Work Text:
Sollux liked having the late shift. Day and night cycles tended to matter less out in space, where there were no concerns about the deadly Alternian sun and thus no need to structure lives around sun protection and avoidance. Even the number of hours in a sleep-wake cycle could get mucked up with no natural light and dark, nothing but the electric lights inside the ship and the dark vastness of space beyond. Then, whenever they docked, local time invariably differed from whatever the crew had gotten used to, and so on. Regardless of all that, most crew members preferred work schedules that let them keep the hours they were used to.
Suited Sollux just fine. As the best IT professional aboard, he had the authority to take whatever hours pleased him and give the rest to his underlings, but he was okay taking the dregs now and then. It let him curry favor with the trolls he had to work with, and he got to enjoy the quiet of a daytime ship besides, with most of the notorious annoyances sleeping soundly in their shared respiteblocks. If there were no pressing issues for him to deal with, he could simply sit at his desk, ostensibly at the ready to help anyone who came by, and goof off.
That night's "job" was some lazy gaming. They were just barely passing close enough to a planet for him to get some decent PVP matches going with some of the inhabitants down below, so Sollux was determined to take advantage of it before they flew out of range once again. Not even the dark gaze boring into him from behind could stop him. He slouched a little lower in his desk chair, back of his neck prickling with the feeling of being watched.
Looking over his shoulder and away from the screen for a moment risked losing him the game. Sollux clenched his jaw, weighing the options, and prioritized his pride. No way was he losing a round against some random alien, probably a wiggler for all he knew. The source of the hairs standing up on the back of his neck could wait. It meant he had to put up with the mild discomfort of psionic energy building in his skull, asking to be released. His mouth tasted metallic, and then he went and doubled it by biting down too hard on his lip.
"What?" he asked, only after evidence of his victory was splashed across the screen and he could idle for a minute between matches. Slowly, the leather of his desk chair creaking underneath him, Sollux turned to look. Barely a glimpse of the watching troll penetrated his awareness. Wavy hair, striped scarf, and the pinprick glimmers of countless bioluminescent freckles glowing in the semi-darkness of the empty block. He couldn't possibly have drank any more in before Eridan lunged for him.
"Hey! What are you doing? I was kind of in the middle of something, you know." His voice wavered slightly with the effort it took to sound serious and stern, but it was so worth it not to laugh. Eridan grunted quietly, unimpressed with being challenged, and grabbed him right out of his chair, leaving it spinning emptily in his wake. Sollux got a blurred view of the room behind him, filled with other unattended desks, and writhed in Eridan's arms like a slitherbeast. "Lemme go, you freak!"
All he could see after that was the knit of Eridan's sweater, masking the toned muscles of his back. Sollux had been slung right over the captain's shoulder like a sack of potatoes, an arm across the backs of his thighs holding him firm there.
"What makes you think you've got the right to tell me what to do, Sol? I outrank you, remember? And I've been watchin' you for a long, long time. More than long enough to fall for you, and to know that you belong to me. No one else is worthy of lookin' at you, much less takin' care of you the way you need." Oh yes, there were definite perks to having such a melodramatic mate, proven by how emphatically he delivered those words. Paired with grasping Sollux a little more roughly to himself as he tapped a polished claw on the keyboard to lock Sollux's work computer, he could almost believe that he was actually being swept away by a forceful, obsessive stalker.
"What are you gonna do to me? Where are we going?"
"That ain't for you to worry about. You just relax and be a good boy for me, and I promise you'll enjoy the results." Sollux choked on his next intake of air, struggling to hold in a laugh. It would be more rewarding the longer he resisted breaking the kayfabe.
"Oh, will I?" Yeah, he was pretty damn sure he would.
"You certainly will. Sayin' you don't trust me?" Eridan hefted him up a little more securely over his shoulder. He didn't miss a beat along the way though; just kept carrying him through the halls. They'd spent enough time calling this ship hive that it wasn't hard for Sollux to guess where they were going. Straight to the captain's quarters, a spacious personal suite far from where the rest of the crew slept. "Those are fightin' words, slitherbeast. Don't make me have to go outta my way to prove it to ya."
"That doesn't even make sense," Sollux complained. Just to be a brat, of course. He had no true issues with the quality of his mate's acting. His eyes glowed brighter in the artificial light of the corridor. A telltale sign, along with the faint whiff of ozone, that a gentle psionic shock would come seconds later. "Shouldn't you be proving that I'll enjoy it anyway, if you're so sure I'm gonna love whatever you have planned? There's no going out of your way necessary."
"Shut it," he grumbled fondly in response. Shocking him wasn't going to slide without revenge being taken promptly. Which it was, in the form of a gentle smack to his ass. Again, without Eridan stopping for even a second. If it wasn't so attractive, it would have had the potential to be seriously infuriating how easily Eridan kept his composure when he wanted to.
"Make me."
"When we get there, darlin'. Not playin' the role of seekin' revenge against your stalker anymore? Might hurt my feelins if you keep tirin' of our games so quickly."
"Are you pouting?" That time, Sollux couldn't hide the amusement in his voice. They were getting close to their private sanctuary, just one more corner to round and the narrow, discreet little hallway to their door to traverse. "Just because I can't see your face in this position doesn't mean you can get away with that unnoticed. I can hear you pout."
"I am not! I'm bein' perfectly dignified about it all. Gotta assert myself as your owner. How can I do that if I'm showin' weakness left and right?"
"Don't worry about that. Zero chance of me suddenly deciding to reject you and look for someone else to pamper and dote on me. You know I love it when you surprise me like this, so there's no need to pout. You're a perfect kidnapper, just like you're a perfect everything else." The world tilted slightly, the strong frame of Eridan's shoulder shifting underneath him, and Sollux thought he was about to be set down at the door. Instead, his mate only adjusted his grip on him. He could hear the quiet beep of Eridan pressing his thumb to the biometric reader on the wall. Immediately following that was the click of the door unlocking, and then they were in.
"Here ya go, my beloved." Those words were delivered as sunnily as possible. It was the perfect contrast to the performatively careless way Eridan threw him down on the comfort platform when they reached the respiteblock. "Now I've got ya in my lair, and ain't no one gonna be comin' to save you."
"No one would dare, even if they could hear. They know everything is as it should be. Me belonging to you, you belonging to me." A smirk painted across his face, Sollux reached out with both hands. Before Eridan could pin him to the mattress, he pulled him down on top of him instead. They collided with a soft huff, and he wasn't sure whose lips it came from. "So it's time for you to prove that I'm gonna enjoy what you have in store."