#like yeah eldritch being tentacles and all flesh of metal eyes that glow in the darkness

[void-the-punk-or-something-idk]

Incredible. Trying this on the guard stand at work today.

❗a tip

you can always make a boring task more interesting by imagining yourself as a creature while doing it

[star-going-supernova]

Of Birthdays and Abominations

For my buddy @liliflower137​, who’s having a rough day and doesn’t deserve an ounce of that stress! Have some tater tots from the Inky Eyes, Golden Heart ‘verse! It’ll probably go through a revision before I add it to the series on Ao3, but for now,   (ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧

When Henry woke up on June thirteenth, he stumbled out of bed with wild hair and a demonic aura that wriggled more than normal. He made his way downstairs, blinking sleep out of his eyes.

Curiously, the kitchen lights were off. Usually, his mama was bustling around in there long before he so much as stirred. He was still getting used to a lot of human things, but sleeping in was something he’d taken to almost immediately.

He stepped over the threshold, and just as his aura pinpointed his parents’ locations, they jumped out at him— his mama from behind the island-counter and his papa from the pantry— and shouted, “Surprise!”

Henry’s aura reared back in shock, and it took a moment of serious concentration to keep it from attacking them.

Staring wide-eyed, he watched as his mama came and swept him up. “Look at you, my little boy growing up already!”

What?

Papa joined them and ruffled Henry’s bedhead. “Happy birthday, son.”

Oh! June thirteenth, yes, that was the day he’d chosen— admittedly at random— for his birthday.  He’d forgotten that humans greatly enjoyed celebrating the anniversaries of their birth.

Demons didn’t care much about that. The only time your age served any importance was when you were abandoned by the caretakers after six cycles— er, years. Then you had to do everything for yourself.

But it made sense, he supposed. Humans had such limited time, after all, not to mention how accident prone many of them were. So of course they would get excited when they managed to last another year.

“How does it feel being eleven now?” Mama asked him.

Was he supposed to feel something change? Had he already screwed up acting like a human?

“I don’t feel any different,” Henry whispered. “Am I s’posed to?”

Mama blew a messy kiss into his cheek. “Nah, it’s just somethin’ silly us adults always ask you youngsters.”

Henry went a little bit boneless with relief in his mama’s arms and smushed his face into her shoulder. That was a close one.

Papa laughed and turned the kitchen lights on. “C’mon, we have a special day planned, starting with your favorite breakfast.”

“Chocolate chip pancakes?” Henry asked, head shooting up. “Really?”

“With extra chocolate chips,” Mama said, booping their noses together.

Humans were on to something with this whole birthday thing.

After eating far too many fluffy pancakes— seriously, it was a good thing demons could prevent themselves from getting stomach aches— his parents told Henry that his present was less of a physical thing, and more of a surprise trip.

This was more than okay to him, since as a demon, he could technically magick himself any random object that might have caught his fancy. Even though his parents were still young and healthy, since he had to think of his own lifetime in terms closer to forever, he’d much rather create as many good memories with them as possible before his time with his chosen family ended.

But those weren’t the type of thoughts he wanted to have, much less on his birthday.

Especially not since the surprise was spending the afternoon at the beach with Joey and his mom.

“Happy birthday, Henry!” Joey cried, throwing his arms around Henry’s shoulders.

Laughing, he returned his friend’s hug, careful not to use his demonic strength. “Thanks, Joey!”


“C’mon,” Joey said, pulling Henry towards the water. “Have you ever been to the beach before?”


“Uh,” Henry thought about the false memories he’d spent weeks constructing for his parents. “I don’t think so?”

Joey grinned. “I think you’ll like it. You can swim, right?”

“Yeah.”

Joey’s smile turned mischievous. There wasn’t much of a height difference between them, but he was taller than Henry by enough to pick him up, waddle into the shallows, and— despite Henry’s silly protests— drop him into the water, both boys laughing all the while.

Hours passed as they messed around, going from playing in the shallows, to making sandcastles, to having lunch, back to their sandcastles, and now they were deeper than they’d ever gone before.

There was a tall, red metal buoy not too much farther out, and Joey wanted to touch it— a special achievement according to him. Henry dutifully followed after him, and they grabbed onto  the edge, letting it tip and bob under their weight.

Of course, that’s right when Henry realized that this was something not unlike a portal to one of the lower levels of hell, the ones that were inhabited by creatures instead of demons.

From the depths, summoned by their presence, he sensed something rising up towards them. A flick of his aura told him it was an ocean chimera. He could feel its hunger.

Henry sighed and turned to Joey with a grin. “Race you back?”

Completely unaware of the eldritch horror beneath them, Joey lunged forward into the water, crying out, “You’re on!”

Watching for a moment to make sure his friend didn’t look back, Henry held his breath and sunk into the water, using his aura to drag himself down. Despite the darkness as it got deeper, he could easily see the monster, including the moment it latched onto him as a potential food source.

Three heads— each bearing an open maw full of sharp teeth— protruded from a squid’s body, surrounded by writhing, poison-emitting tentacles that reached for him.

Henry’s fangs extended with his horns, and the water around him became illuminated by the glowing of his veins. Making sure all three pairs of eyes were watching him, he snarled and revealed his power to the train-sized behemoth.

Aura crackling beneath his skin, Henry stared the chimera down as it shrieked and twisted, futilely trying to escape its doom. The flesh around his eyes threatened to become corrupted, but he held his power steady, refusing to lose it before the beast’s soul was fully eradicated.

Bubbles trickled out of his mouth, and he was sure Joey was close to the shore and would notice him missing soon, if he hadn’t already. He didn’t necessarily need to breathe— though his time as a human had gotten him used to it— but he wouldn’t be able to pass his absence off as an accident if he stayed down here much longer.

Abominations like this always took longer and more power to completely destroy, but finally, the body burnt away into ash, despite the water surrounding it. The laws of nature were nothing to those with the power to defy them.

Satisfied, Henry spun in the water and somehow managed to teleport on his first try to just a few feet behind Joey, right as his friend stumbled into the shallows. 

“I win!” he cried, jumping up and down, spraying water in every direction.

After running his tongue over his human-flat teeth to make sure his fangs were completely gone, Henry grinned. “Yeah, you sure beat me.” His power thrummed through his body, and the part of him that was still inherently demonic knew he could destroy this entire beach and everyone on it with little more than a thought.

Joey laughed and tackled him back into the water. They continued playing, as carefree as children their age oughta be, but it took another hour for the skin around Henry’s eyes to stop hurting.

It’d be years yet before he would even begin seeing any side-effects from using that power, but sooner or later, he knew his half-demon, half-human form would eventually show visible signs of the aura that struck fear into even his own kind.

Henry didn’t mind all that much. It was worth using it to protect others, especially Joey. A few months of friendship might not seem like much in the grand scheme of things, but to a demon who’d been taught growing up that there was no such thing as friends at all?

Those months meant the world.