Archive of Our Own

Alcohol was a pretty damn good choice—especially when loneliness and heartbreak came knocking. It was the best friend you could ever ask for.

He mused, setting yet another empty bottle on the floor, his vision already softening at the edges. This was exactly what he needed...numbing every sense until the ache of being without her dulled to something he could almost bear.

When sober, he couldn’t stop thinking about her. Anya Forger lived in every corner of his mind, every single second. He hated her for vanishing without a word, yet he knew she’d had no choice. So he turned all that fury inward.

If only he had been strong enough, if only he could have bent the world to his will, none of this would have happened.

He hated the thought of making things any harder for her.

Damian Desmond, twenty years old, also as the agent Dawn, was enduring training that outsiders would call brutally inhuman.

Yet he actually thrived on it. Results are all that matter. The suffering along the way? Irrelevant. He takes the missions, he completes them. Perfectly.

Accepted every trial and completed every task perfectly, that is what he needed to do, not anyone else.

Complaining and negative emotions would only slow him down, and that was pointless.

Ever since he had realized this, he had shoved those feelings to the very bottom of his priorities—or simply thrown them away.

Meaningless things only hindered efficiency, and efficiency is everything.

In his eyes there was only one goal: in the short term, to keep sharpening his own strength; in the long term, to wield the family’s power and push Ostania and Westalis toward true peace.

But every single step served one ultimate purpose—to create a world where Anya Forger could finally be felicity.

If he could achieve that, he would not mind being ground to dust.

Yes, he knew he was risking everything for a hazy, uncertain future. But if he could die for an ideal, then his life would have meant something.

Damian’s eyes grew heavier. His eyes are getting heavier. He forces himself through his nighttime routine—washes up, brushes his teeth, lays himself out neatly in bed. Then he lets his mind go slack, savoring the rare emptiness. Normally he overthinks everything. Under alcohol's influence, thinking about nothing feels like a luxury.

Then he saw someone.

It's a woman. Young face—early twenties, maybe—but something about her reads as older. Maybe it's the depth in those emerald eyes, that stillness that comes from having seen things. Or the way she carries herself—not like a innocent girl.

She looks like someone he knows better than anyone. Could almost be her. But there's a grace to her that's almost dizzying, the kind of beauty that takes years to settle into. The girl he knows was too much of a chaos magnet back at Eden to pull this off.

Except in reality, she's two years younger than him. A mind reader. Part of some reconstructed fake family. She even lied about her age to get into Eden with him.

This can't be her. At least, not the her from now.

He must be drunker than he thought. Dreaming. Hallucinating an older version of Anya Forger right in front of him.

The woman—let's call her Anya, dream-Anya anyway—steps closer. Like she's heard something. Sits on the edge of his bed, watching him with concern, saying something he can't quite catch.

She smells like musk and tuberose—that Eastern sort of floral, edged with caramel sweetness. It wraps around him, invades his senses.

A feather, soft and fragrant, brushing against something in his chest that's been aching for too long. Cool palm, delicate skin, her hand touches his forearm, and it's enough to stir something he'd rather not acknowledge.

What's she saying? He can't focus. There's a lag between what he sees and what's happening, and it's making him dizzy.

"Anya..."

Her name slips out. He gives up, lets himself fall forward into the warmth of her.

The heat radiating from her skin, the softness of her chest. It hits him like coming home after years lost. She just sits there, stroking his hair, and he's suddenly five years old again, held by a mother humming lullabies, completely at peace.

He's this drunk? Anya studies his younger face, memories flooding back.

One minute she was heading home from work—anniversary night, Damian waiting—and the next, some glowing circle of light yanked her here. Then gave her a list:

1. Do not panic. The original timeline will pause while you are away.Complete the task and you will return.
2. This is nine years before your time.
3. You cannot leave this room. Finish before dawn or face the consequences.
4. You may leave no physical trace, but memories will remain.
5. Any truly effective action will also affect him nine years from now.

Before she could even decide if she was accepting this mission, the circle of light disappeared. She opened her eyes to a dimly lit room reeking of ALCOHOL.

So... what's the actual task? The thing didn't even let her ask.

She's not new to supernatural stuff—she is supernatural. Anya Forger could read minds from the very beginning of her memories.

As a telepath herself, Anya wasn’t shocked by supernatural intervention… but it could have at least explained the rules. “Failure is on you”? Fine. She would test it.

She starts probing. And realizes: the man in the bed is her husband.

Just... younger. Barely twenty. Wasted out of his mind. His thoughts are all over the place, scattered like stars.

But the main thing—

Maybe she can fix something here. Maybe this is a chance.

He looks younger than the version she reunited with, more raw. The separation anxiety's carved deeper into him. There are shadows under his eyes that weren't there in her time. He seems darker. More haunted.

She hurries to his side, sits down, asks if he's okay, and her chest clenches. Is this how he was during those years she was gone? He never let any of this pain show in his thoughts when she asked. Changed the subject. Brushed it off.

She's pieced together bits of his self-loathing, his inner war. Childhood trauma flaring up again in adulthood. But seeing it firsthand?

She knows what to do now. First: comfort this younger version. Read him, guide his thoughts. Second: go home and give her Damian the upgraded version of the same therapy.

Yeah. This is very her father's style—Dr. Forger, psychiatrist. Today she, Anya Forger-Damian's-wife, is moonlighting as a therapist.

Family practice. But it's still basic spycraft.

Damian's eyes snap open. He looks up at her, studying. Anya Forger always does this, he thinks vaguely. Makes you want to keep looking. Even the dream version. Gets under your skin no matter what.

"Desmond? Damian? Syon?" She pokes his cheek, trying to pull him back. He just turns his head toward her stomach, sulking like a kid refusing to talk.

"Alright. I'm right here, Damian? I came back?" Her voice softens without meaning to. She pats him, slow and steady.

"You WILL leave. Right? "

"..."

"I've had dreams like this before. Wake up and they're fake. Only thing real is you being gone."

"...That's different. A huge distinction. A misunderstanding. This me is real, I swear. I didn't mean to leave you. I—"

He exhales, barely a sigh. The alcohol makes him almost honest. "Real or fake doesn't matter. You coming back or not—same thing."

"Let me guess. You're about to say you're sorry? Apologized for being forced to leave? I know all that. Explaining doesn't change anything. Because I know you didn’t on purpose. "

Anya freezes. For a second she wonders he's even drunk. If he knows exactly what he's doing—maybe more lucid than her.

Then she remembers. Five years later, when she tried to explain, he said: None of that matters now. He always knew. Just... understood. In his own way. Silently carried it.

“I never blamed you, I just…missed you. Two years. It’s been a long time since our last meeting. And I’m afraid…I may never see you again. So I'm trying to intervene in the war, utilizing the political influence of my family, or do something like a spy who’s you beloved in your childhood. ”

“Am I doing well? I must be drunk…but I want to be frank more in my dreams. Honestly, This is my regret. ”

He always carries everything alone.

So she stays. Lets her presence say what words can't.

"Real or not..." His voice is muffled against her. "Just stay with me. Quiet."

"Anyway, I knew it was fake. No one could gets in my safe house in silence . Not even you. Unless you brought explosives."

The sadness hits her—his, hers, she can't tell anymore. He turns just enough to look at her, blinking slow. "Even if you're not my her. I still miss you so. "

"How can you tell? Is it... that obvious?"

The ache deepens.

"The ring finger. You're wearing one, formally. But even without that, you eyes. The way you shown yourself. More mature than ever."

"...You're happy with your husband, right?"

Now she gets it. That heaviness in him. He always assumes he's not enough. Always reaches for the worst possible interpretation. She, however, needs to stop this spiral.

She leans down. Rose-golden hair spills past her neck, curtains around them. And just, kisses him.

He hesitates. A split second—too long without this, too afraid to believe what he wants could actually happen on an ordinary night, in some drunken dream.

Then he kisses back. Tentative. Careful. Like she's porcelain yet he might break her. His lips barely trace hers, melting into something that feels almost like drowning—a Dionysian wave of want, alcohol pulling him under.

If this is a dream, just let me stay asleep.

“Damian…”

She drew back from their tangled kiss with a trembling sigh, suddenly aware of how the carefully chosen outfit she wore felt like an unbearable burden. The intricate earrings came off first, placed gently on the nightstand. Her slender, pale fingers reached behind her neck, unclasping the delicate chain of her necklace.

Moonlight poured over her skin like liquid pearl, flawless and dazzling. While he was still dazed, she tugged his shirt open, then coiled around him like a serpent tasting the air—slow, sinuous—climbing to his shoulder to lick the delicate, flushed shell of his ear.

Damian’s alcohol-soaked mind went blank for a heartbeat. He could hardly believe her boldness, yet his body ached so hard it bordered on pain.

“…You’re married.”

Damian watched her remove every last piece of jewelry except the wedding band. The diamond caught the light like a silent, mocking taunt from her husband. He turned his face away in awkward defiance—the last feeble protest he could manage.

If this were real, if he knew who the man was, he might do something his sanity would never forgive, something that contradicted every vow he had made to make her happy.

“Oh my, Damian. My poor and lonely little boy. ”

Anya sank lower, unbuttoning him with deft fingers, sliding his trousers down, then daring even further with a teasing caress that made his breath hitch.

“Have I ever told you how adorable you look when you’re being all proper and stiff? It makes me want to do terrible things just to wipe that serious look off your face, Mr. Prim-and-Proper.”

The thoughts flooding her mind twisted like knotted silk. She felt his abdominal muscles tighten beneath her cheek as she pressed her face to the fabric already straining with his outline, then wrapped her lips around the swollen tip through the thin barrier.

From that moment everything slid irrevocably forward. Anya listened to the storm of his thoughts and realized he still hadn’t grasped her hint—instead he had spiraled into the opposite extreme.

He believed her desire to be close to him meant her marriage was unhappy. From there his mind leapt to making her happy, then to quietly arranging some non-fatal “accident” for her “husband,” a divorce, a chance for him to pursue her—

The plan haven't fully formed, but she could not let it continue. How could he misunderstand her so completely? She had to make it clear.

“Yes, I’m married. But do you really intend to keep pretending you don’t know why I still wear this ring?… Do I look like someone who has that kind of kink?”

She wanted to crack his head open and peer inside, but all she could do was bite down on the firm swell of his pectoral in frustration, leaving a faint crescent of teeth as petty revenge.

“Let me reintroduce myself. On my passport now the name reads Anya Forger Desmond.” Her hand closed gently around his throbbing length, making him flinch.

“And I’ll emphasize—I did not marry Demitrius. I married a man named Damian Desmond. Yes, you can go ahead and wonder if you know that man nine years from now.”

—Oh. So that’s how it is.

Damian’s hazy mind spun. Anya really married me years later? The alcohol burned hot across his cheeks. His thoughts turned raw, unguarded.

—She came back just to comfort me. So happy I am. But I don’t want her to leave. What do I do? She doesn’t belong here—she’ll go. Nope.

Anya sighed—how many times tonight?—and pulled him into her arms, kissing his check softly. “I don’t know how much you’ll remember after tonight… I will leave. But as soon as there’s any chance at all, I’ll come back. I won’t abandon you. Promise. ”

“Mmm.”

“Right now...yeah, in this timeline, I should be in America at university. Communication is terrible—only letters. The Cold War is still going, and my father intercepts everything I try to send you. I’ve been thinking about you both every single day.”

“Mmm.”

“And you—stop carrying everything alone… I’m your wife. My whole purpose is to share the weight… And stop drinking so much!”

“Mmm…”

…She saw the low, quiet smile curve his lips. Even through the fog of drink, joy radiated from him like sunlight from within. Though he stayed silent, he buried his face against her like a child seeking comfort.

Anya never stopped the slow movement of her hand, yet something deep inside her chest clenched hard. His total, vulnerable surrender stirred a secret, darker hunger she had never named.

Her mind hovered between heaven and hell, but the question narrowed to one unbearable point: even though he was still Damian, even though every version of him made her heart race, could she really start doin'something on this Damian who was seven full years younger?

They say three years is a generation gap. Anya looked at the man before her—technically an adult, yet compared to the mature husband she knew, he seemed like a beautiful, brooding boy.

Seven years felt impossibly awkward. When she remembered her own twenty-year-old self, she suspected she had still been half-asleep to the world. Seeing this younger Damian through the eyes of a married woman almost made her cheeks burn with unexpected shyness.

He was far more mature than others his age, that's true, and the two-year gap in real time had always made him seem older. But placed against a seven-year difference, that maturity shrank until it almost vanished.

In their more advanced timeline he had always been the gentle guide in their intimacy. She had loved it, had gladly followed. Yet ever since their reunion she had been physically unable to control him absolutely.

His fighter’s body was simply too strong. The only time she could dominate was when she rode him—and even then it felt like tempting fate. She gave their married life top marks, especially in sex. But Anya needed to admit that sometimes she missed the thrill of being the one in dominant.

None of that was the real issue. A cold sweat prickled down Anya’s spine as she realized what she was actually contemplating: was she seriously planning to rob the cradle?

In this twenty-year-old Damian, they had experience, yes, but limited variety. Could they be called crazy in love and sex, but compared to their sex after marriage, she have to say it's to pale into insignificance by comparison.

Anya remembered the first time they had together in his eighteen, she dominated and seduced him to get into her body. Pretty delicious. The favor was unforgettable. Although they haven't any experience in this area, but recognizing the fact they're touched deeply made both of them satisfied.

At this age he would let her lead completely—especially drunk.

Stop. Stop. Why was her subconscious steering her straight into forbidden territory? Do your job, go home, celebrate your anniversary. That is your mission tonight. Anya Forger Desmond.

She shook her head, trying to clear the haze, but his breathing had grown rough. Deliberately she tightened her grip around the sensitive ridge beneath the head, then lowered her mouth to kiss and suckle until the long hand-work finally ended.

She swallowed out of pure habit, feeling nothing strange, she was used to sucking him and drinking all of his liquids—until she lifted her eyes and met the dark, devouring look in his. Only then did she realize she had crossed a line.

…Coming in my mouth was probably still too much for him at twenty, right? Back then I wasn’t very good at it anyway.

The thought lacked conviction. Before she could speak he pulled her into his arms; moments later she felt the hard, insistent press against her belly. Alarm bells screamed—she had forgotten how inexhaustible he was at this age. The boy really meant it.

Had he sobered up? …Should I pretend to resist a little? Then she heard her own treacherous heart whisper the answer.

The brooding intensity of his youth blended with the steady maturity of the man he would become; both versions set every nerve in her body alight. But this twenty-year-old Damian’s gaze was darker, wetter, almost ghostly, as though he had stepped out of another world.

The alarm rang again, louder. This time the problem was she could not refuse. The twenty-year-old Damian she had never seen—neither past nor present—carried a dangerous, intoxicating flavor all his own. Her reason, that shameless little devil, nearly made a decision that would scandalize their ancestors.

His eyes held the coiled restraint of a predator before the strike… She suspected he would devour her until nothing remained. Yet the lightning flash vanished as quickly as it had appeared, like an illusion.

Remained gentle, gathering her close, his fingers toying with the ribbon at the nape of her neck that held her slip dress.

Still, that inescapable gaze lingered, damp and clinging, sliding over her skin like warm silk. The satin and silk whispered down her body with gravity’s soft pull.

Her mind blanked for a second—she could not believe what he was doing. Suddenly they were skin to skin.

Moonlight spilled over her porcelain-smooth curves, flawless and blinding. Damian lowered his lashes, gazing at the soft, full swell of her breasts, then reached out almost absently to knead and roll them.

Anya wanted to crawl under the covers. The moment his attention wavered, control had slipped back into his hands.

Damian truly was made for this.

His stare moved like tangible fingers, slow as serpent scales across her flesh, raising goosebumps of icy delight.

Pleasure rippled from every nerve ending. Anya bit back a moan.

“…Do you really want to? I…”

“You what?”

He tilted his head as if he hadn’t heard, turning her body to face the same direction as his own, fingertips sliding over the soaked fabric between her thighs, stroking lazily.

“I don’t want… ah!” A short cry escaped her as shame and forbidden thrill collided; the mere knowledge that her younger husband was touching her like this made her scalp tingle.

“Hmm? Weren’t you going to comfort me?” Damian enveloped her in the shadow of his body, resting his chin on her crown and inhaling the scent of her hair with a soft sigh.

“What if I say I want to right now? We haven’t seen each other for so long…”

“Don’t you miss me?”

The low timbre of his voice struck her eardrums like a cello’s deepest string. His words curled around her like a siren’s song, every stroke of his fingers pushing her higher.

Anya felt as though she were a tiny boat tossed on a stormy sea, instinct told her something in his words did not add up, yet she was spellbound, helpless.

“Damian… no, we really can’t… I mustn’t…”

“But your body seems to have its own opinion.” Damian smiled, wicked and knowing, increasing the pressure to the clitoris until she cried out sharply. Then a new idea sparked in his eyes.

Anya gasped as his four fingers and palm came down again in a measured slap against her dripping, swollen folds. The tender, blood-flushed entrance and throbbing pearl endured a storm of exquisite violence.

“Answer me, Anya.”

His arm locked her against his chest while his other hand alternated between pinching her stiff, reddened nipples and delivering another wet slap to her leaking core.

If her mouth would not be honest, he would regretfully let the far more truthful one below speak for her—until water sprayed and she could no longer form complete sentences.

“Do you only want me? Will you accept me no matter what I’m like?”

—I’m going to die here, she thought.

Logically he should not even know how to do this yet… Lost in the sea of desire she no longer knew where she was.

The only thing could she do was cling to his body to keep from collapsing.

Whether she leaned or was imprisoned, Anya herself no longer knew.

“What if I wanted to lock you away so only I could ever see you? Just imprisoning you in a hidden island where anyone wouldn't find you. I’d take care of you, keep you from every danger, but your whole world would be me alone?”

She could never predict whether the next touch would be tempest or feather. Only knew the dull ache and overwhelming pleasure multiplied exponentially.

When she could bear no more she sobbed into his chest. Damian coaxed and kneaded her through it, gentling her even as he drove her higher. Anya lost count of how many times she cummed in his violent spanking.

She heard him sigh again, almost regretful. Anya thought dazedly that the Syon was thoroughly rotten—both the older and the younger version possessed the same wicked tastes.

Curled against his broad, solid chest while reason slowly returned, she looked up at the familiar melancholy expression now restored to his face and finally understood what had felt wrong.

At some point she had stopped being able to read his heart.

The young Damian would never have played so intensely.

Therefore she could say with absolute certainty: the wicked Damian before her right now carried the soul of her twenty-nine-year-old husband.

So those words had been his true feelings all along—the dark, possessive hunger he had always disciplined into silence, the terror that revealing it would make her leave again.

Everything swirled inside him. The understanding he had shown was not complete acceptance but the iron restraint he used to cage those pathological urges.

Perhaps the jealousy born of love had nearly drowned him, yet he still wore that calm, cloudless smile.

Anya poked his cheek, trying to coax a smile. He refused. She sighed too—sighed at herself for not making him feel safe enough, sighed at the insecurity that kept him from believing she would embrace even his darkest corners.

“Damian.”

“Syon.”

—Hubby is deliberately ignoring me. What do I do? I can’t read his heart, but I have to do something.

She slipped her fingers through his, pressed, and toppled him backward, quickly curling into his arms and clinging to his neck, pulling their bodies flush. The safe, familiar scent of him filled her nose.

Kissing his ear, then she squished his face like dough, babbling his name until she finally dragged her husband mind back to the present.

“Come on, it’s alright. I’m right here with you.”

“Humm.” Damian’s ears were scarlet, yet he stubbornly refused to meet her eyes. He didn’t know WHY the circle of light had let him spill every hidden thought, but after speaking them he could suddenly hear hers clearly too.

Perhaps that brief gift of telepathy was exactly why he had dared test her with those dangerous words.

So this was what reading minds felt like—direct, merciless access to another heart, able to tell truth from lie. What moved him most was her thought that she hadn’t made him feel secure enough.

But Damian knew the fault was not hers. He simply did not trust himself.

“Syon, stop pretending nothing happened!” She wrinkled her nose in mock anger. But to Damian she looked exactly like an outraged Pomeranian, so adorable he almost laughed.

“It was probably the circle of light. When I arrived here I could hear everything you thought—both earlier and now.”

Damian spoke hesitantly. “About that last question you were thinking… it’s not your fault. I’ve been like this since I was a child. It’s already much better.”

Anya sucked in a sharp breath. She had not realized the supernatural being was powerful enough to temporarily grant someone else telepathy.

“Then you have to tell me. Even with my ability, if you avoid thinking about it, how am I supposed to know?”

—Sigh, he’s always been like this. The Second Son does far more than he says.

“Mmm.” He agreed softly. “Those thoughts… maybe I was just being greedy.”

Mrs. Desmond looked as if she had heard the most unbelievable story. “What’s greedy about that? There must have a huge misunderstanding. You are my legal husband. You have those thoughts because you LOVE me, and you’ve never actually restricted my freedom or anything.”

“You’ve always respected my choices and feelings. Do you honestly think I’d ignore everything you’ve done for me just because of a few dark little ideas? I don’t care how wildly you spiral. I only know my husband is the person in all of Berlint who supports and loves me most. I want only you. Even if you told me to let go, I wouldn’t.”

“Only your existence gives me the strongest backbone. Don’t you know yet that you are my harbor and my pillar? I absolutely forbid you to deny that.”

Damian Desmond silently gathered his beloved wife into his arms and pressed a reverent kiss to her forehead.

“I have the impression of tonight—I mean, before the circle of light suddenly brought me here. But the memories aren’t clear. I only know you came, you spoke to me very gently. When I opened my eyes the next morning, nothing was there. No physical trace. So I always thought it was just a dream.”

Anya remembered her earlier internal struggle over whether she was “robbing the cradle” and felt a wave of shame—then forgot he could still read her. His gaze swept over her like a slow interrogation.

“Never mind… do as you like.” His ears burned crimson. Memories from this body before his consciousness arrived flooded back.

The current Anya was far too skilled. He wasn’t sure the younger him would have lasted on her...the body, the temperament, the eyes which showed the light of desire.

“I know I was in a terrible state back then. No matter what you did, the fact that you came was already the greatest comfort.”

“Ah, so this was always meant to happen.” Anya recalled the circle’s instructions and suddenly understood.

4. You may leave no physical trace, but memories will remain.
5. Any truly effective action will also affect him nine years from now.

“So the timeline has closed perfectly—why the twenty-year-old Syon’s memories are hazy.

One reason is that I couldn’t leave physical evidence. The other is that after he passed out drunk, your consciousness arrived through the circle. So everything that happened afterward only the twenty-nine-year-old you remembers.”

“Indeed very clever.” Damian pondered everything from reading at home while waiting for her mission to end until now and had to admit the deduction was probably correct.

Yet the circle seemed to follow its own mysterious rules.

“I don’t know the rules exactly, but I suspect they are love—and a way to mend the regrets we both carried.” Anya gathered her jewelry from the nightstand, eyes curving with sudden mischief.

“Most important of all, the knot in your twenty-nine-year-old heart needed the experience of your twenty-year-old self as the catalyst to come undone. I think that’s why the circle sent us here one after the other.”

“—So when exactly did you arrive here tonight? Give me a precise time.”

She punched his chest in mock anger, remembering how he had spanked her into trembling, speechless bliss.

“Guess.” Damian caught her fist, unfurled her fingers, and brought them to his lips for a kiss. “But we can always go home and finish what we didn’t finish tonight.”

Anya glanced at the sky beginning to pale and thought of the circle’s final instruction—“finish before dawn.”

Whether before the literal dawn or before the agent Dawn, she had completed her task perfectly.

In the faint light of morning they poured out every last drop of love. Perhaps that was the circle’s true purpose—to let love be spoken fully before the breaking of the dawn.

Anya Forger Desmond knew that after they left, the twenty-year-old Damian waking alone would feel a quiet ache.

Yet in the steady flow of linear time he would eventually meet the version of her who was already running toward him. They still had so much time left to tell each other about love—both before dawn and long after it.