#maybe be nice to redo em one day when im bored

[recallback-art]

It started out as a silly joke, but now whenever I have new guys I like I make goo emoji's of them and that's just become like my thing.

I'll post some of the others eventually I'm sure, but here's a sheet of Hatogoo that never got properly emoji'd. They're free to use, but I'd ask you credit where appropriate and asked ofc.

[ashintheairlikesnow]

Mirrors (Box Boy Kauri)

The Anon with the question about Kauri seeing Vincent Shield kind of took over my pre-work writing time today! Whoops. At least I got a little work done on Danny before I got distracted...

Tagging: @maybeawhumpblog, @pepperonyscience, @haro-whumps, @18-toe-beans, @burtlederp!

CW: Some references to past violence, brief/vague references to Kauri’s treatment by Owen, but nothing specific at all

Kauri doesn’t look in mirrors.

There are a few, around the house - in the bathrooms and one in Owen’s bedroom that’s big on the wall. He can’t quite escape that one, but he never has to look directly at it, so all he catches is a hint of his black hair, the curls that escape any attempt to control them, long thin limbs and pale skin. 

That’s it.

He never looks at his face.

When he brushes his teeth in the morning - when he uses the special soap for his skin and the washcloth over cheeks and mouth and jaw and nose and forehead - he doesn’t raise his eyes. Owen brushes out his hair and tells him if it’s good enough, and Kauri never ever looks at himself in the mirror.

He doesn’t like mirrors.

When he gets too close to them, his hands tingle, fingertips going sparking and numb and asleep. Look at 645898. His heart pounds, and he feels cold sweat on his neck that he can’t explain. There are too many mirrors even if there are hardly any.

It’s okay. He doesn’t need to look in mirrors, or worry about how he looks, because Owen will tell him when he looks good and when he doesn’t. Owen is very honest, and some people don’t like guys to be honest about whether or not you look good, and isn’t he so fucking lucky-

Incorrect mental aberration.

Kauri’s fingers twitch, and he can feel the little circles they pushed onto his skin that stuck, see the wires, the-... no. He forces that thought away, because the days he doesn’t remember the little circles are the better days.

Custom order, custom training. Look, I don’t make the rules. This is what’s on his paperwork. 

So I’m supposed to, what? Put pictures of this guy up on every wall?

I don’t know, don’t look at me. I’ve never had a custom for this kind of shit. Look at the custom positions here. Jesus, this kid’s going to be put through the wringer. Plus making him afraid of his own face? Whoever picked this one must be a real weirdo.

Sssshhh, 645898 will hear you say that.

Who gives a fuck what he thinks? It’s not like he’s people.

They all think they’re people, until they’re done. I guess I’ll try putting the pictures up. What else do you think I could do? Negative reinforcement?

Don’t know. Videos, maybe? Movies? Give ‘im a good once-over every time this idiot’s face is on the screen. Heard the guy’s in a shit ton of movies now. Or, hell, just whisper his fucking name in the pet’s ear.

You know we don’t touch ‘em, Connor. Not allowed. Nobody but the owner. Gets ‘em all nice and needy for the richies.

Yeah, well. Maybe I was a little fuzzy on the no-touching rule. Everyone makes mistakes now and then. 

Connor, you’re going to get fired if you keep messing with the merchandise.

Worth it. Besides, my success rate is excellent, they give me the ones that fight. Now, I can tell your jackass trainee’s been listening to us. Want to make him regret it?

Kauri cleans the mirrors without ever looking at them. There’s a cleaning lady who redoes all his work, but he doesn’t care. He only cleans to make time pass faster. He and Keira, working together. She bumps into his feet sometimes and it’s like having a cat or a dog, he tells himself. It’s like having something that cares about him.

He wants to look in the mirror, because he’s not supposed to look in the mirror. And Owen’s not home right now, so it’s the only chance he’ll get. He wants to he wants to he wants to.

He can’t.

It’s like remembering he used to be someone else, when he tries. And he’s not allowed to know if there was anyone else in his skin. It’s a face on the wall and a voice in his ear and the circles pressed against his temples and the pain.

His hands shake, his feet don’t feel the floor anymore. He tries to look at himself, to see the blue eyes and the black hair and the skin. Catches a glimpse and thinks, I didn’t know my eyes were shaped that way, that’s kind of pretty. I wonder if anyone else looks like me.

For just a half-second, he sees the same eyes, but longer hair. Her smiling face when he shoved his way past her down the stairs to where someone had breakfast ready for them. Out of my fucking way, jackass, she laughed at him with a backpack over her shoulders, and they tripped over each other at the landing, sprawling, and Mom yelled at them to get a move on already.

Kauri was mad, but he wasn’t really, because her name was Keira and his name was-

ERASED

There’s a sudden rush of white in his vision. He feels his knees buckle and his heart fall somewhere near the floor and a thunk and then nothing at all.

Kauri wakes up lying on the bathroom floor with Keira bumping into his arm. Kauri physical condition deteriorate. Kauri blood pressure drop. Kauri adrenaline. Kauri reassurance require? Keira provides.

“N-No,” Kauri whimpers. His head hurts - he must have hit it on the bathtub, and Owen will be pissed at him for giving himself a bruise. He’s not allowed to bruise. All the marks have to fade in less than two hours, that’s the rule. They all have to fade, and he’s not allowed to hurt himself, only Owen. “No, Keira, I’m okay, I’m okay, I just-... ow ow ow.”

He hears the door open and close, and freezes where he lays on the bathroom floor. Owen is talking on his phone, he thinks, and he sounds annoyed. “Yeah, sure, okay, I’ll have them over. Look, you don’t have to meet with her here, do you, Mom? You know Kauri is-... yeah, okay. No, I can lock him in my room or something. I know you don’t like to see them.”

Kauri’s eyebrows furrow. He’s never seen anyone in the condo but the cleaning lady, and she doesn’t talk to him. His head hurts, pounding on the right side where he must have hit the tub, and he groans, then claps a hand over his mouth.

Too late.

“Mom? I’ll call you back.” Owen’s voice is closer, and he opens stops in the open bathroom doorway, looking down at Kauri as he slides his phone into his back pocket.

Call for help

Who would you call? You signed up for this. You signed the contract, 645898.

“Hey, Kor-bore, watcha doin’ on the floor?” Owen grins at his own rhyme and Kauri smiles back at him, faintly, automatically. 

“I, um, fell over,” Kauri says, pushing himself onto his knees, into Position Two.

“Yeah, looks like. Shit, you’re gonna have a goose egg, huh?” Owen isn’t angry, and Kauri is confused for a second, until Owen leans over him, a shadow over his body, and presses hard into the red spot at the right side of Kauri’s head, half-hidden by his hair.

Kauri winces away from it, but Owen clicks his tongue three times and Kauri freezes, grabbing onto his pant legs, the soft jogger sweatpants, with fingers that dig hard into the fabric until his hands ache with the grip and the effort of holding still. Owen presses this thumb harder, and harder.

“Pl-please stop, Mr. Owen,” Kauri whines and then the thumb is gone, immediately, and he breathes a sigh of relief. Owen is so nice, to listen to him, when owners don’t have to listen to their Box Boys, Owen tells him all the time.

“What’d you do to hit your head like that?” Owen crouches in front of him, and there are things Kauri lies to him about, but he feels shaky and his head hurts, even worse now.

He can’t remember how to lie.

“I, um… I tried to look in the mirror,” He whispers, and his shoulders jerk when Owen laughs.

He thinks he doesn’t like the way Owen laughs. But when his hand slides through the black curls, Kauri leans into it, closes his eyes, and feels his pounding heart start to slow, to calm. Owen is safe, when he is nice. Owen is the safest thing on earth.

He’s the only safety Kauri has. 

The owner’s touch is safe, whoever they are.

“They did such a good job, didn’t they?” Owen stands, glancing at himself in the mirror - the sandy blond hair that sort of flops over his forehead, the angular shape of his face, a hint of stubble on his jaw. Kauri looks up at him wincing as the light hurts his eyes a little bit. “Shit. My mom’s coming, Kauri, and so is Karen Renford. You remember her, right?”

Kauri’s heart freezes, and blood runs like ice in his veins. “Yes, Mr. Owen.” His voice shakes, but if Owen notices, he doesn’t show it. “I remember Ms. Renford. Is she… Am I… Am I getting-”

Please, no, I don’t want to go back

Don’t make me go back there

Owen blinks and glances over his shoulder down at him, then just laughs, kindly. Kauri’s shoulders relax. “No, Kor-bore. She’s just coming to meet my mom, it’s a nice neutral place for them, I guess. I’m going to have some people over, so it’ll be like a real dinner party, too. We’ll have to lock you up for it, my mom doesn’t like the Box Boys much. Well, doesn’t like me having one anyway. Not one that looks like you.”

“Wh-what’s wrong with how I look?” He tilts his head, and Owen sighs. He doesn’t like when Kauri asks too many questions, and Kauri’s mouth snaps shut.

“Nothing’s wrong with how you look. What’s wrong is how he looks. That he still looks at all.” Owen looks in the mirror one more time, then back down at him. Then he leaves, and as Kauri pushes himself to his feet, he hears Owen laughing to himself down the hall. 

“God, they did a great job on him,” Owen says, and laughs again. “Sweet boy can’t even look at himself.” Kauri picks Keira up and carries her back to the living room, her little wheels spinning.

What job did they do to me?

What did I sign up for?