Chapter Text
Vox hadn't planned it That was the part that unsettled Alastor the most.
Their confrontation had been brutal but familiar—power against power, signal against signal, the air tearing itself apart under forces that shouldn't have shared the same space. Vox, desperate and cornered, reached for something new. Not a weapon he understood. Not even one he had tested.
Just raw, unfiltered magic pulled through circuitry that was never meant to channel it.
Alastor felt it hit him like static through bone. It didn't burn. It rewrote, For a split second, the world inverted—sound became pressure, light became weight. Vox froze, eyes wide behind his screen, as the magic spiraled out of control and collapsed inward instead of outward.
Into Alastor.
The spell didn't attack his defenses. It bypassed them entirely, threading itself into the oldest parts of his existence—broadcast wave, demon core, something far more primal. Vox cut the connection immediately, horrified by what he'd unleashed.
But it was already done.
In the days that followed, Alastor felt off. Not wounded—altered. His power behaved differently, responding sluggishly at times, flaring unpredictably at others. Protective wards reacted to him as if he were two overlapping signatures instead of one.
That was when he understood.
The magic hadn't been destructive. It had been generative.
Vox's experimental energy—half technological, half infernal—had collided with Alastor's nature in a way neither of them could have anticipated. The spell hadn't targeted his body so much as his capacity to create. It forced his essence into a state of replication, of continuation.
Not choice. Not intent.
A consequence.
Alastor said nothing to Vox. He didn't confront him, didn't demand answers that wouldn't exist anyway. Vox wouldn't understand this any better than he did—and knowledge, in the wrong hands, was a liability.
So Alastor adapted.
⸻
Something was wrong.
Alastor noticed it first in the quiet moments—between broadcasts, between smiles. A heaviness settled low in his body, unfamiliar and persistent. His appetite shifted. His balance faltered. Power flickered where it never had before.
He said nothing.
The hotel thrived on noise, on attention, on knowing. Alastor kept this to himself with practiced ease. He laughed louder. He vanished longer. He blamed the bayou air, the static in the ether, anything that didn't invite questions.
Deep down, he knew the truth wasn't an illness.
It was change.
Whatever Vox had done—whatever residue of magic or machinery had tangled with his own essence—it had rewritten something fundamental. Alastor didn't rage about it. Rage would give it ownership. Instead, he treated it like any other threat: with calculation.
He left the hotel at night.
The bayou welcomed him without judgment. It always had. The mud swallowed footprints. The cicadas kept secrets. He carved wards into cypress bark and reinforced old protections that predated even Hell's memory.
When the pain began, he did not scream.
He grounded himself in the present—the smell of damp earth, the pulse of his own magic, the certainty that this moment belonged to him. Whatever was happening would happen on his terms.
And so it did.
The birth was raw, exhausting, and profoundly quiet. No audience. No witnesses. No one to take control away from him. When it was over, Alastor sat trembling in the reeds, holding proof that his body had endured something extraordinary—and survived.
He did not name it yet.
He cleansed the space meticulously. Old magic. Careful magic. Nothing that could be traced. Nothing that could be exploited.
Back at the hotel, the world continued as if nothing had changed And that was the strangest part.
Alastor carried the knowledge alone—not as shame, but as sovereignty. His body had been altered without his consent, yes—but what came after belonged to him. Every choice. Every silence. Every step forward.
One night, as the radio crackled softly, he allowed himself a rare truth.
"They don't need to know," he murmured to the dark. "This is mine."And for once, secrecy felt less like fear—and more like freedom.
⸻
The consequences did not arrive all at once. They came softly, like humidity settling into bone.
Alastor learned quickly that his power had changed its rhythm. Broadcasts required more precision now—less brute force, more intention. Where his magic once surged outward indiscriminately, it now curved, instinctively protective, pulling inward before releasing.
Containment had become second nature.
He adjusted. He always did.
The hotel noticed nothing beyond minor eccentricities: his absences grew more scheduled, his temper less theatrical, his routines more deliberate. He claimed a locked room no one else entered. He warded it heavily—not out of paranoia, but preservation.
Sleep changed him the most.
He slept lighter, waking at unfamiliar sounds, senses stretching beyond himself. At first, it unsettled him. Vigilance had once been a choice; now it was instinct. Over time, he stopped resisting it and learned how to rest within it.
Resilience, he discovered, wasn't loud.
It was preparing bottles in silence.
It was weaving lullabies into static so low no one else could hear.
It was learning how to split his attention without fracturing himself.
The bayou became a second home.
He brought supplies there. Reinforced protections. Old spirits took notice—not with curiosity, but respect. They understood continuity. They understood survival without spectacle.
Sometimes, when the night was thick and warm, Alastor would sit beneath the cypress trees and allow himself to simply exist. No grin. No audience. Just breath and presence and the steady proof that life continued.
Vox never confronted him But Alastor knew Vox suspected.
Their encounters became cautious, clipped. Vox's screens lingered too long on Alastor's silhouette, scanning for anomalies Vox didn't dare name. Alastor let him look. Let him wonder. Uncertainty was a far sharper boundary than confrontation.
Nothing Vox could say would undo what had been done And nothing Vox knew would ever give him claim. The greatest change, Alastor realized, was internal.
He no longer defined himself solely by control over others. Control over himself—his time, his silence, his future—proved far more powerful. He had endured transformation without breaking, secrecy without shame.
One evening, as the hotel buzzed with its usual chaos, Alastor paused in the doorway of his private room. He listened to the soft, steady breathing inside.
A small sound.
A monumental truth.
"I remain," he said quietly.
Not as defiance.
As fact.
And in that quiet resilience—built day by day, choice by choice—Alastor found something unexpected. Not weakness, Not loss But a strength no one else would ever be able to take from him.
⸻
Alastor learned the hotel's rhythms in a new way.
Not as a host.
Not as a performer.
But as someone who measured time in short intervals—between feedings, between soft breaths, between moments of stillness.
He moved more carefully now. Doors closed without flourish. His laugh, when it surfaced, was lower, shorter, as though conserving something precious. He still attended meetings. Still appeared when necessary. But the gaps between those appearances widened.
Charlie noticed. She was good at noticing when people tried not to be seen.
At first, she chalked it up to one of Alastor's moods—an eccentric withdrawal, a dramatic buildup to something theatrical. But the pattern didn't fit. He wasn't vanishing loudly.
He was fading quietly.
Dark circles lingered beneath his eyes, barely hidden by magic. His shoulders carried a fatigue that had nothing to do with boredom. When he smiled at her, it was genuine—but brief, as if smiling cost him something now.
One afternoon, Charlie caught him pausing in the hallway, hand braced lightly against the wall. "Alastor?" she asked, careful. Not accusatory. Just present.
He straightened immediately. "My dear! Simply savoring the architecture." She didn't argue. She just nodded But she began to watch.
She noticed how he always returned to the same locked corridor. How his radio static softened late at night instead of growing louder. How the usual sharp edge in his voice dulled whenever exhaustion crept too close And sometimes—very rarely—she heard it.
A sound beneath the static.
Soft. Rhythmic.
Almost like a lullaby.
Alastor's private room had changed, too. Charlie only glimpsed it once, when the door opened a fraction wider than intended. No spectacle. No macabre decor. Just warmth. Wards layered not for power, but for quiet.
For safety.
Inside, Alastor moved with surprising tenderness.
He held the baby with steady hands, murmuring nonsense words woven gently into radio hum. The sound soothed them both. He had learned which tones calmed, which rhythms coaxed sleep. He had learned patience in ways he never anticipated.
Exhaustion clung to him—but so did resolve.
When the baby slept, Alastor allowed himself to sit, Just sit. He did not broadcast. He did not plot. He simply existed in the stillness, one hand resting protectively nearby.
This, he decided, was not weakness, It was responsibility. Charlie never confronted him, Not yet.
Instead, she left a cup of tea outside his door one evening. No note. No questions. Just warmth, steaming quietly in the hall. Alastor stared at it for a long moment.Then he smiled—small, real, unseen by anyone else.
"Perceptive girl," he murmured.
He did not invite her in But he did not move the cup away, either And that was the beginning—not of revelation, but of understanding.
⸻
The hotel felt it before it understood it.
Alastor's presence used to arrive like a thunderclap—static snapping, laughter cutting through rooms like a blade. Now, he entered spaces more gently. His footsteps no longer announced him. His radio hum settled into a lower frequency, less command and more... comfort.
People noticed.
Husk was the first to say it aloud, squinting over the bar as Alastor passed without comment or provocation. "Radio Demon's gone tame," he muttered. Alastor paused. Looked back. And instead of bristling—He shrugged. "Nonsense," he said lightly, and kept walking.
That alone unsettled everyone.
Niffty noticed next. She stopped barging into his space, not because she was told to, but because something about him now asked for care. She cleaned more quietly near his rooms. Straightened things that didn't need straightening. Left flowers sometimes. Old ones. Wild ones.
Charlie noticed everything.
Alastor listened more when she spoke. He interrupted less. When tempers flared, he diffused instead of inflaming. His cruelty—once sharp and deliberate—dulled into irony, then into restraint.
Softer, Not weaker, Never that. Just... gentler around the edges. Behind locked doors, the softness had a name.
Daisy.
He spoke it the first time barely above a whisper, testing how it felt in the air. The baby girl stirred at the sound, small fingers curling instinctively, as if she already recognized it as hers. "Daisy," he repeated, voice warmer this time.
A simple name, An ordinary name. That, too, was intentional.
She fit against him easily, impossibly light for something that had altered the course of his existence so thoroughly. He learned her patterns the way he learned frequencies—what pitch calmed her, what rhythm eased her breathing, what silence meant sleep instead of distress.
He sang to her sometimes. Not broadcasts. Not performances. Just fragments of old melodies woven into static so soft it barely existed. The bayou listened. The wards held. The world, for once, did not intrude.
Alastor was still tired. That never truly went away But it was a purposeful exhaustion now—the kind that came with vigilance, with care, with choosing to stay instead of vanish. He planned his days around Daisy's needs without ever thinking of it as sacrifice.
He thought of it as priority.
One evening, Charlie caught him in the hall again. He looked worn, jacket rumpled, eyes shadowed—but peaceful. "You seem... different," she said gently.
Alastor tilted his head, considering her. For a moment, she thought he might deflect. Joke. Vanish.
Instead, he smiled.
"Change is not always decay, my dear," he said. "Sometimes it's refinement." She smiled back, satisfied enough—for now. Behind his door, Daisy slept.
And Alastor—Radio Demon, monster, legend—sat beside her crib, one hand resting protectively nearby, knowing with absolute certainty that this softness was not something the hotel had taken from him.
It was something he had chosen to keep.
⸻
Charlie didn't ask.
That was how Alastor knew she was growing certain.
She stopped hovering near his door, stopped pretending coincidence when she crossed paths with him late at night. Instead, she adjusted the hotel around him—meetings scheduled earlier, noise softened in nearby halls, Niffty gently redirected away from certain corridors without explanation.
Protection, without intrusion.
When others questioned it, Charlie smiled and said, "He needs rest," with a confidence that brooked no argument.
And somehow, everyone listened, Daisy changed the magic first.
Alastor noticed it in the smallest ways: spells holding longer than expected, wards reacting before he consciously triggered them. His power no longer lashed outward by default. It curved, instinctively shielding the space around him.
Around her.
His radio static—once sharp, invasive—grew layered. Frequencies nested within one another, creating a depth no one could quite parse. Demons sensitive to magic found his presence less oppressive, less predatory.
Safer.
That word spread, slowly and strangely.
The Radio Demon wasn't feared the way he used to be. He was still respected—still dangerous—but the rumors shifted. People spoke of his territory as neutral ground. Of deals honored without cruelty. Of a silence around him that felt deliberate instead of threatening.
Alastor heard it all and said nothing. Reputation, like magic, was just another signal. And his had changed pitch.
The moment he acknowledged love came unexpectedly. Daisy wouldn't settle. No static worked. No melody soothed her. Alastor paced the room, exhaustion tugging at him, frustration flickering dangerously close to self-reproach.
Then she quieted when he spoke—not a hum, not a spell Just words. "I'm here," he murmured, holding her close. "I have you." The truth of it struck him with a force no spell ever had.
He stopped moving and Looked down at her And in that stillness, something ancient and carefully guarded loosened. "I love you," he said, quietly, as if the walls themselves were sworn to secrecy.
The wards didn't react.
The world didn't shatter.
Nothing punished him for it.
Alastor exhaled, slow and unsteady, and let the words exist, Far from the hotel, Vox watched Not directly, Never directly. He saw the data first—Alastor's broadcasts changing shape, losing aggression. Power spikes smoothing into stable curves. Influence holding steady without intimidation.
Impossible.
Vox zoomed in on feeds, watching Alastor move through rooms without commanding them. Watching others relax instead of recoil. Watching a legend become something... anchored.
It unsettled him more than any threat. Whatever Vox had unleashed in that fight—whatever magic had gone wrong—it had not weakened Alastor. It had given him something Vox could never manufacture.
Connection.
Vox turned the screens dark, unease settling deep in his code. There were consequences he couldn't undo. Changes he couldn't compete with And for the first time, Vox chose distance.
Back at the hotel, Charlie passed Alastor in the hall and smiled. Not curious. Not demanding.
Just protective.
Alastor inclined his head to her—a gesture of acknowledgment, rare and sincere.
Behind his door, Daisy slept And Alastor, softer and stronger all at once, stood watch—not as a demon performing power, but as someone who had found something worth guarding.
Not loudly But forever.
——
Daisy wouldn't stop crying. Alastor had tried everything he knew.
Static tuned low and warm. A slow sway timed to her breathing. Murmured reassurances woven into half-forgotten melodies. Nothing settled her. The sound cut through him sharper than any blade—small, desperate, insistent.
"Please," he whispered, voice strained, pacing the room. "My dear... hush now. You're safe. You're safe."
The words trembled despite his control. Fatigue dulled his edges. Panic crept in where confidence usually lived. He adjusted his grip, careful not to frighten her, but his hands shook now—just slightly.
"Please, Daisy," he pleaded softly. "Please."
In his distraction, the door didn't click shut all the way.
Down the corridor, Charlie froze. She had been walking past—nothing more—when the sound reached her. Not the hotel's usual chaos. Not static. Not laughter.
A baby crying, Her heart skipped. Charlie followed the sound without thinking, steps slow, respectful, until she reached Alastor's door—ajar by barely an inch. She knocked once, softly.
"Alastor?" she called. "It's... it's Charlie."
The crying didn't stop. When she pushed the door open just enough to see inside, the world shifted.
Alastor stood near the crib, coat discarded, hair loose, eyes wide with fear she had never seen on him before. In his arms was a tiny baby girl, red-faced and wailing, her small fists clenched tight in his lapel.
For a long, breathless moment, neither of them spoke. Then Alastor turned fully toward her.
"Charlie—" His voice broke. He caught it quickly, but the damage was done. "Please. You mustn't—don't tell anyone. I beg of you."
He held Daisy closer instinctively, like he was bracing for something to be taken from him.
"I didn't mean for you to see," he continued, words rushing now. "This isn't—she isn't—please, my dear, I can't—" Charlie crossed the room in three quiet steps. She didn't reach for the baby. Didn't crowd him. She simply lowered herself to Alastor's level, eyes soft, voice steady.
"Hey," she said gently. "You're not in trouble."
That stopped him. "I'm not here to take anything away," she continued. "And I'm not telling anyone. I promise." The crying hit a sharp peak, and Alastor flinched.
"I don't know what she needs," he admitted hoarsely. "I've done everything right—everything I know how—and I can't make it stop." Charlie glanced at Daisy, then back at him. "May I help?" she asked. Not assumed. Asked. Alastor hesitated—just a second—then nodded.
Charlie spoke softly as she demonstrated, guiding his movements rather than replacing them. Adjusting Daisy's position. Slowing the sway. Humming—not magic, not power—just a gentle, imperfect tune.
"Sometimes," Charlie murmured, "they just need to feel someone else breathe." Alastor followed her lead. Gradually, Daisy's cries softened. Shuddered. Faded into small, hiccupping breaths. Her fists loosened, fingers curling into the fabric of Alastor's shirt.
Silence returned—fragile, but real.
Alastor exhaled, shaky and long.
"Thank you," he whispered. Not performative. Not guarded. Just honest. Charlie smiled, eyes a little damp. "She's beautiful," she said quietly.
Alastor looked down at Daisy, then back at Charlie. "She's Daisy," he said.
Charlie nodded, like she'd been entrusted with something sacred. "I won't tell anyone," she repeated. "But you don't have to do this alone. Not if you don't want to."
Alastor didn't answer right away But he didn't close the door this time, either And that—quiet, fragile, real—was the beginning of trust.
——-
When the silence finally settled, it felt too loud.
Daisy slept against Alastor's chest, small and warm and utterly unaware of how close he'd come to unraveling. Her breaths were shallow, even. Trusting.
Alastor wasn't His hands still shook. Charlie noticed. Of course she did. She stayed where she was, giving him space, but her presence alone made something in his chest tighten painfully.
"I almost lost her," he said suddenly. Charlie looked up. "Lost her?"
"I couldn't calm her," he continued, voice low, hollow. "I couldn't fix it. Power, magic, knowledge—none of it mattered. She cried and I—" He swallowed hard. "I was helpless."
The word tasted wrong in his mouth. Charlie didn't correct him. She didn't minimize it. She just listened.
"I've survived Hell itself," Alastor went on, eyes fixed on nothing. "I've been hunted, dismantled, rewritten. And this—" He glanced down at Daisy. His grip tightened reflexively, then loosened, terrified of hurting her. "This terrifies me more than any enemy ever has." Charlie's voice was soft. "Because you care." He laughed once—sharp, broken. "That's the problem."
The admission cracked something open.
"I don't sleep," he confessed. "Not properly. Every sound feels like a warning. Every breath she takes feels borrowed. I keep waiting for something to take her from me. From my mistakes. From my failures."
Charlie's throat tightened. "I don't deserve her," he said quietly. "I know what I am." She shook her head immediately. "Alastor—"
"No," he interrupted, but there was no bite in it. Only fear. "Don't soften it. I've hurt people. I've destroyed lives And now I'm responsible for something innocent." His voice dropped to a whisper. "What happens when I fail her?"
Charlie stood then—slowly, deliberately—and stepped closer.
"You're already protecting her," she said. "You're exhausted because you're trying. You're scared because you care. Bad people don't worry about failing like this." He looked up at her, eyes wide, almost feral with the weight of it.
"I don't know how to be gentle all the time," he said. "I don't know how to stop being dangerous." Charlie reached out—not to Daisy, but to Alastor's sleeve. Just barely touching.
"Then you learn," she said. "And when it's too hard, you let someone help." The room felt unbearably small. Alastor closed his eyes.
For a moment—just one—his composure shattered. "I don't want her to be afraid of me," he whispered. "I don't want to be the monster in her story."
Daisy stirred, letting out a tiny sound, and instinctively, Alastor softened his hold, murmuring nonsense under his breath. The contrast was devastating.
Charlie watched him carefully. "She won't be," she said firmly. "Not if you keep choosing her. And you are. Even when it hurts."
Alastor's breath hitched. He turned his face slightly away, radio static flickering weakly before cutting out entirely—no performance left to hide behind.
"I need her," he admitted, barely audible. "And I don't know if that makes me selfish... or human." Charlie smiled sadly. "Probably both."
The silence returned again—heavier this time, but steadier.
Daisy slept.
Alastor stayed awake.
And for the first time, the weight of loving something fragile settled fully onto his shoulders—not as punishment, but as truth And it hurt, God, it hurt But he did not put her down.
⸻
Charlie eventually left. Not because Alastor asked her to—because she understood when staying would make the fear sharper instead of softer. She paused at the door, looked back once, and said only, "I'll be nearby."
Alastor nodded, unable to trust his voice. When the door closed, the room felt hollow.
Daisy slept on, blissfully unaware, her tiny chest rising and falling against his own. Alastor sat down heavily beside the crib, shoulders slumping as though gravity had finally remembered him.
The adrenaline drained.
What remained was dread.
He stared at her for a long time.
So small.
So breakable.
So dependent on someone who had built his entire existence on being feared. "I don't know how to do this," he whispered. The confession echoed uselessly in the warded room.
He thought of all the things he wasn't: patient, gentle by nature, forgiving. He thought of his temper, his past, the way cruelty had once come as easily as breath. He imagined her someday crying because of him—his voice too sharp, his presence too much.
The thought hollowed him out.
His magic flickered weakly, reacting to his distress, warping the wards until he forced it back under control. Even his power seemed uncertain now, as though it, too, was afraid of causing harm.
"I can't afford to make mistakes," he murmured. "And I will. I always do." Daisy shifted, letting out a small, unhappy sound in her sleep.
Alastor froze instantly. Every muscle locked. Every sense sharpened. His heart slammed against his ribs like a trapped animal.
He leaned over the crib, breath shallow, counting her breaths like a ritual. One. Two. Three. Still breathing. Still warm.
Only then did he realize his face was wet. He hadn't cried in decades. The tears startled him more than anything else. He scrubbed at his face angrily, as if insulted by his own weakness, but they kept coming—silent, humiliating, unstoppable.
"I'm afraid," he admitted to the empty room. "And I don't know who I am without control."
Daisy's fingers twitched in her sleep, brushing against the edge of his glove.
He didn't pull away.
Instead, he carefully removed the glove, exposing bare skin to the world, and let her hold onto him. The contact grounded him in a way magic never had.
If something happened to her—The thought cut off violently. He couldn't finish it. Wouldn't let himself.
So he did the only thing he could, He stayed awake. Hours passed. The hotel shifted through its nocturnal cycles. Laughter echoed distantly, muffled by wards. Life went on, ignorant of the quiet war happening in one small room.
Alastor didn't move.
He watched the door like an enemy. He watched the shadows like they might betray him. He watched Daisy like she might vanish if he blinked too long.
By the time dawn crept faintly through the curtains, he was shaking again—not from fear this time, but exhaustion so deep it felt dangerous.
Still, he didn't lie down. "I'll endure," he whispered hoarsely. "I always do."
But for the first time, endurance felt less like strength—And more like a promise he wasn't sure he could keep And that uncertainty hurt worse than any wound he'd ever survived.
⸻
By the second night without sleep, Alastor's thoughts began to blur at the edges.
He sat in the chair beside Daisy's crib, spine rigid, eyes burning, magic pulled so tight around himself it ached. Every sound felt too loud. Every silence felt like a threat. His radio hum stuttered now and then, not enough to be heard outside the room, but enough to betray how frayed he was becoming.
Daisy stirred, Not crying—just shifting, small and restless. Alastor was on his feet instantly, dizziness crashing through him so hard the room tilted. He grabbed the crib rail to steady himself, breathing through clenched teeth.
"Easy," he murmured, though he wasn't sure whether he meant her or himself.
His hands felt clumsy now. Slower. The fine control he prided himself on slipped in tiny, terrifying ways. He adjusted her blanket three times before he was satisfied, heart racing as if he'd narrowly avoided disaster.
What if I drop her?
What if I miss something?
What if I fall asleep?
The last thought terrified him most.
He hadn't realized how much of his identity was built on vigilance until it became unsustainable. His body needed rest. His mind refused it. Every time his eyes closed, images surged forward—loss, failure, silence where breath should be.
He pressed his knuckles against his mouth, biting down hard enough to ground himself.
"I can't," he whispered. "I can't afford to."
Daisy let out a small sound, half-sigh, half-whimper. Alastor scooped her up immediately, though his arms shook now, muscles screaming in protest. He paced the room, steps uneven, exhaustion dragging at his limbs like wet clothes.
"I'm here," he murmured again and again, voice rough. "I'm here. I'm here." The words felt thinner every time he said them. He caught his reflection in the mirror by accident.
The sight startled him.
His eyes were sunken, glow dimmed. His grin—absent. His shoulders hunched inward, as if bracing against a blow no one else could see. He looked... older. Not in years, but in weight.
"I'm failing you," he said to the reflection, quietly. "Already."
His magic reacted sharply to the thought, sparking and then collapsing in on itself, leaving him momentarily lightheaded. He swayed, clutching Daisy closer, panic flaring white-hot.
"No—no, no—"
He sank down onto the bed, sitting instead of standing because he didn't trust himself anymore. That realization hurt more than any insult ever could.
Daisy's warmth seeped through his coat. Her breathing steadied again, slow and trusting.
She still trusted him. The knowledge was unbearable. "I don't know how long I can do this," he confessed, voice barely sound. "I don't know where the line is between protecting you... and breaking myself."
His eyelids fluttered despite his best efforts. His head dipped forward, just for a moment—just long enough for terror to surge through him and jolt him awake again. He laughed weakly, bitter and exhausted.
"Pathetic," he muttered, though there was no cruelty left in the word. Only fear.
Somewhere in the hotel, Charlie paced her own room, uneasy, sensing strain she couldn't see. She didn't intrude. She trusted him to ask.
Alastor hated himself for needing help—and feared even more what would happen if he didn't take it. As dawn crept closer again, he sat unmoving, eyes burning, arms aching, heart heavy with love and dread in equal measure.
He was so tired.
And he was still afraid that if he rested—Everything he loved would disappear.
⸻
By the third night, Alastor stopped pretending he could endure it.
His body shook constantly now, fine tremors he couldn't fully suppress. His thoughts looped, snagging on the same fears until they lost meaning and became pure sensation—pressure behind the eyes, static buzzing under his skin.
Sleep crept closer anyway.
Not gently.
Violently.
His vision blurred at the edges. Sounds distorted. Once, he startled awake without remembering drifting off at all, heart hammering as if he'd just survived an ambush.
That was the moment something inside him snapped—not loudly, but decisively.
"No," he whispered, setting Daisy gently back into her crib. His hands lingered there, reluctant, before pulling away. "I won't risk it."
He moved to the center of the room and began to draw sigils into the air, fingers trembling but precise. Old magic. Forbidden magic. The kind designed for siege demons and eternal sentinels—creatures never meant to rest.
Creatures never meant to care. The spell coiled around him like wire. "I will remain conscious," he intoned, voice hoarse. "I will not sleep. I will not falter. I will endure."
The magic locked in with a painful snap.
Alastor gasped, dropping to one knee as the spell bit down on his senses. The fog vanished instantly—replaced by a razor-edged clarity that hurt in its own way. Every sound sharpened. Every thought accelerated.
No rest.
No release.
He stood slowly, testing it.
His eyelids did not flutter. His body did not beg. The creeping pull of unconsciousness was gone entirely, cut out of him like a flaw.
Relief hit first.
Immediate. Powerful.
He laughed—quietly, shakily—and returned to Daisy's side, watching her sleep with renewed intensity.
"There," he murmured. "I've fixed it."
But the relief didn't last.
Hours passed, then more. His body remained awake, but it did not recover. Pain accumulated instead of fading. His muscles ached relentlessly. His thoughts raced too fast, colliding with one another, fraying at the edges.
The magic kept him conscious. It did not keep him whole. By the next evening, his radio static had warped into a thin, erratic hiss. His magic misfired in subtle ways—wards flaring too brightly, then dimming too far. He caught himself staring at nothing, thoughts slipping out of order.
Still, he refused to break the spell. Every time exhaustion threatened to become something dangerous, he looked at Daisy.
She slept peacefully. Safe. Alive, That was enough. "You matter more," he told her, voice tight. "Always." When Charlie knocked that night, he didn't answer.
He couldn't risk her seeing him like this—eyes too bright, movements too sharp, magic buzzing painfully under his skin. He stood silently by the crib, listening to the knock fade away.
Guilt twisted in his chest But not enough to stop him. By the third day without sleep, the cracks deepened. He forgot words mid-sentence. Lost track of time entirely. Once, he reached for Daisy and stopped himself just in time, horrified by how unsteady his hands had become.
Fear roared back—stronger than before.
This was worse.
This was dangerous.
But undoing the spell meant rest. Vulnerability. Trusting the world not to take her while he was gone. Alastor sank into the chair beside the crib, gripping the armrests hard enough to splinter the wood.
"I don't know how to choose," he whispered, voice breaking. "I don't know how to protect you without destroying myself."
Daisy stirred, sighing softly in her sleep.
Alastor leaned forward, pressing his forehead gently against the crib rail, magic crackling painfully beneath his skin.
He had made himself unbreakable.
And in doing so, he was breaking anyway—slowly, quietly, out of love And love, he was learning far too late, could be the most dangerous magic of all.
⸻
Charlie knocked once Then twice. "Alastor," she called softly. "It's me."
No answer.
The silence prickled at her skin. Not peaceful—wrong. The hallway wards felt strained, humming at a pitch she'd never heard from him before. Too tight. Too sharp. "Alastor," she said again, firmer now.
When she opened the door, the first thing she felt was pain. Not her own—his.
The magic in the room was buzzing like a live wire, compressed to the point of screaming. Alastor stood by the crib, unnaturally still, eyes glowing too bright, smile fixed in a way that didn't reach anywhere real.
Charlie froze. "Oh," she whispered. Alastor turned to her immediately. Too quickly.
"Charlie! My dear," he said brightly. Too brightly. "You see—everything is perfectly under control." She took in the details all at once.
The tremor in his hands.
The way his magic snapped instead of flowed.
The exhaustion carved so deep into his face it looked permanent.
The spell—gods, the spell wrapped around him like barbed wire.
"You didn't sleep," she said. Alastor waved a hand dismissively. "Unnecessary. Inefficient. I've resolved the issue." Her jaw tightened. "You did something to yourself."
"For her," he corrected smoothly, gesturing toward Daisy. "And she's fine, as you can see."
Daisy slept peacefully, unaware of the storm holding itself together inches away. Charlie stepped closer. "Alastor... that spell—"
"Is brilliant," he snapped, just a little too fast. "Elegant. Effective. I am fully alert, fully functional, and fully capable." He smiled wider, as if daring her to argue.
She did, "You're lying." The word landed hard.
Alastor's smile faltered for half a second before snapping back into place. "Now, now—"
"You're not fine," Charlie said, voice shaking—not with fear, but anger. "You're barely holding yourself together. Your magic is screaming. You can't even stand still without shaking."
"I am doing exactly what I need to do," he hissed, control cracking at the edges. "I am protecting her."
"At the cost of yourself!" He laughed—sharp, bitter. "Oh, please, I'm expendable." Charlie recoiled as if struck. "No," she said fiercely. "You are not."
He stared at her, genuinely confused.
"That's easy for you to say," he replied quietly. "You don't hear what I hear. You don't feel the ways this can all go wrong. If I sleep, I fail. If I rest, I risk everything."
"That spell is hurting you," Charlie said, tears burning in her eyes now. "And if it collapses—and it will—it could hurt Daisy too."
That stopped him.
Just for a moment.
Fear flickered—raw and unguarded.
"I wouldn't let that happen," he said immediately. "I'm watching. I'm always watching."
"That's the problem!" she cried. "You can't do this alone, Alastor. You're not meant to." He shook his head, almost frantically. "I can't afford trust. I can't afford weakness."
Charlie took a steadying breath, then lowered her voice. "This isn't strength," she said. "This is fear pretending to be control." Silence crashed down between them. Daisy stirred slightly in her crib, making a small sound.
Alastor turned back to her instantly, posture softening despite himself. The contrast was devastating. Charlie watched him—this powerful, terrifying demon reduced to a man unraveling because he loved something fragile.
"You think you're doing fine," she said quietly. "But you're drowning And you don't even realize how deep you are."
Alastor didn't answer.
He just stood there, magic screaming, eyes burning, jaw clenched—terrified to let go, terrified to keep holding on.
And for the first time since Daisy's birth, the lie he'd been telling himself—that he could endure anything alone—began to crack.
Not enough to break.
But enough to hurt And Charlie stayed, unmoving, determined not to let him destroy himself in the name of love—even if he hated her for it.
——-