Today's Fanart by Blanche_Minuit on AO3
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The grin on Malevola stretches slowly and sharply, the kind of smile that makes you feel like prey even when she is supposedly being friendly. She watches every tiny movement you make, every hesitant step you take, every micro-adjustment of your grip on your clipboard, every nervous glance, as if your discomfort is the most entertaining thing she has seen all week.
Sonar shifts aside to let you in, his long fingers fussing with his tie in an attempt at professionalism that only makes the whole situation more surreal.
He stands there like a polite eldritch butler, which somehow makes everything worse.
Crossing the threshold feels like entering a pocket dimension of chaos. The apartment is absurdly small, a dingy studio with peeling paint, a crooked ceiling light, and furniture that appears to have been assembled by someone who refused to read the instructions. The home seems to hum with eerie vibrations that seep into the air, emanating from the walls themselves. You pray it is a normal half-demon thing and not, say, a trapped spirit or some curse left over from a questionable summoning.
Welcome to The Apartment From Hell™.
The scent hits you before you fully register anything else. It is a baffling, almost offensive mix: incense thick enough to make your eyes water, the faintly sweet, vaguely chalky tang of protein powder, the metallic ozone-crackle of residual magic, and something earthily that makes you suspect one of them may have kidnapped a small woodland creature for fun.
And the clutter.
Oh, the clutter.
There is a portal-like shape on the floor, outlined in some kind of black residue; is this a meditation? Summoning? You are not asking. That is a line you do not cross. And then there is the fridge, a monument to passive-aggressive domesticity, plastered in sticky notes in two dramatically different handwriting styles:
'Buy milk.'
'Stop drinking my milk, or I will bite you.'
'YOU BITE EVERYTHING.'
'NO, I DON'T, only the things that annoy me.'
'So... everything?'
'Blocked.'
"Oh, don't mind the mess," Malevola says, breezing past you like a walking hazard sign with confidence. Her horns nearly scrape a hanging light fixture as she tosses her hair back with a flourish, practically radiating chaos. "We had a little... disagreement this morning."
"She tried to bench-press the couch again," Sonar mutters, eyes fixed on some distant, secret logic only he understands.
You blink. "Is that... a common issue?"
"She refuses to accept that gravity applies to furniture," Sonar says, voice weary as though this is a problem he has been enduring for centuries.
"Gravity?" Malevola scoffs, placing her hands on her hips and tilting her head like a cat judging a particularly boring mouse. "Gravity is a suggestion."
This is not a home. This is a supernatural daycare. I am in a daycare for overpowered toddlers.
You tighten your grip on the clipboard like it is the only thing anchoring you to sanity in a tornado of chaos. You inhale carefully, flipping through papers on your clipboard as if approaching a wild beast. Somewhere in the back of your mind, Blonde Blazer's voice mumbles about 'believing in them' or some shit, but you tune it out.
This is... this is something else.
"Sonar," you venture, brow raised, "you... graduated from Harvard, didn't you?"
YOU ARE READING
Send the Dispatch (Dispatch x fem!reader)
Romance"Dude, I think I miss working as the Dispatcher..." It wasn't supposed to be like this. One minute, I was behind a desk, pushing papers. Next, I was thrown into chaos. I used to only read about it in incident reports. Somewhere along the way, I stop...
