| Plaything | Antisepticeye x Reader

Chapter 30

{A/N} Thanks so much to @KatSlenderArnold for the great idea that I've put into this chapter!

When I'd gone upstairs, I'd noticed that it was far past midnight and I didn't feel tired. Still, I tried to fall asleep. For almost two hours I was unsuccessful. Surprisingly, I woke up at my usual time this morning and felt completely refreshed. Anti's affecting my sleep patterns.

After breakfast, Anti leaves the house for a moment, and I head back downstairs. During my boredom (and refusal to go outside), I begin to toss knives at the dartboard again. In the twenty minutes I spend practicing, I see improvement in my aim. After a little longer, I begin to alternate between my dominant and non-dominant hand. When that gets boring, I try closing my eyes.

During one of these experimental shots, I feel Anti materialize in front of me. I carefully open my eyes, wincing. To my surprise, I find that he's caught the knife by the blade between his index and middle finger, the point an inch from his face. He steps to the side, keeping the knife in place, and glances at the trajectory it was taking.

"A bit too far to the left."

I let out a shaky exhale. "I thought I was dead."

Anti glances over at me curiously, simultaneously throwing the knife into the dead center of the dartboard. I explain: "I assumed you'd be angry if I chucked a knife at your face."

He shrugs. "It's happened before."

"You've taken a knife to the face before?" I catch myself. "Actually... I'm not that surprised."

Looking over at Anti, I find that he looks a bit more tired than usual. It's weird, seeing him without his usual energy. That is one of the things that he and Jack have in common. Anti's tiredness isn't super noticeable, but I know what to look for. Against my better judgement, I ask him about it:

"You okay?"

The phrase "don't think about it" materializes on his lips, but isn't vocalized. Anti's mouth closes and he looks down at his hands, which he's placed on the counter. He debates whether to tell me about what the issue is, and I assume he'll keep me out of the loop, as usual.

That's why I'm surprised when he says, "I'm tired."

I blink. "Lack of sleep or... something else?"

Anti runs a hand through his hair and glances over at me briefly. It's weird hearing him speak honestly, but I'm glad he's doing it.

"I feed off of fear," he begins to explain to me. I nod to show I'm listening. "Usually, I focus on one person at a time and use their fear to power me, and occasionally I'll have other people who's nightmares I mess with.

"When my routine stopped working on you, I started scaring others a bit more – plaguing their dreams more often, torturing them in real life – but they're all boring. I get impatient with them and kill them off too soon or leave them with their trauma. It's not like I'll die, but it's draining."

I nod thoughtfully, mulling over what he's said. "Why didn't you just stop messing with me and go to the next person?"

Anti shrugs. "You're interesting, at least, even if you're not scared, anymore. I'd rather be tired than bored."

After processing this response, I sit down on the couch. I close my eyes and sit forward, resting my elbows on my knees. Eventually, after a couple minutes of thinking, I shift so that I'm almost sitting upside down. At that point, I'm hit with an epiphany.

"Got it– Wait."

My swift movement into an upright position made the blood rush from my head, and a headache followed. When the pain subsides, I motion for Anti to follow me. He curiously obliges, trailing me up to my room where I open my laptop and start up Steam. A list of unplayed horror games sit in my library. I gesture to them.

"Would artificial fear work? You'd still scare people off to the side, but you'd have my fear to feed off of, again."

Anti stares at the screen for a moment and shrugs. "Technically, the fear in the nightmares is artificial because you know that it's just a dream. The only difference here is that you can't feel the pain."

"Let's give it a whirl."

I open the first game in my library: The Joy of Creation. Obviously, I pick story mode and begin in the bedroom. Anti sits on the bed behind me, watching the screen and I intently. I do well with the fairly simple mechanics for a couple minutes before I get a Chica jumpscare. It's a struggle to continue because of it (I nearly knock off my headphones) and I finally receive a final jumpscare from Bonnie, who'd managed to open the door and kill me.

During the game over screen, I catch my breath and try to calm my beating heart. Though he doesn't say anything, I can almost hear him smiling behind me. I turn around and find him looking less tired, giving a wide wide grin.

"I'm going to assume," I reply, still a bit shaken, "that this works, too."

I turn back to the computer screen, taking another stab at the game. It takes three more tries for me to complete the night, each time getting frightened by a different character. By the time I've gotten through it, my heart is beating a million times every second. Swiveling to Anti again, I find him much more energized, looking like his usual self.

"I actually cannot do this anymore," I admit. "My little heart can't take it."

Anti stretches and cracks his neck. "Doesn't matter now – I've got enough fear to last two or three days, even if I don't scare other people."

Though his joy was somewhat at my expense, I can't help but give a small smile at his satisfaction. A warmth spreads through my chest and my face is dusted with a nearly imperceptible warmth. Anti pulls me toward him, and into his lap. I'm unsurprised that, when I try to push myself out of his lap, his arms tighten around my waist. I sigh.

"At least now you don't have to slice open my neck," I remark.

"I guess..." he whines.

"Oh c'mon. I just saved you a lot of time and effort. The least you can do is show a bit of gratitude."

"Gratitude, huh?" Anti kisses the base of my neck and I tense.

"Th-That's not what I meant."

He laughs at my reaction. "Nervous?"

"Kindly unhand me, sir."

"How about no?"

Anti's kisses trail up my neck, to my jawline, and finally rise to my cheek. He turns me so that my lips meet his. For the first time, I don't try to resist. It's not like I want to kiss him, though. It's just futile to try to stop him. That's the only reason... right?

{A/N} Again, thanks to @KatSlenderArnold for the idea of using horror games to fuel Anti. Your idea actually came at the perfect time because I was going through a little bit of writer's block.

I hope you enjoyed this chapter of "Plaything" as much as I enjoyed writing it. Comments and votes are super appreciated. Thanks for reading! ~Blue