#because it's scary and dehumanizing every. single. time. i feel so fucking scared each time

[ninja-go-to-therapy]

The Rescue

The day is upon us. 

Fun fact, this chapter has been in the making since February 2nd of 2020.

Summary: two strangers break in.

Trigger Warnings: pet whump, dehumanization, stockholm syndrome, violence, kidnapping, death threats, possessive whumper, and just like... general uncomfy vibes associated with the aforementioned warnings. If that sounds like it would bother you, please don’t read!

3715 words

The day had been good. 

The snowfall outside was thick and heavy, coating the world in white. It was pretty, and he’d liked looking at it through the window, curled up at his Master’s side while a fire blazed. Master had been reading something, absentmindedly petting him while he did so.

It had been warm and comfortable, and he’d loved every second of it.

Even if looking at the snow reminded him of a long time ago. When he had still been bad. When he had been punished more often, when he’d fought against what Master had wanted.

He shuddered just thinking about it.

But it was okay. He was good now. Master had put up with how much trouble he’d been in the beginning (and he was so, so grateful), and it had paid off. He was happy now.

The snow had been pretty.

Now, here he was, comfortably curled up on his bed and beginning to drift off to sleep, hair still somewhat wet from his bath. Master had given him a warm, fluffy blanket now that it was cold again, and he loved it so much he’d almost cried.

It was black, like his collar.

Just as he was losing his connection to consciousness, he heard a… commotion, outside the door.

He snapped his eyes open, suddenly wide awake. Was Master hurt? It had sounded like a crash. Had he tripped? Had something fallen? What was going on on the other side of that door?

The handle jiggled, and he felt dread coiling tightly in his stomach. Something was telling him that he needed to hide.

He sat up, but before he could get any further, the door came open, slamming loudly against the wall.

In the doorway, illuminated only by the light out in the hall, was definitely not his Master. Instead, there were two men, or maybe boys, dressed in brightly colored outfits. He stared at them. They stared at him.

The dread turned to nausea and a sick feeling crawling under his skin made him want to tear it all off. He grimaced at the imagery that brought to his mind, flesh being ripped from bone. Master would be upset if he did that. It would make him less pretty. And Master loved that he was pretty.

“Cole,” one of the boys breathed, finally snapping out of his trance. He had darker hair than the other one. Curlier, too. Quick as lightning, he was on his knees, directly in front of Pet.

He looked at the stranger in terror, not daring to move. He was going to attack him, or worse, and what then? What was he supposed to do?

The stranger lunged, and Pet squeezed his eyes shut, expecting a blow. But instead, two strong arms wrapped around him, the boy pulling him close.

“Cole,” he sobbed, tightening his grip around him. “Oh, first master,” he managed to get out between cries. “I knew you weren’t dead, I knew it…”

The other one joined the first stranger in entrapping Pet in their arms, holding him uncomfortably close. Only now that both of them were doing this did the shock begin to wear off.

Two strange boys had broken into his home, and now they were trying to restrain him.

He needed to… he needed… he needed to do something! He was too weak to defend himself, and with two of them, they could easily overpower him anyway. But he couldn’t just do nothing. Master would — oh. That seemed like a good plan.

They pulled away, and the blond one cupped Pet’s face, looking at him in what sort of seemed like misery in its purest form. Maybe there was some relief in there too. He didn’t know, and he didn’t care.

Pet couldn’t take it any longer. He screamed.

He screamed at the top of his lungs, scrambling back and away from the two intruders until his back hit the wall. Even then, he didn’t stop screaming.

No words. He didn’t want to get in trouble for speaking. But he screamed as loud as he could manage, praying his Master would come for him. Would save him.

Panic lit in the one wearing blue’s eyes. “Stop screaming!” he begged, “it’s us!”

He couldn’t breathe. He needed help, he needed to get away. He reluctantly let his screams die down, knowing that if Master hadn’t heard him already, he still wouldn’t hear him if he kept going. He prayed Master had heard him. He needed to be saved.

“Jay,” the one in green said, yanking on the blue one’s arm. He looked like he was going to yell, but stilled as the blond jerkily gestured to the room itself.

He glanced in the general direction the other one had been pointing, and his face absolutely dropped. Pet just pushed himself further into the corner, trying not to imagine what they would do to him.

They would want to hurt him. They would maybe even kill him. Would they try to kidnap him? Did they have something against his Master? Was that why they were doing this?

Why else would they go after a pet?

“Cole,” the one in green said, tears shining in his eyes. “All this time…” he whispered, voice choked up. “I’m so sorry.” he was directly in front of Pet again, now. He had nowhere to run. “I’m so, so sorry.” He was being held again.

It wasn’t comforting, like when Master held him. It was scary and wrong and disgusting and he needed to get away.

He hated that they kept calling him Cole. That wasn’t — he didn’t — that wasn’t right. That wasn’t him. That wasn’t his name. He wasn’t Cole, he had never been Cole. He was a pet, and nothing more.

These boys were trying to hurt him. That was all that was important, anyway.

The blond one put his hands over Pet’s, a green light emanating. Pet only had a moment to be alarmed before the boy was… pulling his handcuffs off?

He stared at the boy in bewilderment. Why would he have done that? So it would be easier to take him, maybe?

The thought made him sick.

Footsteps pounded on the stairs above. It had to be Master. He was coming to save him!

The blue one slammed the door shut, barricading it with his body. “Lloyd,” he called, “get that fucking collar off of him.”

They were going to take his collar?

No! No, no, no, he needed his collar, he loved his collar, they couldn’t just take it! A soft whimper escaped him as he covered what he could with his hands. He wouldn’t let them take it without a fight.

“What’s going on in there?”

Master was going to save him.

“Lloyd!” the ginger snapped.

“I’m working on it! Cole is freaking out!”

There was too much chaos, too much stress. He’d never been more terrified before. From the other side, Master was banging on the door, doing everything in his power to get in. Master would protect him. He knew he would.

Tears built up in his eyes. There was so much noise around him. Strangers were trying to hurt him. Master had been locked out. Each pound on the door was like a hit directly to his skull. Too much, it was all too much.

The blue one looked panicked, stressed. No doubt because his plan (whatever that may have been) was about to be foiled.

The other one moved to gently try to pry Pet’s hands away from his collar, and it might have been the stupidest thing to do, but he was so scared and he couldn’t just let them take him away and he couldn’t let them take his collar away and he just wanted this all to stop and — he screamed. Again.

The one who wasn’t trying to attack him nervously looked between them and the door. He closed his eyes for a moment, like he was preparing himself for something. Pet could only wonder what.

The boy stepped away from the door.

The door came open in an instant, which startled his attacker badly enough to give Pet the chance to escape. Immediately, he scrambled away, hiding behind Master.

For the first time, there was silence. And then…

“Let go of him,” the one in blue said, his voice coming out in a deep growl. Pet didn’t know why, but it sounded wrong. Like his voice wasn’t supposed to be so angry, or so serious. 

“Not a chance,” Master glared, standing in front of his pet protectively.

Everything was going to be fine, he told himself. Nothing bad could happen if Master was here to protect him.

“I swear to the First Spinjitzu Master himself. If you don’t let him go, I will kill you,” the blond said, harboring a flare so fierce it could burn through steel.

“He’s mine!”

“No he’s not!” the one in blue yelled.

He was so scared.

The same green that had been used to take away his handcuffs resurfaced in the other boy’s hands. “Try me.”

When Master made no move to give him up, the ginger’s hands crackled with… electricity? Lightning? He’d always been scared of lightning.

“Cole,” the blond one said, “move.” He looked angry. Light was sparking from his fingertips, now, illuminating the room in a deadly shade of green.

“You can’t have him!” Master yelled, “He’s mine!”

The boy actually screamed at that, the glow travelling up his entire body until Pet could hardly stand to look that way. It was so bright. The energy almost crackled and popped, like an angry fire.

“Time’s up.”

The room exploded in light.

— — —

Lloyd and Jay sat exhausted in Cole’s bedroom, watching over his sleeping form. It had been far too long since either of them had come in here.

Honestly, it had been far too long since Lloyd had done much of anything. This last year may have very well been one of the worst of his life.

But now they had found their brother. He was back, he was safe.

Lloyd tried not to think about the horrors he’d seen in that basement. But he couldn’t stop his mind from wandering.

A cage. A dog bed. Chains. The collar that Cole had defended so fiercely.

And Cole… had been scared of them. He hadn’t uttered a single word, just stared at them with wide eyes, shrinking back whenever Lloyd or Jay had tried to get close. He’d been so uncomfortable, so terrified.

And then the monster who had done this to his big brother got in. Cole had gone to him immediately like a — he wanted to vomit just thinking about it — trained dog. If the room was anything to go off of, that was exactly the idea.

Cole had been stuck in that basement for a year, and Lloyd couldn’t help but think that it was a little bit his fault.

If he’d helped more, if he’d done anything more than lying in bed all day, miserable, then maybe they would have found him sooner. But no, Cole had been trapped there for so long and now… now he was hurt.

That was the only way Lloyd could really think to describe it.

Just thinking about the way he had screamed sent shivers up Lloyd’s spine. He’d been so desperate to get away from them.

Cole was strong. He was a leader, he was a rock. So to see him looking so small and weak, helpless, terrified — it was jarring in the worst possible way. He’d never thought Cole could be reduced to that.

And yet he had been.

The man who had done this to him — Lloyd couldn’t recall his name, and right now, he couldn’t give less of a fuck — had actually had the audacity to claim that Cole was his. What made it even worse, however, was that Cole didn’t protest at all. Like he actually believed it.

It was probably for the best that he’d been knocked unconscious. Lloyd hadn’t meant to — he’d been so angry, so full of raw emotion, his powers had just… reacted. Cole was in the wrong spot at the wrong time, and was sent crashing into the wall, slumping over.

The only reason it was a good thing was that, if he really did think he cared for the bastard who had hurt him, he would have been upset to see Jay and Lloyd beat him to the brink of death. It would have only traumatized him further.

Lloyd had never considered himself to be a violent person before. He always tried to find the most effective solution while doing as little harm as possible to his opponent, but this… this was different. He’d never hated someone so much. 

And so he’d let his anger out, screaming and hitting and giving that man every bad thing he deserved. He deserved worse. He deserved so much worse. But eventually, Jay had pulled him back, told him that Cole was their priority.

He’d wanted to hurt him more. But what damage he had inflicted was still sickly satisfying, burn marks from both lightning and energy alike littering his skin. He hoped they were permanent. He hoped that man remembered every second of hurt they’d inflicted on him.

He hoped he would endure it a million times over.

But that wasn’t important right now. What he needed to be worried about was that Cole had already been scared of them, but now… now he was almost scared for him to wake up.

He hadn’t meant to hurt Cole. He really hadn’t. It had been an accident.

But Cole wouldn’t see it that way.

He would see it as a deliberate attack, and if he found out what they had done to his kidnapper, he would likely only panic even worse. No matter what angle you looked at it from, it was Lloyd’s fault. Again.

“Maybe I shouldn’t be here when he wakes up,” he mumbled.

Jay opened his mouth, likely to contradict him, but Lloyd beat him to it. “I blasted him really hard. He’s going to hate me. Don’t try to tell me he won’t.”

Jay sighed, looking over at Cole sadly. “We don’t know how his mental state is right now,” he finally said. “I don’t really… first master, I don’t know how he’ll be when he wakes up or where to go from there or what to do no matter what happens.” he ran a hand through his hair, twirling a curl anxiously.

Lloyd could relate. He stood, approaching Cole carefully. He looked peaceful now, curled up on the mattress. 

None of his old clothes had fit him anymore, so the two of them had needed to rummage around in the rest of the ninjas’ stuff until they’d found something that worked. Jay had always been a fan of oversized sweaters, and he’d been happy to give one of them up for Cole. It didn’t fit perfectly, but they’d figured it was the best they could do for now. 

They’d also found a pair of sweatpants neatly folded on Zane’s bed, and had taken those, too. Lloyd doubted he would mind.

Lloyd brushed his fingers gently through Cole’s hair, his heart lifting the slightest bit when Cole smiled faintly in his sleep.

Maybe he would be okay after all.

— — —

Pet woke up on something soft. Softer than the floor, softer than his bed. What…?

Oh no. What if it hadn’t been a nightmare? What if it had been real? It was too soft, and he couldn’t feel the reassuring weight of his collar around his neck, of his cuffs on his wrists.

They’d taken him. They’d stolen him! Not only that, but they’d removed every ounce of his very identity! No cuffs. No collar. He was as good as nothing without them.

He could hear his kidnappers speaking quietly somewhere nearby, though he couldn’t make out any of the words.

He had to think. If they’d succeeded in stealing him, what had they done to his Master? What if they had hurt him? What if he was dead? 

What did these bad people even want with him? Why were they doing this?

He wanted to cry. He was alone, and scared out of his mind, and he wanted his Master so badly. But Master wasn’t here. If he couldn’t have his owner, he could have at least turned to his collar for the smallest bit of comfort. But they’d stolen it, just like they’d stolen him.

This was so bad.

He was so bad.

He was bad for letting these people kidnap him and he was bad for letting them take his collar and handcuffs away, and he was bad, always bad. He deserved to be punished.

“Cole?” someone asked. It wasn’t his name. He hated being called that. But he knew they were addressing him. “Are you… awake?”

If they were asking, then they must have known. He didn’t know why they were trying to act so gentle about it. They were bad people. If nothing else, he could be sure of that.

Reluctantly, he opened his eyes, wanting to crawl out of his own skin. The two boys that had stolen him were at his side in an instant.

“Hey, hey, don’t sit up too fast,” the one in green said, reaching out a hand.

He flinched back. Green had attacked him. His body was still sore all over from it. Green wanted to hurt him. This he knew.

The boy’s face fell, and the other one stepped in. “You’re safe now,” he said, “you’re safe. You don’t have to be scared, Cole.”

Safe? Oh no, he was most definitely not safe. Safe would be being at home with his Master, not being dragged off to this horrible, unfamiliar prison by two strangers against his will.

“Do you… remember who we are?” blue continued, hesitant. 

He stayed silent.

“We’re your friends.”

Friends did not kidnap each other, and pets did not have friends.

He turned away, hoping it wouldn’t make them too angry. What would they do to him? Torture, no doubt. They’d torture him, hurt him, try to break him apart into little pieces. And he was so, so scared to find out how.

“Please say something,” blue begged, “I know you always said I’m the motormouth, but please, say something. Anything.” He almost looked hopeful that Pet would comply.

He wouldn’t do it. He wouldn’t go against what his Master wanted, even while he wasn’t here. If the boys could get him to speak, what other bad things could they make him do?

He wanted to go home. He’d never been kidnapped before, but it was so stressful and terrifying and bad. He wanted Master to hold him and pet him and be with him. He just wanted Master. Why would the bad people take him away?

He sniffled, struggling to hold back his tears. Master loved it when he cried, but he didn’t want to look so vulnerable in front of the enemy.

A loud ringing sound cut through the otherwise silent room. Pet flinched back, startled. 

“Ohhh shit,” the one in blue mumbled, fidgeting frantically with his phone. “It’s his dad.”

“Let me,” the one in green mumbled, taking blue’s phone and hurrying out of the room. 

Pet found himself somewhat relaxed at the idea of there only being one of them instead of two. He was glad green had left. Blue had yet to hurt him, so he decided he liked him more. But liking him more wasn’t the same as liking him.

Blue sighed. “I’ve missed you so much.” Something about his eyes were achingly familiar. Or, no, not familiar. They had never met before. But his eyes were… they were sad, he decided. He knew what it felt like to be sad. He was sad to have been stolen.

Pet looked down purposefully, wishing his kidnapper would just get the message. He didn’t want to talk. He didn’t want to hear them talking. He wanted to go home. 

He didn’t want his head filled with lies, either.

The door flew open, and if it hadn’t scared him so bad, he would have wondered if these people knew how to open doors any other way.

“Cole!” an older man all but yelled, practically running at him and engulfing him in an uncomfortably tight hold.

“You don’t understand, Mr. Brookstone, I was trying to tell you—” the blond said, having rushed in after him.

Slowly, the man released him, backing away a bit. “Son?”

They were attacking him they wanted to hurt him he wanted to go home please just let him go home.

“Cole?” the man asked again, finally seeming to notice the way Pet was trembling. “It’s me. It’s your dad. I’m here, son, I’m here.”

He was lying.

There were too many people in here. He had only ever been around Master, and now he’d been dragged away by total strangers. He didn’t know them and they wouldn’t stop crowding him. He just wanted them to leave him alone.

“Why won’t he… why won’t he say anything?” the man asked weakly, turning to the other two. He looked desperate. “Why won’t he say anything?”

Subtle as he could, Pet backed away. These people weren’t sane. Screaming about children and friendship and trying to get him to talk.

He wanted to sob. He would take the pole over this. He hated the pole, but at the very least, he had the comfort of his Master when it was his punishment for something.

Here, he was alone, but he wasn’t. So many strangers. So many bad people.

He wrapped his arms around himself, squeezing his eyes shut. They wouldn’t stop talking, there was too much noise. He couldn’t handle this. He needed help, he needed to be alone for real. 

Instead, from somewhere far away, he could hear the clatter of frantic footsteps — like someone, or multiple someones, were running — fast approaching.

Please no. Not more people. He couldn’t handle more people.

The universe did not care what he wanted, and in the doorway, three more people appeared.

Pet started sobbing.

[trashthebreadburnthecircus-blog]

004. Fuck Your Personal Brand

“Machines wear out. Cars rust. People die. But what lives on are the brands.”

- Hector Liang, as quoted in Naomi Klein's book No Logo

It's strange to think not so much how language has changed over the years, but how we have sanitized it to make what should be horrifying ideas and actions palatable.

“Extraordinary rendition,” aka literally kidnapping people, trapping them in a Kafkaesque legal framework, and imprisoning them in a way that no sane person would consider justice. “Enhanced interrogation,” or torture as it was known once upon a time. “Terrorist,” a person who can only be from a Muslim or Muslim-adjacent country. There are plenty other examples (Citations Needed did a particularly good two-parter (I, II) on this very topic). But these stand out for me in recent popular memory. Indeed, the most consumer-based country on the planet is, no surpise, great at branding – especially rebranding our own heinous acts.

Here I'd like to point out: all the previously examples are aimed at “The Other” – our real-life version of the bugs from Starship Troopers, enemies that we can constantly point to as the source of our collective troubles. Sometimes, this is also used in regards to our internal “Others”; think the term “urban,” most specifically in the late 1990s to early/mid 2000s. “Urban” was simply a code word for Black and Brown people of a certain socioeconomic status and background. We hear these terms – we have heard them – and we accept(ed) them. They become/became part of the zeitgeist. The complicity with which we accept(ed) this lingual rebranding is – or should be – very frightening.

But I want to talk about something that I find insidious, not because it's worse than any of the previous examples (it isn't), but because it's a dehumanization that is not only in vogue, it's even encouraged, and we willingly take it on ourselves. It is the idea, and use of, the term “personal brand.”

I want to break down what a brand really means. Let's use an actual brand – Gatorade. Disclaimer here: Gatorade is in no way affiliated with this site and/or post. And full disclosure, I consume their product, wasteful plastic and all, on a semi-regular basis. (I can't say the following enough: to live in America is to be complicit in so many things, and I'm as guilty as many of my fellow citizens).

What do we take from a drink with the Gatorade brand? It is positioned as a product made for those competing in sports to rehydrate. We see the “G” logo, or the lighting bolt icon, and we can immediately know and recognize what this product is for. A specific purpose has been defined. And when it's fulfilled its purpose? Into the trash recycling bin it goes. We can wax poetic about the “lifestyle” Gatorade represents – and as the aforementioned (and seminal) No Logo pointed out, corporations have long since moved advertising away from the actual product towards a nebulous lifestyle you can “buy into” – but ultimately, we are buying colored sugar water in a bottle. Once the contents of that bottle have been used up, that's that.

You may say I'm being hyperbolic. You may say that this is an unfair comparison; that “personal brand” takes on a different meaning when applied to a human being versus a product. But I would argue that because of the original, root usage of the term, we willingly dehumanize ourselves when we use “personal brand.” We use it as a signal to the rest of the world (a quick signal, because our attention spans are shot to shit) – I fulfill this single purpose (or multiple purposes, if you want to really flex). Maybe we can consider – if we all willingly accept sanitized language for murder, torture, illegal surveillance, etc – how can something like a “personal brand” ever seem scary or wrong? Can we accept it as dehumanizing if we've already dehumanized so many other things?

If we all have thoughts, opinion, feelings, why do we so willingly adopt the rhetoric of a discardable, inanimate object? Or of corporations that want and need us to keep buying and consuming more shit?

Maybe this is the natural tendency of a society that legally accepts corporations as people. A society that will argue as vociferously for a product's qualities as it will for human rights.

And the other aspect of the personal brand is that despite how we as human beings use the term, it fundamentally means that we actually aren't all that unique. And uniqueness has been the selling point of modern times, has it not? Customize your wardrobe, your music, your online ads, because you are the Sun in the Universe of Consumption. But as a “personal brand,” you are a classifiable object. An object based on a frame, a shape, a use, a purpose, that we are all familiar with. The packaging might be slightly different. But whether you are Gatorade, Powerade, or something else, when we collectively decide you are used up, we'll toss you. Hope you had that personal rebrand ready!

I usually hate when people engage in the following kind of quasi-nostalgia, but fuck, man, didn't a “personal brand” used to mean “having a personality” at some point? Are we so isolated and used to having marketing pounded into every one of our senses that this is the only way we know how to communicate with each other? Is this our half-assed grab at immortality?

Forgo doing a great act, or many small acts that go unseen but make an impact. Instead, make great posts. Cultivate an easily accessible personality. Become a great product.

We wind our way through the world, all heroes of our own stories. In this period of late capitalism, where the Almighty Brand has been venerated for decades, perhaps we have reached a natural conclusion of human behavior. We want to stand out, to be noticed, to be loved, to be recognized. I can't fault anyone for that. But for fuck's sake, let's not willingly adopt language that makes us seem less than human. One of the biggest, most influential companies in the world already considers us “products.” This has been mentioned in a legal framework. How many other God-King Corporations (and the pieces of shit running them) take the same viewpoint?

If we voluntarily talk about ourselves this way, why should they be scared of our collective power? When's the last time an empty bottle was worth considering?