IMPORTANT NOTICE: As of May 2026, I consider myself officially semi-retired in the writing community. I am still around, but not actively posting as much.
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First things first, this is an 18+ blog.
Minors, Blank Blogs, and Blogs without age easily accessible DNI. While I don't actively police my followers, I do ask that this is respected.
DNI if you are a Mahito hater or believe Hisoka is a pedophile!
Secondly I mainly write and post YANDERE/DARK CONTENT.
I do my best to tag appropriately, but will sometimes miss things. I am human.
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cane user here, I stumbled upon your mahito x cane user fic yesterday and it's SO GOOD. like genuinely, no one ever wants to explore this particular disability in writing (especially yandere fics) so yours made me so so so happy, not only I felt seen but the writing is exquisite as well... wishing you 100 years of happiness...
Nonny, my dear, I am wishing you the same 100 years of happiness for the kind words 💛 Thank you
I am glad you felt seen; it's always lovely to hear such things about pieces that are more niche than others. 'Broken' is definitely one of those pieces where, yes, anyone can imagine themselves in that position for the sake of the fic, the ones that get it Get It.
Title: The Village in Winter [Yandere Chrollo x Reader]
Synopsis: You meet a strange man in the museum one day.
Word count: 7500ish
Notes: yandere, autistic coded reader, kidnapping, manipulation, Chrollo is an asshole
Tuesday. Thursday. Saturday.
Each of these was a Museum Day. Well. Not officially. It wasn’t on some city-wide calendar or anything as glamorous as that. It was, however, a simple fact of life: every Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday, you came to your city’s famous art museum for the afternoon.
It was easy enough to take a long lunch during the week–the missing 2 hours on your pay wasn’t exactly something to weep over and if you wanted to cry, you could always come in an hour early to make up for it.
And you didn’t work on Saturday at all, so it was your time to spend as you wished. So why not spend it at the most famous museum in the city?
Maybe infamous was a better word. Outside news agencies never got tired of remarking about the dubious and potentially illegal origins of some of its works, rumored to be stolen hundreds of years ago by some king-or-another from a formerly favored lord.
The infamy wasn’t why you went, of course. You went for the art, dubious origins or otherwise. More specifically, you went for the paintings. Sculptures weren’t the same. They were often boring, blank imitations of life that captured nothing but smooth solid porcelain.
It was paintings that drew your eye and kept your interest. The brushstrokes, the way the lighting was specifically designed to pull people’s gazes this way and that; the hidden secrets behind a subject’s expression. All the little details that you could count on being there time and time again.
And so, like clockwork, you went there time and time again. To admire, to walk. Some of the guards and docents knew you by name at this point and, if they’d given it, you knew theirs, too.
It was nice to remember things when you went to the same place. It was nice, too, to visit the same paintings. The museum rarely moved pieces–it had happened only once in your memory–and that was especially ideal. Your steps and path could be familiar day after day.
What was not nice, however, was the fact that there was (today, of all days, a Tuesday) a man standing in front of your favorite painting at the exact moment you wanted to approach it.
The man’s presence wasn’t the not-nice part. (It was often nice when people admired the same things you did, because it meant they might ask you about them. And as many years as you had under your belt visiting these same paintings, these same steps, you knew quite a lot.)
The not-nice part was that there was a man standing in front of your favorite painting, and he was staring at (horror!) the wrong thing.
As you trace your familiar steps, coming agonizingly closer, you can see that he’s not looking at the painting but the frame. The frame! Of all things! He’s got his head tilted just-so, looking at it this way and that. Like he’s admiring it. He stops only when your footsteps get close enough to make it clear that you’re about to stop at the same spot.
“The frame isn’t period authentic,” you say, perhaps a bit too loudly, “There’s no point in looking at it.”
The man hums. You half-wonder if he’ll snap at you, people sometimes do.. But instead he looks back at the painting, as if he’s trying to see what you mean. “What makes you say it isn’t period authentic?”
His voice is low, a murmur. Out of respect for the museum, maybe, or he’s just embarrassed at being called out. You don’t bother trying to figure it out, because the question he asked is more than enough to have you ready to spill out the words.
“Well,” you begin, swallowing because you can already tell it’s going to take a while. “For one, it’s gilded with aluminum.” When he doesn’t respond, you smile, unbidden. “And of course, aluminum isn’t suitable for water gilding.” Your finger points to the frame (an unwelcome frame, in your opinion–but again, it was the painting, not the frame, that one ought to look at) and wiggles. “The era this painting was made, water gilding was the most popular. They certainly wouldn’t have used an inferior material like aluminum to do water gilding.”
“I see,” he says, after a moment. “Is that all?”
It is, naturally enough, not all.
“No!” You say, maybe too loud, because he raises an eyebrow. But you press on. “If it was just the frame material, that would be one thing. Not everything was water gilded, of course, it was just the most popular. But the real tell…”
And you might be reading him wrong (you do that a lot) but he does lean in, doesn’t he? Because he’s interested in what you have to say. You think. It would be welcome, anyway.
“The real tell,” you continue, pointing here and there on the frame. “Are the fasteners. Especially around the joints..” You press on before he thanks you, because he shouldn’t thank you before you give him the really important detail here.
“When the painting was made, they didn’t have keyed stretchers yet.” You point here, and there. “These made it easier to expand the frame, or make it smaller, simply by sliding the keys and tightening the screw. Before,” and there’s a laugh in your voice, “it was a pain when you wanted to take a painting out and swap it for something else. But with these newer ones, it was much simpler!”
There is a beat or two, and you wonder if he’s going to scoff and give you that smirky little smile people give when you’ve shared too much information that they apparently didn’t want. (Even if it was fascinating information, nonetheless.)
But he doesn’t. Curiously, and it’s a pleasant sort of curiosity, his smile isn’t smirky at all–it’s pleased. Happy, even, if your guess was as good as gold.
“Thank you,” he says, eyeing the frame–still the wrong part, you think–again. “I wasn’t aware that frames held such nuance.” He glances at you. “I appreciate your insight.”
Insight. Huh. No one has ever called it that before. Word-vomit, yes. Over-explaining, definitely. “Stuff no one cares about,” that one was pretty common. But insight–that was new. And it was, like his smile, perfectly pleasant. It made you feel almost fluttery.
“Most people don’t appreciate it,” you admit, too honest. “But the frame isn’t the important part of the painting, anyway…”
The next time he looks towards the painting he, thank goodness, actually looks at the painting within the frame. “Is this your favorite painting?”
“Of course.” The words come quick and sure.
“Why of course?”
Sometimes you wonder if other people have a switch that lets them choose when to hold back,
and when to indulge in their words. Because you find it very, very hard. Especially when it’s something like this, something like a painting you adore, something like being asked to explain why it is your favorite painting.
But this stranger asked about it, so even if this mysterious switch did exist, you certainly would have slammed the “full speed ahead” setting without hesitation.
“Well…”
This stranger gets to learn about it all. About the artist (Henri Lamorliere) and why he chose the subject (a village scene in the winter) and who commissioned it (a prince who owned the land and later died from complications related, presumably, to his gout) and how it ended up here, in this city, of all places. (That was, indeed, a longer story–involving said potentially dubious origins that you were more than happy to indulge in, considering the stranger’s interest.)
As for why it is, of course, your favorite–it is because of all the tiny details, small things, inconsequential and silly to most, but details that keep you coming again and again. A child depicting playing in the snow with friends; a couple ice skating, with one leg clearly losing balance, forever frozen before the young man falls straight on his bum; a woman with a bucket, frowning, staring into a frozen water well; a farmer carefully draping warm blankets over his horses; a streak of mud revealed underneath the pristine snow as a cart of firewood is pulled along; and on and on. It’s not just a painting, it’s a frozen moment, people forever engaging in these mundane or delightful or simplistic moments.
When you are done (and you must admit, you talked for quite a while) the man doesn’t roll his eyes or sigh or say that he must be off, which is very often the case when you talk too much.
Instead he, of all things, smiles.
“Thank you,” he says, and before you can ask why, continues: “How fascinating. I didn’t know the history of the piece as well I as I thought.” His eyes roam over the painting, the details you cling to. “And I never thought much about the scene being depicted.” He glances at you. “Not in the way you have, at least.”
It might be an insult. It might not.
“When you come here as much as I do, you learn a lot.”
He hums. Seems to consider something. And then, he asks:
“Would you like to share a coffee?” If you’re not mistaken, there’s a warmth to his voice. A bit of humor, too. Maybe he didn’t hate your diatribe about the piece, in the end.
But–well. It won’t work out, at least not without a concession on his part. (And yours, too, not that he’d understand it.)
“I only get coffee after I see the rest of my paintings.” A pause, something heated piercing the apple of your cheeks. “Um. They’re not my paintings. I didn’t paint them. I don’t have any work on display,” you explain, as if he needs that clarification. “I think of some of them as mine, because I visit them when I come here.”
Sometimes, when there’s time to ponder on it, you liken actions to machinery. It starts with thoughts. They go through a certain process before resulting in an expression or a word. That’s what you think of, now, as you watch this stranger taking in what you said. His own thoughts are no doubt moving through the cogs, being sent this way and that on some conveyor belt, ending in his final action.
Though it isn’t one you expected.
“Well then,” he says. “May I accompany you to see the rest of your paintings, so that I could join you for coffee?”
Huh.
It’s a break in the routine, sure. But he didn’t roll his eyes while you talked or quickly excuse himself to get out of hearing what you had to say. And if he was willing to listen, and follow your route, well–it might just be okay.
You don’t exactly plan to smile when you answer, but it creeps along your lips all the same.
“I suppose you could,” you say, and that smile quirks. “If you can keep up.”
“My name is Chrollo,” he replies, oddly, like it’s an answer.
–
Chrollo does, in fact, keep up. More than that, he engages in conversation with you, offering counterpoints, asking questions, even going so far as to ask how you learned such-and-such a detail.
Despite the interruption that he presents, it’s not unwelcome. It’s nice, actually, and as the afternoon goes on, you almost regret that there aren’t more paintings on your usual stop. But it’s not like the afternoon stops when you visit Boy and his Dog, one of the museum’s quirkier paintings; it is, yes, a Boy and his Dog. But the dog is wearing human clothes, and the boy is running wild on a broken leash.
(The painting always makes you smile. When the stranger asks why, you’re almost–well, perhaps actually–rude when you explain: “Because it’s all backwards, of course.”)
After Boy and his Dog comes coffee. And if your newfound companion is relieved to have finally gotten to the part he asked you about earlier this afternoon, he doesn’t show it. Instead, he watches; he watches as you approach the counter and the barista greets you by name, already starting your familiar order before you say a word.
“You come here often,” he says, and it’s not a question.
You nod and eye the pastry case. “It’s tradition,” you say, not taking your eyes off the goodies displayed inside the climate controlled glass. If they have fresh cinnamon buns, you get one of them. If they aren’t fresh, you stick to the prepackaged cookies. “Every Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday.”
The glaze isn’t hard, but smooth, a bit of it still runny along the edges.
Fresh.
“One cinnamon roll, please,” you order. Then pause, because that isn’t quite right today, is it? “I mean, two.” But is that right, either? You eye Chrollo and something like a smile plays at the edge of his lips. “Er, well, if you’d like one, that is–”
“I would, thank you.” It’s a relief to not have to walk back the order, and the barista behind the counter swiftly bags them up.
Chrollo orders his own coffee before you can offer to add his to your tab, but that’s all right. At least you’re buying him the cinnamon bun. It’s nice to help others, especially someone who was patient enough to listen. (Not just listen, though, you remind yourself. Actively engage with you, which is far better. And more rare.)
You’re in the middle of your cinnamon bun–literally, fork stabbing the middle part first, which is the softest, gooeist part–when he speaks up.
“I enjoyed our conversation today.” Soft, almost as if he didn’t say the words often. Maybe, and this was perhaps too egotistical of you, he didn’t.
“Mm,” you say, because you really did want to eat that middle part first, and the explosion of sticky-sweet cinnamon goodness in your mouth prevented further words for a few moments. Something about this seems to amuse him, and he places a hand over his mouth before he chuckles.
“What?” There is still some cinnamon roll still clinging to your teeth.
“Nothing,” he murmurs, though it wasn’t nothing at all. “I was simply thinking that I might see you on Thursday. If that’s all right.”
Your mouth quirks. It’s not irritation that you’re feeling. Not really. But he was something new, a blip in your schedule. Still, he didn’t make a mess of things. He listened, and it was nice, actually, for someone to not shoo you away like some gnat the moment you got going on a favorite topic.
“It’s all right,” you say, mind still wavering, but voice already made up. “If you can still keep up.”
He snorts, and nothing more.
–
On Thursday, he’s there. Standing by your favorite painting. And staring, again, at the unimpressive, unimportant frame. Of all things–again!
“You–” And it’s strange, how easily the indignation bleeds into your words. “But I already told you about the frame–”
But when Chrollo turns, he’s smiling, and it takes you a few slow moments to realize that he was kidding. Ah. It was… It was a joke.
There’s a flush in your cheeks as you stuff your hands into your jacket pocket. “I’m not good with jokes,” you admit.
He stuffs his own hands in his pockets and you can’t decide if it’s intentional mimicry or if he simply does the same thing in an awkward situation. (And which of these options is better, really?)
“Nor am I, it seems.”
That, for some reason, makes you laugh.
Makes him laugh.
Makes the afternoon start off on a better foot.
Later on, after paintings and coffee, Chrollo insists on coming to the museum Saturday to see you again.
You don’t protest.
–
It’s remarkable how quickly Chrollo becomes a part of your daily routine, and how swiftly he moves from being solely within your once-tidy museum routine to the outside.
To things like asking you out to dinner, and when you explain that on Tuesday evenings after work you go home and make breakfast for dinner, he insists on taking you to a diner-style restaurant to maintain your breakfast meal while not intruding on your home life.
Which is considerate, you think, that he understands that you’re wary of inviting a relatively new acquaintance into your home. But–going out to eat is not what you usually do. At least he doesn’t comment when you fidget too much, when you don’t look in the waitress’s eyes as you order, and when you seem relieved when the check comes.
You like him better for it.
–
Chrollo doesn’t tell you that you’re doing things wrong. Which is nice. It’s not that most people tell you flat out that you’re doing something wrong, at least not since you’ve become an adult. But you can tell by their looks; pinched eyebrows and frowns, glances, murmured comments to their peers.
Chrollo does none of this.
Chrollo does, however, often forget how you like things; or rather, how you don’t like things.
He gets too close. A hand that brushes your thigh when you sit together for lunch or coffee, his arm slung around your shoulder when the museum gets too crowded and you start to feel the crush of it crawling up your back. A term of endearment slipped in at the end of the night. Goodnight, dearest.
Maybe it’s a lot to remember, or maybe he’s just forgetful. There are other options that sometimes sneak up in your mind–maybe he’s doing it on purpose–but they are swiped away so quickly.
Because it’s Chrollo. He listens to you, he actually pays attention to what you say. He doesn’t mind that you sometimes have trouble making eye contact or that you get flustered in ordinary situations.
More than that–
He’s your friend. Someone who listens, who has something interesting to say, who seems to actually care about you. He’s the first friend you’ve had in a long time, and you were willing to put up with his forgetfulness in order to keep that friendship alive and well.
Even if it meant having to bat his hand away from your thigh on more than one occasion.
–
It’s Friday evening.
Friday evening should be relaxing. The end of the work week, a time to grab a favorite frozen dinner from the freezer and relax in front of the TV with a show that you’ve seen a thousand times.
Once it’s over, you’ll turn on the news and you might work on a puzzle or write in your journal or slowly make progress on an embroidery kit you picked up 2 years ago and have only ventured into a few times.
You might do these things, except–well.
Except everything has fallen apart.
Your shaking fingers almost don’t manage to pick out Chrollo on your contacts, and it’s a wonder your phone doesn’t crash to the ground and break into a million pieces with how much your hands tremble.
“Hello?”
He barely gets the word out and you’re already blubbering into the phone, incoherent, words bubbling out with no time to make them more understandable. They choke out, stuttered and half-baked, before you finally beg for the one person who might understand your distress.
He manages the trek in record time, impossibly fast, but you don’t pay attention. It doesn’t matter. What matters is that he’s here and you don’t even protest this time when he sees your sobbing form and immediately scoops you into his arms.
It’s almost comforting, the way he squeezes you, gives you something to feel grounded. One of his hands inches a bit lower on your back than you’d like but even that doesn’t matter, doesn’t even register, because his presence has calmed you down enough to spit out the terrible truth:
“They stole it.” You gulp in a great, heaving gasp. “The Village in Winter. Someone… someone stole it.”
Chrollo’s body tenses. The news drones on in the background, but it’s moved on to something less important now. As if something could be less important than this. There’s a great big hole where the painting used to be, on the wall, in your mind.
Chrollo steps in or rather, steps back, placing one hand on your chin–the sensation makes something itch down your back, but you ignore it, because such things can be ignored in a time of great distress. “You are truly upset,” he says, finally, slowly.
“Of course I am!” Your own hands come up now, grabbing the one on your chin, tugging it down so you can squeeze it with great abandon. Chrollo doesn’t seem to mind. “It’s all wrong–” It’s wrong, too, the way that other hand still rests far too low on your back. “It won’t be there. I love that painting. I love it and now when we go to the museum tomorrow, it won’t be there!”
Chrollo’s hand on your lower back begins to stroke. Maybe it’s soothing. Or meant to be; you have to give him credit, you think, for rushing over and trying to calm you down.
“We don’t have to be there,” he murmurs.
Which does nothing to calm you down at all, because of course–
“We do have to be there.” Bitterness sets your jaw hard. “We do have to be there, and it will be all wrong.” The thought of all those precious details lost to you forever, the stories you’ve wound through again and again in your head. Even the new routine of admiring them with Chrollo, who always takes interest in the wrong part of the painting–that will be gone, too.
And it’s wrong, wrong, wrong. The world feels worse for it. What would be the point of going to the museum, when you’ve lost some integral part of yourself, all thanks to the work of some lowlife thieves?
Chrollo finally pulls himself away from you, a frown set on his lips. He glances around your living room, the disrupted Friday evening routine that is begging to be set back into place without all the pieces.
“Have you had your tea? You always drink it while you watch the news, don’t you?”
You do. Yes. Not tonight, though. At least not more than that first sip before it was interrupted by the horror of the news report.
“I was too upset to finish it,” you admit. “It’s on the counter.” But if you could finish it, maybe it would help. Now that Chrollo’s here to set everything back into order. It wouldn’t make things right–nothing could, except the restoration of that pivotal painting–but it’s a start. A comfort.
“Could you…”
He’s already on his way to the kitchen, a hand slipping into his pocket. “Of course. I’ll warm it up for you.”
“Thanks,” you force out, the word heavy on your tongue. Yes. Thank goodness Chrollo is here to set things into place. He knows what you like and need, wandering hands notwithstanding. So it comes as no surprise when he emerges from the kitchen with a newly warmed cup of tea and you stumble on shaking legs to the sofa.
Microwaved tea never tastes the same, and it’s no exception here. It’s almost too bitter now. But you choke it down anyway while Chrollo sits next to you, eyes on the screen, the flickering bar underneath the next program that repeats the news about the museum break-in.
Theft suspected to be the work of professional thieves. More updates on stolen paintings will emerge as staff inventory the losses. At least three security guards found dead…
The world spins. Literally, the world spins, and you reach out a hand and stand up on reflex with the anxiety that spreads through your chest.
“Chrollo?” He’s there, sitting next to you, but he falls in and out of focus as your vision wobbles.
“Yes, love?”
“I don’t feel very…” The word never comes before everything goes black, and you only just register the awful sensation of falling and being caught in someone’s sturdy hands before you faint.
–
Someone has shoved cotton into your mouth. That’s the only explanation your mind comes up with when the world returns and all you can taste is stale dryness. Someone must have shoved cotton into your mouth at some point before the blackness and this bleary, foggy wake-up.
But why would they do that, and why does your head feel so fuzzy, and why does the world feel like it’s moving? There’s an awful sound underneath you too, almost like rushing and wheels mixed together, like heavy traffic or–or a train.
Oh. Oh, no.
Air comes in great gulping gasps as you heave yourself forward and sensations assault your senses. A leather seat underneath you, the sun dimmed by drawn curtains, warm, stale air, the sound of rolling wheels and ground underneath you–and Chrollo. Chrollo sitting your opposite, on the same type of leather seat.
You’re on a train. You’re awake and on a train and Chrollo is sitting in front of you.
It’s a dream. Maybe. That’s what you think as you swallow up the cotton feeling, smacking your lips, craving the realization that this is nothing but a bizarre nightmare.
But nightmares don’t feel like this. This is real. It’s your body that feels sluggish and heavy, your eyes blinking away an awful, long sleep. Your voice that croaks out the words that half-stick to the roof of your mouth:
“Chrollo? Where… am I?”
There’s another question that clings to the back of it–What happened?--but the low curl in your gut makes you avoid it for now.
Chrollo, for his part, looks appropriately serious for the bizarre situation you’ve woken up in. He leans forward, folding his hands together, as he scans your face. For what? An injury? Is that why you’re here? You fell and hit your head and the only solution was a specialist who is only available in the next city, so Chrollo booked you the first tickets on the next train and he didn’t have time to warn you before–
“Dearest.”
The low curling in your stomach squirms, too. He knows you hate those pet names. It was easier to ignore them back then. When the two of you were strolling through the museum or he was indulgently watching you reorganize your books. When you weren’t suddenly on a train, feeling like you got hit over the head with a hammer.
A strange place, a strange Chrollo.
An answer might come, but your mouth is still too sticky and Chrollo interrupts what you might have said, anyway.
“We’re on a train.”
After a moment, a slow word comes. “Yes.” You swallow. “I know that.”
Chrollo smiles. It might be indulgent, but all you can think is: has his smile always been so condescending?
“Do you know why we’re on a train?”
Well. It would be stupid to say “yes,” when you don’t know the answer.
So you spit out the runaround thought from earlier, though even to your ears, it sounds more ridiculous with every passing word.
“I fell and hit my head and the only solution was a specialist who is only available in the next city, so you booked the first tickets on the next train and you didn’t have time to warn you before–”
He doesn’t call you an endearing nickname (thank goodness) this time but instead his smile widens, just enough to make it look like he wants to coo at you. It’s gross and sticky and you rub at your arms to make some of the feeling go away.
“Stop that. I’m not a child.”
His smile doesn’t waver, which only sparks a rush of indignation. The world has stopped feeling quite so heavy and when you sit up, you move to pull aside the curtains, if only to find out where in the world you’re at.
The countryside that’s rolling by isn’t remotely familiar. All lush and green and pretty. Are you even in the same region? The same country?
“How… how long was I asleep?” No, that’s not the right question. “Why was I asleep? I don’t remember…” Falling asleep at all. And what you do remember doesn’t fit inside this puzzle. You’d been watching the news, and there was the terrible report about the theft at the museum, and then Chrollo came over, and you drank your tea. One plus one should equal two, not waking up on a train.
Chrollo hums, and the sound brings you back. The ground rolls heavy underneath you two, separated by the carpeted floor.
“I drugged your tea,” he says, plainly enough.
It can’t be what he said, though. You’re hearing things. Maybe you suffered a blow to the head. That might actually make things.
“You what… my what?”
“I drugged your tea,” he repeats. Calm and clear and you’re certain that you’ve heard him right this time, only it’s still all wrong. Because this is Chrollo. He wouldn’t, he couldn’t. But he did. He said so. So the only thing left to wonder is:
“Why would you do that?”
“I enjoy your company,” he says, still leaning forward. “Very much so. And it was time for me to leave town, but the thought of leaving without you, well…”
Now, there are no “right” answers to this question. No one ever catalogs the proper responses to a hypothetical question about drugging one’s tea. Still, what he tells you doesn’t sound like the sort of answer one should give.
Kidnapping someone for ransom, sure. Kidnapping someone because they found out some terrible secret and no one else can no, understandable. Kidnapping someone to kill them because you’re secretly a murderer, again, makes sense.
Kidnapping you because he likes you?
It’s so wrong, so out of place, that you don’t answer. Can’t answer. There’s something sticky keeping your mouth shut and that something is Chrollo’s lack of common sense.
And then, of all things, he puts a hand on your shoulder. Firm. Irritating. A touch you want to shake but when you try, his grip keeps you in place. It’s too much. Too heavy and personal. It was something to be brushed off before, swept under the rug while you focused on what you liked about him.
But now?
You must be glaring. There’s a moment where you take stock of your expressions. Your eyebrows feel low and heavy, so they must be furrowed. Your mouth is dry and open. And your eyes are… well. It’s understandable to cry.
Worst of all, though, is that Chrollo’s hand goes from your shoulders to your cheeks, and it’s when he wipes at your tears that you finally fling your body backwards with enough force that the back of your head smacks against the wall.
It helps, this pain. This motion. So you do it again. Move your head forward and then back, feeling the firm smack of the wood against your head.
Thump. Thump. Thump.
An ordinary person might look shocked. An ordinary person might cry out and tell you that you're hurting yourself.
Chrollo, however, simply looks like he’s admiring a painting. He takes in the details, his head tilting just so.
“I packed some of your favorite things,” he says after a while, over the sound of your skull smacking against the wall. “Once we arrive at our destination, we can unpack some of them. It could help you calm down.”
“I want to go home,” you reply, between thumps. “I want to go home.”
He doesn’t reply, which is as good as a “no.”
“I’m taking you with me,” he says, still calmly, like you aren’t trapped on a train, like you aren’t banging your head with increasing intensity against the wood.
“I don’t want to go with you,” is all you can say, helplessness straining your voice. “I want–I want–” And when you look around, all you can see are these walls, the window, Chrollo. There are a thousand things that you want right now, and none of them are here.
You want your old microwave with the 7 button that sticks so you have to push it hard every time, you want the pink flower rug in your living room that you’ve had since childhood, you want your pumpkin-shaped mug with the chip on the handle, you want your blankets and your bed and the alarm clock on the side table on the left side, so you can wake up and easily roll over to hit the snooze button–
It’s only when Chrollo says your name that you realize you’ve been saying all of this, to him or to yourself, you’re not sure. There’s something stupidly hungry in the way he looks at you. It’s in the way he listens, too. Like he’s hanging onto every word so he can pick them all apart, splaying them open to reveal something inside.
But what? And why?
He doesn’t tell you. Instead, he hums. It’s a low grounded sound. It makes you feel–and you hate it, it’s gross, this feeling–comforted. Almost. Sort of. The way it used to, when you were feeling out of sorts and he swooped in to get you off the ledge.
Only this time he’s the one who pushed you to it, first.
“I’m not taking you home,” he says with a finality that makes your body jerk. “But you can view me as your new home, if it helps.” The smile he gives is warm and kind and if you were sitting in the museum over a cup of coffee, maybe you’d believe it.
“But you can view me as your new home, if it helps.”
It doesn’t help.
–
Your upper arm hurts from the way Chrollo gripped you in the hotel lobby.
“Don’t try anything, dearest,” he’d said, on the way in. Quiet and calm and sticky on the dearest. He might as well have been telling you that he was ordering in for dinner. “I’ll kill everyone in this hotel if you do. I’d rather not have to clean up any messes tonight. I’m sure you understand.”
The words should have shocked you. Or maybe they did, and you’re still in such an inward frenzy that you can’t seem to react to anything within the freezing utter bewilderment of your present situation.
So you didn’t say anything, though he gripped you hard all the same. And now you’re sitting on some oversized sterile hotel room bed that smells too much like sharp laundry detergent. There’s a mint on the pillow. You bet it tastes like soap.
“We’ll be staying here for a few nights,” Chrollo murmurs. The pair of suitcases he’d brought in are on top of the bed, and there’s a shock to your system when he unzips one of them and you recognize what’s inside.
It’s filled with your things–your hairbrush, a wellworn paperback copy of your favorite book, a bottle of your tried-and-true face wash.
Your clothes. (Well. Some of them.) Right down to your underwear, neatly folded on top. Chrollo had–taken them. Touched them. Been through your things, clearly.
“You…” The word comes out all strangled, and heat rises to your cheeks for more than one reason. “You really…” You really kidnapped me, you really planned it out, you really went through my private things and plucked them up.
He takes the pause in your thoughts to crouch down, peering into your face like he might yank the words out himself.
“Yes? What is it?”
“You... you…” And the words you want to ask are stuck between your teeth until you force them out. “Why did you do this? It’s not just… it can’t be just because you,” and your mind reels to remember what he said on the train. “Because you enjoy my company.”
Chrollo says nothing for a moment. A whole lot of nothing. Your mind is working too fast and you expect him to smile or grin, expect him to give some terribly wicked speech like a villain in a movie you’ve seen a thousand times.
Instead he blinks. Instead he frowns.
Instead his hand reaches out to grip your chin and you don’t have time to register the uncomfortable buzz from being touched when says something so softly that you have to strain to hear it.
“Oh, dearest. Don’t you know?”
When your chin does try to jerk away from his touch, it grows tighter, even as his gaze seems to soften. It’s a strange look on Chrollo’s face. Chrollo has looked contemplative, yes; contemplative and intrigued and annoyed, even, when some museum-goers were being too loud for your liking. He’s even looked sympathetic.
But soft? It’s new. It’s unwanted. And the expression stays on his face despite both of those terrible qualities.
“I care for you,” he says, repeating his earlier words. “Not just as a friend. But…” He turns your head this way and that. It makes you feel like a prized horse at auction. “I believe… as something more.”
Not just as a friend…
Not just as a friend–
“Not just as a friend.” Your repetition comes out all stilted. Maybe because of the hand on your jaw. Maybe because the words seem to creak out of you, every syllable one step down the staircase you’d rather avoid descending.
Something like a film reel flickers through your memories. Little moments, brought back to the forefront with a disgusting clarity. Why had you brushed him off so often? Because you were lonely; because he was your friend. Or so you thought.
But the way he pushed past what you wanted so often seems calculated now. The times he sat too close and let his thigh brush against yours; the way he didn’t hear you, or so he said, when you’d asked him to please stop calling you those soft, sweet pet names. The times he claimed not to be hungry only to ask if he could share your meal afterwards–the way his fingers brushed against yours when he accidentally (or was it?) reached for a bite at the same time.
“The whole time,” you bite out, acid rising in your throat. Your fingers curl against your thighs and there’s a terrible urge to knock them into something. “Were you like this… the whole time?”
Amusement crinkles through the softness in his face. It’s just as grating as nails on a chalkboard. “Did you really not notice?”
Shame flushes through you, heating up your cheeks, your chest, the very air in the room. “Of course not,” you spit out, words sounding more stilted with every passing moment. “Most people wouldn’t notice–notice that.”
At some point, he’s let go of your chin, and you take the moment of the realization to scoot backwards on the bed. Away from him and closer to the dingy looking headboard, which might have been pretty once upon a time, but was now scratched and chipped.
“Of course they would,” he counters, climbing onto the bed like some sort of terrible cat. “And they have, with far less effort on my part.” He pauses, a smile. “Not out of any genuine affection, of course. Don’t worry about that. Only to get something I wanted.”
He’s closer, now. Too close. His hand cups not your chin this time, but your cheek, and there’s only a few moments in between his face and yours. What if he…?
“Stop,” you say, desperate, helpless. “Don’t touch me.” He doesn’t stop. He leans in closer and you smack against the headboard. “Why aren’t you listening to me?”
What he says makes about as much sense as jello salad. Which is to say, no damn sense at all. “I am listening.” The almost-coo in his voice makes you want to hurl. “I’m hearing what you can’t say out loud, that’s all.”
But that’s not true. Is it? There’s too much going on. He’s too close and this room smells like soap and you ought to be home, not here, with yourself, not Chrollo. The muchness of it all has you aching to get away and make sense of it all, some way, some how.
“I always say what I want to say,” you manage, but you can’t hide the question in it. Isn’t that true? Isn’t that how it’s always been? It’s why people tend to look at you strangely sometimes. It’s why you were often too much for them, when it came down to it.
“You think you do, my dear.” His thumb rubs against your cheek. The touch is sandpaper. “But there’s something else inside you, I think. Something stuck that I’d like to crack open and pull out, if I could.” The fondness in his tone is out of place with the world around you. “If you’d let me.”
You need him to stop touching you. You need him to get away. You need this entire room to vanish, the sight of it, the smell of it, the feel of the unfamiliar sheets underneath you. A sound comes out, something short, stacatto–
“No.”
And Chrollo doesn’t leave and his thumb keeps rubbing your cheek, so you bring your arm up, smacking him away. Only his arm doesn’t move at all. It’s like hitting a pole–sturdy and impossibly strong.
So you try again, and again, and the sensation of hitting his arm isn’t helpful or soothing. It only makes your breath come in faster, makes the world spin. His breath grows faster, too, and you can’t begin to imagine why.
“You’ll grow to like this in time,” Chrollo says, finally, a touch of a sigh in his voice. “You’ll grow to like me.”
“No,” you say again, even though it doesn’t help.
In response, Chrollo simply continues to stroke your cheek.
–
In his defense–not that you are defending him–Chrollo said nothing when you’d taken the first opportunity to abandon the bed and build something like a fort in the corner of the room. It wasn’t anything like the pop up tent you used to have as a child (then a teenager and, sometimes, in a pinch, as an adult) but it would do. A fort made from blankets and some of the bed pillows, despite the detergent stink.
Anything to avoid sleeping in the same bed as Chrollo. More than that, anything to be alone, or something like it. You rocked yourself to sleep and dreamt about the museum.
In the morning, you wake up and remember everything in one great gulping heave. Your body tenses when you hear Chrollo walking around the room–the sound of the sink, the toilet, the rustling of clothes–until his footsteps stop outside your makeshift shelter.
He pops his head inside without so much as a warning.
“Good morning. Did you sleep well?”
The glare he receives is enough of a response. He chuckles it away, easy as a gnat.
“I’d like to show you something. It’s a surprise.”
“I don’t like surprises,” you reply, voice tired and dull. He’s going to show you anyway. He knows it, and you do, too.
He holds open the drape of your fort but you don’t have the energy to be grateful that he at least didn’t drag you out of it. Your limbs feel heavy and awful as you crawl out, and the hotel room in the daylight looks no better than it did at night.
But Chrollo must have done some unpacking while you slept, because there are a few more things scattered around. His clothing, slipped into hangers. Toiletries–his and yours–on top of the chest of drawers.
And something set against the wall, covered in a plain black tarp.
The surprise, it seems. Curiosity prickles at you. Maybe it’s a good distraction from everything else. Maybe you’re just genuinely interested in what could possibly lay underneath.
Chrollo’s smile almost looks youthful as he tugs at the edge of the tarp, and you see a flash of black as he pulls it away, revealing the treasure underneath.
The Village in Winter.
It’s all wrong. It’s naked, without the frame, propped up in some hotel room surrounded by chipped furniture and laundry smells.
There is no air left in the room, no water left in your lungs. You could cough up a thousand years of dust right now and still not run out.
“You stole it,” you manage to say. Chrollo simply nods and looks for all the world like he’s showing you something he’s proud of; and he is, you think. Proud of everything. The urge to fall down swims through you, and you grip the wall.
“You were a great help,” Chrollo says, voice soft and confident and anything but assuring. “We were struggling with the best way to remove it without damaging the work underneath.” He tilts his head, just so, the same way he did that first morning in the museum.
Nothing is the same as that first morning in the museum.
So um…thoughts on the new TADC episode because…wow
Nonny, I'm going to level with you. When I got this ask, I hadn't seen the latest episode out of Pure Fear.
Because I've read 'I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream'. I knew what to expect on some level, but oh man. oh man.
They did not hold back with those parallels. My particular favourite being the nod to AM's line on how he began to hate humans, and Caine's crash out in his office.
Considering all that happened, even with Caine's supposed fate, I do not think there's going to be a happy ending. My only outright prediction is that everyone will either be deleted or die, except for one person.
Warnings: Suicidal ideation, Implied kidnapping, Death (not reader), Invasion of privacy, Invasion of personal space, Reader suffers from depression.
Additional Notes/Author Notes: This was a thought helped brought to life by the ever delightful @after-witch. Their one detail made everything come together.
Forgive my absence; it will happen again.
It was cold.
A penetrating chill, exacerbated by the moisture in the air, it clung to you. Seeping through skin, muscle, and sinew as it tried its best to worm its way into your bones. Warmth was fleeting, brought on only by puffs of breath and the occasional tremble of your body. You pressed your lips against your fingers in search of more.
You wanted to leave. Not just the room - dank, wretched place that it was - but in general. Leave this… place, leave this city, leave this world-
“You’re doing it again.”
The sing-song words, teasing in their lilt, cut through the silence and brought you back to yourself.
You shifted on the concrete, limbs somewhat numb from sitting cross-legged for too long.
“Sorry.” You murmured, but you both knew you didn’t mean it.
Mahito waved off the apology, lying back against his chair. It was an old, ugly thing - the kind one would find at the end of a driveway. The fabric, which had once been cream-coloured, was now brown, worn, and tattered with neglect.
It stunk of cat urine and dry rot.
Mahito sat sideways with his legs slung over one of the armrests. He wore a pair of black-framed glasses, much too large for his face, that kept sliding down his nose whenever he moved his head. He pushed them back into place, all the while looking at you expectantly.
Animosity sharply curled in your chest from the look before retreating into a dull bitterness. “What?”
“You never answered my question.” Despite the air of theatrical professionalism, you could still hear, still feel, the pout in his voice.
“I didn’t think I needed to.”
“Why?”
“Because I’m talking to you.”
Mahito’s smile stretched wide with that, making the dried flecks of blood splattered across his face crack and flake under the strain.
“That you are.~" He pushed the glasses up again. “But I do think it’s important for us to verbalize how we feel, don’t you?”
Your silence hung in the air.
“Don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“So…?”
“No, I’m not feeling better.”
Mahito nodded along and made a note of your answer in the notebook on his lap. The glasses slid down his face again.
You looked away from him, unable to bear it for long, but he didn’t mind. On the contrary, moments like this delighted him. It wasn’t like he tried to hide that fact, even with the act he was putting on.
He often described to you how the air around you would thrum with melancholy. It was black, thick, and heavy as it oozed from you. If he had to compare it to something, molasses came closest, but such comparisons weren’t necessary - you felt - when you could see it too. At least right now, you could.
There was also the matter of your face. Filled with such sadness, yet nothing at the same time, while you would stare vacantly in whatever direction your head was tilted.
Mahito had never seen someone so beautifully miserable.
Another smile wormed its way across his face. “Do you think it’s because nobody has noticed yet?~”
You looked back at him with that same blank, despondent expression. “What?”
Mahito huffed and snapped the notebook shut, gesturing at the steaming lump of flesh and bone in the corner of the room with it.
“You told them you didn’t think anyone would notice if you were gone.” He clarified, annoyed. “Do you think it’s because you were right?”
A pang went through your chest, twisting around your heart, and you regretted looking. The disgust was there, of course - the fear and horror upon the visual reminder of what had become of another human being - but it was a short-lived kind of despair. A deeper kind still clung to your soul, one you physically had to swallow down, but such efforts didn’t mean much around Mahito.
He tilted his head when you didn’t answer him.
“Well??”
“Yes.” Your voice was hitched with unshed tears, and you made a point to look at him again. “And you made sure of that.”
The accusatory, sorrowful yet hateful tone you had made Mahito giggle.
“Come now, what use were they anyway?” He waved his hand at the pile once again. “You never even met them in person.”
“That doesn’t matter!” You snapped suddenly. “At least they would have noticed!”
Mahito hummed, disbelieving. He reopened the book - huffing when the pages stuck together from the blood - and skimmed through the notes your online therapist kept about you. A part of you still had the energy to feel violated.
“I’m not so sure.” He said with that stupid, overly professional tone. “Remember, it’s important not to project our expectations onto others-”
“Fuck you.”
Mahito snickered. Those words held no bite; they were as watery as your eyes were.
“Now, now, remember that abusive language can result in a session being cut short.~” He made a note in the book of the two tears that rolled down your cheeks when you looked away from him. “What are you feeling at this moment?”
“You know damn well-”
Mahito tutted disapprovingly. “Nah ah ah, we need to verbalize, remember?~”
Exasperation filled your otherwise dejected face, and he couldn’t get enough of it. When you finally looked at him again, he wordlessly urged you to share.
“I want to fucking die, is that what you want me to say??”
Mahito leaned back against the chair as you spoke, readjusting the glasses while taking in every waver, every trembling word.
“Ever since I met you, I can’t fucking stand it here. You-”
“You wanted that before we met.” Mahito grinned at you. “Otherwise you wouldn’t be able to see me.”
“Fucking whatever.” You spat, looking disparagingly at the ground again. This time, Mahito didn’t like that.
He slid off the chair and onto the bare concrete to join you, invading your space and twisting his body disjointedly so his face was directly in front of yours.
“Such tears.” Mahito cooed as he saw the droplets hanging from your lashes. They’d undoubtedly hit his face if they fell, but he didn’t mind. “But I want to know, is it as bad as it was when we met?”
“Please shut up-”
“Like everything was too heavy.” Mahito’s voice became a dramatic mimic of yours from when you had described it to your therapist. “Suffocating. Like swimming in an open ocean with weights attached to your ankles?”
Your attempt to look away from him was thwarted by both of Mahito’s hands gripping both sides of your skull - forcing you to stare into piercing blue and grey.
“Is it as bad?” He asked again - urging.
“No.” You managed to reply. Voice barely above a whisper. “It’s worse.”
A smile curled at Mahito’s lips again, and one of his thumbs swiped across your cheek - the cold touch succeeding in making its way deeper than bone.
Two is a Crowd is insanely good. Mahito is so delulu and I just know that he's gonna be performing his weird-ass experiments on the baby(ies) when they're born.
"Aw, such small delicate creatures. I wonder what'll happen if I ...."
Thank you! That fic has been getting a lot of traction again lately. No clue why, but I am certainly not complaining, I am glad you and others have enjoyed it.
Mahito is genuinely such a freak and I love and hate everything about him. Especially when he's exploring new situations such as this.
Hi! I’m sorry if this seems rude, but this blog’s been pretty quiet for a bit, and I wanted to wish the creator well in case you had things going on outside!!🫶🏻🫶🏻
Wishing you luck with whatever may or may not be happening!! Happy Holidays!! 🎉🎉🎉
Not rude at all, I know I haven't written anything in close to a year.
I've had a lot of problems IRL that have taken any desire I have to put words on a page. I still daydream and brainstorm, but no ideas have gone further than that. I'm also just not on Tumblr as much as I used to be after being in a job that involves a LOT of physical labor.
Hopefully one day I'll be back to fic writing, though right now I'm taking time for me.
I do appreciate the concern though, thank you for the kind words and happy holidays to you as well.
Okay but yandere Vox with a female darling I could kind of hear him calling her ‘princess’ as some kind of condescending nickname DOES ANYBODY ELSE SEE MY VISION
I know he calls Charlie that because she is the princess BUT HEAR ME OUT IN A YANDERE SCENARIO:
“Oh no no no noo, princess~ I have a SPECIAL place for you.”
Maybe it’s just me but the way he says it just got me GOD I hate him I love him
📣 You're right, my dear nonny, and you should say it louder
