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graffitibible · 4 years

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how do killjoys treat raygun burns? i genuinely have no idea and i know you've already gone pretty in-depth with raygun wounds in general but i was curious about the treatment

cw: we’re gonna be talking about medical stuff and injuries in here. i’m not gonna include any graphic pictures and also i’m gonna warn anyone who wants to do further research that some of the images that’ll come up are gonna be pretty damn graphic. tread carefully!

SO i’m gonna be going off this ask here, and running with the assumption that raygun burns probably both bleed and burn. thats important since thats gonna affect how youd do treatment. it also means that raygun injuries are messy. most burn injuries in the real world can cauterize - theyre unique in that the site of injury is usually sterile at the time of injury. however, since the rayguns in this world are capable of making someone bleed (rather a lot too, if the comics are any indication), that means that these wounds can get pretty gnarly.

the important thing about how rayguns in danger days seem to work is that they are not pure laser bolts! if they were, they’d be able to pass through something and cauterize it pretty neatly, like a lightsaber. the raygun blasts have an obvious physical component - they can physically knock someone back, for example, and we see sparks shower when people are shot in the music videos. so rayguns in danger days have an apparent kinetic component to them: you are basically applying heat to the human body at high velocity.

ONCE AGAIN, THIS GOT LONG. THE REST IS UNDER A CUT. mind the content warnings above!!

other than that, we’re not sure what specifically the makeup of the lasers like...are. electromagnetic radiation? plasma? heat? electricity? i doubt its pure electricity since that would be more consistently fatal, but it is some kind of bolt that has both heat and velocity on its side to be sure, but thats the extent of what we know.

now logically, this would actually cause the human body to like. explode. cause thats what happens when you apply that much heat to something made of mostly water. getting hit with a bolt of something that hot would cause all that water to boil off abruptly and then the steam would fucking parboil you. not a fun way to go though it is funny that the steam would be the thing that causes the most damage. so yeah actually a very gory kind of injury.

obviously thats not what happens in danger days, since no one to my knowledge Fucking Explodes when theyre hit with a laser bolt. but lasers from rayguns can make blood FOUNTAIN OUT OF A DUDE’S GUT in the comics so obviously they can do a hell of a lot of damage (the mvs are way less explicit but they also werent allowed to like, swear in the mvs and had to tone down some of the violence and shit so im taking the comics canon as the more “realistic” one wrt rayguns here) the science here is kinda...eh, cause laser bolts don’t appear to be a penetrating injury but rather a messy “burn and blister” kind of injury that are nonetheless capable of making someone eat it pretty quick.

but this is danger days and this is kinda where science goes to die so here is how i view laser injuries in the universe:

danger days laser bolts have a kinetic or explosive quality to them.

what this means is that the injury is twofold: first, the heat damages the external layer of skin. i’d hazard that we’re talking second-to-third degree burn levels of injury on immediate contact. second, the kinetic energy released at that velocity and force generates an explosive impact that does damage to surrounding tissue.

what’s left is an injury that both burns and bleeds. my take on it is that the bolt impact creates the open wound, while the heat intensifies that damage and disseminates it. you need a temp of maybe 300ºF and higher to cauterize a wound so lasers would have to burn at least a little bit lower than that since the injuries do consistently bleed. but since the human body is pretty sensitive to high temperatures that works out in our favor seeing as if you heat things too much, again, the risk is that we would Fucking Explode.

lots of burn injuries, especially third degree and higher, tend to bleed. since thats the closest thing i have to compare to a laser wound in danger days, thats going to be my basis here.

treating a raygun injury is likely to resemble burn treatment in a lot of ways

burn treatment stuff varies a lot and i will spare you guys from googling this and going “oh thank you google images thank you for showing me what a graphic third degree burn looks like i am so glad that i know this and that this is in my search history and keeps popping up in my search history im SO GLAD.”

burn injuries go by degrees. first degree is like mild sunburn basically, and only affects the epidermis or external layer of skin. second degree affects the top and middle layers of skin and can leave blisters. third degree burns go all the way to the subcutaneous fat layer and can leave the skin white and charred. fourth degree burns can go through nerves and muscles and even down to the bone and can cause permanent damage that requires amputation. at fifth degree you have significant risk of organ injury and at sixth it’s basically like “fifth degree, but with the common side effect of Death.”

again im not linking to anything here because pretty much every information article you get on this stuff is gonna have some nice graphic images. so if you look this stuff up on your own do it at your own risk or have an image/media blocker extension ready if that kinda thing squicks you out

the main takeaway is that any burn from like the third degree downward can be very brutal and hard to heal over - they can cause swelling and severe scarring and the destruction of the epidermis and hair follicles means that new hair won’t grow. add to that the idea of raygun blasts tearing open that external layer of skin that means that you can get burns that go in pretty deep which would go a long way to explain how it is a weapon that doesn’t appear to have a lot of “penetrating” energy is capable of killing someone relatively immediately, especially if theyve got that initial kinetic impact thats capable of tearing open the dermis and making the injury go deeper.

im going to tentatively say that raygun injuries are basically full-thickness burns with a few bells and whistles. basically, they destroy the epidermis and the layer of skin below it, the dermis. thats the level of third/fourth degree burns and worse, essentially.

so, serious burn treatment usually goes as follows:

clean! that! wound! it’s best to do this in a sterile environment, cause otherwise youre gonna end up blistering the injury and agitating it further. you wanna get all the dead tissue and gunk off the burn.

pain medication. with most burns the nerve endings can get pretty fried and you might not immediately experience any pain, but since raygun injuries go a little harder than your average burn, thats probably not the case. people definitely consistently react in pain after theyre shot with a raygun in the both the mvs and the comics. so yeah, its painful. pain medication is nice to mute that feeling.

antibiotics and/or tetanus shots to make sure that you don’t get an infection

intravenous fluids containing electrolytes as well as a diet high in protein and nutritional supplements

antibiotic ointments/creams for the injury

skin grafts to close the injury since a burn of that severity would have difficulty closing completely on its own. yikes.

continuous monitoring of the patient to prevent sepsis and eschar from fucking with the blood vessels and healing tissue.

obviously killjoys do not have the benefit of a fully stocked hospital. if youre in bat city youre probably gonna be in more luck. but if youre slumming it or if youre in the zones, heres what i imagine the killjoy diy procedure would likely be:

application of water over the wound. cool water is best, not ice-cold (alright alright alright alright alright etc)

cleaning the injury comes next to prevent infection. ideally you would use soap. do not scrub as youll agitate the wound

pain medication might be helpful here, but who knows if thats common out in the zones - and i imagine city-born killjoys might have some hang-ups with taking meds, so who fuckin knows there.

bandages, ideally clean ones, would help cover up the injury and keep it from the elements in time for it to heal. that will also cover up the skin while the bleeding heals up. keep the wound as closed from infection as possible.

check up on the injury consistently especially since the burn probably wasnt sterilized on impact the way most burns are. a messy injury like that one can go south very very quick.

realistically i doubt that skin grafts are readily available. its recommended that you stay out of the sun and avoid lots of exercise that might risk reopening the injury. and that...is going to be nigh impossible if youre a zonerunner lol. its likely that improper treatment can lead to infection and then death. it is also likely that too much agitation of the injury can lead to the wound reopening, infection, and then death.

if you get stuff like light grazes, where the bolts clip you but dont fully impact you, that means youre like to get some surface-level burns that cover a larger surface area. theyll heal quicker if you treat them right, but thats a larger area thats open to infection. burns that go deep into the skin have more immediate fatality risk. there could be variation here as well! maybe a laser gun with a lower or dying charge will do less damage. maybe some guns have fancy “stun” settings that don’t do permanent damage.

the human body is surprisingly resilient and can recover from a lot. but burns are no joke and a raygun blast can easily be fatal either immediately or a little bit after the fact. even if you survive the blast, there are likely to be a lot of repercussions to taking a serious hit, which im again basing on the noted consequences of major burn injuries

likely consequences of surviving a raygun hit in the zones:

scarring. especially without skin grafts, this ones gonna be a gimme, and likely permanent. serious burns can leave lots of color changes to the skin as well as keloid tissue (which is a raised, lumpy kind of scar tissue. you can google it if you want but as i warned before: images might be pretty grody). this would also prevent the growth of new hair in those areas. most hospitals try to excise this and replace it with skin grafts to speed healing but like i said thats not likely to be an obvious solution in the desert.

nerve damage. burns that go super deep can permanently remove the feeling from the affected part of the body. this is likely to be permanent. deep contact usually remains intact but stuff like subtle pressure changes can be outright impossible to sense. this can also cause contractures in the affected area.

weakness in the affected area. related to the above point, damage to muscle tissue and nerves can reduce range of motion, strength in that area, and more.

itching and pain at the site of injury. pretty self-explanatory. that one might get better as you go on depending on how good the medical treatment was at the time of injury.

inability to sweat. the destruction of sweat glands in affected areas are possible if the burn goes deep enough. in the desert this can be very bad news lol

psychological trauma. a given. any traumatic injury can have long-term psychological effects.

my main takeaway here is that killjoys who’ve been in lots of serious firefights are gonna have a sHITTON of scarring, some of it obvious. lots of killjoys looking pretty fucked up. lookin wiped out. my other takeaway is that surviving a raygun blast is pretty dependent on getting care for it as soon as possible, cause the infection/hemorrhage risk seems pretty high.

ofc this is just me analyzing this shit to hell and back and it’s probably nowhere near that scientifically DENSE im just detail-oriented as hell. so take or leave this answer, whichever you like lol. i like writing the nitty gritty details of injuries since i generally wanna emphasize how rough life in the zones can be so this is something im interested in exploring.

#anon #ask #*fabrication #cw medical stuff burn stuff etc.#im not capable of writing a succinct answer to anything lol #anyway this is why like...so many kj characters and ocs i design are SUPER scarred #and also why so many analog vets are missing limbs and stuff

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weeklyfangirl · 4 years

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Frat Boy Pt. 23

part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6, part 7 (1), part 7 (2), part 8, part 9, part 10, part 11, part 12, part 13 , part 14, part 15, part 16, part 17, part 18, part 19 , part 20, part 21, part 22

Here’s the chappie where you get a look beyond the Mediterranean fortress Harry calls home... ;)

Timing is sometimes too perfect to be the pure product of coincidence.

Everything is connected: the earth and the seas, the moon, and all the sky’s stars.

Our bodies are made of these, fragments of their nature, tying us to this world.

Aunt Lara used to tell me that we are a part of the cosmos, the cosmos pushing and pulling people into paths they’re supposed to be on. She’d smoke her cigarette on our porch with the full moon hanging high in the sky that she’d soon be flying through, and I’d nod, thinking I was so cool just for being around her. It was our time then, just the two of us, sometime after my parents had gone asleep and I’d sneak past their room to meet her outside. She never told my parents I was staying up late on a school night. She’d take another drag, extending one to me, knowing I wouldn’t take it.

“I’ve seen seven year olds with these things,” she’d mutter, laughing to herself, and when she’d look out, I imagined she was envisioning the Roman Cafe she’d frequent beside the famed Colosseum. A hot sun, and balmy breeze, warm like the foreign friends she’d meet, or the lukewarm seas lapping around her ankles. “So much warmer and clearer than anything you’ve ever felt here. The most miraculous shades of blue...” She’d smoke, she’d smile. I’d admire.

It was a full moon that night.

Just like it was tonight.

There are some things that happen so precisely, I think there must not be any other way these things could have happened, no other explanation, other than Aunt Lisa’s: the universe and its timing are inextricably linked to create our destiny.

Our choices change our future, sure. But there’s something beyond that, in the fickle way our choices play out ironically, that makes me think some things are fated. God, the cosmos, whatever you believed in - they had bigger plans for everyone.

They certainly had bigger plans for me other than a depressing Netflix binge in my dorm room after the game.

Yellow fluorescents flickered in the dismal parking garage. Lionel Styles was waiting by the elevators with Sven, looking oddly casual in normal streetwear. They grabbed Harry from me as soon as I’d parked, carrying him in. I followed, for a brief second questioning whether or not my services were needed. Maybe this was only family now.

But Lionel hastily beckoned me towards him. “You wanted a hands on experience right?”

His words seemed crass in a moment like this, but I brushed it off as stress as I went with them in the elevator. Lionel punched in a code and it creaked to life, slower than normal. A table had already been cleared in one of the surgery rooms, a white plastic sheet like that of a serial killer lain across. Gauze, ice water, rags, forceps, and needles were atop a metal tray. It was everything I expected of a surgical room - stark, sterile, and cold without any frivolous decor. No paintings. I assumed there was never anyone awake enough in this room to enjoy them anyway. Sven lay a white medical pillow down, too thin to be comfortable, as Lionel lowered Harry. I cringed, feeling another wave of nausea wrack through me. His gauze, once pink, was now completely red and looked wet to the touch.

“He’s been bleeding this whole time,” I breathed. Albeit obvious, it was less to inform Lionel than it was to come to terms with it myself.

Lionel flicked one of the syringes, nodding solemnly. “He might need a blood transfusion.”

Blood transfusion. IV poles were behind the table, blood blags and clear IV fluid already ready. He was expecting this.

“Shouldn’t he be at a hospital?”

“Nothing we can’t do. He’s just a boy. Gets into scrapes every now and then.”

“This is more than a scrape.”

He ignored me, plunging the needle in, and less than a second later, Harry’s eyes fluttered.

“Adrenaline,” I whispered under my breath. I recognized the protocol.

Lionel looked at me, curiously. “You’ve done a good job. Did you stuff the wound?”

I shook my head. Harry was still lightly breathing thanks to the adrenaline. But he wasn’t anywhere near stabilized to warrant my work being commended.

“It’ll be enough until my friend gets here,” he said.

I looked at him, skeptically.

“The anesthesiologist,” he clarified.

And I blamed it on the shock for being so daft. Dr. Styles had been established in the medical field since he received his degree, it was no surprise if he had a “friend” for everything.

“Is Mary here?” I don’t know why I asked this question. I don’t know why I thought it was relevant. Perhaps because if my mom knew I was bleeding out on a table, she’d be right there. Right beside me. She would’ve been the one driving, bossing around all the doctors. 911 would have been called and she would’ve moved hell fire and water screaming like a banshee to get to me. “Does she know?” I questioned.

Lionel didn’t even look at me, carefully unwrapping the gauze. “She’s sleeping. I didn’t wake her.”

The separate lives of Mr. and Mrs. Styles spread further in my eyes, only their roof and rings joining them.

I unpacked new gauze, handing it to him. The butterfly bandaids hadn’t held, big shock, and blood trickled down in a steady current. How much blood could he have left? Lionel didn’t have time to be surprised, but the stoic doctor looked a shade whiter when he grabbed the gauze. The wound was exposed and he hesitated, simply applying pressure. His hands bloodied by the second.

For as renowned as he was, in facing his own son, he suddenly seemed paralyzed. I wanted to shake him.

Sven re-entered, slightly out of breath. I’d never noticed him leaving. “They’re here, sir. But they can’t get in-”

A spark was lit. Something familiar for him to grasp onto. “Elevator’s been jamming,” he cursed.

I helped apply pressure, and Dr. Styles looked at me, unsettled.

“I’ll stay here. You can let them in,” I nodded, even though there hadn’t been a question.

“It’s deep. So you have to physically stuff the wound with gauze. Have you ever dealt with a stab wound?”

My eyes narrowed. He already knew what kind of injury it was.

Then, mustering all the poise and retort of the First Lady, “With all due respect sir, I can do this.”

“I’ve seen grown men faint at the sight of needles let alone handling an open wound.”

“Thank God I’m a woman then.” I don’t know what possessed me, but my steely gaze must’ve been convincing. Lionel ran through the door, not even bothering to shut it.

Perhaps it was all the hours of being kept to dull paperwork and the maddening helplessness I’d felt for too long now.

But I couldn’t sit around anymore.

I needed to do something.

Sven watched me as I put on gloves and bunched up the gauze, holding my breath as I pushed it past the skin’s opening, ignoring his little gasps telling me this was hurting him, and ignoring the hot sensation around my hands. Tissue. That hot sensation was his tissue. I was inside Harry. I was touching… suddenly the anatomy I’d memorized in textbooks was a little too detailed. These gloves were too thin. I kept going and Sven jumped in to help elevate Harry so I could wrap the gauze around his entire abdomen, stuffing his wound until it was full.

We didn’t speak.

I sat on the only steel stool in silence. I may not want to sit around, but right now the floor could move beneath me at any moment. Sven was in the corner of the room, gaze locked to the clock. The minutes seemed to tick by slower than anything I’d ever felt. I could feel time, just like in the elevator. And maybe it was because his time was running out. He could die. Harry could very well die. If I’d chosen to go with Renny, if I’d stayed a moment longer, if I’d left a moment sooner, I would’ve passed the locker room without hearing him, without seeing him at all. What would the alternative have been? An image of Harry bleeding out, cold on the floor made me nauseous.

And still the clock ticked.

I could have screamed by the time they burst through the doors in a flury. Two men I’d never seen before entered in slacks and untucked button-downs. This hadn’t been an expected call. This wasn’t official. They ignored Sven and I, instantly getting to work, which was fine by me as long as I could stay. They inserted needles and attached wires and masks until I wasn’t sure I could untangle him if I tried. The smallest mewling noises came from him, but he didn’t stir. I don’t think he had it in him to move anymore. Only able to give one desperate lolled roll of his head.

One of the men, the anesthesiologist, fiddled with a machine. The whoosh of releasing gas sounded when Harry took his first breaths. A slow, but steady, heart rate appeared on the monitor.

Lionel looked at it briefly.

The Doctor and his helpers worked for what seemed like hours. Maybe it was. For how long time felt and despite how intently I’d been staring at the clock, I couldn’t recall when we’d arrived. I cringed as they undid my handiwork, only to excavate deeper into the wound. I know this might be my future when I pursued medical school, but on more than one occasion I had to look away.

Sven had left the room entirely, standing guard just beyond the door. At least Sven escaped the smell of metal and flesh.

They stapled Harry together like meat, a butchered boy on the operating table, like Hasbro Operation except no one was laughing when the forceps dug in, and nobody won.

Every time I cringed, I reminded myself: Harry was asleep. He couldn’t feel any of this.

He looked like a corpse under the unforgiving white light, but the heartbeat reminded me he was alive.

When Lionel Styles finally turned away, tossing his gloves in the bin, he looked whiter than the sheet beneath Harry.

It was the longest night I’d ever had.

But for him, to excavate into his son the way he just had, I imagined it was longer.

------

“I didn’t have to come,” Matt said, for the first time irritance lacing his voice. Golden Boy stood at my doorway, recoiled, after I’d practically growled upon seeing him.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “It was a long night.”

And annoying after the e-mail notification I’d received about the DG Pretty Please. Time was running out, and it was the last thing I’d had on my mind recently.

“Why was it so long?”

I twirled my hair around itself in a messy bun, letting it hold itself up. I just shrugged while Matt’s concern mounted.

Lionel had asked me not to speak of it. “We’ll let you know when you can see him,” he’d said. As far as anyone else was concerned, I hadn’t been there that night. There was a reason he didn’t want Harry going to a hospital. Less questioning, less spotlight, less of an impact on their image… it still unnerved me. Such a horrific injury, and yet… it was almost expected, brushed under the rug. Had Harry really been this much of a troublemaker growing up that a stab wound was equivalent to a scrape for Dr. Styles?

Matt set the steaming Del Taco bag on the floor. “Y/N, seriously, what’s up? You couldn’t even stay the weekend on campus? She told me you’ve been gone for weeks.” He sat down at the foot of my bed when he was sure I wasn’t going to turn into a snarling monster. Which, to be fair, must have been a hard conclusion to come to. “And it’s true, I haven’t seen you around at all. You just… disappeared.”

“Okay, it was ONE week,” I clarified. “And we don’t see much of each other anymore anyways so don’t act like you’re so butt hurt that I decided to come home again.”

I wanted to take the words back as soon as I said them. They were the ones we hadn’t said. The ones we knew were true. But a mood had crept through me last night turning me sour against the world. And now each word I spoke was infected with its poison.

His brows scrunched, eyes flashing with indignation, not sure how to handle me, of all people, lashing out abuse.

“Yeah, because you quit your PT job.”

“I got a new one!”

“And that’s fine! Why are you so… defensive right now??” he laughed briefly at the absurdity. “I just don’t know why you’re trying to blame this on me. Where is this coming from?”

I remained silent. I didn’t know why I was blaming him so harshly for our friendship reaching a downward slope. I knew we had different circles of friends, and as gross of a cliche as it was, he was with the athletes and I was with… Renny. Though now I was starting to hang out with Lynn more, too. A part of me envied him for having such an instant community with his team. Isn’t that why people joined sororities? For community? I’d seriously flunked that one, though a little voice told me I just wasn’t trying hard enough.

He looked to my collaged wall, expecting to see our photo strip. But it wasn’t there. He stood up, finding it atop my mom’s arts and crafts bin.

“Haven’t been here in a while,” he said, softly.

I watched him, stood in my room like all those high school nights of old, seeming taller than before. Like in the months we’d lost touch he’d somehow gotten too big for this room, like he’d somehow outgrown me.

“It fell down,” I lied, because Harry had taken it off.

They say your high school friends won’t stay with you forever, that as you grow older, the number of friends you stay in touch with start dwindling until it’s down to one or two. I stopped speaking to most of mine after the first year of community college. People move on. People change. I changed too, even though I stayed behind. But there was always Matt. Of all people, I didn’t think it would be him and I standing apart and feeling farther, still. When these relationships change, the transition feels gradual. It’s like, in some unspoken unseen moment, your lives sync up, and you’re both busy at the same intervals. And then you make plans to see each other, but both of you don’t reach out the day you’re supposed to meet up. Neither of you follow through. Because it’s easier. It’s natural. An unspoken agreement.

“We’ve both been busy,” I said.

“The last time I saw you, you had a massive mark on your neck.”

“You can say hickey, Matt.”

His eyes fluttered, and he looked away. If I wasn’t devoid of emotion then, I’d think it funny how he got flustered just thinking or talking about anything sexual with me.

“You’re pretty close with Harry then?” he asked, ears slightly reddened.

“What makes you say that?”

“An educated guess.” A charming smile lit his face, almost shy, the hostility in the air dulling for a moment. “I’ve seen you with him before, and you were wearing his jersey at the game… I didn’t really believe it though.”

“What do you mean?”

“C’mon. Harry Styles.”

“And?”

He raised his hands as if the answer was so obvious it was floating in the air. They dropped. “He’s not really your scene, is he? I don’t mean that in a bad way, he’s not really my scene either.”

“So?”

“So, nothing. I was just trying to find something to talk about.” He was getting more irritated now, his thumb digging in between his fingers. “Really, I don’t even care to talk about him, let’s talk about you. Please. Have you drawn anything recently? Why’ve you been feeling off?”

I snorted. “Please, I haven’t drawn anything since high school. There’s nothing new.”

He crossed his arms, testing me. “I don’t buy it.”

He was smart not to.

“You know… It took a lot for my dad to ask me to stay behind instead of going off to Princeton,” he said. Every molecule seemed to still around him. “He can barely speak now. The guy who wouldn’t ask you to fetch the boogie board even if you were the one who’d let the waves take it in the first place...” his voice trailed off, a silent sadness swirling in blue eyes.

I remembered Patrick Price taking us to the beach and pushing us beneath the big waves, teaching us how to balance on those harmless foam boards we’d pick up at Rite-Aid. Just three years ago at high school graduation, Patrick was running across the grass playing football with Matt and Dad at the BBQ while Mom and Summer dished out the pasta salad and watermelon. He was diagnosed two years ago, and now instead of serving pasta salad, Summer serves him, watching him closely on his wheelchair. ALS was a nasty disease and it acted fast.

“I can’t help you if you don’t want to be helped,” he finished.

I wanted to say that I was sorry. I wanted to say that it wasn’t him, that it was me. But something else had already consumed me, not letting in the light, finding the darkest parts of me and unfurling them until some spilled past my lips. “You didn’t have to drive all the way down here just to see me.”

“I didn’t,” he said, and even though he hid his hurt well, I could still see it. He stood from the bed, making up his mind that there wasn’t any use being with someone who pushed away anything that ventured near. “I’m helping my dad move offices. The rent is too high now for landscapers.”

“They’re leaving? But you guys have been in the same spot for years.”

Matt gave a shrug, taking his turn at the silent treatment.

“I didn’t know,” I said, lamely.

The chasm between us grew bigger, and I shrunk even smaller, letting the silence and guilt consume me.

“But you wouldn’t want to talk to me about that either, right?”

I swallowed, hard. I deserved that.

And I was too ashamed to stop him from leaving.

Less than an hour later, I was cursing him again. The smell of Del Taco drove my mother away from the living room. Messy wrappers lay scattered around me when the door opened. I may have been too ashamed and prideful to apologize to Matt, but my growling stomach was stronger than both.

She saw me in the same position Matt had left me, and I avoided her gaze, checked my phone. No updates.

The room seemed cold.

“You look like you’re having the same day I’m having.” She came in with a basket of clean clothes, setting it on the floor.

“Mom, I told you I’d do that.”

“No, you needed rest.” There was a flash of pity, but it was lying beneath a thick shell of annoyance. She huffed, sitting on my bed, just like Matt hours before.

She snuggled closer. I faced her on my side, hands pressed against my cheek. She mirrored me.

I waited for her to say something, but in the silence her eyes grew wide, shaking her head. The mysterious reason for her mood like a gorged balloon floating towards a fan.

“What?” I asked.

“I think your Dad has feelings for somebody else.”

My brows scrunched. “What?”

“I don’t have any proof. But we were on a date night last night and…” -she let out a cruel laugh that made me want to hold her- “He was texting her.”

“Who?”

“A waitress.”

“A waitress?”

“Nicole the waitress.”

“How do you know it was her?”

“He denied it. But I looked at his phone when he went to the bathroom. She’s been a little… friendly with Dad.”

“Nicole?? Mom, she’s like nearly forty.” A brief memory of a friendly blonde working in the restaurant trickled up and left a sour taste on my tongue.

“Still fifteen years younger than me.”

My nose shriveled up, the thought of Father being romantic with my own mom made me cringe, but the thought of Father being romantic with somebody else? It didn’t seem… conceivable. My parents weren’t like the Styless. They kept us together. They loved each other.

“Have I met her? I’ll punch her next time I see her,” I said, the words still not connecting with my brain. With the facts laid out before me.

Mom snorted. “Not before I do.” She plucked at a hangnail, a habit I’d gotten from her, and I could practically see the insecurities already rolling around in her mind.

“You’re gorgeous, Mom.”

She gave me a look. “I’ve been stress-eating chocolates. I need to watch myself.”

“Mom.” I frowned, seeing worry behind her humor. “He needs to watch himself.”

She sighed, turning to the ceiling. “I don’t know. I just have this… feeling.”

“Women’s intuition?”

“Yeah,” she breathed, and I knew if Mother was telling me this from her vault of secrets, it must have been significant. She wasn’t one to listen to Lara’s spirituality, but intuition was something she would never refute. Momma turned back, rattling her thoughts together. “Anyway. I’ll just be... shocked. If it’s true. I mean...a waitress? Really?” Silence suspended. The afternoon sun warmed the room a little more than usual, exposing the paled filmy stars on my ceiling to be illuminescent frauds. “Or maybe I’m not,” she said, quieter. Before I could bat my eyes, she changed the subject. “Why’d you come back last night?”

But I could still see the steam rolling off her shoulders. “Do you want to talk about it more?” I offered. The Del Taco turned queasy in my stomach, and as much as I loved her, I really hoped she said no.

She shook her head. “No, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have mentioned anything.” She squeezed my hand, letting me know she meant her apology. She did a once-over at my stale big t-shirt. “Did something happen to make you want to come home?” Her fingers ran along the tops of my knuckles. “Or do you just love me.” Her smile was less than half-hearted.

“I was going to be alone at the dorm again. Renny was going to a party and I didn’t want to go with her…”

“I hate how she leaves you alone. Maybe we should get you a puppy for company?”

I gave her a look and she caved. “No, you’re right. Probably wouldn’t fit in there. You couldn’t take care of a puppy now anyways. Too needy. So, did he like the house?”

Her mind seemed scattered in a million directions. Mine struggled to keep up.

“Mom, seriously what are you talking about?”

“Oh, I didn’t know if he said anything about it afterwards or-”

“Mom, who?”

“Harry, honey.”

She was clueless of what her words did to me. My heart lurched just hearing his name, and the worry from last night washed over my exhausted frame like a crab on the shore, strong tides like a persistent weight, threatening to carry me away again.

“I’m sure he liked it,” I said.

“It’s an older home...he’s probably used to columns of marble.” Her embarrassed smile for even asking the question made my heart split further.

“Actually, he did say something! I remember now, he told me it was cute. Homey. He thinks the marble stuff is too cold anyways, he’s excited to come back,” I reassured her. The last bit was probably a stretch but it worked. Embarrassment fell away and her smile glowed.

Satisfied that she was happy, I turned to face my ceiling, closing my eyes. The problems with her and Father swum in the back of my mind, but I was too tired to take on anything else. She was an adult. She could make her own decisions. The information settled in a box in my brain, waiting for a moment when I could fully process it and I’d unlock it all again. I could feel the inklings of damage it would do to me if I truly unpacked it - anxiety, anger, confusion, fear, pity.

Family was a constant.

I couldn’t think about that changing, too. Not when I could barely keep my eyes open.

“You’re so sad, angel. What’s going on in your mind, hm?”

I shook my head, shifting to look at the ceiling. I didn’t need to feel guilty for not confiding in her. I needed to not feel anything.

Her presence was like a lighthouse, radiating heat, beckoning me to come back. All without her saying a word.

She looked as if she were going to say something else, but her hand fell back into her lap. “Okay,” she said.

She didn’t even try.

Maybe she knew the fog was too thick for me to see her light.

Then, through the fog, a vibration shook me to the core.

-----

“Y/N, I wasn’t expecting to see you so soon,” Sven stepped aside, the grand foyer to the Styles estate stretching out before me. Any other time, it would be enchanting, captivating. Now, it looked as treacherous as a hospital hall. I wasn’t sure what rendition of Harry was waiting for me on the other side of the staircase.

My feet carried me up a familiar path, my heart pounding at the unknown.

Irrationally, I had to remind myself that Harry was alive. I wasn’t going to find him, not like I’d found my Grandpa in his room.

Regardless…

“Are there people watching him? Is he alone?”

“He’s stabilized. There’s no need for nurses to keep watch.” Sven held dirty linens as he stayed in my shadow up the stairs.

I nodded, the assurances not really meaning anything, not until I could put an image in my mind as to what he looked like. Right now, all I could conjecture was a gray blur for a head sticking out above the sheets. How bruised would he be? How much stained blood would there be? I didn’t know what to fill in the gray with, so my mind envisioned the grim Harry I’d last seen, the Harry that, if it weren’t for the monitor, I wouldn’t have known still had a beating heart.

Each step carried me closer with a horrifying thought. My brain playing connect the dots as I walked.

Pale.

A clay boy.

A stitched up doll.

And everyone knew dolls didn’t breathe.

I didn’t realize I was alone until I turned around. Of course Sven wouldn’t have followed me, but for some reason I wanted him to be here.

Maybe it’s because he was with me when I’d seen Harry last.

“Y/N.” The familiar voice was weaker, but the grim tone was still so painfully bare. Of course he’d sensed me.

When I stepped out from behind the door, I didn’t find a dilapidated monster. Harry lay resting.

“Hey.” I snuck in, light as a swallow’s feather in the morning breeze, floating down beside him and resting my head atop crossed arms. The sight of him shook me. “Raggedy Harry,” I barely whispered, a horrible punch-to-the-gut feeling ballooning in my chest.

Half of his face swelled more than the other, his bottom lip completely bruised and jutted out, with a fairly deep gash that had started to scab. I fought the urge to trace over it.

“Looks worse than it is,” he said, watching my eyes carefully. Besides the pink-red swelling, his face appeared flushed. And despite his injuries, he was still miraculously beautiful.

I didn’t even blush from staring. Loose earthy curls had not been affected by time spent smooshed against the pillows. If anything, it’d pushed them forward, the floppier fringe defying gravity just there above his forehead. People could go to a stylist and ask for effortless mussy curls and not have it turn out as good as his - and this just with his genetics and days spent sleeping.

If I were him, I’d look like a grease monkey.

“Well, I can’t see the worst bits I’m sure.”

His chest was wrapped in gauze, this time not bloody to the touch. It was thick, white, and secure, and suddenly the tears that had yet to spill started pricking my eyes. I didn’t know just how badly I needed to hear the words before he said them.

“Y/N, I’m fine. I promise.”

The heaviest weight lifted from my shoulders, but my body slumped deeper into his mattress from an instantaneous realization. I’d needed Harry to be okay. I needed him here, even if I couldn’t explain why.

My hand reached out, brushing the tops of his hand.

“It would’ve been a dick move if you died,” I managed to breathe. I let out a sorry excuse for laughter, nervously sniffling.

His eyes seemed heavy, tired. The circles beneath them a cry for help from his beaten body.

“You can sleep if you want. I just wanted to check in on you.”

“I’m not sleeping when you’re here. S’all I’ve been doing,” he croaked. A flood of relief washed over me. Being apart from him was the last thing I wanted right now. The anxieties that’d been plaguing me the past 24 hours were muted to a dull simmer, drowned out by the highs of my body being close to his. Noticing his body...

A steady drip came from the IV hooked to his arm. Five pill bottles were on his nightstand, within arms reach. He noticed my staring.

“To stay hydrated.” Then, under his breath, “And numb.”

“I know,” I barked a laugh that instantly felt out of place. “I want to go into medicine, remember?”

His voice seemed lower when he rumbled, “S’right. You’re a smart girl.”

The tenderness in his voice sent an unexpected warmth straight to my chest. “You know that’s also a curse,” I noted. “I think too much.”

“I know,” he said, but he didn’t laugh like I had. It sounded like an apology. I almost jolted when his hand reached out to touch mine, not expecting him to be warm.

“You almost died,” I said, taking a breath. “I was there when you almost died.”

“I never wanted you to be there-” Before I could take offense, he weakly squeezed my hand. “I want to protect you, Y/N. I never wanted you this involved with me.”

“Well we’ve done a shit job at staying uninvolved. You can barely protect yourself. You can’t protect yourself.”

“That isn’t going to happen again.”

“The fact that it happened! Harry, I don’t think you understand how scared I was. How scared I am. I could be next, I don’t know what they want...”

A horrifying puzzle piece clicked into place. My nightmare of being stabbed could become a very real reality. It wasn’t until I saw Harry wincing that I realized his breath had quickened.

“I’m sorry,” I apologized. “Shit I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to stress you out. We don’t need to talk right now.”

The sting of I never wanted you this involved with me pulled me to the door, but his hand pulled me back.

“No. Fuck no.” But his grip softened again, his abdomen screaming at the effort to pull me back to him. When he spoke again his voice was a murmur, quiet-quiet, so gentle I could’ve imagined it. “Stay. Please. Seeing you here is the happiest I’ve been all week.”

My heart could’ve flown out of my chest, but for the buzzing electrical phenomena his words ignited in me, I was frozen by his sober admittance of want. It seemed all we ever did was dance around each other, literally. As if we were in an old 1700s ballroom, and everyone was dispersing into pairs. We spy each other from across the room and tiptoe around, refusing to seek other partners, yet refusing to commit to a dance.

“Is that sad?” His sincerity broke my reverie.

I leant closer, and his eyes fluttered shut in expectation… But my lips pressed soft kisses to closed lids. “I’ll stay,” I promised, nose to nose. Because my answer to his question would be yes. Something told me the mess of his body finally matched the inside of his heart.

Rather than tilt his head up to kiss me, he tried scooting over in the bed. It was painful to watch. I stopped him. There was plenty of room for me to lay beside him. So I did, scared to touch him.

“I’m not going to break,” he huffed. Tough and untouchable, I imagine being tip-toed around was the exact opposite of what he was used to.

“You didn’t see yourself that night.” Bloodied gauze and feeling his hot insides against my hands was enough to make my own blood curdle. It was enough to make me question if the Harry in front of me was simply a mirage. He was okay now, I reminded myself. But after I’d seen him bleeding out in the seat next to me, I wasn’t sure I believed him to be unbreakable anymore.

“You’re right, I’m… sorry,” he looked away, as if not being able to meet his reflection in my eyes. As much as I could hear regret, I knew he felt it even more.

My hand reached out, fingertips gently touching his raised cheek. “You were the one who felt it.”

He barely leant against my touch, gaze boldly probing my tired eyes, puffy from crying. The longer he stared the guiltier he became.

“Maybe we both did,” he said. The statement seemed to confuse him, brows stitching together. “No one’s ever been there for me like you. And-” he smiled as wide as he could with the swelling- “honestly it scares the living shit out of me. I know you didn’t have much of a choice to help-”

I surprised myself again, the definitive statement flying out of my mouth faster than I could comprehend. “I’d do it again.”

But the words seemed to hurt him more. His head lulled to the side, his prominent adam’s apple moving as he swallowed, deep in thought. “You’re too good for me,” he surmised. Before I could argue, he took my hand, pressing the back of it to bruised lips. He was acting so soft, so vulnerable. Was it the drugs? Was it an act? But if it was, how could eyes lie like that?

He hummed as if we were laying on the beach on the first hot day of summer, despite all the pain he must be in. The pros and cons list I’d written and stashed in my purse was sending out a throbbing heartbeat in my body, burning a hole where my purse lay at the end of the bed. No matter if the list were true, it couldn’t encapsulate the complicated person that he was. It wasn’t a fair portrait to paint. And putting me on a pedestal wasn’t either. “That’s not true,” I mumbled, far too late.

“It is,” he said. No room for argument.

“Did they give you some love drugs in this medicine bag of yours?”

His brows quirked at love, but he didn’t seem mocking when he said, “Maybe.” Emerald eyes were a mix of admiration, torment, and want as they drank me in, and I was sure if I let him stare into my soul a moment longer, he’d discover I wasn’t perfect at all.

I looked out towards his panoramic balcony window. Little flickers of light told of a city at the bottom of the hill, the dark ocean like a blanket for the rest of the world just out of reach. I wondered how long it’d been since the sun had set. Like any night with Harry, the rest of the world slipped away.

I stole a glance back at him, the beautifully broken boy resting his eyes. As if sensing me, he stirred, mumbling something incoherent.

“Too far,” he repeated, opening up his arms.

“I’m not laying on you Harry. Your stitches could burst.”

He growled. “I don’t care.”

And I didn’t doubt it. I came as close as I dared, thankful his shoulder wasn’t bruised as I lay my head in the crook of his neck, hands blindly combing through curls.

I could feel him relax into me, hear the boyish smirk across his face. “My mum used to do that,” he whispered. “Not this mum, my other…” his voice stuttered out. “My biological.”

It grew quiet in the room. An opening to the door of his past just barely letting in light.

“Do you miss her?”

“Can’t miss what you don’t remember,” he dismissed. And just like that, the door to his past was slammed shut. It was exactly what he said about the Styles’s first child Jane. But this time it sounded rehearsed, mechanical, a river of emotion carefully masked. But not to me.

My hands stilled, not sure if I should continue. But he leant into me again, and I continued my gentle work, as if undoing his tresses could untangle messy thoughts. “Thank you,” he sighed.

In some unspoken moment, he turned his head down, his tanned beaten face leant closer to mine. And with the intimate intensity only he possessed, he saw me. Like I was the only woman in the world. The oxygen seemed pulled from the room as time suspended. He leant lower until our foreheads brushed, his brows stitching together when I instinctually drew my leg across him, careful not to hitch it up too close to his wound. Our breathing deepened, the anticipation building as my hand drew across his face, my fingers settling behind his ear. He huffed, irritated at the tangling of the IV chord when he wrapped his arm around my side.

We stayed like this for a while, cradling the other. And just like I had done before, his pillow-soft lips ghosted over my cheek, then my nose, then my chin, until they hovered just over my lips. My eyes fluttered closed, the trail he left leading to one place…

“Y/N,” he breathed. I opened my eyes. There wasn't any reluctance in his eyes, but something similarly cautious yet fervent, an unspoken sentence pushing against closed lips.

But the sound of glass shattering woke us both up. His body turned hunter, still as stone as he listened for what came next. A hysterical cry drove Harry to stand, miraculously faster than I thought possible, and it wasn’t until he limped halfway towards the door that I realized he ripped out his IV. The banshee scream turned into a chilling wail, freezing me to my core.

My mind went to the worst case scenario. I’d have to jump from the window somehow. The gang must have found us. They must be in the house-

“It’s Mary,” he cursed, stopping my spiralling mind so quickly I was left dizzy. I don’t remember following him, but he stopped me at the door, hands locked around my shoulders.

“She has… fits, sometimes,” he explained.

“I don’t care.”

“Y/N, you don’t have to see this, too,” he said, and the amount of shame that shadowed his face was like a gouge through my heart.

I barely had time to say the words before another scream ripped through the empty house. “I’d do it again.”

With a somber nod, he rushed us out, practically sprinting to the living room where Mary Styles lay cradling her shell-shocked frame on the floor.

“You were gone. You left me,” she sobbed. Her hair was ripped from its usual loose curls and mascara ran down her face like the clear snot running from her nose.

“Oh my God,” a voice mumbled.

But I realized the voice was me.

The glass mirror at the bar had shattered. Shards of glass lay scattered all over the floor. Harry trudged through it, barefoot, bits of red mixing on the marble floors.

“No one was here, no one saw.” Her eyes were crazed as Harry bent over to pick her up and she pushed him away. “No! NO!!”

Fear spiked in my body. I’d never seen someone look so disconnected from the present reality. This was raw. Unpredictable.

But Harry seemed unphased.

“No one saw her, no one saved her,” she wailed. The weight of the words caused crippling sorrow. She stopped resisting, retreating into a shell of herself with choked cries, “Jane, Jane…” as Harry let out his own shout at the effort to lift her.

“Be careful, you’re hurt,” I called out, weakly. He didn’t bat an eye.

“Go through those doors, through the living wing, there’s a closet on your right. Grab the Valium and meet me in the guest room.” He avoided my gaze, looking instead to the direction I should be running to.

“Where in the closet?”

“Black box,” he ordered. Then, whispering to Mary, “It wasn’t your fault.”

But if she heard the words, they didn’t register, her face twisting, her own little trickle of blood running from the tips of her hands.

Her sobs barely quieted as they rounded the corner down the hall, abandoning me in the wreckage.

I was careful to step around the glass, heading to the massive hidden door in the wall I remembered Harry pointing out as the “living wing.” No one was around to confirm if memory served correct, but when I finally found the latch handle and tugged it open, tropical foliage surrounded me. It smelled humid, like stale water and… musky. Like when I had a hamster in fourth grade and forgot to change out its bedding. The light from the moon shone through their giant skylight, illuminating caged birds gently calling behind bars, enclosed in a sizey aviary. A small raised indoor pool made of rock looked like a concave fossil, with a shadow swimming amongst the mossy water. A miniature crocodile skirted to the furthest edge away from me and raised for air, two eyes looking skeptically in my direction. “Toto” was etched into the rock.

There were more enclosed habitats, and at the head of the room overlooking it all, a giant wooden desk. But no closet. No closet.

Frick.

I didn’t have time to ponder the eccentricity of the Styles’s owning a freaking zoo in their mansion. Nor did I have time to try and find a friggin light switch. Not at all.

I walked the length of the wing which seemed just as expansive as their living room. Ironic, I thought. Because this was literally a living room.

Then, beneath an arching tree canopy held in a planter box, two wicker handles protruded from the wall with a crack running between them.

Bingo.

They opened easily, revealing a deep closet full of filing cabinets and old paintings. My phone light illuminated the top, where two black boxes seemed to have gone untouched for years.

My foot tapped impatiently, not sure which one to grab. I hadn’t heard any cries of bloody murder, but someone (not me, someone more athetlic) could’ve run a mile in the time I’d been gone.

I reached for the one closest to me. It was velvet, I realized, surprised even this family’s storage containers would have some element of luxury. I prayed to find pills. But instead, a wax sealed envelope holding a thick stack of documents glared back at me. I was just about to secure the lid again when the inklings of a photograph peaked through between the papers. The deep-red seal, already opened, was their insignia, a cursive “S” that looked like it’d come from the 18th century.

Since the seal was already broken…

My hands carefully leafed through the pages, and as if they knew, the animals grew louder, alarming themselves of an intruder. These documents seemed court-ordered. Various signatures adorned the pages using language I couldn’t understand. My heart dropped when I realized what I was holding. Adoption papers. Among them, a newspaper clipping about a boy separated from a violent family, and adopted by rich Americans.

Slowly, with each word I read, the oxygen felt snuffed from the room, another puzzle piece falling into place. One that changed the picture completely.

Wednesday morning at 5 am, neighbors of Sheffield awoke to gunshots at the King flat. After an attempted murder of his wife resulting in two gun shot wounds to Maisie King’s abdomen, Roger King committed suicide. Maisie is currently in recovery, and her two children have been placed in foster care while the court assesses their home situation.

More newspaper headings were clipped out, detailing the TV star rescuers of the boy, how lucky he was and how a wonderful, ritzy life in California awaited him. His entire fate had been changed - but there was no mention of Gemma. And in each photo, the child-like innocence in his eyes seemed vacant, replaced with a stoic sadness I’d only seen glimpses of when he was medicated. When he was too numb to remember to keep up the mask.

For how little the Styles’s divulged about Harry’s past to the American press, in England the story seemed to be the tragedy turned happy ending. At least, to some extent, the Styles’s were owed credit for something. They’d probably paid off the international papers.

Little Harry… My stomach suddenly flipped, the room’s darkness transferring to something physically heavy in my chest. There was a photograph, too, and I carefully wedged a finger where the worn corner of it peaked out from the paperwork, keeping its place as I tugged it out. But when I saw it, I almost dropped everything.

The familiar curly-haired child I’d known from old Housewives episodes stared back at me in a worn blue polo from discolored film. Reddened tear-stained eyes looked at whoever was behind the camera.

There were fresh bruises on baby-plump cheeks, cuts across rosy cherub lips.

I looked away as soon as I saw it, but the image had already burned in my memory. A taste for the shadows of scars I could only imagine he carried ten-fold. His cuts had buried much deeper than flesh; the most dangerous wounds afflicted his soul and stole the air straight from my lungs.

Oh, God.

Oh, Harry.

How could anyone do such a thing? He was just an innocent boy, how could anyone- how often…?

Bitter bile rose in the back of my throat. Dealing with bloody injuries was one thing, but seeing a beaten child had me sick for another reason entirely. This was something evil.

I put the photo back just as quickly. I’d gone too far this time. I’d really gone too far.

So it was almost an accident that the next photo fell out when I was putting back the first.

A man, strewn across a red puddle seeping from his head. A gun tossed at his side. The bile rose again and I refused to stare, but my mind caught the ends of wavy brown hair and a face that wasn’t really quite there.

I should’ve noticed when the animals quieted, I should’ve heard footsteps quicken in the other room, but it seemed far away, muted by the roaring secret I’d just uncovered, my mind fully fixated on the life no one could have known about Newport’s playboy hier.

If Harry hadn’t noticed the velvet top of the box not quite closed shut, he saw the guilt in my eyes when he stood square before the closet doors.

He looked irritated, almost grabbing the closed box from my fingers.

“It’s the wrong box!” I cried, horrified that even my voice reeked of pity. And something else. Fear.

He froze. A flame flashed beneath the dulled emerald, a spark of knowledge I was sure he’d like to forget. That he’d probably tried to forget, countless times. He shoved it away and grabbed the other box, stopping briefly as he walked past me again. He threw a cold glare.

“Don’t be scared of the snake,” he said. “But he doesn’t like strangers.”

As if on command, a giant boa constrictor slithered out from the overhanging tree, tightly coiled around a branch.

I felt my heart lurch in my throat.

“Harry!” I called, but he wasn’t here anymore. And if he was, he didn’t answer. He left, rushing to deal with one mess, when I feared I’d just created an even bigger one. Frozen to the spot as I figured out how to basically army-crawl out of the closet, I ran out past screaming birds and rustling waters, snake eyes burning two holes in the back of my neck as I chased Harry’s shadow.

come talk about frat boy! or if you just wanna talk... i’m getting tired of talking to my dog lmao

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xredxrainx · 4 years

Text

Paradox

Summary: Naruto and Sasuke’s fight lead them both to the future, in which things have gone very, very wrong. Things need to be made right, for both Sakura and her daughter, Sarada, as well as their own futures. Heavily inspired by Twitch & Spaz’s ‘Fast Forward’ series (pretty well a remake with added elements).

Fanfiction.net (Chapter 1)

01. Past Shenanigans

He found himself chained down in a hospital bed. How did he know it was a hospital? Well, there was an IV drip sticking out of him and the scent of disinfectant filled his nose. Also, the room was pure white and sterile. How did he know he was chained? Well, he tried to stretch and move, but no. He couldn’t. Chakra stronger and potent than his own stopped him from moving.

Next to him, was the blond knuckleheaded ninja. Albeit, less chained up. Literally, in no cuffs of any description. He was snoring annoyingly loud with a bubble of snot dripping out his nose. Sasuke’s nose scrunched up in disgust.

The boy closed his eyes and asked for his chakra to flood to the surface, but… nothing. Zilch. Nada. It wasn’t working. This was weird. Even for him. Even in his life.

Opening his eyes again, he looked around once more. Nurses were coming in and out of view of the window on the door, before he saw a familiar blonde – Tsunade – walk in. The woman looked the same as always, young and her face full of make-up, even though she was much older than many would expect. At least, that was what he had heard. The older woman’s hazel eyes flickered onto Sasuke in disgust, before she glance over at Naruto with a deep fondness.

“You’re awake already,” she stated, moving to Naruto to check on his vitals and such, “I’m not even surprised that Naruto is still asleep,” she huffed.

Sasuke stayed silent.

After she tended to Naruto, her expression fell onto Sasuke once more. “I was surprised when you both came in,” she said softly, playing with her hair in almost an anxious way, “When I had heard that you were both apparently here, I didn’t expect this at all.”

“Stop talking in riddles,” Sasuke finally said rudely, “I have my goals, and you won’t stop me from reaching them.”

She almost looked sad as Sasuke said this, “Yes… your goals… I’m not even sure where to begin explaining what’s going on, and even if I should considering how delicate this is. Kakashi doesn’t even have an idea of what to do, and he’s the one running the show.”

‘What did she mean by that?’

The two then heard the tell-tale signs of someone waking up, with a loud yawn and a groan. The blonde ninja sat up and looked around, rubbing his eyes before grinning at Tsunade.

“I knew you’d get things sorted, Tsunade-baa-sama!” he said cheerfully, his grin wide.

The older woman almost looked like she had seen a ghost when Naruto had begun speaking, and the boisterous kid didn’t really realise what was going on. Not that either of them really understood why things were… different. The Uchiha looked down at his chakra bound hands. He couldn’t put them together to make any hand signs, and he also couldn’t move his feet.

Her smile was pained, “Of course, Naruto… I… have some things to tell you, but I think I’ll wait until Sakura and Kakashi get here...”

Sasuke scoffed, “Why do they need to be here? You’re the Hokage, aren’t you?”

“Not anymore,” she said, not looking in Sasuke’s direction.

She didn’t say much more than that.

ANBU arriving in her office was not shocking, but what they said definitely shocked her, “Uzumaki Naruto and Uchiha Sasuke are here...”

‘What? Why?’

Her green eyes flickered in hesitation as she looked away for a moment. Memories of the latter forming in her head like a drum. It hurt to remember that. She bit her lower lip and asked for more information, which the ANBU was not willing to provide.

(“How did this happen!?” she cried out, clutching onto Naruto’s cold arm, as Kakashi rested his hand against hers, “Why…?”

“He was too far gone, Sakura,” referring to the man that Sakura had once loved.

“…”)

Sighing heavily, she willed herself to meet with her once-teacher, and get to the bottom of this.

The medic-nin found herself at the front of the hospital. She had just come in from home, having been working at home from the moment. It was just easier like that for the time-being. She ruffled her long, pink hair nervously, running her fingers through it and catching any knots. The woman took a heavy breath and made her way inside.

One of the nurses were fiddling with their phones, no doubt using the new social media widgets that had recently been created. It was a phenomenon, and it was so shocking to see how much had changed in fifteen years. It was so different to what she had grown up with. Radios had only just been created back then, and now you could watch interviews and such on the television now. The dark-haired nurse jumped and hastily put away her phone and put on a friendly smile.

“Haruno-sama! I didn’t think you’d be in today,” she said, quite shocked.

“Where is Tsunade-shishou? Sakura asked coolly, wanting to get down to the bottom of what the hell was going on.

She had last seen Naruto thirteen years ago… Sasuke thirteen and a half years ago… Why would they return now? She knew that the latter was causing many issues all around the world with his army, but… he had yet to touch the Leaf, but she was sure their time was coming. He was leaving them till last, probably to savour it, the sick bastard he is. She knew he was alive, but Naruto? She assumed that he had been killed by Sasuke… but… She didn’t want to believe that…

But why wouldn’t the blond, knuckle-headed ninja not return if he was alive? He had so much here that he would not have been willing to give up.

“Oh, um,” the nurse started, “Room 206. In the restricted zone.”

‘Ah,’ Sakura thought, ‘It makes sense that they would be kept away from general populace.’

Sakura swallowed, before making her way to the elevator, “Thanks, Riko-san.”

“No worries, Haruno-sama.”

It was time to face whatever demons that she had held back in the past.

“You fucking idiot, Sasuke-teme!” Naruto snarled, nearly ripping out of his sheets after Sasuke had uttered something rather insulting.

The two boys were glaring at each-other with venom and malice, particularly from Sasuke’s end. Sasuke had had enough of being here. He would have been in Sound already, if it weren’t for these bindings that these stupid shinobi had placed him into. No, he was still here - still weak. He should be getting stronger under Orochimaru’s guide, and getting ready for the fight of his life time. He had goals, dammit.

Naruto had ruined that for him, for the moment.

“What makes you think I can’t get out of this, and come over there and kill you, dobe?” Sasuke drawled, inky eyes flicking dangerously with the crimson of the sharingan. Rage. He felt that at the moment. He shouldn’t be here.

“As if you could!” Naruto shouted back, his own rage storming beneath his bluey depth, “You’re a damn idiot, Sasuke-teme! You know that Kakashi-sensei could train you better than that stupid snake.”

No, he couldn’t. Kakashi could make Sasuke strong, that was for sure. But not quickly enough. Kakashi was the copy-cat shinobi who also carried the fabled sharingan. But… Orochimaru and Kakashi were different in their training styles, no doubt. The young Uchiha wanted to kill Itachi as quickly as possible, then he would figure out what he needed to do after.

Tsunade was watching the two fight in astonishment, she had forgotten how ruthless the two were. The two boys were like chalk and cheese, completely different people, but they were definitely similar in the sense of their strengths now. That was for certain. Tsunade could feel the coolness of the chakra from Sasuke, while Naruto’s was warm with a dark underlying presence. The kyuubi, no doubt.

“Naruto, Sasuke,” the older woman sighed, “Shut up, and wait.”

A gentle knock was heard at the door, and both boys tore their attention to the sound.

And then, the door opened.

Sakura wasn’t sure what to expect, but it definitely wasn’t this. In front of her stood the two younger boys that she remembered fondly from the team seven days. Her eyes fell onto Naruto first - his hair was scraggier than it was when he got older, and blue and orange stood out the most for him. His eyes were the same gentle but confident blue that she remembered. He looked shocked to see her, his mouth agape. She was sure she had the same expression on her own face.

And then her eyes fell on… him.

Sasuke was wearing his blue hooded shirt, with the usual bandages around his arms. His hair was formed in spikes up the back, and he was smaller than what she had remembered. His dark eyes were as smouldering as always, and dangerous… definitely. This was the younger Sasuke who had yet to commit any of the atrocities that she had heard of. And had dealt upon her. This was the younger boy that was wrapped up in revenge, but still gave a damn about his teammates. Sakura had always wondered if he had originally left to protect them too… that she wouldn’t be surprised of.

“What the hell?” Naruto barked, “Why do you look so old? But like hot?”

The two boys were looking at her as if she was an alien, and Sakura understood the feeling well. This was… weird. She knew they were not the same Sasuke and Naruto that she had last seen, no. These were the younger ones. They were weaker, and smaller and just - even their chakra felt different. Even if it was only slight on Naruto’s end, but Sasuke’s… it was dark and cold.

Tsunade sighed and rubbed her brow, “I don’t even know where to begin…” her attention fell onto Sakura, “Kakashi is currently in a meeting, so he won’t be here for a while…”

“They’re not from this time, shishou?” Sakura asked, her eyes not leaving the two, “What…?”

Sasuke seemed to come to this realization too, but Naruto yelled out, “What? How!? All we were doing was fighting in the Valley of the End, and I don’t know how--”

The two women looked at one another, “The clash of rasengan and chidori?” Tsunade said softly, looking at the boys for their agreement.

Naruto nodded, while the younger Uchiha watched on sourly.

“That’s… weird,” Sakura said softly.

Sakura looked completely different. She was older, curvier and her hair was longer, kept back in a loose pony-tail. This woman was… beautiful, even Sasuke had to admit. Her lips painted with a light shade of red. Her eyes did not really meet his… however, and that made him uncomfortable. The boy did not understand what was going on, other than the time travel part. How far ahead were they? Was Itachi dead?

The latter question was ringing in his head. Where was his older self now? Was he powerful? If Itachi was dead, then yes… he was. But he didn’t have the answer for that yet. He made the mental note to ask later on, but for now, he needed information on how to get back. He still had his goals in the past that still needed to be completed, and for that… he needed to go back.

The two women talked to each-other quietly, which annoyed Sasuke. They were doing this on purpose, and the two boys were still very far in the dark. What year was it? How old were they in this timeline?

Naruto had hopped out of bed at this point, “Hey, c’mon! This involves us too! What’s going on?” he whined interrupting the two women.

Within seconds but, Sakura had engulfed the blond in a tight hug which made Naruto squeak. He did hug her back however, but he didn’t understand why she was hugging him so tightly.

Sasuke pursed his lips, watching in irritation, he was sure he was also about to get the same attention. However, when Sakura dropped the hug and kissed Naruto on the cheek, she look his way sadly. But didn’t come close. This… was weird. Sakura was weird in this timeline, Sasuke decided. He was used to being the centre of attention when it came to her, and this was just… weird. He didn’t really know what else to say about it.

“Hey, Sakura-chan! Are you okay?”

She had covered her face with her palm at this point, and the light shake let Sasuke know that the woman was crying. Why was she upset? What could be upsetting her at this time? It was odd.

Tsunade patted her student on the back before her attention fell onto both boys, “Well… we should probably begin explaining some things to you both. First, the Sasuke of this time haven’t been seen in over a decade in this village. Naruto was… killed in the Valley of the End twelve years ago…” Tsunade’s expression became dull and sad, reminiscing on the boy that was killed by the dark avenger.

“What!?” Naruto shouted, obviously surprised by all of this, “You killed me!?”

Sasuke would have covered his ears if he could, instead he just gave the hyperactive boy a feral look. He… wasn’t sure himself, really. Even with the fight with Naruto just now, he wouldn’t have brought himself to end Naruto’s life. Why did his elder self do it? Was it for the power of the mangekyou sharingan? He stayed silent, not wanting to give his feelings away on the matter, just eyeing Naruto wearily.

The roseate hummed softly, “After that… well, one by one the villages have all slowly went down under Sasuke’s rule - and their groups’, by extension. From what our scouts have gathered, their group - Taka - have been pillaging them, and taking all their resources. They’re a powerful group of war criminals… we’re in war at this moment. Uchiha Obito is also apart of that group.”

‘Another Uchiha - what? And war?’ Sasuke was perplexed. This was wrong. All of this. While he normally wouldn’t care what would happen to others, this was bad. The world was being destroyed by his future self at this moment, and his rag-tag group of criminals. The Uchiha avenger swallowed, looking at his hands now, unable to meet anyone’s gaze.

Tsunade spoke now, “There’s many more things that are going on, but for the moment,” she clicked her fingers, and the bounding around Sasuke evaporated, “We should find somewhere else to speak for now,” her attention was on her previous student, “Would your house be okay? She’s not home, right?”

The roseate nodded her head, “Yeah… she should be at the academy, I’m sure it’ll be fine for now. Just for an hour, however.”

The raven-haired boy’s head tilted at this.

Sakura’s home was beautiful. That was the best way to put it. It was decorated in pastel colours, and while it was a bit bright for his liking, it was definitely Sakura. She had prepared everyone a cup of tea, and was finishing up in the kitchen now. Sasuke’s dark eyes focused on his hands, flexing his fingers before stretching his arms. He was happy to be out of his bindings, but he was surprised that they had let him out rather easily… maybe it was because between both Sakura and Tsunade, they would easily be able to stop him. While Sakura had not shown anything, it was clear that she was a lot stronger now.

Like her former teacher, she had a small diamond in the centre of her forehead that, from what Sasuke had been told, assisted in both strength and healing. She was a medical shinobi now, and was surviving. Very well, it seemed. Her house was maybe three bedrooms, with one definite bathroom. It was quite large and just a little outside of the main centre of town. It was actually bordering on the Uchiha district… which did make Sasuke frown when they were headed that way.

He couldn’t find himself to continue to be offended, however.

Taking a sip of the warm, black tea made him feel a little bit better.

Sakura re-entered the room and sat down next to Naruto. Tsunade had left moments ago, saying that she was going to inform Kakashi of what was going on, and that he needed to be here. Kakashi, from what Sakura had explained, was now the Hokage. That had shocked both himself and Naruto.

(“Before you died, Naruto, we were going to announce to you that you would be the next Hokage in a few years. Kakashi would begin training you immediately.”)

Sasuke took a heavy breath. It… was sad.

“I think… what will be going down, is that we will need to figure out what exactly caused your leap in time,” Sakura said, humming as she sipped her green tea, “I don’t know too much about that sort of thing, and I don’t think it’s really been documented… except for that one time that Naruto got sent back in time, but that was different again.”

Naruto blinked, “I - what?”

Sakura laughed dryly, “Yeah, it was funny actually.”

Her expression changed for a moment, before turning into a heavy scowl. She stood up abruptly, and wandered out into the hallway, towards the entrance of the house.

“Sarada! I know you’re in here,” she said harshly.

‘Sarada?’

In seconds, a girl with dark hair and red glasses appeared in front of the table. Her brows forming into a scowl. “Who are these people, mama?”

Sasuke blinked a few times before the girl seemed to realise something, and her eyes bled to… red?

Word: 3200 approx.

#sasusaku #sasusaku fanfiction #my writing

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writing-the-end · 4 years

Text

Exodus- Part 6

Previous Part

An Edolas Hermit Story (AU belongs to @theguardiansofredland )

Impulse wakes up in strange places, but surrounded by familiar faces. Not all of them welcome. But these people are not like the villains and heroes he knows from Hermitland. They’re different, and he can’t tell what’s real and what’s false.

_______________________________________

I know a lot of you can’t wait to see Impulse, Tango, and Zed meet, but I just have to make the tension a little higher before we get that wonderful reunion!

Also, if you like my writing check out my story Wandering Stars! It’s a novel sized story with D&D like action and a few wayward trips to the world of the Hermits by our three adventurers! Check out Chapter 1 Here!

Warning: This story contains general dark elements and language. Blood and needle warning for this part.

________________________________________

Impulse gasps to reality, finally escaping the inky darkness of sleep. He’s been trying to wake up for...well, he can’t tell how long. Hours? Days? Weeks? But it felt like he was walking through sludge, worse than wading across water to get to where he is now. Impulse’s eyes dart around the room, taking everything in. Every sense is wild and alive.

The room is small, only a few beds lined against the wall. Pure white walls, white sheets, white everything nearly blinds Impulse against the harsh fluorescent lights. It smells just as sterile as it looks, a hint of cleaning supplies and saline in the air. Beside Impulse, he can hear the steady, but rising beeps of his own heartbeat. A screen shows the constant rise and fall, each peak and trough growing in frequency as Impulse gathers more information about the world around him. He follows the grey cord from the heart rate monitor, down to his right arm.

It’s there he also sees the other line tying him down. A thin needle beneath his skin, clear liquid dripping from a bag held above his head. The beeping of the monitor rises to frenzied pace, Impulse grabbing at the IV tube in his arm and ripping it free of his skin. He holds down the bloody pinprick, leaping from his bed. His right foot becomes entangled in the cords all around his bed, tugging on the white bandages that match the ones wrapped securely around his arms. He collapses, finding that the floor is becoming quite familiar to him. Impulse finally rips the heart rate monitor off his finger, the incessant beeping filling his head even after it stops.

Impulse needs to get out of here. Wherever here is, nothing is good about it. It looks too much like Bastion Towers. Where he was held, put through that horrible rehabilitation. Wounded and weak, Impulse struggles to his feet and limps to the doorway. He needs to get out of here, figure out where the hell he is. Is this the End? Or...has he met his own end? Is the afterlife supposed to be this painful?

He reaches a bloody hand for the door’s handle, but it moves before he can touch it. Bursting open, he sees two faces he never wanted to see ever again.

Doc and Cub. Their foreheads are creased with wrinkles, eyes glimmering with worry until they rest on Impulse. Cub steps forward. “Thank goodness you’re finally awake, kidd-”

Cub narrowly dodges as a metal tray is flung at his head. The stranger collapses backwards, grabbing anything within his reach and flinging it at Cub and Doc. The latter yelps, taking cover behind a filing cabinet. Cub dares to press forward, despite the screaming and projectiles. “No! No, I won’t let you take me back! Get away from me!”

“Wha- hold on kid what are you talking about?” Cub pauses, confused. Just short enough time for the stranger to get his hands on a thin scalpel. He shakes as he brandishes the medical tool, blood pouring from where he had ripped the IV drip out. The white bandages on his other arm are stained with bright red blood, new bruises already beginning to appear. It was the crashing noise that alerted them to the trouble within the infirmary.

Cub steps forward, but Impulse swings the sharp knife, and he immediately backs off. This isn’t right, something is wrong. Impulse knows it. Cub is playing with him, pretending to be his friend. Lull him into a false sense of security. This is the man that chased him through that damned forest, tracked him down like a wild animal. There’s a lapse of silence between the two, neither moving in the stalemate.

Until Doc peeks his head out from behind the cabinets. “Is everything safe to-”

He ducks back in as the stranger cries out, throwing the scalpel in Doc’s direction and retreating. He starts to clamber onto the beds like a feral cat, jumping for the high windows of the guild’s infirmary. Doc covers his ears at the sound of glass shattering, and Cub grunting from beyond his hiding spot. “Xisuma! Help!”

Xisuma careens into the room, crashing into the doorframe to reach the cry for help as soon as possible. He looks across the infirmary, at the scene before him. Doc is hiding behind a cabinet, and the room looks like a tornado has blown through it. Cub and the stranger are in the center of the room, surrounded by shards of broken glass. Cub is yelling, begging for the stranger to stop, that he’s only going to hurt himself more. But the patient won’t listen.

“Xisuma! We need to sedate him before he hurts himself more!” Cub calls, holding down the kid’s arms before yelping as the frenzied stranger bites him. Xisuma slides across the floor, pulling out a syringe filled with green liquid. Cub notices the neon sedative as Xisuma flicks bubbles free of it. “Not the experimental one you made on the way here!”

The mad scientist pouts, but puts the fun syringe aside for a more mundane, more boring method. Cub holds down the stranger, his face creased with worry and even a few tears in his eyes. Why is this kid so terrified that he was willing to jump out a window to make an escape? Xisuma lends his free hand, holding the struggling patient still and letting the syringe pinch into his skin.

Impulse’s screams seem to fall on deaf ears, trying to escape the grasp that Cub and Xisuma have on him. Holding him down, preventing him from escape. They did it. They finally caught him, pressing his shoulders and arms against the cold tile floors. Impulse feels hot tears sting at his eyes, watching as he grabs at the labcoat on Xisuma. Trying to rip his hand off the syringe in Impulse’s shoulder. But it does nothing, and he feels his mind grow cloudy as the needle is pulled away from his body.

His hand, bloody from glass and the IV drip, slips away from Xisuma’s white coat. It leaves a red stain down the burnt and tattered fabric. The weight of his limbs feel like ten tons of rock, and the voices around him drift in and out of clarity. “I don’t know what’s going on...he hurt himself trying to get…what is going on?”

What is going on?

----------------------------------------------------

Ren sips his tea, much quieter than the slurping noise that his friend Grian makes as he chugs the last of his warm drink. Ren sighs, closing his book and stretching out his arms on the bed in front of him. He kneads the warm white blanket before standing. “I’ll get us another mug.”

“Can you get a new one for him?” Grian picks up the mug, completely full with now lukewarm tea. If he were this stranger in the bed, he’d want a warm cup of tea when he woke up.

Ren smiles, taking all three cups out of the infirmary and to a kettle of boiling water. He quietly dumps the cold tea down the drain, watching the tea extract flush away. What a waste of tea, but he understands Grian’s concern. He hums to himself as he lets the warm drinks steep, adding in the honey and sugar to an exact amount that both he and Grian enjoy. He can only guess for the stranger.

When Ren returns with three full mugs of steaming hot tea, Grian is talking. Not to himself- the stranger is awake. Grian’s soft voice and even softer attitude has managed to keep the patient in bed, though Ren can read his body language well enough. The stranger is tense, about ready to leap into action at a moment’s notice. He makes his presence known to both of them, walking over slowly and setting down the drinks. Ren flicks his tail to the side, taking a seat next to Grian.

“Would you like some tea?” Grian whispers, offering the warm mug to the kid. He’s hardly even able to sit up, reattached to an IV but pale from all his wounds. For a second, the stranger only looks at the mug with a withering gaze, but eventually takes the hot drink. He holds it close, watching the drink for a minute. He finally drinks. “I’m Grian, and my feline friend here is Ren.”

Ren nods, picking up his notebook and scribbling down in the paper. He’s been keeping a ledger of notes since the stranger appeared, promising to give it to Cub later on. The first thing that Ren noted was that the patient has a trigger with certain people- specifically, the very person who rescued him, as well as Doc and X. He can’t help but wonder why. “What’s your name, stranger?”

“I-” Impulse pauses, looking down at his drink. Should he be trusting these two people? When he woke up, Grian was immediately pressing him back into bed. For such a short stature and seemingly diminutive nature, Grian was strong. But the gentle voice of the man with the bow tie, his calm face and soft touch eased him into a jaded calm. He’s not even sure if he should trust the tea the two gave him. It could be drugged- it could have tiny robots from Cub to reinstate the redstone tracking with him. But the tea felt good on his lips, warming his cold, pale body. “I’m Impulse.”

Saying his name aloud felt like he was signing his own arrest warrant. Surely now Xisuma and Cub would come barging in, dragging him back to rehabilitation- or somewhere much worse. But Grian and Ren glance at each other, sharing some silent conversation with only their eyes. Glimmers of words, facial twitches as sentences. Grian turns back, and lifts a tub of cookies. “Are you hungry? You look like you could use some sugar.”

“Wh-where am I?” Impulse questions, carefully plucking a cookie and nibbling on it.

“Well...you’re in our guild’s infirmary.” Grian taps his finger, setting a few cookies aside for some of the others. Cub and Xisuma really deserve a treat, they’ve been moping since the last time Impulse woke up.

Speak of the devil, Xisuma quietly opens the door to check in. Holding a clipboard of notes, he immediately cringes upon seeing Impulse awake. Impulse also reacts to Xisuma’s arrival, his heart rate monitor skyrocketing as he scrambles in his bed to get as far away from the new arrival as possible. Ren rests a firm but soft hand on Impulse’s shoulder. “It’s okay, Impulse, he won’t hurt you. He’s our friend, he’s here to help.”

“But...but General X…” Impulse stutters out, eyes never wavering from Xisuma as he carefully walks closer.

Xisuma sits down a few feet away, offering space for the stranger. He immediately starts scribbling notes, chicken scratch handwriting noting what Ren called the patient. Impulse. Xisuma’s head runs at a thousand kilometers per hour, before he finally realizes what is happening. An ecstatic spark gleams in Xisuma’s eyes, the mad in ‘mad scientist’ bubbling forward. “You aren’t from this world.”

Both Ren and Grian give Xisuma a confused look. What the hell is he talking about? Different worlds? He’s completely lost it. But Impulse seems to catch on, and offers a short nod. If Ren remembers something about the Impulse they had before, he was quick to catch onto just about everything put in front of him. “What are you talking about, X?”

Xisuma pushes his hair back, giving an excited grin. Impulse doesn’t rest from his coiled perch, eyes never leaving Xisuma in the chair nearby. He looks just like General Xisuma- but also nothing like him. His eyes show no sign of malice, though they are a bit wild. In fact, both of his eyes are still in working order. “Wha-what is this world called?”

“Edolas. I can’t believe it- you are true proof that other worlds exist!” Impulse squeaks as Xisuma hops his chair closer, putting more distance between himself and the strange version of Xisuma before him. “What is your world called? Are there other versions of us there as well? What about-”

“Whoa, too much man.” Ren pats Xisuma on the back, pushing him back to his seat with a flick of his bushy brown cat tail. Xisuma realizes he’s scaring Impulse, and shrinks back himself. He hated seeing the fear in the stranger’s eyes when they had to sedate him. He felt like a horrible person, a villain. But Impulse was only going to hurt himself more if he and Cub didn’t do something.

Ren pulls Xisuma away, handing off a folded note with a whisper in his ear. Impulse can only watch as Xisuma reads the note, glancing back up his way. There’s hurt in X’s eyes, the wild mop of brown hair tugged on by a scarred hand. But Xisuma nods to Ren, and creeps closer. Much slower, as calm as the mad scientist can be. “I just want to help, Impulse. Can I replace your IV drip?”

“What’s in there?” Impulse snaps, looking at the saline bag hanging above him. Is it some sort of sedative? A mind altering drug?

“It’s okay, Impulse.” Grian whispers, placing a warm and gentle hand on Impulse’s shaking fingers. “I promise, our friend here is a really nice guy.” He bites his lip, before adding on. “Once you get past his...ah, erratic behavior.”

Impulse glances at Xisuma, noting the crooked smile this Edolas Xisuma offers him. Erratic is the last thing he could call General Xisuma. But he nods, his eyes never wavering from X as he exchanges the nearly empty bag for a full one. Grian and Ren smile, their calm auras putting both Xisuma and Impulse at ease.

Ren hands off a cookie to Xisuma as he leaves, a note scribbled on the napkin that it sits on. Grian stays near Impulse, helping him relax and fall back to a healing sleep. What this time has shown Ren is one thing- this Impulse from another world fears three people above all. Doc, Xisuma, and Cub.

He can’t help but wonder why them? Doc and Cub are two of the sweetest people in their guild, and while Xisuma is a little strange his heart is always in the right place. They’re some of the best people in the guild.

So what were these backwards, villainous versions of their friends like? How was it so bad that even just seeing their faces could bring such terror, no matter how irrational such a thought is? What has this strange new Impulse been through?

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cruciferousjex · 5 years

Text

Only Gods

a oneshot about the creation of Imp that elbow-dropped my brain until 4am last night, so please enjoy Hordak's goddam baby rabies.

❤

Hordak had spent his life in the constant company of his Brothers. He'd rarely been alone, much less lonely, much less how horrendously lonely he'd at times been on Etheria. He felt the lack of family keenly, missed their voices and scent.

Hence Imp.

That he had never managed to clone a body for himself was not entirely true. He had, and on his first attempt no less. A perfect vessel, flawless in its code, the result of years painstaking labor. It would take twenty years to mature into a proper container for an Emperor. Prime was able to expedite this process into months, but it involved ingredients and power sources unavailable on Etheria. So, Hordak settled in for the long haul. All he had to do was wait and watch his immortality thrive in the vitrine before him. It was his prize creation. He placed it in the center of his Sanctum and kept an eye on it always, so he would know the moment anything went wrong.

For three years he watched it grow from a strange little lump into an organism with distinct fingers and toes and a face. It began curled up, as was typical for a clone, but to his suprise it one day stretched out, flexing its fingers, floating blissfully in the green creche fluid.

This alarmed Hordak greatly. Given he was never overly involved in any aspects of the Horde's reproduction, but he'd never seen a tanked clone move.

"What is wrong with you?" he muttered before the vitrine console. "What is wrong with you?"

[[MORE]]

The scans sent back nothing. He went over every inch of the clone's form with his own eyes, stepping slowly around the tank with his hands on the glass, looking for any sign of decay or mutation on its little knees or claws or wings. But nothing appeared amiss, and the scans read perfectly normal.

Hordak pointed at the clone.

"Cease your movements," he commanded it.

It did not cease it's movements. It spent most of its time curled in the proper position, but every so often twitched and jerked and splayed its limbs. The scans never indicated any problem. Perhaps this was normal? He'd never spent any great amount of time on the creche decks of the flagship where he himself was gestated. Maybe tanked clones always moved? Hordak came into the sanctum one morning to see it had flipped itself upside down, arms and legs spread to the four winds, a smug expression on it's sleeping face.

"Well don't you look happy with yourself!" he said. He tried to muster up some anger or frustration but, oddly enough, could not. He shook it off and settled for annoyed. "I told you not to move. Little imp."

He spent the whole of that day working in the green light of that ridiculous upside-down urchin. When the Force Captains came in for a briefing their eyes went wide. Hordak glanced back at the clone - it looked ridiculous - but the Captains dared not say anything. They simply reported on their most recent defeat against Bright Moon.

"You lost twenty soldiers, three skiffs, and runestone data it took years to obtain," Hordak snarled at the cringing Captains. "There will be punishments for this idiocy. There will be-"

There was a loud thud from the tank. Everyone in the room startled and turned. The clone had kicked the side of its container. It's heel slid against the glass loudly.

Hordak cleared his throat and turned back to the Captains. They looked from him to the creche and back again in fear.

"Explain yourselves," he growled, pointing at the head Force Captain.

"Sir, we - we were - unprepared-"

"Unprepared?" Hordak snarled. "The Horde saves you from your miserable lives, expends untold energy raising you, feeding you, training you, providing you with the best technology and weaponry and planning on Etheria, and you dare say to me that you were UNPREPARED?"

Another loud thud from the tank. The clone slammed it's little heel into the glass once, twice, three times, as though stomping out whatever was causing upset in the Sanctum. The Force Captains took a visible step back, their eyes wide.

Hordak gestured to it. "Even HE can see that it is a pathetic excuse, Force Captain. You have failed me. Now get out of my sight while I decide on an appropriate punishment."

They bowed and rushed out the room, doing everything short of running. Hordak turned to the tank.

"I told you to stop moving," he muttered to it, tapping on the glass. "I have an empire to run. Your interruptions will not do."

It placed its foot on the glass as if to show it to him. Counterargument, it seemed to say, observe my little foot. Five tiny toes. Look at all these little lines on my sole, so perfectly made.

"That's very nice," Hordak said, "But you must stop. They're more afraid of you then they are of me."

Despite himself Hordak smirked. He had never explained to the Force Captains what the clone was, and they had certainly never seen it move. To them it just appeared one day as the centerpiece of his Sanctum. He saw them stare at it every time they came in. He knew it "freaked them the fuck out." Or so he'd overheard.

He enjoyed that.

The question in their faces. The awe and terror. The struggle as they attempted to understand the contents of the Sanctum and failed. He decided he liked the fear the clone inspired in them. It was good to cultivate the aura of one who dabbles in the dark and profane and twisted when dealing with Etherians. It kept them on their toes. It was not as though this was too far off the mark, after all. Soon he would have to detank the clone, open it's skull, and make some ... minor alterations.

It was a few deep snips, very simple really. A few connections cut which rendered the brain ready for transfer. It needed to happen within a four hour window of a brain hormone reaching a certain saturation point or the entire endeavor was lost. Hordak kept a tracker with him that would go off the second it was time.

He watched the hormone numbers slowly rise over the next month. The clone returned to its proper position for a while then flipped and twisted in place, kicking its chubby legs, smiling peacefully. One time it stretched its arm over its head and pointed upwards, little wings outstretched, as if to say there, there is where I'm going, into the sky.

"You're staying right here," Hordak said.

The wing twitched.

"Those will fall off when you mature," he said to tank. "It is said that only gods keep their wings. That is why they are the symbol of the Horde."

The little finger pointed with more insistence. The face scrunched up tight and yawned.

Hordak's entire body snapped to attention. It had never opened its mouth before. He had a nearly overwhelming primal impulse to get the baby out of the water. It was helpless and in terrible danger.

He remembered he was the terrible danger.

Hordak swept some data pads off the console in frustration and walked out.

The alarm went off that night. He looked at it with dread, which was not what he expected at this milestone. There was no reason to fear, it was a simple procedure he was well prepared for. He would drain the vitrine of the pre-surgical creche fluid, perform the procedure, then replace it with post-surgical fluid which kept the brain from repairing itself. And there it would remain for twenty years, growing steadily into his next vessel, but definitely not flipping or pointing or smiling or yawning or kicking the side of the tank.

He did not look at the clone he prepared for the procedure, setting up a tray with scalpels and clamps and tubes. As he drained the tank fluid its little body was caught by a net, which lifted it up to the top of the tank for Hordak to remove and take to surgery.

He finally forced himself to look. It was limp now, sleeping. He gingerly reached in and picked it up. It was warmer than he expected. Heavier. Out of pure instict he held it to his shoulder, one hand protectively over its back. It melted into him. He touched it's head. The tuft of hair there was the softest and most delicate thing he'd ever felt.

"Well," he whispered to it. "It's time."

But he could not make himself move. He just stood there, feeling the weight of it against him. He shut his eyes, savoring it's scent. It had been so long since he'd known the scent of his people. A million sense memories of Prime's flagship bubbled their way up to the surface, filling him with longing for home. For his Brothers. He missed so desperately having others of his kind close by, and they did not get closer than this child on his shoulder.

It's little hand teached out and touched the skin of Hordak's throat. He swallowed hard.

"Stop. Get to work," Hordak chided himself. He gathered his resolve and turned towards the operating table, white and sterile, the instrument tray ready. The sharpness of the tools was repellent to him.

"No. This is not a child," he said to himself. "This is a container. It is your future."

The baby pressed its face to Hordak's neck, sharp little teeth nibbling at his skin. It's mouth was warm. It cooed.

"Quiet!" Hordak snapped. "Quiet. You've been a very bad boy, always moving and now you're making sounds. I never did that when I was in the tank," Hordak said, though he had no way to be sure. "I was good. I stayed still. Never uttered a word till I breathed air for a week, and here you are not ten minutes old, making noises. I -"

"Keh," the baby said, and gurgled.

Hordak grimaced. He glanced upwards as though entreating a higher power to help him, to stop this terrible churning in his stomach and chest. To make this child into the cold dead container he needed it to be, magically and without his involvement. The light glinted off the scalpels and clamps on the tray next to the surgical table. They were so sharp. He didn't want the child anywhere near them.

Hordak stopped walking. Turned in an anxious circle. Gently bounced the infant before forcing himself to a stop.

What the hell was he THINKING? No, this was ridiculous, the procedure was the only sensible way forward. The four-hour surgical window was ticking past, and he had contaminated the pre-surgical creche fluid. There was no going back now.

There was an another problem. What Hordak had now should he stop- what he had inadvertently created - was a permanent toddler.

Clones did not have the ability to grow outside a tank until the age of ten, when soldiers underwent tank removal. From the age of ten they could reach full maturity on their own, but not before. Until that point they needed close monitoring, the intoduction of certain hormones and nutrients into the creche fluid at certain times, or they would simply stop growing. If he did not go forward with the procedure now the clone would remain this size and shape, forever an infant complete with wings and tail.

Hordak knew nothing of infants. He did not know how to teach it to talk and walk and keep itself clean. Ten year old clones were uploaded with this information just after detanking and were thus immediately self-sufficient in that sense. There was no time for potty training in the Horde. On Etheria he had dedicated a portion of the infirmary to serve as an orphanage but he could not in good conscience send a brother of Prime to be to raised among lesser beings.

Hordak could - he supposed he could - tailor an upload for the child that contained whatever Hordak needed him to know. To his knowledge such had never been done, but at this stage the brain was still malleable enough, still had enough growth hormone to work with. He felt reasonably confident he could provide the child with adequate self-sufficiency and knowledge. That would go a long way towards making the little imp a tolerable companion, which, Hordak supposed, was what it was to be if he went through with this. With ... keeping it.

No. No, this was an absurdity. What in the hell would he DO with it? There was no space in his life for an infant, no matter how independent. What if it cried? The scalpels still shone on the table. Hordak could still save himself this trouble and gurantee himself immortality.

The baby nibbled at his neck. Slid his little arms around him and cuddled in close. Made a happy, curling little coo, and sneezed.

No, Hordak realized. No, he could not.

Hordak shut his eyes and gave a final defeated sigh. His shoulders sagged. The fight was over. The imp had won.

"This is stupid," he muttered. "This is so utterly stupid."

The child shifted it's weight, dropping his head back to show Hordak a big smiling mouth full of little pointy teeth. Hordak cradled him. He pointed his tiny finger. Showed him a little foot. Here I am, he seemed to say to Hordak. Look at all I have!

"Yes, I see," Hordak sighed reluctantly, taking the foot between his fingers. "Very nice. Come now."

He turned away from the operating table and carried his child to his personal rooms to dry it off and find something to wrap it in, the choice made, for better or worse. Had he known then he'd never again be able to generate a flawless new body for himself he may have chosen differently. But he was more naive then. Etheria had not yet drained him. Back then he assumed if he'd achieved something once he could do it again. In the ensuing years he would learn, over and over and over, that this was not the case.

But in that moment Hordak did not know that, so he gave the child's head a gentle scratch. Imp smiled. Hordak found himself smiling back. He was filled with warmth. With relief that he'd chosen not to lift a scalpel to this little thing. He was ... glad of it.

How the hell had this happened? What supernatural force made Hordak abandon immortality for a creature that was logistically useless to him? Likely a huge burden?

Hordak looked down at the sleeping mystery in his arms, pondering it's power over him. The child's little wings fluttered. Wings he would keep forever. Hordak took one between his fingers, paper thin and sweet.

Ah.

That was, Hordak decided, a proper explanation. One that made sense to him, that explained the child's extraordinary power.

Only gods keep thier wings.

#hordak #imp #entrapdak #spop #spop fic #baby rabies #surgery #babies #surgical

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clintbartonswife · 5 years

Text

Forever

@witch-of-letters thanks for requesting this! I diverted from it slightly but I hope you still like it

Pairings: Steve x Reader, brother!bucky Warning: swearing, mentions of abuse masterlist

For as long as you can remember, it had been the three of you against the world.

When you and Bucky were 6, you had gone to the park to play when you saw a scrawny blond getting the ever-loving shit kicked out of him in an alley way by a guy who was easily a good few inches taller than him.

“Hey!” Bucky had shouted, rushing over to help, “Leave him alone”

You had followed your twin, and without much of a struggle had sent the boy on his way.

“I had him on the ropes”

You had offered a hand to help him up, offering him a soft smile.

“Sure you did punk” Bucky said, matching your smile as he rested his hand on the boy’s shoulder

“Jerk”

When you were 8, you learned the reason why Steve never backed down from a fight.

Bucky and you had snuck over to Steve’s apartment after dinner one night, climbing the fire escape into his room, only to be met with the sound of muffled sobs.

“Oh my god Steve are you okay?”

You rushed into his room through the window, Bucky close behind you.

“What – what are you doing here?” he asked, trying to choke down his sobs, “you shouldn’t be here”

“We were gonna ask to see your sketches, punk. What’s happened?”

The two of you fell into silence as a heavy thump was heard through the thin walls of his bedroom walls, followed by Sarah’s heaving sobs. The sound made Steve curl up into a ball again, whimpering at the sound of his mother’s crying.

“She locked me in so I couldn’t help” he sobbed, “he won’t stop hitting her”

You exchanged a look with Bucky, pure shock overtaking you. You had no idea this was going on, but suddenly a lot of Steve’s stubbornness was starting to make sense. Pulling him into a hug, the two cocooned him between you for the rest of the night, holding him as the repetitive thumps echoed through the small flat.

When you were 15, the love you had for Steve started to blossom into something more.

You were sat next to him, eyes closed as the familiar scratching sound of charcoal on paper filled your ears. Bucky was out on a date with a girl called Belle, leaving you and Steve alone together. For the past few years, due to Bucky’s ‘charming good looks’ as your ma had put it, he had been going out with a lot of women, meaning that you and Steve would often hang out in the afternoons together.

“Are you drawing me Rogers?”

“Wha – no – I thought you were asleep”

You had opened an eye lazily, an easy-going smile on your face.

“And waste time with you? Never. It’s just relaxing to hear you draw”

You noticed that the more time you spent with him, the more nervous you got, and every time he’d call you ‘doll’ you’d get a weird feeling in your stomach. Rebecca had called you out, saying that you were sweet on him one night – something you avidly denied at the time – but the longer it went on, the less you could deny it.

When you were 17, you couldn’t deny your feelings anymore.

Men had started taking an interest in you in the past few years, often trying to ask you out on dates around the town. Thankfully Bucky had managed to scare most of them off from the outset with his protective brotherly nature, but unfortunately some were still brave enough to ask.

“Want to go out dancin’ sugar? You look real pretty in that dress”

You had resisted the urge to roll your eyes, sending a silent plea for help to Bucky and Steve before turning back to the man in front of you.

“No thank you, but I’m sure Cindy would be interested, she’s been making eyes at you since you walked in”

Setting his eyes on the blonde at the booth opposite, he gave you a polite nod before making his way over to her.

“Why wont they stop” you groaned, slumping back in your seat unceremoniously, “I’m not interested in them!”

“You haven’t been on a single date Y/N, it’s become a sort of competition in the neighbourhood” Bucky frowned, obviously disapproving of them using you as a bet, “what’s the reason you haven’t gone on one anyway?”

You glanced at Steve quickly, crossing your arms.

“I’m waiting for the right person”

Bucky caught your gaze and his mouth dropped open, slapping Steve’s shoulder rambunctiously.

“Well would ya look at that!”

“Bucky!”

“Are you gonna tell him or am I gonna have to do it for you? Both of you are blind fools I swear”

You blushed, making eye contact with Steve before looking away to the floor, leaving Steve a stammering mess as he figured out what was going on.

“Me?”

“It’s always been you”

When you were 18, you both said ‘I love you’ for the first time.

You had forgone going to the dance hall with Bucky and his date, opting instead to stay in the boy’s apartment. With the gramophone you had borrowed from Mrs Gillert upstairs, you twirled around the room in Steve’s arms, bare foot and care free.

“I’ll never understand why out of all the boys in Brooklyn you chose me” Steve admitted quietly, “I always dreamed about it, but I never once thought I’d be good enough for you”

“You’re everything to me Stevie”

“I love you, doll”

A blush bloomed on your cheeks, happy tears filling your eyes as you met his lips in a sweet kiss.

“I love you too”

When you were 20, you saw Steve break for the first time since you were children.

His mother had been ill ever since his father’s death a few years prior, Bucky picking up an extra job just to help him pay for her medicines, but she was just getting worse. A few hours before she went, Sarah had grabbed your hand, intertwining your fingers and placing them over her heart.

“You’re good for him” she said, voice shaky and weak, “Promise me you’ll look after him”

“I always will – Buck and I have his back Sarah, you know that”

You held him that night as he sobbed, the last of his family dead and gone, only passing him over to Bucky to make some dinner (which you forced him to eat). The situation felt very reminiscent of that night years ago, the three of you knowing that in that moment, there was nothing you wouldn’t do for the other.

When you were 24, your life started to crumble around you.

After the announcement that the USA was joining WW2, Bucky and Steve started training in Goldie’s gym every day for 3 hours, eager to join the fight.

They ignored your protests, Bucky insisting that it was the right thing to do.

He was approved, Sargent Barnes of the 107th, ready for deployment in a few weeks. Steve, on the other hand, was not so lucky. Though it was horrible to say, you had never been so glad for his illnesses as that day.

He wouldn’t stop though, and on Bucky’s last night he ran off to the sign-up tent again. As always, the two of you followed him, ready to stop his mess, only for Bucky to cave in and let him try.

“You stay with him, okay? I’ll see you back at the house”

You just nodded, giving your brother a hug before following Steve again, holding his hand in yours.

“Steve please, you’ve tried enough. I can’t – I can’t lose both of you”

“I have to try, don’t you see? If I had stood up to my dad then maybe – maybe ma wouldn’t have gotten so sick and-“

“No. Steven Grant Rogers don’t you dare think like that. That was out of your control-“

“But I can help here. Please, just let me try. One last time, doll, I promise”

You sighed, ducking your head to hide the tears that had begun to gather in your eyes, nodding dejectedly. Steve pressed a kiss to your forehead, his hand slipping out of yours as he began to walk away.

“I’ll be back”

Not a minute later, you were approached by a middle-age German man, and the rest was history.

When you were 25, you rescued your brother from HYDRA’s clutches.

After deciding that, fuck it, you’d follow Steve to the ends of the earth, you had accepted Dr Erskine’s offer and became the first female candidate for the super soldier serum. The following madness that ensued left you, now dubbed Liberty Prime, and Steve, Captain America, new dancing puppets for the government. That is, of course, until you heard of the 107th’s fate.

Taking the jet offered by Howard Stark, you and Steve had ignored your orders and broken out all the POWs that had been taken, eventually finding Bucky in a small lab, strapped down onto the table. After a very quick argument (“What the hell have you done?”, “joined the army”) and a dramatic fight with a dude with a red face, you were on the way back to base camp, holding hands with your two favourite boys.

Once Bucky was out of the med tent, the three of you went back to your bunk, huddling together like you did when you were kids the silent promise of forever suspended in the air.

When you were 27, the realities of war caught up to you.

Being a member of the Howling Commandos, you had seen a fair amount of horrifying stuff, but nothing could prepare you to see your twin falling from the train, mere centimetres from Steve’s hand.

The two of you were inconsolable, only talking to each other because you were the only ones that understood. Nothing would ever be the same.

So when it came to making the call to put the plane in the ocean, you both decided stupidly fast.

“I love you, doll” “I love you Stevie”

You tucked your head into the crook of his neck, fully submerged in his embrace as the jet went down.

“’Til the end of the line”

But now, as you woke up in the sterile hospital room, you were alone.

No Steve, no Bucky. Alone.

“What the hell?”

Your last memories of the ship crashing into the cold sea made no sense as you stared at the blank white walls around you, eyes blowing wide in panic. Your fighting instincts instantly kicked in, pushing yourself off of the bed and into a defensive position.

A crackly tune filtered out of the radio, the weird calmness of the room making you uneasy.

“Miss Barnes, it’s good to see that you’re awake”

You spun around to stare at the newcomer, the woman looking an awful lot like Peggy.

“Where am I?”

“You’re in a –“

She was cut off by a large man pushing her out of the way, his eyes wild and searching.

“Y/N?”

“Steve?”

“Don’t listen to them – somethings sketchy – the walls aren’t real” he urged, grabbing my hand and punching his way through the set’s walls, “We need to get out of here”

“How are we alive?” I asked frantically, keeping up to speed with him as an alarm started to blare through the building.

“I don’t know”

As you burst out of the building and onto the streets, you could immediately tell something was wrong. Your hand immediately flew to his arm, clutching his bicep as you were forced to a halt by black cars surrounding you. He pushed you behind him slightly, taking a protective stance in front of you as you searched the area for a way out.

“At ease, soldiers! Look, I’m sorry about that little show back there, but… we thought it best to break it to you slowly”

You moved to the side slightly, coming out from behind Steve, despite his quiet protest.

“Break what?”

“You’ve both been asleep. For 70 years”

Ever since Fury had broken the news you refused to be separated from Steve. They seemed to have expected that though, as the housing they provided was set up for two people.

“We’ll leave you alone for the rest of today for all of this to sink in” an agent explained, “If you have any questions just press this button and someone will come running”

You nodded politely as she left, still in a slight daze as you stared at the luxurious apartment.

“They’re going to want us to fight”

“I know”

“Will you?”

“Im with you Steve. I’ll follow you til the end of the line”

He took your hands in his, pressing light kisses to each knuckle.

“For Bucky” he said, voice cracking slightly.

“For Bucky”

_______________________________________________________________

Steve Taglist: @patzammit

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nessamaurice · 5 years

Text

Simple Ch. 7 (Loki x F!Reader)

I hope you guys enjoyed the somehow fluffy, easy going start, cuz this is where that part ends. Welcome to my nightmare.

Masterlist

Summary: Tony and the Avengers are in desperate need of something like a “babysitter” to have an eye on Loki and teach him “how to human”. He decided to stay on Midgard over the dungeons of Asgard as punishment for his deeds in New York. That’s where you swoop in. A simple receptionist at the Avengers compound. You have to share an apartment in the compound with Loki and damn, he’s a really tough nut. With your open and kind character it seems that you are slowly cracking his shell. But suddenly things are getting twists that will change your life and your relationships there irreversibly.

Story rating: M

Chapter trigger warnings: torture, humiliation, death, harming, drugging, angst, panic, captivity, traumatization (if I didn’t add something I didn’t think of, let me know pls)

Words: 3516

The first thing breaking into your consciousness was the hell of a headache. Awfully slowly your mind clicked back into state. It felt like it took hours. The cold from the coarse concrete surface beneath you started to make your skin go numb. That made you realize that you were naked. Completely. Suddenly your brain began to rush. Wide awake you fumbled around since you were in pure darkness. No single spot of light. Not even the little green spot on the bracelet Tony gave you. The moment the hope rose was the moment it died. When it was not working they were not able to locate you. But at least they were not able to take the vibranium bracelet off your arm. You were happy they didn't just chop off your hand. Your body was now on code red. Every sense was fully there to get the situation. You tried so hard to take a deep breath and calm down at least a little bit. Carefully you let your hands slide over the ice cold ground around you. No indication for the size of the room. Only the sounds you made told you it was a big one, though not empty due to the echoing. Warily you stood up and you suppressed a moan as your head answered the movement with a heavy droning.

Touching down your body you confirmed what you felt at first, you weren't wearing a single piece of clothing. Instinctively you covered your sensitive areas with arms and hands and stood there, totally out of concept. Tears came running down your cheeks without you noticing them. You turned your head around in the dark to maybe find any source of light but were disappointed. You heard a far thud from the left side behind you and immediately turned to that direction. Panic rising within you, you carefully stepped backwards, away from that sound, reaching a hand out behind you to feel any obstacles before you would trip and fall over them. The soft patting of your sweaty feet on the crumbly surface was unnaturally loud in your ears. It felt like you were going backwards into the unknown for kilometers. You almost let out a gasp as you finally bumped into some kind of machine behind you. You turned to palpate it but you had no idea of any machines so couldn't identify it. You surrounded the cold, iron giant in front of you and followed its figure. You came to the conclusion you had to be in some sort of factory because the big machine was connected to a conveyor. You wanted to follow the route of the conveyor but only could take like three steps before you bumped again into something. Into someone. You audibly sucked air into your lungs in shock. The fact that the person didn't react at all was not making it better. You turned into the other direction to get away but was stopped mid-movement by another person you ran into. Panic making you drowsy you turned to the side where you assumed was no machine standing, but the same happened. You retreated towards the machine until you felt the cold iron screws and levers poking you in the back. You fumbled to find the start of the conveyor and assumed that there was a gap beneath it and abruptly ducked away and under the conveyor. Your flight instincts kicking in you were ready to run despite the fact you couldn't see one damn thing. You couldn't believe you were right and there actually was space beneath it and were almost on the other side as a strong and rough hand grabbed you by the ankle and dragged you back. You couldn't help but scream and kick in any direction, only hurting yourself as you hit against the props of the conveyor. Your fingers tried to dig into the concrete floor but you only scratched up your nails until they were bleeding. The rough floor almost grated your skin. Another hand pulled you up onto your feet by grabbing your hair. Two more hands took your arms and twisted them behind your back. You were pushed forwards, forced to walk if you didn't want the person holding you to stomp you down. You hissed and screamed questions that were left answered with silence. Your head was violently pulled up and held aside as another injection was thrust into your neck. You felt dizzy and your body turned slightly numb, but did not lose conscious. Your vision changed. You had to blink a few times before your surroundings were enlightened. You realized there never has been any darkness, you were simply blinded. You felt so sick you just wanted to throw up and pass out. You had to cough and retch, pressed your eyes shut, the now bright light stinging in your brain like thin, hot needles. Carefully you opened your eyes as you had your head tilted down and the first thing you saw was your naked and bruised body. Bringing your knees together to cover at least anything you slowly looked up. A tall man stood in front of you, smiling down on you. His gaze wandering over you sent million disgusting shivers down your spine.

"So, you are the long lost Stark child." He had an European accent, German maybe. His smile turned into a grin. "You are not in best shape, I have to admit." He studied every inch of your skin which made you wanting to claw it right off your body. You felt tears dripping off your jawbone. "Luckily your physical state does not matter. At least you woke up, you were unconscious for almost three hours, although it should be just one. I'll have to take a note for further medication." He turned on his heels and addressed to the men holding you, "Bringt sie ins Labor. Wir haben Arbeit zu erledigen."

After you were dragged through lots of doors and corridors you entered a laboratory. It was clean white and looking overly sterile. Persons in white lab coats and protective masks stopped and turned their heads as you were forced into a big chair with movable spots around it, like a dentist's chair. Dozens of unknown eyes watched you getting shackled into the chair. You tried to tilt your pelvis backwards and pressed your knees together as far as possible so you maybe could hide this spot from the curious views since you had to accept that your bare torso was on display. You were strapped into the chair at so many spots that it was almost impossible to move one centimeter. The men that dragged you here left the room and one of the white lab persons approached you. You tried to talk but the former injection had turned your tongue into lead meanwhile. You could do nothing but watch these robotic acting persons work on you. They shaved the left and right side of your head and placed electrodes on the pale skin, only leaving a broad stripe of hair on the middle of your head. Tears dripped on your thighs as you watched our hair softly falling down besides you like in slow motion. They pierced your arm to get a vascular access and stuck more electrodes along your sternum and on the sides of your ribcage. The lab people were extremely careful and cautious not to touch you even slightly more than necessary. They strictly avoided eye contact. Monitors were rolled into the room and connected with the meanwhile numerous cables from your body. Then, all in a sudden, every single person left the room. You sat there, strapped and muted, naked and frightened to death. You were not able to catch one clear thought, your brain swam in a soup of adrenaline and tranquilizers. All you heard was the echo of the words 'the lost Stark child'. You just closed your eyes and tried to stop the world from turning so fast. Your system was almost knocking out when someone grabbed you by your left over hair and pulled your head up. Lazily you blinked at the blinding light. Your eyes could not focus correctly, you saw the shadowy silhouette of a person. Shortly after a cold liquid shot up the veins of your arm everything clicked into place. In front of you sat the man who ordered to bring you here.

"So, Y/N, finally we found you. Took us really long to figure out you actually did not die in the accident. Well, that was what we wanted from the beginning, so it worked out, but we were tricked and couldn't get our hands on you. But luckily, it doesn't matter anymore." He slipped into white rubber gloves. "I'm so sorry to sound stereotypical, but this can go two different ways; an easy one and a hard one. You are free to choose." He turned around to pick a syringe with a purple liquid and added it to the infusion bag connected to your arm. "But first of all, that you are even capable of answering the questions, we will help you remember."

Cold sweat was dripping on your thighs, falling down from your face. Your breathing became shallow as you felt awfully slowly how your surroundings began to blur and you fell into the deep, black void.

Your muscles tensed up to an incredibly painful level as millions of memories rushed over you out of the blue. Things you saw for the first time since you have been 11 years old but could immediately feel the moment again. The atmosphere, the feelings, the voices, the smiles and the tears. Absolutely everything your mind had tried to lock up forever was pulled violently into the blinding light. It was so familiar and so strange at the same time. You saw the beautiful smile of your mother, softly stroking your cheek. The loud and hearty laugh of your father as you said something sassy. The back of the head of your uncle as you sat on his shoulders, running through your garden. He took you off his shoulders to hold you up into the sky, screeching of fun and joy, and as you looked down you looked into the happy face of a young Tony Stark. Uncle Tones. That was too much for your brain and it did the last thing it could do to protect yourself from freaking out; it turned everything off. Tony's face fading in front of your eyes, you felt your whole body turning limp before it all went dark.

Your sleep was dull and dreamless, a blessing for your overstimulated system. You were tugged back to consciousness, everything felt numb. They let you sleep in sitting position and you carefully lifted your head. Your neck should've hurt terribly but you just didn't feel anything. You looked around and saw your captor sitting at one of the desks watching a screen, turning around to you.

"Oh good, you are awake." He rolled over to you on his office chair. The noise of the small plastic wheels was nearly unbearable for your ears. "Hope you had some nice rest, you are not getting any more of it for quite a while now." He tapped on one of the monitors next to you. "I am turning down your painkillers and tranquilizers now. In a few minutes you should feel everything and be able to speak again. Nothing I would look forward to if I were in your situation." He now faced you directly. "My name is Dr. Daniel Fieberbrunn. I am the chief physician of the Hydra facility you are held in recently. I am continuing the mission my father started. He was killed by one of our own soldiers. A real tragedy. The soldier had to get readjusted and the mission was paused. But now, so many years later, I get the honor to revive it since our spies at the compound found out you are the presumed dead child of Marlena Stark. Your parents were killed by one of our soldiers and his mission also included to leave you alive and bring you to us. Why, you may ask. Well, after my father found out Howard Stark had another child, a daughter, he started research on her and her husband. Soon after we eliminated Howard Stark, Tony Stark found out about her. We've been watching you for years already to find out if you were of any use for Hydra. Stark tried very hard to keep his sister and her family dark to protect them. Pathetic. Finally, as you turned 10, my father found evidence of what he was sure. He wanted to obtain you to form you in young years. But it looked like our soldier failed at the mission and you died as well. He went missing for several months before he reappeared at our base out of nowhere. When my father confronted the soldier with his failure he lost temper and killed him. But the soldier was very valuable for Hydra so instead of getting eliminated he got readjusted. I heard it is not much better than getting killed, so I'm satisfied with that. Of course I will not tell you what my father believed to see in you. Not yet." He looked at his watch. "Alright, any second your physical senses should come back to life. I hope I answered enough questions to keep you quiet and cooperating, so we can speed things up. I neither have the empathy nor the patience to deal with a whiny, confused girl. Ah, I see the medication stop shows up."

His lips formed a small smile as you started to feel every bruise, cramped muscle, the sores beneath the shackles. You coughed and retched as you tried to speak.

"Why? Why are you doing this?" Your voice was a mere, husky whisper.

Your opponent rolled his eyes. "As I already said, we want to form you so you will be useful for us. You will help us to finally bring peace and order to the world. If you ask another question I already told you the answer of, I will have to punish you. I don't have time for such chatting."

"I'm not 10 anymore, you cannot form me into anything I don't want to be."

His answer was a loud laugh. "You simply have no idea of what we can do."

"I'm the most regular person you can imagine. Just a simple woman. I'm of no use for you. What should I have that is of interest?"

He sighed and pulled out a scalpel. Before you could react he grabbed your face with an incredibly tight grip and drew a deep cut from your eyebrow across your eyelid to the edge of your malar bone, almost splitting your eyelid in two. You cawed into his ear since your voice was not capable of screaming already. Warm blood ran down your face and dripped onto your thigh, forming a growing puddle between your legs. The sharp pain was so intense, it almost paralyzed you. All you could do was breathe and cry. The blood blurred the vision of your left eye. As you tried to blink the pain peaked to an intolerable rate.

"I told you I'm not gonna tell you what is special about you. Another thing like that and I will blind the other eye. Then I will tear it out of your skull and replace it with an artificial eyeball."

You had no idea what to do. You were in complete and utter distress.

"What do you want from me?" You wheezed.

"At first, tell me everything about the accident. I want accurate answers. You are allowed to take your time. This will be not always the case. Make use of it."

It made your insides twist to only think of cooperating with them but you were so, so scared. You didn't want your eyeball replaced with an artificial one so they probably could survey you for the rest of your life, always seeing everything you would see. You tried to make up a plan to survive as long as possible until you were rescued. Rescued. That word echoed through your mind. You risked a little look at your bracelet. It was still there, firm and tight around your wrist, shining between the dull shackles, but the green gem was dark, like a usual jewelry. You pushed the thought aside that you would stay here for long. Hope was now the only thing that kept you alive. You sent a quick prayer and concentrated on your task.

The accident. You carefully closed your eyes, the pain from your left eye omnipresent in your thoughts. But you were able to recall. You were in the backseat, gazing out of the window as the dark silhouettes of trees flew by. It was at night, you were on the way to somewhere. Where to? You didn't know, Mom and Dad didn't tell you. They were in a hurry to get into the car. They didn't talk with each other, Mom wasn't even singing along the songs on the radio as she usually did. You didn't realized it before, but as you looked out of the window you saw a quick, small silver flashing between the trees just one second before the disaster happened. Mom was screaming, Dad hitting the brakes really hard, but too late. The car bumped over something, you heard a loud bang, the car overturned and slithered grating over the asphalt. You were screaming and crying. Dad didn't move at all. Mom coughed and turned to Dad, pure panic in her eyes. She looked back at you and started crying as she saw you were alive. She wanted to get to you but was ripped out of the car. You screamed high pitched but silenced immediately as you looked outside. You saw a dark person holding tight onto Moms head. His arm shone like silver in the moonlight. The screams of Mom grew louder and louder, you closed your eyes and pressed your hands on your ears. You heard the dull screaming until it abruptly stopped with a muffled, cracking sound. You dared to look again and just saw the metallic arm letting go of Mom, she fell to the ground. He picked her up again and put her back on her seat. Her head tilted to the side, towards you. You couldn't recognize her, you only saw empty staring eyes and blood. He walked around the car and checked on Dad, but didn't do anything with him. Then he stepped back and ripped out your door, tossing it behind like it was nothing. You were completely paralyzed by fear. You simply stared into his face, your whole body trembling. Half of his face was covered by a black mask, you only saw his eyes glancing at you through strands of dark hair. He tore out your safety belt with one easy move and grabbed you by the collar of your coat. He pulled you out of the car and held you in the air easily with his silver arm, eye to eye. You floundered with your feet, every movement hurt so much. You stared into his eyes, glowing brightly blue in the moonlight, filled with rage. You held onto his metallic arm, crying and breathing heavily. The angst causing your lungs to rattle. You managed to wheeze, "What... did you do... to Mom? Where's... Mom? I... I... can't... breathe..." You felt like you were asphyxiating. Automatically you reached into the pocket of your coat. The man immediately violently grabbed your hand and pulled it up again. His hold was so tight, making you scream as you felt your wrist cracking in his grip. He looked down as he heard something hitting the floor. As he saw your asthma inhaler lying there his face changed. He looked back at you again, his eyes wide and brows furrowed. It looked like he would process something. Like he recalled something he forgot. Slowly he put you back on your feet. You fell to the ground, unable to stand since your legs seemed severely injured. Half lying on the street, you reached out to fetch your inhaler and used it as the doctors had shown you as you first got it. Shortly after drawing breath became easier. You sat up and leant against the car. You could do nothing but cry. You whole body hurt. Mom and Dad were gone. You were surrendered to the mercy of their murderer, standing in front of you. You looked up at him, the tears blurring your view. All you managed to mutter was "Please don't kill me. Don't kill me. Please don't." You repeated it all over and over again. He looked at you, completely different expression in his eyes now. If you didn't knew better you would have said it was regret and panic. He knelt down and carefully picked you up. The pain of being moved with all your injuries was too much and you passed out. You thought you heard him say something before all went dark, it sounded like "I'm sorry."

Taglist: @it-jinxed-us, @humbledarkness, @lunawitch19, @redryderdesigns

#loki #Loki Laufeyson #loki x reader #loki x female reader #loki fiction #marvel #marvel fan fiction #fanfic simple #nessa maurice #slow burn #loki slow burn #torture #interrogation

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solaneceae · 5 years

Text

EGOTOBER DAY 2 - Trap

Jump, fall, grab, swing, let go, turn, fall again.

The cold night air whistling in his ears, catching on the edges of his suit. The smell of asphalt and smoke, of cosy coffeeshops and dirty alleyways.

The cacophony of people walking far, far below him, of cars honking and tires shrieking, of thousands of lives happening all around him, each one the protagonist of their own story.

To those citizens, he is but a bright red blur in the corner of their eye. A cameo. An extra. He’s okay with that.

Grab a windowstill, push himself up onto a rooftop, run, jump, fall head first into the void, eyes closed. An ecstatic grin pushes his mask up his nose, the street’s neon lights reflecting in his bright blue eyes.

In this moment, when time seems to stretch and stop, when his heartbeat synchronizes with the busting and thrumming of the city, his city... Jackie knows freedom. Pure, unconditional freedom.

Then, as fast as it started, the moment is over; a shrill scream from somewhere below reminds him of his mission, and his elated gaze turns steely and focused. He twists his hips to reposition himself, grabbing a street lamp in his fall. He lands before two struggling silhouettes in the dim, sickly lights of your generic shady back alley.

A quick glance tell him everything he needs to know: male figure manhandling a smaller, slimmer one. His body has moved before he knew it, ramming his fist into the larger form’s stomach with a vengeful grunt. The figure is shoved backwards, crashing down on a pile of dry cement, sending greyish dust flying everywhere.

Jackie huffs, and straightens up a smirk growing on his tanned, fleckled face. “Didn’t yer mom tell you not ta lay hands on a lady?”

Only a dazed grunt rewards his taunt. Seemed like the guy wouldn’t get back up anytime soon. That was easy, he thought, brushing dust off his arms before turning to the woman. “Are you al-”

He barely had time to register the metal pipe coming his way before pain exploded across his skull. He let out a startled gasp, the impact sending him flying; his vision swam, tiny fireflies dancing all over the alleyway. It hurt.

His back slammed against a wall as gravity took its hold on him, and everything went dark for what seemed like a second. He blinked back into awareness, a pained grunt clawing its way up his throat; his mouth filled with a metalling tang; he must’ve bit his tongue at some point.

“Shit, the bastard’s got a mean right hook.”

The hero looked up, his features twisting in pain and growing confusion; the male had gotten up and stood tall above him, scowling down at him. His arm clutched at his stomach. “Hear that, asshole? I’m gonna feel that punch for a week!” the man snarled before kicking the red-clad ego in the ribs.

Jackie’s eyes widened, curling up in an attempt to protect himself. God, it hurt like a bitch. He couldn’t breathe, couldn’t see straight, his thoughts were all over the place and his reflexes shot to death… what the fuck was happening?!

“Frank, enough.”

He froze. The new voice was quieter. Softer. Colder. Through his blurry vision, he caught sight of a smaller figure standing next to the man. Indubitably feminine. And holding a metal pipe.

It finally clicked, and he cursed himself for his recklessness. A trap. This whole “aggression” had been a setup to catch him off-guard. He groaned, straining his muscles in an attempt to get up, despite the growing nausea threatening to make him lose his lunch here and then. Fuck, he probably had a concussion.

The woman tutted, her voice dripping with false sympathy. “I wouldn’t do that if I were you.” The vigilante bit his lower lip, not gracing her with a response, and rose up a few inches. His action was rewarded by a heavy foot slamming into his chest, slamming him back on the asphalt with a sickening crack.

Jackie’s nerves went alight with overwhelming, white-hot pain. Someone was screaming, though that was probably him. The shock sent him into a coughing fit as his brain switched back and forth between duty and basic survival instincts.

get out get out run get out FIGHT STOP THEM run run run run get away GET UP get away-

“You see,” the woman started, her voice muffled by the cotton surrounding his head, “we’re trying to run a business here. We can’t have you swinging around where you don’t belong, beating up our men and ruining everything we worked so hard to achieve, now, can we?”

Jackie didn’t see what or who exactly she was referring to, but he decided that, in this moment, it didn’t matter. Those guys obviously planned on getting rid of him, and given how fast the alleyway spun and how bad his skull pounded… He spit out a mouthful of blood onto the grey asphalt. As much as he loathed to admit it, he was in no shape to fight them off. So the next best thing would be…

“Heh.” the man smirked, crouching down in front of the fallen hero. “That looks like it hurts.” he taunted, reaching out to roughly poke at his ribcage -the green-haired ego managed to stay silent this time, only a hissing intake of air betraying how he really felt. The criminal’s eyes shone with malice. “Guess you won’t be running around messing with out plans no more, huh?”

Jackie coughed again, more blood dribbling down his chin. He hoped he hadn’t punctured his lungs again, the doc would never let him hear the end of it. He braced himself for what was to come next, clutching something on his utility belt. Please work, please work, please work for the love of god.

He looked up at his foes, his cut up lips stretching in a crooked smile. “Maybe not.” He fixed his gaze somewhere above the man’s head. “But they will.”

When the two turned to look behind them, their faces twisting in surprise and rage, he pointed his grappling hook at the sky and pressed the button. The metal grip shot up, further and further from the ground. C’mon, c’mon-

The telltale clank of the hook catching on metal filled him with relief, and before he knew it he was airborne, angry screams echoing in the alley below him. He ignored his burning arm, the possibility of a dislocated shoulder, the pain radiating from his chest. He ignored his darkening vision, his growing nausea, the sticky warm liquid running down his temple and soaking his hair and beard.

He ignored it all, letting his body fall into the flow of familiar motions, rehearsed a thousand times and more. Swing, let go, catch, fall, land, run, jump. Again, again, and again. Tripping on a loose wire, falling, getting up. Running.

Get away. Get back. Get home.

His thoughts scattered, his world becoming foggy and distant. Time, space it no longer mattered. Just the colorful lights flying past him -or was he flying past them?- and gravity grabbing and letting him go over and over in a soothing rhythm, like a heartbeat.

Up.

Down.

Up.

Down.

Up…

***

Henrik run a hand down his face, reclining in his seat with a weary sigh. Finally, his shift was over. Like every thursday night the ER had been packed with drunken teenagers carrying in their comatose friends. He should really stop covering Edward’s shifts whenever the other ego decided to disappear god-knows-where every now and then.

He got up and left his office, gruffly saluting his colleagues on the way out. He couldn’t wait to go home and pass out on the couch, granted the thing wasn’t already claimed by either a drunk Chase or a territorial Anti.

He shook his head, stepping out of the clinic and into the cold night air. His own family were a handful by themselves, between them and his dumbass patients it was a miracle he hadn’t gone insane yet.

The walk back to the house was uneventful enough, the distant rumble of an oncoming storm soothing his nerves. But as he climbed up the stairs to the front door and shoved the key into the lock, he froze.

As a legitimate, respectable, 100% real doctor, he was familiar with the sterile, chemical scent of hospitals; hell, he’d been inhaling it for so long he barely noticed it anymore. But one smell he could never really get used to was the distinct, heavy tang of blood. A smell he’d just caught a whiff of.

He frantically turned the key and pushed the door open, the emotional man overtaking the calm and calculating doctor. This was his home, his kin, this was different-

He rushed inside, flicking the lights on. There was someone laying on the couch alright. Cladded in bright fabric and leather, wild green strands escaping his hoodie, framing a light blue mask.

Covered in a lot more red than what was considered normal, even for him.

“Scheiße, Jackie!” Henrik called out, rushing to his most reckless brother’s side. Said brother stirred and looked up at him, a cocky smirk displaying his blood-covered teeth. Fuck, this looked bad. The hero raised a hand in greeting. “Hey doc-” he croaked out, before a wet cough cut him off.

“Verdammt Jackie, shut up and don’t move an inch!” Schneep ordered, kneeling in front of the couch. He gently -well, gentler than with his usual patients at least- grabbed the hem of the vigilante’s hood to get a clear look at him; the left side of his face was coated in blood -dry, good, so he wasn’t bleeding out from here at least- and his gaze were clouded and unfocused. Henrik frowned, taking his phone out of his lab coat to shine the light in the hero’s blue eyes, making him wince.

“Pupils aren’t behaving normally. Concussion.” the doctor mumbled. Jackie chuckled. “Ah- yeah, that’s a thing. Shoulder might be fucked up a bit. Also pretty sure I broke a few ribs. ”

“WAS?!” the older ego shrieked in disbelief “What the hell? What were you doing out there? Taking down a drug ring?!”

“Shhhh,” Jackie hissed, lifting his hand in a placating gesture, “Tone it down doc, you’ll wake up the others.”

“Tone it- are you joking? You’re hurt!”

“Please, just…”

The hero grimaced, averting his gaze. “I… don’t want the others to see me like this. Especially Robbie.”

Henrik stopped, considering his little brother’s words. They seemed to mostly come from a place of pride, but there was something else here. Worry. Last time the youngest member of their household had seen one of them injured, he’d been inconsolable. Jackie was right; bringing the others into this would only cause more chaos and distress.

He sighed, surrendering before the other’s pleading expression. “Alright. We’re going to your room, I’ll patch you up and take care of those stains on the couch. But I swear, if you move around while I’m gone, I will pump you so full of sedatives you’ll be out for a week!”

Jackie let out a painful wheeze and smiled. “Sounds fair.”

------

@tabbynerdicat @lilakennedy (cuz this one has your dad in it :D ) @egopocalypse @humblecacti

dm me if you wanna be added to the taglist!

#jacksepticeye #egotober #egotober2019 #trap #jackieboy man #henrik von schneeplestein #jse egos #jacksepticeye egos #tw blood #blood #whump

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ernestsinclairs · 6 years

Text

Test of Faith - Bryce Lahela x MC

Bryce Lahela x MC (Alina)

**Note: This story takes place a few years later, just so I could have everything work out.

“Here. I stole this from the obstetrics department.”

“Jackie, you didn’t need to,” Alina said quietly, quickly slipping the tiny box between a stack of patient charts and prescription pads. “I’m sure it’s nothing. We were careful.”

“Does Bryce strike you as the type of person who’s careful?”

“Well, I am,” Alina shot back with a quick peer around the corner to make sure no one was coming. Besides the regular call nurse filling out the round assignments while snapping for an espresso, it was empty.

“Look at me, Alina,” Jackie hushed. “I know you’re nervous. And I know that the senior residents sure as hell won’t like it. But I will. Whatever happens, I’m in your corner - and Landry too if he isn’t shy.”

“Thanks,” Alina said softly, taking one last peek at the nurse around the corner. “I know it sounds . . . hurried right now, but I appreciate it. Really.”

“I get you,” Jackie said. “Now go. There’s rounds in twenty minutes and I don’t need Dr. Mirani on my ass because you’re late.”

“Aren’t you ever the charming one.”

Pushing the box further into the mess of diagnostic papers, Alina turned the corner to the interns’ quarters, ducking behind the row of dressing lockers to slip into the bathroom unaccosted. The blond intern from pediatrics didn’t even look up, and Alina breathed a silent prayer. She didn’t need the biggest gossip at Edenbrook getting riled.

Her breath caught suddenly in her throat as her fingers pursed the little box open. The young Alina in medical school or college would have scoffed at such a situation, straight out of a late night drama pulling all the stops to not get cancelled. If anyone had told that younger self she’d once be hiding in the interns’ bathroom with a pregnancy test and a side of anxiety, she’d have laughed the messenger out of there.

Laughter no more. Now it was more like roils of nausea and nervousness.

A few minutes later, and Alina sat in the blinding fluorescent light of the stall, the little white test turned facedown on her lap. The sudden beeping of her pager faded into the background before, unable to bear it any longer, she clicked it off and threw it on the floor where it settled with a sad clang.

Another beeping started, this time from her phone. Five minutes of ignorant bliss was over. Fingernails clicked on smooth white plastic, a sharp breath pierced the air.

Positive.

Alina groaned, hiding the little lines in her palm and burying her head in her hands. Right when all the stars were falling into place, they wouldn’t be any longer. The last year of her residency should have been exciting, should have been hopeful. She’d finally be out of the tiny salary and shared rent, make some headway on those student loans, send some of that new paycheck home for her mother’s retirement.

And now?

She couldn’t deny the tiny thrill at the back of her heart, faint, but still there. Despite the new worries crashing down on her in a crushing maelstrom, the tiny spark of joy at the news still lingered. She - no, they, would be having a child. A little life of their own, bringing sleepless nights and laughter, exhaustion and parental joy.

It was time he knew. This secret wouldn’t keep itself, especially if Jackie knew. If she walked out to fanfare or the faces of shocked medical interns, she wouldn’t be surprised.

Crumpling the packaging and burying it deep inside the trash can, piling on paper to hide it, Alina gave a quick splash of cold water on her forehead, gasping for air. A sudden wave of anxiety overcame her as she studied her own face in the mirror. A worry line here, tired eyes there. Whether she was cut out for this, she didn’t know. She could only hope that Bryce’s unflappable self assurance would stay through this one.

“Alina?”

Bryce stumbled to a stop outside the operating doors, his mask still half off his face, hair still mussed one side where the surgical cap had pressed down on it. His weariness was obvious, the circles under his eyes, usually invisible under the sheen of pure enthusiasm and a carefree demeanor, were suddenly all too visible.

“I didn’t think you were scheduled to cut out someone’s lung.”

“I’m not,” Alina said, trying to purse her lips into a smile and failing.

“I just needed to talk to you about something. Alone.”

Bryce stared at her in silence for a few seconds, the tiny moments seeming to stretch out into a terrible eternity. Wringing her hands together, Alina could only feel the tiny plastic test in her back pocket growing heavier and heavier by the second.

“Is something wrong, Alina?” Bryce asked, whispering in her ear as he gently guided her away next to a spare gurney. “Is it about us?”

“Maybe? Yes? No?”

Looking around, Bryce quickly wrenched open the door to the supply closet they’d spent their first day in and ushered her inside. The comforting darkness inside ballooned up, and when the surgeon reached for the light switch, she caught his hand in midair and lowered it.

“I’ve always liked it this way.”

Alina paused, her mind wandering back to the little double lines tucked inside that back pocket.

“Never mind. Put the light on.”

The fluorescent light came flooding on, washing the entire space with a sterile blue sheen. The sudden wave sent a roil of nausea through her stomach and Bryce caught a hold on her forearm as she steadied herself.

“Alina, what’s wrong,” Bryce repeated softly, pressing his forehead to hers. Alina sighed, closing her eyes and luxuriating in the moment for a precious few seconds. Somehow, his cologne had survived six hours of surgery and the sharp tang of antiseptic. His hands traveled from her arms to her back, gently rubbing the tension out of them, and her skin tingled with a much needed warmth.

“Have you though about the future? About what it means for us?”

“We’ve had this talk,” Bryce replied, pressing a quick peck on her nose. “You know we’re spending it together. If . . . that hasn’t changed since I was in that OR that is.”

“It hasn’t,” Alina reassured, burying her face in the front of his scrubs. “Just a little twist.”

Bryce immediately straightened up, tired eyes suddenly alert.

“We’re not breaking-”

“No, we’re not,” Alina said, a tiny giggle escaping her lips before she could trap it. “I’d never think of it.”

Bryce relaxed, smiling sheepishly as he raked a hand through his hair, the silky brown popping back into the little flip she’d come to know and love.

“Do you remember our plans? The one you wrote up on a piece of paper that your roommate threw away?”

“I never forget things,” Bryce said, hugging her close again. “A little house just outside Boston. No more student loans. A diamond ring on your finger and a nursery.”

Pulling back, he gave her a tiny smile before leaning in to kiss her again.

Alina winced, gently wrenching her arm from his embrace and fishing around in her back pocket.

“That last one might be . . . a little sooner than we thought it was.”

Bryce blinked. For such a talented surgeon, he could be so incredibly dense.

With a shaky breath, Alina brought out the little strip of white plastic, her vision blurring until the two little pink lines became the only thing she could see. Apparently, it was the same predicament for Bryce.

“What is that?”

Alina could have slapped him. Four years of college, four more years of medical school, three years since starting an elite surgical residency all those seasons ago, and Bryce Lahela was simultaneously the smartest and most ignorant person she knew.

“Bryce,” Alina pushed, pressing the test into his hand. “You know what this is.”

He blinked, bringing the test up to his eye, then dropping it to the floor the second his jaw did.

“You’re pregnant.”

Alina stammered, a quick response suddenly failing to come out. She’d thought about this moment for countless nights, tossing and turning sleeplessly as her alarm grew more and more. She’d ease him into it first, she’d decided. Then they’d make a plan. Yes, plans always worked. This one would work too. But now, looking up at his shocked face and wide eyes, she wasn’t sure there would even be one.”

“Bryce, I know this was sudden, but I-”

“You’re pregnant.”

“Yes, I told you that. Look, maybe we just forgot that one night or-”

Bryce punched the air with an excited whoop, nearly knocking a supply basket of suture kits on top of them. Pulling her out of the way, he suddenly hoisted her up into the air, twirling her the best he could with the medical equipment cluttering the whole space.

“This isn’t a trick isn’t it?” Bryce asked breathlessly, all former signs of exhaustion gone. “Please tell me it isn’t.”

“Far from it,” Alina laughed, cupping his face in both hands and nuzzling his cheek. “I am.”

A wide smile broke out on Bryce’s face, no witty quips or self assured comments, just pure joy radiating out of that face. Laughing again, softer this time, he pressed a kiss to her lips, then another, peppering her with them until she couldn’t speak.

“Change of plans,” Bryce said after they had both calmed down. He was holding her gently now, different from the passionate force of the earlier years, and his hand lightly caressed her still flat stomach as if he was afraid of hurting her. “The plan starts now.”

“Oh god,” Alina fretted, hands flying to her face before Bryce lowered them. “We need a new place. We can’t split a baby between yours and mine, and we can’t have roommates. We’re both only residents, we need money. And we need to break the news and we-”

“Hey, hey,” Bryce hushed, tenderly running his fingers through her hair and kissing the top of her head. “Look, your residency’s shorter than mine. It finishes in a month, and Ramsey’s already got a job here and that fat paycheck lined up. We can save up enough before the baby comes.”

“And our place?”

“We’ll get one together. There’s that new condo opening up next month we can get. Trust me, we’ll be okay.”

Bryce kissed her one last time, holding her a few seconds more for good measure. “And I’ll be at your side the whole time.”

Alina exhaled in relief, her lungs flooding with sweet air as she let out the breath she hadn’t even known she was holding.

“Right,” she nodded, her hand already unconsciously flitting towards her stomach. “Together.”

“Now, how about we start getting the plan together,” Bryce teased, opening the door for her and escorting her out. “You seem to like them quite a lot.”

The couple continued to talk as they meandered down the hall, oblivious to the nurses cutting paths in front of them, the occasional bedded patient being wheeled to the OR, the ringing of phones as harried secretaries sought to catch them all.

“Here’s what I’m thinking,” Bryce said, hands in front of him as if he was taking a snapshot. “For a boy it can be Connor. Or Ryan. Or really whatever you want. And for a girl, what about those tree or flower names people are pulling? Rose or Holly or something else you think is nice.”

“You are going to have to wait a bit to see what we’re having,” Alina said, laughing giddily as a sudden wave of excitement hit her.

“Boy or girl, I don’t care,” Bryce said confidently as they turned towards the interns’ locker rooms. “If the baby has us for parents, there’s no way anything can go wrong.”

“If what has you for parents?”

The couple froze and Alina’s heart sank as she caught sight of Dr. Ramsey rounding the corner, equally frozen in place with a rare look of shock etched on his face.

“Nothing,” Alina squeaked, quickly sidestepping the senior doctor and ducking inside the interns’ quarters.

“Nothing at all.”

@teenytinymagician @regency-lady @tmarie82 @give-me-ernest-sinclaire @divergentofhogwarts @indiacater @queenlorelaiwalker12 @findingdrake @frugalchoicer @valenciajeff

#open heart #OH #open heart fanfic #open heart fanfiction #bryce lahela #bryce x mc #bryce lahela x mc #bryce lahela headcanon #bryce lahela headcanons #bryce lahela fanfic #bryce lahela fanfiction

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badolmen · 5 years

Text

@billy-hoepe in this house we disregard canon characters’ deaths and substitute wholesome fanfiction for depressing canon.

Miles looked down on the Morphogenic Engine room, the life support pods like a marble collection. Some where cracked, others streaked with blood, or entirely dyed red. One was illuminated, the Engine’s screen flickering with indecipherable black and white images that reflected on the glass prison of William “Billy” Hope.

He looked around the room, the quiet and stillness no reassurance of safety, but he sat in an office chair, catching his breath and catching up with his still reeling thoughts. There was silence, except for the hum of electricity and the omnipresent static that had invaded the journalist’s thoughts. But there was no immediate danger. Walker had gotten his due, at the hands of the very thing Wernicke had asked, maybe even begged, Miles to kill.

And nothing about it felt right.

Thumbing through his notes, camcorder resting precariously on the many buttons and levers of the control panel, the more he thought about it, the less sense it made to kill Billy. He was young, he had only been admitted to Mount Massive four years ago, and none of the files Miles had found said why he had been admitted. From the notes, he seemed normal, if a little childish, compared to the other patients.

No one could leave while Billy lived. Or that’s what Wernicke had said. It sparked some familiar itch of curiosity in Miles, the same feeling of anticipation and vengeful spite to understand and share that understanding at the expense of the corrupt. Was the Walrider limited to Mount Massive Asylum? By what? The chamber doors did not block the exit, as far as Miles had seen before the apparition stopped him.

It seemed more likely that the Walrider could only travel a fixed distance from its host. Down here, it was stronger, more corporeal than the flickers he had seen in the upper levels. Down here it could pick up Chris Walker and throw him around like a rag doll before stuffing his corpse into a ventilation shaft.

Why had the Walrider done that? Why would it save Miles if, as Wernicke said with such confidence, it only planned on slaughtering him? It could just enjoy the thrill of the hunt, but then why had it not attacked Miles since he attempted to leave? How much control did Billy have over the specter, and how much control did it have over him?

In his racing mind, thoughts blurred by pain and logic viewed through static, Miles decided that the Walrider wanted something. It wanted freedom. Would it continue its slaughter? Or was it satisfied with the blood of those who had brought it here, who had tortured its hosts?

And why would Wernicke ask Miles, a shell shocked, blood soaked stranger with a camcorder, to kill the host of something that bordered between a deity and a demon? Why the fuck should he trust a man who was supposed to be dead? Who had helped orchestrate the monstrosity of Mount Massive? He glanced at the security cameras in the corners of the control room, beady black lenses glaring down with impatience. Could Wernicke see him?

So many questions. So few answers.

Miles rubbed his face, aware of the blood streaking across his cheeks from the stubs of his fingers. Maybe there was some untainted medical supplies down here.

A tap on the glass.

He couldn’t help but flinch, the muscle memory of shrinking from every unexpected sound already too deep in his bones. His eyes slowly lifted from the notes, past the softly glowing buttons and switches of the terminal to the window that separated the control room from the engine room.

The swarm of darkness hovered, its form constantly twitching and shifting, vaguely resembling a human. It somehow looked more human than many of the Variants Miles had seen in the last few hours. The Walrider had no eyes, but Miles could feel its gaze on his face; it was patient, watching, waiting.

Miles hadn’t spoken in hours. Adrenaline, the acrid smell of death that filled every breath, and pure fear had kept him silent, words a waste on the pure insanity of this building of horrors. Even Wernicke wasn’t given a word of confirmation, Miles too panicked and confused to form coherent sentences, let alone responses to the sheer, terrible absurdity he had been immersed in.

The words were slow, slurred by exhaustion and rough from screaming.

“What do you want?” It wasn’t a charged statement, full of hate or fear. It was empty. Beaten and apathetic, lacking any venom or sarcasm. He hardly expected an answer, the swirling, living shadow barely reacting to the sound. Which made its whispery, static filled voice all the more startling.

“Wir wollen nach Hause gehen.” The words were coming from everywhere and nowhere. They vibrated in Miles’ bones and echoed in the back of his mind, the syllables punctuated with the shrillness of auditory feedback from a poor microphone speaker setup. The ringing in his ears stopped, and the journalist looked back to the Walrider.

“Ich niecht sprekt Deutch,” Miles managed, butchering the foreign language. He had spent a few week’s in Germany, years ago on some story far less blood-soaked as the Murkoff corporation. He hadn’t been very fluent in the language then, but he at least recognized the language, and what seemed to be the word “house,” whatever that meant in the context of an abomination of Nazi science and spiritualism.

The Walrider almost seemed to blink, the nanites that made its corporeal form flickering briefly where Miles supposed eyelids could be. The shadow dissipated from sight, Miles watching the grey and black dust disintegrate into thin air.

The loud smack against the glass nearly gave him a heart attack, though he wasn’t really sure what he expected from the being that had slaughtered so many already. Miles didn’t question where it got the blood. He grimaced at the blood spatter, too desensitized to worse to be wholly disgusted when the Walrider began to trace shapes onto the glass.

A circle with lines inside it. The circle broken into two, jagged pieces. A sloppy rendition of the exit sign.

“I gotta get Billy out of his pod or whatever to leave this hellhole?” The Walrider nodded. They were communicating. Specifically, Miles was communicating with some sort of interdimensional spirit demon thing that required a physical host traumatized enough and in the right way to produce nanite robotics using their cells. He put his notebook away, and picked up his camcorder, the apparition swaying slightly.

“Okay, okay, fuck, okay, so,” Miles took a breath. He hadn’t spoken on camera in hours. He hadn’t had much he could say without sounding crazy himself. But the thing in front of him was on camera. And was waiting. “This, uh, Walrider wants me to break its host, Billy, out of his pod down there, and I think my only other option is to kill the host, or whatever the hell that Nazi fuck was talking about,”

Miles approached the entrance to the Morphogenic Engine room. The second he opened the barrier the Walrider could tear him to pieces. It could rip him apart from the inside. It waited by the stairs, shifting form like thousands of flies.

“I think I’m going with the former, so if I die doing this shit, know that I’ve had a very long, fucked up night, and just want to go home, I don’t want anybody else to get hurt,” Miles breathed a shaky sigh, his hands aching. Killing Trager was satisfying, but Miles was a reporter. Not a murderer.

No matter how much relief washed over him when Chris Walker was shredded through a ventilation grate, no matter the panic and chaos that killed Trager, Miles wasn’t a fighter. Billy was one of the few people in this damned shitshow that hadn’t actively attempted to mutilate, murder, or do worse to Miles. Was it sane to trust the demigod like being that had started this nightmare of slaughter and lunacy? He would find out.

The door slid open, the gush of sterile air cold and dry. The Walrider did not attack him. Miles descending the stairs, camera on and breathing unsteady as he approached the dreaded Morphogenic Engine, the engineering abomination that created this mess.

And Billy Hope, the only living human being besides Miles, eyes vacant at the flickering screen.

Miles didn’t know what half the tubes and wires fed, read, or carried. They were life support, monitoring equipment, and presumably linked to the massive machine that hummed above. The Walrider kept a few paces away, watching Miles with an almost cautionary gaze.

“So, I don’t suppose you know how to get him out without killing him, huh?” Miles asked aloud. The Walrider gave a growl of static. “Yeah, yeah, I’m sure you would have done it on your own if you could, no need keeping me around otherwise. Right. So, where the fuck should I start?”

He was very much aware that the Walrider wouldn’t respond, at least not in an intelligible manner that Miles could understand. Talking, even to himself, after so long of keeping silent was refreshing. It helped him feel less terrified of the swarm of nanites hovering over his shoulder.

He looked over the terminal, alight with finger scanners and electricity. The machine had hundreds, thousands of buttons and lights. Touching any of them could kill Billy or provoke the Walrider.

“Y’know for being the thing that wants me to get you outta here, you aren’t being any help,” Miles muttered, pointing the camcorder to the swarm. It hissed softly. “Then show me what the fuck you want me to do ya creepy fuck,” It mimed an action. “Oh fuck no, you’ll just shred me if he dies, or whatever,” The Walrider mimed the action again. “I don’t have a choice, do I?” The Walrider growled. Miles did not have a choice.

“Playing fucking charades with a shadow demon, this is just how my night is going,” Miles sighed, setting down his camcorder on the machine’s terminal, facing the pod. He needed something heavy. A fire extinguisher would do. He wrenched it from the back wall, muffling a whimper of pain as his fingers curled around the cold metal.

“By the way, Walrider, demon, thing, uh, do you plan on killing more people once we get outta this hellhole? Cause if that’s your plan I don’t think I should be doing this, in good conscience and all,”

It hissed at him, ever shifting face baring black fangs.

“Y’know what? I’ll take that as a no. You seem to be the most reasonable, sentient being in this fucked up hell hole. Does that sound like a plan? I get you and Billy out of this place, you don’t cause Armageddon or whatever the fuck it is you would do to society. Deal?”

A growl.

“Glad we’re on the same page,” Miles said, setting down the fire extinguisher as he sized up the pod. He doubted he could shatter it without hurting the occupant, but it was what the Walrider wanted. “Just so we’re clear, uh,” Miles looked to the Walrider, who hovered expectantly over the pod. “If I fuck this up, could you, like, not kill me? Or at least kill me quick. Whichever is easier,”

Static hummed in the back of his mind, pressure building in his ears as it reached a high pitch. He picked up the fire extinguisher, trying to find the best way to hold it with his mangled hands.

“Here goes nothing.”

The glass shattered more easily than he had expected, buckling under the first blow from the fire extinguisher. The liquid inside was sticky and cold, a strong saline smell that brought back memories of his research into Cargill’s human rights abuses in their Peruvian salt mines immediately filling the air.

Billy was still inside the pod, wires and tubes now pulling against his weight and drawing blood. His eyes were still fixated on the screen, dull and passive. An alarm was blaring, softened by distance and the walls that separated Miles from the main hallways. The Walrider was screaming, its form swirling and shifting. Billy was dying.

“Fuck, I’m working on it, fuck, just, just give me a second,” Miles muttered, stepping through the glass on the floor to reach inside the pod, icy liquid squelching uncomfortably beneath his shoes. It was better than blood. A lot about the very heart of Mount Massive was better than the gore and insanity above. “Let’s get you down buddy,”

The restraints were tight, leaving behind imprints on the smaller man’s wrists. Released from the manacles, Billy slumped forward, atrophied muscles in his arms unused to being free from their position wrenched behind his back. The wires and tubes attached to his back and chest were taught, blood streaking down his emaciated ribs and bony spine. Above the Walrider flickered from side to side, shrieking unintelligibly.

He couldn’t imagine how long it took the Murkoff staff to shove these tubes down Billy’s throat, put needles at every joint and wind electrodes around his limbs. Miles grimaced as he quickly removed the tubing and wires that seemed to be imbedded and wound around every inch of Billy’s body, electrodes and needles dangling from their threads inside the empty pod as he pried them from freezing flesh.

He was cold and heavy, skin dull like wax as Miles lifted Billy over the broken glass to set him down on the floor. Billy wasn’t breathing. His pulse was absent from thin, blood soaked wrists. How long had it been since he had drawn breath on his own? Could he breathe on his own?

Miles started compressions, the Walrider’s static screams growing angrier and more panicked. It hurt, his bloodied hands needled with pain at every compression. Two breaths. More compressions. He needed to breathe, but Billy stayed still and silent. Two more breaths. Miles was slowing down, losing the rhythm as panic began to set in his bones. The shadow above was in agony, writhing and hissing. The Walrider charged forward, teeth bared and snarling.

Then Billy coughed. And breathed.

His eyes were bright, dark pupils the size of saucers and iris a mere ribbon of pale blue. Billy gasped for air, throat ragged, and breaths choked.

“There – there you go, breathe, Billy, just breathe,” Miles managed through his own gasping breaths of receding panic. The Walrider was gone. For now. Billy twitched and groaned, nothing more than a whimper of fear and pain escaping his blue lips as he shivered, trying to curl away from Miles, who had retrieved his camera from the Engine’s bright control panels.

“No, no, hey – hey, it’s okay, I’m not,” Miles swallowed the lump in his throat, his blood stained, mauled hands reaching out in a gesture of comfort that suddenly seemed less than friendly. He curled his hands away, pulling them closer to his chest. “My name is Miles. You’re Billy, right? I’m here to get us out, okay? I’m not going to hurt you, I promise.”

Billy stopped inching away, arms and legs shaking from strain, cold, and fear, but his eyes held a gleam of something that might have been hope, and relief.

“Okay, here, you’re freezing,” Miles too off his jacket, wrapping it around Billy’s shaking shoulders. “That better?” The jacket was warm, heavy with the scent of blood and sweat. Billy nodded. “Can you get up? On your own?” Billy could barely sit up on his own, head lolling weakly side to side. “Okay, is it alright, alright if I help you up?” He nodded.

Miles wrapped an arm around Billy, the smaller man’s cold arm slung over his neck. He was heavy. Stiff. His skin seemed almost ashen in the cold light, steps shaking and feet unsure as they made their way to the stairs.

“Take it easy, the exit’s just down this way,” Miles said as they limped down the hall, slowly going over palettes and containers that blocked the path. Even with Miles’ jacket, Billy shivered incessantly, cold fingers gripping the reporter’s shoulder for stability. A few more paces and they would be at the exit.

The doors opened, Miles bracing at the sight of the heavily armed men surrounding Wernicke’s withered, sickly frame. He could feel Billy shake even more violently, from fear rather than the cold in his bones. His eyes were wide with panic, darting over the masks and guns to the old man’s skeletal face and angry eyes.

“You are a fool, I had hoped you would have had the sense to kill this monster, not release it,” Wernicke’s voice slurred, Billy nervously glancing from Miles’ aggrieved expression to the doctor. There was the click of a gun safety.

Billy didn’t know when Miles had pushed him to the side, behind a stack of containers. The first thing he knew that it hurt. His bones hurt. His joints hurt. His head hurt. The second thing he knew was that Miles was hurt, the gunshot a distant echo in his scattered mind. Red was on the floor, a growing puddle. He smelled copper and gunpowder.

The image of Miles, gripping his shoulder, camera still clutched in one hand, glaring up at the men in the doorway, was the last thing Billy Hope remembered before unconsciousness ate away at his vision like rust. The last thing he heard was the rattle of gunfire, and screams.

#outlast #outlast whistleblower #outlast fanfiction #miles upshur #billy hope #the walrider #ra speaks #my writing #guess who now just HAS to write the next few chapters ;)))#it me.

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ice-magician · 5 years

Text

Journal of a Madman

Lawrence, Kansas, 1983

The flames burned hot on Dean's back. Even as a young kid he understood the gravity of the situation- Daddy was in trouble.

John shoved Sam into young Dean's arms screaming, "Take your brother outside as fast as you can and don't look back! Now, Dean, GO!"

Dean grabbed Sam and ran downstairs, feeling the heat of the flames singe his hair. He bolted out the door, but his feet slipped on the dew-covered lawn. Sammy went tumbling out of Dean's arms, wailing and crying. Worry for his baby brother spurred Dean to his feet. He got to his feet, but froze.

Out of nowhere a figure appeared, standing between Dean and his brother.

Though the man's back was turned Dean could feel a smile creep into his voice. "On second thought, you're too precious to leave behind. Aren't you, Sammy?"

The figure turned to face Dean, making the young boy's blood run cold. His eyes were a sickening pale yellow. The evil churning within their depths was enough to make any stomach flip and grown men run away, but not Dean. Dean wasn't leaving Sam.

The young boy heaved himself up with scraped palms, "You leave my brother alone!" he shouted.

The yellow eyed being chuckled, a sound that sent shivers down Dean's spine.

"Oh," he sized Dean up, "why didn't I choose you instead? You've got spunk, kid." The man leaned over, gleaming yellow eyes staring into crystal green ones, "but I will take your brother, and you can't stop me."

The man swiveled around, scooped up crying Sam, and looked down upon the mortified brother.

"Don't worry, kid," he said." I'll take nice care of your brother, better than your daddy ever could." The demon spat the distasteful word.

He smiled down at Sam's tear-streaked face. "Yeah, we'll have lots of fun. Won't we, Sammy?"

Dean lurched forward and pounded his tiny fists on the man's leg.

He shouted at the top of his lungs, hoping beyond hope that his father could hear him. "LET MY BROTHER GO!!! LET MY BROTHER GO!!!"

"Oh, quite a temper on you. You'll see lil Sammy again, someday." He grinned at the boy. "See ya later, Dean-o."

The man snapped his fingers, and was gone. The only trace that he was ever there was the smell of sulfur, and a pair of boot prints fading quickly in the grass.

Dean sobbed. His tiny form fell onto the dew-soaked grass. "BRING MY BROTHER BACK!!! BRING MY BROTHER BAAAAACCCKKK!!!"

I’m sorry. I’m sorry for so many reasons. I’m sorry I could never be the son you deserved. I’m sorry that I couldn’t be the brother he needed. Most of all, I’m sorry that I didn’t know you. I fought, but not enough. I ran, but not fast enough. I resisted, but only when it was too late. I’m so sorry for who I became. You deserve to hear what led to this.

Madness was more of a side effect than the original disease. Madness that tears at the brain and tries to whisper the soul into the blissful dark.

For seven years I ran. For seven years I was going more and more insane. Slowly but surely. It got worse every day. I was plagued with nightmares in the darkness. I could never sleep. I hallucinated when I was awake, so consciousness was a living hell.

In the beginning, I constantly wondered if it was all worth it. The nightmares, the hallucinations, cacophony of resounding voices. I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t die. I knew death was worse than living on the run.

There was no Heaven waiting for me. As I would take my last breath, I would spiral downwards. Their groping claws would pull my soul in every direction. Every demon across every plane of existence would have known I had met my end, and he would have come for me. Even in death, he would find a way to use what I was.

So, I never gave in. I somehow always stopped myself. Now, I know it was the Winchester in me.

I would run. I would run until I couldn’t run anymore. And when my time ran out? When I inevitably would see him again? I took comfort in knowing that my death hadn’t been from my own hand.

Living in my own hell was better than making others’ lives miserable. He had twisted my being into something, something indistinguishable. I had been used. I had been a weapon. I swore on my life that I would never crawl back to that, no matter how broken my sanity would become.

I was Sam. I was a boy with no name, no family, friends, no one. I had been raised by a demon who had taken everything, but I would not be a puppet any longer.

The white washed rooms stared back at me. White sheets, white table, everything was so sterile and clean. Unlike me. I felt as if I didn't belong in a place such as this.

Yes, I belonged in an asylum, but my room's atmosphere of purity made my stomach ache with guilt. I wasn't pure, and I certainly was no hero. I was dark. I was a black, endless void of horror. I was the monster children fear lurking in the cold blackness. I was every lost and lingering shadow. Nowhere to go and nowhere to belong. I was everything he had molded me to be.

No family, friends or even a random cousin that no one really knows but they always show up at family reunions. No, I had none of those things. The only constant in my life was this- solitude. The icy chill of being alone for too long almost overwhelmed me sometimes. But that was okay, I'd convinced myself. I was away from people, and they were away from me. More importantly, I was away from him. Three asylums in four months, and I had no intention of letting him catch my trail. I wasn't going back. Not now, not ever.

My door opened, snapping me out of my trance. It was the nurse, Collie, coming by with the med cart. Collie was cute with her curly brown hair, and knowing green eyes. She was one of the few nurses that would actually have casual conversations with the patients; we were real people, not abnormalities set aside in a desolate facility.

She smiled at me and I managed a weak imitation of a grin back. I liked Collie, but I was never one for social interaction. Still, Collie persisted.

Collie brought over the cup with half a dozen pills inside, "Here you go," she passed the cup to me with some water to wash it down.

I always took them, just to humor the staff. I didn’t need medication. Doctor’s could do nothing to fix a broken soul.

After making sure the medicine was gone, she did a routine check of vitals. I found this excessive, but the institution insisted on making sure their patients were well taken care for.

Collie slid her stethoscope down her neck after checking my heartbeat, "So, Sam," she said, "how have you been feeling?"

I said nothing, knowing actions spoke louder than words. Nothing is more deafening than utter silence.

She bit her lip in concern, "May I?" Collie asked, gesturing to the spot on the bed beside me.

I nodded, "Sure."

Collie slid down to sit. A sad, concerned look criss crossed her face. "Have you been keeping a journal like I asked?"

I gave a sad chuckle. “Yeah, not like there’s much to write about, though.”

"No improvement at all? Not even a lighter mood to the dreams?"

I sighed. "Still monsters... It's always the same, Collie, and I can't stop it... I don't think it will ever stop. I’m sorry. I know you care, and I appreciate that, but there’s nothing you can do to save me."

I studied the linoleum floor, surveying its blocked pattern as I waited for Collie's optimistic response. She had always tried to make things better, to make things seem not half as bad as they were. Unfortunately, it had never worked.

Just as Collie opened her mouth the speakers turned on, announcing it was nap time. Saved by the asylum intercom. She stood and piled her stethoscope atop the cart.

She glanced back at me. "Sam, if you ever need anyone to talk to, about anything, I'm here. I hope you know that. Okay?"

She sounded worried, as if my yes or no would make would break her entire world. I tried a half smile again. "Yeah, sure, Collie."

Collie smiled, pivoted, and pushed her cart out the door, brunette hair flipping behind her. I was alone again with my thoughts.

My eyes grew heavy. I didn't want to sleep, but exhaustion doesn't care what I think. Involuntarily, I laid back and slid into another nightmare.

I ran hard, fast. I hadn't run that fast in a long time. I was in a forest. Tall oaks and spruces loomed above my head to form a canopy, blotting out the sun. It was hard to see anything. My breathing was heavy and I was sweating buckets. I had been running for so long that my brain couldn’t recall when exactly the chase had started.

The smell of blood stopped me dead in my tracks. I licked my lips and a salty, sickeningly familiar taste oozed down my throat. Not today. Not ever again. I'd been clean for too long to cave in now....

"Sam!"

A man's voice echoed across the dark woods. He sounded familiar somehow, but not from my nightmares. It wasn't the voice of my victims, my colleagues, or my tormentor.

This voice wasn't threatening. There was genuine concern. My heart ached. Whoever this mystery man was I seemed to know him. No, not just know him, I missed him.

A figure jumped through the foliage of a bush in front of me. He was covered in sweat and blood, but I didn't focus on that. The figure before me, someone I had never met in my life, I knew. I knew him in the indescribable way your gut tells you the truth, whether or not you have experienced or seen it.

He stared back, eyes wide. He seemed surprised to find me, maybe even a little relieved.

My heart ached again. I'd never seen this man in my life but I felt the compelling urge to bear hug him.

His eyes grew misty. "Sammy." He almost whispered my name.

I gulped a deep breath of air and uttered a name I'd never said but felt all too familiar on my lips, "Dean?"

Dean, Dean Winchester. His name was Dean, and he smiled back as wide as a cavern. He acted as if he had found the greatest treasure in the world. He took a step towards me.

Suddenly, the air whistled with the sound of an arrow being shot. Dean gasped and clutched the projectile now lodged in his chest. He staggered to the forest floor.

"Dean!" I screamed, lunging forward to catch his fall.

He coughed up blood and spit onto the leafy ground.

Dean smiled a sad, painful smile. "Too slow on my feet, huh?"

He hacked up more blood. I held his head and tried to keep him awake, but his eyes fluttered shut.

"Dean? No! Dean!"

Sorrow choked my voice. I hugged his body closer, the wound still dripping blood. Suddenly, Dean went rigid. He pulled away and looked at me. My stomach did a somersault. No longer were Dean's eyes green with life. No, now they're an all too familiar yellow.

Wearing Dean’s face, Yellow Eyes smiled. "I'm coming, Sam. Don't you worry, we'll be a family again soon."

Everything went black as a demon's eyes.

I jumped in my bed, cold sweat soaked the mattress and clung to my shirt. I bent over to switch on the lamp on my side table, and winced with the effort. Urgently, I turned on the light. It's soft beam made the room glow a strange tint of yellow.

I looked at my hands- they were bleeding. My fingernails were jagged and bloody. I gingerly ripped a piece of cloth from my bed sheet. Biting one end, I wrapped the four crescent- shaped cuts in my hand as best I could. The mattress' springs bounced pitifully under me as I repositioned for my injured hand. He was coming. I had to leave. I had to go... but where?

Sighing, I closed my eyes. It was too late (or too early?) to think about running for my life, or from my life. My mind slid into a state of semi-consciousness- not awake, but not asleep either.

The air was cool in the corridor. Everyone else was in the commons room, but I always enjoyed the view of the yard. Large windows looked out to the world beyond- the world of the sane free, the world of the sane… more or less. I stared at the perfectly polished glass and stroked its smooth surface, my hurt hands shouting in protest. That morning I'd caved and asked the nearest nurse for help. Luckily, she was one that didn't care. She applied the antibacterial, wrapped it in gauze, and happily wiped me from her mind. I smiled. It's the small things.

I looked back outside. When people think “asylum” what probably springs to mind is straight jackets and concrete exterior. While some assumptions were true, the same could not be said for the building’s grounds. Patients weren’t allowed at the building’s entrance, but there was a beautiful backyard. Wooden benches hugged a concrete path lined with planted flowers. An old tree stood proud in the middle of the grounds, the walkway curving around it, and ending at the fence which cut patients off from the outside world.

Behind the fence laid a dense forest of ancient planted giants. I recalled my dream, and shivered. That man, Dean, I could still feel his blood on my hands. The horrors of the nightmare reemerged. A man, a friend? Looming trees, and darkness that consumed all noise. A well aimed arrow, and a crooked smile.

Through the night I had desperately tried to remember him. I drew his face on my notebook so I wouldn’t forget. Dean, whoever he was, was trying desperately to find me, and, for what felt like the first time, I wanted to be found.

I wanted more than help. I wanted more than just a life of sadly limping along lonely hallways, constantly glancing over my shoulder. For the first time in a long time, I wanted to live. I wanted it so badly. I needed it. I needed to know the man from my dream. I needed to know what he wanted.

My sad reflection glared at me from the window. I really was a sorry excuse for a man, wasn’t I? Frustration boiled inside me. A deep part of me, the part I tried so hard to contain, contemplated smashing the glass. This wasn't the only time I'd entertained the thought. The cursed vision swelled in my mind's eye- glass would litter the floor, alarms would buzz wildly overhead. My vision would go red. My heartbeat would pound in my ear. I would be able to feel the very blood rushing through the frantic bodies around me. I would bend down to scoop up the largest shard I could find and then... and then.

I took my hand off the slick surface, leaving behind a sweaty film. My breathing had become deep and frantic. I rubbed my eye so hard it hurt. When would the visions stop? The waking nightmares fueled the monster lurking beneath the surface. No, I was not that man anymore. I had escaped, and I’d be damned if he ever dragged me back.

The thought stopped my racing mind. I was damned, I had been my entire life. There was Heaven, sure, but not for me. Hell, well, a more or less welcome home party surely waited. Purgatory, but that was for monsters. If there was no life outside of the poison that set my destiny, then I just wanted to fade into oblivion. No eternal happiness or damnation, just, nothing. I was ok with nothing.

I turned to continue walking towards my cell, for that's what it was- a cell. Then a voice caught my attention.

"There is no rest for you, Sammy."

Ice-cold tendrils weaved their way in between my vertebrae and tightened with a vice grip. I knew that voice. I hated that voice. I tried to avoid it as often as I could. I hardly opened my mouth because of that voice.

My reflection spoke again, "You're a monster, Sam. For what you've done to people, for what you've done to anything you touch, you're going to burn."

I whipped my head around to face the monster. He had sickening pale skin and eyes sunk so far into his skull that he looked like a dead man. His lips were chapped and bleeding. Along his face, cuts oozed liquid as white as himself. My monster, myself.

He smiled again, with his jagged, shark-like teeth.

Rage boiled inside me. "I've already burned," I told him, "I've endured every form of punishment that I deserve."

He waggled a thin, blood soaked finger at me, making a “tisk-tisk” sound.

"Oh, Sammy, but you haven't. He will come. Soon. He will come. He will take you home."

I gulped so hard my Adam's Apple hurt. "No. I'll never go back. Not on my life."

He snickered. "What life? Your life was over the moment you were born..."

"Shut up," I whispered.

"... But the worst is fearing the unknown, right?" My reflection snickered and sang in a sick lullaby tone, "Poor little Sammy, sitting in a tree, waiting for Azazel to rescue me. Again I swing, again I play, 'til I'm thrown back in the dark, old cage."

"I SAID SHUT UP!!!!"

I hit the glass hard. Jagged lines spread across my monster's face. He continued to smile. He smiled until the entire window came crashing down. Blood and glass spilled over the once pristine floor. My labored breaths returned. What had I done? I had used its strength. A part of me had buckled.

Alarms screeched throughout the building. Overwhelming screams of insanity and fear cascaded over me. I clamped my hands over my ears to lessen the noise. It did nothing to silence the monster’s laughter that resonated in my skull.

Boots pounded against the white linoleum floor. Before I knew it, I was surrounded by guards. They cuffed me, and dragged me to my room. Through it all, I didn’t resist. My mind was reeling with what I had just done. I couldn’t remember the last time I had used its strength. Was I becoming weak? Had the arrival of hope shaved down the calloused resolve I had built up over the years? I had just wanted him to stop. To stop telling me everything I already knew, but hoped to avoid.

I wasn’t aware of my surroundings until I was strapped onto my bed. The workers buckled arm, and ankle restraints tightly. Sweat dripped down my forehead; my hair clung to my face. I couldn’t breath. The world was breaking around me.

Something sharp pierced my skin. Liquid sleep flowed in my veins. Within moments, everything started to relax. I couldn’t sleep. I couldn’t rest. I needed answers. I needed to find Dean…

A part of myself drifted into oblivion, but not without hearing demon's voice whisper in my ears. "You're going to burn, Sam."

The backwoods road lay covered in fallen Autumn leaves. Fall. How could it be Fall already? Dean took a swig of beer and set it back in its holder. From the trunk came sounds of banging and scratching. Someone was getting restless.

"HEY!" Dean threw an empty beer can in the backseat, a weak attempt at getting the creature's attention.

"Shut your cake hole or I'll rip you a new one!"

It didn't help.

The monster continued to claw and screech in its makeshift prison.

Dean sighed. Why couldn't the badies just accept their fate and shut the hell up?

"Twenty more miles," he whispered to himself, "just twenty more miles."

Twenty Miles Later

"AHHHHHHHH!!!!" the demon howled in agony.

Holy water dripped down his face. The creature, going by the name of Sahar, struggled against his bonds. His screams echoed down the empty halls of the rotting office building. The chair rocked back and forth with the power of his quakes. Of course, raw strength would get him nowhere, and the Devil’s Trap at his feet nulled any supernatural power that could save his life.

"It's no use, Sahar." Dean said,. He crouched to look the demon in the eyes. Sahar’s long hair was caked with sweat and holy water. His black eyes boiled with rage as steam rose from his burned face.

"Look around you. You're not going anywhere." Dean smirked.

Sahar spat out a laugh. "Maybe, but neither are you, Winchester. You're looking for your brother, I presume, but you won't find him. Whatever you do to me, it won't even touch what Yellow Eyes would if I say a word."

Dean spun the knife in his hands. The blade was a beautiful thing- forged with metal from the deepest pit of Hell. Dean had snagged it off a demon in Tennessee a few years back. Since then, it had been his go-to weapon with the black-eyes sons of bitches.

Moonlight reflected across Dean's features, but the rage in his eyes shone brighter. For a moment, the demon wondered if Dean actually could do worse than Yellow Eyes. A strong willed man with a vengeance was nearly impossible to stop, especially if he was a Winchester.

"Listen, Sahar," Dean casually sat across from the demon on a lone office chair. "I'm going to give you three chances. Chance one-" Dean counted them off on his fingers as he went, "you tell the truth and I'll give you a quick death. Chance two- lying equals demon blade plus holy water rain storm. And Chance three," Dean smiled, "well, I guess I'll just get creative."

Sahar spat through bloody teeth. "Maybe you should listen to your old man- give up, daddy's boy!"

Dean bolted from his chair. He ran at Sahar and gripped him by his dreadlocks. The demon gasped in surprise. He gulped for air as the hunter pulled his neck back further and further.

Dean glared at the filthy, scum of the earth creature. He felt no pity for the man trapped inside his own body. For all he knew, that man was dead and gone. All Dean saw was a hunk of meat in a fancy suit with a slithering, Hell infested demon inside. He truly didn't care what would happen next.

"You're gonna regret that, buddy. Now tell me-where is Sam Winchester?"

Sahar gargled a sick laugh. "Your brother is gone, Dean. He was gone a long time ago. Lost to all."

Dean gripped Sahar's dreadlocks harder, causing the demon to spit up more blood. This interrogation was nearing its end.

Dean held the knife the Sahar's throat. "I don't believe you."

"Believe me,” Sahar gurgled between sentences, “don't believe me. What does it matter? I'm dead, and your life's work is useless. Sam. Is. Dead."

Those were Sahar's last words. With one clean slice, Dean cut the demon's throat. Sparks of orange ran through his body, illuminating the skeleton, and burning his corrupted soul. The sound of Dean’s panting and demon blood hitting dusty floor were the only sounds for miles. Sahar could lie no more.

Dean packed up his things. He burned the body, readied the Impala, all with one sentence racing through his mind- Demons lie. Demons lie. Demons. LIE.

He slammed the trunk closed. Dean hated asking for help, but years of searching and coming up empty handed had left him desperate. That demon had been his last chance. The only lead he had gotten ahold of in months was reduced to ashes.

Dean leaned back and grunted. The demon had known about John. How had he known? It felt like a lifetime ago, but the argument still rang in Dean’s ears.

“Stay away from Sam, Dean. I know you don’t like it, believe me, I don’t either, but you need to stay out of this.”

“Why? We’ve been spending all this time searching for Yellow Eyes to avenge Mom and Sam, so why stop now?”

“I’m not stopping. You are.”

“What?!”

“Dean, your brother is beyond saving. I’ve seen what the demon’s done to him; there’s no coming back from the carnage he leaves in his wake... Just, please, stay out of it.”

“Like Hell I will.”

That was the last time he had seen his father. Five years, five years with no contact from the man he had once admired. Dean assumed it was a good thing and a bad thing. On one hand, his father hadn’t found Sam, on another, they still weren’t on speaking terms. Whatever, the problems of his father were his alone. On the road with no companion but the various mix tapes in his dashboard, Dean had learned how to take care of himself. He didn’t need his father; he needed Sam, and by God that’s what he was going to do.

Swallowing his pride, Dean dialed an old friend. “Pamela, it’s Dean. Yeah, yeah it has been a while. Listen, could you meet me at Bobby’s place? I… I need your help.”

Bobby's place was an old, run-down mechanic shop with a home attached. Nothing to look twice at, but only at first glance. Take a step beyond the "Get Out" signs, rusting machinery, and the barking rottweiler, and you'd start noticing some oddities.

Strange crystals hung hidden in trees. The place had a subtle smell of salt to it. And, behind every other rusted iron rod, there would be a toolbox full of polished knives, and other assorted weaponry. Dean knew that some trucks were stashed with extra rounds of ammunition, and salt. He had to admit- he’d missed the old place.

It’s, well, it’s really good to see you, boy.”

Bobby held Dean in a tight hug. If it was anyone else, Dean would have let go immediately, but Bobby was, well, Bobby. He had watched over Dean when he was too young to hunt. He had helped Dean fix his first car engine when he was twelve. More recently, he had jerked Dean out of his pity party after the big fight with John. He had aided Dean more than Dean cared to admit. In more ways than one, Bobby was Dean’s father.

Dean released Bobby from the hug. “You too, Bobby.”

It had been years since the two had had a real, face-to-face conversation. Between hunting, and searching for Sam, there was no time for chit chats. Neither could admit that it wasn’t great to see the other after such a long time.

“Alright, don’t hog the boy, Singer.”

A woman in a tank top with dark hair smiled at Dean. “He’s got to save one for me.”

Dean smirked. “I could never forget you, Pamela.”

The psychic raised an eyebrow. “I’m not sure if that was a pickup line, or a compliment, but it doesn’t matter. Come here.”

Pamela embraced Dean. “We missed ya, kid.” Pamela said into Dean’s ear.

Dean pulled back. “Yeah, I, I’ve just been busy.”

Bobby snorted. “‘Busy’ my ass. ‘Busy’ is working one case. What you call ‘busy’ is what other people call ‘obsessing’.” Bobby sighed. “But, I guess it runs in the family.”

Dean froze. “I suppose it does.”

A dark silence fell over the group. The air suddenly felt like was pounding on Dean’s chest, trying to break him.

Pamela smacked Bobby’s arm, and gave him a stern glare. “Anyway, we aren’t here for you boys to sulk around. We’ve got work to do.”

Pamela strode into Bobby’s house, leaving Dean and Bobby in her dust.

“I’m sorry, boy.” Bobby said, “It’s just. I worry about you.”

A moment passed, then Dean gave Bobby a sly smile. “I’ll make sure to hold those feelings close to my heart, old man.”

“Shut up and get inside… idjit.”

Pamela was waiting at Bobby’s kitchen table. “Glad you boys decided to join me.”

“Bobby was just too overwhelmed with emotion at seeing me. Personally, I think he might need help.” Dean pretended to whisper the last part as he sat down next to Pamela.

“Blab all you want, boy, but I’ve still got pictures of you during-.” “Ha ha, you’re right, Bobby. Let’s. Just. Move. On.” Dean said through gritted teeth.

The old man victoriously took the final seat at the table. Bobby’s kitchen wasn’t a ‘kitchen’ in the sense of home cooked meals, sit down with family area. His had more of a “this is a week old, but it’s probably still good” charm to it. Old and new beer bottles sat on the countertop. The trash can was already filled with old beer cans, discarded numbers, and dirty napkins. One wall proudly held an array of landlines with labels such as “FBI”, “CDC”, etc. Some might call it a fixer upper, but Bobby’s house represented every American hunter, and he was damn well proud of it.

At the table’s center sat a silver blade, a bowl, and a strange necklace. A simple piece, with a leather strap, and one gold pendant. No one knew the piece’s exact origin, only that it was highly valued among people who collected supernatural artifacts. Bobby had acquired it some years ago, and it had never seen the light of day until Pamela found it.

“And you’re sure about this?” Dean asked.

“About 75% sure.”

Dean raised an eyebrow, making Pamela raise her hands in surrender.

“Hey, if this thing was buried so deep that even Bobby isn’t sure, you can’t have a 100% guarantee.”

“She’s right, you know.” Bobby pointed to the strange necklace. “What little lore I could find on this thing points to it being able to sense something. A few sources say the old man upstairs, but a few reference it as a tracker.”

For last ditch efforts. Dean thought.

“But,” Bobby picked up a blade. He extended the handle to Dean. “here’s to hoping it’ll work in our favor.”

Dean nodded, and took the knife. In one swift motion, he slit the palm of his left hand. Searing pinpricks of pain jolted through his appendage. Dean bit his lip in concentration, pouring every fiber of him, every thought, every molecule, into one single thought- Sam.

His blood dribbled into the old ceramic bowl. Bobby took the necklace, and sank its head into the growing pool of red liquid. Dean could almost feel Bobby’s energy mixing with his, both shouting Sam’s name. Bobby left the ancient pendant to soak in Dean’s blood. The brother leaned back, his mind racing, yet focused. All he could do was replay that night. The night he lost not only his mother, his brother, but his father as well. The necklace would work. All evidence pointed to the mysterious piece holding great power. It had to work.

Pamela held out her hands to Dean and Bobby. Her eyes were set, no doubt deep in concentration. Everyone needed to be prepared for whatever came next, be it disappointment, or relief.

Dean grasped her hand, letting his blood flow into her palm. “Let’s do this.”

I dreamt of a two lane road. I turned left, then right; there was no one. Trees clung to pavement's edge, itching to crawl into the forbidden territory of craggily cement.

I could see the moon overhead. The moon, the stars, they all hung blissfully in a sea of black night sky. When had I ever had a dream so quiet? So… uneventful? Something wasn't right. Quiet wasn't right, not for me.

I took another step forward, but almost fell on my face. I felt the ground swell beneath my feet. Cracking cement heaved up, then down, like a breathing chest. I was sent careening into a nearby tree. My back hit the rough bark with a “thud!”. I fell onto moist grass, surely bruising both my knees.

The world began to merge together. Stars slid into trees like two watercolors converging. The bright moon twisted into a blurry spiral; becoming one with the darkness of the night. I held my own spinning head, my eyes squeezed painfully shut. It was all too much. Too many swaying, spiralling images. I was in a sick LSD trip with no way out.

“Been down since I began to crawl…”

What the Hell?

Somewhere beyond me, music was playing. Mournful lyrics with an upbeat tune, I could almost feel it growing closer to me.

“... Been down since I began to crawl

If it wasn't for bad luck, you know I wouldn't have no luck at all

Hard luck and trouble is my only friend

I been on my own ever since I was ten…”

Slowly, I felt the world begin to cease its warped escapade. My body’s molecules stopped feeling like they were being drawn and quartered. Beneath my hands, the grass calmly receded. In its place, a rough ground grew. Gaining my courage, I finally dared to open my eyes. The first thing I saw was tattered carpet. I gingerly rubbed the fabric, where grass had been moments before. Still disoriented from my roadside experience, I gave myself a moment to lift my head.

A house, an old, musty house, with books scattered everywhere. I was in some sort of den-turned-office room, with an old wooden desk at my back. Everything would have appeared relatively normal, if not for the three people holding hands in front of me. An old man, a woman, and another man, whose back was turned to me. Their eyes were all closed in deep focus, a mysterious bowl sat on the table between them.

I could tell immediately that they weren’t demons. There was no smell of sulfur in the air, only booze and old books. It didn’t seem likely that Azazel would recruit humans to do his work, even for small cases. If it wasn’t demons, then where was I?

I tried to stand up, but all the blood had drained from my legs. Instead, I ended up falling backwards onto the old writing desk. Papers and books went tumbling from their respective places, and, in sync, the three figures opened their eyes and turned towards me.

My world stood still. Everyone was at attention, almost in fighting stances. The old man’s eyes grew incredibly wide, his face completely drained of color; the woman looked almost equally as stunned. Normally, I would be as far away from the old house as possible, leaving it and its secrets in my wake. One thing stopped me- the final figure. Bright green eyes stared at me, the same eyes I had watched the light drain from. It was him- the man from my dream.

“Dean?”

“Sam?”

We both stopped, shocked at our synchronized responses. Dean took a small step towards me. The woman looked like she wanted to protest, but thought better of it. The man in the trucker’s cap had tears in his eyes.

“Is,” Dean held back a choking sob. “Is it really you?”

“I, um….” I nervously shuffled my feet. I might have known Dean from my dream, but I still didn’t really know anything about him. All I had was a gut feeling that we had met before.

The man with the trucker’s cap held Dean’s shoulder. “This is all a lot to take in, I know, but for right now we need to focus on finding him.”

Finding me? The only people who wanted to find me were demons. Had I been wrong? Were they playing me? I tried to inch backwards, but the desk was still in my way. I could have bolted to the right, to the open door, but something told me the three would have pinned me down in seconds. I didn’t want them to do something we would both regret.

My stomach suddenly tangled into a knot. My knees buckled beneath me from the spontaneous pain.

“Pamela?” Dean shouted. “What the hell is happening?!”

Sweat cascaded down my forehead. I couldn’t breath; it felt like the room’s air had condensed to form a solid mass pressing hard against my chest. Dean tried to take another step forward, but the woman, Pamela, grabbed his arm.

“Dean, this is still a vision. Something is obviously wrong on Sam’s end. Break what little connection we have and we’ll lose him forever.” She cast me a sorrowful look, then turned back to Dean. “Hurry.”

Dean nodded curtly. “Okay, okay.”

He squatted down to my level. I must have looked like a mess. Matted brown hair stuck to my face like glue on paper. My breathing reflected that of an asthma attack. I was drowning. Drowning in a sea of pain, of fear. Some… something was wrong. My soul was being ripped from my body. Dean’s body was practically trembling. He had tears in his eyes, like he was the one in pain.

“Sam? Sam… where are you right now?”

Where was I? Images flashed through my mind. Previously polished hallways were bathed in red. Once lively patients sat limp on blood- stained seats. My safe place, my windows, were as they had been when I left them- bashed in, but someone stood on the broken glass. Her brown hair was caked in blood, her white nurse’s gown torn to shreds. Collie turned to me, and my breath caught in my throat. Her eyes were completely bloodshot, liquid of life running down her cheeks.

“Help… help us… Sam.” Collie began to cough up blood. She fell in a heap on the floor, completely motionless.

“Sam? Sam!”

I was back in the old house. All three party members had high levels of worried looks on their faces, none more so than Dean. He was so close that he was nearly touching me, almost throwing Pamela’s advice completely out the window.

I sucked in deep breaths of air. “Brycon Family Psychiatric Hospital, Nebraska. Hurry.”

The room spiralled into a dark void, until Dean’s worried look was the last thing I saw.

Black eyes. I awoke to two sets of black eyes standing over me, both dressed in nurses’ bodies. I didn’t recognize either, but their sickening sneers were the signature stamp of every demon. I readied my body to bolt for the door, only to find I couldn't move. My hands were restrained in cuffs at my side, and my ankles were locked to the bed frame.

The female demon patted my head. “Aw, does baby want to play tag?”

“Go to Hell!” I spat at her.

Both demons howled with repulsive laughter. Their voices bounced off the walls as bone- chilling wails. The male demon’s eyes twinkled with mischief. A part of me wanted to ask what had happened to everyone, but the other part didn’t want to know.

“Oh,” he said. “That insult never gets old.” The demon grabbed my face. He squeezed so hard I could feel bruises begin to form. My squirming only fueled his excitement.

“Alright, alright. Calm down, everyone.” Someone’s voice called from the doorframe. A demon in a tight black dress and bouncing black hair relaxed her shoulder against the metal frame. Under normal circumstances, she would have appeared like nothing more than a woman going for a fancy night out. But, as the demon stood under the flickering bulb in my room, dark stains became more and more apparent on her dress. Black stilettos flaunted a nauseating color of red.

I should have felt revolted, utterly repulsed by the amount of blood that stained her face and hands, but I wasn’t. Innocent people’s blood that decorated her outfit wasn’t what made my stomach hit the floor- it was that I saw myself in her place. Young me stood in that doorway, drenched in demon and human blood alike, and I was smiling.

She grinned blood- soaked teeth at me. “We wouldn’t want to damage the merchandise.”

With a painful shove, the male demon released my face. Black Dress sauntered towards me, a signal for the other two to leave. She sat down on my bed, hardly making the mattress move.

She idlely made circles on my kneecap. “You know, Sam, we’ve all really missed you. It will be so great to have you back home.”

I jerked my leg away, as far as my restraints would allow me. The mere thought of her touching me made my blood boil. No, I was not going back. Dean would find me. Wherever he was, he would find me. All I had to do is stall.

“I am not going with you. Whatever it takes, I will beat you. I will beat him.”

Black dress gave an exasperated sigh. “Sammy boy, you don’t really believe that, do you?” The demon studied my face for an answer. Hard, stone- cold eyes stared back at her.

“Yes, yes I do believe that. I will shred my soul. I will fade into oblivion. I will do anything I have to. So, all you black- eyed sons of bitches can go screw yourselves.”

The snark faded from the demon’s face. Her eyes narrowed, anger at my stubborn resolve obviously building inside her. She knew I wasn’t bluffing. With a huff, she stood from my bed.

“You want to play hard ball? Fine. Guys!”

The two demons returned to the room, this time both holding a squirming hostage. My breath caught. I knew it had happened, but a part of me had prayed it wasn’t true. The female nurse restrained a gagged and bloody Collie. One eye was bruised so much that it was swollen shut, but the other was wild, darting around the room at every demon, until finally landing on me. Through her gag, she called my name.

All the blood in my body had turned to ice. I needed her to run. I needed everyone to escape with their lives. The demons were my responsibility. I had brought them down on the unsuspecting heads of people who had given me sanctuary.

Black Dress gazed back at the two innocent captives. “Pathetic, isn’t it? Human lives, so easily snuffed out. Their bodies, so easily damaged.”

With a swift flick of her wrist, she backhanded Collie across the face. The nurse who had shown such kindness to me, who was beaten because of me, let out a muffled scream. The demon struck again, and again, and again.

“Stop!” I shouted. I struggled harder against my bindings. I had to help Collie. She didn’t deserve what was happening; none of them did.

“Stop!” I screamed again.

Black Dress turned back to me, the devilish smile had returned to her face. She had known I would give in. She had known that I couldn’t let innocent people get hurt because of me.

“Ah, Sam.” The demon returned to my side, rubbing her bruising knuckles. “I expected more out of you. Seven years alone has made you soft. Then again, you were never truly be Azazel’s pet, were you? Escaping with your sanity, part of your humanity in tact. The sad fact is, no matter how much demon blood, no matter how much training you go through, a part of you always sees the good, doesn’t it?” She sighed, and flicked the caked on blood off her nails. “I suppose it’s just the Winchester in you, huh? You bastards never seem to learn your place...”

Winchester? Did she say Winchester?

Black Dress was still rambling, but I had stopped paying attention.

Winchester? Winchester like, like Dean? Are we related?

Puzzle pieces began to fall into their rightful places. That was why he had been so emotional, so obviously desperate to find me. He was family. Dean was family, but a nagging sensation told me he was more than that. Dean was family, and, and…

The hospital faded away. I was in an old car, singing along to rock songs made long before I was born. Dean sat on the driver’s side, passionately belting out lyrics. We were happy. We were together, and we were happy.

The scene changed. Dean and I stood outside of a once busy office building. We were in fancy two piece suits. A grisly scene sat before us. A good seven feet of ground was tapped off, several patches of it covered with white sheets. We flashed fake badges at a skeptical police officer.

“Agents Zeppelin, and Elliot.” Dean lied. “We’re here to take a look at the bodies.”

The officer scoffed. “Good luck. They’re in about half a dozen spots.”

I didn’t doubt him. The area certainly smelled like something had died. I turned to Dean, who looked like he might throw up. A small smile crept up my lips.

My vision changed one last time. Deep, cracking pain shot through my right shoulder. Somehow, I already knew it was broken. I felt like utter crap. The world was dark and cold. My shoes dragged across muddy earth. A voice called somewhere in the darkness. Dean and the man in the trucker hat rounded a corner on the road in front of me. They were both carrying shotguns, like they were prepared for a fight.

That’s because they were. A voice rose in my mind.

Dean’s expression loosened into one of utter relief. “Sam?”

I smiled a little. “Dean.”

His joy didn’t last long. As quickly as it had arrived, relief was thrown out and replaced with sheer horror. “Sam, look out!”

I didn’t even have time to respond. A white hot pain, unlike anything I had ever felt before, sliced through my back. I fell to my knees, unable to carry my own weight. Dean ran towards me at full force.

“Nooooo!”

He slid to the ground in front of me. He was talking, but I could barely hear him. The pain in my back dulled into a deep throb. Dean was holding up my head, trying desperately to keep me awake. I knew it was no use. I could feel my soul begin to fade; my consciousness ascend from my body. I… I was dying

One last remark from Dean made it through. “... That’s my job, right? Take care of my pain- in- the- ass little brother....” Brother. Dean was my brother.

My mind fell back into the hospital room. The demon was still talking, Collie and a patient were still being held hostage. It was like nothing had changed, but for me, the world had been flipped on its head. I had a family. I had people who missed me, who cared about me. I had people who had been looking for me my entire life, the life of a twisted demon boy. The other life, the one from my visions, that had been taken from me. My family had been taken from me. Azazel had stolen everything. A life had been stolen, but by God I would not let the one I lived be destroyed as well.

My body began to quake with anger; the world around was taking on a new light. I could almost feel the sweat from my body evaporate off, as if my rage was turning me into a human furnace. A newfound strength swelled inside my soul. All the demons must have recognized it as well. Collie stared at me with a mixture of curiosity and fear.

Black Dress leaned inches away from my face. “Are you even listening to me, boy? Don’t you care that-?” She cut herself off. Her eyes widened, whether from shock of fear I wasn’t sure.

“You know what? No. No, I don’t care. I am not that guy anymore, and nothing you, Azazel, or the Devil himself can change that. You know why?”

Without hesitation, I headbutted her in the face, sending her reeling backwards. She twisted her ankle wrong, and her stilettos sent her falling to the ground. The demon hit her head with a sickening “Thud!” on the hard surface.

“Because I’m Sam Fucking Winchester.”

The remaining two demons, sensing a turn in the tide, released Collie and the other patient. Their hosts’ bodies shook in convulsions, before flying out the door in twin plumes of smoke. Adrenaline was rushing through my body. There was more of them, I knew it. If Azazel was on his way, then there were more to come as well.

The patient had fled the room, which left only Collie and I. She was half facing the door, where the demons had taken their swift leave. I could see her mouth hanging open in disbelief.

“Collie? Collie!”

The nurse slowly turned back to me. Her face was completely white, the only color coming from the bruises inflicted upon her. A thousand questions flew across her eyes in a single second. There was so much she needed to know, but apparently couldn’t find the words. Instead, she stared down at the unconscious demon on the floor. I was worried she might pass out, or have a nervous breakdown.

“Collie, look, I know this doesn’t make sense right now, but things are about to get ten times worse. I need you to uncuff me so we can get out of here.”

She didn’t move.

“Collie?”

“D-demons. Those... those were demons.”

I nodded slowly. “Yes, they were.”

She nervously gulped. “And… and you?”

“I… I’m a friend, which is why we need to go.”

Outside my room, something crashed. I could hear the tell tale sound of demons flying through the air. They knew something was up.

“Collie! Now! I need you now!”

Collie shook her head, trying to force herself out of her daze. She rushed to my side, and unlocked every restraint. I tested my ankles on the floor. They were a little weak, but I could manage. I twisted my wrists, trying to get the blood flowing again.

I turned to Collie. “Okay, where’s the speaker station?”

She blinked in surprise. “Ah, um, it’s at the front desk. We had a private room, but it’s shut down for maintenance.”

“Okay. Good, good, that’s good. Listen to me- go and wait outside. If you see an old black car, flag them down, alright?”

“But, what about you?” Collie furrowed her eyebrows. “Don’t think I’ll play ‘damsel in distress’ while you fight like a lone wolf!”

Her determination, her grit, that was the Collie that had watched over me during my time at Brycon’s. I admired that about her, but her willingness to fight wasn’t what we needed. Collie wasn’t equipped with the knowledge I had about demons, and we didn’t exactly have an arsenal of supernatural firepower at the ready.

“I’m sorry, Collie, but that’s what I need from you right now. Just trust me.”

She looked directly into my eyes. I felt my very soul being scrutinized. Collie didn’t know whether or not to trust me, and, given the circumstances, I didn’t blame her.

Finally, she nodded. “Okay. Take this hallway, then a direct right. Got it?” I nodded, and Collie started to head out the door, but she stopped short. The nurse turned back and pointed at me. “But if I die, know that it’s on your ass, Sam.”

“I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

I gave her a quick smile before she bolted from the room. There was a door leading outside, only accessible by a worker’s keycard. Collie would get out fine, but it was my turn to get to the front desk. I leaned down, and riffled through the pockets of the male nurse. A jolt of exhilaration rushed through me when I came back with his keycard.

I followed Collie’s instructions to the locked door. Swiping the dead man’s key card, I opened the door to the lobby, and to a horror scene. Bodies lay strewn across the floor. They were all in various intact states, depending on what demon attacked who. Nearly every inch of the carpet was soaked in blood. I held my mouth to resist the urge to vomit.

Another crash sounded behind me. Through the glass doors, I saw a growing cloud of smoke barreling down the hallway.

Ah, Hell...

I rushed behind the front desk, shoving aside the dead worker. “I’m so sorry.” I said sincerely.

All the destruction, the heartbreak, it was all my fault. Some would say that there was no way I could have prevented the destruction brought upon Brycon’s, and they would be right, but I could have kept myself on the run. If I hadn’t stopped for so long. If I hadn’t gotten so, so comfortable… It didn’t matter. What was done was done. My job was to avenge those who had lost their lives. It was on my shoulders to make things right.

On the desk before me sat various letters, a family photo, a stress ball, and a microphone. I glanced at the photo, of the smiling man, who lay dead on the floor. I said a quiet prayer for his family to forgive what I had done. I leaned into the mic.

“Deus, et pater Domini nostri Jesu Christi, invoco nomen sanctum tuum, et omnem immundum spiritum, qui vexat hoc plasma tuum…”

“So, what? You exorcised an entire asylum?”

Dean and I were rolling down the backroads of Nebraska. It was one o’ clock in the morning, but I had no intention of sleeping. We had been driving down dirt roads, taking every shortcut and loop possible, in hopes that the police wouldn’t catch wind of our location. Personally, I had no problem with it; any moment I got to spend with Dean, with my brother, was a moment I would treasure. Of course, when he wasn’t making me sound like some kind of hero to his surogat dad.

I nervously rubbed the back of my neck. Dean was making it out to be far more of a big deal than it needed to be. “I mean, you just say the words.”

Dean shook his head in disbelief. “‘You just say the words.’ Can you believe this, Bobby?” He shouted into the phone.

Over speakerphone, I could hear the snicker in Bobby’s voice. “Sounds like your brother could teach you a thing or too.”

“Hey! Say the word- I’ll kill any monster. Shifter, demon, chupacabra. I’m there.”

Bobby sighed. “Unfortunately, I know that’s true.”

Dean rolled his eyes, but held back another snarky remark. A sense of joy I had never experienced before rose in me. For so long I had been running scared. Running from my past, even from my future. But with Dean, with Bobby? I wasn’t scared anymore.

“Hey, uh, Bobby.” I said into the phone. “Did you… did you get what I asked for.”

A moment of silence passed. “Yeah, yeah I got it. Collie’s fine too, in case you were wonderin’.”

“I never had a doubt that she would be fine… but, you’ll still meet us at your house, right?”

“... If it’s what you want. Honestly, Sam, I don’t know if this will accomplish anything.”

I felt a rock tie itself to my gut, and begin to pull me down. I knew it was probably a fruitless endeavor; Dean and Bobby had both said so, but I had to at least try.

“I know, Bobby, but if I don’t… If I just sit here, I don’t think I could ever forgive myself.”

“I get it, boy. You hard headed Winchesters just never give up.” “If we weren’t hard headed then we wouldn’t be Winchesters, would we?” Dean smiled to himself.

“No, no, I suppose not. I’ll see you boys in a few.”

I returned the burner phone to my pocket. Dean had insisted that I get one, and I was happy to oblige.

“He’s right, you know? About being not sure if it’ll work?”

“... I know… But I have to try.”

I leaned my head against the cool glass window. The moonlit roads of a peaceful night rolled past. Trees, bushes, the occasional wild animal, all flew by in a flash. Everything was so calm, so normal, that I could almost believe I was as well. I could almost believe that I wasn’t infected with demon blood, that there wasn’t a crazed demon out to get me, or that my family evidently hunted the monsters I had grown up around. I could almost believe it, almost. However, a part of me didn’t want to, just like a part of me didn’t want to send my journal. But, we all have to overcome our demons, even if it takes us a little while.

So, John, if you’re reading this, I hope you understand my side of events. Dean filled in a few blanks, but wanted to keep it third person. He insisted that it was my story to tell, not his. It was kind of nice of him, then again, it was his fourth beer, so he was feeling a little generous.

Please know that I don’t resent you. Everything you did you did because you wanted to protect the people you love. Being scared of who I had become, uncertain if I was still “Sam”, makes sense. But, if you would ever be willing, I’d love to meet you. Dean has told me loads of crazy stories. Honestly, it sounds like our lives could be some kind of movie, or something like that.

Dean and I will be in Jasper, Alabama hunting a coven on the 27th. If you want, we could meet somewhere? Dean insists that there’s a great breakfast place nearby. Anyway, I’m not… I’m not anything to be scared of. I’m just… just me. I’m just Sam, Sam Winchester, and I hope that I can prove it to you soon.

- Sam Winchester

Good Lord, this took longer than it should have. Huge thanks to @cross-roads-blues for the art and @spneldritchbang for the event! Hope you enjoyed, and have a Happy Spooktober! ; )

#time to go watch the new ep now #Sam Winchester #dean winchester #bobby singer #pamela barnes #spn fanfiction

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magioftheseas · 6 years

Text

Bitter Dark

@femslashfeb Day 11: Rest Days

Summary: After the events of dr1, Asahina has difficulty sleeping and relaxing. She and Kirigiri talk over coffee a few times. A short story told in almost snippets.

Rating: G for General

Warnings: None. There’s angst tho.

Notes: I wanted to get something out so I rushed to finish this... It’s only 2K so it’s more like a snack than my usual stuff. Cozy reading is good, right? Even though this isn’t the cosiest.... Oh but KiriHina and Aoi are good. Please give them more love.

***Alternate Ao3 Link***

Commission? Donate?

The first time, it had been at ungodly hours early in the morning. She hadn’t really been surprised when Asahina had dealt with nightmares and insomnia before in the school. In the shelter later turned hell.

“Oh, Kyouko-chan!”

Asahina perks up with a smile of course. Bright blue eyes wide alongside it, and a cheerful tilt. If it weren’t for Kirigiri’s keen eye, the shadows beneath Asahina’s gaze would’ve been lost to the heavy shadows cast by the lamp being the only source of light in a considerably dark room.

A saved bit of electricity. But, perhaps, Asahina hadn’t been much in the mood for bright light. That was understandable. Kirigiri felt the same way after all.

“You couldn’t sleep either, huh?” Asahina asks almost innocently. There’s tiredness that flickers in her gaze, but she has enough energy to hide it. She drops a spoonful of sugar into the mug she has set out. The bitter smell of coffee lingers in the air, but it lightens and sweetens because Asahina can’t get enough sugar and cream into the drink.

“I can make you a cup, too!” she chirps, then. “How do you prefer your coffee, Kyouko-chan?”

Kirigiri snaps to attention. She sighs softly.

“Black. Pure black.”

Asahina giggles. “I’m not surprised. Back then, you said your favorite chocolate was dark.”

She remembers that.

She shouldn’t be surprised, considering Asahina’s sweet tooth. But what would’ve been a meaningless conversation to fill up dead space for someone else was Asahina’s genuine means to try and form a connection.

All the same, Asahina is humming as she preps the coffee maker.

“...did you have a bad dream?”

Asahina stiffens, briefly.

Ah. Perhaps I shouldn’t have...

“It’s actually nothing like that.”

Kirigiri perks up.

“Well...” Asahina presses the button. Coffee pours out. “The room I was in was just so...sterile. You noticed it, too, right? No color in the walls, in the carpet... Even the pillows and blankets are all grays and whites. I couldn’t stand it.”

“I see.” So something like that perturbed her. “This place does have an unsettling atmosphere. As well as the people here...”

“I’m definitely grateful about being rescued, but don’t you think there’s something off about them?!” Asahina exclaims, cheeks puffing. “They’re all so serious. They’re all in these dark suits and they even wear sunglasses so that you can’t see their eyes. Is it really alright to trust them?”

“We don’t have to trust them,” Kirigiri said. “But. We don’t have any option but to rely on them for now.”

“I don’t like the way they acted around Naegi,” Asahina huffed.

I don’t like it, either. Kirigiri couldn’t help but think. But Naegi-kun, of course, smiled as if nothing was wrong. That’s just...his character.

“Here you are, Kyouko-chan.”

“Ah, thank you.”

She takes the mug gingerly, sipping at it as Asahina downs her own cup.

“It will be fine,” she finds herself saying. “Even if the means are dubious—I believe we will be fine.”

“Yeah. Yeah, yeah.” Asahina nods almost furiously. “But—if they try anything weird, I’m gonna beat them up.”

Kirigiri snorted at that, lips twisting into a smile.

“If a time comes where we are stuck with only one another, I’m sure we’ll manage thanks to you, Asahina-san.”

Asahina beamed. It serves to make those shadows beneath her gaze ever darker, the bags ever heavier.

“Thanks, Kyouko-chan.”

It is not long before she sees Asahina by the coffee maker again, turned away but with a stiff grip on a cup that perhaps had gotten a bit cold. Asahina, who, again, greets her with a bright smile when she notices her arrival.

“Good morning, Kyouko-chan!”

“It is adequate, I suppose,” Kirigiri replies. Asahina just laughs without a care, despite still looking exhausted.

“I’ll make a cup for you. Black, pure black, right.”

“Yes, please. Thank you.”

“No prob!”

Asahina gives her a thumbs up and, for what it’s worth, Asahina has become stellar at presenting cheer. She’s almost as good as Naegi, but even Naegi couldn’t put in that much effort.

Asahina is even humming as she waits for the coffee mug to fill. She’s also shifting from one foot to the other.

Ah...

“Done! Here you are, Kyouko-chan!”

Before Kirigiri can comment, however, Asahina is presenting her with the mug. Her smile is bright and easy.

Despite looking exhausted.

“...thank you.” She takes the cup gingerly all the same. “You seem quite in your element.”

“Eh? You think so?” Asahina giggles, rubbing at her nape. “Actually, I worked at a lot of cafes to pay for sports gear. One time my swimsuit got torn and—weeeell that’s a long story. But it was absolute hell, Kyouko-chan! All those delicious foods that I could only serve! It was awful! But...” She plays with her ponytail. “It wasn’t bad. Sometimes I was given bread as thanks.”

“I see,” Kirigiri murmured, sipping. Asahina, likely out of self-consciousness, sips as well. And then, she blanches. Kirigiri’s expression doesn’t change, for what it’s worth. “Cold?”

“...heheh... Maybe a little...”

Admirably, she finishes it anyway.

“Oh, by the way, Kyouko-chan, let me talk to you about bread...!”

Just like that, Asahina broke into a long-winded ramble, and Kirigiri listened politely, nodding along when appropriate. She hoped that whatever was bothering Asahina would lighten up the more Asahina went at length about these significant, mundane topics.

“Hey, let me help.”

“Oh, uh, thank you... Asahina-san.”

“It’s no prob.”

Kirigiri perks up as she watches the scene of Asahina grinning at one of the many people in suits. This one in particular, however, is scrawny and uncertain, flustered by Asahina’s attentions. They have not yet managed quite the level of calm as their colleagues. This is likely why Asahina approaches them with such ease and chats them up.

“I really am thankful for all the Future Foundation has been doing,” she says. “So I wanna help in whatever way I can.”

There’s a twitch in her smile—but Kirigiri already knows how efficient a liar Asahina is.

“You don’t have to...” The suit hesitates. “You kids have already been through a lot, so...”

“We’re not kids,” Asahina chirps, and yet they flinch anyway. “Not anymore. Right?”

“I...suppose... Um... Y-You should probably talk to the branch leaders, though...”

“Alright.” There’s not a twitch this time. “Then I will. Thanks.”

“Oh, no, it’s nothing...”

Finally, Asahina notices her staring. While keeping one arm lifting the materials, she gives a wave. Kirigiri merely waves in return.

...the branch leaders, huh.

“They’re going to put me in charge of delivering food to other survivors,” Asahina tells her later. “So I won’t be able to see anyone else for a while. Tell Naegi that I’ll miss him, alright?” She grins. “Tell Hagakure not to cause trouble, wish Touko-chan luck, and poke out Togami’s eyes if he’s being a dick.”

“...very well.”

They are still recovering, but of course Asahina is rushing ahead anyway.

“We will likely take up tasks as well, but...” Kirigiri trails off. “We are not quite as pushy as you are, Asahina-san.”

“Whaaat? I’ve seen you guys be plenty pushy,” Asahina laughs. “Even Naegi has quite the backbone under the right circumstances. You really should have more confidence in everyone, Kyouko-chan.”

“It is not that,” Kirigiri said. “Asahina-san... You are not the kind of person who rests easy, are you?”

Asahina keeps on smiling, even as her lips twist just the slightest bit.

Kirigiri touches her cheek carefully.

“If you do leave, can you at least promise that you won’t overwork yourself, Asahina-san? Can you try to take rest days?”

Asahina holds her hand in return, and she squeezes it hard. Thankfully, the nerves there are long-dead, so Kirigiri cannot feel it. She can, however, see the veins in Asahina’s grip, and how it trembles. Asahina’s smile, too, is wavering.

“I guess I can try,” Asahina says brightly, all the same. She makes a comically serious face. “But, you too, Kyouko-chan. Don’t pick up the slack when the others fall back. Especially Hagakure. Kick his ass if he drags his feet.”

...that is...

“If we are supporting one another, we will be fine,” Kirigiri said. “But now I worry more for you, Asahina-san, since you will be separated from us.”

“I... Y-Yeah...” Asahina shakily nodded. “Yeah, that’s true, but—I’m a tough cookie.” She winks. “I can definitely manage. And I’ll write letters. Tons of them. I’ll keep y’all in the know. So try not to miss me too hard!”

Kirigiri gives a small smile in return, but Asahina still tightly grips her hand.

“...actually...”

Kirigiri’s smile drops when Asahina’s face buries itself in her shoulder.

“A-Actually...”

Kirigiri’s lips part as Asahina begins to tremble against her.

“I’ve been thinking—a lot, lately—about the other people outside. The other people in need of rescue. And I get so sad and so sick that I just can’t relax at all. And then... I-I think about...how the Future Foundation still has no idea where our families are... Where are my parents? Where’s Yuta? I don’t know—we still just don’t know.” Her breathing hitches in a way that sounds painful. “Oh, god, what if they’re dead already? What if they’re starving and sick? W-What if—!”

“Shhhhh...”

It’s funny. While she’s seen reassurances like this before, actually performing it is—strange. She runs her fingers through Asahina’s hair, that springy ponytail she always has up, and it doesn’t feel quite right. She can feel the hammering of Asahina’s heart and the warmth of her body, and it’s all very strange. Asahina has embraced her before, but unsurprisingly, it was nothing quite like this.

“Shhh, shhh...” Even the shushing is a little awkward, not the most comforting even to her own ears. She almost feels dirty from how blatantly inexperienced and inadequate she is to provide the comfort Asahina clearly needs. “Asahina-san...”

Asahina lets go of her hand to wrap her arms firmly around her midsection. Asahina squeezes and Kirigiri can definitely feel her spine protest just a little. But then, Asahina chokes out a laugh, and Kirigiri also feels her heart swell at the sound.

“Kyouko-chan... I love you, you know that? I love you lots.” Quieter, Asahina adds. “I love all of you so much... Well... Most of you.”

“I...care about you deeply as well,” Kirigiri stiffly replies, feeling her face warm. “We are friends, after all. We have been through quite a bit together, so...”

So it is frustrating that I cannot do more for you than I already have.

Biting her lip, Kirigiri more formally returns the hug, squeezing in return. She hopes Asahina can feel it, even if she definitely won’t be hurt by it.

“Yeah, we have.” Asahina nuzzles her shoulder. “It’s thanks to you that we even survived as far as we did. You, Naegi... Even the others helped sometimes...” A small, almost pained chuckle. “I feel like I didn’t do much.”

“You do not give yourself enough credit, Asahina-san.” Without your bright and smiling face—would we have really come out on top as strongly? “You do a lot, even if you do not always realize it.”

“I’ll still do more,” Asahina mumbled.

“...” Kirigiri sighed and patted her head a couple of times. “Just don’t overdo it. Take rest days. All that. Can you promise that much, at least? Can you? Asahina-san?”

There’s a drawn out silence afterwards, and vaguely, she can tell that Asahina is idly playing with her hair, namely the braid.

“Kyouko-chan,” she hums. “You’re so formal with me that it’s a little embarrassing. Maybe call me Aoi? Even Hina would be fine, I think.”

“A... Hina.” Kirigiri swallowed. “Very well. But you did not answer my question, Hina.”

“I will.” Asahina pulls back to give her a grin. “Promise. If I break it, I’ll swallow a thousand needles!” She finally pulls away completely, and the world is just a little colder as a result. “Continue taking care of everyone for me, alright?”

“I... Yes, of course.” She nodded mutely. “Of course... Hina.”

With another cheeky grin, Asahina waved her off before skipping away, ponytail bouncing and swaying with every spring in her step.

Relax, my heart, Kirigiri thought coldly as she watched her go. Relax.

When she later had coffee again the following morning, the taste was so bitter that she had to add a little bit of cream. It would be a while before anyone else awoke, so she sipped her drink in pondering silence, looking at the ceiling.

#KiriHina #kyouko kirigiri #aoi asahina #femslashfeb2019 #Magi fics #dangan ronpa #for some reason tumblr let me post this

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scintillating-galaxias · 5 years

Text

give ‘em hell, darling

Chapter Three—Step 2

Uriel makes an example out of Aziraphale.

CW for descriptions of body horror. (Read it here on ao3!)

Aziraphale had forgotten how absolutely clinical Heaven was.

The air had a sterile tastelessness to it that laid heavy on his tongue. Everything was an inoffensive gray, white, or beige, or possibly a daring khaki. Every building was made of polished and unblemished marble and cut perfectly into either cubes or a strange design that, in the human world, would be called ‘modern art’ and then be scoffed at for being labeled as such. There were no decorations to be found. Fountains of holy water and nature were the only exceptions and both were native only to the living quarters of the good human souls that had made it up here. The angelic HQ had no need for such lavacious things.

Crowley was right about the smell of bleach. Aziraphale hadn’t noticed it before, but it was everywhere, soaking into the cold, cold stone and purging any disease from its purity. It stung his nose and reminded him of the ghastly stories of hospitals that took patients in with no intention of allowing them to leave again. It made him yearn for the metallic smell of rain, the belching fumes of gasoline, the rich, the faintly sweet smell of his leather-bound books, oh his books. He missed them dearly. He missed Earth dearly. And he had only been here for a couple of minutes.

Aziraphale was beginning to feel that he had made a mistake turning himself in so easily.

He shifted his wrists beneath his tightly bound cuffs. Upon Aziraphale’s arrival, Uriel had bound them and his wings as well so that if he tried to go back down to Earth, he would fall and reach terminal velocity before becoming angelic paste on the pavement. He didn’t use his wings to literally fly from Earth to Heaven or vice versa, but he required their Holy presence to properly go to and from the two places. That being said, he had an extremely painful cramp that was seizing up his entire left side, and he very much doubted he could convince Uriel to loosen the cuffs on his wings so that he may stretch them out.

Speaking of Uriel. That was a rather wicked looking dagger they had.

“What is it?” Their face was a perfectly cut mask of cool indifference, as per usual. But something about it looked pleased at Aziraphale’s discomfort.

“Oh, nothing, nothing,” Aziraphale said quickly. He glanced away, warily watching the dagger out of the corner of his eye. It was made of some pulsating purple-black material that hissed and bubbled and dripped with something that clearly disagreed with being in such a holy space. He could feel its tarlike aura molding itself onto his, trying to capture as much as it could before drowning it. It made him feel a bit nauseous. It was a mystery how Uriel could hold it at all, even with the glove.

Aziraphale tensed and untensed his arms, trying to relieve some of the pain. “Erm,” he said awkwardly. “That’s a fascinating... knife you’ve got there. Is it new?”

Uriel hardly spared him a glance. “It was specially commissioned from the Hell Forge just for you.”

“I-I see.” Aziraphale swallowed and inched further away from the blade. It appeared Crowley had been correct. Again. Aziraphale should really start to heed his cautiousness more often. You’d think he’d be a little less uppity about it, especially after six thousand years. He bit his lip and hoped Crowley was doing alright without him.

He tried to distract himself by flicking his eyes to a familiar cityscape. He took in skyscrapers and apartment complexes gleaming in the too-bright sunshine. They stretched their bony structures and scraped an ivory intrusion against the pure blue sky, punctuated by painting-like clouds. Rain was a rarity, yet a rainbow arched gracefully above it all, its colors bold and bright in a way they never would be on Earth. This felt incredibly ironic to Aziraphale. The rainbow had been made for humans after the Almighty had demolished the entire population of Mesopotamia and then some. It was a gift, a promise, to never let it happen again. Shouldn’t that have been proof enough that the whole Written Plan about the Apocalypse was a load of old tosh? Humanity was not meant to come to an End. And here was Heaven using Her promise as a minute detail to a perfect picture.

Aziraphale felt a venomous critter of disgust creep through him. He smiled thinly. “Lucky me.”

“Yes. Lucky you.”

He decided Heaven’s imitation of Earth’s atmosphere was not for him. He focused instead on the floating Globe lazily spinning in the middle of the floor. It felt like yesterday that he was being berated by the Quartermaster as he dipped his finger into the little brown-green patch that was England. He desperately wanted to relive that moment right now. In fact, his finger actually twitched in a desperate attempt to flee, despite being fully aware of what would happen if he did.

He wondered what was going to happen if he didn’t. They’d been standing here for a good ten minutes now and had not moved. “Pardon me, but could you perhaps enlighten me of my fate?” he said, allowing a bit of a plea to slip into his voice. “I am your prisoner. I’d like to think I have a right to know.”

“You’d be wrong.”

Well then. So much for that. Aziraphale pressed his lips together and nodded. Questions still bounced uselessly around his head like the balls inside of a bingo wheel. He picked whichever one popped out first. “What is it that we’re waiting for?”

Uriel finally looked at him, but he almost wished they hadn’t. “Your cell is being prepared. You need to stop asking questions.”

Heaven has a prison? thought Aziraphale. What was the point of that? Why would anyone need to be punished if they, with himself and his Fallen brethren as the exceptions, could do no wrong? Perhaps humans could still be a bit rowdy.

Or maybe they merely made one just for him. They made a dagger just for him. A room didn’t feel like that large of a stretch.

Uriel’s chin came up slightly as though they were listening to something. Aziraphale turned his head about, but didn’t see anyone, until he noticed the earpiece place snugly on Uriel’s head. They were silent for a few more seconds. Then they brought a finger to their ear and said, “We’re on our way.” Then, to Aziraphale, “Follow me.”

“Wh—I demand you tell me where we’re going first!”

Uriel barked out a wrathfully amused laugh. “You’re in no position to be making demands. Come.”

They began to walk away. Aziraphale followed them after a hesitant moment.

Together they went down stairwell after stairwell, through hallway after hallway. Every place was strangely devoid of life. Aziraphale peered into offices as they passed by—not a single soul. No one at the desks, no one bustling back and forth with a clipboard, not even a single friendly conversation. The only sounds were the colliding echoes of their footsteps: Uriel’s, firm thuds from the heel of their boots, Aziraphale’s gentler shuffles from his loafers. Apprehension and curiosity began to struggle beneath his skin, straining for answers. He swallowed them down and tred on.

They finally made it to the first floor after what was paradoxically a short eternity and thirty seconds. Uriel went straight for the sliding doors without a single glance back. Either they were confident Aziraphale would not make a harebrained escape attempt, or—no, Uriel was quick as a whip, and could be as dangerous as one, too. Especially with that dagger. Aziraphale wouldn’t be going anywhere. He trudged after Uriel, trying to keep his gaze from drooping to the ground for too long. They went through the sliding doors and Aziraphale—

Aziraphale… stopped.

Because before them, stretching for miles and miles and miles, were millions of angels. The ground and sky were swallowed up by grey suits, white dressed, five thousand all-seeing eyes staring in directions that could never be named. A cacophonous mix of true forms melding around corporeal forms lit up space in impossible colors and shapes. Heat and cold lived as one, light and dark, unified and separate. All types of heavenly creatures from raging seraphim whose being swelled and engulfed everything in a five hundred meter radius to a ninth rank angel who was dwarfed in comparison and everything in-between was there.

And every single one was staring at Aziraphale.

Stupefied, he could only manage, “So that’s where everyone went.”

The front of the crowd swelled towards him at his words, taking him in, picking him apart, like a greedy ocean tide lapping at the soles of his feet.

“That’s the traitor?” murmured a Throne. “He doesn’t look it.”

A buzz of agreement rose and fell. Some were even dubiously daring to dart their gaze back and forth between him and Uriel. He could feel it too—the strange mix of righteous anger and unyielding love, yet doubt was melting holes into that steely resolve. Aziraphale coaxed a weak smile to his face. Perhaps—perhaps Heaven had some hope.

“Shut it,” snapped Uriel. Evidently, they were not pleased with the reaction. “Don’t you feel it? This is who sabotaged the Great Plan. This is who turned God’s Will into something of his own creation.”

A few Powers shared a glance. “Do you… want an answer?” said one, very carefully avoiding the word “honesty.”

A nearby Cherub bristled, its interlocking wheels made up of nonexistent planes of existence spinning faster in agitation. This is who renounced God’s will, it howled, their celestial voice resonating from every atom and screaming into every angel’s head, this is who twisted the Great Plan and put Her plans to ruin! This is he who turns his back on the Almighty!

And just like that, the crowd shrank away from Aziraphale, hissing like water on a burning skillet. Uriel smirked and strode into the crowd. It slowly parted around Uriel at first, but as Aziraphale reluctantly went to follow, it shot away as if he were poison. Which, if Heavenly propaganda was up to its old standards, he may as well be.

“There is hope for you yet!” shouted a fellow Principality as he passed. “Renounce, and God’s Love will shine on you once again!”

Aziraphale cringed but did not allow his head to bow in shame. He resolutely kept his eyes up. They couldn’t possibly know what had really happened on Earth. They couldn’t possibly really know Earth. Humanity. He could forgive them.

“Look upon the grayness to his being? He has been tempted to Sin by that demon! Oh, for shame, for shame!”

They didn’t know what a wonderful creature Crowley was. He could forgive them.

“Save him, save him!”

They didn’t know.

“O Lord, bestow upon your lost child the sight to see what is good and just once again…”

He could forgive them.

Aziraphale walked on, and on, and on, walked on through the jeers, walked on through the judging glares, walked on through the tears. The anger was overwhelming him, but he couldn’t tell if it was his own, or simply what he was absorbing from twenty million angels. The tide returned and snared his ankles. It felt like drowning in a boiling sea. Foaming waves dragged his struggling body away from the safety of the shore, tossing him out to churning open water and plunging him deep, deep down into seething depths. Reaching for air wasn’t possible—it was burning too. It forced its way into his mouth and began to broil his insides, setting his very heart aflame. His skin blistered and popped, liquified salt poured into his wounds before he could heal again, taking him apart one quark at a time, until—

“All I have done!” roared Aziraphale, his cuffs humming as they strained to keep his wings from flaring out. The tears on his face steamed up as soon as they touched his flesh. “All I have done is love humanity just as She commanded me!”

Uriel spun around, an ugly rage marring their face. “You went against Her Written Plan!” they bellowed back, dagger jabbing closer to him with each word. “Did She not command that, too?”

“It never was Her Ineffable Plan!”

A collective gasp went up. Heaving, Aziraphale spat, “Or did Gabriel fail to mention that, too?”

The jury of Heaven fell completely silent. Uriel worked their mouth. Aziraphale closed his eyes and desperately tried to control the solar flares leaping from his body. When he reopened his eyes, it was to the sound of Uriel stalking forward, taking Aziraphale by the front of his shirt, and hissing, “We’re going.”

And then they were in a new room. The audience had vanished but their voices echoed again and again. Aziraphale wrenched himself away from Uriel and stumbled back. In the same instant, Uriel disappeared again, leaving him alone.

Like most of Heaven, the room was composed of white. The only color was the golden sigils engraved into the marble walls and himself. He noted with some hysterical despair that the room had nothing in it to fill the space—no beds, no tables, no windows, not even a chair. And, like most of Heaven, it was very cold.

There were no such things as shadows here, no creases in the corners to indicate there even was a corner. He could not tell when one wall ended until another one began. It all stretched into an everlasting white expanse wherever the golden sigils were not present. He sighed; the sound barely made it off his lips before it fell dead. The gazes of the sigils bore down on him, waiting to see what he would do. He closed his eyes against them; they felt too much like what amalgamation waited for him outside.

Quietly, Aziraphale knew this would not last. He remembered the first few angelic beings who doubted his crime. There must be more beyond them. The Cherub had gotten everyone riled up, Aziraphale included. That was simply how Cherubs were. He had seen Uriel’s face when they did not immediately denounce him; clearly, something was incorrect about how they thought Heaven really was. He swiped away another tear and struggled to steady himself with one, two, three shaking breaths. Under better circumstances, perhaps they would have listened.

There was hope yet. He was not alone. He firmly held on to that thought as he knelt down and wept.

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