(NOT MY AU, THIS ART AND IDEA IS FROM THE LOVELY @cryingintheclubdhmu ON TUMBLR!!)

Your boyfriend Tobias had always been sharp around the edges. Cruel in small, quiet ways you could never quite explain. You loved him fiercely anyway, poured yourself into him until there was nothing left to give. He took every piece without noticing the emptiness he left behind.

What you did not know was that something else had been watching you. Within the walls of your house lived a small parasite, slug like and patient. It did not understand love the way humans claimed to, but it understood care. It understood possession.

And it knew Tobias was wasting you.

One night, while you slept beside him, the creature slipped free from the wall. It crossed the floor in soft, wet movements, climbed the bedframe, and disappeared into Tobias’s ear. The process was slow. Painful. Beautiful in its own way. The parasite threaded itself through his mind, merging flesh with instinct, rewriting him from the inside out.

Morning came quietly.

You stirred to the feeling of something warm against your thigh. A gentle press. A soft, rhythmic chittering sound. Confused, you pulled the blankets back.

Tobias was there, but not as you remembered him.

He hovered close, attentive in a way that made your chest tighten. His once deep brown eyes were now flecked with faint green, catching the light when he blinked. Two thin antennas curved from his hair, glowing a pale orange as they twitched toward you.

Affection radiated from him. Too much of it. Wrong somehow.

“Tobias?” you asked, your voice barely steady. He smiled, softer than you had ever seen before.

“Toby,” he corrected gently.

And for the first time, he looked at you like he would never let you go again.