Chapter Text
Thirty-six
The morning after Sinsmas, Blitzø unwraps himself from around Stolas and gingerly moves out from underneath their shared blanket. His feathered face is still damp with tears and - even asleep - Stolas shifts uncomfortably in place, all four eyes scrunched tightly shut. Blitzø rubs one hand over his cheek, drying it as best as he can. He offers a smile that Stolas can't see and then turns his back to him, something more important to deal with.
The pills.
Blitzø pads over to the kitchen, stepping carefully around the creaky floorboards. In their flat, that means long strides on tip-toe. With a stiff breath, he plants himself in front of the sink.
Their landlord sucks and Blitzø hasn't seen a handyman since the guy who came to ‘service’ their boiler eight months ago just fucked it irreparably. Most of their crap doesn't work and half the ‘fun’ of being broke is being surrounded by unfixed shit. The kitchen sink is much the same. Of the four pipes that run underneath it, only three actually carry water. One’s technically sewage overflow, another’s ice cold in winter and Satan's scorching asshole in summer. The third pipe is okay, though it has the pressure of a paraplegic’s hand job. Those three play russian roulette for who's providing water and who's draining it. Every morning starts with a prayer circle that pipes no2 and no3 are the only ones playing. Today, that can wait.
The fourth pipe is eternally empty. Blitzø has tried unclogging it, cleaning it, blowing it, enema-ing it - everything short of paying someone to fix it, really. Now, he's thankful. He crouches down and unscrews the top part, sticking his hand into its dry interior. His claws brush against plastic and he plucks the bottle up with a quiet rattle.
Blitzø never knew that Stolas took pills. It is Hell; for every one demon there's at least two vices. Blitzø personally indulges in unabashed violence, seething self-hatred, and nasty as shit sex stuff. He always figured that Stolas joined him in the latter and they ended up perfectly on average. Pills, though? He's throwing curve balls that Blitzø can't suck.
Looking back over his shoulder, Blitzø sees that Stolas remains un-soundly asleep on the sofa. He unscrews the lid and carefully pours the bottle’s contents onto the tiled floor. There are a few more than half the pills left, so small and so pink and so damn unassuming. They're not the exact same, but Blitzø has seen similar before - from scrubbing Barbie's vomit off the carpet after her first OD. He swallows around his dry throat at the memory.
Not like a fucking psycho, he counts every single pill, moving them from one tile to the next. Thirty-six. The label says to take one-to-two a day. Blitzø scoffs. He tips thirty-five of them back into the bottle and returns the whole thing to the hiding spot in the pipe, screwing it back into place under the sink. He drops the singular remaining pill onto a plate and gets to work steeping some tea for Stolas.
With the kettle whistling, he wakes up pretty quickly. He still doesn't move. Blitzø pours their sweetest cereal into a bowl and covers it in the fancy-ass plant milk that Stolas pretends he doesn't prefer. He makes up a third plate as well - filling it with toast - in case that’s what Stolas is in the mood for today. Circus experience be damned, it's still a struggle to carry all that shit over to the sofa at once.
Stolas barely looks at Blitzø or the tea or the cereal or the toast. He scoops the pill off its plate and downs it dry, only then blinking up at Blitzø. He stares expectantly, as though he might vomit a second one into his mouth like a real momma bird.
Blitzø does his best to smile, nudging the bowl of cereal forward. “I made your favourite.”
Stolas shrugs. He takes the mug of tea only because Blitzø presses it so firmly into his lax hands. It's yellow and a bit chipped but usually the design makes him giggle - a pattern of sunflowers with a big pair of overalls on one side. Underneath it says ‘wanna get in my plants?’. Comedic genius, Stolas used to think. Fucking horrendous, Blitzø still knows.
Now, Blitzø grins at him with painfully clenched teeth, waiting for him to laugh. Stolas doesn't so much as twitch, slender fingers wrapped around the mug, not going to drink it. His own face falls.
He leaves the cereal and the toast on the coffee table in case Stolas changes his mind. Then, Blitzø goes back to the kitchen. He picks out enough assorted fruit that it would probably be faster to take the whole bowl over instead, just on the off chance Stolas might somehow be more likely to eat unripe grapes over sugary greed seed.
The whole time, Blitzø's doesn't spare so much as a glance to the kitchen sink.
Thirty-three
A few days later, Stolas has barely improved. Blitzø thought maybe mindless TV would help pull him from his daughter-less, depressed funk so he’s played the shittiest, corniest romance channel for about seventy straight hours. Every time Stolas' pretty eyes go cold and dull, Blitzø turns up the volume and points at the screen at each minor plot beat, like Stolas is blind and dumb and won't know what's happening otherwise.
When Blitzø has to cook or call M&M to keep I.M.P afloat during his absence, Loona keeps Stolas company instead. She doesn't talk to him but she does force him to sit up, occupying the other seat on the sofa. During those short stretches, Stolas just about stops wilting into the cushions long enough to look halfway alive. Or maybe just a quarter. Blitzø hopes it's a start.
The show currently on isn't the usual Hell-a-Novela that Stolas used to be obsessed with. This one has no Gabriella and no Alejandro, but it does have shameless rip-offs called Lucia and Gonzalo. A few months ago, Stolas would have rather been boiled alive than watch them for one infuriating minute. But today…
Well, maybe being boiled alive just seems fucking swell now, who the hell knows.
Loona's tail thumps against the back of the sofa, not really wagging as much as it's twitching. Stolas just barely looks towards her and Blitzø’s hands squeeze around the spoon he's using to mix their marinara. That’s more than they’ve seen all week.
“Isn’t she the cunt from that shitty film?” Loona asks.
Stolas’ attention melts away almost immediately and Blitzø clears his throat, trying to cling to it. “Which shitty film?”
Loona turns around, kneeling on the cushions and leaning towards the kitchen. Like this, her tail nudges against Stolas' shoulder. Hopefully, this might keep him present.
“You know,” she repeats, “the shitty one.”
“Come on, Looney,” he tries, “you gotta be more specific. Voxflix is, like, excludingly shitty films. And mediocre porn.”
Stolas mumbles then, the first time he's made a non-crying sound in over three days.
“Exclusively.”
Blitzø struggles with a response. “What?”
Stolas sighs. “Exclusively shitty films. Not ‘excludingly’.”
“Oh.”
“And,” he continues quietly, “this actress plays Ramona Rawdog in Ultimate Cleavage 13, that's likely what Loona is thinking of. Her performance was… eager.”
Something tight and sore inside Blitzø's chest relaxes. He unclenches his fist, letting the spoon fall to one side of the bowl and depositing the whole thing onto the counter. As he walks round to the living room, he swears he feels a bit lighter.
Dinner can wait for a bit, he decides. He sits in the narrow spot left between Loona and Stolas, his tail wrapping around Stolas' small waist. He doesn't really react to Blitzø, eyes back on the TV. They're a little glassy, but not as unfocused as before.
“Millie loves that cleave crap,” he says, to drag on the one conversation Stolas might engage in. “But I think they fucked the fleshlight too many times after number eight and ended up gross and sticky, you know.”
Loona bristles. “Ew.”
Stolas sort of hums, sort of ignores him. Blitzø is listening so closely that he could probably convince himself a single cough is a full, articulate sentence.
He tries a few more times, as many topics as he can come up with. Like that one spark has died out, Stolas retreats back into himself further and further with each word from Blitzø's mouth. He rubs his tail over Stolas' hip and smiles like it doesn't fucking hurt.
Dinner that night is silent. Only Loona really eats it.
Thirty
Almost a full week since Sinsmas, Blitzø can't justify staying home with Stolas any longer. Maybe if he hadn't totally fucked M&M’s pensions back in November, sure, but he did fuck them and he fucked them hard.
As always, he wakes up first and starts on breakfast. He unscrews the fourth pipe under the sink and pulls out the bottle of pills. Counting them to make sure none are missing, he leaves one on Stolas' plate and goes to put the rest back. And yet… Blitzø can't quite seem to let go of them.
Today will be Stolas’ first time alone since the last time he was alone. Which just happened to be his big, stupid trip to the palace and his almost-quasi-suicide-death thing. Not that the memories are haunting Blitzø or some shit. He's A-okay, obviously.
And Stolas doesn't know where his pills are, but - if Blitzø isn't here to help keep his spirits up - will he look for them? The hiding place is good but the apartment is small. Stolas is smart and he can be really fucking stubborn. What if he finds the bottle and he panics or he gets too sad or he just gets confused and he takes too many? And then what if Blitzø comes home to find -
He shoves the bottle into his trouser pocket. It's cool against his leg, too wide to be completely unnoticeable. Blitzø pulls his jacket on too, trying to cover the bulge.
Stolas wakes up about ten minutes later. He needs a shower. He hasn't really done anything to get dirty, but his feathers are dry and untidy, small tufts dislodged from days without any preening and weeks without a full one. Blitzø can probably look up how to do that later.
“Hey, Stols,” he greets.
Blitzø places a plate full of waffles on the coffee table. They're covered in syrup and they're golden brown. Picture perfect, if only Stolas would look at them. Instead, he grabs the pill and swallows it straight away.
There must be something he'll eat.
Trying again, Blitzø says, “I'm going into the office today. You wanna come with?”
Stolas shakes his head, face tipped down. Secretly, Blitzø is thankful. It's more dangerous at the office.
“We only have two sets of keys,” he lies, “so I'll lock this door behind me, okay? If you need anything, you just gotta call.”
His head nods this time, which is close to progress. Blitzø’s claws dig into his palms. He’ll lock the balcony door too.
“You’ve really gotta call,” he repeats, “cos it's fuckin’ dangerous, yeah? And I have the crystal so if there's anything. Splinter or stab wound or if you're just kinda horny - capiche?”
Stolas almost smiles, he thinks, though it could just as easily be a trick of the light. He nods again, then reaches for his fork.
Of three waffles, he eats only half of one. Blitzø watches every mouthful, cooing and clapping over this tiny shred of improvement. When Stolas is done, Blitzø presses himself against his side, rubbing his cheek into the feathers at his bicep. Stolas tuts softly at him, but leans in as well.
“Have a good day,” he says, voice croaky with disuse. “I'll be okay,” he promises.
Blitzø takes a deep inhale, comforted by the scent of staleness and dust. “You have a good day for me, yeah?”
Stolas doesn't nod this time, but Blitzø hadn’t either. He kisses him on the shoulder, then cleans up their breakfast shit. Loona gets up five minutes before they're set to leave and he hurries her out the door, taking all the keys and locking it behind them.
Twenty-nine
That morning, there's four back-to-back hits. On the bright side, they're all fast as shit and precisely planned out - Moxxie's one virtue. It's easy as sin for Blitzø to throw himself right into the deep end and to pretend for a few hours that everything is fine. They traipse around a housing development in Wisconsin, through a flooded aquarium in fucking Canada, down ski slopes is damn Bulgaria, and over the Massive Fuck-off Wall of China in - well, he forgets the specifics of that one.
If Blitzø is disappointed to find the pill bottle still securely in his pocket when they get back to the office, well, fuck.
It's after lunch when the problems start. Blitzø shuts himself away to do research. He starts by looking up preening videos and gets bombarded with bird porn from avian sinners. Fun in theory, really annoying right this second. When (if) Stolas is in the mood for fucking again, he'll definitely revisit for ideas.
He tries searching again, typing out, ‘bird prening. for cleenin. NOT fuckin.’ Only about half the results involve wet cloacas this time so Blitzø can rest somewhat easy, watching through the more tame videos. Since life sucks and capitalism fucks everyone eventually, he gets a shitty midroll ad. Unskippable! He reaches for his phone, planning to check on Stolas as it plays, when the tinny voice catches his attention.
“You in Hell?” The baphomet asks. “Of course you are! You were shitty up there so now you're down in the shit with us. No worries though! Her highness Belphagor has just the thing.”
The screen switches to a cheery montage of sinners and imps frolicking around the pink fields of gluttony, heads literally in the clouds. It’s the most obvious green screen since that fake-ass bomb showed up in Sin City. The actors’ eyes sparkle and their mouths are stretched into tight, unrelenting grins. Blitzø scowls down at them.
The baphomet continues, voicing over the video. “With ‘Happy Pills’, you too can escape the constant shitty fuckery of Hell! Speak to your doctor about a prescription.” In the ad, the imps and sinners smile even wider somehow, and the baphomet's voice continues quietly and much more quickly. “Terms and conditions apply. Side effects may include nausea, weight gain, insomnia or drowsiness, dry mouth, blurred vision, constipation, dizziness, and sexual dysfunction. Serious effects include suicidal thoughts and serotonin syndrome. If you're a hellborn, never go over the prescribed number of pills. If you're a sinner - go fucking wild!”
The ad ends and the preening video resumes. Blitzø is deaf to it but pauses it anyway. He pulls the bottle from his pocket and squints at the tiny text on its label, finding it incomprehensible. But he's just heard it.
He takes an unsteady breath in. Side effects, right, it's medication. Nausea and dizziness suck for sure, but Stolas could probably do with some weight gain, if Blitzø is being honest. Sexual dysfunction doesn't matter if they're not having sex in the first place. And then -
Well, the last two. Blitzø resolves not to think about that one, but does type in ‘serotonin syndrome’ in case - by some fucking miracle - it means immediate depression cure.
It doesn't.
Serotonin syndrome is a potentially life-threatening drug reaction caused by excessive serotonin accumulation in the nervous system, usually within 24 hours of starting or increasing serotonergic medication.
Blitzø could throw his laptop through the fucking window. He could throw himself right along with it.
Stolas could have died. Blitzø didn't read the side effects and let him take pills that could kill him. Just starting the shitty meds could have offed him on that first day after Sinsmas. Blitzø thought counting the pills and making sure Stolas only had one a day would be enough but he was wrong and stupid and beyond naive. He wants to be comforted by the fact that Stolas hasn't died. If starting the pills again didn't kill him, then surely he must be used to them by now? But there's that one word:
‘Usually.’
Can Blitzø really risk Stolas on ‘usually’?
A knock on his office door pulls him from his thoughts. He makes some half-formed, surprised yowling sound rather than replying with words and Millie takes it as an invitation.
“Heya, B,” she says, “me ‘n Moxx gonna head out now, if that's okay? He's heard about this - uh, gun? - sale startin’ at five and -” she stumbles over her next word, taking Blitzø’s pallid face in, “- y’alright?”
Blitzø tries to say yes. He clears his throat and steals himself and everything. “I'm just - it's… fuckin’ no.”
She frowns at him, circling round and perching on his desk. She gets a great view of his laptop screen, preening video paused in one corner with the serotonin syndrome search results taking up most of the display. Millie looks down at his hands, the pill bottle clutched in one hand.
“They're Stolas',” he gives in way of explanation.
“I figured.”
Blitzø clenches his fist. “I can't believe I was letting him take them.”
“Well… they are his prescription. He must need them.”
He rolls his eyes. “Yeah? Have you seen those doctors in Sloth? You pay ‘em good enough or you fuck ‘em good enough and they'll give you as much as you can shove up your ass on the way out.”
He remembers Barbie's first prescription. Just before the circus burned down, she'd fallen from the trapeze and broken her leg. She'd still been in hospital when all the other shit happened. When that first run of pills ran out, she begged for a second. When she OD’d on that, she woke up begging for more, for stronger. And no matter what Blitzø said to the doctors, she always got it. Human drugs are a piss take to imps but that shit? The stuff made in Hell?
Blitzø can't survive Stolas being on it too.
“But if he does need it,” Millie barrels on, “ain't it more dangerous to take it away from him?”
“He was fine all last month.”
“Was he?” She pushes.
Helplessly, he shrugs. “I thought so! Fuck, he was better than he is now at least.” A scary thought dawns on him. “He’s way worse now. Could the pills have -”
“I really don't think so,” she says, “he's not been on ‘em more than a week. They're probably still takin’ effect.”
“You're just guessing.”
“So are you.”
Blitzø groans, head falling into his hands. “I hate this shit. I shouldn't give them back.”
Millie hums. “Talk to Stolas, yeah? You gotta trust him to tell you what's up.”
Yeah, right. That never worked with Barbie. Maybe Stolas will agree to a month of rehab too, then crack three ribs on the first night jumping out the window to escape.
Blitzø tries to be more reasonable out loud. “He got these -” he rattles the bottle, “- back when he was a prissy shit prince. Fucking immortal. He won't know his not-immortal, very killable limits.”
Millie bites her lip. “I ‘spose. We don't… in Wrath, it ain't the fashion to be poppin’ pills. But I still think you should talk to him.”
He tells her he will but he doesn't plan to. After M&M leave for the day and Loona falls asleep at her desk, Blitzø is torn between pouring all twenty-nine pills down the bathroom sink or dumping them in the trash outside. Then, he remembers Octavia coming all the way from the palace to drop them off, the very last thing she did before breaking Stolas' soft, sad heart.
Blitzø buries the bottle in his top desk drawer, pulling loose sheets of paperwork and bills over them. He takes Loona home without looking back.