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ghostiesnightmare · 19 days ago

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The Rules We Mend

Pairing: Brahms Heelshire x Female Reader Summary: After the punishment comes silence, leaving you to pick up the shattered pieces of your mind. But when violence breeches the walls of the Heelshire manor it's your captor who saves you, carrying you home in bloodstained arms. In the quiet aftermath, soaked in steam and shadows, something unspoken begins to bloom– and the rules between you start to bend. TW: DARK content read at your own risk. , breaking and entering, trauma bonds, unprotected sex, stalking, foul language, implied assault, power imbalance, excessive descriptions of violence, murder, torture, nudity, blood, handjobs, sloppy kisses, dare I say fluff?, and more. Word Count: 8,246 MDNI-NSFW A/N: Took this ask and RAN with it... eat up. [part one] [part two]

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The early morning doesn’t seem real.

Soreness clings to your flesh like a second skin, every breath, every stretch of your limbs reminding you of last night– of him. Dried sweat coats you like a wet blanket, the sheets tangled around your thighs reeking of sweet and sex and sin.

The attic, in its gloom and darkness carries a much deeper secret– something darker that you could not quite place, almost possessive in the way it held your heart in a chokehold. Dust particles float in the haze of the rising sun, casting a faint kaleidoscope of shadows along the walls. Undisturbed by years of wear and tear, the abandoned passageway entrance glares at you from the far wall– eager to swallow you whole.

The image sends a shiver down your spine.

Shifting slightly, the metallic bed frame groans beneath your weight. You freeze in place, waiting for the beast pressed against your back to stir. A moment, two– nothing. Daring to glance behind your shoulder, your wrists throb, skin raw and irritated from the wire bindings forced upon them hours ago.

A mess of curly brown meets your gaze, locks ruffled as the cool porcelain of the mask presses uncomfortably against the swell of your shoulders. Slow, heated breaths fan over your naked skin– the occasional snore breaking through the silence as you are practically nuzzled.

It was strange, seeing him like this. So calm, so vulnerable as he peacefully slept beside you, not a care in the world– arm strung lazily over your waist, fingers ever so slightly digging into your flesh. The scene tranquil, as if it were any other morning instead of the result of another punishment.

The tears had refused to come last night, the ones of self-pity and hatred only sprouting in the aftermath when you knew you were the only one to witness them. Now, all that remained were the broken pieces of your sanity for you to put back in place.

Even when Brahms had whispered broken promises like twisted wedding vows against your bruised skin, you fought the shame, the guilt of it all. But in the wee hours of dawn, the early kiss of the sun only taints your skin further with the devilish acts of the night.

Brahms shifts slightly, curls raking across your flesh– a gurgled groan slipping. Spine straightening, you pause, not wanting to disturb the peace you were so desperate to keep. Something wet smears your back, and you realize he was drooling.

Gross.

Cringing away from the sensation, you peel the sheets away from your skin. Punishment or not, the Heelshire manor always required your undivided attention. Lifting the massive arm draped over you, your eyes linger a beat too long at the wiry muscle staring back at you.

You couldn’t shake the way he held you after your punishment– gentle, borderline worshiping you as he brought your betrayal to the surface. Brutal strength you knew you held no match against, yet once you had been properly disciplined the touch was undeniably tender. Your thumb presses against the vein in his wrist, the slow pulsing of his heartbeat almost lulling you back into his arms.

The same arms that dragged you into the tunnels with such viscous strength you felt as if your heart would beat out of your chest.

You swallow, shaking the memory from your mind. There was no point in dwelling on the past, you had much more pressing matters to attend to. Easing out from beneath Brahms’ grasp, you push yourself up from the mattress– wobbly legs planting against the rotting wood of the attic’s floor.

Brahms groans, rolling over in your absence. A pause, then another grumble of a snore tearing through the air. The broad expanse of his shoulders shift, muscle rippling before disappearing underneath the tattered blanket. Your jaw clenches.

Stumbling across the rotting floor, you didn’t know what about last night unsettled you more, the punishment or the affection that had followed. You didn’t want to find out.

The silence of the manor, of the tunnels, seem louder as you dressed– the scratchy fabric of that godforsaken apron cutting into your skin like a testament to your own undoing. Clinging to the bruises dotting your hips and sternum, you shuffle uncomfortably, trying to make the treacherous clothing yours once more.

It seems that the Heelshire manor laid claim to your very soul.

Tying the apron around your waist, you could still feel the heated breath against your ear, voice a cruel melody playing in your mind like a broken record: “I love the way you hate me– it means I’ve ruined you the way you’ve ruined me.”

Worst of all, you knew he was right– every touch, every word seeping into your soul like a reckoning leaving you to pick up the pieces and pray that you were wrong. And God, you pray you were wrong.

Trying to ready yourself for the endless expanse of daily chores, that very idea made your stomach curdle like sour milk: not the tears, not the violence, but the undeniable heat that pooled in your being at the thought of his touch in those late hours– and how you let him.

You spare one last glance at Brahms’ sleeping form as you tug on your shoes, a heavy sigh tearing from your throat as you glance at the passageway. It would take sheer luck for you to successfully navigate the sprawling expanse of tunnels to the kitchen, but it was better than risking the wrath that would follow if you woke him.

At this point, you have nothing to lose.

The morning tasks went by in a foggy haze, mind reeling from the lack of sleep. Yet, you persevere through the tiredness weighing you down like a bowling ball strapped to your chest. Afterall, that was all you could do– deep breaths, one foot in front of the other, ignore everything else.

That was the rule if you hope to avoid another punishment. Afterall, perfection was never encouraged, it was expected.

So perfection was the goal– the tea brewed with careful dedication, breakfast made with culinary expertise, foyer wiped clean of all former sins to utmost excellence– as if you were ashamed of the actions that had taken place in the past. Porcelain china was cleaned until shining, silver polished until shimmering, yet shaky hands folded the linen napkins with apprehensive devotion.

Devotion– such a silly word these days, yet you find yourself living the very being of a lifelong disciple. Pathetic.

Every task seems to take twice as long as it should have, something you would have been scolded from in the past, yet the harsh words never came– the master of the house sleeping soundly as you work silently in the early hours.

It was as if your body no longer belonged to you, chores forgotten as the grandfather clock chimes towards the afternoon– dish towels muddled, feet tripping over each other while stumbling across the hardwood floors. All you could focus on were those sinful touches that lingered into your every waking breath.

Passing by the foyer mirror while dusting, you barely recognise yourself– something much smaller, more raw than you remember. Shoulder slouching, finger trembling, eyes sunken in. As if you were a shell of your defiant state.

Just like he likes it.

Forcing those less than professional thoughts from your mind, you try to find comfort in the small actions throughout the day. The heat of the sun pouring through the stained glass windows, the smell of parchment paper in the pantry, the clatter of the china as you organize the kitchen cupboards– things that usually calm your racing heartbeat failing when nothing compares to the thoughts swirling in your head.

The groan of the metallic bed frame as it scraped against the floorboards. The sting of the wire as it bit into your skin. The fire in your stomach as your sins were swallowed whole.

Stop it.

The cool press of the porcelain against your heated skin. The burn of your skin as he slapped you over, and over again. The damning scream that tore through your throat as you came.

“Stop.” Fingers digging into your temples, the muddled dishrag falls into the kitchen sink as shaky breaths tear through your sternum. Nails scratching against the skin of your scalp, you beg to be anywhere else.

Not in this room, not in this house– anywhere as long as it was far away from him.

Poor thing, what happened to that pesky backbone of yours, hm?

Glass shatters, the echo ringing through your ears like a gunshot as the broken china plate lay in ruins at your feet. Stumbling backwards, panic grips your heart in a vice-like grip, tears dotting your vision as you struggle to slow your ragged breathing.

The sting in your fingertips doesn’t even register until it drips onto the hardwood floor, coating the surface in an all too familiar shade of crimson. Dropping to your knees, shards needle into your skin as trembling hands scrub away the mess– the sin.

But it was too late.

His voice was in your head, in the walls, in the house, everywhere all at once as it rings in your skull, words reducing you to a whimpering shell of who you once were.

There’s nothing left that’s yours.

Your stubborn defiance, so rooted in your hatred, was now reduced to a sniveling whisper that haunted the manor. That was the worst part of it all, he didn’t have to chain you– barricade you within the house, tear away your defences, or threaten you.

No, that would have been too easy.

He had taken your freedom piece by piece, chipping away at your defences with such quiet devotion one could have almost called the act loving– and you had let him.

A muffled sob slips past your lips, hand pressed against your mouth like a scolded child as you try to will away the sound. Chest heaving, silent tears drip onto your palm, and when you pull away your hand all you could see was red.

God, you couldn’t breathe– you need air.

Limbs moving without thinking, trembling hands yank the gardening gloves hanging from the pantry door, feet slipping on the discarded glass shards. The thin material, worn from use, cling to your sweaty palms as you slip them on, rubber scraping against the slices in your fingers.

The door slams against the wall, rattling the kitchenware as you dart into the chilly air, seeking the only place of sanctuary you could think of before you were pulled back.

The greenhouse.

The one place Brahms never went– the only place in this forsaken world that still belongs to you. The only place keeping you sane.

The wind whips your hair across your forehead, all too similar to a slap in the late afternoon. Grey clouds, dark and foreboding, block out any sunlight as you scurry to the ancient structure, arms folding against your chest. Sparing one last glance at the manor as the greenhouse comes into view, you try to push away the feeling of him staring at you from the attic.

You hadn’t checked the tunnels, refused to clean up your mess, didn’t notice if he heard you flee the grounds. You didn’t care.

If you spent one more second in that haunted house, you'd scream, and there was no telling what punishment would await you after that.

Looming over you like a forgotten chapel, overgrown vines wrap around the dirty glass, dripping in secrecy and silence and privacy– the answer to your prayers. The ironwright bars scream as you pry the door open, darting inside as the wind howls against the glass. Slamming the door closed, the heavens burst, rain battering the ceiling and casting a kaleidoscope of shadows across the dimly lit room.

For just a moment, just one breathless second, you felt that maybe, possibly you could find peace within the sprawling plants. But peace never lasts on the Heelshire grounds, and the monsters always come crawling back home.

Whether that meant him or you, there is no telling.

Exhaling a breath you didn’t realize you were holding in, the greenhouse seems to come to life as you walk across the cobblestone flooring. The air, damp with humidity, wafts heavily with the scent of dirt and earth with undertones of lavender. Almost unnaturally warm, mist swirls along the aisles of potted plants, herbs, and flowers. Sweat pools in your gloves, softening the long forgotten sting of the slices on your fingertips.

Not even bothering to remove them, you gingerly reach for a fern, the stems twirling around your arm as your hand plunges into the moist soil. Oxtongue tickles your wrists as you walk, leaves and stems bending under your touch. Lightning flashes across the sky, painting the greenhouse in a ghostly glow of white before disappearing into gloom once more.

There were no calculated footsteps behind you. No harsh words, no empty threats, no heated breaths wafting over the nape of your neck– just you.

Clutching a pair of rusted clippers, the smell of tea leaves and mint invade your nostrils, calming any bubbling nerves that remain. Plucking a few strands of lavender from the soil, you become lost in the tranquility of fog and dirt and moss. Every breath tastes like earth and tea tree, not the sour tang of mildew and mold.

You feel the cleanest you had in weeks, even with sweat dripping down the expanse of your neck and dipping into the frayed collar of your shirt. The buzz of anxiety shifts into something quiet, something much calmer as you work, hands kneading the soil and discarding stray weeds from the greenery.

Stepping towards the middle of the greenhouse where the tea leaves grow, the waxy edges of the foliage glimmering in the light– dancing under the shimmer of rain overhead. A smile, small, thin, but a smile cracks through your dry lips, the first in weeks.

Kneeling, you pinch a strand between your gloved fingers, clipping a few before pressing them into an apron pocket. Almost lovingly, you trace the shape of the winding stems, relishing in the fragility poised between your fingers.

“Hello, little thing.” you coo, humming as the plant almost seemed to wrap itself around you. So pure, something untouched by the violence and hostility in the manor, yet so delicate that its life was held in the palm of your hand.

Here, hidden away from the overgrowth, time passed differently. Slower, kinder. The routine came easy, the weight in your chest falling away as you collect the waxy leaves in your apron.

Inhale, snip a few leaves, exhale, press them into the folds of your apron, repeat.

The storm rages onwards, rain battering against the glass panes, but the sound was white noise among the plants– a blanket against the war around you. Leaning into the sensation, you continue onwards, apron jutting from the collection of greenery tucked within the fabric.

Brushing a strand of hair from your face, dirt smeared across your skin, your gaze meets the overgrown camellia sinensis adorning the back wall. A bittersweet sigh tears from your chest at the sight, leaves choking beneath the thick, oppressive weeds crowding the soil bed.

You always have meant to trim them, yet always forgetting when time seemed to be against you– much more focused on Brahms than a pitiful plant. Yet, as you stare at the winding overgrowth trapping the leaves, a pang of empathy stirs in your gut.

It deserves better.

Approaching the back wall, another telltale flash of lightning ripples across the sky, and your hand freezes midair.

The air was still– too still.

Something was wrong.

It isn’t a sound, not exactly, but a feeling of dread curling around your stomach as you glance behind your shoulder. This, you know– the telltale sign of goosebumps fluttering across your arms, the hairs of your neck standing straight up as a chill tears through you.

Like you were being watched through the broken slates in the greenhouse.

Spine straightening, you almost miss the shadow darting across the threshold of the door as thunder claps across the sky. Snapping your head towards the greenhouse entrance, the garden shears fall to the floor, breath catching in your throat as you expect to find a furious Brahms towering over you–

Nothing. Just vines flapping against the wind.

Turning back towards your work, you uproot a weed, cursing as the thorns prickle against your wrists as you toss it to the floor. Kneeling to grab the shears for a particularly pesky stem, you pause.

The garden shears were gone.

Blood turning to ice, you duck under the raised bed, expecting them to be haphazardly strewn across the cobblestone– but nothing. The air turns sour, something akin to anticipation crackling through your skin as you shakily stand on wobbly legs. Pushing away from the wooden countertop, you stuff the last handful of leaves into your apron before turning to flee.

Lightning flashes through the sky once more, just a split second, and you finally see it. A figure– wrong, two.

Tall and broad and creeping across the fogged glass just behind the entrance. Worst of all, there was no porcelain pressing up against the greenhouse, the faint childlike smile peeking through the wall.

Brahms wasn’t there.

Bile risse in your throat as your heart drops to your stomach, stumbling backwards in an effort to conceal yourself among the shrubbery. Your ankle crashes against a metal watering can, the hollow clang tearing through the silence like a bomb.

Fuck.

Clamping a hand around your mouth, you drop, knees digging into the cobblestone painfully as you still, pressing into the greenery so hard you felt as if you were returning to the clutches of the earth.

You have to move, run– but you were trapped inside.

The metal hinges whine as the door is forced open, the wind howling fated warnings as two figures emerge from the storm. Your mouth dries, air torn from your lungs at the sight.

It wasn’t Brahms, you were right about that. It wasn’t even close.

Soaked to the bone, covered in black clothing, hunting boots squelching against the stone. Two men adorned in muscle and brawn and eyes so hungry you could feel them from across the room. The shorter of the two enters first, stepping into the reprieve of the storm and tugging off the balaclava, revealing a nasty slash across his face, purple and mottled. Your stomach curdles.

The other, taller– quieter, stretched. A flash of silver catches your eye, a machete hanging from the black cargo pants with eerie stillness. A duffle bag drops to the floor, the sound of metal clattering throughout the air as the men survey the plants as if they were livestock.

Scarface finds you first, eyes burning into you as you shrink against the cobblestone.

“Oh, fuck.” A slow, calculated grin spreads across his face– revealing a row of broken, yellowed teeth. “-I thought you said the place wasn’t occupied.” The taller one gruntes, hand resting on the handle of the machete, now glinting under the rain. “...the place looks like a goddamn mausoleum.”

Fighting the urge to vomit, you muster any courage you could gather, trying to seep venom in your words. “Get out. This is private property–”

“Private property?” The shorter of the two mocks, taking a step closer. The words die on your tongue. “It looks like you’re the only one here, sweetheart. That private enough for you?” The other chuckles, and you swear your heart lurches from your chest.

They weren’t here to escape the storm.

They weren’t here to find solace in the plants.

They weren’t even here to rob the place– at least, not anymore.

“Pretty little thing, all by yourself.” Scarface speaks again, words dripping with venom, with need. His accomplice nods, “Wonder what else she has hidden in the house…” his eyebrow cocks beneath the mask, and you shrivel at the sight. “I bet she keeps all kinds of things locked away.”

Your hand darts behind you, blindly grappling for something, anything to protect yourself with. Your fingers close around an ancient weeder, the tongs rusted and dull from age and abandon, but they were better than nothing.

“Don’t move, or I swear–”

Your threat goes unheard as Scarface lunges across the table, a startled shriek tearing from your throat as his fingers wrap around your ankle. Blindly kicking upwards, your heel catches his nose, snapping his head backwards. Scrambling to your feet, you hold the weeder in front of your chest as he rises– blood dripping from his nose.

“You fucking bitch!” He slaps you across the face, hard. White splinters across your vision as your head cracks to the side, ribs cracking against the edge of the soil bed as you fall. Crashing into the cobblestone, the taller one wraps his hand around your hair, pulling you onto your feet.

Scalp burning, you stomp on his toes, hoping to throw him off guard as tears line your vision. Scarface turns, kicking you in the gut, and you collapse, wheezing as the air is knocked from your lungs. Greedy hands tear at your apron, tea leaves spilling onto the floor as you kick and punch, landing a lucky hit as the weeder digs into Scarface’s forearm.

He grunts, tearing the weeder from your hands before landing a right hook upside your head. You feel your eyebrow split… was he wearing a ring?... and the world tilts. A hand kneads at your breast through your shirt and you scream– the sound long, primal– rattling the caging of the greenhouse.

It was the kind of scream that cracks glass, the kind that summons ghosts, the kind that reaches into the walls.

Blood pours from your temple, blinding your right eye as your pulse thunders in your skull. Writhing against your captor’s grip, another jab hits your ribs and the taste of iron fills your mouth.

The taller one forces your wrists over your head, and you deadweight in the hopes of relieving the pressure burning your wrists– to no avail. Scarface chuckles, spitting blood. “Stop fucking moving and this will be quick, I promise. Or don’t– I don’t give a fuck.” Fingers dig into your jaw and you cry out under the assault.

The sound of glass shattering halts the attack. Craning your head, you barely catch the blur of movement before it slams into your assailant, jostling you from his hold. Crumpling to the floor, an unearthly growl tears through the room. You freeze, relief flooding your system.

Boots crunching against the shards of glass, Brahms emerges from the shadows– shoulders heaving, towering form casting a shadow over your crumpled state. Porcelain mask cracked from the force of the blow, Brahms straightens, a rusty poker clutched in his fist.

The very one that was stabbed through your journal the night before.

They never stood a chance. Bloodlust radiating off his form in waves, the poker connects with the tall male with a sickening crunch– both crashing into the side of the greenhouse with such force the entire greenhouse rattles. Scarface pales, stumbling backwards as you scramble towards the corner of the building, head pounding as the room falls into chaos.

Fists pound into the bludgeoned man’s face– once, twice, shrieks escaping as he tries to pry Brahms off of him. Something pops, Brahms’ fingers plunging into the male’s eye sockets, and you gag as a shrill scream fills the air. The sound of flesh tearing fills the room as Brahms punches him.

Over, and over and over again.

Until the beast of a man was nothing more than a bloody pulp pressed against the glass. Scarface pushes across the room, vaulting the soil bed as he sprints towards the door, trying to run. But Brahms was too angry, too fast, fist colliding with his temple just before he reaches the threshold.

Grabbing the shears, your missing shears, Brahms plunges them into Scarface’s neck– a choked gurgle escaping as the man coughs on his own blood. Ripping the tool from the flesh, blood sprays across the room, coating the fogged glass in a gut-churning crimson.

Lungs burning, you cower in the corner, only able to watch as the male twitches against the cobblestone. Brahms towers over him, placing his foot onto his throat before stomping.

Once, twice until there was only silence in the greenhouse. The rain, the only sound, continues to batter against the glass as Brahms stands– chest heaving as his gaze snaps towards you. The mask, ever still, doesn’t soften as you stare. But his voice, eerily calm, utters just one word.

Your name.

Hanging in the air like a prayer on his tongue, a broken testament to his faith. Voice low, straining beneath violence and fury, the world around you splitting as a sob tears from your throat. Adrenaline fleeing your limbs, you collapse.

Before your head cracks against the cobblestone, strong arms curl beneath your back and knees, hoisting your writhing form away from the bloodstained floor as if you weigh nothing. You curl towards him, burying your face into the damp fabric of his tattered sweater as you breathe his scent in frantic, shaking gulps.

Dust, firewood, worn books– just the way you like it.

Tears stream down your cheeks as you shake, fingers digging into his sweater as you sob. The weight of the world felt as if it were lifted off of your shoulders, and for the first time since you arrived in that godforsaken manor, you feel safe. The poker clatters to the floor, completely forgotten as he cradles you to his chest, calloused fingers combing through your matted hair as you weep.

“I was so scared–” you hiccup, gasping for air as you push closer to his skin for warmth. “-Oh God, I thought they were going to…” The words refuse to come, a broken sob manifesting itself as you shakily wrap your arms around his neck. Muscles convulsing, your teeth chatter against the frigid air.

“You’re hurt.” Brahms murmurs against your hair, thumb dipping into the blood pooling at your eyebrow. You flinch, breath coming out in uneven, ragged huffs. “They… touched you.” Ribs burning, every breath sending a ripple of pain down your spine as you inhale. You didn’t even realize you were whimpering until his finger ghosts over your jaw, tilting your head to look at him. You glance at your hands, fingers clenched around the fabric of his sweater and tainting it in crimson.

The blood on his sweater wasn’t just yours.

He pulls you in closer, and you jolt, fear coursing through your veins– knuckles turning white as you grip him like a lifeline. He stills at the action, eyes boring into you through the porcelain mask.

“It’s alright. I’m here,” Forehead pressing against your own, you shudder. “-I’m here. Let me help you.”

His skin was warm, soft, any semblance of a response dying on your tongue as you bury your face into his chest.

For the first time, it feels like home.

The manor doors slam open as you are ushered inside, water, blood, and dirt trekking through the halls as Brahms carries you up the stairs. You could feel all three clinging to your skin– sticky, cold, and full of sin in a way you knew you couldn’t scrub off. The thought made you shudder violently in his hold.

Somewhere in the back of your mind, you expect to be dumped in your room. Maybe placed on the kitchen table to tend to your wounds. Even the bathroom, if you were lucky– somewhere practical.

Instead, Brahms persevered, trudging up past the stairs and pushing towards the only wing in the house where you scarcely visit. The master wing– his wing. Pushing open the heavy doors, the smell of cedar and worn paper fill your nostrils, the scent dizzying as you are gently set on the edge of the bed.

Squirming uncomfortably, you pull the tattered remains of the apron to your chest, cringing as dirt and blood seep into the pristine sheets. Barely even registering the softness of the bed, you could only gape forward– hair matted to your skull as your body thrums with pain.

The sound of running water tears you from your fogged gaze, and you glance towards the bathroom, where Brahms moves with startling urgency– filling the tub with warm water, tearing towels from their resting places, grabbing a washcloth. Steam begins to waft through the air like vengeful spirits, your bones aching for heat as your toes curl at the sight.

Trying to push yourself off the bed, you rise on bruised legs. A pained gasp rips through your chest, and you wobble. Ever so carefully, you are lifted into the air once more, legs dangling as you are brought to the edge of the clawtooth tub.

Firmly planted on the edge, your toes barely brush against the marbled floor. In another life, another place you would have dreamed of being able to bathe in such a luxurious setting, yet all you could think about was the warm water that await you.

The flimsy remains of the apron are carefully pulled away, frigid fingers trailing under your bare stomach as the grimy sweater is pulled over your head. If you had been braver, more stubborn, you would have resisted– but tiredness weighs you down like a wet blanket.

Moving gently so as to not spook you, Brahms fiddles with the button of your jeans, sending another chilled shudder down your spine. Slowly, your jeans and panties are ushered down your legs, socks quickly following as you sit bare against the porcelain tub.

Hands cupping beneath your knees, Brahms eases you into the water– causing a hiss of pain to grumble from you as the warmth laps at your wounds. “I know… I’m sorry.” His voice cuts through you, so gentle it almost hurts, as if he was in pain just from watching you writhe in discomfort. Fingers cradling your jaw, the cool surface of his mask presses against your heated forehead. You sigh, eyes closing as you sink into the sensation, trying to relax your aching muscles.

The rustle of clothing echoes through the bathroom, but you ignore it, choosing instead to savour the warmth seeping into your chilled bones. The water sloshes against the tub as Brahms climbs in across from you, knees brushing against yours. Lazily opening your eyes, you faintly make out the blurred outline of him reaching for something before your forehead is set ablaze in pain.

Gritting your teeth, your hands fly to the edges of the tub, knuckles turning white as your nails dig into the smooth surface. The soaked washcloth dabs along your split brow, wiping the blood away from your skin. Cool fingers trace the bruise on your ribs, ever so slightly brushing against the curve of your breast as he begins to wipe the grime from your flesh.

The scratch of your jaw comes next. Then, the slash on your thigh. Finally, the bruised ring around your throat. Each movement sends a thrill through your veins as the pain begins to subside, the sting of your wounds fading under the warmth of the water– of his touch.

“They don’t get to keep any part of you… not even this.” a whisper, laced with disdain as his thumb presses against your brow. Your lips tremble, tears blotting your vision. “I…” you swallow thickly. “-I thought I was going to die.”

“No.” he hissed, shoulders heaving as his gaze drills holes into the split skin. “You belong to me.”

The words should have scared you, sending a pit of dread in your stomach at the possessive tone. They should have irked you– irritate you even– but they didn’t. Tonight, they felt different.

Shifting in the water, your hand wraps around his wrist, halting his movements. The washcloth drops between you, water splashing onto your chest as you meet his searing gaze. Frozen in time, Brahms lets out a shaky exhale– so subtle, so gentle as if he didn’t trust himself to hold you together.

You were beyond saving, anyways.

“I’m sorry… for leaving.” You whisper. “-for…” voice catching in your throat, you instinctively glance away, shame lapping at your skin thicker than the blood in the water.

For breaking the rules.

“I know.” Slow, calculated words ring in your ears. He knows– he always does.

“But you saved me.” Retorting, knees curl to your chest, chin resting on them as you wait for any reasonable explanation as to why there was no punishment– no threatening words, no searing touches exploring your unforgivable sin.

He only huffs. “Always.”

You blink at him, stunned at his response. The water stills between you, air heavy with something like a confession. His fingers twitch, shaking every so slightly before they curl into a fist– and you see it.

Fear.

Barely contained beneath the surface, the very same driver of his fury that ended in blood and sweat and violence– is a sense of terror, one rooted in losing you. Your chin digs into the skin of your knees and you watch as his self control teeters closer to snapping. Once so cold, so brutal, now held back by only your gaze.

Your heart lurches within your chest at the sight.

Before you can stop yourself, your fingers cradle the cracked porcelain of the mask so endearingly he flinches. Adam's apple bobbing from the touch, his hands tense at his sides as if he were burned– mentally debating whether to retreat or tear your hand away. But he does neither, only staring at you through half lidded eyes, chocolate orbs stirring with confusion, apprehension, and something you couldn’t quite place.

You could swear they glisten under the light.

“I… let me see you.” you urge, fingertips cusping the edge of the mask– slightly grazing across the dark curls that hide beneath. “-please.”

Silence crashes through the room, the only sound coming from the occasional drip of the faucet. The air shifts, and you almost retreat into yourself at the tension– pulse hammering in your ears like a wardrum.

A pause, then slowly, Brahms shifts into your touch.

Drawing closer, water sloshes over the side of the tub and crashes over the marble tiles as his knees plant on either side of your own. Massive frame surging towards you like a tidal wave threatening to swallow you whole, dusky curls tickle your forehead as his face stops just inches from your own.

You don’t flinch, refusing to pull away as you brave onwards– the eye of the storm. His palm, slick and trembling, cups your jaw. Thumb brushing the bruise forming under your eye, he pauses– offering himself to you like a lamb being sent for slaughter. Your fingertips catch the wiring tucked behind his ear, and his breath catches in his throat.

Finally, you lift it.

The porcelain rises with a low creak, water dripping down his skin as you unmask him with aching slowness. His jaw catches the light, then his cheekbones, his brows– until there is nothing separating him from your gaze.

And you see him for what feels like the first time.

Bruised, blotted skin peppered with scars and burns running across his cheekbones. Seared browline and sunken eyes lined with fringed lashes dripping with water and grime and tears. Bottom lip split open, dried blood caked to the scruff of his jaw– clenching like the weight of the world was lifted from his shoulders and threatened to leave him shattered beneath your gaze.

But his eyes– that is what tears your heart to shreds.

Coffee with flecks of caramel so devastating you were drowning. Irises dilated so wide his eyes almost look black as he gapes at you, memorizing your reaction– carving it into his skin. You swallow thickly, reaching upwards, and he doesn’t stop you.

Fingertips tracing the mottled skin, nails delicately scraping over the swelling, he shudders. Shoulders sagging as if it were the first time he was touched in his life, not out of fear, not of pity, but with empathy. His lip quivers as you move closer, cupping his face in your hands as if he were made of glass, thumbs rubbing circles into his temples.

“You didn’t have to…” nails scraping against his scalp, he groans at the feeling, and you falter. “-save me. You could have left me to be punished.” trailing off, your hands retreat, shame building in your stomach. “...let me get what I deserved.”

Fingers coil around your wrists suddenly, firmly planting them on his shoulders. “Don’t–” he rumbles, brow twitching as a warning glare flickers across his face. “Don’t ever say that.” Voice dripping with pain and anger, you shudder.

Pressing your forehead against his, no barriers– no masks, the rawness of it all sprouting tears in your eyes. “I’m so sorry.” You breathe out, nose brushing his as your lip quivers. “For hurting you– leaving you. For thinking you wouldn’t come for me.”

He pauses, jaw clenching as he tastes the apology on his tongue. You swallow thickly as his nose ducks into the crook of your neck, breathing you in. “I would always come for you… you’re mine.”

Forgiveness– the taste sweet on your tongue.

Tilting upwards, you catch his eye, all resolve shattering as you lean in and press your lips to his– slowly, carefully. Not a kiss of a prisoner, not one full of fearful regret. But one shared between broken pieces clinging to the only warmth they have left.

You finally feel whole.

Hands sliding into his wet curls, you tug on the tufts as you pull yourself closer, chasing the flutter blooming in your stomach like something born again. He falters, arms wrapping around your waist as he falls backwards, water spilling out of the tub as you collide with his chest. But neither of you notice– neither of you care.

You were drowning in something else entirely.

The taste of iron fills your mouth, and you pull away, breath stuttering as you see the blood trickling down his chin. Your tongue darts out, wetting your lips as the ghost of the kiss remains– warm, intimate.

Fingers dig into the flesh of your hips like you would vanish beneath his touch, the reality of your affection, your willingness almost too much to bear. “You’re hurt,” you murmur against his skin. “...because of me.” His brow furrows, a sigh tearing from his throat as you press into him.

A pause, one full of ache and longing– before: “I had to. They touched you.”

“I know.” Cupping his jaw in your hand, you examine the damage– hushing the protest forming on his lips. Mustering the courage coiling around your ribs, you echo those very words whispered in the greenhouse. “Let me help you.”

It wasn’t a plea, one forged with fear of punishment. Instead, it was a vow.

With every ounce of gentleness you could muster into your aching limbs, you shift forward into the tub, water sloshing around you as you straddle his waist. Brahms’ breath catches in his throat, something akin to awe glimmering in his eyes as you reach for the discarded washcloth. Wringing it in your hands, you press a kiss to his temple.

Bones weary, skin bruised– yet you never felt more alive.

“Let me take care of you,” You urge again, murmuring against his heated flesh. “...you always take care of me.” Pressing the drenched fabric to his lip, he jerks against your touch– wincing as you wipe the blood from his chin. His fingers flex beneath the water, but he doesn’t stop you.

Trailing the cloth across his jaw, the water pools down his neck as you wipe away his skin with devout reverence. You trace his jugular, ducking to his collarbone– where a purple bruise blossoms along the tender flesh. He groans at the action, as if it hurts to be touched so gently when no one else ever has.

You brave onwards, cleaning his wounds of dirt and grime, replacing the pain with feather-light kisses as you work. Your nails rake down his chest every so slightly, and he twitches. You couldn’t tell what festered beneath his skin: fear, restraint, or something much darker pulling at his psyche.

He killed for you– so now, you would have to live for him. Something that sounds more like a blessing than a punishment.

The cloth falls from your palm, a dull smack echoing through the walls of the bathroom as it hits the water. Your fingers delve lower, nails lingering across a scar splintering across his stomach– and he gasps into the crook of your neck. A jagged smile breaks out on your cracked lips.

Poor thing.

Nails dragging down his skin, your fingertips brush against his cock, lips folding over his as you swallow the moan building in his throat. “Let me…” you whisper against him, breathing in his shaky exhales as you wrap your fist around him. “-I want to.”

The fist gripping the porcelain edge of the edge almost splinters the surface as you trail your fingertips along the underside of his cock, jerking your hand towards his tip. A strained exhale wafts across your collarbones as you pump him underneath the water. Brahms’ head thuds against the edge of the tub, curls messily plastered to his forehead as sweat drips down his temple– eyes fluttering shut at your sinful touch.

“You always want to control everything,” Voice dripping in cotton-swabbed heat, your hip bones push against his stomach as your arms wind around his neck, trapping him beneath you. Breasts squishing against the hard ridge of his chest, a stray hair dips onto his cheekbone– tickling the swollen burns blossoming across his skin. “The rules, this house… me.”

The words taste bitter on your tongue, yet as they coat the condensation-filled room they sound devout. His lips part, a sputtered protest building in his chest as you latch your mouth against his jugular, the sharp thrum of his pulsepoint hammering against your lips in a dizzying concoction.

The tip of his cock catches on your folds, and your stomach flips– mouth unbearably dry. Nails raking into his shoulder blades so roughly you were certain you draw blood, chocolate orbs snap to your own, full of pain and heat and want.

“You don’t get to control me. Not this time.”

Your hips lower as you spear yourself on his cock, walls screaming as heat churns in your gut. Brows furrowing at the uncomfortable stretch, a shaken exhale escapes your lips as you seat yourself in his lap. Brahms groans, hands flying to your hips as you rock against him– water spilling out of the tub with every stroke.

Fingers digging into your flesh so hard it bruises, yet he doesn’t shift, refusing to dare and break the spell as you set the pace– guiding your hips in such a teasingly slow manner it almost hurts. Your thighs burn as you roll your hips, knees slipping against the porcelain as you ride him like it was your last night on earth, as if the manor was engulfed in flames and you were damned for eternity.

Maybe you were– the way you could feel him in your throat something so unearthly it feels as if you were already dead.

Iron, cedar, and earth cling to your skin as he jolts beneath you– cock hitting your cervix as a whine builds in your chest. God, you couldn’t breathe, the hard ridge of him tearing into you, stealing the air from your lungs and leaving nothing left but strained gasps. Mind foggy as steam wisps around your heated skin, all you could focus on was the subtle roll of your hips.

A shaking rise, a deep fall, as you prepare for the aftermath– like a moth drawn to a flame.

“Look at me,” you whisper, voice hoarse, head tilting back as his cock digs into your walls. Your clit scrapes against his skin as you lower yourself once, twice– the sensation causing you to flutter around him.

His eyes, God those eyes, dark and heavy sear into your own. Hungry, depraved, wild. Hips screaming for release, you suck on your bottom lip for comfort, muscles ablaze as your pace falters. Let me help you.

“You’re mine too.”

The words slip before you catch yourself, but it was too late. Almost barely audible, but impossibly weighted. And with them, Brahms’ resolve shatters.

Surging forward, your legs coil around his waist as he thrusts upwards– mouth melting into yours as you are all but lifted from the water. Pushing up on his knees, Brahms’ fingers dig into the fat of your ass as he bounces you on his cock. You gasp, nails digging into his back at the shift in the position, every movement much more pronounced as your insides turn to mush.

Spit dribbles down your chin as his tongue pushes into your mouth, claiming you as his. Toes curling, your heels dig into his lower back, spine arching as he practically splits you in two. The rhythm is frantic, breathless as his cock drives into your gummy walls– ruining you for all others.

He bottoms out, hips stuttering as your teeth sink into his bottom lip, fingers dancing across his flesh like worship. Every inch, every ridge, every scar mapped by your palms as you commit him to memory. Not as a monster, not as your captor– but as a man.

Your name falls from his lips like a broken prayer, low– raw, and your fingers drag across his scalp. Fisting damp curls between your fingers, you yank his hair backwards, lips raking across his jawline as he holds you like you weigh nothing.

“Shh,” you whine. “-you’ll wake the dead.”

His eyes roll back into his skull, something between a groan and a shudder tearing through him as he molds you against his skin. Heat and blood and need coarse through your veins, stomach clenching as tension knots in your gut.

Fire laps at your skin, climax coiling around you so tightly you feel as if you would snap. Nails scraping against Brahms’ scalp you whine as the orgasm crashes through you– legs numb from the force as you cling to him like your saving grace.

His eyes widen as your head buries into his neck, thighs twitching as exhaustion consumes you, brain short circuiting from the overstimulating combination of pain and pleasure coursing across your skin. Shuddering, Brahms retreats, pulling you off of him as his hand wraps around his cock, frantically pumping himself with laboured breaths as you sink against the edge of the tub.

You could only stare, lost in those dangerous caramel flecks in a sea of brown coated in lust, obsession, and something else hiding just beneath the surface. A strained groan echoes across the bathroom walls as Brahms peaks, coating his navel and thighs in a frothy white.

Before you could stop yourself, you move closer– grabbing the washcloth and wiping away the mess. So faithful, so devoted. A content sigh bubbles from his chest, fingers curling around the edge of the tup as he hoists himself over. Your eyes glance at his back, covered in irritated scratches across his shoulder blades, sending a wave of heat churning in your gut.

The very scratches you marked him with just moments before.

The bath water, now tepid, sloshes against your pruned toes as you are hoisted from the tub. Standing on wobbly knees, a fluffy towel wraps around your shoulders, condensation dripping down your skin and onto the marble tiles. You dry yourself silently, muscles aching, limbs numb as you try to ignore the eyes boring into your flesh.

The mask lay forgotten on the bathroom floor, a reminder of your fall from grace. Towel wrapped loosely around his hips, Brahms ushers you towards the bed– no teasing words, no lingering touches, just warm sheets encompassing your naked form as you sink into the mattress.

You don’t speak, you don’t have to.

Weariness sinking into your bones as the bedspread lowers next to you. Arms coil around your waist like ivy, pulling you into a solid chest as if he feared you would vanish from his grasp. Melting into the soft goose down of the duvet, you tilt your head towards him, offering a peck on the underside of his jaw. He grumbles in response, tiredness evident as his movements grow sluggish.

Lips caressing the crown of your head, you almost miss the whisper that wafts against your flesh.

“Mine.”

Eyes fluttering closed, sleep begins to take you– body weighing into his chest like roots taking shape. Slow, deep breathing fills the room, the faint sound of the water draining from the tub echoing across the walls. Skin pressed so tightly it felt as if you were fusing together, the world fades to black.

Outside, the greenhouse waits– rain mingling with the blood soaking the cobblestone path. Tea leaves curl around the broken bodies left to rot, the smell of death heavy in the damp air. Silence clings to the manor like moss, sprouting across the tunnels and through the halls.

And beneath it all, something begins to stir– something that might be love.

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ghostiesnightmare · 23 days ago

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Sorry for the delay in updates everyone— I have a bunch of screenings and a possible meeting with an oncologist so bear with me! Once I’m feeling better I will be back to posting regularly!!

-ghostie <3

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ghostiesnightmare · 28 days ago

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I'm so obsessed with your Brahms writing! And I need more. I beg you please!

I love the way you make Brahms a more controlling and dominant character<3

My ask/ idea: Brahms and reader got a pretty 'unique' and close relationship. What if someone broke in and Brahms protected the reader or saved her or something, and I ended up giving her a kind of eye-opener for some other parts of him. Like she isn't only for him to use and abuse u know. But also to keep and protect

Thank you 🙏

AHHH this is impeccable. Perhaps a part 3 of “The Rules We…” series as a way for Brahms to redeem himself from the godforsaken acts that took place in the first two parts?

Yall have been EATING the Brahms fics up, so I’m already writing a draft ;)

#ghostiesdarkrambles #ghostiesrequestsandasks

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ghostiesnightmare · 1 month ago

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The Rules We Break

Pairing: Brahms Heelshire x Female Reader Summary: Trapped within the walls of the Heelshire Manor, you thought that the rules kept you safe. But secrets don't stay buried, and Brahms has found yours. Now there are no more lies, no escape, and no pretending– only a reality where desire is control, and submission is the only way to survive. TW: DARK content, dubcon/noncon, power imbalance, rough sex, foul language, choking, spanking, pussy slapping, overstimulation, orgasm denial, abuse, nudity, violence, creampies, manipulation, degradation, paranoia, unprotected sex, and more. Word Count: 8,157 MDNI- NSFW- read at your own risk. A/N: The long awaited Part 2 of The Rules We Keep is finally here! Inspired by this ask. Enjoy ;) [part one]

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The Heelshire manor was quiet.

In the late hours, there was no familiar shift in the floorboards, no hum throughout the ancient pipes, no groan in the weathered shutters that flapped in the wind– just silence. If it had been a few weeks ago you would have welcomed the lack of sound, relishing in the privacy of the spacious house.

But there is no privacy in the Heelshire manor– you know that now. Not when he’s there, watching your every move, waiting for you to slip. Always two steps ahead before you even realize you’ve fallen into another twisted game of his. The idea alone of your own personal boogeyman would have made you laugh at the stupidity of it all, but Brahms Heelshire was very much real.

That godforsaken night in the bowels beneath the manor proved it. Forged in sweat and blood and dirt, a piece of you was forever bound to him– a fact that you knew he relished in. The power held over your head, the fact that your survival entirely depended on a childish whim was a trophy most men would hold dearly. But Brahms was no man– he was something far worse.

The shrill scream of the kettle jolts you from your thoughts, heart almost leaping from your chest at the sudden noise. Fear was a common occurrence these days. It was if the house itself enjoyed basking in your fear, all too similar to its owner. Trying to slow your racing pulse, you push away from the kitchen counter to attend to yet another chore on the seemingly endless list.

Wrapping a towel around the handle, you balance a porcelain teacup in your palm– trying to steel the tremble in your hands as you pour the boiling water. Small raised welts dotted the flesh of your knuckles, sending needles of pain shooting through your fingers as you moved. Another token of Brahms’ love, a teaching moment that showed just how particular he was about his evening beverage.

Loose tea, never bagged. Silver spoon, polished to perfection so it gleamed against the dim lighting. A singular sugar cube placed on the tea saucer– just how he liked it.

The whole ordeal made you want to scream.

Yet, you swallow the anger threatening to tear through your throat, setting the kettle back on the stove top. Some battles are best fought silently– you knew that, learned that from him. The toast pops up from the toaster, one of the only modern appliances left in the kitchen, golden brown and ready to be buttered. Rummaging through the silverware drawer, you imagine raking the blunt knife across his skin rather than the toast, digging it into his flesh so hard it would draw blood.

Of course, there were no knives sharp enough for you to cause him harm– he made sure of that after your first encounter. You had to beg to be trusted with butter knives, the savor of the win almost shifting you away from the reason you were banned from them in the first place.

Evening tea ready, you brush your hands on the scratchy material of the apron, your first gift you had received due to good behavior. Placing the saucer and plate on a tray, you straighten– fear wedging in your throat momentarily as you gather the courage to turn.

The doll sits at the table, like always. Lifeless eyes stare absentmindedly forward, hanging an eerie sense of dread through the air. His assigned chair is pulled back just a bit further than usual, and the doll teeters slightly from the gap.

Someone’s impatient.

“Brahms… your tea is ready.”

A pause. The wall opposite of the kitchen countertop rattles oh so slightly as something– no, someone shifts within the passageways. Your jaw clenches, yet you push onwards. “Brahms. It won’t stay hot forever.” The floorboards creak as a section of the wall pushes outwards, revealing a void of black that sends memories flooding back through your mind.

The tunnels. The fallen beams. Your desperate attempt at escape. Him.

A hand shoots out of the darkness, and your teeth sink into the flesh of your cheek. Planting himself against the wall, your own personal hell emerges from the shadows. Hulking form towering over you with brute strength you knew better than to fight against, Brahms Heelshire crept into the light.

The porcelain mask almost glowed under the haze of the overhead chandelier, and a knot of nausea settles like a pit in your stomach. That mask– the very object of your nightmares in a way that sends a chill down your spine, no matter how many times you see it. It was too smooth, too perfect to be attached to the monster that hid beneath it.

Calloused fingers twitch at his sides, and you swallow the lump that had formed in your throat. “Tea,” You murmur, voice practiced– poised. Just like he taught you. Brahms took a weighted step forward, then two. You fought the urge to flinch as he approached.

He didn’t speak, preferring to drink in your every move– ever the observer. Your knuckles whiten as you grip the tray like a lifeline, offering it to him. You expected a barked order, a tilted head, some sort of reaction as he stalked towards you, yet he simply plucked the tray from your hands with eerie precision.

Hands folding at your front, you bow your head ever so slightly as a show of feigned reverence. He liked you best that way– small, submissive, perfectly playing the part as a piece to his game. Pretty little housewife, you knew the whole ordeal turned him on like nothing else.

Brahms sighed, mask lifting as he silently sipped the tea. Chiseled jawline, dark curly scruff adorning his cheeks under smooth, silky skin– if you had known any better, you would have thought he was attractive. Brahms shifted under your gaze, turning to look in your direction, haphazardly chewing a piece of toast.

There it was– the monster hidden beneath the mask.

Deformed, uneven puckers of flesh blossomed across the hidden side of his face. Shriveled wrinkles warped the entirety of his cheek, the hollow of his cheekbones almost protruding against the mass of pink and white. The burn scars that reached the edge of his jaw left his beard in shambles, tufts of unruly hair patching across where the scars had partially healed. Your fingers twitch at your sides.

You knew about the story, whispered between your brief grocery drop offs from Malcolm– the fire that almost engulfed the manor. The fire that was supposed to kill him. Yet, there he stood, a monster born from the flames that only left behind scar tissue and violence. A piece of you wondered what Brahms would have become without that fateful day– the man he was meant to be.

Deft fingers set the tray back down on the table.

The same ones that wedged their way between your thighs.

Your mouth went dry at the sight. You feel the weight of his gaze, stripping you of all defences like he knew exactly what you were thinking. Something you couldn't quite place swirled in those chocolate orbs, and it was almost shameful that the sudden flush in your cheeks gave you away. The rapid pounding of your heartbeat was thunder in your ears, and all you could muster was a wobbled, “Bedtime, Brahms.”

It was pathetic, really, to be plagued day and night by the very soul who ruined you. Yet, here you were– a collection of the broken pieces he created molded into his perfect little maid.

If Brahms spotted your little slip, he didn’t show it. Simply tilting his head in your direction before reaching out his hand, mask secured back in place. Tea abandoned on the kitchen countertop, your toes curl in defiance within your boots before relenting. Forcing your feet to drag across the hardwood floor, you slip your hand into his grasp– trying to ignore the shiver it sends down your spine. Immediately, his fingers wrapped around yours, trapping you in his grip.

Fighting the urge to pull away, you lead him upstairs, each step feeling like a guilty verdict hanging over your head. Though his skin felt warm to the touch, Brahms radiated the cold, an icy sense of anticipation crackling in the air. His presence haunts the manor like a ghost– lurking, watching, entirely inevitable. You feel the telltale chill settle in your bones and wrap around your heart in a vice-like grip.

No matter how much you dreaded it, despised it, you knew what was expected of you. Worst of all, he knew it too.

The double doors glared at you like the jowls of a hungry beast, daring you to venture closer in order to swallow you whole. The attic laid untouched since your unexpected arrival– a time capsule of your demise, another trophy of your loss of freedom. Brahms didn’t seem to mind abandoning his self-made home, however, more content to have you wait on him hand and foot in the comfort of his late parents’ abode rather than within the walls.

Opening the doors like a servant would royalty, you drop your hand from Brahms’ hold. The air here was different, tainted with the sins of the Heelshires– a price you were now forced to pay in full. The floral wallpaper had faded over the decades, the mahogany four-poster bed dwarfing the other lavish furnishings in comparison, the desks coated in a fine layer of dust. You weren’t allowed to clean here, the disarray of the bedroom providing Brahms with an unknown comfort you couldn’t quite place.

The bed was a different story, however. Perfectly made with washed sheets, fluffed pillows, and creased comforters made of the finest goose down– just the way he liked it.

You go through the motions, anxiety washing away as you take part in the nightly routine that feels much more like a ritual. Pulling back the covers, dimming the lights, filling the carafe with cool water, folding the morning robe with utmost care. Through it all, Brahms sat on the edge of the bed, gaze searing your every move– watching.

Ushering the much larger male into bed, you fluff the pillows, tucking the blankets around him with almost motherlike devotion. As if tucking a child into bed, your fingers brush Brahm’s shoulder, his skin burning beneath your touch. You fought the urge to recoil.

“Goodnight, Brahms”, you whisper, the words sounding so doting it made your head spin. It sounded so genuine you could have believed there was devotion in them. You knew the final rule, the very one he altered on that fateful night in a way that twisted even your final moments to revolve only around him. Swallowing any semblance of pride you had remaining, you duck down, forehead brushing against the cool porcelain of his mask.

Waiting, expectant– just like he taught you.

Brahms pushed upwards, the icy touch of the glass brushing against your lips. Bile rose in your throat– it was sickening. This routine, the role you had learned to play so well. Spine stiffening, you straightened, hands fumbling with the sheets as you smoothed them over his torso.

Brahms turned towards you, head tilted– the light catching his eyes as he met your gaze. You freeze, hands hovering over the blankets as your blood turns to ice. You knew that look, the one filled with warning in a way that only meant one thing.

Something was coming. Something horrible, just not tonight.

Breaking his gaze, Brahms settled into the blankets– your queue to leave. Sharply turning on your heel, you flee the room, relieved of your duties for the day. In your haste to leave, you almost trip over the doorway, stumbling as you slowly close the doors.

You were safe, for now.

Scurrying down the hallway draped in ornate rugs and antique paintings, you pause at the threshold of the guest room– no, your room. Sighing, you duck past the door, sliding the door into place before locking it with a satisfying click. Only then could you relax.

Spine pressed against the wood, you took what felt like the first breath in hours. Fingers rubbing your temples, you try to shake the lump forming in your throat. You couldn’t cry– that had stopped weeks ago, resulting in nothing but more lessons. Now all that was left was the breathless terror when awaiting punishment.

Trembling fingers undo the ties of your apron, the article of clothing falling to the floor as you creep towards the only safe space you know– the wardrobe. The mahogany structure towers over you as you slowly open the door, shoving pairs of shoes and papers out of the way in order to reach your deepest, darkest secret.

Hidden beneath the rubbish, the false bottom creaks as you remove the heavy pane of wood, revealing your journal. The paper crinkles under your fingertips as you hold it to your chest like the most precious jewels in the world– the only saving grace of your sanity. The smell of dust and ink invades your senses as you flip through the pages, filled with the secrets you didn’t dare to speak out loud.

It was the only place you told the truth, yet somehow as you write under the cover of moonlight, the walls had never felt so thin.

Like it had already betrayed you.

The morning is eerily quiet.

The raps on the master bedroom door go unanswered, bed haphazardly made upon forced entry– sheets crumpled with almost laughable amateurity. At first, you welcom the help, any and all semblance of freeing up your busy schedule seeming like a kind gesture. As the morning went on, however, the chill of silence began to creep into your bones.

The breakfast you tirelessly poured over for an hour sat untouched on the kitchen counter. Brahm’s favorite morning tea lay forgotten on the porcelain saucer, sugar cube and all. The bathwater you had drawn per usual request had long gone cold. Even the ancient phonograph, recently dusted to perfection, lay silent without a choice of records to pass the time. Through it all, there was no sign of Brahms– no telltale rustle behind the walls, no groaning of the pipes, no suffocating gaze weighing down on your every move.

It was as if he had vanished into thin air. Yet, for some odd reason, you couldn’t place the pit forming in your stomach.

As the morning turned into the afternoon, your calls towards him to respond, to eat, to do something became more urgent. The initial annoyance at the childish act of a cold shoulder quickly turning sour as the minutes tick by on the grandfather clock, a sense of worry washing over you. Throughout your chores, you catch yourself straining ever so slightly at every sound within the manor, trying to pinpoint whether Brahms had created the sound.

As much as you hated to admit it, thoughts of dread immediately began to swirl in your mind– each imaginative scenario overanalyzing what could possibly be the root of the strange behavior.

Did something happen? Had he fallen ill? Was he angry with you?

The silence should have brought you some sort of solace, the lack of constant attention and unyielding amount of chores finally bringing you a sense of freedom. But it didn’t, the daily routine completely shattered, leaving you to do nothing more than wander the very manor you were trapped in.

Unless…

You pause in your pursuit of dusting off the banister, eyes flickering towards the grand entryway like a child yearning for a stolen sweet. The treacherous voice in your head screamed at you to move, to take the chance now that you were alone and leave this horrid place behind you. But as you gaze past the ornate stained glass windows into the surrounding fields, something roots you in place.

Was it loyalty– something beaten to submission within you? Had you grown so accustomed to the life you have lived that you couldn’t go forward without it? Or, by some laughable act of fate, did you not want to leave?

Shaking the thoughts from your head, you look down, dusting so furiously that the dark wood gleams back at you. You had work to do whether Brahms was watching or not, there was no denying that there were more important things than planning escape– another rule you learned the hard way.

Eyes shifting towards a hidden panel in the wall, the hair on the back of your neck prickles as the images of that fateful evening flash through your mind. Those godforsaken tunnels were the root of your very downfall, resulting in far worse consequences than a battered ego and failed escape attempt.

Consequences you try not to think about when you lay in bed at night.

Your fists wound themselves around your apron– another nervous bad habit that Brahms hadn't yet broken, knuckles turning white as the scene replayed in your head like a broken record player. It was wrong, so completely lewd to even think about it, yet the shame blossoming in your stomach as you peered into the tunnel was enough to shatter any hope of reasoning with yourself.

You hadn’t been in the tunnels for weeks, fear seizing your heart as the walls would seemingly shrink around you– caging you in place. The idea alone of being back in them, with him, sends a shudder down your spine.

If Brahms didn’t want to come out of the tunnels by his own free will, fine. It was less distracting this way.

Rummaging through the cleaning bucket on the stairs, you produce a worn rag and a bottle of metal polish. Scrubbing the seemingly infinite amount of bronze plaques adorning the walls, you huff– irritation growing as the silence continued to weigh down on you like a wet blanket.

Maybe Brahms was in one of his foul moods, often ignoring you when things weren’t perfectly set to his expectations. The silent treatment only worked for so long, until he ran out of patience. Your hand pauses in its ministrations, realization suddenly tearing through you like a gunshot.

Patience– the deliberate, calculated kind he only savoured when he was planning the best way to punish you during another lesson.

You stiffen instinctively, not from fear exactly– but a sense of adrenaline from the horrific possibility that you were right. The silence became suffocating, the walls of the manor closing in around you as you fought to keep your gaze on the rag in front of you.

You feel it in the air then– something is definitely wrong, and Brahms is waiting for you to realize what it is. Yet for the life of you, there isn’t any semblance of a clue why.

He knows something.

Hoping to shake the impending sense of doom, you move upstairs– trying to scrub away the anxiety like the tarnish on the brass and bronze. Legs filled with lead, the trek down the hallway seemed to become more daunting with each step. You had the sudden urge to flee to your room and hide away from it all until it boiled over, only to return and beg for forgiveness after the anger passed.

The rag falls from your hand as you halt in place.

Your room– you hadn’t checked on the wardrobe since late last night. Your journal. The one place you dare to let your true feelings show in order to keep sane in order to dream of a life beyond the manor. Thoughts you had written beneath the guise of safety, of privacy.

But there is no privacy in Heelshire manor– you idiot.

Blind panic short circuits your nervous system, adrenaline pumping through your veins as you bolt to your room. It was a simple slip– just one, a small mistake easily outshadowed by the great feats you had accomplished on the daily to prove your undying devotion. Surely, your only secret was safe from prying eyes. Surely, he hadn’t found it.

The bedroom door slams against the wall from the force of being ripped open, the sound rattling against your eardrums as you dive for the false compartment hidden within the wardrobe. Trembling hands fumble with the latch– papers, half folded clothes, and shoes scatter along the hardwood floor as you tear the wardrobe apart.

Empty.

No crumpled papers, no half-smudged ink drying along the leather-bound journal, no ballpoint pen waiting to be written with– just the mahogany floor of the dresser gaping back at you. A nauseating wave of horror washes over you, denial tightening around your throat like hot embers. Frantically, you dart around the room like a woman gone mad, caution thrown to the wind as you search for the missing journal.

Sheets are ripped from the bed, duvet overturned. Desk drawers are rifled through with utmost precision. The chaise lounge scraps against the floor, lopsided with the hope of the book hidden between the cushions. But no matter how feverishly you searched, the journal was gone– seemingly vanished into thin air.

But you knew better. You knew Brahms– the weight of the world crumbling around you as tears well in your eyes. That horrible, sinking feeling in your gut twists like a knife– finally revealing its godforsaken name.

Retribution.

The sound of glass shattering echoes through the house with the force of a gunshot, sharp and violent. Then, another. Your bones rattle as the crashes clatter throughout the first floor. Something heavy topples, metal screeches, weighted footsteps stomp through the floorboards beneath you. Before you can think you jolt to your feet, legs pumping as panic rushes towards the chaos.

In your haste, you almost trip over the cleaning bucket in the hallway– now discarded. Lurching down the stairs, blood pounds in your ears as you approach the destruction. That telltale saying engraved into your very being plays like a broken record in your mind.

Break a rule, pay the price. Break a rule, pay the price. Break a rule, pay the–

As you round the corner into the foyer, the breath is ripped straight from your lungs.

The floor is littered in torn pages, every surface coated in paper and ink. Your words, your secrets, once scrawled within the false comfort of your room were now displayed like war trophies across the room– each screaming one word: guilty.

Sentences you never imagined to see the light of day were underlined in crimson, at least– what you prayed was red ink. Words torn from the deepest recesses of your mind stare back at you, a cruel act of vengeance on display.

“I hate him. I wish he were dead.”

Below it, another.

“He treats me like a slave. He’s a monster.”

The words taunt you, coated in a laughable cruel twist of fate. The scene made you sick.

“The punishments are the closest thing he will ever get to love. It’s sadistic.”

“He looks at me like he owns me, yet for some reason I can’t shake that feeling from my mind.”“I dreamt of the tunnels again… I don’t think I’ll ever be able to scrub the sins of that night from my skin.”

“I hope he rots in hell.”

“Why do I ache to be scolded? The silence is the worst of it all. What is wrong with me?”

And the final nail in your coffin, the passage you wrote just hours ago– your confession.

“I hate that through it all, I like it. I like him. It’s disgusting– what does that say about me?”

You almost choke on your breath at the words. You had written that in the still moments of the early hours, when you were faced with nothing but the truth. Now, it was being used against you.

The gutted leather of the journal meets your gaze, turning your blood to ice. There, in the center of the foyer’s fireplace, stabbed through by a rusted poker like a slaughtered animal. It was a crime scene, your fate held in the balance by the judge, jury, and executioner– Brahms Heelshire.

Your knees wobble, legs threatening to give out beneath you as you gape forward. This wasn’t just an act of revenge, it was a message. A twisted celebration of your betrayal, now on full display. It wasn’t about the journal– it was about what you said. He had read every word, and now?

You had to pay the price.

Lips trembling, the silence of the manor feels stifling. The walls seem to close in around you, much more akin to chains– caging you in. Fists clenching, you turn on your heel, fully prepared to flee the scene and pray for forgiveness later.

His voice cuts through the silence: cold, low– halting you mid stride.

“So that’s what you really think of me.” Brahms emerges from the hallway, light glistening across that haunting mask, fingers twiddling around something as he set the stage for your downfall. Your pen. Stalking into the room with calculated steps, you shrink against his gaze– dread weighing you to the floor like prison shackles.

“You think I’m some kind of monster,” He seethes, ragged breaths so strong they shake his broad shoulders. “-some thing you hate.” Fingers flex, the subtle notion too terrifying to interpret as his fiery gaze sears your skin. He’s relishing in your fear, you realize. Basking in the blind panic like a predator stalking its prey.

“You’re mine!” A fist crashes into the wall, punching into the drywall and rattling the foyer. You flinch, heart leaping into your throat at the weighted words. You want to cry, want to beg, want to fall to your knees and pray for forgiveness and swear you would never do it again– but you can’t. You know there’s nowhere to run, you’re trapped.

Stepping forward, Brahms snatches the nearest page to him– jutting it towards you like a court verdict. “Do you remember writing these things?” His voice drops to a whisper, words strained. “Do you remember thinking them, practically saying them out loud?” You swallow thickly, response dying on your tongue as you fight back tears.

“I know you meant it– every word.” Closing the gap between you, Brahms towers over your trembling form. The cool porcelain of the mask brushes against your forehead as he leans closer, breath fanning across your skin. “-Now, I’ll make you prove it.”

You don’t know if he means your hatred, your desire, or both.

With that, Brahms crumples the paper between his hands, tossing it towards the fireplace. There were no flames, but you swear you could feel your soul burning before your very eyes. Turning towards you once more, calloused fingertips wind around your forearm, pulling you into his chest. You stumble, fumbling as you try to pry your eyes away from the chocolate orbs that burned with something you couldn’t quite place.

Something like anticipation.

“No more games,” Voice dropping, the grip on your arm tightens with a bruising force, causing you to flinch. “-no more pretending.” Brahms moves at that, stalking out of the room and pulling you in tow. Ducking towards a false panel in the wall, your eyes widen– knees locking as the panel is opened and the darkness of the tunnels stare back at you.

Oh god, the tunnels.

The tears fall at the sight, dripping onto the hardwood floor as you thrash in his grip. Broken pleas fell from your lips as you squirm, begging to go anywhere else. You sob out apologies, praying for forgiveness you knew would never come. Brahms paid your outburst no mind, simply digging blunt nails into your skin so roughly you were sure he drew blood– like he was marking you.

The dark swallows you whole as you are dragged into the tunnels. Your pleas fill the space as if it would save you, but they drown in the void. The tunnels seem narrower now, the smell of dust and sweat and mold raking through your lungs as the walls threaten to reach out and grab you. You try to shake the memories that hang on the tattered walls like a coat of wet paint.

The chase. Fallen beams crushing you in place. Your jeans caught around your ankles. Brahms ruining you for all others.

Breaths coming out in shallow huffs, and you try to slow your racing heartbeat. The air was damp, sending a chill straight through your bones– any semblance of comfort abandoned within the bowels of the manor. Each step dragged behind Brahms, your legs struggling to keep up with his pace as he expertly navigated the tunnels.

The very tunnels he fucked you in.

Heart hammering so loud you were sure he could hear it, you squeeze your eyes shut, trying to memorize the twists and turns through the narrow passageway. It wasn’t until the familiar creak of the narrow stairs that you realize where you are. No– not here.

The attic.

Brahms pauses at the threshold, the door swinging open as you lock into place. The blood drains from your face as your gaze is met with the gloom of his hidden sanctuary– the very place you first met on that fateful night. Dust coats every surface like ash, casting long shadows across the rotting wooden floor. Your stomach lurches as the bed comes into frame.

“Remember this moment.” he mumbles, the words weighing heavy in the dim room. “This is the moment that you stopped lying to yourself. The moment you admitted how much you really hate me.”

He doesn’t wait for your response, shoving you towards the bed so quickly you crumple onto the mattress in a heap of twisted limbs. Squirming like an overturned bug, you try to push yourself upwards onto your elbows only to be forced back down. The warped bed frame groans under the weight, the mattress dipping as Brahms crawls on top of you– knees effectively locking you into place as he straddles you.

“You write that I am a monster. That I hurt you– scare you.” He taunts, any and all reason stripped away as a finger ghosts your cheek. You try to fight the flinch rising in your spine, dread mixing with the chill of his words. “You don’t get to lie and keep secrets,” he continued, bitterness stabbing into you like a rusty knife. “-Now? I’m going to show you exactly what it really means to hate me.”

A hand wraps around your throat, and it’s shameful how your cheeks flush at the touch. Your silent betrayal only eggs him on, grip tightening– not so much to hurt, but as a reminder of who exactly you belong to. “Don’t lie now,” He hisses. “You wanted me angry, wanted this.”

You shake your head weakly, a final plea for mercy. It goes unanswered.

“Tell me the things you wrote. Out loud… I’m sure you remember.” You blink at the order, guilt scrambling your stomach into knots. “Brahms, please–” “Tell me. You wanted to confess so badly, so now you will.”

Trying to ignore the hand shifting from your throat to the collar of your shirt, your lips tremble as you think of the gutted pages in the foyer– the ones that damned you.

“I… I hate him. I wish he were dead.” you whisper, fingers scraping against your clavicle as your buttons are hurriedly undone.

“Louder.”

Voice cracking, you obey– reciting every horrible thought, every twisted confession. Every word exposing you in ways you wished you were never seen. Even as you fumble, you could practically feel Brahms’ smile through the mask as he absorbed your corrupted betrayal.

“Say the one about the punishments… I liked that one.” You swallow thickly, hot tears trailing down your cheeks, throat burning with shame. Your tears are wiped away with such devotion it mocks you, shirt undone and exposing your trembling torso.

“I hate that through it all, I like it. I… like him. It’s disgusting– what does that say about me?”

Porcelain rubs against the column of your neck and Brahms leans down, sending goosebumps down your spine. “What does that say about you, hm?” He murmurs, voice too soft– too calm, breath wafting along your skin, dripping with less than pure intentions.

“It says you’re mine– and that you were always going to be punished.” You know you should protest, fight the ridiculous notion, but deep down you know he was right. “So now, little liar… I think your lesson is long overdue.”

A yelp tears itself from your throat as your wrists are forced upwards, something metallic winding around them– binding you to the bed frame. Insticintly, you tug, struggling against the thin wire securing them in place.

You’re shaking now, blood simmering as your wrists go raw from the friction, the prospect of escape dwindling as the pads of Brahms’ thumbs draw slow, calculated circles into your lower rib cage. If you had known any better, you would have considered the action soothing– but as his gaze burned into you, it felt anything but.

“Comfortable?” He’s mocking you, hidden smirk dripping in pride. His touch feels like ice, but you jolt as if you were burned. You shake your head, breath catching as you tug on the restraints— but he only laughs, the sound coated in bitter disappointment.

“Still lying, like you hadn’t dreamed about this before. But it’s alright– after tonight you’ll never be able to lie again.” A hand lazily palms at your clothed breast, the chill in his touch stiffening your nipples. You squeeze your eyes shut, trying to slow your breathing as your bra is ripped away from your chest, straps digging into the flesh of your back before snapping from the force.

Teeth sinking into your bottom lip, you suck on the flesh for comfort, willing yourself to not squirm as the frigid touch brushes your nipples. Brahms sighs in contemptment, the sight of your undressed torso unexplored territory.

After all, he would actually be able to see your reactions this time. The thought alone sends electricity sparking through the air, realization dawning on you as your nipples are roughly rolled beneath his fingertips.

You jolt, trying to twist away from the borderline painful touch, but Brahms continues his methodical exploration of your breasts. Thumbs tracing the underside of the mounds of flesh, his hands seem to swallow you whole. A taunt whimper slips, and you want to sink into the mattress and disappear forever– embarrassment heating your cheeks.

Brahms pauses, fingers frozen above your skin. You glance upwards, blood turning to ice as those chocolate orbs swirl with an idea. Brahms shuffles, producing a long strip of fabric. Your eyes widen as he leans forward, tying the fabric behind your head– effectively cutting off your sight.

No.

The memories of the tunnel come flooding back. The dirt needling into your knees as you clawed at the floor, the ache in your ribs as they scraped against the fallen beams. The feeling of Brahms’ nails digging into your hips as he defiled you.

Darkness coats your vision, and you strain against the fabric. “Brahms, please–”

Something rough scraps against your shoulder, curls tickling your jaw. Uneven, puckered skin brushes downwards towards your breasts, and you shudder at the sensation. Oh god, he wasn’t wearing his mask. Stubble needles into your skin, followed by something wet.

Brahms breathes against your skin, burrowing his face between the valley of your breasts. You cringe at the feeling of his scars digging into you, lip trembling as his mouth latches onto one of your peaks. Teeth sink into your nipple, and you whimper– jaw clenching as his tongue flicks across the sensitive skin.

“No more pretending to be good, you want to be punished. You wrote it countless times, so now I will.” He murmurs, barely audible as he peppers your breasts with heated kisses. It was so wrong, the mixture of the roughness of his deformity and the softness of his tongue sending heat flickering through your stomach.

Exposed, humiliated, and completely at his mercy– just the way he taught you.

Spit coats your chest as Brahms drools over you, hands tenderly gripping your breasts before giving them a harsh squeeze. Your spine straightens, and Brahms chuckles at the reaction. Eager in the pursuit to enjoy your skin unprohibited by the mask, fingers trace down your sternum, creeping towards the edge of your waistline.

The fabric of your jeans catches on your hip bones as they are pulled down, gathering around your knees. You shudder as the cold air sinks into your naked skin, stomach clenching as you go gooseflesh in the chill. Dexterous fingers press onto your unclothed pussy, and you gasp.

“Poor thing,” Brahms muses. “What happened to that pesky backbone of yours?”

Fingers slip into your folds ever so slightly, and you pull so hard against the wire the bed frame creaks. “You’re wet– disgusting little liar. Pretending you hate me while you drip on my fingers.” Course pads swirl against your clit, and you moan. “Say it. Say you want your punishment.”

You clamp your jaw shut, refusing to give him the benefit of your words. A sharp sting jolts through your pussy, causing a pained cry to rip from your chest– he slapped you. Tears threaten to fall as Brahms rubs the tender flesh. “Say it.”

A pause. “I… I want it.” You swallow thickly, surprised at the submissive tone in your shaky voice.

“You need it.”

“I–” You hiccup, snot running down your nose.. “I need it.”

Two fingers plunge into you so abruptly you whine, stretching you uncomfortably and scissoring. There was no tenderness, but something much worse– cruel indulgence. You clench around his fingers as they fuck into you. Sinking further into the mattress, you try to slow the merciless pace Brahms set for you. The hand that wasn’t making you soak his fingers digs into your waist, nails sinking into your flesh and leaving red crescents in their wake.

You shudder, hips twitching as the brutal pace massages your gummy walls. The cloth digs into your temples as you squirm– hot, heated breaths quickly filling the space as the telltale warmth grows in the pit of your stomach.

“I own your body, your mind. Even your pathetic fantasies– there’s nothing left that’s yours.” Brahms growls, jaw scraping against your collarbone as he sinks his teeth into the column of your neck. A broken moan tears from your throat, saliva coating your skin as Brahms laps up the assaulted flesh. You clench around his fingers, stomach tightening as his fingers sinfully plunge knuckle deep.

Lewd squelches, another betrayal of your body, ring in your ears. Your cheeks flush as the pads of his fingers drill against the spongy spot that makes your head spin, fingers twitching within the bonds of the wire. Your hands were going numb from the pressure, tingling spiking its way down your spine with every rough thrust of his fingers. Your knees burn, scraping against the scratchy material of your jeans due to your incessant squirming.

The stoked embers within your stomach only grew, heightened by your shame. Every movement, every sound dilated under the darkness of the cloth covering your eyes. You strain your ears to hear something, anything that could distract you from the growing ache between your legs. It felt as if you were on fire, a sheen of sweat coating your skin and dripping down the valley of your breasts.

It was all too much, too hard– your pussy clenching around those godforsaken fingers in a vice-like grip. His fingers claim you in a way that your own could never fight against, pushing within you so desperately that your eyes flutter behind the makeshift blindfold. A third finger slips alongside the others, and you feel like you’re going to burst.

“Brahms, hah–”

“That’s it.” He breathes, “-Make those sounds for the monster you hate.” As much as you want to burrow your face into the mattress and crawl within your skin, your body falls into the dizzying feeling of falling from grace. Brahms, ever eager to coax more noises from you, thrusts his fingers upwards abruptly, thumb drawing hard circles on your clit.

Oh god, you were going to squirt at this point.

“Brahms, I’m sorry, please–” Toes clenching, your spine straightens, head knocking against the bed frame as your back arches, hips begging to chase the high that was threatening to spill over. You were so close it hurt, breath coming out in strained huffs– another low, needy moan escaping.

Then it was gone.

Brahms retreats his fingers right before the climax comes crashing down, any sense of relief spoiled as you clench around nothing. Your eyes widen beneath the blindfold, forearms aching as you wriggle against the wire, knuckles white as you bite back the sour taste of dissatisfaction. Trying but failing to stifle the groan of anger building in your chest, your jaw groans from the pressure of choking down your pride.

“What was it you said?” His voice cuts through the air, “-that my punishments were… sadistic?”

The blindfold feels cold and wet against your face, and you realize you were crying. The punishment was clear now, he was going to have you fall apart on his fingers only to take away the release you craved for– and there was nothing you could do about it.

Just the way he likes it.

The cycle began after that. He wouldn’t ask, or coax– just claim you with his fingers, dragging your body to the depth of hell so you were begging for him, for mercy. Bring you to the tipping point just to rip away your climax, only to start over again. Tears turned to screams, prayers to begs, yet the cycle would just repeat itself.

Over, and over, and over.

You couldn’t even count the amount of times he had tormented you at this point, certain you had blacked out after the first four cycles. Wrists hanging weakly from the wire were red and raw from your struggles. The blindfold was soaked through, a mixture of your tears and sweat clinging to your feverish skin as you blankly stared into the darkness. Throat hoarse from your pleas, you could only let out a strained croak as Brahms’ fingers slid out of your convulsing body once more.

“Please, no more.” You sob, entire being full of an ache you knew only he could fix– yet you knew better than to beg. “Please, I can’t–”

“Tell me you hate me.”

You freeze at that. Fingers dig into the fat of your ass so roughly you cry out in pain, but Brahms only sighs.

“Tell me you hate me.” He repeats, fingers moving dangerously close to your aching pussy. Terrified of another torturous cycle, all you could do was obey.

“I…” you swallow. “I hate you.”

It was true, you did hate him. You hate how through all of the pain and the hurt and the betrayal, you still crave nothing but him. It disgusts you. Worst of all– he knows it too.

“You wrote that I ruin you– let me finish the job.” Hands grip your hips, effectively flipping you over with utmost ease. You groan, arms twisting uncomfortably in front of your head as your shaking knees meet the mattress. Trying to push yourself up on your crooked elbows, the crown of your head is shoved into the pillow, the taste of mildew and sweat filling your nostrils. You squirm uncomfortably, taking in greedy gulps of air against the damp pillow– trying to ignore the brush of Brahms’ hips meeting the fat of your ass. Without warning, Brahms drives forward, spearing you on his cock so quickly a pain-riddled gasp falls from your lips.

Allowing you no time to adjust, Brahms steels forward, rocking his hips against you so vigorously the bed frame rattles against the wires– forcing you to bow against him. The ache in your pussy screams against the much bigger intrusion, and with every thrust short, quick gasps melt into the pillow beneath you.

Toes curling at the force of the brutal pace, your jaw slacks– drool running down your neck as Brahms filled every inch of space you might’ve used to resist him, hate him. You flutter around his incessant thrusts, trying to alleviate the pressure that had been building within your stomach for the past few hours.

“You know, sometimes I hate you too.” A rigged smack against your ass jostles you against the mattress, pain needling down your leg as Brahms rubs the inflamed area. Continuing to bully his way into your sore walls, Brahms groans at the sensation of you falling apart due to his ministrations– how ironic.

“I hate the way you lie to me.” A strike.

“I hate when you smile at me like you aren’t scared of me.” Another one.

“I hate that you look at the walls instead of me when you speak.” His breath is hot against your lower back, feeding the fire growing against your skin as another strike rings out through the attic. “-Like, mmh– you’re thinking of ways to escape.”

You’re sobbing now, knees wobbling as blow after blow ripples against the fat of your ass, no doubt leaving it an angry red. “I hate that you wrote about running away– about leaving me like I wouldn’t find out.” A strike so heavy it almost topples you lands, and you scream.

“I hate that even now, you’re pretending you don’t want this.” He presses deeper with every word, rutting against your cervix– making your eyes roll back into their sockets. “-That you don’t want me.”

Another strike.

Babbled apologies rattle your rib cage tainted with shame and guilt, prayers of gentleness left with no response. “But worst of all, I love the way you hate me.” He shudders, wrapping a fist around your hair and forcing you to arch against him. Teeth sink into the unmarked junction of your neck as he bottoms out inside of you.

“It means I’ve ruined you the way you’ve ruined me.”

You break then– a silent scream filled not with relief, but shame. Sparks fly across your vision as you orgasm, overstimulation racking through your limbs and shaking you to your core. Head reeling, your nails dig into the flesh of your palms, drawing blood. A scream echoes through the room, raw and heated and divine– and you realize it was coming from you.

Brahms devours it, the essence of your ruin sweeter than any other victory. Hips stuttering against you, his nails dig into your hips– holding you against him as he climaxes. Thick, hot ropes of cum coat your sore insides, and you clench at the feeling. Shallowly thrusting his orgasm into you, Brahms lets out a sigh of relief before stilling completely.

You flinch at the sensation, overstimulated pussy screaming for solace– for mercy. Yet, Brahms Heelshire is not a merciful man, opting to reach over you and undue the wires holding your wrists taunt. Limbs free, you all but collapse onto the mattress, earning a chuckle from the male behind you.

Mirroring your movements, Brahms pulls you into his arms– the very ones that tormented you for hours on end. Spooning you in bed, Brahms refuses to leave the warmth of your pussy, another testament to your punishment. Holding you with the reverence of a lover, the blindfold is stripped away from your gaze, revealing the dark gloom of the attic once more.

A thumb wipes away a stray tear, drawing circles on your cheek as if you were the most precious thing in the world. The action makes your stomach lurch with dread. “You’ll learn to love me properly now, without the lies.” Brahms hums, tucking his scarred flesh into the crevice of your neck.

A pause.

“...the way I love you.” He finishes. If it was a threat, you didn’t care. You were too tired, too broken to think about anything other than the dull ache between your thighs. A hand intertwines with yours, held over your stomach where you could still feel the outline of him buried inside of you. If you knew any better, the action almost seemed holy– a vow, a promise to you.

“From now on, no more pretending. You’re mine– forever.” You know he doesn’t mean romantically. He means you’ll never leave this godforsaken house, never have a single thought that doesn’t already belong to him, never leave him alone again.

As you lay in the attic, the air still smelling of sex and sweat, darkness begins to overcome you. While Brahms nods off in the late hours of the night, the sweet release of sleep doesn’t come.

Because when you sleep beside a monster in a house that holds no secrets, you learn not to dream.

[part 3]

#ghostiesnightmare #slasher x reader #slashers #reader insert #slasher smut #x reader #smut #female reader #horror smut #x you smut #brahms heelsire x reader #brahms heelshire #brahms the boy #brahms x reader #the boy 2016 #slashers x reader #brahms heelshire smut #brahms heelshire x reader #brahms heelshire x you

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ghostiesnightmare · 1 month ago

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hey i was am a big fan. I had a request for Brahms Heelshire. What if he found out you had broken a rule (but like yall were together) if that makes sense. And he punishes the reader in a bunch of diffrent ways (spanking, overstimulations, orgasm denial, ect).

Anon, you have a wonderful twisted mind.

The scary thing about Brahms is he is so unpredictable. But the thing we do know for certain?

Break a rule, pay the price.

Because there is no privacy in the Heelshire manor– you know that now. Not when he’s there, watching your every move, waiting for you to slip. Always two steps ahead before you even realize you’ve fallen into another twisted game of his. The idea alone of your own personal boogeyman would have made you laugh at the stupidity of it all, but Brahms Heelshire was very much real.

Yet, in the false security of your room, you file away your deepest darkest secrets during the aftermath of that fateful night in the tunnels. It was the only place you told the truth, yet somehow as you write under the cover of moonlight, the walls had never felt so thin.

Like it had already betrayed you.

The result?

The Rules We Break-- coming soon! Part two of The Rules We Keep, inspired by this wonderful request!

[full story here]

#ghostiesrequestsandasks #ghostiesdarkrambles

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ghostiesnightmare · 2 months ago

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Anything in general for poly lost boys or house of wax?

You've come to the right place anon! I thoroughly cherish both movies, and the boys– I'm obsessed.

The lost boys have my heart, literally. Cigarette smoke, leather jackets, silver jewelry– they are the epitome of what every 'bad boy' aspires to be. David, always the leader, thinks of all the manipulative ways he can get you crawling back towards him– preferably on your knees. Dwayne is ever observant, content in watching the others tear you apart for his own amusement only to push you towards the breaking point to see those pretty tears. Marko's hotheaded nature is a force to reckon with, both sadistic and chaotic in the way that leaves your head reeling– it's best to stay on his good side if you want to prevent another feeding. And Paul? Paul is the most unpredictable of them all, any kind action quickly replaced by those dark desires he carefully hides beneath the surface. You were doomed the second they laid eyes on you.

Stalking within the shadows of Santa Carla only adds to their allure, yet the real reason to their suspicious actions would make anyone's skin crawl.

Maybe you always knew that deep down.

Maybe you find out their dirty little secret.

Maybe you were in the wrong place wrong time when they were ready to feed.

But now that they have their eyes on you, it's futile to escape. The boys never agree on anything. But sharing you? That comes naturally.

The Sinclair brothers, on the other hand, have very different end goals in mind. Motor oil, candle wax, gasoline– these brothers were built from the rough, so they don't play nice.

Ambrose is a ghost town, one full of lies and secrets buried beneath the layers of wax carefully painted on. All it takes is one missed turn, one blown-out tire, and suddenly you're the new attraction– one that's alive, at least.

Lester always spots you first, those fox-like eyes scanning the forest floor like he was made for the hunt, making sure you are exactly where they want you to be. Bo's charm slips as the white-hot temper festers beneath it all, hands practically begging to tear you to shreds and snuff out that defiance he finds so... distracting. And Vincent? Vincent is more than happy to take the broken pieces that are left and mold you into a masterpiece of blood, flesh, and tears. After all, it's what he does best.

Your request has been noted, I will be working on bringing our sexy poly vampires to life ASAP. And for the Sinclair boys... I have the perfect fic idea for them.

Thank you for your ask!!

They're waiting for you.

-ghostie <3

#ghostiesrequestsandasks

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ghostiesnightmare · 2 months ago

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Cut by Mercy

Pairing: Michael Myers x Reader TW: DARK content read at your own risk. Abuse, kidnapping, violence, knifeplay, blood, descriptions of injuries, implied noncon, etc. MDNI- NSFW

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Michael Myers is the manifestation of wrath.

There is no rage with Michael– no fury-driven punches, no regrettable insults hurled in the heat of the moment. Emotion, after all, is a human experience, and Michael is something far from human.

Michael is consumed by his actions. Every kill, every stalk, every deliberate step is driven by the endless desire to snuff out any and all light that threatens his pursuit of darkness. Like a shadow flickering on the edge of your gaze, he’s there– watching, waiting, plotting.

And then there was you.

Innocent, naive you– the very opposite of him in almost every way. Kind where he lacked mercy, patient where he was ruthless, pliable in all the ways he was rigid. Your mere existence has his bloodlust spiral out of control, the idea alone making the darkness claw towards you in an addictive pull.

Michael’s reputation precedes him: the ghost of Haddonfield, the second hand of death. Even if you had heard the stories, the hushed warnings, nothing would have been able to protect you from him once his gaze was set on you.

Like death, Michael is inevitable. Like wrath, he stops at nothing to have you– no matter how many bodies he has to step over to get there. Once you are in his grasp, the only thing that could ever possibly free you is the very kiss of death, whether by him or the devil himself is up to how well you behave.

Michael’s twisted version of love boils down to one thing: ownership. His love is one of violence, born in blood and sweat and bruises– not of something as pathetic as affection. Somehow, by some cruel stroke of fate, he found you more interesting alive than dead. It’s only fair that he breaks you into pieces to figure out why.

You are claimed as his, smothered in the obsessive pursuit to delve into your soul and pick you apart to mold beside him– it’s suffocating. Always methodical, he falls into the same path that has driven him for years, stalking you from the shadows, memorizing every detail, controlling you through fear. The pure rush of tearing your heart to shreds beats any thrill of the hunt– it only feeds his hunger.

A stranger to kindness, his consuming presence would ravage you from the inside out. The poisonous touch leeches into your very soul, manifesting in bruises, scrapes, and cuts across your skin. Swollen lips, runny eyes, trembling hands– the whole thing turns him on like nothing else.

Michael isn’t afraid to push you too far– after all, what’s the fun in holding back?

Bleeding gashes? No problem, he’ll patch you up just to tear your flesh open once more. Broken bones? Michael will wait until they’re almost healed just to press down until you scream. That’s how he likes you best– snivelling at his feet, covered in his sinful influence and crying for a shred of kindness. It’s a manifestation of his power over you. On his best days, he offers a shred of sympathy– just to rip it all away from you.

If you ever try to press your luck by escaping, you better pray to all things holy that you succeed. Because if you fail, Hell could freeze over before you forget the consequences. Michael’s love is terminal– you can beg, you can run, but in the end it doesn’t matter. He caught you, and now you have to pay the price.

The basement reeks of sweet and blood, the air uncomfortably cold as he drags you back to your personal Hell. Ankle throbbing beneath you, it’s clear that it’s fractured before you could even look at it– the tumble down the stairs leaving you dazed and sore. Never too dazed, however. Michael always made sure you were deathly aware of the pain you were in– every ounce of what was to come.

The tears fall at that, practically searing your skin as they drip onto the concrete below. You know better than to grovel, to plead. It never made a difference in the end– only exciting him. Michael towers over you, monstrous form blotting out the little light in the room. You hear it almost immediately: that rasping, eerie drag of his breath beneath the mask. It’s calm, too calm, and that’s what terrifies you the most.

A hand winds around your matted hair, dragging you onto your knees so suddenly you shift your weight on the injured ankle. A hiss of pain rakes through you, and Michael drinks it in. Always watching, always feasting. Scalp screaming, babbled apologies fall from your lips as you beg for release. Michael offers you barely any semblance of response, cocking his head as his searing gaze burns down at you.

He never speaks– he doesn’t have to. After all, actions speak much louder than words.

You barely have time to whimper before you are slammed back down, a pathetic ragdoll at his feet. In this moment, you had never felt so small, so fragile– his broken plaything. Pressing your aching forehead to the cold concrete, you shake ever so slightly with broken, silent sobs.

Michael crouches over your form, studying your trembling form with cruel fascination. The cool tip of the blade drifts down your back, slicing the tattered tank top in two. You didn't dare to move, dare to breathe. It felt almost soft, a kiss of death slicing mere millimeters from your flesh. Yet you knew better. The blade was a promise, a vow of what was to come.

The scariest part about Michael?

He will still love you– no matter how much you fight, how much you deny him, how much you beg, how much you bleed. Not because you deserve it, not because you want it. But simply because he found you, and now you were his– forever.

Like a moth drawn to a flame.

The calloused touch of his fingers digs into the back of your neck, forcing you to arch upwards. You meet his gaze, if it could even be called that. Staring into the void of the mask– into death, only one word falls from your lips.

“Please.”

But Michael doesn’t understand love, or consent, or mercy. Only possession. You knew that better than anyone.

As you are quickly ushered backwards, the rough cement scraping against your shoulder blades, you realize the true horror of Michael’s tainted devotion.

Michael’s love is a death sentence and a wedding vow all at once– and you have no choice but to take it.

Until death do you part.

#ghostiesdarkrambles #ghostiesnightmare #slasher x reader #reader insert #slashers #michael myers x reader #michael myers smut #michael myers #halloween franchise #halloween fanfic #x reader #michael myers x you #horror #slashers x reader #slashers x you #seven deadly sins drabble #nsfw

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ghostiesnightmare · 2 months ago

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About the author/ housekeeping

Hello everyone! I thought it was about time to do a little introduction about myself as the page continues to grow.

This account name is called ghostiesnightmares, so feel free to call me Ghostie or Ghost! I am a college student in my 20's and use she/her pronouns.

Writing fanfiction has been a HUGE part of my life, I started from Wattpad writing yandere fics and graduated to the Tumblr community! I am still new to Tumblr mechanics as I only started posting on here for about three months (any tips or recommendations are well appreciated!!)

A big part of my writing is for darker characters, therefore my content is usually filled with the depraved nature of those I write about. I do my best to tag accordingly and be sensitive towards any and all triggers, but if there is anything I miss along the way PLEASE reach out to me so I can fix it!

That being said, this blog is a mixture of dark romance and horror smut. If you want a happy ending... I'm probably not your gal. I write for these characters because, deep down, they are monsters. My goal is to bring them to life in a way that is both accurate to their internal darkness while also fulfilling all of our deepest, most secret fantasies.

If there is a character you want to hear more about, I would love to hear from you! My inbox is always open to requests and character rants, so trust your message will be read ASAP. New fic ideas and drabble possibilities are always on my mind ;)

Boundaries: There are only a few things I do not write about: pregnancy, scat, and necrophilia. These are just my personal boundaries, but if there is anything else you can imagine up, I would be more than happy to bring the fantasy to life!

Reader perspective: My fics are mostly leaning towards feminine presenting readers. This is due to my experience as a cis woman, and I want to be respectful to others by not writing about experiences I cannot personally or fully relate to. That said, I am more than happy to branch out, but I want to be able to do so in a proper manner that is fully inclusive and respectful to all my darlings!

I would love to hear from you all, so never feel afraid to reach out! As always, read the taglist... and maybe bring a weapon of choice. My boys don't play fair.

Good luck, you'll need it~

– ghostie <3

#ghostiesnightmare #ghostiesupdatesandthoughts

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ghostiesnightmare · 2 months ago

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The Price of Failure

Pairing: Albert Shaw x reader TW: DARK content, read at your own risk. kidnapping, manipulation, restraints MDNI- NSFW

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Albert Shaw is the epitome of pride.

Nestled away in Denver, Colorado it’s almost too easy to blend into the crowd, playing the part of the sweet silver fox with a mysterious past. Similar to a mask, he portrays the role almost too well, never leaving a trace. He’s cold– calculated. Many know him as Albert the mechanic, the professor, the quiet smoker who sits outside the bar with just a slightly unnerving gaze– never the serial killer.

Slipping through the cracks undetected for so long has left him with a sense of superiority– both mentally and morally. After all it’s only fair, how else is he supposed to think? With everyone turning a blind eye to his dark side, his ego only rises. Once he meets you, poor little thing, it’s pure nature for him to grab what’s rightfully his.

He doesn’t just want to own you– he wants to manipulate your every thought, every emotion to directly and solely be focused on him. To Albert, control is everything, and with you that obsession to maintain superiority only grows. You aren’t just another nameless victim rotting away in that basement, you’re his prized possession– a project for him to completely break you down and build what he wants from the pieces.

His love is completely conditional, if you could even call it love. Constantly molding, testing, grading you to meet his almost unattainable standards. Of course, he isn’t without mercy– when you succeed, he’ll reward you. Trinkets, music, books, practically anything you could possibly desire while trapped in this prison, say the word and it’s yours. When you fail, however… Albert is more than happy to play his favorite role: The Grabber.

Your punishments are just another testament to his complete and utter control over every aspect of your life. You want to be a brat? Then you’ll be a starving brat. Decide to mouth off? Fine, he knows just the thing to shut you up. You’re his pretty bird in a cage, and no matter the challenge or setback, Albert is determined to mold you into his perfect plaything.

In his eyes, you aren’t a lover– a partner, but the walking reminder of his success and ability to turn Denver into his own personal playground. He’s obsessed with the idea of you, deeming you worthy to accept his every word, every thought as pure fact. His witty nature has him learning every detail about you, twisting your each and every thought into something worthy of his time.

“I know better than you what you need. You’ll thank me eventually.” He would say after a particularly rough punishment, disappointment becoming a very tough pill to swallow. It’s almost suffocating in the way he watches over your every move, correcting you on even the smallest of problems you push his way.

He doesn’t just want you to own, he wants to perfect you. He wants to make you completely reliant on his guidance, not because he craves your attention– but because he can.

The scariest part about Albert? If you fail to meet his expectations and push him too far, any affection he would offer you is completely taken away. It’s almost terrifying in the way he’ll flip, stripping you of any dignity just to watch you break from the pressure. He’ll take it all in stride of course, murmuring praise in your ear as you come crawling right back to him. You’re suffering only proves his point– no matter how much you try to defy him, it’s always outshadowed by how much you need him after all.

Your wrists would throb against the blood red velvet he ties you up with– even on your worst days, you had to be dressed to play the role of his favorite toy. Strapped tightly to the chair, you would squirm, brain foggy from the past few hours of him educating you. And of course– you had to go and ruin it all.

Albert would tower over you, perfectly composed as he practically dissected you with his eyes. Crouching to your eye level, the telltale patronizing grin would turn your blood to ice– a sign of another lesson. “Look at you, following orders so perfectly.” A pause, a brush of his fingers against your cheek. “... you make it so easy to love you.” The words sending the oh so familiar shiver down your spine.

Lips wobbling, broken pleas die silently on your tongue. You know better than to speak without permission– you learned that after the first few times. The tears however, flow anyways. Albert would sigh, wiping them away so delicately that you almost forget that he was the one causing them. “No, no– none of that now. Good girls don't cry unless I say so.”

The words were soft, yet your skin burned worse than any slap. Albert’s eyes darkened, fingers digging into your jaw and forcing you to meet his stare– one full of pity. “You disappoint me,” he remarked, almost regrettably– as if scolding a child. “All this work, and you still break so easily. You’re so fragile.” Shame blossomed in your stomach.

His thumb brushed against your bottom lip, and your jaw slacked in submission– coating his skin in your saliva. So obedient, so willing– just like he wanted. “I was going to let you have something nice tonight.” A breathe, yet you knew there was a price you had to pay. There always was. “...but I think you should learn the price of failure.”

A whimper flickers across the room, and you almost speak– to beg, to plead your shame and admit just how sorry you were, but his laugh silences you before the words come out. The sound rattles your brain– a laugh filled with something you couldn’t place.

It wasn’t kind, or cruel, or mockery. But one of pride.

Because that was Albert Shaw’s greatest sin. As he towered over you, watching you tear yourself apart for even the smallest scrap of mercy, he knew he had won. And he had never been more proud.

“You’ll learn eventually,” he whispered, fingers trailing down the column of your neck, leaving a trial of fire in their wake. “...You’ll learn to thank me.”

#ghostiesnightmare #ghostiesdarkrambles #albert shaw #the black phone fanfic #slasher x reader #slashers #reader insert #x reader #female reader #the black phone #the grabber x reader #the grabber x you #drabble #horror #slasher x you #seven deadly sins drabble #NSFW

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ghostiesnightmare · 2 months ago

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With finals wrapping up I’m delving into the twisted little corner of our world here to bring the slashers to life! I'm currently working on a deep delve into each of the slashers I have written for so far, and am always looking for inspiration. If you have a request for a character feel free to share-- I love hearing from you all!

Thank you also for over 150 followers! I love each and every one of you ;)

-ghostie <3

#ghostiesupdatesandthoughts #send in some requests!!

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ghostiesnightmare · 2 months ago

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Graded on a Curve

Pairing: Professor Albert Shaw (The Grabber) x Female Reader Summary: All she wanted was an A, and all he wanted was obedience. When a professor with a sinister past takes an unhealthy interest in one of his brightest students, their academic games spiral into a destructive affair. The final lesson? Devotion isn't extra credit– it's required. TW: DARK content, dubcon/noncon, power imbalance, rough sex, foul language, choking, spanking, abuse, nudity, violence, blackmail, creampies, manipulation, alcohol, cigarettes, degradation, paranoia, unprotected sex, teacher-play, and more. Word Count: 10,467 MDNI- NSFW- read at your own risk. A/N: I tried a different formatting for this one, let me know your thoughts! Also Albert, when I catch you Albert-

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He’s doing it again.

Annoyance flared in your stomach as you tried to ignore the eyes burning holes into your head, pencil gripped in your fingers like a lifeline as you scribbled in your notebook. The classroom was silent, save for the flutter of paper and the shuffling of nervous students squirming in their seats.

A pop quiz on a Tuesday afternoon– something you had learned to dread every time you squeezed into the lecture hall, mind blanking with every tick of the flimsy clock mounted on the wall. At this point, you were certain you would fail yet again, the prompts carefully written on the chalkboard glaring back at you with leering stares. Flickering your gaze from the questions, you absentmindedly scanned the front row– eyes landing on the icy blue you had grown to despise.

Albert Shaw met your stare with borderline amusement, chalk twirling haphazardly in his fingers as he leaned against the pulpit. His usual stiff posture was abandoned as he watched the students work, chalk tapping lightly against the wood as he observed, brow cocked. Subconsciously, your teeth gritted, grip tightening on your pencil as you tore your gaze away from him, jotting down some half hearted response to the last question before giving up on the quiz altogether.

Professor Shaw was beloved across the student body for his work, the active presence he had on campus preceding him when you initially joined his class. Classmates would rave about his lectures, thoroughly impressed by his ability to guide the narrative for creative writing, turning even the most boring essays into a work of art. With the end of senior year steadily approaching, your choices of electives were declining– the options “slim pickings”, as your advisor had said.

Originally, you felt grateful you were able to snag a spot into Creative Writing: From the Pages to Life, quite literally being the last possible student able to join. Hearing nothing but positive feedback from past students who took the course, you were assured it would be smooth sailing until graduation. You were sorely mistaken.

Alongside pop quizzes and almost two hour lectures, the assignments piled up like a mountain beneath you, almost toppling over as the semester progressed. And Professor Shaw himself was nothing short of a nightmare– practically tearing your work apart every time you submitted, corrections and not-so-helpful feedback covering the page so severely the sheets were smudged red. He was single handedly standing in the way of your graduation, a pathetic 42% heaving you down like the weight of the world.

“That’s time… pass your papers to the front of the class. I’m sure you all did well–” The words jolted you from your trance, Professor Shaw quickly collecting the sheets of paper. Tearing the scribbled page from your notebook, you passed it forward– shame budding in your stomach. The professor gathered the papers in his arms, assembling them into a neat stack before returning to the chalkboard, erasing the prompts.

Your teeth sunk into the inside of your cheek, nerves buzzing through your skin. “-As I’m sure you are all well aware, we are halfway through the semester, which means it’s time to discuss your final project.” Internally you groaned at the prospect of yet another assignment, the idea of spending hours typing for a bullshit prompt sending your head spinning. Professor Shaw continued on, ignoring the groans and muffled whispers sprouting throughout the classroom.

“You’re final project,” He began, rolling up the sleeves of his collared shirt around his elbows. “-will be something different this year. I want you to choose a real-life figure to analyze. Not a biography, but a delve into the actions and moral compass of someone who has left an impact on society– positively or negatively.”

That piqued your interest.

Spine straightening, you let the words settle as ideas began to take root. Chatter erupted throughout the lecture hall, students turning their heads as they openly brainstormed with their peers. Professor Shaw chuckled slightly, holding up a hand while speaking over the noise– quickly putting an end to the discussion. “You’ll have the rest of the semester to work on this assignment, so I expect nothing short of perfection.”

A small piece of you stung at the prospective jab, and you shifted uncomfortably within your seat. The class was silent, anxiety crackling throughout the air as Professor Shaw unpacked the final assignment. Clearing his throat, a hand combed through his sandy blonde hair, rustling the locks before speaking.

“I highly recommend researching this figure thoroughly. I also expect a one-on-one meeting with me during my office hours so we can discuss your figure of interest in detail. You can sign up for a timeslot through the class portal. Now, with the last–” He paused, eyes shifting towards the clock. “... five minutes, take a piece of paper and write a few figures of interest, along with your name and student number. I will collect them and connect with you regarding your choices.”

There was a shift in the air at the comment, and you quickly tore a page from your notes, pencil scraping across the paper as you wrote your personal information. Silence quickly enveloped the lecture hall once more, Professor Shaw settling comfortably in his chair, fingers already clicking away at the clunky computer provided by the school.

You shifted, pausing as you wracked your brain for possible figures– who did you want to write about? The clock continued to tick, your arch nemesis, and a sudden dark thought sprouted within your mind. Glancing sideways, you looked at another student’s paper, prominent figures such as Louis Armstrong and Isaac Newton dotting the page. You rolled your eyes, the idea of spending half a semester learning about the founder of gravity putting you half to sleep.

Training your gaze forward, you studied the professor in front of you, the silence suddenly feeling heavier as you watched him type. He must have felt your intense gaze, because he straightened slightly, eyes scanning the sea of students. Gaze locking with yours, you froze– the icy blue sinking through your skin and settling into your soul.

Just for a split second, there was something– something different in the way that he looked at you.

His lips twisted into the faintest of smirks, sending a shiver down your spine. Your stomach flipped, thoughts emptying as you stared, skin suddenly hot to the touch. Why was he staring like that? The blare of the final bell screeched through the class, students quickly packing up as they dropped their slips of paper onto Professor Shaw’s desk– eager to leave the room.

Realizing you had spent the time daydreaming instead of writing, you jotted the first name you thought of down on the paper, folding it gingerly between your fingers. It seemed like a longshot, but with recent events shaking Denver to its core, the idea seemed like a good one. Shrugging your backpack over your shoulder, you approached the desk, dropping the scrap of paper onto the pile. Quickly brushing past, you retreated out of the room– the sooner you got back to your dorm, the better.

Trying to ignore that oh so familiar feeling shuddering up your spine, you darted into the hallway, thankful to escape the chill of his gaze.

The last student’s footsteps echoed throughout the lecture hall, leaving Albert Shaw completely alone– fingers still tapping away at the keyboard monotonously. Glancing away from the screen, he began sorting through the scraps of paper, brows furrowed in disappointment. Marie Antoinette. Louis Armstrong. William Shakespeare. Figures who, although leaving significant marks throughout history, were easy answers. Irritation quickly built as he flicked through the papers, predictable figures leading to boring essays. But one slip caught his eye– a name written in messy, hurried handwriting:

The Grabber.

Fingers dug into the slip of paper, curious eyes tracing the almost illegible letters– a sick smile curling on his lips. The University of Denver’s favorite professor, hiding a deep, dark secret. And now, you– unknowingly bringing that very secret into the light. Albert sank further into his chair, a quiet laugh bubbling in his chest. So, you wanted to know more about The Grabber– about him.

How interesting… the thought alone made his fingers twitch. The darkness he so perfectly kept hidden beneath the surface began to fester, calling out to him.

Turning his attention back to the computer screen, fingers quickly moved along the keyboard as he inserted your personal information into the class database. And just like that– there you were. Albert’s eyes darkened as he clicked through your student profile, ID photo quickly filling up the screen as he scrolled. So, the big bad wolf had a little admirer; he just never expected it to be someone so innocent.

He recognized you almost immediately, those eyes always somehow meeting his own while he lectured, trying yet failing to read him. You were suspicious of him– smart girl. Albert clicked his tongue as he poured over your personal details; you were a good student and an even better writer, yet your grade in the class was nothing short of abysmal.

Distracted, are we? Poor girl, you just need a bit of motivation.

Logging into the class portal, Albert looked through the open slots for office hours, something akin to excitement bubbling in his chest. He knew it was wrong to schedule appointments for his own students, but the thought of waiting to pick your pretty little brain apart was too good not to indulge in.

His last slot for the week sat empty, Friday at 4pm. Perfect. Confirming your availability was so easy it was laughable, why disappoint the fan-favorite professor who just wants to help? Now, all he had to do was wait. You were curious about him, the real him, and now he was more than happy to oblige.

You know what they say– curiosity killed the cat.

A crash of thunder rumbled through the air, the onslaught of rain only increasing as you ran across campus, backpack tucked under your raincoat. Sprinting past the deserted students union, your sneaker sank into a puddle, frigid water soaking into your socks.

Curses spilled from your lips as you pushed onwards, sneakers practically squishing as you reached the Humanities building. Throwing the door open, you ducked inside, water running off the raincoat and dripping onto the hardwood floor. A relieved sigh escaped you as you leaned against the door, trying to catch your breath.

The comforting smell of beeswax and old books filled your nostrils, and you quickly shed the sopping coat, shaking it before rolling it under your arms. An advisory meeting on a Friday afternoon, how convenient– not like you were going out in this weather anyways.

Professor Shaw had personally asked to see you regarding your paper, and with every step you took you began to regret your decision. Was it too morbid– choosing the uncaught serial killer of Denver? Too weird? The absolute last thing you needed was a biased grudge already weighing your paper down before you even started.

Trudging through the hallways into the staff wing, you scanned the alphabetized nameplates of various professors until the smudged cursive Shaw caught your eye. Slowing to a halt, you glanced at the ajar door– hand hovering over the door handle as you swallowed your pride and pushed the door fully open. Stepping into the empty office, your eyes strained against the dull lighting of the cramped room.

Piles of books covered almost every available surface, stacking so high you had to carefully weave your way through to avoid collapsing them. The faint smell of coffee and cigarette smoke hovered in the air, practically enveloping you as you clutched your backpack closer to your chest. The storm continued to brew outside, raindrops hammering against the singular window and casting an eerie glow into the office.

It was obvious that Professor Shaw spent a majority of his time on campus in the cluttered room, evidence of his presence manifesting in the form of empty stainless steel tumblers and tabbed student papers. You ducked further into the space, dropping your backpack onto the floor as a stack of slips caught your eye. At the top of the folds of paper, your messy handwriting glared back at you like a guilty sentence; The Grabber. Snatching the paper, you shoved it into your jeans pocket before turning to grab your backpack and leave– the idea of cancelling the appointment becoming more favorable with each passing second.

“Going somewhere?”

A voice ripped through the silence, causing you to nearly jump out of your skin. Whirling around, your gaze quickly settled on that haunting blue that burned into your skin. Leaning against the doorframe, Albert’s fingers haphazardly clutched a copy of The Psychology of Serial Killers as he stared at your startled state. Another flash of lightning sent a steam of light into the room, uncovering an amused look painted across the older male’s face. Trying to slow your heartbeat, you shrank backwards towards the desk.

“Professor Shaw! I didn’t realize you were there.” The room felt suddenly stifling, and you subconsciously shifted from one foot to the other. Pushing further into the room, the door clattered shut behind you– lock clicking in place as the professor brushed past you and settled into his desk. “Sorry about that, I was just grabbing some research materials from the library.” Gesturing to the empty seat, he learned back in his chair as you got situated.

The book dropped against the desk, and you realized you were caught. A knowing smile played on Albert’s lips, yet something about it was far from warm. “So…” His eyes scanned over your form, sending a chill of unease churning in your stomach. “–you’re the one who chose The Grabber as your figure.” Fighting the wave of embarrassment that washed over you, you forced yourself to nod along to his words.

Leaning closer, Albert’s elbows propped against the wooden desk, hands cradling his chin as he continued– voice hushed as if sharing a secret. “I have to admit, it's not the easiest choice… most would go for someone with easily obtained facts. But you–” His eyes flicked from the book to you, pools of blue swirling with something you couldn’t quite place. “... you want to find the darkness. I admire that.”

The compliment sent your cheeks ablaze, bashfulness quickly rising as his almost predatory stare bore into you. The professor cleared his throat, the tension in the room snapping as he relaxed in his chair– biceps flexing as he rolled the sleeves of his button up to his elbows. Forcing your gaze to hold steady, you tried to push the thoughts of wandering eyes from your mind.

Albert Shaw was a sought after bachelor in Denver, with students practically throwing themselves at him for any sign of praise. And God, he was attractive– with a dreamy build, sharp jawline and an even sharper tongue that left many in his classroom with less than academic thoughts. In the musty air of the office, you could faintly make out the smell of cologne– notes of musk and bergamot mixing together with the lingering scent of his cigarettes in a mouthwatering concoction.

Who knew the fan favorite professor had a smoking habit? You wondered if he had a signature brand, Marlboro seeming too dare-devilish and Camel too unsophisticated. Eyes drifting oh so slightly to the desk, you glanced at his fingers tapping absentmindedly against the wood– no ring, empty finger flaunted like a trophy.

Chesterfield man.

“You seem… distracted.” His voice cut through the silence, low and smooth– just like the drawl of the nicotine he probably inhaled just minutes before your meeting. Your gaze snapped to meet his, and you realized too late that he had been watching you the entire time, brow raised slightly as though he knew exactly what you had been thinking.

Sputtering slightly, a pathetic excuse fell from your lips. “Sorry, I guess I’m ready for the weekend.” Mouth twitching just shy of a smirk, he gestured back towards the book nestled between you, ignoring the blatant lie. “I’ll try not to take up too much of your time then. So, The Grabber.” His voice drops slightly at the mention of the name, and a small part of you shivers.

“Are you curious about the psychology of fear– about what drives a person to take a life? Or is it the terror that draws you in?” Shifting in your chair, you contemplated his questions, uncertainty bubbling in your stomach as you hesitated your response.

“...I guess it’s fascinating, really. The way fear can almost–” You inhale, trying to phrase the feeling, “...It’s almost binding, even for the one who instills it.” He hummed at that, the sentence lingering almost uncomfortably in the air he contemplated your words. “Do you think someone as heinous as The Grabber could feel affection for his victims in his own way, or is it all about power?” The probe catches you off guard, mouth drying as you fumble for the words.

The professor watches you like a hawk, clearly expectant for an answer– fingers slightly tracing the wood beneath them. Chesterfield, with a hint of bergamot. “...I–” You swallow thickly, trying to force confidence in your tone. “I think it’s about control. He wasn’t born evil… but some sort of circumstance made him that way. I want to figure out why.” Nodding at your words, his fingers steepled under his chin once more, regarding you. The silence stretched a beat too long as he pondered.

“...And what if there is no reason?” he asked finally. “What if he did it simply because he wanted to?” You blink, the possibility never really crossing your mind. “Then… I guess that just makes him all the more terrifying.” Sighing, his lip twitches ever so slightly. “Terrifying, yes– but also liberating, no?” You stiffened at that, pulse quickening at the harrowing choice of words.

Gaze lingering in a way that sucked you in, the silence thickened between you– and you found any semblance of a response dying on your tongue. “I think you’ll find this topic enlightening,” Professor Shaw concludes smoothly, “I look forward to seeing how you formulate it. Your grade depends on this paper, so I expect more than regurgitated research.” Your teeth sink into your cheek at the jab, eyes darting to your book bag. Standing from the chair, you pull the bag over your shoulders and turn to leave– but his voice stops you once more.

“One more thing. You chose The Grabber.” You look back. “–out of every figure in history. Why?” There was a gleam in his eyes. Something unreadable, almost hungry for a response. You shrug, “I guess he just stands out.” An amused chuckle was your only answer, and you took that as your cue to leave. Darting back into the hallway, you missed the smile curling on his lips. “I’m sure he does.”

In that moment watching your retreating form, he decided– he’d make sure you really understood fear.

You needed a distraction.

Anything really, to keep the thought of that meeting at bay. You tried to push the memory away, but his voice was too smooth– his eyes too sharp, coiling around your ribs and settling deep in your gut like a dirty secret. That weekend, your roommates finally convinced you to go out– claiming a change of scenery would help with the school jitters. You didn’t have the heart to tell them the truth, however.

The bar was cramped, half-lit, and thrumming with the chatter of college nightlife and the rattling bass of some up and coming cover-band. It was the kind of place that smelled like stale beer and sweat, with vodka shooters and a wary bouncer who looked over your roommate’s ID with haphazard suspicion.

Clinging to your drink, you laughed over the music at your friends and their stories, trying to ignore the thoughts that were clearly elsewhere. You could still feel him– Professor Shaw’s presence hammering against the inside of your skull like a bad hangover. The way he looked at you when he had asked if The Grabber could feel affection. The way he poured over your words like he wanted to eat them up.

You excused yourself before your thoughts could spiral too far, muttering something about needing fresh air as you slipped out the back door and into the alley. The night air bit into your skin, a comforting chill that crept over you as you leaned against the brick, still vibrating with the bass from the speakers inside. Pulling the oversized bomber jacket tighter around you, your fingers absently dipped into your pocket, crinkling the carton under your grip softly.

Chesterfields– the same kind you had Googled after you had left his office, the scent that clung to him so distinctly it coated your discarded sweater days after. You didn’t smoke, didn’t even like the smell– but something about the way it clung to him like an invisible signature sent you reeling. You had stupidly bought them anyway… like you couldn’t even help yourself.

Maybe you just wanted to feel close to something you weren’t supposed to. You slid one between your lips, unlit– letting the taste of tobacco settle on your tongue like a sin. You closed your eyes, trying to focus on the quiet hum of the night, trying to exhale the thought of him.

“Didn’t peg you for the type.”

Your breath caught in your throat, the voice turning the blood in your veins to ice. Eyes snapping open, the cigarette fell from your lips. You turned– and there he was. Professor Shaw, leaning against the opposite wall, bathed in the flickering cherry of his own cigarette. Smoke curled around his face like a halo of death, vintage denim jacket slung low around his shoulders, sleeves rolled slightly.

No briefcase, no collared shirt– just a man in an alleyway with that damn smirk that had been haunting you since Friday.

“I’m not,” you answered too quickly, voice raw and small. He cocked his head slightly at that, flicking ash from the dart. “Then what are you doing out here, pretending you are?” You didn’t answer him, shrinking back against the wall, caught. His eyes dipped to the forgotten cigarette now crushed beneath your boot, exhaling smoke from the side of his mouth. “Looks like someone is trying to impress me.”

A flush crept up your cheeks, and suddenly the cement beneath your feet looked more interesting than the man in front of you. “I… I didn’t know you were here.” You admitted, forcing your gaze to remain steady as his shoes shuffled into your field of vision. He chuckled slightly, the low tremor sending a buzz down your neck. “Didn’t say you did,” he drawled, stepping closer– giving you time to move away, to leave, but you remained rooted in place. “-But you thought of me, hm?”

His voice– it was like velvet and honey, a whisper just gravely enough to make your heart leap in your chest. Boots practically touching, he towered over you, taking another inhale of his cigarette. “You don’t have to admit it,” He started, eyes flicking from the cigarette to you, then dropping momentarily to your lips before settling.

“... You should be careful. Thoughts have a funny way of becoming habits.” You scoffed at that, shoving your hands back into your pockets, fingers curling around the carton once more. “Like yours?”

He hummed at that, the air between you thickening with something much more electric than nicotine. Flicking the butt of the cigarette, he stood silently in front of you, watching you like a puzzle he already knew the answer to. Without thinking, you produced your own carton and offered it, earning another chuckle. Fishing a new dart from the carton, the older male sparked it.

“Curiosity's dangerous,” He muttered, words slow– deliberate. “It has a way of dragging you in deeper than you’re meant to go.” He was so close, you could practically taste the bergamot and... was that whiskey on his breath? You swallowed hard, mouth suddenly dry.

“What happens when it does?” Another smile, calculated this time. “Then, you learn how much of yourself you are willing to give away… just to get a little closer.” A tremor settled up your spine, and you found yourself falling under his gaze. Your teeth sunk into your bottom lip, electricity thrilling through you as he took another draw from the cigarette before flipping it towards you.

Your jaw immediately slacked, and he slotted the dart between your lips, expectant. You took a drawl, fighting the urge to cough as the smoke filled your lungs. Professor Shaw– no, Albert smirked.

“You wear it well.”

The door behind you slammed open, your friends’ laughter echoing into the alley– the moment cracking as they drunkenly stumbled into the night air. You quickly spat the cigarette from your lips, turning to glance at the noise before looking back. He was gone, the only evidence of his presence being the soiled cigarette on the cement.

But as you ushered your friends home, his words followed you, settling deep in your lungs like the smoke. You couldn’t tell which was more addicting– him, or the burn he left behind.

It took two weeks to build up the courage to see him again.

Fourteen days of agonizing over your paper, staring at the computer screen and willing the words to appear– yet the draft sat practically untouched. Your fingers refused to move along the keys, thoughts swirling with anything but academics. The moment in the alleyway was etched in your brain– the thrum of the bass in the air, the brush of his finger against your skin when he folded the cigarette between your lips, that smirk.

The threat of deadlines did nothing to keep the pull towards him at bay. Late at night you found yourself rolling an unlit Chesterfield between your fingers, the scent alone sending a different type of buzz down your spine. You had skipped last week’s lecture, the idea of being in the same room as him, watching him put your mind in a hazy fog.

The few paragraphs you mustered up hung over your head like a death sentence, phrases like ‘a mask gives permission to do what you refuse to do otherwise’ seeming much less focused on The Grabber… but instead on Albert.

When Friday finally rolled around, you tried to stifle your pride and focus on your research, not the eyes that plagued your dreams. Swinging open the door to the office, he was already seated– absentmindedly grading papers at the comfort of his desk. The navy sleeves of his button up were rolled to his elbows as a feeble attempt to fight the April heat, revealing a small pale scar along his forearm.

You shouldn’t have noticed it– but you did.

You swallowed hard, forcing your gaze to meet the icy eyes now trained directly on you. Albert shifted in his seat, the papers now discarded– attention diverted. “Missed you last week,” he stated simply, voice unreadable. “-I figured you’d been busy.” You nodded, jaw clenching slightly. He noticed. “Yeah, I’m just… trying to get ready for finals.” He hummed at the response, not pushing further.

“Let’s see what you’ve got.” Dropping into the empty chair, you rummaged for the printed draft, an edge of nervousness bundling in your stomach.“It’s not finished. I’m still working through–” “... your fascination? That much is obvious.” he interjected, plucking the sheet from your hands.

You flushed, heat rising to your cheeks as you avoided his gaze. “That’s… that’s not what I meant.” You protested, but he was already reading. Silence settled between you as he scanned the paper– then, a chuckle. You bristled at the sound.

“What?” Albert’s smile was sharp, a knowing look needling its way towards you as he set the paper back on the desk. “Just a line you wrote: ‘fear isn’t the absence of control– but the illusion that someone else has it’.” He paused, before adding, “That's not research. It sounds like it's coming from experience.” You opened your mouth to argue, but it was futile.

He was right– you had typed it last night, thoughts plagued by the phantom burn of the smoke in your lungs. Thoughts of the rasp of his voice. Albert shrugged slightly, retreating. “I’m not judging… I’m just… curious.”

His words from that godforsaken night echoed in your mind, and before you could stop yourself, you mumbled. “Isn’t curiosity dangerous?” An amused huff cut through you like a knife. “So you were listening.” The line between professionalism and something you couldn’t quite place pulled taunt, and your fingers suddenly itched for the carton stowed in the bottom of your bag.

Leaning back in his chair, Albert rested his head on a hand– movements slow, deliberate. “You’ve crossed a line, from academic to… personal.” Your pulse thundered in your ears, blood rushing at the insinuation.

Chesterfields, bergamot, and whiskey.

“Haven’t you?” You blinked, fumbling a response. “-What?” “In your research,” He said innocently– but his eyes were anything but. “Have you ever done that before? Blurred the line, made it into something… else?” You didn’t know how to respond, the question seeming much more pointed to the stolen moment in the alley.

Your body reacted like he shot across the desk and grabbed you– that quiet thrill coursing through your veins. That same dull panic that gripped around your throat like a vice. Albert smiled again, satisfied with your lack of response.

“This is a good start. I expect you to have a full draft for us to work through next week.” The mask of professionalism quickly slotted back into place, and a small part of you deflated at the change of tone. Nodding, you quickly gathered up your things– rattled by the conversation. Standing to leave, he spoke again, so softly it almost didn’t reach you.

“Oh, next time…” He didn’t look up, eyes trained on the sorry excuse of your essay on the table. You froze. “-Try not to wear that perfume you wore in the alley. It’s… distracting.” Your breath hitched, realization slamming into you full force.

You hadn’t worn perfume that night, only your jacket– the one you never washed.

You swallowed hard, fingers gripping the strap of your book bag as something akin to defiance bubbled in your veins. “Why do you even care about my interpretation, anyways?” A beat. Then he answered, voice low– curling towards you and settling in your bones.

“Because you chose him, and I want to know what that says about you.”

You were late.

Fifteen minutes past four and you didn't have a semblance of a reasonable excuse. Your hair was messily pulled back, blouse wrinkled, bag half zipped and stuffed to the brim as you darted across campus. The deadline for the paper was fast approaching, yet the closer it came, the less you focused, becoming crippled against the mountain of work.

Creaking open the door, Albert was already there, leaning against the back of his desk– no papers to grade, no distractions. Just him, waiting.

"I was beginning to think you lost interest." He stated plainly, eyes burning holes into your head. His voice was calm– eerily so, but the tightness in his jaw suggested otherwise. You stiffened slightly at the sight.

"Sorry..." You murmured, ducking into the room. The door clicked shut behind you, and you moved to sit while pulling out your paper. Albert's hand rose, halting your movements.

"Stand. Now, let's hear it." Crossing his arms over his chest, Albert held your gaze. You blinked, uncertainty settling over you. “Hear it?” He nodded. “I want you to read it– aloud. I need to see where you hesitate.” A pause, then: “Where you’re conflicted.”

Your mouth went dry at the command, a small piece of you praying it was a jest– but the drumming of his fingers against the desk told a much different story. You relented, pulling the draft from your bag before letting it drop to your feet. Fumbling to the first page, your fingers twitched. The paper felt heavy in your hands, weighted by guilt.

“A mask, in many ways, is a threshold. A symbol not just of anonymity, but also of transformation. It acts as the cryptic gateway for him to become what he so desperately wanted to be without it.”

Your voice wobbled ever so slightly at the end of the line. The memory of the alleyway, the smell of him– that smirk clawing through you and sinking its teeth into your throat. You brushed on, but he noticed. He always did. Albert hummed slightly, a strand of sandy blonde hair falling out of place. “Keep going.” You swallowed, mentally screaming at yourself for letting your gaze linger on him before continuing.

“The mask is a necessity, not just to hide his identity– but as a characterization of himself. He gives himself the permission to instill terror in others. Fear, after all, demands participation, willing or not–”

“Do you believe that?” Albert tilted his head, jaw clenched. You paused, confusion washing over you. “I– what?” You prayed he wouldn’t press, but you knew it was futile. “That fear demands participation... and submission?” he clicked his tongue, pushing off the desk– towering over you.

Your mouth opened for a response, but nothing came. You knew why he was pushing you, the line between the essay and your obsession had dissolved days ago, blurring together in some sort of depraved admission.

“I think…” A pause filled the room before you continued. “Sometimes… we let it happen. Because we want to see what we are capable of while under pressure.” There was a beat, and you shrank into yourself– worried you had crossed a line.

But instead Albert smiled, almost coyly like you had handed him a secret. “So you do understand.” Stepping closer, his shadow cut across the outline of your shoes as he approached. A calloused finger reached out and tucked a fallen strand of hair behind your ear– delicately, intimately.

Your breath caught in your throat.

His fingers grazed your cheek, and it was almost sinful the way your skin burned under his touch. “Have you been thinking about him– The Grabber?” He murmured quietly, eyes dark. “...Or about me?”

You stiffened, fingers digging into the edges of your paper so tightly your knuckles turned white. You were caught, trapped in the web of seduction he had oh so carefully set around you– and now, you were unraveling.

Albert retreated slightly, and the air crackled between you. “You’ve crossed into something else entirely, you know that?” His tone was deep, but sharpened with something you couldn’t quite name. The tension stretched like an elastic band, and you were terrified for it to snap.

“Your paper– it’s not an analysis. It's a confession.” You stiffened, spine straightening as you gaped at him like a deer caught in headlights. “That’s not true–” Jaw trembling as you forced the words out. Liar. Albert reached for the printed pages, wrenching them from your grip as guilt held you in place. Flipping through the draft, his eyes cut into you once more when he found that godforsaken line you had almost deleted three times.

“What frightens us most is not the mask, but how safe we feel once we put it on.” He tapped the page slightly, before adding, “Tell me, what does that mean?”

You fumbled backwards, retreating slightly against the expansive bookcase that lined the wall. Eyes downcast, all you could emit was a faint excuse. “It’s… just an idea. A theme.” Albert stepped forward again, so close you could reach out and touch him. The stack of papers were placed under your chin, forcing your gaze to meet his.

Trapped– you were caged in place.

His voice dropped, any semblance of patience wearing thin. “You’re a terrible liar, you know that? Tell me the truth.” He pushed, brows furrowed in what you could only describe as desperation. You swallowed hard, breath caught in your throat. “I don’t—”

I don’t know, I swear. But you did– you always knew.

Albert leaned in, breath ghosting across your cheek. Your knees wobbled as that addictive scent you dreamed about wafted over you. Whiskey, chesterfields, and something much darker.

“You want to know what it feels like, don’t you?” His voice sounded like silk, but the words coiled around you like venom. “To be powerless. To be chosen. Goody little two shoes wants to play with fire, hm?”

Something in your stomach twisted like a knife. Hot embers settled in your throat, and you realized your eyes burned. You managed to push yourself away, jolting further into the bookcase. Albert’s arm dropped, giving you space– but not release. Unnerved, you scrambled to collect your things, pulse thrumming painfully in your throat. You begged yourself to not cry, trying to hold the broken pieces of your ego together as you moved towards the door.

Albert’s voice cut through the silence as you fumbled for the door handle. “I expected more from you by now. The girl who stares down monsters and calls it research. Maybe I gave you too much credit.”

You turned, eyes stinging with something much worse than humiliation. Jaw clenched, you glared at him. Albert met your furious gaze with a smirk– knowing he had won. “Fuck you.” You grit out, wrenching the door open and darting into the hallway. As the door clicked shut behind you, his final words followed you like a curse– spoken just loud enough for you to hear.

“Finish the paper. Or I will.”

You promised yourself you wouldn’t beg. You swore you would hold your head high as you slipped into the academic building, but with every step you took, your resolve shattered. Campus was silent at the midnight hour, save for the soft hum of the fluorescent lights lining the hallways.

He failed you. He had the nerve.

That red mark on the computer screen– that final, looming F– it dragged you here with your tail between your legs. Pathetic, really. But as you approached the office, your self pitying turned into blind rage. His light was still on, of course.

He was waiting for you so he could gloat.

You pushed the door open without knocking. Just as expected, Albert sat at his desk, a glass of liquid amber in his hand– collar unbuttoned, sleeves rolled. He doesn’t flinch at the sound of the door slamming open, nor your whirlwind of emotions as you stormed into the small space. He just took in your sorrow– bathing in it. Your eyes met the final paper splayed across his desk like a corpse on an autopsy table, red ink slashing through the lines with unnerving similarity to blood. You shove the door closed, breath coming out in fiery huffs. He looks up, eyes gleaming– expecting you.

“I was wondering how long it would take,” He mutters, eyes glancing at the clock on the wall. “Midnight. Fitting.” Your fingernails dug into your palms to keep you from lashing out. “You failed me.” “I did.” White-hot rage shot through you at the certainty of it all, as if he were discussing the weather with you and not keeping you from graduating. “You can’t just–” “I can.” He interrupts smoothly, standing. The half empty glass sat deserted on the table, and a small piece of you wanted to throw it at his righteous face. “... and I did. That wasn’t just a paper– it was a confession. You handed me a case study of your own desires and expected me to give you an A for honesty.”

Your throat tightens, and you want to cry– to hit him, to cry, to pound your fists into the wall until they bled. But all that came out was a meek, “Why are you doing this?” Unfettered, Albert circles the desk like a wolf, eyes trained on you as you fight back tears.

Come on, show me– look at me. Good girl.

“I wanted to see if you meant it. If you came crawling back. And look…” His eyes drag over your form, and something told you it was anything but professional. “Here you are.”

You flinch as he closes the gap, fingers encircling your wrist as he pulls you towards him. You try to pull your hand free, but his grip is tight, deliberate. “I think you wanted to get caught. You wanted me to see it. Every line you wrote– you wanted me to know what exactly you thought about when you lie in bed at night.” A wave of nausea washes over you.

“You’re delusional.” You bite out, but you know your words have no impact.

He just laughs, the sound grating against your bones. “Not delusional– aware. Much more than you. You’re the one lying– to your professors, to your friends, to yourself.” He pulls you closer, and you can practically taste the whiskey on his breath. “Not to me though. You could never lie to me.”

He pauses, cocking his head towards you. “What was the line?” He pulls a page from the desk with his spare hand. “‘fear isn’t the absence of control– but the illusion that someone else has it’?” His eyes slice into yours, and your throat tightens. “Do you know what you are saying there? You’re tired of pretending– you want to be stripped down. Owned. Controlled.”

You pull yourself from his grasp, but the words ring true. “That’s not what I meant–” He slams the paper onto the desk with such force your teeth rattle, gaze caging you into place. “-But you did. So stop lying about it.” You open your mouth to protest, but his hand shoots forward, wrapping around your throat– not tight, but present. A simple reminder of your fragility, how easy it would be to break you.

Pulling you forwards, his hair tickles your forehead as you gasp for breath. Tears well your eyes, pulse jackhammering through your skull. “What… what do you want from me?” You babble, and his lips brush your ear.

“Everything.”

He kisses you– hard, like a man half starved. You gasp against his lips, the taste of whiskey and Chesterfields coating your tongue as he invades your senses. You want to push away, to scream, but your body betrays you– melting into him. His teeth scrape against your bottom lip, shattering any resolve you tried to muster.

His grip around your neck tightens, and he steps backwards, dragging you to the desk. Sweeping your papers off with one arm, he presses you against the wood. “You want to be graded?” He practically growls against you, and it's shameful how your stomach clenches at the noise. “Then prove to me you’re worth more than a fucking F.”

The wood digs into the flesh of your ass, breath hitching as Albert looms over you. His eyes are coated with something ominous– rapturous. Gone is the polished professor with sly smiles and witty barbs. All that was left was a hungry man, something inhuman stretching behind his expression as he glared down at you. The whole thing sent butterflies sprouting through you.

You burned for him– yet you hated you much you wanted it, wanted him. The hand wrapped around your throat gives you a slight squeeze, and your knees all but give out. You shouldn’t want this, from him of all people. But you do– God, you do.

You try to speak, try to say his name– but he beats you to it.

“You begged to see me,” He whispers against your lips, thumb brushing against your pulse point almost adoringly. “Not the version who grades papers, but the real one. The thing behind the mask.” His fingers let up on your throat, tilting your chin upwards with a kind of gentleness that nauseates you.

“...I hope you’re ready. Because once you see me, you don’t get to look away.”

You couldn’t even if you tried.

Tugging you further onto the desk, a greedy hand palms your breast through your blouse. You jolt at the sensation. “No matter how well I hid it, you always knew, didn’t you?” Lips ghosting across your jaw, his voice grates through your ear– turning your brain to mush. As much as you didn’t want to admit it, you knew.

You always did.

“Say it.” He mutters with eerie calmness, fingers undoing the first button of your collar so swiftly your head spins. “Say my name.” You shake your head, silently begging for it not to be true. That this was all just a bad dream. But the calloused fingers brushing against your exposed skin were very much real.

You called to him with every sentence you wrote, every word trembling with guilty fascination. You gave him a name on paper, humanized his horror by giving power to his acts. But you didn’t realize it then– he was watching you write it, and now you had to pay the price.

“You’re… him. You’re the man from the stories– behind the mask. The Grabber.”

He shudders. The confession rips away any remaining shred of normalcy as he tears your blouse in two. You yelp, squirming against the assault, but he pushes onwards. “That’s my girl. Too smart for your own good. But now…” He purrs over you. “You finally understand.”

You try to pull yourself from his grasp, but he slams you downwards, back pressed uncomfortably against the wood of the desk. “You wanted to know what he does to the ones who misbehave, didn’t you?” He hisses, and tears blur your vision. “Writing your shitty little essay, turning me into your obsession. You want to be scared.”

You try to babble out a response, a pathetic excuse, anything– but you knew it was useless. He grabs your wrist and brings it to his chest, letting you feel the rapid heartbeat through the thin fabric. “You wanted to know if the stories were true.” His voice twists, sickeningly soft as he ducks his head into the nape of your neck, stubble scraping against your skin.

“They’re worse.”

The tears fell at that, full of guilt– of humiliation as the pretty fantasy you had built up over the semester came crashing down. Albert Shaw, the professor you had all but fawned over for weeks, was the very incarnation of the figure you had desperately written about in your paper. And worse of all– you were now caught in his gaze.

Yet through the horror and betrayal, something much darker called out to you. You had always liked him, admired his charm and even cherished the intimate moment with him in the alleway. But being there with him, skin pressed against yours so tightly you felt as if you were fusing together– it was all the more addicting.

All you could utter was a simple, “Please.” Even then, you couldn’t tell what you were begging for. Clad in only your bra and jeans, Albert’s movements continued their onslaught– commanding, dominating. A whimper builts in your chest as his fingers boldly trail your clavicle, painting your skin in a trail of fire.

His tongue creeps up the column of your neck, warm and wet– a broken squeak building in your chest that quickly turns into a yelp as his teeth sink into the soft flesh. Daggers of pain erupt from the assault, and Albert drinks it all in– tongue tracing the bruise forming.

Oh God, he was marking you.

And through the haze of fear and ecstasy, you realize something even more terrifying: You liked it– no, loved it. Your fingers dig into the flimsy material of his shirt, back arching off the desk as he peppered your skin with nips and bites, head ducking towards the valley of your clothed breasts.

If this was anyone else– a simple hookup after a night at the bar, a classmate– you would have been nervous. But any reluctance within you disappears as he simply wraps his fist around the center of your bra and pulls. The fabric digs into your back before it snaps, Albert quickly discarding the ruined material before cupping your breasts beneath his fingertips.

Your spine goes rigid as his thumbs brush against your nipples, causing a wave of goosebumps to erupt across your skin. You shudder at the sensation, clenching around air as he rolls them against his fingers. You hiss, and Albert chuckles at your sensitivity.

“You want me to stop? Say it– use that voice you’re so proud of.” Hunched over the valley of your breasts, his hot breath fans over your skin– and you moan. “Oh… can’t?” Trailing one of his hands down your sternum, his mouth latches onto the unabused breast, teeth scraping against your nipple as he sucks on the bud.

You squirm, pathetic whines quickly filling the room as his spit soaked your chest. Your breaths came out in ragged gasps at the tabooness of it all– your professor hunched over you and practically worshiping your body. Yet you knew you weren’t the one in control. The stray hand trails along the waistband of your jeans, and your legs go limp.

“So skittish– you’re like a terrified animal.” He mused against your chest, fingers slipping under your jeans– tapping your hip bones expectantly. You hesitate, then slowly open your legs.

That’s my girl.

Albert quickly filled the spot in between your legs, caging you in against his desk. He would never have admitted it– the way he dreamed about seeing you like this, sprawled beneath him and practically begging for his touch. It made the darkness within him scream to take what was his.

Abandoning any attempt at keeping things slow, his hand flattened against your skin– cupping your clothed pussy with his palm. Your brain short circuited as he brushed against your core, fingers digging so harshly into his back you were certain you were tearing his shirt to shreds. It was almost embarrassing feeling how soaked you were, the damp fabric of your panties practically sticking to his hand as he rubbed you under your jeans.

A stray finger pushes your panties to the side, dipping into your folds– and you whimper. Albert’s eyes darkened, blown with deep admiration as he watched you fall apart on something as effortless as the palm of his hand. “Go on, defend yourself. Defend why you’re dripping for the man who failed you.” He seethed, fingers pulling away from you in order to discard you of your jeans and panties. You shrunk further into the desk, shame building in the pit of your stomach as the response died on your tongue.

The denim burned against your skin as it was roughly pulled from your legs, pooling onto the hardwood floor beneath you. As much as you wanted to deny it, wanted to protest– the patch of wetness soaking through your discarded panties was a guilty verdict of your true thoughts. Growing impatient, his fingers resumed their previous position, index finger unceremoniously burrowing deep into your cunt without warning.

Gasping, your hands flew to his chest to push him away, yet Albert paid your defiance no mind. Twisting deep within you, your juices quickly coated the digit, dripping down his wrist and onto the desk beneath you. You wired your eyes shut, embarrassment eating away at you as you heard the squelch that emitted when he withdrew his finger from you– only to delve right back into you.

Your breaths came out in labored pants, jaw clenching as he worked his finger into you, stretching you out, testing you. Albert groaned at the feeling of your gummy walls clenching around him, and he quickly added another finger, reaching that particular spot that made your eyes roll. Your hips stuttered, whines pouring from your lips as he fucked you in his fingers.

“You should thank me. I’m making your little fantasy come true.”

You could only moan in response, tension building in your gut as he scissored his fingers within you. You would be lying if you hadn’t touched yourself late at night with the thoughts of his bergamot and whiskey scent coating your mind– but your fingers were no match against his own. His thumb pressed harshly against your clit, and you all but spasmed beneath him.

So submissive– so pathetic. How cute.

You were quickly unraveling, the lewd sounds of your pussy milking his fingers bouncing off the walls of the office. Sweat beaded along your hairline– the air filled with your body’s betrayal. Albert’s breath hitched as your fingers dug into his shirt, claws sinking dully into his chest, and with that, his resolve shattered.

Withdrawing his fingers within you so quickly it ached, you were spun around– chest pressed uncomfortably against the desk. The glass of whiskey teeters slightly from the force. You craned your head backwards, and the sight turns your blood to ice. Albert stood behind you, eyes opium blown as lust radiated off of him in waves. Practically shaking, he quickly unbuttoned his shirt– revealing scars dotting along his chest, lean abs, and naval. You didn’t want to know how he got them, the sight alone sending jolts of fear down your spine. Gone was any restraint, any hope of mercy– all that was left was the monster you had created.

A hand weaves into your hair, yanking your head backwards. You yelp at the sensation, pain needling your skull as your back was forced to arch against him. His slacks met the fat of your ass, bulge pressed into you as his breath met the shell of your ear.

“You shouldn’t have written about me,” He growled, the sound of his belt buckle coming undone sounding like a gunshot in the quiet. “Now that you have, I’ll make sure it’s the last thing you ever write about.” Before you even have a chance to scream, he drives his hips forwards, spearing you on his cock.

God, it hurts. Stretching you out far beyond comfort, nestled so deep within you the head of his cock kisses your cervix. There was no kindness, no waiting for you to adjust– just possessive, violent thrusts that sent your hip bones chafing against the desk. The hand holding your hair in a vice-like grip tugs, and sparks of white dot your vision. You wriggle against the desk, begging for any sort of release, any sort of slowing down– but your cries were left unanswered.

Albert groans at the feeling of you clenching around him, so tightly the hand curled around your hair tightened into a fist. Hips jutting against yours with brutal force, his mouth latched onto your shoulder, biting so hard he was certain he drew blood. A gurgled moan tore from your chest at the sensation, and for the first time Albert thought he was capable of love.

It was all too much. The sounds, the smell– the feeling of him burrowing so deeply within you you were certain he was splitting you in two. But your body sucked him in, ass meeting his eager thrusts as you arched– trying to relieve the pressure that was mounting within.

You wanted to understand evil, but now it was inside of you.

Corrupting you from within, every roll of his hips sending you further towards Hell. Your breasts bounced as he burrowed within you, skin feeling like you were melting as warmth blossomed from the pit of your stomach. Albert ushered your knee upwards cupping your knee with his spare hand, and you gasped– cockhead kissing your walls so sinfully you clenched without warning. Albert swooned.

“Hah, sucking me in so well… fucking slut.”

If he had been anyone else, the jab would have hurt. But the shift in position had your eyes rolling into the base of your skull. The table trembled from the force of Albert’s pace, yet your body took him in like you were dying and he was a breath of fresh air. Short, staccato moans poured from your throat as he fucked into you, all morals escaping as the tension within you climbed. “No one’s going to touch you after this, no one–mmh can. You’re mine now.” Albert seethed in your ears. Your ass suddenly burned– did he… slap you? Your stomach clenched at the sensation, the sting of your ass heightening the pleasure of you being ruined from the inside. Albert’s hips stuttered slightly as you barred down against him, expletives flying from his lips as he held your hair in a death grip.

You liked that? Dirty girl.

He hissed, resolve quickly breaking as your greedy ass met his thrusts– so tight you were choking him out. Carding a hand through sweaty hair, he leaned over you, naked chest pressed against your back. “Hmm.. wanna cum? Tell me.” Your eyes widened, babbled nonsense gurgling from your lips as your cunt practically mewled.

“You– oh fuck, know what happens to girls who break the rules. Tell me.”

Your toes curled at the threat, fear spiking through you as you stared forward with teary vision. Through the small window mounted on the wall, you could faintly make out the outline of Albert looming over you, gaze burrowing into you through the reflection. “Please, I want to.” “-Please what?” Swallowing your pride, you turned your head ever so slightly over your shoulder, staring into the icy blue that haunted you for weeks.

“Please, sir.”

With that, your fate was sealed. The hand tangled in your hair forced you downwards, your cheek scraping against the desk as Albert picked up pace. You wept– pussy clenching around him as you sobbed from the stimulation.

The coil in your stomach snapped, white-hot pleasure washing over you in waves as a broken scream filled the room, the incarnation of a fall from salvation. It suddenly dawned on you that the noise was coming from you, nails digging into the wood of the desk as your body spasmed from the sensation.

Albert hissed at the subconscious clench of your cunt, hand quickly meeting your hips as he rutted into you. “Just like shit– that. Good fucking girl.” Practically chanting the words into the air, he rode out your orgasm, hips drilling into you so viciously it sent you into an overstimulated mess.

All good things must come to an end– Albert knew that better than most.

Staring at the reflection of your body bent over the desk, eyes void with anything but pleasure, something in him snapped. Your name fell on his lips like a prayer as his hips stilled against you, orgasm crashing through him. Your body jolted as wet, hot spurts of cum settled within you, filling you beyond repair. Albert slowed, head tilted back as he shallowly thrusted his cum deeper within you.

Sweet little girl– ruined for all others.

Pulling his softening cock from your folds, you shivered– pussy aching at the retreat. Legs weak, skin burning, mind scrambled like the pages of your draft scattered across the floor. You refuse to move, too tired to do anything but lie there like an offering.

Holy shit.

Albert’s behind you, tucking his shirt back into his slacks with eerie calmness– like nothing had happened. Like he didn’t just ruin you in a room lined with books on ethics. Like he didn’t just give you the most earth shattering orgasm of your life.

You limply push yourself onto your elbows, reaching for your ruined bra. His hand catches your wrist. “You don’t need that,” Albert murmurs, and your spine straightens at the sound. “-Not anymore.” Your throat tightens– what?

He kneels, tugging your clothes back onto your hips with the care of a lover– but when he looks up, his gaze is anything but. “You came here for clarity. Now you have it.” You try to speak, pushing yourself to stand on wobbly legs, but his next move halts you in place. Pulling a folded paper from his desk drawer, the bright red F turning your blood to ice.

Your grade sheet.

“I told you not to lie to me.” He mumbles, placing the slip of paper on the desk. The desk you were bent over just seconds before. “-But you did, over and over. You’ll live with the consequences.”

You blankly stare at it, the fog of the previous events shattering as tears line your vision. “You’re… you’re failing me? After–” Albert raises a brow, leaning against the window. That fucking window. “You think this changes anything? That I’m still not your professor? You came here knowing what I was– wanting it.”

He looks at you without any semblance of emotion and you want to cry for being so stupid. He really was a monster.

“You thought submitting to me would save you?” He whispers, amusement sinking into his tone. You grab your tattered blouse, throwing it over your shoulders in a sad attempt to keep your emotions at bay. “I’m not interested in saving you. I want to see how far you’ll fall.”

The way your stomach drops tells you the unbridled truth: you always knew he would be like this. Every flirtation, every assignment, every comment scribbled onto your essays. He saw your darkness, and now he owned you.

You scramble for the door, voice raw from emotion– and screaming. “You can’t do this,” You threaten. “I’ll go to the university. I’ll tell–” Albert’s smile catches you off guard. “Tell them what?” He asks cooly. “That you wrote about a killer, then fucked your professor because he scared you?”

Silence. Your words caught in your throat as a tear fell from your cheek.

“You’re a writer,” He brushes past you. “-use your imagination.” He opens the door, ducking into the hallway. He pauses in the threshold, shadow towering over you– smile almost hiding the hunger in his eyes. Almost

“Class dismissed.”

The door shuts in your face, and you’re alone in his office– bruised, breathless. A scrap of paper flutters to the floor from the edge of the desk. You bend to pick it up with shaking hands, morale destroyed and hopes squashed.

It’s your essay– the one he covered in red weeks ago. On the back, there was something new, something private scrawled like a dirty secret only you were meant to find. Trying to silence the sobs building in your throat, you turn the page over.

You wear fear beautifully. A+ in devotion. -A.S

That fucker.

Even as your legs tremble on your stumble back to the dorm, your dignity bleeding out with every step, he’s grading you. Measuring your own spiral into ruin in letters and ink.

Like it was always the plan.

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ghostiesnightmare · 3 months ago

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holy moly ya'll THANK YOU for over 100 followers! I really appreciate the support-- it's so fun talking with everyone and writing all of our deepest darkest fantasies. I have something juicy coming soon I apologize for the brief hiatus, school is kicking my ass.

(COUGH COUGH I would love some suggestions or requests to work on while I procrastinate finals lol)

-ghostie <3

#ghostiesupdatesandthoughts #send in some requests!!

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ghostiesnightmare · 3 months ago

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Professor Albert Shaw anyone? The idea of him corrupting one of his oh so innocent college students and threatening to fail them has me gnawing on the bars of my enclosure.

He would totally be the perverted type just stare during class, eyes ghosting over your form as you quickly jotted down notes, struggling to keep up as he lectured. The type to get hard just from the idea of you biting down on a pencil, the thought alone driving him wild.

He would start tanking your grade on purpose, the sight of you pouting when receiving your papers back, eyes welling with tears better than any quick fuck. He would palm himself from underneath his desk, practically begging to see you cry during class.

Although being a straight A student you would quickly become overwhelmed with the amount of pressure in the class, grade plummeting after every assignment— no matter how hard you studied, no matter how hard you tried. And the whole time, he would watch, drinking it all in as you frantically tried to stay above water.

Finally, he would use the failing grade looming over your head as an excuse for “office hours”, and of course you accept— why wouldn’t you? You were so trusting, so naïve; the perfect goody two shoes. Besides, he was just trying to help.

It's only when the door to his office is locked and he has your skirt flipped up past your ass, fingers burrowing so deeply in your cunt you want to cry that you realize he wanted to do anything besides help you.

Professor Albert Shaw with an obsession so strong he wouldn't stop until he swallowed you whole.

---- UPDATE: Full fic inspired by this drabble here

#slasher smut #ghostiesnightmare #ghostiesdarkrambles #smut #should i make a fic on this?#the grabber #albert shaw

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ghostiesnightmare · 3 months ago

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Your writing is EVERYTHING - from the details to the plot, I cannot describe how you can do that !

Request ;Michael sparing your life when you do something that makes him curious and excited - like kneeling in front of him or something like that ! I writed something like this on another account, but you write so good you have to do something with this !

With blood, knife Play, choking, some very very brutal Mikey, Pain kink-

Sorry for my bad english, my first language is french 😘

Salvation

Pairing: Michael Myers x Female Reader Summary: You were never supposed to survive him. You could have fled and buried the haunting memory of that fateful night– yet something draws you back to the ruins of faith and blood. Back to a place where your fear turns into something more like devotion. TW: DARK content, heavy religious influences, dubcon, blood, gore, knifeplay, choking, foul language, BLASPHEMY, unprotected sex, rough sex, vivid descriptions of pain, power imbalance, abuse, and more. Read at your own risk Word Count: 8,081 MDNI-NSFW A/N: This fic is HEAVILY reliant on Christian influences, so please read at your own risk. I recommend listening to Christian Woman by Type O Negative, which I had on repeat while writing this fic. I really struggled with this one, ngl... enjoy!

-----

They say fear is the oldest and strongest emotion– primal and unrelenting.

It’s an instinct woven into every creature, the deciding factor between life and death. The fear of the unknown is the greatest thing of all, or so Lovecraft once claimed. Yet, something about the quote never sat right with you. Fear is a fleeting thing– it tends to lack depth. It’s a faceless ghost– the sensation of goosebumps prickling against skin, the jitter in your bones as you shiver from adrenaline.

But no matter how hard you tried to picture it, to show it, the emotion evaded you.

You groaned, fingers moving instinctively across the page of your sketchbook as you tried to capture the essence of the scene before you. The town square was buzzing with movement– costumed figures prowling through the streets, faces covered in an assortment of masks and bodies disfigured under layers of fabric.

Children clutched worn pillowcases, bounding from vendor to vendor in order to get their hands on a new sweet treat, parents following closely behind. Haddonfield’s annual Halloween Jamboree was nothing short of tradition, the mid-sized town throwing a lavish festival the Friday before the week of Halloween, something about being family friendly– as the mayor had said a few years back.

The event itself was always a hit, with college students flocking the scene from the nearby campus once the sun had fully set and the adults could come out and play. The festivities, as cheerful and decorative as they were, hid a much darker secret.

As Halloween approached, so did the threat of death.

As much as people tried to ignore it, no matter how close parents held their children, no matter the curfews or buddy systems– death always came to collect. A heavy exhale escaped you, thumb smudging the shadows of the sketched scene, darkening the edges– there, it almost looked real. Almost alive.

Gazing over the sketch of haunting figures parading down the sidewalk, something caught your eye. A frown caught on your lips, brows furrowing. Holding up the sketch to the darkened sky, you glanced upwards, comparing fiction from reality. A muddled shape etched into the background of the town square– had you meant to draw that?

A smudge… no, a figure, so faint it was nearly swallowed up by the charcoal shadows, standing just in front of the treeline– watching.

“You’re doing it again.” The sound nearly made you jump out of your skin. Whirling your head around, the sketchbook clattered onto the wooden bench, now forgotten. Tiffany leaned over your shoulder, brow cocked in amusement at your jumpy state. Rolling your eyes at her antics, you quickly scooped up the sketchbook, frustration bubbling in your stomach.

“Jesus Tiff, you scared the shit out of me–” Your gaze caught the shape of the charcoal pencil on the concrete, “–ugh, my pencil! You owe me a new one.” You huffed out, gingerly rolling the ruined utensil between your fingers. Tiffany mumbled out an apology while moving around the bench, the scent of cigarettes invading your nostrils as she collapsed next to you.

“Seriously babes, it’s almost Halloween– not some art critique.” Her nose scrunched at that, and you shoved her shoulder halfheartedly. She squealed at your assault, shoving you back before continuing. “...Can you put down the creepy sketches for one night? Jennifer and I skipped the callbacks afterparty to be here.” She pouted, those damn doe eyes burning into you, guilt gnawing in your stomach.

You sighed, tucking the sketchbook into your backpack. “I know, I know… I’m just–” “–Being a little weirdo like always?” Jennifer cut in, plopping into the open spot to your right on the bench. She grinned at you, pushing a beer bottle into your hand, the other gripped around another glass. You instantly took a swig, grimacing as the warm taste of stale beer invaded your senses.

“C’mon, this is like the last Friday we have together before rehearsals start! We have to do something fun.” She mused, Tiffany nodding along absentmindedly while she fiddled with her jeans. “This is fun!” you protested, but you couldn’t help but smile at them, knowing they had already won you over. Tiffany and Jennifer were your vices– they could convince you to do just about anything, no matter how much you disagreed with them. That’s what made your friendship so strong, they pushed you out of your comfort zone, and you kept them from going off the deep end.

Something about tonight, however, felt different.

The Halloween Jamboree was too loud, too bright, too crowded. The air buzzed with anticipation of an unnamed influence, something that made the hairs on the back of your neck stand up straight. Jennifer drained the last of her drink, tossing the bottle haphazardly behind her with a smirk. She straightened suddenly, a mischievous glint in her eyes as she looked you and Tiffany over.

“You know what we really need?” She questioned, and your stomach dropped a bit. The last time she uttered that phrase it resulted in you being banned from half the frats on campus after she stole the composite pictures from Lambda Chi Alpha. You chuckled slightly, the image of her drunkenly tackling a pledge like a linebacker with the picture cradled in her arms flashing in your mind.

Tiffany cocked a brow, apprehension coating her response, “What?” Jennifer flashed a wolfish grin, plucking the beer from your hand, ignoring your whines. She took a swig, contemplating her words before speaking, “–We need a real scare. I say we do something actually terrifying…”

She glanced at the costumed children in front of her, brows furrowing before she added, “-None of this kiddie haunted house bullshit.” Tiffany was instantly intrigued at the prospect, but you were less assured. “Like what?”, you questioned, yanking the beer bottle back into your hands and taking a sip.

Jennifer shrugged, but Tiffany’s eyes gleamed– an idea popping into her head and she grabbed your shoulder. “I mean… There is that old church just outside of town.” She mused, Jennifer quickly taking the bait. “That’s perfect! You’re a genius, Tiff.”

Your heart skipped a beat at the suggestion. The church.

You had heard the rumors, the stories. Some said it had been abandoned for decades after the fire ravaged the building, leaving the charred remains scattered along the forest floor to rot. Others said it never had been abandoned, the decaying steeple housing something much more sinister.

Whispers of the couple that was brutally murdered earlier this year quickly fluttered through your mind, their warped corpses draped over the altar. “Demon worshipers”, the sheriff had said, but you weren’t so sure. The church was your secret– having been obsessed with the dark ruins that seemed to swallow you up every time you walked through the doors. You had sketched it from memory countless times, the skeletal archways and dusty pews burned into your brain.

Something about it always called to you.

Jennifer’s grin only widened, and you fought to keep your expression neutral. “What do you think, scaredy cat?” She mocked, the beer turning sour in your mouth at the taunt. “–Think you can handle it?” You swallowed thickly, debating saying something. You wanted to say no, the idea of having your friends trample around your safe space making your stomach churn. ‘It’s not safe’, you wanted to plead, ‘–it’s dangerous’.

Instead, you found yourself pulling your backpack over your shoulders. “Let’s go.” You mumbled, causing an excited squeal to erupt from your friends, who were hot on your heel. You quickly finished the beer, tossing it into a stray trash can as you passed, a heavy sigh building in the back of your throat.

Three girls exploring a haunted church a few nights before Halloween… what’s the worst that could happen?

The church was always grim at night.

Like an icon to broken faith, it loomed over the treeline– the charred steeple cutting through the horizon like a knife. The rusted iron gate stood ajar, the hinge groaning as you pushed it further open, like a mouth leading into darkness. The wind howled in the distance, whipping through the shattered windows– making the building sound as if it were breathing.

You shivered against the cold, braving onwards. Leaves crunched under your boots as you walked, Tiffany and Jennifer following closely behind. Weaving through the asymmetrical headstones of the cemetery, you paused at the entrance of the church, Tiffany tripping over her feet as she glanced upwards. The wood of the heavy doors had deteriorated over time, moss and mushrooms sprouting from the ground upwards.

You leaned against the heavy door, pushing one open with a grunt. The wood gave way, the rusty hinges screaming as you opened the door. Stepping inside, the three of you gaped upwards, taking in your surroundings.

“I need a cigarette.” Jennifer mumbled, eyes trailing the stained glass depicting different saints and angels. The moonlight streamed through the gaping holes in the ceiling– the rafters in various stages of decay as your eyes adjusted to the lack of light. Sidestepping a fallen pew, you made your way forwards, navigating through the familiar maze of stone and wood.

The air was thick with rot and dust, hanging heavy around you like a weighted blanket. Your hand traced the ornate carvings of a confessional booth, the wood now splintered and covered in graffiti. A place once considered to be holy– now desolate and abandoned. Jennifer rammed into the overturned pew, obscenities flying from her mouth.

Ushering the duo over, you pulled them to the back of the church, the cracked marble of the altar glowing faintly under the moonlight. The air stilled here, a chill seeping into your bones as you stared forward. Tiffany straightened, swallowing thickly. “Is... is that where–?”

You nodded, the gruesome crime scene photos from the newspaper flashing in your mind. Jennifer, ever fearless, moved forward. Brushing her hand against the altar, she hopped up, legs swinging as she sat on the resting place of two unfortunate souls. Your stomach boiled at the disrespect, but you held your tongue. “Ya know…” She started, fishing out a cigarette from her pocket. Lighting it, she took a drag before continuing. “Some say they saw the devil before they died. That’s why the police never found their killer.” Tiffany shuddered at the statement, eyes catching a drop of dried blood hidden underneath the altar.

You rolled your eyes.

“Their friends were drunk. I mean…” You gestured around yourself to the decaying church, “-Who else comes to a church to play the Ouija board? They were seeing things.” Jennifer pushed off of the altar, heels clicking against the dusty floor as she took another drag. She exhaled, blowing the smoke into your face– your eyes stinging as a cough ripped from your throat.

You snatched the cigarette from her fingers, anger building.

“Whether you believe in it or not, go smoke outside. You’re being rude.” Jennifer’s brows furrowed, an angry pout building on her lips as she glowered at you. “Jeez, someone’s got their panties in a twist tonight.” She huffed out, taking the butt of the cigarette from your hands and moving towards the front door. “I’ll be a minute…” She called over her shoulder, eyes meeting yours with a twinge of irritation. “–Don’t wait up.” Her footsteps retreated outside, and

Tiffany sank into a wooden pew– trying to steel her nerves. Your fingers twitched, itching for your sketchbook. You wanted to capture the essence of the church, something about it so harrowing it stayed with you every time you left. The cracked altar, the rusted candelabras, the splintered organ shoved into the corner– it whispered to you, begging you to explore, to dive into the depths.

You glanced at the altar once more, trying to imagine the final moments of those who came before you.

The hiss of spray cans against stone, the clink of beer bottles and the smell of cigarette smoke. The whispers to a wooden board, the shrieks of excitement as the planchette moved. An unexpected visitor– a struggle, a piercing shout– then nothing. Was the violence in a place deemed sacred the reason for your obsession? Or was it something darker, a force calling you from the bowels of the church?

Did they pray to a god they didn't believe in as they were slaughtered, or did they know that they were forsaken? Your mind spun with the possibilities, fingers burning to sketch the outline of the saints etched into the wall. They had to have seen, they had to have known, yet nothing saved them… why?

A gurgled scream tore through the stale air, causing your spine to stiffen.

Your head whirled, eyes meeting the frantic Tiffany, who shot out of the pew. You both turned towards the noise, fear settling in the pit of your stomach. Jennifer. Your throat dried, heart pounding in your chest as you called out– a piece of you begging, pleading for a response. Nothing. The silence seemed to swallow you whole, your feet anchoring you in place. God, that scream– the sound seared into your brain as you gaped at the door.

Tiffany bolted towards the front door, feet skittering across the assortment of debris littering the floor. Your brain yelled at you to move, to run and follow Tiffany, but you were frozen in place. Stumbling forward, she reached the expanse of the open door, darting out momentarily. Your heart leaped within your chest, mouth opening to speak– but any semblance of words died on your tongue. You looked upwards. The iconography of forgotten saints glaring down at you in the haze of night, solemn faces weathered by time.

Is this how it felt to feel the wrath of God?

Tiffany rushed back inside, slamming the wooden door with a force so strong it made the church tremble. Deathly pale, she stumbled over the debris, collapsing in a heap a few feet from the doors. The smell of vomit filled the air, and you flinched. The sight of her– broken, trembling, driven half mad– snapped you from your trance. You whispered across the darkness, arms beckoning her towards you, but she remained rooted in place.

“What… What did you see?!” Tiffany choked on a sob, breath hitching. Snot ran down her face, and she whipped her face with her damp sleeve. “Tiffany–” Your voice hardened, urgency rising like bile in your throat. “–Where is Jennifer?” At the mention of her name, Tiffany went rigid. She shook her head violently, as if the words themselves would summon something terrible.

“She’s…”, Her fingers dug into the floorboards, clawing for something solid. “Oh god– she’s dead.”

The words hung in the air– and a piece of you begged that it was some kind of joke. But nothing about the trembling girl in front of you seemed staged, it was all terrifyingly real. You swallowed hard, straining your ears for any sound of movement. Adrenaline began to flood your senses, your heart feeling like it was going to burst from your chest.

The church was quiet– too quiet– the only sound coming from the wind whipping through the rafters.

The heavy door shuddered slightly as it was pushed open once more, the shriek of the hinges catching your attention. The open doorway was a gateway to the void, no matter how hard you squinted darkness met your vision. Hope rose within your chest, pushing your shaking legs forward– one step, two. Maybe Jennifer had gotten hurt, maybe Tiffany saw the blood and panicked, maybe– just maybe your mind was playing tricks on you.

A shadow passed through the threshold of the doorway, thick and oppressive.

Tiffany let out a pitiful whimper, shrinking further into the floor, refusing to look behind her and into the doorway. You squinted against the darkness, trying to make out the shape you swore you saw move into the entrance of the church.

The stale air in the church thickened, and you swallowed dryly, eyes tracing the doorway. A stream of moonlight broke through the battered steeple, cutting through the darkness– and then you saw him. That godforsaken pale mask you had only heard of in ghost stories, those hollow eyes that burned into your skull. Like death itself, the boogeyman of Haddonfield had come to pay his due.

Michael Myers.

A part of you knew, deep down that Jennifer wasn’t coming back. Whatever had made her scream had already decided her fate, and even worse– you were next.

The church seemed to tighten around you, the air growing suffocatingly thick. Your knees locked in place, fear crackling through your veins. You should have known better, that there was no salvation in a house of God– not here, not tonight. Michael stepped further into the church, breaching the line of sanctuary, and you knew– no prayer would save you now.

Tiffany tried to run, she really did– but nothing could keep her foot from catching on the edge of an upturned rock. She stumbled, a frantic yelp ripping from her throat as her twisted limb crumbled beneath her. Her fingers clawed at the floor, desperately trying to drag herself from the shadow looming over her. Gasping for air, she outstretched a hand– praying, begging for salvation.

Like a lamb sent to slaughter.

Your mouth went dry at the absolute irony of it all– hunted down in a revered sanctuary. Mentally you screamed at your legs to move, to give out, to do anything other than stand there and gape like a deer caught in headlights, but your feet remained rooted to the floor.

“God, please help me–” Tiffany sputtered out, calling out your name like a lifeline, tears streaming down her face as she writhed like an overturned bug. “... I don’t want to die–”. The pitiful words pounded in your skull, yet you couldn’t tear yourself away from the scene. Michael refused to stop, hand gripping the back of her hair and pulling her head upwards off the floor. Her eyes met yours, and the blood drained from your face.

The saints loomed overhead, their engraved expressions frozen in silent judgement, empty eyes watching, waiting. Their lips did not move to save her– for she was already damned.

The knife came down in a single, unceremonious slice, severing the fragile skin of her throat. Her prayer gurgled on her tongue, blood spilling over her hands as she clawed at her throat. Tiffany convulsed, her eyes bulging from her skull as she choked on her own blood before deteriorating to the dusty floor.

Silence fell over the church once more, and you felt like you couldn’t breathe. Your knees buckled beneath your weight, a dull pain stabbing into you as you collapsed. The stone needled through the denim of your jeans, and your hands trembled, barely supporting you. Michael moved onwards, a shadow cast by the hand of God– silent, inevitable.

His gaze burned into you, scorching your flesh as you stared, unable to look away. The sickening dribble of blood, a calculated step, two. And then– slowly– you lowered your head. Your fingers curled into fists as your head dipped, breaths coming out in frantic huffs as you knelt, body possessed by something ancient, something primal.

His overwhelming presence bore down on you, the outline of his boots barely visible under the curtain of hair pooling from your head, obstructing your view. Another deep sigh came from Michael– your judge, jury, and executioner– the knife, your penance, gripped tightly in his fist.

“Please,” the word slipped from your lips before you could stop yourself, voice hoarse, resolve shattered.

You couldn’t decipher what you were pleading for… the finality of your punishment– or deliverance? Your prayer echoed around the space, the weight of his gaze bearing down against you. The church walls stood, unmoving. The saints did not weep– the grounds did not split, swallowing you up into the depths of hell– just silence.

You remained frozen, head bowed to the floor like a deranged sign of reverence. You didn’t dare to raise your gaze, not when you could feel him standing over you, his presence practically suffocating. Michael did not move, motionless above you. You could have sworn you heard him breathing– slow, steady, somehow human– but everything else surrounding him embodied the unnatural. The moment seemed to stretch into eternity, time itself faltering around him, heavy and stifling.

Then, footsteps– slow and calculated.

You squeezed your eyes shut as they receded, the jostling slam of the wooden door swallowing his form into the night. The cold rushed through your lungs as you gasped for air, shuddering as you released a breath you didn’t realize you were holding in. Just as soon as he appeared, he was gone. For the first time since his untimely appearance, you forced your body to move– hands flattening against the floor as you shakily pushed yourself upwards.

Blood coated the soles of your boots as you stumbled towards the entrance of the church, and you forced yourself to look. Tiffany’s motionless body lay mere inches from your laces, lifeless eyes staring blankly at the vaulted ceiling– eerily mirroring the saints glaring down at you.

You knew Jennifer wasn’t going to be any better, another lost soul put in the wrong place, wrong time. Your fingers dug into the splintered wood of the door, and you pulled the door open, the frigid nighttime air biting into your skin.

They were dead, but you– you were alive. Your stomach lurched, a strangled sob ripping from your throat as you dry heaved against the doorway. Your body shivered, wracked with fear, with grief, and something much worse.

Something that burned in your chest like shame– something that felt like gratitude.

The funeral was a blur.

Jennifer’s family was a wreck, her mother sobbing openly as they lowered the casket into the ground. She clawed at the wooden box as if to drag her daughter back into the light– to life. Tiffany’s parents were more solemn, her father silently watching the scene unravel as he held his wife to his chest.

There’s a saying you read in a book once, that parents only feel true sorrow when they bury their children within their lifetime. Seeing it all now, however, the saying was all the more horrific. You stood at the back of the service, nails digging into the palms of your hands– leaving crescents in their wake. The questions from the officers interrogating you just days before still swirled in your head, voices muffled against the sobs of the funeral party.

We just wanted to explore, you had said. They ran– but I don’t know why I didn’t, too. You expected disbelief, the fragmented pieces of information you remembered painting a picture of the boogeyman you were sure had been blamed for many other crimes. In the end, the weight of two bodies– killed days before Halloween– seemed to be enough evidence that mirrored your claims.

You didn’t cry– you couldn’t, not when you had survived.

The guilt gnawed at you, clawing through your ribcage to the point where you felt like you couldn’t breathe. It was immeasurable, but there was something else growing within you– something darker. Michael had spared you, not due to mercy or luck, but from something you couldn’t quite place. He had watched you– stood over you with your life practically balanced between his fingers– and he walked away.

Your mind couldn’t let it go, replaying the moments like a broken record, trying but failing to analyze what could have been your saving grace.

You had stopped sleeping since that night.

Every time you closed your eyes, he would be there, towering over you– a silent threat. You dreamed of him, not as the brutal murderer that ripped the life from your friends, but as something far from human. He was always there, lurking in the back of your mind like a shadow. Throughout the restless nights, you would toss and turn, the events of that forsaken night playing in an endless loop.

The church. The knife. The screams. But most importantly, the haunting silence that followed.

The air always felt heavy during the night, as if you were being watched– the hair on the back of your neck standing straight up as you tried to force your bloodshot eyes shut. You tried everything to relieve the stress: chamomile tea, lavender lotion, weighted blankets, a noise machine. Yet the sweet solace of sleep never came, the only semblance of rest coming from the daydreams that followed your every waking moment.

You became withdrawn from school, the days bleeding together after the funeral into a mess of smeared memories. Your classmates assumed you were grieving the loss of your friends, the trauma uprooting your life in a way that left you… different. If only they knew the truth, the nightmares plaguing you at night, the guilt of it all, weighing down on you like a wet blanket.

He consumed your life, from the moment you dragged yourself out of bed to the second you shut your eyes. It was as if you missed him– the thought alone made you feel sick. But it was there, those dark thoughts crawling within your chest, feelings you could only describe as a fucked up gratitude. Michael had spared you, leaving behind nothing but unanswered questions.

And no matter how hard you tried to push the feelings down and snuff out the curiosity, you wanted to find out why.

The darkness manifested itself within your work. At first, you didn’t even notice– mindless doodles on your notes as the professor lectured in class, sketches charcoaled in your notebook during the nights you dreaded sleep. Somehow, he always managed to take form.

The curve of the blade of the knife, the angle of his shoulders, the hollow outline of his mask.

As your mind wandered, the page would fill with details you only could have imagined– the sharp curve of a nose, a widow’s peak of dark hair, steely eyes. Fingers would haphazardly turn the page, having a mind of their own as you zoned out. One page, then two, then three. By the time you looked down, snapping out of your haze, the paper was riddled with him.

Your paintings began to darken– landscapes draped with shadows, an outline of a figure in the distance at the focal point. Images of the icons within the church became anything but saintly– empty sockets sunken into withered heads, the sight ghastly morbid. Clay sculptures related to broken bodies filled with deep slashes, hands outstretched for any semblance of mercy.

During class critiques, even your professors noted the sudden change in your content– casting worried looks your way as their eyes scanned your work. “This feels… heavy. Haunted, almost.” You brushed the comments off, lying through gritted teeth. Some bullshit excuse on the study of trauma– yet you knew that it was further than the truth.

But when you returned to your room, you found it transformed into a gallery of him. The paintings, the sketches, the sculptures burning holes within you– calling to you, taunting you. He was everywhere, like a stain you couldn’t scrub away. And although you hated to admit it, a part of you knew you couldn’t if you tried.

You started to confess.

Not to a priest or a therapist– but to your bathroom mirror, the warped reflection in the glass being your only comfort. Your fingers would trace the cool surface, hushed whispers filling the dim space. “I should have died–”, breath fogging up the glass as your dark confession echoed against the tiled walls. Voice shaking, you added: “... with them.” They were sane, choosing to scream and run in order to try and beat death.

But you, you had knelt– and for that, you lived.

Your nails dug into your palms so hard it drew blood, the dull needling through your skin in a way that made your head spin– the pain buzzing through you like a draw of a cigarette. You barely recognized the individual that stared back at you: skin flushed, hairline beaded with sweat, hands clammy. But the most unnerving was the look in your bloodshot eyes, swimming with a darkness you couldn’t quite place.

It was wrong– falling into the abyss of sin, playing back the memories of that night with an almost obsessive admiration.

You should have moved on by now, gone to therapy, maybe started medication and begun to pick up the shattered pieces of your life. Instead, you stood in front of the bathroom mirror, chanting your own damnation like a prayer– fingers subconsciously tracing the shape of his mask against the glass. Images of you on your knees in the church flickered through your mind, and your chest tightened with something far more sinister than fear.

Something worse… something reverent.

You could still feel the weight of his gaze when he towered over you, encompassing you so thoroughly you could feel it in your soul. Tearing your gaze away from the mirror, the damp skin of your forehead pressed against the cool glass for comfort, mantras swirling in your head like a broken record player.

There is no salvation in a house of God.

You flicked your gaze to the bathroom door, an idea seeming a little too much like temptation sprouting within your mind. Maybe– just maybe– if not salvation, there was clarity found only in the place you had sunk to your knees all those nights ago. Pushing yourself away from the mirror, determination began to stir within your gut. You had to go back– to see.

You couldn’t run away from your demons, you had to confront them. Slipping into the night air, a chill settled within your bones, an unknown force spreading goosebumps across your skin. As you trudged through the dark, you thought back to the pivotal moment: the scrape of the stone against your knees, the sound of his ragged breaths, the crushing tension crackling in the air like wildfire. It had felt– holy, the sensation gnawing at your stomach, clawing into your throat in a way that made you question your own sanity.

No… not holy. But something dangerously close.

The church loomed over you, eerily identical to that night.

A sleeping beast– the rusted gate resembling a gaping mouth to the pits of hell, inviting you inside. You stepped through the threshold, the crunch of gravel the only noise as you approached the heavy doors. A part of you cursed your actions, the idea of coming back being nothing short than madness. You were chasing answers that were ghosts, fueled by trauma and grief– not by reasoning.

And yet, you pushed onwards, hands steeled against the heavy wood. In your peripheral a small pool of dried blood painted the stone walls of the church, hosting the last moments of your friend’s life. You refused to look, swallowing thickly as you finally pushed the door open. The church welcomed you with open arms, the pull so heavy you felt as if you were possessed.

Moonlight crept through the open ceiling, casting the interior in a ghostly haze. The church seemed frozen in time since your last visit– the cracked marble altar glaring back at you in an almost inviting manner. Your knees ache at the memory of kneeling there, a subconscious feeling of guilt burning against your throat, pulse quickening as you retraced your steps. Approaching the back of the church, the familiar scent of dust and rotting wood filled your nostrils– along with the undertone of something metallic.

Your jaw clenched at that, eyes wandering to the broken pew that resulted in Tiffany’s death. The stale air suddenly shifted, and then you felt it– the weight of a presence behind you. Your breath caught in your throat, yet you refused to turn, already knowing the source.

His boots scraped against the uneven stone, measured, calculated.

The sound sent an electric current down your spine, causing you to stiffen beneath his gaze, eyes trained forwards towards the altar. A small part of you had imagined this moment, the possibility of returning to the scene fueled by the same darkness invading your artwork, your life.

But the reality of him standing there, mere feet away from you was too much, consuming you whole. Your fingers twitched at your sides, forcing your body to move, to look– and there he was. Michael Myers stood behind the last row of pews, the moonlight casting his shadow across the church like death, untouched by time.

The mask that plagued your dreams caught the light, its hollow eyes drinking in your frozen form, the call of the void. The knife was gripped loosely in his hand, dangling at his side– a stark reminder of his sins. You should be terrified, but for reasons you couldn’t even begin to explain, you weren’t. Something buzzed against your skin like an unspoken prayer, and you found yourself speaking before you could stop yourself.

“I… I knew you would come back.”

Michael’s head tilted ever so slightly, silent at your words. He never spoke, you knew that much, but you felt his response– the action in itself almost mocking you. You could feel him, his presence so thick with tension it coiled around you like a snake, poised and ready to strike.

You swallowed thickly, body betraying you as your knees buckled under his gaze, and before you could stop yourself, you were sinking to the floor. The cool stone dug into your knees, the familiar sensation almost comforting against your skin. A trembling breath escaped you as you knelt before him, unable to do anything but watch.

Michael took a step forward, then another– the air thinning as he approached, boots halting inches from your knees. You craned your neck upwards, stomach churning as you gaped at the silent killer. He was so close you could feel his warmth, the scent of metal and something much more primal seeping into your senses. Your lips parted, but any semblance of begging died on your tongue.

Instead, you whispered a confession– one that would seal your fate.

“I haven’t stopped thinking about you.” You don’t know the things you do to me. There was a pause, a shift in the air as Michael looked down at you– studying you. The cold metal of the knife brushed your cheek, yet you did not flinch, your body rooted in place, entranced. You felt chosen– a sacrificial lamb that should have died all those nights ago, but somehow didn’t. But now here you were, offering yourself to him willingly.

The knife nicked your cheek, your teeth sinking into your bottom lip at the sting, the blade glinting in the moonlight. Your heart hammered in your chest, threatening to crawl out of your throat. Would he end it now and finish what he started? Or– your eyes shifted from the blade to that unholy mask– would he let you live? The decision was his alone, his cross to bear. The knife inched closer, pressing into the cut so suddenly a whimper bubbled in your throat, leaving you waiting– wanting.

The knife never strikes.

Instead, it traces along your cheek, the tip ghosting along your jaw. Your breathing is shallow, uneven puffs filling the cool air as the metal pressed ever so slightly into your skin– a warning. You tilt your head upwards, bearing your throat to him– your offering. The action causes the tension in the air to snap, you feel it in the way the air becomes too heavy you feel as if you were suffocating.

Michael doesn’t speak– he doesn’t have to, you know what he wants, what he has always wanted, and what the devil inside of you wants too.

Forgive her, for she knows not what she does.

Heat pools like hellfire in your stomach, and your tongue darts oh so subtly to lick your chapped lip. He moves at that, inevitable. A hand wraps around your throat, pulling you upwards with strength that seems far from human. Your hands clench into fists at your sides, fighting the urge to struggle against the touch as your toes scrape against the stone, begging for leverage.

His fingers wrap around your neck so forcibly your jaw groans from the pressure, thumb pressing against your hammering pulsepoint– beating for him. Your pulse flutters against his skin, throat bobbing as you try to breathe. You should be struggling, should be fighting, but something about the way his hold makes you feel owned ignites fire across your skin.

His hold softens ever so slightly, and you greedily gulp in a breath, thighs clenching as something sinful churns in your gut.

He leans down, mask scraping against your forehead as you drown in his gaze. The light catches, and a ghostly blue devours you, your blood turning to ice at the sight. His breath comes out in ragged huffs, escaping through the holes in his mask– washing over you like a baptism.

You were drowning in him, but it was anything but holy; it was something much worse.

You don’t know who moves first. All you know is that one moment you are gasping for breath in his hold, and the next he has his fist wrapped in your hair, dragging you towards the altar. Your scalp screams for relief under his hold, your legs struggling to root yourself as you are all but practically thrown on the altar. The marble is cold against your back, sinking through the thin material of your top– but not as cold as his touch.

His hand wraps around your throat once more, holding you in place against the altar as goosebumps erupt across your skin. The knife trails down your chest– and before you can protest, the blade is cutting through your top, slicing the flimsy material into shreds. Your nipples harden against the frigid air, chest heaving as you look helplessly upwards.

The tip of the knife traces over your left breast, tapping slightly against your pebbled nipple, causing a shudder to rip down your spine. The knife trails to the valley of your breasts before halting at the flesh above your heart, digging into the skin slightly. You grit your teeth at the sensation, a droplet of crimson rising to the surface from his ministrations.

It was so wrong– knowing you were mere inches from death, yet the fire licking at your stomach left you spiraling towards sin.

You clenched subconsciously, skin feeling suddenly too hot as the knife retreats from your skin. Thrown to the side, the knife clatters loudly against the marble, Michael’s hand cupping the abused mound roughly. His thumb dips into the blood, smearing it against your skin– tainting you. The hand around your throat squeezes teasingly, and your hips buck ever so slightly at the sensation.

Your breath stutters as he paws at your breasts, rolling the sensitive flesh beneath his fingers. You shudder, a whine building in your throat from the pressure, tears pricking your eyes at the needling pain. You had never felt this way before– the pain coating your skin in a way that left your head spinning, thighs clenching around nothing as you squirmed against his touch.

His fingers brush down your naval, crudely unbuttoning your jeans before ripping them and your panties down your legs, leaving you naked against the marble. Your breath stutters, spine aching against the hard surface as Michael slots himself between your parted thighs.

Your body is an offering– a sacrifice for the taking as your sins are laid bare.

Michael’s fingers dig into the fat of your ass, hauling you closer to the edge of the altar, pressing your flesh against the scratchy denim of his jumpsuit. Your jaw trembles as your clit scrapes against the jumpsuit, sending overstimulating sparks up your spine. You jolt at the contact, Michael brazing onwards, groping, prodding at you like an unwrapped gift.

His fiery touch was anything but gentle, his calloused fingers digging so hard against your skin you moaned weakly, wincing at the realization that bruises would be left in their wake. Michael let out a huff, seemingly pleased with your body laid out before him, hand retreating from you to unbutton his jumpsuit. Still held in place, you squirmed slightly, back screaming as you moved against the unpolished marble, chafing your skin.

Every movement resulted in an intoxicating pain that sent you reeling, your penance.

The worn stained glass cast a kaleidoscope of colors on Michael’s mask, the saints above watching in silence. Do the saints weep at your sin? Do they turn away? Your thoughts are torn away when the tip of his cock brushes against your folds.

You panic, trying to push yourself upwards, babbling nonsense with his hand around your throat. You aren’t ready, you don’t think it will fit– but Michael is undeterred. Jutting his hips forwards, his cockhead dips between your folds, stretching you uncomfortably. You realize that it’s pointless to reason with the devil– if he wants something, he takes it.

Your insides are screaming as Michael pushes onwards, driving into you inch by inch. The tears fall at that, stinging as they mingle with the blood on your cheek. You feel as if you are being split in two, thighs clenching so hard you worry you’ll snap. Michael’s hips meet yours, and you swear you can feel him in your throat.

Leaving you with no room to adjust, Michael bottoms out, snapping his hips forward and starting a brutal pace. All you can do is take it, fingers reaching out to clutch at the fabric of his jumpsuit, the only thing grounding you as his hips stutter forward. You gasp, the stretch feeling as if you were burning from the inside out, tits bouncing as your back scraps against the altar.

You openly sob now, the pace too intense, too rough– so full you feel as if there is nothing left but him. The denim of the jumpsuit brushes your clit again, sending an electrical current across your skin, tearing a broken moan from your throat.

You were melting, skin so hot that you already feel as if you are in the pits of hell.

Michael grunts, cock plunging into your gummy walls with such force your head spins. The sounds of your staccato gasps echo in the church, accompanied by the lewd squelch of your pussy sucking him in. If you were a better woman, you would have felt shame, yet the only thing you could feel was the ache between your thighs.

With every thrust, the signing pain began to subside, turning into something so intense your mouth gapes. You suck in a shuddering breath, eyes rolling as his tip hits that oh so sensitive spongy spot, causing your toes to curl. The hand around your neck tightens, his grip unrelenting as you gasp for air.

God, it's too much– your head spiraling from the shards of pain shooting up your back from the friction– yet you couldn’t do anything else but moan. “Michael–”, his name is a breathless plea, a wicked prayer as his weight sinks into you. Your body arches beneath him, a sinner consumed by rapture. A sheen of sweat coated your skin, dripping down the valley of your breasts.

Michael’s hips rolled against you like a man driven mad– but you knew better, he was no man.

The hand wrapped around your throat in a vice-like grip released, hips abruptly leaving yours as he pulled out, causing your pussy to flutter around air. Fingers digging into the fat of your hips, you were flipped as if you weighed nothing, tits crushed against the cool marble as you were pushed face down onto the altar.

Your hair was quickly bundled around his fist, forcibly arching you against him as he realigned himself to your leaking hole– pushing himself back inside with ease. Your tongue lolled from your lips at the sudden shift in position, Michael’s cock delving even deeper within you.

Pain shot through your already tender scalp, white sparks flying across your vision as you stared into the abyss of night laid out above you. Stars poked through the gaping hole of the church ceiling, the heavens glaring down at your sin– mocking you.

Oh God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

Your hips ground against the stone edge, your legs trembling under the weight of his brutal thrusts. You had long abandoned any semblance of sanity, openly weeping as you fell from grace, utterly corrupted by the way his hips rolled against your ass. You clawed at the altar-top, nails chipping from the force as Michael barred down fucking into you so roughly your breath caught in your lungs.

Heat pooled in the pit of your stomach, pussy fluttering as the tension built within you– a testament to your sin.

The action was anything but holy, the scent of sex practically dripping from your shaking form as you were bullied into from behind. The taste of metal invaded your mouth, teeth gnashing against the flesh of your cheek as a pitiful attempt to stifle your moans.

You were his offering– his to take, his to taint, and you were falling fast. Your stomach tightened, tension becoming unbearable as your spongy walls were all but abused. The knife was still there– lying beside your head, discarded as if it was no longer needed.

Then you realized– it wasn’t, he owned you now.

And with that, the heavens collided.

A scream tore from your throat as you came, relief flooding your body as your brain short-circuited, toes curling from the force. Michael fucked you through the orgasm, balls slapping against your clit in a way that left you in a sobbing, overstimulated mess. You clenched around him, his pace beginning to falter as Michael climbed towards his own release. Your knees gave out, your hair being the only anchor keeping you from collapsing.

Michael’s breaths came out in primal huffs, a low growl slipping as he came– thick ropes of cum filling you to the brim. You shuddered at the feeling, mind blank with nothing but the sensation of the shallow thrusts of Michael stilling against you, pushed to the hilt. You struggled to catch your breath, heart practically beating out of your chest as you went lip under his hold.

Michael pulled his softening cock from your folds, the sensation making you whine. Your lips fluttered at his retreat, cum spilling down your thighs as the void overtook you. Your hair was freed from his grasp, scalp tingling as you limply pressed your temple to the cool surface of the marble. His weight abruptly vanished, yet you were too fucked out to care.

For a moment, you didn’t dare move, skin damp with sweat– with sin.

Every inch of your skin burned, scrapes and bruises coating every surface, the corruption sinking into your soul. You were ruined– and yet you found yourself blindly reaching for him, fingers swiping air. Confusion wracked your form, and you weakly turned, fingers gripping the altar for support– but he was gone.

The ritual was complete, the offering devoured. You had given him everything: body, mind, soul– and now there was nothing left.

Your discarded clothes pooled at your feet, a soulless reminder of the events that had taken place. A raw, broken sound escaped your chest– a laugh bubbling past your sobs. This was your penance, your punishment for offering yourself so willingly to something that would destroy you.

Now, you were alone– utterly and completely at the mercy of God himself.

A shiver crawled down your spine at the thought, knowing he had left you once before, yet you had returned. So what was stopping you from doing it again? Your lips parted ever so slightly, a single prayer slipping past– not to God, but to him.

“Michael…” You knew there would be no response, only silence. But as you slowly gathered the ruined fabric at your feet, you knew deep down that he was listening. He was always listening. And now that you had offered yourself to him, he wouldn’t have to come for you; you would go to him.

Because there is no salvation in a house of God, only him– and he is the only one left to worship.

#horror smut #slasher smut #slasher x reader #slashers #reader insert #x reader #smut #x you smut #female reader #ghostiesnightmare #michael myers smut #michael myers x reader #michael myers #halloween franchise #halloween michael myers

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ghostiesnightmare · 5 months ago

Text

The Subject

Pairing: Michael Myers x Female Reader Summary: As a graduate student writing your dissertation on the enigma of Michael Meyers, you try to prove his acts of violence fulfill a dark, psychological need- a crude substitute for intimacy. When Myers resurfaces, your academic obsession drives you dangerously close to the darkness you have been researching. The deeper you delve, the clearer it becomes that you aren't just studying the monster; you're caught in his gaze. TW: DARK content, extreme gore, descriptions of a dead body, mutilation, murder, weapon play, copious amounts of blood, alcohol, foul language, stalking, non-con, nudity, violence, intense paranoia and fear, power imbalance, degradation, unprotected sex, restraints, rough sex, abuse, blood as lube, creampies, and more Word Count: 12,657 MDNI-NSFW A/N: This is incredibly dark, please read the TW's before continuing.

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Every child grows up hearing the story about the Boogeyman. What many consider to be an old-wives tale that serves to trick young children into obeying their parents, the reality of the situation can be much more sinister. Terrified at the prospect of being stolen out of their beds in the middle of the night, they learn to obey their parents, set the table, and have good manners. Haddonfield, however, is plagued by its very own boogeyman, those knowing the story refusing to even mention his name out of fear of summoning him and invoking his wrath. Michael Myers; a force that many can only describe as the essence of pure evil.

Still at large, Myers’ kill count only continues to soar after his untimely escape from the Smith’s Grove Sanitarium, leaving countless detectives baffled at his ability to evade law enforcement. The nature of his crimes, although gruesome, begs an unanswered question to his motives: Why? Was Michael Myers a forgotten member of society that snapped under the pressure of household stressors? Was he simply “born evil”? Or is there a deeper rooted cause for his bloodlust for violence? The seemingly intimate nature of the unspeakable crimes seem to point to a forgotten theory: What if Michael Myers was a sexual deviant, the thrill of the hunt better than any orgasm intercourse could provide?

You paused, leaning back from your desk riddled with papers, empty coffee cups, and almost illegible notes. Rubbing your eyes, a frustrated sigh huffed from your lips as you scanned the words again, the bold text of your introduction glaring back at you.

Something about that final sentence– it wasn’t right, not compelling enough to capture the intensity of your theory. Leaning forward, you deleted the sentence, fingers tapping away at the keyboard as you typed:

The undeniably intense nature of these crimes are marked with a chilling, hands-on approach, raising a disturbing possibility: for Michael Myers, the thrill of the kill transcends primal violence, serving as a perverse substitute for human connection.

Brows furrowed, you gnawed on your bottom lip. It was better– but not quite there. Grabbing a red pen, you glanced at your to-do list, the bullet points feeling a mile long as you jotted down: Fix Introduction– final sentence? Groaning slightly, you looked upwards, the words: Dissertation Defense: one month! staring back at you from a neon post-it note taped to the corner of your clunky macintosh computer.

Your chest tightened, anxiety spiking at the almost unending list of corrections, evidence gathering, and typing required in the next few weeks. Your pen clattered against the desk as stretched, joints popping from the pressure, a tired yawn escaping. You needed coffee– desperately.

Eyes shifting through the introduction for one last measure, you highlighted the final sentence as yet another reminder to tweak your work. Before you could finish, however, your swirling thoughts were crudely interrupted at the jolt of your door swinging open, accompanied by your roommate’s dramatic entrance.

Kimberly waltzed into the small bedroom, permed curls bouncing as she balanced a concerning amount of Chinese takeout containers. “Jesus, you need to open a window in here– it smells like a library.” She cringed, ruffling her nose as she hurriedly dumped the takeout containers on your floor.

You rolled your eyes at her theatrics, pushing away from the desk before plopping onto the shaggy carpet, unpacking the haul. “Says you, beaver lady, every time you come back from the lab you reek of pond water.” You teased, and she huffed.

“That’s so not true! And stop calling me that, once you read my totally rad argument, you’ll never look at them the same!” She defended, offended at your jab, sitting in front of you and grabbing a box of lo mein from the takeout pile.

You grinned at her antics, perfectly manicured hands struggling with the wooden chopsticks as she shoveled the noodles into her mouth. “Okay, okay fine– just stop calling me Hitchcock and I’ll call it even.” You joked, stomach growling as you grabbed your own pair of chopsticks, rummaging through the pile for your kung pao chicken.

Kimberly was not only your roommate, but best friend from highschool, with both of you deciding to apply to colleges together during your senior year. Now, almost six years later, you were joined at the hip while you worked towards your Masters Degrees.

Your mouth watered as the comforting taste of chicken and tangly vegetables invaded your senses, stomach growling as you devoured your meal. Kimberly shifted, lo mein sauce dripping down her chin.

“So… how’s the paper? I swear if I write anymore my brain will literally explode.” She pouted, glancing at the whirlwind of papers dotting almost every surface of your room. You shrugged, choking down another bite, chopsticks still gripped in your hands.

“It’s going well… I just feel like it's missing something. There hasn’t been a killing pinpointed to him in months, and I’m getting tired of reading over the same reports and crime scene photos–” “Ew, I’m eating. No gore, please.” Kimberly shuddered, and a tired chuckle escaped you at her squeamish nature.

She paused, chewing on her bottom lip before speaking again, the friendly atmosphere in the room hardening. “Do you… think he will be back?” She muttered, and your smile fell. Pondering, you set the container onto the carpet, wiping your hands on your bell bottomed jeans.

“Probably,” You voiced finally, “–why? Are you scared a big bad killer will come after you?” You mused, shoving her arm playfully, causing a startled squeak to escape from her. “Uh, duh. I don’t know how you aren’t terrified of Mr. Boogeyman.” She retorted, nose scrunching at the prospect of the masked psychopath.

“With my research, I’m sure he doesn’t want to be within 100 feet of me, scared I'll finally prove my theory.” You joked, falling backwards onto the floor and staring at the ceiling, food abandoned. “Ugh, I’m pooped. I feel like I could sleep for years.” You complained, joints stiff and mind heavy.

Kimberly slammed her plastic tupperware onto the floor, the noise jolting your gaze towards her as she stared at you with newfound conviction. “No can do, missy, we have to go out!” You groaned, pushing yourself upwards by your elbows.

The last possible thing that you needed was to be pressed up against other students at a dive bar drinking your night away, much rather preferring a hot cup of tea and a good night’s sleep. “I can’t, I have to wait for a call from the police station to get more files-” Kimberly let out an exasperated sigh at your statement, silencing you.

“C’mon… Halloween is a few days away and Fowl Play is hosting their annual costume party. I swear if you stay in this room any longer you’ll fade away. Mr. Slasher can wait.” Kimberly persisted, standing abruptly and turning to rummage through your closet, throwing random articles of clothing onto your bed as she searched for a costume.

You began to protest, but she cut you off. “I’ll buy your drinks,” She mused, voice full of mischief as she pulled a lace bra from the pile of clothing, holding it up to her chest and striking a lewd pose, causing a smile to break out on your face. “It’s late anyways, the detectives can call you in the morning… please?” She begged, those brown doe eyes pouting as she bargained with you. A defeated sigh escaped you, and you shuffled upwards, padding over to her and snatching your bra from her grasp.

“Two drinks,” You stated, fighting off another yawn, and she squealed in delight. “You’re the best, you know that? I promise it will be fun. Now go figure out a costume! We leave in ten minutes.”

Kimberly called over her shoulder, rushing to the door and heading to her room, the whirlwind of movement just as chaotic as when she arrived. The door slammed shut, and you grimaced, dropping the bra back onto the bed. Glancing back to your desk, you sighed, rubbing your temples.

Just a few hours, and then you would be back to work. What could possibly go wrong?

“What on earth are you dressed up as?” Kimberly questioned, voice barely audible over the thumping synth at Fowl Play. Tugging the thin strap up your shoulder, you glanced down at the now-ruined satin dress clinging to your skin. Pulling your costume together took sheer willpower and luck, finding a half used canister of fake blood from one of your Sociology projects hidden away in the kitchen cabinets.

“I’m Carrie White, duh.” You mimicked her iconic catchphrase, gesturing to the plastic crown on top of your head. She rolled her eyes, shoving a Tequila Sunrise into your hand. “Always so morbid, you creep.” She teased, tattered sleeve brushing against you as she showcased her zombified cheerleader costume.

Fowl Play was the place to be in Haddonfield, usually packed to the brim with college students throwing down shots under the illumination of neon lights after a long school day. Today was no different, a colorful glow cascading through the crowd decked out in ripped jeans, leg warmers, and hair teased to the ceiling.

Only a few days before Halloween, the theme did the holiday justice, with faux spider webs dripping from the ceiling, swaying under the breeze of the fog machine. The room was covered in a hazy atmosphere, blue lights making the plastic skeletons hanging from the rafters glow an eerie green. You eagerly sip on your drink, trying to block out the stench of sweat, cigarettes, and hairspray coating the room.

Kimberly sways her hips to the beat, head rocking as she downs her drink, grimacing at the strong taste of alcohol. “Ohmygod, I love this song!” An excited shriek escapes her, the sound of the Bee Gees’ Night Fever tearing through the speakers. Tugging you further onto the dancefloor, you squeeze past an intoxicated Frankenstein, who glowers at Kimberly’s antics.

Unphased, she pulls you across the floor, and you laugh at her easy going nature. Suckling on your straw, you quickly set your empty glass on the bar as you passed by, catching the eye of the bartender apologetically as you were dragged along. Finally reaching a suitable dancing place, Kimberly stopped, spinning you around as she settled into a groove, feet kicking and hands shaking.

Stomach warm from the alcohol, you threw your head back, surrendering to the music. The dance floor was littered with costume-clad classmates, all swaying to the beat in various stages of intoxication. Glancing at a cardboard cutout of Nosferatu, you shook to the beat, eyes darting over the crowd.

As much as you didn’t want to admit it, you needed the distraction.

You couldn’t remember the last time you went off campus for anything not school related, and you relished in the feeling of the stress washing away with every shake of your wrists. A vampire and mermaid tried to do the robot, causing Kimberly to burst into laughter, cheeks flushed from the alcohol, and you gripped her hands, spinning her.

The music cut out suddenly, causing the crowd to groan in annoyance. The DJ, perched behind a booth lined with cassette tapes and records, huffs into the microphone at the rude reaction. Kimberly grips your hands in excitement, realizing the votes on the costume contest were in.

“Alright, alright, I know you all have been waiting for this moment. The winner of this year’s annual Spooktacular Showoff is, drumroll please–” The sound of rumbling thundered around the room in anticipation, people stomping their feet while waiting for the news. You braced in anticipation, excitement coursing through your veins.

“ –Carrie White! Get on up here, you cool cat!” Your jaw dropped in shock, ears ringing as Kimberly screamed in excitement, practically shaking you like a ragdoll and dragging you to the DJ booth. Applause roared through the crowd, spare a few disheartened grumbles of disappointment. The DJ presents you with a purple wristband, the words Free Drinks sharpied onto the paper material.

You paled, embarrassed under the spotlight, hands clammy as you gripped your prize. The DJ turned to the crowd, microphone hissing as he spoke again. “Better luck next year, everyone! Now, who’s ready to boogie?” Shoving another cassette tape into the player, the speakers thrilled to life once more, and you were left to escort Kimberly to the bar, pushing through the sea of bodies in your way.

Kimberly leaned on the chipped wood of the high top counter, batting her eyes at the bartender before proudly pointing to your wristband. “Two Alabama Slammers please, extra strong.” She shouted over the music, and you grimaced at the high pitch. Kimberly quickly grabbed the glasses, winking at the bartender before turning to you.

“See, fun right?! Now we have to stay, it’s not every night you get free booze!” She mused, gulping down her drink, other hand gripping onto yours as well. You sighed, chuckling at her inebriated state. “How about some shots? It’s time to party!” She squealed, chugging the rest of her beverage before sipping on yours, not that you were complaining.

You cringed internally, quickly realizing you were responsible for her actions for the rest of the evening. It was going to be a long night…

After what seemed like hours of music and infinite drinks, you finally were able to pull a now very intoxicated Kimberly out of the bar, narrowly avoiding her elbow as you peeled her away from her sloppy makeout session with a football player. The cold air bit into your skin as you stepped outside, goosebumps spreading across your arms.

Slipping an arm around Kimberly to steady her swaying form, you shuffled down the sidewalk, eyes scanning for a cab. Behind you, the bass from the bar thumped faintly, your drunken counterpart bobbing her head to the beat, hiccuping mid-step. “Pshhh… that was– sooo much fun.” She slurred, breath reeking of vodka. You cringed at the smell, silently cursing yourself for not cutting her off sooner.

“Let’s get you to bed, yeah?” You muttered, trying to ignore her whining protests to go back to the bar. Sweat dotted your hairline as you pulled Kimberly along, the damp fabric of your dress sticking uncomfortably to your back. You were in desperate need of a hot shower and a good night’s sleep after a night like this, and you groaned at the thought of the mountain of work you had waiting for you upon your arrival.

Kimberly stumbled, tripping over a crack in the sidewalk, almost pulling you down with her. You steadied her, bracing against her dead weight as she babbled about the Halloween decorations lining the street. Glancing around your surroundings, you silently admired the quaint houses dotting the sidewalks, pumpkins and foliage adorning their porches.

“Heyyy look, it… it’s mister boogeyman….” She spewed out, grip tightening on your arm suddenly. Her words made your stomach drop. Following her gaze, you froze, Kimberly nearly bumping into you as your feet locked into place. A towering figure stood ahead on the sidewalk, clad in the unmistakable mechanic suit and white mask you had seen countless times during your studies. Your heart seized in your chest, details from case files and crime scene photos flashing through your mind, apprehension winding in your gut.

It’s just a prank, you reasoned with yourself, knowing the streets were full of replicas of the killer during the Halloween season. But as you stepped closer, unease churned in your gut. The figure stood perfectly still, like a statue, the faint flow of jack o’lanterns casting eerie shadows across his masked form. Kimberly laughed, sticking out her tongue at the male before you could stop her. “N-nice costume, creep.” She called, pointing at him.

Your nails dug into her wrist as you quickened your pace, keeping your gaze forward, though you couldn’t help but spare him a glance as you passed by.The void of the eye holes in the mask burned into you, your mouth instantly drying at the sight. “Sorry…” You squeaked out over your shoulder, hating the tremble in your voice. He didn’t move, but you could feel his gaze, heavy and chilling as you continued walking.

The headlights of a taxi cab crested over the hill, and you stopped abruptly, frantically waving your hand. Relief washed over you as the car squeaked to a halt in front of you. Throwing open the car door, you practically shoved Kimberly in, ignoring her drunken protests before climbing in behind her. The taxi driver glanced out the window, brows furrowing at the Michael Myers impersonator on the sidewalk.

“He with you?” You whipped your head around.

The masked man stood in the same spot as before, watching. Shaking your head quickly, you turned back to the driver. “No. Just drive, please.” He grumbled at your command, putting the car into gear and tearing away from the sidewalk.

Your gaze creeped to the back window, leaning against the glass as you watched the masked man fade into the distance behind you. Only when he disappeared from view did you relax, letting out a breath you didn't realize you were holding. Kimberly slouched against the seat, tracing her knee with her fingertips, mumbling to herself.

You could practically feel the disappointment wafting off of the taxi driver, but you didn’t care, wanting to get back to the safety of your room as soon as possible. The rest of the taxi ride went smoothly, the outline of your apartment building entering your vision after a short time.

Leaving the taxi driver a generous tip, you dragged Kimberly from the car bed and led her towards the building. Balancing Kimberly against you, you fumbled with your keys, pushing the door open and maneuvering her carefully up the flight of stairs, trying to avoid any safety hazards as you went. Hauling Kimberly into your shared apartment, you quickly dumped her onto her bed before rushing to grab her a glass of water.

By the time you returned, beverage in hand, a passed out Kimberly met your gaze, snores filling the room. Begrudgingly, you set the glass on her nightstand, pulling a blanket over her costume clad body before turning away, shutting the door behind you.

As the door shut, exhaustion hit you like a wave. Kicking off your shoes, you head to your room, skin itching for a hot shower. Ripping the tiara from your hair, your fingers scratched your scalp, a satisfied groan escaping you as you massaged your skin.

Picking up a sleep shirt and a pair of shorts, you shoved the pile of clothes Kimberly left on your bed onto the floor, mentally noting to pick up your room in the morning. You turned, arms full of clothing as you headed towards the hallway for the bathroom.

The phone rang, the shrill landline tearing through the silence, and your blood ran cold.

Snatching up the phone, you pressed it to your ear. Who calls this late at night? “Hello?” You grumbled, irritation seeping into your tone at the delay of your pursuit of a hot shower. “Detective Langley speaking.” A gruff voice answered. A rustle of papers sounded out through the telephone, noise grainy against your ear. “... Is this miss (l/n)?” Your pulse quickened.

“This is she.” “I know you’ve been working with Detective Harmon for months now,” Langley said abruptly, voice sharp with urgency and something else you couldn’t quite place. “If you were anyone else I wouldn’t be calling, but–” He paused, seemingly debating whether to continue. “... I have something better than case files for you. Can you be ready in ten minutes? I’ll have a cruiser parked at campus.” Another pause, this one more heavy.

“We think… He struck again.”

Blood pounded in your ears, shower forgotten as the words echoed in your mind. Excitement coursed through your veins as you dropped your pajamas onto the counter. “I’ll be ready in eight.”

Hair still damp from what was probably the fastest shower of your life, you shoved your keys into your bag, beelining towards the patrol car parked at the curb. Fumbling with the passenger door, you glanced at the officer inside, who you could only imagine was Detective Langley.

The older man sat in his seat, fingers gripping the steering wheel, dark eyes meeting your own. You clambered into the passenger seat, buckling your seatbelt before shutting the door. Detective Langley shifted the car into gear, pulling away from the curb and moving towards an unknown destination. He glanced at you expectantly, and you quickly pulled out your small voice recorder from the bag, items shuffling around as you pressed the record button.

“Log seventy eight. Thursday, October 29th, 1980. Time is–” You glanced at the dashboard for the time. “–Eleven forty-five.” Setting the device in your lap, you waited for the officer to speak, mind swirling with possibilities.

Adrenaline began to pump through your veins, heartbeat quickening as you were possibly being escorted to a live crime scene. After pestering detectives for months, attending multiple press conferences and participating in many ride-alongs, this could be your big break for new evidence. You would be experiencing everything first hand, the prospect sending your head spiraling.

Officer Langley shuffled uncomfortably at being recorded, pausing slightly before speaking. “Victim is a 19 year old babysitter. Distress call came in at eleven fifteen from the victim’s employers who arrived back from dinner to a silent house. The child she was caring for was unharmed, but–” He faltered, eyes flickering to your own before finishing “... but the victim was found dead on scene.” Your heart dropped at that, the reality of the situation quickly setting into place.

Someone was murdered, and you were going on scene.

“Suspect is still at large, with many indicators pointing towards Myers. Same MO, same timeline.” Langley finished, clearing his voice suddenly. You took that as your queue and pressed the pause button on your recorder, staring at him expectantly. “Look kid, this is nothing like the crime scene photos or briefs you’ve seen. This is an active crime scene, and there’s a few rules you have to follow.” Your spine straightens, and you wait for instruction.

Langley sighs, eyes steely as he cruised down the road. “You are a civilian, remember that. No touching, no pestering, and god no puking. You watch, take notes, and maybe ask some questions.” Your heart flutters, eyes trained forward as the telltale red and blue peeked over the horizon, illuminating the dashboard. “Thank you, Detective.” You whisper, nerves leaving you giddy as the car slowed, crime scene tape blocking the street. “Don’t mention it, kid. I’m doing this as a favor.” He said gruffly, and you didn’t question further.

Police cars lined the street, officers swarming the house as a terrified family stood in the front lawn. A press van idled against the curb, a newscaster speaking to the camera with the house in the background, trying to flag down an officer for questioning. You swallowed thickly, watching the chaos unfold in front of you.

Detective Langley parks the car, and you jolt out of the seat, grabbing your notebook and pen. Popping the trunk, the detective quickly pulled a blue vest over his chest, grabbing a bag before circling the car to the passenger side. An identical vest was shoved into your hands, and you quickly slipped it on.

Detective Langley moved towards the lawn, pulling the crime scene tape upwards and allowing you to slip underneath. As you stepped forward, a hand quickly grabbed your shoulder, halting you in place. “Remember, no touching. And for the love of god, no recording.” You nodded, hands gripping the notebook tighter.

The air felt heavy, tainted with the prospect of death. You meekly followed the detective in front of you, trying to ignore the puzzled looks of other officers brushing past you. Reaching the front porch, the flash of a camera within the house illuminated through the windows. A rush of officers moved through the front door, and Detective Langley pushed forward, stepping into the house. You ducked in behind him.

Immediately, the bag dropped to the floor, and he pulled the zipper open. Realization hit you like a wave, you were suiting up. Mimicking his movements, you quickly pulled booties onto your feet, covering your shoes. Slipping a plastic poncho over your head, the fabric crinkled as it settled around your knees. Detective Langley paused, fishing something out of the bag before handing it to you. A ponytail.

You quickly bunched your hair on top of your head, not wanting to interfere with the investigation. Pulling on a pair of sterile gloves, you straightened, covered head to toe in anti-evidence attractant. Detective Langley moved forwards, and you silently trudged after him, dwarfed in the billowy poncho and booties. As you walked, a foul odor hit your nose, causing your face to scrunch ever so slightly, brows furrowing at the smell.

The smell was metallic, mixed with an earthy scent that made your stomach flip. The scent of death, you thought, pushing past another officer before entering the living room of the house, trying to steel yourself as you braved onwards. Another flash blinded you momentarily, and you blinked.

The temperature dropped with every step you took, as if you were walking into a grave, goosebumps settling across your skin. Something horrible happened in the room ahead of you, and you glanced at the wall of the living room, stomach dropping at the bloodied handprint streaking against the yellow wallpaper.

Stepping into the kitchen, you froze, blood turning to ice. A few mere feet in front of you, was a body. The first thing you noticed were her eyes, open so wide with only one expression, the sight making you falter: terror. Her face was frozen in a moment of raw fear, mouth gaped open, eyes staring back into you, unmoving, unyielding. Her blue sundress was covered in blood, the crimson pooled around her and soaking into the tile below.

Skin deathly pale, covered in gashes, no doubt from a knife. You grimaced, glancing at her stomach, naval cavity torn open so feverishly you could see the yellow of her ribs, organs poking out of her, intestines spilling onto the floor. And the smell, a mix of blood and raw flesh so putrid the singular drink curdled within your stomach. You paled, head reeling as you gaped at the body, fingers gripping your notebook so tightly your knuckles turned white.

Officers moved around the body, unphased by the gruesome sight as they tried to collect evidence. You stood frozen in place, ears ringing as you imagined her final moments. A terrible struggle. A desperate attempt to escape. A knife raised in the air. A blood curdling scream. Then, silence. You squeezed your eyes shut, the imaginary scream rattling you to your bones.

The black and white photographs of the crime scenes you were used to were nothing compared to the live scene, the nature of it all leaving you feeling light headed. Detective Langley approached the body, and you weakly followed him, swallowing thickly. Crouching over the body, he glanced at you trying to avoid the pool of blood creeping towards your bootied feet.

“See this?” He gestured, finger extended above the body, tracing the laceration on her stomach. The closeness of her body was worse, you could practically feel the terror radiating off of her, final moments ingrained permanently into the house. You trailed his movements, trying to ignore the view of the ruptured liver engorged on the tile floor. “One laceration to open her up, then short, quick stabbings. That’s why her organs look like mush.” Langley muttered, and you grimaced at the crude words.

“A rage killing…” You said, mind flickering to the countless pictures you had seen in the past, frozen in time. The detective nodded, standing once more. “What do you think, kid? Your theory still make sense?” You faltered at his words, staring back at the mutilated body in front of you. Pausing, you exhaled sharply, pushing yourself into research mode.

Flipping through the pages of your notebook, your gaze met the detectives once more, emotion seeping from you as you got to work. “The MO is identical; babysitter around Halloween found in the wrong place, wrong time. Her wounds are strikingly similar to–” You flipped through another page, wracking your brain for other victims.

“–Bob Simms, who also had severe lacerations to his abdomen. This however… seems more personal. See the ligature mark around her left wrist?” You gestured to her arm, confidence quickly invading your senses, the buzz of gore falling from your mind. “He tied her up, and she escaped. He likes the chase, but when his victims defy him, he reacts poorly, losing control.” You paused, before muttering, “– Like an enraged lover.” Detective Langley pondered your explanation, nodding.

“I’m surprised. You know more than I expected.” Another blinding flash of the camera, and you glanced down at your notes, quickly flipping to a blank page to sketch the basic layout of the body, marking points of interest.

“What’s the civilian doing here?” An officer grumbled out, and Langley shot him a deathly glare.

“She’s with me, working to crack the case. What are you doing?” He bit out, and the younger officer paled, stammering out an apology before moving back to investigate. Turning back to you, Detective Langley huffed. “Take some time to jot down some notes, I have some paperwork to fill out. Good work, kid.” Brushing past you, Langley disappeared into the sea of officers, leaving you alone.

Thoughts whirled through your mind, and you stared at the body once more, lips pursing at the sight. The more you stared, the more confident you became in your theory, the hands-on approach towards the violent killing meaning only one thing:

Michael Myers was a predator.

A sexually deprived, anger driven force of nature that sought pleasure within his obsession for violence. The one thing he craved to invoke being the last thing his victims ever feel: terror.

Your mind clicked, and you scribbled the sentence down in your notebook, writing: introduction? before circling the passage. Tucking the notebook under your arm, you quickly slipped out of the suffocating house, desperate for fresh air. Stepping into the night, you peeled the poncho over your head, discarding it in a marked bin on the lawn.

Stripping the protective layers from your body, your breaths greedily drank in the fresh air, savoring the scent of pine and freshly mowed grass. Around you, the crime scene continued to bustle with life– flashing lights, murmured voices, the crunch of boots on gravel. Your gaze drifted past the chaos, drawn to the dark treeline sprouted behind the house. Dense shadows swallowed the foliage, faint outlines of pine branches drifting in the chill October breeze.

A shuffle in the distance caught your attention. You squinted, zeroing in on the movement. Settled in between two bushes, something shifted– a figure, still as stone, blending in against the trees. Your breath caught in your throat, panic gripping you as you gaped forward. Another patrol car rumbled down the street, the headlights cutting across the line of trees as it curved around the bend.

For a split second, the light caught something. A flash of white.

Your mind flickered back to the bar, to the masked man who stood motionless on the sidewalk. Horror churned in your gut, the realization slamming into you full force. It wasn’t a costume. It was real, it was him. Michael Myers; waiting, watching.

The sound of gurney wheels squeaked against the gravel, tearing your eyes from the scene. The body bag, black and heavy, was escorted by two officers to the waiting van, enticing you. It was only a second, your gaze shifting before moving back to the treeline, where the figure had been.

Your chest tightened as you stared at the bushes, the bushes empty. You scanned the treeline, eyes straining for any movement. He’s gone. Pulse quickening, you glanced down at your notebook, tucked in your grasp. Had you imagined it, the tension from the grizzly scene making you see things?

The flash of white, the outline of his silhouette against the treeline— it felt so real.

Detective Langley reappeared at your side, the sudden presence startling you. The older male chuckled at your jumpy state. “Crime scene jitters?” He mused, gruff voice teasing. You hesitated at the question, debating telling him of your discovery, but the words died on your tongue. “Yeah… I guess so.” You muttered, eyes still trained on the treeline. He patted your shoulder reassuringly, calling over another officer.

“Get her back to campus,” He ordered before turning back to you. “When the pictures are developed, I’ll send them your way. If you have any more ideas or theories, give me a call.” Digging into his pocket, he produced a card, his number written on it. You thanked him, taking the small piece of paper and tucking it into your notebook. Another officer led you to the cruiser you arrived in, and you shakily slid into the passenger seat, dumping your notebook into your bag.

The ride back to campus felt like a blur, the events of the past few hours burned into your skull. Exhaustion weighed down on you in a vice-like grip, but sleep never came, leaving you tossing and turning, mind going a million miles a minute.

Each time you closed your eyes, the image of terror on the butchered girl’s face stared back at you, sending bile rising in your throat. You stared at the ceiling, imagining the treeline. The rush of lights, the flash of movement. The white of his mask, watching silently.

You wondered if you would ever sleep again.

You tried to convince yourself that it was just stress, but something felt off. Your body ached from long nights of restless sleep, terrorized by vivid nightmares that jolted you awake, drenched in sweat and goosebumps covering every inch of skin. Images of the crime scene burned into your brain, the hollow eyes staring back at you in the woods.

Your room was a chaotic mess, papers, notebooks, maps, photos, and almost illegible handwriting covering every surface. The few days after the crime scene had sent you down a rabbit hole, with you spending every waking moment hunched over your desk, typing away at your computer screen. Each bump in the night, each shadow cast along the wall somehow traced back to him. Your masked killer invaded your life, even outside of your research. Walking back from the library one night, the streetlights cast unnatural shadows against the sidewalk, shifting under your gaze. The quiet was deafening, broken only by the patter of your footsteps in the late hour. But it was always there– the subtle noise of shuffling behind you, always watching. Always waiting. You had whirled around, scanning the darkness, seeing nothing.

Yet the feeling was always there, the sensation of being followed coating you like a second skin, creeping into your bones and sending your brain spiraling. You had picked up speed, terror gripping your chest, only relieving slightly when you reached your apartment, locking the door behind you. But as you turned to shut the curtains, your stomach dropped. Under the faint glow of the streetlight in your peripheral vision, a figure stood there, the white mask catching in the light.

But as soon as you shifted your gaze to the movement fully, it was gone.

The days began to blur together as you poured over your work, trying to settle the feeling of constant dread in your stomach. But no matter how fast you typed away at your dissertation, no matter how long you engrossed yourself into your research, the feeling remained.

Even Kimberly began to notice the shift in your behavior, cautiously leaving food at the foot of your door, begging you to relax, to take a break. But the dissertation had you in its hold, demanding you continue onwards, pushing you to the brink. As the deadline to your dissertation approached, so did the inexplicable things that began to haunt you.

Your door would slightly be open when you returned from class, ajar and leaving a crack of light into your room when you were certain you had locked it. Your papers would be shifted, unorganized chaos jolted as evidence would be stacked differently than when you had left it.

Pieces of information would be underlined or circled, even though you were sure you hadn’t touched them. It was always worse at night, faint creaks and heavy breathing seeming to come from outside your window, even from the second floor. As time passed, though, things began happening that you couldn’t chalk up to paranoia, something real.

You had been stewing in your room, shuffling through papers and editing your final draft of your dissertation when the phone rang. The shrill sound had startled you so badly you almost dropped your coffee mug, the liquid dangerously close to spilling from your mug. Thinking it was Detective Langley asking for progress, you had picked the phone off the receiver quickly, pressing it to your ear.

“Hello?” But there was no answer, heavy silence on the other line. You almost ended the call, confused, when you heard it. The breathing, rough and oppressive, was very same that you could practically feel pressing down your back during sleepless nights. “Who… Who is this?” Your voice had trembled, fingers gripping the phone like a lifeline as you strained for an answer.

The line went dead.

You slammed the phone on the receiver so hard the plastic had cracked, blind panic tearing through your chest. Kimberly’s words rang through your head from that fateful night, taunting you. I don’t know how you aren’t terrified of Mr. Boogeyman. But now, you knew. He was like a shape in the dark, a creature of the night feeding off your fear, growing bolder as your paranoia began to take hold.

And that was the most terrifying part of all.

The murders hadn’t stopped, either. Almost nightly, Detective Langley would summon you at ungodly hours, desperate for your input on another case. The bodies began to pile up, a mountain of evidence continuously being added to your work as your point was all but proven. The scenes became all the more violent, crimes of something you could only describe as passion rattled you to your bones, each victim becoming more mutilated, more disfigured.

The last crime scene had finally broken you, vomit spewing from you as you ran from the house, stomach twisting at the decapitated body of another unfortunate babysitter. Haddonfield was put under curfew, children were shuttled home in groups, and parents refused to let their teenage daughter babysit for others. But nothing could stop the carnage. You were spiraling, and fast. Tension began to build within you at your heightened stress, lack of sleep, and the deadline hanging over you like a death sentence.

The apartment door slammed shut behind Kimberly, rattling against the cheap metal frame so loudly you jumped. Lifting your head from the kitchenette table, you glared, bloodshot eyes worn from pouring over your notes. Kimberly dumped her book bag onto the floor at your feet, smushing a stack of papers that you gingerly grabbed off the floorboards.

“Jesus girl, you need to calm down. You look like you’ve seen a ghost.” Kimberly groaned, shrugging off her jacket before reaching into a cabinet, grabbing a mug and a handle of vodka before making herself a drink. You glanced behind you, staring out the window into the pitch black. “I saw him again,” you bit out, voice tight with nerves. “–He was right there, outside the window. Just standing there.” Kimberly rolled her eyes, a sharp laugh escaping her, although it sounded forced.

“Him? You mean Mr. Boogeyman? You have got to be kidding me.” She took a gulp of her drink, grimacing at the bitter taste before turning to you. “You’ve been obsessing over him for weeks, certain he’s ‘after you’”, she said, airquoting her words snarkily before adding, “–You’re just paranoid.”

You grit your teeth at her words.

“I’m not paranoid.” You snapped, practically snarling at her. “I know what I saw. He was there.” Kimberly sighed, worry settling into her frame as she smiled pitifully at you, as if you were insane. It made your blood boil. “Look, I get that you’re super into this whole true crime thing and want a shot at being Miss Detective, but you’re letting it get to you. I mean, really?”

She scoffed, throwing up her hands. “You think some infamous killer is stalking you because you want to prove that he’s a pervert? Do you hear how crazy that sounds?”You swear you see red. “I’m not crazy.” You seethe, stomach churning at the word.

Crazy– she thought you were crazy.

Kimberly sighed, brushing her hair out of her face before speaking, chewing at the bottom of her lip. “I’m sorry. It’s just– I’m worried about you. If it’s bothering you that much we can call campus security. Do you want some tea or something?” Her voice wobbled, and you rolled your eyes. Security wouldn’t stop him, if anything it would only make him more angry. You ignored her, turning your attention back to your work, going through highlighted passages and making changes.

The sound of glass shattering had your gaze shooting to Kimberly, whose mug was in pieces on the tile. “Damn it!” She cursed, dropping to her knees. You stood, rushing over to the paper towels before kneeling across from her. You padded at the liquid silently, tension thick between the two of you as you cleaned her mess. Kimberly slowly picked up the pieces of the mug, and you finally noticed her shaking hands.

The ear-splitting sound of your alarm clock jolted you from an uneasy night’s sleep. Groaning, you tore yourself away from the bundle of sheets, blindly slapping your hand down on the clock, silencing the noise. You yawned, rubbing your tired eyes as you stared at the clock. The glowing red numbers read 6:00AM. Your breathing hitched, nerves crackling in the air of your bedroom. Today was dissertation day. You sat frozen in your bed, anxiety weighing you down against the sheets.

Months of research, sleepless nights, crime scene tours, and the questioning of your sanity have led to this moment. You couldn’t tell if you were relieved or terrified, but you were too tired to care. Swinging your legs over the edge of the bed, you stretched, trying to shake the exhaustion that clung to your skin. Things will finally settle down after today.

They had to.

Creaking open your door slowly, you peeked into the kitchen. The smell of freshly brewed coffee wafted to your nostrils as you stepped into the shared space, however Kimberly’s usually boisterous presence was absent. You glanced at the counter, an array of empty bottles of liquor staring back at you, and you sighed. You hesitated outside her closed bedroom door, deciding against waking her to apologize for your behavior.

It looked like she had a long night. Opting to not start another fight, you grabbed a mug, pouring the liquid gold that you considered to be your lifeline into the cup, warmth seeping into your hands. You sank into a chair, pulling out your prepared stack of notecards, flipping through them absentmindedly as you drank.

After what felt like the longest hot shower of your life, you steeled yourself to your fate and began preparing for the day. The dissertation defense was scheduled at 11:00, and by 10:00 you were dressed in business professional– pressed shirt chafing against the material of your blazer. Fiddling with the tailored sleeve, you checked your appearance in the mirror for what seemed like the hundredth time, smoothing out your slacks nervously.

The overall look screamed professionalism and sophistication, though you spent at least 15 minutes deciding between heels or loafers. Sighing, you chose the heels, slipping them onto your feet for the extra mile. Running a hand through your hair, you grabbed your notecards, speech recorder, and a printed copy of your dissertation, taking one last look in the mirror.

“You can do this.” You breathed out, forcing a confident smile.

The walk to the campus building was brisk, heightened by the bundle of nerves churning in your stomach. Shivering against the October breeze, you pulled your blazer closer to your body, braving onwards. Passing students chatted happily, their carefree nature buzzing in the air as you brushed past, running possible scenarios through your head.

Muttering to yourself, you tried to pinpoint your key phrases as you walked, the telltale brick of the graduate student conservatory cresting the horizon. Pushing through the heavy wooden door, the smell of old books and cigarette smoke filled your nostrils, and you took a deep breath inwards. Approaching the small conference room, you tried to shake the nervous tremble in your voice, professionalism quickly overtaking your form.

Glancing into the conference room, a board of five suit clad figures discussed your work, each having meticulously read your dissertation in the previous days. Doctor Strigler, the head of the Sociology and Human Behavior department, relaxed in his swivel chair, waving you inside. Swallowing thickly, you entered the room, settling behind the oak podium and flipping through your notecards.

“Good morning, miss (l/n). Take a moment to prepare yourself, and then we can begin. After a standard presentation of your findings, you will be cross examined, followed by a final Q+A, and then you are free to wait outside until the decision is made.” Doctor Strigler smiled fondly, adjusting his spectacles. You nodded, palms sweaty as you pulled out your printed dissertation. Clearing your throat, you settled, pushing your nerves away before starting.

“Good morning gentlemen, it is my honor to present my findings on what we consider to be one of the most prolific, yet mysterious serial killers in our great state of Illinois–” Your voice trembled ever so slightly.

“–Michael Myers.”

For the next two hours, the room was a blur of academic rigor and prowess. You presented your findings on the masked killer with practiced confidence, taking the committee through multiple recorded pieces of evidence, showing crime scene photos, and more. Occasionally, questions interrupted your presentation, some easy while others required you to contemplate before responding.

During the cross examination period, you defended your points passionately, citing your mile-long list of sources and evidence. As you talked, the nerves melted away, replaced with a calculated sense of confidence that highlighted your almost obsessive nature towards your theory. After what felt like centuries, the committee called time, thanking you for your presentation and excusing themselves to deliberate.

You paced the hallway, wracking your brain for any mistakes you may have made in the heat of the moment, wringing your hands nervously.

The door to the conference room swung open, Doctor Strigler stepping into the hallway to wave you down. You halted your movements, almost skidding across the floor. This was it– the moment that decided your fate. You swear your heart was going to beat out of your chest, and you had the sudden urge to retch. The anticipation hung over you like a death sentence, and you steeled yourself, squaring your shoulders before approaching the older male.

Smiling warmly, he extended his hand towards you.“Congratulations, Doctor (l/n).” Tears instantly welled in your eyes, your body feeling a thousand times lighter, the unforeseen weight lifted from your shoulders. Your cheeks hurt from how wide you were smiling, and you quickly grabbed the Doctor’s hand, shaking it enthusiastically.

Stammering out your appreciation, you rushed back into the conference room, thanking each of the committee members and picking up your extensive collection of files scattered along the desk. Practically sprinting out of the room, you fought the urge to skip out of the building, arms full of paperwork, feedback, and your research materials.

The walk home felt surreal– the sun shining brighter, the birds chirping joyfully, and the breeze carrying a newfound lightness with it. You thought of all the ways you would celebrate with Kimberly after a sincere apology, bracing yourself to the possibility of spending the night at Fowl Play again. The thought alone made you smile, your pace increasing as you hurried home to break the good news.

By the time you reached your apartment, you were giddy with excitement, the afternoon beginning to fade into the evening with the October chill setting in. Practically bouncing up the stairs in the apartment building, you rushed into your bedroom, dumping the stack of papers onto your desk.

Kicking your heels off, you shrugged off your blazer, hanging it in the closet before heading back into the kitchen. “Kim-bear, I’m home! Come on out, there’s something I’m dying to tell you!” You half expected Kimberly to pounce on you at your words, squealing and shaking you like a ragdoll. Instead, silence was your only response, lingering heavily in the air.

Opening the overhead cupboards, you grabbed two wine flutes, the reality of your accomplishment sinking in. “I did it…” You whispered, setting them down carefully on the counter before turning to the fridge. The bottle of white wine glared back at you, unopened– you and Kimberly using it as a milestone market, not opening the bottle until one of you passed your respective dissertations. Digging through the cupboards for the wine opener, you called over your shoulder.

“Kimberly, you’ve been in there all day.” The telltale pop of the cork echoed around the kitchen, but still, there was no response from your roommate. Your frown deepened as you poured the sauvignon blanc into the glasses. “Look, I know I’ve been an ass recently,” you admitted, tone softening as you glanced at her closed door. “–But I did it, so we’re celebrating whether you like it or not!”

Nothing.

Setting down the bottle with a hollow thunk, you grabbed the glasses, padding over to her room. Although closed, the crack under the door flooded with light, signaling she was home. Irritation prickled at your skin, but the longer you waited, the more it was outweighed by unease. “Kim-bear?” You called again, knocking against the door, wine sloshing in the glass. You pressed your ear against the wood, straining for any noise.

No footsteps, no sound of her hushed voice, even the telltale noise of music playing non-stop on her vinyl player was absent. Just silence. Your palms grew clammy, glasses balanced in one hand as your fingers hesitantly brushed against the cool metal of the doorknob.

“Kimberly.” You urged, panic beginning to set in, voice barely above a whisper. You gritted your teeth, worried you’ll run into a very hungover roommate who was not in the mood to chat. “I’m coming in…” You warned, twisting the doorknob and pushing into the room.

The sight inside stopped you mid stride.

The bedroom was a mess– mirror smashed against the carpet, shards of glass covering almost every inch of the floor. Papers, photos, and cassette tapes were strewn across the room, desk chair overturned, legs shattered into splinters. And there, draped against her bed, was Kimberly.

At least, what was left of her.

Blood stained feathers coated her skin, pillows torn to shreds at her side. Shirt cut clean open, a nasty gash sliced through her midriff, ribs protruding from the open cavity of her chest. Her organs were on full display, liver ruptured and pressing against the gnarled entrails of her intestines. There was so much blood– pooling from the open carcass, staining the sheets in a deep scarlet, covering every surface within its reach. And the smell, the metallic scent of blood mixing with her open cavity in a way that made your stomach flip.

The wine glasses slipped from your fingers, shattering against the floorboards. Your stomach lurched at the gruesome sight, throat choking on a scream that refused to come. You dry heaved, bile rising to your throat as you suffocated on air, blind panic tearing through your skin. The world tilted around you, spinning as your knees wobbled, the sight of her glassy eyes staring straight into your soul. A gargled sob finally tore through your throat, and you slapped a hand over your mouth to stifle your cries, the horror of the scene sinking into you.

Blood dripped from the edge of her bed, winding down her limp leg before dripping onto the wooden floorboards in sickening plops. Your breathing hitched, suffocating you under the weight of realization. Her wounds were fresh– gaping, raw, and impossibly brutal. Her last breaths were probably moments before you walked in the door, a flash of horror sending white hot fear stabbing through your chest.

You had just missed the act, meaning her killer was still here.

A faint clatter came from behind you, the sound subtle– like the scrape of metal against wood. Your heart seized within your chest, the hairs on the back of your neck standing straight up. The all too familiar feeling of being watched settled over you like a wet blanket, heavy and suffocating. You turned slowly, worried about any sudden movement resulting in your certain demise.

Your gaze landed on the bathroom across the apartment, the doorway an ominous void of inky black. Your brain screamed at you to look away, to run, but you were frozen in place, legs bolted to the floor. The darkness seemed to shift, alive and writhing, a figure emerging from what you could only describe as hell.

First, the pale mask appeared– eerily blank, followed by the navy of the mechanic suit, fabric soaked with so much blood it looked black. His broad shoulders shook with the same ragged breaths that kept you awake so many nights before. He tilted his head just slightly, examining you. The light caught the knife clenched in his fist– your roommate’s blood still dripping from the blade, and your knees wobbled.

You leaned against the doorway, bare foot crunching on shards of broken glass, needles of pain slicing up your leg. But you couldn’t move– no matter how much you screamed at your legs to run, your body betrayed you as it remained rooted to the floor. The only thing you could do was stare– gaping at the legend you had spent the better part of a year dissecting, eyes tracing the inhumane shape of a man who had spent a lifetime dismantling lives.

Michael Myers had finally come for you, the devil paying his due.

Your brain wracked with silent begs of mercy, but all that escaped your lips were broken sobs. You knew nothing could save you now, any pleads of salvation useless against him. And as much as the terror short circuited your brain, you couldn’t deny the curiosity pooling within your stomach. The specimen you had been obsessively studying for what felt like a century stood just feet away, the probability of your theory practically proving itself as an image of Kimberly’s disfigured corpse flashed through your mind.

He took another harrowing step forward, and the inquisitiveness bolting you in place shattered, replaced by the primal urge to escape. Legs faltering, you propelled yourself forward, sprinting towards the door leading into the hallway. Pain shot up your legs as the glass embedded deeper within the flesh of your feet, but you refused to stop. Practically launching around the kitchen counter, you stumbled over your discarded heels, almost crashing into the wall. Breaths coming out in frantic puffs, your hand stretched towards the door, your only saving grace. Your voice finally returned, a scream so raw with emotion it rattled your ears. “HEL-”

A hand too large to be human clamped down around your mouth, yanking you backwards by your jaw.

Immediately, you dead weighted– pressing downwards as you clawed forwards, fingers desperately trying to reach for the door. Wailing screams pressed against the meaty palm, the noises almost completely silenced as you tried to wrench yourself from his grasp. Flailing your limbs, you struggled like your life depended on it, clamping your jaw down so hard into the palm of his hand that you drew blood.

Michael huffed, pulling you backwards with such force you lost your footing, bloodied soles of your feet slipping against the wood. Your back hit the hard expanse of his chest, blood– Kimberly’s blood– instantly soaking through your thin blouse and pressing into your skin. The blade of the knife was pushed against your throat, and you grimaced at the cool metal biting into your skin, the sharp edge slightly drawing blood.

The mantra you confidently spouted all those weeks ago echoed in your head, chiding: He likes the chase, but when his victims defy him, he reacts poorly, losing control.

You stilled at that, heart in your throat– life in the hands of your own personal boogeyman. Those horrid breaths wafted from his mask, fanning over the top of your head, ruffling your hair. He smelled like death– rather, he was death, dragging you into the depths of hell. Your research told you he liked fear, practically basking in it– but was it more than that? Was the gratification in the initial scare itself, or the control he asserted over his victims?

You squeezed your eyes shut, cursing your brain– constantly analyzing, dissecting. Your heels dug into the floorboards as he stepped backwards, head craning into his chest to try and alleviate the sting of the blade against your neck. He maneuvered you with ease, pulling you towards your bedroom.

A small part of you flushed, stomach dropping– your room.

Your research papers were still scattered across the desk, the walls coated in notes– like an obsessive stalker, about to be unveiled by the subject of your research. Every detail of his history, every violent act, every conspiracy documented with extensive detail. You mentally cringed in his hold, wanting nothing more than to curl into yourself from the embarrassment, the irony of it all.

Michael kicked your door, the wood splintering beneath his boots as he pulled you into the room. The pressure of the knife against your neck alleviated, the deadly weapon clattering against your desk, splattering droplets of blood across your printed dissertation. Hand still holding your mouth under his bruising grip, he pushed you into the desk.

Sparks flew across your vision– the world spinning as your skull cracked against the wood, disorientation rattling your brain. Your right temple felt like it was burning, a warm gush of blood dripping down your eyebrow, filling your eye with stinging pain. You moaned weakly, blinking as your dazed vision began to clear once more.

Vision settling, a crude sketch of the mask in the bushes that fateful night stared back at you, taunting you. You wanted to die– not from his knife, but from the mortifying realization that your work was on full display. Your hands were forced behind you, tearing you from the self-deprecating spiral, a hand pressing them against your back, holding you flat against the desk. Your hip bones dug into the edge painfully, breasts uncomfortably squashed beneath your weight as you wriggled against the hard surface.

You protested immediately, desperate noises sounding too lewd for comfort pressing against his palm. His hand released your jaw, teeth audibly clattering together as you begged, “Please, don’t look–” frantically before something was shoved into your mouth. You choked slightly, the taste of worn clothing coating your tongue. He gagged you– you realized, aching jaw throbbing.

The research you had worked tirelessly on shifted beneath you, and your eyes shot upwards to the collection of polaroids, crime scene photos, and police sketches of the very man holding you down. Your room looked like an obsessive shrine, theories connected with red twine pinned along the entire expanse of drywall.

You swallowed thickly, humiliation churning in your gut like a child caught stealing from the cookie jar. You weren’t his typical MO, but your research must have hit a nerve from the masked killer. He was going to kill you– you had delved too far within the rabbit hole, and now you would pay for it with your life.

You squeezed your eyes shut, heart hammering within your chest as an eerie sense of acceptance washed over you.

You half expected him to rip your heart from your chest, feasting on your flesh before he fled the scene, but you knew he would use that god forsaken knife. You knew him too well, the months of research proving just exactly how he would kill you– slowly, intimately.

The smallest voice inside of you revelled in the fact that you were right, aware all along just how deep he had fallen from grace. You braced yourself, expecting the blade to tear through you– instead, a torn paper was slammed down onto the table next to your head. You jolted from the sudden movement, quickly reading the crumpled paper.

Your eyes widened, breath faltering as you writhed against his grip, twisting your wrists so vigorously that you were certain your skin was rubbing raw. The scribbled line you had written for your final introduction glared back at you, a cruel reversal of your own research being used against you:

Michael Myers was a predator.

You weren’t just terrified– you were transfixed, the idea of him actually reading through your notes… was it a sign of acknowledgement? The hand that wasn’t pinning you to the desk brushed your hip, and your breathing hitched, silencing your analyzing thoughts. Cheek scraping along the wood of the desk, you met your captor’s gaze– peering into the void.

Fingers curled around the waistband of your slacks as he stared back at you, challenging you. The blood drained from your face as your slacks were tugged roughly down, catching at your knees. Goosebumps erupted along the exposed flesh, bare ass hanging off the edge of the desk– a harrowing realization tearing through you.

You weren’t just an unlucky researcher who got too close to the sun, you were prey– and the boogeyman finally came to collect. The rough pads of his fingers dug into the flesh of your thigh, kneading the skin so curtly your stomach somersaulted.

You should want to scream– to run, to pound your fists into his chest and claw at his skin– but all you could do was watch his exploratory movements. He was studying you, just as you had done towards him for the better part of a year, curiosity stilling you against his touch. This was so wrong– you were supposed to be dead by now, blood pouring from your skin as life drained from your eyes– not sprawled half naked over your own research.

Your thighs clenched as the scratchy material of the jumpsuit brushed against your skin, hips meeting his. Gaping at that devilish mask, you refused to avert your eyes– even as your panties were ripped away from your body you stood firm, entranced. Was he experimenting with you before ending your life, or was he finally, finally cracking under the pressure from the lack of intimacy? The beast of a man behind you jerked forward slightly, hips grinding against the fat of your ass– but you were too focused on your inner ramblings to care.

A ragged huff escaped the male hovering over you, breath fanning your back as realization slammed into you. He wasn’t doing this for him– he was doing this for you, giving you the concrete evidence you were missing in your theory.

The thought made your head spin, warmth pooling in your stomach– Michael had read your research, combed over the countless theories with meticulous detail, and now he knew the perfect way to make you pay for your pitiful investigation. The knife haphazardly draped against the dissertation was lifted, and a pang of fear stabbed into your chest.

Was this it? Were you going to be found half naked and covered in bloody handprints over your own research? You tried to track the weapon with your eyes, but Michael quickly ducked out of view behind you– leaving you in the dark.

A cool sensation fluttered over your left asscheek as a finger brushed over the skin, wet and slimy. You cringed at the feeling, trying to arch away from the mysterious liquid as it— your eyes widened— dripped down to your lower thigh. The finger trailed lower, through the crevice of your ass and coating your inner folds, smearing your skin with the liquid.

The telltale scent of iron invaded your nostrils as the thick fluid clung to your skin, sticking to your folds. Your stomach fluttered in betrayal at the action, the finger lazily dipping into your folds to smear more– your stomach tightened– blood onto your pussy. He was using your best friend’s blood to prepare you, to ruin you.

The thought made your lip quiver, your own juices mixing into a concoction of dizzying sin and lust. The air was thick with tension, a sense of anticipation and shame quickly washing over you. The object of your obsessions was teasing you, somewhere inside making the darker parts of your mind swoon.

Michael’s finger pushed inside of you, testing the waters. You shivered at the feeling, clamping your jaw shut so as to not expose your thoughts. The finger curled within you, and with it, your stomach flipped. Michael grunted, seemingly pleased with the warmth coming from your folds, and quickly withdrew his finger. The rustling of fabric tore you from the daze, and you strained your head above the desk– barely able to make out the monster of a man unbuttoning his mechanics suit in your peripheral.

Your breath hitched. This couldn’t be happening– it was all just a fucked up dream you were having, the obsessive nature of the killer finally manifesting itself in the darkest of ways.

Yet the warm press of bare hips against the fat of your ass was very much real, the outline of his cock nestled dangerously close to your blood tinted folds. You screwed your eyes shut, fuck you were not prepped enough for this– mentally or physically you couldnt decipher. A deep huff sounded out behind you, Michael’s patience wearing thin, and his cockhead caught against your folds as he pushed forwards– coating himself in your juices.

You whimpered as his free hand gripped your hip, blunt nails digging into your flesh while he steeled himself, inexperience radiating off of him as he finally aligned himself to your core. You tried to relax, a shuddered breath escaping you at the prospect that this was going to hurt, and badly. Your captive hands curled into fists, digging into your palms as your bit into your inner cheek for comfort. And without so much as a warning, Michael sunk inside of you.

A choked gasp spilled from your lips at the stretch, feeling as if you were being torn in two by the almost inhumane size. Tears welled in your eyes, teeth gritting against each other as Michael stuttered forward— inch by inch. Helplessly, you clenched around him, body screaming for relief, but your silent pleas went unanswered.

Cockhead dragging against your gummy walls, his tip dug mercilessly into your cervix, causing a flash of white-hot pain to erupt within you. Your teeth sunk into your bottom lip, drawing blood, and you sucked on the metallic taste for comfort. God, you felt like you were dying– stabbing pain encompassing your lower half as you tried to arch away from the onslaught.

Michael shuddered, hips stilling once he was fully submerged in your warmth. Tears streamed down your cheeks onto the wooden desk as relief washed over you, the burn of it all settling in the pit of your stomach. You were so full, stuffed to the brim to the point where the pressure was unbearable. Any solace of comfort was ripped away as he moved, pulling out quickly before slamming his back into you.

Black spots shot across your vision– a broken moan tearing from your throat as your cheek dug into the wood. The hand gripping your wrists tightened, your fingers tingling from the lack of blood flow as Michael settled into a deep, grueling pace. It was too much– too rough, the force of his thrusts causing the wood of the desk to clatter against the wall.

Papers crumpled beneath your weight as you were forcibly rocked to the movement, wood splintering into your cheek as you chafed against it. Your body barred down, staccato pants spilling from your mouth as you laid there and took him. If this had been anyone else, you would have been embarrassed at the way you could barely breathe, but with every sharp thrust you fell further from sanity.

He was ruining you, seemingly pushing so far you could feel it in your throat. Michael bottomed out suddenly, and you swore you saw stars, body spasming as he kissed your cervix. Any shame that you had been gripping onto seemed to vanish into thin air with every thrust, your hips pressing so hard against the wood you were sure there would be bruises.

Fuck it felt like you were being dragged into hell itself, the devil reincarnated destroying you for all others.

Sweat clung to your hairline, the room burning as Michael fucked into you like a man gone mad. Involuntary grunts, gasps, and moans bounced off the room, raw with emotion– and you finally realized they were coming from you. It was so wrong, so lewd to be tainted by the very person you had obsessed over, but it felt too good for you to care. The underside of his cock brushed against that oh so sensitive spot so sinfully your toes curled.

You were consumed with it– taboo and all, stomach tightening as Michael’s hips rocked into you.

Brows furrowing, you abandoned any semblance of control or consciousness, chasing the high that sprouted in your stomach. You felt like you were going to break, stomach fluttering at the sting of his sheer size. You were practically milking him, clenching down so hard you swore you could have heard him hiss from behind you. The hand that was gripping onto your hip like a lifeline tangled within your hair, yanking you upwards.

You gasped, pain needling your scalp as you arched to meet his demands. Refusing to let up, Michael continued his merciless pace, using your hair as an anchor against his thrusts. The cool material of his mask brushed against your shoulder, causing another gargled moan to seep from you at the action. You were a mess– button down clinging to your sweaty skin as you subconsciously angled your hips to accommodate the shift in position.

The outline of his cock was much more evident now, scraping against your walls so brutally your heart caught within your throat. Your body tensed, praying– begging to find release. Practically teetering on the edge, you wrenched your head from his grasp, turning to meet his gaze.

You just wanted to see him, the monster you had spent countless nights studying.

The hazy light of the bedroom caught his mask; the devil staring back at you. A sea of blue met yours, pupils so dilated they looked black. Those eyes– not the animalistic thrusts, not the churning of your insides– but those eyes threw you over the edge.

A guttural scream tore from your throat, body spasming as you came around his cock. Michael’s hips stuttered against your at the sudden shift, a deep groan invading your senses as you fell from grace. Your eyes rolled to the back, head hanging weakly as you gasped for air. Electricity jolted through you like a live wire, and you shuddered, fluttering around him. Michael huffed, composure quickly falling away as you clung to him like a lifeline, his own orgasm fast approaching.

He shoved you forwards once more, pressing you so hard into the desk you felt as if you were going to melt into the woods. He pushed forward– once, twice before finally, finally he finished. Hot, thick ropes of cum coated your insides, and you subconsciously fluttered at the feeling. Michael stilled, hips flush against the fat of your ass, cock throbbing as you both struggled to come down from the high.

You sank into the wood, exhaustion weighing you down, head still spinning from your orgasm. Michael slowly withdrew from your sputtering form, the void quickly overtaking you as he tucked himself back into his jumpsuit. The ache of his cock quickly overtook you, and you winced, fear beginning to settle into your stomach.

Michael had gotten what he had wanted– now what?

You squirmed against the hand still pinning you to the desk, babbling utter nonsense in the hopes it would spare your life. The knife that rested just inches from your face was lifted, and your eyes screwed shut, waiting for the final blow.

But it never came.

The hold on your wrists eased up, and you quickly fell backwards, knees weak and legs trembling. You quickly whipped your head around, trying to shield yourself from any attacks, but you were met with nothing. Your room was empty, door wide open as your personal boogeyman seemed to flee into the night. The knife was nowhere in sight, seemingly vanishing into the air. Your frantic gaze scanned your room for anything out of place, any secret hiding places he could have gone to, but everything was the same as you had left it this morning.

Your knees gave out at that, and you crumpled onto the shaggy carpet. Tears of relief, fear, shame– and something else you couldn’t quite place dripped down your face. You were alive, somehow spared. The events of the day quickly came crashing down: your dissertation, Michael, and– your eyes flicked to the open door once more– Kimberly. You pushed yourself upwards once more, knuckles gripping the desk as you rose to your feet. Wobbling slightly, a blank patch on your desk caught your attention, stopping you in your tracks.

Your printed dissertation– it was gone.

Your breathing hitched, stomach knotting at the sight. Somehow, you already knew where it had disappeared to. Lip quivering, you stumbled into the kitchen, mind still reeling. The sensation of him lingered, thick and heavy, the evidence of what he had done to you– with you still dripping down your thighs. You cringed at the feeling. Kimberly’s door remained open, and you sucked a breath through your teeth, refusing to look.

Hands fumbling for the receiver, you quickly punched in Detective Langley’s number, gripping the kitchen counter so hard your knuckles turned white. The line rang, and you shifted your gaze to the window. The sun had nearly vanished beneath the horizon, painting the sky in a crimson hue that made your skin prickle.

It was the same red that was smeared on your skin, the same red that pooled beneath Kimberly’s lifeless body– the color of blood.

The dial tone droned in your ear, and for a moment, everything blurred, the phone shaking in your hand as the horrifying truth gnawed at your stomach. You had spent months dissecting the mind of a killer, and he had finally come for you.

And yet, you were alive– untouched yet violated, unscathed yet completely undone. The phone continued to ring, and a thought flickered in your mind, wrapping around your heart like a vice. You had never been the observer, you had always been the subject.

And worst of all– he knew it too.

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