#ticci toby fanfic

[grvyrd-drms]

toby with a s/o who shares a similar trauma to him? if uncomfortable just ignore this rq!

toby rogers x fellow traumatized reader hcs

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A/N: oh no don't worry this is MY TIME TO SHINE THANKS DAD ‼️ i'm projecting a little bit on this one tbh

CW: gn!reader, abuse, borderline personality disorder, shit dads, trauma, ptsd, bullying, mental health issues, etc. just a sad post all around lmao.

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-starting this off by mentioning this is written by someone who had an abusive dad, was severally bullied and has mental disorders. hes literally like me tbh btw fr!!!!

-toby doesn't like to talk about it. his family. school. his mental disorders and tics. he acts like the only life he's ever lived was under the control of slenderman.

-if anything, you would be the one to open up first. if you're a secretive person, just imagine how toby is. you open up about your past, all of your issues etc. and he just.... kind of stares at you. it's uncomfortable at first, and you start to panic and think you overshared or said something triggering.

-then he just sighs, closes his eyes. he doesn't make eye contact with you, just kind of stares into the distance. he mutters a quiet "yeah... i get it. me too." and it's fucking DEPRESSING.

-theres a thick, but comfortable, silence that filled the room. of course you didn't tell him all the details, and he didn't tell you any, but the point got across to both of you that you've both been mistreated.

-from there on toby just kind of studies you. he notices some of your habits are the same as his, flinching at loud sounds or being uncomfortable when you're around angry men. you freeze up when you hear people whispering, and he finally starts to understand why you lock yourself in your room to have panic attacks.

-he's not the world's best therapist, but he's a good listener. he cares about you very much and tries to make it clear by awkwardly offering a shoulder to rest on when you're upset or having unpleasant flashbacks.

-toby's voice gets quiet and his movements become gentler when you're upset about something. he understands what it's like to get like this and knows how to help you (he tries, at least).

for a sprinkle of angst;

-of course he has issues too, and god forbid if you both are having a hard time. it'll be like hell on earth.

-for my bpd fellas, if you've ever dated a person who also has bpd, take that traumatic shit and multiply it by 100.

-toby's bpd is so bad and it's so painful to watch. he'll be freaking out, slamming himself into walls, hurting himself, yelling and crying. he'll split on you, being just a total dickhead.

-of course this will then domino affect, and it'll start making you feel like shit too. give it a few minutes after you freak out and storm off and toby will be crawling back like a pathetic mess. sobbing, begging for you to stay with him, to not leave. he "can't go through that again." his eyes are dark as he clings onto you, he can't stop apologizing. in his eyes, he just made the biggest mistake of his life. which is saying a lot.

-he wants to be good for you. he tries so hard.

[8-dermestid]

Hey, I'd like to request a Toby x Reader, with a story that covers the evolution of their relationship (from them meeting to becoming intimate lovers, with steamy moments, if you feel comfortable writing that kind of thing, of course) thks !

hi-hi-hi, i kind of took this idea for a bit of a joyride, i hope you enjoy this regardless of how i crashed it into a telephone pole

dirty laundry

relationships: ticci toby x reader

word count: 1.2k

links: available on ao3

warnings: scent kink, masturbation, canon-typical violence, i like my tobias like a kicked-in-the-head-dog, obsession, toby vomits

You’re fresh meat.

Toby creeps around behind you, trailing you through the non-Euclidean hallways, hyperbolic rooms that are an impossible fit within the actual shell of the manor from the outside. The few things you carried with you find homes in your new bedroom. All of your chores get done without noticing your second shadow.

Dinners, when it isn’t a fend-for-oneself type of night, have everyone in the mansion gather around a long table. Toby, whose name you learned from other people barking it at him as they shoved him aside, sits as far as he can from you (at one point, he shoved other people from their chairs to maintain his distance from you). Toby is starstruck by you, and he does not know why. When you get up to leave the table and wash up your plate, he watches you from the table, not looking away for a second.

Months and months go by, and after spending weeks trailing you and trying to understand why he’s so captivated, Toby finally gets the courage to speak to you. He’s quiet, wide-eyed, and on the verge of puking all over you, but he finally coughs up that he would like to be friends. You nod. You’re like an angel, a wonderful, merciful angel for underbelly scum like him.

After another few weeks of spending time together (where Toby wants to rip his skin off because he’s so excited to have a friend in this carved-out hole in hell), you have your first task, and Toby accompanies you. You’re chasing down a college-aged man, but he gets the bright idea of scrambling into his car and trying to run you down.

Toby pulls you away right before the hit-and-run, and you’re left panting in his too-tight grip, sweat rolling down your neck.

“Thanks.” You breathe. 

It is the only quiet thing that comes out of your mouth, and Toby wants someone to carve out a place in his brain so he can keep that remark inside of him forever. Abruptly, there is a distant crash. Your catch hit a telephone pole. You beat your victim until there are brains smattered across the steering wheel. It’s the best thing Toby has ever seen.

He fingers himself that night until his clit burns.

(Deep down, at this moment, he wants you to peel him apart with a scalpel and crawl inside him. Toby would let you pull his guts out for so much as a smile. If he could crawl inside of you, it would be such an honor. He wants to surround himself with you—living, breathing, knowing everything about you.)

He feels awful as hot bile pools in his gut when he digs through your dirty laundry, your literal dirty laundry. He pulls out the shirt you wore while you were running around chasing a kill the other night and working up a sweat, the cotton steeped in your delicious sweat and grime—dirt and blood and you, you, you, you, you, you—Toby smothers himself with your bloody, dirty shirt until he’s sobbing, curled over himself like a pill bug as he holds back vomit steaming in his throat when he climaxes the seventh time into his hand. He wants to stop—he knows you’re coming home soon—but Toby can’t help himself, even though it feels worse and worse with every motion, even though he wants to puke up your smell embedded into the lining of his intestines. 

He throws your shirt across the room and vomits into the corner until he curls into his bed and falls asleep.

✸ ⦻ ​​✸

The fragrances you wear start drying up faster than usual, and Toby stops smelling like Toby (not good, like body odor and rot). He starts using some of your hair-care products—he thinks you won’t notice, but you do. He smells like your shampoo now.

It was an accident—you forgot your fake ID and insurance in your room and had to come back for it (someone got too close but also thought they could outrun you with a car—too bad you can drive across state lines). You open the door and spot Toby hunched over your closet, panting like a dog as he digs through your laundry bin. He pulls your underwear from the pile and presses them to his nose, shuddering as he loses himself in fantasy. 

You’re such a voyeur as you watch Toby’s free hand loosen his belt, fingers already digging deep to satisfy some unending craving. God, he’s howling like a beaten dog as he tumbles to the floor (smacking his head against hardwood) as he ruts against his hand.

Toby is shaking so hard you’re afraid he’s going to make himself sick, and an intense climax leaves him writhing with his back against your bed frame. He scrambles to his feet and pulls for your pillow, straddling the damn thing as he sobs into himself with a disgusted howl about it.

Just as he pulls his pants down to his ankles with a scrambled hurry so he can begin humping your pillow, Toby spots you in the doorway and freezes like you have a gun pointed between his eyes. He looks at you like a dog on the euthanasia table—or Old Yeller staring down the barrel of a gun. His diaphragm hiccups, tears roll down his cheeks thick and heavy. He’s an ugly crier—snot-nosed and loud and red-eyed until he’s dizzy—Toby pushes his hands into his sockets and scrapes his gloved palms over his eyes. He grabs a Swiss army knife to try and pull together some pathetic apology that someone as heavenly as you deserves.

He opens the blade, digging his nails between metal bits and bobs to pull out the knife, then he pushes it into your hand and then pulls your knife-wielding hands toward his belly.

“Y-You can,” Toby hiccups, sniffling as tears carve deep lines down his face, “---If you wanna. You can. I would want to if I was you.”

He keeps trying to pull your hand toward him, now trying to get you to carve out his vulva. You yank back the knife hard, losing your grip as it collides with a far wall.

He sputters and tries to cover himself (he did not think to yank his pants over his bumpy hips when he finally caught you) while trying not to puke in front of you.

“I… I’m not going to do that.”

He scrambles and tries to kick you off, dragging himself across the floor to grab the knife to try again. He begs and pleads for you to do it. 

“No.” You say so flatly that he knows you mean it, and that kills him.

You keep him pinned to the floor until he quits. Toby is sobbing into his sleeve when you finally get off of him. He’s gross, he says, Gross and nasty, and he’s not quite sure why you didn’t put him down.

You don’t know why. 

But, you start, if he likes you that much, he can keep the shirt—if he stops using up all your body wash. Toby sits in front of you like an obedient hound. He inhales your smell from the shirt—he’d give up cigarettes and do this for the rest of his life if he could.

Maybe one day, Toby will finally get your scent from its source. Maybe one day.

[pyrovverse]

FOREST FIRE .

CW: Abuse, violence

Tobias Rogers was not a good person by any means. A problem child from birth, he would prove to be too much for his mother, Connie Rogers, to handle. She never knew what to do with him. On the other hand, his father, Dan Rogers, was only fuel for the forest fire the boy would become.

For years Toby and his elder sister, Lyra, would fall victim to brutality and instability at the hands of their father who would begin to lose himself to alcohol. The violence that the boy witnessed enveloped his developing brain as he only began to do what he saw, oftentimes throwing aggressive temper tantrums. These fits would cause a tense relationship between him and his sister in their early childhood.

With Lyra being the eldest, Connie had far more expectations for her daughter unlike with her son. This led to Lyra growing out of her conduct issues, and Toby growing into them. While his sister matured and became a decent girl with friends and good grades, Toby would on the other hand fall victim to his fathers image. With his father being a strict man who desired complete control over his family, Toby and Dan often clashed. And the two men had bullets in their teeth, creating a battlefield of a home. The dignity being brutally stripped from Toby only led to him attempting to compensate.

He would repeatedly be pulled out of public school due to continuous fights with the other kids, who would ruthlessly bully the boy due to his strange tics and demeanour. Being unsocialized and isolated, Toby found himself intruding on others boundaries, or rather not having a care for them in the first place. He did and said whatever he wanted, if anybody tried to tell him what to do, they would immediately be struck down. Nobody but himself was in control of his life, and in his life he was in power.

Toby was a callous, vulgar, and loud-mouthed boy who had a sadistic streak. He never fit in anywhere, his wild eyes and unkempt appearance made him stick out like a sore, eerie thumb. The other kids his age would pick up that he wasn’t quite like them, he was antisocial and strange. He had a dark sense of humour and would make morbid jokes, even laughing at others pain. And his macabre fascination with death and destruction was the cherry on top for Toby’s bad reputation.

Obnoxious as he was, Toby had a way of making his way in the world. The boy was crafty and eccentric, blazing through life and leaving behind nothing but char everywhere that he went. The fire within him would carry on throughout his life, never expiring, even when he was brought to his knees.

[necroromantics]

🧺 — Laundry And Taxes

chapter 16. // (masterlist)

The loud blaring scream from the old TV danced throughout the small living room of Nina’s apartment as the screen played a classic slasher film. Junk food and nail polish sprawled out on the hardwood floor beside the two girls as Natalie firmly gripped Nina’s hand in hers, applying another steady stroke of pink paint onto her nails. Only the glow from the TV screen, and the dim light from the lamp standing tall next to the couch, illuminated the dark apartment which had long been overtaken by the midnight hour.

Perching the brush in between her fingers, Natalie carefully ran the paint over Nina’s nail one last time, before leaning back and examining her handiwork. She watched as the girl blew over her freshly polished nails, as she beamed with excitement as she spread out her hands.

Natalie fought back a smile at the enthusiasm, and brought herself to her feet, stretching the late-night tiredness out of her overworked limbs.

“Gonna go out for a smoke. You coming?”

As her nails finished drying, Nina nodded, and jumped to her feet as well, and followed the tall girl over to the front door, grabbing her leather jacket as Natalie grabbed her coat.

The springtime weather outside had been warmer than other nights, with only the occasional chilly breeze rushing past the two girls standing on the front step of Nina’s apartment building. The downtown streets were consumed by the darkness, only the orange overhead glow of the flickering street lights reflected off of the wet roads, glistening in the little remaining snow that hid in the shadowy cracks and crevices between buildings. Natalie held her cigarette between her fingers, with her jacket draped over her pajama top. She stared out at the world around her, watching cars drive past, splashing the dirty water of the melting ice, the sound of the engine roaring. Taking a deep inhale of smoke, pressing her lips onto her cigarette as she thought to herself for a moment, she thought the busy nightlife of the moment was almost peaceful.

Nina sat herself down onto the cement step, arms crossed over her knees, and took a deep breath in. It was a quiet night, only the occasional car or pedestrian passed by. The stars were brighter than usual, mingling around the waning moon in the abyss skies.

Natalie glanced down at the girl, and took a seat next to her. The two girls sat in silence for a moment, letting the world move past them.

“So what's going on with you and Toby?” Nina asked, turning her head to look at Natalie, who looked back at her.

“What about us?”

“Like are you two a thing or…?”

“We’re just friends,” Natalie said, tapping the building ash off of her cigarette.

“Whaat! You two are so cute together though,” Nina continued to tease as the other rolled her eyes.

“I don’t think he even knows what he wants.”

“Well what do you want?”

Natalie took another long drag from her smoke as a drunken group stumbled down the sidewalk, past the pair, and down the street, laughing and chatting amongst themselves. Another car drove past, the headlights reflecting off of the water collecting on the roads.

“I don’t know, just a quiet life I guess. I know Toby wants to go back to how everything was, but I don’t,” she sighed as she stared down at her burning cigarette, “I’d rather have a good life than have him.”

Nina stayed quiet for a moment, looking at the girl who looked down at her feet, with time and tiredness tracing her freckled face, her messy unwashed hair tangling itself over her shoulders. She was strong, made to be tougher than most girls her age. She was tall, she took up space without restraint. She was bold. Nina eyed the way Natalie’s brow furrowed, with disgust, or frustration, or shame. She watched as Natalie took her last deep breath in of smoke, and flicked the finished cigarette to the ground, inhaling life into her dazed body as she shook herself out of her own thoughts and back into the moment.

“But whatever, that doesn’t matter.”

“That’s like, really similar to how I felt with Jeff,” Nina said, “All I really want is to have a good life but how can I even achieve that if I’m just like, all alone, you know?”

“It’s better to be alone than with someone who makes you feel like shit, Nina.”

“I guess so. But I don’t want to live my life alone like there’s got to be something about me he can love, right? It doesn’t even matter anymore though, it’s not like he’s here,” She ran her hands over her ponytail, laughing sadly at herself.

“You don’t need to waste your time on someone who doesn’t appreciate you. Jeff was a dickhead to you anyways.”

“I know, I know. It’s just that even if he was a dickhead, I wish things were different.”

“Yeah, I know that feeling,” Natalie muttered, groaning softly as she stood up, tailbone sore from the hard cement, “This conversation is getting too deep, let’s go inside.”

Natalie sat down on the couch beside Nina who buried herself under the covers and stretched out her legs. She laid back into the seat and placed her arms over Nina’s legs, watching the rest of the film playing out on the old TV, reaching for the remote to turn the volume down. When Natalie glanced over to the younger girl, she noticed Nina had fallen fast asleep, breathing softly as her chest gently raised and fell. She looked peaceful.

Natalie turned back over to watch the movie, the ambience of the world around her harmonizing with the suspense of the final scare before the credits rolled. She loved horror movies, how they never really had a happy ending. She thought it was most realistic how the main character fought so hard to survive, maybe even killed the killer, but could never truly be free from everything that had happened. The violence, the blood, being stripped from everything. Natalie thought that was what made horror movies so realistically gruesome. That she had a morbid understanding that no one else seemed to have. The only thing they didn’t get right, she thought, was that when the main character was the last one standing, there was never an annoying idiot in their life to insist he wanted to stand with them. Natalie had survived her own slasher film, the final girl, and the final asshole who didn’t understand personal space. When you survive a horror movie, she thought to herself again, you spend the rest of your life trying to make sure a sequel doesn’t happen. And Natalie’s mistake was befriending a serial killer.

As she watched the credit scene play alongside some suspenseful music, the girl turned the TV off with the remote. For a moment, she stared at her reflection bouncing off of the black screen, as if she was trapped in a void. She saw the kitchen lights from behind her shine over her in the reflection as well, and when the girl leaned her body away, it seemed the light seemed to follow. Natalie sighed and leaned back into the couch, staring up at the ceiling, the world quiet around her, the weight of Nina’s legs remaining still on her lap. She thought about the most dreadful things; she thought about Toby, the boy she considered her best friend.

She had never met anyone who had so closely resembled the sun. If she looked at him for too long, her eyes would burn. He was Icarus, and scorched wings. Teeth bared to the world as he fell. She thought back to a newspaper article she read about how when the sun dies, humans wouldn't know until eight minutes later. Natalie made it a point to stay eight minutes longer with him at any chance she could. She wanted to be there when his light went out.

The girl shook off her thoughts, and readjusted herself into a more comfortable position, before closing her eyes. She listened to the softly breathing girl draped across the couch, the occasional car passing, the creaking of the old apartment settling. . She listened to the sound of the clock on the wall ticking. Natalie listened to the world live on beyond her, and wondered how quiet it would be when the sun died. Her body fell heavy, breathing shallow, before the girl finally drifted off to sleep.

The next morning, Natalie stretched the tiredness out from her slender limbs as she walked through the crisp warm countryside. The snow had begun to melt, dead grass from under the white blankets peaked out. Birds had begun to sing again, the subtle heat spread over her body as the girl made her way down the gravel roads. She dragged herself up the front porch steps, and into the house. Natalie listened as she heard the muffled TV playing from the livingroom, which meant Toby must have been home. Last time they talked, they had another argument over her unfavorable customers at the bar.

She shuffled past the living room, and into the kitchen, where the early morning sun shined past the windowsill, the white paint chipping. The old floorboards creaked under her sluggish steps as she turned on the coffee machine and went to grab her mug from the cupboard.

“Hey, how was the sleepover?” Toby asked from behind the girl, standing idly in the doorway.

“Where’s my mug?”

“What?”

“My coffee mug. Where is it?” Natalie closed the cupboard, and turned to face the boy, who always looked a little bit guilty of something.

“I accidentally dropped it last night, and-and it broke.”

“Are you kidding me?”

Toby stood silently for a minute, feeling the rage seeping from the girl across the kitchen.

“It’s just a fucking cup Nat, why are you mad?”

“‘Cause I told you to not touch my shit, Toby. You just don’t fuckin’ listen,” Natalie said, raising her voice as she pressed her hands together, trying to put a leash on her temper.

“Why the fuck do I gotta listen to you? You bitch me out over a fucking cup, I said it was an accident,” Toby raised his voice back, not quite willing to put his own leash on.

“Maybe have some respect for me and my things and we wouldn’t have this problem.”

“Well maybe I just don’t respect stupid bitches, hows that sound?”

“Don’t call me a bitch, Toby, I swear to God.”

“Don’t act like a bitch then.”

“You’re fuckin’ unbelieveable” Natalie shouted, slamming her hands on the countertop before pushing past Toby, and out onto the front porch, closing the door hard behind her.

She dug a cigarette out of her pack, quickly lighting it, and closing her eyes as she inhaled. She felt the smoke go to her head, drowning out her racing thoughts, taking her teeth off of her tongue. Natalie let out a deep breath as she pressed her back to the wall, and squinted her eyes at the bright blue skies that draped over the rolling green fields.

The front door slowly creaked open, and Toby stepped out onto the porch beside the girl who refused to look at him.

“You should learn how to leave people alone,” she muttered as she continued to look off at the farmland ahead. Anywhere but him.

“You should learn to be less of a bitch.”

Natalie scoffed as she raised the cigarette to her lips once again, her free arm draped around her side, squeezing herself. Toby quietly stood by her, tapping his thumb onto his other hand and tried not to bite the inside of his cheek too hard.

“You know, I-I can just buy you a new mug,” he said softly, tripping over the words he forced out past his gnashing tongue, “I didn’t know you’d get so mad about it. I swear it was just an accident.”

“Don’t worry about it, it doesn’t matter.”

The two stood in silence under the sun, listening to the passing breeze, and occasional birdsong. Natalie sighed to herself as she put out her cigarette, and nudged the boy’s arm with her own.

“Nina was telling me about this dumb frat party or something. She invited us, but I don’t know if you want to go.”

“Sure why not, better than being trapped in this place.”

The music blared loudly throughout the house, the bass of the song nearly causing the floor to shake. Toby groaned to himself as he noticed all of the people talking, drinking, laughing. Some dancing, some flirting. He couldn’t even hear himself think. He glanced over towards Natalie, who looked equally as uncomfortable, maybe even more than he was. The two pushed through the crowd of drunk strangers chatting amongst themselves, and into the kitchen where they saw Nina talking to a guy neither of them recognized. When she noticed them, Nina excitedly waved them over. Toby made his way towards the eccentric girl, and Natalie followed closely behind, pushing off a guy who accidentally knocked into her.

Nina poured four shots of vodka, and handed a glass to each of them. She plugged her nose while it went down, Toby shook off the taste, and Natalie swallowed the liquor down like she swallowed her pride.

“This is Joshua, he’s a friend of mine,” Nina shouted out, barely being able to speak over the stereo blasting dance and pop music. Toby scanned the older boy up and down, before easing his hostile expression, and giving a nod. He glanced over his shoulder at the girl behind him, watching as Natalie hugged herself with her arms, and glared around the room. The boy nudged her with his arm, gaining him a scowl before she realized it was him.

“Lighten up Nat, have another shot,” he shouted, leaning over to her so she could hear better.

“I’m going to take it slow, but you go wild.”

“Suit yourself,” Toby exclaimed before turning back over to Nina and the other boy introduced as Joshua, preparing himself to do another shot with the group.

Natalie took a step back as she made her way over to the chips, grabbing a paper plate as she piled some on, and sneaking herself a beer from the cooler. She pressed herself against the wall behind her as a couple of girls rushed past, giggling amongst themselves. Tossing a chip into her mouth, the girl watched quietly as Toby shotgunned a cooler with a few other boys. She watched as he brushed off the twitches and jerks in his fingers and arms. She couldn’t understand how it was so easy for him to talk to people. It was as if he had a special talent of making friends, while she couldn’t connect with people even if she wanted to. As she leaned her sore back against the wall, feeling the soft vibrations of the bass as the beat dropped, looking out over the sea of people in front of her, she couldn’t help but feel as though she only existed in the shadow of the boy she called her best friend.

Natalie pressed her bottle to her lips as she choked down the last drop of beer, tossing the empty drink into the garbage can next to her, and pushing past people to make her way out into the backyard. The chill of the night brushed against her face as Natalie inhaled the fresh air, feeling the weight that suffocated her in that house fall off of her chest. Her hand dug into her jacket pocket as she pulled out a cigarette, replacing the cool, fresh air in her lungs with a burning smoke as she lit it, and inhaled. Natalie closed her eyes, sitting herself down on the hard cement step, the music barely muffled by the walls separating her from the party indoors. A few groups of people mingled outside alongside her, most of which held red solo cups in their hands, or joints, or cigarettes, chatting with people they’ve probably known their whole lives. The girl rested her arms over her knees as she stared down at the ground, listening to the world around her. She tried not to think about how slow, or fast, time was passing her by. She tried not to think much at all.

The girl sat on the step for a moment, finishing up her cigarette before flicking it to the ground. One song done, a couple seconds of silence, another one starts. Cheering, talking, yelling. Arguing, and yelling. One song ends, another one starts. Natalie groaned as she pulled herself up to her feet, making her way back into the party. As soon as she entered the house, back into the kitchen, she saw Nina quickly approach her, she stumbled a bit as she walked, anxiety painted her face alongside her flashy makeup.

“Oh my god there you are, I was looking all over for you,” Nina said as she grabbed Natalie’s hand, “I think Toby had too much to drink.”

The girls made their way into the living room, where they watched as Toby argued loudly with another unfamiliar boy.

“Toby I found Nat,” Nina shouted out, but he ignored her, or couldn’t hear.

Natalie watched on the sidelines as Toby drunkenly bickered back and forth with the college kid who was bigger, and taller than him. She watched as he insulted the other boy, put him down, clawed and bit his way to the top. It was a mortifying act, as if he had something to prove. As if he was lost in his own self-deception and lies. When the older boy called Toby a freak, Natalie watched as Toby tackled him to the ground, a hunger for revenge in his dark eyes. She watched as everyone crowded around, watching the younger boy take the bigger one to the floor, and beat him senseless. Even the pop songs blaring in their ears couldn’t muffle out the sounds of shouting, and yelling, and Toby threatening the other.

“Say that shit again,” he screamed louder than any bass the stereo could produce, “you think it’s fucking funny now, huh?”

Natalie's first pet was an elderly herding dog. As it aged with her, she watched as her companion succumbed to old age when she was only a child. She watched as Nina yelled for them to stop, other men pulling Toby off. When he looked at her, she saw a familiar look in his eyes. She knew better than anyone how to let a dying dog die. The sun was burning out, the girl thought. Natalie stayed for an extra seven minutes before storming out that night. She changed her mind before the eighth. She decided that she was better off not witnessing the light die too. That girl never really liked the dark.

As she pushed past the crowd of people, some shouting, most watching, and out through the front door, she tried to ignore the wasted boy who followed out after her. Natalie made her way down the road, pretending like she couldn’t hear Toby calling her name.

“Nat for fucks sake slow down,” he yelled out, running up to the girls side. She bared her teeth and quickened her pace, rejecting the orders of the boy. As he grabbed her hand, and stumbled over himself, Natalie had then noticed how bloody he was. He didn’t seem to notice, or care.

“Where are you going?”

“I’m going home,” she replied as she yanked her hand away from his grasp.

“What, why?”

“Because you’re acting like a lunatic!”

“So what? You think that makes you better than me?” Toby slurred his words as he raised his voice, unable to stand still as he tripped over himself.

“I didn’t say that,” Natalie spoke back.

“Well you sure fucking act like it.”

“What’s your problem?”

“There’s no problem, I’m having the time of my fucking life,” he shouted out, pushing past her and walking himself back home. He wiped the blood from his nose as he walked ahead of her.

Natalie stood for a moment, letting distance grow between them as the boy continued down the street, and shook her head in disbelief.

Toby burst through the front door of the quiet little farmhouse draped in the darkness of the midnight hour. Sobriety began to wash over him as he collapsed onto the couch that night. His finger ran over his lip as he noticed blood pouring from his busted mouth. He didn’t remember being hit, but was sure the other boy must’ve gotten a few good punches in. Toby turned himself over onto his back as he looked up into the dark livingroom, he couldn’t even remember why he started the fight in the first place. All he knew was that he would do it again. That he would spend his life fighting, and sleeping on the couch. It was him against the world, and he did what he had to do to survive. As he closed his heavy eyes, the buzz still warming his body, he made sure he heard Natalie come into the house before he let himself fall asleep.

[kagecage]

Oh great and powerful fanfic guru please answer my humble plights,

IMAGINE creepypasta of your choice with a s/o who gets cold in like 70 degree weather so imagine when the snow starts to fall and cuddling on the couch under fluffy blankets cause it's cold!!!! >V<

Please and thank you! ☆(ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*

Omggg my first request, thank you so so much for this <33 i hope you have such a wonderful day, now onto the creepypasta fic >:)

Winter Summer

Ticci Toby x Reader

Lying in your freezing bed, you were crawled up into a ball with multiple layers of blankets on top of you, no matter how many layers you put on, it would still be freezing. Your speaker playing music in the background was just some white noise to you, shaking and sneezing under the covers, you heard a knock on your wooden door.

Too cold to move you let out a small ‘come in’ yet it was loud enough for the person on the other side of the door to hear, entering without hesitation was none other than your twitchy boy standing by the doorframe. “There you are! Cmon, get up, you didn’t even have breakfast nor lunch yet!” Toby said with a few stutters here and there, slipping his hands under your large amount of layers, he grabbed onto your hands and started to drag you out of your blankets. You were groaning from the coldness and from your lack of warmth from your blankets.

“Nooo, it’s too cold” You whined with your hands in his as he continued to drag you, half your body was on the ground whilst the other half was on your bed with your legs still under the covers. “You need to move, you’ve been in your room all day, besides, i’m bored and I missed you” he pouted, lifting you off from the ground and are now in his arms. “You saw me not even an hour ago Toby” You spoke up, freezing under his touch, as he carried you down the stairs to the kitchen, his body jerking and twitching more than normally, probably from the low weather, not that he knows, he can’t feel.

Releasing you from his grasp, you were found in the kitchen on a stool by the island. Resting your arms on the counter and laying your head, he placed a plate in front of you yet frowned from the sight of you, “you okay? You seem cold” he asked, stutters and all. You groaned in response, his frown deepening as he sighed, taking your arm and dragging you to the living room, you immediately sat on the couch and lied there in the cold. You hated this weather, you just wished it was summer all over again, the warm feeling of the sun on your skin, the leaves growing and the flowers dancing with the wind.

Meanwhile you hadn’t even noticed that toby left the room to get blankets and pillows, “I’m back!” His voice muffled, looking over to your boyfriend, his arms were filled with fluffy blankets and pillows, placing them on the ground he smiled at you, taking off his sweater, he handed it to you with pink cheeks. You smiled at his kind gesture and took it in your hands, slipping it on your body. It somewhat helped your body warmth knowing it was his as you felt butterflies in your stomach.

“You lay down, while i make a small blanket fort for us, then we can watch a movie!” Toby exclaimed, while his arm jerked up, i smiled at him and nodded in response as he started to build the said fort, grabbing a few chairs as the walls, making a roof, and even using a pillow as a ‘door’.

Toby crawled into the fort and saw you in the same position, waiting patiently for your lovers touch. Seeing your body still quivering from the cold, he immediately crawled towards you ,due to the low roof of the fort. Slithering next to you on the couch, he placed the extra blankets on top of you both as he cuddled and stuffed his head into your chest, the warmth of his body on top of your cold one instantly heats you up, reminding you of summer relaxation, just you both lying there with peace. Toby loves to hear your heartbeat no matter what, it calms him down on so many levels, and the touch of toby in your arms never fails to give you beautiful and fluttering butterflies.

Feeling his hands around your torso while yours in his dark brown fluffy hair is enough to put you to sleep.

Just you two, on the couch, in the living room.

Until Jeff thought it was a good idea to throw ben on the roof of the fort.

Thank you!! <3

-K.T

A/n: im sorry if this isn’t really what youre hoping for, but i hope you had fun reading!!

[doodlingangel]

ANNOUNCEMENT + IMPORTANT QUESTION

...still going strong...

Hello. I'm DoodlingAngel, or Angel for short. As you guys may have seen in a previous post, I have been obsessed with this chatbot @ch3rry-l1m4d3 authored, and goodness... it's been so much fun. I genuinely enjoy this thing soooo much. It has truly helped me fall back in love with writing, the Creepypasta fandom, and of course the ticking time bomb himself: Toby Erin Rodgers, or 'Ticci Toby,' as it were.

I have been able to flourish within this chat, and I cannot thank the wonderful mods enough for their efforts. Unfortunately, I am unable to credit them properly, as I cannot find their account handle on here. Just know that I credit them for their amazing portrayal of Toby within this chatroom, as they have given me some of the best writing to bounce off of. I'm so grateful for meeting them...

So...I have an announcement first and foremost:

I'm going to adapt the RP from this chat into a proper story. As you can...heh...see from the number of messages this bot has... that's gonna take a while. Heh...oops...got carried away lol😅

Fair warning: Updates may be slow, as I have a full time job, a cat to care for, and a lot of personal stuff in between. Life's been a bit rocky for me, but I really want to make this story happen. I grew up with this fandom, and could never truly leave it. Toby has been my favorite character for over a decade, and it felt so nice having him portrayed in a realistic way within this chat. It also seems like the mods enjoy our RP as well, as they have issued me an incredibly heartwarming request...

So um...yeah. Hehe... it seems like my writing has peaked some interest within this chat...and they want me to rewrite Toby's origin story.

I understand Grisgrisdoll/Kastoway/whatever they are called now has had their drama and left the fandom and all that. This post isn't about them. This is about Toby, a character that I've held close to me for over a decade.

...I want to give him the backstory he deserves. I reread the original...and it's very...dated. I understand Grisgrisdoll/Kastoway wrote this when they were...what...12? 13? Obviously, nothing written by anyone in that age range will be Shakespeare lol. However, it's a decent base...and I want to build a house on top of it.

I want to rewrite Ticci Toby's backstory. Or, at the very least, retell it in my own writing style.

I DO NOT TAKE CREDIT FOR TICCI TOBY! HE BELONGS TO GRISGRISDOLL/KASTOWAY! I KNOW THEY'VE DISAVOWED THE FANDOM AND WHATNOT, BUT I STILL WANT TO CREDIT THE RIGHT PERSON. This is their original character at the end of the day, regardless of if they claim him anymore or not.

All I ask for...is your guys' support and...I guess "permission"... To do this. I would love to rewrite such an important story to the fandom, and modernize it. I want to do Toby justice with his origin story.

I want to bring Creepypasta into a new era. No more overly edgy word choice and needlessly complicated, backrooms-level explanations for why things happen. No more botched and forced mental illness depictions. No...I want to make something *realistic.* I want this to be a story anyone outside of the fandom can read and enjoy. I want to take this seriously.

I've been in this fandom since early middle school. I was 11 when Ticci Toby first debuted... I'm 22 and I still adore this character. I adore the headcanons fans made. I adore the fanart (@pink-key, your Toby is adorable hehe~). I adore the memes. I adore all things Ticci Toby.

I reread his origin story and updated character bio, and... they're severely dated. They're in desperate need of modernization and revamping. I say this because I've noticed throughout the fandom that no one can truly pinpoint down what his personality is, so he teeters between "Murderous, evil monster who will cut your throat for breathing his air and paint the walls red with your blood," or "uwu softie boy with tourettes who falls for every girl he sees" or something else that isn't quite accurate to the character.

I want to do him justice.

All I ask for is your support. I'll get started ASAP if you guys are cool with this.

Thank you for listening.

Oh, and one more thing. This has been a big pet peeve of mine since I came into this fandom, and I know it may not even be relevant anymore. It was just...something small that always bothered me, I want to rectify that right here. Right now.

Ahem...

'DON'T YOU DARE FORGET THE SUN' BY GET SCARED WAS NOT A GOOD SONG FOR TOBY! THE AUDIO MIXING AND PRODUCTION AREN'T GREAT AND THE LYRICS ARE LACKLUSTER AND UNRELATED TO TOBY!

IN FACT...

SCREW THE SUN! WE'RE IN THE HOUSE OF WOLVES NOW! THIS IS TOBY'S SONG AND I WILL NOT BE TAKING ANY QUESTIONS! THANK YOU AND GOODNIGHT!

Edit: lollllll I'm a boomer. It's all ai. There are no mods lolllllll Idk how these things work. I was just getting such amazing, in depth, and relevant responses that I assumed people were writing them hahahaha! Eh, the fact that an AI was able to flow with me so well is both hilarious and gives me hope.

[stephaniebrownslover]

★彡[!TICCIWORK+NINAKATE DOUBLE DATE ONESHOT!]彡★

So @crushedsweets and @necroromantics tricked me into writing this. It's bad so don't have any expectations alright. And not exactly a date scene, kinda?

Also I tried to do some research about Toby's tics but I didn't understand how to write them. If how badly written his tics makes you feel bad, please let me know and help me with fixing it!

There's nothing special about this, just a simple, light-hearted fluff, no warnings! Swearing maybe?

And meeting part is soooo sloopy I'm gonna cry and sorry for everything

V●ω●V—V●ω●V—V●ω●V—V●ω●V—V●ω●V

"C'mon, babe! It'll be fun!"

Nina could hardly stop herself from wrapping her arms around Kate's body as Nina cheerfully clapped her hands in the air. She knew that Kate wouldn't say anything to her even though she wasn't used to being touched, but she was still trying to learn not to hug her every second.

What, she was going to have a girlfriend who was worthy for planets and she wouldn't let her know how much she cared about her every second?

Bullshit!

"Not that I don't trust you but you sure?"

"Yeah! You already know Tobes and you'll just looove Clocky."

Kate took a deep breath as Nina cheerfully extended the word; she had tried her best to turn the tense expression on her lips into a smile, and Nina was struggling not to kiss her on the lips right there, right now. Kate was a wonderful person.

"...Alright."

Kate was a wonderful person, indeed.

After all, Kate had put aside her social awkwardness just for her and agreed to go on a double date with Nina's two favorite friends who happened to be her favorite couple!

"Thank you, thank you, thank you!"

The girl with purple and black hair throw her arms around the neck of the girl with messy black hair, fearing that she would experience an explosion of love if she controlled herself more. 

"You're... cute when you, um, when, uh-"

Nina waited for her to finish her speech, looking into Kate's eyes with her own eyes, shining with joy.

"...Nevermind."

After giggling slightly, she did not neglect to plant a small kiss on Kate's cheeks.

"You're sooo cute when you're embarrassed."

"I'm not!"

Kate felt her heart tighten under the sweet expression of her lover, who gave her a puppy dog stare while trying to wipe the strawberry lipstick that formed on her cheek reflexively.

"Embarrassed..."

While Kate was talking, she gently pulled her hand away from her cheek. At the same time, Nina was admiring her precious treasure, which she valued more than anything. The way Kate's voice gradually became a whisper was so cute that she could feel her heart was going to explode.

"Whatever you say."

"Really."

Not taking the defiant gaze seriously, Nina waved her hand in the air, which had lesser bracelet compared to other.

"Believe you."

"You don't."

"Okay, okay."

After Nina didn't say anything for a while, she slowly decided to calm down Kate, who was caught up in a tsunami of thoughts in her own mind. Of course, Kate knew the other people who stayed in the forest, but she got really nervous in such situations, since she had never met anyone except Toby and Nina before, other than proxies. And that was so cute!

Kate, was like a highschooler waiting to be invited to the prom!

Sure, there was a very serious and heartbreaking truth behind this, but Nina was trying not to let Kate know that she was upset for her by looking at the positive side of the situation. Because she knew crying or pitying her would do neither of them any good.

"Actually, there are some things we should do."

Kate raised one eyebrow in the air with an inquiring expression.

"Like following them?"

"No, not like- why though?"

"To talk something."

While Kate tilted her head slightly forward, Nina reached out and held her hands to give her courage.

"That's very smart, too. But I mean other than that."

''Oh."

Nina raised her hands in the air, which were together with Kate's, as she spoke cheerfully.

"We need to go shopping. And we should buy something for the cutey couple. And I have to see the place, maybe do some decoration if necessary. Oh, also I need to do something cute but embarrassing for them and-!"

Kate didn't let her talk any more, she leaned Nina into her lap with a perfect move, which she used an extra effort while holding her because of Nina's imbalance.

And accompanied by autumn leaves falling from the trees, she kissed her girlfriend on the lips.

"Uh, hi, babe."

Nina didn't quite know what to say as she left the kiss.

She could have sworn her legs were shaking as Kate put her safely on her feet. Kate made a move to put on her mask and leave the forest. All this romance was too much for her.

Still, ignoring the voices telling her to walk, she turned around and checked on Nina.

"Comin'?"

"Um, yeah!"

Pausing, Nina came to Kate with a sudden run and took her hand. 

"So, we also need to buy you new clothes-"

While Nina was starting to talk cheerfully, she suddenly felt the need to put her empty hand to her mouth and apologize.

"Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry! I love your style but it's just-"

"Get you, no worry."

Kate slightly increased the squeeze on Nina's hand to reassure, and then reinstated it again.

"You're the best! Maybe we can buy couple t-shirts, too! And Megadeth stuff, I guess. I know you like them."

Kate was lucky to have her mask on.

And she was the luckiest person in the world to have such a girlfriend.

✾✾✾

"So, yeah."

Clockwork straightened up on the sofa where she and her boyfriend Toby were sitting, and joined arms. While talking normally, she was literally shocked when Toby suddenly told her that she and Nina and Kate were going out on a double date two days later.

"The fuck did ya' get us in?"

While raising one eyebrow in the air, Toby also moved to a proper sitting position, both excited and nervous. Although it was too difficult for him to make eye contact, he looked at Clockwork's right eye. He was careful not to look at her clock, since he could het distracted easily by the movements of the clock.

"Dunno, she-she was making the eyes and- and I... it happened, o-okay!"

Clockwork took a deep breath with an exasperated attitude.

"How the hell did you survive 'til this time?"

Toby tried to put on a cool expression with a big smile, but failed.

"I'm that cool."

"You're that dumb."

He waited hesitatingly while he held out his girlfriend's hands to take his. When he did not take a negative attitude from her, he took her hands in his own palms. He knew that she didn't like to be touched suddenly because of her past, so he was showing lots of effort in order to avoid hurting her.

"C-come on, Clocky, just come f-for me!"

"Know what? Screw it-"

As Clockwork took a deep breath again, she decided to give her approval to this meeting idea. After all, although Toby would ask her for many things for his entertainment, there would be very few things that he would actually ask her to do. Besides, she could already get along with Nina, and it wouldn't be bad if she met Kate, whom Toby often talks about.

"Please, p-please, please-"

"Let me finish, asshole."

Toby was already in the begging position.

"Oh, sorry sweetie."

"Don't call me sweetie."

Clockwork hadn't said that to seem rude, she just didn't like being called by an affectionate nickname, and she knew Toby was doing it to annoy her. It wasn't that she was really angry or anything, she was just making Toby realize once again how stupid and cute he was.

"I'll come but-"

Unable to hold himself any longer, Toby jumped out of the coach into the air, reflecting on the exact meaning of the word excitement, and joyfully shook his fists in a sign of victory. Then he joyfully held out his hand to take Clockwork's hands and rotate them.

"You're the best! Love ya'!"

"Fuck you, Toby!"

Clockwork certainly didn't like being interrupted in the middle of something important, and this case was no exception.

"Sorry sorry."

A devilish smile formed on Clockwork's lips as Toby instantly apologized.

Oh, how innocent and pure he was.

"I'll come only if you agree on that butterfly tattoo."

"Done!"

Her evil smile turned to a surprised feature when she saw that Toby had so easily accepted getting a butterfly tattoo on his waist area to make fun of, which had been a matter of discussion for months. This tattoo thing was a conversation that had been going on between them for months, and even though Toby found tattoos cool, he refused this offer since he didn't want to do something ridiculous.

"What kind of a speel she put you on?"

Toby leaned his head forward in a slightly embarrassed attitude. Every time he would talk about his past, he would do this.

"I-it's just, just I never had a co-cool girlfriend and real frien-ds and I want them to li-ke-ke each other so."

She could feel an anger beginning to bubble up inside her. She didn't like anything Toby had experienced in his past, and she hated everyone, especially his father, except his older sister and his mother. Toby didn't deserve for anything he went through as a child to happen to him.

She knew she couldn't undo the past, but now was in her hands, and she wasn't going to let anyone treat him like that again.

"D-don't know, just ram-ramblin'."

When he realized Toby was also uncomfortable with this topic, she changed the subject.

"Just promise me you'll don't say how 'awesome' I am in every two seconds."

She loved the way Toby's eyes shone like a puppy dog's. She could have given up almost anything for this view.

"Does t-that mean no butter-flies?"

"Nah, that's settled."

Almost.

"I had a h-hard child-hood and I was always-ways afraid of need-les because of-"

"Don't push your luck, kiddo."

When Toby started smiling, she realized that he was teasing her just to get away from the tattoo, and she decided to put a stop to it.

"Finee."

When Toby extended the word and saw that there was silence, he put a big smile on his face.

"Ever told ya' I love ya'?"

"We need to go shopping now."

Clockwork suddenly got up from the sofa and pointed to the door of the room where they were sitting.

"Why?"

Toby looked at the place she was pointing with a meaningless expression.

"To buy them a gift and normal clothes for you."

He suddenly put her hands on his chest with an expression as if he was betrayed.

"Hold o-on, what's wrong with my clot-hes?"

"All are muddy or blood stained."

"...Fair e-enough."

He had spoken in such a hoarse voice that it was almost certain Clockwork had not heard him.

He sometimes underestimated his lover's perfectly sharp ears too much.

"Let's go then."

When Clockwork pointed to the door again, Toby raised one eyebrow in surprise.

"Now?"

"Now."

He suddenly directed his gaze to his feet.

"Aw, man. That's suck."

Clockwork was content to just shrug.

"Your fault."

Toby said nothing, only came closer to Clockwork, who was waiting for him to leave the living room, and together they made their way to the bathroom of the cottage to make preparations for landing in the city.

They weren't holding hands, but the fact that their shoulders were touching was good enough for both of them.

✾✾✾

"Alright, so which one would you prefer?"

Nina held up the crop shirts she was holding, which had two different style cuts, one completely black and one completely pink; and because she was indecisive, she was asking Kate which one was more beautiful.

Kate, who wanted to finish shopping and go home as soon as possible, was disturbed by the brightness of the store's fluorescent lights and the noise of a pop song playing in the background. She leaned forward, bringing her back to a hunched position on the soft stool in which she was sitting. Fashion was definitely not her specialty, and she was surprised every time that Nina had such an impressive style.

"Both?"

"Aww, sweetheart, I'd love to buy both for myself but you know, I'm still paying for Christmas gifts."

After Nina made a noise like she was watching a kitten, Kate decided she didn't want to disappoint her. She couldn't do it reven if she wanted to anyway, she only felt that way because she wasn't used to get so much love.

She ran her fingers around the clothes rack behind her for a while, looking at the crops with a sensitivity that would hurt if she touched them, trying to choose the one that reminded her Nina most.

"Hmm, maybe... this one?"

There was a pretty cute butterfly pattern on the purple crop top she held. Instead of childish butterflies, this one was a stylish butterfly that could have been more of a music band's album cover, Nina's eyes literally lit up when she noticed the elegance of the outfit in her girlfriend's hand.

"Oh my god, you're a genius, Kate!"

Since Nina took the cloth from Kate's hands without thinking, Kate's efforts to look at the price tag were interrupted.

"Nina-"

"What? Something wrong?"

Not understanding why Kate was uneasy, Nina shook her head from side to side, had officially forgotten about her surroundings due to the excitement provided by a beautiful piece. Even though she had a ton of clothes in her closet.

"... No."

"That's like the best thing I've ever seen and I'll buy this one no matter what. But, let's check the price first!"

After grasping something through the outfit with her long nails, Kate quickly realized that the real smile on her face had been replaced by a fake one.

Nina spoke in a slightly trembling tone of voice.

"Kate, dear, you really want this one?"

"That's okay."

Kate didn't want her to but something so expensive, she would have liked to give it to her girlfriend as a gift, but she had no money left since she had invested all her money in some games and CDs last month. 

Although she was trying to make a mental note of stopping by the store at midnight, she had a bad headache because of the brightness which prevented her from thinking.

Kate grimaced with a sudden headache, but Nina misinterpreted her expression and bowed down in front of Kate, thinking that she had upset her.

"No, no, no, don't do that face, my baby. Please, I'll get it, okay?"

"Don't buy it. It was just a rec."

It wasn't easy for her to speak when she was trying to massage her aching head with her fingers.

"But you liked it! We got everything you wanted and this is not an exception."

"But..."

Kate had realized what a misunderstanding there had been, and she wanted Nina to know this, and stop her from buying it. Nevertheless, Nina thought that she would tell her not to buy it again because of her previous sentence. That's why she tried to soften the atmosphere with a joke.

"No. If you liked it, everyone'll literally fall in love with me."

"Toby?"

Nina, who thought the question was whether Toby's falling in love with her or not, eagerly replied.

"Yes, even Toby."

Stopping to question what kind of misunderstanding she had fallen into, Kate raised one of her bony fingers and pointed to a person at the entrance of the store. He was not wearing his usual glasses and had used an ordinary surgical mask instead of his classic mask to hide the wound on his cheek.

"No, Toby."

When Nina looked at the place where Kate's finger was pointing, her eyes grew wide with surprise.

"Toby? Is that Clocky?"

When she confirmed that the two people talking to each other were Clocky and Toby, she grabbed Kate's hand and pulled her to her feet.

"Let's go."

Toby was holding a children's t-shirt with dinosaurs in his hand at the time, the size of the t-shirt oddly matched Clockwork, but the model was so ridiculous and babyish that Clockwork got angry. It wasn't a real anger, it was more like she was annoyed.

"Oh, don't threaten me with that shirt, bastard. You know damn well I have photos."

"D-delete them or I swear I'll fuck you-"

Nina, who was entering in the middle of them at that time, got between the two while they were arguing. She waved both hands to her friends at once.

"Hi Clocky! Hi Toby!"

While Clockwork was puzzlingly questioning whether she was seeing correctly, Toby returned her greeting.

"Nina?"

"Hi Nina!"

Nina greeted him again, as if she hadn't been the first to speak.

"Hi guys! Wow, what a sweet surprise!"

"Yeah..."

Nina cheerfully clapped her hands in the air while Clockwork hummed to herself.

"Sooo, what were you talking about?"

"This sel-fish prick you see refu-ssses to buy me clothes."

When Toby dived into the middle of a word, Clockwork felt the need to interrupt and tell the truth in order to prevent a misunderstanding.

"For fuck's sake. That's not the deal!"

Toby gently moved his hand to the side of his face that was close to Clockwork for blocking her, then he spoke in a hoarse tone of voice.

"Whatever."

Clockwork walked wearily over to Kate, who was waiting on the sidelines. She knew that this duo would soon be immersed in their own conversation and she'll be ignored. That's what he wanted anyway.

"So what're you doin' here?"

"You first."

"It's kinda a long story. So you know our date thingy and we decided to go shopping for some stuff like..."

Clockwork came near to Kate, who was waiting on the corner with a nervous attitude, and stood next to her for a while. She understood that Kate had noticed her coming but didn't care because even though she had never spoken to Kate, she knew how full of danger and caution she was.

Still, this was not enough to control Clockwork's sense of curiosity. That's why she decided to break the silence and start a conversation.

"Yo, are you Nina's girlfriend?"

Kate made a short answer without needing to look at her. Although she didn't care, she knew that she would have to talk soon with her, so she asked a question in a monotone tone that she already knew the answer to. She didn't want there to be any strange tension between them if they needed to be alone.

"Yes. Are you Toby's?"

"Sadly."

"Hmm."

Finding nothing to say to this, Kate contented herself with merely making a thinking noise. Nor could it be said that she fully understood the reason why Clockwork had said such a thing about her lover.

"He's such a pain in the ass sometimes."

Toby looked at where Kate and Clockwork were, and sent a stupid kiss to Clockwork, she rolled her eyes, but he couldn't stop her lips from curling up slightly. Then, seeing that Toby and Nina had returned to their own conversation, she spoke.

"But he's kinda cute deep under his idiotness."

Kate tried to make a joke so as not to feel too strange in this environment.

"Must be really deep."

Clockwork raised her non-eye-patch-wearing eyebrow in amazement. It was obvious that she had not expected such a thing after Kate's silence.

"Oh, I liked you."

Kate began to play restlessly with the sleeves of her long-sleeved t-shirt.

"Okay."

Clockwork felt the need to speak again a little later.

"You know, Toby talks about you a lot. Kate this and Kate that. You're kinda famous."

''Oh."

Clockwork spoke with a sarcastic grin.

"I like how you scare him."

"Uh, sorry."

"But you protect him, too. And that bastard can be cocky sometimes, so he deserves it."

Kate allowed her tense expression to relax and replied with the comfort of knowing that she was approved.

"Yeah."

"So thank you."

"For..?"

Clockwork spoke with a pause, even the thought of something like this happening caused her a deep sadness, so itwas not easy to express.

"For not letting him die."

Kate paused for a while, not quite sure what she should say.

"...You're welcome."

She made an attempt to start a conversation again without letting a new silence fall. It wasn't bad talking to Kate, but she didn't like her being so nervous. However, she couldn't say anything because she knew the reason behind it.

"How about you two?"

Kate didn't expect such a question, so it was almost like she hit a wall. She wanted to put her hands on her cheeks so that the slight redness had formed on her face wouldn't be noticed, but she just stayed still since it would attract more attention. She wished she was wearing her hoodie.

"We're... cool."

"Seems so."

Clockwork had noticed how excited Kate was, contrary to Kate's hopes for the opposite, and she had found it quite sweet.

"You really like her, don't you?"

"Yes. Why?"

"She might seem happy but she has a rough past about... relationships."

Everyone clearly knew that she was talking about Jeff.

Every time this topic was brought up, she got really mad with true anger. Clockwork's friendship with him had broken down because of his terrible behavior to Nina.

"What's your point?"

Kate had made her hands into fists, as she does every time this topic is brought up. Nina's past did not concern her, and she was also ready to fight to the death with any ghosts from her past.

"Don't ever dare to hurt her."

Kate responded by shaking her head.

"Same for you."

Feeling that she was still nervous, Clockwork decided to say the result out loud to calm down the atmosphere. As if it wasn't obvious enough.

"Glad we could sort this out then."

However, Kate still could not get rid of the uncomfortable feeling caused by this situation. And this was quite understandable for her. Obviously, if the same thing had happened with Toby, Clockwork would have given the same reactions, even more.

"I'm serious. I'll kill you if you-"

"Relax, I won't. Okay?"

Clockwork made a sign with one of her hands in order to stop her.

Kate took a deep breath and tried to relax, just like Nina had taught her.

"Okay."

There was silence between them for a while. Having figured out that Kate is not a very talkative type, Clockwork decided to use the badge of the music group she saw when they first met to start a topic to talk about.

"You like Megadeth?"

"Yeah. They're cool."

"The coolest."

Kate was excited to find someone with similar tastes to her after a long time. Nina and she had very different musical thoughts from each other, and although Toby was the closest person to hers, it became different after a while.

Unable to contain her excitement any longer, she asked a question.

"What else you listen?"

And just when they got to the really interesting part of the conversation, they were interrupted with Nina grabbing Toby by the arm and dragging him away.

"Heyyy, babeee!"

Clockwork did not neglect to hum to herself.

"Oh no."

Both of them, especially Clockwork, were literally shocked when Toby spoke cheerfully.

"So we deci-ded to go o-our date now."

"Now?!"

Because of her unwittingly shouting, all the customers turned their attention to the group of four. She could feel being being crushed under Kate's rude gaze towards her.

"Sorry, or whatever, but now?"

"Yeah! All of us are already here together so why not?"

Nina clapped her hands in the most cheerful way, as if it were possible.

"But-"

"It's okay, sweetheart. I know you don't like unplanned things but it'll be better over than waiting nervously. But it's still okay if you're not feeling good enough to talk with others. We can go back to my home."

"... It's fine. Just... surprised."

She knew that Kate did not like sudden changes of plans. It was only by immersing herself in the excitement of the moment that she had suddenly decided on such a meeting. But for Nina, it was more important than anything for Kate to feel at peace, and if Kate didn't feel comfortable, she was ready to give up the date.

But Kate had said yes.

Kate was perfect, Kate was cute, Kate was charming, Kate was a very nice person!

Nina could not stand the love surging inside her any longer and hugged Kate with a flood of emotions at that moment.

"Even Kate said yes, please come for me, Clocky."

"I'm gonna fuckin' kill you one day."

In contrast to Kate and Nina's conversation, Toby and Clockwork's talking seemed tougher, but that's how their communication was. Still, that didn't mean they didn't love each other.

"You lo-ove me."

Although Toby couldn't be seen smiling because of his mask, it could easily be understood from his eyes.

"No, I don't!"

"Aww, you'd die for me."

Clockwork gifted him a middle finger.

"Eat shit and die, asshole."

"Guys, she loves me so mucc-ch."

Toby made the special sign that they had developed, which meant that he wanted to hug Clockwork, and Clockwork approved this with a deep sigh and her head.

"Fuck all of you."

"Are we group hugging?"

"No!"

"No!"

Clockwork was already getting overwhelmed by Nina jumping on top of them while Toby is buckling under pressure.

The amazing thing is that even Toby said no to this offer.

"Kate, would you like to come?"

"I'm fine."

"Here, hold my hand."

Nina held out her hand to Kate, who was standing on the edge watching them, so that she wouldn't feel lonely. Although Kate sighed with annoyance, she took Nina's hand and moved a few steps closer to the hugging trio.

"Can we stop this bullshit?"

Clockwork spoke in a strange voice as she tried to breathe.

"Just five more seconds."

"Alright."

When Nina finally loosened her arms, Toby also breathed with relief and instantly pulled on his arms.

"So what's the plan?"

"I know somewhere to hang."

"No bars in daytime, Clocky."

"..."

Kate, upon the rejection of Clockwork's offer, spoke up to make it clear that she also knows a place.

"Kate, love of my life, I love hanging out in the forest with you but I wanna do something different now."

"I know."

"..."

After there was silence for a while, Toby raised his index finger excitedly in the air, as if he had been shaken from side to side by a sudden tick wave.

"Oh, how about game saloons?"

"That's amazing!"

"Hey, you didn't pay for them!"

Just when they were leaving the store, they suddenly stopped with an angry employee calling them out.

"Oh, right."

Clockwork muttered to herself.

"God help us all."

"He won't."

She grimaced at what Kate said.

"Oh man, we're so fucked up this time."

"Hey, look at this Clocky!"

When she looked at the place Toby pointed out, she saw the rabbit hat in the section where the check out was.

May God have mercy on the poor souls of Clockwork and Kate.

V●ω●V—V●ω●V—V●ω●V—V●ω●V—V●ω●V

[insomniac-shado]

In my au, when Toby met Connie for the first time again he was with Clocky. Since Toby couldn’t remember Clock had informed Toby of who Connie was. What she was like. And Toby was ecstatic, wanting to reconnect with his long lost mother.

They went to her house late at night. When Connie answered the door Toby burst in and started rambling. Reminding her of who she was, how much he missed her, etc. And Connie was staring at him in fear the whole time.

He noticed this, and tried to reassure her, promising he wouldn’t hurt her- but Connie had already backed away to the counter and grabbed the phone. Toby began begging her not to call the police, eyes wide with panic, promising over and over again that he wouldn’t hurt her- but it was no use.

Clockwork had to practically drag him out when the cops started coming. They made it to a safe space to hide, and Toby broke down into tears. Sobbing. Whimpering about how he’d lost everyone, how it was all his fault. How crushed he was that his own mother was scared of him. And Clocky just sat there holding him, unsure of what to say at this point. Just whispering comforting words into his ear, keeping him close to her chest.

Okay I already made a post about a scenario like this but I wanted to share the actual canon version of Toby meeting Connie in my au because the other was just a drabble i thought up 👍

[sillygeeseys]

NEWER/UNDERRATED SET IT OFF SONGS, BUT AS CHARACTERS FROM MY CREEPYPASTA FANFIC

(Some obvious, some foreshadowing)

Toby: Punching Bag, Bleak December, Projector

Jeff: Evil people, Killer in the mirror, Better Than This

Liu: Swan song, Breath in Breathe out, Fake ass friends

Splendor: Upside down, Happy All The Time, Why Worry

Slender: HORRIBLE KIDS!!!!! Duality, Parasite

Masky, and Hoodie: Plastic promises, Together forever, Win Win

Also!! If any of my loyal commenters on that fic are here then please know I love you. You literally drive me to keep posting chapters even when I'm not at my peak

[creepst-crypt]

Does any one know about Voicebox from “Voicebox a ticciToby love story” the 12 part fanfiction from 2014?

I listened to it in one sitting and I’ve never been the same. (Once a year I sit down and listen to the full thing)

[grvyrd-drms]

TOBY ROMANCE HCS BUT WITH A TRANSMASC READER PUHLEASEEEE

toby rogers x transmasc!reader hcs

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A/N: as a cis girl that 1. has many transmasc friends and 2. has dated transmasc guys, i hope you're satisfied with my work lol!! i got kinda silly with this one i'm just too funny.

CW: mild mild mild NSFW, transmasc!reader, brief nudge to internalized homophobia

------------------------------------------------------------

-toby is so conflicted at first. him????? a HOMOSEXUAL?????? oh me oh my!! you bet!!

-he just cannot help staring at you behind his hooded droopy eyes. smirking at your jokes, wanting to spend more time around you. realizes his cheeks get all rosy when you get too close to him.

-i hc that he has big dorky feet, so if you use diy packers you'd definitely end up using his socks (please wash them beforehand he's been running around in the woods all day) to really get that big pp effect ykwim 💪💪💪.

-sometimes forgets that you're not biologically a guy and gets taken back at first when he remembers you're trans tbh. like there's just no doubt in his mind, whatever you want to be, that's what you are to him.

-totally doesn't care wether you wear your binder or not, or if you walk around shirtless. he's just so excited to have someone who tenderly loves and cares for him.

-anyone who gives you shit is dead before they even finish their sentence. even if you aren't bothered by it, he is. how fucking dare anyone be transphobic towards his boyfriend. will use any weapon/object nearby without even thinking.

-definitely steals T for you if you're at the manor and don't have access to it. five finger discount (in his terms that means he threatened to take off the five fingers of a doctor for it).

-(if you're on T) competes with you to see which one of you can grow facial hair faster. he doesn't grow much so you'd probs end up winning tbh.

-is so casual about your body. during intimate times he's just so pathetic that he doesn't care which holes you have lmaoo. he just wants to please you.

-staring issue. means no harm by it, but he just can't help getting lost in every curve, every crevice, every beauty mark and scar on your body.

-a little handsy so he may or may not touch/squeeze your chest during intimacy. absolutely loses his shit if he upsets you though. like totally spirals. you're gonna have to reassure him afterwards that you're okay lol.

-BIG HUGE cuddler. loves to just hold you in peace. he loves your body more than anything in the world.

------------------------------------------------------------

i hope i made you proud anon 🫡

[8-dermestid]

i'm over sleeping like a dog on the floor

relationship: ticci toby x reader

word count: 7.6k

links: available to read on ao3

warnings: canon-typical violence, character dies by decapitation (off-screen death but on-screen head), toby is psychotic/has tics/is disabled

Working the graveyard shift as a middle-of-nowhere gas station has its perks; you get paid to do nothing but mop and organize shelves. Most nights you spend alone (or with your only coworker), until you get a regular customer for the first time since this place opened.

(like/reblogs are greatly appreciated, requests are open ✷)

As autumn passes away and winter begins to take hold of the climate, the manor becomes a hellish place to live. Plenty of well-developed people struggle with the seasonal changes—the colder air, longer nights, and dead-looking forests make seasonal depression hit hard. In Toby’s experience, however, these symptoms hit harder for the people in the mansion. The temperature drops make Jeff irritable, his decade-old burns aching as fresh nerve endings attempt to make connections to his old skin. EJ always found a way to hide in their room for months, only coming out if forced by Slenderman’s jobs or a need for food. Anyone with chronic pain had more intense symptoms, and anyone prone to stress snapped under the pressure. Tim and Brian always left before winter hit (only because they looked non-disabled from the outside and could mask until they found a place to hunker down).

Toby is no exception to this rule. The stress of incoming frost and shorter days makes him quick to anger, his tics become more frequent and intense, and he becomes more prone to biting his fingers until he bleeds. Joining Tim and Brian would be a dream, but that is all it would remain (being visibly disabled, paranoid, and psychotic beyond belief—and the hole Toby carved out in his cheek—made masking almost impossible). If he were to try and follow them to a hotel room, Toby would get strapped down and sedated in a stark-white hospital with buzzing overhead fluorescents.

The last time he went to the hospital was because he stepped on a rusty nail six months back, and Tim and Brian almost thought about tracking down EJ because hospitals and Toby do not mix. Thinking about those fluorescents makes him sick. The droning electrical hum makes his skin crawl.

Maybe tonight is the night—though the idea crawls with stressed-induced impulsivity and panic like centipedes under his skull—Toby needs to mull over this thought with a cigarette.

Jeff is arguing with nobody again and slamming his head against a wall. Sally’s running around upstairs. EJ hasn’t been home in months. Tim and Brian are who knows where, not that Toby cares, and the other people crowding this place are too quiet for Toby to care about right now. He rocks in his bed (a moldy mattress with loose sheets piled atop it, a thin, ratty blanket being all he can use to hide from the cold) 

(Hush). The quiet is safe, and breathing softly and stepping carefully is safe. It’s good practice to keep his head down when there’s incoherent screaming in the room down the hall. The clatter of overturned furniture and scratching on the walls are commonplace sounds, whether rooted in reality or psychosis. 

Toby tries to control his volume by breathing through his mouth, sniffling now replaced with hollow gasps. He’s so careful not to let any loudness escape him (not an easy feat). His diaphragm stutters, his shoulders heave in an involuntary twitch, his ribs push inward, and his spine curls sharply down. 

Do it. Deep breath in, hold for four, out for four. Grab a cigarette and a lighter, and try to take your mind off things. Toby rocks on the floor and nurses a cigarette between his teeth, letting the smoke simmer in his lungs before exhaling low. He quits rocking on the floor, rising to his feet and beginning a careful hunt, opening every drawer, opening the creaky closet door, checking the big hole in the wall, checking the drawers once more, then out the window (pulling the half-hanging curtain over to give him some sense of privacy). Finally satisfied, Toby tugs the sheet on his mattress until it slips from the corner, exposing a large hole carved into the side, its guts twinkling with bits of fiberglass.

Toby sticks his hand in, numb to the prickling sensation scraping across his skin, and pulls out a large, empty duffel bag. He crawls towards his drawers and tosses his extra clothes into a small heap atop the bag, stuffing it until it’s bloated like a three-day-old carcass. With only a few possessions to his name—his hatchets, a hunting knife, a hammer (which he puts into his pocket instead, worried about scratching his things), his CD player plus headphones, a sentimental bag of teeth, and a dented thermos—Toby is ready and packed, letting out a shaky breath as he zips up his bag. Checking around all the hiding spots again (his searching based on psychotic delusions), Toby finally pulls the moldy curtain back and opens the window, which squeals in protest. He freezes, checking his surroundings and listening for even the softest sounds of disturbance in the creaky manor. 

The mansion’s natural groans and hums make the house feel alive. It’s watching him—and watching him think of a plan to get out of this hell. The radiators creak, and the walls ache like the house is breathing around him. The walls are moving, Toby thinks. He is inside a living thing. He pries open the window, and the house cries out in protest. The chains supporting the windowpane squeal like birds, and Toby scrambles out of the window and onto the once-shingled roof in a panic, nearly slipping from the second story in a thoughtless terror. He digs into his pocket and pulls out his beat-up box of Marlboro Reds, curling up into a ball on the roof, shaky hands searching for his lighter. Toby can’t stop shaking. His neck pops in two places. He should climb back inside—crawl back into that living, breathing beast—and pretend this idea of freedom never crossed his mind. 

Toby sticks a cigarette between his teeth, digging around his many pockets for his lighter. He’s so nervous, whole-body tremors as the agonizing howls of the mansion’s other tenants remind Toby of his options: keep living within Slenderman’s walls, dirt-poor and sickly, but safe from the cruelties of the outside world, or risk contact with the outside, possibly getting strapped down to a hospital bed and drip-fed a cocktail of medications, sedated and alone. Toby’s grip is loose, and his lighter slips from his hand as it twitches involuntarily. Toby watches it slide down the roof and hop over the broken gutter, landing in a puddle beneath the house.

Toby peers over the roof—making the quick choice to abandon his duffel bag inside his room —and swings his legs over the edge, dropping down. He sticks his hand into an ice-cold puddle and pulls the cobalt-blue plastic body from the water. He rolls his thumb over the striker, shaking the lighter and trying again (flick, flick, flick, Toby can hear the fuel when he shakes it vigorously), holding the dead thing to his dry cigarette, cupping his hand to protect any weak flame it may produce. 

Nothing.

Toby throws the lighter as hard as he can into a tree, hands trembling uncontrollably, wrists flinching, fingers curling in distress. He pulls on his hair—tugs and tugs, grabbing at the curly strands at the nape of his neck and tugging upwards like he’s pulling a shirt off over his head—trying not to scream and cry about his two-dollar lighter being a shitty, two-dollar lighter. He pulls one axe from its holster and the hammer from his pocket; the next smoker he spots won’t make it home (and Toby can add some teeth to his plastic-baggie collection, whichever ones he can salvage from the destruction of a stranger’s dental record). His cigarette (with a sharp angle in the filter from an angry bite) gets stuffed back into its cardboard container, then the box, and into his pocket.

Toby picks a direction and walks, one hand tugging at his hair and the other’s knuckles white around a hatchet handle. Each tired step squelches under him. Slick leaves and muddy earth force walking to be a conscious thought; Toby, already nauseous with stress, stumbles forward, using the tall trees for support (and to ground himself on the textures of moss and lichen under his fingertips). 

Keep breathing. 

In for one, two, three, four; Hold for one, two, three, four; Out for one, two, three, four.

Keep walking, don’t stop, don’t turn back, don’t even look back. One shaky mile becomes two, then three, then four. Each threshold crossed brings Toby further from the manor and closer to freedom. 

One time, Toby had to visit a mortician’s office to take care of a sloppy kill months ago. The doctor was working late, and Toby came across the current project: some forty-something man with silver hair and scratchy stubble. The mortician had already slipped the eye caps under the man’s eyelids, and the little barbs gripped the backside, holding the shape of the lid to make it look like the man’s eyes hadn’t sunk back into his skull. Toby peeled back the man’s lips, admiring his yellowed, crooked teeth and dry gums. There were wires connecting the upper and lower jaw, keeping the man’s mouth shut with needles nailed into his bone.

The process was fascinating and morbid, and the wires and nails made Toby queasy because the man’s body was so cold. Sometimes, Toby felt like that—or that he felt trapped in that state—the stiffness, the cold, the wires and nails keeping his jaw wired shut no matter how much he wanted to scream.

Sometimes, it was him laying on the cold, metal table stinking of formaldehyde, stiff with rigor mortis with sunken eyes and guts in the viscera bag. He found the body shortly after and beat its face in with his axe until they were unrecognizable. He took three teeth (one of their wisdom teeth and two molars), the only intact thing left of them, and fled through a broken window.

Toby, rubbing his eyes, pushes them into the sockets as he stumbles past the tree line and down a crag. When he makes contact with the ground and stumbles forward in his dreary state, Toby is startled when a car blares its horn at him. The driver shouts at him, swerving over the double-yellow to avoid hitting him.

Toby stands in the road like a deer, heart pounding against his ribs. He watches the car swerve back over the double-yellow and around a wavy bend, eventually concealed by a shelf of carved rock. Turning to look across the empty highway, he spots a gas station bathed in red neons with an inviting golden light warming the interior.

An older man with a blue face mask is walking behind the gas station for the restroom, and Toby stalks behind him, axe in hand.

✸𓆟✸

“It’s getting windy now. Are you sure your bus is coming after your shift?”

“Probably,” You say, “they’d only stop if there was some looming total disaster. They operate like a Waffle House.” Walking into the custodial closet (slash break room), you grab a bucket and mop and move out to a monstrous soda spill left by a group of teenage boys (where one of them just got their learner’s permit, you’re sure of it).

Something collides with the dumpster outside. 

You think it’s someone dumpster diving again. 

Thud. Thud. Thud. Thud. 

“Quit being so paranoid.” Your coworker says.

You turn to Sandy, and she shrugs, straightening the 5-Hour Energies by the register. She’s pretty dressed up for a graveyard shift at a gas station, with her hair done up and pink tinsel weaved into her box braids. She’s wearing a concert tee with a little stone fairy printed on the front and leg warmers with these tall boots. Her makeup is shimmery and loud; she belongs at a club covered in confetti and glitter like it’s 2009.

“No need to be scared of the boogeyman, or… whatever they call that guy.”

“Slenderman?”

“Mhm, that. I’m sure it’s just good Photoshop, just an art project people are writing scary stories about, and parents think it’s real, and now the news is involved. It happens all the time!”

“Yeah, but…” Your words die in your mouth. 

You saw him, you swear, between the trees or houses on your walk back to your dorm. Impossibly tall, with no features, stalking you from a distance like an animal. Maybe Sandy’s right. The stress of academics and work is probably just driving you crazy, making you see things that aren’t there. The town newspapers haven’t helped your theory of delusion, as people won’t stop going missing in this area. You’re tempted to grab a flashlight and check the perimeter, just in case. You reach for one on the shelf nearby, but Sandy gives you this disappointed look.

“I’m not letting you go ghost hunting. Not good for you,” Sandy’s gaze softens, “Now I feel like a dick for buying these tickets.”

You quit mopping. Tickets? 

“Ugh, don’t look at me like that! When I bought them, there wasn’t this Skinnyman stuff—”

“Slenderman.” You say.

“Slenderman stuff,” Sandy corrects, “I didn’t buy them when this Slenderman stuff was going on.”

“...Again? You went to a concert two weeks ago.” You say, focusing on pushing the mop over the soda spill until it makes the water a murky brown.

“That was nothing. It was a house concert, this one is real and at a big venue and everything! I’m taking my girlfriend for her birthday. Please, come on! I’m sure nothing crazy is going to happen tonight. Nothing ever happens here, anyhow. We work at a nowhere gas station in the middle of nowhere—I’ll even pay you, please.”

You may be terrified of these recent missing persons cases, but Sandy does pay you handsomely when she pulls stunts like this.

“Mundy doesn’t have to know about our little arrangement. It can be off the books.”

Mundy’s your manager, but not actually in your opinion. He never shows up, carries a ‘my way or the highway‘ view of things, and rules over this run-down Shell gas station with an iron fist. You missed your cousin’s birthday because he needed you to watch over this place. He’s the worst.

“You know what? Sure.” You say.

Sandy whoops and tosses you more money than you’ve ever seen in a paycheck. She squeezes you tight and says thank you about a million times.

“You’re the best, and I owe you one—or three—I don’t care, whatever you want! Take it easy.”

Her girlfriend pulls up, tucking her stout blue car parallel to two rusty shells. “I mean it! No ghost hunting.”

She dashes out of the gas station before you can speak. According to her orders, It’s a free, lazy night for you, and your first order is doing your legitimately obtained puzzles. You grab a magazine you ‘borrowed’ from last month’s shipment. You pull out a Sharpie and fill out some blank spaces. You chew on the cap, filling in NAP for twenty-eight across. Fifty-five across is FRIDGEMAGNET. Fifty-two down is IGLOO. Eleven down is easy as you fill out the top corner of the board without much trouble—TENDER, UMAMI, MEAT, SKEIN… It’s almost too easy, or you should seriously consider the big leagues. You finish just above half the crossword only half an hour into your shift, tossing the magazine aside and switching to swiping through your phone to keep the crossword-world-record holders off your tail, as they can’t know about your prowess yet.

That girl who captained cheerleading is having a baby, and there’s also a picture of her wearing a wedding veil (not that you care, considering she stuck gum in your hair during your math final). Some Robotics club girl got into one of those Ivy leagues and is having the time of her life, and a ton of videos of your past friends drunk at a club, confetti all over their everything. You turn off your phone with a heavy sigh and set it on the far side of the counter next to the cigarette shelf, returning to your only company for the night.

You finish the crossword after nearly an hour (it technically only took you thirty-five minutes, but you wouldn’t stop getting up to try and do something productive to keep your mind off your downward spiral), and you sneak the magazine back into the pile with all the other ones that look just like it.

The door slides open, and a man who looks your age stumbles inside, brown hair dripping wet. You switch into professional mode and get your feet off the counter. You give him your standard welcome, but he ignores it and ducks into the aisle closest to the wall. 

Maybe he’s just cold and drunk, but he looks rough. His sickly gray skin—with eyebags dark enough to be mistaken for under-eyeshadow—gives him an almost zombie-esque look (like a trad-goth, but gray). He peeks over the top of the aisle and locks eyes with you, lurching back as if it burns to hold your gaze. He reaches the far corner of the store, opens one of the fridges, and pulls out a can. You watch this man pace the back perimeter and grab a few things, still meandering.

“Can I help you find anything you need?” You ask, but he doesn’t seem to hear you as he stuffs a fistful of Slim Jims in his pocket.

Whatever, he’ll eventually find what he’s looking for if the poor guy searches long enough, or maybe not, considering his apprehension about approaching the front half of the store where your register is. You feel like a cat watching a bird from the window as you watch this strange person pace around the back of the store for nearly twenty minutes. Maybe you have a staring problem, but this guy is too eccentric to look away from. He knocks into the slushie machine and hisses to himself, speaking under his breath. 

He creeps forward to the counter like a deer, a few loose bills and coins tightly held in his bandaged palm. There’s not one bit of eye contact, but his gaze is piercing as his eyes remain locked on the linoleum floors. You grab the soda can he slides onto the countertop, then nod to the Slim Jims sticking out of his pocket.

His shaky palm opens, fingers twitching as five or six individually wrapped Slim Jims spill onto the counter. You count them up and add them to the total. Then he grabs a lighter and tosses it into the pile, the lime-green case clattering amongst his other purchases.

“That’ll be $12.56.”

He hands you $9.27. It’s all he has, and his sudden nervous energy confirms that.

He seems paranoid, and maybe getting a fistful of Slim Jims in him will do him good. You look at the camera and take the money he gave you, bagging everything he piled onto the counter.

“Oh—” He coughs into his fist, his neck creaks, “You don’t have to do that.”

You reassure him, “It’s nothing.” crosses your lips as you pass him the plastic bag.

He steps back, shies away, and then flees out the door like a feral cat. You hear another car horn as this strange guy disappears from view beyond the tree line.

Another weird stranger, you think. He’s just another passerby you’ll never see again.

✸𓆟✸

That’s what you think until he shows up again two weeks later. He’s dirtier than last time,  his fingernails caked with dirt as he bumps into Sandy. He grabs a soda from the back and shuffles to the front, eyeing your name tag. He says your name as if he’s kneading the word between his teeth and under his tongue like a lozenge.

You take the Pepsi from him and scan it. He coughs up enough money to pay for it—and a little more, four dirty singles more than he needs to pay for the soda.

“From last time—I know it wasn’t enough, I remembered.” He says, wiping his hand on his jacket. He looks proud of himself.

You thank him, and he looks like he’s about to burst, squirming at the compliment like a prodded insect, shakily taking the can from you and cracking it open.

“I’m Toby,” He tips the sugary drink back, then swallows hard, “Well, my name’s Tobias, but Toby sounds better. Toby Rogers sounds better than Tobias Rogers.”

Sandy eyes you, gesturing to Toby with a long acrylic, who’s now rocking back and forth on his feet and rambling. You shrug. He’s probably not a threat. 

He seems chill, you mouth to her.

He grabs a map and turns it over in his hand. He sets down his drink and skims over the large map of the state. You take his moment of focus to take in his features, dull, brown eyes that skirt around the paper. His hair is greasy and messy, probably knotted beyond care. His clothes—beat-up hiker’s trousers, a heavy jacket over a ratty black tank top, and goggles with bright orange lenses, the right one cracked. He twitches, then turns the map to you.

“Are there any ways to go here?”

You snap from your observation, blinking as your vision is filled with the veins and artery-looking highways across this middle-of-nowhere part of the state. Toby points to some empty spot on the map, some national park (you think).

“Well, you could take the interstate highway.” You suggest, dragging your finger along the thickest vein on the map.

“Well, I’d need a car for that, right? I don’t have one of those.”

Oh. That’s the problem with this part of the country. No car, no luck. If Toby wants to leave, he would need a car—whether that be from a friend or a stranger. You tell him so: that there aren’t many options to leave if you don’t have the money to do it, which feels especially cruel considering you essentially spotted him for Slim Jims the other week. He folds the map politely and then slips it back into its container.

“That sucks, I guess,” He says, continuing to nurse his drink. Sandy makes a phone-shape gesture with a frantic expression on her face. 

Toby’s a little eccentric, but he’s not 9-1-1 call-worthy. You shoo her away to reorganize the shelves. He keeps talking at you about a variety of things. He sounds like a camper, talking about how living in the woods is better than where he’s living now, how his roommates are very noisy, and he’d rather be cold and wet and living in a tent than be in his current situation.

“Off-campus housing must be tough. Are you in a fraternity?”

“Fraternity? No, not uni,” he says, shuffling on his feet as he pulls the soda tab off the can and rolls it between his fingers, “Not uni. Not smart enough for it. I didn’t even finish high school.”

“Oh.” 

Now it’s your turn to shuffle awkwardly.

Sandy slips into the break room and shuts the door behind her, leaving you, Toby, and the blinking security camera. Toby finishes his beverage and looks for a bin to toss it (and to look polite and well-mannered). You lift the garbage bin from behind the counter (also to look polite and well-mannered).

You both talk about a variety of things. Toby seems to relax once it’s just the two of you. He asks you about working here. He asks if you like it.

“Kind of. Pay is pretty bad, but the graveyard shift means I get paid to do nothing,”

He nods, then runs his fingers over the ridge of paper maps again. His hand snaps sharply downward to grip the counter, his free hand tugging up his sleeve so he can scratch his arm.

“Is there not any other way out of here?” Toby abruptly pulls his hand from the counter and strikes his temple with the heel of his hand, “W-Why won’t anybody let me leave?” Toby’s voice is cold and jagged like glass with corrosive terror. You recoil, instinctively covering your precious internal organs with a defensive lurch. Toby does the same, pulling his hood over his matted hair and bumping into the flat shelf behind him. Besides the hum-buzz of yellowed fluorescent lamps, the store is silent. He tugs the goggles over his eyes in a rough motion, too, mumbling and rocking to soothe himself.

After what feels like an eternity, Toby finally speaks at a volume you can hear.

“Do you ever feel like you’re being watched?” He weeps, “Like, even if you sleep on the second floor, it can still see you—even if you’re hiding—and it knows exactly where you are, and you can’t do anything?”

Sleepless nights, icy chills that leave the hairs on your neck standing on end, that prey-animal feeling where you know you’re being followed and observed (but your eyes can’t catch that distant figure, tall enough to blend in amongst the trees). People stopped believing you after you cried wolf a few too many times. Calling friends in the dead of night on the side of the road did not earn you a good favor, which explains why so many people stopped talking to you after high school. You look down at your near-dozen crossword puzzles filled out on lonely graveyard shifts, down at your hands, and then you meet Toby’s frightened gaze.

“I guess, yeah.” You reply. 

Toby blinks, tugging his blue surgical mask to rest comfortably on his nose.

“Really?” He creeps back towards the counter, shuffling forward to speak quietly, “I like coming here because I feel like I’m finally alone; It feels like I’m safe here—like nothing can hurt me.”

You nod. Working here gives you plenty of quiet, something most people can not get enough of. This place can be nice as long as Mundy leaves you and Sandy.

“My house isn’t a great place to be right now. That’s why I come here a lot. Nice and quiet, no screaming.”

“I get that, too,” You say quietly, speaking as if you’re trying not to frighten a wild animal, “Sometimes everything is just… too much, yeah?”

“...Yeah,” Toby whispers, “Yeah.”

He relaxes, taking a few deep breaths before pulling back his hood and goggles. Toby then hooks a finger around the elastic band on his surgical mask and pulls it off of his face, revealing a gaping scar on the side of his cheek that looks like it was chewed through. His teeth are visible, fairly yellow (but otherwise fine-looking), and slightly crooked. Seeing Toby’s face in its entirety takes you a moment to become accustomed to, his crooked smile and slightly-bent nose are not what fills your mind. His jaw is soft and rounded, and his gray-ish skin is smattered with lighter marks of old wounds.

Toby scratches at the healed-over gash, picking at some calloused skin while his other fingers curl involuntarily.

“I don’t go out much at all—” He starts, wiping his hand on his coat, “It’s been nice, even if I’ve had to sneak out to come here, I don’t want any other guys knowing I’ve been out here to see you—” Toby scrunches up, fingers curling as he watches you process his words. 

Toby has the nervous energy of a dog retired from blood sports and brought into a quiet home, always biting the hand that feeds because it’s all he’s ever known, kicking and screaming in terror at any gentle caress, howling like you’ve flayed his skin, separating sinew and flesh. He has matted fur and mangled teeth; he limps from years of brutality, eyes darting around the peaceful setting expecting to be bitten; to be scratched; to bleed with no future of quiet.

You walk out from behind the counter and sit beside him, bumping knees. You both sit in silence, surrounded by the warm hum-buzz of fluorescent lights. Toby’s shoulders heave with a tic as he knocks his knee against yours. The small noises of the creaky building and its humming electronics (which would normally send Toby into a tizzy) didn’t make his skin crawl. He feels his chest fill with air then feels the air leave out of his nose as he takes in your features, following the slope of your forehead down to your nose and mouth, then your chin and your neck. If you were to meet his gaze now he would die, so he enjoys this moment next to you for as long as he can.

Your time together is cut short when Sandy exits the break room.

Toby’s face warms as he scrambles to his feet and scurries out the door with a quick goodbye and thank you shouted in your direction.

You feel a hot blush creep up your face from your neck, Sandy finally speaks once it creeps to the tips of your ears.

“Did I…interrupt something?” She asks, holding back a snicker.

“A little bit,” You say, stuffing your hands into your pockets, “I keep your things from Mundy, you keep mine.” 

✸𓆟✸

There are three things that, when they come together, become the ingredients for the worst shift of your life.

First: Sandy doesn’t clock in, any shift without Sandy is like a peanut butter and jelly sandwich without the jelly.

Second, and this one’s new, Toby doesn’t visit. He makes the grueling night shift a little less boring and gives you someone new to chat with and learn things.

Third, Mandy does one of his surprise visits, especially when he remembers the security cameras he installed.

He stormed in only a few minutes after you clocked in, stomping about the store and trying to find something to interrogate you so he could open the door to harsher criticisms. He finds a few misorganized cans and grills you.

“You’re supposed to put the tall cans in the second fridge, don’t mix them.”

“My bad, Mundy. Won’t happen again.” You say, holding your hands up.

Most of the time he finds minute things, but because there are hardly any customers, there’s hardly anyone to mess anything up, which means there’s not much you can do to fill out a shift. This time, however, he pulls out a little card, holding it out as if you are supposed to know what that means. He drags you into the break room and pushes the little SD card into his dingy laptop. He clicks on one of the few dozen files stuffed in the folder. 

You watch a VOD of the security footage from a few weeks ago when you spotted Toby for those three extra Slim Jims. Mundy looks like he’s about to explode, pausing the video when all of Toby’s items are dumped out on the counter.

“You rang up only three Slim Jims that night. Why do I see six going into that bag?”

You freeze up, half because that’s such a stupid thing to pull you aside for, but also because Mundy is that crazy.

“I—”

“And then here,” He scrubs the video forward, showing the following interaction the following night, “Loitering? You’re letting people run amok in here when I’m not here? To think I trusted you and Sandy to care for things on your own.”

“Toby wasn’t doing anything—”

“No, don’t give me that done,” He snaps, ”Do you have any idea, any clue, what you’re doing to this place by letting people like that loiter around my store?” Mundy shouts, “Letting—You’re letting total thugs and drug addicts hang out in here. Do you ever think about what that may do for the reputation of this place?”

You sink back into your chair, which squeals as you curl like a sun-dried bug.

“You’re lucky I’m not going to fire you, do you understand? You’re lucky. That’s all you are. If that guy didn’t pay you back, you would be handing in your uniform.”

“But he’s not—”

“Not what?!” Mundy throws his hands up in exasperation, “Do you think normal people want to shop when you let crazy people bounce off the walls? You let this guy in—dirty and probably drugged out of his mind—and you make conversation with him? Let him loiter?”

“Mundy—”

“No, I’m not even going to bother with this,” He shoves the sopping-wet mop into your hands, “If I see any more shenanigans after this—you’re done. Get mopping. I have a headache from dealing with you, especially since I’m always trying to keep Sandy under control.”

Mundy massages his temples, walking into the break room while mumbling, “Now I’ve got to replace that piece-of-shit camera, too. Always on the fritz...”

You get to mopping, and Sandy passes through the automatic doors, a tense expression on her face.

“You know, I could hear him from the break room,” She mouths, “I think I would be the same if I were the manager of a dead-end gas station, especially if it were the only thing I had done with my life.”

Sandy pulls her purse over her shoulder, “Be careful not to unscrew your arms from mopping so much.”

She leaves, climbing into her girlfriend’s passenger side and pulling out of the dirt lot even faster. Mundy exits the break room and watches you like a hawk, and you spend three hours doing purposeless chores to keep him happy; you mop the floors, reorganize shelves, and restock the fridges (which were full) until you can barely hold yourself upright.

“See? I hired you to do your job, not just loaf around all night behind the counter.”

Ugh.

✸𓆟✸

Toby comes in again a few days after Mundy’s new ordinance began, and you can tell that all of this recent surveillance is getting to your head because you immediately look up at the camera that watches the both of you as if it’s going to snap at you like a dog. He says hello, waving with his eyes squint-y from a smile.

“You look like you’re about to puke.” Toby chuckles, leaving a few bills on the counter while he heads to the back to grab a drink, “Something wrong? Is it Sandy?”

“No, just… work.” You grab Toby's drink, eyes flicking to the camera as you take the money, count it up, and give him a few coins in change.

“Is it Mundy?”

You hush him, eyes flicking up to the camera. He nods, taking his drink and starting his familiar pacing around the main body of the store. You grab the mop from the break room, though you’ve already mopped this entire place three times, and begin your familiar dance to follow Toby around the store.

“He won’t let you stay. If I let you loiter, Mundy will fire me,” You meet his gaze, and he looks like a kicked dog, “I’m so sorry.”

Toby peeks at the camera, then looks back at you, “Is he here?” He asks.

“Break room, most likely watching the footage from my last shift. Mundy’s waiting for me to slip up, so it’s been stressful.”

Toby pats your shoulder, then takes his can and finishes the rest of his drink quickly, “... I’m sorry. I can go home if being here is a bad thing.”

“I don’t want you to go, though—” You say, your voice is a little too heavy for talking to a regular—”...You know, you’re one of three customers we’ve had for weeks. Isn’t that funny? This place is a dump. I would quit, but I need the money.”

Toby watches you push the mop in a fit, pushing and pulling water across the clean linoleum tiles.

“...I have to go now. Thanks for everything.” Toby says quietly with a new coldness to his soft tone.

His sudden shift in demeanor makes you a bit nervous as he exits the store, waving sweetly at you. You wave back. Hopefully, he didn’t say thanks for everything because he was leaving forever. You watch him disappear along the edge of the highway, and you are left alone to mop the floors for the rest of the night, eventually leaving because Mundy doesn’t trust you to handle closings anymore. 

Toby scales the crag outside the gas station, slipping back into the woods with new feelings bubbling under the surface of his skin. He races past familiar trees, spotting the mansion on the horizon. He scales the wall using the only standing gutter left, and then he slips into his room through the window, angry enough to chew on his hand until he bleeds. He pulls off his shoes and flings them into his dresser. The quickest, easiest answer would be to run back there, hatchets in hand, and dismember this guy that’s been bothering you. The other part of Toby, the one he kept hold of after everything that happened to him (the part of him that’s still seventeen years old and terrified), wants to just curl up on his dingy mattress and give up. He grabs a hatchet and curls up with it in his arms, running his hand along the handle’s grain.

Maybe in a few days, he doesn’t want to scare you, maybe he can make it look like a bad accident.

There’s the clatter of furniture, the familiar sounds of home, and Toby drifts off to sleep, planning out the next few nights to prepare even if it means he won’t be able to see you. Spending the next few days in the manor is rough because everybody won’t stop asking questions. Toby hardly imagined anyone in the manor enough to notice he was still there (it took everyone nearly three weeks to notice EJ’s absence when it was too late to catch them), and it was even stranger for others to be concerned about Toby’s whereabouts.

He wishes EJ was still here, they hardly cared about unimportant things and cared even less about stupid things like visiting someone behind Slenderman’s back. They would have helped him plan, listened to Toby go through a few plans, giving a thumbs up when good and a thumbs down when bad. He instead spends the few days pacing around his room as ideas swarm his brain like locusts, biting off chunks until Toby needs to sleep and quit thinking.

✸𓆟✸

Mundy grumbles, stepping outside and lighting a cigarette as he stands next to the dumpster, eyeing the few gutted shells of cars abandoned on the lot. He twirls the keys around his finger, more stressed about adding two sudden openings online. He always hated computers.

Toby peeks around from behind the dumpster, eyes trailing down Mundy’s back, eyes boring into his spine and shoulder blades beneath his shirt. He unhooks one of his hatchets from its holster on his hip, creeping along the edge of the gas station’s wall as Mundy shuffles on his feet.

You already settled into your shift hours ago, Toby memorized your schedule so he could always bump into you. Mundy was so wound up from Sandy organizing the magazines her way that he nearly snapped and fired her on the spot. 

Any reprieve from Mundy’s surveillance would not be taken for granted. You start counting the ceiling tiles, wishing you could do a crossword right about now.

“You think Mundy’s… Okay?” Sandy pipes up, restocking the beef jerky bags on a distant shelf.

“No.”

“I mean—yeah, he’s not generally okay, but… he’s been outside for half an hour…” Sandy stands, abandoning her work, ”I don’t smoke, but that seems like a long time to be out there in… that.” 

Rain beats against the windows so intensely it’s hard to see the highway that runs parallel to the station, the only indicator that the highway still exists is the occasional flash of high beams as someone drives by. You can understand the need for a break (whether with a cigarette or a puzzle) but this torrential downpour would dampen anyone’s smoke break, at least he should be standing under the concrete awning. Lightning lights the night sky, highlighting the dark forests that swallow this little establishment. Thunder growls overhead, rolling over your mind like a cold chill.

“Something’s wrong.”

“Oh my god, please don’t go off on one of your tangents about Slenderman, I do not need that right now, especially since this is the first time we’ve had a moment without Mundy breathing down our necks. Besides, give me some reprieve since I’m handling garbage on such a stormy night.”

“I wasn’t going to!” You throw up your hands dramatically, “You’re the one that brought it up!”

Sandy looks outside and shudders, “Slenderman isn’t real, I’m not going to let your little internet ghost stories scare me.” She swallows, slipping outside and pulling the garbage bag from its canister, “You’re so paranoid.”

You watch her disappear into the darkness, the automatic doors sliding shut as she rounds the corner to toss the bag into the dumpster. You suck in a breath and push it out shakily. You hear muffled shouting, Sandy calling out for Mundy, but there’s no response. 

The store feels too big all of a sudden, you feel too exposed with the large glass sliding doors, but Sandy’s jeers about your paranoia push that nervous energy down into the pit of your stomach. 

Sandy heaves the bag up above her torso, but her shaky grip (and her laziness about tying the top of the bag) causes a plethora of things to spill from the bag. Sandy huffs, dropping the half-full bag on the ground and groping for trash in the dark.

She groped around in the dark, mind swimming with frustration and confusion. The rain soaks through her coat, and her well-kept nails are caked with mud as she picks up garbage. She feels the usual things—crumpled-up cans, napkins, and old fast food bags.

But the sudden, leathery texture that she brushes her fingertips against, a coppery tinge to the air. It’s warm, warm like a person.

A blood-curdling scream rings out after a flash of lightning turns night to day (followed by the loudest clap of thunder you’ve heard—the kind that makes the earth shake). You chuckle to yourself, but you shut yourself up when you hear her hysteric sobs mixed in with Sandy’s horrified screams.

Everything goes quiet.

“Sandy?”

Her sobs continue, you can hear her crying.

“Sandy—” You step out into the rainy darkness, “—Hey, are you there? Is everything okay? Was it a raccoon or something?”

She shouts your name with the desperation of a wild animal with an arrow through its leg, scrambling to her feet, she’s soaked and cold.

She grabs the collar of your shirt, drags you back towards the light, then locks the doors behind the two of you, and knocks a shelf over to block the door.

“Sandy, what the hell? I just—”

“M-Mundy’s dead—he’s fucking dead,” She gasps, sobbing harder than before, ”We’re next—Oh god, oh god, oh god—”

Sandy lurches and vomits, dark bile streaking across the linoleum tiles. You’re at her side in a second pulling her dark, curly hair away from her face. You guide her to sit down in the break room, kneeling in front of her as she nearly shakes herself to pieces.

“He’s dead? You’re serious?”

“His head was in a garbage bag—” A dry sob rattles her frame, ”—He’s dead. Dead, dead, dead.”

You pull out your phone and dial the emergency number, gently soothing Sandy as she tries to hush up when the line connects. You give the operator the address and hold the phone for Sandy. She sputters, trying to spit out her words. The operator asks her questions, trying to get her to relax.

She described Mundy’s still-warm head rolling out of the bag, Sandy’s skin void of its typical warmth and vibrancy. Sandy emphasizes how warm it was when she touched it, like feeling a leather bag sitting in the sun.

The operator soothes both of you, help is on the way.

After thirty minutes of agonizing silence, The approaching ambulance’s siren wailed like an angel, and the paramedics that arrived on the scene ushered you and Sandy out and swaddled you both in blankets. Tape cinched the gas station, and officers secured the perimeter, marching like ants. The rain was still heavy, and large droplets beat against the ambulance. Detectives sat across from you trying to get Sandy (in her nearly catatonic state) to recite the scene.

“I don’t know,” Sandy said, “I don’t know.”

I don’t know, I don’t know, I don’t know… She’s rocking herself, shivering either from terror or the cold—perhaps both—as you rub her back and try to help her calm down.

“Rich,” a paramedic shouts, which drags the detective's attention from Sandy, “Call up Morgan—We’ve got another.”

He sighs and hops out of the ambulance, beating a phone number into the small buttons and walking off into the rain.

Sandy turns to you, she’s ice cold, “...What are we gonna do now?”

Your mind can’t help but wander, the rational half of you wants to believe that this was some kind of freak accident, that Mundy just…

Well, you aren’t sure how someone could be accidentally decapitated, but maybe there is a logical explanation for Mundy’s death. He is just another number in a vast list of victims of these unexplainable attacks. Some believe in a Jack the Ripper scenario, while others lean towards the supernatural. You’ve fallen down the rabbit hole before, and with each passing moment, the idea of your past delusions being real sounds less and less insane. Sandy nudges you, interrupting your slip into panic. 

“What are we going to do now?”

“I…I don’t know.” You whisper, curling up under your blanket.

You swear you see someone moving amongst the trees, and dread washes over you like an icy bath. 

What are you going to do now?

✸𓆟✸

[pyrovverse]

HOME SWEET HOME .

CW: Paranoia, death, murder/gore, abuse, fire, alcohol abuse

During the blazing summer of ‘96, the Rogers family made the impromptu decision to go for a trip to Lake Catherine State Park in Arkansas and to visit family which nested in Bentonville. Toby was early in his boyhood at eleven years old when he found himself lost deep within the forest that surrounded the lake. Though it was only afternoon when the young boy had found himself misplaced, the woods were dark and cold. Was it evening already?

It took eight long hours until the search party brought him safely back into the arms of his mother who was worried sick about her troublesome son. He was first discovered in an unresponsive daze, staring off into the wilderness as though he was looking at something in particular. There wasn’t anything there. It wasn’t spoken of since, and soon the family, and the boy, began to forget all about the strange situation.

Though the ordeal had long slipped his mind, the aftereffects stayed. Toby had found himself plagued with random coughing fits, nosebleeds, strange dreams and violent intrusive thoughts. Slowly, he felt himself rotting away from the inside. On some occasions, the young boy would wake up behind his home late in the night, having sleepwalked to the forest edge that bordered his backyard.

It seemed as though tragedy followed Toby like a stray dog. When he was 17 years old, he fell victim to a sudden, violent car crash that took the life of his elder sister, Lyra, who was driving her brother home from a doctors appointment. The force of the steering wheel crushed her and she died on impact, while the boy was left with a broken arm and concussion. The last imagine Toby had of his dear older sister was her bloody body mangled, and the awful sound of life escaping her through a gruesome series of groans and wheezing.

Throughout his life he wore strength like a golden medal that he held in between his canine teeth. But on that godforsaken day, his knees fell weak, as so did he. Life slipped through the cracks of his scarred hands and from the moment he stepped out of the wreckage, he hadn’t felt real.

From that moment forth, a sure descent into insanity grasped his now fragile mind. He felt a sickness take hold of him, far heavier than any grief that struck his sore heart. Through the midst of despair and loss, he lost all sense of what to do with himself. The stress proved to be too great for the boy who’s medal of strength was crumbling under the weight of the world. He was angry. Angry at his father for not being there, angry at his peers for their rejection, angry at the world for turning its back on him. Angry at himself.

But hating himself did nothing but prove Dan right, and so every fibre of that hate he directed towards the outside world. And his “me against them” mindset only strengthened its resolve as he lost the only person in his life who treated him as a human being. Now she was gone, and no amount of screaming and yelling and begging could get her to turn around from that pearly white staircase and come back to him. Now he was as alone as he’s felt his entire life.

Nobody taught Toby how to bear the burden of loss. He spent his entire life destroying everything through a rough series of fury and malice, that he was at a disadvantage when something left his life not of his own doing. Every semblance of control he mustered up over the years slipped through the cracks of his fingers like murky water, and he began searching for solace in liquor. Alcohol became a familiar coping mechanism for him, stealing booze from his father which prompted more violence in the unsteady household. His days for the next couple months would begin to consist of him running away from home, fighting with his parents, or drinking in the forest behind his house.

On cold, lonely nights he would sit on the edge of those woods in his backyard with a bottle held in his busted knuckles, and he would wonder if any fire could burn hot enough to rid that house of its sins. If anything could stop the war from raging on, if some day he could lay down his arms.

Over the next few burdensome months after the funeral, a bizarre, creeping feeling of being followed would begin to drape over Toby like a blanket of paranoia. It started off small. He would sometimes see things out of the corner of his eye, peeking around corners or standing amidst the trees that would disappear when he blinked. Then he’d begin to experience face blindness, or something of the sorts, where he could catch glimpses of people in crowds with no faces. And when the sleepwalking found itself back to the boys nights, he felt as plagued with disease as he did when he was 11 years old.

It had gotten to the point he would spend hours staring out his bedroom window at the woods behind his house, only being interrupted by his concerned mother noting that his nose had started bleeding. The trees had eyes, and they were watching him. There was something waiting for Toby in that forest. Something that would begin to torment the boy with nightmares and haunting visions of his deceased sister. Sometimes, late in the dead of night, he could swear he heard that terrible groaning and wheezing coming from outside his bedroom window. It beckoned him.

It was a cold November evening when the boy killed his own father by bludgeoning him to death with a baseball bat. After an early morning altercation with his father, Dan had been drunk and aggressive, and Toby was hanging on a very thin thread that inevitably snapped.

There was something primal within the younger as he brutally attacked his dear old dad, mercilessly battering the elder until his face was nothing but unrecognizable mush. The familiar scowl was the last thing he saw of Dan Rogers. Toby looked into the terrified, furious eyes of his creator as he beat him down, and in his fathers eyes the boy only saw his own reflection.

Toby lost everything that day. Or rather, he gained everything. He had nothing to lose to begin with, and now he was free from the chains of that house. And the visions of that warzone of a home being engulfed in flames only became true as he left the battlefield with gasoline and blood soaked hands. Dazed, and coming off of a rage-fuelled adrenaline rush, Toby thoughtlessly made his way to the forest he had been called to for weeks. The smell of smoke began to heat up the chilly autumn night, and as the fire grew, it accompanied the moon in lighting up the dark sky.

The last thing he remembered from that fateful night, one that was a long time coming paved through years of abuse and torment, was the feeling of flames on his skin and rough smoke in his lungs as the forest he sat silently in became a victim of the housefire. As the heat engulfed his surroundings, his vision went blurry and his head felt full of static.

This was the death of Tobias Rogers, the boy born of forest fire.

[necroromantics]

🧺 — Laundry And Taxes

chapter 1. // (masterlist)

“Oh darling, please believe me~”

Toby’s dark eyes fluttered open as he jolted up, his hand pressing over his chest as he caught his breath. He could hear The Beatles blaring from an old boombox stereo in the room next to him. He could hear a familiar voice humming alongside in a pretty tune.

“I’ll never do you no harm~”

The soft sun shone through the bedroom window as his hands dropped and gripped the sheets of the bed he sat on. The boy eyed his surroundings, a sick feeling bubbling up in his stomach as he nearly threw up.

What was he doing in his childhood room?

He raised a shaking hand up to his face and let his fingers run over the gash that once scarred his cheek, quickly noticing it was no longer there. He was now once again seventeen years old, and everything was fine.

A million thoughts raced through his mind, paralyzing the boy's trembling body as he struggled to breathe. The warm rays of sunshine danced on his pale skin, and the chirping birds outside accompanied the muffled music. The same records his sister would always play.

His sister.

Toby suddenly threw his body out of his bed and scampered down the hall, almost breaking down the door as he forced himself into his sister's room.

“Lyra-”

“What are you doing?” The girl scolded her little brother, she had been cleaning her room while singing along to her favorite album.

Hesitantly, Toby collided his body against his sisters, gripping mindlessly onto her as though he was desperately seeking confirmation she was real, and not another hallucination. She smelt like peach juice and beach. She felt warm, and alive. Her arms cradled the boy who was overcome by dizziness, he felt as if he was about to faint. As he stared into her familiar green eyes, he ignored her confused gaze. She was as beautiful as he remembered. It took everything in him to fight back a sob, to collapse into her arms and weep. All he could do was stare, take in her entire presence that had been so cruelly taken from him all those years ago. He was here, and so was she, and for now, everything was fine. For once in his tortured life, he seemed to be having a good dream.

“Seriously, what's wrong with you?” Lyra grumbled, pushing off her clingy brother, “are you going to get out of my room now? I’m sort of busy here, nutjob.”

He couldn’t move, as much as he wanted to, he couldn’t muster up the courage to look away. A part of him was terrified that if he did, she would disappear again. In response to her brother's difficult attitude, she shouted out, “Mooom, Toby won't leave me alone!”

A faint voice from the kitchen called out in response, “Toby, stop bothering your sister.”

His mothers voice, he recognized. It sounded almost angelic. For a moment, he thought he must have died in that godless forest and ended up in heaven. He scoffed to himself at the idea as he made his way to the kitchen to see his mother as well. Toby knew better than to entertain the idea of being freed from his sin, he knew he would never see the pearly gates when he died. Not all dogs go to heaven.

He first noticed how lively his mother looked as she scrubbed away at the dishes, compared to all those years he witnessed her carrying such heavy grief in her bones as she moved. Toby only watched from a distance, lingering quietly at the entrance of the kitchen.

“Do you need something?” Connie called out to her son. Her awareness of his presence took the boy off guard, he stammered for a moment. She never noticed him watching all the times he had done it before. Back when everyone told her that Toby had died in that forest fire long ago.

Toby made his way cautiously to his mothers side and embraced her in a tight hug, causing her to let out a surprised gasp at the sudden affection of her troubled boy.

“I’m sorry mom,” he dug his face into the nape of her neck, “I’m so sorry.”

“Oh- Toby, it’s not a big deal,” she hushed as she ran her overworked fingers through the messy, chestnut hair of her son. As Toby pulled away, he allowed himself to get a good look at her face. She looked healthy, happy. Better than he remembered.

As a proxy, he would occasionally check in on his mother, from a distance. Or drop off flowers for mothers day in the dead of night. Only tragedy had gotten this close to her in years. Only tragedy. He inhaled the sun and sound from the nostalgic world around him as though he were living in a mere memory. He breathed in his mothers perfume.

“Why don’t you go clean up your room while I finish making dinner, sweetheart,” Connie suggested, pinching his cheek. His hands, no longer scarred, lingered over hers before he let out a deep breath and made his way back to his childhood room.

Toby sat down on his creaky, small, old bed and embraced the afternoon environment for a moment. His sister was still blasting her music from her room, his room still smelt like teenage musk and a summer long lost. He was years away from the battlefield, and yet he couldn’t shake the feeling like something bad was going to happen. The boy grew frustrated at the hopeless situation, to be thrown into a happy memory only to realize he must have to be stolen back from it soon. To wake up on the ground of that dreadful forest.

Standing up, he peered over at the family portrait perched on his tiny dresser. The photo of his family he knew, with his sister, his mother, him, and his father. To his shock, it was now replaced with a new photo which no longer included his dear old dad. Only Toby, Lyra, and their mother. They looked happier, Toby’s smile was more genuine, Lyra was beaming, Connie looked peaceful. They looked like a normal family.

A few hours had passed before Connie called her children to the dinner table, bringing spaghetti and meatballs to their plates. This was the same table where he would so often sit across from his father who would spend the evening ranting and raving, berating his son for being a useless burden. A haunting feeling creeped up behind him, smothering him, stealing his breath. Toby picked at his food, trying to choke down the anger at the idea that his father could still be alive. All of that fight, that effort, went to waste. He had gotten his family back, but he couldn’t shake the idea that he must have gotten that monster back as well. It burnt holes in his gut when he thought about it.

“When's dad coming home?” He spoke up, breaking the soft silence.

As soon as he finished his question, it was as if a wave of tension choked up his family. Lyra glanced worriedly over to Connie, her body sitting still, waiting for her mother to speak up. Connie looked up quickly at her boy, shock and a hint of guilt mingled on the cracks of her face, dancing in her green-blue eyes.

“I’ve promised you this, Toby, he isn’t coming back.” She smiled as she continued to work at the food on her plate, but anyone could see she was fighting back a sorrow too heavy for one woman to carry.

Toby’s heart dropped, he felt uneasy for a moment. And then he felt relieved, and then angry. In what world did his mother gain the courage to kick that man out? In what world did everything turn out fine? That was when the realization drowned him, suffocated him. Toby wasn’t sent back in time. He was in an entirely different world. One where things work out for the best. One with no war.

Memories from before he woke up in this place flooded his mind like a wave pool. Crimson skies, the shrieks, the desperate attempts to flee. His desperate attempts to find that girl. If he ended up in this strange world, he wondered who else wound up here as well. His tired brown eyes glanced down to his hands. They had no callous, no scar. Innocent. He curled his clean fingers into a fist and squeezed. It was far too quiet, far too peaceful.

That night, Toby laid in bed and stared up at his ceiling decorated with dinosaur-shaped glow in the dark stickers that had long worn out. He thought back to how small he was when they had first stuck them there, his father had to lift him up so he could reach. Everytime Toby thought about his dad, he felt a burning sensation consume him. He gritted his teeth down to metal and ash, he clenched his fists so tight they whitened. Toby sat up in bed, he couldn’t sleep. His brow furrowed as he tried to control the rage that took him over. There was something unfed within him, begging to devour like a hungry dog.

His gaze turned towards his bedroom window to meet the trees wrapping around the flickering street lamp illuminating the night outside. Something about that sight overtook him, and he couldn’t help but stare out into the endless void of the midnight hour. Call it desperation, frustration. As his body fell back onto his bed with an irritated groan escaping his mouth, Toby let himself fall into a deep slumber, hoping he would wake up back into the world he knew. Back where he knew himself. Back where he knew he didn’t have to feel as powerless as he did confined in the walls of his childhood home.

Toby softly awoke as he took in a deep breath of morning sunshine and August breeze. He rubbed his tired eyes and examined the area around him, heart beating fast as it typically did when he woke up, readying itself for tragedy. There was a bed underneath him, carpet under that, and a horribly familiar house that surrounded. To his complicated feelings of dismay, he was still in his childhood home. He sniffled to himself as he sat up and let his feet hit the ground. The boy thought back to all the times he would wake up in strange, unknown places with no recollection of what he had been doing before. He thought back to the times he would wake up with blood on his hands, and how he never knew if it was his or not.

The lanky boy, still in his pajamas, shuffled out of his room and down the hallway which led to the living room. His hands traced over the walls he grew up with, gliding over patched holes in the wall, listening to his sister talk to one of her friends on the phone in her room. As Toby made his way to the blaring TV, he stared at the infomercial for a long while, waiting for the image to turn to static, or to distort as it typically did where he was from. The longer he waited for something to happen, the more he realized it never would. Like awaiting the arrival of a friend who he hadn’t met yet. Everything was normal.

Toby made his way out of the house and into the outdoors. The boy had no regard for his appearance, no shame. He had the belief that he shouldn’t waste his breath trying to please a world that endlessly rejected him. The summer heat embraced his body as he eyed his surroundings. Toby made note of every car, house, neighbor mowing their lawn. He twitched and turned to every bird flying, tree swaying. Every stranger he passed as he walked down the sidewalk of the neighborhood he had walked a thousand times made his fist clench in preparation. His hand would make its way down to his side, ready to grab a hatchet that no longer resided on the belt he was no longer wearing.

As he looked at the large, overbearing forest that he was approaching at the end of the street, Toby could only think back to the last time he had witnessed it in all its mightiness and size. When he entered the woods, all he thought about was the fire. The heat that scorched him, the ash that choked him, the smoke that scraped at his lungs. The blood of his father that he wore like a glove on his hands. Compared to the night Toby Rogers died, the now once again seventeen year old boy felt odd standing alongside the tall trees he had once burnt to ash. The boy looked out at the vastness of the wide green forest, taking it all in, as he did last time he was there. This time, there was no fire, no blood, no tragedy. There was no static. No faceless entity.

“Are you listening?” Toby called out to the endless nothingness. In reply, there was a harmony of birds chirping. A warm summer breeze danced past him. He stood silently, eagerly awaiting a response from the eldritch being who tortured him for years. A masochistic desperation for a sign that he wasn’t left behind. He felt healthy, clean. A cleanliness that drove him mad. It stripped him from all he was. Toby was left bare and small standing directionless in the midst of the woods. He choked back his frustration and turned to make his way back home. There was nothing there for him.

[aerodumb]

So I wrote a Ticci-Toby fanfic

You were getting ready to go outside when one of your rings slipped from your hands and got under a drawer. You begrudgingly kneeled and lifted it a bit to look for the ring, but you found something interesting along with it. An old diary with only a few readable pages.

Am I projecting my problems onto this fanfic? Yes.

Is it self-indulgent? Yes, to some extent.

Please, if you find any mistakes or if the wording is weird, tell me. English is not my first language!