warden headcannons (x reader)
✿˖˚ ༘𐙚 > // synop: my warden headcannons. I tried something different this time: some of the x reader parts are tidbit scenarios (def not fic ideas i'm too lazy to write ^_^) cause the ask also mentioned a fic. Reader (you!) is gn and an unspecified mix of inmate/employee/secret third option.
wordcount: 4847
rating: medium well -> (pg13 but read warnings.)
warnings: cursing, unhealthy relationship in general, possessive behavior, warden will NOT leave you alone, possessive behavior, narcissistic behavior, yall think he's a sociopath too?, cannibalism mention
a/n: bit of a darker warden i've written
Ambidextrous
Smells like cinnamon.
Afraid of the dark (and probably has a nightlight/sleeps with a teddy bear).
One of the biggest sweet tooths of all time.
Typa guy to shout “I need my beauty sleep!” when the government is banging on his door to arrest him.
Designed all of the contraptions in his prison; a very talented architect.
Could have been a god tier children’s book illustrator (if he was normal).
Doesn't pay taxes, water bills, electricity bills, etc. (I don't think he has to but if he did, he still wouldn't).
Can control the day/night cycles in Superjail, but doesn't use this power much (may have forgotten about it).
Either perfect or illegible handwriting (I couldn’t decide. Maybe both).
If someone is better at something than he is, either he doesn’t gaf or he banishes them to the shadow realm.
Forgets things so easily.
Even if it’s something he has to do every day or is extremely important, it will probably slip his mind.
Unfortunately, he also forgets to write things down so only god knows how much information has been lost to the depths of the Warden’s shit memory.
Prefers baths to showers (sings in both and is horribly tone-deaf).
Takes the longest, most lavish baths known to man. Will soak in boiling hot water until it turns cold and use so much soap and bath salts the room ends up smelling for days afterwards.
Loses interest in things super quickly. He could be so obsessed with something, for example, a color that he wastes all of Superjail’s budget on recoloring the prison, and the next day the phase is over.
Well, it’s either that or he gets unhealthily obsessed over something unimportant and frankly stupid, throwing his entire life out the window in pursuit of this fixation.
Maybe not a full on sociopath but… you know.
Mid-conversation he will get distracted/an idea or remember something he had to do and proceed to run off, leaving whoever he’s speaking with in the dust (Jared could finally get listened to if he played subway surfers gameplay while he’s talking to the Warden).
This is also why Superjail doesn't have meetings anymore — Warden kept falling asleep or up and leaving in the middle of them
King of unemployment (but he actually has a job so that doesn’t make sense).
Being the warden of Superjail is probably the only job he could ever do. Any other form of employment would end in disaster (he would take too many days off and/or burn the establishment down).
Sucker for happy endings. I bet he would adore Hallmark movies (but I doubt he could sit through a movie with an attention span like his).
I feel like his fortune can not be told. The tarot cards will burn up, the crystal ball will crack, his palm lines will literally shift.
Would probably get addicted to short-form content apps.
Incredible procrastinator when confronted by a problem.
Unless said problem directly endangers or interests him, NO WAY is the Warden gonna put any effort into solving it.
This leads to a lot of conflicts boiling over and causing loads of damage because he ignores them.
So now Jared makes the Warden see the problem and immediately fix it (work smarter, not harder ig)
Has eaten human before. Not saying he liked or disliked it. He’s just eaten human before.
Will lose at a game ONCE and never play it again.
“Practice makes perfect!” NO, practice is a waste of time and effort. Why keep trying again and again like an idiot when you can do something better? (He won't waste time giving a speech about determination and practice to other people).
Plays with his food.
Favorite meal is probably mac and cheese or something childish. Maybe dinosaur nuggets. Maybe both.
Lowkey loves seeing things explode.
Doesn't age; eerily stays looking 35-45 years old; he has that permanent Norwood balding scale stage 3 cut..
Although, he can simply make his hair look however he wants using his magic
Speaking of, Warden relies on his magic way too much. (I wish they made an episode where his magic stops working. I think that would be funny)
Lost something? Fabricates it out of thin air. Needs to get somewhere? Makes a portal or teleports or creates a giant, flying, rainbow train. Hungry? Actually he can’t do anything about that. All the magic food he makes tastes like sand.
He can’t cook either lmao.
On the topic of magic, his shape shifting is very odd. A person won’t feel any pain, but can tell where their body parts are.
His entire closet is the same thing (fuckass purple suit).
Warden is not just in touch with his inner child, he IS the inner child.
ZERO situational awareness.
Would put his mouth under the chocolate fountain even if it’s in the middle of a wedding/awards ceremony/a political leader’s inauguration/he’s being held hostage.
Can take insults fairly well (most of the time), but it depends on who’s insulting him. Typically, he doesn’t realize they’re insults.
Whenever he’s dissed by an inmate, he brushes it off (either thinks it’s some form of endearment or acknowledges that they’re below him, therefore their opinions do not matter).
But if Jared was to insult him (not saying that he ever will), he’ll immediately fire back some crazy insult targeting his insecurities and hand him a mile-high stack of work to do.
Calls breakfast the most important meal of the day.
Stays away from drugs and alcohol (he doesn’t need that stuff anyways, he’s constantly on something)
Loves throwing parties, loves planning parties, loves being in parties, doesn't even think about logistics, doesn't clean up afterwards.
Speaking of, Warden will throw you a BIG ASS party for anything and everything.
Even if you repeat again and again you just want a little party with a few guests, he'll brush you off (You're spitting nonsense! Everyone loves parties!); no matter how small the occasion, he's gonna invite (force) everyone in the jail to come.
Big ceremony, bigger cake, mounds of presents from people you have never seen in your life, and it ends with the room on fire and hundreds of dead bodies.
That's a huge factor in your relationship – the Warden tries to do something nice for you, and it always turns disastrous.
Despite this, he never learns from his mistakes and continues to set up flamboyant events for you that makes the death count and damage costs spike.
Love language, like him, is all over the place. Gift giving is among the least common because he forgets to buy you things – unless it’s spur of the moment. If he does remember, gifts tend to be jewelry (in the Warden’s favorite color(s) because he bought it, not you).
Wearing any of the jewelry he gives you makes his ego explode btw. He gets all giddy and hyper when he sees how good it looks on you and keeps complementing you and showing you off.
Will also buy extremely extravagant flower displays (with no note) and send them to wherever you sleep.
The first time it happened, you almost had a heart attack upon opening the door – loose petals spilled onto the hallway, pooling at your feet, and the headache-inducing floral scent punched you in the face. You struggle through a jungle-esque roomscape, massive, vibrant walls of flowers crowding around you to create a vibrant, fragrant, cramped alleyway. The only thing breaking up bunches of flowers in every hue imaginable (some looking straight unnatural- did that one just blink at you?!) were strange topiaries of cherubs and anatomically correct hearts and buff, tophat-wearing men. Some bouquets were so tall they bent at the ceiling, drooping over what you thought was your bed — in its place stood a huge heap of vibrant red roses. You finally reach a clearing and turn in a slow circle, taking in what looked like the aftermath of a car crash – if said cars were made of flowers. You had no idea, a.) where this monstrosity came from, b.) who sent all these flowers, and c.) what to do with them (and how to get them out!).
You ended up sleeping on your floor because you were too tired to even attempt to move anything. You know, once you get used to the smell, it’s really not that bad.
The next day, the Warden asks if you got his “little gift.” You give him a dead-eyed stare and somehow stamp down the urge to wring his neck.
If you haven't officially accepted him as your boyfriend, just know he’s gonna try and pick you up every time he sees you.
He’s really obvious about it.
Hardly any sense of embarrassment too, so the only person feeling self-conscious is you as he proclaims his undying love for you in front of a bunch of incarcerated, filthy, aging men.
Horrible, HORRIBLE pick up lines!!!!
Absolutely terrible pet names (fym i’m your “delicious honeybunny darling”).
Do you love your personal space? Oh wow, so does he! You have so much in common!
Insists on walking side-by-side, and upon doing so, he’s so close your shoulders are practically touching —when you try inching away, he follows right along.
Whenever he asks you a question he leans in really close. Like it's not even lovey-dovey or anything, just plain weird.
Teleports you to his office whenever he feels like it (which is frequently). Mercifully, this doesn't happen as much as it could; the Warden appears to have some semblance of courtesy.
Like most in the jail, (cough Jared) you end up being ready to work on his incredibly janky, extremely nonlinear, horribly The-Warden-of-Superjail schedule.
Even if it’s after midnight, you're suddenly falling through cold air, only knowing that wherever you are is not your bed.
Sprawling on scratchy carpet, your glazed expression recognizes the Warden’s office. Half-asleep eyes meet a moonlit silhouette of your boss/warden/boyfriend, thoroughly shocked by his appearance; you hadn't seen him in several days and, quite frankly, he looks like shit. Suit dirty, stained, and wrinkled, hair disheveled, top hat askew (but somehow still on his head), the Warden heaves you up to your feet and begins to talk rapidly, bloodshot eyes leading a frantic pace through paper-littered floors and stacks of mugs long-since emptied, rambling about something that you just can't grasp because you're falling asleep again.
He’ll suddenly wake you — whether it be violent shaking or ice cold water materialized from thin air, your eyes snap open and you’re forced to listen to his cryptic, paranoid speech until the sun rises and Jared comes in with today's agenda, or he collapses out of pure exhaustion.
Bottom line: even though he has a schedule, the Warden sleeps and wakes when he wants. Everyone else just has to adapt to it.
You better be a good listener (or able to tolerate long ass, one-sided yap sessions) because Warden is GOING to talk. A lot. And it will be about many different topics with little to no linearity.
On his lengthy rambles, he tends not to listen to you; if you try to interject he’ll probably talk over you, but if he’s in a bad mood he’ll be all passive aggressive (Did I ask for your opinion? Oh, sorry, was I talking to you?)
You never really get bored because there's always something going on in Superjail…
…
…
..but if the Warden feels like you aren't paying enough attention to him, he will make Superjail boring to force you into asking him for entertainment.
It's Monday, then Tuesday, then Wednesday, and a sudden realization dawns upon your lounging form – as of late all you had been doing is relaxing in your room, doting on the exciting events of last week while nothing, absolutely nothing had chaotically disrupted the peace.
Your confusion sparks a list of missing occurrences you’d gotten used to: there was a lack of all out war between ancient empires and/or mythical creatures, the Warden hadn't dragged you to some weird event of his, and not a single building had been engulfed in flames. Plus, there was no weekly riot! And there were always riots on Wednesdays.
For the past three-or-four days, you'd just been passing time in your room reading or writing or drawing whatever time-killing hobby currently interested you. Sudden boredom overwhelms you, so you decide to take a walk and search for entertainment — maybe there’s a knife fight in the yards or some wacky prisoner punishment you hadn’t seen yet.
It’s not long before you've crossed paths with the Warden himself (of course you encounter each other; he’d been waiting all day for you to come find him!) and comment on how Superjail’s been so …quiet.
The Warden’s quick to respond – he purrs that if it's been too boring and you’re in dire need of a neat little event to keep things interesting, he could possibly… make something explode, or release a bloodthirsty beast. It’ll be a little favor between friends, a little chaos just for you! But keep in mind – when the time comes, you'll have to do something for him in return.
Oh how the Warden loves his bargains.
Something else he loves: when you compliment him.
Anything as stupid as “your tie looks nice” has him wearing a dumb-as-a-doornail grin all day.
Occasionally, he’ll stare at you until you take the hint and give him a half-hearted compliment (followed by the Warden’s bright reply: “Aw, you’re such a sweetie-pie!” or “You didn’t have to say that, sugarbear!” (you really did have to say that because he would have gotten even more insufferable)).
But don't worry – he compliments you back! Sometimes so much so that it makes you squirm with discomfort (which, truth be told, makes him about as happy as getting a compliment).
As soon as he learns what you're interested in, he gets into it as well.
Then he promptly goes off the rails and gets way more obsessed than you, going as far as building a time machine and/or kidnapping the creator(s) or ripping through the space-time continuum to find his favorite characters themself.
May or may not have a shrine for you in his closet (complete with rose petals and candles, many photos of you (in varying degrees of blurriness), and some of the stupidest things – your crumpled gas station receipt and a pen you threw out because it ran out of ink, to name a few.)
He’s really obsessed with making sure you have breakfast in bed. If you get up to eat breakfast instead of letting him be all flamboyant and send you a four course meal, he will genuinely get mad.
Frequently boasts about how well liked and important he is.
Yes, you can see right through his gloating, but that doesn’t mean he’s gonna stop (or you’re gonna tell him to stop, because that makes it way worse)
I haven’t mentioned that the Warden doesn’t like being declined, have I?
Well – to him, denial is a form of disrespect, an attack on his authority (and good lord does this man loooove his authority).
If you don’t give him (what typically is) an answer to a question of his – he’ll get offended and start bugging you. It’s best to give in sooner rather than later — most of what he asks of you isn’t that important anyways.
It’ll be small at first — examples being, in every conversation you have, the Warden will bring up the topic, or mention it loudly when you’re around. The most harmful it gets is a mean retort or snappy comeback, yet the more stubborn you are, the more annoying he’ll become — this man is relentless.
By week two he’ll probably cease to leave you alone if he can help it (you breathe a sigh of relief whenever he’s hauled off to actually do his job). You’re frequently awakened by the shouting of his request outside your window in the middle of the night.
Soon, you begin to avoid the Warden, taking different routes or turning sharply and hurrying off in another direction. The difficulty of finding you paired with the difficulty of your stubbornness, of course, makes the situation much worse. Avoidance boosts his thinly veiled frustration that grows with each dead-end of an interaction.
If you last three weeks, he’ll resort to ulterior methods to obtain his goal, to force you to buckle and give in (you WILL give in. He can keep this stuff up forever).
Well, this is an unusually serious matter, but let’s say you don’t want to move your room closer to his.
The first few days, the Warden asks you every single goddamn day if you’re reallllllyyyy sure about not wanting to be closer to him. By the end of the week he’s planting fears into your head through offhand comments (I heard the area of the Jail you’re in is real dangerous! Inmates die in Superjail every day! You wouldn’t wanna join them, would you?)
Then maybe he’ll hire thugs to stake out the hallway leading to your room, make them chase you a little, or hell, even break in and muss your stuff up; nothing too bad, of course, just a necessary, garish display of how utterly dangerous Superjail is. You need the Warden to protect you.
The next day he’s looking at you with stupidly expectant eyes, asking if you “slept alright, dear?” (oohhh he’s such a little bitch… i want him)
And if, instead of asking for a room switch, you scoff and turn your head away, the Warden stops with his silly games.
The next day, you’ll step outside to completely unfamiliar surroundings; confusion and dread erupts when you recognize the Warden’s door right across from yours. He’ll gleefully burst out of his room to greet you, talking incessantly about the wonderful day ahead, and all the fun you’re gonna have together, and how perfect this new setup is.
What I’m trying to say is, the Warden gets what he wants. Always. (and if he can’t, he gaslights himself into thinking he didn't even want it anyways).
He’s really obsessed with making sure you have breakfast in bed. If you get up to eat instead of letting him be all flamboyant and send you a three course meal, he will genuinely get mad.
LOOVEES physical touch. Something about feeling your body heat against his, feeling you shift into his touch, knowing your bodies fit together perfectly overloads the serotonin in his brain. Skin-on-skin enthusiast right here.
When he gets the chance to hug you, he loops his arms around you eight times and squeezes you really hard (like some weird snake).
Nuzzles you like a cat (probably purrs, too).
Also loves picking you up and twirling you around, especially when it catches you off guard.
Despite how obsessive he may seem so far, your relationship with the Warden is incredibly unstable due to his weird ass mood swings.
One moment he’s serenading you during some elaborate, romantic dinner or cuddling, rambling sweet nonsense, and the next he’s nowhere to be found.
As you search for the Warden, you’ll spot a flash of purple upon a cloud whizzing through the sky, or hear from Jared he went to visit that German doctor in the basement (Warden forbids you entry… you often wonder why).
But next morning he's dragging you all over Superjail on his daily rounds or to show off something he’s been working on. He won’t let you out of his sight; you’re glued to his side like he’s glued to yours. And then minutes later he ran off to go make Jared miserable with a new idea of his.
He claims life is best when you’re around, and if you know anything about the Warden, he wants life to be best every second of the day (but that doesn’t explain why he simply abandons you in the middle of hanging out — if anything, it makes it more confusing).
The Warden actually doesn't get as much free time as you’d think. Yes, he has his (very frequent) days off, but work days in which he is confined to his office do exist (shocker!).
These horrid periods of time are consumed by the worst thing in the world — long hours doing paperwork that only the Warden can do. During these days, you basically fuel him – you're on his mind every second he counts down, planning more ways to chase you down and annoy you.
Would be a terrible caretaker if you got sick. If you value your life at all, don’t even tell him – stay in your room and let whatever it may be pass on its own.
First off, the Warden wouldn’t understand how or why you’re sick; even if you have a common cold, he’ll probably assume you’re cursed and bring in every type of medical cure from witch doctors to chemotherapy to clickbait article writers. You can’t eat anything he feeds you cause there’s a high guarantee it’s laced with a pill he heard would save you (source: some crackhead). He just cares about you is all :(
But he’ll genuinely get angry if you aren’t feeling better by a certain date; he’ll pout and refuse to visit you, or if he does visit you, he remains passive aggressive and/or standoffish the whole time.
Typically your relationship is very relaxed, but Warden will have weird phases where he gets paranoid as fuck.
Will actually SNIFF YOU to make sure you haven't been with another man.
Wanted to inject a tracker into your blood stream without your knowledge but he probably forgot or was too lazy to make one (thank god).
Gives you a curfew, too. (It’s a big and dangerous place out there, he explains, wouldn’t want you hurt or lost or kidnapped! Or god knows what else) (honestly? He just wants a time to look forward to so he can find you on command)(and he gets off on that feeling of controlling little aspects of your life but who said that?)
…puts the freak in control freak.
He's also dumb enough to not realize he’s being manipulated. Need to go for a walk (alone) to clear your head? All you have to do is make eyes at him and ask nicely, and he completely melts, forgetting about all the dangers he constantly reminds you of.
If you sleep next to him you're gonna wake up with his arms and legs wrapped around you like a cage. You can’t roll over or get up, you can hardly even breathe.
The longer your relationship stands, there’s two ways I can see it going:
One: he gradually gets more and more disinterested. To him, you were just a toy – something he occupied himself with for a little while, but no more. Now, he needs something new and interesting.
You find yourself longing for the silly interactions with that overbearing man, no matter how infuriating he could get.
And you realize how the Warden had cut you off from the world – no matter how close you were, each and every friend or family member was chased off. Rekindling your old relationships after this long would be tedious and difficult; overall, it was something you just didn't have the energy for.
Your depressive state grows and grows, all while the Warden is moving onto greater and greater things, completely unburdened by his abandonment of you.
But let's be real – that's not what you came here for, now is it, my good friend?
So here we have option two: he gradually gets more and more possessive.
You drive him absolutely insane. Everything about you is somehow, astoundingly perfect for him. He’s convinced you’re his soulmate – your body is perfection, your mind is fascinating, and every second with you feels like cloud 9.
It’s clear the Warden has a thing for control. Yes, he slacks off, but his iron-fisted rule on Superjail withstands hindrance after hindrance; he thrives in his absolutist regime, thrives in the feeling of exerting power over others with not a single opposer in sight.
So obviously, he absolutely adores the idea of controlling you – a toxic merge of love and power is better than any drug out there.
Alas he doesn’t see it as simply “controlling” you, it’s much closer, much more intimate.
Running you – like his prison – better encapsulates it.
Like most things, it starts out subtle, or as subtle as it can get with the Warden, anyway.
i.e, during your lunch break, the Warden exclaims in his ever-cheerful voice, “You’re eating with me today, honeybunny!”
You can do so much as blink before you’ve been sat in some grand, intricate dining hall – one of many forgotten by the Warden until this very moment – dazed eyes reading the four course menu while he sits on the other end of the table, forty rows down, prattling on and on about whatever he feels like, his incessant chatter fading in and out of background noise.
The kitchen was told to “take their time,” so the lunch drags into dinner. Mercifully, you have cutlery, but this unfortunately is not permanent; by the third time the Warden pulls something like this, he simply feeds you himself while going on and on about how beautiful Superjail is at night and all the nighttime activities he has planned (as it's currently 1 PM).
Then he’s creating your wardrobe, planning your daily schedule (all but a carbon copy of his), planning everything for you when, in all his life, he’s never planned anything for himself.
(But he still takes you out on an impromptu excursion. He is, after all, the Warden of Superjail.)
But it doesn’t just stop at planning.
No, he’s serious about wanting to be with you every second of the day. Not just on a physical level, on a mental level, too.
The Warden is slowly chipping away at your boundaries and barriers until he’s uncovered everything there is to see; until you’re just like him — utterly and wholly infatuated.
Or that's what he thinks is going on anyways.
He’s hardly “chipping away,” moreover saying things he’s not even aware are threats, and you hand him the information out of fear or fatigue — you’ve seen what he’s capable of, how impulsive he is, and no matter how energetic you are he will drain you.
But he thinks all these answers are a sign of trust, a proclamation of love; this delusion feeds his adoration for you and by taking the easy way out, all you’re doing is digging your own grave (but there’s no “way out” in general, now is there? You’re in his domain, in his prison, nonetheless),
But what could a person squeeze from a victim that they've already backed into a corner and mentally dissected upon a cold bed of terror?
Well, there's always something new to learn! For example, how you interact with the world, analyzed through the trusty way of stalking (hell, he’ll even put you in a situation or two, just to see what happens! Don’t worry about all the death and destruction – it’s all illusions, anyways. Is it?).
One day he just lets you leave. He just opens the doors to his room and lets you go. So as you meander down a path, you ponder about the absence of the Warden. How strange it is to lack something that’s so common it’s second nature – you feel like an inmate being released from a prison they’ve spent half their life in. Too bad you'll never truly be free.
But alas, sometimes the Warden will get too busy, but don't worry, he has a solution!
While freedom is all fine and good, you swear there's a shadow in your peripheral every time you turn your head. In fact, it’s become so common you've begun to ignore it, blaming it on sleep deprivation — the Warden has been summoning you every time you try to go to bed,and you’re beginning to think he’s attempting to indoctrinate you into his jacked up sleep schedule.
You, of course, would have no idea that there's private investigators watching your every move, even if what you've been doing as of late is keeping to your room — the only place you feel secure.
But that feeling won't last for long — your room, his room, same difference.
Warden won't hesitate to exploit your fears to ensure you never leave Superjail, meanwhile he’s justifying all his actions with the good ole’ umbrella term of “love.”
It gets to the point where you're with him, always. Might as well handcuff you two together.
And maybe he does end up following through with that tracker idea, but it doesn’t matter at this point.
He keeps you caged like a bird, never letting you anywhere he doesn’t want you around.
After all, there’s all these big scary men who’ll do god knows what to you!
What, you think just cause you’re not an inmate you get special treatment?
