#cw: graphic bodily harm

[ayyy-imma-ninja]

The brazin bull I think it's called it's a copper bull that you put someone inside and set a fire under it and when they scream it just sounds like a bull

That's a good one. But the boys like to control how much damage they inflict on the targets.

@moonlit-dreamers and I discussed this question, and we decided that the perfect medieval torture device they'd use would be The Rack. The one that stretches out the body.

They would even make a sick game out of it.

warning: graphic depictions of the torture game below the card-

They would take turns, and slowly turn the wheel to stretch out the target's body a certain number of times based on a dice roll. This is to see who can go the furthest without ripping or dislocating a limb. Whoever dislocates a limb is the one who has to clean up the mess, and the other gets to kill the target. With each turn the target is slowly being stretched and pulled apart. Sun and Moon will ensure that they stay alive just long enough for them to have their fun.

Arguments may or may not ensue over who wins, possible accusations of cheating. Sibling banter at its finest, all while the target is just in agony.

[forwhump]

Touch

a/n; touch starved human weapon who’s never known kindness gets a hug :’) & a bunch of other times he’s touched, mostly in a horrible fashion

for the anon that wanted silas to get a hug & the anon that wanted more of the unit !! two bingo squares crossover episode best of both worlds babeyyyy

tw/cw: grievous bodily harm, mutilation, guns, traumatic brain injuries, implied rape/noncon, references to graphic violence, medical torture

living weapon whumpee

The first touch Silas ever knows is that of the cold, gloved hands reaching into the opened cavity of his chest.

Their touch is not gentle. Their touch introduces Silas to pain. It’s a pain that he will very quickly become familiar with.

They open him from throat to groin. They peel skin away from meat, and meat away from muscle. They pry apart his ribcage and crush his ribs into splinters of bone. They pull out chunks of organ tissue and they hold him down, against the cold steel of the operating table, as they take the colder steel of a surgical scalpel of his hairline.

Silas’ very first memory is waking up to those cold, gloved hands fishing his small intestine from his opened gut.

The very first touch Silas ever knows is that of those hands.

Silas doesn’t like to be touched.

He learns this very quickly.

It’s an empty cell, carved from stone, not quite tall enough for Silas to stand in but that doesn’t matter because Silas can’t stand. He’s shackled to the floor by the iron closed around his throat, and he’s left there for days in the dark.

He’s alone. He’s alone a lot in the beginning.

The first person that he ever sees, outside of that operating room, is a soldier. Silas doesn’t recognize him but he spits, “I’ve been waiting a long time for this, you ugly fuck,” and swings his fist into Silas’ face with as much force as a human being can manage.

His name is Point, Silas learns later, and his touch breaks his right eye socket into splinters of skull.

They manage to save his eye. Much later, however, Point puts three bullets in it, and Silas loses his right eye for good.

Silas learns very quickly that touch is something vile. It’s something to be shied away from, something that hurts. Touch is inhumane.

When Silas is touched, it hurts him.

When Silas touches, he hurts.

They chain his hands in front of him, and they shackle him at the ankles. He has to wear a bite bar because they don’t trust his teeth.

They’re right not to.

Because they remove the bite bar, the chains, the shackles, and there’s carnage.

When Silas touches, he hurts. When Silas touches, there’s carnage.

Silas usually does his field tests alone, but not always. They are a team, technically, him and the unit, and the district needs to be sure they work well together, or some shit equivalent.

Silas had spent a lot of time making a careful point not to let the unit see him the way the soldiers see him, as the horrible thing he really is, and introducing them into the field tests had made him edgy, and it had made him feel kind of sick.

It turned out to be a waste of emotion.

Even now, the soldier’s gun aimed into Hal’s face, Silas makes quick work of pulling his throat out through the back of his neck. He uses his teeth, and still, as Hal stands, he wipes blood from his eyes with his sleeve and looks up at Silas with a grin that’s nothing but relieved.

“Good looking out, man,” he says, and holds his fist out to Silas. Silas doesn’t know what to do with that, so he doesn’t do anything. Hal kinda gestures with his fist and says, “don’t leave me hanging, big guy. Bump me.”

Silas raises his eyebrows and Hal reacts like he hit him.

“You’ve never had a fist bump?” And he says it like it’s something heinous, like it’s even the most heinous thing Silas has done in the last three minutes. “Oh, man,” he says, but his grin is bordering on obnoxious. “I’m so glad I get to take your fist bump-ginity.”

“No,” Silas deadpans, because he doesn’t know what that is and he also doesn’t want to.

But Hal says, “yeah. Come on,” which isn’t all that convincing on its own, but he adds, “Wren will think you’re really cool if he finds out you do fist bumps,” and Silas squints. Hal grins again, wide and innocent, and holds his fist back out to Silas. “It’s easy. Just bump my fist with your fist. Fist bump.”

“Why?” Silas says.

“I don’t know,” Hal says. “Who cares? Just do it.”

Silas looks at Hal’s hand for a long time and decides the pros — Wren might be impressed he’s learned something — outweigh the cons — he just doesn’t want to. He relents and knocks his fist against Hal’s.

Hal, who throws both his arms up and his head back as he cheers.

June, after she left the service, was a hairdresser for a while.

Silas knows this, because she tells him, “after I left the service, I was a hairdresser for a while.”

Silas says, “okay.”

“So you can trust me,” she adds.

“No,” he says.

June tips her head back, dramatic, as she groans. She’s been wielding the hairbrush like a weapon. “Silas. Come on, dude. Stop being a bitch about it. Let me brush your hair.”

“No,” he repeats.

“Silas,” she repeats.

“No,” he says.

“Wren’ll like it,” she tries, and Silas narrows his eyes. She grins, and she has a very predatory grin. “You wanna look good for Wren, don’t you, big guy?”

He’s starting to suspect these people might be using Wren to manipulate him, and it’s unfortunate that it’s working. Silas sits on the floor, and June, with the added boost of the back of the couch, pulls a brush through his hair like she’s trying to rip all of it out.

He complains the whole time, mostly for the sake of complaining. “Ow,” he says again, and June groans at him.

“You’re too big to be this much of a pussy.”

“You’re hurting me,” he says. She isn’t.

“I don’t care,” June replies. “Stop moving.”

“I’m not moving,” he says.

“You’re flinching,” she says.

“You’re hurting me,” he reminds her.

“You should’ve started brushing your hair six months ago,” she bites back.

“How was I supposed to know?” Silas asks, and he’s won, because she quiets behind him, and her hands tug a little less violently at his hair.

“Sorry,” she says finally, and Silas tries not to smile but it tugs on his mouth at one side. He doesn’t think she’s looking at him, so he doesn’t try all that hard to hide it and so it makes him jump when he turns and she’s leaning over his shoulder to look him in the face. “Hey,” she accuses. “That’s not funny. I thought I hurt your feelings.”

He cracks a smile, despite his best attempts. “You couldn’t hurt my feelings.”

June grins widely, raising her eyebrows. “I’d love to try.”

Silas snorts, and she laughs as she pulls back over his shoulder to tug the brush through his hair again. She ties it up for him; a half knot, because, “I thought it would suit you. I was right.”

He tracks Wren down, just in case.

He has a pencil tucked behind his ear and Silas is strangely entranced by it. “Silas,” he says, and he says it with a smile. “You look so handsome.”

Silas doesn’t know what it means, but he’s flattered, anyway.

He’s on his back on the concrete, looking down the barrel of a gun.

It’s shaking. Point’s hand is trembling. “You stupid, disobedient fuck,” he spits, and Silas barely sees the bottom of his boot closing in on him before it’s cracking his cheekbone. “Bad. Dog.”

Both of Silas’ arms had been nearly amputated at different points, but he can still lift his left hand. Just barely, and it trembles with blood loss and severed tendons, but he manages to lift it from the wet concrete and fold almost all of his fingers down, save for the middle.

Point roars in frustration.

Silas knows the cold kiss of gunmetal, for only a second, and then an eruption of heat that’s white hot and electricity charged and Point empties his gun into Silas’ face.

Silas is reintroduced to the touch of surgeons, but this is nothing new.

He loses his eye.

They take Wren.

Silas couldn’t give less of a fuck about his eye. He’s got another one, he’ll be fine. What’s another disfiguring injury? But he gets back to the unit, and Robin finds him in Wren’s absence.

They’d taken Wren. Robin doesn’t know where.

His touch is a firm handshake that makes Silas’ skin crawl. But he accepts it, even if he didn’t need Robin to ask. Even if he would’ve raised hell, anyway.

He’d been really careful around Wren. He’d been so careful.

Wren’s different. He isn’t like any of the rest of them. He’s gentle in a way Silas thinks super soldiers just aren’t capable of. His skin is still soft. He’s still so human, and he looks at Silas, and he sees something in him that’s human, too.

But he’s wrong. Silas has known for a long time that he’s wrong, and whatever it is that Wren thinks he sees in him, it isn’t human.

He’d wanted so badly for it to be true, though. He’d wanted to believe Wren. He wanted there to be something human in him because he never wanted Wren to stop looking at him like that. He’d done his best not to let Wren see anything less, to not let him see him as any less human than a couple of fatal injuries.

He’d never let him see anything else. He’d been so careful.

But then he finds Wren, and he finds him with a group of soldiers.

Their touch is not kind.

He’s shackled to a bunk by an ankle to the bedpost, and Silas doesn’t even know what they’re doing to him but he knows it’s vile. The sounds make his skin crawl. Wren is begging for it to stop.

He’s crying, and it’s crying like nothing else Silas has ever heard. Wailing. He isn’t in complete control of himself after that.

The soldiers all react to him with flailing, frantic cowardice, shouting and clambering for guns, for knives, for weapons, and it’s embarrassing. Silas is embarrassed for them. Cowards, all of them — loud, cruel cowards. All so scared of Silas, every one of them, and they fuckin’ created him. What a fuckin’ joke.

He lets them scramble, looking at Wren through the blur of them. His mouth is swollen, face shiny with tears, and when he sobs, he sobs, “Silas.”

“Don’t look,” Silas says.

He doesn’t recognize any of the soldiers because their faces all blur.

Every one of them dies in that bunk, and they do not die gently. They die screaming and they die in pain.

Partway through suffocating a soldier with another’s small intestine, Silas lifts his head, and Wren is still there.

He reaches out and splinters the bedpost with one hand. He can’t look at Wren for too long — he doesn’t really wanna see the look on his face. “Run,” he says, and peels the jaw off a nearing soldier with one hand, without even looking at him.

Wren runs.

Silas is punished greatly for his disobedience.

Still, he isn’t looking forward to being back in the unit. The long walk back has his heart beating higher in his chest than he thinks it should. He only ever wants to be in the unit because he wants to be where Wren is — if Wren doesn’t want him there anymore, Silas will have to find a way to stay away, whatever he has to do.

He gets back to the unit and he’s expecting Wren to look at him in disgust if he looks at him at all. He isn’t expecting the way Wren pushes himself into Silas’ chest, arms so tight around his waist that Silas is surprised by the strength of him.

It doesn’t hurt, though, a very pleasant sort of vice, warm and Wren. “What are you doing?” He asks softly.

“A hug,” Wren says, face pressed into the spot just beneath Silas’ sternum and the pressure of him is nice.

“Why?” Silas asks, and Wren makes a sound that Silas can’t decipher as laughter or crying. It might be both.

“You didn’t have to do that for me,” he whispers into Silas’ crewneck.

It’s probably the stupidest thing Silas has ever heard him say. “I’d do anything for you,” he says, flat.

And it’s true. There isn’t anything in the world Silas wouldn’t do for him. Wren doesn’t even need to ask. Clinging a little tighter to Silas’ sweatshirt, he sobs.

Silas cradles the back of his head with one hand and lets himself be hugged.

The concrete of the common room floor is a cool touch against his cheek.

It’s the last thing Silas knows before his skull is crushed.

When Silas gets back to the unit, he has tremors in his hands and he doesn’t remember how to read.

When Silas gets back to the unit, it’s been months. He doesn’t know how many.

When Silas gets back to the unit, he’s surprised to immediately find his arms full of Hal.

“What?” Silas says, and then June is jumping onto his back, clinging to his neck, and Wren is at his side, small hands finding Silas’ skin beneath his sweatshirt and his touch is warm, impossibly soft. Silas cradles the back of his head with one hand. “What are you doing?”

Hal laughs from somewhere around his armpit as June laughs loudly into his shoulder. “We missed you, big guy!” She crows.

“We missed you!” Hal cries.

Wren laughs into his side and it’s a little wet. “We were so worried about you.”

Robin is lingering nearby and Silas points at him with his other hand. “Don’t come anywhere fuckin’ near me.”

His face doesn’t change, militant as he is, but his gaze flickers to Wren and back before he says, in the low, rumbling version of Wren’s accent, “welcome back.”

Silas lifts his chin, sort of a nod. He looks back down, at his shaky armfuls of the rest of them, and he can’t help the smile that tugs at his mouth on one side.

They laugh and they cling to him and the touch of the pressure and the weight of them hurts, it makes his recently reconstructed bones groan in protest, and he’d be lying if he said it didn’t but he’d also be full of shit if he said it bothered him at all.

Silas would consider himself pretty well versed in pain; this has to be his favourite.

[mercurywritesstuff]

Summary: Fei Kai moved to South Korea to get a fresh start. The fresh start included a man with curly hair and glasses.

Story warnings: Single mother! Kai x Ex military! Changbin. Strangers to lovers. Enemies to lovers. 3rd person. Disabled! Changbin. Kai flirts with people as always. Suggestive in many chapters. Themes of PTSD.

CW: Fleeting mentions of Night Terrors, Blood, Graphic depictions of bodily harm and death, How Chanbin lost his leg, Both Kai and Changbin being emotionally immature, both Kai and Changbin need to touch grass, one suggestive scene(Kai is naked, Changbin needs to stop being curious), angsty

2.6k word count

Taglist: @mynameisnotlaura, @palindrome969

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Chapter 5: Bloody Makeups

Fei Kai never hated anyone. She didn’t even hate her parents, or Han for being a mild douchebag at times. The most anger she felt in her life was distaste, she always wanted to be the clear, level-headed person. 

She didn’t know why she never felt the emotion. She could have sworn she felt angry when she was young, but that went away quickly. It felt as though something was missing from her, but no one ever thought it was bad. Her parents waved her off, her school age friends laughed at her when she brought them her worries. So, she decided that she was a person that didn’t need emotions for anger. From the age of twelve, she thought that it was normal for friends to have that one calm personality, and she was it. It was just a normal part of her life, that she didn’t even bring it up to her friends. 

So maybe when she became a mother, did she suspect something was wrong. Her daughter felt so much emotion, so much anger that it scared Kai at time. She wouldn’t change her daughter for anything, though. Not even for her anger. 

So why did she feel an unknown emotion bubble up within her in five months of hosting Seo Changbin? She felt odd, he just made her so warm in the wrong ways. His stupid smirk, stupid hair, stupid eyes. She wouldn’t let him get to her, though. She was mature enough to not let emotion rule her train of thought. 

Kai turned several times on the small pull-out couch, her mind not resting from the day. For the past five nights, Kai would get woken up in the middle of the night with yelling coming from the master bedroom, before quieting down. The first night, Kai would try and enter but the motherfucker locked the door every night. That's fine with her, he made it very clear that he didn’t want her help. 

Kai sighed, her skin making everything sticky with sweat. She sighed one more time, before sitting up. She wasn’t going to get any sleep, so she might as well start working early on work. She opened her laptop and typed away, going to the wee hours of the morning. 

Footsteps roused her from her fixation when she heard the new familiar clang of soft feet and plastic hitting her floor. Changbin had recently gotten a prosthetic leg, only a few weeks back, and Kai didn’t like how she got excited at the prospect of him walking. She was trying to not let the man rule her thoughts, but she couldn’t help it. Throughout her days, she could only think of him. Did he sleep enough? Did he eat? She blamed it on her mom brain, treating even the people closest to her like her children sometimes. 

“What are you doing up?” Kai asked, eyes focusing on the blurry figure of the man before her vision cleared. 

One thing that Kai didn’t like was how hot the man was waking up. Hair curly, glasses for the early morning, voice laden with sleep. She wanted to focus on her family, not the man who was basically sex on legs. She needed to focus, and not on her attraction to Changbin. It’ll pass (No it wouldn’t). 

He chuffed, rolling his eyes before sitting on the far end of the couch, away from her. Kai’s stomach churned at the blatant closeness, but she ignored it to finish working. The couch was basically a love seat, and Kai could feel him take a breath next to her, the warm air making goose bumps pop up all over her body. 

Changbin watched her work. Despite his ploy to hate her, he couldn’t deny that she was getting more beautiful as the days passed. Now that it was summer, her skin grew even more of a tan, highlighting how flawless it was. There wasn’t a wrinkle in sight, showing how young the woman was.  

She had recently cut her long hair short and dyed it a light brown. She currently had it up in a ponytail, highlighting the expanse of her neck. He didn’t know if he wanted to bite it or throttle it. Stop being horny, Changbin thought to himself. He blamed it on not being around women for a while. Yeah, that was it. 

“I could say the same thing to you,” Changbin shot back, voice dripping with venom. Kai rolled her eyes once more, reaching to put her headphones on. Today was the first day on Duri’s summer camp, so five more weeks of dealing with the monster called Seo Changbin alone felt like it was going to take forever. She couldn’t believe she was actually looking forward to being left alone with a man. Gross. 

She put on her headphones, blasting a rap song to try and tune him out, bobbing her head along to the beat. 

---

When a few hours passed, and Kai finally sent the paperwork to the insurance company, she shut her laptop and stretched, a yawn falling from her lips. She set her headphones down and looked around at the oddly quiet apartment. Her eyebrows shot up in suspicion, padding through the apartment to try and look for the man. When she couldn’t find him, she let out a sigh of relief. 

She entered the bathroom, not bothering to close the door fully while she stripped to cool her body off. She entered her shower, turning the knob as cool as it went and sighed at the good temperature. 

She hummed, not hearing the footsteps stepping towards the bathroom. 

Changbin was listening to some tunes, blasting through his own headphones. He had just gotten back from the gym, all sweaty and overwhelmed with the heat. He grew confused at the door ajar, and when he opened the door, his face grew hot, and his eyes widened.  

It was the worst time to realize the door to the shower was glass. 

The two made eye contact, Kai letting out a shriek and Changbin stepping out, adverting his eyes and he slammed the door shut. Kai immediately shut the shower off, wrapping herself in a towel, as she felt the stupid churning of her stomach again. She was mortified. 

It had been days since the incident, and they had yet to speak a word to each other. Every time they were in the same room, Kai would immediately leave with a heavy blush on her face with embarrassment. She was quieter at work too, not going unnoticed by her coworkers. 

Changbin felt guilty. This wasn’t the reaction he wanted from her, and he felt as if he ruined his chances to get a rise out of her. But Changbin being Changbin, he wasn’t about to give up.  

“Seungmin?” Changbin asked, gaining a hum from the younger male. They were hanging out on their own, the rest of the group either at work or on a grocery run. “What is the best way to piss someone off?” 

“Are you still on the Kai drama? Dude, it’s been months, just drop it.” Seungmin groaned, laying on his back. “You need a hobby, or a girlfriend. Or both.” 

“No, like listen to me. She has never gotten angry at all. All she does is stare at me, ignore me, or apologize. It’s not about me disliking her now, I’m genuinely curious if she never gets angry.” 

“Oh my god, if I help you, will you shut up about it?” Changbin nods at his words. “Okay, first you want to...” 

---

Kai yawned as she entered her apartment, rubbing her tired eyes and turning on the light. The apartment was quiet, which was a nice change from the yelling of her friends. What she didn’t expect, however, was the body on her floor with red liquid pooling around it. 

Kai leaned against the counter, watching as his chest rose steadily even when he tried to hide it. Kai rolled her eyes, a smirk playing on her lips. “I know you’re playing, get off the damn floor and clean up the mess.”  

Changbin’s head snapped up, a pout evident. “How did you know it was a prank?” 

“One, you’re breathing. A person who lost that much blood wouldn't be breathing or not as tan as you are right now. Two, blood is not bright red. It’s darker than that.” She walked over, scooping the liquid with her ring and middle fingers. “Clean it up, it’s your mess. You’re a big boy.” 

Changbin groaned, looking at the playful twinkle in her eye, thinking the ruffling in his stomach was just discomfort from being around her for so long. She was smart, he’ll give her that. Maybe he had to up the stakes a bit. Although, he didn’t mind the decent conversations they had. 

He had done everything he could in three days to piss her off. From throwing her clean laundry in the mud, to making her late to work, to even trying to get her fired, he was at a loss. That was until he thought of something. 

He tucked his protheses under his bed after he was sure Kai had gone to bed. He willed himself to sleep, but he left the door open for an experiment. 

He was in the middle of the desert. Him and his buddy Ha-Joon were on a mission to transfer high grade military explosives. Changbin thought it would be a good idea to joke around with the missiles, before accidentally stepping on a land mine. They were both warned of the mines that had yet to be picked up from the area, and Ha-Joon was very diligent in this. 

The two went flying, Ha-Joon had landed on the pack of explosives, blowing himself up and the bottom of Changbin’s leg. 

Usually, he would be waking up at this time, but he willed himself to stay asleep. 

He was in the desert for ten minutes, bleeding out and looking at the mangled body of the man that had become his best friend. 

There were hands trying to wake him, gripping his hands as he sunk his nails into soft, warm flesh. He knew it wasn’t his own, due to the lack of pain. He felt blood trickle down his arms, but the hands hadn’t moved. 

“Changbin,” A voice called to him. “You’re safe. You’re not there.” Her voice was like a siren. 

Soon, his eyes snapped open, and the worried look of Kai peered down at him. 

Changbin sneered, pushing her away from him. “What are you doing here?” 

Kai stared at him incredulously, blood trickling down and dripping on the light wood. The gall of this man. 

Kai took a deep breath, lips flitting through her teeth as she bit her bottom lip. “You were screaming, I was worried.” 

“Yeah, well save your feelings for someone who cares. It’s not like I actually want you to help me, I’d rather get help from a trash can. Well, close enough I guess.” 

Kai didn’t know why she stayed; she would usually leave after he spat his piece. Her eyes narrowed in mock scrutiny. “Why are you being like this? This is my home, and I’m letting you stay here. Why are you being an ass?” 

Changbin kept his shock in check. It was the first time she called him out on his bullshit in the five months they lived in the same vicinity to each other. He played up the snarl on his face. 

“Well maybe you deserve it. You’re like a robot, and I don’t like robots.” He crossed his arms. Kai could laugh from his audacity. 

And she did, she laughed at the shock of it all. “Are you joking? You must be joking, because I cannot believe anyone would go this far. You know, I’m done helping you. Scream and cry at me, I’m done being bullied.”  

She turned to leave, before stopping cold at his next words. He didn’t know why he said what he did next. 

“What kind of mother doesn’t want to stand up for herself?” It was more of a statement than a question. “Aren’t you supposed to be setting up an example for your daughter?” 

Kai slowly turned to look at the man, eyes wide as she felt an unfamiliar feeling boil up within her. Her face went red, and her eyes filled with tears. Not tears of sadness but was met with ones from an ugly emotion. 

“Don’t you dare bring my daughter into this. I thought you were just being a dick because you lost your leg. But now I see that you are just a plain asshole, Seo Changbin. You really are a piece of work.” She turned and stormed out of the room, slamming the door and making the apartment rattle. 

Changbin released the breath he was holding, but when he should've felt happiness from successfully making her mad, he only felt regret. He looked up at the ceiling, flinching when he heard drywall and glass break, hearing her anger-filled scream and then silence following. 

It was time to apologize. For everything.

---

Kai sat at the kitchen island, angry tears flying down her face as she stared at her bloody and shaking hands. Why did she have to feel this way? She knew there were other emotions behind what she now knew what anger was. Was it sadness? No, it felt deeper than that. 

She couldn’t stop the sobs that racked her body, hands flying to wipe away the tears before she winced at the sting of blood in her eyes. She shook out of it when she felt a hand grip on her wrist. She looked up, disappointment making her expression heavy. 

“Get off of me,” Kai mumbled, but not making a move to shake him off. 

He stayed silent, dropping the first aid onto the counter and taking out gauze. The two were hushed, Changbin focusing on wrapping her hands (after cleaning them) with the clean roll of gauze. 

“’m sorry. For everything.” He mumbled. 

“Why do you hate me? What have I done to be treated like shit?” She pleaded, tears filling her eyes once again. 

Changbin sighed, rubbing his temples. “At first, I thought I hated you for taking my place in the group. Then, I thought I hated you for being so perfect-” 

Kai snorted. “You think I’m perfect?” 

Changbin nudged her shoulder, a playful glint in his eye. “Focus.” She let out a giggle, before nodding. “I think I was just jealous of you? But then, I got curious. I had never saw you angry, so I made a game to myself to get you angry.” 

Kai chuckled and shook her head. “You’re special, you know that?” 

“Special good or special bad?” 

“I’ll let you know if we start over” 

“Deal,” Changbin shook her hand, and then let his eyes widen when she winced at the pain. “I’m so sorry.” 

Kai laughed softly, and Changbin realized he wanted to hear only that sound for the rest of his life. 

Chan sat with Felix and Hyunjin as they watched Changbin and Kai play pool the next day. It was late at night, and the younger was positively radiating excited energy. “They finally made up.” 

Felix hummed, looking at the two actually get along for the first time. “I give it a few weeks until they start fighting again.” 

“I don't know, lix.” Hyunjin hummed, watching the way they played around with each other. It was like they had been friends for years, not the short time they began to know each other. “They seem awfully close.” 

“I give it a few weeks,” Minho mentioned, head tilting. Hyunjin jumped from the sudden appearance of the older man. 

“Few weeks for what, Min?” Felix asked the veterinarian. 

“Until they finally realize their feelings for each other.” 

“They were at each other’s throats two days ago. I doubt they feel anything other than platonic feelings.” Chan muttered. 

But Lee Minho was always right about these things. 

They make me want to scream, and make them kiss like little barbies.

[i-eat-worlds]

Always Kid, Always

Or: I rewrote Pat’s death scene

This is pretty heavy, so mind the warnings and read at your own risk!

Thanks to @snaillamp for helping with medical things. They’ve got an ask Enjar game going on, go check them out!

cw: major character death, graphic depictions of mortal injuries, blood, brief mentions of other bodily fluids (vomit, urine), medical treatment, institutional indifference to human life, emotional whump, hurt no comfort, grief, guilt, Dead Dove Do Not Eat

Pat has been condemned.

The human capital council voted 3-2 to deploy her, along with the rest of Turquoise. He and Henle had gone up on the stand, two years worth of medical records with him, and told them in no uncertain terms that this will likely kill her. Her powers are tearing her body apart. It’s not just her nerves anymore, it's her blood vessels and internal organs and muscles and bones. Any use of her powers could be her last.

They agree with them. They say it’s dangerous for her. They also say that this villian, whatever the fuck his name is, is more dangerous “For everyone,” they say. It’s bullshit. They have other heroes. Heroes that won’t die. Heroes that can’t die.

The mission is stupid and dangerous and everybody knows that. It doesn’t matter. It’s for the greater good.

Joseph, though he hates it, though he knows it’s selfish, can’t help but think “fuck the greater good.”

He doesn’t hunt down any of the council members. He doesn’t slam them against the wall and yell at them until he’s red in the face because it won’t change anything.

Pat has been condemned.

***

The locker room is utterly depressing

The normal banter is gone, replaced by oppressive silence. Everyone suits up slowly, painfully, speaking only to ask “can you zip me up?” or “can you buckle this for me?” His medic patch feels more obtrusive then normal, like an annoying itch that won’t go away. The already heavy bag feels crushing.

Pat’s hair is done up like it normally is, tightly pulled back in two french braids so it will t under the helmet. As she laces up her boots, he can see the black and orange compression socks she’s wearing underneath.

She catches him looking and smiles, the corners of her green eyes crinkling.

He tries not to puke. It’s awful.

The helipad is worse. They’re up high, the city spread out around them, as they wait for their ride. Pat stands next to him, chewing on her lip. He turns to her.

“If you don’t want to go inside, we’ll find another way. I’ll take the heat. Martin’ll take the heat. Henle’ll take the heat. We will keep this off you.”

She dips her head. “It’s okay. They picked me for a reason. This dude? What he made? It’ll kill you.” Her eyes glimmer with tears. “I can’t let that happen.”

He could say the same.

“We can abort. I will fight for you on this, Pat. All of us will.”

“No.” She shakes her head. “He’s dangerous. For everyone. I signed up for this. I knew what I was getting into.” The helicopter roars overhead. “It’s for the greater good.”

It’s too loud, and they have to stop talking.

***

The villain’s base looms on the horizon. It’s boring looking, like some sort of factory or warehouse, but it's not.

Warehouses don’t have lasers.

The building is mostly empty, because even villains know that you should try to protect your employees from further harm. Per the plan, Pat charges straight into the heart of the compound, hands on fire, eyes glowing, and very tachycardic.

Even though they can’t see her, it’s obvious where she is. Just follow the violent thrum of energy and the rumbles reverberating through the floor. It shakes the whole building, rattling the windows. Pat is busting through door after door after door, but she’s getting there.

For a brief second, there’s a pause. Joseph thinks that maybe she’s made it.

Then, a violent shockwave shakes the building, nearly taking him off his feet.

That’s it. That’s the discharge that will kill her. The clock has started. She’s dying now.

He silences his com, ignoring Martin’s voice ordering them to leave the building, warning that it’s unstable, and goes deeper inside. Running as fast as he can, he traces Pat’s steps, following her path of destruction into the heart of the building.

She’s crumpled on the warehouse’s concrete floor, glass windows blown out around her, lying in a rapidly growing pool of blood. “Pat!” He yells as he approaches, looking her over.

He sees a steady stream of blood oozing out of her leg.

“Hey kid,” He says, kneeling down by her side. “Pat, c’mon.” He quickly ties a tourniquet around her mangled left leg, trying to stem the bleeding. She screams as he tightens the windlass and clips it in. He quickly searches for any more major bleeding, hands patting up and down her body while he calls for help. Helicopter. Here. Now.

He finds a jagged hole in her chest. Her sternum seems to be half gone, replaced by a deep pool of red. Fuck.

“Ex-exhale?” She whimpers, eyes wide with worry. Her face is clammy and her breathing is fast and she looks like she’s about to cry.

“Joseph. Call me Joseph, yeah?” he says, tearing open a package of gauze and jamming the contents into her chest. Her blood is warm as it coats his fingers, and it's awful.

The scream is even worse, loud and piercing and heartbreaking. “I know it hurts, just stay with me, yeah?” he says as he keeps packing, watching the gauze turn pink and then red as it’s saturated completely.

There is one thing in this world that can save her right now, and it’s a healer. If he can get her to the helicopter, then maybe she’ll make it. He digs out his IV kit and seizes her arm.

“I-I think I’m gonna..” She says, her breath catching.

“It’s okay, I gotcha,” he says. Her veins are too sunken back. There's no way he’s going to be able to get an IV in.

“I don’t wanna die," she hiccups. “Please, I don’t wanna die.”

His fingers press into her neck and find her pulse. It’s weak and thready. Her breathing is slowing down. She’s dying.

“I’ve got you,” he says, “I’m going to do everything I can to help you.” It’s a lie, because there's nothing he can do. She’s lost too much blood, and she’s bleeding out internally, and there's not a damn thing he can do about it.

“‘M sorry, Exha-Joseph.” Her voice wavers, and she starts to cry even harder. “Please, I don wanna go,” A gasp escapes her blue tinged lips.

He wraps his hand around hers, bloody blue nitrile intermingling with shaking and cold flesh. “It’s okay Pat, I know it’s scary.” He comfortingly squeezes her hand. “I’ll be here to help.”

She whimpers, and she looks up at Joseph again. Her eyes are pleading, and she looks so desperate to keep living. Another tear rolls down her cheek, and she gasps again. “ ‘m, sorry. ‘M so sorry, ‘oseph.”

“It’s okay, you’re amazing, kid.” Tears well in his eyes, and he lets them fall. They both know what’s about to happen. He takes her in his arms, maneuvering her shaking body onto his lap.

“ ‘m sorry I couldn’t be better.” Her words are barely audible, voice raspy. She heaves another breath in, body almost convulsing with the eort.

“You were great, Pat. I couldn’t have been more proud of you.” He smiles down at her as the tears fall freely.

“Thank you, ‘oseph,” she slurs, blinking very, very slowly.

“Always, kid, always,” he chokes out, watching her eyes slide close. Her pulse is still there, but only barely.

“I love you, Pat.” Her breaths are getting further and further apart.“From the moment I met you, I knew you were going to be amazing.” He squeezes her hand, one last time.

A horrid, horrid silence passes over everything. “I’ve gotcha’”

Her chest rises.

“Always, yeah? Fucking always.”

It falls.

It doesn't rise again.

She’s dead.

She’s fucking dead.

The tears come harder, and he lets them. He yells, loudly and painfully. Anger erupts in his mind.

Why her? Fucking why!

Her skin is gray, muscles too relaxed. She looks so…almost…alive. There's a warm feeling on his thigh, where her legs are resting.

She’s pissed on him.

Carefully, he sets her down, closing her lifeless eyes and bowing his head.

Everything hurts. His mind is screaming.

“Exhale to Guardian, Exhale to Guardian,” he says into his coms, half on fire, half numb.

“Guardian on, location and report,” Martin’s voice responds.

He’s quiet for a very long second. “Surge is dead.” He grits his teeth. “Repeat, Pat is dead.”

The words land like a jetliner plummeting out off the sky

Martin orders him to return. They disregard the helicopter.

Everything is very quiet.

It doesn’t feel real.

It is.

***

The ride back is even quieter than the ride there. Everyone sits together, heads held low.

Even breathing seems wrong.

Halfway there, it hits him. This is why INSUPA uniforms are black. To hide the blood of those they let die.

It’s soaked into the lower half of his uniform from kneeling and sitting in it. The piss stain is still drying too, but its not as noticeable. His gloves were so sopping wet that it got under his fingernails. The smell of iron stills burns his nostrils.

He has to look horrible.

The words play over and over again in his mind.

“Pat is dead.”

“Pat is dead.”

“Pat is dead.”

“Pat is dead.”

By the time they arrive at the centre, everyone is crying. No one tries to hide it. It doesn’t matter.

Pat is dead.

Pat is dead and it was preventable.

Pat is dead, and it is partially their fault.

But mostly, it’s his.

He bypasses the locker rooms and starts to march straight for the council's office. They’ll pay for this, he’ll make them. The patch is heavy on his shoulder.

“Joseph, no!” Henle yells at him.

He keeps walking.

They yank him back, pressing him against the wall. “I can’t let you do this.”

“They let her die, Henle, what you let me to do!” Everyone is looking at them. It doesn’t matter.

They lean in closer. “You’re smarter than this.”

“Henle..”

“You charging into that office and punching the teeth out of them will not change anything. Not for the better, anyway.” Their face is deadly serious, though their eyes are bloodshot from crying.

Joseph is silent for a moment. “She’s dead, Henle.” He breaks, fracturing into a million pieces. The tears are like a waterfall. “I sat there, and she was crying and apologizing.” He wipes his eyes. “She said she was sorry.”

Henle pulls him into a hug, and Joseph lets him, still sobbing violently. “She looked so sad. She begged to live. She thanked me.” His mouth gapes open. “This is my fault. If I hadn’t…If I hadn’t encouraged her to…fuck…if I hadn’t…” He slowly melts to the floor, hyperventilating.

They don’t let go. “Hey, shhh, breathe with me, yeah.”

Joseph tries his best, carefully watching their chest, trying to match its movements. “I’m sorry,” he mumbles.

“You’re okay.” They let go, and Joseph relaxes back into the wall. “How about we go get you cleaned up?”

He’s suddenly hyper aware of the dried blood itching his skin. He wants it off.

“Please, yeah.”

As he walks towards the locker rooms, he finds himself crying once again. The anger flares. It’s going to eat him forever.

She didn’t have to die.

She didn’t have to die.

She didn’t have to die.

Taglist: @pigeonwhumps @rainydaywhump @painful-pooch @rainbowsandwhumperflies

[casteliacityramen]

Common and Applicable Content Warnings For This Blog (WIP)

Preamble/Forewarning:

This blog revolves around many characters who are in the process of healing from traumatic incidents in the story's past and present. Therefore, some of the topics may not be suitable for all audiences.

I cannot promise that upsetting topics will always be hidden underneath a readmore / properly tagged due to genuine ignorance or negligence.

When I share posts within discord servers or other social media, I will do my best to provide content warnings.

I will do my best to depict traumatic moments respectfully and tactfully. However, if downplaying those events does a disservice to those who have gone through similar events, I do not want to pull punches.

The following tags are pulled from a "common triggers" list. If you do not see one that is particularly specific to you, I apologize.

| Link back to pinned post |

Topics that may not be tagged

Alcohol / Drunkenness

Violence

Blood

Death

PTSD

Medical Procedures/Surgery

Topics that may be tagged with “cw: ___” but not pre-warned with a “readmore”

Blood / Bodily Injury and Harm

War

Abuse (emotional, verbal)

Topics that will be tagged with “cw: ___” in conjunction with a “readmore,"

Self Harm Behavior

Suicidal Ideation

Graphic depiction of injury. Short-form: Gore

Domestic Abuse

Common Sensitive Topics I don't intend to touch upon (red topics are subject to change)

Explicit pornographic depictions

Abortion

Vehicular Accidents

Cancer

Drug Addiction

Homophobia / Biphobia / Transphobia

Incest

Pedophilia

Pregnancy

Rape

[nothinggoodhappenscomics]

Welcome to Nothing Good Happens: Comics

"A collection of comics that seldom end blissfully."

A woefully pessimistic comic blog, posting comics that never end well for anyone. If you're a fan of morbid consequences, karmic protagonist shortcomings, or rooting for the 'final girl' to make it; make yourself at home.

The content you'll find here is created by yours truly. Some are from my own imagination. Others are the product of prompts I've scraped from the corners of the internet (with all credit given). Want to see your own twisted tales come to fruition? Click the "Have a Comic Prompt?" button and submit your cruel ideas.

The stories span a variety of genres. Dark fantasy, liminal space, sci-fi, apocalypses; there's truly something for everyone. Tread with caution when reading; not all themes are for everyone. The beginning of each post will contain caution and trigger warnings, before proceeding into the story. No story will be exploitative or morally and ethically deplorable. Stories' caution warnings are coloured coded based on severity of the cautions;

No CW: No extreme or mild themes of mature content. Happy endings are still not present in these stories...

Light CW: Light themes of eeriness or suspense. Nothing graphic or overly descriptive.

Soft CW: Mature themes, such as mentions of death, mild violence, suspenseful or dangerous scenarios.

Hard CW: Mentions and descriptions of gore, bodily harm, psychological horror. These posts will also be spoilered with Tumblr's mature content option.

Caution warnings will also be provided in the tags of each story.

If you prefer reading words off a screen, please follow NGH Stories. The original Nothing Good Happens writing blog that started it all.

With that all being said and done...

Grab a warm drink, turns the lights off and enjoy reading.

...You remembered to lock the front door, right?

[late-to-the-party-81]

You bring me closer to God - Ch1

AN: Righto, I’m here to pop my Buckquín cherry (thanks @sidepartskinnyjeans and @buckyismybicycle for enabling)

Big thanks also to @buckyismyconstant and @sparkagrace for the song recommendations - NIN and Placebo hit just right.

Beta’d by @hannahshattuck

Dividers by @firefly-graphics and mood board by me

HSB Prompt is Long day at work  - thank you @buckybarnesevents

Master list| Hot Bucky Summer Master list

Summary: Bucky’s pissed off, his blood boiling, but all he can think about is taking out his frustrations on a certain, newly-minted Falcon. 

Relationship: Bucky Barnes x Joaquín Torres

Word Count: 1.7k

CW: Mean Dom Top Bucky, Enthusiastic Sub Bottom Joaquín, Pre-established ‘Situationship’, Male Masturbation, Rough Sex, Unprotected Sex, Degradation, Sub Space, Non-Verbal Joaquín, Flash backs

Bucky was pissed. 

Angry. 

Incandescent with rage.

It was bad enough that he had to deal with what seemed to be an never ending stream of war-lords, manic super-scientists with robots, or mal-adjusted mutants, but add to that the fact that Joaquín seemed determined to throw himself into harm's way, Every. Single. Time. had him practically frothing at the mouth.

It had been an annoyance when they first met, when he’d found out how the baby-faced Lieutenant had tried to single handedly stop the Flag Smashers, but since they’d started, whatever this was, Bucky was finding it harder and harder to reign in his violent tendencies.

Luckily, for all concerned, Sam didn’t say anything out loud about Bucky’s mood shifts, although he had smirked, earning him a ‘murder glare’, before Bucky stalked away.

But today? Today the little idiot had jumped in front of Bucky, to protect him from some unknown projectile. Sure, Quín wasn’t completely helpless - he had his suit and his wings - but that wasn’t the point. Bucky was eminently more indestructible, and the kid shouldn’t be risking himself like that, especially not for him.

Once the battle was won, and SWORD were making their way in to carry out clean up - of weapons, rubble and unidentified goo - Bucky had ignored his partner and his, well, sort-of other type of partner - lover, fuck buddy, whatever - and stomped off to his part of the jet, the place he sat when he didn’t want to talk to the others. Sam and Quín had tiptoed around him, and Bucky had pretended not to see the pointed looks his two winged colleagues gave each other as he cleaned and resharpened each knife in his current arsenal.

The newly minted Falcon had only tried once to speak to him, but hadn’t even gotten a word out, his mouth gaping like a fish when Bucky had just growled at him.

“Not now!”

He’d almost felt bad when Quín's expression had fallen, like some kind of kicked puppy, but only almost. He was still too mad.

It had been a tense two hour flight back to up-state New York, and the new Avengers compound. It was late when they got there, and Bucky knew there was no point going home to Brooklyn, because he’d just have to be right back here first thing in the morning for the debrief.

As he’d exited the high-tech stealth plane, Sam had risked bodily injury to snag his arm.

“Don’t be too hard on him, please. Think about what his actions really mean.”

Bucky had just grunted and shaken off Sam’s arm, before walking away at high speed, to his  quarters. He needed to relax, but his blood was up and he knew only one thing was gonna take the edge off. 

His thumbprint let him through the door with ease, and he kicked it shut before crouching to unlace his combat boots. Those were thrown unceremoniously in a corner and then he began to divest himself of his tac vest and other clothes with as much speed as he could manage without damaging the clothes. He was moving as he dropped the various types of black fabric to the floor. Each knife was pulled from its holster and flung at the well scarred coffee table, every single one landing with a reverberating thunk into the wood.

By the time Bucky moved into the bedroom, which only had the barest minimum of personal touches, he was naked and only carrying his phone. He opened his music app and cast a playlist to the smart speaker, placing the phone on the dresser

As he walked to the bathroom, the music started to play. The beat thudded through his body and the lyrics spoke to his state of mind.

He started the shower, stepping under the water before it had even fully warmed, needing to wash, not only the sweat and the grime from day away, but also the anger and frustration too.

Goddamn it. Why did Joaquín have to risk himself like that? Fucking selfish, is what it was. Sam would have been devastated if his protege had been seriously injured, or worse. And him? Well he obviously did like the young man, that much was clear by the number of times he’d been balls deep inside him. He obviously didn’t want to see the young man hurt.

He smirked to himself.

Unless it was hurt in a specific, consensual way by him, of course. Quín did cry such pretty tears, after all.

Water cascaded over him, soothing, and Bucky let his hands travel down his torso and he remembered the last time he’d indulged himself in the soft warmth of Joaquin’s body.

It had been a standard, post mission fuck, the pair of them full of adrenaline and needing to get it out. It had been the younger man who’d started it that time. He’d left the hanger first, leaving Sam and Bucky to finish up. They were all going to get washed up and then meet in the conference room for the debrief. Sam had turned one way to head to his room and Bucky the other, when a closet door shot open and Bucky was dragged inside. 

He’d feigned surprise, of course. He’d know that Joaquín was lying in wait for him, because of the erratic thumping of his heart and stuttered breathing that Bucky had heard from 10 feet away. It was cute though.

“You need something, baby boy? Something so urgent you couldn’t just wait and come knock on my door?”

But Quín had already started to go non-verbal, his need taking over and he’d just rubbed his body up against Bucky’s, nose to Bucky’s neck, inhaling the sweat of the mission, and letting out a pathetic whine. Luckily Bucky knew just what his boy needed.

“You wanna get caught, don’t you? Want everyone here, all of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes, knowing just what a slut you are, huh?”

It had barely taken a touch to Joaquin’s shoulder to have him falling to his knees, pulling at Bucky’s belt and zipper in his frenzy to get to Bucky’s cock. Bucky had smiled to himself in the dim light of the storage closet, leaning his weight against the door, and watching his lover lose himself. That was until Quín finally wrapped his lips around him, taking him deeply, with sloppy strokes, and Bucky had had to close his eyes, at least momentarily, overwhelmed by just how fucking good Quín’s mouth felt.

He’d let his lover run the show for a few minutes, slobbering and gagging messily, letting out garbled moans and whimpers as he choked himself on Bucky’s dick, but then he’d pulled the young man off him, and reached into his back pocket for the small packet of lube he now always kept with him… for ‘emergencies’.

And Quín had known the drill. As Bucky lubed up his cock, the Baby Falcon had shucked the sinfully skin tight pants he’d worn under his flight suit. Bucky had lifted him, and he’d wrapped his legs around Bucky’s waist. The former assassin had spun them around, pressing the younger man’s back to the door. With desperation and a lack of finesse, Bucky had managed to get the remains of the lube out of the packet and onto his fingers, summarily spread it over Quín’s tight little hole and roughly pressed one in.

Joaquín hadn’t been able to hide his sudden intake of breath, but had had the forethought to muffle any further noises by biting down on Bucky’s leather jacket. Bucky’s prep had been fast and somewhat lacking, but at this point neither of them cared. They’d both needed to be fucking. Right then!

Bucky had lined himself up and sunk home and Quin’s pathetic whimpers had made his dick impossibly harder and spurred him on. The fuck might have been inelegant, and over faster than either would have liked, but it was what they had both needed.

Back under the spray of his Stark paid for shower, Bucky’s hand drifted down to his cock, fully awake after exploring those memories. He wrapped his right hand around it and started to jerk himself with quick, firm strokes. He could have gone slow, but just like that last time with Quín, he needed to get off. He needed to come, and hopefully exorcise the demons currently plaguing him.

He focused on the memories of Quín’s channel squeezing him tight, of the way the smaller man had shuddered in his arms each time Bucky brushed his prostate. The way those involuntary movements had been also accompanied by the most musical of whimpers and sighs, driving Bucky’s hips to snap up, harder and faster. 

Fuck!

He loved the way Quín’s long dark eyelashes alway brushed over his cheekbones, and how his warm, tawny skin flushed pinker as the young man got more and more aroused. He’d get frantic as his orgasm got closer, moving his hips to meet each thrust, tears gathering in the corners of his eyes…

Bucky came with a shout, barely managing not to crack the tiles on the wall with his left hand as he leant against it. Panting, he watched his spend circle the drain, white and sluggish, before slowly sinking down it. 

He’d achieved his goal, but it hadn’t worked as he’d hoped - His cock was still rock hard and his blood was still boiling in his veins. There was now only one possible way to assuage the feelings coursing through him.

He finished up the rest of his shower quickly. As he towelled himself dry, he knew that in theory he should take the time to properly clean his arm and give it a tune up, as well as giving his shoulder a break from wearing it, but that would have to wait until later. He needed two hands for what he had in mind, and he couldn’t wait any longer.

Chapter 2

Tag list: @jobean12-blog @krissy25 @bodeckersdiamonddoll @goldylions @luxeavenger @wheezy-stucky @doasyoudesireandlive @chemtrails-club @talia-rumlow @peaches1958 @pono-pura-vida @writing-for-marvel @kmc1989

[demonskiss]

Masterlist

☁️ - sfw • 🌑 - dc • ☄️ - smut • 💫 - fic • 🪐 - angst • ✨ - interaction • ☂️ - request

Multi Characters

character outline

muse feelings & indicators

multiple darlings? ☁️☂️

the college experience ☁️☂️

avoidance 🌑☄️☂️

cw: violence, threats (not to reader), gaslighting, rumor spreading, noncon touching, threats of noncon

annoyance! 🌑☄️☂️

cw: violence (to reader), implied blowjob, restraints, stalking, noncon touching

rewards for success ☁️☂️

cw: suggestive

violence is my love language 🌑☂️

cw: violence, murder, implied blood covered sex, possession

keeping your head afloat ☁️☂️

cw: manipulation, threats of rumor spreading

their types ☁️✨☂️

cw: suggestive

lingerie dress up ☄️☂️

cw: bruising, biting

too much sleep 🌑☄️☂️ (☁️ for violetta)

cw: noncon, somno, creampie, cnc, oral (reader receiving), fingering

valentine’s day ☁️☂️

cw: murder, slightly graphic gore, pda, slightly suggestive

delicacy on a silver platter ☄️☂️

cw: hybrid!reader, afab!reader w/ gn!pronouns, heat, restraints, riding, overstim, breeding, groping

shy darlings ☄️☂️

cw: afab!reader w/ no!pronouns, hair pulling, restraints, degradation, praise, overstimulation, dumbification

tsundere darling ☁️☂️

Emory

introduction

emory being bit ☁️☂️

emory with a masochistic lamb 🌑✨☂️

cw: pain play, threats of bodily harm (to reader)

emory’s lamb getting sick ☁️☂️

emory being recognized 🌑☂️

cw: bodily harm

emory’s displays of affection ☄️☂️

cw: fingering, edging

would emory let their lamb fuck them? ☄️☂️

cw: bottom!emory, penetrative sex, threats of death (to reader), biting

obedience 🌑☄️☂️

cw: dubcon, violence, begging, implied overstimulation

putting the “fun” in funeral ☁️💫

cw: mentions of previous noncon, dehumanization, threats of death to reader

Indignation 🌑☄️💫

cw: noncon, drugging, blades, threats of violence, degradation, biting, no foreplay, no aftercare

Blythe

introduction

blythe being pushed away 🌑☂️

can blythe finger you? ☄️☂️

cw: amab reader, fingering, handjob

blythe’s methods of comfort ☁️☂️

blythe being bit ☁️☂️

blythe’s cuddling and sleeping habits ☁️☂️

my world at your fingertips ☁️💫

cw: mentions of self mutilation

you miss… what now? ☄️✨☂️

cw: teasing, implied marathon sex

Violetta

introduction

violetta being drawn ☁️✨☂️

violetta and her unbearable cuteness ☁️✨

Ambrose

introduction

introducing ambrose to technology ☁️☂️

cw: suggestive

[ask-bing-and-the-g-unit]

Liar liar liar liar.

Bing let the door close behind him. He finally let out an exhale, fans lowering in speed from the fresh air before he slumped against the surface of the door to sink to the ground. Tentatively and shakily, his hands reach up to slide off the glasses to stare at the mirrored lenses with his COLOUR:3rr0R eyes. He rubbed his chest, trying to make his fans calm down without giving any effort before he shuffled to rise to his feet.

The shades were abandoned by the floor vent as he approached the mirror, gaze focused on his torso. Then he met his own gaze — and he flinched.

CW: GRAPHIC — no blood, no gore — BODILY REMOVAL — SELF AFFLICTED HARM

‘Maybe- maybe if I just…’ His hands rose to his face, and he took his left thumb to his right eye on and began to push in by the corner. The eye seemed to grow bigger as it was brought forward more and more, and he could hardly register his laboured breathing and trembling form. His thumb was knuckle-deep when he felt the wires.

And he popped it out.

[forwhump]

a/n; sorry !!!!!!!!!!!!! (either for the delay or the fact that I’m posting again depending on how you feel about me)(I’m from mountains, canada and I drove to prairies, canada & at one point completely out of nowhere my friend was like “you could hide a military base out here so easy” I was like 👀)(silas could literally be in flatlands, manitoba we don’t even know)

anyway LOL this is for the anon that asked for more outside pov !! I was actually looking for smth hal ‘cause I have a lot more lighthearted stuff & sort of caretaking healing things from hal’s pov BUT !!! I felt partway through june needed more screen time & I went back and wrote a lot of early stuff from her pov & this is some of that & it is TOO GOOD not to post !! more wren backstory 😏 but nothing good has happened to wren in his life so y’know

tw/cw: sexual violence, rape, noncon, transphobia, misgendering, graphic depictions of violence, serious bodily harm, forced imprisonment, captivity, mentions of kidnapping, sexual slavery, medical torture

outside pov, military whump, mentions of super soldiers

June has been in the unit for about two years — she thinks — when Point comes to escort her from the common room, and it isn’t unusual. Not at first.

She safely assumes it’s for combat or field training, which are two of the only three things she ever gets escorted from the unit for. The third is medical. She’s never seen anything else, she’s never been taken to any other part of the district, and the hair on the back of her neck starts to rise as Point leads her deeper and deeper into the labyrinth, farther and farther from familiarity.

“Sir?” She tries, and he doesn’t even look at her.

He leads her to a door at the end of a long, empty hallway. He stands with his back to it, finally looking at June. Something in his jaw twitches. “Against my better judgment,” he says, and has to stop, to calm himself, closing his eyes, breathing in slowly through his nose. When he opens his eyes again, he looks at her and says, “if I had another choice, you would not be here. You are about to become privy to information only my most trusted men have been entitled to. It is contraband. If, for any reason, my superiors find out, and she is taken from me, I will not be happy. And if I’m not happy, your employment with me will be terminated by means of your life. Do I make myself clear?”

June had never seen any farther into the district than the arenas, even further underground. This is a single, armoured door, at the end of a long, empty hallway, at the junction of more long, empty hallways. “She?” June asks.

“Do I make myself clear?” Point repeats, and June’s body nods with no help from her brain.

“Sir,” she says.

Point clicks his tongue, irritated, before he unlocks and unarms the door.

It opens to the worst thing June has ever seen in her life.

“Fuck!” She says, and she doesn’t mean to, taking a quick step back. She can see Point watching her, blank, from the corner of her eye, but she can’t look at him. She doesn’t want to look anymore but she can’t pull her eyes off the body laid flat on its back on the concrete.

The costume dress is ripped and stained, tulle and gingham soaked through with blood. The body is so emaciated that June can clearly make out every bone in its leg beneath its waxy, bruised skin.

She fixates on the long, white hair. Robin has the same hair.

“Oh my fucking god,” she says.

Robin speaks of him, still, but he hasn’t been the same since this place got to him. None of them are. He isn’t frantic in the same way, but he still talks about him. When Robin talks, it’s most of what he talks about.

When he’d been taken, escorted here, his brother had been with him. The artist. They’d taken him, too. The soldiers all staunchly denied him ever even having a brother with him, so June had always assumed he’d been killed at the scene. Robin had insisted as long as he’d been there — they’d taken his brother, too. He was here somewhere.

He was right.

June feels cold all over.

“I think her pelvis is broken,” Point explains, and she has never experienced the rush of emotion she feels now, wet and hot, like a tide that breaks in her chest.

“You think her —“ she starts, and it almost makes her gag. She has to take a long breath in through her nose. She still can’t look away. “You think his pelvis is broken?”

“No,” Point admits. “Her pelvis is definitely broken.”

“Oh my fucking god,” June says again, and her voice sounds really far away. Robin’s brother has been real this whole time and Point’s been keeping him as a pet. “Oh my fucking god. You raped him to death.”

“She’s still alive,” Point says, and he says it like she’s dumb. He steps closer to nudge him in the side with the toe of his boot and Robin’s brother makes a quiet, wet sound June has only ever heard from dying men.

She reacts without thinking, shoving Point away from him. He moves, but he sneers as he looks down at her. “Stand down, January.”

“Get the fuck away from him!”

One of his eyebrows lifts, menacing. She doesn’t like Point, and she’s never liked Point, but one of the things she’s growing to loathe is his almost cartoonish villany. His mood swings are goofy and violent and it sets her teeth on edge. “I own her,” he says, low and dangerous. He leans in close. June is a big girl — Point is a massive fucking man. She doesn’t want to be intimidated by him but he speaks like a threat and his breath is hot against her face. “I can do whatever I want to her. That’s not why I brought you here.”

June would be shivering if she let herself, which is interesting because she’s actually as hot as if she’s running a fever. The sweat is cold as it trickles down her spine. “Why did you bring me here?”

Point looks down at the blood dried on the concrete, at Robin’s bleeding, broken brother, and says, “I don’t know what to do.” He looks at June slowly and his face is completely void of any emotion that June knows or recognizes.

“What?” She says.

He looks down again, back up, and she still can’t read his face at all. “I don’t want her to die,” he finally admits.

“Oh my fucking god,” June says, and she doesn’t mean to. She doesn’t know what else to say. She knew Point was a mean bastard but she never would’ve thought he would’ve been capable of this. “You should’ve thought about that before you raped him to death.”

��She doesn’t have to die,” he says.

“What do you want me to do?” June cries.

He looks at her like she’s a little stupid, which is just mind blowing, and motions to Robin’s brother with one arm. The other is held at his back, at ease.

Wren.

The name comes to her out of nowhere.

Robin’s brother is Wren.

“You’re also female,” Point explains, and kind of tilts his head, “I think.”

“What the fuck are you talking about?” June says. “So?”

He motions at Wren again.

June looks at him, too, and it’s so much more horrible now that he has a name. He’d had family before, loved ones, somebody who was worried about him, and that was bad enough, but now this small, bleeding thing, broken down the middle, has a name.

Wren.

What was their last name? Some other kind of bird, wasn’t it? Was it Heron?

“I don’t know why you think I can help him,” June says.

Point’s eyebrows lift. “I figured you would’ve dealt with your share of female hysteria.”

“Female hysteria?” June repeats. “He was raped to death!”

“She isn’t fuckin’ dead!” Point snaps.

“He’s dying right now!” June cries. “You know that or you wouldn’t have come for help. What the fuck do you expect me to do? Really?”

Rage simmers in Point’s face for only a second. It’s gone just as quickly, replaced by something shier, almost more bashful. “Word is,” he says tightly, “you were a big…female advocate during your time. I thought you might’ve —“ and he cuts himself, exhaling sharply. “I thought you might’ve known somebody who’d been…hurt like her before. I thought you might know what to do.”

“They died,” June says.

“No,” Point says.

“Yes,” June corrects. “I worked around a lot of men like you. They were always civilians, always young, and they always died. Always.”

“You just let them die?” Point says, like he’s horrified by that.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” June says. “He needs a doctor. Have Medic —“

“No.” When he’s not speaking with too much emotion, Point doesn’t speak with a lot. Still, this is the flattest June’s ever heard his voice.

“Oh my god,” she says. “I know what to do and that’s what I know. If those girls in the field had been allowed access to a doctor they might not have died. They would’ve had a fucking chance, at least. What do you think is —“

“No,” he says.

“You’re really just gonna let him die here?” She protests.

“She’s contraband,” Point says, flat. “I thought I made myself clear.”

“So?”

Point looks her up and down once, lip curling disdainfully. “On paper,” he says, “she was terminated on site.”

Something shivers in June’s chest and makes her breath rattle. “Oh my god.”

“She is an unsanctioned pet,” Point says, “and —“

“Oh my fucking god,” she says. She takes a step away from him and she isn’t sure when she had gotten so deep into this room. She doesn’t like it, but she’s standing between Point and Wren and she can’t bring herself to stand anywhere else.

He kind of rolls his eyes at her. “And —“

“So he was always going to die here!” June cries, and the spike of hysteria in her voice surprises even her but this is fucking unbelievable. This is unreal. This place was a hellscape when these men were just working guard detail at a fucked up mad science program making super soldiers.

She should’ve known better. She was in the military, and she knew what those men were like. Point was right, kind of; she didn’t really work as an advocate, she just got a nickname. She used to fight, physically fight stationed doctors to try and get them to help the girls the soldiers always left behind. But they were always locals, civilians; the military’s doctors weren’t authorized to help them.

She should’ve known they’d never just be working guard detail.

She just never would’ve thought they’d be keeping a fucking sex slave in the basement.

What the fuck?

“What the fuck!”

Point exhales through his nose. “Yes,” he agrees.

June puts a hand to her chest and her heartbeat is like gunfire. Robin had been so hysterical about his brother when he’d gotten here, but he’d been going through withdrawals. June had never doubted that he was real, like Hal had, but she really thought they’d killed him, and that Robin had probably just blocked it out. That he’d completely forgotten it after the lobotomy, or whatever the hell they did to him.

He’d been real this whole time and Point had been keeping him as a pet.

“Oh my fucking god.”

“I don’t want her to die,” Point admits again, and June can feel it under her hand, the way that makes her chest constrict.

“At this point it’s probably the least you can do,” she spits, and her head is spinning.

“No,” Point says, and she hates that she agrees with him, but he’s right.

She can’t let him die down here. Not like this. “He needs a doctor,” she says.

“No.”

“That’s all you can do!” she protests. “There’s no other way to help him! You broke his fucking pelvis. He probably needed a doctor six months ago but if he doesn’t get one now he’s going to die. If you don’t want him to, tell Medic.”

“They’ll take her from me,” Point says.

June throws her arms up. “Then he’ll just be dead!”

Point looks down at her for a long time and she looks right back. She thinks he’s probably trying to intimidate some hidden medical prowess out of her, but she’s serious, and at some point he sees it in her face. His lip curls back from his teeth and he leaves. Without a word, he leaves, and he locks the armoured door behind him.

“Fuck,” June says out loud, and she doesn’t mean to. Her voice breaks.

But they’re alone. At least they’re alone.

Slowly, she turns to Wren, and slowly, she sits beside him. “Hi, Wren,” she whispers. He doesn’t respond and she doesn’t really expect him to. Slowly, she reaches out to him, brushing bits of crusted hair out of his face. He looks like he’s probably really beautiful, and he looks young. He looks so young that it makes June nauseous and she has to do everything in her power to keep her voice soft and calm and sweet. She wants to scream for him. She wants to cry.

She starts to push his hair out of his face and his eyes don’t open but he flinches with his whole body. “It’s okay,” June whispers. “It’s okay. I’m not gonna hurt you. My name’s June. I’m a friend of your brother.”

It stirs something in him. His head turns slowly against the concrete and his hair is so white the parts dried with blood look like they’re rusting. Blinking open his eyes, he looks up at her, and he has eyes so much darker than June was expecting. He has really, really dark, really wide eyes, bloodshot and bruised underneath, and he looks up at June from beneath wet eyelashes and it makes him look even younger and she cries with him, then. She can’t help herself.

“Robin?” He asks, but just barely. His voice is really small, but when June strains to hear it, she can hear Robin’s accent, softer and sweeter. “He’s alive?”

“Yeah,” June agrees, smiling wetly, “and he’s clean. He’s all big now, looks like a real cowboy. They fixed his teeth, too. He’s got a great smile.”

He chokes out a wet sound that June only realizes is a sob when a tear clears a track in the grime on his face.

“I know,” she agrees softly. “Really seems like you got the shitty end of the deal here.”

He makes another choked sound and June likes to imagine that in another life, he got to laugh towards the end. “I’m gonna die,” he says, and June can hear it in how thin, how wet his voice is, that yeah, he probably is, “aren’t I?”

“I think so,” June whispers. “I hope not.”

He chokes out another sound, another sob. “I think I want to,” he whispers, and his brittle voice breaks. “I don’t wanna do this anymore.”

“I know,” she agrees. “I think I would, too.” He moves his head, tips his face up towards the ceiling, and strips of flesh have been peeled from the side of his throat. She takes his hand so carefully, and she doesn’t look at the bruising around his wrist or every one of his broken fingernails. “I don’t think I’d want to be alone,” she explains.

He makes a choked sort of sound. “I’m never alone.”

“I’m sorry,” she says softly. “Do you want to be alone now?” His fingers tighten around June’s, almost frantic, and she says, “it’s okay. I’m not going anywhere.” She squeezes his fingers as much as she’s comfortable, which is just barely. “Couldn’t get very far if I wanted to.”

She’s crying, but that feels rude. What does she have to cry about? She tries to wipe her eyes with the back of her other hand and says, “I’m really sorry this happened to you.”

He doesn’t say anything but his fingers are still shaking so June knows he’s still alive. He’s so cold she thinks it would be hard to tell, otherwise. She doesn’t think she’d let go of his hand either way.

They sit there for such a long time that June thinks that Point’s left them both to die. She holds Wren’s hand and cries for him when he isn’t conscious to hear it. When the door is finally opened again, she jumps so hard it feels like it throws something out in her back.

Jumping to her feet, she keeps Wren safely behind her as Point filters back in, face blank. Close at his back is Medic and June sobs out loud.

She would go as far as to say she likes Medic. A trauma surgeon, Medic is a good doctor and he’s kind to them. He’s a prisoner, too. He doesn’t want to be there, either. Him and the entire rest of his team are fitted with collars, flickering at all times with dangerous red light. Insubordination will lead to electrocution which will lead to death.

Medic is a prisoner and he’s one of if not the only person down here with any sort of humanity left. He reacts to Wren like any normal person would — with horror.

He recoils so hard it makes him take a step back, and he bumps into June. Neither of them acknowledge it. “What the fuck?”

Point opens his arms, dismissive. “Fix her.”

“Who is this?”

“Who cares?” Point says. “Can you fix her?”

“What the fuck?” Medic repeats, ragged. “What did you do to her? Who is this?”

“Robin’s brother,” June says, and Medic looks at her with eyes blown wide with horror.

They blow even wider with realization. He looks at Point slowly. “What the fuck?”

“You’re wasting time,” Point says. “She’s dying.”

“His pelvis is broken,” June tells him quietly, and Medic sucks in a sharp breath through his teeth.

“Fuck me,” he says. He rubs his face slowly, but if there’s one thing June likes best about Medic, it’s that she respects him. When he lowers his hands, he looks at Point. He says, “get the fuck out. Take June back to the unit, and stay the fuck away. If you try to see him at any point while he’s in my care, I will fucking kill you. You understand?”

Point’s lip curls back from his teeth. “You’re in no position to tell me what to do, doc.”

“Then maybe we’ll have Weaver come down here and take a look at him instead,” Medic says.

Point snarls, actually snarls, like some kind of fucked up beast, and the way the sound reverberates through the room is deeply unsettling. But he takes June by the arm, and he turns.

June turns to look over her shoulder, but Medic closes the door between them. As she turns back around, she sees it’s because Point tried to look back, too.

She doesn’t say anything to Robin. Maybe that’s the wrong choice, she isn’t sure. What would the right choice be? Would she wanna know, if it was her? What if she’d been lobotomized?

She doesn’t say anything and she doesn’t see Medic for months. When she does she’s sitting in a bed in the medical bay, trying to peer around for any sign of him. The medical bay, unfortunately, was designed for privacy; the size of a large airplane hanger, there are enough beds for a small army but spaced out far enough that June can’t peer end to end.

When the door is pushed open and Medic lifts the corner of his mouth at her, she has a bullet in her arm but she forgets that it hurts and blurts, “is he okay?”

Medic smiles a little more properly and the relief that crests in June’s chest almost makes her start crying out of nowhere. “No,” he says, “but he’s getting there. He’s alive.”

“Oh my fucking god,” she says, and he laughs. “Can I see him?”

“Let’s get this bullet out of you,” he says, “and we’ll see.”

A few months after that, somebody new is introduced to their unit. Like every other time, they don’t know until the guards show up with them. The new guy, this time, has long white hair, the same colour as Robin’s.

June cries pretty uncontrollably.

Robin doesn’t cry — can’t, maybe? — but June cries enough for him, too.

[nothinggoodhappensstories]

Welcome to Nothing Good Happens

"A collection of stories that seldom end blissfully."

A woefully pessimistic writing blog, posting stories that never end well for anyone. If you're a fan of morbid consequences, karmic protagonist shortcomings, or rooting for the 'final girl' to make it; make yourself at home.

The content you'll find here is created by yours truly. Some are from my own imagination. Others are the product of prompts I've scraped from the corners of the internet (with all credit given). Want to see your own twisted tales come to fruition? Click the "Have a Story Prompt?" button and submit your cruel ideas.

The stories span a variety of genres. Dark fantasy, liminal space, sci-fi, apocalypses; there's truly something for everyone. Tread with caution when reading; not all themes are for everyone. The beginning of each post will contain caution and trigger warnings, before proceeding into the story. No story will be exploitative or morally and ethically deplorable. Stories' caution warnings are coloured coded based on severity of the cautions;

No CW: No extreme or mild themes of mature content. Happy endings are still not present in these stories...

Light CW: Light themes of eeriness or suspense. Nothing graphic or overly descriptive.

Soft CW: Mature themes, such as mentions of death, mild violence, suspenseful or dangerous scenarios.

Hard CW: Mentions and descriptions of gore, bodily harm, psychological horror. These posts will also be spoilered with Tumblr's mature content option.

Caution warnings will also be provided in the tags of each story.

If you prefer a visual style of story telling, please follow NGH Comics. It hosts shorter stories in the form of comics. Some stories from here may be adapted into short or long form comics over there.

With that all being said and done...

Grab a warm drink, turns the lights off and enjoy reading.

...You remembered to lock the front door, right?

[transhualians]

just realized I never made an intro post for this blog so hello hello friends! 💞🫶

I go by many names, but you can call me lee! this blog is for my selfshipping content. I post a variety of different content, both SFW and NSFW, and I do post problematic fiction (and believe that everyone has the right to do the same), but all of it is tagged, so it is avoidable. if you don't like my content, that's okay! simply close this blog or block me. everything I discuss here is fictional and if you condone any dead dove topics in real life, block me.

I'm a xie lian (tgcf) fictive, and I occasionally refer to canon xie lian in first person. I'm in a traumagenic system but I support endogenic systems.

the f/o that I will talk about 95% of the time is hua cheng (I have a couple others that I am not comfortable sharing publically for anonymity reasons). please do not follow if you post about him in a romantic/sexual tone.

DDDNE/potentially triggering topics will be tagged (see taglist below). dead dove topics I will talk about frequently include noncon, stalking, kidnapping, etc. also I am exclusively sub so pretty much all of my NSFW imagines will read as sub reader :'D

I'm not super picky about my DNI. TERFs/radfem and any other kind of bigot can fuck off, pro-transID/radqueer do not follow. Minors are free to interact with my SFW posts, NOT my NSFW posts. You don't even have to be explicitly pro/comship to follow, I just ask that you be respectful.

Taglist and extra info below the cut:

For clarification, I support all of the following:

- pro/comship, anti-harassment, anti-censorship, etc.

- endogenic systems and syscourse-neutral systems

- anti-contact paraphiles

I do NOT support the following:

- pro-contact paraphiles/radqueer

- pro transID

- radfems, TERFs, anti-sex work, etc.

- transmedicalism and exclusion of non-harmful queer identities (by harmful, I mean identities which actively and objectively hurt or intend to hurt others [ie. pro-contact MAPs], or identities that appropriate topics or identities that you do not have inherent experience with or feel the real-world consequences of [ie. transracial or transdisabled identities].)

- heavily anti-endogenic systems/supporters

Taglist

feel free to hide/block any tags that make you uncomfortable! tumblr has that wonderful feature for a reason! /gen

organizational

-f/o imagines (general f/o scenarios)

-discourse (contains discourse and/or possibly controversial topics)

-🍁.info (mostly my sexuality-related special interest posting :])

-🍁.reblog (reblogged from someone else)

-🍁.mine (my own post)

-🍁.positivity (positive content, mainly about kink/proship)

-🍁.personal (personal topics/posts, not applicable to almost everyone like f/o imagines)

content-related

-tw noncon (explicitly non-consensual sex)

-tw dubcon (dubiously-consensual sex)

-tw underage (reader is imagined as underage [SIDE NOTE: actual minors get the hell off my blog])

-tw kidnapping (reader is kidnapped)

-tw stalking (reader is stalked)

-cw yandere

-tw abuse (psychological abuse and/or toxic behavior depicted *not physical. for that see below)

-tw violence (descriptions of verbal or physical violence)

-tw gore (graphic descriptions of violence, blood, and/or bodily harm)

-safe sane consensual (no dead dove topics are touched on in this post)

tags will be added as needed.

thank you for reading!💞🫶

[deada55]

The Mill

crossposting: ao3

synopsis: A young Toki helps rebuild the mill.

for kloktober day 14, creation/destruction

cws: unrevised (RIP), non-graphic violence and bodily harm.

When the cover lifted, he pushed his hair off of his face and climbed up the ladder, making sure his head was high and his pace regular. To face the world again was to embody God, and God was proud, and God was strong. Gratitude went farther than your own aching body or the taste in your mouth from licking the walls to keep yourself from dying of thirst. All the deserts, all the low places, all the waterless, dark holes and all the suffering of this earth were divine productions that must be celebrated like any other.

    The wind was all the courage he needed to stand at the top of the hole in front of his father and four other men standing a couple meters behind him. His face wasn’t right but he didn’t know it until his right cheek was struck. Like his jaw was on a spring, he returned it to center, and then was beckoned to follow.

    Their pace was almost impossible to achieve without panting, but they traveled through the sparkling, white valley in as much silence as possible. The clanking of saws and ropes hid his sighs as he worked to calm his breathing and push himself to keep up. He followed a meter behind the last man to “demonstrate humility”, and to be shielded fron the gentle licks of wind that stung his bare chest (what little wasn’t already too numb.) 

    It was a beautiful morning: the sun was blinding over the hills and the snow was still light. Down underneath the first couple centimeters was ice, but it was par for the course this early in the winter.

The mill couldn’t be operated all year, and the window was slim before it would be too frozen. For all the times the mill could break, this was close to the worst. In the punishment hole, he didn’t feel particularly bitter about his father being angry. He was angry about it, too, but he never would have broken the mill on purpose. The tired wood shattered while he pushed it the same as he’d been taught. It was his duty to forgive, and he forgave the best he could. What made him feel like he deserved to be in the hole was that his father would think he’d be so malicious, or defiant. 

Good boys never broke the mill.

...

The bark scraped against the scabs on his shoulders every time the hillside shoved it forward. His father and the rest of the party traveled to his right in a row in case the log slipped away from him and went forward down the slope. Although it bore down on him, it wouldn’t travel all the way down to the mill on it’s own. He gripped it between his hands, arms raised above his head to pull it forward. If he tried to walk backwards, he’d fall under it, and the knobs from the sawed-off branches would punch into his chest like releasing the excess rise from a loaf of bread.

More importantly, he wanted to do it right. Being impressed wasn’t faithful, because it was evidence of doubting His blessings. And it wasn’t humble. He only wanted his father to be happy with him, and, hopefully, God. He saw the point, he was righting his wrong. 

If he couldn’t be good, he’d work hard, He’d be useful.

The end of the whip zipped over the loose strands of his dirty hair milliseconds before he felt it strike the back of his head, right around the base of the skull. He should have expected his father to bring the whip and he dared not slow his feet down even when his so-called “betrayer tears” welled into his eyes. His head stayed throbbing the rest of the way down, and his right leg got a few more lashes before he found the energy to move faster. 

Once the log was beside the mill, he helped de-bark it and took a turn at the saw. He was released to the rest of his chores shortly after noon and finished them as the first couple stars budded in the sky.

He prayed to feel better, just better enough for tomorrow, better enough for the next day. The night started to swallow everything and he walked from pure memory. If he couldn’t make it home, he deserved to die in the snow like a coward. If he deserved to live, God would take him home.

Completely numb, he slipped into the house and floated upstairs to the corner of his parents’ bedroom where he slept. He could expect another beating (probably a strapping) if they didn’t see him doing his nightly prayers but he couldn’t stand to watch them eat. The warmth of the kitchen alone would have been delicious if he trusted himself to stand up straight. 

He woke up to his mother’s cold, silky fingers moving across his forehead and a heaviness that soaked every muscle in his body all the way through. Trapped, he looked up at the morning light on the wooden wall. She left. Two feet gracefully skimmed the steps. Then, six pairs of feet came running up. 

He slept again as suddenly as thunder.

[catspawcreates]

Im not ready to post this on AO3, but I penned out Chapter 1 of my Hunted AU - To Poach the Sky

CW: Implied Graphic Bodily Harm | Death

To Poach the Sky Chapter 1 - Emotional Shrapnel

A horrific scream cut short greets your hungry ears. Your body chills and limbs stiffen in reflex to the fatalistic sound. This was it… this would be your end. You dove too deep, stepped on the wrong toes and ended up here…in the death fields as they were so lovingly called by the fans. Game Over as they say.

If you didn’t know any better you could have taken solace among the wildflowers tugging at your legs, reveled in the fresh clean air swirling by, or perhaps even laid down to view the stars hovering in the thick velvet blanket of a sky above. Nature lived and breathed around you, but the soft rustle of the tall grass provided no comfort. You were painfully out of your element, even if it called to your soul in some primal way. Having been raised in the city, your experience with the great outdoors was limited and controlled via camp grounds and cultivated hiking trails, cut out from the forest with human needs in mind.

It was nothing like this maddening anticipation and dark ambiance of the night symphony threatening to engulf you in its wild jaws.

The few still close paused only for a moment at the sound cutoff far too early. Someone’s little child…gone like that. Why did people like these games? What sickness infects humanity with the desire to witness atrocities? Certainly you had stared at your fair share of traffic accidents or watched an action movie or two… or more. But this? It was insane to think that anyone would willingly put themselves into such a dangerous situation.

Oh the forms that had to be signed, their rights waived of their own volition. For what? Money? Glory? A rush of adrenaline? That last one you were certainly feeling in spades. When you took this (ridiculously good paying) reporting job you never imagined those forms would bite you in the ass. It had seemed ridiculous some of the oddly specific terms of the contract, but now… now you realized how foolish you had been to not read over the fine print. Not that it probably would have done you any good with the sleazy language of lawyers. The contracts written with silver tongued ink using terminology only the ones in the know could decipher in a court of law. The opportunity seemed to be just what you always dreamed of, but now… you realized how too good to be true it was.

The others, suited up in tactical gear and armed with firearms you had only seen in movies and video games, moved nearly silently despite the reedy grass they waded through. The cover was weak, but hiding in cover wasn’t exciting. No…this was a game. This was a show, the stakes as high as they come. Your bones and muscles refused to allow any movement. You were still as a statue, sticking out like a sore thumb among the ever moving landscape.

One of your “teammates” side eyed you, the disgust and disappointment evident even behind their protective mask. You didn’t belong here. You weren’t trained or prepared. They had fit you in some basic gear, but it was pitiful compared to their professional equipment. This was a fate thrust upon you by those far more powerful than you. Your stomach lurched at the memory. Pushing down your stomach and your thoughts, you will your body to work. You didn’t want to be a sitting duck. At least a duck could try to fly away from their hunters, and there was no doubt you were being hunted.

You didn’t need to feel the hair standing on end across your skin to know that you were a gazelle among lions. You could practically taste the danger in the air. The tense energy palpable and thick with anxiety. You knew what Could be out here. Maybe you didn’t know exactly what it was, but you hoped for a low value target to be stalking you (even though you knew otherwise). As much as your “team” was hunting their quarry, you could feel it in your basic animal instincts buried deep in your biology that you were equally being hunted by the unknown mark. Bears and wolves were facing off in the night, and you were just hopeful that your end would be quick if it was your end…wishful thinking.

Fewer and fewer silhouettes were in your field of vision. The players were splitting off to stalk the mystery target in their own ways. They could work like a team or go solo, it didn’t matter much either way for the game but it did matter to their pride. The brief realization that you were quickly being left behind left an icy dread trailing up your spine. You didn’t know what to do. Your “team” was equally as dangerous as whatever was out there. They would not keep you safe.

The overwhelming feeling of helplessness wrestled with your will to live, and your heavy limbs collapsed in on themselves as you curled into a ball below the surface of the ocean of grass. There was no real cover in this field. There was no protection. There was no hope.

You muffled your tears, a futile attempt to stay hidden, as you made yourself as small as possible. Maybe you could stay hidden? Another stupidly hopeful thought. You knew they’d be able to sense you, but it was a small comfort to delude yourself. You steady your breaths to quiet yourself further as you notice the eerie stillness around you. Birds held their songs in their throat, the insects hid away in their small crevices and the wind died down. It felt as if existence itself had paused.

Your heart began to beat violently in your chest with heightened senses driving the anxious feeling in your core. Each beat threatening to give you away, you swore it was loud enough to wake the dead.

Silence…

……

…..

Faintly the sound of merry jingle bells lilts across the plain

…..

Was that….

The sharp sounds of gunfire shreds your thoughts in the air as screams pierce the landscape. Heavy pounding upon earth rumbled through the ground enough to shake you from your stupor. Not but a few yards from you a shrill cry bubbled out unpleasantly, gasping with horrifying clarity, much too close for comfort. Your primal fear fueled you as you crawl below the surface of plantlife. You can’t decode what’s unfolding around you, your brain numbing against the horror. You only know you have to move or die. You might die anyways, but at least you weren‘t the one who froze like a deer in the headlights. Yelling, whistling bullets, smooth rhythmic thumping and cries fill the darkness. The professionals that you were with but moments ago filled the night air with a cacophonous melody of ear splitting gun shots, curdling screams, incoherent yelling followed by the thick scent of copper.

The blood pounding in your ears attempted to drown out the chaos erupting around you on all sides. The target seemed to be impossibly fast, weaving through the grass with ease as bone crunching, fleshy sounds accompanied the screams that died out on either side of you. You felt the air leaving you with the rising panic… chest tight with dread constricting your vital functions…

All at once the horrible din hushed. Low gurgling and gasping played on the edge of the breeze before being quickly snuffed out. Stopping, you feel the ground tremble with terrible anticipation. The dramatics of your demise heightened by the rush of fear in your veins. Time lengthening with each increasingly powerful sensation. Purposeful and predatory, the target flaunting their power with each footfall, knowingly fueling your fear and seeming to revel in it with their slow approach.

It was coming for you. How quickly it had dispatched the experienced players. It was unreal, this was unreal… you weren’t really here… you weren’t really here…but you were. You knew what was coming for you. Stories of this “prey” spread far and wide, more myth than truth it had seemed, but no… it was more terrifying than you had ever thought possible. They referred to it as prey but in reality they were hunting an apex predator. No one ever survived.

Shaking uncontrollably your body reverts to the comfort of the fetal position. The pose you held when you came into this world and the pose you’d carry when leaving it.

….. thud

Laying on the ground tears cascade from your eyes blinding you in your final moments. Sobbing and shuddering, your heart feels as though it's about to beat out of your chest, the unbearable wait stretching out painfully.

….. thud

The fear gripping your soul washes through you, a tsunami sweeping you away. The edges of your vision begin to darken, and your mind mercifully numbs to your surroundings. Staring up at the moon shining brilliantly in the sky, you find solace that this beautiful nightscape will be the final image you are left with.

….. thud

A tinge of red intrudes your blurry vision. Drearily looking down through the grass the moon meets your gaze again. You must be delirious. Wasn’t the moon full a moment ago?

….. thump

Eyes closing, your body succumbs to the stress and shuts down. Useless, useless body. So many things left undone. So many promises now broken. You drift in a sea of thoughts and regrets as your mind disconnects from your flesh and bones, blissfully retreating into the void.

…..

On the edge of consciousness you hear a faint

…jingle… jingle…

The sound of your fate coming to meet you.

[purkinje-effect]

The Anatomy of Melancholy, 91: Formica

Table of Contents Third Instar, Chapter 22. Go to previous. Go to next. KITCHEN SINK DDW CHAPTER AHOY. CWs for insects, heavy chem use, faked romantic embroilment, NSFW, graphic eroticized self-harm, forfeit bodily autonomy, memory and reality fuckery, mental break, and ego death. If you want to skip this chapter, the takeaways are included as the very last footnote.

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Data integrity recovery... 75%... Please do not power off your system.

______________________________

November 1, 2287

‘Choly toils over his plentiful notes salvaged upon vacating Lease 37. The ancient paper crinkles and warps from fresh water damage, and the ink is not entirely indelible. He appreciates that it follows to expect he would pen formulas and sketches to paper, but just like their memories of it, even these notes have gaps. Surely, the bungled holotape which he has yet to eject from his Pip-Boy sequesters even deeper detail. Missing pages might account for some diagrams and annotations lacking their antecedents, but only the existence of text files on the holotape can explain such extensive, consistent, glaring omissions. In essence, without the work he expects hides within holotape, he possesses only the appendix.

A smile quivers at the corner of his lips.

Did we glimpse what was never meant to be seen again, or did we awaken it? If we were meant to see it again, then why have us so soon and so completely forget? Everything about the mall was put there for a reason. …I just haven't any clue what reason that could be.

If the omissions aren't on the holotape, they're lost for good. For his sanity, its contents must complete the picture. How he gets on Berries can nettle even him, but the sheer earnesty of whatever he was on about in these footnotes nauseates him. The chain reaction of the storm and whatever chems he took during it convoked notions and imagery which churn his heart in an abyss. The handwriting is unmistakably his, down to an idiosyncratic reliance on Cyrillic in places. It’s unsettling enough allegedly to have witnessed such things, but he's desolate to know them only secondhand through what amounts to letters to himself. Reading what survived the lease flood jogs uncomfortable fragments of thoughts he struggles to piece together, like driftwood lapping against an uneasy brume-choked shore.

He wishes that there weren’t any parsible sense within these individual scraps of understanding, that they couldn’t possibly interrelate to anything more grandiose. The juxtaposition of thermodynamics substantiating the supernatural… Awe and dread wrestle for his grief. No matter how much of his notes he may ever restore, not even a polymath like General Francis would believe what these annotations threaten to insinuate. Even without Berries, he can tell the math itself details something very real, but sound math without evidence will always be on paper mere theory. Perhaps it’s best if most take it for an overwrought fabrication.

It tickles him a bit that he's somehow penned something that psychologically strangles even him. It's almost a shame that it reads like nonfiction. Almost.

Yet, when he wrote these pages, he understood the conditions that came to damage Angel and the Pip-Boys. They are his key to undoing that damage. There are several units in the onboarding manual about gaussian repair. If he can deconstruct the nor'easter's magnetic properties, he can study the patterns it cut in their collective data media. Without this insight, he won't stand a chance otherwise.

Fuck it all, magnetic fields. It’s no wonder no one can remember fully. How anyone in the Hinter can inure themselves to such insidious inclement weather is unfathomable in any measure. The drugged MREs aren’t what makes Lockreed feel so secure. Something far more sophisticated has to be at play here, for the prewar building's interior to remain even more pristine than Deenwood despite apparent abandonment.

Something grazes loose hairs of his wadded up chignon. He smooths the hair down, and doesn't pay it much mind until it happens again, too absorbed in the notes. He feels behind himself. The RadRoach chirps a warning at him.

"I know this is your house," he tells it in Russian, not turning or moving, "but for now this one room is my home. I wish you and your cousins understood it."

He eases forward to set down his papers on the desk. His ears are trained on his unappreciative host behind him. He whips around in the chair to grab the insect. He grabs its antennae. It flails and chirps angrily, and it flicks its wings in an attempt to dislodge his blinding grip. For how flexible even an enormous roach is, and for how barely he has a grip on it, he cannot get a grip on any other portion of its anatomy without the risk of getting bitten. As he rises and walks to the office door, he thinks to beg for it to stop squirming. He flings it as hard as he can down the hall and shuts the door. He eases himself back into the chair, and rolls his eyes.

To tell an insect not to squirm… They breathe through abdominal contractions–isn't squirming then their way to hyperventilate? At least this one didn't get a bite.

He leans to pick up his notes again. His faint, shaking fingers trace the crude sketches he hopes are–and he wishes aren't–life drawings. A smirk twitches.

"Pèlerins. She called them… Pèlerins, didn't she?"

Do my sketches do their likeness any justice?

Why am I never certain my nightmares are nightmares?

______________________________

January 9, 2288

Sticks adjusts the scarf around the lower half of his face and snaps the flaps of his ushanka back over it, then continues whittling with his multitool. In the lingering four feet of snow, he shields himself from the occasional bite of wind by crouching behind a stand of rocks. His Pip-Boy's Geiger counter clicks lazily, and he half wishes he could simply turn it off rather than tune it out. A variety of wood lay in his lap and around him along with a handful of various wires he’s scavved from inside Lockreed. He might not know much of any intended use for them, but he's found that braided wire makes a damn fine snare, so he supposes that means it’s good for something. He shakes his head and eyeballs the piece of pine branch he’s notching.

You’ve lost your marbles for good this time, River Sticks. You finally got out of this damn place, and you’re still puttering around here.

It's not so bad, that he hadn't known a need to procure foothold traps before leaving Ant. Pelt traps are easy enough to lay. Provided reliable wood and sufficient cordage, the hard part is always patience. He spent most of yesterday looking for a gap in the ice where he could cast the seine he usually wears for a shawl, but he only netted two small bass and a load of garbage from upriver. He’s surprised the snow and ice have persisted this late into the season. But, he’s been overjoyed he gets to eat something this week besides RadRoach, for the first time since they got themselves stuck inside Lockreed. It’s something of a frustrating inversion, for him to crave things to eat alongside the meat, but two months with not even so much as a tato or carrot has him a bit deranged.

He has a lot of reasons to be a lot of kinds of deranged.

His shallow, sharp breaths don’t condensate around his face. His thin cracked lips peel back in a grimace. He works at notching another piece of pine. His hand isn't acting up so much today. Occasional vague guttural snaps punctuate his strokes.

Even though they got one of the F.C. generators back online two weeks ago, ‘Choly still forbids any of them to go anywhere without extensive scrutiny beforehand–not to another floor, and certainly not outside. The little rat bastard thinks the place is haunted by the General or something, Sticks guesses. He was on about something, after they found that body in the basement. All Sticks followed was, give me a few days. The new project got him to leave Sticks alone for a bit longer than usual, anyway.

Open sesame.

The building security system calls ‘Choly Colonel Carey. Thanks to ‘Choly’s tinkering, it now thinks Sticks is some dame named Maria. He’s not sure what ‘Choly did, but now he can come and go as he pleases.

I’m free. I can cut all my losses and run like I wanted. Guy’s hyper-focused on so much history malarkey and a crap ton of computer projects. He’s constantly junked up. He wouldn’t notice for days. Maybe even months.

Sticks tucks his multitool back in his left hand, then stands and gathers his whittled components, and treks off to locate good trees for setting snares.

So why doesn’t Sticks just leave? It’s been so easy to string the guy along with bluffs of infatuation. It bugs him somehow that ‘Choly’s so readily respected his demand for space. Has the lovestruck worn off? If he did notice Sticks left, would he even care? Sticks can’t have lost his hook in him somewhere between here and Ant. And surely, 'Choly hasn’t been faking being into him, too. It would be too much for the ghoul, if he’d been getting played by his mark.

What exactly is 'Choly's angle with all this, anyway?

He finds a sturdy slim forked tree, and begins running some wire between its two trunks and through a branch through which he’s bored a hole. He sets to winding up the load.

Those disgusting Blue Flu smoothies. He could become contagious again without those. I can handle him cutting me every few weeks… Don’t lose sight of your grand prize, you fool. The bastard hasn’t made good on his promise yet to cook me Deenwood treats. He doesn’t just represent everything Deenwood has to offer–he has the whole damn cookbook and knows how to read it. And he won't even need that place to make the stuff!

He catches himself overwinding, and eases back the load a few turns before setting a safety branch. With a sigh, he kneels down to unpack a two-foot wide patch of snow. When the ground is too frozen to clear out a ditch, he replaces the snow as loosely as he can. Then to either side, he tamps down twin stakes with the butt of his machete, and ties a snare loop. He pulls out a cut open Vim can, into which he's stuffed the diced up second fish he didn’t eat the day before, and taps out a portion of it atop his makeshift camouflaged pit.

I can’t let go when I’m this close to my hard work finally paying off.

That’s all it is.

He mutters to himself, as though he’s forgotten what he’s been after for over fifty years.

"Whole damn cookbook…”

He’s got his rifle. He decides to track a Radstag once he’s done laying his snares throughout the nearby area. It will be difficult to dress larger game with a multitool and machete, but he’s overdue for a solid physical challenge, and damn, if he couldn’t go for some ribs.

______________________________

January 13, 2288 [2288.01.13-0,1]

A declarative chirp concludes the algorithmic gaussian repair scan. ‘Choly glances up at the terminal screen from the lease papers. He unglues himself at some point and reaches to eject the holotape from the Pip-Boy tape deck. His eyes trace the key-prong cord tethering the device to the terminal. Every time he remembers that there exists a model of Pip-Boy with two tape decks, he wishes he had one. In order to write from one holotape to another, or run any script on one and apply it to another, he must plug into a terminal to use its hardware. Neither jealousy nor anxiety seizes him so much as anticipation. Success signifies far more than a reading opportunity, but in the moment it’s exactly that: he can finally deglaze one background anxiety that’s caked his brain for months.

He couldn't risk the data on the nor'easter holotape with his script experiments. He had to be fully certain the script works, as he's ruined several dozen formatted JBD cartridges ironing out viable gaussian repair script. Applying his script to a formatted holotape has only served repeatedly to damage it beyond restoration. If it weren't so ironic to have caused permanent physical lacunae in the holotapes, in his attempts to test a tool intended to repair them, it would madden him to suspect that jogging his own memories of Division Day could bake in or even accrue further brain damage.

He's had his Pip-Boy back online for several days now, for his efforts, at least. He clutches the holotape a little too long, and a little too firmly. A broken sigh falls from a broken smile. He disconnects the Pip-Boy and clips it back on his right arm, and allows it to synchronize with his Vault Suit before reinserting the holotape and clicking the deck shut. He takes it with him to the break room, for reading material over lunch.

He notices that he's already hard programmed to walk as lightly as possible, and that he carries his cane sooner than bear weight on it. Though he can't term it fear in his condition, he remains cautious not to draw Sticks's attention, in the chance the ghoul has come back inside already.

Only once in the break room, choosing his boxed meal, does he chuckle softly to himself: Olivia salad.[2288.01.13-2]

He prepares a goulash and grazes on it. All this time, he’s expected to retrieve a single document for his efforts, but it surprises him to find that his transcript of the events of the Division Day Nor’easter span multiple entries. Between the holotape and the physical annotations, his transcript tallies upwards of fifty pages, all for an eighteen hour time frame. Speculation sublimates amid bewilderment, that even more may have been lost when they relinquished Lease 37. Not even his “Fly-Blown” session, with its strangely organic comixture of narrative and hard pharmacological fabrications, had been so prolific.

His arms feel so much heavier. A soporific grin pulls the corners of his mouth abreast. He checks the medical diagnostics tab of his Pip-Boy to confirm that he once again enjoys the benefits of these two hundred year old Meals Ready to Eat. He couldn't dream of having ready access to this quantity of DayTripper anywhere else. He’s grateful for his companions, but these gifts the General has left behind are his truest undeniable grace here.

One of the earliest entries details what he had endeared a Foucauldian cocktail. He chuckles at the neuroplastic engineering that explicates his capacity to have penned such a volume of information in such a short span. Enduring attention, enhanced cognition, lasting satiety, and suppressed fatigue. He wonders whether he moved even once the entire storm. He plans to hash out some future means to compound the cocktail into a single chem dose, with the intent to market it to the Commonwealth’s aspiring authors.

Continuing through the holotape, he encounters one instance too many where the entries reference his notes, and can stand it no longer. He shovels the remainder of his meal and returns to plant himself at the desk. Before he proceeds another second, he copies the Nor’easter holotape to a formatted JBD cartridge. He calls for Angel, to store the original, safe inside it. While in its storage, he puts his hands on the twin armillary baubles from Burlington Glassworks. He can’t imagine how they survived the lease liquidation. He plucks them from inside his Mister Handy, thanks it, and turns it loose to resume patrolling their empty building.

He eyes the baubles with an indistinct unease. Inside the storage compartment, they had cast their impossible color in lieu of light, but under the fluorescent office lights, their observable chroma is limited to their effect on reflected light, as though that peculiar green-red gold were only visible in shadows and images. He sets them on the desk and tucks a sublingual Mentat. He then inserts another JBD into his Pip-Boy tape deck, intent on stenographic exegetics as he jumps between reading on the terminal and reading on the written page.[2288.01.13-3]

It's a heavy read, and a dense one, but he persists. He can't remember any of the details transcribed in the lease notes or holotape, yet it is manifest that he penned it from a firsthand account. His account must then substitute his memory of it. An otherworldly choreography had played out that day, to the tune of a lethean blizzard's imperceptible cacophony. What had compelled the pretemporal images; the Satellites, Children, and Laners; the ants; Sticks or even himself? They all had followed a path, seemingly incomprehensibly exact in its byzantine dimensions, yet at once just as rudimentary in the sense by which its actors had connected with it. History forever repeats itself in echoes and distortions, a fractal formula of design.

Something brushes at the back of his mind like a loose hair, or silvering cobweb. He twitches, and wipes at it as though physical action can liberate him of it.[2288.01.13-4] It isn't a RadRoach. He checks to be sure.

Something deeper than chem reliance robs him of the grief, guilt, and terror he rightfully expects every time he gains fresh postwar information. He half suspects that he's simply so far past the threshold of these emotions that he can no longer register them meaningfully: in the same way human nerves have a limit to the amount of pain they can measure, the human mind must have a limit to the amount of fear or remorse it can process. He delights to have stumbled upon one of the oldest nepenthes known to humanity, left with no other choice but to forget, because remembering takes too much. He wonders if his cryogenesis monopolizes a similar stranglehold on his experience and recollection, or if some more profound trauma explicates his displacement.

But is biology to blame for this general anesthesia, both acute and chronic? He sneers and smears at his face to loosen tightness building between his temples. He chews up the Mentat and continues to knead the sides of his head with the heels of his palms. It feels uniquely myopic to suspect nothing greater is at play. The mathematics he implemented in this transcript are beyond him without Berries, but tenuous fringes of insight still hover around the formulas, diagrams, and statistics. The philosophy of intelligent design doesn't quite ring, but the deliberateness of it all still unfurls a certain welcome resignation.[2288.01.13-5]

Attempting to alter the trajectory set in motion by the events which bound the Pèlerins to the granite feels like trying to steer an explosion after the fact. He won't need to consult Mama Murphy on the tenets of free will: she alone is evidence that knowing the temporal terrain only reinforces the path it's blazed. She saw Jared's chem-warped, monstrous visage through 'Choly's Jet bleary eyes, easily a decade before 'Choly hallucinated it. Rhyme or echo, time cascades ever onward.

He can't control any meaningful aspect tangent to his existence, any more than he could have controlled whether Jared became a monster in Lexington, or whether the General melted together everyone in Lowell. He feels so small… like an ant.

The sensation of the stray thread laps at him again.

Ants follow the signals of a pheromone trail to dictate their path and behavior. Something just as ingrained must dictate how humanity moves and behaves.

He relinquishes the notion of free will. He accepts a lack of agency, and accepts the role of agent.

I was only following orders.

Something inside him cracks. He writhes in a hollow eroticism. He's always thought he seeks control in sex encounters, but perhaps even deeper he endeavors simply for things to transpire as intended. If that responsibility can be relegated to someone or something else, he can focus more completely on achieving results.

A resigned smile doubles down on his inability to feel terror, despite any logic that he well ought to.

"These silvered cobwebs. Nemiza plays cat's cradle all around me."[2288.01.13-6]

He reclines on the loveseat, and imagines an undetectable force willing him to undo himself. He flicks the stenographic capture lever which he's missed so dearly, and lets the Tryasovitsy work him apart with a calligraphic fever. He knows full well that Sticks is not sixpence to the good on any transaction to ferry him safe to the Afterlife.[2288.01.13-7] He can’t expect Sticks to do all the work for him, machete or not. For all he is and all he's done, as a ghost he can only expect to drown in a river of nepenthe. Neither this world nor the next has room for him.

You caress the insides of your thighs. And you tremble.

Your fingertips drag the contours of your pudenda through fabric. And you shiver.

You unlatch the busks and buckles of your Surgical Leathers, to intimate the ecdysial rapture of an insect capable of ripping off its own husk. And you rasp.

The zipper glides apart and even your garments peel off your form. And you burn.

The fingers of one hand tangle in your hair, to pin your neck over the armrest and bare your neck. And you’re bent and broken apart.

You’re laid bare, indelicate, and structureless. Your outgrown nails scrape bright lines on your skin. And isolation peals between your ears.

You're denied climax–imago and imagination. You can't come, or become. Not now, and perhaps not ever. Your only purpose now is to need, and continue to ever need. It always has been. And rotting, ineffectual aches bloat you.

Your nails graze your bare crotch, to appreciate the keratinous bite of the insect you fancy that you are. And you convulse. 

You rake them down your thighs, and you rake them to fill them with skin and blood. And your own throat gags you.

Your feeble fingers can’t dig deep enough. You reach for the Komár, and unsheath it. You place its tip above the knee and drag it up the thigh, just to compare its bright red strokes to those you can leave yourself. No, precision and swiftness are unbefitting of you. Again you wrack your throat by the hair, and you press the blade beneath your jaw. And jaundice waxes you.

You'll claw yourself to sloughed viscera like this, reduce yourself to crystallized pheromonal commands made manifest. You'll sweat and writhe ad infinitum, forced to modulate your sex just to keep from slashing your own throat. And you’re paralyzed ever-waking, ever-watching yourself edged to oblivion.

Who has placed the knife to your throat? Who holds it there? As it should be. Your form only serves to hover perpetually a razor’s edge from expiration.[2288.01.13-8]

Again and again his skin stings and crawls. Even once he lets himself put up the Komár and return to the use of his fingertips, he can't wipe or scrape thoroughly enough. Raw and unsatisfied, he sprawls deflated, unable to decrypt exactly what his mind is on about. All the while, in a detached commitment, he continues gently grazing and caressing his red-streaked ragged body.

He decides he's not the ant, but rather the surface they traverse, the surface which their tireless path erodes underfoot.[2288.01.13-9] To humanity, granite is timeless. Even if humans manage to destroy it, its history-haunted sand will still blanket the beaches and oceans with granitic specters. His mind wanders to chemistry, and formic acid's varied uses. Originally identified from compounds isolated from ants, the substance was once a prime reagent in both pharmacology and resin synthesis. Too, it is the less egregious cousin to formaldehyde, the prodigal embalmer. Formica may not be granite, but they both posit crystalized dimensionality. The Lane's ants symbolize its granite's eternity, and its frozen granules of undiluted time.

But, he’s not granite: in this analogy, he’s more like formica, a substitute, a resin. He thinks again to Sutter Grove’s diorama, and how much like a diorama the Concourse itself resembled during the nor’easter. So much concern of surveillance saturates the nor’easter holotape transcript. Was he not the surface on which the actors play out their roles, but rather the surface by which an outside observer might perceive the play itself? A lens is a surface, he guesses, but a viewer-jailer dynamic only holds when the players are aware they might be watched. He speculates that the nor’easter’s mass lacuna was a consequence of environmental circumstances eroding a veil between the diorama and the audience which was meant to hold fast.

We witnessed the scurrying behind the curtain.

It would be impossible for him to guess what the author of such a performance would want to achieve through such a work. The ants were the flymen that fucked up, tugged strings they ought not have, at a time they ought not have, and sent the curtains tumbling down.

He wrestles to differentiate his fantasy from his understanding of the events of the nor’easter. If he’s the surface which suspends the audience’s disbelief, perhaps the collapse of such a curtain signals the erosion of the fourth wall. To what consequence, did the ants’ actions pull him down? And most importantly of all, did destroying their audience’s immersion mean the actors' performance was fictitious?

Suddenly, he can’t succinctly define fiction.

The nadir of an existential ego death throttles the last of his physical strength. He lies there with exhausted relish, beached with a raw unparalleled systemic throbbing. He'll clean up the mess he's made of himself… eventually.

He's exposed, and knows he's exposed, but doesn't seem to care. He stares up into the ceiling, legs sprawled across the back and arm of the couch, and fixates on what little he can see without glasses. He resents that he can perceive this fourth wall but cannot seem to alter it himself. He resents Sticks’s near-perfect Charisma. He resents the General’s ludicrously high Intelligence. He’s not Strong enough or Intelligent enough or Enduring enough or Charismatic or…

"Happy New Ye– Oh my stars, Sir!" Aghast, Angel shifts from entering to rushing to 'Choly's side. "No time to tell me what's happened to you. We haven't any Stimpaks. Oh, this won't do! I'll fetch the iodine."

'Choly bolts upright on the couch. Abjection gnarls his features.

"NOT MY IODINE–!"

It hesitates, caught between imperative concern for its owner and the need to abide by him.

"At least allow me to prepare a wash bin for you. Try not to move too much. I won't tarry!"

As the Mister Handy rushes off to the bathroom to wet a hand towel, he reclines again and his mental track persists. He thinks to just lock the robot out, but doing so would require that he get up. He wants to ask it to fetch him his next Melancholia dose five days early, but he also knows he would have to explain himself to Sticks if he were to need to replenish his medication a week ahead of their schedule.

What use is it, to be Melancholy? he demands of himself.

In his state, he hasn’t even the faculty to snivel over it.

Maybe, Melancholy has forgot how to be Melancholy all this time.

Maybe, he just needs a nudge to recall his nature. 

And maybe, like the holotapes, and their Pip-Boys, and eventually Angel, he too can move past seeing dimly in a mirror of his own imago.[2288.01.13-10]

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[0] Formica. Both the ant genus and the resin.

[2288.01.13-0] Tagline for Carpenter's Prince of Darkness.

[2288.01.13-1] January 13, the Mara Winter. Considered the unLuckiest day of the Pagan Slavic calendar, during which the Tryasovitsy, cruel spirit agents of the winter deity Mara, are at their strongest. It's also Russian New Year's Eve: due to date shifts when changing calendar formats, Russia celebrates New Year's twice.

[2288.01.13-2] Olivia salad. Olivier salad is a traditional Russian celebratory mayo salad dish.

[2288.01.13-3] Exegesis. Critical objective explanation of a text.

[2288.01.13-4] Silvering cobweb. Серебряная паутина. Nods to the Strugatskys’ Roadside Picnic, and the threads that no one else seems to notice except the protagonist. ‘Choly is something of a pastiche of several characters, one of them being Kirill Panov. This fic was originally titled A Cure for My Me, after “a cure for his melancholy.” (The title did still work its way into being a chapter title in First Instar.)

[2288.01.13-5] Intelligent design. The pseudoscientific belief that the intricacy and inexplicability of certain aspects of the universe are proof that a supernatural entity played a role in its creation.

[2288.01.13-6] Nemiza. The Slavic pagan deity of death. He/She measures the thread of life and cuts it to the appropriate length, before sending it off to the Afterlife.

[2288.01.13-7] Sixpence, ferryman. Blended reference. A. In Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis uses the metaphor of a father giving a child allowance, and the child then using that allowance to buy him a gift, to suppose that all humanity can give God is already His. B. Sticks's nickname is chiefly for being a ghoul trafficker who lives by the river, after the River Styx in the Underworld of Greek mythos. C. There are some similarities between Greek mythos and Slavic pagan beliefs. A comparison can be made between the River Lethe and the River Smorodina, in that souls must be ferried or risk forgetting everything and dissolving into the river. D. In many accounts, it's agreed that one must pay the ferryman his due or he may refuse or betray the request for a trip across. E. Here 'Choly feels like anything he could provide Sticks is already something Sticks can get for himself, that he brings nothing to the equation. Because he hasn't provided Deenwood chems as agreed upon, he's convinced Sticks has no reason to stay faithful to their arrangement.

[2288.01.13-8] The structure of the second-person narrative follows a mental track of what ailment each of the Tryasovitsy excels at inducing. Figuratively, rent asunder by mental demons.

[2288.01.13-9] I once heard the explanation that Formica got its name by being a surface which only ants’ tireless path could erode. I’ve since learned that it’s a substitute ‘for mica.’ I like my high school teacher’s story better.

[2288.01.13-10] Being Melancholy: he's had this vein of "art imitating life imitating art" navel gazing in the past, most notably in Chapter 10, "Fly-Blown." He adopted his nom a clef Melancholy, with the nuance that he felt contrived and fictitious, a fictional character at risk of knowing he's exactly that. He questions whether he commands self agency, in inventing himself or in how he might define himself. His skepticism of what it means to be Melancholy is, at its core, the very spirit of Anatomy.

[X] Sticks has gotten outside and wants to run off, but he is catching complicated feelings about conning 'Choly by faking being into him. Meanwhile 'Choly successfully restores the Division Day holotape, and he engineers some really fucked solace where he could otherwise find none after documentation of that eldritch mess is the only way he genuinely knows about it: in essence, history reads as fiction but is no less his reality.

[stardustroleplays]

Rules & About

Obviously I can't stop you from interacting if you aren't open enough about your views to get blocked, but know that bigotry of any kind is not welcome here. I can and will use the block button very liberally in that regard.

I only write with people who are 18 or older.

That being said, romance and smut are NEVER a requirement. I'm just as happy roleplaying familial, platonic or hostile relationships. For example, just because one of my characters might have a romantic dynamic with a canon character in one thread with one user, doesn't mean I aim for or even want that every single time. Please tell me about your expectations and boundaries!

I am primarily a mobile user, so I don't have access to tumblr's desktop functions, including cutting posts. For this reason, if you want to do a longer rp, I highly prefer using discord. Feel free to dm me for it!

If we had a thread going on/were plotting, and I stop responding randomly, you are 100% allowed to spam me. Chances are that my ADHD just got the better of me and I either forgot or thought I already replied. Sorry in advance!

English is not my native language, so if I sound a bit stilted or my grammar is off, that's why. If you ever need me to clarify something, let me know. I promise I won't be mad.

While I've been roleplaying for a few years (around seven, I think?) and have found rp partners on tumblr before, that was always done via rp finders. I've never actually had a dedicated rp blog before, so please bear with me while I figure this all out. lol

My limits with regards to story beats are child abuse, especially CSA, self-harm (especially cutting), religion-based queerphobia, and eating disorders. While I don't mind these themes coming up as, for example, parts of a character's backstory, I would prefer not to have them as a focal point within the roleplay.

With regards to kinks, my hard limits are piss, scat, anything else involving excrements or bodily fluids, feet, raceplay, diapers, and mutilation. For any other kinks that might be a bit "out there" for lack of a better word, feel free to straight up ask if I'm comfortable roleplaying them. I can promise that even if I'm not into them, I won't judge you. I'd be a hypocrite if I did.

"cw: X" is the format I use to tag any potentially triggering content. If you need me to tag anything specifically, or I forgot to tag a post, please let me know!!

I'm semi-lit to advanced lit and tend to match my partner's length. That being said, if you're the sort of person who prefers short replies, that's cool too, I don't mind at all. Don't feel pressured to write more than you are able to.

Most of my OCs are fandomless. The ones that aren't will be clearly marked as such. If you want to do a non-fandom roleplay with a fandom OC of mine, let me know and we'll work something out!

I'm generally very flexible when it comes to character lore, and I love AUs, so if you want me to change a few things about my characters to make our verses fit together better, I'm open to that.

Don't expect any fancy formatting. I'm screen blind and graphic design is the bane of my existence.

About Me

Hi, I'm Zenith, but you can also call me Stardust or Dusty. I'm 22 years old and my pronouns are they/them.

I like houseplants, the colors blue and green, and my girlfriend :) and I'm really not that exciting of a person. i also work weird hours and have chronic insomnia, so if i'm online at weird and inconsistent times, that's why.