Obsessive

Canon-compliant.  The Curse of the House of Fëanor.  Inescapable.  Goes from Darkening of Valinor up to the Second Kinslaying.  Quenya names used (Maedhros = Maitimo, Fëanor = Fëanáro, Fingon = Findekáno, Amras = Telvo, Maglor = Makalaurë).  General craziness.  Takes place in First Age. Introspective.

Disclaimer: Tolkien owns the characters and plot

Pairings: none

Characters: Maedhros, Maglor, Fingon, (sort of) Fëanor, (mentions of most of the Royal House of the Noldor, Amras, the Sindar, Morgoth, random orcs/balrogs and Eru)

Warning: canon-compliant, canon character death, obsessive behavior, insanity, premeditated homicide, mildly explicit descriptions of violence and gore (including but not limited to murder), allusions to torture and mutilation, lots of revenge (uh, yeah... hope I didn't miss anything >.>)

Song: One Reason

Words: 924
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obsession (noun): a persistent disturbing preoccupation with an often unreasonable idea
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/obsession?show=0&t=1362942535

When Fëanáro had been amongst the living, Maitimo had never understood his father.

Always, he had been preoccupied, something always on his mind that drew him away from reality.  Always another project, more jewels to be made and gold to be shaped, more inventions to be created.  More hours to be spent hidden away in the dark of the forge with only fire and dark thoughts for company. Rare was the time that Fëanáro focused on his family.  Rarer still was the absence of fey light in those eyes.

And then Morgoth had happened, and Fëanáro went off the deep end.

Nothing seemed to reach his father but thirst for revenge and the relentless need to reclaim his treasures.  Maitimo had realized then that his father had gone completely mad, that his entire world revolved around three glowing gemstones and eradicating anyone who dared to stand between him and his goals.  Not his people or his brother or his nephews or even his sons could purge away the hunger that seemed to gnaw right through the essence of everything that the great prince had once been.  When Telvo had perished, their father had not even blinked.  As if the death of his son didn't matter.  Nothing mattered but getting back the Silmarilli.  Nothing.

Maitimo had not understood.  Never understood.

Until now.

No one noticed it.  Not Makalaurë.  Not Findekáno.  Not even himself at first.  But Angband had changed him.

Lying in his own filth, tortured until his mind could think only of pain and hunger and thirst and cold, Maitimo knew he had gone just as mad as Fëanáro had ever been, alone in the darkness in the deepest dungeons of hell on earth.  The urge to rip apart those who tormented him with his bare hands became an obsession.  Rage burned and twisted in his gut, until all he could think to distract himself from horror was that he wanted them to suffer as he suffered.  Oh, how he desired to see their blood painting the walls, their innards shredded at his feet, their bones ripped through flesh in a tangled array of gore.  How he desired to have the foul taste of black blood on his tongue, slick between his fingers and matted in his hair.

And Aiya! how he wanted to take what most the Dark Lord coveted and rip it forcefully away as had been done to him.  How he wanted to leave the towering shadow bereft, knowing that he had been defeated, that he had been humiliated by a lowly elf!  How intoxicating the very thought was! And then the bastard could rot in his shame, and Maitimo thought his lust would be satisfied, the vicious animal resting in his spirit sated by rivers of blood and the light of his revenge.

Eventually, he had given up even that hope, but being rescued and roused from his morose hibernation had brought back that fury tenfold.  With a sword in his lone hand and no chains holding him to an icy, filthy dungeon wall, he could begin anew.  He could create himself over again, create himself in an image that would give his enemies nightmares.

He could make them suffer.  He could make them run from him in terror, make them fear him to the very core of their rotten beings.  His spirit sang at the very notion!

The quick recovery gave his people hope, brought smiles to his brothers' faces.  But none of them realized that something much worse than a broken spirit was writhing just below the surface, begging and pleading to be let loose upon their nemesis--be it Morgoth and his forces or the innocent people of Doriath or Eru Ilúvatar himself!.  Obsessive thirst for revenge bubbled like lava through his veins until sometimes it felt almost physically painful.  Until the phantom burning of his right hand wracked him with agony, nonexistent fingers twisted unnaturally into claws.  Until he wanted to scream and tear his hair from his scalp or smash something against the wall into a million tiny pieces that would lie scattered across the floor.

Until he wanted to kill someone and scatter their body as he scattered those shards, bathe in their thick, warm blood until it soaked permanently into his flesh like ink unto pale sheets.

No one noticed the shadow growing day by day, hidden beneath blazing fire and a shield of vicious calculation.  When he looked at himself in the mirror, his eyes looked more and more like his with each year that passed.

Losing Findekáno had been the last straw.  Just like with his father.  And Maitimo could only wonder how long the same violent thirst had been burning beneath Fëanáro's skin before the prince had snapped.

When the time came to march upon Doriath, Maitimo did not hesitate.  He smiled and bared his teeth in hunger, in overpowering lust.  And he rent apart the people without mercy and coated his flesh in their blood, splattered their bodies across the floors and walls with glee.  In his mind's eye, he could almost taste victory, the burn of terror in his nose and the sound of screams ringing in his ears.  So close, yet so far beyond his reach...

And then it was over.

When he was presented the bodies of three of his brothers, brothers he had cared for since they were little elflings, he had not even blinked.

The thirst had not been sated.

And he understood.
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Is this angst?  I'm not entirely sure about this LOL.  In any case, I've been listening to awesome music and watching Trinity Blood again, which definitely gives me a taste for bloodshed.  And the anime isn't even half as gory as the manga.

In any case, yesterday my friend Martha sent me a link to this song (One Reason by DWB feat. Fade, the Deadman Wonderland opening song) and I've been listening to it all morning and afternoon.  Lovely song in its own way.  By the way, Deadman Wonderland is an awesome anime if you've got the stomach for it.  I will freely admit that it gets pretty gory and bloody, gladiator battles and lots of blood and such.  I don't think it's as bad as Hellsing Ultimate OVA, though.  DW blurs out the really nasty stuff.

Sorry for more crazy!Maedhros (=Gold-Seven artwork on dA: Maedhros alone stood aside and Kinslayer, both a touch out of her normal style), but I like him.  If you want him to stop being crazy, go on dA and read "Insanity" by ~mog9089.  The two overlap, but "Insanity" is much less introspective.  No happy endings guaranteed.