Chapter Text
Fuck, where was it…? Red dug through the kitchen, growling to himself. Had Edge decided to punish him for some arbitrary slight by hiding it again…or had Red gotten drunk and ate his stash before blacking out again? Just to make sure it wasn’t his brother being an asshole, Red summoned a bone attack just so he could stand on it and reach the cabinet above the fridge.
Nope, not there either. Which meant Edge hadn’t stolen it—Edge usually just settled for hiding his shit far above Red’s reach, as if to constantly rub it in how freaking tall his younger brother was.
Ugh. Goddammit…and it had been the good stuff, too. Red had gotten a bonus from his work, and decided to splurge with a little indulgence, and now it was gone. Seriously, he had been looking forward to it all week, the thought of sitting down on the couch with his well-earned gains and a marathon of Top Gear the only thing getting him through work each day. And now? Now all he had to look forward to for his Friday night was Edge’s reheated lasagna and fat-free mustard. Ugh.
The sound of static could faintly be heard in the background; slowly, Red realized that it wasn’t coming from the television in the living room, but from empty space just a little to his right. He cocked his head, struggling to pinpoint the exact source of the noise, then felt a surge of something that wasn’t quite magic but still felt awfully familiar and then he saw it. A portal opening up before him, no bigger than his fist. One of those annoying goody two-shoes always asking for his help? Or one of Nightmare’s idiots come to bully him into wrecking shit?
A black skeletal hand, the fingertips tinged with yellow and red, emerging from the portal let him know that unfortunately it was neither. He had just enough time to catch a glimpse of something clenched in the fist before it came sailing toward him to smack him in the face. A balled-up piece of paper bounced harmlessly off his skull, landing on the kitchen tile while Red heard an irritatingly familiar derisive sneer from behind the portal.
“Next time, don’t get dark chocolate. Anything above 80% burns, trash freak.”
The portal closed, leaving Red staring sightlessly at the space where it had just been. Slowly, he tilted his skull down to see that the ‘paper’ was a chocolate wrapper. Specifically, his chocolate. The fancy, high quality, artisan-crafted chocolate he had gotten just for tonight, because yeah Red liked his chocolate dark sometimes, who the fuck is gonna make fun of him for it? Plus, the benefit of liking dark, dark chocolate was that no one would steal it because no one else liked it—but clearly he had underestimated a certain destroyer’s pettiness.
Error.
Red felt his teeth grinding on each other, hard enough that his gold tooth was threatening to crack under the pressure. That piece of shit. Always stealing his chocolate, his ice cream, just—all of his snacks! No matter where he hid it, no matter how obscure the nook or cranny he squirreled his candy into, Error always somehow sniffed it out. He knew he was running a terrible risk, keeping chocolate in his pantry for more than a day, but the chocolate had been on such a good sale, and you had smelled so nice while you talked about the quality of it…Red had to get it then and there, even if he wasn’t going to eat it until later in the week.
Hm…a thought occurred to him, thinking of you and your cute little sweets shop. It was a quick jog from his house to your shop…he supposed he could just…get another chocolate. After all, he had gotten a pretty good bonus, Red could splurge twice in one week.
Maybe this night wasn’t going to be such a bust after all. Maybe he could even convince you to close up shop and join him on the couch…heheheh.
Red couldn’t help the grin stretching out over his skull as he shrugged his jacket back on and headed out the front door.
You were just winding down the taffy puller when you heard the light, tinkling chimes of the bell above the front door signaling the arrival of a customer. Which, normally you’d be ecstatic about, except that you were closed, and that door was supposed to be locked. So, either there was a particularly ballsy robber, or you had forgotten to lock the door and someone was incapable of reading the sign stating that you were ‘CLOSED’. Either way, someone was getting an earful, and maybe an ass full of buckshot if they really pushed it.
With an irritable sigh, you slapped the off switch, leaving the taffy stretched out between the hooks, and stormed up to the front, making sure to snatch up your trusty shotgun as you did so. The bell continued to chime, changing from a pleasant jingling into obnoxious clanging that had your finger twitching irritably toward the trigger.
As you came around the corner from the backroom, you groaned when you caught sight of your intruder. Sans the fucking skeleton, or “Red” as he insisted you call him, the most obnoxious, horny, annoying monster you had ever met—and you had met Jerry—stood at the front door, shaking the bell above the door with a shit-eating grin on his face.
It was a struggle to plaster your sweet, innocent mask of a smile onto your face, it really was, especially when Red wiggled his browbones and asked you, “What’s a sweet thing like you doing, workin’ so late?”
“Oh, just keeping an eye out for any trespassers,” you said lightly, your voice so syrupy, sugary sweet that you feared you’d give yourself diabetes. “Some people just don’t ever seem to read the ‘CLOSED’ sign, you know?”
His grin hitched down an inch at that, and for a moment you thought that your thinly-veiled sarcasm had actually pierced through the hollow space between his non-existent ears, until he puffed out his chest, making his way over to you as he asked roughly, “Someone bothering ya, sweetheart? You feel unsafe?”
“Huh?”
He pointed at the gun still clutched in your hands. “There a reason ya keep a gun in th’ shop, sweetheart?”
“Just…keeping myself safe,” you said slowly. “Things have been a bit rough since…well…”
“Ya ain’t gotta be polite,” Red scoffed. “Since we came up from Underground, ya mean. I know not all the other monsters are as…socialized as sweet little ol’ me. Lotta dead bodies, fires, robbin’—I know how it is. Us monsters, it’s easy ta see humans as easy targets—yer so weak, I guess we’re just tryin’ to rearrange the hierarchy a bit, y’know?”
It was weird, hearing him talk so candidly about the chaos that his fellow monsters were causing as they attempted to upheave society. You fidgeted, your eyes darting up to meet his quietly amused eyelights. “You don’t seem to be like that, though.”
“Me? Nah. I know where I stand, and I ain’t gotta set shit on fire to prove myself.” Red chuckled, leaning in; his voice grew husky, deepening an octave. “Every monster knows who I am. Anyone steps ta me, it’s the last thing they eva do. You humans…yer a bit slower to learn, but you’ll know soon enough.”
Was he trying to intimidate you? You looked up into his hooded sockets, noting how his chest still puffed out dramatically and he hunched up his shoulders to make himself look bigger. No…it almost seemed like he was bragging about his strength, as if he were trying to impress you. Ugh. As if posturing about how much everyone feared him was supposed to make you just drop your panties and bend over the counter for him.
Now that you weren’t concerned about being robbed, you heaved a sigh and turned away from Red, in doing so missing how he deflated just a bit and the way his cocksure grin twisted into a petulant pout at your lack of reaction. You tucked the shotgun away underneath the counter, then folded your arms, resting your chest on the counter as you leaned forward to pin him with a thin smile. “So, what brings you to my shop at such a late hour?”
Red looked confused. “It’s only six, sweetheart.”
“Yes, and I closed at five. Is there something I can help you with, Red?”
“Need some chocolate. Got a fuckin’ chocolate thief in the house, and they swiped tha gourmet shit ya sold me on Monday.”
It took everything in you not to show your annoyance at him breaking into your shop because he lost his chocolate, but years of dealing with retail and surly monsters had shaped your composure, boosting it to frankly inhuman heights. Your eye didn’t even twitch; instead, you feigned the deepest of concerns for Red’s woes, propping your chin in your hand as you forced an expression of true distress. “Oh no, but you seemed so excited for it…”
“I was!” he practically shouted; he caught himself, a light red flush sweeping over his cheekbones as he reined himself in. Red tugged at his hood, trying to hide himself in the fluff of his jacket as he scowled. “Was savin’ that fer tonight…and then that asshole hadda go and swipe it.”
“And here I thought it’d be safe, but I guess there is someone who likes dark chocolate like you do—”
“He don’t even like it!” Red shouted; you arched a brow, not appreciating his sudden aggression, and Red shrank back from the quiet reproach in your expression. He rubbed at his skull sheepishly, but continued to grumble. “Fuckin’ asshole threw the goddamn wrapper in my face, told me it was too dark. Shithead still ate tha whole fuckin’ thing, though.”
You had absolutely no idea who he was talking about, and quite frankly, you didn’t care. You just wanted him out of your damn shop so you could get back to your closing duties.
Just appease him, soothe his ego a little bit, sell him some chocolate and get him out of here.
“Well,” you said lightly, making sure none of your underlying irritation bled through your voice. Red perked up, eyelights watching you avidly as you spoke, hanging onto your every word. It was almost flattering. Almost. “It just so happens I still have a couple bars of that chocolate. I suppose I could give you a good discount…for your emotional damage.”
Red scratched at the back of his skull. “Eh, I dunno, sweetheart. That stuff’s pretty pricey, and Boss is always gettin’ onta me about wasting money on stupid shit. Think I might just get some of those truffles you made—see if I can keep those safe from him.”
Oh hell no. You had ordered that stupid dark chocolate just for him—no one else liked it, and you knew you’d never get the shit off your shelves otherwise. Was this thief really that prolific? You saw a potential opportunity to double your sales—might as well try to make a profit if you were being forced to deal with Red’s troubles on your own time.
“How about this? Since the dark chocolate wasn’t enough to throw him off…why don’t you try buying something that will make him suffer so much he won’t dare steal your chocolate ever again?”
He perked up at that, eyelights gleaming at the thought of his enemy suffering. His grin widened, and he leaned forward to look at you eagerly. “Ya got somethin’ in mind, sweetheart?”
You nodded. It took you a moment to find the box, long tucked away from display when you had realized no one was going to buy it, but after a minute of digging around your display shelves, you proudly slapped down a box on the counter. Red leaned in curiously, one brow raised as he read the label. “El Fuego Choco?”
“Yep! It’s usually used as a gag gift, though they actually had to take it off the market because there were a bunch of lawsuits about people’s rectums melting or something, I wasn’t paying attention. I bought it before the whole class-action lawsuit, but obviously now I can’t sell it—though I could have a slip of the hand when ringing you out and drop it into the bag…if you get what I mean.”
The packaging held his attention, even as you talked. Red’s eyelights glittered malevolently as he read the multiple warning statements on the wrapper, and you swore you saw drool pooling at the corners of his grin. “What—it’s spicy chocolate or somethin’?”
“Or something,” you chirped, giving a sly grin when he shot you a look.
He chuckled, a low, gravelly sound that rumbled through him. “Yer somethin’ else, sweetheart, ya know that? A guy could fall in love with a gal like you. You think this’ll do the trick?”
“I guarantee this is one piece of chocolate he won’t forget.”
“Ya got yerself a deal, then.”
Gladly, you rang him out for the dark chocolate, giving him a slight discount that just seemed to make him leer at you even more blatantly, and as you bagged his candy up, you accidentally knocked the box of ‘El Fuego Choco’ in under Red’s approving eye. You gave him his change and his candy, relieved at the prospect of having made a pretty decent sale and getting him the hell out of your hair, only to realize that he wasn’t moving to leave. Your brow arched again, eliciting a sheepish grin from him; he ducked his head, shifting his weight from one foot to the other, and you noticed with bemusement that he was blushing.
“Say…” he said hesitantly, his tough guy façade dropping for the first time since he had started frequenting your shop. “You…uh, ya really feel unsafe here?”
You shrugged, suddenly finding it hard to meet his eye. Logically, you knew you were in a relatively safe part of town, and the majority of the monsters that frequented this area tended to be the more…socialized monsters, who didn’t see a need to pick a fight with the first person to look at them funny—though it was still fair game if you made the mistake of getting in their personal space or made any moves that looked like you were challenging them. The closest real crime had gotten to your sequestered little corner of town was a break-in at the convenience store a few blocks down, but still…
Red watched you silently, eyelights flickering with some unreadable emotion. His voice was gruff, yet softer than you were accustomed to. “Ya don’t gotta worry about my feelins, sweetheart. I know we’re scary. Ya know…it’d really suck if anythin’ happened to ya. I mean, where else would I get my chocolate from? A cute little human like you needs someone lookin’ after ya, ya get me? How ‘bout I stop by in the mornings, check up on ya before I go to work, and I can check in on ya after I get off work too. Just ta make sure no one’s messin’ with ya.”
“Oh, no,” you said lamely. “Red, I couldn’t bother you to—”
“That ain’t a request, sweetheart. Don’t worry about unlockin’ the door tomorrow mornin’. I’ll drop in on my way ta work.”
Before you could protest, tell him you didn’t need protection, he was gone. You blinked—where…? Just, there one moment, and then the next moment, gone. Was this some secret ability monsters had? Or just the usual Red bullshit?
Ugh. You slumped against the counter, burying your head in your hands. Great. Despite all your efforts to convey to Red that you were not interested in him in the slightest, he seemed to have fixated on you to the extent that he felt the need to harass you every day now. Now you were going to have to deal with this puffed-up skeleton posturing and blustering all over your shop on a regular basis. Ugh. Ugh!
Could this get any worse?
The spicy chocolate was gone when Red checked the pantry the next morning. His skull felt like it was practically about to split open with the force of his grin as he imagined Error’s face when he took a big ol’ bite out of that biohazard.
He had to hand it to you—it was a devious idea, one that he was almost angry that he hadn’t come up with himself, but to have such a dastardly idea come out of your mouth while you smiled so sweetly…Red had felt his soul jumping out of his chest, ready to bond with you right there on the spot.
Shit, but you were cute. It had started out as just a simple crush on the pretty human selling him chocolate, but the more he interacted with you, the more he saw that soul-melting smile…Red realized that you were special—you were his soulmate, the natural resonance between you calling to his soul whenever he was in the same room with you. Yet, you never seemed to notice his attempts to impress you, or get your attention…of course, Red groused to himself, he’d have a human for a soulmate. A dumb, pretty, soft human, too out of touch with her own soul to notice it pulling toward him.
That’s alright, though. Red had never been handed anything in his life; he was used to working for what he wanted. And for something he wanted as badly as you…well, Red didn’t mind putting in a little extra effort.
It was quiet in the shop, finally. Not that you were complaining about the volume of customers you had seen earlier—God knows, you enjoyed seeing money flowing into your ledger for once. Your shop had been open for little over a year, and while you knew that small businesses took forever to start turning a profit, still, seeing all that red in your ledger had you nervous.
The cheerful chime of the cash drawer as you closed it, significantly more loaded with money than when you had opened this morning, lingered pleasantly in your ears. You sat back on your stool, letting yourself truly breathe for the first time in what seemed like months. Finally—you felt like you were going to make it.
Your decision to both make and stock monster-specific candy especially seemed to have been a financially sound one, and you patted yourself on the back for including elective classes on infusing magic into cooking in your culinary school curriculum. Despite the rampant racism (specism?) still perfusing society in response to monsters emerging from the Underground and violently inserting themselves into the world, it could not be denied that monsters were a significantly growing demographic for marketing to target. Once it became apparent that your shop catered to monsters—and some part of you wondered if that was due in part to Red spreading the word—you had noticed a huge influx of growling, bristling customers shoving at each other while they drooled over the finest sweets.
Though, you had also received a few odd questions from them, Red included when they realized that you yourself had made a good portion of your monster candy stock.
“You got mage blood in yer family, sweetheart?”
The random question had you pausing in the middle of laying out the fresh batch of truffles, lining them up one by one in the display case. You blinked up at Red, who was making a show of how nonchalantly he was leaning on the counter above you. “What blood?”
“Mage blood. Ya know, tha magical bastards who put us Underground.”
Well, that just made you less inclined to answer that—if you said yes, did that mean monsters were going to hold a grudge against you? Not that it mattered anyway; if your family housed a mage or two in its branches, you weren’t aware of it. You shrugged. “Dunno. Never asked.”
He must have sensed your apprehension, because his face shifted into that sheepish grin he got whenever he was nervous about having offended your delicate human sensibilities. “Nah—I’m not like, tryin’ to sus you out or nuthin’. Just curious, is all, since ya can use magic.”
“I don’t think I’m a mage…”
“Nah, yer not. Ya ain’t got the soul of one. But, ya don’t gotta be a mage to be able to use magic—just means ya probably had one in yer family at some point. Pretty rare for humans from non-mage families to be able ta use magic.”
His words had given you plenty of food for thought in the days after; you had never thought twice about your ability to infuse your baking with magic. Honestly, you hadn’t even realized you were capable of doing it until you had taken that elective on magic, and when the professor had everyone taking the test on soul types, you found the magic-receptive paper turn green in your hands. That had naturally progressed to you looking into using healing magic, and then monster candy. The professor hadn’t said anything about what humans could and couldn’t use magic—though you had received a lot of envious looks from your less…gifted classmates when you excitedly presented a batch of magic-infused lemon bars.
Even now, your mind was racing with thoughts on how to further capitalize on your skills. Your fingers drummed on the counter, your foot tapped on the rung of your stool. The small candies, like the butterscotches and the truffles seemed to sell the best, but they just weren’t large profit-makers. Perhaps if you offered the ability to pick a variety of flavors and package them up—oh! A variety pack! Hmm.
“Hey! I’m talking to you! Rude-ass human, I swear I should just string you up and—”
You looked up, startled, to see—well, for a moment you thought it was Red cast in shadow, but it was the oddest monster you had ever seen, and you had seen a plane blushing as it perused your Valentine’s Day selection. A skeleton monster, who looked almost exactly like Red except for he looked completely different at the same time; his bones were dark as ebony, the teeth in his scowl yellowed, with sockets of deep crimson and mismatched yellow and blue eyelights shuddering within. Blue streamed from his sockets down his skull—you looked closer, squinting, when you didn’t see any fluid dripping to the floor, and realized that they were bundles of string coming out of his sockets. What on earth?
“Can…I help you?” you asked cautiously.
“I’m looking for whatever fuckwad sells this chocolate.”
He slapped a wrapper down on the counter; you leaned forward to get a look at it, and instantly paled. It was a black wrapper, with emblazoned on it in damning, crimson bold letters, “El Fuego Choco”. Oh. Uh oh. In hindsight, perhaps egging Red on to provoke a dimension-hopping skeleton had more potential to backfire directly upon you than you had initially estimated.
Shit. For once, you actually found yourself wishing Red had stuck around this morning—make him deal with this, instead of letting you get caught in the crossfire.
Alright, just play it cool and maybe he won’t burn the shop down. You forced your usual smile to your face and looked back up at him, noting how his sockets narrowed at your cheerful expression. “I’m afraid I don’t carry that brand.” Which wasn’t totally a lie, because you didn’t carry it—anymore, seeing as how Red had cleared out your stock.
His scowl deepened. “See, I’d have an easier time believing that if you didn’t have an empty display box for it right there at the top of your trash can.”
Woops. You glanced down and saw that the empty box was indeed right there at the top of the trash from last night, right where you had left it. With a nervous laugh, you looked back up at him, anxiously twining your hair around and around your finger. “Ah, hah, you see the thing is—”
An almost dismissive flick of his fingers had you pausing in your hasty excuses; there was a flash of blue, your only warning before you found yourself being hoisted up into the air. You looked wildly around to see that blue threads had encircled your limbs, all the threads leading back to where Error clutched them in his hand. He twitched his index finger, and your hands were suddenly bound together and yanked up over your head.
“Ah—” your confused protest was cut off by the sensation of yet another thread winding around your throat, tightening in warning when you attempted to say anything.
Well, this was an…interesting experience. His threads were warm, tingling with foreign magic that evoked a strange, fuzzy feeling in your chest. When they dug into your soft flesh, instead of pain or fear you felt…hm. You’re not sure what you felt, but you kinda wanted to feel more.
“Don’t try to fucking pull one over on me, stupid human,” the strange skeleton said hotly, squinting up at you as you dangled over him. “I could destroy this world with a single thought if I wanted—and believe me, do I wanna rip apart this fucking waste of space. But I don’t wanna deal with the squid bitching about balance or whatever kick he’s on this week, so if you just answer my questions, I might let you go.”
Hmm. You liked his voice—it was deep but not gravelly like Red’s, and it didn’t have that awful Boston accent, and it had just a little bit of an otherworldly, alien vibe to it that just intrigued you even further. You listened to his rambling threats for another minute, not even paying any attention to his numerous promises to rend your world asunder while you let the deep rumble of his voice float pleasantly through your awareness.
“So, let’s try this again,” he was saying now, as you finally forced yourself to focus on what he was actually saying. “This your chocolate?”
No way out of that without straight-up lying. You sucked your teeth as you thought of a way to get around answering him directly, but finally you gave a sigh of defeat. “It came from this shop, yes.”
“So, you sold Red this chocolate?”
“Yeah…”
“Do you have any idea what this chocolate did to me?!” he asked forcefully, his eyelights flashing dangerously.
Well, your first guess would have been that it blew out his rectum, but seeing as how he was a skeleton, you weren’t entirely sure what your second guess would be. Blew out the magical equivalent of a rectum? You bit your lip, wavering on whether you wanted to risk certain death by asking this murderous-looking stranger if he had a rectum. His scowl darkened at your supposed refusal to answer his question, and you felt the strings tightening in a warning manner around your neck and limbs.
“Ah—” Thankfully his thread dug into your larynx before your choked-off cry could turn into a moan, because the last thing you needed was for this skeleton to find out he was awakening some kinks. You didn’t think you were into that kind of stuff, but the spreading warmth from your core and your increasing urge to rub your thighs together was telling a different story.
“Now, you’d better start answering my questions,” the skeleton growled. His mismatched eyelights roamed over your body, a sneer twisting his skull as he looked you up and down, taking in your helpless form. “I mean, unless you like being tied up or something.”
Awkward silence as you were suddenly forced to confront your own sin. You felt your face grow steadily redder under his condescending gaze, your squirming increasing in amplitude, and you could almost see the exact moment he realized what a degenerate you were. He blanched, glancing down at the strings clutched in his hand, then up at your face, his eyelights jittering in his sockets. “Wh—you—wh—are you—seriously?!”
“Eheh..” You wiggled sheepishly; your face felt hot enough to fry an egg on.
“Wh—I’m tttttrying to interrrrrrog-g-gate you here! You are rrrruining the vibe!”
You gave him your best attempt at puppy-dog eyes, batting your eyelashes at him and wishing that you hadn’t been too lazy to layer on your mascara this morning. “I’m sorry…”
He stamped his foot, and for the first time you noticed the flickering around his head and body. It grew more pronounced as he worked himself up, until you could make out the word ‘ERROR’ flitting in and out of existence around him. His voice also grew more…glitchy, was the only word you could describe it as; his speech interspersed with stutters and drawn out syllables, and you found it hard to follow along as he started ranting and raving about how this had never happened before, how gross you were being, and cut it out right this instant!!!!
The entire time he was chastising you for your transgressions, his hand jerked and twitched with his violent gesticulations accompanying his lecture. Each time he flung his hand up, you felt the strings tightening even more around you, his foreign magic digging in further and further until you were sure you’d be waking up with imprints of his strings tomorrow. It was getting harder to breathe—the thread was pushing against your esophagus now, and you were barely able to get more than a few gasping breaths of air.
Your head felt light, heady with the combination of his magic and a lack of oxygen, and you could feel your vision blurring at the edges. His deep voice filled your head.
“Annd just w-w-w-what do you haaaaave to say for yourself, hhhhum-m-man?”
Oxygen—sweet, delicious oxygen—rushed through you once more when he released the chokehold of his threads around your throat, glaring up at you as he waited for your answer. You wheezed and gasped, coughing pathetically while he just folded his arms across his chest impatiently. What had he asked? Honestly, you had no idea; you finally managed to get your breathing under control, squinting down at him through the haze of your still addled mind, and you found yourself thinking that even though he had the same features as Red, this mysterious stranger was oddly more…appealing.
“Wwwwell??”
Fuck it, you just spouted out the first coherent thought to cross your oxygen-deprived mind. “…you’re pretty cute,” you wheezed.
“W-w-w-w-w—” He blanched, even harder than last time, and to your consternation, he…froze. Literally. You watched in disbelief as he stood there, absolutely unmoving—even his error messages floated around him, suspended in mid-air. Did…did you break him?
After a minute, there was movement—a loading bar popped up above his head. You watched with growing bemusement as it slowly, so slowly progressed from 0 to 100%, at which you heard an oddly nostalgic sound of an old Macintosh rebooting.
“Wwwwwww—what did you just say?”
You cocked your head, your curious amusement overcoming your fear. “I said you’re cute.”
“Wh—wh—” His chest heaved, and the skeleton pulled string after string from his socket in what you realized was a nervous habit. "W-w-why would you say that?!"
"I dunno, cuz you’re cute?”
Yellow-orange bloomed across his skull, a sharp contrast to the inky black of his bones—he was blushing, despite how furiously his eyelights flashed at you and how far his scowl stretched down at the corners. “You’re just t-trrrrrying to pull one over on me,” he accused. “I’m not—not—nnnnot cute! Take it back!”
“Fine, you’re not cute.”
“Told you—”
“You’re adorable.”
“Nnnnnnauugh!” He stomped away, and you watched with an unrepentant smile as he stood in the far corner of your shop, fuming and muttering fiercely to himself. His arms flailed as he ranted to absolutely no one—during one of his more violent gestures, he actually let go of the strings holding you prisoner. You dropped down onto your stool with a solid “oof!”, the breath you had worked so hard to regain knocked out of you by the impact of your ass on the hard stool.
After a minute, he had finally calmed himself down enough to storm back over. It had only been like ten minutes since he had stepped into your life, and you were already starting to see a pattern in your interactions with him. He scowled at you, not even seeming to notice that you were no longer tied up at his mercy. You beamed back at him, making sure to lean forward on the counter in just the right way to push your tits together.
The stranger stared at you for a moment—you noticed with triumphant glee that his eyelights definitely dipped down to peruse your cleavage more than once—before finally he gave a huff and slid the wrapper towards you on the counter. “So,” he said gruffly, hiding his pout in his scarf. “You really don’t sell this?”
“Not anymore.” You told him ruefully, giving him an apologetic smile. “I’m—I’m really sorry if it hurt you at all. All Red told me was someone kept stealing his chocolate, so I gave him the idea of hiding that for you to find—I didn’t mean any harm.”
He paused, his frown deepening. “Wait—this was your idea?”
Oh, shit, you and your big fucking mouth. You stammered out, “y-yeah.”
“Ha, I knew someone as dumb as that shithead didn’t have that good taste!” He crowed, seeming to…celebrate? You blinked, absolutely confused, as he folded his arms across his chest and cackled to himself. “Gotta admit, I didn’t realize there were humans with such good taste, but I’m a great enough guy to admit when I’m wrong.”
To your amusement, he cut a side-eye to you, and based on how his chest was puffed out, you got the sense he was almost expecting you to praise him for being so amazing and open-minded. Too bad for his ego, you were still trying to wrap your head around just what the hell was happening. “You…you liked the chocolate?”
“Liked it??” he scoffed. “What a stupid fucking question. That was the best chocolate I’ve ever had in my life!! I’ve never had a chocolate that made my soul burn like that, that made my whole body feel like it was on fire. I felt so alive. I can’t believe that douchecanoe Red never got anything that good before. That chocolate changed my life.”
“O-oh. Well…I’m glad you liked it.”
“Yeah!! So, when are you getting another order in?” he asked eagerly.
You rubbed the back of your neck nervously. “Well, um, that’s the thing. They discontinued it, because it kinda killed people and melted their rectums.”
“…what’s a rectum?”
One hasty anatomy lesson later, and his non-existent lip was curling. “Eugh, that’s disgusting. Are all humans like that?” You nodded, and he actually gagged. “Fucking nasty. I can’t believe you shove your food through a meat tube.”
Well, that was one way of putting it. Somehow, he had found a way to make rectums even more gross.
“So,” he said finally, having put all thoughts of digestion from his head. “You really can’t get anymore in?”
“’fraid not, cutie.”
His shoulders slumped, and you found your heart breaking at how dejected he looked just then. “Figures,” he mumbled into his scarf, his voice oddly bitter. “I find something I like, and the universe takes it away from me.”
Oh, no, he was somehow meeting all your standards. Cute, emotional, and just a big dumb baby who you wanted to hold in your arms. Throwing all caution and reason to the wind, you blurted out, “You know, I could probably make you more chocolate like that, if you wanted.”
He stared at you incredulously, even as the rational side of you screamed ‘What are you doing?? This stranger just dropped in, tied you up and threatened you, and you’re offering to make him chocolate?!’ To which you replied ‘Yes, he’s cute and I haven’t gotten laid in months.’
His voice was so quiet, it just barely broke through your internal argument. “…really? You’d do that for me?”
“Sure,” you chirped, smiling at him so warmly that yellow bloomed over his skull again.
“…why?”
“Hmm. I dunno.” You leaned your chin into your palm, mulling it over out loud. “You’re pretty cute, and I’d like to talk to you some more, I guess. I’d love to see you again. Stop by tomorrow morning, and I’ll see what I can put together for you, okay?”
“Um. Okay.” Bless his little soul, he just seemed so taken aback by how easily you had taken control of the situation. He tugged at a stray string from his socket, looking so unsure as he glanced over at you in a mixture of suspicion and curiosity. You gave him another smile when you caught him in the middle of yet another glance—he flushed a vivid golden yellow and tugged his scarf up to hide his face.
A flash of inspiration came to you—and the opportunity to get another bad-selling product off your shelf. You turned to the massive wall of candy behind you; you could feel his eyelights burning into your back as you browsed the selection, trying to find the specific product you w—ah! There!
With a wide grin, you turned back around, holding out a bar of chocolate that he looked at suspiciously. “Here, you can try this tonight and tell me what you think. It’s not nearly as spicy as El Fuego Choco, but it’s made with cayenne peppers so it should have a little kick.”
He reached out to take it, and you noticed that his hands weren’t a solid black like the rest of him—his phalanges were red, with the tips of them a golden yellow to match his blush. Taking the utmost care not to touch your own hand, he plucked the candy from your unresisting grip, then squinted suspiciously at you. “I don’t get it. What do you want in return?”
“Hm. How about…” you thought about asking for a kiss, but even you thought that was too forward for someone you just met. Ah! “How about your name? You never told me.”
“Huh??” There was that blush again. He turned away, scowling. “You just—you just must not have been listening! Stupid human, never paying attention when I talk…that’s just so rude, you know that?!” He huffed and puffed, his slippered foot tapping on the hardwood floor, before he grumbled so quietly that you almost missed it, “It’s Error. My name’s Error.”
“Oh, Error. I like it.”
“Of course you do!” He preened at the indirect compliment; it was interesting, watching his emotions bounce back and forth between a strange, inflated sense of pride, and his bristly, guarded nature. “You probably wish you had a name as cool as mine.”
You laughed softly at how proud of himself he was. He really was the most interesting character to enter your shop, and despite how rude and off-putting he was, it was different from Red and all the other monster’s brash, blunt nature, and you found yourself drawn to it. It was new, it was novel, it was interesting, it was something that promised to break the monotony of your life.
It was going to be your new mission in life, to blow out this mysterious skeleton’s rectum.
Error sat on his beanbag, staring up at the ‘ceiling’ of blue strings entangled above him. His mouth tingled pleasantly, the cayenne pepper attempting to eat a hole into the magic coating his mouth. It was good…but not El Fuego good. He sighed irritably, wishing for the millionth time that he hadn’t just devoured that godsend of a chocolate in one go, that he had let himself savor it.
If you really came through on your promise…oh, the possibilities. All the El Fuego he could ever dream of. Error could scarcely believe such a boon had dropped itself into his lap.
But…why? Why were you willing to do that—no, why had you offered, of your own volition?
Ugh. Error rubbed at his temples, warding off the migraine threatening to overtake him as he struggled to piece together the events of today. He had started out sure of himself—all he had to do was threaten a dumb human, and they’d give him what he wanted, like they always did. Humans always shrieked and cowered whenever they saw him, saw his rage, the wrongness of his magic.
But not you. Even when you had clearly been terrified out of your wits, you had smiled at him. You had looked at his strings, his glitches with interest, with fascination, even as he choked the life out of you. Ugh, not just fascination—he tugged at his jacket anxiously, remembering that flush in your cheeks. Ugh. He felt hot and itchy all over, but not in that nice way that El Fuego had made him feel.
Error couldn’t remember feeling like this, not once in the long years since he had first tumbled out of that portal with no memory. He had felt a lot of things—anger, hate, grief, frustration, glee, anger, anger—but he had never felt this, and certainly not over a human.
You…you were new. You were interesting, you were different. And if you could deliver on your promise of magic-meltingly spicy chocolate…
You were his.