Chapter Text
It’s common knowledge to not exit your house after dark. Why? Well, because the monsters come out after the sun leaves. Monsters like zombies that will grab you with their grimy and bloody hands and try to sink their teeth into your flesh or tall creatures called endermen, who will tear you apart with their long claws and unhinged jaws if you even barely direct your gaze to theirs.
There's many monsters in the world but the worst of all are demons. Demons with skin dark as the void, who will make your life miserable if you manage to anger them. Some people believe that demons are able to lure you into their clutches with dark magic. There's even rumors of people who have angered demons that disappear one day, never to be seen again. Some people of the village say that those people were killed, while others say that they were enslaved or eaten by the nightmarish creature-
But Skeppy thinks that is pure bullshit. Maybe monsters exist, but if they do, then Skeppy has never had the opportunity to see one. They’re probably stories parents tell children to spook them and make them actually go to bed, because really? Zombies? Demons? At least try to be more original when making up tales that are going to become tradition.
No one -except Skeppy- comes out of their houses at night. Although it's pretty weird being the only one outside when he takes his nightly walks, he’ll take the quiet. It’s nice, especially because of the rude stares he gets during the day. Apparently because he isn’t scared of some childish stories, people think he’s crazy. Which he can slightly understand because maybe he is crazy for not believing some weird tradition the village he’s lived in his entire life believes in, but they could at least hide their distaste towards him better! Earlier that day he wanted to buy some bread and the baker charged him more than the guy who bought the same bread seconds before him.
Whatever, if they don’t like him, then fuck them! He doesn’t like them either. He should up the prices in his forgery, see if they dislike him even more that way.
He huffs out a laugh at that thought, they’d probably kick me out, He thinks to himself, maybe declare me a witch or something like that.
He’s too lost in his thoughts that he didn’t notice he entered the forest at one point in his walk. He looks behind him but the only thing he can see is darkness and the silhouettes of some of the trees that grow in the forest next to the village.
He stops walking.
This is bad. He doesn’t believe in monsters but what he does believe in are the wild animals that live in this forest. Skeppy should probably leave, like, now if he doesn’t want to be devoured by a ravenous wolf pack.
He starts walking in the direction he thinks he came from. Five minutes pass with no sight of the village. He keeps walking for about ten minutes and when he thinks it's been thirty minutes he stops walking.
He just stands there for a couple seconds before he looks around him. His stomach drops when he realizes he can’t see anything familiar.
Maybe I was walking in the wrong direction? He thinks nervously, I can’t be that far into the forest.
He chooses a random direction and starts walking. The trees that seemed so harmless in daylight now tower over him, the branches bent at an angle that looks like they’re trying to reach him. He jumps at the sound of an owl cooing and jumping off a tree, flying over him and disappearing into the darkness. He looks at the tree the owl was in and swallows a scream when he sees something dark scurry away, breathing heavily he takes a couple steps backwards and narrows his eyes. Skeppy observes the tree for a moment and calms down once nothing else happens.
“Oh my god.” He whispers to himself, “I need to get home.”
He ignores the slight tremble in his fingers and starts walking again.
This is fine. It was just a squirrel or something. A silly little animal who has no idea it almost gave him a heart attack. He’s just gonna keep walking, he’ll go back home, go to bed and be under his warm blankets-
He hears a twig snap behind him and he stills. He gulps and slowly turns around and immediately begins running at the sight of two pure white eyes watching him.
What the fuck! What is that?!
Skeppy keeps running, not wanting to find out what that creature is. He hears something flapping him and he spares a quick look behind him.
He’s surprised when he sees nothing behind him, expecting the creature to be running to catch up to him. The creature is… gone? He slows down and stops running. He turns in the direction where the creature was and looks around, trying to see where it could be but all he sees is darkness. He calms his breathing and places a hand on his chest.
“Maybe I am crazy.” He wonders out loud, slightly breathless. “That was probably just my imagination-” He says but is interrupted by a loud thump and the sound of a couple leaves crunching under the weight of something behind him.
This time, he doesn’t turn around. He keeps still and his eyes widen when he hears a low laugh coming from behind him.
“You seem pretty lost.” A voice croons from behind him but the sound of the voice is wrong, it sounds like forks being dragged on porcelain. That's what breaks him from his stupor, quickly turning around. His eyes somehow widen even more when he sees a tall figure in front of him. He shudders when he sees two bright white eyes shining in the darkness.
“What…” he breathes out, cringing inwardly at the pure fear audible in his voice. The figure in front of him seems to relish the fear painting his tone.
“What do you want?” He tries to harden his tone, trying to make his voice more demanding. The creature in front of him hums before speaking.
“Nothing.” It says, “I just wanted to see what a human like you would be doing out in the forest so late.” It adds, the voice sounds friendly. Too friendly.
“I-” Skeppy starts to speak but pauses when he processes what the figure had said. “Human?” He questions. “You’re- you’re not-” He tries to ask but the figure in front of him cuts him off.
“Not human?” It continues the question for him. It giggles, as if Skeppy said a joke. He sees something move in the dark and move close to its face. A small flame appears on what moved in the darkness and now that Skeppy can see he observes the creature in front of him. The thing that moved was a clawed hand, the features of the figure in front of him make his eyes widen in terror.
“Of course I'm not human.” It says in a low tone. When it opened its mouth to speak two sharp fangs were revealed. It’s skin is pitch black, which explains why Skeppy couldn’t see it in the dark that had enveloped them. Its face is shadowed by a large hood that is also black, although it's a normal shade of black, not the abysmal black that colors its skin. Two holes are cut on the top of the hood, a horn comes out of each hole. The hood extends down it’s body to what Skeppy thinks is a cloak but if it is he can’t see it since the small flame that lit up from it’s hand only illuminating its face, not it's body.
A demon.
Skeppy chokes and tries to back away but the demon quickly extends its hand and grabs his shoulder, gripping it with its long claws. He can hear the demon mutter something under its breath in a language he doesn’t recognize. When the demon finishes muttering, Skeppy gets the sensation of thick rope enveloping his whole body. He tries to move his arms or legs but he can’t order them to move. His breath quickens and he can’t move his head to look anywhere but the demon who is observing him. The demon stops holding his shoulder and its arm goes back to its side.
The demon smiles sweetly but its lips widen a little bit too much to seem like a kind gesture. “I thought you’d try to run away.” It says, a small laugh bubbling out of its lips. But the smile quickly drops and it gives Skeppy a glare.
“Don’t try to run away. You’re stuck. I made sure of it.” It snarls. After a moment the demon crouches down and grabs a stick. With the hand that has the flame it lights the end of the stick on fire. It makes a fist and when it opens its hand there no longer is a flame on it.
It stands up and takes a couple steps towards Skeppy. It grabs Skeppy’s hand, ignoring the small gasp that escapes the human’s lips at the action and puts the stick in his hand. “Don’t drop it.” It mutters, the man quickly grips the torch harder, hoping the demon won't notice the small tremble in his fingers.
The demon moves back and simply watches him. Skeppy’s still breathing heavily, even though he’s not being chased anymore.
They stand in silence, the demon observing Skeppy while he tries to figure out a way out of this situation.
When a couple minutes pass and the silence becomes slightly comfortable -for Skeppy, because the demon looks content to watch him in silence, what a creep- Skeppy decides to speak up.
“So…” He starts, sniffing through his nose and shivering a little, he didn’t notice how cold it was before but now that he’s been standing in the same place, not being able to do anything to warm himself up he feels coldness seep into his clothes.
“Can I leave?” He asks, looking anywhere but the demon’s eyes.
The demon hums and touches its chin with a finger, as if considering the option of letting him go. The demon smiles and looks down at him and with a cheeky smile it chirps a small “no”
“Oh.” Skeppy says. He looks down at his shoes, not knowing what to respond to the demon.
“I’ve been watching you for a while, you know?” The demon mentions. Skeppy’s eyes snap back up to look at the demon with wide eyes.
“What?” He shrieks. “What do you mean you’ve been watching me?” He asks in a fearful tone.
The demon ignores his question. It talks again as if Skeppy never said anything.
“I can’t really come out when it's day, since the humans in your village would hunt me down.” It says, sounding bitter at the last sentence it said. “But I've seen you. You come out at night, not being scared of what might happen to you, unlike all the other villagers.” It notes, and with a slight smile it speaks again.
“You’re interesting.”
Skeppy opens his mouth to protest but the demon keeps on talking.
“You were walking around here, not at all aware of your surroundings. You should stop doing that, by the way. You’re gonna get killed if you do that. You’re lucky I’m a merciful demon.” It huffs out a small laugh before speaking again.
“Since you weren’t really paying attention to anything, I decided to trap you here-” It says but is interrupted by Skeppy.
“T-trapped?” He asks, voice stuttering, alarmed at the thought of being trapped with the demon.
The demon leans down to Skeppy’s height and pats his cheek with its clawed hand. “Yes.” It responds to his question, “You’re trapped. That’s why you couldn’t get out of the forest, silly! If you keep walking you’ll just end up in the same place. It's like a loop.” It says sweetly, smiling at the human, as if it didn’t just tell something to said human that made him feel pure terror.
“W-what?” Skeppy says quietly, “Am I going to be able to leave?” He asks weakly, already knowing the answer is probably no.
The demon hums, and leans away from the human. It begins to circle Skeppy slowly, who shudders. God, this is so creepy, He thinks.
When the demon is standing where he was standing before, done observing Skeppy, it answers his question.
“Normally I would say no.” It starts, “But I’ll give you a chance to go back to the normal world.” It says, Skeppy perks up at the prospect of being able to go back home.
“But,” It starts talking again, “Only on one condition, will you be able to go back.”
“And what would that be?” Skeppy asks eagerly.
“I want you to…” The demon pauses what it was saying, looking a bit embarrassed. It hesitates when it continues speaking.
“I want you to be my friend.”