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stormkeeper_lovedorisTitle: Riptide in Eight Acts
Fandom: X-men First Class
Word count: 3,115
Rating: NC-17 (Could be NC-17 or R but I will be cautious and go with NC-17. No overt PWP but several sexual situations)
Pairing: Azazel/Riptide
Summary: Riptide's life so far, summarized in eight acts.
Disclaimer: I don’t own these characters and no copyright infringement is intended here. I certainly don't make any money off of fanfic
Riptide - In Eight Acts
Act One
His story began in a tiny village in Latin America, its young inhabitants leaving for the cities in droves, in the hopes of finding better jobs and better lives. The local school didn’t go any higher than the equivalent of eight grade and the teacher, rarely in receipt of his salary, showed up less often. Skinny dogs roamed the mud roads near the shacks where people lived.
Janos had been planning to leave, following in his older brother’s footsteps. His father was dead-set against it, demanding that the rest of his children remain here, as long as his eldest continued to send money home each month.
He was forced out soon enough. A neighbor discovered Janos and the other boy. His enraged father beat Janos bloody, telling him that he already had three daughters and ordering him never to return.
A sympathetic Aunt found enough money for Janos’s bus fare to the city – Tia Dolores had always been the only one to show him love and tenderness since his mother’s death. His elder brother, though, had been warned and would have nothing to do with Janos. Janos became familiar with sleeping on sidewalks, wearing the same dirty shirt and having the same stale taste in his mouth. Hatred and bitterness lodged inside of him, finding the permanent home that Janos himself lacked.
Act Two
It all changed the night that the three men attacked him. It wasn’t clear what they wanted from the filthy teenager who clearly didn’t have money to buy a bottle of Coke. But they dragged him into the alley and began to beat him.
A force surged inside Janos. A tremendous wave swelled up, suggesting great power and commanding him to use his hands. He felt somehow filled with wind and water – filled with majesty, if that wasn’t a crazy idea for a homeless street kid. In an instant, he knew what to do and he channeled this urgent energy. His would-be attackers were swept away, along with the debris littering the alley.
For the first time in his life, Riptide felt power. He would never be beaten bloody again. Power wasn’t the only sensation he experienced that day; he felt fear and guilt too because he correctly surmised that his attackers were killed in the groundswell, and that wasn’t what he had intended. But mostly he felt triumph, an addictive sensation he had never experienced before.
Act Three
Sebastian Shaw found him. By then, Riptide had built up a somewhat comfortable financial position, but he knew he was vulnerable too. He couldn’t always control these strange powers, and the authorities were after him. Riptide never actually wanted to be alone, but his circumstances didn’t exactly allow him to create lasting friendships. He couldn’t stay in one place for too long, fearful of being caught.
And Shaw’s pitch made sense. Power and money. The world that had abused him down on its knees. The safety of a group. Riptide did not even have to think about his response.
The only downside would be having to follow Shaw’s orders, but he wouldn’t realize the full ramifications of that until much later.
It wasn’t bad, at first, though it wasn’t great either. Working on Shaw’s team was a definite mixed bag. Shaw worked his people hard and they were often on the move whereas Riptide wanted a home. He delighted when Shaw bought a submarine which became their permanent base. The wind and the sea were Riptide’s allies. Shaw could be difficult and demanding, but he also left Riptide alone when he didn’t need him. Shaw trained Riptide to master his powers, and he still felt that surge of pride and power every time he used them successfully. He enjoyed observing Shaw’s growing respect for his powers. Of course, Shaw was fairly stingy with compensation, but Riptide’s bank accounts steadily grew anyway. Riptide’s English wasn’t perfect, but he spoke and understood enough and his command of the language improved at the slow and steady pace of his increasing wealth.
Act Four
“We have a new associate,” Shaw announced one day. At that point, the only other members of the team had been Emma and a man who went by the name Dread. There had been two others when Riptide had joined a couple of years ago, but one had been killed and the other disappeared.
“Azazel,” Shaw gave the name of the new man, who stood next to him. “You will see a demonstration of his powers at training today.”
“Fucking demon freak,” muttered Dread as he surveyed Azazel’s appearance.
Azazel did not take kindly to the insult. “You want to fight me?” he asked. His English was heavily accented - Russian or some other Eastern European, Riptide guessed.
“With pleasure,” Dread answered; he always wanted a fight.
Dread was a powerful mutant and not easily defeated, but he was no match for Azazel. Azazel used his sword with considerable skill and agility. He was swift and deliberate, and fiercely strong. Unbeknownst to the rest of the team, Azazel was holding back. He would not demonstrate his teleportation abilities until later.
Riptide stood back and watched the fight, though it didn’t last long due to Azazel’s far superior skills. Riptide admired the way Azazel wielded his sword, and it got him quite excited. But the admiration and lust he experienced watching the fight were not his predominant emotions.
Recognition. That was what was on his mind as he watched Azazel. The sensation kept flashing across his neurons: me. He is similar to me. The phrase “my other half” slid into his mind, the notion that they were two sides of the same coin. It wasn’t logical, not at all, but emotions meant just as much to Riptide as logic, if not more.
This feeling of recognition had never happened to Riptide before. He had plenty of experience with sex, plenty of meaningless trysts. It had always been a wondrous, though brief, release despite the fact that his lust for men had cost him his family years ago.
Riptide hardly ate the next few days, and could not sleep no matter what. His forehead was slightly hot, his stomach unsettled and each time he looked at Azazel, quickly averting his gaze lest it be noticed, the feelings grew more intense.
Act Five
He hadn’t been aware that the attraction was mutual.
For the first few days, they barely spoke. At Shaw’s command, they fought – he required all of his men to battle each other for practice. Azazel won the first round, which wasn’t a surprise; the man clearly had expensive experience, although Riptide held his own. At the conclusion, Azazel offered Riptide a handshake and commended him for a good fight. None of Shaw’s people had offered such a gallant gesture.
“Thank you,” had been all that Riptide was able to offer, since the experience of fighting this man and now the touch of his hand were almost too much to bear.
They exchanged a few words during the next several days, Riptide now silently wishing that his own accent was not so strong. In a band of men such as Shaw’s, several unwritten rules exist, one of them being that you don’t inquire about the pasts of the others. But Azazel asked Riptide where he was from, and Riptide didn’t hesitate to give him a little bit of information, mostly because he desperately hoped to learn more about Azazel. He wanted to maintain eye contact when he spoke to Azazel and fought hard to do so, but knew that he’d spent most of their conversation looking down at his hands. As a distraction, he created a small gust of wind and played with it as they spoke. He didn’t notice Emma walking by with a raised eyebrow, or Emma’s split-second of eye contact with Azazel.
The knock came on Riptide’s door that night. He hadn’t been asleep, almost having resigned himself to another sleepless night, and the first time he heard the knock he didn’t believe his ears. Then the knock sounded once more.
He opened the door and stepped back to let Azazel in, blinking several times.
“Your clothes - off,” Azazel ordered. “All of them. I want to see you.”
Riptide scrambled to comply. He wanted it badly, although he simultaneously feared what this man who looked like a demon might do.
“You like what you see?” Riptide asked bravely, when his clothes were a pile on the floor.
“Beautiful,” Azazel murmured, though Riptide didn’t know it at the moment because Azazel said the word in Russian.
Riptide’s fears about coupling with a man who looked like a demon had been unfounded, and he learned that that a sword was not the only thing Azazel could wield with skill. Afterwards, Azazel seemed pleased at Riptide’s enjoyment, casually playing with the thick hair on Riptide’s chest and chuckling, “I am older man. I know what I am doing, yes?”
So the attraction was mutual. But what about this feeling of recognition, this sense of being one? Riptide knew a lot about sex but not much about love.
Act Six
Riptide was lost in Eros’ grip. He didn’t want to leave his tiny cabin, not when Azazel was inside of it. All during the day he was at work doing Shaw’s bidding, but Riptide would replay fragments of the previous night, over and over. He could think of almost nothing else, and he had to fight to be the confident, focused man who Shaw expected.
The kisses. None of his previous lovers had been much for mouths, for the work of lips and tongue against lips and tongue. Azazel didn’t linger overlong on it, but he kissed like he meant it.
Tracing his fingers along Azazel’s body. His mutation was beautiful to Riptide. The colors, the thrill of the deep red skin and hair blacker than Riptide’s. The colors spoke of passion. Seeing Azazel respond to the touches of his hands thrilled Riptide as well.
Azazel beckoning Riptide towards the bed, having the younger man lay on his back. Riptide nearly howling with pleasure at the work of his lover’s lips and tongue on other parts of his body.
Azazel kissing him passionately again, while using his tail to snake around and open a container of lubricant. Azazel murmuring, “Turn over”. More kisses, and a slick tail gently stroking and then pressing against Riptide’s opening, in preparation. The tail continuing to massage and stroke the area, Azazel taking it so slow and so gentle that Riptide wondered if he ever was going to enter. The craving making him mindless until Azazel finally, finally flicked his tail away and entered.
All rational thought gone, Riptide pushing back against Azazel. That tail again, coming around front and encircling Riptide’s hardness. Pumping it fiercely in time with Azazel’s own thrusts inside, the two men lost in an animal rhythm, groaning and grunting, seeing who would break first.
Riptide counted the hours until night, wanting the day to be finished as soon as possible so that Azazel would come to his room.
Act Seven
Riptide had lived so much of his life in fear. Fear of his father, getting caught when he lived on the streets, fear that someone would track down Shaw and his team. Now that he had Azazel, he felt more confident, more brave. His whirlwind life began to contain a measure of stability.
But Shaw’s pitch no longer made as much sense as it once did. Do this many people need to die?, Riptide wondered. He had thought that they would just make some money and harm only those who stood in their way. Annihilating most of humanity seemed a bit like overkill, and the potential for something going hideously wrong was huge.
Riptide made the mistake of uttering one or two of these thoughts aloud. Emma was just out of earshot, but of course the telepath didn’t need to use her ears to pick up his words and report them.
Shaw conveniently selected a time when Azazel was out on a mission. He called the rest of the team together: Emma, Dread, and another man who – like Dread - would soon be killed in one of Shaw’s schemes.
Shaw recited Riptide’s complaints.
“Sir, please, you not understand,” Riptide began in defense, knowing he was in danger but even then not fully realizing how horrendous it would be. “I never question you. I believe in you.”
“Don’t lie to me,” Shaw said. “Remember who trained you. I expect and require utter obedience, and when I don’t receive it, there is always a price to pay. Always.” Shaw paused and then continued, speaking slowly, “Once you speak ill of me, you simply won’t speak again.”
Out of the corner of his eye, Riptide saw Emma hand Shaw something. He saw the glint of metal.
Shaw turned to Dread and ordered, “Hold his mouth open.”
Riptide struggled against Dread but the other mutant was too strong and Riptide wasn’t given even a second or two to muster his powers. His eyes were wild and terrified as Shaw approached and deftly sliced most of Riptide’s tongue off. Shaw dropped the severed flesh onto the floor, which Riptide fleetingly thought resembled a slice of fruit.
The shock wore off in an instant, and then Riptide’s universe became nothing but blood and pain. The red liquid spurted out of him as he sank to his knees in agony. He rocked back and forth. His vision clouded over but not before he glimpsed the small fleshy mass on the floor next to him.
Somehow Azazel was there. Later he would learn that Emma mercifully had called him back from his mission. Cursing in Russian, Azazel teleported away to return a second later with someone he knew who had medical experience. The bleeding was staunched and numerous painkillers were procured.
Riptide spent the next several days in a drugged haze. Azazel would pop into his room at intervals, saying, “It is time for your next one,” as he fed him the medication. Swallowing a pill – or anything - was difficult now.
When the pain began to numb on its own, Riptide had to learn to adjust. The humiliation and fear whenever he saw Shaw were nearly unbearable at first. The image of his severed tongue on the ground would terrorize him anytime he closed his eyes.
And he had practical matters to deal with as well. Learning how to eat without a tongue – and while feeling so utterly sick all over – was difficult, and his weight dropped. Azazel returned early from the next mission Shaw had sent him on to keep him away, and he brought with him cans of soup, jars of applesauce, and a large bag of oats.
“I will stay here until you finish half,” Azazel said, thrusting the bowl at him. He didn’t move until Riptide lifted the spoon and forced it down, despite the sickening feeling inside his mouth, despite having no appetite.
Verbal communication was now lost to him. Riptide had always been quiet, but he had needed speech as much as the next person. He now wished that his written English was as good as his spoken English.
Days passed and the pain began to dissipate; he didn’t need to take such strong painkillers as often. Riptide’s mind began to clear, and the next thing he did was fight to keep the one thing he could not bear to lose. He knocked on Azazel’s door that night.
“Three more hours until next pill,” Azazel said, ushering him inside the cabin. “You must wait – a more high dose will cause more harm than good.”
As Azazel spoke, Riptide began undressing. He did not feel sexual desire – it would be a few more weeks yet before his body overall felt well enough to desire food or sex – but he certainly didn’t want to deprive Azazel.
A more gentle type might quietly reassure Riptide that he could wait, but Azazel was not going to turn away what was offered to him. Riptide would look back weeks later and marvel over the fact that it had not been awkward at all. Azazel kissed him – not on his mouth but elsewhere – and later on they would just reinvent the way they kissed. The touches of their hands had the same electric effect on each other as always. Orgasm would not be a problem either; Azazel’s preferences had always been along the lines of penetration rather than receiving oral. Riptide couldn’t quite take his pleasure that first time after the assault, but Azazel’s touching helped heal him and eventually he would take the same enjoyment in this again too.
Both men took to carrying a notepad and pen around with them, and Riptide’s written English would improve rapidly.
Act Eight
Riptide never forgot that flash of recognition that first time he saw Azazel, as if he had met the other side of his coin. Although that sensation was instantaneous, determining what Azazel’s feelings were became a process that unfolded much more slowly.
“I can teleport us somewhere he can’t find us,” Azazel whispered one day, when Shaw and Emma were both far away and on an engrossing mission. “I have some ideas that I think will work. Do you want that?”
Riptide’s hands shook as he wrote his response. “Anywhere! Do not care where as long as you are there too”.
It would be dangerous. Shaw and Emma were so powerful that no matter where they went, there would always be a chance that they would be found. What would Shaw do next?
Their plans were in the works, and then Magneto happened. Shaw was dead, something Riptide had thought would never happen. He couldn’t believe it when he saw Magneto holding aloft the corpse of their former leader.
Shortly afterwards, Riptide scribbled a note to Azazel. “What do you want to do now that our leader is Magneto? Stay with Magneto’s team or leave?”
Azazel was quiet for a moment and then said almost exactly what Riptide had written in his note earlier. “Either one. As long as it’s with you.”
THE END
Author’s Notes:
Feedback is always appreciated.
Also, a word on Azazel. I understand that comic-version-Azazel is some sort of demon who has been around forever. What about movie-verse? Maybe so, maybe not; we don’t really get enough of movie-Azazel to know if they are following comic canon or not, and we all know that the movies rarely do so. I think it’s equally possible that movie-Azazel, like Nightcrawler, is simply a mutant who looks like a demon.
Two companion pieces to this fic have been written! One is the sequel, "Act Nine: The Kingdom". The other is an expansion of Act Seven, "Soft and Hard".
Fandom: X-men First Class
Word count: 3,115
Rating: NC-17 (Could be NC-17 or R but I will be cautious and go with NC-17. No overt PWP but several sexual situations)
Pairing: Azazel/Riptide
Summary: Riptide's life so far, summarized in eight acts.
Disclaimer: I don’t own these characters and no copyright infringement is intended here. I certainly don't make any money off of fanfic
Riptide - In Eight Acts
Act One
His story began in a tiny village in Latin America, its young inhabitants leaving for the cities in droves, in the hopes of finding better jobs and better lives. The local school didn’t go any higher than the equivalent of eight grade and the teacher, rarely in receipt of his salary, showed up less often. Skinny dogs roamed the mud roads near the shacks where people lived.
Janos had been planning to leave, following in his older brother’s footsteps. His father was dead-set against it, demanding that the rest of his children remain here, as long as his eldest continued to send money home each month.
He was forced out soon enough. A neighbor discovered Janos and the other boy. His enraged father beat Janos bloody, telling him that he already had three daughters and ordering him never to return.
A sympathetic Aunt found enough money for Janos’s bus fare to the city – Tia Dolores had always been the only one to show him love and tenderness since his mother’s death. His elder brother, though, had been warned and would have nothing to do with Janos. Janos became familiar with sleeping on sidewalks, wearing the same dirty shirt and having the same stale taste in his mouth. Hatred and bitterness lodged inside of him, finding the permanent home that Janos himself lacked.
Act Two
It all changed the night that the three men attacked him. It wasn’t clear what they wanted from the filthy teenager who clearly didn’t have money to buy a bottle of Coke. But they dragged him into the alley and began to beat him.
A force surged inside Janos. A tremendous wave swelled up, suggesting great power and commanding him to use his hands. He felt somehow filled with wind and water – filled with majesty, if that wasn’t a crazy idea for a homeless street kid. In an instant, he knew what to do and he channeled this urgent energy. His would-be attackers were swept away, along with the debris littering the alley.
For the first time in his life, Riptide felt power. He would never be beaten bloody again. Power wasn’t the only sensation he experienced that day; he felt fear and guilt too because he correctly surmised that his attackers were killed in the groundswell, and that wasn’t what he had intended. But mostly he felt triumph, an addictive sensation he had never experienced before.
Act Three
Sebastian Shaw found him. By then, Riptide had built up a somewhat comfortable financial position, but he knew he was vulnerable too. He couldn’t always control these strange powers, and the authorities were after him. Riptide never actually wanted to be alone, but his circumstances didn’t exactly allow him to create lasting friendships. He couldn’t stay in one place for too long, fearful of being caught.
And Shaw’s pitch made sense. Power and money. The world that had abused him down on its knees. The safety of a group. Riptide did not even have to think about his response.
The only downside would be having to follow Shaw’s orders, but he wouldn’t realize the full ramifications of that until much later.
It wasn’t bad, at first, though it wasn’t great either. Working on Shaw’s team was a definite mixed bag. Shaw worked his people hard and they were often on the move whereas Riptide wanted a home. He delighted when Shaw bought a submarine which became their permanent base. The wind and the sea were Riptide’s allies. Shaw could be difficult and demanding, but he also left Riptide alone when he didn’t need him. Shaw trained Riptide to master his powers, and he still felt that surge of pride and power every time he used them successfully. He enjoyed observing Shaw’s growing respect for his powers. Of course, Shaw was fairly stingy with compensation, but Riptide’s bank accounts steadily grew anyway. Riptide’s English wasn’t perfect, but he spoke and understood enough and his command of the language improved at the slow and steady pace of his increasing wealth.
Act Four
“We have a new associate,” Shaw announced one day. At that point, the only other members of the team had been Emma and a man who went by the name Dread. There had been two others when Riptide had joined a couple of years ago, but one had been killed and the other disappeared.
“Azazel,” Shaw gave the name of the new man, who stood next to him. “You will see a demonstration of his powers at training today.”
“Fucking demon freak,” muttered Dread as he surveyed Azazel’s appearance.
Azazel did not take kindly to the insult. “You want to fight me?” he asked. His English was heavily accented - Russian or some other Eastern European, Riptide guessed.
“With pleasure,” Dread answered; he always wanted a fight.
Dread was a powerful mutant and not easily defeated, but he was no match for Azazel. Azazel used his sword with considerable skill and agility. He was swift and deliberate, and fiercely strong. Unbeknownst to the rest of the team, Azazel was holding back. He would not demonstrate his teleportation abilities until later.
Riptide stood back and watched the fight, though it didn’t last long due to Azazel’s far superior skills. Riptide admired the way Azazel wielded his sword, and it got him quite excited. But the admiration and lust he experienced watching the fight were not his predominant emotions.
Recognition. That was what was on his mind as he watched Azazel. The sensation kept flashing across his neurons: me. He is similar to me. The phrase “my other half” slid into his mind, the notion that they were two sides of the same coin. It wasn’t logical, not at all, but emotions meant just as much to Riptide as logic, if not more.
This feeling of recognition had never happened to Riptide before. He had plenty of experience with sex, plenty of meaningless trysts. It had always been a wondrous, though brief, release despite the fact that his lust for men had cost him his family years ago.
Riptide hardly ate the next few days, and could not sleep no matter what. His forehead was slightly hot, his stomach unsettled and each time he looked at Azazel, quickly averting his gaze lest it be noticed, the feelings grew more intense.
Act Five
He hadn’t been aware that the attraction was mutual.
For the first few days, they barely spoke. At Shaw’s command, they fought – he required all of his men to battle each other for practice. Azazel won the first round, which wasn’t a surprise; the man clearly had expensive experience, although Riptide held his own. At the conclusion, Azazel offered Riptide a handshake and commended him for a good fight. None of Shaw’s people had offered such a gallant gesture.
“Thank you,” had been all that Riptide was able to offer, since the experience of fighting this man and now the touch of his hand were almost too much to bear.
They exchanged a few words during the next several days, Riptide now silently wishing that his own accent was not so strong. In a band of men such as Shaw’s, several unwritten rules exist, one of them being that you don’t inquire about the pasts of the others. But Azazel asked Riptide where he was from, and Riptide didn’t hesitate to give him a little bit of information, mostly because he desperately hoped to learn more about Azazel. He wanted to maintain eye contact when he spoke to Azazel and fought hard to do so, but knew that he’d spent most of their conversation looking down at his hands. As a distraction, he created a small gust of wind and played with it as they spoke. He didn’t notice Emma walking by with a raised eyebrow, or Emma’s split-second of eye contact with Azazel.
The knock came on Riptide’s door that night. He hadn’t been asleep, almost having resigned himself to another sleepless night, and the first time he heard the knock he didn’t believe his ears. Then the knock sounded once more.
He opened the door and stepped back to let Azazel in, blinking several times.
“Your clothes - off,” Azazel ordered. “All of them. I want to see you.”
Riptide scrambled to comply. He wanted it badly, although he simultaneously feared what this man who looked like a demon might do.
“You like what you see?” Riptide asked bravely, when his clothes were a pile on the floor.
“Beautiful,” Azazel murmured, though Riptide didn’t know it at the moment because Azazel said the word in Russian.
Riptide’s fears about coupling with a man who looked like a demon had been unfounded, and he learned that that a sword was not the only thing Azazel could wield with skill. Afterwards, Azazel seemed pleased at Riptide’s enjoyment, casually playing with the thick hair on Riptide’s chest and chuckling, “I am older man. I know what I am doing, yes?”
So the attraction was mutual. But what about this feeling of recognition, this sense of being one? Riptide knew a lot about sex but not much about love.
Act Six
Riptide was lost in Eros’ grip. He didn’t want to leave his tiny cabin, not when Azazel was inside of it. All during the day he was at work doing Shaw’s bidding, but Riptide would replay fragments of the previous night, over and over. He could think of almost nothing else, and he had to fight to be the confident, focused man who Shaw expected.
The kisses. None of his previous lovers had been much for mouths, for the work of lips and tongue against lips and tongue. Azazel didn’t linger overlong on it, but he kissed like he meant it.
Tracing his fingers along Azazel’s body. His mutation was beautiful to Riptide. The colors, the thrill of the deep red skin and hair blacker than Riptide’s. The colors spoke of passion. Seeing Azazel respond to the touches of his hands thrilled Riptide as well.
Azazel beckoning Riptide towards the bed, having the younger man lay on his back. Riptide nearly howling with pleasure at the work of his lover’s lips and tongue on other parts of his body.
Azazel kissing him passionately again, while using his tail to snake around and open a container of lubricant. Azazel murmuring, “Turn over”. More kisses, and a slick tail gently stroking and then pressing against Riptide’s opening, in preparation. The tail continuing to massage and stroke the area, Azazel taking it so slow and so gentle that Riptide wondered if he ever was going to enter. The craving making him mindless until Azazel finally, finally flicked his tail away and entered.
All rational thought gone, Riptide pushing back against Azazel. That tail again, coming around front and encircling Riptide’s hardness. Pumping it fiercely in time with Azazel’s own thrusts inside, the two men lost in an animal rhythm, groaning and grunting, seeing who would break first.
Riptide counted the hours until night, wanting the day to be finished as soon as possible so that Azazel would come to his room.
Act Seven
Riptide had lived so much of his life in fear. Fear of his father, getting caught when he lived on the streets, fear that someone would track down Shaw and his team. Now that he had Azazel, he felt more confident, more brave. His whirlwind life began to contain a measure of stability.
But Shaw’s pitch no longer made as much sense as it once did. Do this many people need to die?, Riptide wondered. He had thought that they would just make some money and harm only those who stood in their way. Annihilating most of humanity seemed a bit like overkill, and the potential for something going hideously wrong was huge.
Riptide made the mistake of uttering one or two of these thoughts aloud. Emma was just out of earshot, but of course the telepath didn’t need to use her ears to pick up his words and report them.
Shaw conveniently selected a time when Azazel was out on a mission. He called the rest of the team together: Emma, Dread, and another man who – like Dread - would soon be killed in one of Shaw’s schemes.
Shaw recited Riptide’s complaints.
“Sir, please, you not understand,” Riptide began in defense, knowing he was in danger but even then not fully realizing how horrendous it would be. “I never question you. I believe in you.”
“Don’t lie to me,” Shaw said. “Remember who trained you. I expect and require utter obedience, and when I don’t receive it, there is always a price to pay. Always.” Shaw paused and then continued, speaking slowly, “Once you speak ill of me, you simply won’t speak again.”
Out of the corner of his eye, Riptide saw Emma hand Shaw something. He saw the glint of metal.
Shaw turned to Dread and ordered, “Hold his mouth open.”
Riptide struggled against Dread but the other mutant was too strong and Riptide wasn’t given even a second or two to muster his powers. His eyes were wild and terrified as Shaw approached and deftly sliced most of Riptide’s tongue off. Shaw dropped the severed flesh onto the floor, which Riptide fleetingly thought resembled a slice of fruit.
The shock wore off in an instant, and then Riptide’s universe became nothing but blood and pain. The red liquid spurted out of him as he sank to his knees in agony. He rocked back and forth. His vision clouded over but not before he glimpsed the small fleshy mass on the floor next to him.
Somehow Azazel was there. Later he would learn that Emma mercifully had called him back from his mission. Cursing in Russian, Azazel teleported away to return a second later with someone he knew who had medical experience. The bleeding was staunched and numerous painkillers were procured.
Riptide spent the next several days in a drugged haze. Azazel would pop into his room at intervals, saying, “It is time for your next one,” as he fed him the medication. Swallowing a pill – or anything - was difficult now.
When the pain began to numb on its own, Riptide had to learn to adjust. The humiliation and fear whenever he saw Shaw were nearly unbearable at first. The image of his severed tongue on the ground would terrorize him anytime he closed his eyes.
And he had practical matters to deal with as well. Learning how to eat without a tongue – and while feeling so utterly sick all over – was difficult, and his weight dropped. Azazel returned early from the next mission Shaw had sent him on to keep him away, and he brought with him cans of soup, jars of applesauce, and a large bag of oats.
“I will stay here until you finish half,” Azazel said, thrusting the bowl at him. He didn’t move until Riptide lifted the spoon and forced it down, despite the sickening feeling inside his mouth, despite having no appetite.
Verbal communication was now lost to him. Riptide had always been quiet, but he had needed speech as much as the next person. He now wished that his written English was as good as his spoken English.
Days passed and the pain began to dissipate; he didn’t need to take such strong painkillers as often. Riptide’s mind began to clear, and the next thing he did was fight to keep the one thing he could not bear to lose. He knocked on Azazel’s door that night.
“Three more hours until next pill,” Azazel said, ushering him inside the cabin. “You must wait – a more high dose will cause more harm than good.”
As Azazel spoke, Riptide began undressing. He did not feel sexual desire – it would be a few more weeks yet before his body overall felt well enough to desire food or sex – but he certainly didn’t want to deprive Azazel.
A more gentle type might quietly reassure Riptide that he could wait, but Azazel was not going to turn away what was offered to him. Riptide would look back weeks later and marvel over the fact that it had not been awkward at all. Azazel kissed him – not on his mouth but elsewhere – and later on they would just reinvent the way they kissed. The touches of their hands had the same electric effect on each other as always. Orgasm would not be a problem either; Azazel’s preferences had always been along the lines of penetration rather than receiving oral. Riptide couldn’t quite take his pleasure that first time after the assault, but Azazel’s touching helped heal him and eventually he would take the same enjoyment in this again too.
Both men took to carrying a notepad and pen around with them, and Riptide’s written English would improve rapidly.
Act Eight
Riptide never forgot that flash of recognition that first time he saw Azazel, as if he had met the other side of his coin. Although that sensation was instantaneous, determining what Azazel’s feelings were became a process that unfolded much more slowly.
“I can teleport us somewhere he can’t find us,” Azazel whispered one day, when Shaw and Emma were both far away and on an engrossing mission. “I have some ideas that I think will work. Do you want that?”
Riptide’s hands shook as he wrote his response. “Anywhere! Do not care where as long as you are there too”.
It would be dangerous. Shaw and Emma were so powerful that no matter where they went, there would always be a chance that they would be found. What would Shaw do next?
Their plans were in the works, and then Magneto happened. Shaw was dead, something Riptide had thought would never happen. He couldn’t believe it when he saw Magneto holding aloft the corpse of their former leader.
Shortly afterwards, Riptide scribbled a note to Azazel. “What do you want to do now that our leader is Magneto? Stay with Magneto’s team or leave?”
Azazel was quiet for a moment and then said almost exactly what Riptide had written in his note earlier. “Either one. As long as it’s with you.”
THE END
Author’s Notes:
Feedback is always appreciated.
Also, a word on Azazel. I understand that comic-version-Azazel is some sort of demon who has been around forever. What about movie-verse? Maybe so, maybe not; we don’t really get enough of movie-Azazel to know if they are following comic canon or not, and we all know that the movies rarely do so. I think it’s equally possible that movie-Azazel, like Nightcrawler, is simply a mutant who looks like a demon.
Two companion pieces to this fic have been written! One is the sequel, "Act Nine: The Kingdom". The other is an expansion of Act Seven, "Soft and Hard".
