Hermitcraft Oneshots

Empty Rooms in Old Homes

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TW/CW: N/A

Prompt: Empty rooms

Characters: Cyrus

Style: Angst

Word Count: ~400

AU: Mortuus au

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It had long been unsuitable to live in. Its glass shattered and metal rusted; overgrown and wild. The old house creaked in the breeze, threatening collapse at any moment. Despite this, Cyrus gently pushed open the rotting wood that was left of the front door.

It stepped inside carefully, afraid of disturbing old things best left forgotten. The paint was chipped; it crumbled beneath Cyrus' touch. Some of the pictures were still there, although none were still on the walls. They depicted birthdays and holidays and true, unbroken happiness. It had been a long time since a similar picture could be taken.

Wandering deeper into the house, its eyes lingered on the rooms. It remembered the joy and sorrow and things it thought it had forgotten. It remembered game nights in the living room, wrapped in blankets, and arguments over breakfast in the kitchen. Remembered chasing Wels down the halls and being told to go outside. Remembered the hope and the mistakes and the love that once echoed in every room, hovering close for when it was needed. Love that had long since abandoned those four walls.

It missed it. The love of a happy home. Of routine and family and the way it felt to have somewhere, someone to come home to. The love that had once been so familiar to it, now lost and the feeling barely remembered. Its heart ached for what it knew it couldn't have but what it so desperately needed.

Cyrus didn't know how long it had been stood there, mind shifting from memory to distant memory as if scared to forget them. It hadn't noticed when it had gotten dark but knew it should have left a long time ago. Or maybe it never should have come. It made its way down the familiar hallway for the last time and shut what was left of the door behind it.

Pushing away the memories of rushed goodbyes, it walked away from the house that it used to call a home. It tried to pretend that it meant nothing to it. That it was just some empty rooms. It knew, however, that it couldn't erase the past. That even when there was no trace of the rotting building left, it was and would always be so much more than empty rooms.

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I hope you enjoyed this oneshot! This is the start of a 42-prompt thingy I'm doing. It's meant to be a prompt a day but I'm mostly gonna be doing it over 42 weeks. I've included the prompts in the image at the top if any of you guys want to join in. None of the prompts are mine. I'll also leave them in a list on this note :)

You may also notice that I've cleaned up this book, I hope that it will now be easier to skip any oneshots that you wouldn't want to read for whatever reason.

Until the next one, bye! ~Mors