impure thoughts?"
Zechs's fingers started to trace over Duo's hands, making small circles that sent literal shockwaves through Duo's body.
"Lustful thoughts. About a gorgeous, blue-eyed man with long hair and lips made for sucking my cock."
"That… sounds very impure," Duo managed to choke out. The intensity of Zechs's gaze and the words he had said left Duo struggling to breathe much less formulate rational thought.
He glanced down at Sex God's satin covered cock, at the shapely bulge and fuck he wanted it.
"Yes," Zechs sighed, sounding almost apologetic. "But there's more."
"Tell me," Duo begged.
"I think about more than fucking that perfect mouth." Zechs hands trailed away from Duo's, leaving Duo's hands clasped together while Zechs smoothed over Duo's sleeves and across his chest, fingers coming to a stop on the top button of Duo's black shirt. "I think about his body." Zechs started to undo the buttons, fingers glancing over Duo's skin as he worked his way down and it was all Duo could do to hold still, his hands gripped together like he was holding onto the last shred of his self-control. "About stripping him bare and mapping his chest with my cum."
Dear fuck. Duo was pretty sure he was going to come himself, just listening to Zechs 'confess.'
Already his dick felt painfully erect, trapped in his tight black pants and aching for attention.
Zechs pushed Duo's shirt open, tugging it free from his pants and then running his hands over Duo's bare flesh.
Duo shivered.
"W-what else?"
Zechs smirked yet again and his nimble fingers moved to Duo's belt, slowly, tauntingly, easing it free.
"I think about taking his cock in my hand and making him beg for release. I think about tasting his cock and his come and hearing him call me God."
Zechs squeezed Duo's erection through the thin fabric of his trousers and boxers and Duo moaned and arched up into the touch.
"Fuck, yes," he breathed.
"Fuck? Oh, I think about that too," Zechs laughed.
He unfastened the fly of Duo's trousers and encouraged Duo to rise up on his knees. Zechs pushed the trousers and Duo's boxers down to his knees, exposing Duo's demanding cock to the chill air and Zechs's heated gaze.
"Mm. Yes, I think about fucking his ass." Zechs wrapped one hand around the shaft of Duo's cock and Duo gasped in surprise and relief. Zechs's other hand circled Duo's left hip, curving around and squeezing first one and then the other cheek of his ass. "Fuck, yes, indeed," Zechs crooned as he moved his hand over the length of Duo's cock.
Duo made a sound, some kind of mewling, begging sound that was absolutely humiliating and he was confident he would have died on the fucking spot if Zechs hadn't leaned forward immediately and stopped him from making any more sounds like that by kissing him.
It felt like Zechs was going to consume him - he was so much larger - his mouth, his hands, his body, his heat - and Duo did everything he could to fight to stay alive, kissing Zechs back with all of the strength and vigor he could manage, surging forward to meet him and thrusting his cock into Zechs's hand.
Zechs chuckled and Duo took the chance to catch Zechs's lower lip between his teeth, sucking on it until Zechs moaned and the hand on his ass curled into his flesh and hauled him even closer.
Zechs continued to stroke his cock, and Duo continued to unabashedly try to fuck his hand.
Duo released Zechs's lip and thrust his tongue into the other man's mouth, seared by the heat, desperate for more. Zechs's tongue tangled with his, thrusting back and fuck it was glorious. Duo didn't even know if they were fighting - didn't know if Zechs was trying to control things or just match him and Duo didn't care. It felt so fucking amazing and this was the best fucking kiss of his life.
But then Zechs pulled away, leaving both of them panting, gasping for air, eyes glazed and chests heaving.
"Beg," Zechs growled.
"What?" Duo whimpered again when Zechs twisted his hand, increasing the pressure on the underside of Duo's cock and it felt like a damn lightening bolt went straight to his balls. "Do that again, please."
Zechs sneered and did and again, Duo whimpered, made that fucking sound that should not ever come from his lips.
"Yes," Zechs groaned. "Beg me."
Oh. Right.
It felt incredible, what Sex God was doing to him, and Duo could feel his body desperately rushing towards orgasm and he really fucking wanted to come. But being told to beg went straight to that part of Duo's brain that hated authority, that had led to him spray painting No War on the principal's door when he was in middle school and they had announced that military recruiters would be coming to give a presentation, the same part that had made Duo walk out of the prom planning committee in high school when he was told that his classmates only wanted wholesome couples in history represented by their stupid fucking theme and no, Lancelot and King Arthur weren't wholesome.
Zechs's eyes narrowed as Duo remained silent and his hand stilled.
Oh fucking no fucking way!
Duo screamed at himself and he and Zechs glared at each other for a long moment.
"Please," he finally ground out, gritting his teeth together so hard his jaw hurt.
"Please what?"
"Make me come." It was less begging and more demanding, but Zechs's lips curled upwards again and his hand tightened on Duo's cock, stroking him harder and faster than he had before.
His other hand lingered over the cleft between Duo's cheeks, slowly, tantalizing moving lower.
"Yes," Duo encouraged him. "Yes, please." He was sounding less commanding and more pleading with every heart-beat and Zechs was looking more and more pleased with himself.
Zechs' index finger circled the tight ring of muscle at Duo's entrance and he whimpered again, aching to be touched, to be filled.
Zechs removed his finger and Duo groaned in protest. Protest that instantly evaporated when he saw Zechs put the finger into his own mouth and then pull it out, dripping with saliva.
Duo practically crawled into his lap when Zechs pressed the wet finger against him again.
"Tell me how you like to be fucked," Zechs said, his voice rough.
"I… I… ughnn, fuck, please. Please."
Zechs was doing that thing with his wrist again, was sending sparks to Duo's balls and Duo was so fucking close.
The finger circled Duo's anus and then pushed into him. Duo finally had to abandon his clasped hands posture and instead gripped Zechs's shoulders, holding on for dear life because his body felt like it was going to combust, felt as if Zechs's touches scorched him to the very core.
"Tell me," Zechs insisted. He slid his finger deep into Duo's body, curving it and pressing forward and Duo saw stars.
"Tell me how you want me to fuck you. Do you want it slow or fast? Do you want me to be gentle or do you want me to pound into your ass so hard you can't even breathe?"
"Yes, fuck, yes, yes. Please, please, please just - oh! Fuck - fuck, Zechs - fucking God!"
Duo came with such intensity, gripped Zechs's shoulders so hard that he was pretty sure he broke the skin and Zechs's just looked at him with an expression that was somewhere between worshipful and ravenous.
The world practically exploded, Duo's vision going a little white at the edges and his blood feeling like vodka. Duo felt tears prick at his eyes and his throat tighten and the world felt right and pure and empty.
It took him a few minutes to come back down, to remember his own fucking name and realize that Zechs no longer had a finger up his ass or his hand on his cock but was instead holding Duo against him and rubbing his back in soothing circles.
"I, uh," Duo had to clear his throat and he forced himself out of Zechs's arms, as much as he wanted to do nothing more than bury himself, to tuck his neck under Zechs's chin and breathe in deeply and feel his heat and strength.
Zechs was looking at him strangely, the sneer and the smirk gone, his eyebrows drawn together in a look of concern and Duo felt his face turn red.
A stranger gives you a life-altering hand-job and you completely lose your shit and freak him the fuck out. Good fucking job, Maxwell.
Par for the course, really. Duo fucked up everything he touched - of course he couldn't be trusted to let a little Halloween party kinky sex turn out well.
"Sorry. I… fuck." Duo ran his hands through his hair, scrubbing at his eyes as surreptitiously as he could.
"Come here."
Duo dropped his hands away from his face and saw that Zechs was still on the floor, had shifted so that he was sitting on his ass instead of kneeling, and his arms… were open. Inviting.
Duo was tempted. He was so fucking tempted. And desperate.
But he also…
For fuck's sake. It's a fucking Halloween party. How the fuck are you losing your shit? You had two fucking drinks and one fucking hand job and now the world feels beyond broken or more perfect than you imagined and fucking - fuck.
"I'd like to hear more about artificial liminal spaces," Zechs said, his voice soothing.
Right.
The shit Duo had been talking to himself about, out loud, while he sat alone in a corner.
"Please," Zechs added, and the way his lips formed around the word made it very clear that he didn't say it often.
He reached out with one hand, stretching, and Duo hesitated but then fit his hand into Zech's and allowed the other man to tug him close, allowed himself to sit in his fucking lap and rest his head against Zechs's chest.
Duo listened to the steady drum of his heart.
"Why do you have butterfly tattoos?"
His question startled a laugh out of Zechs.
"I don't," he said after a moment, amusement tinging his voice and arms tightening around Duo. "They're fake. I thought it would round out the costume - I wanted skulls and a grim reaper but the store was sold out. All they had left were butterflies, so I decided to make it work."
"Pretty sure you could have made anything. You could make a Barney tattoo look sexy."
Zechs laughed again and Duo really, really liked the way it sounded, the way it felt.
Zechs ran his fingers down Duo's back, pushing his shirt up so that he could trace Duo's spine and Duo let himself relax into the touch and just exist.
"What happens next?" Zechs eventually spoke up, his hand still drawing patterns in Duo's skin.
"Uh…" Duo sat up, taking the hint. "I, uh, do you want me to leave first so you can -"
Zechs pulled Duo back against him.
"No. What happens next for my confession. I've told you my sins. Well, a few of my recent ones. What happens next?"
"Oh." The relief Duo felt was a little overwhelming. "Your penance."
"And what is that?"
"Depends on the sin. And the sinner." Duo shrugged. Father Mulson had told him to say twelve Hail Marys, had listened to Duo rush through them in fear and relief and sent him on his way and then picked up the phone and called his mother and Duo had never really been able to trust anyone again after that. Had never even been tempted to step in a confessional booth since.
"Well. I am a prolific sinner. But I'm not sure my sins are all that unforgivable. Or that I want to be forgiven. Especially since I'm already tempted to sin again."
Duo snorted a laugh and then looked up to see that Zechs was smirking down at him, the expression surprisingly tender.
"If that's the case, a few Hail Marys or Our Fathers probably won't do the trick. Maybe…" Duo was pushing his luck, was delusional to think Zechs would be interested. "Maybe you should go visit a holy relic or… a shrine."
"A shrine?" Zechs frowned in confusion.
"Yeah. You know, I'm actually thinking about making one."
"Making what?"
"A shrine. There's this Sex God who really, really deserves one. Only trouble - I need a phallus for the centerpiece because, well, you know. Sex God. Think you could help me out with that?"
Zechs lips twitched.
"If you're suggesting my penance is to let you use my cock to worship me, then I hope you realize that I'm going to sin a lot more."
"I was kinda counting on that."