Work Text:
Spamton takes a long drag of his cigarette, the ember flaring bright in the dim light of his office.
The smoke curls upward in slow, deliberate spirals, caught in the weak spin of the ceiling fan before flattening against the stained tiles.
The blinds are drawn tight. Neon bleeds faintly around their edges, painting thin stripes across the cluttered floor. His desk is buried in contracts and assignment sheets, red ink circling deadlines that feel closer by the hour. The desk lamp casts a sharp yellow glow over everything, turning the room into something small and interrogative.
It feels less like an office.
More like a confession booth.
He balances the receiver between his shoulder and ear, cord stretched thin across the desk.
“So. Easy week, huh?” he says lightly. “Figured you’d dump another mountain of work on me like you’ve been doing.”
He flips a page with one finger, scanning numbers he hasn’t actually read.
A pause answers him. Long enough to make his smile strain. Long enough for the faint hum of the line to feel intentional.
“I thought I would allow you some space,” the voice replies smoothly. “You seemed… preoccupied. I was unaware that your assignment included getting close to the host.”
Spamton goes very still.
The chair legs scrape softly as all four settle flat against the floor. The fan overhead clicks once as it turns.
It has only been a few days. He has been careful. Careful about who might see. Careful about where his hands rest. Careful about the way his voice shifts when Tenna laughs too close to him. Careful about the way he lingers after the cameras cut.
“… how did you find out.”
A quiet chuckle hums through the receiver. Low. Amused.
“I have eyes everywhere. Do not make the mistake of thinking you can hide from me.”
Spamton crushes the cigarette into the ashtray until it bends, paper tearing under the pressure. Ash scatters across the glass tray like gray snow.
His reflection in the dark window looks back at him, distorted by the thin neon stripes bleeding through the blinds.
The voice continues, unhurried.
“You have been neglecting your assignments. So I will offer you an incentive. Finish everything on your desk, and I will reward you with an interesting piece of information.”
His jaw tightens. A muscle flickers beneath his eye.
“What kind of information?”
Another soft laugh.
“Finish your work.”
The line clicks dead.
The dial tone hums for a moment longer before Spamton lowers the receiver slowly back into its cradle.
The office feels smaller now. Quieter. The neon outside flickers, throwing the shadows into motion.
“… yeah. Great. Fantastic.”
He rubs a hand down his face, smearing ash along his cheek without noticing.
He looks at the stacks of paper. The red ink. The circled dates. The numbers that never seem to shrink no matter how much he signs.
The cigarette burns out in the tray beside him.
“… what did I get myself into.”
—
Tenna talks in his sleep.
Spamton learned that the first night he stayed over.
Tenna’s apartment is warmer than the studio. Cables run neatly along the walls. The air hums faintly with electricity, a constant quiet presence beneath everything else.
The first time the light flickered across Spamton’s eyelids, he thought he was dreaming.
He opened his eyes. Tenna lay beside him, still asleep. Antenna slack. Expression soft in a way Spamton never sees when cameras are on him. His breathing came slow and even.
The screen was awake.
Tenna talks in his sleep.
Not in words. Not in murmurs.
His screen displays.
Spamton has learned, in the short time he has been here, that the dreams (could you call them that?) follow patterns.
The first ones are usually flimshoots.
Fragments from earlier in the day. Studio lights flaring too bright. A camera turning before it should. The edge of a backdrop. Tenna mid-introduction, smile fixed and gleaming, then dropping it between breaths. A hand to his antenna. A quiet adjustment of a dial.
They are brief. Unpolished. Gone in seconds.
Common.
After that, the signal tends to falter.
Color bars fill the screen. Vertical stripes, stark and saturated. A thin electric whine slips into the room beneath the apartment’s steady hum. Static creeps along the edges of the display. The image rolls once, twice, like it is searching for the right channel and failing to land on it.
That, too, is common.
And then—
Spamton.
Not framed for broadcast. Not buffered by graphics or applause. Just him, caught at strange angles. Mid-laugh. Mid-gesture. Smile stretching a fraction too wide before it softens. His hands straightening his tie when he thinks no one is looking. The slight hitch in his posture between lines.
Those dreams have been appearing more often.
Spamton never looks away from them fast enough.
Then there's the ones that make something inside him feel thin.
Being a television Darkner gives him a clearer connection to the Light World than most. He can see it in fragments. Brief glimpses. Movements through a lens that exists somewhere beyond this one. Most Darkners can only sense when they are picked up and used. Tenna can watch.
And when he dreams, the signal bleeds through.
The screen glows softly in the dark.
It shows the Dreemurr house.
Always the living room.
Spamton recognizes it instantly now. The couch pushed against the wall. The soft carpet. The lamp in the corner casting a warm pool of light. Family photos lining the shelf. The angle stays almost the same every time, as if the television in that house is watching back through the glass.
Tonight the living room sits empty.
The lamp is on. Shadows stretch across the carpet.
Spamton slowly sits up in bed.
His reflection overlays faintly against the image on the screen. If he leans forward, if he narrows his eyes, it almost looks like he is standing there himself.
Almost.
His chest tightens painfully.
Freedom feels inches away. Close enough to imagine stepping into. Close enough to ache.
He hates it.
He pushes the blankets aside and stands, gathering his clothes from the floor. He pulls on what he needs and tucks the rest under his arm. The living room remains still behind him, unchanged and unreachable.
There is a soft click as Tenna begins to wake.
“Spamton?”
He pauses at the door.
“Where are you going?”
Spamton keeps his back to him.
“Just remembered I’ve got some work to finish before tomorrow,” he lies. “Didn’t wanna forget.”
There is a quiet rustle of sheets. He hopes Tenna won't call his bluff.
Instead he just hears a soft sigh. “… Right. Okay. Sorry for keeping you up.”
Spamton feels his heart break. Just a little bit.
“Shut the door on your way out?”
Spamton nods once and leaves without looking back.
—
He finishes everything.
Every assignment. Every contract. Every ridiculous request.
He works past midnight most nights. The neon outside his window flickers off and on and off again while he signs his name in tight, mechanical strokes. He doesn’t stay the night at Tenna’s. Doesn’t linger anywhere he might be tempted to stay.
Paper shifts from one stack to another. Ink dries. Deadlines are crossed out.
By Thursday, his hand aches.
By Friday, his desk is clear.
When the phone rings in his office at the end of the week, he answers before the first ring fully fades.
The receiver is already at his ear.
“Well done,” the voice says pleasantly. “It seems you were quite motivated.”
“I just had a productive week,” Spamton replies flatly. “Don’t read into it.”
A hum of amusement answers him. Soft. Knowing.
“As promised. Listen carefully.”
Spamton grips the receiver tighter. The coiled cord creaks faintly under the strain.
The voice lowers.
[THE LORD OF SCREENS CLEAVED RED BY THE BLADE]
The words don't echo or distort. They land clean.
They settle heavy in the room.
Spamton’s breath catches.
That is a prophecy line. The kind whispered about in back rooms behind shuttered shopfronts. The kind passed between Darkners in low voices when the lights dim. The kind tied to endings that cannot be undone.
He has heard fragments before. Half-verses. Broken warnings.
Never this one.
“The Lord of Screens,” he repeats faintly after the silence stretches.
He can hear his own pulse in his ears.
The line goes dead.
No click of laughter. No further explanation. Just the dial-tone of a severed connection.
He lowers the phone slowly, placing it back in its cradle with more care than he usually gives anything.
Tenna is called that sometimes. Half-joking. Half-reverent. A title tossed around on set with a grin.
Lord of Screens.
It can’t be him.
The image tries to form anyway.
Bright smile. Antenna gleaming under studio lights..
A cold weight sinks into his stomach.
“… you’ve gotta be kidding me.”
—
It feels like déjà vu.
Spamton lies awake in Tenna’s bed again, staring at the ceiling.
No flickering tonight. The screen remains dark, the red standby light dim and steady.
He turns onto his side. Then onto his back. Then onto his other side.
The sheets rustle.
“You’ve been doing that for days,” Tenna murmurs, voice thick with sleep. “You’re not resting at all. Spamton, what’s wrong?”
Spamton swallows.
This is his chance.
One clean cut before everything tangles too tight.
“I can’t do this.”
The mattress dips sharply as Tenna pushes himself upright.
“What?” he asks immediately. “What do you mean you can’t?”
Spamton sits up slowly, keeping his eyes fixed on the far wall.
“Us,” he says quietly. “This. I can’t keep doing it. I need to stop.”
There is a beat of stunned silence.
“Stop?” Tenna repeats, the word cracking. “Stop what? Stop staying over? Stop… what are you saying?”
“We should’ve just stayed business partners,” Spamton forces out. “That’s all this was supposed to be.”
“No.” The word comes out fast. “No, that’s not— Spamton, where is this coming from?”
He stands, gathering his clothes from the floor.
“Did I do something?” Tenna’s voice rises, panic creeping in. “Tell me if I did. I can fix it. I can change it. Just don’t— don’t say it like that.”
Spamton keeps his back to him.
“It’s not about you.”
“Then look at me!” Tenna says, louder now. “If it’s not about me then look at me and say it.”
Spamton’s shoulders hitch.
“I wish I could have you,” he blurts, the words tearing out of him raw and unpolished.
Tenna freezes.
“You do have me,” he says, confusion overtaking the panic. “Spamton, we’re already together. You have all of me. I’m right here.”
Spamton lets out a sound that is almost a laugh and almost a sob.
“That’s not what I mean.”
He presses a hand hard against his face, fingers digging in as if he can hold something back by force alone. His shoulders shake despite him.
“You could never understand,” he says, voice breaking clean in two. “You don’t know what it’s like to want something you’re already holding and still feel it slipping through your fingers.”
Tenna stares at him.
“Then explain it to me,” he says, softer now. “Help me understand.”
Spamton shakes his head violently.
“I can’t.” he chokes. “I can’t tell you.
He reaches the door.
There is a sudden movement behind him, quick and unsteady. Fingers close tight around his wrist.
He turns despite himself.
Tenna is standing there, antenna drooping low, hands trembling where they grip him.
“You can’t just leave,” Tenna says, breath hitching. “You can’t just say it’s over and walk out. Not like this. Not without explaining.”
His grip tightens.
“Please,” he says again, more desperate now. “If something’s wrong, we’ll figure it out. We always do. Just don’t walk away. Don’t— don’t leave me here like this.”
Spamton feels the burn of that touch all the way up his arm.
Tears slip free despite everything, wrong and fragile.
Cut the strings.
Move on.
“I’ll sign your contract tomorrow,” he says quietly. “You won’t have to worry about me after that.”
Tenna startles.
“That’s not what I’m worried about,” he says, voice breaking. “Spamton, please—”
Spamton pulls his hand free.
Tenna reaches after him, fingers catching only air.
“Spamton, wait— please, just talk to me—”
He opens the door.
He does not let himself stop.
He does not let himself turn back.
—
He finds himself in his office a few days later, and everything about it feels staged.
Spamton’s office is too bright. The blinds are half open, thin stripes of light cutting across the desk like bars. Everything else has been cleared away. No stacks. No clutter. Just a single folder placed neatly in the center.
Tenna sits across from him.
He looks polished. Composed. Antenna carefully straightened. Hands folded tight in his lap like if he lets them move they might shake apart.
He is not looking at Spamton.
Spamton had expected this to be simple.
Sign the contract. Get it over with. Move forward.
Instead, Tenna had been scarce for days.
No lingering after tapings. No quiet knocks at his office door. No late night calls. Messages routed through assistants. Smiles delivered only when cameras were on.
Once or twice, Spamton thought he caught him watching from across the studio floor, only for Tenna to turn away first.
Avoiding him.
The explanation, when it finally comes, is light. Casual.
“I needed to fix a few things in the contract,” Tenna says, as if that accounts for the distance.
As if revisions require silence.
He still does not quite meet Spamton’s eyes.
Spamton opens the folder and scans the pages. He already knows every line. Partnership dissolved. Obligations fulfilled. No lingering clauses. No ties.
The paper is crisp. Recently printed.
There are faint impressions beneath the final draft, barely visible where the light strikes at an angle. Indentations from previous pages. Paragraphs longer than the ones that remain.
Language once denser.
The margins are narrower now. The promises shorter.
What sits between them is clean. Purely transactional.
A segment in exchange for a secret.
Exposure in exchange for confession.
An ending carefully outlined in polite, airtight terms.
Tenna’s fingers press faint crescents into his sleeves as Spamton turns the page.
Everything necessary is there. Nothing more.
Final.
“Is everything in order?” Tenna asks, voice carefully level.
“Yeah,” Spamton says. “It’s clean.”
A small nod.
“If you need more time—”
“I don’t,” Tenna says quickly, cutting himself off just as fast.
Silence presses in.
Spamton picks up the pen.
The sound of it scratching across the paper feels deafening. Each letter of his name carves itself in slow, deliberate strokes.
When he finishes, he sets the pen down.
The soft click echoes.
Tenna inhales sharply.
Spamton glances up before he can stop himself.
Tenna has turned his head away completely. One hand is pressed hard against the lower edge of his screen, fingers curled tight. His shoulders shake once, then again, like he wants to keep it silent.
He can’t even look at him.
“It’s done,” Spamton says, barely above a murmur.
Tenna nods without facing him.
“Okay,” he whispers. “Okay.”
The phone rings.
The sharp trill slices through the room.
Both of them flinch.
Spamton stares at it for a moment before reaching over and picking up the receiver.
He doesn’t speak.
He just listens.
His face drains of color all at once.
The change is immediate and horrifying.
His eyes widen. His pupils shrink. His free hand rises slowly to cover his mouth like he’s trying to hold something inside.
“Spamton?” Tenna says, alarm creeping in. “What is it?”
Spamton’s fingers press harder against his lips. His shoulders tremble. His breath stutters in sharp, uneven pulls.
Tears well in his eyes and spill over before he can blink them back.
He still doesn’t say a word.
He just listens.
“Spamton, please,” Tenna says, standing now. “You’re scaring me.”
Spamton’s grip loosens.
The receiver slips from his hand and hits the floor with a sharp crack.
From it comes nothing but warped, screeching garbage noise. Harsh static. Distorted fragments of sound that do not form words. The line remains open, hissing and crackling against the tile.
Spamton stares at it like it’s bitten him.
Then he grabs his coat from the back of his chair so abruptly it topples over.
“Spamton—”
He’s already moving.
He doesn’t look at Tenna.
He doesn’t speak.
He bolts for the door.
“Spamton, wait—!”
The door slams open.
And he runs.
Behind him, the phone lies on the floor, spilling broken static into the empty office.