The door was locked. Not just locked, but carefully soundproofed.
If one could call it soundproofing anyway, it was just a bunch of shirts shoved in the bottom gap with the sides loosely taped up.
The room was dark, save for the enticing blue-white glow of the screens against the wall. Carefully set up so he could watch the door. Just in case.
It felt stupid, what he wanted to do.

Hands idly tapped the stupid looking microphone. Was he stalling? Maybe a little bit.
He'd spent so long setting things up that he wasn't sure if he was even ready to try. Looking up the beginnings of others who had gone down such a path, and how so many of them had started out with far less than what he'd taken the time to do for himself.

Even now, hesitantly sliding into the chair he could see the avatar on one of the screens appear and copy him. That was still weird and funny. He held up a hand like a wave, admiring the squishy red paw pads that mirrored it.
He stared for a minute, pondering the vague emotions he felt somewhere in the distance.
Still stalling.

On a whim, he moved to switch it off. Too much. Too soon. He wasn't sure he'd be able to school his face properly just yet. He still wasn't sure this was a good idea, but he was here now, wasn't he? Too late to turn back.

So he ghosted his hands over the still new headphones, tapping the target pattern on either side with a hint of amusement before sliding them on, eyeing the door one more time like one of them might abruptly open it and discover what he's doing.
Nothing happened.
Fuck, he was actually going to do this.

He opened up the chat conversations he had online with people who had no idea who he really was, what he usually did, and finally typed out a message.

Gonna start a stream now guys, come watch me play Minecraft!

He didn't click the button, though. He just.. stared at it, thinking. The camera was off, no avatar in the corner, just nothing but that border he'd cheekily designed. Distantly in the group chat he saw replies, but wasn't reading them. It was..
Like he was on the edge, the precipice of something he couldn't name.

Finally, a ping ripped his attention from his thoughts.

Good luck, everyone's looking forward to watching you!

So cheerful. Positive. Funny in a way.
He snorted, finally moving.

Ew, you're sappy

Dude, you'd be an awesome streamer just do it already!

Lol

Putting the thoughts out of his mind, he finally went live, moving on to the simplistic game as he considered what to say. His gaze snapped to the three viewers that appeared within a few seconds. Support from people he'd never actually met. It was weird. Different from the borderline family he lived with in a way he still couldn't fully explain, even to himself.
So he just started talking.

“Hey guys. Welcome to the first stream ever. You should probably buckle down for a lot more in the future.” He ignored the twist in his Soul as he said that, a weird mix of excited and uneasy as he spoke in an almost monotone voice, deliberately keeping all his usual distinctive lilting flair out.
Easier not to be recognized that way, yet also almost.. freeing in a sense. The anonymity.

He spun the mouse around, huffing at the five messages already sent.
“I'm going to start off with Minecraft today, nothing too big, just some chill gameplay to start us all off. I heard you guys recommend I try building in creative for a change so that's what we're gonna do here. So sit back, relax, grab some snacks and maybe a nap while I'm in your ear today.”

It rolled off the tongue surprisingly easily as he started loading up a world, hands ever so slightly jittery with the expectation that suddenly someone appearing in the slightly growing chat would recognize him and it would all come crashing down.
But that didn't happen.

He just kept quietly rambling, keeping to that same, carefully constructed near emotionless tone of voice that felt familiar to his low states, all while clinging to that hint of amusement the entire time. He might actually slip into an unfeeling state otherwise.

After about an hour of cracking the most vanilla of all his jokes and ranting so calmly about the lack of knives in the base game it could have been an unenthusiastic discussion, he found himself relaxing slightly. The viewer count had reached a shocking 13 accounts, with just three regularly chatting. The five that had known about him had brought a few friends.

He idly made a crack at the unlucky number mixed with surprise at there being so many for a brand new streamer’s very first time. He tensed a little when the chat took it the wrong way a bit, someone declaring they were going to be a fan from day one and never miss a single stream as others started mentioning alternate accounts.

All of a sudden, that number jumped up to an astonishing 21.
He forced a chuckle despite his surprise and urge to swear. “Fuck, how many accounts do you guys actually have?” Slipped out between his mental filter with a bit more emotion than intended.
Luckily no one seemed to react to the slipup, just immediately replying with numbers. One of them seemed to quote something he didn't get about 70 accounts- he could tell it was a quote but not what, though the absurdity made him snort as somehow conversations between viewers started up in the chat. It was actually moving once every other second.

While he'd seen just how astonishingly fast chat could go with bigger channels, he'd never expected to get very far himself. Especially on the very first try.
He didn't even have much of a goal for viewership or channel growth in the first place, just a desire to test his capabilities at acting normal and having mundane fun. What would be better at testing that than a live audience of strangers?

He wasn't sure when that concept had become more, but it had at some point between settling on the idea of professionally streaming and actually having a full setup.
Now he was here, attempt one, with a full 21 viewers on a basic Minecraft stream. What the fuck was he doing here?

The stream continued for another hour as he just rambled, eventually delving into the topics of normal life. Which he floundered in a little bit.
“I honestly don't know how to pay taxes. I'm pretty sure I've been committing tax fraud for years at this point, though I'd say it's probably the least of my worries anyway.” He muttered automatically before realizing how he shouldn't say that.
“Not that any of you should follow that example or anything. Leave the tax evasion for criminals like me.”

Wow Daggerz, are you really a criminal?

The question appeared in chat and he silently cringed.
Fuck. Now he had to deflect somehow.
“Yeah I'm a criminal, but not on purpose. I stabbed that child in self defense, I swear.”
Suddenly the chat was alive with reactions to the ridiculous response as he simply kept on building in the game. Normally this would be boring, yet his mind was occupied by the chat, the people watching him, the inherent risk of someone recognizing him.
This.. this was fun.
He was having fun.

That actually shut him up for a minute. The weight of realizing that he was enjoying himself here.
Nobody was dying. Or getting hurt. Or even scared.
No, they were just having fun watching him play around and talk.

All of a sudden, he was reminded of Before.
A different time in his life, one he'd mostly blocked out. That person wasn't him. That person was dead.
He..
His Soul twisted uncomfortably and he abruptly felt nauseous.

He wanted to shut everything down right then and there, but he couldn't just cut everything off without explanation. So he made an excuse.
“I'm gonna hafta wrap this up in a minute, everybody. Hope to see you all again soon.” Liar.
He slowed the project to a stopping point as those watching seemed oddly sad to see him go in various ways. It wasn't as amusing as it had been just minutes before.

Now.. all he could think of was of a different time, a naive, innocent little nobody who told shitty jokes on a stage and slept at sentry station.
Disgusting.

Eventually he was able to quit the stream with a weird mix of pride in doing it properly and relief that it was over, all tainted by that undercurrent of loathing.
Fuck, how did he come to this? This was stupid.

He abruptly shot to his feet, hissing incoherently when he stumbled on the wheels of the chair, tipping it over as it slammed the headrest against the edge of the desk, hanging there precariously as he backed away. A warm red glow was blending into the whitish tones of light from the computers, pulsing erratically as he automatically raised a hand to the writhing shape. As if to shield it.
But nothing could ever truly hide what he had become long ago.

He wanted to break it. Destroy everything. He shouldn't be doing this, acting like his history hadn't stained him in blood and dust and mania. Like.. like just another guy.
He was literally putting on an act for them, and for what? Why? There was nothing to gain in the end. It was.. painfully.. excruciatingly mundane.
There was no real thrill. No rush of energy in a lost life, no pounding excitement of meaningless nobodies fleeing like ever so many deer from a predator.
He was-
This was-
He teleported out of the room.

The hall was a little blinding for a few seconds after being in a dark room for hours on end, but he knew the place well enough to start walking anyway. No one would interrupt him today, it was one of those quiet days where they all isolated from each other to do their own things. One of those days where Horror would prep meals for the week, where Nightmare would be holed in his study, reading some kind of novel or history book from wherever the fuck AU's he gets them from. One of those days where Cross was either training or out doing whatever with that purple hooded weirdo.

So he could wander around and do just about anything. Which was what he wanted.
He needed to stop thinking, to get his stubborn mind off of the past.
There was one thing he often resorted to that usually worked.

The room was large, separated from the rest of the mansion to avoid damage to any valuable property, cement floor heavily cracked over years of attacks breaking through it, metal lined walls dented and warped from similar abuse. The outside was a shell of a building to match the weird gothic/dark academia aesthetics of the maybe-mansion-maybe-castle they lived in.

His focus was on the latest row of targets set up against a far wall.
Killer palmed a dagger to his hands, phalanges twitching with memories he needed to forget.

He was never going to be an entertainer.
He was and always would be just a murderer.
The blade sank hilt-deep in the dead red center.
Black droplets hit the cold stone floor with a splatter like blood.
A Soul writhed itself into an unnatural ringed form once more.