Ticci Toby x Reader: Hunted (15)

*before I start typing this I just wanted to say I am so super sorry for keeping you guys waiting... This one will be extra long just for you!

(oh and also, I am giving 'you' kind of like a side quest, no one ever really explained Zalgo so I thought maybe i'd give you some background I made up kinda like a myth on the way... I promise though there will be more Tobyness)

Toby's pov:

"Hey guys!" Pinkamena rejoices. "Uh h-hey..?" I say wishing I wasn't strapped down so I could pinch myself... Pinkamena was missing for a couple years, and to see her now, and here of all places... I just wasn't sure right now. 

"My little pony, friendship is magic!~" Jeff continues singing. "Wow Jeff, Zalgo must have really screwed with your noodle if your singing THAT" Pinkamena giggles lightly to herself. "So w-wait, why are you here Pinkamena..? D-do you work for Zalgo now?" I ask my eyes growing wide as I see her reach for a scalpel... "Yea... I'm not proud of it but... I needed the extra money at the time, and Zalgo was offering benefits for this position..." Pinkamena says polishing the blade of the scalpel with a white dried blood-stained wash cloth, a hint of disappointment filled her voice. 

"S-so are y-you going to kill us?" I ask, I felt the tension in the room grow as dense as maple syrup. "No silly, not yet anyway... Hah just kidding... But I do have a plan to get you to (y/n)... Gossip travels fast in this castle." Pinkamena says cutting the leather arm and leg straps.

Your pov: 

You grab a black cloak from the closet, and put it's hood up. You stash the map into one of the left velvety pocket of the cloak, take a deep breath and step out onto the ledge of the window. 

You carefully side-step across the overhang of the castle walls, hoping to not plummet into the depths of darkness. To your surprise the room's window next door was unlocked, so you opened it and crept inside. The room was dark and the door was closed only, only a single candle in the center of the room brought a dim bit of light around it... The room was cold and gave you an eerie feeling.


Hearing it's soft voice that sounded almost like a cry made you for the wall you scale the walls breathing heavily in dismay trying to find the door. You find a switch and flick it up, a light doesn't come on but something that brings light lowers. A chandelier from the ceiling lowers down, instead of being lit by lightbulbs it too it is lit by candles making the room all the more spookier as it reveals your surroundings.

Your in a room full of dolls, everywhere, not just a single freaky doll... Each one had a forsaken, forlorn expression. Some were boys, others were girls, some had black sparkling wings, others had sets of horns.. There was one thing they did have in common however... They all seemed to be children about the same age... One moved towards you slowly and mechanically, it's eyes filled with sadness.

"P-Please miss, y-you must help us... We we're Zalgo's many children... But he had us t-turned into dolls when we turned 10 years of age."

Well, I already am trying to break the curse Zalgo has put on his wives... I might as well try to help them. You think to yourself. How can I help them? As if reading your thoughts they suddenly begin to answer in a melancholy chorus. 

"The curse on us, the lost children, is as old as malevolence, as old as almost time itself... Only Lunette knows how to break it, she was the first of us... They keep her locked in the dungeon, because she is said to carry a great power... We are not able to leave this room because we lose all movement upon our exit. Go talk to Lunette and she will know." 

What about your mothers why can't they help you? You ask mentally.

"Because they forgot us the days we became dolls... We will probably never see them again..."

Okay, I promise, I will free you guys... you think putting the candle down to look at the map, from where you were in the entrance to the castle dungeon was only around the corner... Everything was at stake here, it was all or nothing...

You crack the door open to see that no one was in the hallway so you quietly close the door and quietly run through the monochrome hallway. I need to get the sword, find Lunette, and free whoever I can. For some reason, you were able to keep your composure and not go into another 'anger attack'... 

Pulling the hood more over your head you head down the long trailing stairs into the dungeon. With every step the light grew dimmer and dimmer... The stairs themselves were made of a black onyx-like stone, and the occasional torch brought scanty bits of light in with the black and white pyre that flickered. Every step, the temperature also became increasingly cold.

The staircase felt like it'd never end... You looked up towards the direction of which you came, but the entrance was gone. This made you uneasy, I hope i'm not cursed to forever plunder down these stairs. Your walking pace turns into a sprint down the stairs, your breathing fastens as well as your heartbeat. You hear the echo of each pronounced footstep making contact with the stair. 

The echo pounded in your head louder and louder with every step causing your head to throb. The feelings of anger and hate begin to once again bundle inside of you, swirling inside your mind. 

Calm down. Calm down. Calm down.

You decide the best thing to do is to just sit on the steps and clear your head for a little while... It actually seemed to help you calm yourself. You close your eyes and breathe deeply, picturing Toby's face in your head... Please still be out there... Please live, and please stay alive. 

You were hoping no one would catch you while you were on this little break, but you knew that if you didn't do this.. You would go berserk. Again. You open your eyes after taking a few more breaths of the muggy, dank air surrounding you. It was then that your finally saw the end of the stairs. Was your mind simply playing tricks on you this whole time?

At the end of the stairs were two sleeping guards. You quietly make your way past them treading carefully upon the dirted floors.  The dungeon itself was a immense chasm-like maze. Most of the cells were barren with the exception of the occasional skull or bone that littered the ground.

A small voice fills your head...

"Find me (y/n)..." 

At the end of the current hall you were walking in was a clad black door. That had to be it, that had to be were Lunette was being held. You run to the end of the hall, it was locked from the outside, so you could just unlock it from where you were by just flipping a few knobs and switches that barred the door shut. 

In the room sat a doll, her lavender colored hair was in two braids, red shining eyes, and a black bow pinned in her hair. She was strapped to a wooden chair with leather, a pair of jet black horns from her head and black sparkling wings behind her... Her skin was ivory and she wore a black and dark blue striped dress her lips were parted in a forlorn frown like the other dolls... Lunette? You mentally ask still astounded the dolls can hear your thoughts... It did come in handy though since you couldn't speak at the moment.

"Yes, that is me... Please free me (y/n), I will help you in any way that I can..." 

Her voice was child-like, and had energy unlike the other dolls. You undid the leather strapping around her wrists and ankles. "Ah, thank you... I have not been able to move this way for decades..." She says rubbing her arms and legs, as if in an effort to make sure they are real. "Now before we go there is a story I must tell you, so that you will fully be able to understand how to save the other children... 

Mentally, you were slightly interested but also unsure if this would turn into another boring history lesson... "No need to worry... I'll give you the shorter version." Lunette says smiling. 

~Story telling mode lol~

Long ago shortly after the human race came to be... There was a girl, and her name was Amaryllis (meaning beggining), she was the first to fall in love with a demon who at the time was named Sephtis (meaning eternal death). He too was deeply in love with her, but ancient rules forbid them from being together...  One was nothing without the other, they refused to be apart... In time other demons and humans fell in love, and so a war was later started demons against demons, humans against humans... Brother against brother and so on. Sephtis ended up killing his father who wanted to keep the ancient ways, his father was king of the underworld and so Sephtis claimed the throne, passing laws uniting demons and humans and restoring balance to our worlds... 

Against all odds, Sephtis and Amaryllis could finally be together... They ended up getting married and a child was soon to be on the way... They should have been happy... But then the angels waged war against the demons and Sephtis had to leave so that he could defend his people against another bloody war...

The same day he left Amaryllis gave birth to her first and last child... She later died from complications of the birth, her dying wish was for her daughter to live happily, and for her name to be Lunette (meaning little moon). Lunette was raised secretly during the war, she never left the castle walls, for if she was found, she would be used as a hostage or bait...

When the war finally ended and Sephtis could finally return home, he learned that his wife had died. He thought the wounds of war would heal with time, but he knew her death would be something too painful to ever fully recover from. He finally met his daughter for the first time, now almost ten years old... He loved her as soon as he saw her, she was the  only light left in his world of death and chaos...

One day however, specifically her tenth birthday which was also the tenth year since the war began, she went missing... Never to be heard from again... Sephtis later changed his name hoping to forget his past... He henceforth became known as Zalgo. He tried to remarry several times, but each new human girl was never like Amaryllis... Each marriage failed more than the last, and yet he still kept his wives as trophies, beating and manipulating them as he pleased. He turned each one into a mindless meat-puppet demon by hexing them the day of their wedding, with a cursed kiss.

With the many wives came many children, he loved each one... But every child went missing on their tenth birthday no matter how many precautions were taken... He would always remarry right after his previous child disappeared. The loss of Amaryllis and his children took a heavy toll on him, he became bitter hating everyone that crossed his path. He especially began to hate his 'rival' Slenderman, who was even able to stitch himself together a perfect little family, something Zalgo failed to do even after all these years. 

Zalgo, is still searching, searching for the love he had lost so long ago...He doesn't know it but the war has given him a sort of madness kind of like a post traumatic stress disorder. He saw many of his friends and allies fall before him in trecherous ways, and he too was tortured throughout the war...

It's like a clockwork curse, each child shares the same birthday, the same day that the war began... And right after the child is gone the cycle begins anew just with a different wife and an eventual different child... Zalgo doesn't know this but... Every tenth birthday his madness gets the best of him... He turns us into these dolls... Some say it's so we will never die like Amaryllis... So we can be preserved... Others just say it's a product of the mad king himself.

He also threatens the guards while he is under the subconscious madness... Telling them that death is the least of their worries if they try to save the children or try to tell him when he's conscious.. So if he asks, they say we went missing like the last, and for this he pins the blame on Slenderman stealing them away, because Slenderman has always been rumored to steal children.

~End of story time ~
 
You were so flabbergasted you didn't even know how to reply to that story... So how do we save the children..? And is it possible to save Zalgo? You ask. "It's too late to save my father he is long gone... He will have to meet his demise to save the wives, but that you already knew..." H-How did you know that I knew? You mentally tremble. "I have a clairvoyance, I see everything that happens in this castle... Unfortunately. To save us, Zalgo must know the truth he has to see me, and then and only then the curse will be broken and we will be kids again..."

What will become of you guys then..? "Well, some can live with their mothers, others like me will try to drift through life the best we can by ourselves..." Lunette was the only doll, that could move freely unlike the other's robotic movements... It seemed like the curse became more potent with each passing generation... Lunette seemed to be almost human except for her doll-like appearance... Let's go get that sword! You say smiling, you and her go back into the hallway of the dungeon to search on, she trails a little behind you. 

So... Do you know where the sword is..? You ask, hoping her clairvoyance could come in handy... "Unfortunately no, I can't see outside objects in the castle.. They are invisible to me..." Well so much for that... You turn the corner and see a large pile of sparkly black ash. some discarded spears were around it... Something went down here...

Judge Angel's sword was no where to be found. Someone was fighting the guards, and they won... They had to of had the sword... But where could it be now.. You check the adjacent cells but there is no one or anything in them... Suddenly the angry voices start swirling in your head again... 

Destroy the doll destroy the doll!!!~

In a confused rage you look around for Lunette but she is gone... Lunette?! Suddenly something grabs your wrist. Tightly. You look and see a guard, a very angry one at that. "You! You did this?!!" He asks.. You shake your head, wishing you could talk now more than ever. You felt like you would go mad, from not being able to speak. 

The anger causes you to shake off the guard's grip with a violent jerk. You elbow him in the eye socket. "Ow... Hey!" True he was only angry mostly because he thought you had killed his little buddies, but you didn't do it.. So who cared..? Your animal instincts kicked in and you ran like hell in the opposite direction. Guards gathered where you were running and in no time you were cornered... 

Some grabbed your wrists others grabbed your ankles, one even grabbed your neck. You were currently immobilized. You angrily thrashed your body about in a hate-filled rage, but to no avail... I'm becoming a monster...-And where did Lunette go?

"Do you think we should give her the collar?" One asks. "Yea, the last thing we need is for her to ruin the boss's wedding... Har.. Do you remember that Clockwork chick earlier... She was a ruffian just like this er' one." Another demon comments. Clocky. A demon puts a black choker-like necklace around your neck, it had the similar stones like the one on the mute ring. 

It only took a few seconds before you felt all emotion slip away... You were now in a thoughtless emotionless numbness. The guards lead you upstairs closer and closer to your wedded doom... You glance and see yourself in a window, your eye color was now completely red, your hair was a long trail of a raven's ink that just barely skimmed the floor in length, your skin was so pale it just burned your eyes to look at it's shimmering paleness. 

Your body had gotten taller and curvier, your cheeks were a pale pink color and your lips were as red as a drop of blood... Except for the red lips and eyes, you almost seemed to blend with the monochrome landscape itself. "Iv'e never seen a ring transform someone so dramatically as her... She's so gorgeous though, too bad she'll be wasted on a mad demon king." One of the demon's gossiped.

Lunette was your last and only hope now, you just hoped freeing her would be enough. Everyone paused at the sound, it was the sound of 24 chimes of a clock... It was midnight, the time your wedding would soon be starting. 

Toby's pov:

Pinkamena tied us up and is leading us through the halls as we speak so that we can blend in as prisoners. Jeff since leaving the room has been silent like he himself had no idea what was going on. Pinkamena stopped at a peculiar looking door, tall in stature and a yellow smiley face was painted on it, it perhaps was the only yellow thing in the whole castle. 

A crooked smile forms on her face, the air suddenly turns to uncertainty. I glance at her eyes and they are filled with a catatonic madness. She opens the door... This wasn't the ceremony room, it didn't hold a single person... Well an alive one anyway. Bloody viscera and carcasses of humans and animals litter the ground. Bones. Blood. Flesh. 

Pinkamena just looks up at us momentarily with nothing but a simple grin upon her face. I feel my own body stiffen in horror, I didn't want to fight her but if she got in my way i'd have no choice but to take her out. A crooked smile showing chipped yet pearly white teeth. A single twitch of the eye.

Jeff's slouched body straightens and he begins to sing again. But this time the lyrics were all messed up like they were with the spider. "My pony my little pony... Pony pony pony!~" If this was indeed like the spider situation, then it couldn't be good... Pinkamena twitched the left side of her face violently, and then shook her head as if she was snapping out of a spell.

Jeff stops singing and she closes the door and continues to lead us through the hallway. "Sorry guys... I uh, must have had the wrong door..." She states almost unsure of the words coming from her own mouth.

Was she originally planning on just taking us to her little torture room? Could Pinkamena really be trusted?

~small time skip brought to you by Jeff singing 'i'm a barbie girl in a barbie world'~

We arrive about four minutes later at 2 large doors, painted red, perhaps just like the yellow smiley doors they were the only red furnishing the castle had. "Toby... Before we go in you need to promise me that you will stay calm and wait for the perfect time to strike no matter what. Wait for my signal." Pinkamena says full of composure. 

"I-I know, I will" I say, my face cast down to the floor. I must if I want any shot in saving my (y/n) and my family. Pinkamena slowly opens the doors, the doors that will lead me to my sweet (y/n).