#nephro.pdf

[mocharaycookie]

the partial scan i did a while back for cookie run comic 40 AND MORE IMPORTANTLYYYY a complete scan for cookie run comic 41 are now accessible on my website, and can be found here --> https://feelingmachine.moe/cookieruncomics

happy reading, sugartearabros!

[antonballdeluxe]

Cookie Runner's Misogyny Problems

As if a fandom full of teenagers and a game of fujoidbait could go any wronger.

I've played this game, or at least Ovenbreak, since 2020. This fandom has grown massive since, bulking up once with the release of Almond, another noticed sharp point of popularity around when Parfait Cookie was released, and since growing. This has its own advantages, of course -- helps make sure the series won't die, and a lot of fan-merchandice to choose from nowadays, which is always appreciated. And, of course, a growing fancontent base in general, because, well, Devsisters can't write their own characters for shit.

But with that popularity, comes the worse of the worse, the Tiktokification of a community, as I've noticed all too well. Insane cosplayer antics, actually having the blorbos from my shows regonized in a convention…but I could go on about that for days. Today I go on with another, more focused, and maybe a bit more subtle way to pick apart every single one of you's. I am going to cover the way women are treated in popular fandoms, but mostly this one. It's obvious that misogyny is real, but the Cookie Run fanbase seems to have a really, really bad problem with it, for god knows what reason. And first, we go onto a more recent example, and a comparison of the reception of two cookies in Kingdom.

Affogato and Pomegranate. They're both evil, long-robed, feminine looking, serving a worse interest, manipluating all over the place, lies, gatekeeping, gaslighting, you know the joke already c'mon. But what I've also noticed is that, with Affogato's release and the rather humorous surprise of Affogato being a dude -- Affogato seemed to instantly rise in popularity once that happened. The leaks were originally more focused on because of Cacao, but with the reveal of a feminine man, here comes in the fan art, the praise, and all for...the gender reveal. All right after. And still going. And then you look at Pomegranate, who does all of the same shit, but because she's a woman and just so happened to attack the masculine (their gender is still unconfirmed in my heart...) Dark Choco Cookie with said manipluation and an added dosage of hallucinatory torture, she's hated almost universally by newer Kingdom fans, either that or just led onto the joke of the girlboss, and never truly analyzed for what she is -- effecient, but a great writing at a morally dark-gray character.

Again, these characters basically do the exact same things in terms of evil villainous shit, but because one is a man, and the other is a woman who attacks another man, the man is praised by the viewers, the woman attacked.

Sure do wonder why.

Of course, the evidence for this wider problem extends past just comparing two randoms. Another great one is on the topic of two characters who just so happen to be women in love, which is everybody's thing to hate nowadays -- Sea Fairy and Moonlight. These two get evidence upon evidence for Sea Fairy's pinning on Moonlight, just as close as they can write without just outright saying it because laws in countries with money and whatnot.

And then Espresso and Madeleine come out, and manage to score four times as many fanfics about their yaoi-abusive relationship within a year, compared to the Sea Fairy and Moonlight tag over more than three or four by now. Espresso wanting nothing to do with the stuck-up Madeleine totally means they're in love, guys! Oh, Sea Fairy's entire reason to live is because she wants to reunite with the woman she is in love with? Ehh, not enough evidence. Put her with Sparking because he looks in her direction in a single splash screen or something. Fuck everybody who did that, by the way.

For every lesbian pairing popular in this fandom, you could probably find a group of people who deny it for reasons basically pulled out of their ass. Chili Pepper and Rye? Abusive to some. Beet and Carrot? Siblings, despite no evidence suggesting such, seeing as Beet literally just wandered into Carrot's property one day and was set to work for ruining her crop. Lime and Orange? Again, I keep seeing them being called siblings for no reason. What the fuck is up with that?

I remember an incident when I was first in the Cookie Run fandom where a certian cutscene where Princess asks Knight to catch something for him and he fails at doing so and ends up hit in the head being used as evidence for Princess somehow being abusive. The person who mostly pedalled this bullshit ended up a bi lesbian proshipper, which is even more reason to discredit it.

And who could forget when Cocoa was rereleased in Kingdom, and tonnes of people, not knowing the sheer amount of evidence for Mint Choco and Cocoa's own relationship, perhaps even stronger than SeaMoon evidence at this point, merely shoved her off to the side? Saw someone call her evidence of queerbaiting once. Fun Tiktok comments section to scroll through, that one.

And speaking of the feminine men thing with Affogato -- You never see this with masculine women. You never see it at all. Aloe was revealed as a woman after over a year of undetermined gender and I saw people joke of her being kicked from the whole acryonym. She lost about half of her fanbase that day, I swear. Same with Sour Belt, Melon Bun, ect.. Tossed to the edge, compared to the worshipping of, perhaps, Whipped Cream.

"Oh, but Nephro! This is all schizophrenic amounts of tiny evidence, pulled out of your head. Are you sure this is enough to say there is a misogyny problem here?" Yes, because it is also in every other fandom populated by the youth of the chronic onlineness of today. Genshin Impact, Identity V, Sekai, all of whatever is most recent? It's mostly because of the men. It's because of whatever they can do with men. I'm so fucking sick and tired of it.

Rant over, time to play Barbies-Kissing-Naked in my room again.

[mocharaycookie]

scanned and uploaded cookie run comic 42 onto my website in case anyone wants to check that out !!!

read here

[mocharaycookie]

smoke break

rush and the reader having some tomfoolery while the hotel remains devoid of trespassers.

written for a dear friend.

AO3 MIRROR: https://archiveofourown.org/works/43180497/

The black smog wrapped around you like the feathers of a boa as he went past you to open the door, keeping the path to a dim room on the outskirts of the paths usually taken open. A square table, tilted to misalign against the carpet below it, yet aligned towards the placement of the pieces framed against the walls, which were nothing too special, and looked more like something that would be obtained at any furniture shop rather than the fine arts.

You took a seat, looking up with your elbow on the table, resting your head upon the hand built upon it, and watched as Rush pushed the chair over to the wall with such little force that the bare air could've carried it. The small dimensions of the room made his height seem even more intimidating, and to you, endearing, not to mention the smell of gasoline and factory that came off of him like a fond cologne, a send-off to the roaring twenties for whatever unfortunate soul could still remember such an age and stumble inside the hotel.

It was your acquired taste, however. You could say he smelled like a personal heaven any day.

"So!" that booming voice he had spoke, or rather, yelled with no intention to yell yet would always be able to be heard from a few rooms away, "haven't seen anybody coming through for the past day. Pray for me this lasts."

"Mhhm."

That Jersey accent was already about to drive you crazy. Anyways, now that it did come to your attention, the hotel had been quiet recently. A much needed break for everybody involved, and you had already been witness to a few conversations held within this grace period. The other entities also seemed to have noticed it, embraced with a warmth of the cravings for peace. It would not last forever. People would be back, and people would be slain for everybody's sake, and that's why it was treated like it was worth such mild celebration. Rush's permanent grin seemed to extend farther down the cheeks, though that could just be because you were there. While your paths did not cross as much as either of you would like, times like these of relative quiet were spent together, stuck together, cold fumes wrapping around you without objection to his touch. The cold smoke, another acquired taste. You couldn't get enough of it.

You couldn't get enough of him. He was loud, able to strike fear into anybody, and you liked that.

"Plenty of things to do here, just have to look for them. There's always a few pieces missing, but the backgammon set should be good," he gestured to the left -- a shelf with a few other classic board games, a deck of cards, something unrecognizable as a game that probably was taken off of a dead body, and the already mentioned backgammon. You wished you were aware of this earlier. A few weeks to a few months. Time was lost too easily here. None of these looked too great to play with only two players, and the other two player options were either not competitive enough for you to like, too competitive and could rile either of you into a frenzy, or not that fun at all.

But the best sort of fun came from just making things up, and you already had a game made up as your selection for the night. Your head perked up from the unintentional slipping towards the table it had made.

"Give me a hand, dear. Wait, no...the entire arm. Two, if you'd so desire," you requested.

A hearty chuckle, a nod from the face of slightly brighter grey, and the smog bent to form the shape of two arms, starting from an elbow, the condensed fog taking a reach to hold onto one of your own hands already. They were minuscule compared to those monsters -- and cold, too. Even colder than just burying your face into it like you usually did. Hopefully frostbite wouldn't come and ruin the moment. You've seen Rush with these before -- fingers blocky and the size of your torso, and you had watched those fingers form the tightest grip against a trespasser and throw them against a wall at one point, reducing bones into powder with just one movement. He could've done that to you at one point. But now...?

Your arm moved up, shifting the elbow into that classic posture for a round of arm wrestling, and Rush copied your movements without a word, without a blink or twitch of that handsome face.

"Ready?" you asked.

"Whenever you are, love," he growled, a growl of upcoming ecstatic sparks. The battle was on, both of your hand's now in the ring. 

And you were either suddenly really good at this, or the smoke beast was not as strong as he let on, because it was already in the struggle part of every arm wrestle match. Tilted to the left, then the right again, an almost-win on Rush's end being shoved up as you began to break a sweat. The two of you exchanged words during all of this -- they were not very kind words. The love language of telling each other that you would kick each other's asses, to eat shit after the round, a banter that Rush and you loved to engage in. It soon turned into screaming curse words at each other, Rush giving a finale of a growl, and your hand being shoved onto the table. He always won, but it's not like you minded. Rush's eyes closed in enthusiastic laughter, and you joining in with a chuckle while still trying to process the last few seconds of that brawl.

You moved the arm to give a congratulatory handshake with him, an excuse to hold that hand yet again, and it felt like something had happened within those few seconds of intensities.

And you did hear a slight snap alongside the bang of your fist on the table.

And this wouldn't be the first time, nor probably the last, that he would've accidentally broken something in your frail works.

"Rush, think you did that thing where you fuck up my wrist again. Watch the way it dangles--" you shook out your wrist a little bit, and while it did hurt, it didn't hurt as badly as last time. It wasn't broken at the very least, but you still let out a string of quiet swears to decorate your pain before stopping.

"Wait. Again?" One of the few things that could nearly wipe that grin off his face.

You made another muffled agreement.

"Ice pack, then? Want to come with me to get it?"

Another mhm and a nod. Without hesitation and with a whole lot of worries, Rush swooped over, curling around your body with the icy pollution, lifting you up inside of it, pushed around until you could be cradled by what made you cough and choke, and would let suffocate you if it ever got to that point. Perhaps the grip he has on you could've just doubled as an ice-pack instead, but once Rush's mind was on your safety, it would be impossible to stop his search. Speaking of, he just broke that door trying to leave. That sort of hunk behavior...you've been smitten by it since first seeing him, and it still makes your thoughts go to mush. Great distraction for whatever's going on with your wrist.

[mocharaycookie]

How the Cogs of Toontown Online Are An Anti Capitalist Metaphor

autism be upon ye

foreword: this was written as a "fuck it, we ball, pick whatever topic you so desire" research paper for a creative writing class, with a pre-determined format to follow. as a result, my writing style may seem off here. hope you enjoy.

READ ON MY WEBSITE HERE

What I Knew and What I Want to Know

While I was both too young and didn’t have the money to fully play the game while it was still under a subscription service, Toontown Online has always been one of my more intense interests, mostly due to the charity that is several private servers that keep the game running, sticking to the original, or branching out into a modernized experience, but for now, sticking to the original game. Toontown Online was a kids’ aimed MMORPG (Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game) started by Disney in 2003 and shutting down a decade later, with a pretty lively presence in the genre during this time. The plot was basically that you played as, well, a cartoon anthropomorphic animal, and kept the world cheery and fun against the ongoing invasion of “Cogs”, which are these businessmen robots, heavy emphasis on businessmen, with all the boredom and drab that comes with such. You fight against them using stereotyped cartoon gags, because, well, Cogs can’t take a joke. Rinse and repeat this basic basis with variations of the fighting format all throughout the game as you progress, as well as other stuff to do (grinding gets boring, and Toontown Online was notorious for grinding), and you have what remained successful until it was pushed off to the side for Club Penguin.

I’ve always been much more interested in the Cogs than the toons when it came to this game. Their origins, which elaborated on with a simple flash animation within older installers for the game, are mostly unexplained. And, of course, the unified designs of just average, uncanny office workers with little variation except for head design and suit color dependent on department, are a specific, stylized sort of cool. There’s also probably something to say about my own personal experiences with work and neurodivergency and the want to be one, but that’s not the point.

The point now will turn political – despite the game being aimed at kids who could afford ten dollars a month to play, there are some specifics parts that addle to my now an adult brain, that make it think of the further lore implications, and what it means in the greater scheme of things. What do the Cogs represent? What does the war between the Toons and them mean? Of course, it’s also very easy to compare such a thing to the workforce in our own daily lives, and how big corporations play a role, reaching in, making evil decisions, and yet, giving us no choice but to consume their product. And what would I use any of this information for, to look into the implications of Cogs as a symbolism for real-life capitalism and its evils? Probably just rewording this entire paper into an essay to be posted on my website, but also, for my own fan-writings for the game, because, well, making fan content is fun.

My Search Process

The main treasure chest of information when it comes to Toontown Online nowadays is the Toontown Preservation Project, a website hosting game design documents, concept art, and much more, donated from the developers of Toontown Online while it was still active, such as Bruce Woodside. There’s also, of course, the many still-standing videos and posts on old forums about Toontown Online, as well as the gameplay that remains in private servers (mostly relevant to Toontown Rewritten, which is actually the group that runs the Toontown Preservation Project as well). The documentation is vast, encompassing things never implemented into the game, removed early or in beta testing, but for almost all of the conception, there is no use of the word Cogs to describe the Cogs. Instead, they are called Suits, and no discussion into the robotics parts, either.

However, these are not decisions that made it into the final game, and thus, could mean nothing at all in the long run. What was in the game, however, was Unites, a reward for completing a certain boss that replenished either your gags or your Laff (the toon equivilent of health), which were considered the most useful of boss rewards for obvious reasons. When a Unite was used, your Toon also shouts “Toons of the World,” and then a slightly varied prose based on the type of Unite. In addition, if you went a little bit out of your way, you could get a Speedchat (pre-picked) phrase of just “Toons of the world, Unite!”.

While if you had any clue of the book or the man behind it, you probably could’ve seen this coming, but there is something to be said of Toontown Online’s central themes and including a rip from “Workers of the world, unite” (Marx), which is straight from The Communist Manifesto. While it has never been confirmed, nor probably ever will, if the recycling from such a fundamental source of socialist theory was on purpose or merely a coincidence, it sure does work for my point here.

In addition, take into account the setting of the game, and how Toontown’s economy seems to hinge upon a plethora of small businesses, there is the obvious comparison one could make to themes of anti-monopolization. Toontown is defending itself against what the fate of plenty of smaller towns has become, which is depending on one or two companies to carry the entire area in terms of business, and while the Toon’s shops all serve all sorts of purposes (but being boiled down in gameplay to just throwing quests at you), the Cogs only have one overbearing one, so at least there’s one major reason to keep them out of sticking their stick into the ground.

What I Have Learned

What I can gather from all of this is actually pretty interesting into the accidental symbolism the Cogs have become over the years, as, in my own eyes, the unavoidable evils of a society that hinges on capitalism and the selfishness of product become more obvious. They are a stereotype, sure, but also a stripped-down truth to the place of most workers in the eyes of company – in the truest form of the word – just another cog in the machine. The robotism of Cogs can also be taken as a symbol of automation, as more of the bottom-line, repetitive work becomes shelved out by machinery and AI to replace humans, at the cost of jobs for those who do not have a specialization in anything at all, or who’s specialization has become the menial labor needed for these, such as factory work.

There’s little variation compared to the colorful forms of toonery you play as, having to fit into these molds, and perhaps, business stereotypes as the Cog types are most often named after. There is no deviation. You serve a purpose, serve it well, and that’s all there is to it. That’s your life purpose. Have fun doing that until you die.

I’m also not the only one who’s attempted to co-relate their own life to the satire situation of Cogs. During the research part, I was stumbling over some less than reliable sources of social media, and plenty of older Toontown Online players had ended up in office positions themselves, and mentioned how, in a way, they had become what they once fought against. Sometimes, this was more obviously aligned with the office positions shown in-game, with one user stating “When I was having an early 20s life crisis when the song Suit and Jacket by Judah and the Lion came out and I have a vivid memory of standing in the shower hating working at a bank and being pushed to ‘sell’ checking accounts and that’s when I had the sleeper memory of toontown cogs awaken in me” (goddessbotanic). In the system of modern life, where one has to almost kill themselves, emotionally or otherwise, just to be able to keep up with the frivalities of modern life, to keep a roof on their head, the best you can do is try and keep your tooniness alive, though only at the side.

What This Means to Me, and How I’ll Use It

I’ve always cared about little silly niche topics to try and explore like this. Though there is probably no true intention to any of the evidence brought upon the table except for really in-line coincidences, it all seems to add up to a more mature way of seeing a game I’ve cared about since my first years using a computer. I’m all too big on nostalgia – most of my best memories of technology were with the early 2010s net, which encompasses the later years of Toontown Online, as well as the earlier years of some of my other favorite games, as well as an era of content that wasn’t as dopamine-trapping and headache-causing as the modern internet feeds. Something like this is a bright, fresh light, and makes it all too easy to keep caring about Toontown Online.

Fortunately, I am not trying to embrace a grave. The spirit of Toontown Online still lives on in the form of private servers that keep the game running and available to play, and, in both spite of what made Toontown Online shut down in the first place and to avoid copyright troubles, entirely for free. The two most popular are Toontown Rewritten, which keeps to the base game for the most part for nostalgia reasons, and Toontown Corporate Clash, which adds new content and quality of life changes to change Toontown and modernize it into an all-new, exciting experience. I’ve invested a lot more hours than I would like to admit on a few renditions of these servers, but time having fun is not time wasted, despite what the Cogs think.

Works Cited

Marx, Karl, 1818-1883. The Communist Manifesto. London ; Chicago, Ill. :Pluto Press, 1996.

“r/Toontown - Ever Realise We Grew up to Be the Cogs?” Reddit, Dec. 2022, https://www.reddit.com/r/Toontown/comments/zmwjtm/ever_realise_we_grew_up_to_be_the_cogs/.

Luthin, Stefanie. “The Unique Anti-Capitalist Journey of Toontown Online.” VGA Gallery, VGA Gallery, 24 Mar. 2022, https://vgagallery.org/vga-zine/toontown-anti-capitalism.

Woodside, Bruce. “Toontown Preservation Project.” Finalized Suit Turnaround -- Toontown Preservation Project, Toontown Rewritten, 28 Aug. 2022, https://toontown.online/Finalized- Suit-Turnaround-4393ef3db89341638e8a55242b79ee0a

Toontown Preservation Project, Toontown Rewritten, https://toontown.online/

[mocharaycookie]

misty/reader fic i did ffor my girlfriend this year. hope somebody likes it like she did

[mocharaycookie]

and the work day stretches into the night

you just get to sit there and watch the c.l.o. do paperwork. that's it. that's the fic. written in honor of the release date of corporate clash's 1.1 update's anniversary. thank you for bringing me the woman ever AO3 MIRROR HERE

You observed the C.L.O.’s hand, carefully crafted, drop a pen onto a wooden desk with a soft clang to the metal barrel of the writing device. Her hand took a brief pause before it switched a side’s desk lamp, from dim to a brighter setting that startled your eyes that had already adjusted to the previous on setting dusk. The pen was retrieved, and there was a mild shift of her shoulder that you rested on as the C.L.O. continued the barrage of tonight’s authorization signatures and god knows what else was in there. She was a swift one with paperwork, but it seemed that having somebody watching did give her a reason to take more detail into this work.

Many a suit would kill to be in your place now, but for different reasons. To climb the corporate ladder would be one thing, but you had managed to take an alternative route to be allowed the metaphorical throne of an “emergency reassembly of individual position” to become her assistant. To go over the history now would be pointless, but you two were...close enough. There was no talk of lovers, but rumors were already blooming from the more gossipy of the company of just how you had came to be.

And now, the literal throne – the silent observation as she does those nightly tasks, ones the C.L.O. had become so used to that any sort of annoyance at how mundane the busywork had become had numbed itself. You wouldn’t be paid any sort of overtime for being here hours beyond your usual time to clock out, but that meant nothing. It was enough to just stay by her side, the same side that emits the substantial noise of a cooling fan whirring around the shoulder blades’ joints and beneath her suit, overpowering once so close, but nobody had shattered her veil of professionalism enough to hear it before.

Her chassis was both modern for a suit and the sheer opposite. Some parts updated, some not, not to mention that her entire lower half went against the humanoid structure a suit usually would have. It was best described as tank movement, treads and all.

But something about that had always picked at your processors, fascinations that were maybe shared in a different way.

And now, the admiration you had for this supercomputer of your boss was unable to be avoided. Between that and the exhaustion coming over you (had you forgotten to recharge last night?), you instinctively leaned onto her neck. The metal was cold, your own shoulder meeting the seam where plating met, narrowly above a bolt holding it together, the humanoid structure hiding a jungle of vines, mechanicals, the very soul of the C.L.O. and perhaps every other suit, but for now, hers. And that seemed to have gotten some part of her attention, as the hand that was not busy with trying to re-ink a stamp with the department’s emblem retreated from holding a paper steady. It passed and drifted across the bow that decorated her shirt collar, and nudged the other side of your body closer to her neck.

You were now surrounded by the cold metal that made up what you one day could only dream of calling a lover, behind the wooden doors of the headquarters, because suits weren’t built for such things as romance. It had become more popular now to be open about such things, but mostly within those whose careers wouldn’t be on the line for it.

But for now, those doors were shut, and it was only the two of you perhaps in this entire building, however vast it was, so there was that freedom to do this sort of thing. And maybe it was unlucky to be positioned right below her ears, decorated with yet another circular bolt colored a deep purple that almost was an earring in its own way – she could definitely hear your own fans going haywire with how overheated you felt from the situation, as much as you could feel it within your chest.

You looked up for a second to see if there’s some sort of expression on her face. Her face – the sharp nose, the bright rounded glasses that framed a long shape sculpted to perfection of a suit, the way her hair was kept short and to a side – there was never a denial to those below her that age had not rendered her any less beautiful to those who apply to care about such things. And to believe she was not married after all those years, focused so narrowly on a career, not wanting it any other way.

The C.L.O. had a small smile on her face as she kept her hand close to you.

And she almost never smiled!

She wasn’t known for being warm like the Senior V.P., or being drowned in the apathy that the stalemate against the Toons had brought the other two department heads. She still had that fury against them, that burning passion to show herself as being capable against them, no matter how many times she had been sent down a trap-door by those pests. She was rendered cold by it all, and yet, she smiled just by having someone touch her, be by her side. That was enough to break the ice when nobody was there to see it melt.

And the next morning, both of you would have to pretend this moment was not shared, but for now, it was basked in. Her hand twirled around, before a finger slipped under your own arm. And then, the pen was set down again, before she broke the silence.

“Is there a reason why you haven’t said anything?” she questioned. Your entire body somehow grew colder than the metal to metal contact already was, surrounding the warmed core.

“If you want me to,” was your only response. Stepping out of line when you’re this close to underneath her command always seemed so daunting.

“Please do. This position is isolating, to put it at that. It’d be more than welcome to hear somebody else control a conversation.”

And all you could get out of your now-even-more-flustered state was a nod, which she could probably at least kinda feel through her hands, your entire body going even stiffer than being, well, metal, already rendered it. She wanted to know more about you. How daunting, how terrifying to have to open yourself up to her. It would feel like a vivisection of yourself, the piercing of a butterfly for her to see, but beyond all the fear involved in trying to develop more of a personal relationship outside of a work one – a sinking feeling knowing it could just be worth it.

Her hand lowered down, and you re-adjusted as to not fall from the front. There was a sudden noise of the treads of her lower half pulling away from the desk – something, just something so admirable about the more abstracted machinery she was made up of. The noise accompanied that of the cooling fans and the general whirring of her insides, and as she went to the other side of the room leading to what separated her quarters from the rest of the HQ, she spoke once more, going from the unusually personal tone of voice from before to that usual commandance.

And now, the C.L.O. ordered, “Tomorrow. Same time as today was. Make sure to open up a little, however. It will be good background noise, if not more."

With the advancements of suits more software part of the brain, that would be jotted into your mental calendar. Around an hour after everyone else would be gone, in other words.

She once again reached up to your smaller chassis, opting to just pick you up entirely, reaching downwards to place you at the edge of the stand her body connected to the tank half, and used the back of her fingers to gently nudge you off. You landed onto the tiles with a bit of a bounce in your lower legs, and with a silent wave from the same hand that had led you down, you were on your own ways once again, but not for long.

[mocharaycookie]

i'll save you, and a little more than that

seek tends to figure's wounds after actions not thought before committing to them. contains spoilers for the ending of floor 1, if you want to avoid those.

AO3 Mirror Here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/41782986

The smell of freshly-opened gauze could not overpower the lingering one of flesh ripped away from what protects it, the sound of unravelling continuing at a steady pace as it was ripped and then dressed over an arm that, despite how many strange ways Figure's arms could bend, was certainly bent wrong. A twisted limb would certainly need better treatment than this, but it wasn't like anybody was a doctor, and Seek was the first entity to find Figure after it had ran after a lucky player, and ended up like this.

"Figure, could you lift that arm up? Just an inch or two," Seek whispered, in a muted tone that was almost never heard in that voice by anybody else. The quiet boundaries Seek had set for speaking to the others did not apply to how it spoke to Figure, and especially a mangled Figure, one that Seek carried an utmost worry for, where all was tossed out of the window for it.

It took a few seconds for Figure to register what was being asked -- shock was still in the soul. It also took a few seconds to even try and lift up that arm, which was met with a burning flash of twisting pains in that arm, not even making it the centimeter that would be needed to finish the wrap of gauze without dropping the arm, and with the notice of a low whine of that pain, a noise that sent some of the pain away and into the dusty air, and hopefully to never come back again. Figure's mind still lingered on what had caused it, what would be explained later, when it came into words to speak and not noises it had heard. A rush into the elevator, yet only seconds too late, already throwing itself farther down than imagined onto the top of it, and then thrown away to that midsection between first floor and the one below it. It was felt, unimaginably felt within an arm slammed into a pillar, a body thrown around like a ragdoll, and heard was that throwing and that pitiful crunch. That arm -- that broken arm, that Seek now had to patch up, like sewing the ragdoll Figure was now. The doll that, if an actual doll, Seek would give the finest chair and display and throw a tea party with.

The whimper of pain had continued, echoed, worried Seek even more about what had happened.

"Ah, Figure...darling. You -- you really don't have to, I can manage it myself," Seek's other arm dropped the roll of gauze for a second to keep the broken limb on the floor, as Figure had tried to raise it again for it in the midst of those words, "on a scale of one to ten, how much did that hurt?"

"Eight. I've done worse."

"I know." The shared emotion of suffering. Seek's arms unraveled from the original intent of repair, and took a moment to just rest on top of Figure's chest. A crack in that exterior rib-cage. Was Figure always this tall, large, intimidating? Only while Figure laid on that cold concrete, a head resting on the side of a box, could Seek grasp the difference. No matter how tall Figure was, Figure was to be held here like a baby bird in the nest, cared for, loved. A hand moved alongside one of the ribs, fingers gliding, leaving behind a trail of ooze. Not only was physical repair necessary for a full recovery after this wreckage, but, what Seek tried to avoid for the others out of some secrecy complex, was to emotionally care for Figure in these coming days. Stay near its side. Make it know that it was loved. Really dig that in, that it would recover, liked or not, because that was what Seek wanted right now -- only the best treatment.

A sigh, "But that doesn't matter right now. You're..." Seek paused to find a word. Hurt? Too obvious. Beautiful? Weird, especially right now -- the thought of somebody being even prettier while nearing death was a taboo once, yet one felt all too much right now. Beautiful, even while in injury. Beautiful when it hurt, beautiful when it was hurting. Figure was beautiful, a beauty it could not see for itself, but Seek saw with the clearest eye, or at least, would be clear if not for the post-cry fog right now.

"A mess?" Figure spoke up. Of all of the words Seek could've chosen, a mess would not be one of them, though it would fit to outsider's view.

"No. Just in need of some T-however it goes."

"Tender, loving care." It was something Figure was distant from, but with Alexandria's amount of reading material, of course it would know what Seek forgot. It had all the time in the word to memorize these things. And those desperate feelings of shocked love were returned back with such a term -- simple, muted love. The love and adoration and things Figure was not quite used to would come back like a thundering storm of cupid's arrows once it could feel anything more than the haze and pain.

A feeling of haze, pain, but somebody was there that Figure loved, was loved back with. Somebody who cared. The disconnect of emotions between the entities were not there for the two of them, and especially right now -- the cables plugged in, they knew each other, they loved each other. A savior's love. Figure would be saved, and it could take at least a comfort in knowing that.

"Yes. That's what you need, dear," A word that Seek had come to adore calling Figure, and it had better get used to it, because once Seek knew it was fair game to say, that word was grasped, shot at Figure whenever Seek passed it or stayed near it or any other chance Seek g, "And as much as I could give you. As much as this roll extends for."

"And promise me you'll never do something like this again. There are things down there that will take care of whatever goes through," Seek's voice entered a sudden sterness -- it meant this. If Figure came into harm, or worse...unfathomable thoughts. It almost had just done that. Never again.

"Just for you," The slightest smile. A smile wretched in pain, but a smile that held onto that promise as a hand held onto Figure's chest. That hand was still there, feeling for life, breath, warmth, and all. A promise made. If Seek had said it, Figure would certainly heed. Anybody else, and it would be cut to seventy percent odds, and a thirty percent of forgetting.

Another rip and pull of the gauze. The tending-to continued, the two's communication whittled down to moving whatever could be moved without those burning feelings, but no matter how short those sentences were, they remained with a sense of love that one could not tell from when Seek usually would have to attend to wounds. A sense of caring, a sense of doing anything for the vulnerabilities of the least vulnerable of all of them. And it seemed like Figure's legs were not as mutilated as the arms -- soon, a prescription for soft bed rest, preferably with a nurse at Figure's side to take the most tender, loving care of it.

[mocharaycookie]

One-Eyed Insomnia  

hotel nowhere's sudden uptick in activity has left everybody exhausted, and seek already had sleep issues to begin with. tonight, seek falls asleep in a certain place, near a certain person, perhaps accidentally, perhaps not.

AO3 MIRROR HERE: https://archiveofourown.org/works/41640534

Another long night of work.

But it was not work, not paid, and definitely not given worker's rights. It was merely a position pushed onto whatever lingered around the hotel, to keep it in the same lingering eternity it has been in. It could be compared to a relic of the past, and even a single stranger's entrance was considered a threat to that duty. In the recent weeks, though, it had become much more than the occasional rat. The mystery of this place was presumably ratted out, because what was once barely an issue to this limbonic place was now an infestation of the rats. Tourists, explorers, whatever the name was, continued to just flood inwards, and while most could be stopped in their tracks and exterminated, some would flee, brag to whatever lied out there (because nobody here remembered anything of the outside world, other than the pinpricks of conversational details overheard), and thus, the issue worsened.

Seek considered this extermination just another part in the usual, or at least on the outside, treated it as such. Not much cracked through the stoic eye, the whispering serious tone when mumbling to himself a hope of the infestation dying down, and to return to that ever-limbo state of only having themselves. What was once quiet was not, and on the inside of Seek's ink, was a secret new annoyance for the lack of this quiet. But for now, remained a small peace in the air, and with this break in location and chase-down, came a time to feel anything other than adrenaline. More, exhaustion, weak arms, tired legs, both begging to be back into a single puddle and relax for just a little bit before being given form again. Despite the physical aches, Seek wanted this mere pause of it all to last for as long as possible. A quiet room to just sit down would be the Light's miracle.

And it knew just where to go for that yearning of rest -- the quietest place around.

A small library, and libraries are, well, meant to be quiet. And surely, Figure would not mind if Seek was there, just for not too long. They were used to each other, more than the passing-by and quick conversation that Figure lent the other entities. Perhaps a bit...close.

The door opened with that usual noise, that alerting jingle of a bell set on top of the doors. It was there just for Figure to hear. And then, nothing. Figure was usually quiet, and surely, it would've heard the bell.

Figure was not there at all, which was both a good, and a bad thing. It didn't leave the library that often, but at least it was extra time for Seek's hopings of a break from the nonsense of tourists. Its hands scraped across a bookshelf -- and on the slight outdent of one half-falling out, that book was the lucky pick of the day. As per a lot of what Seek was, one of the many secrets was that, while at this extended stay, Seek was an avid reader -- but there was one issue it had to hop through first, and that was the entirety of the library was in braille. It also hadn't taken too long for Seek to pick up braille, and all it needed to do that was one weird tip.

Keep Figure in mind and in heart, and do it for Figure.

With that, Seek dragged itself over to a nearby chair. Each step echoed those cranky aches in the heel, shocking up to a pain in the knee, into the hips, and so on. Too much running -- Rush probably slacking off a bit as well, adding to what Seek needed to do around the hallways. Every single second, only one thought repeated itself.

 Tired.

Seek lowered itself into that chair, opened up what it had picked -- something it couldn't remember the first sentence of, so that was a good sign. Something new to calm the nerves. One eye stared down at the pages, and the library remained quiet and without interruption. What was Figure up to, anyways? The legs still ached, would probably be like that for quite a while. Nice, lovely, dead quietness. Just a few more pages, and then it'd check outside the doors again, and back to the book, and-- And without warning, exhaustion caught up to what usually caught up to the exhausted.

Seek's head made a slight bang on the table. Fast and cold, it had fallen asleep, and with that, it melted away into two puddles -- a large mess on the chair and floor, and a small bit of ooze left over as a bookmark. Hidden out of plain sight, at least.

And if any daring hotel tourists were near the library at this point, it would stay quiet for quite a while. Maybe somebody slipped through this crack. Then, the entrance of somebody else, the usual dweller. Those quiet, low clicks, the make-sures of not running into the pillars that held the place upon itself (though, like all other things, mistakes were made in this sometimes). And then, Figure stepping into that bit of sludge on the floors, and several sudden worries peering up. Seek usually slept where nobody could find it, and perhaps, Figure could just set that right and give Seek what it usually does in the first place. Adjustments. A small drawer nobody touches, the couch in the corner, and then remaining there, listening for that beat of silent life from Seek. Everything was ok now, as Seek would like it, hidden away while in that vulnerable position of well-needed rest.

A flag next to the hole in a golf course. The sign before the turn. The guardian for that valued, vulnerable something, is what Figure felt. Vulnerable. Vulnerable was the people who tried their best to sneak through, and failed, and had bones break against wooden-panelled flooring, and heads popped off like the snap of two cherries from the stem. But this vulnerable Seek was a vulnerable that had to be kept alive at all costs, for Figure could tolerate Seek at the very least, if not a lot more of other feelings that do not have a single word to be put to them except for a loving care that could only sprout from situations like living here. The vulnerable heartbeats of two monsters was all that sounded. And if anything dared to disrupt that lovely symphony, it would be ended with the sound of a guardian's never-last kill.

And fortunately for the two, this peace had lasted until, then, Seek opened that eye. The material its head rested on felt much softer than what it had fallen asleep on, taking quick glances -- it had been moved. The uncertainties of this awoke Seek faster than that time Screech had yelled in its ear, and without that uncomfortable ringing in the ear after. And what was that weight on the back?

A quick solidification of an arm to try and pull it off, and it was a rather thick blanket, one of the wooly ones Figure kept hidden for itself. Such valuable things as something nice to sleep under were always up for grabs -- no matter how long the entities here had lived with each other, they still tended to break that one boundary. There would always be than every-man-for-itself mentality as long as they dwelled here, for as long as that something kept them here. Before Seek could glance up at Figure, Figure had already heard the stand-by sleeping turn a bit louder.

"Awake?" it asked, but didn't expect an answer back.

A slight yawn before a response came from Seek, and then it mumbled, "Yes. Where did you put me?"

"Somewhere better than before." Figure's words were raspy. A throat now always burnt by the noises it made to visitors it didn't want, a show of fierce monstrosities. If only it didn't have to do those.

"Still in your abode, right?"

"Where else?"

Thoughts, impulses, came into Seek's head. Those sorts of things one only does when they're comfortable around somebody else. And then, the plunge into that thought -- Seek shuffled its head a little, then the body, and then slumped right back down into a sitting Figure's lap. The feeling of Figure's skin would not be pleasant for anybody who wasn't touch-starved, and everybody here was touch-starved enough. Leathery, like the hide of some animal only spoken of in the leftovers of medieval tale.

"Right here is fine, too."

Figure felt that cold, in-love head on the thighs. Flustered, but accepting of such a gift, the thick claw lifting up to give Seek another blanket -- the hand landed on Seek's back with a dove's gentle touch. These claws had killed, and would kill again, but not for now. For now, these claws were for loving Seek the way anybody deserved. Neither of them would know or remember after how long this moment lasted, because even such simple things as relaxing with the warm bodies of one another touching could last an eternity after a blizzard of stress. It was their forever to cherish. A warmth like the fire in the heart, and if the two could make it last forever, it would. No words were spoken -- Figure tended to only speak when spoken to, and Seek was relishing in being held, and probably too relaxed to speak, like a cat laying in a sunlight that has never shown itself around the hotel.

A lovely forever when forevers were all the two ever knew.

Still, forever is a broken concept, as time still passed, and it had already been awfully long. Then came something Figure picked up long before Seek ever would -- someone was coming, and its hand pulled off of Seek's back, before speaking up about it.

"Tourist again. None of us sound that light on the feet." Except for Halt, maybe?, a footnote in Figure's voice left as a thought. A moment ruined, but Figure could surely sit back down and talk about whatever Seek was up to before this after, after the unwelcome were dealt with.

"You always pick up on them so early...uh. Dear. Is it ok if I call you that? Just once?" A heartbeat picked up to speed in Seek's chest, both from the anxieties of upcoming onslaught, and from whatever it had just said -- it was obviously in love, but why? But that question must be saved for later, if not buried under the grave. Love was a senseless thing like that.

"It's fine." With the confirmation of pet-name, the two stood up from that loveseat of a couch, with Seek then giving Figure one last glance. Most would find something like it disgusting, but it was a sight that Seek had grown to adore. The outwards ribcage was for toying around with, and if Seek had a mouth, they surely would've kissed by now.

"Both of us, Seek?"

"Yes, dear," and the slight noise of a lovestruck note at the end, from a mouth that couldn't wait.

Just one of them was a formidable foe for the people who came around. The two of them? At once?

An unstoppable force for whatever was to come.

[mocharaycookie]

Claustrothalassophobia  

The only hotel open in the middle of no-where tends to move fast. So fast, that nobody notices that curiosity had killed a black cat. (In other words, I tried to write an origin story for Seek.)

(mirror on ao3 will be in the replies/notes this time)

Some jobs are worse than others, and some jobs are only applied to if you never read the details about them in the first place, because such entries would scare anybody sane and not just looking for drug money off.

Fortunately for that cobweb-empty position at the Nowhere Hotel, a man had occupied it for at least a week by now, enough to just get used to things, the in-and-outs of both paperwork, door keys, and the people themselves. What had brought him towards this was the people. There was something he liked about a place where everybody passed through, but nobody stayed. A melting pot of minds, an opportunity to see the ends of the world from the same seat. The only other thing to entertain during the long night-shift hours was the quietest radio in existence, music and news being nearly drowned out in a static of disconnect.

There were not many opportunities here, but at least Nowhere was here. Enough of a wage to survive on at the time, at least. That's all he could ask for -- to live, to live comfortably as his father did or his grandfather did over in a European country that was surely nonexistent by now. The world spins so quickly now, it wasn't always like this, but just like the renters of rooms came and went, so did those things, so easily tuned out.

As the mind floated away with thoughts such as these, somebody approached his desk, glanced at the name-decor right next to him, and then back at his glasses-covered eyes. A young lady, with a face obscured by the giant brim of a sunhat, and the shadow of the hat for the rest.

"Hello, ah...[Nobody remembers who he was anymore, so his name is not relevant.]? How much for two nights?" Her voice was like a violin, but one awkwardly tuned, and out-of-sync with the rest of the world.

"Two nights, eh?" His own voice was a deep piano, and his eyes went towards a small chart on the side. Surely he would've memorized these by now. "...Around ninety," and back to the lady, with a swivel of the chair.

"That's a steal, but with what I've heard floating around this area recently, I'm not surprised. Here, just give me a moment," She opens a white wallet, or rather, a once-white wallet now some shades of light dull yellows and greys from being around tobacco's clouds for too long. The amount is pricked from this bottomless pit, and slid over the desk. The hand of the attendant takes it, files it away, throws the spare keys over. Another deal done, but with what sour note she left off on, the thoughts wandered again. It was a quiet night, an easy encouragement for daydreamery. He had never went out much, so these sorts of things usually slid around him, but whenever a rumor landed on his lap, he ate into it like the meals they were for such thinking minds. No wonder he was the only person here, and not just because he only took night shift. There was only two other men during the day, and they both looked the part of desperate enough to be there. He was different -- young, and his mom called him handsome enough for it to not be entirely a lie.

A curiosity blooms. He must know more. And he was never above anybody he looked down upon, because, he, too, worked here, in what he would soon find out was --

"A haunted hotel! Dear, you've been watching too many big-screen flicks. The paranormal is disproven." An argument broke out while a newlywed couple rented for the night. It was the beginning of the next night's shift, and it seemed that, as rumors do, it had spread out like the disease it was. The owner was praying that it not spread too far, that the profits didn't hurl down underground and the place be bought by frauds to become a hyperbole of itself. Him, on the other hand, simply tuned into the gossip radio today.

"God is invisible, and makes movements, so how would the dead not be able to as well?"

"God is God, we are humans. We are judged on death, not left to fester." The man's lips and brows curl into disapproval. This marriage would probably not last.

The two of them's conversation grew too far away to eavesdrop upon after that, going down that long, long hallway to reach a ground-floor bedroom. What made this place unique was the way it cut down on costs -- it sacrificed view, and instead of the floors going up, they went down. In consequence, the basement was now a second floor that too many people had accessed on accident, only to find dusty nothings. The second floor was empty, except for another room in the middle, which nobody, not even the owner, the braggart he was, spoke of.

The night grew, a rain poured down upon the area, and his head grew unsteady. Between yesterday and today, a black cat sprung from his head. He wanted to know more. If he could find a ghost, he would land upon the riches to escape such a workplace as this, and if he found nothing, he would be bestowed riches from the skeptics instead. Either way, he wanted to be the one to discover it all. Hopefully, nobody would have to wait too long for this mystery to be solved, as a lone man stood from the desk and walked over to the elevator. The long hallway, and at the end of it, a lone elevator. Wallpaper that threatened to curl from the bottom, a coffee stain on the ceiling, and the noises of thin walls and what lied inside, which could not be spoke about, because then they would hear you speaking, too. And then, the elevator, an old, creaky thing it was. He was no stranger to it, but with a general chain of the keys to the entire residence in his pocket, and with this friend, he could go anywhere.

The familiar ringing ding, as the friend greeted him. Two muscular figures walked out and away without saying a word, and the place was his. It was a small one, cramped, and if somebody told him this was originally a coffin, he would believe it. A press of the 2F button, and a tune reminiscent of a popular song played as it took all of less than a minute to reach another empty hallway. Somehow in even worse condition...there had to be mold here. There just had to. On the left, after a similarly long walk, was the door to the storage room. Without a word or even a hum, he traveled over, opening the door with a loud creak. Coughing from the sudden onset of dust and aged air, his eyes closed, then opened again.

A glance to the left brought piles of boxes, unused furniture, other things like that. A glance to the right brought nothing but the empty room's decaying walls, some spots stained black, which only made him more curious of this fate. And in the center lied a single, small room, with one single door in the middle, wooden, aged like the rest of this place.

And below the door, in that small crack every door had, glowed something. Something was making light from inside, a dull cyan light, but a light that had no common-sense answer. With the light came the sparkling specks of dust that floated around, illuminated in its presence, then drifting away as he approached this single door, staring down at the list of keys in his hand. It would now be a game of chance and picking-luck and lock picking if he got desperate enough to discover the source of this light, and the sources of these rumors. Small steps, filled with anticipation, echoed through the room, a drum beat towards the prize.

His hand reached towards that padlock, holding it up, and then began a key roulette. Not that one. Not that one either. That one doesn't go to anything at all, so why would it be that? And then, there it was, as the lock fell off to the floor, an echoing bang. The door creeked open, and then, on impulse, was slammed to the other side of the wall. Inside this awful room was...not much different from the outside. Perhaps the skeptics were right, that this was all hyperbole, but the light's source was still there, now faint, and surrounding a certain box. He tore that cardboard away like it was Christmas day, and inside was...dusty books. All dust. His lungs were never good with dust, and he was coughing more and more the more time he spent in the room. While peering into this box, the light also came from not only the room, not only the box, but from a certain book. Eyes on the prize it was, and the prize even had the sigil of an eye on the top. This was it -- his claim to fame, a book that produced light was paranormal enough to set him free from the bounds of this awful, awful job. With that, there was no harm in exploring the rest of this untouched tomb.

It was mostly other boxes, perhaps with more reading materials in them, but touching it up more than this could bring the case from pure curiosity to an unwarranted, messy theft. In the corner the door was slammed into laid a lamp, never used, not even with a light-bulb in it. The duties were done by now, but as he walked away from this sacred place, an even worse feeling than dust allergies came over him.

The feeling of being watched, no matter how irrational, stabbed into him like the key into the lock. It went through his head, his chest, that awful feeling, a cold air, dreadful, threatening to strangle him and decapitate him. It was only the feeling air gave one when one felt paranoid, but now, it was the highest feeling, dominating all else. It only encouraged him to make a swift escape. Not running, for he had to be noiseless this entire escapade. Whatever was watching him could also hear him, smell him, and if close enough, touch and then go for the kill on him. Back into the hallway he went, where that swift shifting walk then became a dash towards the elevator. The feeling of being watched had faded away by then just enough so that he could make a little bit of noise, and that allowance was used most usefully on it.

He nearly had ran himself straight into the elevator, merely crashing into it with one arm only, his back bending, trying to take a breath after that assault on the respiratory. Coughing, wheezing, a cacophony of exhaustion. It lasted for an eternity, the book still grasped underneath his arm, perhaps with the cover now soaked in a panicked sweat. Once that feeling had, too, faded away, he punched the elevator buttons, a detour from the usual gentility he had used on his friend before. By now, it must've been time to go, to sleep and forget any of this happened, and toss the book in his own basement to never be touched again. It had to be the book. It had to be.

One more ding, and the doors opened, with him nearly falling, still leaning on them, and then standing up again right in the middle of the floor. With less abuse than the call up, he pressed back to floor level, the doors closed, but then nothing happened.

He pressed the floor level button.

Nothing happened. He pressed it again. Still, nothing. The presses turned frantic, then, once again, punches and swings. Still, it remained still, the flickering lights more dim than usual after the hits. With that being said, the emergency call buttons were then punched instead, with him slumping to the floor soon after, mind heavy and drained from the night's swift event.

But while he was here, and would be here until the day-shift starts and somebody notices the malfunctioning, he might as well get started on cracking open this book. If he was going to throw it down to where it belonged, it didn't hurt to just have a taste of Nowhere Hotel's secrets first.

While the events aligned, and there was no mistake in his actions, the path he was taking would not be well.

The pages seemed blank at first. Turned, turned, turned. Then an eye, similar to the one on the cover, small, in the center. Two eyes on the next page. Three. Five. The entire page was eyes. Staring at different directions. Flipped another page, the eyes now stared at him. One last page, one fatal turn. The book was blank again, but it was unnoticeable, because now, a powered fountain of black ink poured from that page, onto the ceiling of the elevator, and then back to the floor. It was a torrent, with him dropping the book in fright but no matter that or his cowardly crawl back into the corner of the room, the hose of ink continued with no end, perhaps even growing more strong.

The flood had arrived for his sins, as already, the ink had covered the floor entirely, and began to grow upwards. The doors were sealed from outside, and with nobody to help, no buttons functional, all he could do was wait as the pouring rivers of the void came upon him. First one inch, which would stain enough of his shoes to need replacement. Then two, then three, then six, socks that went from new and tight-whitey to that same voided black.  It stained everything it touched, and only continued.

Up to the waist -- He went on the tips of his toes to try and delay inevitable fate. When one of his hands sunk into it, it felt less like ink, and more like an awful goo substance. The plumber would have a horrible time with this. Despite the book being submerged in the thickness of its spewings, it still showed no signs of stopping.

Up to the chest -- It was cold, cold as the nights, and as dark as it too, again. One hand reached up towards the ceiling, him being just tall enough to reach up to it. Stabilization would not save him from this fate. As it reached closer and closer towards his nose, a rotting-flesh smell came from it, enough to make any man who hadn't worked in a place like this puke into it.

The tip of the chin -- A prayer was whispered. This prayer would not be answered, because God could not reach the place where he had been. It was no longer Nowhere, but somewhere, he was at, and in this somewhere, he was alone, and would die alone in this flood.

The eyes and nose -- Just before it had reached here, he had taken a deep breath to hold. Once it went over the eyes, he had already considered himself a dead man. It is the human instinct to try and survive in the most hopeless situations such as these, however. The endless void was all he would see now, eyes closed or opened. It didn't feel any different if his eyes were open. One last bid to safety, he shuffled towards the door right before the liquid hit the top of the elevator, banging on the door with the desperation of survival. And then, what would've been a scream became inhaling bits of the ink. It was enough to set in the oncoming fate.

It would be safe to say that the slowing and the stopping of the banging sounds from within that personal hell were from the onset of a drowning demise. His body floated up to the ceiling, light enough for that, covered in that staining blackness. Quickly, it putrefied, and then...

The elevator soon resumed normal activity, with the next few days reporting that the walls in it felt stickier than usual. His spot was soon filled, because, again, there were not many places to work in desolate lands like Nowhere was located. Missing posters hung through the walls, with some assuming it was an actual disappearance, and some assuming the hotel would now lean into the rumors of hauntings.

In another word, this man would wake up, not a shell, but not himself. But for now, all that remained of him was the posters as traces, around hotels and around the town.

"MISSING MAN -- PLEASE SEEK OUT [He is no longer here.] -- $2000 REWARD" was the only trace. He is no longer there, or anywhere. But he still lives on, just not as himself, yet not forgetting himself. He seeks a way back to the hotel he came from, but the one he's rented an eternal room at is similar enough, no?

[mocharaycookie]

a good song first, and then we...

while the rest of the hotel sleeps, seek and figure take some time for each other's presence. day two prompt: first date

AO3 MIRROR: https://archiveofourown.org/works/41813667

Despite the moon being covered with the thick clouds that threw rain to pour onto the hotel windows, it still shined bright enough, penetrating these clouds, and even the curtains alongside the windows, bringing in just enough light so that an unlit room could be seen. In the room the two stood in, silent, waiting for one to make a decision, the one side of the room facing this full moon was all windows, the sole audience to their eventual stage.

And then, that decision was made at random, Seek's hands pouring over a small box of records, as if silent piano keys, before stopping at one at random. Those hands pulled it out, before its body swung around with a grace prepared for tonight, the disc sliding into a player, dusted off just for tonight. Something that would hopefully compliment each other, and compliment that pounding rain. Some days, the downpours, while constant as always, just felt a bit worse than others.

"Just tell me if you want the disc changed or, or to change my pacing, or if you just want to stop, or..." Seek would've continued on with those caring assurances, but the mind stopped there, but without waiting for a response from Figure, just started whatever was on that record. It turned out to not be anything too special, a little bit aged, but not disagreeable. A shuffle away from the table, and Seek's foot made a quick two taps against the wooden floor. There was a small language of assorted sounds that they two shared now -- to guide the blind. This was merely to call Figure over to a certain spot -- right in front of Seek, walking over, and then there. The simple things like those were a fresh bloom of caring act.

"So! Figure, have you done this before?" Seek asked, and with that sentence, already laying the hand that set the tone to grasp around Figure's midst of the arm. It was only habit, boundaries now broken down, an endless world of possibilities with just touch.

"No. You?"

"...Well, I-" A facade of formality could be broken with a single statement here, "can't say I ever have."

"Might be better that way. Put your arms up for me, then."

Seek gave a nod that would go unseen, before lifting both arms as high as they'd go, and, as another signal, both hands snapped. With that, Figure's own claws went up to them with a slow gentleness, hands that would never grow used to such touches as opposed to rough, quick movements against others, and not with. The claws closed around Seek, a warmth around such a cold ink, a feeling that made Figure's own head float -- if only these hands could be used for this and this alone, gentle, gentle things. Flower-picking. Handling a sewing machine. Holding Seek's hands. Holding Seek. Those feelings floated around Figure's head, unwavering, yet waiting for the next movement for those hands to take, to be led by someone shorter, smaller, but at that same level. Seek's own arms were still reaching as high as they'd go.

The chorus in the melody picked up, and at that time, Seek knew that they would not stay still forever, and to do what the two had planned to miss sleep for in the first place. It took a step to the left, then one more, making sure its heel clicked along that floor. There was a degree of separation within Figure's echoing of the movement, but the two already had it settled, a rhythm and a beat to take that rhythm against. A few more steps, and then, to the direction the two came from.

A simple dance that lasted for until the next set of what would be lines if an instrumental wasn't chosen -- Seek then took to a lead once more, stepping into Figure, body against another body, and again, cold against warmth. One arm wiggled itself out of the claws that kept them there, wrapping the arm around Figure's chest, and holding on for love and for life. With more strength than one would expect of a lithe form of sludge, Figure was taken for a sudden spin. It was slow, graceful as the two could manage, which wasn't very graceful at all. Seek had almost tripped trying to get out of the spin, relaying itself back to holding onto chest rather than arm. It was a steadier bridge to go against, and there would be no complaints from having a face next to such lovely form. Bits of Seek's slime had dispersed onto the floor from that near-mishap, to join the moon as the audience for this performance. This pattern of steps and then a spin went along, while not lasting too long, feeling like a forever to be around the lover, and surely they wished it would last an eternity.

A voice joined the track soon enough, a low, rumbling hum from Figure. Another stream flooded into the river soon after, small la-la-las from Seek. The voices that spoke I-love-you's to one another had joined once again to complete the song, to fill in a blanks where they knew lyrics would fit, but where none would be found on the disc. With the two in such sync, the place of dance sped up, moving alongside the room, cleared out in the middle. The edges were a bit of a wreck, but a wreck Seek could be a guiding eye for, an imperfect ballroom that just seemed to work for the two, just for tonight, that just seemed to fit the mood. The humming stopped, only for Figure to speak.

"You know, when I saw you, or...anybody, I never thought that anybody would get this close to me."

Without stopping any movement, the two were beginning to talk a multitalk. They were learning not only to dance, but to dance with each other. To be near each other. The highest honor, to just have each other.

"Aren't you happy things turned out like this, though?" Seek felt uncertain of that one.

"Just with you." A slight lie that hid a slight desire to just be able to open up more with the other entities, but that thought, while it would usually resonate and open up like a black hole, merely flied away into a space where the orbit of the two lovers were too busy rotating to care about such things.

"Well, it's certainly an honor, then. And besides, you should really--" Seek was cut off by it's own reaction to a misstep against a book that fell out while moving furniture and was kicked against. Unable to regain any balance, the rhythm now snapped into half and halted, Seek leaned back and fell with a short yell, and with no strong need to let go of Figure, in fact, quite the opposite, had taken Figure down with it. Figure's own screaming reaction was a lot louder, an interruption to the silent night it had been. And then, the even louder sound of the two's collapse against the ground, Figure pinning Seek to that wood, before immediately feeling that pin, and, taking pinning feelings into note, lifted itself up from the potential crush.

"Are you ok? Hurt? Seek, love, are you hurt?" That was a slip of words, but Figure would let itself slide just once for that.

"I'm fine. Actually...come back down. That felt nice," Seek whispered. The request was odd, especially so soon into the dating, and at such a slip-up in the midst of the date, but Figure obliged, letting itself go limp on top of Seek, looking down at that smaller, cute body that was starting to melt into the floor from overwhelming feelings. The two stayed silent, exchanging glances, looking away out of embarrassment, and eventually, conversation would start again, but not for long. It was late, neither of them too fond of all-nighters. Whichever entity was going to find the two of them in this cuddle pile better keep it a secret after.

[antonballdeluxe]

My Woes on Carrd

It's not too rare for a piece of anything made for professional adults to consume is eaten up by a disproportionate percentage of fourteen year old girls.

But what if it was a website instead, made for businesses, and again, used mostly by the fourteen year old girls of the web? That's Carrd's reputation for you, other than as anyone's extended twitter about me page, a replacement for tumblr about autobiographies, it's the new and hip way to introduce yourself to the web.

Easy to use, drag and drop, place, write, style, done. That's your page! Kinda like a very easy version of Neocities. And again, this was made for...businesses. Professionals. People with things to do, products to sell. And then Twitter came along, realized that unlike their site, Carrd has no precious character limit to describe every bit of your personality and life and market yourself as a niche micro celebrity, and went at it. That's what Carrd is now, the about me's, the kinlists, the do not interact if pages.

It's basically a more lame, watered down, and sensitive as fuck Neocities.

So why does Carrd piss me off?

Well, it's mostly the ones who use it who piss me off, but there's so many things I could discuss involving the site itself. For one, there's a definite lack of freedom, as with all code-free drag n' drop editors of websites or games or whatnot. They're easy for normies to use, but at the cost of freedom. You have plenty at the disposal, sure, but the general layout and look of the site means that with what they give you, there's only a few designs that will look good, pleasing, or bring the eye towards the guy who made it. And you've probably seen them everywhere. Oh, look at it, it's just like a file viewer and a window, except pastel mint! And there's a Korean girl in the upper left corner! Sooooo pleasing, I guess. Oh, what about roman numerals instead of any descriptor to your pages? Now I'm sure to see what anime boy is literally you before finding if you want me to follow you or not. And don't get me started on the disaster known as scenecore or any -core for that matter. Webcore carrds are genuinely ironic.

But what if you want to do more than this? What if you...wanted a custom cursor? Or things falling in the background? Music on the page? More than 50 drag n' drops on your bio? Well, better coin up, sucker. Carrd Pro time. That's their subscription services that the cool and edgy kinnies use and share accounts with their friends and groomers to get all of that done, because simply embedding cool fancy code is paywalled. And having more than three sites. And not having a "Made with Carrd" thingadoo on the bottom of everything. And uploading content over 2MB or whatso. There's still a file size limit, even on the biggest tier. Fuck, even having a favicon is paylocked. And all of this comes for about twenty dollars a year, or if you want to get really fancy and go for an even bigger plan with bigger files and more sites and even more ways to build a website that you could learn from 2-4 hours on W3Schools, fifty a year. Some of this is useless knickknack for bragging rights, but some of it is literally just how websites should work. You can't download your Carrd without hucking up the fifty, by the way.

So basically, get limtied to a few styles because nothing else sucks, and pay 20 a year to have little sparkles when you click. What a wonderful way to make money.

Go back to why people who use it suck, Lobst.

So, about the people who use Carrd. The entire brain process of using Carrd to explain who you are has lead to an epidemic of forgetting your elementary-middle school internet safety lessons, and now, oversharing is the norm. I've seen people use NOT oversharing on your Carrd as a bullet point on a call out, mostly dealing with race, which is as expected knowing that I read Twitter callouts for fun. I've gathered a few examples here of the new norm of "who am I online?", where instead of introducing via talent and hobby, it's your identity points.

Notice how none of these really have a catch, a reason to be mutuals. Of course, they're on another page, but it still feels sad and silly that the first thing you see is enough information to doxx a few of these individuals. Did you know that you only need one's age, state, and first name to wittle down the results to around ten or so individuals. Swap around a few of those for other basic identifiers, you can still get a close view at a doxx. That's bad, to say the least.

Not to mention the sheer amount of non-identifying personal information in these bios. Using mental illness as a standpoint, a personality trait, a way to paint one in a romantic sadness, has become all too common. Hell, I did it a year ago, I'm still growing out of all of it, I'm anonymizing myself once more, disconnecting, and it's more than freeing.

But what if I still want to use Carrd?

Well, for one, share as little information as possible about yourself. Your basic information should only really be what you want to be called, and an age approximation. Do not make yourself vunerable to those who can take advantage of that. Fill it up with things you enjoy, so you can easily be found by others that share your hobbies or favorite bands. And for that matter, make sure your page is readable.

Peak example of what to not do with a carrd. Oversharing, nobody needs to know that you wrote that fanfic, because that's disgusting, what the hell do your homework. And about the layout, even taking these screenshots made me need to get an Advil. I'm serious. The background is flashing neons, everything is a gif, sparkles, it's so ugly. There's more to it, and for the faint of heart, here it is. It's become an inside joke within my group.

As a small wrap-up, Carrd isn't to blame as a platform for a lot of the glaring issues with it, well, except the pricing plans, because that's bullshit. Most of the problems with Carrd falls on the user, and if you can avoid those problems, feel free. Or just make a Neocities for that extra freedom, and for a lot of effort. Actually, no, just make a Neocities, gives you great bragging rights as well.

[mocharaycookie]

Waifuism Communities are Inherently Fucked

Or at least the popular, not-closed-off, and active ones that exist at the moment.

WARNING: it's another waifuism article. Sorry.

If you've been following sugarteara.moe for more than a month, you already know about my waifudyke behaviors, my cringe behaviors, my cringe and fail. However, this week, month even, I've been thinking about the overall state of the community, and with that, came leaving every public waifuist community I was in (which was like, two, anyways), and for good reasons. Most, if not all waifuist communities, are irreparably fucked. I'll go over some more in-depth concepts in here, but if you want two people who agree with me, I'll link to them at the end.

My initial reason for leaving public waifuist spaces was something the two mentioned have also covered -- the pedophilia, oh, the widespread pedophilia. This is merely a symptom of a bigger issue with pedophilia in anime/otaku communities, which is also FUBAR, but that place is for another day. Most places include a simple cover-up "mental maturity" rule, which basically is a romantic Harkness Test. Unfortunately, this plays into the otaku/anime trope of "guys she looks like she still plays with polly pockets but she's actually 9001 years old", and they get away with it, while anybody who does object is given the "wow it's just a drawing". You treat your relationships as real as a 3D one, yet cannot even abide to 3D age of consent. Pedophiles, simply, disgusting pieces of shit who should honestly all die. The mental maturity law also lets zoophiles get away with their own shit, which is also disgusting, but I've seen less of that around.

While I did just use "treating your 2D partner as a 3D one" as a reasoning behind that moral, I also think that sometimes, waifuists also treat their 2D partners as "too" real. This is mostly worrywart behavior, but also comes at a great expense of the waifuist's mental health. The easy line of "anything you can do with a real person you can also do with them!" simply...shouldn't exist. It is a cope. There's a widespread concept of "roleplaying" your everyday with your partner, the "Oh I did X with waifu!" is met with great applause. It's fucking weird, and anybody who doesn't play with it is seen as the weird one too for being unsupportive of the relationship or something. It is not unsupportive, it is not making my relationship less valid if I regonize my partner as NOT REAL, and act accordingly. Being in love with a fictional character can be upsetting due to that wall, but in most cases, it's better to just accept the unreality of it all, and make do with those feelings.

Being that "odd one out" also comes into play with, well, again, this is another otaku-based-community thing, but there seems to be a stigma against Western character sources. Unconventional gets it even worse. 90% of unconventional partners tend to be Western partners, so I'm lumping those two together. In a community of all anime girls, it is somehow weirder to be in love with Some Guy instead of a big titty foxgirl. This leads to feelings of alienation, and yet, there seems to be a sort of protectionship between Western waifuists because of this. Also, a lot of weird comments will come if you are unconventional/Western, and sometimes, being seen as a troll or invader for being outside of that norm. There is a thin line between a genuine relationship and an obvious troll sometimes, and while it is hard to tell, it isn't too hard to at least check before being weird about it.

And now, for a problem I struggle with myself a lot -- the idea of having to live up to some "ideal waifuist" conventions, to be the best that you can be. To look up onto others is normal, to idolize them to this extent is not. If you have to ask yourself if you are doing enough, first, take a breather. Also comes into play with "shrines" of physical media for a character. Merch collecting is a joke if you are, again, from a source with almost no merch, which happens to be the unconventional ones most of the time. And then you go and see someone with a gacha-game partner with an entire fucking wall of figures, posters, little trinkets and toys. Some of these even get official body pillows. Feels awful if you just...can't get any of that, or at least, officially. Fan merch is always better anyways, but what about the people who don't even have that?

This is probably more surface-level than I intended it to be, but I do hope somebody who intends to be a leader finds upon this, gives it a good look, and uses it to improve. Again, these widespread issues are unavoidable unless you just...sink away to your own spaces. Waifuist spaces end up more casual hangouts more often than not, and it's generally not my thing in the first place. Without a comfortable, safe area to spend time talking about my own things, and with my own aversion to common small-talk, I find no reason to not just talk about it with the closer groups I have outside of these spaces. I can literally go on about Mocha Ray Cookie to someone I went to school with, there is no need to resort to these places for socialization.

https://psychonauts.neocities.org/journal/thegripesofawaifuist.html

https://macaque.neocities.org/articles/waifuism.html

[mocharaycookie]

helping, bloody hands

seek lets figure take the finishing blow on an unlucky visitor to the hotel.

CONTENT WARNINGS: DETAILED VIOLENCE (DECAPITATION)

AO3 MIRROR: https://archiveofourown.org/works/41889342

Another day, another unlucky loser who had managed to get far enough to the hallway Seek designated as its own, and its own trap to use. The silent gliding of goo followed right behind a running man, the man faster, but quickly losing steam, half from running away from this perceived threat and half from the screams for help he has been letting out the entire stay at the hotel. The next door was thrown open, but in a moment of inattentiveness, this man had ran straight into a certain doom, almost knocking himself cold from how hard he had thrown himself into the pile of furniture straight in the midst of the cross-shaped room. A scream cut off, and a body falling to the ground to turn away and face his chaser, irises shaking as much as the rest of his body, those yells turned into praying whispers for mercy.

Seek had plenty of time to make its way over and to tower over, right in front of the still-seated victim. The trail of ooze slid over and around the floor, a gate to seal fate. Seek remained silent, staring, with its own heavy breaths right next to the pest below it.

While Seek usually took care of those who it caught on its own terms, today felt like a day to shake things up, perhaps too exhausted to kill, or just not in the mood for disposal of the tourist. The gate creeped upwards in the air, tar hardening, tendrils extending from the inside and pointing towards the man. And then, a whistle coming from where there was no mouth. The only sign to this man that this was not just some animal, but knowledge that would not escape the hotel anytime soon. Anybody who witnessed the higher side of Seek, or the one now making its way over to the room Seek stood in, usually did not make it out alive in the first place.

With the echoing of stomps, the door that would've been the bid for freedom was opened, bringing another horror into view, those prayers not becoming simple whimpers without words. Another muted whistle, and Figure shambled over to next to Seek, nearly laying a hand upon Seek's shoulder, but deciding against it at the last second.

"What's needed here?" Figure asked, a voice that had just waken up, a little less aggressive than usual. Seek then made a mental note to make absolute sure that no other person was around to hear, or at least, nothing that was not just another entity. Knowledge was a dangerous power, and while the commotion of tourists to this limbo had started to die down, as soon as the wave subsisted, it had already picked up again. Any hint that they were anything but monsters, and this place would never be left alone.

"Just a favor. Keep your head up for me?" Seek's tendrils became two thick tentacles, and then fused into one larger hand of the sludge, taking a quick grab at the man, who, by now, could've at least tried a bid for escape. His arms struggled against the grasp, but to no avail, being lifted to right in front of Figure's gaping mouth. Teeth stained with blood and neglect, a body made of rotting meat, a bone sticking out from the shoulders, and bluntly, a horrid stench coming from Figure, which remained silent and still at the request. The hand jolted around this helpless man, left and right, away and back to in front of the tunnel of doom, letting out a few screams. Simple entertainment, but enough to make Seek feel humored on the inside. There was no harm in playing around with the doomed, and, after so many people simply submerged into sludge to never be seen again, it had become habit for Seek to try and strike something worse than fear into them. Anything to make the experience less repetitive. It had even tried to host a conversation with an important-looking victim, which had lasted for all of five minutes until Seek grew tired of being asked for freedom, and dipping him into the never-ending plunge.

And then, while centered once more, the hand began a slow journey to the final station for this player. Slow, grueling, giving them a wide view of the guillotine. Then, the fist of slime stopped, with his head almost halfway inside Figure's mouth.

Seek's words remained blunt, before giving the execution order.

"Go for the kill."

With one bite, a resounding crunch could be heard from the inside and out of the mouth. Teeth sharp enough to bite through wood had no trouble with severing the skinny neck from this man's body, one last scream fading into a deathly gurgle of blood seeping into Figure's mouth, the sudden metallic taste prompting it to open the mouth back up, letting both the head and what was inside of it spill out onto the ground. The head had been reduced to a main puncture above the ear, brain matter flowing outside of it like a popped balloon, and other holes where what remained of the blood dripped away, not to mention a neck and a body still being held by Seek. The body had gone limp, but the neck's sever was spewing with what remained of the body's ichor. It felt like just another day to Seek, a day of the week that wasn't remember, nor cared about. It was routine to watch death come and go for the two, but helping one out with a murder felt alien. Bonding experiences were usually not as rotten as this, but a rotten that had become an everyday to the entities, and it just felt as much as a favor as would be lending over a towel to dry off in.

"...You really could've told me what this was beforehand, love," Figure mentioned.

"Are you not used to it? With how much longer you've been here than me?"

"It's not that. I was sleeping before this."

"Ah." A guilt rushed over Seek, not from the carcass that the hand now threw over to a corner, before vanishing back into Seek's mass, but for something as simple as waking Figure up. If Seek had known, it would've just dealt with this threat itself.

There was just something peculiar that laid over the two now, though. Watching one another kill like this, helping each other like this -- it only made them want to become closer with each other. Murder was never mundane with a loved one. And the way Figure had clamped onto the head like a bear-trap, with such speed and strength -- something that would be kept locked under the keys of the mind floated up for Seek.

 I wish Figure would kiss me like that.

Yeah, that one was going to stay in the thought cabinet.

[antonballdeluxe]

where are my horns?

i could ask a million questions like this, though,

but of course, that gets me nowhere. It still leaves that feeling I've had for an entire lifetime or more, though, the feeling that pierces through the chest with a red thread, but isn't love.

Rather, an isolation uncomparable to my usual isolations. In the spirit and heart, I've never felt like I belonged inside a humanity or a human form, but rather, alongside it, or perhaps somewhere else altogether. It feels like red thread, but also a thick cloudiness congesting my throat, my lungs and stomach, to choke me. It feels like a numbness in my hands, a numbness of something that I do not own. I do not own these hands! I'm supposed to have something else.

Somewhere in August 2020, was that first taste of mourning a life lived, but only realized after. It lingers within me since. It is an ebb-and-flow, waves, sometimes wondering if I even exist at all. Being alongside crowds of others brings on that too easily. It's like being an outline alongside filled-in shapes. Something missing.

But maybe I wouldn't be this way if I wasn't so fragile overall. I had a history of unfortunate events, a series, but not as bad as losing one's parents in a fire. It was small ones that added up, maybe two or three big things, but like the red thread through the heart, swords gashed through it, too. It bleeds out, an unstable outline, and onto the floor, where the filled-in ones see, and avoid it.

Again, in August 2020, I had a realizing of that missing piece of "myself", and it was, rather, an odd person that I happened to be. Like looking into a mirror, I saw blue, and the brain saw it as myself. That's me. Lobster Cookie is me. Strange sentence. Stranger memory. Feelings. Touch. Warmth. But undeniable truth.

And a whole lot of missing things. Missing a home I knew so well. People that I loved, and was loved back by. But maybe most of all was a body so strange.

Where is the body I was given by Her Holiness?

Legs, long and spikey and a bit shiny in the light. War-torn scarring on the chest. An androgyny I still search for in this life. Hell, the claws! Even typing feels wrong sometimes. Claws. Well, one claw. And where are my horns?

To mourn what is lost from who I am is isolating.

And so, it cycles again, from isolation, to an inhumanity so strong, and to going back in the shadows, where perhaps I was born.

...Will this one make sense to anybody but me? Does anything make sense at all in this world? No. So let's live together, free in a nonsensical city.

the song i was listening to for half an hour while this was written is pretty good, and maybe fitting, so why not put it here too?

[mocharaycookie]

carved-out pumpkin

some hotel tourists come more prepared than others, as jack finds out by popping out in front of the wrong one.

AO3 MIRROR: https://archiveofourown.org/works/41982669

The trap was set, and all Jack had to do was wait for whoever came through that next door. It was elaborate, a trick of pulleys, string, and the things only Jack would come up with. He had already embraced the ongoing spike in people coming through quite well, only upping the game of pop-up-and-run spooks. It was something in his nature, an inherent trait nobody would ever take away. No wonder he was here. And while he was here, he waited for a second member of the group to show up, the second part, and the most important part of it all.

Rush. Where was Rush? And then, as coincidental a name as Rush could be, it was in front of Jack’s upside-down setup, one of Rush’s dry hands resting against Jack’s chin with a slight hold to the tip of it, the other crossed across its own wide chest.

“…Interesting! Can’t say I’m not hopeful, but a little confused on what you’ve got here,” Rush’s voice had a slight sarcastic tone at the moment – Jack could do anything of use, but whatever useful ideas Jack had would always spiral into these sorts of things. He was perfectly capable, but applying himself was another story – almost never happened unless he wanted to. Meanwhile, Jack blabbered on about the setup, giddly-voiced, the mess of wires, around his leg, arm, gears glued onto the wall and about to bring the whole thing down to the wooden floors. Inspired by the chimes of opening a door in a small restaurant – someone would open it, and then, he’d be flipped around a hundred and sixty to a hundred and eighty degrees, right in front of the face, and scream.

“If the shoe fits!” Rush gave off a hearted chuckle. Its body tilted to the left, passing through the small fitting of the doorframe and Jack, before continuing on. First came the fake scare, and then the real one – nobody was to enter these grounds, after all. But people did, and, the grounds being the anonym of holy ones, people were dealt with in a way that could be told around the campfire to scare – people died here. Plenty of them, and yet, still coming, and for what? Like moths to a light behind a flytrap, people came, and lives ended.

The waiting game was on for Jack. His chest beat with an anticipation like no other, a feeling he lived for. His role in life was this, a perfect fit, a soul molded for these opportunities. It was a cheery turn from everybody else – he loved being here, and he had nowhere else he wanted to be, either. No family to tend to, nothing in his name. All Jack had was these little things, this job, and making the best of it was a duty that felt like it was handed to him from God.

Footsteps rung to the ears. Jack’s tremulous, racing heart only picked up in pace. It was time. It was his time to shine. Louder, and on came another noise – the jangling of chains, the brushing of oversized boot-cut jeans on the floor.

The door opened, and with that, a certain wire was pulled, which knocked down a ball onto a lever and then the lever set off some more wires, and Jack’s body was pulled down, upside-down and then not so much, right into this visitor’s face. A scream, loud, boisterous, and with not too much of a bad intent went right through their eardrums, and this man’s hands were pulled up to the chest, aiming something Jack could not see in time to avoid.

Smoke floated from the barrel, after the bang of the pistol echoed throughout the entire floor of the haunted and God-forsaken, yet God-watched-over hotel. Jack’s playful scream was silenced with a whine, a whine of great, sudden pains right under the shoulder, yet not low enough to hit the heart. A dark blood poured from the new-found hole onto the floors, Jack’s legs wriggling to free himself from his own contraption, locking himself in and away from a help that was already on the way. He had barely a glance of the face or the body of who had shot him – bearded, neutral-colored jacket, but that was all that registered other than the dangerous feelings of being on the verge of death.

A death that would mean potential freedom, but that prize would not be granted anytime soon.

Two shouts came from behind the injured – Rush again, and a voice that Jack never got to hear as often as he wanted to. Rush’s was more of a threat and then a scream, followed by the sounds of slams against a wall, the gunslinger already captured and definitely about to pay with the most vicious, vengeance-fueled beating. Being trapped in places did that to people – it forced bonds, because without allies, there would’ve only been enemies. No matter how monstrous the dwellers of this place were, they were most certainly dwelling to stay. “Jack? Jack? Respond if you’re still alive!” and out from the sides, came Ambush. Smaller, paler, but still just as strong as her brother. A short ponytail flied through the air, almost floating in place like the body of the ghost she was, an arm reaching out, nearly slamming Jack to the ground to pull him out. The other arm cradled the bloodied body, blood seeping into the collar of the jacket, everywhere it could go, it had touched.

“Hang in there, please. You haven’t said anything,” Ambush’s comforting words quickly came over to a rushing fear – and Jack’s head turned away, and Ambush knew – with a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach – that if those prayers were not answered in due time, she had lost a true friend. Or at least, one of the few friends one could make, stuck here, a limbo, until some poor soul was thrown into the same situation as everybody else.

“…Huh? No, I’ll be fine.” “You’re clearly not. Face my face and say it again,” Ambush barked. There’s no way Jack wasn’t taking this seriously, either. He had never been in a situation like this, as desperate and drastic, but the deal of shock on the body led to the haze Jack always felt like he was in only growing worse. But with that, Jack tilted his head as far as it would go, right into Ambush’s hollow eyes.

"I said I’ll be fine. Look.” Jack’s hand, even more pale than the almost-white it was, reached up, pointing to the wound location. It had missed anything too important – just a bleeding risk.

“See? I know what I’m doing.” “…Just let me take you—” A sound of an almost-sob. She’s about to lose her cool, “Anywhere other than bleeding out on the floor, please! Just let somebody patch you up, please, and—” The almost-sob is now a straight-up cry, “And save you.” “Can’t I just walk there?” Another laugh. “Like this?! No. Just stay still.” The other arm reached down, underneath a brittle back where the spine stuck out, even with clothes covering it, and lifted Jack up to stride. Tears ran from Ambush’s chin, dripping into whatever was underneath where they’d land.

“Ruuuush! In 78! As soon as possible!”

And by the time everything did situate itself in 78, with Jack laying on one of the beds, a half-there head gazing and counting patterns in the ceiling, the bleeding had stopped – maybe Jack had a few less screws loose than everybody assumed. Just some days of bed-rest, and whatever Ambush could do to patch that man up, and things would eventually fade to a neutral normality as normal as the awful green on the walls of the halls. And even if it had went up and towards the head, or down and towards the vitals – something would’ve happened, whenever a miracle recovery or just appearing a few days later after an apparent death.

Not even death would free these monsters from what they were trapped in – a light prayed to was the light that chained them here. All there was, and all there would be. And at least this would be a great story to share at that weekly “making sure everybody is still alive and kicking” meet.

At least Jack knew how to build a good trap. Priorities.