Published: August 21st 2021, 3:37:49 pm
I'm too excited to wait for one of my regular post days to post this so here's a lil extra present today!
Fun themes in this fic: werewolves!
Triggery themes in this fic: horror elements, references to child abuse/neglect, neglect, abandonment, attempted murder, ANGST (but with a somewhat happy ending)
This fic was straight up inspired by another artist's au, I'll post a link at the end since it's spoiler-y.
I might write a follow-up if people are interested!
~~~~~
Why was it that the beam of a flashlight actually made being in the dark even scarier? Like there was no way Eijirou was going to turn the light on his phone off to be in complete darkness but also he was terrified that at any moment the beam of light would fall across something terrifying, like a dead body or a serial killer or an angry ghost or something. He kind of wished he hadn’t taken this stupid dare, but he wasn’t going to back out now--that’d be totally unmanly! So he readjusted his lucky snap-back, and trudged on.
---
Eijirou had been having a fun hangout day with the squad. They’d gone to the arcade, got ice cream, found a fox skull in the park, chased some squirrels, and took down a few gyms in Pokemon Go (cause yes, they were still playing).
Then Hanta had coupons for this new Denny’s so they trooped across town, goofing off and laughing like the pack of feral idiots that they were. And they’d passed this creepy-looking house, right? Like it looked like it used to be a nice place, with this big fenced yard, set back from the road, lots of trees and bushes and stuff for privacy--but there’d obviously been some kinda fire so the roof was half collapsed and the windows were all black and busted and the plants were overgrown.
And that started a conversation.
While Eijirou knocked back a syrup-soaked Lumberjack Slam, Denki and Mina tried to tell the story of the house being haunted. Except they couldn’t get the story straight. Either the former owners were eaten by their cannibal child who still lived in the basement subsisting off rats, or the basement was haunted after the previous owner’s kid set the house on fire, or it was haunted by the ghost of a feral person who lived in the walls, or the house used to have a secret dog fighting ring in the basement and it was haunted by all the dogs that died in the fire.
“One of these things is not like the other…” Hanta said.
“Apparently the place had a lot of dog barking noise complaints while it was still occupied--but the owners didn’t have a dog,” Denki replied in a spooky voice.
Then Hanta pulled up Zillow and announced that the place didn’t even have a basement. Then Denki suggested they go sneak in that night and try to find if there was a secret basement. Then Mina backpeddled so hard, if Eijirou had had any doubts that the three were messing with him, they would’ve vanished because she definitely believed there was something going on at the house and even though she was totally unafraid of serial killers (“I’d just go completely feral and bite em! Chomp!” (so manly!!)) she was deeply afraid of ghosts and undead stuff (“How do you defend against that? You can’t kill them, they’re already dead!”). And Hanta and Denki teased her about this, saying they’d go without her while she fretted to be left alone, until finally Eijirou volunteered to go in by himself and--
And that’s how he wound up here, standing alone in the darkened entryway of a half-burned out house at a quarter to midnight while his friends were camping outside. Literally, they’d pulled out Hanta’s old tent and all their sleeping bags and set themselves up a cozy nest complete with snacks and Netfli. Luckily they lived in a college town where the locals expected a certain level of teenaged tom-foolery, otherwise they probably would’ve had the cops called on them by now.
Eijirou assumed with his squad so close by there’d be someone to hear him scream and he could totally trust that they would, ghost or not, come and help him… but he couldn’t really hear anything from outside so maybe not.
It was just Eijirou, his phone, his lucky snapback, and his manny-pack filled with jerky, a pocket knife, a spare phone charger, and a bottle of water… against a cannibal/feral wall person/spectral dog fighting victim.
At least he hadn’t had to break in--the firefighters had done that for him however long ago the fire was. The door didn’t even close properly behind him.
Eijirou took in a deep breath, let out a closed-mouth cough from the smoky stench, and marched forward. As he walked through the gekkan he almost kicked off his shoes on instinct before he remembered he didn’t have to. Actually, he really shouldn’t. The floor was nasty, covered in soot and boot prints left behind by the firefighters. And of course after dousing the house in water to put out the flames, the firefighters hadn’t stayed after to clean up, so the whole place smelled like smoke and mold.
The gekkan let out into a short hallway that ended with a flight of soot-stained stairs that disappeared around a corner. If Eijirou turned left, he’d be heading into some kind of living room--and that was the plan, since he was trying to find a secret basement so he should probably stay on the ground floor--but he lingered. Like a deer in headlights he stared at the wall where the stairs disappeared and imagined that at any moment a hideous face would appear around the edge. Would it shriek? Or would it just stare wide-eyed and unblinking, jaw-slacked while it slowly wrapped spidery fingers around the edge of the wall, bracing to pounce--why did he let his friends convince him to watch scary movies while they waited for nightfall?
Eijirou would like to say that he sucked it up and marched into the living, but lying was unmanly: he ran like a frightened toddler, then rolled his phone light across the space, doing a sweep--like a cop, checking the corners for murderers before letting his guard down.
Eijirou had spent enough lazy afternoons watching home improvement shows to know the room he was standing in was what is known as ‘open concept’. It was a large space, he could just imagine a living room leading into a dining room and then there was the kitchen, the cabinets looking like nothing more than black boxes.
The carpet was definitely the source of the mold smell. The edges of the room were particularly bad, with soggy dark patches of the stuff. The mold had even grown down the seam where two sections of carpet met, dividing the living and dining room.
The smell was something and Eijirou kept his breathing shallow and made his way to the large window at the front of the room. The glass was all some level of broken and soot-stained with the occasional streak where water had snuck in through the cracks and holes and washed the black away.
The damage to the window affected the moonlight coming in and created jagged patterns on the floor. Eijirou stood a moment with his back to the window, keeping his body and gaze inward, watching the room for any sign of movement as he bathed in the light of the half moon, breathed in the fresh(er) air, and listened to the soft outside noises of crickets, traffic, and--if he strained his hearing enough--the quiet laughter of his friends. It was a welcome reminder of normalcy.
As he set forward again, Eijirou wondered if the situation was better or worse because the house was empty. Furniture would’ve cast creepy shadows, but might also make the space more alive. Instead, the living and dining rooms were empty but for indents in the carpet and discolored patches on the walls and floor where pictures once hung and cozy rugs once lay. They kinda reminded him of scars; the family had left their mark on the place.
Then he entered the kitchen and he thought that if the discolored patches were scars then this was an open wound. The wall next to the sink had been hacked open--the cabinet there was in pieces, the splinters still littered the floor. Eijirou shone his light on the hole and saw burnt insulation, curled wires, and dented metal pipes. If he listened carefully he could hear dripping coming from somewhere below.
He was reminded of a time Before. When he was very young and his neighbor’s house had an electrical fire. While his mother comforted the sobbing woman, he’d inspected the damage. The fire had been inside the wall and so the firefighters had torn it open with axes to put it out.
That must’ve been what happened here. Except with his neighbor’s house the fire got called in almost immediately so there was mostly just water damage--this was obviously a lot more serious.
As if he needed any further indication that the house was uninhabitable, he found a blank space and trailing pipes where a dishwasher and fridge should be. He felt kind of bad. He didn’t know much about real estate but he’d assume a nice house like this would have appliances when you bought it. Them being gone meant the house wasn’t just temporarily abandoned; no one was expected to live here again. Poor house.
Eijirou wandered past the end of the cabinetry and came to two doors. One obviously led to the backyard but the other… well, if Eijirou’s spatial awareness could be trusted then this door led under the staircase.
Kind of the logical place to put basement stairs.
Eijirou swallowed. Wow, he had not appreciated how the open concept thing had spoiled him because opening a door to an unknown room was actually pretty scary.
He reached a shaky hand for the doorknob, then paused.
What would he do if something popped out at him? He shifted his weight, bent his knees a little, straightened them, readjusted. Would it be smarter to run or fight? Mina had a point when she said she could take a living threat--like Eijirou had full confidence if a cannibal or a feral wall person leapt out at him he could probably kick their ass if need be, but if he got into supernatural creature territory then things got iffy.
How the hell do you hurt something that isn’t even alive. His fidgety side-stepping had him walk in a complete circle before he realized it and cut that out.
Enough!
Live with no regrets!
If a cannibal ghost was going to eat him then so be it!
He yanked the door open before he could think on it a second longer.
“SHIT!” He shrieked and leapt back as maybe fifty cockroaches went scurrying over the wall, up the ceiling, some of them across the floor--right toward him!
Eijirou all but flew onto the kitchen counter, the light of his camera phone doing a crazy dance across the floor while the roaches zipped around trying to avoid the light.
Eijirou didn’t know what kind of sounds were coming out of him but there were a lot of them because oh fucking God some of the roaches had run under the counter he was hiding on and some of them were above him on the ceiling and what if they dropped down and landed on him--
Bang! Bang! Bang!
Eijirou jumped about a foot as the door to the backyard shook, the knob rattling.
“Eijirou?!” That was Denki’s voice.
The fear unknotted itself in Eijirou’s throat, but his whole body was still buzzing with anxiety because--
“Denki, there’s roaches!”
The door handle stopped jiggling. There was a moment of silence and then… familiar cackling.
Eijirou’s face burned. “Shut up! There’s a lot of em!”
“Not roaches!” Hanta--petrified of spiders but somehow completely unafraid of cockroaches--laughed. “Ghosts are okay but not roaches!”
“Aw, c’mon Hanta!” Mina scolded, but Eijirou could hear her amusement. “Hey Eijirou! If it makes you feel any better--if I’d gone in there with you guys and saw a bunch of cockroaches you would’ve been carrying me out in a body bag. So technically you saved my life?”
That did make him feel better actually. Plus when he’d screamed his friends had heard him and all came running.
Eijirou shakily got down from the counter, shining his phone light in a circle around himself like a barrier against roaches before he approached the back door.
Unlike the busted front door, the back door still had a working lock. He opened the door but took care not to touch it much. Now that he knew there were cockroaches here he wanted to avoid touching things as much as possible.
His friends were all smiling at him and it was enough to make his pout wobble a bit into a smile. “You guys are jerks.”
“Glad to see you weren’t being eaten by a ghost,” Denki snickered.
“Do you want to stop?” Mina asked kindly.
“Yeah, are you getting too scared?” Hanta turned a shit-eating grin on him.
Eijirou’s pout was firmly back on his face. “No, I haven’t really had a good look around yet, I’m doing like… a cursory sweep or whatever. Also: NO! I was just… startled.”
“Uh huh,” Denki sneered.
“Oh shush,” Mina scolded, “you guys were scared too!”
“We were concerned for our bro!” Denki protested.
“Yeah, maybe leave the back door open, just in case,” Hanta threw Eijirou a more sincere smile and Eijirou’s pout fell. They may be total jerks sometimes but his bros were still his bros.
“I will!”
Hanta leaned back, ready to leave Eijirou to it. “Let us know if you get too scared.”
“I won’t!”
“Sure Jan,” Denki smirked as he went to follow Hanta.
“Be careful, Ei,” Mina said as she trailed after, pulling her jacket tighter around her shoulders as she hurried to catch up to Denki, bumping shoulders as the three trekked across the lawn to the side yard where they’d pitched their tent.
Which left Eijirou to face the cockroach house.
As much as he hated roaches, Eijirou hadn’t been lying when he said he was just startled. Now that he knew they were there, he just needed to step carefully, not touch anything, and blast all crannies with light from his phone.
The door he’d opened didn’t lead to a secret basement, but to what must have been a laundry closet. The washer and dryer were gone, only the hookups remained, sticking out of the wall like broken bones. He knocked on the walls, looked around for any wallpapered-over doors or paved over dumbwaiters. Finding none, he resumed his search of the kitchen.
With one finger he carefully flicked open cupboards before jumping back and letting any inhabitants scurry away before checking for anything suspicious. Nothing there either, except for a ton of mini-jump scares thanks to the insects.
He scoured every nook and cranny with the light of his phone, knocked on the walls, jiggled the shelves, looking for suspicious seams or secret levers, but found nothing.
Eijirou moved on from the kitchen and started knocking on the walls of the living/dining room, checking for dead spaces that could mark the entrance to a secret basement staircase. The fear of roaches faded and his fear of the supernatural returned. His breath grew shallow as he imagined at any moment one of his knocks would be met with a responding knock. It was otherwise uncannily quiet inside the house, only the distant dripping sound and the echo of Eijirou’s footsteps. He passed a vent and thought he heard a shuffling from within. He gave the vent a wide berth, the rational side of his mind saying ‘it’s probably just more roaches’ while the irrational side chanted ‘feralwallpersonferalwallpersonferalwallperson’.
Eventually he got all the way around the room and found himself at the doorway leading to the gekkan and the creepy staircase. Eijirou bit his lip. After experiencing so much anxiety it was kind of anticlimactic that he hadn’t found anything. He supposed he could do a more thorough check of the gekkan… and the creepy staircase. He’d definitely watched movies where there were secret passageways when you lifted up some of the stairs.
Taking a deep, bolstering breath, he stepped back onto the hardwood, and into the line of sight to the stairs.
Instantly something felt off. Eijirou tensed and looked around. What was it? He sniffed the air and smelled only dust, soot, and mold, same as he smelled the whole time. He spun, rolling his camera light around him and seeing nothing new. Then he tipped his head to the side and listened.
It was so quiet he could actually hear his own heart beat. A shuffle from another nearby vent had him flinching, but again, despite the little voice chanting ‘feralwallpersonferalwallperson’ in the back of his head, he felt mostly confident that it was just roaches. Plus, that wasn’t what had triggered him. There was that distant echoey dripping still, but that had been going on the whole time he’d been there.
Eijirou didn’t know how long he stood there listening--mostly to his own pounding heart--before he eventually realized he wasn’t going to pick up on what had first caught his attention. He took a hesitant step further into the hallway, then stopped again because there it was…
His footstep.
It sounded like normal.
He tapped his foot. Super normal, maybe a tiny echo because of how empty the place was but… it wasn’t the echo he’d been hearing while walking around the other room.
Eijirou stood on the border between the carpeted area and the hardwood and tapped with his foot.
‘Tap-tap-tap’ went the hardwood.
‘Tapah-tapah-tapah’ went the carpet.
The open space would make more echoes so that could be why? Eijirou had the stroke of genius to try knocking on the wall, not to listen to echoes from within, but from without… and the floor definitely had more of an echo to it.
Holy shit?
Eijirou rolled his phone light across the carpet, his heart rate picking up in excitement.
The seam! Where the mold had marked the line between two sections of carpet. Eijirou flashed his light from one section to the other.
Under the dust and black boot prints, the living room carpet had discoloration from years of sunlight coming through the large window. Between that, and the indents left behind, Eijirou could see where the family couch sat, even where a table maybe sat off to the side.
But there wasn’t anything like that in the dining room... almost like the two sections of carpet weren’t put down at the same time!
Eijirou approached the moldy seam, digging in his manny-pack one-handed. He wound up pausing to take a sip of water, partly because hydration was important and he was kind of panic-sweating a lot, but also because he was shaking a little bit and needed to calm down because honestly it was probably nothing! It was probably a coincidence! Yup!
Finally he found his pocket knife.
It wasn’t a boy scout’s pocket knife. Eijirou’d got it when he left home and had spent precious money on a really good one. It had a can opener, a file, a hook and detachable pin for picking locks, pliers, and a blade as long as his palm. He used this attachment on the moldy seam, prying up a corner of carpet.
The carpet edge came up way easier than he thought it would (maybe easier than it should?). Staying in a crouch, Eijirou dragged his knife along the whole seam, all the way across the room until he hit the wall. The carpet wasn’t as moldy here so he used his hands to pull it up. He’d never lifted carpeting before, it was surprisingly heavy! The more he pulled up the heavier and more cumbersome it was… although it still like… detached easily--had they sealed it down with hot glue?
Regardless of the quality of the materials, an attempt had obviously been made to thoroughly seal the thing down, that much was clear as he pulled up more and could see the streaks of glue in careful lines across the floor.
He got so focused on completing his task he forgot to be scared. Propping his phone against his water bottle on the kitchen counter, he let himself get lost in the motions. Pull-pull-pull-cut when the carpet got stuck-pull-pull-cut-cut-pull.
By the time he pulled up the last of the carpet he was extremely sweaty. He’d rolled the sleeves of his t-shirt up and readjusted his lucky snap-back to better keep his wet hair out of his face. His determination to see the task finished had even made him forget how gross the mold was and he put his whole body into gathering up as much of the carpeting as he could, and shoving it over into the kitchen.
Then he stood there, panting, sipping his water, and wiping sweat from his forehead as he admired his handiwork.
Under the dining room carpet was hardwood floor that continued on into the kitchen. Unlike the kitchen floor though, the dining room floor was covered in streaks of rug glue and swirling patterns of mold stains and watermarks. The pattern of the glue continued across the whole room, so he almost missed it, but the water staining gave it away--against the wall nearest the kitchen was a seam in the floor.
Holy. Shit.
It wasn’t a paved over dumbwaiter or a little door that’d been wallpapered over. But a trap door under the carpet was pretty damn incriminating.
Eijirou licked his lips and readjusted his slippery grip on the pocket knife.
He picked up his phone and debated texting his friends… but if he pried up the trapdoor and it turned out to be nothing he’d feel stupid. And no matter what was down there, there’d probably be cockroaches and he didn’t want to carry Mina out in a bodybag.
He steeled his resolve and approached, put his knee on the trap door as he carefully cut the rug glue all around the seam, all the while trying to mentally justify all this: ‘It’s probably just an access point to pipes under the house,’ he thought. ‘Or to a regular crawl space, not a secret basement.’ The glue split easily under his knife. ‘How would you even open this? There’s no handle--’
Except there was a little hole. It wasn’t quite a keyhole, but it was wide enough.
Eijirou’s knife blade wouldn’t fit in there… but the lock-picking tool would. He inserted the hook and turned it so it caught on the edge of the wood from below.
Eijirou breathed deeply. ‘This is going to be just like the laundry closet,’ he thought, ‘I’m going to get all worked up and then just get scared shitless by some innocent-but-still-totally-disgusting bugs’.
Before he could waste any more time thinking about it, he pulled with all his strength.
The trapdoor came up so easily he nearly had a heart attack and fell on his ass. And then he stared down.
It was not an access point or a crawl space.
It was a staircase.
Not a nice one like the stairs leading upstairs, no. These were made of unfinished wood, the nails clumsily pounded into the side board. The light from his phone was shaking across a dirt floor below, dotted with little divots where water had dripped down. There wasn’t even proper walls--it was a secret, dug-out basement.
Nothing good happens in secret, dug-out basements.
And that was ignoring the smell. His brain refused to process the smell, instead just injecting panic directly into his bloodstream.
His eyes flickered from his phone screen to down the stairs and back again as he clumsily opened the messenger app and hit the only chat history in his phone. There were a few unread messages:
D: Hey man, you still alive?
M: If you wanna bail you can, it’s been a while!
H: We're gonna watch Pacific Rim!
H: We're starting it…!
And it was a mark of how genuinely freaked out Eijirou was that he felt nothing when he saw his friends had started watching his favorite movie ten minutes ago.
His fingers paused over the keyboard, what should he say? What should he do? He could go get them. He kind of wanted them here. But he also didn’t want to leave the trapdoor. Like spotting a spider, he was scared if he walked away the situation would change… something bad would happen. He didn’t even want to turn his back on those stairs long enough to leave. He was paralyzed, frozen in fear.
And that was the smell, he realized. It didn’t smell like decay. It didn’t smell like something was dead down there. It actually smelled like something was living down there. And it was a fearful something.
Eijirou shuddered and shook his head. It was the fear smell making him so scared, he told himself. Something--a dog or cat, maybe even a tanuki or fox--had probably gotten trapped down there somehow and it was naturally frightened.
At least that’s what he told himself. It gave him the courage to look away from the patch of earth below him long enough to type a response to his friends.
E: Basement confirmed, definitely something alive down there
Something shuffled below.
Which, duh! Of course! It was established! Something was alive down there!
But Eijirou still jumped. It seemed to happen in slow motion--his hand jerked, fingers slacking even as his thumb moved to hit ‘send’. Except instead of hitting ‘send’ his thumb hit the edge of his phone and his dumb, sweat-slick, fear-numb fingers lost their grip.
Thunk-tha-thunk-thunk-thunthunthunthun-tk tk tk!
Eijirou stood frozen in the dark kitchen and stared at his phone, lying on its side at the bottom of the stairs.
“Fuck,” he squeaked. The embarrassingly high-pitched curse actually snapped him out of his paralysis.
Why the fuck was he so scared?
It didn’t smell like death down there. It smelled distinctly of something alive--and hadn’t he been so confident that a living thing couldn’t harm him because they’d be on equal footing?
He steeled his resolve, shoving his fear down into a chest made of frustration with himself and then burying that beneath a pile of compassion because there might be some innocent creature trapped down there.
That or a cannibal/feral wall person.
Either of which he could take in a fight, so it was all good.
To-tal-ly all good.
He started down the stairs… and if he went as quietly as possible, he told himself it was because he didn’t want to scare an already frightened animal.
The air below was so much cooler, the cold seemed to creep up Eijirou’s body as he descended. It smelled like earth and mold and waste and spoiled food and fear, but at least the soot smell wasn’t so bad so… small blessings.
The dripping he’d heard upstairs was louder now, echoing around the unfinished walls, and he could immediately see the source.
The way his phone had landed, propped up on his Pokeball-themed popsocket, illuminated the nearest wall. Right about under the kitchen sink there was an old paint can. Water dripped from the ceiling, landing in the paint can with a weirdly cheerful ‘plink-plink-plink’.
The metal of the paint can reflected the flashlight, giving just enough light to the space for Eijirou to make out shapes. The basement was sparse, but not completely empty, there was definitely debris on the floor--judging by the smell, it was trash.
His heart was pounding in his ears when his feet finally met the dirt ground.
Before he could overthink it, Eijirou snatched up his phone and flashed the light across the space, moving so quickly he almost missed it.
Almost missed him.
Eijirou gasped. Panic had him in a force-choke hold. He jerked the light back onto the boy. Every muscle in his body was a tense knot. A delirious part of his brain hoped he’d mis-seen.
But he hadn’t.
The boy was crouched with his back to Eijirou. Arms wrapped around knees, head down, rocking slightly. He flinched when the light hit him, the only acknowledgment he gave to Eijirou’s presence.
Eijirou was utterly frozen, but his mind was going a million miles a minute. Could his friends have set this up as an elaborate prank? But no, even if they could find someone willing do this, they couldn’t make up that smell, the glued down rug, the mold, the water stains. He was a real person, he was really here, and he’d been here a long time.
Eijirou straightened slightly from the defensive crouch he’d gone into.
“Um.” His voice cracked and he tried to clear it as quietly as he could. “H-hello?”
The boy exploded. “I’LL KILL YOU!”
Eijirou yelped and darted back so fast he tripped and fell, dropping his phone and losing his hat.
There was a loud clang. “FUCK!”
Eijirou scrambled for his phone as the boy coughed and hacked and swore.... There was a lot of swearing.
When he turned the light back on him, Eijirou saw the boy straining against… a collar. The boy turned and grabbed behind him, grabbing a chain, attached to a metal ring in the wall and pulling desperately. Bare feet scrambled against the dirt furiously for a few seconds before all the fight left him and he collapsed like a pile of sticks.
Because shit was he skinny.
Eijirou stared, fear slowly leaving him. He’d mistook him for a kid because of his small size but he was really just a really skinny teenager, maybe around Eijirou’s age. His skin was pale, his blond hair spikey and sticking up in all directions, though it seemed to point specifically out to either side of his head. He was wearing a tank top and sweatpants--both had seen better days, covered in dirt and sweat and who-knows-what.
Eijirou looked around, feeling completely helpless. He had no clue what to do in this situation. He looked one way and saw the paint can catching the dripping water. Had this guy been drinking from that? He looked the other way and saw a patch of overturned earth--the source of the stink. His stomach turned, and it wasn’t from the smell. Further on, he saw one of the shapes he’d barely made out earlier was one of those big box freezers people usually keep in their garage. It was lying on its side, lid half open, random contents spilled across the ground. Eijirou could see the dirt floor scratched up in lines of four--scars of fingers dragged through the ground pointing right back to the stranger.
When he looked back the guy jerked away from the light, but kept his narrowed eyes on Eijirou. He’d stopped swearing, but not even the too-bright light could stop the venom in his gaze. There was such a desperate hatred in his eyes… it was like he thought Eijirou had put him down there.
Eijirou didn’t want to think of who had done this or why. He’d just realized that the concept of a feral wall person was actually horribly tragic, because someone had to make them that way and… no, that was too much to unpack and this guy needed help right now.
“It’s gonna be okay, man,” Eijirou said, trying to sound more confident than he was feeling. “I’m not going to hurt you.”
He reached for his manny-pack and almost pulled out one of his packs of jerky before he remembered something he’d seen on TV--that eating too much after starving would make you puke. Instead he pulled out the water bottle. He’d only drank a bit of it.
When he looked up the stranger was staring at the water with desperate eyes.
“It’s okay,” Eijirou said, “you can have it.” He uncapped the bottle and carefully offered it out.
The stranger snatched it from his hand and threw his head back to drink, draining almost the whole bottle in seconds before he stopped to gasp for air. Then he dropped it and whirled around.
Eijirou dove to catch the bottle before it could tip and spill, only realizing after he’d caught it that the guy was puking.
“Oh shit!” he yelped.
Okay. Okay, so if you drink too much water after being dehydrated, you’ll puke the same as with food, okay, okay.
Fuck.
Good going, Eijirou!
“Shit, I’m sorry. Okay, uh…” Without thinking, he stepped into the guy’s space and tried to touch his shoulder. He meant to be comforting, but the boy flinched and gasped like Eijirou’d burned him.
Eijirou jumped back, biting his lip. The unhelpful voice in his head that’d been chanting ‘feralwallpersonferalwallperson’ had taken up a new cry: ‘Idon’tknowwhattodoIdon’tknowwhattodo’.
‘Think about it logically, Eijirou,’ he thought to himself.
Problem one: the light made the guy uncomfortable.
He set his phone to the side, letting the light hit the wall just beside the stranger. Eijirou’s night vision was pretty good so he could still make the guy out.
Problem two: he was freaked out.
“It’s uh… it’s gonna be alright man,” he said lamely.
The guy ignored him, spitting into the puddle of water-bile that was soaking into the dirt. In the low light Eijirou could kind of see him cock his head and look at the puddle thoughtfully.
Problem three: the guy was desperately thirsty.
“Here, man.” He very carefully poured some of the water into the bottle’s cap. “Okay, this is… probably a better amount for now…”
He held the cap out and watched the shaggy shape of the guy’s head turn toward him. He could feel his eyes on him, considering… watching.
“It’s okay!” Eijirou pulled the cap back to himself and sipped, then refilled it. “It’s safe!” He held out his hand and was surprised to hear the guy scoff right before snatching the cap away and sipping it himself.
His hand darted back, quick and demanding. “More.” His voice sounded like he’d swallowed glass.
Eijirou took the cap back, but didn’t refill it. “Maybe we should wait and see how well that bit settles first?”
The chains clanked together as the boy shifted.
Problem four: the guy was fucking chained to the wall.
Eijirou licked his lips. The boy had attacked him when he first saw him… but who was Eijirou to judge? He’d never been locked in a dark basement for who knew how long. How was someone in that situation supposed to react when a stranger suddenly appeared?
Eijrou’s eyes flicked down to the collar once more.
“How about I help you out of that?” He gestured at his own neck.
For a second he saw something other than anger flicker through the stranger’s eyes. Eijirou clung to this, letting a weak smile spread across his lips. “It’s alright.” He reached for his manny-pack with exaggerated slowness. “It’s alright.” He pulled out his pocket knife.
The guy’s eyes snapped to it instantly.
Eijirou held up a pacifying hand. “It’s alright,” he said again (because third time’s the charm!), “I’m just going to use this and cut the collar off okay? I’ll be super, super careful and won’t hurt you, I promise--”
“I’ll do it my fucking self!”
Eijirou jumped at the sound. How could someone so weak-looking be so loud?
The boy reached his hand out again, just as demanding as before, but maybe more desperate. Eijirou noticed his hand was trembling first, then noticed how dirtied and chipped his fingernails were. Maybe he needed this?
Eijirou carefully flipped the blade open and offered the handle. The stranger snatched it away.
Immediately, Eijirou realized he’d made a mistake.
The collar wasn’t skintight, but it was still tight enough that the guy couldn’t just pull it over his head, so there wasn’t much room for a knife to maneuver. Jerky motions from shaky hands meant the stranger was doing more harm to himself than the collar. In the gloom, Eijirou could see dark blood against pale skin.
“Oh shi--stop, let me--”
“No!” The stranger pulled away, sawing furiously at the collar, slicing his jaw with every other stroke. The pain and Eijirou’s mounting panic only seemed to make him more agitated, his breathing going quick and frantic as he tugged on the collar with one hand and clumsily cut with the other. He tilted his head back and changed the angle of his cuts so the blade sliced up along his cheek--so close to his eye--Eijirou couldn’t bear it anymore. He grabbed the wrist holding the knife.
The next moment seemed to happen in slow motion:
Eijirou reached for the knife with his other hand, only to watch as the blade dropped to the ground. The stranger put his whole weight forward, knocking Eijirou off his feet. Eijriou looked up in surprise and saw the boy’s eyes glowing--literally glowing--red in the dark, saw the shine of long canines, heard the ferocious roar rip from a dry throat, and realized… this guy wasn’t human.
Luckily, neither was Eijirou.
Instinct kicked in, and before Eijriou could blink he’d already rolled the other boy beneath him, a snarl tearing past his lips right before his teeth clamped down on the stranger’s neck--not breaking skin, but pinning him in place.
Then they both lay still.
Eijirou pulled back slowly and spat a mouthful of the guy’s blood off to the side before turning to look him in the eye.
The stranger was staring at him in shock. Eijirou almost smiled. He’d felt the same way the first time he’d met another werewolf. Of course, his surprise had been mixed with delight. This guy didn’t seem to know what emotion to tack on to this meeting, but at least it wasn’t whatever crazy panic that’d pushed him to slice open half his neck.
Eijirou looked him over carefully. This close he could see that the guy’s hair really was wild and sticking up all over the place--but what he’d assumed were two solide clumps on either side of his head were just a pair of fuzzy ears. The moon was only half full and most wolves that Eijirou had met could control their transformation during this time… but he’d never met one in such a weak, feral state.
And he was weak again. It was the same as when he’d pulled the chain before collapsing--the stranger had used up all his energy and now was limp as a ragdoll. Even his breathing was weak and that had Eijirou lifting his weight off of him, afraid of crushing him. He didn’t move back though, instead looking the dude’s face over until he was satisfied that the cuts on the guy’s face weren’t that bad.
Then he looked over the collar. It was wide and made of thick, hard leather. Eijirou had once had a collar like it, back when he’d lived at home, with one noticeable difference: Eijirou’s collar had a buckle like a belt, with a loop in the front that he hooked to his own wall chain. And there was the difference. He could do it himself: fastening, hooking to the wall, unfastening, unhooking. It had all been in his control. This collar was a leather strap with metal clasps at the back, connected to the chain by a padlock.
He shifted, reaching for the pocket knife with one hand while the other rested between shoulder blades that stuck out so bad it was a wonder they hadn’t broken skin. The pocketknife was slick when his fingers found it and he grimaced as he clumsily wiped the handle on his cargo shorts with one hand. When he lifted his gaze to the collar again he spotted the stranger staring at him, his eye still glowing red. He wasn’t growling or glaring, just... watching.
The room was quiet.
Eijirou licked his lips. “Have you been down here since the last full moon?”
A blink was his only response.
“Where’s your pack?... Do you have one?”
The stranger took a raspy breath in and then spoke: “Are you real?”
Now it was Eijirou’s turn to blink silently. There was so much there that he didn’t know how to address. He was in so far over his head. “I’m real,” he said weakly. He cleared his throat. “I’m real.” He said, stronger this time. “My name is Kirishima Eijirou… what’s yours?”
There was a long enough pause that Eijirou wasn’t sure if the guy would reply. Eventually he rasped out: “Bakugou Katsuki.”
Eijirou offered him as much a smile as he could manage. “Bakugou Katsuki? I’m going to get you out of here.”
Eijirou held his pocket knife loosely out in front of Katsuki, letting him watch as he clicked the blade closed and flicked out the lockpicking tool. His hand left Bakugou’s narrow shoulders to pull out the detachable pick. It’d been a while since he’d had to use his lockpicking skills but he was pretty well-practiced. Sleeping rough when you turned into a rabid wolf once a month meant you had to get good at getting into locked places (so you could lock them up behind you).
Bakugou jumped when he inserted the pick into the keyhole, but otherwise didn’t move. Pale furred ears flicked back to listen as Eijirou started working the lock. Hm. That wasn’t a bad idea actually. He let his ears change as easy as sticking out his tongue. A strange sensation and yet lack-of-sensation took over his ears as they grew long and changed position on his head, sprouting black fur. His hearing was much better like this and he cocked his head to better listen to the ticks and scratches inside the lock until, with a satisfying click, the shackle lifted.
Eijirou willed his ears back to their regular shape and sat up, expecting the other to follow… and was surprised when he didn’t. Bakugou’s eyes were still open, but he didn’t move--even his breathing was shallow.
Shit. “You okay, man?” Eijirou asked. “I didn’t hurt you too bad earlier did I?”
That red eye flicked back to Eijirou’s face. “Is this real?” He asked again.
Eijirou’s lips tightened into a thin line as his eyes grew hot. He sucked in a deep breath before letting himself reply. “It’s real,” he said as he took the padlock in hand. “I’m real--” With a flick of his wrist he unhooked the shackle from the clasps at the collar’s back. The heavy material slid free of Bakugou’s neck immediately, landing with a ‘thunk’ in the dirt. Eijirou tossed the padlock away and tucked his pocket knife in his manny-pack. “--and I’m getting you the hell out of here.”
He stood up, one hand wrapped around a skinny wrist, the other supporting his lower back.
Bakugou didn’t need any more motivation. He hauled himself up onto his feet with some of that wild energy Eijirou saw early.
“Fuck you, you fuckin’...!” He gasped under his breath. For a second, Eijirou thought he was talking to him, then--“PIECE OF SHIT!” Bakugou kicked the collar so hard he almost fell over, but Eijirou caught him. The collar actually flew about a foot in the airbefore flopping across the ground and lying there like cartoon roadkill; flat and dead.
“Alright, alright…” Eijirou said gently. Bakugou was clutching Eijirou like he was all that was keeping him on his feet (he was) but also seemed to be trying to push him away and stand on his own. Eijirou allowed it--but only because he had to grab his hat and tuck his phone in his pocket so the light would illuminate the stairs.
When he turned back, he found the crazy guy not only still on his feet but also, incredibly, trying to go up the stairs on his own. He lifted one foot, set it back down, then tried again. He tried a third time, leaning forward like he could somehow pull his body up by sheer will, instead he almost ate stair but Eijirou managed to grab him. He moved to pick him up, but Bakugou shoved him back.
“Don’t…” the guy rasped.
“It’s alright, bro,” Eijirou said, moving to pick him up again. “I lift!”
“Don’t!” A hand to the face convinced Eijirou to listen. “Don’t… help!”
“Oh… uh…” Eijirou had already lifted him up one of the stairs while they struggled, but he let the guy’s feet touch the step at least. He couldn’t imagine what he would be feeling if he were in Bakugou’s place but… he imagined he’d want to leave the basement on his own power as well.
Except Bakugou wasn’t really strong enough for that.
“Stop helping!” He wheezed.
Geez, this guy. “I’m not helping… I’m... spotting!”
He was definitely helping. In fact, he was kinda completely holding the guy up (it wasn’t hard, Bakugou couldn’t weigh more than a hundred pounds). But… he had his feet under him and he was lifting them (even if he needed Eijirou to get up that last bit), one thin arm was wrapped around Eijirou’s shoulder while the other reached forward, nearly touching the stairs so he was half crawling up the steps. Bakugou looked up at the trapdoor’s opening so Eijirou could see the gleam of the flashlight reflecting in his eyes. He imagined people who climbed Everest looked at the summit with the same look in their eyes.
Bakugou’s fingers dug into Eijirou’s back, his breathing ragged. As they came to the top of the stairs and the air warmed, he gave a full-body shudder.
Finally, finally they were above ground level, one step, then another, and they were finally at the top. The hand on Eijirou’s back pulled away and he eased Bakugou to the floor to rest. Bakugou sat there, his head rolling around, taking in his surroundings like he was drunk off of them. His harsh breathing took on a sharper, gaspy edge.
When Eijirou had first entered the living room it had seemed dark, silent, and terrifying, but compared to the basement it was downright cheerful; moonlight-bright and noisy with crickets from outside. He looked around and saw the indents in the carpet, the discoloration on the walls, scuffs on the wood floor; all these scars of a life abandoned. Only Bakugou could see what once was there, what was taken away while he was left behind.
A pale hand reached out and traced the marks on the hardwood--the carpet glue. His gaze turned to the piled up rugging Eijirou had moved and his whole body went still. He wasn’t even breathing.
Eijirou had heard of the five stages of grief and until that moment couldn’t recall what they were or what order they fell in… but he could see each of them playing out in rapid succession on Bakugou’s face.
A quick jerk of his head, as though he could deny what he was seeing. Then his expression pinched into rage, almost immediately falling into pain, his lip trembling and eyes glittering as his breathing returned, twice as erratic as before. And then came the tears.
Eijirou wasn’t at all surprised, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t completely heartbreaking when Bakugou lowered himself to the floor in a face-down fetal position. Sobs ripped out of his dry throat like a saw across wood, while both hands covered his eyes like he could block out the evil he’d seen.
And it was evil.
Eijirou had never hated anyone. Never thought himself capable of it. But as he watched this boy--just a kid his own age--break apart, he felt a hot snake of hatred coiling around his heart. Someone had lived here with Bakugou. Someone Bakugou trusted enough to let them lock him up for the full moon. Someone he trusted enough to let him out afterward. It was probably someone he’d loved. But instead of honoring that trust and love, they’d covered him up and left him to a slow, awful, lonely death.
Eijirou hated them for it.
But at the same time as he felt that growing anger, he also felt a sense of wonder. He’d only found the trapdoor because of the mold, the mold only grew because of the water damage after the fire, which was caused, by Eijirou’s guess, by a lightning strike. Hell, Eijirou wouldn’t have even known about the house if he and his friends hadn’t walked past it. And they’d only walked through the neighborhood because Hanta had a coupon for Denny’s.
Eijirou looked down at this pile of skin-and-bones and thought with no small amazement that the universe really wanted this guy to live.
And Eijirou planned to help with that.
Bakugou was too drained to cry for long and didn’t move more than taking hiccupy breaths as Eijrou gathered him up in his arms. “C’mon,” Eijirou said softly. “I’m taking you home.”
There were no protests this time.
-----
Eijirou had expected to come upon his friends peacefully watching Pacific Rim all snuggled in their sleeping bags. Instead they were standing outside the tent, debating whether or not Eijirou was ignoring their texts because he was in trouble or because he was waiting for them to enter the house so he could prank them.
Boy, did he feel older than he felt last time he saw them.
Denki spotted him first. “Holy shit. Ei, what the hell?!”
The other two whirled around to face him and gasped when they saw what Eijirou was carrying.
“Hey uh…” Eijirou glanced down at the boy in his arms, only to find he was out cold. Eijirou lifted his gaze. “This is Bakugou. He’s one of us,” Eijirou said. He glanced back at the darkened house. “The basement was his Safe Place. He was trapped.”
Mina clasped her hands over her mouth while Denki went pale.
“Since the last full moon?” Hanta asked as he approached.
“I don’t know,” Eijirou answered honestly. “I think maybe longer.” He looked down at the boy, saw the tear tracks cutting through the dirt on his face and felt his throat close up. “They left him behind,” he croaked.
When he looked up to his pack their expressions were hardened.
None of them had been locked in a basement for who knew how long, but they’d all been alone before they found each other.
“Okay,” Hanta clapped his hands together. “Pack up, we’re going home right now. Ei, keep doing what you’re doing.”
They had a nice place to stay now, but that hadn’t always been the case and the three packed up their campsite with practiced speed. Mina broke away at one point, bringing her favorite blanket: a fuzzy, hot-pink thing with zebra-stripes. Eijirou knew from experience that it was super snuggly. With a bit of maneuvering she managed to wrap Bakugou up nicely. He roused a little, but let out a sleepy sigh and resettled in Eijirou’s arms. If Eijirou hadn’t already subconsciously adopted the guy as a new packmate before then, then seeing him contentedly wrapped in his pack’s scent would have certainly done him in.
Laden with bags of camping supplies, Eijirou’s three friends formed a circle around him and the pack set off for home.
~~~~~
So I saw this art on Twitter and it lived in my brain for months until I finally got around to writing it all out (and doing multiple edits). The artist has their own Patreon if any of y'all are looking for more krbk artists to support!
The title is a reference to the end of the Cask of Amontillado when 'there remained but a single stone to be fitted and plastered in' :D