I want to clarify this IS a Drake song, and it was in the works before the Drake & Millie Bobby Brown ordeal. I never really was a fan of his in general, even if his music was, *grits teeth* catchy, but had originally felt obligated to attach an angst filled AU idea to the song many a year ago.

I want to apologize to anyone who would get uncomfortable with the use of one of his songs, but I wanted to crank this one out since it was so short and I just didn't want it lingering around in my WIPs anymore.
Fuck you, Drake.

11/14/18

"Inspired by" songfic, but it helps if you listen to it at least

Words: 2600. Because I said so.

Mood: Darkness, sadness, longing, Roxanne ready to cut-a-ho at any moment (and Megamind is a-okay with that)

Characters: Megamind and Roxanne. That's it. Oh and a redhead.

"Houstatlantavegas" by Drake, So Far Gone, 2009

*Rolls over*

They called her Temptress, and she was the most beautifully broken thing he had ever seen.

He originally hadn't meant to linger at first. Hell, he hadn't planned on staying any longer than it should've taken to scout out the place for any potential profitability, seeing as it was on the outskirts of a recently overthrown territory he managed to take a hold of.

And yet somehow he was there long enough to hear the music change, hear how the dirty sounds of desperation melted around pure sin, saw the lights filter out from the harsh sharpness the ellipsoidal lamps offered to the soft caress of a followspot being turned on over the center stage.

Long enough to see her standing there. Where she took his breath away with a glance, her strikingly blue eyes peering with disinterest from underneath a black fedora while her leather suit clung to her as a second skin.

One hand on the fedora and the other wrapped around a whip strapped to her hip.

The soft pout of her blood red lips garnered attention; their movements were easily as captivating as watching her hips sway to a needful rhythm, her lips hugging each word that followed the song flowing out of the overhead speakers. Her fluid hands were another form of distraction; dancing, enchanting, caressing the air that surrounded her and beckoning a spell she did not know.

She would crouch, she would raise, she would bend; no matter the movement his eyes stayed fixated on the bloom of her lips at every which way and angle she would grace him with.

He hadn't realized he had been entranced until the crack of the whip brought him back, his eyes finally taking in the sight of her exposed skin. Sometime during his infatuation with her mouth did she shed herself of her clothing; everything gone but the boots on her feet, a pair of velvet briefs concealing her bottom and the snapping whip in her hand.
As well as that smirk he wanted to devour off her face.

It was at that fated moment he realized he didn't want to claim her as his own, contrarily, he wanted her to stake her claim into him, if she wished it so.

Could she ever want it he'd think as they locked eyes while she offered herself to the city night after night.

And in the end it was never about her body, the lewd looks her angelic face would shape or the promise of lust and death in her gaze that would keep him returning to her serpents dance.

At least, that's what he kept repeating to himself in the dark of his room after every visit.

Eventually the visits became more regular, almost scheduled, wherein he would get his drink at the bar and sit with his disguise under the dark prior to the queen's arrival. Everyone else's performances never quite matched her level of standards; as a result waiting though every dance prior to hers was trying, if not torturous.

But when she made her way out of the shadows to the spotlight, her movements slow and languid, he'd forget how to breathe. Every time.

In each beginning she would sway her way to the pole, disrobing her outfit layer by layer to reveal herself for her audience. By the time she reached the end of her walk she would twine around the metal bar on stage, completely bared to the flesh for her nightly visitors.

Any fabric she had left on her legs was always guaranteed to drop, but whatever lay underneath had no room for negotiation.

If she was allowed to hold on to any form of dignity, it was hidden within that stretch of fabric that wrapped around her curves of her hips. A secret she shared with no one.

A secret many tried to take.

He held some worry for her safety, as obvious as he would with the amount of attention she captured. There would be few who jested at the opportunity of having her exposed to their pleasure. All talk, really, since the risk of getting killed or at least maimed along the way was too high.

Then there were fewer who actually had the balls to attempt a go at it, if their fear of being spontaneously castrated was non-existent. None ever made it farther than having the bouncer wrap a hand around their neck, if Temptress herself hadn't already gotten to them first with a well-placed swing of her heel.

But really,that college punk that managed to land a hand to her thigh was just asking for a new facial piercing.

The repeating guests that usually kept their distance had been around long enough to know better. To know she offered more than just a show if one behaved. Which was why most nights he would find the room in a standstill when she stepped into the light, straining to listen the tale she had to share.

Her skin told stories, whispered lies, a fantasy she wasn't allowed to own easily spoken through the movements of her body.

And if you looked closely enough, you would be able to hear what she had to say.

Anyone with even a remote sense of conscious thought could see it was all business to her; she hardly took any pleasure from wringing herself out on a nightly basis. If anything could be taken from her facial expressions of disinterested ecstasy, it would be that she's a very convincing performer who knows how to wield a mask to shield those from her shattered reality.

She never showed interest in anyone else, unless they showed interest in her than a few occasions did it catch his eye when she walked through the muted crowds with a guest in tow, on their way to the back-alley exit. And he never raised an eyebrow when she walked back in alone with nothing more than a sprained wrist and sometimes a stiletto missing its heel.

Which is why he had been heartbroken the night she approached him at the bar with that smile that made him want to bear his wrists out to her. Had made small talk he knew would lead to nowhere but the bed. Tilted her head towards the back rooms and lead him by that invisible leash.

Shoved him flat against the back of her dressing room door while stealing his breath and his gun in one swift movement.

She earned his respect that night, although in all honesty he probably would've just handed it over had she asked. She showed no fear, no hesitation at all as her fingers soundly tightened around the grip of the gun without even questioning the glowing weapon itself.

One arm tangled in his coat while pressing into his neck and the other holding the barrel steady underneath his chin, she stared him down with warmth intensity in her eyes that bore into him. More life than he'd ever seen since he first laid eyes on her, really.

This development was-

interesting.

She'd noticed him more often than not the nights he stood in the shadows. Choked him with all the information she had gathered in the back of her head, things she would take in as she put out on stage.

She would've been a great investigator in another life. A damned good interrogator. But as unfair as the city was with her denizens, she always made sure to break down the strongest.

Having felt he humored her enough, he gripped her wrist with one hand as he twisted the gun away, the other gently but quickly placed in the crook of her outstretched arm to fold it into herself and rotate them both, having her back rest against the door instead.

A flash of his teeth, few words spilled between, a twist of his wrist and he was as much exposed to her as she was to the world.

Once he revealed himself to her, she could not keep her eyes off of him from her perch on the stage, as if he hadn't been staring back to begin with.

He didn't bother exchanging the disguise for another, trusted her methods enough to dispel the need for marking the club as his. If she let him walk out of her room alive he at least had the decency to let her take care of things her way.

So long as everything was under control, as it usually was. Usually.

On slow evenings she would invite him to wait out on the comfort of her changing room bed, gifted to each of the dancers private rooms courtesy of the previous mistress who Temptress had mentored under. An offering, she said, for the girls to have a safe place to crash after their mistress had a "talk" with a guest who paid too close attention. And to prove her trust in him, had extended her invitation to what was considered their safe place.

An invitation he did not take lightly.

Slowly she opened up to him, one petal unfurling at a time, until she was comfortable enough to let him see her bloom. In the privacy of her changing room, of course.

"Would there be anything else you would do with your life if you, say, found a reset button?" he asked through the thick smoke lingering in the air during one of their quiet evenings. His blue spirit felt lifted in the sweetness of it all even as he laid still besides her. Never bothered by the act and in a way why would he be? He practically controlled the entirety of the city's supply.

She held her breath in, letting the flow of sticky smoke filter out through her nostrils in a lazy lift.

"Not sure. Hard to imagine what a decent life would be like when all you're used to is shit. Besides, can't really think of anything much better when the pay's this good."

He couldn't help but feel a resonance in her struck cord as she handed him the glass pipe.

"You're good at sticking your nose where it doesn't belong. You could've done some investigative journalism for all I know."

She snorted at that response, a hand running flippantly in her bangs.

"And can you imagine the actual reports? ' This is Temptress, signing off'"

She smiled at that, the line of her lips cutting deep into her cheeks. The dullness never left her glossed over eyes.

He gave a noncommittal shrug into the mattress. "Doesn't sound half bad, could be your alter ego," he defended before tilting his head further backwards with practiced impassiveness.

"What, is, your name anyway?"

She eyed him from her seat, a nervous grind of her teeth the only sign of hesitation. "I'll show you mine if you show me yours."

"I don't really know mine," he responded without pause. "It could've been 'light' or even 'tektite', but that's just some of what they called me in the days before the black hole-" he said before the sullen quiet overtook him, his eyes suddenly diverting to the ceiling.

She stilled, running her tongue underneath her top lip and taking in a muted sigh.

"People call me Roxie."

He hummed, blankly staring into the ceiling. "Funny," he said after a moment of prolonged silence, letting the quiet of her room suck out any humour the sentence would've carried.

"As Ironic as it is, you don't look any more than just a Roxanne."

Her face froze, the stillness of her chest making him hold his own breath as he waited for, anything. Then he heard it. Heard the beauty that was her laughter for the first time, the sound of the sky opening up. His lips slowly stretched into a grateful smile of awe.

He wouldn't have minded if that was the last thing he ever heard in his life.

Most nights ended that way, laying on the bed together sitting in comfortable silence between bouts of needless chatter. Others, he held her in his arms as she shook in pain of memories past.

The one night he found her unconscious he nearly had blood on his hands.

She lay limp against his arms, a barely restrained anger simmering underneath the surface of his eyes. Most of the addicts had already run out at that point, a few lingering in the corners in the ghosts of their former selves. The one that pointed Roxanne out for him stood alongside him quietly, her vibrantly red hair cascading over her slumped shoulders as she held onto herself.

"She does this, goes on these- bingers, every once in a while. Says it helps her," the redhead murmured with a plaintive shrug. "With what other than getting fucked up I don't really know."

He breathed out his frustration and held her against his chest a little tighter, adjusted his grip as he stepped his way over the unconscious bodies of the travel agents he incapacitated on his way in.

He figured he should've come sooner when he got the text, somehow tried to make it to the trap house faster even though he knew he was breaking laws left and right on his way there, social and theoretical.

Getting her home was only slightly harder, seeing as they've never spoken of their respective habitations. Tapping into her phone helped him solve that problem quickly, and if she had any objections to the matter, they would have to deal with it after she sobered up.

On his way to her bedroom, his eyes skimmed over the layout of her apartment without taking anything in. He didn't think it was his place to get to know hers.

He cleaned her up and laid her in bed. Cleared her living area and replenished her kitchen. Watered the neglected windowsill plants before making leave.

When he met her gaze during his next visit she held no face of thanks, absent to the thought of their previous encounter. She rolled a shoulder in a half-effort shrug as she finished off the last of her drink and slunked off the high bar stool. Made way to the hall that led to her room, taking the ache in his chest with her.

She would probably never be able to give him what he wants the most, would never be able to reciprocate the feelings he buried deep inside himself, each layer of filth and lies a weighted cloak over his heart.

But that was okay, when he got to see her genuine smile in the privacy of her dressing room. Was allowed to hear her laugh in those quiet nights laying side by side. The laugh that almost made him think he was alive.

Almost convinced him he was real.

They called her Temptress, and she was the most beautifully broken thing he had ever seen.

And he was hers.

Song notes;

"Hey there, pretty girl, you know, exactly what you got-
I don't, blame you at all, you can't resist it-
'specially when the light's so right, and the money's so tight, and it's coming in every single night-
she don't wanna leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave, leave-
She just stuck in
Houstantlantavegas-"

I hate my life I hate this cold weather I hate not being able to come up with dirp to give you other than *duck quack*.
So the temp recently went from a scorching satans asshole in the middle of November that was 94* to 32* with ice on my windshield within a week exactly.
Texas I hate u.
Also plz person sitting next to me stop eating your pickle with your mouth open for the love of Jibbers Crabst.
lort give me patience because if you give me strength i will choke a bitch.

With barely restrained murder,
-P.C.