Acid Rain

Posted originally on the Archive of Our Own at http://archiveofourown.org/works/43985308.

Rating: Explicit
Archive Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply
Category: M/M
Fandom: 天涯客 | Faraway Wanderers - priest, 山河令 | Word of Honor (TV
2021), Dune Series - Frank Herbert, Dune - All Media Types
Relationship: Wen Kexing/Zhou Zishu
Character: Zhang Chengling, Gu Xiang
Additional Tags: Not Beta Read, Using lore from the original series only, Heavy spoilers
for Dune Messiah onwards, Anal Fingering, Shapeshifting, Smut, Some
inspiration from Dune 2021
Language: English
Stats: Published: 2023-01-02 Words: 3706

Acid Rain
by urvogel

Summary

Zhou Zishu does not remember how many faces he has worn in the 30-odd years since he
was decanted from the axolotl tank. Wen Kexing remembers having parents. The House
Corrino killed his parents. He serves the Emperor Corrino. Face Dancer ZZS x Sardaukar
Burseg WKX

Notes

This was originally written in Jan 2022. Spoilers for Dune Messiah through to
Chapterhouse: Dune just by virtue of the lore I have included. The porn is about midway
starting with "The tip of Wen Kexing's finger" and can be skipped to "Wen Kexing lay and
watched".

Recommended Listening: ACID RAIN - LORN & Dune (2021) OST - Hans Zimmer

See the end of the work for more notes

Wen Kexing remembers having parents. He takes the memories out and polishes them into stories
so he doesn't forget. The House Corrino killed his parents. He serves the Emperor Corrino.
Sometimes the contradiction threatens to split his head apart. But he endures. He will become a
perfect, ruthless, unimpeachable Sardaukar and someday his knife will be within reach of the
Emperor's throat. Another emperor will follow. He knows this like he knows the weight of his
shortsword. But still – the chaos will be something to see.

It is not strictly condoned for Wen Kexing to take Gu Xiang under his wing, but it is not punished
either. The in-fighting and politics of Salusa Secundus requires alliances and followers. As long as
she does her training and takes care of herself most of the time he can protect her a little bit. She
had been born here, both parents dead in the line of duty, but he hoped he could preserve a little bit
of humanity in her that she will be able to carry to the outside world someday. She helps him
remember that there is an outside world. But all his humanity is already dead. He is not a human,
he is Sardaukar.

As is traditional, Wen Kexing goes from prisoner to guard and takes control of Salusa Secundus by
killing all his predecessors. First he kills his way out of training. Then leads a troupe, a battalion,
then a legion. There are a large number of traditions and superstitions on Salusa Secundus, but for
a planet of criminals and child soldiers only one above all: power rules. There are always
complaints, but they are reduced to a simmering discontent by his second year of tenure after he
has already killed most of his main challengers. Sometimes he wonders why he bothered. Ruling a
prison planet through absolute strength is a tedious and thankless job. But what it does bring is
opportunities to go off-world. Usually to kill the emperor's enemies. But as a Burseg he can take
trips to colourful, beautiful planets where the air is always perfectly breathable, the plants non-
toxic, and the gravity positively generous. When the killing is done, he can go to brothels and learn
about the uses of bodies other than surviving. He can eat and drink delicious food and wine. And
then he leads his troops back to hell.

Zhou Zishu does not remember how many faces he has worn in the 30-odd years since he was
decanted from the axolotl tank. Zhou Zishu was not his name and this was not his face. Zhou Zishu
had lost the memory of his first shape, but he remembered his Tleilaxu name. The name he was
called by his masters. Muladeviya. He wanted to leave that name behind. Zhou Zishu was just the
last person he replaced and the one he has been the longest. He used to remind himself of this
whenever he caught himself thinking of Zhou Zishu's past in the first person. He wasn't there, for
that idyllic childhood in the martial Qin household. No, he had only arrived when Zhou Zishu was
fifteen and suddenly a Lord after his adoptive father died. That was when Zhou Zishu was killed
and replaced to better infiltrate the highest echelon of the Imperium for the Tleilaxu.

It was best to replace someone at a moment when others will be least likely to notice small changes
in personality and habits. A death in the family. A great shock. Taking a new position. At those
transition points was when Tleilaxu inserted the knife. Even when Face Dancers took the memory-
personality of someone it was coloured by people's perception of themselves. How they really were
perceived by others could be fatally different.

The personalities of all the people he had ever been still lived within him. Sometimes they spoke to
him. Sometimes he became them in dreams. His memories were disjointed, time difficult to track,
as one person layered upon another. And people's memories were all filtered through their own
biases, so sometimes their remembrances conflicted. He had even been other people while the
original Zhou Zishu had been alive. Those memories were jarring. There were his memories of
being Zhou Zishu. And there were Zhou Zishu's memories of him as someone else.

And then Zhou Zishu had gone rogue, from both the Imperium and the Tleilaxu. All those years
pretending to be human beings, some of it had to stick eventually; he wanted a human life.
Whatever life he had left to live. After all, Face Dancers were not genetically programmed to live
as long as their masters. At any point if one of them found him they could order him to kill himself
and he would do it. He wasn't sure yet if he could disobey them. He might never be sure until the
moment came. He also had to avoid the Bene Gesserit, with fingers in everything across the empire
– but less so here, in the Emperor's private army. He had run into them before and they had known
what he was immediately. Whether they revealed him or not was entirely up to their own priorities,
which were difficult to predict.

So he had come to Salusa Secundus as Zhou Xu, yet another face and name, this one entirely false.
The Tleilaxu had people embedded everywhere, but the isolation of the largest prison planet in the
known universe would help hide his tracks. After waiting a while, changing faces and names a few
times, he would kill and replace a high-ranking Sardaukar to go off-planet. If he could live long
enough to do that, he might find his freedom.

"Burseg, do you want to go take a look at the new arrivals now? Only half are at a trainable age
this time, the other half are just scum."

Wen Kexing sighed in boredom. He was staring out one of the few windows in the administrative
offices at the ripple of purple lightning across the sky. The acid rain ate away at anything even
slightly porous and there was only ever too much sunlight or not enough so it was easier just not to
have windows at all. There would be a heavy storm tonight. It would likely last a few days. A bit
harsh on the new arrivals, but they would have to get used to it.

"Are any of them handsome?"

Their faces and identity information were recorded but it was never very much. The prison planet
was not choosy in its admissions. Who you were before you arrived didn't really matter. That was
all wiped away.

"Why even ask me? You know I can never guess your taste in men."

Wen Kexing sighed again.

"I guess I must."

"You don't have to, you're Burseg-in-Chief, you can make Burseg Meng do it."

Wen Kexing levered himself out of his seat and adjusted his uniform. If he covered up his rank
badges hardly anyone would recognize his face when he walked around. He was probably one of
the most secretive leaders the Sardaukar had ever had, but it had served him well as a survival
tactic.

"Let him lie to me and give him the excuse to recruit all of the competent ones to his faction
immediately? Don't be silly. I have to make him work a little bit harder than that to overthrow me."

Zhou Zishu's forehead itched where his prisoner number had been tattooed. He could smooth it
away with a thought, but he wouldn't. It was convenient if everyone thought that the numbers were
a reliable indicator of one's identity. Just how people thought faces were.

He had been released from the quarantine holding cells for new arrivals after three standard days,
according to his internal clock. He had been given a set of plain work clothes and a basic respirator
and sent out into a large hall that looked more like a large city commons than a prison. There were
several floors open around the central atrium, some obviously entertainment venues, with a vast
statue of the emperor in the middle. He had been told before being released that there were no
restrictions on prisoner movement but they also wouldn't provide a place to sleep or food. If
someone wanted to go live outside or walk to another prison camp they were welcome to try.
Most of the people sitting around and talking or bartering at stalls were dressed in the recognizable
light armour of the Sardaukar, but there were others like him dressed in mismatched outfits. Many
with full headmasks and durable-looking all-weather outer clothes that made identification
difficult. And all of them were visibly armed. Except for the ones being lead around in chains. It
seemed like that was a fate he was going to have to avoid.

He could already feel the watchful gaze of predators who had been paying attention to the fresh
arrivals coming out of the exit in front of him. He knew what was expected of him in this
environment. It was kill or be killed, eat or be eaten. That was fine. He would find somewhere to
relax and watch and wait until someone foolish came sniffing around.

"Look at that one, Burseg. That one's just laying there! Is he brain-damaged?"

"He's clearly just relaxing."

There was something about the man's relaxed face, the careless pose, the curve of his back.
As it turned out, the someone foolish who fell into Zhou Zishu's trap was a teenage boy too old for
the Sardaukar training regime. A political exile from some minor noble family, far too soft for a
place like this. Zhou Zishu hadn't been planning on sticking his nose in, but they disturbed his
napping spot and didn't seem inclined to let him go freely.

He got out of it a sword and an unwanted follower.

Then, just when he thought he'd gotten clear of trouble, someone new appeared.

To his surprise, his first strike was caught, the tip of the blade trapped between two gloved fingers.
"You shouldn't have told me."

Wen Kexing had a hand on Zhou Zishu's throat like a collar and kissed him like he was trying to
bruise. He bit down hard Zhou Zishu felt his lip split and tasted blood. Wen Kexing licked at it and
his lip stung.

"I could keep you here. I could make you stay."

Breathing hard, blood on his lips, his dark eyes up close looked wild, terrified, desperate. Zhou
Zishu looked at him patiently.

"You would make me stay when you yourself don't want to be here? When you want to destroy this
place?"

Anger rose on Wen Kexing's face and his hand flexed for a moment – but then released. His hand
dropped to Zhou Zishu's chest. He stared at it for a long moment in silence. He felt anger at the
universe again for giving him someone who would only leave him behind.

Zhang Chengling, asleep in the corner of the room, made a noise in his sleep that attracted both of
their attention, but he didn't wake. It served to stir Wen Kexing from his trance. He withdrew out of
reach to a seat facing the door.

"You should rest."

Zhou Zishu normally would have liked to argue with him, but it hurt to breathe and he was worried
about a broken rib puncturing his lung. If he sat and meditated his body would heal itself faster
than a regular human's, but it still took focus and energy to coax the shattered pieces of his body
back into the correct shape. Tleilaxu bioengineering was not omnipotent. Yet.
Although he had known he needed to leave the Imperium and his Tleilaxu Masters behind, once he
had done that he found himself somewhat aimless. He could help people as he wanted to, ignore
them, or hurt them. He could do nothing. Just waste the remaining years of his life wandering
alone like that. Hurting no one, with few cares, like an elephant in the forest. But then there had
been someone who needed him. A boy. And he had remembered Zhou Zishu's younger brother.
The one he had let die for the mission. He had Zhou Zishu's memories and his personality and he
knew what Zhou Zishu would have felt when they heard the news because he had felt it. In
retrospect, that was when he had known – he was done. He was too far gone to keep being a spy
within a spy. Now he had a chance to do something right.

Zhou Zishu sat in a lotus pose, or as close he could manage. He looked at Wen Kexing sitting in
the dark, somehow managing to seem restless in complete stillness. He had said he wanted to keep
Zhou Zishu here, but he was the one who looked trapped.

"When you knew I wanted you, why didn't you just seduce me and kill me when my guard was
down?"

Zhou Zishu looked at him sideways.

"You like that idea, don't you?" he replied.

Wen Kexing's pupils were dilated wide like a cats.

"You fucking me and then killing me? Yes. I would like that. And then you would take my
memory of us into you. I'd live in you forever."

The tip of Wen Kexing's finger pushed in and Zhou Zishu sighed and forced himself to let go. He
relaxed into the warm bath water. He could control every muscle in his body, of course he could
control this one too. When the tip of Wen Kexing's finger stroked across the inside of his flesh he
made a little noise of surprised pleasure. He hadn't been expecting it to feel good. He had been
prepared for pain, for discomfort, like the first time he had had sex as a woman with a vagina,
awkward and only serving as an object to fulfill someone else's desires. He had penetrated women
too, but that had been a different pleasure still.

Wen Kexing was watching him intently as he twisted the first finger out and and gently pushed
another one in with it. Zhou Zishu's lips parted and he spread his legs further at the sensation. Wen
Kexing smiled at him and he felt flushed, not just with the heat. He had endured more terrible
scrutiny than this before, but this was what would break him. Wen Kexing's intense focus on
tracking his every reaction made him hyper-aware of every expression on his face, every
movement of his body. What sort of face was he supposed to make? He couldn't remember. When
he had two fingers in deeply and curled them up stroking, Zhou Zishu jerked at the sudden jolt of
electric pleasure and Wen Kexing actually laughed. Zhou Zishu glared at him as water sloshed.

"What?"

"Good. You're feeling it."

Wen Kexing grinned at him with a hint of smugness and started stroking his fingers in and out
along that spot. Zhou Zishu grabbed onto his shoulder for balance and felt like he wasn't getting
enough air to breathe. It felt – strange.

"Don't," he choked out and Wen Kexing didn't stop at all, just smirked more and drew closer
between Zhou Zishu's legs so he could reach deeper. He pressed a third finger against his rim and
Zhou Zishu inhaled sharply. Then his free hand wrapped around Zhou Zishu's cock and he
moaned. He felt the need to hold on to something even though he already was. One of his hands
was clutched at Wen Kexing's bare shoulder and the other was holding on to the edge of the bath.
Wen Kexing penetrated him with three fingers and started thrusting them in and out while working
his cock with his other hand.

"You're so beautiful," Wen Kexing murmured, eyes sparkling, as he leant in and kissed him. Zhou
Zishu's mouth opened as Wen Kexing started stroking that spot again and Wen Kexing took
advantage of it to thrust his tongue inside. Zhou Zishu felt himself rocking down against Wen
Kexing's fingers as they pushed up, feeling the counterpoint of his cock wrapped in a water-
warmed hand, less in control of his body than he ever had before. He felt like he was going to melt.
Like all the fake identities he had piled on top of him over the years were going to slide off – and
all that would remain would be him.

"Lao Wen," he moaned, digging his fingernails into skin and scratching, staring at a blank point on
the ceiling.

"Oh, A-Xu," he murmured back, impossibly raw. Zhou Zishu closed his eyes and focused on the
sensations. He was going to come, he could feel it just out of reach, and it was only a matter of
time. Everything came down to the tight wet heat around his prick and the blunt, filling pressure in
his ass.

"Oh."

It was close. He reached for it. And it knocked him over, turned him inside out. Wen Kexing's
fingers pressing inside him made it feel like it lasted forever. Every time he thought it was over
there was a bit more, until it petered out. When he was limp and panting Wen Kexing kissed him
again swiftly and then there was a rush of water as Wen Kexing got out of the bath and then was
lifting him out too. Wen Kexing then lifted him and before he knew it he was laying on the bed
with Wen Kexing pressing down heavily on him, kissing him hungrily again like he wanted to eat
him alive.

Zhou Zishu cracked open his eyes but all he could see was Wen Kexing's face. It was easier to
touch, to lift heavy limbs and stroke hands down his back, grasp the firm muscle of his ass, feel the
press of his cock against Zhou Zishu's stomach.

"Can I now, A-Xu?"

Zhou Zishu considered for just a moment what Wen Kexing might do if Zhou Zishu said no.

"Yeah," he sighed instead. Wen Kexing wasted no time in getting wet fingers at his hole again. He
spread his legs and lifted his hips and winced a little as his still-raw nerves protested, but it was
only an initial twinge. It was perhaps one of the most trivial reasons why he had manipulated his
own body but he did it now. Just so that when Wen Kexing guided the head of his erection in he
felt fresh arousal instead of sparking discomfort. Wen Kexing was watching his face again for his
reaction, but much less patiently than before. Zhou Zishu saw his throat bob.

"Go on," he urged, shifting a little to plant his feet against the mattress.

"You..." Wen Kexing said, hesitating for a second, but it didn't take any further encouragement for
Wen Kexing to push in the rest of the way and Zhou Zishu pulled one of his legs out of the way.

Having something even larger in him was another new sensation. If he looked down he could see
 where their flesh was joined, but it was too much. He quietly gasped as Wen Kexing was totally
silent, thrusts quickly going from controlled to frantic. He was getting hard again. He might come
again. Wen Kexing certainly was going to.

Wen Kexing lay and watched Zhou Zishu's naked back in the low red-orange lights. Zhou Zishu
was sharpening his knife – Wen Kexing could hear the soft rasping noise. As he listened to the
rough rhythmic sound Wen Kexing felt like he was drowning, willingly sinking into a deep pool.
Looking at Zhou Zishu's back caused something within him that had always been running and
scratching at the walls to still. He was calm.

Zhou Zishu could turn around and stab him right now and Wen Kexing might let him. It would be
a relief. No more planning, no more killing, no more revenge. But he had never given himself the
luxury of death before, why would he start now? Now, when he was so close?

He had always been so sure that he would die one day while pursuing his vengeance, but now he
found he didn't want to. He wanted so much more than he had ever let himself want before. It was
consuming him. Most of all, he wanted a future with A-Xu. One where he was not a Sardaukar but
a human, just as Zhou Zishu had become a human. If it was possible he wanted it. He deserved it,
didn't he? Why should all these imperial noblemen get to live free lives and not him? Billions of
people, whole planets of people, who lived without the shackles of being the Emperor's blade.

"A-Xu, I have to go."

Wen Kexing was slumped in the doorway, hunched over with his head in his hands like it
physically pained him.

"The Emperor... I have to go. Send the kids away like we planned. But... can you wait for me?
Please? Until I come back..."

Zhou Zishu looked down at his hands, wishing there was alcohol in them. Something.

"Yeah. I'll wait. So go and take care."

Wen Kexing straightened himself and stood, shoulders back. He gave a faint smile at Zhou Zishu
over his shoulder before his face became a mask. Once again the Sardaukar. Then he left.

Zhou Zishu let him go. He got Cao Weining, Gu Xiang, Zhang Chengling, and Gao Xiaolian
together and put them on a shuttle, all papers and radio checkpoints carefully researched and forged
by him. They would be on the same Spacing Guild ship, but separate from the rest of the Sardaukar
and with luck they would be able to slip away unnoticed after the jump.

He watched and waited as the Sardaukar prepared for war so that he could pick one off very
carefully like a wolf stalking a herd of sheep. Those who thought themselves wolves never
expected it. A dark room, a quick-slow knife in the lungs. He didn't bother taking the Sardaukar's
memories, just his face, armour, and weapons. Didn't want that personality in his collection. He
would gather intelligence the old fashioned way, keep an eye on how things progressed.

And then he was on a ship to Arrakis. Dune, the desert planet.

End Notes
End Notes

"elephant in the forest": The Dharmapada Sutra 23:330 (source, Muller 1881)

"It is better to live alone, there is no companionship with a fool; let a man walk
alone, let him commit no sin, with few wishes, like an elephant in the forest."

Zhou Zishu's Theilaxu name Muladeviya: We only have a few canonical Theilaxu names.
Scytale, from Dune Messiah, is named after a cryptographic/authentication method used by
Spartan generals. So I decided to use a (poorly researched) cryptographic method from
India documented in commentaries on the Kama Sutra.

If the porn seems suspiciously similar to the Snake Demon AU, this kinda turned into that.

If anyone wants to take the idea and run with it please do, and let me know. I love to talk
about Dune, especially Face Dancers.

Please drop by the archive and comment to let the author know if you enjoyed their work!