there's a distant, closed off ringing in his ears and in the back of his head whenever habit's in the room. it started when evan gave up the fight, relinquished any confidence and dignity he may have once had (which honestly was very little in the first place) and figured out it was in his best interest to be cooperative and just listen to what habit told him. it always ended up being for the best to let him use his body as a vessel when he wanted and let him carry him up into the attic and torture him until he was bruised and bloody and could barely stand up on his own when he was in somebody else's.
evan realized, one night, when he was lying in a shitty, worn-down mattress on the floor, nose dripping blood and stomach covered in gauze, wrists nearly broken and the rest of him bruised to all hell, that he'd given up. he'd stopped pretending like he hated habit, because at this point, he didn't have the energy to hate him anymore. he still thought he was disgusting, because he remained the psychotic demon who tormented his friends and killed most of them off in the end. but he didn't have it in him to really care about what habit did anymore. maybe that was selfish, maybe he should be fighting back, but he didn't have anything to fight for anymore. hatred moved onto neutrality and neutrality moved onto dependency. habit was the only one who kept him alive: the only one who kept him (mostly) out of harm's way. kept him away from that tall thing and made the rake or whatever it was called leave him be. as long as he let habit do what he want, he was pretty sure he'd remain relatively safe.
because habit could keep him alive for a little while longer, and evan wasn't sure he was ready to die yet, no matter how much he wanted to.
there were restful periods when evan would get sick or worn down and habit would take care of him, give him a break. of course, as soon as he was well again, habit would beat the living shit out of him, but he'd learned to savor what little calm he had before the inevitable storm. he sometimes wonders what happened to vinny, and then he remembers that it doesn't matter. he'll never see him again: not if habit has anything to do with it.
he didn't love habit. not really, because he could never love someone who ruined his life so completely. however, he'd relinquished part of his sanity to him. he'd given over some of his sense of self, allowed habit to learn all of his weaknesses and soft spots because he had nothing to lose. he'd given in, surrendered, and now he finds himself in a rather bare room a bit away from the attic, falling asleep in the cold of damp room that he just assumed would be his home from this point on.
"up and at 'em, sleeping beauty," evan shouted as habit flipped over the dingy mattress he was laying on, rolling him onto the cold, wooden floor. he groaned and coughed and held his side because it still hurt like hell, but habit didn't really seem to care.
he flinched (or he was pretty sure he did) when habit let the mattress fall back to the ground and stepped over it, placing his other foot on the other side of evan and looming over him. it was slightly terrifying, but then evan remembered it was way too early for habit to want to torture him. nah, he usually liked to let him move first. wake himself up, walk around for a bit, and then stick him in the attic when he was awake enough to actually know what the hell was going on.
"damn," habit chuckled, eyes darting over the gauze and bruises and dried blood around his nose and lip, "fucked you up good, didn't i?"
"was-" evan has to catch his breath, "wasn't that the point?"
"generally, yeah, but i was going easy on you that time."
evan shuddered so hard his entire body spasmed, a jolt rushing up his shoulders painfully. the fact that he was going easy on him was just unpleasant to think about. if that was habit's easy mode, what was his normal, or his extreme? habit laughed at him and bent over, grabbing evan's forearm and yanking him to his feet with strength that evan hated.
