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From the notes of Agent Aban Stone, in regards to being an Agent-slash-Familiar to Doctor Robotnik:
“You would expect his favorite blood type to be B-negative. You’d be wrong. With B-negative only making up two percent of the population or so, you may breathe a sigh of relief upon hearing this. You’d also be wrong if you did that quite yet; his favorite blood type is actually AB-negative, which is the least common blood type. He likes to make things as difficult as possible.
The order, from best liked to least, is AB-negative, O-negative, B-negative, B-positive, AB-positive, A-positive, A-negative, and O-positive. He’ll complain less about the type if the victim is caffeinated. You can either add this to the blood after getting it from the victim or by getting victims from coffee shops and delivering them fresh, assuming that’s a viable option.
Metal containers tend to preserve the original taste of the blood better than plastic ones, if you have to take blood with you. For your sake, get used to carrying around a decent thermos or five.
Live victims taste better. If you can get away from whatever obligations you have in order to track someone down, then the Doctor will be far more appreciative than if you brought him an alternative.
While the absolute bare minimum that he can function with properly is about a liter of blood per day, he operates at his best with two in his system. He prefers to separate those feedings into different times of the day, unless he’s drinking straight from the source. The average adult can sustain him for a little under a week at minimum intake and between two to three days at max.
Finding high-quality victims will save you a lot of grief in the long run.
In the absence of proper victims or nutrition, don’t be surprised if you end up as the Doctor’s next meal.
Don’t miss mealtimes.
Don’t feel guilty for what must be done.
And don’t forget that you aren’t special for doing this.”
-
It’s a funny story, actually, how Stone ended up working for Robotnik for as long as he has. Most of his predecessors didn’t piece together the whole ‘vampire’ thing until they were on the business end of the Doctor’s fangs, but Robotnik didn’t keep asking for them because he wanted an easy meal. He just needed someone to invite him into buildings, and he kept getting sick of the other ones.
Stone loves his job. He really does.
It’s ironic, he thinks, that he spent so long grappling with his own conscience while in his previous line of work and can’t seem to find a problem with this one. When he was still something of a spy, traveling the world to assassinate high-profile targets, at least there was some sort of vague political motivation behind what he was doing. Now, when he drags people into the lab, gagged and bound, solely because his boss threw another hissy fit in the middle of the day, he can’t find it in him to care. Robotnik’s ‘thank you’s, sparing as they are, always seem so much more earnest than a new star on his profile or a medal he had to keep secret from everyone.
That’s part of it. Along with that, there’s a part of him that is deeply, primally satisfied that he knows why he’s doing what he’s doing. Even when he has to take the bodies to his own apartment to prep them for later meals, the cabinet under his sink having turned into a glorified medical supply closet, Stone can’t feel much of anything, watching those victims bleed out and die. Like this, his Doctor eats. Like this, he does what he’s supposed to.
(Plus, Robotnik seems to like him! That never happens! Sure, he ate the last few guys he hired, and Stone will probably end up the same way, but for now, he hasn’t gotten annoyed enough to rip his throat out!)
Nevermind the fact that he enjoys what he does, he’s damn good at it, too. One of the other reasons Robotnik got rid of the last few babysitters involves something along the lines of ‘repeated and-slash-or egregious fuckups that Robotnik just couldn’t forgive’, whatever that means to the Doctor. Knowing him, the poor bastards could have just been in the wrong places at the wrong times, making them the easiest target for Doctor’s uncontrollable bloodlust, but there have been plenty of times that Stone has been conveniently within arm’s reach, and Robotnik hasn’t grabbed for him. He sticks his hand out, sure, fingers splayed and his chin cocked up high in annoyed defiance that he has to ask a human for something, and Stone, without a word, pulls a thermos out of his bag and hands it to him. He’s never once missed a feeding time, random and sporadic as they are. He anticipates the Doctor’s needs, and he makes sure to never, under any circumstances, leave him wanting.
So, that’s how he avoids being bitten. It’s a wonderful life, standing by Robotnik’s side, watching an immortal genius change the world at the cost of a few civilian lives. Stone considers himself privileged to be there, untouched by those gleaming fangs, and he can’t imagine being one of the idiots who gave up this dream of a job, just so they could slack off or hold onto their precious morals or whatever their excuse was.
However.
Some nights, he gets it. He stands against the wall of the lab, his arms folded behind his back as the screams of Robotnik’s latest snack melt into silence. He always watches Robotnik go after the live ones, taking a sick sort of delight in how much joy they bring him, but his mind starts to wander after the fight bleeds out of the meal. Robotnik’s fangs sink into a neck like they belong there, smooth and sharp and almost effortless, and if it weren’t for the cries for mercy, Stone would expect it to be painless, too. He’s watched Robotnik savage dozens of bodies by this point in his career, and he grows more fixated on those fangs, on each flick of Robotnik’s devilish tongue, with each passing day. He has no idea why those other agents died, but those feedings tempt him to flirt with death a little, too. He watches like the hopeless voyeur he is as Robotnik takes his pleasure from someone else’s veins, and he thinks, his knuckles white in his balled fists, god, I wish that were me.
But he’s no use to the Doctor dead, nor does Stone really want to die in the first place. He lives only because the Doctor wills it, so in the meantime, Stone keeps him well-fed, totes the body off when he finishes, and stands off to the side, developing some particularly niche kinks.
The times, he’s learned, when it’s most critical to keep the Doctor calm, is when their work drags them out of town. Hotel rooms are difficult enough as it is, seeing as Stone has to ensure that Robotnik ends up with an interior room, and beyond that, that the room gets cleaned during the times that Robotnik isn’t sleeping or working, which is generally outside of the realm of human work hours. Robotnik also doesn’t have the luxury of sticking to his typical sleep schedule, either, with meetings booked back to back during the mornings and afternoons, which means more feedings and more agitation that could have been avoided if the higher-ups just stuck to the Doctor’s preferred schedule the first time Stone sent it to them. Windowless travel is a hassle, sneaking meals in the middle of the day is a hassle, and ultimately, all of the factors that make this ordeal a mess, if they aren’t attended to, lead to so much more bloodshed than Stone knows how to cover up.
Stone, however, is good at his job. They haven’t had an incident like that since week one, thanks to Stone’s mitigation strategies. His favorite (and, he suspects, the Doctor’s favorite) involves a conference room all to themselves so they can get two minutes of privacy; sure, he likes knowing the Doctor is well taken care of and all, but the Doctor eats either way. No one checks what he drinks out of those thermoses. Still, this allows them to disappear for a while, have a sidebar to themselves, and bitch.
And god, the Doctor has given him such a penchant for gossip over the years. It’s getting to be a problem.
“You have no idea how sickening it is, Stone,” Robotnik hisses as the latest in a long line of conference room doors clicks shut behind them, Stone hot on his heels, “knowing that I could eviscerate anyone in that room, and they’d still be more valuable to me like that than they would be alive.”
Yes, he does. Robotnik has expressed the sentiment before, dozens of times, and yet Stone still nods along with him like it’s the very first. “It really is insulting.”
Robotnik barks out a laugh, shrugging his coat off as he slumps down into a chair and spins around in it once, idly, as he speaks. “Insulting doesn’t even begin to sum it up. Here I am, drinking the premade shit, and yet they’ve got perfectly good blood right there? They’re soiling it.” As he makes his way back around again, something on the Doctor’s face changes, and Stone swears he sees a glimmer of a smile pulling at his lips. Robotnik sighs, pillowing his cheek on a fist. “Did you see the carotid on the captain?”
At the idea of Robotnik wanting something, of fantasizing about it, Stone’s heart kicks in his chest. He did notice. He scoped the guy out for him, actually, and he considered dragging him here so that the Doctor would get his fill. “Is it sick if I say I did?”
“It means you’re paying attention to the right things. You have your priorities in the right place, you sick fuck,” Robotnik replies. Despite himself, that grin splits into a smile, and Stone nearly rushes out of the room to try and find a way to get him what he craves. He could, probably. How hard could it be? Instead, though, he just stands there, watching Robotnik resign himself to another meal spent with his teeth jammed through plastic. “The things I would do for something with a beating heart right now.”
“I’m sorry,” Stone says. He means it, too, but Robotnik’s smile falters right after he so foolishly admits defeat, and Stone wishes he could take it back. In the brutal absence of a time machine, he clears his throat and puts his eyes to the floor, hurrying to explain himself. “I want to. I really do, but the brass doesn’t seem to get your whole- uh. Affliction. I don’t want to turn heads.”
Robotnik snorts, waving a dismissive hand. “Fuck them. What are they going to do, kill me?”
“Yes, sir. Typically that’s how these things go in film, at least.”
“Ugh.” Robotnik’s eyes roll so far back into his head that Stone swears they spin all the way around and come back up from the bottom, giving him just enough time to suppress a grin. “Buzzkill. Shouldn’t I find some way to make these retreats tolerable?”
Stone considers himself a fixer. ‘Sycophant’ isn’t really the right word, no matter how fond Robotnik is of it; he wants to be here, helping Robotnik, because the man downright fascinates him, and Stone would do anything in his power to see him thrive. When the blood supply gets low and the situation grows a little more grim, Stone has this thought, a persistent red light blinking in the back of his head that reminds him that there’s always one other option, one that he’d never voice to Robotnik out of the fear that he might not take it as well as Stone means it, but Stone can’t help himself. He doesn’t even feel himself start to say it. His mouth just sort of- falls open. “Well, you could always-“
Stone slaps a hand over his mouth to keep himself from finishing that thought. He hopes he’ll be able to brush it off, but when he looks up again, Robotnik has stopped any and all motion, staring up at him with one eyebrow raised and a look that says ‘what are you keeping from me? What do you know that I don’t?’. “Always what, Agent?”
Fuck. Him and his stupid, persistent urge to mend things that don’t need fixing. Stone’s face flushes under Robotnik’s gaze, and he has to tear his eyes away to remember how to string sentences together. “Always, uh- well.” He swallows hard. If he doesn’t say it willingly, Robotnik will force it out of him. “You could bite me, sir.”
Silence.
“I have plenty of blood,” Stone adds, as though that makes this situation any less tense. Confused as all hell, his body gets a few wires crossed somewhere next to his fast-beating heart, breaking into a sweat as a chill runs down his spine. Hot, cold. Pleasure, fear. “I’m willing to share.”
“Look at me.” The Doctor keeps his voice so calm and so even that Stone doesn’t even register it as an order at first, just a string of words that makes his shoulders tense up and his spine go rigid. He can’t move. He can’t bring himself to look over. Lucky for him, Robotnik isn’t exactly known for his patience. Out of the corner of his eye, Stone watches as his lip curls into a snarl, fangs slipping just into view, and before Robotnik even says a word, Stone knows he’s fucked. “I said look!”
A familiar feeling washes over Stone. A compulsion. A need to serve, to follow that command at the expense of his life if he has to.
They’ve played this game before, after all. It’s one of Robotnik’s favorites. If Stone is across the room and Robotnik can't be bothered to cross it, all he has to do is say the word, and Stone will pin himself to the wall or slap himself across the face at full force, no questions asked. Sure, he would do that anyway, but at times like these, he can’t stop, even if he wanted to. That vampiric glamour does a damn good job of reminding him who’s boss.
The command, as far as Stone knows, is “look”, but that’s not what he does. He still hasn’t quite figured out where this particular power comes from or how it works, just that, upon being issued one, his body moves on its own, following any implicit commands (or even just what the Doctor has in mind, as interpreted by what Stone subconsciously thinks will best serve him) to the letter. This one is no different; he lurches forward, left foot first, his chest following, and his head and arms dangling awkwardly behind him as they try to catch up, looking every bit like a marionette with its strings cut. His footfalls are heavy, one after the other until he makes it to Robotnik’s chair, where he collapses to the ground at his feet. He can’t even wince in pain when his knees hit the floor, undoubtedly stoking a fresh pair of bruises; it’s outside of the realm of the command. Instead, he sits back on his heels, folds his arms behind his back, and keeps his head down, his spine perfectly straight otherwise. Once he gets into position, the glamour cedes. Blood flow resumes as normal in his limbs, and he knows that, if he so pleased, he could move again.
No, he didn’t look. Not technically.
If he knows anything about the Doctor, then this is better. After such an egregious error, this position will make it a hell of a lot easier for Robotnik to fuck him up to his liking.
Robotnik sits back in his chair, lording over him like the god he knows he is. He has one ankle propped up on the opposite knee, a hand over his mouth in stern contemplation, and Stone does his best not to rob him of the right to kill him by dying of suspense first. “Stone.”
Oh, god. Okay. This is bad. To anyone else, that tone of voice might sound relaxed or ambivalent, maybe even conversational, but Stone can recognize the calm before the storm. All he wanted to do was help, but he jumped the gun, and now he’s the latest failure in Robotnik’s employ. Stone isn’t exactly one to cry, but if any emotion can get him there, it’s shame. “Yes, Doctor.”
“You know what I’m about to say to you.” Fuck. Stone squeezes his eyes shut, letting out a sharp breath, and Robotnik continues on as though he hasn’t noticed, all sharp, sweet condescension.. “I suspect you’ve seen this coming for a good, long while.”
“I- I can’t say I-“ Stone chokes on those words, trying to get them to mean anything, but he stops himself. He knows better than to lie. There’s a reason he hasn’t offered before, but in those bouts of late-night risk analysis, he always expected Robotnik to just laugh at him and then kill him. He never thought he’d get this comprehensive of a humiliation game before the end, but- but that’s stupid, right? He should have. He knows Robotnik better than anyone. “Yes, Doctor. I’m sorry. That was too forward of me.”
With a soft tch of annoyance, Robotnik’s posture shifts. He slouches forward, planting his feet on either side of Stone’s legs, his elbows on his own knees. He threads a hand into Stone’s hair, short as it is, and drags his head back in one sharp motion. Stone blinks his eyes open again, adjusting to the light and the fluorescent halo around Robotnik’s figure, but when Robotnik starts to speak again, Stone still can’t make out the look on his face. “You waltz around my lab, day in and day out, and I can smell your goddamn pulse. Do you know how obnoxious that is, Stone? You holding out a thermos with a smile on your face while there’s a perfectly viable candidate to stick my fangs into, standing right in front of me?”
Stone can see him again, finally. The malice in his eyes. The hunger. His chest aches. “I can’t imagine what I’ve been putting you through. Just by virtue of my existence, too.”
“That’s right. You can’t.” With that, Robotnik’s hand slips a little lower, the leather of his glove dragging down Stone’s face. He tips his chin up a little higher, putting him in a position more to his liking, then slides lower, and- oh. He was making room to wrap his hand around Stone’s throat. He sneers down at him, applying no pressure, but Stone still struggles to draw breath all the same. “You have no earthly clue what it’s like to have somebody hand you a Milkbone while they’re dangling a filet right in front of you. Which one would you rather have, Stone?”
Stone gives the knee-jerk, “oh my god is that seriously how you think I perceive you” response. “I’ve never thought of you as a dog.”
“That’s not the point.”
Right. They're having a conversation here. Stone grimaces, trying to find the right way to phrase it, and when that doesn’t work, he does that on instinct, too. “I’m just saying, if it meant you got to eat in a way that made you happy, I’d gladly take the dog treat. I’d give you everything I am, if I had to. My body hasn’t belonged to me in so long, I just-“
Robotnik’s thumb traces across his jugular, and Stone stops dead. He forgets to breathe. He forgets how to breathe.
“You ‘just’?” Robotnik mocks, snapping him out of his daze enough to pay attention to the task at hand. “You’re not supposed to tease an animal. They may bite. I thought you’d know better.”
Stone’s voice comes out barely higher than a murmur. “I do.”
Robotnik lets out a contemplative hum, pressing against the vein with a barely-there pressure that makes Stone want to squirm for reasons he only kind of understands. “So you meant it, then?”
If Robotnik so willed it, Stone could die right here, right now, knelt at his feet, and it would be to his benefit. All he would have to do is slide his hand up into Stone’s hair again, yanking his head to the side enough to allow access to the vein he’s toying with already, and Stone wouldn’t be able to fight him off, neither physically nor emotionally. In all likelihood, that’s what he’s building to. He always had a flare for the dramatic. It’s half the reason Stone is so madly, deeply in love with him that some nights, alone in his room, it makes him sick with affection. He meets Robotnik’s eyes, and says, with every ounce of conviction in his body, “Yes, Doctor. Without a doubt.”
Yes, he’s going to die here, but fuck, at least Robotnik of all men will be the one to kill him. Stone can’t imagine a better way to go.
Robotnik doesn’t kill him, though. Not right away. He scans his face over for a second, hunting for even so much as an ounce of non-existent dishonesty, and when he finds none, he lets go of Stone’s neck, sliding his fingers down into his shirt instead and yanking him forward. “Here’s what’s going to happen,” he says, matter-of-fact, and Stone’s brain immediately clicks over to “instructions from the Doctor” mode. “You are going to go upstairs, to my room, and clean up. Whatever you need to do. Don’t bother with any cologne or anything, I want to be able to smell you. You are going to put on a nice, tight shirt, rolled up to the middle of your biceps, and whatever else you’d wear on a normal day. Keep the tie, lose the jacket.”
Okay, so “instructions from the Doctor” mode short-circuited at “to my room” and came back online—sort of—upon hearing Robotnik say the word “tight” with that sort of emphasis. Stone’s eyes go wide. “Sir?”
Robotnik continues without acknowledging him. “Then, you’re going to kneel on the bed and wait for me to come to you. Don’t bother calling. I’ll find you when I’m ready.” He pauses. His gaze flits back down to Stone, one eyebrow raised. “You haven’t eaten garlic recently, have you?”
“I completely cut it out of my diet when I met you.” Which sucked, but Stone lives in hope.
In an instant, all that hard work, and the corporal punishment, and the murder, and this confession are all worth it: Robotnik’s face splits into a fangy grin, the very tips of his canines flashing in the light. His hand slinks out of Stone’s shirt, and he pats him on the cheek, knocking him right out of his stupor. “Good dog. You have your orders.” He flicks his wrist in the direction of the door. “Go.”
By no means does Stone have to be told twice.
It takes him a bit to get inside. Sure, he takes the stairs to avoid waiting for the elevator, since standing still sounds like a special sort of hell right about now, and he makes it up to the room in record time, but he fumbles with the key for a solid thirty seconds, fucks up scanning it a few times, gets in, and remembers he probably needs new clothes if he’s going to “clean up” or whatever the hell the Doctor told him to do. He gets new clothes from his room, fumbles with the other room key again, and has to pace around once he gets inside for a few minutes so he can stop feeling quite so antsy. He has his orders. He made peace with probably dying at Robotnik’s hands a while ago. Been there. Done that. Accidentally turned it into a sex thing.
But this is different. The Doctor isn’t stupid. He always punishes Stone in ways that intend to hurt him, or humiliate him, or something of the like, but this?
Why does it sound like he wants Stone to enjoy this?
When would a man like that ever feel obligated to make somebody’s death pleasant?
Stone shakes that off. Orders. Right. He needs a shower.
He still hasn’t heard the door open by the time he gets out, nor after he gets done blow-drying and resetting his hair in the right position. He puts his clothes on as he normally would, retying his tie three different times to make sure it’s absolutely perfect, and even then, nothing. He gets the sleeves of his shirt rolled up so tight that his fingers tingle a little bit. He slips out of the room, bracing himself for a set of teeth in the side of his neck, but-
Robotnik still isn’t there.
Damn. An ambush might have been fun.
Taking a shaky breath, Stone makes his way over to the edge of the bed, then pauses. As an afterthought, he toes his shoes off, then climbs onto the bed, on his knees, as instructed. He can’t figure out what to do with his hands for a moment, seeing as he has no idea when Robotnik will actually grace him with his presence, so he ends up folding them in his lap for the time being. If that hides the way he’s damn near tenting his pants, then so be it.
Stone forces himself to breathe. Tries to will his heart to return to its normal rate of speed. Shuts his eyes and fights in vain to translate arousal back into fear so Robotnik doesn’t try to take this away from him.
Fuck. What is wrong with him? He shouldn’t be as into this idea as he is. It’s nothing special. It’s just the way Robotnik eats. It’s normal. It’s something he’s seen several times, and something he learned to accept as part of his daily routine years ago.
He’s still arguing with himself when the door clicks open.
Stone’s eyes flutter open at the sound, even though he keeps them glued to the wall in front of him instead of the door. He can see Robotnik shifting around out of the corner of his eye, leaning up against the doorframe with his arms over his chest. “Huh,” he says, almost impressed. Stone sits up a little straighter. Holds his chin a little higher. “And here I thought you would have run away with your tail between your legs.”
Stone raises an eyebrow, trying to keep his tone as formal as possible. That’s still his boss, after all. “You gave me time to pack so I could run away?”
Robotnik scoffs. “No. Of course not.” At that, he turns, shrugging his coat off and folding it in the same neat, meticulous way Stone has seen him do so dozens of times. “If you had, that would have been a head start. I would have caught up to you and killed you.”
He says it like it’s a fact, not something he would have had to work for. Stone swallows. “Do you not intend to kill me now?”
Midway through setting his coat on the chair by the door, Robotnik pauses, glancing over at him. “Do you really want to know?”
Stone opens his mouth to reply. To agree.
Then closes it.
“Oh, you kinky little fuck,” Robotnik hisses after a few long moments, far more delighted than Stone could have ever expected from him. He straightens up, and even though they only have a few inches of a height difference between them, with that smile on his face, Robotnik lords over him like a god. “That’s what I like about you, Stone. You take your beatings and you ask for seconds.”
That’s a recent pattern of behavior, actually. It hasn’t come up before, seeing as Robotnik grows agitated every time Stone mentions any previous employers (in a way that, to Stone’s miserable, lovesick heart, almost looks like jealousy), so Stone hasn’t told him that he used to be a bit more… creative, when it came to orders. “I live to please, sir.”
“Of course you do.” A beat. Robotnik points at his torso and gestures vaguely with his hand. “Is that why you buttoned your shirt all the way up to your neck?”
Oh, shit. They haven’t even started, and Stone has already fucked up. “I- uh,” he stammers, raising a hand before thinking better of it for several reasons and dropping it right back into his lap as he tries to explain himself. “I assumed, with what you said, you’d be going for my arm instead, so I thought I’d-“
“I changed my mind. Lose the tie.” With that interruption, all the joy suddenly gone, Stone rushes to comply, fingers working the knot out with practiced ease until- “Wait. Pause.”
Stone pauses. Removes his hand from his tie again.
Watches as Robotnik crosses the room in a few long, even strides, then grabs him by the tie and yanks. Instinctively, Stone gets up off of his heels, but then Robotnik pulls him again, and Stone has to catch himself on his hands to keep from falling off the bed. He thinks about asking what they’re doing here, what the rules to this game actually are, but then he catches a certain sort of gleam in Robotnik’s eye and just- goes for it.
He arches his back a bit, leaning into the pull, and meets Robotnik’s gaze, eyes wide, his voice low. “Is there something else you’d like me to do for you, sir?”
It pays off. Robotnik’s eyes flash with something heated, and in the pit of Stone’s stomach, he burns just as hot.
Regardless, Robotnik lets go of him with a pleased hum, taking a step back. “Perfect. Take it off.” A beat. “Lose the top few buttons, too, or I’ll lose them for you.”
Stone rushes to comply, pulling his tie right off and tossing it aside before he fumbles with the buttons of his shirt, hands shaking all the while. A thought occurs to him, and although he would hate to spoil this perfect, perfect thing, he thinks that maybe, just maybe, this should be voiced for later records, and at least if he does it now, he doesn’t have to look Robotnik in the eyes as he does it. “I feel like I should—y’know, with how this all came together—clarify that you don’t have to-”
“Shut up,” Robotnik snaps. Stone shuts up. Robotnik watches him undo the first four buttons, his shirt open to the center of his breastbone, before he interrupts him. “Arm, Agent.”
Stone takes his hand off of his collar and sticks his arm out, wrist up. “Yes, sir.”
Across from him, Robotnik climbs onto the bed, sliding closer to him than Stone is strictly used to without pain immediately following. Gingerly, with a tenderness Stone is even less used to, he takes Stone by the arm, thumb poised over his pulse point. He frowns, if only barely, then, with a grunt, tugs Stone a little closer to him, leans in, and just- sits. And listens. And breathes. He might be getting the scent, but Stone, tense as he is, can’t really tell.
He’s had this theory for a while now that the Doctor can smell fear, sort of like a bear. He always seems to know when he’s getting under someone’s skin, but he never reacts when someone seems uncomfortable, so Stone assumes that he either isn’t particularly adept with reading body language, willfully or otherwise. Either way, if he’s right, he hopes that sense doesn’t extend towards disappointment, too; he doesn’t need to know how badly Stone wants him to slide up further, to a more vital pulse point, to somewhere that’ll sting a hell of a lot more. He did have him unbutton his shirt, after all. Robotnik would be cruel enough to get Stone’s hopes up, only to not give him what he wants. It’s one of the things Stone loves about him, usually.
“Nervous?” Robotnik asks, jarring Stone out of his thoughts. Stone blinks, and when his eyes focus again, Robotnik’s chin is damn near resting on his forearm.
Stone’s free hand tightens on his thigh. Why the hell is he being amicable? Polite, even? He knows he has Stone on the ropes here, hunted like a prey animal, so why not take advantage of that? Of course he’s nervous. That’s what Robotnik wants, and Stone is nothing if not eager to serve. “Why do you ask?”
“Your heart rate is elevated.”
“Oh.” Stone swallows. So Robotnik is keeping tabs on his vitals these days. He’ll have to ask about that later, assuming he makes it out of this room with his life. “Uh. That’s not why, sir.”
“So you are getting off on this,” Robotnik muses to himself, like he’s talking about a specimen he has pinned down in a shadow box in his lab, making Stone’s face flush. In all honesty, this entire setup is nothing like the dozens in Stone’s library of fantasies, but this one makes him feel so bone-deep desperate that he feels like an idiot for not having come up with it. Robotnik turns his head, pressing his cheek against his inner forearm while he keeps a gentle yet commanding hold on Stone’s wrist. Their eyes meet, and in an instant, the problem gets ten times worse. He’s sure Robotnik hears the way his heart kicks up into a much higher gear. “What’s your blood type, Stone?”
Stone once again finds himself a little too lightheaded to be anything but honest. “I- I don’t know.”
“You don’t know?” he echoes. Stone shakes his head, and with a look of disbelief, Robotnik shifts his head to look up at him again, his chin actually resting on Stone’s forearm this time. “Isn’t that information listed on your dog tags, soldier? Shouldn’t you have been told that years ago?”
“I was. I mean- they did. They just got it wrong.” Robotnik just hums in response, staring at him. He doesn’t ask for Stone to continue, but Stone does all the same, knowing that, if Robotnik wants him to stop, he’ll find a way to shut him up. “When they pulled me from active duty because of an injury, I woke up in the hospital, and they told me they’d accidentally mixed up my type with somebody else’s during enlistment and had given me the wrong transfusion. They never told me what the right one was once they fixed it.”
“Of course they didn’t.” Robotnik nods along, playing like he’s doing their usual back-and-forth scrutiny of the higher-ups, but his gaze trails down to Stone’s arm again. Behind his lips, he runs his tongue along a fang. “Do you take care of yourself as well as you take care of me? Specialized meals, proper hydration, the works?”
He thinks I’m doing a good job, a tiny part of Stone’s brain chimes in. Damn. If the blood loss doesn’t kill him, all the “dirty talk” will. “Yes. I do.”
“All of your bloodwork in the past has come back normal?”
“Exceptionally.” Robotnik hums again, falling silent. Stone manages to hold back for a few seconds before the suspense gets to him. “Permission to speak?”
“Granted.”
“Why are you taking this so slow?” Robotnik doesn’t respond right away. He gives Stone a chance to get it all out, and Stone… takes it. It’ll get him a reaction. He’s always been so fond of the Doctor’s reactions, and the Doctor, in kind, is always thrilled to watch Stone sweat. “I can’t remember the last time I watched you eat someone live. Usually, when I bring you a corpse, you go for the throat, so I don’t understand why I’m any different.”
At that, Robotnik smiles, but it isn’t kind. With him, it so seldom is, but Stone knows this smile better; it’s the one that says “you poor, stupid son of a bitch”, the one he used in every single meeting they’ve been in today. “Because, Stone,” he says, voice dripping with condescension and something far more venomous, “I want to savor this one.”
Stone was right. Watching from a distance, those fangs sink in without much force at all. All Robotnik has to do is line the tip of one up with his vein and lower it, and it splits the skin apart like it belongs there. It barely even hurts.
An involuntary sound slips from Stone’s throat. He realizes that he’s still maintaining eye contact with him, and while Stone makes no effort to pull his hand away, Robotnik squeezes his wrist a little harder as he pulls off of him. Blood wells up in the puncture wound, and he holds Stone’s gaze as he laves his tongue up the crook of his elbow with an obscene sort of melodrama that leaves Stone breathless.
Something about this to him is special. He wants to savor it, like he said, but he wouldn’t be showing off if he didn’t have an audience. The Doctor is quick. He’s efficient.
It’s almost like he wants Stone to savor this moment, too.
“That whimper was cute,” Robotnik comments idly, dragging Stone back to reality before plunging him right back into the deep end of being head-over-heels for him. It isn’t full-on criticism—Stone knows what that sounds like, easy—but there’s still a bit of teasing behind it. “Afraid of needles, Stone?”
Stone lets out a sharp, strained laugh, more out of anxiety than anything, but he is the furthest thing from afraid of needles. The Doctor doesn’t know that, of course, not unless he’s been spying on Stone during his medical appointments lately, but at the most recent one, Stone passed out during a blood draw. Prior to that day, he’d never done so before, and frankly, he takes pain better than anyone he knows, but he was still half-thinking about the way Robotnik had cornered him in the lab that day to give him hell for accidentally picking up someone with anemia, blood still dripping from the corners of his mouth, and that memory in combination with the sudden, unexpected prick of the needle crossed some wires. He went from fine to rock hard in two seconds flat, and the swirl of the faint pain, arousal, and rapid blood loss coalesced in a perfect storm of overwhelm. Next thing he knew, he was lying on the floor of the clinic with a very oblivious, very well-meaning nurse asking him questions about his family and if they had a history of hypoglycemia.
Stone swore to himself that he’d never let Robotnik know about that, though. Instead, he gives Robotnik the same answer he gave that nurse, the one that begs the asker not to pry further or look down, and it comes out just as broken as it did last time. “Not… exactly?”
“I’ll bet,” Robotnik replies, nodding along with no small amount of condescension, and- oh, fuck, he totally knows. He just continues, though, watching Stone’s face flush as he switches back to the delivery of dry facts and observations. “Your blood type is AB-negative. Your bloodwork should continue to come back normal. Whatever you’re eating, keep eating it. You have a very, very strong heart.” Stone is still reeling with the note that he’s Robotnik’s preferred type, feeling oddly like he’s done something good just by existing, when another drop of blood wells up in the crook of his arm. A grin pulls at Robotnik’s lips as he glances down at him, then back at Stone, one eyebrow raised. “As evidenced by.”
Yeah, obviously. His heartbeat is practically the only thing he can hear right now, thrumming away in his ears as he forces himself to process everything that was just said to him. Once it all registers, Stone realizes the implications of it. They’re orders, not just facts. “So you do intend to let me live.”
“Stone, you’re such a convenience that killing you would be the dumbest mistake I’ve ever made,” Robotnik scoffs, like Stone is somehow, inexplicably, supposed to have gleaned that from the years they’ve spent together. It isn’t a given. Still, it makes Stone glow with pride, only for that to immediately be overshadowed by the blazing inferno that comes with watching Robotnik lick away that drop of blood, drop his head onto Stone’s inner wrist, and sigh in pure bliss, his nails digging into his wrist through the gloves. “Just because I want a taste doesn’t mean I’m letting you escape that easily.”
Really, Stone will never be free of him. Even when Robotnik sits up and releases his wrist, giving him all the space in the world to run, Stone holds his arm out for another few seconds, too dumbfounded to move. He’s never not thinking about him, and he’s not all that sure how he lived before this, but it’s hard to find enough room in his brain to turn all those vague, cloudy feelings into words when there’s suddenly a big, blinking sign that reads “THE DOCTOR WANTS ME HERE” taking up all the space. “Oh,” he says instead. It takes him another moment to be well and truly embarrassed by that, knowing he’ll probably spend the entire car ride home thinking about it and trying not to explode, and he responds a little more appropriately. “O-Oh. Uhm. Thank you, Doctor.”
Robotnik doesn’t acknowledge that. “Just know,” he continues, peeling his gloves off with the same care and precision he always uses, “I’m not guaranteeing your safety. When I bite your neck, you’re going to need to hold very, very still for me. If you thrash, I’ll think you’re trying to fight me, and there’s a nasty part of me that may rip your throat out and eat you alive.”
Stone chokes, and the room goes a little fuzzy for a second the moment Robotnik mentions biting him again. “Oh,” he echoes, but in his efforts to make it sound a little less like a gasp, it almost comes out as a moan. He doesn’t really have the brainpower to beat himself up over it, seeing as he’s getting exactly what he wants, and all he has to do is wait for Robotnik to give it to him.
Robotnik glances up from one of his gloves at the sound, folding it and setting the pair on the nightstand. He’s mentioned before that he hates touching people, that he hates the pliancy of flesh and how any amount of warmth just makes him hungry, but he never wears the gloves while feeding, hating the way the blood gunks up the buttons even more. He rolls his eyes when he sees Stone’s face, sighing. “You could at least try not to look so whipped.”
Well, he could, but where’s the fun in that? Either way, Stone snaps to attention with the realization that yeah, maybe he is enjoying himself a little too much, but he rearranges himself into the position Robotnik ordered him into earlier, back straight, fists balled tightly in his lap. His knees are starting to ache, folded up like that for so long, but he wouldn’t dare complain. It occurs to him, briefly, that he looks even more subservient now, but Robotnik looks pleased, so he figures that plausible deniability is the wine that pairs best with a meal of an eager servant. “This is just what needs to happen. I’m just doing my job.”
Robotnik snorts as he settles in front of him again, up on his knees. “You keep telling yourself that,” he mutters under his breath. He gives Stone no time to argue, cold hands sliding up to rest on his cheeks, and as he stares down at him, not looking him in the eyes, Stone sits, transfixed, helpless to do anything but follow the light twitches of his hands. “Tilt your head to the- no. Other direction. Perfect. Don’t move.”
He leaves him there like that, staring up with reverence to some god and his throat bared, and Stone thinks, for a moment, that Robotnik isn’t going to touch him again, only for his hands to land elsewhere. One slips into the short hair around the back of his head, coiling past the guarded part of his neck to get there, and the other hands on his opposite shoulder. Both hold him tight, like Stone would dare to disobey a direct order. Robotnik settles into the empty space against Stone’s throat, and finally, at the feeling of cold breath on his skin, Stone feels himself start to relax into it. His eyes close. He waits for the pain he’s been craving for so long.
He doesn’t get it. Not right away.
Instead, Robotnik takes a last-second opportunity to play with his food.
“No matter what you do,” he murmurs, almost contemplative, “I may still decide that I haven’t gotten my fill. I may go back on my word and kill you, just because I like the way you taste. You know me. You know I would. Does that scare you, Stone?”
Stone lets out a breath, and while he starts to shake his head, he remembers that he was told not to move the second Robotnik’s fingers tighten in his hair. “No, sir.”
“And why not?” he asks, as though he doesn’t already know.
Stone answers either way. “I already told you. I’d die for you if it meant you got what you wanted.”
Against his neck, Robotnik smirks. It may not be the traditional sort of appetizer, all the foreplay and whatnot, but he’s satisfied either way, snapping right back to instructions and leaving Stone’s head spinning. “Hold still. Stay loose. I’ll handle the rest. You’re not getting a countdown, so just know that this might sting a little bit.”
With that, he rears back, and Stone, in his absence, tells himself not to tense up in anticipation. Not to panic. He dares to catch a glimpse before it happens, and in that perfect moment, all he needs is a single glint off of those brilliant, gleaming fangs for his body to instinctively relax into Robotnik’s grasp, giving himself over in his entirety, open and vulnerable and-
The fangs sink home in his carotid.
Stone chokes, his eyes flying open, and he does his absolute best to stay still, but he can’t help himself. His hands come up, hovering at the height of his elbows, but he remembers himself before he fucks up even further, holding them right there. The Doctor was wrong; it stings a hell of a lot more than “a little bit”. Pain blossoms out from the wounds now that they’re there, a sharp heat scalding two clean lines into his veins, and if Robotnik hadn’t explained to him dozens of times (without being asked) that vampires aren’t venomous, Stone would almost think that he’s injecting something into him, electrifying him from the inside out. It’s more sensitive than he realized in his fantasies, that expanse of skin on the side of his neck, but he can’t exactly conjure up the pain in a daydream. It hurts, and he’s gasping for air, clawing desperately at what little space Robotnik has left between the two of them, and he could never have imagined how good the real deal would be. It takes everything he has to behave, to refrain from grabbing onto Robotnik when all he wants to do is pull him in and let him get his fill. “Doctor-”
Robotnik pulls his fangs out of his throat, and without pause, he licks a stripe up Stone’s neck, catching the first spurts of blood from the wound before they get a chance to drip. Stone falls against him, panting, making sure to splay his arms out on either side of him in a last-ditch effort to keep himself upright without grabbing what he’s not allowed to. Without a word, Robotnik drags Stone a little closer, chest-to-chest now, and Stone sinks into him with a soft sound. That gets a reaction out of him, one purred against his throat. “Aww, don’t whine. That wasn’t so bad, was it?”
“No,” Stone breathes instinctively, and he starts to shake his head, but Robotnik snarls, nipping at his skin again, and Stone freezes where he is. “Sorry, Doctor, I didn’t mean to.”
“I’d think not, no.” Robotnik runs his tongue over the bite mark again, and this time, on the upswing, he dips the tip of his tongue into one of them. Stone jolts, his hands balling up into fists as he squeezes his eyes shut, and Robotnik chuckles. “Well, either way, there’s no backing out now. You’ve already got a pretty set of holes in your neck.”
“Please, god, could you just-”
Robotnik cuts him off there. “Trust me, I’m getting to it.”
Then, he boosts himself up a little further onto his knees, puts his mouth over the wound, and drinks like a man starved.
The benefit of the fine points of a vampire’s fangs, Stone realizes as Robotnik feeds on him, is the relatively thin holes they leave in their wake. They’re deep, sure, but the blood doesn’t have a lot of surface area to escape through. Their sharpness ensures that the skin doesn’t tear further when faced with pressure, but since they don’t get any bigger, they also don’t increase blood flow over time. It takes longer to bleed out than it would typically, even if said vampire is incredibly impatient and can’t wait for it to come out on its own. Before this, Stone never really understood the appeal of hickeys, especially not visible ones, but the pressure from the Doctor’s mouth makes him a believer in two seconds flat, his vision blurring out and all rational thought jumping ship. He knows Robotnik doesn’t like to be touched, knows this shouldn’t be anything but perfunctory and professional, but he lets out a soft groan at the feeling, and he has to grab onto something. He settles for the Doctor’s shirt, just below his chest, balling up the material in his hands and trying his best not to whine. Robotnik pauses for a second, and Stone starts to apologize in a desperate effort to keep this going, but then the hand on Stone’s shoulder slinks down between them, pulling Stone’s hands from his shirt. He replaces the closer one on his waist, then nudges the other one to do the same. Stone clings to him gratefully, and-
And it occurs to him that, beneath his thumbs, the thin layer of fabric separating flesh from flesh, there is a soft, pliant layer of fat. He hadn’t noticed the gradual change until he finally got his hands on him, but when they first met, Robotnik was little more than skin and bones. He complained of inadequate food sources before Stone showed up, of poorly-selected prey that he didn’t want to eat in the first place, and of little time to hunt for himself, but there’s physical proof that Stone not only keeps him alive—Stone keeps him well fed. Better than he would have fed himself, even.
Maybe Robotnik didn’t think about it when he put Stone’s hands on his waist. It’s a lie Stone can tell himself later, once this is all over and he’s laying in a heap in his hotel bed, but for now, Stone tells himself that the Doctor only ever does things on purpose. He hisses out a curse under his breath, his eyes fluttering back into his head, and he swears he can hear Robotnik let out a pleased hum as he takes his hand out of his hair and brings it down to cradle Stone’s cheek instead, redoubling his efforts on his throat.
Oh, fuck. Okay. No. The blood capacity of his body isn’t going to be what ends this. That is, as is the fire it lights in him embarrassingly early.
“Doc,” Stone pants, almost pleading as he trembles from the exertion to stay upright. “Doctor, I’m- I might-”
“Oh?” Robotnik interrupts him there, coy, and as he deprives Stone of that pressure again, Stone nearly sobs, slumping forward into him. “A little more scary than you thought when you’re on the wrong side of the fangs, huh? What, are you calling mercy already?”
Stone’s entire back goes rigid. “No!”
“No?” Robotnik echoes, almost a little incredulous. Like he intended for this to be something of a lesson in getting too greedy. He would do something like that, giving Stone exactly what he wants with sweet, cloying touches, only to turn it into a punishment at the very last second where only one of them benefits. It’s a cruel practical joke he likes to play from time to time.
The joke is on him, though; Stone can’t imagine a single way this could go wrong. There’s no dissuading him, not when all he needs is a little more pressure, a little more contact, just one more taste of that thrill, and-
Stone bites down on his lip so hard that, if he had any more left to give, he’s sure it would have drawn blood. He presses against Robotnik a bit more insistently, trying in vain to bare his neck a little further. “Please, god, don’t stop!”
“Oh?”
For once, that’s not Robotnik’s cue to pull away. When he’s enjoying himself as much as he is, Stone knows he would never. Instead, he indulges him, putting his lips to his throat again, drinking him down and clinging onto him like Stone would ever dare to try and escape. Stone doesn’t bother holding back the moan that slips out in response, a little too far gone for it to matter to him anymore, and that pressure mounts with each passing second of suction, dragging him further and further below Robotnik’s influence and monopolizing all of his attention. It burns him from the inside out, a cold mouth made scalding by his blood, and by the time that the heat builds in his gut and it finally occurs to him that they never discussed this next part-
Stone cums in his pants, untouched, and he swears the Doctor managed to get a little piece of his soul in there with all of that blood.
Oh, yeah. He’s gonna regret that one tomorrow.
He doesn’t black out this time, at least. It may be humiliating, getting off from little more than a bite wound and some stabilizing contact, but he’s spared the embarrassment of falling fully unconscious. He isn’t exactly responsive, though, when Robotnik lets him fall back on his heels again, allowing him to slide down his body in a pile of ooze as he lets out a high, keening sound. He holds him up the whole way down, at least, before settling down in front of him, shamelessly licking the remaining blood from his lips as he looks Stone over. His fangs are stained red, he notices, and while Stone’s first thought upon seeing two of him should be something like “maybe I lost more blood than I thought”, his actual first thought is “oh good, one for each side”. “Fascinating,” Robotnit remarks once he sees the growing wet spot in the front of Stone’s pants, and goddamn, does he look like he means it. Stone allows himself a hazy grin (or rather, can’t hold one back). Robotnik’s eyes flit up to him, and he grins right back, all condescension. “And a little disgusting. I thought you’d know to conduct yourself with a little more decorum in front of me by now.”
Stone should probably apologize. He knows that. He does not, however, know that he’s kind of swaying, struggling to stay upright, until Robotnik reaches out and grabs him by the shoulders to stabilize him. Similarly, all he manages to say is something like “ngh?”, so he’s 0/2.
“Did I break you already?” He’s mostly asking himself, but he reaches two fingers towards Stone’s throat, and Stone shakes his head as vigorously as he can anyway. Robotnik seizes him by the jaw with his other hand, then prods at the holes. “I didn’t puncture anything too vital, did I?”
Not unless he’s counting Stone’s dignity, he didn’t. Stone finally manages to get himself together enough to string words together, even if he can’t really breathe or keep his words from slurring together. Still, he’s a well-trained dog. He knows when to speak and heel and roll over, and he knows, sort of, how Robotnik wants him to reply. “No, sir, that was just-” Stone stops for a moment, thinking it over, and when he can’t find a formal way to answer, he just lets out a dazed laugh and says the more candid version, “-probably the best orgasm I’ve ever had.”
“For ‘the best orgasm you’ve ever had’,” Robotnik drops his voice to a poor mockery of Stone’s, then snaps right back up to normal, “you don’t sound especially grateful for it.”
Oh! Stone knows that one! He lists forward, catching himself on one hand and reaching for the zipper of Robotnik’s pants, but right before he makes contact with it-
Robotnik takes him by the hand, tsking at him and shaking his head like a chiding parent. He releases it after a moment, letting Stone take it back. “Try again.”
Well, shit. Maybe he doesn’t know that one. Then again, if he managed to get off on just being bitten, maybe Robotnik expects to get off on just biting him, or- or maybe he doesn’t want to get off at all, and he just wants to continue eating now that they’re done with that interruption. That’s how Stone interprets it, anyway, better judgement clouded as it is. With a bit of hesitation, still not completely sure if it’s correct, Stone bares his throat to him again. More blood beads up in the holes as he does, and while his cock does make a valiant effort to harden again at the feeling, there simply isn’t enough blood left in him to make it happen.
Robotnik’s eyes flash, landing right on the blood once it wells up again. His mouth parts, if only in a sliver, and he starts to lean forward, but he stops, turning to leer at Stone’s face instead. “Where are your manners?” Stone, mollified, starts to sit back up, but Robotnik reaches out with a lightning-fast hand and holds him there. “If you’re offering, I certainly won’t say no, but really, it would do you some good to get your head on straight so you can go back to telling me what I want to hear.”
Stone thinks about it for a moment. Rather, he tries to sift through all of the TV static in his brain and comes up completely blank, then squints at him. “What do you wanna hear, sir?”
“Think, agent. I know you’ve got two brain cells left to rub together in that head of yours.”
He really doesn’t. As much as he would like to, all he can think about is the way Robotnik keeps eyeing his throat. After a few moments of total non-response, the Doctor rolls his eyes and slides his hands back to Stone’s shoulders and shoves him down onto the bed. In an instant, he’s on top of him, pinning Stone down with a hand on either side of him and his mouth on his throat, letting his fangs barely clip the skin as he has another taste. “Oh!” Stone gasps, chin coming up to make more room for him, and a second later, warmth bleeding into his chest, it hits him. He knows exactly what Robotnik wants to hear. “Thank you, Doctor!”
“You’re very welcome.”
From there, Robotnik isn’t really feeding off of him anymore. This new position, near as far as Stone can tell, is something else. It makes it so that Stone doesn’t have to try too hard to keep himself in one place, nor does Robotnik have to hold him up. Instead, Robotnik kneels between his legs (and Stone can’t remember spreading them, but at some point, he did), and he isn’t drinking from him so much as he’s nursing what’s left like a glass of whiskey at last call. He sips, sure, but that’s mostly to get a sound out of Stone than anything else. More than anything, he licks. He lets a little bit come up to the surface of the wound, then cleans it off. It never fails to earn the exact kind of shudder that he wants to see. At one point, he sticks his tongue in one of the holes again, just toying with it, and instinctively, at the feeling of something so foreign, Stone squirms, but Robotnik shuts that one down as soon as it starts; one of his arms slides underneath Stone’s back and pulls, and Stone, pliant as a ragdoll, dangles off of it, back draped in an arch that he couldn’t squirm out of if he wanted to. He laughs, because holy shit, he’s supposed to be the strong one, but if this is what Robotnik can do, he’s going to develop more than one new kink before leaving.
Robotnik, however, doesn’t hear the thought behind it. He just hears the laughter once he picks him up, and he growls, pulls Stone flush to his chest, and tonguefucks the hole until the laughter turns into moans again.
It’s not feeding, really. That would require the Doctor to get more than a taste within the fifteen minutes or so that he carries on like this. It’s a negligible amount of blood, but he really does savor it, appreciating each and every little drop that Stone lets him take. Come tomorrow morning, Stone will find more hickeys than he knows what to do with and a bunch of little pinpricks around the two holes he signed up for (not that he minds), but tonight, he doesn’t mind. He lays, blissed out, in the Doctor’s arms, and he purrs with satisfaction when everything starts to feel suspiciously like Robotnik kissing his neck, over and over and over again.
Once he finishes, Robotnik eases him back down onto the bed, and Stone lets him turn his head to look at the wounds. Robotnik hisses. “First aid kit?”
“You don’t have to be done.”
“Shut up. You’re horny and borderline hypovolemic. Tell me where it is.”
Stone sighs as Robotnik climbs off of him, waving a hand vaguely in the direction of the closet. It’s over there somewhere. He’s sure of it. “Uh… backpack? Probably? You don’t like it when blood gets on your stuff, so-”
A thought occurs to him. Stone rolls over hard to his side, punctured side up, and drags the collar of his shirt up over the puncture wound, holding it there. He watches as Robotnik digs through his backpack, looking for the wound kit Stone keeps there for emergencies or fang-related accidents, and when Robotnik turns around, he raises an eyebrow at him. “What? Did you get lonely in the two seconds I got up?”
“Uh.” Stone blinks. “I didn’t want to get blood on your sheets.”
Robotnik, of course, laughs at him. He doesn’t say why, but Stone knows this song and dance well enough. Of course you’d think about that, you pedantic ass, that laugh says. It’s a ridiculous expectation, but you remembered it, and you committed it to heart, it says. Whipped, it says.
The first aid kit, as it turns out, is in Stone’s backpack. Robotnik brings it over to the bed, and Stone reaches for it, fully prepared to deal with the bite marks himself, but Robotnik sneers, slapping his hand away. “Hold still.”
Stone watches, transfixed, as Robotnik pulls an alcohol pad from the case and tears it open. As instructed, he stays still, letting Robotnik wipe his neck down with it. He can’t imagine there’s any blood left around the wound after all of that, but it’s not like Stone has even had to consider a risk of infection when it came to Robotnik’s other victims. “I meant it when I said you could drink some more,” he says, absentminded, as Robotnik finishes up with that part of it. “I don’t mind. ‘S basically your blood already anyway, so.”
Out of Stone’s view, another paper wrapper tears open. “You’re done.”
“I don’t have to be,” Stone protests. Robotnik just sort of grunts in response, placing a gauze pad over the wound. With that out of the way, Stone flips over onto his back and pillows his head on his hands, chuckling softly. “Could do this aaaall night.”
The Doctor bristles. “If I take anything else, you’re going to die, and that would be a massive pain in the ass.” Oh. Right. He has a job to do, and Robotnik doesn’t seem nearly as blase as he did about Stone’s life an hour ago. After a moment, some of the tension seeps out, and Robotnik’s jaw snaps shut. He forces a few words out like they physically pain him to say them. “You did… good. I’m satisfied.”
The Doctor needs him. The Doctor needs him enough to care for him when he’s injured. He cares about him enough to put the first aid kit back in Stone’s backpack, going as far as to slot it in the right pouch.
“Are you gonna turn me?”
That may be a little too forward, though.
“Huh?” Robotnik stands up straight again, looking at Stone over his shoulder with one eyebrow raised. “Turn you?”
“Into-“ Stone pauses, gesturing vaguely to Robotnik with one hand, “into what you are. So I can keep helping you. If I’m immortal-“
“Then you can’t open doors for me,” Robotnik finishes. By no means was that what Stone planned on saying, but it’s true. There is a function to his job beyond getting chewed on. He sinks back into the bed, trying his best not to look disappointed, but he either does a bad job or Robotnik smells it on him, because Robotnik clicks his tongue, annoyed, and turns to face him fully. “Maybe I will one day, Stone, but you think I’m going to give you up that easily when I just found out what an eager meal ticket you are?”
A thrill shoots down Stone’s spine. He expected all of this to disappear in the morning, for them to never talk about this again, but Robotnik wants to do this again. Sure, he may still change his mind and kill Stone in his sleep to avoid the awkward conversations that would inevitably ensue, but- shit, what a way to die. He sits up, propping himself up on his hands, his eyes wide. “You’re going to drink from me again?”
A grin. “I may not even have the manners to ask next time.”
Fuck, that shouldn’t be as hot as it is. The comfy bed and the anticipation have been fun, but there’s something about the idea of milling around the lab, not knowing when Robotnik is going to decide he needs a pick-me-up and ambush him from around a corner, slamming him into a wall and tearing the buttons from Stone’s collar so he can-
“Soon?” Stone pleads, leaning in a little further. Sounding so desperate may be a mistake. There’s probably a sea of a million hearts in his eyes right now, but it’s nothing Robotnik hasn’t seen before.
At that, Robotnik hums. He strolls a little bit closer, taking Stone by the jaw and tilting his head up to face him. Stone stares, watching as Robotnik looks him over, then prods his head to the side until he can see the gauze pad on the side of his neck. At that, something in his eye gleams, and he lets go of Stone’s face, patting him on the cheek. “Maybe if you’re a good boy.”
Oh, yes. Being a vampire would be great. Walking the earth for an eternity at Robotnik’s side would be a dream come true. Still, though, there’ll be time for that in the future. In the meantime, what’s the harm in letting Robotnik drink from him? Over and over again? As much as he wants?
Stone makes a mental note to get a list of his most frequent fantasies written out for the Doctor. If he has his way, Robotnik isn’t going to be turning him for a good, long while.
He leaves Stone there, breathless, and departs through the adjoining door, coat in hand. There’s no reason for it; that’s Stone’s room, and the only difference between this one and that one is Stone’s presence on the bed. He doesn’t lock it, either, so it’s not like he’s looking for privacy.
During week two in Robotnik’s employ, Stone discovered that vampiric hypnotism isn’t a myth. He doesn’t really remember being hypnotized so much as he remembers his vision blotting out in a haze of red when the Doctor casually sent him to retrieve a laundry list of tools from a workbench on the other side of the lab. In the interest of not fucking it up, he just gave Stone the instructions directly, and he functionally did it himself, all without moving. Stone stays a little more conscious whenever hypnotism comes into play now, seeing as he desperately wants to remember each and every second of it, but that haze is always there. It’s undeniable, whenever Robotnik decides to take control of him.
In kind, Stone knows when he’s not hypnotized. He knows the Doctor doesn’t really have to say anything for it to work, but that haze never sets in. Still, it’s a little more fun to pretend that the way his body moves, as though on autopilot, to follow him into the adjoining room, is simply another order he’s helpless to follow.
He finds Robotnik at the desk in the next room over, already toying with a scrap of some new invention as he sits there. He doesn’t even look over at Stone, pausing to snap his fingers and point to the spot on the floor beside him. Stone stumbles over, collapsing onto the carpet on his knees, and when Robotnik holds his hand out, Stone obediently places his own in it.
Robotnik dips down, just for a second, to prick one of Stone’s fingers with a fang. He licks the drop of blood off, then, just as gently, presses a kiss to the back of Stone’s hand, lets it go, and returns to work.
No, Stone isn’t hypnotized. He has no direct orders. Robotnik does not ask him to be there with any words, but he wanted Stone to follow. If, subsequently, Stone wraps his arms around his leg, hanging off of him with his cheek pressed against his knee, looking every bit the ‘hypnotized’, lovesick thrall Stone has always dreamed of being each time Robotnik reaches down to pet him?
Well, that’s just another Tuesday for them. The sky is blue. Water is wet. Stone is madly in love with him, and he’ll do absolutely anything to serve him. Obviously.
-
From the notes of Agent Aban Stone, in regards to being an Agent-slash-Familiar to Doctor Robotnik:
“He knows that the nature of his existence dictates that, eventually, he will lose you. He brings it up a lot, actually, along with how he won’t miss you once you’re gone. It’s my personal theory that he lost people dear to him in taking up this mantle, but I’d never dare voice that to him. It’s none of my business, honestly. It is my business and yours, though, to make sure your time with him lasts. Don’t prolong the inevitable or anything, but the more consistent and reliable you can be for him, the better your time working for him will be.
That being said, if you don’t think you can do that, you should show yourself out now. You have to want it. The Doctor is going to live for an eternity, and you have to pray that your devotion is enough to ease that. You have to give him everything you have, and then some. If you cannot provide him with an eternity, then this is not where you belong. He’ll know if you’re not genuine, and there will always be someone out there, someone more deserving, who wants that job more than you do.”
-
They do not talk about it the next morning. Stone wakes up, though, which is a great sign, and Robotnik isn’t any more testy than usual, which is an even better one. He doesn’t regret it. Miraculously, he doesn’t mind the way that Stone is. Who knew a guy with such obvious abandonment issues just needed someone who’s a little bit obsessed with him?
Right now, there’s a wall separating them, some meeting that Stone doesn’t have the security clearance to sit in on droning away without him. He’s been relegated to sitting outside with the only other agent there, who also, coincidentally, drones on about a bunch of things Stone doesn’t particularly care about. Stone nods along, humming like he’s listening, while he thinks about last night and the dull throb of the bite marks on his neck, until-
A word catches his attention out of his peripheral. He jolts, his eyes snapping wide open, and he turns his attention to the other agent, who gawks at him right back. Stone forces himself to calm down after a second, clearing his throat. “Sorry. What was that last part?”
“Uh.” The agent blinks at him. “The bit about ‘bloodsucking bureaucrats’?”
Damnit.
Luckily, the door to the conference room swings open right after, and Stone’s head whips over to look at it, waiting for Robotnik to come out. It puts the bandage on his neck on full display, and the other agent points at it, still talking despite the fact that they have no obligation to anymore. “I was meaning to ask. What happened to your neck?”
Robotnik slinks out of the conference room, disgruntled as ever, and Stone lights up. He forces himself to respond, though, if only to keep his reputation in tact. He thought about this excuse. He practiced it in the bathroom. He turns to the agent, grinning at him and playing a little sheepish, even though he’s not even sort of embarrassed about it. “I’m not allowed to pass on the specifics due to security concerns, but I can say that an opportunity arose that required me to go above and beyond the call of duty, and I took it.”
Robotnik, in passing, snorts. “Way to kiss ass, Agent Stone. Having fun down there?” Stone pushes himself to his feet, ready to follow right on his heels, but Robotnik stops in front of him, one hand held up, the other digging through Stone’s bag. He shoves an empty thermos into Stone’s hands, then keeps walking, calling over his shoulder. “Coffee first, then find me.”
He dips out of sight without another word, leaving Stone standing there with his mouth hanging open, and the other agent starts mumbling to Stone as soon as he can’t see Robotnik anymore. “Jesus, that guy gives me the creeps.” He nudges Stone with his shoulder in a way that is probably supposed to be companionable. “I dunno how you do it, man. He always has this look on his face like he wants to eat you alive.”
Oh, he doesn’t know the half of it.
Stone’s hands tighten around the metal of the thermos. Being a vampire, the Doctor cannot drink coffee. He complains about it often, how seldom humans are actually caffeinated when he needs them to be, and cites it as one of the only things he misses about being human. He forbids Stone from bringing it into the lab, and more often than not, forbids him from drinking it altogether. Stone gets it, with Robotnik being the jealous type and all, but that doesn’t change the fact that Robotnik still cannot drink coffee for himself. He can’t request that Stone make it for him.
Then again, that isn’t one of Robotnik’s thermoses.
It’s Stone’s.
Stone sighs, a smile tugging at his lips. “Oh, well. Y’know. It’s really not so bad once you get used to it.”