Tendershipping Week Day 2 - Control [Doll House]
@tendershippingweek
She's done folks, she's done, DollyFic is D O N E I hope you enjoy it.
Read on AO3 [https://archiveofourown.org/works/32559964]
Ryou doesn’t know how long it’s been since he’d woken up on top of his bathroom countertop.
His legs had folded neatly beneath him, only dressed in his undergarments. A shopping bag had been freshly emptied onto the sink countertop and more garments were hanging nearby. Hands that were not his wrapped around his waist, threading buttons through a very expensive-looking regency shirt.
The Spirit of the Millennium Ring was behind him, smiling from behind the mirror.
He'd wanted to demand answers but his mouth didn’t open. Ryou struggled to control his own limbs. He couldn't move. In the mirror, Ryou’s face was blank. His eyes were glossy and near lifeless, encased in the same stiff trance as the rest of his body.
“Good evening, Landlord,” The Spirit whispered in a low and cheerful voice into Ryou’s ear. Hot breath had slipped from The Spirits mouth and over Ryous skin - real lungs breathing real air. How it was possible, Ryou didn’t fathom.
The Spirit gazed into the mirror as he spoke, his eyes locking with Ryou’s blank expression. “Ready to play?”
Ryou couldn’t answer, of course. His body was hoisted into the air and carried into his own bedroom. A new laced comforter was draped on top of his bed. Ryou's eyes gazed emptily at a mirror set up across from the bed, watching himself descend onto the sheets.
Remembering what happened before he woke up in the bathroom is foggy, like seeing through salt water. He tries to unlock those parts of himself, but he can’t even close his eyes to concentrate.
“You only see what I let you see,” The Spirit says, putting a hand over Ryou’s eyes and closing his lids. The darkness helps Ryou remember the past 24 hours with clarity. The sensation of cloth beneath his fingertips, ripping off price tags, paying with cash. Coming home and laying out the millennium eye and then the rod in a pattern, spiritually connecting them to the other items nearby. He remembers The Spirit manifesting a second body, remembers watching it vanish when he let go of Ryou's arm, then reappear when he grabbed it again.
The hand comes off and it all fades - Ryou only sees the ceiling now.
With his mind still reeling from the information of The Spirits shopping spree, he’s sent into a brief shock when he feels a hand on his bare leg. His stiff body doesn’t follow suit of his own reflexes, however.
With an unsettling casualness, The Spirit bends his leg and something runs up Ryou’s skin. Sheer and velvet soft, it comes up to his mid-thigh and gently clamps down when The Spirits fingers slip out of the cuff. His other leg is grabbed, subjected to the same. His hips are lifted for him with one hand, another running the pants up his body, before settling around his waist with a snap.
Ryou still can’t move as the Spirit gets on top to straddle him, a new piece of clothing in hand. He gently puts Ryou’s head and arms through the holes -- they slip through it easily, letting the addition hug against his back. Hands that were not his button them up to his chest. A waistcoat, maybe?
“You look... decent,” The Spirit preens, running hands up Ryou’s torso. “Why not have a look at yourself?” Ryou’s chin is grabbed and his face is turned back to the mirror.
His reflected body is dressed in a regal, outdated outfit. The cream-lace ruffles and light-blue velvet matte compliment his light skin and hair.
Ryou’s not one for mirrors. He’s embarrassed by the instinctive compulsion, too at odds with the myriad of accusations and declarations of his appearance. Whenever he looks, he hears the background whispers and sneers of his peers and family and strangers. He always got more attention for his appearance than he ever wanted. Now, though? Forced to see himself? Watching the Spirit gaze at him wearing his own face? It was strange, but --
Secretly, he’s always wanted to dress like this.
He feels….
“Handsome…” Ryou murmurs. His eyes widen as he realizes that he had spoken the word aloud. He tries to say more -- to ask the spirit why this is happening. But his face goes frigid once more.
“I didn’t quite catch that.” The Spirit asks, voice low. Ryou’s face is turned again, staring up into the dangerous eyes of his otherworldly self.
His mouth and throat relax, returning to him enough for words -- but something is wrong.
““Whhhi’m-” His tongue isn’t doing what it should be. His throat pushes a burst of air from his mouth, forcing his lips open.
“I’m-” He swallows to stave off the compulsion.
“-So-” His neck stiffens, his head suddenly as stiff as plastic. The rest of him follows suit. His last defiance is to grit his teeth through the word-
“-Handsome.”
Hearing himself, Ryou’s face flares red. The Spirit laughs after the ventriloquism is complete.
“I’m glad you approve.” The Spirit answers.
Ryou’s fingers itch. He watches The Spirit bring out a jewelry box and he can taste bitter envy on the back of his tongue. He can’t move on his own, a limp puppet, incapable of even the slightest twitch without The Spirit’s allowance. He thinks back to how quickly he had control of certain muscles, and how quickly he'd lost that control.
The Spirit holds up a stick pin and a scarf. The stick pin is small, with gorgeous opal cradled in the jaw of a skull. Macabre, but tasteful. The scarf is wrapped around Ryou’s neck and the pin is placed with care.
The Spirit’s hand leaves the scarf, taking Ryou’s, and settling his itching fingers in The Spirit’s place. His middle and forefinger bracket the stick pin and Ryou can feel the smooth fake ivory between them, the soft cotton blend pillowing his palm. The Spirit drags Ryou’s finger over the opal, over the eyeholes, over the tiny rows of teeth.
Satisfaction runs crisp and refreshing through his chest. His ribs sink into it, trying to pin the feeling of perfection in place, but it quickly skews sideways and recedes.
The Spirit eases Ryou upright so the two were torso to torso against each other: almost in an embrace due to lack of working limbs on Ryou’s part. Ryou’s head is tilted forwards, cradled in the crook of the Spirit’s neck, comfortable against The Spirits’ arm. A brush starts to waft through Ryou’s hair. The repetitive motion of it is soothing. It moves slowly, relaxing his muscles and beguiling a lull in judgement.
“You like the feel of this,” the Spirit remarks. It’s a statement, not a question. The gentle combing continues. “Just as I deserve to have a handsome doll, you deserve to be one.”
Doll?
“My favorite doll.” The Spirit says softly.
A care and gentleness warms the back of his neck and scalp. Ryou understands that he’s being emotionally manipulated. He wants to point it out, but his mouth twists into different vowels, instead. “I’m so hand-” Ryou stops his sentence with a surprised grunt as soon as he realizes what was coming out of his mouth.
The Spirit starts speaking once Ryou goes quiet. “I’ve had so many dolls - you remember how many I’ve made, don’t you?” The Spirit drops the brush. “But none of them were as good as you. ”
Despite the manipulation, this is… hardly the worst The Spirit could be doing, Ryou reminds himself. No one’s getting hurt, friend or otherwise. And The Spirit’s been rather gentlemanly about it, overall. Besides being slightly embarrassing, Ryou can’t see the harm in being well-dressed.
“No,” Ryou’s loose hair is stroked back into place. "Not like you.”
