Chapter Text
It was practically like any other day, waking up to nothing but headaches every morning. With a muttered groan, you'd sit up on the bed feeling all groggy as your vision tried to adjust to the light the best it could. Your limbs felt sore, just like every other morning and waking day. A bad taste always present in your mouth, but you could never tell if it was from the taste of the alcohol or the consumption of the raw flesh and meat you've chosen to survive on. Not the healthiest diet in the world, but you didn't need to be convinced that there were probably other diets out there that are much worse than your own.
You managed, you always did. Without any complaints as well.
You'd sit up on the bed, the clawing feeling of the past wounds reacting to each movement you make every waking second. It gave an almost pleasurable feeling, but it was one that was easy to not react to. The sunlight shone in through your balcony door, lighting up the room with its glow. A sigh left your lips as you finally got up from the bed, it making a muffled creak as you got up from it. You stretched out your limbs before heading your way into the bathroom. It was cold in here. The cold air brushed against your past scars as the messily done stitches on your face, it was enough to send a small shiver down your spine. Your body guided you to the sink, looking up at the mirror ahead.
No wonder why people were disturbed or afraid by your appearance, you were disgusting. You knew that, but it never affected you. If anything, it amused you how quickly people would fold in your presence face-to-face. You even had people who acted like completely jackasses to feel intimidated by your appearance. Your hands traced over the stitching over your face, it was the most visible one as it was.. well, on your face. On display for the whole world to see. It was messily done, done in a way that'd make it seem obvious no medical professional had done it. It wasn't too fucked up, but it wasn't prefect. The rest of your body wasn't pretty either, it was a canvas filled with imperfections. Scars, past wounds, dead skin and more stitched skin. Luckily for you, your uniform had long sleeves that covered up the sight of your body. You could only imagine how people would react if they had seen the rest of your body. The pure disgust they'd feel.
"Dad?"
A voice suddenly broke you out of your train of thought, a small voice that could only come out of a mouth of a child. As your head turned towards the door, you saw who you expected to see. Your child, Star. They weren't exactly your child, biologically. It was obvious: The black hair, the light blue eyes, the claws, the completely pale skin, the literal horns and bat wings? There was no doubt that you couldn't biologically react something like this. Your gaze looks down at them, they were quite small. But why wouldn't they be? They're a child. Around 5-6 by the looks of it, you never really bothered to ask them when you took them in.
"I'm hungry," Star spoke, "Can I have something to eat?"
You sighed once more, of course, they're a living being. They need to eat to survive, just like you do. And you're lucky enough that they also eat the raw meats of humans, so feeding them would never be a hassle.
"Go into the kitchen and wait, I'll come after I brush my teeth."
You spoke, your voice was always pretty gruff sounding. It didn't sound the way you wanted it to sound, it was too cold and almost empty. Sometimes it'd come off more emotionless than intended, but not everyone seemed to mind it. Certainly not your child either. Star gave a quick nod before moving away from the doorway to find their way into the kitchen. You muttered a few words underneath your breath before getting your toothbrush and toothpaste to brush your teeth.
It didn't take long before you rinsed your mouth and put your brush away. You left the bedroom, the only intention was for you to go to the kitchen to make something for your child to eat. On your way out, you quickly grabbed your grey, button-up shirt. Putting it over your white T-shirt as you made your way into the kitchen. Star was waiting by the counter, sitting on a stool, looking at you. You silently did your buttons up, the scars on your body now being covered by the grey fabric of the uniform. You'd walk over to the fridge and open it, it was.. definitely weird from a normal person's view. On one hand, you've got vegetables and a few other dairy products. But then the other half is simply just raw, chopped up meats and organs. You were running low on meats however, you'd probably need to go and hunt for some more later on in the night.
"Do you want anything in particular?" You'd ask, just incase they didn't want to eat meat. For a while you've been wondering if you should at least get some other foods, not entirely for yourself but for Star as they can also consume ‘normal’ dishes. Maybe you should, it'd be a easier way to get used to eating normal dishes again. Not that you really had any normal dishes growing up, you were usually starved a lot. You waited on food that never came. You remember the feeling, the feeling of hunger. You remember going nights without anything in your stomach, always needing to clutch it in pain. It was one of the main reasons why you chose such a big turning point in your life. Back then it was easier to excuse, you were a child that needed food to survive. But now, you don't have an excuse. You have the money to buy actual dishes, dishes you've never tried before. Yet you still resort to the disgusting taste of others flesh. "I want to eat.. uh.. uhm.. liver!" Star responded, sounding excited like they always do.
Unable to deny it, you did feel a small sense of warmth for this child. It was not a big feeling, but you knew there was definitely a subtle change on the inside they made you care for this hideous creature. You looked around inside your fridge, you were lucky enough to have some liver on you. Pulling it out of the fridge, you walked over to the cutting board and placed it down. You reached over and grabbed your cleaver, cutting up the liver into bite sized pieces for Star. Cooking it didn't matter, Star was never too picky about how they wanted to eat meats. Despite not having the best eyesight in one eye, you've learned how to do this job with your eyes closed. Able to guide your blade where ever it wanted to go without getting your fingers cut, but you were still careful. You didn't fully trust yourself despite your skills. You chopped away, cutting the liver more before stopping once all the pieces were bite sized. You'd get a bowl and slide all the pieces of chopped liver inside, the blood staining the cutting board, your cleaver and your fingers. Though it was no big deal, you've dealt with worse before. You walked over to where Star was seated, placing the bowl in front of them. Without thinking twice, Star immediately started to eat the pieces one by one. You walked over to the skin, cleaning the blood that stained your fingers and then wiped the cleaver clean, putting it away once its used was done.
"Just leave the bowl in the sink, I'll clean it up when I return home, okay?"
You had told Star before collecting your keys off the counter and walking over to the door. You put on your dark, leather boots while hearing Start mutter something along the lines of an 'Okay' in the background. You unlocked the door before heading off the work, closing the door behind you. Being in public wasn't your favourite thing, but you needed to get to work somehow. You much preferred staying at home, or at least in an area that was much isolated from a crowd of people. You walked along the sidewalk, not paying much attention to your surroundings. Dangerous enough as your couldn't see well in one eye, you could bump into someone or something accidentally.
"Get out of here you freak!"
The voice made you pause midway, turning your attention as to where the voice came from. It was a man, yelling at.. a clown? A clown that was on the floor, his cheek seemed a bit red. The man must have punched him. You didn't necessarily pay attention to the words the man was saying, but you could practically hear the aggression in his voice. Accusatory comments. Violent speeches. There was a lot the man was saying to the clown. Why was there a clown here? You didn't know. You'd notice something on the ground, a poster? Promoting the freak circus of horrors, since when were these around? You suppose this is what you get for not paying attention to your surroundings, you don't get in touch with the events happening in your city. Another yell made you snap out of your train of thought, causing you to look at the scene again.
You should probably go and do something, it wouldn't hurt to prevent someone from getting attacked. Although, it would personally be weird behaviour from you. You practically kill people.
Without another word, you slowly walked over to the scene putting yourself in-between the clown and the man. You eyes gazed down at the man. At first, the man seemed pissed that someone had blocked his view of the clown.
"Who do you hell think you are, you have no right to just barge into this conver—!" However, upon the man looking up to see who had 'rudely' intervened in his shouting fit. He froze, his words slightly trailing off as his gaze met yours. Upon seeing your face, the way you towered over him, your... Appearance. He stammered beneath your gaze, you gave no form of reaction to him.
"I— uh, my– my— apologies, Sir— I didn't mean to.. ahem.. raise my voice at you—" He muttered out a half-assed apology, purely done so that he didn't need to deal with you. Your presence alone made him back down. Despite not giving any form of facial reaction, it amused you to see the way the man turned all quiet when seeing you. Seeing how violent he was before, it was almost laughable seeing him back down and stutter when being around you. You didn't talk, you didn't need to. Your appearance can do the work for you. The man walked away, most likely out 'respect' to not upset you. Majority of the city people knew who you were, not only due to your appearance, but because of an incident a few years back. Since then you've practically given most people this idea that you're not an easy target to mess with.
Once the man was gone, to turned to look at the clown on the floor. No words were spoken from either of you. You reached out a hand, hoping he'd take the help for the very least. As you helped him up, you noticed that he was... Quite tall. Taller than you. He looked at you with a smile. It wasn't even a look of disgust, not fear. Those were usually the two most common reactions to your appearance.
"Hm," you looked at the mark on his cheek. Maybe you have a band aid for him, you usually carry those things around on you. Searching in your pocket, you'd find a pink one. A band aid is still a band aid, right? Hopefully this clown wouldn't mind. "Use this, if it still hurts I'd advise you to go to a doctor."
The red clown smiled before taking the bandaid from you. You could notice a faint redness on the man's cheek, not from the punch. Almost as if he was, blushing? Maybe you're imagining things. He was silent, almost like you. The tension was awfully awkward for you, so you simply carried on walking. You didn't really have anything else to say to the clown after that interaction, you just needed to get to work and do your job. You've came late on several occasions, but they usually let you off. You believe it has something to do with the vibes that you just give but you never really questioned it.
The interaction was probably a one-time thing, you never really interacted with all the people other than Carol and your child, Star. You've interacted with a few of your co-workers before but it's never really full-blown conversations outside of work related concerns. You didn't think much of the clown, as you thought it'd be just a single interaction.
There's no way you'd run into him again.