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that-gay-guy-from-hell · 6 months

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Uncontrolled Instincts: Vergil x Male Reader

MINORS DNI; THIS IS FOR ADULTS ONLY

SERIOUSLY, GO AWAY!

SUMMARY: The eldest son of Sparda has been through many trials and tribulations within his almost fifty years of life. Despite this, Vergil was still learning about the different ways his heritage could bring him to his wit's end-- how it could bring him to his knees and leave him completely and utterly at your mercy.

BEGINNING NOTES: Requested by @kasianthus on Tumblr! (Sorry this took so long--didn't know if should still stage because of that so sorry if you aren't really into DMC anymore in the like year this took lmao sorry) This legit has been sitting half-finished for months (Like this was requested way back on March 5th lmfao); so I figured I should probably finish it lmfao 🦢💧🦢 Top/Dom Vergil x Sub/Bottom Male reader Pre-established relationship Semi-mindless smut with a lil' fluff Lots of smut--like a ton. Rut (Vergil); the reader is unaware of this being a thing in devils Minor scent kink Small masturbation scene (Vergil) Mating/Breeding kink (Possessive of the reader) Biting/Blood (Bleeding?) kink: Vergil bites hard enough to draw blood (he is a devil after all) then does some kind of painful stuff--it’s not very long or anything but I figured it is important to mention. Bruising + Scratching Minor Oral (blowjob; Reader receiving.) Monster fucker stuff; dick sleeve/slit stuff, etc. Devil Trigger sex Overstimulation Knotting 💧🦢💧 >Unrealistic sizes for his Triggered dick(s)--just let me have fun. If you want actual sizes, go to Vergil’s H/C chapter. >Because of the mental state Vergil’s in, he’s a bit sappy--almost reminiscent of V--during some parts. >I used the concept art from DMC 5 as a reference for Vergil’s (regular) Devil Trigger; figured I should put that here to avoid any confusion (since it’s very different from his 3-design and semi-different than his 4-design). Dante’s 5 DT has pupils so Vergil’s does too (even though the concept art doesn’t; neither does Dante’s concept art btw).

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“That is an idiotic suggestion,” Vergil’s lip twitched as he lightly snarled, “Although I shouldn’t expect much else from you.”

“Yeah? Well, if you’re so damned smart,” Dante crossed his arms as he leaned back in his chair, scowling at Vergil, “Then what’s your plan.”

“I told you,” the blue devil squinted, “I can handle it alone.”

Dante slammed his hands down on his desk and shot up from his chair, “And as I have told you ,” he rounded to the front of his desk, leaning against it slightly, and stood face-to-face with his older brother, “ No, you can’t. ”

The devils stared at one another, growling while exchanging death glares. Amongst the loud snarling, however, a stressed-out sigh could be heard. Lady, who had grabbed a beer, was trying to ignore the twins' incessant bickering. She's been waiting for over an hour for Nico and Trish to swing by and pick her up and she was almost at her breaking point. Quietly, she tapped her fingers against the half-drunk bottle while grumbling to herself. A part of her felt like she was babysitting two toddlers rather than sitting at the establishment of two middle-aged devil hunters. As she raised the bottle to take a drink, a loud commotion behind her caught her attention. Slamming down the bottle, she whipped around with a venomous glare.

With hands wrapped around one another, the twins wrestled momentarily only to be cut abruptly by Vergil slamming Dante’s back through the railing and treads of the staircase. A loud strangled coughing came from Dante as one of the metal bars speared him through the chest, splattering Vergil’s face with a trace amount of blood.

“What is wrong with you two?!" Lady’s tolerance had finally run out, "I just fucking fixed yesterday's damage!” She stood from her seat, arms crossed.

Hearing her irate tone, Vergil released Dante’s neck from his grasp and stood up; not saying a word.

Dante groaned, looking up at his twin, “Lil’ help?” He stuck out his hand which Vergil used to yank Dante back to his feet.

Vergil straightened his coat, “I think I will take my leave for today-”

“Good,” Dante shifted uncomfortably, placing a hand over the gaping hole in his middle, feeling it slowly repair itself, “Can’t stand you being so pissy.”

Lady pinched the bridge of her nose, “You are no better, Dante. Both of you are acting like children.”

“I am not,” Dante huffed.

Vergil glared at his brother from the corner of his eye before strutting towards the garage door, “I am leaving,” he stopped after he was slightly past Lady and turned over to his shoulder, addressing her, "Contact me only if necessary.”

With that, Vergil left The Devil May Cry.

Upon opening the front door to your shared home, Vergil instantly felt a heavy hazy heat spread throughout his limbs. He took a slow deep breath as he stood in the entryway, trying to get a hold of himself. Unhurriedly, he hung his coat and slid off his boots, mumbling to himself about his next move. He decided that a shower may ease his mind as he wandered into the cozy co-inhabited home.

The blue devil warily looked around, trying to avoid you. Eventually, he found you in the bedroom, making things difficult, since he needed to stop in there for clothing. He peered in through the door and saw that you were lying on your stomach, reading a book while softly humming. From where he was standing, he got a perfect view of your ass, only worsening his issue .

Vergil shook his head and took a deep breath trying to deter his thoughts; only after which did he realize that getting a deep whiff of your scent was perhaps the worst thing he could do at the moment. He stood with a scrunched face and closed eyes as he tried to ground himself, doing his best to ignore the overwhelming perverse thoughts eating at him, and the fiery feeling spreading to his lower half.

You turned over and sat at the edge of the bed, dangling your legs over the edge, “Hey-! You’re home early,” you flashed him a cheerful smile that quickly fell as you got nothing but silence in return, “Everything alright, Vergil?”

“Yes, everything is fine,” Vergil’s eyes avoided yours and his answer was quick and emotionless.

You raised a brow at his seemingly discombobulated reaction, “You sure?”

He nodded and moved to grab some casual clothing from the dresser, “I am going to shower.”

Your brow raised further, “Okay..?”

Vergil looked over to you as if he were going to speak but closed his mouth, turned away from you, and left.

In the brief moments that your eyes met with his, you noticed the small bits of dried blood on his clothes and face. It was probably Dante’s, knowing how much the two had been fighting the past week or so; however, that didn’t make it any better nor did it ease your mind. You slid off the bed, and placed the book on the nightstand, leaving the room. Unhurriedly, you meandered down the hall as you mulled through what could have upset Vergil so much.

As of late, he's been in such a sour mood that he barely even says "Good morning" or "Good night", not to mention the lack of physical affection. He hasn't even been sleeping in the bedroom with you, "preferring” to sleep on the couch. A frown decorated your face as a wicked thought echoed in your mind, "What if he is distancing himself so he can disappear…"

You shook your head, "He'd never do that, he loves me... Right?"

With another shake of your head, you decided that you were going to talk with him once he's finished his shower.

When Vergil entered the restroom, he lazily tossed his change of clothes off to the side and turned the shower faucet as cold as he could. While the water ran, he stripped down and neatly placed his worn clothing in the hamper.

Just being in your presence had made him unbearably hard and was driving him up the wall. It seems even the Dark Slayer isn’t able to conquer his instincts, much to his vexation.

A quiet hiss left his lips as he stepped under the icy water. Vergil’s skin was beyond sweltering, being so hot that it was bothering him; a man whose body runs on average at around 120°F (49°C). The contrast between him and the nearly frozen water created a sauna-esc environment--fog quickly filling the room. As he washed his face off, he stared mindlessly at the wall. He’d never experienced something like this before; and, to be quite frank, it's exhausting. The sheer amount of emotional ups and downs was enough to make him nauseous. Not to mention that he’d been avoiding any sort of affection towards or with you for nearly a week.

It all mixed up into a hellish disaster that Vergil just wanted to end. Tired of the immense toll this was taking on him, in every way possible.

With folded arms, he stood facing the water as a small discontent grumble left his lips. He had hoped that the cold water would have killed his hard-on; however, it didn’t. Now he was just miserably standing under frigid water with a rigid cock.

Vergil let out a low growl of irritation, his face scrunching into a grimace as he lightly pinched the bridge of his nose. Despite not being one for masturbation, he decided to try and handle his urges alone. He ran his hands up his face and then slowly back down, sighing loudly. Then he turned around and leaned his forehead against the wall, the water now beating against his back; a feeling that would have most definitely troubled him if he weren’t so worked up.

His brow furrowed as he shut his eyes, placing one hand on the wall and the other around his throbbing dick. Slowly, his hand moved at the thought of what he’d do to you if only you were here harshly pinned between the wall and him.

The feeling of you squirming underneath him as he bit down on your neck. Your groans as he shoves himself inside your tight hole. The feeling of your hands in his hair, pulling it in ecstasy. How deep and hard he would pound your insides. Growling obscene and perverse comments into your ear and watching you react; feeling you react. Folding you as he bent your legs up as far as he could, his nails digging into your skin.

Vergil wanted nothing more than to claim you --to breed you --to leave you unable to move and full to the brim with his cum.

The blue devil’s face scrunched further with every quickening stroke, trying to reach his peak, “Ngh- ha~” A frustrated whine of a huff escaped his nose as he bit down on his lip.

Unknowingly, he started bucking his hips into his hand in pursuit of the tantalizingly close orgasm. However, try as he may, it never came; all he managed to do was work himself up even further and nearly break his fingers from how hard he was pressing against the tiles.

After what seemed like an eternity, he removed his hand from his cock and just stood there with his eyes closed. He placed his face against his bicep with a deep exasperated inhale, trying to figure out a solution that wouldn’t involve him explaining what was happening.

A soft knock at the door caused Vergil to choke on his exhale, “Vergil, you alright? You’ve been in there for over an hour…”

Although you didn’t care how long he took, it was a bit concerning when his longest shower ever was fifteen minutes . In combination with how he was earlier, you were well within your right to worry.

He felt his cock twitch at the sound of your voice as he ran his thumb across his tip, doing his best to subvert the idea of asking you to join him, “I am fine,” he straightened his posture with a small sigh, “I will be out momentarily.”

The blue devil waited to hear you walk away before he turned off the water and stepped out. He dried off and slid on his black boxer briefs and an indigo t-shirt. Then, as per usual, he went to pomade his hair but found his tin completely exhausted. Vergil balled up his hands, his nails lightly puncturing his palms in anger. In his heated departure from the shop, he had completely forgotten to pick some up before returning home. In a vain attempt at normalcy, he used the dampness from the shower to slick it back.

Then the real issue became apparent. He needed to figure out how to hide his excitement . The blue devil mulled over different ideas as he moved his jaw back and forth. It was then that he noticed he, unintentionally, grabbed a baggy set of grey sweatpants; ones that would be able to hide most of his painfully aching flesh if he wore them just right and tucked himself in a very specific way.

After a few attempts, he managed to get it right and looked at himself in the mirror; it was barely noticeable, allowing him to take a sigh of relief. As he opened the door, he was able to place where you were in the house by the sound of your heart, you were in the living room. Knowing that if he saw you he’d lose the struggle with himself, he quickly slipped into his study; which was right between the bathroom and bedroom.

The Dark Slayer quietly shut the door and turned on a desk lamp. The room wasn’t anything too elaborate or fancy; it only contained three bookshelves, a small desk, and Vergil’s favorite chair. The blue devil grabbed his current book from the desk and sat down, making the plastic ever-so-slightly creak underneath him. With the lick of his fingertips, Vergil paged through to where he had left off in the novel.

After nearly ten minutes of re-reading the same page over and over, Vergil slammed the book shut with a growl. At this point, his body was beyond burning with lust and he wanted nothing more than to soothe his pulsating cock. Moving his jaw in thought, he debated trying to relieve his itch again; however, before he could decide, a gentle knock came from the door.

“Vergil..?” your voice was barely audible.

In a panic, Vergil snapped back, “What?” He scrunched his face and pursed his lips in immediate regret at how he answered.

There was a moment of silence before he heard you sigh, “Never mind, sorry; didn’t mean to bother you. I’ll leave you be.”

As you began to walk away, Vergil bolted up from his seat; upsetting you was the last thing he wanted to do. Opening the door as quickly as possible, he called out to you, “Wait-!”

You turned around; only a dozen or so strides away. With a brow raised in curiosity, you noted how disheveled Vergil looked: between his outfit, hair, and how overall ragged he looked you knew something was wrong. The two of you stood staring at one another for a minute or so; neither of you being sure what to say or do next.

The blue devil turned from your gaze to look down, shifting awkwardly, “I…” he stood with his lips slightly parted and shifted once more.

You took a few steps towards him, “Is something wrong, Vergil?”

He shook his head ‘no’ and tensed his shoulders, “Stay back,” although he intended it to sound commanding, it sounded more like he was pleading.

Your brow creased, “Why?”

That was the million-dollar question, wasn’t it?

The intense aching in his body only worsened by being near you, he scrunched his face trying to block out his insatiable yearning for you, “I can’t-” Vergil looked up from the flooring to you as he spoke softly, “I don’t want to hurt you.”

“What does that-” you shook your head, “Vergil, what is going on?” You continued to steadily and carefully approach the high-strung man.

With every step you took, his body tensed up further and further. Part of him wanted to run as far from you as possible, ashamed and afraid of his need; the other wanted nothing more than to slam you against the floor and let into his sinful primal desires. He closed his eyes and took a deep steading breath; doing neither of those things--unintentionally allowing you to get closer.

You stood only two or so strides away and were able to hear a faint growling, “My Love?” When you went to grab his hand, his eyes snapped open.

Vergil jolted backward and hit the still-open study door that was behind him… which broke it right off its hinges with a loud cracking thud. You flinched at the sudden loud noise and pulled your hand back.

He turned to his side slightly to look down at the broken door, “Fantastic…” he then turned back to you with a sigh, “Forgive me, I-”

That’s when he noticed where you were staring at his body.

You squinted and pursed your lips, doing your best to stifle a small laugh, “Is your weird mood cause of that ?” You gestured with your eyes down to his painfully obvious hard-on.

Vergil shifted his jaw and huffed out a meek answer, “It is more than that, I am afraid.”

“Care to share?” you set a hand on your hip and smirked, very much oblivious to the severity of what was going on.

The blue devil shook his head, “No-” A shiver ran up his spine as he watched you slowly and intensely eye him up, “You’re not going to like the answer.”

“Vergil, we’ve slept together quite a bit,” you gently grabbed one of his hands, “What is so different now?”

His voice was strained as he gripped your hand tightly and paused a moment for a moment before continuing, “This is out of my control.”

“What? Vergil,” you furrowed your brow in confusion, “What does that mean?”

He opened his eyes and stared at you momentarily, using his tongue to play with his teeth in thought.

“Don’t make me beg,” you lightly teased.

“Fine,” Vergil pushed you against the wall, a knee placed right between your legs, and holding both your hands off to your sides, “I want you,” he leaned closer, his breath tickling your ear, “I need to--” he paused for a moment in thought, “I need to breed you,” behind his voice you could hear a rumble, telling you how desperate he really is.

He placed small kisses along your jawline and pulled back to look you in the eyes, pleading with you to save him from this torment of self-restraint he has been going through for nearly a week now.

You raised a brow, “And how’s that any different than normal?” You gave him a suggestive sultry smirk.

He cautiously placed his lips atop yours; despite his current affliction, he wanted to make sure that he took things slow--at least, slow enough that he wouldn’t hurt you. The kisses were long, heated, and sloppy. The both of you moved your mouths together in an almost exaggerated manner, perfectly synchronized. Vergil pushed against you and a low rumble filled each of his motions; doing his best to show you how much he needs you. How much he desires you in your entirety; mind, spirit, and body. How much he wishes to consume your frail humanity and turn you into his sinful plaything.

The blue devil’s grip tightened around your wrists as he fought his urge to demolish you right here and now. The heat from his body was overwhelming. Both he and you were acutely aware of it, a very thin line of sweat adorning the two of you. Vergil pushed his leg up further between your legs, lovingly nudging your slowly growing arousal, listening to the faint groans you gave.

After a few minutes of these slow impassioned kisses, he slid his tongue into your mouth. Excitedly he explored every bit that he could. Though Vergil had tasted your sweet tongue many times before, he always had the same amount of giddiness as he did the first time. His growling had become prominent enough that you could feel it within your mouth; a new, but welcomed, feeling.

With a gentle roughness, Vergil bit at your lips and tugged on them, which you lovingly returned. A small smirk decorated his lips as he let out a happy huff against you before diving into another plethora of fiery lustful kisses. With each languid motion of his plush lips against yours, his grip tightened around your wrists; gradually losing the arousing factor and becoming painful--you weren’t even sure if he realized that he was doing it.

Breaking away from his lips for a brief moment, you let out a low hiss, “Vergil, that kind of hurts,” you squirmed against his hold.

He stood there with his forehead against yours, loosening his grip slightly. With a low husky growl of a voice, he whispered against your kiss-swollen lips, “I need more,” he nuzzled his nose against yours, “Please.” His eyes met with yours, they were heavy and glazed over; he wasn’t asking you, he was begging .

“Just--” You did your best to stay calm, knowing that Vergil was far from it, “Give me a minute to get ready and I’m all yours..?”

A small displeased grumble left his lips before he bit at your lower lip, pulling it slowly, then whispered against you, “You’d best hurry,” he released his grip on your wrists, “Best not to keep me waiting,” he turned and walked towards the bedroom, leaving you in a confused light-headed daze.

Once within the bedroom, he grabbed the nearly empty lube from the side table and set it on the tabletop. Absent-mindedly, he began to tap his foot, doing his best to ignore his slowly thinning patience. Vergil was still rather uneasy about informing you about what was truly going on. The two of you had been romantically involved for many years now, but it was only within the past year that the two of you had become sexually involved. In hindsight, Vergil regrets not explaining the consequences of doing so.

The consequences of mating with a devil.

A nearly inaudible creak in the floorboards caught Vergil’s attention, pulling him from his thoughts. Instantly, the blue devil was upon you and was as close to you as possible, his lips connected with yours once again. With a startled moan, you grabbed his biceps and felt him dig his fingertips into your sides as he tried to pull you impossibly close.

Not giving you a chance to think, Vergil moved you over to the bed and had you pinned beneath him. Using one of his hands, he held both of yours above your head as he stared down at you. He placed his free hand on your cheek, thumbing over your skin slowly, a small smirk tugging at his lips.

The blue devil’s hand drifted down your neck and to your chest, “I am sorry for this.”

“For what?” You tilted your head.

Without answering, Vergil leaned down and bit down on your neck. A sharp pain caused you to flinch and let out a low groan. He’d pierced through your skin and was working his teeth further into your flesh. It was uncommon for Vergil to make marks where others would be able to see them, but he never has drawn blood or bitten you this hard before. An uneasy feeling pricked at the edges of your mind--the unnerving feeling of being a devil’s prey.

Once Vergil felt the mark was dark enough, he leaned back up as he licked his lips and teeth clean of your blood. Your eyes met with his and Vergil had a crazed stare that sent cold shivers down your spine, it was a feral dominant look that only worsened the growing bad feeling in your gut. He moved to the other side of your neck and gave it the same treatment; puncturing your flesh deeply.

You let out a sharp moan as you felt him remove his teeth and give the new mark small loving licks. Curious as to how’d you respond, he took one of the tips of his split tongue and pushed it into one of the teeth holes. With pursed lips, your brow scrunched and you pulled away from the feeling; however, Vergil wasn’t done. He quickly placed another bite atop the same spot, moving ever-so-slightly out of line with the already there divots. The blue devil was enjoying the iron taste of the thick red substance and he wanted to taste you more; perhaps a side effect of him being the only Sparda descendant to consume human blood in mass?

With a third bite to the same spot, you finally spat out a whimper; one that wasn’t of pleasure. However, the devil didn’t notice and clenched his jaw harder at your struggling.

“Vergil, stop-!” You jerked away from him with a voice that was somewhere between angry and frightened--not a hint of enjoyment in earshot.

It took him a moment to react, removing his teeth with a low faintly animalistic huff. The blue devil leaned up and looked down at you, watching you writhe at the painful feeling, assessing the situation. A prominent red stain had adorned his lips, teeth, and surrounding skin; he looked as if he were truly attempting to eat you. A few tears pricked at the edges of your eyes which caused him to look away, almost shameful.

“Vergil?”

He released your hands and sat still, looking like a kicked puppy.

You leaned up and gently placed a hand on the side of his jaw, turning him to face you. Vergil’s eyes were glazed over and his lips slightly parted, still very obviously aroused but hesitant to continue. You ran a thumb along his lower lip, wiping blood off the stained surface. Slowly, you connected with his lips.

With a loving force, you pushed your lips hard against him and moved your hand from his jaw to the side of his neck, firmly holding him. Using your other hand, you grabbed a fist full of his shirt and pulled him into you. All the while, you’d pushed your tongue into his mouth which earned a surprised muffled moan from Vergil.

His mouth tasted, unsurprisingly, of blood and was broiling hot. Vergil worked himself into your grove, moving along to the rhythm you were setting; a rarity in your relationship. You moved your hand up from his neck and interweaved your fingers with his hair, grasping the strands tightly. A small amount of pride pricked at the edges of your mind as you heard him let out a low unfiltered moan and felt him tremble under your grasp. This, however, didn’t last long.

Unwilling to remain submissive, Vergil pushed you downwards again. Mindlessly his kisses began to wander around your skin placing small kisses along your clothed shoulders and chest. In return, you gently groped at his shoulders and arms, earning a low moan from your devilish lover.

You noticed that he was still wet from his shower as you ran your hands under his shirt giving his skin a soft smooth feel. Your fingertips flattened against his pecs, kneading against him. Slowly, you made your way over to his nipples and pinched them tightly. His back arched slightly at the feeling and he let out a low breathy moan.

However, the blue devil’s hands weren’t stationary and had begun to move, drifting downwards. They rested right at the edge of your shirt for a moment as he felt you grope his chest. Then, bit by bit, he slid his hands underneath your shirt. Taking the hint, you removed your hands from him and pulled the fabric over your head, tossing it somewhere in the room.

The blue devil’s slender fingers groped along your chest, seeming almost desperate to feel your body. Your hands grabbed the edge of his shirt and began to tug at it. Vergil leaned up and pulled his shirt over his head, looking down at you with slightly labored breathing.

In all his years of life, in neither Hell nor the human world, has he ever had he found another so captivating as you are. Even during times like these, times of sinful lust, you still managed to look holy to the tarnished devil; a sacred being that he’d gladly become a martyr over, someone he’d give his life up for. Despite his irritation at his current affliction, he can’t help but be glad that it is with you and that he found someone he wants to spend the rest of his life with.

As he stared, you stared back.

A small amount of pride tugged at your heart at how you’d managed to get someone like Vergil, someone so beautiful. Your eyes focused on his partially agape kiss-swollen lips that he’d roll his tongue over moistening them every so often. His hair was down courtesy of the lack of pomade and clung to the still-wet skin of his brow, giving him a rather ragged look. Despite Dante being his twin, the two looked nothing alike in your eyes--even with the same hairstyle. Slowly your gaze traveled to his half-lidded eyes when you noticed something; his eyes were the icy glowing blue of his Devil Trigger.

You wriggled to sit upright, “You’re quite worked up, huh?” With a smile, you watched Vergil’s face become red and you placed a hand on the side of his neck, thumbing over his throat softly.

“Why do you say that?” his voice quivered a bit as he felt your hand slowly move down from his neckline to his hips.

“You’re acting… strange ,” you ran your hand close to his bulge, purposely missing it, and rested your hand on his thigh.

He gave you a half-confused half-disappointed look.

“Not that I don’t find this…” you gently rubbed his thigh, earning a stifled moan from the devil, “ aggressively dominant side of you alluring.”

“Do you?” he smirked slightly, “How strange…” Vergil leaned in and gave you small pecking kisses.

You smiled widely and spoke between kisses, “Care to share what the special occasion is?”

Vergil quietly chuckled and murmured against your lips, “In time.”

Between loud sweet pecks, you gently whispered, “Come on, please Vergil?”

Instead of answering, he gave you a long kiss; one that only broke once he felt you pushing away for air. Vergil’s fingers gently ghosted the three-times-bitten dark spot he’d left on your neck, staring with concern.

Noticing his upset attitude, you grabbed his hand and brought it to your lips, kissing his knuckles.

“Does it… hurt ?” His voice was soft, with a small tinge of sadness.

“You want me to be honest?”

He nodded.

“Yes, it hurts, but-!” You made sure to cut him off, knowing damn well what he was going to say, “It’s fine and it’ll heal,” you ran soft kisses up from the hand you’d been kissing and to his shoulder, resting there for a moment, “It’s alright.”

“I am sorry for harming you,” he looked to the side, his eyes meeting with yours, “I didn’t think that I…” His voice cracked as gazed upon you with remorse.

You leaned up from his skin and looked at him with a soft smile, “Don’t worry about it, Vergil…” With a soft sigh, you leaned forward and placed a soft gentle long kiss on the underside of his jaw, “It’s flattering to know that you want me that badly, dear.”

Vergil pushed you back downwards, straddling your hips. His fingertips pressed into you as he eyed you up and down and, with a low dark desperate tone, he remarked, “That doesn’t even scratch the surface of how I feel right now.”

As he began to run his digits down your body, he leaned down and placed a very soft kiss on the tender spot. Bit by bit Vergil began to kiss down your middle, mumbling very softly against you, “ “The Fountains mingle with the river/And the rivers with the ocean,/The winds of heaven mix for ever,/With a sweet emotion;/Nothing in the world is single,/”,” he stopped right above your navel and lightly bit at the skin, staring up at you and locking with your eyes, “All things by a law devine/In one another's being mingle -/Why not I with thine?”.”

He continued until his head was between your thighs. You propped yourself up on your elbows and saw that he was already staring back at you. With hot and heavy breaths, he kissed the inside of one of your thighs all the way to your dick, then gave the other thigh the same treatment.

“Vergil-” You swallowed apprehensively, “Are you sure that you’re alright to be doing--”

“I won’t harm you,” he gave you a small smile with half-lidded eyes, “I promise,” his breath was heavy as he brushed his cheek and nose along your bulge, speaking in a quiet needy manner, “Let me taste you, please.”

Your breath caught in your throat as you tried to keep up with the sudden mood change; Vergil going from overly dominant to an almost submissive pleading. Before you even answered him, his fingers were within your waistband and were pulling at the fabric, completely exposing you to him. A small moan left your lips as you felt him kiss along the insides of your thighs once more. They were slow sloppy kisses, licking and biting at the sensitive skin.

Vergil stared at you for a moment, a smirk of pride tugging at his lips from how you were watching him with bated breath. Very unhurriedly, he ran his tongue down from your tip to your balls. As he ran back up, he split his tongue apart and slid your cock between the two sides. Encouraged by your low groans, he did the same motion back down.

Carefully he took your sack into his mouth and began to lightly suck on it. Instinctively, you placed a hand in his hair and grabbed it harshly, making the blue devil moan lowly. As he released you from his mouth, he made sure to stick his tongue out and run it up your seam.

Your fingers tightened as you let out a groan and a quiet call of his name.

Returning to your shaft, he placed kisses along the underside of your dick upward. Once at the top, he licked at your slit and watched as you squirm at his motions. With a heavy breath, Vergil placed his lips around your cock and gradually took you into his mouth. His hands found purchase on your hips and he pulled you as close to him as possible, the tip of his nose touching your lower abdomen. You fully leaned up, to get a better view of him, and placed both your hands in his hair as he bobbed up and down at a moderate pace.

“Vergil~ fuck that feels good,�� you groaned as he began to move faster at your words.

He smirked in response. Although he’d never admit it, he enjoys hearing you say he’s doing good; that he’s the reason you feel good. However, unlike normal, he wasn’t planning on bringing you to your peak; instead, he removed himself from your dick and stood up. The two of you shared a long heated kiss that he used to lean you back down, then he pulled back.

“Turn over,” his voice was low and gravely, palming himself at the sight before him.

With a small nod and smirk, you did as you were asked. You could hear Vergil shuffling around before feeling him rejoin you on the bed with his hands kneading against your ass. Although his motions weren’t particularly aggressive, the pressure he was using was extreme and was going to undoubtedly leave bruises. If you listened very closely, you could hear him purring behind his growling.

You let out a small laugh, “You’re quite pent up, huh?”

He momentarily paused, his hands still gripping you, “You could say that, yes,” before you could respond, you felt him dig his fingers harder into you, “May I?”

With a smile, you turned over your shoulder to him, “How cordial,” you softly laughed, “Go ahead, I’m all yours Vergil.”

Once he let go of your butt, Vergil smirked slightly at the sight of you lifting your hips up a bit. He was almost tempted to skip prepping you but he bit his lip; he can’t have you getting hurt, he needs you to be available for him. After lubing up his fingers, he slowly slid the first digit inside.

Taking a deep breath, you did your best to relax into his hand. Vergil shifted so he could kiss you while continuing to stretch you. He placed several gentle pecks along your neck and your jaw, a rather loud purr coming from deep within his chest.

As he slid a second finger inside you, he heavily laid his head on the crook of your shoulder and began to give the area small heated kisses. You let out a small moan and turned towards him, kissing the top of his head. A smile tugged at your lips as you felt him let out a low happy sigh, his lips just barely hovering over your skin.

Another stifled moan came from you as he began to curl his fingers and return to kissing your neck, slightly nipping at it as he traveled along your neck and shoulder.

Quietly, as if afraid to speak, Vergil whispered between kisses, “I love you, my delicate little Lily.”

With a soft laugh, you looked at him, “That’s new-- “Lily”..?”

He chuckled, seemingly embarrassed, “Yes, I thought it appropriate. Do- do you not like it?”

“I don’t mind; just curious as to- ngh-” You groaned as you felt Vergil add a third finger.

“As to what, my love?” A cocky smug smirk tugged at his lips.

“Why did you th-think,” you closed your eyes and bit your lip, doing your best to hold back a moan, “to use it now?”

Vergil hummed in thought for a moment, making sure to keep his lips close enough to your skin that you could feel his lips vibrate--sending a shiver through you, “Because you remind me of such…” He removed his fingers and leaned up, “You are so very fragile-- so very breakable; and yet,” a chill ran up your spine as you felt Vergil run his nails from your shoulder blades down to your hips, leaving a minor scratched trail down your body, “you allow me to taint your beauty --to toy with your naive innocent humanity….”

His hands rested on your ass momentarily, letting out a low sigh, before fully removing his hands.

With a gravelly sensual tone, he continued, “Do you want to know why I want you so badly, Dearest?”

Hearing him shuffling around slightly, you nodded as a small amount of butterflies began to form in your gut.

The blue devil laid down over you, getting as close to your ear as possible, “Because you are mine-- my human plaything; do you understand?”

Against your lower back, you could feel his cock twitching and could feel how unbearably hot his skin had become. You swallowed hard, “I’m not sure I do.”

Vergil placed his forehead between your shoulder blades. He used one hand to prop himself up and the other was around his dick, stroking it slightly, as he whispered, “You are bound to me; in both heart, soul, and body .”

Without allowing you to respond, he prodded at your hole with his tip and slowly began to inch his way inside. A loud moan left your lips as you did your best to relax into him; feeling each bit of him that entered your body.

“You are my mate,” once fully seated inside you, he returned to your ear, “My one and only,” the blue devil kissed your ear, then gently bit and tugged at it, “for the rest of eternity.”

He sat back up with hands now placed on both sides of your hips. In response you picked your ass up, creating a downward dog position.

It started slow and controlled. He’d only pull out an inch or two and very carefully push himself back in, not wanting to harm you. However, these gentle motions didn’t last very long. Vergil did try his best to control himself; biting his lip, gripping onto you (unintentionally bruising you yet again), et cetera, but it didn’t work.

Vergil pulled his dick out, leaving just the very tip of it inside you, and rammed into you. It was hard enough that you jolted forward and let out a moan that was somewhere between pleased and startled. He repeated this motion but picked up the pace with each jab. Soon enough, all that could be heard throughout the house was the sound of his balls hitting your skin and your moans of bliss. Vergil wrapped his hand around the front of your neck and pulled you upwards, bringing you into a kneeling position.

Now using quick shorter thrusts he wrapped his arms around your middle, holding you flush against his body. A small amount of drool left the corner of your mouth as your vision became blurry, completely engulfed with the feeling of Vergil inside you. Mindlessly, you laid your head against the top of his shoulder which gave him plenty of room to bite and suck at your neck. One of your hands found its way to his hair, grabbing it tightly, and your other was neatly interwoven with a hand from your devilish lover. Your grip tightened on his hand as you moved your hips, doing your best to complement Vergil’s pattern.

This pose didn’t last very long. Vergil roughly shoved you back down and stood up, pulling out completely. Before you could question, you felt him harshly yank you over onto your back. Now facing upwards at the disheveled man, you got a proper view of him and you noticed several things that were just ever-so-slightly off. His teeth were much sharper and slightly thicker. A finite amount of scales had appeared on his cheekbones. The glowing icy blue eye color that you’d noticed earlier, was even more apparent and had heavily dilated pupils in the middle that were intensely trained on you.

You placed a hand on his cheek, very carefully thumbing over the black-blue scales. He leaned into your touch, his eyes closed tightly, and gave your palm a long kiss, momentarily staying with lips pressed against your hand. An unintentional confused 'huh?' left your lips at how hot his breath and mouth were, he was scorching; the hottest you’ve ever felt from him. Slowly, he opened his eyes and leaned back up.

The blue devil slid off the bed and pulled you to the edge then put his tip back inside only to slam as hard as possible into your hips.

“Fuck~ Vergil,” you arched your back and wrapped your legs around his hips.

With a smirk, he repeated the action and created a pattern of extremely hard and moderately forceful thrusts that he switched between every four or five thrusts. Vergil looked down at you with a devilish smile, reveling in how undone he made you. Getting an insurmountable amount of arousing pleasure from the sounds of unintelligible gibberish moaning coming from you. The sight of your body being moved by just the force of his jabs. All he wanted to do was feel your insides even more, to reach as far as he could inside and claim every bit of you.

He grabbed your legs and pulled them up, resting them on his shoulders. The feeling of sinful pride he had only increased as he heard you call his name and saw your hands grabbing the sheets tightly. He slowed his hips for a moment, still maintaining the force of each thrust but trying to prevent himself from making a mistake and Triggering.

Vergil’s hands slid from your calves to your thighs, firmly kneading against your skin--his fingertips being imprinted into your skin with dark marks. A very distant dark part of him wanted to eat you, to bite your flesh --to mar it up --to cover you with his scent --to make sure you know exactly which devil you belong to. He licked his lips as he let out low heavy breaths from his partially opened mouth. Feeling his peak coming, he looked up at the ceiling as his thrusts became shorter and his pace picked up, moving faster than before.

Typically, he wouldn’t finish this fast but he couldn’t help himself. All he’s wanted to do for nearly a week is just fill your insides, and he was going to do just that. Vergil shifted slightly, making sure to hit your prostate with each gyration.

He let out a loud growling moan, cumming inside you. Only a few moments later did you call out with a sharp moan as you felt an intense orgasm ripping through your body.

Slowly, Vergil rode out both your orgasms. Gently, he removed your legs from his shoulders and pulled out of your body. You gazed into space for a moment before leaning up slightly to see Vergil, confused as to why he hadn’t said anything.

You audibly swallowed as you stared at him, “Y-you’re that pent up, huh?”

Vergil shamefully met your eyes. He was still hard and had scales on several other spots on his body. The thoughts of allowing himself to cut loose, to show you his inner urges without a filter made him both unfathomably terrified and overwhelmingly aroused. This was bad and he knew it, and seeing you so blissfully unaware of the danger you were in only tempted him further.

“Vergil,” you sat up fully a small grunt leaving your lips at the dull pain from being slammed so hard, “You alright?”

His lips thinned as he furrowed his brow, avoiding your gaze once more, “I am fine; however, I…” He paused, unable to finish his sentence.

“We could try it out, you know,” you gave him a meek smile as his eyes flicked to yours.

He shook his head ‘no’, “I can’t risk hurting you for something so trivial.”

“This is obviously not ‘trivial’. You never have this issue-- not to mention how different you’ve been acting,” you reached out to grab one of his hands, “What’s wrong, Vergil? You can tell me; I promise I won’t judge or get upset.”

The blue devil intently watched as you ran your thumb over his knuckles, “Fine…” He moved to sit beside you on the bed, staring straight ahead, “You know what an animal in “rut” means, correct?”

You nodded, “Yeah,” your eyes thinned as you slowly turned to him, “Vergil, you don’t mean--?”

“I should’ve told you before we…” he sighed with his shoulders tensing, “Because you and I became intimately involved, I now will go through this every spring,” he looked over to you, momentarily locking with your stare, “and you are the only one that can give me… relief .”

With a slow nod and deep breath, your eyes flicked between his hard-on and his gaze, “Guess I didn’t provide enough “relief”, huh?”

He gave you a small smile, “I’m afraid it’s not something that will be able to be soothed with only a round or two or even three, my love.”

You moved your jaw in thought and stood up. Sighing softly, you moved Vergil’s arms off to his sides and sat on his lap. You placed one hand on his chest and used the other to push a strand of hair out of his eyes, resting the hand on his cheek afterward. A loud purring emanated from his chest, vibrating your fingers, as you stared softly into his icy-blue eyes, “I love you so much Vergil; you know that?”

The blue devil smiled, “I do,” he leaned closer to you, placing his forehead against yours, speaking in a breathy whisper; his breath ghosting along your lips, “I love you as well; more than words could ever describe.”

The two of you connected lips and the hand that was on Vergil’s chest slid up to his face; allowing you to cup it between your hands. Vergil took his hands and ran them down your sides and then settled to hold your lower back as he continued to give you sloppy sweet kisses, gently pushing his mouth against you.

Cautiously, Vergil bit at your lips to ask for permission to enter your mouth; which you accepted. He let out an unintentional elated moan at the feeling of your tongue with his. His fingertips dug into your skin, pressing and kneading against you in excitement. With a lustful aggressiveness, Vergil pushed you onto your back--down onto the floor of the bedroom.

Making sure to maintain the kiss, Vergil shifted the both of you around so he could line himself up with your hole. Slowly, he slid back inside and devoured each of the divine noises that you made in response. That thought made him growl slightly; he wants to defile you over and over, to hold you for as long as you will allow him to.

Only once he was fully within you did he break off the kiss and allow you to take a deep breath. He held himself up with his arms, looking down at your breathless form. A prideful smug smile tugged at his lips as he began to move slightly, grinding himself into you. It didn't take long for him to reach a moderate pace. You reached up and ran your hands along his body, feeling each divot, each curve, each soft and hard surface; taking notes to yourself as if you hadn’t ever been allowed to touch him before. His heart was pounding so fast that you could feel it no matter where your hands were.

The blue devil’s mind was reeling. He was so engrossed in how good you feel that he hadn’t noticed how hard he was slamming into you, pushing you along the floor with each pass of his hips. His growling had returned, albeit tenfold louder and a great deal more animalistic; completely replacing his moans.

Although you know Vergil has issues with you touching his back, you were too immersed in the moment and wrapped your arms around him. One of your hands found its way to the back of Vergil’s head, threading your fingers tightly into his hair. You did your best to try and wrap your legs around him too; hoping to prevent him from shoving you along the floor any further.

He did stop for a moment, only to take the opportunity to pick you up and slam you against one of the walls of the room; knocking several things from their hanging spots. A sharp moan left your lips as you felt his nails aggressively dig into the sides of your thighs. Vergil placed his mouth at the crook of your shoulder and nipped at the skin, leaving various marks.

You let out a slight hiss as he got a little too close to one of the deeper marks from earlier; in a way to seemingly apologize, he gently licked at your neck. He then leaned back and looked at you for a moment, letting out a set of shaky breaths. Vergil connected lips with you as you slid both hands into his hair; grabbing fistfuls of the silky white strands. His kisses were aggressive, pushing your head against the wall. Your body tensed, legs tightening around him, you were getting close--and so was he.

Quick jack-rabbit thrusts replaced his previous tempo. His wandering grip continued as he slammed your hips down into his, moving your body in a harsh rhythm with his. The two of you parted lips allowing you to throw your head back--at least the best you could being against a wall--and Vergil placed kisses on your windpipe.

The blue devil placed his head on your shoulder as he focused on fucking you. It didn’t take long for him to reach nirvana, spilling himself inside you with a low sustained frustrated growl. You reached your peak as well; cumming with a low grunt and gentle groan of Vergil’s name.

He ground against you and let out gentle shuddering breaths against your neck, giving you slight goosebumps. Without removing himself, he carried you back over to the bed and laid you down. Propped upwards using his hands, he stared down at you. Vergil was breathing heavily with a hung-open mouth and had a layer of sweat on his brow. More scales had appeared and his stare was oddly blank, as if he were lost in deep thought. You watched as he used his tongue to play with one of his canines and his brow twitched into a slightly agitated state.

“Vergil?” You weakly grabbed one of his biceps, giving it a light squeeze, “Is everything okay?”

A set of quick blinks brought his eyes back into focus, accompanied by a shake of his head, “Yes, I am alright--sorry.”

After a pause, he leaned up and gradually removed himself. A shiver ran up your spine at the feeling and you stared up at the ceiling for a moment before tilting up to look at the blue devil.

“Oh…” You gave him a dumbfounded stare. He was still hard, cock twitching at your surprise.

Once you looked up at Vergil’s face, you saw that he had crossed his arms with one hand over his face; mortified and ashamed of what was happening.

With an awkward laugh, you took a deep breath, “So, how many rounds do you need, again?”

Vergil’s eyes slowly met with yours as he shook his head, whispering, “I’m… unsure.”

You scrunched your mouth to the side, “What about trying to use your “Trigger”? You seem even worse off than earlier, Vergil.”

He removed his hand from his face and shot you a stern glance, “No, I can’t risk hurting you--”

“Vergil, if you keep this up, you will hurt me,” you grunted in slight pain as you sat up fully, “I can only take so much,” you laughed slightly, placing a hand on the back of your neck, “Especially with how rough you’re being.”

The blue devil thought for a moment, his tongue playing with his teeth. A part of him knew you were right, that if this continued there was a very high chance he would hurt you, and he really loved the idea of allowing himself to let go--to show you what he could really do. Still, the sheer amount of uncontrollable possibilities kept him hesitant.

What if you don’t like it and he’s too far gone to stop?

What if he manhandles you too hard and breaks something--either something in the room or, more importantly, you?

What if he hit you against the wall or floor too hard and hurt you?

What if he bit you and couldn’t stop himself from sinking his teeth in too far?

What if you died because of him and his stupid demonic instincts?

“Vergil..?”

He flinched at your sudden closeness. You’d gotten up and were standing in front of him, concerned that he was standing silently for so long. With one hand on his bicep and the other cupping his face, you made small circles with your thumbs. His eyes fluttered shut and he leaned towards you, placing his forehead against yours.

The two of you shared a very sweet and emotionally soft kiss, drawing it out for quite some time.

With lips just above his, you quietly pleaded, “You can do whatever you need to, Vergil; it’ll be okay.”

Vergil swallowed hard. With one final squeeze of his arm, you let go of him. His eyes flicked all over your body as he gave it one final thought. Taking a deep breath, he nodded; he had to try it.

All he could hear was the loud pounding of his heart as he allowed himself to Trigger. Soft cornflower blue light filled the space. You smiled at the sight before you. It wasn’t very often you got to see Vergil use either of his Devil Triggers; his normal Trigger being a much rarer sight.

Under his breath, he let out a soft chuckle at your doting stare. Although he’s never told you, he finds it amusing that you’re so enamored with his devilish forms. He unfurled his wings from his sides and mindlessly stretched them outwards before bringing them back in close to his body. Pride pricked at his heart as he saw your expression of such a trivial act.

Cautiously, you approached him and reached out to touch his chest. This was the first time Vergil had allowed you to be anywhere near him while in a non-human state. His scales were hot to the touch, but not painfully more along the lines of freshly dried linen or hot asphalt. Through your fingers, you could feel a low rumble coming from within his chest.

With a slight shake, Vergil placed a hand over yours and locked eyes with you. Uneven breaths left his lips as he waited for you to say something-- anything.

You smiled softly and inched closer, placing your head on his chest, “You are so beautiful, you know that?”

A noise somewhere between a scoff and a laugh left his nose, “That’s not what one should say when face-to-face with a devil.” Vergil wrapped his arms loosely around you.

“I’m not just face-to-face with “ a devil”,” you smiled wider and looked up at him, “I’m face-to-face with m-my…” you stumbled over your words as an embarrassed shade spread across your face, your confidence quickly dissipating.

“Your what?” He tilted his head in curiosity, wanting nothing more than to hear you say it.

With a voice no louder than a whisper you looked away from his eyes, “with my mate.”

He stared with parted lips before giving a small smile, “How strange to hear you say that,” Vergil leaned down to you, whispering, “Are you sure this is alright?”

Without answering, you connected your lips to his. Your hands slid up to the base of his neck on either side, gently scraping your nails on his scales as you went along. His arms tightened to pull you closer, placing one at the small of your back and the other on your ass. Slow careful kisses turned to sloppy impassioned French kisses. Vergil's tongue desperately felt the inside of your mouth, now being able to reach even further inside. You let out a surprised grunt at the feeling but were quickly distracted by a harsh groping motion against your ass.

Once you broke apart, the two of you stood staring at one another. Curious as to what he’d do, you ran your hands slowly down his torso. The heat coming from his body was unbelievable but his lower abdomen was tenfold worse. Distantly you found yourself worried if his cock would be too hot for your body to take in. As your fingers worked their way down, you took note of the texture changes between his chest, stomach, and the bright blue V that pointed to where you were headed.

Gently, you rubbed your fingertips up and down the glowing area, earning a stifled groan from Vergil. Curiously enough, you were expecting the area to feel akin to the rest of his scales--hard and rough--but were greeted by a warm velvety silk feeling. As you kneaded against him, he pulled you into another set of passionate kisses. The hand from your lower back traveled up your spine and braced the back of your neck, pulling you as close to him as possible.

Mindlessly, he leaned forward and dipped you back slightly. He broke from your mouth and kissed the corner of your mouth. Bit by bit, he kissed along your jawline, to your neck, and finally your throat. All the while, your fingers continued to their original destination. Carefully, you teased the area around his still-hidden cock and lightly ran your middle finger along his slit. Vergil’s breath hitched and he stopped his kisses, his breath washing over your skin.

A sultry smirk tugged at your mouth as you felt his tip begin to emerge. Vergil’s wings uncontrollably flexed outwards at the odd feeling, much to the blue devil’s surprise--and slight dismay. He’d never thought about trying anything even remotely sexual while like this, so the feeling of your fingers kneading against him made him feel as if he were a virgin again; feeling overwhelmed by nothing but the slightest of your touches.

You slowly ran his tip between your fore and middle fingers, feeling pre-cum dripping onto your digits. His cock was pleasantly warmer than normal, eliciting a small groan from you as you thought about him being inside you. The cum that decorated your fingers was also hotter than normal and seemed to be much thicker. The blue devil took a deep breath and shifted slightly, his wings curling around the two of you. In an almost painfully slow motion, Vergil ran his tongue along your neck, small papillae scrapping the sensitive area. He let out a shaky breath as you stroked along the sheath where his cock was, making his cock appear much faster than intended.

Before you managed to have him fully out, Vergil picked you up and placed you onto the mattress. He placed both his hands beside either side of your head, still standing, and his wings outstretched behind him. You stared up at him as a small shiver ran up your spine at the sight. Vergil’s eyes were dilated heavily and were fixated on yours. A part of you knows you should be afraid or at least apprehensive about what is happening, but you couldn’t be bothered; you were much too invested in the moment.

A wicked grin adorned his face, teeth on full display, “You really want me, don’t you?”

“And if I do?”

“Hmph,” the blue devil leaned back up and pulled your hips to the edge of the bed.

With slow long pumps, he touched himself to the sight of you. However, when you tried to lean up to see, he quickly pushed you flat.

“Did I tell you to move?” His voice was utterly layered with an overwhelming dominance.

Your gut churned and twisted as you waited with bated breath for him to ram your body, except, the blue devil knew he had to be careful with you. Although it was seen as a dominating move, Vergil laying you back was done to keep you calm. If you’d seen him fully erect, you would’ve tensed up tenfold worse and this would’ve been much more difficult than it already will be.

He grabbed the lube from the nearby table and coated his cock. Whatever excess was on his hand, he very carefully put it at your entrance--making sure his claws didn’t knick you. After a small debate, he dragged you a bit closer and put your ankles on his shoulders, aligning himself with your hole.

“Relax,” he placed a hand on your stomach, skin dipping down slightly from the tips of his claws, “Just focus on your breathing.”

You pursed your lips and stared mindlessly at the ceiling, doing just as he said and taking deep calm breaths, trying to keep yourself from tensing.

Vergil pushed his tip in, earning a gasp and deep grunting moan from you. Bit by bit, he continued to push inside, doing his best to fight the urge to slam against you. You were gripping the bed, pulling on the already decimated sheets. The size of Vergil’s cock normally is something that would make most men green with envy but the size he was working with now was nothing short of “porn star” material.

His hand that was on your gut slid up to your chest as he leaned down into you, causing him to push inside quicker than intended. Doing his best to not cut you with his claws, Vergil groped at your pecs and lightly kneaded against you. Low in his chest, he was emitting a purr that was intense enough that you could feel it through his hand.

After what seemed like an eternity, he was fully seated within you. Heavy deep lust laden breaths left your agape lips as the blue devil closed his eyes, focusing on the feeling of your innards snuggly squeezing around him. Vergil could feel your rapid heartbeat and could practically taste your arousal; being able to smell human pheromones just like a human can a fresh baked bread, sometimes being strong enough to give a taste to the air. It made his body ache, giving him a strong sense of pride to know that you were just as madly into him as he is you.

You placed a hand atop the charcoal-grey scaled hand on your chest, “Vergil…”

The two of you locked eyes and Vergil leaned down to you. Gently, he kissed you. It was a physical manifestation of a promise; a promise that he will take good care of you. The black and blue scaled devil tilted back upright, his fingers lightly clawing up your middle sliding to rest on each side of your hips. With slow careful--almost fearful--motion, he began to test what you thought of his devilish body. A string of low groans left your lips as you closed your eyes, focusing on the feeling of his cock. Your chest was moving in an almost exaggerated manner as Vergil slowly ramped things up. The unhurried nature of his movements allowed you to feel each rib of his cock, feeling every time one would leave and re-enter your aching hole.

In an elongated teasing manner, Vergil removed himself out to his tip and pushed back in--making sure you felt every bit of him and savored him. He closed his eyes, doing his best to keep a level head as he intently listened to the breathy moans leaving your lips.

Once more, he removed himself out to the tip; this time, however, he slammed back inside. A sharp mixed noise of a grunt, moan, and gasp came from you. His eyes opened as he repeated the action; making sure to remove himself slower than before and return twice as hard.

Your back arched at his actions, eyes focused on the ceiling above you. When you looked back at Vergil, his eyes were trained on yours with an unplaceable emotion hidden behind his gaze. His emotion became clear when he harshly pulled out and slammed his hips against you; no longer feeling the need to hold back.

With each thrust, you were pushed up on the bed and his hands would yank you back down to meet the brutal bucking of his hips. All that could be heard was the sound of his hips hitting yours and the wet squelching from the previous rounds and copious amounts of lube in your ass. Concentrating on your expression, Vergil failed to notice that his claws had sunk into your skin which anchored his grip into you. Leaning down, he placed his face in the crook of your shoulder; kissing you carefully.

After a moment, he leaned back up slightly to place his nose beside yours. You placed a hand on his cheek, thumbing over the leathery skin. Your pinkie mindlessly ran along the silver spikes that formed a beard of sorts at his jawline, curious as to what it felt like. He leaned into your touch and, despite him still jackhammering away, he felt a warm sweet feeling at your overly gentle treatment of him.

“Grab onto me,” Vergil whispered, his voice thick with lust and uncharacteristically gruff.

You did as he asked, wrapping your hands around the backside of his neck. Vergil picked you up and wrapped his wings around you, pushing you tightly against him. A small hiss slipped through your lips at the feeling of your dick rubbing against Vergil’s torso. It didn’t hurt per se but it was extremely overwhelming. Your nails dug into his scales, tears pricking at the corners of your eyes.

Seeming to notice your distress, the blue devil began to lightly lick and nip at your neck and throat. He took a long deep inhale of your scent, pressing his chest against yours, desiring to get closer to you than possible. As he exhaled, you felt his hot breath wash over you and tickle at your skin causing you to let out a restrained laugh.

With a hum, Vergil slowed slightly and took a moment to enjoy the closeness of your bodies. The feeling of your soft human skin against his scales made his gut twist. A distant hidden part of him felt an odd arousal from the idea of how fragile you were--how he could crush you instantly if he wanted; completely contradicting his main anxious mindset.

Moving your hand to his chest, you pushed him away, confusing Vergil for a moment, before you cupped his face and pulled him into a kiss. Lazy sloppy kisses caused him to let out a small moan, which intensified at the feeling of you repeatedly biting at his lower lip. His thrusts switched to a moderate pace as his fingertips kneaded against you. As you pulled away, he let out a disappointed huff, which was quickly replaced with a dark low gravely moan.

Despite not being able to break his hide, you leaned down and bit his neck; at a somewhat odd angle because of the horns that wrapped around to the front of his head. It is rare for Vergil to allow you to bite him, however, feeling you claim him--just as he did you--made his body ache. After a moment, you stopped and placed a soft kiss against him. You repeated the action on the other side of his neck, Once done, you trailed kisses along his neck to his throat and placed an elongated kiss against his Adam’s apple. Vergil let out a small grunt at the feeling and, when you tilted back, you were met with heavy half-lidded eyes.

The blue devil nudged you to expose your neck and placed his face in the crook of your shoulder, breathing heavily, “I love you.”

Without allowing you to respond, he pushed your hips downwards and fucked into you as quickly as possible. A loud groan left your lips at the inhuman speed of Vergil’s cock and you grasped at whatever you could, causing Vergil to let out a surprised huffed moan at your unexpectedly rough touches. His claws left the new loving craters in your thighs and slid to your ass, pulling you apart.

Before you could question, your eyes went wide. The blue devil pushed his knot inside you, somewhat forcefully, as he let out a thunderous semi-whiney shaky moan. Once buried into you, his hands returned to your hips and his claws to the same holes as before.

You let out a whimpering moan as you hit another peak, feeling his cum gush inside you. He hadn’t disclosed anything about a knot or that he was going to use it inside you, but you weren’t complaining. It felt as if he’d been pent up for a year with how quickly and how much was being released.

It was both a painful and heavenly experience.

All the while, Vergil could only continue to repeat your name and whisper how much he loves you; almost as if he were begging for you to say it back, as if you weren’t already committed to him. With a soft kiss against his horn closest to your mouth, you whispered, “I love you,” which caused him to grind against you, attempting to further spear you than he had already.

Unsure what to do now you were stuck together, Vergil laid you back down and laid atop you. His wings were stretched out flat and his forearms were wrapped around your torso, across your shoulder blades. With his face directly down onto your chest, his eyes fluttered shut and he purred loudly. Although you wanted nothing to do but lie still, curiosity got the better of you, and you ran a hand along his horns which made him purr tenfold louder.

Admittedly, Vergil wanted to stay as you were, interlocked and him pinning you down; but he also wanted to patch you up. You could feel how fast his heart was beating; whether it was from fucking, cumming, or nerves was anyone’s guess. All you could do was lay there and take it while listening to his breathing and purring. The two of you stayed interwoven for nearly ten minutes, Vergil shifting several times in an attempt to remove himself.

Finally, he stopped twitching. He stood back up and carefully slid out which was accompanied by an audible pop and your hips quivering. Vergil’s chest heaved as he de-triggered. Beyond tired, he returned to the same position as before and laid against your chest.

“Vergil?” Your voice was raspy and very overtly worn out.

Without moving, he spoke against your skin, “Yes, my love?”

You placed a hand in his hair, running your fingers through the utterly disheveled white strands, “How do you feel?”

He quietly laughed, “I am calm, for now; if that is what you are asking.”

With a heavy exhale you hummed a sound of relief.

“How are you feeling?”

“Want me to be honest?”

“Mhm.”

“Like I was just in a category five hurricane.”

“I’m sorry,” he placed a kiss against your breastbone, “Is there anything I can do to make up for it?”

Lightly, you ran your fingers down his neck to his shoulder blades, sliding up his arm, “Help me get into the bath?”

Vergil smiled, “Of course, my dear,” he shifted upwards and placed a kiss against your lips, “Anything for my mate.”

===

ENDING NOTES: Originally I had planned to also have Sin Trigger sex in this but I thought that would be a bit too much to digest from one story; plus “Bed of the Blue Devil” is entirely based on that aspect. Also between the teaser from yesterday (early this morning) and now; I found out that I have the ‘rona so… Life is really great--it’s just one thing after another, I finally wanna write and do stuff but now I’m exhausted and feel like someone beat my skull in with a sledgehammer 🦢💧🦢 Poem Quoted: “Love’s Philosophy” Percy Bysshe Shelley

If you like this please consider checking this on my AO3. There are extra chapters and my H/Cs over there, so please consider checking them out! Comments, Likes/Kudos, and shares are always appreciated! Thanks so much for reading!! :)))

MASTER LIST FOR TUMBLR

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seyaryminamoto · 5 months

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hello! I really like your meta about Zuko, and I'm so glad that I finally found a person who also thinks that Zuko in book 3 is a much worse person than he was in the book 1. I always thought that something was wrong with me, since literally no one sees this obvious fact for me! But I would like to ask you: What do you think about Katara in book 3? the fact is that she was my favorite character in books 1 and 2, and the way she was written in book 3 upset me a lot. it seems to me that they spoiled her character, but I can't explain why. Please share your thoughts!

Glad you've enjoyed my extensive meta on the fandom's fave, haha. I did write a lot about him, always nice to know my thoughts on the subject are still deemed relevant.

As for Katara... well, I have thoughts on her, too. My experience with her character is quite similar to yours, I'd say, because I too felt a lot better about her character in the first two seasons of the show compared with the third. I don't usually give this a ton of thought, but after your ask, I figured I'd try and figure out what exactly went down with her that made people like us feel so uncomfortable with Katara's portrayal at multiple points of Book 3...

For starters, I'll say I vibed with Katara a lot when I started the show for reasons beyond her being a great character or being written wonderfully: she could very well have been written mediocrely and I would have loved her anyway simply because I ran away from anime to ATLA in an era where anime kept shoehorning incest undertones into every sibling relationship, even in shows that didn't have that as a core subject. It happened at least twice that I can remember, I kept seeing people raving about shows where it WAS the core of it (I still do not understand the Oreimo deal, like, the minute I read that show's title I puked in my mouth and knew I'd never watch it), and I just needed... safety from that concept, I guess?

So when I went into ATLA, and the first sibling relationship you're exposed to is Sokka and Katara, two siblings who very much act like siblings? I was thriving. It was thrilling. I felt so refreshed that I think I didn't care much about the flaws of Book 1, despite my inability to sense direction for most of it, because thank the universe, it was a sibling relationship that made sense to me!

With that as an opening, I'd say that, initially, I thought Katara was fine for most of Book 1. In Book 2? She fell off the radar for me a bit simply because other characters are introduced that just appeal to me so much more than she does. I vibe better with characters like Azula, who tend to be the type of female character I just LOVE, and with characters like Toph, she's a tomboy, I was a tomboy (... was? x'D maybe I shouldn't use past tense...), so I gravitated much more towards those two by no real fault of Katara's core personality traits. Back in Book 1, there aren't as many main characters, so you don't have a lot of variety to choose faves from. It's not that strange, I think, that once the cast broadens, people's interest in certain characters can scatter too.

But then Book 3 happened, and I just couldn't enjoy Katara outside of episodes where she wasn't that important. The Katara-centric episode of Book 3 stand among my least favorite episodes of ATLA altogether, and among the least likely episodes I'd ever want to rewatch. I literally skipped over The Painted Lady in my first rewatches of the show, every bit as much as I skipped The Great Divide or Avatar Day, both of which annoy me a lot in the first two seasons. The Puppetmaster? Not even close to being an episode I could enjoy. Even the Runaway, that's supposed to be Toph-centric, ends up making me count down the minutes for it to end and I'm not even going to get started on The Southern Raiders and the absolute can of worms that episode is...

So, with all this being said, if we peel this particular cabbage open little by little...

After mulling it over, I've grown to suspect that Katara has major inconsistency issues since day one that most people don't particularly like to acknowledge, and that flew over most of our heads from the beginning of the show. She's pretty much portrayed to us as an empath, someone who has so much heart that she can't help but feel everyone's pain and suffer with them all the time. The fandom 100% acts like that's who she is (while also obsessively adultifying her unnecessarily, and forcing her into the mom!friend role, which... we'll talk about that later)

But this is also the same character who, when her brother banished Aang from the Southern Water Tribe as early as in episode 2, protested in a very particular way once Aang was gone. Which one of these statements sound more accurate to Katara's character, and a suitable protest for her to proclaim upon witnessing this injustice against Aang?

"Aang is alone! How could you send him away on his own? He could be in danger, Sokka! He's just a kid!"

"The Air Nomads are gone, Sokka! Where do you think he'll go? He doesn't have a home to go back to and you just sent him away!"

"You happy now? There goes my one chance at becoming a waterbender!"

If you ask the fandom? They'll most likely think that her reaction was either #1 or #2.

Surprise surprise: it was actually #3

I'm not saying she didn't show empathy towards Aang while Sokka was ranting at him, because she did. I'm not saying she wasn't willing to be banished along with Aang until Sokka asks if she'd choose pretty much a total stranger over their family and tribe, because she was. She absolutely did all those things.

... So why would she focus only on how he represented her one chance at becoming a waterbender once Aang is gone?

This feels off to me. I've never particularly liked that line. And you could absolutely say that Katara has every right to be mad at losing her chance to reclaim an aspect of her culture that she cannot connect to, but the way it was framed here? It absolutely makes Katara look more selfish than she actually was. The wording is not good. The show doesn't emphasize, at this point, that bending is such a core and crucial part of their culture and that Katara feels a major responsibility in being the ONLY person in the South Pole that can keep it alive. So it just comes off as a child's tantrum. Sokka's concerns were 100% valid too, even if he went about them while being a jerk (he is, indeed, an older brother...). He wasn't even wrong in the end about how dangerous Aang was to their tribe, since Aang's mishap with Katara on the ship gives away his position to Zuko, and it results in Zuko ramming a huge ship into their home and nearly killing people in the process. But you DON'T see the show fully framing it as though Katara and Aang did something wrong -- it was an honest mistake. We know it was. Sokka is framed as unreasonable for being so paranoid even though later events in the very episode prove he wasn't.

And that's... the crux of the issue with Katara's writing. If you ask me.

There are far too many instances where Katara makes mistakes that she's not held accountable for, that she doesn't apologize for, that run against the core logic and principles of her character and they either get shrugged off or overlooked. There are far too many situations where she acts out, and is a jerk at her jerk of a brother, even unprompted on occasion, and it's supposed to just be funny. One particularly stood out to me when I revisited it a few years ago, I can't really remember what for (maybe when I was writing Jeong Jeong's arc in Gladiator and I had a look at the fishing village...?), but it's the famous flashback episode in Book 1: The Storm.

The scene in question is... humorous. Supposedly. Katara is trying to buy fruit in the market but then realizes they have no money to pay for it. Not only does Katara piss off the vendor, but the vendor actually takes her rage out on Sokka once she realizes these kids won't give her any business: he gets kicked in the rear, as the transcript's description says. No one protests the woman's violent reaction, not even Sokka. Katara most certainly doesn't do it. But that's not all there is to it: Sokka doesn't hold what happened with the fruit vendor against Katara, they have a conversation on how they have no money and no food... and Katara offers him the golden ticket solution to their problems:

"You could get a job, smart guy."

Am I too feminist for thinking it's insane that Katara expects her brother alone to get the job? That she's not saying the THREE of them should get jobs? She and Aang are BENDERS! That's an asset most people aren't likely to find in any would-be employees in the central Earth Kingdom! So... wouldn't it be logical for all of them to do it? But no, instead, Sokka alone has to get the job?

And yes, I know, Sokka is the provider, Sokka is the protector, Sokka would do ANYTHING for his sister and the people he loves: you ask the fandom, though, and that's Katara instead of him. Moments like these simply do not exist in the fandom's eyes and, if they do, they're just excusable because Sokka is boring/weird/annoying/insert-demeaning-nonsense-here and Katara is a queen who can do whatever she wants.

Then, the consequences arrive once Sokka gets a dangerous job on a fishing boat and nearly gets killed in a storm. Aang is the one who shows concern about the potential storm when the fisherman's wife brings it up: from all I can see in the transcript, there's nothing from Katara. Sokka says they told him to get a job, so that's what he's doing, and there's no manifestation of concern from either of them about maybe joining him on this fishing trip to ensure he's safe. Instead, Aang is haunted by his past and Katara goes with him when he leaves, which, yes, is very important for context on the Air Nomads and Aang's life... and yet we don't really NEED for this scene to be Katara and Aang only. It could've included Sokka too. The plot of the second half of the episode would change? Likely. They could've come up with another idea, and not shown us a Katara who doesn't show concern for her brother's safety or any remorse when her unfair demands or expectations from him could result in catastrophic outcomes :') yes, she worries about Sokka's safety once the storm hits, but there's no sign of her feeling responsible for Sokka being out in the storm at all. No apology. Which is ironic, because Zuko apologizes to Iroh in that very same episode, hence, an apology from Katara to her brother could have mirrored that side of the story well, and they REALLY loved doing Zuko-Gaang parallel scenes like that, so it would have fit perfectly! Didn't happen, though.

Point being... Katara's compassion and empathy are not absolute. It's important to keep in mind is that they don't need to be! But precisely because she falters with them in moments where she REALLY shouldn't, with people as important to her as her own brother? It becomes very difficult to believe that she's the empath the fandom is convinced she is, and that the show's narrative tries to push her as.

The real reason why her failure to show compassion to Sokka in "humorous" situations feels so unnerving isn't because she's a typical little sister who takes her brother for granted (which is a perfectly logical/believable behavior!): it's because there are no consequences for it. Maybe at some point or another there were? But I for one can't remember many instances where Katara failed Sokka and it was framed as her fault and her responsibility. Let's look at other Book 1 instances that exemplify what I mean:

She freezes him to the deck of Zuko's ship, which puts Sokka in MAJOR danger, and she just tells him to hurry up as if it weren't her fault that he's frozen in the first place. We don't even see her making efforts to thaw him out of there when she IS the waterbender so it seems logical that she should be able to help with that (and if she's too inexperienced to do it? The least she can do to help her brother out of a dangerous situation is to TRY???). But apparently it's funny that she doesn't help him when it's her fault! So this is fine!

She endangers the entire group over the waterbending scroll, which, of course, the pirates had no right to have anyway and it's reasonable that she'd want it for herself... but she antagonized a group of fully adult, dangerous, potential murderous pirates, against Sokka's constant warnings that they shouldn't pick that particular fight. As far as I can remember? Her apologies on that episode are exclusively about how she hurt Aang's feelings by being jealous over his greater talents as a bender. Basically, nothing for Sokka, no apology for not listening to him about danger, making it worse when the very final moment features Katara proudly telling her brother that she won't steal things... unless it's from pirates. So lesson not learned because it's funny, again, to never acknowledge that Sokka has a point.

She actually cares about Sokka's fate in Jet! But the thing is... the narrative doesn't frame that as Katara's fault. Because it's not. Jet made his choices and he did awful things and he captured Sokka, lied and gaslit everyone, because he had a goal to fulfill and he used Katara to make that happen. As angry and upset as Katara is, it's not exactly shown that Katara is sorry for having trusted Jet when Sokka could have ended up paying a deadly price for it. She's angry at the betrayal, even in Book 2 it's constantly framed as though Katara is upset at him as an ex-girlfriend would be upset at her ex-boyfriend for lying to her rather than, you know, being pissed at him for nearly killing her brother + an entire village. My point is, the narrative framing never holds her responsible for Jet's choices. Which, again, she's not. But she IS responsible for her own choices... and one of those choices was disregarding Sokka's warnings about Jet. THAT was her fault, and her responsibility. She jumped to conclusions and assumed that Sokka was bitter and jealous that Jet was the charming cool leader Sokka could never be. There were no apologies to Sokka over that, either.

I could go on, and on, and on. The truth is, I bring all this up to show with solid evidence that Katara's writing was always a little... unstable. Weird. Disconnected from logic in many regards, I'd say. It's not logical/compatible to tell us that this character has the BIGGEST heart of the entire cast when she fails to show that heart to none other than her own brother, who is inarguably the person who she knows best and with whom she should share the closest relationship, even as her friendship with Aang grows and thrives. That makes no sense, thematically speaking.

Is it meant to be comedic? Yes, every bit as much as Iroh sexually harassing June was done for comedy's sake. That's not an excuse for characters behaving in ways that are thematically contrary to what they're supposed to be portraying... and along with that? No excuse for them facing zero consequences for that behavior. Which is, in fact, my main issue with these flaws from Katara: I have no issue with the writing choices in the scenes I listed just now! I take issue, however, with the lack of follow-up and consequences that you can BET, 100%, would have befallen Sokka if it had been him instead of Katara acting that way. He faced consequences even for things he didn't do, for comedy's sake: he wouldn't have gotten away with disregarding Katara's safety as often as Katara did with him, no chance at all.

Ultimately, these scenes in Book 1 are kind of ignorable in the larger scheme of things (or at least, that's how the fandom has always acted). Not a lot of people take any of this as major proof of characterization for Katara. You won't see a lot of fic writers showing her acting like this. Canon, though, often would go down this route for funsies, and the comics certainly did it plenty too, that I can remember. Part of the issue here is that, as funny as it is, it also makes Katara feel stale as a character, as does the Sokka-Katara dynamic, at large, because there's no progression for it. That's probably my greatest gripe with the Great Divide, believe it or not: it fakes being an episode where Sokka and Katara are going to be confronted over their conflictive tendencies, and the ONLY potential development in that basically-filler episode SHOULD HAVE BEEN Sokka and Katara learning to be a bit more harmonious and respectful of each other? ... And that's just not what happened at all. The status quo remains exactly the same after that episode, and it continues to be like that until the end of the show.

The real reason why Sokka and Katara are deemed the healthy siblings is because, of course, compared with the other main set of siblings in the show, these two appear to get along wonderfully. But the truth is, their relationship is not as dynamic as it deserved to be. And that's part of why Book 3 ends up failing in ways Book 1 might not have, while having similar flaws: Book 1 is when you're still getting to know these kids, and that's why I find its flaws far more forgivable than anything that comes later. When there's basically no development for that connection at all, Book 3 winds up falling flat with characters like Sokka and Katara and the bond between them.

All this being said... I'm not saying that Katara is terrible in Book 1. I still stand by the fact that I really enjoyed her character in many instances of this season, there absolutely are situations where she sasses Sokka that still make me crack a smile, and genuinely humorous situations that don't paint her in a questionable light over her lack of concern for her brother's safety. Her fight to earn the right to be trained as a waterbender is deeeeeply flawed but it's not her fault, it's more the misogyny of the writers/creators that decided that a betrothal necklace from his past would make Pakku unlearn all his sexism and get over his bullshit right after beating up a girl who was fighting tooth and nail to make him acknowledge her. That he only acknowledges her because he wanted to marry her grandmother is... uh... fuckboi behavior even when he's well over 70 years of age? XD

So, yeah, Book 1 still has my favorite Katara of the entire show even though I REALLY wish she wouldn't get away with things that other characters wouldn't get a pass for (... well... other than Zuko...). I can't enjoy her as much as I enjoy other characters because I really don't like it when characters aren't held accountable for serious mistakes they made.

Moving on to Book 2, though, and leaving behind my greatest gripe with Katara's Book 1 writing (lack of direct consequences/self-reflection on her part), Book 2's biggest sin when it comes to Katara is the beginning of the "mothering" trope. I honestly did not feel motherly vibes from Katara towards anyone in Book 1. Sokka is very often the one playing the responsible role, while Aang and Katara are seeing the world, practicing their bending, doing reckless and fun things. The entire thing about Katara being the mom friend started in Book 2 when she suddenly becomes the epitome of responsibility (well... kinda) when Toph joins the group. She still does sketchy stuff with zero consequences (I'll forever complain about how ice is not cold in this show, the kids she froze to the wall may have been dicks, but freezing someone alive that way should have resulted in serious health repercussions, just as ANY case of freezing someone alive should have, ffs, be it Zuko in Book 1's finale or Azula + Katara in Book 3's...), but once Toph is part of the group, she becomes the cool girl who's "one of the boys", and now Katara is "the mom". This dynamic gets forced into the story pretty much right after Toph joins the group. And after that? It doesn't really change for the better often. There are only a handful of instances where Katara wasn't acting wholesome and comforting and kind and compassionate in Book 2 (... particularly with Sokka, ofc), but the point where her dynamics, even with Aang, start to feel motherly is definitely Book 2.

And this adds to the issue, in the end: Katara's appeal as the main girl in the show is suddenly gone because Toph is here, and she's a way more unique character that the writers definitely were having fun working with, probably more fun than they had with Katara. So they had to find a new niche for her, I'd dare guess. Thus, instead of actually building up an awesome and solid friendship between Katara and Toph, they mostly just clash and collide. Toph is basically the ONLY character who gives Katara grief and isn't framed as in the wrong for it, which is its own set of issues (namely, Toph not being challenged enough by the narrative, which stunts her character growth), but among many things, we suddenly get shown that Katara is a girly girl who likes makeup and she ropes Toph into this when nothing we've seen so far suggests that Toph would be comfortable with that. Katara pushes her into doing things because they're the "girls of the group"... and it doesn't often look like Toph's feelings on anything are important when Katara is pushing her around for whatever purpose. I'm not saying Toph hated the spa day, she certainly had fun eventually, but even when the comics made a "Katara and Toph's day out" story, where Toph got to choose what to do for once, the story devolved into Katara's show anyway, and things concluded with Toph deciding they're better off doing girly things together when they want to hang out because Katara is just too intense for the things Toph would like to do.

This isn't even in the show, but it's basically a response to Tales of Ba Sing Se to try and even out Katara and Toph's one-sided dynamic, where Katara calls the shots of their entertainment... and even then, Toph doesn't really get what she's looking for. But Katara does get that out of Toph because all she wants is a girl to do girly things with and Toph provides that in the end, no matter how much of a tomboy she may be. Toph might just want a friend who loves the things she loves, and who knows, Katara could be that person! But the story never leads her in that direction so we never see that happen. And that's why that particular friendship never really... clicked for me. Their dynamics don't really feel enjoyable to me as they were written in the show, even though they very much could have been.

That's one thing I'll always give ATLA: the character potential and synergy they captured with that cast could be absolutely incredible. Team Avatar is so iconic because they really could work well off each other. A lot of teams in other media just aren't this good (... one of my main reasons to not enjoy Voltron and drop it in season 1 was my absolute failure to find any synergy between those characters, it felt like they all hated each other and I honestly did not enjoy their dynamics in the least), but Aang, Katara and Sokka have great synergy due to their different personalities in Book 1. Same when Toph joins them in Book 2. Zuko ABSOLUTELY could have been better in the group than he was if Book 3 hadn't devolved into the Zuko Woobifying Show by the second half, where the only writing priority was making him friends with everyone, and making them all feel sorry for him and have compassion towards him. But, broken down to his core traits, Zuko's personality would have resulted in solid chemistry with everyone else's if they'd gotten off that agenda anyway! So ultimately, ATLA has a big win in this respect that a lot of TV shows would LOVE to recreate but they simply haven't struck the right kind of balance in character traits.

Hence why the way they wrote Toph and Katara's dynamics kind of feels like a betrayal to me. Those two could have been a lot of fun, they have EVERYTHING it takes to be entertaining characters with not a ton of things in common and yet building a solid friendship that hinges on their differences. I've seen a fair few examples of that kind of dynamic in other media, and it absolutely would be possible with Toph and Katara. It's really unfair that they couldn't capture their dynamics in such a way that both characters would SHINE, rather than constantly resorting to conflicts between them that never seemed to truly be resolved.

So: Toph should not be a problem for Katara. She should enhance her character and doesn't because of writing failures. One of the core failures is "mom friend Katara", of course: there's nothing inherently wrong with Katara stepping up and taking care of people she loves, but there's something very wrong with it when she's suddenly portrayed as this motherly figure when she's doing things that Sokka had been doing just fine in Book 1. Main reason why this is the case? Sokka got dumbed down to full-time class clown for whatever reason in Book 2. While he has good moments, a lot of times they went WAY overboard with making him a source of comedy this season and that, too, contributes to mom friend Katara. Since Sokka is being so meh? We even feel relieved that Katara is there to keep things together because nobody can expect the other three to do it, right? But... Sokka was doing it in Book 1. And there's no real development to explain him NOT doing it anymore once Toph joins in besides "Katara is now the mom friend and Sokka is just here to be funny". It's not organic development: it's forcing tropes that just don't fit. And while Katara's mothering doesn't feel as unpleasant as it could here, it ultimately forces a new interpretation and portrayal of her character that honestly isn't all that interesting, most of all when the other characters are constantly portrayed as "more fun" while she's just here to keep them in line.

It just isn't the same Katara we met in Book 1, and it shows in spades. Book 1 Katara would have been hyped to join Aang and Toph in chaos while Sokka screams at them to behave themselves. Book 2 Katara is the one trying to keep the other three in line, and there's genuinely zero development that led things to that stage. It's not organic storytelling. There's no growth that leads to that, and so, it feels off.

But the core problem of all these flaws in Book 1 and Book 2 is that they roll together and snowball into something far greater that then proceeds to just... disrupt everything we thought we knew or understood about Katara. We've been told she's a kind person above all else, someone who cares about people close to her, someone who embodies hope and strength and love...!

... And then Book 3 starts, and we're actually facing a Katara who shifts into a wholly different person with the speed of a whiplash that we're left not knowing who tf this is anymore.

"Mom friend Katara" absolutely comes back in Book 3, why lie? She takes care of people, she tries to provide, she tries to be nice and sweet and then also enforces discipline on Toph (particularly) when she's being irresponsible!

But the reason why The Runaway is such an unpleasant episode is because Katara's behavior is dialed up to a thousand, and the conflict between her and Toph feels WAY too similar to what it was when they were barely getting to know each other in The Chase. Why are they STILL clashing over such things? There are occasional glimpses of friendliness there in The Runaway, sure! But they're not so strong that you actually feel like that friendship supersedes their conflicts and their propensity to bicker and argue and hurt each other. Toph blatantly calls her out on her mothering and fully canonically confirms that Katara is The Mom Friend™. Where Toph is annoyed but eventually complies with doing what Katara wants to do in Tales of Ba Sing Se, this time Katara makes a huuuuuge fuss over Toph's misbehavior and her scamming Fire Nation people. And you could argue that Toph has every right to do it, or that Katara is right to be worried, just like Sokka used to worry about such things in Book 1...

But what we get is a stale dynamic that repeats the same problems we saw in Book 2, as well as Katara coming off as rather hypocritical because she, too, did dangerous shit and picked dangerous fights where she shouldn't have, and ignored everyone who told her not to do it: she gave Toph that kind of grief over things Katara was willing to do back when Toph wasn't in the group (see the pirates thing), and she will try to stop Toph from having fun on her own terms when nobody has ever tried to stop Katara from doing that in hers. Of course, any Katara advocate would read this and go "you're missing the point: Katara was sad and upset that she was being LEFT OUT! That's why she was so mad about this!" Then the irony of the matter is that this argument STILL reflects poorly on Katara. She gave her friend a tough time, called her a wild child and a crazy person, went through her personal belongings because "she could tell Toph was hiding something from her", so she fully disregarded Toph's privacy... all because she couldn't say "Wait, you guys went scamming Fire Nation people? Damn, why didn't you wait for me! I would've gone too!", and there you go, problem solved! Katara's not left out anymore!

Yes, of course, that's not how it WORKS, people can struggle to identify what they feel...!

... And now it's my turn to say that that's not the point.

The point is that Katara said and did hurtful things to her friend. Things she eventually regrets, yes, but that she didn't have to do at all. This is the same person who fed Appa a bunch of food that made it look like he was sick, all be it to keep the group from leaving the Jang Hui river village so she could go out of her way to heal the injured and sick without telling anyone what she was doing. That, too, was a choice she made with no concern regarding how the rest of her team might feel about it: was she doing something nice? Sure! But it's not fundamentally different from Toph doing whatever she wants with zero regard as to Katara's feelings on the matter. Katara KNEW she was stalling their journey and that Sokka wanted them to move on: she didn't care about his feelings or priorities, and the story eventually frames Katara as being in the right for feeling that way. Here, she's in the inverse scenario, only it's with Toph rather than Sokka, and instead of realizing that she, too, has made choices that were irresponsible/dangerous/risky and STILL went all out with them, down to fighting whoever opposed her choices? Katara just doubles down until she, again, breaches boundaries and overhears Toph and Sokka's conversation, WHICH IS ANOTHER CAN OF WORMS DUE TO THE SOUTHERN RAIDERS FOLLOW-UP...

The thing is, Katara as a mom friend is not even a good thing. It's not conducive to fun or interesting storytelling, not in Book 2, not now. It doesn't make Katara a more interesting and dynamic character. The way she's portrayed isn't so she looks tragic for taking this role, it's all about forcing these kids into tropes that don't necessarily add up to who they have been so far. Katara's mom friend status is NOT treated with any compassion. It's not handled as a sore, difficult subject outside of the ONE conversation Sokka has with Toph that Katara overhears. And it's not centered on Katara's tragedy, on how she overcompensates for her mother's absence, it's centered on Sokka accepting her as a motherly person and encouraging Toph to do the same thing. The people who saw further depth in it probably haven't looked at the script itself in a long time: you CAN see more to it, but that's not the point of the scene. That's not where it's going. And the fact that such a tragic situation is what conduces Katara to take up the mom friend role actively makes it look like... she shouldn't have it. Why would she be the mom friend if she's just overcompensating for Kya's death? If she's taking up responsibility by thinking that no one else will (a blatant lie because, again, in Book 1 there's NO SIGN of this behavior and it's Sokka who's in a role of responsibility compared to her), it suggests that EVERYONE ELSE ought to step up and stop "relying" (and Sokka very much uses that word) on Katara being the mom friend. It's not a healthy thing. It's a coping mechanism that seems to be actively damaging Katara: and the story doesn't acknowledge it that way.

So... "mom friend Katara", dialed up to a thousand in Book 3, absolutely has a connection with why her character loses its sheen by this point in the story. There's no attempt to deconstruct this coping mechanism by Katara. No indication from the rest of the team that maybe Katara should get to be a kid just like them and stop being so uptight (even though VERY often she's not that uptight but the show very much tries to pretend she is). It's Katara's initiative to do a scam, it's not Toph or Sokka or Aang who think she needs to join in on the fun, she basically inserts herself in it. So basically, those three take the route of saying "that's what she's like, we just gotta bear with it", instead of actually helping her. If we'd seen that? Mom friend Katara would actually be a fun element to witness deconstructed by the story. And I'm not blaming either Katara or the other three for this:

This is EMINENTLY a writing problem.

Mom friend Katara is not a good trope. It could be if the point was to help her break free from it. It's not. It's simply weak writing that can't handle two girls with proactive, aggressive personalities and a ton of agency, a lack of creativity in realizing how much potential there could be in making Toph and Katara the absolute best of friends. It's seriously a disservice to the two of them that this trope literally blooms over Toph joining the show and then NEVER gets resolved or chased away. And when you have characters like Sokka or Aang kind of joining the bandwagon of "yeah, Katara's a mom!" when the two of them traveled with her in Book 1 and she WASN'T that at all? It makes matters infinitely worse.

So, if you ask me? This is the first thing that makes Katara feel more unpleasant than ever before in Book 3.

The second thing is even worse.

We return to accountability, as well as to illogical flow of thought when it comes to the writing of Katara: in Book 1, we see a hopeful girl who never speaks ill of her father or betrays any manner of displeasure or distrust towards him. No sign of her being conflicted by what Hakoda is doing: the focus is entirely on Sokka's feelings on the matter once it finally comes up in Bato of the Water Tribe, and Katara is a secondary matter, if even that.

This would be fine if Hakoda hadn't come up at all as a subject throughout Books 1 and 2. If Katara had never had the potential opportunity to see her father in any of these instances and had backed out from them for bigger reasons than... plot reasons.

For reference: she's excited, just as Sokka is, when Bato says he can bring the kids to meet their dad again. They're HYPED. We see no sign of Katara being upset at Hakoda for leaving at this point. The only portrayed reason why she and Sokka decide not to go see Hakoda is because they think Aang needs them more and they decide to forgive him for hiding the map. Katara, from the get-go, is not as angry at Aang for hiding the map as Sokka is. Clearly, Sokka wants to see Hakoda far more intensely than Katara does: even so, there's no sign anywhere here that implies that Katara harbors resentment or dissatisfaction towards Hakoda.

Book 2 gives us a similar situation: Katara declines going to see Hakoda and offers to be the one who stays in Ba Sing Se so Sokka can go see Hakoda himself. Sokka is soooo thrilled and thanks her and calls her the best sister ever and Katara very much says she is, indeed, the best. Which she's allowed to, worth noting, I'm not saying her reaction to Sokka's praises was bad, it's actually funny: but what I AM saying is that she knows how much this matters to Sokka and that's why she makes the offer she does. It's also VERY convenient! Because logic dictates that, if Sokka stays behind, he realizes the Kyoshi Warriors aren't themselves far faster than Katara does (even though, to be fair, Katara didn't really have much time to realize it at all), and we wouldn't have Aang suffering over Katara's imprisonment because the one in chains would be Sokka and then Aang might just go "oh okay it's just Sokka, I can go cosmic if it's not Katara"

... yeah I'm being sarcastic I actually don't think Aang wouldn't have saved Sokka, but they very clearly had Katara stay behind first and foremost for this specific purpose...

But Katara's acknowledgement that this is a good thing for her brother makes you REALLY wonder how much of a secret grudge she was supposed to feel towards her father at this stage of the story. The truth, in my opinion? She wasn't actually supposed to resent Hakoda as she did, let alone quite so harshly.

My sister personally told me that she thought Katara's anger at Hakoda was a fine storytelling choice when I told her I didn't like it. She told me Katara herself most likely didn't realize how hurt she had been by her father's leaving, that it wasn't until she was around Hakoda again that she understood she resented him at all, and that she had a lot more pent-up rage and frustrations than she had EVER acknowledged, and they burst out frequently in Book 3. Which, you know, is one possible explanation that tries to make this whole thing more palatable. From a human standpoint? This is valid.

... From a writing point? Not so much.

A Katara who struggles to understand her heart (which... is odd, tbh. As far as they portray her, Katara tends to know exactly what she's feeling, why she's feeling it, and she acts on her emotions rather than brains more often than not) would be portrayed as confused over her own rage at Hakoda. She would not have been written as a snappy teenager who hates her dad. She would have snapped at him and then apologized by reflex, unsure of what's come over her. We would see Sokka trying to mediate between them too, probably asking Katara what's her deal, and she would have no idea how to explain it. Katara would be avoiding Hakoda, knowing she loves him, not knowing why she seems to hate him now, afraid of saying things she shouldn't. Every time she snaps at him, she should worry about what she did, she should fear for Hakoda's feelings, she should reflect on what's going on inside her heart...!

... But that doesn't happen. And that knocks SO HARD on the concept of empath/compassionate Katara that it basically turns her into a whole different person.

As I've said countless times so far: it's not about Katara being perfect. I don't WANT her to be perfect. But I DO want the show to acknowledge that she's not. I want the flaws to REALLY read as flaws. I want other characters to react to those mishaps on Katara's part, and I want HER to reflect on what she's doing and realize she's messing up, just as she does when she hurts Aang's feelings in the Waterbending Scroll, which is most likely the best situation where Katara actually owns up to the exact mistake she made and feels genuine, palpable, obvious remorse for it. But when you feature Katara lashing out at Hakoda, and everyone just staying quiet because "uuuuh, awkwaaaard...", it feels off. Aang asks Katara, outright, what's her problem with her dad! And Katara goes "What? What problem?" She's acting like she's not even aware of the fact that her behavior is out of place, basically gaslighting Aang into pretending that she didn't do anything rude or mean to Hakoda. Aang literally saw it with his own eyes and is the ONLY person to bring it up.

To make matters worse? Katara has been with Hakoda for WEEKS. It's not like they just crossed paths two seconds before Aang opened his eyes. The implication is that she's been behaving like this, or her behavior has been deteriorating towards Hakoda with no one worrying about it or trying to make her reason with it. for that long. Sokka didn't do anything. Hakoda just took the teenage rants and left her alone because that's what she wants. And when the one person brings up that she's not acting like herself? Katara pretends nothing's wrong and acts like everything's fine and she's not acting any differently from herself. Whether she actually is just lying to Aang or ALSO lying to herself is a matter of debate... but what it suggests is she's unwilling to confront the gravity of her choices and how she can be hurting her father with them.

This is NOT to say that Katara has no right to be angry about Hakoda abandoning her in the Tribe. She has every right to be upset and feel forsaken. Their mother died, and Hakoda left with all the men of the tribe, and Sokka was left behind, tasked to protect everyone, and Katara apparently felt responsible for the whole village too: as valid as Hakoda's quest to fight in the war might be, it's not out of this world for Katara to harbor frustrations and resentment over what happened.

What IS out of this world, and particularly, not appropriate to her character, is that her way to convey those feelings was something she gave herself to, completely, only to reason with it once Aang was missing so that the episode would conflagrate her problems with Aang and Hakoda into the same thing.

This is basically a dark expansion of what we've seen in Katara's treatment of Sokka since Book 1: where it was typically "humorous" when she was a jerk to him and paid no price for it, this time it's not humorous. This time, you're supposed to see her being a jerk and then go "aaaaw, poor dear," even if you're not supposed to get mad at Hakoda because he is very much a decent dad. The show was trying to have its cake and eat it too with this situation, because Katara DOESN'T apologize to Hakoda for being unfair to him: HAKODA APOLOGIZES TO HER. Hakoda acknowledges the pain he caused Katara and the damage his leaving has wrought upon his children by apologizing and explaining how much he missed them... but Katara does not acknowledge the pain she inflicted on her father by acting out when he wasn't doing anything wrong. Is this teenager behavior? You could chalk it down to that, but that's precisely why teenagers can be a pain in the ass! And that's very much how Katara is being portrayed if she's unwilling to acknowledge she acted out and hurt someone she loves!

Her problems and resentment towards Hakoda magically go away after that single conversation. After this? She loves him. No hard feelings left. If her problems with Hakoda were this deep and difficult to navigate and work through, either she bottled them up in the rest of the show and stopped them from affecting her father... or she just got over it that quickly. Which would be very unrealistic because Hakoda apologizing for leaving doesn't change the damage Katara suffered through because he was gone. A single apology doesn't fix everything that people read into Katara's deep anguish in this scene and episode. And yet that's very much how the show portrays it: Katara is 100% fine in every single other interaction with Hakoda she gets past the first episode of Book 3. Does that make sense? Is that good writing? No, actually: it's literally digging up a problem, making it up last minute with zero lead-up to it, where the ONLY way to read "lead-up" is to pretend that Katara always had ulterior motives to avoid going to see Hakoda, even though we NEVER were shown that she was hiding anything, something that could be VERY easily shown in the story if they'd always had this in mind. The truth is that they didn't. They made it up for this episode, forced it in there, didn't even write it right because nobody reacts to Katara's behavior reasonably except Aang, and she gets away with it without even having to apologize. That's... not good form for any character, let alone Miss Responsibility and Empathy, is it?

This is why it's such a problem that Katara acted as she did towards her father. It's not because this is an unthinkable flaw: it's because there's very much no lead-up to it, kind of like there's none with Korrasami's big reveal in LOK's finale. It's because there's no follow-up to it either. It's because we don't see Katara living up to her supposed core character traits, where she should have a realization that her choices and actions and behavior have hurt someone else, someone she cares about. None of that happens.

And I will say: it's different when it comes to her clashes with Zuko and her reactions to him in the second half of Book 3. This is basically the MAIN thing the fandom gives her grief for and I hate them for it: she has every right and reason and justification to show no empathy or compassion towards a person who, as far as she could tell, took advantage of her compassion in Ba Sing Se, of Aang's compassion frequently across Book 1, and paid them back for all of it by joining forces with Azula and showing no concern to help Aang when Azula almost killed him. I am no fan of Iroh's... but Iroh jumped in to help Katara and Aang escape, at risk of being captured. Zuko stood beside Azula and did NOTHING to help those two leave. He showed zero concern for Aang's survival. He saw his sister potentially murder someone and had ZERO REACTION. So, no offense but full offense: Katara's unwillingness to trust Zuko is JUSTIFIED. Not only is it justified? It's CORRECT. It's the only writing choice that makes sense. Sokka getting over it relatively quickly feels off to me, no matter if the Boiling Rock adventure isn't as bad as others might be. Aang not holding a grudge for too long kind of fits because it is Aang... but Katara being that mad at Zuko? That's 100% fine. It fits. It works. And anyone pretending that what I said about Hakoda applies to how she treated Zuko is just completely biased in Zuko's favor.

Katara and Zuko do not have a secret magical powerful soulmates bond in canon. Their one instance of bonding comes after multiple instances of the exact opposite thing. Katara and Sokka were 100% down for leaving Zuko to freeze to death in the North Pole, and the ONLY reason why Zuko survives is because Aang can't let that happen to him. It's AANG'S compassion that saved Zuko. Katara felt none, AND SHE DIDN'T HAVE TO FEEL ANY. Let's not forget that!

Moving on to Book 2, Katara actually makes her first offer of kindness to Zuko and Iroh in the Chase when she offers to heal Iroh after Azula's attack. Zuko's reaction is to lash out violently and yell at her to leave: who, exactly, would feel inclined to think this poor beautiful sad boy just needs love when you OFFER HIM kindness and his reaction is, in a manner of speaking "go fuck yourself I'll handle this on my own"? And it's worth bringing it up because it feels like the fandom is hilariously misled into thinking the Gaang magically knows what Zuko is up to and how he's growing and evolving, as if they were part of the audience: they're not. The last time Katara saw Zuko before Ba Sing Se is literally when Zuko refuses her help. We're also talking about Fire Nation people: Katara has every right and every reason to believe that Zuko is refusing her help, not out of personal, internal strife he's dealing with and has no idea how to handle... she very much can read this as "inferior Water Tribe peasant, you will not heal my uncle with your wretched waterbending!" Because... let's be real, that's what Zuko looked like to Katara across Book 1. She has no real reason to think he's any better or different from that until their catacombs scene...

... And he stabs her in the back and joins Azula there. Right after "bonding" with her.

So let's be VERY clear on that respect: Katara has no real reason to forgive Zuko. She has no real reason to feel empathy outside of the show constantly trying to push that she's kind and compassionate with no boundaries, even if she forsakes that kindness and compassion at random whenever the plot requires it. But her death threats to Zuko? They're completely fine by me. I'd be pissed if she had acted any differently, and if anything I hate how easy Zuko had it to befriend everyone but Katara.

... Not to say I'm happy with how he befriended Katara either, but anyway...

As this isn't Zuko meta, we're not going to get into the true core glaring issues in The Southern Raiders, because ultimately, that episode paints Zuko in a disgusting light that his fans are constantly gaslighting themselves about. He was not beinga heroic good dude helping someone he connected profoundly with. His behavior leaves so much to be desired and proves he hasn't unlearned a lot of toxic things he had internalized. He didn't unlearn them in this episode, either. But the GREATEST sin Zuko commits in this episode, without a doubt, is bringing Katara on a journey that ultimately did NOTHING for her. The only person benefitting from it was Zuko himself. I've seen people pretend that Katara finally found closure: she did not do such thing. She learned what kind of scum killed her mother, but she did not forgive him nor did she kill him. Closure would mean peace. Katara did not find peace with the situation. She's shown troubled, sitting at that pier, miserable, when Aang talks with her, she's STILL angry. That's not closure. It never was.

What it was, however, was the journey where Katara thanked Zuko and forgave him because..! Uh... because...

... Why, exactly, did Katara forgive Zuko here?

He brought her to her mother's killer: she found no closure from it. In fact, she learned the VERY disturbing truth that she hadn't realized so far: HER MOTHER DIED SPECIFICALLY TO SAVE HER. Her mother sacrificed herself for Katara's sake. She CANNOT find peace with this reality in a single afternoon because holy shit, who would? Katara KNEW her mother had died. It's not until Yon Rha tells her what happened that she understands what happened in the igloo. Katara herself, her waterbending skills, and the target she painted on her own back because of something 100% out of her control, something that is NOT evil and that the Fire Nation was hellbent on destroying, are the reasons why Kya was murdered. This is DISTURBING SHIT to deal with. And the show completely sidelines this revelation and the dark impact it could have on Katara, which, seriously, is HUGE, way worse than what happened with Hakoda, because it very much could have triggered a profound self-hatred by Katara towards her own skills because how tf could her bending cause her mother's death?! Not to mention the obvious: who was that source? Who told the Southern Raiders that there was a waterbender? Who the hell is responsible, beyond the Fire Nation, for her mother's death?

There's A LOT to unpack here.

And none of it matters because Katara is just supposed to forgive Zuko for exacerbating and worsening her trauma regarding her mother's death :') funny how that works.

This IS the point where Katara should make a display of darker sides of herself that she didn't know or understand. THIS is where Katara turning dark like Aang did after Appa vanished would make PERFECT sense. With this revelation about Kya that's beyond disturbing: not with Hakoda... and certainly not with Sokka.

The cusp of Katara's worst is, by far, her behavior with her brother in the Southern Raiders. I know a million excuses have been made for this moment: my problem is NOT the fact that she lashed out at him as she did and said something DEEPLY hurtful. It's the fact that KNOWING, SEEING HE'S IN PAIN...

... does not matter to her one bit.

Instead of a trite scene with Zuko spouting shit he does NOT mean (aka "violence wasn't the answer... but lol go kill my father okay??"), we deserved a scene with Katara and Sokka talking this out. People pretend it's fine as it is: it's not. Katara has spent the ENTIRE show disregarding her brother's feelings in a myriad of ways: this time, it was way more painful and way more hurtful and SHE KNOWS IT. It's not funny. She's not amused. She's not being a shithead little sister. She's ANGRY. She's UPSET. She has every right to be! What she DOESN'T have a right to do is hurt her brother DELIBERATELY and then escape every consequence from doing that.

There's very much no way to spin that moment into making Katara a decent sister. There's no way she remains true to her core values of being empathetic, kind and wholesome when she will insidiously, vindictively hurt her brother this way. And what I said earlier about her overhearing Toph and Sokka in the Runaway? It actually gets a follow-up in this scene: Katara telling Sokka that he didn't love Kya as she did is basically her WEAPONIZING the information that was NOT meant for her as her alleged evidence that Sokka didn't care about Kya as much as she did. As if his inability to retrieve Kya's memory was NOT a manifestation of trauma, as if it were something he's FINE with! He's not! How guilty must he feel for that? Does that matter to Katara at all? Why... nope. Because all that matters at that point is her own rage, her own feelings, her own fury. Which is, then, entirely against the character we've been told she is.

The lack of apology or follow-up to this horrible moment will never stop being one of the absolute biggest misfires in one of the WORST written episodes of this show. Yes, I said it. The more I ponder The Southern Raiders, the more I realize it's an immensely flawed speedrun to establish a friendship that simply doesn't add up. Katara and Zuko becoming friends after this journey requires some wild, absurd leaps of imagination that, boiled down to basics, don't make any sense. There's no reason for Katara to decide she'll forgive Zuko after she regains enough clarity. Why does she forgive him? Because he proved he'd rather make her happy than defend his nation anymore? Ironically, at no point does Katara show any appreciation of the fact that Zuko is setting aside his firebending supremacist attitude completely for her sake. So maybe that's not it.

Ah... is it because of how he, and he alone, was ready to help her go on this journey of revenge...?! Why, ironically, the only reason why ONLY Zuko goes on this journey is incredibly artificial and fake: this IS intended as Katara's "field trip" with Zuko. None of the field trips make sense, from a logical standpoint, as duo journeys. I've mentioned it to a few people: Sokka and Zuko could have brought Toph with them to the Boiling Rock, a metal location where her abilities would be VERY useful, used her as a false prisoner and turned her in as a captured ally of the Avatar's, who 100% will bait him into coming here to rescue her so that the Fire Nation can get him next! A cover as strong as that one might actually get them further along on that rescue attempt than what they did in canon. But this CANNOT BE... because it was Sokka's field trip with Zuko so nobody else is invited, even if they're very much not doing anything else (as is the case with Toph). Aang? Why didn't everyone join the firebending discovery with Zuko and Aang? They weren't doing ANYTHING in the Western Air Temple at the time. They very much could have gone with them too. But they don't. And that's exactly why Katara's trip works exactly as it does: it's the solo journey with Katara and Zuko, and the ONLY way to make it work is to show Sokka and Aang completely opposed to the concept of finding Yon Rha. I'm not saying I think Sokka and Aang would have been on board if they're allowed to remain IC... but they could have wanted to go on this trip with Katara regardless of not agreeing with what she wanted to do. Hell, as is OBVIOUS: Kya is Sokka's mom too. His opinions, his feelings on this subject, should matter just as much as Katara's do, and fuck anyone who pretends otherwise. These two are NOT supposed to be the well-known unhealthy siblings Zuko and Azula, who each got one parent in their corner and therefore the other parent treated them like they were worthless or a monster. Hakoda and Kya were parents to BOTH their children, and any narrative or interpretation that attempts to say that ONLY Katara's opinion on Kya matters is immediately ruled out, for me, as absolute bullshit spouted by someone not worth listening to. Point blank.

Also, the fact that Zuko USES Sokka to gain this information about the southern raiders, and then doesn't even extend the chance to Sokka to join them? When Sokka is basically his new best buddy? That... does not make sense. It basically portrays Zuko as a disloyal asshole who takes advantage of his friends for his purposes and tosses them aside, disregarding their feelings whenever it suits him.

So Sokka's treatment at the hands of this episode is just deplorable. Both Zuko and Katara are HORRIBLE to him... but Katara is our focus here, she's actively hurts Sokka and then proceeds to not care. Because that's how she has operated so far, and that's how she always will.

Hence: we have a long, long tradition of Katara not treating Sokka fairly all across the show. The reasons why it's not a fair or balanced relationship at all is because Sokka typically pays the price for being a dick to Katara: either she inflicts the punishment herself, such as when he's disrespectful in the Drill and she smacks him with the slurry, or the narrative inflicts some magical punishment instead that CONSTANTLY proves that Sokka is not allowed to be a dick without facing consequences for it. Does he ALWAYS learn the lesson? Sure he doesn't! But the consequences for it NEVER stop. He doesn't get away with being a jerk to his sister. That's forbidden. But Katara? She's allowed to get away with it every single time! And the reason why it gets worse and worse is because we went from relatively silly/comedic things, in which Katara did not apologize because "it's funny that she didn't apologize", to NOT funny things at all, such as this scene in Southern Raiders. Even just a troubled glance at Sokka, or a slight hesitation after seeing how hurt he is, would be enough for me: there's NOTHING. She doubles down and keeps charging ahead. Zero thoughts or concerns given to her brother.

If this isn't why you have issues with Katara, well, I don't know why it might be the case in your case x'D But I absolutely attest that the combination of "mom friend", "selective compassion particularly when it comes to her brother" and "absolute imperviousness to consequences for her mistakes" are the things that fully caused my initial appreciation of her character to shift into ambivalence and then into full blown dislike once I reached Book 3.

Worth noting: THIS IS A COMPLAINT ABOUT THE SHOW'S WRITING. Boiled down to basics, written by any more competent hands, I don't think Katara would have acted the way she did often, ESPECIALLY in episodes like The Awakening or The Southern Raiders. I categorically refuse to write Katara in my stories as someone who gets free passes for EVERYTHING she does. I also refuse to portray her as the mom friend, particularly in Gladiator. There's a lot of depth you can give this character! So much you can do, so much worth exploring... and canon just settled for stunting her and then only bringing her out to play in ways that make her unpleasant, not particularly bright and extremely resistant to character development even after allegedly learning lessons (see how her initial behavior around Hama, who shows red flags often, isn't all that different from how it was with Jet? There's only a handful of moments where it looks like Katara MIGHT be wary, and yet they're quickly overcome by her excitement, which Hama manipulates in her favor until she does the bloodbending reveal). So I'm NOT saying Katara had no potential... but I am saying the show itself failed her, big time, because of how she was written. A quick glance through the transcript of the Puppetmaster to confirm my memories that Katara shows no sign of concern over Hama when Sokka finds her suspicious reveals that, after Hama shows them her comb and that she's from the Southern Water Tribe, Sokka, and Sokka alone, apologizes for suspecting her of being sketchy. Nothing from Aang, even though he was part of it too. Nothing from Toph, either. And certainly nothing from Katara. Only Sokka apologizes. As usual.

So... what does this tell you? What does this tell any of us? That Katara's development is... erratic, at best. That it's not linear isn't a bad thing, but that it contradicts itself non-stop, that her core traits come and go willy-nilly as the plot demands it, that her motivations to do things (like forgiving Zuko) don't add up to her experiences or to any lead-up we've witnessed, is most certainly not good.

If I were to rewrite ATLA, the main characters I'd want to rewrite into making a lot more sense than they do, and making their arcs actually logical, are Zuko and Katara. I'd definitely add a few rewrites for Iroh, particularly to make him WAY more accountable for shit than he ever was, and to show he's not universally loved and shouldn't be, since people would have very reasonable grievances with him. I'd also rewrite a handful of things with Aang, too. Toph, full-stop, deserves a growth arc of her own beyond getting stronger and getting used to having friends. Girl has the range. They just never let her explore it. And of course, I'd change a fair few elements of Azula's writing as well. But I feel like no characters would warrant a deeper intervention than Zuko and Katara, precisely because they constantly fail to live up to all the stuff people keep pretending they're flawless exhibits of.

And this is one more issue we've got going on with Katara:

The fandom ABSOLUTELY has been unfair to Katara. A lot of people hate her for no reason. A lot of people who potentially have unexamined racism making their hearts' choices for them and they despise her just because she dared not have fully-white skin. A lot of people pick completely ridiculous things to get angry at her, such as people who HATE HER because she's "rude to Zuko". Just, fuck off. That's about the stupidest reason to hate this character and stupid reasons for that have been heard plenty.

But Katara's fans have become... reactionary. They appear think that any criticism to her character NEEDS to be fought off with "she was right tho" or "she has every reason to act this way" or "she's HUMAN she's allowed to make mistakes you heathen!! That's what a flawed character is like!"

Here's the kicker, though: if you have justifications and excuses for every little unpleasant thing Katara EVER does? You're basically taking a dump on her character yourself and saying she IS flawless.

Flaws in characters are bad things that cannot be justified. They can be funny! They can be annoying. They can be infuriating. But they're things that inconvenience other characters, that hurt them, that show they're not above or beyond doing harmful things! All of what I listed in this crazy long post are Katara's flaws. The reason why I don't like the way these flaws were handled are all the things I already have talked about: no accountability for flaws is basically saying that these flaws don't matter. No follow-up, no lead-up, means Katara is allowed to be as much of an ass as she wants to be and nobody cares: THIS IS NOT FAIR. This is not how ANY character should be written. This is the core reason why I've spent years feuding with Zuko and Iroh: they get away with shit they should NOT get away with, EVER. They're not held accountable for so much they should be. This happens to Katara too. particularly in her dynamcis with her brother. And when people see those flaws and just start listing reasons why it's actually okay? All you're doing is dehumanizing these characters to pretend everything they EVER do is fine.

Also worth noting... character flaws are the way characters grow. If a character is DEEPLY flawed, you know what kind of work you have cut out for you as a writer. If you're writing a story heavily steeped on character development? Then those flaws are VITAL to the work you have to do in order to develop these characters!

But when Zuko is unnecessarily violent and you're told "it's because his culture and family are!", you rightfully assume that as he drifts away from Fire Nation ideology, Zuko WILL grow less violent. Then, you watch how he picks an unnecessary fight with Aang in the finale because everyone's being lazy, an EXTREMELY violent fight at that, and you contrast his earlier behavior with it and... where's the difference, exactly? How did he grow or learn better if violence is STILL his immediate reaction to anything he doesn't like?

Thus, when Katara's flaws get overlooked, ignored, disregarded? What kind of development does Katara get, if none of her flaws are addressed in a way that makes it look like she's genuinely learned any lessons? At least, none of the worst, biggest, glaring flaws were addressed. None of the things that she SHOULD be troubled by and that she shouldn't be happy with herself over, especially after seeing how she hurts people with her actions. This isn't cool. This isn't a fun way to write a character. And it's so glaringly unpleasant when you can so very easily contrast this with the well-known terrible flaw Sokka displays early on: sexism! And then he gets his ass kicked by Suki and he learns to respect the Kyoshi Warriors... and we never see him displaying that particular flaw again. THAT is what growth looks like! What can we point to with Katara that remotely compares to this? That she accepted Zuko? Yeah, no, that sincerely could not count any less. Her personal arc CANNOT be about Zuko. That she got over her mom's death? She didn't. So that's not it either. That she helped Aang save the world? So her personal arc was about Aang and not herself? Was her whole role in the story to play Aang's cheerleader, then? Because if that's it... she was doing that just fine at it since day one. She's the only person who faithfully believed the Avatar would return well before Aang turned up in her life, if the first episode's introduction is to be believed.

So... what, exactly, was Katara's arc? If it's just her waterbending skills, then she's as stunted as Toph, unexplored and underdeveloped and left to just strengthen her fighting skills while Aang and Zuko and Sokka are getting full character arcs, even if very lowkey but very much effective in Sokka's case, where they develop and grow (or they should) into the men they're supposed to be to end the war! Why don't Katara and Toph get similar arcs? Why aren't they challenged on a level that actually provides them with lasting, solid, provable growth, where you can look at them where they started out and see how they ended up and conclude their journey was beautiful?

I insist... writing. Weak writing. Failures to understand/develop characters properly. And of course, lack of accountability in storytelling. I wrote that one focusing mostly on Zuko... but it's very much applicable to every character who fails to own up to the things they should and deserve to face consequences for.

Anyway... this is what I'd say about Katara atm. I'm not 100% sure this is everything because I might have overlooked some stuff that also made Katara's character kind of backfire (while I'm no Kataang hater, I 100% agree that the ship should have been written better too, and after writing them whenever I have, it's honestly kind of ridiculous how such an easy ship could get fucked over so badly by weird writing choices...). Whether you agree with these assessments or not, ultimately, there are valid reasons to feel offput by Katara and don't let anyone tell you otherwise. Most of all when you DID appreciate and cherish the character once before, but her fans just jump to the conclusion that you must be a mindless hater to think she's anything but flawless (this, while claiming they love that she's flawed, then they proceed to reveal they have no idea what a flaw is...).

(final note: SORRY IT TOOK ME FOREVER TO ANSWER! Super lengthy answer to make up for it, I hope :((( sorry)

#anon #I am not tagging the character directly but I bet this is gonna show up in her tag anyway because Tumblr gonna Tumbl #look #if you're the kind of katara fan who cannot stand a single word against her #just don't read this for your sanity of mind #... but if you go ahead and do it anyway?#don't come back at me with a million arguments to prove your fave is indeed flawless #because you're basically just spitting upwards at that point #and further proving that you do not understand character growth or development in the least #she's not a goddamn religious figure she's a fictional character #every fictional character that's worth something is flawed #and flaws are not always going to be cutesy pretty things #such is the case with Katara #the writing of this show is a mess in many regards #but they fucked up in particular with some characters the fandom adores #and I hate how the fandom acts like that's not the case at all #just to take trips into delululand and absolve them of every single thing they did wrong #and all the very deserved consequences for their worst actions #because the show itself dropped the ball hard enough in that respect for the fandom to do the same #you do you #but no argument will change my mind #and if none will change yours?#... skip past this post :')#it's a free world

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