Chapter Text
Managing a hotel on your own is difficult.
Katherine knew this from hard-won experience. Her late brother’s ghost couldn’t properly check in people or handle keys or clean rooms, and her kids could only do so much outside of school. Most days, barely half the hotel’s rooms were unhaunted enough to give to a guest. When they even had guests, at least.
The ghosts never made things easy, either. Scaring off patrons was a huge problem, one however she begrudgingly had to accept. They had helped out when they needed it the most. And Nathan was her brother, dead or not. She made the mistake of trying to get rid of them and nearly lost her family.
Then there was Abaddon.
Nathan hadn’t just given her a moldering hotel barely scraping by, but his strange little ward as well. The boy, a demon in human skin, was bothersome on a good day. On other occasions he’d trashed her hotel, was responsible for more than a few blood stains, taught her daughter black magic, threw tantrums, ate her beauty products, brought her dead animals, and put a wedge between her and the townsfolk due to his insomniac late-night escapades. He’d done all that and more for the first year of living here at the Undervale.
But since he’d beaten up a group of hooded strangers he claimed to be cultists, he’d been strangely more laid back. Not nice, but he wasn’t as big as a nuisance to the point she contemplated chaining him up again. He still caused his fair share of damage and got into all sorts of mischief, but he’d been oddly helpful, too.
It was Abaddon’s idea to apply for a grant. Bafflingly, the demon had mentioned to her in passing he knew of some historical places that could gain such funding from the government if applicable. Nathan had praised the boy all evening when Katherine announced that her application went through and was accepted. The Undervale did have a lot of history. With this money, they were able to fix up some things and get the kids’ nicer stuff.
There was even a little for Katherine to splurge on herself.
One dreary, slow Saturday, Katherine found herself alone at the hotel. Besides the ghosts and Abaddon, Ben and Esther had landed sleepovers at friends’. She was so glad to see them making friends at school. While she missed them, a part of her was also guiltily happy to have an evening to herself. No dinner or homework to worry about. And Abaddon was a demon, he was able to fend for himself. He’d go days without showing his face, but she rarely worried as she’d seen evidence of him eating stuff in the cabinets.
Because of this Katherine decided to have a quiet evening. Hotel was closed for the night, no guests. Nathan was preoccupied with ghost things. And she had some wine, chocolates, and a hot bath with epsom salts and lavender-scented bubbles calling her name... It would be heaven. But this would be a tricky task, as she’d have to get creative to ensure she was alone to actually enjoy herself.
Katherine bought several cases of sea salt. She hated cleaning it up but it was worth it for some peace. It trickled down on the ground in a calming, soft hiss as she poured it all around the bathroom, by the door and against the baseboards. She smiled at her finished work.
“Katherine, you deserve this,” she said aloud to herself.
She heard something creak overhead, but quickly chalked it up to this being an old building, and the heating system sputtering to life. No ghost, or demon, was coming in to disrupt her.
Turning on her phone to some light spa music, Katherine slowly got undressed. Humming happily, she looked at herself in the mirror as she watched herself disrobe. Idly she thought of calling Joel back one of these days. They’d had a nice night, if it wasn’t for a bloody serial killer.
God, she missed sex.
“I’m not old,” Katherine said as she traced her fingers along her belly and cupped her breasts. Still perky, nipples firm from breastfeeding years ago. Soft stomach, some stretch marks, but still good, she thought. She could still date and such. “I still got it.”
Confident, she stepped into the bath and sighed at the delicious warmth. It was almost too hot, but at least the water was hot at all.
“Oh, this is nice,” she moaned, leaning her head against the lip of the tub and picked up her glass of wine from the stool beside her. “Katherine, you have outdone yourself..”
Honestly, she should treat herself to this more often. It was so simple, just a half hour to herself if that much. Sipping her wine, Katherine closed her eyes and let out another sigh, feeling the tension of everything slowly ebb from her shoulders. The heat of the bath seeped down to her bones. She wiggled her toes and stretched her legs.
Suddenly she was thinking of how else she could relax. An orgasm was a great stress-reliever, after all.
Setting her wine down, Katherine pulled up a knee and slowly trailed her hand down her body. Her other hand found and toyed with her breast, teasingly, gently, slowly building up in heat. Desire was something she’d been just as divorced with as Ron, busy as she was raising her children and running the hotel, but Katherine was a big girl, she knew she could still enjoy herself without company. This was all she needed.
A quiet moan fell from her lips as she slid two of her fingers against the folds of her sex. Carefully, she wanted to draw this out. She dipped her fingertips in and—
The grate above her suddenly popped open with a loud bang like something had fallen against it. Or hit it. Startled, Katherine looked up and saw a small mass falling out from the ceiling. It fell right into her bath, landing with a loud splash that caused a fair amount of bathwater to slosh out onto the floor.
“Abaddon!” Katherine cried out, alarmed. She scooted as far into the bath as possible, throwing her arms over her chest. The little boy-the demon-did a very uncomfortable looking summersault in the water before finding the surface and breaking free from the bubbles with a sickly gurgle. His arms flailed.
“Katherine,” he greeted calmly like he was passing her by in the hallway, that abnormally deep voice of his sounding so out of place in this room of all moments. It sounded out of place for his frail body, with eyes both too old and too young.
“What the hell? How did you get in here!? I put salt down—“
“I was already in the vents overhead,” he explained, nostrils flaring. His eyes were red, pupils thin slits. “You trapped me in here with you.”
“Then WHY didn’t you say anything?” Katherine groaned, pulling her knees up to her chest. The logical thing to do would be to get out the tub and throw Abaddon out, but she’d have to bare more of her nudity to him. Goodness gracious, how much did he see? She knew he was a little bit of a creep when it came to spying, or lurking as he called it, but doing it while she’s in the bathroom? Did Abaddon not have anything better to do than watch her? She was shocked to the point that she couldn’t move much, torn between horror and embarrassment.
Abaddon’s nostrils flared again. His eyes were still that crimson color, pinned on her like she was an unsupervised tub of strawberry yogurt. He didn’t say anything and shocked her further by scooting closer. He looked so ridiculous, fully clothed while soaking wet. It was how she had to wash the little bugger in the kitchen sink. “You are a woman,” he grunted. Weird.
“Y—yes of course I am a woman, Abaddon. Now get out of my bathroom.”
“The salt. There’s salt in this bath, too.”
Goddamn it. Katherine would have to get out, then. With an angry glare thrown his way that she really hoped he could decipher on his own, she uncrossed her arms and gripped the sides of the tub, hoisting herself out. Muttering to herself, Katherine grabbed a towel and wrapped it around herself. She tried to ignore the heat of Abaddon’s blatant stare. This behavior was completely unacceptable but she didn’t have the energy to parent a demon on decency.
“Now you,” Katherine huffed as she scooped the boy out. Water and bubbles were everywhere. Ugh. She grabbed a towel and pressed it against his body as she kicked the salt line away from the door. “Abaddon, this is so not okay. You can’t just spy on me when I’m in the bathroom. I swear to God, if you do that to Ben or Esther—“
This threat seemed to snap Abaddon out of whatever trance he’d been in, eyes turning from red to blue. “Excuse me? I am the Cobra King, I do not leer at children. Ben is my brother, and Esther is my closest companion. Do not sully our relationship with an accusation, matriarch.”
Dramatic, but it soothed her nerves. She sat him on the edge of her bed, frowning at all the water he was dripping. “You look like a wet cat,” she sighed. “You need to get out of those clothes, I don’t want you dripping water all over the place.”
“Very well,” Abaddon said, which honestly shocked her as much as him falling into her bathtub. Normally he whined and kicked if his clothes needed to go to wash. It was all he ever wore.
Katherine left him there and returned to the bathroom, shutting the door behind her. Sighing morosely at her abandoned bath, she pulled the stopper to let it drain and donned her purple robe. Back in her bedroom, she found Abaddon naked.
Sitting on her bed, legs spread, and—
“Abaddon, cover yourself up,” Katherine said, looking away. If it was some other, innocent little HUMAN boy, she wouldn’t have even drawn attention to the fact that he was erect, or as erect as his prepubescent body was capable of being. But Abaddon was, in his words, thousands or billions of years old. If he understood the concept of leering, then he damn well should understand the concept of sexuality, and how completely not okay he was acting.
Abaddon looked pissed. Actually, he’d looked pissed before she’d said anything. “You told me to get undressed,” he said, gesturing to the pile of wet Puritan clothing. “I am undressed.”
“You can’t just—“ Katherine growled to herself and tossed the towel on him. “Nevermind. Here. Take an old t-shirt while I go wash your clothes.”
The demon wrenched the towel away and got to his feet, flushed now. “This is your fault.”
“What?”
He didn’t respond, which honestly made her a lot more concerned than anything. What, did he actually—? No way. Nuh-uh. That was not something she was about to explore. Exasperated, she helped him into the oversized t-shirt.
Katherine chose to ignore the way his hand brushed against the swell of her chest.
“Out, and don’t go sneaking into my bathroom again when I’m in there,” Katherine said to him as she opened her bedroom door, a basket of clothing under her other arm.
There goes her evening of relaxation…
~
Things were relatively normal for the next several days. Besides her quiet exasperation with Abaddon, the daily grind continued as per usual. The kids were back and up to their usual antics alongside the boy, Nathan was Nathan, and Katherine did her best to keep the place together. She did keep a closer eye on Abaddon, a bit paranoid but soon told herself it was pointless. For the next few days, he would stand close enough for her to feel his head near her hip. His hand would touch hers if she handed him something. His eyes would follow her across the room or through the vents. He would sit under the check-in desk whenever she dealt with a guest and toy with the strings of her shoes.
She didn’t say anything about it, and didn’t acknowledge it.
What happened in the bathroom had been unacceptable, but in the end she reasoned it wasn’t entirely his fault. So what if he… reacted like that. He was (allegedly) an ancient demon, and lust was a sin and wasn’t sin their whole thing? No, she thought to herself. Abaddon talked a big game about torturing the souls of the damned, but he’d never hurt them. He helped, in his own way, as much as he sowed mayhem. But he acted so much like a little boy that she saw him as such in someways, and her maternal instincts stirred for him on occasion. Other times he acted like some feral animal, not understanding social ques, crawling in the vents and eating things he shouldn’t. He wasn’t her child, however, and despite the ruse of him being her nephew, he wasn’t really.
The fact hits her one Friday morning when the kids have gone to school. It was just Abaddon at the table; her brother had left when some of the ghosts were getting agitated over some TV episode dispute, hopefully to calm them down and not rile them up with his own opinion. Katherine was washing dishes from breakfast, keeping an ear out for any possible ring of the front desk bell.
She heard Abaddon push back from the table, chair scraping against the floor. Little shoes padding.
“Hello, Katherine,” he greeted from behind her. She glanced over her shoulder and saw the little boy, sullen and baggy-eyed. He looked so pale, and stayed thin no matter how much they fed him. It used to worry her, but she’d seen him eat things that shouldn’t be eaten and lose limbs all the time. As long as he was… moving, she figured he was okay. Physically at least. Katherine figured she shouldn’t be so hard on him. He complained about his “vessel” to her before. And he was the one to suggest getting government funding. That had helped a lot. Perhaps she should cut him some slack.
“Hello, Abaddon,” she greeted softly. “How are you doing?”
“Fine.” He didn’t ask it back, so she turned back to the dishes. She assumed he wanted to go under the sink, so she stepped to the side.
But to her utter shock, he didn’t. Instead—
She feels his hands on her ass.
She leapt back. “Woah, what the hell!?”
Abaddon looked just as startled, and jumped back and landed on all fours like some feral cat, eyes red. “What!?”
“You don’t—Abaddon! Don’t touch people there!”
His brows knit together and his lips pulled back into a sneer. “I wasn’t doing anything harmful.”
“Yes, you were! Abaddon, you don’t touch people below the waist like that.”
“Below the waist,” he echoed, looking upset still. His eyes raked up her figure, slowly in a way that she’d never seen him do before. It made her feel uncomfortably self conscious. “Fine.”
Abaddon got up and marched out of the kitchen.
Katherine, confused more than angry, reluctantly turned back to the dishes.
~
It happened again the following week. Katherine was busy scrubbing the floors on the second floor. Jessic had had some tantrum earlier and left a slimy… substance on the floor. It was frustrating to clean up as it stuck to the carpet.
It was a Wednesday afternoon, and once again only her around. She’d dropped the kids off earlier, Esther complaining on the way that Abaddon had been acting strange.
“Strange how?” Katherine asked, a hard jolt of anxiety in her gut as she thought back to the incidents she had with the little demon.
“He’s been a little irritable,” Ben said.
“Yeah, and he’s not interested in playing like he usually is. He just hangs out in his hidey holes,” her daughter sighed.
“How long has this been going on?”
“Over a week,” Esther said.
“Well… that’s normal for Abaddon to go off on his own for a while. He’s a demon, sweetie.”
“Yeah, but not like this!”
Indeed, it wasn’t. Katherine knew that. Had long since accepted it when the boy would vanish for days at a time, then show up for a meal one day as though nothing out of the ordinary had happened. But acting ‘irritable’, by his standards, was odd. He was normally pretty friendly—as much as he was able—with Esther.
Katherine scrubbed away at the sticky stain on the carpet, cursing her sore knees. She should really get a pillow to do this.
Abaddon’s tricycle rolled from around the corner, and she looked up to see the boy riding up to her. She’d been hearing him riding around out of sight for the past two days. He looked upset.
“Is something the matter?” She asked, watching as he stood up from his bike and came over, hands held to his chest like a t-rex.
Abaddon didn’t say anything and knelt beside her, arm against hers.
Sighing, she said, “if you’re going to be clingy, then you can help out. Spray that stuff on here,” she guested to a specific cleaning product.
He quietly debated this before nodding. Truthfully she had expected him to huff and refuse and go on about his titles from hell but he didn’t. He picked up the bottle, sprayed some in his mouth with a smack, then sprayed where she directed. “Thank you, Abaddon.”
He perked up at this. “Will I get allowance?”
Warily, Katherine said, “You can have some quarters.”
The boy frowned. “I don’t want your human money.”
“Then I have nothing to offer except some of Esther’s stickers. Now—“
“Do not patronize me, woman,” Abaddon growled, actually growled—an inhuman sound that admittedly startled her despite all she’d faced in the hotel. His eyes flashed purple then red.
“Woah, calm down.” She narrowed her eyes. “Then what do you want?”
Abaddon watched her warily for a moment. Before she could roll her eyes and go back to scrubbing the carpet, his little hand suddenly shot out and made contact with her breasts, cupping the left one. Katherine gasped, the contact sending a jolt through her. “Aba—“
He squeezed, fingers pinching her nipple through the fabric of her bra and shirt. His hand was cold and yet the touch was warm. Before she could even react, he let go and stood up. Marched back to his tricycle.
Katherine’s jaw hung open as he rode off.
~
Abaddon had become a bit of a stalker.
She means that in the most softest of cases, as she really didn’t know what to make of it. He didn’t act any different around the others, didn’t say anything threatening or disturbing other than grouchy responses to questions.
But when Nathan and the kids were absent, he touched her. Brushed against her, touched her waist, her breasts, and honestly, Katherine had no idea how to handle it. If he was some naughty kid, she’d ground him and take away privileges, send him to a therapist, consider boot camp, a long fucking talk about what touch is and isn’t okay. But Abaddon wasn’t just a kid, he was a bloody demon and somehow she didn’t feel entirely threatened.
She’d swat his hands away and he’d huff and growl and give her the stink eye like she’d done something wrong, but ultimately he’d stop until the following day.
It only became a serious issue when Joel made a surprise visit yesterday to say hello and give flowers. It had been very sweet, and she’d smiled and they were talking one moment, and the next—
Abaddon burst into the room from the kitchen, snarling, red eyed.
Joel had gasped and made a hasty exit. That’s it. That was the final straw. So Katherine had blown up on the demon. She’d said some things she wasn’t proud of, said if he kept acting like some little heathen, then he could just move out.
For a split second Abaddon had looked so heartbroken that she’d felt bad, deep down, but held her tongue as he stormed off and crawled into the nearest vent.
That night she found a dead mourning dove on her pillow, pristine wings spread wide and head at an awkward angle. Katherine stood frozen for minutes, staring, trying to rationalize it. But she knew it was Abaddon, only he did such things. It was only Abaddon.
“Did you like the bird,” he asked her gravely the following day when she got home from dropping the kids off. She sighed, resigned to her newest little stalker. It seemed to be just them, thankfully.
For some reason, probably stupid of her, she didn’t want anyone to know about this.
Abaddon had failed to show up to mealtime the past few days, and Esther was getting morose about the emotional and physical absence of her friend. Honestly, if this kept up, Katherine didn’t know if she wanted Abaddon spending time with Esther at all.
“This is becoming a problem, Abaddon,” she said, dropping her purse to face him. “What is up with you lately? This is- all very inappropriate. The touching, the stalking, scaring away Joel, the dead bird!”
“It was a gift.”
“People don’t give dead animals as gifts, and that doesn’t make it right,” Katherine crossed her arms. “What is wrong with you?”
Abaddon exploded. “What is WRONG with me? I’ll tell you what’s wrong! I am an immortal demon trapped in a pathetic little body. I’ve seen the history of this world replayed nearly a hundred times and you all ending in tragedy in every way. It’s been countless eons since I’ve experienced a rutting season and my essence yearns to enjoy it but cannot properly do so! Now here you are, fertile and in your prime. YOU are what’s wrong, Katherine!”
She-
How the hell was she supposed to unpack that? Between the history and his personal hang ups with the little boy he was stuck in, she focused on the ‘rutting’ bit.
“Abaddon, are you saying you’re in heat or something?”
“Heat is for females,” he snarled. “I crave to dominate you.”
Holy shit. He was being serious.
“I can’t deal with this right now,” Katherine said as they stared at one another for a long while. Feeling hot in the face and unsure how to handle this, she took the coward’s way out and made a hasty retreat to her room. He did not follow.
~
Katherine debated putting salt along the door, but for some reason she didn’t. So the little demon wasn’t so much a creepy stalker as he was acting on some twisted demonic instinct. It did seem cruel for a… sexually mature entity to be trapped in the form of something that should never be sexualized, and yet he was frothing at the mouth because she was “fertile” and he was in a rut? Christ.
She sat on her bed, looking at the pillow she’d found the dove on earlier. With a sigh, she suddenly stood up and got undressed, put on her fluffy robe and got under the covers. Curtains shut. She had work to do but decided it could be held off. If an unlikely guest came, Nathan would alert her.
How was she supposed to handle Abaddon when he was like this? Was he going to try and turn his attention to others if he couldn’t get satisfaction from her? God forbid. No way. She’d hire an exorcist faster than the little creep could say “Froot Loops”.
She didn’t want to look at Abaddon that way. He might sound like a man, but he looked and acted like a small child.
The door suddenly crept open. She tensed, looking over her shoulder. Abaddon stood in the doorway. His red eyes gleamed from the dark, making her feel irrationally like a rabbit cornered in a den by a ravenous wolf.
He couldn’t actually hurt her.
“Come here,” Katherine groaned with surrender, and the boy bolted to her bed, climbing up beside her. He was shaking. “Is it really all that bad?”
“I’m in agony. Not the good kind.”
“Did this ever happen when Nathan was alive?”
Abaddon’s brows furrowed together. “No. I was set off smelling you masturbate in the bath.”
Fucking hell.
Before Katherine could formulate another response, Abaddon clambered atop her, the covers separating them. “Katherine. Please.” He actually whimpered.
She didn’t really want to, but, “Will this help you go back to normal?”
“In theory. The last time this happened I smelled a woman back in the second asylum who was turned on by everything. I spent the day fraternizing with a pillow above her cell. They ended up lobotomizing her, a shame.”
“Then why don’t you use a pillow?!”
“Not working this time.”
Oh.
“Please. Let me touch you.”
“…I’m not letting you put anything inside me,” she said, loathing herself. Abaddon’s eyes brightened and he saddled her thigh. She felt, then, the firmness of his small erection, even through the fabric of their clothing and the blankets.
“I’ll be quick.”
“You better.”
And he started to hump her. His gaze was fixated on her face so intently that Katherine had to look away. It was awkward and uncomfortable, his hands gripping the covers on either side of her as his pelvis undulated against her leg. He grunted and sweated, his red eyes glazed over with unrestrained lust.
“Careful,” she whispered when he looked like he might roll off her. He whimpered and jerked harder against her. Katherine closed her eyes and tried to pretend this wasn’t happening at all, praying one of the ghosts didn’t walk in, but hands at the top of her blanket pull her back to the moment. She gasped as he yanked the sheets from her, opening the front of her robe in the process. “Damn it, Abaddon—“
“Shut up,” he whined, mouth at her chest. She felt his hot panting again the swell of her breast, then his hand at her bra, yanking the cups down. Her tits were bared to the air.
“Abaddon,” she said, immobile despite her brain screaming at her to not let him go this far. His mouth found one of her nipples before she could react. He wasn’t big enough to have both her thigh and her breast, so he scooted up to grind on her hip
His mouth was warm and wet and- he was suckling at her unlike a baby, yet similar, tongue curled around the hard bud. A bolt of electricity ran through her, back arching off the bed. He whimpered against her skin, humping faster. He sucked and lapped at her nipple like it was all he could breathe through. Eyes hooded and glowing red.
“Oh, baby,” Katherine said, the endearment falling from her lips involuntarily. She cupped the back of his head, fingers in his dark hair. The mouth at her breast applied more suction. He needed another bath, she thought as he sucked and moaned like a needy puppy. The little sounds his mouth made were slick and loud, lewdly innocent.
She gripped his hair as he suddenly pulled off her breast with a wet pop only to switch to the other one. His hand fondled the first one, smearing the spit he left behind. He squeezed and pulled and played, suckling like his life depended on it.
Abaddon’s humping went faster. He was all but sobbing now, glassy-eyed as he sought satisfaction. Katherine tried to ignore the sensations his mouth was giving her, heat coiling in her stomach. His mouth at her breast… It was absurdly erotic. Fuck her, it felt nice. Every tug of his mouth and tongue pulled at the nerves that ran down to her womanhood. The rustle of bedsheets and his panting filled the room. She hoped no one heard, but the thought of being caught as Abaddon sucked on her tits made her tense.
And frustratingly aroused.
“Shit,” Katherine hissed when his sharp teeth scraped her nipple, nerves on fire. “Baby, careful.”
He ignored her or didn’t hear, tongue lapping at her breast. Before she could respond, he was tensing up and moaning around her nipple, giving one last hard jerk of his hips before going limp atop her.
He stayed like that for a while, eyes closed and mouth lazily suckling her teat. Only then did she notice how warm he felt, almost feverishly hot, when he was usually so cold.
“Abaddon,” Katherine said, tugging lightly on his hair. His eyes opened, baby blues staring back. He pulled off with a wet pop, licking his lips. “Are you going to behave now?”
He grunted as an answer and crawled off her body. There was a wet spot at the groin of his breeches. To her frustration, she felt hot and bothered now in more ways than one. Her inner thighs felt damp and tingly. She wanted to touch herself but covered herself up instead.
“Yes,” Abaddon said, looking more tired now than he ever did. “I’m… better.”
Katherine found herself wanting to pull him back, tuck him against her side and coax him to sleep. Comb his hair and kiss his forehead. Tell him he did a good job. Call him her baby again. But she kept her mouth shut and watched as he stumbled off the bed, shoulders slumped.
“I won’t bother your bed again,” Abaddon whispered. Before Katherine could say anything, he had left the room.