Onyx
Today was going to be different.
It didn’t matter that he still wanted to die.
After nearly panicking from fingers, he didn’t think he could handle it.
He didn’t want to think about it.
Today was going to be a better day because it had to be. He didn’t want to risk never being allowed to see Shane again, and he didn’t want to risk Dominic’s ire at him for trying to kill himself. Especially since he knew there was no way to do it, not easily, not in that room, after what he’d done.
So he was going to try to enjoy it, and not get in his head, and play games, and pretend he wasn’t seeing himself slowly start to change.
A knock sounded on the door, then Shane opened the door to Dominic’s office and stepped inside.
Onyx brightened, eager to bound up to his feet from where he was sitting next to Dominic’s desk, but he kept himself in check because everything was precarious.
“Perfect timing,” Dominic said mildly, looking up from his laptop. But where his tone and words might be mild, his expression was not.
“Can I go?” Onyx asked, feeling like a child asking a parent for permission to go play. “I promise, Dominic, I’ll behave.”
Dominic’s expression softened as his gaze went from Shane to Onyx, and his lips twitched. “Yes, you may go.”
Onyx shot to his feet, already on his way to the door.
Behind him, Dominic said in that same mild tone, “I expect today will go well.”
Shane nodded.
“Let’s go,” Onyx told Shane impatiently. “Games aren’t gonna play themselves.”
Shane stepped back through the doorway, clearing the way for Onyx to pass in front of him. “Yeah,” he said awkwardly, closing the office door behind them. “I guess they won’t.”
Onyx led the way to the rec room. He had to wait for the werewolf to unlock the door, but then he bounded inside, heading straight for the controllers for the gaming system.
Shane slowly followed Onyx into the rec room, closing the door securely behind them before making his way over to the couch and sitting down.
It was like nothing had happened, except it had. So much had changed.
Like having Dominic’s fingers inside of him, which had been the whole reason he’d been allowed this freedom to begin with.
Onyx navigated to a game and away from his own thoughts “So, how fucked are you, anyway?”
Shane glanced sidelong at Onyx. “I’m still alive,” he said cautiously. “I still have all of my fingers and toes, for now.” He licked his lips. “Are… Are you okay?”
The question caught him off guard. Onyx remembered the last time he’d seen Shane, right after the party, when he had not been okay at all. He scowled, but he guessed he’d sort of brought the counter question on to himself.
Onyx hesitated, torn between the truth and a lie. “I don’t know. He wants everything. I’m giving him some of it, I guess. So it’s… fine. I’m just doing what I have to.” And if he sounded a little defensive, who could blame him?
Shane nodded. “Good. What did you want to play?"
“Anything,” Onyx said, but he went back to the racing game they’d been playing before…
Before.
“I’m still mad at you,” he said as he started it up. “I get why you did it. But I’m still pissed.”
Shane reached for the controller and went through the car options once Onyx had pulled up the menu for them to select the different parts of the vehicle they wanted. “I know. I get why you are, and it’s fair.”
“You’d want the same thing in my position,” Onyx said, focusing on building his own car with the ease that came from playing the game many, many times. But always alone.
“Yeah,” Shane replied slowly. “I can imagine I probably would.”
He wanted to talk to Shane about some of it, to get advice, to try to puzzle out what Dominic was actually up to. But he didn’t have the nerve.
Onyx nodded. He didn’t chase the subject down. Not then. Not yet. Maybe he never would.
He wanted to talk about the game and pizza and mundane things, but he didn’t know what else to say. This was turning out to be awkward, and he wasn’t sure why he hadn’t expected that. Maybe they should’ve gone to spar instead.
“Did you get snacks?” Shane asked when the silence stretched out between them.
“Oh, yeah. By the coffee table,” Onyx said. “And… next time, I’ll talk Dominic into that pizza place.”
“It’s good pizza,” Shane offered.
“I haven’t had good pizza since… before the takeover,” Onyx said softly. “I don’t even remember what it’s like.”
Shane glanced at the Rayne witch in surprise. “Oh, well, that’s far too long. You should definitely try to talk Dominic into it.”
“Next time." Onyx fell silent again, then words escaped him despite not wanting to say anything at all, “He tried to get me to socialize with other… other people’s pets.” He scowled. “I hated them.”
Shane didn’t look at Onyx. “Why did you hate them?”
Onyx hadn’t been expecting the question, somehow, and it showed as he fiddled with the controls of the game. He’d flown through building his car, but he went back to it like he was second guessing it. Like he was second guessing everything.
“Because that’s what I’m supposed to be,” Onyx told him, his voice unsteady.
“Yeah, he says he doesn’t want me broken or whatever, but he wants me well behaved.
He wants to be able to show me off.” He shook his head fiercely.
“I don’t want to be that.” He bit his lip.
“They’re so… docile and boring and broken. ”
“I don’t think he expects you to be docile, or boring. I don’t think he wants those either,” Shane replied, his tone cautious.
“You’re not saying he doesn’t want me broken,” Onyx pointed out bitterly.
“He still wants me to be his…” He couldn’t bring himself to say it.
“He treats me like I’m his…” No, he couldn’t say that either.
“I don’t know. I don’t know, but I couldn’t just be like they were.
Then this other witch who had his fucking magic called him my master.
” His nostrils flared. “I don’t care what this fucked up world says.
I’m never going to simper and call him ‘Master.’”
Unless Dominic kept pushing him. Unless Dominic managed to take more from him than he already was. Unless he lost everything he was.
Assuming there was anything left to lose at all.
Shane slanted a sidelong glance at Onyx. “Has he ever demanded that you call him ‘Master’? Or that you simper?” He licked his lips. “He wants his tiger in golden chains, but he doesn’t want him domesticated, I don’t think.”
“Well, no,” Onyx grudgingly admitted. “But…” But nothing. If Dominic wanted him to call him that, it would’ve come up by then. But the others saw him that way, and Onyx hated it.
He scrolled over to the game to select a track.
“He wants me in his bed,” he said flatly. “He wants me to want to be there.” Why was he saying it? It was beyond humiliating. But who else would he ever be able to talk to about this? “It’s not me. I’m not a—“ He caught himself, not saying the word even though it was close.
“Yeah,” Shane replied.
Nothing else followed that word, but then, what had Onyx expected?
Onyx sighed and queued up the round. He focused on the car, on speeding around the track, instead of the topic he’d opened up with Shane about. He didn’t know what else to say. He didn’t want to admit that it was worse because it felt good.
It wasn’t until he’d completed his first circuit of the race that he asked, “Do you have someone?”
Shane started. “What, like a boyfriend? Or a pack?”
Onyx shrugged. “Like a boyfriend, or a pack, or friends, or any of it,” he clarified. He didn’t look at Shane, his eyes on the screen instead.
“Nah. At least not right now. Being a lone wolf isn’t that bad,” Shane replied, falling farther behind on the leaderboard as he spoke.
“Isn’t it hard to be alone all the time? I thought wolves liked being around other wolves.” Onyx didn’t know much about werewolves, but he was pretty sure that was the case, at least.
“It’s hard sometimes,” Shane said slowly, slowly enough to where Onyx wondered just how hard it was.
“Harder for the wolf than for me, but I have some old buddies from when I was in Maelstrom, and we go run sometimes for the full moon. It helps. We used to hang out sometimes, but we’ve all been pretty busy lately. ”
“Is it different?” Onyx didn’t know how wolves worked. “Like your wolf, it’s a different thing?” He glanced at Shane, then focused on the game again. He wasn’t sure what he was asking or why, really. It wasn’t like he’d ever be a wolf. He didn’t need to know anything about mutts.
Still, Shane was the closest thing he had to a friend, and didn’t people ask these things?
“Shit!” Shane’s car was hit with a projectile, and he went skidding across the track.
He scowled at the TV as he steered his car back.
“Yeah, kinda. Sometimes it's more different than others. I don’t know how to explain it. There’s times when I’m shifted and it’s just all me and other times when I’m just riding backseat and it’s mostly wolf.
And sometimes when I’m not shifted that the wolf is pushing and trying to come out, and I’m having to hold it back.
” He shrugged. “Don’t think I’ve tried to explain being a werewolf to someone who wasn’t a werewolf before. ”
Onyx nodded slowly, not even smirking at Shane’s misfortune in the game.
He wasn’t sure he understood exactly, but it made sense.
“I’ve tried explaining being a witch to people before, but…
” To the humans of the rebellion, who hated witches as much as Onyx hated supes, it hadn’t mattered.
He sighed. “They didn’t want to listen. They said it was wrong, that it was disgusting, all sorts of things. ”
He cleared the third lap and sat back.
“I don’t know what I am anymore,” Onyx said, voice weirdly quiet to his own ears.
“If I don’t have magic, am I really a witch?
If I’m a plaything, do I matter? Why does Dominic treat me like I’m…
I don’t know. He treats me like I’m a pet, but it’s not like you want to fuck your pets, you know? I don't get it.” He grimaced. “Sorry.”