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“Look, Joel,” Ethos tells him, voice soft. “I’m not sure what’s up with Grian and Gem today, but I can’t trust them.”
He takes a bite of his apple, the fruit crunching behind his mask. “Just - come with us, alright? Your team will need blaze rods anyways, and I’d feel more comfortable with backup. Someone I can trust.”
He doesn’t look over at where Bdubs and Pearl are arguing. He doesn’t need to - Joel’s heard some of the stuff Bdubs has been saying behind his teammate’s back. And Ethos - neck kisses aside, they’ve always been good for each other. Good partners.
“Sure,” he tells Ethos, grinning, the hilt of his sword a cool comfort in his hand. “If you’re that desperate.
Ethos - makes a little noise of protest, at that, but he doesn’t argue.
“Meet you at the portal?” Joel asks,and Ethos straightens. Nods.
“Don’t forget food,” he says, chucking the core of his apple into the bushes before wandering over to The Hole. “Half an hour!”
-----
“I thought it was just going to be us,” Grian says, putting a little too much weight on the word, when Joel arrives at the portal half an hour later.
Joel - well, he makes an offended sound, sure, but that’s interesting - especially the look that Ethos shoots Grian in response.
“Joel’s a good guy,” he says. “Good to have around.”
“Oh my god,” Grian whines. “You really are obsessed. I can’t believe you two -”
“What, me?” Joel protests. “No, he’s obsessed - he’s the one that invited me, Grian, don’t start saying lies -”
The noise that rips out of Grian is sick of their shit, obviously, and Joel has to bite back a smirk.
“Right,” he says, finally. “Then we’re just waiting on Gem.”
“Gem. Sure,” Joel says. “You’ve already found the fortress?”
“Not yet!” Ethos chirps cheerily, and Joel has to bite back his groan.
-----
“Look, Gem,” Joel tells her, voice soft, as behind them, Ethos and Grian wait for the bridge to be built. “Be careful, all right? Something’s up. I don’t know what, exactly…”
“With Grian?” she asks, as he digs out another pile of cobble.
“Both of them,” he tells her. “Grian, definitely. Ethos - I don’t know. He didn’t want to be alone in here.”
“He told you that, huh?” she asks.
“I don’t know,” Joel answers back. “It’s - weird vibes. Like - I don’t know. Maybe the whole Boogeyman thing got me on guard - I feel like we’re playing Among Us. Like someone’s going to stab me in the back.”
“Right.” There’s a long pause, as if Gem’s considering that. “You sound crazy, you know.”
Joel laughs, as he reaches the far side of the lava lake alive. “Maybe. I didn’t win by not watching my back.”
“And what makes you think it wasn’t me Ethos was worried about,” she asks, which - seems fair. But…
“If you wanted me dead,” he tells her, looking over at where the lavalight has turned her copper hair into a mane of fire, “I’d be dead. All it would’ve taken was a tap.”
She laughs, too, at that. “Oh, Joel,” she says, voice fond. “You’re sweet. And you’d’ve just let me shove you in, huh?”
-----
“You’re an idiot,” Gem tells him, once they’ve gotten to the Nether Fortress.
She’s knelt beside him, fingers slick with magma cream as they stretch him open. He - hadn’t even had time to react, or message in chat - Grian had wrested his comm out of his hand, Ethos’ arm had been around his neck, and the whole world had gone fuzzy. By the time he’d woken up, he’d been like this - arms bound behind his back painfully tight, ankles tied to two tripwire hooks on the floor, face perilously close to the lava at the center of the well he’s bent over.
“All three of you?” he manages, and his gut squirms in humiliation at how thin his voice sounds. “Really, Gem? You’re not even on the same team -”
“Oh, we wouldn’t have to be,” she says. “Not for this. You look so pretty when you’re all tied up - I’ll have to send Lizzy some pictures.”
She curls her fingers inside him, and Joel wails when the ropes stop him from squirming away - keep him nice and spread open for her, stroking his prostate as he wriggles against her touch.
“She’ll be heartbroken she missed this,” Gem adds, grinning. “You’ve gotta show up, though. Otherwise other people fuck your husband.”
“Ge-e-em -” Her name sounds strained and raw when he forces it out, and she laughs.
“Gem!” Grian cuts off whatever either of them might want to say next. “Gem Gem Gem! Look what we got!”
He’s still well out of sight down the hall - but he’s approaching at a run, bursting around the corridor with his arms full of blaze rods.
“Good work, Grian!” Gem praises, her voice sugar-sweet, as Ethos ambles in behind. “Now - close up that hall. I don’t want any distractions.”
“Right,” Grian agrees, dumping the pile of blaze rods beside Joel’s feet. There’s a glassy tink as he starts shoving them into his inventory - all but one, as Joel realizes when it lands in a smarting line across his ass. “You look like you’ve been having fun.”
“I have,” Gem agrees, smirking. “He’s such an idiot, you know. You should’ve heard him on the bridge over - he thought you two seemed sus.”
Ethos laughs at that. “Really?” he says, and Joel doesn’t manage to hold back the whine as a hand tangles in his hair and his head is dragged back to meet the older man’s eyes. “And you still went into the Nether with us, huh?”
“Grian said there wasn’t a boogeyman,” Joel protests, rasping a little from the awkward angle. “This isn’t -”
“This isn’t us killing you,” Grian tells him, smacking his ass with the blaze rod again, hard enough to earn a yelp. “Or - not unless you make us. This is… a temporary arrangement.”
“Really temporary,” Gem agrees. “Just for today. But, you know - why not have some fun with it?”
“So, what,” Joel pants. “You’re going to fuck me and kill me?”
“Not if you’re good,” Ethos tells him patiently. “One or the other. Either we have some fun with you, and you get to live and keep your mouth shut -”
“- or you have to find your way out of this little mess alone.” Gem curls her fingers again. “And we’re not untying you, and you still keep your mouth shut unless you want to lose all six lives in a row.”
It’s - not looking good. Either way - there’s three of them, and whatever they have to lose if he talks can’t be that bad if they’re being so up-front about it. It’s - hard to think, with Gem’s fingers rubbing his insides teasingly, and the air so hot, and his throat aching from the strain of his head forced back -
Ethos’ red eye glimmers down at him, and Joel tries and fails to swallow.
“You’ll let me live?” he asks, hating how pathetic it sounds, and Ethos laughs.
“We’ll be the bestest of friends tomorrow,” he promises, and the thought makes something warm pool in Joel’s gut.
“Do your worst,” he says, and Grian laughs.
-----
Gem has stretched him pretty well already, so they don’t waste time.
Still, Joel wails as the blaze rod slides into him. It’s lubed in enough magma cream that it doesn’t burn, exactly - but it’s thick and firm and unyielding, and hot enough to make him thrash against his restraints in pain as Gem stretches him open on it.
It’s longer than her fingers, too - long enough that it can keep going, sliding into him deep and leaving him thoroughly impaled when her hands let go.
“Aah -” he wails, rocking his hips in struggle. Grian’s hands - Ethos’ - hold him down, though, leaving him helpless to do anything but adjust and writhe as she does - something. Grabs a piece of leather to cover her own hands, apparently -
Because a minute later, she’s holding it again, and he’s being fucked open with the length of the thick rod.
He shrieks. There’s no controlling himself - not as he’s stretched and burned without injury by the brand being worked inside him. He’s garbling something - pleas, maybe, that go ignored as Ethos wraps his balls in one warm hand and squeezes a warning.
Grian’s fingers on his cock are lighter. Teasing.
“Go on,” he croons. “You’ve got to cum for us, Joel. Show us how nice and ready you are.”
Joel - can feel the tears turning to steam on his cheeks. There’s no escape, though - not with Gem thrusting deep and then pulling back far enough to massage the tip of the blaze rod across his prostate. Not with Grian and Ethos’ hands on his cock, milking him towards an orgasm that they both know isn’t going to be good -
He’s desperately, helplessly hard in their hands. When he cums, it’s a pathetic, ruined spatter, right into Gems palm - one that’s smeared across his face as the pair of them rise to reorganize themselves.
“Go on,” Gem tells him, the rod still thrust deep inside and abandoned as he reels with it. “Lick me clean.”
He - obeys, as best he can, like a pathetic, beaten dog, and he can hear Grian laughing behind him. Ethos chuckling.
“Good boy,” she croons, when he’s made a mess of it. “Aw… look at you.”
She - drops a block into the lava in front of him. Then another - and Joel gasps in relief as that heat, at least, fades.
“So,” she says. “We talked about this a bit. The boys - they want to fuck you. And I - you’re going to eat me out, okay?”
He nods against her palm.
“Good boy,” she croons, climbing up to straddle the rock. She’s already shed her armor - her pants slide off easily, too, all the way down to the ankles that she then hooks over his shoulders.
“Don’t get lazy, or I’ll tell Lizzie,” she threatens, as he nuzzles into her soft crotch.
With her fingers tangled in his hair - well, Joel knows what he’s doing, at least. He lets her control him, gives over to her as Grian and Ethos circle behind him where he can’t see.
He’s - used to the fear, in Life games. Used to teaming, used to being back-stabbed. This is - different, though. Too early. Usually, it’s the fifth session at least before he’s worried about being killed by someone who’s fucking him -
Ethos’ hands are firm, but not rough with him, as he takes Joel’s hip in one hand and the base of the blaze rod in the other. He teases, a little - Joel whimpers into Gem’s cunt as the rod rubs and shifts inside him, still achingly hot - but it’s not long before Grian makes an impatient sound and Ethos pulls it out -
- Only to sink into his warm hole with the same smooth motion. Joel - is used to him, at least, and he can’t help but react, pushing back into the stroke until Gem yanks his hair to remind him where his attention is supposed to be. Ethos groans - and then his hands are sliding forwards, holding Joel by his ribs as he’s fucked against the too-hot brick.
He’s - he knows what buttons to push. When to hurry, and when to linger, when Joel can’t hold back the breathy little sounds that he gasps against Gem.
He’s a tease, is what he is, and Joel can’t help it. After a minute - more than a minute, far too long - he begs.
Gem pulls him forwards against her, and he’s pleading into her pussy, her thighs squeezing around him so he can’t move away as she throws her head back. He laps at her too, as best he can, but his focus is on his hole, where Ethos is rocking up into him, hands back on Joel’s hips so he can sink deeper, pulling him down with every stroke -
Joel cums before him, this time, cock hanging untouched and half-hard as he spurts down the side of the well. Ethos - doesn’t even falter, fucking him through it, until at last, just before it’s too much for Joel, he sinks deep and grunts like an animal and Joel can feel himself flooded, filled up with cum -
“Good boy,” Gem croons, petting his hair as Ethos rasps wordlessly. “God - you look so good when you’re getting fucked, Joel. No wonder all the boys are into you.”
He - moans, words muffled by bliss and ache and her.
“Good boy,” she tells him again. “One more, right? And I want to cum too…”
There’s a laugh from behind Joel, at that.
“Then I shouldn’t go easy on him, huh?”
Joel wails as Grian slides into him. He’s - not as big as Ethos, and, slicked with the magma cream and another man’s cum, it shouldn’t be hard to take him.
Grian is rough, though, in a way that Ethos doesn’t care to be. This time, it’s less about deep, steady strokes - Grian fucks him shallow and brutal, talons trailing down Joel’s ribs as he’s used.
And then -
Grian’s other hand wraps around his cock. He’s - cum twice, neither of them satisfying, and Grian’s hand doesn’t caress but squeezes, right by the base, holding him in place to be fucked and manhandled all at once.
“Go on,” Grian snarls in his ear. “If Gem hasn’t cum by the time I do, I’m going to fuck you with the rod until she does -”
It’s - all the encouragement Joel needs. Once he’s focused, again, tongue exploring Gem’s folds as eagerly as he can, Grian starts to fuck him properly, deep and rough, and Joel wails when his roving free hand slaps his ass -
And Gem’s head tosses back again - but this time, her grip on his hair loosens. Joel pushes forwards through the haze, sucks her clit as she cums on his face - and behind him, he feels as much as hears Grian groan, too, and fill him up a second time -
He sags against the stone, and Grian convers him, wings spreading out on the hot brick as they both pant for breath. He’s - soft, and in Grian’s hand, and Grian strokes him teasingly but Joel doesn’t even have the energy to respond. His head is still nestled in Gem’s - well, not a lap, exactly, but south of that -
It’s Ethos who starts to pick them apart, when they’ve finally caught their breaths.
Gem is helped to her feet. Like a gentleman. And Grian - he takes a little longer to slide out of Joel, who can feel the hot mess slipping out of him after -
They clean each other up as he pants there, whole body aching and sore and unsatisfied, before anyone bothers to pay attention to him.
It’s Gem who does, of course.
She slides back onto the well, pushing him off as she does so he’s kneeling, instead, at her feet. A part of him expects her not to be done, yet - but her hands are gentle as they stroke his face -
“We could kill you,” she offers, not unkindly. “Or do you want us to get you out of here?”
He - could respawn. All the aches would go away, and - and Bdubs would probably come by and take care of him, if he messaged. Or Scar - even Lizzie -
But he’s not that bad off, so he smiles through his split lip up at her. Grins, even.
“Take me home,” he says, and it’s an invitation.
Grian laughs, and kneels to untie him, and Ethos’ hands are warm and big as they pick him up like a toy.