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[lyeofhell]

Continuing this idea.

You should be scared. Very scared. Instead you were just stupid in thinking that this person who had repeatedly broke into your home, admitting to watching you, and completely invading your privacy didn’t mean you any harm.

Your logic that if he wanted to, he would have. You just hoped to god that your intuition about him was right. You had met monsters before. They didn’t make themselves known until it was too late.

But he was different. The small things he did to make your life easier weren’t things men intent on hurting you did. And it wasn’t like he didn’t have the opportunity to.

You had gotten a dog and a cat. A bonded pair that had been left when their family moved away, leaving the partners stranded.

When you came home with the adorable mutt you sent your shadow a cheeky text.

Don’t worry. I made sure he was good with men. Just not sure if he cares for masked ones.

More worried about the cat.

This little guy? Cheese is harmless. You attached a picture of your new orange cat sleeping peacefully on your couch.

You named the fucking thing Cheese?

Dog’s name is Mac.

That only earned you a thumbs down emoji.

It had been three weeks and you were certain he hadn’t been back into your apartment. You had to do mundane tasks again. Take out the trash. Get your mail from the box. You weren’t sure how he was managing that one.

It wasn’t until you got held up at work that you sent him a text. You felt like you were asking too much, but thankfully he had crossed the line from breaking into your place.

Could I ask a favor?

Almost instantly he sent back a reply.

You could

Can you take Mac out? I’m not gonna be out of here for another 3 hours. Another waitress quit last minute and I’m stuck here. 😭

You added the crying face for effect.

Could test out that biting theory.

He won’t bite you.

Wasn’t talking about the dog, Love.

Forty minutes later you got a picture of Mac looking up. His pink tongue hanging out of his mouth, looking up in excitement.

Be careful if you pass by the guy who hangs out back by the play area. Mac dislocated my arm this weekend being a little asshole and lunging after him.

Thought you said he wouldn’t bite.

Wouldn’t bite YOU. He’s a good judge of character.

He’s a good boy.

The following shifts, your shadow would send you photos. All of Mac. All outside. None giving you the slightest idea of what he looked like.

You gave him a heads up that you’d be able to take him out yourself. You don’t know how you’d react to finally meeting him. You could have easily stalked him as he had done you, but there wasn’t any fun in that. And he had made this fun.

You didn’t however count on Mac scratching at the door at 10 pm that night.

Or the next.

Or the next.

His entire schedule was thrown off. The vet said it was a UTI and your only options were keep letting him out as needed or he will try and hold it in and risk his bladder getting inflected. Or even his kidneys.

You were standing in the flood light at the edge of your apartment building when your phone buzzed.

You need to stop going out this late. Not safe.

Why? You text back, grinning. You’re out here too. Not anything to be afraid of.

Careful. Sounds like you like having me around.

Who says I don’t?

He didn’t respond. You try again.

Am I ever gonna be able to meet you?

Three dots appeared after moments of silence

Don’t think so pet.

What’s the point then? Isn’t a hunter’s goal is to get close to their prey?

Is that what you think you are to me? My prey?

You couldn’t tell if he was actually offended. Fuck. How do you make this better?

Is it bad if I want to be?

What the fuck? Your reaction was to turn things sexual? But you weren’t lying. You often found yourself imagining him, a masked stranger coming into your room while you slept. Looming over your defenseless body until the exact moment he decided to strike.

In an instant he would have your hands restrained and a palm covering your mouth. He’d tell you to hush. The fantasy hard to imagine in that moment when you wondered what he would sound like.

I’m not actually afraid of you, you know?

Oh really? Someone is feeling brave tonight. Going out into the dark. Taunting their stalker.

You swear your could feel your heart trying to beat out of your chest. He was into it. Just as much as you were. You thought maybe given the initial cute acts of service it was more of a guardian angel kind of thing.

It wasn’t until you noticed underwear missing did you know he was just as filthy as you hoped him to be. Even though you never brought it up. Too afraid to get in too deep with someone who could be a sociopath.

You could come and see how brave I am.

He didn’t respond immediately and Mac was done dribbling out the last hit of pee. You were in the stairway when your phone chiroed.

Fine. See you soon.

A picture followed. It was dark. So dark you had to turn up your brightness. When your eyes focused, your stomach dropped.

It was you.

A stilled image of you walking into the building your back turned. The image too clear to be taken from a distance. If you had to guess it was no more than ten feet away.

Ten feet away and you didn’t hear a fucking thing. Completely oblivious to the danger close by.

That night you had came so hard you had half a mind to text him a thank you for being the inspiration behind your bliss.

[lyeofhell]

Hiding in Ivory

(part one of my spooktober collection)

Synopsis: Simon goes in for a shave, Ghost just keeps shaving

Cw: gratuitous blood and gore. Body horror. Suicidal ideation, kinda. Body dysmorphia. SELF HARM. Please let me know if I've missed anything. MDNI

There are no locks on barracks baths, but Simon's always found his mask hung on the doorknob makes for a good enough deterrent. It's served as a decent warning since his time as a rookie, the endless shift of bases all coming to learn what would happen if his privacy wasn't respected.

The line of showers isn't as long now as it once was - the prestige of a position well earned reducing the shared space from twenty maximum occupants to five. Still, big brother had only sourced the one manufacturer and the scenes all seems the same, images blurring across the years.

He's no different now from who he was when he enlisted, stagnant and moribund, but at least the grout isn't moldy here.

Simon bathes quickly, a hard-hammered routine which takes him less than five minutes. Efficient, necessary. He's uninterested in gaining attention, especially that of his commanding officer flexing archaic rules like nail inspections just to prove a point. He's fairly certain Price would never, but he's had enough of testing that theory. There'll be no Price to protect him from a court martial if Price is the officer he's assaulted.

The bath is wide and rambling, a cold front that dissipates the heat of his shower before it can even reach his clothes. Simon doesn't shiver as he pulls his trunks on, too used to the cold and damp. Balkans, winter training, permafrost - it's not something easily forgotten. Bare feet tread silently over cracked tile, fractured edges left ragged and untended because no self respecting serviceman would walk through a barracks bath without a pair of thongs. Simon relishes the razor's edge against his peroneal tendon, the satisfaction of knowing he was the only one who dared to immeasurable. Garrick had caught him once like this, scolded him for tempting fate and fungus alike. Simon didn't see why he should fear the rot that's been coming for him his whole life anyway.

Much more threatening is the mirror.

Wide and iminent, it spans the stretch of sinks along one wall, meant to be shared with a pile of other recruits. Simon takes up nearly half of it, hulking form unavoidable in his periphery. It does no good to play coy with himself anyway, dark eyes training on his own reflection like he's staring down an enemy combatant. Neither flinches, not even when Simon takes his tote out, splays it across the runner. It's a simple kit. Unlike Garrick and his sandals, Simon does not require much grooming, his mask effectively negating the need. Still, the cover came with its down sides and a thick weave which caught his stubble irritatingly placed high on that list. 

It was Price that taught him to shave properly, the finicky old bastard taking so long to clean up his scruffy neck it was hard not to pick up some tricks along the way, watching silently under the guise of surveillance as his captain pulled a bowie knife down his own throat after days spent in the humid jungle had left him desperate for relief from the coarse grow out. Price had used aloe as cream at the time, the irritation of razor burn calming even as he worked, nicks from the remaining bumps coagulating into the gel. When he was done, Price wiped everything clean and started it all again and Simon resolutely refused to think about what it meant that it had never occurred to him to shave twice. 

He can go longer between visits with the mirror now, his beard fine and fair enough to last nearly a full week between reappearances. Simon keeps a habit of it when he can, holing himself away to pull a straight razor over his skin in hurried strokes. Cuts weren't uncommon, though he supposed it didn't matter much when the purpose of the exercise was to help him hide his face with more comfort. It's no different now, a small rotary of blood blooming under his nose when the heavy razor fails to properly navigate his philtrum. If it scars, it will blend with the pre-existing network there, just another tributary. Simon washes the excess shaving cream from his face and starts again. 

Practiced and methodic, it goes smoothly until the razor catches a gnarled edge of his lopsided Glasgow smile, knotted skin tugging hard enough to make his cheek snap back against his teeth when his deadened nerves finally relay the issue. It's not just a nick this time, though he only realizes that when the blood wells high on its raised edge, spills over along the wide line of scarring. It fills the hollow of his cheek, paints the bagged tissue dark. Surrounded as it is with fresh shaving cream and pale skin, it makes for a strangely familiar sight. Ghost pulls the razor down his other cheek impulsively, the angle all wrong. 

Without the benefit of cicatrix, there are no dulled receptors. Ghost feels every centimeter as the blade slides across his cheekbone, cutting down until it matches the scarring on the other side, leaving his top lip cut up at the corner. It would be enough to make him wince if the satisfaction of the mark didn't drown out the associated pain. He takes a minute to look himself over, head tilting this way and that. The cold, wan lighting gleams in the wells of blood along the uneven cut of his scarring, a crooked row of molars.

The next cut is straight down instead of across, a long scrape back along the hinge of his jaw which leaves a flap of skin dangling there, the gruesome sight making his breath hiss between his teeth more so than the actual feel of it, and despite all his years of training for moments like this, there's no helping the base parts of your brain which can't be overwritten, the simple little lizard parts which see a dangling tail and decide to drop it in order to fight another day. The razor rides the bolt of his mandible and the tag of skin is caught in its track, sheared off in one smooth cut. Simon inspects the blade clinically, thumb pulling down to safely remove the blockage. When his eyes roll back up to his own reflection, he's able to assess the damage without flinching. The same could not have been said mere moments ago.

A swath of exposed dermis now decorates his jaw, red-welled and stinging where the shaving cream drips into it. Roughly four by four centimeters and deep as his subcutaneous layer over the jut of bone, it's possible he'd need a graft to heal it properly, if he even bothered. Ghost would be quite as happy to cover it in gauze and keep it hidden away behind his mask, just one more spot of skin he'd never have to shave again. It would heal badly, kept damp and unaired for long hours of the day. There was a burn on his thigh which had suffered a similar fate, now a quiltwork patch of hard, angry red scarring which never seemed to pale no matter how much time passed. He eyes the bloody contrast between the dark hollow of his jaw and the pale white ridge of cheekbone above it contemplatively and then draws the skin of his cheek taut and makes another scrape. 

Pain swells and ebbs in the passing minutes, adrenaline dulling his senses until he's able to work methodically across his jaw: a lathing pull from cheek to mandible, and a strong cut to shear off the excess. It comes off in sheets like matted hair, just as much a relief to be rid of. His hands shake as he works - shock or excitement it's hard to tell -, making him sloppy, cutting down to bone on a few stripes. He takes calming breaths when needed, adjusts his grip to be more careful. 

Ghost doesn't want to die, he just wants people to understand he already has.

Blood and tissue collect in the sink, red rivulets thinning where they combine with the condensation. It leaves delicate spider web designs across the porcelain, veins and stains it much like him. Ghost barely even notices, eyes trained on the face slowly taking shape in the mirror. He's never been much of an artist, but he imagines this is the thrill a sculptor feels when the unwieldy blocks of excess fall away and the rough-hewn silhouette they'd had in mind begins to form. His chin is the hardest part, bleeds the most. With it darkened and visually recessed, he doesn't like the look of his top lip at all and briefly debates cutting it off in favor of showing the neat row of teeth there instead, but he'll be removed from the team if he can't properly communicate on comms anymore, and a lifetime of drooling uncontrollably wouldn't make up for the aesthetic benefit so he leaves it be, eyeing his handiwork critically when he gets his whole jaw pared down to the basest layers of skin. 

It's a terrible visage that stares back at him, the planes of his skull stark white and pale where they jut out above the exposed recesses of his jaw. Blood flows down his throat and over his chest, the thin fine lines of unmarred skin he'd left on his chin continuing down his gullet until the chords of his neck tunnel blood into their path, lines becoming convoluted and smeared somewhere over his Adam's apple. He traces cleaner lines down with the tip of the blade. These will heal neatly, unnaturally straight and white. It's familiar, as close as he's gotten to a recognizable reflection since -.

Well, since.

Shame about his nose, but he can't cut it off without again risking his position, and he thinks with its protruding nature, skinning it to a pink mess would only make it stand out more anyway, instead of visually receding so he skips it. For now at least. Could always see about cutting it off later, when he has the proper tools to hack through his cartilage. No need to be rash. The hollows of his eyes, however…

Ghost pulls the skin below his left eye taut and brings the razor to his lash line.

[lyeofhell]

Bela Lugosi in an interview (1931)

[lyeofhell]

Bela Lugosi and Frances Dade in publicity stills for Dracula (1931)

[lyeofhell]

[lyeofhell]

Painted sculptural bosses on the vaulted ceiling of Barcelona’s cathedral.

[lyeofhell]

coochie doing that weird pulse thing it does when I get too horny. like girl stop. I’m focusing on reblogging images and funny hahas, you’re being annoying

[lyeofhell]

im an abbot and tbh if i dont vibe with one of my monks i call the vatican and tell them he's tempting the other monks to most profane and unnatural couplings and they just take him back and send a new one no questions asked

[lyeofhell]

Even as you’re holding me close, I feel a pain, sharp as needles, dragging at me. I feel the life running out of me, as though my blood were being drawn.

The Vampire Lovers (1970) dir. Roy Ward Baker

[lyeofhell]

need // secondo // 540 words, gn, making up, 18+, mdni

He is mad enough to wrap his arms around you despite the smoke coming out of your ears. Warm lips as a promise of reconcilliation, pressed to the spot beneath your jaw that he uses like a weapon. You're undressing after you left him stewing in the living room, debating in just your underwear whether you want to wear one of his shirts tonight or not.

He gives you room, tries to at least, but he cannot stay away for longer than five minutes. You'd tell him to leave if you truly wanted to but you never do, selfishly, trying to coax the softness out of him that follows an argument. He has become good at it, the reconnecting, bridging the chasms of his own making. He had to, since he knows you.

"I'm still mad," you whisper.

"I know."

He can be over-bearing at times, disregarding your assessment of a situation, when you tell him you're fine but he still thinks he has to help. It's a habit he can't shake, growing up the way he did, and usually the idea of a soft-faced, barely-grown Secondo standing up for his brothers is enough to soothe your ire.

It does not matter. He is insecure when it comes to this new thing, committing to someone he actually cares about. But he does not bend, not really, though he inches closer to compromise. He will tell you that he stands by what he did, words that come with a confidence that has your knees weak. He is a rock – but he cracks when it's you.

"You always think you know better," you say – statement, not accusation.

"Is it so bad that I look out for you?"

"That's not what this was."

He silences you with his hand sliding down your front, cupping you underneath your underwear. The conversation has worn itself out, if it ever had any momentum to begin with. His skin, warm and sorely missed, draws a sigh from your throat. He folds, pulling you close in the way that screams that he would rather crumble to dust than lose you. It sets you on fire and you rut against his hand, barely holding yourself up. You don't have to, not when he's here.

"I will not apologize," he whispers, fingers stroking with precision, "for making sure that you are safe. Even–"

"Secondo–"

"– if you think you do not need me."

He holds you steady when you fall over the edge, suspended by two strong arms that you know won't let you go all night. His lips are back on your neck, fingers slowly carrying you through the ebbing waves of pleasure. With these feelings between you you wonder how he could ever be scared you'd leave.

"I do need you," you whispers. "More than is healthy."

"More than I deserve," he says.

You sigh, ready to move on. The previous question is obsolete as Secondo picks your shirt for you, a faded Iron Maiden print from the stack you're usually not allowed to touch. It's soft from wear and too many turns in the washing machine. You make sure to hug him once he dragged it over your head.

"Still mad?" he asks.

"No, not anymore."

short fic collection

[lyeofhell]

Dracopia my beloved

[lyeofhell]

woke up to a very weird phonecall this morning from an unknown caller ID of ‘hey gorgeous, what are you wearing’ (like dude it’s 9am wtf do you think) but when I went silent he just repeated it and then hung up, called again, let it ring out, then called again and honestly as strange as it was all I could think of was ‘this is something soap would do’

like. you mean to tell me soap wouldn’t scrounge around the pits of the internet to try and find some girls number, call it, say the cringiest one-liner and then SAY IT AGAIN because she didn’t answer. Except soap wouldn’t stop calling and you’d just have an all day rotary of some weirdo calling your phone asking what you’re wearing while he tugs one out on the other end of the line.

[lyeofhell]

Bootblacking is top level kink because it's one of the few I can think of where the nominal sub is treated as a thoughtful, knowledgeable technician from the outset.

Like, a flogging bottom might be praised for their ability to take pain and know their limits, or a rope bunny might be recognised as keeping themselves in good physical shape so they can hold complicated stress positions for longer than a novice, but even the most beginner of beginner bootblacks has learnt a little bit of materials science (Will this type of brush scratch this patent finish?), a little bit of basic chemistry (If these were last polished with a silicone wax, how do I remove that to start to bull them?), a little bit of leatherworking history (Is that natural fibre stitching on those surplused Warsaw Pact boots, will my polish rot it?) and spent time practising techniques on their own boots.

And it's one of the few kinks I can think of where the top is so immediately physically and emotionally vulnerable to the bottom in that way: I put my foot in the hands of a stranger bootblacking at a party, and I trust that they won't damage the boots I was gifted by my long-dead Master when I was 17, that they won't soak the stitching and start the rot of the boots I was wearing when I first fucked the love of my life, I trust that they'll carefully work around and treat the cuts and scuffs in the leather that I picked up wearing these same boots marshalling at a dozen prides and going toe-to-toe with strikebreakers and scabs on twenty years' worth of picket lines. The experienced bootblack can look at my soles and where my boots crease, and see that I have a weak hip, that I'm slightly bowlegged, that I don't drive and that I walk even in the weather where I'd rather not. And I trust that they'll see that worn-out, poor, slightly sad old man and still call me "sir".

It just feels like a lot.

[lyeofhell]

[lyeofhell]

JAMES MCAVOY as PADDY SPEAK NO EVIL (2024)

[lyeofhell]

VALERIA GARZA roving adventure + blackcell variant