Idée Fixe | Yan. Alastor x Reader
>Warnings: Not much yet, violence, unsettling themes, depictions of Hell, cannibalism.
>Word Count: 5k.
The Catalog
Act. I
Hell was not how you imagined it to be.
This realization came to you, not during your descent into damnation, nor when your body first struck the scorched realm below with enough force to fracture bone.
It did not settle upon your shoulders while witnessing monstrous creatures tearing one another apart in the streets like starved animals brawling over scraps. While the damned screamed themselves hoarse beneath blood-red skies.
You had expected endless suffering upon your arrival, constant violence and lasting misery.
No, the revelation came much later. Only in hindsight did certain things begin to resemble a pattern.
As if the world had not been brutal on its own, it offered you a brief and carefully constructed mercy.
Convincing enough that you never questioned whether it had been doomed from the beginning. Looking back now, you think some deeply pathetic part of you wanted Hell to be just that simple. If not pleasant, then at least doable in ways that did not demand unremitting suffering.
You carved out little routines for yourself and foolishly convinced your heart that eternity might pass quietly if you kept your head low enough.
What a humiliating thing that belief turned out to be.
The barbarity here was not confined to carnage, that would have been simpler to understand. Hell’s true depravity lived in the more unsuspectable things. In how easily affection became leverage. How safety always arrived with hidden conditions attached. Love, power, protection, and companionship; every meaningful thing eventually twisted into something edged to cut you from the inside.
Most of the time, you failed to realize you were being devoured until there was barely anything left worth saving.
Back then, however, you knew none of this.
Cannibal Town fit you the way a doll suited a dollhouse. Grotesque, perhaps, but it possessed a peculiar sort of community beneath all its sharpened teeth and bloodshed.You had settled there not long after arriving in Hell, drawn less by intention and more by circumstance.
The district’s strange civility made it easier to stomach than the harsher parts of Pentagram City. Cannibal Town somewhat had rules, etiquette. And the cannibals, while unsettling, with time, eventually came around. Perhaps because you provided something novel to the town.
Or perhaps, Rosie herself had taken a liking to you early on, in which Cannibal Town functioned as both social approval and protection all at once.
You quietly built a life for yourself. Wave politely at passing townsfolk, avoid asking what was being served at community gatherings, and never stare too long at the butcher windows. In time, the place became familiar.
While other sinners clawed desperately toward power, you found yourself shrinking from it instead. Overlords amassed territory, built empires from violence and fear, names became brands here, whispered either in reverence or terror depending on who spoke them.
Every sinner in Hell seemed consumed by the same insatiable hunger to dominate something, someone, somewhere.You did not understand it, conceivably that made you foolish. Or you simply lacked whatever monstrous instinct that others possessed so naturally.
You wanted no throne, no influence, no grand ambitions carved into the skyline of Pentagram City.
You only wished to be left alone with your creations. So you built Dollybell Boutique, instead of an empire. You spent your evenings sewing lace rather than spilling blood. You learned the names of your customers, instead of gathering souls beneath your heel.
Little by little, you carved something resembling peace from the carcass of damnation. The bell above the boutique door chimed softly.
“Cute place.”
You barely glanced up at first, too focused on tying a satin ribbon neatly around the neck of a half finished doll resting in your lap. Post meridiem light spilled through the storefront windows, bathing the shop in rosy gold. Dust particles drifted through the air, somewhere deeper in the shop, tiny footsteps pattered faintly across wooden floorboards.
Dollybell Boutique had first been born from necessity, you needed money. A way to survive without indebting yourself to Overlords, and opportunists lurking behind every corner of Pentagram City. Selling your craftsmanship made sense. It became your answer to all of it, or perhaps distraction was the more honest word.
You look up, momentarily putting down the ribbon on your hands aside.
“Oh, welcome!”
What once began merely as a means of sustaining yourself gradually became something far more. You buried yourself into creation with near embarrassing devotion, as though keeping your hands busy might somehow prevent your mind from wandering toward uglier truths.
The boutique gave you structure, a rhythm. Something gentle enough to return to when the rest of Hell became too raucous, too heinous, too unbearable to last for long periods of time.
The sinner lingering at the entrance looked briefly caught off guard by your enthusiasm. Tall, broad shouldered, vaguely reptilian. Golden eyes scanned the boutique, the numerous dolls lined up on shelves stared back at him silently. “...Huh.”
Needle through fabric, thread pulled taut, button eyes sewn carefully, you had to admit there was comfort in predictability. In creating things that behaved as intended when so little else ever did. You loved the process almost selfishly.
The smell of fresh fabric, the cluttered warmth of your workshop, sketches littering every available surface because ideas arrived faster than you could bring them into existence. Some creations came to you while parading around town, accomplishing errands. Others emerged spontaneously in the middle of conversations, forcing you to excuse yourself abruptly just to scribble concepts onto nearby paper before they vanished from your head entirely.
Creation soothed you. Perhaps because it had always come easier to you than destruction.
The sinner narrowed his eyes at a doll perched near the register. Its rounded head tilted toward him with an uncanny motion.
“The fuck? That thing just moved!” he gestured wildly toward the doll seated atop the desk dressed in frilly pink satin.
“This place is creepy as shit.”
You furrowed your eyebrows. Cannibal Town hosted weekly dinner parties where guests politely complimented one another's seasoning preferences while eating severed limbs off of fine china. The butcher down the street occasionally hung torsos outside his storefront like decorative wreaths during holidays.
Yet somehow your dolls were what unsettled people? You never really understood why.
You stifled a laugh beneath your breath before setting aside your sewing supplies,
“Oh don't mind them,” you answered lightly, “they get curious around new people.”
“Geez, this town’s really full of freaks.” He muttered, beneath his breath.
The sinner's attention drifted around the shop after that, towards the racks of frilly clothing. The button eyed dolls, posed eerily atop velvet cushions. Tiny handcrafted accessories displayed beneath warm amber lighting.
“You make all this yourself?”
You stood from your chair, nearly tripping over a pile of fabric in the process.
“Mhm,” You nodded, “the dresses too, design the fabrics, oh and the music boxes!”
“I guess, it's… not as shitty as it could've been.”
Your expression brightened, you always liked hearing that. Most people assumed craftsmanship came easy simply because you made it look effortless. They didn’t see the sleepless nights spent reworking patterns. The dozens of ruined prototypes hidden beneath worktables.
The cramped fingers from hours of hand stitching delicate lace into microscopic seams.
The sinner continued inspecting the doll probing it with his pointy finger before glancing toward you again.
“... So what’s with the alive thing anyway?”
“Well… they aren't really alive per se.” You hesitated briefly, “some customers just like companionship. Others use them for protection, surveillance, and uh… other uses.”
The sinner raised an eyebrow.
You moved toward another shelf and carefully lifted a small doll dressed in black velvet.
You pointed giddily, “she can fit through vents.”
“This one is very good with handling firearms.”
Your voice lowered conspiratorially, “Oh, and this little fella, helped somebody catch their business partner skimming money.”
“Hmm, Go on.”
Eventually, the sinner left with one of your dolls tucked awkwardly beneath his arm despite his earlier complaints.
“Pleasure doing business with you, come again!”
You considered that a success.
While waving the doll goodbye, the others gathered, watching him through the boutique window with quiet scrutiny until his figure disappeared into the winding streets of Cannibal Town. In the distance, gunfire cracked, followed shortly by, irritated shouting.
Normal afternoon activities.
You return to tidying up the shop absentmindedly, smoothing crooked ribbons, and reorganizing displaced fabric rolls while the phonograph crackled softly somewhere near the back room.
Poppet was discovered attempting to pry open the cash register again.
“What did I say about touching things that aren't yours?” you scolded mildly, clicking your tongue.
The bear crossed his tiny arms in visible annoyance.
“You’re just mad I caught you.” You plucked him unceremoniously from the counter and set him back atop a shelf.
“You don't even use money.” Honestly, you wonder how he formed such peculiar habits.
In due time, you made a place for yourself within Cannibal Town.
Mornings opening the boutique, long afternoons tangled in thread and fabric. Sinners began recognizing the soft jingle of the boutique bell whenever customers entered your shop. Customers wander in with blood still drying on their sleeves while asking whether certain dolls can be armed. Elderly cannibals stopped by simply to gossip about town happenings or complain theatrically about relatives they were considering eating.
Rosie, especially, took to you quickly.
At first, her visits seemed harmlessly neighborly. A prominent figure welcoming a newer resident into Cannibal Town’s odd community. She purchased dolls occasionally, complimenting your storefront displays, and lingered longer with each passing visit. Conversations drifted beyond shallow pleasantries into something warmer.
You found yourself beginning to expect her visits. She listened attentively, asking thoughtful questions, remembering small details you’d long forgotten mentioning yourself. Speaking with Rosie felt natural, you would even find yourself rambling to her sometimes, discussing sewing techniques and design concepts while she listened with genuine intrigue rather than polite obligation.
You genuinely enjoyed her company, which perhaps should have concerned you more considering the woman routinely discussed cannibalism with the same relaxed cadence you'd usually find while engaging in small talk.
Some afternoons were spent beneath parasols in the town plaza while she entertained you with stories, observations, local scandals, and charming critiques of Pride Ring’s more tasteless residents.
Cannibal Town respected Rosie.
Admired her, even.
And perhaps that should have warned you on how deeply influential she truly was.
“Sugar?”
“Two, please.”
“Sweetheart,” Rosie sighed fondly, “at this point you’re simply drinking melted candy.”
“It balances the bitterness.”
Rosie’s abode had a distinct atmosphere, everything smelled faintly of floral, tea, and rotten flesh.
You try not to think too hard about the last one.
Jazz drifted smoothly from the radio nearby while she sat poised across from you, delicately stirring cream into her tea.
“Anywho,” Rosie sighed, “I told her, who hasn't thought about eating their first husband at least once? I mean I certainly would if he didn't taste so bad!”
She bursts into laughter, leaning back against the loveseat, her gloved hand lifting to her eyes to wipe away faux tears.
Spread neatly between the two of you sat an assortment of Cannibal Town’s delicacies displayed atop pristine porcelain trays. Pinkie sandwiches, strawberry tarts, and tea cakes dusted with powdered sugar. Neatly baked flakey pastry spirals beside what looked suspiciously like candied knuckles.
You laughed despite yourself, lifting your teacup to conceal the smile tugging at your lips.
“I still think eating your spouse should probably be grounds for concern.”
Rosie waved a dismissive hand.
“Oh, pish posh, after a certain age, every long-lasting relationship becomes a matter of restraint.”
“That’s not very romantic.”
"Perhaps not. Though I've found expectations are usually the first thing people ought to lower.”
The conversation dissolved into light laughter after that. The sound filled the room easily, warm and infectious that you found yourself joining in despite the topic at hand.
You had long since stopped trying to determine which of Rosie's stories were true and which had simply become more entertaining in the retelling.
The answer was rarely clear, and Rosie seemed to prefer it that way.
Rosie reached for a tea cake, delicately breaking off a piece between gloved fingers.
“Speaking of unfortunate unions,” she began, dabbing a stray crumb from her glove, “did you hear about the Beaumont estate?”
You groaned immediately.
The Beaumonts.
There was never a shortage of scandals surrounding the Beaumonts.
“Which scandal is this one?”
“The current one.”
“That doesn't narrow it down.”
Rosie smiled into her teacup. “Old Mr. Beaumont finally perished.”
“Wait, wasn't he already dead?”
“Well, yes.” She lowered her cup. “But now he's properly dead.”
You stared, “uh-huh.”
“My dear,” she sighed patiently, “we're in Hell. There are layers to these things.”
That was somehow a reasonable explanation by local standards, you decided not to question it further.
“Anyhow, he left behind a rather substantial fortune, several properties, and an absolutely scandalous collection of antique bone china.”Rosie leaned forward conspiratorially, lowering her voice as though preparing to share state secrets.
“Now two of his children are fighting over the inheritance.”
You snorted.
“They've been fighting for months now though?”
“Precisely!” Rosie exclaimed, delighted that you were keeping up. “Which makes it all the more impressive that they've finally escalated to poisoning one another.”
Your teacup froze halfway to your lips.
“Both of them?”
“Both of them.”
The answer came far too quickly.
A small pause followed, you narrowed your eyes.
“Did it work?”
Rosie simply smiled, that told you everything you needed to know.
You buried your face in your hands.
“Cannibal Town is ridiculous.”
“And yet you've grown quite fond of it.”
The words drew a reluctant smile from your lips, you opened your mouth to argue before realizing she was entirely correct.
Somewhere along the way, the Town's oddities had become familiar.
Its strange customs, the bizarre devotion to manners while simultaneously discussing questionable recipes for one another. The residents who tipped their hats politely before dragging corpses down the street.
It had ceased feeling temporary. The realization settled strangely in your chest.
Home was perhaps too generous a word. But it was close enough.
Rosie watched the thought cross your face, her smile softened. “You've done well for yourself, you know.”
You looked up.
“What?”
“The boutique.” She gestured vaguely with her teacup. “Your little dolls, your customers. You've settled beautifully sweetheart.”
“It's not that impressive.”
“Now, that's simply untrue.”
You lowered your gaze to the tea swirling inside the porcelain. Praise had always sat awkwardly upon your shoulders, especially when it was genuine.
“When I first got here,” you admitted, “I didn't think any of this would last.”
Rosie tilted her head, “the boutique?”
You shook your head.
“Any of it.”
Your hand made a vague gesture toward the window.
Toward the town, toward the life you'd built here. The words felt sappy spoken aloud.
“I remember.”
The simple statement drew your attention back to her.
“You were much jumpier when you first arrived,” Rosie started, amusement evident in her tone.
“You spent three weeks convinced everyone intended to eat you. Though, I can't blame you.”
Heat immediately flooded your face, you rarely reflected on those early days.
The uncertainty, the constant feeling that one wrong turn would result in becoming someone's dinner.
You remembered wandering uncharted streets with white knuckled caution. Sleeping with furniture pushed against your front door, flinching whenever strangers addressed you.
As though the smallest mistake would shatter whatever little stability you'd managed to scrape together.
You whined, your hands flew up to cover your face.
“You looked exhausted those first few weeks. Every time I saw you, it was as though you were waiting for something dreadful to happen.”
“I suppose I was nervous.”
Your gaze drifted toward the window.
Outside, the afternoon sun cast long shadows across Cannibal Town's cobblestone streets. Through the window, you could just make out a pair of townsfolk chatting animatedly beside a flower cart. One was carrying what appeared to be a human femur tucked beneath their arm.
You felt a strange sense of normalcy within you. At least, by Hell’s standards.
Rosie hummed. “Nervous is one way of putting it.”
She leaned back into her chair.
“I remember wondering how long it would take.”
You tilted your head,“how long would what take?”
“Before somebody tried to take advantage of you.”
The words were spoken lightly, but the comment landed strangely. Not because it was particularly alarming, Hell was full of opportunists. That much had never been in question.
Nonetheless, something in Rosie's tone caught your attention. It was barely noticeable, yet it was enough to make you pause.
You frowned into your napkin.
Why was she being weird all of a sudden?
The conversation had been perfectly pleasant moments ago.
Now she was speaking as though she'd been expecting some unseen catastrophe all along.
For an instant, Rosie looked older. Not physically, something else. The warmth remained, the smile remained.
Yet you were reminded that Rosie did not merely live in Cannibal Town. She ruled it. People listened when she spoke, sinners vanished when she wished it.
You had seen enough of Hell to understand that a position like hers was not won through kindness alone. The realization surfaced only briefly before vanishing beneath another pleasant smile.
You couldn't tell whether she was warning you about something specific or merely indulging one of her occasional philosophical moods.
With Rosie, either was equally possible.
“You know,” you shifted awkwardly on your seat, “you’re making me sound awfully helpless.”
Rosie merely watched you over the rim of her teacup, and said nothing.
The silence stretched, not necessarily uncomfortable. Just long enough for you to wonder whether she'd meant something by it.
_ _ _ _ _ ⊹ ࣪ ˖
The boutique has been busy lately.
A handful of custom commissions, several repairs, three wedding dolls, and one surveillance doll. As well as a particularly demanding client who insisted upon seventeen separate wardrobe changes for a doll barely larger than a loaf of bread.
You were still irritated about that one.
Despite yourself, you couldn't suppress the small flicker of pride that surfaced.
The boutique had come a long way.
What had once begun as a cramped little storefront furnished with secondhand shelves and stubborn optimism now occupied nearly the entire building.
Bolts of fabric crowded the walls in precarious towers of velvet, lace, and brocade. Shelves overflowed with dolls in varying stages of completion.
Some sat fully dressed and watching from their perches. Others remained scattered across worktables in pieces, waiting patiently for arms, eyes, or wardrobes.
Sketches hung from corkboards, pinned atop older sketches which had long since disappeared beneath layers of newer ideas. Dress concepts overlapped weapon designs. Fabric samples were tucked into corners. Entire sections had become illegible beneath hastily scribbled notes written during moments of inspiration.
Every misplaced spool of thread. Every abandoned sketchbook, every pair of sewing scissors forgotten in increasingly ridiculous locations.
At least until you needed to find it again, which was precisely the problem.
You stared at the empty space upon your worktable, then at the surrounding clutter.
The scissors had been there ten minutes ago, you were certain of it.
Slowly, your eyes narrowed, “Poppet.”
A faint rustle came from the fabric shelves.
You turned, Nothing.
Your gaze lingered suspiciously, still nothing.
“...Poppet.”
The bear froze. Half of his form concealed behind an avalanche of folded velvet, Poppet sat perfectly motionless, large button eyes stared forward with all the innocence of a child caught standing over a cookie jar late into the night.
The little bear was one of your oldest creations.
Dark oak-brown fur covered his round, slightly pudgy body that had softened with age, and by years of repairs and adjustments. A black button served as his left eye, while a caramel-colored one occupied the right, leaving him permanently lopsided.
You had originally intended to replace the mismatched pair.
Eventually, you'd grown fond of them.
A small waistcoat sat snugly around his middle, several pockets lined the front.
A terrible decision, in hindsight.
Poppet treated every pocket as a personal treasure vault.
Lost buttons, thimbles, ribbon scraps, coins, sewing needles. Once, inexplicably, an entire door handle. You had never discovered where he'd gotten that.
Around his neck sat a cream colored ribbon that had long since lost its original color. You had straightened it countless times, it never remained straight for long.Several careful repairs traced across his seams.
Reinforced stitching beneath one arm, a patch hidden beneath his little waistcoat. Tiny imperfections accumulated over the years, marking every adventure he'd managed to stumble into.
At some point, you had considered remaking him entirely.
The thought lasted less than five minutes. Poppet simply wouldn't have looked like himself otherwise.
Presently, those mismatched button eyes stared back at you with profound innocence.
The missing scissors rested neatly beside him.
Needless to say you were not fooled.
“I can see it, you know that right?”
A pause.
Then, with visible reluctance, he nudged the scissors forward.
“That isn't shiny enough for you,” you reached, “don't lower your standards.”
Eventually, the scissors found their way back to the worktable.
A rare victory.
You spent the remainder of the afternoon buried beneath commissions.
Customers came and went in a steady procession of peculiar requests and stranger explanations.
By closing time, your shoulders ached.
The dolls, meanwhile, appeared entirely unaffected by labor. Poppet had somehow acquired three bottlecaps, a silver cufflink, and what looked suspiciously like somebody's pocket watch chain.
Before you knew it, the sun had begun its slow descent.
The streets had begun settling into their evening rhythm, the shopkeepers swept their storefronts, lamps flickered to life one by one casting pools of amber light across the cobblestones.
A gentleman across the lane tipped his hat politely as he passed, his pointy teeth glistened against the warmth of the lamp post.
You returned the gesture automatically.
Only after he'd continued on his way did you notice a sinner's corpse trailing behind him, the body disappeared into a nearby alley with a soft scraping sound.
You knew better by now not to investigate, experience had taught you that curiosity rarely improved a situation.
The evening air had begun cooling by the time you were locking the boutique doors.
A familiar voice called out before you could make it halfway down the steps.
“Darling!”
You turned over to your shoulder. Mrs. Weatherby stood, a wicker basket hung from one arm and a carving knife peeked out from the inside.The blade looked recently sharpened.
“Lovely evening, Mrs. Weatherby,” you pleasantly smiled.
The elderly cannibal beamed, “Lovely it is, business good?”
You chuckled, “definitely busy.”
“Wonderful. Nothing worse than an empty shop!”
Considering where you lived, you suspected there were several things worse than an empty shop.
“Having guests tonight?”
“Oh yes, yes,” she adjusted the basket. “i've been marinating since yesterday.”
You nodded politely, “that sounds nice.”
Then paused.
“...The food, right?”
“Of course the food.” Mrs. Weatherby blinked, “why on earth would I marinate the guests?”
You laughed awkwardly. “Right… Silly question.”
She shook her head with warm hearted disappointment. “Now then, if you don't have plans, you're welcome to join us.”
Her smile widened, ”we're expecting enough for seconds.”
You glanced briefly at the cleaver, then back at her.
“I think I'll pass for now.”
“Suit yourself.” She shrugged, “more for the rest of us.”
Mrs. Weatherby eventually wandered off, leaving you to continue home. Which, admittedly, wasn't very far.
The apartment above the boutique occupied the entire second floor. The staircase leading up was narrow and slightly crooked, hidden behind a velvet curtain near the rear of the shop. The steps creaked beneath your weight in familiar places. After all these years, you've long since memorized which boards complain the loudest.
The apartment itself had never looked particularly impressive.
Most visitors would probably call it cluttered, but you preferred the word lived in.
The sofa was salvaged years ago, your paint stained dining table occupied one corner, buried beneath sketchbooks, fabric swatches, and unfinished ideas.
A few mismatched lamps crowded the sitting room, each seemingly purchased from a completely different decade. Books competed with sewing supplies for shelf space. Half-finished projects littered wherever you had last abandoned them.
Nothing really matched, but everything was where it belonged.
The towering windows were your favorite part. Truthfully, they were the reason you'd chosen the apartment in the first place.
From here, Cannibal Town looked different. Less like a district populated by cannibals and more like a collection of glowing windows and chimneys curling lazy trails of smoke.
You could overlook rooftops layered one atop another, laundry lines strung between neighboring buildings.
Golden lanternlight filtered through lace curtains, turning the apartment into a glowing little pocket above the town.
More often than not, you found yourself sitting beside those windows with a sketchbook balanced upon your knee long after you'd intended to sleep.
On particularly quiet nights, you could pretend it was ordinary. It could almost pass for the real thing.
Almost.
Somewhere in the distance, you could see the town square. During festivals, parasols were scattered through the streets like vibrantly colored flowers. During less festive occasions, public executions were occasionally held in the very same location.
Those, too, could be observed from the comfort of your armchair. Cannibal Town had always possessed a remarkable ability to treat both events with identical enthusiasm.
By the time you pushed open the apartment door, Bonbon was already waiting.
The black cat doll sat atop the sofa's backrest, motionless except for the slow lazy swish of his tail.
Unlike Poppet, Bonbon rarely felt the need to announce his presence.
Bonbon resembled a cat only in the broadest sense.
His body was slender and long-limbed, stitched from midnight black velvet that swallowed light rather than reflected it.
Unlike Poppet's softened seams and well-loved patches, Bonbon remained almost unnervingly pristine.
Dust rarely seemed to settle upon him. You had stitched every seam yourself, selected every scrap of velvet, fastened every button by hand.
Yet of all your creations, he was the one that felt the least decipherable.
His ears were tall and sharply pointed, giving him a perpetually attentive silhouette. A narrow tail trailed behind him, often curling neatly around his paws wherever he chose somewhere to observe.
And Bonbon did a great deal of observing.
Two deep navy button eyes sat upon his face. At a glance they would appear pitch black, yet when sunlight struck them just right, traces of its color surfaced beneath the shadows.
A silver ribbon sat loosely around his neck, threaded through a tiny bell that never seemed to ring no matter how much he moved. You'd tested it before, repeatedly.
The bell worked fine, Bonbon simply refused to make noise with it.
At times, the sensation struck with startling clarity. You had fashioned him from cloth and stuffing. Measured his proportions, chosen his fabrics. Given shape to every inch of him with your own hands.
Yet Bonbon occasionally regarded the world with such quiet scrutiny that you found yourself wondering whether you had truly created him at all. Or merely provided something unknown with a body to inhabit.
Now that you think about it, the name had turned out to be wildly inaccurate. You've called him Bonbon shortly after finishing him.
At the time, it had felt fitting. All oversized ears and velvet fur. Something sweet, something soft.
Like candy.
Years later, the name remained, the personality however did not.
Bonbon possessed all the warmth of an unpaid tax collector.
The apartment settled around you with familiar creaks and sighs. Downstairs, the boutique had finally gone quiet.
The silence that followed closing time always felt larger than it ought to.
You shed your coat onto the back of a chair, Bonbon's gaze followed your movement.
“Good evening to you too.”
Bonbon regarded you in silence. The navy buttons reflected a faint sliver of lanternlight.
As usual, they revealed absolutely nothing. You reached down and smoothed a hand between his ears, the velvet was cool beneath your fingertips.
He remained perfectly still throughout the gesture, maintaining the same air of detached dignity he approached most things with.
“There you are.”
Your thumb brushed over one pointed ear before you withdrew.
You chose to interpret that as affection. After all, he hadn't bitten you. That alone placed you higher on his list of preferred company than most people.
Leaving him to his vigil, you crossed toward the kitchenette.
A kettle soon found its place upon the stove, while Bonbon abandoned the backrest in favor of the windowsill.
The kettle began to whistle shortly afterward. Steam hissed from the spout as you lifted it from the stove and poured water into a waiting teacup, the familiar aroma of chamomile circulating all throughout the loft.
Bonbon had already claimed his customary position, which was propped up by cushions, the time you returned.
You settled into your usual armchair near the windows, balancing the sketchbook across your lap. Steam curled from your teacup as you tucked your legs beneath you.
The cat sat soundlessly upon the sill, button eyes fixed upon the town below. Beyond the glass, Cannibal Town glittered beneath the encroaching dusk.
The scene possessed an almost deceptive tranquility.
If one ignored the occasional scream.
Or the gentleman currently dragging what appeared to be a severed lower body across an intersection.
Or the frenzy of cannibals unfolding near an alley, mauling the corpse of a sinner tearing apart its intestines and slurping it as if it was a bowl of spaghetti.
Huh.
They seem to be enjoying their evening.
The thought arrived so effortlessly that it gave you pause, your fingers tightened slightly around the porcelain cup.
Once upon a time, nothing about this place screamed normalcy. The anxieties, the constant anticipation of disaster, every stranger you deemed dangerous, and every conversation felt like a trap waiting to spring shut.
It had been a year since then.
The number seemed absurd when held beside the memory of your arrival. Not because the number itself was remarkable. By Hell's standards, a year was practically nothing. Sinners spoke for decades here, entire feuds lasted longer than mortal lifetimes.
Still.
A year ago you had arrived expecting to be swallowed.
Both metaphorically, and literally.
You had expected survival to be measured in days. Weeks, if fortune proved unusually generous.
The first week had been spent assuming every conversation concealed some ulterior motive. The second, held conviction that every stranger possessed a knife hidden somewhere on their person. By the third, you had convinced yourself that the relative calm could not possibly last.
In hindsight, perhaps that had been the correct response.
Fear was difficult to sustain indefinitely, but you certainly hadn't expected this.
The apartment.
The Boutique.
The Town.
Companions.
Before long, your life accumulated routines.
The illusion disturbed you, you knew enough about Hell now to understand how unusual your circumstances truly were. Not everyone found a place for themselves here.
Some sinners spent eons clawing despondently toward stability and never reached it. Others attached themselves to powerful figures for protection, only to discover the arrangement came with concealed conditions.
Some vanished entirely, conformed by carnality, bad decisions, savagery, or simply the wrong person noticing them at the wrong time.
You had somehow avoided all of it. No opponents, no debts worth mentioning, no overlord breathing down your neck.
The absurdity of it wasn't lost on you.
You traced the rim of your teacup absentmindedly, your gaze slipped toward the windowpane.
Surely there had been a moment, a specific day. A specific conversation.
Some invisible threshold crossed without notice.
Yet the harder you searched for it, the less certain you became.
The fear had not disappeared, something ever-present until the moment you consciously listened for it.
You listened now, and found only silence.
That wasn't right. Hell was not supposed to become comfortable, you knew that. Everyone knew that.
Comfort implied predictability.
Predictability implied safety.
And safety—
You knew better than that...
… Didn't you?
You had simply gotten lucky, there was no other explanation otherwise.
The realization should have felt comforting. Instead, it felt oddly fragile.
Because when you stripped everything else away, there was one unavoidable conclusion.
The longer you examined your circumstances, the conclusion arrived with unpleasant clarity.
You hadn't conquered Hell. If anything, Hell had barely acknowledged your existence.
You hadn't outsmarted it, nor beaten impossible odds through some hidden cleverness. You had simply been overlooked, there were sinners far stronger than you.
Far smarter.
Far experienced.
Far more ruthless.
Wicked in ways you couldn’t even fathom.
Yet, some of them still ended up owned.
Some became cautionary tales whispered over drinks.
And somehow you remained here.
Why?
The question surfaced before you could stop it.
Why you?
What else had stopped bothering you?
How many compromises had accumulated without notice?
How many terrible things had gradually become ordinary?
You didn’t yield some immense power, you weren’t particularly dangerous. You made dolls, for goodness sakes. You drank tea, and spent entirely too much money on fabric.
There was no reason you should have survived this long beyond blind, staggering fortune.
And luck was a deeply frightening thing to build a future upon, because luck implied randomness. Luck implied chance. Luck implied that all it would take was one wrong day.
One wrong decision.
One wrong person.
Your attention shifted toward Bonbon, the cat remained placidly upon the sill.
Watching.
You frowned, had you always trusted the dolls this much?
The question arrived so abruptly that it startled you, of course you trusted them.
You had made them.
The chamomile had begun cooling. The warmth of the teacup suddenly felt insufficient, you stared into the dark reflection staring back from the window.
For the first time in months, perhaps longer, something felt profoundly wrong.
Not because disaster had arrived, but because it hadn't. The absence itself had begun to feel suspicious.
You had spent so long expecting catastrophe that its failure to appear now seemed far stranger than its arrival ever would have.
The thought coiled itself around your ribs.
The life you'd built felt disturbingly delicate, as though it existed only because something had not yet reached out and crushed it.
An entire year had passed.
Not a week. Not a fortunate month.
A year.
Twelve uninterrupted months in which nobody had chosen you. Nobody had taken an interest, nor decided you belonged to them.
It should have felt reassuring. Instead, it left you wondering how many people had once believed themselves safe.
How many had looked out their windows and imagined they understood the shape of their lives. How many had mistaken a reprieve for permanence.
The town gleamed beneath the evening lights.
A pleasant sight, nearly picturesque.
You took a shaky sip of tea.
And found yourself wondering just how far mere luck could take a person.
Note: brooo alas it's finally done! This is the first chapter of my very first series, Idee Fixe. I hope it wasn't too shitty lmao, Nonetheless, I have lots in store for this fic. Can't wait to show you guys!! 🩷
