Chapter Text
Spamton didn’t know why he still came to this stupid bar.
The Cyber Grill. His and… their old haunt.
Every Friday night, Spamton sat on a worn down barstool that was much too tall for him, and downed free shots of battery acid while listening to moderately amusing stand-up comedy and trying not to think about the people that he used to sit with in the booth in the far corner. Given that he was now Cyber City's biggest celebrity by a mile, his trips to the bar usually meant mingling with old regulars that knew Spamton way back when and sat intrigued while he colorfully and loudly described what his life was like as Queen's favorite guest in her mansion. Even though it could get a bit repetitive, there was nothing like having a crowd of people who used to feel sorry for him hanging off his every word and losing themselves in his salesman’s smile.
The laughter in the air died down as the last act—a rather spiffy looking Plugboy—wrapped up with a smattering of applause. Another aspiring big shot of the comedy world making their debut. Spamton leaned on the bartop and glanced over at he and his lost friends' old booth again, frowning. Even though he didn't need them or the memories anymore, something deep inside him still hurt when he thought about what once was. He finished off another shot and waved the Addison bartender over for a refill.
God. He should have just gone to the Color Cafe. A man of his status should have been enjoying a well-prepared meal at the VIP table served by Queen’s Swatchlings. And then he could give them a very generous tip followed by a very generous “thank you” in his room at the mansion to end the night. There was no good reason why Spamton G. Spamton should be spending his Friday nights at the Cyber Grill like he was still the Little Addison That Couldn’t.
He picked at the freshly groomed fluff covering the backs of his hands with a sigh and settled into his seat, knocking the back of his shoe into the metal legs absently. The front doors then opened with a sudden slam, making every head in the room pivot towards the entrance. A strange looking man in a clown outfit entered the building and made his way to the stage, the obnoxious sound of bells trailing behind him. He sat his rather round body on the empty stool and made himself at home under the spotlight. The man blew and tapped on the mic, making the deafening screech of feedback ring through the bar. A grin that could only be described as shit-eating was plastered on his round face as he kicked his dangling legs like a child. And what were those shoes ? Spamton knew his sense of style used to be questionable, but for god’s sake. He supposed they went with the whole getup, but that didn’t mean he had to think they were fashionable.
Spamton mentally prepared himself for whatever this was going to be. The clown started to talk, and then Spamton realized that nothing could have prepared him for this. Every joke seemed to land perfectly. This strange little clown had the Cyber Grill doubled over in laughter the entire time he was on stage, Spamton included. His stomach hurt. He couldn’t breathe. Tears were streaming down the sides of his face. He’d never laughed that hard before in his life. Unlike most everyone else who took up the stage on comedy nights, the clown appeared to be in his natural habitat performing in front of a crowd, as if he’d done it a million times and this was just number 1 million and one. He seemed so at ease, so confident under the neon blue, pink, and yellow lights that were typical of Cyber City establishments. As he spoke, Spamton noticed he had a bit of a lisp, as if he’d never grown out of it as a child, but it did not seem to deter him or interfere with his performance.
He was almost mesmerizing to watch. Other than the fact that he was a damn good comic, there was this slight echo in his voice that didn’t seem to be because of the room. The way the little bells on his ridiculous looking hat jingled as his head moved, accenting his words, demanded his attention. His T-shaped tail swished absently behind him and sometimes curled around the leg of the stool which he sat on. Spamton’s mind conjured up an image of that tail curling around his leg instead, and his natural blush grew dark enough to match the rouge on his cheeks at the thought. Maybe he could blame it on the battery acid.
Spamton tore his eyes away from the clown’s tail and directed his tunnel vision towards his face instead. Bad idea. From his seat at the bar, Spamton could make out a slight golden glint in the black, star-shaped holes he had for eyes. His sharp, equally golden teeth made him think of the type of unsavory Darkners he’d heard about lurking in the Dark Web. His face was covered in a thin layer of fluffy purple (or was it blue?) fur, with large, even furrier, pointed ears sticking out the sides of his head. Spamton had never seen anyone like him before in Cyber City. He looked like a demon who worked at a carnival as a side gig.
And Spamton, the fool, wanted to see more of him.
Who was this foreign man in strange clothes and why did that crooked, toothy smile of his make his heart skip a beat? He looked like the type of creature that would lurk in the darkest corner of your bedroom and make a game out of keeping you awake at night as the golden pinpricks in his eyes stared you down, as if the exhaustion of staying awake and the fear emanating from your body pleasured him, satiated him.
Spamton realized he’d stopped paying attention to his words and shook himself out of his introspection. The final few jokes of the clown’s set landed just as well as the rest of them and he went out with a bang, taking an exaggerated, flourishing bow and soaking up the cheers of the crowd. Spamton cheered with them and clapped with shaking hands. He had to talk to this man. He loved his confidence, his energy, his…everything. But not like this. He was a mess. He needed another drink.
Spamton waved the bartender over again and the orange Addison moved to pour him another shot. Spamton shook his head.
“No, no, no. Just leave it there,” he said, pointing at the bottle.
The Addison raised their eyebrows at him.
“I mean it. The whole thing.” He pulled out his wallet and slapped a stack of Dark Dollars on the bartop with his salesman’s smile and a wink, not even bothering to count how much he’d given them. “Keep the change.” Even though he was already getting the drinks for free, Spamton didn’t pass up an opportunity to flaunt his money after spending so long not having any.
“Wow, thanks.” The Addison smiled, a deep orange blush on their face, and left the bottle behind before taking the cash and serving other patrons.
Spamton turned his attention back to the purple(?) man across the room. As the clown left the stage, the bar patrons crowded around him as if he were a hot new celebrity despite his strange appearance. Cyber City had always adored fresh talent and this time was no different. The clown mingled with his new fans, and Spamton quickly threw back enough shots that he lost count. With each tingling mouthful of D-cell battery acid, Spamton felt his body warming and the jittering in his limbs subside. Half a bottle later, he felt his confidence return to him eventually and decided it was time to approach the intimidating unknown.
Spamton adjusted his tie and hopped off the barstool with a wince; it was always a bit of a drop back down to the floor. With deliberate movements, he made his way through the bar, his mere presence compelling people to immediately clear a path for him despite his stature making him harder to see. The crowd surrounding the clown parted quickly, and now Spamton could finally get a real look at him. He was so much more attractive up close. Spamton still couldn’t really tell what color fur he had in that lighting. But now he could see that they were both about the same height (without the lifts he always wore in public) and that the golden lights in his eyes appeared to switch off when he laughed hard enough for his eyes to narrow. Or maybe they were just hidden briefly. He didn’t know.
What he did know was that he had to talk. To the clown. Right now.
He opened his mouth, but all the pre-rehearsed flirts and seduction techniques Spamton kept up his sleeve for snagging a rising starlet or up-and-coming musician were wiped from his mind. Erased. Gone. For the first time in a long time, he just didn’t have the words, even with liquid courage tinkering with his code. It wasn't like this with other people he’d pursued, and the implications of that made his mouth dry up.
He swallowed and took a deep breath. Flirting wasn’t going to happen right now. His brain just wouldn’t allow it. But Spamton needed to strike up a conversation. The guy was a comic. He just got off stage after an amazing performance. Start there. Straightening his cuff, Spamton put on the welcoming grin that all Addisons had plastered on their faces when talking business, and suddenly the confidence he’d lost came back to him in a wild rush.
“That was quite the performance you put on back there!” he praised, words filtered through his impenetrable salesman persona.
Everyone’s heads turned to look at him. He’d stolen the clown’s spotlight with only a single, albeit loud, sentence. The clown looked in his direction as well, golden eyes meeting his black ones.
“Who, me, me?” he asked innocently, his imp ears perking up. Spamton noted the odd repetition of words—that wasn’t there when he was performing. A vocal tic he’d suppressed? It was…kind of cute. He felt his defenses cracking already. Not so impenetrable after all.
He laughed, the type of laugh he’d practiced in front of a mirror that would help make a customer feel at ease during a sales pitch. Laughter did wonders to hide things.
“Of course I mean you! I haven’t heard a set that good since ‘96! Meet the right industry people and you’ll be a big shot like me in no time!” Spamton approached him, still grinning from ear to ear. “How ‘bout we sit and chat for a while, lemme buy you a drink.”
“A drink, you say?” He blinked, expression contemplating, before settling on a toothy grin, his eyes brightening. “Who am I to decline such a generous offer? And after quite the barrage of compliments! Uee hee hee!”
What an odd laugh. Oddly charming, more like. Spamton batted the thought away, and with a barely noticeable battery-acid induced sway in his step, he led the clown away from the attentive crowd and to a booth. Black cape fluttering around him, the clown seemed to float as he walked, with a little bounce in his gait like his inner child was dying to come out and play. They passed that booth on the way to one closer to the back of the bar, and Spamton pointedly did not look at it, did not think about how he used to have the seat facing the stage, next to the wall. Smile and keep walking, smile and keep walking.
Spamton slid into his chosen booth, his feet missing the security of the ground. He realized he’d chosen the side that faced the stage, and cursed himself. The fact that he was in the middle of the booth instead of against the wall didn't change anything. But his involuntary trip down memory lane was halted before it began as the other man joined him on the other side of the table. Since he was about the same height as Spamton, maybe a little taller, Spamton knew for a fact that his feet were dangling as well.
Normally one would go to the bar top and order drinks, but for a big shot like Spamton, things always seemed to come to him, never the other way around. The Addison bartender, ever attentive to their most affluent customer, made their way over with a couple of glasses of battery acid and placed them on the table with a typical Addison work smile and flushed cheeks.
The comedian looked at the fizzing green liquid, sniffed it, poked at the glass. Like a Tasque prodding at something interesting. He'd clearly never had one before. Spamton kept smiling, amused, and sipped from his own glass. "It's battery acid," he explained, "Good stuff. Just don't bathe in it!" He chuckled at his own joke, pale in comparison to the ones the other man made mere minutes ago. He let out a breath he didn't realize he was holding when his laughter was joined by the clown’s, and suddenly his breath was taken away entirely by the enrapturing sound hitting his ears.
The clown started to dig in his pockets for something, smiling brightly when he found what it was he was looking for. A…straw? One of those funny looking ones that parents often gave to their children, with loops and whirls and fun shapes that broke up the monotony of a normal straw. He gazed at the purple plastic fondly, then plopped it into his glass and gave his drink a little sip. Spamton was right about his inner child, it seemed. He focused on his face expectantly, in the hopes that his foreign tongue would be pleased with the taste of his world’s only alcoholic beverage. Spamton could tell when the sting of D-cell battery acid hit his taste buds, as his face scrunched up from the typical sparking sensation that came with the drink. It seemed like the scrunch was a good one; the clown’s face lit up as he continued to sip. Spamton’s smile grew, and he kept his eyes trained on the clown for a bit, taking him in, studying him.
Conclusion: the odd looking man across from him was hot. Spamton always knew there was something off in his coding from the day he hatched—maybe a missed semicolon here, an incorrect return statement there—like a part of him wasn't fully compiled. Unlike his fellow Ads, sales and long noses weren't factors in his attraction towards people, and he just didn't care what species his romantic pursuits were. The Voice knew this and this was one thing it allowed him leeway on when telling him to go forth and date some celebrity streamer or investor. This time was different…the clown clearly wasn't from Cyber City and looked like a freakshow, new and exciting and fear-inducing. He had absolutely no idea what this man was.
And Spamton had never seen anyone more attractive in his life.
“Y’know, I never caught your name,” Spamton started, shaking himself out of his one-man staring contest.
The other man chuckled, a strange echo-y sound that sounded somewhat haunting when it reached Spamton’s ears. “That’s because I never said it.”
“Well then, you’ve got me at a disadvantage,” He leaned forward on his elbow. “You know who I am, but I know absolutely nothing about you except that you’re definitely not from around here and you’ve got a talent for making people laugh.”
“Know you, you? Do I?” he asked. There was that odd tic of his again.
Spamton laughed again. “Of course you do! Number One Rated Salesman of 1997?”
The clown stared at him with those voids he called eyes, silent.
Right, he’s not from here. Dammit. Recover. “Big Shot Autos?” He paused to allow the other Darkner a chance to recollect. “I’m the guy whose face is plastered all over Cyber City. Surely you noticed the ads, the posters, and billboards on your way here?”
A tilt of that furry head accompanied by the bells on the clown’s hat and a slow blink was his only answer. He looked like an adorably confused Tasque. Spamton’s grin became strained and he clenched his fist under the table, fighting the urge to bite his nails. His eye twitched. It was no longer typical for someone to not even recognize his face these days, let alone not know him at all. It was…unsettling.
He laughed it off and took another sip from his battery acid. “Tell you what, sweetheart. Let’s make a deal! I’ll tell you my name, and you tell me yours; even the playing field.”
Wait. What did he say? Sweetheart? Shit, he hadn’t meant to say that. Maybe the battery acid was loosening his silver tongue, or maybe this stranger’s unnatural attractiveness was cutting through his mask like paper.
But before he could backtrack, the other man grinned, baring his sharp teeth. Phew. Maybe he didn’t notice his slip, or maybe he didn’t care. “Uee hee hee! Deals are but the games of business, are they not? I shall play this salesman’s game with you, then! Your move!” he said with a flourish of his hands.
“Spamton,” he declared proudly, puffing out his chest, “Spamton G. Spamton, the name so nice you say it twice!” He winked with a click of his tongue, and now it was the moment of truth. He was finally going to discover the name of the man who metaphorically tossed his confidence into the equally metaphorical recycle bin and slammed the lid shut with 20 layers of encryption. It was probably something mystical, unique, creative—
“Jevil.”
Spamton blinked. “Jevil?”
“The one and only!” He looked proud of himself.
“Aww, you’re just pullin’ my nose!” Spamton grinned and waved a hand at him. Leave it to a comedian to give him his stage name. Jevil. Given his overall look, Spamton figured it was probably just jester and devil all in one, just a part of his persona. “I meant your real name, not the one you use up there in front of the crowds!”
Jevil giggled, and slurped up half his drink in one go. Jeez. “Oh, but that is my real name. We agreed to play the game, and I always play fair,” he said.
Spamton huffed, amused, but conceded. “If you say so. It’s just that I’ve never heard a name like that before.”
“And I’ve never heard a name like Spamton before,” Jevil quipped with equal amusement, lisp distorting the way Spamton's name left his mouth in a ridiculously adorable way. His teeth glinted in the neon lights as he smiled.
Touche.
“Got me there.” Spamton raised his hands in surrender. “So…where’re you from, Jevil?” he asked conversationally. The name sparked on his tongue like the battery acid Jevil seemed to have taken a newfound liking to.
A dreamy expression came over Jevil’s furry face. “A quiet kingdom of cards and games, of magic and whimsy! Where the branches of candy trees make good places to hang and sleep the day away when I am not entertaining the court! It is quite different from this city of yours, yours.”
Spamton hummed, Jevil’s broad brushstroke of an explanation still keeping him interested. “Well, we don’t really do things with magic here. The wonders of technology with a little bit of magic sprinkled in is all we need. The only trees we’ve got are for storing data, and we’ve got more of a bustling queendom here in Cyber City. Our queen, in her infinite Internet-induced wisdom, invited me to live in her mansion, y’know! I’m just that much of a big shot!” he said, his smile turned prideful.
“I see, see.” Jevil fussed with his green and yellow collar. Something was off about the way he sipped at his drink, like there was mischief in his movements. He paused for a brief moment of silence between them before boring his eyes right into Spamton’s as he spoke up again. “And does being a big shot also involve staring at people as if you wished to make a feast out of them?”
Oh.
Oh no.
Spamton’s brain finally caught up to what Jevil meant by that. The grin on the clown’s face confirmed it even if Spamton was still processing his words. He was pretty sure his entire face had reddened. A little nibble on his nails wouldn’t hurt. His teeth ached for it.
“You- I- I- I wasn’t- shit,” Spamton stuttered out. His salesman’s smile went scattering in the wind, and he dropped his head onto the table. He was fucked. How was he that obvious? Had anyone else noticed? Spamton peeked up at the clown sitting across from him.
Jevil wasn’t laughing at him like he’d expected, but his eyes sparkled with…was that amusement? Did he think this was funny? Spamton was utterly embarrassed, ready to disintegrate into a shower of bits, and Jevil was grinning like he’d accomplished something. Well, there was no way that Spamton G. Spamton was going to stand for being called out by a man with a lisp no matter how cute it was. He gathered himself and moved to slide out of the booth, and got halfway up before he was stopped by a clawed hand on his wrist.
“Oh, wait, wait! I didn’t mean to make you upset,” Jevil said, his smile softening a bit.
Spamton froze, eyes locked onto Jevil’s hand. It was furred, too, just like his face, shaped almost like a paw, with golden claws that matched his teeth and eyes. Spamton’s pounding heartbeat drowned out the noise of chatter and jokes and applause. And then Jevil’s thumb started moving, a slow back-and-forth motion that was barely perceptible but there. Spamton made a strained noise in the back of his throat. He thought he was going to melt onto the floor in front of the entire Cyber Grill. Before he knew it he was sitting back in the booth, his earlier embarrassment forgotten.
“Okay, maybe I did, just a teensy weensy little bit,” Jevil suddenly confessed, bringing his thumb and pointer on his free hand together. He giggled. Fucking giggled.
Spamton glared and snatched his arm back, immediately mourning the loss of warmth on his wrist despite his annoyance. “Is this a game to you? You trying to make me look like a fool?” he growled.
Jevil shook his head, bells tinkling. “The only fool in this room is me, me,” he said. He sounded surprisingly genuine. “I merely wanted to see if the salesman would sleep, so that the real man beneath may come out to play! But I see that I may have played with him a bit too much.”
For a moment, they stared at each other, neither of them saying a word. Spamton sipped at his battery acid again and smoothed his hair back with a shaking hand. God, he needed a smoke. He wasn’t prepared for this. He knew how to handle a sale, but still acted like the freshly hatched Ad that chased hard and got rejected harder when it came down to attraction.
“The real man, huh?” Spamton gave a mirthless chuckle. “You don’t want the real me.” He pulled a cigarette and his lighter out of his breast pocket, waving them at Jevil for permission, and Jevil’s answering nod was accompanied by those sweetly tinkling bells again.
Jevil blinked. “Bold of you to assume such a thing. Have you not been listening to my words? You must not be as good of a salesman as you claim if your listening skills are that awful, awful!”
As Spamton lit his cigarette, he noted that the gold in Jevil’s eyes brightened, like he was amused by his own joke. He took a quick drag, feeling his nerves settle slightly, and glared at Jevil through the hazy curls of cigarette smoke that surrounded the two of them. “What do you mean ‘not good?’” Spamton asked, jabbing the cigarette in Jevil’s direction. Ash fell onto the table. “You’re talking to the best salesman in Cyber City! I’m so good, I’ve got cars, money, commercials, a room in Queen’s mansion; you’ve got jokes and games and a stupid clown outfit! Why don’t you stick to commenting on what you’re good at!”
“Jester,” came Jevil’s simple reply.
Spamton’s brows furrowed. “What?”
“Jester, not clown,” Jevil corrected, finishing off his battery acid with a smile and the obnoxious sound of his straw vacuuming up the last few drops. Really? That was his grand takeaway from this?
“And you’re right. I am quite good at games!” He paused, tilting his head in that Tasque-like manner again. “Especially when the other participant is ever so fun to play with! Uee hee hee!”
What the hell did he mean by that? Jevil’s smile changed. It was…dangerous. Predatory. It made the flush of battery acid and anger spread to the very tip of Spamton’s nose. Even under the colored neon lights, he was sure that Jevil could see the effect he was having on him. There was no hiding it.
Spamton’s leg began to shake, and even a long drag from his cigarette couldn’t fully sedate the involuntary movements. Jevil bore his eyes into Spamton’s, cornering him, pinning him in place. Spamton couldn’t bring himself to look away, lest he look weak and let the clown— jester— win whatever game he was playing that only he knew the rules to.
Suddenly, something brushed against Spamton’s ankle, leaving as quickly as it came, and he jumped, back going stark straight at the feeling. He fought the urge to tear his eyes away from those specks of gold to check what it was and prayed that the thing that touched him wasn’t a Maus. As far as he knew, the Cyber Grill didn’t have a Maice infestation. Hopefully. But then he felt something again, and this time it snaked itself around his shaking leg, curling, caressing him through his slacks.
Caressing?
Oh.
Holy shit.
That wasn’t a Maus.
That was.
Jevil.
He had a tail. That swishing, T-shaped tail. The same tail he had curled so casually around the leg of that stool earlier, was now curled around Spamton’s own leg, teasing. Jevil had to be a mind reader on top of everything else, because there was just no other way he knew. No way he knew that this was exactly what Spamton had thought about before when he had the whole room captivated by his words. Spamton’s eyes widened, yet he held his ground, even as the slight uptick in Jevil’s grin challenged him to look away, daring him to say something. Jevil used the surprising strength in his tail to tug on his leg, and Spamton gasped.
That was it. Spamton was going to die right then and there, in the middle of the Cyber Grill with a forgotten cigarette in his hand and a strange man with a strange way with words feeling up his leg under the table. There was only so much a man could take. He’d encountered people who were extremely forward before and they were looking for a night of fun with Spamton G. Spamton, which he would gladly take them up on, or they were just a minor celebrity that the Voice had him pursuing so he could date them for a few months for publicity.
But this…this was something else. Jevil was clearly aware of the attraction he felt, and if he was toying with him in this way he had to have felt the same. He spoke of the real man beneath the big shot, Spamton the confident yet nervous wreck of an Addison, and how he wanted to play his game with him. Whether Spamton liked it or not, he was part of Jevil’s game from the moment he walked on stage. And despite not understanding the rules or what the win condition was, Spamton found himself wanting to keep playing. However, there was a chance, the rational part of his brain supplied, that Jevil was merely using him for amusement and was going to laugh in his idiotic face before leaving the self-proclaimed big shot alone, flustered, and embarrassed.
But rationality didn’t get him where he was now. Rationality would have seen him hang up the phone on that fateful day, doomed to rely on his fellow Addisons’ charity and pity just to survive.
Forget rationality. Even the playing field, big shot. Do your job and make him an offer he can’t refuse.
Spamton steeled himself and straightened his tie, the recycle bin full of his trashed confidence now opened.
Right click. Restore.
It wasn't all there, just bits and bytes of broken pieces; Jevil had made damn sure of that. But he had enough to break free of the spell the jester had him under, just for this moment.
Spamton once made a deal with an angel, his saving grace.
Maybe it was time to make a deal with the devil.
“Let’s play something different,” he declared, eyes still locked with Jevil’s.
Jevil chuckled, softer than he had all night. That expression of his was nothing short of wicked. “Oh? Are you not having fun, fun?” Still playing his unnamed game, still playing by his own rules, he flicked the bar of his tail against Spamton’s calf—once, twice, punctuating his vocal tic—nearly making Spamton lose his already unsteady hold on his cigarette and his sanity. Bastard.
Shaking his head almost desperately, Spamton spoke through gritted teeth. “No. Your game’s not fair. And you said you only played fair.”
“Ah, so he does listen!” Jevil exclaimed, suddenly louder than before. A few people nearby had turned their heads to locate the source of the reverberating voice, but Jevil didn’t seem to care about the attention he’d drawn. “It seems that I’ve been proven wrong, wrong!”
“Shut up.” Spamton hissed, leaning forward, as he felt the eyes of outsiders honing in on this bubble of theirs that they created. As much as he liked the validating attention of a crowd, this felt intrusive. Wrong. Like the only eyes that should be on them were each other’s…
Snap out of it. You just met the guy. Focus.
They sat in suffocating silence until their intruders turned their attention elsewhere. Spamton swallowed, took a shuddering breath, remembered his cigarette. It took more effort than it should have to bring it to his lips. The smell of smoke and the neon tinted haze soothed him, anchored him. The slight pressure of Jevil’s tail, which made itself at home wrapped around Spamton’s now steady leg, felt crushing.
He wished it were tighter. Higher.
Stop.
“We’re gonna play my game now, a salesman’s game,” Spamton whispered, echoing Jevil’s words from earlier.
The lights in Jevil’s eyes seemed to twinkle, expression curious now that Spamton finally decided to take matters into his own hands. He mirrored Spamton’s positioning and leaned forward with his arms crossed on the table, meeting him halfway, Spamton’s longer-than-average Addison nose just barely keeping Jevil at a distance that would allow him to remain somewhat sane.
There was another teasing tug on Spamton’s leg, drawing them closer under the table where only they were aware. He inhaled sharply at the sudden movement, brain registering the sickly sweet scent of cotton candy and marshmallows that wafted off Jevil’s fur, and yet as his lungs filled with sugar and smoke, it made his mouth water for even a single taste.
“Turning the odds in your favor?” Jevil replied, quieter this time to match Spamton’s volume, but breathier.
Now that they were closer, Spamton realized Jevil’s cheeks had the slightest amount of duskiness to them—not as severe as the glowing red on his own cheeks, but there. It seemed that he wasn’t as in control of the game as he led on. Or maybe, as he wanted to be. In this, they were the same, and Spamton didn’t know what to think about that.
“L-Like I said the last time”—Spamton took a deep, shuddering breath, aggressively shoved the butt of his cigarette into the table to put it out, as if it had offended him—“Just evening out the playing field.”
Jevil sat, waited, brought a clawed hand up to his face to rest upon it. Blinked slowly, curiously. Waiting for the new rules and the new game to be announced, still looking past Spamton’s nose and into the tiny black dots of his eyes.
And with the last of his tattered confidence, Spamton opened his mouth once more…and then he realized his error, that he’d gazed into the abyss for far too long.
The abyss gazed back, inches away, but within it, he saw the light.
Lights.
Two of them.
Heaven.
Like he’d done before, the first time he tried to speak to the captivating man in front of him, Spamton reached for his voice.
But nothing came.